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A shadow fell over Theon.
Asha, again.
His sister peered over his shoulder as he yanked the free end of a line taut and anchored the knot in place with a locking hitch. She made not a sound. He’d not noticed her approaching, but there she stood, tall and cross-armed as she judged his work. Other men were shuffling about the deck, shifting rotation on duties. That meant no more knots for Theon. Not for a few hours.
He took solace in that, and yanked off the long scarf holding his hair out of his eyes, damp scalp tingling in relief as a breeze brushed through.
“Well, captain?” he asked and gestured towards his work.
High noon caught the gold of Asha’s many earrings as she tilted her head this way and that, pursed her lips, and poked at his simple hitch.
“Wrong,” she decided, and flicked his nose. “Do it again.”
Theon flung his scarf to the deck. A tremor ran up the line as he grabbed hold of its weighted end.
“How!? I crossed over the line and went through middle!”
“Then where’s the cross? And where’s the middle?” She picked at part of the knot, loosing it enough to roll the line about. “You started from the wrong side of the loop—and I would have picked a different knot altogether.”
“You’ve only taught me the one!”
“And you’ve barely learned even that.” Asha ruffled his hair. She had to reach to do so, and Theon would have much preferred if she didn’t fucking bother. “Baby steps, Theon. It’ll come back to you.”
All he wished for at the moment was a better sister.
“Damn that rope,” he grumbled, shoving the offending thing into her hands. If Asha’s lackeys snickered at his poor boatmanship, he ignored it as best he could and stomped off towards the Black Wind’s small bunk hold.
“Excuse me!” Asha called behind him. “Your captain hasn’t given you leave to–!”
Slam.
The cabin door rattled with his force, but he did not stop to worry over its rusty hinges, or the irritated curses of the off-duty reavers who filled the cabin’s hammocks.
His small cot (a privilege, according to Asha) creaked as he threw himself upon it. The blanket stank of mildew. A broken cloak pin quickly became a small dagger in his fingers, the woodwork of the ship his unfortunate victim as he lay and sulked. All patience fled him. The butchered grain earned new pinpricks with every sour thought that crept in.
This wouldn’t be forever; Harlaw was a mere two days away by now, and then it was off to Pyke with Theon and back to Deepwood Mott with his sister. At least, that was the plan as of the morning. Asha seemed hesitant to do do anything with Theon at all, but couldn’t easily do nothing with him either.
Keep him on her crew, and someone was bound to notice eventually. Just having a longship was enough of a glaring target – keeping the North’s newest enemy aboard would make the largest of bullseyes look like pinholes by comparison.
So that made him a liability to his sister, and a sure burden upon his father. Any drop of joy about returning to Pyke once again soured at the thought of what that man would have to say to him, if Asha was his most forgiving critic.
Quite the reversal, her in the North on their father’s orders and Theon back beneath the man’s briny thumb.
Only three days ago, he’d been prince of a castle – effectively determining the fate of a whole kingdom. Foiling it’s war, at least, but by all accounts those had been the moments Theon felt an ounce of the autonomy he’d so craved. More than buying whores with Ned Stark’s allowance. More than anything. He made himself the Prince of Winterfell, saw an opening that no one else did, and Gods did it make him feel high and proud and in control and…
A clipped breath sieved through Theon’s teeth, and he rammed the cloak pin into the poor floorboard.
Empty. Proud, in control, and void of anything at all.
If that title brought him anything now, he did not know how to feel it. Maybe the speed of his downfall was just too fast, and in time his mind would catch up with all of the shame he couldn’t quite conjure. The catharsis was just as great as the nothing that came soon after.
Really, even the catharsis wasn’t even half what he’d hoped it to be. A thorn in the foot did not stop hurting just because one staked claim to the branch. Theon wondered how he’d expected his old thorns to be any different.
Asha threw open the cabin door after little more than five minutes. From her stance alone, he could tell she was not pleaesed.
Theon mumbled,“Mother of all bitches” under his breath and flicked the pin into the wall.
“Are you done?” Asha’s voice was thin, and sharp. “I’ll remind you that I don’t tolerate stowaways.”
“Stowaway,” Theon scoffed. “Go rub your tits in Qarl’s face.”
That did not impress his sister.
“I would, but he’s trying to sleep.” She nodded to one of the sleeping lumps in the hammocks – a blonde lump that gave a decidedly Qarl-ish grunt. Theon repressed a curse, feeling half the idiot and all the nuisance that Asha and her men thought him to be.
(Which of her crew of fools Asha fucked made no difference to Theon, but he should at least try to know their faces. To save himself the pain.)
“This is my ship,” she pressed, “and you’re my deckhand until we reach Harlaw. Try to remember that.”
“Funny way to pronounce ‘brother,’ have you developed an accent?”
“That’s you, Prince of Winterfell. Get back to the deck.”
Theon wanted to kick something. There never was any argument worth winning with Asha, was there? So, he slunk out if his seat and trudged out of the hold, bearing her reprimands all the while. None of her crew even bothered to glance their way – by now, all of them were used enough to their bickering to know it was not worth their daylight.
(That was for the best. They’d have taken Asha’s side anyway.)
“A little effort would not hurt you,” she started, once the cabin’s hatch shut. “A little respect, at least. I could have have left you at that castle and made you face the consequences of acting a fool.”
A fool? Theon found that entirely unfair.
“You would have done the same as me.”
“I’d not have killed the boys, not when their brother already wanted me dead.”
Theon scoffed. “Aye, you’ve never killed anyone, have you?”
“Pirates. Guardsmen. Those who signed their lives to the same dangers as me.” She shook her head, earrings clinking. “Not toddlers.”
“There were circumstances.”
“The boy was three, Theon-”
“For the Gods’ sakes, it wasn’t even them!”
Several heads whipped their way. Theon lowered his voice to a whisper, and hoped that Asha had been speaking softly enough that her men would take his outburst without context.
“Bran and Rickon. Not… Wasn’t them.”
Asha repressed her surprise well, but for a slight raise of her brow and a sharp breath through her nose. She squinted at him and held that breath, searching his face for any sign of a lie. Of course, there were no lies to be found. Not this time.
Her lips pressed into a thin line before a long, bereaved hiss of a sigh sieved from between her teeth.
“The children of smallfolk,” she guessed, correctly, and Theon had never felt so judged even under the heavy eye of Ned Stark.
The North. Robb. Their hatred was of his own choosing. Theon had slammed that door shut firmly and with purpose, and spat behind his heels. From Asha, though, the ridicule ached, like his fingers got caught in the hinges.
He coughed instead of answering. Which, he supposed, was answer enough.
“What a hole you’ve dug, little brother.”
The wooden railing was warm from the sun, and Theon leaned heavily against it as he turned away from his sister. He hoped he looked appropriately brooding as he focused, instead, on the even waters below. He must have; his sister gave a long sigh behind him, but he did not hear her walk away.
Asha must have thrown the perfect stone. A curdling sensation in his gut announced the first cracks in his wall, the first drops of that shame he’d not yet deigned to feel trickling through his stonework.
“Gods,” he cursed, watching his reflection’s brows crinkle together and his lips draw tight.
No matter what he did, someone was bound to hate him for it. Why? Why had he ever wanted to go back?
“I don’t regret it,” Asha’s voice cut through. Theon whipped up to look at her again.
“Taking you back,” she clarified. “I don’t regret that, despite how hard you’re trying.” Her fingers snapped towards the prow. “Go on. Cromm needs a break from rowing.”
Theon had no will to keep fighting her today, and gave a half-hearted “aye, captain,” before doing as she bid.
This wouldn’t be forever, after all.