A Vow Without Honor

The Departures

"I always wondered how anyone could live there," Myra murmured, picking at the fabric of some yellow dress she never got the chance to wear. Sansa might enjoy it. It was a little much for a girl of her age, but their father had always relented to her pleas.

"And we wonder how anyone can live where you do."

Myra smiled softly, thinking back to her far off and isolated home. She supposed it would be difficult for outsiders to understand why anyone would want to live in a place others deemed a cold wasteland, but that wasteland was the only thing she wanted to see again, and she had to wonder when she actually would.

"May I ask something of you?"

Syrena nodded. "Of course, my lady."

"Will you watch out for Sansa?" Myra asked, turning her gaze back to the handmaiden. "I can't exactly bring you to Winterfell, you'd go mad within the hour, but the queen did trust you to me. I doubt she would mind if your service moved to my sister. After all, she is supposed to marry her son.

"Arya can handle herself, but I fear Sansa will find out what King's Landing is like all too quickly, and sometimes a septa is the last person you want to confess your fears to."

Syrena watched her for a good while, her dark eyes thoughtful, and perhaps surprised? It was hard to say. Her handmaiden was a difficult person to read, but Myra had gathered enough about her to realize that her obedient attitude might be a front entirely. There was a fierceness to the Dornish girl, one that made her wonder why she would choose a life in service.

The woman nodded once. "I will watch after her, my lady, you have my word."

It was a small party that saw her off at the docks, mostly family and the servants they had brought with from the North, the exception being Renly Baratheon.

He looked regal in his doublet, with the gilded stags of his house crisscrossing the dark green pattern. His beard was neatly trimmed and not a hair on his head was out of place. She briefly recalled her words to Robb on the day she left home all those months ago, about fancy men and her utter disinterest in them. How he would have laughed to see that she had almost chosen the fanciest of them all.

She stood off to one side of the group with him for a moment, her father allowing them a moment's privacy before her final goodbyes. Renly had decided to make a show of it all, placing his lips to her hand the instant they approached one another. It was the first time it did not make her blush like a maiden. Rather, she just wanted him to be done with it.

"I don't suppose there is a chance I can convince you to stay?" Renly asked, his smile brighter than the sun shining above them.

It was as if a veil had been lifted from her eyes. Suddenly all his moves and gestures, they seemed so empty to her, promises that had no intention of ever being fulfilled. She wondered how she could have ever been so foolish.

Still, Myra wore a smile when she spoke to him. "I'm afraid not. Being so far from home, it takes its toll."

"Perhaps I should visit one day then. I've never been to the North."

Even before everything, Myra was certain she would be able to see his lie. Renly looked uncomfortable speaking the words, as if traveling to Winterfell was some sort of sentence for punishment.

She took his hand, squeezing it gently. "There will be no need, Renly. A woman can tell when she is not worth the effort."

Myra almost laughed at the look on Renly's face, like a child caught in the wrong. His smile disappeared and his eyes grew wide, though he tried to recover with a cough and a quick shuffle.