It was a clear sunny day in the North, and the people residing in the little town of Winterfell were bustling with enthusiasm as they went about their daily work. Merchants peddled their wares, blacksmiths pounded their anvils, and the cooks prepared their meals.
Usually, Winter was the time when Winterfell became fully occupied with the nearby Smallfolks gathering here to hide from the cold and to stave off their hunger. But it was the peak of the summer right now and the town was easily full, almost to the point of bursting. From blacksmiths to woodworkers, Merchants to Hunters, nobody seemed to be sitting idle and everyone seemed to have plenty of work on their hands.
The reason for all this could simply be attributed to the Starkhorse factory or rather factories on the outskirts.
The abundant work there was creating all kinds of direct and indirect jobs and was attracting workers from all over the North, not only that miraculously some families had even migrated up from the South, which must have broken some kind of long-standing record considering how rare it was for people to travel to North to find work instead of the other way around.
The east gate of Winterfell was lively with people from all walks of lives coming and going, some were Merchants who came to ask permission to do business and open shops, while others were regular Smallfolks looking to settle their petty disputes. The gate remained open most of the day, necessitating guards to stay alert all the time and were kept busy as beavers.
But on the complete opposite end was the Hunter's gate; it was exactly what its name implied, it was the gate that the hunters used for their hunts as it directly opened into the nearby Wolfswood.
It was calm here, as the only traffic this gate saw was in the morning when the Hunters left for the day and in the evening when they came back. In fact, the guards even considered it their break time whenever they were rotated here. There was nothing to do here except to just laze around, gossip and sometimes even take a nap.
So as usual the guards were standing on one side of the gate with their heads stuck together and were having fierce discussions about which maid was the prettiest and which one had what qualities. But suddenly out of nowhere, their lazy afternoon was interrupted by a loud piercing yell.
"STOP HER!!"
The guards were immediately scared out of their minds, thinking that they were being attacked and they instinctively stumbled for their weapons before their eyes looked up and they realised who the culprit was.
It was the youngest daughter of the Stark, a naughty brat barely tall enough to open doors. And here she was, riding on the back of that massive majestic horse, that belonged to Jon Snow, like a veteran. She had an ecstatic expression on her and was periodically looking back at her pursuer with a naughty grin as she headed straight for the gates.
"Stop her, you idiots!" Lady Stark shouted furiously at the dumbfounded guards, who hastily sprang into action as they saw her enraged face while chasing her unruly daughter.
The guards immediately ran towards the middle of the gate and stood in front of it with their hands spread apart forming a human barricade. However, the horse displayed no intention of stopping. Instead, it sped up even further scaring the shit out of them. They briefly hesitated on whether to use their weapons before they looked at each other and decided that they didn't want to be slain by Jon and simultaneously leapt out of the way, leaving the horse to easily bypass them with a quick jump.
"HaHa... Too slow, Stupid!" Arya shouted while giggling loudly before she waved her hands, "Good day, Losers!" and taunted before disappearing straight into the Wolfswood forest not far away.
The guards had funny expressions on their faces at being outwitted by a snot-nosed brat but all their amusement immediately left them as they caught sight of a fuming lady Stark coming towards them, and almost immediately they shuddered and scrambled to stand up straight and tried to put on as remorseful of an expression as they could, hoping to be gain some sympathy by the Stark Matriarch.
"Why didn't you stop her, You Idiots!" she berated the guards the moment she reached them. "And why were the gates left open at this time? Are you slacking?!"
The guards felt wronged by the questions but upon seeing the lady's eyes spitting fire they knew better than to argue back, fortunately for them someone else caught up to her and spoke up for them, "It's not their fault, Mother." Sansa said calmly, not being out of breath despite the light jog, unlike her Mother, "This gate typically remains open during the day, and the hunters must have just departed for the forest."
"Fine then," Catelyn said turning her head away from the guards who immediately felt relieved at getting spared and sneaked away at the first chance while she was looking into the forest, "What do we do now? The stupid girl went into the forest alone," she said in a mixed tone of frustration and worry, "What should I do, Sansa? Should I go after her?"
Thankfully before she could do something as foolhardy as going into the forest, Jory appeared from the direction of the stables, "Did she manage to get away?" he asked immediately after seeing their faces and the absence of someone.
"What do you think?" Lady Stark replied curtly, without taking her eyes away from the trees as if hoping that the girl would wise up and come back.
"Umm..., I'll immediately prepare a search party then," Jory said as if it was a regular thing which it was, considering the number of times the Stark children had gone into the woods, "Don't worry, My Lady, We'll easily find her," he bowed before running away towards the courtyard.
Catelyn sighed wearily. "I swear that girl is going to be the death of me. It's all because of her father and her brother; they spoil her too much. And you!" She turned to Sansa, accusingly, "Did you have to inform her that he's coming home? This all began because she wanted to go with him."
"She would have found out sooner or later anyway," Sansa shrugged nonchalantly, "And he's our brother she should know about it,"
"She doesn't have to! Look what happened because of that—" Sansa's eyes immediately narrowed making Catelyn change her words midway, "—because of Jon... And now my little girl is all alone in that forest... Oh! Crone, please guide her home safely,"
"She's not alone, Mother," Sansa said gently while rubbing her mother's back, "Peggy's with her, she wouldn't let anything hurt her,"
"P-Peggy?! Are you joking? Or am I the only one sane here? How can you even think that it would be fine to leave your only sister in a forest under a horse's care?"
Sansa knew that it wouldn't be possible to explain anything to her without making her even more hysteric so she didn't even try to reason with her about why the rest of the family was so trusting of Peggy, "Don't worry Mother, Well find her—Oh! I know! I'll go and call Becca, she always knows where to find her..."
Catelyn hesitated for just a moment at that, before she nodded her head, as she knew that the girl Becca was one of the few people who had an affinity with her daughter.
"I'll go get changed then," Sansa said, running off.
"Wait!—No! I don't want you to—" Catelyn attempted to stop her, but Sansa was already out of earshot, leaving her exasperated., "Oh! Sevens! What has happened to my sweet little girls?"
Not only Arya, even her perfect little girl didn't listen to her anymore, and Sansa had gotten fond of learning to fight and was too comfortable in breeches and bows for Catelyn's liking, "How am I supposed to find them good husbands like this? Why did this all happen?" she lamented to herself and her mind immediately supplied an answer in the form of an image of a handsome man with an evil smile making her grit her teeth.
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