Répondre à : ADWD 21 – Schlingue II

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Nouveau chapitre de Schlingue qui est assez particulier car il doit endosser un rôle (en fait son ancienne identité) et pourtant intérieurement il se rappelle tout le temps qu’il n’est que Schlingue.

Dès le début, on voit que Schlingue n’est pas acteur de son destin. On « lui a donné » des éléments (et il n’a pas eu énormément de choix)

They gave him a horse and a banner, a soft woolen doublet and a warm fur cloak, and set him loose.

En plus, il se demande s’ils pensent qu’il va fuir, pour qu’on puisse le chasser. Tout le reste sert surtout à mettre en parallèle ce que vit « Schlingue » et son passé quand il est passé là avec Robb en route vers le Conflans. Malgré tout ce que veut Ramsay, l’identité de Theon reste présente (ou se bat pour exister et remonter à la surface). Un peu comme Arya reste Arya même si elle doit perdre son identité Stark. Faut dire que Ramsay le ramène à la réalité

“You will pretend to be a prince,” Lord Ramsay told him last night, as Reek was soaking in a tub of scalding water, “but we know the truth. You’re Reek. You’ll always be Reek, no matter how sweet you smell. Your nose may lie to you. Remember your name. Remember who you are.”

“Reek,” he said. “Your Reek.”

“Do this little thing for me, and you can be my dog and eat meat every day,”

Schlingue passe vers la tour mais les ennemis sont alentours. Je trouve d’ailleurs qu’ils visent bien mal (c’est pratique)

There was no reply. Inside the walls, he knew, the ironmen were discussing whether to admit him or fill his chest with arrows. It makes no matter. A quick death here would be a hundred times better than returning to Lord Ramsay as a failure.

Then the gatehouse doors flung open. “Quickly.” Reek was turning toward the sound when the arrow struck. It came from somewhere to his right, where broken chunks of the curtain wall lay half-submerged beneath the bog. The shaft tore through the folds of his banner and hung spent, the point a bare foot from his face. It startled him so badly that he dropped the peace banner and tumbled from his saddle.

“Inside,” the voice shouted, “hurry, fool, hurry!”

Il vient pour « words » (on en reparlera après). On peut dire ce qu’on veut mais Schlingue fait preuve de beaucoup d’assurance, même si intérieurement il n’en mène pas large. La garnison fer-née, c’est pas grand monde (et des familles de basse extraction).

Moat Cailin has fallen, Reek realized then, only no one has seen fit to tell them.

Schlingue demande à voir le chef, qui va mal. Et il le fait tuer. Ouch. Puis il s’annonce avec assurance (tout en se remémorant son passage passé) et dit pourquoi il est là avec des parchemins et tiens de la cire rose (ce sera important plus tard)

“Who asks?”

“Lord Balon’s son.” Reek, my name is Reek, it rhymes with cheek. “I am here at the command of Ramsay Bolton, Lord of the Hornwood and heir to the Dreadfort, who captured me at Winterfell. His host is north of you, his father’s to the south, but Lord Ramsay is prepared to be merciful if you yield Moat Cailin to him before the sun goes down.” He drew out the letter that they’d given him and tossed it on the table before the drinkers.

One of them picked it up and turned it over in his hands, picking at the pink wax that sealed it. After a moment he said, “Parchment. What good is that? It’s cheese we need, and meat.”

“Steel, you mean,” said the man beside him, a greybeard whose left arm ended in a stump. “Swords. Axes. Aye, and bows, a hundred more bows, and men to loose the arrows.”

“Ironborn do not surrender,” said a third voice. “Tell that to my father. Lord Balon bent the knee when Robert broke his wall. Elsewise he would have died. As you will if you do not yield.” He gestured at the parchment. “Break the seal. Read the words. That is a safe conduct, written in Lord Ramsay’s own hand. Give up your swords and come with me, and his lordship will feed you and give you leave to march unmolested to the Stony Shore and find a ship for home. Elsewise you die.”

Ils pensent être secourus mais ils se leurrent

“My uncle is never coming back,” Reek told them. “The kingswood crowned his brother Euron, and the Crow’s Eye has other wars to fight. You think my uncle values you? He doesn’t. You are the ones he left behind to die. He scraped you off the same way he scrapes mud off his boots when he wades ashore.”

Those words struck home. He could see it in their eyes, in the way they looked at one another or frowned above their cups. They all feared they’d been abandoned, but it took me to turn fear into certainty.

Schlingue négocie plutôt bien et on lui reproche quoi ? « Words » ^^

“Enough,” snarled Dagon Codd. “You think you can frighten ironborn with words? Begone. Run back to your master before I open your belly, pull your entrails out, and make you eat them.”

L’opposant meurt car Schlingue a retourné une partie de son public. Il a gagné

He almost felt a man again. Lord Ramsay will be pleased with me.

He pulled down the kraken banner with his own two hands, fumbling some because of his missing fingers but thankful for the fingers that Lord Ramsay had allowed him to keep.

N’empêche que les fer-nés ont opposé une forte résistance aux Bolton

“All who weren’t dead, my lord.”

“I thought there would be more. We came at them three times, and three times they threw us back.”

Et Ramsay est miséricordieux !

“You must be starved. Damon, Alyn, see to them. Wine and ale, and all the food that they can eat. Skinner, show their wounded to our maesters.”

En vrai, on a des preuves qu’il a vraiment nourri ces gens ? Parce que gâcher des vivres pour des gens qu’on va tuer ensuite, c’est… étrange, surtout à la veille de l’Hiver.

Schlingue est récompensé, il mange avec les chiens (mon dieu ce que c’est horrible). En plus, Ramsay le tente : veut-il partir ? Bien entendu c’est un piège et Schlingue se recroqueville

“My lord,” he said, “my place is here, with you. I’m your Reek. I only want to serve you. All I ask … a skin of wine, that would be reward enough for me … red wine, the strongest that you have, all the wine a man can drink …”

Lord Ramsay laughed. “You’re not a man, Reek. You’re just my creature. You’ll have your wine, though. Walder, see to it. And fear not, I won’t return you to the dungeons, you have my word as a Bolton. We’ll make a dog of you instead. Meat every day, and I’ll even leave you teeth enough to eat it. You can sleep beside my girls. Ben, do you have a collar for him?”

Et au matin, les prisonniers sont morts, 63, dans une mise en scène pas si loin que ce qu’a vu Daenerys, non ?

One was short half an arm. Another had a parchment shoved between its teeth, its wax seal still unbroken.

Roose arrive du sud et il est en mailles, pas con (cela dit, même à la noce il est en mailles), et surtout il n’est pas sous son heaume, malin.

Schlingue est là quand Ramsay est présenté à sa promise, « Arya »

Arya had her father’s eyes, the grey eyes of the Starks. A girl her age might let her hair grow long, add inches to her height, see her chest fill out, but she could not change the color of her eyes. That’s Sansa’s little friend, the steward’s girl. Jeyne, that was her name. Jeyne Poole.

“Lord Ramsay.” The girl dipped down before him. That was wrong as well. The real Arya Stark would have spat into his face.

Peut-être Schlingue mais Theon (celui jusqu’à ACOK) aussi se serait rebellé contre son ravisseur. Alors que finalement il s’est soumis. Comme quoi, hein…

Mais pour le coup, en effet, ce n’est pas Arya.

Chapitre assez éprouvant où Theon arrive à donner le change alors qu’il panique intérieurement. Niveau stratégique, ça bouge car Moat Cailin est tombée ce qui change beaucoup la donne dans le Nord. En plus du mariage à venir, bien entendu.

Je sers la Garde et c'est ma joie. For this night, and all the nights to come
MJ de Chanson d'Encre et de Sang (2013-2020) et de parties en ligne de jeu de rôle
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DOH : #TeamLoyalistsForeverUntilNow. L’élu des 7, le Conseiller-Pyat Pree qui ne le Fut Jamais