Thinking about how the Lady in Silver is an escapist pipe-dream for both Sophie and Benedict, in very different ways.
For her, it's the fantasy of being part of her father's world - as per her birthright, as Irma and Alfie underline, even if just for one night. A Penwood granddaughter wearing family heirlooms, free to admire and navigate society to her heart's content.
On the other hand, it's also Benedict's fantasy of belonging - if he met his match in this debutante of his own class, surely there's room for him to fit in as well. It's an illusion, because as blinded as he is by his privilege, he's still aware of his inadequacies both as a nobleman and as an nonconforming artist, as neither role fits him quite right. If the Silver Lady were real, that means he could choose one of these worlds and be done with it.
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Been a couple of days since I binged it, and I'm still thinking about the way AKOTSK handled showing vs telling, and how compelling they managed to make the contrast between these.
Simply put, they tell you something REALLY loudly (think, Fossoway's redditor rant) and then pointedly show you the opposite (Egg stepping up to save Dunk, Baelor's actions at the trial, Raymun's genuine horror when he saw the wounds on the the prince he supposedly hates) in a way that invites you to question where the truth actually lies -- is it what characters say it is, or what their actions reveal?
Lyonel loudly declares that Baelor risked nothing to defend Dunk, which is obviously contradicted by the outcome of the trial -- but Lyonel's outburst isn't meant to tell you what's true, rather to make you interrogate the bias between facts and what characters believe.
so I've been seeing people saying again and again that Rhaegar set out to recreate the OG conquerors' trio because he's so prophecy-obsessed and so on and so forth...but I don't know that I am entirely convinced of it? I think there's a general confusion in this case between a character's actions (such as they appear in the text) and authorial narrative & thematic intent.
There are two scenes where this gets brought up - the House of the Undying, which relishes the ambiguity of who Rhaegar is addressing between Dany and Elia -- and then also the follow-up, in which Dany notes there was no Visenya to complete the triad of Rhaegar's children.
Obviously, unbeknownst to her, there is a third child; Jon being the Visenya she is looking for. But I rather think that's because grrm was cheeky about his themes and very particular about the way he plays with gender inversions and cyclical history. I think that to extrapolate from these scenes that Rhaegar wanted to bio-engineer himself a Visenya is a pretty large leap.
This set of scenes becomes especially juicy imo, now that we know from hotd that knowledge of Aegon's dream is transmitted from king to heir. Obviously, it adds one more layer to the scene & dynamic between Rhaegar and Dany, as he passes this knowledge to her from beyond the grave. What this scene also does, is plant another seeds of the secret of Jon's parentage. I'm by no means one of the readers who figured RLJ out on the first go, BUT I do remember getting to this scene a decade ago and wondering, "is there a third child of Rhaegar's out there? Huh, seems like not. Weird. Ok next vision."
I think from a Watsonian standpoint, the names just alligned that way. Obviously, Rhaenys' name ties in to both his own, and his mother's, as having that Rhae- preffix. With that being said, the conqueror is not the only possible namesake - and it's kinda spicy of Rhaegar to name his Dornish first-born daughter also after the Queen Who Never Was. After her, he started seeing the omens around his son's birth, and we know from Maester Aemon that he was then convinced that his child would be the Prince, and not himself. As such, what better name for a king, if not Aegon?
Then, from the Doylist POV, these are all just fake-outs, and parts of the tragedy that preceded the current-era story. There was no Visenya, there was no second conqueror's trio, the promise was broken etc etc. We know grrm never intended these kids to survive - we know that if there is an Aegon the Conqueror returned, it's not anybody's son - it's Dany herself. We know that there is a Visenya to her Aegon, and he's currently lying dead in the snow lololol.
Like, there has to be this separation between what's authorial intent re: themes, and what's characters' actions and arcs, bc if Rhaegar actually wanted to just engineer the trio again, wouldn't he have just named his eldest Visenya?
Thinking once again about my jaime&dany meeting fic and the fact that I have 1k of dialogue and notes written out, a soundtrack laid out and several sketched out storyboards because - you might have guessed it - they drive me absolutely batshit insane.
I need to reread the books this summer, to fully get the tone right, but there is something incredibly delicious and compelling to me about jaime being a lying liar who lied his whole life vs daenerys slayer-of-lies targaryen and the way these two could intersect. Who will make it out?? Without even getting into "we shall talk when I return" and the way jaime is haunted by rhaegar, I feel like it's entirely boring to assume she might just outright kill him or ask for his head or any of the above -- there is so much meat and possibility in this dynamic, that it kinda makes my brain go brrr
was tagged by the lovely @virshiral 🫶 here's a lil doodle + snippet combo of something I've been tinkering with! lots of post-battle pining and a measure of comfort for dany and jon snow in--
to have loved and lost (614 words)
"Samwell removed the bolt in your leg and cauterized the wound." Jon keeps his voice quiet, his words slow. It is too deep to sew shut, Sam had whispered, calm even as sweat beaded on his brow, the bleeding too strong. There is little he would not do to keep from recalling the scent of burned flesh in his nostrils, and the way she'd thrashed against his grip while Samwell worked. "He gave you milk of the poppy for the pain, and left the tea for your fever."
She nods, pleased enough with the report, as business-like as if they were at the wartable in her crimson tent and not on her sickbed. A shiver passes through her, and she whispers half in apology, "I do poorly with the milk. It reminds me of a day I would rather forget."
There is something in her face that bids Jon to look away, to offer her the privacy of a vulnerable moment. It is not his place—
"And you?"
Her hand crept over his once more, scalding fingers a shock against his own. The question disarms him, as does the softness she asks it with. What right has he to be considered as such —among her people?
"I am well enough," he says, trying to keep his words light. It is an abysmal failure, and Jon lowers his eyes, desperate to escape the worry in her own. His breath catches in his throat at the sight of their clasped hands, the fevered heat of hers in his colder one, her blood still under his fingernails. He'd barely washed his face and removed his armour, before returning to her quarters to keep his vigil.
"Someone needed to stay guard, to make certain you were safe." The words are stilted, so he shrugs, "I wouldn't have slept anyway."
"Still, it needn't have been you."
There are few enough things he carries as heavily as the shame of his lies. This time, at least, he inclines his head and does her the courtesy of telling the truth. "But I am here nonetheless."
Moonlight pools in the white bedsheets around her, the gratitude in her eyes silver-bright and entirely impossible to bear. She is not one to keep herself away from those she treasures; it is something Jon has noticed already months ago. She clasps hands and crosses arms with allied lords and serving maids alike, presses kisses to Ser Barristan's bearded cheek and Missandei's forehead in lieu of greeting. Daenerys Targaryen, a slight woman worth an entire battalion when taking the field on the wing of her Black Dread, is impossibly free with her affections — he's known this, logically, but it has not prepared him in the slightest for being on the receiving end of such an onslaught. Nevermind that it is not dragonfire she unleashes on him, but rather the soft caress of her thumb over his knuckles and her murmured gratitude; Jon is felled under their weight, unable to breathe.
Perhaps she feels the way he tenses, or perhaps some new ache grips her, but she retracts her hand first, pressing the back of it to her flushed cheek, leaving him bereft.
It is no wonder she is freer with her touch— Jon has rarely seen one keep lucid while burning up the way she does; it is a miracle that she recognised him at all, nevermind thats she knew to ask about her people. She would have kept any of them close, had another been here in his place. Rather, any of them would have been able to offer her the simple comfort of a held hand. Jon feels ungainly in his skin, and unbelievably foolish.
gentle tags for @rookamell and @grad-writes 🫶 no pressure, of course!!
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was tagged by the lovely @shivunin - life has been frankly absurd this year (in between working like 3 jobs and several family health crises) and I got much less written than I would have hoped for, but these three stories have been steadily adding up words in the docs, and I would like to finish them at some point this summer. feel free to ask any questions about these or the other things I've got on the back burner? 🫶
Which WIP should I work on next?
viago depression roadtrip extravaganza aka - give me to the road ch 4
epic elven divorce ft. hobbits - over hill moor and changing ch 6
jaime lannister's suicidal shenanigans re: targs - the kingslayer's death
Voting ended onJul 6
Gentle tags for @virshiral @rookamell and @grad-writes if you guys feel like it/haven't done this yet ❤️
am willing to bet 5 bucks that grrm got the targ aesthetics from the 80s classic Ladyhawke bc rutger hauer as etienne of navarre is the targaryen prototype
