The sword of Ser Waymar Royce

[Nadden]

 

Our newly anointed Knight and freshly sworn Brother of the Night’s Watch Ser Waymar Royce journeys north into the haunted forest where he appears to face off one on one in a duel to the death. He gets wounded and seemly butchered. But his sword tells a different story.

 

Did Ser Waymar Royce break his oath? Did he hope to die? Was he suicidal or just willing to sacrifice himself?

 

There’s an old childhood saying that goes like this, “Cross my heart, hope to die, stick a needle in my eye”. The saying decrees that a needle be stuck in an eye of someone to ensure that they are indeed dead should that person break their word.

 

In our story there’s a moment just before  Waymar is seemly butchered that he, figuratively, gets a needle in his eye. If this is true what does it mean? Was Waymar lying? Why?

 

Did Martin have this pledge in mind while writing the AGOT, Prologue?

 

Somewhere I read that long ago the idea of sticking “a needle in the eye” was done by adults on corpses. It was a custom to make sure that someone wasn’t still alive before they were buried. Children took the idea and used it as part of a pledge to tell the truth. Leave it to kids to take something so morbid and attach it to a noble pledge to ensure honor.

 

After Waymar appears to be butchered, Will eventually finds his courage. He climbs down from the tree. He sees Waymar lying facedown dead and the end of his sword a few feet away. Warily looking around, Will knelt to snatch up the broken sword and when he rose so did Waymar. It’s at this point that we see the figurative needle in his eye. Here’s the quote,

 

Quote

“His fine clothes were a tatter, his face a ruin. A shard from his sword transfixed the blind white pupil of his left eye.”(AGOT, Prologue)

 

From this passage it’s not immediately obvious that the shard is, figuratively, a needle. Our author obscures this detail in a bygone passage. Here it is,

 

Quote

“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.”(AGOT, Prologue)

 

The phrase “like a rain of needles”, a simile, directly compares the scattering “shards” to “needles”. The shard in Waymar’s eye is from his sword and the same set of shards that, just moments before, were figuratively described as “needles”. Thus a figurative needle in his eye.

 

Martin’s deliberate separation of the literal object from its figurative counterpart seems to give weight to the idea that this is an important connection being made.

 

The simile, “like a rain of needles” comes during the death of Ser Waymar Royce’s longsword but is not reveal until Waymar’s apparent resurrection. The placement of the two aspects of this idea may be telling. In fact, it’s Waymar‘s death pose which gives us the “Cross my heart,…” moment, the first part of the that old childhood pledge of honor.

 

Here again our author brings together a facet of death and the idea of a child.

 

Waymar’s death pose is a variation of Child’s pose, a basic yoga position. I know the Child pose, seems a bit of a stretch for Martin, pun intended, so I’ll explain. In the actual pose one rests on their knees, resting their buttocks against their heels. They bow forward lowering their upper body onto their thighs and their forehead to the mat with both arms extended out. The variation brings one arm under (“threads”) across one’s chest, crossing their heart. This is, figuratively, the “Cross my heart,…” moment.

 

Let’s compare this to the description of Waymar’s death pose,

Quote

 

“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.

 

  …(and three paragraphs later)…

 

  Royce’s body lay facedown in the snow, one arm out-flung. The thick sable cloak had been slashed in a dozen places. Lying dead like that, you saw how young he was. A boy.”(AGOT, Prologue)

 

 

The description is vague. So let’s ask a question. Why would Will think Waymar looks young? Waymar is facedown in the snow, his cloak splayed out over him displaying slashes in a dozen places.

 

The answer, because Will is considering his body position. Like any good crime scene investigator worth their weight knows, the position of the body is important. And true to Martin’s pattern of revealing his clues he divides the information up. First Waymar drops to his knees shrieking still alive. Then Will sees him dead several paragraphs later facedown with one arm out-flung.

 

The fact that Martin is deliberately making it difficult for the reader to fully conceptualize Waymar’s death pose by spreading out the details is reason again to feel confident that this is an important connection being made.

 

According to the old pledge of honor and based on the discoveries to this point Waymar  “…hoped to die…“. But Why? And why does the “…stick a needle in my eye.” moment and the “Cross my heart,…” moment appear out of order?

At the end of Ser Waymar Royce’s death scene he is on his knees face down in the snow with one arm out-flung. After analyzing the text I’ve concluded that Waymar’s death pose is actually a basic yoga pose. Will, the crime scene investigator in this case, thinks…

 

Quote

“Lying dead like that, you saw how young he was. A boy.”(Prologue, AGOT)

 

“A boy”, a male child, is an interesting thought by Will. Why?….Why when Waymar is face down does Will think he looks young? Why when his long thick sable cloak splayed out over him displaying a dozen slashes is Will thinking, “A boy”. Like a good crime scene investigator Will is noting the position of the body. It might seem like a stretch but Martin has arranged Waymar’s dead body in Child’s pose. Children are a developing central theme in ASOIAF at this point. The pose I’m submitting beginning with Child’s pose has a common variation called Thread the needle which completes Waymar’s death pose.

 

Thread the Needle also happens to be connected to that central theme. It’s children's game in which the participants stand in a line and hold hands.

 

It’s hilarious but this yoga stuff has all the makings of Martin’s sense of humor. Much like in the next chapter when Jon mutters a curse at Theon calling him an “Ass”. Then later, after being tortured by Ramsey Snow Theon is renamed Reek.

 

In our yoga pose Waymar’s arm would literally be referred to as the needle. When performing the pose one goes to their knees and lowers their forehead down on the mat arms out-stretched in front of them. Then twisting, threads an arm or figuratively the needle across their chest and beneath the other arm. Take a look at the very first line in the very next paragraph following “A boy”,

 

Quote

“He found what was left of the sword a few feet away, the end splintered and twisted like a tree struck by lightning.”(Prologue, AGOT)

 

Analyzing this passage one might ask why doesn’t Martin just say “hilt” since that’s what he’s talking about? Why call it “the end”?….That’s eventually the question I asked myself after arriving at some other conclusions.

 

Early on, I noted that throughout the Prologue that Waymar’s actions parallel the actions of his sword hilt. In fact, I determined that he’s the objectification of his sword hilt or his sword hilt is a personification of him, either way. Take a look at the initial descriptions of him and the hilt of his longsword,

 

Quote

(Waymar) “…drew his longsword from its sheath. Jewels glittered in its hilt, and the moonlight ran down the shining steel. It was a splendid weapon, castle-forged, and new-made from the look of it. Will doubted it had ever been swung in anger.”(Prologue, AGOT)

 

Now consider Ser Waymar Royce’s initial description:

 

Quote

Ser Waymar Royce was the youngest son of an ancient house with too many heirs. He was a handsome youth of eighteen, grey-eyed and graceful and slender as a knife. Mounted on his huge black destrier, the knight towered above Will and Gared on their smaller garrons. He wore black leather boots, black woolen pants, black moleskin gloves, and a fine supple coat of gleaming black ringmail over layers of black wool and boiled leather. Ser Waymar had been a Sworn Brother of the Night’s Watch for less than half a year, but no one could say he had not prepared for his vocation. At least insofar as his wardrobe was concerned.(Prologue, AGOT)

So, Ser Waymar Royce was a (splendid) handsome young son of Bronze Yohn, Lord of Runestone, with glittering grey eyes. He was a (castle-forged) Knight, and a (new-made) sworn Brother of the Night’s Watch. Likely, he had never been in a real fight. In fact, Martin directly compares him to a “knife”, calling him slender. Further confirmation of this idea comes in the study of both Gared and Will, the other two rangers in the prologue. They too are the objectification of their weapon hilts. And the Other follows the same pattern.

 

The point I’m making is that “A boy” has another connotation. Waymar, “a boy”, is the objectification of his sword, specifically “the end” of his broken sword. “The end” and “A boy” are synonymous. It’s why when Will snatched up the broken sword that he and Waymar both rose.  Here’s the quote,

 

Quote

He found what was left of the sword a few feet away, the end splintered and twisted like a tree struck by lightning. Will knelt, looked around warily, and snatched it up. The broken sword would be his proof. Gared would know what to make of it, and if not him, then surely that old bear Mormont or Maester Aemon. Would Gared still be waiting with the horses? He had to hurry. Will rose. Ser Waymar Royce stood over him.(Prologue, AGOT)

 

Read what happens when the two phrases are swapped for each other.

 

Lying dead like that, you saw how young he was. (The end).

 

And,

 

He found what was left of the sword a few feet away, (a boy) splintered and twisted like a tree struck by lightning.(Prologue, AGOT)

 

In the first passage we’re seeing how two one-syllable words, once a traditional way to end a story, are used to indicate Waymar’s life or song being over. “The end”.

 

In the second passage we’re seeing the use of the two adjectives, splintered and twisted modifying, in this case, “a boy” to perfectly illustrate both Waymar’s death and yoga pose. “The end” of the “splintered” sword, the origin of the steel splinters that Martin previously calls “a rain of needles”, is “twisted”. “Twisted” like “a boy” threading the needle in our yoga pose.

 

This is a piece of the yoga motif that has likely already begun and persists moving forward and is something that deserves further exploration. Briefly, my thoughts expand to a puppy and a dead mother direwolf in the next chapter. Puppy and Downward Facing Dog are the next two poses following the Child’s pose. Additionally, a Warrior pose and Hero’s pose could likely precede and describe Waymar’s sword “on high” and the moment he went to his knees.

 

But first I’d like to focus on the last part of the quote from above. At the end of the quote Martin directly compares the sword end to a tree struck by lightning. So if Waymar’s sword hilt, a personification him, is a figurative tree stump; than the figurative lightning would seem to be the blade of the sword of the Other. The blade of the sword because, like Waymar, the Other’s sword hilt is likely a personification of it.

 

Furthermore, if Waymar’s sword hilt is, figuratively, a tree stump than the blade is the tree that “shivered into a hundred brittle pieces” by the strike. And a shiver, which can be a noun, is a fragment or splinter than they would be a perfect metaphor for the shards, that Martin describes as “a rain of needles”. A shivering tree or shivering timber sounds much like an exclamation in the form of a mock oath as stated in the phrase, “shiver me Timbers”. It’s usually attributed to the speech of pirates in works of fiction. It is employed as a literary device by authors to express shock, surprise, or annoyance. We see this in the lightning strike.

 

The phrase is based on real nautical slang and is a reference to the timbers, which are the wooden support frames of a sailing ship. In heavy seas, ships would be lifted up and pounded down so hard as to "shiver" the timbers, startling the sailors. Such an exclamation was meant to convey a feeling of fear and awe,

 

“Shiver" is also reminiscent of the splintering of a ship's timbers in battle – splinter wounds were a common form of battle injury on wooden ships. Shiver can also be used as an expression of being "cold to the bone".