A.N.: To Joldino-Sidestreaker, you must have speed-read the last update in about 0.5 seconds! You reviewed so quickly, I got whiplash! Thank you so much! This chapter is dedicated to you, and also to LiliLoveNutella, I think you've been marathon-reading my stories this weekend! And to breezzylife12, RHatch89, and pistonsfan75, thank you for your reviews!
Who else binge-watched The Witcher? Anyone wondering who my face-claim is for Gendry - Henry Cavill. Those thighs… He's what I imagine Robert would've looked like in his prime.
Also, the face-claim for Alynore is Kristine Froseth (of Sierra Burgess is a Loser and The Society).
I've been listening to "Marry Me" Suite from Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End a lot this week; I like to think it's a bit of a theme for Larra (with all of the Stark music and especially "The Last of the Starks" of course!)
Valyrian Steel
15
Objectivity
"Well?"
Only slightly startled this time, Alynore set her tiny teacup down in its delicate saucer and licked the last of the fragrant Qartheen tea from her lips, thinking quickly. Her grandmother seemed to find the moment when Alynore was at her most relaxed, unguarded, to harangue her with questions - to unsettle her, and see how Alynore responded to pressure and scrutiny.
If she could learn to outwit the Queen of Thorns in verbal sparring, Alynore supposed she would be prepared for any diplomatic situation life threw at her.
"He took command of the chamber the moment he entered it." To her grandmother, she often said the first thing that came into her head: Firstly, Grandmother was impatient - but she always said there was no 'wrong' answer - they discussed Alynore's observations, and built from there. Alynore, her grandmother was discovering, had inherited her shrewdness.
Her grandmother chuckled softly, shaking her head sadly. "He reminded me of Rickard. The Northmen have such a peculiarly recognisable presence. Of course, half of it is inherited, but Jon Snow has built his through experience. They are grim, and quiet as a breed, yes; but it's the calmest person in the room you'd be wisest to mind, my dear."
"He wasn't particularly calm when he throttled Theon Greyjoy," Alynore remarked, and her grandmother's wizened mouth twitched.
"Bad blood, my dear; it gets the better of us all," she warned sadly. They were here, on Dragonstone, because of bad blood - bad blood between the Cersei on the Iron Throne, and any Tyrell who had survived her. Bad blood had compelled Olenna Tyrell to ally with the Martells; together seeking out the last Targaryen. Formidable allies, allies they needed to wipe out House Lannister. The Queen's Hand seemed to be the fiercest advocate for annihilating the Westerlands, erasing House Lannister from the tomes of history. Given the trial he had endured for regicide - the trial that had cost Dorne its favourite prince - Alynore wasn't surprised Lord Tyrion had turned on the family that had betrayed him. "And it is never wise to come between a Stark and his sister."
"The King is not a Stark."
"Not in name, but he has the blood," her grandmother mused. "More than that - he has the respect of his people - and Northerners are a hard people. They are the largest and poorest realm in Westeros, constantly at war with the wildlings beyond the Wall, at war with winter… Hardened, proud, fierce men are not so easily won - yet they named a bastard their king."
"Ser Davos said the King has united Northmen with the Free Folk from beyond the Wall." Alynore fiddled with the tiny cake in front of her: They had brought many supplies from their larders, gifts of Arbor wine from her grandmother's Redwyne relatives, as had Prince Doran's emissary Ellaria Sand. The Queen had brought strange, exotic delicacies from Meereen and Volantis and even Qarth, and graciously shared some of them, perhaps as hints and enticement of the treats that could be expected when she sat on the Iron Throne and her empire spanned from Westeros all the way to Dragons' Bay. She wondered whether fear or awe compelled people to provide tribute to Daenerys Targaryen's conquest: Give her treats and move her on, before she set her greedy dragon's eyes on their hoards of treasure. "Jon Snow allied with his enemies, and brought them under his protection… They say wildlings advise him in council, just as Northmen and Knights of the Vale do… Daenerys Stormborn freed slaves and conquered Dothraki…but she either abandoned them in economic distress or brought them across the world to make war for her…"
"Interesting, isn't it, that a woman who proclaims to be devoted to peace and prosperity seeks to enforce it with open war," Lady Olenna smiled ironically. It didn't reach her watery blue eyes, which were shrouded now with constant grief. "Jon Snow took a great gamble coming here; was he particularly wise, do you think, in doing so? Why did he not send an emissary?"
"If what he says is true - and the Lord Hand seems to trust Jon Snow's earnestness, even if he doesn't believe in White Walkers…" Alynore began thoughtfully. Lord Tyrion was drunk and oozed irony most of the time - Grandmother said he was a great deal more interesting now that he was intent on preserving his still-living body in alcohol - but when he was sincere, even if he was absolutely slaughtered from drink, they knew he was being serious. And Lord Tyrion respected Jon Snow, King in the North. It hadn't escaped the Westerosi present in Queen Daenerys' court that Lord Tyrion had from the very beginning and without fail addressed Jon Snow as Your Grace. He respected Jon Snow's position even if the Targaryen queen refused to. And they found themselves following the Hand's example. Alynore herself was not…delighted with the Queen's pride. "I don't think Jon Snow would risk an emissary's safety by sending them; that implies he would rather risk his own life than condemn another's by sending them into hostile territory… He values others' lives above his own… The Queen said Jon Snow would not bow to her - and he shouldn't; the North have reclaimed their Kingdom and named him their ruler… But he was respectful that she is a Queen… He has shown respect to her position in coming in person - a King meeting with a Queen…and she was vile to him."
She was glad of the thick, engraved stone walls to muffle their voices. Grandmother did not trust that there were not ears in the stone, listening; but the truth was, Queen Daenerys had not presented herself at all well this afternoon, and even if the Spider heard their words through his little birds, Alynore wondered what the Master of Whisperers would actually tell the Queen. The Queen had set everything up with her advisors to unsettle the King in the North and get the measure of him while under pressure - emulating Grandmother's tactics with Alynore during their lessons - but she wasn't bright enough to realise that while she was trying to get the measure of Jon Snow, her tenuous allies were given opportunity to scrutinise and get the true measure of Daenerys Stormborn.
Alynore…wasn't impressed.
Initially, she had been awed by the Queen's beauty, fascinated by the intricacy of her braids, drinking in every wardrobe change, marvelling at the exquisite skill of the Queen's dressmakers, until Grandmother's questioning made Alynore realise that she was more impressed with the gowns…than the Queen herself.
That was a problem.
The Queen's words were very pretty: Her actions so far had failed to match them. With the benefit of her youth, her anonymity, and her non-threatening prettiness, Alynore had the freedom of the fortress and surrounding lands to investigate for herself, to overhear things, to see things others wouldn't - she was underestimated because of her youth and beauty. Over the last few weeks, she had become less and less impressed by the Queen - Alynore continued to admire her gowns, yes, but the Queen herself…disappointed Alynore. What little highborn girl hadn't grown up yearning to go to court, in awe of the mythical Queen she heard stories of, praising her beauty and virtue and wisdom and goodness - they had been speaking of Cersei in Alynore's youth yet it was directly applicable to Queen Daenerys, who was falling short of Alynore's expectations - especially with her reputation for justice.
Alynore was starting to believe that the stories of the Queen's justice were purely based on the Queen being the survivor: She had lived, therefore her version of events was told. And because she had lived, she was right. Therefore everything she did was good, and just… That worried her.
It worried Alynore that she had seen the Dothraki raping a girl in the quay, without repercussions: Rapers in the Reach were swiftly sent to the Wall, or cut. It concerned Alynore to see the lack of boats out fishing, to provide food for the locals to preserve for the winter. It concerned her that the Queen's plans did not include due care for the people she had brought across the seas, who were being given no direction from their leader, struggling to adapt to the island… And Alynore, who walked with her little cousins every morning past the Dothraki camp to the little fishers' hamlet at the coast, knew first-hand that the Queen's adopted peoples were struggling. They did not know how to fish the seas: The island could not sustain hunting, and they had little to no experience with agriculture, especially in this climate.
Alynore knew the theories behind agriculture - her House's wealth was founded in their fields, after all - but not the practical nature of farming: She only knew gardening, a pastime her septas agreed was acceptable for a young lady, especially a lady born of House Tyrell. They were expected to take an interest in gardens: Highgarden was of course named for them, and famed throughout the world for their gardens. They were supposed to contribute. Alynore was a lover of flowers, not a farmer: But common sense told her that a starving people was a dangerous one, and the Dothraki were becoming agitated - they subsisted on horse, yet they could not risk their horses because of the Queen's invasion. Every bloodrider needed a horse, and another to ride if the first fell: They could not spare the horses to feed their people, and were not being given the tools they needed to find alternative ways to provide for themselves…
Alynore was concerned by the atmosphere in the eerie fortress, and the Queen's lack of warmth - Jon Snow's reception was not outstanding in the Queen's brittle, forced politeness: Consistently, as the Queen's advisers engaged in battles of wits to sway her one way or another, advising patience and politics, and immediate and unrelenting assault, her impatience gave way to foul moods that set most of them on edge, waiting… Too many of the older people who had come to Dragonstone remembered the Mad King. They had witnessed his malice and his madness first-hand.
With her all-consuming focus on King's Landing, on the Iron Throne, nothing beyond acquiring the Iron Throne, 'ruling' was an afterthought. Lady Olenna had been invited to sit in on the council sessions: Grandmother was not impressed that the Queen consistently refused to plan for what happened after she took the Iron Throne - to think about her policies now, so that implementing them would not take long, to help her establish her rule quickly, efficiently and irrevocably: Taxes, foreign trade, military pensions, justice, agriculture, religious tolerance… Succession.
It was constantly a worry to her Grandmother, who had left Alynore's cousin Willas at Highgarden to implement their plans: He was the only man in the family Lady Olenna truly respected as having a hefty dose of intelligence and agency, worthy of leading their family through the greatest tragedies it had faced in generations - in spite of his crippled leg, which had done nothing to diminish his wits.
Willas was the future of House Tyrell: Alynore was the eldest surviving granddaughter of Lady Olenna, and the closest thing Willas now had to a surviving sister - she was a precious commodity, pretty and beguiling and of marriageable age - essential for alliances to secure the future of their House, of the Reach.
Queen Daenerys would not speak of the future beyond capturing the Iron Throne: And she either ignored that there was a necessity for it, or had faith that her advisors knew how to rule her people, for she had no interest in learning how to lead them. Alynore wondered whether the Queen even knew her people were bordering desperation. She didn't know which was more unsettling - a ruler who had no interest in her people; or a ruler who trusted the prosperity of her people utterly to her advisers, lying to herself about their contentedness.
Jon Snow had come to Dragonstone because he didn't trust that his people could come in his stead and be safe. The rumour was he had left his sister, Lady Sansa Stark, as chatelaine of Winterfell, as de facto Regent of the North in his absence, and according to Lord Varys' little birds, was doing a splendid job of readying the North for both winter and invasion: Jon had made provision for his people's security even in his absence, in the possible event of his capture or execution at the hands of a foreign queen. He would not risk their lives; but had risked his to ensure theirs by asking for help against an enemy no-one believed in.
"Do you believe him?" Grandmother asked, looking her right in the eye. "Did you think he was handsome?"
"Very handsome," Alynore admitted, her cheeks warming, fidgeting subtly under her grandmother's smirk. And tall, so deliciously tall, his dark curls cropped, his beard clipped neatly, his cheekbones sharper than his Valyrian steel sword belted at slender hips. Broad shoulders, and an implacable look so sharp, so kingly, she didn't wonder why battle-hardened Northmen had yielded to him, why wildlings had allied with him. She had immediately liked his simple, fiercely masculine way of dressing, boiled leathers and coarse wool, thick, worn and serviceable, and barely of better quality than what his men wore - he wasn't a man who thought much of his dress, and was certainly not a man defined by his dress…
She imagined he could be dressed in rags and still, people would flock to him as their leader. She imagined he had had little better than rags as a brother of the Night's Watch, where they flung the dregs of Westeros to be forgotten. And yet the Northmen had named him their king - not because he had acted like one, or dressed like one, or demanded they treat him like one: Because he had earned their respect as their leader.
Alynore sighed softly. "But that's not why I think he's telling the truth."
"No?"
"It would be…reckless to ignore his warning. He has had a difficult life, and after all that, has come all this way to warn people, potential enemies, that their lives are in danger," she said earnestly, gazing at her grandmother. Jon Snow was either stupid or the most unselfish person she had ever met. "Not because he has anything to benefit from it; he came because it is right that everyone who can be warned to do something about it can."
"Starks have never historically been scheming by nature but they are brutally honest," Lady Olenna mused. "It would be far more comfortable to sneer and brush off his warnings, but -"
"He's come all this way, knowing he'd likely be murdered on the spot," Alynore said softly, and her grandmother nodded.
"And yet he's here, just the same," Lady Olenna said softly. "Starks have always been righteous; one would think them frightfully dull. But I must say I rather enjoyed watching him ruffle feathers in the throne room." Her grandmother chuckled, eyes twinkling impishly.
"What does Ellaria Sand have to say about him?"
"Nothing very much of consequence, only that her paramour had journeyed beyond the Wall. According to Prince Oberyn the Free Folk are a people more ferocious and unpredictable than the Dornish," Lady Olenna said, waving her hand enigmatically. "For Jon Snow to have allied them with the Northmen, their most bitter enemies…"
"That takes strength of character," Alynore said softly, fiddling with her many, delicate little gold rings. Grandmother watched the dragons keening and whirling in the air beyond their windows; they were always flying, and Alynore wondered if they were joyous to be home - more joyous than their mother. Perhaps they sensed they were home, on this volcanic island. She wondered briefly where Daenerys Targaryen had come across three dragon-eggs; the rumour was the last in Westeros had perished in the Tragedy of Summerhall when Aegon the Unlikely died with most of his family, and Prince Rhaegar was born. "Do you think she'll kill him?"
"Oh, she still believes she's a woman and queen of immaculate morals," Grandmother sniffed derisively, waving her hand; the large blue stone, a turquoise, glowed on her finger, stark against the rich black brocade Lady Olenna was wrapped up in. "And she has two good eyes in her head; rumour has it she likes them tall, dark and handsome. She'll be in heat for the King in the North."
"Grandmother!" Alynore wrinkled her nose, as her mother smirked.
"Save your blushes, my dear," Grandmother chuckled. "If I were younger…"
"If you were younger, none of this unpleasantness would have happened," Alynore said, with the conviction of youth. She knew her Grandmother well: And had Olenna warred with Cersei in her prime, the lioness of Lannister would have been annihilated. More than that, Westeros would have prospered, and perhaps risen from the backwards reputation it had suffered for centuries as great city-states like Braavos rose from the swamps and Qarth reigned eternal. Westeros had stagnated.
"It would have been quite something, to challenge Cersei, as I was in my prime," Grandmother mused.
"You're still a force to be reckoned with," Alynore smiled sadly. Less so, since Baelor: Something had fractured irrevocably in her grandmother's spirit. She was…fragile, in a way Alynore had never viewed her grandmother as vulnerable. "Has the Spider whispered anything about Cersei, and what she intends for the Reach?"
Grandmother cocked her head to one side, her pleated veil swishing silently over her shoulder, and eyed Alynore shrewdly. She pushed her large turquoise ring around her finger thoughtfully, rubbing the stone with her thumb. "What would you do? If you were in Cersei's position? Facing treason and invasion?"
"Treason? If Daenerys Targaryen wins we shall be celebrated for our defection, the last of the Tyrells, who fought to dethrone a tyrannical queen…" Alynore said gloomily. If the Queen's conquest was successful. She had been thinking about what happened next ever since Grandmother whisked her away from Highgarden to act as lady-in-waiting and confidante, to be tutored at her grandmother's elbow in the arts of diplomacy. "As the Starks say, winter is coming. If I were Cersei, and I knew there was an army ready to invade, I would…take all the food, or access to it, at least. Starve everyone else to the point of capitulation and compliance, to feed my armies."
"The Reach, then; she will set her eyes on the breadbasket of Westeros," Grandmother sighed, nodding. "Your cousin believes the same."
"Could our men stand against the Lannister army?" Alynore asked dubiously. The Tyrells were famous for their pageantry, not their strategy. During the Rebellion they had fought for the Targaryens - for Rhaegar - and relied heavily on the military brilliance of their bannerman Lord Randyll Tarly. Alynore hoped her cousin Willas had thought to approach the proud lord. He was an unpleasant man, but he knew strategy.
Lady Olenna sighed heavily: She was in no way ignorant of their family's pitiful military strength. With Loras dead, the great hope of their family for a warrior was gone: Willas was cleverer, but crippled - their bannermen would not respect him as they should for his brilliance, because he could not sit a horse beside them and lead them on the battlefield. "In favourable conditions, we might have a very slender chance of beating them back. At least long enough for Daenerys Targaryen's forces to break a siege."
"Then why are the Queen's forces not marching to Highgarden, laying siege to the Rose Road?" Alynore asked grimly, and her grandmother's face crinkled expressively, her eyes twinkling.
"Why not, indeed," she said softly. Alynore narrowed her eyes at a truly reprehensible thought.
"They won't take prisoners this time, will they?" she said softly. In blowing up the Sept of Baelor, Cersei had crossed a line. In declaring herself Queen as the pit still smouldered, her son's body lying broken at the foot of the Red Keep, she had sent a message to all of Westeros, all the world. Cersei had been playing the game for years; now she was setting the terms. She had nothing to lose, now: Her two sons were dead, one in her arms, one by his own choice, and her daughter resided in peace and tranquillity in the Water Gardens of Dorne, never to return to her mother's embrace while Prince Doran and the Sand Snakes and every Dornishman lived to remember their beloved Prince Oberyn.
"No. Cersei declared to all when she blew up the Sept of Baelor that she places no value in hostages," Grandmother said quietly. "She will see this out, to whatever end."
"To whatever end," Alynore echoed sadly. She was acutely aware at all times that she sat by her grandmother's side, conversing with her as student and heiress, because her cousin Margaery was gone: Otherwise she would have been left to live out her days as another wallflower in the rose-garden, pretty to look upon but indistinguishable from all the others. There were too many Tyrells.
Had been too many Tyrells.
Alynore glanced at her grandmother. "Are they underestimating her viciousness?"
"The Queen's advisors? I do not believe so," Grandmother mused, "however it is one thing to be a brilliant strategist with the benefit of intimately knowing your enemy, and being a proud young thing set against listening to anyone's advice but your own."
"She's ignoring their counsel," Alynore sighed.
"They give insight, and Lord Tyrion has foresight," Grandmother sighed heavily, shaking her head, "yet in spite of all warnings, the Targaryen girl has come this far without educated men such as these to guide her, and been triumphant."
"She burned everyone else, that's why," Alynore sniffed, and her grandmother gave her an arch look. "She has no diplomacy."
"Oh, none whatsoever. She was not raised by them, but she is every inch a Targaryen," Grandmother smirked nastily. "Hostile, entitled, totalitarian. And utterly, utterly convinced in their gods-given rights to conquer, to inflict their will upon those lesser than themselves. She reminds me of her father, in the beginning."
"What was he like, before the madness?"
"Oh, I am sure the potential was always there, Duskendale only enhanced it," Grandmother said, frowning thoughtfully. "He was clever, but erratic. Lacked commitment, above all things. Excellent ideas, no grit to see them executed. Lord Tywin ensured the realm did not suffer, as the king flitted from idea to idea, never settling, never satisfied. He was charming, though, in the beginning. As this queen is charming. But dangerous. You never forgot that Aerys was the king. As she will not allow us to forget she is the Dragon Queen."
Alynore frowned out of the window, as the green dragon soared past. Terrifying as they were, she could not deny they had a certain awing majesty. "She relies on them."
"Mm… And what is she without them?" Grandmother asked, echoing Jon Snow. Her pale eyes were twinkling, and she was smirking - she looked almost like her old self, like the sharp-tongued grandmother Alynore remembered.
"You liked him," Alynore realised, and her grandmother chuckled.
"He is blunt and earnest and it was a delight to see that proud little girl soundly smacked," Grandmother said, smiling. "I'm not surprised the King in the North is unimpressed by the girl's monologue…not after everything his family has suffered, all his sister has endured."
"What was Sansa Stark like?" Alynore asked: She had never set foot at court, never seen Lady Sansa, but her cousins had said she was beautiful. Lady Olenna did not speak for many moments; she rubbed her thumb over her turquoise, her watery blue eyes faraway.
"She survived Cersei," Grandmother said softly, and Alynore watched her face, reading her expression. Grief, yes: Sansa Stark had accomplished a feat not even Margaery, for all her beauty and brilliance, could pull off. Grief, yes, for Margaery, and their family's loss: but also respect, for the girl Lady Olenna Tyrell had underestimated.
The Queen of Thorns wouldn't make the same mistake again.
"We were all so distracted by the vulnerable, tragic beauty and her courtesies, we never saw the wolf-pelt bristling beneath the petals," Lady Olenna said poetically, but her face fell, grief-stricken, earnestly bemused. Lady Olenna sighed. "Now the she-wolf has been sharpening her claws."
"Could a wolf kill a lion in combat, do you think?" Alynore asked.
"Oh, certainly," Grandmother said, waving an impatient hand. She added shrewdly, "A wolf never hunts alone."
"How does a steward of the Night's Watch become King in the North?" Alynore wondered aloud. The Queen's titles told her story: Jon Snow was King in the North, and that was that. It left everyone wondering who he was. It left them curious, wanting… Whatever Jon Snow's journey had been, it would be utterly unique. After the exhibition in the throne room, Alynore thought she had the measure of the Queen - and of Jon Snow. "Jon Snow was right; nearly every woman on this island has endured the same and worse than the Queen. Jon Snow's story seems worth hearing."
"Then ask him to tell it, though I'd wager he'll be reluctant. Northmen are men of few words," Lady Olenna smirked. She sighed, shaking her head. "They say the Young Wolf was wise beyond his years…he certainly had strategy, brutalising the old lion across the Riverlands, snaring the golden one… Those boys were raised together."
"They were brothers."
"One was a bastard. Lady Catelyn was a proud cow. They were brothers; Jon Snow was threat to her son's inheritance," Lady Olenna said, shaking her head. "One wonders how the fate of House Stark might have been shaped had Jon Snow been left behind as castellan of Winterfell as Robb Stark marched to war."
"Likely he would have been skewered by Ironborn," Alynore sighed. "They leave no man behind who could ever raise a weapon against them."
"Happily for Alarra Snow she was no man," Grandmother quipped.
"But she died anyway," Alynore said softly, thinking of the pain and fury in Jon Snow's eyes when he had spoken of his twin-sister. Alynore had never been to the North, never even seen snow, but the wandering crows told stories of the Night's Watch and the True North beyond the Wall, and she knew the King's twin-sister had died beyond it in frozen wastes, forgotten.
She couldn't help wonder, briefly, what would happen to the Night's Watch now that the North had allied with the wildlings. If Jon Snow wasn't lying, and the White Walkers weren't just figments from legend…this was what the Watch had been created for - not to keep away savage men, but to keep away true monsters. What if they were real; what if they could be defeated, with all allied Westeros… What then?
Alynore wondered if Jon Snow had thought that far ahead. If he had allowed himself the luxury of thinking there was even a glimmer of hope that they may survive monsters from legend…if he planned ahead. What provision could he make for the survivors of the Night's Watch, who had known nothing but honour and service and deprivation in the name of doing what was right.
Had Jon Snow thought it out? Had he sat with his sister, chatelaine and heiress of Winterfell, of the North, and worked out what happened next - every possible outcome? How did they best secure the future of their people, and how did alliances forged in the fires of true terror affect those decisions? What would become of the wildlings after? Had he thought about the economy of the North, poor and largely left to itself, scratching meagre livings off rocks? Grandmother said Northmen were prudent: They lived off what they had, and thanked their old gods for even that much. They were…in shocking contrast to the pageantry and frivolousness of the Reach: Their cultures were absolutely opposite.
And Alynore made up her mind to discover how Jon Snow had become King in the North; and what made him worthy of the crown, and how - or whether - he would continue to earn it.
Because gifts given could always be snatched away.
There was no security.
The Red Wedding had taught them that, long before Baelor had.
"How will the Hand and Lord Varys advise, do you think?" Alynore asked her grandmother, who sat in on the council meetings, though refused an official place in the Small Council until Daenerys had claimed the Iron Throne. The contention between warmongering Lord Tyrion and the more diplomatic stance of Lord Varys was well-known by now: They had enjoyed working together to thwart common enemies to protect King's Landing from Baratheon invasion and Northern aggression, and were friends, Alynore thought, but advising the Queen was different entirely. They were not protecting: They were conquering. One coaxed for minimal loss of life and diplomacy, cleverness and caution, patience: the other championed wholesale slaughter and destruction to ensure that every trace of the disease that was Cersei Lannister was burned from the land, from the very pages of history.
"Interestingly, Lord Tyrion may champion Jon Snow. They have a past friendship, and a sense of mutual respect," Lady Olenna mused.
"But allying with Jon Snow would divert their cause from the Iron Throne," Alynore countered, and her grandmother's eyes twinkled as she shifted, turning herself toward Alynore more fully, the better to look her in the face, as her Grandmother liked to say, to see the whites of her eyes. "It is more likely Lord Varys will champion his cause, when helping the North defeat its enemy could cement allies in Westeros. The Queen needs Westerosi allies, allies in a position of strength. The Starks are reasserting their strength."
"A feat none thought possible after the Red Wedding," Lady Olenna said softly. Her eyes were strained, pained, when she smiled at Alynore. "A lesson to us all."
"She won't want to help. Her pride is wounded. She's come here to save Westeros and the Starks have already saved the North for themselves and their people," Alynore said. "They wouldn't have named Jon Snow their king if they didn't believe in him… She came expecting to be wanted, and needed; the North doesn't need her."
"Oh, they need her armies," Lady Olenna waved a hand. "Lord Tyrion will see they are not committed to any cause but destroying his sister utterly."
"Do you think it is possible she might actually try and earn his respect?" Alynore asked. "Daenerys, I mean. I don't believe she's used to not impressing other people. Jon Snow wasn't at all impressed by her."
"He didn't embarrass himself by panting at her heels, you mean," Lady Olenna snickered. "Oh, she's used to men becoming cunt-struck at the sight of her, the thought of bedding her… Night's Watchmen take no wives, and father no children; they live their lives for a cause greater than their own… They are used to deprivation, to making the hard choices. They are of that rare breed who are trained not to think with their cocks, in spite of having full use of them."
"The North can't afford for him to yield to her," Alynore said, and her grandmother nodded.
"So he shan't." Lady Olenna's eyes twinkled viciously. "It shall be entertaining to watch the tables turned on Daenerys Stormborn. She's never met a man who hasn't wanted her; never met one she could not bend to her will."
"She'd never met a Northman."
Even in the Reach, the stubbornness and honour of Northmen was legendary. Jon Snow was the last of the Starks to engage in the game of thrones, for the sake of survival and honour - Alynore wondered if he was following in the footsteps of Lord Cregan Stark, who ended the Dance of Dragons during the Hour of the Wolf, defining the Targaryen dynasty by championing and crowning King Aegon III… She imagined he had been warned against coming south, against following the footsteps of his grandfather Rickard Stark, the man whose fiery execution beside his son had sparked the Rebellion.
The Starks had historically had the power to make or break the Targaryen dynasty.
She hoped Daenerys Targaryen realised it would be in her benefit to make a friend of Jon Snow.
A.N.: A little insight into the minds of background characters, Lady Olenna starting to groom Alynore; and their opinions of Daenerys and Jon Snow.