Fffc Regular Challenge r18.08 - None shall pass

[m_findlow]

Title: None shall pass
Fandom: Game of Thrones
Characters: Torchwood team
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 621 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for Regular Challenge r18.08 - Bridge at fffc
Summary: Arya has big plans to defy the South.

Arya pulled up her horse just shy of the stone monolith. It didn't look nearly as imposing as the first time she'd come here. The Twins. House of House Frey. Or at least it had been, before she'd come and destroyed it. The thought still gave her a little tingle of pleasure, watching as Old Walder Frey saw his entire family poisoned before his eyes. Every Frey of any import had been there that night. Only it wasn't Walder Frey that watched them. It had been her, Arya Stark, come to claim her vengeance for the murders of her brother Robb and her mother Catelyn.

'We should destroy it,' she said, gazing out across the River Trident from atop her horse. 'Cut off all passage to the North.'

'And what happens when the Northmen need to travel south?' Brienne asked her.

She wasn't quite what Arya counted as a travelling companion, but it was what Sansa had given her. She supposed she should consider it fortunate Sansa let her travel at all, let alone south. She had duties however, firstly to reclaim the allegiance of every Northern House that has allied itself against House Stark, and secondly to ensure that there were no rabble armies left to pillage the countryside. She'd take her sword to any Bolton, Greyjoy, or Karstark that dared to defy her. Those that underestimated her would pay the ultimate price.

She hated this bridge with every fiber of her being. It didn't matter that there was no one left to man the two towers that stood at each end of it, and that whatever minor cousins and half cousins of Freys that had survived had fled and gone into hiding. The towers would ever be their sigil even after all of that House had died out.

'What of Riverrun to the south?' she asked Brienne.

'Captured by the Lannisters,' she said.

'And what of House Tully?' She knew none of her mother's family, but their House was a valuable asset south of the Green Fork.  

'Your Uncle Edmure conceded the castle to them to save his own skin.'

'A coward,' Arya replied. She'd rather die that give up so much as a single blade of grass to the Lannisters.

'It was done with very little bloodshed,' Brienne said.

'They should have held out,' Arya replied.

'Ser Jaime gave them the option of a peaceful surrender.' Brienne hoped that it had remained that way.

Arya didn't want to hear anything more about Jaime Lannister. She tugged on the reins and set her horse toward the broken gates, hearing the sharp clop of hooves on the hard cobblestones. It hardly looked like a fortress anymore, abandoned and unmanned. She came out through the other side of the tower's courtyard and found herself at the beginnings of the bridge. She kicked the horse's flanks and set it off at a gallop across the stone until she was all the way across, pulling up her mare sharply.

She smiled to herself, having made the crossing without event. No more Starks would have to promise themselves to the sons and daughters of Freys in order to cross the river. She had ensured that.

'I am Arya Stark and I claim the Twins in the name of House Stark and the North,' she said no no one but herself. Jon's war might have been with the North, but she would be sending a raven to Winterfell this evening to request men to fortify the towers and ensure that no Lannister ever dared cross into the North again. Winterfell might be her true home, but Sansa was its rightful lady. This bridge would be hers and she would be Lady Arya of the Twins.