The Last War

Prologue : Dragonpit

The sun was high in the sky, overlooking King's Landing, bathing the city in its soft golden light, despite the winter which was now very close.

Sansa was getting hot, much too hot, under the thick fur that covered her shoulders and her heavy dark dress. But she didn't know if it was due to the sun, unexpected in this season, or if it was something else.

Four years old. It had been four years since she had set foot in the capital.

The thought had been eating away at her, as she got closer to the place where the current Queen of the Seven Kingdoms had agreed to meet them. Her eyes were lowered on her feet, which she contemplated attentively, without paying attention to the crowd of people around them, who were going to the same place.

Her dæmon, Seldan, was perched on her shoulder in the form of a chickadee. He had not yet taken his final form, surprisingly, but Sansa did not mind. When he would no longer be able to metamorphose as he wished, it would be a sign that she would be an adult, and what she had glimpsed of that world did not please her at all.

When she had been younger, she had wanted with all her heart to marry a prince, to become a princess, and then to become a queen.

But that little girl was dead, dead and buried, and the only thing that the young woman who had taken the child's place wanted was to become that little girl again, with her dreams and illusions, and above all, with her innocence.

Innocence had no place in the adult world. It was the most important lesson she ever learned.

She looked at Seldan, who had jumped from her shoulder, now a cat, and walked in front of her.

Sansa stopped, pensive, looking at her feet again.

''Everything is going to be all right.''

She looked up at her dæmon, but did not answer anything.

''I think he's right, you know...''

Sansa turned her head, surprised by the voice that had spoken next to her.

She smiled when she recognized the owner. It had been as long since she had seen Tyrion as King's Landing, and yet when he was being nice to her like this, she could only feel her heart warm a little, without really knowing why. His dæmon, a fox named Stelsa, walked beside him.

He smiled slightly, almost sadly, when she looked at him.

He had grown a beard. It made him look much more serious, wise, almost, as if all of a sudden he had grown up, but differently.

Tyrion resumed:

''I don't want to go to this meeting any more than you do. After all, the last time I saw my sister, she wanted me dead. I doubt that Cersei has changed her mind about that. I understand very well that you don't want to be in the same place as her either.''

Oh. So that was it.

Tyrion thought that Sansa was anxious to see Cersei again.

To tell the truth, she hadn't even thought about it.

It might sound strange, but she hadn't thought for a second about what her reunion would be like, if you could call it that, with her.

When she was little, she had wanted to look like Cersei Lannister so much.

Cersei was rich, coming from the richest family in the kingdom. Cersei was beautiful, the most beautiful woman in the Seven Kingdoms, and, according to rumors, perhaps even the most beautiful woman in the world.

Most importantly, Cersei was a queen.

And when the King had decided to visit Winterfell eight years earlier, accompanied by his family, she was delighted to finally meet the woman who had been occupying his mind for several years.