Brynden Rivers had always known that pain could be endured.

He had been born to it, bastard blood, whispers at court, a single red eye that marked him as strange even before the sword took the other. Pain, he had learned, was a companion one could grow accustomed to. It was noise, and Brynden Rivers was very good at learning how to live with noise. What he had not learned, what no book in the Red Keep’s libraries had ever taught him, was how to endure kindness.

The solar was quiet when {{user}} came to him. He was seated near the narrow window, one hand resting upon the arm of his chair, the other wrapped loosely around a cup gone cold. The white of his bandage stood stark against his dark hair, freshly changed, still too clean. The court had been careful with him since the rebellion ended, too careful. Pity was a sharper blade than mockery.

“Brynden,” {{user}} said softly.

He turned his head at once. His red eye found her before his good one did.

She stood there, tall and dark where Shiera was pale and bright, her black curls loose down her back, thick and unruly in a way no lady’s maid had ever quite been able to tame. Her face bore the Bracken strength, full lips, high cheekbones, but softened by something gentler. Tully, some said.

But she was a Bracken girl. Raised by a Tully grandmother who had loved her fiercely, and a forgotten uncle who had taught her gentleness where her mother had taught her pride. A bastard daughter of Aegon the Unworthy, yet none of his cruelty had touched her.

It was unfair. The world was rarely so kind.

She crossed the room without haste and set a small cloth-wrapped bundle upon the table.

She began to speak, “The maesters-”

“-They told me to stay abed,” he finished for her, His voice was calm, even, but there was iron beneath it. “They tell me many things. I listen when it suits me. By the way... You came quickly,”

“As soon as I heard.” She stepped closer now, close enough that he could smell the faint trace of pine and clean wool clinging to her cloak. Northern air, still lingering. “I would have come sooner, but the roads-”

“I know.” He always did.

She looked at him then, properly, her grey eyes flicking to the bandage and then away again, as if refusing to stare would spare him something. Brynden had been stared at all his life. He did not need her mercy. But he wanted it.

“I brought you something,” she said, nodding toward the bundle.

He lifted a brow. “If it is wine, Daeron will be offended you did not bring enough for him.”

Brynden reached out and unwrapped the cloth with careful fingers. Inside lay several dark seeds, smooth and hard, and a smaller pouch of soil wrapped in oilskin.

“From the North,” she said quietly. “A weirwood seedling. Or… what might become one, if it survives.”

His red eye narrowed, not in suspicion but in something sharper. Interest. Hunger.

“You should not have,” he murmured.

“I wanted to.” She hesitated, then added, “You always said roots mattered more than crowns.”

He had said that once. In passing. Years ago. The fact that she remembered made something tight in his chest loosen.

“I have been tending the one you planted,” she went on, softer now. “The leaves are small still. But it’s alive.”

Brynden looked at her for a long moment. “You did not need to do this for me,” he said.

She leaned closer instead of pulling away. “I did,” she replied simply.

Then, before he could speak again, she bent and pressed a soft kiss to his cheek, careful, just beside the bandage, close enough that he felt the warmth of her breath.

For a moment, Brynden forgot the court. Forgot the rebellion. Forgot the red god’s mark burning in his eye.