dear_mun | (no subject)

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canon: a song of ice and fire

(no subject)

This place is stupid. It's boring and there aren't even any real wolves there. If you like it so much, you go. You don't even know how to fight. I could last longer than you could. I don't need lights that flick on and off with your hand and food that comes out of boxes and stupid things like that. I can sleep outside if I want to and eat bugs and make a fire and hunt and kill and you wouldn't know how to do any of those things. And I have a Needle.

There aren't any lions there, anyway, and if they come I can kill them. It doesn't seem so scary. There's nothing to be afraid of.

... Is there?

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There is always something to be afraid of but it is the fear that makes us stronger. If you are scared beyond reason My Lady you are bound to fight ten times harder than if you possessed not one bit of fear at facing your opponent or trial placed before you.

I knew a man who told me that fear cuts deeper than swords. The man who fears losing has already lost.

An interesting way to think of it, though I have never thought of the fear of losing. My mentor spoke to me of a deeper fear, the fear of failing the ones you mean to protect. His words were always to never fight for your own gain as selfishness is the quickest way to an early grave. Fight for those who can not fight themselves. Fight for those who are in your heart, past and present.

[How about a really tall and very sinister man who has creepy wolf head things forming out of his hair now and then. Also what may well be giant snakes crawling all over him under his cloak.]

Thinking the power to kill is the power to avoid fear is a very fast way to meet it...When something you cannot kill arises.

But what if you already have? Failed the ones you want to protect.

[Um. WHAT. And also:]

Anything can be killed.

[YEAH. UM WHAT IS RIGHT.]

I do not disagree. But can you kill anything?

Then you protect their memories, you protect what they stood for.

How?

[Hmph.]

Yes.

[He takes a moment to close the height difference by crouching down.]

By surviving, fighting on and making sure the Kingdom, excuse me, the world where you are from never forgets them or what they gave. Be who they believed you could be, no matter what trials stand before you, even if you are afraid, facing your fears is the truest sign of bravery.

Is that what you did?

Demons? Gods? Fate? The ones you love?

That is what I do every day, from the mundane tasks of overseeing the Kingdom to the fight to reclaim my siblings and place my brother and sister in their rightful place on the Thrones. My parents and all who have died for our cause believed me capable and so it is this which I fight for now.

[She makes an annoyed face.]

No one can kill the gods. You're being stupid.

Edited (misread shhhh) 2012-06-01 22:54 (UTC)

Hu-hu-hu-hu! [His laugh is quite sinister, and it causes the serpents under his cloak to writhe. A god killer is he, although the term is rather loose to him.]

So suddenly, not everything can be killed?

If you're a king, why do you have to fight for your siblings? Kings get whatever they want.

[She sees those ripples in the fabric, and let's just say there's a whole lot of wary side-eying going on]

I meant living things.

Gods are alive. Unless you kill them, of course. Hu-hu-hu.

You're a liar.

[His hair twists into a wolf's head, growling heavily at her for a moment before one of his hands rises to calm it with a soft stroking.]

I am many terrible things, girl. But a liar is not one of them. I've killed everything I listed to you before, sometimes more than once. I will admit, killing a god is harder than it sounds...And it sounds difficult, no?

[She listens with rapt attention. A man who could kill anything. She knew such a man, once.]

How did you do it?

First, I ran him through with my arm, then filled him with swords and cut off his head. [A hand emerges from his cloak-it's quite different looking to the rest of him, being a strange purple and clawed, unlike his otherwise pale skin. The fingers flex to imitate the shape of holding a head.] But he decided not to accept that death.

So the next time we fought...I ate him.

[.....Oh.]

Are you making that up? I'm not a stupid child, you know. I don't believe in stories.

Edited 2012-06-01 23:43 (UTC)

I told you. I am not a liar.

Think, girl. If something refuses to stop existing, how do you get rid of it?

[He decides to let her try and answer, although the fact a long green snake has slithered up his arm to curl around his fingers might be distracting.]

And most Ladies do not speak to a King this way, I am glad you do.

I am by nature more Commander than King. My brother was by birth order meant to take the Head Throne, my sister the Minor and myself to train as a Shadow and become The Knight, he who protects the King and Queen. It has always been this way by birth succession but treachery can change many things and now I must fight to free my siblings not from just enforced slavery but mind stealing herbs that have left them former shells of themselves.

A King who simply has what he wants is no more than a spoiled brat. A King, a true man, A Commander especially of the 1st Division is selfless, he does nothing for Glory, everything for Honor and Duty, to protect and guide those who look to him. To stop what treachery has changed and once more create the melody which promotes harmony.

My people have never believed that being King entitles you to whatever you want, being King is a great responsibility, you must care for all people, no one is without your mercy or guidance and if one should fall, it is your failure.

[Eyes tracing the thing winding around his arm, she considers, chewing on her lip a little.]

You have do it yourself.

Hu-hu-hu. Yes...But how? If something can't be pushed from its position...

[The serpent flicks its tongue at her.]

Then you must take its place, as fully as you can. If you cannot push them from their seat, become them and sit there too. For me, I took everything. His flesh, his kingdom and his fate.

I'm not a lady.

[Treachery killed her father and drove all her brothers and sister apart. This is a story Arya has heard before, one she's lived. Her voice is bitter and full of hatred.]

King Joffrey isn't a true man, not like you say. He didn't care about anyone. None of them do. But they get whatever he want. My father was honorable. It doesn't keep you alive.

What happens to you, after? After you take their place. Who are you?

You're a victor.

[His serpent decides to return to the cloak.]

By station you are, the same as I am a King. But we are not always what we are by station by nature. Give me your name and I will address you as such. I am Atlasian, Shadow Commander 1st Division, at your service.

[Feelings the Commander turned King recognizes within himself, ones he is not allowed to indulge because of his place but he nods at her words.]

No, but I think, would I have rather that my Father were a man who was like this King Joffrey you speak of, one who would be spoken ill of because of his nature and be alive or that he held the Honor of our Blood and people even if meant he died at the hands of those he trusted most.

The former seems much worse a fate than to know that his life was taken because he would not demean himself or his family. That leaves me with something to fight for, for his Honor. For my Mother's honor and my siblings freedom. Life is not always fair, those who should die do not, those who should not die, do. But, one day people such as the King you mention will find themselves facing a true man of honor with no one to protect them and their fate will be sealed. And if not, the shadows will creep in on them sooner or later.

[The girl smiles, just a bit.]

You can't kill lions with a needle.

[He smiles back, although his is extremely creepy. He can't help it-ever since he became a Demon Lord he has just been scary.]

Maybe not with your kinds of needles.

There's only one kind of needle.

Don't be stupid. There are bigger ones. Sharper ones.

[She's thoughtful throughout this, but thinking too much of her father makes her sad, so she focuses on Joffrey instead. She doesn't think shadows can do anything. But she could, if she was quiet as one.]

Or maybe wolves.

[Then she read his meaning, Shadows in his world were another thing entirely, when spoken of doing such things as murdering wrongdoers it was meant the men, such as himself who wore the black cloak, moving like shadows and doing what must be done.]

Most certainly wolves could, they are a noble breed.

They only seem that way to you because you're so clumsy all you do is poke yourself.

Shut up. You wouldn't even know what to do with one.

Don't talk nonsense. I'm better at it than you are.

That's what you think.

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