“Ned,” she remarked with surprise in her voice, absently taking the cup of water he offered. Maybe it was because the edges of her vision were taking on a funny quality that she did not immediately recognize him, but his presence brought her a significant degree of relief all the same. Lyanna managed to let a smile peek through her discomfort, albeit the fact that it was a little sardonic. “I might not be able to help it,” she replied, gulping in as much air as she could in the process. Perspiration was beading the skin on her forehead, but she was fighting off the urge to slide down against the nearest wall with everything that she had. Lyanna thought a little distractedly that maybe her brother was right after all.
As her body learned to adjust within the constraints of the overly tight garment, her vision began to clear and she managed to take a better look at Ned. He appeared to her just like he always had, although similar to her, he was not wearing his usual Northern garb. His southern clothes were in the Stark colours and Lyanna thought with no small amount of resentment that he definitely seemed more comfortable in it than she was in hers. The acrimony, of course, was not directed at her brother but to the person unknown to her who took it in their hands to decide this unbalanced way of things.
“At this moment, I only wish I felt like it, too.” Her slender fingers traced the bodice of her gown, feeling the rich fabric ripple under her hands. It was beautiful, and she suspected that she looked beautiful in it, almost like she belonged in this place where everyone seemed to be beautiful at all times, but even a dress as handsome as this one could not disguise her wolf-blood, and she had no desire for it to. “Beautiful things always come at a steep price, it seems.” Lyanna looked down at herself with a frown, breathing shallow breaths and trying not to move too much. She turned her attention back at Ned with an inquisitive groove appearing between her brows. “If I never go back inside and decide to run back to my quarters instead, do you think they’ll notice I’m gone?”
“Take my arm if you need,” Ned said, offering her his elbow. “I’ll keep you standing, at the very least.”
He misliked his sister’s color. She looked hot and sick, stuffed into that dress like a miserable sausage. The heat of every noble body in the hall did not seem to care that it was winter. Even he was sweating under it--he misliked all the eyes, too, and all the obsequious smiling and scraping. He imagined high mountain air and the strange silence of the Eyrie, unlike anything here. There was no hearing the clamor of people that high up, even should they be nearby. Gods, that sounded like peace. He was ready to quit the Red Keep entirely.
“We must stay,” Ned said, grimly--but because it was Lyanna, he let her see how very weary he was to bear up the burden of representing their house to strangers who did not care about him or her or anything except what they could get from them. “Otherwise we do an injustice to both the hospitality of crown and the name Stark.”
