Jon Valles

He ignored the comment about Genevieve Beaumont. He didn’t want Valles to ever speak of her. Or look at her. Or even think of her. He knew men like Valles who thought all women belonged to him; that all women would beg for him. Alexandir wondered if any woman he had had had ever wanted him. As long as he lived (which might not be for much longer) he would stand between them.

He laughed, then, when Jon told him he had best try passing out under the bed, as it worked so well for him last time. “Indeed, it has. It is why I am still alive.” 

“You do not think of her.” He repeated, “If only it were so easy for me.” He added, his wine sloshing in his cup. What he would give to never have to worry about Avelina Beaumont again. He meant her or her own no harm, but she was so convinced that that he did that Alexandir knew he should worry as much about what she might do as he did with Rowena (who had already made at least two attempts on his life). 

The words had come slipping out before he knew what he had said and, sobering up a bit, he looked back at Valles, “She does not much care for me. I’m afraid I have fallen a bit short of her very high expectations for her goodsons.” He chuckled again, looking directly at Valles, “But perhaps her standards aren’t as high as I once thought.“

“Ah! A compliment. I’m flattered that a man of your great intellect should be so impressed.” He said, his voice dripping in sarcasm. Being told you had a way with words from Valles was like Loys Mortain telling you you were brave. 

He shook his head, “No, you are right, Lord Valles. I don’t think they want anything from me.” Except my head. Just as they certainly must want your’s. 

Jon grunted when Alexandir said he’d always be standing in his shadow.  It was true, and yet given his tone, Jon felt it had been intended as a jab.  The only trouble was, Jon couldn’t figure out where the barb fell.  It irritated him that the detestable little creature might speak so and he colored once again, but could not find a way to respond to a jab he did not understand, save with more anger.  Alexandir’s apparent indifference towards all of Jon’s carefully aimed jibes did nothing to quell his temper, either.  He could think of nothing better than to insult his condition.

“Did your father even bother to teach you the ways of the sword?  I heard all you did in the South was actually done by Ned Barret in the South and you merely took credit.  But then, that would make sense, wouldn’t it?  Your father did quite enough when he chose not to expose you to the elements.  The shades of the gods clearly demanded your blood, else they should not have built you thus.  Any Northerner would know better.”

Jon rolled pale eyes as Alexandir spoke of Avelina.  It was a tiresome subject: speaking of a person Jon did not like with another person he did not like.  “Of course you’ve fallen short.  That’s the lot of a dwarf, isn’t it?”  For a moment, Jon fancied himself quite clever.  “Besides,” he added, following a long tug on his cup.  “Avelina Arrington wanted me, not you and not that sorry husband she got.  Me.  Not that it matters, now.  I do not want her.”  He smirked, pleased with himself.  “Avelina ought to be the least of your worries.  The last woman who was engaged to you wanted you so little she plunged her entire nation into war to avoid having you.  Did she die in the sacking?  Perhaps she fell on her brother’s sword, afraid you’d come claim her.  No one could blame her.”  He arched his brows.  “What will your present fiancée do to avoid your touch, I wonder?”

Jon’s face darkened when he mentioned how long Avelina’s standards were in his regard.  “On the contrary, they are of the highest order.  Lynessa could have had any man in Aragoth.  She chose me.”  Jon raised his chin.  “For all your fortune, title, and heritage, she did not choose you, I notice.”

Once again, Alexandir’s words rang true in Jon’s own ears, but his tone belied them.  It grated on Alexandir that he’d turned Jon’s barbed words around on him, while also failing to see the truth.  So blind, these fools, Jon thought.  He could not wait to see their heads, still dripping blood, suspended on pikes.

Clerebold Wylymot.  It was not the first time that charge had been heaped against him.  Clerebold has far more deeds to his name than had William DeGrey, so why did he get all the clamor?  Only because he was old and staggering when Jon plunged his sword through the man’s back?  For all his former greatness, everyone said that Clerebold had been weak of the mind, but he’d known to run when he’d seen Jon’s bloodstained armor.  It was Jon’s glory to have cut them down, yet they threw it in his face.  Jon had done what others were unwilling to do and ‘great’ Cassius could never have maintained his advantage without someone on the ground.  In fact, none of them could have.  To be sure, it was as thought Jon himself had lifted Rowena onto her throne, but instead they all spurned him and spoke of Clerebold Wylymot with scorn. 

Which of them had been brave enough to take on so renowned a warrior?  Rowena had called and Jon had answered.  Who else could say they had done as much as Jon in the queen’s service?  Certainly, what had Alexandir Godiva done?  Oh, he’d vanquished the South.  Oughn’t that to have been Jon?  Oh, he’d subdued a great enemy of Aragoth - one with whom he’d started the war in the first place.  As many had died on the Isles as at the Hall of the Dragon Riders?  Why was Alexandir Godiva praised while men spat upon Jon?

Jon turned a deeper shade of red and stood up.  Leaning forward, he slammed his palms down on the tabletop, leering across it at Alexandir.  The hall fell quiet as he began to retort.  “You wish to hear that tale, do you?  I’m not so talented with words as are you.  Perhaps I shall show you, sometime, Lord Dwarf.  Bards will sing of my deeds for generations, even now it should be never far from your mind, but you prefer to think of it as savagery.  That night demanded savagery.  Had you not been too drunk to notice, you might know that.  No one speaks of the horrors you perpetrated in the South, but that’s just war.  Tell me, dwarf, what are you hiding?  What did you do to those simple Islanders when they laid down their weapons before the onslaught of Aragoth?  Unlike you, I hide nothing.  Everyone knows what I did, just as they know what you didn’t do.  Shall I demonstrate my might?  You could do little and less to stop me, should I decide to take your head.”

“You mustn’t threaten His Grace, Lord Valles,” Avelina Beaumont’s voice cut in, calm, and Jon turned towards her with a sneer.  She continued speaking, her voice grating with every syllable.  “He is of the blood royal and your liege lord.” 

Where the nerve came from, he didn’t know.  No woman had ever addressed him thus and Jon’s eyes burned.  For a moment, he thought of showing her his wroth in a more tangible way, but she needed something more to deter her.  All eyes were on them; they all needed to see the truth. 

“Liege lord,” Jon spat.  He turned pale eyes on Alexandir.

“Get away from me, woman!” Jon growled, shoving her aside (he barely even noticed when she stumbled and fell) and standing back before ramming the table.  It shuddered and then flipped, sending food flying and displacing all the guests sitting with them.  Metal screamed as bowls hit the ground and whirled against it, the table itself hitting with a horrible crash. Everyone seemed to shout at once.   Jon’s cousins skittered about, Guin helping her sisters and cousin while people from other tables jumped up to help the ladies. 

Jon went on bellowing.  “We all know you mean I mustn’t threaten ‘in public.’  Let them hear.  Let them all hear!  Men like Alexandir Godiva blather and blather for they see themselves as invincible.  You think, because your sigil is a dragon, that no one can harm you.  All the gods damn you!  I could lay waste to you and, gods know, I’m tempted.”  He looked around the crowd, all eyes set upon him.  Beaumonts, Arringtons, and Godivas all gaped at him.  Even the queen, high on her throne, cast blue hues towards him. 

“That is quite enough!” Lysander Stafford, at a further tale, was striding towards them as he spoke.  Jon decided he would kill him, too.  A stake right beside Cassius Montagu. 

Ramsay Bolton, A Dance With Dragons (via

incorrectgotquotes

Arthur had never seen such a sight in all of his years. The Beaumonts never wanted coin and now all of Aragoth would know that only the Queen herself might outdo Lynessa Beaumont. Or rather Lynessa Valles. He must get used to that, he supposed. 

The wedding itself had been one thing, but the celebration after was another. The wine flowed like water and there were singers and entertainers from all over Aragoth. There was dancing and music and more courses than Arthur could count (and more still on the way, it would seem). 

It had not gone smoothly, but then with Valles as the groom could anyone except otherwise? He and Alexandir Godiva, both quite drunk from all that wine, had made a scene. Arthur said nothing, but he agreed with every word Alexandir said and would have told him so, if he hadn’t taken his leave directly after. 

Arthur had been chatting with Elyzabeth Fontaine and when she left to rejoin her sisters and cousin, he realized he had not seen his sister for some time. This would not have worried him if he hadn’t noticed at that moment, that Jon Valles was no longer at his spot beside his bride. Comments he had made about his sister flooded back to him and his blood boiled. Would even Valles be so bold to seek her out at his own wedding? 

Perhaps he had only made those threats to watch Arthur’s reaction, but Arthur would not take that chance. He grabbed the nearest serving boy by the collar, “Have you seen my sister?”

He must have had a look of murder in his eyes for the servant trembled, “Please, your grace! I saw her heading towards the Hall of the Gods.”

Arthur released him, wondering if he spoke true. Cordelia was a religious girl but he did not think she would suddenly feel as though she ought to pray in the middle of her cousin’s wedding celebration. Finishing his cup in one fluid motion, he handed it, emptied, to the boy before going to the Hall, himself. 

It was cool and quiet. He saw no sign of his sister, but he was not alone. Jon Valles was there beneath the altar of the hero. 

Jon had more or less stumbled his way to the Hall.  Gods, I’m drunk, he thought in surprise as he leaned against the Hero, himself, for support.  It had surprised him, a mite, that she had suggested here, of all places, but the surprise had only served to excite him all the more.  Arthur will rue this day, Jon thought, eagerly, pushing himself back onto his feet.  If only he were in witness when I ruin his sweet sister, that he might know his own despair.  Jon’s lips twisted at the thought, but he was content enough to inform Arthur of the event, himself.  Never would House Arrington forget how he’d lived within its fair daughter, Jon decided, staggering.  He leaned back against the Hero, again.

His head was swimming, but he’d never felt more sane.

When he heard the tread, it sounded heavier than he’d expected.  Perhaps her longing had gotten the best of her.  Still, the voice said otherwise.  “Arthur, mine own good cousin,” proclaimed Jon, making a mockery of a bow.  “Have you come to watch?” he inquired, arching a brow.  He felt like vomiting.  He smiled, instead.  A vicious grin it was, all teeth, as thought he meant to make of Arthur a meal.  “I ought to have guessed that was your game.  You’re man enough for little else.”

He straightened to face Arthur, swaying only a little - a steadying hand grasping the god’s ankle.  “I’ve nothing for which I needs must thank the gods.  They died a thousand thousand years ago and seeded the world with their heirs.  What are we, Arthur, if not gods amongst men?”  He tilted his head.  “You look at me, Arthur.  What do you see?”  Jon’s grey eyes were narrowed and he watched the Duke carefully.  Jon remembered, still, how they’d all sought to rob him of that which was rightfully his, fifteen years ago.  How was it that Arthur Arrington had so much when he deserved so little?  Soon enough, Jon would show him the dirt, when he threw him, naked, into an unmarked grave.  No one shall remember the name of Arrington once my reign has begun. 

“How mighty you are, Arthur Arrington, last son of a man who would be king.  Did he squeal like a girl, when you slit him from navel to nose, or did he fight?  What of your mother?  A sweet bosom had she, and hair much like your sister.  I wanted to fuck her, did you know?  I suppose I shall have to settle for the daughter.  Your sister is far more beautiful than her mother ever was.” 

One way or another, Jon Valles would be dead by nightfall. Even if it meant that Dmitrei must take the life, himself. Still, he had three pawns poised to do the job for him, however, and the odds that one of them should take his life seemed rather in his favor, be it by Arrington, Godiva, or Montagu hands. 

Dmitrei arrived at Fontaine that morning. He was playing the part of dutiful servant. Jon Valles saw him as a man who had connections, but who would be easily tossed aside and trampled upon when he was finished with him. He expected Dmitrei to stay close to him now, reminding him of his friendship and what he had done to help him secure his Beaumont bride so that when he was king, he would be rewarded. And Dmitrei would not give him any reason to believe otherwise that his motives were otherwise.

He was admitted into Valles’ chambers by a small servant girl who look terrified to show him the way. The room was dark, save from the light from the fire. Still, he could tell that he was dressed in his house colors: all blacks and silvers. He was ready for the day to begin, it seemed.

And so was Dmitrei.

There was one thing, and one thing alone, that could be said for Jon Valles and it was that, at that precise moment, he cut a fine figure: face half lost to shadow and cloth-of-silver glittering gold and argent.  He wore all black, save the cobra embroidered in silver thread across his back, the inside of his cloak, and slashes that revealed silver beneath his outerwear.  With gilded firelight behind him, he turned grey eyes on Dmitrei.  It irked him, when he occasioned to remember, that the Massard colors were the inverse of the Valles colors (black on silver versus silver on black, respectively), but the thought was far from his mind at that moment. 

Soon the crown, he thought.  He would build of Lynessa, this night, a throne of flesh.  Dmitrei might well feel proud: he’d played a humble role in Jon’s rise - and he did not mean to let Jon forget it.  Still, even vermin such as Dmitrei had their uses and Jon congratulated himself, inwardly, at how deftly he’d put the man to work.

Dead eyes flicked towards Dmitrei’s face before finding a more interesting subject: a goblet almost overflowing.  Scooping this up, the corners of his lips twitched upwards.  He pictured Lynessa, pictured all the men who desired her across the realm.  Yet only I shall have her.  He was hungry and only Lynessa Beaumont would sate him.  Lynessa and the crown that I shall place upon her head for...serving me.  If she pleased him, that is.  He would take however many wives he pleased, in the future.  “I hope you have not cast your eye so far, Massard.  You must realize Lynessa is, already, mine.”  Still, it pleased him to think others might want what Jon, alone, could take.  She’d had her vigil - she was ready and pure for him and Jon ached to conquer.  “A woman might slay other men, but never me,” he proclaimed, turning dead eyes once more upon Dmitrei.  “It is I she desires.”

He took a long suck of his drink.  “You have done well, Dmitrei,” Jon informed the lickspittle.  “I will not forget the fact when I come into my own.”  Soon, now, so soon...He could taste his future on Lynessa’s sweet lips.

“We never agreed upon your...reward,” observed Jon, narrowing his eyes.  It concerned him a mite that Dmitrei had weaseled out of the question, before.  Was he angling for a sister of Lynessa’s?  He’d hardly done enough to warrant good brother status to a future king - even he had to know that much.  If he were thinking of Rowena or Helena or Cordelia, he best think better. 

Jon would put each to the sword the moment he tired of them.  He thought, perhaps, he’d make Alexandir and Arthur watch him fuck the girls before killing the lot.  Next, he would scour the earth and all records of the names Arrington and Godiva.  You are the last, he thought, smugly, as he conjured them in his mind’s eye.  As for the dragon rider, he thought he would impale him, leaving him to die that way.  Fitting that a dragon rider should die without his feet on the earth.  Jon Valles chuckled.

And so Dmitrei would continue to have him believe that he was all that Valles saw in him. And wouldn’t such a man have come to him on this, the eve before he took his new bride and sealed the Beaumont alliance, to remind him who had help to make the arrangement? And who would further, help him become King? 

He supposed he would also take this time to pay the spies he had in Valles employment as well. 

Dmitrei caught the look Valles gave him and, ever the dutiful servant, moved quickly towards where the glass bottle of wine sat and poured them both a glass. Handing one to Valles, Dmitrei nodded, “Oh, yes. I have seen her. She is, as you say, rather consumed. I do not think she shall sleep this night,” He said. He wondered if Lynessa would. She had seemed excited, while her mother seemed worried — one mistake could mean everything. But Dmitrei had confidence in himself, even if Avelina did not. 

He allowed himself a laugh at the comment about her mother, “The idea of losing a daughter has never sat well with Lady Beaumont,” Dmitrei said, “And now she is losing all three. Indeed, her youngest may be lost forever,” He added, “Frantic would be putting it lightly, my lord.” 

He paused, “She knows, of course, that her eldest could hardly have made a better match, but I will warn you: I’m afraid you will still have to deal with her … wrath, tomorrow. She may have given her permission for you to wed her daughter, but she’s never been especially … kind to the men who mean to take her daughters away from her. You won’t escape with your life, if she has a say in it,” He said, lightly, as though in jest. 

He smiled then, as though he thought Avelina’s wrath was something one could only laugh at, when really he knew better than anyone how dangerous she truly was. He had warned Valles, but knew immediately that he would not take his warning anymore seriously than if he had told him that Lynessa had been manipulating him from the start. 

“Gold?  Perhaps a pretty little thing to warm your bed?  Some young girl - or boy? - to brighten the night?” he inquired, eyes narrowing.  It didn’t particularly matter to him where Dmitrei took his pleasure, but he was a mite curious.  He thought he knew what kind of man Dmitrei was, but that didn’t mean he thought he understood him entirely, either.  “An advantageous marriage?  A stately appointment?  You have already a council seat, the de Montford lands and titles, an estate in the far-flung South.  What would you have of me?”

Dead eyes brightened as he thought of Lynessa lying awake for want of him.  “She has not long to wait, now,” he said, softly, stroking his beard.  He found himself, for the first time, wondering what she might long for tomorrow night.  Where did she shiver to be touched?  Or long to touch?  A grin scrawled across his face and he glanced out the windows as rain distorted the view of the green east.

Tedious Lord Moran and the boy Stafford - he had a great deal of potential, Jon thought, but still he would never command Jon Valles again - would expect to meet the new Lady Valles but Jon would keep them waiting as long as it suited him.  And still, he knew, the fools would be blindsided when he seized the throne.  Renfry, alone, might not be outwardly shocked, but he felt that even that man would be surprised.  Fools, the lot of them.

His grin sharpened into something predatory as Dmitrei spoke of Avelina.  It pleased him to think of her desperate and demanding, the idea of her loosing to him.  She’d be dead in two day’s time.  He turned with some confusion when he spoke of the youngest.  Pretty little Celia.  “What of the youngest girl?  Has she fallen ill?”  Perhaps he’d not get the chance to fuck her, afterall.  He should have taken her when he had the chance, he thought with a spike of anger.

"I imagine that they will stay here, under your protection, once Lord Fontaine passes?" He asked, as he walked slowly towards Valles, absentmindedly brushing his fingertips over detailed map of Aragoth that lay open on one of the tables as though he was looking it over, but in truth his thoughts were far from geography. 

He had feared this and in the back of his mind, he always knew that it would come to that. The Fontaine girls had no other living relatives, that he knew of, where they might go. Their only hope had been for marriage. Arthur had always pushed things he didn’t like to think about to the back of his mind: unconfronted. He knew he had to make a choice and then he could save one of them, at least, from that fate. Living with Valles now could not be a good thing, but no woman wanted him for her lord and master. 

"I will choose my own wife, when the time comes," He said, firmly. Valles would have no say in it. “You, nor any man, will choose for me.” He realized, of course, that the entire city had been wondering if he could do just that: but Arthur knew himself and eventually a choice would be made. He would carry on the Arrington name. 

A cousin for a cousin … 

"Has that all been settled then?” He asked. He had heard rumors, of course, but he never had truly believed them. Nor did he mean to insult his aunt by asking her to confirm them. He had seen first hand how much Avelina cared for her daughters. Wasn’t it Lynessa’s birth that had marked the end of their childhood friendship? Her daughters had changed her: they were her everything. 

Which was why this move did not make sense to Arthur. Oh, he could well understand what Valles (and every other man in Aragoth) saw in Lynessa. But what did she see in him? She had no need for all his wealth and armies — certainly not at the expense of being his wife. He had expected Avelina to marry her eldest to something she thought worthy (or almost worthy) of her daughter. 

"I am surprised my aunt gave her consent," He said. "But then, if this is indeed Lynessa’s desire, I suppose she couldn’t find it in her heart to say no." In truth, Arthur only knew his cousin on a rather superficial level. All of the girls had grown up together and Arthur had never bothered to learn anything about her to set her aside from the rest. Still, he doubted that even Lynessa should want Jon for a husband, whatever her might bring to the marriage. 

It seemed much more likely that this was all part of some scheme Avelina had devised, but to what end, Arthur could not see. She, like himself, knew that there could be no fighting Rowena, ever. They could not win. He and his aunt, both, knew that they must always remain her humble servants if they wished to protect their own lives and the lives of those they loved.

Then I must be content to seek her out in the quiet moments. Arthur stared hard at him. He was a silly little man if he thought he would ever come close enough to his sister to speak with her. Arthur would not let that happen. He had seen the way that Valles looked at any beautiful woman and he knew the sort of thoughts that danced around in his head. 

I killed my own parents in cold blood, he wanted to say, what do you suppose I might do to you? 

"Who can, indeed?" He asked, raising an eyebrow, "Weddings are as unpredictable as anything else. No man can see the future." No man without magical abilities of course and even then, it had not been proved to be always right. The future was always changing.

Such prying questions, Valles regarded Arthur gravely.  “That choice shall be theirs when the time comes.  They may seek their own food and shelter, or they may remain upon my charity.  I only ask that they fulfill the duty of any woman in running a house for a man,” he said, softly, innocently enough coming from another, perhaps, but he was Jon Valles. 

“My sweet cousin Isabella, I think, is the most likely to stay on.  She was a wife, once.  She knows how to run a great house, and she knows something of men.”  He watched Arthur, carefully.  Like everyone else in the East, he wished to unravel the secret of his favorite Fontaine.  “But then, Elyzabeth, though an untested maiden, does have a degree of understanding with regard to these things, having been her father’s helpmate.  Ophelia and Guin are, I think, the most likely to leave and what then of them?  I can’t imagine what women seem to think they can achieve without a man to protect them?  Shall they take to the streets?” he shrugged, smiling laconically at Arthur.  “Who can tell?”

He exhaled slowly as Arthur said he would make his own choice.  “Yet, I am their protector.  Suppose I told you that you may no longer pay court to two of them.  Or, I simply wed them to someone else, out of hand?  Would I not, then, have made up your mind?”  He sipped his sherry, watching Arthur.  Still, he did not like to picture Arthur laying claim to any of the girls.  They were Jon’s.  Perhaps, when he had tired of them, he might release one into Arthur’s bed.  Afterall, he knew even a single night with Jon would improve them drastically.  Women were empty shells, waiting for men to fill them up and, if they found a good enough man, to be bettered by having borne his weight.

Jon sneered into his cup as Arthur questioned the Beaumont desire for him.  “Did you not know, then?” he inquired, lips curling into a mocking smile.  “Your aunt desired me...desperately.  For herself.  For a time, she thought she could win me, for a time I was tempted by an old desire, but...”  But then he’d seen Lynessa.  Once her fair image was engraved upon his mind, he could not shake her.  “Once she discovered, to her grief, that she could no longer have me, she left me to court her daughter.”  His smile twisted in private amusement.  It pleased him to deny Avelina that which he knew she wanted, knowing she had never looked his way when he might have deigned to take her.  “And the daughter is...” he closed his eyes, picturing her as she would come to him upon their wedding night, her clothing falling away to reveal the sleek figure he’d so obliquely glimpsed ere now...  “Exquisite, indeed.” 

Jon returned his gaze to Arthur’s.  “I’m surprised you didn’t try for her.”  He laughed, suddenly.  “Haven’t you heard?  She’s imminently to be connected with Fontaine.  Isn’t that what you desire in a woman?”  If you try for my wife, thought Jon.  I shall see that you come to rue your very birth.

She had lost all patience with him and then he moved too close and the closeness made her skin crawl. How dare he corner her as though she was some prey to be trapped! She was a Beaumont and an Arrington, and far above him both in rank (and character). Her mother would surely hear of this. 

Thankfully, he saved her having to escape him by dropping his hand on his own. 

Celia liked being compliment: she had suffered many men who payed her pretty words about her beauty, her spirit …  but when Jon Valles spoke about such things, she felt repulsed. She would have rathered that he stood there insulting her than talking about how she turned heads. 

"Many suitors," he agreed. He thought of Lynessa, then, rising from the bath, steaming water streaming from every curve of her body...He would teach her every stroke of pleasure and every press of pain soon enough. "But only one will bed her." She would shriek his name in agony and ecstasy and she would be his forever.  "I will be that man and you shall be my sweet sister," he added, moving closer. He would take them both together, too, and the other girl as well. Avelina would never sneer again. Arthur's pretty name would be plunged into forgetfulness as he rammed Valles into them. "Do not fear, I have reason enough to be confident. Your sister wants no other. Her body is my temple and often shall I make worthy sacrifices upon its altar."

He arched his brows. "And you a bride as well!" he added. He wondered if she'd tremble when Loys unrobed her, or when he touched her nakedness...He would cut off the man's cock, Jon decided, before he permitted him the mercy of death. "As your...brother, perhaps you'd like to ask me about what Loys shall expect of you as a dutiful wife. There is much I could...help you understand. I am quite sure your mother left you woefully unprepared. She always was a champion when it comes to withholding the essentials." Never once had she brushed her hand across his thigh or leaned such the he could see down her dress to the gentle slopes and soft peaks of her virginal breasts. She had never once looked his way when she'd taken court by storm with torrid affairs. Lynessa was a different breed. She had sense enough to know who was man enough for her.

He scowled when she took that tone with him. A woman ought never to address a man so. He ought to have struck her so that she staggered and hit her head again on the wall when she fell, skirts tangling amidst her soft white thighs. Jon pictured her ankles, her shins, the smoothness of her untouched skin beneath his rough hands. He would help her unwrap them - and exact a toll for his assistance. He pictured her maiden blood staining those fine silks and the slickness of her Arrington Crimson upon him as he drove onward.  Unflinching, he thought, wryly, one side of his mouth turning upward at the thought.

so i don’t know what we really want to do with the relationship between these two now. rowena still employs jon though because, wow, SO MANY ENEMIES STORMING ROWENA’S CASTLE. and now i think she’d definitely know that jon is marrying lynessa so she might be like “WHY WOULD ANYONE MARRY THAT FILTH?!?!” and basically be a little amused??

Ummmm, as for their relationship at large, Jon is def all about Jon, ok, so he feels that he basically single handedly put Rowena on the throne and then got no credit bc Cassius stole his thunder by killing off the Dragon Riders while Jon Valles took out any remaining soldiers/guards that were around (not many bc the country was at peace) and plundered the Hall of the Dragon Riders and killed all the old people/little kids in training/stole all their treasure/etc for Rowena.  he also made himself extremely wealthy in so doing by taking a good percentage of the plunder himself.

I know he also resents that Alexandir got picked to go to the Southern Isles, bc Alexandir returned with all this glory and Jon’s like THAT COULDVE BEEN ME and meanwhile isn’t clever enough to realize that Rowena sent Alex to die and Alex just didn’t die.  He likes to protect his pride by saying things like, “The Queen clearly knew she couldn’t do without me near her.”

tl;dr: Anyway, so he probs has mixed feelings about her hahahaha to say the least.  Bc she’s a woman, she doesn’t wanna hit that (why?????? jon can’t figure that out????? she must not feel she’s good enough for him?????), he DOES want to hit that, he means to cast her down and take all that she holds dear, he feels she doesn’t give him enough credit for his excellent excess of awesome, up until recently he was v excited to be the queen’s own hand-picked standing army until he decided that he, himself, could be king.

BUT ANYWAY.  The world would def be better off w/o Jon Valles.  No question.