A WINTER ROSE ⊳ g. of thrones [1]

CHAPTER SIX | The Kingsroad

THEY TRAVELED along the Kingsroad until they came to a fork in the road, to which they would go one way, and Jon another. Ellena looked to her half brother, with sad eyes. "Do you have to go?" She asked, once more. "Please, Jon.... You're our family. You're my brother." Her words fell into the cold air, and Jon smiled solemnly. "I'm not a Stark." He spoke lightly, and though his tone was not harsh, his words were. "You are to me." She whispered.

Jon dismounted his horse, and she hers, and as the two held to their reins, they enveloped one another as tightly as they could, trying not to weep into one another. "I'll send ravens as much as I can." He pulled away, and for once a true smile crept to his lips. "And maybe you'll come see me one day. Imagine, a woman on the Wall." Ellena laughed, shaking her head. "What a scandal that would be," she mused, before looking back to their father who rode forward to them.

"Goodbye, Jon Snow."

"Goodbye, Ellena Stark."

Mounting her horse once more, she rode up along the hill, before turning to take one last look at Winterfell, her home, the last time she would see it, it felt like.

"You'll be back. Don't worry," her father came beside her, his soft eyes kind and assuring as they looked onto Winterfell. "But what if we never come back, father?"

Ned simply laughed at his eldest daughter. "I pray to the gods that should never happen. You'll go back home one day, I promise." For a moment there was silence before he began to pull something from his pocket. "I forgot, I had a leaving present for you."

Ellena took the ring from his hand. It was small, silver with a black raw onyx stone in its center. "It was your aunt Lyanna's. You were meant to have it. You have her beauty, but you also were born with the same iron underneath that she was." Claws wrapped around the stones edges, barley noticeable unless one looked closely. She didn't look up when she said, "Did Rhaegar Targaryen give this to her?"

Ned's face hardened, but he looked back to his daughter, "We'll take about you aunt when we return home. I promise."

————

Ellena rode horseback most of the journey, enjoying the countryside alongside Arya and her father. Arya would often run about, collecting wildflowers and giving them to her father or giving them to Ellena to weave into a crown of flowers.

After another days ride, the kings party had stopped, the ladies gathering on sheets laid out on the grass. Ellena sat with her sisters and Jeyne Poole, the daughter of Vayon Poole as well as one of Sansa's closest friends. Sansa and she spoke of Joffrey's future marriage to her, all while Ellena braided Arya's ruffed up hair.

As she pinned the braid together in a bowl around the top of her sisters head, the two watched their direwolves play in the grass, chasing butterflies and wrestling one another to the dirt. "Who do you think father will have you married off to?" The words came sudden and quick from her little sisters mouth, but she was not ashamed. That was the funny little thing about Arya. So quick witted and loud mouth, without a regret in the world, her words always true to her heart.

"I don't know. I suppose he won't let me turn away another one, lest he anger mother all the way back home." The two giggles. "Perhaps I'll marry Ser Loras, or maybe Lord Renly, if I'm lucky." From afar, her father sat beside a tree with the king. Ellena watched them speak, their lips moving in almost an angered fashion, frustration dripping down their faces in the summer heat.

Before long, Arya has run off with the butchers boy, Mycha and Ellena was left alone, weaving a crown of flowers Arya had laid out for her. "How delicate," a sweet voice said. Ellena looked up, and there stood the queen, a crown of sun beams falling over her hair as she looked up.

She looked like a goddess sent to torture her.

"Do you mind?" She didn't even give the girl a chance to respond before sitting down along with her in the grass. Ellena didn't quite understand the intrusion of the queen and continued her work, small thorns biting at her finger tips as she weaved about it.

"I remember it being quite hard when I left home for King's Landing. I can't imagine what it's like, being away from half your family, and just so soon after your little brothers fall.."

"I have every faith that Bran is alive. Stark's are strong, and even tougher to kill." She responded coolly.

The queen smiled. "Anyone can be killed, little rose. Your title can't protect you. Your name can't protect you. Nothing can."

———

Arya was missing. Sansa was a sobbing mess. And her father was worried sick.

Ellena cooed and held Sansa in her arms as the girl cried into her sisters arms. "I should have stopped them," she sobbed. "I should have stopped them, and now Joffrey is going to hate me, he'll never want to marry me. Why does Arya have to ruin everything?"

Ellena grabbed her by the shoulders. "Sansa, it is just as much Joffrey's fault as it is Arya's. Arya shouldn't have attacked Joffrey, but the prince shouldn't have attacked the butchers boy. You need to tell the king and queen what you saw. You need to tell the truth for our family." Sansa's lip trembled as she nodded. and Ellena sighed. "You need to be careful, Sansa. Court isn't going to be easy for any of us. We have to stick together, or we'll be lost. And you need to put your bickering with Arya aside. I need you to grow up."

We never should have left Winterfell. She thought as both girls were summoned to the king, three stories told, two lies, and one direwolf was killed. We never should have left Winterfell. She though as she wept, releasing Visenya to go back home, hoping the wolf would find its way back to Robb and her mother. We never should have left Winterfell. She thought as she tried to sleep, her tears gone, and a cold fire beginning to burn inside her. We never should have left Winterfell. She thought as they reached the gates of the city, wolves thrown into the starving lions den. We never should have left Winterfell.

a/n: kind of a short chapter, but at least i updated!!! please vote and comment, i'd really appreciate it:)