on odds & ends

[mockeries]

I see you haven't faltered in your intent to send me to space. Nor in your perusal of yet other places to which to send me.

— No, no, I don't mean to complain; I would not dream of being half so ... ungrateful, shall we say. It is an unbecoming trait, after all.

That said, take care. I have no intention of suffering the consequences of a misstep on your end. There is no such thing as an easy game, even when one is provided with a slate that is nearly blank. I should know.

Comments

[wont]

Such tenacity should be commended, shouldn't it, father?

[ She has her own reasons, of course; everybody did. But Alayne does not give them voice, for she is certain her lord protector knows them all already. ]

[comeliness]

The lord Baelish, complain? [ She knows the way these things work. Obsequiousness is next to comeliness. ] I have never heard of such a thing. No, by all accounts, the Master of Coin is quite agreeable.

[tully]

[ Silver mockingbird, silver temples. By rights, she should recognize him, but the years separate them — long and unkind. ]

In what ways do you know?

[familially]

[ It was a betrayal, it had to be. Petyr promised and she believed and now Ned was dead. Maybe it hadn't been his fault but family, duty, honor were her words before she was ever Catelyn Stark, back when she was just Catelyn Tully and there was a boy with a head filled with too many romantic notions named Petyr Baelish who loved her. (More than a sister, while she no more than a brother.)

A Stark can keep their promises, she should have known better. (Family. He was a family of sorts in her heart, even now.) ]

But you've learned to play many games in the years we were apart, have you not?

[ A simple question of sorts, have you played me, the one who asked for your life to be spared all those years ago? ]