BLEEDING LOVE ⚜️ ROBB STARK

Chapter Six • Northern Hunting

Four nights....

She sighed. She watched as her mother looked over the lovely dress that they had made for her in King's Landing. She had a fitting before they left, she had a fitting that day. Her thin waist would still allow her to fit. Her mother winced at the white gown with a fur and silk coat to keep her warm, and golden embroidery. It was magnificently crafted. This would be the dress she wore the night she would be given away like a brood mare and then defiled by that wolf. She would make Robert suffer for forsaking her daughter this way.

Cersei looked over at her daughter who was dressed in a pink nightgown. She was on her bed with her knees to her chest, her long waved flowing out neatly brushed, her eyes not leaving the canopy. Cersei slowly walked over to the wine that her daughter had not yet drank. They brought bundles of the stuff with them. Cersei poured herself and another for Lyla. She walked over and offered it to the girl who simply looked up at her mother with a solemn expression.

"Drink it, sweetling," she calmly ordered.

Lyla accepted the glass, despite she wasn't in the mood to drink. She rarely drank wine. Only when she had to. This was a time when she would have to.

"It will calm you nerves, sweetling."

With that they both took a sip of wine. Lyla sat up properly, making room for her mother to sit besides her. Cersei looked at her daughter who has been a woman for two years now. She was beautiful. Maybe more so than Cersei. Young, kind, radiant. Her mother wanted that beauty all for herself. The north would ruin her. She took Lyla's hand, her soft hand in hers.

"Four nights," Cersei informed her.

"Four nights," Lyla repeated like a little bird.

"I always loved you in this shade of pink," Cersei informed her. "Green and blue will be fine enough. Though black will soon enough be quite prominent in your clothing. No more red or gold. That is until you return to King's Landing."

According to the law, I will belong to Robb Stark once the marriage is consummated. According to you, I must bare him a son or two. I will never return to King's Landing. Or Storm's End. Or Casterly Rock. Or Summerhal. She avoided her mother's gaze. She knew her mother didn't want to accept this either. Her grandmother Joanna died when her mother was a young child, she only wanted to make sure that Lyla had a mother.

"What if I do not return?" Lyla asked, curiously.

She touched her daughter's soft cheek, looking into her cat-like emerald eyes that mirrored her own. "Are you a lion or a stag, sweetling?"

"I am a Baratheon, my sigil is-"

"So you are a weak and feeble creature who will allow the bears and wolves of the North to abuse you?"

"No," Lyla responded.

"You are a lioness, my love. Embrace it. Stay quiet and obey. Never cry, men do not want your tears."

"I never cry." The last time the princess openly shed a tear was eight years ago. She only cried when she was alone. Though even then it was unlikely for her to cry.

"I know, that is why you are a lioness. Let them hear you roar from all ends of the North. So loud grandfather will hear. The squids in their water will hear. The snakes in the south will hear. I promise you that you will soon be brought home. Be patient, sweetling."

She wanted to tell her mother how kind Robb Stark was to him. How interesting the North was to her. She was not comfortable with Robb Stark the way she was to Loras Tyrell who had become a companion, his father wished for Loras to marry Lyla, it never happened and the two remained friends. Winterfell was cold and dark, with so much history of the great and proud Starks. She felt as if she didn't belong. But she did not detest the idea of living in the North the way that her mother wanted her to. She simply nodded.