Author's Introduction: Hello! I'm new to fanfiction and this is my first piece. I usually only write original stuff, but I've had a simultaneous writer's block for my original work as well as a recent all-consuming, soul-crushing obsession with everything Sanrion, so, this happened. I don't have this planned out, but after writing one chapter, I'm kind of obsessed with it. I thought this would ease my feelings, but, oh no, it made everything about 1000001% worse, so, yeah. Anyway, this is up, and I'm working on the second chapter now. Let me know what you think. No beta reader, so if there are any mistakes, kindly point them out. I'm kind of OCD, so I'd really appreciate it instead of finding a published mistake six months later and the ensuing inevitable anxiety that would bring.

As for the world of this story: Most of the canon of this story is derived from the books, not the TV show (a la Sansa never married/was abused by Ramsay. Like, wtf D&D?!). That said, I adore the TV show (most of the time), and especially Peter Dinklage and Sophie Turner's portrayals of my two favorite characters, so there will be references to moments that perhaps happened in the TV show but not necessarily in the books (walks in the gardens, handing him the chalice, "Your mother would want you to carry on," etc.). Also original backstory/flashbacks that I think are in keeping with canon/characterization because feelings, so, fight me. They were canonically married for months and we got a grand total of two TV scenes between their marriage and day of separation, and only a few scenes about badly cooked pease in the books. Not cool. So, I've improvised. All of this is post-ADWD. On things where the show has surpassed the books (get it together GRRM!), I accept the events of the show as canon (e.g. Jon Snow's fate, Stannis vs Ramsay, etc.), so be warned that there *are* s6 spoilers in here. If my predictions end up wrong by the end of the 6th season here in a few weeks but my story is still, possibly, canon-viable, I'll update it to reflect that. Won't really explain more because (I hope) my writing should speak for itself.

Enjoy!

Chapter 1

Sansa I: Banner of Black, Banner of Red

The winds were mercifully gentle on her fair skin as Lady Sansa of House Stark, Queen of the North, waited on horseback for the encroaching army of the Dragon Queen to arrive from the east. She looked to her left to the Wall. The skies were clear today, and in the crisp winter sun she could see the black, pinprick silhouettes of the watchers on the wall looking down. They should be looking North, not South, she wanted to tell her half-brother, Jon Snow, who sat horseback to her right and had command of her armies, but she could hardly blame the men. It was daytime, and an attack by the Others was unlikely at this time; she could only imagine that watching from above a host of 50,000 marching from miles away, a procession like a great black centipede winding along the base of the Wall, shadowed by three large, menacing specks in the sky, was vastly more intriguing than staring North at the same wild scape beyond the wall, changed only by weather and shadow.

To Sansa's left sat her cousin Robert Arryn, Lord of the Vale. Today was a relatively mild day for a Northern Winter, but her cousin was bundled and bulked in layers and cloaks to twice his scrawny size, with a scarf wrapped round his head even under the hood of his cloak. He was a frail thing, but stronger than anyone had suspected. Many had expected him to die soon after his mother, Sansa's Aunt Lysa, died, but he lingered. He had even been bedridden for a while, with no one to keep him company but his favorite cousin Sansa. But eventually, Sansa realized it was boredom that trod down his spirits more than anything. His mother had been his world, his only companion. When she died, he'd lost everything, everything but Sansa, and his title. She'd convinced their then-guardian, Petyr Baelish, to allow him to play with boys his own age (most a bit younger, though), and eventually he made a good recovery. With Sansa's encouragement, he grew from the sickly, childish thing his mother had always allowed him to be and grew to be something of a proper little lord, if still weaker than he should be.

And Sansa would forever thank the gods she'd made the efforts that she did, when she did. It was three years ago that her brother Jon had sent a raven with word of Ramsay Bolton's menacing letter to the Vale, with the added message:

I know I'm only a bastard, Lord Arryn, and I'm not related to you by blood, but I urge you to come to the aid of Winterfell. Ramsay Bolton has your cousin Rickon, your cousin by blood, one of the last remaining members of your blood family left. I have an army of Wildlings who owe me their lives, and I intend to march south with them to free my brother, and I've called upon the Northern bannermen still loyal to House Stark over House Bolton to converge at Winterfell, but only with your Knights of the Vale can victory be assured. Please, if you have any fondness for your mother's kin, rally your bannermen and march north to meet us in the field of battle.

Regards,

Jon Snow, son of Eddard Stark, Lord of Winterfell

Former Lord Commander of the Night's Watch

Jon had had no idea Sansa was there, but reading her half-brother's words for the first time in five years brought her heart to bursting with joyful warmth. Even with the ominous words that Rickon was in the hands of the legitimized bastard Lord of the Flayed Man, it was proof that Jon was alive, even that Rickon was alive. That Robert wasn't her only family left—that her wolf's blood wasn't the last of its kind.

Sansa had asked Petyr to let her make the case to Robert, and he'd granted it to her. With his leers and grins as he watched her bloom from a thirteen year old girl when she arrived in the Vale to a young woman of five and ten at the arrival of Jon's raven, he did much for her, more than she would have liked. He'd stolen a kiss from her that day, but she pushed the memory from her mind. He was dead and gone and would never kiss her again—she'd made sure of that.

That night, after much deliberating over the soft but pleading words she'd use, she broached the subject with Robert after he'd happily eaten his share of dessert sweets and hers, as she'd given them to him when asked. "Robert, you're so sweet to me. You take care of me here, and I take care of you. I think of us as brother and sister, don't you?"

"Of course I do," he'd said.

"I'd do anything for you, to keep you safe, you know that, don't you?"

"Of course I do, Sansa. But you are safe. We're all safe here in the Vale. No one can touch us here."

Even though they'd left the notoriously impregnable Eyrie behind as the first winter snows had descended upon them, he still felt invincible in his lands, surrounded by his men. The last of his childish tendencies to be quashed before Sansa made a good lord of him yet. No one is safe anywhere, Sweetrobin, she wanted to tell him. Surely your own mother's death taught you that?

But she didn't press the point. "Maybe we are safe in the Vale, but what good is life in the Vale as we sit by idly and read ravens' scrolls about the deaths of everyone we love?"

"You want us to fight the Lannisters? For Aunt Catelyn and Cousin Robb?" he said. His eyes widened in fear; his mother had instilled in him a lifelong fear of the Lannisters after she incessantly (and unjustly, it turned out) blamed them for the death of Robert's father, Jon Arryn.

"No, Robert. Not the Lannisters." She showed Robert her brother's message, but not the scroll that contained Ramsay Bolton's own words. Reading those particular words had terrified Sansa for her brother, and she was hardened to threats. Little fazed Sansa after what she'd endured at Joffrey's hands and orders. Had Robert read them, he would have curled up in her arms and never come out. No, Jon's words were tempered, told him what he needed to know, and no more.

"We can save cousin Rickon?" he asked, holding the scroll gingerly.

"We can save Rickon," Sansa confirmed with a smile. "Will you help me save my baby brother?"

She made her beautiful blue eyes as big as she could and let a pleading smile flit across her lips. Sansa had long known the effect she had on those of the opposite sex, but only recently had she learned to control it, to use it to her own gain. Most of the time Petyr saw through her efforts, but Robert was as putty in her hands with the right words as accompaniment.

Robert took a deep breath and fixed his feeble chin in an attempt to look like a determined little lord that he most certainly was not. "We'll do it. We'll send for the Knights of the Vale on the morrow, and then we'll march north."

Sansa took him in her arms then, and gave him a kiss on the cheek. The rest of the evening, she planted images of their victory in his mind, telling him how she'd show him the Godswood, the Weirwood tree, the broken tower, the library, the hot springs in the greenhouse, how he'd play with Rickon and have yet another cousin, yet another "sibling." When she'd asked him what bedtime story he wanted to hear that night as she tucked him into bed, he said, "None. I have enough to dream of tonight. Goodnight, Sansa."

That had all been two years ago, and she had done all she'd promised on that night and more. With the plight of the White Walkers at the Wall, after Winterfell had been retaken, the Northmen and the Knights of the Vale had banded together with the men of the Night's Watch to restore all the castles along the wall that had fallen into disrepair and to man them for the good of the realm. Robert complained often of the cold, and mentioned occasionally returning to the Vale, but she'd gently remind him Winter was no longer coming and was properly here, in the Vale as in the North. And in the Vale he'd be alone. No Sansa, no Rickon. Just him at the court of the Royces who hosted the Arryns in Winter when the Eyrie was impassable. And seeing as Myranda Royce always teased him terribly, Sansa smirked when he recanted his wish to return home and renewed his will to remain by her side at the Wall.

The banners behind them, the Stark Direwolf and the Falcon and Moon of House Arryn at the forefront and flanked by the banners of the other honored houses of the North and Vale, whipped and shuddered as the breeze picked up slightly. They had been waiting away from the encampment for half an hour already, but the army of the Dragon Queen was getting close. The three shadows in the sky were getting larger as the flew over the host, and one of the dragons gave a screech that even at a distance made their well-trained warhorses wicker and shuffle. At the forefront of the army, Sansa could see a large banner of black with red on it: the three-headed dragon of House Targaryen. And to its right, a smaller banner of red. Sansa's breath hitched when she saw it. She knew he'd be here, she'd read his signature at the bottom of the correspondence to the Night's Watch herself, but it was only now that she truly realized, truly felt it, that she'd see him for the first time in five years: her husband.

She'd already been at the wall for over a year and a half as the Night's King tested the Wall's defenses, sending waves of the icy undead at various points of the Wall. So far the combined men of the Night's Watch, the North, and the Vale hadn't failed, but that wasn't to say there hadn't been casualties. When she'd heard the proclamations that the Dragon Queen was coming, that her dragons would lay waste to the "icy fuckers," as so many of the gentlemen of the Night's Watch liked to call them, even in front of a Lady, she was overjoyed. She'd walked as fast as she could through the snow without running to Castle Black to read the raven's scroll herself, Podrick Payne running at her side as her Queensguard. When she'd reached Lord Commander Dollett's study, he gave her a smile as he always did.

"Is it true?" she asked, turning to Jon, who held the scroll in his hand as he stood by the fire.

"Aye, it's true," he said, and she beamed at him, wrapping her arms around his neck.

When she pulled away, she noticed there was a frown on his face, but she thought nothing of it as she plucked the well-read scroll from his fingertips and read aloud:

"Lord Commander: From across the Narrow Sea, Daenerys Targaryen, the First of Her Name, Queen of Meereen, Queen of the Andals and the Rhoynar and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, Protector of the Realm, Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea, called Daenerys Stormborn, the Unburnt, Mother of Dragons—wow that's a lot of titles," Sansa interjected, and Edd chuckled. "Mother of Dragons has heard your plight. She makes her way to Eastwatch-by-the-Sea by ship, and will set sail from Braavos within two turns of the moon. Within six turns of the moon, she and her army of 50,000 strong, comprised of Unsullied, Dothraki, and the company of the Second Sons, will arrive at Castle Black, as well as Her Majesty's three dragons. With sword, shield, and fire, Her Grace will do what the Usurpers and Pretenders to the throne will not, and Protect the Realm in truth, not just in name. We would have your reply to Braavos before setting sail as to the status of the castles, defenses, and numbers to better plan for our alliance as we cross the Narrow Sea. Signed..." And at that, Sansa faltered. Finally, she looked to Jon, who had his eyes fixed on her. She looked back to the scroll. "Signed Tyrion Lannister, Hand of the Queen, Righful Lord of Casterly Rock, Shield of Lannisport, and Warden of the West."

Sansa's head spun as she dropped the scroll on Edd's desk, said her farewell, and left the room as quickly as she'd entered it. She ran into Podrick, who had been standing outside, but she pushed him aside as she made her way down the exterior stairs. "My lady?" he called after her as she ran. At the base of the stairs, Sansa collapsed onto her knees into a snowdrift and heaved out the contents of her stomach.

"Sansa," Jon said, and she felt his hands on her back, the warmth of his body close as he crouched over her to shield her from the curious stares of the onlooking Brothers in Black.

There was a ringing in Sansa's ears, and she didn't know if the buzzing of her mind was an inability to form a coherent thought, or a failure to process the myriad thoughts rushing at her like waves in a storm.

"He's alive," she said, the first proper sentiment she'd been able to voice in over five minutes. "He's alive," she echoed herself, and she leaned into Jon. She looked up, and Pod had a flask of wine uncorked and offered to her. Her husband really had trained him well. She'd chuckled at the thought as she accepted the wine, swished it around her mouth, then spat it out to join the remnants of her breakfast. Unladylike, but both Pod and Jon had seen her in far less dignified situations, so she didn't mind her courtesies with them in this moment.

He was alive, that lord husband of hers. She'd presumed herself a widow for so long she'd forgotten there really was a chance Tyrion might still be alive in the world somewhere. She took a long draught of the wine, leaned against Jon a moment as her thoughts settled into something manageable, and then stood. She wiped her mouth with the back of her glove, straightened her skirts, and then turned to look at the courtyard of Castle Black, where several brothers still looked at her. Jon gave his former brothers a stern look, and most of them turned away. Regardless, Sansa put on an air of composure and walked back to her tent with Podrick at her side. She dismissed Jon, and left Podrick outside by the brazier at the entrance to her tent amidst the encampment of Northmen stationed at Castle Black. Jeyne Poole, her childhood best friend, rescued from the clutches of Ramsay Bolton, and now her handmaiden and lady in waiting, took off Sansa's cloak and brushed the snow from her skirts.

Sansa took off her gloves and handed them to Jeyne before dismissing her, never taking her eyes from her bare, uncovered left hand, and the golden Lannister ring she still wore there on her fourth finger. She had continued to wear it in the Vale after escaping King's Landing, though she'd turned it over to hide the lion sigil so it resembled a simple golden band, merely to keep suitors at bay. Petyr had pressed her to take it off so that it wouldn't deter a match with Ser Harrold Hardyng, Petyr's potential betrothal of choice for her, but she'd refused. ("I can't marry until after Lord Tyrion is confirmed dead anyway, so why hide it?" she'd argued, and eventually she'd won.) He'd been angry at her for her refusal, but more for her loyalty to any man who wasn't him. In truth, Sansa simply wanted to deter any suitor, especially Petyr himself. She always smirked at the grimace that shadowed his eyes as he unaskingly took her hand only to feel the cold Lannister gold on her finger, a reminder that she wasn't his. I am his, and he is mine, the words from her forced wedding echoed in her mind as she gently touched the lion sigil on her ring. From this day, until the end of my days.

After leaving the Vale, wearing the ring was simply a habit after three years of wearing it daily. In retaking Winterfell and nursing Rickon back to health from the barbarities inflicted on him in the dungeons under Ramsay's watch, for which Sansa made sure he'd suffered tenfold, Sansa kept wearing it. Every now and then, when she passed the library and smelled the dusty books that had survived the blaze left by the Ironborn, or when a jug of Dornish Red managed to make it to the North and was freshly uncorked, or when Jon would make an uncouth joke when he thought Sansa wasn't listening, she would absent-mindedly touch her ring, remembering fondly the times her husband had made her want to laugh. She hadn't, to his constant disappointment; she didn't think she'd ever be capable of laughter again after the events of the so-called Red Wedding, but he'd made her dream, wish, hope of laughing at times even in the darkest hours of her loneliness, with no hope of a family to return to even after the war, and for that she would forever be grateful.

And so it was that the banners came closer, the banner of black and banner of red. The red three headed dragon was now visible on the larger banner, and Sansa could just make out the gold of the Lannister lion on her husband's banner. More noticeable, however, were the dragons, the dragons of flesh and blood and scale, not those of cloth and color. They flew high, higher even than the wall, but they were close enough that she could make out their colors: onyx black, snow white that almost blended into the winter sky above, and bright emerald green. All eyes of her retinue were on the dragons as they circled over head, finally landing a distance away from her retinue at the signal of a woman on horseback with white-blond, unmistakably Targaryen hair. Sansa had never seen a Targaryen, but there had been enough paintings of them in the Red Keep (those that King Robert hadn't had destroyed, anyway) that she recognized her hair as soon as she saw it. To her left and right sat large men, warriors and commanders.

Her hands tightened on her reins as she searched out the man she hadn't seen in five years, the figure who would sit just short of his companions, but she couldn't pick him out just yet. She looked to Jon, who was glancing at her from the corner of his eye. She gave him an assured smile that said she was fine. She was quite the liar now, from words to smiles. She only wished she'd had the talent in King's Landing. It would have saved her a lot of grief. But alas, she was eleven when she entered the city and thirteen when she left it. No child should have to know how to lie like that, to lie as well as it would have taken to help her in any way.

Finally, the host came to a halt as Daenerys Targaryen held up her fist. Silence filled the air as the sound of fifty thousand footsteps quieted at once.

A young woman on horseback rode forth from Daenerys's retinue. She took down the hood of her cloak to reveal a beautiful, dark face and wild, untamed hair like Sansa had seen only of a few Summer Islanders in the capitol. "Before you is Daenerys Targaryen," she called out. "The First of Her Name, Queen of Meereen, Queen of the Andals and the Rhoynar and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, Protector of the Realm, Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea, called Daenerys Stormborn, the Unburnt, and Mother of Dragons. Her Grace has come to aid the men of the Night's Watch and its allies to protect the realm against those known as the White Walkers."

Jon pulled his horse forward a few steps. "Before you is Sansa Stark, Queen of the North, Lady Paramount of the North, and Stewardess of Winterfell. Beside her is Robert Arryn, Lord of the Eyrie, Defender of the Vale, and Warden of the East. Together, they, and the Night's Watch, welcome you into this alliance to protect the realms of men."

There, finally: in the second row, next to the unknown man holding the Lannister banner, she spotted him as a burly, dark-skinned man in skins and furs and his even larger horse in the front row shifted to the side. She kept her face impassive as she glimpsed him, his face hidden in mid-day's overhead shadow under a hood just as hers was. Her stomach fluttered a moment, but she refused to let it show.

She took down her hood and her auburn hair streamed over her shoulder with the breeze for the first time since leaving her tent over an hour ago. With the Stark blood that flowed through her veins, the cold exhilarated her, and she felt color coming to her porcelain cheeks as the cold nipped at them. She stepped her stallion forward even with her brother. "Now that the formalities have been observed, I welcome you properly to Castle Black and to the North. I hope the castles east of here along the wall have greeted you well along your march toward us. The lords of my retinue will lead you to the lands prepared for your encampment. There, we have set out hay and covered troughs of warm water for your horses, as they must be exhausted after such a journey over sea and land. We also have had extra cooks' tents set up and working tirelessly on stew enough for your numbers as well as ours so that your men may eat as soon as they wish. It may not be the most elegant of meals, but after a long march in the cold of winter, I know how good even a bowl of broth can taste, so long as it's hot. Our hospitality is yours. I hope we can discuss the terms of our alliance properly on the morrow, after you've had time to set up and rest overnight."

The Dragon Queen observed her, and Sansa sat tall on her stallion, giving away nothing. Daenerys looked over her left shoulder, and Sansa could tell she was looking to Tyrion. He gave a bow of the head, almost imperceptible except to Sansa who was watching him. Daenerys looked again to Sansa, and gave the same gesture, but stronger and more deliberate. "I thank you for your hospitality. It is welcome in these cold months as Winter has Come."

Sansa smiled at the allusion to her family's words and brought her horse even further forward until hers stood parallel to Daenerys's white steed, close enough to speak only to her. "I hope I don't offend, but I've made special arrangements for Lord Tyrion. As you know, he is my husband, but also a Lannister. While I have ordered my men to attempt nothing upon pain of death, he is a Lannister in the North, after all his family has done to mine and so many of my bannermen's families. With your leave, I would take extra precaution to ensure his safety, and our alliance."

Daenerys considered her for a moment before answering. "As you will. Lord Tyrion," she called out over her shoulder. Sansa looked to him. There was a moment of pause before he pulled his horse forward of the retinue and directly in front of Sansa's.

"Your Grace," he answered to Daenerys, the first words from her husband she'd heard in over five years. "Your Grace," he added to Sansa, curtly. Sansa's brow furrowed, but only for a moment before she smoothed it.

"Lord Tyrion," she said, courteous as always. "I've made alternate arrangements for your security given the tension between your family and the company here. I hope that's acceptable."

He simply nodded, face still hidden in shadow under the thick brown cloak he wore. Sansa looked back to her men. "You know your orders," she stated, and most of her retinue, including Jon, led off to the side of Daenerys's host, directing them to the encampment. Daenerys nodded her head and left with her army, leaving just Sansa and Tyrion behind.

Only two of her retinue remained as all others left them: Brienne of Tarth, her sworn shield maiden, and Podrick Payne. As Podrick came into view, she finally heard her husband's familiar chuckle. Sansa smirked at him. "I thought you might appreciate a familiar face."

"I'd thought 'alternate arrangements' might include feeding me to the wolves," he quipped.

"Well, you've stayed alive thus far..." Sansa mused.

A pause, and then a clipped response. "Sorry to disappoint."

Sansa kept her face clear of emotion as she looked under his hood, trying to read his face. When she couldn't reach him through the shadows, she turned away to Podrick. "Escort Lord Tyrion to his tent. See that he has anything he needs."

Sansa knew she was being rude, leaving without so much as a goodbye, but she didn't care. She rode away with Brienne at her side then, not looking back to her lord husband. Sorry to disappoint... Did he really think so little of her? With a frown, her thumb touched at the lion signet ring through her gloves as she rode to Castle Black. She'd planned to go back to her tent to work on letters to White Harbor and see Tyrion, Daenerys, and the rest of the Dragon army settled in, but after his response that had inexplicably struck her heart as a physical blow, she wanted distance. Five years apart, reunited at last, and he hurt her as only a Lannister could. Yes, she wanted distance.