Alerie Hightower & Olenna Redwyne
Her husband's mother thought Alerie a fool, just like she thought her own son a fool. But Alerie knew and observed more than Olenna Redwyne ever thought possible, or would deign to give her credit for. Mother, Alerie called her mother-in-law, but she thought of the woman always as the Lady Olenna.
Lady Olenna loved her grandchildren, that much could not be denied. And she had significantly higher opinion of them that she did her own son, or the woman he married. Willas and Margaery especially. She was thick as thieves with them, spending hours cloistered with them, talking about things Alerie could only guess at. Alerie, like her husband, was not part of this intimate coterie.
"Whatever it is you're planning, Mother, be sure my sweet Margaery comes to no harm," Alerie said sweetly to Lady Olenna before Margaery's wedding feast.
Lady Olenna laughed. "You are not as thick as your husband after all, Alerie dear."
"Mace only wants the best for our sweetling, and for the family," Alerie replied, her voice rising in defense of her husband.
"Oh I don't doubt his good intentions, only his methods. He is too much his father's son."
It was the wine, Alerie suspected. Lady Olenna had done something to the wine Joffrey drank. But Margaery had drunk from the same cup too, and she was unharmed. Margaery must have known. Her sweetling must have known when to drink and when not to drink from the cup. Lady Olenna had prepared Margaery well.
Why should that surprise Alerie? Margaery had always been closer to her grandmother than to her own mother. She learned graces and courtly behavior from her mother, but everything else from her grandmother.
Her sweetling was safe from harm. In the end, that was all that mattered to Alerie.