Girls Gone Canon Cast - ASOIAF Episode 102 - ADWD The King's Prize Featuring Alicia Kingston

Episode Date: September 18, 2020

This week, the Lord Commander Alicia Kingston aka AK joins us to weather the storm with Asha Greyjoy. Through the eyes of the kraken not-queen, we observe the march toward Winterfell led by a fiery stag, kissed by autumn's snows.  Note: Mild Lovecraft Country spoilers AK's YouTube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFINw6LLA-4NiycBCAhxxvQ Alicia on JoeMagician's Channel Discussing Areo Hotah - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0-g7254qWI  ManaroGeekTV (where Alicia joins Manaro to discuss The Expanse and other ASOIAF things) - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1lo_HzhE8_5Q6gxn7h4cUA   Valkyrist's ASOIAF Readings - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCt4wLFDQux4Rg_qdhu_hl7Q  (Spoilers All) The Feast at Winterfell and the Tragedy of "The Mummer's Farce" by /u/Militant_Penguin - https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/1vyif5/spoilers_all_the_feast_at_winterfell_and_the/  --- Eliana's twitter: https://twitter.com/arhythmetric Eliana's reddit account: https://www.reddit.com/user/glass_table_girl Eliana's blog: https://themanyfacedblog.wordpress.com/ Chloe's twitter: https://twitter.com/liesandarbor Chloe's blog: www.liesandarborgold.com Intro by Anton Langhage Background Music:  The Descent by Kevin MacLeod Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4490-the-descent License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/  

Hello and welcome to Girls Gone Canon, A Song of Ice and Fire, episode 102, The King's Prize featuring Alicia Kingston. I am one of your hosts, Chloe. And I am another one of your hosts. And yes, we do have another another one of your hosts today. Our friend, Alicia. Hello, Alicia. Thank you so much for coming on with us.

Oh, greetings and salutations, my ladies. Thank you for having me on. It has been quite some time since, since we've really been able to plan this and bring it all together, but we're finally here and I'm very happy to be here. Yes, it has been some time I've been waiting and I was like really excited when you said that Asha was one of your,

one of your favorite POVs. I was like, Ooh, that one's coming up soon, but I couldn't tell you yet. Because it's a secret. It's a secret, yes. Our POV order is very secret.

We have some friends that like to guess at what it is and try to make some speculative guesses at what's next. And we just won't tell them, you know? We might tell you later. We like you. But we'll see. You see, that sounds like there's plans within plans of brewing and and i like that i like that well you all might know alicia from her youtube channel we'll get a

link in the description of course over for the lord commander ak and you might know alicia from minero geek tv's channel a bunch of different YouTube channels. My main one right now is Lovecraft Country. I used to do live reactions for Game of Thrones, and I thought about doing that for Lovecraft Country as well. But there's slow spots sometimes in those episodes. So doing it live I don't think would work that well. So I did record myself this last time doing it. I just got to figure out editing. I've just very, very recently started editing videos.

So I'm slow going at it, but I will be having a couple of reactions come up for that fairly soon. I had one tinfoil thoughts video about Cressillium and Ruby. Two, technically three characters from the show. And the next one that I'm working on is about Uncle George

and the godly lights the godlike lights that are put on his character I think there's three different gods that are referenced with him but we'll see and I'm really only doing that because in my heart of tinfoil hearts I'm really hoping he's you know spoilers if you haven't

watched the show I'm hoping he's not actually dead and he comes back so it makes me think just because of the clues I've seen it makes me think he's not actually dead and he comes back. Interesting. So it makes me think, just because of the clues I've seen, it makes me think he's going to be resurrected somehow. So that's basically it. At some point, I think Monero's... So we're going to get together at some point and do some discussions about it.

If you guys are watching the show, ladies, you're welcome to join us. We can work something out. Just let me know chloe are you watching i haven't started yet because it sounds scary it sounds like a scary show first episode i'm personally like i'm not i'm at this point where the stars haven't aligned for new things right now i'm actually if you are on the Discord with us, on the Girls Gone Canon Discord, our patrons that are in the Thunder tier and above

have been enjoying some fascinating chatter with us there, mostly about food. And yes, Mary of House Richmond, I'm coming with those cabbage rolls. I promise I'm going to email them to you. I swear. You know, if I keep saying I'm going to email her, maybe she won't be mad. I promise I'll do it, Mary.

I'm sorry. Anyways, I digress. We're doing lots of food talk and people have talked a little bit about Lovecraft Country there. I've watched the first episode and I really hope that, I mean, Uncle George has to be alive because it's Courtney B. Vance. That's what I said. It's like, how did you get Courtney Courtney B Vance and he's only there for two episodes I mean they let him marry Angela Bassett you know what I'm saying that's Mr. Angela Bassett you don't do that uh-uh you get me I'm like you can't marry Angela Bassett like that

and only be in two episodes of Lovecraft Country so I don't know I feel like he's got to have some sort of contract but I've only seen the first episode I want to read the book that's yeah I I my my next venture once the season is over so I don't like spoil myself yes is to listen to the audiobook but also shout out to Courtney B Vance because this man was there for two episodes and he made the whole damn realm care about this character yeah after just two episodes. That is not an easy thing to do. The man makes it a masterpiece. Absolutely. Indeed.

You're selling this show to me? I mean, I was planning on watching it anyway, but waiting until everything comes out so that I can just watch it all day so that I can be less afraid. What I will say is it is creepy. It is creepy. is creepy but beyond that because of honestly it's set in the 50s but everything that they're going through is so tied into

where society is in our real world right now and then you spin that with the horror genre and it makes for a very very interesting dynamic it's a bit gory in some parts especially last week's episode but it's still worth it to go through and like i said there are some very very creepy moments and some things will come up and you'll hear that music start and you'll basically just say, nope, nope, nope, don't do that. Hoping that the characters will hear you, but they never listen.

There's gonna be some of those moments, but I think all together, you will enjoy it. And also, shout out to Lady Smollett, Journey, because she is doing the damn thing. You know, Letitia fucking Lewis. She is handling that. She is basically right now to lady smallette journey she is doing the damn thing with uh you know leticia fucking lewis she is handling that she she is basically right now if you watch watchmen the performance that regina

king gave in watchmen it to me is very much mirrored with how journey is playing her character on lovecraft on country it's It's very good and watch the first episode. It will tie you in. It's somewhat of an anthology because they hit different horror markers through different episodes but the story is all tied together.

And it's tied together very well. It's from the minds of Misha Green, Jordan Peele, and J.J. Abrams. So the writing is on point. Some folks have issues with modern music being in there. I think for the vibe that they want some scenes to have, you kind of have to put modern music in because the 50s didn't always just give off that extra vibe that you need.

So I don't mind the music. I think it all still ties in. I think it's great. I love pretty much everything about the show. Wow. So yeah, go watch. This is like the most glowing,

like a recommendation that I've heard of the show so far. I mean, I've heard people say positive things, but now you're like making me want to pick it up immediately, but. Oh, I can give you specifics. If you want specifics,

we can set up a PowerPoint presentation right now. Ten reasons why you should watch Lovecraft. Start immediately. Immediately. Well, now that we have the glowing review, we have to cancel the podcast and we all need to go get on to our streaming devices and start watching Lovecraft Country. No, I'm just kidding. We still have to do the podcast later. Seriously, HBO should pay me for that advertisement.

They should. They will be backing up your dumpster of gold as soon as they back up our dumpster of gold for season eight of Game of Thrones. You know what I mean? So I'm just waiting for my money. If only it were so simple. For my favorite season of Game of Thrones.

I know I'm cracking you all up. Tsk, tsk. Oh my god, she's really going to do it every episode and I'm proud of it. I will make that joke every episode. Alicia was also on recently with Joe Magician. We talked about it during our Eryohotah episodes covering Eryohotah with Joe Magician.

Yes, that was such a fun such fun conversation really really fun conversation and like i was telling the ladies here earlier a lot more interesting than i initially thought it could be ariel's one of those uh guys where you don't expect a whole lot but then you start digging and there's these layers that come up and these mysteries and things that don't quite make sense if he's just a guard of the prince of dorne it was good that that's all i can say it was good go go watch that if you guys haven't seen it yet yes we'll link that as well yeah aria hotel is really interesting often overlooked as we were saying so ice and fire con is where we usually are seeing each other annually and that is a huge bummer we all wish we were there at the the possible ice and fire cons this year that have both been moved back but

that's usually where we get to hang out indeed and it's always a fun time always a fun time but then 2020 happened so here we are about the winds of winter the winds of covid oh man i mean now we're gonna what re-enter probably our second winds of winter literal winter yeah the pandemic's still going so yeah it is gonna be a long night well thankfully we have a lot of book to get us through there and you know if we are worrying about our winter i cannot imagine how asha grayjoy must be feeling with her winter in the north right now winter what are you talking about winter this is just autumn sweet kiss what listen we're a michigan november y'all okay i'm pretty sure that's how you feel about it i'm just global warming it's not like it's really like maybe a january a michigan january

with global warming shit all right see that's that's what i was gonna say i am in ohio now but i grew up mostly in new york okay you know what the weather is like uh in new york when it's winter it's winter yeah there's there's none of this it's 85 one day and then raining and then snowing the next day so i can i i know the cold you know when it makes your face hurt like you know that feeling i don't know that feeling oh my sweet summer child sweet summer child i am a sweet summer child alicia is dealing with ohio i grew up in michigan and my partner grew up in buffalo so oh you can do the math there we are what the winter is yeah yeah real winter real winter and my parents actually live in northern so in northern michigan on a lake area

so they they get the snow but there's not as much anymore you know it's kind of crazy this has been great i'm so excited in general to have alicia on but we have to talk about what we missed between the last episode the last chapter and now in our lightning round and our lightning round is going to be weird today everyone it's going to be a little weird it is going to be a little limited it's going to be just a few different chapters actually it's going to be three different people just kidding it's the same person it's reek the prince of winterfell and the turncloak uh but i wanted to skip all the stuff in between just because there really wasn't anything that really mattered for asha in between the last chapter wayward bride and the king's. So we're gonna get into a lightning round.

We start with Reek 3. Reek serves both his lords of Bolton loyally, but the son and the father have begun to fight about wedding arrangements among other things. Roost takes Reek on a field trip to Barrowton where he gives Theon a whole lot of exposition about why his son is crazy. The Prince of Winterfell. Reek steps in as the man of honor in Argus Stark's wedding.

Which takes place in the Godswood. With equal embarrassment before, during, and after for all. Wow, that's a real euphemism. That leads us to the turncloak. Bard and his wenches come to spring John's sister from the clutches of the evil Ramsay Bolton and befriend the serving man, Reek, in their plans. Aw.

And now we've arrived to the King's Prize. Asha finds herself riding as one of Stannis' prized captives in the march to Winterfell. But as the cold winds rise, they begin to lose men, horses, provisions, and the word sacrifice is on everyone's lips. Burn her! Even more so next chapter. Sneaking up. But starting us all off, before we get into all of that I want to take a moment

enjoy, smell the flowers while they're still here and not completely frosted and just really really appreciate George's imagery at the beginning because I think that it does a great job of opening the chapter especially in contrast to how the whole chapter closes we have these quotes

from literally the beginning. The king's host departed Deepwood Mott by the light of a golden dawn, uncoiling from behind the log palisades like a long steel serpent emerging from its nest. The southern knights rode out in plate and mail, dinted and scarred by the battles they had fought, but still bright enough to glitter when they caught the rising sun. Faded and stained, torn and mended their banners and surcoats still made a riot of colors amidst the winter wood azure and orange red and green purple and blue and gold glimmering against bare brown trunks

gray green pines and sentinels drifts of dirty snow. Something very interesting about the way that we open this is that we are looking at the Southern Knights, right? And all of these colors, like you said, azure, orange, red, green, purple, blue, gold. You know what all those colors remind me of? A rainbow. Kind of like that brother that Stan- You're gonna call him the shit name brother i was gonna say stanley yes kind of like wait that wait that's a ship um so yes and also there's something about pegging that gets brought up whenever anyone says stanley and i'm not sure how it came about it came about during

the noticast podcast live streams and uh yeah whenever anyone says Stenly, and I'm not sure how it came about. It came about during the Nauticast podcast live streams. And yeah, whenever anyone says Stenly, the immediate response is pegging. So keep up, I guess, if you want to. I digress. These colors feel similar to Renly, to Stannis's brother that he claims to so despise and all of his methods he so despises. It reminds me of Renly's rainbow guard. We have a line from A Clash of Kings. Stannis turned back to his wife. My brother is young and strong and he has a vast host around him and these rainbow knights of his. He hates his brother for treason, but yet his very own Kingsguard, though he doesn't call them that, they have definitely appointed themselves as such, is a rainbow guard. We have the blue and orange of the Florence, the gray and

white of Horp, Godry Farring's purple, Massey's green, blue, and red and white, Suggs in his pink and red, Buckler is blue, Patrick, of course, has the blue and silver Dallas Cowboys logo, has the blue and silver Dallas Cowboys logo. Grandison is yellow. Follard is white and red. We have a rainbow. Stannis is just like all the other lords in the end of the day. I was just thinking about Renly's peach.

Just because as soon as you said rainbow guard, it's like, yeah, Stannis really is still going to be thinking about that damn peach. I think he is. Now he has a rainbow rainbow guard i do think it haunts him like you know later on in the chapter we're gonna see him thinking intently about things and i think that's a great point like he could still be thinking about redley's peach at that point and how could he not right a lot of these people were redley's men yeah it's like no he's he's you know confronted with and i think i said it in our notes um later on down but it's prevalent here too he's still that middle child yeah he still has that middle child syndrome you know he wasn't just in robert's shadow he was arguably to me. In Renly's shadow as well. They both were much more well-liked than him. But Renly said it best.

You didn't want any friends, brother. So you reap what you sow. This is how you set it up. So now you have to go to other people's men to build your own army. Because you were never good at really building your own. own army because you were never good at really building your own and speaking of reaping what we sow we see all this through a pov that does not sow right does not reap and does not sow from asha and she is of course a prisoner in this column the main column is following with mules and oxen and carts and fodder and the the rear guard protects it all. They're traveling 300

miles from Winterfell to Deepwood Mott, so that's what, like, you can go, what, 70, 80 miles in an hour? It's like a six-hour drive, maybe two gas breaks at most if you gotta pee. So for Winterfell, it's gonna be 15 days. That's what they decide. From Deepwood to Winterfell, it should be 15 days. And they're covered in shackles. They're being watched over by the snoring Alisane Mormont. Asha was meant to be a prize. She is to be displayed in chains to the northern lords to prove Stannis' power. But, of course, she's hearing the knights gossip in the back.

She hears Lord fell say robert would have made this march in 10 days which eliana if you remember this is one of those lords that bent the knee to robert during the rebellion that i always talk about yeah oh but yeah that rebellion yep that one that you never and then friends. I've heard about it. This history. Allegedly. Allegedly. Justin Massey says that, well, make sure you don't mention that to Stannis.

And Asha, as you were saying, Alicia, notices that Stannis is still very much living in his brother's shadow. But I think, as you said, it's a great point that it's both his brother's shadows and it's it's also interesting as an observation coming from asha because you know she was always her father's favorite because i guess her brother's side so maybe not always but she was her father's favorite afterwards and the only child left and therefore didn't have to live in anyone's shadow unlike theon when he shows up later on and i do want to kind of push back though on lord fell's assessment of robert at the time of saying this in the present day of dance because i feel like robert maybe okay maybe he could have done it in 10 days uh because he just loved fighting so much and he's all like ned but if we just like left and just fought all the time or he could have done it back in the day during this alleged rebellion but based on what we see of how robert is during the present story and like how long the train going to winterfell at

the beginning of the books took i i just don't know that he could have made it in in 10 days like lord fell things like i think that he would have moved at the same pace that Renly's camp, you know, speaking of the other brother, like, was moving down in the south, right? Like, they were taking their sweet time. And many of those are, again, the same soldiers who are here now. Robert was also an attention whore, just like Renly so all that stopping to have a party or have a mini tourney on the way to play at war you know to to curry friendships or favors or whatever Robert would have been doing the exact same thing as Renly and he might have been keeping a bit of time yes but there still would have been delays and then you have to also take into

account the weather which which i think we'll get into a little bit uh later on down yeah and it's very obvious that lord fell is one of those guys who and first of all he's not the guy robert brought up right like his grandfather is so he's living in this myth of my grandfather always said that king robert brought him up from his knees and you know that kind of thing and it's the good times it's this guy that's just like oh back in the good old days when king robert was ruling but in reality in in retrospect looking back they finally got rid of the monster king aries right you get king aries the second finally off the throne you get the monster, King Ares, right? You get King Ares II finally off the throne. You get the monster out, and they bring in someone

who is absolutely mediocre, who's going to induce no change, is going to fall on Acedia and change nothing about Westeros, you know, and then they what? You praise them for doing it? This guy is falling back on the good times of nothing but mediocrity, something that I'm sure us in America understand way too

well. No, no, he did make some some changes i mean one one really big change is the coffers of the realm are not full anymore and there's probably a few a few different types of wine that were probably made and named in his honor that we may not have heard of my god oh good some coping mechanism some capitalist coping mechanisms. More small folk were added to because Robert graced the women with his seed. He did a few things.

Wait, didn't those kids get murdered? Fuck them kids. Oh, well I tried. I tried. I think we got a little meta a few a few of them survived there's some sprinkled in there still somewhere who's to say truly who's to say anyways let's pull out of the meta for a second none of that was in relation to real life or

anything uh no not at all so asha broke her ankle during all of this. Like, nothing worse could have happened. A broken ankle does not sound like what I would want during this. The fetters that she has on her wrists are chafing her, and we get this little passage. No man has ever died from bending his knee, her father had once told her. He who kneels may rise again, blade in hand.

He who will not kneel stays dead, stiff legs and all. Balin Greyjoy had proved the truth of his own words when his first rebellion failed. The kraken bent the knee to Stag and Direwolf, only to rise again when Robert Baratheon and Eddard Stark were dead. only to rise again when Robert Baratheon and Eddard Stark were dead. Asha, of course, in turn had bent the knee to Stannis, asking for the lives of her nine ragged men, left, that's what Krom, one of those ragged men, called them, and she thinks even though Stannis gave her their lives, she sensed no mercy in him.

Yeah, first of all, fuck Balon. His philosophies were always dumb and ridiculous. I guess he was slightly right, you know, when you bend the knee, you can come back up again with blade in hand and whatnot.

But sir, you did come back up with blade in hand and look at your people now. Where are you at? You're dead. Where's your son at? He might as well be dead. Where's your daughter?

She's in prison. His ideologies sound great when he says them, but it doesn't feel like he stuck to one. He stuck to it when he suited them. And it's kind of like how we see Littlefinger is opportunistic. Balin was also opportunistic. He just wasn't fast enough and her culture has never been fast enough politically you know what I mean like they just

haven't caught on to it because they don't want to trade their pride for that and he was so close to getting it and then so far it's like commit you could have gotten there Balin yeah they're too stuck in that the old way you have to pay the iron price. Dude,

try to find some place to plant some crops. Sell something. Get some type of trade. Actual trade going on. You guys are- Ironborn are always mad that people don't accept them or don't like them. Well, look at the shit you do.

No one's gonna want to deal with that forever. Nash is starting to realize like, realize that. But something that you said I thought was interesting in terms of, like, Bela, and it sounds good when he says it, but then you're like, all of this is, like, ridiculous bullshit. It's kind of like, in some ways, he's kind of like the opposite of Stannis, right? Like, he, Stannis is terrible at delivery. Stannis is very uncharismatic and has no idea how to inspire people, really. is terrible at delivery. Stannis is very uncharismatic and has no idea how to inspire people, really. But

there's depth there behind his ideas and his policies, especially later on in the books. It always seems to fit that it's more, you know, do what I say, not what I do. Like, just pay attention to the words coming out of my mouth. Don't worry about what I'm doing over here. You go where I told you

to go. Yeah. I also had an image of a an actual like kraken like an actual little squid holding a sword and that was important for me to relay is it wrong that all I

pictured there was Squidward holding a sword? oh my god we need to make that! oh my god Squidward has equipped the sword of podcasting, plus 10 defense. Oh my god. I've been thinking about Squidward a lot lately. I'm worried. You know what, I don't even want to know why.

Let's just smooth, why don't we pass that? Sorry, sorry. Alicia is skeptical of why I think about any sort of fictional character now. That's a story for a different time, everyone. For now, the story here is A Song of Ice and Fire. It's, we see that Stannis

has, as you all know, as Asha... No, no, no, no, no, no. You don't get to skirt over the fact that you just said, for now. Oh, man. What do you mean? You want me to say, to relay it now? No, I just wanted to let the realm know. Oh, absolutely.

In case they missed it. You know, we're gonna, this is me bending the knee right now, you know, and I'm kneeling so that I can come back again with a blade in hand in this podcast. Just like Squidward, maybe. Now that imagery's in my head.

Moving along. Stannis. Stannis. Coming back to a different animal. A deer. A stag. As opposed to a squid. We see that he's kind of learned the value of sparing people's lives and

talking about another squid again, Asha, I love this moment with her because she's talking about the moment of her pleading for her men's life and that she kind of she's offering everything she can. She's like, do what you will with me. She's not even just offering her life.

She's laying it all on the line in that moment to barter for her crew to stay alive for those people who follow her and it's one of those ways that i feel like we see asha show really great leadership we saw a lot of that thought process in the previous chapter where she keeps thinking about history and going over her options and these internal debates. Because the thing that's most important to her is how is she going to get her men out of this? Because she exhibits a really, really deep responsibility for what happens to them. And I think that we see that in another character as well. And it kind of reminds me of Ned Stark, right? And him thinking and feeling great grief when he sees that the men who have followed him

have been hurt or killed and just feeling responsible for them they all think about Jory? justice for Jory justice for Jory girls want to get real wet about Jamie Lannister until you say Jory

you know what I mean? they want to be real about Jamie and hisannister until you say Jory. You know what I mean? Like, oh, they want to be real about Jamie and his blonde locks until you remind them about Jory dead in the streets of Miami. Okay, anyways. Miami? Listen, King's Landing, Miami, they're both shitholes, all right?

There's a lot of Stark and Asha in this chapter. Surprisingly so. It's not the north it is though right like the ironborn have as we're probably gonna entail this episode they have a certain belonging with the north they have been a part of the north before they have since not just uh been separate from them but also like developed their own culture off of what the North kind of had going. I think Asha is well, we didn't get to know the other sons that

Baelon had, but they clearly weren't that great fighters because they both died in a rebellion. But you know, Asha compared to Theon seems to have a better sense of, one, how to properly read the room and read people

and assess them for how she needs to act in relation to them to to try to get what what she wants or and at the very least she's respectful when it when it comes to her people she's trying to get these guys free yeah she knows the iron islands aren't you know that great but that's her home and she loves it and she wants to make sure that her people are safe and she takes that responsibility onto her and honestly i question where she learned it from because balon to me just never seemed to have that true sense of ownership and love and care for his people. He seemed like a very self-centered guy to me. It just seems to me that Asha has a greater understanding of what is wrong with the interactions between ironborn and mainland and she knows

that she needs to act and speak accordingly to try to change that stigma she just isn't in a very good position to do it right now especially not now right after the queen's move gone wrong and i would add that like balin we can shit on him all day long because he was shitty in most ways however doran has kind of the same relationship with arianne right like he still technically prepared her to be air ish even though she kind of lived with that subconscious thought of like i'm not the air and asha grew up with that same thought as we've discussed that like i am the heiress i am going to take the iron islands and i am going to do better and it's all that punching up right that anger and like i can relate that maybe your parents aren't always the best sometimes your

parents don't try sometimes parents try uh all parents come in different shapes sizes attitudes efforts uh dignity etc like i mean like none of them are the same as we know and balin yes was semi-shitty but he raised her in a way to think that she would be the next person in line for these islands her mother raised her to be bold as she remembers my mom is the same kind of way know, I don't always agree with my parents ever, but my parents raised me in a way that I kind of know some moral quandaries. Yes or no, right or left. And I think Asha has that. And it's something about that next generation magic, right?

Like Ned had his shortcomings and Jon and Sansa and Arya and Bran all have those lessons, but they're going to do better. And I think there's something so Northern and so stark about the way that Asha has taken this lesson and taken what Balin has taught her and somehow transmuted it into, listen, if we do our reaving and raiding and we take these Northern lands, we can hold them hostage and make them give us more land. Like we can do this thing and nobody wanted to back her, but she had these big ideas and these innovative new ways, right? The new ways. And I

think that's a lot of what it's about. It's about kind of transmuting these lessons Balin gave her, whether they were great lessons or whether they were just like mediocre. I think he did at least give her something to ponder, know yeah and you know regarding that question of where did ash learn this yeah i think very much from balan and i think at the very least she really internalized at least a love of for her people from balan right like clearly he had a vision of what he wanted for the iron islands uh he wanted them to be i think a better a better one of the kingdoms than it was it's just that as uh chloe was saying asha had a different vision for what that looks like and that happens regardless of whether it's good parenting or bad parenting or mediocre

parenting as you were saying like rob was groomed to rule right he was first in line he was there all the time just as asha was likely groomed and and Rob had his own ideas of what it takes to rule what it would take to uh to secure northern victory and Asha as we see uh she was interested in research right she spent a lot of time with uh Roger Carlaw it seems her favorite uncle who was a big reader probably did a lot of studying and maybe came to her own conclusions of seeing like hey this works for other kingdoms maybe this is something that we can implement and and bring to the iron islands and this is something that's going to be great for our people and and make it like our our culture really sustainable and i mean it's entirely possible

she could have gotten that from some of her mother too too. We don't know. We don't get that much about her other than that she was bold. But, you know, she has one studious brother and another sister who's insistent upon her own rights. So there's quite a few people in Asha's life that she could have gotten a lot of these different lessons from and gleaned it. And especially, you know, Balon's not a great leader and especially not a great father to one of his kids. But he was a really, really excellent father to one of his kids but he was a really really excellent father to one kid just one of them well cause the rest died or got taken away

and I was gonna say he kinda had to be cause he only had that one so he had to make do I mean other parents were not great parents to their single child you know the moment Bruce Bolton got only one kid, he was like, I hate this kid.

And he's talking shit about him to everyone. I mean, we hate him too. Freaking Roos, man. And honestly, I almost want to blame Roos for Domric, but he did tell Domric to stay the hell away from Ramsay, and Domric

didn't want to listen. That's true. Alicia, you're pronouncing it incorrectly. It's Dom-eric, I think is the correct way that you're looking to say it. It's Dom-eric. D-U-M-B. Yup. Bless his pretty little head. Stupid pretty little head.

The dumbest little pretty head. Idiot. Stupid pretty little head, but from everything, the little that we know of him, and I mean, I guess you can't always trust a word of, what's her name? Lady Dustin. Barbary Dustin. Barbary Dustin, yeah.

But she speaks highly of him, and there isn't a whole lot of ill ever said about domrick so i it's i'm inclined to believe that he could possibly have been a better person you know one of those forward thinking offspring that we have here like asha and rob trying to you know bring in a new better way of things so to speak but yeah it's really neither here nor there just a random thought on domeric domeric what if we didn't skin people interesting progressive i wonder what would they would they actually like us if we didn't respect us like they respect the starks if we didn't fly people maybe asha has heard about stannis's courage and determination, and of course Stannis' just nature, but she still doesn't like him. Same.

Same. Or the fact he's dangling her in front of the northerners to prove himself, which, knowing the northern culture, she doesn't really think this will awe them. The joke is, of course, that Euron doesn't care if Asha lives or dies. Her husband could care-ish because, you know, he wants a free place to live and she has nowhere to go. But Stannis wouldn't understand that nor would he have listened.

She thinks that her very womanhood seemed to offend him. Yeah, see, and that's the thing. That's what I was saying about Asha. She is a lot more skilled in reading people and their situations than Stannis is. Stannis is the one true king, yeah, I get it. However, Stannis does still have his flaws, and I think it would be ignorant to overlook those like some Stannis fans do.

Yep. Asha can already tell that her being a prisoner right now is not working you know stannis is talking about dangling her in front of the northmen in change there's northmen riding with you right now they're not impressed my guy how do you think getting to winterfell and saying, look at this is going to make it any better? It's not. Yeah. That's what I'm wondering is like,

does it get better? Is that what they think? These people that think that things are going to go positively for Stannis, like this is autumn's kiss, right? Exactly. Like you,

you're not even prepared to deal with what the real weather is coming up with and like my thought on that whole thing was he's not technically frustrated with asha but he does maybe deep down recognize that the how he wants to use her is not working for the northerners and he's mad because he can't use her for anything else he's all about everyone has use and everyone has their place in the world that i want to build what am i going to do with this this chick that should have a dress on and not armor and not be dual wielding axes in battle how am i going to use her you know it and it goes beyond that because then that's a failure on him because here again is an obstacle that's been presented to him and he's not quite sure how to get past it and he might actually be a little bit um sexist in his thoughts but i feel like where where this is concerned it's

messing with him on even more of a deeper level than he's really used to and he doesn't know how to handle that we know when stannis gets stressed and gets in his head he just basically stands there and stares into the flames he doesn't know to do, but he still has to give off this sense of confidence that he's the Lord. He's the one true King and he's here. So don't worry that I'm not doing anything and I don't have any real plans and shit keeps going wrong. No matter what I try to do, just respect me because I'm the one true King.

If you got gotta keep saying you king my guy you you really ain't the king these are all true stannis thoughts absolutely i don't have any complaints about the things that ak is saying same loaded the trigger cocked it i'm just saying no it's all very true like as you said he's like well shit i have this thing and i should know how to use it and i he's like turns out stannis i mean he struggles with this right he struggles with the politicking knowing how to use the pieces how to how to wield power in such a way that he can uh secure his hold on it and you know as you said he he's trying to give off confidence but i mean maybe he's giving that outward look right as you said, he's trying to give off confidence, but I mean, maybe he's giving that outward look, right?

As you said, and putting on that stoic face, but everything else that's going around right now, it does not inspire confidence. Nobody feels confident. He quite literally keeps going up in flames. Yes, flames. And not in the flames that he wants. No, not at all. Not a single song. Later on.

The tent. Yeah. It's interesting because Asha is the one remarking that he quite obviously has a disdain for women. Like around Alysanne, around Lady Glover. They bother him. It's very obvious. And there's only one woman who speaks his language. The soldiers are all saying, right?

They're all whispering like, Melisandre's back at the wall that's his woman uh and it's funny because she's wrong too you know i mean when you when you when you puff a guy up especially a guy in the mindset that stannis is in you know yeah no that's true that's what's gonna happen that's what's gonna happen again classic middle child syndrome he always feels slighted he always feels in the shadows and now here comes this chick from across the narrow sea saying you have this great destiny you're a zora high reborn he's going to start listening to her because she is speaking all of the language that he has been wanting to hear his entire life.

He matters. She's wrong, and neither of them know that just yet. But for right now, this is what it is. And that's what Ash is calling him on right here, right? She is straight up being like, oh, this is how I play all my men too. And it makes me like, she's like a proficient Cersei. We talked about how in Deepwood Mott last chapter in The Wayward Bride, she is kind of at her own Blackwater, right?

Like she can either die within those walls or be taking a prisoner outside by Stannis. And that's kind of how she views things. It's kind of a cynical view. But when you look at Cersei's view, sometimes it's so cynical to a fault where she doesn't actually factor in realism, where Asha is factoring in realism. And it's just so obvious that she's like, oh, this is this whole guy's number because she's so removed from the situation she's such an outside look and when you spoke about how you know she she seems to have uh Eliotta spoke about Ash's leadership qualities earlier and this all reminds me to a couple chapters from A Clash of Kings a little book I

like to read once in a while and The Sack of Winterfell in A Clash of Kings so if we compare this to Bran's chapter or to Theon's the Ironborn take Winterfell and the Iron of Winterfell in A Clash of Kings. So if we compare this to Bran's chapter or to Theon's, the Ironborn take Winterfell and the Ironborn are actually victorious there. We have these lines from Bran and Theon. A good lord protects his people, he reminded himself. I've yielded Winterfell to Theon. Louder, Bran, call me prince.

Interestingly enough, Stannis kind of reads as another second son, as we've been saying in that chapter, with a few issues to get through. Theon and Stannis read really similarly throughout all of this. I will be as good a lord to you as Eddard Stark ever was. Theon raised his voice to be heard above the smack of wood on flesh. Betray me, though, and you'll wish you hadn't, and don't think the men you see here are the whole of my power. He then says, if Robb Stark can stave off the Lannisters, he may reign as king of the Trident hereafter, but House Greyjoy

holds the north now. Replace that with Baratheon, and it sounds a bit like Stannis. I think it holds true as a good parallel. Theon is just in this chapter. He punishes men for raping in the sack. He even ends up burning a child at the end of this plot to try to, you know, get him out of the hell he's in. Honestly, Theon's arc as a microcosm is probably what Stannis is going to experience, although a little darker, a little more prophetic, probably ending in death as well. We even have this line, There'll be no flaying in the north so long as I rule in Winterfell, Theon said loudly.

I am your only protection against the likes of him, he wanted to scream. He could not be that blatant, but perhaps some were clever enough to take the lesson. That reads a little Stannis-y to me. And of course, Asha is reading a bit like Bran here. Quite obviously, Asha has a different ruling style in mind compared to Stannis, and she sees that his rule is not the way to the North's heart. That's not how to win. Exactly. That is it exactly in a nutshell. I put in here, you know, I again found it interesting that Asha was able to read Northman. So, so well,

much better than Stannis. And I think that proves like what you were saying earlier, that the ironborn and the North do have those connections in their ways of life. You know, and one of the things Stannis finds frustrating is that he has to take Winterfell. He doesn't necessarily want to go and save anyone,

but he knows he needs the North and the North is not going to bend to him or give him any type of assistance unless you go and do this thing for them and you secure their lands first. And Stannis does not like being in anyone's pocket. He seriously feels like he's been that for many many moons and he is again the one true king it's his by rights you should be doing what i say just because i told you i shouldn't have to go and do anything to curry favor with you but he does and he knows he has to, and he's not gonna

voice it, but I think we can see it in his actions, is he is very upset that he has to do this. And it sucks, but it is what it is. I mean, yeah, yeah, it's an upsetting situation, you know, being caught in these autumn kisses that for

many feel like, as I say, winter fucking them hard and it hasn't yet right and not even a little bit I mean like he tried to see if he could get a slight shortcut right he's like if I bring Jon Snow everyone's gonna just be like yeah totally let's do it let's do it

and then Jon's like I can't do that for you I can't give you this shortcut because I have to be here this is my place so Stannis is like fine fine, we'll do the long way. You know what? See, and this was another thing with Stannis that, again, it's do what I say, not what I do. Stannis is all about the rules. This is a man of the Night's Watch that's taken his vows.

Yeah. You're literally talking to the lord commander and you want him to just walk away from that so easily to help you bruh yeah yes really yes come on now son come on i mean in those john chapters alone like i before our john chapters aka i was on the fence like not like on the fence about stannis I knew he was gonna like be a dick eventually burn his kid give up everything because he sucks you know what I mean like I knew he was gonna break that's the tragedy of Stannis Baratheon like Stannis the manus he can be the manus and be as just as he wants but like he has to have that downfall that tragedy there's no way he lives or

survives because what's the point of the story right and in a way he has a lot of foreshadowing for kind of some daenerys stuff in the story as we've kind of discussed but i don't know something about seeing him through john's eyes made me go oh you're just about power dude all you care about is power buddy all you want is control complete control and it's something that i say as like this is probably total like super green hippie bullshit but like what gives one person the right what makes one person so much more special so much different like so much better than another person that they can control a human's life what gives you that power like what god gives you that power what right what by

what right do you get to have control over someone's life and what makes you more important than another person you know what what right i think that's something that stannis is wrestling with within this chapter right it's something that davos had made him pause upon and actually rethink it it's taking him a little time to internalize that because as we see, he's still like, but what if we didn't follow the rules for me when he's at the wall? He's doing that here, right? He's asking that question to an extent and saying,

no, we don't have that right at this moment. And trying to get his men to also realize that. They don't all get it, right? Because a lot of his soldiers what specifically justin massey you know they really believe well justin massey not as much but a lot of the other soldiers they really believe in in that red god right they're all like i wish melisandre was here

because they're they say the last time we did this without her it uh went poorly which actually now that you think about it really kind of went against Stannis' plans, because he's all like, no, we're going to secure victory, and it's going to look amazing for me, because if we win, then it's going to look like Melisandre did it. So, anyway. And that's the thing, that he's already battling. You know, these men are

supposed to be here for him, but they're all around the fires saying Melisandre should be here power is what they know so what what he tried to do was leave her at the wall so people would look to him but he only served to strengthen her position because that backfired on him people have just lost more faith in him and placed more faith in her and they think that it had she been there right maybe they would have won and Ash is like well

I don't know who this mystery woman is was she at Deepwood because you did pretty well there and Justin's like but that wasn't a real battle right like there were just a few of you and a bazillion of us even though you all fought very bravely and we actually knew the woods and you didn't and Winterfell

will be a battle right with many many more men who know this land better than we do. And they're like Roose Bolton, right? They have enough to rival us. If not more. I mean, they have more men. Let's be real.

They have more men. We know that. Let's not lie. And we find that out in a later chapter, in Theon's Winds chapter. And I understand that Justin know justin massey is very much a tool but i and he but i do like him and like he's nice to asha only for her claim sure but at the least like he's showing here what he's telling asha i think is a shrewd understanding

of the politics of what's going on it's a lot of what we've been saying just now about melisandre and how the trappings of power works and you know coming back to some of those other ideas of like you know kneeling first so you can come back with a sword later he's thinking about the Blackwater and we learn again in that Theon sample chapter from Wins that Justin Massey was one of the people along with Richard Horpe to be like Stannis we've got a retreat all right the day is lost and And you can see that Massey doesn't want to redo that day, but now they're in too deep. We're going to see them in this chapter get to a point

where they can't retreat. They have to go forward. And that's what Stannis wanted to do at the Blackwater. And I'm just like, why? What was his plan? Was he just going to stay and die? Everyone knew that the day is lost. And it's not just like Balon's lesson to kneel and fight another day. It's like, maybe you've got to retreat sometimes so you can go another day.

Even though, you know, I do think that Justin's a little wrong because we have to free Ned's girl, even though it's not Ned's girl there, but we have to free her. The symbol's important. That's the thing with those Southern Lords, you know,

they don't understand how the North operates with their people. Yeah. As disjointed as some things are now the north nine times out of ten stands firmly together the hill tribes or you know the mountain tribes of the north they don't always you know come down to winterfell that much but when they do they always still recognize the Ned you know that that's their lord and he's treated them justly as far as we know none of them have any

real bad things to say about him that I've seen so obviously he's doing his job and they respect and care enough to know that okay his kid is in there with these horrible ass people nobody in the north really likes the boltons so we gotta go get her you want us to follow your southern ass back across the neck and win some war for you that we don't even care about you're going to do this for us

first yeah because stannis has to you know he's fucked if he doesn't yeah damned if you do damned if you don't at this point yep and he sees that position that he's in and he really doesn't like it that's what's really messing with it and asha is listening to everything going on right like she's a prisoner she has nothing to lose and she thinks from what she's heard ruse might have more men than stannis and massie had opposed the march on winterfell, as we know, as many of the other Southern Lords had. And the Northmen were like, no, we have to get Ned's girl home and Ned home. And those Northmen were Morgan Little, Brandon Norrie, Big Bucket Wool, the Flints and the She-Bear. Those are also named as the Northerners.

And we get a look at some of the southern men as well get your booing ready eliana corliss penny sir godrey the giant slayer thanks can i get another boo come on now oh sorry yeah boo sir godrey farting he's trying to convince us his last name is farting it's not off with his head he's the worst he he actually really is he's one of like actually the worst the only one with any redemption is justin massey and he's like to uh to coin a phrase that we're talking about heavily over on discord this week a fuck boy but like he's like a non-consequential fuck boy you you know what I mean? He's like, fuck around and have fun with him, but you know it's not going to last anyways because it's war. But he's better than the rest of them.

But Ser Godry, he sucks. He sucks bad. Just sucks. I mean, we shot on him a lot during the Jon episodes, and it turns out he's never learned his lesson. He still sucks. And he only gets worse throughout the chapter. However annoying and horrible he seemed at the wall, he's still that and maybe gets worse. Unsure. I'll have to think about where he's worse at.

The men continue discussing the march and the troubles ahead. They decide that the Boltons are unlikely to meet them in the field, and their provisions are not going to allow for mounting siege weapons. Yeah, I mean, lots of snow is going to do that. Harwood Fell is optimistic that Arnulf Karstark and Mors Umber will join their strength to Stannis' lol, and they can use the

force to raise towers and rams. Interesting. Everyone's very optimistic, but Asha thinks they'll die by the thousands while they do so. Try and raise these towers and rams. Lord Peasbury, though, says, why don't we just stay at Deepwood and stay out the rest of the winter? And Bucket Wall laughs

at this idiocy. He's like, Copper Glover doesn't have any food. Don't be silly. Do you see how many of you are here? Who the hell is gonna feed everybody? I agree. He's like, do you know how long winter last everybody we are in the north do you think they just grow money on fucking weirwood trees what is that you go go sit and stare into your damn fires little boy go sit down stop playing at war right like go outside see what you can find to pay the electric bill

and then we'll talk fucking lord peasberry seriously we know it's like winter lasts like a month right and and that's the thing is it doesn't right like these seasons are different their winters are quite obviously longer and not like four months not like oh here's five months of a season they have like two years of summer and then all of a sudden it's winter and their life sucks and we noted it last chapter but galbert glover has nothing in his fields because when the ironborn took his castle they literally trampled those fields they also consumed whatever was in his cellars asha was notably in the wayward bride sneaking to the kitchen to eat from a huge wheel of cheese right like that

is like she was out there making her own charcuterie platter and asha comments about the trampling on the field we like real life wheat takes seven to eight months for a harvest cycle it's planted mid-fall latest it grows out until spring summer there's no chance for a harvest like it's over winter is here it's on the door like they can joke and say it's autumn's kiss but there's no time to prepare anymore this is it no yeah i think um they're gonna have a horrible time yeah once will to really honestly they're having a horrible time right now they are and i and i i. And I want to say that in the back of Asha's head, she probably regrets that. Yeah.

Because now look, even if they would have been able to hold and they did defeat Stannis, still, what are you going to eat? And yeah, and she shows sympathy towards the Glovers. Yeah. And that's the thing is Asha was so caught up in how to stay alive, she didn't think about the Glovers, right? Like, that seemed to come as an afterthought, as we notice in this chapter. And putting it into these terms, this is how we see Littlefinger so easily dupe the Vale, right? Because the South buys. That's how they replenish their stocks. They buy. They don't have to grow. The Reach has a lot of different variations of growing and agriculture,

but the South doesn't have to think in terms of natural resources. When Asha and Tristifer talk about Sea Dragon Point, they talk about the natural resources there, and she names them off. The South can buy their way out of problems. Look at how the Throne took the Lannisters. Now, the North is the literal rendition of if you teach a man to ice fish, he'll have fish for the rest of his life. The rest of his life, yeah.

Well, maybe for like a few days, as we're going to find next chapter. Maybe like ten days. Well, yeah, yeah, it definitely depends on how many men you're teaching at one time at the same fishing hole. Yeah, that's unfortunately not going to last them for their lifetime. Not all men are made with the same amount of brain cells, okay? Absolutely true. And the Southern Lords do not think on that level whatsoever.

Fewer than most. Because they're so uppity that they think that the shit just magically appears. They say they want it. They can toss some silver stags at it. And then boom, it's there. You don't get that luxury in the North. Old folks literally will leave their homes and go die in the woods if they have to.

So their younger family can survive the winter in the North. That's how harsh shit is. And that's the contrast, right? In the north, people will sacrifice themselves for the good of the many. Right? That seems to be the philosophy that we're seeing right now, whereas in the south, as we're

seeing with these men, they're like, what if I sacrifice this other person for the good of me? Pretty much. Pretty much. I mean, look at everything Tywin has done. Yes. And everything Cersei's done. From the very jump street,

Jaime pushing Bran out that window. True. It's a common trend for Southerners. Well, no, not unfortunately, but very fortunately we don't see a lot of that in the North. Richard Hort interrupts this and turns to Stannis, beginning to say, Your brother. But Stannis cuts him off because he knows what Robert would have done.

Robert would gallop up to the gates of Winterfell alone, break them down with his war hammer, and ride through the rubble to slay ruse bolton with his left hand and the bastard with his right stannis rose to his feet i am not robert but we will march and we will free winterfell or die in the attempt this is why people don't like stannis why would you add that part at the end it's it exactly it's that little bit at the end what the fuck you mean or die in the attempt bro we didn't come here to die we did not come here to die we came here to win all we do is win win win what the fuck are you talking about stannis well he could have ended it there like that was a that was a pretty like interesting you know like that was decent yeah that was a good delivery we will and then you add this shit on see as soon as that little last bit

that's when the crowd goes like there's a collective bitch face all across the realm you gotta keep it optimistic man you gotta keep your political speeches big even tyrian knows that tyrian in the black water had a great speech where he's like listen like we're gonna go in and we're gonna give it our all guys like we're all bastards right like we're all gonna go john has good speeches asha last chapter she had a great speech but this this is what you come out swinging with st Like, this is... And that's the thing. Again, Stannis never wanted to make friends. He always thought that he can do things on his own.

And because he is who he is, just for the hell of it, people are gonna just do what he says. No, sir. Robert had qualities to where he could make his enemies be his friends after one drinking session and it don't even gotta be till the whole drinking session is over after that first shot this man is telling jokes with some guy whose son he probably killed 10 minutes ago yeah yeah but it's all gravy renly was even better he would have found the right words to say to to get these people on his side just stanis just doesn't have tact he is a great tactician and a good military leader but to be king to to be this person that people actually respect and even more importantly, when you're in that position, love and care about. And, you know, to curry favor that people actually want to help him succeed and see him succeed.

Stannis doesn't know how to do that. His PR team sucks. You need more than the Wicked Witch of the Far East and, like, a Smuggler Knight. You know what I mean? You need more than just Stannis. The Wicked Witch of the Far East that don't smuggler knight you know what i mean uh more than just the wicked witch of the far east that don't even know how to read the signs yeah you need more than the fucking team from wizard of oz right like the lion with no heart i mean uh let's find the courage and move on stannis but he has no charisma none of that and the lords feel doubtful and it might be

because of what you're saying here right like his Because he's saying, we're gonna die. Yeah, that might be it. His victories are becoming well known. He smashed wildlings at the wall, he cleaned Asha and the rest of the Ironborn out of Deepwood, and now he's going on to avenge the Red Wedding. See, he could have led with this, you know? Like, this is why some people do, like, amongst his camp, right? Follow him and respect him, because they are seeing that there are victories they they respect that they saw what

happened at the wall and maybe if stannis was like you know if he had led up with all that and it's like and we're gonna do that again at winterfell but no he's like we're gonna die oh that's the thing it's that trickle down effect Like yeah you did have some good wins. Under your belt. Like you're probably the only dude. That we've read about that. Totally beat back the ironborn. At sea.

That is impressive. However in these recent times here. My lord. You've had L after L. After L after L. and it keeps getting worse. Your whiny ass dudes are crying because there's a little bit of snow on the ground. They don't know how to deal with it. They don't want to move.

They think they should stay in this spot and winter where there already is no winter. Like it's a vacation. And now you saying they gonna die? That's your pep talk? Yeah. And he doesn't even give them a good, we're going to die. He doesn't give them a, we're going to go out in a blaze of glory. No, it's totally grim.

Yeah. He could have given something like how Big Bucket Wall talks about it later. And we'll get there. That's what I was about to say. He needs to take cue from Wall. And all he has to do is weaken Bolton, right? Like, if he can weaken the Boltons the North will abandon him because every

house in the North has lost someone in the Red Wedding and Asha thinks about this right and she's like oh so you hope but first the King must bloody him only a fool deserts the winning side and maybe it's just me but I feel like Asha's very

removed point of view here from this whole situation is something to think about she understands this all too well thanks to her queen's moot right and her failed queen's moot yep uh she understands that only a fool deserts the winning side well they're all going to euron for a reason no one wants to desert the winning side there and uh stannis i don't know if you're gonna be the winning side once a couple starks come back into play yep and he did try to get the starks on his side but you went to the wrong start dude you you went to the stark that is the most like his uncle daddy and he keeps his vows just like you

as a stickler for the rules would expect him to but then here you are trying to coax this man out of his seat maybe he didn't show up when Ned was like where's Stannis yeah right here where is he exactly see you know what that just reminded me again

a lot of this could have been avoided and I I'm going to blame Stannis here. Because when the shiz went down, after Jon Arryn died, Stannis had the damn information. Yes. He knew Ned was coming. He had the receipts. This little asshole left and went to Dragonstone and never said not one word until after all the shit went down. Yeah. and never said not one word until after all the shit went down yeah if you actually cared enough to go and tell john aaron what was going down because granted you know your brother's not

gonna listen to you so you go tell one of the men that he trusts with everything what's going down and obviously john believed him because he ended up dead for all that and now when the pinch time really comes and you know ned is coming you should have met him long before that page from the the the freaking council got to him you should have been there at the gate to greet him at kingsland and like hey bruh i know we i have had my issues with you in the past but it's been shit going down right now and i need you to be aware of what is happening we need to talk but no you just took your ass back to dragon stone and said fuck everything and now you mad that people don't want to call you king absolutely true and part of it is like on one hand it's like where where the fuck were you like you're not gonna

trust the the guy the whole time Ned was in King's Landing. Yeah. The whole damn time. You could have been there to help him, dude. But he was building his creepy fucking nightmare before Christmas council, right? Like, that's what he was busy doing with his old creepy fucking witch girlfriend and his creepy maester who ends up dying anyways because he obviously is like, oh, you're pretty. I love that maester. Oh, I love Crescent too.

But I'm just saying, I don't know. It's very interesting that he used it as an opportunistic moment. And it seems that people in this story that use opportunistic moments like this of tragedy and despair and weather that is not great. like this of tragedy and despair and weather that is not great, people that use that to their advantage usually do not win in the end, is just something I've noticed, right? Like people who try to exploit other people to politically get ahead. So maybe we'll keep our eye on that moving forward. They always say that, you know, the old gods are in the north,

but the old gods we know don't like ugly and whether you think they can see you in the south or not i'm telling you they can see you and they gonna get you i think you're right just saying they don't like ugly you know who likes we already know what's coming to house fray and house fray ain't in the north well they are unfortunately right now for a little that's true just a little bit we'll get a little bit we'll get them out but you know who eliana does not want us to get out you know who eliana's like keep him in sir justin massey eliana's a song of ice and fire asha chapter boyfriend uh yep yep mine is carl just Justin is Eliana's boyfriend, and Justin won't stop

flirting with Asha. He's flashing smiles and jokes. He has these handsome blue eyes and blonde hair. I think Carl and Justin, I think that they could agree to a threesome. I'm gonna throw it out there. Put that energy into the universe.

I'll just jot this down. If that's what they had to do, yeah. Yeah. And I think they should be thankful for this threesome you're talking about personally. I agree. It's something that we deserve. I mean, they're pretty boys. They're pretty boys from the South.

They, again, don't know shit about the real world and how to actually navigate in different places other than their homes. Because half of them probably haven't been more than a couple miles or maybe one town or one city away from where they grew up. So, no, they're looking at it the whole wrong way. it the whole wrong way you don't get an ironborn lady of asha's caliber no just by smiling at her and bringing her some wine and maybe some extra bread and cheese even though the food is running low you don't get that with jokes that doesn't impress asha at all you want to impress her pick up a sword or an axe better yet pick up an axe and show what you can do

yeah uh demonstrate that and also bring something to the table right like a lot of these people and put some bass in your voice yeah because you know we would we you know forget what the show you know did with asha's character not that i'm wholly mad at it i get why they did it but asha appreciates being dominated and a lot of times that happens with people that hold leadership roles all the time they like that little bit of space where they can cut loose and have someone else be in control justin massey ain't that guy he can't handle asha no he's not gonna be able to give her what she wants especially a kingdom what she wants most is a kingdom get women want kingdoms get me a kingdom you know everyone he's trying he's trying to come to her so he could get his kingdom she already even though

she doesn't have much she already has more to bring to the table than he does yeah he's lost all of his lands right he's a southern lord with no lands and he's after her and her islands and he either has to lower his pride or be a knight the rest of his life and as we know from the john chapters he had wanted val and that got kind of ruined so ash is now his target and asha of course is being watched over by a different jailer by al Alysane Mormont, who's the ferocious heir to Bear Island. This is actually something I really appreciate. She's short, she's thick and muscular and chunky. She has big thighs, big boobs, calloused hands.

She's dressed like a warrior. She's wearing fur and boiled leather and ring mail and sheepskin. And she's actually of an age with Asha. They're the same age and a warrior class of woman in their own very distinct culture and i think that's really awesome how it's pointed out here and uh i don't know i just like the way that asha gets to kind of see another warrior of her caliber it's so great when you get to see them come together and it's something that i just wish a lot of the other women and girl characters were able to do

and interact with each other. Alysanne, she explains a lot of the women on Bear Island are kind of like that later on, but it's not something that women, especially as we are talking about the difference between the North and the South, really get to experience. I very much appreciate the lady warriors of this series I honestly would have liked to see you know Asha's thoughts on Daisy had Daisy not had Daisy not been killed at the red wedding

you know she was part of Rob's personal Kingsguard for Northern Lords to show that amount of trust, to have her be one of the ones protecting their king, that shows her skill

and her valor. You know, I don't think Rob or anyone else did that just to do her a favor. He actually saw the skills she had and he recognized that and honored her with that position. And the Southern Lords

can't think on that level because they're they're too much in their dicks pretty much it's it's all about the peen and they don't know that women can and will fight and cut you down just as hard as any other man if you give them the means to absolutely and none of this really matters to asha right because she at this point knows that she's been defeated twice so she won't get her father's land she was defeated at the king's moot very publicly in front of all the ironborn and then she was defeated at deepwood mott wedding a southern lord or knight would just make that worse, and it doesn't

matter because she's already married to Eric. She thinks, the Kraken's daughter turned out to be just a woman after all, the captains and the kings would say. See how she spreads her legs for this soft green landlord. It makes me think that how Asha fears she's perceived by the Iron Islanders is actually how Stannis is being perceived by the Northerners. Asha's chapters reinforce the placeholder Stannis is in the North. Her comparisons of the Northern culture and the Ironborn culture, how they follow, how they lead in light of her culture is especially significant here. She's somehow surviving through this journey with a broken ankle in the bitter cold and stannis well he's not looking great he's losing man after man he's starting to look gaunt he can't survive leading men in this northern climate so how can he expect to lead the northern

people how can he expect to lead the realm yeah like i mean you you can't you can't keep this small band of soldiers that you have alive how is anyone supposed to put trust in you to to guard all of of the the kingdoms yeah it's just not going to work it isn't going to work and you know and he he's giving, I think, too much credit to people that he shouldn't. He's leaning on them too much. But then missing gems like Alysanne or Asha

that are in his midst that he just chooses to ignore. Yeah, and the Mormons are a respected house. Yeah, exactly. You know, Alysanne would not be there if she wasn't capable. But Stannis and such as him, it's really all Southern Lords, they don't know how to think like that. So you use every resource at your disposal. If this woman has a battle axe or spiked mace or sword that she can wield well, and you know that she has that skill, that they have the right type of mentality, they're going to utilize that skill.

They're not going to stamp it down because it's needed. The North doesn't waste. Southerners, though, they prissy like that. Yeah, and that's interesting because what you're saying here is, and which absolutely makes sense for somewhere like the North, is that the people are themselves a resource, right? Yes, very much so. Makes women precious and perfectly as capable as men here.

And it's so interesting because again we saw it a bit through john who obviously has a biased northern perspective because he's john um and very much of the north but we're seeing that outsider's perspective again from asha neither southern nor northern kind of in the middle but they she comes from a land also of limited resources hoping for something a little different so yeah she's she's just kind of comparing the two even though she's not really saying it explicitly we can really see how that comes through you know like one of the thing one of the lines from i don't remember if it was said in the book but on the show that has always stuck with me with asha is that first moment when Theon is getting ready to take

the soldiers that were given to him to go on that task that Baelon sent them on. They didn't want to listen to him when he first got down. But Asha came through said like five words and everybody's up at him getting to work. And Theon's looking at her like, bitch, what the fuck? And her line was, on just looking at her like bitch what the fuck and her line was these men would wait here for a year for me if i told them to you on the other hand they don't know you yeah they know me they know my skill they know if they act up i'm gonna chop them the fuck down and they know that they're not gonna be getting back up so they're going to go against their liege lady. You know, and it's not normal for Ironborn to see a woman in leadership like that. But again, they watched this woman grow up.

They know the skills she has. They know the training she has. They know her mind from how she rules them. Yeah. If she told them stand still for a year on that dock on one leg patting the top of their head they would do it Theon doesn't understand leadership on her level I'd add that on top of that like you know they would do that and I would say it's a start it is a start for them they should be yeah listening to her at that caliber and above personally that's

just my personal opinion i digress that's facts and this energy is exactly what lets asha keep justin massey bringing her luxuries while she's imprisoned right like he's supposed to be her jailer but he's out here like here's your really nice shampoo and conditioner just kidding they don't get showers uh and he's more entertaining he would do it though he would do it you know what they do get though well well maybe not everybody but asha she gets a leg rub from him because of her ankle and you know the the horse died that was pulling the the cart she was in so now she has to walk on this broken ankle but that's okay because you know massy gonna come over here and you know massage that muscles and try to limber you up my lady but i can't give you a horse but

let me try to ease your pain just a little bit yeah don't you do that for me chloe i digress damn it chloe chloe you slipping on your pimping man come on now i'm sorry you you're supposed to take care of your lady for better for worse for stanis or for poor oh no but you know what justin massey isn't that bad i joke about eliana's a swath uh hook up justin massey but he's more entertaining than aliceane right and asha is like well everyone here hates me except for justin massey so he's more entertaining than aliceane right and asha is like well everyone here hates me except for justin massey so this is fun i'm just gonna be nice to him i guess and she does ask for a horse they went 22 miles the first day 24 the second and she has no freedom she wants a

horse those that were devoted to her lord they leave their prayers each night outside the king's pavilion men at arms and knights and asha would have called these men the king's men but she learns that everyone calls them queen's men instead for the queen they left at castle black not salise yeah it really gives you an insight into who holds the real power here, right? And where Stannis' power derives from. It comes from the faith that these men have in Melisandre as opposed to it coming from really blood inheritance or physical strength. It's because he's been blessed

by Melisandre. That moniker of Queen's Men, I think it really means something a little different. It hits different in Ash's chapters because she's someone who was trying to be queen. She was trying to get people to follow follow her she had some queen's men and a lot of them defected and that that idea of faith is i'm sure something that's well taken based on the influence that the damp hair has in the iron islands and how no one followed her because the damp hair was like what if we held a king's boot everyone and that was a terrible idea we should have never done that and um maybe maybe it'll come into play

again for him if he's you know alive in the next book so a lot of things are really gravy there so yeah i'm sure aaron very much regrets calling that king's moon like bro you so deep in your feelings that you really called for this thing to happen. And now look who's in charge. He played himself. He did. Exactly. Congratulations. You played yourself.

You played yourself. You could have just convinced them to give Asha the crown. And they would have listened. They're doing a lot of shooting themselves in the front. Here comes Euron with the presence. And now you're fucked. to the crown and they would have listened they're doing a lot of shooting themselves here comes you're on with the presence and now you're they do a lot of shooting themselves in the foot and it's not just the ironborn right we get like the southerners godly the giant slayer he's a dick he's muscled and arrogant asha thinks he's hungry for glory not unlike his king that he doesn't

treat small folk both woman or wolves very well uh and she's kind of like seeing these southerners she's kind of figuring out how to play them she asks justin for a horse like ak said and the next time he comes through she's like i'm going crazy in my chains please let me have a horse and he's like you're nope that's the king's decision not mine and she's like your king won't listen to a woman. And Alysanne is like, why would he listen to an Iron Man after what your brother did at Winterfell? Which, of course, was not Ash's fault. She explains, she's like, I'm not Theon, but the chains remain.

No one cares. And she goes on to think about her mother. She reflects back at the last goodbye that she shared with her mother over at Ten Towers on Harlaw's lands. Yes, we have this line. Theon could not come, Asha had told her, looking down upon the ruin of the woman who had given her birth. A mother who had lost two of her sons, and the third... I send you each a piece of prince. Whatever befell when battle was joined at Winterfell

Asha Greyjoy did not think her brother likely to survive it Theon Turncloak, even the she-bear wants his head on a spike as well she should yeah, it's understandable I mean, his actions might have led to the death of her sister in a way yeah, they did and I do like how this chapter is paired directly with the turn cloak.

Right before we have the passage, Jane, her name is Jane. She should not look to me for rescue. Theon Greyjoy might've tried to help her once, but Theon had been ironborn, a braver man than Reek. Reek, Reek, it rhymes with weak. This is what makes the next chapter, The Sacrifice, for Asha so exciting and so full of depth. Asha has been assuming this entire time that her brother, weak or injured, would not survive the Flayer's game. But instead, Theon appears at the end of The Sacrifice and says,

Don't hate the Flayer, hate the game, sis! It's the best moment in the whole box sorry speaking of Theon moments Theon moments that we have not seen in the entire story that we brought up during our coverage of Theon he's not yet seen his mother

we've not seen them interact so she hasn't seen him doesn't know he's not a baby boy so it'll be interesting also that her name, Alanis kind of gonna throw this out there interact so she hasn't seen him doesn't know he's not a baby boy and so it'll be interesting uh also that her name Alanis kind of gonna throw this out there Alanis is kind of like the name Alisane but if you switch some of the letters

around I don't know what it means I don't know it might not mean anything but it's a thought it's a thought yeah It's a thought. Yeah. Asha asks Alisand if she has brothers, and Alisand tells us of her five sisters,

Lyanna, who is on Bear Island, Lyra and Jory, who are with Mage, and Daisy, who was murdered at the Red Wedding. She also says she has a son and daughter. They're ages two and nine. And she says she also started pretty young, maybe even too young, having children. But she's like, better than waiting.

Looking at Asha, and Asha's like, wow. Wow, I'm being attacked. Asha asks who her husband was, and Alysanne responds that her children were fathered by a bear and smiles telling her mormont women are skin changers and warriors who turn into bears and find mates in the wood sidebar biggest overlooked mystery in this whole damn series who in the hell is fathering these mormont kids i know it's i know a lot of people think it's Tormund and I think that fits except maybe when

it comes to Daisy either way who is the daddy and why were they allowed to keep the name Mormont instead of Snow that's a good question I think there's a Bear Island is definitely different

it's supposed to be different from the rest of the north in that way of similar to the Iron Islands, right? Like, they dealt with so much bullshit from the raiders from the Iron Islands for so long. I feel like they get to just have whatever they want as their culture. Or maybe they were like, you know, J.R. was cool, but then he exhibited really poor judgment in abdicating and then letting Jorah rule Bear Island. And Jorah was an and then letting Jorah rule Bear Island and Jorah was an idiot. Fuck Jorah. And they were like, obviously we can't trust men anymore. So.

Also, why was Jorah even allowed to marry that damn Hightower girl? Why was Jorah allowed period? Alright, why was Jorah allowed anything? I mean, exactly. You know, Bear Island is arguably one of the poorest spots not because you know they can't survive and provide for their people but they are nowhere near rich on the level

that the high towers are who approved that match it's a really good match just something that didn't make sense to me it's a really good match like you can't hope for that as a tiny ass northern house we know no offense to bear island i don't mean this in a mocking way, I just mean it quite literally, they're inconsequential to the rest of the nation, right? Like, no one thinks about them. Yeah, true enough. We do. That doesn't count, though. Well, I'm sure the Starks did enough because they always stayed loyal. enough because they always stayed loyal.

So there was enough care there but it just in the grand scheme of things, they're one small ripple in that pond. One very tiny ripple. They're consequential to the north like you said and the Starks because of I mean the very POV that we are looking at all this through. They're a

stronghold against the Ironborn. But everyone else, they're like, I don't know, whatever. I guess those people are there. It's the defense. It's like how the neck is the defense against the south. Indeed. Well, Alysanne's smile fades

when she reminds Asha of why those women of Bear Island became these warriors, right? Because the Ironborn raided their island and the young cubs had to learn to fear the krakens and the old way and we talked a lot last chapter about ash's hopes and dreams of settling people on sea dragon point in the bay of ice if her conversation with tristane botley wasn't just wishes she'd do best to learn from these men that have come from house wool or

the flints from the Bay of Ice, because that's where Sea Dragon Point is, right? This northwest point of that bay. These would be her neighbors. Making good with the bears might be in her far better interests if she wants to make Greyjoy amends. And I also think something really interesting is coming up in this culture and religion in the northern land in general sea dragon point for example has weirwood circles in its highest hills and was known to be inhabited by children of the forest ashen knows that the old way has cost the ironborn so many of their battles so much land their pride has been too bold in the face of their ambitions over the years. Yep, and I think that ties into what we were all saying earlier.

Asha, to me, and you guys correct me if I'm wrong, but she's the only main Ironborn character that we've seen actually look and assess the things they did in the past. And she very clearly sees where they are right now in the present and she wants a better future and she knows ironborn are not going to survive if they continue to cling to this old way you know she she's actually a bit remorseful about it which you know is commendable to her because you know not everyone's going to look back and see something that they their people did and actually feel bad and take responsibility within themselves for it and try to change it so that's one of the things that makes

asha you know one of my favorite characters in the whole story she's very good and again like i said reading the room and trying to think of better ways to do it. Just unfortunately, she doesn't always have the resources to really get to where she wants to go. And she's open minded, right? She might not be a history buff. She doesn't claim to be a history buff, but she also isn't saying to Uncle Roderick, no, put the book away, Nunkle. I don't want to read your smelly old books. She is open to these

histories and i think there's something in these ironborn histories to look back at george likes to sandbox a lot of these ideas and when you look back at for example theon the hungry wolf stark king theon his battles against herig whore who had control of stony shore and sea dragon point and the iron islands and King Theon defends the North during the Andal invasion, with House Bolton at his side, defeating Argos Sevenstar, burning a bunch of Andal villages, capturing houses and septs, and Herig leads ships to the North, burns the Wolf's Wood, his son Ravos the Raper destroys Bear Island and rapes and reaves its people and their belongings, and Kangtheon, the hungry wolf Stark, has to come down to expunge these ironborn from his lands,

freeing both Cape Kraken and Bear Island as well as some of the other northern lands on the Bay of Ice. What we're seeing right now with Stannis cleaning out the swamp in the north does feel like this story, him cleaning the ironborn out. But with the northern land we're hearing about having so much potential to live upon, it kind of makes me think that the Stony Shore, Cape Kraken, Bay of Ice, all these lands, the Sea Dragon Point, these are important places. I think that we're definitely going to be seeing places like the Gift resettled in a dream of spring but i imagine the rule of the iron islands could change ash's ending in game of

thrones was pretty vague we know many people have opinions on it but i could see this being a compromise for her instead of having this independent people maybe she'll take some of the northern land in the end and resettle it with her people and have them start having their own new way. Right? Be a part of or join one of the kingdoms. Can I just backtrack a little bit? Just to take a minute or two to wax poetic about Theon the Hungry Wolf. If you want to talk about legendary Starks, go look up Theon, the Hungry Wolf. Dude is

the epitome of badass. He's probably my second favorite Stark ancestor in the whole lore. He didn't just fight against the Andals. He took his people and crossed the Narrow Sea and went to Andalos and kicked their ass

there. Yeah. And then brought all their heads back his people and crossed the narrow sea and went to andalos and kicked their ass there yeah and then brought all their heads back and put them up in a line along the shore of the narrow sea back on his side uh of the north and west of rose basically saying bitch don't and guess what kingdom the andals never got a foothold in yep that's my dude he is my second favorite the only one that trumps him in my book is cregan because cregan's the only stark that went to king's landing handled some shit and then disappeared back north like the mrs freaking avalon and went back home unscathed hell yeah yeah. The most cool Starks knew what the hell was up. Yeah, I really like

what you said about Theon Stark and I think that that's something that sounds like it's going to be coming into play, right, with the ending of the books, especially if we see, maybe not as a Theon, right, but what you're saying of being unconquered.

So that'll be interesting. i kind of wonder you know is that something that we could see i i mean maybe it's like as you're saying with the kingdoms right but it doesn't seem like that's what's going to happen for the ironborn per se as as close saying maybe they'll join one of the kingdoms maybe not or maybe this is something where like the ironborn suffer so much and in a way they're reborn again and we'll have to see what kind of culture reforms afterwards that likely Asha hopefully will take them and help them rebuild. my hopes for the ironborn is that, you know, they'll, you know, drop their old stigmas, their old ways, and actually learn how to function in the present world that they are in.

Because, you know, the, the raping and the reaving and, you know, thieving all up and down the coast is just not going to get them any type of wealth the way they think, you know, they're still,

uh, Stan in, uh, um, hair black because of what he accomplished. You cannot go back to that. There's no way, you know,

the rest of Westeros is not going to let you because they're not going to let themselves fall into that nonsense. Again, I understand you want to be more important, but you need to go around doing it the right way and i think asha is the forward thinker that's actually trying to well not trying to just yet but she wants to make those changes you know she she sees what needs to be done and she wants to get there but she's got to start first, and unfortunately, she's not in a good starting position right now.

Yeah, she's in a really bad starting position, especially right now in the third day. They're passing familiar landmarks, and she's like, remember the time that I was here a few bucks ago? We thought we were in a bad position then, passing this stony hill, these natural stone arches, going all the way back to Winterfell, but, you know, it's not as bad as right now, because she's like, back then, you know, we were trying to warn Thea and tell him,

set the folly aside. She failed that day, too. Things are failing a lot right now, because they're going 14 miles, stumbling on the side of the road under trees that night. Justin Massey unlocks her shackles and she gets taken by him and Alisanne to see Stannis, who feeds her table scraps. Winning real hard right now.

Good starting position. At his pavilion, eating scraps while his commanders and captains eat well and then they go to another place, the tent. It's yellow canvas. It's faded and stained by mud and mildew. With a standard flying from the

center pole. There's a night fire blazing on its fourth side where the queensmen pray to their jealous god because other things that aren't going so well for her right now. Her religion, the drowned god, is seen as a demon in the eyes of the queensmen.

She's like, well, well shit i guess i gotta embrace their god or seem somewhat pious because otherwise she's gonna be doomed to the flames things are going really great she's already heard the men urging it and thankfully stannis has refused yes and she thinks about stannis victory, the face of his red and hungry god. His eyes were sunk in deep pits, his close-cropped beard no more than a shadow across his hollow cheeks and bony jawbone. Yet there was power in his stare, an iron ferocity that told Asha this man would never, ever turn back from his course. Which means that Melisandre is going to burn his daughter. Anyways, I'm just kidding.

That was a joke. Everyone, we know it's him. This is the one true podcast. She brings herself to one knee. She begs Stannis to strike her irons off and let her ride. He says that she earned her irons and she agrees and now she offers him all she can her ships her men her wits kind of see asha trying to get out of this uh prison imprisonment with both the jamie lannister and the tyrian methods of negotiation jamie lannister

just let me ride the horse right just take the irons off of me, Tyrion. But what if I gave you these things that I don't really have right now but promised? And my wits! Ah, to be a rich kid, am I right? Oh my god. Meh. I mean, if you're gonna be a bastard, you better be a rich bastard. That's for sure. That's true.

John only learns that later on. Stannis mentions, he's like, well, you know what? Fun fact, your ships are in fact mine now, or I burned them. So I don't need you to tell me anything. And also, fun fact, Asha, you have barely any men left. I killed them all. Great.

Awesome. And Asha's like, okay, okay, what if I can deliver Torrin Square to you? And it's Garrison. But Sinus is like, I don't really give a shit about Torrin Square. I want Winterfell. And so Asha tries again. She asks this time, take my chains off

and I will help you take Winterfell. And she drops some great lines that are not good. This was a She goes, your grace's royal brother was renowned for turning She drops some great lines that are not good. This was a... It's a bad move. She goes, Your Grace's royal brother was renowned for turning fallen foes into friends. Make me your man. And Seamus is like,

The gods did not make you a man. How can I? What a mistake. Why would you bring up Roberto? 30 points from House Greyjoy. Oh my god. Was she trying to neg him? Come on, Asha. You you knew better you knew better why did

you bring up you know she thinks afterwards she thinks she's like i fucked up so you know what i'll at least give her that that she at least like sat there and was like maybe not my best move you know it it seemed in in stannis's response that he might have slightly, you know, even though he seemed like he brushed it off, he might have slightly thought about Torrin Square. Because that really would have just been more supplies and more fighters to

join him. But then she goes and mentions Robert and he completely dismisses everything else after that. And to be fair, we know what awaits them if they did go to Torrin Square because Theon goes there for Roose and Ramsay Stannis turns back to his fire and Justin Massey pulls Asha aside telling her don't bring up the brother she thinks I should have known better and remembers Theon living in

awe and fear of Roderick and Meryn, deciding brothers never grow out of being little brothers. She thinks about throttling Stannis with her chains, rattling them at her wrists, and she eats stew. It's venison stew. They had found a scrawny heart that night, which I feel like is some foreshadowing, right? A scrawny deer. Mmm.

A scrawny heart. But it was all they had. Outside the tent, the men received a heel of bread and a chunk of finger-length sausage and the last of lord glover's ale that's so sad yeah the loss of the alcohol um mood no why why is the room always i know it's so sad it's so sad the throttling status with her chains i i just feel like george is making a brief reference to star wars and princess leia the job of the hud in that moment i caught that yeah just like a guys remember i like i like things and

we get a reminder of the distance that has to be crossed from deepwood mott to winterfell we get the line 100 leagues from deepwood mott to winterfell 300 miles as the raven flies and then justin on day four of this march wishes that he were a raven especially as the snow begins to lightly fall and i kind of thought that was another interesting line referencing something else that happens in this book where bran finds out that the children of the forest have mostly gone into the ravens and i'm like oh that's funny people did that in this book i was gonna say he wishes he was a raven well don't wish too hard you might end up a crow boy oh that's true good one he's going to the wall I mean for a little bit before he goes to bravos

it snows again the following days and soon the men have snow caked beards if they didn't have beards then they start to grow one for warmth the wind picks up as they struggle through the hills with some of the northmen wearing what are called bear paws great name by the way fantastic branding they're the the old

tennis racket glued to the shoe trick and these ones though are made of old wood pieces attached to the shoe. And some made them for their horses and other creatures as well. Though the animals didn't really like them. And one broke its ankle trying to walk in them. Which makes sense. They're called bear paws, okay? They're not called horseshoes.

Horseshoes are different. Alright. Really? Are they? they're not called horseshoes horseshoes are different all right really are they see i gotta wonder when they have fashioned them for the animals though just like they fashioned them to suit their own yeah they're supposed to be spare bits of wood though so like obviously it seems they didn't have the right support in the right places or too much like you know when you wear like you ever have like a crazy pair of like boots with a

heel on them that are like a not a stiletto heel but like a big heel like those like they're very confusing so you're like wow you're gripping my leg and my ankles so hard but yet there's a heel on my foot and i might die i think yeah the well i think the horses are they no they're not about fashion. Sometimes they're about fashion. Never mind. I'm not going to go down. I'm not going down this rabbit hole that I was going down with horses.

It's fine. But, yeah. The Northmen begin to then outdistance the rest of the group because they've got bear paws. And the people with the wagons and the men keep falling behind and they're trying to keep up the fifth day of the storm brings them across a frozen pond that's concealed by snow and then they end up losing four horses and several men including harwood fell who tried to rescue them and then ends up getting pulled out before he drowns his

lips blue and skin pale interesting interesting look shivers violently for hours and dies in a feverish sleep never speaking after that okay when i read this the first thing i thought of was euron uh this is like some crazy euron symbolism not the whole dying part which will also probably happen uh but the coloring, right? The pale skin, the blue lips, and the silence, the not speaking before his death. And I think George does a lot to use Euron as kind of this foreshadowing or this metaphor for the others, right?

For the oncoming winter. It's great to keep him in the backdrop since he's specifically the one that is responsible for taking Ash's claim out of this, right? I mean, her ill attention to Lady Glover is also unhelpful, right? But with no backup or other options, I mean, Euron is the reason she can't go home. And he's coming. Much like Herig the whore and Ravos the raper burnt everything down, Euron is gonna burn everything down and fight Theon the Hungry Stark, whoever Theon the Hungry Stark is. I personally love the theory,

I think poor Quentin put forth that Bran and Dany will burn Euron physically and mentally, right? With each other, like Dany will be using the dragon on him, Bran will be frying his brain out. I don't know know kind of a cool idea but if this chapter is just the beginning of winter autumn's kiss and the winds of winter is gonna be worse I feel like we're gonna get a lot of these winter

as Euron comparisons moving forward and see that then that's interesting you thought about Euron I thought about the others perfect one in the same yeah because of the cold and yeah there's definitely interesting you thought about Euron I thought about the others perfect one and the same be be yeah because of the cold and yeah there's definitely parallels between both of them um I do agree though that it's you know in defeating Euron it's going to be a dual purpose and I think dual effort and I think when it comes to

the others if the Night King does ever show up or whoever whatever title the leader of the others have once they do actually show up for the long night I think it's going to take you know the actual

Azor Ahai reborn whose name is Snow. It's going to take him fighting on the physical plane and Bran fighting on the mental plane. Okay. But that could just be tinfoil. I could be totally wrong about that. Hell, probably right. Who knows at this point?

Yeah, we shall definitely see. Yeah. But yeah, the Winds of Winter is going to be extremely harsh because seriously they've they basically were caught in a blizzard like overnight you know where they were camping and they woke up and all there was just snow everywhere and they went from being able to cover 20-25 miles in a day to just maybe 2 or 3 and that's how harsh that winter is already but the northerners

are laughing saying no this is still just autumn's kiss winter fucks you hard we ain't there yet bruh we're still in first base oh my god and naturally like along with that we start getting the whisper of a sacrifice

right like just a whisper of it everyone just keeps saying sacrifice false gods godry barring corliss penning clayton sucks clayton sucks yeah exactly i hate him justin massey seems pretty cool right he's like no no this sounds awful but stannis is saying nothing asha knows he heard though stannis is sitting at a plate of untouched onion soup staring into the flames of a candle ignoring the talk probably thinking about davos because he has onion soup no he ain't thinking about that. He's again in that middle child syndrome. You know, when too much is hitting him too fast, he literally freezes up. So there's food in front of him. He could be eating, getting some warmth, a little bit of warmth in his belly against this cold that he is not used to at all. at all but he's hearing all these things that people are saying and it's just you know not meant to be

a pun but it's literally adding more fuel to the fire and he's just so in his feelings all he can do is sit there and stare at the flame yeah I kind of want onion soup and I'm kind of mad that uh Stannis has wasted the soup uh I actually feel really

like it is just sitting there again southerners be wasteful yeah it's it's really sitting there going to waste you are running out of supplies you gonna let this bowl of soup go to waste bruh did you forget what you had to go through defending storms and word this is this is who you are now well that's why i think that he's thinking of davos here because it is onion soup and he's staring and he's tells davos what he sees in the fire he says yeah he does see things sometimes in the flames he said i saw a king a crown of fire on his brows burning burning davos his own crown consumed his flesh and turned him into ash do you think i need melisandre to tell me what that means?

So, I wonder if he's seeing himself, right? Burning, or if he's seeing something else burning. Can he see it by fire? Yeah, something else, like what, I mean, as he said, you don't need to tell me what that means. He knows what's going on, and does he feel like, well, shit, it's catching up with me now.

Here we are, in the blizzard i mean technically he's not the only you know person in the story that would have a uh king like title you know john has that but i'm pretty sure we can say it's not Jon but there is also Fagon it's possible that R'hllor is granting him a boon and saying that he might beat this pretender but he doesn't quite know how to interpret that and also that's tinfoil

I had a tinfoil while I was reading this chapter I had a tinfoil that he what if one of the things that he sees in the flames is Shireen burning and he's trying to do what he can he sees in the flames is shireen burning right and he's trying to do what he can he's so desperate to try and prevent that future but the road that he's on keeps leading him towards that i don't know it was a crazy tinfoil it would be interesting

it would add a whole layer of caring to stannis for me like i would care about said stannis for me like i would care about said stannis because i mean even here in this line in davos five and storm his own crown consumed his flesh and turned him into ash uh that line right there is indicative of stannis's entire plot right moving forward like you me all three of us we all know what that means stannis knows what it means he knows what it means and even this early as a dance with dragons he knows what that means and i i personally believe he will not be living past the winds of winter that might be a personal opinion but i think it's right like most of my opinions are naturally but this line is again indicative of that right like that's there aren't many ways you can interpret your crown consuming

your flesh and turning you into ash yeah i think it is uh totally fitting you know it's just especially to where we are right now in the story it winter is here and the it's maddening and it's deadly yes and stannis is sitting here looking like the lord of death himself yes more and more he's getting more gaunt and you're starting he's starting every time asha looks at him there's this very skeletal imagery that she sees in his face and he's having dreams or you know visions about seeing a king with the crown burning him to ash not looking great yeah though it's interesting because when i also think about it as as i think to an extent of what you were saying earlier alicia that's a lot of that's a lot of the rulers in this story they're all kind of doing something that leads them a little bit to their own

demise not just stannis and you were also saying you know this cold is maddening and that's a line this story they're all kind of doing something that leads them a little bit to their own demise not just stannis and you were also saying you know this cold is maddening and that's a line that asha thinks as she sees the weather going on here she's like this is a cold that drives men mad and i'm uh i'm gonna give a shine to uh lady eowyn there in asha's thoughts you know yeah this is a cult that's driving men crazy but she is no man and i think it speaks very clearly because she still has her wits about her she's still watching still listening still trying to see what she could use to get it in i love that yeah more than that i think she's uh she's still able to perceive things and know what she can do right like she's still seeing what opportunities can arise for her

and still trying as we saw her try to get her chains off and i think it's fair to say that stanis through her eyes is probably the most honest view we've seen of him uh even through john's eyes stanis is a little tainted he kind of thinks fondly of him just because he hasn't had a new dad in a book right it's been like at least one book since he's had a new dad so i think that the adoption papers got signed without him being able to have feelings and after finding stannis both determined and courageous she also finds him unyielding and a bit creepy and the cold driving men mad that definitely makes me think of stannis's eventual downfall and you know stannis in all that right now he's still refusing to burn people as sacrifices maybe because he knows that that way lies madness but but it's hard, right? It's hard to

make that choice, because even at night they're finding that it's hard to stay warm in the damp and heavy tents. The fires are burning lower and fewer, and food is often cold or raw. Even the night fires are beginning to shrink,

though they prayed as loudly as they could. We have a segment from one of the prayers. Show us your bright sun again. Still these winds, melt these snows, that we may reach your foes and smite them. The night is dark and cold and full of terrors, but yours is the power and glory and the light. R'hllor, fill us with your fire for now and forever. Through bounty, our Christ, amen. Wait, sorry.

I mean, it sounds like that. It sounds a lot like that. I pulled that line from the end of the Lord's Prayer. It's almost the exact same sort of construction of for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Yeah, it is. I just thought that was... But you gotta you gotta

look at it really at velour right now and think is it though is it you know because it seems like unless you give your god that you think is so true and just a sacrifice unless you commit murder he might not be helping you are you sure this is who you really want to be following you know we say that the seven is probably the closest to christianity or catholicism uh just in its traditions and just how long it's been around but kind of makes you wonder at the end of the day what george is really saying about relore especially with considering you know magic being a sword with no hilt a whole lot of people believe it in something that works once in a while kind of like everything else in the world but you know i digress yeah i mean that's very true yeah you can even put that up against um the drown god

religion you know they believe that religion has power because you know they they go and they drown themselves and then a priest brings them back they think that's something mystical and magical they don't know that they're just's something mystical and magical they don't know that they're just performing cpr and if you get the water out of somebody's lungs quick enough they can survive so cpr is pretty magical it's it's uh and and they attribute that to like only the priests are trained on how to do that which if you're in a culture like the ironborn i'm sorry that's just dumb everyone should know how to perform CPR. You literally

damn near live on the ocean. Y'all, what are you doing? Yeah. I think some of them are like Victorian. They're just like, we're gonna commit, we're gonna wear armor even though we're fighting on ships. And our main weapon is a bow and arrow. I'm gonna sink.

Yeah. Freaking ironborn. Corliss Penny later wonders out loud if an army had ever frozen to death and the wolves laugh at him. Big Bucket says this is no winter. And they have a saying that

in the hills they say autumn kisses you but winter fucks you hard and that this was only autumn's kiss. And Asha's over here praying. She's like, I hope that I never know true winter. And won't mostly. She's the king's prize. And so far has been spared the worst of the hunger and cold. She's riding in the wind with furs and a roof.

in the wind with furs and a roof and throughout this chapter I was like I guess the Dothraki would think that this was not noble but it kind of sounds like the life compared to everyone else right now the people that have it the worst are obviously the horses and the stable boys

like the common men in fact we hear about a stabbing that happened the night before when two squires and a man at arms argue about who get to sit near the fire and uh the next night someone lights a tent on fire in the scuffle right yeah like yeah let's just go ahead and waste more resources that we have because we can't stop being petty and learn how to share a freaking space like it's like i said it it makes me giggle every time i think about it i would love to have seen those southern lord's

faces when they were told nah bruh this ain't winter what you talking about man this is just autumn's kiss wait till winter really gets here then you'll be shitting frozen blocks in all of your silky southern pants as north uh eastern women here we all know what this means right like we all have had those friends that have visited us in the north or in the east when it's a little colder in the fall or winter and they're from a warmer place and they're like what do you mean we all know that feeling and we all know that that look we give them like you sweet summer children but i feel like this is something really notable because the stable boys the horses and the common men having it the worst ashel here knows she is privileged in fact she's calling out that she's privileged, but it shows who gets the shitty deal.

Like, it's very obvious who's working on the floor, being turned against the other poor people, right? So the horses and the stable boys and the men-at-arms all got in a fight last night over who got to be near a fire and be warm. They get distracted and put against each other, but how does Stannis sleep? The small folk suffer while the high lords play their Game of Thrones in deed. They have furry red shirts. Yep. And that is it. They do. They actually do. They literally do have red shirts, probably.

And Stannis, he hears all this, but because it deviates from actually do that that is literally do have red shirts probably and stan and stan stan is he he hears all this but because it deviates from his actual goal he's not going to pay attention to it when hello sir you have to pay attention to the the people that you want to uh call you king you should have been out there helping to settle this dispute then maybe that tent that y'all need with supplies in it that y'all need would not have gone up in flames things are desperate your men are not used to this type of winter so what are you doing to try to help ease them this is another example of where Stannis is failing as a ruler. You can't handle a little band of people right now.

You're not leading them very well. And you're wondering why they put in more faith in Melisandre, who isn't even there, but you are. It's such an interesting contrast to another march that we saw in the snow that was pretty awful that that march fucking sucked for everyone too much more terrifying up in the north that sam survives and the leadership of jr mormont who has put together his circle his ring of fire right and that's his idea in a way to keep his men safe stannis is struggling with that he's just like well everyone we're gonna go take winterfell or die trying and i'm like great inspirational amazing and the the privilege right that he has

and also that asha has even though asha's a prisoner that privilege kind of manifests in a couple of different ways not only is she privileged and not having to take care of the grunt work, the jobs of the people who are getting shunted the most in Stannis' camp, but she also gets those provisions, right, to stay alive as a prisoner. She's getting a little better food because, I mean, despite being a hostage, the king's prize, she is the prize, right? She's kept alive and considered valuable enough that she would even be a hostage as opposed to the men in her crew that she was trying to barter her

own life for uh they're the ones who died because they weren't considered important enough just like all these as you said red shirts that are out here and it's kind of it's this funny tension that's going on in this chapter because she is the king's prize doesn't feel very prized right now because we're in the middle of an autumn's kiss allegedly and trudging through the snow and i mean what they're getting it's a little it's better than absolute scraps you know what that just made me think of though and i don't think I noticed it before until, like, right now that we're talking about it. This is very Robert of Stannis to be handling it like this. You know, he sees that there is some work to be done.

There's areas of opportunity that he needs to look at and try to fix in the best way that he can with the little resources that he can but he at least needs to get out there and show his men that you know he can do this there this is still a just cause now we're gonna run off and fight or die trying and he's ignoring all of that it's very similar to robert who i cannot imagine that he didn't see that there were issues but he still wanted to be in his cups he wanted to be the little playboy that he was you know back in the day when when he was strong and he could lift his warhammer with one hand and all that good stuff he's still trying to live in his glory days and stannis is is showing very much the same traits here he doesn't want to see what's actually happening he only wants to see the vision that he has and he can't break himself from that bubble stannis is still trying

to get there yeah he can't break from that bubble to actually see what's what to really act accordingly right now yeah that's an interesting contrast between them as you said they're letting people squabble it out between themselves but and try and sort out those issues without getting involved but all the while you know in in the real life right not not really real life in the book real life horses are dying from exhaustion real life. In the book, real life. Horses are dying from exhaustion and their meat's getting butchered after. This is what people have for food now, because the provisions are low and many of the southern

men are urging Stannis to, like, why don't we just make camp until the storm passes? Which also, I'm gonna be real, that does sound like a bad idea, too. And then the queen's men are pushing, yeah, right? Like, let's camp in the middle of the snow. Great. Amazing. I love this camping trip. Yeah, where there's no resources.

Absolutely. Brilliant. No one has good ideas here because the Queen's men are also pushing a sacrifice. Also seems like a bad idea. Like, we gotta keep some people alive, right? If we're gonna fucking take Winterfell and not die trying. Asha's informant, Justin Massey, says,

Good thing for you, though. Stannis isn't going to sacrifice you even though Sir Clayton sucks and Sir Godry farting keep trying to press him to do it, they're like give the unbeliever to the fire, shun the unbeliever Charlie

and Stannis though responds with half my army is made up of unbelievers. I will have no burnings. Pray harder. But Eliana, doesn't that mean that Stannis won't burn his daughter? I mean, he's given up. He eventually starts giving up. I just wanted to come in with Strahmian's argument real quick, you know?

It's a slippery slope that is slippery because of all of this ice around everybody. it's a slippery slope that is slippery because of all this ice around everybody it's real though it's by real i mean real yeah i mean and that is the one maybe one of just a small few gold stars that i'll give to stannis in this moment he knows that if he burns anyone that doesn't believe yeah and nine times out of ten if he's gonna burn anyone that doesn't believe it's gonna be one of the north men or asha neither one of those actions will go over well with the north men and they will leave they don't need him to survive right now they can very happily fuck off right back to their homes and say fuck you stannis and they'll make it back home safely stannis and his men won't he needs them and he knows he needs them it's like maybe they can make me some fucking little bear paws why

haven't they made stannis bear paws that's what i was thinking too why have the southern men not tried to incorporate these tools that they see the northerners using stop being whiny and complaining about shit you're at war war is fucking hard okay you're in the north with winter coming and you are obviously not prepared look at what the north men are doing copy their technique you'll be at the very least you'll be able to move faster and you won't have to worry about this shit but the pride goeth before the fall you guys the pride goeth before the fall them southern lords that's the whole problem absolutely and this isn't even what like they were dealing with again like in that same chapter like they've got it good right now right

the northmen pointed out they're like this is nothing and also they don't have ice zombies or ice demons coming for them yet this is fine everything's fine this is a doable situation it's survivable but right they too stuck up their ass and i think that's what's so concerning right this is not even as bad as it can get for for many of the people who they're like this is this is just normal so if they're already at their wits end and this is not even as bad as it gets this is far from it the and they're already like let's just start burning people at this point like how much worse is it going to get they're just trying to sacrifice people only for comfort right now not even for survival and because of their own unpreparedness and unwillingness to adapt.

And I think Stannis is concerned, part of why he's probably not eating, because he's probably too fucking nervous because he realizes, shit, this is the limit for everyone. It only goes downhill from here because the Southerners that I've brought here are completely unable to cope. Yeah, they start to even experience

some of the cannibalism in the camps, right? And that's not even the worst of it. Asha that night, she had never been highly religious as we know, but she prays to he who dwells beneath the waves. Their marching then slows to a stagger and then a crawl. They reach five miles per day, then three miles, then two miles per day, two, all the way down from 22. By day 10, they're having daily meetings that they're calling the cold count to account for people and goes from one dead, three missing, six horses lost to two dead, a night, four horses down, one back up, and we get a big passage of time the baggage train losses are the most gruesome though dead horses wanes broken and overturned and men who wander off or sit down to die which stannis says let them we press on i will say he has that luxury

wander off my ass they straight up deserted because they saw you were on that nonsense and they didn't have that to do anymore. The ones who just stopped to die though, they have that luxury right now, but they're not going to have that luxury when true winter with the others comes south of the wall. People are going to be like, no, no one can die. That'll be bad. They'll be seeing

every one of those soldiers that stopped to die come back at them sword in hand and you will not be able to stop them. These are not the typical walking dead or not a living dead zombies that we have going on here.

It takes more than just smashing their skull. There's very specific ways that you have to fight these creatures and y'all are not prepared y'all aren't even prepared to go up against other humans right now you're losing they're not even on even before it even really starts and that's true the north men in contrast to the southerners only lose one man and a mule they fare so much better exactly like it's only one and a mule

again why is stannis not seeing this and saying okay you see what they're doing do that because respect my authority right he's losing so much and the northmen that are with him are sitting there giggling having a grand old time every night even though the fires are a little bit smaller they're still surviving they are on the quest that they want to be on to go and save the daughter of the Ned and get rid of the fuck shit Boltons

because nobody fucks with Boltons like that they don't like them and they're fine this is like a day at the pool for them honestly they are not worried about too much at all. But then there's Stannis and his whiny ass lords. And no one, for whatever reason, in their ranks can figure out that maybe we should just, you know, when in Rome, do as you do. I mean, it's like, I don't know if you guys watched the hundred but

there are different clans on that show um also you know hashtag Alexa deserve better she will always be my Hita um you don't go after as Jada who is in the far north in the winter time because it's damn near always winter time in as jada territory if you are foolish enough to do that then you might as well just lay down and die before you even get there because that that that's dumb and that's what's happening with these southern lords now they did not account for the change in weather even though it's well documented that in the North, it snows even in the years of summer. It's not like you didn't have this information.

Why did you not plan better? Yeah, they didn't plan at all. They weren't prepared. They thought they were going to just like plow through it. And at first I was like, I mean, I guess they were too deep. They couldn't have adapted. But now that I think about it, I'm like, they had wagons. They could have pulled these wagons apart and made themselves some bear paws if they

were like willing. Exactly. They could have pulled these wagons apart and made themselves some deer paws if they were willing. Exactly. They could have tried. When these horses die that are pulling the carts, you're eating the horse meat. Okay, so that's one resource you're learning to not waste. But what are you doing with these wagons with all this wood and the supplies that's on them? Why not repurpose them to help you move better right it just doesn't make sense to ignore that resource again the north does not waste resources southerners

though they don't care about that they don't think of it in that way and it shows because their original eta the 15th day comes and goes they're not even halfway there they've left the road scattered with frozen corpses broken wains oh my god asha ends up winning her freedom on the 20th day of the march it's the same day that she ends up getting her leg rub from justin massey as we've discussed very very intimate leg rub and uh she's very happy because the cold thumbs her ankle very quickly within 30 seconds. And by darkness, she is yearning for her wane and her shackles again. But she has to walk on her broken ankle. And then we get this very solid piece of writing where George says that they consume

the end of the vegetables, day 26, the last of the grain, day 32. And then all they have left is raw, half is raw half frozen horse meat from the slain horses is that not an episode of the walking dead right there yeah it is it pretty much is like like how how much more do you really have to endure stannis to see that you need to change your tactics you are not punish people for cannibalism when you can't feed them right like stan is he's known for being able to lead men and being very capable of leading men during war times where the hell did all of that go when this situation comes up my guy you can't get out of your feelings so much that you're just ignoring your random failures and you can't get people back on track i need

you to get out of your head stanis i want to like you okay the realm wants to like you but you're being a bit of a fuckboy right now. I need you to not. Everyone's having a really hard time, and then, like, what? Next chapter, you have, like, a bunch of people roll up, and they're like, hello! We just came from the wall. Much further than your journey. Greetings,

everyone. Exactly. Do you want to load? Right now, things are not looking good. It's really grim grim the guides that lady glover had sent with them swear that winterfell is three days away and you know what they're probably right they're like if everyone could get their shit together stop crying yeah corliss penny's like i think we could only do it if we leave the weakest behind horp insists that the weakest are beyond saving and the strong must reach winterf or die. I don't know that we have to make that choice.

You know, everyone could just fucking put on bear paws. Oh my god. No, I do strongly believe this. Everyone put on bear paws and it'll be maybe three days away. It's really, I looked at the map. They're right, it's not that far. Then we have

this line here. Finally, after a nightmarish day when the column advanced a bare mile and lost a dozen horses and four men lord peasbury turned against the northmen this march was madness more dying every day and for what some girl ned's girl said morgan little he was the second of three sons so so the other wolves called him Middle Little, though not often in his hearing it was Morgan who had almost slain Asha in the fight by Deepwood Mott. He had come to her later on the march to beg her pardon for calling her a cunt in his battle lust, not for trying to split her head open with an axe. Ned's girl, echoed Big Bucket Wallard. We should have

had her and the castle both if you prancing southern jackanapes didn't piss your satin breeches at a little snow. Yes. So true. Honestly. Honestly, he's right. That's what we've been saying from the beginning. If y'all assholes

would just buck up and stop being whiny you could have been there stopped fighting over tents and dumb shit and i i do think it's interesting i'm gonna come back to middle littles saying his apology because i was kind of super mad at the end of last chapter i was like i can't believe that guy was calling her a cunt while fighting her she's been up all night fighting this was really hard all right she's doing an amazing job and she really was like she fought off so many people in that moment and it was such a way to punctuate that previous chapter because asha has been ruminating on how

she lost the king's mood because she's a woman and she's struggling to be taken seriously as a leader because of that and then her uncle was able to just marry her off using a seal because she's a woman even though she's like way more qualified than victorian and you're on and so so this moment i'm glad he apologized because i feel like it's a compliment coming from little he's like you know what it was bad to just reduce you to this vulgar term solely about solely about your uh reproductive parts and that he's not apologizing recognize the school yeah exactly he's not apologizing. He recognized the skill. Yeah, exactly. He's not apologizing for trying to split her head open because he's like, you were a worthy opponent.

I see it as a compliment. Game, game. Yeah? Yeah. Game of Thrones. Game recognized Game of Thrones. Indeed. Wow. Indeed. Peasbury is insulted, though, at the exchange that he has with the Northmen and then accuses,

for some reason, he accuses Big Bucketwool of being one of Ramsay's men secretly and then we get this wonderful speech between Big Bucketwool and Lord Peapod, if you were a man, I would kill you for that. But my sword is made of too fine a steel to be smushed with Kraven's blood. But he took a drink of ale and wiped his mouth. Aye, men are dying. More will die before we see Winterfell. What of it? This is war. Men die in war. This is as it should be, as it has always been." Sir Cordless Penny gave the Clan Chief an incredulous look. Do you want to die, Wool?

I want to live forever in a land where summer lasts a thousand years. I want a castle in the clouds where I can look down over the world. I want to be six and twenty again. When I was six and twenty I could fight all day and fuck all night. What men want doesn't matter. Winter is almost upon us, boy, and winter is death. I would sooner my men die fighting for the next little girl than alone and hungry in the snow, weeping tears that freeze upon their cheeks. No one sings songs of men who die like that. As for me, I am old. This will be my last winter. Let me bathe in Bolton blood before I die. I want to feel it splatter across my face when my axe bites deep into a Bolton skull. I want to lick it off my lips and die with the taste of it on my tongue.

I shot in Morgan little. Blood in battle! Then all the hill men were shouting, banging their cups and drinking horns on the table, filling the king's tent with the clangor, Asher Granger are going to welcome to fight herself. Bye! So good. Oh, that's so good. Oh my god, Alicia, you did so good. I did. At the end, I was like, I'm ready, I'm ready. I'm going. I am no Valchrist, mind you. If you do not know who Valchrist is,

I would highly recommend go and looking at his channel. And this speech is one of my favorites that he's narrated. Also, the Broken Men speech and the North Remembers. Oh, that man's voice is magic. The way

he does those speeches. Please go check him out. For sure. We'll add that to the links. And that was very fun. Thank y'all for letting me do that. Of course. That was so good. I was'all for letting me do that. Of course. It was so good. I was like, damn, that's how you inspire people to fight. That's how you do a speech.

Oh, yeah. We should all be following Big Bucket Wool. Stannis need to take some cues. For real. A lot of what he was saying in terms of what they're doing here and dying in the snow and for glory kind of reminds me a lot of what's happening with Lord Manderly, another Northman. A Northman transplant from the South, hundreds, thousands of years ago.

And it reminds me of an analysis that Reddit user Militant Penguin long, long ago, years ago, back when we thought, anyways, years ago, wrote, we thought anyways, years ago wrote and how there's like this Northman culture of glory and going out in this way, glory and honor, right? Because they know that winter's coming and what that means for old men

and we see it come up a couple times in Arya's chapters and Jon's chapters, like for example Arya remembers that during the long winter, men who lived beyond their years would announce that they were going out hunting, and their daughters would weep and their sons would turn their faces to

the fire, but no one would stop them or ask what game they meant to hunt with the snow so deep and the cold wind howling. She wondered what the old Braavosi told their sons and daughters before they set off for the House of Black and White. And so that idea of they're going out. They know that, as Big Bucket Waltz says, right, he's like, this is my last winter.

So I'm going to just go out on my terms. And John thinks of something similar, right, where in the winters, the old men would gather up what strength remains in them and announce that they are going hunting. And then their bodies will be found come spring. Some are never seen again. I don't think they're going to have that luxury with the others coming but it's kind of what's going on here too, right? They're choosing their own

terms on how to go out and we actually discussed that a little with Circe and Asha in the previous chapter and these old men are doing that too. Yeah, that's a really great way to look at it and you know uh some of these several chapters put back to each other the feast at Winterfell a lot of these Clash of Kings chapters in Winterfell definitely have a lot of the same vibe even in this next bit they end up finding an abandoned crofter's village, which makes you feel like you're right back in Bran's POV, right?

Running and dodging right after Winterfell's been already sacked. They find a watchtower, a long hall, some huts. They plan to stay for the night. They decide to fish in the lakes. Stannis, though, is looking like a dead man walking. He'd already been thin before, and now his skull's shape can be seen through his skin he decides they can stop for fish but he says that they march at first light unfortunately they don't wake to light they wake to snow and silence again another silence mention

stannis looking like a skeleton it's safe to say that if you look like a skeleton in this book probably aren't gonna have a long life right like if death omens are flashing around you you're probably gonna die that is very true yeah asha awakes to allison's stores as well as the silence asha is cramped in a pile of furs and she notices that trumpets are no longer blowing to rouse them there are no war horns either and she's like something's wrong it is too quiet and yes it is too quiet we get a lot of that scene setting there with those sounds

but I also really want to call out the imagery here like I said it contrasts well with the start of the chapter with all those vibrant colors the beautiful golden dawn light because now it's yet when light came, the camp woke to snow and silence. The sky turned from black to white and seemed no brighter. The snow was still falling even more heavily than when she crawled inside the

tent. The lakes had vanished and the woods as well. She could see the shapes of other tents and lean-tos and the fuzzy orange glow of the beacon fire burning atop the watchtower, but not the tower itself. The storm had swallowed the rest. You know what that just made me think of just now?

That gave me some brand imagery. Remember when he is in the cave and he's exploring and he goes, you know, deeper and deeper in, all color seems to disappear. Oh. And everything is like in this matte black and white. Hmm. Interesting. The further he investigates.

And this does feel like Bran vibes. Okay. Yeah. further he investigates and this does feel like grand vibes okay yeah and and you know in in my opinion blood raven is probably five steps already past death you know he's got bones showing in his outside of his body but there's no blood on those bones he's not dripping blood anywhere he's all but spent but you know now there's this new green seer who's young and spry and still has all of his blood and might get trapped in a tree because he doesn't know how to come out of visions in time hey and asha got trapped by trees right and here stan is looking like the lord of death himself yeah yeah that's that's very interesting how uh blood raven and stanis look similar right now and and as you

said the the color disappearing that's a great comparison because that's something that is in this book right really helps hold everything together i thought you were gonna say like the storm swallowing the rest made me think again of Euron, right? He doesn't just have to be like a rainy storm, but the snowstorm, especially with that connotation to the others, all go together. And that storm

has now also swallowed the whole village. Stannis' host is sitting snowbound, unmoving, walled in by ice and snow. That's it. And here's King Skeleton Sten is saying, so you were saying sacrifice, were you? Tell me more of that. Because I feel like that's what might become.

Yeah. I had two thoughts about that. Like, my first thought to this whole entire ending was, oh my god, snow day. Everyone go back to bed was that just me you're the only one happy about this situation it's literally like the midwest jumped out of me i was like oh we have a snow day great uh but the real thought i had was this is the worst it's been so far right as far as weather climate etc and it's only going to get worse so like with the

rationale that it's going to get worse you agree you just said so does that mean that it's going to get worse for stannis almost definitely so with that rationale does stannis's road trip seem not great is that just me this is the worst road trip ever yeah worst planned where are the drugs ever uh euron has the drugs honey oh that's right yeah yeah euron has all that and torment's not rocking with him so they don't even have any sour goat's milk to go there davos ain't there so they don't got no fermented crab they're just fucked all around nobody has anything you know they're even out of meat they don't even have any meat anymore it's a wrap they're probably picking snow up and dumping it into a pot and boiling and drinking the hot water yum maybe i mean they're like okay i guess we'll have a little

bit of fish for a bit but yeah so everything going as it is at first there was a place that seemed a little bit like salvation and they don't quite make it to Winterfell it almost feels a little bit like the Israelites right making their crazy journey all the way to the promised land they're like we're gonna make it to Winterfell and before they can make it into the city, they're like, we're going to do it, and then things go awry. And then they're like, but what if we waited out here? Well, not what if.

God was like, you've got to wait out here for 40 years now. 40 years, you dumb idiots, for worshipping that damn calf. Yeah, now they're here at the Crofter's Village, and it's like a 40-day journey. Their 15-day journey has become like a bazillion days. Yeah, so of course their supplies are going to run out. And it's like a 40 day journey. Their 15 day journey has become like a bazillion days. Yeah. So of course their supplies are going to run out. Of course,

no one accounted for the winter or even thought to consult the North men on what they could possibly face and how to properly be prepared to navigate towards that. Now they're sitting here eating raw and frozen horse meat. I just, I feel like the Dothraki could have came over here and been way more prepared than them. Probably. Yeah, though you say that, and I imagine that this is, if this is how this goes for them, that means that we probably don't have a lot to look forward to there either, right?

Because arguably winter's going to be worse, and they will have dealt with even less of that climate and true enough but they also have folks that have dealt with winter true that are advising the leader of that expedition so i think they that they would that person is smart enough to plan accordingly. I hope so. Fingers crossed. Because otherwise you're going to have a lot of horse to eat. I mean, well, that's cold for them, isn't it, though? Yeah, it is. They already have horse to eat, so I don't know.

Maybe I... Yeah, they prefer horse. All right. Well, we are leaving this episode on a low note for Asha and Stannis and crew. Man, that was a lot. Everyone is on the verge of death. Yeah. That's not great.

Everyone's on the verge of death. Not. Well, mostly them. Everyone else around them is like, I don't know, whatever. Tycho and the Storys. We're going to make it. We're going to meet these people, right? We'll see. What's happening to everyone here?

We'll see, Tycho. We will see. Alicia, thank you so much for joining us today. Can you please tell everyone where they can find you online? Yes, indeed. I am on Twitter a fair amount. I don't live on my phone, but you can find me there. It's ak underscore ds09.

I will be doing some Lovecraft stuff on my channel, so you can check me out there. I know me and Monero are going to be talking about some stuff on her channel as well, so please go sub to her. She's already got a whole bunch of awesome videos up um i don't have a whole lot more booked that i could think of in the future hopefully some stuff will come up because i do love collaborating around the realm with uh this lovely fandom that we have so you know you know, just stay tuned. We'll see where it goes. Yeah, I think we brought it up before, but I know that you and Monero had been covering The Expanse, which, of course, I know many other A Song of Ice and Fire fans

are quite into, especially as one of them was one of George's protégés, if I'm not mistaken. And so check out their discussion and coverage on The Expanse as well as their Song of Ice and Fire discussions. Indeed, yes. And those are all on Monero Geek TV's channel. You can find them there.

Wonderful. Well, as always, thank you so much for tuning in to another episode of Girls God Canon. We will be back next week with The Sacrifice, and we will also be back with a guest. Our good friend Wendy will be joining us. Yes, we have another guest.

And you might all remember Wendy as the Wendy Nerd on Tumblr or on Twitter. And Wendy, of course, has done a lot of really great analysis on Women in a Song of Ice and Fire and, of course, on the relationship between Ned Stark and his children. So, yeah, we look forward to having her on the podcast. Can't wait to bring it up with you guys. As always, make sure you're tuning into us

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We'll get to that in a second. But Pandora, that's the new one. And I was like, I didn't know Pandora did podcasts. So those are just some of the places we might be. but Pandora that's the new one and I was like I didn't know Pandora did podcasts so apparently those are just some of the places we might be yes and as Eliana mentioned you can join us over at patreon.com

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Again, patreon.com slash girlsgonecanon and we want to thank all of our patrons for supporting us especially. Yeah, you can come watch me stream myself try to fight the same boss over and over again and die over and over again in dark souls me yes we are going to free winterfell or die in the attempt over and over and over again as always i've been one of your hosts, Chloe. And I have been another one of your hosts, Eliana.

Thank you. Thank you. Alright. Goodbye. Alright. Carry him away let's say. This is the wrong chapter, Chloe. Whatever. Ugh.

Okay, I'm stopping. Now.