eachdraidh | (sixth lemon cake) video ✧ open to both courts

[ before the lockets sits a well-composed and well-turned-out lady: her face is set with discipline -- though below it she wants to crack and cry. but sansa stark has a duty -- some imperative -- to speak calmly of grave matters. nothing about this is comfortable; nothing about this is within her conventional grasp. she could compare it to her makeshift trials before the lords declarant or her audiences with the king, but this stage is far wider. out of frame, her fingers tremble. ]

Dear Shardbearers of either court --

[ if her voice shakes then it is by design. some honest fear is permitted into her tone, for what better to move the hearts of strangers than to express genuine dismay at this great knotted problem? she would not have thought to even sell it as injustice until living here and meeting many a person who appeared outraged over these alliances. these marriages. these common cages. ] One turn of the moon ago, High Queen Morla delivered onto me an ultimatum: to marry some Unseelie lord of her choosing, or else invite war upon the Cothromach. Whatever your loyalties, I beg you all to recognize the attempt for what it was --[ and do please fill that blank with your own outraged conclusions. ] I call for aid and support.

[ some words are permitted more of a quiver than others: morla; marry; aid; war. ] But I fear war has come already -- has long already been present -- and today I will refuse the proposal offered, because I fear it was only ever a blade's poisoned edge. I would prevail upon some soul from that queen's court to speak my refusal to her. [ powerful men have met her vulnerabilities with laughter, only to turn and shake their heads when she took small careful steps towards decision. what else is she to do? if she will not play the game by their rules, she must try to write her own. but even now, she hinges her action upon the passion of someone else's protest. someone else's judgement -- for better or worse. ]

The Lady Keeper of the Cothromach will not swear away her city to another court by marriage vows or by vows of any kind. [ except for other partial vows made in quiet rooms with would-be neutral parties. but those meetings are a secret and her announcement today comes instead to engage the hearts and sympathies of prospective champions who might grow incensed over a bully's tactics. lady sansa is not above playing upon their pity if said pity will protect her, her family, and her new city. anyone's pity will do: seelie or unseelie alike. ]

High Queen Morla's dogs are at the gate; let us be wolves when we meet them.

( ooc; i know some efforts have already been made re: the unseelie camps by lancer and others -- there's also a fresh log for the battle itself. )

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[Jon is at first dismayed: don't show weakness, he thinks. They will fall upon you like vultures. (He has spent so long trying to avoid the same, on the Wall.) She ought to seek power, not pity, because only the former will last - pity bleeds into derision so easily, and derision into rebellion. But in the end, he can't deny that it was a... moving display, and her own choice besides. She is his liege lady, now, it will do nothing good to question a decision she has already acted upon.

So he swallows his misgivings, and goes to her as he did after her last announcement to the lockets.

This time he knocks quietly, so as not to startle her.]

[ the door swings open.

and in its shade stands sansa stark, the lady keeper -- and her time in troichean beinn has clearly hardened her. not against fear or weakness: those she shows in spades. but laughter is an old lost memory, indulged last wearing another face during samhain. because today she finds her scrap of the map at war with a whole court.

and all because of a bastard-smith's bold intervention. no, she manages to think, it is not right to blame him for a choice made hers. ]

Jon. Lord Commander. Captain. Gods, I know not what I ought to call you now--

I think Captain, before others, for that is what I am here. [And he had hated being Lord Commander - it had been terrible and lonely, and the things he'd done while wearing that title-- no. He won't say it to himself, but he seeks to flee that. He does not want to be the man he'd turned into. The one who makes mothers give up their babes, the one who watches men burn as sacrifice, the one who has no sisters, only brothers.] But brother, alone. For that is what I am here.

[He exhales quietly, and gives what he hopes is a reassuring look.] I should be off to find Stiles soon, we ride out. The Seelie Queen has gifted him some great and powerful magics for three days, and where better to use them then to prove useless an army drawn up to cow this city? [An excuse already prepared, as he suspects his sister might like for Stiles to stay safe behind the castle walls.]

[ brother, then. she doesn't speak it -- but it's enough to let her lips trace the word. soundless. ]

Three days. And he spends them here? [ an exhale. gratitude. ] Jon. Promise me. If things are bad out there -- [ i don't want to know. ] You must tell me. There are those I might yet be able to draw to our side if I know they are needed. Be my sword and I will be your quill and we will...

[ do this together. but she does not manage to say it. ]

[He remembers with a start.] I have a bird. A- a raven. Lord Commander Mormont's old raven, in truth. I asked for a boon to Cothromach, and the gods only know why the fairies saw fit to gift me with the old beast, but. [He stops, frustrated with his sentence going nowhere, and starts again.] You might use it, if you wish. It flies fast and true, to any man you name, anywhere in the land... though it is like to beg corn off of you at every opportunity. [And, though he doesn't realize it yet, it will scream warnings at her of things yet to happen in the battle. It may prove terrifying, but surely useful, if she seeks to manage the calls for reinforcements.]

Oh.

[ something whirls in behind her eyes. some...possibility. not hope, exactly. but mild plans made from mild offers. sansa may not be bent towards the martial or the war-like, but she is no slouch in a handful of other directions. she has ink; she has parchment. ]

-- Good. Jon? Thank you. He'll be perfect. Is it a he? Does he have a name? [ ravens ought not to be named, she imagines, but this one is spoken of so particularly. lord commander mormont's old raven. ]

It is a "he." [Jon pauses, as though searching through his own memories.] No, I don't think so. I never heard the Old Bear call him anything, in any case. [He looks to her. He's not so good with such things - Ghost came to him, for all the little ways the name had just seemed to fit - but he still has none for his new direwolves, nor any of the horses he liked to ride.] You could name him, if you like.

-- After. [ she clenches her teeth. swallows hard. she is trying to be hopeful and painting a pretty picture in her words of an after that will certainly come and see them victorious. ] I will name him once the battle's won.

[ sansa reaches for one of jon's hands. the left, today. ]

[If he dies in the woods or at the gates, he sincerely hopes she doesn't name the annoying old beast after him in some fashion. He squeezes her fingers though, offering a thin, small smile, and certainly doesn't voice that sentiment. Not when she's putting such efforts into optimism.] After. [he agrees, and lets himself linger, but only for a moment. Only to let his calloused thumb wander over the knuckles of her own hand, then he lets go, and half-turns towards the hallway again.] I'll send you updates as I know them. They will not have your city.

Edited (u saw nothing) 2014-11-05 09:31 (UTC)

[ these small connections are paltry things. thin things. not the sort of emotional depth one anticipated from siblings -- but the two of them had to learn it all over again. none of it came easy. except for, perhaps, the trust. the trust was rock-solid and secure and it was what sansa could anchor all other progress against.

on impulse, she holds up her empty palm. almost a wave. almost a farewell. she knows this might very well be the last time she sees him, but she cannot quite pull together the depth of word and assurance to make the moment count.

so instead: ] I'll pray for you. With all my breath. We might have no tree, but I will pray.

[ sansa has not spoken aloud before now about any desire to pray to trees. in public, she defends the faith of the seven. in private, she barely indulges words about faith at all. but today she wishes for that northern faith. she wishes for hard roots and wide red leaves.

she wishes to see her blood kept living. ]

(sixth lemon cake) video ✧ open to both courts

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