THE AGREEMENT

Author's Note: This is a non-profit fanfiction based on A Song of Ice and Fire. It is part of a larger story world I plan to adapt into an original novel. All names, places, and affiliations may change in the future.

ROBB

The sun hung low in the sky, casting long shadows across the training yard as Robb completed his final forms with the Yi Tish blade. Though different from the balanced weight of his Northern sword, he had grown accustomed to its lighter feel and the way it moved like an extension of his arm rather than a tool in his hand. Master Fu had nodded approvingly today—a rare gesture from the taciturn weapons instructor.

Sweat cooled on Robb's skin as he returned the practice blade to its stand. His muscles ached pleasantly from exertion, his mind clearer than it had been in days. Physical training had always helped him think, and today he needed that clarity. After a full day of consideration, he had decided to approach Ruyan with his nameday request.

This could change everything between us, he thought as he made his way toward the princess's quarters. Or it could reveal that nothing can change at all.

He found her in the villa's garden pavilion, studying a collection of scrolls spread across a stone table. Afternoon light filtered through ornamental screens, casting patterned shadows across her still form. She looked up as he approached, her expression as unreadable as ever.

"Lord Stark," she acknowledged with a slight inclination.

Robb took a steadying breath, reminding himself of the stakes. This wasn't merely about satisfying curiosity but determining whether any true partnership could exist between them. Whether the North's future would be better served by alliance or continued isolation.

"You told me that you would show me what I refused, so it would make me reconsider the alliance," he began, his voice steady despite the tension coiling in his chest.

"I did," Ruyan answered simply.

"You are showing me YiTi, but you have yet to show me yourself." Robb paused, choosing his next words carefully. "I didn't just refuse the alliance. I also refused you. Hence, to add more weight to how I will decide, you must show yourself so I'll get to know you."

She could dismiss this outright, he thought, studying her face for any reaction. She could say I have no right to make demands.

Instead, Ruyan seemed to absorb his words, her dark eyes focused on him with an intensity that revealed nothing of her thoughts.

"How will you accomplish this?" she finally asked.

Robb hadn't expected this response—not immediate rejection or eager acceptance, but a practical question about implementation. It was quintessentially Ruyan.

"Friendship," he answered, "the Northern way. Blunt and honest and can still hold grievances, much like the situation now."

Like Jon and I after a disagreement, he thought. Still brothers, still loyal, but with the truth between us, not buried beneath false courtesies.

Ruyan digested his words for a few quiet moments, and Robb waited, observing her reaction. The slight tension in her shoulders, the barely perceptible furrow between her brows—these tiny tells suggested she considered his proposal with serious attention rather than dismissing it outright.

"Will you even believe friendship coming from me?" Ruyan asked carefully.

The question surprised him—not because of its content, but because of its insight. She had immediately identified the fundamental challenge: trust. After everything that had happened, would he truly be able to believe in any overture of friendship she might offer?

"It is up to me to judge your authenticity," he answered, meeting her gaze directly.

And I will be observing, he added silently. For every hint of calculation, every moment of genuine feeling.

Silence stretched between them, heavy with unspoken thoughts. Robb waited, letting her feel the weight of the moment. Now, she had a choice—to reveal herself or to remain hidden behind imperial protocol and diplomatic necessity.

Finally, Ruyan spoke. "I want my mission to succeed, so I will enter a friendship with you." She paused, then looked at Robb directly, her expression subtly different than he had ever seen. "But I will be honest. I do not know how to be someone's friend or befriend someone."

The admission shocked them both. Robb felt his carefully constructed expectations falter. He had anticipated resistance, perhaps negotiation, maybe even a calculated performance of friendship. But this simple confession of inadequacy? It caught him entirely off guard.

He looked for manipulation or lies in her statement, searching her face for signs of deception. But all he found was an uncomfortable authenticity that seemed almost painful for her to express. She was telling the truth—perhaps the first completely unguarded truth she had offered him.

Gods, he thought with a sudden clarity that felt like cold water down his spine. She really doesn't know how.

He saw her differently now. Not cold by nature, but isolated by design—and perhaps still learning how to be human. He had seen her as cold by choice, reserved by training, and calculating by nature. But what if her imperial mask concealed not just hidden warmth but genuine inexperience with basic human connection?

All his life, Robb had been surrounded by friendship—Jon's steadfast loyalty, Theon's irreverent camaraderie, the easy bonds formed with the sons of his father's bannermen. Even with those of different stations, he understood the foundations of mutual respect and genuine care that underlay true friendship. The idea that someone might never have experienced such connections was almost inconceivable.

Yet it made a terrible kind of sense. The perfect imperial doll was raised to fulfil a destiny rather than to form attachments. Trained in diplomacy rather than friendship, strategic alliance rather than genuine connection.

The plan he'd made—watch her, test her—suddenly felt like trying to read a book no one had taught her to write.

"You've never had a friend?" he asked, unable to contain his surprise.

Ruyan's posture stiffened almost imperceptibly. "I have siblings. I have imperial relatives. I have tutors and attendants. I have diplomatic connections." Each category was listed with precise definition. "Friendship was considered... unnecessary. Potentially compromising to my duties."

The matter-of-fact way she delivered this information made it all the more troubling—not as a confession of deprivation but as a simple statement of imperial reality.

It unsettled him—but the course hadn't changed. He'd still have to judge what came next.

His plan had been to observe her attempts at friendship and judge whether a genuine partnership might be possible. Now, he faced a different challenge altogether: how to assess someone who would be attempting something she had never experienced before.

Part of him—the strategic part his father had cultivated—recognized this as potentially advantageous. Ruyan's inexperience might make her easier to read, and her attempts at friendship would be more transparent than if she were skilled at such interactions.

But another part—the part that had grown up with his mother's Tully values of family and honour—felt an unexpected pang of something dangerously close to pity. What kind of life had she led, where such basic human connections were considered liabilities?

"Then we'll start with the fundamentals," Robb heard himself say, surprising himself with the decision. "Friendship begins with honesty. You've already shown that. And with spending time together beyond duty—talking about things that matter to us, not just our kingdoms."

Ruyan listened with the same focused attention she gave to military strategies or agricultural techniques as if he were explaining a necessary diplomatic protocol rather than the basics of human connection.

"I believe I understand the theoretical framework," she replied, and Robb almost laughed at the formal response. "But application may prove challenging."

At least she's self-aware, he thought. And honest about her limitations.

"We have time," he said, more gently than he had intended. "The rest of our journey will provide opportunities."

Something flickered across Ruyan's face—relief, perhaps, or uncertainty. Whatever it was, it vanished quickly behind her composed features.

"Then I accept your proposal," she said formally as if they had negotiated a trade agreement rather than agreed to attempt friendship. "When do we begin?"

This time, Robb did laugh—a short, surprised sound that seemed to startle them both. "We already have, Princess. This conversation is our beginning."

Robb looked at her, knowing he could push through her boundaries slightly. "For this to work, we shall be honest to each other. We can still withdraw things we do not want to reveal forcefully, but we must start with basic things. That is the bare minimum."

"I understand," Ruyan says, then went quiet.

As he took his leave, Robb found himself in entirely unfamiliar territory. He had sought to know Ruyan better through friendship, only to discover that friendship was foreign to her. The revelation cast everything he had observed about her in a new light—her coldness, calculation, and precise adherence to protocol.

He was no longer simply judging her capacity for genuine connection but potentially showing her what such connection meant in the first place.

The boundaries of captor and captive, diplomatic opponents, and potential allies seemed suddenly insufficient to describe what might develop between them.

Robb thought as he walked back toward his quarters, the mountain twilight deepening around him. "Father would caution me against sympathy," he said, "He would remind me that this doesn't change how I came to be here or the imperial ambitions behind it all."

And that was true. Nothing about this revelation negated the circumstances of his journey to Yi Ti or the political calculations that had brought them together. Ruyan still wanted the alliance. She still served her father's vision.

But as he watched the first stars appear in the darkening sky, Robb couldn't help but wonder if there might be more possibilities than he had initially imagined—not just between their kingdoms but between themselves as people.

I wanted to know who she was, he reminded himself. Now I'm beginning to see.

Whether that knowledge would lead him toward accepting the alliance or more firmly against it remained to be seen. But for the first time since he had awakened on that ship bound for Yi Ti, Robb felt that he was truly seeing Ruyan—not just the princess, the mission, and the person behind the perfect imperial mask.