AN:
Some minor notes and some major notes.
I have made changed the way Joffrey speaks in this fic, mostly because some people found it tedious to read. Tell me what you think about it in this chapter. Though I actually don't know what the change will look like across different sites.
Also, there needs to be a minor correction from last chapter that someone brought to my attention (credit to Quiet Fury):
Ser Lothar Brune, who died last chapter was not called the Apple Eater during this time, but only after the battle of the Blackwater. In fact, Lothar was not even a knight during this time, only a free rider. I decided that this error was minor enough, that I will just wave it off as AU.
Also, Also. For another error that I have decided to Retcon instead of just wave off, is how many Kingsguard were dismissed in the Lancel Chapter. Lancel sees 3 knights of the White Sword order get dismissed and sent to the Night's Watch. But in Gendry's chapter, that number is actually 4. I will not give a reason right now, but I have decided to go with the Lancel chapter retcon and will thus be editing the Gendry chapter to retcon the fourth dismissed Kingsguard. Maybe, eventually. Whenever my lazy ass gets around to editing this stuff.
Lady of Stark
Sansa had been a good girl; she had done as the Queen had asked her. She had written those letters. She had remembered her courtesies, and she had begged the Prince for mercy to her father.
So why?
They had done it with her father's sword, which she had seen him clean in the Godswood a thousand times before. And yet, it was the sword that killed him. The crowd cheered when Ser Ilyn held that sword. She remembered everything, including yelling for them to stop until her voice became gravelly. But Sansa couldn't recall the blade tearing through her father's neck. She had been standing right there and must have witnessed what happened. But hours later, she couldn't recall the scene in her mind.
She tried to, tried to keep her father's last moments in her memory. And she felt so ashamed when she realized that it would be better not to remember.
All she could see was her father confessing, and then she had begged, as Ser Ilyn stepped forward with Ice, and the crowd cheered and in the next moment they had been carrying her to the Red Keep after she had gone limp. Sansa kept imagining the King's Justice walking just outside her chambers and kicking in the door. And her father's sword would swing, and Sansa would be headless as well.
Perhaps I ought to be dead, Sansa thought as she opened the shutters of her window.
Arya is brave, so is Robb who was leading their father's army in battle against the Lannisters. Bran and even Rickon were not scared of anything either, Bran climbed the walls and Rickon laughed at Old Nan's stories. Jon Snow was perhaps as brave as their father, with his dark hair and grey eyes. Any of her siblings would have been brave. But Sansa was a coward.
She knew her death would shame the Lannisters and the Crown, and that there will be songs written of her braveness and their cruelty. It would also remove the only hostage the crown had against her family.
Even so, these things did not make her braver. And Sansa lost her nerve and turned back from the window.
Not that it made her feel less afraid, with how she shook from fear. Her mind played tricks on her as she kept imagining Ilyn Payne marching to her door and dragging her out, Ice in hand.
So she looked at the door, and listened for any upcoming footsteps. And she kept seeing Ser Ilyn standing there.
Despite this, when the door finally opened, Sansa had not heard any steps.
"Lady Sansa!" The Prince exclaimed as he barged into the room.
She half thought that the whole day had been imagined, and that her father would get mercy as the Queen had promised her.
"Today, proper justice was delivered unto the traitor!" The Prince said with a cruel smile.
Sansa knew that she could not have just imagined everything, even so, she had held on to the slightest bit of hope. The prince had been so handsome, seemed so kind and brave and like all the stories she had heard.
But now, as she took in the sight of him, Sansa wondered how she could have ever been so stupid. His attire consisted of a lion-patterned doublet that was padded and a gold cloak with a high collar that framed his face. His eyes were harsh and conceited, and his lips were soft but set in a cruel smile. All the kindness there, all the soft courtesies, they likely were just as imaginary as everything else Sansa thought she knew about the Prince.
I should have known, the thought occurs to her. I should have known after Lady.
"I have something I want to show you," Joffrey told her.
There was something off about him, Sansa noticed, as he dragged her out of her room. She was still wearing the same dress from earlier in the day, at the Sept of Baelor. There was dried blood on the hems of her skirts, and every time her mind wondered at where it could have come from, she would begin to sob uncontrollably.
So, she did not think about it. She did not think much about the Prince barging in to her room and demanding that she follow him either. And she very much doubted he would tell her if she asked where they were going.
But then the Prince stumbled, and Sansa had a moment of sheer clarity as she watched Joffrey nearly face plant into the ground. She wondered if she would be blamed for the humiliation, and that the Prince would summon Ser Ilyn at once to come lop off her head.
"Are you alright, Your Grace?" One of the two Kingsguards, with their white cloaks, asked.
"I am fine!" Joffrey bit out as he stood back up and grabbed her again.
But he did not seem quite himself to Sansa, he looked pale and far too frantic by half. She hoped it was guilt and shame for her father's death.
"Come this way!" Joffrey shouted as he led her to the entrance of a gatehouse, to the bottom of a spiral staircase leading to the battlements.
A sob pushed its way out of Sansa's throat and her legs immediately gave out from underneath her. She knew where they were heading all of a sudden.
"Get up!" The Prince yelled, utterly furious.
"No," she replied with a terrified cry. "Please, no, I beg you, don't make me."
"Drag her up there, dog!" Joffrey demanded as he turned and ran up the staircase.
Sansa closed her eyes, as tears that she thought had already been thoroughly shed, ran down her cheeks. She barely registered the Hound gently carrying her up the tower. When they reach the top, Sansa sees the spikes lining the wall, and she looks at every where but at what is placed atop them. She contemplates freeing herself from the Hound's grasp and flinging herself from the wall and-
She shut her eyes tight and continued. She couldn't see it. She couldn't. She couldn't.
Blood covered the length of the spike, and Sansa closed her mind to where its source could be. Why it had to be-
She couldn't look. She couldn't think of it.
Old Gods and the New, she prayed.
There was a sound ahead of her, and she looked to see Joffrey collapsing to his knees. Dawning horror filled his face as he looked up the spike. He turned to her then, and when he saw her, he became even more pale than before.
Sansa was utterly confused as the Prince looked away from her, shame and regret on his face.
"Take-" The Prince had not screamed, but the word came out so loud it had Sansa clutching at her ears.
"-take it down!" Joffrey ordered, less loud but equally commanding. And suddenly Sansa remembered that the boy before her had been crowned King, and was a Prince no longer.
"…y-your grace." One of the Kingsguard stuttered out.
" .down!"
Then the men moved, as if a force not of their own will was controlling them.
Sansa kept her eyes on the Pri- the King, she reminded herself – and watched as Joffrey gasped out for breath like someone had been holding his throat and squeezing. Then he collapsed to the ground, shaking and still gasping.
Perhaps the Gods had listened.
The Hound was at the Prince's side in an instant, lifting him up into his arms.
"Oakheart!" The Hound bellowed. "See the girl back to her room!" And then the man was gone, taking the king with him.
Sansa tried to not look at what the other Kingsguard was doing as Ser Arys Oakheart led her from the tower. They walked back all the way to Maegor's holdfast when a runner came up to Ser Arys and told him to run to King's Landing and summon Grand Maester Pycelle.
Sansa was suddenly alone, with no minders or guards to watch her. She had seen the city from the tower, the two other hills of the Conqueror's Sisters, and beyond them the open fields outside the city's walls. She wondered if she could run all the way to Winterfell if she left now.
But Sansa didn't run. She just stood there, listlessly and without any idea of the world around her.
"You!"
Suddenly the Queen was there, holding her by her throat and shaking her.
"What have you done to my son?!"
And the Queen had ever been so kind to Sansa. But then again, so had Joffrey.
Sansa couldn't breathe.
The Queen pulled out a dagger from her belt, and Sansa hoped it would be plunged directly into her heart so that she wouldn't feel any pain. She half wanted to thank the Queen for her mercy, as she did not want to test her courage again standing before an opened window.
But the Queen didn't plunge in her blade and Sansa collapsed on the ground gasping for breath and holding her neck.
The King had appeared again from somewhere, and he was saying something to the Queen. Sansa couldn't really hear anything.
The Hound picked her up gently again, not to take her back to that tower, as instead Sansa found herself back in that room they had locked her up in.
The man of the Kingsguard tucked her into the bed. "Sleep, little bird. You will need your strength."
Sansa tried her best not to sleep.
She failed, and her nightmares were terrible.
The next day, there was commotion in the Keep around her but Sansa did her best to ignore it.
Her maids talked at her, when they brought breakfast, but she kept her silence.
"…might make new captain for the Gold Cloaks."
Her mind focused, and Sansa turned sharply to the girl whom had spoken. "What?" She asked, her voice quiet even to her own ears.
And then they told her that Janos Slynt had been killed in the night. The man had been the one to hold down her father for Ser Ilyn. She had wished that he and the King, and the Queen would all die in the night.
If the Gods had mercy, the King and Queen would soon follow.
"Jeyne!"
Sansa wept as she held her friend tight, she had not thought she would ever see Jeyen again.
But her friend had returned. With a story of a ghost that had Sansa weep well into the night.
Despite her reluctance to speak with anyone but Jeyne, she still had visitors.
Grand Maester Pycelle would ask if she was sick and would bring over a box of flasks and bottles. As her bedmaid held her down, he forced her to undress, felt her brow, and touched her all over. He offered her a concoction of herbs and honeywater before he left. Ordered her to take it every night before bed.
"Don't drink it, my lady." Jeyne told her. "It might not be safe."
Sansa didn't.
They did not come to take Jeyne away again, as Sansa had feared. And the two of them were left alone for the most part. And Sansa was thankful for that, as she comforted Jeyne about her late father and her friend told her stories about how Sansa's father had slain the men who betrayed him using Ice.
Sansa didn't call her friend a liar, as Jeyne had seen what she had seen. But she was much sooner to believe that it was Ser Ilyn acting on behalf of the Queen or someone else.
At night, and in the darkness, they took to the same bed. They would fall asleep that way, weeping into each other's arms.
"Let me go!"
Sansa awoke hearing a scream. There were footsteps outside her door, exactly like she had dreamed, and she wondered if she would die with Jeyne in her arms.
Then in came the King, carrying in his arms a boy who was kicking and screaming.
Sansa blinked, and she looked again at the boy. "Arya!"
Her sister suddenly stopped moving, and the King set her down.
Sansa didn't know how she got out of bed, or how she even crossed the room. The next thing she knew was that she was holding on to her sister for dear life.
Despite Sansa's efforts to steer her sister away from screaming obscenities at the King, Arya still managed to turn and begin glaring at the King with hate filled eyes. "He killed him!" Her sister said. "He killed father!"
"Quiet," Sansa whispers in her sister's ears. "He could have you killed."
That does nothing to deter Brave Arya.
"Forgive her," Sansa implored, then she remembered her courtesies and bowed her head. "If it pleases you, Your Grace, Please, she is only a girl."
"He killed him!" Arya screamed again.
The King, the boy who had cruelly dragged her to see her father's head only averted his eyes, he was shamefaced.
"I did." He confessed. He spoke slowly, and in a deliberate manner.
Sansa blinked, as she realized that the stories she had heard of the King's illness had not been falsehoods.
Suddenly Arya had a small sword in her hand, she ran forward out of Sansa's arms and thrust forward with the blade. She thought her sister might skewer the King right there, and win the war for their brother Robb. The Queen would have had them executed for it, but maybe that was for the best too. They could then be with their father.
But Joffrey caught the sword right before it sunk into his heart. Arya tried pulling back the blade and cutting open the King's hand, but the boy's grip was far too strong.
"I did kill your father my lady." Joffrey said softly, each word seemed like a battle. "And regret it immensely."
"I don't care!" Arya shouted. "I will kill you!"
And suddenly her sister had been disarmed. "Perhaps someday my lady, you may yet kill me." The King told her. "But today I will hold vigil for Lord Stark."
Sansa felt her breath leave her.
"You will?!" Arya demanded. "You who ordered his death? You who killed him? You are a murderer!"
"Aye," Joffrey nodded, his face still shame filled. "As are you, my lady. A stableboy, on your flight from the keep."
Arya reeled back as if she had been slapped, and Sansa knew at once that the words were true.
"I- I did…" Tears ran down her sister's cheeks. "I only wanted- he was- I didn't mean to…"
"I will not hold it above your head, my Lady." Joffrey told her sister. "For the boy was seen grabbing you, and you were fleeing in distress."
"You killed Mycha!" Arya said. "You have no right…"
"The Gods hath have judgement in store for you and me, my lady." Joffrey told her.
There was a white scarf covering her father's neck, covering where his head had been severed. She remembers him looking so rough and dirt covered after spending time in the black cells, but now he looked clean. They had placed some unguent cosmetic on his face to make him look almost alive.
He was dressed in his finest clothing and boots, the white and grey Stark colors and direwolf on his silk doublet. Ice was laid in the coffin as well, her father's hand made to clasp around it. The Valyrian blade shone in the light coming down through the skylight of the glass domes atop the Sept of Baelor.
Sansa thought that she wouldn't even be able to look at him, that she would have turned away again like she did on the tower and wept uncontrollably. But now, she could only stare at her father. He looked to be sleeping, and Sansa half imagined that he might suddenly wake from a deep slumber.
Despite Arya's stone face as they were brought to the coffin, when her sister had seen the body, she had begun to silently weep. Jeyne wept as well and prayed in the Old Tongue. Half the time whispering the prayers, the other half exclaiming them aloud, to the disapproval of the watching Septons and Septas.
Sansa wished she could pray with Jeyne. Joffrey told them that her father's last words had been a prayer in the Old Tongue, that many had heard despite the roar of the crowd, but none had understood. But her mother and Septa Mordane had not seen it necessary for Sansa to learn, and so she had not.
And so, as Jeyne and her sister fell to despair, Sansa found herself simply standing there, not a single tear in her eyes and without anything to say.
She did not cry for the rest of the day either, nor did she say or do much of anything except comfort Jeyne and Arya. Instead, she simply stared at her father, and sometimes, between blinks, she would see him rise awake from his slumber. Only for the truth to stare her in the face again in the next moment.
Sometimes, Sansa's gaze flickered to the King, who was standing vigil only a few steps away.
Arya fell asleep first, tear marks running down her cheeks, and she had likely had a long day before she was brought to Sansa's room. Jeyne fell asleep next, still muttering prayers in the Old Tongue over and over again.
Sansa herself laid down on the marble floor at the foot of her father, unable to fight her exhaustion either. Her gaze flickered again to the King, who still stood in his silent guard.
Despite her efforts, sleep still found her.
And when she woke, the King still stood in his vigil.
They went back to the Red Keep the next day, and Sansa thought that it would be the last time she would see her father.
There was another disturbance at court again, and Sansa couldn't help but gasp as she watched the Queen be dragged away from the Keep by her own guards.
Arya laughed at the sight, a cold bitter thing ripping its way out of her throat.
But then they watched silently from the window as the woman who had so terrorized them was taken away.
Sansa prayed again to the Gods.
Joffrey came to them again, and her sister had not attacked him on sight. He did not wear finery, but a simple shirt and breaches. The clothes were not truly rundown or torn, but they leant more to street urchin than the Lord of the Seven Kingdoms.
Then he asked them to come to the Sept of Baelor and she was frightened while her sister exploded in fury.
But it was a command from the King, and so they obeyed.
Their father was exactly where they had left him, though they had sealed his coffin and Joffrey told them that only bones were left of him.
And then the King inexplicably left them there in the Sept.
It was nearing sunset, and Joffrey had left them there that morning. They had spent the time quietly praying by Lord Eddard's feet.
And then the King returned, and Sansa gasped when she saw him.
He looked pale and thirsting, he had been walking barefoot, and his feet had swollen and were bloody from small cuts. There were whispers from the Septons around them that the King had walked around the city, up and down the three hills named for the Conquerors, and through Flee Bottom and the Streets of Steel. That he had walked the path around the city seven times, and many said that it was enough atonement.
But then, Joffrey had knelt before one of the Septons, and a Silent Sister had carried forth a nine tailed whip. The Septon looked reluctant, but eventually took up the whip.
"Forgive me, Your Grace." The Septon, who had Sparrow feathers on his robes, whispered.
But Joffrey only shook his head in response.
Then the Septon delivered the first lash. And it was a half-hearted thing.
Joffrey turned back to the Septon, something gleaming in his eyes and the Septon swallowed down his discomfort and delivered another lash.
Sansa flinched back at the force of it. It cut the King's back, and its sound echoed around the Sept like thunder. But the King did not even flinch or cry out at the blow.
And then the Septon struck again, and again, and again.
Jeyne fainted, and one of the Baratheon men caught her before she struck her head on the floor.
There was another lash, and another, and another.
"We should-" The sparrow Septon tried to say, but a sharp look from the King had him continue.
There was another blow, and then another.
Blood ran down the King's back, and with every blow, more cuts appeared.
Arya, her fearless and normally undaunted sister was crying quietly. She had finally had enough of it, shutting her eyes and blocking her ears with her hands. When Jeyne awoke again when a Silent Sister flicked water onto her face, her friend saw Arya and followed her example.
But Sansa looked on, unable to turn away.
SNAP
She flinched as the whip broke on Joffrey's back and the Septon who had been delivering the blows was weeping openly.
"Forgive me, child." The Septon said through his tears.
The man was silently taken aside, and Sansa thought that that would be the end of it. Instead, another identical whip was brought forth and another Septon stepped towards the King. This one looked far more eager than the first, and the lashes he delivered had made the Septas who had remained stoic so far, weep. Sansa still felt no tears, but she flinched at every thunderous echo.
This Septon exhausted himself rather quickly, and another took up the whip. The man delivered two lashes to Joffrey's back, before handing the whip to someone else.
And on and on and on it went. Until every Septon in the room had whipped the King.
Then the Septas stepped forward, bearing clubs instead of whips, and each of them delivered a single blow to the King's back. Some were halfhearted, others struck with fury and violence unbecoming of the Faith's women. Or so Septa Mordane had said.
When it finally ended, so much of the King's blood had been spilled on the marble floor of the Sept, that Sansa expected Joffrey to die.
Many around her whispered much of the same. And Sansa finally looked around and saw Ser Preston Greenfield and the Hound standing there, along with many of the King's knights and Baratheon soldiers. They looked in distress and some them had been reduced to tears as well.
She half imagined what would happen if Joffrey were to die in that moment. Ser Preston would step forward, drawing his sword and accusing the whole room in being complicit in Kingslaying. Then the Baratheon men would all draw their swords, and they would all be killed on the spot.
But Joffrey remained upright, he had not made a sound for the last few hours. Except for some near silent grunts that Sansa barely heard at all.
Then the King crawled forward, slowly on hands and knees. He crawled until he reached Lord Eddard's side, and he stayed there. Praying.
This time, Sansa did not fall asleep and she watched Joffrey pray at her father's side for the whole night.
When dawn finally came, the King rose from his praying, only to immediately collapse on the ground. Ser Preston rushed forward and helped the King to unsteady legs. Covering the King with his white cloak.
They soon made a whole procession, of the King surrounded by his Knights and men. While the Septons and Septas marched behind them, four of whom carried the coffin of Lord Eddard. Sansa followed after her father, her sister and Jeyne having gotten not a whiff of sleep, walked wearily by her side.
The King led the procession up Aegon's hill, every time his legs became unsteady Ser Preston, or the Hound would catch him. They entered the Red Keep and made their way through until they reached the Godswood that overlooked the sea.
There was no wierwood there, the heart tree merely an oak that a face had been carved into. It was still a Godswood, and Sansa's father had brought them here to pray when Bran had woken in Winterfell.
A grave was dug before the old oak, and Lord Eddard's body was lowered into the ground. Sansa finally felt tears wet her cheeks.
It was a temporary resting place; Joffrey had assured them. Until the road to Winterfell could be opened and Lord Eddard sent to rest in Winterfell's crypts. The sword, Ice, was placed in a vault so that men would not be tempted to disturb the Lord of Winterfell's resting place.
The whole of the Red Keep was present for the final burial.
As Sansa stared at Joffrey, she wondered what she ought to make of him now.
She didn't know if she could ever forgive him for what he did, for not showing mercy when he had sworn to her that he would.
It was just that now it was so hard to hate him. That black hatred that had gathered in her heart since the day of her father's death seemed to almost disappear.
The North Remembers, Sansa's father had once told her. She would always remember Joffrey's order to Ser Ilyn, she would remember how cruel he had been afterwards. But she would also remember the shame that had been on the boy's face, and his acts of atonement.
And Gods help her, Sansa did not want that hatred to return to her heart.
Further AN:
This is the end of the first arc, though I might have made it way too angsty.
I based Joffrey's actions on those of King Henry II's of England. Basically the King had this friend named Thomas Becket who he helped rise to the position of Archbishop, with the hope that Becket would then help him in bringing the Church in line.
But Becket made it clear that he would serve the Church if he was made Archbishop and so he did. This greatly annoyed and angered the King in equal measure. And so one day when Becket had done something else particularly annoying to Henry, he offhandedly said something to the effect of: "Will someone not rid me of this turbulent priest?"
Some of Henry's loyal (and somewhat stupid) knights, heard the King say that and thought the King had meant it as an order. So they went and hacked Becket to death. Pretty brutally too. And so Henry had to atone for this by doing some public humiliation. (walking barefoot, being whipped by priests, creating a shrine for the man, and a bunch of other religious things.)
Joffrey's case is not exactly like Henry's. I believe that canonically Joffrey is fully responsible for Ned's death. But that he was ultimately a kid, only twelve years old and being subtly and not so subtlety manipulated by the people around him. Saying all of this, I think there is enough canon evidence available for me implicate Baelish in Ned's death and I subscribe that he wanted Ned dead as badly as Varys was going to keep him alive by sending him to the Wall.
Now, all of that does not really absolve Joffrey for Ned's death. And he has since then done a lot more horrible things in Skyrim and Westeros (since his return). He has a very strange moral code and his views on justice are half morality and half hypocrisy. What do I mean by that? Well he implicitly kills Baelish and many of his cronies because if he doesn't immediately hunt them down, they will start destabilizing King's Landing around him. Those men who he considered to be just corrupt, like the Kettleblacks or others who helped Baelish defund the crown, he simply arrested. And is beginning to build a Justice system that would effectively crack down on any such corruption in the future. Only Lothar he kills, because the man implicitly believed that the King was treating him unjustly. And there was to give him a trial by combat. So Joffrey did, and Lothar met the same fate as the Ebony Warrior.
Next Arc will begin next chapter, with Tyrion! and his mountain bandit friends. Though there might be an interlude between now and then.
