AGOT

A Game of Thrones

• Sansa I
• Sansa II
• Sansa III
• Sansa IV
• Sansa V
• Sansa VI
• AGOT Round-up: Sansa’s Development
• AGOT Symbolism and Foreshadowing

AGOT

Sansa I

By Brashcandy

SUMMARY

The chapter begins with Sansa at breakfast and feeding her direwolf, Lady, under the table. Septa Mordane is unhappy about this, and comments that when it comes to Lady, Sansa is just “as wilful” as her sister Arya. Sansa is excited because it’s the day that the Queen has promised to take them out riding with her in the royal carriage, and she’s also feeling immensely happy about her engagement to Prince Joffrey:

It was a great honour to ride out with the queen, and besides Prince Joffrey might be there. Her betrothed. Just thinking it made her feel a strange fluttering inside, even though they were not to marry for years and years. Sansa did not really know Joffrey yet, but she was already in love with him. He was all she ever dreamt her prince should be, tall and handsome and strong, with hair like gold. She treasured every chance to spend with him, few as they were.

The only concern that Sansa has about enjoying her day is Arya. She fears that her sister will be as obstinate as ever, and will not dress nicely to meet with the queen. Setting off to find Arya, she locates her on the banks of the Trident, trying to brush out Nymeria’s fur. Arya promptly informs Sansa that she has no intention of joining her for the outing with Cersei and instead plans on going upstream with the butcher’s boy Mycah to search for Rhaegar’s rubies.

Rubies,” Sansa said, lost. “What rubies?”

Arya gave her a look like she was so stupid. “Rhaegar’s rubies. This is where King Robert killed him and won the crown.

Sansa regarded her scrawny little sister in disbelief. “You can’t look for rubies, the princess is expecting us. The queen invited us both.”

“I don’t care,” Arya said. The wheelhouse doesn’t even have windows, you can’t see a thing.”

“What could you want to see?” Sansa said, annoyed. She had been thrilled by the invitation, and her stupid sister was going to ruin everything, just as she’d feared. It’s all just fields and farms and holdfasts.”

“It is not,” Arya said stubbornly. If you came with us sometimes, you’d see.

The sisters continue to argue for a while, until Sansa, unable to convince Arya to return, even with the promise of lemon cakes and tea, returns to camp, feeling “alone and humiliated.” She wonders how she and Arya could be so different even though they were only born two years apart. Noting that it would have easier to understand if Arya had been a bastard, indeed she looked so much like their half-brother Jon, Sansa remembers when she was little asking her mother if Arya really was her true daughter.

When she reaches back to the camp, she meets an excited crowd gathered around the queen’s wheelhouse. She learns that the council has sent two riders to escort the King back to KL. These two knights are decked out in all their finery and splendour, one of them wearing the white cloak of the Kingsguard. However, Sansa becomes alarmed upon glimpsing another stranger, Ilyn Payne, and nervously retreats when he catches her gaze. She ends up bumping into Sandor Clegane.

Strong hands grasped her by the shoulders, and for a moment Sansa thought it was her father, but when she turned, it was the burned face of Sandor Clegane looking down at her, his mouth twisted in a terrible mockery of a smile. “You are shaking, girl,” he said, his voice rasping. “Do I frighten you so much?

Sansa is startled, but she notes to herself that Sandor is not so terrifying as the other man. Joffrey orders Sandor to leave her alone, and she quickly recollects herself in order to apologize to Payne and greet the two knights, Barristan Selmy and Renly Baratheon. Cersei tells her that unfortunately she has to cancel their tea date, but suggests that Joffrey can entertain Sansa for the day. Sansa is overjoyed at the prospect of spending an entire day with her betrothed, and agrees to leave Lady behind at the camp as well as Joffrey’s bodyguard, the Hound.

Her happiness, however, is bitterly short-lived. After picnicking and riding for a while, they come across Arya and Mycah play-fighting with wooden sticks. Joffrey begins to taunt Mycah, telling him he’s no knight and only able to beat little girls. He places his sword point against Mycah’s cheek and draws blood. Arya becomes enraged and attacks Joffrey, hitting him at the back of his head with the stick. Sansa begins to scream for them to stop but the fight escalates. Mycah has run off, and Joffrey begins to come at Arya with his sword, Lion’s Tooth. Nymeria appears suddenly and lunges at Joffrey, biting his arm and flinging him to the ground. Calling off Nymeria, Arya throws Lion’s Tooth into the river and takes off with her horse and the wolf. Sansa is left with the injured Joffrey and tries to comfort him to no avail. He lashes out instead and tells her to get help and leave him alone.

ANALYSIS

The chapter really lays the groundwork in pointing out the essential differences between Sansa and Arya. Whilst Arya prefers to go exploring and thinks nothing of getting dirty and tearing her clothes, Sansa is almost the exact opposite. She enjoys dressing nicely, hates the thought of going off playing in the mud and by the river, and wants nothing more than to enjoy what she considers to be the civilized company of the Queen and Myrcella. In fact, the only similarity the girls seem to share is their affection for their wolves, with Sansa just as intent on keeping Lady around her, even whilst breakfasting.

I found Sansa’s relationship with her wolf here to be really heart-warming. It’s clear that she loves the animal just as much as Arya does Nymeria, but often it seems to be overlooked due to how soon Lady dies in the book (and what some people assume is Sansa’s culpability in the death). When she is scared by Ilyn Payne, she instinctively reaches to Lady for comfort, and the wolf is very protective of her too, snarling at Sandor in that first meeting.

Sansa’s innocence and naivety are prominent in the chapter. She thinks she is in love with Joffrey, even though she doesn’t know him well, and is shocked when Arya declares that she doesn’t like the Queen. Her love of lemon cakes is noted too. It’s clear that she tends to take people at face value. She believes that Cersei is kind and honourable, because she’s beautiful and that’s how Queens are supposed to be. We see the same thing with Joffrey—he fits her ideal image of what a Prince should look like, and she’s immediately enamoured with him.

I have to admit that I am sympathetic to Sansa in her argument with Arya. The latter seems intent to buck tradition at all costs, and I can understand Sansa’s frustration in trying to get her to do this one thing. However, it’s evident that there’s no enmity between the sisters. They are simply two very different individuals, and both of them are stubbornly set in their likes and dislikes.

I’m interested in why Arya claims that she doesn’t like the Queen. Is it because she is a better people reader than Sansa is, or is it that she’s responding to Cersei’s own dislike of her? I’m assuming that Cersei would have shown slight distaste towards Arya’s behaviour during the journey back to King’s Landing, and perhaps Arya picked up on it?

I was also very impressed with how Sansa handled the introductions to Barristan and Renly. It really highlighted her skill at courtesy, something that we see later on, and her ability to recollect herself and her manners, even in frightening situations.

Sansa knew the name, and now her courtesies that Septa Mordane had taught her over the years came back to her. “The Lord Commander of the Kingsguard,” she said, “and Councillor to Robert our king and to Aerys Targaryen before him. The honor is mine, good knight. Even in the far north, the singers praise the deeds of Barristan the Bold.

Her meeting with Sandor is curious. She backs into him and her first impression is that he’s her father. The kind of protective role that he’s to play in her life seems to have been hinted at fairly early by Martin then, and it’s noteworthy to see that she doesn’t think he’s as scary as Ilyn Payne.

Sansa’s devotion to Joffrey also had me rolling my eyes! But in a poor girl kind of way. She genuinely believes that he’s a decent boy, and is ecstatic over getting to spend the day with him. When he asks her what she wants to do, she tells him “Whatever you’d like to do, my prince,” and even feigns liking to ride to please him. Ah, the things we do for love! (OK, wrong choice of words, but you understand) She also thinks that Joffrey rescued her from Ser Ilyn and the Hound, an exaggeration that again underscores her innocence, and her desire to have a fairytale romance. She compares Joff to two legendary knights here, Serwyn of the Mirror Shield and Prince Aemon the Dragonknight. We will see a later reference to Aemon again, but I was very interested in the reference to Serwyn. He was a member of the KG and according to the Wiki:

Serwyn, better known as Serwyn of the Mirror Shield, is a famous and legendary member of the Kingsguard.^[1] He is still a favorite of the smallfolk.^[2]
Legends
According to song, he once saved Princess Daeryssa from Giants.^[3] He slew the dragon Urrax by approaching the beast behind his shield so the dragon only saw its own reflection, Serwyn then speared Urrax through the eye.^[4] He was haunted by ghosts of all the knights he killed.^[5]

Hmmm, foreshadowing relating to another member of the Kingsguard perhaps? *coughSandorcough* Also, something to bear in mind about the grand fight in the Eyrie suggested by the prophecy of the girl with purple serpents in her hair slaying the savage giant; and will Sandor help in this fight and be a dragonslayer?!

For some reason, I didn’t remember the fight between Joffrey and Arya being as nasty as it really was. Joffrey’s natural cruelty is really shown in the way he treats Mycah, but was Arya right for attacking him? In retrospect, it would have been better for everyone if she had kept her anger down, and had let Joffrey grow tired of tormenting Mycah, but I can understand the rage she felt at Joffrey’s casual wickedness and Mycah’s helplessness. The situation is completely overwhelming for someone like Sansa, however, and all she can do is cry and try to plead for them to stop. Again, I sympathise with how helpless she felt, and the sense of despair over the incident that got so quickly out of control.

I do wish that Sansa had wised up to Joff’s true nature in this chapter, especially after he lashes out when she tries to comfort him, but I can see why that would not be a realistic expectation. She’s so completely enraptured with the idea of him as her perfect Prince that his words probably didn’t do more than make her feel a bit hurt at the time.

AGOT post-Sansa I: Eddard III

by Rapsie

SUMMARY

After the fight at the Trident, Arya goes missing for 4 days and is eventually found by Jory Cassel, but is taken straight to the King and Queen rather than her father when they return to Castle Darry. When Ned is informed, he asks that Sansa be brought before the King as her voice may be needed while he goes straight to the audience hall at Darry. The first thing he notes is that the Hall is too full and mostly full of hostile Lannister men. Arya is distraught and Ned goes to comfort her and ask why she was not brought to him. Robert says he thought it best the matter was settled quickly. Joff and Cersei then give their version of events and Arya gives hers.

After Arya’s version, Renly is escorted out of the chamber as he descends into fits of laughter that a little girl with a stick unarmed Joff. Ned then asks Sansa to step forward and give her version of events, which he knows will clear Arya.

His eldest daughter stepped forward hesitantly…{dress description}….She blinked at her sister, then at the young prince, “I don’t know,” she said tearfully, looking as though she wanted to bolt. “I don’t remember. Everything happened so fast, I didn’t see…

Arya immediately calls Sansa a liar, knocks her to the ground and begins hitting her. She is pulled off Sansa, still kicking at her, by Jory. Ned notes that Sansa is pale and shaking.

Cersei then says that Arya is as wild and filthy as her wolf, and demands she be punished. Robert and her then proceed to argue very publically. Cersei says Joff will carry the scars for the rest of his days and Robert says maybe that should teach him a lesson and plans to end matters there, but Cersei asks what will happen to the wolf. Jory says the wolf has gone.

Cersei offers a reward for any man who brings back the wolf pelt and Robert rebukes her. Cersei and Robert then proceed to engage in snide and derogatory comments to each other. Until Cersei triumphantly points out that they still have a wolf, namely Sansa’s wolf Lady. Robert curses her, but says so be it. Ned pleads for Lady’s life, but Robert overrules him and tells him that the wolf would savage her one day and to get her a dog, she’ll be happier for it.”

Sansa then realizes that Lady is to be killed and pleads for her pet’s life. Arya defends Lady and demands she be left alone. Ned again pleads for Lady as a brother and for the love Robert once had for his sister, but Robert ignores him. Ned then asks that he at least do it himself, but Robert does not respond and instead curses Cersei and leaves.

Cersei calls for Ser Ilyn, but Ned says that he will do it himself. He leaves the hall to the sounds of his daughter wailing. After Lady is dead, he runs into Sandor Clegane who has killed Mycah.

ANALYSIS

This chapter highlights the fallout from the fight and as we will later see, the fight was the instigator of Joff’s hatred of Sansa because she saw him humiliated. What is interesting is that Sansa had told her father what had happened the same day, and yet 4 days later Ned had not talked to the King about it and no one else had asked for or heard Sansa’s version of events, which strikes me as odd. We do see in the next Ned chapter though that considerable fuss was made about Joff’s injuries as one of the first things he is told when he reaches KL is that everyone is praying for Prince Joffrey after his attack. Therefore I am amazed Sansa was not questioned earlier , or Ned had not had a quiet word with Robert.

Anyway, moving on to Sansa. At the end of her first chapter, what was meant to be a wonderful day with her betrothed went horribly horribly wrong. Her sister is now missing and her betrothed seems to hate her and everyone is trying to find her sister.

Ned notes how intimidating and hostile the audience chamber at Darry is, and when Sansa is brought forward to speak, she is hesitant and tearful, which would imply that she is scared and out of her depth. The fact she looks from Arya to Joff suggests that she is in a quandary over what to do, so chooses to say she doesn’t remember because then she is not picking sides. This was not the right thing to do, but an understandable one for a scared 11 year old who is being forced to pick between her sister and her betrothed (the boy whose family one day she is meant to become part of). I don’t think this was a deliberate attempt to side with Joffrey, but a non-decision to try and extract herself from being involved in this terrifying position. Indeed during this scene, both girls are extremely scared and upset and even Ned feels the lack of friendly faces.

The fact that Arya immediately attacks her when she says she doesn’t remember and quite brutally does not help Arya’s case at all: I would say Arya’s reaction is overkill, but also understandable as she is terrified and her sister isn’t supporting her.

At this point Robert wants to call it quits and just have the issue left alone. This is where I think it turns into a fight and power play between Robert and Cersei more than anything else. Cersei had said back in Winterfell that she didn’t want the wolves coming south. Now she has the opportunity to do something about it and manages to have Lady killed. The importance of this scene is that it sets up the future tormenting of Sansa by Cersei and Joffrey.

NB: Some people also believe that Robert’s line “get her a dog she’ll be happier for it” maybe foreshadowing a friendship between Sansa and Sandor Clegane.

AGOT Sansa II

SUMMARY

It is the day of the Hand’s Tourney and Sansa, Jeyne and Septa Mordane travel there in a litter with yellow silk curtains. Many knights are there and have setup their pavilions around the Tourney grounds.

The splendor of it all took Sansa’s breath away.

And she notes that it is better than the songs. She has dressed beautifully and notes that everyone is looking at her and smiling.

Various knights and Houses are then described. Sansa notes that Jory looks like a beggar compared to other knights and that Septa Mordane “sniffs” when he appears. As the jousting goes on, both girls cry out when riders clash, but unlike Sansa, Jeyne covers her eyes whenever a man falls, but Sansa notes she is made of sterner stuff and does not show too visible a reaction, and Septa Mordane compliments her composure. Then Ser Gregor’s lance goes through the gorget of Hugh of the Vale, and Hugh is killed not ten feet away from Sansa. Septa Mordane has to remove Jeyne, who had started weeping. Sansa, however, sits composed with her hands in her lap, watching with a strange facination.

She notes he is nothing to her, but then realizes he will be forgotten and no songs will be sung for him and feels sad.

The jousting then continues, and lots of knights, lords, etc., who will play a larger role over all the books are introduced. At the end of the day, only four participants are left: Ser Gregor, Jaime Lannister, Ser Loras Tyrell and Sandor Clegane. During the course of the Tourney, Ser Loras hands out white roses to various ladies, but hands a red one to Sansa. Sansa is very enamoured of Ser Loras. Whilst overwhelmed by his gallantry, a man approaches Sansa. She notes that he is short, and nearly as old as her father. The man states:

You must be one of her daughters . . . You have the Tully look.

Sansa is immediately ill at ease and states that she is Sansa Stark. Septa Mordane introduces him as Lord Petyr Baelish. He states that:

Your mother was my queen of beauty once… You have her hair.

He then proceeds to brush her cheek as he pushes back a lock of hair. Then quite abrupty leaves.

Sansa and Septa Mordane then attend a feast. They are given places of high honour, and Sansa sits next to Joffrey. He has not spoken to her since the incident at the Trident and she feels her throat tighten. She notes that:

At first she thought she hated him for what they’d done to Lady, but after Sansa had wept her eyes dry, she told herself that it had not been Joffery’s doing, not truly. The queen had done it ;she was the one to hate, her and Arya.

Sansa looks at him and trembles, afraid that he might ignore or be cruel to her, but instead he is charming and pays her compliments all evening. As the evening progresses, it is one of the most magical Sansa has ever known, with singers, fools, and Joff being sweet to her all evening. She notes that his arm is still troubling him, but that he does not complain about it. There are many courses, and Sansa can’t eat more than two lemoncakes, much as she loves them, although she thinks about attempting a third. Robert is getting drunk and Joff suddenly suggests that she goes back to the castle and asks if she needs an escort. At first, she says no, but seeing Septa Mordane drunk and passed out beside her, says yes. Joff orders Sandor Clegane to take her back to the castle.

Sandor laughs at her and asks if she thought Joff would walk her back, then pulls her to her feet and says they must go as he is drunk and may need to kill his brother tomorrow. Sansa is terrified and tries to wake Septa Mordane. But she doesn’t wake. Sansa notes:

the feast was over, and the beautiful dream had ended with it.

Sandor and her return by torchlight over the tourney grounds. She is frightened of him and doesn’t want to look at him, but feels she must as that is what a true lady would do. She comments on his gallantry and calls him Ser. Sandor snarls that he is not a knight and she should spare him her empty little compliments, and then asks what she thought of his brother and if he was gallant. At last she says no man could withstand him and feels proud of herself for answering. Sandor then mocks her and she tells him he is unkind. Sandor then begins to talk about Gregor and then holds her chin and forces to look at his face in the torchlight. Half his face has been burned away, and Sansa begins to cry. Sandor lets her go and snuffs out the torch and asks her if she has a compliment for that. He then tells her the story of what happened to his face. After he finishes, Sansa realises she feels sad for him and is no longer afraid. A long silence ensues and she becomes afraid not for herself but for him and rests a hand on his shoulder and tells him his brother was no true knight. They travel in silence back to the city. Sandor escorts her to her room and tells her if she tells anyone what he told her, he’ll kill her.

ANALYSIS

This was probably one of Sansa’s happiest days: life was even better than the songs she had imagined. She is the centre of attention and everyone is smiling at her and Loras gives her a red rose. What is sad in retrospect is that most of this seems to be part of the “game.” She is the betrothed of the Crown Prince, the future Queen, and everyone is trying to get on her good side, and she doesn’t see it. For her it seems like a song. Indeed, how little anyone is actually concerned about her is highlighted in AFFC when she says that Bronze Yohn saw her at the tourney and LF basically says she was one of many girls and he wouldn’t have really noticed her.

This is also the first time we see Sansa’s ability to keep her composure regardless of what is going on around her. Her reaction to seeing a man gruesomely die in front of her is almost disinterested. Yet she is praised for it by Septa Mordane. This chapter also highlights something I personally had never realised before, that Septa Mordane is a snooty bitch. Indeed, people seem to blame Cat for Sansa being a bit snobby, but I am beginning to think her governess had a lot to answer for.

It is also the first time Sansa meets Littlefinger. What is fascinating is she is immediately ill at ease with him. His comments are, on a reread, incredibly ugh! and creepy. One of the things Sansa is accused of is not being a true Stark, and yet in this scene when LF mentions her Tully look, she immediately identifies herself as a Stark.

Her thoughts at the feast are interesting as it is clear she initially did blame and hate Joff after Lady’s death. However, she tells herself it wasn’t him, it was the queen and Arya. Now, clearly this is unfair to Arya and a whitewashing of Joff, however, he was still the boy she was destined to marry. Her own father had killed her wolf when the Queen ordered Lady killed, and despite everything, he had not broken off her betrothal or it seems really spoken to her about it. So I can see where it is easier to make yourself believe that your future husband isn’t evil, because believing it that young would suck. All the same, she is afraid of Joff, but Joff then worms his way back into her affections.

His arm still being painful is interesting, as this must have been at least a month and a half after the trident incident. Whether he was faking it or not is up for debate, but if not, then he was quite badly injured. Although knowing Joff I would hazard a guess at attention seeking.

Sansa’s journey home with Sandor Clegane is another interesting point. All throughout her conversations with Joff and others, she is at pains to say the right things and recites courtesies she has learnt. When she tries this with Sandor, she is mocked and rebuked. She is afraid of him, but actually tries to answer his questions honestly, rather than with her learned phrases. The fact she lays a comforting hand on his shoulder and feels fear for him after he tells her his story also highlights one of the best aspects of Sansa’s personality traits: her compassion and empathy.

Indeed, Sansa imagines what it is like to be in stories and songs and therefore can perhaps visualize and understand others better. What is interesting is that in this chapter both LF and Sandor reveal something very personal about themselves to her, and then get uncomfortable about their disclosure of information.

It is also important chapter as we are introduced to a wide range of characters within the story.

AGOT

SANSA III

by Brashcandy

SUMMARY

The third Sansa chapter sees her still engaging in the storybook discourse of monsters and true knights. Sharing a cold supper with Jeyne, she’s upset that her father did not send Ser Loras after Gregor Clegane for his terror campaign in the Riverlands. Ned chose to send Beric Dondarrion instead, but Sansa laments the loss of seeing a true story come to life:

Her father’s decision still bewildered her. When the Knight of Flowers had spoken up, she’d been sure she was about to see one of Old Nan’s stories come to life. Ser Gregor was the monster and Ser Loras the true hero who would slay him. He even looked a true hero, so slim and beautiful with golden roses around his slender waist and his rich brown hair tumbling down into his eyes.

Her fantasy dashed, she remembers expressing her displeasure to Septa Mordane upon leaving the gallery about her father’s judgement. The Septa scolds her, but Petyr Baelish intercedes and agrees that some of Lord Eddard’s decisions “could do with a bit of questioning.” Commenting on Sansa’s wisdom and beauty, he engages her further by asking her just why she would have sent Loras instead. Sansa explains her ideas about heroes and monsters, and LF utters one of his infamous lines in the series:

The king’s councillor smiled. “Well, those are not the reasons I’d have given, but…” He had touched her cheek, his thumb lightly tracing the line of the cheekbone. “Life is not a song, sweetling. You may learn that one day to your sorrow.

His comment makes Sansa feel uneasy, so she decides not to share this part with her friend. Jeyne thinks that Ned should have sent Ilyn Payne, but Sansa believes he’s basically a “second monster” and thinks of how much he creeps her out: “He made her feel as though something dead were slithering over her naked body.” When Jeyne goes on to talk about Lord Beric, Sansa notes to herself that Jeyne’s crush on the man is hopeless. She’s of too low birth and very young, but Sansa decides that voicing these objections would be unkind.

The conversation shifts to talk of Prince Joffrey, with Sansa sharing her hopes that he’s the one to kill the white hart on the hunt with the other nobles. She tells Jeyne that she dreamt it, admitting to herself that it was only a wish, but it was more convincing to claim it was a dream, which everyone accepts are prophetic. Jeyne mentions that she has seen Arya in the stables that day walking on her hands, but Sansa has no desire to wonder about what Arya has been up to, and continues relating what happened at court that day. She tells Jeyne about the disgusting appearance of the Night’s Watch man, Yoren, and admits to pitying her half-brother Jon if this is really what the Watch is like.

In the morning, Sansa gets up early to watch Beric and the other men heading off to capture Gregor Clegane. She is excited by what is happening and thinks that it was like a song coming to life. Going down to breakfast, she is pleased to encounter Arya, given the general desertion of the Tower of the Hand, and proceeds to fill her in about why the place is so empty. Arya wants to know what Gregor has done, but asserts that Jaime Lannister and the Hound should also be made to pay for their crimes. This sparks a heated dispute:

It’s not the same,” Sansa said. “The Hound is Joffrey’s sworn shield. Your butcher’s boy attacked the prince.”

“Liar,” Arya said. Her hand clenched the blood orange so hard that red juice oozed between her fingers.

“Go ahead, call me all the names you want,” Sansa said airily. “You won’t dare when I’m married to Joffrey. You’ll have to bow before me and call me Your Grace.” She shrieked as Arya flung the orange across the table. It caught her in the middle of her forehead with a wet squish and plopped down into her lap.

“You have juice on your face, Your Grace,” Arya said.

It was running down her nose and stinging her eyes. Sansa wiped it away with a napkin. When she saw what the fruit in her lap had done to her beautiful ivory silk dress, she shrieked again. “You’re horrible,” she screamed at her sister. “They should have killed you instead of Lady!

At this outburst, Septa Mordane orders them both to their chambers and promises Lord Stark will hear of the argument. Sansa is livid, tearing off her dress and hurling it into the cold hearth before collapsing in tears on the bed and falling asleep. Around midday, Septa Mordane comes to her room to announce that Ned wants to see her. Waking from her sleep, Sansa has a fleeting thought that Lady is in the room with her, but remembers that she was only having a dream of them running together, but she can’t recall the rest.

She goes to her father, and Arya arrives as well. Anxious to avoid his censure, Sansa blames the argument on Arya, saying her sister started it first, but Ned is in no mood to entertain the fight. Seeing her father’s displeasure, Arya offers an apology to Sansa, and suggests that she could wash the dress to try to remove the stain. All this is forgotten though, when Ned announces that he’s sending them both back to Winterfell. Devastated, Sansa immediately states she doesn’t want to go, and so does Arya, although she seems to be willing to accept if Syrio is allowed to go North with them.

Sansa, however, is inconsolable. She tells her father that she loves Prince Joffrey “as much as Queen Naerys loved Prince Aemon the Dragonknight, as much as Jonquil loved Ser Florian. I want to be his Queen and have his babies.” Ned replies gently that Joffey is not the one for her, but when she is older he will make a match with someone worthy, “someone brave and gentle and strong.”

When Sansa insists that Joffrey is the only one she wants and that she will give him a son that is as brave as the wolf and proud as the lion, Arya is derisive, telling her this won’t happen if Joff’s the father, and besides that he’s a stag, not a lion. Sansa enraged, declares that Joff is nothing like his old drunken father, thereby inadvertently giving Ned the final piece of the puzzle surrounding the Lannisters’ treachery. Advising the girls to tell no one of their plans, he sends them off. Arya attempts to comfort Sansa, telling her that it will not be so bad, and that they’ll get a chance to be with everyone again, Bran, Robb, even Old Nan and Hodor. However, this only serves to increase Sansa’s anger:

Hodor!” Sansa yelled. You ought to marry Hodor, you’re just like him, stupid and hairy and ugly!” She wrenched away from her sister’s hand, stormed into her bedchamber, and barred the door behind her.

ANALYSIS

Wow. If I had to find a name for this chapter it would be Sansa Surprises, but not really. The last two chapters have seen her at various times upset, frightened, unsettled, excited and happy, but this one has all of that plus the added whopper of a rage and anger directed primarily at her sister. I have to say that I was largely disappointed with Sansa’s behaviour in the chapter, and somewhat surprised by what seemed like an even more entrenched belief in a fantasy world, where true knights go to slay monsters. I can see why Martin would have wanted his early characterization to be consistent, and I completely agree with the value of this given what Sansa has to experience later on, but it’s still a bit perplexing to the extent that we see her naivete here, at least to me. Given the events on the road with Lady’s death, the revelation by the Hound, and then the first hand witnessing of Gregor’s terror at the tourney, I would have thought to see a girl that is slightly more aware of the dangers around her, and that what she thought happened in fairytales doesn’t function the same way in real life.

And yet, I can see why she would, or at least I can understand why she comes to think that all of this is playing out like one of her songs. Maybe the reverse becomes true oddly enough. The conversation with Sandor, Lady’s death, and Gregor’s near assault of Loras at the tourney, have convinced her that yes, monsters do exist in the real world, and they need to be defeated in order for the story to have a happy ending. Who better to defeat a monster but a “true knight”? Sansa has indeed modified her initial thoughts in light of what Sandor tells her, but this modification has not made her any more enlightened or “smarter” about what life is really about. If anything, it seems to have convinced her that there’s a need for true knights more than ever, and hence her displeasure with her father’s decision not to send Loras.

This view results in the sage warning of Littlefinger when he learns the real reason why Sansa wanted her father to dispatch Ser Loras instead of Beric. Their exchange is quite revealing, and really highlights two things which become clearer (and more disturbing) in ASOS/AFFC:

1. LF’s desire for Sansa: The stroking of her face is in direct contrast to the Hound’s rough grabbing of her cheek to get her to look at him.
2. He’s not only interested in manipulating her, but “schooling” her as well: He is genuinely interested in finding out why she wanted Loras sent, and is unimpressed by her answer. I think we see this later on when he asks her questions to gauge if she is thinking analytically, but in this early exchange, he can only issue some advice, which sounds ominously like a warning.

The latter quality is certainly what Sansa takes away from the conversation, and she feels disconcerted enough not to share it with Jeyne. LF’s “warning” is nonetheless prescient, but there is an uneasiness that Sansa feels around him that is firmly established in these initial meetings.

And now onto what really disappointed me concerning Sansa in the chapter: It wasn’t her emotional outburst at the end when she tells Arya she’s ugly and hairy and stupid just like Hodor—although it wasn’t her finest moment in light of her sister’s efforts to comfort her; but rather one minor detail and a fairly big one:

• The throwaway comparison of Alyn to Jory on the morning she wakes to see Beric and the men heading off to on the hunt for Gregor:

The next morning she woke before first light and crept sleepily to her window to watch Lord Beric form up his men. They rode out as dawn was breaking over the city, with three banners going before them; the crowned stag of the king flew from the high staff, the direwolf of Stark and Lord Beric’s own forked lightning standard from the shorter poles. It was all so exciting, a song come to life; the clatter of swords, the flicker of torchlight, banners dancing in the wind, horses snorting and whinnying, the golden glow of sunrise slanting through the bars of the portcullis as it jerked upward. The Winterfell men looked especially fine in their silvery mail and long grey cloaks.
Alyn carried the Stark banner. When she saw him rein in before Lord Beric to exchange words, it made Sansa feel ever so proud. Alyn was handsomer than Jory has been; he was going to be a knight one day.

It’s really an insignificant observation, but I think it shows Sansa’s utter lack of awareness on the danger that is facing these men, and the comment about Alyn being handsomer than Jory made me want to scream: “Jory’s dead! Wake up, Sansa! This is life and death we’re talking about, not maidens and monsters!” It’s one of the only or very few times when I was completely exasperated with Sansa’s naivete, and wanted to reach into the story to shake her physically.

The major disappointing moment in the story comes when she asserts that Mycah was the one to attack Prince Joffrey. I’m in the camp that thinks this isn’t a mismemory, but a wilful attempt to deny the truth in order to discredit Arya’s opinion that the Hound should have been beheaded for murdering Mycah. Indeed, in this very same chapter we’ve seen that Sansa isn’t above lying to make her case more convincing: telling Jeyne that she dreamt Joffrey would be the one to take the white hart, when in truth she was only expressing a wish. If I had been Arya, I would have wanted to throw something at her too (although Arya’s immediate reaction in violence is concerning once again).

There is a lot of symbolism attached to the blood orange splattering on Sansa’s white dress. One of the things that struck me was the similarity in responses between now and later when Sansa gets her period for the first time and reacts in terrified panic, trying to burn the evidence. In this scene, she storms to her room, tears off the dress and flings it into the hearth, although there is no fire going. If we take the coming of a girl’s period to signal growing up, coming into maturity, then it suggests that Sansa’s experiences will be painful and bloody.

Her absolute misery over her father’s declaration is even more understandable given the events in this chapter. Sansa has told two lies in support of Prince Joffrey, the one to Arya more grievous than the one she tells to Jeyne, and with this kind of troubling investment in the relationship with Joffrey, it’s not surprising that she reacts with such despair to her father’s decision. What is new however, is the force of her reaction. Tears, yes, but also complete rage at Arya in the end. I suppose as well that her father’s tentative allowance of Syrio to join them probably seemed to her that he was favouring Arya’s needs, and not her own. Arya too surprised me in the chapter. I wouldn’t have thought to see her offering to console Sansa and help cheer her up with thoughts of home, but it was nice to see this aspect of her character, and her understanding of her sister’s unhappiness.

There is irony again in Sansa’s comparison of her love of Prince Joffrey to the love Naerys felt for Aemon the Dragonknight—considering this was an illicit romance—but I also found her insistence on having Joffrey’s babies to be revealing. Although earlier she bragged to her sister about how she would be Queen and Arya would have to bow to her, she mentions none of those aspirations to her father, and I think this is where we see her real innocence being highlighted through this kind of “girlish” dream of having babies and living happily ever after. I think it reinforces the idea that Sansa’s desire to be with Joffrey isn’t so much about herself, or any self-important wish to be Queen, but rather rooted in family life, simplistic notions of romance and marriage, and the idea of giving Joffrey children he can be proud of.

AGOT

Sansa IV

By Rapsie

SUMMARY

Sansa and Jeyne have been locked in a room in Maegor’s Holdfast for three days, and the Queen has finally asked to see Sansa. She is trying to put on a dress without the aid of servants and finding it difficult. At the same time, she is trying to reassure Jeyne who is crying and desperate to see her father. Sansa reflects that Jeyne is “such a child.”

She then thinks back to the first day in the room and how she had cried too and also been terrified when the killing began. She reflects that she has heard the sounds of sword on sword all her life, but that it is different when it is real because of the sounds and screams of dying men. She notes:

In songs, the knights never screamed nor begged for mercy.

Again she notes she wept and called to see her father, septa, the king and her prince, but was ignored until Jeyne Poole is thrown into the room with her and tells her they are killing everyone and that the Hound had broken in her door with a warhammer, and that there were bodies and blood on the stair of the Tower of the Hand.

Sansa dried her own tears as she struggled to comfort her friend.

She notes on the second day the iron portcullis is down and the Lannister guardsmen are on the walls, and everything was silent apart from Jeyne’s sobs. Some servants bring them food and clothes, but seem terrified too and when she tries to talk to them:

they fled from her as if she had the grey plague.

Then at sunset bells start tolling and Sansa notes that the King is dead, but doesn’t know how she knows it and wonders if that was what the fighting was about.

She wonders if Joffrey is king or if he has been killed too, and is afraid for him and her father. She dreams about being Joff’s Queen.

The next day, Sansa gets taken to see the Queen by Ser Boros. He takes her to the council chambers passing a dead body being retrieved from the dry moat on the way. Sansa averts her eyes in case it’s someone she knows.

In the council chamber are Littlefinger, Pycelle, Lord Varys and the Queen. Sansa notes that they are all wearing mourning clothes. Sansa notes that the Queen smiles the saddest and sweetest smile she has ever seen, but wishes Joffrey was there. Sansa tells the Queen that no one will tell us what has happened. the Queen queries the “us” and discovers Jeyne Poole is with Sansa. The Queen is displeased, and Sansa asks if Jeyne can see her father. Pycelle lowers his eyes and Sansa starts to get anxious and thinks no one would harm a steward as he doesn’t even wear a sword. Littlefinger offers to find a place for Jeyne. The Queen says “not in the city” and orders Boros to escort Jeyne to Littlefinger’s apartments. Sansa asks why Jeyen can’t see her father, then gets scared and says Jeyne’s a good girl and hasn’t done anything wrong. The Queen says Jeyne has upset Sansa and motions for Sansa to sit beside her. Sansa notes Varys ringing his hands and Pycelle looking at a paper, but:

she could feel Littlefinger staring. Something about the way the small man looked at her made Sansa feel as though she had no clothes on. Goosebumps pimpled her skin.

The Queen tells Sansa that she and Joff both love her and to be brave, then Varys says her father is a traitor. Sansa says he wouldn’t do that, but the Queen shows her the letter Ned sent to Stannis. Sansa begins to panic and says it’s a mistake. The Queen says she knows Sansa is innocent, but how can she let a traitor’s daughter marry her son. Sansa wails that she loves Joff, and thinks it’s not fair that he is taken away from her. The Queen says she knows Sansa loves him, otherwise why would she have come to her. Sansa then thinks about how she told the Queen about her father’s plan to send her away.

She was the good girl, the obedient girl, but she had felt as wicked as Arya that morning, sneaking away from Septa Mordane, defying her lord father. She had never done anything so wilful before, and she would never have done it then if she hadn’t loved Joffery as much as she did.

She had wanted to go to the king, but he was rough-voiced and often drunk and frightened her, so she went to the Queen instead, and then was taken to the room in Maegor’s by Arys Oakheart.

Returning from her memories to the council chamber, she pleads that they have to let her marry Joff, and that she’ll be a good wife to him and that:

I’ll be a Queen just like you, I promise.

The Queen and Varys begin to talk about Sansa’s love and say it would be a shame not to let her marry, but Pycelle says she is a traitor’s daughter and betrayal will come naturally to her. Sansa protests and Littlefinger says that she is more like Cat than Ned. The Queen says if she could believe Sansa wasn’t a traitor, then she could marry Joff, but remembers the fight between Arya and Joff.

Sansa exclaims that she is not like Arya:

She has the traitor’s blood, not me. I’m good, ask Septa Mordane, she’ll tell you, I only want to be Joffery’s loyal and loving wife.

The Queen says she believes her, and if the rest of her family do nothing treasonous then it will be fine. The Queen asks her to write letters to her family to tell then of her father’s treason and not to worry as they will tell her what to say. Sansa is still unsure and asks to see her father, but is told she has disappointed the Queen with that response. Sansa feels herself on the verge of tears and says she only meant . . .  pauses and then asks if he’s hurt and what will become of him. The Queen says the king will decide.

The king! Sansa blinked back her tears. …..Her gallant prince would never hurt her father, no matter what he might have done.

She goes on to think that her father might have to be sent back to Winterfell in exile or across the narrow sea for a few years, but will be able to come back when she’s Queen. She worries that it might not happen if her family rebel, so agrees to write the letters. She writes four letters, to Cat, Robb, the Tully’s and to Lysa.

She goes back to her room and sees that Jeyne and all her things have gone, and gratefully thinks they’ll be no more weeping, but that somehow it was colder in the room. She builds a fire and reads her favourite tales. As she is drifting off to sleep, she realises that she hasn’t asked about Arya.

ANALYSIS

Dear Lord, where to begin! Sansa, what happened to your brain?

I found Sansa’s almost incredible all-consuming passion for Joff to almost come out of nowhere in this chapter. While it is shown in the previous one that she didn’t want to leave him, she goes almost Glenn Close, Fatal Attraction in this one. I actually found it to be an almost unbelievable jump in her characterisation.

What was well-done though, and actually understandable, was her sneaking off to tell the king and then Cersei that she was being sent away. Since her first chapter, we have had evidence of her growing rebellion and disobedience, alongside her observations that Arya disobeys and there is no punishment for it, only hugs. Septa Mordane twice says that she is growing more disobedient, and when she and Jeyne sneak off to find the strawberry tart, they both feel as wicked as Arya. We have also seen Sansa question her father’s judgements, and have that questioning validated by Littlefinger and her assumption that his leg is affecting his judgement. We also have Septa Mordane, who at every available opportunity says that she must obey her father, actually offer to take her to say goodbye to Joff in the previous Eddard chapter. Then agree that Sansa shouldn’t go to say goodbye. Also while Sansa is not allowed to say goodbye, Arya however is allowed to go off and have a dancing lesson. Even Septa Mordane is unaware of the danger they are in (and I would have thought Ned would at least give her some clue that the girls were not to be let out of her sight), and to Sansa it is again another example of how her sister gets what she wants and Sansa doesn’t. After Sansa runs from the room, Ned says:

Let her go, Septa. I will try to make her understand when we are all safely back in Winterfell.

Sigh. Oh Ned, if you had just let Septa Mordane go after her. Oh, Septa Mordane, if you had just told Ned that his daughter was getting a bit more wilful these days. Also, Septa Mordane, the girl has run out of the room crying. DO NOT just sit down and finish your porridge. Worst Septa ever!

Anyway, while it was for selfish reasons, I can completely understand why Sansa went to Cersei. Arya is getting everything she wants and Sansa, the good one, is getting everything taken away from her so decides she will be wilful like Arya for a change. She is 11 years old and the danger of the situation has not even vaguely been explained to her. She is doing the equivalent of asking one parent for something, being told no, so decides to try the other one instead.

What is awful and ridiculously selfish about her behaviour, though, is almost everything that happens after that. Yes, she is terrified and doesn’t know what is going on and it is admirable that she tries to comfort Jeyne despite the fact she is scared too (foreshadowing her descent down the Eyrie with Sweetrobin). However, her all-consuming passion for Joff to the extent that she doesn’t even think about Arya, apart from basically calling her sister a traitor, is awful. Her complete ignorance about the danger she is in and that her sister is in, is hard to fathom. She seems preoccupied with being Queen and with Joff and despite the death and carnage she has heard and Jeyne has described, she is still thinking of pretty weddings and her gallant prince.

One line in the piffle about her love for Joff stood out for me though and it was:

I’ll be a queen just like you, I promise.

I wonder if this is foreshadowing. Sansa and Cersei seem to be running parallel paths and given Sansa’s treatment at the hands of Cersei, it will be interesting to see what Sansa does if she ever has power over Cersei. Indeed, Sansa could be a Queen like Cersei, scheming etc., but unlike Cersei, Sansa might be exceptionally good at it.

Anyway, while Sansa’s behaviour seems to suggest an awareness that something untoward is going on in regards to Jeyne Poole and her desperate pleas that Jeyne is a good girl, her incredible fantasy idea that Joff will send her father away and then let him back and everything will be fine, is almost verging on the rationale of someone half her age. Her behaviour is dire and forgetting to even ask about her sister seems completely out of character, so that I found this chapter both well set up and not so well set up in terms of her development.

This chapter also highlights her third interaction with Littlefinger, and again her feelings are ones of unease and of him being creepy; looking at her as if she has no clothes on, etc. Given that we now know he had asked Cersei if he could marry her then, this is incredibly creepy. What is interesting from Sansa’s POV, though, is that until she feels him looking at her like that she describes him as Lord Petyr or Lord Baelish. Only when he gives her goosebumps does she describe him as Littlefinger. it seems already at even this early stage there are the beginnings of separating him into two different personas.

Also, the fact that she wrote a letter to Lysa means that there is a nice identifiable piece of Sansa Stark’s handwriting there, should Littlefinger need it for anything.

In the last chapter, Sansa describes her wish about the White Hart and Joff and mentions dreams are prophetic. I don’t think this is a throwaway line in terms of her dream in this chapter.

That night she dreamt of Joffrey on the throne, with herself seated beside him in a gown of woven gold. She had a crown on her head, and everyone she had ever known came before her, to bend knee and say their courtesies.

Given the Maggy the Frog prophecy, my first reaction to the woven gold dress, given our previous thoughts about Ser Payne, was eeeeeeek, Sansa’s toast, and I still think it might not be a good one for her future. However, I thought it contrasted very nicely with Cersei’s dream in AFFC:

She dreamt she sat the Iron Throne, high above them all. The courtiers were brightly coloured mice below. Great lords and proud ladies knelt before her. Bold young knights laid their swords at her feet and pleaded for her favors, and the queen smiled down at them. Until the dwarf appeared as if from nowhere, pointing at her and howling with laughter. The lords and ladies began to chuckle too, hiding their smiles behind their hands. Only then did the queen realize she was naked. Horrified, she tried to cover herself with her hands. The barbs and blades of the Iron Throne bit into her flesh as she crouched to hide her shame. Blood ran red down her legs,as steel teeth gnawed at her buttocks. When she tried to stand, her foot slipped through a gap in the twisted metal. The more she struggled the more the throne engulfed her, tearing chunks of flesh from her breasts and belly, slicing at her arms and legs until they were slick and red, glistening. And all the while her brother capered below, laughing.

In Cersei’s dream, she is on the Iron Throne and it is her humiliation and a foreshadowing of her naked walk that occur. In fact, her brother’s laugh as her attempt to sit in the Iron Throne destroys her. In Sansa’s dream, however, she is seated beside the King, but people bend the knee to her. I wondered if this foreshadowed Sansa’s ability to play the game better and accepting a role of consort, but as everyone bent the knee to her, then she is really the power behind the throne.

Lastly, the fairytales. When Sansa returns to her room, she retreats in to the tales of:

Florian and Jonquil, of Lady Shella and the Rainbow Knight, of valiant Prince Aemon and his doomed love for his brother’s queen.

Now the first and the last are quite well known, but the middle one has no other reference in the series. The term Rainbow Knight seems like it could relate to possibly both Brienne and Sandor. Brienne was part of Renly’s rainbow guard, and since the Faith have rearmed some think Sandor may join the Stars who wear Rainbow Shields.

AGOT

Sansa V

By Brashcandy

SUMMARY

The fifth chapter opens and Sansa is a prisoner. Her new status is not unknown to her, even though Cersei calls her captors “honor guards for my daughter to be.” Sansa notes ruefully that there isn’t anywhere she could go, even if she wanted to, and restricts her activities to walking in the yard, picking flowers and going to the sept and the godswood to pray for her father.

It is the first day of Joffrey’s court session, and Sansa has come there to beg mercy for Ned. As she enters the chamber, she recognizes many familiar faces, but the fallen status of House Stark is clear when mostly everyone refuses to look at her and tries to avoid speaking to her:

Sansa slipped in among them, murmuring greetings as she worked her way toward the front. She recognized black-skinned Jalabhar Xho, gloomy Ser Aron Santagar, the Redwyne twins Horror and Slobber… only none of them seemed to recognize her. Or if they did, they shied away as if she had the grey plague. Sickly Lord Gyles covered his face at her approach and feigned a fit of coughing, and when funny drunken Ser Dontos started to hail her, Ser Balon Swann whispered in his ear and he turned away.

And so many others were missing. Where had the rest of them gone? Sansa wondered. Not one of them would meet her eyes. It was as if she had become a ghost, dead before her time.

Joffrey enters the court and the proceedings commence. First on the agenda is reading out a long list of names of persons that the crown expects to swear fealty to the new king. Pycelle calls many names, chief among whom are the lords Stannis and Renly Baratheon, Mace Tyrell, Walder Frey, and ladies Lysa Arryn and Catelyn Stark and their children. The failure to appear and swear their allegiance will result in the loss of lands and titles and being adjudged traitors.

After this, the court appoints Tywin Lannister as the new Hand of the King, and declares that Janos Slynt, Commander of the City Watch, will be raised to the rank of lord and granted Harrenhal as his new seat. Sansa notices that this decision causes some consternation among the other lords gathered in court.

Sansa glimpsed motion from the corner of her eye as Janos Slynt made his entrance. This time the muttering was louder and angrier. Proud lords whose houses went back thousands of years made way reluctantly for the balding, frog-faced commoner as he marched past.

But this is only the first in a series of controversial decisions that Joffrey and Cersei proceed to enact. Next, Cersei calls on Barristan Selmy, Commander of the Kingsguard, and tells him his service is at an end. Joffrey also accuses him of letting his father die.

Sansa watched as the knight peered up at his new king. She had never seen him look his years before, yet now he did. “Your Grace,” he said. “I was chosen for the White Swords in my twenty-third year. It was all I ever dreamed, from the moment I first took sword in hand. I gave up all claim to my ancestral keep. The girl I was to wed married my cousin in my place, I had no need of land or sons, my life would be lived for the realm…

These words, however, fail to move the Council or Joffrey, with LF mockingly pointing out that all of the kings Barristan served under are dead. When Cersei announces that Jaime Lannister is to be the new Lord Commander, this is what enflames Barristan. Calling him a Kingslayer, he rejects Varys’ attempts at placating him with promise of lands and money for his service. He strips off his armour, and tells them that he is a knight and will die a knight.

Littlefinger, unable to pass up the chance for mockery, ridicules him as “a naked knight.” Sansa notes:

They all laughed then. Joffrey on his throne, and the lords standing attendance, Janos Slynt and Queen Cersei and Sandor Clegane and even the other men of the Kingsguard, the five who had been his brothers until a moment ago. Surely that must have hurt the most, Sansa thought. Her heart went out to the gallant old man as he stood shamed and red-faced, too angry to speak.

The laughter dies when Barristan draws his sword, but he only throws it at Joffrey, telling him to melt it down and add it to the throne as it would do him more good than any of the others in the hall, and perhaps even Stannis might chance to sit on it when he comes to take the throne. This angers Joff, and he sends men after Barristan to arrest him.

In place of Barristan, Sandor Clegane is made the new KG member, but obstinately refuses to take any knight’s vows. After this, Sansa decides it is the opportune time for her to make her plea and approaches Joffrey on the throne. She is wearing her ivory silk dress, dyed in black to hide the stain that Arya made with the blood orange. Kneeling upon Barristan’s discarded white cloak, she asks for mercy for “my father, Lord Eddard Stark, who was Hand of the King.”

Cersei and Pycelle are dismissive, the former telling her that she is disappointed she has come to beg for a traitor, but Sansa is persistent and focused on Joffrey, whom she believes is sympathetic to her cause:

Sansa had eyes only for Joffrey. He must listen to me, he must, she thought. The King shifted on his seat. “Let her speak,” he commanded. “I want to hear what she says.”

“Thank you, Your Grace.” Sansa smiled, a shy secret smile, just for him. He was listening. She knew he would.

Admitting that she is not there to proclaim her father’s innocence, but rather to ask for mercy, Sansa tries to give some mitigating reasons for why Ned acted the way he did. She cites his hurt leg and that Pycelle was giving him milk of the poppy which may have clouded his judgement. After hearing her speak, Joffrey declares that he will be merciful, only on the condition that Eddard confesses his crime, and admits to Joff being the rightful king. The chapter ends with Sansa’s overjoyed certainty that her father will do so and be saved.

ANALYSIS

The chapter struck me as the beginning of Sansa’s real isolation at KL. She is all alone, with no one to talk to and it’s a marked difference from the earlier experiences at court when she had Jeyne and Septa Mordane for company, and people were anxious to meet and entertain her. Now that she’s a prisoner, she’s automatically become a pariah, with no one wanting to be seen associating with her. This of course is a sad comment on human nature, the tendency to kick someone when they’re down or to fail to empathise with another’s suffering. The chapter displays this unflattering quality both with reference to the treatment of Sansa, and later on with Barristan Selmy.

It does seem, however, that Sansa is able to adjust as best as she can to her new status. She’s not foolish enough to believe Cersei’s spin on the guards that follow her around, but she wisely accepts that there’s no place for her to run to. Her father is currently in captivity, and she has nowhere else to go. She has to try to negotiate and survive within her means, and this consists of praying for her father at two holy places, and making a brave appearance in court to petition the king. At this point, Sansa is still banking on Joff’s love for her, and this, coupled with her love for her father, gives her the courage to make this plea.

I really detested the treatment of Sansa by the other lords gathered in court. She isn’t responsible for her father’s behaviour, but they shun her, as Sansa thinks, as though she had the plague. It’s obviously quite a depressing realisation on her part, as she mentions feeling like a ghost with no one wanting to take notice of her. I think all of this though, is building Sansa’s character bit by bit. It takes real courage to remain in a place where everyone is refusing to speak to you and still carry out the mission you came to do. It also speaks volumes that Ser Dontos allows himself to be dissuaded from speaking to her, but this is the same Sansa who will risk a beating later on to save his life.

I enjoyed the chapter as well for the absolute folly displayed by Cersei and Joffrey in making their decisions. In thinking to shore up loyalty for Joffrey, they effectively sowed considerable seeds of discontent in the unpopular appointments of Janos Slynt and the Hound, and the dismissal of Barristan. Knowing as we do whom the latter proceeds to give his loyalty to after he leaves the KG, Joffrey and Cersei practically handed over an asset to their sworn enemy. Raising Janos Slynt to a lord was an insult to every noble there, and the Hound’s appointment was nothing more than a sham given the nature of Barristan’s dismissal and his refusal to say the vows of knighthood first.

It’s interesting that this seems to be the first time Sansa hears her sister’s name when it is called at court for those required to swear fealty. She realises that Arya must have escaped that day and thinks that she is probably safe at Winterfell by now. That’s clearly where Sansa would prefer to be as well, despite her continued love for Joffrey.

The lack of respect showed to Barristan was also surprising. You would think that Cersei would have attempted to treat him with more honour given his esteemed reputation throughout Westeros, but again, this is where we see Sansa showing a lot more empathy, and sensitivity to a person’s distress, and displaying a mature awareness concerning people’s feelings. She recognizes that the laughter is what must have pained Barristan the most, given that his entire life was dedicated to honour and courage. She does not partake in the laughter herself, but feels a lot of sympathy towards this “gallant old man” who is now being told he is no longer fit to serve. It reminded me here of her similarities to another Queen, Daenerys Targaryen, in their reverence and respect towards Barristan.

Joffrey by contrast comes off as petty and petulant, and Littlefinger as mocking and cruel. The Hound’s refusal to say the knight’s vows is also counterpointed by Barristan’s refusal to give up his knighthood. It’s an interesting dichotomy. One man associates knighthood with feigned principles and pretence, whilst the other clings to it as representative of honour and dignity. Which one is right or wrong? What lesson can Sansa take away from all this?

I think this is where it comes down to personal behaviour. Barristan associates being a knight and serving in the KG as the highest honour he can attain, but his legacy is nonetheless tainted by having served under some real tyrants and misfits, one of whom he was currently being dismissed by. Still, his very real courage and prowess in battle have made him famous. Sandor, on the other hand, thinks that knighthood is just a bogus tradition, but has not chosen to live his life with any honour or dignity up to this point. He enjoys a rather infamous reputation as a result. Ultimately, both these men will have to define their lives not by whom they serve so much, but what they do under that service, and knighthood has very little to do with it one way or another.

Sansa’s continued hope that Joffrey’s love for her will make him spare her father’s life is given some validation at the end of the chapter, even though we as readers know this isn’t the case. Joffrey is displaying the kind of lordly tolerance and fairness he wants to make people believe he possesses, and Sansa at this point is still blind to this fact about him. I do think she acts with real courage here, especially in the face of Cersei’s and Pycelle’s disapproving comments. She makes a childish, yet heartfelt case for her father’s life, and is rewarded with Joff’s promise that if Eddard confesses, he will be granted mercy.

Varys at least shows some support for her cause, but Littlefinger is notably silent, only asking if she was denying her father’s crime. It’s not surprising that Sansa later comes to think of him as not doing anything to help her out in KL. From the very beginning, LF has been concerned with not what is best for Sansa—in this instance, saving her father’s life, but how best to get her under his control.

Some final thoughts on the symbolism and foreshadowing in this chapter: when Sansa kneels on Barristan’s white cloak, I felt this was foreshadowing of her later making use of Sandor’s discarded cloak in the Battle of Blackwater bedroom scene. Both cloaks are thrown down by their wearers in disgust and anger, symbolising the corruption of the Kingsguard. This corruption and dishonour will be keenly felt by Sansa in ACOK, but it seems to me that in particular reference to Sandor and Barristan, Sansa’s “faith” in these cloaks, and her unique understanding and compassion shown towards the men who wore them, suggest that they will get another chance to do some good and find honour in their lives again, as we do end up seeing later on with Barristan/Daenerys and Sandor/Arya.

Barristan’s words to Joffrey also seemed to be slightly prophetic. In the end, all the swords around him did him no good, and he’s killed by poison. Will Stannis suffer a fatal cut attempting to sit the Iron Throne too? One can wish. With the looming threat of the grey plague in ADWD, Sansa’s comments about it here were certainly eerie, and finally the sad realisation that Sansa’s certainty about what her father would do wasn’t wrong, but it was her desperate conviction in her beloved Joffrey that lets her down cruelly.

AGOT 2

Sansa VI

By Rapsie

SUMMARY

Sansa is in the Tower Room following her father’s execution. She has spent the time crying and sleeping and not talking to anyone, and not eating. She dreams about her father’s execution and seeing Janos Slynt and Ser Ilyn Payne kill her father, and how she wanted to look away, but couldn’t. She notes that:

her prince had smiled at her, he’d smiled and she’d felt safe, but only for a heartbeat, until he dais those words, and her father’s legs.

She thinks that she may die too, and thinks that it might not be so bad to die. She goes as far as opening the window to throw herself from it, thinks that her death will shame those who have wronged her and that singers in the future will write songs of her grief. But in the end she can’t do it and returns to the bed, crying.
At one point Pycelle comes to see if she is ill, and:

made her undress, and touched her all over while a bedmaid held her down.

She dreamt of footsteps slowly ascending the tower towards her and of Ilyn Payne coming to chop her head off with Ice. In the dream, she is naked and tries to cover herself as the sword comes through the door.

Eventually, Joff comes to her with Sandor Clegane, Ser Meryn Trant and Ser Arys Oakheart. Joff demands that Sansa be in court that afternoon. Sansa pleads that she doesn’t want to go, and Joff demands that Sandor get her out of bed. Sandor scoops her out from under her covers,

Do as you’re bid child, “Clegane said. “Dress”. He pushed her toward her wardrobe, almost gently.

However, Sansa backs away from them all and says that she did all that was asked of her, that she won’t do any treason and just wants to go home, and remembering her courtesies says if it please you. Joff tells her that she is staying in KL and that she has to marry him. She wails that she doesn’t want to marry him and that he chopped her father’s head off. Joff says he was merciful; if it hadn’t been her father, he would had him torn or flayed.

Sansa looks at him:

seeing him for the first time. …She wondered how she could ever have thought him handsome. His lips were as soft and red as the worms you found after a rain, and his eyes were vain and cruel. “I hate you,” she whispered.

Joff says that a king shouldn’t hit his wife, and immediately orders Ser Meryn to do it. Sansa falls to the floor, with her head ringing and a bleeding ear. After feeling her ear and seeing the blood, Sansa then says she will do as she is asked. Joff, Meryn and Arys leave. but Sandor Clegane stays behind…

long enough to yank her roughly to her feet. “Save yourself some pain, girl, and give him what he wants.”

“What…what does he want? Please tell me.”

“He wants you to smile and smell sweet and be his lady love,” the Hound rasped. “He wants to hear you recite all your pretty little words the way the septa taught you. He wants you to love him … and fear him.

After he goes, Sansa has her maids prepare a bath and make-up to hide her bruised and swelling face because she knows Joff wants her to be beautiful. The warmth of the bath makes her think of Winterfell and that gives her strength. She doesn’t talk to the maids except to give orders, as she doesn’t trust them and knows that they work for the Lannisters. She dresses in the same dress that she wore to the Tourney in the hopes that Joff will remember what a nice evening they had together and treat her more gently because of that.

Ser Meryn arrives to take her to court. She realizes that:

He felt nothing for her at all. She was only a…a thing to him. She wanted to get angry with him, to hurt him in the same way he had hurt her and threaten him with exile… but she remembered what the Hound had told her, so all she said was, ‘I shall do whatever His Grace commands.

However, she tells him that he is no true knight, and notes that while Sandor Clegane would have laughed, Ser Meryn Trant just didn’t care.

She watches the proceedings at court alone on the balcony, trying not to cry, and watching Joff dispense justice. He seems bored by most cases and Lord Baelish, Grand Maester Pycelle and the Queen often give the rulings. However, on those he takes an interest in, his judgement is cruel and sadistic, and none of his council can convince him to change his mind. Lord Janos Slynt, however, agrees with Joff’s judgements and Sansa looks at him:

wishing she could hurt him, wishing that some hero would throw him down and cut off his head.

Then however she thinks that there are no heroes and remembers:

what Lord Petyr had said to her, here in this very hall. “Life is not a song, sweetling,” he’d told her. “You may learn that one day to your sorrow.” In life, the monsters win, she told herself, and now it was the Hound’s voice she heard, a cold rasp, metal on stone. “Save yourself some pain, girl, and give him what he wants.

After the court is dismissed, she hurries off, but finds Joff waiting for her with Ser Meryn and the Hound. Joff tells her that she looks better and she forces herself to smile and say thank you. Joff asks her to walk with him and although it makes her flesh crawl to take his arm, she does it. She calls him my lord instead of His Grace, and Joff says she is as stupid as his mother says she is. Sansa thinks:

After all that had happened, his words should have lost their power to hurt her, yet somehow they had not. The queen had always been so kind to her.

Joff goes on about how he’ll get her with child as soon as he is able, and if they are stupid then he’ll cut off her head. Sansa repeats the necessary courtesies, yet thinks:

The Hound was right, she thought, I am only a little bird, repeating the words they taught me.

Joff continues to shame her by asking if she’s flowered and being generally cruel until they reach the steps that go to the battlements, and Sansa stops realizing that he is taking her to see her father’s head on its spike. She pleads for them not to and moves away from Joff, and backs into the Hound:

Do it, girl.” Sandor Clegane told her, pushing her back toward the king. His mouth twitched on the burned side of his face and Sansa could almost hear the rest of it. He’ll have you up there no matter what, so give him what he wants.

She takes Joff’s hand and climbs the steps, but when she gets to the top, she looks past the heads and out over the city and its sights, and to the north, thinking that somewhere further north is Winterfell. Joff gets annoyed that she isn’t looking at the heads, but Sansa thinks:

He can make me look at the heads; she told herself, but he can’t make me see them.

Joff gets cross and has Sandor Clegane show her her father’s head. She looks at it calmly, but doesn’t see it and eventually asks Joff how long she has to look. Joff is disappointed that she is not upset and takes her to see the rest of the heads including Septa Mordane’s. Eventually, he says that he will give her a present on his nameday, says that her brother is a traitor and at Winterfell the Hound called him the Lord of the Wooden Sword, and looks to the Hound for a continuation of the jest:

Did I?” The Hound replied. “I don’t recall.” Joffrey gave a petulant shrug.

Joff then says he will give Sansa her brother’s head for his nameday, and then Sansa tells him that maybe her brother will give her his. Joff has Ser Meryn strike her twice for this and he bursts her lip open.

Joff tells her that she’s prettier when she smiles and laughs, so she forces herself to smile. As she does so, she realizes that they are 80 feet up and with one push she can send Joff to his death, and perhaps hers, she moves to do this, but:

Here, girl.” Sandor Clegane knelt before her, between her and Joffery. With a delicacy surprising in such a big man, he dabbed at the blood welling from her broken lip. The moment was gone. Sansa lowerd her eyes. “Thank you,” she said when he was done. She was a good girl, and always remembered her courtesies.

ANALYSIS

Sansa’s grief in the beginning of the chapter very much echoes Jeyne Poole’s in the previous one. Her distress and the nightmare of seeing her father’s execution is heartbreaking, and realizing what a sadistic shit Joff is.

However, what I have always missed until this re-read was the following by Pycelle:

made her undress, and touched her all over while a bedmaid held her down

During this awful time she is actually held down and sexually assaulted by Pycelle! Ugh.

Her contemplations of suicide are both melodramatic in terms of the song element and her broken body shaming those around her, but also show that if pressured enough she is willing to take the ultimate way out to avoid a horrific situation.

Also, we see that Sansa is not as meek and mild as everyone seems to think. She is not tractable and completely weak but she is beaten into that position, and instead of saying what she thinks, she uses her courtesy armour and internalises her thoughts. Initially, she is very resistant to Joff and says exactly what she thinks and this is met with violence.

She immediately takes on Sandor Clegane’s advice and tries to give Joff what he wants. It is notable in this chapter that Sandor has already got into her thought pattern and to a lesser extent so has Littlefinger. She thinks of the advice both gave her and even seems to sees herself as Sandor said she was, as a pretty little bird repeating everything that she has been taught.

The difference in the effect the two men have on her is that so far Sandor both gives her advice, protects her and refuses to be complicit in her bullying (in this particular chapter at least). Littlefinger, on the other hand, had given her advice, but hasn’t followed through on doing anything personal for her.

The other thing that comes through in this chapter is her incredible level of personal strength. Her ability to use her courtesies to her advantage and also look but not see are brilliant. She is learning to mask her own thoughts and feelings (a valuable skill for a player in the game). One that I am unsure that Littlefinger is aware of, because she was courteous beforehand.

She is also more observant than she is given credit for. She knows that the servants are spies and can’t be trusted. She works out Meryn Trant’s character and manages to hold back everything she really wants to say to him. However, she does get beaten up twice in the same day by him and manages to be pleasant. Personally, I couldn’t do this. Her internal tenacity is formidable. Although saying this she is still hurt that the Queen had lied to her. She thinks how the Queen has always been so kind. It’s almost as if she has rearranged in her mind the person who was responsible for the death of Lady.

Her talk with Sandor Clegane and her later thought that she can almost hear the rest of his sentence are interesting, because it shows that she is already starting to see him as a protective figure. I also think it is interesting that Sandor Clegane kneels to her for the second time. Given the importance of “kneeling” in the novels, I do wonder if this has some significance.

AGOT Round-up

Sansa’s Development

By Brashcandy

We’ve completed the AGOT chapters, and I’ll be posting Sansa I of ACOK tomorrow. In the meantime, Rapsie and I thought it would be beneficial to give a brief summary of what we’ve learnt concerning Sansa’s development and the symbols/foreshadowing related to her character arc. I’m going to go ahead and list the points on her development that we see in the first novel:

1. Sansa is introduced to us as an innocent, naïve girl, who enjoys most things to do with courtly life—knights, tourneys, dancing, etc. The description of being in love with love fits the early Sansa perfectly, as we see by her infatuation with Prince Joffrey.
2. Her idealistic world is pierced early by the terrible fight at the Trident between Joff and her sister, and by the loss of her direwolf, Lady.
3. One of Sansa’s positive character traits is her ability to empathize with others. We see this when she hears of the Hound’s story and reaches out to comfort him, forgetting her own fear in the moment. It is a trait that belies her otherwise immature perspective on the real world.
4. This immature view is highlighted when Sansa does not seem to grasp the seriousness of what has happened with the death of Jory, her father’s captain of guards, and the consequences that will develop because of this rift between the Lannisters and the Starks.
5. She is very much someone who sees the world how she wants to see it. She isn’t willing to let go of the fantasy life that she has built for her and Joffrey.
6. The danger in Sansa’s naïveté becomes manifest when she goes to Cersei and reveals that her father plans to send her away.
7. Sansa’s world begins to collapse and we see how she acts under pressure. Unlike Jeyne, who caves in when frightened, Sansa seems to draw strength from having to comfort her friend, and acts very maturely when called to face the council.
8. Sansa’s loyalty to her family comes through clearly towards the end of the book. She is very hesitant to write the letters to her family, and she later goes to plead for her father’s life. For someone that is frequently accused of being a traitor, I think these were important things to see.
9. Her faith in Joffrey and true knights is dealt a huge blow by the end of the book. She finally sees Joffrey for what he is, removing the blinders of infatuation and girlish desire. It marks a new mature Sansa—one who is fully experiencing the horrors of the real world—by seeing her father executed, and suffering beatings at the hands of the KG knight, Meryn Trant.
10. She is able to appreciate what it will take to survive these torments by following the Hound’s advice to give Joff what he wants. This amounts to being courteous and polite at all times and burying her true feelings of revulsion and anger. Before, Sansa’s use of courtesy was all about impressing others, now it’s about something more serious: survival.

All in all, AGOT represents a radically transformative experience for Sansa. She has arguably had one of the most shocking character arcs in this book, going from a sheltered girl, utterly in love with her betrothed, to experiencing violence from his command at the end. One would expect that these things would have embittered Sansa, but there’s still the sense at the end of AGOT that she’s able to recognize the monsters from the men.

AGOT round-up

Symbolism & Foreshadowing in AGOT

By Rapsie

As Brashcandy has given her excellent synopsis of ACOK Sansa I, I have also added in something vaguely in line with foreshadowing regarding her and also some of the other characters, from chapters we haven’t discussed and possible foreshadowing regarding Sansa there.
Anyway, foreshadowing points:

1. The Death of a Lady

In AGOT, it is heavily implied that the direwolves are important to the Stark children. The death of Lady therefore has several possible foreshadowing elements for Sansa. Ned notes how all the direwolves’ names fit them perfectly, and also fit the children they belong to. Lady is the smallest and most gentle of the direwolves, reflecting Sansa’s position as the gentlest of her siblings and possibly the least wolf-like. Both girl and wolf are Ladies first and foremost.

Lady’s death, however, seems to hint that Sansa could become permanently separated from the Stark side of herself, or that the Lady she was once going to be has been sacrificed. Also, unlike the other Starks, she now no longer has her “wolf” to protect her.

This connects to the throwaway line by King Robert,

Get her a dog, she’ll be happier for it.

However, no replacement pup is found and instead we see Sansa interact with Sandor Clegane, known as the Hound. Although the nature of the relationship is not hinted at, this line could certainly foreshadow Sandor Clegane taking Lady’s place as important to Sansa’s arc. She has already mistaken his hand for that of her father’s.

2. Two Sides of the Same Coin: Cersei and Sansa

Although this points to future chapters and Cersei chapters, even as early as AGOT there seems to be a parallel arc in the development of these two characters. Sansa’s first chapter is pivotal in highlighting how a twist of fate in the same place will and has effected both their lives: namely the fights at the Trident. Both have been set up to marry princes and both lose their princes at the same spot in the Trident. Rhaegar is killed by Robert and Arya injures Joff, which turns him against Sansa. The Arya/Joff fight could foreshadow Sansa growing into a similar character arc as Cersei, but succeeding where Cersei failed. Whilst talking to the Queen after Eddard has been arrested, Sansa says:

I’ll be a Queen just like you, I promise.

But does this mean she will be exactly like Cersei or that Sansa will be able to become like the Cersei she thought was real: beautiful, loved and powerful.

3. A Gown of Gold: Golden Gowns, Sansa and Cersei

Sansa dreams:

That night she dreamt of Jeffery on the throne, with herself seated beside him in a gown of woven gold. She had a crown on her head, and everyone she had ever known came before her, to bend knee and say their courtesies.

We are all aware of the Maggy the Frog prophecy and the significance of gold and death to Cersei’s children. However, it is also interesting to note that golden gowns do not seem common in the series. Indeed, the only references to women wearing completely golden gowns are the following two.

Cersei in ACOK, the morning after the BBW:

At the Council table, Queen Cersei shimmered in a cloth-of-gold gown.

Olenna Tyrell in ASOS, when she rearranges Sansa’s hairnet at Joff’s wedding:

Lady Olenna Tyrell told Sansa when she tottered up to them in a cloth-of-gold gown.

These three instances seem to encompass the idea of Joff’s death and Queens wearing gold while defeating their enemies, or being paid homage. Did Sansa’s dream foreshadow Joff’s death at the hands of Olenna, or a future date when she will herself be Queen? Or does her wearing a golden gown herald her own death?

4. A Gown of Gold: Cersei and Sansa 2

Sansa’s dream also contrasts with Cersei’s dream in AFFC:

She dreamt she sat the Iron throne, high above them all. the courtiers were brightly coloured mice below. Great lords and proud ladies knelt before her. Bold young knights laid their swords at her feet and pleaded for her favours, and the queen smiled down at them. Until the dwarf appeared as if from nowhere, pointing at her and howling with laughter. The lords and ladies began to chuckle too, hiding their smiles behind their hands. Only then did the queen realize she was naked. Horrified, she tried to cover herself with her hands. The barbs and blades of the Iron Throne bit into her flesh as she crouched to hide her shame. Blood ran red down her legs, as steel teeth gnawed at her buttocks. When she tried to stand, her foot slipped through a gap in the twisted metal. The more she struggled the more the throne engulfed her, tearing chunks of flesh from her breasts and belly, slicing at her arms and legs until they were slick and red, glistening. And all the while her brother capered below, laughing.

In Cersei’s dream, she is on the Iron Throne and it is her humiliation, and perhaps a foreshadowing of her naked walk. In fact, her brother’s laugh at her attempt to sit in the Iron throne destroys her. In Sansa’s dream, however, she is seated beside the king, but people bend knee to her. I wondered if this foreshadowed Sansa’s ability to play the game better and accepting a role of consort, but as everyone bent knee to her, then she is really the power behind the throne. Sansa doesn’t want power, but has it.

5. The Troublesome Attire of Sansa Stark

As the dream analysis above shows, dress is important in Sansa’s arc. It is the armour of a Lady as much as courtesy. In AGOT we see find out Sansa has been given a dress be Cersei and Arya ruins it by throwing a blood orange at it. It is later dyed black and she pleads for her father’s life in it. However, after the initial ruining, she strips it off and throws it in the cold fireplace (echoing her actions when she later gets her period). Indeed, as with the next dress Cersei gives her (for her wedding to Tyrion) this dress causes her nothing but despair.

Her choice of disposal is also interesting and may in fact be more relevant in ACOK, but already by throwing her dress ruined by Blood oranges in the Fire, do we see some hint as to her future being connected to a house that might have a motto concerning those two elements?

6. Life is not a song: Songs and Tales

One of Sansa’s major ties is her love of songs and tales. Could these in fact be hinting at any future path for her character arc? Those focused on in AGOT are:

Serwyn of the Mirror Shield: Which focuses on a knight of the KG who kills a dragon, rescues a princess from giants and feels guilt over the people he has killed.

Prince Aemon the Dragonknight: The KG member who may have had an illicit affair and was the true love of a queen.

Florian and Jonquil: A homely looking fool who fought as a knight trying to win his love Jonquil.

Lady Shella and the Rainbow Knight: A love story.

All Sansa’s favourite stories seem to involve either illicit love, unfulfilled love, trials to rescue maidens and members of the KG or other knights. Again, these could foreshadow a possible romance with her and someone other than a future husband she doesn’t love. Also, the Rainbow knight, could reference Brienne as she was part of Renly’s Rainbow Guard.

7. The Second Monster: Ser Ilyn Payne

Sansa gets creeped out by Ser Ilyn every time she sees him. Could this foreshadow her father’s death, or is there something more to it?

8. The first of many Cloaks for Sansa Stark

When Sansa begs for her father’s life, she kneels on the discarded cloak of Barristan Selmy. Given the significance of cloaks in Westeros, this again could represent how his cloak represented something that should protect a future Queen, or it could represent that Sansa is being protected by a true KG member. Will Barristan one day be sworn to protect her again? Either way, cloak and clothing and the men who offer her cloaks represent a symbolic role in Sansa’s arc.

9. Wargmaster Sansa: The Deanna Troi of Westeros

Sansa has lost her wolf, but GRRM has said all the Stark children are wargs to some degree. Sansa seems to have a huge amount of empathy. This lets her connect with people. At one point, she thinks she can almost hear the rest of Sandor Clegane’s thoughts, although not in a warg way, but I see what your are driving at type of way.

10. Feeling a bit Peaky?: The Grey Plague

As of ADWD, there has been a lot of speculation over the Grey Plague, a variant of Greyscale. Due to the power of Kindle, it appears that (as opposed to greyscale) the grey plague is only mentioned twice in AGOT and both times by Sansa: once when the maids flee from her and then in the court room. It is only mentioned on three other occasions: referenced by Aurane Waters (Yi TI) and Pycelle (Oldtown) in AFFC, and once by Illyrio in ADWD.

I’m not sure if this is prophetic, but with Sansa’s possible future connection to Aegon and her current connection to Tyrion (who may have greyscale) this maybe more than coincidence. Or does it hint at a future outbreak in KL, or something else.

11. Wish upon a Star: Sometimes wishes do come true

[…] wishing she could hurt him, wishing that some hero would throw him down and cut off his head.

So Sansa wants a hero to cut off Janos Slynt’s head . . . 4 books later . . . and we have Jon Snow do that exact thing. However, this highlights another interesting point. Both Sansa and Arya have certain wishes, and they are slowly but surely turning out to be true. Arya’s death list and Sansa’s wish about Janos Slynt. Certainly, this is one of the best pieces of foreshadowing that has come to pass in terms of Sansa.

12. The Savage Giant

Since we have already started our analysis of ACOK, I thought I might as well include this.

I am only a little lion, child, and I vow, I shall not savage you.

Given the prophecy about Sansa slaying a savage giant, Tyrion’s nickname from Shae and the comment about savaging, their wedding, etc., I think this is the first hint that Sansa may one day kill Tyrion. I know it is almost a given that it is LF, but there is still room for speculation.