Chapter Text
“What?” said PC Brienne Tarth, blinking ferociously.
Had she lost her mind, or had her boss finally, after several years of desperately waiting on her part, just offered her a position as sergeant?
“Aren’t you listening? We’re making you sergeant,” said Oberyn again, his mouth curling into a smile.
“Really?” she beamed, “Truly? Honestly?”
Ever since she had graduated from the Police Academy, she had slowly been working her way up the Metropolitan Police Service, tackling every possible situation that could come her way to the best of her ability. The Croydon Cat Killer. The Potato Peeler Plot of 2015. Community Policing. She loved being a PC but being sergeant would give her more responsibility and allow her some authority amongst the other officers she sometimes feared she lacked. Not to mention more money.
“Of course.”
“Thank you, sir! I won’t…”
“In Casterly, Somerset.”
Brienne blinked again. He’d said it so quietly she barely heard him.
“What?”
“In Casterly, Somerset.”
Her mental map of the UK was a bit crap. She’d grown up on the Isle of Wight, and her dad had never had the money to take her on holiday to anywhere other than package trips to Alicante. She had rarely ventured beyond the M25 and never further than the Watford Gap.
“I’ve never heard of it. Where is it?”
Oberyn shrugged his shoulders. “Somerset.”
“But…” said Brienne, “I live here. My job is here. Isn’t there a sergeant job in London?”
Oberyn smiled and there was something mocking in it. “Nope.”
“Can I stay on as a PC?”
“Nope.” Oberyn really was smiling now. He was happy about this.
“I don’t want to leave London.”
“Well, you don’t have any choice.”
That statement hit her hard.
“Why not? Why can’t I stay?” Brienne hoped her face would convey enough bruised hurt to make him change his mind, but Oberyn got to his feet and crossed his office, turning the kettle on.
“To be honest, Bri, can I call you Bri?”
She wanted to tell him no fucking way, but she thought that was probably not the best way to persuade him to let her stay.
“Sure.”
“Bri… ever since you got the Potato Peeler…”
“The Potato Peeler Plotter…” she corrected him.
“Whatever… the Potato Peeler Plotter… you’ve been making the rest of us look bad.”
“Look bad?” Oberyn got out two cups from the cupboard and popped a tea bag in both.
“You’ve got an arrest rate at forty percent higher than anyone else on the force…”
“Service,” she corrected, “official guidelines state that force sounds too aggressive.”
Oberyn continued, unabashed, “you completed the Targaryen drug smuggling case almost single-handedly.”
“Yes, I did,” she said, proud of her accomplishment. “Isn’t that a good thing?”
He shook his head. “Not when your face gets splashed all over the front of the Evening Standard every other week, making it look like you are the only policewoman in London.”
“Police officer,” she insisted. “I am just the same as anyone else.”
Even as it came out of her mouth, she knew it was the wrong thing to say. He flipped the switch on the kettle off and turned around.
“Well, Casterly needs a new police officer, and you fit the bill perfectly.”
Ever since she had worked here, she had resented Oberyn. He was always more interested in his latest fling than whatever cases they should have been focussed on, but because he had a natural gift for hobnobbing with his superiors, he always found himself on his feet. Brienne was jealous of him for that talent; she had always found it impossible to win people over.
She got to her feet, suddenly angry.
“You can’t just make me go… let’s see what the team think about this!”
The team didn’t give a shit. They were as happy to see her go as Oberyn was. There wasn’t even a goodbye party. As she sadly packed her desk up, she wondered what she had done wrong. Had her pursuit of being a good police officer really cost her the friendship and support of her colleagues?
“I hear they occasionally get some old farmer losing his marbles and going on a gun rampage down in Somerset,” said Obara, a hint of a mockery in her voice, “but that only happens once every ten years. It’s mostly people complaining about their neighbours hedges. There’s none of the excitement we have here in the city.”
Brienne knew she was right, but she didn’t want to give Obara the satisfaction of seeing her cry.
She left the station for the last time with only a couple of half-hearted goodbyes from some of her colleagues and the box containing everything from her desk, taking a slow tube journey back to her flat in Balham. Once, and only once, she had locked the door of the dingy one bedroom flat behind her did she allow herself to cry. Oberyn had given her two weeks to pack up her life. Her tears were mostly for her lost job, but also for the rising sense of fear of how easy it would be in the West Country in two weeks’ time. Her roots were so shallow in London; she had no friends in the city, and her only family was down on the Isle of Wight. The only connection she really had was Hyle.
God, I’m pathetic…
Over the next few days she sorted out her affairs; arranged a new tenant, told her bank she was moving, got in contact with the Chief Inspector in Casterly to arrange her new life. She only rang her dad two days before leaving for Casterly.
“Hi, Dad.”
“Hi, Pumpkin. Everything okay?”
She didn’t really know where to start.
“Yes, fine. I’ve been made sergeant.”
She could hear his smile even on the phone. “Congratulations! It’s what you’ve always wanted.” Her silence prompted him to speak again, “isn’t it?”
“It’s in Casterly, Somerset.”
“Where’s that?”
“Somerset,” she said, repeating Oberyn’s response to her.
“Oh, but I thought you wanted to stay in London? All the action is in the city?”
“Yes, I did,” she said sadly, “but I don’t really have much choice.”
He breathed deeply. She could tell he was going to try and give her some fatherly advice. “You always have a choice, love.”
Her heart warmed for the first time in days at that comment. “I know, Dad. It’s a new opportunity in Casterly, it’s…”
“Make the most of it. You could have a fresh start in a new town. Be the best damn sergeant the South West has ever seen. Make some amazing friends. Find the man of your dreams and all that,” he laughed. She could tell he was trying to be reassuring, but she was still not feeling particularly positive.
“I’ll try,” she said.
What she didn’t tell him was that she was a hundred percent sure she was going to die alone. Even if she did meet the man of her dreams in Casterly, there was no damn way that she would be the woman of his.
On her penultimate day in London, there was only one thing left to do before leaving for Casterly: tell Hyle.
Hyle had been her on and off boyfriend for the last three years. They were currently off, but she thought she owed him an explanation nonetheless. Their relationship had always been one built on expediency; he liked sex, she liked not feeling alone. It kept coming to an end when they would finally both remember they didn’t love each other, and it was just the simple transactions that kept them together. As expected, she found him pouring pints at the local boozer, The Lady Stoneheart, chatting up some woman he was serving. Brienne decided to hover at the end of the bar – it would only be a matter of time before he noticed her and came to say hello. It took about fifteen minutes for the woman to eventually return to her friends at one of the rowdier tables and then, and only then, did Hyle sidle over to her.
“Hey Brienne, feeling lonely again?” he said, a wry smile on his lips. She knew he didn’t mean it – it was a poor chat up line above everything else – but still it stung.
“No,” she said, trying to ignore the wave of sadness about to engulf her, “can I have a drink please?”
“Sure. Cranberry Juice?”
“Yes please.” As Hyle began to bustle around preparing her drink, Brienne went over and over in her mind what she was going to say to him.
“So…” he said, placing her drink in front of her, “did you want to talk, or…”
“I am moving away,” she blurted, deciding ripping it off like a plaster was the best option.
She expected him to be wrong-footed at the very least, but her words seemed to bounce off him like water on a duck's back. “Cool. Anywhere exciting?”
“Casterly, Somerset.”
He looked confused. “Where’s that?”
“Somerset,” she said for what felt like the four hundredth time that week, trying not to let the sadness leak out in her tone. He doesn’t even care…
Hyle went to fiddling round with some glasses, so Brienne spoke, trying to regain his attention. “Will you miss me?” she asked.
He shrugged, “of course.” He didn’t look at her as he said it. There was obviously something about her expression that betrayed her sadness, because he then seemed to recover himself, smiling at her and put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “Hey, we had fun while it lasted didn’t we?”
She nodded before saying, “but why didn’t we ever become a thing, Hyle? Why did we never fall in love?”
He dropped his hand as if he had suddenly been burned. “Many reasons,” he said. “I like variety in life, for one. I’ve never been your traditional monogamous type and I’m not made for settling down and becoming some poor bird’s Prince Charming. And as for you, you don’t even want a boyfriend.”
She raised her eyebrows in shock, “I don’t?” This was a genuine revelation to her.
“No,” smiled Hyle, “because you are more in love with your job than you will ever be with any man. And until you find someone who means more to you than being a policewoman, that’s how it will remain.”
“Police officer,” she corrected, almost as a reflex.
“Police officer,” he repeated, sighing, her response validating his answer. He gave her a polite nod and a friendly smile. “If you are ever back in London, it would be nice to see you. I’d like to catch up.”
“Sure,” she smiled, even as her eyes were flooding with tears. “I’ll see you around Hyle.”
“See you.”
And she left the pub, without even finishing her drink.
The next morning, she was up bright and early to get the first train heading west from Paddington. She had left her flat keys with the landlord before she left, armed only with a small suitcase. Inside, were all her clothes and the few sentimental items she possessed; the blanket her mother had knitted when she was born, Galladon’s old teddy bear, the plastic ring Connington had given her. That last one was not so much sentimental, but a reminder. She ordered a coffee and then boarded the train, deciding to sleep until she got to Castle Cary. Consequently, she had her eyes closed as the train left the London terminal.
Her dad's words came back to her. The way he painted it, she could have all the things she never had in London in Casterly - friends, a place in the community, respect, love - and she tried to believe it.
It’s a new start, she said to herself, and I’ve got to make the most of it.