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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Perhaps. Though after several thousand years, most dances are hardly exciting.

S-several thousand...?

[ her surprise is feigned. by now, long-living beings cannot surprise her. she has seen too much here. ]

Yes. Though I understand that many will live long lives, here.

[ Well. Provided they aren't killed repeatedly. ]

And yet perhaps not so long as that. [ but...! she thinks about tzilan. yes -- it's possible.

but the more important question: ] How many of those years were spent here?

Not even one, yet. Though I find that human nature is much the same across worlds.

Such, I imagine, is the very nature of...[ nature. she swallows the repetition. it is clumsy. ]

[ His head tilts. ]

Humans?

Them, certainly. I cannot speak to others. [ like whatever in seven hells he was. ]

Are there others, in your own world?

There are Others -- [ oh you can almost hear the capital o. ] But my eyes have never seen them.

That is often the way of things Other. I myself rarely interact with most of the world, though I am forced to be far more active in this one.

Will you tell me what you know of them?

[ He's a very curious sort of being. ]

If you'd like. There are others who know more, perhaps, but I...

[ she cannot always delegate. she cannot always avoid speaking. so her tactics change: ] These Others live in the Land of Always Winter. Beyond the Wall. Indeed, a great man built the Wall to keep our lands separate. They are creatures of frost and chill.

And why should your lands be separate? What is it that they do?

They war. As we war. Not, I think, in the same manner. But there was a war, and the Wall was built to keep our lands apart. The details are bare at best -- most believe the Others haven't been seen in...[ a brief moment while she thinks. ] Thousands and thousands of years.

Human memory is poor, [ he agrees- well, at least he thinks he's agreeing with her. ] Yet you believe they are there?

I didn't. I...don't know what I believed. [ too much uncertainty; too much weakness. she tries again. ]

I have since heard reports from north of the Wall. Trusted ones. I haven't seen them myself, yet I think I must now believe.

Perhaps it is best to believe and to prepare for something that may never come than to remain stubbornly ignorant and be blindsided.

Alone amidst the Seven Kingdoms, my own lands did prepare. We supported the Wall like no other. The North respect the men of the Night's Watch where others mock their cause.

The North, [ he repeats; it's as if he's plucked the word from the air, is turning it between his fingers only to slide it into his pocket. ]

The memories of men last all the longer when the men remain alive. If you are very lucky, you will tell stories of what is truly on the other side of the Wall when all others have been taken by the cold.

[ It's a statement that's sort of like wishing her well, if it weren't... a bit creepy. ]

Are your lands near the sea?

Stark Lands sit between the Shivering Sea and the Bay of Ice.

[ that is to say 'her lands' (such as they were) spanned a continent. but she adds softly: ] Our seat is somewhere near the middle. Winterfell.

(sixth lemon cake) video ✧ open to both courts

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