#rodrik harlaw

[sugarwhitedeath]

there is something wrong with me

#euron greyjoy #victarion greyjoy #daenerys targaryen #rodrik harlaw #asha greyjoy #falia flowers #aeron greyjoy #asoiaf #valyrianscrolls

[duchess-of-oldtown]

I get a lot of people judge Asha on how she acts around Theon when they're reunited on the Iron Islands and then after Winterfell but consider this: Theon barely remembers her. But she doesn't have that luxury. She remembers everything about him. She remembers his first word, his first steps. She remembers how he'd run to her when Maron and Rodrik were being cruel, how he'd hide behind her when Euron was around, how they would crawl under her bed during storm's together or huddle around the Reader when he would tell them stories about the Grey King. She remembers how excited Theon was about the Rebellion, how disappointed he was when he was left behind. She remembers Baratheon soldiers climbing over their walls, her father kneeling and then strange men coming to take her last brother way. Don't tell me that she didn't hold onto him for dear life or fight them off. Don't tell me that nobody had to hold her back when they finally pulled him free. Then ten years pass with only a few letters. She's left alone with her mother who begins to vanish and a father who suddenly puts all his hope in her, because she's all he has left. Then he comes back. He's somebody else now and he doesn't remember her. He puts himself in danger to prove himself and she tries to stop him but he's running toward the edge and she can't do a thing to halt him. Then she hears nothing about him for months even years on end. And all of a sudden he's standing before her, remembering her name like it's something important and she can't do anything to save him. Again.

#I will keep defending Asha until the day that I die #She's traumatised and she doesn't even realise that for herself #I will keep talking about this wreck of a family until my last breath #house greyjoy #Asha Greyjoy #theon greyjoy #euron greyjoy #balon greyjoy #Rodrik harlaw #House harlaw #Rodrik the reader #The Iron Islands #valyrian scolls #pre asoiaf #asoiaf meta #The winds of winter #A clash of kings #a dance with dragons #a song of ice and fire meta #a song of ice and fire

[teen-spirited-away]

House Harlaw

"Conquest Is Our Harvest"

Sigill: Scythe

Colors: Silver and Black

Seat: The Ten Towers

"Harlaw was not the largest of the Iron Islands, but it was the richest and most populous."

House Harlaw is sworn to house Greyjoy of Pyke. It is one of the wealthiest houses in the Iron Islands.

#house harlaw #the ten towers #asoiaf #game of thrones #house greyjoy #alannys harlaw #rodrik harlaw #hothos harlaw #gwynnese harlaw #aesthetic #edgar allan poe aesthetic

[jedimaesteryoda]

Do you find the Ironborn an interesting part of GRRMs story and/or world building?

The Ironborn are clearly inspired by the Vikings with the revanchist Confederate sympathizers. The tradition of the kingsmoot where they elected kings is a unique development, but only lords and men with enough property (a ship) get a vote. It's a society effectively controlled by pirates. They also have slavery in the form of thralls, and yet refuse to call it slavery with an attitude of "yeah, but it's not like those people" despite it still involving kidnapping people, and forcing them into a life of unpaid, forced labor and sexual violence for women.

As someone who supports anti-colonial movements in real-life, I find them interesting. They are the westernmost kingdom with a history of using their technological advantages in the form of iron when the mainland used bronze, as well as longships, to colonize and plunder the mainland and enslave the greenlanders under a Manifest Destiny doctrine. After they lost those advantages and lost their independence, they kept the Old Way going by appealing to an imagined past. This effectively makes them the most easily despised society in Westeros with a steady mix of the worst impulses: racism, misogyny, hypermasculinity and slavery and liable to turn on each other.

The Old Way is represented by the Greyjoys, a family with systemic abuse, few real relationships with one another other than with Balon, and a lot of infighting living in a literally crumbling castle falling into the sea. Balon launches a rebellion, fails, suffering big personal losses and is then "don't worry, it'll totally work this time." He is an old man clinging to the past, brooding alone in his tower as his house figuratively and literally crumbles around him. Victarion personifies the Old Way as is: an unhappy, hypermasculine dumbass warrior with his imagination constrained by the limits of his ideology, making him a tool easily manipulated. Euron is the Old Way as it appeals to the Ironborn: appealing on the surface but a predatory monster beneath who promises an impossible dream destined for disaster. The Ironborn take it given he is offering them emotion, and Ironborn are deeply unhappy as a people. The Old Way doesn't give them the happiness it promises, but plenty of disaster when their victims inevitably fight back.

The Old Way is riddled with hypocrisy with Victarion saying the Shield Island ships fleeing battle ceased to be men when they retreated when he did the same thing at Fair Isle. Aeron disdains maesters for choosing a life of service when he did as a Drowned Man. They begrudge Robert's forces' invasion and destruction of the Iron Isles when they glorify doing the same to others.

There are however those who support a New Way like The Reader and the three Harmunds before him.

There is clearly a struggle between the Old Way and the New Way within Ironborn society going on for centuries. The three Harmunds encouraged friendly relations with the greenlands and trade as well as literacy with Harmund III trying to outlaw the Old Way. The Shrike led a rebellion against Harmund III and it resulted in an invasion of the Iron Isles and the Famine Winter after that starved, impoverished and depopulated the Iron Isles with the New Way rebuilding the Iron Isles.

Quellon Greyjoy tried similarly until he died and Balon reversed his reforms. The Reader himself is an intellectual in a society that frowns upon literacy and scholarship, yet it's what allows him to effectively challenge Euron by pulling back the curtain on his tricks. He knows the dreams of reviving the Old Way is a pipe dream.

The attempts to revive the Old Way keep ending in disaster, taking more Old Way ideologues with them. And even without that, reaving had been on decline for a while and replaced with trade with men "returning with treasures their forebears had never dreamed of." Rather than driving them forward, the Old Way holds them back and has been slowly dying.

The current generation of Greyjoys just may be the last gasp of the Old Way.

#asoiaf #ironborn #iron islands #house greyjoy #balon greyjoy #victarion greyjoy #rodrik harlaw #euron greyjoy #aeron greyjoy #aeron damphair

[bringerofplagues]

Some underrated ASOIAF characters who deserve more attention

As the title says, this post will be about some of my favourite ASOIAF characters who i think deserve more attention.

Aurane Waters:

The first character on this list is Aurane Waters. Now Auranes story isn’t very deep but he is fun, entertaining and cool as hell. So he starts out fighting with Stannis at the battle of blackwater bay, then he ends up joining Cersei on the small council and manages to charm her by looking like Rhaegar, and then he runs off with her newly build navy. Now i do not like Cersei so people who can play her and beat her at her own game instantly have a place in my heart. I should also mention that i love pirates and there is strong evidence that Aurane will become the pirate king known as the Lord of The Waters using the ships he stole from Cersei. This also puts him in an interesting position going forward as he could realistically join any faction in the current conflict and be a big player which is really cool. My last point is this, just look at him, the dude absolutely fucks:

Rodrik Harlaw, aka The Reader: Rodrik is Asha and Theons maternal uncle and he is my favourite ironborn character. In many ways he reminds me of Doran Martell, an fatherly figure to a female pov character who is noted to be more cautious than the people around him and who is looked down upon by many within his culture. I also like his quirk of loving books, even having had septons at his home to help him care for his collection. I also love his relationship with Asha, being a better father figure to her than Balon was ,as well as her biggest supporter (that title might be challenged by Qarl and Tristifer). He also seems to be scheming to protect Asha from her forced marriage by overturning the kingsmoot, as he sends her a book that specifically mentions that a kingsmoot can be nullified if a claimant was not present, in this case that would be Theon. And then there was the time he owned Euron the Incel with just 2 words. Euron was bragging about having sailed to Valyria when Rodrik says: “Have you?” which clearly pisses Euron off. Fucking legend

Brynden Rivers, Aka Bloodraven: Ok so, Bloodraven does get a lot of attention especially from the theorist community who have the saying “when in doubt blame Bloodraven”. But i don’t think enough people give attention to him as a character. The cool thing about Bloodravens character is that he seems to be a product of his enviroment. Bloodraven grew up in kings landing as one of the great bastards of king Aegon The Unworthy. He famously suffered albinism which resulted in him having to wear heavy black clothes all of his life. This would have gone on since his childhood, and we know that this trade made people not trust him. So people have apparently distrusted him since he could walk outside. Imagine what that does to a kid. And then at some point he figures out he is a skinchanger. And that is when he becomes the master of the game of thrones and worlds best spymaster.I love this because a lot of characters justify their distrust of him because of how good of a spy he is, but he became that way because no one trusted him. And lets not forget that he was apparently a really nice military leader. At least enough to where most of his private army, The Ravens Teeth, decided to join him on the wall despite being under no obligation to do so. That show some major respect from his men. And at last he has some really cool Odin symbolism going on with the one eye and the ravens and all that.

#asoiaf #aurane waters #rodrik harlaw #rodrik the reader #brynden rivers #bloodraven

[amuelia]

Victarion could feel the unease in the hall. He pushed himself to his feet. “Brother,” he boomed. “You have not answered Harlaw’s questions.”  - The Reaver, a Feast for Crows

Euron and Rodrik’s confrontation from a Feast for Crows :)

Happy Birthday @quaithe ! ❤️❤️❤️

Depicted: Euron Greyjoy / Group including Germund Botley, Andrik the Unsmiling, Left Hand Lucas Codd, Quellon Humble, Hotho Harlaw / Rodrik Harlaw / Group including Victarion Greyjoy and Nute the Barber

#asoiaf #house greyjoy #euron greyjoy #rodrik harlaw #victarion greyjoy #nute the barber #a song of ice and fire #a feast for crows #valyrianscrolls #2022 #comics

[sowthetide]

the water can’t drown me | T | 1214 words

The days bleed together, the sun runny as a yolk. The seabirds scream and the wind wails and the hungry sea eats away at the world. Ships come and go, and she watches the horizon.

Alannys waits. She is patient. Oh, so patient.

#no STRS update this sunday but we do have this! #for goddcoward <3 <3 <3 #alannys greyjoy #alannys harlaw #theon greyjoy #balon greyjoy #asha greyjoy #fic #asoiaf #rodrik harlaw #i will be writing more lannyfic and probably some aeronfic too

[mother-rhoyne]

Euron's most Greyjoy moment is definitely when Rodrik went "uhm you're full of shit" to his face in front of everyone and all he had to say after his (absolutely not rehearsed) godliest man to ever set sail speech was "shut up nerd"

#just saying Theon's been getting his lessons somewhere #Euron Greyjoy #Rodrik Harlaw

[hell-heron]

This is not something that could be a serious theory about canon (one of those cases where it definitely would come up if true) nor that I can use for fanfic (clashes with all my preexisting headcanons for that generation) so random post for my 25 readers it is.

I think it would be cool for Alannys and Rodrik to be their father's salt children and Gwynesse be the only fully legitimate one from a rock wife. I think it really would have enhanced the Iron Islands worldbuilding differentiating it from the mainland to have this dynamic within the royal family and happening to important characters. I also think none of these passages make logical sense if Rodrik and Gwynesse are just plain full siblings, especially not as comparison to Asha's situation where unlike Gwynesse the law is fully on her side.

Fun fact, the Italian translation also describes Alannys as Rodrik's half sister, probably because the translator was unable to parse the complex word string "another widowed half-mad sister". Though, I prefer for Rodrik and Alannys to both be the salt children in this train of thought, for the implications for Theon and Asha and also makes more sense chronologically as Alannys is even younger than Rodrik

#i have other fanwankings as to why gwynesse thinks that in my standing headcanons but not really an explanation for why rodrik thinks its a #good argument to make ajgjsk #asoiaf #alannys harlaw #rodrik harlaw #gwynesse harlaw

[aegor-bamfsteel]

How do you think ACOK/AGOT Theon Greyjoy would have gotten along politically and personally with his uncle Rodrik “the Reader”, as well as cousin Ser Harras Harlaw? For me, Theon’s relationship with his mothers family is one of the more notable missed opportunities for interesting personal dynamics (also, if the Theon Latecomer theory comes to pass, R’hllor help us all if poor Alannys never gets to hold her baby boy one more time)

I agree with you in that I’m very interested in the Harlaws, as despite their limited page time they’ve proven to be varied characters, from bookish Rodrik to stern knight Harras to ambitious Hotho to proud and stubborn Gwynesse and tragic Alannys. Usually characters in these minor houses get one trait for all, especially the ironborn; it’s the bigger houses that get this sort of variety and nuance. Plus they breed a shaggy pony that I’m guessing (due to the resemblance between the Iron Islands and Scottish isles) is analogous to the Shetland pony.

Harras and Theon probably did have a personal relationship before the latter had to leave Pyke, and I don’t think it was a positive one; “As a boy Harlaw had been fast friends with Balon's eldest son, Rodrik” (AFFC The Reaver) but Theon “remembered Rodrik's drunken cuffs” and told Patrek that he was horrible enough he doesn’t care Jason killed him (ACOK Theon I). Anyone who was fast friends with Rodrik is likely not going to be someone Theon has warm thoughts of. What little we know of Harras has him a great warrior, loyal, has an ancient Valyrian steel sword, serious, merciful enough (Euron had all the Hewetts killed while Harras just imprisoned the Grimms)…most of which would bore Theon, some of which would remind him of Ned Stark whom he feared due to their history (and he and Harras must’ve had some history too). Basically I don’t think they’d be personally friends. However, if Theon became his liege, I think Harras would support him (certainly over the Greyjoy uncles) and would reave where he was ordered.

Rodrik Harlaw, I think Theon would feel similarly to how Asha does in early AFFC, resentful of his cautioning him about fighting a war the ironborn can’t win, but unlike Asha probably thinks less of him for constantly reading books (Luwin at least admits to never liking him); and he thinks Victarion is an old man who’d just take his orders, so he’d likely think even less of Rodrik and his advice. However, Rodrik would still support him out of necessity and try to advise him, though wouldn’t personally reave.

Don’t worry, Theon is going back to those islands and meeting Alannys. It’s all part of his subverted Hero’s Journey, in which he returns to his home a greatly changed person due to the trials in the unknown world, now with the ability to grant boons to his deeply damaged community, aka Alannys (who’s the only person happy to see him for non-political reasons). I say this with hope, because even though GRRM has expressed dislike for the Hero’s Journey Monomyth, even he can’t resist the idea of his main characters going back to the place they’re born (the possible confirmation of seeing Casterly, show!Daenerys on Dragonstone, of course all Starks will be at Winterfell)

#ask #house harlaw #theon greyjoy #asoiaf headcanon #harras harlaw #rodrik harlaw #asoiaf predictions #opinion

[ironbornsource]

Ironborn Character Bracket

Welcome to the Ironborn Character Bracket where your ironborn faves face off against each other and you get to vote to pick the winner!

Quick FAQ under the Read More

How will this work?

Characters will face off against each other in a poll in pairs as shown in the bracket above. The winner of each pair will progress to the next round, until there is a final winner. Basically, like a regular single-elimination bracket. Voting will start on September 22, 2023 and each poll will run for one week. Once all round of 16 polls close, the quarter final polls will open within 24 hours and each of those will also run for one week. Rinse and repeat for the semifinal and final rounds. We encourage you to follow the blog to not miss any new polls!

Where are Theon and Asha?

We decided to leave them out for the sake of making this a little more interesting/exciting and less predictable. Let’s see who else y’all stan ❤

Only 16 contestants? Such a small bracket!

Yes, unfortunately there are not a lot of significant ironbron characters. We wanted a bracket that would break down nicely and evenly. So for one more round we’d need to go up to 32 characters, and while we could find 32 named ironborn characters, at some point it becomes a little arbitrary which name-only/single mention characters would be picked vs. not picked. We’re sorry if we’ve excluded your minor fave! Feel free to tell us who they are in an ask so we can take that into consideration next time.

Can I send in propaganda and such?

We won’t be posting propaganda under the polls, BUT feel free to send asks with propaganda, comments, thoughts, whatever, and we’ll publish them here for everyone to see! 

#ironborn #iron islands #balon greyjoy #aeron greyjoy #euron greyjoy #victarion greyjoy #quellon greyjoy #alannys greyjoy #alannys harlaw #rodrik harlaw #rodrik the reader #tristifer botley #qarl the maid #gwynesse harlaw #dagmer cleftjaw #wex pyke #baelor blacktyde #dalton greyjoy #harren hoare #black harren #hagen's daughter #asoiaf #tumblr bracket #ironborn bracket #polls

[dyannawynnedayne]

Who Has The Most Gender?: Round 1

Arya: art by laurellerual, AWOIAF Page

Rodrik: art by nosafeanchorage, AWOIAF Page

BRACKET LINK

#we are all born naked the rest is drag #round one #arya stark #rodrik harlaw

[duchess-of-oldtown]

I love Rodrik Harlaw because although he loves Asha, he's not really into the whole Iron Born thing. Yes, he's gone to war with Balon, he goes to the kingsmoot, he sails with Euron but he doesn't really believe in it. Anything not book related and he's like

#This man was done before the series even begun #And I respect him for that #Rodrik Harlaw #The Harlaw of harlaw #House harlaw #Harlaw #The Iron Born #the iron islands #The Iron isles #House Greyjoy #valyrian scrolls #Asha Greyjoy #balon greyjoy #euron greyjoy #Affc #Adwd #asoiaf #a song of ice and fire #ASOIAF meta

[cola-fiend]

Alannys Greyjoy @ Rodrik Harlaw

#asoiaf #iron islands #alannys harlaw #alannys greyjoy #rodrik harlaw #house greyjoy #happy au 🥹 #Alannys is just Rodrik’s cooky sister that laughs loudly and loves her children 🥺🥺🥺🥺 #Rodrik is the long suffering uncle that just wants to read but Alannys brought the kids over 🙄 #Alannys being a bottle blonde cigarette mom with a heart of gold

[alleyskywalker]

How do you think ACOK/AGOT Theon Greyjoy would have gotten along politically and personally with his uncle Rodrik “the Reader”, as well as cousin Ser Harras Harlaw? For me, Theon’s relationship with his mothers family is one of the more notable missed opportunities for interesting personal dynamics (also, if the Theon Latecomer theory comes to pass, R’hllor help us all if poor Alannys never gets to hold her baby boy one more time)

Hi! Sorry it took me so long to get to this ask. It's true that the Harlaws are not very developed, being minor characters mostly.

Harras particularly we know next to nothing about. We know he's a knight, perhaps encouraged in that direction by the Serrett/Westerlands side of his family, he's a good fighter and seems on the all-business side of things (although this is taken very from off-hand type of comments). He does not appear to be married? Not sure what that says either way. He's actually, if I'm reading the family tree right, a cousin of Rodrik the Reader, which makes him Theon's like…second uncle? Or whatever that's called? However, he's younger than Rodrik it seems, given that he was good friends with Rodrik Greyjoy, Theon's brother. While it's difficult to project a personality from these scant details, I think the friendship with Rodrik probably doesn't bode well for Theon and him being friends. Even if Harras didn't personally participate in Rodrik's bullying, he's the kind of person who would be friends with a Rodrik and, even if we say he was younger and grew out of it or whatever, Theon would still have that association. Politically, however, I see House Harlaw sticking with the Greyjoy kids, whether Asha or Theon. If we assume that Rodrik didn't consider his bullying of Theon personal (and more as normal sibling hazing he'd do to anyone), Harras might also feel an honor/chivalry-induced drive (see knighthood) to support his close friend's brother and rightful heir.

Rodrik the Reader is interesting because we do know a little more about him, but we don't see him interact with Theon or anyone else much in the family, aside from Asha. Theon's favorite uncle in his childhood seems to have been pre-conversion Aeron, i.e. someone of similar personality to himself - social, charming, fun-loving, brash, lusty, etc. Rodrik in comparison would probably feel boring or uptight to Theon. Theon in ACOK would also probably be, or at least try to appear as, on a bit of an anti-intellectualism bend. Not because he's dumb or even "was a poor student" or whatever, but because he's just not nerdy or a bookworm, generally to begin with, and he's trying extra hard to fit in with the Iron Islands cultural slant, which IS somewhat anti-intellectual relative to the mainland. (I'm willing to bet this is half of where those "Greyjoys are working class" modern AUs come from lol.) In any case, Theon is not likely to appreciate the nerdy, secluded company Rodrik would offer.

That said…an uncle doesn't need to be a buddy, necessarily. If Rodrik wanted to bond with Theon for whatever reason and/or just happened to be in the right situation… He seems to be a pretty insightful and above-average-on-empathy type of person. Theon also really needs a stable and compassionate father figure, or any family member really, who could offer him emotional safety and support. Rodrik may not be perfect in this role, but he'd probably do better than a lot of other people, especially in the Greyjoy family. So assuming either specific effort on his end or the right type of situation, I think Theon might be inclined to reach for him, just because he's so obviously starved for love.

Politically, even more so than Harras, I think Rodrik could be safely considered a supporter of Theon, at least unless he's going up against Asha. If it's Theon vs. Asha…that might be a different, difficult sort of situation which I could see falling either way due to a number of factors.

#theon greyjoy #rodrik harlaw #rodrik the reader #harras harlaw #asoiaf #meta #asked and answered #op

[bringerofplagues]

Daddy Issues Of The Kraken: An Analysis of Theon and Asha Greyjoy

 Daddy issues a recurring theme in ASOIAF. The most famous examples are probably Jon Snow with his tendency to bond with many male authority figures and Tyrion Lannister with the entirety of his relationship with Tywin. However i think one of the most interesting executions of this theme are Theon and Asha Greyjoy. Specifically i belive that Theon and Ashas relationship to their dad Balon Greyjoy and their respective surrogate father figures acts as a microcosm of their entire characterization, especially in regards to their relationship with Ironborn culture.

I will start by examining Theon as i believe his daddy issues are more obvious than Ashas. Theon has obviously been greatly impacted by growing up with the Starks. While he never seems to think of Eddard Stark as a father he does consider Robb Stark a brother. The tension between his love for his stark family and his desire to be accepted by his Ironborn family is the central element to Theons character. It gets illustrated very well in a short passage in ADWD where Theon is in the crypts of Winterfell. Theon sees a statue of Theon Stark, a king winter known as the hungry wolves who acclaimed fame by fighting the Andals and kicking the Ironborn out of Bear Island. When seeing the statue Theon thinks to himself that Theon Stark is his namesake.This is interesting as him being named after a Stark king and not a Greyjoy symbolically ties him to the Starks, especially considering that Theon Stark was an enemy to the Ironborn. One must also remember that the Ironborn claim to be a completely different race than the peoples of mainland Westeros and take great pride in this difference. As such Theon being named after a main lander also differentiates him from Ironborn culture. There is also the option that Theon is wrong in this belief and that he is actually named after some other historical figure named Theon. If this is the case it shows us that Theon thinks of himself as more of a Stark than a Greyjoy, at least after all of the rejections and torture he had gone through during the series. Earlier in the series when Theon goes to the Iron Islands to meet with his father it is clear from the start that he no longer fits into the culture nor his own family. His father rejects him based on his clothing and he is constantly met with mistrust as people are concerned with the time he spent on the mainland. Whats worse for Theon is the fact that most people seem to expect Asha to follow Balon and not Theon. Asha also ends up tricking and humiliating him, thus showing that she is above him in Ironborn society. This is where his surrogate father Dagmer Cleftjaw becomes interesting. Dagmer is in many ways an archetypical Ironborn, he enjoys reaving, songs about reaving, drinking, and has his characteristic cleft jaw. Dagmer thus acts as a symbol of Ironborn culture to Theon, and unlike his father Dagmer is willing to accept Theon.I believe this is why Theon cares so deeply about Dagmer as he is the only Ironbron who truly accepts him and cares about him, at least from Theons point of view. With this i will now move on to discussing Asha.

Ashas problems with her family and the Ironborn are a lot harder to notice. This is partly due to us first meeting her through Theons POV. As such our first perception of Asha is colored by how Theon sees her. Specifically Theon sees Asha getting much of the acceptance that he desires for himself. Theon is very jealous of Asha and this impacts how we see her. It is only once we starts Ashas POV that this perception of her starts getting torn down. For one Asha is not as happy with her father as Theons chapters would leave you to believe, as she mentions that the she considers Ten Towers her true home, not Pyke. We don’t know why this is, but we see that Asha rejects Balon, despite being his preferred heir. If we contiue with the theory that Balon represents traditional ironborn culture / the old way this would symbolise Asha rejecting those ideals. And we do see this in Ashas POV chapters at the Kingsmoot, she even at one point claims that the old way is dead due to Aegons unification of the seven kingdoms. Asha instead proposes a much more pragmatic world view in which the ironborn should focus on achieving whatever gains they can most realistically achieve. Specifally she proposes that the Ironborn should exit the war and consolidate their gains along the stony shore. If we now look at Ashas father figure Rodrik Harlaw we see that he is a highly atypical member of ironborn culture who also seems very pragmatic. We know he used to hire septons to tend to his books despite not being a follower of the faith of the seven. Meanwhile many people on the Iron Islands outright hate the faith and would never hire a septon. Other than Rodrik, those who are okay with septons are usually worshipers of the faith. We also see his pragmatic nature after the kingsmoot when he gives Asha a way to reverse the kingsmoot and escape her arranged/forced marriage, since Theon would be able to overturn the kingsmoot. The kingsmoot is also interesting as Ashas status as Balons preffered heir is suddenly ignored due to her gender. This shows us that while ironborn culture is willing to accept Asha and give her power when the alternative is an outsider, as a woman she will still always be seen as lesser than the men from her culture. This may be part of the reason why she rejects the Old way, and again it is interesting as Rodrik never rejects her based on her gender, seemingly not caring about it at all. It is worth to note that Asha doesn’t fully agree with Rodrik as she enjoys the idea of going out and seeking glory while seeing Rodrik as a craven since he would rather stay in his tower and read

To summarize, Theons character is centered around the conflict of his love towards, at the very least, Robb Stark and his desire to be accepted by an Ironbron family who constantly rejects him, this is what leads him to making the many bad decisions he does throughout the series. The latter part of this conflict is reflected in his relationship to his two father figures. Balon rejects Theon while Dagmer gives him the acceptance he craves. Meanwhile Asha seems to be accepted by Ironborn society, at least when compared to Theon who is seen as an outsider. However she rejects her father in favour of the more pragmatic Rodrik Harlaw. In the same vein she rejects the old way in favour of a more pragmatic new way of thinking. We also see that Asha is seen as lesser than her uncles due to her gender by many ironborn but not by Rodrik. As thus their relationships with their respective father figures acts as a microcosm of their relationships with ironborn culture.

#asoiaf #theon greyjoy #asha greyjoy #balon greyjoy #dagmer cleftjaw #rodrik harlaw