stannis week 2017 // day five: stannis the lord || @fyeahstannis
his mother tells him stories about jaehaerys the wise, long after his brothers have drifted off to sleep. about how one day, he will become lord who is right and just, never cruel, always willing to listen to the smallfolk.
in the dark, he can see his future in his mother’s eyes: something distant, something that makes hope catch in his chest.
his halls are solemn. his men eat, their voices never rising above murmurs. there are no songs to be sung here, no banter and jests, nor the warmth of companionship.
the meat is hard, the soup is only mildly warm. he wonders if jaehaerys ever had to worry about this, right before his appetite dissolves.
he dreams of that crown on his head, of walking up the steps towards that monstrous iron chair. as he stands with his back to it, the sea of smallfolk below start to cheer for him. they are calling, clamoring for him as if he is robert, renly, cloaked in all his glory and fairness.
but when he sits on the throne, the edges stab him, and he watches his blood run down the stairs, bright crimson and hardly forgiving.
“sometimes,” his mother says. “sometimes people do not understand that what they need is a firm hand. they want the gentleness in life- don’t blame them for it.”
“guide them. even if they hate you, in the end, they will see your worth.”
his halls are silent. in the distance, the bells of his fool, the cawing of the maester’s ravens.
lord of everything and master of none, he sits and tries to remember the way his mother’s eyes looked, the future reflected there.
he’s trying to catch that hope the boy he was still possessed, only he thinks he will never get it back again.
