Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/ works/1586681. Rating: Explicit Archive Warning: Graphic_Depictions_Of_Violence, Underage Category: F/M Fandom: Game_of_Thrones_(TV), A_Song_of_Ice_and_Fire_-_George_R._R._Martin, Mononoke-hime_|_Princess_Mononoke Relationship: Arya_Stark/Gendry_Waters Character: Arya_Stark, Gendry_Waters Additional Tags: Sexual_Content Series: Part 1 of Gendrya_Oneshots Stats: Published: 2014-05-08 Words: 1498 ****** Nobody Knows Your Heart ****** by waitingforthehogwartsletter Summary Gendry finds Arya long after the war, and she's barely human anymore. Nobody Knows Your Heart   In the moonlight I felt your heart Quiver like a bow string's pulse In the moon's pale light you looked at me   Nobody knows your heart   When the sun is gone I see you Beautiful and haunting, but cold Like the blade of a knife, so sharp, so sweet   Nobody knows your heart   All of your sorrow, grief and pain Locked away in the forest of the void Your secret heart belongs to the world Of the things that sigh in the dark   All the things that cry in the dark   I found her on the edge of the woods, seeking revenge for her life, for her poor faith. She looked wild, she looked broken; she was herself in the purest way – a creature of darkness and despair. She accepted me after a struggle of words and limbs and blades. She let me stay with her, and I watched the sun set over the water of the river; she avoided the light and fluttered in the shadows like a wounded wolf. Like the big wolf that stuck so close to her, scarcely moving away or letting me close without a guttural growl and a glare of hatred and distinct fear. In the moonlight, Arya came out. In the moonlight, she let me closer. In the moonlight, away from the sun and day she could no longer relate to for all the darkness dwelling within her, I felt her heart. I felt her heart, and it quivered like a bow string’s pulse. She let me trail the scars on her arms with only smallest of growls that died away the further up my fingers went. Resting on her shoulder, my hand spread warmth through her cold skin, the marks on her bare skin not as shocking. Silvery scars like spider’s web. My heart wanted to reach out over the small distance between us and kiss each memory threaded to her skin that should not have been there, but in my mind, I knew it would only earn me such scars, and to her – the touch would only push me away and wouldn’t make a difference. But then, in the moon’s pale light, she looked at me, finally, her inhuman eyes searching for a spark of humanity in my own. As she looked at me, she tentatively stepped closer. One of her hands slowly rose to rest on my chest, over my heart. Her hand trembled lightly, in anticipation. I wanted her to remember me. Kissing her wouldn’t help – I have never before kissed her, not when she was just a child and I have not known what love meant for her, for me with her. But I kissed her nevertheless, unable to stay away, and urged on with the fright in her eyes. The fright I saw in wolves, in all animals, but fright that could not have been human at all. I wanted to bring her back with that kiss. I wanted to show her humanity – the beauty of humanity. I expected for her to pull away at the contact – but Arya hadn’t. She scarcely even seemed shocked – there was only a slight tremor in her lips as she tried to give back the touch of the kiss I pressed on her lips. It seemed I was more shocked that she reacted positively, than she had for the kiss to happen. And then, as I pulled her into my arms and she clutched my shoulders with her claw-like fingers, I thought that nobody knew her heart. Not anymore. Her lips, although pale and dry when I looked at her before, seemed to soften under the burden of the pure act of fondness and affection imprinted on her. When I tried to gently tilt her head to a side, to deepen the kiss, to sooth her trembling figure, she pushed back into me with some sort of a sharp strength, breath taking, disastrous. She was fast in learning the ways of mouth and tongue in contact with someone else’s. But as hard as I tried, her lips were eager with fever and cunningness, and she bit and growled when I moaned. If she only hadn’t been so eager and so shocking, I might have controlled the want, but with her finally warm and tangible in my embrace, I couldn’t pull away when I knew there was nothing. The skin of her face was softer, with only one scar over her brow and cheek, and I stroked her closed eyes with my fingers, her edged cheekbones and the dent below them. I slipped my hands over her neck, over her shoulders, and she clawed her fingers up my shoulders and over my back, then over my neck, digging her nails on the nape of my neck. And then, like a slip she hadn’t wanted to make, a mistake she couldn’t hold back, her growls suddenly turned into one, soft, thrilling moan. To make up for it, Arya started pulling off my clothes, and the ruined fabric of hers. She left us bare and I was so in love with her, no matter who she was and what she was, and I wanted her so much, all of her, of who she was and who and what she was going to be. She collapsed to the grass, the only featherbed she would ever accept, and pulled me with her. When the sun was gone, I saw her. In the dead of the night, in the light of the moon, she was bare below me, firm with decision, soft with the same want I felt. She let me touch every part of her, with no shame. Her back arched when I touched her breasts, and she moaned and moved with stronger ache. She boldly pulled my hand south, between her thighs, and I felt just how ready and willing she was, and she touched me, like the dreams I never dared to dream, and I moaned like her, like an animal. She pulled my head down to kiss my lips and I was shocked, again. My hands went back up to prop my body so it wouldn’t fall down on her, but she seemed to want exactly no distance, her skin covering mine. And then, when her legs spread further, I pushed into her. She squirmed a little, but I had not known whether it was from pain or desire again. And when she found out how, she locked her ankles on the small of my back and bucked her hips into mine. So I pushed in again, and again, and with each slam into her, she gave one of her own, like there was no pain, like there was nothing but her and me. Together. She went faster, because that was how Arya was – and I followed her pace, crumbling apart with each of her movements, because I knew I failed, but I couldn’t pull back, because that would mean only another failure. She was moaning and panting, but when she fell apart, it was with a howl, followed with a growl when I followed. No human moans – only wolf’s growl. I lay beside her and looked at her, because somehow, I knew she wouldn’t look at me, maybe until the next night, if I lived to be there. She was so beautiful, so haunting, but so cold. And I would still do anything to stay with her, and stay alive with her, to see the next night. When she got up and routinely pulled her clothes back on, she didn’t look like what happened moments ago had happened at all. I followed, of course, how could I not have? She was like a blade of a knife when I tried to kiss her, pulling away sharply, but the touch of her lips for shorter than a second was so sweet I could not let regret unravel within me. Again, she was far away, not letting me touch her, and I was almost shocked again, but I reminded myself… Nobody knew her heart. She walked to the trees where her wolf slept, and all of her sorrow, grief and pain seemed to weigh on her each step, locked into her like the forest of the void she truly was. If Arya had a heart, it belonged to the world. Not a person, not a soul. She would never be mine. But I would be hers, no matter how much she despised that horrible truth. Yes, her heart belonged to the world, but to the dark one, to the sad one, of the things that sighed in the dark, things she could become. All the things that cried in the dark, like I knew she never would again. Nobody knew her heart, but maybe I would… But I never woke up, not to see the sunrise, not to see the sunset, not to feel her again. I was hers, but she never wanted anyone. Nobody knows her heart.       Please drop_by_the_archive_and_comment to let the author know if you enjoyed their work!