InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "Get down, make love!"

fear_cuts (fear_cuts) wrote in we_coexist,
@ 2015-09-25 21:26:00

Entry tags:

arya stark, hannibal lecter

Wolf blood (Hannibal)
Since removing her cast, Arya had spent much of her time making her leg strong again. Some of it could be mistaken as a child playing--running around the grounds of Erik's estate and chasing after birds, or standing on her toes as long as she could. She also spent time sneaking out, which wasn't as hard as she had initially thought now that her leg was better. The City was large and strange, and she was hardly given a second look. She walked and watched and listened while she was out, and when she returned, rumpled and smelling of the burning fuel of the cars, nobody said anything.

When she dreamed at night, she saw the City in another way: sometimes low to the ground, sometimes high up, sometimes with the taste of blood in her mouth. But there were shadows almost as dark as those of Westeros, and lights almost as bright as the day, and sometimes in the day she passed places that she had seen as she slept.

She had food and shelter and a bed and clean clothes. There were no Lannisters or Freys. She could almost let her guard down.

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fear_cuts
2015-11-07 04:15 am UTC (link)

He could say that because nobody was looking for him. Nobody would hold him hostage or kill him and put his head on a pike if they found him. She would rather be nobody until everyone on her list was dead, and then she could be Arya Stark again and go back to Winterfell.

But Winterfell was gone and there was nobody to go back to, and she was here anyway. She could be herself if she wanted and Arie the orphan girl if she didn't and maybe that was okay, too.

"I suppose," she said reluctantly. Then, with more excitement, "Can we work with a sword soon? I like that. I'm good at that."

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eatspeople
2015-11-12 09:44 pm UTC (link)

"You sound uncertain about what I say. Let me pose it to you as this: the things that I know, that I am going to be teaching you, do you imagine that they have gone unemployed in my life, or do you think that perhaps I know them more intimately? Just consider, no need to answer. The query is more hypothetical than anything.

"There may be people here you know, or there may be nobody who knows your face at all outside of the friends and acquaintances that you've acquired since arriving. There are two familiar faces for me within this city."

Hannibal thought about Clarice and Will with a bit of a smile. He really did need to get the two of them into the same room.

"We can work with swords soon." He promised. "Have you been practicing your story? Arie's story?"

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fear_cuts
2015-11-14 02:49 am UTC (link)

The way that Hannibal talked reminded her of King's Landing. Not the smallfolk in the streets, but the lords and ladies in the Red Keep, the ones who made talking their lives and business. He might have been at home there, she thought. They played a deadly game at court, and he could have kept up with them easily.

Her lord father had not been one for that kind of talk. Eddard Stark had been direct and blunt. But he'd died, and the people who could talk from both sides of their mouths all lived. Maybe there was a lesson there.

The thought of a Lannister arriving while she'd been in Erik's mansion made her flush in fury. "No," she admitted. "I was more worried about my leg than my story." She paused. "I told Erik the truth."

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eatspeople
2015-11-16 08:03 pm UTC (link)

"It is good that you've told Erik the truth. He needed to know. He can help you, as well. Now that he knows who you really are, he'll be more open to it. He'll be more open to you. Though he might be upset for a little while that you kept anything from him to begin with, I'm sure he'll get over it. He's a... I won't say he's a rational man, but he's a man who understands when things need to be done a certain way for certain reasons."

Hannibal was pleased by her reaction to having been lax. It was important that she know she couldn't let her guard down at any time, that she couldn't let herself grow soft in any way.

"You will need to learn how to focus on more than one thing at a time, Arya. While I'm glad you were concerned for your leg and your healing, you should have been doing the other, as well. I should have been able to come in here and quiz you on any bit of Arie, even things you have not yet made up. You should be able to answer without thought at this point. I'll give you a week. At the end of the week, you should know the color of eyes on her first pet. And remember, basing your lies in facts will always make the lie more believable and easier to recall in dire situations. If you can do this, we will spend a day at sword practice."

He thought that was a large enough motivation, though he was sure the girl was motivated to do what he asked anyway. She was the one who wanted to become like her faceless men. This was all a step toward that.

"I will teach you whatever is within my scope, this I can promise you. But you have to promise me that you will be a proper student, that you will not doubt or question my methods. That if you ask to learn something, you will do your best to learn it and not become lazy. There are some things in the world that perhaps you are not meant to learn, and I will be able to tell if we happen upon one of those, but I will always give you the benefit of the doubt."

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fear_cuts
2015-11-18 04:38 am UTC (link)

Arya glowered, though she was more angry at herself than at him. Hannibal was right. She should have been working on her story, because what if the Lannisters arrived some day? What if she walked into the kitchen and Queen Cersei stood there just as she'd been the last time Arya had seen her?

Well, Arya would grab a knife and stab her in the heart and have no reason to lie in that case, but Hannibal was still right.

"Okay," she said. "I'll do my best."

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