AFfC 45: Samwell 762

Sam and Gilly make it to Oldtown, despite Ironmen attempting to attack their ship. Everyone is surprised that Ironmen are so close to Oldtown and Sam is very worried about the security of the realm. An Oldtown captain is not at all happy about Cersei keeping the Redwyne fleet tied up at Storm's End (or is it Dragonstone?)

Sam plans to visit Archmeisters in Oldtown then take Gilly to his family home Horn Hill, assuming he thinks it is secure enough with his dad in Maidenpool.

Sam goes to the Citadel, which is the university for maesters. He wants to give all his information to the Seneschal, who is presumably in charge of the Citadel, but instead is intercepted by Alleras the Sphinx, an acolyte, which is at least one rank above a novice in the maester hierarchy, I think. Sphinx is an interesting name because Maester Aemon talked about sphinxes before he died. Alleras takes Sam to see the Mage, who it turns out is behind this interception of Sam from the beginning, because he saw Sam's coming in a dragonglass candle. Having heard all of Sam's story about wights and Coldhands (remember the freaky guy Bran has gone off with?), and about Dany being the prophesied saviour of the universe, the Mage sets off immediately to go and see Dany before anyone else gets to her.

The Mage seems to think that the other Maesters don't like all this magic and scorcery and will kill people who talk about it too much. It does seem as if there is a theme here about the end of magic in the world, but unlike with Tolkien's Middle Earth where the fading of magic is inevitable, here magic is attempting to make a bit of a comeback. Certainly it seems as if the Valyrians, before the Doom of Valyria, had powerful magic including the Internet of Candles. That magic and dragons were then lost. And now we know dragons are back along with assassin shadows, wargs and wights. Maybe it's a cycle, somehow involving comets or winters. But it does make me wonder if the maesters, far from believing that magic is all a load of nonsense, are in fact trying to bring about the end of magic. Or in general have an agenda beyond just being good doctors and scientists.

And what's this? The Mage's apprentice is Pate? And Pate is kind of pasty looking? Wasn't he killed in the prologue? Let me see... Yes. He stole something from the Mage for the Alchemist and then got killed by the Alchemist. Did the Mage bring him back to life Beric-style? Or is it something weirder? Is the Alchemist warg-mind-controlling Pate's reanimated corpse now, to get at the Mage? Sam has taken a disliking to Pate: that must mean something.

But can Sam really trust the Mage and the Sphynx? He's been told not to tell the other Archmeisters his story. But maybe the Mage is just trying to keep things hidden for his own benefit.

It's all getting a bit complicated.

AFfC 44: Jaime 746

Riverrun is taken. The former castellan Blackfish Tully has escaped by swimming under a submerged portcullis. He is highly likely to cause trouble in future, so Jaime wants to find him. Jaime is letting the Tully garrison go free, because that is what he promised Edmure. Jaime's aunt Genna thinks this is a mistake and Jaime to chivalrous. Jaime thinks he can't be all that chivalrous since he won the castle by threatening to hurl Edmure's baby away with a trebuchet. But win the castle he did, and with no bloodshed, so I think he has done the right thing here. Some of the garrison want to join the Watch, seeing as they think they won't make it as hedge knights. Jaime gets Raff the Sweetling to escort those ones to Maidenpool, where presumably Lord Tarly can make sure they get ships north to the wall.

Edmure reminisces about playing with wooden blocks with Littlefinger in the Riverrun solar as a child. It must be a real bummer losing the family home like that. You can see why Emmon Frey is worried that keeping it will be difficult.

There has been some arrangement between Tywin Lannister and the Westerlings. I'm not quite sure what it is, but Jeyne's mother is in on it, and seemingly it involved abortion of Robb Stark's baby. Jeyne is still grieving for Robb and the baby, but her mother has no time for all that. She needs Jaime to help arrange a new marriage to an appropriately Lannister-friendly lord's heir. I get a vague sense that Jeyne's mother was in on the Red Wedding somehow, too. Edmure and the Westerlings are now headed for the protection of the Lannister family castle, Casterly Rock.

The drunken Ser Ryman Frey, whom Jaime booted out of the camp, has been killed by Beric's outlaws. His sons are suspicious that the outlaws knew just where to find his party and how strong it would be. It turns out that the singer from Ryman's pavillion, whom Jaime had sing the Rains of Castamere to Edmure to torment him in the previous Jaime chapter, is none other that Tom o' Sevens, friend of Lem Lemoncloak. So clearly he is the spy. He is planning to stay at Riverrun for the winter. Beric's (or is it now Catelyn's) outlaws will cause a lot more trouble yet, I think. Tom also mentions another singer, Wat, who went off to King's Landing. It was Wat who Catelyn tortured into lying about Margaery.

Jaime orders the Freys to give all the Red Wedding captives to Tommen. I suspect he sees the need to start making peace with more factions, and hostages to trade will help. Not among the captives is Jeyne's brother Reynald Westerling, who was loyal to Robb until the end and is now only presumed dead, so perhaps we will see more from him later.

Ser Dermont is out looking for Blackfish but only get trouble from wolves. Jaime wonders if Arya's direwolf is still at large.

Now that Dragonstone has fallen, Jaime expects Storm's End will next. He does not know all the ways things are looking better for Stannis now that Cersei is imprisoned. He does hope that he can somehow make things better for Tommen by getting rid of Cersei and her cronies and installing Kevan Lannister as hand. Little does he know Kevan has already been summoned.

Jaime's mother visits him in a dream. She seems to know about Cersei because she cries when Jaime says he is a knight and Cersei a queen, just as Tywin wished for. He awakes and it is snowing. This is pretty bad because everyone has been so busy with war that they have not stockpiled enough food, and now there is unlikely to be another harvest. It makes me wonder what the growing seasons are like on this planet. If the winters and summers are years long, how often are the harvests? Anyway, I don't see things going well for any but the most powerful lords when half the continent is starving. This winter is going to be grim even without monsters from beyond the wall.

Finally Jaime gets Cersei's letter begging for help. He burns it and does not answer her. It seems like he will ignore her plight. It's certainly a convenient way to get rid of her.

AFfC 43: Cersei 728

Well, that escalated quickly. The High Septon has arrested Margaery after whichever Kettleblack it was "confessed" to rumpy-pumpy with her. Cersei has the Gold Cloaks arrest a bunch of other people who are implicated. She arranges things so that Margaery will either be tried by the Faith or else be defended in trial by combat by Kingsguard Ser Boros Blount whom her Kettleblack can beat. She's pretty pleased with herself for thwarting the prophecy that a younger queen would replace her (even though it's obviously predicting Dany, not Margaery).

There are snags, though. For a start, Cersei realises she did not consider the reaction of the smallfolk, who love Margeary, which is a fairly amateur miscalculation. She's a bit surprised when Margaery herself figures the whole thing out and calles her a vile, scheming, evil bitch, an epitaph worthy of an Eastenders villainess. Neither does she anticipate the fervour of the Septon. Instead of just believing Kettleblack and letting him go (so Cersei can send him to the wall to kill Jon before giving him a Lordship), he whips him until he blabs about not only this whole scheme to set up Margaery, but also the one where Cersei had him assassinate the previous High Septon (for knowing about her and Jaime). And now Cersei is locked up in the Sept just like Margaery. It's hard not to laugh. She's facing trial now, too. And since she has established that only a Kingsguard champion can defend a queen, she can't even deploy whatever Frankenstein's monster Qyburn has been cooking up for her (with the over-sized armour; is it a resurrected GREGOR?)

Now she's relying on Jaime. Maybe he can fight better with his left hand by now, or maybe he can recruit someone quickly into the Kingsguard (after all, there is a vacancy since one of them died in Dorne and I don't think Cersei knows that yet).

But there are already other socio-political consequences of Cersei's arrest:

• The other Kettleblack no longer commands the city watch, reducing Cersei's influence there.
• Qyburn is dismissed from the council, reducing Cersei's influence there.
• Ser Harys Swyft and Grand Maester Pycelle are in charge of which documents Tommen attaches his royal seal to.
• They have asked Kevan Lannister to come and rule.
• Mace Tyrell has stopped besieging Storm's End (good news for Stannis).
• Lord Waters, in charge of the navy against Jaime's advice, has taken all the ships, probably to join Stannis (good news for Stannis).
• Taena Merryweather (whom I'm pretty sure Cersei should not have been trusting so much) has disappeared back home with her husband.

AFfC 42: Brienne 712

At first I was, like, "yay! Brienne is still alive!" But now I'm all, "hey, GRRM, stop trying to kill Brienne all the time!" This is the second Brienne chapter in a row where she's left ambiguously-probably dead at the end.

It turns out Biter's sword-like tongue was actually a sword, or at least Gendry's spear, which is, duh, obvious now. And it's good that Gendry finally joined the fight. But now Brienne has been captured by Beric's men, and the trouble with that is they are really Catelyn's men, since it seems like Beric probably died bringing her back to life. He ought to have known, I think Thoros was warning him about his draining life-force last time we read about him, right before Arya escaped into the clutches of the Hound.

Oh, Lem Lemoncloak is now the new Hound, since he has the helmet now, having taken it from Rorge, who was wearing it when he massacred Saltpans. And of course Biter was at Saltpans; that should have been obvious from the descriptions of some of the atrocities there.

Anyway Brienne's reunion with Catelyn was not the happy affair I might have hoped for. It turns out Catelyn thinks Brienne is now on the Lannister's side, and I can see how it looks like that. She's talking about Jaime in her sleep, has his sword and his letter and Tyrion's squire, and Catelyn is supposed to believe Jaime really does have Sansa's best interests at heart? Even I am doubting that, now.

But they can't all just be hung, can they? Brienne screams a word. What word could save her?

AFfC 41: Alayne 686

The Eyrie is being closed for the winter. Suddenly its impregnability does not seem like such a guarantee of safety. In the winter, and presumably during even a small siege, nothing can be brought up to it so its occupants will starve. Sansa has to coax the awful Robert out of bed. I want to hate him but he seemed to get more sympathetic towards the end of the chapter. I admire Sansa's patience, nonetheless.

On the way down the mountain she meets the amusing but dangerous Lady "call me Randa" Myranda Royce. Between gossip she shares the news that Riverrun (held by Sansa's uncle) has yielded but Dragonstone and Storm's End (Stannis') still hold. We know better about Dragonstone, but I am not sure whether Jaime really did win Riverrun first or whether the news just arrives to places like the Eyrie in the wrong order. Myranda also tells that Jon Snow is now commander of the Night's Watch. Sansa wishes she could see him but knows it will never be, so certain is she that she will be Alayne forever.

Myranda apparently had an affair with Marillion, and is a bit sorry about it since he turned out to be murderer. Except that Sansa knows he was not, and this is exactly the sort of secret that I suspect Myranda will be very good at extracting. Once again Sansa seems naive in comparison.

Petyr turns up with news that Sansa will be betrothed to Harrold "Harry the Heir" Hardyng, described by Myranda as Lady Waynwood's ward. Myranda wanted to marry him but Waynwood wouldn't have it, but now she thinks herself lucky considering he already has a bastard, and Petyr knows of a second bastard. It turns out that, via some complicated family connections, he is the heir of Little Lord Robert, who will probably die at some point. Petyr is hoping for Tyrion to die, Sansa to marry Harry, then reveal herself as Sansa and claim both the Eyrie and Winterfell. Quite where this leaves Petyr himself I'm not entirely sure, except that I am sure he would do well out of it somehow. One slight problem is that Cersei's inevitable downfall is happening faster than Petyr had planned, so he has to work fast.

AFfC 40: The Princess in the Tower 665

Oh this is good.

Arianne was last seen trying to cross a river with Myrcella and her conspirators. Captain Aero Hotah captured them. Kingsguard Ser Arys Oakheart threw himself at Hotah's axe and died, presumably to save Arianne whom he loved since she seduced him into helping her. In the confusion, the mysterious Darkstar tried to kill Myrcella, which he thought would bring on war with the Lannisters more quickly. Her horse moved away just in time, saving her life, but she lost an ear and her face will be scarred.

Arianne is locked in a tower for several days or weeks. She broods about the uselessness and cruelty of her father, Doran Martell. He's the typical awful father that important lords make, having to be more concerned about the security of the realm than the happiness of their daughters. He tried to marry her to a succession of awful old men. He kept her coddled and out of state affairs. She was the rightful heir to the throne of Dorne but she spied a letter to her brother Quentyn promising him the kingdom instead of Arianne. Even now Quentyn is across the narrow sea hiring The Golden Company so he can take Dorne from her.

Except that almost none of that is true. Doran Martell is not the meek and useless man everyone thinks he is. He's playing a longer game, is all. Ever since the Lannisters killed his sister Elia and her children, he has been plotting revenge by marrying his family with the remaining Targaryens. The letter was to Viserys. He would marry Arianne to him and Viserys would, through her, inherit Dorne. He didn't tell Arianne about it because she is a blabbermouth, and the parade of old men was deliberate: he had to make it look like he was trying to marry her off but knew she would refuse them. Drogo put paid to that plan when he poured gold over Viserys' head all the way back in book one. So now Quentyn is off trying to find Dany and marry her, and bring her and her dragons back to finish off the Lannisters. I'm even wondering if he had something to do with Dany getting those dragon eggs.

The trouble now is that Arianne's foolishness means that when Kingsguard Ser Balon Swann turns up with GREGOR's head, he's going to find out what happened to Myrcella and war with the Lannisters might come too soon.

AFfC 39: Cersei 650

The master of coin Lord Gyles is dead and Cersei is not happy about it, and blames Maester Pycelle. She gets Pycelle to tell her that he has been giving Margaery Moon Tea, which is a bit like the morning after pill and thus this is evidence that she has been treasonously having sex with her courtiers. Cersei, with Taena's help (and I'm not sure she should really be trusting Taena so much since it was not that long ago that Taena was spying on Cersei for Margaery) cooks up a complicated plot to prove that Margaery and her cousins are all having orgies all the time so that even Lord Tyrell won't be able to complain when his daughter is beheaded.

I thought this was all going to come about more easily a couple of Cersei chapters ago when Cersei was trying to get one of the Kettleblacks to seduce Margaery. I guess this proved too difficult. I strongly suspect that Margaery is not having orgies at all and the moon tea is for something else. Or else Pycelle is lying.

Qyburn and Cersei torture Margaery's singer Wat the Blue Bard into confessing what they need him to confess and giving them a list of names of people involved in the sex parties. It's all a bit vague how much of this Cersei believes and how much she knows she is faking it all just to get rid of Margaery. I'm not sure even Cersei knows. Nobody likes to think of themselves as the baddie so they will believe whatever fiction is necessary to think themselves good.

Cersei thinks this is all going to work and that Maggy's prophecies will be thwarted. She dreams about being locked up in the dungeon and Tyrion saying that all her children would be crowned and she would see them die. I think this was another part of the prophecy. She tells Taena also that she thinks Tyrion is meant to kill her.

Cersei tells Osney Kettleblack to go and see the new Great Septon and confess that he has been indulging in obscenities with the young queen. She says his punishment will be to go to the wall, where, if I remember rightly, he is to kill Jon Snow. He says he'll do it if she lets him commit obscenities with her, you know, just so he won't totally be lying to the Septon. Cersei goes along with it, because that's how she rolls.

Things are not looking good for Margaery, but I can see about a million ways this scheme can go wrong. Cersei has to trust quite a lot of untrustworthy people. The Tyrells themselves have successfully done quite a lot of skullduggery to get Maergery into this position. They must have felt somewhat secure in leaving her at King's Landing with only young cousins and Cersei. Don't they have any insurance policies?