The snow is piling down in Winterfell beneath a dreary sun as it begins to sink below the horizon. The sheen off of the snow is tinted a pale pink with the fading light and Sansa keeps her gaze averted downward to avoid any prying eyes as she leads her horse through the gates of the town. Her body is covered head to toe in a thick fur coat, boots, and a hood, but somehow she still feels revealed and vulnerable, even with the dagger sheathed firmly on her belt. No one dares to speak to her about everything that had happened but she can feel the guards watching as she pulls up her mare at the exit of the town to a halt so that she can mount up. The horse is as white as the landscape before it and Sansa strokes her palm softly down the animal’s neck before pressing her heels to its sides and moving off at a brisk pace down the path towards the outer villages.
It has been 12 days, just over a week, since she was broken free from Ramsay’s grasp but each time she closes her eyes, she can still feel his grip snaked around her as strong as ever and it makes every muscle in her body tense. Even with Jon now ruling Winterfell, her months held prisoner have erased any feeling of it being home and replaced all her warm memories with harsh ones, violent ones, memories that she tries hard to bury.
Sansa shakes her head lightly and a few strands of red hair escape from her hood to flutter across her cheeks, blushed from the cold. She refuses to let memories overwhelm her right now. She is safe, she has to remind herself. The barking of a dog is not Ramsay’s hounds, it is merely a pet. The yelling from the town is not a cry of fear, it is merely children playing. Swallowing down a lump in her throat, Sansa lets out a deep breath and rides forward steadily towards the little town she had been recommended to visit.
The cold feels numb against her skin and the girl is so lost in her own mind that it doesn’t seem to take much time at all before the chatter of life becomes louder around her and she is arriving in the small village on the outskirts of Winterfell. It seems to be a relatively poor area but Sansa is certain that she had heard of a reputable healer in the area. There are those within the castle walls but those nurses have known Sansa for years. She would never want them to see her how she is now so battered and broken. Her blue eyes look around carefully and she slows her horse to a walk until they come across a little house on the edges of the town with a small sign in front of it that reads of a healing and tailoring service. She knows that the sun will be setting soon and she fiddles nervously with her hands, hoping she isn’t too late to arrive. Sansa swings her leg over the saddle and dismounts slowly, hearing the crunch of her boots against the snow. She wraps her mare’s reins under the cover of a large oak tree and with that, approaches the door and knocks several times, still occasionally gazing over her shoulder as if she expects to be recognized or have someone jump out at her. When a woman comes to open the door, Sansa clasp her hands behind her back and averts her gaze back to the floor.
“ I know it is getting late and I hope I am not interrupting anything but I was wondering if someone might be able to help me with some injuries I have recently acquired? ” She swallows hard and tucks her coat more firmly around herself.
