House Among Chaotic Kingdoms

Votes for this Turn:

A1 - Combat - 1

A2 - Leisure - 42

A3 - Scholarly - 3

A4 - Diplomacy - 4

A5 - Language - 3

A6 - Communications - 0

S1 - Wikipedia - 21

S2 - Steam - 0

S3 - Paradox - 32

S4 - World - 0

Ideas:

(6R) Hunting Bird for Sansa - 27

(4R) A Weirwood Bow for Sansa - 17

(2R) Hunting Tutor (addon to A2) - 15

(1R) Kraken carved Seashell Necklace for Yara - 7

(2R) Wooden Sword for Arya - 5

(0R) Save the Money - 5

(1R) Food from the Veil for Ned - 4

(5R) Snow Shrike for Sansa - 3

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Rolls for this Turn:

Personal: Crusader Kings 3 Wiki

Thanks to Blind (disambiguation), we now have fiat-backed perfect vision.

No sort of blinding or vision-obscuring method will work on us, and if our eyes are injured, they will regenerate themselves nearly instantly.

This extends to things like obscuring smoke and darkness, also.

Basically, we have as good vision as a person can have in any environment.

So, no perfect night vision, but we still hit the genetic jackpot in terms of our eyes, and they will never degrade.

World: Warhammer Fantasy Wiki

Thanks to the Arrowhead Formation, Viserys Targaryen is now Talented at all War Skills.

(Strategy, Castrametation, Poliorcetics, Fleetcraft, and Battlewise/coup d’œil.)

He’s also rich enough to afford Mercenary Company Contracts at this point, and still has a True-Seer on side, so this is just an awful combination for us…

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Story:

The hunt had gone well enough that by the time the three of you turned back toward Winterfell, with the horses picking their way along familiar ground and the wolves moving easily around them, the whole afternoon had taken on that light, satisfied feeling some days managed when nothing had gone wrong, and no one had spoiled it by talking too much.

Sansa was in good spirits, which was always pleasant to see out on these little hunts because she had grown into them in her own way rather than by force, and Jon had that quiet, settled look he often wore after a decent outing, while you were mostly content to let the road home come to you without hurrying it.

That was why the interruption landed so soundly.

The rider came hard enough to draw every eye at once, and though he was not in such a state that anyone expected disaster, he carried himself with the sort of urgency that meant whatever news he brought had outrun ordinary sense and was not meant to wait politely until supper.

He reined in close enough to speak without shouting, then gave the news directly, which was that Berenice had returned to Winterfell and had not returned alone, because she had come back with a southern party under a sigil none of you knew at first, a ship with some sort of fruit upon its sail.

That would have meant little to you on its own, and meant no more to Sansa or Jon by the look of them, so the three of you turned your horses home at once and made for Winter Town with far less lingering than before, because whatever had happened had plainly grown larger than a simple healer’s return.

You met Yara there before you reached the castle proper, and she had Arya with her, which meant she had clearly already heard enough of the matter to come looking for the rest of you and had not thought it worth waiting quietly for explanations to drift down on their own.

She was the one who named the sigil for you, and she did it with the sort of clipped certainty that made you feel a little stupid for not knowing it yourself, because she said it belonged to Ser Davos Seaworth, and when all of you looked at her for more she added that Ser Davos was the right hand man of the Master of Ships, the king’s brother Stannis Baratheon.

That changed the shape of things immediately, because a southern escort was one matter and Stannis Baratheon’s right-hand man was another.

So, the walk and ride back up toward Winterfell lost most of their lazy ease after that, not in panic but in focus, while Yara told you what she knew and Arya listened as hard as if the whole thing were another story meant only for her.

By the time you reached the yard, Berenice was already there with Davos and the rest of the party.

Though she was the one everyone looked at first because whatever southern business had followed her home mattered less at that moment than whether she had succeeded or failed where so many others had not even known how to begin.

She looked more tired than when she had left and also, somehow, more certain, which was a good sign in a healer and a better one in a traveler returning from Dragonstone with northern hopes tied to her saddle.

When she was asked, plainly enough, whether the thing had succeeded, Berenice did not dress the answer up.

She said the beginning had been difficult, because while the old gods had not turned from the work, the body they were being asked to answer through did not meet them wholly and did not receive their touch as deeply as it might have in the North.

Still, she said, she had managed to slowly reduce the greyscale scarring until it no longer held that unmistakable look of the sickness, and though it would not leave Princess Shireen untouched, it would, in time, come to resemble old burns more than greyscale, which was still unfortunate but much kinder than what had been there before.

That alone would have been enough to stop the yard and hold it quiet, but then Berenice went on and made the whole matter stranger.

She said that after those first small signs of success, Shireen herself had declared an intent to turn from the Seven and keep instead to the old gods, which had gone over badly with her mother, better with her father, and more seriously than anyone had first expected, because once the matter was allowed and the princess held to it, the healing improved in ways too obvious to miss.

Berenice did not say that lightly.

She said it as someone stating what her own hands had seen, which was that the work answered better after the child had given herself honestly to the old gods, and that if any doubt remained as to whether Shireen meant the conversion or only hoped to purchase a miracle with borrowed prayers, the body itself had settled that question.

There were a great many reactions to that, though most of them kept themselves under control because Ser Davos Seaworth was still standing there, and a man does not give all his thoughts away in front of southern company unless he is either a fool or already too powerful to care.

Davos, for his part, was not hard to look at once your attention finally landed on him properly, because he did not carry himself like a glittering court man or a peacock lord sent north to impress strangers.

He stood steady, plain, weathered by sea and use, and looked exactly like the sort of man Stannis Baratheon would trust for real work rather than pretty errands.

It was Berenice who explained why he was there.

Lord Stannis, she said, had sent Ser Davos as her escort north and as the man meant to treat with Lord Eddard Stark on his behalf, because whatever began as private compassion had now become something House Baratheon intended to notice and answer in kind.

That was as much as you heard before Aunt Catelyn began moving the children out of the way with the particular firmness women of sense used when they did not wish to repeat themselves.

There was no sharpness in it beyond necessity, but she still shooed the whole lot of you off before anyone could root themselves too solidly nearby, saying that there would be important negotiations and that nobody was to get underfoot for them, which of course only made you want to know what the negotiations were about all the more.

Still, there was no fighting her on it, and in truth, you had no wish to be the child remembered for hovering outside a hall door while Lord Stark and Ser Davos Seaworth talked over matters bigger than yourself.

So instead of standing about uselessly, you went down into Winter Town.

The thought had come on you half-formed while the adults were taking their places and sharpening themselves into political usefulness, and once it had come properly, you could not quite set it aside, because over time you had begun to notice things about Sansa that did not always announce themselves loudly.

She had grown into the woods and the bow and the little hunts with more grace than almost anyone would have guessed a year earlier, and she had made a place for herself in all sorts of ways, but that did not mean she never got lonely, or never watched other people’s bonds with a little more feeling than she spoke aloud.

You had seen the way she watched Janus sometimes, especially when the bird followed you as though the two of you had been born in conspiracy together, and though Sansa liked Janus well enough when he allowed her the honor, you were not blind to the fact that she envied that ease a little.

So you placed an order to be sent to White Harbor.

You were careful about it too, because if it was going to be for Sansa then it had to suit her and not only your own idea of what ought to suit her, and by the time you had finished speaking with the merchant and settled the details, the thing felt right enough that you were able to leave it behind with a kind of quiet satisfaction.

The walk back up to Winterfell felt longer than it should have, likely because now there was time to wonder what Uncle Ned and Davos were saying behind closed doors, and whether they were speaking mostly of Berenice, or of Shireen, or of religion, or of politics, or of all those things braided together into the sort of knot only adults and lords ever seemed to enjoy loosening.

Whatever passed between them, it had plainly gone well by the time you returned, because the air in Winterfell had changed in that subtle way houses did when important news had settled on the right side of fortune.

No one told you the whole of it at once, and perhaps no one could have, but the signs were there well enough, with a look from one servant warmer than before, a nod from one guard, and a faint smile from somebody in the hall who ordinarily did not smile at children unless compelled.

By the time supper came near, you were quite certain of one thing, which was that at some point or another nearly the entire household had given you some small sign of approval, as though your one act of compassion had gone out into the world and returned carrying more with it than anyone had expected.

Part of that was plainly Berenice’s success.

Part of it was the fact that where so many others had failed to help a king’s niece, or not even known how to try, the healer you had sent from your own lands had done what maesters and others had not.

Part of it was that the whole affair had reflected well on the Springlords and on those who kept the old gods, because Shireen’s sincere conversion had not only sharpened the healing but, in the eyes of many around you, had proved something real and forceful about the strength still living in the old ways.

And then there was the rest of it, which was bigger than healing and smaller than glory and somehow still more useful than either, because you had brought honor to the North, brought honor to House Stark, and somewhere in the middle of all that helped improve the standing between your uncle’s house and the royal House of Baratheon.

That was a strange thing to sit with.

You had sent Berenice because Shireen was a child and because scars left by greyscale seemed cruel enough to stir pity even in people who had never seen her, and because the Springlords were tied to your lands, whether the rest of Westeros thought much of that tie or not.

You were not sure, by the end of the day, what Uncle Ned and Davos had said to one another for so long, and perhaps you were not meant to be sure yet.

But you were sure of the smiles, sure of the changed air in the household, and sure that however strange it felt to stand in the middle of it, Berenice had come home successful, a princess was healing, the old gods had been answered in Dragonstone of all places, and Winterfell was pleased with you in a way that would take some getting used to.

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Skills:

Combat:

(4) Westerosi CQC - 85/100 (+15) (Skilled In North)

(4) Westerosi Swordsmanship - 50/100 (+10)

(6) Northern Archery - 50/100 (+35) (Skilled)

(4) Northern Equestrianism - 32/100 (+30) (Knack)

(4) Heavy Armour - 45/100 (+15) (Skilled)

Diplomacy:

(5) Interpersonal Communication - 55/100 (+15) (Skilled)

(2) Public Speaking - 75/100 (+5) (Skilled)

(6) Management - 90/100 (+30) (Prodigious)

(3) Stewardship - 21/100 (+7) (Knack)

(3) Northern Law - 3/100 (+7) (Knack) ←

(2) Westerosi Law - 93/100 (+7) (Knack)

Language:

(5) Common Speaking - 52/100 (+12) (Knack)

(5) Old Tongue Speaking - 69/100 (+12) (Knack)

(4) Valyrian Speaking - 14/100 (+12) (Knack)

(4) Common Reading - 65/100 (+15)

(2) Westerosi Runes - 20/100 (+10)

(4) Valyrian Reading - 5/100 (+10) ←

Scholarly: (Knack in North)

(4) Math(s) - 25/100 (+10)

(4) Accounts - 25/100 (+10)

(5) Northern History - 100/100 (+15) (Knack)

(3) Westerosi History - 20/100 (+10)

(4) Northern Peoples - 85/100 (+10)

(4) Westerosi Peoples - 10/100 (+10) ←

Leisure: (Knack in North)

(4) Northern Hunting - 31/100 (+25) ←

(2) Fishing - 73/100 (+25)

(2) Swimming - 63/100 (+25)

(1) Seacraft - 21/100 (+0)

(1) Climbing - 92/100 (+25) (Skilled In North)

(1) Acting (Lying Convincingly) - 100/100 (+3)

(3) Gardening - 100/100 (+30) (Prodigious)

War:

(2) Strategy - 75/100 (+25) (Prodigious) ←

(1) Castrametation - 35/100 (+0)

(1) Poliorcetics - 10/100 (+0)

(1) Fleetcraft - 10/100 (+0)

(1) Battlewise (coup d’œil) - 10/100 (+0)

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Earning: 4

Spending: 6

Banked: 18

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Rolls for Next Turn:

T1 = Person/Event in the World

L3 = Slightly Inconvenient

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Voting:

Main Actions: (+ = Low, ++ = Mid, +++ = High)

A1 - Train with Jon, and sometimes Rob and Theon, in the Yard. (Combat Focus)

(Reputation: ++ Jon + Theon, + Rob)

A2 - Go on Hunts With Jon and Sansa. (Equestrianism + Leisure Focus)

(Reputation: ++ Jon, ++ Sansa, + Ned, - - Cat)

A3 - Keep up your studies with your cousin, Sansa, and Maester Lewin. (Scholarly Focus)

(Reputation: ++ Sansa, + Cat, + Ned)

A4 - Act as your Uncle Ned’s page with Rob and Theon. (Diplomacy + War Focus)

(Reputation: ++ Ned, + Theon, + Rob)

A5 - Spend your time speaking the Old Tongue with Arya and Omek. (Language Focus)

(Reputation: ++ Arya, + Yara, + Ned)

A6 - Follow Rob until he shares his Friends and Activities with you. (Communications Focus)

(Reputation: +Rob, + Cat, + Ned)

Personal Rolls Sources:

S1 - Wikipedia

S2 - Steam Games

S3 - Paradox Wiki's (D30) (On Cooldown 1/1)

S4 - World Rolls List (D12)

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Information:

1 - On the Hunting Tutor:

There seems to be some confusion (mostly on my part) about what you guys want with hiring a hunting tutor.

So I'm going to clarify: (and possibly retcon some of my past answers, sorry)

If we want to hire a hunter to get something for us that could conceivably be gotten in just a few days, then it’s 1 resource.

If we want to hire a tutor to give us, Jon, and Sansa tips and tricks and to buff our hunting skill, that's 2 resources and would count as a gift, not a main action.

It would be -2 Resources for + Jon and + Sansa, along with a large bump in hunting skill.

It would NOT need A2 to win, also, which is why I’m really confused as to how to count the votes for this last round, because “Hunting Tutor” definitely, no question, lost the gift vote this turn.

But a bunch of you who voted for A2 (about 15/42 or about 35%) seem to have voted for it under the assumption that it would mean that if A2 won, that we’d hire the tutor regardless of how the Gift vote went.

This is not the case, as you can tell by the chapter.

That said, I just want to make it clear for those who keep voting for “A2 + Hunting Tutor” that these are separate votes, and we don’t need Hunting to be the main action to get the benefits of a bit of hunting with a tutor.

All that needs to happen for this is for Hunting Tutor to win a Gift Vote.

If Hunting Tutor wins next time there's a Gift vote (and that seems likely with how many keep voting for it), then I’ll write a bit about that, regardless of what the rest of the chapter is about.

2 - Reputations as of Chapter 32

Jon - Close Friends

Sansa - Close Friends

Arya - Friends (+)

Cat - Friendly

Ned - Close Friends

Rob - Friendly

Theon - Good

Yara - Good

(Neutral → Fine → Ok → Good → Friendly → Friends → Close Friends → Lifelong Friends → BFF’s)

(+) Means we’re one “+” with that person from it going up a rank.

(-) Means we’re one “-” with that person from it going down a rank.

Thanks to the Mission to Dragonstone, we have gained:

+++ Ned

++ Cat

+ Rob

And a big boost to the way the people of Winterfell view us, along with a minor reputation boost among the Northern Lords who now view us as “Soft Hearted.”

Additionally, the Springlords will be gaining a fairly large reputation boost, especially in the North, and will be quite thankful to you for this.

Sub-Note: I added in “Lifelong Friends” because “Close Friends" was going to stay for too long without it.

The amount we need for BFF hasn’t changed, but if we get someone to Lifelong Friends, then our relationship with them gets locked, so it’ll never go below “Friends” no matter how long it’s been, or what’s come between you.

A good example of “Lifelong Friends” would be Tyrion and Bronn in the show.

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Write-In/Questions:

1 - Exactly what kind of bird should we get for Sansa?

The Bird will arrive in Winterfell next turn, and by default, I’m going with a Gyrfalcon, since it’s a hunting bird commonly used in northern climates.

But I figured you lot might have some other ideas for a bird that would suit Sansa better?

(This one's not a vote, I'm just curious.)