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[EYRIE DINING ROOM, NIGHT]
[LYSA serves SANSA a pastry]
"Your mother always had a sweet tooth, you know?"
"Really?"
"You do?" Sansa asked.
"Many years ago" Catelyn answered with a smile. Better times...
"Oh, yes. At suppertime, she would go straight for honey cakes, candied almonds, and custard. Anything sweet. Eventually, your grandfather had to assign a septa to watch her at meals. Cat was the firstborn daughter after all. It was important that she remain desirable so Father could arrange a good match for her and she was starting to get fat."
Catelyn blushed. That was unnecessary from Lysa....
"My mother, fat? She never let me have my pudding until I'd finished all my proper food."
"This is before she married your father and moved to the North. By the time you were born, your father's austerity had become hers. Marriage changes people."
"Evidently, not always" Robert snorted. If it were the case, Lysa would have been a lot better than she was. Jon's presence should have done a world better if that were the case.
Catelyn held her tongue. Marriage had changed Lysa. Not for the best, but it had.
"I didn't mean for you to stop. Go on, enjoy them. How do you like them?"
"They're delicious. Where did you get the lemons? You can't grow them up here."
[SANSA eats another. LYSA takes her hand.]
"Oh, gods, no. Petyr had three crates brought all the way from King's Landing. He knew you liked lemon cakes. He's so kind. He really cares for you. Think where you'd be without him. In their clutches and tried for murder. He feels responsible for you. Why? Why does he feel responsible for you?"
"Well, I'm half Tully. He loved your family so much."
"Loved your mother. That's what you wanted to say."
"She didn't" Arya muttered darkly. Her aunt did not cut a good picture for Arya. First, she refused to help Robb to free her father, then she refused to ally with them when the war broke out, and now it was revealed she was the reason the war happened at all.
She was the reason her family was broken and separated.
It was all her and her stupid rat's fault!
"Your mother never loved him. Never. Cat always went straight for the sweetest thing. The most obvious thing. Your Uncle Brandon. Your handsome, arrogant, cruel Uncle Brandon."
Brandon snorted.
"You can be cruel from time to time" Lyanna pointed out
"I'm never unnecessarily cruel" Brandon scoffed. He was insulted that she'd think he would be.
"He almost killed Petyr in a duel. And your mother loved him anyway."
Catelyn blushed at the part where Lysa spoke of her being in love with Brandon.
But the rest were focused on the other part.
"Baelish challenged me," Brandon said harshly. "Had he not overstepped, he'd be uncut and unharmed."
"Should have killed him there and saved us all this" Jon muttered.
Brandon snorted.
"And now Petyr is risking his life to save you, the daughter of a woman who didn't love him no more than those whores in his brothels. Has he told you about them?"
[LYSA holds SANSA's hands firmly and won't let go.]
"He hasn't told you about the vile things they do with their bodies? The vile things they let him do with their bodies?"
"They get paid for those things" Oberyn defended with a snort. "Is that what she's angry about? Women getting paid for selling themselves to Baelish?"
"She's jealous that Baelish has not done those things to her" Elia snorted. This was the Lady of the Vale...
"Are you pregnant?"
"What? No, I told you. Lord Tyrion and I never-"
"I wasn't asking about Tyrion. What have you let Petyr do with your body? Your young, pretty body."
"Is she jealous of Sansa?" Jon raised a brow with an amused smile.
"Surely not" Sansa's brows furrowed.
"You look most like Mother, so maybe that's why" Robb reasoned with a shrug.
Sansa looked disgusted. She did not want to be with Baelish and to know he was interested in her... She was disgusted.
[LYSA grips harder.]
"You're hurting me."
"I'll know if you lie."
"I'm a virgin, I swear it. He loves you, Aunt Lysa. All he says is that I'm stupid. I'm a stupid little girl with stupid dreams who never learns and I'm a terrible liar, so I should always tell the truth. And I swear to you that he has never touched me. Not once, not ever."
[LYSA stands up and hugs SANSA to her breast.]
"Shh. Shh. Shh. It's all right. It will all be all right. You'll be a widow soon. They'll execute that dwarf for murdering the king and you'll be free to marry Robin. You'll be the Lady of the Vale. Hmm."
"That's why she saved her" Catelyn muttered in shock. Lysa did not save Sansa because she was family, she saved her so the North was hers as well. No, not hers... the North would be Baelish's.
Bile rose as the realisation set in. How could she have become this? How could her sister become so disgusting?
[KING'S LANDING GARDEN]
[PRINCE OBERYN MARTELL sits writing on a scroll. CERSEI enters, flanked by guards. He stands to greet her.]
"Prince Oberyn. Writing letters?"
"A poem, actually."
"You still write?" Elia questioned with a soft smile.
"Still as shit as you remember" Oberyn sighed, to his sister's amusement.
"May I show you the gardens?"
"I couldn't very well refuse a royal escort."
"No, you couldn't."
[They walk through the gardens now, the guards a few paces behind them.]
"I didn't realize you were a poet. For your paramour?"
"For one of my daughters."
"You have several, don't you?"
"Eight. The fifth is difficult. I named her after my sister Elia."
"She is nothing like you" Oberyn chuckled, the tone a sad one. Perhaps he had thought he'd find his sister in his girl if he named her after his sister. It was a futile effort in the end, but Oberyn loved her dearly still.
Elia smiled, gripping his hand for his comfort and squeezing it gently.
Oberyn returned it with a squeeze of his own.
"I can't say it without turning sad. And after I turn sad, I grow angry."
Elia gripped a little tighter.
"Perhaps that's why she's difficult. The gods love their stupid jokes, don't they?"
"Which joke is that?"
"You're a prince of Dorne. A legendary Fighter. A brilliant man feared throughout Westeros. But you could not save your sister. I'm a Lannister. Queen for nineteen years. Daughter of the most powerful man alive. But I could not save my son. What good is power if you cannot protect the ones you love?"
"It's a good way for her to squirm her way to your support" Tyrion commented, unhappy but not blind to the wisdom of the ploy. "Using your grief for your sister to get you on her side."
"It isn't" Oberyn agreed. "But she forgets one thing."
"And that is?"
''Her father is the reason my sister is dead, and I hold her equally responsible for not having found justice for that" Oberyn shrugged.
Tyrion sighed. It was good for future him that Oberyn still held that belief, as tiring as it was by now.
"I haven't seen my daughter in over a year."
"The last time I saw her, she was swimming with two of my girls in the Water Gardens. Laughing in the sun."
"I want to believe that. I want to believe she's happy."
"You have my word. We don't hurt little girls in Dorne."
"Everywhere in the world, they hurt little girls. Would you bring her a gift for me? I wasn't there for her name day. I don't know when I'll see her again."
[CERSEI points to a sailing ship in the bay.]
"The best shipwrights in King's Landing have been working on it for months. Myrcella loves the open water. Please tell her... her mother misses her very much."
Myrcella couldn't help but smile. Her mother did care, she cared more than Myrcella had thought.
But that did nothing to improve her opinion of the woman, especially after seeing the many things her mother had done with no remorse. Seeing the things she's capable of has made Myrcella wary of the woman.