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Catelyn always wore long sleeves these days. She was thankful when winter came because then she never had to bear her arms. It was just cool enough to wear long sleeve shirts and jackets still, which she gladly always did. She just couldn’t bear to look at her left arm anymore. There were some nights when she even wore a long glove to cover it.
She knew that it was weak – knew that she should move on – but the thought of seeing Ned’s first words to her tattooed on her forearm cut her to the bone and right through her heart.
It didn’t really matter though in the end because she had the words memorized. She’d memorized them the day they’d appeared on her arm – and she’d come to find out that they weren’t the first words that Brandon had ever said to her. She’d been confused, devastated, especially upon finding out that Brandon had lied to her. He’d said that her first words to him had been tattooed on him – and they had been, strangely enough. How could she be his soulmate but he not be hers?
He died five months later in a car crash in the middle of her first semester at college. Turned out he wasn’t going to live long enough to become her soulmate.
She met his younger brother Ned at Brandon’s funeral. “I warned him about driving too fast whenever it snowed,” he’d sighed while standing next to her, but not to her. Then he seemed to realize that she was right there and looking quite distressed because he glanced at her and an apologetic look. “I’m so sorry; I can’t believe I said that.”
“No, don't be; you’re right,” she’d replied. And then they both froze, realizing what the other had said.
Finding out that your dead boyfriend’s younger brother was your soulmate at said late boyfriend’s funeral was quite possibly one of the strangest situations she would ever be in.
Or so she’d thought.
After Ned’s unexpected death, Catelyn found herself reevaluating the whole tattoo thing. She’d had her soulmate and he was gone. She was only thirty-five when he died. Now that he had been taken away from her, she was destined to be alone for the rest of her life. Some of her friends tried to encourage her, get her to go on dates, but they were all worthless. The men she went on dates with had no tattoos on them. It was thought that maybe they could just settle for not being alone. That meant nothing to Catelyn. She was fine being alone. Besides, she had her children to love and care for.
And then she woke up on her thirty-eighth birthday with new words tattooed on her right arm.
Catelyn didn’t know what to do, so she panicked. She sat down at her vanity and stared at her reflection, but when she caught sight of her arm, she gripped it tightly to hide the words and looked away. What was going on? This couldn’t possibly be happening. She got ready like normal for the day. When Sansa asked her what was wrong, Catelyn smiled and said it was nothing.
She watched Robb drive Sansa and Bran to school. Arya always rode with her half brother Jon, who would come to pick her up. Catelyn had always held mixed feelings about the boy Ned had fathered, but the boy was loyal to her youngest daughter to a fault, always taking her to soccer practice and picking her up so that Catelyn didn’t have to worry about it while at work. She dropped Rickon off at daycare and then headed into work. Then she worked until five.
It was a normal day. Nothing out of the ordinary. Even better, those new words tattooed on her arm were not spoken to her. Both relief and sadness swirled inside her, confusing her further.
This went on for weeks and then months. Catelyn would go to her office in the Stark & Tully firm or she’d go to court or she’d sometimes visit prisons and she’d make trips to see her clients. Eventually, she was able to put the words out of her mind. It was a mistake, a flaw in the system. That was what Brandon had been, in a strange way.
(She’d heard whispers though – of people getting a second chance at a soulmate. It was very rare, so rare that it was more of an urban legend than truth. She herself had never met anyone that had had this happen to them, so it was all so very hard to believe. And yet, when she lied awake at night, her right arm seemingly burning, she couldn’t help but wonder if maybe those whispers had been true.)
It was June and impossibly hot. Still, she wore long sleeves, albeit a thin material that breathed easily and she could push up past her elbows if need be. She was meeting another lawyer from a big shot firm over a battle concerning their client’s company dumping waste improperly. People were getting sick, other people were suing, the CEOs were refusing to comply, and the negations had turned sour. Catelyn didn’t normally step into these sort of deals, but this was a major case. It was time for the big wigs, so to speak.
“Do you want me in there with you, Mrs. Stark?” Dacey Mormont asked. The girl was in her twenties, fresh out of law school, but she was so terribly bright and wicked smart, top of her class at Harvard. The girl was going far and Catelyn had made sure to snatch her up before any of the other firms could.
“No, I think I’m going to handle this meeting on my own,” Catelyn replied as she walked into the empty meeting room. “It’ll send more of a message, don’t you think?”
Dacey smiled and nodded her head, leaving the room immediately. Catelyn arranged the files into a neat order. Organizing things had always helped her relax. Truth was, she loved meetings like this. She mostly stayed out of courtrooms these days and helped the firm run smoothly, especially after Ned’s passing, but she felt most alive during these sorts of intellectual confrontations. There was a knock on the door and Catelyn just waved her hand without looking up, the glass walls not hiding her.
“Ah, you must be Catelyn Stark,” a man’s voice said.
Catelyn looked up sharply and said before even breathing, “And you must be Tywin Lannister.”
Both of them froze and stared at each other. No, she couldn’t help but think, looking at the man before her. She’d heard of Tywin Lannister by reputation only. Lannister & Lannister was the top law firm in the city, Stark & Tully riding at their heels. She’d known that it was going to be an uphill and very tough battle when she’d caught sight of his name in the paperwork, hence why she’d decided to do the meeting herself and become involved in the case.
But this? No, this couldn’t be happening. Tywin couldn’t possibly be… She couldn’t possibly be…
And then, a ghost of a smile played at his lips. “This is going to be quite the case,” he said.
“We should get down to business,” she replied tersely, sitting down behind the table.
Tywin nodded his head and let the door fall shut behind him. “Of course.” He set his briefcase on top of the table and sat down in the seat across from her, his gaze intense and unforgiving (and yet she thought she saw a glint of curiosity and maybe even uncertainty in his green eyes, just as he was sure to see them in hers). “I’m all about business, as you’ll soon find out.”
Well, she was going to find out one way or another, she supposed.