Honour

AN: Semi-Canon. Season 1 stands. Jaime did make a deal with Catelyn to return her daughters. He did lose his hand but upon returning to King's Landing, Tywin forces him to marry Sansa instead of Tyrion. Jaime is largely the arrogant personality he was in the early seasons with hints of the man he becomes, just in case he seems OOC. I have taken liberties so I will not be following the events of the show.

Honour

He stands in her doorway and he knows what he must look like. Despite their father's insistence that he be bathed and dressed like the Lannister and Kingsguard he is, Jaime knows that there is something in his eyes that gives away what has been licked at by hot water and concealed in fine, golden cloth. Some flicker of torment. He left Brienne of Tarth to go search for the youngest Stark; he knows that she will not break her vow to Catelyn Stark. Jaime, on the other hand, is not so certain of his honour.

Honour has always been a strong word for him. Once upon a time, it was the whispered fantasy of knights and white cloaks, of his boyish whims to do good in the world and to earn his place as Tywin Lannister's heir, as a heroic figure in the songs of old. Then, it became a joke. Honour was it, that had him fucking the Queen (his sister, no less) after he'd sworn to protect the King? The jokes kept coming, always at his expense. Honour that he broke his vow to protect a king, to take no lover, to father no children. And now, what honour existed when he could never return Sansa Stark to her mother, not whilst his father lived?

It is not honourable that he stands in her doorway, that her room was the first place he went after his. Not to everyone else. Jaime, however, thinks there might be some honour in it, their own twisted, vicious kind, maybe, but it is honour nonetheless.

Cersei looks at him, shock making her face softer than he's seen it in a while, not since she married Robert Baratheon for the throne and he groaned another women's name in her ear on their wedding night. A Stark's.

"Jaime," she breathes.

Jaime wants to go to her but he finds it's as if his legs end in stumps too. He knows the moment she sees his hand, or lack thereof. Her mouth gapes in horror, twists in scorn and gone is the sweetness of their reunion, destroying the image that has kept him going these past months. Cersei, her kisses, her golden hair, the only thing that forced him to live when all Jaime wanted was to die.

He moves forward, towards her, propelled by some stumbling semblance of that dream-

"Leave."

He falters. "Excuse me?"

Cersei looks him in the eye. She never falters. "Leave."

~o~

He hasn't spoken to his sister since the day he'd returned and gone straight to her room. He's seen her, of course, in court but the Queen had conveniently avoided looking at him. Jaime could not stop looking at her.

When a waiting girl knocks on his door, therefore, with a note requesting his presence in his sister's rooms, he doesn't hesitate. Jaime suspects she might have needed time to overcome the shock of his return, and the shock of his state of being. Whatever the reason, he is glad she is willing to see him again, to accept him into her room, into her arms, into her bed.

Jaime doesn't expect the sight that greets him.

He knocks once before slipping into her chambers but he stops short when he sees Qyburn sitting at her table. Cersei smiles thinly by the fire. He sees her second.

"Brother," she welcomes, folding her hands in front of her.

"Sister," says Jaime hesitantly. He looks between the pair of them again. "You called for me?"