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When Jaime was a boy, he loved to listen to stories. The sweet lullabies of the serving girls, the adventurous legends from the stablemen, the cautionary tales that he would hear from the elders in his family, and the jovial, bawdy fables his Aunt Genna would tell.
More than any other though, Jaime loved the stories his mother told him.
Even now, many years later, he could remember her voice; the soft tone full of warmth and life, her gentle laugh that was never harsh or cruel, and the comforting breath of her whisper. That was the one he still heard in his own voice sometimes, the one he recognised and told him he was on the right path. Jaime spent years wishing he could hear her again, just one last time, until he realised there were other ways of remembering her, and her voice.
When she told the tales, she rarely sat away from him, like he’d seen some mothers do, where they would be perched on a chair and the child at arm’s length on the floor. He was always tucked under her wing protectively, shielding him from the world around them. It would be a long time after those moments that anyone ever did anything to protect Jaime and make him feel safe again.
The story didn’t matter, not really, as long as it was from his mother’s lips. There was one tale that was amongst his favourites though; The Red String.
Whenever Jaime bled, whether from a scrape due to falling from a tree or a nip from a sword, and droplets of scarlet blood used to appear, his mother would tell him that it was because there was a red thread that connected from his heart, all the way down to the tip of his fingers.
When Jaime asked why we would have such a thing, she explained that the thread continued, we just couldn’t see it, and our red string connected to someone else; the soul who matches our own.
“Red and gold, Mother?” he would ask hopefully, looking up at her with bright green eyes.
“Yes, sweetling. Of course, a red and gold thread,” she would reply with a smile. His mother always changed the little details in the story that would make Jaime happiest.
When their mother first told the story, Cersei was there also, lounging on the bottom of the bed playing with a doll, swinging it by the hair. She scowled at the tale, pulling holes in it, using her clever and quick mind to negate the details.
Cersei would say it was impossible for a thread to be in two places connected like that. What would happen if the other person left the room? What if they left the kingdom? Would it stretch? How did people not get constantly tangled? What happened if the thread was cut or your arm was cut off? Every detail of the story she had a question for, and every answer led to a roll of her eyes. His twin liked facts, and reality, and things she could know.
From then on, their mother always saved the story of the red thread for a time when Cersei wasn’t there with them. She knew Jaime enjoyed stories that gave him hope, or courage, or happiness. Or love. That he would take the message of the story and try to follow through with it in his life.
His mother knew him well, recognised that underneath everything, Jaime had a soft, caring heart and a kind mind, and the moral of the story would always reach out to him and grip, no matter the validity of the details.
She used to change the characters of The Red Thread, a different circumstance each time, and he would listen intently.
“Once there was a young boy, and his grandfather told him that he would take him that day to meet the soul he was connected to by the red string,” she began, one chilly evening as Jaime was curled into her arms.
“The boy happily went along, immediately recognising the house the old man had taken him to visit, because it belonged to the most beautiful girl in the village. He bristled up his chest and walked confidently through the door, proud that when he was older, he would be the envy of all other men for having the prettiest bride.
For the next hour, the boy drank tea with the girl, and he was amazed by her beauty, and her long flowing hair, the colour of sunshine, and admired her graceful movements. There was only one problem; the girl showed little interest in him, turning her nose up at all his stories, and throwing the yellow rose he had brought her to the side.
But the boy continued, because his grandfather had told him that not all people recognised or even liked their soulmate on first sight. As he was sitting at her table one day, taking a bite of cake, he started to choke, the airway to his lungs being blocked, and he couldn’t breath.
The girl with the golden hair just sat their looking at him, just stirring her tea even as he tried to croak out a plea for help.
Suddenly, was was a large thump to his back, sending him flying forward. Then another, and another, until that piece of cake shot out of his mouth. The boy fell to the floor with a startled bump, gasping for the air that was now able to travel through his body. When he looked up, he saw pale eyes, and ashen skin just barely peaking out from mousey brown frizzy hair. It was the girl’s sister.
The boy thanked her, trying to avoid staring at the star shaped scar on the sister’s chin that was raised and burning pink. He bid farewell to his golden love that day, promising to visit on the morrow.
And so he did. Each day, for the next week, he visited the house where his soulmate lived, bringing her a yellow rose every time. And each time he was there, the golden girl took the rose without thanks, before shutting the door.
The next week, the boy’s grandfather fell ill, and the young man spent day and night caring for him. One day, the sister of his love, the girl with the star scar, came to visit his grandfather bringing him some fresh red apples, as the old man had shown her kindness once in the market.
Seeing the opportunity, the boy asked the scarred girl to sit with his relative for an hour so he could go and visit her sister as promised. She agreed, so off the boy went, a yellow rose in hand, and again the golden girl took it and shut the door.
For the next two weeks, the events remained the same. The star scar girl would come and care for his grandfather, tidying the house, making them food until the boy returned from delivering the yellow rose to the girl’s sister.
Unfortunately, the grandfather died, with both the boy and the star scar girl holding his hands as he passed from this world into the next.
It wasn’t long until a war broke out in the kingdom and the boy, like many others, was sent off to battle. He fought valiantly and bravely, knowing he had his soulmate of the golden girl to return home to one day.
The war ended, and the boy survived, now a man grown, and he returned back to the village a conquering hero. The people were lined on the streets to welcome him home, and every girl in town was falling at his feet begging to be his bride.
Eventually, he spotted the golden girl, and he couldn’t believe that finally she was there waiting for him, welcoming him and wanting him. As he got closer though, she was not how he remembered in his mind.
Her hair was still yellow but was flat and lifeless, like a dead flower petal. She still moved smoothly but with the rigidness of a doll. She still had brown eyes but they were muddy and murky. It had seemed to the boy that she had changed, until he realised she hadn’t converted in any way. She was the same as she had ever been. He was the one that had changed.
No sooner had he dismounted his horse, than he heard a scream in the distance. Running quickly, he headed towards the old apple tree and arrived just in time to catch a falling figure in his arms.
She had eyes the tone of silver, light skin that was smooth to the touch, and thick wavy brown hair the colour of sparrow feathers. On her chin was a mark, bold and brave as a star.
As they were laying there, in each others arms, a beautiful red apple fell between them. They had saved each other, they had cared for each other, and from that moment on, they loved each other.”
Jaime’s eyes were drooping a little by that point, the relaxing tone of his mother’s voice mixed with the happiness of the story giving him a warm contented feel in his belly.
“You see, sweetpea, that’s what love is,” his mother continued, tucking a blanket around him. “Without respect, there is no love. Without care, there is no love, and without trust, there is no love. It has to exist, and it has to be on both sides. The boy and the girl with the star scar were forged with the same red thread-“
“Red and gold thread,” he yawned.
“Yes, Jaime,” she chuckled. “The same red and gold thread as each other. It wasn’t always obvious to either of them at first, but then real love shouldn’t be. Like anything else worthwhile in this world, it is earned, on both sides. Those two were made from the same material, even though they couldn’t see it on the outside.”
“Like me and Cersei?” he asked, snuggling into his pillow.
Jaime’s mother shook her head so harshly, he could feel the movement vibrate into the base of the bed. “No,” she said, her voice darker and more clipped than before. “You two are forged from the same blood, at the same time, but you are not the same. Not underneath.”
Jaime opened his eyes enough to frown. It wasn’t what he believed, not what he had been told. He and Cersei were two halves of a whole, sharing a soul, a perfect mirror image of each other. He explained this to his mother.
Again, she shook her head. “Do you remember how old cook made such a fuss when some oil got spilt into the drinking water?”
Jaime nodded, sitting his head up a little. “She was angry for days because she said it was the purest spring water, and now greasy oil sat on top of it.”
“That’s right,” his mother nodded. “They were now both in the same container, taking up the same space, but they were so different.”
“Cook said that the oil spoilt the water, so you couldn’t drink it, so no one, not even the dogs would want to drink it,” he remembered.
“The water would always take it’s place under the oil, it just naturally fell to the bottom as the oil claimed it’s place at the top,’ his mother continued. “It would coat the surface so much that you wouldn’t see that pure water there. It just looked like oil.”
“So Cersei and me, we’re like oil and water?” he asked. His mother always had a message in her stories, always did it in a way to encourage Jaime to be his best.
She gave a long deep sigh. “Perhaps, sweet child,” she admitted. “Cersei has it differently to you though, and it’s natural for her to think she needs to push to be seen and to grasp some power. Many will try and take and force in this life.”
“Should I be oil so that I am always seen and have power?” he asked dubiously. Jaime didn’t like the sound of that. He understood what his mother was saying though. He found reading words challenging, but he understood stories. He had to to listen in his life more than most people did, and that’s how he gained his knowledge.
“No, Jaime,” she said, tucking him back in and giving a kiss to his cheek. “My sweet-hearted boy, you must always be you. Just honest, brave, loyal you.”
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Winterfell - Over 30 years later
The isolation wasn’t unfamiliar to Jaime. Being in a hostile environment surrounded by the enemy was part and parcel of being a knight, and a Kingsguard at that. The fear never came from dying. He wasn’t afraid to die, and never had been.
Standing here now, in the heart of Winterfell, surrounded by northern bannermen, Dothraki, Unsullied, Wildlings, the withering glares of the remaining Starks, and one particularly annoyed Targaryen, Jaime couldn’t think of a time where he felt more of an outcast.
Being a Lannister, you always felt like an outcast in some way, though few spoke of it. They were a house more than any other where you had to rise to the high expectations. If either inwardly or outwardly, you didn’t fit the mould, then you always faced the fear of being seen as such. That wasn’t acceptable. You had to carry the Lannister name, and show what it meant to be a Lannister.
Perhaps in some ways it was easier if you didn’t fit in outwardly. Jaime wouldn’t say he was jealous of Cersei or Tyrion, for being passed over because of their look or gender, but at least they didn’t need to pretend. Growing up a Lannister, you were always going to know how to act like a Lannister. But that didn’t make you into one.
Cersei and Tyrion were smart, they knew how to take a situation and fit it to suit them, to work in their favour no matter what the cost. To say whatever they needed to say to exude power and gain control. It came naturally to them. That’s what a Lannister was supposed to be. That’s what Jaime was supposed to be. He wasn’t.
It had taken him a long time to get over that. A long time where he tried to be a name, tried to fit the label that was stamped on him. All the labels that were stamped on him.
The Lannister part of him could stand here and lie. Fall to his knees and beg forgiveness, throw his family to the wolves, both figuratively and literally, and claim that everything he had ever done was a mistake and he regretted every choice he ever made. Perhaps that would woo the Starks more, these righteous offspring of Ned who would judge him with a strict moral compass. Perhaps it would convince all these northern men, all these Wildlings, the Dothraki and the Unsullied. All these men that fell to their knees and switched alliances like they were changing boots. Perhaps it would even convince this young Targaryen, the one that still hissed and brusqued at him. She may have heard stories of her father, but they wouldn’t have been the truth. She would have heard stories about Jaime, but it wouldn’t have been the truth.
If he begged hard enough, talked long enough, made excuses and explanations detailed enough, then he could perhaps convince this Dragon Queen that he was sincere. Tyrion must have done that in some way, to get from being an enemy, a member of the family that killed her relatives and ended a dynasty, to now being her Hand. That’s what Lannisters did. They got power at any cost, because they knew they could always pay back their debts.
That wasn’t him. So instead of speaking like a Lannister, of coercing like a Lannister, of cunning and calculating like a Lannister, he followed the advice of one Lannister. His mother.
Be himself. Be him. That’s what she had always told him, and those words were never quite needed when she was around because she always cleared the road in that direction. Maybe they weren’t even needed right after she was gone, because her presence still ghosted his path.
Somewhere, he had lost his way. Lost the end of the thread to find the right way through the maze. For years he had drifted, following those names and labels that were placed on him.
As he was talking to the Starks, to these Northmen, to this Dragon Queen and her army, he talked from his heart, from his soul. He spoke as himself, no matter what the outcome.
It clearly wasn’t what any of them wanted to hear, how he wouldn’t stand there and make excuses for his actions, that he did the best for his family like all the rest of them did for their own. He wouldn’t stand there and lie. Jaime could sense Tyrion lingering there, cursing his older brother for being an idiot and a fool, warning him that he was another two words away from facing the jaws of a dire wolf or the flames of a dragon.
Jaime didn’t care about that. Death he didn’t fear. Going back to being that shell of a man he was for so many years was what he feared. Of never being that knight he dreamed of as a little boy is what he feared, those pages in the White Book being empty and his legacy being one of dishonour and apathy, is what he feared. Of never being the man he was meant to be. That’s what he feared.
Death was nothing.
If he died now, or was thrown in a dungeon to rot, pulled apart by a wolf, burnt by a dragon or run through with his own sword, he would go to his grave with honour. And by the look on the faces in front of him, that seemed the way it was going to go.
The screech of the chair happened in his periphery, while he was still weighing up which method he would choose to die by if given the choice. But he knew she was behind him before she spoke.
You couldn’t spend that much time in someone’s company without sensing when they were near. It was weeks and weeks they were together, shackled and forced at times, clinging and clasping at others, but connected together in some way. It was more time than Jaime had ever spent physically with another being since he was in the womb with Cersei. That event he had no memory of though. Those long days and nights in the Riverlands with Brienne were impossible to forget.
Jaime knew the sound of her footsteps, how anxious she was feeling by how much she shuffled, the turn of her breathing if she was scared, without even needing to look at her. And right now he knew she was terrified.
No one would ever think of Brienne as being scared, they wouldn’t see that about her and she would would hide it well. Jaime could imagine them all staring at her, as though getting up infront of all these people, including self proclaimed kings and queens, was nothing for her. He knew different. He knew her.
As she was speaking, Jaime could barely look. While only moments before, he stood proudly, staring them all in the eye as they listed off his sins. No one could ever excuse Jaime of being a wallflower, or holding his tongue, and he would never shy away from a battle.
This was very different though as Brienne defended him, spoke of his honour, of his valiancy and made him sound almost heroic. She did so to all these people around her who believed he was anything but those things.
Brienne spoke of how he had saved her, cared for her and trusted her, when he had no reason to do so. It benefited him in no way. Lannisters always paid their debts, it was true, but they never gave first. Only when they had to do so for their own gain of power.
As she spoke those words, he could only flicker his eyes up a few times, the room blurring around him so it was as though the only tangible presence was Brienne’s voice.
His eyes were drawn to her sword belt, the only spot of colour bleeding through. The red ruby of Oathkeeper caught his attention, as though it reached out and grabbed him. It sparkled through the dim light of the room, brighter than the gold of the sword’s hilt.
It was warming in a world that was covered in cold. It was safety in a world that was full of danger. It was heart in a world that was full of hate. Oathkeeper belonged to her, a gift at a time where he hadn’t had much to give, a connection that would always be there no matter where she travelled around Westeros.
Now, standing here, he realised that the distance had not mattered. As Brienne stood there, saving him by standing up and telling their story, caring for him by saying words no one had ever said about him before out loud, and trusting him by vouching for his honour; time and distance had not dampened anything between them.
It had been agreed before he could even catch a breath, and his sword was shoved back into his arms by a particularly pissy Unsullied. Jaime quickly ran his thumb over the ruby on the hilt, before he placed the sword belt back on. Its scarlet light matched the one on it’s other half completely.