R+L=J v99

[MtnLion]

If Robert didn't know where Ned was going, he probaly assumed he would try to go for Lyanna (at some point, someone was going to remember that she was missing). That's kinda the logical conclusion. Yet, Robert doesn't say "I'll send people with you" or anything, apparently. I find kind odd that Robert didn't go and look for Lyanna himself. You know, the one he really luuuuuved?

Robert was too busy customizing his crown, and getting pads for the iron throne. ;)

Seriously, Ned and Robert nearly went to war, all over again, in King's Landing about Robert's treatment of the Lannisters (Jaime and the killing of the children).

[BearQueen87]

If Robert didn't know where Ned was going, he probaly assumed he would try to go for Lyanna (at some point, someone was going to remember that she was missing). That's kinda the logical conclusion. Yet, Robert doesn't say "I'll send people with you" or anything, apparently. I find kind odd that Robert didn't go and look for Lyanna himself. You know, the one he really luuuuuved?

Robert knew Ned was going to Storm's End, right? He just didn't know that Ned would go to the TOJ afterwards. But yeah, it is odd (yet not out of character) for Robert to be behind the ball in not sending someone after Lyanna

[Ser Duncan the Small]

There is another possibility that is pointed to by the text. Ethan Glover was Brandon's squire and he was imprisoned in the Black Cells along with Brandon. Ethan is the only one that we know of that was not killed in captivity, but he has been in the Black Cells for over a year, and is likely not in very good physical condition. Why would Ned take an ill squire on his trip to the tower? ;)

I had forgotten he was a Glover. BearQueen mentioned this (crediting Ygrain) and I liked it a lot. Makes sense to me. I bet he rode out to meet Ned when he went to lift the siege

[BearQueen87]

There is another possibility that is pointed to by the text. Ethan Glover was Brandon's squire and he was imprisoned in the Black Cells along with Brandon. Ethan is the only one that we know of that was not killed in captivity, but he has been in the Black Cells for over a year, and is likely not in very good physical condition. Why would Ned take an ill squire on his trip to the tower? ;)

GLOVER! That's it. I kept calling him the squire cause his name escaped me.

[Ser Duncan the Small]

Robert knew Ned was going to Storm's End, right? He just didn't know that Ned would go to the TOJ afterwards. But yeah, it is odd (yet not out of character) for Robert to be behind the ball in not sending someone after Lyanna

I'm thinking Robert hadn't the faintest idea of where to begin. It makes sense that the squire, having heard of the troubles between Robert and Ned, rode out to tell Ned without telling New King Robert. It is odd that he was not killed in captivity and moreso that he went to the Showdown

[sj4iy]

Well Ned and Robert had just fought rather harshly over the dead Targ babies. They weren't really speaking at all. It took Lyanna's death to heal the breech

Even if they hadn't fought over it, I still doubt that he would have told Robert about it because I think he knew what he would find. Maybe that's why he was so quick about it, though...he didn't want Robert finding out and going after Lyanna himself.

[BearQueen87]

Even if they hadn't fought over it, I still doubt that he would have told Robert about it because I think he knew what he would find. Maybe that's why he was so quick about it, though...he didn't want Robert finding out and going after Lyanna himself.

Oh god. Can you image if Robert found Lyanna before Ned...

[sj4iy]

Oh god. Can you image if Robert found Lyanna before Ned...

Aegon all over again, probably.

[stateofdissipation]

It is explained after the comma.

Like Ashara was waiting for him to show up, and tell her how it went...

But maybe I'm making things up. :blushing:

Ned would not speak of the (Jon's) mother, not so much as a word, but a castle has no secrets, and Catelyn heard her maids repeating tales they had heard from the lips of her husband's soldiers, They whispered of Ser Arthur Dayne, the Sword of Morning deadliest of the seven knights of Aerys's kingsguard, and how their young lord had slain him in single combat. And they told how afterward he had carried Ser Arthur's sword back to the beautiful young sister who awaited him in a castle called Starfall on the shores of the Summer Sea.--aGoT page 62

[BearQueen87]

It is explained after the comma.

Like Ashara was waiting for him to show up, and tell her how it went...

But maybe I'm making things up. :blushing:

Going back to this for a second. I don't think Ashara, ect were waiting for Ned after the battle, but if we're right about Starfall sending help to the TOJ in the form of food and supplies and servants, the Daynes would expect that the servants would come back. So they might think Ned showing up is just him seeing the servants home safely.

And then...SURPRISE! Baby! Dead brother! Sword!

[Julia Martell]

Oh god. Can you image if Robert found Lyanna before Ned...

Lyanna would have gouged Robert's eyes out with the midwife's forceps if he laid on a finger on baby Jon, even if she was bleeding out.

(20 pages! OMG guys it's almost time!)

[stateofdissipation]

Lyanna would have gouged Robert's eyes out with the midwife's forceps if he laid on a finger on baby Jon, even if she was bleeding out.

(20 pages! OMG guys it's almost time!)

The danger Robert posed tends to get vastly overrated..

We had come late to Robert's cause. It was necessary to demonstrate our loyalty. When I laid those bodies before the throne, no man could doubt that we had forsaken House Targaryen forever. And Robert's relief was palpable. As stupid as he was, even he knew that Rhaegar's children had to die if his throne was ever to be secure. Yet he saw himself as a hero, and heroes do not kill children.--Tywin --aSoS chapter 53

Now lets see what Ned thought about it."The gods be damned. It was a hollow victory they gave me, A crown... it was the girl I prayed them for, Your sister safe...and mine again as she was meant to be. I ask you Ned, what good is it to wear a crown? The gods mock the prayers of kings and cowherds alike." --Robert aGoT 111

"I thought you were a better man than this Robert. I thought we had made a nobler king,"--Ned aGoT page 343.

The Lyanna ran off tends to get overplayed as well.

And then there are some things that are just don’t square with history. In some sense I’m trying to respond to that. [For example] the arranged marriage, which you see constantly in the historical fiction and television show, almost always when there’s an arranged marriage, the girl doesn’t want it and rejects it and she runs off with the stable boy instead. This never fucking happened. It just didn’t. There were thousands, tens of thousand, perhaps hundreds of thousands of arranged marriages in the nobility through the thousand years of Middle Ages and people went through with them. That’s how you did it. It wasn’t questioned. Yeah, occasionally you would want someone else, but you wouldn’t run off with the stable boy.--GRRM

http://entertainment...sy-and-history/

[BearQueen87]

The danger Robert posed tends to get vastly overrated..

I think you're underestimating how fiercely a mother will protect her children--something that is a major motif throughout ASOIAF with Cat, Dany, Cersei...

[stateofdissipation]

I think you're underestimating how fiercely a mother will protect her children--something that is a major motif throughout ASOIAF with Cat, Dany, Cersei...

you do know that none of the above actually did a good job at protecting their children.... survival of the children being the deciding factor in good protecting.

But that is neither here nor there.

Robert was not a threat to babies according to Ned and Tywin.

[BearQueen87]

you do know that none of the above actually did a good job at protecting their children.... survival of the children being the deciding factor in good protecting.

But that is neither here nor there.

Robert was not a threat to babies according to Ned and Tywin.

doesn't matter if they actually met their goals, it's about the fact that they tried to protect their children. Lyanna would have done the same: she would have tried to protect her child from any force she saw as a threat.

[sj4iy]

doesn't matter if they actually met their goals, it's about the fact that they tried to protect their children. Lyanna would have done the same: she would have tried to protect her child from any force she saw as a threat.

She would have tried to, but there was nothing she could have done after she died- we know that.

[BearQueen87]

She would have tried to, but there was nothing she could have done after she died- we know that.

True. But anyone that walks into that tower that isn't Ned is probably not going to met kindly by Lyanna. She doesn't know what anyone-not-Ned would do.

[Alia of the knife]

Because the app is first and foremost an encyclopedia. It presents information, not figurative language. I simply pointed out Jon's death as a way of showing that the app is unable to present us with complete picture right now because of the lack of information. Just because the app says he's dead doesn't mean that he has to be dead because it wouldn't reveal any big secret. Same with something like the ToJ situation...we lack enough information from the books to draw a complete picture and the app is unable to do anything about that until the next two books are released.

I see what your saying, and I agree on the nature of some of the ambiguity of the wording.

He can say definitively that Rhaegar is dead, that Lyanna is dead, and that Brandon died without having sons for example on the question of the Starks almost becoming extinct because all that is known, but as for the rest, even Aegon.......

I'm not up to something here. It really makes no matter the tower was on Dornish soil or not - the chances that the Daynes provided the tower with food and provisions are still zero. Some other people might have, though if Rhaegar cared. The tower was clearly on the northern side of the mountains. Anyone from Dorne proper would have had to cross all the mountains to get there, as well as answer questions of the Fowlers and Manwoodys what they were doing with this stuff (they would have been average merchants, now, would they?).

The Tower of Joy scenario looks like a romantic retreat/escape from the world thing - on the outside. But why the hell would Rhaegar do this

- right at the major pass into Dorne - it's not that he could hide his silver-gold hair or his purple eyes, not to mention the white knights attending him.

- this close to Dorne (or actually in Dorne), where most of the lords/people loyal to House Martell would most likely not be happy with what he was doing there.

I'm just saying - were there no (abandoned?) watchtowers, hidden villages etc. in the Riverlands, the Reach, or the Westerlands - much closer to Harrenhal?

As to Wylla:

UL seems to assume that she was always a servant of the Daynes, but that's not confirmed, or is it? She eventually became Edric Dayne's wet-nurse, but this does not confirms that she was always in the service of House Dayne. My guess was always that Ned sent her to Starfall after she was no longer needed there, to prevent her from talking (and to silently corroborate the Ashara story).

As to Ashara: We don't know where she was during the war, or do we? She could have been in Starfall - explaining how she survived the Sack - but she could also have been in KL for most of the time. Perhaps she even was on Dragonstone and returned to Dorne by ship? All we know for sure is that she apparently eventually killed herself at Starfall.

Alia,

if I get the time line right, then Tywin tried to offer Cersei to Rhaegar very early on, and he tried to do the thing as correct as possible. Approaching Aerys, and only Aerys. Cersei was still very young (around 10, wasn't it, she went to Maggy on the very same day) when Aerys rejected her, and she still lived at Casterly Rock at that time. Cersei's memories do not suggest that she and Rhaegar had ever a private conversation, or interacted on a level which enables you to get to know somebody as a person.

Before Aerys came to Casterly Rock for the tourney, Cersei may have met Rhaegar once or twice, if she was taken to court, or if the king came to the West before that, but that would have been it - and she would have been even younger then.

Rhaegar rejecting Cersei would only make sense if Tywin/Cersei approached Rhaegar before they approached Aerys (enabling Rhaegar to discuss the offer with his father).

But I could easily see Tywin trying instigate an affair between Rhaegar and Cersei afterwards. The similarities between Otto/Alicent and Tywin/Cersei are way too striking, and Elia could easily have suffered the fate of Queen Aemma.

Well, at some point, the Ruling Lady of Dorne came calling to offer her children to Joannas, but Tywin told her that at least Cersei was meant for Rhaegar.

Some time later. Cersei was rejected and Rhaegar married Elia, something that Tywin never forgave as we see later his terrible revenge.

Also, while I don't think Rhaegar was perfect, I don't think he can be compared to Viserys who really was a jerk. A poster last night on the tPatQ thread gave a great analysis and break down of Viserys character.

I also see quite a few parallels between Tywin/Cersei and the Queen of Thorns who supposedly jilted a Targaryen Prince, (though the theory goes it she who was rejected, and rejected by Prince Duncan for Jenny of Oldstones).

"Black cats brought ill luck, as Rhaegar’s little girl had discovered in this very castle. She would have been my daughter, if the Mad King had not played his cruel jape on Father. It had to have been the madness that led Aerys to refuse Lord Tywin’s daughter and take his son instead, whilst marrying his own son to a feeble Dornish princess with black eyes and a flat chest. The memory of the rejection still rankled, even after all these years. Many a night she had watched Prince Rhaegar in the hall, playing his silver-stringed harp with those long, elegant fingers of his. Had any man ever been so beautiful? He was more than a man, though. His blood was the blood of old Valyria, the blood of dragons and gods. When she was just a little girl, her father had promised her that she would marry Rhaegar. She could not have been more than six or seven. “Never speak of it, child,” he had told her, smiling his secret smile that only Cersei ever saw.

“Not until His Grace agrees to the betrothal. It must remain our secret for now.” And so it had, though once she had drawn a picture of herself flying behind Rhaegar on a dragon, her arms wrapped tight about his chest. When Jaime had discovered it she told him it was Queen Alysanne and King Jaehaerys. She was ten when she finally saw her prince in the flesh, at the tourney her lord father had thrown to welcome King Aerys to the west. Viewing stands had been raised beneath the walls of Lannisport, and the cheers of the smallfolk had echoed off Casterly Rock like rolling thunder.

They cheered Father twice as loudly as they cheered the king, the queen recalled, but only half as loudly as they cheered Prince Rhaegar. Seventeen and new to knighthood, Rhaegar Targaryen had worn black plate over golden ringmail when he cantered onto the lists. Long streamers of red and gold and orange silk had floated behind his helm, like flames. Two of her uncles fell before his lance, along with a dozen of her father’s finest jousters, the flower of the west. "

"By night the prince played his silver harp and made her weep. When she had been presented to him, Cersei had almost drowned in the depths of his sad purple eyes. He has been wounded, she recalled thinking, but I will mend his hurt when we are wed. Next to Rhaegar, even her beautiful Jaime had seemed no more than a callow boy. The prince is going to be my husband, she had thought, giddy with excitement, and when the old king dies I’ll be the queen. Her aunt had confided that truth to her before the tourney. “You must be especially beautiful,” Lady Genna told her, fussing with her dress, “for at the final feast it shall be announced that you and Prince Rhaegar are betrothed.”

I speculate with confidence that both Rhaegar and Aerys knew why they were being treated at Casterly Rock. and I tend to think that Aerys may not have been that opposed to the match if he wasn't opposed to marrying Rhaegar to a lesser House such as the Martells, and like it or not for their titles of Prince/Princess, Elia was a last resort, or else why wasn't she considered at the very first?

She had dragons blood, she was older than Rhaegar, and I doubt a secret, and yet Aerys sent Steffon Berantheon to the free cities for Rhaegars bride.

And if the Targs. married Hightowers and Aryns, then why not Lannisters or Starks?

I don't think Aerys went all that way just to call Tywin a servant when his House was well above others for Rhaegar to get a bride from, so I'm sticking with while Cersei saw sadness in Rhaegar s eyes, he saw crazy in her emerald depths just as likely saw goodness in Elias.

[UVA]

Robert was not a threat to babies according to Ned and Tywin.

Insofar as he couldn't dirty his own hands and allowed (and was grateful to) other people to accept blame (Tywin), sure he wasn't a child killer. Yet Robert certainly didn't eschew the benefits he reaped from Rhaenys and Aegon's deaths. He didn't prosecute those responsible, and in fact rewarded the Lannisters for their fealty via child murder. This coupled with Ned's surprise at Robert's continued hatred of the Targaryens, Rhaegar in particular, some 14 years after the Rebellion, after ordering the assassination of a young girl, do we need to undermine the threat that Robert presented to baby Jon?

She would have tried to, but there was nothing she could have done after she died- we know that.

And this helplessness is the pathos of Lyanna's death scene.

[Kingmonkey]

If Robert didn't know where Ned was going, he probaly assumed he would try to go for Lyanna (at some point, someone was going to remember that she was missing). That's kinda the logical conclusion. Yet, Robert doesn't say "I'll send people with you" or anything, apparently. I find kind odd that Robert didn't go and look for Lyanna himself. You know, the one he really luuuuuved?

Ned had named that murder; Robert called it war. When he had protested that the young prince and princess were no more than babes, his new-made king had replied, "I see no babes. Only dragonspawn." Not even Jon Arryn had been able to calm that storm. Eddard Stark had ridden out that very day in a cold rage, to fight the last battles of the war alone in the south. It had taken another death to reconcile them; Lyanna's death, and the grief they had shared over her passing.

(italics mine) aGoT ch12

Robert was wounded in the Battle of the Trident, and Ned lead the forces after that. Robert arrived at KL some time after Ned did and stayed there when Ned went to lift the siege at Storm's End to recover from his wounds. After Ned dealt with Storm's End he left his army, taking a tiny group of his own men to go to the Tower of Joy.

I'd say the obvious assumptions that lead from this are:

1. Ned knew in advance of the ToJ, or he wouldn't have found it so quickly

2. Robert didn't, or he'd have been involved in some way.

3. Ned intended to keep it that way, hence the small force of his own trusted men when he had an entire army at his disposal.

Some less obvious ones:

1. Ned might have saved (or might have believed he could have saved) Lyanna if he'd gone straight to the ToJ. Ned's deep feelings of guilt over the events at the ToJ hint that he knew about the ToJ before he went to Storm's End.

2. Ned had a reason to keep the information from Robert, and if it was just Lyanna, he wouldn't -- so he knew something before he arrived at the ToJ that made him want to go there on the quiet. The "storm" under which he left KL was his disagreement over how Aerys' child-heirs should be treated, so the best explanation for his silence is that he expected to find a child heir at the ToJ as well as Lyanna.

3. Ned's next action after the ToJ was to go to Starfall to return Dayne's sword, while Barbary Dustin holds a huge grudge about him not having returned her husband's bones -- Ned's ally at the ToJ. Why the priority for Ned's enemy over Ned's ally? If Ned knew about the ToJ, someone told him. Ashara Dayne was a handmaiden to Elia, who was at King's Landing. This makes it quite reasonably to guess that Ashara was also at King's Landing during the sack. She would have feared for her life, and then in strides Ned, who she knew (possibly loved) and trusted, so it would make a lot of sense for her to seek Ned out for her own protection. This gives us both an obvious source for Ned's knowledge of the ToJ and a reason why Ned would have gone straight to Starfall afterwards. My guess, Ashara told Ned on the condition that he do all he could to spare Arthur. Having failed to do so, he returned Arthur's sword to her. Her guilt over her part in her brother's death gives us a very good answer to why she (is reported to have) then committed suicide.

The third one is also another likely source for part of Ned's sense of guilt, and I'd say Ned's dream hints strongly at this. He feels guilt about the ToJ, and in his dream it is the 3KG who are clear while his own men are wraiths. This suggests he feels more guilt about the 3KG than about his own men. He lead a lot of men into war, and a lot of them died. Well, that's war. His talk with the 3KG I believe is highly stylised rather than literal, but points strongly to a sense of an inevitability to the climax; thus Ned's guilt here may be not simply that good men died, but that he failed to stop it. Lyanna's not the only person to say "Promise me" to Ned -- it's pointedly echoed by Robert. Perhaps Ashara said it, too.