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loxare · 1 year

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On their wedding day, he put his hand to her cheek and called her the most beautiful woman in the world.

He could have been correct, from an objective standpoint. Truly, she was one of the beauties in town. Her curls always in perfect order, her smile plump and joyous, her figure comely, even hidden modestly beneath clothing. From an objective standpoint, he was wrong, as nothing about beauty is objective, but none in the town would have disagreed with his assessment.

They spent several years together, in loving bliss. They built their house together, they planted their garden together, they grew together.

And then came the day that a hole in reality opened beneath him. Without thought, she jumped in after, a bare half second after he vanished.

When she opened her eyes, she was somewhere else. The stars were different, and wrong. There was the wrong number of moons, and the sun was the wrong colour. But the worst, most egregious wrong was that he was not there next to her. This, she could not abide.

She had nothing to her name besides her labour, but that she had in abundance. She travelled, from town to town, trading hours of work for food and board. She taught herself to draw, and she drew her love. Over and over, she drew him. In the dirt, on walls, on her own clothes. Asking, always asking, if any had seen him. Eventually she acquired paper and ink, and drew her husband again. Her inquiries became easier, more frequent, although the answers never changed. For none had seen her love.

She learned many things as she travelled. She learned how to fix a carriage wheel. How to tend to livestock and how to weed a garden far larger than the one she had known. She learned to shape a bowl from clay and to chop timber and to carve wood. She learned to fight off brigands who would take from her her sparse money, her life, or worse.

She learned other things, about this place she was in. It was a place where many came, and few left. A nexus one called it. A refuse heap, another said. But the method of arrival was always the same. One moment in the familiar, the next falling into the strange. But the people were the same, for all that they were often of alien appearance. Some looked down upon her dirt covered hems and worn boots. Some ignored her. Most were willing to at least listen to her question, to look at her picture, so carefully drawn. To keep an eye out, and pass on a message should they find him.

Time passed, and passed, and passed. The world she came from did not have things such as magical crystals or soul mates or wizards, or if it did they had none of the power that those here did. Regardless, one town she stayed in recommended she find the local witch, for they specialized in red strings of fate.

And so she did. The witch gave her a bowl of stew and a comfortable chair, and then listened when she spoke, and looked carefully at the drawing. It was a different one. She had drawn many, over the years, as the old ones wore out, and as her skill increased. And the witch said that they did not know if he was indeed her soul mate, but if he was, then the red string of fate that they revealed would lead her right to him. She need only follow it.

It was not an easy ask. The witch wanted a blanket woven by her own hands in payment. And so she stayed in the town, longer than she had stayed anywhere. She traded her labour and her art for thick wool, and weaving lessons. It was near winter before she had a result she was pleased with, carefully folded in her arms to be presented to the witch. The blanket was unfolded immediately upon delivery, shaken out to its fullest extent. The blanket was scrutinized, for quality of the weave or for something else that she could not fathom. Finally, the witch nodded their head. They turned back to their cottage, moving to close the door. She protested, concerned about her end of the bargain, but needn’t have worried. For around her finger was tied a red string which hadn’t been there before. The end led off, through the woods.

And so she followed it. She followed it through fallen leaves. She followed it across rivers. She followed it through snowbanks and through melt waters and through hot summer sun. Finally, she followed it into a clearing on a mountain. And fell to her knees in despair. For in this clearing was nothing but moss, and the end of the string, fading into nothing.

She did not have long to weep however, as a hole in reality opened above her, and down he fell. Without thought, she moved to catch him.

He was just as he had been on the day she had left him. And as he opened his eyes, she suddenly felt ashamed. For he was here, perfect and whole and young. But it had been years and years for her. Her hair was frizzy and knotted. Her lips were thin, her hands were rough, and her figure both hard and flabby at once.

But he opened his eyes, and he called her name, and she nodded. And he smiled at her, and called her the most beautiful woman in the world.

On a truly objective standpoint, he was incorrect. Both because beauty was not within the realm of objectivity, but also because there were many women who could be called more beautiful, subjectively.

But she also knew that he was speaking nothing but the honest truth. For he loved her. He loved her, he loved her, he loved her. He loved her hair, frizzy as it was. He loved combing it free of knots, and helping her braid it in the mornings, and loved tucking flowers into it, to surprise her when she looked in the mirror. He loved her smile, and loved seeing it, and loved being the cause of it. He loved it when she spoke to him, when she told him of the things she had done, and what she had learned. He loved her art, even as he blushed darkly at being her only subject. She taught him what she knew, and delighted when he found particular pleasure in pottery. They travelled, to find a home that suited both of them. The first time she defended him from brigands had been a terrifying and yet exhilarating experience for them both.

And they built a house. With a room full of paper and clay. And a garden, and a loom. And always, forever, she was the most beautiful woman in the world.

#Loxie's fics #story time #hmmmm thoughts #this might be a folk tale in the book I'm writing #It's like. *related* to a main character's plot arc #but not entirely #but it might also just exist here and in my thoughts #long post #I suppose

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musical-chick-13 · 2 years

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I think people who pick one character from AsoIaF/GoT to be The Protagonist are missing the point, because pretty much all of the characters think THEY are The Protagonist™ and that’s ultimately what screws them over.

(I also want to preface this by saying that that’s the reason I find these characters so interesting, and that this is not meant to insult any of them. I LOVE this story, and this is one of the many reasons why.)

Cersei thinks she’s the Villain Protagonist™ of a gritty drama. Even if it doesn’t make sense for things to work out for her, she assumes they will, seeing everyone around her as faceless idiots serving her narrative. Anyone and everyone will betray her because that’s what always happens in stories like this, so she won’t give them a chance to ever get there. People will move the way she assumes they will; everyone is predictable and stupid and shallow and cowardly. And as such, no one possesses the necessary skills to take her down. If she’s more ruthless and ambitious and paranoid than everyone else, she’ll get what she wants. But that’s not how life actually works, so all she does is alienate those around her, even necessary allies. People aren’t always predictable, not all of them are compliant or subservient or easily-frightened or incompetent. And if you prioritize ruthlessness and distrust, the people who aren’t those things aren’t going to see any reason to keep you around or give you aid.

Jaime thinks he’s a Cynical Misunderstood Antihero. He doesn’t need to work on bettering himself or de-internalizing his violent impulses, because he’s not the problem, it’s society, it’s people’s incorrect assessment of him. Look, he made a friend in Brienne, that must mean he’s not all bad, right? He thinks this story ends in a Public Image Rehabilitation, but he still conflates love with violence, and he still has a fucked up relationship with consent, he’s arrogant to a fault, he still insults Brienne (and just about everyone else) when the opportunity presents itself, and he never bothers trying to change that. And it’s all of this that prevents him from every truly becoming a good person. He’s so mired in this idea of being misunderstood that he doesn’t make a concerted effort to prove that he actually is. People think he’s an oath-breaker, that he has too big of an ego, that he doesn’t care about the people he swore to protect, and he thinks that simply going, “Yeah, but they don’t have the whole picture” is enough in and of itself to prove them wrong because, in a lot of stories, it is. But all his behavior does is cement his reputation as these things.

Dany thinks she’s The Chosen One, which means whatever she does is automatically the right decision. People will accept her rule because it’s hers, she deserves it, it’s morally right. All of her enemies are blanketedly wrong on all accounts in all cases. Her goals supersede anyone else’s because those goals are the way to a Happy Ending, and she doesn’t consider that other people might not see it that way. Many people’s gripes with her stem from gross places like misogyny or wanting to continue keeping slaves, but she forgets to acknowledge that some people’s issues with her might actually be valid. And that The Chosen One is actually a terrifying idea to people outside that person’s immediate personal context. She has three sentient WMDs, essentially. And if she thinks that using them is always morally correct, that the fallout from doing so can’t possibly be a problem because she’s using them and it’s for a noble cause, you end up with what happened in Astapor; and you end up with Drogon killing a child in Mereen and, eventually, her demise at the end of the show.

Sansa starts out thinking she’s an Optimistic Child Hero in a fairytale. This leads to her being held captive at court (she trusted that the authority figures were benevolent), writing a letter to her family that almost comes back to bite her to a deadly degree once her sister finds out in the show (she thought she could solve everything herself via a peaceful resolution), and to her trusting a complete monster of a boy until it’s too late (she thought he was Prince Charming). She thinks that being the Soft, Beautiful Heroine means people will love her and everything will end nicely and neatly, but sometimes instead of “love”, people just take advantage of you. And sometimes their reaction to your beauty isn’t innocent appreciation-sometimes you end up with Littlefinger. (Or Tyrion or The Hound who...let’s just leave it at “they have their own issues,” especially book-wise.) This morphs into assuming that a fairytale-esque betrayal will befall her with every new person she meets. It’s why she defends Petyr after his murder of Lysa, and it’s why she doesn’t leave with Brienne; if she’s going to be betrayed anyway, she might as well at least stick with a villain she understands.

Ned thinks he’s the Noble Hero in a typical fantasy series. He doesn’t consider everyone else’s capacity for cruelty or the idea that honor alone might not be enough. Sometimes there are no perfect choices, sometimes mercy does not give you the end goal you envisioned, and sometimes you can try your best and that can all be undone by one impulsive, unforeseeable action. You can’t honor your way out of ruthless political conflict.

Robb thinks he’s a Romantic War Hero, and thus everything will magically work out for him. His ideals and his marriage will conquer everything. But he broke a marriage promise to a powerful family, and that has consequences. The world won’t bend to his will, not even if he is doing the right thing or has noble goals, not even if he’s had war success, not even if the people at home love him, not even if he’s in love (show) or doing the most honorable thing he can (books). He thinks that being the hero means he can make it through Westeros without having to play the game, and he gets murdered for it.

Theon thinks he’s an Underdog Outcast Hero. He’ll come up from behind with an unsuspecting War Victory, and that will earn him respect, the love of his family, and a legacy he can look back on with pride. And that mindset leads him to murder two children, to drive away any allies and good grace he had at Winterfell, and the reason that the War Victory he imagined was so unexpected is because it’s completely untenable. He gets more and more desperate and it’s increasingly harder and harder to hold onto the control he’s managed to obtain. He has reasons for wanting this that make sense, and he’s been dealt a pretty bad hand in life, and he thinks that’s and his determination to overcome his personal identity struggles is enough to not only justify his actions, but ensure that those actions will be successful. And then his plan blows up in his face, he assumes he’s been miraculously saved (probably still having something to do with seeing himself as The Unexpected Hero), and ends up at Ramsay’s mercy.

Arya thinks she’s a Badass Heroine in the making, a skilled swordslady and Rebellious Princess who’s destined for more than this stuffy life of politics and dresses and formalities. But rebelling isn’t always enough. It doesn’t help with the Mycah situation, and she still needs to rely on others’ help in getting out of the city after Ned is executed. When she does try to embrace the “fully self-sufficient sword lady” idea while with the Faceless Men in Braavos, she is told to functionally discard her identity completely. She does an unauthorized kill because she, not her assassin-persona-in-training, wants to (though the victim’s identity differs in books and show), which leads to her being temporarily blinded and prevented from going on assassination missions, and outright forced to beg for food in the show. In the show, after being reinstated as an apprentice, she is tasked with killing an innocent person, refuses (rebels), and realizes that this life is one she can’t handle. She goes home, and her heading straight for her sword is one of the things that almost completely ruins her relationship with Sansa. In the upcoming Winds of Winter release, her chapter excerpt has her prioritizing revenge over her apprentice duties, and she remarks that her new identity is ruined with this rebellious action. When you rebel, there are consequences-this doesn’t change just because your intentions are good or because you are or think you are important.

Jon thinks, similarly to Ned, that he’s The Good Guy, that doing the right thing, that following The Code is paramount. He thinks that, because he’s The Good Guy, that doing the right thing with the maximum amount of good for everyone will always be a workable option, and that the heroic option will always yield the best result. This is why he thinks proclaiming his love to Ygritte in the show will end well (because love is good and conquers everything) and is, instead, shot by her several times. It’s why he doesn’t foresee a mutiny in either medium, which leads to his (temporary) death. (Let’s be real, he’s getting resurrected in the books, too, this is the one thing I’m sure of.) Because yes, everything is tense and he’s on bad terms with the Watch, but surely they wouldn’t go that far. It’s rough going, and he has to juggle the needs of several widely different groups of people, but he’s doing the right thing and that will win out; his conviction will protect him, at least for the time being while he tries to manage the bigger threat of the White Walkers. The real fight is with them, the mysterious overarching enemy, not within his own ranks. This is a story where everyone puts aside their differences to fight a greater threat-except for the times when it isn’t.

Even Catelyn isn’t immune, as she assumes that Petyr, since he’s her childhood friend, is invested in solving the mystery of what happened to Bran when he tells her the dagger used in the attack was Tyrion’s. Lysa is her sister, she can’t possibly be suspicious. She thinks the Lannisters are evil, her instincts tell her that they were behind everything, she’s the Protective Mother Heroine, so she must be right. But although she is to a certain extent correct, that’s not the complete picture. And this slightly-misplaced confidence leads her to arrest Tyrion, the retaliation of which is Tywin siccing his forces on her homeland, one of the major first steps in the upcoming political war. Then, her continued focus on saving her children-something that must take precedence because they are her children, and this is her story-leads her to taking Walder Frey’s supposed offer of a fix-it solution for Robb breaking his marital pledge at face value, despite House Frey’s reputation, and despite this neat resolution seeming far too good to be true. She’s so focused on the Lannisters-the Obvious Endgame Enemy-that she doesn’t consider the possibility of betrayal from the Freys. She thinks that the world is giving her a break-because she is so desperately looking for one, because she deserves one, because her family deserves one, and those are reasons enough for her to have one-that she doesn’t even bother to re-evaluate the situation until it’s too late.

Melisandre thinks she’s a Religious Hero, but she ends up burning a child alive and alienating one of her few remaining allies in the process (and Davos was barely an ally to begin with). She thinks she’s Doing What Needs To Be Done to serve her savior, but it hurts Stannis more than it helps him, and he just ends up being murdered by Brienne. This is obviously in the show only (at least at this point), and I don’t know if Stannis is going to burn Shireen in the books or not. Stannis thinks he’s the Lawful Hero, and thus, because according to law he’s the Rightful Ruler, anything he does is automatically excusable; he’s just righting a wrong. And in the process, he imprisons his closest friend, has a hand in murdering his brother (when kinslaying is one of the most universally hated breaches of conduct in this fictional universe), allies with a dangerous woman that much of his own court despises, and, in the show, murders his only child and drives away most of the rest of his remaining team.

They all think that, since they are the main characters of their own stories, that they’re the main character of the larger, overarching narrative. That having understandable reasons or sympathetic qualities or even just having a clear goal that they desperately want, that’s enough to cement their importance. And they think that means that they’re justified in everything they do, that everything will work out for them, that the consequences will be lesser for them than for others, because that’s what it’s like to be the main character. The whole point is that there is not A Protagonist™ and that maybe we should examine why a story needs A Protagonist™ in the first place and what that narrative tradition tells us. When GRRM said he turned down adaptation offers because they only wanted to focus on Jon and Dany, this is why.

#asoiaf #got #asoiaf meta #got meta #most of this is directly related to everyone deconstructing the archetypes they would represent in other stories #so I'm not sure how much of this is just 'deconstructing tropes' and how much of it is 'Main Character Perception Syndrome'#also obviously this isn't every character I ran out of room and honestly some of them like davos and brienne and maybe even loras #probably don't think they're The Main Character which there's a whole other essay in there about how they're The Good People #I personally think Bran never gave off 'I think I'm the main character' energy but I know haters will disagree with me on that #like...Idk his sense of self-worth kind of went away and he spent a bunch of time trying to get it back and figure out how to get by #in a society that now thought he was worthless. and how to get enjoyment out of life when his goals were no longer reachable #it read less as 'I think I'm more Important™' and more 'I'm just trying to survive man' but also I love bran I might be a little biased lmao #cersei lannister #jaime lannister #dark!dany #sansa stark #arya stark #theon greyjoy #jon snow #catelyn stark #robb stark #ned stark #melisandre #stannis baratheon #I take my life into my own hands by putting actual names in the tags but I talk about these characters and I don't know how else to tag #this to ensure people who don't want to see it won't have to see it #also for anyone wondering where tyrion is on this list: I was too tired to delve into this phenomenon regarding him because it is ESPECIALLY #prominent regarding him. and this post was already so long and talking about tyrion in this context probably would've made it TWICE as long #there genuinely isn't enough space in here to include him but know that I'm counting him too. most definitely #behold! a creation!

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