#i'm just not good enough at playing eyrie yet i think...

[folkdances]

I HATE THE MARQUISE DE CAT THIS GUY WINS EVERY SINGLE GAME RAAAAAGH

[istumpysk]

Operation Stumpy Re-Read

AGOT: Tyrion IV (Chapter 31)

As he stood in the predawn chill watching Chiggen butcher his horse, Tyrion Lannister chalked up one more debt owed the Starks.

Oh you want to keep score?

+.+

"Meat is meat," Bronn said with a shrug. "The Dothraki like horse more than beef or pork."                 

"Do you take me for a Dothraki?" Tyrion asked sourly. The Dothraki ate horse, in truth; they also left deformed children out for the feral dogs who ran behind their khalasars. Dothraki customs had scant appeal for him.

Dothraki, Lannister, Greyjoy, and Targaryen. What could go wrong?

+.+

"You're making a sad mistake, Lady Stark. I had no part in any attack on your son. On my honor—"                 

"Lannister honor," was all she said.

Amusing he doesn’t realize that’s worth nothing.

+.+

Scarlet-tinged spittle flew from the fat innkeep's mouth as she begged of Catelyn Stark, "Don't kill him here!"                 

"Don't kill him anywhere," Tyrion urged.

"Take him somewheres else, no blood here, m'lady, I wants no high lordlin's quarrels."    

Masha Heddle, you’re about to learn it’s the innocents who suffer most when high lords play their games.

+.+

Only two of the Freys had stirred, Tyrion noted, and they'd sat back down quick enough when their captain failed to move. He might have smiled if he'd dared.    

A sneak peek at how useless House Frey is.

+.+

I was about to settle down to a warm fire and a roast fowl, and that wretched singer had to open his mouth, he thought mournfully.

+.+

The wretched singer had come along with them. "There is a great song to be made from this, and I'm the one to make it," he told Catelyn Stark when he announced his intention of riding with them to see how the "splendid adventure" turned out.

The irony of Catelyn bringing Marillion to the Eyrie. Thanks, I hate it.

+.+

"This is the high road," he gasped, looking at Lady Stark with accusation. "The eastern road. You said we were riding for Winterfell!"

Catelyn Stark favored him with the faintest of smiles. "Often and loudly," she agreed. "No doubt your friends will ride that way when they come after us. I wish them good speed."

Even now, long days later, the memory filled him with a bitter rage. All his life Tyrion had prided himself on his cunning, the only gift the gods had seen fit to give him, and yet this seven-times-damned she-wolf Catelyn Stark had outwitted him at every turn. The knowledge was more galling than the bare fact of his abduction.    

+.+

"It was not my dagger," he insisted. "How many times must I swear to that? Lady Stark, whatever you may believe of me, I am not a stupid man. Only a fool would arm a common footpad with his own blade."

He’s got you there.

+.+

Just for a moment, he thought he saw a flicker of doubt in her eyes, but what she said was, "Why would Petyr lie to me?"                 

"Why does a bear shit in the woods?" he demanded. "Because it is his nature. Lying comes as easily as breathing to a man like Littlefinger. You ought to know that, you of all people."

She took a step toward him, her face tight. "And what does that mean, Lannister?"

Tyrion cocked his head. "Why, every man at court has heard him tell how he took your maidenhead, my lady."                 

"That is a lie!" Catelyn Stark said.

(...)

Catelyn Stark stared at Tyrion with a coldness on her face such as he had never seen. "Petyr Baelish loved me once. He was only a boy. His passion was a tragedy for all of us, but it was real, and pure, and nothing to be made mock of. He wanted my hand. That is the truth of the matter. You are truly an evil man, Lannister."                 

"And you are truly a fool, Lady Stark. Littlefinger has never loved anyone but Littlefinger, and I promise you that it is not your hand that he boasts of, it's those ripe breasts of yours, and that sweet mouth, and the heat between your legs."

Catelyn, I’m begging you to take 5 seconds to think this through. You’re smarter than this.

+.+

The mountain clans cared nothing for the enmities of the great houses; they would slaughter Stark and Lannister with equal fervor, as they slaughtered each other. They might spare Catelyn herself; she was still young enough to bear sons.

Nice reminder that every woman in the story is always one wrong turn away from being raped.

+.+

Catelyn Stark was trapped against the stone face of the mountain with three men around her, one still mounted and the other two on foot. She had a dagger clutched awkwardly in her maimed hands, but her back was to the rock now and they had penned her on three sides. Let them have the bitch, Tyrion thought, and welcome to her, yet somehow he was moving.

Before you go commending him, keep in mind he’s a dead man if anything happens to Catelyn.

+.+

… and Catelyn Stark stepped up behind him and opened his throat.

Like mother, like daughter.

+.+

Tyrion glanced over to where Lady Stark was dressing Ser Rodrik's wounds. "I'm willing if she is," he said. The freeriders broke into laughter, and Tyrion grinned and thought, There's a start.    

He’s not even that funny. What is wrong with this fandom?

+.+

"As I was saying before we were so rudely interrupted," Tyrion began, "there is a serious flaw in Littlefinger's fable. Whatever you may believe of me, Lady Stark, I promise you this—I never bet against my family."

Catelyn, please.

Final thoughts:

I never cared for the chapters that feature fighting/battle.

4 down, 35 to go. :(

-> return to menu <-