Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Phantoms of Ice and Fire, #7: Rains of House Martell. The point of view we're hearing from is Cersei Lannister everyone, our lovely Mother of Madness, and even though I strongly dislike her in terms of villainy, her character is freaking brilliant and of course Lena Headey does an amazing job portraying such a nuanced, gorgeous character. I hate to love her and I love to hate her, but I digress. Last chapter was our first Daenerys chapter and she has established that there are troubles abound and Tyrion now knows of Jaime's capture, things to come from there. But, this is a Cersei chapter ladies and gents. Enjoy Chapter #7: Rains of House Martell.
Cersei Lannister
There's a storm approaching. Thunder bellows out over Blackwater Bay, high above in the squalls where the gray clouds battle. Jeweled fingers tap against a windowsill, eyes scanning out over a dominion covered in a feeling of solemnness. Queen Cersei of the House Lannister, rightful queen of the Andals and the First Men, First of Her Name, and Protector of the Realm - titles, oh the titles - stands in her room, perched high above the streets of King's Landing, a god in her own eyes, a god feared by the tiny people down below.
It has been a strange few weeks in King's Landing, the Crownlands are eerily quiet since the departure of the Dragon Queen whore and the Northern bastard, but Cersei never stays quiet forever. She wonders, though at a distance as she doesn't want to seem too interested, where they are now, those two massive armies. Did keeping them in the dark do anything for her self image?
"Of course it did," she tells herself in moments of doubt, clenching a wine glass yet not actually drinking any of the wine. "I am the Queen."
Her father's words - the ever so mighty powerful Tywin Lannister - ring in her head like the bells rung with a city under siege, a dead king, or a wedding. I don't mistrust you because you're a woman. I mistrust you because you're not as smart as you think you are. Any queen who must say 'I am the Queen' is no true queen. Cersei's lips turn back into a cruel smile, and she almost wants to laugh at the absurdity of her father's words. He didn't even get to die of old age, but a bolt to the heart. Where does he lie now? A body sinks into the dirt of Casterly Rock, now abandoned and an empty husk of the glorious ancestral seat it may have once been. All that remains of the fearful, roaring lion that is Tywin Lannister is ashes, and blood seeping into the soil.
The wind is salty, and Cersei has heard no word from Euron Greyjoy in quite some time. She smirks to herself, at the thought of a rugged sea pirate with an eye-patch and a gravely voice somehow coming to sweep her off her feet. As if. Cersei is a queen, not some broodmare or fair maiden who swoons at the dumb songs written by even dumber bards. The whore Sansa would still be like that, she probably is still like that.
She has not thought about her in a long time. Cersei hears the prophecy over and over in her head - a younger, more beautiful will come to cast you down - and immediately seizes Sansa up and down at that absurd Winterfell feast, with the bat Catelyn Stark sitting next to her, crowing and crooning like all boring women do. Cersei takes one good look at the kissed by fire girl and sees her for the meek dove, the weak-minded, naïve little girl she is, and has no idea how this could be her mortal enemy, her fate somehow intertwined with her. Then cast aside is Sansa, a ragdoll that not even a dog would want, but out comes another.
Oh, Margarey Tyrell. Gods have their cruel jokes.
Somewhere in the back of Cersei's mind, she believes once upon a time she could befriend this doe-eyed golden rose, somehow, with a good bit of fortune. It all comes crashing down, and she's never appreciated the emerald lick of flame that wildfire brings more than she has in her entire life than in that single, momentary instance. Gold their crowns, and gold their shrouds. She does not plan for the long term and does not assume that her baby boy is to jump from a window mere minutes after... but the witch's words have never been spoken more true.
Riding on the wave of flames, comes the silver-haired dragon queen, Daenerys Targaryen, and Cersei realizes then and there she had been wrong the entire time. This is her enemy, this is her mortal flesh wound, and she decides that she will do all in her power to cast aside the foreign traitor and the armies that march with her. As she crumbles the Tyrells, as the crumbles the Martells, as she crumbles the Starks, the dragons will see that not even wildfire shall spare them.
Her goal had been to light the Dragon Pit up ablaze, let their screams simper onto the wind and then live in a new era of wealth and supremacy, but Jaime and Qyburn both express distaste at the idea, and she gives up in its relent. Betraying them is so much better, the rug has pulled from out underneath their feet.
Cersei clenches an empty wine glass in her hands, moreso holding it just as if it is like a lifeline, a tethering rope to keep her from tumbling off the edge. Her head lowers down to stare at her stomach, which is starting to swell even more now, and Cersei grins. This is the last piece of the world she wants. A dynasty for the child she is carrying, for her son Joffrey - she knows this will be his name, no golden boy hero to dissuade her otherwise - and there will be trumpet sound day and night, the bells will toll, and Cersei will keep the Lannister legacy roaring long after she's gone.
She hasn't had one sip of wine since Tyrion's visit into her chambers, and part of her is almost gladdened that she knows he hasn't lost his wits. There is comfort in seeing him again, but it is easily displaced by fueling rage at the horrors he has brought to her family. He is responsible for father's death, and he is partly responsible for Myrcella's demise as well, having made the stupid and foolish plan in the first place. He is her only comfort, in the time where Tyrion is acting Hand, Tywin occupied with the Northern host, and Jaime stuck in some howling wolf's cage... and Ceresi leaves the memory as an afterthought.
The queen walks back to her bedside, moving away from the window as the air starts to heat up, and the tension begins to build over her skin. Electricity crackles and pops over the waves, and little by little does the sun drown out in a grayscale cloud cover, and the rains will being to weep o'er these halls of King's Landing. Cersei stares at the bed, leaning against one of the pillars holding the monstrous structure up. There's an indent pressed down into it, from where she constantly sleeps, staying stuck on the left side where Tommen slept, as she can feel his presence radiating up from underneath. Away from her spot is nothingness, a flat surface, and the words still sting though the sound waves have long since then fluttered away.
I don't believe you.
How couldn't he? Cersei is still puzzled over the enigma presented, all that she has done for him, her Jaime while he's been at home and away. All she has done has been for his safety, whether he wants to believe it or not. Had she spoken up about betraying the Stark-Targaryen alliance, knowing her brother's foolish honor that he claims exists, Jaime would speak and ruin everything. Their child together is real, she cannot deny this fact, but she will never let him have a part in this boy's life, whether he be living or otherwise once the storm passes.
"Could you do it?" her mind taunts daringly. "Could you kill Jaime, your own kin, your own flesh and blood and the only one who matters in this world, if it really came down to it? Even if the pale fingers are pulling at your throat, could you kill him?"
Cersei does not know if she can do it. She doesn't know if she wants to ever, truly dwell on such a monstrous thought. Is it a monstrous thought, though? She is unable to decide. Normally, the world is black or white for Cersei, either it helps her, or it doesn't. Is Jaime's demise something that'd hinder or help her in the long run? Other decisions have been easy, like rain off of a wing - Olenna Tyrell said that simile - and Cersei no longer uses it in her daily vernacular. Her jeweled fingers tap against the one of the bed posts, and she peers at it with a frown. There's an amber stain deep in the paint, looked as if it had been scrubbed over and over with a wet cloth or brush to get the stain off.
It is incapable of being anything other than blood.
Cersei has not had any executions in her room since her becoming of Queen, and with a sad sigh, she remembers that Tommen was a too timid boy to perform any sort of brutality in the royal chambers. This amber stain - blood more like - belongs to Joffrey, there is no other possibility. The faces of her children flash by, in quick succession, one after the other, but not as bright and bubbly children that once were hers, but corpses, dead corpses that haunt and clash at her with bony fingers and hollowed out eyes.
Joffrey's face is twisted in a sadistic, cruel smile, the rivers of dried blood clinging to his face as he spits up poison and wine, still dressed in his beautiful golden red embroidery. His eyes are alit like a fire, burning and consuming, and there's no soul in them. Myrcella is next, with strands of hair as gray as the Northern snows, and there are drops of blood trickling out with a timed precision. Where did her lovely girl go? Tommen, oh sweet Tommen, is last, and the sight almost makes Cersei vomit on the floors. Her precious baby boy is a figure with a neck bent far to the right for what is considered normal, eyes wide open, staring at a blue death filled with nothingness, blood lacerating his throat. However, his mouth is open, as if he is in the middle of speaking someone's name, and a chill slides through Cersei's body as she can practically hear the name.
Margarey. My wife. My love. His whore. My whore.
Rivets of emerald fire lace the curtains, turn the sky into smoke, and the joy of Cersei's destruction of the High Sparrow turns into ashes in her mouth.
Tyrion always said it, didn't he?
She looks away from the bed, a coldness surrounding her and embracing her like a long lost kiss of death. Jaime's desertion stings in all the places she's never believed could be hurt. How many times did she chastise her brother, the golden child? Insult after insult after insult yet he stays to her side, whimpering like a wounded puppy, clinging to her skirts, and Cersei's fingers lace down his spine, up his scalp, and inside his heart as she twists, keeping him tethered to him like a kite on a string. Yet the string is cut, snipped blindly, and the downfall is hard and vicious and bumpy; Cersei's still recovering.
There's the role of having a commander for her armies, as with Randyll Tarly's death by fire, and Jaime's desertion left vacant. Cersei ponders tirelessly over who would lead the Lannister forces that are to stay loyal to her. The Mountain is always her first choice, but he cannot speak, and he certainly cannot leave her side as being her personal bodyguard. She's heard rumors of the Golden Company's several captains. Their leader, Harry Strickland, is incapable of meeting her in person due to some injury sustained in a battle - she scoffs over empty wine glasses at Harry's propositions; how can a man lead a sellsword company if he despises fighting? - so she's nearly sent the second in command instead. Not as graceful as Strickland in the negotiation department, but picks up for that in spades with his fighting ability.
However, then, three days later, a second raven follows. Harry Strickland shall indeed grace King's Landing with his presence.
She snorts. If Euron and this... Harry fellow haven't killed each other, perhaps they'll be superior and competent commanders of the Lannister forces than what her own brother, her own twin would ever be.
A soft knock rouses her from her thoughts.
"Enter," she says and lets out a sigh. Being cooped up in the Red Keep for twenty plus years of her life has not been exactly what she calls the most thrilling of days. There's hardly anyone to talk to, except for Qyburn, who happens to be the man that has gently knocked on her door.
Her Hand and Grand Maester all in one - titles, oh the pretentious titles - stands in the doorway of the room, his golden pin of the hand placed on the top circle of his robe. His eyes are sunken in and his face is more weathered than the last time she saw him, which had been a little over a day ago. However, her faith in the man is undoubting, and the things he has done for her, in her name, she'll never be able to repay. Life is precious, and luckily, Qyburn knows every mannerism of it. Behind him is The Mountain, oh the mighty Ser Gregor Clegane. Their new armor, the black and silver one, gleams from the dying light streaming through the windows. The gray storm clouds continue to pile up; thunder roars in the distance, and Cersei savors every single millisecond of noise.
It is as if her husband, the poor old dead Robert Baratheon - as if the stag would ever match toe to toe with the lion, Ceresi smirks to herself - is making his warning call. "Try and stop me if you can," she thinks, as if the fat whoring ex-husband can somehow hear her. "I am the storm, I am the one who brings the fire, the rain, the snow, the storm, I am Queen and you're nothing but a corpse."
"Your Grace," Qyburn bows humbly. "I hope I am not disturbing you."
"Not at all," Cersei keeps clenching onto the wine glass like a lifeline, she is unable to part from it despite it being an empty shell.
"We're ready, my queen. She awaits on the steps of the Sept of Baelor," he quips a smile at the mentioning of the old religious structure. Nothing remains there than rubble and ash and more rubble and ash, and the dead bodies that have fluttered away in the wind like seeds for a harvest. A constant reminder that the lion still has her claws, a constant reminder that the rains will weep over the halls for those who dare cross the Lannisters, and that Cersei heavily sends her regards.
Qyburn's words cause her to life her head up in defiance, eyes ablaze, chaotic emeralds aglow with the passion of wildfire. She knows of whom he speaks, and the hour of reckoning is there. "Very well," Cersei sets the wine glass down, nodding. "Let's get this over with."
The walk to the steps of Baelor are lonesome and solemn. Qyburn passes details of Jaime's capture at Moat Cailin, and Cersei ignores him. The man is no longer a part of her life. All that matters is the legacy, the ugly iron throne, and her child, anything else is collateral and will burn away like the rest. The Dragon Queen and the King in the North reached White Harbor earlier that morning, by estimates from ravens, and the snowfall has ceased for a brief time. She wonders if things go hand in hand, as if the Stark bastard returns to the North and the snow ceases to cover her. "Even a dragon can freeze to death," she gives a light smile at the joke.
Standing, still shackled, in front of the ashes of the Sept of Baelor, is Ellaria Sand, Oberyn Martell's paramour, mother of the Sand Snakes, and the leader of Dorne. Oh how the mighty do fall. Her gorgeous locks of onyx hair are splitting and long, like the claws of tree branches cracking into stone. Even through all the horrors she's suffered, a struggle reflects in the woman's eyes, a steely gaze that glares at Cersei as the Mad Queen approaches. A crowd is starting to form, keeping their distance from The Mountain's great sword, but curious enough to see what will happen with the traitor.
When Cersei comes to visit Ellaria earlier that morning, the woman that she met so long ago is a dead shell compared to what she sees now. Her daughter, though Cersei's never bothered enough to learn the girl's name - all fodder, truth be told - is a sagging pile of skin and bones, the poison leeching through the girl's body slow enough so a mother can watch her child die. Cersei ponders if Catelyn Stark watched her son die? A knife in the heart and a slit throat sounds good as any. Ellaria is dragged from her cage screaming, still screaming at the daughter's body as if her words are somehow going to resurrect the corpse back to life. No mother deserves to watch their child die, and Cersei has seen all of hers suffer and crumble. It is justice by the gods - pah, the gods are bullshit - that Ellaria Sand has all she knows ripped away from her before the reckoning hour is long before her.
Cersei stands on one of the remaining steps, facing the crowd of commoners clustered to witness the event. It has been a decision long in the works, and she'll write to Jaime one day when all of this madness is over that her brother indirectly helped Myrcella's killers be brought to their fitting end. His leaving hardens her heart, and she declares to the court that Ellaria Sand's execution is at hand and will happen on the morrow, until it is the very day.
"Citizens," Cersei begins, followed by a roar of thunder. She looks up at the sky, not with a glare, but a welcoming smile. Let nature weep and nature warn all of those who hear her message, the storm of House Lannister is on the rise after being on the fall for so, so long. "Standing before you is Ellaria Sand, ruler of Dorne! She and her daughters were the killers of my daughter, your princess, Myrcella. After counsel, we have decided that Ellaria Sand is accused of treason. And for that, she is to be sentenced to death," she crouches down next to the other woman, a woman she is supposed to be inspired by, a woman that is to be her equal in ways that Cersei cannot describe, yet all that will remain is a carcass that will become a feast for the crows. "Last words, Lady Sand?"
Ellaria turns her head, and the stare is haunting, but Cersei has stared into the eyes of those who are about to die, dying, or dead so many times that the haunting feel only lasts for a few seconds, like the tartness of a lemon, before fleeting away like the wind. "You are a monster."
Cersei gives a bemused smile, gripping Ellaria's face with her hands. "Look at me," she orders. The viper's eyes search everywhere else, still defying her own commands in the last seconds before death. "Look at me!" Cersei screams, bringing their faces closer together, where Ellaria's black pits are enraptured by the beauty of wildfire, of the coursing surge of bitter rage. "I must say, I thank your paramour for dying. The Red Viper helped create the very thing that shall be the end of you. He ended your love, and now he'll end you."
She stands back up, but not before Ellaria stutters out a harsh, "Whore!" as if her dying breaths are spent saying such a petty insult.
"Surely you can do better than that," she says dismally, and then louder, to the crowd, "I, Cersei, of the House Lannister, Protector of the Realm, and Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, sentence you to die!" her voice is thunder to the crowd, and a cheer rises up from that, and the chanting begins, and she is reminded of that day, at Baelor, with Ned Stark and her insane, insane son that has remnants of wildfire burning in his gaze. She steps back. "Ser Gregor," she orders.
In the blink of an eye, The Mountain draws his great sword, and instead of beheading Ellaria in a guillotine fashion, the brute swipes his sword sideways so it takes the head clean off, severing the head from the rest of the body like cutting down the thickness of a tree. The crowd lifts in a roar, and cardinal spews everywhere. Ellaria's head is ripped from the ground, held in the Mountain's hand, out for all to see. The body slumps forward, headless, crimson blood pouring out into the cobblestones.
In the sky above, and at Cersei's behest, the grayness lets out a thunderous clap, and the rain begins to fall. It falls down so hard it mattes Cersei's hair to her head, where she can no longer see two feet in front of her face. The rainwater mixes with the blood and the soil, and Ellaria's body dampens underneath the bombardment. The Mountain chucks the head towards the crowd, which surges forward to seize it, the prize of the day, or perhaps even the food of the day should they be so bold.
Cersei lifts her head up to the sky, sighing with contentment, and the feeling of euphoria and the elixir of life rushes in her blood.
And so the rains weep o'er their halls, and not a voice for them to hear.
The rains of House Martell have fallen down, and fall down they'll continue until no more snakes and vipers and cobras litter Westeros.
Cersei turns her gaze north, and the rains call for House Targaryen.
There we are ladies and gents, that was Chapter #7: Rains of House Martell. In gist, due to Jaime's desertion, and Cersei's descent into madness, she's hastily executed Ellaria of House Martell. This has surpassed Chapter 3 as my favorite one in the story so far, and ironically enough they are both Lannister characters - 3 was in Jaime's perspective - as goodness aren't they amazing? Cersei is going to be one of my favorite POV's to write, if not my favorite, so let your thoughts abound for what's to come.
The arc is almost over, nearing on Chapter 10. Do you think there will be any possible repercussions to Cersei's actions? I am also one of those who truly believes Cersei's pregnant, but what happens to the child entirely in terms of the show I think I already know. Did any of Cersei's tangent thoughts allude to other developments in her character or arc to come? If so, what are your thoughts?
Next Chapter P.O.V: A Lannister of Casterly Rock and The Salt Queen
Another chapter with two points of view, ladies and gents. Any takers as to who they are? I can't wait for the chapter, so I hope to see you all soon. Thank you so much for reading and I hope you have an amazing day! I love you all so much! Bye!
~ Paradigm
