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catelyn and jaime
At the king's insistence, they all wed in the Great Sept. Catelyn smoothed her marriage cloak over her shoulders and tried to count that as a blessing. In these uncertain times, royal favor must be a blessing, even if it felt so far away from what she actually felt.
King Aerys and Queen Rhaella watched them from the dais, and Prince Rhaegar and Princess Shaena watched impassively just below them. Catelyn couldn't tell any of their feelings just by watching them. The Targaryens had their own traditions, with no regard for blood or moiety; Catelyn couldn't quite wrap her head around how they could be so easy about it, but at the moment she secretly envied them all. At least they only had one or two spouses, usually, and at least they knew exactly what to expect from all of them. Much as she didn't enjoy the thought of marrying Lysa or Edmure, at least she knew what kind of people they were, which was more than she could say from her husband and her wife.
Her wife practically glared daggers at her through the whole ceremony - which shouldn't have surprised Catelyn, really, she'd heard plenty of stories about Cersei Lannister and her designs on the Prince. Even worse, Jaime had been looking at her practically the whole ceremony, equally indifferent to the gods and the septon and his spouses-to-be. When it came time for Catelyn and Cersei to join hands, Catelyn couldn't help digging her fingers in extra-tight. Cersei must have gotten the point, because Catelyn's palms had nail marks in them as she drew away.
The bond to her husband came next. He was so handsome, was the most infuriating part - even after the negotiations and the compromises, after all the practicalities that went into this marriage, she couldn't push down the sheer feeling of want as she wrapped her hands around Jaime's and repeated the holy words she had just said to his sister. His own vows followed hers, and it almost surprised her when he finally tore his gaze away from Cersei and looked right at Catelyn as he said them. It should have pleased her, but instead the sparks of anger (and desire) burst into a blaze inside her, stiffening her spine as she pressed her mouth against his to seal their vows.
She could feel him smirking against her lips, but it still wanted to make her melt into him, put her own marks on him and let everyone know who he belonged to. He quirked an eyebrow as he drew away from her, and she wondered if he could recognize her thoughts. Good.
Last came the kiss of peace to her Evening brother, but even as she kissed Eddard's (Ned's, she'll have to remember that) cheek, she couldn't help but notice Jaime's lips curling just above his teeth. Maybe his teeth would be as sharp as his sister's eyes. She'd find out tonight.
jaime and cersei
Sometimes Cersei could curse the whole world - curse her husband and her wife, curse Shaena Targaryen for surviving and taking a royal husband from Cersei, curse the whole tradition of marriage itself. She couldn't quite curse the idea of sedoretu, though. If she couldn't be a queen, being one of the Ladies of the Rock was not a half-bad compensation, and at least she would always have Jaime by her side.
Jaime curled warm into her side right now, the third night after their marriage. The first two nights belonged to their spouses, as tradition demanded, but the third night could be spent as they damn well pleased, and Cersei was determined that it would be that way forever. What did some Northern lesser son and some Riverlands chit have to do with her and Jaime? As far as Cersei was concerned she and her twin had been married since the day they were born, and nothing and nobody could change that.
"We could do what Father and Mother did to the Freys, you know," she said, running her fingers up Jaime's chest. Her idiot grandfather had been foolish enough to promise his golden children to some coin-clinker, and the son had died screaming in his bed just days before the wedding. The daughter had wisely run off with some merchant to Essos after that, and Mother and Uncle Stafford stepped smoothly into her place with marriage to Father and Aunt Genna, Lannisters all together just as it should be.
Jaime smiled ruefully at her. "They did that before they got officially married, you know. That makes a difference," he said, catching her hands in his own. Mother and Father had been Morning and Evening, too, but he knew better than to mention that by now. He kissed her fingers and met her eyes. "You know they'll never mean more to me than you, you know?"
"Yes," she replied, crashing her lips against his. Determinedly she shoved all thoughts of Catelyn and Ned out of her mind. So what if she'd found pleasure in their couplings, however fleeting? So what if they'd had her body? Her heart was spoken for already.
ned and jaime
The fight could have gone worse, but not much more. A handful of bandits should not have been a problem even if they had taken the hunting party by surprise - they had peeling leather armor, nicked swords, and very little fighting skill beyond hacking at whoever stood nearest. But Arthur Dayne had once told him that even the strongest fighters couldn't defeat luck, and a stray rock had turned Jaime's ankle and sent him careening down just as the largest bandit slashed at his mostly-unprotected chest. Jaime had killed the bandit, but not before the bandit got his own blow in. As the rest of the Lannister party dispatched the last of the bandits, the gash in Jaime's chest bled slowly and shallowly as Jaime tried to breathe through the pain in his ribs.
So consumed was he in feeling sorry for himself, he almost didn't notice when his husband sat down next to him. No surprise, not noticing Ned. He'd seen Ned kneeling uncomfortably in the rocks of the godswood, and they'd occasionally sparred together - Ned was slow and careful as a fighter, obviously well-trained but without any zeal for it - but otherwise they didn't interact much. Jaime wasn't sure whether he liked the distance or not. Lately, some part of him leaned toward "not."
"Let me," Ned said, reaching into his satchel and holding up a bottle of some awful-smelling substance. "Let me help you."
"This is a very obvious way to poison me, you know," Jaime replied, because he honestly liked seeing Ned's nostrils flare whenever he jibed at him. The rest of his jibes took longer that he wanted because he promptly was overcome with another bolt of pain shooting through his bones. When he came back to himself, he realized to his own irritation that he'd instinctively grabbed hold of Ned's hand. He let go and shook out his fingers. "What is that? Something my otherparents told you to bring?"
"It's mine. An old Northern remedy. If you'd prefer to bleed..."
"No, no, let's try it," Jaime said, stripping the rest of his shirt off and stretching as he settled back on his makeshift pillow. He smirked as he saw Ned's eyes flicker to his chest, and lower - not so icy after all, are you, he thought - but in the end he closed his eyes and let himself sink into the coolness of Ned's hands and medicines against the heat of sun and blood. A little coolness could do a world of good, sometimes.
cersei and catelyn
Their husbands had been avoiding them. That was the only explanation Catelyn could think of. Jaime had rejected her scheduled night for the third time in a row, claiming a headache, and in itself that would not have bothered Catelyn inordinately - it took a while for everyone to figure out a marriage, after all. But then Ned had spent less and less time with her, when before they had spent most of their free evenings settled in the least-uncomfortable part of the rocky godswood and talking about what it felt like to be one of the few permanent residents of Casterly Rock who was not a Lannister. Her father's voice echoed insistently in her head - every marriage is difficult, be a good and dutiful wife and you will find your way through - but Catelyn couldn't quite quell her feelings of uneasiness.
She still wandered out into the godswood late at night, not quite admitting she was looking for Ned. (And why did she feel so strange about asking after him, anyway? It should be no shame for a sister to look for her brother, but finding him gave her a thrill she didn't want to examine quite yet). It was pure luck when she found Cersei instead, her hands gripped tight around a sword and slashing at the air as if it were her mortal enemy. Catelyn snorted. If any woman could declare a war against the air, it was Cersei.
Cersei must have heard her, for she whirled around, her face shifting from alarm to disdain to, finally, challenge. "Very well," Cersei said, tossing the other sword to Catelyn's feet and assuming an attack position. "Let's see what you can do, then."
Cersei was probably expecting Catelyn to run away. Instead, Catelyn picked up the sword and leveled it at Cersei's throat.
The first clang of the swords rang through Cat's body, jarring her bones in a strangely pleasant way. Cersei smirked back at her, raising her sword for another attack.
They fought for less time that Catelyn thought they would, but when it was over they were both panting heavily and pressed tightly against each other, with Cersei's breasts heaving against Catelyn's. The swords hung loosely at their sides, ready for another attack but calling a truce, just for now. Catelyn kissed Cersei then, for the first time since their wedding night, and as Cersei kissed Catelyn back she could taste both of their smiles.
cersei and ned
"I want to know what you're doing with my brother," she said. In the evening light, she shone brighter than the sun, and Ned didn't quite know which way was up and which was down. It was a feeling he'd had rather a lot, lately - ever since he'd come to Casterly Rock.
"I want to know what you're doing with my sister," he replied. It was an honest question, but one that still made something in Ned squirm. Catelyn and Cersei had been spending most of their nights together, and it should be perfectly normal for a brother to worry about his sister...but he had a blood sister to compare, and he'd never felt this way about Lyanna.
For a moment he almost thought he saw hesitation in Cersei's eyes - something thoughtful and quiet. The only time she'd looked that way before, it was when Ned had first brought Jaime home after the bandit fight and she'd glanced over his wounds before throwing her arms tightly around him. Maybe there's another chink in her armor now. But the moment passed, and Cersei drew up close to him, running her fingers up his arm. She smiled slyly up at him - he wondered, sometimes, just how much she knew. "Would you like me to show you?"
Jaime had this exact same look in bed, sometimes. Ned pushed the memory aside as he looked at Cersei. "Do it, then," he said, almost faint at his own boldness. The two of them had never shared a bed since their wedding night, but this was his wife. Surely that had to mean something. Surely that had to mean everything, this bond to the Lady of the land where he would spend the rest of his life.
He'd expected only a barb from her before she told him to get out of her sight, like she had so many times before. Instead her smile turned almost real - did she like it when he pushed back at her? - and she kissed him, and as Ned leaned into the kiss, nothing else mattered at all.
catelyn and ned
It all fell apart at night, the most beautiful night Cat had seen at the Rock. Moonlight bounced charmingly off the rocks of the godswood and stars shone through the branches of the trees, and still Catelyn raced among them as fast as her heart. Even when Ned sat and waited behind her, her body could not stop.
"I don't - I can't - " Every other word twisted over Cat's tongue. What words could she have? After - after -
"I didn't know either," Ned said calmly. Somewhere in Cat's rambles she crashed into him, and she instinctively curled into his solid body. She barely heard his next words. "Maybe we should listen to them."
"They're committing incest," she snarled, snapping back from Ned and staring him in the eyes. "What is there to listen about?"
Looking in his eyes was the mistake, she thought belatedly, because his eyes were the color of a storm in the moonlight and he was the only thing solid in this godsforsaken mockery of a godswood and she really shouldn't be thinking about incest while in the arms of her moiety brother.
He loosened his grip on her as if he could sense her thoughts, but not enough to let go.
She leaned in closer to him. "Where do we go from here?" She couldn't stop thinking - Jaime and Cersei in bed together, everything she herself had done with Jaime and with Cersei, the things she'd guiltily imagined late at night dreaming of Ned in her bed. It all blurred together in a heady mix of pleasure and dread and shame.
Ned stroked a strand of her hair out of her face. "We'll figure it out," he said, then hesitated. "What do - do you - "
She kissed him then, because the moonlight and the memories were swirling inside her, and because Ned was the only solid thing she had to cling to ever since she'd arrived at this godsforsaken Rock. He didn't even flinch, just leaned in closer to her, and that made her wonder how long he'd been longing for this himself. Some part of her screamed your brother, your brother, but it just made her pull him even closer to her.
She didn't even notice Jaime and Cersei approaching until they appeared right behind her. She stared boldly back at them. After what she'd seen, what reason did she have to be guilty?
To their credit, they didn't seem shamefaced at all. "I was wondering," Jaime said. "I think I won that bet, don't you think, sweet sister?"
"We all won that bet, I think," Cersei replied. She pulled both Ned and Cat closer to her and Jaime, and as they all fell together Catelyn knew she was lost.
jaime, cersei, ned, and catelyn
The sedoretu's first anniversary was all in gold, as befit a Lannister. Gold leaf clung to the edge of the pastries, which the guests dined on with golden forks in the light of golden candlesticks. Tywin spared no expense in proving what a good match he'd made for his children, especially since the king and queen had proclaimed the official wedding date for Rhaegar and Shaena only a fortnight earlier. No one was foolish enough to openly compare the celebrations at Casterly Rock favorably to those at the Red Keep, but they had good reason to think it, and that was what the Lannisters wanted most.
The sedoretu's real celebration came later that night, the four of them crammed into Cersei's chambers on the grounds that she had the best view of the sunset over the sea. As the sun set the four of them shared stories of their growing up, and once the sun set they all tumbled into Cersei's bed together with no regard for whose hands found who in the dark. Tomorrow would shine bright and golden as any of them, and they would be prepared to face it together.