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[farfromthesea]

The dead may not be wandering the streets tonight, but Theon has prepared as if they might.

As he's told Daryl, as he knows Daryl knows, the living who would wreak havoc this night will be more dangerous. He's not foolish enough to think anyone might try for their small cabin on the beach out of sheer greed; he thinks instead of the joy of the Ironborn in collecting the iron price.

He thinks of Ramsay Bolton's smile and his blade.

He wakes up with the sort of nightmares he hasn't suffered since the crimson of his scar had slowly faded to pink. Without Daryl--

He cannot allow even the beginning of that thought, even if they're unlikely to see action at all, even if Daryl's more than able to fend off attackers.

They fortify the cabin, and Theon lays in a supply not only of the arrows that can be bought, but the sort he'd fired into the attacking horde in the Godswood. He crafts them along with the spears he can best handle; while he's learned to fire a gun, while he has possession of a crossbow, he wants what his hands know.

When the night finally comes, he sits on the front step, bow in hand, listening, hearing no screams yet. Only the sound of crows in a nearby tree, a sound no more comforting.

Comments

[lastmanstandin]

"'s quiet," Daryl muttered, worrying the inside of his cheek with his molars. Quiet didn't always mean safe. Often, it meant something was on its way.

He dropped onto the step at Theon's side, bowie knife in hand. Dog was on alert as much as they were, sticking close, eyes always on the horizon.

[farfromthesea]

"Quiet for now," Theon murmurs, shifting a tiny bit closer, trying to strike the right balance between the comfort of Daryl solid against him, and their ability to act should the quiet break.

And it will break, he's certain.

"I thought it would be too much like the Long Night. Only the closer we got to tonight-- it's not the same. The white walkers, they were... I reckon they took some mindless joy in the attack, and the Night King, he was glad when he thought he would conquer us. They weren't doing it just for fun."

[lastmanstandin]

"People are assholes," he agreed simply, head tilting subtly at the first signs of commotion in the distance: An alarm, probably coming from a nearby car.

"Other ways to let off steam," he grumbled. "Whoever's makin' the decisions 'round here's off their fucking rocker."

[farfromthesea]

Theon tenses at the sound, the strangeness of this night making the shriek of alarm feel alien all over again.

"If anyone's really making the decisions," he says. "Does seem more... planful, than the normal shit, though." Somewhere, not far from the car alarm, glass breaks, and someone whoops wildly. His fingers tighten on the bow.

"These people haven't even-- what've they got to let off this much steam about," he mutters, well aware he's bitching pettily.

[lastmanstandin]

Daryl snorted.

"Maybe the fact that their lives are pointless as shit," Daryl muttered, feeling vaguely unkind for saying it, but he'd never much seen the point of trying to fit himself into the rest of normal society. Not back home, sure as hell not here.

He'd found his people, and that had to be enough.

[farfromthesea]

"Life could be shit, where I'm from," Theon says, having long stopped calling any part of Westeros home, especially when home is here beside him. "Hard and cold and-- shit. It wasn't the lowborn poor folk who played these games, not usually. The highborn lords and ladies that didn't work and suffer."

His mouth curves down hard.

"If I've got anything to thank Ramsay Bolton for, it's keeping me from being one of them still."

[lastmanstandin]

"Maybe they would've, given the chance," Daryl said, with a shrug. "Higher ups give the go-ahead, folks let off some steam. Seems like a pretty clever diversion."

And if that was the case, what were they being distracted from?

[farfromthesea]

"Some of them, aye," Theon agrees. "It could happen when you took an army though any place people lived, though it was most likely the soldiers then." A thought occurs, sudden and sharp enough that he winces.

"It's how the Greyjoys lived. All that shit about the Iron price, it was a way to dress things up like the shit about people being more peaceful after the Purge. I didn't know for a long time I was lucky to be a ward in the North instead of--"

There's a scream, not as far off as he'd like it to be, and he stands, drawing an arrow.

[lastmanstandin]

Daryl rose to his feet, slipping a bolt from the quiver of his crossbow and loading it silently. Reaching for Theon's spear, Daryl handed it over, then took a step out into the yard, his head cocked to listen.

"Sounds like it's coming from the south," he murmured, hearing another, slightly muffled shriek.

[farfromthesea]

The last damned thing Theon wants to do is to leave what safety they've cobbled together and put them both at risk. It's unlikely that anyone's after their small home and bit of land; they'd be able to pass a quiet night, most like.

"Let's go then," he says, low and not without reluctance. With Daryl's crossbow ready in his hands, Theon moves his bow to his back and arms himself with the spear. He takes a moment to press his mouth hard to Daryl's-- and then turns south, toward the sound.