Lana sat in the Maegor's Keep with the other women, who shivered with fear while the queen drank herself into oblivion. They couldn't hear the war, but Lana knew that men outside were dying to protect this castle.

What a waste. They would be doing it all over again soon, except again dragonfire.

As the siege arrived, the panic rode strong in its wake. It had been a few hours of sitting in the stone fortification with weak, cowering women before Sansa had left the Keep. The queen had even sent for Joffrey. What an idiot. In Lana's opinion, Cersei should let her son die with some kind of pride and glory, not snivel away under his mother's skirts.

Lady Hornley asked for another cup of wine and Lana had one ready. Lana walked over to the beautiful young woman with yellow hair, like a younger twin of the queen. Lana had to admit that her and Tommen would have made beautiful children. Perhaps it was even a reason for why Cersei chose her.

Lady Hornley smiled at Lana, coughing, the bags under eyes darker today. She said to Lana,"Well, it was short-lived, but I am happy to have had you as my handmaid."

"Yes, it's been an honor, my lady," Lana said with a smile. Whatever guilt a normal person had for committing such an act, Lana burned it away. Lady Hornley was not as innocent as she seemed, or else she wouldn't have had someone pay for her execution.

The dark light of the candles softly flickered against the metal chalice that Lana handed to her lady. Lady Hornley took a long drink of the wine, and of course, Lana had ensured that a lethal dose was inside. She had a few more lethal doses on her, in case something happened to this cup.

But the lady drank it, and it would finally be over soon.

Lana leaned in, like she was about to tell her lady something private. "Master Xirgis thanks you for you time," Lana said, bowed, and walked away, but not before she caught the look of confusion and dread in her Lady's brown eyes. Lana wished she could have stayed to see the realization, but she would not risk it.

It wasn't until Lana was out of the room that she heard the screams.

Lady Hornley would no doubt be choking by now, as the poison was quick to hit the bloodstream, slowly closing the larynx. The Gripping Widow, they called it. Lana ran through the halls, doing her best to act hysterical, throwing a dash of onion juice in her eyes. She approached guards. "Assassin! With the women!" she shouted crying near real tears from the sting.

The men ran, and once out sight, Lana ceased her falsities and growled as her eyes stung something fierce. She blinked heavily, tears still forming as she made her way to the statue that she hid her bag behind. She placed a hand on it, closing her eyes as if it would help the burn. She opened them again, her nose starting to run, and she slung it over her shoulders. She walked to the wall that she scouted earlier, and repelled down in order to get as far away from the kill site as possible, and as quickly as possible. Luckily, she didn't need her eyes too much for this, which still burned. She thought it was funny that in a world like this, they still didn't have any antidotes to onion juice in the eyes.

As she moved, she could hear the sound of men running, fighting, and screaming. It would allow her to runaway unnoticed.

Once she felt like it was clear, Lana hid behind a bush and changed her clothes. She already had leather pants and a leather corset on underneath, topping it with a thin, loose shirt, cinching it with a metal belt around her waist. She threw up the hood that she tied around her neck, quickly put on a pair of boots, grabbed her bag, and began to run through the castle, ready to leave this place behind.

Adrenaline was fueling her veins with so much vigor that her legs were nearly shaking. She had done it. She had killed the lady and poisoned her slowly. She would be able to return to Dany now.

She rounded a corner and ran into Ellyn, who was completely disheveled.

"Vaella!" She shouted with joy in her eyes, barely lit by the braziers. Her expression quickly turned to fear. "Your outfit. What's happening?"

"I'm leaving," she admitted, breathless from the rush adrenaline.

"Did you hear that there was an assassin?" Ellyn asked, nearing her.

"I did. It's terrifying," Lana said with little concern, nodding her head as she tried to move past Ellyn.

"Quite," Ellyn said, and everything about the girl changed. Ellyn stared, unblinking at Lana, as the expression on her face turned to nothing. Lana paused, her brows furrowed, and she looked over the handmaid.

Ellyn attacked Lana with a speed she was unprepared for, unaided by the irritation in her eyes. Ellyn placing a dampened cloth over Lana's mouth. Gods this woman was much stronger than Lana had ever anticipated. Every move that Lana made proved entirely useless – Ellyn predicted them all, and even countered them.

She is trained.

At some point, Lana had fallen to the cold, stone floor, lying on her back as her body began to lose control of its muscles, her mind fading in and out of consciousness. She squinted her eyes to see Ellyn pull her off her face, as if a wet cloth had been lying over it this whole time.

A faceless woman.

"It is nothing personal," she said with a neutral tone only known to the order, her face completely unrecognizable.

And then Lana was consumed by the blackness.

Clegane was half drunk and on the back of Stranger, stabbing anyone that came near, his entire armor and face covered in so much blood that eventually there was a permanent stench of iron.

Once out of the gates, he rode for freedom until he could no longer smell the smoke. Finally, he turned back to look at the castle, which was a small green dot of fire that was still reaching for the sky with a vibrancy no normal fire had. I fucking hate fire.

He looked in the general area of the castle where Sansa Stark would be. He felt a pang of regret for leaving her after she told him no, but it was too late to go back and grab the Stark girl now. The idiot child didn't understand men at war. But she would understand that lesson one way or another, as Clegane had seen Lannister forces move in.

They'd won.

And now Sansa would officially be Joffrey's pet.

Clegane worried that this day would somehow haunt him, and he wasn't sure why it would. The castle before him was full of murderers, liars, rapers, and people that paid them all alike. He was used to them, and to the torture that they doled out. He sucked his bottom lip to his teeth and sneered. The Stark girl didn't belong among them, and she couldn't do a damned thing about it. That's why it bothered him.

He could have helped, made her come with him. Someone like her needed someone like him, and he just left her.

But fuck it. She made her decision, and she was not his to protect anyway. She couldn't even stand to look at him.

He turned Stranger back around and rode in the moonlight. When he finally breathed in fresh air that was far removed from the capitol, he slowed his warhorse down to take a swig of water.

He laughed to himself. "Fuck the king," he said out loud with a smile. Clegane was alive, and unburnt from the flaming fucking arrows, managing to only suffer a few flesh wounds and bruises.

The more he trotted along the road, the more he was grateful that he didn't take the Stark girl. Honesty, what had come over him to act like a knight? She'd be nothing but trouble, whinging the whole way north. And to top it all off, she would probably be ungrateful for his act, like the rest of them. Like Joffrey. She already was.

Clegane needed to watch himself, lest he grew too soft.

There was no surer way he'd die than to grow soft.

When Lana woke up next, she was mostly aware of how little space she had. The air no longer smelled of shit, and instead, smelled like that of wood and rum.

And like the change of morning to night, Lana calmed. She grit her teeth, flared her nostrils and opened her eyes wide as she stopped moving. She let herself take in the details, one small piece at a time.

The faceless woman. Wood and rum. The siege.

Lana became aware of the sound of a carriage rolling on a wet, dirt road and the sound of a horse trotting in mud. Lana smirked. The faceless woman had thrown her in a used barrel.

Lana slowly looked down, trying not to make a noise as her heart thrummed so hard she worried the faceless woman would hear it. There were chains on her wrists. She tried to move her ankles, and quickly realized they were chained too.

The next step was to see if there was any way to escape.

She knew of ways to torque the chains apart, but there was no way that the faceless woman would not be aware of that. They were No One for a reason, like a hive mind of professionals designed to have no emotions, desires, or history.

They were just No One.

"You're quiet," the faceless woman said, her voice penetrating the wood.

Lana held her breath, shocked the woman was already aware of Lana waking up. Either I made a sound, or the poison she used is very calculated. Probably both.

"Well, wanted to see if I could escape. Don't think I can," Lana said with acceptance. She was fucked, at least until she got where she was going.

"It would really be against your interest."

"Can I at least come out?"

"Might be spotted."

"Why am I not dead yet?" she yelled through the barrel, her voice echoing against the wood.

"You will be soon. But the man who gave your name paid to see you first. So we must go to him."