Lady Stoneheart (with Spoilers)

[Ser Few of the Fingers]

Ok, so everyone hates Catelyn. But I cannot avoid feeling cheated with Stoneheart's attitude. It's COMPLETELY irrational. When they're just about to hang Brienne, I felt like everything was played at high speed so the reader wouldn't notice that they all lacked justification. It's like if Martin wanted to put Brienne in a dramatic situation, but it didn't quite fit.

First of all: apparently, because Brienne has a Lannister sword, now she's an enemy and a traitor. But wait, haven't we just seen Lem taking and using the Hound's helm? Why can he have the belongings of an enemy and Brienne can't? So, Brienne's now a traitor because she has Jaime's sword and Jaime's bad. Let's see... does anyone remember who freed Jaime? But of course, Catelyn! And to which purpose? To rescue Cat's girls! So now Brienne is guilty of having delivered Jaime safely and looking for the girls... Who should get hanged again?

Second: Ser Hyle and Podrick. Ok, Ser Hyle is Tarly's bannerman. And Tarly is bad because... he's protecting Duskendale. So, yeah, anyway, I don't really care much about him (although before he proposed marriage to Brienne I did think he was a nice guy who actually felt guilty and wanted forgiveness). And Pod is guilty, of course, of being a Lannister lackey. He was the Imp squire, and the Imp is bad because... wait! Hasn't he already proved his innocence in the Erye? Perhaps he cheated, that filthy dwarf.

Third: the whole Brotherhood. So apparently we can explain Stonehearts vengeful attitude because, as Martin said, death changes people, and it does not make them nicer (so Dondarrion was becoming eviler and eviler every time? That's why he resurrected Catelyn, just to laugh at how grimm things will become?). Or maybe it's because she has half her brain with worms and rotted away. But what with her band of outlaws? Not only they follow a zombie nobody understands (how did she convinced them of being their boss if she's barely able to speak?), but also they do not think twice (or once for that matter). It was ok when they were helping her hang the responsible for the Red Wedding, but when they're about to hang a little boy and a wench that they know had nothing to do with it, they should reconsider, I think. When Brienne offers to ransom Podrick's life, Lem says that her father cannot give him his wife and daughter back... so he goes around hanging people hoping that that's the way of reviving his wife and daughter! Very clever Lem! It is at this point where Jack-Be-Lucky tells him "do you figure to talk the bitch to death?", as if he were saying "hurry up before we (or the reader) starts thinking and discover this has no sense at all!".

Perhaps Thoros feels guilty about this, but he doesn't say a word. Wasn't he like the second in command when Berric was with them?

PS: This whole "Martin, I feel cheated" thing also has to do with the way this book is written. Before I read AFFC I was amazed with the writer's abbility to justify the travels of every character to be at an important event and be able to experience it through them, while keeping a relatively stable number of protagonists (or POV's). I'm refering to Catelyn voyage to meet up with Renly, or Theon's journey back home, or when we got really important stuff narrated twice by different characters and their perspectives (like Tyrion and Davos at the Battle of the Blackwater, or Tyrion and Sansa's wedding). But with this book it feels like Martin didn't want to give to much importance to certain characters in particular, while the plot involving them was quite important, so we get the Asha/Areo/Victarion plot divided evenly between them, and we get also ONE chapter for Areo Hottah, ONE for Ser Arys and more for Arianne. I know it had to be this way not to reveal everything until the end (if we had been with Doran all the time, there was no dramatic revelation of the plans he had, and the same thing with Victarion and his hatred towards Euron), but it doesn't feel as good as before to me.

[T-Payne]

I'm definitely in the camp of Catelyn / Stoneheart fans though I agree that she is on a rampage at this point with anything but justice on what's left of her mind. It doesn't seem like she's taking any rational notion such as "Brienne is still trying to fulfill her commitment to me" into consideration. I kind of like what she seems to have become though, albeit in a twisted way :devil: . Anyone angry at her for her mistakes in Game should feel vindicated in my opinion. She experienced the death of almost her entire family before being betrayed and murdered. Being brought back was not necessarily a gift either, it seems downright miserable.

I was also heavily disappointed with Brienne's hanging as she was brimming with potential as a protagonist (as much as that concept even exists in this story). How convinced are we that she is dead though? It seems to me much like the Arya chapter that ended with an axe in the back of her head.

Martin is definitely fanning this story out through Feast and Dance. He seems to be digging deeper into each character while adding more. That means an exponentially growing list of plotlines to keep up with. At this rate, the next book will be 1500 pages and cover a week or so chronologically :ack: . I'm very curious to see how he plans to really wrap this up in two more volumes. I think a lot of us fear a "Lost" ending where loads of questions are unanswered and the reader is left to come up with too many of their own conclusions.

[Chatayas]

When Brienne is talking to Thoros of Myr, she asks him of justice. "I remember justice. It had a pleasant taste. Justice was what we were about when Beric lead us, or so we told ourselves...[but] war makes monsters of us all." This statement makes it clear the brotherhood lacks justification. They have become "monsters" hungry for blood. They may have started out seeking justice for the fallen, but now only desire vengeance for themselves. Only an endless flow of death will compensate them for the lives of the friends and family they lost.

Lady Stoneheart trusts no one. She was betrayed too many times and lost too much. Now she only seeks vengeance. Anyone and everyone's blood for the blood of her family. It doesn't matter the extent of their crime, only that they committed one. Befriending Lannisters is a crime as far as the brotherhood is concerned. Thoros tells Brienne "I do not doubt that kindness and mercy and forgiveness can be found...but do not look for them here." Is it so hard to believe that after all the horrors Cat has endured she would become the cold, angry creature she is? I detest what she has become and her judgement of Brienne, but I did not feel cheated by GRRM or think it was implausible as far as the story was concerned. Anyway, I think Brienne lives.

Also remember that Stoneheart gave Brienne the chance to leave and go kill Jaime, but she refused. She carried a Lannister sword and document from the king. How is that suppose to look to Stoneheart? Looks like Brienne switched sides, that's how.

As far as the several POV's in Dorne and the Iron Islands, I didn't have any grievances against that. It seemed the only way to get a well rounded view of whats going on in these places.

[HaraktheHirsute]

Remember, Bolton gave Jaime's regards to Robb before skewering him, so I would guess that could very well have given Lady Stoneheart the impression that Jaime was in on the Red Wedding. Then Brienne cried out his name a bunch of times as the not quite conscious captive of the outlaws, which doesn't look too good.

[HaraktheHirsute]

I was also heavily disappointed with Brienne's hanging as she was brimming with potential as a protagonist (as much as that concept even exists in this story). How convinced are we that she is dead though? It seems to me much like the Arya chapter that ended with an axe in the back of her head.

I don't think Brienne is dead (though I'm highly annoyed that I probably won't find out for sure until Book 6). The chapter ends with "She screamed a word." I highly doubt Martin would end Brienne on that note.

[HaraktheHirsute]

BTW, anyone notice the similarities between Brienne and Tyrion? Both ugly, both further disfigured in battle and both twice falsely accused. It would be interesting if these two met.

[King Slayer]

Just keep in mind, Catleyn/Stoneheart, has recently had her (favorite?) son killed in front of her, and also thinks her other two sons, Bran and Rickon are dead. She also thinks Arya is dead, and she knows Ned is dead. So she pretty much only has Sansa left, and even her whereabouts are cloudy. Oh, and she also had her throat slit, and then brought back to life in a sketchy manner. I don't know about you guys, but I think I'd be going on an emotional rampage myself.

[alguien]

Read an interesting bit today with regards to the idea of resurrection in ASOIAF, according to GRRM (in his interview with John Hodgman):

I do think that if you're bringing a character back, that a character has gone through death, that's a transformative experience...My characters who come back from death are worse for wear. In some ways, they're not even the same characters anymore. The body may be moving, but some aspect of the spirit is changed or transformed, and they've lost something. One of the characters who has come back repeatedly from death is Beric Dondarrion, The Lightning Lord. Each time he's revived he loses a little more of himself. He was sent on a mission before his first death. He was sent on a mission to do something, and it's like, that's what he's clinging to. He's forgetting other things, he's forgetting who he is, or where he lived. He's forgotten the woman who he was once supposed to marry. Bits of his humanity are lost every time he comes back from death; he remembers that mission. His flesh is falling away from him, but this one thing, this purpose that he had is part of what's animating him and bringing him back to death. I think you see echoes of that with some of the other characters who have come back from death.

[Rebecky]

I think that Catelyn has been through so much, and eventually i think a little crazy before she dies that i understand why she does what she does.

Why would she care for justice and the 'right' thing when she thinks all of her children apart from Sansa are dead.

[ravenlioncourt]

As most people have been saying, I think that Stonehearts actions are understandable, when you are defined by that much grief and sorrow logical thought wouldn't enter into the picture. It's also nice to see a writer that actually has consequences for characters being brought back from the dead. But my big question is - who will Stoneheart pass on the fire to? She can't be on a rampage for ever, and given Martin's comments about Dondarrion only focusing on his mission it seems highly unlikely that she will ever be Catelyn again.

There has to come a point where she stops, and given Catelyn's past character I can perhaps see her not wanting to pass it on unless for the sake of family. Saying that I don't know if there is any way for a character brought back in this fashion to die without passing on the flame...?

[lyvyathan]

Ok, so everyone hates Catelyn. But I cannot avoid feeling cheated with Stoneheart's attitude. It's COMPLETELY irrational. When they're just about to hang Brienne, I felt like everything was played at high speed so the reader wouldn't notice that they all lacked justification. It's like if Martin wanted to put Brienne in a dramatic situation, but it didn't quite fit.

First of all: apparently, because Brienne has a Lannister sword, now she's an enemy and a traitor. But wait, haven't we just seen Lem taking and using the Hound's helm? Why can he have the belongings of an enemy and Brienne can't? So, Brienne's now a traitor because she has Jaime's sword and Jaime's bad. Let's see... does anyone remember who freed Jaime? But of course, Catelyn! And to which purpose? To rescue Cat's girls! So now Brienne is guilty of having delivered Jaime safely and looking for the girls... Who should get hanged again?

Second: Ser Hyle and Podrick. Ok, Ser Hyle is Tarly's bannerman. And Tarly is bad because... he's protecting Duskendale. So, yeah, anyway, I don't really care much about him (although before he proposed marriage to Brienne I did think he was a nice guy who actually felt guilty and wanted forgiveness). And Pod is guilty, of course, of being a Lannister lackey. He was the Imp squire, and the Imp is bad because... wait! Hasn't he already proved his innocence in the Erye? Perhaps he cheated, that filthy dwarf.

Third: the whole Brotherhood. So apparently we can explain Stonehearts vengeful attitude because, as Martin said, death changes people, and it does not make them nicer (so Dondarrion was becoming eviler and eviler every time? That's why he resurrected Catelyn, just to laugh at how grimm things will become?). Or maybe it's because she has half her brain with worms and rotted away. But what with her band of outlaws? Not only they follow a zombie nobody understands (how did she convinced them of being their boss if she's barely able to speak?), but also they do not think twice (or once for that matter). It was ok when they were helping her hang the responsible for the Red Wedding, but when they're about to hang a little boy and a wench that they know had nothing to do with it, they should reconsider, I think. When Brienne offers to ransom Podrick's life, Lem says that her father cannot give him his wife and daughter back... so he goes around hanging people hoping that that's the way of reviving his wife and daughter! Very clever Lem! It is at this point where Jack-Be-Lucky tells him "do you figure to talk the bitch to death?", as if he were saying "hurry up before we (or the reader) starts thinking and discover this has no sense at all!".

Perhaps Thoros feels guilty about this, but he doesn't say a word. Wasn't he like the second in command when Berric was with them?

PS: This whole "Martin, I feel cheated" thing also has to do with the way this book is written. Before I read AFFC I was amazed with the writer's abbility to justify the travels of every character to be at an important event and be able to experience it through them, while keeping a relatively stable number of protagonists (or POV's). I'm refering to Catelyn voyage to meet up with Renly, or Theon's journey back home, or when we got really important stuff narrated twice by different characters and their perspectives (like Tyrion and Davos at the Battle of the Blackwater, or Tyrion and Sansa's wedding). But with this book it feels like Martin didn't want to give to much importance to certain characters in particular, while the plot involving them was quite important, so we get the Asha/Areo/Victarion plot divided evenly between them, and we get also ONE chapter for Areo Hottah, ONE for Ser Arys and more for Arianne. I know it had to be this way not to reveal everything until the end (if we had been with Doran all the time, there was no dramatic revelation of the plans he had, and the same thing with Victarion and his hatred towards Euron), but it doesn't feel as good as before to me.

I felt that the transformation of Catalyn to Stoneheart and her subsequent behavior is totally logically in her character development.

Cat has always had that impulsive streak. She doesn't think - she just acts on impulse and emotion.

1. She stayed in Bran's room for months? after he fell down - totally neglecting Rickon.

2. Then she rushed to King's Landing - to confer with her husband leaving Bran and Rickon

3. She seizes Tyrion on impulse - in effectively declaring war on House Lannister - without even thinking about the consequences of retaliation to her husband and her daughters who are practically in Lannister territory (not to mention the Stark bannermen - the Tully estates + the matter of actually reaching her sister's castle safely)

4. She releases Jamie Lannister without consulting her son, her liege King - for only a foolish unsecured declaration by the Kingslayer that he would release her two daughters. Did she even consider whether Tywin Lannister would honor that promise? Not to mention the impact of releasing a major enemy player would have on the fragile alliance that Robb had created.

And of course - there's the matter that Stoneheart was dead for 3 whole days before being resurrected - rotting in the water like a dead fish - that would have surely had some negative impact on her (current) disposition..

As Stoneheart - well she's twisted, mean, cruel ... not to mention rotting in her flesh and probably missing most of her marbles too. Of course she's going to lash out - considering what an idiotic character she was when she was alive, her current behavior is easy to predict.

It would actually have been appropriate for her (in the story telling process) to have used Oathkeeper to do Brienne in.

[Jehane]

I don't think Brienne is dead (though I'm highly annoyed that I probably won't find out for sure until Book 6). The chapter ends with "She screamed a word." I highly doubt Martin would end Brienne on that note.

Any ideas what that word might have been? When I first read the chapter, I thought it might have been "Jaime" (I'm somehow convinced that Brienne is secretly in love with Jaime *g*), but I'm pretty convinced now that it was "Arya" or "Sansa".

As for Stoneheart's irrational behaviour: You got some valid points there, Octavio, but I'm not sure whether reason actually applies to an undead being, especially to a woman who lay dead in the water for three days before being resurrected. I agree with Lyvyathan that this had a negative impact on her personality - that and having lost pretty much everything she ever cherished.

[Aki]

Lady Stoneheart is just not Catelyn Stark anymore. She's not thinking rationally, she's just mad for revenge, like in her final moments at the "Red Wedding", where she killed that Frey idiot. At that point, she was already mad.

She released Kingslayer after she got the word that her sons are dead. She probably felt guilty for not being with them, for not seeing her little boys for so long. All she hoped for after that, was that Robb is going to return to North, live long and have children.

After Beric Donderion returned her to life - she wan no longer Catelyn Stark. She is only trying to get back at Frey's, Lannister's and Bolton's for their part in the "Red Wedding".

There is no strategy at what she does, no thinking ahead, just mindless revenge on anyone who's connected with those who harmed her, and her family.

Real question is why are people following her, are they so insane after the war, that they too only want to hang people.

[Lemonraven]

Real question is why are people following her, are they so insane after the war, that they too only want to hang people.

They lost family and possibly friends because of the war and they too want revenge. I remember that Lem mentioned this to Brienne.

[Canadian Goose]

I felt the same way as you Octavio. When they were starting to hang Brienne and company I was just like "what are you doing?". I mean Brienne was trying to find the Stark girls and just because she has a Lannister sword and Said "Jaime" a few times when she was unconcious and badly injured that makes her a traitor? I understand them going crazy on the Freys, I truly do. But hanging anyone and everyone they come across is :huh: going to far. I didn't mind Catelyn as much as others have said they do/did but I really don't like Lady Stoneheart.

[Longclaw998]

When Lady Stark died Lady Stoneheart was born.Really two different characters.But, the people following Lady Stoneheart recognize her as Lady Stark and follow her as her sworn bannermen.They all are hell bent on revenge and I am glad to see House Stark getting some payback.I find it interesting that all of the main characters have similar flaws.At times it is hard to tell the good guys from the bad guys.Catelyn/Stoneheart is typical of this dichotomy.

[Errant Bard]

I felt the same way as you Octavio. When they were starting to hang Brienne and company I was just like "what are you doing?". I mean Brienne was trying to find the Stark girls and just because she has a Lannister sword and Said "Jaime" a few times when she was unconcious and badly injured that makes her a traitor?

No, what makes her a traitor is actually working for the Lannisters, and refusing a direct order to go kill the Lannister general, a guy who had something to do with the Red Wedding, a guy who just took Riverrun, a guy who tried to kill Bran, a guy who had Jory and a handful of Stark retainers killed on a whim, a guy who threatens to throw babies with trebuchets, a guy, who simply, leads the enemy army against their little guerilla. (And Jaime actually really did know what was going on when he told Roose to send his greeting to Robb, by the way, though it's not really relevant.)

The Brotherhood is already hunting for Sansa and Arya (we know that from a draft for the last chapter that found itself in the Russian edition, and can guess by the orphanage Gendry leads or the chase given to the guys who sacked Saltpans and "the Hound" ), and Brienne is not only inefficient, but counterproductive, trailing two Lannister bannermen behind, and being as subtle and visible as a sore thumb in her quest.

And Stoneheart is definitely Catelyn, the same character, with not much changed past the anger and trauma. If you reread her chapters you'll see that she expresses several time the desire to kill every Lannister, Greyjoy or Clegane she finds. She's only stopped by the fact that she still had stuff to lose. Now, though? She has nothing to lose anymore. She still lets people who were not involved with the Red Wedding or the Lannisters live, as the ASOS epilogue shows, or Septon Meribald can attest.

[lyvyathan]

Ok, so everyone hates Catelyn. But I cannot avoid feeling cheated with Stoneheart's attitude. It's COMPLETELY irrational. When they're just about to hang Brienne, I felt like everything was played at high speed so the reader wouldn't notice that they all lacked justification. It's like if Martin wanted to put Brienne in a dramatic situation, but it didn't quite fit.

Why? Don't you realize that its consistent before Catelyn became Zombie Cat?

There was probably more logic and thought in hanging Brienne than in letting out go of Jamie and kidnapping Tyrion.

[lyvyathan]

First of all: apparently, because Brienne has a Lannister sword, now she's an enemy and a traitor. But wait, haven't we just seen Lem taking and using the Hound's helm? Why can he have the belongings of an enemy and Brienne can't? So, Brienne's now a traitor because she has Jaime's sword and Jaime's bad. Let's see... does anyone remember who freed Jaime? But of course, Catelyn! And to which purpose? To rescue Cat's girls! So now Brienne is guilty of having delivered Jaime safely and looking for the girls... Who should get hanged again?

But didn't Cat give Brienne the choice of using the said sword to kill Jamie? And she refused. So ergo, she's a Lannister agent now.

If I were you, I'd be thinking about Catelyn's previous choices - most of them were pretty irrational. So her behavior as Stoneheart, is actually an improvement imho. Can't blame a zombie for killing people in a wanton fashion.

But to be honest, I don't know why GRRM chose to resurrect Cat. Frankly I'd rather see Syrio back in action instead.

[Errant Bard]

If I were you, I'd be thinking about Catelyn's previous choices - most of them were pretty irrational.

None of them were irrational