Semi-closed

[reek]

Who: Theon Greyjoy (reek) & Various
What: Theon got a canon update! It's not pretty. Here's a catchall.
When: May
Where: Olympia...mostly not leaving his home tbh
Warning(s): Typical ASOIAF/GoT warnings & added torture mentions



[ Starters will be in the comments! If you would like one and we haven't talked about it yet, PM me or grab me at muttonchops, or just wildcard me. Theon will largely not be around Olympia, but he will visit the stasis units closer to the end of the month if you want to catch him then. ]

Comments

[reek]

There was no one left from your Winterfell. Only the ghosts would have recognized Jeyne for who she was.

[ But the ghosts never left me alone.

It was admittedly for the best, in the end. Jeyne’s false identity guaranteed her safety for a time, and a rescue that never would have taken place otherwise.

He doesn’t tell Sansa how he hadn’t wanted to aid in the rescue, or how he had been forced into it despite insisting again and again that the plan was foolish. It had been foolish, it had failed, forcing him to take things into his own hands, and he had been frightened. He’s frightened still, but he had saved the girl. No one, not in his Westeros or Sansa’s, can claim that he hasn’t saved someone.

That ghost of a smile widens ever so slightly. Finally, someone has thanked him. After all he’s been through, someone has finally thanked him for his trouble. ]

It wasn’t Arya.

[ He knows she’s been listening, but he feels the need to remind her anyway. Just in case her gratitude is misplaced and she feels the desire to take it back. ]

Fools. All of them.

[unprays]

The ghosts, [ she whispers, remembering how it had felt, in Winterfell, staring at the walls of her home, tasting the air and thinking how it would never be the same.

but then Theon smiles, and she smiles back, even with his reminder — for that, she nods. ]

I know. [ Arya wouldn't have needed rescuing, she thinks. ] You saved my dear friend, a girl who's never done anything to deserve a fate like hers. [ she doesn't repeat it, her words of gratitude, but it's still there, underneath every word she speaks. that Theon did something no one else could have done... something that she would always be grateful for.

she falls silent for a moment. ]

Do you... believe me now? That what I told you before was the truth? In your home, you saved Ramsay's wife. In my home... you saved Ramsay's wife, too. [ only it was her instead of Jeyne. ]

[reek]

[ He’s tried not to think about it. Thinking is difficult. When he closes his eyes, he still only sees blood and ruin. When he retreats too deeply into his mind, he starts to question which parts of him are Theon and which parts of him are Reek, but he can’t ignore this anymore, not when Sansa is forcing him to face it. ]

I believe you. You did nothing to deserve it either.

[ His voice is quiet as he drops his gaze to his mangled hands. Two Westeroses: the whole concept is disquieting and upsetting. Two times his father gave him up, two times he betrayed his best friend, two times he fell into Ramsay’s hands. Perhaps they happened in different ways, but they still happened. He's silent for a moment, but then he suddenly asks: ]

Why is that the difference?

[ His voice breaks, but he doesn't look up. He still hates appearing so weak, but what can be done? He is weak. He's fragile and frail and broken. ]

Of all things, why that? Why couldn't it have been that your father's death never happened? Or Robb's? Why not Robb sending someone else as an envoy to my father?

[ Why do I even exist in your Westeros?, he almost asks, but he holds his tongue. He's being stupid, but two Westeroses is even more stupid. ]

[unprays]

[ there had been a weight pressing on her heart, until this moment — she feels the exact second it falls away, breaks in two, lets her heart beat freely. she hadn't realized how badly his distrust had affected her.

but it seems her heart is allowed to beat only for it to break, too, a sharp blade driven into it at his words. it isn't as though she hasn't thought of it, too: why were some things different, when the things that truly mattered had never changed? where was she, in Theon's Westeros, if not in Winterfell? had the other Sansa found a better fate... or a worse one? was she even alive?

slowly, she shakes her head. ]

I don't know. Maybe... maybe some things were always meant to happen. Because there is no way Father would ever be anything but honourable, no matter the place. He would have always told the truth. And because Robb was like Father, just as honourable. Because he would have married for love, always... because he would have trusted you, always.

[ she knows it's painful to say, and must be even more painful to Theon to hear. but she won't lie to him — he's been lied to enough, and she won't have a part in that, no matter if it means hurting him with her words. ]

But it also means Ramsay was always meant to have a Stark as a wife, a fake Stark or a real one, and you were always meant to save her.

[reek]

[ Theon had too much time to think down in the dark depths of the Dreadfort dungeons before he learned his new name. He thought about the Starks, what a close family they had once been, and how he had aided in scattering them throughout the Seven Kingdoms. Davos Seaworth claims to know Rickon’s location, but gods only knew what had become of Bran. Where is Arya, and what fate has befallen Sansa? New only ever reached him of Jon Snow after he had become Lord Commander and of Robb after he had been slain at the Twins. ]

He shouldn’t have trusted me.

[ He would clench the his teeth if he thought they wouldn’t just crumble right out of his mouth. He knows why Robb trusted him, but he hates him for it. He hates the way it weighs on his heart. It’s because no one else ever did trust him. It’s because Robb saw him as a brother. It’s because Robb wanted him to see his home again, just in case he never would. ]

I wish he hadn’t. That should be the difference. None of this ever should have happened.

[ He’s spent so long wishing that he’d died alongside Robb instead. His guilt is still too great. It would be so easy to just escape from it, to just be Reek who has no guilt, but that’s an equally as terrible option. The fact that he’s considering it at all is terrifying, though. ]

[unprays]

You think the Boltons wouldn't have found another way?

[ she knows her voice sounds harsh, but she can't listen to this — Theon blaming himself, thinking that it was his choices that had led to this. true, some of them had, and she'd hated him for his betrayal, once... but it wasn't only him, just as it wasn't only her fault that Joffrey cut off her Father's head, just as it wasn't only Jon's fault that Rickon had died on that battlefield.

there was never only one person to blame. ]

I agree, none of this should have happened. But, Theon, if you think it was all because Robb trusted you, because you were sent back to your father and listened to him... that's not true. The Boltons would have found their way to Robb's counsel, Roose Bolton would have betrayed him nonetheless. Perhaps they wouldn't have taken Winterfell, not immediately, but... the only thing you would have changed would have been your own fate.

You would have died by Robb's side, with his wife and my mother. And... [ she reaches out, hesitantly, placing her hand on his arm, the gentlest of touches. ]

I'm glad you didn't. I'm glad you're alive.

[reek]

[ He flinches at the sound of her voice. He knows in his heart that Robb was just a boy in over his head, skilled in strategy but perhaps not as skilled in his political tactics. Roose Bolton was always older and more cunning, but it feels better somehow to put the blame onto himself. It gives him something concrete, something to chain the identity of Theon Greyjoy to. It’s something awful and genuinely makes him want to die or retreat back into the persona of Reek, but he feels as though he needs his sins to remember who he is. ]

I’m sorry.

[ He flinches once more when she touches him. He isn’t exactly frightened of her, and she hasn’t hurt him, but he simply doesn’t want to be touched. It’s been a long time since anyone has touched him except to cause him pain, and now it makes him anxious, like the fingerprints of whoever’s touching him might burn him. ]

I’m not glad I’m alive. But I’m glad you are, and I’m glad Jeyne is.