Disclaimer:
George R. R. Martin owns A Song of Ice and Fire / Game of Thrones, Suzanne Collins owns Hunger Games, and I (unfortunately) make no profit from this *shrugs*
Let me emphasize:
You do NOT need to have read Hunger Games to understand this fic. The Hunger Games element is more of a side piece, and is not vital to understanding the plot at all. So even if you haven't read the Hunger Games, please give this fic a try :)
Full Summary:
"Are you afraid? Good... In real life, the monsters win"
The 13 Districts of Westeros take turns hosting an annual inter-district competition. "The Great Games" is a grand tourney where each District chooses one champion a year to compete in a series of broadcasted tasks (usually physically taxing, gory, etc.). The Victor wins fame and fortune, but some Districts have extra incentives...
Gendry Lannister wins the 72nd Games, and it looks like his prize is Arya Stark.
A/N:
We're in a pseudo-Hunger Games AU (i.e. some elements of HG, but I am sticking to GOT & ASOIAF characters). We are also in a pseudo-Hunger Games verse in terms of technology. No Capitol, just 13 Districts who take turns hosting the Great Games. District 2 is where the story is currently set, and District 2 is broken into 4 areas: West, East, North, South.
The Great Games
Chapter 1:
how to capture a prize
"Are you afraid? Good. You're in the Great Game now. And the Great Game is terrifying. The only people who aren't afraid... are madmen."
~ Tyrion Lannister, Game of Thrones
Cersei Lannister had been wholly content to spend the warm afternoon lounging on her patio, with sangrias and margaritas chasing each other down her throat. So, how did she end up off her chaise, and instead in her air-conditioned parlor, with tanning oil plating her skin to her silk house robe? Why is she half standing and half freezing in front of unwanted visitors?
The answer is making annoying muffled protests on her venetian floor.
In front of Cersei, her son's malicious minions have chained down an infamous battered young woman. Cersei notes blood oozing from various wounds on the little heathen who is being forced to her knees, and so gestures to the nearest servant to do something about it before stray cruor ruins the pearl tiles she had imported from District 1. The nervous attendant scurries away to acquire a towel, and his anxious obedience reminds her of the stuttering servant boy from earlier. The one who had so hesitantly interrupted her blissfully relaxed, pleasantly buzzed state with his stuttering ("M-my lady, y-you've guests.")
She should have ignored the blundering boy.
Speaking of blundering boys, Ned Dayne, her son's flaxen-haired best friend, shakes the metal chains leashing down the girl. The bound brat snarls behind the cloth wrapped around her mouth. The girl then turns her unattractive scowl towards Cersei, who is can't help but be curious over this girl who she has heard of for years, and yet never deigned to see.
'Your eyes are the colour of ash, and your hair is the colour of dirt.' Cersei thinks derisively. 'How very fitting, given where you come from'.
Upon further inspection, there is a glassy glaze tinging the girl's angry eyes. Suddenly, Cersei understands how such a usually incompetent band of boys were able to subdue their prey. Cersei briefly notes the lack of mortal wounds on her son's crowd. They would have returned worse than a little banged up had they not resorted to drugging the girl.
She feels a slight tremor in her hand, a dryness in her throat, and a craving burning in her stomach. 'Why in the Seven Hells am I wasting my time with this charade?'
In truth, Cersei is irritated that she was interrupted for this farce. She wants nothing more than to return to her vodka and veranda. So she pastes on a practiced smile, and invites (commands) the de facto leader of the group to speak. "Ned," she begins in a tone too saccharine, "I believe you boys were well aware that she should be delivered to my son's newly won home, not mine."
Ned, the only one of her son's nauseatingly sycophantic followers that she can sometimes tolerate (mostly just because he's so nice to look at), has the good sense to appear chastised as he responds. "We couldn't get into his new house yet… since… well… since he hasn't technically won yet." As if to avoid offense, he rushes to add on, "even though we all know he will win, obviously, but still... so we don't know where to keep her for him. After he took down that District 9 dude, the only one who was any actual competition, we knew she was going to run if we didn't, well, stop her... and, well, he told us to… he told us to make sure she didn't run."
Cersei nods patiently at Ned's babbling, keeping her expression placid. It is a good thing the boy has his looks and body, since he is clearly lacking in the head. He is even luckier the little hellion didn't damage his pretty face (by his limp, it looks like only his leg was a casualty of her defiance). Speaking of, Cersei turns her appraising eyes back to the girl.
'Passably pretty', she concludes from what little she can appreciate behind the dried sweat, strands of blood, and layer of grime. The girl has a misleadingly delicate face, with fine cheek bones and big eyes, but she looks shorter than expected. Moreover, the girl is wrapped up thoroughly in chains and rope (just like she imagines offerings to gods once were). So much so, that Cersei can't make out the girl's form. 'You must be fit and strong, given what I've heard of your… infamous reputation from the Training Centre.'
Cersei wonders if that is the appeal of the girl to her brutally beautiful son: the challenge of taming the knife-throwing hellion with an angelic face, crude tongue, and skilled hands. In time with Cersei's wandering thoughts, the girl twists in a manner that is almost successful at loosening the group's hold on the restraints, but one of her son's lackeys (the one with horrifically blotchy skin, unkempt long hair, and pale close-set eyes; as well as a newly bruised neck, and recent black eye) tightens the chain that he holds and jeers something at the prisoner.
'I wonder if I should switch over to red instead of white for my next sangria.' The higher ethanol concentration beckons Cersei like a siren, and momentarily distracts her, so she doesn't hear exactly what the nameless lackey sneers to the petulant prisoner. It was likely quite lurid, given both the fool's exaggerated leer at the girl's body and Ned's horrified expression. The latter is clearly shocked of the other boy's crassness in front of the woman who is not only Gendry's mother but the Mayor's daughter. Ned chastises the graceless lackey accordingly ("Watch your tongue Ramsay! You can't just say things like that in front of the Mayor's daughter. Are you entirely classless? Don't you–").
Cersei has enough. She grows more and more exasperated at the stupidity of the fools her son surrounds himself with, and cuts off Ned's reprimand. "You may deposit her in one of the guest rooms in my West Wing for now." She concedes. "Lead them to it," she instructs to the same servant boy who had dared disturb her afternoon. He nods repeatedly, eager to please her, and begins to guide the group away. She figures Ned's attempt at grace (and pleasingly tight shirt) earns them the warning that she tosses over her shoulder on her way back to her haven. "Boys, do be careful about leaving any visible marks on her, Gendry will be… quite wroth if his prize is damaged."
She continues walking towards her afternoon plans. She doesn't need to be facing the boys to know that cold claws up their spines at the thought of her son's wrath. She hears the girl ('Arya', Cersei tells herself sarcastically, 'might as well call the newest tenant by her name')being forcibly dragged towards the stairs leading to the second floor of the West Wing. Cersei wonders how long it will take for Gendry to destroy the wretch. She wonders what her son has planned for his little obsession, and her stomach inadvertently rolls when she recalls just how… creative Gendry had been with the girl in the past.
'Red.' She decides, wondering why she even bothered with white in the first place.
{ Masks are effective when facing blurred vision }
"Things are not always as they seem; the first appearance deceives many."
~ Phaedrus
End of Chapter 1
Review pretty please :) What do you think of Cersei? What do you think of Cersei being Gendry's mother? What do think of the writing, grammar, plot pace, dialogue, etc?
Preview of Chapter 2: how to breed monsters
Gendry isn't really her son anymore anyways. He's the son her mother never gave her father.
...
"There are plenty of ways to break little girls, Gendry. Explore your options."
...
(she bred a monster, she isn't surprised)
...
Tywin laments over the creature in front of him... and wonders how much of his grandson's cruelty was born from his own relentless training of the boy, versus how much was due to his daughter's indifference... It is cruelty that is unmatched; he remembers every detail of the gory report given by ... of what horrors the boy was capable of at just 15 years old (of what he did to the girl he now wants to own).
A/N: I've spun my Hunger Games Clove x Cato fic into a Gendry x Arya fic. SO if you've read "A Monster's Prize & A Victor's Mask", there will not be many differences up until like chapter 3 or 4, before I diverge a lot. If you are waiting for Chapter 3, I'm so sorry, it's been on my computer for over a month, I just had another two plot bunnies (One Hunger Games and one A Song of Ice and Fire) that ran away with me, and I can't post Chapter 3 until I finish Chapter 4 because their timelines are connected (which makes no sense now but you will totally understand when you read it!)
PRETTY PLEASE REVIEW. IT GIVES ME FLUFFY FEELINGS : )
- and pushes my lazy self to write more chapters, of course ;) -