Change is Inevitable

Subterfuge — visual introduction

This is a story that begins with misread intentions.

With questions history refuses to answer, and choices that might have changed everything—if fear had not spoken louder than desire, and duty louder than truth.

Alicent Hightower did not refuse her path.

Daemon Targaryen did not arrive in time to alter his.

And so the world called inevitability what was only delay.

House Hightower and House Targaryen do not remain distant in this telling. They collide, they linger, they change each other in ways neither can fully undo.

After all, fire does not remain fire when the wind refuses to leave it alone.

It spreads.

This blog is an archive for my AO3 work Subterfuge: moodboards, character studies, deleted fragments, and additional lore.

→ Read here: Subterfuge (AO3)

https://archiveofourown.org/works/85825461/chapters/226854381

Chapter 16: The Consequences of Your Actions

https://archiveofourown.org/works/61452235/chapters/167192263

https://archiveofourown.org/works/61452235/chapters/165282985

Her chamber door slammed open and in stormed the King Beyond the Wall. His large hands fisted at his side as he halted mid movement in her doorway.

Sansa couldn’t help but just stare at him from her throne once the initial fear had subsided. Her ladies in waiting, summer children who had never known the touch of war or men, were scrambling from the surrounding chairs to their feet. Their embroidery long forgotten on the floor as they moved to get away from the raging man before them.

Jon looked so different from the last time she had seen him, gone was the stubbled chin and short unruly hair. Now he stood before her somehow taller, with a beard, scattered with grey, and his hair still unruly but tied behind him, with curls threatening to escape at every angle.

It had been over ten years since she had been in his presence, sending him beyond the wall so the seven kingdoms may know peace and she knew that her own appearance had changed in that time. 

No longer a child and somehow more crone than matron these days her own hair was fading from the auburn of the Riverlands to a colour that matched the never ending snow. 

They had exchanged ravens for the years, little notes about the kingdoms, about trade and about their lives.

“Get out.” he seethed at the girls, Sansa couldn’t help smirk as the girls all turned from him to her awaiting her instructions. 

He might be the King Beyond the Wall but she was the Queen of the North and she held the power here.

She nodded for them to leave and they quickly gathered their belongings, curtsied at both King and Queen before escaping the room that was quickly becoming stiflingly warm. Sansa knew they would not be far, listening in through the door, waiting for all kinds of gossip to share later with their companions. 

Once the last girl had closed the door Sansa gestured for him to sit, still silent and without rising to show him any formalities. They had been raised under the same roof, she saw no need to be Queenly now.

Jon sat gingerly on the edge of a seat, his large frame devouring the wooden structure.

Sansa’s last letter to the man had been a farewell, he had ignored her last three, having his own men respond to her questions about trade but anything in relation to his life or responding about hers was left unresponded too. 

So she had written him one final letter before handing the job of communicating with the men beyond the wall to one of her advisors. The letter, like many others had been responded to by his own men, and left her the knowledge that much like most of the relationships from the war this too had run its course.

“You are well.” She finally stated, looking at her nails instead of the king.

“You do not wish to write to me any longer.”

Her eyes rose to him, her brow perfectly arched in question.

“You wrote me a letter, telling me you wished to no longer speak.”

“I wrote you a letter, explaining that I was no longer the person to speak about trade and my advisor Lord-”

“I do not wish to converse with your Lords, I will converse with my Queen!”

“You do not converse with me at all, Jon, you have had advisors responding to me for the last seven moons! I am only confirming that I will follow your lead.”

They fell into an uneasy silence, both unable to be the next person to speak.

Sansa fiddled with the hem of her sleeve, an old habit from her childhood before she sighed deeply.

“I meant you no offense, you must know that. Time has robbed me of so many people, I just thought you were one of them. Arya is gone, only the gods know where. Bran is South and will not venture North. My family is scattered to the winds and I am tired.”

Jon nodded slowly, and suddenly time slipped away and they were children again, sitting in this throne room talking about the war to come. His face is so uncomfortably young.

“It hurts to speak with you, to think about the possibilities of what could have been.”

“What could have been?”

“Us, Winterfell, peace in the castle we both grew up in.”

Sansa swallowed her heart, which now beat rapidly in her throat.

“You never wrote back.”

“And I never knew how much I missed you until your letters stopped. Sansa-” he breathed out, her name on his lips less a familiar name and more a prayer, “I am banished to beyond the wall, to never return to the South. And I thought I was fine with it, accepting my lot in life because I had your letters. We were redrawing the lines between the South and Beyond the Wall. And I thought that was it.”

“Jon, I will not stop trade between my people and yours. The North is flourishing-”

“I do not care about trade Sansa! I care about you!” 

He fell from his chair and knelt on the ground, his hands grasping at her skirt.

“Jon-”

“I miss you Sansa! More than anything in this world and the next!”

“You have a funny way of showing it, you ignore my letters and now come here and demand my attention.”

“I have made many mistakes in my life, but setting you aside was the worst.”

“Jon-”

“Please Sansa, let me apologise.”

Sansa stared down at him, the King Beyond the Wall kneeling at her feet, grasping her skirts as if she was the only thing stopping him from drowning. 

A good side of a war to support is only as good as the threatening opponents you show us they were capable of defeating. Robbs victories were impressive because with the lesser numbers in foreign lands he was able to outsmart Tywin at every advance. The Lannisters victory in the Blackwater was impressive because they pushed Stannis back when he was literally minutes away from taking the city.

This is a story about a family experiencing a civil war with magical nukes.

Like if you’re going to write a story about a war in a fantasy world you’d think they’d like actually focus on driving home how dangerous both sides are in said war. Instead they just flounder around having the characters on both sides make such monumentally stupid choices that it’s a wonder they didn’t get overthrown ages ago even with their dragons.

hotd writers wanting to write strong women, but also acting like they have to be likable and can't be really criticized, bc you can't criticize women, that's misogyny /s, resulting in these female characters not being fully fleshed out, but instead flat as a pancake and actually dehumanized. it's pathetic tbh and giving "we have cersei at home".