There's nothing dignified about what Sansa sees through a crack in the door. It's feral, wild. Naked limbs beginning and ending only the Gods know where. At first, she's kind of morbidly curious as she stands at the door, barely even daring to breathe. Then, as it registers more clearly with her just who that golden head of hair belongs to, disapproval begins to well in the pit of her stomach. Errant thoughts about trust, honour, duty ricochet around her head. Anger at her own naivety rushes through her, how could she be so stupid!?

His eyes flicker upwards (heavy lidded with mouth half open, she notices) to meet hers, and one sharp intake of breath collides explosively in her chest with sheer, pure embarrassment. She turns quickly and flees down the corridor, angry with him, with the girl, with herself. Rationally, she knows she has nothing to be angry about. He's not necessarily doing anything wrong, after all. But Sansa had assumed... assumed that he what? A mean voice in her mind spits at her, That he would live out his days here in Winterfell, with cold bones and a cold bed, and nothing but the honour of serving Lady Stark to sustain him?

She avoids him for a few days, and by avoids she means that while he's there on the periphery of her vision, by her side as he had been since the day he found her, she avoids speaking to him directly, or looking him in the eye, or even saying his name. Her temper is short and she barks orders from her seat in the throne room and she knows it's not fair on the men and women who serve her loyally but she just can't swallow this ball of irritation that has taken residence in her throat. Especially since the few times she dares sneak a look at Lannister from the corner of her eye, she swears the only expression she can detect on his face is one of vague amusement.

He caught up with her eventually, as she knew he would.

She had planned to spend an afternoon going over Winterfell's inventories and reports, so she seated herself at the small writing table in her chamber and bid her maids leave her. No sooner had she settled to the task than the tall build of Jaime was nonchalantly leaning against the doorway.

"Busy this afternoon, my Lady Stark?" he enquired, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

She looked at him squarely, setting her shoulders the way she did at the council table, "I am rather, yes. Is there something I can help you with, Jaime?" She allowed herself a small measure of triumph at her clear, steady voice.

"Not particularly, my Lady. I had, however, wondered if there was anything I could help you with."

The room was silent for a few beats and the tension so tight between them Sansa felt sure she could reach out and pluck it like a string on a harp. "What do you mean, Ser?"

He flinched ever so slightly at that, she noticed. He had been simply Jaime to her for some time now, while he used various forms of address for her, depending on his mood, their company (or lack thereof), and whether he was making fun of her or not. Maybe she had allowed him too many liberties, and maybe now was the time to show him that she was just as adept at playing these games as he was.

"You've seemed a little... off colour, my Lady," his insufferable smirk annoyed her beyond reasoning.

"I am perfectly well, I thank you Ser Jaime. But I do have a rather large task ahead of me this afternoon, so if you could spread word that I am not to be disturbed until dinner, I would greatly appreciate it," she returned her gaze to her work and hoped that he would choose to heed the not-so-subtle implication in her words. There had been quite enough humiliation for one afternoon and she needed him gone before the rising blush was too obvious in her cheek. When Sansa looked up a few seconds later the doorway was empty, but the tightness in her throat and the fluttering in her belly only intensified.

In the beginning, strangely enough, it was his complete inability to show deference to the new Lady of Winterfell that endeared him most to her. His quick comebacks and sarcastic remarks were usually at her expense, but in reality she occasionally needed that reminder of who she had been and who she was; after everything – and that was an awful lot – Sansa Stark had survived. The way he spoke to her reminded her so much of Robb (but with more vulgarities; Robb would never have said some of the things Jaime did within her hearing) and she missed that brotherly teasing and nitpicking, however much she may have hated it at the time. Now, she considered it as the sum paid for the love of an older brother. Not many girls were lucky enough to have had a brother like Robb, however short his young life may have been. And now that she was by herself in Winterfell, trying desperately to cling to the last shreds of what once had been her home, Jaime Lannister's wit was the closest thing she had to having family.

(Sometimes she allowed herself silly moments where she imagined that if they had not been Starks and he had not been a Lannister, if this were not Westeros, if there had never been any reason to go to war, if, if , if... but this was Westeros, and while Robb had been good and honourable, he'd also been stubborn about it, high-handed even, so he had paid in the most terrible way for his lapse in judgement. Jaime, in contrast, had lived by his own strange code of honour, not giving a single damn what anyone thought of his actions and yet he had come through, not unscathed, but alive.)

Is that why she felt the way she did, then? Because Jaime was the closest thing to a brother she had now? She tried to take herself back, back, back, remembering Robb's face and picturing him in that room with that girl instead of Jaime. How would she have felt then? Slightly disgusted probably, embarrassed definitely, but not hurt, not sad.

It wouldn't have felt like Robb had abandoned her.

And that was it; the root of her short temper, her irritation, her irrational behaviour. She had thought her and Jaime the same in only one respect; that they were last remaining survivors of a way of life that no longer existed. They had developed this unlikely camaraderie when everything else about them had crumbled into nothing and she hadn't realised until now the extent of the comfort and solace she found in that thought; she was alone, but she wasn't alone by herself.

Jaime, however, needed more than that, apparently. It was selfish and cruel of her to be angry with him for it, to try and make him feel guilty because he wasn't the same as her (not that Jaime would feel guilt, of course), but she couldn't quash the feeling, and for the first time in a long time, Sansa began to cry. With her head on the table top, she cried for her loss and his loss, for the broken things they had become, and for the broken world they had to try and make sense of now. And she cried for herself, the last of the Starks, the lonely Queen of the North, sitting on her ice throne, surrounded by people but yet still so alone. Even Jaime Lannister, the lion in wolf country, treated with suspicion by almost everyone, had someone and that someone was not Sansa.

Jaime didn't go far after Sansa dismissed him. He stationed himself just down the corridor from her chambers, waiting for he knew not what. Something was troubling her... he was troubling her. And he'd really rather not. He thought there was probably enough weight on those slender shoulders without him adding to it. True, he had been amused at first, thinking of her shocked face, blushing cheeks and ensuing jealousy. What he assumed had been jealousy, anyway. Jealousy was fine. He could cope with a spot of jealousy. That was a game he had played many times in the old days (a few short years felt like decades to him now) and it even made him smile some to think of Sansa, the cool, measured Ice Queen, having a jealous streak that heated her flesh and made her forget herself. But after a few days of sustained avoidance and a less than successful attempt on Jaime's part to tease her out of herself with conversation, he was concerned that there was more to it than first appeared. The tell-tale hitched breath – usually accompanied by silent sobs – was proof enough of that and he revealed himself in her doorway once more.

"Sansa..." he started softly, but how to continue? He'd been used to tears that were pre-meditated, that fell with purpose, where every drop was intended to manipulate or disarm. He was only ever required to curb their flow with sweet reassurances uttered into the shell of an ear and kisses that started lightly as they chased away those poisonous droplets, but very quickly grew heavy and frantic and bruising. And he couldn't very well go down that route with Sansa now, could he? Without her express permission, of course, but he stamped that thought down before it really had a chance to take shape.

She looked up, the blue of her eyes made all the more vibrant against their red rims. Her cheeks glistened with moisture and when she spoke she sounded defeated, weary. Wearier than he'd seen her since the worst of the rebuild was over.

"Just go Jaime." Whatever he'd been expecting, it wasn't that. It was always at the back of his mind that he was there completely at her pleasure, but he never let himself imagine what it would be like to be turned out of Winterfell, with no home and no loved ones anywhere in the world.

"And where would my Lady have me go, do I dare ask?"

"Wherever you'd like Ser. I hereby release you from your vow. You have seen me home safely, you have helped me rebuild, and I am now Queen of what were once my father's lands. I think you have more than fulfilled your promise to my mother."

"Sansa, you are being unreasonable," he told her firmly, in a tone he could have easily imagined himself using with Myrcella, had it ever been required of him. That brought a spark of life back to her face. "As much as you like to think you have everything under control, you still need me here. I won't go. I don't want to go."

Her expression turned hard. She was still angry, then.

"No, I wouldn't think you would want to leave, since you've made yourself so comfortable here! You can be as free as you like, I suppose, when the Queen of the North is wrapped around your finger. Do you even miss anyone, Jaime? Do you feel your losses as keenly as I feel mine?! Are you safe from memories when you don't have to see the ghosts in the halls, in the corridors, in your rooms, in the yard? When you don't hear the echoes of laughter of your brothers and sisters every time the wind blows? This place means nothing to you and you can be whoever you like within its walls. I hate you for that, Jaime Lannister!" She had raised herself to her feet during her outburst, chair scraping back noisily, the harsh sound a perfect accompaniment to Sansa's fury. She had picked up a paperweight and launched it at him; he dodged neatly to one side and let it thud twice behind him, once on the wall and then again on the floor, "I hate you!"

In three easy strides he was across the room, large hands pinning her upper arms to the wall behind, noses not even an inch apart, green eyes challenging blue. He spoke in a low voice, the hard edge reverberating through her body with every word. She needed to hear him now, and hear him well, "Do not presume to know me, Lady Stark. Do not presume to make judgements about my grief and do not assume that because I am far away from my home, I feel no pain and see no ghosts. They are with me every single day, and you are a silly, ignorant girl if you think otherwise."

Her eyes were wide, her mouth in a perfect 'O,' and for a moment, Jaime recollected a young, foolish girl who loved and lived for songs and stories, who dreamed of gleaming knights that brought her lemoncakes and flowers, and sat with her in gardens bathed in warm sunlight. And for a moment, he lamented the loss of her simple youthful innocence. But it dawned on him that somewhere, buried far under that crystallised ice exterior was still a young girl who needed to believe in something. His voice turned marginally softer as he released her arms and sank to the floor, back against the wall, "You can't send me away because you saw me fucking a girl, Sansa. You just can't."

She was quiet for a few moments, and then sank to the floor next to him, "I know, truly I do. I just thought... if we didn't have our grief, what would we have that makes us the same? I don't want to be alone with it all, Jaime. I can't forget and I didn't think you could either."

"I can't, Sansa. Gods, I've tried everything and I can't. If I left here, there'd be nothing to keep it at bay. So don't ask me to go again."

She takes his left hand in hers, tentatively, and makes a vow of her own, "I won't. Ever."

Later, still on the floor of Sansa's chamber and with that signature smirk back on his lips, Jaime takes a chance, "Sansa, can I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"Were you even a little jealous?"

She looks incredulous, as he knew she would, and his smart mouth earns him a barely-there punch to the muscles in his upper arm, her elegant fingers curled up into the tiniest of fists. Fleetingly, he desperately wants to know the answer, to hear her admit to feeling something, anything for him (it's been so long), but the light kiss she places on his knuckles before settling her head on his shoulder tells him more than her words ever would.