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VelvetWhispers
Super-Earth
- Joined
- Aug 24, 2024
- Location
- Paris
Winterfell – The Night of the King's Arrival
Lady Elyra Frostmere
The goblet in her hand was silver, but Elyra would've traded it for something gold-plated and poisoned if it meant thinning the crowd inside the Great Hall by half. Or at the very least, silencing Ser Meryn Trant's chewing.
She slipped out of the side door with a feline grace that drew no attention—none that lasted, anyway. Lady Elyra Frostmere had made something of an art out of vanishing when no one expected her to, and appearing where she wasn't supposed to be. The cold bit instantly at her skin, but she welcomed it with a smile curving her painted mouth. The frost was honest. Unlike some of their guests.
A snowflake landed on the rim of her goblet. She took a sip anyway.
Winterfell lay beneath her like a sleeping beast, walls proud and worn, the air thick with the weight of old gods and older secrets. The sky above was a silver-black canvas, stars scattered like shattered glass across the heavens. It was quiet out here, peaceful in the way only the North could be: a stillness wrapped in danger, beautiful and cruel.
She exhaled, watching her breath swirl into the dark.
Inside, the court was pretending. Lords and ladies jostled for position like hounds for scraps. The king's laughter had been loud and wet, echoing through the hall with the sound of wine sloshing down his front. Robert Baratheon, once a warrior king, now more beer barrel than blade. He hadn't come all this way for the scenery, that much was clear.
The Starks, gods bless them, were hosting with all the warmth of their cold stone castle, but Elyra's instincts stirred with unease. The King wanted something. People didn't come to Winterfell unless they wanted something. That was the one universal truth of the North: you had to mean it to survive here.
She sipped again, leaned her shoulder into the cold stone of the courtyard arch, and let her dark eyes scan the yard.
That was when she noticed him.
A shadow standing apart from the others—brooding, quiet, still. He was speaking with Lord Stark's brother, the one with the beard that could catch birds if he turned his head fast enough. Their voices didn't carry, but Elyra knew how to read a man's shoulders, and Jon Snow's were drawn tight with resolve. Or was it rebellion?
She tilted her head, curious.
The name Night's Watch drifted toward her on the wind like a scent she couldn't quite place. Elyra's mouth twitched.
Ah. So the bastard boy wanted to run off and freeze his noble guilt away with a band of glorified crows. Predictable. And just when he was growing into that sharp-boned, storm-eyed kind of handsome too.
Her attention sharpened when another man approached. Blonde, with a mouth that smirked even when still—Tyrion Lannister, the Imp of Casterly Rock. His words were clearer, spoken with intent to carry. He didn't whisper the word bastard, he said it like a toast, daring anyone to flinch.
Elyra didn't flinch. But her knuckles whitened just a touch around the stem of her goblet.
When the lion left and the Stark uncle followed, Jon remained alone, staring out at nothing in particular. A painting of a lost boy in a man's body, shoulders slumped under the weight of invisible chains.
She watched a moment longer, the way a cat might observe a wounded bird—part curiosity, part hunger, part pity.
Then she pushed off the wall and strolled forward, quiet as snowfall.
"I hear the Wall is stunning this time of year," she said lightly, her voice silk spun with snow. "Of course, I also hear it smells like piss and broken dreams, so perhaps the view balances things out."
She stopped a few paces away, just at the edge of the torchlight, shadows dancing across her features—high cheekbones, dark eyes framed by longer lashes than any Northern lady had the right to possess, and lips that held secrets the way noblewomen held fans.
"I'd offer you something stronger than introspection," she said, raising her goblet in offering, "but I only steal from the kitchens, not the cellars."
A beat passed, just long enough for her to tilt her head and let her eyes roam over him with open curiosity, not the false demureness most ladies feigned.
"You're Jon Snow, aren't you?" she added, as if she hadn't known it the moment she saw him. "Lord Stark's… let's say inconvenient truth."
The words could've been cruel in another mouth, but in hers they dripped with playful mischief, not malice.
"I'm Lady Elyra Frostmere. You've probably never heard of me. That's all right—I quite like lurking in obscurity. It keeps the expectations low."
She stepped closer, the wind lifting her dark curls just enough to brush her cheek. The silk of her gown whispered around her legs, dusky grey trimmed in black—a proper Northern lady's gown, if a touch more fitted than convention demanded.
"But truly, you're thinking of taking the black already? Before you've even lived a little?" Her voice dipped, amused and conspiratorial. "Seems a touch dramatic. And I'm a woman who routinely keeps knives in her garters."
She looked up at him now, more earnest beneath the teasing glint.
"Don't go walling yourself off with old men and criminals just yet, Jon Snow. You might find the world has more to offer than shame and silence… even for someone like us."
She took a slow sip, watching him over the rim of her goblet.
"Besides," she added with a smirk, "you'd look terrible in black. Far too broody. People might mistake you for a poet."
And with that, she turned her gaze back to the stars, as if she'd merely wandered out to count them—and not to keep a brooding boy from throwing himself into a lifetime of celibacy and cold.
She couldn't say exactly when it had started—this sharp tug in her chest whenever she looked at him, this need to keep him from wasting the fire she could see flickering behind that brooding stare. Maybe it was the way he stood, so stiff in the cold, already trying to make himself small in a world that had done nothing but remind him of his place. Maybe it was the way he let the word bastard stick to his skin like a brand, like it defined him more than his blood or his mind ever could. Or maybe—gods help her—it was because he reminded her of herself. Sharp around the edges, colder than they liked their ladies, and too proud to beg the world for more than it was willing to give. And so, for reasons she hadn't yet dared to name, she couldn't let him walk into the dark and vanish into a vow he wasn't ready to make. Not when the world hadn't even seen what he was capable of. Not when she seemed to.
She tilted her head back one last time, letting the starlight kiss her face, before her gaze drifted down—back to earth, back to the boy alone in the dark with his ghosts. Jon Snow stood where he'd been left, still and solitary, his breath curling in silver ribbons before him. There was a weight to him that went beyond his years, the kind of heaviness one only carried when born into a world that made promises it never intended to keep.
Elyra studied him, her dark lashes lowering slightly. There was something in his posture—shoulders tight, jaw clenched—that made her feel the familiar itch beneath her ribs. Not pity. Never that. But recognition, maybe. Kinship, of a kind. The way the world had tried to tell both of them what they were allowed to be.
She moved toward him with the elegance of moonlight sliding across still water—unhurried, but inevitable. No rustle of silk or crunch of snow, just the soft whisper of her breath in the cold. She drew close enough to see the flicker of surprise in his eyes, and the tension in his frame that was so like a sword, half-drawn.
Her fingers brushed his wrist, featherlight, the first touch electric in the space between them. She watched his eyes for resistance. For reason. Found only breathlessness.
So she leaned in, slowly, so he could stop her if he wanted—though she already knew he wouldn't. Her lips found his with the confidence of someone who'd always gotten what she wanted, but kissed like she didn't know if she ever would again. A breathless, molten kiss that tasted of stolen wine and unspoken thoughts.
And when she finally pulled back, barely an inch between them, she smiled like the moon was watching. "There," she murmured, voice like velvet sliding over steel. "Now when you're shivering on that Wall, you can close your eyes and remember… Winterfell wasn't always cold."
Lady Elyra Frostmere
The goblet in her hand was silver, but Elyra would've traded it for something gold-plated and poisoned if it meant thinning the crowd inside the Great Hall by half. Or at the very least, silencing Ser Meryn Trant's chewing.
She slipped out of the side door with a feline grace that drew no attention—none that lasted, anyway. Lady Elyra Frostmere had made something of an art out of vanishing when no one expected her to, and appearing where she wasn't supposed to be. The cold bit instantly at her skin, but she welcomed it with a smile curving her painted mouth. The frost was honest. Unlike some of their guests.
A snowflake landed on the rim of her goblet. She took a sip anyway.
Winterfell lay beneath her like a sleeping beast, walls proud and worn, the air thick with the weight of old gods and older secrets. The sky above was a silver-black canvas, stars scattered like shattered glass across the heavens. It was quiet out here, peaceful in the way only the North could be: a stillness wrapped in danger, beautiful and cruel.
She exhaled, watching her breath swirl into the dark.
Inside, the court was pretending. Lords and ladies jostled for position like hounds for scraps. The king's laughter had been loud and wet, echoing through the hall with the sound of wine sloshing down his front. Robert Baratheon, once a warrior king, now more beer barrel than blade. He hadn't come all this way for the scenery, that much was clear.
The Starks, gods bless them, were hosting with all the warmth of their cold stone castle, but Elyra's instincts stirred with unease. The King wanted something. People didn't come to Winterfell unless they wanted something. That was the one universal truth of the North: you had to mean it to survive here.
She sipped again, leaned her shoulder into the cold stone of the courtyard arch, and let her dark eyes scan the yard.
That was when she noticed him.
A shadow standing apart from the others—brooding, quiet, still. He was speaking with Lord Stark's brother, the one with the beard that could catch birds if he turned his head fast enough. Their voices didn't carry, but Elyra knew how to read a man's shoulders, and Jon Snow's were drawn tight with resolve. Or was it rebellion?
She tilted her head, curious.
The name Night's Watch drifted toward her on the wind like a scent she couldn't quite place. Elyra's mouth twitched.
Ah. So the bastard boy wanted to run off and freeze his noble guilt away with a band of glorified crows. Predictable. And just when he was growing into that sharp-boned, storm-eyed kind of handsome too.
Her attention sharpened when another man approached. Blonde, with a mouth that smirked even when still—Tyrion Lannister, the Imp of Casterly Rock. His words were clearer, spoken with intent to carry. He didn't whisper the word bastard, he said it like a toast, daring anyone to flinch.
Elyra didn't flinch. But her knuckles whitened just a touch around the stem of her goblet.
When the lion left and the Stark uncle followed, Jon remained alone, staring out at nothing in particular. A painting of a lost boy in a man's body, shoulders slumped under the weight of invisible chains.
She watched a moment longer, the way a cat might observe a wounded bird—part curiosity, part hunger, part pity.
Then she pushed off the wall and strolled forward, quiet as snowfall.
"I hear the Wall is stunning this time of year," she said lightly, her voice silk spun with snow. "Of course, I also hear it smells like piss and broken dreams, so perhaps the view balances things out."
She stopped a few paces away, just at the edge of the torchlight, shadows dancing across her features—high cheekbones, dark eyes framed by longer lashes than any Northern lady had the right to possess, and lips that held secrets the way noblewomen held fans.
"I'd offer you something stronger than introspection," she said, raising her goblet in offering, "but I only steal from the kitchens, not the cellars."
A beat passed, just long enough for her to tilt her head and let her eyes roam over him with open curiosity, not the false demureness most ladies feigned.
"You're Jon Snow, aren't you?" she added, as if she hadn't known it the moment she saw him. "Lord Stark's… let's say inconvenient truth."
The words could've been cruel in another mouth, but in hers they dripped with playful mischief, not malice.
"I'm Lady Elyra Frostmere. You've probably never heard of me. That's all right—I quite like lurking in obscurity. It keeps the expectations low."
She stepped closer, the wind lifting her dark curls just enough to brush her cheek. The silk of her gown whispered around her legs, dusky grey trimmed in black—a proper Northern lady's gown, if a touch more fitted than convention demanded.
"But truly, you're thinking of taking the black already? Before you've even lived a little?" Her voice dipped, amused and conspiratorial. "Seems a touch dramatic. And I'm a woman who routinely keeps knives in her garters."
She looked up at him now, more earnest beneath the teasing glint.
"Don't go walling yourself off with old men and criminals just yet, Jon Snow. You might find the world has more to offer than shame and silence… even for someone like us."
She took a slow sip, watching him over the rim of her goblet.
"Besides," she added with a smirk, "you'd look terrible in black. Far too broody. People might mistake you for a poet."
And with that, she turned her gaze back to the stars, as if she'd merely wandered out to count them—and not to keep a brooding boy from throwing himself into a lifetime of celibacy and cold.
She couldn't say exactly when it had started—this sharp tug in her chest whenever she looked at him, this need to keep him from wasting the fire she could see flickering behind that brooding stare. Maybe it was the way he stood, so stiff in the cold, already trying to make himself small in a world that had done nothing but remind him of his place. Maybe it was the way he let the word bastard stick to his skin like a brand, like it defined him more than his blood or his mind ever could. Or maybe—gods help her—it was because he reminded her of herself. Sharp around the edges, colder than they liked their ladies, and too proud to beg the world for more than it was willing to give. And so, for reasons she hadn't yet dared to name, she couldn't let him walk into the dark and vanish into a vow he wasn't ready to make. Not when the world hadn't even seen what he was capable of. Not when she seemed to.
She tilted her head back one last time, letting the starlight kiss her face, before her gaze drifted down—back to earth, back to the boy alone in the dark with his ghosts. Jon Snow stood where he'd been left, still and solitary, his breath curling in silver ribbons before him. There was a weight to him that went beyond his years, the kind of heaviness one only carried when born into a world that made promises it never intended to keep.
Elyra studied him, her dark lashes lowering slightly. There was something in his posture—shoulders tight, jaw clenched—that made her feel the familiar itch beneath her ribs. Not pity. Never that. But recognition, maybe. Kinship, of a kind. The way the world had tried to tell both of them what they were allowed to be.
She moved toward him with the elegance of moonlight sliding across still water—unhurried, but inevitable. No rustle of silk or crunch of snow, just the soft whisper of her breath in the cold. She drew close enough to see the flicker of surprise in his eyes, and the tension in his frame that was so like a sword, half-drawn.
Her fingers brushed his wrist, featherlight, the first touch electric in the space between them. She watched his eyes for resistance. For reason. Found only breathlessness.
So she leaned in, slowly, so he could stop her if he wanted—though she already knew he wouldn't. Her lips found his with the confidence of someone who'd always gotten what she wanted, but kissed like she didn't know if she ever would again. A breathless, molten kiss that tasted of stolen wine and unspoken thoughts.
And when she finally pulled back, barely an inch between them, she smiled like the moon was watching. "There," she murmured, voice like velvet sliding over steel. "Now when you're shivering on that Wall, you can close your eyes and remember… Winterfell wasn't always cold."
