Skip to main content

a song of ice and fire - Did Jaime realise what Bolton's motivation was?


In A Storm of Swords 1, when Jaime Lannister and Roose Bolton meet in Harrenhal, the following conversation takes place (Jaime's PoV):



"I'm a captive here, not a guest. Your goat cut off my hand. If you think some prunes will make me overlook that, you're bloody well mistaken."


That took Roose Bolton aback. "Perhaps I am. Perhaps I ought to make a wedding gift of you to Edmure Tully... or strike your head off, as your sister did for Eddard Stark."


"I would not advise it. Casterly Rock has a long memory."


"A thousand leagues of mountain, sea, and bog lie between my walls and your rock. Lannister enmity means little to Bolton."


"Lannister friendship could mean much." Jaime thought he knew the game they were playing now. But does the wench know as well? He dare not look to see.




What does Jaime mean by 'knowing the game they are playing'? Does he mean the game of two enemies making some sort of deal that's advantageous to both sides (Bolton's motivations being exactly what he says they are later in the same conversation), or does he realise that



Bolton has sold out to the Lannisters (i.e. to Lord Tywin) and is planning to betray Robb Stark



? We've been led to believe, by Jaime's own PoV scenes and by Brienne, that Jaime wasn't a part of what I mentioned in the last spoiler-tag, but does this scene suggest that actually he did know about it before the Red Wedding?



Answer



At this point Jaime has no reason to believe that Bolton has sold out the Starks. He's been locked up in the Riverrun dungeons for most of the war, with very little information being fed to him. What Jaimes means by "the game" was Bolton trying to find the most advantageous position to hold. Basically, he's negotiating with Jaime



"Perhaps I ought to make a wedding gift of you to Edmure Tully . . . or strike your head off, as your sister did for Eddard Stark"




Here Bolton states what he should do as a Stark vassal. The fact that he hasn't done any of this, and presents it in the form of a suggestion, means that Bolton is hoping to hear any alternatives that Jaime has to offer.



"I would not advise it. Casterly Rock has a long memory."



Jaime states that doing so would make him a mortal enemy of the Lannisters. A threat basically.



"A thousand leagues of mountain, sea, and bog lie between my walls and your rock. Lannister enmity means little to Bolton."



Bolton dismisses the threat. Lannister enmity is not enough of a threat for him to change his mind. Does Jaime have anything else to offer?




"Lannister friendship could mean much."



Jaime changes tack, promising Lannister friendship (and all that entails) should Bolton release Jaime.


And so on and so forth. At this point Jaime believes that he's negotiating Bolton's into betraying the Stark and allying himself with the Lannisters. He has no idea that Lord Tywin had already done so.


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

fan fiction - Does the Interdict of Merlin appear in original Harry Potter canon?

In Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality by Eliezer Yudkowsky a concept called the ' Interdict of Merlin ' appears: (all emphasis added) Chapter 23: His hand on the doorknob, Harry Potter already inside and waiting, wearing his cowled cloak. "The ancient first-year spells," Harry Potter said. "What did you find?" "They're no more powerful than the spells we use now." Harry Potter's fist struck a desk, hard. "Damn it. All right. My own experiment was a failure, Draco. There's something called the Interdict of Merlin -" Draco hit himself on the forehead, realizing. "- which stops anyone from getting knowledge of powerful spells out of books, even if you find and read a powerful wizard's notes they won't make sense to you, it has to go from one living mind to another. I couldn't find any powerful spells that we had the instructions for but couldn't cast. But if you can't get them out of old books,

Why didn't The Doctor or Clara recognize Missy right away?

So after it was established that Missy is actually both the Master, and the "woman in the shop" who gave Clara the TARDIS number... ...why didn't The Doctor or Clara recognize her right away? I remember the Tenth Doctor in The Sound of Drums stating that Timelords had a way of recognizing other Timelords no matter if they had regenerated. And Clara should have recognized her as well... I'm hoping for a better explanation than "Moffat screwed up", and that I actually missed something after two watchthroughs of the episode. Answer There seems to be a lot of in-canon uncertainty as to the extent to which Time Lords can recognise one another which far pre-dates Moffat's tenure. From the Time Lords page on Wikipedia : Whether or not Time Lords can recognise each other across regenerations is not made entirely clear: In The War Games, the War Chief recognises the Second Doctor despite his regeneration and it is implied that the Doctor knows him when they fir

warhammer40k - What evidence supposedly supports Tau as related to the Necrontyr?

I've heard of rumours saying that the Tau from Warhammer 40K are in fact the Necrontyr. Is there anything that supports this statement, in WH40K canon? I just found this, on 1d4 chan 1 : Helping Necrons? Or are they Necrontyr descendants? An often overlooked issue is that Tau have no warp signatures, just like Necrons, hate Warpspawns and Warp in general, just like Necrons, have the exact same skull shape,stature and short lives, and the overwhelming need for Technology and beam weapons, JUST LIKE NECRONS. GW may have planned a race that simply prepares a pacified, multiracial galaxy for Necrons to feast upon, supported by Ethereals that have a C'tan phase blade. Then there is a reference of "dark seed in east" by the Deceiver, so the tricky C'tan might give Tzeentch the finger in the JUST AS PLANNED competition. Or maybe GW just has so little creativity that they simply made a new civ conforming to an Old One's standards without knowing it. Is this the connec