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The room next door finally went quiet.
The heart-rending "screams." The blood-stirring "struggles." The groan of a bed pushed past its limits.
All of it, gone.
The silence that followed was worse than any of the sounds before it. It scraped along Ramsay Snow's nerves like a flaying knife, inch by deliberate inch.
He was still sitting against the wall, arms wrapped around his knees, like a child abandoned in a corner.
The silent smile hadn't left his handsome, twisted face. It made him look unhinged. It made him look dangerous.
He had lost.
His pride. His art. His loyal hound.
All of it was now a plaything on someone else's bed. Music in someone else's ears.
And he, the hunter, was chained up next door like a dog, forced to listen to every last note of it.
Humiliation. Anger. Jealousy. Venom.
Every emotion churned through him and settled into something colder than all of them combined.
He wanted to kill.
He wanted to kill Lynn.
He wanted even more to kill the bitch who had betrayed him. Miranda.
He would flay her himself. He would make her understand exactly what it meant to betray her master.
Ramsay rose slowly to his feet.
Three hours. The oil lamp had burned out long ago. Only the pale moonlight through the window remained, stretching his shadow long across the floor.
He walked to the door and closed his hand around the cold iron handle.
Click.
A soft sound. The door swung open.
Unlocked?
Something feral lit up behind his eyes.
Negligence?
Or another trap?
He didn't care anymore.
He just wanted to find her. Wrap his hands around her neck. Squeeze.
He moved through the dark like a lone wolf, each footstep swallowed by silence. The corridors of Winterfell stretched empty around him. Somewhere distant, a patrol's boots scraped stone, then faded.
Everything was going smoothly. Impossibly so.
He knew exactly where Miranda would be.
Right next door. Lynn's room. The largest, warmest one in the keep.
The door was slightly ajar. Firelight bled through the crack.
Ramsay pressed himself against the wall and peered inside.
Lynn wasn't there. Some urgent matter, no doubt.
Only one woman in the room.
Miranda.
Her back was to the door. She wore nothing but a loose silk robe, her black hair damp and dripping, spread across her shoulders.
She stood before a large full-length mirror, studying her own reflection.
In the glass, her body, wild and strong, was covered in bruises. Deep purple marks bloomed across her skin like strange flowers in the snow.
They stabbed at Ramsay's eyes.
He bit down hard, his chest heaving, barely holding back the urge to kick the door in and tear her apart.
He held.
He watched Miranda slowly raise one hand. Her fingertip traced a red mark on her neck in the mirror.
Then the corner of her mouth curved.
A smile.
Not the smile he knew. Not the cruel, bloodthirsty one that had always been his.
Something else entirely. Something soft. Something satisfied, like a woman savoring a memory she didn't want to let go.
BOOM!
The last thread of reason in Ramsay's mind snapped clean.
He shoved the door open and charged in.
"Bitch!"
The word tore out of his throat, barely contained, raw with rage.
Miranda spun around.
When she saw his face, twisted and burning, a flash of panic crossed her eyes.
Then it was gone.
Replaced by calm.
She didn't scream. She just pulled the silk robe tighter around herself.
"What are you doing here?"
Her voice was flat. Like she was speaking to a stranger who'd wandered into the wrong room.
That calm enraged him more than any scream could have.
"What am I doing here?"
He moved toward her, step by step. Those pale blue eyes were on fire.
"I'm here to kill you. You shameless bitch."
"You dare betray me."
"Betray?"
Miranda laughed.
The sound was hollow. Full of self-mockery, full of something bleak.
"Lord Ramsay." Her voice stayed even. "Have you forgotten?"
"It was you who gave me to him. Your own words. Your own hands."
"I was only carrying out your order."
"Order?"
He grabbed her wrist. His grip was crushing, almost enough to snap bone.
"When the fuck did I ever say that?"
Miranda smiled.
"Wasn't that what you wanted?"
"And now that it's done, you're going back on your word."
Ramsay went still.
He hadn't said it. He knew he hadn't said it.
Then something clicked.
"Miranda." His voice sharpened. "Don't you remember?"
"That wasn't Ned that day. It was Lynn in disguise. You saw it yourself."
"He impersonated me. He said those things deliberately, to get inside my head, to turn you into a weapon against me."
"I've already explained this to you."
"If you believe me — if you come with me, get out of Winterfell tonight — I'll forget everything. We start clean."
Miranda's smile didn't waver.
Run with Ramsay. Go back to the Dreadfort. Let him flay her alive.
She knew his methods better than anyone.
This was simple. He wanted to use Lynn's trust in her as a key, and once the door was open, she'd be discarded. A tool with no further purpose.
She already knew what happened to tools that outlived their use.
"Ramsay." Her tone was almost gentle. "Do you think I don't see it?"
"What good would exposing Lynn do for me? I have no power. No leverage. Nothing to bargain with. I'm a captive who wants to live, and I have no other choice."
"I'm choosing to be Lynn's willingly. His plaything, if that's what you want to call it."
"I was blind before. You made sure of that."
"But I see you clearly now. So stop trying to pull my strings."
"If you actually care what happens to me, walk away. Let's end this cleanly."
Ramsay's entire body shook.
He couldn't accept it. Couldn't process it. His untouched prize, taken before he'd even had the chance , and now she was standing here telling him her heart had changed too.
"Miranda, you slut."
His voice dropped to something ugly.
"You wanted to throw yourself at that bastard from the start, didn't you? Didn't you?"
"I'm telling you right now."
"Even if you die, you die as my plaything. No one else's."
Crack.
He backhanded her across the face.
Blood welled at the corner of her mouth.
She raised her head and looked straight at him. No flinching. No tears.
The slap had lit something in her too. A fire she was done trying to bank.
"Heh." Her voice came out low and sharp. "Finally dropping the mask."
"Fine. Yes. I wanted him. I'm a slut. The worst kind, the absolute worst in all the world."
"I gave him everything he asked for. Whatever position he wanted, I took it."
"On the bed? On the bed."
"On the city walls? On the city walls."
"In front of a crowd, if that's what he'd wanted. I would have smiled."
"Lord Lynn wanting my body is the greatest honor I've ever been given."
"I was just using everything you taught me." Her eyes met his. "To please a better master."
"And I have to say..."
The corner of her mouth curled into something vicious.
"Lord Lynn is so much better than you."
"Stronger. Bigger. He lasted over three hours tonight. My legs are still shaking."
"And you?"
"Your own handmaidens told me. You don't even last a minute. Not even thirty seconds." She tilted her head. "How pathetic, Lord Ramsay."
"Truly. It's almost funny."
She covered her mouth and laughed.
Those words hit like a branding iron pressed flat against his chest.
"Shut up."
"Shut your mouth."
Ramsay lost it completely. He shoved her to the ground.
"Bitch! I'll show you who your real master is!"
He was an animal. He wanted to burn his mark back into her with something primitive and savage. He wanted her to understand what betrayal cost.
Miranda didn't fight him. Didn't beg.
She lay still and watched his face, grotesque with desire and jealousy and rage, and felt nothing.
No love. No fear.
Only a cold, dead quiet behind her eyes. And underneath it, something that felt almost like relief.
"Touch me," she said quietly, "and Lord Lynn will flay you alive. Believe me, Ramsay."
He didn't hear her. Or didn't care.
Miranda closed her eyes.
BANG!
The heavy oak door exploded inward.
Northern soldiers in full armor poured through the gap like a breaking wave, swords drawn.
"Ramsay Snow!"
The shout hit the room like a thunderclap.
They were on him before he could move, driving him face-first into the floor, pinning every limb.
"Get off me! You bastards!"
He thrashed. He roared. He got nowhere.
A mad dog caught in a trap, snarling at steel that wouldn't give.
Miranda sat up slowly. She pulled the torn robe around herself without a word.
She was Lynn's now. Ramsay didn't get to see what was his.
She didn't look at Ramsay again.
She listened to his screams and curses fade down the corridor until there was nothing left.
---
The lord's study. Winterfell.
Lynn sat before the fireplace, unhurried, straightening his clothes.
Roslin stood quietly behind him and refilled his wine.
About time.
Sure enough, the door opened shortly after.
Two guards dragged Ramsay inside, bound so tightly he could barely shuffle his feet.
"My lord!"
"This man — he tried to rape Miranda. In your own room."
Lynn didn't look up. He was busy with his dagger, wiping the blade in slow, careful strokes.
Then he raised his eyes.
Ramsay was on his knees, soldiers' hands on his shoulders, holding him down. Lynn looked at him the way a man looks at something mildly interesting he found on the bottom of his boot.
That same warm, easy smile. The one that made the cold feel colder.
"I just wanted to see what a mad dog would do once someone let it off the chain."
"Turns out you're even more of a dog than I thought."
"No." Lynn tilted his head slightly. "That's not right. Calling you a dog is an insult to dogs. You're something beneath that."
"Miranda in your hands." He shook his head. "A pearl wasted on a pig."
"But don't worry."
"Miranda is in my hands now. I'll take very good care of her."
Ramsay stared at him. His eyes were a map of burst vessels and pure, distilled hatred.
If a look could kill, Lynn would have been a corpse a hundred times over by now.
"You devil."
The words scraped out through his teeth.
"Thank you." Lynn smiled. He stood, crossed the room, and crouched in front of Ramsay until they were eye to eye.
"You know what, Ramsay."
"Those filthy little thoughts you have about Myrcella. About Arya. About Sansa." His voice was almost conversational. "I know all of them."
Ramsay's whole body went rigid.
What?
His own private mutterings , overheard by Lynn? There had been no one around. He was certain of it.
How?
Why?
Lynn's gaze dropped. Traveled slowly downward.
His eyes went cold.
"There's one thing I can't stand." His voice stayed quiet. "People touching what's mine."
"Especially my women."
"Myrcella. Arya. Sansa. All of them."
"Miranda doesn't quite belong in that category yet , but she's a prize I won from you. That makes her mine by right."
"You reaching for her is the same as reaching for me."
Lynn stood. He looked down at Ramsay from his full height.
"I've been too lenient with you. I see that now."
"I've decided to send Roose Bolton a gift."
He turned to the guards.
"Do you know how the kennels at the Dreadfort castrate their hunting hounds?"
The color left Ramsay's face in an instant.
"They use a blunt knife, heated until it glows red. Then they work slowly, "
"Enough."
Ramsay's voice cracked. Even he, with everything he'd done, with everything he'd enjoyed doing , he didn't want to hear this. Not now. Not with the understanding of what came next settling into his bones.
Lynn smiled.
He picked up a dagger from the table and held it out to one of the guards.
"This one's sharp. It'll make it quicker. I'm a merciful man."
"Take him. Physical castration. Clean work." He paused. "Not half a centimeter left. Understood?"
He turned back to Ramsay.
"This is what you earned, Ramsay. This is the price for coveting my women."
His voice didn't rise. It didn't need to. The room had already gone ice-cold.
"I'll send the gift intact to the Dreadfort. Right to the dining table."
"I want Roose Bolton to taste his grandson himself."
The last trace of color vanished from Ramsay's face.
Fear.
Not the kind he knew how to use. Not the kind he inflicted. This was the kind that went all the way down, past thought, past pride, past everything.
He could die. He had always been able to die.
But not this. Not like this.
"No , no! You can't! You can't do this!"
Something broke open in him. He started thrashing, screaming, his voice climbing into registers it had never reached before.
"Kill me! Just kill me!"
"Please. Kill me. Please, "
No one answered him.
Two guards hauled him upright like a sack of wet grain and dragged him toward the door.
"Lynn! You bastard! You'll regret this! I curse you — I curse you to die screaming — !!!"
The shrieks echoed down the corridor, rising and then falling, until the stone swallowed them whole.
Silence reclaimed the study.
Lynn settled back into his chair by the fire. He picked up his wine glass and took a slow, quiet sip.
His face was perfectly still.
As if he had just given the order to put down a disobedient dog.
➤ Next: Reek — What Was Lost