"You look beautiful," Lilia said as she looked at the little girl in front of her. They were currently getting for a feast that Princess Arianne insisted on organizing as a way of 'making Princess Myrcella familiar with her new family'. Of course, Lilia was perfectly aware of the fact that it was only an excuse for her to throw a feast. She had been invited as well, which she felt happy for.

"You think so?" the girl hesitantly indagated earning a smile from Lilia. "Do you think Trystane will think so too?"

"Myrcella, you look absolutely breathtaking and if Trystane doesn't realize that, then he's either blind or stupid" Myrcella looked down with a shy smile. "Have you talked to him lately?"

"Yes, we walked through the gardens and he seemed to be sweet" Lilia smiled at the Princess's happiness. Lord Tyrion had certainly made a good match when setting that betrothal. Lilia hadn't had the opportunity to speak with the young Prince but she did have the opportunity to take a look at him. He seemed like a good lad, one worthy of Myrcella.

"Then, you have nothing to fear. Just be your usual lovely self!" Lilia advised as she combed the girl's hair with her fingers. "Now, it is time to go. You don't want to keep your intended waiting"

"Will you come with me?" Lilia had been invited to the feast by Arianne herself. However, she wasn't keen on having to go. She never liked feasts, she never thought they were extravagant and back home, whenever her family hosted a feast, she would seek refuge with Jon, who was rarely allowed to stay in the room.

"Alright" she agreed after looking at the girl's eyes. For better or for worse, that girl was her Princess. Despite the family, she had come from, in spite of everything her family had done to Lilia's, she couldn't refuse the little girl.

They headed to the feast together, once they got there, everybody was dancing and having fun. As Lilia looked around she realized she knew nothing about feasts because that one was completely different from any feast she had ever had the opportunity of attending.

Everything was very colourful, without being boring. People would dance and simply have fun without the weight of looking proper. Bastards wouldn't be left outside, as some of the Sand Snakes were standing with Princess Arianne.

For a moment, she wished she had been born a Martell of Dorne instead of a Stark of Winterfell. She had heard her father say that Dorne was unlike any other place she would ever see in the Seven Kingdoms and that the people were similar to the ones who lived in the North.

Lilia couldn't disagree more.

Yes, they cared about family as much as northerners did, but they also had another context of the family very different from the people in the North. Perhaps the desert and the heat made them that way, but the truth was that compared to them, the cold wasn't the only thing freezing in the North.

One thing she also wondered was when and how had her father come to Dorne. Many say it was due to the war, others said he came to visit the one who people believed to be Jon Snow's mother, the woman who had made Ned Stark cast his honour aside for a moment, something not even his own wife had been capable of. The woman's name had been forbidden by her father at Winterfell, but Lilia still managed to discover the woman's name – Ashara Dayne.

She was the sister of Ser Arthur Dayne, the Sword of the Morning. Rumour has it that they met at the Tourney of Harrenhall, when her uncle, Brandon, had to go up to Ashara, who was one of Elia Martell's ladies, to ask her to dance with his shy brother. And they did. They danced once, and many said that she was the first woman her father loved.

Sure, he did love his wife, but before her, there was Ashara Dayne. She had a tragic ending, Lilia had been told that the woman jumped off a tower after being pregnant with a baby. In the North, many believed that baby to be Jon Snow, but others believe that the baby died and that its father was actually her uncle, Brandon Stark.

She knew her mother believed Ashara to be Jon's mother, even if the woman had never mentioned her name to Lilia. However, the crypts of Winterfell kept many secrets, and Lilia had heard some of them as a child when she used to play with her siblings inside. Usually, they would play hide and seek, but one day, Jon had told her about a dream where he was walking to the crypts going further than they ever had when they played there, he said he would wake up scared in the middle of the night. So, that day, she decided that she would go with him and that they would go to the end of the crypts, from their grandfather and their uncle and aunt, till Bran, the Builder's crypt.

They tried to, but they never made it, since their father caught them as they were walking there. He forbade them to ever go to that part of the crypts and, for the first and only time, Lilia feared her father. That was the time where she thought her father would hit her for encouraging Jon to go there. She was a child, her curiosity had gotten the best of her, but Ned was too worried and upset to care. He yelled at her and punished her by sending her to her chambers and keeping her there for the rest of the day.

Lilia never really understood why he was so worried. After all, the crypts were the safest place in Winterfell. Not many knew how to access it, so there would be no one there to hurt them.

The truth was that Lilia never went further than the first floor of many. The curiosity, on the other hand, would often surface. Jon's dreams never stopped, he would always wake up when he was about to get to the darkest part of the crypts. He would avoid telling her since he knew how much she wanted to see what was there and why their father wouldn't let her go further, but she would always figure it out.

"Princess, Lady Stark" Lilia woke up from her thoughts as Prince Trystane approached them. "Can I have this dance, Princess Myrcella?"

Myrcella froze for a second, she was too embarrassed to say anything at all, making Trystane clearly apprehensive. Lilia understood both sides, even if she had never gone through that. The nearest she got from that situation was having to refuse Joffrey, which had happened many times in the last months.

"Yes, you can" Lilia replied for the Princess, making Trystane look at the girl for reassurance. She nodded slightly, taking his hand and looking back at Lilia, who smiled supportively.

"A Lannister and a Martell, they don't even imagine how dangerous that is" Lilia looked to her right only to find Oberyn with a woman by his side. She had olive skin, dark hair, along with deep eyes of the same colour. The woman was very beautiful and looked like the type of woman Lilia pictured as the typical woman of Dorne. "Are you enjoying Dorne so far?"

"It has treated me fairly" Lilia politely replied, making Oberyn and his companion share a look, followed by a smirk that Lilia simply ignored, returning her gaze to the young couple.

"Well, I guess it is time for you both to meet" Oberyn caught Lilia's attention once again. "This is my paramour, Ellaria Sand. Ellaria, this is the girl I've talked you about, Lady Lilia Stark of Winterfell"

"It's very nice to meet you, Lady Ellaria" Lilia smiled a bit, earning a giggle from the woman. This left her confused, had she done anything wrong or was the woman simply mad?

"I'm no Lady, dear. I'm a bastard, I have thousands of siblings. I don't know how they do it in Winterfell, but here bastards are not Lords and Ladies" she cleared out. Lilia wanted to be delicate and she didn't exactly know what to say. She had never met a bastard aside from her brother. She had heard of some northern bastards, for example, Ramsay Snow, the bastard of Dreadfort. Nevertheless, she hadn't spoken with him, and so, she didn't know what to say without hurting the woman. "But it is my pleasure, Lady Lilia"

"Well, in Winterfell bastards are not family, they are an embarrassment, so they are either called bastards or not acknowledged at all" she explained, earning a look from the woman. "Yes, people in Dorne have a different way of seeing the world, a much more pleasant and fair way of seeing it"

"Here, in Dorne, bastards are the result of passion and love and lust, they are not an embarrassment and we don't feel ashamed of them" Oberyn cleared out as he pressed Ellaria's body against his, making Lilia look at her feet. Her parents had never done anything of the sort in front of her, they had never shown lust or... anything like what those two were doing. "I have eight bastard daughters of my own, I believe you must have talked to them already"

"Some of them" she confirmed, making Oberyn smile. She didn't quite understand if they were doing that to make her feel uncomfortable or if they simply acted like that on a daily basis.

"Uncle" Arianne showed up out of nowhere and hugged her uncle. Lilia took a moment to look at them. They looked very alike, and from what she had seen so far, they also acted very alike. They didn't have shame, all they cared about was partying and living their lives in extravagance. "You did come after all"

"What can I say? The Princess left me no choice" Lilia replied shortly, being interrupted by a man showing up.

"Mors Manwoody, what were the odds of finding you here?" Arianne stepped in with a smile. The man had ginger hair and green eyes, his skin wasn't as pale as hers, but not as dark as Arianne's, making Lilia realize that not only Dornishmen had the appearance of Oberyn Martell.

"Word spreads fast around here, you should know that by now" Arianne gave him a look as he rolled his eyes. "That and your uncle told me"

"Of course he did" Arianne looked back at her uncle as he and his friend hugged each other. Lilia watched the scene as memories of her own father and Robert Baratheon surfaced. Everything was much easier when the man was alive, once he was gone, everything went down and tragedy hit her family. "Well, I would love to spend more time with you all, but I have other places to be at"

And what places did she have to be at...

So, Lilia and Ellaria got along well and it looks like she's about to meet some new people while she's staying in Dorne...

This chapter might have been a little boring but the next one is going to be filled with much more interesting stuff going on! 

I hope you've enjoyed it and see you!