Chapter Text
The air was cold in White Harbor, as it was all around the year, the sea bringing the freezing winds into the city and with it into New Castle. There, a woman dressed in black velvet sat on her bed, staring out the window at the snow laying itself over the city like a white blanket. Her eyes were glazed with tears waiting to fall down her cheeks, but she wouldn't let them. She had spend enough days and weeks crying and cursing at the gods, whichever would listen, for everything that had happened in the last months. Her husband dead and without an heir she couldn't provide him with, Victaria found herself feeling abandoned up in a land she had learned to like but had never had quite fit in. She had always missed her home, but especially in this trying time she found herself longing for Highgarden, the warm spring days and the smell of flowers.
A knock interrupted the silence, followed by a quiet, mousy voice that sounded through the thick wood door. "My Lady, a letter has arrived for you." A letter again. She had gotten many in the past weeks, most of her family trying to keep her spirited in this time of loss and some of her old companions, sending their condolences. She was sick of these letters, were they always filled with the same sentences: I'm so very for your loss. How can I help you in those hard h ours? But nobody could or would help, that was the jest. Because Victaria was thousands of miles away from those people, up in the North, where even the spring mornings were filled with snow.
"You may come in." The heavy door opened with a defening queak, behind it a servant girl who then hurried in with hasty steps, her shaky hands holding a thin envelope, a gold flower stamp on it. Why would there be another letter from her family so soon, had the last one just last week? Was there other important news that her father wasn't able to write in the other one? She stretched her hand out to the girl who handed her the envelope.
"Lord Manderly has received the same letter." The information struck Victaria in the face, a puzzling look settled in her face. She took the letter and opened it quickly, intereste in what news this may contain that it was so important to send to the Lord of White Harbor as well.
My little Flower, the letter started and the woman knew immediately from whom it was from. Only one man had ever named her that, and that was her father.
I fear that my last two letters may have brought you little comfort, though I had hoped they might ease even a small part of what you carry. Words feel poor things when set against grief, and I know well that none I send can change what has come to pass. Still, I could not remain silent, and so I wrote, even knowing it might not be enough.
You have been much in my thoughts of late. More so now, when I know you must bear this loss in a place that was never truly your own. You are, of course, still in mourning, and I would not have you cast that aside before you are ready. Grief does not lessen because we wish it to.
Yet I cannot help but wonder whether remaining where every corner must remind you of what has been lost does you any kindness.
As you know, my duties keep me in King’s Landing, and your youngest siblings remain here with me. They speak of you often, more than they perhaps show, and I know they would find great joy in seeing you again. As would I.
I have spoken with the King, and he has received the thought of your joining us with warmth. There is little that binds you to White Harbor now, though I do not write that lightly. Still, I would have you consider whether a change of place might allow you to breathe more freely.
I have written as well to Lord Torrhen, so that he is aware of this and no discourtesy is given in the asking. This is not a summons, nor a command. It is only an invitation, and the choice remains yours, as it should be.
Take the time you need.
But know this, my sweet girl: you are missed, and you have a place here, should you wish to return to it.
Send word when you are ready.
With all my love,
Leo Tyrell
Her breath hitched as the tears she had held in for so long slowly ran down her cheeks. Her free hand rested on her stomach slowly, a sting in her chest. There is little that binds you to White Harbor now. It was true of course, her marriage to Lord Domeric had never resulted in an heir, not a child to continue her late husbands line. It had been her, the maesters had said, who wouldn't receive the child, her fault that she marriage had remained fruitless. She had always asked herself if it had been the fact that there was no love between them that made them unable to conceive, but then she thought back to her parents marriage and her mother, who had born six children in ten years, without a single affection between them in sight. So the maesters must have been right, it was all her fault.
But after all those hardships and pain, she still had a hard time coming to accept her fathers offer. After five years away she had slowly learned to accept White Harbor and its cold winds for what they were, even though it had taken time. And her husband had never been unkind to her, sometimes even respected her, had asked her opinion in things. And that had made everything else that happened mor bearable. And then there was his borther, Torrhen, the new Lord of New Castle, who had been her only friend here, who had made her laugh, who had jestered with her. Would he be dissappointed if she left? Would he want her to stay here? She didn't know.
"Are you alright my Lady?" The servants unsure voice rung her out of her mind, her hand quickly moving from her belly to her face to wipe away her tears.
"Yes, of course. I just need to be alone." The girl nodded, before falling in a short curtsy and leaving the chamber. Victaria settled back down on her bed, her thoughts railing with the words of her fathers letter. She would need some time to reach a decision, but still, her mind now filled with images of her siblings, standing before the gate of Highgarden, waving her off on her journey north. How would they look today? The question lingered, and so when night dawned, her decision was final.
The hall of New Castle was grand, mosaics covering the walls and the floor, depicting images of merman and their paramounts. Rich seagreen beamed at the Lady stepping through it, her goal set before her. Lord Torrhen Manderly sat upon the dais, watching his two sons play with wooden toys in front of him, while his courtiers were gathered around him, talking about ships coming in with goods from all across the realm. But his eyes remained infront of him at the twin boys, Medrick and Desmond, who were his pride and joy since their birth. Victarias stomach turned at the sight of it, her mind trailing towards a bitter thought. Her children should have been sitting there, her and her late husband’s offspring, bearing his name, securing her place, giving shape to a future that had never come to pass. But she pushed that thought quickly out of her mind, as she reminded herself that Torrhen was her friend, and she should not turn her pain against him.
When she reached the dais, she curtsied before the Lord of New Castle. "Lord Torrhen, I would like to have a word with you."
The man looked up from his children, meeting Victaria with a kind smile, kinder than any she had known those last years. "Of course." He stood up from his seat. “You may leave us alone, this is a matter of family,” he said to his men, who all hurried out of the hall one after another, their voices fading until only the quiet presence of the children and the echo of the vast room remained.
"How have you been? I haven't seen you in over a week, but I also have been busy." He walked over to his good sister, his demeanor slowly changing from one filled with happiness to one with sorrow. He lost his brother too after all, and even though they haven't been as close given their age difference, the late Lord Domeric already fifty and four at the time of his death while his younger brother held the age of thirty and two, he griefed as well.
"I have been fine mostly, thank you my Lord. I just required some time alone in those last few weeks. I have been to the godswood a few times, to pray." They had begun walking toward the exit of the hall, their steps slow and measured.
"You and your queer habit of going to the godswood. I think, by the Gods, I will never understand it, as we were both taught the Faith of the Seven and to pray in a sept, were we not?" This was not entirely true, and she knew it, but she had stopped trying to explain it to him a long time ago, because she had come to understand that it was not something he wished to understand, and so she left it at that. He only nodded at her answer, accepting it without pressing further, as they left the grand hall and walked along the corridor, where faded banners hung from the ceilings and rusted swords were secured to the thick walls, remnants of a past that lingered even as time moved on.
"Well you know, I just enjoy it more to pray in the nature than in a sept, it feels like the Seven are closer to me when there is no rood above me." This was not entirely true, but she had stopped explaining this to him a long time ago, as she felt he didn't want to understand it. He just nodded at her answer, as they left the grand hall and walked along a corridor. There were faded banners hanging from the ceilings and rusted swords secured to the thick walls.
"There is a motivation for my talk with you my Lord." She had started fidgeting with the hem of her sleeves, the small, restless movement betraying the nerves she could not entirely still, no matter how composed she wished to appear.
"I already received a letter, and I suppose you have an answer for the question your father has posed." This was more an assessment than a question, though there had been no disappointment in Lord Torrhen’s voice, no resistance, only a quiet acknowledgment that the moment had always been coming. Victaria felt her confidence steady at that realization, as though his acceptance allowed her to stand firmer in her own choice.
"I have. I want to travel to Kings Landing, so I may join my father at court. I have missed him terribly and my siblings also. And he was right, there is nothing really that keeps me here." The words felt heavier once spoken aloud, more final than they had within her thoughts, as though saying them had turned possibility into certainty.
"Not even my friendship?" The Lord jested, making Victaria release a chuckle, though there was something beneath it, something softer that lingered for just a moment longer than the humor itself. "I am deeply hurt now." Lord Torrhen made a dramatic gesture that symbolized a broken heart, and at that a laugh escaped the woman opposite him, freer than she had expected, surprising even herself in how easily it came after weeks of silence and restraint. She hadn’t laughed in weeks, and now it felt so effortless that it unsettled her slightly, because it reminded her that there had been something here worth missing, perhaps not the place itself, but the presence of the man before her.
But he quickly turned back to the conversation, as though he too understood that lingering in that moment would make what followed more difficult. “You will get a ship as soon as you want, and only the best men to steer it. And a knight will be sent with you, for your wellbeing of course. I hope that is to your liking, Victaria.” Her name came from his lips with a softness that had not been there before, something quieter, almost careful, and she could not help but wonder whether there was a part of him that wished she would choose differently.
“Thank you, Torrhen.” She returned his name just as quietly, the familiarity of it carrying something unspoken between them, something that had grown in the spaces of shared laughter and quiet understanding and now stood at the edge of being left behind. “I will be ready on the morrow, I want to travel swiftly.”
“Of course. Then everything shall be ready. But I have one request. You must bring a letter with you, an answer for the King, that I won’t make it to the young Prince’s wedding festivities. There is still much to manage here, and I cannot leave the matters of White Harbor in others hands just yet.”
At the mention of a wedding, something within Victaria shifted in a way she could not quite name, her thoughts catching on the word as though it held more weight than it should, drawing her mind toward images she had not allowed herself to linger on in years, of warmth and light and halls filled with music instead of silence, of a union celebrated rather than endured. Her own wedding rose unbidden beside it, quieter, colder, shaped not by joy but by duty, by expectation spoken over her rather than chosen, and she found herself unsettled by the contrast, by the realization that she could not remember what it might feel like for such a moment to belong to her rather than to the role she had been made to fill.
She steadied herself quickly, forcing the thought back into place before it could take root any deeper, unwilling to let it grow into something dangerous, into longing or resentment or anything that might follow her south if she allowed it, because she had made her choice already and would not weaken it now by looking too closely at what had been or what might have been. “Yes, of course, my Lord,” she said, her voice composed and even, carrying none of the quiet disturbance that lingered beneath it. “I will take the letter.”