NO TEARS JUST SPEARS
Tyrion sighed, looking over his advisory sheet as he mulled over his flagon of wine. "I've got Saskia Crockett, Petri Mustonen, Bella Sanchez, Morgan Smith, Carys Pritchard, and Esther Whenlock. Miss Whenlock, Jaime," he groaned.
"Not terrible, considering."
"Not terrible? Mr Smith is far too obsessed with Sandor and Cleganebowl, and insists that I am a time-travelling foetus. Miss Sanchez won't rest until she successfully seduces Father and then sets him up with Sansa. Unfortunately, she's got Miss Oloi and seven others for competition. Mr Mustonen's got a thing for 'Cersei with her bitch face on', of all people, though I suppose talking to me will cure him of it, or perhaps her visit later in the year shall do the trick. Though… when does Cersei not look like that?"
"Never," Jaime agreed.
"Miss Crockett stalks trouble and staff, but Wyman's work seems to be taming her some. Some. We'll see. Miss Pritchard is obsessed with Jon Snow, but that sort of thing is easily curable in comparison to Stannis obsessions and believing D + D = T. She'll not be much work. But then there's Miss Whenlock. She told Miss Oloi the other day that Aeron must've been raped by a door warged by Moqorro."
"Robb says she told Stannis to divorce Selyse and marry peaches."
Tyrion took a swig of wine. "Peaches?!" he sputtered.
"On the bright side, you can laugh at Miss Whenlock," said Jaime. "Sansa's got Hockins. You can't laugh at Hockins."
"Who was lucky enough to get the sane one?"
"Mr Remo? Lady Stark. Though he probably thinks he's having a nice chat with his future mother-in-law and is not to be schooled in proper writing of fanfiction."
Suddenly, there was a knock on the door.
"Ah. Here she is, the girl of the hour…" Tyrion said, grimacing and waving Jaime away. "Come in, Miss Whenlock, come in…"
"Miss Whenlock, no," came Tyrion's voice from his solar.
Aww yiss, mothafuckin' Esther, Saskia thought, grinning as she crouched against the wall right beside the door, drabble in hand. This was going to be good. It was going to be even better for her, because… well, anything she wrote would be much more decent in comparison to whatever Esther decided to ship that week, and Tyrion would love her writing and hold her up as an exemplar of decency and brilliance and normality, all for very little effort of her own other than trying to be somewhat normal and not as wildly fannish and lustful about Robb as Jaqen insisted that she was.
"Many men had cut Strong Belwas, but only one, a slight, secretive, sexy crannogman, had cut his heart. Miss Whenlock, by now I should know better than to ask you what in seven hells this is and what in seven hells is wrong with you."
Who the fuck's Strong Belwas, and what's a crannogman? Saskia mused. Whatever and whoever they were, clearly shipping it was a big no-no, maybe much worse than Robb/Lyalyah.
"It's love in its purest and most animalistic form. Did you see the part with the onion prostate massage?"
"Unfortunately. Why is Howland Reed even in Meereen?"
"Because 'e's really Benjen and therefore Daario?"
"No. Just no. And I thought Benjen was now inhabiting the body of Satin? Or has he moved on to warging Three-Finger Hobb and Donal Noye? Or perhaps Jon Snow thinks Val is beautiful because she is his uncle?"
"Perhaps," Esther sighed, "but we are all vessels of Lord Benjen."
Tyrion coughed. "Come back to me next week with whatever Miss Oloi assigns you, Miss Whenlock, and make sure that it is sane next time. No onion prostate massages. No Strong Belwas/Howland Reed. No crackpot Benjen theories. Perhaps, if you like writing about Sansa Stark as your fanfiction history suggests, you could try a me/Sansa AU or something Stark-based and not batshit."
And Esther spilled out of the solar, shaking her head. She noticed Saskia waiting and made a noise of dissatisfaction. "Don't get your 'opes up 'e'll like whatever Robb stuff you've written," she said. "'E's impossible to please."
"Right, thanks for the heads up," said Saskia. Or maybe it's impossible for you to be sane.
"Lord Tyrion?" Saskia said, gingerly stepping into the solar. And there he was sat at a desk far too large for him, in a chair far too large for him, surrounded by stacks and shelves of books and flanked by Carl Drogo and Peter Bealish the dragons.
"And what have you brought me today, Miss Crockett?" he said, gesturing for her to sit.
"It's a drabble about Robb," she said, passing it over.
He gave her a pointed look. "A smutty drabble, Miss Crockett?"
"No, it's… normal, I reckon?" she whispered, fixated on his skeletony gaping nose hole. "I mean, there's no nakedness and lust."
"Thank the old gods. Thank the seven. Thank the god of tits and wine," Tyrion replied. "And speaking of wine, drink up," he said, pouring her a glass.
Saskia took a trembling sip, then another, then another. This wine was good, rich and sweet and potent. Clearly the good stuff was reserved for staff, as the diluted stuff served at luncheon was certainly nowhere near as good.
"Robb dreamt of wolves howling at the gates of Winterfell, and of weirwoods white as moons shivering in the harsh brunt of winter," Tyrion read. "Beyond the snows and ice of the North, a great army was arising—blue-eyed and straggling, advancing with the tides of wind. The North was rising, too, behind him, rallying forth their unfurling banners, sigils dark against the whitened sun on the far shores of the Lands of Always Winter. And with an immense clash of spear and helm, sword and hauberk, the North was won, and spring soon could come again to bless the budding earth."
Saskia waited with bated breath, then finished her goblet. Tyrion's face was expressionless (and so scarred and gaping and weird, kinda ew). What was he going to think of her first OC-less fic, one that hopefully wasn't as lustful and ridiculous as Jaqen claimed her writing was (and had to be, because she was at a university just for that)?
"Not bad and nicely descriptive for only being a hundred words," said Tyrion. That was a relief. "You are wise enough now to know what weirwoods and sigils are, and you are imaginative to have Robb alive and fighting, if only in his dreams, during a long and maybe last winter. Not exactly interesting or original, but there aren't any throbbing members or OCs or canon characters being raped by doors. I'd say it's a first job well-done."
"Miss Oloi wouldn't allow them," Saskia said a bit dejectedly, despite the partially half-hearted praise. "The OCs, I mean. And I reckon being raped by doors is verboten, too."
"Indeed," he said, pouring them both more wine. "And how are you finding life in Westeros?"
"Could be better, could be worse. There are spiders in the baths and I'm scared of the dragons and terrified of Ramsay and Jaqen H'ghar hit me with a stick and I've got to work for Wyman Manderly and Stannis makes us march outside in phalanxes at three in the morning and Jeyne is married to Robb and Neddy exists, but… but the food is good and I've made some friends and…" she blushed, "…and I get to see Robb Stark every day. That's a plus."
"Of course, as expected. And your teachers?"
"I don't know. Nice? Well, some of them. In character?"
"Mostly, I should hope," said Tyrion, "though I suppose tomorrow might change your opinion of that slightly. Or a lot."
"What's… what's tomorrow?" Saskia stammered. Tomorrow was Wednesday, which meant she had Archery, her writing workshop, and Contemporary Issues in Westerosi Society, and not one of her teachers had mentioned anything particularly interesting or unusual about the day… though, Saskia thought, her stomach lurching sickeningly, it would be rather out of character for them to orchestrate reasons to kill her if they weren't Ramsay or Olly or Joffrey, thankfully and hopefully permanently deceased in this canon.
"You will see. You will see, with any luck only this once," said Tyrion reassuringly, pouring Saskia and entirely new goblet of wine and sliding it across the desk at her. "No need to fret, Miss Crockett. By now you should know we don't aim to kill you in any way. We your teachers don't, at least..."
There was a limit to Tyrion's reassurances, and not much limit to Saskia's anxiety.
'Tomorrow' was finally here, and though Saskia had spent some time worrying about what Tyrion had meant by his characterisation remark (would Davos and his BFF Stannis go completely off the rails and start lopping off body parts for no reason, or would Catelyn lock them all outside again and start playing the Rains of Castamere and have all the girls who hated sewing brutally shanked and slain?), she'd had a bit of wine and stopped fretting. For the most part, by her own estimation.
The staff were eating their breakfasts rather normally, no sign of out-of-character happenings going on. Robb was feeding Neddy spoonfuls of porridge as Jeyne held the wee baby in her lap, and Sansa was conversing with her mother, and Rickon, under the careful watch of his nanny Osha, was smashing peas into the table and making a horrid mess. Olly was glowering whilst Jon tried to convince him to eat his eggs (the lad likely lived on a diet of souls), Sandor was scowling at fanbrats, Ramsay was polishing his brand new neon yellow vuvuzela, and Stannis the Mannis was marking the previous day's homework, his lips contorted into a frustrated frown.
Miss Ellie, though, was at the podium on the dais, waiting expectantly for silence.
"An announcement, sweet summer children—" Miss Ellie began.
"ARE SANSA AND SANDOR GETTING MARRIED?" Orla shrieked immediately, jumping up onto her chair and staring with rabid intensity at Sansa, who was, to likely Orla's immense disappointment, sitting too far away from Sandor. "ARE JAIME AND BRIENNE—"
"No one's gettin' married," the Hound gruffed loudly, "unless you'd like me to wed a sword to your face!"
"An announcement— of an academic nature, Orla Dwyer," Miss Ellie seethed as Tywinly as she could—which was not well or stoic enough at all. "You may lower your hand, get down off that chair, and stifle the trifling waste you consider thoughts. Prince Oberyn?"
Lucy welly swooned as Prince Oberyn, in his beautiful orange robes, ascended to the podium, looking right fit as ever.
"As some of you are aware, my paramour Ellaria and my four youngest daughters live with me. My eldest, Obara, does not, and she will be visiting the Official Fanfiction University of Westeros to instruct you in a subject most important. She will be making a rounds of all Slaying 101 lessons for the remainder of the week, beginning this morning, with an important message on being a strong female warrior. Of course," Oberyn said with a piercing look at Tywin and a jerk of the head towards Brienne, "such a lecture could have been more reasonably and inexpensively achieved in other ways. Please give my daughter your undivided attention, or she will be angry. Very angry."
So Obara, whatever she's like in the books, is out of character and is angry? Is that all that Tyrion had meant?
"FIELD TRIP!" Amy squealed, pounding the table so hard she knocked over an entire goblet of honeyed mead in the process.
"It's not a field trip if you don't go anywhere new, turdbrain," said Esther.
"Who you calling turdbrain?!"
"You?"
"But we get to go to outside! With the other Slaying classes! And we get to meet Obara!"
"Still not a field trip. That's an assembly."
Amy pouted. "Why are you so cruel to me?"
"Cos I'm your cousin! I'm allowed to be!"
Field trip or assembly or whatever it was, it'd be a nice break, Saskia thought, from trying to shoot targets and failing miserably whilst Ygritte helped her and teased her simultaneously, all under the evil glare of Little Hitler. Or it'd be nice if Lucy managed to control herself around Oberyn, her new favoured lust object, because Lucy was now chunnering something, once again, about spears and flesh and gripping it firmly and how fit her darling Prince of Dorne looked this morning.
"Oberyn's just so perfect," Lucy finished, sighing, her lust for Jon Snow seemingly and totally forgot.
As soon as all three of that morning's various Slaying classes (and various staff, including Robb, Jeyne, Catelyn, Jon, Sansa, Daenerys, Ramsay, Tyrion, Jaime, Tommen, and five of Tommen's cats, all on leads) were outside on the tourney-field, the hilarious horror began. It started, naturally, with Letty.
"I'm not sitting down! The grass is wet! And spiders live in grass!" Letty was whimpering at the instructions that Bronn and Oberyn had given them all. "I'm not! I'm not!"
"That they do," said Oberyn with sexy nonchalance, smirking. "You should be happy that you are not north of the Wall, and that the itty bitty leggy itchy things that soon will crawl and bite beneath your smallclothes are not the size of hounds, with pincers big enough to rip your face off. Ask Tormund to tell you about those. I am sure he will be thrilled to oblige in much greater and memberier detail."
"Spiders! With pincers!" Letty gesticulated to the grass in an overdramatic fashion as she continued to whimper. "With pincers! Save me, Lord Benjen!"
"Benjen!" someone echoed.
"Are you sitting down and shutting up as you were asked, or am I slicing your eyes out bit by bit with a rusty lancet?" Bronn grunted to Letty. "Down, Miss… fuck it, whatever the fuck your surname is. Miss Salad. You get down as well, Miss Nelson."
Carolina, too, was one of the last students still standing, smirking at the fine object of her affection with her arms folded across her chest—as usual, in casual defiance of everything horrid asked of her.
"I love it when men say that to me," she grinned as she slumped to her knees as seductively as possible.
"Not… on… your… knees," Bronn grumbled. "The next time you'll be on your knees, it'll be to have your head lopped off. Will that be today, Miss Nelson?"
"Maybe? It would be a sweet death," said Carolina. "Wait, why have you got a spear?"
"You don't want to see what happens when I don't," Bronn said.
"Well, you've a nicer one in your pants."
Bronn just groaned, shaking his head. "Right, you lot," he said to the by now totally seated crowd. "A quick word before we meet our esteemed guest, Obara Sand—or, as we call her here, Showbara. If you've sensitive hearing, please move to the back of the crowd. She won't be quiet unless she's acknowledged. A 'thanks, yes, no, please, Showbara' usually does the trick. And whatever you do, indulge her and do. not. laugh. Do as she commands. She has been known to harpoon those who offend her."
"Somewhere in the transition from book to television, there was a rift," Oberyn added. "An accident, perhaps. Obara has never been the same. Something in her cracked. Some say it was the writing on the show that caused it. Some say it was my demise that pushed her over the edge."
Saskia hadn't got to any part of the books that involved Oberyn or the Sand Snakes, but even she had to admit that the Dorne storyline was the worst-written and most painful one to watch, and that Obara and the short-haired one (Tyene?) were horrible. But how much worse could the girl be than she was in the show? Sure, the Sand Snakes were a little ridiculous with their monologuing and silly fight scenes and bad pussies and… well, everything, but how much more out of character could Obara Sand – Showbara – be?
A lot worse, in fact, and a lot stupidly funnier. The olive-skinned woman that Oberyn led before them was maybe about twenty-five or so, with a long, lean face, dark eyes, a spear in hand, and, as soon as she opened her mouth, no volume control. Next to her was a massive pile of spears. This was Obara Sand— or was, at one point, Obara Sand, before David and Dan had got to her.
"HELLO," Showbara yelled with all the confused obviousness of a Gumby. "I AM OBARA SAND I FIGHT FOR DORNE."
"She's beautiful!" the Cryptkeeper and another fanboy moaned in unison. The Cryptkeeper's hand roved to his pocket, as usual, but Bronn, quick to act, smacked it with the butt of his spear.
"She's stupid," Edrick corrected.
Obara paid no mind to the comments about her, much less the Cryptkeeper's predictable masturbation attempt, and only continued her tiresome monologue. "DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM MY NAME IS OBARA SAND I FIGHT FOR DORNE I AM THE BASTARD DAUGHTER OF OBERYN OF HOUSE MARTELL I AM THE ELDEST OF THE SAND SNAKES THAT IS TO SAY OBERYN'S DAUGHTERS. MY MOTHER—"
Several pairs of eyes wandered over to Ellaria, standing by Oberyn and holding his hand in a way that, seemingly, did not make pervy Lucy discouraged or jealous at all. As Lucy hoped, Oberyn and Ellaria would never be discouraging of extra-relationship hanky-panky.
"What? Don't look at me. I didn't birth it," Ellaria snapped.
"—WAS A WHORE IN OLDTOWN SHE NAMED ME AFTER MY FATHER DO YOU KNOW MY FATHER OBERYN OF THE HOUSE MARTELL OF SUNSPEAR I WILL AVENGE HIS DEATH."
"Easy there, Showbara. Volume."
Showbara only stared at Bronn confusedly for half a second, and continued with her repetitive speech.
"WHEN I WAS A CHILD I HAD NOTHING MY MOTHER WAS A WHORE IN OLDTOWN AND MY FATHER IS OBERYN MARTELL. I HAD NOTHING NOT EVEN FOOD OR CLOTHES OR THE WILL TO LIVE-" a lie, Oberyn mouthed to the students, "-BECAUSE I HADN'T A SPEAR BUT I DIDN'T KNOW WHAT IN LIFE WAS MISSING, MY FATHER AND MY SPEAR. WHEN I WAS A LITTLE GIRL, WHEN I WAS EIGHT, MY FATHER CAME TO TAKE ME FROM MY MOTHER WHO WAS A WHORE IN OLDTOWN AND HE SAID TO ME— I AM OBERYN MARTELL AND YOU ARE OBARA MY DAUGHTER. WILL YOU CHOOSE TEARS OR THIS SPEAR MAKE YOUR CHOICE AT ONCE. YOU CANNOT BE A STRONG WOMAN IN FANFICTION APPARENTLY IF YOU DO NOT HAVE A WEAPON AND THAT WEAPON SHOULD BE THE SPEAR IT IS SUPERIOR JUST LIKE ME. AND TODAY THAT IS WHAT YOU WILL BE DOING YOU WILL BE CHOOSING THE SPEAR OR THE TEARS. THE TEARS WILL BE FROM WHEN I KILL YOU."
Jeyne had her hand over Robb's mouth as he leant over, eyes scrunched, making odd wheezing noises as he struggled to contain a fit of laughter. "Don't get yourself killed again, Robb!"
"I'm trying not to!" Robb wheezed. "It's a bit hard!"
"Tell them about being a strong female character and an effective warrior, my dear," Oberyn said to the ridiculous warrior girl, who stood as if stunned, staring at the crowd before her, blank-eyed and stupid-like. "Tell them how to choose weapons that suit them, and how practising improves skill."
Showbara just stared vacantly. And then, after a few uncomfortable seconds of near-silence, she opened her mouth. "YOU MUST HAVE A SPEAR IN ORDER TO BE A STRONG FEMALE CHARACTER YOU MUST FIGHT FOR DORNE YOU MUST BE A WARRIOR WITH A SPEAR YOU MUST BE LIKE ME I AM OBARA SAND."
Lucy sniggered. All fell silent. Showbara paused, turning on her heels and marching straight over to the source of the laughter. And Showbara was right up in Lucy's grill, breathing down her neck, looking downright lividly daft as she clutched her spear, ready to strike. Lucy trembled. She was taller than Showbara Sand, but, shrinking before the spear-twirling girl wonder, looked surprisingly small and weak in comparison.
"I FIGHT FOR DORNE!" she yelled. "WHO DO YOU FIGHT FOR, LITTLE GIRL?"
"The… North," Lucy breathed, recoiling slightly, biting her lip so as to suppress any laughter… though by now, under the threat of being harpooned, this didn't seem all that hilarious anymore.
"I SEE WHY DO YOU NOT FIGHT FOR DORNE I FIGHT FOR DORNE WHO DO YOU FIGHT FOR?!"
"The North. House Stark and Lancashire!"
"THAT IS NOT IN DORNE!" Showbara wonder-raged as monotonely as possible, if it were even possible. Her dark eyes were glinting with speary fervour as she beheld what Lucy had got in her left hand. "HAVE YOU GOT A SPEAR?!"
"Yes! I take lessons with your father!"
"GOOD GIRL I WILL NOT BE KILLING YOU TODAY CAN I SAY THE SAME OF ALL OF YOU?"
"YES!" they answered in unison.
Saskia heaved a sigh of relief that Lucy was fine and unspeared, but Showbara wasn't done with her inane threats and shrieking about Dorne. She was now breathing down the necks of a Ryger girl she recognised from archery and her friend, spear at the ready, whilst the girls cowered somewhat beneath that unwavering, penetrating stare, at the weapon aimed right at the Ryger girl's jugular.
"WHAT ARE YOUR NAMES?"
"Maeve…"
"Jess…"
"GOOD MORNING JESS AND MAEVE I AM OBARA SAND BASTARD DAUGHTER OF OBERYN MARTELL I AM A SAND SNAKE THAT IS TO SAY ONE OF OBERYN'S DAUGHTERS THOUGH I AM THE ELDEST AND THE BEST. HE FATHERED ME ON A WHORE FROM OLDTOWN THAT IS WHY MY SURNAME IS SAND IT IS BECAUSE I AM A BASTARD BUT MY FATHER IS OBERYN MARTELL I AM NOT A MARTELL. WHY DO YOU NOT HAVE SPEARS?!"
"Because…" Maeve gulped. "I take archery, and Jess is doing swordfighting. That's… that's why we've not got spears…"
"WE ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO HURT LITTLE GIRLS IN DORNE BUT THAT IS MY FAVOURITE HOBBY. THAT IS WHY I HAVE COME TO THIS UNIVERSITY I WILL HURT YOU IF YOU DO NOT PICK UP THE SPEAR. WHEN I WAS A LITTLE GIRL IN DORNE I WAS NOT HURT I DID NOT CRY WHEN I PICKED UP THE SPEAR."
"Thanks, Showbara," Jess whispered, dropping the sword in her hand and backing away slightly.
Showbara's lip twitched (the closest the robotic, crazily-monologuing young woman could come to smiling, evidently), and went off in search of her next victim. She found him over by Ellaria, holding his own spear and looking rather disheartenedly at her, at, maybe, what the show had done to her.
"YOU HAVE A SPEAR TOO?! SO DO I WHEN I WAS A CHILD MY FATHER OBERYN OF THE HOUSE MARTELL TOOK ME TO COURT AND HE SAID NO TEARS JUST SPEARS DO YOU KNOW MY FATHER OBER— OH…"
Showbara stood silently for a flicker of a second, squinty-eyed and thinking much too hard, before seeming to realise that she was, in fact, conversing with her father, who was Oberyn of the House Martell of Sunspear, in Dorne, for which she fought.
"NOW IS THE TIME OF RECKONING WHAT DO YOU CHOOSE DO YOU CHOOSE THE SPEARS," Showbara monologued to the students, gesturing with a nod and point of her spear towards the massive pile, "OR THE TEARS YOU HAVE NO OTHER CHOICE. CHOOSE WISELY OR I WILL KILL YOU."
They all chose tears. Of laughter.
For those of you sadly and pitifully unacquainted with Monty Python's Flying Circus, this is a Gumby:
(slash) watch?v=M68GeL8PafE
There is now a poll on my profile on this site: WHO exactly is Benjen? Go on and cast your votes! You can vote for up to 20 different characters that he's warging/secretly is!
Next on: Orla tries to start a club, and Pyp and Grenn come with a few important messages about the Night's Watch.