Iron and Blood: a Theon & Sansa Story

Chapter 20

Theon
"Jeyne Poole?" Theon exclaimed as he climbed the castle stairs with Sansa. His shirt was wet with the sweat of his labors, and he wanted to wash his face with cool water. Sansa, who had slept nearly half the day on Theon's lap, seemed more awake than usual.

"Yes," she replied, smiling. "You're to marry Jeyne Poole."

"Never," Theon snapped back. He moved aside to let a washerwoman down the stairs beside them. "My father would never let it happen."

Sansa shrugged playfully. "I imagine Jeyne can be very persistent when she wants to be. She mentioned she might try to bed you before the wedding."

It made Theon roll his eyes, but he could see that Sansa was bothered—perhaps in a way even she could not quite place.

When they reached his chamber door, Theon peered down the hall to ensure no one was coming before he motioned for her to go in. Once inside, he barred the door and sat down on the bed to remove his shirt, now stained with sweat.

As he did it, Sansa looked down at her hands. "Will you let her?" she asked in a quiet voice.

"Let Jeyne Poole?" he shot back. "What—bed me?" He unlaced his shoes. "Not until it snows in Dorne." Theon hoped it would make Sansa smile, but instead she just leaned her back against the wooden door and picked at her fingertips.

"I know you're no maiden," she murmured. Theon moved his shoes to the end of the bed and stood over his water basin. He rinsed the sweat from his face with a handful of it, brushed the droplets away with his bared upper arm.

"Aye," he admitted, "but I've not touched anyone since you."

Sansa just shook her head and remarked under her breath, "I don't believe you."

Her back was arched off the door, and she was looking at him with raised brows. Theon moved his eyes up her body: she wore a thin blue gown, laced up the front to cover her breasts, open enough to expose her collarbones and neck. He could make out the seams of her small clothes along the bodice, and it drew him closer to her.

"I swear it," Theon told her, his voice sharp. "You're all I want."

Sansa pushed off the door to meet him beside the bed. She countered, "Am I?"

Theon's hand found her waist. "You look like this," he breathed, touched her mouth gently with his fingers, "have these lips—and you think I could have eyes for anyone else in Westeros?" His heart was pounding hard for her, and his manhood pounded with it. With the hand on her waist, he pulled her closer, so that his nose nearly touched hers.

Sansa turned her head shyly, but only a little—enough that Theon could lean down to touch her neck with his lips. He pulled them back slowly, before planting another kiss closer to her chest. She took a deep breath, and Theon heard the faintest moan slip between her teeth.

He pushed his groin against her hips and Sansa arched her back to meet him; all that separated them was fabric. Even that felt like too much. When Sansa pulled Theon down to kiss her, he felt her shoulders fall back against the door.

The last time they kissed, it had been tentative, cautious; this was so much more. Sansa's tongue came through Theon's lips, and he accepted it hastily, met it hard with his own. For a moment, Theon had to smile—Sansa could not have kissed more than a few men, perhaps even none, and yet she felt so natural on his mouth, like it was all she had ever known.

Her taste was so sweet, Theon started to feel drunk on it. Why he had ever looked at any other woman before her, he could not say. She fit so perfectly in his hands, her body curved to join him at his manhood.

Sansa was a maiden, Theon knew, but she seemed to have forgotten her innocence entirely when she kissed him then. She smelled so new—like the flowers that bloomed in the Winterfell gardens all spring.

When Theon's hand wandered up her bodice, he felt her hesitate beneath his touch and stopped himself. "Is it okay if I touch you?" he asked.

Sansa kissed him again and replied, "I want you to." He pressed his forehead down to hers so that she met his gaze. She added, "But you can't have all of me."

Theon stayed close to her. "What do you mean?"

She sighed, and Theon heard her breath shake. "You cannot be inside of me," she whispered then. "You know that."

He did know it. While it was true high-born ladies sometimes lost their maidenhead while riding horseback during their travels, there was a chance Sansa still had something to show for her maidenhood. She would risk Joffrey's anger on their wedding night, along with the public shaming, if she did not appear a virgin when he took her.

Theon let his hand brush over Sansa's breast. He leaned close to her ear and replied, "Who said anything about being inside you?"