Girls Gone Canon Cast - ASOIAF Episode 149 — AFFC Brienne VII

Episode Date: December 24, 2021

No chance, and no choice.  Links mentioned:  bidonica's twitter: https://twitter.com/bidonica1  bidonica's links to art and prints: https://linktr.ee/bidonicart  ---- 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

Hello, and welcome to Girls Gone Canon Reads A Song Of Ice And Fire, Episode 149, Brienne 7 In A Feast For Crows. I am one of your hosts, Chloe. And I am another one of your hosts, Eliana. Once again, we are joined by Dog this episode. Well, not actually. I'm not petting a dog. I just meant the spirit of Dog in these chapters. The spirit of Dog. Why are you trying to say Dog died? No, you tried to pull that off. No, Dog's alive. I did. You all, last week, I was like, wait, shit, is dog dead?

Did I forget if dog lived or died? And I had to look it up. Dog is still alive. Not that dog. Hallelujah. World is saved, but I was very worried. I was like, are we gonna have to eulogize dog at the end of this? A dog POV chat? Ooh. Anyways.

I mean, maybe we'll get one of those or something similar, right? In the winds of winter. Maybe like a Dogs of Aeswaf. What if we just do a dogs episode for your birthday? Oh, interesting. That's a thought. I think the horses would be better, but.

Or we could pick something else entirely. That would be fun too. I don't know. We'll see. My birthday is a while from now. We'd have to bring on some of our horse friends, you know? Yeah, my birthday is like in four years from now, you know? Jesus Christ.

Well, hello. We're excited to be doing this chapter because it is one of the greats, right? It is. This is a chilling. It's so short. The buildup is so fast and the end is crazy. It is like a kick-ass chapter. Yeah, it is.

It is. And honestly, with all the action in this chapter like if you read all the brienne chapters together as we have it makes sense the whole flow of everything and this being like the action-packed climax it all makes sense i know people are like nothing happens in chapters i'm like shut the fuck fuck up but I mean yeah I don't know honestly it's one of the tightest arcs like if you follow from 1 to 8 it is the tightest

chapter delivery it starts off it tells you everything you need right you start off you're on the night errand you're being told Brienne grew up in this manner this is how she has now gone out into the world and then you get kind of the crises that are being presented of what she cares about what she internally wants and what the people around her want and how that affects brienne

and i i just think it's so tight and this chapter is the perfect climax right like ultimate climax before next chapter which is like an underworld chapter. It's very spooky, very creepy. And I'm excited because we're bringing on a good friend to talk about it with. Bidonica, who is an amazing artist, is going to be our guest for our final Brienne chapter that's coming out next month, which is going to be out January 14th for public. 2022. Yes. 2022. Crazy. out next month which is gonna be out january 14th for public 2022 yes 2022 crazy but by donica is an amazing artist amazing artist a proclaimed jamie and brienne fan you know we have to let them have a little bit this arc a little bit gotta give them a little bit so we only give them a little

we give we give i think a lot because ourselves. We're giving to ourselves, too. I'm very excited to have Bidonica on. And, I mean, I'm always excited for all of our guests. And we've had a strong run, these Brienne chapters. Shiloh, Sam, Lo, and now Bidonica to close it out. Yeah. I've really enjoyed having all of them on. And, yeah, I don't know. I think Bidonica's a perfect person to close it out. I've really enjoyed having all of them on. And yeah, I don't know. I think

Bidonica is a perfect person to close it out with. I'm excited to hear her point of view on a lot of this and a lot of the Underworld chapter. Absolutely. And as you said, amazing artist and illustrator, and I'm glad that she could find the time to come hang and talk Brienne with us. Always love, like, I mean, I think there's a different way of interpreting things, right? Like, we saw one interpretation of Brienne from the book on the screen, and there's always something of, like, how you, the reader, are envisioning that, and you get to see

you know, really, Bidonica's view of Brienne through her art. So, very excited. If you're sitting around online looking for something to look at this holiday season, check out Bidonica's Twitter at Bidonica1. We will link if you're sitting around online looking for something to look at this holiday season check out by donica's twitter at by donica one we will link that below in the description but she has a one of those like link tree things that you can click and it takes you all over to her art we'll

link her art too she has done this awesome theon study where she penned out Theon's Clash arc and on. And it's really impressive. You've got to take a look at it. Yes. Well, what else are we bringing all of you, right? I mean, this actually, you might be like, oh, no, we're not going to have any Girls Gone Canon until 2022. But wait, there's more, kind of. There is. 2022 but wait there's more kind of there is well while brienne's chapters will be ending next month there's a new journey that's going to begin a new journey new we're taking you all on we're

doing star new hope oh my god we're doing star wars we're not doing star wars oh my god i have mental health we just do a Dune episode instead. I care about my sanity. I love Star Wars, just not to cover. But we are doing a new POV. We will be back with a new point of view. So keep an ear out for that.

If you are a patron, you'll slowly start to see that rolled out depending on your tier we start to early reveal. I think this week we're going to start early revealing for for our zorse tier and we'll move on down with the chestnut sweetfoot lightning stranger all all those guys we'll get down there you'll get it you'll get the new pov reveal and i can't wait for you to find out what it is and there's other stuff at patreon.com slash girls gone canon even if you're just like a stranger to your patron you know there's other stuff at patreon.com slash girls gone canon, even if you're just like a stranger to your patron, you know, there's a lot going on. But on Patreon, we also have another kind of different new POV. It's Patroclus from the Song of Achilles. Patroclus, I guess. I'll figure out the pronunciation eventually. But yes, we are. That is our new POV, very briefly.

eventually but yes we are that that is our new pov very briefly our new pov yes in greek mythology yeah we're doing a song of achilles by madeline miller this month over at patreon for our patrons and the stranger tier and above and i do have to say madeline miller also just announced that she's doing a persephone book yeah. Yeah, like two days ago. You know I'm lit right now, right? I'm like, yeah, sad girls for Persephone. We're out here. We're excited. Bust out the pomegranates, everyone. Good time to do it too. We'll probably cover that one too. Yeah, you and I, you and I, we are recording this on the winter solstice so what a time yeah yeah persephone it up release that pomegranate not bow and marsh different pomegranate yeah no not that pomegranate um i do like pomegranates though just in general yeah agreed annoying though i would have got a

lot of work yeah i would have gotten trapped in the underworld i would have been like fuck yeah i love pomegranates i'm worried because you could be kidnapped real easy i know i'm like let's invite strangers of course pomegranates yeah i'll eat strange food anyways please nobody do this to me don't kidnap eliana please my god please do not Please do not. Please, my children. They're hungry. Yeah, if you wanted to hang out benignly, you can do so on the internet on Discord. Patrons over in the Thunder tier and above have access to

our Discord, where we hang out, we chat, once a month we do a brunch slash happy hour with get to know yous and icebreaker games. It's really fun. We have a great time over there discussing everything, not just Song of Ice and Fire, other books, other shows, including His Dark Materials, right? The other series that we do cover, which we do want to put out there that we will not have an episode of His Dark Materials to close out 2021. However, we'll return with the Amber Spyglass

the first week of the new year so if you're looking for those episodes in your feeds keep an eye peeled for that we'll be back with our friend cassidy to cover the next few chapters yes we are going to soar into the new year fly into the new year with our good friend cassidy who loves birds in the way that I love dogs. Actually, no, way more. Cassidy's like actually an expert on birds. I like I'm like, yeah, this is a fluffy dog. I mean, that's expertise in its own way. But absolutely. So that's how we're gonna kick off. I'm excited. I'm very thrilled. Very thrilled about that. Love Cassidy, love birds. Love HD. Good stuff. good stuff read his dark materials if you're looking

for something to read this holiday season you've already read a song of Achilles and you're caught up for the patreon episode read his dark materials I beg you it's great it's really great there's a his dark materials trilogy right which is the one that came out long ago during my youth and now

there is a current like sequel series sandwich series right of the books of dust and the third book of dust is i it's around the corner i'm pretty sure like there's they're putting things out feels like gears are turning is what i've heard um that's been a buzz we've had a thing for webinars during the pandemic and the big last webinar i attended with pullman on it or an interview he was doing he said he was in the hundreds page wise on that last book so yeah a lot and it has a great faithful adaptation a very faithful tv adaptation exists i think yeah mostly very faithful yeah yeah or bbc if you are across the pond, you know, from the homeland of the His Dark Materials books.

Unlike, I mean, George R.R. Martin, you know, he's American. He's one of ours. One for each. One for each. All right. Well, that is our housekeeping for this episode for brienne seven let's jump on into our lightning round eliana what did we miss between brienne six and brienne seven in a feast for crows we missed circe seven circe allows loris to lead a dragon stone against

marjorie's protests later she gives Feliz to Qyburn. Jaime 5. Jaime listens to hard truths from both his cousin Davin and Aunt Jenna. We have this new character, Cat of the Canals. By day, she sells clams. By night, she sells secrets. Arya takes revenge against a brother of the Watch, returning to the House of Black and White, and then wakes without vision. Samwell 4. A rum-filled eulogy leads Sam and Gilly to celebrate life together. Cersei 8. Cersei remembers a prophecy told long ago by Maggie the Frog, and hatches a new plan to rid herself of her Tyrell daughter-in-law. hatches a new plan to rid herself of her tyrell daughter-in-law i just have to add as a side there that i love the beginning of cersei there of cersei seven that you know she's like yeah take felice i never want to see her again kyburn and then the very end of cersei eight she's like wait so is it

like too late to use felice for my own bidding and kyburn's like girl it was too late like that night what are you doing what are you doing cersei she was gone the moment you gave yeah you gave her away how do you think this works that brings us to brienne seven in a feast for crows seven brienne thought again despairing she had no chance against seven she knew knew. No chance and no choice. I never even clocked that all of that language comes here in the seventh chapter. Interesting. Beautiful. Poetry. A mile from the crossroads they come across a corpse, hanging from a dead tree with lightning scars across it the crows had eaten his face the wolves his legs and the block of salt is in the corpse's mouth what imagery the crows had eaten his face the wolves his legs a block of salt in his mouth

i think this is some very obvious retribution for two things not only is it retribution for what has happened at Salt Pans, but also for guests right at the Red Wedding, right? It's also guests right at the Red Wedding, we see that there's Lannisters and wolves and fray outfits amongst this crowd as we go on. And it's kind of not just punishment and retribution, but it's also a warning, right? When we see how these orphans and how the brotherhood without banners have kind of propped open and created their own economy their own little world in the middle of war in the middle of all this desolation this is a warning sign to

deter people from the inn a line of defense not unlike the snowmen right uh in castle black the snowmen on the walls but this is to deter people from the inn where the last defense is these children with crossbows and gendry that's a great comparison the snowmen i forgot about that and also i think this explanation makes a lot of sense because i was wondering like why are they putting just blocks of salt in these corpses mouths right for it to be a message regarding the salt pans and as you pointed out the guest right at the red wedding with that like salt and bread because i was like that's an that's kind of expensive probably like salt is a sought after commodity

yeah especially with winter coming on and the harvest being over like there's no more harvest you have to preserve what you have left it not only is it salt in the mouth like awful i mean like a horrible thing right uh and imagery wise for the betrayal but also yeah this is right now you need that salt so you're actually being so petty purposefully yeah in this moment right like you're paying for pettiness it's insane yeah so very interesting sent a message it absolutely does as we see in this chapter and regarding messages just for the reader i wonder if like the dead tree covered in lightning scars right it kind of is a little reminiscent of barak our lightning lord oh yeah yes it is Yes, it is. It is.

And I love that that's like, especially when we have these weirwoods and alongside this, originally with Feast and Dance having originally been joined, you get to think about Theon a lot in this chapter. There's a lot of Theon chapters reflecting here. Theon dance chapters are just all over this to me, this here chapter. So that scarred tree representing Berak and i'm thinking of like the weirwood and bran and blood raven and their weirwood being the bodied tree as well i love it i love that barak is sitting over all of this 100 percent heil checks out the corpses and he comes

back with a half helm he offers it to podrick who'samish, and he complains the helm has worms in it. Heil's like, you're squeamish as a girl. Shut up, Heil. Saying, worms wash out, and Brienne scowls at him. We were all scowling at Heil, but also, it's funny that he says that, because it reminds me a little bit of Arya, right? Because seeing that Pod is squeamish as a girl, just because he doesn't want to be around worms, I'm like, well, we know a little girl who's like, hell yeah, worms, I'm gonna eat it, and...

Is it Arya or is it Chloe? No one knows. Yeah, I'm like... Worms! This is how you get trapped in the underworld, Arya. Don't just eat things. I didn't really think about that with the kindly man, but the hell, I mean, the fact that there's like a skull still in it. Exactly.

Being eaten by the worms. There's so much death imagery. That and later we get the maggot color of the maggot white of Rourj's face. Yeah, right? Ew. So gross. The worms are all over this chapter. After all of this little exchange, hardly a hundred yards go by without

a corpse and each wears a noose of hemp and rope and each has a block of salt in its mouth some are cloaked in gray blue crimson faded by the rain and sun some have badges axes arrows salmon pine tree oak leaf beetles bantams bo, boar's head, tridents. And Brienne realizes that, ah, these are all the broken men. Swollen in death, faces gnawed and rotten, they all look the same. On the gallows tree, all men are brothers. Brienne had read that in a book, though she could not recall which. It's a great follow-up to the chapters we just came from of the Quiet Isle, where all of the men were buried together, regardless of their allegiances in life. But it's also interesting context when you put it alongside these ongoing discussions about the maesters, right? And allegedly giving up their stations in life and becoming all like one and part of this order in the

complementary book to A Feast for Crows, A Dance of Dragons. And also in regards to what's going on with the Night's Watch. I didn't really think about the Night's Watch in this. And now that I think about it a little bit more, it does. The intentional placement of these men being hanged with the salt in their mouths. It reminds me a little bit of Jon as these character arcs are aligning in similar areas in some aspects, choosing to hang the men at the wall, and then changing to sword for Janos. And that key kind of difference in specifically choosing to hang people, and then changing your mind saying no sword and what a sword death means versus a gallows death. I think there's a lot of, especially for Brienne,

who has a lot of choices she's making, and a lot of choices she doesn't have to make because they are made in the moment for her in this chapter, that intentional killing. And it also brings to mind another book that kind of runs parallel to this book in some aspects, which is the sworn sword, right? Duncan Egg. there's a lot

of gallows talk throughout duncan egg and there's this one line i'll talk a little more about duncan egg and gallows later but there is this one line that i find interesting where egg says the king's law gives lords the power of pit and gallows on their own lands and we see uh rowan weber have to execute haha no pun intended that and utilize that uh against osgrave on her lands and as we watch these children these orphans and gendry and the like kind of protecting them and then the brotherhood as the outer ring of protection you kind of see that they've created their own lands like i said their own system their own kind of lordships they're all little lords and ladies with the brotherhood as their protection and their seven gods around them their lord of light uh i think that's interesting that

they're kind of carving out and creating what they can of this destruction and desolation as their own home and their own system and their own laws with power of pit and gallows going on yeah that is really interesting and they also get to choose like who who they'll allow to stay here right who they'll give quarter to and who they won't so i really like that interpretation of them kind of having ownership over this place it's really sad that they have to because they are like literally children but um absolutely uh and something else i realized as i was like reading through this again and then coming back to the point you're saying about its sons of message and and all these hanging these hanged men right reminds me a little of what the masters did and then what

daenerys does in response with the crucifying of those people. That's interesting because I was also thinking a lot of these chapters end in the feast dance area in such similar, like you have that fire and ice in each ending. You have Quentyn dying with the O. You have corpses are really littering a lot of this and it made me think of Barristan at the end of dance with the corpses being thrown over the wall. Oh, right, right. At Meereen. littering a lot of this and it made me think of baristan at the end of dance with the corpses being thrown over the wall oh right right yeah yeah marine like this is not unlike that in some aspects like this is kind of this is the really gruesome messaging yeah this is the vibe everywhere yeah all over planetos planetos

heil identifies these guys as the men who had raided salt pans and mirabal says may the father judge them justly so it's good to see septon mirabal and show a little bit of that bite here because he was sent right or the elder brother was like um you're gonna have to go absolve sir quincy of his sins because i couldn't do it and as we know sir quincy also bears culpability in the destruction that we're seeing right now, right, for his failure to protect the people at the salt pans, and so I kind of like this character detail,

this moment from Maribald where he's like showing that he too has it in him to be judgy. Yeah. There is, like, it's interesting because he says well i'm off to do this and the elder brother is very quick to show that spitefulness of like well that guy fucking sucked so good luck with that job i'm surprised you can do that i wouldn't be going there

yeah and the idea of like there are better people to be helping yeah exactly which i will say in some aspects this brings us right back though to people like sandor or jamie who were still worth helping you know even though they were seen as monsters for some of their really unforgivable crimes like holding a knife to a girl's neck or you know throwing a kid out of a tower i can see that these could be akin to each other right slicing micah yeah up his seams i get it i mean different people right have different things that they're willing to i guess look past forgive yeah forgive or whatever because i mean the elder brother gloss over yeah

the elder brother might not be able to forgive it but we're seeing brienne might be able to understand it too right like some of the things that you discuss yes um septon marabald can maybe find it in him to show mercy to these people but maybe but he cannot hear right those who raided the salt pans just as the elder brother cannot and it's because again marabald has that personal connection with the septon so perhaps he wouldn't feel so strongly maybe he would maybe he wouldn't right if it weren't for him being so close to the septon at the salt pan so it's interesting how that perspective changes brienne though isn't so worried about who all of these men were but she is worried about uh who's going around hanging people who hanged them i do think you should wonder that brienne that does seem like a problem you would want to know about. She had heard that the noose was

Beric Dondarrion's brand of execution and that he may be near. Dog and Septon Mirabal seem anxious to move ahead, and they put on some miles until the wood gives way to muddy fields and clouds of crows. There's a brief moment, though, where Heil Hunt says that these are the kind

of people most improved by death, and I do find that interesting in the context we were talking about forgiveness just now in the context, especially of the hound, in this idea of second chances. Has the hound, quote unquote, being dead, is he improved by that, right? By, yeah, that second chance, or even as we see Aaron Damper, who's part of this story, Theon, and perhaps even soon brienne that atonement and that like you've been talking about the last couple episodes that chance at rehabilitation right like changing those behaviors and when we see through mirabal and the elder brother like

not only changing those uh chances of rehabilitation that they would never get in a normal world of westeros like our everyday orbital world of Westeros would not provide them that chance. So giving them that, will that improve them? It is an interesting, it reminds me a little bit of the nurture versus nature with Joffrey that we talked about before on the cast a little. Just like, you know, if Joffrey's dad was not king robert baratheon and queen cersei lannister what could have been different probably even jamie would have done a bang-up job you know i mean bang he already did a bang-up job uh but maybe he would have done another bang

up job he might he was probably gonna be better i I don't know. Who knows? Who knows? Just thoughts. Well, they come across more hanged men. Brienne, though, akin to what you were saying, says to herself, they were evil, but it still makes her feel sad. She still feels sympathy and sorrow for them. None of these men have a hound's helm. Very few actually have helms at all. have a hound's helm very few actually have helms at all and i thought that was such a very quiet indicator right of class for them that few of them have helms few of them had any protection on the field uh the helm that we do find is a lannister helm so it goes to show you who i mean

think about what they have for war supplies you know when you get to the end of the line and they're out of helms they're out of the good, they're out of the good armor, they're out of good swords, not for the poor. So it's kind of just sad. They were just thrown into it. Absolutely. And it also gives you a sense of who the class as well, right, of those who are stealing the helms, if any of them had helms and it's stolen because, you know, as Brienne realizes, a lot of these are broken men, as are those who are doing some of the hangings. It's an ongoing cycle of just fucked up shit. Podrick asks where they'll be staying for the night, and Maribald seizes on this pretty eagerly.

He tells them they're staying at the Old Inn. Well, this is an inn with many names, the many named inn. Raised during Jaehaerys's reign, it's said he and Alysanne had slept here, and then it was called Two Crowns in their honor, until an innkeep built a belt tower, and it changed to the Bellringer Inn. Later, Jon Heddle, Long Jon Heddle, a crippled knight, took up the inn, and ironworking. John forged a new sign, a three-headed black dragon of black iron. When the wind blew it clanked, and so it was called the Clanking Dragon.

So I wanted to bring in something that we've actually learned from our other series, the historic materials read-through as well as slash this actually comes more from like the book of dust trilogy where we learned a bit more about very very old inns and establishments and namings and it's kind of fun to see how the name of this place has evolved over time it's the case for many establishments right especially those that are like hundreds of years old or that have histories for example the book the there's a boat in the book La Belle Sauvage, and that's named for an establishment that is called La Belle Sauvage that, if you do some research, we talked about it in one of our episodes of it used to maybe like look like this, right? Have an actual bell, etc. So you can see how a lot of these places, they rely on objects

and symbols to have its name recognized and then that changes over and over but it's very still tangible right it's bell and then a bell ringer right a sign with a dragon clanking dragon or two crowns maybe they used to have a picture of two crowns or something right like these are important markers for people to understand the names of places and it's really important because few folks would have been literate so it's got that symbol to stand in there but of course there's that other aspect right

that many have pointed out before us of the black dragon rusting and turning red and how that might be a sort of hint towards Aegon VI's true colors let's see his true colors um wow i actually i didn't really think about this in this length i really love and i and i love that the agon six of course is such a great

connection to draw this history to modern a song of ice and fire as well and i think there's something so great about the history of this inn as its names start to change and as like the ownership changes and your kind of talk of agon six made me think about stay with me we're gonna get a little symbolism tinfoil on this one okay uh is there is there almost some north foreshadowing in this and why I think that? I do think there's a lot of Jaehaerys and Alysanne in what's going to happen in the North in the end of the true dream for spring, right? Of resettling the gift that Jaehaerys and Alysanne had originally gifted to the North.

Um, so that's one thought I'm having. Two crowns this is kind of a connection that i think i'm thinking mostly of because of the show in some of the costume design in having two wolves on sansa's final crown in rob's outfits with the two wolves and bran his outfits with the wolves at the collarbone there are two just kind of closing it and each side of him yes two wolves but yeah two crowns also makes me think about two swords as in ice being split into two swords and then you have the talk of the tower and later long john heddle a crippled knight uh taking up the inn and iron working and i don't know it just makes me think

about possibly like resettling of the north resettling of the gift there's a lot of that that i'm thinking of this chapter and like you said agan six's true colors john snow's true colors in reflection of that um the clanking dragon you know i i just like that just reminds it just some of that it makes me wonder maybe some of some northern foreshadowing is amidst this chapter as well the two crowns and the two two crowns as in bran and sansa yeah yeah and the splitting of the of westeros i i see it and like i mean i strongly believe you know i remember after season 8, Season 8, and I was like, oh, yes, of course. I mean, there were so many theories, right, that ice would be reforged. And I realized, I was like, oh, yeah, that was symbolizing the split.

And then as you said, the two crowns. Interesting. Something going on there. And it would be around here, right? It would be around in this area because this is the riverlands so yeah yeah i mean it's something and even with uh and we'll talk about this later fire and blood right the resettling of the riverlands and fire and blood i think now i want to reread that if only because uh after war the trident and everything and lady sam

i'd like to reread some of that now because i think there is a lot there especially through the cattle and brienne chapters and these perspectives we're having on the riverlands and the war going on across the riverlands the crownlands the trident this area uh i think there's something more that's going to be settled score wise as we get through these books we have to return to the riverlands and the Riverlands have to come back in a meaningful way. I think Fire and Blood is really showing us that. It's like, everything is the Riverlands, dude. Like, this is a huge

area because of the lateral just space it fills. Just across the Riverlands, it is the war. Oh my god. I don't remember all the words. Tell me more about Long John Heddle. Long John Silver. His reign here with his Long John Silver and his bell tower.

Well, Long John Heddle. But when the smith's son grew older, a bastard son of Aegon IV, as you all know, rose up against his brother, takes a black dragon for his sigil. You all know this story because you're all nerds. That's why you're listening to our podcast. We are too. Lord Derry owned the lance and was highly loyal to his lord. Chloe looks so aghast.

But she shouldn't be, right? Because, I mean, he cut down the dragon post and casts it into the river. And one of the heads of the dragon eventually washes up. Years later, on, interestingly, the quiet isle, it is red with rust, and the innkeep never ended up hanging another sign. So they just called it the River Inn, you know, whatever, it's the River Inn now. And the rooms are kind of, like, over the water, so guests can, like, even fish out of their windows. It sounds like a very deluxe like hotel experience. There's a lot of great Blackfire and Targaryen talk.

You brought up the Aegon Six thoughts, you know, but it does also remind me a little bit of the Sworn Sword. The whole backdrop of Dunk and Egg, kind of the actual conflict comes that it starts as peacetime and then the black fire rebellion rises in dunk's story brienne's in her sworn sword era arguably i'd say brienne is going off in her sworn sword era as dunk she's no longer the hedge knight right graduated a book and there's actually a moment dunk feels a ton of guilt because he's taking the spot of arlen's squire after the blackfire rebellion and he takes some spots of some people that have died that shouldn't have died even saying the name made dunk feel vaguely guilty i stole his place only princes and great lords had the means to keep two squires if agan the unworthy had given his sword to his heir, Daeron, instead of the bastard,

Daemon, there might never have been a Blackfyre Rebellion, and Roger of Pennytree might be alive today. He would be a knight somewhere, a truer knight than me. I would have ended on the gallows, or been sent off to the Night's Watch to walk the wall until I died. Dunk feels so much guilt, and it on a like the guilt Brienne's feeling lately, right? We're seeing her feel really guilty, a little dark, things are not going great. I imagine she's facing some of that same imposter syndrome with her Oathkeeper sword, as we're seeing as well. I think it's great George has looped this in so much. The sworn sword, a lot of those plot points definitely come to the surface that are being looked at and nodded at in this chapter. And especially considering the mystery knight

comes next in the series of the three books. So if this is her sworn sword era, the mystery knight is her next era. Okay. It makes me think of Dunk with his shield, right? He has the gallows shield in a mystery knight. Dunk had not had time to have it painted with his elm and shooting star so it still bore the arms of its last owner a hanged man swinging grim and gray beneath a gallows tree it was not a sigil he would have chosen for himself but the shield had come cheap he even enters in the tourney in mystery night as the gallows knight and then there's this line that is said to him by maynard plum maynard plum maynard it's blood raven it's fucking blood raven uh blood raven says to him while in disguise and i think this is coming back for brian right now

the most would you rather die with honor intact or live with it besmirched no spare me i know what you will say take your boy and flee gallows night before your arms become your destiny interesting this is this is great i the way you've tied together i i forgot the gallows night story i gotta do too it's like i mean clearly you did it because you brought it into this chapter i had to do a little rereading i had to do a little rereading sharpen up you know i'm pretty smart but i'm not like memorized every other line just mostly every other paragraph but yeah and then as as you've likened dunk here right feeling like he's taken this place of arlen squire it's a lot of that survivor's guilt also not just the imposter syndrome but a little bit of that and we see that brienne is also feeling

a lot of that i think we saw it a lot at the end of last chapter, as Brienne goes over in their mind, like, all the, all of these things that have happened, and also when it came to Nimble Dick Crab, too, so, like, very interesting. Well, Septon Meribald explains to Brienne that, yes, yes, but the river moved 70 or 80 years ago. Erosion, you know, rivers are like that. Old Masha Heddle's grandfather kept the place and she is who had given him this history lesson.

He calls her a kindly woman who was fond of sour leaf and honey cakes and that she would let him sleep at the hearth when she had no vacancy for him and even give him stale cakes, bread, cheese to take on his way. But unfortunately, as we know, Masha Heddle had been hanged by the lions and one of her nephews tried to reopen the inn, but the roads were too dangerous. He brought in some sex workers, but that didn't actually help the business

and then some lord killed him. Sir Heil made a wry face. I never dreamed keeping an inn could be so deadly dangerous. It is being commonborn that is dangerous when the great lords play their game of thrones, said

Septon Mirabold. Isn't that so, dog? Roar! Dog barked in agreement. Wow. You know know just pop it out right now give her the award thank you two characters two characters and when i say that the performances were so emotional critics are saying all over the world that the portrayal of dog in girls gone canons episode 149 brienne 7 and a feast for crows they are just they're not even saying they're just crying it's just tears i read it in the new yorker of laughter i'm just

like feeling in this dog moment you know i'm like yeah dog make that political statement i'm like i feel like the fire elbow gift i'm like dog dog i did feel like his agreement was the most important part but yeah you can't overlook this classic you know line this is the line like first of all he said the thing he fucking said the thing i mean maybe maybe the creators of the hit hbo experience game of thrones named it that because of this line because of how you know just inherently important it is to the series maybe i mean if they really understood the books that they would have fucking included dog okay they cut out all these characters but they cut out the main character whatever yeah of course

i'm mad that they cut out agon but i'm real mad they cut out dog no you're right a dog should have been included and that that's true you can quote Eliana and me on that. Arianne Martell. They're fine, but dog? Dog. We need a dog. Dog? Dog. All right. Well, now, now, in the in the current time, modern 2021, the inn is called the Crossroads Inn. And two of Masha's nieces have actually opened it once more. Hi, old jokes, he says. They could call

it the Gallows Inn. There's your gallows again. They come upon it, and it's large. It's three stories above the roads. Walls, turrets, chimneys. And the chimneys are made of white stone. So it's very bold against the gray sky. Reminds me now a little White Walls, just because you brought up

the Mystery Knight. It's White Walls. I love that. We visit what they found at salt pants right we do a little backtrack george rr martin style the fairy took them there from quiet isle and the survivors had all fled the dead given to the ground and the town itself remained ashen unburied the air still smelled of smoke and the cries of the seagulls floating overhead sounded almost human like the lamentations of lost children damn i never think of seagulls like that but you know good for him you know what it kind of makes me think of summer hall i'll see myself out oh with the air smelling of smoke and the lost children yeah

i see you sad i'm sad my god it's a sad chapter it's like it's it's an intense chapter it's sad but also very moving yeah at the end you know with um brian's heroism. Well, and I mean, that's that is kind of, as we get there, it's very Dunkish. Dunkish. Two Cs. Well, nothing moved on its battlements but banners. It took a quarter hour until a woman appeared

asking their business, asking for shelter for the night, but she had told them to be gone, and that the closest inn is at the crossroads. Nothing would bring her back to the door, so they sheltered in the woods that night. But there is life when they get to the inn. As they near, they hear a faint hammering of steel. It seems that the inn has an active forge. Heil hopes that they have an active kitchen as well and craves a crisp roast chicken. They approach the inn where four girls are waiting on the porch. The youngest, two and naked, and the oldest, nine of ten, are guarding the little one.

Heil asks them to get their mother and there's like an awkward moment and they're like, Our mom's fucking dead. Our mom got killed, Heil Hunt. Yeah, the other ones are like, I just don't have a mom, whatever. Yeah, I mean, theirs died too. Yeah, or abandoned them. anything good times this is an in of fun the eldest girl steps forward demanding to know who they are and brienne says we're honest travelers we just need somewhere to shelter and introduces them all the hammeringing suddenly stops. The girl looks them over, introduces herself as Willow and asks if they will want beds. Heil asks if she's the innkeep and she's like, no, my sister Jane is, but she's not here. And then she says that all they have is horse meat

to eat. They're fresh out of sex workers, but they do have beds, some feather, some straw. She asks if they'll be paying with silver, and Heil laughs at them. And Heil's like, are you trying to rob me? Willow eyes the donkey and its bundle of supplies, and she's like, where'd you get the food? Maribald responds they got it in Maidenpool, and Heil asks if they question all of their guests this way. Heil has some I-would-like-to-speak-to-the-manager energy going on, and I do not like it. Where is your Bob, your stacked A-line Bob, Heil Hunt? Would you like to speak to the manager energy going on and i do not like it where is your bob your stacked a-line bob heil hunt would you like to speak to the manager these are the managers you motherfucker you won't like the other manager because the other manager is lady stoneheart

that's true yeah i mean they he eventually gets that right he eventually does get to speak to the manager but that's the next chapter. Willow explains they don't often have visitors. It's when sparrows are worse. And a boy's voice comes through from the stables and adds thieves and robbers, and we have this line of when that boy emerges, and it's Brienne turned and saw a ghost.

Renly. No hammer blow to the heart could have felled her half so hard. My lord? She gasped. Lord? The boy pushed a lock of black hair that had fallen across his eyes. I'm just a smith. He is not Renly, Brienne realized. Renly is dead. Renly died in my arms, a man of one in twenty. dead. Renly died in my arms, a man of one and twenty. This is only a boy. This is so sad, right? Because Brienne, like, she looks at him and she sees a ghost and she sees suspicion and anger in his eyes. And she thinks this is not warm, like Renly's eyes welcoming. And even their facial hair is different. And the way she's seeing Gendry versus renly it's interesting because gendry has

actually been through a lot right he's also seen war very much up close it was not games and dining at bitter bridge for gendry he's gone through a lot of hardships out here and he's become hardened through it he's not the same boy that we met in the Arya chapters. And seeing the ghost of Renly in the next chapter, she sees a literal ghost, right? Renly is still kind of romanticized and she still really feels hurt at his loss. And her role in that, however small, which I think is small or big, in her opinion, that role was, but it actually is stoneheart in the next chapter we're here renly's gone renly's ghost which you'll talk about i'm sure today renly's ghost coming up in other ways personified is gone but this is an actual ghost of a human being that was in her life and influential shit gets real absolutely i mean brian has many ghosts now at this time right like again that's that's gone over a little at the end of last chapter and renly's definitely one of them and yeah yeah

absolutely and i you've pointed out one actual literal ghost that we're gonna get in a way stoneheart or zombie depending on how people care about that but speaking of bastards who are ghosts i mean in all likelihood we're gonna get another royal bastard who is gonna be also a ghost right john ah uh-huh uh-huh i didn't even think of that yeah that's good that's good i mean that is a ghost john have a lot yeah they got stuff in common yeah yeah and like you right, he's been hardened through all this stuff. I mean, look at what it did to Arya. Arya's like, yeah, we kill people now. And Gendry's like, what the fuck?

Anyway, so, Faribault says they mean no harm, explaining, Masha used to always give him a honey cake when he would visit. But Gendry says that she's dead. The lions hanged her. Hyle adds that hanging seems to be the favorite sport around here, that if he lived here, he'd plant hemp and sell rope and make a fortune. Fucking right-wing capitalist Heil Hunt. I swear to fucking God.

I'm waiting for the perks of Heil Hunt to come up in this chapter. When do you think I'm going to see them? I'm not entirely sure. He's got comedic relief there's that i guess and amidst everything else yeah funny he's so funny i don't know i don't know eliana i'm just waiting for the perks to start happening men are funny i guess men are funny brienne asks willow if all these children are her kin. Willow's like, no, they're orphans. They come here on their own, or the sparrows bring them. She sizes Brienne up, a familiar feeling, unfortunately, for Brienne, and says, if you're a woman, why are you dressed like a man? impacts Brienne in the past few chapters, and obviously, you know, I guess Brienne's unfortunately used to it, but Meribald steps up to the plate once more and tells Willow that, oh, Brienne is

a warrior maid, using the same term as from last chapter, and that she needs a room. He asks if they have rooms for them, and the boy says no, but Willow says yes, arguing with Gendry that these people have food, and we're gonna fucking get this food, the little ones are hungry. She stamps her foot, and as if by magic, ragged boys and girls just pop out and appear.

Some of them also are clutching crossbows, which are just wound up and loaded. Then Heil jokes Heil's got a lot of names for this inn. Heil now jokes that they should call it the crossbow inn but internally brianne thinks that orphan inn is more apt i do love his little names for the inns they're kind of funny i'll give him that that's you know what a quarter of a point all right this is the contribution yeah this is it this is finally the true he is redeemed in my

eyes and i love the imagery of the ragged boys and girls popping up i guess if we're thinking in universe it is directly parallel to various right with his little birds popping up with the knives yeah i think the end of you know kevan's doom at the end of dance is kind of akin to these children but also the survivalism of it all for these children it's very peter pan and wendy in some aspects, right? That, like, Peter Pan shows up and takes out the Darling family for a ride in the sky because they're children and they're never

going to grow up. And the Brotherhood shows up to protect them in some ways, right? Like, these are, like, the lost children. It's so sad that Willow and Jane are just trying to, like, take care of them. Who's going to take care of Willow and Jane, right? Brienne in this chapter, at least. But who trying to like take care of them who's gonna take care of willow and jane right brienne in this chapter at least but who's gonna take care of brienne god it's very stressful i do like the slight dichotomy being presented of willow and jane as these variations

of aria and sansa as we'll talk about for for her thinking jane could be aria there's also something in the personalities, right? Like Sansa being the bossy lady telling people what to do throughout the chapter, and also a protective sister and lady of the people, while Arya's there with the crossbow. There's even something with what we were talking about a little bit earlier, it kind of got me thinking with the two crowns and a lot of the other stuff going on in the start of the chapter.

It makes me think about resettling the gift in how the riverlands is torn to shreds in the war and these two girls are resettling this patch of land right and not unlike aria sansa maybe bran and john in the north rebuilding the north resettling the gift and the riverlands again in fire and blood and the riverlands in tiw in Fire and Blood, and the Riverlands in Tiwau and Adas, I guess. What they're doing is really interesting here. Jane and Willow, and I like

the idea of how it ties into what we might get one day. I'm fine. Well, Willow begins to throw out directions. Help them with the horses. Put down the rock. Get one for the fire. Help the septon with the bundles. Willow

takes them to their rooms, which end up being three rooms that all join together, with feather beds, chamber pots, and windows. Brienne even has a hearth. She lets Podrick stay with her this time, as they're no longer at the Quiet Isle. They mean to leave secretly, just the two of them tomorrow. This is Brienne's plan, because Brienne loves ghosting. Brienne did this before, too, stay with her this time as they're no longer at the quiet aisle they mean to leave secretly just the two of them tomorrow this is brienne's plan because brienne loves ghosting brienne did this

before too if you'll remember yeah she does and if only they had if only they had she ghosts uh the merchants in the start exactly exactly well maribold planned to go out to Lord Harroway's town with Doug and the elder brother convinced Brienne that they wouldn't find Sansa on the trident so they planned to leave while Hyle was still asleep

as she had not forgiven him yet for Highgarden and all those hijinks and as he said he swore no vows about Sansa Stark. Podrick then asks where they're going to go next, but Brienne quite literally has no clue. The crossroads could take them anywhere to the Vale, to Riverrun, or the North,

through the next bogs, or to Winterfell. There's a lot of choices, and honestly, like, there's not many clues to go on. I get it, I get it, you know? Again, Brienne's getting better at this. Or they could go south. Slink back to King's Landing, relinquish Jaime's magical sword, and find a ship to take them home, having failed.

But some part of them yearn for evenfall, for their father. The other part of them wonders if Jaime would comfort them, and should she weep upon him. And she thinks that's what men wanted wasn't it soft helpless women that they needed to protect I love this being placed

in the center of the chapter before we get to the crazy ending right as we get there or she could go south and just admit she's failed and go home and do what society wants her to do and it's like what she just said she's been through so much in these seven chapters it's like it's not it's especially earlier when we're thinking about the whites a little bit like it's not every human wants comfort like if you've been through a bunch of trauma look at sam's chapter with sam and gilly and sam you know even in his fear of it kind of

choosing love you know choosing like i'm gonna comfort gilly and try to just celebrate life because we could be dead dude we could be really dead i could be dead we could all be dead uh everyone wants comfort it's not weakness to want to be comforted after having a horrible time and it also reminds me this exactly is her becoming catalan for this moment right it's just like what catalan says i want to weep i want to be comforted i'm so tired of being strong i want to be foolish and frightened for once just for a small while that's all a day an hour and the way that uh you know wanting to escape is a actually better for heil and them in some aspects heil might stand a chance right to not suffer for her crimes which happens in the

next chapter or be taken but also everybody is telling her this is what people want what soft women really are like they're this wanting comfort doesn't equate you to being a soft woman especially in the face of what brienne is able to pull courage out of themselves and do at the end of this chapter and like flip off the fucking societal view of that and say no i'll do what a mother does, the same as Catelyn. I'll protect, right? The ferocity. Absolutely. And it even reminds me of, I mean, it feels like a path to becoming, again, a broken man on Brienne's part. That desire for comfort and finding nowhere that offers it. And, like, it even reminds me of Brienne's relative, your fave, your boy, Sandor.

I mean, you specifically. Me specifically. My boy. Your boy. Your boy. Yes, your boy, Chloe. Sandor. And, I mean, like, that's what he wanted, right?

He wanted comfort. And so few people offered him that except for Sansa. And he's, like, according to many, you know? Like, here he's a feared figure he's image of like manly man to so many people across westeros he isn't joffrey joffrey's like wow so cool sandra clagin um yeah i took the song she never gave it why would you say this aliana You really hurt my feelings tonight. I didn't even think we were going to go into it, but here we are.

I thought this is what you wanted, to talk about Sandra. I clearly have misread. Just because I write about dogs for you doesn't mean I want you to write about dogs for me, okay? I did it all wrong. No, I'm just kidding. I didn't really think of him in that. But it's true i mean i don't know maybe after the trauma of reliving what in your childhood you know ailed you and by ailed you i mean traumatized the shit out of you having to relive it all the time like maybe that's

enough to just want a fucking hug once in a while dude someone hug him yeah yeah and it also sorry one last time one more person who wants to comforted paralleling at a similar time perhaps in in their stories is daenerys right in the the wilderness yeah alone and when she finally thinks i i was only a young girl right she she turns it you know when they finally invert it, right, in Daenerys 10 in A Dance of Dragons, where she realizes and is like, I just wanted friends. I'm only a young girl. So. Yeah.

The lone, I mean, and that's the same, right? Like, Brienne is only a young girl. She's lonely. This is a lonely road she's choosing. Yeah, compared to me, also. Brienne's quite young. They head to the common room, which is crawling with orphans. The tables are pushed together, three long rows.

Gendry was the closest thing to a man-grown, but yet Willow shouts the orders, as if a queen in her castle, and the other children are merely servants. Brienne starts to wonder, is Willow someone more important? She's too young to be Sansa, but maybe the right age for Arya. Catelyn said she lacked her sister's beauty. Okay, Brienne, listen, be nice. Brown eyes, brown hair, skinny. Could it be? Brienne was not sure of the color of Arya's eyes, though. Maybe she didn't dye at salt pans. So close. Oh my god. Why does no one look at Arya's eyeballs? We're so close. And this is so well layered against dance, though, with Theon. Like, not far off in location, probably, at the same time of what's happening for Theon.

Someone will know. Someone will notice. It's the brown eyes, not the gray. That's just, that's so funny. Why does no one look at Arya's eyeballs? Because she's busy, like, in mud piles. That's just, that's so funny. Why does no one look at Arya's eyeballs? Because she's busy, like, in mud piles. That's true. They're just like, Arya, what are you doing? And I mean, I guess it's kind of funny, right? Because they're trying to look for people who look like Arya to find Arya. And it's like, that's not going to help you anymore. Arya can look like anyone. but I mean, I do feel for Willow in these moments and trying to order everyone around

and bring order to this place. Like you said, trying to carve out a place for her and for the children here. And there's something that I feel is kind of connects Willow and Brienne, right? Of how Brienne thinks that maybe Willow is someone else just because Willow exhibits like fantastic leadership and delegation skills, right, of how Brienne thinks that maybe Willow is someone else just because Willow exhibits, like, fantastic leadership and delegation skills, right? But the potential that Willow has is held back, right, by the station that she's born in,

as, uh, Septon Mirabal said, right? It's just that the common folk, being common-born is dangerous. And it, like Brienne, right, like, society is dangerous and like Brienne society's expectations of what Brienne should be like for being born in this body has held Brienne back to an extent just as Willow is in her station yeah

absolutely and given them both bigger tasks than honestly what is normal in that station for either that's true big undertakings for both of them both bigger tasks than, honestly, what is normal in that station for either. That's true. Big undertakings for both of them. No chance of no choice. Yeah, none.

Outside, the boys help Podrick unpack Donkey, carrying in food. Septim Mirabal helps him take charge of the porridge, and he laments his long-gone oranges to a very small boy he's like i promise in the spring i'll bring you an orange if you'd be a good lad and help stir the porridge now oh gladly trade you a stir today for a orange next year meanwhile at the fire two years three

years and probably never he's probably gonna die and that boy will never have an orange anyway life is terrible fuck i mean that's like what the oranges are right in the other areas of this book shit death fucking motherfucking death i mean yeah that is what that is oranges yeah plop plop oh my god yeah dude they're all gonna fucking die it's so sad meanwhile at the fire hyle pulls his boots off and they discuss how this is the inn where Sandor killed his brother's men. Heil seems kind of spooked by that and Brienne's like, what, are you scared of children? He says that children should be wrapped in swaddling clothes and hung on the wall until girls have boobies and the boys, you know, can shave. Brienne, though, feels sorry.

She's like, I feel so bad for these orphan children. Hyle rolls his eyes and he's like, I forget you're a woman with a mushy heart like porridge. Then he proceeds to say, well, you need a husband anyways to have a baby, so why not me? You could marry me, you know? Oh my god, what a prize. What a consolation prize. Brienne scowls, saying he probably hopes to win his original wager, right? But Hyle disagrees, saying marriage would serve us both. Lands for me

and a castle full of children for you. Wait a second. This does not feel equal, Hyle. Horrible. He really is projecting a lot here, right he says he's capable he's like yeah i have a bastard i promise i won't inflict my kid on you and brienne declines saying that okay my dad is only 54 he could totally get a new son on a wife but how's like i mean that's pretty unlikely all right we're talking about odds of

him having a boy first of all he's gonna have the odds of finding like a wife and a wife that'll have kids and then it's gotta be a boy it's a whole lot right and brian like is like this game fucking sucks all right go play with someone else it's it's i feel like the subtext is you know like brian is basically telling him like it's not cute when you try to play Sundari. Okay, Heil Hunt. It is, like, I don't know. I'm still waiting. I'm just waiting for

Heil Hunt to show his worth, because this whole thing is also, like, hey, I could be your husband and have your lands and give you kids so you have purpose in life. And, like, Brienne, they have purpose in life right now you know like they they feel a little lost at the crossroads but at by the chapter's end i mean that's the thing is like it is a further perpetuation of the game they played right with her maiden head it's not all that different he

hasn't changed he's trying to offer her now a new plea bargain for her pussy uh i don't know he's just like now he's trying to say it nicely again and this is what every man has done to brienne like the whole time why is this an attractive option like do they why would they they would never think this was an attractive option so seeing it at the end of this chapter reinforced that brienne is like no this is my only path i have to do it or i have to die no chance no choice i have to protect these children that's how brienne mothers the children right like it's not about conceiving children for brienne to be a mother brienne is a mother in this chapter brienne does what mothers do yeah there's more than one

way yeah to care for children. Like, you don't have to bear them, right? We see a lot of people here in Fire and Blood, right? They bear kids. They're terrible mothers. Just because you have them doesn't mean you're great at it. You don't get a license that says you're

an A-plus child bearer. Yeah. Yeah. Like, whatever. And I can't tell if, like, Heil Hunt actually, like, is going for this or if it's just, like, is Heil Hunt negging? Like, I feel like does Heil Hunt actually, he's interested in Brienne and is just terrible at, like, being honest about it. But. Who knows what diet Jamie really wants.

I know. Don't, don't neg. Don't neg if you're trying to flirt. It doesn't really work no especially yeah especially if you know the person's just like way better than you right stronger out of your league completely out of your league yeah honestly don't neg it's not gonna work if this person has better armor better sword better body better prospects better land better status honest in every way yeah better heart dating advice better brain

from girls con canon if yeah it listen if the person you're chasing is brienne of tarth you have no chance no choice you can't do it you're not you are out of their league i said what i mean yeah don't try to bring brienne down to your you work on yourself work on yourself then come back yeah if you sparkle maybe you'll catch brienne's eye okay heil hunt maybe you should start sparkling yeah be a little more golden you know and then he says another thing next that does not make me happier with him i just want to put this out there that this line also i'm like heil you're not doing yourself any favors because he says leave your chamber door unbarred tonight and i'll prove what i say jesus fucking christ brian's like i don't

i didn't ask for this booty call don't text me at 3 a.m please this is why girls ghost that right right this is exactly why brian's ghosting she's like oh i said no um and and brian promises that if hyle does then hyle's gonna leave that room a eunuch and then they leave him and septon marabold leads the children in grace all but gendry who crosses his arms and glares around at everyone i'm into witchcraft adolescence that's true also that gendry's no longer gendry's a convert um because afterwards marabold asks if he has love for the gods and you know gendry's like not your gods and he leaves citing his work to do and the boy tells him oh yeah he has love for the lord of light and then willow hits him with a

spoon telling him to eat and not bother the lords with talk hey that's not like acceptable you know i mean they are those that have converted i mean and let's face it the lord of life is also promised through protection by the brotherhood it is also right now spreading through class because of that, because that's their nearest form of protection. So I'm sure a lot of those children, as they become of age, living there, would start to convert if they believed in it. And if that's the only god that you've ever seen actually do something for you, right? Like, Gendry, interesting. And magic. He has nothing right like he threw everything

into like wagering into being a knight through them he even he lost aria he lost hot pie lami he really lost on the road that was the only family he really had ever had now since leaving king's landing he must be really lonely he's lost his whole mini war family he's seen a bunch of bullshit go down and and not only is he following the lord of light he's following the lightning lord right like barrack is kind of part of his god uh if barracks who he's also modeling himself after is his positive you know male figure in his life now. He's modeling himself into a broken man. I don't know. The seven and the old gods never did anything for him.

Why wouldn't he believe in this one? He's watched this one work. Oh, he's like his uncle, right? He's like, I'm going to try a new bird now. Wow. That's true. I went there. I mean, it is.

It is. That's what you're saying I think yeah Gendry I mean I don't think this is like necessarily what's happening to Gendry

but a lot of what you're saying comes back to something that I've that we've brought up in previous episodes of like I mean when people are isolated and have nothing left

this is a it's a pathway for radicalization and extremism but i mean a lot of it here with gentry like you've said it these people who follow the lord of light are the only people that he's seen actually doing something for the common born and also i mean they have like literal miracles you know like i understand how that would turn someone into a convert and be like yo they just brought that person back from the dead that's incredible yeah i mean that's

pretty convincing jesus performed miracles according to the bible you know and people followed him so exactly i love this passage it says the children fell upon the supper like wolves on a wounded deer quarreling over codfish, tearing barley bread to pieces, getting porridge everywhere. And I do want to add Septimerebald feeds two morsels to Dog. For every one, he eats himself. That's very important, right? We gotta give it up for Dog. Outside.

Dog. Dog. The rain is falling. The fire is crackling inside hyle watches willow smack smack the children with her spoon and he chuckles and he says she'll make some man a frightful wife maybe gendry i love that so much brienne is thinking that this willow could be aria even right so hyle is like wow that Gendry kid's gonna marry Willow that Willow girl and I'm like oh accidental Gendry and Arya accidental Gendry and Arya

oh is it accidental or is it intentional I don't know something about a feather bed right whoa whoa Brienne says someone should go take some food to gendry speaking of gendry right she's like oh he stormed off ha he stormed off uh so she wraps up food she wraps up cheese bread apple cod takes it over to his forge where he's bare chested beneath his leather apron beating on a sword she watches him noting that renly's eyes and hair is the same as his but not his build he uh his build is not like renly's it's more like the fabled brother robert fighter finally he notices her and he rejects her supper offering and he's like do you think you're my mother there we are again with the mother she says she's not and she's like who was your mother by the way just asking you know just just wondering uh mbd she could tell he was born in king's landing though and he plunges his sword

into water the steel hissing and ignores her and she asks his age and maybe his father and he's like my mom's dead i never knew her and she calls him a bastard and he's like wow i'm a knight how could you say that to me as we all know right he never knew his father also and gendry retorting to being called a bastard with i'm a knight it's also i think kind of a reflection of brienne as well right these outcasts who are living up to these ideas of knighthood and i mean of course right like reminds me a little because brian's like are you sure like are you sure you're a knight i mean she doesn't say that but i feel like there's a vibe there of that and it reminds me a little of dunk right who claimed to be a knight but i think i mean gendry was knighted and

there were way more people who witnessed it yeah that's interesting to think of too that gendry's knighting was much more witness than dunks would have been quote unquote and brianne has done either didn't happen yeah yeah and of course this is face to her again right like what would you understand about knighthood brianne they all say to her you know you could never be a knight yeah it's kind of it's interesting that he faces her with that maybe she shouldn't have called him a bastard. That was a little rude. I mean, she left out a word, probably because she was like, I can't just drop this ball on this kid. She's just like, oh, you're a royal bastard.

Yeah, that's true, though. She is trying to hold that back a little bit. And she keeps going. She's hinting, though. She's like, so you have blue eyes, black hair, born in King's Landing. And she's like, you must have seen king robert before right and he's like uh one time i was playing near the mud gate and he came back from hunting and he was drunk and he almost ran me down and he goes damn dude that's damn yeah and he's like but you know

king robert's better than those sons of his and brienne goes in her head, she's like, oh, shit, Stannis is right. Those aren't his sons. Oh, my God. I think this is a really great realization and it's not really lingered on. And I'm curious to what this means for the Winds of Winter and for A Dream of Spring for her, because I don't think Brienne will want to kill Stannis any longer. I think this is also like a little moment for Brienne who is becoming not to come back to what you said. I think this is also like a little moment for Brienne who is becoming not to come back to what you said. But yeah, those parallels coming back with Stannis in the story for R'hllor and isolation. Maybe she's starting to see a little less of the gold and green rose colored lenses and understanding maybe a little more of what Stannis was doing.

Stannis told it true in this moment you know yeah yeah and i mean like people have talked about how like renly probably knew but yeah he says he didn't and i mean like if brianne here is piecing it together yeah the walls are coming down it maybe maybe she's going to really stray from that memory of renly after this book once we get into tiwau perhaps one day when you look under your chair well brienne again begins to say something to him and is about to be like, about to have this talk, tell this kid about his royal parentage. Big truth bombs, but unfortunately a different bomb hits instead because suddenly Dog is barking and is frantic because someone was coming.

And Gendry's like unconcerned. He's like, yeah, those are my friends and you're going to meet them soon enough. But turns out they're not really friends. Also through the rain and the barking, Brienne hears swords and mail clinking and then seven men come through some wounded and the last is massive and hulking his horse is blown and bloodied under him and his face is maggot white yay his cheeks are covered with weeping sores and then brianne draws oath keepers like yo these are no one's friends okay nobody? Nobody's friends with these people. She tells him to armor himself, and he comes out

hammer in hand as lightning cracks across the sky. Oh, I get it! I get it! Yes, the lightning lord himself. Oh! Sick! So happy. Well, they both stand in front of a man wearing a hound's helm, and the door bangs open at the inn, and Willow steps out, a crossbow in hand, shouting at the riders beneath the thunderous sky.

It's so sad, because this is like, Gendry's expecting the Brotherhood to return, but they're still not here. And they don't come back until the very end of the chapter, as we hear very vaguely, as Brienne is, you know, dying, passed out. So like, they never stood a chance if Brienne had not been there they would have all probably been massacred they stood no chance no choice against these guys yeah Brienne barely holds herself down there for a while you know like she gets through them but it's rough the man that's in the hound's helm threatens Willow and tells her if you lose a quarrel I'll use that quarrel on you and it's in the hound's helm threatens Willow and tells her, if you lose a quarrel, I'll use that quarrel on you. And it's in very awful ways.

And Willow takes a step back. That fear right there, right? Like, Willow's pretty brave with the people that weren't very immediately violent, but Willow takes a step back from this man. I mean, Willow's still brave in this moment, right? But knows when. When can a man be brave? Shit. I mean, I would be real scared. I pee.

I pee. Yeah, we don't see her, like, shaking her hands, but I'm sure she's scared as she busts out that crossbow. How can she not be? Regarding, though, this man in the hound's helm, we all know it is not the hound it is not sander clagin but there is this like wonderful convergence here i think of these ideas of identity and symbols that are coming together in this chapter it starts off with that really great setup

regarding the changing signifiers for the inn and then how the name changes, but there's this question of, like, is it not the same inn at its core? Which, yes, is also about Aegon, but I also think it could be said, right? This could be applied to questions surrounding Lady Stoneheart, just because the name changes and the appearance changes.

Is it Catelyn? Is it not Catelyn? Right? And even in Cersei, does the nature of a person or a thing change just because the names do? Just because appearance changes? But also in regards to identity and the inn and naming, we have someone here who is donning the helm, the armor of the hound,

and gets a stab into that person much as we discussed long, long ago now in our Identity Patreon episode. One of, I think, our first Patreon episodes. And there's a poetry to this happening considering how Gendry reminds us of Renly and Robert

because Renly's death left a vacuum that allowed Garland Tyrell to become Renly's ghost by also putting on Renly's armor. So we have a little echo of that here. And then coming back to that inn and to Aegon, how all of these trappings and symbols have been just draped around the Lannister bastards. But then here is Gendry, right, with the very mirror of what would be a strong identifier, that undeniable Baratheon look.

Yeah, and there's also something to really reflect that in that helm at the start the lion's helm offered to podrick by hyle full of worms dead gross skull that really reinforces that kind of lannister bastards baratheon rule here of having the the storm lord himself against that cracked sky and the destruction of house lannister that it's kind of bringing upon itself after destroying the riverlands yes yes um and i mean like that he's turning down right being one of the lions i also again i'm just i'm just proud of brienne you know brienne's detective skills they are leveling up as Brienne pieces this identity together and I'm just like move over detective Pikachu Brienne's in town you got a new PI detective Pikachu is Eliana's second favorite movie after Brienne one through eight her favorite movie like detective Pikachu it's really good

I know you do I love it too I love it too It's really good. I know you do. I love it too. I love it too. Seven. Brienne thought again, despairing. She had no chance against Seven, she knew.

No chance and no choice. She stepped out into the rain, oath keeper in hand. Leave her be. If you want to rape someone, try me. Damn. Wow. That takes a lot of courage. Brienne's power, honestly. It is. that takes a lot of courage brienne's power honestly it is it is a lot of courage and it's like external courage it's like not just what she's been working up inside her but she stands and does something it's big it's such this this whole end is such a

whirlwind of emotions and it's so emotional this is kind of a lot of the culmination of her plot what it's come to she had no chance against seven no chance and no choice how many chapters have we heard brianne think to herself how you know she couldn't take on more than a few people at once she'd surely die without someone else helping her she couldn't do it and here she is and she has to fight off these men these broken men and there's something even in this chapter that's reminiscent of ned's version of saving the children as we bring up these lannister bastards as we bring up the baratheons ned saving the children uh and how hyle wants brienne to be a mother so badly this chapter, apparently. Just like, won't shut up about Brienne's womb.

And how society wants that. Here, as I mentioned, Brienne has become a mother, right? Just by protecting all of these orphans by standing up with her sword and daring to run it through these people. Redefining what a mother is. Like Catelyn with the assassin in the tower with bran right that catelyn didn't think she just stood up and in the ferocity of doing the right thing for her child brian has just adopted all of these children within this moment she is like no i have to i have to stop them it's not just sansa It's not just Sansa. It's not just Arya that I'm saving, right? It's protecting children and women and men and people, protecting everyone everywhere from wrongdoings.

Also, in a way, becoming a warrior. It's also like, maybe Brienne is not the warrior maid, but the warrior mother, right? As Lo talked about in terms of how septon mirabal pulled from a different facets of the seven to combine into this one figure and and you know you're talking about like brienne and brianne's body and and protecting the children and brianne's using their body in many different ways here to protect Willow and the other children right on one hand Brienne is using their body as bait a distraction of like

all right so you want to assert power or dominance over another body over specifically a female body well here is mine but also in terms of again that warrior aspect of that sphere of a knight and actually being out there and fighting. Yeah, this against that moment where Brienne is thinking about going home, phoning it in, just being done, right? Giving up and just doing what Brienne's supposed to do in society, being a Westerosi woman, a highborn woman, and just doing that. And, you know, we're told that if you have power and if you have any sort of power that others may not have you should use that power to help others right that's the right way to use power and control power and exercise it and at the same time brienne does not always have that power but she does have some protections here from the king whether it's paper shield or not

her status her birth her sword her her good armor her steed, her money, as we've watched her spend her money to help people throughout the story, too, in some aspects. This is a true knight. This is what it means. This is using that power to help others. And it's interesting that when you look at Dunk's story, it's set in peacetime, right? And battles are organically cropping up throughout powerful people as those tensions stay underground, but brew leading up to the next Blackfire Rebellion. But here it's wartime. And it's not just battles breaking out on those bubbling tensions, but it's the large folk have had all these battles, the small folk have been pushed all the way to this side of poverty and this side of

destruction through those wars happening through the large folk right so just watching brienne navigate this and know that like brienne does have some power that others do not and can exercise that power to help and that giving up would be like a total dismissal of having that privilege, right? Knowing that you had the chance to do something and just fucking it up and just saying, no, I'm just not going to use it. Brienne knows they have something very important and very special. And everyone's been telling Brienne that they do not have that their entire life. And here Brienne chose to stand against that yes absolutely brienne's living up to the heroes and the songs and it's not that the songs right it's not that anything has chosen brienne

it's that brienne has chosen to be a hero you know does that make sense like there was no like outside thing that said all right this is it yeah it. You, my child, are destined. You pulled the sword out of the stone. And Brienne's like, someone's got to hold something. Even if we got to use the stone itself. When can a man be brave? Exactly. The outlaws turn and the man in the hound's helm begins to laugh, calling Brienne uglier than he remembers.

And he says that he'd sooner rape Brienne's horse, and one of the wounded outlaws says, yes, a horse! We need horses! And food, give us that! Outlaws are after us, and then we'll leave. But the hound's hell man disagrees, saying that he wants to cut Brienne's

legs off and make her watch him rape the crossbow girl. I'm like, what the fuck? Yeah, and of course, we'll talk about it, but this is not unlike the first time Brienne met these men, right, with Jamie on the road. It's so sad though, because besides the main few

broken companions, the other men are not unlike the unhelmed men she saw hanging, right? The men she still felt sad for even though she knew they were awful they probably do just want a horse and food and to run like sandor right like he had no aim he just wanted to drink it all away until it was over it's it is sad to like watch the background characters that are very very briefly here but the fight is not with them right brienne taunts him saying he has no

manhood according to shagwell hoping to provoke him and it works he comes after her the others stay back watching the show she hopes the mud and darkness will stop him but stays prepared oath keeper meeting his rush as he reaches her with his axe whore he boomed freak bitch i'll give you to my dog to fuck you bloody bitch well the first person i've heard who does that um yeah right shit oh maybe the first because different jane different other book anyway so this is a really fascinating exchange though between brianne and roge because brianne is taunting rorge by calling attention to his male body and seeks to emasculate him verbally right by saying oh you don't have

like your genitals which is what everyone kind of like reduces brianne to right what everyone's reducing everyone around to what they're reducing manhood to as though like that's what even really matters here it's like no you're here and you're, like, trying to kill kids. Like, what the fuck? And yet it works. Like, Rorge takes that real personally for some reason. The assertion of him not having a penis. Yeah.

It's like what Goodwin said, right? Their pride will make them want to vanquish you quickly, lest it be said a woman tried them sorely. The goading that she's doing here to pull him into the mud and hope that he Yeah, yeah. And like, Rorge is, again, very displeased with that. And so Rorge seeks to reassert his power, again, by denigrating them to just their body and saying like, wrongly, right? That sex workers exist solely for men's sexual pleasure. That's, that's a lot of what we see happen to brienne right like like we talked about yes back then with sam like the interesting assumption that brienne was a sex worker because brienne was dressed as a knight and then it comes back to freak right and i think again of lowe's reminder of uh trans and gender non-conforming people being regarded as gender freaks and then of course the catch-all term there right of bitch

combined with giving brienne to his dogs and then it reminds me a little again of what lo is saying last chapter of how people see trans and gender non-conforming people as monstrous or inhuman yeah it's uh it's it's an interesting exchange. There's so much loaded in there. Brienne is able to avoid that, though, where I personally would be spiraling. I mean, I guess physically kind of spiraling. I'd be dead by now. But Brienne has no shield.

So all Brienne can do is evade the crushing blows. Brienne has no shield, so all Brienne can do is evade the crushing blows. Brienne almost falls at one point but recovers, but she feels an axe graze her shoulder. We have this magnificent part of the passage. She could not fight seven, not alone, even if one or two were wounded. Old Sir Goodwin was long in his grave, yet she could hear him whispering in her ear, Men will always underestimate you, and their pride will make them want to vanquish you quickly, lest it be said a woman tried

them sorely. Let them spend their strength in furious attacks while you can serve your own. Wait and watch, girl, wait and watch. I like this Sir Goodwin. We've talked about it before, but... Better than Rowell. I know, right? And we've also seen Brienne, like, I think We've talked about it before, but... Better than Rowell. I know, right?

And we've also seen Brienne, like, I think, bring up this idea before, but considering that... It's kind of funny, right? This person, Rorge, is imitating one of the Cleganes, Sandra Clegane, of course, and is one of the people who I believe were formerly under the command of Gregor Clegane. And the way that Brienne is fighting here

reminds me a little bit also of Oberyn, right? And Oberyn's strategy for defeating the Mountain, a.k.a. Gregor Clegane. It does have a lot of that battle in it. Yes, the baiting. I love that. She runs Oathkeeper through this man, his axe falling,

and she feels the helm against her, the hound's helm. Rain falling down through his eye slits. Sapphires, she whispered at him as she gave her blade a hard twist that made him shudder. Makes me shudder too. Of course, going back to Jamie's chapters, Jamie chuckled. There's a funny fool. I have a riddle for you, Shagwell. Why do you care if she screams? Oh, wait, I know. Sapphires! This is such a, such a chilling passage. All of it, all of the end of this is so chilling. But sapphires, this is not just the moment that they came across the poor fortune of meeting the

companions in Jamie's chapters, but it's also the culmination of all of the violence, even the petty, quiet misogyny that has just been, like, rooted in Brienne's arc pointed at her, especially by Rorge, who there, in a storm of swords, stood over her, arguing who should get to rape her first, and then beating Jaime into submission, as well as stealing Cleos's surcoat and then committing crimes in that, if we're going to feel bad for Sandor's helm, may as well feel bad for Cleos' surcoat. And this isn't just from Rourj, even these subtle digs at her, it's anyone, it's really anyone in her plot, even the town folk looking at her and giving her disgusted looks while she dared to try to protect them um back a few chapters ago right it's very sad all the voices in her head they're always gonna underestimate you go home brianne go

home tarly all of it coming together if sapphires are all she's fucking worth how do they feel right now right how do they fucking feel absolutely it Absolutely. It's such a good moment because I honestly forgot that Brienne had whispered sapphires before until this reread. And it's, like you said, so much is just packed into that one line. It's such a big fist pump moment.

It kind of feels like almost a salty reply, and yet it's perfect. It's worth it. And as you said, it throws back all those rape threats that they levied against her. And just that one word and how small they made her feel. Right. That's not something that a lot of the other knights have to deal with. And as you've quoted, right, that word was first shouted by Jaime.

And here Brienne delivers it in a whisper. by Jaime and here Brienne delivers it in a whisper but as we know Brienne's really just been positioning Jaime in their mind as this like I mean Jaime's kind of a damsel in distress at times right but also like the patron that this quest is being done in the name of are dedicated to and usually it is I think a woman in the knight errant stories but for Brienne to like evoke those sapphires as they hold the magic sword that Jaime gifted them it almost becomes like this magical incantation and then at the same time as Brienne's

like considering right returning home to Tarth and like there's something to be said about that idea of home with those sapphires and Brienne instead choosing this and not the life that Hyle said that they could have back on Tarth. And so for Brienne to whisper sapphires tied to the,

the Isle of Tarth, I don't know. It's interesting. It's really loaded. Like going back to what sapphires meant in that moment that jamie knew they would know that was what she was worth here's what i'm actually worth and it's oath keeper up your fucking guts motherfuckers bitches motherfuckers absolutely yeah there's something i almost kind of wonder i don't know if it'll ever come up

sapphires and yet rubies you know here at the riverlands and the trident that's it that's all I have and in her sword and in the sword sword she shouted she lets the man fall

but biters now crashing into her lifting her driving her into the ground. She feels her head snap on a rock and his weight drive her in the mud. Oath Keeper's gone. She slams her fist into his doughy face, hitting him again and again, but he doesn't feel the blows. He just keeps crushing her, smothering her. He tears out her hair, and she feels her dagger. She remembers her dagger in her side so she takes

it out to stab slashing him across his belly feeling the blood gush out so gross and biter's white flesh right they call out how biter looks it's like having milk white all this stuff yeah maggoty and then also like the lack of response that he exhibits to like any of like what we would assume is the pain that Brienne is probably inflicting upon him by like hitting him, stabbing, et cetera. Really reminds me of like the whites.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. There is a lot to that, especially, I mean, like we said earlier, talking about kind of the parallel of all the endings of the arcs being either fire and ice, right? This makes the ending very much so ice. I mean, it was already half ice, let's be real. But it does make it very icy.

Him being a white, a broken man. Yeah, amidst all these other, I guess, fire whites going on around here yeah he smashes her in the face and she feels bones crack pain blinding her he breaks her forearm and he tries to tear her head off her shoulders she hears a dog barking men shouting the step the clash of steel behind her between the claps of thunder sir heil had joined the fight but it Brielle is in this moment also being pushed beneath some of this water, and has these moments of feeling like drowning, right? And it reminds me again of those ideas of death and rebirth. And especially because it's in the same book where we see Ere and Damper performing the ironborn CPR baptisms. And of course, it comes up alongside a chapter.

And by that, I mean Brienne's next chapter of someone who's being brought back to life by fire just as you know and i feel like just as brian's first kill was very much this like coming of age moment and we tied it to some of these ideas of maidenhood this is also another rite of passage for brian and it's sort of like a baptism as well. Yeah, and there's something in the way that as he's up against her, the language of how the helm is up against her, right, as she's fighting these men. Rorge's helm, the hound helm, was pressed into her skin. It's almost like a molding of her becoming the broken man, right, in this chapter,ound she's taking on the hound she is the hound now and there's even this moment here you're the hound now you're you're a doggo you're the man now dog i mean even up to the scars right not only was the helm being pressed into her by roge but now biter's giving her the scars to come

back to like you were speaking about how he was kind of like gregor clegane in his fighting style he's given her sandra's scars he's pressed her face in the fire uh and there's also something about this that's like because there's seven of them that she's supposed to fight alone and now you have heil joining in in the background and dog barking and men shouting and probably gendry uh there's something to be said of this being a trial of seven like dunks trial of seven right like you even have a baratheon a storm in it yes this is kind of dunks trial of seven being played out again just unfair and mean and awful way more intense or yeah even the broken bones the crunch of the cheek it's like if no one came up

that's like baylor to support dunk yeah hey heil just stood up you know he's in there he's fighting i'll give him that I will give him that it's still not an even number didn't Dunk need 7 in order to even enter the trial yeah we gotta do it live these poor lost children well

we close the chapter with I cannot die yet she told herself there is something I still need to do. Biter's mouth tore free, full of blood and flesh. He spat, grinned, and sank his pointed teeth into her flesh again. This time he chewed and swallowed. He is eating me, she realized, but she had no strength left to fight him any longer. She felt as if she were floating above herself, watching the horror as if it were happening to some other woman, to some stupid girl who thought she was a knight. It will be finished soon, she told herself.

Then it will not matter if he eats me. Biter threw back his head and opened his mouth again, howling, and stuck his tongue out at her. It was sharply pointed, dripping blood longer than any tongue should be, sliding from his mouth, out and out and out, red and wet and glistening. It made a hideous sight, obscene. His tongue is a foot long, Brienne thought, just before the darkness took her. Why, it looks almost like a sword. Thanks for the tone shift on that one.

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic. I was making a joke, but yeah, a little bit, yeah. I can't tell if you're being sarcastic. I was making a joke, but yeah, a little bit, yeah. Okay, I know she just got her face eaten, but let's just gloss over that for a moment. Wow, the horror going on there. I was, like, actually physically feeling ill. I love that the last word of this chapter is sword.

I want to bring that out i think um so jamie is really present in this chapter as you kind of brought up right we've been bringing it back to jamie her plot and her arc is kind of coming back to jamie and everything jamie kind of told her in a storm of swords and all of that kind of coming true but in a different way all the things happening to her and the the many challenges that she's facing on the road. However, the last word of this chapter is sword, that his tongue almost looks like a sword. And at the end of Brienne's arc in Brienne 8, we have the very last lines of the chapter. Brienne sucked the air indesperately, even as the rope was strangling her. Nothing had ever hurt so much she screamed a word according

to a so spake martin that word now is known and the word that she chose is sword because of course stoneheart has asked her you know will you fucking kill jamie are you gonna keep fucking around or you know do you want to die right noose or sword kid well brienne screamed sword now we must pit the lovers against themselves there uh so i feel like it's interesting that that word is sword but this is also the last word of this is also sword yeah right two chapters in a row with sword and biter's tongue looking like a sword makes me think of the only other sword brienne's really interested in besides oath keeper which is jamie's dick thank you that's all have a great day the same thing but it all it does i i'm not even saying it but the sexual like

not only was i mean it's horror so not only is it this grotesque like birthing of his tongue being a foot long as she's like in shock about to die um it also has like sexual gross tones you know like it is kind of like i mean it reminds me of like hentai tentacles yeah i mean a horror sexual thing that is what it kind of comes out as, so it really does make me think of Jamie's dick here. Or like that scene in Seven that has never left me. Yeah. God, why did I think of that? All right. But, I mean, beyond Jamie's sword specifically, right, we have discussed the connections between, like, phalluses and swords, right? They are tied together in literature.

Okay. And I think we're going to probably dig into this more next chapter, but, like, the connection you're drawing between, like, the tongue and the sword and, again, the phallus. We find out later on that this is Gendry's spear, actually, but Brienne missing next chapter is missing the sword, Oization of male voices and how Brienne loses, I guess, that power and agency once Brienne doesn't have the sword. That's part of, like, why Brienne wants the sword so badly, right? It allows Brienne to move between what Westeros's,

like, masculine and feminine spheres are. But it also ties into, I mean, when it comes to that silencing and losing the sword and and again voices i mean literally silence literally silent lady stoneheart yeah but again we'll probably talk about that more next time with our friend by donica yeah with our friend by donica but i wanted to bring up one more thing again this was once upon a time the same book as the dance of dragons you said we weren't going to talk. We were in that moment glossing over briefly Brienne's face being eaten, but ties together very well with a lot of the other things we're seeing regarding cannibalism, etc. In the story popping up more.

about that but it is like he is eating her he's cannibalizing her and yeah in that same in that same do it reminds me of cersei too of cersei at the end of her arc in her walk of shame and like her hair being taken from her and like her body being you know like visibly having her body and parts of her body injured and stripped things stripped from her like that's like this is the the eating of brienne's cheek is a little different but it reminds me of that too like just like people pelting her with shit and like people degrading her body obviously it's not for as i mean not for the same purpose not for saving children but the offering yeah opposite but but that that idea of body yeah these women's bodies being like just fucking degraded in their mission to do what they do

brutalized different missions happened to lady stoneheart's body right yeah exactly like be naked for a long time and then they're like this has been rotting here long enough let's throw it in the river yeah and I mean hell she had the doughy skin too right the mottled curdled skin even earlier in this chapter right we start with that imagery of human bodies being eaten consumed

by the wolves and the crows all sorts of animals are out here eating people. Good for them, I guess. Not good for the people. What an intense-ass, epic-ass motherfucking chapter. Brienne chapters are fucking good.

They are really good. Who wants to fight me on that? They're so fucking good. You're like, no chance and no choice. No chance, no choice. Fucking fight me. If you don't agree with me that Brienne chapters are good, you're wrong. And that's alright. That's fine.

Is it fine? I don't know. Yeah, I mean... I'll just have to like them enough for the both of us. And you can do that. I also will like them very much. So, between the two of us, we can like them for the whole world. But obviously other people like Brienne's chapters.

Between all of us, with our powers combined. Someone, someone will be able to. Well, we'll be back to finish Brienne's chapters next month. It's going to be out January 14th for public. It's going to be out January 14th for public. Yeah, we'll be back in January, January 14th for public with Brienne's final chapter. Brienne 8, final published chapter. Can't wait.

With our friend Bydonica, who you have to check out online, who has some amazing art and some fun tweets. I always love reading her tweets. So check her out. Yes. her tweets so check her out yes and of course we are also kicking off the new year with our our historic materials episodes just a reminder that our next episode for the public will be a historic materials episode with our guest cassidy but between all that you do get a bonus POV chapter on our Patreon. It's Patroclus in the Song of Achilles. It's gonna be all of them.

Until then, you can leave us an email, a tweet, a DM of note, however you feel it, over at our social media, girlsgonecanon, C-A-N-O-N, at Twitter, or you can pop us an email, let us know how you're feeling about the episodes or the chapters or anything you've noticed recently in the books, girlsgonecanon, C-A-N-O-N, at gmail.com. Yes. And things can get hairy here at the end of the year, and if you want to make sure that you get our new episodes next year in 2022, be sure to subscribe to us on one of the many streaming platforms that we are on, such as Podbean, on where all of this is hosted.

Google Play, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Acast, Stitcher, iHeartRadio. That was good enough. You did great. I'm impressed. Another award. We started it with an award. Oh, my Another award. We started it with an award. Oh my god. Wow.

End it with an award. Wow. So grateful. So thankful. And yes, as Eliana said, we'll be putting out another bonus episode for patrons this year, 2021, on the Song of Achilles. If you're in the stranger tier and above, five bucks and up, you will have access to that.

Next year, we'll have a slew of new bonus episodes. We'll be back with some A Song of Ice and Fire bonus episodes on Patreon, back to the free cities, and some other exciting things that we'll let you know about then. So thanks for listening. As always, I have been one of your hosts, Chloe. And I have been another one of your hosts, Eliana. See you next year.

Oh, shit. Damn. When you put it like that. Mary Brienne. Oh, yes. Mary. Is that what Jamie's trying to do? Oh my god. Goodbye, everyone. Goodbye.