ataraxion | 005 -- video;

[ ah, robb returns to video posts. there's a marked difference in the set of his face. he looks older, more solmen if such a thing were possible, more like his father, than he did in those very first few times he'd addressed the ship. grey wind is at his elbows, eyes gleaming as his great jaws part in a disinterested yawn. the display of teeth though, that sure is something to see. robb sinks a hand into the fur at the scruff of grey wind's neck, and the action is almost a boy reaching for something familiar, something to anchor himself to. ]

I wish to request a favor of this ship.

[ kings don't make requests, they give orders. that is what robb learned from his namesake but in his time spent aboard this ship he's also learned that a displaced king gets himself more by requesting rather than trying to command. ( like the beggar king, and if his stomach turns at that he ignores it. ) ]

My youngest brother Rickon has come aboard this vessel. I don't seek to curb his curiosity, but only to ask that discretion is used when answering his questions and granting him knowledge.

[ there's a pause. grey wind huffs a breath, impatient, and robb's hand twists in the fur. ]

And perhaps not encourage his fondness for knives.

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[ words do not come immediately. everything robb is balks against it, at yielding his burden to sansa's shoulders. she should not have to take it up.

but finally, finally, he speaks. ]

I worry for our family. Rickon and Arya are wild as beasts, and Jon Snow and I no longer know each other as we once have. We make a sorry pack.

[ The words make Alayne sad, the sentiment bleeding into her expression, though keeps her chin tipped and her spine strong. I was never a wolf, she thinks and it is Sansa's thought, not Alayne's. Joffrey beat me for my wolf's blood but he was stupid and blind. I am sorry for it.

Robb does not speak of blame, but still she sees it. ] That is not your fault. You understand that — don't you?

I sit at the head of our household. Where does the fault lie if not with me?

[ it is robb's duty to bring them together, but they all scatter to the four corners of the ship no matter what he does. ]

[ There are times when Alayne wishes that Robb would cast off his mantle of honor, that he were less his father's son — if only for the sake of his own heart. It speaks volumes, perhaps, to the ways in which she has changed. Practicality and survival make for terrible, if effective, teachers. ]

Time has been unkind to us all, and has taken us to different places in our hearts. These are things not easily undone. And these are things you did not do.

No, I did not. But I should be able to unite us and make us a pack again. Father would...

[ and he chokes on the words, but the hang in the air anyway. father would be ashamed, father would be ashamed at the state i have let his house fall to because that has always been all that mattered to robb, living up to his father's example, making his father proud and he hasn't, not here. ]

[ The mention of father steels something in her. Sansa's father had built a life of honesty and so had been forced to make forfeit of it before its time. Alayne's father lived a life spun of nothing but lies and, in doing so, lived and lived and lived. What sort of lesson should she learn from such an example. Either way, it is bitter, though Alayne keeps it from her tongue. ]

Father would have met with the same struggles. Even he would have known difficulty. [ A pause and Alayne shakes her head. ] You cannot punish yourself with his memory. His ghost is not half as unkind.

[ it's different for robb. eddard stark had not been unkind, had loved his sons and they had known it, but his love had ever been tempered with expectation, or so robb had thought. his father both loved him and lay expectation across robb's shoulders and robb had never allowed himself to stagger beneath the weight of it. his father had said, mind your brothers and your sisters, you are head of this house while i am gone and now he was truly gone and-- ]

I don't punish, but I can't...

[ can't forget, can't do what is expected, everything gets caught in his throat and robb sighs instead. ]

Bran's offered to take up the task of finding a teacher.

[ Alayne knows what it is Robb means to say and she hears the words, even though they remain left unsaid. Still, it makes her said that he does not speak them aloud. That is one confidence he cannot give her, or perhaps refuses to give himself. The woman called Aberdeen had once kept Robb's counsel — was she ever given such confessions? Did she ever hear the things that Alayne does not? ]

No one has asked you to forget, Robb. I just wish you to be kind. To allow yourself the generosity and understanding you give to others. What have you done to not deserve such kindness in turn? Circumstance is not shortcoming.

[ A pause and then, as earnest as she is capable of: ] You have not failed us. We, if anything, have failed you. Please— take Bran up on his offer and do not think yourself lesser for doing so. It is a wise proposition, is it not?

Edited 2012-09-09 16:55 (UTC)

[ there is something about his bannermen, about aberdeen, that gives robb a freedom he will never have with westerosi, even his family. if he speaks aloud his secrets to them, what does it matter? they will never betray him, never think less of him for their standards are wildly different. they put him on no pedestle, and there is something liberating in that. ]

If it pleases you, then I shall. And Bran will be happy with the task, I hope.

[ It is a truth that Alayne feels more than understands with her mind, for she is guilty of much the same. It is one of the reasons why she does not break from Petyr's side, nor has no intention to once she is Princess in the North and has reclaimed Sansa Stark's name. Only Petyr understands the faces she wears, the contents of her heart — how it is neither duplicitous nor whole. With Petyr she need not pretend.

It is, as he thinks, liberating. But for Alayne, also sad. ]

What would please you, Robb?

[ it is such a strange question that he doesn't know how to answer it. what pleases him has not been of importance, not once, not since he was a small boy and eddard stark drew him aside and explained the great task that was to be set to him. it has never been about what robb wants, it's been about what robb is expected to do.

the question leaves him at a loss. ]

I don't know.

[ the admission shouldn't feel so shameful, but it does. ]

[ It is, perhaps, the saddest thing he has ever said in her presence. Not a difficult task, given how mindful Robb is of her always; but in that mindfulness comes a denial as well, an inability to ask for the things he desires, the constant need to make her happy and avoid her frown. It is an advantage that has served both Sansa and Alayne in the past, but the use of it is nothing short of selfish.

Have I had a hand in your unhappiness, she thinks. Oh, how the thought burns her. ]

That makes me sad, Robb. We, all of us, are allowed some joy.

Hush now. You bring me joy, and our family brings me joy. I want for nothing else. I am a king, am I not meant to be joyful?

[ robert baratheon had been, robb remembers that well. but that has never quitebeen the example he wanted to emulate. robb's kingship is cobbled together from secondhand stories and snatches of things seen while glancing sideways at his father and king robert baratheon the first of his name. he makes it work as best he can, but... ]

005 -- video;

video | ENCRYPTION 30%

video | ENCRYPTION 30%

video | ENCRYPTION 30%

video | ENCRYPTION 30%

video | ENCRYPTION 30%

video | ENCRYPTION 30%

video | ENCRYPTION 30%

video | ENCRYPTION 30%

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