The scene when Janos Slynt and Alliser Thorne arrive at the Night's Watch and have a beef with the teen who lead the defense on the Wall will never stop being funny to me. Especially since, Jon gets his chance to let his sassiness to shine! Because he gets two idiotic superiors in the price of one. And ofc boy is roasting them right in front of their face ( and Janos is too idiotic to even notice that)

Ahh I saw requests were open again and I love your work so much!!! It would be really cool to see Jon is Essos style clothing and Daenerys in Northern style clothing. A little clothing swap between the two 🙈🫶🏼

Randomly thinking about grrm’s deconstruction of knighthood in asoiaf and how ironic it is that the Night’s Watch - an organization known to be half full of murderers, rapists, thieves, and all sorts of criminals - is essentially in charge of defending all of humanity when shit hits the fan. Like westeros just scrambled ‘the lowest of the low’ together into a penal colony in the far north and is totally fine depending on them for their survival; though tbf, i guess part of it has to do with expecting these societal ‘others’ to give their not so valuable lives for the good of the realm, who really cares if they live or die because they’re out of sight and out of mind. And it’s kinda funny too when we factor in the kingsguard because it’s a far more respected institution than the NW presently, but it too has its fair share of monsters. Quite a few men of the kingsguard have been morally bankrupt individuals, and we even see how the men of the KG sometimes forget other people they should be responsible for because their one priority is the king (we see what happens when you put the people of the realm first and then are ostracized by it a la Jaime tho there’s more to it). Missing the forest for the tree is something both institutions share, making them quite similar. So it’s interesting how grrm flips the fantasy classic of the black knight vs the white knight. The black knight is often anti-heroic, if not straight up villainous, and is often made to be diametrically opposed to the valiant and ever good white knight. But asoiaf has white and black knights both be shown of great virtue and great vice. The white knights in this story really are no better than the black knights. I’d love to see how these two entities could intersect, i.e., what happens when a white knight eventually changes his cloak for a black one (*cough* Jaime *cough*) and how that falls into grrm’s deconstruction of the romance of chivalry, the extent of personal heroism, and perceived knightly virtue. Welp I don’t even know what point I’m trying to make anymore, I just wanted to talk about the KG and the NW because they’re really cool.

no one:

literally not a single person in castle black:

sam and jon, within hours of knowing each other: here is my tragic backstory. oh my god our tragic backstories are narrative parallels. are we best friends? i think yes.

What is honor compared to a woman's love? What is duty against the feel of a newborn son in your arms… Wind and words. Wind and words. We are only human, and the gods have fashioned us for love.

AND NOW MY WATCH BEGINS Chapter 9: The Fire That Burns Against The Cold

And, as always, lots of love to @st-clements-steps and @arielchelby for the wonderful beta work 💙

Waymar Royce

The stars began to come out. A half-moon rose.

[…]

A shadow emerged from the dark of the wood. It stood in front of Royce. Tall, it was, and gaunt [...] Its armor seemed to change color as it moved; here it was white as new-fallen snow, there black as shadow, everywhere dappled with the deep grey-green of the trees. The patterns ran like moonlight on water with every step it took.

[...] "Come no farther," the lordling warned. His voice cracked like a boy's. He threw the long sable cloak back over his shoulders, to free his arms for battle, and took his sword in both hands. The wind had stopped. It was very cold.

The Other slid forward on silent feet. In its hand was a longsword [...] It was alive with moonlight, translucent, a shard of crystal so thin that it seemed almost to vanish when seen edge-on. [...]

Ser Waymar met him bravely. "Dance with me then." He lifted his sword high over his head, defiant. His hands trembled from the weight of it, or perhaps from the cold. Yet in that moment, Will thought, he was a boy no longer, but a man of the Night's Watch.

The Other halted. Will saw its eyes; blue, deeper and bluer than any human eyes, a blue that burned like ice. [...]

They emerged silently from the shadows, twins to the first. Three of them … four … five … Ser Waymar may have felt the cold that came with them, but he never saw them, never heard them. [...]

The pale sword came shivering through the air.

Ser Waymar met it with steel. When the blades met, there was no ring of metal on metal; only a high, thin sound at the edge of hearing, like an animal screaming in pain. [...]

Behind him, to right, to left, all around him, the watchers stood patient, faceless, silent, the shifting patterns of their delicate armor making them all but invisible in the wood. [...]

Again and again the swords met, [...] Ser Waymar was panting from the effort now, his breath steaming in the moonlight. His blade was white with frost; the Other's danced with pale blue light.

Then Royce's parry came a beat too late. The pale sword bit through the ringmail beneath his arm. The young lord cried out in pain. [...]

The Other said something in a language that Will did not know; his voice was like the cracking of ice on a winter lake, and the words were mocking.

Ser Waymar Royce found his fury [...] and he came up snarling, lifting the frost-covered longsword with both hands and swinging it around in a flat sidearm slash with all his weight behind it. The Other's parry was almost lazy.

When the blades touched, the steel shattered.

A scream echoed through the forest night, and the longsword shivered into a hundred brittle pieces, the shards scattering like a rain of needles. Royce went to his knees, shrieking, and covered his eyes. Blood welled between his fingers.

The watchers moved forward together, as if some signal had been given. Swords rose and fell, [...] Will closed his eyes. Far beneath him, he heard their voices and laughter sharp as icicles.

[…]

Will rose. Ser Waymar Royce stood over him. […] A shard from his sword transfixed the [...] pupil of his left eye.

Do you think GRRM missed an opportunity to show gay relationships in the Night’s Watch since it’s an all male institution or is this a case where you can only have so much?

The close PoV structure does limit GRRM's opportunities in some ways. He can only write what the PoV character picks up on - and it's kind of a thing that Jon Snow isn't always in best tune with the feelings and experiences of those around him. He's noticed the one relationship, so the reader can be absolutely certain there's relationships going on in a general sense, but Jon Snow's just not paying attention to the love lives of people around him. Which means GRRM can't show much more without breaking character, a new PoV - or something to draw Jon Snow's attention.

As of ADWD we have both a new PoV at the Wall and what looks very much to be a grieving lover amongst the people who assassinated Jon Snow. The gay male experience at the Watch is not ever likely to be examined in detail, but there may be a little more worldbuilding yet.

I love the Night’s Watch chapters for a lot of reasons but a lot of it is the dynamic between all the boys Jon befriends - Sam, Pyp, Grenn, and poor Small Paul. Sam starts off very convinced that they’re going to leave him because he’s Jon’s brother, not theirs, except Grenn just point blank refuses to leave Sam behind, and Small Paul is insistent that he can carry Sam as well.

Grenn and Small Paul even refuse when given the okay to leave Sam by another brother!

When Jon wakes up at Castle Black, the first thing he does is reach out for his brothers, and Pyp holds his hand!!!

Jon is upset with Grenn for leaving Sam behind at Craster’s but Grenn doesn’t brush it off - he is crushed by what he did, and feels guilty as all hell, and Pyp has to try to cheer him up!

Jon smiles at their antics while they’re in the middle of a long siege/battle that is overwhelming them.

And then of course, when they’re all reunited, they are so adorable

The scene when Jon is chosen as Lord Commanded has so much Pyp, and my man Dolorous Edd being the funniest person in the room as usual

i just love them all so much!! they’re brothers!!!!!!

Jon Snow Returns to Camp by Krista A. Leemhuis

TWOW Jon Snow @ The Night’s Watch If He Wakes Up And Can't Instantly Spot His Femboy Steward/Squire And Their Puppy:

Jon discovering dying Ygritte is a very sad scene. And it gives the lovers the chance to have a final intimate moment...

...until you remember that Jon couldn't move well on his own ( with his injury) and a couple of parallels above he describes Satin not only helping him get down to the yard but also move around.

So while Jon and Ygritte have their farewell scene somewhere nearby Satin is standing looking like this:

Samwell Tarly as the Page of Pentacles

A Tarot of Ice and Fire @toadpeee

I can’t help but feel that Jon specifically being the Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch is perhaps the most important role he can have. The average Westerosi really doesn’t care much about a prophesied prince or king. They’re not too fussed about magic swords meant to kill snarks and grumkins. What they do know is that when the Others come knocking, it’s the Night’s Watch that stands between them and death. The Watch may have fallen on harsh times and may lack the prestige it once had, but it has a very real history of being the one line of defense in Westeros. It’s even accredited in songs as being the cause of victory in the first Long Night. And where legends fall out of fashion and eventually become forgotten, the Watch has been an ever present and tangible figure in Westeros for thousands and thousands of years. So what happens when winter really comes? Westeros won’t look for a prophetic savior. The first thing they’ll look to is the Watch. And who leads the Watch at the moment? Jon. And by extension, who will be the one people look to for survival and leadership? It’s Jon. Jojen said it best: at night, all cloaks are black. In the upcoming war, all of humanity becomes a part of the nights watch. And Jon becomes humanity’s natural leader. If we ever see another great council, I imagine that Jon will be offered the crown primarily because of his position as the LC and his actions leading the war effort. His parentage will merely be an added bonus; assuming it’s even considered in the first place.

considering how often they have to go chasing after him in canon, i just KNOW modern au snow patrol are tired. someone has to be on jon-watch every time they go clubbing because one sip of alcohol activates his stark wolf hindbrain and he's off. sam then spends the next two hours in escalating panic as dolorous edd lists every dangerous and terrible thing that could be happening to him. eventually grenn always finds him drunkenly trauma dumping on a complete stranger (this is how jon makes 90% of his friends) and drags him home by the scruff of his neck. there's a betting pool on when pyp will snap and buy one of those toddler leashes. pyp tried this once. jon gnawed through it.

In the end Halder and Horse had to pull him away from Iron Emmett, one man on either arm. The ranger sat on the ground dazed, his shield half in splinters, the visor of his helm knocked askew, and his sword six yards away. "Jon, enough," Halder was shouting, "he's down, you disarmed him. Enough!" Jon page 1088

Jon has a flashback of a memory of growing up in Winterfell while sparring. Because of this, he has to be pulled away from his opponent.

This picture was another example of why you can't afford to scan through the quiet pits. I had originally picked the sentence right before this. Which was exclusively the flashback. I hadn't been looking forward to doing it because I'd already drawn Jon sparring in his last chapter. At the same time, because I was just doing a quick scan I caught myself mixing him thinking about Catelyn from two pages later with this scene.

I had a great idea for her to be standing in the foreground reacting to the "I'm the lord of Winterfell" line as much as Robb did. It came as quite a surprise when Mr. Martin immediately flashes back to Jon going postal on Iron Emmett.

Fortunately, this challenge is only limited to choosing the chapter so it was easy to move to that scene.