From Pawn to Player: Rethinking Sansa V

[Valkyrja]

LALALALALALA

*refuses to believe those washerwomen know anything about Sandor whatsoever*

:P

But, seriously, I'm pretty sure they were just talking about fighting prowess in that scene -- at most, they were taking the Kettleblacks' 'speed' to signify their potential for 'stamina'.;) But, overall, I felt the significance was more of a comment about how Sansa views Sandor's reputation, because of the way Sansa thinks that if these Kettleblacks are so great, "then how come I've never heard of these dudes until now, eh?" (paraphrase). She seems oddly proud of Sandor's reknown/notoriety/infamy, and is at once defending him while still acknowledging him to be the proficient fighter/killer that he is.

[Kittykatknits]

Overall it seems the poor ladies of Westeros aren't that lucky in that department though, judging by Arys and Tyrion's exploits, and even Jaime is guilty of this. Cat and Ned also seemed fairly well, vanilla and unexciting. Only Asha seems to have it a bit better. So who knows, maybe the washerwomen thought "fast" was good since at least it's over quicker, or something? :stillsick:

You know, I am hating myself for writing this and I feel it stains my soul, but at least Littlefinger managed to make Lysa happy in the sack.

(I feel I am the worst embarrassing thread derailer today, what with this and the Dany/Jon reread thread. I blame Lummel! )

LALALALALALA

*refuses to believe those washerwomen know anything about Sandor whatsoever*

:P

But, seriously, I'm pretty sure they were just talking about fighting prowess in that scene -- at most, they were taking the Kettleblacks' 'speed' to signify their potential for 'stamina'. ;) But, overall, I felt the significance was more of a comment about how Sansa views Sandor's reputation, because of the way Sansa thinks that if these Kettleblacks are so great, "then how come I've never heard of these dudes until now, eh?" (paraphrase). She seems oddly proud of Sandor's reknown/notoriety/infamy, and is at once defending him while still acknowledging him to be the proficient fighter/killer that he is.

Yes, Valkryia, that's what I was thinking too. You have both assured me, thank you. My head is in a certain place after seeing some pictures over at a certain community so this is very much in my thoughts right now.

@Lyanna Stark, it seems like Jon did a pretty decent job of keeping Ygrittee happy. He was able to go at it more than once so that must have counted for something.

**I'll also apologize for the thread derail, my fault this time.

[Lyanna Stark]

Speaking of the Kettleblacks and Littlefinger's plans, any thoughts on how that could affect Littlefinger's information from Kings Landing. I can't remember if all of them were imprisoned or just two? (The ones Cersei actually shagged, although she somehow told the religious dudes it was all three?) Without them it seems LF will be far worse off.

Also, is it time to have some crackpot going on the tapestries? IF we're thinking Kettleblacks and LF trickery in Kings Landing?? (I'm sorry but the tapestries are sooooo fascinating to me.)

@Lyanna Stark, it seems like Jon did a pretty decent job of keeping Ygrittee happy. He was able to go at it more than once so that must have counted for something.

Ah yes, good point about Jon Snow. I suppose we can probably count Daario into the non failures here, although he is from Essos (Essosian??) and not a proper Westeros man. The Kettleblacks seem mostly like failures since Cersei didn't seem impressed much, and poor Lancel will have to go down the same route. Does that leave Jon Snow, Qarl the Maid and Littlefinger then? :dunce:

[Kittykatknits]

Speaking of the Kettleblacks and Littlefinger's plans, any thoughts on how that could affect Littlefinger's information from Kings Landing. I can't remember if all of them were imprisoned or just two? (The ones Cersei actually shagged, although she somehow told the religious dudes it was all three?) Without them it seems LF will be far worse off. Also, is it time to have some crackpot going on the tapestries? IF we're thinking Kettleblacks and LF trickery in Kings Landing?? (I'm sorry but the tapestries are sooooo fascinating to me.) Ah yes, good point about Jon Snow. I suppose we can probably count Daario into the non failures here, although he is from Essos (Essosian??) and not a proper Westeros man. The Kettleblacks seem mostly like failures since Cersei didn't seem impressed much, and poor Lancel will have to go down the same route. Does that leave Jon Snow, Qarl the Maid and Littlefinger then? :dunce:

I had thought it was only two of the Kettleblacks not all three. But my memory with everything related to the Kettleblacks is sketchy, I have a hard time telling them apart. As far as we know, the KBs were LF's main source of eyes and ears, right?

Here's a question though, if the KB's father learn what is happening to them, could he somehow betray LF to go help out his sons?

[1234567]

LF and the Tapestries:

Tapestries have been mentioned in passing throughout the series.

Robert's Tapestries: Cersei had these removed. These seem to ostensibly be the tapestries LF has asked for. If they are family tapestries showing Baratheon's of the past, then they could be LF's evidence that Joff, Tommen and Myrcella are not Robert's children.

Dragon Banners: When LF talks about news from Gulltown, it could be that he has heard about Aegon / Dany and he has requested the tapestries as a method of gaining favour with Aegon and co when they come to visit the Vale.

Hidden Object: Something has been hidden in the Tapestries and LF has one of his spies hidding something in the tapestries.

LF seems to have a few spies in KL. The Kettlebacks and also probabley Brella the maid. Any others anyone can think of?

[brashcandy]

At the heart of the matter though, Littlefinger cares only for Littlefinger. In this even Cersei is better since she at least cares for her children a whole lot. Hopefully Sansa can wield her greater empathy and create useful opportunities with it, like perhaps somehow managing to pair up Lothor Brune and Mya Stone. I'm not sure Littlefinger would notice something like Brune fancying Mya, since it's rather below his notice. Littlefinger said himself, famously, that somehow even the humblest pawns can have a mind of their own, and I tend to think this was is not prophetic, so showed something he should live by, but in fact doesn't.

Yeah, I think he's stopped worrying about the humblest pawns to be honest. For example, he warns Sansa about not trusting Randa Royce, which might be all well and good, but it seems like Sansa is going to form a much more substantive relationship with Mya Stone. She may be taken with Randa's irreverent speech, but she appears deeply intrigued by the bastard girl, with respect to her relationship with Lothor Brune and the quiet strength she displays. While Randa talks about wanting a new husband badly, Mya advocates for women to be independent of men:

"... Men come and go. They lie, or die, or leave you. A mountain is not a man, though, and a stone is a mountain's daughter. I trust my father, and I trust my mules. I won't fall."

[Kittykatknits]

Yeah, I think he's stopped worrying about the humblest pawns to be honest. For example, he warns Sansa about not trusting Randa Royce, which might be all well and good, but it seems like Sansa is going to form a much more substantive relationship with Mya Stone. She may be taken with Randa's irreverent speech, but she appears deeply intrigued by the bastard girl, with respect to her relationship with Lothor Brune and the quiet strength she displays. While Randa talks about wanting a new husband badly, Mya advocates for women to be independent of men:

In other words, he doesn't worry about the as they are to humble to be a worry? So, he ignores Mya because she is to low of a pawn but worries over Randa who he thinks may be a bigger concern.

[brashcandy]

In other words, he doesn't worry about the as they are to humble to be a worry? So, he ignores Mya because she is to low of a pawn but worries over Randa who he thinks may be a bigger concern.

Yes, basically :) Randa is the gossipy type, and this is what LF naturally fears, but he's overlooked Mya Stone, who's actually a lot more radical in her world view and advocates for women not to be tethered to men or relationships. This is really the opposite of what LF wants, since he's invested in keeping Sansa dependent on him forever.

[Kittykatknits]

Yes, basically :) Randa is the gossipy type, and this is what LF naturally fears, but he's overlooked Mya Stone, who's actually a lot more radical in her world view and advocates for women not to be tethered to men or relationships. This is really the opposite of what LF wants, since he's invested in keeping Sansa dependent on him forever.

Ok, I got it. Thanks for explaining, wanted to make sure I understand you correctly. This goes back to some of what we were talking about earlier. LF thinks he is good at reading people but his strength is limited to figuring out how weaknesses to exploit whereas Sansa is much better at seeing underneath that, to what they really want. Since he doesn't see anything in Mya, it never occurs to him that she is a danger.

[Elba the Intoner]

Ok, I got it. Thanks for explaining, wanted to make sure I understand you correctly. This goes back to some of what we were talking about earlier. LF thinks he is good at reading people but his strength is limited to figuring out how weaknesses to exploit whereas Sansa is much better at seeing underneath that, to what they really want. Since he doesn't see anything in Mya, it never occurs to him that she is a danger.

Yeah. Not to mention that it is very ironic that LF would think this way since that's his basic gripe with the major high born families like the Starks and Tullys. Even the Lannisters (except Tyrion) dismiss him as not being much of a threat because he's too lowborn, yet he has been probably their biggest threat. Now he's doing the same with people like Mya and his loyal retainer Brune and it would be great if this dismissal of them as inconsequential really comes back to bite him in the ass!

Also, KittyKatKnits, I have been meaning to respond to your post no. 135 about how you see Sandor as a broken man. I totally agree with this. I posted something about this on vol. IV of this thread. It occurred to me when I was re-reading some of Brienne's chapters in Feast how first we get that speech from Septon Meribald about broken men, and then the very next chapter is the one where she gets to the Quiet Isle where not only does it seem that most of the monks and EB are former broken men, but we learn that likely our Hound is there too. It really is incredible how all these little hints from different stories and characters come together to create a complete picture of a character, especially a non POV one like the Hound.

Another thing I wanted to comment on regarding the Hound has to do with something Lyanna said a few pages back about how he keeps talking about how he is just a butcher. I don't know how I missed the relevance of this before, as I participated in the reread and I am sure it was discussed then, but the fact that the one really horrible act we know Sandor/Hound has done is kill Mycah who is a butcher's boy! He kills the butcher's boy, and later keeps trying to reinforce to Sansa how he is just a butcher who likes killing. Another bit of symbolism that fits into the Hound persona!

[brashcandy]

Ok, so I've been reading the "Hiding Needle, Remaining Stark" thread on Arya. Most of the comments supported the theory that Needle represents Arya's connection to her Stark identity and that it means she'll never fully embrace her FM persona. I then came across this interesting statement by Errant Bard which put a different spin on it:

Arya not throwing away Needle was a sign she could not let go of her past when she buried it. I expect her to unearth it one day and find that metal in a damp canal city will rust to nothing, though, and it will be an accurate metaphor for her attachment to her past. Just like her warging into a cat at the end of AFFC.

Now we know there are very close parallels between Sansa's and Arya's arcs in the books. Just as Arya is asked to fully commit herself to the MFG, LF tells Sansa she must be Alayne Stone all the time, even in her heart. My question is this: is there a similar tangible item that connects Sansa to her Stark heritage? Also, can we apply what Errant Bard says above to Sansa's situation? We know she resolves at the time to feed LF lies and arbor gold, but by the end of AFFC she's much more comfortable with being Alayne Stone. Could she experience a similar "tarnishing" of that attachment to her past, where reclaiming Sansa Stark is no longer possible in light of all that has happened?

[Newstar]

We haven't seen anything stated about him that way inclined, and I have a feeling Tyrion especially would just LOVE to have a go at him for that if it was the case. After all Jaime seems fine with having a go at Loras about Renly.

I'm not sure brothel visiting is a sure fire way to tell since Whoresbane Umber got his name after killing a male whore, after all.

You know, it never even occurred to me that the Hound might be anything other than straight, and I twigged to the Loras/Renly thing pretty early on. Whoops, heteronormativity!

I always thought that the Hound's sexual interest in Sansa was pretty much spelled out, as well as how conflicted he was over it, at least in the books. In the TV show--and I know mileage varies on this--I didn't get any whiff of sexual attraction from TV!Hound in their scenes together. TV!Hound could very well have no (sexual/romantic) interest in women.

The funny thing about TV!Hound's scene in the Blackwater episode is that once you take out the sexual attraction and the raging (and the holding a girl at knifepoint), his proposal to take Sansa with him sounds downright sensible. He's even offering to take her to Winterfell, which I don't recall was ever on the table (at least not explicitly) with Book!Hound. I had no sense of threat or danger from TV!Hound in the Blackwater Sansa scene at all, whereas Book!Hound is downright terrifying and unstable and you don't know what he might do. When Book!Hound told Sansa "I could keep you safe," I wanted her to back away slowly; when TV!Hound told Sansa "I'll keep you safe," I completely believed him. Even knowing that TV!Sansa would likely not be better off in the long run were she to leave with Sandor (no more than in the books), and knowing that Book!Sansa was completely justified in refusing to leave with the drunk lunatic holding a knife to her throat and extracting a song from her, I was screaming at TV!Sansa "Just go with him! You don't think he's going to hurt you, he's not being creepy or violent with you, and he's offering to take you home, so what is the problem already?"

On the Sandor/rape issue...I always thought "I'll have a song from you, whether you will it or no" had connotations of sexual violence. When Sansa hears him say this, she innocently takes it at face value, rather than immediately enrolling in a self-defence course as I would have if some guy told me that, but the fact that the dream Hound says the same thing to her in bed suggests that at some point between ACOK and ASOS, she subconsciously associates his words with sexual implications. When Sansa dreams of the Hound in bed with her, rasping "I'll have a song from you," it's mixed up with another coercive, sexualized situation (Tyrion in bed with her). When the Hound confesses to Arya that he "took the song, she never gave it," to me that's a recognition that in extracting something from Sansa that she wouldn't otherwise have given him, he in some sense violated her...which is probably what leads him to go on to confess that he meant to "take her too."

The scary thing for me about the fact that the Hound was pushing Sansa down on the bed, his confession "I took the song, she never gave it," Sansa's dream about the Hound telling her "I'll have a song from you," and the phrasing of "I'll have a song from you, whether you will it or no" ("I'll take something from you, whether you'd part with it willingly or not") is that it gives the whole BBW song episode strong overtones of sexual violence. In fact, if it weren't for the Hound confirming in ASOS that he didn't rape Sansa ("I meant to take her, too. I should have. I should have *bleeped* her bloody..." etc. etc.), I would have assumed that the Hound did rape Sansa in BBW, that Sansa has completely blocked it out, and the false kiss memory and her general romanticized view of the incident is her way of coping with what happened. It's a bit of a relief that the Hound confirms that the song is all he took.

[Lady.]

In response to brash's point - I actually very much felt the Hound was her connection to her Stark identity, or at least part of it. Harder to capture a relationship as the tie to her Stark identity, as opposed to an inanimate object like Arya's Needle, but when she would think of him she would say something (to paraphrase) 'but that was Sansa, and I'm no longer her' and push the thought of him away. I could very much see her continue precariously down the Alayne path with actions that are perhaps slightly morally ambiguous, and then reunite with Sandor at some point and re-forge that connection to her Sansa side. Just a thought but it was something that stood out to me upon first read - how closely she linked the Hound with Sansa.

To diverge slightly, I've been dying to catch up and comment on the education/septa mordane/etc. posts but I don't seem to have the time to sit and read through pages of responses and then keep getting further and further behind! :dunce: So I'll just post them now.

The point I wanted to make is threefold. Firstly, I think education is a shared responsibility. I don't think, as others before me have rightly pointed out, that it can be laid at the feet of any one person. Ultimately, I think Ned/Cat/Septa/everyone never expected this turn of events - they just came out of an epic war and couldn't imagine that Sansa would need to be prepared for anything other than a gentle high courtly life, which played to her natural preferences for song/stories/etc. My second point is that I think Martin is toying with the ideas of nature versus nurture in these ways. I don't believe that if Arya was taught needlework with her left hand (which is actually my third point) she would somehow take to embroidery as never before. I think the Baratheon/Lannister children are perhaps the greatest example of this - we have Joffrey, Tommen and Myrcella born of the same parents with relatively similar upbringings, and yet one is a sociopath. Sansa and Arya may have been nurtured relatively similarly (with differing success rates on 'ladylike' pursuits) but there natural preferences and strengths are different. My third point (I'm getting there I swear ^_^ ) is regarding the handedness issue. I'm not sure if someone did finally comment on this or not, but I have to say that from a RL perspective, just because Arya did swordplay with her left, doesn't mean she would have necessarily been left handed. I do believe that Martin put that little detail in to suggest that Arya is lefthanded and connect with the needlework thing. But since debates were continuing using this point, I just wanted to point out that left handed people aren't always like right handed people with regards to hand preferences (in fact I know some people who are staunch righties but randomly do one sport with their left)! My mother is also left handed and does everything with her left hand (ie all sports, cutting bread, etc.) But I have different hand preferences depending on sport, skill, etc. In fact, with needlework I would probably use both hands depending whether I was going for speed or intricate work. So I know this isn't necessarily relevant to the conversation, but when I see people constantly saying 'ah if only the Septa had taught her with her other hand!!' I can't help but think 'that's not necessarily true!' :closedeyes:

[Tumnas the Torpid]

My question is this: is there a similar tangible item that connects Sansa to her Stark heritage? Also, can we apply what Errant Bard says above to Sansa's situation? We know she resolves at the time to feed LF lies and arbor gold, but by the end of AFFC she's much more comfortable with being Alayne Stone. Could she experience a similar "tarnishing" of that attachment to her past, where reclaiming Sansa Stark is no longer possible in light of all that has happened?

Very interesting angle on Arya, though I will be sorely disappointed if Needle does prove useless in the future. I can't think of anything analagous that Sansa has been holding onto for that long. The only thing that comes close is...well, I imagine you know what. She's still got a certain cloak, right?

[Lyanna Stark]

Yeah, I think he's stopped worrying about the humblest pawns to be honest. For example, he warns Sansa about not trusting Randa Royce, which might be all well and good, but it seems like Sansa is going to form a much more substantive relationship with Mya Stone. She may be taken with Randa's irreverent speech, but she appears deeply intrigued by the bastard girl, with respect to her relationship with Lothor Brune and the quiet strength she displays. While Randa talks about wanting a new husband badly, Mya advocates for women to be independent of men:

Interestingly here, Mya Stone advocates for women to be independent (a modern thought) while one of the reasons Randa seems to want to get married again is to have someone to have sex with. Both behaviours are far off the lady ideal of Westeros I'd say and very modern thoughts. It does seem like the next logical step for Sansa after having been shown how false her view of marriage and a woman's function in society were that she now gets introduced to some more radical thinking. In ACOK, she could not really take in what Cersei said about being sold off to some stranger and ridden like a horse, but now she can. After all the horrible experiences she's had already, she's more ready to accept different lines of thinking and to be less judgemental about non traditional solutions to problems, I imagine.

It makes it even more fascinating that all this is flying completely under Littlefinger's radar. He thinks Sansa is Cat 2.0, including the dutifulness, but I think there Sansa has already distanced herself from what her mother was like. She's recognised that in her current situation that will get her nowhere except into another marriage farce. Interestingly, during AGOT, ACOK and up to the wedding with Tyrion, "dutiful" and reminders to herself to be courteous come up constantly, but after that we see far less of it, and in AFFC nothing.

[Lyanna Stark]

The scary thing for me about the fact that the Hound was pushing Sansa down on the bed, his confession "I took the song, she never gave it," Sansa's dream about the Hound telling her "I'll have a song from you," and the phrasing of "I'll have a song from you, whether you will it or no" ("I'll take something from you, whether you'd part with it willingly or not") is that it gives the whole BBW song episode strong overtones of sexual violence. In fact, if it weren't for the Hound confirming in ASOS that he didn't rape Sansa ("I meant to take her, too. I should have. I should have *bleeped* her bloody..." etc. etc.), I would have assumed that the Hound did rape Sansa in BBW, that Sansa has completely blocked it out, and the false kiss memory and her general romanticized view of the incident is her way of coping with what happened. It's a bit of a relief that the Hound confirms that the song is all he took.

That's certainly a common way to read it, and how I read it the first couple of times as well. It's also very, very likely there for a reason, maybe to tie into the fact that Sandor now spends his time with the reformed (or reforming?) soldiers and rapists at the QI.

However, regarding the "I meant to take her too, I should have" comes straight after his regret of not stopping the beatings, so it looks really, really out of place there, logically. Does he regret not raping her? That seems like a strange thing, especially coming right after lamenting allowing the beatings.

With that reading, what he is saying is 1. I should have stopped them beating her 2. I meant to rape her. 3. I should have raped her. And that makes very little sense, considering that he recently had a nervous breakdown about her marrying the Imp.

That line makes far more sense if what he is saying is 1. I should have stopped them beating her. 2. I meant to take her (with me) 3. I should have taken her ( out with me). Then it's a list of regrets. Finalised by the "I should have fucked her bloody and cut her heart out before leaving her for that dwarf" as a nice hyperbole saying basically 4. Nothing I can think up (and I can think up a lot of Gregor-like crimes due to knowing Gregor) could be crueller than leaving Sansa for the dwarf.

That also fits well with what he talks about at the Inn with Arya, since he wishes Cersei would cook Tyrion in Wildfire and then tickle him til the moon turns black.

However, it's not a coincidence that it's framed in terms of vulgarity and pretty brutal sexualised violence I think.

[Tumnas the Torpid]

The scary thing for me about the fact that the Hound was pushing Sansa down on the bed, his confession "I took the song, she never gave it," Sansa's dream about the Hound telling her "I'll have a song from you," and the phrasing of "I'll have a song from you, whether you will it or no" ("I'll take something from you, whether you'd part with it willingly or not") is that it gives the whole BBW song episode strong overtones of sexual violence. In fact, if it weren't for the Hound confirming in ASOS that he didn't rape Sansa ("I meant to take her, too. I should have. I should have *bleeped* her bloody..." etc. etc.), I would have assumed that the Hound did rape Sansa in BBW, that Sansa has completely blocked it out, and the false kiss memory and her general romanticized view of the incident is her way of coping with what happened. It's a bit of a relief that the Hound confirms that the song is all he took.

I've had a suspicion that the false kiss memory could possibly have been Martin planting the seed for Sansa's entire original account to end up being false (or incomplete); I've never brought it up because it is crazy, and the textual evidence against it is legion.

[1234567]

@ Elba the Itoner

I don't know if it is another connection, but when Ned goes to kill Lady, he says that Lady deserves better than a butcher. Sansa certainly deserves someone better than a butcher (of men) and even post QI there would be better choices than Sandor.....Aegon or Pod for starters. But then again we don't always get what we deserve and more importantly we sometimes do not want what we deserve. :)

[Daidalos]

Quickly regarding the Kettleblacks and their relevance to Littlefinger's plots. I think that the Kettleblacks were a valuable, if limited, resource, and that they have been spent. Furthermore, I don't think they will prove to be much of a liability to Littlefinger: even before they outlived their usefulness, he recognized that they were too treacherous to trust with serious plots (e.g. Joffrey's poisoning), which suggests that the Kettleblacks weren't that clued in, nor extremely valuable to Littlefinger.

[Kittykatknits]

Also, KittyKatKnits, I have been meaning to respond to your post no. 135 about how you see Sandor as a broken man. I totally agree with this. I posted something about this on vol. IV of this thread. It occurred to me when I was re-reading some of Brienne's chapters in Feast how first we get that speech from Septon Meribald about broken men, and then the very next chapter is the one where she gets to the Quiet Isle where not only does it seem that most of the monks and EB are former broken men, but we learn that likely our Hound is there too. It really is incredible how all these little hints from different stories and characters come together to create a complete picture of a character, especially a non POV one like the Hound.

Septon Meribald's speech makes it pretty clear to me as well. But, Sandor as a broken man made sense for me when I was trying to break down and understand what he was saying during the BBW scene with Sansa. His wish for Tyrion to be burned, his statement that he'd lost everything, his offer of escape, the erratic behavior in that scene. I went back and reread all his previous scenes, trying to get in to his head as much as possible. It really changed my perception of the character quite a bit. I still think his fear of the fire that night was a big factor in his decision to leave but not nearly to the degree that many people do.

Very interesting angle on Arya, though I will be sorely disappointed if Needle does prove useless in the future. I can't think of anything analagous that Sansa has been holding onto for that long. The only thing that comes close is...well, I imagine you know what. She's still got a certain cloak, right?

I agree with Lady above. As best as we know, the cloak was left behind in KL. The only way the cloak came with is if LF was somehow able to smuggle her clothes out of KL which I doubt he did. But, the link to her past is Sandor, especially as I believe he is her wolf substitute.

@ Elba the Itoner

I don't know if it is another connection, but when Ned goes to kill Lady, he says that Lady deserves better than a butcher. Sansa certainly deserves someone better than a butcher (of men) and even post QI there would be better choices than Sandor.....Aegon or Pod for starters. But then again we don't always get what we deserve and more importantly we sometimes do not want what we deserve. :)

I've thought this before too. In a way, if she does end up with Sandor, I don't think it would be a happily ever after. It would closer match the definition of bittersweet in some ways. Sansa deserves the best, and as much as I love Sandor, he isn't the best. He's an emotionally immature alcoholic with no lands, no title, no money who is wanted for desertion and Saltpans. When you look at it this way, he isn't much of a catch, yet Sansa wants him. So, in a sense, she may get what she wants but it isn't close to what she deserves.

Quickly regarding the Kettleblacks and their relevance to Littlefinger's plots. I think that the Kettleblacks were a valuable, if limited, resource, and that they have been spent. Furthermore, I don't think they will prove to be much of a liability to Littlefinger: even before they outlived their usefulness, he recognized that they were too treacherous to trust with serious plots (e.g. Joffrey's poisoning), which suggests that the Kettleblacks weren't that clued in, nor extremely valuable to Littlefinger.

Thanks for the insight. I have a hard time with anything KB, anything related to them blurs together and I get confused.