Yay - we made it! Finally a new new chapter (by number anyway). Thanks for your patience. Enjoy x
Murmurings of girls bothered her.
Perhaps it was because she had never had many female friends. The longer she thought on it she wasn't sure if she had any friends at all.
She had never found the need to have a flock of hens around her and she had never been anywhere long enough to develop friendly affections for anyone. Well for the most part.
The only friends she really had were the ones that were rewarded handsomely for keeping her safe. She liked to believe that they chose to be with her and maybe they did but not because they cared for her as a friend but because the had a duty, an obligation to protect her.
She tried not to think on it for too long. It made an uncomfortable feeling rise in her chest, she had felt it before and she never wanted to feel it again.
To care for people was also to open yourself to the possibility of loss. This wasn't to say that she didn't care for others, she just wanted to keep the list of people she cared for as short as possible.
Court reminded her how much having allies was much more valuable than having friends. Court also reminded her how much she despised having to fulfill the duties of a lady at court and there were even more duties when you were sister to the King and the good daughter of the Hand.
She tried to recall a time where she had enjoyed court. The ladies of the Stormlands that were brought to treat with her at Storm's End were a bore, much like the ladies of Dragonstone. It didn't help that her aunt Selyse didn't keep the company of ladies either and her uncle didn't care for the company of others in general.
It didn't matter. They didn't matter. They all wanted something from her. They all wanted her favour in the hopes that in turn they would be granted the favour of their liege lord or even the King himself.
Fools.
Although the sad girl seated directly across from her reminded her that the Starks wanted nothing of her. Something that she found incredibly fascinating. It wasn't often that she was treated like a regular high born lady.
Oh the privilege. The privilege that everyone seated at the table had.
"Lady Sansa, it is my honour to present my grandmother the Lady Olenna of House Tyrell." The girl went from sad to terrified, a change in tune from when she first arrived at King's Landing with dreams of marrying Joffrey and becoming queen.
Vesara had genuinely hoped that her return to the Capitol and the attentions of Margery would distract Joffrey long enough to forget about Sansa.
"Kiss me, child. It's so good of you to visit me and my foolish flock of hens." Vesara shot her a sharp look, never in her position had she been included as a hen and definitely not foolish and certainly not to her face. "We're very sorry for your losses."
She didn't particularly care for the Queen of Thorns approach to things but clearly she found enough success to last until her ripe old age.
"And I was sorry when I heard of Lord Renly's death, Lady Margaery… and you too of course Princess Vesara." She certainly did not appreciate discussion of her uncle's death either. She was afraid that others would see through her fake disdain of the man she had grown up alongside. "He was very gallant."
Vesara stifled back a smirk. Renly was many things, gallant was hardly one of them. She recalled many times when they were forced into an old farmhouse fifteen or so leagues north of Griffin's Roost as part of Stannis' paranoia and how terrified Renly was about the whole experience.
They were to learn to survive on the bare minimum and how to defend themselves. Renly always needed to be bribed with shiny things and Vesara, well the very thought of making her uncle and her father proud was always enough motivation for her.
"Gallant, yes." Margaery responded with a polite smile before her grandmother interrupted. From what it appeared it was hardly a term that Margaery would describe him as either.
"And charming and very clean. He knew how to dress and smile and somehow this gave him the notion he was fit to be king." The Queen of Thorns hardly approved of Renly, she hardly approved of anyone.
"Renly was brave and gentle, Grandmother. Father liked him and so did Loras."
Of course Loras liked him. They both shared a liking for shiny things.
"Loras is young and very good at knocking men off horses with a stick. That does not make him wise. As for your fathead father—"
"Grandmother! What will Sansa think of us? Let alone Princess Vesara. They might think we have some wits about us."
Sansa politely bowed her head.
"I pay it no mind Lady Margaery, I know of family with wild tongues. And not to speak of ill of the dead but I am also familiar with fathead fathers." She played to the jesting of the old woman much to Lady Olenna's dismay.
"Well yes, wild tongues and wild tempers are certainly familiar to you one thing we can be grateful for is that yourself and Renly inherited some of your grandfather's qualities… unfortunately Renly missed out on the knowing his place part. Robert has two sons and Renly has an older brother. How could he possibly have any claim to that ugly iron chair? We should have stayed well out of all this if you ask me.. but once the cows been milked, there's no squirting the cream back up her udders, so we are here to see things through."
Perhaps the murmurings of the Queen of Thorns would be enough entertain her enough to put up with the hens.
"What do you say to that, Sansa? Shall we leave this ugly talk of seasoned courtiers at rest and have some lemon cakes?"
Olenna raised her left brow at Vesara which from what she had observed meant that she was about to venture into dangerous territory.
"Now I want you two to tell me the truth about this royal boy, this Joffrey." Vesara was taken aback by the old woman's bluntness in asking such a question out in the open. "Who else would know better? We've heard some troubling tales." The silence was beginning to make the woman raise her voice in desperation directing her attention to Sansa, "Is there any truth to them? Has this boy mistreated you? Has he ripped out your tongue?"
Vesara noticed that the red headed girl was beginning to shake.
"Joff… King Joffrey, he… his grace is very fair and handsome and as a brave as a lion."
"Yes, all Lannisters are lions. And when a Tyrell farts, it smells like a rose… "
Margaery interrupted. "…but how kind is he? How clever? Has he a good heart, a gentle hand? I'm to be his wife. I only want to know what that means."
Vesara groaned internally.
"We're only women here. Tell us the truth. No harm will come to you." Olenna fired a fierce look at Vesara.
If they insisted on discussing what a repugnant person her brother is she didn't know why she was invited to such a forum.
"My brother is a special kind. Merely the product of a rancorous, wealthy mother and a father who had zero regard for anything that does not satiate any of his yearnings. Unbridled power does disagreeable things to people." Vesara was careful in how she stated things, she merely wanted to encourage Sansa to say something to have these women leave her be.
"My father always told the truth."
"Yes, he had that reputation."
"And they named him a traitor and took his head. Joffrey. Joffrey did that. He promised he would be merciful and he cut my father's head off. And he said that was mercy. Then he took me up on the walls and made me look it."
Vesara wondered if she would have been able to save Eddard Stark if she had remained in the Capitol a few more days. If he didn't beg her to leave then perhaps things may have turned out different.
At the time she had more than Eddard Stark to be concerned about. She got the boy out safely and that was all that mattered to the two of them, in fact it was the one thing that the two agreed on.
"Lannisters know no meaning of mercy." Olenna noticed an apparent sadness that lingered in Vesara's eyes briefly.
"I never meant… my father was a traitor. My brother as well. I have traitor's blood…" Sansa was shaking even more than she had been throughout the entire discussion.
"She's terrified Grandmother, just look at her." Margaery clearly sought to cut her grandmother's pestering.
"…what does that make me Lady Sansa? Both of my uncles have attempted open rebellion against the crown. My father's crown. My brother's crown. Treachery is not genetic Sansa. If we were to be guilty of the crimes of our kin no one would be free from sin."
"He's a monster." She whispered.
"Ah. That's a pity."
"Please, don't stop the wedding."
"Have no fear. The Lord Oaf of Highgarden is determined that Margaery shall be queen. Even so, we thank you for the truth."
Vesara noticed the efforts that Olenna and Margarey went to show kindness to Sansa, something that she had attempt on private. She knows what it is like to be lonely at court, to be an outsider pretending to be an insider.
Having her guards stalk Sansa was hardly the same as extending her some sort of comfort. Vesara didn't really know how to comfort anyone. She had never been comforted herself.
She had no one to hold her when her father died, no one to tell her that everything would be okay. And again she was short of one human that she loved and there was no one to stroke her hair as she cried out for the uncle she cared for like a brother.
It had been moments like that where she wished she had a mother, someone who loved her so fiercely, the way she was scared to love Durrandon.
But he was her everything and she would always tell him that everything would be okay.
The two Tyrell women may have looked as if they cared for Sansa, but women like them never really cared for anyone. They were like the girls and women brought to treat with her. All of them were out to gain power much like everyone else in the realm.
They didn't know what they were really getting themselves into. The real curse that power and family ties were. So much so that she had considered not returning to Westeros at all, but she couldn't do it, despite as much as she wanted to. If she had stayed the odds of safety for her boys and she would have increased tenfold.
She didn't know the true reason that she chose to return; only the ones that she told herself repeatedly.
She owed it to the Baratheon legacy. She owed it to her father, her grandfather. They would never have run.
They would never cower from a fight and neither would she.
"And what were we trying to prove with that little display my ladies?" Vesara asked. It came out more bluntly then she had intended.
"We did not mean to offend Princess." Margaery quickly stated. She knew it was a means to block anything that may come from her grandmother's mouth.
"Rumours dear. As I am sure that you are no stranger to. We merely wished to hear first-hand whether rumours of your younger half-brother, nephew…" she paused as if she were about to continue her list, "…were true and well, you did not come to his defence."
It was true. Vesara did not even attempt to deny the cruelty of her young brother; she would have been foolish to say anything against him or in support of him.
"We all have our vices Lady Tyrell, my brother included. Who are we to tell a King what he can and can't do. His good hand, Lord Tywin Lannister and I are nought but his vessels." Vesara could have sworn that she saw the old woman choke on her tea slightly.
"Like unbroken horses in need of the right rider. Lord Stark's death was merely a case of an incongruous rider taking the saddle."
Clearly Vesara's observations were a shock to the old woman who simply widened her eyes and tightened her thin lips.
"Lord Tywin has seemed rather distracted as of late, definitely different to the man of his youth. Perhaps there are new challenges that may impede his ability to bridle this horse."
"I assure you my lady, nothing distracts the old lion… he is just as sharp as he was in his youth."
Vesara had wondered if she was pushing things too far with emphasising her admiration for Tywin Lannister, all she needed was enough to prove that she was loyal to a particular cause, even if it happened to be a Lannister cause.
"You should be honoured he is so taken with his grandchild, I can not say I have seen nor heard that he has bestowed such favour with the rest of his grandchildren. Tell me Princess, what makes your son so special?"
She was surprised by the woman's question and her intentions.
"There is nothing that makes my son any different from the rest of the Lannister grandchildren my lady. If there is, perhaps I am missing something."
She had heard what many of them whispered and the murmurs only became louder and louder the longer Jaime had been gone. They spoke of Tywin's inaction to get his son back from the Stark confines and then to find him somewhere between the Stark camp and King's Landing. They spoke of Tywin no longer needing a son who had failed him when he could start again with his grandson.
From what it appeared, that was exactly what he was doing.