The Iron Thorn | Theon Greyjoy

46.

Theon

Looking at those two boys hanging there was hard for even me. I had not intended for Massey to see it. Truly, I hadn't. It seemed I did many things these days that I wanted so desperately to shield her from.

   Pacing the halls of the castle, I tried to muster the right words to say once I walked into our room again. An apology for having her locked inside might have been a good starting point. She was surely fuming, ready to bite my head off on sight. If only she would have taken the time to see things from my perspective. My life, and by extension her's, would never go back to how it was before. Perhaps it was a mistake, but no one could know that. I had come too far.

   To my surprise, when I finally swung my chamber door open, I didn't find Massey waiting on my bed waiting for me. She wasn't in the chairs in the corner, either. She laid motionless on the floor, clutching her knees and resting her head on a book that seemed to have fallen from my shelf.

"Massey? What are you doing?"

No answer.

"I said, what are you doing down there?" I began to unlace my doublet. "I'm speaking to you."

Silence.

   "I'm sorry that I locked the door, alright? But, I told you to stay in here. You must listen to me."

   She finally spoke up, barely a whisper across the room. A soft sob escaped her mouth before she reined it in.

   "How could you?"

"You can't be upset about this. Not with me," I explained as I sat to take off my boots. "They ran. They put me in this position. I never wanted to hurt them—"

"I'll kill myself," she muttered in the middle of my sentence.

   I shot my head up from my shoes to her. She remained still in the same position she had been in for gods know how long.

"I mean it. I'll kill myself before this becomes my life."

"You don't mean that."

She sat up now. Though she avoided matching my gaze, it was clear that she had been crying. Sobbing. Her eyes were swollen, her cheeks flushed red. Her shoulders slack against the flickering firelight. Maybe pity should have been my first instinct, but it wasn't. She was only riling the anger that weighed so heavily on my shoulders already.

"How can I ever face Lady Stark again?"

   She was asking herself, not me.

"It's not your fault, Massey," I forced myself to say in an attempt to console her. "It's their's—"

"And Robb..." Her eyes watered again and she pouted her trembling bottom lip. "Robb."

   There it was. Lady Catelyn. Robb. Nothing I did, for her or for our house, would have been good enough to stand against the Starks. Never. At the end of each day, her allegiance would lie with them, dead or alive. She'd always have fond memories of the man she was meant to marry, fond memories of a family that accepted her so readily.

"Unbelievable," I said under my breath before I could stop myself. I put my tongue inside of my cheek and scoffed. "You still think of him."

   There was a long beat of silence that seemed to snap her from her trance on the floor.

"I still think of him? How dare you—" She paused to stand, stepping closer to me as she met my eye line in a way that made me wish she had just remained a pathetic ball on the floor. "There is no shadow of Robb between us. Only over you."

There was brief moment in which I let her words seep in.

"Then start acting like it."

"Acting like it?" She echoed.

"Acting like it," I repeated, not at all willing to back down or be overly gentle. "You can begin by being loyal to your husband's house."

"You killed the boys. Bran and Rickon—"

"No. You do not question what I do," I spat in a tone I'd only ever used toward men, the tension between us bubbling to the surface as the restraints on my anger began to slip. "You live still in this fantasy world, as if we will all return to sparring in the yard and dining together like children tomorrow. Everyone has gone in one way or the other. You must come to terms with where you are at. You are at war, and you will choose a side. Should there be more Starks left, I'd guess it'd be a harder decision for you. Unluckily for you, it seems, I'm all that you've got. Do you hear me? It is you and I left. We will make the best of it, but you have got to wise up, Massey. Quickly. You are not a child any longer. Collect yourself."

I took a lengthy step toward her and reached out to take her shoulder in my hand, hoping to get through to her. She flinched instinctively. Her arm whipped away from my grip as she stepped back to put some distance between our bodies, tripping over the book that she had rested her head on. She stumbled only a little, her back finding the wall as she pouted and shook her head.

The anger I held on to dropped like a bird that had just taken an arrow. Heavily and rapidly. In a moment, it was gone. I felt a pang in my heart that might have resembled guilt should I not have recognized it immediately as heartache.

She was scared of me.

   "I wouldn't hurt you," I said more softly as I sneered at even the idea.

She kept the distance between us by holding up her arm if I so much as tried to approach her, tears once again flowing down her cheeks as we locked eyes.

   "You have."