cmk418 | Game of Thrones - Arya Stark

For

murielle who wanted Arya to receive a raven from HotPie

The raven swooped out of the sky and landed on the deck of the boat. Arya sighed. Part of the reason she wanted to travel was to escape from the politics and drama that plagued Winterfell and the Six Kingdoms.

Ravens flew West of Westeros though and it seemed someone was always sending her a missive.

(Never Jon, unfortunately, and she didn't want to think about that.)

An unfamiliar scrawl lined the page. Dear 'Arry, it read, and that narrowed the potential writers down considerably. I hope this letter finds you well. I would have liked to have sent a slice of kidney pie along with it, but I fear the bird would not have been able to get off the ground to find you. Arya laughed out loud, heart soaring a bit at the thought of her friend trying something like that. She was glad that HotPie had survived everything, that there were people out there, ordinary people, not Lords or Ladies or monarchs or soldiers, that had been free of the chaos, unaffected by the Army of the Dead or the tyranny of a Mad Queen. It gave her hope that perhaps one day she could live such a life.

Never entirely free, of course, but a life she could sink into given enough time.

For now, the waves and unexplored lands ahead were a comfort. She glanced at HotPie's letter again. Things at home are much the same. Gendry comes to the Inn every fortnight or so. I have tried to make bread in the shape of a stag, but can never get the antlers just right. She giggled at the thought of HotPie specializing in making bread in shapes of the sigils of all the Great Houses. He never asks about you, but I sense he hopes I will one day say I've laid eyes on you.

Arya sighed and stretched out, letter clutched in her hand, staring at the sky, feeling the wooden planks of the boat firm beneath her back. She could have been a Lady, she could have been Gendry's lady, or a knight like Brienne, and served under Sansa at Winterfell, but all those were prescribed roles, once settled in, they were inescapable.

Better to be forging her own path, to be anyone and no one, Arya and 'Arry, ever changing with the tide.