Catelyn- Chapter 6
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| Catelyn and Ned decide what to do... |
This chapter is told from the perspective of Catelyn. Last we saw her, she was feasting in the Great Hall with King Robert, his entourage and her family.
We are now in Catelyn’s private bedchambers of Winterfell’s Great Keep. Her room is the warmest in the entire castle and she likes it that way because she’s a Southerner and doesn’t do well in the cold.
Ned and Catelyn just finished some hot passionate lovemaking and both of them are at their most vulnerable. Ned tells Catelyn that he’s decided to turn down the Hand of the King position that he was offered by King Robert. But Catelyn says he can’t because it is a very personal offer from the King and one doesn’t turn down the King. She is frustrated because Ned is not opportunistic when it comes to power and position while she on the other hand, doesn’t want to pass up the prospect that their family could be powerful.
We learn that Ned is a reluctant leader and feels that his brother Brandon was the better leader instead of him. He was forced into leadership because his brother died. Despite her frustration, Catelyn empathizes with him because Ned is still haunted by the death of his brother and ironically, THAT woman who bore him the bastard son.
Maester Luwin, the Stark family wiseman/ advisor, urgently disturbs them with a message he found in a gift box left on his table. The message is found to be for Catelyn from her sister Lysa in the Eyrie. After decoding it, Catelyn destroys the note and says Lysa wrote to say that Jon Arryn, her husband was murdered by Queen Cersei Lannister.
Catelyn tries to convince her husband once more that he should be Hand of the King to watch over Robert and uncover the truth of Jon Arryn’s death. Maester Luwin advices him to take the position too. Ned is still fearful because he remembers his father went south to answer the summon of Mad King Aerys Targaryen and never returned alive.
Ned tells Catelyn to stay in Winterfell to look after the boys while the girls would follow him to King’s Landing. Catelyn is against this because the family is separated but she has no choice.
They now decide what to do with Jon Snow. It is clear that Catelyn hates Ned’s bastard son and there’s a backstory to it: Ned went off to fight a war while she was safe in the Tully home of Riverrun. Robb was just an infant then. The worst decision she feels Ned had made was bring his bastard son home to Winterfell. Ned refuses to speak about who Jon Snow’s mother is.
Rumor has it, it was Ser Arthur Dayne’s sister, Lady Ashara Dayne. Ser Arthur Dayne was killed by Ned and he carried his sword back to her in her home of Starfall. She was very beautiful and known for her violet eyes. Either way, Ned loved this mystery woman so much that nothing Catelyn could say would make Ned send Jon Snow away.
Catelyn hates the fact she has to see Jon Snow‘s face every day because he looks more like Ned then any of her other sons.
Ned knows he can’t take Jon Snow with him to King’s Landing because of his bastard status and Maester Luwin proposes to send Jon off to the Night’s Watch. Which they agree is probably the best place for him.
Ned will personally tell Jon about this plan when the time comes.
Analysis
Themes and Topics
-love and trust
-being an outsider
-omens and interpretations
-inheritance of power
-duty vs. self
-intrigue, politics and power
-fear and guilt
-family relations
-sight and seeing motif
This chapter is through the eyes of Catelyn Tully, Ned Stark’s wife.
It’s interesting to know that the chapter first starts describing how warm Catelyn’s bedchambers are. Unlike the rest of the building, her room and her bath is always warm, hot and steaming. Full of moving energy, vibrancy and passion.
Catelyn is not a Stark and she very much doesn’t function like one. She’s a passionate soul: burning like a flame full of love and warmth. She is very family oriented and likes people close to her. She’s not emo, brooding, pessimistic and sullen like her husband. And sometimes, she can’t help but feel like a fish out of water in this cold gloomy world of the Starks. She is the heart of the Stark family, the glue that keeps everyone together.
So Ned and Catelyn have some hot passionate sex and after they do, Ned walks over to open the windows of the room. The both of them are at their most vulnerable but Catelyn notices that Ned looks more vulnerable than ever. “The wind swirled around him as he stood facing the dark, naked and empty handed… he looked somehow smaller and more vulnerable…”
Ned tells Catelyn that he can’t accept the Hand of the King position that King Robert offered him because he’s afraid and doesn’t want the responsibility. He also doesn’t want to put his entire family at risk.
Catelyn tells him that he can’t refuse because she knows the game of politics a bit better. King Robert may get suspicious that the Starks are against him and they may get into trouble. ‘If you refuse to serve him, he will wonder why, and sooner or later he will begin to suspect that you oppose him. Can’t you see the danger that would put us in?”
Ned doesn’t get it though because he still sees King Robert as his best friend and ignores his title. He thinks King Robert would just laugh and let him go. “We were closer than brothers. He loves me. If I refuse him,he will roar and curse and bluster, and in a week we will laugh about it together.”
But Catelyn sees deeper into the situation and knows the offer is something Ned cannot refuse. “You knew the man..the king is a stranger to you… Robert came all this way to see you, to bring you these great honors, you cannot throw them back in his face.” The omen of the dead Direwolf killed by the Stag still bothers her and she reads it that King Robert could kill the Starks if he is feels like it because he‘s the most powerful man in the realm, and she doesn’t want to take chances.
Catelyn gets annoyed that Ned still doesn’t see her point and reveals that the prospect of power is right there in front of the Starks, they just have to reach out and grab it. “He offers his own son in marriage to our daughter…Sansa might someday be queen. Her sons could rule from the Wall to the mountains of Dorne. What is so wrong with that?” Opportunity is right there staring at them in the face and Ned wants to turn it down?
Ned is clearly afraid at the prospect of all this power and responsibility. When Catelyn brings up Ned’s brother Brandon, he feels inferior and unworthy. ‘Brandon. Yes. Brandon would know what to do. He always did. It was all meant for Brandon… He was born to be a King’s Hand and a father to queens. I never asked for this cup to pass to me.” So Brandon was the former Hand of the King, he was meant to marry Catelyn, but he died so Ned was given the Lord of Winterfell title.
But like Catelyn says, Ned doesn’t have a choice. “But Brandon is dead, and the cup has passed, and you must drink from it, like it or not.”.
This is a fine example of Self Vs Duty conflict. Also, it’s interesting to note that in the previous chapter when Robert talks to Ned about taking away Jon Arryn’s son’s title because he didn’t earn it. Here we are meant to question the fairness in inherited leadership: Is it fair that a lordship title is passed down to someone even if he doesn’t want it or is not capable of leading? Or is it fair to only give the title to someone who is capable of leading and deserves it?
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| Maester Luwin played by Donald Sumpter |
Maester Luwin is a very old wise man and also their trusted doctor, advisor in most matters. He tells Ned and Catelyn that someone dropped off a wooden box with a special observatory lens. Note the motif for seeing, in this case, a magnifying lens. A magnifying lens enlarges the truth.
Maester Luwin goes on to say that there was a special message concealed in the box and its meant for Catelyn.
These few paragraphs are dragged out and written tense on purpose to create a sense of mystery and intrigue. What’s in the box? What’s in the message? Who’s the message for?
The message is from Catelyn’s sister Lysa in the Eyrie. She reads the message, gets out of bed naked, and burns the message in the fire. After all that tension and anticipation, we learn that Lysa wrote to say that her husband and former Hand of the King, Jon Arryn, was murdered… by the Lannister queen.
This new info really ups the stakes for Ned and Catelyn tells her husband that he must be King Robert’s Hand of the King. To guard him from the Lannisters and to know the truth about Jon Arryn’s death. “Now we truly have no choice. You must be Robert’s Hand. You must go south with him and learn the truth.”
And Ned still doesn’t want to do it, now Maester Luwin has to advice him. “The Hand of the King has great power, my lord. Power to find the truth of Lord Arryn’s death, to bring his killers to the king’s justice. Power to protect Lady Arryn and her son, if the worst be true.”
Ned goes over to the window to look outside once again. Catelyn and Maester Luwin give him a moment. “They waited, quiet, while Eddard Stark said a silent farewell to the home he loved.” After he was done, he broods once again, that his father went South to King’s Landing too..and didn’t return.
Ned mans up and takes responsibility. He tells Catelyn to stay in Winterfell, much to her unhappiness. Now it’s her turn to feel insecure and afraid “Was this to be her punishment? Never to see his face again, nor to feel his arms around her?”
He tells her to look after Robb and Rickon with Maester Luwin’s guidance, while the girls go to King’s Landing with him. “Sansa must wed Joffrey, that is clear now, we must give them no grounds to suspect our devotion. And it is past time that Arya learned the ways of a southron court. In a few years she will be of an age to marry too.”
Catelyn is crushed because her family means everything to her, we also learn that Bran is her favorite child. “Reluctantly, she let go of them in her heart. But not Bran. Never Bran”
Ned decides that Bran should go with him to King’s Landing to interact with the Baratheon princes. In the end, Catelyn only has Robb and little Rickon at Winterfell. It breaks her heart because the family is separated and she doesn’t even get to be with her favorite child.
But when Jon Snow is mentioned, Catelyn gets very angry. So angry that even Ned could sense it.
We learn about the backstory of how Jon Snow came to be: Ned went off to war while Catelyn was placed in her home of Riverrun. She was looking after the infant Robb. And before she knew it, Ned came home to Winterfell with a bastard son. Ned is so ashamed of Jon Snow’s mother that he never mentions her. Rumor has it that it might have been Ser Arthur Dayne’s sister - Lady Ashara Dayne. She was very beautiful woman ‘with haunting violet eyes.’
Now if we remember correctly, Daenerys and Viserys Targaryen have purple colored eyes. Purple is commonly expressed as a royal color, symbolizing that Lady Ashara Dayne perhaps was of great nobility.
Ser Arthur Dayne was said to be a pretty badass knight. “Deadliest of the 7 knights of Aery’s (Mad King Aerys Targaryen) Kingsguard.” And Ned Stark killed him in single combat. He also carried Ser Arthur’s sword back to Lady Ashara Dayne in the Dayne castle of Starfall.
Ned could not be convinced by Catelyn to send Jon Snow away and that was ‘the one thing she could never forgive him’. ‘She had come to love her husband with all her heart, but she had never found it in her to love Jon’ ‘Jon was never out of sight, and as he grew, he looked more like Ned than any of the trueborn sons she bore him.’
Catelyn makes quite a confession to the reader. That as much as she trusted her husband to be filial and loving, Ned‘s bastard son is someone she cannot accept. She’d be cool with it if he didn’t tell her he shagged another woman or bring the child home… but he did. He brought back his sin of a bastard son home to Winterfell. And not only that, he refuses to admit the name of the woman who gave him this child. And the worst part, Jon Snow looks more like Ned than all the other sons she gave him. She bears this grudge quite heavily and it does tear her up inside. She feels guilty about this but she just can’t let it go and accept Jon Snow.
Catelyn makes her ultimatum that Jon Snow cannot stay in Winter fell “He is your son, not mine. I will not have him.” and they have a quarrel. Maester Luwin saves the situation by saying that Jon Snow could go to the Night’s Watch and he has expressed interest in going. They all agree that it is the best future for him since he has none in King’s Landing.
In Catelyn’s mind, she’s whooping for joy! Because she reasons, this would get rid of Jon Snow from her sight and with the Night Watch’s oath, Jon can’t father any kids that would compete with her grandkids aka Sansa and Jofferey’s kids. We can tell here that Catelyn has a pretty good sense of foresight to think this far ahead about her future grandkids and as bitchy as this may seem, she’s just looking out for her family and she really doesn’t like Jon Snow and never regards him as family. She’s just protecting her interests.
Ned of course feels for Jon more and as worried as he is about sending his 14 year old bastard son away, he agrees that it is good for him and the chapter ends with Ned saying he’ll tell Jon about his transfer in 2 weeks time.
Chapter Impressions
It’s nice seeing the more intimate side of Ned and Catelyn. They do love each other very much but like any couple, they have their differences and trust issues. The story is also propelled forward by the MacGuffin - the death of Jon Arryn and as afraid as Ned is taking up the responsibility, he man’s up finally and makes executive decisions even though they’re painful and will breakup the family.
We also see more of Catelyn and what goes on in her head - as loving and protective she is about her husband, her family and obtaining political power, she holds a deep seated grudge for Jon Snow and it is justifiable, because Jon isn’t her son.
As we learned in the previous chapter about why Ned Stark is such a tortured soul, this chapter makes us empathise with him more. He’s afraid of taking political power because it caused the death of his siblings and father. Ned is a great warrior not a political player and playing the game of politics is something he knows he’s not good at, but after it’s revealed that Jon Arryn was murdered by the Lannister Queen, he knows the only way to protect his best buddy King Robert is to be Hand of the King.
The chapter ends on a sad note that the family will be split up and Jon Snow sent away but it had to be done. Le sigh. Somehow we already get the sense that something dreadful is going to happen…
