End Game// Tormund Giantsbane (3)

46. Complicated

"I can't believe it, did you do the thing? Are you the... whatever you were trying to find?" Rickon questioned snow flakes falling on his eyelashes. 

"I am." Bran agreed. 

"You are what?" Caro countered leaning into Bran. 

"It's complicated." Bran offered as she kissed him temple. 

"I wish Jon was here." Sansa remarked as they sat at the weirwood tree

" Yes. I need to speak to him." Bran agreed.

" Your father's last living true born son. You're Lord of Winterfell." Sansa reminded him.

"I can never be the Lord of Winterfell. I can never be lord of anything. I'm the three-eyed raven." Bran corrected calmly and Sansa blinked back at him. 

"You have a third eye?" Caro countered. 

"Where is Hodor, Summer... Jojen and Meera?" RIckon questioned. But he knew as he looked into Bran's eyes. "Osha was killed too." He whispered moving closer to Caro, he sat between her legs as she ran a hand over his arms. 

"I don't know what that means." Sansa countered. "Three eyed..."

"It's difficult to explain." Bran agreed

"Try, please, for me." Sansa begged. Caro nodded in agreement. 

"It means I can see everything. Everything that's ever happened to everyone. Everything that's happening right now. It's all pieces, fragments. I need to learn to see better. When the long night comes again I need to be ready." Bran remarked and Sansa was still very confused. Caro ran a hand through his hair. 

"That sounds like a lot for anyone to handle," Caro offered. "A weight on your shoulders."

"How do you know all of this?" Sansa countered. 

"The three-eyed raven taught me." Bran offered

"I thought you were the three-eyed raven." Sansa began and she was growing more and more confused.

"I told you it's difficult to explain." Bran reminded her. 

"You had a teacher and once his time came you became him." Caro offered, Bran nodded slowly. 

"Bran --" Sansa whispered desperately.

"I'm sorry for all that's happened to you. I'm sorry it had to happen here at our home." Bran offered looking at her. Caro looked between them confused. "It was so beautiful that night. Snow falling just like now. And you were so beautiful in your white wedding dress." Bran remarked and Sansa sucked in a tight breath, shaken as she stood up nervously. She didn't tell a soul what Ramsay did to her. Caro looked to Sansa her chest tight. She opened her mouth not knowing what she wanted to say when Sansa spoke. 

" I have to go back inside, Bran." Sansa remarked nervously.

"I'll stay a bit longer." Bran remarked his gaze drifting off. 

"You saw-" Caro began. 

"I see everything." Bran reminded her. 

"And let me guess, aunt Caro is a massive fuck up." Caro pondered. 

"Still so Strong, even after all this time." Bran countered. "I hope Tormund makes you happy." 

"He does."

"He proposed." Bran remarked. 

"You really do know everything." Caro remarked with a laugh. 

"He proposed?" Rickon declared glancing back at her. "What did you say?'

"It's complicated." Bran answered for her. 

"It is complicated." Caro agreed.

+

The morning sun and disappointment greeted Caro first when she woke. She didn't even need to look to know Tormund was gone. He left, yet her mind forgot for a brief moment and she wanted him there. Still, she stretched her arm across his side of the bed, hoping to catch his lingering warmth, his scent something. Anything to make up for the lack of kiss, lack of touch he had greeted her with. 

Needing to feel close to him, Caro rolled over to bury her face in his pillow. Instead of his spicy, rum scent, she found a piece of parchment. She opened the folded sheet and smiled.

I love you. Marry me. Your teddy bear with knives, we need to talk about that when I get back too. 

How had she missed this last night? Bran coming home, that distracted her from a note on the pillow. 

It wasn't her morning kiss, but it was something, and she could work with something. But first, she had to get out of bed. She smiled holding the note to her chest before putting it safely in her dresser drawer. 

"Teddy bear with knives, who told you?" Caro laughed out as she got ready. 

+

''this is for you," Petyr remarked holding out a blade made of valaryian steel. ''the last man who wields it had meant to cut your throat your mother fought him off." Petyr told Bran handing it off.

"The other dagger the one that took Catelyn's life I would have stopped that driver with my own heart if I could have I wasn't there for her when she needed me most but I am here for her now to do what she would have done... to protect her children anything I can do for you Brandon need only ask." Petyr said as he leaned in. Bran stared down at the blade.

"Do you know who this belongs to?" Bran asked focused on the blade.

"No." Petyr answered ''that very question was what started the war of the five kings in a way that dagger made you what you are today, forced from your home driven out to the wilds beyond the wall I imagine you've seen things most men wouldn't believe." Petyr remarked. Bran stared down at the blade still. Petyr held out the blades cover and Bran slipped the blade in. "to go through all of that and make your way home again only to find such... chaos in the world I can only imagine-"

"Chaos is a ladder." Bran corrected as the door opened.

'I'm sorry to have disturbed you, Lord Stark.' petyr said standing up

'I'm not Lord Stark.' Bran told him, Petyr just smiled and left though.

'What's that?' meera asked gesturing to the chair he was sitting in

'The maester made it so I can move around more easily.' Bran told her.

'It's a very good idea.'

'You're leaving.' Bran noted.

'I don't want to leave you. But when they come I need to be with my family.' Meera told him. 'you are safe now or as safe as anyone can be. You don't need me anymore. You have no need for me anymore.'

'You're right I don't.' Bran agreed

'That's all you've got to say?' she questioned incredulously

'Thank you' Bran told her

'Thank you?' Meera questioned angrily.

'For helping me.' Bran clarified.

'My brother died for you. Hodor and Summer died for you. I almost died for you Brandon!'

'I'm not really Brandon.' he told her 'not anymore. I remember what it felt like to be Brandon Stark I don't remember so much else now.'

'You died in that cave,' she told him turning and leaving, the door slamming closed behind her. Caro pushed it open cautiously. 

"Trouble in paradise?" Caro mused. "Let me guess, its complicated." Bran smiled back at her. "Is it weird being home? It was for me."

"You see Jory and my father." Bran realized. 

"In every corner. But... I like, I love Tormund but he's not here right now so..." she shrugged wheeling him back and forth. "I like this, can I get one for when I'm feeling lazy?"

"You are the boss." Bran reminded her. "Lady of Winterfell."