Author's Note: It's my first attempt to write from Ned's POV, so it may or may not be a bit OOC and I would like to apologize for that. Also, please bear with any mistakes you might find; I did my best to edit it, but English is not my first language and I'm afraid mistakes are bound to show up here and there. I hope you enjoy the story anyway!

Snow was coming.

Eddard Stark could smell it in the air when he retired to his chambers that night, and the white that coated the roofs and stones of Winterfell in the morning was no surprise to him. He was used to snow, had missed it sorely for many moons when he was a child, being fostered in the Eyrie, and though it had been a long time before he saw anything more than mild summer snows in Winterfell, he knew it would come. He expected it, and he longed for it, for its blinding whiteness and the icy breezes caressing his face as he trained in the yard, for the comforting weight of winter cloaks and furs, and the crunching noise beneath his stallion's hooves as he rode in the wolfswood after a snowfall.

He wished for snow, all the while forgetting his young son had never seen it before. Forgetting that it must have been years since his southron lady wife had seen it last, melting away in the warmer waters of her beloved rivers.

"Ooooh," had been Robb's not very eloquent comment as his eyes took in the once familiar landscape, looking so different covered in snow. He was just a toddler, after all, only two years old, and his eyes were wide and sparkling as he stood on his plump little legs just inside the castle, as if afraid to go outside. Catelyn, standing right next to him, his tiny hand in hers, was no better; her blue eyes gleamed as she stared outside, and she couldn't quite hide her excitement as she took a few tentative steps, letting Robb muster up the courage to walk outside and onto that now unfamiliar ground.

"Mama! So cold!" The toddler squealed, causing a rare smile to grace Ned's lips as he watched him walk unsteadily in the snow once Catelyn let go of his hand, and he saw the same smile on her face when she turned to glance at him. Their eyes met as Robb squealed again, plunging his little gloved hands in the snow and stuffing a handful of it in his mouth, and there was affection in that look, an intimacy that neither of them quite knew how to handle yet.

It was easier to bond over the son they made together, he realized, without having to address the changes their relationship was slowly but surely undergoing. He didn't want to have to think about the way he felt when he looked at his lady wife now, about how he slept more easily with her by his side. He didn't want to acknowledge the way his heart beat faster when he saw her smile, how he longed to touch her hair when she was near, to wrap her in his arms and kiss those red, red lips of hers.

And yet, there he was, standing only a few feet away from her, from the wife he never thought to have, and all he wanted was to join her, join their son in his quest for whatever it was he sought to find buried in the snow. He wanted to forget his lordly duties – just for a moment, an hour, a day – and be a husband and a father, to find again that intimate moment he had broken when he looked away, and strengthen the bond they both knew they were forging, whether they liked it or not.

"D'you want your horse saddled, m'lord?" The young stable boy's question interrupted his musings and stopped him mid-step, and Ned turned around just as the lad unsuccessfully struggled to fight a yawn. It was early, most inhabitants of the castle were still fast asleep or tending to their own business, and the courtyard was not yet filled with the hum of activity that was so characteristic of it.

His son's voice and his lady wife's quiet laughter were the only sounds that could be heard so far, and Ned would rather keep it that way.

"I won't ride out quite yet, Patrek," he answered with a small smile, patting the boy's shoulder amicably. "You can sleep some more." And he said nothing else, resuming his slow but confident walk towards where his wife was kneeling in the snow, building a castle with their son.

"Papa!" Robb screamed happily as he saw him approach, and the joy he heard in his voice coupled with the smile on Catelyn's face made Ned's heart swell in his chest, a feeling that he was still not entirely familiar with.

"My lady," he greeted politely, formally, though there was a warmth in his voice that surprised even him, and he knelt on the ground next to her, observing her and Robb's work while his son clung to his neck. "Might you have need of my assistance?" A question uttered in a serious voice, but there was amusement in his grey eyes, and he knew she had not missed it when he saw it reflected in hers.

"We might have need of your expertise, my lord, indeed," Catelyn acknowledged with a barely concealed smile and a chuckle, sitting back to make room for him. "I believe you've had far more experience building snow castles than I."

That was true, indeed, but Ned was certain they could have done without his expertise just as well. Perhaps, however, his lady wife was as glad to spend time with him as he was to be with her and their son.

"Well," he began, leaning in to take a closer look at what they had made, "that is certainly a good start, my lady. I couldn't have done better myself." High praise, coming from a Stark of Winterfell, a man who had spent his childhood years building snow castles and throwing snowballs with his brothers and sister, and he knew his words pleased her, just as he knew it pleased her to see him interact with their boy when he helped Robb add more snow to the top of the castle to build a turret, for her smile grew so much bigger, and there was warmth in her eyes while she looked at him; a warmth that he had never seen directed at anyone but Robb before.

She said nothing, however, and for a while they were quiet, sharing a silence that was both comfortable and charged with emotions neither of them could find the courage to voice, while every touch of his hands on hers was dismissed as accidental, nothing more than a brush of their fingers as they reached for the same patch of snow, a touch that would bring a smile to his lips – an apology of sorts, perhaps – and a flush to her cheeks.

It was only when the first snowflake fell on their snow castle, when Robb's mouth opened in awe, his lips forming a perfect circle as he tilted his head back and stared, wide-eyed, at the grey skies above, only then did Ned allow himself to look at his wife, really look at her, as the sky yielded yet more snowflakes to fall upon them. And the sight before his eyes took his breath away, leaving him to gaze at Catelyn as if he were standing before a beautiful work of art.

He had always thought her hair was beautiful, truthfully, but he never imagined how utterly captivating it would look with snowflakes catching on it, melting amidst her flaming auburn locks.

"Winter becomes you, my lady," he heard himself say, his voice low, a rumble in his chest, and when he reached out to touch her hair, it was not a conscious movement, not an action he could in any way control. And he was relieved – happy – that she did not seem to want to pull away.

She smiled instead, a soft, sweet smile that was just for him, a smile that he irrationally wanted to steal, to make his own, just to ensure that no one else – no other man in the world – would ever see it. "I was not made for the cold, my lord, but I may yet come to love it," she said softly, and there was nothing accidental in the way her fingers brushed against his now, as she took his hand – the one that was not still reverently touching her hair – and gave it a light squeeze.

She may come to love winter, after all.

The words echoed in Ned's mind as their meaning dawned on him, and the thought gave him a strange feeling of elation, all at odds with the solemnity that was so characteristic of him.

She may come to love the North, and he may very well come to love her more than anything else in the world.

THE END