#dunk and egg

goodqueenaly:

I’m really curious to see how much whatever “The She-Wolves of Winterfell” (which I’m just gonna call “The She-Wolves of Winterfell” for the purposes of simplicity but I know that won’t be its final title) parallels what might be coming up for our Starklings in TWOW. 

There is not much known about the plot of “The She-Wolves of Winterfell” at this point. However, there are a few key details that can be extrapolated from GRRM’s statements. This will be a story about “a group of formidable Stark wives, widows, mothers, and grandmothers that [GRRM] dubbed ‘the She-Wolves’”. These Stark women will consist of, perhaps, “five Lady Starks running Winterfell … with four of them widows of a bunch of fairly recent former Lord Starks, and the current Lady Stark, whose 30-something husband is fading fast from a wound taken from fighting the Ironborn”. These so-called ‘She-Wolves’ won’t be a united front, though, as the story will specifically show “a lot of Stark widows struggling for power, with the current lord dieing [sic] from a wound taken against some Ironborn”, along with “10 children, from various Starks members”. 

So what I’m imagining at this point is that “The She-Wolves of Winterfell” will begin with Dunk and Egg showing up at Winterfell to take service with the Starks against the ironborn. This is, after all, was Dunk and Egg’s plan at the end of “The Sworn Sword” and into “The Mystery Knight”, and while it was put on pause while they attended the Whitewalls tourney, during the course of the story Dunk still reaffirmed their intent to head north; as he explained to Kyle and the disguised Bloodraven, “Lord Beron Stark is gathering swords to drive the krakens from his shores for good”. However, given the indication from GRRM’s statements that Beron Stark will have already been wounded, possibly fatally, by the ironborn, I think Dunk and Egg are going to show up to Winterfell to find that, instead of Lord Beron marshaling an army to fight the ironborn, Beron is dying, and various Stark factions are using the lack of a strong male leader (and indeed, that leader’s possibly upcoming death) to open up questions about the succession; fighting the ironborn has been put on indefinite pause while the ladies debate who should be controlling Winterfell, and if there is any talk of the war against Dagon, it might be only in the context of what any faction’s representative should do against Dagon’s army - should he/she sit the high seat of Winterfell, of course (e.g. “if I/my son were in charge we would do x”). 

I could see Dunk and Egg being totally caught off guard at this development. They came to swear their swords (or, at least, Dunk’s sword) to Winterfell - but who would they even be swearing to, when nobody can agree who exactly represents Winterfell? Even if I’m not sure who specifically the She-Wolves will be, I can imagine the different factions trying to convince Dunk and Egg to support them, especially if Egg’s royal status is no longer a secret (as “The Mystery Knight” ended with Egg wearing his father’s ring openly instead of stuffing it in his boot); this was Prince Maekar’s son, along with a man who by Egg’s cover story was Maekar’s agent in foiling the conspiracy at Whitewalls (even if Dunk himself had to explain to Bloodraven that that was far from the “true truth”), so their arrival at Winterfell could only mean official royal support for whichever faction they endorsed. Lorra Royce might be arguing for her and Beron’s eldest son Donnor; Myriame Manderly and/or Robyn Ryswell might be fighting for regency rights as a recent widow but face bias and blame - “if you had only had a son we would never be in this position” sort of thing - with Myriame perhaps even getting pushback about her heritage - “it was a mistake for Rodwell to marry you, the Manderlys are no true northmen” (also I’m calling it right now, Robyn Ryswell is going to be like her modern-day relation Barbrey Dustin née Ryswell - a smart, ambitious, older childless widow); Alys Karstark might be hoping that her son Beron makes a recovery and so put the Stark dynasty back on course; Wylla Fenn might suggest that her bastard son Lonnel, as the son of a Stark lord with noble northern lineage on both sides, should have the right to rule; Serena Stark might argue that as the legitimate (and presumably at that point only surviving, given Elio Garcia’s comment that Robyn Ryswell was Jonnel’s second wife) child of Cregan’s heir Rickon, she and her daughters should be considered the rightful heirs to Winterfell; Cregan’s daughters (especially the youngest, Lyanna) and/or Beron’s sister Arsa might take Serena’s argument but apply it to themselves, arguing for their own right to sit Winterfell.

So I’m imagining Dunk and Egg think they have to come up with a way to reconcile all of these factions. I can’t begin to speculate on the whole plot, but I would not be surprised at all if part of their argument is that the Starks have, pun fully intended, bigger squids to fry than debating the rulership of Winterfell. While the Starks of Winterfell argue among themselves about who should be its lord, the Greyjoys under Dagon are turning the northern coasts into their playground for pillage. While the crown under Aerys I had admittedly left the Starks high and dry (again, pun intended) against Dagon by refusing to give aid, now the Starks are hurting themselves instead; this intra-Stark conflict is proving a major distraction, undermining the ability and indeed responsibility of the Starks to respond to the Greyjoy crisis. Perhaps Egg will tell the quarreling Starks that if they can settle on a single candidate, he will have his father lead royal troops to help the Starks defeat Dagon once and for all (as we know from Victarion that while Dagon “bearded the lion in his den and tied the direwolf’s tail in knots … even [he] could not defeat the dragons” - but if they refuse and continue their private war among themselves, he would have his father assert the crown’s control over Winterfell and the North directly. (Indeed, if this story takes place after “The Village Hero”, then I’m curious whether Dunk and Egg would use the recent Pennytree affair, as I think it will go down in that story, to reiterate the point - the crown can take away your lands if you won’t do your part to maintain the king’s peace, we’ve done it before and we will do it again.) Again, I’m not sure what the exact story would be - it’s not like there is a suggestion Donnor Stark did not succeed his dad, after all - but I like the idea that this will let both Dunk and Egg stretch their political muscles, solving a crisis through diplomacy rather than force.

Where I think this could be really interesting (besides on its own, obviously) is how that might loosely parallel what we could see with the Stark kids coming back to Winterfell in TWOW. I firmly believe that all the surviving Starks are going to return to Winterfell in TWOW, but perhaps more importantly (and certainly so for this discussion), there are at least a few factions now, and maybe even more in the future, which are aiming to seat certain Starks in Winterfell’s high seat - all without knowing about the other factions or their plans. As was the case in the time of Beron’s possibly fatal wound, there is a surplus of potential Stark heirs at the moment; likewise, as might have been the case in Beron’s time, there is no perfect, uniformly agreed upon candidate for Stark rule. Jon Snow, like Lonnel Snow before him (hey, their names even rhyme!), was the (at least so it’s supposed, for Jon) bastard son of a Stark lord, with some argument to rule Winterfell - from at least his nobly born mother in Lonnel’s case, from the legitimization witnessed by Maege Mormont and Galbart Glover in Jon’s. (I don’t think it’s at all coincidental that Lonnel’s mother is a Fenn - that is, a crannogwoman - given that it’s a crannogman, Howland Reed, who is probably currently sheltering Maege and Galbart and who knows the truth of Jon’s parentage.) Sansa and Arya are legitimate, but female in a world and specifically in a dynasty which has not only never had a ruling woman but has specifically skipped over female heiresses, as in the case of Serena and Sansa, daughters of Rickon. (Again, is it coincidental that these were two sisters, one of whom was even named “Sansa”?) Bran and Rickon may have no specific parallels in “The She-Wolves of Winterfell” (other than, as legitimate sons of the former Stark lord, they would be in the same position as Donnor and his brothers), but they might likewise be debated as potential heirs - Bran for being disabled in a highly ableist society, Rickon for being very young and subject to a long, potentially troublesome regency (and perhaps any bias against Myriame Manderly might echo bias against Rickon’s chief supporter, Wyman Manderly).

I don’t think the Starklings themselves will fight each other for Winterfell, to be clear; I think they’ll just be happy to see and be with each other again after long and harrowing experiences for them all. However, I could see where we might have this same sort of factional quarreling, with the Stark kids themselves perhaps stepping into Dunk’s and Egg’s roles. After all, it’s very possible that as this debate is going on, news is going to come of Euron in the south and/or the Others beyond the Wall (the latter of which both Jon and Bran have good reason to know and warn about); this parallel may be especially potent with Euron (who may in turn empower the Others by bringing down the Wall), given that Euron is the most serious ironborn threat since his own great-grandfather Dagon, and is trying to outdo Dagon in his apocalyptic ambition for world domination. So the Stark kids might tell the quarreling factions around them that their energies need to be put not into deciding which one of them gets Winterfell but in preparing to fight the greatest enemy of humanity and, in fact, all living things. 

Rohanne Webber, known as the Red Widow, was the Lady of Coldmoat and head of House Webber during the reign of King Aerys I Targaryen. She was the daughter of Lord Wyman Webber.  Later, she married Lord Gerold Lannister and became Lady of Casterly Rock.

She was short, slim, and had strawberry-blond red hair and grey-green eyes. She had a dimpled chin, a snub nose, and freckles. Rohanne usually kept her hair bound in a braid that reached down to her thighs, and she frequently played with it. Rohanne tried hard to appear ferocious to other lords and knights. She enjoyed archery.

Lady Rohanne continued to rule Coldmoat, though she had only until the new moon to marry in order to keep her seat. When her people built a dam one of Ser Eustace Osgrey’s man assaulted one of her workers. Ser Duncan the Tall came to Coldmoat on behalf of Eustace to pay the blood price, but she rejected the offer. Lady Rohanne brought her forces where she was confronted by Duncan, Eustace, and Duncan’s squire, Egg. She accepted a trial by battle, choosing Ser Lucas Inchfield as her champion to fight Eustace’s champion, Duncan. Lucas Longinch was killed in the trial, however, and the valor of Duncan reconciled Eustace and Rohanne. They married the next day, allowing Rohanne to keep Coldmoat.

When he woke after nearly being killed in the trial by combat and found Rohanne had married Eustace, Duncan felt rejected. On the day he left Coldmoat, Rohanne tried to offer Duncan a place as captain of her guards, but he refused the offer. At the conclusion of their argument, they kissed passionately, and Duncan cut off her famous braid to keep to remember her by.Rohanne later married Lord Gerold Lannister and had four sons with him. She was the grandmother of Lord Tywin Lannister.