Comment fic meme #2
After the first round of got_exchange we had a surprisingly successful comment fic meme going for a while (here's a list of all the fics that were written last time), so I thought it might be fun to do this again. (Like last time, it's posted on the mod account journal because I don't want to enable anonymous comments on the exchange community.)
I changed the ( Read more... )
I changed the ( Read more... )
I shall forget that I was ever a Tully, I shall forget Father and Edmure and even you, Cat.
“Here,” and suddenly the bundle is in Lysa’s arms, and she freezes, terrified, and her hands do not come up quickly enough to grip him but Cat’s hands are there, steady and sure, a mother knows best.
He is heavier than she would have thought, solid, a real child and not the dream baby that Lysa rocks in her arms each night, made of air and wind. He is warm, and real, and Catelyn’s, always Catelyn’s (Petyr was always Catelyn’s, too, she never wanted him but he was hers regardless, no matter what Lysa did or said or gave, but a son, she thinks, a son would have made him love her, would have set things right), but he does not fall away beneath her grip, he does not disappear, he is so very real.
Maybe someday, she thinks, she prays to the Mother, and she touches a red curl.
Cat’s hand is on her cheek, brushing away a tear Lysa did not know had fallen, but then, Cat has always known her better than she knew herself.
“You’ve been so quiet and sad, Lysa,” she says quietly. “Soon the war will be over, and Father will come home, and Jon and Eddard, too, and everything will be all right.”
Lysa swallows the words that threaten to rip her throat, no, no, I didn’t know, he made me drink it, do you know what Father did to me, Catelyn, what he did to my boy that he would never do to yours? She will grow used to the dull ache, she thinks, she will grow used to biting her tongue and hiding her words, she may forget she was ever a Tully, someday, but even she cannot forget family duty honor, and perhaps someday when she has a living child of her own (you’ll have sons, he promised, trueborn, and she hopes that, at least, is not another one of Father’s lies) she will be filled with something other than grief.
She swallows the words, looks up at her sister’s bright blue eyes (she’ll never tell her, it must be a secret, her father says, and Lysa cannot bear Catelyn’s pity, and cannot bear to temper her sister’s newfound joy with her own misery) and manages to smile back.
There is something comforting about the weight of the baby in her arms, and she mourns the loss of that comfort as she passes him gently back to Catelyn, back to his mother where he belongs, and she accepts him back with greedy hands, as though he has been gone from her for years, as though she would hold him forever.
“Yes,” Lysa agrees, the words feel empty but maybe someday, maybe someday things will be different. “Everything will be all right, Catelyn.”
She is getting better at lying, she thinks; she fools Catelyn and perhaps someday she will fool herself, too.
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This is amazing and it just aches. Oh Lysa. And Cat! You really seem to have a good grasp on her, and how she would be as a new mother, especially as seen though Lysa's eyes. You can definitely see her kindness and sisterly love, even though she doesn't know and can't understand.
But every other line in this just ripped my heart out. Especially: she does not touch her sister’s boy, no, never, she is poison and her fingers may turn him to ash and dust like her own child made from love, she is death to beautiful things and Petyr was always Catelyn’s, too, she never wanted him but he was hers regardless, no matter what Lysa did or said or gave, but a son, she thinks, a son would have made him love her, would have set things right. I just want to hug her.
Thank you for the amazing fill!
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I always thought it was so sad that Lysa had to carry that burden on her own, had to stay at Riverrun where so many awful things happened to her, and this is only the beginning of the heartbreak she'll have, gahhhhh. :( :(
Thanks again for the wonderful comments! :D
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Phenomenal work.
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Thank you again for your lovely words, I appreciate it!!
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Poor Lysa - she really does gain a skill for lying to herself, and she's just a wreck by the time we meet in the series, but she's had so much tragedy in her life.
Thank you againnnn!!! :D
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How sad. Poor Lysa...no wonder she wants to forget she's a Tully. Hoping she'll make a new start, have a new chance at happiness. All her life, she's been in Cat's shadow. Of course none of this will turn out the way she wants to.
You capture Lysa brilliantly!! Well done!
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Thank you for your lovely review! :)
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