Pack Animals |Game of Thrones|

Chapter XV - King's Landing

Gendry and Alysha were up early the next morning and already focused on their work.

Alysha looked up and she raised her eyebrows, wiping her forehead with her hand. "Gen, the Hand of the King is here again." She murmured softly a bit as she had spotted Jon Arryn in the doorway and Gendry looked up from his work.

"It will be all right. He won't hurt me ever, he will just continue... continue to ask me question after questions, as usual I bet." He reassured Alysha who seemed rather uncertain about it, and he sighed. "I can take care of myself, you know that." Gendry murmured as Alysha shrugged a bit.

"But you don't have to, is the thing of it." Alysha murmured as Gendry was swiftly tucking her necklace back into her shirt. "Thanks." She muttered and he nodded.

"Gendry!" Their Master called out and Alysha squeezed his hand briefly before Gendry walked to the front of the shop. "You keep working back there, girl!" He snapped and Alysha jumped to attention, as she started to pick up where Gendry left off on their various projects.

"You have a girl working at your shop? As a blacksmith? Who was the one to give you this authority, good man?" Jon Arryn asked and it was Alysha's turn to start paying real and rapt attention now to what the King's Hand was saying.

Gendry inched back around to where Alysha was, sensing the sudden focus on his best friend and he was standing slightly in front of her and Alysha was holding his hand in hers now, as they were worried about being separated.

Or worse, being separated and then having someone else brought into the smithy and if one of them came back, it would be hard to readjust.

Alysha was half-hidden behind Gendry and she inhaled a sharp breath of air, as Jon Arryn looked more closely at her with a more keen eye, as she hesitantly moved out from behind Gendry a bit, but her hand still held his as she did and Jon Arryn smiled slightly at her, as if to try and reassure her of something, but she did not know what.

"What is your name then, young one?" Jon Arryn asked of her and she looked hesitantly over to her Master a bit as he nodded and Alysha swallows a bit.

"Her name is Alysha." Gendry answered for the timid girl and Alysha nodded slightly.

"Have you a name, young one?" The Hand asked, as Alysha shook her head a bit at him. "You look like a warrior belonging to a noble house. I do have to wonder if you could be related to one of the many." He said and Alysha looked up at him stiffly, as her Master shooed her away and Alysha returned to working alongside Gendry, as they worked in silence and tried to listen to the conversation between the Hand of the King and their Master.

"Are you?" Gendry asked quietly under his breath and Alysha looked at him with a raised eyebrow and he shook his head. "Don't give me the "only a fool" look. Are you a royal bastard or something then?" He questioned and she pulled the sword out of the fire and he started hammering it. "In my defense, you never said to not ask about your name." He stated and she sighed.

"My real name is Alysanne if you must know. Don't you go spreading that around Gen. I was named for the Good Queen." She murmured under her breath and Gendry shrugged, as she took the sword back and rested it on the rack.

"The Good Queen Alysanne Targaryen?" Gendry whisper-shouted and Alysha kicked him in the leg hard, as he winced and she shoved him hard, sending him back a few staggering steps. "Okay I'm sorry. I won't bring it up again." He stated and she nodded slightly, as she turned back to the fire.

Jon Arryn came back from meeting with their Master behind him and Alysha was shaking slightly, before they both nodded to one another and the Hand of the King left the smithy and had no more words to speak to them that day.

Alysha sighed with relief and she looked over at Gendry, who was chuckling at the sight of her relief and she kicked him again, in the ankle this time and Gendry started hopping a bit, trying to disguise the fact that his pain was real.

Later on in the night after the others had gone to asleep, Alysha was still awake and she was holding the charm of her necklace in her hand. Her fingers gently traced the three-headed, fire breathing dragons on the charm and she sighed softly. "Am I truly the last Targaryen?" She dared to ask the question of the shadows around her, as she clenched her hand around the charm before she released it, when she felt something sticky on her hand.

Alysha opened her hand and she saw that when she had clenched her hand, it had turned into a fist and her charm had cut her from a sharp edge that she had somehow missed. Alysha looked at the blood on her palm and now, it was on the arm as well and Alysha looked over at the dying embers of the fire.

Alysha swung her legs off of the bench and she stood up, as she walked over to the fire and she hesitated briefly at the sight of the flames, before she reached into the pile of dying embers and she picked up a handful, expecting to feel the burn almost immediately. But nothing came to burn her.

Alysha looked at the red-hot embers and she shook her head. "I can't be the child unafraid of fire... who cannot be burned by it. That will only get me killed." She whispered to herself and she dropped the embers into the fire once again, as she went back to her bench and prayed silently for sleep to come.