my headcanon: I’ve always thought Brienne would probably do better in the North.
I imagine Northern culture is built around endurance, labor, and reliability. Women there already work, already carry responsibility, already exist in physical space in ways that southern court culture doesn’t really allow. Sexism is still there, obviously, but it shows up differently when strength and usefulness are already part of daily life. I imagine their distaste for the southern way is very much how Russians view western Europeans lol so imagine their surprised with a highborn southron woman would knock a man or two on their ass.
I do think she’d still be treated like a curiosity. People would test her. but once she proved herself, most of that would quiet down. I think common folk would admire her.
She’s beaten the Hound. She’s beaten Jaime Lannister. She’s survived war, captivity, and keeps her vows. There’s also something very funny about the idea that people would be more annoyed they lost to a soft Southron than that they lost to a woman.
Her loyalty matters here too. The North values people who keep their word. And Bri is painfully honest. She doesn’t scheme. That alone puts her closer to Northern ideals than most southern knights.
She also promised Catelyn she would find her daughters and bring them home safe, and she did. Becoming part of Sansa’s guard feels like a continuation of it.
I love the idea of her thriving in the North and finally being appreciated as the badass lady knight that she is.
sidebar: I also imagine that once she becomes more accepted for who she is, she would allow herself to be more comfortable with the softer sides of her. Because as much as I love her. She has a chip on her shoulder for having to constantly prove herself. And sometimes you force yourself to do things you don't wanna do to uphold this vision of how other people see you.
I do not imagine that she would be super feminine and soft and girly, but I do think that she would allow someone to be gentle with her.
what do you mean the princess’s children resemble me? that is absurd and nothing but a coincidence. i am her sworn protector and nothing else. i spend my nights in her chambers only to guard her. speak once more against the princess’s virtue and i will see you beheaded at once for treason.
but more like Brienne fighting for her life to defend the honor of both her Queen and the most loyal man she knows to exist. but if she's being honest with herself...
Characters: Bronn of the Blackwater, Sansa Stark, Podrick Payne, Brienne of Tarth
Pairings: BronnxOC/Unknown, Podsa (implied)
Rating: General
Bronn arrived in Winterfell days before the tourney. He’d been invited to stay in the castle as a special guest, which still felt faintly suspicious as it was written to his wife directly, but he took the room and the food without complaint.
He liked Sansa. She ruled the way most hoity-toity high-borns would never. She spoke to servants the same way she spoke to lords. Asked questions and waited for the answers instead of filling the silence with herself.
That went a long way with him.
His wife got on with her well. Too well, if you asked Bronn.
Every visit they leaned heads together like little girls and traded secrets.
Today, they sat together in the glassgarden, talked while the boys went to the yard to batter each other with wooden swords. Conversation drifted the way it always did, toward children, toward futures, toward what made sense on paper.
That was how marriage came up.
His daughter. One of Sansa’s sons. Someday. Far off. Said lightly, like it was weather.
Bronn stood up and went to watch the yard.
He remembered holding that tiny, red-faced thing for the first time, how his hands shook and his nose burned. Remembered the feeling that rose up before he could stamp it down. And the sound. Seven hells, the sound he made when he cried, sharp and humiliating and real as he held her small, furious body and promised himself nothing would ever touch her without answering to him first.
He’d never imagined he’d care for anyone more than himself. Then she arrived, wailing and furious, and changed his entire world. And the idea of selling her off to some future boy lord, even one of Sansa’s, sat wrong in his heart.
In the yard, Brienne ran the boys through drills, patient and exacting. They were young, all knock-knees and enthusiasm, more noise than skill. Pod worked alongside her, correcting grips, shifting stances, steady and sure. A proper man now. Nothing like the clumsy, stammering page Bronn had met in King’s Landing.
One of the boys was sparring with Podrick, still thinking through his footing, when the eldest didn’t wait.
He cut in hard from the side, all speed and confidence, wooden blade snapping up before anyone could call a halt. Pod turned on instinct, blocked late, still took the tap to his ribs.
Brienne’s voice cracked across the yard. “Enough. You don’t strike when your brother’s engaged.”
The boy shrugged, unapologetic. “He should’ve been watching.”
“You’ll act honorably,” Brienne said, already tired, “or you’ll be barred from lessons for a week.”
Bronn stepped closer. “Honor’s for songs.”
The boy looked between them, weighing that, then smiled slow and sideways, like he’d just been handed something useful.
Bronn stalled on that familiar smirk.
His wife laughed from above, loud and pleased, and called down that Pod was getting slow. Sansa walked beside her, Bronn’s daughter settled against her hip, small hand fisted in red braids.
Bronn glanced up, then followed Sansa’s gaze across the yard to Podrick.
Pod was staring back... with that smirk.
You dirty bastard.
Bronn leaned in. “There’s something about seeing a woman hold a baby,” he said. “Does things to a man.”
Pod half-nodded, then stopped.
Bronn gave him a knowing look and winked. Podrick shoved Bronn.
Oh this is going to be fun.
He teased Pod for the rest of the visit. Asked innocent questions. Made observations. Wondered aloud how a fair queen with red hair ended up with sons so dark, especially when the king consort was all golden curls.
it's okay for your favorite fictional character to be a jerk, in canon or in fanfics, even if they're not a villain or an antagonist. real people can be jerks — good people can be jerks sometimes, that doesn't mean they are no longer good people, it means they are human beings with feelings and complexities.
let your character be a jerk when faced with a challenging situation, when the circumstance warrants them to be a jerk. let them lash out, be angry, make mistakes, do things they end up regretting. it's not bad writing, it's being authentic.
okay so I’m back on my Podsa bullshit and I’m not even pretending to be normal about it.
They’re my favorite healthier Sansa pairing, especially post-series. And yes, I’ve thought about this way too much.
First of all, Sansa deserves peace. Especially in the Television series universe. Actual boring, dependable peace. She’s suffered for many, many years and I like someone that is considered to be "the most loyal squire" that has ever lived to be her most loyal knight.
Podrick is an underrating pairing imo. Age-appropriate. Kind. Gentle. Loyal to a T. Zero desire to control her or manipulate her. He would just be there. Repeatedly. Consistently. Without ulterior motives.
Those first few ruling years would be hell (just imagining the economic strain of almost a decade of wars, winter, Bolton's burning through resources, etc). She’s going to need someone in her corner she doesn’t have to second-guess.
He’d stand behind her chair in council as her quiet competent and devoted queens guard. He's swear his life to protect her and mean it. And would likely love her distantly because she is his queen but also love the person she is. Maybe something only a handful of people would have the honor of seeing.
He'd see her for her and never judge her for it.
And yes, she deserves Pod the Rod. But more than that, she deserves Pod the gentle consistent option.
It’s a future where Sansa gets to breathe and isn’t constantly bracing for the other shoe to drop. Where they can boy be vulnerable and show their faults and negative characteristics, the ups and downs of their relationship/dynamic, and the long process of healing each other.
Anyway. This is me begging to bounce Podsa fanfic ideas again. If you get it, you get it. If you don’t, that’s fine, but you know I’m right ;p
Knowledge is power, my dear, because it tells you what people really are, not what they pretend to be.
People reveal themselves slowly, if you're patient.
Knowing isn't the same as understanding, my sweetling.
Understanding takes time...
...and leverage.
Everyone wants a story they can believe.
"It is double pleasure to deceive the deceiver." —Sansa, probably
Words: 339
His foot had slipped from the rung. The ladder is suddenly too far away. His mind lags behind, still reaching for the next rung. Grasping at air until certainty settles in with a calm he recognizes.
This is where it ends.
He had counted on time to do the work for him. Distance. Old resentment. The jagged edges of sibling rivalry and personality that never fit to begin with. Sisters pulled apart by tragedy, by fear and blood and loss.
Sansa had spend years at his side. Listening. Learning. Becoming careful and calculating in all the ways he admired. And Arya had returned from elsewhere, changed by forces he hadn't bothered to trace. Sisterly love, he believed, thinned under pressure. Blood was easy to turn. He'd done it before.
It should have been enough. It should have been easy.
Even now, he refuses to let go. He replays every word he ever gave her, every silence he trusted to do the work for him, every suggestion meant to sour a bond formed under tension and reunited under worse.
He had not accounted for how stubbornly she remained herself. How deeply Stark she was, buried beneath the courtesy and caution. He had mistaken her patience for permission. He had mistaken her affection for alignment.
When he looks at her, he sees the frightened girl in King's Landing. He has not thought of her as a child in a long time. Thirteen was old enough to learn. Old enough to listen. Old enough to be shaped, if someone takes the care to do it properly. And he had. A decade of quiet instruction, of correction offered gently, of pride disguised as indulgence. Somewhere along the way, she had become his.
He sees himself in her now, as if she had truly come from his loins. And when she meets his eyes, he understands. The clean, absolute, unflinching decision. He sees himself in it.
And as he falls, pride stirs, begrudging and unmistakable, that she learned so well from him.
commision based on Frankenstein done by @tropicoola .
"Why do you let people call you a dog? You won't let anyone call you a knight."
"I like dogs better than knights. [..] A hound will die for you, but never lie to you. "
(A Clash of Kings - Sansa II)
This is my Christmas present for the stunning Sansan's community as a celebration of the love we all share for this couple and the love they share for each other : romantically or platonically they are each other's world.
the best thing about SanSan is that it doesn't even need to be a romantic love story to be one of GRRM's best demonstration of love and knightly devotion in those books anyway: man walked through terrific flames after being guilty of high treason to the crown just to save the only soul that doesn't see him primarily as a cruel monster and yet still accept her refusal and blame it on none but his own cruel actions. She is accused of high treason against the king, researched to be killed, potraited as enemy of the kingdom and yet all she cares about is if him now hate her.
And obviusly i chose this base because both couples have a story rich of marriage imaginery.
a talking point i often see when defending the consumption of dark content is that it’s a coping mechanism for those with trauma which is very valid and true but i also want to make this abundantly clear: you can like dark content for no reason. you can enjoy fucked up shit in fiction because it’s enjoyable and entertaining. trauma is not required as a ticket for entry. enjoy your dark content bc it’s fun and sexy and don’t let anyone take that away from you
the point is that you can experience these things within the safety of your own home. i don't need to actually experience devastation and war to understand its survivors because i can read. and i have developed empathy and understand nuance. and the reason for consuming specific content is personal. why does everyone feel entitled to not just an opinion on shit that is not their business but also thinks they have the right to police them too.
SO weird to me that the default assumption in modern fandom is that you must be attracted to your favorite characters. nah man those are just my funky little guys and gals i want to study them under a microscope. i want to put them in a mason jar and shake it and see what happens
birth year of ASOIAF characters if AGOT took place in 2025:
a lot of the characters in ASOIAF were aged up for the show (with good reason in a lot of cases) but one thing that always strikes me about the books is how YOUNG most of them are.
so here are what their birth years would be if the books started in 2025 (pretend their birthday this year already happened).
this based on ages in AGOT- if we meet the character later I added a year or so depending on the book (also I split groups by decades for ease of reading).
Aemon: 1926
Tywin: 1970
Jorah: 1985
Davos (if ACOK is 2026) and Oberyn (if ASOS is 2026): 1986
Robert Baratheon: 1989
Ned: 1990
Stannis: 1991
Catelyn: 1992
Jaime, Cersei, and Lysa: 1994
Drogo: 1995
Littlefinger: 1996
Sandor: 1998
Tyrion: 2001
Viserys and Renly: 2004
Theon: 2006
Shae and Brienne (if ACOK is 2026): 2007
Loras: 2009
Jon, Robb, Samwell, and Margaery: 2011
Daenerys, Joffrey, and Meera (if ACOK is 2026): 2012
Sansa: 2014
Jojun (if ACOK is 2026): 2015
Arya: 2016
Bran and Myrcella: 2018
Tommon: 2019
Robert Arryn: 2020
Rickon: 2023
please comment if I got anything wrong/forgot anyone! (characters whose ages are too ambiguous I didn't include)
my favourite thing about asoiaf is how it refuses to let you hate characters in a vacuum like yes they commit terrible wrongs but the narrative also hands you their reasons the grief the hunger, the fear the warped love that make those wrongs human it doesn’t justify them it doesn’t erase the harm but it complicates it in a way that feels so painfully real grrm is basically like here’s humanity in all its contradictions now sit with it and i think that’s weirdly so beautiful
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Fandom: ASoIaF/GoT
Rating: General
Words: 1,968
Summary: A short oneshot that serves as a quiet prologue to Sansa’s life as Alayne Stone. Set on the road to the Vale, the whispers that start there, and the way they settle into the stone halls of the Eyrie.
･°˖✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧˖°.
The road curling up from the Ironoaks was little more than a suggestion carved into stone and mud, and by late afternoon the convoy had taken to cursing it under their breath in synchronized misery. Horses slipped on shale. Wagon wheels complained as loudly as the men steering them. Even the gulls overhead seemed offended by the pace.
“Gods, I swear this road's grinding my spine down to nothing,” muttered Jory Heddle, one of Petyr’s older guards, leaning forward in the saddle to stretch his back. “Three more days of this road and I’ll be walking like a folded map.”
“Three?” Ulmer said, incredulous. “Try five. My cousin did this route last winter. Said the last stretch winds up and down like a drunk snake.”
“Then your cousin can keep his snakes,” Jory growled. “I want a bed. A tavern. Anything that isn’t damp grass and cold rocks.”
“Ah, but the Lord is a frugal man,” said the squinting guard. “We'll camp till we reach the Gates. Cheaper that way. Besides—” He leaned in conspiringly. “—he’s busy with the girl.”
That quieted them.
None of them were brave or foolish enough to assume something that would cost them their tongues. But everyone had eyes. And when a girl appearing from seemingly nowhere, named a bastard to no one recalled, pale as washed stone, hair like dusk on water. People noticed. People wondered.
And talked.
And talked more when her accent shifted like the loose stones underfoot.
They watched her from the tail of the group.
She rode sidesaddle on a young palfrey, steady despite the rough climb. Petyr kept close, mounted on his older mare. The girl’s posture was too neat for the road. When the filly spooked at a leaf or pebble, she caught the reins with quick precision and set the horse straight again, palm smoothing its neck. Not a movement you saw in a baseborn girl raised on the edge of the world.
Petyr was beside her in an instant, speaking low. Her braid slipped from her shoulder as she nodded.
“Wouldn’t surprise me if she came from one of his favorite haunts,” the squinting guard murmured. “The man propped up half the Riverlands’ pillow houses before he grew his first beard. Still frequents his friends in Gulltown.”
“Everyone knows he does.” Ulmer quips.
“And a bastard from a whore? Wouldn’t be the strangest thing.”
“Stranger still that he claims she isn’t,” Ulmer added. “Might be too proud to admit she came from a tavern cot.”
A few laughs followed, rough from the road.
“A whoremonger’s daughter only has one path,” someone muttered. “Quiet, pretty thing… lucky she wrote to her lordly father before she ended up in one of his pillow houses herself.”
“Heard she came from a convent.”
“He visits those too?” another asked wryly, and the group snickered.
Speculation shifted, as easy as a horse changing feet.
“Or maybe she’s not his bastard at all.”
The spark of curiosity burned between the men.
“Maybe she’s company for the road, and now he calls her daughter to keep the peace.”
“No,” Jory said, though his tone lacked conviction. “Baelish is many things, but he’s no fool. He wouldn’t drag a strumpet to the Moon Gates. Not when the Lady Lysa writes him so often.”
That earned a soft murmur. Unease. Interest.
They stopped beside a wind-bent copse of trees and began the practiced work of making camp. Horses were tethered. Packs unloaded. The fire coaxed to life.
Jory noticed the girl first.
She dismounted with deliberate care, every motion measured. Petyr was beside her before her feet found the ground, his hand circling her elbow as though she were carved from something fragile.
“Careful, sweetling,” he said. “You must be tired from the long journey.”
“A little,” she murmured.
Her voice carried that uneven cadence again. Maybe she hides an impediment.
Ulmer leaned toward Jory. “She tired, or does he like hovering?”
“Mind your tongue,” Jory muttered automatically. But his eyes lingered too, curious despite himself.
Petyr brushed a loose strand of hair behind her ear. A small gesture, almost tender, out of place with a girl her age. He lowered his head, speaking quietly. She nodded, eyes lowered, posture softening in a practiced way. But when he turned, her gaze sharpened, skimming the camp with clear awareness before she tucked it back down. Mayhaps she was a curious girl, is all.
The men drifted toward the fire as chores finished. Smoke thickened in the air, carrying the scent of salt and damp leather. Their talk sank into the low register of travelers settling in.
“She’s too fine to be his bastard,” Ulmer said, as if making up his mind about the matter.
The squinting guard shrugged. “Men sire all sorts. Even a dull-looking man gets lucky now and again, if the mother was fair.”
“Maybe,” Ulmer conceded, “but she looks like she’s never hauled a net or washed a pot.”
“Aye. And never seen the sun.” The squinting man shook his head. “Skin that pale? She’ll burn living in those clouds.”
They laughed quietly, roasting their aches beside the flames.
“It’s the way he speaks to her. Like he’s teaching her something.”
“He’s a strange one,” Jory said. “But the girl’s no trouble.”
“Still,” Ulmer said, tilting his head toward the pair, “he watches her too close. Like he expects her to vanish if he looks away.”
“Or slip,” said the squinting man. “Like she’s pretending at something.”
A small hush, then a chorus of disapproving hisses.
“Don’t speak folly. Why would he bring a girl who’s pretending?”
“Unless he wants her pretending.”
That earned a few looks but no challenge.
Petyr and Alayne ate a short distance from the others. He tore the bread for her, handed her wine, rested his hand between her shoulders as though warming her through. She leaned in to the fire, eyes flicking around the camp before settling again.
“Maybe she pretends at a higher station,” Jory said after a while. “So she doesn’t shame him when he brings her to court.”
A few men grunted at that. Reasonable enough.
But Jory kept watching. Littlefinger’s hands never stayed far from the girl. A touch to her back. Her arm. Her hairline. Nothing bold. All of it deliberate.
That incongruity stuck like a burr in Jory.
By the time the road leveled out toward the Gates, the men were half convinced their horses would mutiny. The final stretch wound between slabs of pale stone, the air thinning into something colder, cleaner. Servants rushed about the courtyard as the convoy approached, voices echoing against the high walls.
A small shape rushed down the steps before any of them had a chance to call out.
Robin Arryn ran with more eagerness than grace. His arms flailed in wide arcs as if he needed them for balance. His feet slapped the stone hard enough to echo. The boy looked fragile even in motion, a bundle of thin limbs and wide eyes, cheeks flushed from effort rather than health.
“Uncle Petyr!” he squeaked, stumbling the last two steps. His boot caught the edge, pitching him forward faster than he meant to go.
Petyr stepped aside from his mare just in time. He braced himself as the boy launched himself into his arms. The effort dragged a grunt out of him, not loud but noticeable. Robin’s legs swung up as Petyr lifted him. The boy gave a breathless giggle, light and wheezy.
Petyr spun with him in a slow circle.
When he set Robin down, he steadied the boy by the elbow until the child found his feet again.
“You’ve grown,” Petyr said with a small smile. “Keep it up and you'll be the one spinning me."
The boy puffed up at that.
A flutter of blue silk appeared at the top of the steps. The Lady of the Vale descended with a kind of single-minded speed, more glide than walk. Her face shone with relief, though there was a tightness at the edges of it.
“Petyr,” she breathed the moment she reached him. She wrapped her arms around him before he could straighten. The embrace held a desperate sort of force, her fingers fisting in the fabric at his back. Petyr’s body tensed for a heartbeat, a small tell before he eased into the hold, offering her something closer to comfort.
“You're here,” she exclaimed, clutching his face between her hands, looking him over as though checking for injuries. “Thank the Gods. Are you well?Were the roads kind? Did you ride long? I've missed you terribly. You look tired. You must be exhausted. Did you—”
Her questions tumbled into one another. She barely stopped for breath.
The guards lowered their eyes out of habit. A man didn’t watch a lady’s yearning too closely. It felt indecent.
Petyr answered softly, smoothing her anxiety the way he might calm a child. The exchange held a rhythm. Familiar. As though he’d done so a hundred times.
Then her gaze caught on the girl.
It was a small thing—a hesitation mid-sentence—but the shift in her face was sharp enough for even the least observant man to see. The warmth drained. She blinked once, slow, as if trying to place what she was seeing.
Petyr turned, almost surprised himself, as though he’d forgotten the girl stood behind him.
“Ah. Lysa,” he said lightly, “this is Alayne. My daughter.”
A hush rolled through the courtyard. Even the servants pause.
The girl dipped a proper albeit clumsy curtsey. “My lady.”
Her voice was soft, careful, the way she’d practiced. From the guards’ vantage, she looked like she meant it. Lysa, though, stared as if the girl had stepped out of thin air.
“I see… ,” Lysa managed. Her smile returned, though the warmth of it had cooled. “I wasn’t told.”
“A recent matter,” Petyr replied. “But I mean to do my duty. The girl has no one else.”
The men watching traded glances. Duty was one word for it. Lysa’s cheek twitched as she opened her mouth. The guards couldn’t tell if Lysa meant to answer. Her breath caught once, her jaw wagging as if trying to come up with a proper response.
"I've not a room ready for the girl." she finally said, her voice thin.
Petyr reached into his cloak and drew out a small trinket. It looked like little more than polished shell set in cheap silver. A market-stall bauble at best, but he offered it with care.
“I brought you this from the coast,” he said.
Lysa’s face softened as if he’d placed something precious in her hands. Her whole demeanor changed, melting back into pleased relief.
“Petyr… it’s lovely.”
The men had seen grooms calm a balking donkey with less skill.
While Petyr murmured to her, Robin inched closer to Alayne. He studied her like a creature he’d never seen before, blue eyes round with inspection.
“If you’re Uncle Petyr’s daughter,” he said, “then we’re cousins.”
Alayne dipped her head. “If it pleases you, my lord.”
Robin looked very pleased indeed. His voice rose, thin and breathy with excitement. “You must stay near. A cousin needs proper chambers.”
He whirled toward the nearest servant, voice pitching upward. “Prepare a room at once. She’ll stay close to mine.”
The servants scattered, bowing and scrambling, not eager to test the boy’s temper. The rest exchanged glances that flicked between the visiting Lord, the girl, and the Arryns.
The guards felt it shift around them, a new current threading through the courtyard, subtle but steady. staff didn’t whisper so much as breathe speculation. The Eyrie was a hard place for secrets. Sound carried.
And from where Petyr’s men stood, it was clear enough the quiet talk from the road would only grow louder inside stone walls.
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