#boring. but the queen deserves it. :relieved: | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

fandom-imagines-stories · 9 months

Text

Knowing the Steps

Aramis x Reader (The Musketeers)

Words:3566

Summary: Keeping your relationship a secret can have its excitements, but during a ball, you wish you could be open about your love. Aramis tries to make it up to you.

Notes: Not going to lie, this was definitely inspired by watching Santiago as Count Vronsky. The dancing scene just made me melt! Anyway, I thought he deserved another fluffier piece since I write a lot of angst and drama for my musketeer boys. This ended up being a bit more bittersweet than I thought, but I like how it turned out. I also wrote this at work, so be warned, it’s definitely a little frazzled.

More Musketeers HERE

Dazzling fabrics caught candlelight with every sway in the dance. Music swelled. People laughed merrily in their conversations around the room. For most, it was a beautiful scene of joy and prosperity.

You, however, couldn’t be more bored.

“And when we arrived back at the manor, why I don’t think there’s been a grander celebration in all of Paris,” some lord you couldn’t be bothered to learn the name of boasted. He looked to your cousin, and bowed. “Other than yours, of course, your majesty.”

“Well, I have to say I will be very disappointed if I am not invited to the next, monsieur,” the king jested, looking around to make sure everyone laughed.

You forced an amused, airy sigh and wished for an excuse to leave. In your disinterested perusal, your eyes caught the glimmer of a hilt and the slight motion of a feathered hat. Suddenly, the party didn’t seem so boring anymore.

The musketeer standing guard at the other end of the room caught you looking in his direction, bowing his head as a sly smirk spread across his lips. And, for the first time that evening, your smile was real.

The person beside you cleared their throat, nudging your side gently. You jolted out of your daydreaming, relieved to find it was only Anne.

“Admiring the tapestry, hm?” She teased, motioning to the sewn decoration hanging above the group of musketeers. It was huge, gaudy, and far too elaborate to make any sense of, but you nodded as blush rushed to your cheeks.

“Yes,” you gulped, “It’s quite…. Um…”

“It’s awful, isn’t it?” She snickered.

You both had to contain your laughter, even covering your mouth with your hand to keep from squawking like a bird. Still, the sound must have traveled across the room for you could just see your musketeer grin over at you before turning to his companions.

Anne followed your gaze and smirked.

“Ah,” she mused.” Aramis.”

Your face reddened even more. “Who? I’m sorry, I don’t know who you’re referring to, your majesty.”

“Between the two of us,” she leaned closer to you, “he’s always been my favorite.”

This time, you weren’t quick enough to conceal your laughter and an embarrassingly loud snort rang throughout the room. Anne nearly doubled over. You were sure you had to be the color of a tomato by now.

Across the room, Aramis put a finger to his smirking lips, whispering,

“Shhh.”

Aramis winced as a hand swiftly smacked the back of his head.

“Why not be a little more obvious. I’m sure the king will appreciate you displaying your relationship with his cousin,” Athos scolded. “Go ahead. I’m not sure he’s noticed yet.”

“I think he’s busy frightening courtesans into laughing at his jokes,” D’Artagnan scoffed.

Porthos nodded. “Besides, the queen’s definitely noticed by now and hasn’t ordered your execution yet.” He smacked his friend on the shoulder teasingly. “So it must be alright.”

“Don't’ encourage him,” Athos sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Either of you.”

“But Athos,” D’Artagnan said dramatically, putting a hand on his heart for emphasis. “He loves her.” He and Porthos snickered like school girls.

Aramis rolled his eyes.

“Mock all you want,” he said, glancing back in your direction. “But it’s true.”

The four watched as the Duke of Rohan’s son led you out to the center of the room to begin the next dance. Aramis could see the disdain you were trying to hide and wished you were in his arms instead, that he could stand before everyone there and tell them he was yours and you were his. The jealous pang in his chest was matched by the admiration in his heart as you danced.

Porthos pat him on the back again, this time with a sympathetic smile.

“It’s alright,” he said. “She knows where her heart lies.”

The Marquess spun you around so you were once again facing the group of musketeer guards. Your eyes met Aramis and your face fell. How you wanted to run to him and forget who you were in his embrace.

“Are you feeling alright?” Your dance partner asked, his overconfidence chipping as your cheeks paled and you stepped away from him.

You could see your whole life before you. Loveless marriage. Leaving home. A lifetime of loneliness. Without Aramis. Your musketeer, gone forever in a joyous but distant memory.

“I actually feel a little faint,” you gasped, suddenly out of breath. “Excuse me.”

An annoyed frown passed over his face.

You scurried away, bumping into another pair as you rushed out of the room. Aramis forced himself not to run after you, worry overtaking all other thoughts.

“Something’s wrong,” he said.

“Someone else will handle it.” Athos gave him a stern look.

Sure enough, the four noticed the queen whisper something to a lady in waiting and started across the ballroom toward the door. She cast a fleeting glance at Aramis and he discreetly nodded in reply.

“I’m sure everything’s fine,” D’Artagnan tried to reassure him. “Perhaps a lace on her dress tore?” His optimistic tone was met with dark looks from the other three. “Right. I’ll walk around, see if I hear anything.”

Athos pinched the bridge of his nose. “We are all going to be beheaded.”

You laid across the chaise, your head buried in your hands to try and muffled your cries. You could just hear the quiet click of the door and a soft sigh.

“Oh, my dear.” Anne hurried to your side, placing a comforting arm around your shoulders. She pulled you to her chest like a mother would her child or a caring older sister. “I’m afraid I don’t have to ask, do I?”

“If I could stop my heart if only to keep it from beating for him, I would,” you cried. “But it’s his. His completely.”

“You poor, sweet girl,” Anne said, pushing back to brush a hair out of your face. “You never make things easy, hm?” She smiled at you. “But I guess love is never easy.”

You laughed through your tears. “Especially when it involves a musketeer.”

“You couldn't have at least fallen in love with a man from England or Italy or Spain to take you away from here. It had to be a member of your cousin’s guard?” She teased, glad to see your eyes brighten again.

“At least we know Louis likes him?” You grimaced.

“He wouldn’t if he knew Aramis had captured the heart of his favorite cousin.”

You laid your head back on her shoulder, again choking back sobs. Anne stroked your hair.

“What is it? Did the king say something?”

“He doesn’t have to,” you sighed tearfully. “I know what life holds for me.”

Anne’s heart ached for you, remember well the weight of obligation. The wish to love and to live according to one’s desires rather than the orders of another person. If she could spare you the life you were both born into, she would.

A quiet knock at the door alerted you and you hurriedly wiped the mess of tears from your cheeks.

“Who is it?” Anne called, her regal, commanding voice returning.

“Aramis of the King’s Musketeers.” Just the sound of his voice made your heart soar. “I was sent to… investigate a broken window.”

Anne turned to you, shaking her head as she walked across the room.

“You’re both going to have to be better liars if this is going to work.”

She opened the door, revealing the anxious musketeer in the hall. He bowed, flashing a smile.

“I trust things are all clear here, your majesty.” He said.

She gave him a stern, but warm, look.

“You have five minutes.” She glanced back at you. “Maybe ten.” Anne skirted around him and closed the door behind her.

You were across the room and in his arms in seconds. Aramis locked you safely in his embrace, pressing his lips to your forehead, your cheek, and lastly your lips.

“What’s happened? Are you hurt? Did that man upset you?” He asked between kisses.

You shook your head still blinking back tears.

“No, it isn’t that,” you said. “It’s nothing, really.”

“Please.” He laid a hand on your cheek. “Tell me what’s wrong, my love.”

You looked into his loving dark eyes and pulled him back to you for a kiss that said more than your words could. And he understood completely.

What started as a distraction and thrilling secret for both of you had become so much more. The more he fell, the more he knew how much it would tear him apart when things inevitably went wrong.

“I just felt so trapped,” you cried, laying your head against his chest. “So many people want a say in my life, especially my cousin! He can’t manage his own life, let alone mine.”

Had it been anyone else, you would have been punished for criticizing your king. But despite your relations, you tired of Louis’s childish impulses and complaints. Most of the time, he felt more like a young boy with a crown.

“But I suppose if I’d taken power as young as he did, I might act the same way,” you sighed, leading Aramis to sit with you on the chaise. “I just wish things were different.”

He brought your hand up, kissing the inside of your wrist while his mustache tickled your palm.

“We could leave,” he said softly. He turned toward the window, looking over the grandness of the garden with a lump in his throat. “Run away to Spain or England or anywhere, like we talked about.”

You pulled away, eyes wide with surprise.

“We were never serious.”

“Maybe I am this time.” Aramis kissed you again with more urgency than he ever had before. You both realized then how much he meant it.

You found yourself leaning into him, like a moth to a flame. Your hands trailed up his chest. A sigh escaped your lungs. Aramis chuckled, gently pushing you back with his hands on your arms.

“I should go,” he said. “Athos already wants to hang me and I don’t think the queen would appreciate me disheveling your appearance.” He fixed a loose strand of hair, tucking it behind your ear. “You look beautiful.”

“I suppose I should return as well,” you sighed. “Else the king will lose his head.”

You kissed a final time before Arams hurried out of the room, looking back at you with total adoration.

He checked to make sure there was no one in the hall, quietly clicked the door shut, and started back toward the ballroom.

“Monsieur Aramis,” the queen’s voice stopped him in his tracks.

He turned on his heel and fell into a deep bow.

“Thank you, your majesty. It seems that the window was a false-”

She held up her hand to silence him.

“I just need to know one thing if I’m going to permit this to continue.” she held her head high, her mouth set in a thin line. “As you know, Y/N is family and I love her like she was my own sister.”

“Yes, your majesty.”

“So I must ask you.” She stopped toward him. “Do you love her?”

Arams took a deep breath and stood a little taller, his determination and dedication clear in his eyes.

“Yes, your majesty.”

Anne watched him for a long while. He almost felt like a prisoner awaiting sentencing, but even in her seriousness, he could sense a kind of affection.

The queen nodded.

“That’s all I needed,” she said and dismissed him. She went back in to join you and he continued down the hall, unsure of a number of things, but absolutely sure of something much more important.

The guests had finally gone and Louis decided he’d cure his boredom by ordering a hunt. It came as a surprise to Captain Treville, however, to find that four of his musketeers had been requested to stay. The queen claimed that she was afraid one of her necklaces had been stolen and she knew that the four finest of Treville’s men would be able to solve the case.

They were waiting in the courtyard when Aramis felt a sharp smack to his shoulder.

“What. Did. You. Do?” Athos growled.

Aramis shrugged, rubbing the now sore spot. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Porthos sat beside him, holding Treville’s orders from the queen.

“Why would she ask for us to find some piece of jewelry?” He asked.

“Because it’s a lie,” Athos said, snatching the parchment to read it over. “I’m sure this is about something else.” He glared at Aramis, who held up his hands innocently.

“She seemed perfectly aware and alright with the situation.” He thought for a moment. “Okay, maybe not perfectly alright with it-” Athos threw the paper down. “But she certainly didn’t seem like she was planning my execution!”

“What’s all this?” D’Artagnan joined, a bright grin spread across his face.

“Visiting Madame De Bonacieux, were we?” Aramis teased.

“Don’t change the subject,” Athos snapped, handing D'Artagnan the letter.

“Oh, Constance mentioned something about this,” The youngest of them said. “Apparently we’re to meet her at the servant’s entrance near the gardens and she’ll take us to the queen.” He placed the paper back on the table. “She was very secretive about the whole thing.”

Athos frowned, thoughts of exile filling his head.

“Don’t you think she would have told the king by now if she wanted action taken against me?” Aramis asked.

Porthos scratched his chin. “Unless she wants to protect the Duchess from being discovered as well.”

“You know, Constance did say it was something very serious,” D’Artagnan added. He suppressed a smirk so as to not give anything away. He was under strict instructions from the queen herself not to spoil the surprise. Getting to watch Aramis and Athos squirm was just a bonus. He pat Aramis on the back. “We’d better get going. We don’t want to be late for our demise, do we?”

“That isn’t funny,” Athos growled.

Aramis didn’t say a word. Too many thoughts plagued his mind for him to speak. He just put on his hat, took a deep breath, and went to ready his horse.

You had never been to this part of the palace. Anne led you down corridor after corridor and refused to tell you where you were going. The king and most of his courtesans were away all day to hunt and the rest of the palace, including all of the queen’s ladies in waiting, were searching for her missing jewelry.

“Can you at least tell me why you’ve sent everyone running around for a necklace you don’t even like?” You asked.

“I have asked you to trust me,” she giggled. “That is a command from your queen. Now come on!”

You could remember the last time you’d seen her like this. Whatever it was she had planned, she was certainly being sneaky about it. You just couldn’t imagine what could bring you to this side of the palace.

Finally, Anne stopped outside of a large, ornate, but faded door. She smoothed out her dress, lifted her chin, and put on a very grave face.

“Now, I need you to look very serious. If you smile, it shall ruin the surprise.”

“Alright, but-”

She threw the door open and stormed inside before you could finish. Following her, the only expression you could muster was one of shock as you stared at the scene before you.

Aramis, Athos, Porthos, and D’Artagnan stood in the middle of a large, empty room with Constance leading them. At least three of the four men looked just as confused as you. All bowed as the two of you entered.

“I’m sure you’re all wondering why I’ve had Madame de Bonacieux bring you here,” the queen began, sounding as grim and stern as ever.

A chill ran up Aramis’ spine. Perhaps she had changed her mind. He wasn’t good enough. Of course, he wasn’t. You were a duchess. He was a soldier. How could the queen simply look the other way and allow this to continue?

You saw the growing panic on his face and touched Anne’s arm.

“Your majesty, what’s going on?” You asked.

She turned to you, finally smiling.

“Please,” she beamed. “Today I am just Anne.” She faced the men again, discarding her serious facade. “You’ll have to excuse the theatrics. Even a queen is allowed her fun, every now and then.”

“Forgive me,” Athos said, bowing again. “I don’t understand.”

“Is something the matter?” Aramis asked, looking over her shoulder at you.

You shrugged, feeling just as flustered as he appeared.

“Given the… circumstances of which we are all aware.” She glanced between you and Aramis, reaching back to take your hand. “I thought this would be the best opportunity for us to speak freely.”

Everyone looked about the massive room, the boarded-up windows allowing for a little light to stream in. Anne smiled.

“Don’t worry. This ballroom is part of the palace that has been sealed off since the past king died. No one will bother us here.”

Anne took your hand and motioned for Aramis to come forward, placing your hand in his.

“I may not have the power to dissuade my husband's stubbornness or change the laws of this world,” she said. You could see the hint of tears in her eyes. “But if I can give you this moment to be happy…”

Forgetting the rules of propriety, you threw your arms around her. For the first time in your life, it truly felt like you had family.

“Thank you,” you whispered.

“No matter what, my dear, your heart is always your own to give.”

You stepped back, finding yourself in the arms of the man you loved.

“Now.” Anne faced the rest of the group. “We may not have musicians or grand spreads of food, but we have good wine and good friends, so I thought we could make the most of things. You all spend so much time guarding these celebrations, you deserve to have one of your own.”

The four musketeers looked at each other.

Porthos shrugged. “Sounds kind of nice to me,” he said. He stepped forward. “I know a couple of tunes that don’t require any of those instruments that they have at the balls. Just our voices and hands.”

He clapped, the sound ringing through the space.

“Thank you for that demonstration,” Athos muttered.

“That would be perfect, monsieur Porthos,” the queen grinned.

And so the festivities commenced. Athos decided to watch the perimeter of the old ballroom, just in case, but couldn’t bring himself to refuse when the queen wanted to teach everyone a dance from Spain.

Aramis sang quiet Spanish in your ear while everyone clapped and swayed around the room.

The ballroom was alive with laughter and movement and joy. You were finally in your musketeer's arms, proclaiming your love to the people that mattered most to you. It was the most fun you- and the queen- had ever had.

There was no music, but there didn’t need to be. You twirled and skipped and sang and flew as if you were dancing amongst the clouds. Aramis put his hands on your waist and lifted you into the air, making your laughter echo all around.

“I wish it could always be this way,” he whispered, lips brushing your cheek. “I meant what I said. We could try.” He looked at you with such love and persistence in the face of obstacles that you knew he would leave everything behind for you.

But as you spun around the room, you saw his friends, his brothers, his purpose. His place was with them, just as yours was with Anne and your cousin. You could never ask him to leave.

“I love you,” you said, laying a hand on his chest. “And I will cherish every moment I have with you. But I will not take you from the life you love. Even if it means losing you. I can live with that decision as long as you are happy with them.”

Aramis sighed, leaning his forehead against yours, forehead against yours, forgetting the eyes watching the two of you. He leaned forward just enough for his lips to brush against yours.

“I’m sorry,” he cried. Aramis pulled you a little closer. “If I could change the world with only the love I have for you, I would.”

You lifted his chin so his eyes met yours. A bittersweet smile graced your lips.

“We may not have forever. But we have now,” you kissed him again, sweet but meaningful. “That’s enough for me.”

Aramis nodded and continued leading you across the floor in an unfamiliar dance, yet both of you knew the steps by heart.

Anne stood with Constance and D’Artagnan, both had already danced until their feet were sore. Athos joined them and noticed the queen’s saddened features.

“Is something wrong your majesty?” He asked.

She blew out a breath.

“I’m afraid I’m being rather cruel,” she said. “I’m showing them what they’ll never have.”

Athos shook his head, watching the couple with a deep understanding.

“No, your majesty,” he said as Aramis lifted you once again, a smile returning to both your faces. “You’ve given them something to hold onto.”

#the musketeers #aramis #santiago cabrera #armis x reader #the musketeers imagine #bbc the musketeers #anne of austria #queen anne #athos #porthos #d'artagnan

69 notes · View notes

otakebi-cam-wao · 6 months

Text

Produce 101 Japan The Girls ep 3 - thoughts i wrote on real time while watching

as a harowota who initially is watching it cuz of Kasahara Momona

DISCLAIMER: this is long af so UNDER THE CUT!

part 1 Re-evaluation:

Happy:

Kotone moved up to B!!! Deserved!!!! QUEEN of evolution!!!!

RAN (ran) TO A!!!!! love to see that

Joa was nice to see on A after the bootcamp from ep 2

KOTO TO A!!!! amazing (tho i like Yui more) her video was so appeleang

Sad:

Rio going from C to F was a bit sad for me smh

Ranka flopped a lot (B to F) but i didn't like her that much (also her re-evaluation video was hard to see)

Serina from C to D kinda urghhh same with Rimika (she was on HKT48 after all) but actually i was expecting these 2 to D

Keiko and the twins going down was sadly expected BUT MY AYANE!?!? ME SO SO SAD (but got B with keiko and the nakamoris, could be worse, and i didn't want it worse)

Okay, i get Ayane i'd say the same thing knowing my own abbilities, if i was her i would have been relieved to get down a class as well

part 2 shooting:

Mena's expressions are nice

Miu's

Ran's (so eye catching to me)

Miu, Ran and Kassa my choices (Kassa pls) (as if i didn't know Kassa wasn't)

OHHH Suzu and Tsuzumi solos!!! (wanted them to get something) Ran and Miu finalist for center, nice nice (f Kassa) (center was Miu, right?)

yes Miu center INTP center queen (?) (yes i support her cuz INTP first)

the prep all cute

Momoka's "kawachii" cute cuz husky

part 3 battle:

already excited cuz battle (is what i like from some dvd mags)

this funny:

Kaela "winners will have a benefit" T. Hana "meat?" Anon: No way 3k votes? fr?!

so after this was the first ranking?

OHHHH first elimination?

HALF?!?!?!?!

OMFG HALF OF THEM!!!

Top 50 stays, okay okay

Kaela changing the mood abruptly tho it felt so smooth

Kaela is trolling everyone

representatives by luck… HINAFES FEELINGS

ohhh Miu is unpickable

Ran rep. let's gooooo (wait this is for the groups performing later, realized this when ran picked Momoka)

Ran picks: Ranka ooooo A-F support!, KASSA!!!! LET'S FUCKING GOOO, KEIKO!!!, MOMOKA!!! YEI YEI YEI!!! Nonoka ohhhh (cuteness support logic, i see)

Meika pics: Ayaka, F class support; Shizuku i love her voice, Tsuzumi let's gooooo, Sakura ok i c i c (Kassa and "Gyaru ga kita" lol) and Suzu (balance on cuteness)

Yui rep OWO: Tsukushi, Nano, Nagomi bby!!!!, Moe, Joa (Koto felt betrayed?)

I'll stop with the picks

i like Fuka being rep

Miu can change anything?

Kassa didn't want Miu to pick anyone from her group, Kassa protecting mode

I like Miu liking Hazuki low tones; SHE STOLE SUZU!!! stealing Nano, and kokoro, LOL TSUZUMI SCREAMING

wait, why are the other stealing members? this got so confusing, but Ran's got no changes, nice

death battle for the song OWO

ohhhh runing

guru guru!!!

YABAI!

fights for songs on the floor nice!!! (me a bit violent)

teams w/o song must figth the ones with? HOW?!

oh, the ones w songs battle the ones without, i see; but if someone wants it can rise hand, i see

Kassa when Ran gave the appeal! Nice, i like that Kassa i see i see, interesting

part 4 choosing positions and rehearsals:

Miyu leader cuz experience, good

Kotone leader cuz older, my common idea, age or experience

Rimika must be so frustrated…

Kassa's idea to pick center was "nice idea" for me, but i got her same conclusion, they all should be center, everyone voted for Kassa to center… well i'm having a kassa on aisare route thought lapsus

it was between suzu and nano that center, sorry miu, you were boring, but you're not dissapointed, that's good

Miu helping the other team, awww (i'd do the same, it reminds me something i was told at uni, "it's a race to be better than the other, but you must teamwork and help each other anyways", i got reminded of it w Miu's action)

part 5 battle on stage time!:

lol someone w kalea's banner lol

i can't w nakasone, she's so funny

okay how you like that groups, already saw the performances tho…

Black Cats:

I have more liking here cuz Nagomi bby and Yui

they seem to have a hard time on rehearsals, specially leader/center Moe….

it's true that Nagomi fit's it the least, she's bby, but she can learn bout this…

they all want Moe as center, she just need more support, oh leader changed to Yui

awww Yui hugging Nagomi, everyone supporting her, i love it, she's so bby

bby improved while starting to enjoy, nice nice.

clapclapclap to Moe

love how Yui looks

oh Yui main vocals, ok ok

ufff Tsukushi's mic but she could manage it anyways

Joa voice, i like it for rap, cool

fuuuuu yui & nagomi gooooo

Show Up:

Mihaya has troubles to connect names to faces? me too sometimes girl

This team had it hard…

hard works made better team work? apparently

i feel like Mihaya came out of a cocoon or chrysalis as a butterfly after getting this union and team work

Hana is giving me an impression mainly and the one who is rap 1 i think?

Black cats might have the win here…

yui 41 konomi 6

nagomi 37? bby nooo chiharu 55 (tho makes sense i think?)

moe 29 hana 18, moe got less than i thought…

rino 43 mihaya 8, not surprise, tho i do feel mihaya surprised me while looking at the rehearsal footage

joa 31 rikako 25, close close i think

tsukushi 84 mei 24 doesn't surprise me even w mic accident either way black cats win, show up did their best, had a hard time to connect specially mihaya, i feel it was nice

something something melty:

there's Kotone!!

Iyota Hana has a Kubota Nanami vibe here i think…

they look so happy and enjoying this

damn that "futsuu" but yeah, enjoying alone won't give the best

the other Hana has a time with expressions, i see

poor Nana

why there are lotta shots without Kotone? i'm curious

wow the other Hana

LET'S GO KOTONE!!!

forgot main vocal girl name, but good

let's go kotone x10000000

also the other hana expresions got nice

Queen Bee:

Miyu has a interesting face shape and the curve her mouth goes is weird in a nice way

Rin's voice is nice (also weird interesting faceshape… that kinda reminds me of Ozeki Mai)

how everyone suppors ayano cuz of her dancing and Yumeki's words

what the other ayano btw? ahhh she has trouble on the singing… oh no, she has confidence troubles in general

Miyu is so cute with the others, specially Rin

poor Rin's voice tho

i also like Rin's voice Thelma

Rio cute in the sexy way

nice nice

I think i liked Hana's "narcissistic" part over Miyu's idk if in singing or expressions maybe both

shion 27 y. ayano 11, no surprise, tho ayano got better on vocals, yes

i. hana 4 rio 44, surprise the gap… tho kinda expected it? idk

kotone 30 karin 38… i lit couldn't get a grasp of karin, but god it was close, sad for Kotone

y. hana 81 miyu 28?! i said i liked more hana's lines tbf cute hana btw

nana 5 k. ayano 55… ayano got more confident on her dance and was captivating, i agree

honoka 18 rin 56… damn poor honoka… but i also liked rin's voice more

i'm sad cuz of Kotone and y. hana, but clapclapclap queen bee sad Miyu as well tho

Noborizaka6:

Ayaka crying from the start…

oofff hard time for this group and Misaki

Misaki like… adopted F class girls

poor kagura and ayaka

big change we like to see it, more confidence as leader on Ayaka i think

public support, nice

i don't think they'll win, but i feel like nakasone saying "they improved"

lowkey wanna cry for Misaki and her F class girls

they're giving their all i think, so it's nice, i don't like anyone here but i feel like a proud mother

Wakey Wakey?:

AYANEEEEEEEE

group who had hard time to understand lyrics, apparently

EMA?! NO JPOP CHOREO BEFORE?!

Ayane is me understanding songs whenever i sing and (fail to) dance in my room and imagine something

Miyu is cute in the way i found Yamaki Risa cute… idk

their dance arrangement i loved it, i swear

i love Ayane's dead looking face idk idk and how she walks in the rehearsal videos, so… idk… but mood

Miyu is interesting and apparently good leader

Miyu's idea was nice, but weird to execute

now i feel nervous

ii jan ii jan ii jan too Thelma

OMG AYANE'S VOCALS

everyone is so good in my idea

Mena is so interesting as well (is the one who left school for this?)

the wink!!!

the end is beautiful

Ema was amazing anyways i was worried

Ayane's heart was so cute (every minute i just love Ayane more, since i find out she's INTP, sorry sorry)

awww Misaki's words to Ayaka…

awwww Ayane talking is just awwww for me cuz her anxiousness

Miu 3 sae 10…

Mimi 5 Aoi 8… i'm starting to worry

poor Mayu 1 when Miyu 46 (oh! 46 like nogizaka bad joke bad joke) tho i was expecting this

Misaki 4 Ema 50 expected

Kagura 55 Mena 49… wow, i'm surprised, deserved i think, tho Mena was interesting anyways

Ayaka 45 Ayane 151 THE GAP MAKES ME FEEL SO BAD BOUT AYAKA BUT LET'S FUCKING GO AYANE!!!!

awww ayane's surprise face (tho it' was her win an obvious one with Miyu's and Ema's)

ofc Wakey won, it was pretty good performance, but i'm so sad for those F class girls now!!!!

Minx:

Rin revealing they practiced together is so cute, and again i love Miu decided to help them

ohhh Rin got alone at one point and the other group helped her in many ways I WANNA CRY!!!

Only Rin and Kano? this group has a problem here

poor Rin all worried, obviously she's the leader

i'm also proud of her nakasone

i'm proud of the 2 working alone (sadly this happened tho)

me too nakasone i wanna cry they have something i needed this to know

Rin and Kano put literally their Body & Soul there, i also wanna hug them!!!

Miu's group were yasashii oneesans

last day the other 4 joined?! at least they did, but i feel worried and sad

awww they sent they're lessons, awww… that's full of effort…

happy they joined at least

i hope they do good, at least for Rin and Kano

Shizuku hurts me tho, i liked her voice but here she dissapointed me a bit

i wanna hug Rin so badly, like "baby you have this, and Miu's group think the same

ok ok performance, but i wanna cry

kawaii Rin

ahhhhh Shizuku's ad libs v classic-y

i guessed Shizuku would be main vocal cuz classical, sounds a bit weird but nice

i loved these outfits

nice Kano!

to get all this together the last day of rehealsals, it's so good!

KANO!!! RIN!!! I'M PROUD OF YOU 2

New bud:

Miu!!! Tsuzumi!!! Kokoro!!!

NEXT WEEK… but they have all a big love cuz they were so yasashii oneesans (specially Miu) with Rin's group

part 7 ranking:

LET'S GO KASSA!!! (i missed forgot the whole ranking)

#produce 101 japan

6 notes · View notes

angstmongertina · 6 months

Text

7KPP Promptober 2023: Day 14

This is my last post for this Promptober, but I have been CACKLING about writing it ever since I saw the prompt on the planning list for Promptober this year, courtesy of @teaandinanity, who somehow managed to FORGET what I have associated the word "winsome" with for AGES now. (It's I'm Not That Girl, from Wicked.) I love you so much, Tea! <3

So yes, I continue playing the VaLia 'verse, but rather than all of the fun romcom future stuff, I gotta address the fact that we threw two Lyonmancers into the same universe. And yes, I had MUCH fun with the angst.

Bonus: I tried to reference every verse of I'm Not That Girl, and also there's a SINGLE line of dialogue that was intentionally taken wholesale from Lyon's first date. Can you find it? :D

1.5k words of angst below the cut. Beware!

Lady Camellia of Jiyel.

At the Summit, it was helpful, perhaps even necessary, to identify delegates by their kingdoms, for ease of reference, particularly in the case of those lesser known delegates, such as herself. After all, with the varying titles and systems across the seven kingdoms, it was well-nigh impossible to remember every landholding as well as title, or the equivalents for those without such distributions of property.

For her, however, those four words also served well to summarize her entire status, all that she was to the Summit and indeed, the world as a whole. It was a simple fact that even the Queen of Jiyel herself likely did not recognize her name, to the extent that, if her home was familiar, it was likely for her ancestor’s scandal and not for any recognition of her own status.

She was, in short, not meant to be there.

She shouldn't have been there.

But there she was nonetheless, offered an opportunity stolen from a far more deserving lady, another simple fact that it would not do to forget.

Another simple fact that was, in fact, near impossible to forget, surrounded as she was by other, far more qualified, far more talented and ambitious and prepared delegates.

Indeed, there had only been a single conversation at the Summit thus far in which she had been able to forget the pressures of the environment, the consequences of saying the wrong thing, of accidentally offending the wrong person. In which she could relax and speak of Wang Yingming and Shang Yang without fear of boring or insulting her audience by her lack of charm or charisma or the multitude of other ways she did not belong.

In which, even as inadvisable as it may have been, she could be herself.

Perhaps that was why, when she next had the opportunity to explore the grand library, she found herself studying her surroundings more than she might otherwise in such a treasure trove. It was not a fully aimless perusal, of course—the rumors about the libraries in Vail Isle had reached even her small estate, and were one rumor which had proven to be more than accurate—but for the first time, strangely, impossibly, she found herself paying far more attention to the possibility of certain other delegates than to the writings in question.

And even try as she might, she could identify no explanation for the strange relieved smile, the sudden racing of her heart, when she heard a quiet, already familiar voice from behind a nearby bookshelf. Her steps quickening and perusal forgotten, she turned the corner, a greeting on the top of her tongue, and—

It caught, turning to sawdust in her mouth, at the scene before her.

Logically, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that he was not alone; logically, he would have no reason to be speaking out loud, muted but clear enough to be made out even from a distance, if he had been alone, and yet…

And yet…

In just the few days she had spent at the Summit, in the few days just seeing him at mealtimes, if he even attended at all, she’d come to realize that Duke Lyon was not a particularly social or expressive man, even by Jiyelese standards. He was certainly not emotionless, far from it, but he was a man of calm, of self-control that she envied, unlikely to display anything but placid stoicism in company.

Company excepting a bright-eyed, visibly passionate Lady Valeriya, it seemed.

Not that she could blame him; she too had discovered very early on that Lady Valeriya, despite first appearances, was a wonderful, clever young woman who blossomed under attention in a way that any insightful person would recognize, would be touched by. And if he could even be interested in a conversation with her, could even make her feel—

Well, then, surely it was only natural that the two of them together…

The only small mercy was that they hadn’t noticed her yet, captivated as they were by their discussion, something about the merits of direct action or unbiased observation. Then again, from what she had heard of the Duke, Kellem Ives seemed an appropriate topic of conversation, and one that seemed to resonate with his partner as well.

Though, considering the vivacious, downright smitten expression on her face, it seemed as if any conversation with him would resonate with her.

Lia drew a deep breath, holding it in until she could be sure that her exhale would be silent around the tightness in her throat, and turned away. Even as ignorant as she was towards navigating the intricacies of such social situations, even she could recognize when she would be interrupting.

Just as she could recognize instantly, after checking her shoulder against a shelf with an audible bump, when attempting to make an escape would be futile.

“Lady Camellia?”

The fact that it was unmistakably his voice, low and deep and with a hint of shock, somehow made it all the worse; she hesitated for a fraction of a second before turning and dropping into an immediate bow, grateful for the hair that slipped over her shoulders to help block her face from view.

“Good evening, your Grace, Lady Valeriya.”

To her immense relief, her voice held steady, if a touch too cool for the degree of intimacy she already had claim to, at least towards the lady. Unfortunately, however, its finality was not enough to dissuade further inquiry, though she couldn’t blame him for clinging to etiquette in the face of an unwelcome interruption. “What are you doing here?”

“I—” In spite of herself, she glanced towards him, his brow furrowed as if in genuine curiosity, before darting to Lady Valeriya, wide-eyed and still smiling, welcoming, and she had to look away the next second. Even she knew better than to truly believe herself welcome. “I came for the books.” She forced a smile, forced some semblance of a teasing lilt into her voice as she gestured towards the books by her side. “It is a library.”

That appeared to be enough of an explanation to satisfy him, but Lady Valeriya was still watching her in silence and she turned towards the nearest bookshelf, pulling a tome at random. “I apologize for interrupting your conversation. I believe this is what I was searching for.” Turning back, she bowed again, grateful for the opportunity to draw another hidden, shaky breath. “Please excuse me. Have a good evening.”

Thankfully, they allowed her departure without any additional comments, seeming to return to their discussion smoothly, as if there had been no interruption at all. But still, she retreated out of earshot as quickly as she could, a maelstrom of emotions churning in her stomach at the steady brightness of the voices behind her. A maelstrom of embarrassment and guilt and self-recrimination and—

And relief. How could she feel otherwise?

It wasn’t until she had escaped to the privacy of her room, where she was sure to be alone, where she had no chance of disrupting anyone else’s plans, that she allowed herself a moment to pause. That she was able to look down and find herself clutching the book so tightly she had nearly left imprints in the leather binding.

At least she hadn’t managed to crumple the paper underneath.

Taking another steadying breath, she stared down at it, forced each uncooperative finger to relax until she could see the title: From Princess to Peacemaker, a History of Princess Katyia. How very fitting, given her first interaction with Lady Valeriya. And considering…

Subconsciously, she turned her attention to her desk, and the sheaf of papers that her butler had placed there just a few days previously, after she had turned down the opportunity to host an event for the other delegates. She had thought its presence a misguided attempt to persuade her otherwise, but…

But she had seen the way Lady Valeriya’s eyes brightened to something warmer, something genuine, when discussing history, particularly related to Princess Katyia. And she certainly knew of Duke Lyon’s reputation for knowledge in subjects ranging from history to philosophy to mathematics.

Perhaps she could manage to do some good by hosting an event.

When he returned in the morning, she could attempt to convince her butler to squeeze in the event next week. If it went well, it could even provide her standing with Jiyel, her standing at the Summit, a much needed boost, in the only way that she could. She knew better than to believe she had any value, any chance, for a Summit match, but at least she could offer something. And besides…

Lady Valeriya had been through so much already, at such a young age. She deserved happiness, deserved a wonderful marriage to a good man.

And she knew wholeheartedly that Duke Lyon was, that it would be.

She was happy for her. For them both.

And she would prove it, to the world, and to herself.

#Tina rambles.#Tina writes stuff.#Tina plays 7KPP.#7KPP Promptober 2023 #Lady Camellia of Jiyel #VaLia verse

3 notes · View notes

rafor · 5 months

Text

Chapter 50 - Erebus - The Glitch

I asked, “So you kill dragons?” She shook her head. “No.” I pressed on, “But we were both attacked, and you tried to take my life.” She said, “It’s not what it looks like.” I narrowed my eyes. “But you told them that they had a successful hunt after you saw them coming with two dragons.” She explained, “We don’t kill dragons. We’ve just mistaken you for a shadow dragon.” I was still doubtful, and I said, “But you also attacked a wind dragon. I witnessed and heard you doing that,” she said. “We thought she was your ally. We didn’t know that she was the Queen.” I said, “Fine, then how come you are so skilled at fighting dragons?” She said, “You’re getting on my nerves, you know?” I said, “Oh yeah? I suppose I deserve some answers from those who just broke my spine multiple times, bit me, poisoned me, and attempted to murder me in every way possible.” She finally relented and said, “Fine, maybe we do kill dragons sometimes. But we do it in the most humane way possible. Your queen was going to be slain later, while still unconscious, and you wouldn’t have felt anything. Your case was an anomaly.” I said, “Thank you for the clarification. I have to admit that your techniques are very effective.” She replied with pride, “Thanks; I take pride in that.” The others chimed in, “Oh, please be quiet. We did all the work. I even got stabbed,” and he glanced at his legs and the multiple wounds I inflicted on him, so I said, “Fine, let me heal those too.” He said, “Thank you,” even before I did so. He then asked, “By the way, who are you?” I said, “I’m the husband of the Queen. My name is Nox. Please don’t inquire further. I’m not in the mood to answer questions.” He didn’t say anything, but his sister did: “So, what are the perks of being the husband of the Queen?” I said, “It’s not really about perks but more about responsibilities. You have to live and work in the palace, then create a political image of yourself, and every now and then, find a solution to problems like newcomers and cataclysms. It’s a lot. I could go on and on.” She said, “For someone who’s not in the mood for questions, you’re answering anyway.” I said, “Fine, I’ll keep quiet then until we reach our destination.” She said, “Oh, what a shame.”.

We walked in silence until we neared the village, where she halted us at a prudent distance. “Wait here,” she said. “I’ll inform the Guardian and return shortly if all is well.” I wondered who this “Guardian” was. I had never encountered or heard of such a title other than in the domain of Aura. But we obeyed her command and waited patiently. From afar, I glimpsed another shadow dragon conversing with her, and he seemed vaguely familiar. Then I realized I knew him. It was Erebus, whom I had not seen in ages. I was relieved that he was still alive, but he did not recognize me and initially gave me a cold glance. When she came back and beckoned us to follow, I saw him more clearly. He looked weary but determined. He went straight to the queen and examined her condition. Then they lifted her gently and carried her into a tent. I followed them closely, unwilling to let her out of my sight. They laid her down on a hammock that was covered with sheets and blankets. The hammock bore some symbols, one of which matched the queen’s mark. Perhaps that was how they identified her, or maybe they had some prior acquaintance with her. I could only speculate. Erebus turned around and noticed me standing there, watching them intently. He snapped, “What are you staring at?” I said calmly, “I’m just concerned for my queen, dear Guardian.” He frowned. “How do you... why did you call me Guardian?” I did not answer. I did not want him to figure it out, even if the earth dragon just called him that. He continued, “And what is a shadow dragon doing here?” I retorted, “Aren’t you one too?” He said, “Well, yes, but it’s different.” I said, “Fine, whatever you say. But I don’t appreciate your hostile reception.” The elder sister intervened and said, “Oh, I forgot to mention, if our venom had affected you, you would have been dragged here and interrogated.” I said, “Wait, what?” Erebus cut in, “If the venom had affected you? Are you immune to the venom?” I explained, “Not entirely. It just suppresses my element, but it doesn’t kill me.” He said, “That’s impossible without an antidote.” The elder sister said to him, “He’s telling the truth. He also survived me. And you know how I deal with shadow dragons.” He asked, “What did you do to him?” She said, “Why don’t you let him tell you?".

He looked at me with curiosity and asked, “What happened?” I misunderstood his question and started to recount our journey. “We were traveling for more than ten hours and had to land, then while Freya was guarding me, they..." He cut me off and clarified, “Not about that. I mean with her.” I realized he was referring to the bite mark on my neck and the bruises on my spine, somehow still visible even after healing. I corrected myself, “Oh, sorry, well, she bit me. I guess I got poisoned, and then they tried to crush my neck and also break my spine. For more than ten minutes, she held me in her death grip. My heart stopped beating, but I didn’t lose consciousness and survived.” He raised his eyebrows in disbelief and said, “Wow, this sounds so impossible.” The elder sister said, “He isn’t lying, I swear. He is immortal.” He shook his head and said, “Nobody is immortal. What are you?” I gave him a vague answer: “Well, maybe I’m someone you know of but can’t recognize because he didn’t have this form, dear Erebus.” His eyes widened as he recognized the name I called him. He asked me, “What was your name?” I said, “Nox.” He pressed on, “Your real name.” I said, “I think you can get it.” He guessed, “Immortal living being that used to have another form... are you Raphael?” I smiled and chuckled and said, “Congratulations, you got it. It’s really me.” He approached me in amazement and said, “I thought you would’ve never remembered me. You should be dead.” I said, “It looks like I survived multiple times.” He then noticed something else about me and said, “Anyway, you look exactly like someone I can’t really recall. Open a moment your wings.” I did as he told me. He inspected them and said, “There aren’t many dragons with such a pattern. Do you know who you look like?” I said, “Yeah, I know. His name starts with Z and ends with an O.” He said, “Exactly, Zeno. How do you know about him?” I said, “I was going to ask you the same question.” He explained, “Every Guardian knows about him. It’s said that he was the founder of the Guardians. You’re just like a reincarnation of him.” I said, “Erebus, I’m still a human behind this, you know?” He said, “I know, but it doesn’t really matter. I’m glad you’re still alive. How have you been doing all these years?” I explained, “I had a beautiful life with my queen. She fell in love with me, and then I did too. It’s a long story, and I’m a bit tired. I need to rest if possible. I could tell you everything later. Please.” He said, “Oh, of course, but you’ve really got to tell me everything about it in detail later.” I said, “I will, but you get too.” He hesitated and said, “I’m not sure if I can tell you about it, but we’ll see.” Disappointed, I said, "Oh, why not?” He said, “It’s complicated.” I said, “Nevermind, now where can I rest, please?” He showed me the way to another hammock not far from Freya’s and then said, “You’re lucky to be alive. Remember, I wasn’t joking when I said that you aren’t immortal.” I yawned and said, “It’s been twenty years, and even after multiple deaths, I’d think otherwise now.” I was trying to ignore him, but he said again, “I’m serious. You aren’t immortal. Nobody is.” I didn’t reply, but I nodded. I was too tired and didn’t want to keep on with the discussion. I had to rest and get over the experience.

#chapter #dragon #dragons #elements #fantasy #literature #mystery #story #poetry #adventure #the_glitch #the rise and fall of raphael

1 note · View note

simpingwriter · 1 year

Text

#15 'Blood Loss' Pt.1

Queen B Ford x OC

_______________________________

A/N: This isn't going to be a big fic, just a two parter. I read about people wanting something for Ford Tuantie from Queen B and I can 100% see why. I love his dumb ass too and boi do I wish we could done more than just hook up once ;[ As much as I love Ian, damn, Ford owns my heart.

Also, there is a bigger part of my version's MC in the play here that you can't really know about, since it's something that was supposed to be uncovered and be talked about in the Main Story (Ian x Leah) but yeah...to 99% it will never come to that and I like hurting my Characters too much to make a nicer alternative background :)

Enjoy~

_______________________________

It was just two weeks in of you and Bea joining Belvoire's Ranks that you were left all on your own. Winfrey Dorms was boring with only chicks around too, the only two friends you had here out on their own in the city. You didn't want to interrupt their bonding, so you told them to go on their own.

Instead, you slinked around near the Football field, somewhat sad that you couldn't join the team yourself. You "grew up" in a row of schools that, if both genders fit well and played well together, they could also form ONE team.

In Belvoire, the closest you got to the field of sports day was as a cheerleader. But in that case, you did your best to shine on top.

After all, who would you be if you wasted all these years of "flexibility" training in high-school?

Reaching the field, you already spotted the "Alphas" that made up the School's Football Team. Already a week in, you made the same realization you made all these years back in high-school: Next to starting petty cat fights, the Jocks are your favorite group to mingle in. And that even though you weren't any part less feminine than the rest of the girls at Belvoire. If you really wanted to look like a Barbie, you would outshine all their fake asses.

But listening to a group of all too adorable meatheads fight for your gracious feminine attention every time they spot you coming near them? What an adrenaline boost. What an ego boost.

Not that it was already big, rightly so too.

Your favorite of the bunch saw you from a distance already, the exhausted expression and the added frown almost immediately being wiped away, you loved the effect you had on him. (If he only knew the effect he left on you! The ugly inner turmoil he gave you.)

"Leah! Didn't think to see you here today! We saw Bea and Zoey leave Campus earlier, thought you went with them!" Ford eagerly began chatting you up, the Football formerly in his hands long long forgotten as he pushed it back into Luis' hands. He clearly didn't care that the others also had their eyes glued to you, but mostly your neatly hugged curves. After all, you did dress to secretly impress. Every day is a good day to knock some jocks off their feet. Even if they would never get a touchdown. None of them ever will…never.

"I left them to do their shop mingling on their own."

Ford looks just a bit shocked (and yet...relieved?), blinking at you, "Didn't I overhear some of the Zetas talk about the newest limited something stuff coming today?" It hurt your pride that he thought you're just like all these other fashion crazed Zetas. Nonetheless that you aren't even a Zeta.

"One of the most important things I want you to know about me, I don't run after and or follow each new trend like it's the hottest boy toy of the week. I actually have my own taste and stay with that one~"

You whisper the last sentence at him with a seductive grin, locking eyes with him as his mouth falls open wider. Are you a bitch for teasing him? Maybe.

You're interested in fashion just like you're interested in men: Stick to something, don't just throw it away because it no longer is the hottest talk. But once said fashion piece/man no longer treats you the way you deserve (with mutual respect), you will look for your new inspiration.

Oh well, not like you let any man be your inspiration for some while now anyways.

But oh my, does Ford inspire your fashion sense. That's a truly horrible sign.

Unfortunately he has a "rumor" following him, that he slept with half of Zeta and a bunch of other girls in Belvoire. Like hell would a man like him actually see more in you than a quick fling. Something you didn't do.

Not after Tommy, he showed you what real love looked like...

You promised yourself back then to never let someone reach your heart again, romantically at least. You were certain no man could do the things Tommy did for you. Be so caring. Be so loving. Be so gentle. Be so…perfect.

Maybe he was right when he said he ruined you and that he hated himself for that fact. But back then you told him that wouldn't matter as long you never had to look or think about another man the same way as you thought about him.

Unbeknownst to you, one week after Tommy's tearful rant about the nature of your undoubtedly inappropriate relationship…he was no more.

Dead.

Murderer.

Drowned in the algae and bacteria infested waters of the park's fountain.

That also marked the first day of your promise.

So why the fucking hell was a simple jock, one not nearly as educated or tactful as Tommy, slowly and unknowingly, scratching through your barriers already after two weeks?!

Ah no, he wasn't, right?

"Leah, you okay? You're spacing out a bit…and you look a bit pale too actually!" Ford inquired worried, eyebrows furrowed as he got closer. Oh god, n-no, stay away, pleaseeee. Not you. Why you?

But before you can even put up an ounce of protest, Eric butts in, "Yeah, he is right, you really don't look so hot…like, I mean, you always look hot, but right now- I mean, you're still hot right no-" "I think means he agrees, you should go sit down…" Carter saves Eric from digging his own grave any deeper as Ford escorts you to the closest bench.

He shortly left you on your own, your thoughts shortly put on hold as you caught yourself looking after him, guilt for teasing him creeping up inside of you. While all of the Jocks were extremely nice, Ford was the biggest sweetheart of them all.

He was one of the very first standing on your side the day Poppy tried to hand you your ass. Instead, you turned the tables and you remembered his voice clearly being the loudest as the crowd that formed beforehand started cheering and chanting.

Of all of the guys, you two also hung out the most. You just felt awful for him when you saw his grades, Man dresses sharp but damn, he got a serious case of smooth brains for some subjects. Namely Science, Biology and Chemistry. But he was decent at Law, being somewhat able to efficiently learn that with you. Though said learning sessions had a stupidly high chance of getting interrupted by some stupid chick trying to talk him up, which of fucking course always succeeded. (No you're NOT jealous, why should you be?!)

Which then left you to study on your own and him whining to you when he messed up another pop quiz the next day.

"Here, it's cold too. Courtesy of our ice box!" He smiles through his obvious concern for you as he sits down. As you unscrew the cap of the plastic bottle, from the corner of your eyes you still catch the slight shimmy he did, he planned to sit closer to you but apparently decided against it in the last split of a second. So now he sat a decent and proper distance...

. . .

Why the fuck are you disappointed again? Didn't you tell yourself you're not going to JUST hook up with people?

"You look-" "-Not so hot?" You interrupt quietly, reusing Eric's stumble from before, Ford holding his hands up in defense almost immediately as the others continue their training but undoubtedly keeping their eyes on you two, just as curious as the girls in the end.

"No, never, I mean…I think…no I mean it, you actually look great…amazing." He whispers the last part under his breath like you wouldn't hear it, scrubbing his shoes across the healthy green grass under and in front of the bench, shockingly nervous for someone so lucky with getting the girls all over Belvoire.

Wait.

He thinks you look amazing?

"What I mean…you just had this…what do you call it? Looking across yards stare?"

Thousand yard stare. Oh Ford, don't ever change…

"Sure, let's go with that. And well, I got my reasons I guess. Can't always be happy, smiley and ready to kick ass…" you murmur, sipping absentmindedly on the nearly frozen water bottle. But damn made the half frozen ice in it make the water taste like a gift from the gods. In all your campus wandering, you didn't even realize how hot it really was today. It was smoldering, any second now you would see a Fata Morgana you were sure!

"I won't push. Just please be safe, I wouldn't want you to collapse…i don't want to know what would happen if Poppy ran into you during such a thing…" His worry was back full force and you couldn't help but smile at him, he really was a huge sweetheart in the end. So it didn't surprise you when he gasped in short shock as you hugged him, his training gear sweaty and definitely not smelling clean. But you could care less, knowing you had people once again to talk to…if you would open up to them fully someday.

You looked a bit puzzled as the others suddenly stopped their training to hurry off the field, you're about to ask Ford about it when you heard a familiar clicking, only for the sprinklers of the field to start spraying cold water just as Eric got out of the hit line.

Afraid to get a little wet, are they?

Ford distracted by Luis jokingly punching his shoulders, muttering something you actively chose to ignore, you get an idea. "Carter, keep my phone dry, please?" You ask rhetorically with a mischievous grin as you place said object in his conveniently open palm.

Before anyone could really object to you moving so soon again after Ford placed you onto the timeout bench, you swung yourself off it and took off in a quick pace.

Right into the cold spray of water.

Oh and it felt great!

"You would be a horrible prison guard, Ford…" Eric points towards you, Ford only noticing when he saw you move past him and the spot next to him turning up empty.

"Come on, join me! Or are you all made of sugar?!"

Just as Luis is about to be first to enthusiastically rejoin you on the field, you see Carter look at Ford, also standing up already. He held Luis back with the hand not holding your phone, said Bro looking at him in something that looked like 'Why would you stab a brother in the back like that??' as he could only watch Ford join you on his own.

If that wasn't a true wingman, you don't know who is!

The fine spray of water lets you cool down enough to get feeling back in your limbs, picking up the forgotten football from the ground, throwing it up in the air, once. Twice. Thrice. Everytime a bit higher, till it hits nearly five seconds of air time on its way up alone.

During that, Ford had finally joined you, watching you catch it with staggering grace. "You catch like a pro." He noticed with a boyish smile as the water now pelted his face. Now you could no longer tell if it was sweat or sprinkler water making the dimples of his smile stand out as he angled his head downwards to look at you.

"Well, I did play in High-school actually…" You confess, with that Ford being the first in Belvoire to know a part of your background. And he seems to realize that, "Wait really?!", since if you had told someone else beforehand, gossip would have brought said secret to all their ears much much earlier.

"I did a lot of things before coming to Belvoire~" You sing playfully, quickly backing up from Ford before he could use your rare moment of openness to squeeze more secrets out of you. A woman needed to stay mysterious to stay interesting, no? Especially for a boy like Ford.

Not that you wanted that kind of attention…never.

Is what you told yourself to feel better on days like these.

With his nearly doe eyed smile, he realized your game and awaited your throw.

Not after you held out for so long…

With the best form you took with you from your old position on your old school team, you throw the ball towards him. It was a nearly perfect arch as it closed in on him. He didn't expect such a good throw still apparently, eyes wide as he hurried to back up more himself, eyes on the Football.

But not on the slippery ground.

And just as he caught the football, he lost his footing, almost comically slipping backwards, feet high in the air as he hit the ground with an 'oof!' and the last huff of air leaving his lungs as he ended up spread eagle.

And then he started laughing.

"Ooooooh, haha! I didn't expect that! Time for revenge!" As quick as he fell, he got back up.

From the benches, his teammates have to hold back their almost petty little chuckles, having a perfect view of his completely mudded back. After all, he just got his ass handed to him by a girl. Ouch.

He throws with all his might, groaning at the way he pulled half his body with it.

And realizes his mistake way too late.

While you were ready for a strong throw, you didn't calculate the fact that he felt like he had to show you up, girl or not. So this one flew way…way too quick!

The now wet ball slipped right through your grip and crashed directly into your nose. Any other girl or maybe even any other man would've lost their footing, but you took the blow with a quiet growl in your throat, flashing Ford a competitive half grin. And then you felt the first drop of blood hit your upper lip.

"Oh fuck! I'm so sorry! I forgo-" "Is that all you got, darling? I had harder throws hit me!" You interrupt with your snarky sass flaring up, one hand swiping away the now clearly rushing nosebleed, the other going for the ball.

"I hate it when people hold back just because I look like a fragile girl. That accounts to both the field and the bedroom!"

You catch Ford swallow and start to blush at your mention of your bedroom. But damn, he looked like he seriously felt bad right now.

Only one way to change that!

"CATCH!" You yell out out of the blue and in moments notice, it took Ford back to concentrate. He might not be the brightest tool in the shed (and tbh, you didn't care as long you could still find ways to talk to him about interesting topics!) but he knew his way around on the field still and knew when his concentration was asked for and needed.

Your now raging nosebleed was forgotten entirely as you two continued passing the ball, playing out small strategies you both seem to have memorized to the T, long enough for the rest of his wingmen to retire for the day and going to shower without him, Carter calling out that he left your Phone on the bench, leaving him alone with you. By now, your formerly just wet, white, dress was just as muddy as Ford's training shirt and shorts were, the front of your dress specifically covered in a fresh line of nose blood.

Thankfully not one Zeta or any other girl in particular got close to the Football field unless it was to swoon over the players during a game. Otherwise your rugged up ass would be all over The T already.

Oh but the Nosebleed didn't stay forgotten for all too long.

As it somehow didn't appear to stop.

Could your overly physical activity possibly be the cause of that? The rising adrenaline and blood pressure that kept your heart beating faster than what cars probably were allowed to go out on German highways?

No, never. Righ-

As if he saw it coming from a mile away, Ford saw you stagger before you did yourself, running torwards you with a shout of your name, ignoring your goddamn great throw, asshole!

"Hey, don't…you fucked up…your catc- huhh…?" The fact that you're actively falling only caught up with you halfway to the ground, but Ford magically caught you. Well, you still hit the ground, but Ford's upper body softened the blow significantly.

For a moment, okay a minute probably, you stay in that position, only moving your head to keep your already probably broken nose from being reformed and remangled a second time today.

Was it this quiet the whole time already?

Where did the other guys suddenly go?

You weren't sure if it was the just slightly serious blood loss or if you were just stupid in the end still, but ever since you lost him…you haven't felt as safe as today. On the muddy, wet and sweaty-warm chest of a jock after you crash landed due to a nosebleed he may or may not have caused beforehand.

"Thanks…" you mutter over the still busy sprinklers spraying you two from overhead, birds chirping idly in the nearby trees and butterflies on the flowers and in someone's stupid backstabbing stomach it seems.

"We should have stopped when it first started, this is all my fault…" Ford laments with a deep frown, helping you sit up. But all your hands grabbed at was him, steadying yourself against him.

Blood Loss makes people lose more than just Blood but apparently all of the build up walls that took years to perfect.

So when he asked if he should help you back towards Winfrey Dorms, you agreed nearly too eagerly, nodding like you just had the hardest edible of your whole school life, dizziness making it hard on moving any faster with your head.

You barely register him holding back a small smile as he doesn't just help you stand up and walk. Instead he uses his muscles for something beyond Football and does short work of your light weight, carrying you off the wet football field in both his arms…

________________

Note: Don't hold me at gun point to post part 2 tomorrow, by now yall should know how I play ;[

#choices you play #Queen B #qb #Queen B Ford #qb ford #Queen B Ford x Reader #Queen B Ford x OC #qb Ford x reader #qb Ford x OC

1 note · View note

savelit · 1 year

Text

THE QUEEN OF ATLANTIS.

Sarah Rees Brennan.

The poison tides came in one burnt evening in late summer, and everybody knew it was time for the princess to be sacrificed.

Princess Mede knew it as well. She had learned at her old Nurse’s knee to count the seconds of summer as they slipped by, to measure the growing chill in the air until the day arrived when the tide rushed on the shore like an invading army, black as ink and filled with stinking debris. Those who dared go down onto the black and ruined beach reported seeing things as strange and disparate as swathes of rotted silk, dead dogs with bloated bellies and dolls’ heads. The waters brought death to everything they touched.

The princess had to be sacrificed or the tides would keep coming and the harvest would be lost.

Mede was quite looking forward to it. She’d never been sacrificed before.

On the morning of the day when she was due to be sacrificed, Mede almost forgot all about it. She wasn’t used to being the princess. She’d always been a princess, of course. Her parents were the king and queen, she lived in the palace and Nurse called her ‘Your Highness’ in an accusing tone whenever she caught Mede daydreaming.

Her sister Genia had always been the princess, the one who people meant when they said ‘our princess.’ The courtiers dressed up in hunting robes and hid in the gardens around the palace in order to catch a glimpse of Genia without blinds and folding fans in the way. Genia was effortlessly gracious, wrote flawless poetry on blossom-white paper and had a sad, noble beauty that people always remembered. They carried a picture of her face away in their minds and woke to thoughts of beauty in the night, so she was far more beautiful in memory than in reality.

Mede was younger and much less impressive, which meant she was free to spend her time in the gardens without many people asking for her. She sometimes resented Genia and sometimes admired her, and usually loved her. Now Genia was in a far country married to a king rich and important enough to deserve her beauty, Mede missed her.

As a child she’d dreamed of miraculously becoming more important than her sister, of being the princess who unveiled and rode in parades. Now she was that princess, and the parades bored her.

Mede was able to lose all Genia’s former ladies-in-waiting and escape over the crest of one green hill. She was pruning a hedge when she looked up through the tiny leaves, veiling her vision like soft green lace, and in the distance saw the sun blazing high over the sea. That was when she remembered she was due to be sacrificed that afternoon.

She picked up her skirts and ran, worried that she was going to be late, and Nurse told her off as she scrambled into her golden gown. The ceremonial dress was gold-embroidered and the iridescent sleeves fell to her feet in layers that gleamed with all the colors inside a seashell. It did not flow over her body as it had over Genia’s but stayed in stiff folds, as if it was not used to her and could not get comfortable.

When it was time to go Nurse was still trying to put her hair up in the elaborate gold combs without wisps escaping. Mede was trying to remember everything Genia had told her about the ceremony.

It wasn’t meant to be very difficult. Her father would say the ceremonial words, offering his virgin daughter as a living sacrifice to the sea. All Mede had to do was agree and climb into the boat, then wait to be drifted back to shore. It was just a symbolic offering and for some reason it made the poison tides stop. It was nothing.

It was the first useful thing Mede had been asked to do for her country, a chance to be a real princess. And she was already late.

Everyone was gathered at the harbor, wearing bright clothes and standing solemn as if they were in the temple. Her father looked relieved when she appeared and her mother gave her a kind smile directed slightly to one side, as if Genia was still standing next to Mede and she felt she should divide her smiles equally.

Mede stood between her parents and smiled around at her people. They filed past her one by one, acting as witnesses. An old woman Mede bought seeds from gave her a kiss.

“Bless your sweet face,” she said.

Mede crushed down the uneasy urge to hide behind her fan and smiled for the crowd.

The vague idea she had of her people coalesced into the sight of these faces, some familiar, all approving. Beyond them the sea stretched in a glittering sheet of light. The sun made her gown sparkle so it looked like she was wearing a piece of the sea.

Her father took the golden cord and wrapped it around her wrists, tying them tight.

“In the sight of my people and for the love of my land, I hereby commit our princess to the sea.”

He gave her bound hands a reassuring shake, teeth gleaming in his beard, a private smile. As he continued the ceremony Nurse took a firm grip on Mede’s shoulders and corrected her posture as she had done a thousand times.

“Remember you’re a princess,” she said. “Do this with a little grace.”

Her father turned to her again. “My daughter, do you go a willing sacrifice into the sea?”

Mede held her bound hands out to the people and bowed her head. “I do.”

Her mother bent close, perfume sweet and breath warm against Mede’s face. “You’ll be home before teatime, my darling.”

Her father led her to the boat and helped her lie down on the bottom, head fitted inside the curved prow. The shape of the boat cradled her, the planks sun-warmed and time-worn beneath her. She felt the surge of the waves beneath the boat and the impact as it was launched.

She heard the cheers of her people like music or the sound of bells, distant already, the sound rising clear into the sky.

Then there was nothing but the shushing noise of waves as they lapped the small boat. Mede lifted her head, tried to snatch a last look at the harbor and home, but all she saw was the dazzling movement of light on water. She rested her head back against the bottom of the boat, closing her eyes. Afterimages of that light lingered in buttery streaks against the blackness behind her eyelids.

She crossed her hands over her breast and let it all wash over her, the light of the sun, the rocking of her boat and the sound of the sea all coming together in one great rush of sensation. She turned her head, resting her cheek against the warm wood at the bottom of the boat, and was lulled into drowsiness by the peace and the thought of going home having achieved something, served her people, been a true princess. Like Genia.

Everything was calm.

Mede woke and everything was chaos.

She sat bolt upright and grabbed for the side of the boat, feeling the lurch and hearing the rasp of the bottom against rocks. She’d woken sick and breathless, she must have been shocked out of sleep when the boat hit—

Splinters pierced her palms as she clung to the side, the wind freezing and the sea spray stinging her eyes. The sound of the waves had become a threatening roar and she could see nothing.

Her hair was in her face, a sodden veil that obscured the world. She blinked frantically, trying to focus, but then she felt the crunch of the helm against stone, felt the terrible tip of the boat and knew that it was too far gone.

The boat flipped and she hit the water with a smack, knowing nothing but icy shock for a moment before she realized that she was not drowning but on her hands and knees among the rocks.

The sea was stinking and the water felt oily, clotted with filth. Disgust dragged her up, so she was on her feet and staggering onto dry land before she could see.

Mede splashed through the water and stumbled onto dry land. Only when her knees buckled did she realize she had torn them open on the rocks earlier. She staggered but stayed on her feet and pushed the hair out of her eyes. Her hands stung as she did so and she stared down at them: the first thing she saw in this strange land was her own blood.

The rocks must have ripped the skin off her palms too. She curled her fingers over the open wounds and stared around. For a moment all she could see was blackness. Then she blinked a few times and began to piece the nightmarish fragments she could make out into some kind of sense.

The heaving darkness behind her was the sea and the darkness filled with pale wisps like ghosts torn to shreds must be the sky. In front of her loomed a still and unrelieved darkness. For a moment she took it for cliffs, but the shapes were wrong.

They were buildings. No matter where she had washed up, on what filthy poisoned shore, there must be some help to be found.

Mede strode forward and felt one of her wet, trailing sleeves catch on something. She did not stop to wrestle with the material, just let it rip away. The silk unraveled layer by layer past her elbow, leaving one arm naked, filthy and bleeding. She shivered in the cold and strode forward, and thought grimly that nobody would ever believe she was a princess.

The wind ceased howling as soon as she left the shore. Mede found herself on a broken road, breathing dead air.

The air smelled as horrible as the water, stinking as if the whole city was dead.

The city looked dead. The curving road looked like a smile full of broken teeth. Mede stumbled through the gaps and gazed desperately into every window she passed. They were all dark. There was no sign of light or movement in the entire city.

The buildings were porous stone, covered in a screen of slick black filth until they looked like they were made of rotting mushrooms. The silence seemed to lend the foul air a dense quality: Mede found it hard to take proper breaths, and even harder to see why she kept walking through these streets.

There was no hope to be found here. Nobody could live in this city. She was walking through a wasteland.

She did not turn around because there was nowhere to go but back into the sea. These deserted, crumbling buildings were no good to her, but up ahead there were the looming dark walls of a palace.

It was nothing like the palace back home, no graceful structure with curving roofs and surrounding gardens. It was a vast pyramid-like mass squatting like a giant black toad in the ruined city. The walls were covered in the same patina of dirt as the other buildings, but they were whole and promised shelter. She could rest there until morning came.

The gates to the palace were open. One gate was so open it was lying on the ground, half-hidden beneath the enveloping dirt. As Mede walked in she stood on it and the iron was so rusted that it crunched into something like ash beneath her feet.

The door to the palace was open too. It was a long narrow rectangle that made her think of a coffin.

She stepped inside and was engulfed by the stench of death.

The domed hall of the palace and the wide staircase might have been impressive once, but now it was all covered with the same greasy filth as everything outside. Now the hall looked like a dark cavern and the staircase like a pile of blackened bones.

All around her was that terrible smell, as if she was in the belly of some dead beast.

Mede touched her face and felt an unpleasant layer of coolness on her skin. The stone of this city was corrupt: what would happen to flesh and blood in this stinking air?

In that air a sound rang out, making Mede spin and almost fall. She clenched her fists and told herself not to be stupid. A sound was a good thing. It meant there might be help, even here.

The noise rose from a dark opening which Mede looked at and thought vault, and then told herself no, cellar.

The steps down to the cellar were dark and narrow. She tried to go down carefully, but when she missed her footing and grabbed at the wall to support herself her hands slid and found no purchase on the stone. She landed on her face in wet rubble, pulled herself up on her hands and knees and saw a rat scurrying away under a pile of fallen rafters and stones.

A rat. Mede gave a dry little laugh, strangled as soon as born.

“So,” she said aloud. “You and I are the only ones alive in this place.”

“That’s not quite true,” said a voice behind her.

Mede scrambled to sit up, to turn and see who was speaking, and her movement must have startled the rat. It streaked out of its hiding place and Mede saw its left side for the first time: saw the fur hanging like an open coat to show a flash of bone, the empty twisted blackness where an eye should have been.

The voice was dark and low, like polluted water running underground.

It said: “The rat’s not alive.”

Mede reached out in the oily water and grabbed a rafter. She stood with the rotten log grasped in both hands, and turned ready to swing.

He was standing at the bottom of the stairs.

When he moved she fled, running through the water to the wall. She braced her back against the stone and told herself she’d moved because she couldn’t leave herself unprotected on all sides.

The real reason was that she couldn’t bear for him to come any closer.

He moved in a terrible, liquid way, as if he no longer had muscles and sinews. He reminded her of an eel winding through mud.

He was more or less the shape of a boy, though all the details were wrong.

With every smooth, boneless step he took towards her, the smell of corruption grew stronger. She wanted to be sick, and then cry.

“You’re planning to hit me?” he asked softly.

Mede tried to sound braver than she felt. “Not if you leave me alone!”

“So I’ll leave you alone,” the monster said. “Then what?”

He sounded mildly curious. Mede swallowed, tasting bitterness.

“I don’t—I don’t understand.”

“You’ll be alone,” the monster said. “The storm will go on. There will be no way home. We’re all being quiet for you now, but once I tell them you won’t even speak to me my people will begin to stir. You will sit in this cellar alone and alive, listening to the sounds of the dead moving among you. No food grows in a dead land. You’ll starve here. Maybe you will go mad before you die. If I leave you alone.”

She thought she might go mad if he didn’t leave, that she might prefer to die alone rather than look at his face for another second.

He was talking sense, though. Even coming from the lips of a monster in a nightmare city, Mede could appreciate that.

“If you don’t?” she asked. “Then what happens?”

He coughed, a terrible sound that made her think of the possibility of—things wriggling, dislodged, in his lungs.

“Listen to what I have to say. Then the storm will pass and you can go home.”

“How do I know you’re not lying?” she whispered.

“I don’t lie!” he shouted, storming towards her, and his hideous eel-like grace and every dead, discolored detail of his face filled her vision, hit her like a punch to the stomach, knocked her down so she was crouching, sick and trembling, in that cold water.

She was still holding onto the rafter. She’d hit him if he tried to grab her, she thought with a kind of mad calm. She’d hit him and hit him until he was dead twice over.

She waited for the monster to try.

The monster said, a little awkwardly: “I’m—sorry.”

Mede froze, staring at the greenish black color of the hand at her eye level. Rotted lace hung across the back, like an old wet spiderweb.

“I lost my temper. Doing this again… It’s not your fault.”

“I want to go home,” Mede said, very low.

He sounded angry again, though trying to control it, as he answered: “You will.”

“Then I’ll,” Mede swallowed. “I’ll listen to what you have to say. I’ll—trust you.”

“You can,” the monster told her almost gently. “Your sister came back every time, didn’t she?”

All the breath left Mede in one quick, shocked gasp.

“Genia! She never said—”

“She wouldn’t have.”

The monster offered Mede his horrible hand. It was so clearly a courtier’s gesture, a gentleman ready to help a lady to her feet, that Mede was more startled than horrified. She stared at him with her mouth open and he snatched his hand away.

He stepped back, and she thought that was truly gentlemanly. He could see she did not want to be close to him and he was obeying her wishes without a word or a look of reproach.

Mede hesitated, then uncurled her stiff fingers from around the rafter and let it slip away into the water. She rose and stood unarmed before the monster.

“Come with me,” he said.

The monster led her into the domed hall and then up a winding staircase. There was an iron railing fixed in the stone wall that might once have been beautiful, a rendering of an iron vine trailing tiny iron flowers, but now it was blackened and parts were missing. Mede did not touch it. She just took care as she climbed.

Looking at the monster’s back was much better than looking at his face. One shoulder was higher than another and his hair hung in lank damp locks, but that wasn’t so bad. If it hadn’t been for the smell, she could have pretended he was alive.

“What’s your name?”

“Mede,” she said cautiously.

“That’s a nickname like Genia. Is it short for Medea or Andromeda?”

Mede actually had forty-seven names inscribed on a scroll in carmine and gold. She tried to visualize it, but it had never seemed very real to her. She did not need a piece of paper to tell her what her name was.

“I don’t know. Does it matter?”

“It might,” the monster said quietly. “The names belong to very different stories.”

Mede did not care about stories. She cared about her sister.

“Genia,” she said hesitantly. “Why would she not have warned me?”

“Because she is ashamed of her country and ashamed of herself,” the monster answered.

“Because she knows why the poison tides come in.”

They reached the top of the stairs and Mede found herself facing a huge window. Outside the barren lands spread black and ruined before her sight, the city of roads like shattered teeth and broken towers like stumps where limbs should have been. The lands beyond might once have been fields and were now a putrid swamp.

She clung to the crumbling windowsill. “What happened?”

Mede was desperate enough to look directly at the monster. He was standing to one side in the shadows, looking out the window. His head was slightly bowed, his face in profile: it was not so bad.

“There was war between our countries, once,” he said. “We were alive then, and your country was different too, young and fierce. It was all—so long ago. I don’t remember what it was about. All I remember is that both our countries were weak and ruined by war, and there seemed no way for either side to win.”

He inclined his head and Mede was shocked again by how courtly the gesture was. She might have been standing on a palace balcony with a noble who knew her well enough to make his ‘Shall we go?’ a silent question.

She went with him down a long gallery, the walls lined with frames that seemed at first to contain dark mirrors.

On closer inspection, they were portraits. This was a royal gallery, like a sad ghost of the one at home. Mede studied the pictures as they passed rather than looking out the windows. She was dreading the end of the story.

The monster did not seem eager to continue, either. He stopped and looked at the picture she was looking at. It might have felt like she was a guest being shown around a strange palace, if she had shut her eyes.

She glanced at his shoulder, not able to force her gaze up to his face, and nodded at him.

“A peace treaty was drawn up,” he said softly. “A marriage was arranged.”

Mede had expected an account of a cataclysmic battle, the blood-soaked conclusion to the story. She almost laughed with relief.

“Oh, a marriage!”

The monster’s voice sounded a little startled by her laugh, a little relaxed by it. “Yes, between the crown prince of my land and the eldest princess of yours. The princess was very beautiful,” he added, as if wishing to be fair.

It was a small thing: that the story was turning out well, that the monster was prepared to be pleasant, but it felt as if someone had opened a door a chink and let light in on utter darkness.

Mede was so glad she felt a little silly.

“What was the prince like?”

“Oh.” It was strange hearing a monster laugh. “He wasn’t so bad.”

She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye and saw him nod towards the picture before them. Mede examined it more carefully and saw that it was a young man.

The painting wore a veneer of filth and a tracery of fine lines, but under the veil of time and decay she was just able to make out a face.

He had shadowy eyes and rather a sweet smile. The artist must have been good, Mede thought, to have captured a face that usually kept its secrets in an unguarded moment and left an impression of how fleeting that moment had been. The details of the scene were lost, but the prince seemed to be striding long-legged through a green wood with a peregrine falcon on his wrist. The falcon’s wings were spread open, ready to fly, and the prince’s long dark hair had fallen curved across his face, lifting in a long-gone wind as if it was a wing too.

“He wasn’t so bad,” Mede agreed. “So what came next? Tell me what happened to the prince.”

The monster leaned in a little too close. He was not near enough to be inappropriate for a gentleman but too close for a monster, his cold cheek almost brushing hers and sending shocks of horror down her spine.

There was no more laughter between them now. He whispered in her ear, his voice chilly and terribly gentle, so low it seemed intimate. It gave her the feeling of a dead hand stroking her hair: it tied her stomach in knots.

“Should I?” the monster murmured caressingly. “Do you really want to know?”

Mede looked up at him in fear, and knew.

It was some trick of dim light or moving shadow cast by the tattered, tossing clouds in the stormy sky. It smoothed the monster’s straggling hair and his rough skin, cast a faint gleam on his dull dead eyes. Under the puffy, discolored skin she could make out high cheekbones, and a look: all hope lost and all secrets kept. She recognized a certain tilt to his unsmiling mouth, the curve of his face.

“Oh no,” Mede pleaded.

“Oh yes,” said the prince.

Mede turned away from the picture and the monster, leaned against the stone wall and swallowed a few times, her throat aching with no way to ease it. She knew what she should have realized from the start, that the monster’s story could have no happy ending.

“The princess,” she said, her mouth dry. “What happened to the princess?”

“Come. I’ll show you.”

Mede looked around and saw he had stepped back all the way across the room, and pushed open a door. A dark flight of steps lay beyond it.

He gestured toward the door and she was surprised for a moment without knowing why. Then it came to her: a gentleman would have held the door for her and ushered her through. He had offered her his hand in the cellar, shown her into the gallery. She had come to expect he would act like a gentleman.

He obviously knew what a violent contrast his portrait presented. He’d seen the knowledge strike her like a blow.

Like a gentleman, he was holding aloof so as not to distress her further.

Mede looked at him directly, and did not look away. He was staring at the floor and there was no light softening his face, but she kept looking and pieced together the fragments of what he had been: a knife-bridge nose, hooded eyelids. He’d been well-made once, and was still tall.

Pity went through her like a blade, scything away horror.

“Won’t you,” she said, the words tumbling suddenly out of her mouth. “Won’t you give me your arm?”

His eyes snapped up to her face. She thrust out her hand abruptly, before she could lose her nerve under that dead gaze, and gave him an encouraging nod.

“If you please,” she said breathlessly.

He straightened up and smiled at her, the smile from the portrait undimmed by horror or the years. It was slow and bright, a little crooked, tentative more than shy. It lit up his face like sunlight turning a ruined city to gold.

“Of course, my lady,” said the prince.

He made her a sweeping bow and offered her his arm. She took it at once, not allowing herself to hesitate, and held it tightly. She refused to let herself flinch.

It was not like touching living flesh, but his shoulder was a broad solid support behind hers.

There was comfort as well as terror in this.

They climbed the stairs of the tower together.

At the top of the tower there was a room, and in the room there was a bed, and on the bed there was a princess.

The room was high above the dead city and untouched by its corruption. The walls were white and softly curved: pearly, and the bed was draped with gauze and silk flowers. It was a boudoir for a royal bride, and amid the veils and roses the royal bride lay sleeping.

The dust of years was grey on her face. There would be no waking from this sleep.

“She looks like—my sister,” Mede whispered.

“Yes.”

The prince moved to the window, gazing out at his city. He didn’t seem much interested in the dead princess. Of course, he would have had his chance to look his fill at her.

“The heralds said she was beautiful,” he remarked, and Mede understood him a little better.

The indifferent lounging against the window was about as real as his careless stride towards her in the cellar. His shoulders were hunched in a little, his face averted because he did not want to look at the princess.

This mattered to him.

“I was happy to hear it. I was—nervous about the wedding, about being tied to someone who had been brought up to hate my people, but I liked the idea of a beautiful barbarian princess.”

The short, cynical laugh was obviously forced. “I wasn’t half as nervous as I should have been.”

“What happened?” Mede asked. “Tell me the end of the story.”

The prince slanted a look over his shoulder at her, secretive and almost amused. She could not tell if there was any possibility of sympathy in that look.

“Oh, like all good stories, it ends with a wedding.”

“Oh, you—you married her?” Mede said. “Oh.”

The prince hesitated, and then used her name for the first time. “Yes, Mede. I married her.

“I said that she would be part of my country and that watching over her would be the duty of everyone in the land, and my duty most of all. She promised she would be part of my country and that as she prospered or failed, so would the land. She kept her promise. We went up to our wedding bower and—I remember the precise moment. My people were cheering outside the window. There was blossom in the air. She was lying on the bed. I was—unlacing my shirt. She said a spell. She damned herself and my country with her. She killed herself and left my people, dead, to watch over her, dead. She spoke words I did not understand and suddenly everything was death. And since then, every day, everything has been death. Nothing has ever changed.”

Mede looked out at his city of the dead and then back at the princess’s still, lovely face.

Genia had returned from her first sacrifice more beautiful than ever, as if her beauty had been through a fire of pain and come out tempered into something finer. Mede thought she understood that now.

“We sent our princess to destroy your people,” she said slowly.

The prince inclined his head. “I used to hate you all for that. But it was all so long ago. Your country was different, then. It’s beautiful now, isn’t it?”

Mede thought of the light through the leaves in her garden.

“It’s beautiful. But the poison tides still come.”

“Everything changes in time,” said the prince. “Everything but us.”

“Because of us,” said Mede. “And every year the tide comes from your country to mine to—to claim a sacrifice who will hear the story and bear the shame for her people?”

The prince held her gaze in silence and, at last, shook his head.

“Why would we need a princess as an audience? The tides come to claim a promise. They come to claim me a true bride.”

Mede stared at his face, feeling horror flood her as if she was seeing it for the first time.

“You?” she whispered. “A bride?”

“Me,” the prince whispered back, in a faint terrified voice that was a bitter mockery of hers.

Then he looked down, the corner of his mouth turning down too. “I’m sorry.”

“Oh no, it’s not—” Mede began, and stopped. Her only alternatives were to insult him or lie.

“What use would a bride be?”

The prince coughed, a wet rasping sound that made her uneasily aware of all the decay within him. She wanted to laugh at the sheer macabre idea of it, a bride, for something like him. She wanted to cry.

“The theory is that a true bride would break the spell. Make these dry bones live,” said the prince, and stared at his slimy cuffs. “Or make sure the city sinks under the waves and never rises again.”

“Those are very different things!”

“I don’t know. Life or death. Either one would be an answer.”

“It would be a help if you knew which one was the r-right answer!”

The prince gave her a single look. There was a quality of stillness about him, like one of the artificial pools in her garden. She hung lanterns over those pools, and nothing living ever disturbed the smooth bright surface of the waters.

His look held her still too.

“Why?” he asked. “Would you be willing, if you knew which it would be? Every year the tides come to you, and a princess comes to us, and every year a princess turns away.”

“My sister,” Mede said. “She always did the right thing.”

“She always said the right thing,” the prince said. “She looked the part, but she couldn’t play it. She was just like all the others: she came, and she saw, and she did nothing!”

“Have you,” she started, and her voice cracked and broke on her dry tongue. “Have you ever been tempted to keep one by force?”

“Yes,” murmured the prince.

His voice was soft, at a safe remove, but in one swift terrible movement he came toward her. He seemed to be faster than sound for an instant, so his voice was still pleasant and distant while his face was inches from hers and his cold hand was clamped on her wrist.

“We have been betrayed. We have been doomed to a rotting eternity. And every year I have to watch girls like your sister turn away!” The prince’s eyes burned: they almost looked alive.

“So yes,” he whispered. “I’ve been tempted.”

His grip on her wrist tightened. She felt the chill of his fingers deep in her bone. She wondered, thought balanced on the edge of panic, what he was going to do to her.

He lifted her trapped hand and bowed his head over it. “I do not have much. But I like to think I have some honor left.”

He released her wrist and stepped back.

Mede took a faltering step towards him, then bowed from the waist. “I beg your pardon!”

“I’m sorry,” the prince said. “You have been very courteous to me. It was unforgivable of me to scare you.”

They stood for a moment silent and apart. Mede looked at the prince and thought about her sister, Genia the beautiful and noble, the one true princess. She had heard his story and turned away.

A princess of Mede’s own country had sworn an oath and broken it, and the poison tide came to them because of that. The tide would keep coming, tainting their land with death and dishonor every year. She thought of her beautiful serene country, of her rolling hills and perfectly designed gardens. The evening glory was dying in her garden now, but there would be firebushes throwing out blazing colors soon.

Her country would never be free of shame because no princess would be true. No princess would make a real sacrifice.

“You can go home now,” the prince said. “The storm is dying. The boat will be waiting.”

Mede thought of the calm safe promise of harbor and home, and thought she understood Genia. All she had to do was walk away. Nobody would ever know, except her and the dead.

Everyone would welcome her home and tell her she had done her duty.

It would be a lie, though.

“Wait,” Mede said, and found her voice was too shaky to go on. She felt as if she was trying to stand up in her boat during a storm, already dangerously unsteady and about to be knocked off her feet and hurled into dark waters. She took a deep breath and tried to find a calm center, a place in the storm of her own fear where she could stand and think.

There was no such place. Her voice was still wobbly when she went on: “I haven’t given you an answer.”

The quality of the prince’s silence changed. It had been the quiet of obviously familiar despair, but suddenly there was no possibility of gentleness about him. His body was tense, his gaze hooded and intent.

“The poison tides would never come again. And we—we might live.”

The prince nodded once, carefully as if she was a wild animal who might bolt at a sudden word.

Mede took a deep breath of bitter air.

“Then for the love and duty I owe my land, I come to you a willing s-sacrifice.”

She had meant to sound so dignified and resolute. She hated herself a little for the way her voice trembled on that last word.

The prince hesitated, hair fallen in his face, and she saw his lowered eyelids, heard the quick intake of breath and realized he was shy. She moved towards him before she remembered he was a monster.

“You could go now,” he said, speaking very quickly. “You could go and live and—you could come back next year. You’re very young. You don’t have to do this now.”

The idea of going home was like a drop of honey spilled on her tongue, filling her mouth with sweetness and her mind with longing. She closed her eyes for a moment and imagined her garden.

“If I turn away once,” she said, very low. “I won’t come back.”

Mede thought of her sister’s sad face. Perhaps Genia had meant to return and do the right thing.

She opened her eyes and the vision of her garden was lost. The monster’s face was before her. She thrust out both her hands.

“I am for you,” she said. “Tell me what I have to do.”

The monster did not touch her, but there was a look on his face that she thought might mean he would have liked to.

“Wait,” he said, and turned away.

He walked towards the bridal bed where his sleeping princess lay and Mede watched with a strange feeling in her chest she could not quite make sense of. Surely it was impossible to be jealous of the dead, and ridiculous to be jealous about the dead.

The prince stooped over the bed, brushing back a tress from the princess’s face gently, as if he was afraid she might wake. He slid the ring from her finger as he touched her lips with his own. Once he had taken the kiss and the ring he drew back just a fraction and watched her as if at some time, long after death, bitterness had suffered a sea change into something painful and patient.

“Goodbye.”

Under the weight of their stares the princess crumbled to dust. Soon all that was left of her beauty was the dull shine of dust on her bridal bed and the gleam of a ring in the prince’s dead hand.

There were three cups on the end of the bed. The prince picked up the tiny tray and brought it to her. There had probably been sake in these cups once, but now there was nothing but dust.

There would be no priest to perform a purifying ritual for them, shaking his staff over all present. There would be no chance to present offerings to the sacred tree. It was just the two of them in this dead city. It felt like a nightmare of two children pretending to get married.

She pretended to drink three times from each cup, and so did he. The taste of dust clung to her lips.

The tips of their fingers almost touched reaching for the cups, but not quite.

She held herself braced for his touch, feeling like a soldier going into battle, determined not to betray her country. A soldier should not show fear. A bride must not show disgust.

She expected his skin to be as slimy as the castle walls but his hands were dry, if rough. His touch felt as impersonal as the slide of the metal ring onto her finger.

She crooked her finger to keep it on and looked up to find him still bowed over her, and felt a jolt in her chest when she realized what was about to happen.

When he touched her again, it did not feel impersonal. He held her arm where it was covered with cloth, still being a gentleman, and the fact she could rely on him to be courteous made her relax. She put her hand on his shoulder, feeling her face grow a little hot. She had never been this close to a man not related to her before.

He lowered his head very slowly and she knew he was trying to be polite, that he pitied her and she pitied him too. She thought the mutual pity had formed a connection between them, had become warm enough to be called sympathy. She turned her face up to his and met his lips, shivering at the thought of the monster stalking her in the cellar, the prince smiling in his picture frame, the smell of corruption in her nostrils and the comfort of his supporting touch on the dark stairs to this room. And this touch, now.

He did not have to breathe, but she did. She came to the realization that she needed air at the same time that she realized that her arms were around his neck.

She stepped away quickly. He did not try to stop her.

“Is that—all?” she asked. She could not look at him, this time out of shyness rather than horror. “Are we—”

“I think so,” the prince replied, and hastily added: “Thank you.”

She had never heard him sound so young. It made her smile.

She stopped smiling as she asked: “When will we know if—what’s going to happen?”

“Sunrise,” the prince said. “It shouldn’t be long.”

“Oh,” said Mede.

She remembered Nurse’s stories of monsters and brides and curses. It occurred to her that these stories never mentioned a long wait, or the awkwardness of being newly married to someone very strange.

Mede did not feel entirely steady on her legs, so she went and sat on the bridal bed. She froze amid dust and lace when she thought of how that must look.

He was still a gentleman. He sat on a chair by the bed, and they looked at each other a little desperately. Looking at him from a distance and dispassionately, she could not quite believe what she had done.

She looked down at the embroidery on the bed, and curled the fingers that had clasped his neck into her palm.

“What things did you like to do when you were…” she began.

The question seemed ridiculous, but she had to ask. She’d married him, after all, and if everything went well the country would be healed and he would be beautiful and what, oh, what would they talk about?

“I had a falcon,” the prince said slowly, as if trying to remember. “I liked to go hunting. Not to go hunting—not to kill—but to have some time on my own, to be quiet. If—I could show you how to carry a falcon on your wrist.”

Mede’s hand was restless on the embroidered sheets, moving across the silk without her own permission.

“I like gardening,” she said. “If I’d been a man and not a princess, a master gardener told me, I could have been apprenticed and designed my own. I know the names of every plant in my garden.”

The prince saw what she was trying to do. He reached out and lightly took her hand.

“You might like to help rebuild the gardens here,” he said. “We could go out to be on our own. You could teach me all the names.”

Mede smiled without looking up. “I might like to carry a falcon on my wrist.”

He told her, his voice still slow with the effort of recollection but becoming faster and more certain, about takagiri and tiercels. She told him about the crape myrtles still flowering at home, about how she always looked forward to winter and plum blossoms. They held on to each other’s hands and she had the thought, small and hopeful as a blossom in winter, that there might be a happy ending to this story after all.

The first pale fingers of the rising sun came through the window as they were talking, and Mede looked up at his face.

She was braced to see someone she did not know, to see the prince from the portrait, and for a moment she was relieved to see her prince’s familiar face. Then she realized what that meant.

They held hands more tightly than before as they looked out of the window at the rising waters. The sunrise was tinting the waves and the black ruins of the city were transformed under the glittering ocean: the city was turning into gold.

The city would lie at the bottom of the sea forever now, all the nightmares washed away. The dead would become pearly bones and the palace would be a shadowed cavern full of treasures and mysteries. The poison tides would never come again.

Mede was so scared.

“Your parents,” she whispered, thinking of her own parents, of leaving the harbor and her mother telling her she would be home in time for tea. “Do you want to say goodbye to them?”

Her prince’s voice did not waver. It stayed to the end a gentleman’s voice, promising protection and keeping his promise.

“Do you think I would leave you here alone?”

“No. Thank you,” she murmured, her ears full of the whispering of the waves, her eyes almost blinded by gold.

This was being a princess: paying the price of someone else’s treachery, making the best of a strange marriage, going down with a city.

Remember you’re a princess, said Nurse’s voice in her mind. Do this with a little grace.

Mede reached out and took hold of her prince’s arm, tugged him towards her and onto the bed. She sat leaning against him for a moment, breathing in and finding a moment of peace. She could accept this.

She spoke quietly, her voice almost drowned by the sound of the sea.

“It’s our wedding day,” she said. “Kiss me again.”

0 notes

pomfiores · 2 years

Text

how do you die (as a royal) ?

A Happy and Healthy Life

Against all the odds, you actually are not killed early in your life. You survived it all, perhaps on purpose or on accident, but you did not do it without help.

The person you were arranged to marry, regardless of how the both of you felt at the beginning of the relationship, fell in love, and they have protected you from every last threat that dare come your way. Be it poison, assassins, friends, family, you feel as if with them, you have nothing to fear. You go on to have a happy and healthy life with your spouse, having many children and making your kingdom as prosperous as it's ever been. At the age of 87, your spouse dies peacefully in their bed, with you and all your children around, a year later, you too pass away peacefully in your bed, joining your beloved in death.

Your death was a gentle one, and you accepted it with grace, everyone in the kingdom mourned for you.

tagged by: @ilestlesoleil thank u! rip charles. :( a gruesome end. tagging: @cxrsedstar. @lachrymosestorm, @yukikorogashi, @prsonatm, @hashtaghunter, @stcries, @tclesnmirrors, @inkalized, @swordrisen, @juwul, @crimsonfacets , @noctechoro, @mirrortold, @movingcastlle and whoever else see’s this if you didnt do it yet.

#boring. but the queen deserves it. :relieved:#a beautiful life.#i think he'd be poisoned if anything.#the drama of it.#im sure there were attempts but everyone fights for their queen :triumph:#vil is well loved i think. only natural that he's mourned KFJAS #they were already mourning for him after his overblot

10 notes · View notes

band--psycho · 2 years

Text

Jax Teller x Daughter!Reader-Always Know Your Worth

For the lovely @beth-gallagher22

I hope you all enjoy this!💛

Warnings:Being drunk, controlling boyfriend

“Dad I’m fine-”

“You can’t even walk in a straight line,” Jax snapped back, he couldn’t believe the rage he felt coursing through his veins; not just because of the state his house was currently in, but mainly because of the state his daughter was in. Her makeup was smudged all over her face, her words were slurred and her eyes were so glazed over that he could tell just from one look how intoxicated she was.

“Y/b/n has been looking after me,” Y/n began, stumbling slightly as she hugged her boyfriend. But all Jax could do was roll his eyes and scoff at her words.

“I think he only had one way of looking after you,”

He noticed Y/n go to say something but it was the boys voice next to her that he heard, only adding to Jaxs rage, “Actually, I-”

“I wouldn’t finish that sentence if I were ye, laddie,” Chibs interrupted, noticing his friend's anger; as a father he could imagine how Jax was feeling, and knew that if the boy carried on, it wasn’t going to end well for him.

“I think it’s time you went home,” Jax stated,through gritted teeth, walking towards the couple.

As the other sons accompanied Y/b/f name outside, Jax stood next to his daughter, his eyes filled with disappointment, “Go to your room,”

~~~~~

It was a new day; and Jax had now calmed down a little, he went to go and see how his daughter was. He was just about to knock on her door when he heard her crying; followed by a familiar voice shouting at her through her phone.

“Your dad and his club are just a bunch of nutters, it’s not a surprise they’ve all been in prison, they just fly off the handles at the smallest thing!”

“They were just looking out for me; you said it was only gonna be a few of your friends-” Y/n started, calmly, trying (and failing) to hold back the tears.

“Oh so now this is my fault?!” Her boyfriend yelled, making her heartbreak even more as she attempted to stay calm, not wanting to argue with him.

“I’m not saying that, I just-”

“I thought you were fun, Y/n, turns out you’re just a boring goody two shoes. No wonder you don’t actually have any friends to invite to parties,”

Just like that something snapped in Y/n; she’d spent the majority of her morning arguing with Y/b/n, even though the party was his idea, he’d taken no responsibility for it, blamed her for it all, and had continued to talk to her like utter shit.

And she’d had enough of it.

She deserved better than that and she knew it.

“It was your idea to throw the party, when I said there were too many people you ignored me and handed me drink after drink, telling me to trust you and that you’d get rid of them all soon,”

A proud smirk came over Jax's face as he heard his daughter stand up to her boyfriend.

“We’re done,” Y/n said, hanging up the call quickly before he changed her mind with his manipulating words.

A relieved sigh left Jaxs lips at her words; as he walked away from her door; he would talk to Y/n later, but he knew she’d need her space. Right now, he had to get the club together and teach the boy who was controlling his daughter a lesson; one that he’d remember so he didn’t treat another girl like shit.

Taglist:

@xacatalepsyx @i-just-read-stuff @yn-ymn-yln @05supernatural20 @heyitskat101 @coldlilheart @skyofficialxx @beeroses @dazzledamazon @snazzysterek @jitterbugs927 @sassymox @rayslittlekitten @https-lorna @hotdamnhunnam @little-diable @rebelwrites @poor-unfortunate-soul-85 @xbreezymeadowsx @may85 @thexhostess @flanagirl @abadamn @oskea93 @bl3333h @tempt-ress @choochoo284 @msmarvelknight @meteora-fc @it-was-all-a-beautiful-dream @invisible-ninja @the-mayan-queen @redpoodlern @kishie8 @innerpaperexpertcloud @ariellostatci @rosieposie0624 @sia2raw @mrsstevenbuchananstark @alexxavicry @princesssterek @book-dragon03 @bookworm1767 @daphnen21

#jax teller #jax teller imagine #jax teller x daughter!reader #sons of anarchy imagine #sons of anarchy x reader #jax teller x reader #jax teller imagines #soa #soa imagines

257 notes · View notes

midnightmusings-et-moi · 3 years

Text

mirrorball

Remus Lupin x femReader fluff

A/n: this idea came to me while listening to Mirrorball by Taylor Swift- it’s such a 🥰 song which I want to fall in love to so here’s a fic manifesting that lmao (also the gif isn’t mine;credits to the owner)

Warnings: kissing (?), Sirius being suggestive (what’s new) so 13 + , slight insecurity on part of the reader, FLUFFFFF, will make you want to attend the Yule Ball really badly

The stairs leading down to the great hall were carpeted with a luxurious royal blue. The marble railings had pearls and holly twisting around them and the air carried a serene scent of honeysuckle. Chandeliers were suspended above, casting a warm light on the delighted students. Hogwarts really was beautiful during the Yule Ball.

Taking a deep breath, you let the atmosphere calm your nerves. You straightened out your white silk dress that cut off a little above your knees in the front and cascaded down to the ground at the back. The straps closed in on where your neck and shoulders met, forming a gracefully simple halter design. Lilly had convinced you to let her do your hair- she was probably more excited than you about the fact that your crush, Remus Lupin, had asked to take you as his date to the Yule Ball. You were glad you succumbed to her incessant pleads because your hair was tied up in an elegant bun and had tiny pearls scattered across the auburn locks.

Ever since third year potions when you and Remus happened to sit together, you knew you were starting to really fall for the brown haired boy. You doubted he felt the same for you though- he was intelligent, attractive, kind and...perfect. There were so many gorgeous girls in Hogwarts so what made you special to him? Lilly however, would practically yell at you for being so “blind”. “YOU BLIND IDIOT HOW DO YOU NOT SEE HOW HE SMILES SO GOOFISHLY LARGE AT YOU?! REMUS IS HEAD OVER HEELS FOR YOU BUT YOU BOTH ARE BLOODY COWARDS TO DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT!” she would often say.

When he asked you to the ball, you felt hopeful about things...maybe just maybe he felt something too? Or maybe he wanted to take you as a friend? All these questions buzzed through your head as you slowly made yourself down the stairs. Your fingers grazed the holly clad railings as a swarm of hippogriffs raced inside your stomach. Shaking your head to clear your thoughts, you reached to bottom of the stairs where the two of you had agreed to meet. You stretched your neck and scanned the room, searching for the boy you had crushed on for nearly two years.

There he was, standing with James, Sirius and Peter who were all laughing merrily at a joke. Remus looked breathtakingly handsome. He was the tallest amongst them all, his light brown hair that you had always desired to stroke was pushed back, his dress robes were navy blue and fit him perfectly. His face was etched with the scars of his secret which you admired- you always felt honored by the fact that you were one of the people he trusted enough to tell. Remus’ eyes sparkled as he chuckled at something James had said.

All of a sudden you felt your breathing quicken and your heart ache. You couldn’t do this. ‘Am i stupid?’ You thought to yourself, ‘Why would he ever like me when he could have any girl he wants? I’m just an ordinary girl- he deserves better than me.’ Consternation clouded your mind and right then you had resolved to go back to your dorm and if not you would probably throw up on him in a state of anxiety. Now that would be embarrassing. It isn’t like Remus would miss you anyways right? He could just get another girl at the last moment to be his date- and that lucky girl would all too willingly oblige.

Just as you turned on your heel to go back up, you felt a warm hand wrap around your shoulder. You turned you head in confusion and you eyes were met with sparkling hazel ones- it was Remus. “ Y/n! You look gorgeous-wow” His sweet yet husky voice rang out, his eyes taking you in. Heat rose to your cheeks at his words. ‘He’s just being nice he doesn’t mean it obviously’ you told yourself, not letting yourself get hopeful just to be let down . “Oh uh hi there Remus. Um thanks you too” you greeted, slurring your words out, flustered. His lips curved upwards in a smile and his hand left your shoulder. He raised his eyebrows, silently asking if it was okay to take your hand. You nodded slowly, still in a daze. Remus’ large hand softly enveloped yours as he lead you to his friends.

Sirius looked away from the girl on his arm who’s name was Marlene. She smiled at you cordially and complimented your dress. Sirius’ greeting on the other hand was well- unique. To expect anything else would be out of the question though ; you had known him ever since you were seven because of boring pure blood family banquets you were forced by your parents to attend. The two of you always sought each other’s company instead of those other stuck up, nauseating witches and wizards present . “y/l/n! good day!” he said, mockingly bowing. “Don’t you look ravishing, little one” You rolled your eyes jokingly at him, trying to seem calm and respond like you normally would, “Yes hello to you too Sirius.” He joked about you him being your mentor in regards to sneaking away and pranking slimy, prejudiced, pure bloods.

“Hi y/n how are you” James greeted you sort of distractedly, looking around you. “Prongs! stop looking for Lilly jeez she said no to you five times i seriously doubt she’s gonna change her mind now” Sirius said exasperatedly. “James was hoping Lilly would be with you” Remus explained, chuckling lightly in with a mocking undertone. James crossed his arms at Remus’ taunting, “Oh don’t pretend like you weren’t worrying your arse about y/n ditching you because she was 2 minutes late” Remus scowled at his friend, red staining his cheeks.

“Awww” you giggled, sort of relieved that he actually wanted you there. So maybe there was nothing to worry about. ‘Just relax’ you told yourself. Remus returned you smile still blushing and gazed at you for a bit until he was broken from his reverie by Sirius voice. “Moony why do you look like you’re mentally undressing y/n- save it for after the ball when you can actually do it” he said winking suggestively, causing the whole group to break out in a chorus of laughter. Remus scowled at Sirius, shoving his shoulder playfully. Your face turned red as you shoved him too “Do you always have to be so immature and crude” you remarked, shaking your head in feigned disappointed. Sirius stuck his tongue out at you.

You felt Remus grasp your hand, “Let’s get out of here before i get embarrassed even more” He murmured. “Let’s go dance” You suggested before racing into the great hall, hand in hand, the both of you chuckling at you trying not to trip in your heels. The great hall was decked out in gorgeous Christmas decor- enchanted snowflakes fell to the ground, pine trees were adorned with bobbles and garlands and a thousand candles floated around, casting light over the formally dressed students and teachers. A merry chatter floated in the air, instantly having you excited for what the night would entail.

As you both made your way to the crowd, the band hoisted on the blue platform started playing Killer Queen by Queen. All the students including Remus and you starting cheering and dancing, full of energy. You grasped both his hands, reveling in the moment, jumping and dancing together, singing the lyrics till your throats were sore. As the chorus rang out, Remus pretended to be holding a mic to his mouth and sang the lyrics to you. You had very rarely seen this playfully goofy side of him and you absolutely adored it. Clenching your stomach which was aching from the waves of laughter that had overcome you, you fell to the ground, causing Remus to join you in the laughter. As his shoulders shook with uncontrollable chuckles, he reached his hand down to you, which you took. In that moment, you had completely forgotten about your anxiety and insecurities. Being here, laughing and dancing with him was enough. Nothing could be more perfect that watching his gorgeous face overcome with joy.

A few moments passed, allowing everyone to calm down and catch their breaths until the soft tune of a piano being played could be heard. All the couples took their places on the floor and started swaying slowly. “Did I tell you how amazing you look tonight?” the brown haired boy asked you as he lightly placed his hands on your waist, guiding you to the notes of the music. Maybe he did mean it? Your heart fluttered at the thought. The mirror ball above rotated slowly, casting glittering reflections on the both of you. “You look quite wonderful yourself” you said as you hesitantly placed both of your hands on top of his shoulders and stepped closer to him. You gazed into his hazel eyes, searching for something you had wanted for a long time. He gazed right back, never breaking contact. Remus’ eyes glittered in the warm light and within them you identified happiness. Yes that was definitely happiness...but there was something more. Remus’ calloused fingers were brought up to push a stray strand of hair out of your face, his hand grazing your skin ever so slightly, again giving rise to the hippogriffs in your stomach but this time they were conjured from joy rather than nerves.

You had not realized how long the two of you were completely entranced by each other until the music came to a halt. The both of you were broken away from your thoughts, but remained holding each other. Then Remus spoke, never leaving your eyes, “Y/n... I don’t know how to say this. I uh I have never done this before” He said, a look of hesitance falling over his face. He took a deep breath before continuing. “You’re so wonderful in every aspect fathomable and I really like you”. Remus scanned your face, worry ghosting his expressions as you remained silent. Your face was blank, but internally you were processing what just happened. “I’m sorry i shouldn’t have-” he started, taking his hands away from your waist, but then you leaned up, taking his face in your hands and crashed your lips onto his.

They tasted more marvelous than you could have imagined- like fire whisky and chocolate. All the day dreams you had gotten lost in during classes had finally become a reality. He kissed right back placing his hands on your lower back to bring you closer to him. Your hands trailed from his jaw to his neck, feeling the scarred, warm skin under your fingers- it was perfect, he was perfect. As you deepened the kiss you felt him smile against your lips before pulling away and placing his forehead on yours, reveling in the moment. “I really like you too” you whispered, your breath hot against his lips.

Cheers erupted from around the two of you and you turned your head to see the three marauders and a group of students clapping and cheering the both of you on. “MOONY YOU DID IT!” you heard James yell out, a proud smile plastered across his face as Sirius cheered again. Your gaze fell on a particular scarlet haired girl who was jumping enthusiastically- Lilly. You smiled wide as the two of you exchanged excited looks. “I told you” she mouthed before blowing a kiss at you.

Remus rubbed your back, pulling you into his side,bringing his mouth to your ear, “Wanna go up to the common room?” You nodded, pecking his cheek once more. You could not believe that he actually liked you- you could explode with happiness. When the two of you had reached the doors leading to the staircase where it was more quiet you stopped to take your heels off that were killing your poor feet. Before you could do so, Remus swiftly swooped you up in his arms, “No need, i can just carry you up” he said flashing you a large grin. You giggled, threading your arms around his neck and with your free hand carded your fingers through his soft brown hair. “I’ve always wanted to do that” you admitted. He laughed in response. “We can sit by the fireplace, I’ll get us some snacks and we can talk. We can also do more of this” he swooped down to plant a lingering, sweet kiss on your lips. “How does that sound?”

“Mmmm that sounds perfect” You replied, resting your head against his chest. This felt like home. And the best part was that this wasn’t a dream- it was all reality.

Hi there! I hope you enjoyed. If you have any suggestions for what I should write next, let me know!

#remus lupin x reader #remus lupin #marauders imagine #marauder x reader #marauders fluff #remus lupin fluff #remus lupin imagine #marauders x reader

209 notes · View notes

nobutfredweasleytho · 3 years

Text

YOU JUST DON’T LISTEN(F.W)

Summary: Fred’s ex girlfriend writes him a letter to explain the how him using her wrecked her emotionally.

Warnings: angst, like a lot of angst, depressed Y/N, mentions of self doubt, a little swearing, mentions of parents not loving correctly, used reader. Let me know if I missed anything.

A/N: Major thank you to Gabriella @onlyfreds for being an amazing person and encouraging me to write whatever this mess is. I am forever grateful to you

(The font is terrible Im sorry im just getting used to working on tumblr)

Fred Weasley checked the muggle clock on his nightstand. 10:30 AM. His mom will call him for breakfast anytime now. He has been awake for quite some time if he can even count the 30 minutes he tried to sleep but couldn’t, not when every time he tries to close his eyes his mind and eventually dreams are clouded by her. By the last time he looked at her, how devastated she looked, How her face was wet from her tears and her eyes bloodshot red, but the thing Fred will never be able to forget is her voice. How raw and vulnerable she sounded while saying the most horrible thing’s anyone has ever said to him, but he can’t blame her, he has no one to blame but himself because in the end it was he who caused all of this and now its come to bite him in the ass. He hears the door open and his twin brother George enters.

“Mom says breakfast is ready and she wants you downstairs. She says she’ll drag you herself if you don’t show up again today.”

“Tell her I’m not hungry and I’ll come grab a bite later.” I really don’t feel like being surrounded by other people right now. Not in this pathetic state I’m in. Besides it will take me willpower I don’t have to not hex Ron into oblivion.

“Well she will not take no for an answer and I wont either. What’s done is done now and you’ll have to face the world someday so start with your own family because everyone down there is worried sick about you and the least you can do is show your face once in a while so they know you haven’t died of starvation or sleep deprivation.” George has worry written all over him and I’m sure the rest of the family has it too. I feel even more like shit for worrying them.

“Fine. But I come back here if she is mentioned are we clear?”

“We weren’t gonna mention Y/N anyway now lets go moms worried sick for your dumbass.”

Breakfast was going smoothly with Ginny and Ron being exited for Quidditch season, Harry and Bill discussing the unfortunate events of the Triwizard tournament last year, dad asking Hermione about a rubber duck whatever that is, but the most shocking thing is mom asking me and George about the joke shop products. George is doing most of the talking but still the fact that shes even asking is awesome. I was finally feeling peaceful this whole winter break until I heard a hoot outside the window.

“I thought it was Tuesday but since mail is here does it mean its Friday already? Oh how fast time is going.

“No Arthur honey you are right it is Tuesday, Bill or George can one of you see if that owl has the owners name attached to it and bring whatever letter he has here to see who is it for.”

Bill got up from his seat and went to the window next to the countertop to look at the mystery owl. “Do we even know a Y/N Y/L/N?”

The room went quiet. The only thing that could be heard was the owls hoot asking for its treat. Bill seemed not to realise this as he took the letter from the owl, gave him a treat and sent it on its way.

“To Fred Weasley from Y/N Y/L/N… Who’s Y/N is she the girl you’ve been crying over this whole time huh Freddie?” Bill chuckled but I just grabbed the letter. I had no time to even be mad at him because once again my mind fogs up with only her. I couldn’t help but feel relieved and the happiest I felt in a long time. She has forgiven me. Y/N forgave me. That has to be it. Why else would she send me a letter?

“I had a great time with you guys but there’s important matters for me to attend so I have to go to now. Thanks mom the breakfast was amazing as always.” And with that I sprinted towards my room, locked the door and examined the letter in my hands. It was a bunch of them in here. I went to mine and George’s worktable threw some papers that were on top of it to make room for these letters and carefully opened the envelope.

The first thing that I grabbed was a photo. It was a polaroid of me and Y/N on the Gryffindor common room. Happiness filled my heart when I started remembering this night. I looked at the back of the polaroid and surely enough there was a writing on it.

Fred and Yn on the Gryffindor common room at 1 AM the night she turned 17. Listening to ABBA’s “Dancing Queen”. Picture taken by major 3rd wheel George Weasley.

Tears filled my eyes when I remember this night. It was the night I looked at her the way I always should have. Not as a replacement of someone who didn’t care about me.

The next one was also a polaroid photograph but this one I don’t remember being taken. It’s a picture of Y/N teaching me how to play the guitar. I can make up that we are in her dorm but not more as the picture is taken in black and white. I look at the back and surely this one also has a writing on it but the handwriting doesn’t look familiar at all.

A drunken Y/N accompanied by a even drunker Fred trying to play the guitar in the middle of the night. If I fail my charms exam tomorrow I’m killing you both but right now you two look adorable. Picture taken by Cho Chang.

The third one is an actual letter. I chuckle looking at the handwriting. Always so precise and not even one line out of place. I always thought Y/Ns handwriting always contradicts her hot headed persona but it’s actually really cute. I start reading the letter and my heart stops.

Dear Freddie,

I can only imagine the shock that receiving a letter from me would cause you right now especially after our last conversation.

But I have a lot to get off of my chest and I wont be able to move on if I haven’t said it all. Call me a coward but I was really scared to ask you to meet me so I can say it in person, but maybe that’s what I have always been. A coward. A coward because I get scared when someone wants to enter my life, a coward because I hate trying new things at the expense of failing, a coward because I should be able to confront people who brought darkness and sadness to my life.

But one thing I will admit Fred Weasley is that I wasn’t a coward when It came to loving you. It was the first time that I let someone come into my life and heart the way you did, and it will probably be the last. Throughout our “relationship” if you can even call it that as it was more of you customizing me to be her, to be someone I’m not. But that’s why you even talked to me is it, because I reminded you of her.

The signs were right in front of me and I feel stupid enough not to have seen them. But I guess people are right when they say love is blind. Love is such a funny thing to me as the first time I experienced the right kind of love was through you. But that was me creating stuff in my head. You didn’t love me no, you loved the idea of me. But I loved you. I loved you more than anything or anyone I have ever loved, I loved everything about you. But you just don’t listen. You don’t listen to anyone around you. Not George, not your other siblings, not Lee or any of your other friends for that matter, not your professors, but most importantly you don’t listen to me.

You didn’t listen when I told you that the love my parents gave me was only because I reminded them of my brother, the love my old friends back home gave me was one of interest. Everywhere I go no matter who I talk to no one will love me for me. I came to accept that until I met you.

You were funny and crazy and brave and oh so gorgeous. You were basically everything I looked for in… well everything. In a friend or in a partner it doesn’t matter. I thought you saw me for who I am. A broken teenager with issues but that at the end of the day was deserving of love. Oh how wrong I have been but no more wrong than you. You knew this but you just didn’t listen.

That makes us both horrible people now does it. Me who thought you were some kind of savior or some kind of saint and selfishly wrapped myself around your love and you who used me because I remind you of your ex girlfriend who broke your heart. But mine is excused I feel like and yours isn’t.

You would have kept me going for who knows how long just so you can live your imaginations you had for someone else.

Did you think about her the first time we slept together?

Was I not enough for you Freddie?

Was I too clingy too soon?

Is it my hot temper that gets the best of me?

So many questions will be left unanswered on my end because frankly, I never want to speak of you again. Sure I am deprived of love but I will not take it if its not directed directly at me.

I still care about you and will continue to support you and George on whatever you set your mind into. I was waking through Diagon Alley last week and saw this little store with a “for sale” sign. It’s right in the middle of Diagon Alley. I hate how my first thought went that you would have loved it but I seem to do that a lot recently.

I’ll get dressed and think would Fred love this skirt or this shirt.

I start applying lipstick and I’ll think will Fred love this color.

I start eating and I’ll think does this look good enough that Fred would’ve stolen a piece of it when I’m talking to Ginny.

I don’t even know why I am telling you this. How pathetic I’ve become clinging into someone that doesn’t want me.

Anyway I’ve probably bored you enough with my ranting but I wouldn’t have been able to move on unless I said everything that felt heavy on my heart. I also attached some photos I thought you’d like to keep seeing as now you can see yourself with Kayla without having the burden to be near me.

Say hi to your siblings and Harry for me.

Have a nice life,

Y/N

#harry potter #fred x y/n #fred weasley series #fred weasley x reader #fred weasley imagine #fred weasley #fred weasley angst #george weasley #hogwarts #fred and goerge weasley #weasley family #sadnees #i hate this

183 notes · View notes

theusurpersdog · 3 years

Text

A Bird in a Cage

Sansa’s arc in A Clash of Kings is all about boxing her in. Not only is she a hostage in King’s Landing, she’s also expected to pretend she’s not; she has to attend Court with a smile on her face, playing the role of Joffrey’s betrothed every day. Showing any honest emotion is punished by verbal and physical beatings. Her entire life becomes a performance she must put on to keep the monsters at bay. Everything about her world is meant to be stifling; from the physical restrictions to the emotional ones, it all makes her retreat deeper and deeper within herself.

But the real magic of this book is the moments where she finds a way to push back or escape her bounds . . .

Captive

In more ways than one, Sansa is a captive in King’s Landing.

The first kind of abuse she’s subjected to is physical. Beatings are a part of her everyday life. Because Robb was crowned king, or because she was happy Janos Slynt was sent to the Wall, or because Joffrey decided to be especially cruel one day. Sometimes for no reason at all.

She has to take care to dress carefully to hide the bruises:

The gown had long sleeves to hide the bruises on her arms. Those were Joffrey’s gifts as well.

This should go without saying, but domestic abuse is not rational; nothing Sansa does could stop Joffrey from abusing her – no clever words or tricks she could do to keep him happy. Half the time he has her beaten, it’s because of something Robb did.

Because she could be beaten at any moment, Sansa always keeps one eye on Joffrey, terrified that his mood could turn:

So the king had decided to play the gallant today. Sansa was relieved.

. . .

The king was growing bored. It made Sansa anxious. She lowered her eyes and resolved to keep quiet, no matter what. When Joffrey Baratheon’s mood darkened, any chance word might set off one of his rages.

Not only is she afraid of being hit, she’s genuinely afraid he could kill her:

When she doubled over, the knight grabbed her hair and drew his sword, and for one hideous instant she was certain he meant to open her throat.

Sansa knows her life balances on an incredibly delicate string. Jaime being Robb’s prisoner gives the Lannisters a reason to keep her alive, but Joffrey had reasons to keep Ned alive, too. If anything were to set him off, he would kill Sansa without hesitation. That’s why Sansa feels safer with Cersei around to watch her son, because she’s the only thing that remains to keep Joffrey in check. And Sansa knows that if Robb were to do anything to Jaime, her life would be over:

Gods be good, don’t let it be the Kingslayer. If Robb had harmed Jaime Lannister, it would mean her life. She thought of Ser Ilyn, and how those terrible pale eyes staring pitilessly out of that gaunt pockmarked face.

The beating she endures after Robb wins the battle at Oxcross is so bad that she can barely walk afterward; and as I already mention above, she has to be careful to wear dresses to hide her bruises.

And not only does she have to endure the abuse, she also has to carry on the farce for the rest of the court. Everyone knows she’s a prisoner, and everyone knows that Joffrey is having the Kingsguard beat her, but she’s not allowed to show it; all of her pain has to be kept hidden, pushed deep down inside herself.

Which leads me to the other kind of abuse Sansa experiences in King’s Landing. Everything about her time there is meant to emotionally destroy her. Joffrey intentionally tries to taunt her with threats to murder her family:

“It’s almost as good as if some wolf killed your traitor brother. Maybe I’ll feed him to wolves after I’ve caught him.

. . .

“I’d sooner have Robb Stark’s head,” Joff said with a sly glance toward Sansa.

. . .

“I’ll deal with your brother after I’m done with my traitor uncle. I’ll gut him with Hearteater, you’ll see.”

He loves to play mind games with her, like when he promised to show Ned mercy and then cut off his head and said that was mercy. The constant way that he twists reality around messes with her head and leaves her understandably paranoid:

What if it was some cruel jape of Joffrey’s, like the day he had taken her up to the battlements to show her Father’s head? Or perhaps it was some subtle snare to prove she was not loyal. If she went to the godswood, would she find Ser Ilyn Payne waiting for her, sitting silent under the heart tree with Ice in his hand, his pale eyes watching to see if she’d come?

The constant cruelty she suffers, and Joffrey and Cersei’s profound betrayal at the end of A Game of Thrones, make it hard for her to trust anyone, even when they show kindness:

He speaks more gently than Joffrey, she thought, but the queen spoke to me gently too. He’s still a Lannister, her brother and Joff’s uncle, and no friend. Once she had loved Prince Joffrey with all her heart, and admired and trusted his mother, the queen. They had repaid that love and trust with her father’s head. Sansa would never make that mistake again.

How is she supposed to trust anyone, when everything around her is false? When everything is a carefully constructed jape at her expense? Especially because she’s surrounded by enemies; anyone making their home in Joffrey’s court is sworn to kill Sansa’s family.

And Cersei intentionally makes her isolation worse, rotating her bedmaids:

Sansa did not know her. The queen had her servants changed every fortnight, to make certain none of them befriended her.

Sansa truly has no one to talk to, not even friendly servants to keep her company. Her loneliness is so profound that she enjoys being watched over by Arys Oakheart because he’s the only person who will actually talk to her.

She realizes that no one in King’s Landing cares if she lives or dies:

She [Cersei] spared Sansa not so much as a glance. She’s forgotten me. Ser Ilyn will kill me and she won’t even think about it.

And before the Battle of the Blackwater started, Tyrion told her this:

“I ought to have sent you off with Tommen now that I think on it.”

Unlike Joffrey and Cersei, Tyrion doesn’t wish Sansa any harm; he orders Joffrey’s men to stop hitting her, tries to comfort her afterward, and doesn’t want her to be married to Joffrey. But she is not one of his priorities. It didn’t even occur to him to try and get her safely out of the city.

This is dehumanizing. Sansa has no friends or even anyone to talk to, and the people around her treat her life as an afterthought.

Sansa also suffers from the emotional fallout of Joffrey’s abuse. She blames herself when he has men hit her:

She must learn to hide her feelings better, so as not to anger Joffrey.

The fear of being hit by Joffrey is nearly all-consuming for Sansa. It affects everything down to the smallest details of her life, like how she dresses and does her hair:

I have to look pretty, Joff likes me to look pretty, he’s always liked me in this gown, this color.

Instead of getting to live as her own person, doing things to make herself happy, Sansa has to live for Joffrey’s satisfaction. Even when she’s being physically beaten, she thinks of him instead of herself:

Laugh, Joffrey, she prayed as the juice ran down her face and the front of her blue silk gown. Laugh and be satisfied.

Everything about her life is a performance for other people. She wears the gowns and jewels Joffrey likes, dressing to hide the bruises his men leave all over, and says the words they tell her to say:

“My father was a traitor,” Sansa said at once. “And my brother and lady mother are traitors as well.” That reflex she had learned quickly. “I am loyal to my beloved Joffrey.”

Sansa repeats that phrase over and over throughout the book, always at once. Almost like a reflex. An actor on stage repeating their lines, rehearsed and performed a thousand times.

The worst part of the act is that everyone knows it’s exactly that: an act. Sansa is required, every day, to declare that her family are traitors who deserve to die, and for no reason at all. The way Joffrey abuses her is an open secret:

“He’s never been able to forget that day on the Trident when you saw her shame him, so he shames you in turn. You’re stronger than you seem, though. I expect you’ll survive a bit of humiliation.”

There is no way anyone could ever believe Sansa actually loves the boy who killed her father and intentionally humiliates her in front of his court. No matter how well Sansa tells the lie, it will always be see-through; especially because everyone knows that she’s a prisoner, being held until Jaime is freed. Sansa has to repeat the lie of believing her family to be traitors to try and please the Lannisters – if she said anything different she would be beaten or killed – but there’s no way they will ever be happy, because even when Sansa says the lies as convincingly as humanly possible, they know they’re lies because there’s no way they could be anything else. Sansa cannot win.

That’s never clearer than during her conversation with Cersei inside Maegar’s Holdfast, while the Battle of the Blackwater rages on:

“I pray for Joffrey,” she insisted nervously.

“Why, because he treats you so sweetly?” The queen took a flagon of sweet plum wine from a passing serving girl and filled Sansa’s cup. “Drink,” she commanded coldly. “Perhaps it will give you the courage to deal with truth for a change.”

If Sansa told Cersei the truth in this moment, she would be severely punished. And Cersei knows that, because she would be the one doing the punishing. Yet she verbally berates Sansa anyway.

The same dynamic plays out between Sansa and the Hound. At the end of A Game of Thrones, he gives her this bit of advice:

“Save yourself some pain, girl, and give him what he wants.”

And as one of Joffrey’s Kingsguard, he knows first hand of the abuse Sansa suffers if she says anything that could even be construed as out of line. Yet when Sansa tries to follow the advice he gave her, he throws it back in her face:

“ah, you're still a stupid little bird, aren't you? Singing all the songs they taught you”

Everyone in King’s Landing is always threatening to kill Sansa if she tells them the truth, and then calling her stupid when she repeats back the lies they want to hear. They’re forcefully dehumanizing her, demanding she remove all of her own thoughts and emotions and replace them with hollow lines they’ve given her, and then getting mad when her words are empty.

This plays on one of Sansa’s greatest insecurities about herself, which is her intelligence. Because of her low self-esteem, she already thinks of herself as being less-than. That’s very clear whenever she does an act of kindness – she steadfastly refuses to give herself credit for anything:

Sansa could not believe she had spoken. Was she mad? To tell him no in front of half the court?

. . .

Lancel was one of them, yet somehow she still could not bring herself to wish him dead. I am soft and weak and stupid, just as Joffrey says. I should be killing him, not helping him.

She never thinks to herself You are doing this because you are a good person. She always punishes herself internally, calling herself stupid and childish for believing in good things. Joffrey and Cersei have destroyed her so much that she can only see herself through their eyes, cruel and mocking.

The fear that she’s stupid is one of her greatest anxieties:

“My Jonquil’s a clever girl, isn’t she?”

“Joffrey and his mother say I’m stupid.”

And she doesn’t like to be watched by Ser Preston Greenfield because he treated her like a lackwit child.

Everyone around her is comfortable calling her stupid and emotionally abusing her, and it’s easy for Sansa to start internalizing those messages. Joffrey and Cersei’s betrayal at the end of A Game of Thrones forever changed Sansa; the fear that she could ever be so wrong again, and the fear that she was stupid to believe in them, haunts her. Throughout her time in King’s Landing, her self-worth plummets, and she really starts to believe all the things that Joffrey, Cersei, and everyone is always telling her about herself.

Because she has to endure so much abuse and cruelty every day, it starts to become normal to Sansa. Compared to the way Joffrey treats her, anything would be an improvement; she has a soft spot for Arys Oakheart because he hesitated to hit her once:

Arys Oakheart was courteous, and would talk to her cordially. Once he even objected when Joffrey commanded him to hit her. He did hit her in the end, but not hard as Ser Meryn or Ser Boros might have, and at least he had argued.

At least he had argued is one of the saddest lines in a series of books that has a lot of sad lines. Sansa expects so little of the people around her, and is subjected to so much cruelty, that the mere act of hesitating before hitting a defenseless child is enough to stand out in her memory as an act of kindness.

And Sansa thinks this when Tyrion asks her if she’s flowered yet:

Sansa blushed. It was a rude question, but the shame of being stripped before half the castle made it seem like nothing.

This is a perfect moment to show the small ways in which Joffrey is breaking her down emotionally. Tyrion’s question is embarrassing and impolite, but Sansa doesn’t even care because it is so much less embarrassing than the humiliations Joffrey makes her suffer. Joffrey has set the bar for cruelty so high that Sansa is willing to ignore others mistreating her because it isn’t as bad as Joffrey.

The secret friendship she has with Dontos makes this even worse:

“And if I should seem cruel or mocking or indifferent when men are watching, forgive me, child. I have a role to play, and you must do the same. One misstep and our heads will adorn the walls as did your father’s.”

Dontos is not wrong, but it doesn’t make it any less toxic a message for Sansa to hear: I’m cruel and hit you for your own protection. That’s on display when Joffrey is beating Sansa for Robb’s victory at Oxcross:

“Let me beat her!” Ser Dontos shoved forward, tin armor clattering. He was armed with a “Morningstar” whose head was a melon. My Florian. She could have kissed him, blotchy skin and broken veins and all.

Sansa is happy that Dontos is the one hitting her, because at least it’s better than Meryn Trant and Boros Blount. Dontos volunteering to hit her is an act of kindness for Sansa; which further reinforces the idea that someone hitting her is okay.

All of this works to lower Sansa’s standards and warp her perception of what is and isn’t okay; and in the case of Dontos, it is outright grooming on the part of Littlefinger. He intentionally paid an older man to win Sansa’s trust and get her used to the dynamic of secrecy and pushing boundaries, all so he can swoop in during A Storm of Swords. Sansa’s stuck in an endless cycle of her abuse conditioning her to accept more abuse.

All of the abuse and isolation Sansa suffers also leaves her incredibly depressed throughout A Clash of Kings. When she gets the note telling her to go to the Godswood, she thinks she will kill herself before she’s caught:

If it is some trap, better that I die than let them hurt me more, she told herself.

After the bread riot, Sansa has panic attacks; so much so that she feels suffocated in small rooms:

Sansa could go where she would so long as she did not try to leave the castle, but there was nowhere she wanted to go. She crossed over the dry moat with its cruel iron spikes and made her way up the narrow turnpike stair, but when she reached the door of her bedchamber she could not bear to enter. The very walls of the room made her feel trapped; even with the window opened wide it felt as though there was no air to breathe.

She likes to go up to the roof of the tower so she can see the entire city laid before her; it’s the only place where she doesn’t feel so claustrophobic and trapped.

That passage is also so fantastically written to show just how depressed Sansa is. Sansa could go where she would so long as she did not try to leave the castle, but there was nowhere she wanted to go. She's too depressed to go riding around the courtyard; she doesn’t see the point in going around in circles. We know from A Game of Thrones that Sansa has plenty of hobbies: playing the high harp, needlepoint, reading, and sharing gossip with her best friend. In A Clash of Kings, she’s too isolated to have anyone to talk to, but we never see her doing any of her other hobbies either. Nothing brings Sansa happiness in this book.

Especially because she’s constantly surrounded by reminders of her trauma. The way Sansa copes with her grief is by pushing it out of her mind and pretending like it doesn’t exist:

Sansa did not know what had happened to Jeyne, who had disappeared from her rooms afterward, never to be mentioned again. She tried not to think of them too often, yet sometimes the memories came unbidden, and then it was hard to hold back the tears.

Sansa actively tries to forget about the people who mean the most to her because it hurts too much to think of them.

But she can’t forget about Ned when she’s surrounded by reminders of his death. Joffrey and Cersei intentionally throw it in her face, and she has to walk through the same halls his men died in:

Sansa moved as if in a dream. She thought the Imp’s men would take her back to her bedchamber in Maegor’s Holdfast, but instead they conducted her to the Tower of the Hand. She had not set foot inside that place since the day her father fell from grace, and it made her feel faint to climb those steps again.

The reminder that hurts the most is the presence of Ilyn Payne, a recurring figure in all of Sansa’s nightmares. Just his presence makes Sansa’s skin crawl:

She was climbing the dais when she saw the man standing in the shadows by the back wall. He wore a long hauberk of oiled black mail, and held his sword before him: her father's greatsword, Ice, near as tall as he was. Its point rested on the floor, and his hard bony fingers curled around the crossguard on either side of the grip. Sansa's breath caught in her throat.

. . .

She looked for Ser Ilyn, but the King's Justice was not to be seen. I can feel him, though. He's close

When Sansa’s afraid she’s going to die, it’s always his blade she fears:

I'll not escape him, he'll have my head.

. . .

Ser Ilyn will kill me and she won't even think about it.

. . .

If she went to the godswood, would she find Ser Ilyn Payne waiting for her, sitting silent under the heart tree with Ice in his hand, his pale eyes watching to see if she'd come?

. . .

If Robb had harmed Jaime Lannister, it would mean her life. She thought of Ser Ilyn, and how those terrible pale eyes staring pitilessly out of that gaunt pockmarked face.

Watching Ilyn Payne kill her father is the worst thing that ever happened to Sansa, and she lives in constant fear that the same thing could happen to her.

The only thing that keeps her going is the thought of her family. Sansa is insecure in herself enough to start believing the abuse that Joffrey and Cersei inflict on her; but she loves her family too much to ever believe the lies about them. Even though she’s forced to declare them traitors every single day, her internal monologue is always fighting against it:

Rob will kill you all, she thought, exulting

. . .

I pray for Robb’s victory and Joffrey’s death . . . and for home. For Winterfell.

She even finds a way to make Joffrey’s words work in her favor:

“Did I tell you, I intend to challenge him to single combat?"

"I should like to see that, Your Grace." More than you know. Sansa kept her tone cool and polite, yet even so Joffrey's eyes narrowed as he tried to decide whether she was mocking him.

One of the only moments where Sansa is even remotely happy in this book comes when she’s talking to Tommen, because he reminds her of Bran:

Princess Myrcella nodded a shy greeting at the sound of Sansa’s name, but plump little Prince Tommen jumped up eagerly. “Sansa, did you hear? I’m to ride in the tourney today. Mother said I could.” Tommen was all of eight. He reminded her of her own little brother, Bran. They were of an age. Bran was back at Winterfell, a cripple, yet safe.

Sansa would have given anything to be with him. “I fear for the life of your foeman,” she told Tommen solemnly.

That’s a short passage, but it so beautifully captures a small piece of what Sansa is truly like, outside of the abuse and the fearing for her life and the never being able to express her emotions. She loves her family so much and wants nothing more than to be with Bran again. And while Joffrey mocks Tommen for his knightly dreams, Sansa is so nice to him, building up his confidence before he competes. She’s old enough to have grown passed the childishness of Tommen facing the quintain, but because she knows how important it is to Tommen, she gladly plays along with him. We never got to see any scenes in A Game of Thrones of Sansa interacting with Bran and getting to act like a big sister, but this scene does such a good job of showing us that Sansa was a great sister to him.

Sansa also feels a much stronger connection to the Godswood, the ancestral home of her father’s gods:

The air was rich with the smells of earth and leaf. Lady would have liked this place, she thought. There was something wild about a godswood, even here, in the heart of the castle at the heart of the city, you could feel the old gods watching with a thousand unseen eyes.

And even though Lady’s long dead, Sansa still has a strong connection to her wolf. When she believes she’s going to die during the Blackwater, Lady is the first thing she thinks of:

“Lady,” she whimpered softly, wondering if she would meet her wolf again when she was dead.

The more abuse Sansa suffers and the more pressure is put on her to denounce her family as traitors and give up on ever going home, the more Sansa falls back on her family. That’s the only form of comfort she has in King’s Landing; the memory of Winterfell, and the belief that Robb is coming to save her.

The Lannisters have Sansa held captive physically and emotionally in King’s Landing; she has to suffer through beatings and repeat their words to stay alive. But as long as Sansa has her family - has Winterfell - to hold onto, there is a part of her that the Lannisters can never have. Even if it’s only within the walls of her own mind, Sansa has fought herself a small piece of freedom.

Courtesy is a Lady’s Armor

Trapped within the political machinations of King’s Landing, Sansa starts to learn how to play the game in earnest.

Even before she consciously starts to do it, though, Sansa is already in many ways an adept political actor. There’s a reason that all highborn children are taught from a young age how to conduct themselves; Westeros is a society built on the cornerstone of tradition, and knowing how to perform courtly behavior is important. Because Sansa took all of Septa Mordane’s training seriously, she already knows how to walk the dangerous tightrope of courtly speak:

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.”

This is the same skill we saw in her second chapter of A Game of Thrones, when she was proud of herself for telling the Hound that no one could withstand Gregor during the tourney – she managed to say something courteous without telling a lie. Just as she did then, Sansa manages to say an apology to Tyrion that’s true.

It also shows just how good Sansa is at keeping a level head, because just moments before she was thinking this:

Tyrion turned to Sansa. "My lady, I am sorry for your losses. Truly, the gods are cruel."

Sansa could not think of a word to say to him. How could he be sorry for her losses? Was he mocking her? It wasn’t the gods who’d been cruel, it was Joffrey.

Faced with the men responsible for killing her father, she manages to think on her feet and fulfill the role of a Lady.

She also learns how to use that same skill to benefit herself. Whereas at first she was just trying to perform the functions of a Lady, she starts to use her courtesy to talk the people around her into helping her in such a way that they don’t even realize it’s happening:

“I would sooner return to my own bed.” A lie came to her suddenly, but it seemed so right that she blurted it out at once. “This tower was where my father’s men were slain Their ghosts would give me terrible dreams, and I would see their blood wherever I looked.”

Tyrion Lannister studied her face. “I am no stranger to nightmares, Sansa. Perhaps you are wiser than I knew. Permit me at least to escort you safely back to your own chambers.”

Part of why Sansa’s so naturally gifted at this kind of political double speak is because she understands people so well; she’s an empathetic and emotional character, and is extremely aware of the emotions of everyone around her. To affectively influence others, you need to understand what they want and be able to give it to them. Because Sansa is so aware of the people around her, she intuitively knows what they want; and all she wants to do is give it to them, because she doesn’t want to be hurt again.

The whole conversation she has with Tyrion in the Tower of the Hand does an excellent job showing how intelligent she is:

“I . . .” Sansa did not know what to say. Is it a trick? Will he punish me if I tell the truth? She stared at the dwarf’s brutal bulging brow, the hard black eye and the shrewd green one, the crooked teeth and wiry beard. “I only want to be loyal.”

“Loyal,” the dwarf mused, “and far from any Lannisters. I can scarce blame you for that. When I was your age, I wanted the same thing.” He smiled. “They tell me you visit the godswood every day. What do you pray for, Sansa?”

I pray for Robb’s victory and Joffrey’s death . . . and for home. For Winterfell. “I pray for an end to the fighting.”

Again, she shows an unparalleled ability to lie without actually lying. And she’s clever enough to tell Tyrion what he wants to hear without saying anything that’s actually false, that way it can’t come back to bite her later. She learned her lesson in A Game of Thrones not to trust someone just because they’re kind, and is careful not to show her cards to Tyrion. But in case he’s being honest in trying to help her, Sansa does not reaffirm her love for Joffrey. That’s why her answer of I only want to be loyal is so smart; whether Tyrion is playing her false or no, Sansa has given him the answer he wants to hear. She’s kept all of her doors open without creating additional risk for herself.

Having to survive Joffrey every day also teaches Sansa how to get what she wants without actually having to say it. When she saves Dontos’ life, she plays to Joffrey’s ego:

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."

All Sansa wants is to save Dontos’ life, and in the moment she comes up with a spectacular lie. Of course Joffrey would think it humiliating to make Dontos into a fool, so Sansa convinces him that would be an even greater punishment than death. She manipulates Joffrey into doing what she wants him to, and he doesn’t even know it’s happened.

Learning how to slyly insult Joffrey is one of the few ways Sansa can actually express herself as a prisoner, and she gets incredibly good at it. She starts by passive-aggressively getting one over on him:

“Did I tell you, I intend to challenge him to single combat?"

"I should like to see that, Your Grace." More than you know. Sansa kept her tone cool and polite, yet even so Joffrey's eyes narrowed as he tried to decide whether she was mocking him.

But as she gets better at politics she goes even further, actively tempting Joffrey into getting himself killed:

“They say my brother Robb always goes where the fighting is thickest,” she said recklessly. “Though he’s older than Your Grace, to be sure. A man grown.”

Joffrey’s biggest insecurity is that he can’t rule in his own right; Cersei won’t let him do certain things, and Tyrion is in charge of him as the Hand of the King because he hasn’t come of age yet. While Joffrey’s anger is normally aimed destructively at Sansa, here she figures out a way to make it work for her; using his own emotions against him to do something reckless.

As well as learning the art of political double-speak, Sansa starts to understand the broader political machinations at work. Because she was a diligent student of Catelyn and Septa Mordane, she has almost every sigil in Westeros memorized; at Joffrey’s name-day tourney, she recognizes every competitor by their House. This may seem unimportant at first glance, but it’s actually very important; twice in Arya’s chapters in A Clash of Kings she wishes she knew Houses and Sigils as well as Sansa, because than she would know who she was dealing with.

Since Sansa knows who everyone is, she has head start in understanding where everyone’s loyalties lie. On top of that, she’s also incredibly observant; she’s constantly taking in everything around her, stopping to pay attention to every little detail and interaction between people. Even though Cersei and Joffrey are trying to keep it hidden, Sansa notices that Joffrey’s tourney is held inside the Keep because he would be mobbed if they went out into the city. And she knows the Redwyne twins are hostages just as much as she is:

The Redwyne twins were the queen’s unwilling guests, even as Sansa was. She wondered whose notion it had been for them to ride in Joffrey’s tourney. Not their own, she thought.

That’s not something anyone would have told Sansa. For one, no one is even allowed to talk to her per Cersei’s orders. For two, Cersei doesn’t let anyone acknowledge that she has hostages – in the same way Sansa has to pretend she is a guest of Joffrey’s court, the Redwynes have to pretend they’re willing guests. That means that Sansa, with no help from anyone, has of her own accord put all the pieces together and realized the Redwynes are political pawns just like her. Very impressive for a twelve-year-old.

Sansa��s attention to detail is clear when she meets Shae, and immediately notices something is not right with her:

Lollys clutched at her maid, a slender, pretty girl with short dark hair who looked as though she wanted nothing so much as to show her mistress into the dry moat, onto those iron spikes.

And when she’s entering Maegar’s Holdfast at the start of the Blackwater, and notices the guards:

The two guards at the door wore the lin-crested helms and crimson cloaks of House Lannister, but Sansa knew they were only dressed-up sellswords. Another sat at the foot of the stair – a real guard would have been standing, not sitting on a step with his halberd across his knees – but he rose when he saw them and opened the door to usher them inside.

Her encyclopedic knowledge of Westerosi Houses and her attention to detail combine to give her a really good head for political machinations. She sees how the Lannisters use empty titles to flatter their lesser servants while saving the best prizes for their family:

Hallyne the Pyromancer and the masters of the Alchemists’ was raised to the style of lord, though Sansa noted that neither lands nor castle accompanied the title, which made the alchemist no more a true lord than Varys was. A more significant lordship by far was granted to Ser Lancel Lannister.

She manages to keep pace with Littlefinger and Tywin’s games:

She did not understand why that should make him so happy; the honors were as empty as the title granted to Hallyne the Pyromancer. Harrenhal was cursed, everyone knew that, and the Lannisters did not even hold it at present. Besides, the lords of the Trident were sworn to Riverrun and House Tully, and to the King in the North; they would never accept Littlefinger as their liege. Unless they are made to. Unless my brother and my uncle and my grandfather are all cast down and killed. The thought made Sansa anxious, but she told herself she was being silly. Robb has beaten them every time. He’ll beat Lord Baelish too, if he must.

I cannot emphasize enough that Sansa, following the tiny thread of Littlefinger looks happy to be Lord of Harrenhal, manages to predict the Red Wedding a whole book before it happens. That’s pretty incredible. Right now, Sansa has no power to start pulling meaningful strings of her own, but it’s clear that she fundamentally understands the complexity of geopolitics and would be well-prepared to make decisions of her own when the time comes.

Another way Sansa continues to learn about the realities of ruling is through people around her trying to teach her lessons. Because Sansa’s a hostage and isn’t allowed to say anything she feels, she basically becomes a blank slate for people to project whatever they want onto. Cersei, Dontos, and the Hound all try to “teach” her something as they project all of their own fears, insecurities, and trauma onto her.

Dontos tells her to play the fool:

“Joffrey and his mother say I’m stupid.”

“Let them. You’re safer that way, sweetling. Queen Cersei and the Imp and Lord Varys and their like, they all watch each other keen as hawks, and pay this one and that one to spy out what the others are doing, but no one ever troubles themselves about Lady Tanda’s daughter, do they?”

Of course, Sansa already knows this. All the way back in her second chapter of A Game of Thrones, Sansa thinks to herself that Moon Boy is smarter than he looks and is only pretending to be a fool so he can go wherever he likes; and Dontos confirms her suspicions when he reveals Moon Boy is a spy for Lord Varys.

It’s a consistent pattern that everyone around Sansa is constantly underestimating her; partly because of their own biases, and partly because Sansa is an almost entirely internal character, rarely letting people hear her honest thoughts. People assume she’s as hollow as the words they force her to say, but in reality she’s an introvert and a hostage.

The Hound also feels the need to impart some “lessons” onto Sansa:

Sandor Clegane snorted. “Pretty thing, and such a bad liar. A dog can smell a lie, you know. Look around you, and take a good whiff. They’re all liars here . . . and every one better than you.”

Again, he’s assuming Sansa’s much dumber than she actually is. Sansa already knows that everyone in King’s Landing is a liar, and has sworn to herself never to trust them again.

The most valuable lessons Sansa gets are from Cersei during the Battle of the Blackwater:

“Certain things are expected of a queen. They will be expected of you should you ever wed Joffrey. Best learn.” The queen studied the wives, daughters, and mothers who filled the benches. “Of themselves the hens are nothing, but their cocks are important for one reason or another, and some may survive this battle. So it behooves me to give their women my protection. If my wretched dwarf of a brother should somehow manage to prevail, they will return to their husbands and fathers full of tales about how brave I was, how my courage inspired them and lifted their spirits, how I never doubted our victory even for a moment.”

In this moment, even though she’s not doing a particularly good job actually doing it, Cersei articulates what’s really important about politics: optics. Her true motives for protecting the Ladies don’t matter as long as the Ladies believe that Cersei is doing it for the right reasons. That’s what monarchies are built upon. They’re a fragile house of cards constructed out of people’s belief.

That’s a lesson Sansa learns again when Joffrey sets her aside and takes Margaery as his bride. Sansa knows it’s going to happen, and is coached by Cersei how to react:

I must not smile, she reminded herself. The queen had warned her, no matter what she felt inside, the face she showed the world must look distraught. “I will not have my son humiliated,” Cersei said. “Do you hear me?”

But in front of the court, Joffrey carries on the charade, pretending Garlan’s offer of his sister’s hand is brand new information. Sansa watches from the sidelines and sees how people react; chanting and cheering to the theatre of it all. She gets to learn in real time how important it is to be performing your duties for the people. Other characters – most notably Jon Snow and Daenerys – can never quite figure that part of ruling out, and it has grave consequences.

I don’t mean performing in the negative sense. Of course, it can be used like that, like when the Tyrell’s intentionally starve King’s Landing so they can swoop in and make a big show of providing food. But it can also be used for good; it is an absolutely necessary aspect of ruling to let your people know what you’re doing for them. Jon in particular gets in trouble at the Wall because he doesn’t explain why he does things; he just does them and hopes people will trust him. Part of the courtly aspect of ruling is doing the work of showing your people how you’re helping them. That way you build trust with them, and they know you care for them. That’s what Sansa’s learning how to do.

Sansa’s also very good at the literal courtly aspect of politics; the time actually spent in court, sitting for hours and hours as the tedious day-to-day of ruling takes place. After the Battle of the Blackwater is over, Sansa has to sit in court for an entire day as soldiers are given their reward. She manages to stay focused the whole time, giving incredibly detailed accounts of each prize that’s awarded and each act of valor that caused it. She handles herself better than the grown men in the hall:

By the time all the new knights had been given their sers the hall was growing restive, and none more so than Joffrey. Some of those in the gallery had begun to slip quietly away, but the notables on the floor were trapped, unable to depart without the king’s leave.

Actual adults can’t even tolerate it, but Sansa manages just fine. This talent of hers is taken for granted by readers, but really stands out when you compare it to other characters. Sansa has the benefit of being raised to be a Lady, unlike a character like Daenerys who never had to sit through the training. Dany can’t make it through one day holding court in Meereen, and calls a lid early because she’s so bored – then stops holding court all together. Actually being a Queen is horribly bureaucratic, and that’s a skill that takes some practice to be able to perform.

Sansa’s ability to hold her own as a leader also really shines during the Battle of the Blackwater, when all hope seems lost and Cersei abandons the women in Maegar’s Holdfast:

“Oh, gods,” an old woman wailed. “We’re lost, the battle’s lost, she’s running.” Several children were crying. They can smell the fear. Sansa found herself alone on the dais. Should she stay here, or run after the queen and plead for her life?

She never knew why she got to her feet, but she did. “Don’t be afraid,” she told them loudly. “The queen has raised the drawbridge. This is the safest place in the city. There’s thick walls, the moat, the spikes . . .”

“What’s happened?” demanded a woman she knew slightly, the wife of a lesser lordling. “What did Osney tell her? Is the king hurt, has the city fallen?”

“Tell us,” someone else shouted. One woman asked about her father, another her son.

Sansa raised her hands for quiet. “Joffrey’s come back to the castle. He’s not hurt. They’re still fighting, that’s all I know, they’re fighting bravely. The queen will be back soon.” The last was a lie, but she had to soothe them. She noticed the fools standing under the galley. “Moon Boy, make us laugh.”

Sansa has no reason to do this. Cersei has given Ser Ilyn orders to kill her if the castle falls, and all the women in the holdfast are older than she is. She’s the last person who should be capable of standing up to take charge, considering her age and her impending death by execution.

She knows she’s faced with a choice: try and save her own life, or stay and comfort the women in the holdfast. And she decides to stay.

True Knights

This book sees Sansa’s worldview start to deepen. She’s only a child when the series starts, and like most kids has a very simple understanding of the world; there’s good and bad people, and good and bad things that happen. Songs were the way Sansa gave that worldview structure. They taught her that the good things happened to the good people, and the bad things happened to the bad people. Westeros is fair, and only the good people could be put in charge to do good things. Kings, queens, and knights were all avatars of the inherent goodness of the world; people put in place specifically to protect others.

This worldview became unsustainable for Sansa after Ned’s death. Every single rule the songs taught her was violated by her father’s execution. In her last chapter of A Game of Thrones, we see Sansa turn to nihilism as a result; her father is dead, her prince is a monster, and the knights sworn to protect her are the ones beating her. She doesn’t believe in anything anymore, so much so that she just wants to die.

In A Clash of Kings, Sansa starts to grapple with the overwhelming cognitive dissonance. Ned’s death and Joffrey’s cruelty taught her how evil people can be; but she also knows how good they can be, because she grew up in Winterfell. For all of their shortcomings, Ned and Catelyn were loving parents who tried their best to do good, and raised their kids the same.

Sansa still believes in goodness, but sees that everyone around her fails to live up to it:

Knights are sworn to defend the weak, protect women, and fight for the right, but none of them did a thing. Only Ser Dontos had tried to help, and he was no longer a knight, no more than the Imp was, nor the Hound . . . the Hound hated knights . . . I hate them too, Sansa thought. They are no true knights, not one of them.

Notice how she thinks They are no true knights. Sansa is surrounded by unimaginable cruelty, but she holds on to an undying sense of optimism. She knows that real knights don’t fight for the right, but that doesn’t stop her from continuing to believe in those ideals. Unlike in A Game of Thrones, when her belief in good was attached to specific people like Joffrey and Cersei, Sansa’s new worldview isn’t dependent on people to live up to. She believes in doing the right thing no matter what, even if the people around her let her down.

Sansa’s conception of beauty is the same way; in the first book, she assumed that beautiful people must also be good. But in A Clash of Kings, she reverses that order; people become either beautiful or ugly to her based on how good or bad they are. We view Joffrey through many POVs, and it is clear that by any standard that he is objectively attractive; yet Sansa now finds him ugly:

His plump pink lips always made him look pouty. Sansa had liked that once, but now it made her sick.

And she thinks this of the Hound:

The scars are not the worst part, not even the way his mouth twitches. It’s his eyes. She had never seen eyes so full of anger.

It’s not his physical appearance that scares her, it’s the anger in his eyes. That’s the part of him that’s ugly to her.

This evolution in Sansa’s understanding is never clearer than in her interactions with Dontos. The parts of his appearance that Sansa finds unattractive are his blotchy skin and broken veins, which are both symptoms of his constant drinking. It’s his drinking that bothers her:

“I prayed and prayed. Why would they send me a drunken old fool?”

. . .

This is madness, to trust myself to this drunkard

But Sansa manages to look beyond that as soon as Dontos invokes Florian the Fool. As much as Sansa understands that the songs aren’t true, the idea still appeal to her. When Dontos says he wants to make amends and become a true knight, in spirit if not name, Sansa treats him as if he actually were a knight:

“Rise, ser.”

. . .

Sansa took a step . . . then spun back, nervous, and softly laid a kiss on his cheek, her eyes closed. “My Florian,” she whispered. “The gods heard my prayer.”

Sansa’s growing understanding of the world around her also changes the way she thinks of class. To some extent in A Song of Ice and Fire, every single character is classist because they’re all rich people in an extremely hierarchical society. The entire structure of kings, lord paramounts, lords, knights, and peasants requires you to be classist; if you believe everyone in Westeros is equal, the entire structure of the society crumbles. While some of the POV characters like Jon and Davos make great strides in understanding how bankrupt the Westerosi class structure is, they’re still generally classist; it’s almost impossible not to be when you grow up in the culture they did. Davos grew up poor, but the indoctrination of classism has given him an almost religious fervor to follow Stannis as the “true” king.

Sansa especially had a very rigid understanding of class in A Game of Thrones; Arya making friends with the butcher’s boy was anathema to her. But the more that Sansa sees the people in power as the monsters they really are, the more sympathy she has for the people below her. In the sept praying before the Battle of the Blackwater, she holds hands with a washerwoman:

The old woman’s hand was bony and hard with callus, the boy’s small and soft, but it was good to have someone to hold on to

The more Cersei and Joffrey try to isolate Sansa, the more they try to snuff out any feeling of goodness or loyalty she had, the more Sansa reaches out to connect with people. Everything bad that happens to her makes her feel more connected to the people of King’s Landing. She’s too young and privileged (class-wise) to have a fully functioning understanding of the true evils of hierarchy, but she fundamentally understands something most of the aristocracy do not: that the common people are people and should be treated with respect.

She knows the common people will suffer the most if Stannis breaches the city walls, and prays for theme:

She sang along with grizzled old serving men and anxious young wives, with serving girls and soldiers, cooks and falconers, knights and knaves, squires and spit boys and nursing mothers. She sang with those inside the castle walls and those without, sang with all the city. She sang for mercy, for the living and the dead alike

Sansa gladly positions herself alongside the working people, not offended to be among them the way the Lannisters certainly are.

Sansa’s deepening worldview also gives her an incredibly complex relationship to the songs and stories she used to love. As I’ve already mentioned, she doesn’t disown them entirely; the high ideals of the songs are still very important to Sansa. The concept of a true knight, who would actually defend the defenseless, is the cornerstone of Sansa’s belief system, and she doesn’t need that person to actually be a knight – as long as they fulfill the moral obligation of being good. (Little does she know that very person is later tasked to find her.)

But now she knows that the stories lie. She understands their role as propaganda; when Arys Oakheart tries to say the peasants believe the comet heralds Joffrey’s reign, she doesn’t believe him:

“Glory to your betrothed,” Ser Arys answered at once. “See how it flames across the sky today on His Grace’s name day, as if the gods themselves had raised a banner in his honor. The smallfolk have named it King Joffrey’s Comet.”

Doubtless that was what they told Joffrey; Sansa was not so sure.

And she can’t even finish a sentence defending knights without realizing it isn’t true:

“Do you have any notion what happens when a city is sacked, Sansa? No, you wouldn’t, would you? All you know of life you learned from singers, and there’s such a dearth of good sacking songs.”

“True knights would never harm women and children.” The words rang hollow in her ears even as she said them.

The words ring hollow in her ears because Sansa does know what happens when a city is sacked; earlier in a previous chapter, she thinks this:

The whole city was afraid. Sansa could see it from the castle walls. The smallfolk were hiding themselves behind closed shutters and barred doors as if that would keep them safe. The last time King’s Landing had fallen, the Lannisters looted and raped as they pleased and put hundreds to the sword, even though the city had opened its gates. This time the Imp meant to fight, and a city that fought could expect no mercy at all.

Cersei underestimates Sansa, assuming everything she knows is from a song, but here we see that Sansa knows that the songs don’t tell the whole story. Unlike in A Game of Thrones, she no longer holds them in complete reverence. The Sept used to represent everything beautiful about the songs to her:

Sansa had favored her mother’s gods over her father’s. She loved the statues, the pictures in leaded glass, the fragrance of burning incense, the septons with their robes and crystals, the magical play of the rainbows over altars inlaid with mother-of-pearl and onyx and lapis lazuli.

It was the song’s come to life. But after Ned’s death, she hates it:

When Sansa had first beheld the Great Sept with its marble walls and seven crystal towers, she’d thought it was the most beautiful building in the world, but that had been before Joffrey beheaded her father on its steps. “I want it burned.”

She literally wants to set fire to the things that used to represent the songs.

But songs and stories are the foundation of Sansa’s world; even though she doesn’t believe in them the way she used to, they still shape her perception. She doesn’t want to let them go:

There are gods, she told herself, and there are true knights too. All the stories can’t be lies.

She still uses the template of songs and stories to interact with the world, but now with the understanding that the world is so much more complicated. Whereas before, the songs represented a sanitized version of war, Sansa begins to understand it in its entirety:

Away off, she could hear the sounds of battle. The singing almost drowned them out, but the sounds were there if you had the ears to hear: the deep moan of warhorns, the creak and thud of catapults flinging stones, the splashes and splinterings, the crackle of burning pitch and thrum of scorpions loosing their yard-long iron-headed shafts . . . and beneath it all, the cries of dying men.

It was another sort of song, a terrible song.

Thinking about something through the lens of a song no longer represents a childish fantasy for Sansa. Her conception of them is no longer permanent; her view of the songs has changed to fit with her new reality, but it’s still a comforting way for her to make sense of the world around her.

She even incorporates her love of the songs into her political manipulations:

"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 . . ."

Her use of the songs nearly saves her life here. Joffrey doesn’t know enough to be sure that she’s lying, so once the Hound corroborates her story, he has to believe it’s true.

Sansa’s attachment to the stories is integral to her character, and GRRM does a tremendous job of making it important to the arc she starts in this book, which is her continued journey from pawn to player in the Game of Thrones. Sansa’s perspective as a political actor is entirely unique from anyone else for many reasons, and one of those is her connection to the ideal version of Westeros that lives in the songs. Even as Sansa realizes the songs are lies and that the world is so much darker than she thought, she never gives up on the hope that it could be good. Her unwavering optimism for the world, in the face of so much trauma, means that she will never stop trying to make the world better.

Flowering

Throughout her time in King’s Landing, Sansa’s experiences with sexuality are inextricably linked to violence. The way Joffrey physically abuses her comes with a nasty undercurrent of sexual violence. The total control he exerts over her means she has to let him do what he wants:

The king settled back in his seat and took Sansa's hand. His touch filled her with revulsion now, but she knew better than to show it. She made herself sit very still.

The subtext of that scene is drawn to the forefront when Joffrey has Sansa beaten after Robb’s victory at Oxcross:

“Leave her face,” Joffrey commanded. “I like her pretty.”

. . .

“Boros, make her naked.”

Boros shoved a meaty hand down the front of Sansa’s bodice and gave a hard yank. The silk came tearing away, baring her to the waist. Sansa covered her breasts with her hands. She could hear sniggers, far off and cruel.

This is one of Sansa’s first experiences with sexuality, and it is nonconsensual and done specifically to humiliate her.

The relationship between sex and violence is never clearer than at the start of the Blackwater:

"Bless my steel with a kiss." He extended the blade down to her. "Go on, kiss it."

He had never sounded more like a stupid little boy. Sansa touched her lips to the metal, thinking that she would kiss any number of swords sooner than Joffrey

Joffrey is asking Sansa to kiss his sword; the metaphor here is not exactly subtle. To Joffrey, sex and violence are one in the same; having power over someone, hurting someone, turns him on as much as physical attraction. And as his betrothed, Sansa is on the receiving end of his sexually charged violence.

Unlike Joffrey, Sansa’s not turned on by violence, seeing it and sexuality as two separates things. And she would rather suffer through the violence, thinking to herself she would rather kiss the sword than kiss Joffrey. Her experiences with being found attractive to someone have all been so traumatic that actual violence scares her less.

Arguably the most traumatic experience she has is during the bread riot:

Sansa dug her nails into her hand. She could feel the fear in her tummy, twisting and pinching, worse every day. Nightmares of the day Princess Myrcella had sailed still troubled her sleep; dark suffocating dreams that woke her in the black of night, struggling for breath. She could hear the people screaming at her, screaming without words, like animals. They had hemmed her in and thrown filth at her and tried to pull her off her horse, and would have done worse if the Hound had not cut his way to her side. They had torn the High Septon to pieces and smashed in Ser Aron's head with a rock. Try not to be afraid! he said.

In the nightmares she has of that day, she dreams of being murdered; a knife cutting through her stomach until she’s left in bloody ribbons. It’s not hard to see the violent sexual imagery in that description. Sansa knows what those men planned on doing to her, and the memory haunts her. It’s no coincidence that she wakes from those nightmares to her first period:

“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.

The way GRRM writes her reaction is so visceral. As tears streams down her cheeks, she tries to wash herself, cuts apart her sheets, burns them, and tries to drag her entire bed into the flames as well. And the whole time she does this, she keeps thinking They’ll know or What will I tell them? or I have to burn them. She’s so completely and utterly terrified that anyone could ever know, she’s hardly even thinking. It’s just sheer, overwhelming panic.

This line in particular stands out:

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.

Down to jewelry she wears and the way she styles her hair, Sansa’s body belongs to Joffrey. Her job in King’s Landing is to look pretty for him in the hopes that it will save her from his wrath. Her body exists solely to please him. She’s literally stripped of her own agency and control.

Flowering is the last straw for Sansa because it means she can be tied forever to Joffrey through marriage, and he’ll be free to rape her and force her to have his children. And there’s nothing Sansa can do to stop it. Her own body has betrayed her by merely existing.

Sansa’s period is again equated to physical violence during the Battle of the Blackwater:

“You look pale, Sansa,” Cersei observed. “Is your red flower still blooming?”

“Yes.”

“How apt. The men will bleed out there, and you in here.”

Then a second time, Cersei compares sex to violence:

“You little fool. Tears are not a woman’s only weapon. You’ve got another one between your legs, and you’d best learn to use it.”

Through Cersei’s eyes, we get the clearest summary of the point GRRM is trying to make. Existing as a woman in Westeros is inherently oppressive to the point of smothering the life out of her. Where the men are given swords, women are given marriage and childbirth; but the latter is no less violent than the former. In Cersei’s words:

“We were so much alike, I could never understand why they treated us so differently. Jaime learned to fight with sword and lance and mace, while I was taught to smile and sing and please. He was heir to Casterly Rock, while I was to be sold to some stranger like a horse, to be ridden whenever my new owner liked, beaten whenever he liked, and cast aside in time for a younger filly. Jaime’s lot was to be glory and power, while mine was birth and moonblood.”

“But you were queen of all the Seven Kingdoms,” Sansa said.

“When it comes to swords, a queen is only a woman after all.”

In many ways, Sansa’s arc in A Clash of Kings is centered around this idea; the violence of femininity in Westeros. Being a child isn’t enough to spare Sansa the horrors. The whole reason she’s trapped in King’s Landing to begin with is because of her body; the Lannisters want to use her like property – a broodmare to sire them sons to inherit Winterfell.

It’s no surprise the climax of Sansa’s chapters in A Clash of Kings pushes this concept to its furthest bounds . . .

Ser Dontos and The Hound

Throughout Sansa’s chapters in King’s Landing, GRRM is deconstructing the trope of the Princess in the Tower. Sansa more than any other character is aware that her life takes place within a story, and she prays to the gods to send her a hero to save from the Red Keep. GRRM had already subverted the idea of a charming Prince with Joffrey in the first book, so A Clash of Kings subverts the trope of a knight coming to save her. That’s why her two protectors in King’s Landing are Dontos and Sandor Clegane – two men who aren’t quite knights.

For most of the book, the narrative treats Dontos and Sandor as foils. The story of why either one is not a knight puts them on two opposite ends of a spectrum. Dontos has his knighthood taken away from him because he’s too soft. He would rather drink and let people laugh at him than fight with a sword, which is why Joffrey makes him a fool. On the other hand, the Hound likes killing too much to be a knight:

“Let them have their lands and their gods and their gold. Let them have their sers.” Sandor Clegane spat at her feet to show what he thought of that. “So long as I have this,” he said, lifting the sword from her throat, “there’s no man on earth I need fear.”

This dichotomy between them is made clearer in the way Sansa has to escape their advances. Around Dontos, she’s dodging kisses:

"Give your Florian a little kiss now. A kiss for luck." He swayed toward her.

Sansa dodged the wet groping lips, kissed him lightly on an unshaven cheek, and bid him good night. It took all her strength not to weep.

But it’s a steel kiss she has to dodge from the Hound:

He laid the edge of his longsword against her neck, just under her ear. Sansa could feel the sharpness of the steel.

The idea of Dontos and Sandor as opposites is driven home further by their different approaches to Sansa’s love of stories; Dontos uses it to win Sansa’s trust:

“I think I may find it in me to be a knight again, sweet lady. And all because of you . . . your grace, your courage. You saved me, not only from Joffrey, but from myself." His voice dropped. "The singers say there was another fool once who was the greatest knight of all . . ."

"Florian," Sansa whispered. A shiver went through her.

"Sweet lady, I would be your Florian," Dontos said humbly, falling to his knees before her.

The Hound uses it to berate and belittle her:

“There are no true knights, no more than there are gods. If you can’t protect yourself, die and get out of the way of those who can. Sharp steel and strong arms rule this world, don’t ever believe any different.”

Sansa backed away from him. “You’re awful.”

“I’m honest. It’s the world that’s awful. Now fly away, little bird, I’m sick of you peeping at me.”

But underneath the superficial differences, Dontos and the Hound have the exact same relationship to Sansa. When Joffrey is having her beat after Robb’s victory at Oxcross, both make efforts to help her – Dontos volunteering to hit her with a melon instead of a sword, and the Hound telling Joffrey “enough” – but stop short of doing anything that would put themselves in danger. They both make advances on Sansa against her will – Dontos with kisses and the Hound with knives, but the overt sexual nature of both cannot be denied. They both position themselves to Sansa as a sort of mentor figure, telling her how to act and what to believe, with the implicit (and often explicit) message that she’s not smart enough to think for herself and it would really be in her best interest if she just trusted them instead. Both men position themselves as Sansa’s “protector”, but they never protect her from much of anything; in the few moments they’re actually given the opportunity, like during the Battle of the Blackwater, they both panic and leave her to fend for herself.

What really connects the two men is how they use Sansa. To them, she’s the paragon of youth and innocence; the way she believes in the stories reminds them both of what they used to be like before the world beat them down. Sandor was a boy who played with toy knights before Gregor burned his face, and Dontos was saved as a child by the knight of knights Barristan Selmy. While they’ve both grown jaded, Sansa brings out the parts of them that still believe in the stories. That’s clear from the way Dontos reacts to the Lannisters winning the Battle of the Blackwater:

“Oh! the banners, darling Sansa! Oh! to be a knight!”

And even though the Hound claims to hate the stories, it’s a song he wants from Sansa:

“Go on. Sing to me. Some song about knights and fair maids.”

Sansa as the princess in a tower appeals to the fantasy of both men to be her hero.

But this is a subversion of that trope, not a straight retelling. Particularly in regards to Sandor, GRRM really deconstructs the destructive nature of this male fantasy. Before Sandor asks Sansa to sing him a song, he comments on her body:

“You look almost a woman . . . face, teats, and you’re taller too, almost . . .”

Sandor wanting to play the knight with Sansa is always tied to his sexual attraction to her; in every single instance, GRRM always ties them together. There is never one without the other. It should go without saying that this is not good; Sansa is barely twelve, and hasn’t even had her first period when Sandor’s sexual advances start. She is a child. In Maegar’s Holdfast, she’s shocked that men would view her sexually:

“Enough drink will make blind washerwomen and reeking pig girls seem as comely as you, sweetling.”

“Me?”

“Try not to sound so like a mouse, Sansa. You’re a woman now, remember?”

This passage also very clearly draws the connection between Sandor’s relationship to Sansa and violence. Cersei explains to Sansa the way battle makes men into monsters around women, and then the next chapter Sandor appears in Sansa’s bedroom with a knife. This is not meant to be a romantic scene, or else GRRM would not have framed it with threats of rape and violence.

This is further re-enforced by the song Sansa sings to Sandor. When he holds the knife to her neck, he demands she sing the song of Florian and Jonquil:

He gave her arm a hard wrench, pulling her around and shoving her down onto the bed. “I’ll have that song, Florian and Jonquil, you said.” His dagger was poised at her throat. “Sing, little bird. Sing for your little life.”

But Sansa can’t remember the words, and instead sings the Mother’s Mercy hymn:

Gentle Mother, font of mercy, save our sons from war, we pray, stay the swords and stay the arrows, let them know a better day.

Gentle Mother, strength of women, help our daughters through this fray, sooth the wrath and tame the fury, teach us all a kinder way.

It is incredibly symbolic that the Hound demands Sansa sing him a song of romance, but she physically can’t; the only song she can remember the words to is one of forgiveness.

So much of Sansa’s narrative in A Clash of Kings is people demanding things that she can’t give them. Joffrey wants her loyalty, Cersei wants her words, Tyrion wants her trust, and Dontos and Sandor want her love. Everyone is pulling her in different directions, and her entire personality starts to crumble under the pressure; there’s no way she can give all of these people everything they want. Something has to give.

And when Sansa can no longer play her role, when the fear of dying is too visceral for her to wear her courtesy like an armor, the one thing Sansa can still give Sandor is her mercy. . .

Radical Empathy

The running thread that connects all of the themes in Sansa’s chapters is her being trapped. Physically through Joffrey’s abuse, emotionally through Joffrey, Cersei, Dontos, and Sandor, and even by herself mentally as she begins to internalize the abuse. Everything about the Red Keep is meant to turn Sansa cruel and self-interested, just like everybody else; even if they aren’t intentionally cruel like Joffrey, they’re okay with Sansa being hurt because that’s just how life is, like Cersei. Or Dontos and the Hound, who don’t intend to hurt Sansa but do because they’re too caught up in their own narrative to acknowledge her humanity. Even Arys Oakheart, who really doesn’t want to hurt her, but is too afraid to say no and defy the class structure of Westeros.

That makes Sansa’s defiance through empathy stand out in such radical contrast. The kindness Sansa shows everyone, even those who hurt her, is how GRRM brings the songs to life. Sansa doesn’t love those stories because she’s silly and naïve; she loves them because they justify her belief in the inherent goodness of being kind.

Empathy and kindness are Sansa’s defining character traits, and that’s why her arc in A Clash of Kings opens with her saving Dontos’ life:

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.

Even though just moments earlier she had noted Joffrey’s mood was turning dark:

The way Sansa stands up for Dontos is particularly notable because he had the chance to do the same for her in A Game of Thrones, but chose not to:

Sickly Lord Gyles covered his face at her approach and feigned a fit of coughing, and when funny drunken Ser Dontos started to hail her, Ser Balon Swann whispered in his ear and he turned away.

- Sansa V

Dontos wouldn’t even risk treating Sansa with basic courtesy, yet she risked her live to save his.

And that’s not the only time Sansa stands up to Joffrey to save someone:

Halfway along the route, a wailing woman forced her way between two watchmen and ran out into the street in front of the king and his companions, holding the corpse of her dead baby above her head. It was blue and swollen, grotesque, but the real horror was the mother's eyes. Joffrey looked for a moment as if he meant to ride her down, but Sansa Stark leaned over and said something to him. The king fumbled in his purse, and flung the woman a silver stag.

- Tyrion IX

The only other character we ever see move to actually stand up to Joffrey is Tyrion, who is also the only person in court who doesn’t have to be afraid of Joffrey’s retaliation. Everyone else sits by day after day and watches as Joffrey abuses Sansa and says nothing; or worse, they actively participate. But whenever Sansa sees Joffrey hurting someone, she risks herself to make him stop.

Sansa also uses her kindness to give herself courage:

Sansa found herself possessed of a queer giddy courage. “You should go with her,” she told the king. “Your brother might be hurt.”

Joffrey shrugged. “What if he is?”

“You should help him up and tell him how well he rode.” Sansa could not seem to stop herself.

She’s too afraid to speak back at Joffrey when he’s abusing her, but as soon as she sees him mistreat Tommen, she finds the courage to stand up for others.

Kindness is almost an involuntary reflex for Sansa:

Lancel was one of them, yet somehow she still could not bring herself to wish him dead. I am soft and weak and stupid, just as Joffrey says. I should be killing him, not helping him.

Lancel Lannister, who stood by and egged the crowd on as Sansa was stripped and beaten after the Battle at Oxcross. She has every reason not to help him; she knows if she stays in that room, with the battle all but lost, Ser Ilyn is going to kill her solely because of the Lannisters’ spite. She has no reason to stay and help Lancel. But she can’t stop herself.

The moment where Sansa’s kindness stands out the most, though, is when the Hound comes to her room during Blackwater:

Some instinct made her lift her hand and cup his cheek with her fingers. The room was too dark for her to see him, but she could feel the stickiness of the blood, and a wetness that was not blood. “Little bird,” he said once more, his voice raw and harsh as steel on stone. Then he rose from the bed. Sansa heard cloth ripping, followed by the softer sound of retreating footsteps.

I think reading this passage out of context is what allows certain fans to paint this scene in a romantic light. The softness of Sansa reaching out to touch Sandor is an indelible moment. But it does the moment a disservice to read it that way. This scene is so well written because of what comes before it:

“I could keep you safe,” he rasped. “They’re all afraid of me. No one would hurt you again, or I’d kill them.” He yanked her closer, and for a moment she thought he meant to kiss her. He was too strong to fight. She closed her eyes, wanting it to be over, but nothing happened. “Still can’t bear to look, can you?” he heard him say. He gave her arm a hard wrench, pulling her around and shoving her down onto the bed. “I’ll have that song, Florian and Jonquil, you said.” His dagger was poised at her throat. “Sing, little bird. Sing for your little life.”

Afraid for her life, Sansa closes her eyes. But Sandor is too bitter, jaded, and wrapped up in his own self to realize that’s why she closes her eyes; he thinks it’s because she still can’t look at the burned ruin of his face. He came to her room with kindness the furthest thing from his mind; the flames dancing on the Blackwater Rush made him scared like a wild animal, and he’s come here to get something from Sansa – whether she wants to give it or no.

(And while certain people are interested in carrying a lot of water to redeem this character, GRRM has really left no ambiguity in Sandor’s intentions. The passage He gave her arm a hard wrench, pulling her around and shoving her down onto the bed, taken in tandem with his confession to Arya, I took the bloody song, she never gave it. I meant to take her too. I should have. I should have fucked her bloody and ripped her heart out before leaving her for that dwarf, make it very clear that Sandor intended to rape Sansa. That is not up for debate.)

Sansa singing the Mother’s Mercy hymn is the last thing Sandor expected. The idea that in this moment, as Sandor becomes all of the worst things he’s ever believed about himself, about to do one of the most monstrous acts a person can do – that in that moment, Sansa could still show him mercy, is enough to stop him. He can no longer pretend that all the songs are lies and that everyone is only pretending to be good, because in this moment Sansa is still somehow capable of showing him kindness.

Sansa’s ability to have empathy for seemingly irredeemable characters is not limited to Sandor (though certain shippers would like to pretend that’s some unique characteristic of their relationship, it most certainly is not). The dynamic between Sansa and Cersei is so rich because of Sansa’s inability to hate her, even though Cersei is responsible for pretty much every bad thing in Sansa’s life.

The Sansa and Cersei dynamic is one of the narrative’s most dynamic and complex, as Cersei represents a dark mirror of Sansa. Both were in love with the idea of becoming Queen as children, but arrived in King’s Landing to find their Prince is not who they thought he would be – Cersei both literally and figuratively, as she realizes she’s not to marry Rhaegar Targaryen but instead Robert Baratheon. They’re both subjected to emotional and physical abuse by the King for things that aren’t their fault – Robert hates Cersei because she isn’t Lyanna, and Joffrey hates Sansa because of his fight with Arya on the Trident.

But Cersei’s Lannister upbringing and life have made her cruel in all the ways Sansa is kind. She can see the parallels between herself and Sansa, but instead of reacting with empathy, she uses it to justify her cruelty:

“You’re stronger than you seem, though. I expect you’ll survive a bit of humiliation. I did.”

Being afraid of the men in her life has taught Cersei that’s the correct way to wield power:

“Another lesson you should learn, if you hope to sit beside my son. Be gentle on a night like this and you’ll have treasons popping up all about you like mushrooms after a hard rain. The only way to keep your people loyal is to make certain they fear you more than they do the enemy.”

But Sansa reacts the opposite way:

“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.

This line has become the definitive statement of Sansa’s character because it so wholly embodies her ethos. Cruelty is not in her nature, and her instinct is always to show kindness. It also ties a direct connection to her own personal experiences shaping how she wants to be as Queen:

“Fear is better than love, Mother says.” Joffrey pointed at Sansa. “She fears me.”

Sansa knows what it feels like to be afraid, and she never wants anyone else to ever feel like that. Where the cruelty Cersei suffered taught her it was normal and good to rule that way, Sansa learns what it feels like to be at someone else’s mercy. If she ever has control over someone, which she will in books to come, she’s learned to always be kind because she knows what it feels like when someone isn’t.

All of her chapters in A Clash of Kings are full of moments that show how much Sansa values kindness. While I’ve already highlighted the life or death examples, she also shines in the small moments, like when she encourages Tommen before he faces the quintain at Joffrey’s name day tourney. And she comforts him when Myrcella leaves for Dorne:

Prince Tommen sobbed. "You mew like a suckling babe," his brother hissed at him. "Princes aren't supposed to cry."

"Prince Aemon the Dragonknight cried the day Princess Naerys wed his brother Aegon," Sansa Stark said, "and the twins Ser Arryk and Ser Erryk died with tears on their cheeks after each had given the other a mortal wound."

- Tyrion IX

She tries to comfort Lollys Stokeworth across the bridge to Maegar’s Holdfast:

She greeted them courteously. “May I be of help?”

Lady Tanda flushed with shame. “No, my lady, but we thank you kindly. You must forgive my daughter, she has not been well.”

“I don’t want to.” Lollys clutched at her maid, a slender, pretty girl with short dark hair who looked as though she wanted nothing so much as to shove her mistress into the dry moat, onto those iron spikes. “Please, please, I don’t want to.”

Sansa spoke to her gently. “We’ll all be thrice protected inside, and there’s to be food and drink and song as well.”

Her prayer in the Sept before the battle starts shows just how much she cares for everyone:

She sang for mercy, for the living and the dead alike, for Bran and Rickon and Robb, for her sister Arya and her bastard brother Jon Snow, away off on the Wall. She sang for her mother and her father, for her grandfather Lord Hoster and her uncle Edmure Tully, for her friend Jeyne Poole, for old drunken King Robert, for Septa Mordane and Ser Dontos and Jory Cassel and Maester Luwin, for all the brave knights and soldiers who would die today, and for the children and the wives who would mourn them, and finally, toward the end, she even sang for Tyrion the Imp and for the Hound. He is no true knight but he saved me all the same, she told the Mother. Save him if you can, and gentle the rage inside him.

There’s only one person in the whole of Westeros Sansa won’t extend her empathy to:

But when the septon climbed on high and called upon the gods to protect and defend their true and noble king, Sansa got to her feet. The aisles were jammed with people. She had to shoulder through while the septon called upon the Smith to lend strength to Joffrey’s sword and shield, the Warrior to give him courage, the Father to defend him in his need. Let his sword break and his shield shatter, Sansa thought coldly as she shoved out through the doors, let his courage fail him and every man desert him.

This line feels especially important. A lesson that’s drilled into Sansa time and time again by Cersei and Sandor is that her kindness makes her weak. It was used against her in A Game of Thrones, where her trust in Cersei and Joffrey left her completely vulnerable to Ned’s death. But this passage shows that it is not weakness that makes Sansa kind - it’s strength. For a character as kind as she is, and subjected to so much abuse, it would be easy to see her narrative as someone repeatedly letting herself be run over. By including this line, showing that Sansa’s empathy is a choice she makes – and making it clear that she chooses not to have it for Joffrey – it shows that Sansa still has control over herself, and will set boundaries.

Instead of using her experiences in a negative way like Cersei, Sansa learns to carefully apply the lessons of her life; she won’t let abuse stop her from being kind, but she knows when to stop herself from trusting someone again.

Because Sansa’s kindness and optimism are the most important aspects of her character, her arc in A Clash of Kings ends there. Joffrey setting her aside in favor of Margaery is an emotional rollercoaster for Sansa:

Dontos waited in the leafy moonlight. “Why so sadface?” Sansa asked him gaily. “You were there, you heard. Joff put me aside, he’s done with me, he’s . . .”

He took her hand. “Oh, Jonquil, my poor Jonquil, you do not understand. Done with you? They’ve scarcely begun.”

Her heart sank. “What do you mean?”

“The queen will never let you go, never. You are too valuable a hostage. And Joffrey . . . sweetling, he is still king. If he wants you in his bed, he will have you, only now it will be bastards he plants in your womb instead of trueborn sons.”

Throughout A Song of Ice and Fire, the narrative is constantly testing Sansa’s commitment to her ideals. Everything she knows is constantly turned on its head, going from a dream to a nightmare. The momentary joy she feels knowing she doesn’t have to marry Joffrey is only allowed for a second, until it collides with Dontos’ harsh reality.

But instead of ending there, the narrative takes a page out of Sansa’s book and leaves on a vision of hope for the future:

It was a hair net of fine spun silver, the strands so thin and delicate the net seemed to weigh no more than a breath of air when Sansa took it in her fingers. Small gems were set wherever two strands crossed, so dark they drank the moonlight. “What stones are these?”

“Black amethysts from Asshai. The rarest kind, a deep true purple by daylight.”

“It’s very lovely,” Sansa said, thinking, It is a ship I need, not a net for my hair.

“Lovelier than you know, sweet child. It’s magic, you see. It’s justice you hold. It’s vengeance for your father.” Dontos leaned close and kissed her again. “It’s home.”

#Sansa Stark #game of thrones #asoiaf #asoiaf meta #just over 15000 words #which is a new personal record #sansa meta

276 notes · View notes