The thing that compells me about Gwaynston is that it is knight4knight. On the surface, both the "perfect" embodiments of knighthood, but Criston is disillusioned, self-hating, and embittered because his whole story is about the struggle to maintain that façade. Knighthood is a fucking boulder he has to lug up the mountain every day. The "white" in his "white knight" title is something he constantly has to earn and justify because people see him as brown and he sees himself as soiled.
And on the other hand, you have Gwayne who thought knighthood was as easy as breathing. What's so hard about holding honor and keeping oaths? It's what men like him were born to do, after all — it's in his nature. But then he gets taken out of the theater of jousts and tourneys and shoved into actual war, and realizes: shit, it's easy to be just and honorable in comfort and privilege, when you aren't scared and fighting for your life. Men at war turn into beasts, raping and pillaging and getting away with it. Gwayne the Green Knight — Green as in naïve and has to learn that war doesn't reward honorable men.
We could have had a Jaime and Brienne type deal, where Criston impresses Gwayne with how decisive he is a Commander, how he's willing to make tough calls and that Criston's not actually as hateable a man as Gwayne's prejudice led him to believe. Meanwhile, Gwayne challenges Criston's cynicism, shows him that it is possible to still be honorable. There is such a thing as good knights and not just hypocrites.
BUT ALAS! Alaaaaaaas HOTD hates any kind of yaoi. Just ask my close and personal friend, Laenor Velaryon.
gummygunk
jimmyeatworldofficial
izzy806
amandla
turnnoffyourmind
