#septon bernard

[stromuprisahat]

... whereupon the king commanded the bridge [of Maegor’s Holdfast] to be raised, the portcullis lowered, and the gates barred. The castle-within-the-castle stood secure. And so it would remain for eighteen days. ... In the days that followed, Munkun made several further appeals, assuring Aegon and Viserys that all that had been done was lawful, Ser Marston went from pleas to threats to bargaining, and Septon Bernard was brought forth to pray loudly for the Crone to light the king’s way back to wisdom, all to no avail. These efforts drew little or no response from the boy king beyond a sullen stubborn silence. His Grace was roused to anger only once, when his master-at-arms, Ser Gareth Long, took his turn attempting to convince the king to yield. “And if I will not, who will you punish, ser?” King Aegon shouted down at him. “You may beat poor Gaemon’s bones, but you will get no more blood from him.”

Fire and Blood (George R. R. Martin)

The king soon developed a strong antipathy for his new master-at-arms as well. Ser Gareth Long was a skilled swordsman but a stern taskmaster, renowned at Starpike for his harshness toward the boys he instructed. Those who did not meet his standards were made to go for days without sleep, doused in tubs of iced water, had their heads shaved, and were oft beaten. None of these punishments were available to Ser Gareth in his new position. Though Aegon was a sullen student who displayed little interest in swordplay or the arts of war, his royal person was inviolate. Whenever Ser Gareth spoke to him too loudly or too harshly, the king would simply throw down his sword and shield and walk away. Aegon seemed to have only one companion he cared about. Gaemon Palehair, his six-year-old cupbearer and food taster, not only shared all of the king’s meals, but oft accompanied him to the yard, as Ser Gareth did not fail to note. As a bastard born of a whore, Gaemon counted for little in the court, so when Ser Gareth asked Lord Peake to make the lad the king’s whipping boy, the Hand was pleased to do so. Thereafter any misbehavior, laziness, or truculence on King Aegon’s part resulted in punishment for his friend. Gaemon’s blood and Gaemon’s tears reached the king as none of Gareth Long’s words ever had, and His Grace’s improvement was soon marked by every man who watched him in the castle yard, but the king’s mislike of his teacher only deepened.

Gods! Aegon really did have a shitty childhood, didn't he?!

[horizon-verizon]

Seven days after the body of the little queen was consigned to the flames, Lord Unwin paid a call upon the grieving king, accompanied by Grand Maester Munkun, Septon Bernard, and Marston Waters of the Kingsguard. They had come to inform His Grace that he must put aside his mourning blacks and wed again “for the good of the realm.” Moreover, his new queen had been chosen for him. Unwin Peake had married thrice and sired seven children. Only one survived. His firstborn son had died in infancy, as had both of his daughters by his second wife. His eldest daughter had lived long enough to marry, only to die in childbirth at the age of twelve. His second son had been fostered on the Arbor, where he served Lord Redwyne as page and squire, but at the age of twelve he had drowned in a sailing mishap. Ser Titus, heir to Starpike, was the only one of Lord Unwin’s sons to grow to manhood. Knighted for valor after the Battle of the Honeywine by Bold Jon Roxton, he had died only six days later in a meaningless skirmish with a band of broken men he stumbled on whilst scouting. The Hand’s last surviving child was a daughter, Myrielle. Myrielle Peake was to be Aegon III’s new queen. She was the ideal choice, the Hand declared; the same age as the king, “a lovely girl, and courteous,” born of one of the noblest houses in the realm, schooled by septas to read, write, and do sums. Her lady mother had been fertile, so there was no reason to think that Myrielle would not give His Grace strong sons. “What if I do not like her?” King Aegon said. “You do not need to like her,” Lord Peake replied, “you need only wed her, bed her, and father a son on her.” Then, infamously, he added, “Your Grace does not like turnips, but when your cooks prepare them, you eat them, do you not?” King Aegon nodded sullenly...but the tale got out, as such tales always do, and the unfortunate Lady Myrielle was soon known as Lady Turnips throughout the Seven Kingdoms. She would never be Queen Turnips.

Fire and Blood, by George R.R. Martin, pg 638-639

[horizon-verizon]

Sandoq tore Viserys’s battleaxe from the wood where the prince had buried it and split Ser Amaury’s head and helm in half from crest to gorget. Leaving the corpse to topple onto the spikes, the Shadow paused long enough to shove the dead and dying from the drawbridge before retreating inside Maegor’s Holdfast, whereupon the king commanded the bridge to be raised, the portcullis lowered, and the gates barred. The castle-within-the-castle stood secure. And so it would remain for eighteen days. The rest of the Red Keep was in the hands of Ser Marston Waters and his Kingsguard, whilst beyond the castle walls Ser Lucas Leygood and his gold cloaks kept a firm grip on King’s Landing. Both of them presented themselves before the holdfast the next morning, to demand that the king leave his sanctuary. “Your Grace does us wrong to think we mean him harm,” Ser Marston said, as the corpses of the men Sandoq had slain were brought up from the moat. “We acted only to protect Your Grace from false friends and traitors. Ser Amaury was sworn to protect you, to give his own life for yours if need be. He was your leal man, as I am. He did not deserve such a death, at the hands of such a beast.” King Aegon was unmoved. “Sandoq is no beast,” he answered from the battlements. “He cannot speak, but he hears and he obeys. I commanded Ser Amaury to be gone, and he refused. My brother warned him what would happen if he stepped beyond the axe. The vows of the Kingsguard include obedience, I thought.” “We are sworn to obey the king, sire, this is so,” replied Ser Marston, “and when you are a man grown, my brothers and I will gladly fall upon our swords should you command that of us. So long as you remain a child, however, we are required by oath to obey the King’s Hand, for the Hand speaks with the king’s voice.” “Lord Thaddeus is my Hand,” Aegon insisted. “Lord Thaddeus sold your realm to Lys and must answer for it. I will serve as your Hand until such time as his guilt or innocence can be proved.” Ser Marston unsheathed his sword and went to one knee, saying, “I swear upon my sword in the sight of gods and men that none shall do you harm whilst I stand beside you.” If the Lord Commander believed those words would sway the king, he could not have been more wrong. “You stood beside me when the dragon ate my mother,” Aegon answered. “All you did was watch. I will not have you watch while they kill my brother’s wife.” Then he left the battlements, and no words of Marston Waters could induce him to return that day, or the next, or the next. On the fourth day Grand Maester Munkun appeared together with Ser Marston. “I beseech you, sire, end this childish folly and come out, that we may serve you.” King Aegon gazed down on him, saying naught, but his brother was less reticent, commanding the Grand Maester to send forth “a thousand ravens” so the realm might know the king was being held a captive in his own castle. To this the Grand Maester made no answer. Nor did the ravens fly. In the days that followed, Munkun made several further appeals, assuring Aegon and Viserys that all that had been done was lawful, Ser Marston went from pleas to threats to bargaining, and Septon Bernard was brought forth to pray loudly for the Crone to light the king’s way back to wisdom, all to no avail. These efforts drew little or no response from the boy king beyond a sullen stubborn silence. His Grace was roused to anger only once, when his master-at-arms, Ser Gareth Long, took his turn attempting to convince the king to yield. “And if I will not, who will you punish, ser?” King Aegon shouted down at him. “You may beat poor Gaemon’s bones, but you will get no more blood from him.”

Fire and Blood, by George R.R. Martin, pg 685-686

[houseofice]

Bernard

Title

Septon

Allegiances

Faith of the Seven

House Peake

House Targaryen

Culture

Reach

Bernard was a Septon during the reign of King Aegon III Targaryen.

Character

Bernard was regarded as a pious fool. He was younger than Septon Eustace.

History

When Lord Unwin Peake became Hand of the King in 133 AC, he decided to replace Septon Eustace with a younger man, his cousin Bernard. After Unwin resigned and left the Red Keep in 134 AC, Bernarr remained behind. When Larra Rogare, the wife of Prince Viserys Targaryen, gave birth to Prince Aegon, Septon Bernard anointed the child with the seven sacred oils in the royal sept.

During the plot against House Rogare in 135 AC, Septon Bernard tried to persuade King Aegon III Targaryen to leave Maegor’s Holdfast during the secret siege. Bernard wrote down Lord Thaddeus Rowan’s confession as the man was being tortured. Bernard was later named as being an accomplice to the plot, and eventually confessed to his involvement, citing his hatred of the Lyseni and their foreign gods. He claimed that it had been intended for Larra to die, so Viserys could ascend the throne and take a “proper Westerosi queen”.

During the treason trials, the High Septon wrote asking that Bernard be spared execution so that he might repent. King Aegon obliged, and Bernard was gelded and sent to walk barefoot from King’s Landing to Oldtown with his manhood hung around his neck. He spent the rest of his life as a scribe copying holy books at the Starry Sept, under a vow of silence.

Writings

Septon Bernard left no records from his life at King Aegon III’s court. He preferred to write and compose sacred music, which according to Archmaester Gyldayn was appallingly written.