Varys the Mastermind/ Littlefinger the Golddigger: A Comparison

[Jon AS]

I think Gendry is sent to the Wall as a means of preserving evidence of the incest, should such evidence be needed. When Aegon comes and the realm is in shambles, it will distract attention from questions of Aegon's legitimacy to turn the conversation back on the Lannisters with accusations of their illegitimacy.

"Look, I can totally prove that Joffrey isn't Robert's son! All you have to do is look at that young smith who used work for that armourer! He's at the wall right now, but what's a journey of a couple of thousand miles when you're looking to find the truth? Hey, where are you going?"

Yeah, I just don't see it.;)

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

"Look, I can totally prove that Joffrey isn't Robert's son! All you have to do is look at that young smith who used work for that armourer! He's at the wall right now, but what's a journey of a couple of thousand miles when you're looking to find the truth? Hey, where are you going?"

Yeah, I just don't see it. ;)

I think it helps that he looks just like Robert.

And they can always bring him back.

[Spotted Cat]

"Look, I can totally prove that Joffrey isn't Robert's son! All you have to do is look at that young smith who used work for that armourer! He's at the wall right now, but what's a journey of a couple of thousand miles when you're looking to find the truth? Hey, where are you going?"

Yeah, I just don't see it. ;)

in westeros genetics are very easy, you look like a baratheon of you are one, no matter who your mother is

all he has to do is get gendry back, show him off to public

[butterbumps!]

"Look, I can totally prove that Joffrey isn't Robert's son! All you have to do is look at that young smith who used work for that armourer! He's at the wall right now, but what's a journey of a couple of thousand miles when you're looking to find the truth? Hey, where are you going?"

Yeah, I just don't see it. ;)

Sending him to the NW keeps him completely off the radar and ostensibly quite secure. It's not crazy-- this is precisely why Stannis wants Penrose to turn over Edric-- it's the proof he wants (burning Edric came later, but at first it was to hold onto the proof).

I guess, what would be the logical reason to take care with Robert's bastards but mutilate and kill thousands of children? I don't buy they he chooses to save a bastard or two simply because he feels guilt over abusing his birds.

[The Sleeper]

At the time, Ned was supposed to be on the caravan going to the Wall, along with Gendry and Arya. That's a nice gesture of good faith to a former lord of the North who would be in constant contact with his heir.

[Lummel]

I am rather more impressed by Ragnorak's argument that Gendry's role was largely to appease Cersei - ie that the intention was that he should be chased after by the gold cloaks as a way of showing Cersei that he was serving her and trying to give her presents.

However I suspect that Varys was also put bastards by to bring out should he need to prove that Cersei's children were abominations and bastards both - I just don't think that was Gendry's role. The Wall is too far off, too much its own world and too dangerous - there's no sure chance that Varys could ever have got him back from the Wall. There are places more convenient to store bastards in case of future need than the Wall - basically Varys just needs to keep his mouth shut about them. Cersei isn't wandering around and asking everybody with curly black hair if their mother ever worked at the palace (as the old joke goes).

[The Butcher of Dorne]

This has been my absolute favorite thread as of yet!

[Éadaoin]

This has been my absolute favorite thread as of yet!

I agree, this is a great thread.

LF and Varys are two of my favorite characters, and I love to read about them. They're both pretty awful people, but they're fascinating to follow. I can't wait until TWOW to see what happens next concerning these two. I think it would be pretty great if Varys wasn't even a eunuch, though that's just a total crackpot theory as I can't see why he wouldn't be.

[Ragnorak]

LF tells Sansa that if you know what a man wants you can control him. Varys tells Tyrion through his riddle that it is a matter of what a man believes. LF says in a small council meeting that they ought to offer the Tyrells "gold reasons." I get the sense that he considers everyone buyable and that sex, land, titles, etc are just as much gold reasons as gold-- quite possibly because gold is what LF spends to acquire them regardless of how the end product is packaged.

Let's look at Varys relative to LF's value system. Varys, we can reasonably assume, is at least as close to just as wealthy as Illyrio given their partnership. That makes him quite the hard man to buy with gold. He's supposedly castrated so buying him with sex seems a bit difficult to say the least, and his agenda seems to be placing Aegon on the Iron Throne so I don't really see any land or titles buying him off either. LF has nothing Varys wants. On the other hand, I suspect Varys has a relatively good idea of what LF believes.

[The Sleeper]

I am rather more impressed by Ragnorak's argument that Gendry's role was largely to appease Cersei - ie that the intention was that he should be chased after by the gold cloaks as a way of showing Cersei that he was serving her and trying to give her presents.

However I suspect that Varys was also put bastards by to bring out should he need to prove that Cersei's children were abominations and bastards both - I just don't think that was Gendry's role. The Wall is too far off, too much its own world and too dangerous - there's no sure chance that Varys could ever have got him back from the Wall. There are places more convenient to store bastards in case of future need than the Wall - basically Varys just needs to keep his mouth shut about them. Cersei isn't wandering around and asking everybody with curly black hair if their mother ever worked at the palace (as the old joke goes).

But then why not just give Cersei Gendry's head? Besides there two bastards of Robert's whose ancestry is undeniable. Edric Storm and Mya Stone and both of them are safely out of Cersei's reach. In fact their existence made Cersei's baby killing rampage pointless to begin with. The only person who would care about Gendry's fate was Ned.

Unless Varys had nothing to do with Gendry's apprenticeship or escape to begin with.

[redviper9]

But then why not just give Cersei Gendry's head? Besides there two bastards of Robert's whose ancestry is undeniable. Edric Storm and Mya Stone and both of them are safely out of Cersei's reach. In fact their existence made Cersei's baby killing rampage pointless to begin with. The only person who would care about Gendry's fate was Ned.

Unless Varys had nothing to do with Gendry's apprenticeship or escape to begin with.

I think Ragnarok's argument about Gendry fits in with what many have said about Varys's usefulness: he always gives people just enough so that they don't fire him or remove his head, but those people never get the full story. Informing Cersei that Gendry was on his way to the Wall increases his stock in the eyes of the Queen Regent; of course, he conveniently leaves out the part where he arranges for Gendry to go north. And Varys telling Ned in the cell that he arranged for Gendry's safety boosts his credibility in Ned's eyes. When Varys goes on to claim that that all he cares about are the realm and the children, Ned can easily think to himself, "well, he did move Gendry out of harm's way."

And Gendry could easily serve as a trump card for Varys. Yes, people are aware of Mya Stone and Edric Storm. But those two were safely holed up in two of the strongest castles in the realm (and Mya is a girl, so she doesn't pose as big a threat to the Iron Throne as Edric could). That, and as you point out, everyone from Dorne to the Wall knows that they're Robert's bastards; killing them would immediately raise suspicions. Compare that to Gendry or the baby in the brothel: only a handful people knew that Robert was their father, and no one would bat an eye at the death of two lowborn bastards from King's Landing. The way Gendry could serve as a trump card for Varys is that he now has his own bastard up his sleeve to reveal if he should ever need to. And, he deprives him from Stannis, the only other person I can think of outside of LF, Cersei, Pycelle, Ned, and Jon Arryn (the latter two of course being dead by the end of AGoT) who knew who Gendry really was. The spitting image of Robert and Renly would have bolstered Stannis's argument that Joffrey, Tommen, and Myrcella weren't actually Robert's. And if Varys is sincere in wanting to keep Stannis off the Iron Throne, he would want to deny him possible ammunition.

[Lummel]

Because he doesn't need to give Cersei his head. All he needs to do is give her a list of names - he is a spider, giving information is what is expected of him. He has no armies and no soldiers, Varys deliberately creates a public persona that is weak and soft. So in this scenario Varys gives Cersei a list of names and proves his devotion and usefulness to Cersei. Great job done. If those bastards get away - that's fine. If Cersei kills them, that's fine too because he could well have a couple more tucked away some place where he can access them should he need to.

[Ragnorak]

My original reasoning on that was Cersei had to find out about Gendry's existence and specifically his leaving to join the Watch somehow. She may have known about Gendry through other channels but almost certainly had to be told about his joining the NW by Varys. Why would Varys arrange to smuggle Gendry away only to tell Cersei about his being smuggled away? The blacksmith (forget his name atm) was also one of the Antlermen and he was in debt to the crown which throws LF into this mix as well.

Varys says he knows of eight of Robert's bastards (of the 16 Maggy the Frog said they'll be.) So Gendry is not likely that critical to any proof he needs to have on standby. Both Edric and Gendry are apparently the spitting image of Robert. Brienne thinks she sees Renly's ghost so I don't think an actual presentation of the bastards along with the accusation would be a hard sell for all that it matters. By the end of DwD I get the sense that very few people, if any, still actually believe they are Robert's. The Tyrells certainly don't from the hints they throw ar Cersei and they're about the only House whose "belief" matters. Everyone else is plotting a Lannister downfall for wholly separate reasons anyway.

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

Varys says he knows of eight of Robert's bastards (of the 16 Maggy the Frog said they'll be.)

We have:

1. Gendry

2. Edric

3. Mya

4. Bella

5. Barra

6. & 7. the Casterly Rock twins

So there are nine more out there, potentially. Makes you wonder what the overlap is, of the ones that we know of vs. the ones that Varys knows of. Even if the seven we know are included in the eight that he does — and I doubt it overlaps that cleanly — there's still at least one that he's aware of that we're not.

[the Scorpion Knight]

I've been wondering about this for a while, actually. Does the Iron Bank mostly ignore LF because he was good for business with them, or do they hold him responsible because while the Iron Throne actually defaulted on their loans, LF arranged them..?

I wouldn't be surprised if LF's head is part of the dealthe iron bank does with stannis

While they might not care about LF, he was in charge of the Iron Throne's finances, and he might well be in line for punishment for his role in the default.

I even think death is the punishment for that

Oh, and butterbumps! said earlier Varys kills his little birds when he no longer has need of them... I seem to have forgotten that part... :ack:

I don't think V&I kill the little birds once they are old enough they make thwm part of the staff in illyrios manse

[tze]

But I do think he believes in magic, given his acceptance of those aforementioned deaths. Are you thinking he might believe that Melisandre's actions are a form of mummery as well, and not true magic? That's an interesting idea I hadn't considered, but I'm not sure how that would fit-- he did accurately explain the magical causes of their deaths.

I think there's a difference between Varys actually believing something and Varys simply claiming to believe something so as to manipulate a target (Tyrion), and I think Varys's discussion of the magical elements of the Renly/Cortnay Penrose murders falls in the latter category, not the former. He doesn't actually describe the mechanics of how magic was used in their deaths---he just highlights the mysterious nature of those deaths and then tries very, very hard to convince Tyrion that he, Varys, believes in magic. We don't have access to Varys's inner thoughts here, but I highly suspect if we did, they'd run along the lines of "Is he (Tyrion) buying it?" than "Oh, how I fear magic".

I do think that Varys most likely believes the stories about Renly's and Penrose's deaths to be embellished, superstitious nonsense. People are also claiming that Robb Stark leads an army of wolves, has giants riding with him, etc., etc. There's precedent for the rumormongers of Westeros to attribute magical capabilities to anyone they view as "other", and Stannis's weird red priestess certainly fits in that category. Varys never saw any of the Starks with their direwolves (Lady was dead and Nymeria run off by the time the Starks reached King's Landing), and he spent years watching Thoros of Myr try, and fail, to practice magic in Aerys's and Robert's courts. Magic is more prevalent in Essos, but it appears that even there those powers were much, much weaker in the recent past; it wouldn't surprise me at all if Varys never encountered actual (or at least, unambiguous) forms of magic while he was living in the Free Cities (which would have been at least twenty years ago, depending on when he joined Aerys's court), only various forms of mummery.

(And as a side note: it's interesting how Varys's "riddle of power" failed to include a purported sorcerer among the category of "powerful" people. There are any number of implications there, I think.)

I agree wholeheartedly on this, that Varys is using this story as a means of building "trust capital" with Tyrion. I think the story was strategically "confessed" to tell Tyrion precisely what you've suggested about loyalties. I think there's a lot of this story that is complete fabrication, but again, it does seem as though he accepts the existence of magic in some capacity. This particular story should be taken with a grain of salt because it makes Varys appear (intentionally so) weak and vulnerable, which is precisely his trust-building MO, so I agree with you on this. But I guess, how does it explain his correct identification of magic as the COD?

I don't think you can separate out the "magic" portion of the story, though, because everything in that story is geared toward Varys's ending thesis: "and since that day I have hated magic and all those who practice it. If Lord Stannis is one such, I mean to see him dead.". The whole reason Varys needs to build trust with Tyrion in the first place is because Tyrion doesn't trust him (certainly not to the extent Varys needs Tyrion to trust him, so as to more effectively manipulate him). And the reason Tyrion doesn't trust Varys, given their relative political positions, is because they both know that there's a firm and likely candidate for Varys to betray Tyrion to: Stannis. The point of this story is twofold: 1) convince Tyrion that Varys trusts him enough to share a painful secret, thus forming a "bond" with him, AND 2) convince Tyrion that Varys would never, ever side with Stannis. Without the "a fire-loving magic-user mutilated me" part of the story, it achieves only the former and not the latter. And the latter is pretty darn key, given Stannis's threatening political and military position. The fact that Varys claims he was mutilated by the exact same elements he takes pains to associate with Stannis is, to me, a pretty strong hint that readers aren't supposed to accept the magical elements of Varys's "I hate magic" story as anything but self-serving lies.

I doubt it's coincidental that Varys delivers this sob story while literally dressed in a disguise (lying with his appearance as he lies with his words), but I do think it's a coincidence that he stumbles upon the true magical manner of Renly's and Penrose's deaths. Rather like how the Freys like to tell everyone Robb was a warg, and we know he was a warg, but the people actually making that claim don't believe it themselves, even though readers know it's (ironically) true. (And I suspect that many of the people calling Bloodraven a sorcerer way back when didn't really believe he had magical powers at all---accusations of magic-usage, somewhat like accusations of witchcraft in "our" world, tend to be used as propaganda to discredit and demean enemies; if the people making the accusations actually tended to believe them, well, I suspect those people usually wouldn't feel comfortable opposing these "sorcerers" in the first place without at least taking some form of precautions.)

I think that the magical terms applied to him might be subtle clues that something more is going on with him, but the majority of what we see of Varys does suggest it is admittedly more prosaic.

To me, the fact that most of the "sorcerer" labels are applied to Varys in book 1, when we knew very little about him or his methods, and we then spend the next four books slowly deconstructing the nature of Varys's skills, means that the magical terms applied to him are themselves being deconstructed over time (not that they're meant to foreshadow future magical associations). When Varys was asking Illyrio for "birds" back in AGOT, we had no idea what he meant. We spent a number of books incapable of understanding the mechanics of how Varys could know so many secret things that he, logically, should have had no mundane way of knowing (while simultaneously watching explicit magic-users in other places demonstrate and grow their powers). But as the story has progressed, our "man behind the curtain" has slowly started coming into focus, and the repeated reveals of the prosaic nature of his scheming (5 books in), means to me that a sudden reveal that he is in some way associated with real magic, after so much emphasis on his associated "magic" really being only mummery and trickery, would be whiplash-esque.

One of the things I find interesting about Varys and Littlefinger is actually their representation of the changiing nature of "subtle" power in a world where magic is rising. In a world where people can magically change their physical appearances, how useful are mummer's tricks? In a world where all of nature can be used as spies, how useful are Varys's tongueless child spies? Magic renders these schemers' schemes, if not entirely obsolete, then certainly almost obsolete. Varys is basically a poor man's Bloodraven: Varys's "birds" are ordinary human children with their tongues cut out (incapable of speech), whereas Bloodraven's "birds" are actual birds with the ability to actually speak; Varys disguises himself with mummery, while Bloodraven (if this interpretation of Ser Maynard Plumm is correct) used actual sorcery to disguise himself in TMK. Littlefinger decided to attack members of the most powerful magical family I think we've ever seen in Westeros (and the one family that could potentially have strengthened and held the Wall against the Others), yet he's congratulating himself on how clever and awesome he is.

A pretty major theme thus far has been how victory frequently relies as much on lucky timing as on skill or cleverness. The rise of magic means that Varys and Littlefinger, given the nature of the "power" they wield, couldn't have possibly timed their schemes more poorly. Had Varys and Littlefinger been playing their games a hundred years ago, or even twenty years ago, when magic was weak in Westeros, then their schemes might very well have worked. But it's all about perspective: the two "players" whose abilities would have rendered them "powerful" were the other players of the game all non-magical suddenly start looking weak and impotent when magical "players" like, for example, Bloodraven, enter the game. In a world of the blind, the one-eyed man is King---but in a world where people have two eyes, the one-eyed man is on the road to obsolescence (and the three-eyed man rules the roost---cough, cough. :) ) Varys and Littlefinger think they each have an eye where the rest of the world is blind, and had they been born in a different time, that might have been true; but now?

[Little Wing]

I don't think V&I kill the little birds once they are old enough they make thwm part of the staff in illyrios manse

I'd like that much better! I was wondering where it is stated that he kills them... :dunno:

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

I'd like that much better! I was wondering where it is stated that he kills them... :dunno:

There are subtle hints in the books about how he "goes through them," in so many words. It's a "read between the lines" type of thing but the subtext is definitely there.

[Little Wing]

There are subtle hints in the books about how he "goes through them," in so many words. It's a "read between the lines" type of thing but the subtext is definitely there.

Well then if that's true.... I hope Qyburn gets to... play with him.

[The Sleeper]

My original reasoning on that was Cersei had to find out about Gendry's existence and specifically his leaving to join the Watch somehow. She may have known about Gendry through other channels but almost certainly had to be told about his joining the NW by Varys. Why would Varys arrange to smuggle Gendry away only to tell Cersei about his being smuggled away? The blacksmith (forget his name atm) was also one of the Antlermen and he was in debt to the crown which throws LF into this mix as well.

Varys says he knows of eight of Robert's bastards (of the 16 Maggy the Frog said they'll be.) So Gendry is not likely that critical to any proof he needs to have on standby. Both Edric and Gendry are apparently the spitting image of Robert. Brienne thinks she sees Renly's ghost so I don't think an actual presentation of the bastards along with the accusation would be a hard sell for all that it matters. By the end of DwD I get the sense that very few people, if any, still actually believe they are Robert's. The Tyrells certainly don't from the hints they throw ar Cersei and they're about the only House whose "belief" matters. Everyone else is plotting a Lannister downfall for wholly separate reasons anyway.

It still seems a little convoluted to me when he could have simply pointed out Gendry's location with pretty much the same effects, but then it's Varys we are talking about. Also, Gendry's master was not among the Antler Men. He later forged Widow's Wail and Oathkeeper for Tywin. You're thinking about the guy who offered to make Tyrion the demon helmet.