m_findlow (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
m_findlow) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomweekly2020-10-04 11:46 am
m_findlow) wrote in fandomweekly2020-10-04 11:46 am
Entry tags:
[#069] FROM THE ASHES (GAME OF THRONES)
Theme Prompt: #69 - Ray of sunshine
Title: From the ashes
Fandom: Game of Thrones
Rating/Warnings: M. Spoilers for Season 8.
Bonus: Yes
Word Count: 1,000 words
Summary: King's Landing is destroyed and its kings and queens dead, but for Arya, there is still more work to do be done.
Arya rode her white stallion through the disparate camps of the Dothraki clustered around the palace. After so many days, they no longer even heeded her presence. They knew who she was. Whilst they had only ever respected one woman, they knew her as the one who killed the Night King and that afforded her the right not to be raped.
King's Landing no longer resembled anything from her memory. It was broken and burned beyond recognition. Whilst she had never loved its citizens, they hadn't deserved this.
The journey had taken several hours ride in the pouring rain. The Northern army had retreated twelve leagues from the crumbling city gates, waiting for new orders. Arya alone dared to enter the city, her business unfinished.
She hobbled her horse and mounted the red sandstone steps, even as the rain tried to coax her back down them. It had rained for three days straight, and for three days straight she had made the journey through the devastated ruins. The trip was a long circuitous one as she navigated fallen stone, burned bodies and piles of ash tall as two men. Dothraki roamed through the mess, picking over the bodies for loot, lingering mostly in the former Streets of Steel and Gold, where craftsman's supplies of precious metals now congealed in malformed shapes, melted by dragonfire.
At the top of the steps of the broken Red Keep stood Grey Worm and four Unsullied. The rain hit their helmets, making a pinging sound. It was about time Grey Worm came to face her himself. She'd only keep coming back every day until he did.
'I want to see Jon.' It wasn't that she didn't believe he wasn't still alive. The Unsullied would have made a great spectacle of killing him and mounting his dead body outside the palace for all to see.
Grey Worm tensed. 'Jon Snow belongs to us.'
'Oh? Do you rule here now?' Grey Worm's jaw clenched at her audacity. 'No, I didn't think so. Who is the heir to the Seven Kingdoms? Danaerys was the last Queen, so that would make the heir the last living Targaryen, wouldn't it? That would be Jon.'
'He killed our Queen.'
'Your Queen,' Arya corrected him. 'There's been quite a few now. And she killed a million innocent people, so from where I'm standing that doesn't make her a very good one.' She was glad Danaerys was dead. She'd turned out to be just as mad as the rest of the Targaryens. She stopped and corrected herself. No, that wasn't true. Jon wasn't like them. He was a Stark, through and through. It wasn't blood that made them mad, it was the people they'd surrounded themselves with that convinced them of their unquestionable right to rule. They believed in nothing else but their own greatness, but Arya could have said the same of many a House.
'Perhaps you're right. Cersei was the last Queen before her. That must mean the new King is Tyrion Lannister. He's the last one of them left, too.'
'Do not speak of the traitor.'
'Okay then. Suppose Robert Baratheon was the last true King. Only a trueborn heir of his could possibly accede the throne. Gendry Baratheon? Your Queen did make him a trueborn son, after all.'
'This city is ours now,' Grey Worm told her.
Her brow knotted. 'There are close to nine thousand Northmen camped just leagues from the city gates. At a command, they will storm the city and take back Jon by force.'
'Our army is bigger. Many thousands of them will die.'
'They'd rather die that serve alongside your Queen's army. You captured their Commander. That comes at a price.'
'Jon Snow confessed to his crime. He must die for it.'
'If that were true, you'd have done it already, but you haven't. You hold King's Landing for now, but you don't control the Seven Kingdoms. The lords and ladies of those respective kingdoms do, and their forces number in the tens of thousands. More than enough to outnumber all the Unsullied and Dothraki.' She extracted from her pocket the sealed scroll. A heavy drop of water landed on the silvery wax, transforming the snarling wolf's head into a living, moving beast. The seal was unbroken but Arya knew every word that was written, for she had her own raven from Sansa instructing her to be her envoy in the south.
'My sister, the Lady of Winterfell, sends word to you, insisting that Jon Snow be released immediately. She rides for King's Landing even as we speak, as do the lords and ladies of all the great Houses. You will surrender your hold on this city and release your prisoners, or there will be a siege laid around this ruined city until you have feasted on the corpses of your own men and none are left alive but you.' That got Grey Worm's attention. There was nothing left in the city, no food, no ships to bring in supplies and the Kingsroad blocked by opposing forces. It would be an inglorious defeat, but an effective one.
Grey Worm snatched the scroll from her gloved hand, water dripping down his vexed expression until the plinking sound of raindrops on metal began to fade.
Arya turned on her heel and descended the crumbling steps. Even as she did, the rain had eased, and the first rays of sunshine began to break through the retreating clouds. The rains had cleansed the city of its ashen destruction, leaving behind only a grey sludge to trickle down the streets and evacuate itself into the Blackwater, carrying it out to sea, just as the Queen's dragon had carried her corpse far out of over the sea and into the east. It was a small step but an important one. Light and life would not return to the city until the final remnants of Danaerys army were also washed from every nook and cranny, and she would see it done.
Title: From the ashes
Fandom: Game of Thrones
Rating/Warnings: M. Spoilers for Season 8.
Bonus: Yes
Word Count: 1,000 words
Summary: King's Landing is destroyed and its kings and queens dead, but for Arya, there is still more work to do be done.
Arya rode her white stallion through the disparate camps of the Dothraki clustered around the palace. After so many days, they no longer even heeded her presence. They knew who she was. Whilst they had only ever respected one woman, they knew her as the one who killed the Night King and that afforded her the right not to be raped.
King's Landing no longer resembled anything from her memory. It was broken and burned beyond recognition. Whilst she had never loved its citizens, they hadn't deserved this.
The journey had taken several hours ride in the pouring rain. The Northern army had retreated twelve leagues from the crumbling city gates, waiting for new orders. Arya alone dared to enter the city, her business unfinished.
She hobbled her horse and mounted the red sandstone steps, even as the rain tried to coax her back down them. It had rained for three days straight, and for three days straight she had made the journey through the devastated ruins. The trip was a long circuitous one as she navigated fallen stone, burned bodies and piles of ash tall as two men. Dothraki roamed through the mess, picking over the bodies for loot, lingering mostly in the former Streets of Steel and Gold, where craftsman's supplies of precious metals now congealed in malformed shapes, melted by dragonfire.
At the top of the steps of the broken Red Keep stood Grey Worm and four Unsullied. The rain hit their helmets, making a pinging sound. It was about time Grey Worm came to face her himself. She'd only keep coming back every day until he did.
'I want to see Jon.' It wasn't that she didn't believe he wasn't still alive. The Unsullied would have made a great spectacle of killing him and mounting his dead body outside the palace for all to see.
Grey Worm tensed. 'Jon Snow belongs to us.'
'Oh? Do you rule here now?' Grey Worm's jaw clenched at her audacity. 'No, I didn't think so. Who is the heir to the Seven Kingdoms? Danaerys was the last Queen, so that would make the heir the last living Targaryen, wouldn't it? That would be Jon.'
'He killed our Queen.'
'Your Queen,' Arya corrected him. 'There's been quite a few now. And she killed a million innocent people, so from where I'm standing that doesn't make her a very good one.' She was glad Danaerys was dead. She'd turned out to be just as mad as the rest of the Targaryens. She stopped and corrected herself. No, that wasn't true. Jon wasn't like them. He was a Stark, through and through. It wasn't blood that made them mad, it was the people they'd surrounded themselves with that convinced them of their unquestionable right to rule. They believed in nothing else but their own greatness, but Arya could have said the same of many a House.
'Perhaps you're right. Cersei was the last Queen before her. That must mean the new King is Tyrion Lannister. He's the last one of them left, too.'
'Do not speak of the traitor.'
'Okay then. Suppose Robert Baratheon was the last true King. Only a trueborn heir of his could possibly accede the throne. Gendry Baratheon? Your Queen did make him a trueborn son, after all.'
'This city is ours now,' Grey Worm told her.
Her brow knotted. 'There are close to nine thousand Northmen camped just leagues from the city gates. At a command, they will storm the city and take back Jon by force.'
'Our army is bigger. Many thousands of them will die.'
'They'd rather die that serve alongside your Queen's army. You captured their Commander. That comes at a price.'
'Jon Snow confessed to his crime. He must die for it.'
'If that were true, you'd have done it already, but you haven't. You hold King's Landing for now, but you don't control the Seven Kingdoms. The lords and ladies of those respective kingdoms do, and their forces number in the tens of thousands. More than enough to outnumber all the Unsullied and Dothraki.' She extracted from her pocket the sealed scroll. A heavy drop of water landed on the silvery wax, transforming the snarling wolf's head into a living, moving beast. The seal was unbroken but Arya knew every word that was written, for she had her own raven from Sansa instructing her to be her envoy in the south.
'My sister, the Lady of Winterfell, sends word to you, insisting that Jon Snow be released immediately. She rides for King's Landing even as we speak, as do the lords and ladies of all the great Houses. You will surrender your hold on this city and release your prisoners, or there will be a siege laid around this ruined city until you have feasted on the corpses of your own men and none are left alive but you.' That got Grey Worm's attention. There was nothing left in the city, no food, no ships to bring in supplies and the Kingsroad blocked by opposing forces. It would be an inglorious defeat, but an effective one.
Grey Worm snatched the scroll from her gloved hand, water dripping down his vexed expression until the plinking sound of raindrops on metal began to fade.
Arya turned on her heel and descended the crumbling steps. Even as she did, the rain had eased, and the first rays of sunshine began to break through the retreating clouds. The rains had cleansed the city of its ashen destruction, leaving behind only a grey sludge to trickle down the streets and evacuate itself into the Blackwater, carrying it out to sea, just as the Queen's dragon had carried her corpse far out of over the sea and into the east. It was a small step but an important one. Light and life would not return to the city until the final remnants of Danaerys army were also washed from every nook and cranny, and she would see it done.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
This was excellent. You make me miss reading GOT fic. (And the inner Arya/Gendry shipper in me was so happy he got a mention!)
no subject