(fourth lemon cake) voice ✧ open to both courts

[steeledskin]

Fellow Shardholders. [ of either court! ]

I would speak to a man of law -- should any find himself amid our numbers. [ such a profession is unknown to her, but stiles has explained some occupations and tenets of his world and this one in particular piques her interest. sansa stark could make use of such a man who might be bound by her confidentiality. of course, she does not quite understand the ins and outs of the arrangement.

but that's why she asks today: to learn; to plan; to piece together little patches of her defence. ] Anyone who would call themselves lawyer. I would speak with you. That is the word for it, yes? [ lawyer. ] My apologies if I've gotten it wrong; I'm only a simple girl and I am unwise in these matters. I want to learn about the things that are mysteries to me.

[ like whether a lawyer's strange binding powers of argumentation would even apply in these lands. once her conversations are finished, she snaps the locket shut and can be found in the library -- where she organizes books she doesn't care to read, because the practise soothes her and distracts her mind from its darker thoughts. or else come the evening she sits in her chambers, and allies of hers are welcome to stop and knock. ]

Comments

[steeledskin]

I fear I did not either. [ know much about winterfell. ] Not before it was too late.

[ but that is dreary. and sad. and she hates the way they both clam up and go silent when dark matters break up their fledgling conversations. ] Tell me, ser. Have you much work now that you are back in Caer Glaem?

[ polite curiousity. ]

[bullhorned]

[He finds her statement odd. But with the subject changed, he lets the matter drop. A less gloomier subject is welcome.]

Not so much. Only what I've agreed to. I ain't been taking any new orders. I don't want anything unfinished when we leave.

[steeledskin]

A responsible decision. Is there much left to be done?

[bullhorned]

I've finished Sigrid's knife. I'll be giving it to her soon enough. I'll be starting my uncle's sword soon. After that, there will be only a few things that need doing.

[steeledskin]

A sword? For Lord Renly?

[ and a knife for sigrid! she keeps this information near to her thoughts -- and thinks she may speak on the matter with her handmaiden soon. ]

[bullhorned]

Aye, he asked for it, once we returned here. He said he'd be proud to have a sword made by me. Might be he'll not be quite as impressed when I'm done with it, but I promised it all the same.

[He almost had a mind to put if off until his apprenticeship was over, but that part of him that began to recognize family wanted to know that his uncle had a good and solid sword in his hand if he was ever in danger. Gendry was no master smith, but he'd trust a sword of his own making more than anyone else's.]

[steeledskin]

It may be that his request is not about the sword itself, but instead about the making of it. If Lord Renly wanted a perfect sword, he could ask Their Graces for one or a hundred and one. More likely, he wants a sword from you. Perfect or not.

[bullhorned]

Mayhaps it is. Even so, I'll make it as fine as I can manage, even if it ain't as good as what Their Graces might offer instead.

[Though he was now reminded how absurdly he had offered the High King that he would forge something for him once his apprenticeship was done. He felt absurd for that now.]

[steeledskin]

Have you yet given thought to its decoration?

[ because she might have some ideas... ]

[bullhorned]

Antlers, certainly. Gold and black. A crown above the crossguard, I think.

[But that's the limits of what he's come up with, which is literally taking the Baratheon sigil in sword form.]

[steeledskin]

May I suggest an addition? [ she steels herself. ] A blooming rose, guarded most tenderly by those antlers. In honour of his lady wife, of course.

[ of course. ]

[bullhorned]

[He frowned as he considered that.]

I don't know. She's Joffrey's wife now. He might think it insulting.

[steeledskin]

Lady Margaery is wed to King Tommen, ser. [ and he is not here to be insulted. ] She may not have yet witnessed the...dissolution of her marriage with Joffrey, But I have. I can attest to its end.

[ i saw him die. and besides, margaery seemed to have made her choice: she is safer and freer at renly's side. sansa knows it. ]

[bullhorned]

Even so, seems it would make the roses worse.

[But there is not his usual stubbornness present. Only reluctance, because he could not feel certain in combining the two. Not when Renly professed no interest in children. There would never be any true union of the stag and rose.]

[steeledskin]

As you say -- [ she cannot make her case further without betraying her vowed silence. and hurting renly. ]

[bullhorned]

Do you think he would like it?

[He is not content to simply accept the way she often relents in discussion. He'd seen it far too many times on the road to simply let her suffer in silence as she so often did.]

[steeledskin]

I do. I believe he would.

[ and yet she imagines the shock of it once renly saw the rose. ] But you know your craft better than I do, ser.

[bullhorned]

I am, but I think you know him better than I do. So I'll take your word on it.

[steeledskin]

We met first upon the Kingsroad when Father and Arya and I came south. I knew who he was the moment I looked at him. And yet I would not say I know him well.

[ at least, it seems the man harbours secrets she could never have anticipated. ]

[bullhorned]

I didn't know who he was when I saw him. Just some lord. You might claim to know little, but it's still more than I do.

[She was born to the same world Renly was. Gendry is just related to him.]

[steeledskin]

How strange it must have been -- to see a stranger so alike to you.

[ because she forgets that poor people don't have mirrors. ]

[bullhorned]

Even stranger to see someone clean. I'd seen even less of that.

[He hadn't seen the resemblance, in any case. It only became apparent to him the day Lucrezia had cleaned him up and dressed him up. Only then could he see the man that might be a Baratheon.]

[steeledskin]

"Come, now. Surely you speak with some exaggeration--?"

She would not so brazenly question another. But Gendry... well! He inspired honesty in her bones.

[bullhorned]

"Master Mott was the only important person I knew for most my life. But he worked the forge as much as we did. There were days he was clean, but most days he'd be as sweaty and dirty as the rest of us. When I sold armor, it was only ever to hedge knights and free riders. Master Mott was the one who dealt with high lords."

[steeledskin]

"You can't have always been dirty..."

Perhaps he'd never had proper baths, but she couldn't imagine anyone -- even stinky Ser Dontos -- going long without so much as a scrub.

"When we travelled, and at the streams...!" But she supposed King's Landing hadn't had many of those. She had seen the city's veins creep across one another from tower windows and there hadn't been much water before the sea.