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inthedayswhenlandswerefew · 2 years ago

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Have You No Idea That You’re In Deep? [Chapter 2: The Same Agony]

Aemond is a fearless, enigmatic prince and the most renowned dragonrider of the Greens. You are a (newly widowed) daughter of House Mormont and a lady-in-waiting to Princess Helaena. You can’t ignore each other, even though you probably should. In fact, you might have found a love worth killing for.

A/N: Thank you all so much for the love this series has received! I hope you continue to enjoy it. 🥰🥰

Song inspiration: “Do I Wanna Know?” by Arctic Monkeys.

Chapter warnings: Language, slightly more extensive witchcraft, mentions of death and violence, sexual content, this fic is for readers 18+!!!

Word count: 4.8k.

Link to chapter list (and all my writing): HERE.

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“You wouldn’t happen to have any bear teeth, would you?”

“Bear…teeth?” Aemond blinks at you, confounded. You are standing together in the doorway of Helaena’s chambers as she plays on the floor with the children: stacking wooden blocks into diminutive castles, demolishing them with cloth dragons, chanting childhood nonsense songs in a wavering, whisper-soft voice. It is late-morning, and sunlight pours in through the open windows in sheets like rain.

“You see, bears are large terrestrial mammals. Their pelts make good rugs. They are commonly found in caves and forests, eat lots of salmon, and have often been observed—”

“Kindly desist your taunting,” the prince says, though fondly. “Why on earth would you require bear teeth?”

You hesitate. “They’re for…a tradition.”

“A tradition?”

“Um…perhaps…rather…a ritual.”

He flashes a devious grin. “A ritual, or a spell?”

You sigh in defeat. “Never mind. Forget I asked.”

“You still worship the Old Gods,” he realizes. His single remaining eye—bright, cunning, oceanic blue—sweeps you up and down. He is not mocking, not appalled; he is forever seeking to uncover more pieces of you like shells collected from sand. “Well…that’s alright. We won’t tell Mother.”

“Yes, please don’t. She’d send me to the Wall.” This is an exaggeration, though not by much.

“What sort of spell involves bear teeth?” Aemond inquires, amused, like he’s waiting for a punchline.

“One for protection.”

“Oh? And who do you believe needs protecting?”

You peer up at him guiltily. He’ll hate that you’ve had this thought. “You’re riding in the tourney tomorrow.”

“Me?!” he exclaims, and laughs. It’s an alarmingly beautiful sound; you have to stop yourself from reaching out to touch him, his face or his forearm or his long silvery hair. “You think I need protection?”

“You never joust. You haven’t in years, I know, people won’t stop talking about it. They’re all baffled by your sudden interest. Everyone’s wagering bets. And you’re out of practice.”

“Hm, yes, well if Axel Hightower can do it then surely I’ll manage.”

You’re dismayed; if you’ve unwittingly encouraged him, that makes you responsible for any resulting catastrophes. In your own heart, at least. “Please tell me you aren’t doing this to outshine my dead husband.”

“Logistically, it would be rather difficult to compete with a corpse.”

“You don’t joust,” you say. “You never joust…”

“You know, my Uncle Daemon was known to joust on occasion.”

“Perhaps, but you aren’t.”

“Calm yourself.” He’s impatient now. “It’s a tourney, not an execution. And my match is some Lannister boy, it’s not like I’m stepping into the tiltyard with Ivar Kellington.”

“Right.” Ivar is the son of a house sworn to the Baratheons, and he is positively monstrous: tall, broad, fearsome, immovable. When he spars, he has to face two or three ordinary men to keep it competitive. He’s responsible for no less than four deaths resulting from tourney mishaps. He has a reputation even larger than he is; you’d heard about him all the way back in the Reach during your marriage. People around the court refer to him—with both awe and shudders—as ‘Sir Killington.’

Aemond considers you, always searching, never quite finding his footing. “I thought you weren’t one to shy away from battles.” And then he adds swiftly, just to emphasize how beneath him this is: “Not that a tourney is anything like a real battle, of course.”

“I’m not trying to stop you. I’m just trying to help.”

“I don’t need your help,” he replies briskly.

“Fine.”

He stares out into the hallway with his arms crossed. You stare over at Helaena and the children without really seeing them. Neither of you speak, but neither of you leave either.

“Enjoy your sparring,” you say eventually.

“Enjoy the beach,” Aemond replies, and departs almost soundlessly like a shadow. You tug on your pendant as you watch him disappear down the hallway: the lines of his shoulders, the sheen of his hair, the way strips of sunlight fall on him through windows and doorways. As your grip tightens, the oval of moonstone etches its shape into your palm; the silver chain digs into the soft vulnerable flesh at the back of your neck.

That did not go well. That did not go well at all. You frown absently, your mind elsewhere. So much for my attempted witchcraft.

“Lady Mormont?” Helaena beckons, breaking your apprehension like glass. She clutches one of Jaehaera’s tiny hands in hers while Jaehaerys stomps around demolishing microscale castles. You hope this is not prophetic of his (possible, far-off) future reign. “Help me get the children ready. The sea is calling for you.”

You shimmy the toddlers into swimming clothes, gather up toys and linens and pieces of fruit, and walk with Helaena and her white-haired twins down to the golden sand, to the water’s edge. As Helaena supervises her children—which consists primarily of having flustered handmaidens chase them around while the princess sits on a sand dune and embroiders a green-thread praying mantis onto a pillowcase—you wander ankle-deep in the warm, foreign surf.

King’s Landing is nothing like Bear Island. Home was stormy and grey and fog-cloaked, harsh, cold, rocky, inescapably brutal. Home felt old, hopelessly old, older than the stars; there was no hope of changing one’s life there. The people of Bear Island have been scraping out an existence—forcing an untamed, unwilling land to nurse them at blade-point—since long before the Targaryens ever set foot in Westeros, since before the Andals, since before there was any divide between history and myths. But here…here…

As you stand on the beach below the Red Keep, there are gulls circling far overhead and clear blue skies and invigorating heat and ships gliding ceaselessly in and out of port. This land yields life plentifully, effortlessly. Within the walls of the city there are people clawing their way up ladders every minute of every day, and tumbling down them as well; there are always new futures to be made. This is an idea you could get used to. This is a world you could get used to.

Later, much later—after bathing the children, after lunch, after visiting the sept with Queen Alicent (requiring some pantomimed piousness on your part), after a meandering stroll through the godswood, after music and dinner and dancing—he finally returns. You don’t need to see him come in. You can hear his footsteps; you can feel the room shift like a ship rocked by waves.

“Aemond!” Helaena squeals in glee and rushes over to him. Meanwhile, you loiter by the fireplace pretending to be engrossed in a letter. In truth, you’ve read it twice already, and it wasn’t all that enthralling to begin with; one of your cousins, married into House Manderly, has just birthed her fifth child in seven years and feels the compulsion to tell the whole world about it. It occurs to you that some people’s luck is really quite excessive.

You try not to listen as Aemond asks Helaena about her day, as she prattles on about the beach (but mostly about her insect embroidery), as she gets sidetracked and scurries off and lowers herself onto the couch to finish the aforementioned embroidery. The prince’s familiar footsteps approach you. You refuse to look up until he’s waited several minutes with nothing but the dry, popping fractures of wood in the fireplace to split the silence.

“Did you and Sir Criston have a productive time hitting each other with sticks?”

“There was a slight change of plans.”

He tosses a leather pouch to you. You catch it in mid-air. Inside are cracked, bloodied bear teeth. You gasp in the flame-lit stillness. “How…?”

“It was the strangest thing. I, entirely unprompted, was struck by this intense desire to go bear hunting.” He grins: impish, off-kilter, waiting to see if you’ll forgive him. “I hope they’re adequate, they were difficult to…uh…dislodge. From the skull, I mean. And I wasn’t sure if you wanted them…you know. Cleaned.”

“No, you did well. It’s better if they’re bloody.” You are struck by a sudden, ludicrous vision of the prince practically dragging Sir Criston Cole through the woods for hours—their boots coated with mud, their brows sweated, twigs embedded in their hair—while dodging Sir Criston’s increasingly exasperated inquiries. “I don’t know why you did this for me.”

“I know what it’s like to hold something sacred that others don’t understand.”

From the couch, Helaena murmurs: “He had to close his eye.”

You turn to Aemond for a translation.

“To get my dragon,” he says softly, then gestures to his lost eye: quickly, as if he doesn’t want to draw any more attention to it than he absolutely must. You know it happened in some sort of childhood scuffle between Alicent and Rhaenyra’s sons—every noble who’s ever travelled south of the Neck knows that—but you’ve never heard the details. Unthinkingly, reflexively, you reach out for him, resting your right palm against the mutilated half of his face. He’s so perfect in spite of the destruction his flesh holds like a memory; he’s so fucking beautiful. Your thumb ghosts across the section of scar that slits his cheek in two. Aemond flinches and catches your wrist.

“I’m sorry,” you whisper.

Gently, he lowers your hand back to your side. Then he grasps your pendant to examine it more closely. “Hm. Moonstone and silver, together, entwined. Curious, don’t you think?”

“Very,” you agree. You wonder what he looks like without his eyepatch, not in a morbidly curious sort of way but out of a longing—a craving—to know every part of him entirely.

“I’ve studied the Old Gods, you know,” he says. “Purely for scholarly purposes. And the Drowned God, and the Lord of Light. There are temples dedicated to Him in Dorne. I’ve exchanged letters with several of the maesters there.”

“I’m sure your mother is positively delighted that you’re writing to maesters instead of eligible Baratheon and Lannister women.”

He smiles wryly. “Aegon has brothels. I have the library.”

“So you don’t spend all your time sulking around unnerving courtiers.”

“Well, not all of it.” His face is illuminated by the fire, amber and scarlet and gold. He reads the nervousness on yours: the tourney, the joust, your own dawning realization of how much he means to you. “Fear not. I’m coming back.”

“That’s exactly what my mother said before she left me in the Reach with Axel Hightower. And I never saw her again.”

Without speaking, Aemond cups your face in his hands. He touches his forehead to yours—lightly, lightning-briefly—and then backs away. He takes several long strides, as if he’s afraid of what will happen if the space between you could be so easily closed.

“Good luck tomorrow, Silver,” you tell him.

He glances down at the leather pouch of bear teeth still clutched in your left hand. “I thought you were taking care of that for me.”

~~~~~~~~~~

When the rest of the Red Keep is slumbering in unwitting darkness, you slip unnoticed back to the heart tree. You have to do this part here, where the Old Gods can hear you; you have to give Aemond the best chance you can. You pour a handful of the bloodied teeth, rosemary, sage, sea salt, and your last few pebbles of black jade into the mortar you left Bear Island with, and then Oldtown after Axel’s death. You hope you never have to leave King’s Landing. Everything in you struggles against the thought of it, like an animal with its paw in an iron-jawed trap. You light a white candle and set it on a root of the heart tree.

“Protect him,” you implore the flame again and again. It flickers and bends to you in the cold night wind. You grind the teeth until they are a fine, pale-pink dust. “Break others if you must, burn others if you must, bury others if you must…but protect him.”

This next part is the trickiest. Back inside the Red Keep, you evade guards and handmaidens to slink inside the prince’s chambers. The man you are regrettably falling in love with—Aemond Targaryen, Aemond One-Eye, the dragonrider of Vhagar—is exactly where he should be: asleep in bed. He is sprawled on his stomach and occasionally murmuring as if in the middle of a very consequential conversation. He is mostly obscured by blankets, but you can see he’s not wearing his eyepatch; his white hair flows freely and unincumbered over the pillows. You are careful not to look too closely at him, only because you know he wouldn’t want you to.

You crouch down on the cold, hard floor and scatter the powder you’ve ground under his bed. No one would ever recognize it as witchcraft. It could be sand, it could be dust, it could never be noticed at all. When you are finished, you flee the room with feather-light steps.

Yet you think you might have heard it as you crossed through the doorway, just maybe, just barely: a creak, a stirring, the prince rising to catch a glimpse of you with his sleep-bleary eye.

~~~~~~~~~~

A Mullendore unseats a Buckwell. A Tyrell unseats a Rollingford. A Westerling gets so drunk he falls off his horse mid-charge and the Tully proclaims victory. Sir Ivar Kellington breaks some poor Massey boy’s jaw. Everyone applauds politely.

Aegon leaps to his feet. “Well done, Sir Killington!” he shouts, raising his wine cup. “Uh…I mean…Kellington.” Aegon drops back into his seat. Otto Hightower glares at him.

You tug nervously on your moonstone pendant. Helaena claps and smiles when necessary but otherwise watches the birds, the clouds, the horses and works on the favor she’s making. The queen is wringing her hands and dressed—predictably—in a rich emerald-green gown. Alicent has always struck you as kind and affectionate enough, albeit in a distracted sort of way. You suppose she has plenty of legitimate distractions. Her husband the king is ailing, rarely seen, unlikely to live much longer. Her father is ruling the kingdom in all but name. Her estranged stepdaughter, a prospective schemer and confirmed dragonrider, is the heir apparent. And she has an adult son in need of a politically-expedient marriage…a son who doesn’t have any spare eyes to sacrifice to this tourney.

You turn to Aegon, who stares vacantly down into the tiltyard with red, groggy eyes. “I know the prince is good on his feet, but can he joust? You know…without his…?” You point to your own unharmed eye in explanation. Aegon shrugs listlessly. This does not inspire confidence.

As Ivar Kellington exits the tiltyard, Aemond comes in. They exchange a look as they pass each other on their horses, a silent antagonism, a taking of measurements. It can safely be assumed that Ivar—a man whose legacy will be built on the bones of the people he’s brutalized—would like few things more than a chance to publicly skewer the prince, but he won’t get it. The Hightowers would never allow such a match. Aemond smirks up at the giant triumphantly.

The crowd cheers as Aemond and the Lannister boy he’s scheduled to joust gallop around the tiltyard, but in a way that is tentative, taunt, uneasy. No one can recall ever seeing the brooding, one-eyed prince participate in a tourney before. As his long white hair flows out behind him like a banner, as he sizes up his opponent with a cool, stoic gaze, people chatter about how much he reminds them of Daemon Targaryen. Is Aemond another rogue prince? Is that primal breed of fear that he inspires in people deserved? You observe the nobles gathered here from your seat between Aegon and Helaena, noting for the first time just how many seven-pointed stars there are: on cups, on chairs, on pieces of embroidery, on necklaces. Queen Alicent wears them constantly.

What do they do to witches here? Burn them?

A bolt of dread pierces through your chest like a blade. No one is looking at you, of course; no one is paying any attention to you at all. But suddenly you feel naked in this crowd.

Sir Criston has appeared to give Aemond his parting words. He grabs the horse’s reigns and says something to Aemond that you can’t hear over the thunderous noise of the audience. The prince nods. Criston speaks again, miming a technique. The prince continues to nod. His mood is evident from his posture: Yes, okay, alright, let’s get on with it. Criston hands the prince his helmet, which is open in the front and without a visor, and people murmur about how Daemon always wore the same style. You think it has less to do with an homage as it does with practicality. Aemond cannot afford what sight he has left to be obscured by metal. He doesn’t look at or acknowledge you in any way, but when he dons his helmet and his hair is momentarily displaced you see it rubbed onto the back of his neck where no one will notice: a fine, chalky, pinkish dust.

He saw me after all. In his bedroom.

You can envision him crawling out of bed and dropping to his knees, investigating while still clumsy and half-asleep, pressing his palm to the dust before marking himself with it. You smile, a solitary moment in a pulsing space.

That has to be good luck, doesn’t it? That has to give the spell more power.

You wish you knew more about magic. You wish your mother was still alive.

Sir Criston hands Aemond his shield and his lance. Aemond asks Helaena for her favor. She gives it to him wholeheartedly: a small wreath of green calla lilies she’s been weaving together with jittery fingers. She waves him off and then sinks back into her seat, silent and remote.

Aemond takes his place at one end of the tiltyard. The Lannister boy—Leland or Luca or Landon or Lyndon or something like that, you keep forgetting—waits on the other. Their horses paw at the earth restlessly. There’s already blood in the soil, the air. Everyone else clears the tiltyard. The seconds tick down.

Suddenly—like falling forward—both riders have kicked their mounts and the horses are hurtling towards each other. The space between them evaporates like a waning moon. People are screaming all around you, and some of the noise is pure exhilaration but a good amount of it is horror, because already people can see it: the prince’s lance is aimed just a bit too low and too far to the left, and the Lannister boy’s lance is poised to collide with Aemond’s unguarded face. Aemond sees it too, soon enough to know but not soon enough to fix it. His blue eye is wide and gleaming with doomed shock.

Before the riders can strike, there is a deafening snap, a cracking of bones. The Lannister boy’s horse plummets to the earth as its left fetlock shatters. The Lannister boy’s lance goes flying, his lips loose a shriek…and his body falls perfectly into the line of Aemond’s lance. The prince’s lance crashes into the Lannister shield and sends the boy soaring off the back of his collapsing horse. The crowd explodes into cheers and applauds. Aemond has won.

He is dutiful about it, honorable about it. He dismounts and helps the Lannister boy to his feet and expresses sympathy about the horse: such bad luck, so unfortunate, although everyone knows horses are prone to such accidents. He bows graciously to the crowd of courtiers who have so consistently ignored, avoided, misunderstood him. And only then does he come to accept congratulations from his family.

Aemond receives a giddy hug from Helaena, a sloppy whack on the shoulder from a very intoxicated Aegon, and kisses on his hands from the queen. Otto Hightower gives him a proud, beaming nod. Sir Criston sprints up from the tiltyard to embrace—in fact, nearly tackle—the prince. In the joyous mayhem, you make no attempt to capture Aemond’s attention, but he does fight his way through it to find you. He circles an arm around your waist to pull you close so he can whisper to you as he places Helaena’s calla lily wreath on your head like a crown.

“I’m awfully glad I found you those bear teeth, Moonstone,” he says, and then he’s spirited away by admiring nobles.

You watch—alone in the havoc—as Aemond is commended by the great families of Westeros, the fathers and the matriarchs and the marriageable daughters too; and you are struck by a sudden and overwhelming sadness.

He is going to marry a Baratheon or a Lannister or an Arryn or a Stark, you think. And any fantasy that deviates from that eventuality is pure, self-inflicted cruelty.

You don’t belong in his world. Perhaps you don’t really belong anywhere.

Unnoticed—or so you believe—you escape through the spectators and into a small, empty stairwell of the Red Keep. You crumple onto a step, entertain the possibility of composing yourself, and then rupture into helpless, pitiful tears. You sit there sobbing with your face in your hands for five minutes, or ten, or twenty, you aren’t sure. It doesn’t matter. No one misses you.

When you hear the footsteps, you immediately know who it is. You don’t even look up. You wipe your sore, drenched cheeks with the sleeves of your gown and stare down at the stone floor in abject humiliation.

“What troubles you?” he asks. You marvel at his voice, and not for the first time: calm yet compelling, soft-spoken and yet so heavy with gravity.

You consider lying to him, but you don’t. The answer is so simple. Now your eyes find his. “I want something I can’t have.”

Aemond nods, solemn, pensive. “I find myself afflicted with the same agony,” he says. And then he’s gone.

~~~~~~~~~~

There is an informal feast held in the Great Hall to celebrate the winners of the tourney. People roam and mingle and eat off of plates balanced precariously in one hand. There is dancing and music, an anxious plucky sort of sound that plays from the strings. Aemond is the guest of honor, although no stranger would guess it; after his short obligatory exchanges with various nobles and fellow jousters, he makes his way back to his immediate family. You are obliged to accompany Helaena, and thus bound to stay near Aemond; all night you orbit each other like planets, like seasons. Sometimes he catches you watching him as you sip your wine, sometimes he skates his palm along the small of your back as he passes behind you, over and over again you find excuses to stand next to each other while saying nothing, while thinking everything, while feeling each other’s heat through the infinitesimal space between you. Finally, as the evening careens towards midnight, he finds you alone in the doorway of the same winding staircase he tracked you to earlier, except now you’re at the top of it. You’re nursing a cup of wine, unnoticed and unnecessary, still wearing the crown of green calla lilies. Helaena is thoroughly preoccupied with a plateful of pear tarts and the doting attention of Otto Hightower. Aegon is presumably off badgering a servant girl somewhere…or perhaps passed out under a tree.

“This is an odd question, I freely admit it,” the prince says, close enough that you can see the ring of dark blue around the edge of his iris like the ocean at night. Torchlight glows on the flush in his cheeks: one pristine, one ruined. “But would you happen to have been in my bedroom last night?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Lying is a sin in any religion.”

“Alright, yes, I was there. Briefly. Very briefly.”

“So you didn’t want to stay?”

In reply, you only gaze up at him, wanting him so badly it puts aches in your hands, your spine, your lungs, the threads of your heart. His smile is knowing and playful and warm and kind. He reads you the same way he pours over dusty, long-forgotten books in the library and you read him like a spell. You want to know everything he’s made of. You want to feel him beneath the innate design of your fingerprints. He looks into your eyes and sees all of this and more; and then he turns and descends the stairs.

You follow after him, your dress dragging on the stone steps. His footsteps are so light they’re nearly soundless. He moves like a storm, like a wolf; you don’t hear them until they’ve got their jaws around you. Torches burn overhead as you traverse the staircase down, down, down. You can still hear the muffled music of the strings through the castle walls. You can feel the pounding of your heart, the blood roaring in your ears like waves. The music fades as you walk, and then disappears; but your heart grows louder.

When you reach the final step, Aemond catches you, presses you against the wall, kisses you so deeply it feels like you’re drowning in him: in heat, in insatiability, in all that long-caged wildness screaming to be freed. Your wine cup and crown of calla lilies both tumble to the floor. His hands are gliding beneath your dress. You’re ripping open his tunic. In the sea of fabric, his fingers find the velvet-soft inside of your thigh and follow it upwards. You’re soaked for him already. He moans, licks his fingers, kisses you so you can taste yourself on his lips, his tongue. Your hands tangle in his hair and drag him closer, closer, until there’s no space left between you, not even enough to second-guess this. You open your thighs wider, bite his neck, beg him to fuck you. His fingers stroke you until your hips are thrusting in rhythm, until you’re stifling your cries against his bare, flare-hot skin. There is a powerful, shuddering sensation of an opening, a warm glowing like liquid gold. Reflections of fire dance over you both. His breathing is ragged, ravenous. Even through his clothes, you can feel how hard he is, how thick. You are starving to be filled with him.

“Wait,” you gasp, and immediately he stills. You touch his face, your palm to his scar, and this time he doesn’t flinch away. “Can I see you?” you say. “I want all of you. The real you.”

He hesitates. He reaches for his eyepatch. He rips it away in one fluid motion, like a bandage off a fresh wound, like he’s afraid of losing his nerve. Where his left eye should be is jagged flesh framing a glittering, savage-blue sapphire. You can see the shadow of the little boy he was when he was disfigured and never avenged. You can see every brick he’s built himself with since.

“You’re so fucking beautiful,” you whisper, your words weightless and vanishing like smoke.

“I never wanted people to pity me.”

“No one pities you. They fear you.”

Aemond asks, mesmerized, spellbound: “Why don’t you fear me?”

“Because I was raised to admire ferocity, not to run from it.”

“You are perfection,” he breathes. “You were made for me.”

You grab his face with one hand, hook it around his jaw, and look him straight in his eyes, both of them: one flesh, one sapphire. “Show me.”

You’re still throbbing, still slick, still roiling in aftershocks as he plunges inside you. You fuck with your faces close and your hands entwined, kissing, moaning, biting, whispering promises that cannot be kept. When he comes, his teeth close around your collarbone to keep himself from crying out; and then he rests his forehead against yours. You remain there together in this dying moment, in the receding seconds, dwelling in them like the last days of summer. Then he steps back and the illusion is shattered.

You let the hem of your dress drop to the floor. Aemond refastens his tunic and smooths his hair. As you find your balance on weak and trembling legs—as you adjust to the unwelcome absence of him—you push Aemond away. “Go,” you say, glancing to the steps. “Go. I know you have to.”

His hands are open, empty. “Are you sure—?”

“Go,” you insist. “Please, just go. Before you’re missed.”

He looks at you like he’s going to say more. Then he picks up his eyepatch off the floor, secures it over what remains of his left eye, and ascends the staircase to rejoin his family in the Great Hall. That’s where he belongs, after all. That’s where he will always belong.

You wait to follow him until enough time has elapsed to evade suspicion. You wait at the bottom of the staircase in silence, in agony, your skin crawling with the echoes of flames.

#aemond targaryen #aemond targaryen x reader #hotd #hotd fanfic #aemond x reader #aemond imagine

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butterflies-dragons · 3 years ago

Text

Sansa Stark & More Mermaid Allusions

A continuation to this post:

Sansa Stark & Siren/Mermaid allusions

Art credit: Sea-fairies, And Other Poems. Alfred, Lord Tennyson. Boston: Estes and Lauriat, 1890.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Lord Tennyson is an author well known by GRRM:

I was never a warrior. I served in VISTA, not the Army or Air Force, and I opposed the Vietnam War. But I have written a good deal about war and warriors, and read even more about those subjects. Together with Gardner Dozois (a Vietnam era vet), I edited WARRIORS, a mammoth anthology of stories about war and the men and women who fight them. The glories and horrors of war lie at the very center of A SONG OF ICE & FIRE.

Way back in grade school, like many other lads of my generation, I was taught to recite one of the classic poems of those subjects: Alfred, Lord Tennyson's CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE. I don't think they teach that in grade school any more, so maybe some of you younger folks have never heard it.

Stirring stuff, even now. As a kid, I found it enormously moving. I can still remember chanting those lines in class, surrounded by the other kids, all of our voices joining as one. (Do they still recite poems aloud in grade school? Somehow I doubt it).

—GRRM - Two Poems - Not A Blog - MAY 22, 2014

It has also been pointed out that this verse from "The Coming of Arthur," the first Idyll of the famous cycle "Idylls of the King", evokes the the victory over the long night:

“Blow, trumpet, for the world is white with May;

Blow trumpet, the long night hath rolled away!

Blow through the living world—‘Let the King reign.’

—The Coming of Arthur, Idylls of the King - Alfred, Lord Tennyson

And look at this other verse from the Idyll "The Last Tournament," about a fool that was also a knight:

Dagonet, the fool, whom Gawain in his mood

Had made mock-knight of Arthur’s Table Round,

At Camelot, high above the yellowing woods,

Danced like a withered leaf before the hall.

And toward him from the hall, with harp in hand,

And from the crown thereof a carcanet

Of ruby swaying to and fro, the prize

Of Tristram in the jousts of yesterday,

Came Tristram, saying, “Why skip ye so, Sir Fool?”

—The Last Tournament, Idylls of the King - Alfred, Lord Tennyson

A tournament? A fool and a knight? It seems that not only Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe has influenced GRRM to write about tourneys, fools and knights. Maybe Alfred, Lord Tennyson's poetry also put his two cents to inspire George to write about the Tourney at Ashford Meadow and Florian and Jonquil.

So, with that in mind, let's look at another of Lord Tennyson's poems, The Mermaid.

Art credit: Sea-fairies, And Other Poems. Alfred, Lord Tennyson. Boston: Estes and Lauriat, 1890.

The Mermaid

by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Who would be A mermaid fair, Singing alone, Combing her hair Under the sea, In a golden curl With a comb of pearl, On a throne?

II.

I would be a mermaid fair; I would sing to myself the whole of the day; With a comb of pearl I would comb my hair; And still as I comb'd I would sing and say, Who is it loves me? who loves not me? I would comb my hair till my ringlets would fall Low adown, low adown, From under my starry sea-bud crown Low adown and around, And I should look like a fountain of gold Springing alone With a shrill inner sound, Over the throne In the midst of the hall; Till that great sea-snake under the sea From his coiled sleeps in the central deeps Would slowly trail himself sevenfold Round the hall where I sate, and look in at the gate With his large calm eyes for the love of me. And all the mermen under the sea Would feel their immortality Die in their hearts for the love of me.

III.

But at night I would wander away, away, I would fling on each side my low-flowing locks, And lightly vault from the throne and play With the mermen in and out of the rocks; We would run to and fro, and hide and seek, On the broad sea-wolds in the crimson shells, Whose silvery spikes are nighest the sea. But if any came near I would call, and shriek, And adown the steep like a wave I would leap From the diamond-ledges that jut from the dells; For I would not be kiss'd by all who would list, Of the bold merry mermen under the sea; They would sue me, and woo me, and flatter me, In the purple twilights under the sea; But the king of them all would carry me, Woo me, and win me, and marry me, In the branching jaspers under the sea; Then all the dry pied things that be In the hueless mosses under the sea Would curl round my silver feet silently, All looking up for the love of me. And if I should carol aloud, from aloft All things that are forked, and horned, and soft Would lean out from the hollow sphere of the sea, All looking down for the love of me.

Art credit: Sea-fairies, And Other Poems. Alfred, Lord Tennyson. Boston: Estes and Lauriat, 1890.

Wow! The mermaid from Lord Tennyson's poem sounds a lot similar to Jon Snow's "some willowy creature who sits up in a tower, brushing her hair and waiting for some knight to rescue her," minus the need to be rescued....

But there is much more to say about the mermaid from Lord Tennyson's poem and Sansa Stark. Let's see:

Beauty

"Who would be a mermaid fair"

"I would be a mermaid fair"

Sansa's beauty is renowned throughout Westeros.

Sansa's mother was Catelyn Tully. House Tully is famous for their thick auburn hair and half-fish imagery since they have a trout in their sigil.

Singing Alone

"Singing alone"

"I would sing to myself the whole of the day"

A fair lady singing alone or singing to herself is a classic trope in literature, you can find it not only in fairy tales but also in fantasy authors like J.R.R. Tolkien and GRRM:

After a year or two, it came to pass that the king’s son rode through the forest and passed by the tower. Then he heard a song, which was so charming that he stood still and listened. This was Rapunzel, who in her solitude passed her time in letting her sweet voice resound.

—Rapunzel, Grimms’ Fairy Tales - Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm

At last one night he caught a sparkle afar off, and lo, there she was dancing alone on a little treeless knoll and Dairon was not there. Often and often she came there after and danced and sang to herself, and sometimes Dairon would be nigh, and then Beren watched from the wood’s edge afar, and sometimes he was away and Beren crept then closer.

—Beren and Lúthien - J.R.R. Tolkien

“Of Sansa, brushing out Lady's coat and singing to herself.”

—A Dance with Dragons - Jon XIII - G.R.R. Martin

As you can see, it's also classic that a prince or love interest is secretly watching and listening while the fair lady is singing and dancing.

Combing her hair

"Combing her hair"

"With a comb of pearl I would comb my hair"

"I would comb my hair till my ringlets would fall

Low adown, low adown"

A fair lady combing her hair is also a classic trope in literature, from fairy tales to fantasy authors like Tad Williams and GRRM:

Then there came a wind, so strong that it blew off Curdken’s hat; and away it flew over the hills: and he was forced to turn and run after it; till, by the time he came back, she had done combing and curling her hair, and had put it up again safe.

(...) Then she drove on the geese, and sat down again in the meadow, and began to comb out her hair as before; and Curdken ran up to her, and wanted to take hold of it (...)"

—The Goose-Girl, Grimms’ Fairy Tales - Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm

As they walked past the corner of the inner keep that housed the royal residences, Hepzibah pointed up to a small window just below the upper turret. “See there?” she asked. “Just the other day I saw the princess standing there, combing her hair … oh, my, but hasn’t she got nice hair?” A dim memory of gold catching the afternoon sunlight floated up in Simon’s mind, but he was not to be distracted.

—The Conqueror Star, The Dragonbone Chair -Tad Williams

Sansa already looked her best. She had brushed out her long auburn hair until it shone, and picked her nicest blue silks.

—A Game of Thrones - Sansa I

His eldest daughter stepped forward hesitantly. She was dressed in blue velvets trimmed with white, a silver chain around her neck. Her thick auburn hair had been brushed until it shone.

—A Game of Thrones - Eddard III

Under the sea

"Under the sea"

"Till that great sea-snake under the sea

From his coiled sleeps in the central deeps

Would slowly trail himself sevenfold

Round the hall where I sate, and look in at the gate

With his large calm eyes for the love of me"

These verses reminds me of the first verses of Patchface's Song:

Under the sea, the birds have scales for feathers I know, I know, oh, oh, oh It is always summer under the sea

The great sea-snake from Tennyson's The Mermaid and the scaled bird from Patchface's Song allude to a dragon. Actually, the Ice Dragon from the ASOIAF universe is a sea creature:

Of all the queer and fabulous denizens of the Shivering Sea, however, the greatest are the ice dragons. These colossal beasts, many times larger than the dragons of Valyria, are said to be made of living ice, with eyes of pale blue crystal and vast translucent wings through which the moon and stars can be glimpsed as they wheel across the sky. Whereas common dragons (if any dragon can truly be said to be common) breathe flame, ice dragons supposedly breathe cold, a chill so terrible that it can freeze a man solid in half a heartbeat.

—The World of Ice and Fire - Beyond the Free Cities: The Shivering Sea

So, the mermaid from Lord Tennyson's poem enchanting the great sea-snake makes me think about Sansa taming a great beast.

There will be more about Patchface's Song later.

Longing for love

"Who is it loves me? who loves not me?"

"For I would not be kiss'd by all who would list,

Of the bold merry mermen under the sea

They would sue me, and woo me, and flatter me"

These verses reminds me of Sansa's longing to be courted by a young, gallant and kind knight; but instead getting harassed and molested by old creeps, perverts and villains.

Queenship

"On a throne?"

"But the king of them all would carry me,

Woo me, and win me, and marry me"

"All looking up for the love of me"

"All looking down for the love of me"

These verses reminds me of these Sansa's passages:

That night Sansa dreamt of Joffrey on the throne, with herself seated beside him in a gown of woven gold. She had a crown on her head, and everyone she had ever known came before her, to bend the knee and say their courtesies.

—A Game of Thrones - Sansa IV

“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.

—A Clash of Kings - Sansa VI

As you can see, the mermaid from Lord Tennyson's poem is a kind of "under the sea" version of the classic "princess in a tower," a willowy creature like the one that Jon describes in A Dance with Dragons, as if he's not interested in that kind of girls; but with a twist, since Lord Tennyson's mermaid doesn't need to be rescued, she's not trapped in her sea-palace, she is a free and powerful mermaid! She is the one that chooses a king as her husband and enchants great marine beasts and human sailors.

It is possible that John William Waterhouse's painting of "A Mermaid" was inspired by Lord Tennyson's poem "The Mermaid".

Art credit: A Mermaid by John William Waterhouse

John William Waterhouse artworks were known for their depictions of women from both ancient Greek mythology and Arthurian legend.

Many of Waterhouse's paintings are based on authors such as Homer, Ovid, Shakespeare, Tennyson, or Keats.

Greek mythology and Arthurian legend are both themes well known by GRRM and present in the ASOIAF universe.

Shakespeare, Tennyson and Keats are all authors well known by GRRM, according to several interviews and Not A Blog posts. And while he never specifically mentioned Homer and Ovid (as far as I know), the allusions to their works have been made evident by many readers.

Waterhouse was also influenced by the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, and GRRM loves the romantic elements and the medieval scenes with knights and ladies from the works of the Pre-Raphaelites artists.

So, maybe I'm not so far from reality and GRRM really took inspiration from Lord Tennyson's poetry and even from the paintings inspired by Lord Tennyson's poetry to create Sansa, surrounded with romantic elements from ancient myths and medieval history.

But there is more. So much more!

Jonquil and Florian the Fool

In my previous post Sansa Stark & Siren/Mermaid allusions, I talked about the similarities between Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid and Sansa Stark.

And I also mentioned that Jonquil is surrounded by Mermaid & Aphrodite aesthetic.

But what I forgot to tell you is that The Little Mermaid and her sisters were six young girls, the same way that Jonquil and her sisters also were six maids:

There were six lovely children, but the youngest one was the most beautiful of them all, her skin was as clear and delicate as a rose petal, her eyes as blue as the deepest sea, but like the rest of them she had no feet, her body ended in a fish’s tail.

—The Little Mermaid - Hans Christian Andersen

“Six maids there were in a spring-fed pool …”

—A Storm of Swords - Jaime III

Now, thanks to the mysterious Patchface's Song about an "under the sea" world, I realized that there are more connections between Sansa Stark and Jonquil with mermaids. Let's see:

We all know about the first part of the Ghost of High Heart prophecy about Sansa and the Purple Wedding:

I dreamt of a maid at a feast with purple serpents in her hair, venom dripping from their fangs.

—A Storm of Swords - Arya VIII

But the enigmatic Patchface also warned us about the Purple Wedding with his song:

Patchface rang his bells. "It is always summer under the sea," he intoned. "The merwives wear nennymoans in their hair and weave gowns of silver seaweed. I know, I know, oh, oh, oh."

Shireen giggled. "I should like a gown of silver seaweed."

—A Clash of Kings - Prologue

Patchface's Song is talking us about the "under the sea" version of "The maid with purple serpents in her hair," "The merwife with nennymoans in her hair".

Merwives

Merwives are married mermaids.

Sansa is a maid, like the prophecy of the Ghost of Hight Heart says, but she is also a wife, since she was forced to marry Tyrion Lannister, although the marriage was never consummated.

She is a Tully looking (half-fish/mermaid) bride = A Merwife.

Nennymoans in their hair

What is a nennymoan?

Since Patchface is singing about the "under the sea" world, a "nennymoan" is probably another way of referring to sea anemones:

The ornately colored sea anemone (uh-NEM-uh-nee) is named after the equally flashy terrestrial anemone flower. A close relative of coral and jellyfish, anemones are stinging polyps that spend most of their time attached to rocks on the sea bottom or on coral reefs waiting for fish to pass close enough to get ensnared in their venom-filled tentacles. Their bodies are composed of an adhesive pedal disc, or foot, a cylindrical body, and an array of tentacles surrounding a central mouth. The tentacles are triggered by the slightest touch, firing a harpoon-like filament into their victim and injecting a paralyzing neurotoxin. The helpless prey is then guided into the mouth by the tentacles. —National Geographic

So, sea anemones are marine animals with venom-filled tentacles that sound very similar to serpents dripping venom from their fangs. And anemones could be purple like the purple serpents from the prophecy of the Ghost of High Heart.

Now, we all associate "The maid with purple serpents in her hair" with Medusa:

Medusa (Greek Mythology) is best known for having hair made of snakes and for her ability to turn anyone she looked at to stone, literally to petrify. Multiple works by ancient sources, such as Homer, the eighth-century B.C. poet Hesiod, and the fifth-century B.C. lyric poet Pindar, provide a wide-ranging and diverse picture of the fabled creature. According to Hesiod’s Theogony, she was one of three Gorgon sisters born to Keto and Phorkys, primordial sea gods; Medusa was mortal, while the others, Stheno and Euryale, were immortal.

Since Medusa and her sisters were the daughters of two sea gods, they can be associated with mermaids, like Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid and her sisters, that were the daughters of a sea-king.

So we can also associate Medusa with serpents in her hair with merwives with nennymoans in their hair.

And Sansa Stark represents both of them in ASOIAF, she is "the maid with purple serpents in her hair" and "the merwife with nennymoans in her hair."

Indeed, Sansa wore the purple venom called Strangler in her hair during the Purple Wedding. The crystalized venom was disguised as one of the black amethysts from Asshai (a deep true purple by daylight) that adorned her silver hair net:

He touched one of the crystals lightly with the tip of his little finger. Such a small thing to hold the power of life and death. It was made from a certain plant that grew only on the islands of the Jade Sea, half a world away. The leaves had to be aged, and soaked in a wash of limes and sugar water and certain rare spices from the Summer Isles. Afterward they could be discarded, but the potion must be thickened with ash and allowed to crystallize.

[...] Cressen no longer recalled the name the Asshai'i gave the leaf, or the Lysene poisoners the crystal. In the Citadel, it was simply called the strangler. Dissolved in wine, it would make the muscles of a man's throat clench tighter than any fist, shutting off his windpipe. They said a victim's face turned as purple as the little crystal seed from which his death was grown, but so too did a man choking on a morsel of food.

—A Clash of Kings - Prologue

"You've waited so long, be patient awhile longer. Here, I have something for you." Ser Dontos fumbled in his pouch and drew out a silvery spiderweb, dangling it between his thick fingers. 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."

—A Clash of Kings - Sansa VIII

Shae had arranged her hair artfully in a delicate silver net winking with dark purple gemstones. —A Storm of Swords - Tyrion VIII

In summary:

Prophesy of the Ghost of High Heart: A maid at a feast with purple serpents in her hair, venom dripping from their fangs.

Patchface's Song: A merwife with nennymoans (sea anemones have venom-filled tentacles and can be purple) in her hair.

Reality: Sansa Stark with the crystalized Strangler venom disguised as a black amethysts from Asshai (a deep true purple by daylight), in her hair.

Weave gowns of silver seaweed

Sansa knows how to sew and embroider, so I wouldn't be surprised if she knew how to weave as well.

During the Purple Wedding Sansa not only wore a silver hair net, but also a silvery satin gown:

Sansa wore a gown of silvery satin trimmed in vair, with dagged sleeves that almost touched the floor, lined in soft purple felt. —A Storm of Swords - Tyrion VIII

In summary:

Prophesy of the Ghost of High Heart: A maid at a feast with purple serpents in her hair, venom dripping from their fangs.

Patchface's Song: A merwife with nennymoans (sea anemones have venom-filled tentacles and can be purple) in her, hair and gowns of silver seaweed.

Reality: Sansa Stark with the crystalized Strangler venom disguised as a black amethysts from Asshai (a deep true purple by daylight), in her hair, and a gown of silvery satin.

And to do this association even more solid, let me tell you these very interesting details:

The sea anemone's close cousin the jellyfish's name in Spanish is precisely, Medusa;

According to Ovid's Metamorphoses (Book 4 "Andromeda rescu'd from the Sea Monster"), the sea anemone's other close cousin, the corals, have been formed of Medusa's blood spilled onto seaweed when Perseus laid down the petrifying head beside the shore when he saved Andromeda from a sea monster;

Medusa has the ability to turn anyone she looked at to stone, literally to petrify. While anemones spend most of their time attached to rocks on the sea bottom and their venom is a paralyzing neurotoxin. Petrifying and paralyzing are synonyms;

Sansa ("The maid with purple serpents in her hair" and "The merwife with nennymoans in her hair" of the story), ran away from King's Landing after the Purple Wedding and became Alayne Stone.

Sansa Stark's head is wanted for kingslaying.

It seems that GRRM is rewriting the story of Medusa being killed by Perseus, reversing the myth by making Sansa inadvertently killing one of her abusers, her former betrothed Joffrey Baratheon, the king.

And I love him for it!

That's exactly what the artist Luciano Garbati did with his sculpture of Medusa con la cabeza de Perseo (Medusa with the head of Perseus), that was his response to the famous sculpture of Perseus with the Head of Medusa by Benvenuto Cellini.

Art credit: Medusa con la cabeza de Perseo by Luciano Garbati

And I love GRRM even more because he keeps reversing the myths and tropes by making Sansa the slayer of her abusers:

And later I dreamt that maid again, slaying a savage giant in a castle built of snow.

—A Storm of Swords - Arya VIII

The second part of the Ghost of High Heart's prophecy about Sansa sounds similar to the tale of Medusa's head transforming the Titan Atlas to stone:

By strength not Perseus could himself defend, For who in strength with Atlas could contend? But since short rest to me thou wilt not give, A gift of endless rest from me receive, He said, and backward turn'd, no more conceal'd The present, and Medusa's head reveal'd. Soon the high Atlas a high mountain stood, His locks, and beard became a leafy wood. His hands, and shoulders, into ridges went, The summit-head still crown'd the steep ascent. His bones a solid, rocky hardness gain'd: He, thus immensely grown (as fate ordain'd), The stars, the Heav'ns, and all the Gods sustain'd.

—Atlas transform'd to a Mountain, Metamorphoses, Book 4 - Ovid

This detail supports the theory that the savage giant from the Ghost of High Heart's prophecy is Petyr "Littlefinger" Baelish, since House Baelish's first sigil was the head of the Titan of Braavos. Titans from Greek Mythology can be basically described as powerful giants and nowadays the words titan and giant are synonyms:

The Titan of Braavos. Old Nan had told them stories of the Titan back in Winterfell. He was a giant as tall as a mountain, and whenever Braavos stood in danger he would wake with fire in his eyes, his rocky limbs grinding and groaning as he waded out into the sea to smash the enemies. "The Braavosi feed him on the juicy pink flesh of little highborn girls," Nan would end, and Sansa would give a stupid squeak. But Maester Luwin said the Titan was only a statue, and Old Nan's stories were only stories.

—A Feast for Crows - Arya I

But this time the Titan of Braavos won't feed on the juicy pink flesh of a little highborn girl, because the highborn girl will slay him and later will put his head on Winterfell's walls.

And here is another example of how GRRM is reversing the classic trope by making the damsel in distress the one that ultimately saves the knight....

The songs about Florian and Jonquil are Sansa's very favorites, and believe it or not, Jonquil and her Florian could be inspired by one very special symbiotic relationship from the "under the sea" world: the sea anemone and the anemonefish, also known as the clownfish:

Some anemones, like their coral cousins, establish symbiotic relationships with green algae. In exchange for providing the algae safe harbor and exposure to sunlight, the anemone receives oxygen and sugar, the bi-products of the algae's photosynthesis. They form another, more famous symbiotic alliance with clownfish, which are protected by a mucus layer that makes them immune to the anemone's sting. Clownfish live within the anemone’s tentacles, getting protection from predators, and the anemone snacks on the scraps from the clownfish’s meals. —National Geographic Clownfish perform an elaborate dance with an anemone before taking up residence, gently touching its tentacles with different parts of their bodies until they are acclimated to their host. A layer of mucus on the clownfish's skin makes it immune to the fish-eating anemone's lethal sting. In exchange for safety from predators and food scraps, the clownfish drives off intruders and preens its host, removing parasites. —National Geographic

Sounds familiar???

This is what happened when Sansa saved Dontos from Joffrey's commands to drown him in wine:

The king stood. “A cask from the cellars! I’ll see him drowned in it.”

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.

“Did you say I can’t? Did you?”

“Please,” Sansa said, “I only meant … it would be ill luck, Your Grace … to, to kill a man on your name day.”

“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 …”

Joffrey scowled. He knew she was lying, she could see it. He would make her bleed for this.

“The girl speaks truly,” the Hound rasped. “What a man sows on his name day, he reaps throughout the year.” His voice was flat, as if he did not care a whit whether the king believed him or no. Could it be true? Sansa had not known. It was just something she’d said, desperate to avoid punishment.

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.”

The king studied her a moment. “Perhaps you’re not so stupid as Mother says.” He raised his voice. “Did you hear my lady, Dontos? From this day on, you’re my new fool. You can sleep with Moon Boy and dress in motley.”

—A Clash of Kings - Sansa I

Sansa Stark saved Dontos from drowning and he became a fool (synonym of clown).

Dontos pledged to be Sansa's knight and since he was a fool (clown), he became her Florian and started to call Sansa, Jonquil.

Later, Dontos gave Sansa the hair net with the crystalized Strangler venom disguised as a black amethysts from Asshai (a deep true purple by daylight).

Sansa wore the hair net that Dontos gave her at the Purple Wedding. There she became "the maid with purple serpents in her hair" from the Ghost of High Heart's prophecy and "the merwife with nennymoans in her hair" from Patchface's prophetic song.

After the Purple Wedding, Dontos helped Sansa to ran away from King's Landing.

Sansa sailed from King's Landing to the Vale of Arryn on a galley named the Merling King.

It sounds like a symbiosis to me!!!

Sadly, our foolish "Nemo" fish Dontos was killed at Baelish orders....

But after all this research, what are the implications for Sansa's true Florian in the future? Will our fair Jonquil save another foolish knight again? Will our fair Jonquil offer her foolish Florian to live under her protection against savage predators? We will see....

So there you have it!

#sansa stark #grrm #alfred lord tennyson #greek mythology #medusa #mermaids #sea anemones #clownfish #jonquil #florian #jonquil and florian #fairy tales #folklore #poetry #pre raphaelite brotherhood

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agentrouka-blog · 3 years ago

Note

Shadrich=Reed is just a guess. He is described as of very small stature, same as Reed, and there is the connection of Mad Mouse-Rat cook. Also, the cover is nonsense. Varys is missing since the purple wedding. That IT would have offered money to find S is true, but he doesn't say that. Lastly, I don't believe the knight of the laughing tree was Lyanna; imo it was rather Reed, bc he had been praying to the trees. Lyanna had to take the flowers, she was watching. So, imo it was Reed's m.o. again.

Actually, that is not true.

Varys only disappeared the night that Tyrion escaped, which is a good long while after the Purple Wedding. Varys was very much involved in the investigation, and the reward is offered almost immediately.

"I have taken Tyrion's squire into custody. His wife's maids as well. We shall see if they have anything to tell us. Ser Addam's gold cloaks are searching for the Stark girl, and Varys has offered a reward. The king's justice will be done." (ASOS, Jaime VII)

By the time Brienne encounters Shadrich she is half a week out of King's Landing after leaving shortly before Tywin was killed, so she even started out before Varys went into hiding. Shadrich's story is solid.

As for the Knight of the Laughing Tree, we know Lyanna was watching on the last day of the five-day tourney, not necessarily every single day from start to finish.

But late on the afternoon of that second day, as the shadows grew long, a mystery knight appeared in the lists.”

And why would Howland pray to the trees for justice against three squires if he could easily defeat three lesser knights in a tourney, even in a joust?

The lad was no knight, no more than any of his people. We sit a boat more often than a horse, and our hands are made for oars, not lances. Much as he wished to have his vengeance, he feared he would only make a fool of himself and shame his people.

One prayer to the old gods suddenly makes him a jouster skilled enough to unhorse three knights?

The Knight of the Laughing Tree had vanished. The king was wroth, and even sent his son the dragon prince to seek the man, but all they ever found was his painted shield, hanging abandoned in a tree. It was the dragon prince who won that tourney in the end." (ASOS, Bran II)

GRRM gives us a hint with another horse-mad girl of fourteen, currently bucking social convention in Dorne. Conveniently named for one of the two principal ladies in that tourney.

And Elia Sand, oldest of the four girls that Prince Oberyn had fathered on Ellaria, would cross the Sea of Dorne with Arianne. "As a lady, not a lance," her mother said firmly, but like all the Sand Snakes, Elia had her own mind. (...)

"And ladies do not joust," insisted Ser Garibald Shells, a far more serious and proper young man than his companion.

"I do. I'm Lady Lance." (TWOW, Arianne I)

My money is on Lyanna.

#rouka queue #shadrich #howland reed #lyanna stark #knight of the laughing tree #elia sand

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une-nuit-pour-se-souvenir · 4 years ago

Text

random thoughts while i’m re-reading sansa ii and sansa iii.

but i haven’t yet written down properly for the project sansa thing

Sansa II

Sansa rode to the Hand's tourney with Septa Mordane and Jeyne Poole, in a litter with curtains of yellow silk so fine she could see right through them. They turned the whole world gold.

Sansa II is about Sansa’s naive outlook in life. In here, she literally sees the world through gold tinted lenses.

The splendor of it all took Sansa's breath away; the shining armor, the great chargers caparisoned in silver and gold, the shouts of the crowd, the banners snapping in the wind . . . and the knights themselves, the knights most of all.

"It is better than the songs," she whispered when they found the places that her father had promised her, among the high lords and ladies.

The knights, most of all. This chapter should give us Sansa’s true knight, amongst all the false knights.It may even not be a knight, a she begins with this chapter quite idealistic but ends it knowing true knights are cruel (Gregor Clegane), and who wins the Tourney of the Hand is Sandor Clegane, who’s not a knight.

They watched the heroes of a hundred songs ride forth, each more fabulous than the last.

Most likely, metaphoric for all of Sansa’s “true knight” candidates, or knights she finds through her journey. The Tourney of the Hand features in narrative order:

The seven knights of the Kingsguard took the field, all but Jaime Lannister in scaled armor the color of milk, their cloaks as white as freshfallen snow. > Sansa’s tenure in King’s Landing. These knights follow Joffrey’s orders in abusing Sansa.

Ser Jaime wore the white cloak as well, but beneath it he was shining gold from head to foot, with a lion's-head helm and a golden sword. > Jaime Lannister stands apart from the other kingsguard, as he ignores Cersei’s orders to find Sansa and instructs Brienne to find her, giving her a lion’s head golden sword. He’s actually portrayed as a fool in this chapter, could be Dontos Hollard.

Ser Gregor Clegane, the Mountain That Rides, thundered past them like an avalanche. > Petyr Baelish is narrativelly connected to giants.

Sansa remembered Lord Yohn Royce, who had guested at Winterfell two years before. > Sansa’s tenure at the Vale.

Septa Mordane pointed out Lord Jason Mallister, in indigo chased with silver, the wings of an eagle on his helm. > A winged knight, still at the Vale.

The girls giggled over the warrior priest Thoros of Myr, with his flapping red robes and shaven head, until the septa told them that he had once scaled the walls of Pyke with a flaming sword in hand. > A priest of R’hllor and the wall, along with a flaming sword in hand. We can think of Jon at the Wall, but we can also think of Brienne and Thoros of Myr proper as well considering the end of ADWD.

END PARAGRAPH. Chronologically, this fits the narrative. It may suggest these knights are the ones that shape Sansa’s journey. I’m not convinced of this because of how many other knights are mentioned after this.

The most terrifying moment of the day came during Ser Gregor's second joust, when his lance rode up and struck a young knight from the Vale under the gorget with such force that it drove through his throat, killing him instantly. (...) His cloak was blue, the color of the sky on a clear summer's day, trimmed with a border of crescent moons, but as his blood seeped into it, the cloth darkened and the moons turned red, one by one. (...) It would be different if it had been Jory or Ser Rodrik or Father, she told herself. The young knight in the blue cloak was nothing to her, some stranger from the Vale of Arryn whose name she had forgotten as soon as she heard it.

As many have theorised, this may foreshadow Harry Hardying’s death. Indeed this guy dresses exactly like him, pretentiously with the Arryn coat-of-arms. Interestingly, Sansa says that she’d care if he meant something to her. Around the time Harry is likely to die, Jon is dead at the Wall. Sansa won’t care about Harry, but she’ll care about Jon.

Ser Loras (...) was the youngest rider on the field, yet he had unhorsed three knights of the Kingsguard that morning in his first three jousts. Sansa had never seen anyone so beautiful. His plate was intricately fashioned and enameled as a bouquet of a thousand different flowers, and his snow-white stallion was draped in a blanket of red and white roses. After each victory, Ser Loras would remove his helm and ride slowly round the fence, and finally pluck a single white rose from the blanket and toss it to some fair maiden in the crowd.

The ideal knight, dressed in blue, with the rose thematic. Interestingly, he fights against a Royce and wins. There have been many essays about Loras paralleling Jon here.

However, Brienne also dresses in blue, she wears a blue armour, and whose childhood features a bad memory about a Ser Ronnet offering her roses but was actually mocking her behind her backs. Jon is also thematically linked with blue and roses through his mother, who loved blue winter roses.

It is my conviction Sansa’s true knight is Brienne, not Jon.

To the other maidens he had given white roses, but the one he plucked for her was red. "Sweet lady," he said, "no victory is half so beautiful as you." (...) She inhaled the sweet fragrance of the rose and sat clutching it long after Ser Loras had ridden off. When Sansa finally looked up, a man was standing over her, staring. (...) "You must be one of her daughters," he said to her. He had grey-green eyes that did not smile when his mouth did. "You have the Tully look." "I'm Sansa Stark," she said, ill at ease. (...) "Your mother was my queen of beauty once," the man said quietly. His breath smelled of mint. "You have her hair." His fingers brushed against her cheek as he stroked one auburn lock. Quite abruptly he turned and walked away. By then, the moon was well up and the crowd was tired, so the king decreed that the last three matches would be fought the next morning, before the melee.

If we take this all in a chronological order, we have all the knights listed, then Loras Tyrell (Brienne, who started looking for Sansa in ACOK / ASOS), then we have Littlefinger seeing someone else in Sansa but she’s sure of whom she is (Petyr taking Sansa to the Vale, as Alyane Stone), the night comes (winter).

Sansa and Septa Mordane were given places of high honor, to the left of the raised dais where the king himself sat beside his queen. (...) She could not hate Joffrey tonight. He was too beautiful to hate. He wore a deep blue doublet studded with a double row of golden lion's heads(...). Sansa looked at him and trembled, afraid that he might ignore her or, worse, turn hateful again and send her weeping from the table.

A raised dias over everyone else (Wall), Joffrey in blue (Jon as a “Stark”), Sansa is afraid he’ll turn hateful and send her away. This is actually legitimate fear, as Sansa would go to the Wall, yet still afraid Jon would send her away. Jon actually thinks doing this to Arya somewhere in ADWD, the Wall is no place for a woman. It’s also in chronological order with the previous paragraph’s interpretation.

Instead, Joffrey’s perfectly civil, but we must remember he’s Jon’s anti-parallel so whatever’s written about the former reflects in the latter either as a parallel or an anti-parallel and that’s kind of though to figure out.

He raised his hand to summon a servant with a flagon of iced summerwine, and poured her a cup. (...) The servants kept the cups filled all night, yet afterward Sansa could not recall ever tasting the wine. She needed no wine. She was drunk on the magic of the night, giddy with glamour, swept away by beauties she had dreamt of all her life and never dared hope to know. (...) And Joffrey was the soul of courtesy. (....) A thick soup of barley and venison. Salads of sweetgrass and spinach and plums, sprinkled with crushed nuts. Snails in honey and garlic. Sansa had never eaten snails before; Joffrey showed her how to get the snail out of the shell, and fed her the first sweet morsel himself. Then came trout fresh from the river, baked in clay; her prince helped her crack open the hard casing to expose the flaky white flesh within. And when the meat course was brought out, he served her himself, slicing a queen's portion from the joint, smiling as he laid it on her plate. She could see from the way he moved that his right arm was still troubling him, yet he uttered not a word of complaint. Later came sweetbreads and pigeon pie and baked apples fragrant with cinnamon and lemon cakes frosted in sugar, but by then Sansa was so stuffed that she could not manage more than two little lemon cakes, as much as she loved them. She was wondering whether she might attempt a third when the king began to shout.

This is similar narrative to Sansa I, especially becomes it features the “return of the trout” and the queen imagery. I proposed in my post on Sansa I that its subtext was about Sansa becoming queen and that Joffrey was a stand-in for Jon, and that their day together foreshadowed the northern campaign. I also mentioned Joffrey’s behaviour could be seen under two different ways, either parallel or anti-parallel, especially when Joffrey is a little shit.

Entrées: no fucking idea, but apparently it involves Jon offering a “snail in honey” to Sansa. I’m... I don’t know.

Fish Course: To remember from Sansa I: “ It was a day for adventures. They explored the caves by the riverbank, and tracked a shadowcat to its lair, and when they grew hungry, Joffrey found a holdfast by its smoke and told them to fetch food and wine for their prince and his lady. They dined on trout fresh from the river, and Sansa drank more wine than she had ever drunk before. "My father only lets us have one cup, and only at feasts," she confessed to her prince.”

I proposed it was interesting because it included conquering the riverlands (exploring the caves by the riverbank would be checking out riverlords for their cause, tracking a shadowcat to its lair would be chasing the lannisters back west, and dining on trout meant taking Riverrun). This time, “her prince helped her crack open the hard casing to expose the flaky white flesh within.” can be seen as foreshadowing a siege of Riverrun that goes well

Meat Course: To remember from Sansa I, Joffrey is humilliated and consequently never forgivies Sansa, so she’d never be a successfull queen married to her (if he was planning on that at all, since he jumped so easily to Margaery). I proposed that Jon as Joffrey’s anti-parallel would be humilliated in battle but he’d move past it (this is basically what happened in the Battle of Winterfell, he got humilliated and he saved her arse, and even expected him to be angry with her but he went all targ sibling on her forehead instead).

In here, we see what I proposed for Jon to go past it reflected, as Joffrey serves Sansa the queen’s portion, smiling as if all is forgiven despite the source of humilliation being present as “She could see from the way he moved that his right arm was still troubling him, yet he uttered not a word of complaint.” Nice guy Snow, thank you very much.

Dessert: No idea, but a few infamous ones are featured. The pigeon pie present in the purple wedding, cinnamon apples in one of Bran’s banquets (the one he’s given the king’s portion as well), and lemoncakes (three of them), magic number.

Sansa started as Joffrey laid his hand on her arm. "It grows late," the prince said. He had a queer look on his face, as if he were not seeing her at all. "Do you need an escort back to the castle?"

The nice atmosphere is broken because Robert is a dick and fights with Cersei. Joffrey then decides to be a dick as well. This also featured in Sansa I, a boy and a girl fighting, then Joffrey makes a dick of himself.

"You do not tell me what to do, woman," he screamed at Queen Cersei. "I am king here, do you understand? I rule here, and if I say that I will fight tomorrow, I will fight!"

Hopefully, that’s a metaphor for Aegon telling Daniella to go fuck herself, he’s the king of westeros and she does not tell him what to do. I did those dragon posts where Rhaegal (representative of Jon) seems to take take offence of Viserion (Aegon) getting trolled repeatedly.

Sansa could feel the Hound watching her. "Did you think Joff was going to take you himself?" He laughed. He had a laugh like the snarling of dogs in a pit. "Small chance of that." He pulled her unresisting to her feet. "Come, you're not the only one needs sleep. I've drunk too much, and I may need to kill my brother tomorrow." He laughed again.

Joffrey didn’t take Sansa back to Winterfell, but Jon did.

Sansa III

This chapter is completely “useless” at first glance, except for Sansa and Arya’s second squabble, which is when Ned has the ephiphany that Joffrey isn’t Robert’s kid. Other than that, it features a recap of the chapter before, two Sansa and Arya squabbles, and Ned’s "favoritism” (not really, just guilt over his sister) over Arya. So what is this chapter’s for outside of that? The subtext of course.

"Father, I only just now remembered, I can't go away, I'm to marry Prince Joffrey." She tried to smile bravely for him. "I love him, Father, I truly truly do, I love him as much as Queen Naerys loved Prince Aemon the Dragonknight, as much as Jonquil loved Ser Florian. I want to be his queen and have his babies." "Sweet one," her father said gently, "listen to me. When you're old enough, I will make you a match with a high lord who's worthy of you, someone brave and gentle and strong. This match with Joffrey was a terrible mistake. That boy is no Prince Aemon, you must believe me." (...)

"Stop that weeping, child," Septa Mordane said sternly. "I am certain your lord father knows what is best for you."

Urgh. lmao.

Ned promises Sansa a high-lord, who’s brave, gentle and strong, that he is no aemon the dragonknight. The latter is the “easier” one, because Jon will remembers much later that he used to say he was Aemon the dragonknight in childplay. Just one out of all that, doesn’t seem promising, eh?

After this, there’s Sansa and Arya cluing in Ned over Joffrey being a bastard aprading as the heir to the Iron Throne, which is the anta-parallel to Jon. As I said in Sansa I post, this could be foreshadowed in the sisters squabbling over Rhaegar’s rubies. It comes in chronologically order, the motifs of the fight at the Trident are similar to what’s used all over GOT, etc etc. So Jon is here again (he was present in that segment in Sansa I as one of Rhaegar’s ruby), for some reason.

Going back to the beginning of this chapter... the conversation is kind of odd, it goes all over the place. They talk of what happens in there, then Sansa randomly remembers a dream for no reason, and wanders in her mind over this and that. It’s kind of schizophrenic writing... unless it’s kind of awkward because it’s meant to say something else in the subtext... So...

“He wouldn't send Ser Loras," Sansa told Jeyne Poole that night as they shared a cold supper by lamplight. (...) Her father's decision still bewildered her. When the Knight of Flowers had spoken up, she'd been sure she was about to see one of Old Nan's stories come to life. (...) And then Father had refused him! It had upset her more than she could tell. She had said as much to Septa Mordane as they descended the stairs from the gallery, but the septa had only told her it was not her place to question her lord father's decisions.

There have been plenty of essays comparing Jon to Loras Tyrell. This is especially important in Sansa II / Sansa III because Loras is wearing blue (odd choice, as his house colours are green) and roses, thematically connected to Jon’s mother. Ned thinks the kid is too young to be a hero, which is an interesting paralell to him refusing Jon to go to the Wall at first because he was also too young. We can also look at Ned taking Jon as his bsatard son, as taking away the chance to be the song hero. He went from a prince of roses (urgh) to a bastard.

That was when Lord Baelish had said, "Oh, I don't know, Septa. Some of her lord father's decisions could do with a bit of questioning. (...)" (...) He had touched her cheek, his thumb lightly tracing the line of a cheekbone. "Life is not a song, sweetling. You may learn that one day to your sorrow."

Ned’s decision of taking Jon as his bastard will be questioned of course and the truth will come out. Life’s not a song and Lyanna made Ned promise to protect Jon, because Robert would have killed him if he had found out. But Jon has a song, the song of ice and fire. Shut up Littlefinger.

"Ser Ilyn's the King's Justice, not Ser Loras," Jcyne said. "Lord Eddard should have sent him." Sansa shuddered. Every time she looked at Ser Ilyn Payne, she shivered. He made her feel as though something dead were slithering over her naked skin. "Ser Ilyn's almost like a second monster. I'm glad Father didn't pick him." "Lord Beric is as much a hero as Ser Loras. He's ever so brave and gallant." "I suppose," Sansa said doubtfully. Beric Dondarrion was handsome enough, but he was awfully old, almost twenty-two; the Knight of Flowers would have been much better. Of course, Jeyne had been in love with Lord Beric ever since she had first glimpsed him in the lists. Sansa thought she was being silly; Jeyne was only a steward's daughter, after all, and no matter how much she mooned after him, Lord Beric would never look at someone so far beneath him, even if she hadn't been half his age.

(...) "I saw your sister this afternoon," Jeyne blurted out, as if she'd been reading Sansa's thoughts. "She was walking through the stables on her hands. Why would she do a thing like that?"

Instead, Ned chose Beric Dondarrion. There have been plenty of essays that compared Ilyn Payne to Ramsay Bolton (dead eyes and taking over the Stark legacy, etc), and Beric Dondarrion to Jon Snow (dresses in house targ clothes and was ressurrected by a priest of r’hllor, etc). The fact that Ilyn Payne is brought up by Jeyne Poole of all people and after an intermission with the white hart dream, she also mentions Arya, therefore it could be a heartbreaking nod to fake!Arya plotline.

As we also know, Ramsay and Jon have been locked into a bizarre war of wills up north, precisely over fake!Arya. Likewise Beric dying in the middle of his “mission” for the Starks and then ressurrected by a priest of R’hllor, Jon also died while he was going to retake Winterfell and save fake”Arya and its likely he’ll be ressudrected by a priest of R’hllor. In the show, Sansa took over fake!Arya storyline.

It’s interesting to note Beric is awfully old at “twenty-two”, because that’s Jon’s age give it or take it at ADWD if the timeskip between ASOS and AFFC / ADWD have happened (he’s seventeen or so then). It’s worth noting that Beric is said to be “brave”.

“I had a dream that Joffrey would be the one to take the white hart," she said. It had been more of a wish, actually, but it sounded better to call it a dream. Everyone knew that dreams were prophetic. (...) "He shot it with a golden arrow and brought it back for me." In the songs, the knights never killed magical beasts, they just went up to them and touched them and did them no harm, but she knew Joffrey liked hunting, especially the killing part. Only animals, though.

This one is interesting, because it’s sandwiched between the Ilyn Payne and Arya Stark, which could be a mention to the northern tug of war between Ramsay and Jon mentioned above. As we know though, Jon is one that would fit Sansa’s dream, because not only he protected the direwolves who are magical beasts, he took the white direwolf for himself. “Only touch them and not harm them”, dare I say... gentle? Not only that, the anti-parallel btween Joffrey and Jon is fuelled further since Jon took Lady (and later, he’ll be brigning the white wolf Ghost) back to Sansa while Joffrey took her away.

"There was a black brother," Sansa said, "begging men for the Wall, only he was kind of old and smelly." She hadn't liked that at all. She had always imagined the Night's Watch to be men like Uncle Benjen. In the songs, they were called the black knights of the Wall. But this man had been crookbacked and hideous, and he looked as though he might have lice. If this was what the Night's Watch was truly like, she felt sorry for her bastard half brother, Jon.

Yoren of the Night’s Watch and it’s self-explanatory, since Jon as a member of the Night’s Watch is even mentioned in this segment. It’s also worth noting that Sansa fantasises the Night’s Watch to be men like Benjen Stark, the black knights of the Wall... dare I say... strong?

It’s also worth noting Sansa’s disilusion with the Night’s Watch comes after a segment that may foreshadow Ramsay and Jon “fighting” over fake!Arya, then Jon being murdered and ressurrected. Which fits eprfectly with Jon’s own disillusion with the Night’s Watch that he felt in the beginning of AGOT but also in the show when he got ressurrected. Not a happy panda.

“And later these two brothers came before him, freeriders from the Dornish Marches, and pledged their swords to the service of the king. Father accepted their oaths . . . “

The Dornish Marches are slightly north of where Jon was born, at the Tower of Joy. Bascially, the next town towards the north is located at the Dornish Marches. In the show, Jon basically pledged his sword to Sansa (Ned’s narrative heir) as well, there’s even a close-in on his sword before they re-meet at Castle Black. Strangely, Sansa IV features Sansa believing Ned’s plans to take her back to Winterfell and the promised match is a hedge knight which is a freerider without a knighthood.

So, in summary, Sansa reports on three men “auditing” Ned. Loras Tyrell, the true hero, which Ned refused and could correspond to Jon as Lyanna Stark’s son due to the narrative uses of blue and roses and refusal. Beric Dondarrion, Ned’s chosen hero, and could correspond to Jon and Ramsay’s tug-of-war with Arya. Finally, Yoren, and could correspond to Jon defecting the Night’s Watch for being disillusioned after being killed by them, something that was rpesent in the show’s foreshadowing all the way back in season 3. Not only is the story presented chronological, after Beric being “brave”, Sansa randomly recalls the white hart dream (”gentle”) and Jon as a black kngith of the wall (”strong”).

So, Jon could actually be lurking in the subtext of that bizarre conversation between Sansa and Jeyne Poole.

The kitchen yielded no lemon cakes, but they did find half of a cold strawberry pie, and that was almost as good. They ate it on the tower steps, giggling and gossiping and sharing secrets, and Sansa went to bed that night feeling almost as wicked as Arya.

The dessert again.

The next morning she woke before first light and crept sleepily to her window to watch Lord Beric form up his men.

The men preparing to war. Still goes on well chronologically with the conversation before. It had stopped at Jon quitting the Night’s Watch and pledging to Sansa.

"Liar," Arya said. Her hand clenched the blood orange so hard that red juice oozed between her fingers. "Go ahead, call me all the names you want," Sansa said airily. "You won't dare when I'm married to Joffrey. You'll have to bow to me and call me Your Grace." She shrieked as Arya flung the orange across the table. It caught her in the middle of the forehead with a wet squish and plopped down into her lap. "You have juice on your face, Your Grace," Arya said.

So from the subtext from Sansa I and Sansa II, I’m convinced Sansa will become queen MUCH sooner than in the show. This squabble over here is interesting, because Arya calls her “your grace” as if she was already queen. So in the subtext that may correlate to that.

This of course, comes with a very strong imagery of wedding consummation. Sansa is wearing a white dress, that gets stained by blood orange juice (red in colour) at the lap (crotch area). Are they related?

The blood orange had left a blotchy red stain on the silk. "I hate her!" she screamed. She balled up the dress and flung it into the cold hearth, on top of the ashes of last night's fire. When she saw that the stain had bled through onto her underskirt, she began to sob despite herself. She ripped off the rest of her clothes wildly, threw herself into bed, and cried herself back to sleep.

In addition, this white dress has red blood, but it also has black fire when it’s thrown into the ashes of the hearth. The words of House Targaryen are fire and blood, the colours are red and black.They’re all there, in this white dress. So it's a Targaryen (virgin, ehem) wedding dress... for Sansa. There are only two male left for that to happen and only one of them has been lurking in the background.

And after this, comes Ned’s covnersation about Sansa’s true match. So Jon’s all over the subtext, of a chapter with wedding consummation imagery and Ned Stark’s promise of the “true one”. Why, if not to marry his arse to Sansa? I do not know.

#return of the trout #this is important because i care about the riverlands #jonsa heavy

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irene-sadler · 4 years ago

Text

Sir Reynard and the Red Knight

(aka “The Tournament”)

` Had Isbel made it rain? Meve thought maybe Gascon was onto something, but knew better than to ask. Regardless, the weather had changed by morning to a chill wind and cloudy sky which warmed to a damp, but rainless, afternoon. Possibly it was pleasant enough for those observing the proceedings and eating roasted nuts; she herself was drenched in sweat and could see only a small, square piece of the world beyond the two-inch thickness of leather, eighth-inch of steel, and heavy coat of dull black paint that separated her head from the outside world. Her view of the day was of pale gray skies, floating colorful banners, and the back of Bohault’s armor directly in front of her.

(“The tourney armor is not quite what you’re used to wearing.” Reynard had advised her, the night before. “It’s heavier and thicker.”

He’d considered the hastily-painted set he’d loaned her, frowning doubtfully.

“I must admit, I’m concerned that a few of these knights might recognize my armor even with the black paint, but will of course know I’m not in it; luckily it will be hard for them to say much about it if you arrive with no time to spare. Of course, a real professional can generally tell who is wearing a set of armor by the way they fight, whatever disguise they may employ, but they’ve never seen you fight, and even if they know my armor, and they know me, they may not figure out the discrepancy before it’s too late; for them, I mean.”

She’d grinned, gap-toothed and wolfish.)

She wasn’t smiling then, because of her jangling nerves, but he was right. It was impossible to see much of anything through the helm, much less recognize an individual knight, or realize that someone wasn’t really a knight. The roped-off lists teemed with a shifting, crushing press of horses and people – knights, footmen, valets, and Gascon, visible in the front of the mass, talking to Reynard, although she had no idea what they were saying, between the din of the crowd in the distance and the rattle of armor directly around her.

(“You won’t be able to hear much of anything, what with the crowd and the helm,” Reynard had continued, with a smile that almost matched hers, “It’s easiest to just listen for trumpets. The first you’ll hear are a warning to prepare yourself.”)

She heard a distant blare of instruments through the metal and leather that protected her head; her destrier, a massive bay animal, twitched his ears at the sound and sidled gently away from her neighbors, carrying her footmen and valets along with him like lesser celestial bodies. She sat still as he completed his movement and then stood patiently, unaffected by the din or by the dramatics of any of the horses near him. A veteran, she noted with appreciation; she’d borrowed him, like the armor, from Reynard, and wasn’t sure which of the two she valued more at that moment.

(“The second time you hear horns will be when the melee is over. Once all is in order, they’ll cut the ropes; you’ve seen this done, of course. After that you may fight whoever you come across who is on th’ opposing side. As you aren’t a famous, or infamous, knight, nobody will single you out in particular, and all you need to worry about to succeed is staying on your horse – but you’ve been in plenty of real battles, and you know that. I think you’ll do very well, under the circumstances.”)

The mass of men and animals waited; a drift of wood smoke floated over them and found its way through the little gap in Meve’s visor. Her eyes watered; she battled the urge to sneeze, lost, and, at that moment of weakness, the pack suddenly surged forward, carrying herself and her horse along with it. She juggled her lance and the reins for a moment, then noted the frustrated cant of her horse’s ears as he broke into a slow, heavy trot with the rest of the mass of rattling, encumbered men. It occurred to her that the animal knew more about his business than she did, so she dropped the reins, couched her lance, and knocked down her first attacker by instinct as much as skill. The spear shattered on impact with his breastplate and she continued on her way, dropping the useless splinters and happily shifting to more familiar tactics.

(Reynard’s face had turned unsure again, as he spoke. She suspected he was more nervous than she was, herself.

“- you’ll do very well unless, of course, you fall off, and then it’s anyone’s guess. You fight well on foot, better than I do, in fact, but it’s still best for you to stay mounted; mine will do his best to keep you aboard if he possibly can.”)

With a lance, she was awkward at best, but with a mace, she was perfectly competent. Reynard’s horse needed no guidance, and she battered her way through one, then another, of the defendant knights, as they happened to pass into her narrow view. She smashed through the lance of the first as he tilted at her, turned back after him, shoved him to the ground with her shield, and kept going. The second knight she recognized with satisfaction - he was dressed in red armor and had, seeing her unstoppable approach, moved to block her way. Her horse turned himself obligingly to put her alongside. She swung, experimentally, was easily blocked on his shield, and deflected an answering sword-blow with her own. Her next swing was delivered with the full force of her personal dislike behind it. The hit dented the stranger’s shield and splintered her mace; the head flew off into the air. They paused, staring at the splintered handle of her weapon in mutual astonishment.

(“But if you fall, Meve, you ought to yield; Bohault and th’ others will keep you in one piece. At least, I hope they will,” Reynard added, with a doubtful frown, which he shook off sharply. “Yes, they will, you’ll be fine. However, should you lose your helm-“

“Oh,” she said, taking his hand and steering him away from the armor, “Not to worry; I’ll wear a knit hat to cover my hair, and nobody will notice. Although, I do wish Isbel hadn’t refused to charm the thing so it wouldn’t come off at all, but I suppose that’d be an unfair advantage.”)

The moment was interrupted as someone hit the back of her helm from behind, a clanging blow that crashed her off her horse and into the clinging mud below. Isbel had most definitely caused the rainstorm, Meve reflected distractedly, as someone immediately dragged her up out of the muck and onto her feet. The stolid, middle-aged face of Bohault loomed overhead. He released her as she dragged her sword out of its sheath, and shouted an angry negative at whatever he was saying. She abandoned the horse and her shield, pushed Gaspar out of her way, and strode off in search of a new target, ignoring her ringing ears. Close by, one of her allies was scrambling backward, under desperate siege by a pair of opponents; she dealt one a hard punch to the helm with her armored fist, closed with the second and disarmed him with a clever twist of her weapon that sent his sword flying, turned back to her first victim, and scowled in disgust as the knight rapidly backed away from her and made his escape.

The man she’d rescued was floundering in the mud with his helm crooked; Meve made a momentary search, turning her entire torso to see through her visor, for his footmen, saw none, dropped her sword in the mud, and, gritting her teeth through her growing exhaustion, dragged him back onto his feet with both hands. She recognized his face with a flash of annoyance, noticed that his right arm was most probably broken, from the way his shield was awkwardly hanging, and sighed. Over his shoulder, Meve spotted the red knight coming for her, himself unhorsed; she hesitated, then raised her empty hand significantly, and, as he accordingly changed course and passed her by, reluctantly signaled to Bohault. The cavalryman and her own footmen circled around, blackjacks held against the thinning remains of the melee.

(“You’ll get tired, sooner than you think, my dear, but recall that this isn’t a real battle, and you may quit the field at any time, even if the fight hasn’t ended yet.”

She’d scoffed at the idea. Reynard smiled and shook his head at her.)

“There’s no shame in retiring early, so long as you put in a valiant effort,” Reynard had said; she repeated his rhetoric to Ethan, just before Isbel snapped the squire’s right shoulder back into place. The youth had nothing to say in response, but managed to nod to convey that he accepted her comments as an absolute truth, given by his Queen, before he fainted dead away. She sighed, rubbed her aching neck, and prepared herself for another lecture from the sorceress, but to her mild surprise the older woman only nodded approvingly at her.

“You’re wanted, ma’am,” Pug announced, sticking her head into the room, “And the Duke of Dogs warns that you’ve won some prize or something, and ought t’ prepare according.”

“They’ve been saying that the black knight is in love with a princess who was turned by magic into a swan,” Isbel remarked. “And that he is searching for a way to turn her back; as part of his quest, he has taken a vow of silence, so that he neither speaks nor removes his helmet. I’ve no idea how these rumors began circulating, obviously.”

“Fantastic,” Meve mumbled, reaching for her helm. “A swan, is it? Sound most inconvenient; for the knight, I mean. I’m sure the lady is quite content.”

The prize was granted by the middle-aged wife of the defendant Baron, smugly standing in for the mysteriously absent Queen; Meve recognized the woman from the previous day’s jousting even through her narrow view. She was exhausted, but Reynard’s horse carried her to receive her due, again without any instruction on her part, and her mud-spattered armor disguised her slight shaking. Somewhere beyond her metal shell, a man haughtily announced, “Behold here this noble lady, accompanied by my lords the judges, who have come to give you the tourney prize, because you have been judged the knight who has fought best today in the melee of the tourney, and my lady prays that you will take it with good will.”

She did, after a short pause before she realized she was being addressed, said nothing at all in response but only bowed, a motion made necessarily awkward by the weight of metal she wore, and then rode away.

There was no avoiding either the feast or dance that night, and Meve’s dwindling morale was not improved on realizing she would be unable to avoid the Baroness, either; she didn’t dislike the woman, but her patience for small talk was limited, at the best of times, and almost nonexistent after her long day. Luckily, the older woman only eyed her speculatively for a moment as she sat down and then tactfully made uninteresting conversation on occasion. The evening therefore wore on tiresomely, but mostly in silence, until she nodded toward Gascon and his admirers and remarked to Meve, “I believe they grow them without brains, these days; you’d best keep that one in green away from your friend. Do you see her circling? A grasping creature; harpies don’t compare.”

Meve, quite familiar with the behavior of harpies, considered the subject with an analytical eye and said, thoughtfully, “Hmm.”

A few minutes later, they were deep in a detailed discussion of the merits and backgrounds of the women in the hall, and then, after another drink or two, the men as well; it carried them companionably until Gascon escaped the crowd and joined them. He flopped into the seat nearest Meve, uninvited, and consumed the rest of her drink with a dramatic sigh. The Baroness stared blandly at him; Meve rolled her eyes toward the other woman.

“This is awful,” Gascon complained, “I don’t know how the two of you do this full-time. I think I was pretty rude, though; maybe most of those people won’t want to talk t’ me again.”

“You get used to it, after a few decades – oh, what now?” Meve asked irritably, as the door to the hall banged open and an armed man strode confidently through. Conversation in the hall ceased instantly, as everyone else looked curiously at the newcomer: a soldier, Meve suspected from his patchwork armor of mail and leather and extensive mustache, or perhaps a mercenary. The stranger looked around himself, bowed toward the Queen and Baroness and said, politely enough, “Good evening; I’m looking for Sir Reynard Odo.”

“Really? What for?” Gascon asked him, intrigued, but the knight stood up before the stranger could answer.

“Yes? Can I help you?” he asked; Meve sighed as the stranger immediately declared, “My master, Sir Holt of the Fen, represents that you have offended his honor and demands that you apologize or else face the consequences.”

“Who?” The Duke asked in a carrying whisper, blinking.

“The red knight; you remember him,” Meve explained, much more quietly. “What did you do, Count Odo?” she asked, louder. The Count shrugged modestly.

“He annoyed me yesterday evening, my lady,” he replied, “And so I threw him up some stairs. No, sir, I won’t apologize,” he continued, to the messenger. “Would do it again, in fact, given the chance.”

Gascon grinned; the Baroness smirked; Meve had to duck her head slightly to hide her own slightly surprised smile. A whisper of comment and a few laughs went around the room; the stranger ignored them.

“In that case, he challenges you to a duel, to restore his honor by force, says you are a recreant knight and no gentleman, and-“

“Yes, yes,” Reynard interrupted, uncharacteristically impatient, “Gascon, would you mind arranging the details?”

“Not at all,” he said, lightly. “Do you prefer swords, or something else?”

“Doesn’t matter to me,” the knight replied, bowed to all present, and shot a quick glance at the Queen. She nodded, very slightly; he left the hall without another word.

“Well,” she said to Gascon, as the stranger made his exit and the general din resumed, “I suppose we’ll be imposing on your hospitality for a few more days, then.”

“Stay as long as you want,” Gascon replied cheerily.

“I’m not surprised he wants to fight me,” Reynard was saying much later, sitting complacently with his legs stretched toward the inferno in Gascon’s fireplace and the knight who’d fought best that day resting her head in his lap, “But I did expect Sir Holt would choose a less melodramatic moment, if he called me out. These things would never fly in the royal court; you’d never get away with giving the melee prize to an unnamed knight who was dismounted and resigned early, no matter how gallantly he behaved toward his allies, or how well he fought beforehand. At least, not without any hurt feelings or complaints - not that I didn’t hear my share even here. Nor with trying to duel a judge of the tournament, for that matter, before it was yet officially over -”

“She,” Meve interrupted, to redirect his lecture, “How well she fought. And I’ll give prizes in my court as I see fit, sir.”

“Won’t be able to win all of ‘em yourself so easily, there,” he answered, “I thought you had fallen asleep; did I wake you?”

“Resting my eyes only, my love,” she said, “I can hear well enough despite.”

“It’s a fine trophy you’ve won,” Gascon said, examining the ruby-studded ring she’d been awarded with professional appreciation, “What will you do with it?”

“Why, give it to the next swan I come across, naturally,” she said; Reynard almost laughed.

“Say, Reynard,” the Duke continued, as if nothing unusual had happened, “Lord knows I’ve annoyed you hundreds of times, and yet you’ve never thrown me up some stairs. What gives?”

“Did I say annoyed? I meant something else,” the knight replied, with an automatic glance at Meve. She raised an inquiring eyebrow up at him, smiled as he looked cagily away, and made no attempt to hide her gratification at his embarrassment.

“Oh,” Gascon said, with an ironic smirk, tossed the ring to Reynard, and continued, inexplicably, “I get it. Well, I went against Sir Holt in the jousts th’ other day, and I don’t think he’s all that good of a fighter.”

“He knocked you down in a single pass,” Meve noted.

“Exactly; nearly anyone else could have done it just as easily, so it proves no particular skill on his part.”

“Yes, well, I fought him in the melee, and I think he’s more than passing good; you’ve your work cut out for you, Reynard. Although,” Meve added, “I should have beaten him in th’ end, without having to stop and rescue that squire of yours again, Gascon.”

“No doubt,” Gascon agreed, with no obvious sarcasm. “Well, seems you’ve preparations to make, Reynard, so I’ll leave you to it. Don’t stay up too late.”

Thick fog had settled in over the fort by the next morning; the Queen sent dozens of courtiers and retainers on their way before noon, moving very stiffly even to an unsuspecting eye, but otherwise appearing her usual self. The Duke, on the other hand, was visibly hungover and surly on top of it. The Baroness regarded her with a faint, amused smile, but said nothing of note to as she departed; Meve concluded that, probably, the older woman had gotten the wrong idea altogether about her relationship with Gascon, but it was too late to explain, even if she’d cared to bother. The only trouble with her and Reynard’s affair, she reflected, was that its private nature meant almost nobody else had any idea it existed, causing the occasional inconvenience.

She managed the rest of the departures with casual patience. Those few of Gascon’s admirers who were truly dedicated braved his short answers and dull, stupid glare, to no profit - he had no obvious interest in any of the women, no matter what they tried. Reynard watched the proceedings on and off from a distance, saying nothing, but conveniently vanishing during the brief appearance and hasty departure of the red knight. By midafternoon, the last of the visitors were gone, leaving only the lesser mob of Meve’s own retinue. Gascon, who had suddenly recovered from his hangover and moodiness, departed for a conference with the enemy and returned late in the evening.

“Sir Holt’s agreed to fight with th’ usual weapons, but not now. He says he wishes to postpone until some point in the near future; claims that his shield arm is injured from the melee due to a particularly hard hit, and he is, therefore, not prepared to restore his honor immediately,” he reported, helping himself to Reynard’s dinner. Meve smiled smugly.

“So,” Reynard said, yielding over his mostly untouched plate and looking unusually irritated, “There was really no reason for him to interrupt your feast with this nonsense, yesterday.”

“Well, he doesn’t wear that ridiculous red armor because he’s th’ uninteresting but considerate type, like yourself, my friend.”

“I suppose I ought to go back to Rivia Castle tomorrow, then,” said Meve, without much enthusiasm, as Reynard rolled his eyes and Gascon grinned cheekily at him. “Two weeks away from court is, perhaps, a little long; I wouldn’t want them to start getting creative ideas in my absence.”

“I’ll go too; no need to await Sir Holt’s recovery here instead of there,” Reynard said quickly.

“Or you could stay here,” Gascon said hopefully, “Sure, it’ll take a few weeks, but by then it’ll be hunting season, which you shouldn’t miss - boars, should it snow early in the season, deer if it don’t, foxes either way - you’d be home in no less than two months, I figure, when all’s said and done.”

The minor argument that immediately ensued brought Meve to a sudden conclusion; she considered that she wasn’t sure how, exactly, she could have missed the now very obvious reason for Gascon’s moodiness as she interrupted them:

“Gascon, we aren’t parting forever or even departing on a long journey to distant Kovir, only going home, which is a few days’ ride from here at most; you may visit us at any time you choose.”

Reynard glanced sharply at her and then adopted a distant frown. The Duke stared, apparently speechless for once; she looked back at him impassively until he said, “You spend far too much time with that sorceress; you’re acquiring a certain similarity of expression. Have you noticed it, Reynard?”

“No,” the knight said stiffly.

“Anyway,” Gascon continued, “I know all that, obviously, and, well, I’ll be honest: it does feel strangely isolated, out here by myself, after we all spent so much time together before; the two of you have each other, perhaps as a result you don’t feel the same - although don’t get me wrong, I’m very happy for you both; no two people that I know suit each other better - but you’re right, it’s not as if I couldn’t make it to the capitol more often; it’s less simple for you to both drop everything and come all the way here, unless it’s with a good excuse like the tournament. I knew it’d work a charm.”

He ran out of breath on his final, slightly triumphant phrase and stopped; Reynard looked thoughtfully from Gascon to Meve, whose victorious smile had quickly faded to a stunned, slightly hurt stare.

“Perhaps,” he said carefully, “You might have said something about this earlier, instead of delaying and inventing plots, or been less cagey about it all week - in short, you could, generally, have handled this better, but,” he continued, a little louder as Meve opened her mouth to interrupt him, “We’ve all benefited, I think, from this - diversion, one way or another, so no lasting harm done.”

Meve mumbled something under her breath, frowning.

“The next time that you want to get together, however, you might find it convenient to just ask us, without any schemes to bring it about.”

“Yes, of course,” Gascon said, “You’re right. Should I apologize?”

“Not to me.”

Meve shook her head at him, but Gascon said, “I’m sorry, Meve. How do people usually apologize, at court? Flowers? A card? Or I could let Sir Reynard knock me off a horse, like he will Sir Holt?”

“No,” she said, “I can knock you off horses myself perfectly well.”

“I await your summons, then,” he said, venturing a hopeful grin, “Or I could send a fruit basket; we will soon be well-supplied with apples -”

“Look,” she said, finally cracking an amused smile despite herself, “It’s fine; I forgive you. Just - just don’t be such an ass, next time.”

“I will never be an ass again,” he announced, mouthed thank you to Reynard, bowed gallantly, and then prudently departed. Meve stared at the spot on the floor where he’d been standing for a long moment, then sighed, cracked her aching neck and sat in Reynard’s lap, frowning.

“That man is a disaster,” she remarked.

“Do you want me to fight him, too?” he asked; she ran her fingers through his hair and said, fondly, “No, thank you. I don’t think a knock on the head will be of much use, here; Gascon will have to sort himself out some other way, I’m afraid. If he can.”

“And what about you?”

“Me? Well, I’m all right, I suppose.”

Reynard looked up at her, frowning doubtfully.

“Really,” she claimed. “Gascon does have one thing right; having you around makes the more difficult days easier to get through.”

He looked less dubious; she grinned, kissed him, and added, “Although th’ effect might be in part a result of that hit I took in the melee; a knock on the head can solve one’s problems every so often, though not quite so often as it causes them.”

“A good thing your head is so hard, then,” he noted with a smile.

#thronebreaker #witcher #action #romance #sports

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maximumphilosopheranchor · 4 years ago

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Hello!Can you give information about philip ii’s court and people that surrendered him in general?

Hello!

Sorry for the delay. I was pondering a lot drafting my answer how to respond to your question the best because firstly it’s too broad a matter to deal with it here, and, secondly, Philip’s biographies I have read don’t provide as much detailed information on the court under Philip as I would like. Also, I have to say - I haven’t done with reading about Philip and this is something I look forward to learn more about in future.

Anyway, here’s what I gathered. It covers the order after Philip’s return to Spain in 1559.

“The ‘court’ in Madrid had several functions. At the centre was the king, served by his household. There were satellite households, of the queen, the Infantas, and other immediate members of the royal family. Their combined personnel, adding on the staff in the stables and the guards, amounted to a small army. The theatre of their activities was the enlarged and reformed Alcázar [the royal palace, formerly fortress]. The king as chief actor brought three other spheres of activity into this scenario: the functioning of government, the management of diplomacy and ritual, and the direction of public entertainment. Fixing the king’s residence in Madrid gave for the first time in Spain’s history a permanent location for all these functions. (..)

Since the adoption of Burgundian ceremonial in 1548 the size of the royal household had grown enormously. The main component was the king’s household, divided into five main units: household, kitchen, chapel, stables and cellar. Each unit was headed by a nobleman in charge of its administration. The household guard formed an additional unit. Other immediate members of the royal family had smaller households, all financed by the king. The most drastic innovation of these years was the large and expensive retinue which Elizabeth Valois brought and insisted on maintaining, although many of the servants were sent home a few weeks later. The Venetian ambassador felt that it was because ‘the Frenchmen were very ill-dressed, dirty, careless and disrespectful’. Elizabeth’s demands inflated the queen’s household into an entity almost as large as that of the king. (..)

The king’s court in his last dozen years suffered from a lack of social gaiety, due in part to the king’s poor health, in part to his absences and travels. But for the first twenty-five years of the reign there was no lack of vitality. (..) Three factors explain the vigorous life of the royal circle. Most nobles took the court seriously; the queens contributed enormously to social life; and the king himself had an active interest in music and entertainment. (..)

No European court could exist without a client nobility. The Spanish nobles continued to have immense military and economical resources, but these were threatened by rising costs and a high death-rate among heirs. The court offered hope, because it presented the chance of employment and influence, as well as contacts which could lead to marriage. For those who liked such things, there was also the life-style, a welcome relief after the monotony of the provinces. As Madrid grew, more and more nobles gravitated there. ‘It is terrible,’ the king commented, ‘that they all want to leave their estates and become residents of the court.’ A courtly society came into existence, with its own special rules and, later, its own literature. The court of the king, like the courts of the great nobility, was a theatre not only of ritual but also of entertainment, leisure and diversion. (..)

The contribution of the queens to court life was fundamental. Elizabeth of Valois from the beginning tried to reproduce the gaiety of the Renaissance court she had left behind. She enjoyed parties, masked balls, buffoonery, spectacles, outings to her palaces, and picnics. (..) In jousts, she played the part of liege lady to the three young court princes: Don Carlos, Don Juan of Austria, and the prince of Parma. It gave them a romantic scenario which in turn influenced their chivalric ideals. Elizabeth also contributed to the cultural life of court by her love of music, plays and art: she extended her personal patronage to Sanchez Coello and to the Italian Sofonisba. Anna’s [Philip’s fourth wife] role was more subdued and coincided more closely with that of Philip. In the absences of the king’s court, the queens had their own social life in Madrid. Anna loved comedies. In February 1571, she ‘enjoyed herself in the apartments of the princess [Philip’s sister Juana] at a comedy that she ordered to be performed there. At four in the afternoon the Infantas [Philip’s daughters] went to join the queen and enjoyed the play as though they were much older.’

The king’s sisters also played a crucial role. When the empress Maria came to reside in Madrid, she contributed powerfully to the prestige of a city which, during Philip’s absence in Lisbon, had no king. She set herself up in apartments in convent of the Descalzas, where she periodically put on musical entertainments. All visiting dignitaries to Madrid were obliged by protocol to make a formal visit to the empress before calling on any other official.

(..) In his youth as well as during his years abroad, he [Philip] had delighted in jousts and tourneys. The Amadis of Gaul was one of his favourite books (he later approved it as a set text for his son Philip when the latter began to learn French). Whenever possible he presided over tournaments at court. (..) The essential feature of the ‘court’ in Madrid was the royal household. If the king was away, he took most of his household with him. This turned the Alcázar into an empty shell, populated only by its staff, some government officials, and the household of any remaining member of the royal family (..) Practical factors, such as the sheer cost of moving around the kingdom, were beginning to distance European rulers from their subjects. Complex ceremonial further helped to isolate the king. Philip was deeply concerned for his people, but had little effective contact with them. He felt that his accessibility on feast-days, which he tried to maintain all his life, was adequate. (..) As often as feasible, he had his lunch ‘in public’. But this involved no more than lunching (alone) in one of the large reception rooms of the Alcázar, where members of the court and public might see him. (..) He made a rule of being accessible to private petitions while going to or from Sunday mass and deliberately walked slowly, so that people would have a chance to catch up with him.”

Henry Kamen, Philip of Spain

As you can see although Philip had made Madrid the capital city in 1561 he didn’t reside there permanently. He traveled considerably within his Iberian realms and moved among his country palaces which he improved, rebuilt or built - the Pardo, Aranjuez, Valsaín, also known as El Bosque de Segovia, and later, of course, El Escorial where he spent much time after 1571 - and which were located not far from Madrid. In his far distance journeys through the Iberian peninsula the large part of the court went with him but to his country palaces he usually took with himself a small entourage.

“Although Philip made Madrid his permanent administrative capital in 1561 he spent less than half his life there. He resided in his Aragonese lands for several months in 1563-4 and 1585-6, with a shorter visit in 1592; he toured Andalusia in 1570; and in 1580 he left for Portugal and spent three years away from Madrid. Teofilo Ruiz has stressed in A king travels that these long, slow royal progresses involved immense preparation and lavish urban spectacles that often left the king exhausted, and that each of them was ‘inextricably linked to the exercise and experience of power’. At other times the king travelled informally, moving rapidly between his country houses with a small entourage and sometimes alone as he tried to escape the bustle of his court, because ‘tranquility’, according to a Venetian ambassador in 1565, ‘is His Majesty’s greatest entertainment and relaxation’.”

Geoffrey Parker, Imprudent King: A New Life of Philip II

Beside Philip’s wives, sisters, and children at his court in various time periods lived also other his family members: Philip’s illegitimate half-brother Don Juan of Austria, Philip’s nephews Alessandro Farnese, the Duke of Parma, and Arch-Dukes Rudolf, Ernest, Albert and Wenceslas.

On the men who surrounded Philip at the beginning of his reign.

Philip’s closest friend and one of the most important advisers was Ruy Gómez de Silva (1516-1573). He was a Portuguese nobleman and had served Philip’s mother as a page. He and the Castilian nobleman Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, the Duke of Alba, were Philip’s most influential household officers. According to Patrick Williams:

“Technically, his power-base derived from his office of sumiller de corps [court officer in charge of supervising the dressing and undressing of a king and everything to do with the royal bedchamber], in which capacity he controlled the working of Philip’s household, but in reality he owed his political power to his personal relationship with the monarch. Philip had come to trust Ruy Gómez’s judgement and recognised that he needed his moral and practical support as he entered into his kingship. It may indeed have been to prevent Ruy Gomez from exercising too great an influence over Philip that Charles had placed Alba and Gómez in equally strong positions at the head of Philip’s household – Alba as his mayordomo mayor [chief officer of a household] and Ruy Gómez as his sumiller de corps. In England the two men began a struggle for influence that continued until Ruy Gómez ’s death.”

Patrick Williams, Philip II

Apart from this and other posts Philip also created Ruy Gómez the Prince of Éboli and Duke of Pastrana.

Philip’s the second perhaps closest friend after Ruy was Luis de Requesens (1528-1576), the son of Philip’s governor Juan de Zúñiga and his wife Estefanía de Requesens both of whom Philip held in high regard. Unlike Ruy Gómez who was 11 years older than Philip Luis born in 1528 was almost of the same age as Philip and they grew up together, he was Philip’s chief page. He never acquired such power as Ruy Gómez but Philip relied on him greatly and entrusted him important missions which often included controlling the behaviour of someone whose judgement Philip doubted. Philip created him the Grand Commander of Castile and he served Philip as a diplomat and soldier, as lieutenant general to Philip’s half-brother Don Juan suppressing the Morisco revolt, as viceroy of Milan and the Governor of the Netherlands (1573-76).

Among Philip’s personal confidants were also Gómez Suárez de Figueroa, Count and later Duke of Feria (his first representative to Elizabeth I), and don Antonio de Toledo.

Beside Ruy Gómez and the Duke of Alba important statesmen at the beginning of Philip’s reign (not counting those he left in the Netherlands) were: Philip’s secretary Gonzalo Pérez, Francisco de Eraso, secretary of the Council of Finance, Bartolomé de Carranza, Archbishop of Toledo, Fernando de Valdés, Archbishop of Seville and Inquisitor-General, Philip’s confessor Bernardo de Fresneda. During the 1560s a very influential figure was Cardinal Diego de Espinosa whom Philip appointed a member of the council of State, president of the council of Castile and Inquisitor-General. As very important government figures during the second half of the 1560s emerged Philip’s secretaries Antonio Pérez and Mateo Vázquez who was also Philip’s chaplain.

If you have means or access I recommend you to check Maria José Rodriguez-Salgado’s article 'The Court of Philip II of Spain' in R. Asch and A.M. Birke (Eds), Princes, Patronage and the Nobility: The Court at the Beginning of the Modern Age, c.1450-1650 and The Courtier and the King: Ruy Gómez de Silva, Philip II, and the Court of Spain by James M. Boyden.

#Anonymous #ask #Philip II #Philip II of Spain

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