And somewhere lions roam, quite unaware,
in their magnificence, of any weaknesss.
I am almost my old self, here, in these gilded halls.in their magnificence, of any weaknesss.
It is not because I recognise the prosperity, or the culture. It is because my face feels supple in the lamplight, and the music evokes in me something of my past life; I feel more like my father’s son, here, exposed, before others of note. I feel like the man I was raised to be and that, in and of itself, puts me in a sour mood.
But the enigma of it is I cannot break free; no matter how desperate I become, I will always be the man my father raised. Rage will always come more easily than happiness; and even now the sound of music makes me think of useless frivolities, alongside entertainment, love, art, poetry. In this sense, I am surrounded by the very activities I had always been told to disdain—
This, I think, is no place for a captain.
This, I think, is far removed from my destiny. Why then do I feel a need to uphold the legacy of the Starks? Why do I dance when invited to, and listen politely about the statues, and admire from afar the fountains and tapestries?
Why, I wonder, when I would rather the entire thing burn? I cannot look at the surrounding treasures without understanding, with a knowledge borne of experience, how quickly they would be pillaged if invaded. They had wanted me to be the captain to venture forward into other, into lands worthy of invasion, of conquering. They had wanted me to be the emissary of chaos, discord, war.
In another life—one, I think, where I had not loved my best friend with every part of me that was worthy, holy, redeemable—I might have been at the Ieshan party on a quite different note: as a conqueror. And even now, I cannot help but think about ripping the pretty pearls off the servant’s neck—
“Thank you,” I say, instead, as she whisks away a trey of silver and tinkling glasses full of ice and whiskey. The ice, I think, is a statement: who has ice in a desert? And I answer: Adonai’s family.
I sip the whiskey, but even the smell of it makes me think again of my father’s rage.
I am more alike him than I think.
But somehow, I find myself smiling as I drift through the crowd, waiting—
Waiting to find something, I suppose, worth my attention. There is someone--slipping just beyond that woman, and then a man wearing peacock feathers, and the angle of their face and the colour of their hair, something, something, engages me--
I slip past the same party-goers; further, and then I am grabbing a drink from another tray. I offer it, "Would you care to join me?" I ask.
