Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/3997117.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      F/M
  Fandom:
      A_Song_of_Ice_and_Fire_-_George_R._R._Martin
  Relationship:
      Meera_Reed/Bran_Stark
  Character:
      Bran_Stark, Jojen_Reed, Meera_Reed, Hodor
  Additional Tags:
      ASoIaF, Romance, One_Shot
  Stats:
      Published: 2015-05-24 Chapters: 1/? Words: 5784
****** Bran and Meera (fragment) ******
by HecticWaffles
Summary
     As Bran, Hodor and the Reeds travel North to the Wall and beyond, the
     young Prince of Winterfell begins to come to terms with his feelings
     for the older girl, in a fanciful take on what might have happened
     between the lines of a Storm of Swords and a Dance with Dragons. A
     work in progress.
     ***Update*** Inspiration has, for now, returned, and I am retreading
     old ground. I have, at the least, finished the scene that had been so
     abruptly cut off, and am now doing research through the books for
     material for the next bit. This never was the most polished piece,
     but new stuff is even less so. ***End Update***
     ***Warning***This story has had an explicit rating since it was
     started for a reason.***End Warning***
Bran huddled in the corner of the large chamber on the holdfast's fifth floor.
His useless legs were splayed haphazardly out from under the warmth of his
cloak when he stirred himself awake from his fitful sleep. Outside the tower,
the storm had since abated, but Hodor hadn't yet ceased his frightened
whimpering to fall asleep like the rest of them had.
Only an hour ago, the wildlings in the torn-down inn had melted away into the
rain-washed darkness, clearly fearful that Jon would bring groups of Northmen
or the Night's Watch down upon them. Bran had tried several times to reach out
for Summer, but the red-hot pain that he felt there kept driving him back into
his own skin. He had finally given up, and curled up to sleep next to Meera and
Jojen, but something had awakened him again.
At first he thought it was a noise from outside the tower. Perhaps Summer had
crossed the causeway and howled at the tower from the island below. Bran
listened intently, too afraid to reach for the direwolf again, but all he heard
were Meera and Jojen's quiet breathing, and Hodor's whimpered hodors.
Slowly, an insistent feeling crept up from Bran's nethers, and with a wince, he
realized what it was that had awakened him. He eyed the privy chamber that
resided clear across the chamber from where they had slept. With his useless
legs, the privy might as well be in the inn outside and across the causeway.
Sighing, Bran quietly called out to Hodor. "Hodor, I need to go."
The large stable boy looked up abruptly at Bran when he spoke, but shrank back
as if afraid Bran meant to strike him. Instead, he simply shook his head, and
whispered, "Hodor."
Bran felt himself growing annoyed. Ever since he had reached for Hodor to stop
him yelling during the lightning, the stable boy shrank away from him as though
he were afraid that Bran might try it again.
Bran didn't care. If it wasn't for the call of nature, Hodor could sit there
hodoring all night if he wanted. "Hodor!" Bran whispered, even louder this
time, jerking a pointed finger in the direction of the privy. "I have to go."
Hodor simply shook his head and hid his face in his arms. Bran sighed again. He
looked doubtfully at the two crannogmen sleeping next to him. He hadn't wanted
to wake either of them, but if he had to pick, he knew which one he'd prefer.
"Jojen," he called out, as he shook the older boy by the shoulder.
Jojen Reed stirred from his slumber and sat up. "What is it, are the wildlings
back?" The blond boy started to reach for Meera but Bran quickly stopped him.
"No, I just have to go, and Hodor won't help me." Bran could feel his face get
hot, but fortunately it was too dark for Jojen to see it.
Understanding dawned on Jojen quickly, and he nodded quietly. Getting to his
feet, the crannogman wrapped his arms around Bran, and lifted. Or tried to.
Bran was almost as tall as Jojen, and almost as heavy, even with his useless
legs. The other boy did his best, but he was slender and short, and Bran was
even heavier with his warmest clothes on. Panting from the effort, Jojen even
tried to drag Bran across the uneven floor towards the distant privy chamber,
but the floor was too broken and irregular. Finally Jojen sat down next to
Bran, and whispered at Hodor himself.
Hodor looked up at Jojen's call, but when his eyes met Bran's, he shook his
head and buried his face once again.
Jojen looked apologetically at Bran, and whispered, "You're going to have to
wake Meera."
Bran felt his face grow even hotter. He wanted to say no, but he certainly
didn't want to wet himself. Before he could make a decision, however, Meera was
already sitting up.
"I'm awake, what's the matter?"
Jojen hesitated, and looked over at Hodor, so Bran had to come out and say it
out loud, to Meera. "I have to go."
Meera looked puzzled for a moment, but Jojen leaned in, "Hodor won't help him.
I guess he's still afraid from the storm."
Meera looked over at the privy chamber across the room, nodded, and quickly
knelt by Bran, and wrapped him in her arms, lifting him with some difficulty
from the floor.
Bran felt humiliated. It was the first time Meera had ever carried him, and he
would have traded anything for it to have been for a different reason. The
older girl made her careful way across the rough floor of the tower chamber,
and nudged the door to the privy open with her foot. She set Bran gingerly down
onto the seat, and stood back. "Do you...do you need any help?"
Bran's face felt like it was on fire as he shook his head. The last thing in
the world that he wanted was Meera unlacing his breeches. The thought of it
made him feel uncomfortable. and he was already feeling uncomfortably tight
down there from holding it in. Meera smiled at him, and turned away from the
door, giving him some privacy.
Bran reached down and began unlacing his breeches, rushing his movements as an
unfamiliar feeling had been building up in his private parts. Once he had it
free, though, he was surprised. It was standing out from his body, hardened,
and pointing up towards his chest. It had an odd ache, almost like someone was
tugging on it. It hadn't done that very often before. Maybe once, when he'd
watched Osha, the wildling woman, climbing out of the spring in the godswood.
Tonight it had started when Meera lifted him off the floor and carried him
across the chamber. It had gotten worse when he thought of her unlacing his
breeches.
But worst of all, he still had to go. He tried to push himself downwards, to
direct the stream down the privy shoot to the water below, but found that it
wasn't cooperating. If he pushed it down, it would begin to hurt well before he
had it pointed in the right direction, and when he let it go, it simply sprang
back up to its original position. Bran was worried. Meera was standing only a
step or two away, and this was taking too long. He sighed in exasperation, as
he tried to lean his body forward enough. He nearly lost his balance, and bit
back a cry. He might be embarrassed now, but how bad would it be if he fell off
the privy seat with his breeches down?
Meera heard his gasp, and turned around, too quickly for Bran to stop her, "Is
everything alright?" she began, as Bran pushed himself back up into a sitting
position. Her eyes met his, then flicked down to where it was still standing,
straight and hard as an iron rod.
When her eyes dipped to it, Bran felt it give a little lurch. Meera's cheeks
grew red, and the older girl's eyes flicked up to his own, then down to it, and
back several times, before finally resting on Bran's forehead. "Are you sure
you don't need any, er, help, my prince?" Meera looked almost as uncomfortable
as he felt.
Bran shook his head again, and did his best to cover himself with his hands
until Meera turned away again. Then he tried any number of ways to get it
pointing the right way. More than once he felt like punching his useless legs,
but it wouldn't do any good. After a few desperate moments, it finally lost
some of its iron rigidity, and with a sigh of relief, Bran got it pointed the
right way, and unleashed a long and steady stream that seemed to last for a
long time.
When he was finished, and he had laced himself back up, he called out for
Meera. The older girl picked him up from the privy seat, and carried him
carefully back across the room to where Jojen and Hodor were both sleeping. A
stray shaft of moonlight shone on the older girl's face to reveal that she was
smiling.
* * *
Summer's dream was filled with blood and death. He saw Robb pierced by bolt
after bolt, saw his mother screaming in pain and clawing her face in agony. He
saw Arya ridden down by a huge man on a horse, and heard Grey Wind's piercing
cry of agony as he was stabbed through the bars of a cage.
Shouting, Bran wrestled himself free of his cloak, and pushed up into a sitting
position with his hands. The night was dark and cloudy, and the ground felt
hard and cold. Looming above him only a few leagues away, the Wall sat, dark
and threatening.
To his surprise, Bran felt cold, wet tears on his cheeks. His chest was
wracking with sobs. It had just been a bad dream, though, hadn't it? It
couldn't have been true. Meera had been sleeping next to him, her body warm and
close, but now she was sitting up, looking at him full of concern.
"What's the matter, Bran?" Meera began, but when she saw his body convulsing
with his sobs, she quickly wrapped her arms around him and pulled him close.
Bran buried his face into Meera's chest and allowed the sobbing to continue.
The dream had felt so real, but it couldn't have been. His mother, and Robb,
they had bannermen to protect them, trusty men of the North. But what about
Arya? What had she been doing there?
Meera was doing her best to gentle him, he knew, and slowly he began to feel
himself calming down. It wasn't my dream, he thought, it was Summer's. If he
hadn't dreamed it, then maybe it wasn't real. He tried to tell himself that. He
turned away from Meera and he heard Summer's heavy breath as the direwolf
padded up to him through the gloom. Summer had been off hunting, but something
had brought him back. Bran shivered again, as Summer came close, and began to
lick the tears from his face.
Jojen and Hodor were still asleep on the ground beside them. Bran's shouting
had only awakened Meera, who had been sleeping very close. As Summer lay down
at Bran's feet, he turned to look up into Meera's concerned face. He thought
about telling her all he had seen, but found he couldn't. Speaking it would
only make it real. Instead, he allowed her to pull him back into her embrace,
his own arms wrapping around her slender body as she stroked his hair with
gentle fingers.
When he had calmed down enough, he leaned back, and looked up gratefully into
Meera's concerned eyes. "It was just a dream," he assured her, feeling relieved
that he could say so. It was just a dream, wasn't it?
Meera seemed unconvinced, and still a little worried, and so she continued to
hold him close. Normally Bran would have resisted, but for now Meera's
closeness made him feel safe and secure.
For her part, Meera seemed unsure of what to say or do, so she simply held him.
Eventually, she began to speak, seemingly more to fill the silence than
anything else. "We'll be at the Wall tomorrow. And we'll find a way through,
you'll see.
"Not through the Night Fort..." Bran began, for the umpteenth time. There had
been a passage, long ago, but the Night's Watch had filled it in. He had told
Jojen and Meera over and over again, but Jojen was stubborn.
Meanwhile, Meera just gave Bran a knowing smile, and ruffled his hair. Bran
grinned, feeling better as he did whenever Meera smiled at him. When the older
girl hugged him to her chest again, he felt himself hardening behind his
breeches once again.
Bran sighed. It had been happening all the time now, ever since that night in
the holdfast. Mostly it happened when he was looking at Meera. When she climbed
a tree, or bent over to look at an animal track, especially when she smiled at
him. Oftentimes it would happen at night when they huddled together for warmth
under their cloaks. Since the holdfast, Bran usually tried to claim a spot next
to Meera when they slept, and she didn't seem to mind.
Now that they were both awake, and holding each other so close, Bran found that
he didn't want to go back to sleep. Instead, the tightness in his breeches
reminded him of that first night in the holdfast. Leaning back and peering up
at Meera, Bran asked the question he had been wondering about ever since.
"Meera, after the privy room, in the holdfast, why were you smiling so much?"
Meera seemed surprised by the question. It the dim moonlight, Bran saw her
cheeks turn rosy. "Um, well..." the Reed girl stuttered, "I guess I was happy
for you."
"Happy? Why happy?" Bran wanted to know.
"Well..." Meera hesitated for a very long time, then finally continued, "After
your accident, Maester Luwin couldn't be sure whether your...um...male parts
would work anymore. When Jojen and I reached Winterfell, we heard rumors that
you would never be able to have children, or, uh, love a woman." Meera was
blushing furiously now. "When I saw you in the privy, I realized that the
rumors weren't true, and I was happy for you."
Bran was taken aback. Was that all? "Oh, I suppose so. Though I don't see why
that would be so important."
Meera laughed softly and punched him in the shoulder, "You say that now, my
prince, but you'll be glad enough of it when you're wed."
Bran thought about that. He had always known that his father and mother would
one day find a match for him and his brothers. Robb would probably find a match
with some southron lady to strengthen Winterfell's alliances, but Bran was a
younger brother. He'd probably be married to a northern lady to help solidify
Robb's security at home. Bran had known all that, but he'd never cared about
it. He had thought much more about being a knight than he had about being a
lord, anyway.
But then, what would any of it matter now? He was going north of the Wall to
find the Three Eyed Crow, and he might never come back. And if he did, would
his mother still be alive to arrange a match for him? He looked at Meera, who
still had her arms around him. He decided he wouldn't mind so much if it was
Meera he had to marry, and he told her so.
Meera laughed again, "Oh come now Bran, I'm much older than you! By the time
you're old enough to marry, I'll be an old maid, hunting frogs in the Neck like
always. Your parents will probably wed you to someone closer to your age, like
Lyanna Mormont."
Bran grew annoyed when Meera started foisting him off on some Mormont girl he'd
never met. "You're only six years older than me. I could marry you if I
wanted!"
Meera's eyes danced, "It's closer to seven, and are you so sure? You wouldn't
mind when you're still in your prime, and I'm old and ugly and grey?"
Bran could tell that Meera was teasing him, and he was starting to get angry,
"No! You'll never be ugly, no matter how old you get! Besides, I'm the prince,
and I say you aren't too old for me!"
Meera's face grew solemn, "Why, my prince of Winterfell is so gallant. How
could I refuse to wed such a generous lord?"
Meera started laughing again, and Bran realized that she was only still
teasing. Furious, he tried to wriggle out of her embrace, but with his useless
legs the struggle was hopeless. Meera's laughter grew as she held him close
against his will. After a moment, she leaned forward and kissed his nose, then
released him. Bran rolled away, breathless, blushing, and annoyed, but somewhat
cowed by the unexpected kiss.
Meera laid back down on her side, and pulled her cloak over her slender body.
"Who knows, my prince, maybe one day you'll ask me to be your princess, and
I'll say yes."
She winked at him, and shut her eyes. Bran had no choice but to crawl back and
lean against her for warmth, hoping that the steely stiffness within his
breeches would soon subside and stop making every position so uncomfortable.
* * *
The Nightfort was even gloomier and more forbidding with everyone asleep, Bran
thought. The fire that Jojen had built in the middle of the Nightfort's
kitchens was beginning to die down, and the shadows that it cast on the walls
were becoming deeper and more strange.
Bran was still thinking about Mad Axe and the Rat Cook, and wishing that the
others hadn't fallen asleep so quickly. It was lonely, being the last one
awake, and being lonely in the Nightfort made things worse.
Beside him, Meera stirred. Her sleep had been fitful tonight, and she seemed to
be uncomfortable on the Nightfort's hard floors. Meera rolled onto her back,
her eyes remaining closed. Slowly and gently, Bran reached out and put a hand
on her cheek, feeling the smooth skin as the now-familiar tightness in his
breeches began to grow again.
Bran sighed. The stiffness down there was becoming a near constant companion.
Earlier today, while he and Jojen had watched Meera climbing the southern face
of the Wall, Bran had felt the familiar and uncomfortable tugging, and now was
no different.
Slowly, Meera's eyes opened and she smiled at Bran, before slowly sitting up.
"Are you having trouble sleeping, my prince?"
Bran nodded, as Meera bent to throw another of Hodor's logs on the fire. Bran
found that he couldn't help but stare at the subtle curves under her leathers.
He thought back to when he had seen Osha climbing out of the springs in the
godswood at Winterfell. Osha hadn't had curves like the Queen had when she had
visited Winterfell, and Meera looked like hers were even smaller, but Bran
still found himself wishing that he could see Meera climbing naked out of one
of Winterfell's warm springs. The thought of it made the stiffness in his
breeches give a desperate lurch.
Meera leaned back and winced as she turned to look at Bran, "Climbing the wall
wasn't anything like climbing a tree, my prince. I'm glad I got the chance to,
but my muscles aren't." Meera slowly sat back up leaned far forward over her
legs, her fingers reaching around the soles of her feet. "Maybe it wouldn't be
so bad if it wasn't so cold here, but I ache all over."
Bran watched Meera as she began to rub her legs vigorously with the palms of
her hands, every now and then wincing slightly. Bran edged closer to her, "Do
your legs hurt?"
Meera suddenly look abashed. She looked at his legs, then down at her own, "I'm
sorry Bran, I didn't mean to draw attention to..."
Bran shook his head fiercely, "It's alright. Can I help?"
Meera seemed surprised at Bran's request, but she smiled, took his hands in
hers, and guided them to her thighs. She pressed the palms of his hands deeply
into her flesh and showed him how to move them in small circles. Once he had
the motions down, Meera laid on her back, and shut her eyes.
Bran focused intently on his task, for once forgetting the uselessness in his
own legs. He moved his hands up and down the front of her thighs, while she let
out, every now and then, a small gasp or deep sigh.
"Bran, your hands are really strong." Meera managed to say.
For a moment, Bran thought he was hurting her, and he pulled his hands back,
but Meera pressed them back down onto her legs and nodded. Bran continued to
rub, moving his hands along the outside of her thighs, then climbing back
across them to the inside, between her legs. When his fingers neared her
private parts, Meera's hand leapt up to grab Bran's wrist. Her eyes opened, and
she looked at him quizzically.
Bran started to blush. He hadn't been planning on touching her there. He wasn't
a child. He was just trying to rub her thighs like she wanted, but now she was
going to think he was trying to touch her there.
Shaking her head no, Meera rolled onto her stomach. Bran wasn't sure if she
wanted him to continue, so he remained still for a moment. When Meera didn't
speak or move, Bran reached down and began rubbing the backs of her thighs.
Meera didn't stop him, and in fact, began to let out small moans as the palms
of his hands worked through the knotted muscles of her thighs and calves.
For his part, Bran was fascinated. He remembered the ache of his legs' muscles
after long days of climbing. Meera's were long and slender, but there were also
sturdy muscles that corded throughout. While he rubbed them and the older girl
gasped and sighed under his touch, he could almost forget that his legs felt
nothing whatsoever.
Slowly he began to climb his kneading fingers up her legs towards parts that he
was more familiar with. Often, when he sat in the high seat at Winterfell, his
backside would be sore, so he began to rub Meera there. The girl seemed to
hesitate at first, but she didn't move Bran's hands away, so he continued
upwards along the firm roundness towards her lower back.
When he reached her leathers, however, Bran found that he could no longer feel
the flesh beneath Meera's clothing. Though he pressed as hard as he could, he
didn't seem to be accomplishing anything. Bran still remembered the aches in
the small of his back. They had grown even worse now that he had to crawl
everywhere that Hodor didn't take him. So Bran slipped his hands under Meera's
leathers so that he could feel the tense muscles beneath her skin.
Meera stiffened when his fingers touched her bare back, "Bran..." she began, as
he started to rub once again, but soon she was sighing again under his touch.
As Bran's hands climbed higher and higher under Meera's leathers, he soon found
that he couldn't reach much higher from his current position. He could stop, he
thought, but he was only halfway up her back, and it was the shoulder and neck
that always ached the worst, he remembered.
Sliding his hands out from under her leathers, Bran pushed his palms onto the
floor of the Nightfort's kitchen, and shoved his body closer to Meera's. Once
more, he felt the warmth of her closeness. His stomach rested flush up against
her supple and muscular hip. Again, his hands slipped between her leathers and
the smooth skin of her back, his palms stroking upwards towards her shoulder
blades.
This time, however, something felt different. There was a rigid tension in
Meera's muscles, an alien feeling, not at all welcome. Bran's hands froze in
place as he belatedly noticed that Meera's gratified sighs of pleasure had been
replaced by a ragged silence.
"My prince, what are you doing?" Meera asked, and not in her usual, kind voice,
but in a guarded manner he had never heard her use when addressing him before.
At nearly the same time, she flinched away from him, sliding up into a
crouching position. As his hands slid out from inside her clothing, she looked
over her shoulder at him with a strange look in her eye.
"I thought you enjoyed it..." Bran began, bewildered by this change in his
friend and guardian. He shivered in a way that had only a little to do with the
Nightfort's cold.
"Then you thought wrong, my lord," Meera cut in with a sharp voice that had
Bran blinking back tears. He had never imagined Meera would speak to him this
way, particularly not after her kind tone of previous nights. Belatedly, Bran
detected a fiery shade of red in Meera's cheeks, which looked to him like
offended anger, but he couldn't for the life of him think what she could be so
angry about. "I'm not the sort who feels flattered at this sort of thing, no
matter who the lord is who thinks he can get away with it." As she spoke,
Meera's eyes dipped from Bran's own, and flicked to his breeches, where he only
just now remembered the familiar tugging stiffness that had begun long ago, and
had shortly been ignored.
Suddenly, Bran's eyes widened, as realization dawned. When he'd shoved himself
towards Meera, he had pushed it against her leg, hard. She had felt it. Bran
wasn't entirely sure what about that had made her so angry, but now he was sure
that was the problem. She was staring at it, the thing tenting his breeches,
her face burning with...rage? Humiliation? He couldn't tell, he only wished she
would stop staring at it, because it obviously made her angry, and her staring
was only making it jump, and lurch under her gaze. The uncomfortable tugging
feeling had become almost unbearable by now, so he muttered quickly, trying to
divert her attention. "I didn't mean..." Bran began, his voice breaking as hot
tears began to spill down his cheeks. To what? he wondered. He didn't know what
had made her angry about feeling his hardness, so he didn't know what to
apologize for. Before, she had seemed happy that it was possible for it become
hard like this, but now there was no mistaking how upset it had made her. Bran
didn't know how to fix the problem, so he simply wept as her eyes rose up to
meet his again.
For a moment, Meera's expression seemed to soften, but once again her eyes
flashed down to the steely shape pushing up his breeches, and she shook her
head, seeming to make up her mind about something. "No, Bran. It's alright. I
understand. But I don't need any help. I'm not sore anymore." At that, the girl
stood, and straightened clothing that had become disarrayed by Bran's curious
hands, then casting about the room, she chose a spot by Jojen, and laid down
with her back to Bran. She didn't move again that night.
Cold and lonely, Bran wept softly until, finally, he fell asleep.
* * *
The wildling hall shuddered against the howling northern wind. It had been
weeks since Bran, Hodor and the Reeds had left the Wall behind. Now they were
sheltering in yet another abandoned village, while Coldhands the monster sat
silently in the corner. The ranger's eyes were shut, but as Bran now knew, he
was certainly not asleep. The frigid cold north of the Wall was being held
partially at bay by a roaring fire, upon which Meera had roasted the last of
the pig that Coldhands found the night he had killed the men of the Night's
Watch. Bran was drowsy, and enjoying the feeling of warmth and food in his
belly. Tomorrow there wouldn't be anything but acorn paste, and a cold march
through the snow, but for now he was nearly warm enough to be comfortable.
Since leaving the Wall behind, Bran had been spending most of his nights
wearing Summer's skin. The direwolf still felt the cold, but at least sometimes
he was able to find prey to eat. Meanwhile, Meera hadn't allowed Bran to take a
sleeping spot beside her since the Nightfort. She didn't exactly forbid him,
but she had always made sure to wait until he had chosen his spot, then take
hers somewhere else. Without Meera's supple warmth to rest against, Bran had
been all too eager to leave each bleak campsite behind as he slipped into
Summer's skin. However, tonight in the warmth of the roaring fire, he felt less
eager to drift away into the snowy night.
Drowsing by the fire, Bran drifted briefly into sleep, then woke again abruptly
as an exhausted Meera lay down beside him. She had spent the last several
mornings trying without luck to catch some small fish to add to their dwindling
stores of meat. Earlier today she had returned to their campsite, blue in the
face and shivering uncontrollably. Bran noticed that she seemed to be unaware
where she was lying down. Maybe her tiredness had caused her to forget whatever
resolution she had made that evening in the Nightfort. Perhaps she was simply
beyond caring for this night.
To Bran, it didn't matter. He was simply pleased that whatever shadow had
passed between them since the Nightfort had been forgotten, however
temporarily. During the long trek through the haunted woods, Meera had kept him
at arm's length. There were no more hugs, or kisses on the nose, no more secret
smiles and winks when she caught him looking at her. It was as though he had
made a stranger of Meera by pressing it against her in the night, and by now he
was sure nothing would ever be the same between them. Even tonight, he knew,
she was only lying beside him because she wasn't thinking--couldn't be
thinking--about where she was. Bran was just glad it wasn't hard right now.
Probably he was too tired.
In truth, Bran didn't know whether he felt happy, exactly. For weeks he had
spent his nights feeling empty and lonely. The icy coldness in Meera's demeanor
had hurt him, but he had slowly grown used to it, like Summer's old arrow
wound, the pain of which had settled into a dull ache. Tonight's closeness with
Meera cheered him for now, of course. But, he realized, it was reopening the
old wound. When he saw the indifference in her eyes tomorrow, it would hurt as
much as it had the first time he saw it in the Nightfort.
Jojen and Hodor, of course, weren't much help in feeling the lonely hours of
the journey through the frozen North. Jojen was too cold and weak for
conversation, and Hodor never had much to say. Coldhands, of course, made Bran
shudder with revulsion. For the hundredth time, Bran wished that his fall
really had made it impossible for it to harden, as Meera said she had feared.
At least then the thing could never have happened in the Nightfort, and she
would still be close to him. He could still look at her without pain.
It was after several moments of thoughts like this, that Bran felt a tear spill
out of his eye. Blinking it away and trying to ignore Meera's soft warmth
pressed against him, he slowly drifted into sleep.
* * *
Bran pulled himself up, climbed over the gargoyle, crawled out onto the roof.
This was the easy way. He moved across the roof to the next gargoyle, right
above the window of the tower room. Sitting astride the sculpture, and
tightening his legs around it, he swung himself around, upside down. He hung by
his legs and slowly stretched his head down toward the window. The world looked
strange upside down. A courtyard swam dizzily below him, its stones still wet
with melted snow. Inside the room, a man and a woman were wrestling. They were
both naked. Bran began to feel terrified for a reason that he could not
understand, but then he looked at the woman, and gasped. It was Meera.
Bran's eyes drifted slowly over Meera's slender form. Meera's body reminded him
of Osha, the wildling's, though it was softer, the curves smaller. The sharp,
tugging sensation in his loins reminded him that this was a sight he'd yearned
to see for a long time. But he couldn't enjoy it for long, because the naked
man pushed Meera up against the wall. Bran heard soft, wet sounds and realized
that Meera was kissing the man, who had a hand down between her legs. At first,
Bran thought he was hurting her there, because Meera started to moan, low in
her throat. "Stop it," she said, "stop it, stop it. oh please..." But her voice
was low and weak, and she did not push him away. Her hands buried themselves in
his hair, and pulled his face down to her breast.
Bran watched the man as he hungrily kissed a delicate red blossom at the tip of
Meera's breast, the steely hardness in his breeches tugging harder than he'd
ever felt it before, almost aching with its intensity. Looking up into the
man's eyes, Bran was stunned to realize that the man was himself. He was
standing, his naked body pressing Meera's against the wall. His fingers were
between her legs, and something felt wet...wet and gloriously warm.
Bran stared into Meera's face as he touched her. Her eyes were closed, and her
mouth was open, moaning. Her dark hair swung from side to side as her head
moved back and forth. Bran felt an aching crescendo, some strange buildup from
somewhere deep inside his being that was cresting as this moment played out in
front of him like a story that he wasn't writing, though, he realized, Old Nan
would never have told him a story like this. Bran tried to take in every detail
that he could, the shape of Meera's breasts, the warmth of that feeling between
her legs, the sight of her naked body but, for some reason, he couldn't. His
eyes were sealed shut, and he could only feel her. Only hear her moaning, "stop
it," in a voice that didn't really sound like Meera's after all. He felt some
sort of indescribable release, and in frustration tried to wrench his eyes
open.
* * *
Bran awoke on the floor of the wildling hall, the cold light of an all-too-
brief day was shining through small windows dug through the earthen wall. The
roaring fire of last night had burned down to embers, and Jojen was resting
fitfully on the floor a few feet away, while Hodor was staring out of the door
hodoring quietly to himself. Coldhands and Meera were gone, for now. The
ranger, probably, waiting for them to get underway, and Meera most likely
looking for fish. Bran sighed and shifted in his spot on the floor.
Suddenly, he noticed an odd sensation in his breeches. They seemed to be half-
filled with some rapidly-cooling liquid, slimy and sticky all at once. Shifting
uncomfortably, Bran wondered nervously if he had wet himself in the night.
* * *
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