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istumpysk · 2 years

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Operation Stumpy Re-Read

ADWD: Jon V (Chapter 21)

Bowen Marsh had urged him to move into the Old Bear's former chambers in the King's Tower after Stannis vacated them, but Jon had declined. Moving into the king's chambers could too easily be taken to mean he did not expect the king to return.

He's not entitled to your chambers, you stupid boy.

+.+.+

Jon washed and dressed and left the armory, stopping in the yard outside just long enough to say a few words of encouragement to Hop-Robin and Emmett's other charges. He declined Ty's offer of a tail, as usual. He would have men enough about him; if it came to blood, two more would hardly matter. He did take Longclaw, though, and Ghost followed at his heels.

You're surrounded by wildlings and dissenters, you stupid boy.

+.+.+

Marsh pursed his lips. "Lord Commander Mormont—"

"—is dead. And not at wildling hands, but at the hands of his own Sworn Brothers, men he trusted.

+.+.+

Dolorous Edd had heard the entire exchange. As Bowen Marsh trotted off, he nodded toward his back and said, "Pomegranates. All those seeds. A man could choke to death. I'd sooner have a turnip. Never knew a turnip to do a man any harm."

+.+.+

It was at times like this that Jon missed Maester Aemon the most. Clydas tended to the ravens well enough, but he had not a tenth of Aemon Targaryen's knowledge or experience, and even less of his wisdom.

Check his temperature, he's delirious.

Thank god Aemon won't be anywhere near Jon when Daenerys arrives.

+.+.+

The Night's Watch has lost too many of its best men, Jon reflected, as the wagons began to move. The Old Bear, Qhorin Halfhand, Donal Noye, Jarmen Buckwell, my uncle …

. . . you.

Something feels off about him saying uncle instead of Benjen.

+.+.+

Half a mile south of Castle Black, Edd urged his garron close to Jon's and said, "M'lord? Look up there. The big drunkard on the hill."

The drunkard was an ash tree, twisted sideways by centuries of wind. And now it had a face. A solemn mouth, a broken branch for a nose, two eyes carved deep into the trunk, gazing north up the kingsroad, toward the castle and the Wall.

A twisted drunkard with a broken branch for a nose? Is this Tyrion gazing towards the Wall?

+.+.+

The wildlings brought their gods with them after all.

Good.

+.+.+

Jon glanced back at the face, wondering who had carved it. He had posted guards around Mole's Town, both to keep his crows away from the wildling women and to keep the free folk from slipping off southward to raid. Whoever had carved up the ash had eluded his sentries, plainly. And if one man could slip through the cordon, others could as well. I could double the guard again, he thought sourly. Waste twice as many men, men who might otherwise be walking the Wall.

Wild speculation within the fandom over who carved these faces. Was it Bloodraven? The children? A crow? Pretty sure it was wildlings being defiant, like the book suggests.

I thought it was widely understood Bran and Bloodraven don't need trees to see?

"Once you have mastered your gifts, you may look where you will and see what the trees have seen, be it yesterday or last year or a thousand ages past. Men live their lives trapped in an eternal present, between the mists of memory and the sea of shadow that is all we know of the days to come. Certain moths live their whole lives in a day, yet to them that little span of time must seem as long as years and decades do to us. An oak may live three hundred years, a redwood tree three thousand. A weirwood will live forever if left undisturbed. To them seasons pass in the flutter of a moth's wing, and past, present, and future are one. Nor will your sight be limited to your godswood. The singers carved eyes into their heart trees to awaken them, and those are the first eyes a new greenseer learns to use … but in time you will see well beyond the trees themselves." - Bran III, ADWD

+.+.+

A mile farther on, they came upon a second face, carved into a chestnut tree that grew beside an icy stream, where its eyes could watch the old plank bridge that spanned its flow. "Twice as much trouble," announced Dolorous Edd.

The chestnut was leafless and skeletal, but its bare brown limbs were not empty. On a low branch overhanging the stream a raven sat hunched, its feathers ruffled up against the cold. When it spied Jon it spread its wings and gave a scream. When he raised his fist and whistled, the big black bird came flapping down, crying, "Corn, corn, corn."

Now a chestnut tree is reminding me of Theon.

Is this a Bloodraven or a Branraven? I pick Bran. Always Bran.

+.+.+

He wondered if they would all be reduced to eating ravens before the coming winter had run its course.

One boy will eat raven.

+.+.+

Just north of Mole's Town they came upon the third watcher, carved into the huge oak that marked the village perimeter, its deep eyes fixed upon the kingsroad. That is not a friendly face, Jon Snow reflected. The faces that the First Men and the children of the forest had carved into the weirwoods in eons past had stern or savage visages more oft than not, but the great oak looked especially angry, as if it were about to tear its roots from the earth and come roaring after them. Its wounds are as fresh as the wounds of the men who carved it.

Is this someone? Angry, freshly wounded face. . . Jorah?

I'm crazy. I'll stop.

+.+.+

Pig ignorance, Jon thought. The free folk were no different than the men of the Night's Watch; some were clean, some dirty, but most were clean at times and dirty at other times. This stink was just the smell of a thousand people jammed into cellars and tunnels that had been dug to shelter no more than a hundred.

[...]

There are wolves amongst these sheep, still.

Val had reminded him of that, on his last visit with her. "Free folk and kneelers are more alike than not, Jon Snow. Men are men and women women, no matter which side of the Wall we were born on. Good men and bad, heroes and villains, men of honor, liars, cravens, brutes … we have plenty, as do you."

She was not wrong. The trick was telling one from the other, parting the sheep from the goats.

Love how the show turned Jon's basic empathy into him wanting to be a wildling.

+.+.+

There were three women for every man, many with children—pale skinny things clutching at their skirts. Jon saw very few babes in arms. The babes in arms died during the march, he realized, and those who survived the battle died in the king's stockade.

That's fucked.

+.+.+

The tumult and the shoving died. Heads turned. A child began to cry. Mormont's raven walked from Jon's left shoulder to his right, bobbing its head and muttering, "Snow, snow, snow."

It's Mormont's raven? Why is Mormont's raven near Mole's Town instead of in Jon's room?

BRAN?!

+.+.+

"You crows eat good enough." Halleck shoved forward.

For now. "We hold the Wall. The Wall protects the realm … and you now. You know the foe we face. You know what's coming down on us. Some of you have faced them before. Wights and white walkers, dead things with blue eyes and black hands. I've seen them too, fought them, sent one to hell. They kill, then they send your dead against you. The giants were not able to stand against them, nor you Thenns, the ice-river clans, the Hornfoots, the free folk … and as the days grow shorter and the nights colder, they are growing stronger. You left your homes and came south in your hundreds and your thousands … why, but to escape them? To be safe. Well, it's the Wall that keeps you safe. It's us that keeps you safe, the black crows you despise."

"Safe and starved," said a squat woman with a windburned face, a spearwife by the look of her.

"You want more food?" asked Jon. "The food's for fighters. Help us hold the Wall, and you'll eat as well as any crow." Or as poorly, when the food runs short.

[...]

An old man with a turnip cradled against his chest said, "You kill us, you starve us, now you want t' make us slaves."

[...]

"You have to pick," Jon Snow repeated. "All of you. No one is asking you to take our vows, and I do not care what gods you worship. My own gods are the old gods, the gods of the North, but you can keep the red god, or the Seven, or any other god who hears your prayers. It's spears we need. Bows. Eyes along the Wall."

[...]

"The choice is yours," Jon Snow told them. "Those who want to help us hold the Wall, return to Castle Black with me and I'll see you armed and fed. The rest of you, get your turnips and your onions and crawl back inside your holes."

The word slave was not a mistake.

Notice how they're given a choice? Notice how they'll still receive food and land in the Gift if they don't assist the Night's Watch?

Daenerys Stannis didn't offer them true freedom, but Jon does.

+.+.+

Sigorn's father, the old Magnar, had been crushed beneath the falling stair during his attack on Castle Black. I would feel the same if someone asked me to make common cause with the Lannisters, Jon told himself.

Lol.

+.+.+

I will take any boy above the age of twelve who knows how to hold a spear or string a bow. I will take your old men, your wounded, and your cripples, even those who can no longer fight. There are other tasks they may be able to perform. Fletching arrows, milking goats, gathering firewood, mucking out our stables … the work is endless.

Those too old or young to be of use had been cast into the streets, along with the infirm and the crippled. - Daenerys I, ADWD

Both will be stabbed, but only one earns a ticket back.

+.+.+

And yes, I will take your women too. I have no need of blushing maidens looking to be protected, but I will take as many spearwives as will come.

Oh my god, the death of my ship. We'll never recover from this.

+.+.+

"And girls?" a girl asked. She looked as young as Arya had, the last time Jon had seen her.

"Sixteen and older."

"You're taking boys as young as twelve."

Down in the Seven Kingdoms boys of twelve were often pages or squires; many had been training at arms for years. Girls of twelve were children. These are wildlings, though.

You better get over that quick, I'm told you'll be falling in love with an 11-year-old.

+.+.+

A pair of striplings followed her, boys no older than fourteen. Next a scarred man with a missing eye. "I seen them too, the dead ones. Even crows are better'n that." A tall spearwife, an old man on crutches, a moonfaced boy with a withered arm, a young man whose red hair reminded Jon of Ygritte.

Lol.

+.+.+

The dam broke then. Halleck was a man of note. Mance was not wrong. "Free folk don't follow names, or little cloth animals sewn on a tunic," the King-Beyond-the-Wall had told him. "They won't dance for coins, they don't care how you style yourself or what that chain of office means or who your grandsire was. They follow strength. They follow the man."

And they don't follow Stannis.

+.+.+

By the time the last withered apple had been handed out, the wagons were crowded with wildlings, and they were sixty-three stronger than when the column had set out from Castle Black that morning. "What will you do with them?" Bowen Marsh asked Jon on the ride back up the kingsroad.

Hilarious. Three Jon foils.

Reek II -> Jon V

In the previous chapter, Theon convinces 63 ironborn to surrender, and escorts them to their death.

Along the rotting-plank road, wooden stakes were driven deep into the boggy ground; there the corpses festered, red and dripping. Sixty-three, he knew, there are sixty-three of them. One was short half an arm. Another had a parchment shoved between its teeth, its wax seal still unbroken. - Reek II, ADWD

Then Ramsay displays those 63 corpses on wooden stakes, which is a nod to Daenerys crucifying 163 Meereenese nobles.

Meanwhile, Jon recruits 63 wildlings to fight with him.

One of these things is not like the others.

+.+.+

The Lord Steward glanced back. "Women too? Our brothers are not accustomed to having women amongst them, my lord. Their vows … there will be fights, rapes …"

"These women have knives and know how to use them."

"And the first time one of these spearwives slits the throat of one of our brothers, what then?"

"We will have lost a man," said Jon, "but we have just gained sixty-three. You're good at counting, my lord. Correct me if I'm wrong, but my reckoning leaves us sixty-two ahead."

Marsh was unconvinced. "You've added sixty-three more mouths, my lord … but how many are fighters, and whose side will they fight on? If it's the Others at the gates, most like they'll stand with us, I grant you … but if it's Tormund Giantsbane or the Weeping Man come calling with ten thousand howling killers, what then?"

"Then we'll know. So let us hope it never comes to that."

Update: pomegranate still unhappy.

I don't envy Jon's position at all.

Final thoughts:

Sure, Jon's chapters may be agonizing, but think about how much fun it will be when it's Daenerys narrating her own downfall.

It's our reward after Ned, Robb, and now this.

-> return to menu <-

#operation stumpy re-read #adwd #jon v

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grimesgirll · 3 months

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“good fucking girl.”

is definitely not something rick should be saying to his best friend’s girlfriend - especially not with his cock halfway down her throat.

the moment shane had stepped out for a run with glenn and michonne, you and rick were all over each other. you couldn’t handle sneaking into rick’s bed down the hall anymore. you were bound to end up in his lap on the sectional, pawing at him like a bitch in heat.

it’s not that shane didn’t fuck you; he took every chance he got. you’re just enamored with rick. ever since your boyfriend had “shared” you with his fellow officer, rick had been on your mind.

the way his brown constable’s jacket fit against his muscles when they flexed. the glint of his chocolate curls. how good he is with judith.

rick gets you goin’ in a way shane hasn’t for quite some time. he was right when he got you down on your knees back at the rest stop. you did look at rick like you wanted to drain him and then have him bend you over and fuck you silly - and that’s what ended up happening.

ever since that day, shane got off on toying with you and having you sit on rick’s cock in addition to his own. he uttered excuses about the stresses of their new duties as constable but you just slid down your denim skort and squealed the occasion away.

you’re quiet now, nice and muffled on rick’s dick as you swallow around him. the motion has him twitching in your mouth. wanting to finish off inside of you for the night, the thick length in your mouth is withdrawing and suddenly you’re in that familiar face down position again.

“so wet, baby,” rick remarks in awe as his length brushes your slippery entrance.

you’re squeezing your thighs together - trapping him between the pillowy soft surfaces. “rick,” you cry. “c’mon, already.”

“what’d we say?”

you swallow, a tear from how needy you are sliding down your cheek. “please, sir.”

you could care less if shane walked in right now. as long as rick keeps driving his hips into yours and breathing your name like a prayer, you’ll be content. content to get fucked silly by the man before he takes you in his arms and spends the night with a hand on your waist and his nose buried in your hair.

that’s after though.

now, you’re being nearly fucked up the couch.

rick’s just enjoying the way your sweet little cunt grips him like it needs him. the little thing sucks him in even better than your mouth.

and you’re a whole other story. sweat sticking to your glistening forehead, you’re babbling incoherent thoughts, strung out on the cock molding you to his shape.

your slick is pooling around rick like he’s in the fucking atlantic. so close to losing it all over him already, you’re making an absolute mess of the couch that you’ll have to resolve before shane gets home. don’t want him suffering from any fear of missing out.

the man is swept from your mind when rick absolutely crams his cock inside of your clinging cunt. the kiss to your cervix is enough for you to start seeing spots around the older man making you take his cock so well.

every time you park your pussy on rick’s thick dick and come, you ground down, grasp his hand, do anything to get as close as possible. feeling him to skin to skin is second only to feeling him fill you up. the filthy praises coming from his lips come close as well.

“fuck, baby, so nice and tight. you want me to come inside you, huh? have shane come home to this pussy all messy?”

you’re shaking your head like you have any idea what you’re asking for. “yes, rick! i want you to make a mess of my pussy.”

“then come all over this cock, honey.”

“mhmm, rick, i-,”

“that’s it.”

“i love how deep you are, rick-,” you’re bumbling like an idiot and muttering a string of “i love you”s as the dam bursts and you come undone on rick’s cock.

the pulsing warmth beneath you is accompanied by a husky, “i love you too,” and a chorus of your name into your shoulder as rick used his horsecock to fuck you two through your climaxes.

the friction on your clit heightens the heat surrounding you and flooding into you from rick. you’re almost overwhelmed by the bruising kisses rick purples onto your neck as he gathers you on top of him.

“you did so good, honey,” he’s praising you and you’re just nodding, humming, “thank you”s and “i know”s until he’s bear hugging you again. the way he nuzzles into your neck from behind and exhales into your hair is enough for you to forget trudging up to bed and drift off into rick’s touch right there.

you’re already asleep in his arms but he takes the time to stroke your hair and kiss up and down your temples. god, he loves getting this time with you to himself - even if you’re asleep.

with you pressed against him and your heartbeat thrumming, the world is still and rick realizes something - he’s never letting you go.

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