To commemorate Margaery's name day, Joffrey threw a large festival that was held at half past noon for there would be lanterns and candlelight and fireworks - flames needed to overshadow the darkness of night. He brought in musicians from Highgarden, bakers from Dorne, and ordered more pounds of seafood than reasonable from the Riverlands. Joffrey declared his queen's name day would be spectacular and Sansa could only watch as the green eyed ruler of the Seven Kingdoms doted on his wife and the child growing inside her womb.
To all those around her, Margaery had never been more beautiful - her cacao hair gleaming, those clever ice blue eyes shining, and around every exposed sector of her body lay a string of sapphires. "They are a weak comparison to the beauty of yours, my lady," Joffrey boasted one day, just a fortnight before Margaery's name day.
Sansa now sat with Lord Tyrion, only a few seats down from a suppressed Joffrey and his glittering blue queen. A vaguely content expression belied the Imp's usual scowl and truly, it was the closest expression of happiness that Sansa had ever seen on her dwarf husband.
"What brings you such joy, my lord?" Sansa murmured, her eyes kept downcast as she struggled to maintain the numbness consuming her body.
Tyrion had merely smiled at her in return, raised his goblet of wine in the queen's direction and drank with such finesse that Sansa feared he would be stinking drunk before the feast even ended. Cersei, however, seemed to catch onto Sansa's line of thought and insisted that the majority of the table be moved further down as to allocate more privacy to "the king and his wife".
Now, sitting beneath a gilded red canopy, Sansa could only wonder what sweet nothings the king was whispering in his queen's ear. Oddly enough, she felt strangely empty, like a box who once held a great gem but was now as useless as its printed decor. She ought to be grateful that Margaery was enthralling the king, that she herself could live in King's Landing peacefully without having to inure herself to Joffrey's sadism and cruelty. But a small part of her could not help but relish in the idea that it was the wolf who could tame the lion; this twisted fairy tale fancy of hers was still embedded somewhere deep in her soul.
Dissipating and fugacious beauty that it was, Sansa found herself utterly alone with a memory of a king who she felt some strange attachment to - almost like an addiction to a fine mulled mead. Pushing aside the ineffable bitterness that had welled up like a weight of iron in her heart, she urged its heaviness away and plucked up her own goblet, filled with wine by Tyrion in an act of blithe nonchalance, and gazed out at the horizon.
The golden orb was now sinking beneath the offing, bathing everything in a brilliant ocean of gold, red, tangerine, and the faintest hints of amethyst that streaked the edges of the nightly atmosphere. It was a beautiful sight, Sansa thought, far more beautiful than anything man could ever conjure up and she took delight in knowing the sky had not folded this gift unto the queen specifically. That it had not given her this lovely melange of colors and sights because it was her name day and she was queen and pregnant with the king's child despite the fact that Sansa herself had given the king two children. Two beautiful, clever children and Joffrey would only call upon one.
His visits to Charlemagne were sporadic at best and lasted from anywhere between a few moments to long hours; Sansa loathed how she had become nothing more than the breeding mare Joffrey had used to produce his first son. She despised him with every fiber of her being now that he had used her and then cast her aside. The bubbling eruption that threaded to implode from within Sansa, however, came more from the fact that she had developed a certain…penchant for the king, a bizarre fondness perhaps that was a lagniappe to gluttons like she, who could not seem to give her heart away to the right man. Wretched she was, Sansa mused darkly, that she should be a moiety to Joffrey; what was the old cliche? The opposite heart begets one of unequal attraction?
"The gifts!" Lord Petyr Baelish suddenly cried out, breaking Sansa from her revere as a circus of men left the grounds and the Master of Law walked towards the foreground. "Your grace," he addressed the golden sovereign and his queen, "and my queen, may I present to you a gift I have enticed all the way from Essos, a magnificent creature never before seen here in Westeros." as he spoke, a phalanx of men began to march from the darkest corners of the lighted fete, their arms holding thick gold coils of rope that reminded Sansa of the queen's braids.
Making their way closer, Sansa could make out ivory tusks before she was blinded by a wall of white. Her breath hitched when she saw what stood before them: a magnificent beast that was as fierce as it was beautiful. From the corner of her eye, Sansa could see Joffrey's countenance beam with appreciation whilst Margaery's own puckered mouth twisted into something of a satisfied grin. The animal was tall, taller than even the Mountain, and it possessed giant billows of white silk for ears and in place of a nose or snout was a long hose that appeared to be crafted from the white leather of the Iron Islands. Two gleaming tusks of ivory stuck from either side of this strange lengthened nose, curving upward towards the molten sky that was now receding into a violet evening.
"My lord Baelish," the king called out, clearly impressed, "what is this magnificent beast you have brought before us?"
Littlefinger grinned and turned his head just slightly so Sansa could make out a wink in the semi-darkness. "This," Baelish said, turning to look directly into the eyes of the queen, "is what the people of Essos call a white elephant. The beasts roam the hills day and night and when it is dark, they fall away just as pillars tumble in battle. A wondrous sight."
There was a murmuring of appreciation from all the guests; Pycelle seemed to have even gotten into the spirit for he managed remove his gnarled old hands from the thigh of a petrified serving girl to muse the at the beast before them. Sansa saw Tyrion appeared mildly amused whilst Cersei's frosty gaze was directed towards the unusually stoic Kingslayer.
Only Margaery wore an apprehensive glint in her pretty cobalt eyes, the awestruck wonder receding into a rather calculated frown.
"Lord Baelish I am touched by your sentiment but only, I wonder, what use will this beast be here in King's Landing?" Margaery questioned sharply, "where shall we put it? Land is scarce here and the gardens of the Red Keep are already brimming with the roses of House Tyrell, I cannot think of a single place to put this animal, can you your grace?" she asked, turning to look at her lord husband with an expectant smile that bordered on petulant.
Sansa couldn't help but wonder how the girl was even still alive but she kept her peace and took a deep sip from her golden goblet. Tyrion had muttered something into her ear about Baelish and stupidity and what on earth anyone was going to do with a white elephant but Sansa had long since learned how to block him out. How to block nearly everyone out. She crossed an arm over her chest and held the metal cup closer to her cheek, allowing its coolness to soak through to her skin.
She secretly hoped Joffrey would inform Margaery, with all his pomp and circumstance, that the animal would be kept in King's Landing because he was king and she knew nothing. She briefly wondered when that uncouth boy had been replaced with someone who knew how to hold his tongue (at least most of the time) and a slight pang filled Sansa's heart with the knowledge that it was not she who tamed the lion or perfected his facade of the golden prince.
"This is your name day," Joffrey returned, forcing Sansa's eyes to turn towards the royal couple who, for the first time, looked as if they were verging on argument. "Lord Baelish has brought back this animal all the way from Essos. It would be a waste if we were to butcher it when, I am sure, its journey was a difficult one."
"But my love, as beautiful as this creature is, a white elephant cannot be kept in the Red Keep. We simply have no room." Margaery countered, sitting up straighter as her arms rested on the painted armrests with such poise that she appeared to be a mother speaking down to a child.
"Yes and were you the one who outlined the entire kingdom, my lady wife?" Joffrey countered, the spiteful, sadistic boy-king emerging with some sort of desultory ostentation. "I am the king and this beast is an animal fit for King's Landing."
"My love, fact and reason dictates that we simply do not have the capacity to hold such a creature." Margaery returned calmly and with a slight condescending tick that made Sansa cringe. "We must give it away, dear, otherwise it will be a hindrance and you know perfectly well how difficult it is maintain a functioning household here, don't you?" she cooed out the last part and Joffrey's eyes turned cold, the strange unhinged balance that radiated from those emerald depths came surging forward and it was the one expression Sansa knew better than her own heart.
It was Margaery's own patient demeanor that sent the king into a rage as he plucked up his goblet and slammed it back down to the table. A twitch of his fingers told Sansa he wanted to break something - someone - badly. "Lord Baelish!" he suddenly snarled out, "take the elephant to the Red Keep's east courtyard. We will keep him there until his life ends by order of the king." a fiendish grin appeared on the curve of his lips and Sansa felt surprised by how cold his entire disposition appeared to be when only days prior, he had lavished his "perfect queen" with gifts and sweet words.
"Why is the king so very displeased with her majesty?" Sansa whispered to her lord husband once Petyr Baelish had bowed and the elephant removed. Tyrion in turn bit into a soft ball of white cheese, his sluggish manner suggesting that he was already halfway drunk.
"Don't you know?" the Imp retorted with a wave of his hand, "the queen has made her wish known that his grace should stop making visits to see his illegitimate son." Tyrion swallowed, taking a drink of wine before continuing, "she tries to dissuade him every night but my nephew is as hotheaded as a bull and as stupid as a brick sometimes. He won't listen and if he won't listen than the queen won't be happy, if the queen isn't happy then neither is Lady Olenna and if Lady Olenna is displeased then she will badger the Hand of the king until he decides a plunge from the Eyrie is more pleasant than living with this lot."
Sansa's eyes widened. "Has this been made known?" she inquired, her Tully blue eyes bright with a strange vivaciousness that Tyrion had not seen in what felt like years. "Does Lord Baelish know?"
The Imp snorted, "of course he does. Why do you think he brought the white elephant? It's size is only half the story."
"What do you mean?"
Tyrion looked at her, amused. "Don't you know the significance of a white elephant, my lady?"
"No," the redhead retorted flatly, "I've never left Winterfell before coming here, husband."
Tyrion shrugged, "it is of no consequence." he responded nonchalantly with a strange breeziness that was oft apparent with Ser Jaime, "just know that Lord Baelish's gift will bring more than just strife to the lady and the king."
Six days after the queen's name day, Sansa learned that Margaery had lost the child. A boy, Lady Lannister later learned, a healthy boy who, if only two more moons had passed, would have become the new Crown Prince.
"Such a shame, is it not my lady?" Lord Baelish sighed as he took another turn about the garden with the Lady Sansa, "the queen is now in a state of catatonic shock and his grace is none too pleased." he shook his head again, "such a pity. The queen has never felt atelophobia before and now it appears the sweet thing will never earn a reprieve from that blasted emotion."
"Was the king very angry, my lord?" Sansa inquired tentatively, hands clutching at her skirts lined with Dornish lace.
Littlefinger's dark eyes sparkled with amusement at her inquisition. "How very jocular you are my lady," he teased lightly, "to ask if the king was displeased. She is his lady wife and he has sworn to love and adore her for the rest of his days. Such a thing is a tragedy to be sure but they will overcome it." he took a short bow before leaning in to press a kiss to her cheek, "of course he was furious." he breathed out before vanishing from the gardens Sansa so loved.
Yet the joy Sansa expected to feel from such news faltered completely from her body. She felt no joy in the knowledge the queen was now suffering the wrath of King Joffrey, First of His Name, and most likely being threatened with the same crossbow she had been tortured with all those years before. What good was it, Sansa mused, to wish ill fortune upon a rival when such a wish could doom a kingdom? Was she, Sansa Stark, so shallow and hateful still that she could willingly give up the peace of an entire continent just to satisfy some base desire of her own? Were rage and jealousy and revenge not the plagues that brought about the War of the Five Kings? Was it not the very thing that killed her beloved brother Robb and ended the life of her good, honorable father? Of her blessed dutiful mother?
Oh, Sansa nearly wept, how stupid she was! Sitting down beside a lily pool Sansa felt bitter tears leaking from her eyes and rolling down her pale cheeks. What had she done? All those prayers in the godswood for justice to come - what good were they? She had killed a babe still in his mother's womb; Margaery Tyrell may be manipulative and so multifaceted that Sansa could not keep track of how many faces the woman wore, but no human, Sansa cried mournfully, no person should ever suffer the loss of their child.
It was a pain that was indescribable to those who knew not the undying love a mother folded unto her child - her lifeblood; they were a green light in some strange distance that was shielded by an ocean and a jealous knife. Sansa was that very ocean protecting her Charlemagne and Aome and yet she somehow had forgotten that these emotions were no special reserve, that she was not the only one to feel such distress.
In the king's bedchamber, there lied the remains of what had once been a beautiful room. The glossy tables of mahogany were overturned, their wood chipped; the silver dented and broken and covered in the muck of anguish and bitterness. The paintings were shredded by the tip of a blade and the trophies from great hunts and jousts had been torn down by enraged hands and shot at with arrows. In the midst of the room stood a blonde man, perhaps not quite grown yet but no longer a boy; he clutched a crossbow as if his life were linked to said weapon and his royal robes had been torn and dirtied with dust and wood chips.
With his face emotionless, he turned about at the sound his doors opening and found himself glaring down at a petite maid that was too dark haired and bore too great a resemblance to his queen.
"Call for Sansa," he commanded, voice cold, to the blasted shaking thing who had been unlucky enough to have drawn the short straw. "And bring me my son."
"Right away, your grace," she curtseyed and then scrambled out of the room right as a vase came sailing past her head. The smashing of broken furniture was heard even from the outside of the grandiose double doors, the guards cringing.
"Bring me my son!" Joffrey roared unaware and uncaring that the maid had left. "Bring me Sansa!" broken objects of all sizes flew around the room, furniture was knocked and using his blade, Joffrey ripped and stabbed the only item left standing - his grandiose bed - until it was nothing but a pile of feathers and shredded velvet. Breathing heavily, he collapsed down to his knees. "And bring me Queen Margaery's head."
A/N: The white elephant reference I'm using is from the short story 'Hills Like White Elephants' where said animal represented abortion. It's a brief and intriguing read if anyone's interested in it.
And question: a Myrcella appearance or more Tommen? Or should I just dole out more Joffrey/Sansa? Hehe.
Margaery's lost her boy and is now to be put on trial. Lady Olenna will be none too pleased...what do you think Margaery's ultimate fate should be/do you think Joffrey will allow Margaery to keep her head?
Review.