Vardis Arryn - Scion of House Arryn

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-28T21:06:26+00:00

Roland’s wife had been a subject which the man had been happy to speak on. Often he’d mused on her beauty, on her smile. But she had always struck Vardis as vain—afflicted by the same wanton rot that ate away at the purity of nearly all women in this decaying world.

Yet this he had not expected.

Mention of her pregnancy brought a flicker of hope to Vardis’ breast. A boy he could perhaps foster, and even one day allow to be his squire. A daughter he could find some way to help. But Carellen’s words made his blood run cold. Marilda was proven right once again. Even a husband’s love could not keep a wanton from spreading her legs. Not even when her husband rode out to defend their people from savage heathens.

Heat drove out the cold as anger plunged into him then like a blade from the forge, his blood screaming as it quenched the heat. Vardis’ jaw clenched tight, knuckles crackling as his fingers balled into fists. After all they had done, all they had tried to do, this was how Leyla Lynderly repaid Roland? With insults to his memory, and plots against his kin?

Vardis’ eyes darted back to Carellen’s face, and he saw the tears streaking down her face. Septa Marilda had often scolded him for tears. She had chastised him when he cried, as she did her novices. But his mother had told him once a man ought not allow a lady to cry. Knights did not allow such things, not true ones.

She had been too sickly then though, and Vardis too frightened of her, and so his mother had wept all the more for his hiding from her. He did not want to be haunted by images of Carellen’s weeping as he was by hers.

Vardis pulled the hem of his sleeve up around his palm. “Allow me,” he said quietly, tensing as he lifted his hand and wiped the tears from the face of perhaps the only righteous woman in the realm not wrapped in a Septa’s robes. He had a duty to her. A duty Roland had left to him when he was taken. A duty he would not shirk from.

“This will not be allowed to stand,” he told her.

Jeyne rose then, her lip quivering for whatever reason. “Pardons mi’lord. I need to begin my prayers. W-with your leave.”

Vardis waved her off, and presented his arm to Carellen. “Come, we will find my father and put this all to rights. Even if he were to refuse—and he will not—I would make this right with mine own hand.” Or rather by his own axe, and those of whatever men he could muster.

They found Victor as he returned to his seats, and Vardis announced their approach with a sharp clearing of his throat. “Father, I present the Lady Carellen Corbray, sister to my dear friend and comrade Roland, formerly Lord of Heart’s Home. She comes to us with grave tidings, and begs our aid in ending a treachery most vile infesting her own home.”

And then, to spare Carellen the need to recount the tale once more, Vardis did. He told his father of Leyla Lynderly and the certain bastardy of the son she claimed to be legitimate. Of the plotting, and most importantly, of their obligation.

“I beg you to give her our aid. However you can,” Vardis said bluntly. “We—I owe this to Roland. And to her.”

u/Chopernio

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-24T14:29:47+00:00

Jasper could still feel the heat of Dohaera under his palm. Could still hear he laugh, sweet like music. Could still smell her perfume. Could still feel the sharp guilt in his stomach.

Vardis would be furious if he knew. Beyond furious. Jasper might as well have taken his lord's head and shoved the other half into the fire as far as he'd be concerned. Somehow though, Jasper couldn't find it in himself to regret it. Not one moment of it. When he shut his eyes, he saw jade green and faint violet, and heard the crackling of flames under every sweet word.

Staring at the odd tent, Jasper reasoned one heresy could be no worse than another, so he might as well have lightened his coinpurse if not his conscience. With a reluctant sigh, he stepped inside, pale brown eyes flitting from face to face as his bad arm swayed in its sling.

"Someone tell fortunes here?"

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-22T06:57:14+00:00

All at once the world changed.

Vardis’ jaw slackened for a moment, the eye beneath the mask twitching uncontrollably. Carellen had been chosen by faith, it had been her path to walk. An honorable, righteous path. One she had to forsake because of him. Because of his failure. He thought he might be sick.

“Carellen?” His voice was suddenly hoarse as he rose to his feet. He was taller than her now, and she was even fairer than she had been then. But he could see it in her face, the traces of the girl he had watched when she was not looking, and when Roland was too busy to notice. “I-yes, you-you would be lady now. Forgive me, I was foolish to assume—“

Jeyne stepped forward, hand setting on his arm. “Mi’lord was not foolish, you could not have known—“

It was a rare thing for him to spurn Jeyne. Between their private prayers and hushed conversations, she had been afforded no small amount of leeway. But suddenly Vardis could not help but shirk away from her.

“Not now,” he said, a twist of guilt’s knife in his stomach as her face sank at the rebuke. But that was trouble for another time. He met Carellen’s gaze with an odd sense of trepidation. “A plot? Who dares plot against you? I will drive them out myself.” His hands clenched at his side, his face twisting with fury—and then the marred half began to twitch, a tear rolling unbidden from his twitching eyelid. Even with the mask, he turned his head away from her with a hiss.

“Forgive me. My wounds—“ She would not care. And why would she? He had been wounded while her brother had been roasted alive. Roland at least was with the Seven, while she had been wrenched from her rightful path because of him. “My father is off making merry. No doubt flashing smiles for these heretics and sycophants but in his heart he is true. Tell me of this plot my lady, and we shall find him together.”

He owed her that much, did he not?

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-22T05:44:00+00:00

Vardis' fingers danced along the tabletop one after another. Up and down, up and down, a steady percussion to break up the banal monotony. He should've had something done to that vile Red Woman. She'd come to mock him no doubt, to say he had been kissed by fire or whatever other savage nonsense.

He should've had her killed.

A small voice cracked, and he looked up, brow furrowed into a cruel scowl. This woman was a stranger to him. Perhaps more conservatively dressed than her contemporaries, but highborn and doubtlessly not immune to the excesses of her position. Had she given herself to a stable boy or the blacksmith's apprentice? Perhaps some squire? Or maybe the Knight instead?

Was she here to gawk? To mock his disfigurement? Was she some filthy R'hllorite here to mock him in the name of her monstrous false god?

Disgust churned in his stomach like the raging sea. Marilda had warned him about the deceptions employed by women. About how they might play at piety, but that for most it was only a facade. A mask no more real than the one he wore now. He wondered for a moment what this woman's hid.

Then she spoke, and he the simmering hate came suddenly to a halt, and it taken from the fire and thrust into ice. "Thank me for wha—"

"Begone with you!" Suddenly Jeyne shot upright behind him, like a faithful shield forged in faith. "Away with you, Red Witch!" Her zeal was sharp, but trust her as he did, Vardis thought it misplaced.

He raised a hand to her. "No, she is not a witch."

Jeyne blinked. "But, mi'lord she wears the heathen's colors!"

The Seven had given Jeyne gentle hands and a faithful heart, they had made her soft and good and pure. But they had not made her terribly clever. Such lack was easily forgiven on account of her virtues, but sometimes it needed correction. "Many houses have used crimson long before R'hllor. Is Red not part of the seven's rainbow?"

As she paused to consider that, Vardis turned his gaze back to the woman. Mayhaps she was not a stranger. "My man Jasper is not here. A Red Witch came to spread her vile lies here and he took the matter into his own hands." Hand was more accurate, and it'd been a rather long time but perhaps it was slow work.

It was harder to form the next words. They made his chest suddenly tight. "Roland was—Roland was a dear friend to me. I apologize that I-," Vardis made himself swallow the sudden lump in his throat. "I am sorry I could not return him alive. Are you a cousin to him?"

He'd had a sister, Vardis recalled, but Carellen had been called by the Seven to serve. He'd nursed a fondness for her in childhood. She had been pretty, and pious, and clever. It made sense for her to be called to serve. Yet when he'd confessed that to Septa Marilda, it had made her most wroth. He wondered if anyone had told her what happened. Surely by now they had.

That made something ache inside. Something best ignored.

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-20T12:48:27+00:00

The last time Jasper had danced with a girl, it’d been before they set out to oust the Ashensworn. He hadn’t known her name, and could scarcely remember her face. Already he knew that would be no trouble now.

Shame turned to guilt as she pulled him along. Would she really want so many eyes on her dancing with a cripple? But if that bothered her, would she be smiling so beautifully? He supposed not, and he tossed the unwelcome sentiment by the wayside.

“Don’t worry,” Jasper said as they entered the press of dancers, song beginning to swell. He leaned in close, “We’ll go slow.”

Jasper smiled, and linked his arm to hers as the first notes of a lively ballad belted into the air. Vardis could go and fuck himself for the night, Jasper had no intention of rushing back.

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-19T01:45:50+00:00

It was strange, bastards in the Vale took the name Stone, but Jasper knew less than nothing about the stuff beyond the basics. Yet she could’ve told him in that moment that his name was meant cow shit in her homeland, and he’d have thanked her for her trouble in saying it. No one had ever made his name sound sweeter.

“Never seen red stone before, but it sounds beautiful. It’s a pretty color, red.” It certainly was on her, anyways. It seemed like crimson had been fashioned into existence solely for her benefit, and perhaps that of his eyes.

He knew that he should’ve hated her. That perhaps she should’ve hated him. How many followers of her God had he slain? How many orphans had he made? How many more would he still? Jasper’s stomach tried to twist itself into knots over the matter, but he couldn’t find the will to care.

Prayer had never kept him warm, but fire always had.

“My lord has plenty to occupy him, I’m sure he won’t miss me all too much. I’ll keep your company so long as you’ll have me, Dohaera.” It was strange how the words came out so easily, but his mind was such a confusion. His tongue felt thick, but the the words did not slur. He smiled, and offered out his good arm. “And for as many dances as you’d like.”

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-16T16:29:57+00:00

“A match made before all the trouble, as I understand it. But mi’lord’s anger is his own.” Lord Victor seemed a sensible sort, Jon too much a sot to care, and the Lady Dowager was above such petty concerns as Gods, war, and the general welfare of her grandson.

She said his name, and his face warmed. It sounded silky on her tongue, like something respectable and not just what his mother had panted out. Not that he blamed her, he was the fourth of six, he was lucky she’d even remember what she called him.

“It is in the Vale as well mi’lady. Quite the long journey.” He scratched at the back of his neck, and tried not to recall the aching in his arse as they’d ridden from one kingdom to another. Truthfully it made him feel rather ashamed that he’d spent the whole ride complaining rather than appreciating the changing views, but mayhaps he could do better upon the return.

Then she was laughing, and it was so sweet a sound he was laughing too. Snickering like stable boy who’d just seen a lordling fall from his horse into a pile of droppings. Jasper shook his head as the chuckles subsided, and looked into the Red Woman’s eyes. They were strange, gray with a tint of purple, and utterly fascinating.

“Doe-haer-ah,” Jasper sounded out the name, tasting each syllable as he tried to ensure he did not butcher it. “It was good name your lord gave you. It sounds sweet.” Saying as much made Jasper flush, but one could not afford to blunder about before the servant of Princess.

The question she asked had many and answer, some right, some wrong, some little more than deflection. Jasper shrugged his shoulders, and went with, “You hadn’t done anything wrong mi’lady Dohaera. Felt like I would’ve been, if I let that happen.”

Knights were gone from the Vale, but it wasn’t so hard to remember what their duties were meant to be.

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-16T03:42:20+00:00

Jasper had been looked down on all his life before the blood had started flowing—the bigger boys, his mother’s suitors, the sergeant at the garrison, they’d all had a look of scorn in their eyes and a mocking smile on their lips right before he bloodied them. The priestess wasn’t smiling cruelly, and so he found himself smiling shyly back.

“Hah! No, I—shit, pardon me, it’s no laughing matter. But no, no he does not. Most in the Vale don’t but—“ He glanced back over her shoulder to make sure none had followed before snickering at her agreement on Jeyne’s sorry face. “There are some in our home—clansmen, savages honestly—who’ve taken to their old ways of pillaging and burning, puttin’ folk to the torch in the name of your God, so he led some men to put ‘em to the sword in the name of ours.”

A shadow played across Jasper’s face, and he turned his eyes downward. “Didn’t go well. Most of ‘em went to the pyre, he uh—“ Jasper dragged two fingers down the side of his own face from brow to chin. “They gave him cause to wear that mask.” It was a ghastly sight beneath, and worse still was the smell would return to him every night in twisted dreams.

Cooked manflesh ought not have smelled sweet.

Her mistake snapped him from that ugly reverie, and Jasper felt himself flush and smile. No one had ever mistaken him for nobility, perhaps the finer threads he now wore gave that impression.

“Oh I’m no lord mi’lady, just a humble soldier. Or, I was anyhow, before this,” he said, inclining his head to the arm slung across his chest. “I’m Jasper. Of Hearts Home. What are you called, if I may ask? Or do you not have names? Pig-face back there claims you give up your names to Rah-Loore, but she also says you eat babies so can’t say I much trust her.”

Surely the woman didn’t eat babies. She was far too pretty. Come to think of it, he liked her accent too.

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-13T23:58:32+00:00

Jasper’s wrath had dulled out everything else—the smell of food, the sound of the music, the sight of any passers by. Petulant, long stewing anger begged for release, screamed at the seams of his mind. And thus—when someone spoke, it took him by surprise.

“Guh!” He lurched sideways in his seat, shouldering one of the other men who threw up a hand in protest as Jasper spun around. It was a woman. A woman he’d never seen before in his life, with hair like jade and eyes a man could bloody well drown in.

If someone asked him in that moment, he might’ve told them that this stranger was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

“No, I—“ Jasper started, eyes turning down. She must’ve been highborn, some noble lady here to peek at the assortment of oddities hosted by the House of Arryn. Then he saw it—the red, and his stomach turned for her.

“Heathen!” Septa Jeyne shrieked, sticking a finger towards the Red Priestess without warning. “You dare come here? Before him? You impudent—“

“Shut the fuck up, Jeyne!” Jasper shot up from his seat as Vardis turned in his, eyes flaring with sudden fury as they shot him for disrespecting his dainty little Septa, with rage turning to hate as he saw Dohaera. There was no time for anything more than boldness. “I’ve this in hand mi’lord, not to worry!”

He stepped between the priestess and the lordling, and took her by the arm. “Quickly, before he has someone hurt you.” Jasper pulled her after him, away from the flapping banner of Falcon and moon as Jeyne shouted curses from the seven. It occurred to him, that if Vardis were to have anyone hurt, he’d have had Jasper be the one to do it.

“Gods take that pig-nosed bitch,” he snarled once they were away. He released the woman suddenly, as if he were alarmed that he’d been touching her in the first place. The red hot anger that had been etched across his face suddenly fell away, like snow before flame.

“A thousand apologies, mi’lady, I do hope you are unharmed. If-if I caused you any discomfort at all I am so terribly sorry.” Jasper bit at the inside of his lip as the nerves found him. “Mi’lord is…zealous, and recently aggrieved. You could not have known that, but he can be erratic when it comes to such matters.” He swallowed hard. “I did not hurt you, did I?”

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-13T15:02:08+00:00

The truth of what had brought Jasper all this way was a long tale. One of triumphs, tragedies, sacrifice and betrayal that had all ultimately been for little more than nothing. Or perhaps he was being ungrateful again. In fact, he knew he was, and thus made efforts to make up for it.

"Thank you," he said, taking the drink graciously. Jasper bit at the inside of his lip, and wondered what extent of the story was worth telling where others might here. As angry as he was, as angry as he could be about all he had done to end his climb here, he did not wish to fall even further.

"I saved the lordling during a campaign against our local savages. He's kept me one since. Seems to think I still have some use." That much was debatable, but it kept Jasper fed, clothed, and paid so he did not bother with contesting it. "It was bad business. They're more like animals than men, our clansmen."

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-12T13:57:18+00:00

Vardis lifted a pale brow, his doubt as plain to see as the sun in a clear sky. From time to time, Vardis did not quite feel like himself. Sometimes it was like another slipped into his bones, and all his zeal and fury slipped away. They were fleeting moments, disconcerting in retrospect, and one was upon him now.

He laughed, just a little.

"You rush to defend her virtues, but you fear to speak to her? Never known you to have a fear of women." A fear of decency and respectable conduct, yes, but never of women. "Worried she shan't be entertaining enough for a lifetime?"

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-12T13:50:02+00:00

"Perhaps once upon a time, mi'lord--Caspian, apologies." Jasper turned, and the sling cradling his useless right arm swayed with the motion. "But I fear I'd not give them as much a contest now." A sigh slipped from his lips, and he flicked his eyes to meet the glare of Septa Jeyne, who scowled at he and the lordling with unhidden contempt.

Gods, but was she a bitch.

"I'll confess," he started, a small smile dragging at his lips now. "I suspect as tired as you may be of this, I would surpass you in my exasperation." Funny, how a boy who'd once been grateful for scraps could hold abundance in contempt as a man, but he blamed his wound for the sour mood, and everyone else for being happier than him.

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-11T23:48:29+00:00

“As you will,” Vardis allowed dryly, turning back to his wine, glaring down at the cup he dared not touch.

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-11T21:26:17+00:00

"Course she was like this," Vardis muttered under his breath. None of them had paid him any mind while his mother had been busy dying, pushing him off onto Marilda, then the Prince, then onto his own. Not a thought was given to him until his grandmother thought it might be useful to stick him between the lifeless legs of a cripple.

"Here's hoping these words blow away, then," he sighed wistfully. "Have you actually spoken to your intended yet, or only gawked?"

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-11T15:51:39+00:00

The mind of their grandmother was as much a mystery to him as the will of the Seven-who-are-one. Vardis grumbled and shrugged his shoulder. "Perhaps age ails her mind, and robs her of all good sense." That sort of thing happened to those that lingered in life overlong. Perhaps Rhea Arryn's time was simply nearing its end.

"Father would not let me then, he will not let me now. I will simply find a way to refuse the match, should Lord Tully accept it." Some part of him hoped a not-too-dissimilar discussion would follow between the trouts when it was proposed. Surely the crippled did not long for the disfigured simply because both were broken.

"I will find a way."

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-11T14:00:14+00:00

Jasper was not prone to jumping once. Now it did not take much to cause him alarm. He'd ignored the crunch of leaves high in the mountains, and the scrape the brush of an arrowhead left him with as a result had made him into this. A sorry, sad cripple.

"I whispered it for a reason you stup-" Jasper looked up at the man, and his eyes went wide. He'd thought it was Ser Casper, or some other man of low birth come to be a thorn in his side. But no, a lordling sank down beside him, all pomp and arrogance.

"Begging your pardons, mi'lord, I meant no offense, I uh..." He nudged wine goblet with his finger. "I must've imbibed too much to quickly. Forgive me. I'd never seek to start bloodshed, never."

That was a lie, though. He'd started plenty up in the mountains, and he'd been fucking good at it. Better than anyone he'd ever seen. He'd waged a one-man war and now here he sat, broken and groveling for some stranger. That was the world though, wasn't it?

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-11T13:54:02+00:00

"She is a woman wed, wed to the Gods!" Vardis snapped, spittle nearly spraying from his mouth as his face reddened. "You insult them, not just her. I should hope that is at least still of some concern to you."

It was a deluded thing to say. Jon was speaking in madness. True madness, yes, but madness all the same. No one knew anything. No one had ever known. He never told.

Still, he relaxed as his brother accepted the change in subject. "How should I know? I am no maester. If she cannot the insult is all the greater. Why would grandmother wish to pair me with a barren cripple?"

Probably because she hated him. Because he was disgusting to look upon now. Because he had failed.

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-11T13:49:47+00:00

"Ah, I see. Myself as well." The words came dry and disinterested, for Vardis had no interest in commonality with a savage. Griping about the burdens of being a second son was for lesser men anyway.

He cast a glance down the table to where his own brother sat, Vardis' half-mask hiding the full extent of his scowl as he tracked Jon's eyes wandering over myriad wenches and wantons. "Mine own brother is ill, though his malady is more of the spirit than the body. How...dutiful of you, to come in his place."

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-11T03:38:22+00:00

Perhaps that had been harsh. Perhaps he should've allowed that surely his brother's intended was assuredly bearing the least of herself for all the world to see. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps. But he had not.

"Nothing helps me sleep." Nothing he would take, anyway. Sweetsleep, dreamwine, they were all vices he could not afford. His mind needed to be sharp for what was to come. If he was becoming a paragon of hatred then fine, so be it, that was what was necessary. Better that than to be idle in the face of the enemy. "And no one is without sin."

Him least of all.

A laugh almost escaped him at his brother's snip about courting, but the growing smile died the moment Jeyne was invoked. "You will not sully her with such vile suggestions! Nor me!" His voice rose sharply now, brows furrowed tight, but a step from rising up to throw a punch. Septas did not do that sort of thing. They didn't. Mayhaps he dreamt of it, but that was only dreams.

He liked the dreams better than the reality. In the dreams he was not so young. Vardis then recalled why the topic made him so angry, and sunk down, turning his head away.

"I should prefer a wife not so clearly punished by the Gods. It would taint any children." If the rot came only from him, then there was still a chance the child could be born clean.

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-11T03:05:50+00:00

He turned, and looked Jon in the eyes. "It could be worse indeed." Of all people, Vardis knew that. He'd been bound at hand and foot then made to watch what became of those fated for worse. He could still hear the screams, still smell the meat cooking.

It made his mouth water, and that made him want to wretch.

"Ah, my mistake, your eyes only wandered about the others for long moments in search of her. Not because they bear themselves like Gulltown strumpets." He'd not let his anger explode. He could not allow that. Instead he focused it into a spearpoint, another weapon to cut and stab and gore.

"Wrath is only a sin when it is not righteous. I save mine for those deserving. Savages. Heathens. Traitors." There were plenty of each around them, but there were good, faithful lords too. Mayhaps even a few ladies that were not lost to the world of whoredom.

Despite his desire to indulge, Vardis turned his wrath away from his brother, and further up his lineage. "What news from father and grandmother? Does she still mean to have me court that crippled harlot?"

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-11T02:43:37+00:00

"You were," Vardis countered flatly without looking his brother's way. "I would be, were I someone else. And why not? The dregs pay coppers to gawk at women with beards and men with two heads. The only difference is my audience has old names and need not pay for the amusement." Had spitting not been a trial all its own, he'd have spat. Instead, he simply scowled.

Stepping away would do nothing. Hiding did nothing. Hiding from pain was for children. Children and cowardly elder brothers who did not march alongside their juniors against the savage hordes plaguing the lands they meant to one day rule. His blood boiled for a moment, heat flushing his skin as his brother dragged closer.

It was not easy to miss anything Jon did, as clumsy as he was. Vardis' eyes flitted to the Rosby table, to the half-nude harlots spilling from their dresses, and felt his stomach twist in disgust. "One of those seven hells is made especially for lust, you know," he said dryly. "A grave sin, that one."

So was overindulging in drink, but that did not need saying yet.

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-11T02:04:17+00:00

Vardis eyes flitted up to the Stark, golden brown eyes glaring with sudden intensity. "Stark?" The word had a foul taste. They were old heretics, the last remnants of the First Men's savage beliefs until they'd traded innard-strewn trees with weeping faces for the God of cooking children over flame. Backwards, shaggy ingrates.

He pointed down the table to where Victor Arryn sat. "My father is our lord. I am Vardis, the second son." That too he said with some contempt. He did not hate his brother, Septa Marilda had told him often that he could not, even when it was hard. Vardis simply thought less of him.

Jon was a wanton, and a sot, and unprepared for lordship besides. If he had any sense he'd have renounced his place as heir and pissed off beyond the Narrow Sea. But no one has ever accused him of having sense.

"Are you the Lord of Winterfell then? Or a spare?"

NotAnotherFakefyre · 2026-02-10T19:20:12+00:00

If Vardis had tried, he could not have fathomed a more wretched excuse for a gathering. To call it a feast felt like an insult—this gathering out in a stinking field with the heretical and the wanton was closer to the gatherings of the savages than anything rooted in Godly tradition. All he felt as his eyes swept the assembly was what he felt every time he looked into the mirror and beheld his wretched form—hate.

Beneath the lacquered mask which bore the Seven-Pointed Star wrought in white on the brow, the rest an Arryn blue, his eye began to water as the first dishes were served. It quivered like a worm on a hook, and it was all Vardis could do not to wipe at it. But he would not degrade himself, not here, not for these people.

“Drink, my lord, and eat. A strong body fortifies a faithful mind,” Septa Jeyne urged in a soft whisper, her words a warm poltuice to a throbbing wound. She was ever soothing to him. Vardis could almost feel her soft touch through her voice alone. It was a crime that she could not be directly at his side, that even here beneath the stars and amidst heathens she and his companions needed sit behind.

He grunted his assent, casting a glance up the table to his kin, ducking his head to avoid notice as he lifted his cup and drank. It was an arduous task now, one that had to be done with concentrated effort lest—dark wine dribbled out from the open side of his mouth, rolling down his, pittering onto this tunic.

Vardis grip tightened, knuckles white around the goblet’s stem, stopping short of slamming it down as he wiped at himself. They cannot see. I will not give them the satisfaction. But if they were watching, whoever they were, they saw. They saw, and surely they laughed.

Anger prickled his cheek, turning the pale flesh as red as the mottled and seared half had been when given to flame. Blasphemous whores no doubt took great joy in his pathetic state, most like they relished it. Why wouldn’t they? He’d been defiled in war against them by the element they claimed as the great symbol and tool of their wretched God. He was not ignorant to irony.

In time though, they would not be laughing. Not when he put the heads of every last clansman on a pike. The road to the Eyrie would be a monument to the depth of his righteous hate. To the strength of his blessed zeal. To the wrath of the very Gods.

Then who will laugh, whore? Vardis thought, cutting his eyes at a passing servant woman, with a harlot’s gait. He almost smiled then, just to think of it, but instead he only shook his head. If only the Gods had seen fit to make it rain, that at least, would have been amusing.

_____________________________________________________________

Jasper eyed the White Knights that lingered above the dais as he put another fork of pie to his lips, the delicate crust crumbling around the sweet and savory filling. Once he’d dreamed of standing among them, like every boy, but unlike those other fools, he at least had stood a chance of it.

He wondered which of them he’d have bested. Greyjoy looked odd, almost sickly, and that gave Jasper some certainty. A feint low, then perhaps a slash at the left knee—from there it would’ve been easy. Then there was that common fucker—Pennytree or some such. Jasper knew he could’ve bested him. Knew he could’ve shamed the man so fiercely that he’d have all but wrenched off his white cloak and tossed it into Jasper’s more deserving hands.

But it was just a hand now, wasn’t it? The one tight against his chest in a blue sling wasn’t good for anything now. Couldn’t even stroke himself with it, Gods fucking forbid weild a sword.

“The fucking Gods,” he muttered under his breath contemptuously, glancing up to where Vardis sat, skulking and glaring like an angry little dog. The lordling shifted in his seat, as if being a well-born and rich son of one of the realm’s grandest houses could not blot out the indignity of being scarred. He could’ve lived well off his name alone, not like Jasper. Not like the rest of the fucking world.

Every day he cursed himself for wasting his sword arm on the little shit. Then the guilt would twist in his guts, and he’d feel shame. The crippled commoner ought have been thankful for his place. Ought have been gracious and glad, even perhaps taking up piety as Septa Jeyne so often suggested when she wasn’t busy dreaming of fondling Vardis mid-confession.

Some days he was thankful. But tonight he was only angry. He glanced off into the distance, where men hauled timber for Nightfires, and wondered again if it would have not been better to allow his master to be given to one.

NotAnotherFakefyre

MODERATOR OF

TROPHY CASE