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butterflies-dragons · 4 years

Note

Hello! I love your blog. Your meta about women in Jon’s life and Lyanna was so good. Antis always try to ignore the Sansa and Lyanna parallels which is absurd because her story is so similar with Sansa’s... I guess they want to ignore those because they don’t want Sansa to be destined with a Targaryen prince (aka jonsa 🤭). So thanks for pointing them out. Are you planning to write a meta just about Sansa and Lyanna? It would be a good guide for our jonsa arguments. Have a nice day.

Hello Anon,

Thanks for your words.

Antis and haters gonna oppose and hate. That’s their thing. They questioned and denied every parallel that Lyanna and Sansa actually share, and proceed to attack anyone who dare to say they share those parallels. What’s knew about that?

Lyanna and Arya parallels are textual evident, they are easily spotted but they could be easily questioned as well, especially because most of the statements about Lyanna came from Ned, and he is not only an unreliable narrator, but his memories of Lyanna are embellished by love and trauma. If you contrast what Ned said about Lyanna with other sources, not so biased, Ned’s statements about her don’t look so evident and solid anymore.

Anyway, do you want me to talk more about Lyanna and Sansa parallels? Here you go:

Summary

Original Outline

Beauty

The wolf-blood

She-Wolves of Winterfell

Inner Strength

Sword & Armor

Knights protect the innocent

Singers & Songs

The Rose of Winterfell

Blue Winter Roses

Knights & Queens of Love and Beauty

Failed betrothal to a Baratheon

Pleading Ned to protect part of themselves

Targaryen Imagery

Dead before their time

Ladies of Winterfell

Bonus

LYANNA & SANSA

Original Outline & ASOIAF:

Sansa in the Original Outline:

‘Original Outline Sansa’ was very similar to Lyanna Stark.

Each of the contending families will learn it has a member of dubious loyalty in its midst. Sansa Stark, wed to Joffrey Baratheon, will bear him a son, the heir to the throne, and when the crunch comes she will choose her husband and child over her parents and siblings, a choice she will later bitterly rue. (...) Jaime Lannister will follow Joffrey on the throne of the Seven Kingdoms, by the simple expedient of killing everyone ahead of him in the line of succession and blaming his brother Tyrion for the murders.

[Source]

As you can see, the ‘Original Outline Sansa’ shares parallels with Lyanna Stark and Elia Martel:

Romantically involved with the King/Heir of the Iron Throne

Mothers of their sons

Dead while protecting their children

Unwillingly caused the death of family members

Tagged as members of dubious loyalty to their paternal families

Regretted their doomed romances

But ¿How marrying the heir of the Iron Throne/King of the 7K is supposed to be an act of dubious loyalty? GRRM has stated that in high nobility there is no marriage without the Lord Father of the bride’s blessing. Furthermore, from the wedding the bride belongs to her husband’s house, that’s all the fuzz with the cloaking ceremony, going from the maiden’s cloak to your husband’s cloak. You left your paternal house to belong with your husbands house. Sansa’s loyalty was with her husband, and more important, Sansa’s love and loyalty was with her baby boy. So, how choosing his baby over her paternal house could be seem as an act of dubious loyalty then? And even if she wanted to come back to her paternal family, does she really get a chance without the risk of being captured, separated from her baby, accused of treason and executed, leaving her baby boy motherless?

But according to the Original Outline, there was an enmity between Starks and Lannisters. So, or Joffrey abducted Sansa, or Sansa eloped to marry Joffrey. How very Shakespearean! Romeo and Juliet all over again. Or even better, Rhaegar Targaryen and Lyanna Stark all over again.

It is also implied by the fandom that this ‘Original Outline Sansa’ dies because the outline says that Jaime dethrones and kills Joffrey and “everyone ahead of him in the line of succession” (Sansa’s baby). Well, Sansa was not in the line of succession, but it’s probable that Jaime had to kill her to get to her baby boy, which reminds me of Elia Martell and her babies’ tragic deaths.

Sansa in Asoiaf:

Asoiaf Sansa never married Joffrey, never bore him a son, and she’s still alive. But she still shares a lot of similarities with her aunt Lyanna.

Both Lyanna and Sansa got infatuated by silver/golden princes, Rhaegar Targaryen and Joffrey Baratheon, and because of those romantic relationships, they unintentionally played a part in the deaths of their fathers and older brothers, Rickard and Brandon, and Ned and Robb. Later, both of them ended trapped in towers regretting their doomed romances.

According to GRRM, Asoiaf Sansa played a part in her father Ned Stark’s death. But I would say that Sansa’s fault lays more in trusting the wrong people than betraying Ned. The act of betrayal requires willful intent, and Sansa never wanted to betray her father. And we can say the same about Lyanna, she trusted Rhaegar over her family, ran away from her approved betrothal, lived a forbidden romance, and died after giving birth a son to her silver prince.

Sansa and Lyanna commit the same actions, but Lyanna gets more sympathy from the readers than Sansa, who is still considered a member of dubious loyalty or plainly a traitor to the Starks.

Also, as it was pointed out before, “Rickard Stark and Catelyn Stark both saw their firstborn sons murdered in front of them, while convinced that their daughters were far away being raped and abused by cruel princes, and then were brutally murdered themselves”.

Beauty:

Both Lyanna and Sansa are considered beautiful, but in different ways.

While Lyanna had a wild beauty:

“She [Lyanna] was,” Eddard Stark agreed, “beautiful, and willful, and dead before her time.” —AGOT - Arya II

Lyanna had only been sixteen, a child-woman of surpassing loveliness. Ned had loved her with all his heart. Robert had loved her even more. She was to have been his bride. —AGOT - Eddard I

"You never knew Lyanna as I did, Robert,” Ned told him. “You saw her beauty, but not the iron underneath”. —AGOT - Eddard VII

“The maid’s a fair one,” Osha said. —AGOT - Bran VII

The northern girl had a wild beauty, as he [Kevan] recalled. —ADWD - Epilogue

The crowning of the Stark girl, who was by all reports a wild and boyish young thing with none of the Princess Elia's delicate beauty, could only have been meant to win the allegiance of Winterfell to Prince Rhaegar's cause, Symond Staunton suggested to the king. —The World of Ice and Fire - The Fall of the Dragons: The Year of the False Spring

Sansa possesses a traditional beauty:

Sansa’s needlework was exquisite. Everyone said so. “Sansa’s work is as pretty as she is”, Septa Mordane told their lady mother once. —AGOT - Arya I

Sansa had the grace to blush. She blushed prettily. She did everything prettily. —AGOT - Arya I

Worse, she was beautiful. Sansa had gotten their mother’s fine high cheekbones and the thick auburn hair of the Tullys. —AGOT - Arya I

“I [Ser Cleos Frey] saw Sansa at the court, the day Tyrion told me his terms. She looked most beautiful, my lady. Perhaps a, a bit wan. Drawn, as it were.” —ACOK - Catelyn VI

Men would say she had my look, but she will grow into a woman far more beautiful than I ever was. —ACOK - Catelyn VII

“You are very beautiful, my lady,” the seamstress said when she was dressed. —ASOS - Sansa III

Ser Kevan told her she was beautiful, Jalabhar Xho said something she did not understand in the Summer Tongue, and Lord Redwyne wished her many fat children and long years of joy. —ASOS - Sansa III

“Ser Ossifer speaks truly, you are the most beautiful maid in all the Seven Kingdoms.” —TWOW - Alayne I

“Had we known such beauty awaited us at the Gates, we would have flown,” Ser Roland said. Though his words were addressed to Myranda Royce, he smiled at Alayne as he said them. —TWOW - Alayne I

The wolf-blood:

Lyanna:

"Ah, Arya. You have a wildness in you, child. 'The wolf blood,' my father used to call it. Lyanna had a touch of it, and my brother Brandon more than a touch. It brought them both to an early grave." Arya heard sadness in his voice; he did not often speak of his father, or of the brother and sister who had died before she was born. "Lyanna might have carried a sword, if my lord father had allowed it. You remind me of her sometimes. You even look like her."

"Lyanna was beautiful," Arya said, startled. Everybody said so. It was not a thing that was ever said of Arya.

“She was,” Eddard Stark agreed, “beautiful, and willful, and dead before her time.”

—AGOT - Arya II

Sansa:

“I’ve never seen an aurochs,” Sansa said, feeding a piece of bacon to Lady under the table. The direwolf took it from her hand, as delicate as a queen. Septa Mordane sniffed in disapproval. “A noble lady does not feed dogs at her table,” she said, breaking off another piece of comb and letting the honey drip down onto her bread. “She’s not a dog, she’s a direwolf,” Sansa pointed out as Lady licked her fingers with a rough tongue. “Anyway, Father said we could keep them with us if we want.” The septa was not appeased. “You’re a good girl, Sansa, but I do vow, when it comes to that creature you’re as willful as your sister Arya.” She scowled. “And where is Arya this morning?"

—AGOT - Sansa I

"It won’t be so bad, Sansa,” Arya said. “We’re going to sail on a galley. It will be an adventure, and then we’ll be with Bran and Robb again, and Old Nan and Hodor and the rest.” She touched her on the arm. “Hodor!” Sansa yelled. “You ought to marry Hodor, you’re just like him, stupid and hairy and ugly!” She wrenched away from her sister’s hand, stormed into her bedchamber, and barred the door behind her.

—AGOT - Sansa III

Jeyne yawned. “Are there any lemon cakes?” Sansa did not like being interrupted, but she had to admit, lemon cakes sounded more interesting than most of what had gone on in the throne room. “Let’s see,” she said. The kitchen yielded no lemon cakes, but they did find half of a cold strawberry pie, and that was almost as good. They ate it on the tower steps, giggling and gossiping and sharing secrets, and Sansa went to bed that night feeling almost as wicked as Arya.

—AGOT - Sansa III

After my name day feast, I’m going to raise a host and kill your brother myself. That’s what I’ll give you, Lady Sansa. Your brother’s head.“ A kind of madness took over her then, and she heard herself say, "Maybe my brother will give me your head.”

—AGOT - Sansa VI

She-Wolves of Winterfell:

Lyanna is literally the she-wolf in the tale of “The Knight of the Laughing Tree”:

But then they heard a roar. 'That's my father's man you're kicking,' howled the she-wolf."

"A wolf on four legs, or two?"

"Two," said Meera.

—ASOS - Bran II

Sansa went from a “wolf girl” to the she-wolf that killed a king:

He smiled at her. "Now, wolf girl, if you can put a name to me as well, then I must concede that you are truly our Hand’s daughter.”

—AGOT - Sansa I

“I forgot, you’ve been hiding under a rock. The northern girl. Winterfell’s daughter. We heard she killed the king with a spell, and afterward changed into a wolf with big leather wings like a bat, and flew out a tower window. But she left the dwarf behind and Cersei means to have his head.”

—ASOS - Arya XIII

“May the Father judge him justly,” murmured a septon. “The dwarf’s wife did the murder with him,” swore an archer in Lord Rowan’s livery. “Afterward, she vanished from the hall in a puff of brimstone, and a ghostly direwolf was seen prowling the Red Keep, blood dripping from his jaws.”

—ASOS - Jaime VII

“Your Grace has forgotten the Lady Sansa,” said Pycelle. The queen bristled. “I most certainly have not forgotten that little she-wolf.” She refused to say the girl’s name. “I ought to have shown her to the black cells as the daughter of a traitor, but instead I made her part of mine own household. She shared my hearth and hall, played with my own children. I fed her, dressed her, tried to make her a little less ignorant about the world, and how did she repay me for my kindness? She helped murder my son.

—AFFC - Cersei IV

What a kick-ass reputation: Sansa, the she-wolf that killed King Joffrey!

Inner Strength:

Lyanna:

"You never knew Lyanna as I did, Robert,” Ned told him. “You saw her beauty, but not the iron underneath”. —AGOT - Eddard VII

Sansa:

My skin has turned to porcelain, to ivory, to steel. —ASOS - Sansa V

Sansa lost her direwolf Lady, and with her, the possibility to develop her abilities as a warg. But GRRM has still made Sansa an skinchanger through poetry. Her skin has changed to porcelain, to ivory, to steel.

Sword & Armor

While Lyanna might have carried a sword, Sansa Stark is a lady armored in courtesy and she polishes her armor with her wits. As Tyrion Lannister said:

My mind is my weapon. My brother has his sword, King Robert has his warhammer, and I have my mind … and a mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone, if it is to keep its edge." Tyrion tapped the leather cover of the book. "That's why I read so much, Jon Snow."

—AGOT - Tyrion II

Lyanna:

Lyanna might have carried a sword, if my lord father had allowed it. You remind me of her sometimes.

—AGOT - Arya II

Sansa:

Sansa felt that she ought to say something. What was it that Septa Mordane used to tell her? A lady’s armor is courtesy, that was it. She donned her armor and said, “I’m sorry my lady mother took you captive, my lord.”

—ACOK - Sansa I

Courtesy is a lady’s armor. You must not offend them, be careful what you say. “I do not know Ser Willas. I have never had the pleasure, my lady. Is he … is he as great a knight as his brothers?”

—ASOS - Sansa I

“Gods have mercy.” The dwarf took another swallow of wine. “Well, talk won’t make you older. Shall we get on with this, my lady? If it please you?” “It will please me to please my lord husband.” That seemed to anger him. “You hide behind courtesy as if it were a castle wall.” “Courtesy is a lady’s armor,” Sansa said. Her septa had always told her that. “I am your husband. You can take off your armor now.” “And my clothing?” “That too.” He waved his wine cup at her. “My lord father has commanded me to consummate this marriage.”

—ASOS - Sansa III

He wanted to reach her, to break through the armor of her courtesy. Was that what made him speak? Or just the need to distract himself from the fullness in his bladder?

[...]

Perhaps that would please Sansa. Gently, he spoke of Braavos, and met a wall of sullen courtesy as icy and unyielding as the Wall he had walked once in the north. It made him weary. Then and now.

—ASOS - Tyrion VIII

Ser Harrold looked down at her coldly. “Why should it please me to be escorted anywhere by Littlefinger’s bastard?”

[...]

A lady’s armor is her courtesy. Alayne could feel the blood rushing to her face. No tears, she prayed. Please, please, I must not cry. “As you wish, ser. And now if you will excuse me, Littlefinger’s bastard must find her lord father and let him know that you have come, so we can begin the tourney on the morrow.” And may your horse stumble, Harry the Heir, so you fall on your stupid head in your first tilt. She showed the Waynwoods a stone face as they blurted out awkward apologies for their companion. When they were done she turned and fled.

—TWOW - Alayne I

Knights protect the innocent:

Lyanna, as herself and as “The Knight of the Laughing Tree”, defended Howland Reed, a bannerman of House Stark:

“None offered a name, but he marked their faces well so he could revenge himself upon them later. They shoved him down every time he tried to rise, and kicked him when he curled up on the ground. But then they heard a roar. ‘That’s my father’s man you’re kicking,’ howled the she-wolf.” “A wolf on four legs, or two?” “Two,” said Meera. “The she-wolf laid into the squires with a tourney sword, scattering them all. The crannogman was bruised and bloodied, so she took him back to her lair to clean his cuts and bind them up with linen. There he met her pack brothers: the wild wolf who led them, the quiet wolf beside him, and the pup who was youngest of the four.

(…)

“Whoever he was, the old gods gave strength to his arm. The porcupine knight fell first, then the pitchfork knight, and lastly the knight of the two towers. None were well loved, so the common folk cheered lustily for the Knight of the Laughing Tree, as the new champion soon was called.”

—ASOS - Bran II

Sansa, as a lady armored with her courtesy and wits, defended and saved Dontos Hollard’s life, a defenestrated knight turned fool:

The king stood. “A cask from the cellars! I’ll see him drowned in it.” Sansa heard herself gasp. “No, you can’t.” Joffrey turned his head. “What did you say?” Sansa could not believe she had spoken. Was she mad? To tell him no in front of half the court? She hadn’t meant to say anything, only … Ser Dontos was drunk and silly and useless, but he meant no harm. “Did you say I can’t? Did you?” “Please,” Sansa said, “I only meant … it would be ill luck, Your Grace … to, to kill a man on your name day.” “You’re lying,” Joffrey said. “I ought to drown you with him, if you care for him so much.” “I don’t care for him, Your Grace.” The words tumbled out desperately. “Drown him or have his head off, only … kill him on the morrow, if you like, but please … not today, not on your name day. I couldn’t bear for you to have ill luck … terrible luck, even for kings, the singers all say so …” Joffrey scowled. He knew she was lying, she could see it. He would make her bleed for this. “The girl speaks truly,” the Hound rasped. “What a man sows on his name day, he reaps throughout the year.” His voice was flat, as if he did not care a whit whether the king believed him or no. Could it be true? Sansa had not known. It was just something she’d said, desperate to avoid punishment. Unhappy, Joffrey shifted in his seat and flicked his fingers at Ser Dontos. “Take him away. I’ll have him killed on the morrow, the fool.” “He is,” Sansa said. “A fool. You’re so clever, to see it. He’s better fitted to be a fool than a knight, isn’t he? You ought to dress him in motley and make him clown for you. He doesn’t deserve the mercy of a quick death.” The king studied her a moment. “Perhaps you’re not so stupid as Mother says.” He raised his voice. “Did you hear my lady, Dontos? From this day on, you’re my new fool. You can sleep with Moon Boy and dress in motley."

—ACOK - Sansa I

Singers & Songs:

Lyanna and Sansa are linked with singers and romantic songs.

Lyanna loved a singer and became a lady in a song, her own tragic romantic story:

The dragon prince sang a song so sad it made the wolf maid sniffle.

—ASOS - Bran II

The wolf maid was Lyanna Stark hearing her dragon prince Rhaegar Targaryen playing a sad song with the harp.

And curiously enough, a blue eyed redhead man called Jon also wept while hearing Rhaegar Targaryen playing a sad song with the harp:

At the welcoming feast, the prince had taken up his silver-stringed harp and played for them. A song of love and doom, Jon Connington recalled, and every woman in the hall was weeping when he put down the harp. Not the men, of course.

—A Dance with Dragons - The Griffin Reborn

Jon Connington was, of course, in love with Rhaegar Targaryen...

Sansa:

Once, when she was just a little girl, a wandering singer had stayed with them at Winterfell for half a year. An old man he was, with white hair and windburnt cheeks, but he sang of knights and quests and ladies fair, and Sansa had cried bitter tears when he left them, and begged her father not to let him go. “The man has played us every song he knows thrice over,” Lord Eddard told her gently. “I cannot keep him here against his will. You need not weep, though. I promise you, other singers will come.”

They hadn’t, though, not for a year or more. Sansa had prayed to the Seven in their sept and old gods of the heart tree, asking them to bring the old man back, or better still to send another singer, young and handsome. But the gods never answered, and the halls of Winterfell stayed silent.

But that was when she was a little girl, and foolish. She was a maiden now, three-and-ten and flowered. All her nights were full of song, and by day she prayed for silence.

—A Feast for Crows - Sansa I

Bran and his brothers and sisters sat with the king's children, Joffrey and Tommen and Princess Myrcella, who'd spent the whole meal gazing at Robb with adoring eyes. Arya made faces across the table when no one was looking; Sansa listened raptly while the king's high harper sang songs of chivalry, and Rickon kept asking why Jon wasn't with them. "Because he's a bastard," Bran finally had to whisper to him.

—ACOK - Bran III

Later, while Sansa was off listening to a troupe of singers perform the complex round of interwoven ballads called the “Dance of the Dragons,” [sung in High Valyrian] Ned inspected the bruise himself. “I hope Forel is not being too hard on you,” he said.

—AGOT - Eddard VII

She pulled a chair close to the hearth, took down one of her favorite books, and lost herself in the stories of Florian and Jonquil, of Lady Shella and the Rainbow Knight, of valiant Prince Aemon and his doomed love for his brother’s queen.

—AGOT - Sansa IV

After the meal had been cleared away, many of the guests asked leave to go to the sept. Cersei graciously granted their request. Lady Tanda and her daughters were among those who fled. For those who remained, a singer was brought forth to fill the hall with the sweet music of the high harp. He sang of Jonquil and Florian, of Prince Aemon the Dragonknight and his love for his brother’s queen, of Nymeria’s ten thousand ships. They were beautiful songs, but terribly sad. Several of the women began to weep, and Sansa felt her own eyes growing moist.

—ACOK - Sansa VI

So the singer played for her, so soft and sad that Arya only heard snatches of the words, though the tune was half-familiar. Sansa would know it, I bet. Her sister had known all the songs, and she could even play a little, and sing so sweetly. All I could ever do was shout the words.

—ASOS - Arya IV

Lady Ashara was my aunt. I never knew her, though. She threw herself into the sea from atop the Palestone Sword before I was born.” “Why would she do that?” said Arya, startled. (...) “Why did she jump in the sea, though?” "Her heart was broken." Sansa would have sighed and shed a tear for true love, but Arya just thought it was stupid.

—ASOS - Arya VIII

"Do you require guarding?” Marillion said lightly. “I am composing a new song, you should know. A song so sweet and sad it will melt even your frozen heart. 'The Roadside Rose,’ I mean to call it. About a baseborn girl so beautiful she bewitched every man who laid eyes upon her.”

—ASOS - Sansa VII

Lyanna and Sansa are also linked with the tale of Bael the Bard and the Rose of Winterfell.

The Rose of Winterfell:

This is the tale:

According to free folk legend, Lord Brandon Stark, the liege of the north, once called Bael a coward. To take revenge for this affront and prove his courage, Bael climbed the Wall, took the kingsroad, and entered Winterfell under the guise of a singer named Sygerrik of Skagos. (“Sygerrik” means “deceiver” in the Old Tongue.) There, he sang until midnight for the lord.

Impressed by his skills as a singer, Lord Stark asked Bael what he wanted as a reward, but he requested only the most beautiful flower blooming in Winterfell’s gardens. As the blue winter roses were just blooming, Brandon Stark presented him with one. The following morning, the maiden daughter of Lord Stark had disappeared, his only child, and in her bed was the blue winter rose.

Lord Brandon sent the members of the Night’s Watch looking for them beyond the Wall, but they never found Bael or the girl. The Stark line was on the verge of extinction, when one day the girl was back in her room, holding in her arms an infant: they had actually never left Winterfell, staying hidden in the crypts. Bael’s bastard with Brandon’s daughter became the new Lord Stark.

Thirty years later, Bael was King-Beyond-the-Wall and led the wildlings’ army south, and he had to fight his own son at the Frozen Ford. There, incapable of killing his own blood, he let himself be killed by Lord Stark. His son brought back Bael’s head to Winterfell, and his mother who had loved the bard, seeing the trophy, killed herself by leaping from the top of a tower. The son was eventually slain by the Boltons.

[Source]

Jon’s first and only lover, Ygritte, told him this story:

“You said you were the Bastard o’ Winterfell.” “I am.” “Who was your mother?” “Some woman. Most of them are.” Someone had said that to him once. He did not remember who. She smiled again, a flash of white teeth. “And she never sung you the song o’ the winter rose?” “I never knew my mother. Or any such song.” “Bael the Bard made it,” said Ygritte. “He was King-beyond-the-Wall a long time back. (...) “Well, long before he was king over the free folk, Bael was a great raider.” (...) “The Stark in Winterfell wanted Bael’s head, but never could take him, and the taste o’ failure galled him. One day in his bitterness he called Bael a craven who preyed only on the weak. When word o’ that got back, Bael vowed to teach the lord a lesson. So he scaled the Wall, skipped down the kingsroad, and walked into Winterfell one winter’s night with harp in hand, naming himself Sygerrik of Skagos. Sygerrik means ‘deceiver’ in the Old Tongue, that the First Men spoke, and the giants still speak.” “North or south, singers always find a ready welcome, so Bael ate at Lord Stark’s own table, and played for the lord in his high seat until half the night was gone. The old songs he played, and new ones he’d made himself, and he played and sang so well that when he was done, the lord offered to let him name his own reward. ‘All I ask is a flower,’ Bael answered, ‘the fairest flower that blooms in the gardens o’ Winterfell.’” “Now as it happened the winter roses had only then come into bloom, and no flower is so rare nor precious. So the Stark sent to his glass gardens and commanded that the most beautiful o’ the winter roses be plucked for the singer’s payment. And so it was done. But when morning come, the singer had vanished . . . and so had Lord Brandon’s maiden daughter. Her bed they found empty, but for the pale blue rose that Bael had left on the pillow where her head had lain.” Jon had never heard this tale before. (...) “Lord Brandon had no other children. At his behest, the black crows flew forth from their castles in the hundreds, but nowhere could they find any sign o’ Bael or this maid. For most a year they searched, till the lord lost heart and took to his bed, and it seemed as though the line o’ Starks was at its end. But one night as he lay waiting to die, Lord Brandon heard a child’s cry. He followed the sound and found his daughter back in her bedchamber, asleep with a babe at her breast.” “Bael had brought her back?” “No. They had been in Winterfell all the time, hiding with the dead beneath the castle. The maid loved Bael so dearly she bore him a son, the song says . . . though if truth be told, all the maids love Bael in them songs he wrote. Be that as it may, what’s certain is that Bael left the child in payment for the rose he’d plucked unasked, and that the boy grew to be the next Lord Stark. So there it is—you have Bael’s blood in you, same as me.”

—ACOK - Jon VI

This tale resembles Jon’s own story: Bael the Bard and Rhaegar Targaryen, both harp players, “abducted” a Stark maid, Brandon’s daughter and Lyanna, ‘the fairest flower that blooms in the gardens o’ Winterfell’. Rhaegar also crowned Lyanna as the Queen of Love and Beauty with blue winter roses, and they procreated a “bastard” son, Jon Snow. Lyanna died after giving birth to Jon, and the memories of that tragic even haunted Ned, who remembers the Lyanna bleeding and the blue winter roses:

"Promise me, Ned," Lyanna's statue whispered. She wore a garland of pale blue roses, and her eyes wept blood.

—AGOT - Eddard XIII

Promise me, Ned, his sister had whispered from her bed of blood. She had loved the scent of winter roses.

—AGOT - Eddard XV

Immediately after this chapter, comes ACOK - Sansa IV, where Sansa got her first period.

So after a chapter about ‘the fairest flower that blooms in the gardens o’ Winterfell’ it follows the chapter where Sansa Stark becomes a maid, Sansa literally flowered.

Next chapter is Jon again. There is a succession of Jon-Sansa-Jon chapters, that linked them thematically.

Also take note that Sansa was “abducted” by Petyr Baelish, a known deceiver, whose surname has a resemblance with the name Bael.

Blue Winter Roses:

Lyanna and Sansa are linked with flowers, but especially with roses:

Lyanna and the blue winter roses:

Ned could recall none of it. ”I bring her flowers when I can,“ he said. ”Lyanna was … fond of flowers.”

—A Game Of Thrones - Eddard I

"Promise me, Ned," Lyanna's statue whispered. She wore a garland of pale blue roses, and her eyes wept blood.

—AGOT - Eddard XIII

Promise me, Ned, his sister had whispered from her bed of blood. She had loved the scent of winter roses.

—AGOT - Eddard XV

Ned remembered the moment when all the smiles died, when Prince Rhaegar Targaryen urged his horse past his own wife, the Dornish princess Elia Martell, to lay the queen of beauty’s laurel in Lyanna’s lap. He could see it still: a crown of winter roses, blue as frost.

—AGOT - Eddard XV

Sansa Stark:

It was enough that she could walk in the yard, pick flowers in Myrcella’s garden, and visit the sept to pray for her father. Sometimes she prayed in the godswood as well, since the Starks kept the old gods.

—AGOT - Sansa V

Her eyes were only for Ser Loras. When the white horse stopped in front of her, she thought her heart would burst. To the other maidens he had given white roses, but the one he plucked for her was red. “Sweet lady,” he said, “no victory is half so beautiful as you.” Sansa took the flower timidly, struck dumb by his gallantry. His hair was a mass of lazy brown curls, his eyes like liquid gold. She inhaled the sweet fragrance of the rose and sat clutching it long after Ser Loras had ridden off.

—AGOT - Sansa II

—ASOS - Sansa VII

So we have Marillion, a singer, composing a song for Alayne Stone, Sansa Stark in disguise, that he meant to call “The Roadside Rose”

And Loras Tyrell, The Knight of Flowers, gave Sansa a single red rose. I will expand on this next, because Loras giving Sansa a red rose is an allegory in reverse of Rhaegar giving Lyanna the crown of blue winter roses.

Knights & Queens of Love and Beauty:

Lyanna was a Mystery Knight AND was crowned Queen of Love and Beauty at the Tourney at Harrenhal.

Lyanna as the Knight of the Laughing Tree

Lyanna, as herself and as a mystery knight, the Knight of the Laughing Tree, defended the crannogman, Howland Reed, a bannerman of House Stark:

But late on the afternoon of that second day, as the shadows grew long, a mystery knight appeared in the lists. Bran nodded sagely. […] “It was the little crannogman, I bet.” “No one knew,” said Meera, “but the mystery knight was short of stature, and clad in ill-fitting armor made up of bits and pieces. The device upon his shield was a heart tree of the old gods, a white weirwood with a laughing red face.” […] “Whoever he was, the old gods gave strength to his arm. The porcupine knight fell first, then the pitchfork knight, and lastly the knight of the two towers. None were well loved, so the common folk cheered lustily for the Knight of the Laughing Tree, as the new champion soon was called.” —ASOS - Bran II

Lyanna as the Queen of Love and Beauty

Rhaegar Targaryen wearing an armor adorned with rubies (red) gave Lyanna a crown of winter roses (blue):

The Targaryen prince armored all in black. On his breastplate was the three-headed dragon of his House, wrought all in rubies that flashed like fire in the sunlight.

—AGOT - Eddard I

—AGOT - Eddard XV

Sansa as a “Knight”

During the Tourney in honor of King Joffrey’s Name Day, Sansa, as a lady armored with her courtesy and wits, defended and saved the life of Ser Dontos Hollard, a defenestrated knight turned fool, as I explained above.

Sansa as the Queen of Love and Beauty

Art credit: Loras Tyrell Gives Sansa Stark a Rose and the Hand’s Tournament by Jonathan Burton.

Sansa was the unofficial Queen of Love and Beauty at the Tourney of the Hand. GRRM wrote this passage as a resemble of the Tourney at Harrenhal, hiding hints and reversing colors.

Sansa attended the Tourney of the Hand at Kings Landing and met Petyr Baelish who told her that her mother, Catelyn Tully, was his Queen of Love and Beauty:

"Your mother was my queen of beauty once,” the man said quietly. His breath smelled of mint. “You have her hair.” His fingers brushed against her cheek as he stroked one auburn lock. Quite abruptly he turned and walked away. —AGOT - Sansa II

Loras Tyrell, the Knight of Flowers, wearing an armor adorned with sapphires (blue) gave Sansa a (red) rose:

When the Knight of Flowers made his entrance, a murmur ran through the crowd, and he heard Sansa’s fervent whisper, “Oh, he’s so beautiful.” Ser Loras Tyrell was slender as a reed, dressed in a suit of fabulous silver armor polished to a blinding sheen and filigreed with twining black vines and tiny blue forget-me-nots. The commons realized in the same instant as Ned that the blue of the flowers came from sapphires; a gasp went up from a thousand throats. Across the boy’s shoulders his cloak hung heavy. It was woven of forget-me-nots, real ones, hundreds of fresh blooms sewn to a heavy woolen cape. —AGOT - Eddard VII

During the second day of the tourney, Sansa wore the red rose in her hair:

The boy from Highgarden did something with his legs, and his horse pranced sideways, nimble as a dancer. Sansa clutched at his arm. “Father, don’t let Ser Gregor hurt him,” she said. Ned saw she was wearing the rose that Ser Loras had given her yesterday. Jory had told him about that as well. —AGOT - Eddard VII

The Tourney at the Gates of the Moon

And at this point in the Books, Sansa, as Alayne Stone, is organizing a tourney to elect the members of Robert Arryn’s personal guard, named the Brotherhood of the Winged Knights.

Alayne Stone’s betrothed, Harrold Hardyng, known as Harry the Heir, is competing in the tourney.

Since her betrothed is competing in the jousting and since she is daughter of Petyr Baelish, Lord Protector of the Vale, Alayne Stone has great chances to be crowned the Queen of Love and Beauty of the tourney.

The Tourney at Ashford Meadows

Sansa has also strong links with the Tourney at Ashford Meadows, but this is a matter for another time.

Failed betrothal to a Baratheon:

Both Lyanna and Sansa were betrothed with a Baratheon, Lyanna with Robert and Sansa with Joffrey:

If Lyanna had lived, we should have been brothers, bound by blood as well as affection. Well, it is not too late. I have a son. You have a daughter. My Joff and your Sansa shall join our houses, as Lyanna and I might once have done. —AGOT - Eddard I

There is also this parallel between Jenny of Oldstones, Lyanna & Sansa [I wrote about it here]:

Note the parallels between Duncan Targaryen, his betrothed Baratheon and Jenny of Oldstones & Rhaegar Targaryen, Lyanna Stark and her betrothed Robert Baratheon: A Targaryen prince breaking an engagement with a member of House Baratheon that then originates a rebellion.

And this: Sansa was betrothed with Joffrey “Baratheon” and the engagement was broken in the middle of a war with Robb Stark leading an army against King Joffrey, and Jon almost breaking his vows to join Robb’s army to avenge Ned’s death and rescue their sisters. All of which makes me think about these parallels: Sansa being a hostage in King’s Landing & Lyanna’s “abduction”, Ned’s death & Rickard’s death, Robb’s death & Brandon’s death. And that leaves Jon to possibly play the role of Ned Stark in the future.

Basically if Jon and Sansa happens, they will parallel two stories: Rhaegar and Lyanna, a Targaryen/Stark couple; and Ned and Cat, a Stark/Tully couple.

And right now in the Books, Sansa Stark, under the disguise of Alayne Stone, is betrothed with a Robert-like young man: Harrold Hardyng, also known as Harry the Heir:

Both orphaned boys

Both wards at the Vale

Both handsome and physically strong

Both linked to Jon Arryn and the Vale

Both fathered bastards in the Vale: Mya Stone // Alys Stone

Both involved in a conflict with a cousin: Robert killed his cousin Rhaegar and became King // If Robert Arryn dies, his cousin Harry will be new Lord Arryn.

Both betrothed to a Stark girl: Lyanna Stark // (Alayne Stone) Sansa Stark

Pleading Ned to protect part of themselves:

"Stop them," Sansa pleaded, "don't let them do it, please, please, it wasn't Lady, it was Nymeria, Arya did it, you can't, it wasn't Lady, don't let them hurt Lady, I'll make her be good, I promise, I promise …" She started to cry.

—AGOT - Eddard III

He could still hear Sansa pleading, as Lyanna had pleaded once.

—AGOT - Eddard IV

"Promise me, Ned," Lyanna's statue whispered. She wore a garland of pale blue roses, and her eyes wept blood.

—AGOT - Eddard XIII

Promise me, Ned, his sister had whispered from her bed of blood. She had loved the scent of winter roses.

—AGOT - Eddard XV

Lyanna was pleading to her brother Ned to protect her son, while Sansa was pleading to her father Ned to protect her direwolf, Lady, part of Sansa’s soul. Later, Ned regretted failing Sansa…

Sansa’s pleading and repeating the word “promise”, triggered Ned’s trauma over Lyanna’s death. That also happened when Robert asked Ned to protect his children.

Targaryen Imagery:

Sansa’s chapters hide hints about Lyanna’s son, Jon Snow, true parentage.

Indeed, Sansa Stark has a very interesting imagery of white/off-white fabrics stained with blood and fire. I wrote more about it here.

Sansa’s Ivory silk dress stained with blood orange juice and ashes

“Liar,” Arya said. Her hand clenched the blood orange so hard that red juice oozed between her fingers.

“Go ahead, call me all the names you want,” Sansa said airily. “You won’t dare when I’m married to Joffrey. You’ll have to bow to me and call me Your Grace.” She shrieked as Arya flung the orange across the table. It caught her in the middle of the forehead with a wet squish and plopped down into her lap.

“You have juice on your face, Your Grace,” Arya said.

It was running down her nose and stinging her eyes. Sansa wiped it away with a napkin. When she saw what the fruit in her lap had done to her beautiful ivory silk dress, she shrieked again. “You’re horrible,” she screamed at her sister. “They should have killed you instead of Lady!”

(…)

“Arya started it,” Sansa said quickly, anxious to have the first word. “She called me a liar and threw an orange at me and spoiled my dress, the ivory silk, the one Queen Cersei gave me when I was betrothed to Prince Joffrey. She hates that I’m going to marry the prince. She tries to spoil everything, Father, she can’t stand for anything to be beautiful or nice or splendid.”

(…)

“Sansa stalked away with her head up. She was to be a queen, and queens did not cry. At least not where people could see. When she reached her bedchamber, she barred the door and took off her dress. The blood orange had left a blotchy red stain on the silk. “I hate her!” she screamed. She balled up the dress and flung it into the cold hearth, on top of the ashes of last night’s fire. When she saw that the stain had bled through onto her underskirt, she began to sob despite herself. She ripped off the rest of her clothes wildly, threw herself into bed, and cried herself back to sleep.”

—A Game of Thrones - Sansa III

When the king’s herald moved forward, Sansa realized the moment was almost at hand. She smoothed down the cloth of her skirt nervously. She was dressed in mourning, as a sign of respect for the dead king, but she had taken special care to make herself beautiful. Her gown was the ivory silk that the queen had given her, the one Arya had ruined, but she’d had them dye it black and you couldn’t see the stain at all. She had fretted over her jewelry for hours and finally decided upon the elegant simplicity of a plain silver chain.

—A Game of Thrones - Sansa V

Take note that the ivory silk dress was a “betrothal gift” from Cersei, that Sansa later had to “dye it black” so the “blood and fire stain” couldn’t be seen at all.

Oh George! Your wording here is just genius!

Sansa’s bedclothes stained with her moonblood and fire

When she woke, the pale light of morning was slanting through her window, yet she felt as sick and achy as if she had not slept at all. There was something sticky on her thighs. When she threw back the blanket and saw the blood, all she could think was that her dream had somehow come true. She remembered the knives inside her, twisting and ripping. She squirmed away in horror, kicking at the sheets and falling to the floor, breathing raggedly, naked, bloodied, and afraid.

But as she crouched there, on her hands and knees, understanding came. “No, please,” Sansa whimpered, “please, no.” She didn’t want this happening to her, not now, not here, not now, not now, not now, not now.

Madness took hold of her. Pulling herself up by the bedpost, she went to the basin and washed between her legs, scrubbing away all the stickiness. By the time she was done, the water was pink with blood. When her maidservants saw it they would know. Then she remembered the bedclothes. She rushed back to the bed and stared in horror at the dark red stain and the tale it told. All she could think was that she had to get rid of it, or else they’d see. She couldn’t let them see, or they’d marry her to Joffrey and make her lay with him.

Snatching up her knife, Sansa hacked at the sheet, cutting out the stain. If they ask me about the hole, what will I say? Tears ran down her face. She pulled the torn sheet from the bed, and the stained blanket as well. I’ll have to burn them. She balled up the evidence, stuffed it in the fireplace, drenched it in oil from her bedside lamp, and lit it afire. Then she realized that the blood had soaked through the sheet into the featherbed, so she bundled that up as well, but it was big and cumbersome, hard to move. Sansa could get only half of it into the fire. She was on her knees, struggling to shove the mattress into the flames as thick grey smoke eddied around her and filled the room, when the door burst open and she heard her maid gasp.

In the end it took three of them to pull her away. And it was all for nothing. The bedclothes were burnt, but by the time they carried her off her thighs were bloody again. It was as if her own body had betrayed her to Joffrey, unfurling a banner of Lannister crimson for all the world to see.

—A Clash of Kings - Sansa IV

Even if the color of the bedclothes was not stated as white/off-white, it’s very probable that they were of white or an off-white color, like ivory. So, again, we find this very interesting imagery in Sansa’s chapters: white/off-white fabrics stained with blood and fire.

And this passage of a bed stained with blood that must be hidden makes me think about Ned’s dream of Lyanna’s death:

He dreamt an old dream, of three knights in white cloaks, and a tower long fallen, and Lyanna in her bed of blood.

—A Game of Thrones - Eddard X

So I think there is another pattern here: betrothal, marriage and giving birth.

As I said before, the ivory silk dress was a “betrothal gift” from Cersei; and, as Sansa stated, the bedclothes stained with her moonblood was a proof of her having reached her womanhood and thus able to do her duty and marry Joffrey and bear his children.

Moreover, after Sansa’s first moonblood, she had this conversation with Cersei:

“I don’t blame you. Between Tyrion and Lord Stannis, everything I eat tastes of ash. And now you’re setting fires as well. What did you hope to accomplish?”

Sansa lowered her head. “The blood frightened me.”

“The blood is the seal of your womanhood. Lady Catelyn might have prepared you. You’ve had your first flowering, no more.”

Sansa had never felt less flowery. “My lady mother told me, but I … I thought it would be different.”

“Different how?”

“I don’t know. Less … less messy, and more magical.”

Queen Cersei laughed. “Wait until you birth a child, Sansa. A woman’s life is nine parts mess to one part magic, you’ll learn that soon enough … and the parts that look like magic often turn out to be messiest of all.” She took a sip of milk. “So now you are a woman. Do you have the least idea of what that means?”

“It means that I am now fit to be wedded and bedded,” said Sansa, “and to bear children for the king.”

—A Clash of Kings - Sansa IV

An ivory silk dress, a “betrothal gift” from Cersei, that Sansa later had to “dye it black”, so the “blood and fire stain” couldn’t be seen at all, sounds pretty much like Lyanna Stark’s betrothal to Robert Baratheon being “stained” by Rhaegar Targaryen. And then, of course, of Jon Snow hidden in the Wall as a Black Brother/Black Knight of the Night’s Watch.

Again, Sansa’s bedclothes stained with her flowering blood and then with fire to hide the stain, sounds pretty much like Lyanna Stark’s bed of blood after she gave birth Jon Snow, the baby that had to be hidden so his Targaryen identity couldn’t be seem at all.

A white wool cloak stained by blood and fire

When she crawled out of bed, long moments later, she was alone. She found his cloak on the floor, twisted up tight, the white wool stained by blood and fire. The sky outside was darker by then, with only a few pale green ghosts dancing against the stars. A chill wind was blowing, banging the shutters. Sansa was cold. She shook out the torn cloak and huddled beneath it on the floor, shivering.

—A Clash of Kings - Sansa VII

Out of the three passages with this imagery of white/off-white fabrics stained with blood and fire, this one, the one you asked for, has the more evident references of Jon Snow’s true parentage as the son of Rhaegar Targaryen and Lyanna Stark.

Here we have Sansa huddled beneath a white kingsguard cloak stained by blood of the death during the Battle of the Blackwater and wildfire.

I think most of the readers get distracted from the Jon Snow’s true parentage hints here, because they romanticize this scene and believe it foreshadows some romantic future events for her involving the Hound, based in the fact that Sansa had covered herself with “the Hounds cloak” twice. But the relationship between Sansa and the white cloaks is -by far- larger than that; it has more to do with the ideals of knighthood and chivalry, than with the men wearing them.

As you can see, GRRM has plagued Sansa’s chapters with hints of Lyanna’s son, Jon Snow, true parentage.

Dead before their time:

Lyanna:

“She [Lyanna] was,” Eddard Stark agreed, “beautiful, and willful, and dead before her time.”

—AGOT - Arya II

Sansa:

And so many others were missing. Where had the rest of them gone? Sansa wondered. Vainly, she searched for friendly faces. Not one of them would meet her eyes. It was as if she had become a ghost, dead before her time.

—AGOT - Sansa V

Lyanna and Lady (part of Sansa’s soul) both died in the south, before their time.

Lyanna’s ghost has haunted Cersei over the years, Cersei wanted to marry Rhaegar but ended married with Robert. Both Rhaegar and Robert loved Lyanna.

Lady is mentioned in the Books as a “shade”, a synonym for ghost. And after Ned’s death, Sansa became a ghost at the Red Keep’s court.

Sansa and Lady also haunt Cersei, as she remembered them both during her walk of atonement:

The queen began to see familiar faces. (...) She saw Ned Stark, and beside him little Sansa with her auburn hair and a shaggy grey dog that might have been her wolf.

—ADWD - Cersei II

At the end, only the remains of Lyanna and Lady returned home, to the North, to Winterfell.

Ladies of Winterfell:

Lyanna’s and Lady’s bones are buried at Winterfell, what makes them literally Ladies of Winterfell:

“She was more beautiful than that,” the king said after a silence. His eyes lingered on Lyanna’s face, as if he could will her back to life. Finally he rose, made awkward by his weight. “Ah, damn it, Ned, did you have to bury her in a place like this?” His voice was hoarse with remembered grief. “She deserved more than darkness …” “She was a Stark of Winterfell,” Ned said quietly. “This is her place.”

—AGOT - Eddard I

Shortly, Jory brought him Ice. When it was over, he said, “Choose four men and have them take the body north. Bury her at Winterfell.” “All that way?” Jory said, astonished. “All that way,” Ned affirmed. “The Lannister woman shall never have this skin.”

—AGOT - Eddard III

Bran felt all cold inside. “She lost her wolf,” he said, weakly, remembering the day when four of his father’s guardsmen had returned from the south with Lady’s bones. Summer and Grey Wind and Shaggydog had begun to howl before they crossed the drawbridge, in voices drawn and desolate. Beneath the shadow of the First Keep was an ancient lichyard, its headstones spotted with pale lichen, where the old Kings of Winter had laid their faithful servants. It was there they buried Lady, while her brothers stalked between the graves like restless shadows. She had gone south, and only her bones had returned.

—AGOT - Bran VI

Lady’s death and his return to the North to rest in Winterfell is linked with Lyanna’s death and her own path back home. I wrote about this before:

Now, back to Lady’s death. We know that this event is a turning point in Sansa’s arc, but other than that, the paragraphs leading to the direwolf’s execution are laden with symbolism and foreshadowing, not only for Sansa, but for Ned as well.

During the “trial”, Ned decides that he will take Lady’s life himself, in order to avoid having a butcher like Ilyn Payne do the execution. Then, before he struck, he pronounced her name in the same fashion Robb and Jon called the name of their direwolves before they both died. This for me foreshadows Ned’s own death. Also, before Lady’s death, Ned pleads King Robert to change his decision on putting down the direwolf, appealing to the memory of Lyanna, the woman Robert loved. Similarly, before Ned’s execution at the steps of the Sept of Baelor, Sansa pleads King Joffrey to spare her father’s life, appealing to the love he has for her. As we know, both pleas fell on deaf ears and both Lady and Ned lost their lives; bringing the story full circle, as Ilyn Payne himself cut off Ned’s head.

Another interesting thing is that before Lady’s death we have direct and indirect references to Lyanna Stark. We have the direct reference when Ned appealed to the love Robert Baratheon bore Lyanna, in order to save Lady’s life, and the indirect one when he ordered Jory to choose four men to return Lady’s body to the north, to bury her in Winterfell. This order Ned gave to his men alludes to his own decision to take Lyanna’s body to Winterfell to be buried in the crypts, after her demise, brought on by her doomed love affair with Rhaegar Targaryen.

And to finish this post, here some gifsets that illustrate some of the discussed parallels:

Sansa Stark and Lyanna Stark + parallels

Pleading

She-wolves of Winterfell

Beautiful, Captivating Child-Women

Hidden Metal ft. hair parallels

Broken ‘Baratheon’ Engagements ft. more hair parallels

Fair Maidens

BONUS

Lyanna and Sansa in the first Show pilot:

In The Original, Terrible ‘Game Of Thrones’ Pilot That Never Aired, there was a scene where Cersei burned the feather that Robert left at Lyanna’s statue in the Winterfell Crypts:

The Cersei scene that might ruffle some feathers

Let’s begin with a defining scene between King Robert Baratheon and Ned Stark in the Winterfell crypts.

The scene that aired on HBO is slightly different from the scene in the Cushing script, but the gist is the same. Robert asks Ned to be his new Hand of the King, a position left open after Jon Arryn’s death. That’s when Robert places something small but highly symbolic on a statue of his onetime betrothed, Lyanna Stark: a feather.

And that pretty much sums up the sequence you saw in Season 1

But in the script found in the Cushing library, Queen Cersei plays a pivotal role in this exchange’s aftermath ― so much so that her involvement would have changed a Season 5 episode, the recent Season 8 teaser and possibly more.

The following scene is written into the pilot script found at Cushing and involves Cersei visiting the crypts right before the feast at Winterfell:

Cersei exits the crypts, crosses the courtyard and walks into the antechamber between the kitchen and the Winterfell great hall. The celebration for the king’s arrival is underway, and servants are rushing past her with food. The queen’s handmaidens make adjustments to her outfit and remove her heavy fur.

Then Cersei reveals something she has inside her sleeve:

“A word with the Stark girl”. I have no doubt this meant Sansa.

We didn’t get to watch this scene, Cersei never came down to the Winterfell Crypts, and she never took the feather Robert left there for Lyanna. But a few seasons later, we got to watch a scene of Sansa at the Winterfell Crypts, next to her aunt Lyanna’s statue, where she found the same feather that King Robert left there years ago...

...And Petyr Baelish told her the story of Lyanna and Rhaegar at the Tourney of Harrenhal.... I wrote more about it here.

I hope this is enough.

Thanks for your message and good night.

#Sansa Stark #Lyanna Stark #parallels #anon ask #Sansa & Lyanna parallels #Lyanna & Sansa parallels

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tomakeitbeautifultolive · 5 years

Note

Kit apparently said that Dany was bad from the very beginning and "we're culpable. We cheered her on." I cannot stand by the cast painting Dany as evil for her ruthlessness against terrible people while saying nothing about Sansa, Arya, Jon, Jaime, Tyrion, or anyone else doing the same thing in the series. It's blatant hypocrisy.

Virtually every main character in Game of Thrones has killed ‘evil men’ and we’ve cheered them on. By this logic, every viewer is ‘culpable’.

I want to clarify that this is not about whether or not these characters were justified in their actions, it’s just a list to show that the characters and fans gaslighting Daenerys are not and never were morally superior.

The point of this list is to prove that Daenerys is not that different from anyone else where morality is concerned, except that no one ever gave her the benefit of the doubt or considered whether or not her actions were justified.

What was Dany accused of prior to 8x05? (By characters and fans):

Having a temper

Killing her enemies in battle

Executing enemies

Executing traitors

Taking revenge

Executing 'evil’ men guilty of what she deems a crime (slave owners)

Using a method of execution that 'makes people uncomfortable’ (fire)

Not preventing her brother’s murder and not being sad enough as it happened

These are the things that the fans and the men conspiring against her insist were warning signs that she was 'going mad’.

This is going to be a long, ugly post that will probably cost me some followers, but simply typing them out is not good enough because most fans have shorter memories than goldfish. Y’all need visuals.

No, I’m not bothering to put it under a cut either, because I’m trying to prove a point and the fact that it’s long only helps my case. 👍

Let’s take a look at the deeds of the oh-so-morally-superior characters, shall we?

Jaime Lannister oathbreaking by slaying his king

Jaime Lannister attempted to murder a child

Jaime Lannister murdered Jory Cassel

Jaime Lannister killed his enemies in battle, tried to murder Daenerys in battle

Jaime Lannister kinslayed, strangling his cousin

Jaime Lannister sacked Highgarden and left no survivors

Jaime Lannister murdered his enemy, Olenna Tyrell

Tyrion Lannister killed his enemies in battle

Tyrion Lannister professed his regret in ever defending King’s Landing

Tyrion Lannister vowed revenge on his sister

Tyrion Lannister kinslayed by having murdered his father

Tyrion Lannister murdered his lover after her betrayal (Shae)

Tyrion murdered his enemies with Wildfire

Tyrion and Varys committed treason against their queen, Daenerys

Varys encouraged Tyrion to seek revenge upon his sister

Varys tried to murder Daenerys via poisoning her food

Varys kept a man in a torture box

Jon Snow broke his Night’s Watch oaths/vow

Jon Snow murdered Qhorin Halfhand

Jon Snow killed his enemies in battle

Jon Snow executed a man who disobeyed his order who cried and begged for his life (Janos Slynt)

Jon Snow executed men who committed treason and conspired to kill him, including a child

Jon Snow nearly killed a man with his bare hands

Jon Snow committed treason against his queen

Jon Snow kinslayed his aunt/murdered his queen in cold blood

Sansa Stark executed Ramsay Bolton with dogs

Sansa Stark committed treason against her family

Sansa Stark lied to prohibit justice for her aunt’s murder

Sansa Stark broke an oath she swore in front of the heart tree

Sansa Stark ordered an execution without a trial

Arya Stark recited a murder list of future victims

Arya Stark killed an entire family regardless of individual guilt

Arya Stark baked the remains into a pie and fed it to the father

Arya Stark delighted in the murder of Walder Frey

Arya Stark stabbed out the eyes of Meryn Trant before murdering him

Arya Stark relished in the death of Polliver

Arya Stark very brutally tore off the face of the Waif and put it on display

Bran Stark warged into Hodor against his will

Bran Stark, who confirms he is aware of the future, moved the chess pieces around to maximize lives lost so that he could seize power

Let’s take a look at other characters who are held in higher moral esteem than Daenerys Targaryen (prior to 8x05):

Robb Stark executed Rickard Karstark for disobeying him

Robb Stark knowingly sent thousands of his men to their deaths for a victory

Robb Stark killed his enemies in battle

Ned Stark executed a man for what he deemed a crime (Will)

Ned Stark killed his enemies in battle

Sandor Clegane murdered a child on an order

Tormund Giantsbane killed innocents in raids

Ygritte killed innocents (including women) in raids

Ygritte killed her enemies in battle

Tormund killed his enemies in battle (and ate their faces)

Randyll Tarly threatened to hunt and murder his heir

Randyll Tarly betrayed his liege lord Olenna Tyrell

Randyll Tarly sacked Highgarden and left no survivors

Melisandre poisoned a Maester for trying to kill her

Melisandre burned non-believers alive

Melisandre burned an innocent child alive

Stannis and Selyse Baratheon consented to murdering their child

Melisandre and Stannis burned a man alive for refusing to bend the knee

Melisandre and Stannis Baratheon (kinslaying) his brother via shadow demon

This list ain’t even exhaustive. This is just the shit I came up with off the top of my head!

Want to claim Daenerys Targaryen was always foreshadowed to be mad? Cool!

Now just admit everyone else in the series was foreshadowed as mad, too.

#answered #game of thrones #got #anti got #daenerys defense squad #daenerys targaryen #mad queen my ass

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danwhobrowses · 4 years

Text

10 Things that would’ve Improved the Game of Thrones Final Season (For Me)

So it came to my attention that recently it was the First Anniversary of the Final Episode of HBO’s ‘Game of Thrones’. I was taken back to my memory of the BinGOT thing we had at work where we all made predictions of who lived, died and ‘won’ from the last ep (I was in 2nd or 3rd place). And since my mother has started binging it during quarantine I thought in the spirit of that environment I’d discuss a little what I would’ve changed in the final season.

Spoilers for Game of Thrones Season 8 Below, if you haven’t watched it then you’re better off not reading this frankly, if you haven’t been spoiled already at least.

So for starters, the final episode is not the worst tv I’ve ever seen, it just was a sloppy final season in general that really didn’t satisfy the 2 years of hype waiting for it, it’s like with the How I Met Your Mother finale, but that annoyance being more than one episode. But without further ado here are 10 things I would’ve changed about the final season Note: Most will involve the finale. The first 2 episodes were great.

10 - Ten Episodes The Long Night was 1 episode, the LONG NIGHT. A Culmination of the army of living and dead confined into one episode. One of the main problems with the final season was that the pacing was a bit rushed, it made character progression seem unnatural and dropped long-built plot points like water through a sieve. With 10 episodes, which was not a big ask given that this was the usual number and the gravitas of it being the final season would easily allow it to be green lit. D&D immediately backed themselves into a corner by giving a limit they weren’t used to and too much content to put in.

9 - Bite of the Spider Varys’ death was an upsetting start of the penultimate episode, while I would’ve loved him to have survived start to end and potentially ended on top (because he’s never shown to be as cunning or dangerous as he is in the books) there was some sense in him dying. However, Varys was shown sending a letter before his arrest and that never came back up, the finale could’ve used this by revealing to the public Jon’s true heritage, which would’ve immediately undermined Dany’s claim and set up a better conflict. Also we never knew what the voice in the flames said to him...

8 - A More Fitting Long Night While everyone probably popped hard for Arya killing the Night King, myself included, the nature of it was rather abrupt. I don’t think anyone can buy that she sneaked past that entire army. I do feel like the Night King was just a MacGuffin for the Long Night, given that he did so little in the actual fight. This is where a multi-part Long Night would’ve been key as well, going from the Night King being immune to Dragonfire to dying a bit later was not a good pace, and we lacked any conflict with Jon like we teased twice, Arya probably wasn’t the most poetic person to kill him either but GoT seldom did poetic deaths (Joffrey, Cersei, Euron). While the Long Night had exemplary deaths like Theon, Lyanna, Jorah and Beric, the Night King fell among the ranks of Melisandre and Edd in terms of meh deaths. The Long Night should’ve been a bigger bloodbath than it was, half the Dothraki somehow survived remember, we didn’t get to see Ghost fight at all either, no giant spiders, a lot of the tension was lost with the way some fight scenes were filmed; it was too easy to read between the lines and not enough characters had any true ‘oh god this person could die’ scenes.

7 - Resolution for the Characters we didn’t See and Plots unresolved With so much funding and finality in the show, there felt like there could’ve been more stuff that could’ve been resolved; what was the Quaith’s prophecy about? What really happened with the Doom of Valyria? Why does Dragonglass and Valyrian steel kill White Walkers? What is Daario doing after Dany died? Were the Faceless Men really that okay with letting Arya wander around knowing their skillset? Nobody hired them to help in the war either. What happened to the remnants of that warlock dude who stole the baby dragons, they sent one scorpion and that’s it, what happens with the Little Birds now that they’re leaderless? Who was Azor Ahai? What were the spirals about? There are a lot of questions the show kinda just, ignored.

6 - The Mad Queen So, Dany going from ‘I’ll stop if they surrender’ to ‘Burn them fucking all’ was abrupt for many, the majority of fans were not ready or willing to accept turning on their Kaleesi in just one episode. While I could see the conclusion coming from being jumped, losing another ‘child’ and her closest friend as well as her new boyfriend being her nephew and a legitimate threat to her legitimacy despite already pledging fealty, Dany’s descent could’ve used more time, and less naivety. While the death of the dragon was a huge shock, the idiocy fell on Dany in thinking that Cersei would play fair and wouldn’t try to occupy Dragonstone while she abandoned it. There also fell inconsistency when the same fleet and rows of Scorpion crossbows suddenly got Stormtrooper aim during ‘The Bells’. Euron is a renowned sailor, he ruined a Dornish fleet in a previous season, he may be an annoying bastard but you have to treat his naval tactics with a bit more respect - and make Dany less stupid with Cersei doing Cersei things. A lot of people definitely needed more time in buying the idea that Dany had lost her cool and that she blamed all of Westeros to justify burning everyone unashamedly.

5 - Proper Redemption We all know who we’re talking about. Jaime, Jaime, Jaime. In the end he just proved Olenna’s point didn’t he? And his turn away from redemption was only to serve as an example point for Tyrion to use to convince Jon to kill Dany. Jaime didn’t have to live, but he didn’t have to die rushing to Cersei’s rescue, or even due to Euron stabbing him. If anything Jaime should’ve died with some Honour, to be the inverse of Ned as he was presented in Season 1.

4 - My Lady does not have to mean M’Lady This is probably the most selfish ones of my 10 but as a shipper at my very heart and soul I wanted one, at least one, ship to survive this entire turmoil and Gendry and Arya were that couple. We almost had it as well, but then for some mad reason D&D decided that Gendry, despite literally saying that “none of it will be worthwhile if you’re not with me”, stayed in Storm’s End. Arya’s character endgame was right in her venturing off not being bound by the fact that she’s a noble, but Gendry spent a lot of time not caring that he was of Kingsblood to basically being his Father’s son. He’ll rule Storm’s End, marry some woman to have kids, but he’ll still have fallen into the same pit as King Robert did. It would’ve been much more satisfying and hopeful if Gendry abandoned the titles and land he never wanted or needed to accompany someone he loves and who loves him back on an adventure into the unknown. She’s not a ‘lady’ if she’s only marrying a blacksmith and love is the death of duty.

3 - Sansa is NOT Smart (and gets what she actually deserves) Right. So I really, really didn’t like Sansa. Like, I get it, she got held hostage by the Lannisters, watched her father get beheaded, got accused of murder, learned that her brother and mother died, watched the guy who fancied her mother and kissed her kill her aunt and then got effectively sold to an abuser in an arranged marriage. But Sansa is not the smartest player in the game, it was annoying that they tried to portray her as one, she had one idea that anyone could’ve told you ‘don’t be stupid against Ramsay Bolton’. She spent all of Season 8 mainly giving side eye like a petty bitch, completely trying to undermine Dany despite the two being very very similar (remember Dany was raped, sold off in an arranged marriage and watched family members get killed too) to the point where she was conspiring for Jon to usurp her. And in reality she took her ball and left, she was so pissy that the leaders didn’t pick her to be Queen of Westeros that she literally pointed out her own brother’s infertility, claimed that the North wouldn’t bow to a monarch, then declared herself Queen. Hide the ‘Yas Queen’ goggles for a sec, this wasn’t empowering she was throwing her own brother under the bus because she wanted to be queen, and she learned far too much from Littlefinger and Cersei’s playbook to actually be a just one. The North is allowed to be an independent nation, but Sansa’s ‘victory’ was more earned by virtue of a lot of shit happened to her than her actually demonstrating qualities to be queen.

2 - Bran Stark can’t come to the Phone right now... While we’re on the subject of Stark children not being fit rulers, Bran. What a cockamamie decision that was. I was 100% behind the destruction of the Iron Throne, but the chorus of laughter with a democratic rule was a bit of a slap in the face. Of all the choices though, Bran had to be near the bottom, it felt completely unearned that he spent literal seasons disconnecting from the world even to the point where he told Meera and Sam that Bran Stark is no longer here anymore only for Bran Stark to magically resurface when a crown is in waiting. I think it defeats the whole Three Eyed Raven thing too, the guy isn’t really one for the people, which is the problem every other ruler before him failed at. If you can’t pick a just person to lead, then why not a council instead? Just using Bran was a poor and messy decision.

1 - THE MOTHERFUCKING VALONQUAR One of the few expectations across all of Game of Thrones was the wondering over whether Cersei was gonna get what’s coming to her, the Maggy the Frog prophecy was going along quite well up until the Valonquar bit, where the younger sibling that was going to choke the life out of her was: bricks. BRICKS! Of all the long-winded prophecy foreshadowings to drop this one was the worst, Cersei (and Jaime) died in underwhelming, thoughtless fashion, the lack of fanfare on killing off one of the best and most ‘love to hate’ villains in the show only cemented the fact that the finale was not able to live up to the hype. True, most of these are small changes, but it’s worth remembering that there was some good coming out of the final season and it was the lack of those little things and attention to detail that led to the season ending on an underwhelming note.

We did however get a good ton of memes out of it, and at work a long-winded discussion on who should get the ‘winner’ 5-points (compared to the 1 correct points) since we had technically agreed that the 5 points goes to “whoever correctly guesses who sits on the Iron Throne” XD I still can’t believe I was right in Drogon melting the throne though that was one in a million

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nightqueendany · 5 years

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The Original Final Season 7 - Episode 2: Greywater Watch

ON DRAGONSTONE

The episode opens much the same way it opened in 7x02 (though there is no storm raging outside, no conversation about a storm), with Melisandre arriving and speaking with Dany about Jon Snow

However, this is now the same meeting where Dany is planning her conquest of Westeros with all her allies - Olenna, Ellaria, and Yara.

Dany’s allies convince her to listen to Melisandre and summon Jon Snow and hold off battle plans until he arrives - the Riverlands/Vale are in prime position to take Casterly Rock/the Capital so would be better to wait and see what the North can bring to the table

Varys informs Dany and co that Melisandre used to advise Stannis but Olenna reminds everyone that they all once served someone else so it shouldn’t be held against Mel

In private, Olenna and Melisandre warn Dany against Varys, Olenna saying that he is a “clever man” and she’s outlived clever men by ignoring them

Mel echoes these sentiments, reminding Dany that Varys served Robert Baratheon and the Lannisters and tried to have Dany killed several times, etc.

Dany argues in Varys’ defense, saying he might not be loyal to monarchs but that he’s loyal to the realm and he’s exactly the kind of person the realm needs

Mel and Olenna are skeptical, Mel says that the realm is like a flock, they need a shepherd, not a spider, to keep them together - the shepherd being Dany. Olenna’s advice to Dany is much more blunt. She accuses the Lords of Westeros of being sheep. Is Dany a sheep? No, she’s a dragon. Be a dragon. Mel can’t disagree with that.

On Dany’s orders, Tyrion sends word to Jon about coming to treat with Dany on Dragonstone

IN WINTERFELL

Arya arrives and reunites with Jon, Sansa, and Bran

Arya informs Jon of Edmure’s allegiance

After Jon receives Tyrion’s raven about Daenerys, Baelish brings up the possibility of a marriage alliance and, though Jon doesn’t trust Baelish in particular, Davos agrees it may be a good option in order to gain armies, weapons, and dragons in order to fight the Army of the Dead - even with the Riverlands’ allegiance, they still don’t have enough fighting men to take on the AOTD without assistance

Baelish tries to plant ideas into Sansa’s head about Jon and Dany marrying, naming her their heir until they are to have one of their own, meaning if somehow they both die in the wars to come, she would become Queen of the Seven Kingdoms (much like the “if Robert were to die- When Robert dies” from the books), Sansa doesn’t have much to say to this, is more focused on one of Dany’s allies being the Greyjoys

The Hound, noticing Baelish’s scheming and weaselly ways, threatens him to stay away from Sansa (like Jon’s “touch my sister, I’ll kill you myself”)

When Baelish accuses Sandor of being just like him (i.e. wanting Sansa sexually/romantically), Sandor corrects him and says he’s only ever wanted to protect her and Arya and he will do so, even if it kills him

Sometime after his encounter with Sandor, Baelish finagles his way into an invite to accompany Jon and Davos to Dragonstone - it’s more central to all the action, right where Baelish likes to be

IN OLDTOWN

Sam cures Ser Jorah of his greyscale

AT CASTLE BLACK:

Edd and the other Black Brothers/few Free Folk who are hanging out there (not Tormund) discuss the Horn Edd found, some of the Free Folk believe it has the power to bring down the Wall, Mance had been trying to find it as opposed to battling the Night’s Watchmen

Edd orders no one to touch it or go near it

IN KING’S LANDING:

Cersei, in celebration of her pregnancy, commissions the courtyard ground painted with a map of Westeros, telling Jaime, “our child will rule Westeros, a dynasty that will last 1k years, what father had trained us for since we were children...”

She and Jaime also talk about allies and enemies - Enemies to the East, West, North, and South, Jaime asks “where are our allies?”...

Euron Greyjoy shows up in King’s Landing

Even with the news of the baby, Jaime is still distant with Cersei due to her behavior, constantly whispering to Qyburn, obsessing over news of her “enemies” - smallfolk in the city talking shit about her (like the guy in S6 who claimed he showed her his cock during her Walk of Atonement and got his skull crushed by the Mountain)

Euron tries to get Cersei into bed and though she rebuffs him, she tells Jaime she can’t do so for long, she’ll need to claim he’s the father of her child, further shutting Jaime out

BACK IN THE NORTH:

As Jon prepares to leave for Dragonstone, Bran finally tells Jon there’s something he needs to know but he’s not the one to tell him, that on his way to Dragonstone, Jon needs to stop by Greywater Watch - Meera will accompany him so she can be reunited with her family

Jon, Davos, Baelish, and Meera arrive at Greywater Watch, Howland Reed finally tells Jon (in private) about R+L=J, Howland gives Jon Rhaegar’s harp, which was in Lyanna’s possession when she died

While Howland is telling Jon about his parents, Bran is at the weirwood attempting to control his visions and get a handle on them, and he flashes back to Rhaegar and Lyanna as Howland tells Jon the story, how they fell in love, their secret marriage, and Jon’s real name, “Aegon Targaryen”

The title is obviously for House Reed’s ancestral seat to mark the first time it’s ever been seen in the show (and in the books for that matter).

Episode 2 Inside the Episode: Greywater Watch

1) Now, first thing people are probably wondering is: why does Jon find out about RLJ in Episode 2?? Before he meets Daenerys??

And the simple answer is...because it shouldn’t make a difference for him to hear about it later in the season. Remember, this is the FINAL season. So there’s no cliffhanger to leave us on. This is it. Jon’s no longer heading for an “information bomb” in Season 8 because there is no Season 8. And, we all know the aunt/nephew incest won’t matter in the books - as avunculate marriages have been established in House Stark - so it shouldn’t matter in the show.

Plus, Jon knowing who he is as he’s falling for Dany will create a nice tension there because he hates lying, and holding back the truth from her will be difficult once he’s already in love with her. It will be a good conflict for Jon for the season - tell Dany the truth, or keep it to himself?

2) Baelish heading to Dragonstone with Jon:

Probably the most basic no-brainer in the entire season. That Baelish stayed with Sansa in the North in S7 was really idiotic. Baelish never stays in one place too long, even if it’s to be near Sansa. He dropped her off at Winterfell once before, with the Boltons, and headed back south because it benefitted him most. Baelish staying in Winterfell in S7 makes no sense because it doesn’t benefit him.

Baelish’s Season 7 Winterfell plot did nothing to further his ambition and designs on the Iron Throne. Baelish heading to Dragonstone with Jon would. If he can get Jon and Dany to marry, knock off Cersei, and name Sansa their heir before dying *somehow* in the War for the Dawn...his job is essentially done, he just needs to persuade Sansa to marry him after, which as he would have helped name her Queen, shouldn’t be too hard to do.

3) Mel’s meeting with Dany on Dragonstone...

Melisandre coming in during Dany’s meeting with Olenna, Ellaria, and Yara and Theon makes so much sense. If she were to speak before Dany’s whole council and convince everyone of summoning Jon, it would fulfill the idea that D&D tried to pass off in 7x02 as a “feminist” moment with all these powerful women strategizing and making decisions. You know, as opposed to the scene we actually got where the women just went along with what Tyrion planned and had no say in battle strategy at all which was so fucking dumb.

Also, many on Dany’s council know the Starks and would be better at convincing Dany to seek an alliance with Jon than just Mel (whom Dany doesn’t know) and Tyrion, who hasn’t seen either Jon or Sansa in years. Theon and Olenna could vouch for Jon and Sansa, adding their voices of support for this alliance. Also, Ellaria Sand, a fellow bastard, may be impressed with Jon being named King, admire that the North has taken a page out of Dorne’s book to throw out this prejudice against bastards and named someone King who they actually believed in, which would jibe with Dany’s approach of judging people on their merits rather than names, titles, and status.

Basically, everyone in Dany’s council would get on the Jonerys train, as they should.

4) Not necessarily mentioned in the outline of the episode above but wanted to address this, The War for the Iron Throne:

Now, obviously this new strategy nixes several battles from Season 7 and you guys are probably wondering why.

Well, if we think about the structure of prior seasons, big set piece battles, like the Greyjoys vs Greyjoys of 7x02, the sack of Casterly Rock of 7x03, and the Field of Fire of 7x04, are really uncommon in early episodes. We usually get ONE battle per season and that’s the “Episode 9” battle. So to have a season filled with battles is 1) not the GOT norm and 2) really unnecessary. Dany has been all about strategizing in the past, waiting for people to come to her, sitting and waiting to persuade people to her side, connecting with the people first before the high lords. That’s her MO. Going in guns blazing is not Dany’s way.

Yes, Dany’s allies sided with her because of the promise of Fire and Blood. And they’ll get it. But they are also the kind of allies to wait. Olenna plotting Joffrey’s murder to get Margaery a better husband that again, she’d have to wait for. Yara and Theon going all the way to Meereen to get Dany on their side. Ellaria waiting to align with Olenna and Dany before going to war with Cersei. Dany is patient and so are her allies. They understand the importance of well planned revenge. Waiting for Jon and seeing what he can bring to the table is much more on par with what we’ve seen from all of them the last few seasons.

5) And lastly, Howland Reed

Many of us predicted we would see Howland Reed this season (Season 8) and we were obviously wrong. Now, some people may think Howland Reed showing up in the story is unrealistic, but in my opinion, Season 6 set this up for us already. Rather than not name any of Ned’s companions at the Tower of Joy (which they could have done), the show specifically points out Howland, and mentions that he’s Jojen and Meera’s father. Why would we be shown Howland, and have it implied that he’s the only other living soul (without psychic powers like Bran) who knows who Jon really is, and then NEVER do anything with that information?

To me, this was such a bullshit move on the show’s part. I mean, there are a lot of those. But we were owed a Howland Reed scene. We needed to see him in the series. We even got Meera in S7 saying she needed to go be with her family and then we never saw the Reeds in S8 - did they pull a Cersei and sit out the War for the Dawn as well??? I mean, it just makes no sense. There was set up for this and no pay-off.

So having Jon learn from Howland - who actually has a personal and first hand connection to this information - tell Jon the truth about who he is rather than Sam - who had no personal connection to this info - finally pays off what was set up in Season 6 and gives Jon and the audience this information in a much more satisfying way.

Aaand that’s it for Episode 2!

Original Final Season 7: Preface Post

Season 7 Episode 1: Family, Duty, Honor

Season 7 Episode 2: Greywater Watch (Current episode)

Season 7 Episode 3: The Last of the Dragons

Season 7 Episode 4: Dragonglass

Season 7 Episode 5: The Storm

Season 7 Episode 6: Summerhall

Season 7 Episode 7: A City Fit For A King

Season 7 Episode 8: Protectors of the Realm

Season 7 Episode 9: The Battle For The Dawn

Season 7 Episode 10: ?

Keep an eye out next Tuesday for Episode 3!

#game of thrones #daenerys targaryen #jon snow #bran stark #sansa stark #arya stark #samwell tarly #melisandre #olenna tyrell #varys #eddison tollett #cersei lannister #euron greyjoy #meera reed #howland reed #sandor clegane #petyr baelish

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thebluelemontree · 5 years

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SanSan time! So in ASOIAF we get the Hand’s Tourney scene with Sansa & Sandor, and the whole “he was no true knight” moment. It seems like Sandor is still thinking she’s just a “little bird” here - but later, her father as Hand attaints Gregor, stripping him of his titles for his violent crimes. How do you think this makes Sandor feel about Sansa & his perceived seriousness of her moral ideals, considering his trauma re: Gregor being anointed and his other crimes covered up by everyone but Ned?

I don’t think Sandor was ready at the time to draw any positive conclusions between Sansa and her father, because his cynicism always gets in the way of that. While her compassion made him take notice, he doesn’t regard her beliefs as a good thing. To him, they are still woefully naive and a weakness that will only lead to being victimized by the strong and cruel. If Sansa is so ill-prepared for the brutality and bleakness of reality, well, he would point a very judgemental finger at her parents for that. This is not to say Sandor wasn’t quietly making observations about Ned, because I do think a few books in we see subtle indications that Ned’s character and decision to bring Gregor to justice perhaps did make an impression after all. And I think it’s his experience with Sansa that causes him to have a more charitable conception of Ned in hindsight rather than Ned influencing his view of Sansa.

It’s just that Sandor requires a lot of evidence over time before he will consider altering his opinions. He sees exactly what he expects to see, so his point of view is always validated. It takes more than just Sansa saying “he was no true knight,” as groundbreaking as that moment was. It’s precisely that fact that makes him want to work harder at trying to find the cracks in Sansa’s idealism to prove that it can’t be real. It’s only until the conclusion of the Blackwater scene that Sandor can finally accept that she is sincere in her beliefs by treating him with compassion when he least deserved it. To him, Sansa is such an anomaly that the idea of anyone else being that authentic and principled is an even bigger stretch of the imagination than she is.

And what experience does Sandor have with fathers doing right by their children? None. His own father covered up Gregor’s vicious attack and made him uphold the lie. Then he’s a witness to Tywin and Robert Baratheon’s parenting. Sandor always initially gives his life experiences more weight than any counterevidence he saw from Ned or Sansa.

We are given a glimpse of Sandor’s reaction upon hearing the news that Beric Dondarrion was sent by Ned to put down Gregor Clegane through Littlefinger:

Robert was in a fury [over the loss of the white hart], until he heard talk of some monstrous boar deeper in the forest. Then nothing would do but he must have it. Prince Joffrey returned this morning, with the Royces, Ser Balon Swann, and some twenty others of the party. The rest are still with the king.“

“The Hound?” Ned asked, frowning. Of all the Lannister party, Sandor Clegane was the one who concerned him the most, now that Ser Jaime had fled the city to join his father.

“Oh, returned with Joffrey, and went straight to the queen.” Littlefinger smiled. “I would have given a hundred silver stags to have been a roach in the rushes when he learned that Lord Beric was off to behead his brother.”

“Even a blind man could see the Hound loathed his brother.”

“Ah, but Gregor was his to loathe, not yours to kill. Once Dondarrion lops the summit off our Mountain, the Clegane lands and incomes will pass to Sandor, but I wouldn’t hold my water waiting for his thanks, not that one… “ – Eddard XII AGOT

Granted Littlefinger is framing this information in a certain light to pique Ned’s paranoia as he’s been doing throughout their interactions. Ned just tipped his hand as to who he’s worried about and Littlefinger ran with it, making it seem like Ned just crossed Sandor personally. Early on, Sandor is still invested in the idea that killing his brother is the only way to end the pain of his trauma. Not that I think that he genuinely wants to be a kinslayer, but keeping the revenge fantasy alive is a coping mechanism that Sandor doesn’t want to be taken from him. I have no doubt that Sandor did go to Cersei immediately to discuss the situation, but there’s a lot more going on here. This is going to be a long recap and a good deal of rambling. You have been forewarned.

At the inn at the crossroads, Catelyn arrests Tyrion as a person of interest in the assassination attempt on Bran based on Littlefinger’s claim of who won the Valyrian steel dagger. She takes Tyrion to Lysa in the Eyrie, holding him prisoner. Word of Tyrion’s arrest reaches King’s Landing via Yoren. In retaliation, Jaime Lannister and his men attack Ned Stark in the streets, leaving Ned with a badly broken leg. Ned is unconscious with a fever for “six days and seven nights.” When he awakens, he tries to speak to Robert about the conflict with the Lannisters, but Robert will not hear of it. The situation is escalating with both Riverrun and Casterly Rock calling their banners in anticipation for war. Robert decides he’d rather go hunting than deal with this mess, tells Ned they should just simply stop fighting and leaves the next day. Thanks, Robert.

Ned is back to holding court as Hand and dealing with official business. Marq Piper and Karyl Vance, Hoster Tully’s bannermen, show up to accuse the Lannisters of sending Gregor Clegane to attack villages in the Riverlands under the guise of common brigands. They brought with them the few remaining survivors of the attacks to testify that despite the lack of sigils or banners, these brigands were definitely outfitted like proper knights. They had war horses, good weapons and armor, and their inhumanly large leader couldn’t be anyone else other than the Mountain. Ned believes them and suspects what Tywin may be trying to accomplish: “should Riverrun strike back [openly attacking Tywin’s soldiers or bannermen], Cersei and her father would insist that it had been the Tullys who broke the king’s peace, not the Lannisters. The gods only knew what Robert would believe.” The ruse gives Tywin plausible deniability of being responsible, but it is flimsy enough so the Riverlanders to take the bait. There’s no guarantee that Robert, the weak king that he is, wouldn’t cave under pressure to side with his in-laws. We also learn later that Tywin was counting on Ned leading his forces personally to come to the aid of his wife’s family. Away from King’s Landing, Ned could be killed, captured, or traded for Tyrion. Either way, the Starks would be removed from power; however, Ned’s leg was broken during the street fight with Jaime, who knew nothing of his father’s plan.

So Ned sends Beric Dondarrion to bring down Ser Gregor for his crimes against the villagers in the name of the king’s justice, thwarting Tywin’s provocation of Riverrun to retaliate. By putting Robert’s stamp of approval on Gregor’s death sentence, he’s also gambling that this will position the king to side against his in-laws later. You know, when he finally gets Robert to have that big talk about his wife and kids. Sigh.

“Lord Tywin is greatly wroth about the men you sent after Ser Gregor Clegane,” the maester confided. “I feared he would be. You will recall, I said as much in council.”

“Let him be wroth,” Ned said. Every time his leg throbbed, he remembered Jaime Lannister’s smile, and Jory dead in his arms. “Let him write all the letters to the queen he likes. Lord Beric rides beneath the king’s own banner. If Lord Tywin attempts to interfere with the king’s justice, he will have Robert to answer to. The only thing His Grace enjoys more than hunting is making war on lords who defy him.” – Eddard XII, AGOT.

Ned sends Ser Robar Royce to Robert’s hunting party to inform the king (and Yohn Royce) of Dondarrion’s posse and Gregor’s attainment/death sentence. Fast forward to Robert on his deathbed, where he voices his displeasure with Ned putting him in a difficult spot with his wife’s family.

“Ah, fuck you, Ned,” the king said hoarsely. “I killed the [boar], didn’t I?” A lock of matted black hair fell across his eyes as he glared up at Ned. “Ought to do the same for you. Can’t leave a man to hunt in peace. Ser Robar found me. Gregor’s head. Ugly thought. Never told the Hound. Let Cersei surprise him.” His laugh turned into a grunt as a spasm of pain hit him. – Eddard XIII, AGOT.

Robert admits to Ned that he never told Sandor himself. Surprise, Robert dodged an uncomfortable conversation and intended on leaving that task to Cersei so he could get back to having a good time. Because Sandor returned with Joffrey and the Royces, he most definitely heard the news through them. Why does this detail matter? Well, if you were Sandor, wouldn’t you be irked that the king didn’t have the basic courtesy (or balls) to tell you himself? The natural progression of that conversation would be discussing what that means for Sandor’s future, the inheritance of Clegane lands, and his standing with the Lannisters during this conflict. But Robert doesn’t want to touch that topic with a ten-foot pole. What I’m saying is, at that moment, he’s probably more pissed at Robert than anyone else. Following that would be Ned’s decision interfering with one of his primary coping mechanisms. So Sandor marches off straight to Cersei where he was probably told of Gregor’s purpose in the Riverlands and assured that Ned’s order would come to nothing. Indeed, Gregor was ready for Donddarion, ambushing his party from all sides at Mummer’s Ford, soundly defeating them. Meanwhile, Cersei was already making moves to remove both Ned and Robert. But how did Sandor feel about all this?

The grey light of dawn was streaming through his window when the thunder of hoofbeats awoke Eddard Stark from his brief, exhausted sleep. He lifted his head from the table to look down into the yard. Below, men in mail and leather and crimson cloaks were making the morning ring to the sound of swords, and riding down mock warriors stuffed with straw. Ned watched Sandor Clegane gallop across the hard-packed ground to drive an iron-tipped lance through a dummy’s head. Canvas ripped and straw exploded as Lannister guardsmen joked and cursed.

Is this brave show for my benefit, he wondered. If so, Cersei was a greater fool than he’d imagined. Damn her, he thought, why is the woman not fled? I have given her chance after chance … – Eddard XIV AGOT

He’s right there under Ned’s window, mocking and intimidating him. If there was any tiny glimmer in Sandor that maybe Gregor would be finally held accountable for any of his crimes, it was almost immediately overshadowed by his cynicism and confirmation bias. Knowing that Ned’s goose is cooked, Sandor would think Ned a great, naive fool for not understanding how the world really works and how outmatched he is. His worldview is validated yet again by the cunning of his masters. The only thing he can do is attempt to cure Sansa of the same infirmity before its too late for her.

Just before the Blackwater battle, Sandor brings up her father and tries to put some dents in his image to argue his points. For a little context, Sandor was alone on the roof of the Red Keep until Sansa showed up. We can infer with his anxieties about the wildfire that Sandor was up there contemplating his own mortality, which is why he goes so particularly hard in needling Sansa. It seems as if Sandor must have been in the middle of some pretty intense brooding. If he dies in the battle by fire no less, it is in the thankless service of awful people, and Gregor still goes on living and unpunished. If this is how it all ends, well, it’s pretty depressing and of course, as he should have always expected. And here Sansa is still insisting on her idealistic worldview. He goes for a low blow. In that process, he reveals his anger and trust issues with fathers.

She hated the way he talked, always so harsh and angry. “Does it give you joy to scare people?”

“No, it gives me joy to kill people.” His mouth twitched. “Wrinkle up your face all you like, but spare me this false piety. You were a high lord’s get. Don’t tell me Lord Eddard Stark of Winterfell never killed a man.”

“That was his duty. He never liked it.”

“Is that what he told you?” Clegane laughed again. “Your father lied. Killing is the sweetest thing there is.” He drew his longsword. “Here’s your truth. Your precious father found that out on Baelor’s steps. Lord of Winterfell, Hand of the King, Warden of the North, the mighty Eddard Stark, of a line eight thousand years old … but Ilyn Payne’s blade went through his neck all the same, didn’t it? Do you remember the dance he did when his head came off his shoulders?” – Sansa IV, ACOK.

Of course, Ned must be a liar because his father was. He’s got to be no different than Tywin, the high lord he knows best. All fathers and killers are the same. This is the truth as he sees it: those on top, who hold near-godlike power of life and death over their subjects, secretly enjoy exercising that power behind a virtuous countenance. Does Sandor honestly believe this about Ned, or is he trying really hard to convince himself of that? Because for a flickering moment there, it almost sounds like a part of Sandor thinks of Ned in a grand, larger-than-life image before he pauses in thought…

And since he’s the one who brought up Ned and his execution, he also can’t deny that he witnessed a man condemning himself as a traitor in exchange for the safety of the daughter the Lannisters held hostage. He did the very thing his own father would not do: endure the public shame and stigma for love of his child. That is proof that Ned’s honor wasn’t just about his public image, which surely didn’t go unnoticed by someone sensitive to such things, whether he was ready to accept that or not. That Ned wasn’t just merely outmatched by more cunning players, he was the victim of treachery and deceit, failed by a negligent king uninterested in dealing with corruption. While he still does think Ned a fool, there’s a sense that Sandor has adjusted to thinking of him as a decent, honorable, and tragic sort of fool, much like his daughter. What good did that integrity do him? None. The monsters won. Illyn Payne still took his head off while he and his daughter watched. Did you catch how the detail of Ned’s twitching limbs was burned into Sandor’s memory, the same one that plagued Sansa’s nightmares? Yeah, it affected him too. So I do think Sandor is trying to convince himself that Ned was actually a phony and a shitty person because Sandor doesn’t want to empathize with anyone and yet finds himself doing so anyway. Like with Sansa, caring* means having confused and conflicted feelings that force him to re-examine his own life. Add to the fact that Sandor is also the child of a murdered father. I could see a young Sandor having very complicated feelings about mourning his own massive disappointment of a father if he allowed himself to mourn him at all. I don’t see how those memories could not be dredged up.

* I’m still debating whether or not “caring” is too strong a word in regards to Ned. Let’s just say that upon later reflection, I think certain things about Ned’s life and death resonated with Sandor.

It’s a very small, but not unremarkable shift considering how much of a jaded idealist cynic Sandor is. Death probably also has a way of memorializing Ned in a similar way to how separation causes Sandor to reframe Sansa’s courteousness as something he highly esteems; however, Sandor just can’t say that he was wrong these things openly, so you have to read between the lines. Later while telling Arya of his intention to return her to Catelyn and Robb, Sandor says he’s willing to wager that Robb won’t kill him:

If he doesn’t take me, he’d be wise to kill me, but he won’t. Too much his father’s son, from what I hear. – Arya IX, ASOS.

What Sandor is hoping for first and foremost is for Robb to take him into his service, right after stating that he’s done with loathsome and unappreciative masters. In an indirect way, it is an admission that Ned, Sansa, and the other Starks are not just different, but better. Still foolish because it would be “wiser” to kill someone like him, but definitely better. Sandor assumes Robb will be pointing his army toward King’s Landing to free Sansa, so he believes his Lannister intel will make him a valuable asset. “Maybe I’ll even kill Gregor for him, he’d like that.“ What’s also interesting is that he fantasizes about changing Robb’s negative opinion and winning his favor by taking down Gregor for him (in the name of the king’s justice), essentially fulfilling the duty Ned charged Dondarrion with. While he may think he’s got one over on Robb and his long-awaited revenge will be the cherry on top, his wording points to a subconscious desire to please and serve Ned through his stand-in eldest son. That he wants a chance to earn positive recognition from a worthy king, someone who Sansa also loves and admires. The thought eases the pain of his failures and screw-ups regarding her during the Blackwater. Except this goes up in smoke with the Red Wedding.

I don’t know if in the future Sandor will ever have any lines where he openly and positively speaks of Ned, but that would be something I would love to see. Since I am sure he and Sansa are bound to reunite, it would probably come up then. Or Ned’s presence could be quietly felt in the continuation of Sandor’s arc through his choices and actions. Or it could be both. We just have to wait until Winds to find out.

#valyrian scrolls #sandor clegane meta #sandor clegane #ned stark #sansa stark #sansan meta #robb stark #gregor clegane #beric dondarrion #asoiaf meta #my meta #character arcs #calamitylamb #sorry for the wait

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kitten1618x · 5 years

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GoT Afterthoughts ep. 08x02 ‘A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms’ (Jonsa Edition)

Guys this episode was sooooooo good! Okay, okay, okay, let’s unpack here! I have lots of thoughts and since this isn’t broken up into parts, this is going to be a long post, so I’m gonna drop this bad boy under a read more.

We begin in the Great Hall. It appears Jaime is on trial. Queen Dany sits at the head of the table—and imagine having the fucken audacity to sit in Winterfell — in Rickard fucken Starks seat—and in front of his grandchildren, talking about the extermination of Aerys Targaryen like he was some noble king that was just slaughtered by the big bad kingslayer, and NOT the murderous fucken mad Targ king, whom crimes’ you just recently apologized to Jon for, and called him evil to conveniently set yourself apart from him—or did you just forget all that, Dany? Hmmm? IMAGINE the big hairy pair you have to have to actually sit in between the Starks in their own home and utterly disrespect them like that—all while claiming to be in love with one of them? Wow. Just wow. And no, I’m not even sorry for that amazingly clunky run-on sentence, either.

I see that Jaime still has no interest in setting the record straight on why he killed Aerys Targaryen. It appears only Brienne will truly ever know about the millions of people he saved that day in doing so. Jaime stands his ground, though, and gives up Cersei’s plans. Tyrion tries to stand up for him, but Dany cuts him off at the knees (no pun intended), embarrassing him in front of everyone, as per ush.

For a moment her and Sansa have common ground. Sansa doesn’t trust Jaime either because of the wrongs he committed against her family. Jamie won’t apologize for any of it— their houses were at war. But Brienne vouches for him—my courageous, yet shy bb (God, I love her), and Sansa relents, her mind changed when Brienne says she’d fight beside him. Sansa trusts Brienne with her life, therefore Brienne trusting Jaime with hers is good enough for the Lady of Winterfell.

Dany is clearly not pleased with this turn of events. She turns to Jon, addressing him as Warden of the North and asks him what he thinks — assuming he will take her side, but—

He does not.

Dany finally relents as well, grounding out a “very well” between clenched teeth, as Tyrion breathes a sigh of relief that his big bro will not be extra crispy or original recipe’d today. GreyWorm returns Jaime’s sword—rather forcefully, knowing his queen is displeased—as Jaime thanks Dany for her uncharacteristic mercy.

Scene Highlights:

Bran blurting out “the things we do for love” and leaving Jaime shooketh

Sansa immediately standing up and leaving without waiting to be dismissed by the queen, and Jon ducking his head to avoid eye contact and then dipping as soon as Dany turns to face him.

Which takes us into the corridors of Winterfell and Dany resorting to her favorite pastime when she’s angry about things not going her way: berating her Hand in front of everyone. Luckily for Tyrion it’s just Jorah and Varys to witness it this time. Once again she accuses him of treason, and Tyrion is pretty sure that his time as Hand in her service is fast dwindling.

We jump to the forge where Arya stands back admiring Gendry work his magic—a callback to their time at Harrenhall in their younger years. They have a little flirty weaponry banter, and Arya wants to know what the AotD are like. She utters the iconic ‘many faces of death’ lines from the trailer while she impresses Gendry with some dead ass accurate blade throwing. He’ll be getting right on making her that weapon, by the way—and probably walking a little funny while he does it. 😉

Jaime seeks out Bran in the Godswood. He apologizes for what he did and tells Bran he’s not that person anymore. “You still would be if you hadn’t pushed me out that window, and I’d still be Brandon Stark.” Wow. Jaime wants to know why Bran didn’t tell them what he did, and Bran basically tells him it’s because they need him. When Jaime inquires “what about afterwards?” Bran drops an ominous “how do you know there will be an afterwards?”

We jump back to the Winterfell courtyard, where the Lannister brothers are catching up and commiserating about being in Winterfell again. Dany is different, Tyrion tells Jaime, and Jaime doesn’t seem so convinced. Tyrion wants to know if Cersei lied about the baby, and Jaime tells him that was true (as far as he/we know, people). But what I REALLY love about their conversation is this part:

J: She’s always been good at using the truth to tell lies. Don’t be too hard on yourself. She’s fooled me more than anybody.

T: She never fooled you. You always knew exactly what she was, and you loved her anyway.

The funny, or actually ironic thing about this conversation is they’re talking about Cersei, but if you flip the dialogue between the Lannister brothers here, the same could be said for Dany—especially the bolded part. Think back to the things Tyrion said to Jorah when he kidnapped him back in season 5 — he was confused by Jorah’s blind loyalty, too. How the mighty have fallen, Tyrion.

They move their conversation up to the battlements, where Tyrion finds the silver lining that at least he won’t die at Cersei’s hands, and perhaps once he’s torn apart by the dead, he’ll march to Kings Landing and rip her apart too. But he’s talking to himself, because Jaime is too busy watching Brienne supervising the training of her ranks just outside the gates.

And my Braime heart is siiiiiiiinging!!!

He joins her below, and she calls him out for acting weird and not insulting her as per ush. lol It’s really just an adorable little love spat — complete with awkwardness and frustration and plenty of UST. And as the music lulls romantically, he basically admits that she’s the reason he’s here and even though he’s no longer the fighter that he used to be, he‘d be honored to serve under her command if she’ll have him—which is basically fucken a straight up declaration of love, okay? He literally just said—complete with puppy dog eyes—“I love you.” CHANGE MY MIND!!

Brienne is taken aback by this declaration of love and is at loss for words — and so she ducks out, leaving him to watch after her forlornly. And my Braime heart is still siiiiiiiinging!!!!

We head back inside of Winterfell, Dany is alone in her chambers — and they aren’t the Lord’s Chambers, that’s for damn sure. She’s not having a very good day, and her expression here certainly reflects that. Jorah enters, asking her forgiveness, reminding her that forgiveness is important. This leads into a conversation where he basically asks her to take it easy on Tyrion and give him another chance.

While book!Jorah might be a creep, I truly adore show!Jorah, who laments that when he found out Dany gave Tyrion this position, it broke his heart, but he still believes that Tyrion was the right choice; he’s smart, he owns his mistakes and he learns from them.

What I find odd is Dany’s reply: “You’re advising me to forgive the man who stole your position?”

Wait... what? When did Tyrion do that? I recall Dany proudly pinning that golden hand pin on a very humbled Tyrion in the season 6 finale—not some rabid dwarf attacking an unsuspecting Jorah and wrestling the position from his gnarled greyscaled hands—and what-the-ever-living-fuck kind of crazy ass dialogue are they giving this girl?

Jorah has one other suggestion for her, if she’ll allow him such liberties. Annnnnd now the Sansa/Dany scene makes so much more sense. Dany didn’t seek Sansa out of her own accord to try and bridge the icy gap between them because she’s just so humble and wonderful and loving and good!!!! !!!! !!!! It was actually Ser Jorah’s idea.

So Dany takes him up on his suggestion and seeks Sansa out, finding her in the library with Lord Royce. But ahhhh this scene is just so fucken good, so let’s unpack it, shall we?

Dany enters and asks that they speak in private, and Sansa cedes to her wishes, dismissing Lord Royce.

D - I thought you and I were on the verge of agreement before... about Ser Jaime.

S - Brienne has been loyal to me always. I trust her more than anyone.

D - I wish I could have that kind of faith in my advisers.

Here she takes a low blow at Tyrion again, but Sansa defends him.

S - Tyrion is a good man. He was never anything but decent towards me.

D - I didn’t ask him to be my hand simply because he was good. I asked him to be my hand because he was good and intelligent and ruthless when he had to be. (See, I told y’all Tyrion didn’t steal the position... and yes, I’m being petty lol). Dany steps closer into Sansa’s space as she continues. He never should have trusted Cersei.

S - You never should have either.

Sansa drops a truth bomb, insinuating (rightly) that Dany shares the blame here, and Dany doesn’t like this at all. She swallows, containing her anger and paints on a fake smile in her irritation at Sansa’s words.

D - I thought he knew his sister.

S - Families are complicated.

Dany smiles at that and pulls up a seat, indicating for Sansa to do the same.

D - Ours certainly have been.

S - A sad thing to have in common.

D - We have other things in common. We’ve both known what it means to lead people who aren’t inclined to accept a woman’s rule. And we’ve both done a damn good job of it, from what I can tell...

Sansa smiles briefly at this. Clearly, Dany is using the compliment strategy again, but not so shallowly this time. Even if she truly believes this, the commonality of them both being women ruling is where this similarity ends. We’ve seen how differently they run things via season 7’s blatant comparison of ‘the three queens’. Sansa stores food, Cersei steals it, and Dany burns it (and yes, I’m going to keep bringing this up). But honestly, who could forget?

vs.

D - (cont.) ...and yet I can’t help feeling like we’re at odds with each other. Why is that?

Sansa takes a deep breath but doesn’t reply.

D - Your brother?

Yeah y’all, they really did that. But again I say, no love triangle brewing here, folks.

S - He loves you, you know that? *(I’ll address this in a minute)

D - That bothers you?

S - Men do stupid things for women. They’re easily manipulated.

D - All my life I’ve known one goal. The iron throne. Taking it back from the people that destroyed my family, and almost destroyed yours. My war was against them until I met Jon. Now I’m here, half a world away, fighting Jon’s war alongside him. Tell me, who manipulated whom?

Y’all are you serious?!?!? This entire fucken monologue is like literally POLITICAL!JON — I mean, it’s like D&D are literally fucken trolling this relationship so hard. Nothing like hiding some shit right out in plain sight for all the world to not see it. *And if you think for one minute that Sansa is not playing the game here, and that she actually did a complete 180, then I don’t know what to tell you other than, just wait and see.

There was a reason that they cut that office scene between her and Jon in the last episode, and after mulling it over with a few of my comrades, I think that it’s possible that Jon came clean and brought Sansa in on it. They have been a unit since they reunited, and a major part of Sansa’s hostility in the last episode was because she felt Dany was encroaching upon that, and she was losing Jon. Romantic or platonic, no one can deny the dynamic is there between Jon and Sansa. I happen to think it’s romantic, and I will die on this hill—but political!jon and jonsa aren’t mutually exclusive!!! !!! Okay, back to our dialogue.

S - (releases a small laugh and looks down—and I can’t help hearing Catelyn’s voice in my head: ‘you always look at your feet when you lie’) I should have thanked you the moment you arrived. That was a mistake.

D- (reaching down and placing her hand atop of Sansa’s). I’m here because I love your brother, and I trust him. And I know he’s true to his word. He’s only the second man in my life I can say that about.

S - Who was the first?

D- Someone taller.

They both giggle. I assume the other man she’s talking about is Drogo. In any event, I feel Dany is being truly sincere here. This is why people (her stans and the GA both) have a hard time seeing the darkness in her—because one minute she’s sitting narrow-eyed at a table, fighting off a tantrum while she drones on about her father—the fucken mad king—and how her and her brother fantasized about what they would do to the man that murdered him (one can only assume she wasn’t implying knitting him a sweater and mittens), and the next minute she’s all gentle heart and eyes and soft tones about loving and trusting Jon, and giggling with his sister about her ex being much taller than him. I get it. I really do.

But here’s the thing about political!jon that the antis and the jonerii always get wrong—at least the version I subscribe to (and yes, there are several variations of it because we aren’t a hive-mind like we’re always accused of being): Jon has every intention of fulfilling his pledge to Dany and whatever that entails—which is why he keeps trying to convince everyone that she’ll be a good queen (including himself). But he doesn’t love her. He simply used the feelings that he recognized that she had for him, to manipulate her to his cause. This doesn’t mean that he’ll throw her out of winterfell and bone his sister when it’s all said and done—because no, Jon isn’t a creep, but he is actually rather cunning when he deems it necessary.

However, he won’t have to keep up the charade, or boot her ass out of the north, or any of the other things the jonerii accuse us of ‘fantasizing’ about, because Dany is going to go dark, and everyone will see her for what she truly is. So, let’s return to our dialogue so I can get tf off of this scene! lol

~ S - And what happens afterwards? We defeat the dead, you destroy Cersei, what happens then?

D - I take the iron throne.

S - What about the North? (Sansa’s tone drops here as she becomes emotional about her home and her people, the music becomes more ominous as the softness ebbs from Dany’s face). It was taken from us, and we took it back. And we said we’d never bow to anyone else again. (Her tone gets sharper, as she asks again). What about the North?

Dany looks angry now. She’s done playing nice, as she pulls her hand back from Sansa’s. The ominous music drones on as they stare at each other, and the maester interrupts them.~Theon has arrived at Winterfell. The music swells, and Theon looks first to a very visibly emotional Sansa, then Dany, and then back to Sansa again before customarily bowing to and acknowledging his queen. Suddenly Dany gives a flying fuck about her ally and inquires about Yara. Theon explains she’s taken back the Iron Islands in her (Dany’s) name.

“But why aren’t you with her?” Dany asks, confused at his presence, while the music swells again and Theon looks again, to Sansa—and not his queen. Dany of course notices this, and turns to look at Sansa as well, as Theon directly addresses—you guessed it—Sansa, and not his queen: “I want to fight for Winterfell, Lady Sansa. If you’ll have me.”

And oh dear god, I’m so emotional rn, as Sansa’s eyes flood with tears and she runs to envelope Theon in a hug — Theon whom through his own trauma, not only helped to get her away from Ramsay and safely to Jon — but also cared enough for her and the Starks and what he did, to come back and finish making amends!!!! And you know Sansa is so proud of him!!! And I just had a conversation earlier with my bb @scullylikesscience that Theon would likely pledge to protect Bran, and that he will also likely sacrifice himself somehow to save one of the Starks, therefore completing his redemption arc, and I just can’t even rn— 😭😭

Scene Highlights:

Lord Royce leaving only when Sansa dismissed him.

Dany witnessing firsthand the devotion that Sansa and the Starks inspire in people.

Also... don’t forget

We’re back out in the courtyard, where Dadvos is serving up dinner to the Northerners with a side of confidence, and Gilly is advising a woman where to go below in the crypts. A little orphan(?) girl with burns on the side of her face asks Davos where she should go and my fucken heart is shattering again because you know he sees Princess Shireen in her!!!

And Fuck you Bryan Cogman, you’re killing me!!!

She’s not sure where to go because she knows the children are going to the crypts where they’ll be safer, but both of her brothers were soldiers and so she wants to fight too. Auntie Gilly to the rescue: she tells the girl that she’d feel much safer if she was down in the crypts protecting her and her son, and with a purpose, the girl happily accepts her bowl and heads off as Gilly smiles softly at Davos. And god dammit, Liam Cunningham played this scene so well. He literally has me tearing up here!

The horn blows for a new arrival, and Edd is here! The last of the Nights Watch are back together again — and Tormund. lol He glomps Jon, affectionately dubbing him his ‘little crow’, and they let Jon know that Last Hearth is done for and anyone else who’s still out there is pretty much part of the AotD now. They have until sunrise to finish preparing.

And the war council has commenced.~We get a little glimpse of what the NK wants, I guess??? Bran says “he wants to erase this world, and I am its memory.” —but why? And then Sam says something pretty poignant that I want @thelawyerthatwaspromised ‘s thoughts/opinion on: “That’s what death is, isn’t it? Forgetting. Being forgotten. If we forget where we’ve been and what we’ve done, we’re not men anymore, just animals.Your memories don’t come from books, your stories aren’t just stories. If I wanted to erase the world, I may not start with you.”

Pretty sure those that theorized that Sam is writing A Song of Ice and Fire were right, y’all — and with such a ‘poetic’ title, to boot.

They strategize a plan to ferret the NK out using (a volunteering) Bran as bait in the Godswood. Theon volunteers himself and the Iron Born to stay with Bran and protect him (and jfc here comes the end I predicted for Theon and I hate it so much), as Jon shares that taking out the NK will likely diminish the entire army. They cement their battle plans and Dany insists Tyrion stay in the crypts because she intends to keep him on as Hand. Tormund announces that they are all going to die, but at least they’ll die together, and Jon suggests everyone get some rest. Avoiding eye contact with Dany, he utters “your grace,” and then quickly ducks out on her ass again, leaving her looking confused and frustrated.

Scene Highlights:

Jon’s commanding presence in this meeting — even so far as to dismiss everyone, despite the fact that Dany is the queen and supposed to be the one calling the shots. Even her people look to him here for leadership, which is interesting.

Aegon Targaryen and his sister-wives.

Thank you @goodqueenalys ❤️

Alys Karstark making another appearance here, standing beside Theon—yeah, I’m becoming more and more convinced we’re getting a Sansa death fake-out at the expense of this ginger beauty.

We head back out to the courtyard where a lonely looking Missandei attempts to befriend some northern children. Unfortunately, she came with the Dragon Queen, so they want nothing to do with her. Grey Worm joins her and the two make plans to leave for Naath after Dany takes the throne — which means that one of them is probably going to die. Sigh.

Way up high on the ramparts, Sam asks Jon if he’s told Dany yet. He has not, and so Sam prods him a bit — and oh look, there’s Ghost, off to the side looking like they literally photo-shopped him into the scene. 🙄

Edd joins them, and the last of the Watchers On The Wall commiserate, and poke a little fun at Sam. I’m very emotional as Edd says “last man left, burn the rest of us” (which most likely won’t be him) as they pan out to the northern scenery in the distance.

The Lannister boys are reminiscing again, this time by the hearth and are joined by Brienne and Podrick. Momma Brienne allows Pod a half cup of wine (which Tyrion overflows) and Jaime encourages her to join them (smitten fool). She does, as well as Davos and Tormund, too—who is fucken hilarious here as he tries to impress Brienne with one of his tall tales, then sloppily downs his horn of sour goats milk. It’s all rather strange. lol

There’s a brief scene of Arya and the Hound on the ramparts. She wants to know what he’s doing here—when’s the last time he fought for anyone but himself, as to which he replies: “I fought for you, didn’t I?” True enough. Beric joins them and Arya takes her leave, declaring she doesn’t intend to spend her last hours with these two miserable old shits. lol

I’m not sure where she headed off to, but Gendry finds her and presents her with her weapon. Arya wants to know what the red woman wanted with him. He tells her his blood because he’s Robert Baratheon’s bastard — which leads into Arya wanting to know how many women he’s been with. Gendry avoids the question, but Arya persists, many face gaming his ass until he relents. LOL

The number is 3, and Arya wants to be number 4. She wants to know what it’s like before she dies. And holy shit, they went there! They kiss passionately, with Arya taking the lead. She orders him to take his own bloody pants off and takes the bull for a ride—if ya know what I mean... 😉

We return to the group before the hearth in the hall. Tyrion remarks that almost all among them had fought the Starks at some point, and yet, here they all are defending them. But yeah, this story is about a Targaryen restoration.

In their battle banter, it comes up that Brienne is not a Knight—and while Tormund would happily Knight her gorgeous big-womaned ass ten times over, tradition does not allow her to be one because she’s a woman. Oh the irony that the most honorable of them all—the one who actually is a true knight, cannot be named one. Until Jaime says, “hold my beer!” (or wine, rather).

Okay guys, like honestly, this is probably my most favorite scene of the entire series. Everything about it is so beautiful and wholesome, as Jaime declares any Knight can make another Knight and bids Brienne to kneel. She looks to Pod who, with an adoring face, gives her a little nod of encouragement, then she looks to Jaime, and he does the same.

The lovely music, the proud faces of all the men who look on with awe as Brienne kneels and Jaime says the words, pressing his blade gently from one shoulder to the other and makes some fucken Westerosi history when he says proudly: “Arise Brienne of Tarth, a Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.”

Guuuuuuuys!!!! Omg!!!! I’m definitely ugly CRYING here!!!! Brienne’s eyes welling with tears, her proud smile, all these men clapping and their proud faces!!! Yeah, this is definitely 10/10 my most FAVORITE ever GoT scene!!! Just beautiful!

We jump back out to the courtyard where a very adorable and yet insanely stubborn little Lyanna Mormont is arguing with Jorah about going to the crypts. She pledged to fight for the North and she intends to, so she bids her cousin good fortune and leaves to take her place. Sadly, I think that she will not make it through the battle for Winterfell.

Sam has come to give Jorah Heartsbane. This is another very loaded and lovely scene, and my heart is pretty heavy, because I’m not very confident that Jorah will make it out of this battle alive, either. Sam tells him: “your father taught me how to be a man. Taught me how to do what’s right. This is right,” as he presents him the sword. Jorah accepts this heartfelt gesture and declares that he will wield it in his memory, to guard the realms of men.

BRYAN COGMAN!!!! I’M COMING FOR YOU FOR MAKING ME CRY ALL DAMN NIGHT!!!!

But seriously, the dynamic between Jorah and Sam has just been so beautiful. And all the antis can fuck right off with their shit-talking of this beautiful and wholesome creature that is Samwell Tarly!

We jump back to the crew before the hearth who are loathe to call it a night. Tyrion wants a song, and we are treated to Pod’s beautiful rendition of Jenny of Oldstones — and this entire montage is so beautiful, as we see how everyone is prepping for battle, spending their last hours with those they love and saying their goodbyes. The desperation in Missandei and GreyWorm’s very passionate goodbye kiss is extremely moving and makes me think this is probably their final kiss goodbye, and Jorah looks so gallant as he swings ‘round his horse, making his father proud and my heart is just swelling with love and dread and ughhhhhhhh!!!!!

At first I was a bit upset that none of the Starks were actually together here, but in my rewatch, I’ve come to understand why a little bit more. It seems as if they’ve all revisited their own life’s journey prior to coming home (in this episode). Jon, on the ramparts with Ghost and his remaining brothers of the Nights Watch. Arya, first sharing a brief moment with the Hound and Beric (brothers without banners), and then with Gendry. Sansa sharing a meal with Theon out in the courtyard in the home that holds both good and traumatic memories for both of them. He redeemed himself through her (as Jon said), and they share a bond of both surviving Ramsay and his horrors.

Bryan Cogman did NOT disappoint with this lovely episode, which has been what we will surely look back on as a bittersweet eulogy of sorts to some of the beloved characters we’ve come to know over the years. Yeah, this was beautifully done.

Ahhh, and lastly, we delve down into the crypts where Jon stands before the statue of his mother. Dany has very obviously (and understandably) grown tired of being avoided and sought him out. When he acknowledges her presence with a brief glance and a very faint smile, she cautiously moves closer and wraps her arms around him. And yep, here it is—the reveal. I honestly thought he would keep it from her as long as he possibly could, but I guess he figures they might all bite it anyway, so fuck it... (i’m kidding!! Or am i??)

Dany is taken aback by his words. She releases a shuddering breath and immediately steps away from him, denying it: that’s impossible. Jon tells her he wishes it were — and I fully believe him. Aside from the full-on identity crisis he’s been experiencing, you all know he has no interest in the Iron Throne... all this man has ever wanted was to protect his home, and the ones he loves.

Dany thinks there’s a conspiracy against her between Bran and Sam—and now Jon’s tone and demeanor have changed a bit. He takes a step towards her and insists that it’s true, calling her Dany because it’s informal and personal, and he knows now that she’s his aunt—that means she’s still his family—and I think he’s hoping that they’ll still be able to find some common ground with that.

But the fact that she’s found actual family—that she’s not really the last Targaryen alone in the world anymore—doesn’t seem to affect her as much as the fact that Jon is the last male heir of their line, and so therefore his claim for the throne overrides hers. A claim he has expressed no want or intent for, mind you. Maybe he intended to tell her no one would have to know, and he’d never contest her claim if she’d agree to leave the North independent when it’s all said and done... who knows? Certainly not Jon, because it’s clear he’s taken aback by her response here.

D - if it were true, it would make you the last male heir of House Targaryen (she grounds out those bolded words through clenched teeth and Kit’s micro expressions are on point—jfc, Watch his eyes!!). You’d have a claim to the iron throne.

And with the final utterance of Dany’s last words, the war horns sound. As if that doesn’t seem like a harbinger of Targbowl?!?!

But I will say, in my honest and most humble opinion, that his delivery here was all wrong. The way Jon lamented the story, it kind of came off as if it’s something he might have known all along... and therefore she most certainly will feel betrayed at this. Especially considering her earlier conversation with Sansa. Which, the crazy ass irony of it all is, with political!jon, he was actually already betraying her—just not about what she’ll think it was. Did I say that right? lol

They join Tyrion on the Ramparts, the dead are here. Jon looks towards Dany, nodding as if to ask if she’s ready, and she storms off ahead of him, anger evident on her face.

Ahhhhhhhhh, I’m really scared for Jon here, guys...!!! What are your thoughts?

Remember to care for yourselves and stay hydrated as we slug through this hellish week!

ty @farmgirlusa for your dialogue corrections.

#got afterthoughts #episode recap #jonsa #political!jon #dark!dany #anti jonerys #anti targaryen restoration #anti daenerys #not really but you aren't allowed to be critical of her if you're a fan and her behavior was so inappropriate this episode #so i guess it's anti #got s8 ep 2 #got s8

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apiratecalledav · 5 years

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Reasons to be Hopeful for Gendrya season 8:

“I have a son. You have a daughter. We’ll join our houses.”

They have tried to marry a Stark girl with a Baratheon twice now. Robert and Lyanna. Joffrey and Sansa. Third time’s the charm!

Robert and Lyanna are a lot like Gendry and Arya, both in looks and some of their major personality traits. And we see they have similar relationships to Ned and Jon respectively. See how much Robert and Ned’s first scene parallels Gendry and Jon’s meeting- these first serious and solemn-looking exchanges end in smiles and good natured ribbing. Jon and Arya are especially close, just like Ned and Lyanna were. Also, Lyanna’s introduction— showing off her horseback riding in front of her brothers— feels similar to Arya shooting an arrow into Bran’s target in the pilot episode. But Robert and Lyanna didn’t know each other very well, unlike Arya and Gendry who were friends and companions for a long time. Not to mention that Gendry and Arya are much better people than Robert and Lyanna. Gendry is not a drunken philanderer and Arya isn’t as thoughtless (and selfish?) as Lyanna.

Compare Arya’s first meeting with Hot Pie in season 1 to their final goodbye in season 7. In season 1, they met just after Arya lost her family. She was already devastated when Hot Pie insulted her and tried to intimidate her. Arya threatened him and it was one of the first times we see the depths of her fierceness. In season 7, Arya finds Hot Pie just after she avenged her family. She’s already feeling pretty happy(ish) when Hot Pie tells her that Jon has Winterfell, that she’s pretty and calls her his friend. It is the first time in awhile we see her heart and emotions absolutely unguarded. Hot Pie and Arya’s reunion highlights how he went from her bully to her friend, from kicking her while she was already down to giving her the best news she had heard in years when she was as happy as she ever expected to be again. So Arya and Gendry reuniting ought to show us how much their relationship has changed too; from friends to something more.

So far, very few reunion scenes have featured both characters being taken by surprise. Sansa went looking for Jon. Bran knew when he’d see his siblings. Arya probably hoped to see Hot Pie at that inn. Davos tracked down Gendry. The guards told Arya that Sansa was at Winterfell and they told Sansa that Arya was there. Arya learned from Sansa that Bran was home. Jon knows that Bran and Arya are at Winterfell. Sandor knows that Arya survived. So I think it’s very interesting that at this point, both Arya and Gendry are completely unaware that the other is still alive. I think it’s intentional so that it can be one of the few reunions where it’s a complete surprise to both of them.

Just generally speaking, they were as heavy-handed with shippiness as they could get away with in seasons 1- 3 considering the age difference.They had a hard line to walk between “planting the seeds” of a future relationship and not making Gendry look creepy and I think they handled well:

Their first meeting is a classic “meet cute,” especially among kids and/or in adventure stories, where A defends B from danger or harassment.

Gendry realized Arya was a girl pretty quickly or maybe even immediately. In the books, it’s only after their little group is on their own for awhile that he notices she goes far away to pee. I know a factor might be simplifying things because of time constraints. But I think it’s worth noting that in these situations, the love interest will often see through the disguise. It also gets bonus points because even with long hair, Arya had been frequently mistaken for a boy.

“As my lady commands” can be seen as having a similar vibe as Robb and Theon laughing hysterically after Arya throws some food at Sansa. But it definitely can be seen a flirting-- if in a “kids in the school yard” kind of way.

She ogles him blatantly while he is shirtless. Growing up with lots of brothers and their friends and swimming with them and stuff.... it’s not like male anatomy is a mystery to her. It’s basically a big flashing sign telling the audience that Arya does not see Gendry as some kind of big brother replacement.

When they leave Harrenhal, it’s clear that Gendry doesn’t think it’s safe to do so. But Arya goes and he follows rather quickly. Either he really trusts her judgement or he’s willing to die with her.

We often see them exchanging meaningful looks and/or practically reading each other’s minds. When they hear that lady talk about how they’re all slowly being tortured and killed in Harrenhal. When the Mountain picks Gendry to be rat food. How Gendry checks with her before he tells Thoros the blacksmith he used to train with. When they say goodbye to Hot Pie and he gives them that misshapen wolf bread. Or when Arya tries to stab the Hound, Gendry stops her when the rest of the Brotherhood is still dumbstruck. I almost always only see that kind of non-verbal communication in characters that are siblings (twins more specifically) or a couple.

They get a pretty long one-on-one farewell. This show is not big on goodbye scenes. Most are off screen and if not, tend to be rather brief and the characters have to have a stiff upper lip because there are other people around or because they can’t/won’t open up. But the scene where Gendry tells Arya that he wants to stay with the Brotherhood is very emotional and both of them get a bit teary-eyed. It’s not their literal goodbye scene, but it figuratively is. The audience learns that they will soon be parting ways and it is the last time they really speak to each other on screen. Obviously, since their actual separation would be caused by Mel dragging him away, they wouldn’t get an actual, proper goodbye. I think the writers really wanted to show the audience that these two care about each other a lot and would miss each other terribly.

The only other goodbyes I can think of that matches the intensity, music, and dialogue of this scene are Dany saying goodbye to Jorah and Bran saying goodbye to Rickon and Osha. Jorah declares his love and Dany cries tells him that he has to get better because she needs him. And those two were one of the longest running relationships on the show and a popular BroTP/OTP for six seasons. Bran and Rickon, of course, were the last Stark siblings to separate and Osha had been Bran’s last proper guardian figure.

And of course there’s “You wouldn’t be my family. You’d be m’lady.” Yes, this is mainly Gendry highlighting the differences in their stations. But... I do think the use of “m’lady” was deliberate as hell. “M’lady” is loaded with romantic connotations and has long been associated with dashing knights in love with noble maidens fair. Even today, there’s a stereotype of cringe-y guys trying too hard to get girls to swoon by calling them “m’lady.” Heck, even Joffrey trying to woo Sansa made a big deal about calling her “my lady” every time he spoke to her or about her. Not to mention, seeing as Arya was Robb’s sister, wouldn’t it have been more likely she’d have to be referred to as “Princess”? So you can accuse me of shipper goggles, but I don’t think it was a coincidence that a sentence that’s supposed to mean “I won’t be part of your family because I’m a dirty peasant” could also easily be interpreted as “I won’t be like a brother to you, you’ll be my wife.”

Also, we already know that Arya does not have sisterly feelings towards Gendry. So her offering to be his family is especially selfless and sweet. Hey, while I’m being trash, I’d like to point out that family can mean brother and sister and it can also refer to a married couple. Maybe this is foreshadowing that Arya is the one to propose. Heh.

Finally, Arya is not going to be happy staying in Winterfell for the rest of her life. We learn in season 6 that Arya wants to travel the world and see what’s west of Westeros. In season 7, we see that Nymeria has formed her own pack and is forging her own, unconventional path. Clearly, Arya is heading to a similar lifestyle. She is not a lone wolf, however, and she’s going to want someone to go with her. Jon, Sansa, and Bran couldn’t accompany her even if they wanted to. Hot Pie is happy where he is. Sandor is probably going to be 100% done with road trips. If Brienne isn’t too busy with Jaime (let me have my delusions dreams), she’ll probably feel more obligated to stay with Sansa. That pretty much leaves Gendry. And if you recall how quickly he dropped everything to go off with Davos, he has no reason to hang around, either

Bonus shipper trash reason-- the story technically kinda starts with Lyanna dumping Robert and eloping with Ragdoll Tergiversation so it’s only fitting that it ends with Lyanna’s niece eloping with Robert’s son. :)

#arya stark #gendry #gendrya #arya x gendry #game of thrones #i have been waiting since 8th grade vocab class to use tergiversation in a sentence hahaha

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damn-stark · 5 years

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Lost Dragon Ch.20

A/N- I try to add as much extra content for the character so that’s why I can’t finish the whole episodes in one chapter.

Episode- 8x01, 8x02

Warning- none

Pairing- Podrick Payne.

I felt the heat of forges as I walked closer to them. The heat radiating from them felt great against my skin after being out in the cold. I stepped down and saw men at work their faces all covered in grime from working hard to get as much dragon glass weapons as they could before the big battle. I looked around from on top of the steps to try and find Gendry in between the crowd of men. It took me a minute to find him but I found in a corner working hard on weapons. Gendry looks up at me when he notices me standing across from him and he stops what he’s doing.

“I finished it.” He says as goes back and gets my spear that I asked him to make for me. He tosses it to me and I catch and twirl it around in my hands. It has two blades on each end of it and it feels light as I twirl it around in my hands.

“Thank you Gendry, it’s amazing.” I brush my fingers on the blades. He smiles.

“I still wonder why you need a spear when you have to two Valeryian steel daggers.” He said confused as he crossed his arms across his chest.

“They’re short weapons. I need a long one, I have my sword but that’s useless in this battle. And it’s also very helpful to have more then just daggers.” He nods. “So on how many weapons are you skilled at? Because it seems like you’re skilled in a lot of them.”

“I’m good with daggers, swords and Spears.”

“How about a hammer?” He asks as if almost taunting me or trying to prove something. I knew he peferred to train with a hammer then a sword. When we were on the boat on our way here I helped him train. And if I do have to admit he was quite good with it but still needed help with some moves.

“Nope I’m not skilled with a hammer but I can still knock you on your ass.” I say with a smirk he chuckles in response.

“Gendry! He’s here.” A man yelled.

“We’ll talk later.” I tell him as I leave letting him deal with The hound who was probably here to pick up a weapon.

“Alright I’ll see ya.”

With Podrick being bust elsewhere and no meetings taking place I didn’t have much to do. I didn’t really like to spend much time alone in the courtyard. I didn’t really enjoy the looks I would get every time someone passed by me.

I walk across the courtyard and go walk up to my chambers that I was assigned to. While on my way there I run into Daenerys and Jorah walking out from what seemed to be a library. Daenerys tells Jorah something that I didn’t hear but he as I walk up to them he leaves and bows his head when he passes by me.

“Meeting?” I ask her.

“Not quite I was in the library talking to the man who saved Jorahs life.” She responded as started walking.

“How did that go?” I ask as I notice that she doesn’t like that happy.

“Not well.... he’s a Tarly, he was son to Randyll Tarly.” I sighed and my shoulders tensed up. What she had done to his family was horrible and even if it was something she had to. I still couldn’t help but feel guilty. I should of tried to do more. They didn’t both have to die. Especially not the way they died. I didn’t say much about it. Because their wasn’t anything else to say about the matter. Just another person that hated us now.

We walked in silence not really finding any words to say after that. The silence cut short when Missandei joined us. We went into Daenerys chambers to continue talking.

“The people here don’t really like us.” I say as I get a cup of wine from the table.

“I’ve also noticed that. When Greyworm and I were riding on the horses on our way here we got all sorts of looks and none of them were kind.” Missandei said as she sat on a chair by the table that was close to the fire.

“Yeah I also received looks when we were on our way and also when I was down in the courtyard and out front.” I said joining her by the table.

“It’s going to take them a while to get used to all of us. But we cant hide and avoid them we have to try and get their respect. All of us.” Daenerys told us turning her attention from the flames to us.

“You’re right.” I say as I take a drink of my wine. We stay a quiet for a moment until Daenerys breaks.

“So Visenya you and that man that you were with today who is he?” Daenerys asked with her eyebrow raised and a smile growing on her lips. I just smiled and looked down at my wine.

“What about him?”

“You both seemed close.”

“Yeah I like him.” I say as as tuck a strand of hair behind my ear and feel a blush creep onto my cheeks.

“That’s good does he like you?” She asked curiously.

“He does..... but if I got to admit I’m scared.” I said the smile fading away.

“Of what?” Missandei asked this time.

“Of doing else with him.... of getting to attached.... we know what’s coming and if anything were to happen It would hurt me more.” I say with a shaky voice. I feel as tears threaten to fall. It’s been such little time and I already cared a lot for him. I don’t want to lose him too.

“Maybe you’re right not to get to close but if you don’t then you’ll regret it later.” Daenerys told me.

“Yes it is like you said to me once, take advantage of it because we might not have tomorrow.” Missandei said. I couldn’t help but smile. She rembered what I had told her in Meereen. Maybe they were both right. Maybe it is my turn my selfish and take advantage of what I have now.

“When I was a child my brother would tell me a bedtime story about the man who murdered our father, who stabbed him in the back and cut his throat who sat down on the iron throne and watched as his blood poured onto the floor, and how you sat their upon the iron throne watching as my brothers family, my nieces family got slaughtered. He told me other stories as well, about all the things we would do to that man once we took back the seven kingdoms and had him in our grasp. Your sister pledged to send her army north.” Daenerys told the man. The one and only Kingslayer. Jaime Lannister. I’ve seen him before at the wedding and at the trail by combat. I disliked this man but not as much as Daenerys did. It was said that he respected my father yet if he did then he would’ve of tried to do something to save my father’s family that was slaughtered at the orders of his father.

“ she did.” Jaime responded.

“I don’t see an army, I see one man with one hand it appears your sister lied to me.” Daenerys told him with venom lacing through her voice.

“She lied to me as well, she never had any intention of sending her army north she has Euron Greyjoy’s fleet and 20,000 fresh troops, the Golden company from Essos bought and paid for. Even if we defeat dead she’ll have enough to destroy the survivors.” He spoke. I sent Tyrion a glare. I was right we should have never trusted Cersei and her promise. I told him but he didn’t choose to listen.

“We?” Daenerys questioned him.

“I promised to fight for the living I intend to keep that promise.” He answered back.

“Your grace I know my brother.”

“Like you knew your sister?” Daenerys inturrpted Tyrion while she also sent him a glare.

“He came here alone knowing full well how he’d be recieved why would he do that if he weren’t telling the truth.” Tyrion tried to reason with Daenerys. He loved his brother and I get that he doesn’t want him to get killed but why should we trust him.

“He trust his little brother to defend him right to the moment he skits mine and my nieces throat.” Daenerys spat.

“She’s right right why should we trust a man who killed a king who he promised to protect.” I said. His eyes shifted to look at me.

“I respected your father and I looked up to him that’s—“

“Yeah I’ve heard that, you say you respect him yet you let his family. My family. Get slaughtered like they were just wild animals.” I said with anger. Before he had the chance to say anything Sansa spoke.

“You’re both right, we can’t trust him. He attacked my father in the streets he tried to destroy my house and my family same as he did yours.” Sansa said.

“At the time I didn’t know that my father had given the orders to kill your family Princess because If I did I would’ve tried to stop it. And Lady Stark if you want me to apologize for what I did then I won’t. We were at war everything I did, I did for my house and my family I’d do it all again.” Jaime defended himself his eyes shifting from me to Sansa.

“The things we do for love.” Bran spoke up gaining the attention from all of us.

“So why have you abandoned your family now?” I asked as I turned my attention back to the accused.

“Because this goes beyond loyality, this is about survival.”

In some ways it’s true what he said. What we’re going to fight is about survival. We need to fight them or else theyll take over and kill us all. It was still hard to trust him. Even if the Lady Knight vouched for him and Sansa approved let him live because of it, it was still going to be hard to completely trust him.

Once the trial was over I stayed behind and followed Daenerys out. She wasn’t happy at all on how things turned out and she definitely not happy on the news that Cersei lied.

“Visenya was right we should have never trusted Cersei. Either you knew she was lying and let me believe otherwise, or you didn’t know at all which makes you either a traitor or a fool.” Daenerys told Tyrion the Anger clearly heard in her voice.

“I was a fool.” Tyrion responded.

“Not for the first time.” Daenerys spat. “Cersei still sits on the throne if you can’t help me take it back. I’ll find another hand who can.”Daenerys told him before she stormed off.

“I suspect one of you will be wearing this before this is all over.” Tyrion said. I just glared at him and didn’t say a word as I walked passed by him.

I was right that day at the Dragonpit. We should have never trusted Cersei Lannister. The only Lannister I trusted was Tyrion and after this I’m finding it hard to trust him. I was not as mad as Daenerys but I was mad. I was just mad that he didn’t listen.

I walked out and tried to clear my head. I just let my feet take me anywhere just to clear my head.

I made it out the courtyard and out to where people were working and training for the big battle. I let my eyes wonder around to try and search for Podrick. And it seemed that he had noticed me first. As I walked over to him, he got pushed down by the guy he was training with. I couldn’t help but smile after he got pushed down because he was distracted.

After the talk last night with Missandei and Daenerys I wasn’t hesitant or scared no more. I wanted to get close to him. Because we might not have tomorrow.

#game of thrones #game of thrones imagines #daenerys targaryen #jaime lannister #gendry waters #brienne of tarth #sansa #tyrion lannister #the hound #missandei #podrick payne

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tried-and-tested · 5 years

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I love how GOT ended!

I just love the way that Tyrion visits Jaime in the tent when he’s captured, and Jaime tells him that he came to help in some way, maybe try and talk Cersei into surrendering so no one has to die unnecessarily. The Unsullied didn’t believe him when he was caught trying to sneak into King’s Landing, so they capture him and keep him tied up. Tyrion believe’s his brother’s motives and lets him go, telling him that he should try and get to Cersei and talk her down, but if he can’t, then he should make his way to the bells to signal the city’s surrender. Tyrion knows this is going against Daenerys, but he knows that if Jaime can succeed then it’ll save thousands of lives. It’ll be considered treason, but he’s okay with that knowing he did the best thing for everyone. Jaime gets to Cersei in the Red Keep, but she’s so concerned with keeping the throne that she won’t listen to him. She trusts him, so there are no guards around when he decides that she can’t continue to rule. It’s hard, but he kills her there in the Red Keep, knowing that this will save the innocent people of the city. He killed the king once before to save them all from burning, he’d certainly do it again. He leaves and tells the guards that Queen Cersei has ordered a surrender, and the bells should be rung. A young guard runs off with this instruction. The Mountain, wanting to check on the queen, enters the room and finds her lifeless body. In a furious rage, he drags Jaime into the room and kills him, right beside his twin sister. In the distance, the bells begin ringing.

Daenerys hears the bells from atop Drogon’s back. Knowing that there are thousands and thousands of innocent people in the city, Daenerys flies Drogon straight to the Red Keep and blasts it with dragon fire, targeting the tower Tyrion has told her would be where Cersei looks out upon the battle. The tower falls, crashing onto the beach, and the citizens of King’s Landing run scared away from the castle. Daenerys lands Dragon on top of the Red Keep, and he roars, victorious over the city. The Mountain falls with the tower, burning in dragon fire in a feat of poetic justice.

Sandor and Arya hear from some Northern troops that Cersei’s tower has fallen, so the head to the beach to search the rubble. Arya finds Jaime and Cersei’s bodies together, and Sandor finds a body that is burnt but, judging from its size, is unmistakably his brother Gregor. They talk, as they often have in the past, and realize that they will both have to live the rest of their lives without the vengeance they had hoped for, but they will just have to learn to cope and find comfort in knowing that their enemies got what they deserved in the end.

Jon Snow and the forces on the ground begin making their way to the Red Keep after the Golden Company has surrendered, all of their weapons scattered across the streets of King’s Landing. The Queen’s Guard stand down, knowing their queen has been killed and not wanting to provoke the dragon’s wrath. They accept that their city has fallen and they will now have a new Queen. Drogon drops Daenerys off and she enters the Red Keep with the Unsullied and Dothraki at her side, followed by Jon and the northern fighters. Tyrion joins them as Daenerys is giving a victory speech about how glorious the victory is and how they will take their message of freedom to the rest of the world, not just Westeros.

Tyrion and Jon, knowing this means the people of Westeros will be neglected and unprotected, share a glance. They know that something has to be done. Later, after Daenerys has sat on the throne and been coronated, Jon approaches her and speaks his concerns. She takes this conversation seriously, but not because she agrees with him. It’s because she knows that if Jon goes public with his concerns, people will agree with him. He also has a better claim to the throne than she does. Not for any logical reason, just because he’s a man! Sansa will surely make it known that Jon is her brother Rhaegar’s son, making him the rightful air. She stews on this, and asks Jon to meet her late that night.

Tyrion is being held, awaiting trial by the queen. His treason of letting Jaime free has not been forgotten, and will be punished.

Jon shares with Arya that Daenerys wants to meet with him in private. She tells Jon that it’s a bad idea, but having inherited Ned Stark’s sense of morality, he knew that he had to so he could make her see his point of view. So he meets with Daenerys late at night, on the beach. They chat for a bit, her telling him that she knows no one will accept her as queen once they know that he is a Targaryen. He promises to keep it to himself, but she knows he has broken this promise once already. She also knows that Tyrion and Jon’s Stark kin know the truth, so she calls Drogon to her and she burns Jon on the beach.

Arya, ever suspicious, as been watching this whole exchange from the shadows. She knows that she’ll never reach Daenerys with Drogon right there, so she runs to plot her next move. There are lots of fallen King’s Guard soldiers still unburied after the attack on the city...

The next day, while in the throne room, Daenerys is hearing from her forces about issues they are having in the city. At the end of the meeting, she asks to be left alone. Everyone exits, but one Queen’s Guard soldier remains. Daenerys repeats herself, demanding to be left alone. The guard speaks, talking of family and revenge, and of mad kings past. She grows suspicious, and calls for another guard. They’re far away, and the guard in the room peels off his face to reveal Arya Stark. She quickly makes a break for the queen, slashing her throat quickly and cleanly. Other guards arrive in the room, seeing Arya with the bloody Cat’s Paw dagger and the queen’s dead body at her feet. They arrest her and hold her for trial. But, trial by whom?

Drogon senses that something has happened to his mother. He flies to the Red Keep and cannot find her. He eventually breaks into the throne room in search of her, and finds her in a casket in front of the Iron Throne. In anger and sadness, he sets the room on fire, melting the Iron Throne into a molten puddle. He then takes her body and flies off, far from this terrible place that cost him his mother and brothers.

Grey Worm calls for all the leaders of the remaining great houses of Westeros to come to King’s Landing for a meeting. He’s the leader of the Unsullied, but has no ability or desire to lead a country. He brings Tyrion to the meeting, asking this gathering of the Lords and Ladies to decide his fate. They’re unsure of what to do, as none of them are king or queen. Grey Worm tells them to choose a new king or queen, and Tyrion gives a speech about how important it is to choose a ruler who is fair and honest. One who has suffered and knows how to protect the people because they have seen some of the worst that humanity has to offer. Someone with a good story.

Who has the best story? A girl who was born in the north and raised as a Lady. She was betrothed to a mad prince, and subjected to torment both from him and his mother. Their betrothal was broken when her father was accused of treason and beheaded in front of her. The girl’s mother and brother are killed while attempting to rescue her from her captivity in the nation’s capital city. She was then married off to a dwarf against her will, while still being subjected to the torment of the once-mad-prince who is now king. When the king was killed at his own wedding, she and her husband are suspected of his murder. She is taken from the city by a man who loved her mother and now lusts after her. She is then taken to her aunt, one of her last remaining family members, who has gone crazy out of paranoia. Her aunt tries to kill her, and she is saved by this man again who loved her mother. Then she is married off to another man who has taken control of her childhood home, and subjected to countless atrocities. She eventually runs away and finds safety with her half-brother in the Knight’s Watch, and receives additional protection from a noble Lady-turned-Knight. Together with her half-brother, the girl gathers northern forces to take back their childhood home from her previous captors, bringing forces from her aunt’s home which is now run by the man who saved her and lusts for her. They retake the north, and vow to never bend the knee to an outsider again. She becomes key in taking down anyone who would tear her family apart again, and helps bring forces together to defeat the Night King. She always has the best interest of her people at heart. Now, she sits at a meeting of the most powerful people in the country as one of them. Sansa is chosen as the rightful queen of Westeros.

Who better to serve as Hand of the Queen than her brother, Bran, who can offer insights to the past to prevent the same problems from arising in the future? She asks for his help, not to make decisions for her but to offer up objective facts on what has happened in the past. She finds these insights valuable, and decides to accept the appointment of queen.

Her one condition of becoming queen, is that the capital city be moved further north. She knows the houses and people of the north will accept her as queen, but she cannot leave the north. If the capital city were moved to be closer to her people, she could rule over all of them fairly. The north wouldn’t be so isolated from the rest of the seven kingdoms. Everyone agrees, especially since so much of King’s Landing was destroyed already. This keeps the seven kingdoms together, rather than awkwardly making one independent of the others while the other six remain together.

Tyrion is pardoned for his treason. Grey Worm, the Unsullied, and the Dothraki are not happy with this decision because he betrayed Daenerys, but they are not the queen. They reluctantly accept this fate, but refuse to give up Arya without a fight. Grey Worm demands that Arya either be killed or exiled, and Sansa agrees to allow her sister to be exiled. Arya has thrived in other lands before, such as Braavos, and Sansa knows that her sister would never be content to join the Knight’s Watch and be stuck at Castle Black. Is there even a need for the Knight’s Watch anymore? With the Night King and White Walkers dead, it seems unlikely.

Grey Worm and the Unsullied set said for Naath. The Dothraki return to their home land.

Sansa beaks the news to Arya herself, and Arya is happy with this outcome. She wants to travel and explore, find out what is west of Westeros.

Queen Sansa returns to Winterfell while she awaits the construction of a new capital city closer to her home. Arya sets sail for whatever is West of Westeros. Bran takes his seat at the small council as Hand of the King, along with Tyrion Lannister as Master of Coin, Lady Yara Greyjoy as Master of Ships, Ser Brienne of Tarth as Lord (Lady?) Commander of the Queen’s Guard, Ser Davos Seaworth as the Master of War, and Samwell Tarley as Gran Maester.

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themindmates-blog · 5 years

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Chapter 14 - Wargs, dragons and dark magic

"I can't believe I'm actually doing this."

At Osha's mumbled complaint, Ylina let out a laugh. As she laid back on the bathtub placed in the middle of her room, she rubbed both hands over her big stomach and closed her eyes, enjoying Osha's fingers treading through her hair as she washed the lady's vibrant red hair.

"I have never asked of you to wash my hair." The younger girl was quick to notice. "You were the one who offered your services."

"And you said yes." Osha countered, as Ylina shrugged, opening her eyes so that she could look up at the woman who was sat by her head.

"As much my friend as you are, you are still my maid."

"You are lucky I like you, pretty lady, because if I didn't, I would've killed you a long time ago."

"Good thing you didn't. If you had, I would have never gotten to experience such a great head massage. You are even better at it than Prya. And she has been doing my hair for years now."

"Yeah, well, don't get used to it, because I won't be doing it again."

"Is washing my hair such a boring task?" Ylina chuckled as Osha poured some hot water down her head gently. "You can leave me to it if you'd like."

"It's fine." Osha shook her head. "I'm almost done anyway. And I have something else to discuss with you."

At that, the girl sighed. Sliding down slightly in the bathtub, Ylina lifted one of her legs and rested it over the cold metal of the edge of the tub.

"What is it?" She asked tracing patterns in her thighs as a way of distracting herself.

"Bran had Hodor take him outside earlier." Osha started as Ylina nodded.

"So I've heard."

"How?"

"The guards are instructed to tell me where my brothers are at all times, especially if they decide to leave the castle." Ylina shrugged. "I don't want to forbid them from leaving, but I also need to know when they do."

With a nod of her own, Osha finished washing Ylina's hair and reached for one of her towels to start drying it.

"Yeah, well… He's insisting he can get inside Summer's body." The woman said, causing Ylina to gulp down hard.

"He talks to me about it sometimes." She said. "I never know what to say back to him. What do you make of it?"

"I don't make anything, Ylina."

"Osha…" The girl groaned, putting her leg back into the water and extending a hand out for her to take it. "The only thing I can think about is warging but Bran isn't controlling Summer, so it can't be it."

"Warging is a rare thing, Ylina. Even beyond the wall." Osha said, holding Ylina's hand tight as the girl climbed out of the tub, being careful about her very big pregnant stomach. "The boy already dreams about a raven of three eyes. Don't fill his head with shit like this."

"I don't." Ylina defended, grabbing the towels from Osha as the woman stepped back for her to dry herself up. "He already has his head filled. Old nan who used to care for him and Rickon used to tell him stories like that. He remembers and he's worried he is one of them."

"Do you people believe in this?"

"Well, that is a difficult question to answer, I admit." Ylina said, turning around motioning for Osha to help her inside her dress. "Some people don't. Most people, I suppose. Wargs, dragons and dark magic… It's been so long since we've last seen them and people seem to have forgotten about it. But we have seen it all before. We have seen dragons. We have seen wargs. We have definitely seen dark magic. We haven’t, for a long time, it’s true, but why couldn't they return? What would stop them from making an appearance again?"

"You want to believe it." Osha noted, tying up the back of Ylina's dress, careful not to constrain her too much. "You want to believe in wargs, dragons and dark magic."

"I don't want to. But I might have to." She frowned, before spinning around to face Osha. "What do you believe in?"

At that, Osha sighed.

"When you grow up north of the wall, you learn that not believing in stuff is stupid."

"So you have seen it." Ylina insisted. "Wargs, dark magic and dragons."

Walking away from the girl, Osha grabbed her hairbrush and stopped by the closed doors of her chambers.

"Haven't seen a dragon, pretty lady. But I might pretty soon."

"What do you mean?" Ylina frowned.

"Look outside. There's a red falling star."

"Some say the red is the color of the Lannisters." The girl bit her lip, causing Osha to shake her head. “Some say it means Robb will win the next battle he fights.”

“They do, do they?” The wildling woman mumbled, as Ylina frowned.

“What do you say?” She asked. “I’m sure a blood red comet in the sky means something to everyone. Even beyond the wall. Especially beyond the wall.”

"Stars don't fall for people, pretty lady."

"But they do for dragons?"

"But they do for dragons." She mumbled, before opening the door and ushering Ylina's other maids inside.

As the three girls rushed to Ylina to do her hair and help her in her boots and coat, the grey eyes of the lady never once left Osha. With a small smile, the wildling woman moved to close the door.

"I will go check on Rickon, pretty lady. Call us when you are done."

***

It had been a long day and Ylina was tired. Her feet hurt, her back hurt, her head hurt… Being pregnant sucked, having to carry a baby around and still having to get up and do stuff was one of the worst things she has ever experienced, one of the most difficult ones. That was probably why men didn't do it. Ylina was sure neither Theon or Robb would have been able to do what she was doing and, picturing the two of them heavily pregnant while dealing with common people every day of their lives and whining the whole day about it was basically the only thing making her day worth living.

Of course her happiness was short-lived because as soon as the doors of her study were pushed open and there stood Maester Luwin with a paper roll in his hands, Ylina felt his heart drop.

"Do not worry, my lady. It is not from your brother."

And just like that, the girl allowed herself to breath properly again. Waving her hand, Maester Luwin took that as his signal to walk inside and close the door behind him. As soon as he did, he walked toward one of the chairs in front of Ylina and sat down, before handing her the roll.

Picking it up, Ylina frowned, when she saw the stag on the stamp. It was the Baratheon symbol, but not the one she was used to. Not the crowned stag of Robert and Joffrey. The one in the stamp in her hands now, had a stag, stoic and beautiful in front of a fire. Without asking any questions, Ylina pulled the roll open and her confusion only increased as she read the letters.

Ylina Greyjoy, Lady of Winterfell.

I, Stannis of House Baratheon, rightful heir to the Iron Throne, declare upon the honor of my house that my brother Robert left no trueborn heirs. The boy Joffrey, the boy Tommen, and the girl Myrcella being born of incest between Cersei Lannister and her brother Ser Jaime Lannister, the Kingslayer.

By right of birth and blood, I do this day lay claim to the Iron Throne of Westeros.

Let all true men declare their loyalty.

"A bastard? Joffrey Baratheon is a bastard?" Ylina asked, surprised. “And of an incest, no less?”

Extending his hand out toward the girl, Maester Luwin waited for Ylina to give him the letter. As he read it over, the girl took her time to try and make sense of everything. Joffrey Baratheon was a bastard.

"This is a serious accusation they are making, my lady. Incestous activity is frowned upon in every corner of Westeros." The Maester said. “It strips a man of all integrity and honor.”

"I wouldn't put it past the Lannisters. Everyone knows that family has no scrupulous, let alone honor." The girl said, getting up from her seat and rubbing at the small of her back for comfort. "And where were the Queen and Ser Jaime when Bran fell from the broken tower?"

"Ylina…"

"Ser Jaime didn't go out hunting with Father and the boys, did he? And Queen Cersei? Where was she?"

"I don't know, my lady."

"What if that was it? What if the blonde hair Mother found wasn't Tyrion's? But Cersei's? Or even Jaime's? What if Bran saw the two of them together and that was why he was pushed off the tower? It makes sense, doesn't it?"

"It does." Maester Luwin nodded slowly, as Ylina sighed. "But we have no concrete evidence. It is all very circunstancial, really."

"But it is possible."

"Don't hold a grudge against someone just because you want to believe something is true, my lady. It is not wise nor fair."

"Fair?" Ylina scoffed. "Bran has never fallen from anywhere during his climbings. The boy has climbed every single wall and tree we have in this castle and never once have I seen him even slip. When the royal family is here, he finally does. After years of climbing, he falls right when the King and Queen are here. Then, we learn he was pushed and that the Queen has been keeping the truth about her children a secret. It does seem rather suspicious, doesn't it?"

"Suspicious indeed, my lady. But not confirmed."

"Well, it's not like I am going to do anything about it. Stannis Baratheon did all the job, anyway. I bet he sent this letter to every lord out there in Westeros. Everyone now has learned the truth, so I don’t have much to do about it." The girl said, walking around the study to try and ease the pain in her muscles. "Robb will, though. I know he will."

"Your brother is fighting a war against a King already. If he refuses Stannis' call, he will have two strong enemies to fight."

"King Robb has an army and people loyal to him." Ylina countered, stopping in front of the window and looking out to the snow covered hills around Winterfell. "He's won every battle he's fought so far. He is a good strategist and even Tywin Lannister is said to be wary about him now. Robb was nominated King in the North by the very people he was meant to protect his whole life. I know he won't bend the knee. Not to Stannis, not to Joffrey, not even to Renly. Robb Stark is our King and he will bring home our sisters and the indepence of our Kingdom. I know he will."

"Your faith in our King is a commendable thing." Maester Luwin smiled gently as the girl simply sighed.

"I have faith in Robb. I always have and I always will. He will come home soon, I know it. And finally, we get to make him a throne and a crown and the North will know prosperity and safety as it has, for centuries."

"May the gods be good allow us this blessing." The Maester said, as Ylina nodded slightly.

"May the gods be good."

Once again, the room fell silent, but before any of them could do anything about it, the door of the study was pushed open and a guard stood there. When Ylina and Maester Luwin turned around to face him, the man bowed slightly.

"Maester. My lady." He said, continuing when Ylina gave him a nod. "There are ravens coming from all of the Kingdom. Lords and ladies demand to know if Stannis Baratheon is to be our new King."

"The lords and ladies think Robb will bend the knee?" Ylina asked, surprised.

"The lords and ladies don't know King Robb like you do, my lady.” Maester Luwin was quick to explain. “They know your father. And they know your father would have bent the knee for the rightful heir, whoever he was."

With a sigh, Ylina nodded. It was true. Ned Stark was a honorable fool, never once faltering when honor and duty were required, thinking that those two things were always of the utmost importance and that the people he was dealing with thought so too. Ylina admired him, she really did. But she knew better. She knew that, to survive, one has to lie and, most often than not, go down a path where honor and duty don't fit. She knew that the people she was playing against knew nothing about fairness and honesty. That was the Northern way of doing things, the Stark way. But it wasn’t or everyone. Most people only knew betrayal and corruption, never thinking twice before doing anything that would get them closer to their goal, never faltering when putting someone else at risk, never hesitating to think about all the danger they might putting other people in. She knew, but her father didn't. That was why she was alive and Ned Stark wasn't.

"Very well." The girl decided, looking at the guard as the man straightened his posture when his lady addressed him. "Fetch me ink and a feather. I will write to the lords and ladies myself and tell them Robb is still their King and will be until the end of his days."

With a nod, the guard left the room. Ylina moved to sit in her chair again as Maester Luwin watched her struggle with her belly. With a proud smile, he saw, for the first time, not the little girl he used to teach all those years ago. Not the little girl always eager to learn about the history of every Great House there ever was. Not the little girl who always asked the best questions and never settled for half an answer. For the first time in years, Maester Luwin saw the woman Ylina became and the one she had the potential of becoming.

#ylina stark #game of thrones #osha game of thrones #game of thrones fanfic #game of thrones imagine #game of thrones imagines #got #got fanfic #got imagines #maester luwin #Winterfell #Robb Stark #stannis baratheon #Joffrey Baratheon #bran stark #Theon Greyjoy #a tale of the lands #the remnant of the pack

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masterthespianduchovny · 5 years

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Wanna Read My Crazy Ass Sansa and Dany Theory?

I could be completely wrong about this, but I think D&D are going to subvert our expectations in regards to Dany and Sansa.

They’re leaning heavily into Dany being the Mad Queen, esp by having ppl on her council be afraid of that as well. But, wasn’t the Mad King, her grandfather, driven by paranoia and blood lust?

Comparatively, Dany is driven by grief, loss, revenge, etc. she is understandably angry and everyone keeps swearing she’s going mad for being justifiably upset. Even then, despite her rightful anger, she still listens to others (even when it’s for show). She wanted to kill Jaime, Sansa said no and Jon supported her, so she didn’t kill Jaime. She wanted to replaced Tyrion as Hand with Jorah again and he said that Tyrion should be given another chance and she gave him that. Jon told her the truth about his parentage and she saved him twice during the battle, tried to have sexy times with him, and then pled for him to tell anyone else the truth (which he did anyways).

Just about every expression of anger she has can easily be explained in the series and it’s not as if it isn’t justified. Or most of it at least.

Dany’s anger makes sense, but it is constantly framed as madness.

Now, compare that with Sansa. It’s easier to justify her with having trust issues due to her abuse and torture as well as her hostility due to wanting to protect her family. (Dany actually share more things in common with Sansa pertaining this than most are willing to admit, yet this is glossed over)

But, keep in mind that, despite Sansa asking Jon to fight Ramsey to get winterfell back, she’s STILL distrustful of him and that is even AFTER the battle is won. She never stops being paranoid or distrustful about Jon even though she she feels protective of him because he’s her brother (her paranoia is very low key). Sansa was behaving in such a way that Arya was suspicious of her motives and reminded her who she was ruling in place of.

Let’s also remember that she almost let LF convince her that Arya was a threat against her, which would’ve set into motion killing Arya. Some think it was a set up between Arya and Sansa to fool LF, BUT because Bran gave her the 411, sansa realized she was being played and had LF killed instead. And some of these scenes couldn’t have been done to put in a show for LF. Sansa seriously was paranoid about Arya being a threat to her.

When Dany and Sansa first meet, who’s being hostile? Sansa. We can argue all day that Sansa doesn’t have to bow down or like Dany, but that was never Dany’s issue. Dany knew what disrespect was like when she saw it because she’s used to men disrespecting her. The same men who disrespected her, almost always tried to undermine her power.

For Sansa to be a skilled player, openly showing that she doesn’t like Dany isn’t signs of being a player. Or at least a good one. But, if she’s playing the game, her open hostility towards Dany is a sign of her madness. You never let your target know you have it out for them.

We mention how Sansa learned from the best of the best: Cersei, LF, Olenna, Margaery, etc, right? What do all of them have in common?

They smiled and played nice and didn’t show their hands until they had to.

“But, three of them died and Sansa’s still alive; she outsmarted them all.”

No. She did not.

Sansa got saved by the Hound due the battle with wild fire—he saved her on his own will. LF sent a man to pick up Sansa when Joffrey got poisoned because he knew she’d get blamed for it. In almost every situation where Sansa is saved, someone intervened and she didn’t partake in any of the planning to save her life.

But, as Cersei said, “when you play the game of thrones, you win or you die.”

Think about that: there is no middle ground. Sansa could easily be the first one to lose and not die, BUT playing that game corrupts you. She learned the game by people who were willing to do anything to get what they wanted. Cersei blew up a church, Olenna poisoned a child (sure he was evil, but still), Margaery seduced and slept with a child in addition to using sex for influence (no judgement here), and LF orchestrated the entire mess that led to her coming to KL, her parents dying, two her siblings dying, etc.

Sansa isn’t playing the game for the good of the people. She’s no longer concerned about the North, but rather the crown after she hears that Jon has a legitimate claim.

Everyone who plays the game has dirty hands, which is why whenever starks go south they lose their heads: they refuse to play the game.

So, back to Dany: Sansa is being openly petulant and snippy to Dany during the council meeting. We can argue that Dany’s response is poor, but again, we see her discuss Sansa’s behavior in private. When Jorah suggests she speaks with Sansa one on one, although Dany is upset with how things ended, she is still able to be advised and (tries to) listen(s).

Sansa’s response isn’t proof of her madness, but it’s it notable in my opinion.

In 8X03, we see her criticize/insult Dany as she hides safely in the crypts (for the time being) while Dany is out on the field. Missandei is clearly sick of Sansa’s remarks, which means this isn’t the first time sansa has gotten mouthy outside of scripted scenes. Sansa is obsessed with Dany and it’s more than about the north being independent.

Think back to 8x01, Sansa comes off as jealous when she first meets Dany. Then, she goes to Jon and her retort to Jon saying Dany is different from the Mad King is to say she’s prettier. She doesn’t ask Jon why he bent the knee or try to understand his motivations—she’s made up her mind.

With this recent episode, although the north doesn’t open Dany with open arms and they’re still reluctant to trust her, they’re warming up. But, guess whose unambiguously distrustful of Dany?

Sansa.

I agree. Sansa still has reason to be reluctant about distrusting Dany, but she seems to distrust Dany even more after the battle. Dany did a smart thing about legitimizing Gendry to earn goodwill opposed to the usual accusations of how she’s all “bend the knee or die.” She thinks logically about what a Baratheon alliance means for the stormlands as well as a gesture of goodwill to the north/Westeros.

Sansa IS the paranoid one here.

Tyrion points out that the seven kingdoms have flourished when the North and crown got along. We also know that the North is largely left to their own devices because no king has ever bothered to deal with them. I can’t speak for the books, but IN THE SHOW, the North wasn’t hellbent on independence until Ned was killed. The fact that none of the starks knew how to play the game until Sansa also speaks to have disconnected they were with dealing with the crown. Sansa is hiding behind the cover of Northern independence, but it doesn’t make sense when you think about it.

If you look back to the scene where Jon is crowned KITN, who’s upset?

Sansa.

After Arya and Sansa teamed up to take down LF, they’ve supported one another. Jon is Arya’s favorite brother/sibling by far and they used to dislike Sansa together, but she defends Sansa. She tells him that she’s trying to protect their family. We see in this last episode that Arya doesn’t trust Dany and makes it clear from a northern/family perspective.

But, Arya also says that respects Dany fight during the battle and guess what happens, sansa looks at Arya in shock. Not because Arya led some charge against Dany, but rather, she viewed Arya as siding/defending Dany. Sansa doesn’t want Dany to be right about anything or for anyone to side with her.

Is that not being irrational?

Jon has sansa swear not to tell his secret, which she does so in less than an hour. And people already know that Sansa will turned key house against Dany and onto Jon’s (her) side.

But, another telling thing is Tyrion asking Sansa why is she determined to dislike Dany and how it isn’t smart to antagonize Dany. Tyrion has made a lot of mistakes, but that isn’t one of them. He also knows sansa well enough, despite her changing some, that her dislike Dany is deeper than merely protecting the north and their family.

There are more signs pointing to Sansa spiraling into madness than Dany, despite Dany being the Mad King’s daughter (granddaughter???).

#pro dany

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ansheofthevalley · 5 years

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I’m coming for the Salt Throne™, so watch out.

I’m sorry but I’m afraid I must interrupt my joyous broadcast of Stark goodness brought by the last teaser because I have encountered this on the sansa tag.

At first I wasn’t going to engage, because I was really fucking happy about the teaser. But then I thought, you know what, fuck it, some people need to know some facts and I’m gonna give it to them. Also, I stayed up till 4 am writing this shit but tumblr wouldn’t let me queue it, so now I’m writing it all over again. Second also, this person has been commenting on my posts that I clearly tagged “Sansa Stark” and “anti targ restoration”, so they’re stalking the tags, and since they’re doing that, there’s a high chance they’ll read this.

So let’s start, shall we?

First things first

Imagine being this pressed. At this point, you’re just grasping at straws, my friend.

I’m going to go point by point, since this person took the time to do the same about an anti sansa stark post but posted it on the sansa stark stark nonetheless

Point number 1: comparison with Jaime

I’ll give you that this parallel works, given that both characters start the series at a very good point: Jaime is a Kingsguard and Sansa has just gotten betrothed to the Crown Prince. But let’s examine their journey since then. Jaime ends up season one as a war prisoner of Robb Stark, the Young Wolf and King in the North after Robb won in battle, while Sansa ends up being a political hostage in King’s Landing after watching her father die. It doesn’t get any better for any of them, Jaime, in a secret exchange with Cat, promises to deliver Sansa and Arya, so then it begins his adventures with Brienne in the Riverlands, while Sansa is humiliated and assaulted in front of court. Then, while he got out of the Starks cells and thinking he could make his way to King’s Landing all on his own, Jaime loses his right hand and that’s a low point for him, actually, that’s his lowest point. Meanwhile, Sansa finds confort in the arrival of the Tyrells and her betrothal to Joffrey is put aside in favor of Margeary and there are even hints of a new betrothal between her and Loras, it’s starting to look good for Sansa, until Tywin puts a halt to those plans and brokers the marriage between Tyrion and Sansa: now she’s married to the enemy, the enemy that would ultimately kill his brother and mother. If it were possible, it gets worse for both of them: just as he arrives to King’s Landing, Jaime bears witness to the murder of his son on his wedding day, something Cersei was quick to blame Sansa for. So now, Sansa is a presumed kingslayer and a fugitive. Jaime, now changed by his experiences, tasks Brienne with finding both Stark girls, to keep his promise to Catelyn Stark. Season one Jaime wouldn’t have done that, just saying. Sansa escapes to the Vale under the “protection” of Littlefinger. There she realizes the want for home, for Winterfell, the place she wanted to leave as a teenager. Now she realizes the value of home. Both have to fulfull the role of head of the family: Jaime when Tywin is murdered by Tyrion and Sansa after Robb’s death. They are both tasked with the reconstruction of their houses: Jaime in a military way, Sansa in a political way. As Tommen ascends to the Throne, Jaime has to demonstrate that the Lannisters still are a force to be reckon with, even without Tywin. Sansa comes back to Winterfell to marry Ramsay, to reconnect with the North and its people and to find a way to avenge her family. By the end of season six, they both fully embraced their roots: Jaime is a Lannister and Sansa is a Stark. And we see that in season seven. Jaime is loyal to his House and Cersei till the end of the season and Sansa will defend the best interests of her people. It took them a lot to get where they are now, but that’s what happens with characters like them. They are perceived as perfect by everyone around them, but they have their insecurities and they go through a number of trials and tribulations before they evolve and become better than they were.

Point number two: Cersei vs. Sansa. Two (very) different people

Cersei is very much her father’s daughter, capable of lying and manipulation. This is pointed out throughout the seasons, by various characters, and is the biggest compliment you could pay Cersei. She always believed to be the best bet to take House Lannister to new heights, but always overlooked by her father, in favor of her brothers.

Now, the scroll Sansa was forced to write. I’m going to repeat that. Sansa was forced to write that scroll to his brother. She was forced to do it by Cersei because she truly believed it would save her father’s life. You also wildly misinterpreted Maester Luwin’s response (what a shocker):

Robb: Treason? Sansa wrote this? Maester Luwin: It is your sister’s hand, but the Queen’s words

It’s after this exchange that Robb decides to call his banners and declares himself to be in open rebellion to the Crown, until they release his father and sisters.

But let’s go back to Luwin’s line for a bit. You’d know, especially if you read A Game of Thrones, that Sansa doubted in this moment. She had doubts about writing that letter. But she did it anyway. Why? Because she thought Cersei was good and someone worthy of trust. She really thought she was doing the best she could in saving her father’s life. Like worst case scenario, he’d be sent to the Wall, but he’d be alive. Also, let’s not forget she was thirteen years old.

Point number three: Sansa and her love of stories and the disregard for femininity

Sansa is an idealist. She loves tales of knightly valor and romance, the story of Jonquil and Florian the Fool being her favorite. She appreciates and favors all that is femenine: she sings, she draws, she embroiders, she plays intruments. She’s a lady through and through. And there’s nothing wrong with that. That’s the way she was brought up. Being the Warden of the North’s eldest daughter, both of her parents knew she would have to marry someone important, not some minor lord. And with those prospects, she would be educated to be a proper lady.

I won’t get into Arya’s line since this post is getting long enough, but it shows how the show itself views women with femenine traits as inferior to women with more masculine traits. After all, we all know the GA, at that point prefered the likes of Arya and D@ny to the likes of Sansa and Catelyn.

When Sansa says she’s a stupid girl with stupid dreams who never learns, she’s chastising herself. She came to the capital a girl full of dreams and hopes, only to find people that would lie, use and abuse her, while she had to remain the perfect little lady if she didn’t want another beating. She’s chastising herself for having dreams, something every thirteen-year-old should have, but in her case, she’s been stripped from them. And she blames herself for that, when in reality, it isn’t her fault. It’s the fault of the adults that use her as a pawn to their games as she were a thing.

So no, Sansa isn’t stupid and she certainly isn’t like most girls. She learned to navigate the turbid waters of court in order to stay alive. She never gave up hope or sacrificed her kindness.

1 extra point for trying, tho

Point number four: The moon door and Lysa Arryn

Tyrion’s experience with the Moon Door was under a sham trial for the attempted hit on Bran, which means it was public. We know from season seven that it was Littlefinger who orchestrated the assesination, in hopes to frame the Lannisters and thus creating more friction between the two houses and drive away any suspicion anyone could have that Lysa and Baelish killed Jon Arryn.

Sansa’s experience with the Moon Door was private, it was just her Lysa, and then Littlefinger. Lysa was growing paranoid of Sansa, she accused her of sleeping with Littlefinger (in which she wasn’t entirely wrong: Littlefinger was grooming Sansa and kissing her without her consent). Let’s not forget that Lysa has been in love with him since he was fostered at Riverrun. At this point, Littlefinger had married Lysa; she thought it was out of love, but he did it to secure power in the Vale. Ultimately Littlefinger interferes, getting Lysa away from Sansa, and then he threw his wife through the Moon Door proclaiming he only loved one: her sister.

So again, two very different situations. But I’ll give you points for trying hard.

Point number five: Cersei vs. Sansa part deux. Sansa and Cersei are not parallels, they are foils

It doesn’t take a genius to understand that those two lines are there to illustrate how different they are. Sansa can’t sleep, worried and tormented by the loved ones she cannot safe. There’s not a single thing in her manner or face that shows any trace of vengance, just sadness and grief. The only time we get to see Sansa get revenge is when she killed Ramsay. That was personal. She endured months and months of abuse at the hands of that monster. He killed her little brother. His family took part in the Red Wedding, killing many on the Stark men and bannermen, his brother, his sister-in-law and their unborn child and her mother. He was hers to kill. It was in name of all of those he hurt and killed. Cersei, on the other hand, is completely consumed by vengance. Her line demonstrates that she won’t rest until she had killed everyone that wronged her and her family. She’s been asking for Sansa ever since she fled King’s Landing, she tried to hunt down her own brother (not that she had much love for him, but still), she blew up a whole part of the city just to get rid of her political enemies. She drank wine and smirked while that happened. She killed a young woman in front of her mother, and had her watch as her daughter died. She had the septa from the walk of shame tortured and abused by the Mountain repeatedly. There’s a level of darkness in her actions, a level of monstrosity that rival that of her son’s.

Again, extra points for trying reaaally hard

Point number six: Cersei vs. Sansa part tres (since you insist on drawing parallels between the two when actually they’re foils, but whatever). The matches that never came to happen: Cersei & Rhaegar / Sansa & Joffrey

When Tywin was Aerys’ Hand, he promised Cersei that one day, she would marry Rhaegar and be Queen. We know from the flashback scene with young Cersei and Maggy the Frog, that she wanted to be Queen. She wanted the power the crown brought, something she undoubtedly learned from her father. Unlike Cersei, Sansa wanted to be Queen, yes, but it was all a childhood dream. It was her love for songs and stories that led her to believe that fair Queens ruled the Kingdoms and were loved by the people. She never wanted power, she never even grasped at the real implications of wearing a crown after her father died. She learnt the hard way that Queens weren’t fair and loved, that they could be fearsome and cunning. There’s actually someone more fitting for the parallel you’re trying to draw between Cersei and Sansa:

Both Cersei and Margaery want to be Queen for the power the Crown brings: it’s a way to give power to their House, it’s a way they can influence and shape the country in the way they want (though Margaery was more graceful and a better Queen that Cersei could ever be).

Since this got a little long, I’ll leave you with this book quote that finishes to paint Cersei and Sansa as foils:

Cersei: “The only way to keep your people loyal is to make certain they fear you more than they do the enemy.” Sansa: “I will remember, Your Grace," said Sansa, though she had always heard that love was a surer route to the people's loyalty than fear. If I am ever a queen, I'll make them love me.”

And yes, Sansa is a Direwolf that grew up between Lions. But that doesn’t mean she grew up to become one. She grew up and survived them. I’ll leave another quote from ACOK, after Sansa is humiliated at the hands of Joffrey and his Kingsguards:

Sansa: “I am loyal to my beloved Joffrey.” Tyrion: “No doubt. As loyal as a deer surrounded by wolves.” Sansa: “Lions, she whispered without thinking.”

#damn I had to let some things out #this is what happens when I don't go to my box training #I get salty af #I opened the gates of hell #and now I'm ready #come at me #i s2g i'm so fucking tired #nobody disrespects Sansa Stark on my watch #nuh uh #Sansa Stark #sansa stark defense squad #anti daenerys stans #anti jonerys stans #anti aegony stans #fandom wank #got discourse #got

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annoyawritingrefs · 6 years

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S8/Jonsa Predictions

More like things I want see but whatever.

Goes with my post-finale Jonsa headcanons found (here)

🔹Sansa being absolutely infatuated with Dxny. She is everything Sansa wanted to be as a little girl - a beautiful and powerful queen with handsome loyal knights and magical creatures. Arya admires her bloodlust. Jon worries about how taken his sisters are with Dxny because he's actually quite terrified of her and what she could do to Westeros.

🔹Dxny being jealous of Jon's affections towards his sisters. They go on to have a conversation about how it was common for Targaryens to marry their brothers and sisters. Jon assures her that he's the farthest thing from a Targaryen as she could find.

🔹Bran and Sam trying to tell Jon about his parents, but keep getting interrupted althroughout the season

🔹Dxny being jealous and suspicious of loyalties when Jaime shows up and swears his sword to Sansa. Sandor also makes a comment about her looking like a dove, but she's actually a wolf, and swears his sword to her as well. Doesn't help that Tyrion keeps referring to her affectionately as "my former wife." Jon is also brooding in the background as this happens.

🔹Winterfell gets overrun by Wites and they have to flee. Sansa gets captured by Cersei's men and is taken hostage in Kings Landing.

🔹After defeating the Night King, Jon desperately wants to be on the Sansa rescue squad but gets stuck on the destroy Cersei's army team with Dxny instead, who is focused on taking the throne.

🔹Cersei has miscarried her baby and is as unstable as ever with Jaime and all of her children and family gone. She captures and nurtures Sansa like a prisoner pet. With her good heart, Sansa does feel bad for Cersei and tries to comfort her in attempt to survive.

🔹Dxny ends up burning most of Kings Landing but tries to control it after some words with Jon and/or her advisors. It comes down to everyone having to face off with Cersei in the Red Keep, who has Sansa in the Mountain's grips. Everything is in flames, Dxny thinks there's no saving Sansa and gives the command to burn them both. Horrified, Jon draws his sword to slay Drogoon while (slowmo scene here) Sandor and Brienne get Sansa and the Mountain out of the way and Jaime pushes himself and Cersei into the flames. Brienne manages to get Sansa to safety while Sandor and his brother showdown with everything burning around them. He conquers his fear of fire and ends up getting sweet revenge on his bro.

🔹Once Sansa is safe and Cersei is dead, Dxny is livid and heartbroken over the killing of Drogoon and Jon is all "You almost killed my sister! What the fuck" And Dxny plays it off like "Well she ended up fine, I don't see what the big deal is. You actually killed my fucking child you traitor but jokes on you - now I rule the 7 kingdoms." Then Sam steps up all out of breath like he's chasing them around the whole battle, "Jon! I've been trying to tell you all damn season that you've been banging your aunt!"

🔹Dxny accuses Jon of knowing all along and used her to get the throne. Jon admits that yes, he did use her, but not for the throne. He just wanted to protect his home and his loyalty to Dxny ended as soon as she threatened his home by thinking it was okay to sacrifice Sansa. The shock and stress sends an unnoticeabley pregnant Dxny into very early labor.

🔹Jon had no idea that Dxny was pregnant and feels immensely guilty for a multitude of reasons. Dxny knows she isn't going to live much longer after the birth. She and Jon exchange words and apologies and wishes that things were different and she passes on.

🔹Jon expresses the thing that makes him feel the worst is that he's brought another bastard into the world. Sansa steps up and says that [the baby] is not a bastard, she's a Stark. Jon argues that he doesn't even know what his own name is and it didn't matter since he and Dxny weren't married. Sansa then claims she will take her in as her own and give her the Stark name. Everyone gives each other weird glances at the proclamation.

🔹Davos is the first to speak up about the idea, and suggests that it's best for the baby if they get married. Jon and Sansa agree that it would be strange, but Arya is the one who ends up convincing them that it's fine and brings up the point that they're cousins now and they weren't close as kids. She tells Jon that he will always be her brother regardless of him marrying her sister. Jon and Sansa seem hesitant to agree, but most everyone in the room could see it would be a good match.

🔹Jon can't stop feeling horrible and ends up speaking alone with Sansa and expresses guilt over the child not being born out of love. Sansa assures him that if the baby exists because he was trying to protect her and the North, then she was born out of love. Jon also tells her that she deserves to marry for love. Sansa assures him again that if they're doing it for the baby's sake, then she is marrying for love. Jon is bewildered that she could love the child of the woman who almost killed her, to which Sansa replies that the baby is not her mother and not responsible for her deeds. For a moment you think Jon is going to kiss her on the lips, but he shyly goes for the forehead instead. They agree then to name the child Lyanna.

🔹We skip ahead almost a year and we simply see a happy Sansa doting on baby Lyanna and Jon staring at the 2 of them affectionately. All is right in the world :)

#jonsa #sansa stark #sansa x happiness #sansa x jon

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filhadoboto · 6 years

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Jon meets R'hllor

Jon encontra com R'hllor

This story was written for 'Jon Snow Week'

@jonsnowsource

DAY SEVEN: Free Choice (Prompts: Free choice + Prophecies + Family + Adversity).

Summary: Jon is murdered a second time and R'hllor finds him in the space between life and death.

Also on AO3 English | Português

Jon felt the cold before anything else. And when he opened his eyes, he realized that he was lying in the snow, all dressed in black and surrounded by weirwood trees. He got up with difficulty, a sharp pain in his chest made his breathing difficult and within seconds he recognized the place. This was the same godswood where he and Sam had said their vows when they entered the Night’s Watch. In the distance, above the top of the trees, he could see that the Wall was still there, majestic and imposing.

He tried to remember how he'd come to that place.

He was in the great hall in Winterfell.

Daenerys was there. So did Arya, Bran, and Sansa. His family was together.

He was happy because the truth about his birth had been told him and he finally knew who his parents were. Daenerys and he had decided that it didn’t matter that they were aunt and nephew, that their love was more important. And besides, that same love had begotten the son Dany now carried.

The Northern Lords were making a toast to the alliance between the North and the Targaryen Queen, still oblivious that their King was, in fact, the rightful heir to the Iron Throne.

All the people who mattered to him were there, as well as his new allies, preparing to fight the Night King and his army of dead and... and then he began to feel a nuisance in his chest and this nuisance became pain when he couldn’t breathe.

Daenerys had supported him when his body collapsed and Sam had tried to help him... but then...

But then everything had gone dark and... and he had woken up in the forest beyond the Wall.

There was only one explanation for all that.

He was dead.

He had been murdered.

Again.

"No! No, no, no..." he shouted "I cannot die now!" He fell to his knees in the snow "I just found a reason to keep on living, to keep fighting ... Dany. My Dany! I cannot die now. Right now that I found her. I cannot leave her alone... I... I'll never be able to hold our son in my arms. My son will never know the face of his father... just as I didn’t know the face of mine..."

Footsteps caught his eye, and as he turned toward the sound, he found himself in the company of a human-shaped being, but its body was slender and its skin was red. Its hair was long and looked like the flames of a fire, and wherever it passed, the snow around it melted. Its form seemed to flicker as it walked, and Jon couldn’t tell whether it was a man or a woman. The stranger being stopped a few paces away and Jon could feel the heat emanating from the being on his skin.

"Why are you screaming?" It said looking directly at Jon, and he realized that its eyes glittered like ember.

Jon got to his feet "Because I'm angry. I finally found the love of my life and now I've lost her forever."

"You seem to love her very much."

"I love her more than my own life. I had so little time to stand beside her. It's not fair that I die now that I've found her."

"Kings, commoners, men, women, young, old, rich, poor. Death takes all without distinction, Jon."

"How do you know my name?"

The being smiled "I know the name of all those who come to this place."

"Where we are?"

The being looked around "We are in the space between life and death. But you see it as the godswood where you uttered the Night’s Watch vows. It was in this place that you began your journey to save the world."

"How do you... Who are you?" Jon asked.

The being smiled and the fire in its eyes seemed to grow more intense. "I am the one who gave you back your life when those who claimed to be your brothers took it away from you."

Jon stared at him, his mouth open, haunted "Are you the Red God? R'hllor?"

The being nodded. "I am. I thought it would be nice to talk to you in person."

"What do you want from me?"

"What do I want from you? Is that still unclear?" R'hllor took another step toward Jon. "You have not fulfilled your destiny, Jon. You still have a very important role to play. I want you to go back to the living world and get your place back. But just like the other time, it's your decision to stay or come back. If you decide to stay, mankind will have to try to survive the long night until the three prophesies are reborn. If you decide to return, mankind will have a chance to win. The Great War for the Dawn has begun and the Great Other is getting stronger. You saw his servants with your own eyes, just like the other two chosen. Three were prophesied, Jon. And without you, they probably will not win this war. "

"What prophecy are you talking about?"

"Daenerys Targaryen, Brandon Stark and you are the three heads of the dragon. Together, you are Azor Ahai. Together you are the Prince who was promised. You will defeat the servant of the Great Other and make sure there will be another dawn. Brandon has access to all the knowledge you need. Daenerys, bringing the dragons back to your world, reforged the Lightbringer. And you have the strength and skills to help them defeat the servants of the Great Other."

"One of your servants, Melisandre of Asshai, claimed that Stannis Baratheon was the Prince that was promised, the Azor Ahai reborn and the bearer of Lightbringer. She said all these prophecies referred to Stannis. "

"Melisandre. Yes, my servant learned from her mistakes how much prophecy can be dangerous. Something that mortals don’t seem to understand is that the signs of prophecy should not be interpreted literally. Even with the visions I sent, my servant didn’t follow the path she should follow. She was blinded by her own pride and refused to see what I showed her. I guided her to you and even then, she still refused to see who you really were. When they took your life, I used Melisandre as an instrument to resurrect you. Can you imagine my frustration when, after getting the three promised to live at the same time, one of them keep dying over and over again?"

"Well, I didn’t have much control over it, did I?" Said Jon, indignant at the god's words. "I've never been able to fight for my life."

"You are an honorable man and you believe that others can be that way too. You believe that people can be good and trustworthy. And I even like that about you, Jon. But once again you were killed because of it. You trusted the wrong people and once again paid with your life for your choices."

Jon could still feel the echo of the pain he had felt when the poison had taken effect. "I never imagined Cercei Lannister would be able to have me killed after everything we showed her. But I couldn’t lie, I had already bent the knee and pledged the North to Daenerys."

"Correct reason. Wrong person." Jon looked at him confused. "I'm sorry to inform you that the person responsible for your death is much closer to you than you can imagine."

"Are you implying that someone from my own people would try to kill me after I've got a gigantic army to fight on our side against the army of the dead?"

R'hllor shook his head, denying "The person responsible for your death thinks that you have usurped what by birthright should be hers and only hers, the throne of North. And that with you being the heir to the Iron Throne, she will never have a chance to be queen."

Jon looked at R'hllor in disbelief. "No. That cannot be true. She would never... she's my sister!"

"Half sister, or rather, your cousin. And as she herself told you, she learned many things from Cercei Lannister and Petyr Baelish."

"No. That cannot be true. Please tell me you're wrong, she would not be able..."

"I'm sorry Jon, but this was not the first time she betrayed her own family to be a queen. And this time she believes that everyone will blame Jaime Lannister for your death and that she will get everything she wants. After all, who would suspect the daughter of the honorable Ned Stark? Who would accuse the King's sister of murdering him? With your death, she thinks the North will hail her as Queen and that the Lords will break the alliance with Daenerys."

"I trusted her..." Jon's heart was devastated. First he had been murdered by his Night’s Watch brothers for doing what was right. And now his sister had done the same. "Is Dany in danger? Or Arya or Bran?"

"No. Everyone is alert. And it will not be long until the Three-Eyed Raven finds out who's the real culprit."

Jon breathed in relief.

R'hllor gently touched Jon's shoulder. "The time has come for you to decide whether you want to go back and fight for humanity or if you want to move on and have your well-deserved rest."

"Why do you need me to choose to stay or come back?"

"Magic works only if you're willing to go back. If I tried to send you back against your will, your body would work again, but your mind would still be dead."

"I'll remember what happened here and everything you said to me?"

"No, just like last time, you will not remember anything. But I needed you to know all this before asking you to make a decision."

"Will I still be myself when I return?"

R'hllor smiled. "Go back from the dead takes its toll, Jon. But don’t be afraid of what you might lose. Remember everything that awaits you if you return."

"I want to keep fighting." Jon took a deep breath "I'm ready. You can send me back."

R'hllor nodded, pleased "Before you get back, I have a gift for you." he said and pointed to something in Jon's back, which looked back.

Jon had never seen those two people, but he would have recognized them anywhere.

The woman was much like Arya and a wreath of winter roses adorned her long black hair. The man was slender and had silver curls and violet eyes like his beloved Dany.

"Mother. Father" he said, touched, tears flooding his eyes.

Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen smiled, walked up to him and wrapped him in their arms.

The feeling of being held by his parents was indescribable. "I wish I had known you both." Jon said, wiping his tears away.

"I'm sorry you grew up without us and not knowing who you really were." Lyanna said, her little hands clutching her son's face.

"We are so proud of you, my son!" said Rhaegar.

"I... I have so many questions!"

"And the time will come when we will answer them all." said Rhaegar.

"You're going to be grandparents!" Jon said "Daenerys is pregnant."

"You both deserve all the happiness the world can offer. Your fate has always been to find each other." said Lyanna.

"Jon, you need to go now." R'hllor said.

"We'll always be with you, son." said his mother kissing his face.

"We love you so much." Rhaegar said and hugged him once more.

The two then vanished and disappeared. Jon turned to R'hllor. "What did you tell me the first time for me to decide to come back?"

"I said that Daenerys Targaryen was coming to meet you and that you would need each other's help."

Jon smiled. "And now she and our son are waiting for me."

"Yes."

The Red God raised his hand, passed it in front of Jon's face, and everything went dark again.

***

First, he heard her voice. She whispered softly about how she had fallen in love with him in Dragonstone. Then the heat and pressure of her body holding his. And then he felt the soft scent of lavender from her skin and then her tears wetting his face. But it was only when he opened his eyes and met her marvelous violet eyes that Jon knew he was really home.

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