milliways_bar | (no subject)

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Sansa comes downstairs, in a long dress of black lambswool. A cloak is slung over one arm - someone's planning to go for a walk after breakfast.

She sits at Bar, orders some porridge and milk, and begins eating. As she eats, she watches the crowd. It's such habit that she doesn't notice anything new until her porridge is almost gone.

Sansa sees the Door.

A startled motion tips her glass of milk, which thunks against the bartop and spills its contents onto the floor.

"Oh." If she can speak, this means this isn't a dream. You can't speak the words you want to in dreams. "Oh."

The Door.

For a time, Sansa sits on her stool, motionless. Then she begins wiping away small, stray tears.

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"Sor--" she begins, then smiles ruefully. "A habit - one I have to keep close to me outside the Door." See, she's apologizing in order to survive! That makes it all okay.

"It took me a long time to ask all this, didn't it?" she announces after a moment.

Makes it understandable, maybe. But not okay.

Sam grins at her. "It did, at that. And I don't mind telling."

"I am always so worried that I am asking the wrong thing," Sansa confesses. "I try not to offend others, you see.

She tries to piece things together. "I hope you don't ever do what your father wishes you to do. It seems like it will not be a good thing."

Her father even accepted her bastard half-brother, Jon. Fathers who let their kids get kicked out? Not so great in her book.

"Yeah, you're not the only one, Sansa. Suffice it to say that no, it really, really won't be good, at all."

Headtilt. "Well, I don't know what it's like for you in your world, but you really don't need to worry so much about offending people here, at least." And a sideways grin. "Takes a lot more than the odd question to offend me."

"I could have stood to question people more in my land, too," Sansa mutters, with a glance at the Door. There are a lot of memories waiting for her to open them, few of them comforting.

Which is why we're focusing on Sam!

"But your illusion-magics could cloak you from his gazr, correct?"

He shakes his head.

"No. Nothing can. Except... I'm doubtful if his influence stretches into the Bar. Which is perhaps why I'm so fond of the place."

One of the reasons, anyway. There's at least two others.

"Ah, so he knows you are here but cannot influence you," Sansa replies with a short nod.

Almost like herself with her enemies - or that's how she used to think, back when she thought of Tyrion as an enemy.

"You have lived some time, correct?" Sansa asks, some confusion in her tone. She's aware that she might be thinking of someone else.

"That's what I hope, anyway. It's not entirely possible to tell as of yet."

Sam sips his coffee. "You could say that, yes. Why?"

The girl sighs, running both hands through her hair.

Her voice is soft, a touch sad, her expression hard to tell, for she's looking at his handkerchief which rests in her lap.

"I thought I knew people - knew the world - once. I was wrong and...many things followed from my mistakes. If you have lived long, you must know people. What are they like, Sam? Truly like, beyond the songs?"

Sam thinks about this.

Thoughtfully, "People are... complicated. Some are good, and some are bad, but most of them are somewhere in-between, neither truly good nor truly bad. They're a mass of petty sins and good intentions. Individually they're often wildly unpredictable, but it's usually simple to say what a group will do. And important people, or people who believe themselves important, are rarely what they appear."

Sansa raises her gaze to look at Sam.

Petyr's words come, strong after months of ignoring them. Everyone wants something, Alayne. And when you know what a man wants you know what he is, and how to move him.

She smiles grimly. "Good intentions - I know them well. I was a stupid little girl. A piece in the game. That was why the important people never noticed me. It is good to be overlooked, but dangerous to be always as you appear, whether you are important or not."

Though her voice is distant, trapped in the past, she does realize she's speaking out loud. How will Sam react, she wonders.

He eyes her for a moment. And then grins wryly.

"True enough. Trick is to learn where you go wrong. You'd be amazed- or perhaps not- how many don't." Something in his tone suggests he approves of her, though.

Sansa brightens. That's the apple-polishing part of her, hungry for approval as ever.

"Trusting completely in songs and stories - I know that as a fault, now." She looks at the Door again, a strength in her azure gaze that wasn't there before. She's not entirely sure she knows what life is, beyond the songs, but Sam's words will help.

"Someday I will repay you your kindness, Sam," she says, turning back to him, a soft smile on her pretty face.

Sam grins, properly this time. "It's not mandatory, you know."

"It is if one wishes to do the right thing," Sansa replies easily. She glances at her spilled milk and mops it up - not fully, since they have servants here for a reason.

Then she straightens, taking a breath to steel herself as she does so. "There is a world that is waiting for me - more as a piece than a player, for the moment, but waiting for me nonetheless.

"May I keep this?" she asks, holding up the handkerchief. "For as long as it will hold?"

"The trick, Miss Sansa, is to make them believe you're a piece when you're really a player. And I can do better than that for you."

Sam grins, and produces another with a flick of the wrist, which he offers. "Real ones are much more useful, aren't they?"

Sansa instinctively knows that, but it's good to hear someone say it. She desperately needs to sort out her thoughts.

Sansa blinks and gives a light gasp at the display. "I'll miss the magic here," she says wistfully as she takes it.

A demure smile. "Not as much as I will miss those who have it." She pretends to examine the handkerchief, glancing up at him through lowered eyelids, shy and coy at once.

Sam shakes his head at her. "And who's to say you won't be back?"

"...Whoever controls these things," Sansa says uncertainly. "And things might be greatly changed when I return."

She glances at Bar. She should start writing notes. But not before saying good bye.

Sansa doesn't hug men. But she does smile and give him a curtsey. "I have some affairs that need to be set right, sir Sam. Thank you for everything."

"They might be," Sam agrees, "But it's just as likely that they won't be."

He smiles back. "You're welcome, Miss Sansa." And bows in return.

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