The Game of Cyvasse

War of the Rose

The Queen presumptive

Lady Alerie was sobbing as the Silent Sisters performed their slow ritual around Garlan's body. Her wails were only matched by his wife Lady Leonette. Margaery's brother lay on a great pedestal, his face powdered and perfumed to ward off the stench of death, on a bed of green branches and fresh flowers.

The septon recited passages from the Seven-Pointed Star, adorned in an incomprehensible language, while Margaery lifted her gaze from her brother's body to the Warrior. You have abandoned him, you betrayed him. Every tear cut her face with the reminder that this was reality. The brother she loved was dead. On her shoulder she felt a hand, Willas was moving his courage and steadfastness to her.

....

After he slaughtered all men that stayed true to House Tyrell at Bitterbridge, Randyll Tarly proclaimed himself Lord Paramount of the Mander, and Warden of the South, all in the name of King Stannis. The betrayal left a bitter taste in there mouth and unleashed the dogs of war across the fertile fields of Reach. Petty lords turned against each other in a matter of days, old enmities resurfaced, new ones arose from greed for another's land. Tarly was soon joined by Lady Oakheart, both of Fossoways, red and green, and Florents. From the wrath of betrayal, the loyalist force under Lord Rowan barely escaped from Bitterbridge.

Mander relentlessly spat out bodies, and every day more candles burned under the white statue of the Mother.

"We are blessed, if the most of the banners remained at Bitterbridge, the damage would have been far greater," sighed Willas. He turned to Margaery, "Dear sister, you saved us." The uncertainty about her betrothal, and to whom House Tyrell would give its allegiance, created a waiting, a precious time. Without Renly's tournaments and pageants, the army soon melted away. The lords wanted to go home, to tend their fields with the same strong arms that wielded their spears.

"Autumn is cruel to the crops," Lord Ambrose lamented. "The harvest is meager enough, and if we do not reap swiftly, the wheat will rot in the damp air."

Her father had hearkened to the ravens from Bitterbridge and many had left the gathering, only to come back soon enough. Like a flush of spring roses, a new host sprouted, around the skeleton of ten thousand men that her father already had. Garlan had led almost twenty-five thousand along the Rose road, joined with Lord Rowan and met Tarly in battle. Her brother was slain by Perman the Purple, near Appleton. The Mother's mercy did not spare Lord Rowan for the second time and he was taken prisoner. The loss of both commanders devastated the morale of the Tyrell army and it crumbled, like dried petals in the wind.

"Death is not the only child of defeat, betrayal is its twin," said Lord Baelish, without his usual smirk. A few betrayals became many betrayals after Appleton. Footly, Blackbar, Webber, Stackhouse, all turned their cloaks.

"Youthful rashness. No wise man would face Randyll Tarly on a open field. I am a women, and still know that," the blackness of the mourning, cloaked Ollenna Tyrell's face. Old and stiff, but beneath all that, of a gentle heart, for her grandchildren.

"I say, it is a folly to fight Randyll Tarly on any field," replied Baelish. Margaery had known Littlefinger long enough to know that he did not mean to yield, or to give up. Behind the sharp beard and short hair, there were ways beyond the pride and vanity of martial lords. The death of her former husband showed the truth, where war can be won without the armies ever clashing into each other.

The faces of the seven gods seemed empty when she returned to the sept, to look into her brother's eyes for the last time. The stone and wooden faces were before her eyes, once she would have been afraid, and yet, in the hour of her sorrow, the dread of the Stranger is gone, the grace of the Maid faded, and the face of the Mother hardened like the rock it was hewn from. The jagged sun through the glass dome brought light. Are you a god?, she asked the heavenly circle, maybe I should pray to you.