Winter Is Coming

No One

A girl had become another girl. A different girl, with a different face. Two more lives had been offered to the Many-Faced God, and now nothing stood between her and the face that had been doomed from the moment it murdered the agent of the Iron Bank.

Only death may pay for life.

A girl clutched a fresh basket of newly laundered red-and-gold gowns to her stomach. The new face she now wore was fuller about the chest than the previous one, and a girl's back twinged from the strain. Today the doors of the Queen's chamber would open to her; and then the deed would be done. She had to be quick, and calm, and quiet, as a sand-snake in the dunes of Dorne.

And yet the child's voice played over and over in her mind. Arya Stark. Her defiance and bravery and fierce loyalty... Her time would soon come, and a girl had to be ready when it did.

That was when a girl made her first mistake. She paused, outside the door she knew the brown-eyed child trained each morning. It was empty — no clashing swords sounded from within. A girl slowly set down her basket and straightened up, staring at the heavy wooden door. The Queen's death could wait for now. The Many-Faced God demanded the child be investigated. A girl pushed the door as softly as the hinges would allow and slipped into the room, leaving the door ajar so she could escape fast if she needed to.

That was her second mistake.

She stepped further into the room. She didn't know what she expected to find there, if there would be some evidence of the child's importance, but she had to look all the same. It was a large room, spacious, perfect for training. It did not seem like such a space could hold many secrets. Perhaps it would be better to search the child's own quarters — perhaps there would be more answers there. The door creaked behind her, and a girl heard the thunk of its frame hitting the wall.

She spun, feeling the comfort of the cold steel of the knife she'd stuffed between her breasts. Framed in the doorway, five Lannister guards stood, swords out, polished armour gleaming in the midday sun. Sunlight and blood. Coats of red and gold. A lion still has claws.

Someone had sold her out. Syrio Forel, or someone in the court who was less blind than the rest of them.

Sold her out, but clearly did not know who she was, where she came from, or they would have sent more guards. She could take them, but it would be the end of her mission. The Many-Faced God would have to find another way to take the Queen's life.

"What's your name, girl?" barked one of the guards.

"What's it to you?" she replied, a tremour in her voice, ever the frightened but defiant servant-girl.

The guard who had first spoken stepped forward, his armour clanking loudly in the silent room. His hand rested upon his sword hilt, his helmet hiding his features.

"You are to be arrested," he said, "on charge of attempted regicide."

A girl took a step back, shaking her head, retreating toward the back wall. The four other guards stepped to their companion's side, though none drew their swords.

"I swear," she began, "I swear I've done nothing! Please. Please, I'd never touch the King, I'd never touch the Queen." Her back hit the wall, and she stared wildly around her. She had nowhere to go.

"Come quietly and you will be treated well," promised the first guard. He took four more steps toward her, his men behind him.

A girl did not believe that for a second. She would be treated with as much kindness as the rest of the scum of the city. And besides, she had no intention of going with them at all, quietly or otherwise. She just shook her head as they advanced on her, raising her hands as if to push them away. She needed them closer.

"Please," she sobbed, her shoulders curving inward and her hands clenching into fists. She brought them to her chest as if to protect herself, leaning as far from the men as she could.

The first guard's hand tightened around the hilt of his sword as he neared her. She could see his knuckles clench. Just a few feet closer, and then she would strike. The guard's eyes met hers. They looked apologetic. That was the last thing she saw before she moved.

Twisting away from the wall, a girl plunged a hand down her dress and drew her knife. The hilt bore upon it many faces in gold inlay. There was a familiar, almost comforting sticky warmth that gushed over her hand as she shoved the blade into the gap in the guard's armour at the armpit. He gave a cry and staggered back; she grabbed his shoulder-guard, drawing him to her, and even as she buried her knife in his neck she heard the clear ringing of steel as his companions drew their swords.

One of them let out a cry of horror and pain as the dead guard slumped to the ground beside her, but a girl paid him no more heed. Ducking beneath an undisciplined swing from her next opponent, she rammed her shoulder into his gut, clenching her teeth against the impact of bone on metal. They reeled away from each other, and the guard slipped in his dead comrade's blood. He crashed to the floor. A girl spun away from the next guard in a fluid, practiced movement. Right into the chest of another. He grabbed her arm, fingers digging in hard enough to bruise, and leaned closer.

"I would stay still if I were you, girl," he purred in her ear.

She snarled and plunged her knife into his lower stomach, twisting away from him as she did so. He bellowed with pain, but his hand clenched around the only part of her body he could reach — her hair. He yanked, as if to pull her back to him, and with a sickening squelch, like a boot pulled from sucking mud, a girl's face slid off, and Jaquen H'ghar fell forward onto the cold stone floor.

There was a moment of silence, in which H'ghar's knife clattering to the stones rang out like a thousand city bells. The guard stood with the servant girl's face dangling from his limp hand by her hair; two of his companions stood in silence; and the third slowly climbed to his feet, his armour coated in his friend's blood.

H'ghar was the first to move, crawling slowly toward where his knife lay upon grey, leaf-strewn stones. But too slow.

The guard who dripped with blood, the guard who had cried out as his friend fell, moved forward with a roar, and his foot connected with H'ghar's stomach. H'ghar flipped over, though he uttered no cry.

"You will not serve your God no more," snarled the guard, grief and rage evident in his voice.

When H'ghar lunged, they were ready for him. Their knees slammed him to the ground, their arms pinned his, and then the hilt of a sword connected with his head and he saw nothing more.

***

They shoved him into a cell. It was dark, and cold, and full of evil smells. They left him there for days, weeks. Then they dragged him out, and shoved him in a wagon with two other men; a murderer and a rapist. He was to be taken to the Night's Watch with the rest of the criminals and lowlifes of the city — all Lord Stark could offer — where his crimes would be forgotten and he would regain his honour. If he let them take him that far. His mission had failed. Perhaps the Many-Faced God had other purposes for the Lannister Queen. But the truth remained.

Only death may pay for life.