#i got like three joan of arcs when i got confirmed and she fell off of my keychain so i need to find one of my other ones :(

[realnielsbohr]

ok im not even really. religious anymore but i collect those tiny saint keychains and they finally came out with a hildegard of bingen one. she is one of my favorite saints AND her feast day is on my birthday. so um. i need to acquire that one IMMEDIATELY

[theladyjojogrant]

The Missy Chronicles and why it’s one of the best Doctor Who books ever made.

Is it as hilarious as it sounds? Even more so. 

I just read The Missy Chronicles and I still can’t believe how perfect it is. Each story brings something unique to Missy’s character and adds some interesting things to Doctor Who canon that you really, no I mean really, don’t want to miss. 

(Below is a short synopsis of each story and some memorable quotes/things that happened. If you don’t want spoilers, come back and read this once you’ve read the book!) 

1. Dismemberment by James Goss

Basically, the Master always goes to this sketchy gentlemen’s club after he regenerates to just chill and be around other morally questionable people. But this time there’s a problem. The Master (as Missy, though she hasn’t decided on her name at this point) goes to the club like usual after her regeneration, but gets kicked out because she’s a woman. The rest of the story is her carrying out very extravagant plots for revenge on each of the members of the club, including, but not limited to: making it rain blood; tying a man to train tracks, marrying him, and then letting him get run over; and last but not least, freeing an African American slave and letting her poison the food at the club’s big annual celebration, telling them they can be cured if they eat some paper, and then telling them after they eat the paper that she was lying. 

Favourite quotes:

About Missy: “Her eyes possessed that cold burn you got from holding ice.” 

Missy: “So sorry I’m late. Just been running over a maths teacher with a milk float. You know how it is.” (GUYS I’M NOT CRAZY MY THEORY WAS RIGHT AND IT’S NOW CONFIRMED, MISSY KILLED DANNY!!!!!) 

Generally, this story was funny and very typically Missy. Also the African American slave Missy saved is the one who eventually comes up with the name Missy, and the only person from the club that Missy didn’t kill was a certain man named Dr. Skarosa...

2. Lords and Masters by Cavan Scott 

The time lords recruit Missy to go on a mission for them, so they hijack the Eye of Harmony in her TARDIS and send a time lady to hold a gun to her head. Basically she has to figure out what’s causing some strange time disturbances, and it turns out this doctor genetically engineered a creature that could travel in space and time and kept it in stasis so that he could gain the power from its energy or something like that. Missy was supposed to kill the creature, but instead she manipulated the time lady to kill the doctor, kept the creature, and miniaturized then killed the time lady and sent her back to the General on Gallifrey. 

Favourite quotes:

“Missy had places to go and people to subjugate.” 

“Missy gave her the look she usually reserved for simpletons and UNIT personnel.” 

Not too much went on story-wise, but it was interesting to see how Missy dealt with being pushed around by the time lords. She also gets her first “companion” in this story: Yayani, the time lady who’s supposed to kill her if she doesn’t obey the time lords’ instructions. 

3. Teddy Sparkles Must Die! by Paul Magrs

Yes, it is just about as strange as it sounds. Missy becomes the governess of three children in early/mid-20th century England. The children are suspicious of her and go through her things, only to find a sparkly teddy bear who’s really an alien who can distort time and complicated stuff to grant wishes. The teddy bear lets them go to crazy places like the moon and Missy gets the kids out of trouble. In return for her rescuing them, she wants the kids to wish to grow up to be powerful people in the world, and the kids do it because they don’t really get it. So they grow up and become powerful people, forgetting about Missy. Then Missy comes back when they’re older and demands they give her the world. Teddy Sparkles (the alien bear) thwarts Missy’s plan by rewriting time and sending the kids back to their childhood, though he also accidentally incorporates crazy creatures that Missy told the kids stories about into the world. Teddy Sparkles uses up the rest of his energy/life to set everything right again, even inventing a fictional story about a governess with a carpet bag and an umbrella who takes children on fantastic adventures so that Missy will become famous, which is something she hates because she gets crowded by people gawking at her. Missy leaves, and in the end one of the children grows up to be a grandmother, and Teddy Sparkles shows up as a Christmas present for one of her grandchildren. 

I didn’t write down any really memorable quotes from this one, but the whole Mary Poppins connection was great, and I found it interesting that Missy actually “lost” in this one; it wasn’t from her point of view at all, either. 

4. The Liar, the Glitch, and the War Zone by Peter Anghelides

This one is pretty complicated to explain because it’s very timey-wimey, but basically Missy runs her TARDIS into some Gryphons (after escaping from the Daleks at the end of The Witch’s Familiar) and then crash lands in 21st century Venice. Through a series of things happening (time rifts and stuff are involved), Missy’s dematerialisation circuit ends up in 14th century Venice and she goes back in time with a random girl (Antonia) and also tries to destroy 21st century Venice in order to get her TARDIS working again and escape the Gryphons. After the TARDIS starts working again Missy time rams her TARDIS and everything undoes itself, so 21st century Venice goes back to normal. Missy tries to leave Antonia in 14th century Venice with her dead friend who fell through a time rift, but Antonia mysteriously ends back up in the TARDIS. More on that in a sec because...

GUYS. THE THIRTEENTH DOCTOR IS IN THIS STORY. NO JOKE. Missy discovers her dematerialisaiton circuit went back in time when she sees an ad for it being on display in a museum. She tries to ask where it came from, but all the employees keep telling her to talk to the curator. So finally she sets up an appointment, and that’s where I immediately became suspicious. The curator’s office is very thoroughly described, and while the combination of old and new stuff (including a plague doctor’s mask) could be telling of the Doctor (I mean, Day of the Doctor and the Curator, hello???), it also could just be a typical curator. But what set me off was that the curator is never physically described at all. There are other clues (before an obvious reveal at the end of the story.) Through the whole story people keep calling Missy “signora” and she insists that she wants to be called “signorina” instead. The curator calls Missy “signorina” without any indication from Missy. And as the curator is helping Missy find out where the dematerialisation circuit came from, she says “I do enjoy this kind of research myself. It’s a real trip into the past.” Missy also runs into a plague doctor back in the 14th century when she’s getting her circuit back. Then at the end it’s made really clear. Antonia shows up in Missy’s TARDIS (after Missy tried to abandon her) saying “If it wasn’t for her, no one would have seen me again.” She then gives Missy a note: “...two short paragraphs of neat handwriting chastised Missy for her lack of caution, and told her that she would need to try much harder.” Missy goes back to the curator’s office and finds it empty except for the plague doctor’s mask. All the curator’s secretary can tell her is (and it’s the last line of the story): “The doctor doesn’t work here any more.” (*SCREAMS*) 

Also, Missy decides to call one of the Gryphons “Hermione” and then says that she’s a Slytherin girl herself because she goes for the bad boys. She also says that she sees some Severus Snape in herself. 

5. Girl Power! by Jacqueline Rayner 

I don’t know how Jacqueline Rayner can write perfect Doctor Who stories. Every. Single. Time. 

This story is not told in traditional narrative fashion, but initially through messages that Nardole and the Twelfth Doctor send back and forth to each other. Nardole is guarding Missy in the vault and is worried when she seems to be putting together some sort of plot. The Doctor tells him to go along with it, and soon enough Missy is contacting important and influential women all throughout history to create MADAM, Missy’s Army for the Demotion of All Men. (I’m still dying over that XD). She creates a group on “Spacebook” and chats with these women, including Henry VIII’s wives, Joan of Arc, Lady Jane Grey, Elizabeth I, Agatha Christie, and Jane Austen. Basically Missy just wants them all to kill all the men on the planet. But the Doctor joins the chat pretending to be Circe and gets all the women to leave the chat. He and Missy end up talking because Missy of course knows it’s him, and the Doctor thinks she came up an elaborate plot so that she could escape the Vault. Missy sort of accidentally confesses, however, that she was trying to have the oppressed (women) fight their oppressors (men), like the Doctor would do. 

Favourite quotes: 

Literally the entire story. The synopsis is vague because the meat of the story is Missy writing all these feminist things about how to respond to stupid man questions and how to do things that women can’t do at certain points in time (like vote, own property, etc.) and sending them to the members of MADAM. At the beginning of the story Nardole relates to the Doctor things that Missy has asked for, and the Doctor approves or disapproves them. These things include: hairspray, history books about important women (which was where she got the MADAM idea), marshmallows, a campfire (to roast the marshmallows; however, the Doctor doesn’t approve that one because “If she’s still got that can of hairspray, we could all be in big trouble.”), a tiger, and sherbert lemons. 

Missy: “It has come to my notice that being a woman isn’t just about the addition of some wobbly bits and a sudden inability to grow a goatee.” 

Missy on her Spacebook profile under the section ‘other names:’ “Professor Thascales, Colonel Masters, Reverend Magister, Sir Gilles Estram, Mister Saxon. Look, if I called myself ‘Reggie’ or ‘Dave’ the Doctor never even had the decency to suspect it was me. I used to go to a lot of trouble dressing myself up for him so is it so wrong to want some attention?” 

Missy on her Spacebook profile under the section ‘life events:’ “Born, Died, Died, Died, Died, Died, Died, Died, Died, Died, Died, Died, Died Died, Died, Took over some bloke’s body, Died, Died, Died, Became a human, Stopped being a human, Died, Died, Became a woman, Ruled!”

Missy: “I’m 100% done with human women. Hate the lot of them. Hope they all use lead-based makeup and die.” 

I literally did not stop laughing throughout this entire story. And I really mean that. My abs hurt. 

6. Alit in Underland by Richard Dinnick

Takes place during World Enough and Time/The Doctor Falls. Missy and Simm!Master travel around Floor 507 with Alit, the girl who gave Cyber-Bill the mirror in The Doctor Falls. The Masters (with Alit in tow) take out some Cybermen who come after them and find an elevator to leave the floor. 

Not much plot-wise, as you can see, and it’s a fairly short story. But bantering between the Masters is fantastic, and one of the best parts is Missy and Simm talking about how much they love cartoons. Missy tells him that she and the Doctor watched Frozen together and Simm can’t believe it and keeps judging her for it, when finally Missy tells him to “Let it go.” 

The other interesting and really cool aspect to this story is Missy’s character. She comforts Alit, tells her a story when she’s frightened, and even holds her hand. She also deliberately saves people, but keeps that a secret from Simm. I really like how the final two stories incorporate Missy’s slight moral shift. And the last little bit of the story, and of the book itself, is awesome: 

Simm!Master: “Tell me. Travelling with the Doctor. What is that all about?”

“I was imprisoned. It was the only way out.” 

“So you did have a plan before you ran into me. Get rid of him; betray him?” He licked his lips. “Kill him?” 

“Get rid...?” Missy looked at the Master, and her face became a stony façade. “That has a certain ring to it.” 

...

“Note to self: Get rid of...betray...kill.” Missy nodded. “Yes. I suppose that’s the only way.” 

The Missy Chronicles, everyone. If you have the chance to read it, please do.

[ladyjonquilinthenorth]

The Lady of the Rivers

If you’ve spent more than three days in the Jonsa fandom (or GoT fandom at large), you’ve probably picked up by now that GRRM has based his tale heavily on myth (I AM SHOOKETH, @ladyandtheghost​), much on history, and specifically on the events surrounding the Wars of the Roses, a series of wars in 15th century England fought between two major houses, Lancaster and York, as they wrestled for control of the crown.

Much and more has been written on the subject, all of it just a quick Google away, so I don’t feel the need to elaborate any further for the moment. However, there is one aspect of this comparison that I would like to focus on, and how it specifically relates to Jonsa, so stick around, because things could get interesting!

Around the time that I fell down the ASOIAF/GoT rabbit hole, I chanced upon a great show called The White Queen which was airing on STARZ.

(please don’t ask why the poster is all in black. That’s something I’d like to know as well.)

The one-season, ten-episode show is based on a book of the same name by Philippa Gregory. She, in turn, based her writings on the historical events surrounding Elizabeth Woodville, the woman who would eventually go on to marry Edward IV of York, thereby becoming Queen of England, and matriarch of a line of rulers that would eventually end with Elizabeth I.

Many have declaimed on the inaccuracy and incorrect portrayal of the books and show mentioned above, and for the most part, I tend to agree. But for the purposes of this meta, the information I intend to use, while referred to in Gregory’s work, has been confirmed by Wikipedia (I know!) and other sources of equivalent credence.

Besides the titular White Queen, there was another important character present in the book/show and history, namely, Jacquetta of Luxembourg, Countess Rivers, wife first to John of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Bedford (d. 1435), then to Sir Richard Woodville, 1st Earl Rivers, and mother to Elizabeth (and 13 other children, who, for the purposes of this meta shall remain nameless).

During her short marriage to John of Lancaster, brother to Henry V, she was firmly allied with House Lancaster. However, following the Lancastrian defeat at the Battle of Towton, she and her second husband, Richard Woodville, sided with the House of York.

Now, all this would be very interesting if we were looking for more information on the Wars of the Roses, which I don’t know about you, but I’m writing a Jonsa-esque meta here, so let’s move on.

Jacquetta of Luxembourg wasn’t just any old lady. She was the the eldest daughter of Peter I of Luxembourg, Count of Saint-Pol, Conversano and Brienne, and his wife Margaret of Baux. Incidentally, her uncle, John II of Luxmebourg was head of the military campaign that captured Joan of Arc.

But here’s the deal: Don’t ask where, or why, or how it’s even possible, but the Luxembourgs claimed descent from from a legendary water deity known as Melusine, or Melusina.

“The fairy Melusina, also, who married Guy de Lusignan, Count of Poitou, under condition that he should never attempt to intrude upon her privacy, was of this latter class. She bore the count many children, and erected for him a magnificent castle by her magical art. Their harmony was uninterrupted until the prying husband broke the conditions of their union, by concealing himself to behold his wife make use of her enchanted bath. Hardly had Melusina discovered the indiscreet intruder, than, transforming herself into a dragon, she departed with a loud yell of lamentation, and was never again visible to mortal eyes; although, even in the days of Brantome, she was supposed to be the protectress of her descendants, and was heard wailing as she sailed upon the blast round the turrets of the castle of Lusignan the night before it was demolished.”

-The Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border

Now, WHY does this look so familiar???

Oh.....right.....

Anyway, this Jacquetta-Melusine connection is quite heavily expanded upon in the book and show, portraying various spells and schemes woven by the Woodville women for their own ends, as well as that of the kingdom. In fact, during Edward IV’s captivity, Jacquetta was actually accused and later exonerated for witchcraft on the basis of  ‘an image of lead made like a man of arms of the length of a man’s finger broken in the middle and made fast with a wire, saying that it was made by [Jacquetta] to use with witchcraft and sorcery’. It’s worth to note that Jacquetta, and later Elizabeth (a suspected sorceress herself) made no mention of Melusine. Their magic was of an entirely different sort. However, the connection is still present. 

So, if by now, all the bells are ringing in your head and you know where this is going, congratulations! If not, let me break it down. 

The Woodville-Yorks claim descent from Melusine, the water goddess. Sir Richard Woodville holds the title, 1st Earl Rivers. Who is a descendant of that house and granddaughter to the above-mentioned Jacquetta of Luxembourg? Elizabeth of York, wife of Henry VII. 

Which family represents the water/river connection in our story? DING DING DING! 

“Let the kings of winter have their cold crypt under the earth. The Tullys drew their strength from the river, and it was to the river they returned when their lives had run their course”

- A Storm of Swords, Catelyn IV

Who is the scheming, politically savvy matriarch descended from that house? Catelyn Tully-Stark. And who is the daughter of said house whom we constantly parallel to Elizabeth of York? Sansa Stark, (all fingers and toes crossed) future wife to Jon (Snow, Stark, Targaryen, take your pick), rightful heir to the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros. 

credit to @sardoniyx for this work of art!

Where is the Tully connection to magic, you ask? Do not fear, for there is one, and here it is:

Thank you to @marydri​ for pointing this one out to me and explaining it :)

“He found himself remembering tales he had first heard as a child at Casterly Rock, of mad Lady Lothston who bathed in tubs of blood and presided over feasts of human flesh within these very walls.”

A Feast for Crows, Jaime III

Who is this mad Lady Lothston and what does she have to do with the Tullys of Riverrun?

Danelle Lothston, also known as Mad Danelle, was Lady of Harrenhal and head of House Lothston. She was also a witch. She is described as having “long red hair and wore tight-fitting black armor.A story told to misbehaving children said that on moonless nights bats would fly from Harrenhal and take the bad children back to Mad Danelle.”

We know from Catelyn that a castle usually passes to descendants or close relatives of the previous lords.

"No," Catelyn agreed. "You must name another heir, until such time as Jeyne gives you a son." She considered a moment. "Your father's father had no siblings, but his father had a sister who married a younger son of Lord Raymar Royce, of the junior branch. They had three daughters, all of whom wed Vale lordlings. A Waynwood and a Corbray, for certain. The youngest . . . it might have been a Templeton, but . . ."

A Storm of Swords, Catelyn V

The lords of Harrenhal after the Lothstons were the Whents, a descendant of whom was Minisa Whent, mother to Catelyn and Lysa Tully. Since the Whents inherited Harrenhal, it’s fair to assume that there was much intermarriage between them and House Lothston for such an exchange to happen. So, while it nowhere clearly states whether Danelle married or ever had children, it is possible that her blood mingled with that of the Whents, and thereby the Tullys (and the Starks), contributing a slight trace of magic into the bloodline.

Two mutually unrelated things worthy of note:

It’s a possibility that Danelle Lothston was a descendant of the Blood of the Dragon. Aegon IV the Unworthy had many mistresses, the first of whom was Lady Falena Stokeworth. When she and Aegon were discovered abed together by his brother, Viserys, Falena was sent away and married off to Lucas Lothston. Aegon was said to have visited them in Harrenhal for a number of years thereafter. Many years later, Lady Falena returned to court, this time with her fourteen year-old daughter, Jeyne Lothston. There were many rumors that Jeyne was not the daughter of Lucas, but, in fact, the bastard of Aegon IV Targaryen. Despite these, Aegon proceeded to have his way with mother and daughter, both (these Targaryens!). Danelle must have been a great-granddaughter of Jeyne, thereby inheriting the Blood of the Dragon (which didn’t help her case, let me tell you).

The shield Brienne carries, given to her by Jaime, depicts the black bat divided on a field of silver and gold of House Lothston. So, how epic is it that this is the shield used to protect the possible descendants of that house, Catelyn and Sansa?

TL;DR: Elizabeth of York is a possible descendant of Melusina, a water-goddess of legend. Sansa Stark is a descendant of the Tullys, a house iconically linked with water. Both were/will be married off to heirs to the kingdom in an attempt to ally their disgraced houses with the crown. Jonsa is endgame!

So, I hope you all enjoyed this meta. I feel like one has to write Jonsa meta every so often to earn one’s keep in this fandom, so consider this my rent for the month. 

Once again, thank you to @marydri​ for helping me to flesh this out. Thank you, also, to @kitten1618x​ whose meta (linked above. Read the comments there, ALL THE COMMENTS) contains anything and everything you’d ever want to know about the Jonsa/WotR connection, and to @sweetsummersansa​ as well, for this post, helpful for anyone who’d like to read up on the EoY/Sansa parallels. 

Thanks for reading, and lemme know what you think!