Only A Northern Song ~ Game of Thrones / Willas Tyrell ~

Chapter One Hundred and Eleven: Council

A pounding head and churning stomach greeted Eddmina the moment she woke, her eyes cracking open and the candlelight making her vision sting.

Was she on a ship? Was she somehow flying? Surely she had to be, surely that was why she was spinning. Surely that was why she felt as if she was going to be-

"You're alright," she heard a voice reassure her as she retched into the chamber pot. She assumed the owner of the voice was the same person that was holding her hair and rubbing her back, as he had done a thousand times before. "That's it. You're alright."

She blinked, desperate to see straight, but the first thing she saw was the chamber pot, which only made her retch again, so she closed her eyes until she was finished, until she was certain the room would stop spinning. When she was sure, she opened her eyes again, and was instead greeted with the sight of a hand holding out a goblet of water. She took it, taking fragile sips, feeling her face burn as she considered just who was offering her the water while he still rubbed her back caringly.

"Please leave me alone," she attempted to beg. "You don't need to-"

"I want to look after you," Willas assured.

"I don't want you to see me like this," she argued weakly. Willas merely chuckled, leaning over and pushing a kiss to her temple.

"Nothing I haven't seen before," he countered, and when she retched once more, he let out a small sigh. "Nothing I haven't done myself, either."

"I'm an embarrassment," she decided. Willas chuckled again.

"On the contrary, your people love you," he told her. She scoffed in disbelief, and so he took her hand, kissing each of her knuckles until she frowned at him. "Eddmina, seeing you last night, seeing how all those people looked at you... you are a marvel."

"I'm a fucking hypocrite, telling you to stop drinking and then this," she sighed, her face screwing into a frown of shame. "What was I thinking?"

"I can't tell you that, but shall I tell you what I was thinking?" Willas offered, and as he was sure she had finished with the chamber pot he made her wait for the answer as he moved it aside, getting up from their bed to fetch her more water before he sat back down at her side. In that time, she had flopped back onto the pillows he had carefully arranged for her, making sure she was propped up and on her side. She glanced over to him, her vision still not straight, but fine enough to see he was smiling. "I thought you looked like like yourself. You looked happy, as did everyone else. Seven knows you all deserve a bit of that. You especially, you deserved to have fun, and sometimes when we have fun, the gods punish us for it."

She wanted to tell him that they followed different gods, but she could hardly claim that when she hadn't visited her own for months. She wanted to tell him that no indulgence was worth such punishment, and that whatever gods were out there had punished her plenty in other ways, but she decided not to waste her words on arguing, barely having the energy to keep her eyes open as a headache persisted. As if he knew, he reached out and took her hand, and she didn't have the strength to oppose him kissing each of her knuckles, squeezing her hand three times.

"Try to go back to sleep," he suggested gently, shuffling closer to her until she was proppd up by both the pillows and his body. She nestled herself close to him, letting out a small huff of protest until he softly stroked her forehead, the feather-light caress of his fingertips against her flush skin calming her instantly. "It is still the middle of the night. There is nothing to attend to until the afternoon."

"When we came back from the village... did anyone see me?" she asked with dread, her voice gravelly and strained. She wasn't sure if she wanted him to answer, and when he paused she knew it was not going to be positive. "Gods. Fuck."