Jaqen x Smallfolk!reader.
Reader always instinctively knows Jaqen, even when he's taken a different name or face, which is why he keeps coming back.
Reader is an orphan, but an adult. Her profession is probably seamstress or town healer.
I don't know if that's enough details, but that's about as much as my mind will come up with. Sorry if it's not enough.
Thank you either way. Big fan of your blog!
The Girl Who Saw
Requests are closed
- Summary: He would always return and you would always know it was him. No matter what face he wears.
- Pairing: smallfolk!reader/Jaqen H’ghar
- Rating: Mature 16+
- Tag(s): @sachaa-ff @oxymakestheworldgoround @idenyimimdenial
- A/N: Due to lack of information this short story only has 960 words.
The bell above your shop door jingles softly, a silver chime that barely cuts through the hum of your needle gliding through linen. You don’t look up right away—not until you’ve finished the last stitch on the hem, biting the thread cleanly between your teeth. The light in the doorway is strange, distorted as if the sun were unsure how to shine on whoever stands there. But even before your eyes lift, before you glimpse the stranger’s silhouette, something curls in your chest like a waking cat. Recognition. Instinct. You always know. No matter the name he gives, the color of his eyes, the bend of his smile—it’s always him.
When you finally glance up, he is already watching you.
He’s different this time. Not the sly Lorathi with red and white hair, not the gaunt merchant with dull eyes and a limp. Now, he’s taller, broader across the shoulders. His face is dark, weathered by sun and wind, with a soldier’s stoic mouth and a jagged scar that cuts through his left brow. A northern sellsword, by the look of him. Rough leathers, old steel. Nothing like the others. And yet... your heart stutters, all the same.
“Can I help you?” you ask, voice casual, hands busy folding the small tunic you’d been mending. You give no sign that you know him. Not yet.
“A cloak,” he says, stepping inside. His voice is deeper now, rougher — but not enough. “For the cold. This one was told a girl here makes them well.”
You hum, tilting your head as you examine him. “Plenty of girls make cloaks. You came a long way just to find one.”
The man smiles—and there it is. Not the expression itself, but the delay. The fraction of a second where he shifts behind his mask, adjusting to a role that does not fit quite right. It’s always that moment that gives him away.
“You’ll want wool, then,” you continue, as if nothing inside you is clawing forward. You gesture toward a folded bolt of dark green cloth. “Strong, tightly spun. Keeps out the wind.”
He approaches the counter, silent steps that echo nothing. “That will do,” he says.
You begin cutting without asking for measurements. You already know what size he wears. “What name do you go by today?” you ask softly, your scissors slicing through fabric like whispers through air.
The silence that follows is thick and stifling. You hear it in the way his breath pauses. When he speaks again, it’s careful, measured. “A man does not understand the question.”
You smile faintly, eyes still on the cloth. “Don’t you, though?”
He says nothing.
“Last time, you called yourself Rorik. Before that, you were Tomas. And before that… gods, what was it? Harnel? No, that was in Gulltown.” You look up finally, pinning him with your gaze. “It doesn’t matter. I always know. Always.”
There’s a flicker in his expression then—not fear, not even surprise. It’s something stranger. Curiosity, yes. But also something rarer for him: uncertainty.
“You are clever,” he says, quietly. Almost to himself. “Too clever, perhaps.”
You shrug. “I don’t try to be. I just… feel you. Even if you change everything, the way you look, the way you speak—something inside you stays the same. Maybe it’s your soul.”
He chuckles at that, though it’s a dry, strange sound. “A man has no soul.”
You narrow your eyes. “Don’t tell lies. Not here. Not to me.”
He watches you in silence, and for once, he doesn’t have the upper hand. You’ve unsettled him. You see it in the way his hands flex slightly, the faint twitch of his brow. And yet, he’s drawn in closer—not retreating, not leaving. He never does.
“Why do you keep coming back?” you ask, setting the half-finished cloak aside. “Is it me you’re looking for, or do you just want to see if you can fool me this time?”
He doesn’t answer right away. Then, “A man is not supposed to be known. Not this way.”
“Well,” you say, softly, stepping around the counter to face him, “maybe a man isn’t supposed to linger in the same dream more than once. And yet, here you are.”
He breathes out, as if your words strike somewhere too close. “You should not know. No one ever does.”
“But I do.”
You reach up then, not to touch him—not quite. Your fingers hover near his jaw, and his eyes track the movement like a predator who suddenly realizes he’s been cornered. Your voice is a murmur now, intimate. “You wear a hundred faces. But when you look at me, it’s always the same eyes. Always the same shadow behind them.”
He leans into your hand then, just a breath—no more than that. But it’s enough.
“You could name me,” he says. “And unmake what I am.”
You shake your head. “I would never.”
He studies you for a long, quiet moment. The mask wavers. And for the first time, you think you see a glimpse of the real man—the one beneath all the names, the faces, the assassin’s creed. Tired. Lonely. Searching for something even he doesn’t understand.
“Then why do you let me play this game?”
“Because I like watching you lose,” you whisper, smiling gently. “And because… even when you try to hide from me, you always come back.”
His lips twitch into something that almost resembles warmth. “Yes,” he says. “A man does.”
You don’t finish the cloak that day. He stays longer than he should, sitting by your hearth as the shadows lengthen, and though he never gives you a real name, for once, he doesn’t try to be anyone else.
