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janie_tangerineONE
Well, this certainly is quite another world than his own, Roland muses as he tries to understand where he ended up when he walked through that cave’s portal that he wishes he had avoided.
It looks like Gilead’s castle before it fell, though more opulent, and the room seems like a swordsman’s — there is a heavy book on the table, and when he opens it he realizes it records the names of people who belong to some institution named Kingsguard, and who sounds like knights of old, so he supposes that it has to be somewhere like… like Gilead was in Arthur Eld’s times. The room itself is spacious and certainly fit for a commander, and Roland wishes that he had entered it through a door or something of the kind so he could know for sure that there is a way back… except that he hasn’t.
He supposes, as usual, that he’ll have to wait for the rift to heal itself and bring him back to Mid-World, as bothersome as it is.
Meanwhile, he supposes he will take a look around —
And then a woman with what certainly looks like regal air to herself enters the room.
Roland takes a split second to appreciate the fact that she’s… well. Attractive. Tall, though not as much as him, curly golden hair, green-black dress showing off her breasts, emerald eyes on a sculpted face — certainly a beautiful woman… until he looks at her in the eyes and sees that she’s not a kind one.
And not that Roland ever cared to bed kind women, but this is not… well. Just proud or such. This is the face of a woman who hates what she’s seeing and who will do whatever it takes to change the situation, and Roland does not, really not, appreciate it.
“And who are you?” She spits, not looking too impressed with him. “And where is Jaime?”
“I do not know who is this Jaime you speak of,” Roland says, feeling sad for the man on principle considering how she pronounces the name, as if it’s someone who owed it to her to be there, “and my name is Roland, and I hopefully will be gone shortly and he’ll take my place.”
“What is this nonsense?” She asks, moving closer. “My brother should have been here. Not you.”
“And I am telling you,” he replies, “that some magic did this and it will most likely fix itself. And what is your name, pray tell?”
She huffs. “A queen doesn’t owe you any names,” and then she grasps his wrist tight enough to hurt, and — “and you will tell me where Jaime is instantly —”
Sometimes Roland wonders, what would I have done if I had met Eddie’s brother after all, and most of the times he does not imagine the two of them having a civilized conversation.
Sometimes he had imagined grabbing the man’s arm, making it hurt and making him listen.
And there is no way anyone, woman or not, touches him like this as if he’s some kind of property of hers, and so he immediately shrugs her hand off, grabs her arm and backs her up against the wall, pressing his other hand to her mouth so she doesn’t scream, and the hateful look in her eyes says all about what she would do if he let her go.
“Lady,” he says, “I don’t know you and I don’t know your brother but I already fucking pity him, if you think you can dispose of anyone the way you like. I don’t know why I’m here and I hope to be gone soon, so unless you want me to break your arm, and I would because my patience is growing thin, I suggest you stop demanding things of me and leave. And if you think you can send guards to kill me, believe me, I know twenty different ways I can kill them first. Now I will bring you to the door and you will leave and not come back for an hour, and by then I’ll be gone, I hope. Understood? Or I am breaking your arm.”
The woman keeps on looking at him like she’d burn him to the ground if she could, but then she nods at him and he drags her to the door, before kicking her out.
He doesn’t think that she will actually wait.
But now he can buy time and he has a gun, so good luck to anyone trying to stop him with a sword, as if he couldn’t use one if needed —
Then the door opens again.
“Ser, you had asked for me — oh,” another woman says, and when Roland looks up at her —
Well.
She certainly isn’t similar to the previous one — tall, large shoulders, freckled face, broken nose, neck large as a man’s, wearing a blue dress with obvious padding to make her meager breasts look bigger, and he can see at once that she doesn’t usually wear dress. She walks like someone who walks in armor or with weapons.
And well, she truly is a magnificent sight, if you ask him — it’s not as if he ever only looked at women for their beauty, and this one could fight and hold a gun very, very proficiently, and most of all… she has kind eyes, he thinks. Large, blue, of a lovely shade, and she doesn’t look like she wants him dead, for one.
“I imagine,” Roland says, moving near here and closing the door, “that Ser is… a Jaime who was supposed to be here.”
“Yes,” the girl nods. “And you would be?”
“Roland Deschain,” he says, looking right back at her. “I think I am not… from your world. But things should hopefully rectify themselves soon. Meanwhile… I think I had an interesting chat with Ser Jaime’s sister.”
“Oh. The queen,” the girl says, suddenly flushing.
“Well,” Roland replies, “she certainly didn’t make an impression on me.”
“… I beg your pardon?”
“Exceedingly rude,” Roland replies, “and with less awareness of her own nastiness than most people I have known, and I have known many, lady…”
“Brienne,” she blurts, “but I’m no lady —”
“More than her for sure,” he says. “Where I come from, at least queens pretend to have manners. So, could I please know who is this Ser Jaime?”
The girl nods, awed, and explains it to him shortly.
When she gets to the point where the man went back to save her from certain death, the gunslinger knows exactly what’s going on here and he also knows for sure that whoever this man is, he deserves a lot better than his sister.
Now, Eddie did grasp that point when Roland tried to make him, but the problem is that back then Henry was dead and Roland was there to actually listen to him talk, while he cannot certainly talk to this man, if they’re supposed to swap places.
Oh, he realizes. But if he swapped places with me…
“My lady,” he says, noticing that she seems to scoff at it, “can I be… blunt with you?”
“Please do,” she says, sounding like she wants him to be.
“The queen,” he goes on, “is bad news all around, for your Ser Jaime first and foremost. Also, no man who risks his life for a woman the way he did does it out of the goodness of his own heart.”
“How can you know —”
“I think I do,” he sighs. He thinks about Susan for a moment, then shakes his head. “Brienne,” he goes on, “do call him out on that. I am sure that when he comes back, he will listen.”
“… And how are you so sure about that?”
“If,” Roland says, “Ser Jaime is currently where I am supposed to be… then he’s currently talking to a friend of mine.”
Brienne keeps on staring at him in anticipation.
Right. She can’t know. This world-traveling is not sitting well with him.
“Let’s just say that my friend’s brother seemed to have… things in common with our queen. He is going to set him straight.”
“I doubt that Ser Jaime would be… much amenable to listen.” She sounds… quite sad about it.
She also hasn’t met Eddie Dean once in her life, or she wouldn’t be sad about it.
“Brienne,” he says, “if there is one person in… all the known worlds who would make anyone amenable to listen, that’s my friend.”
“I hope so,” she whispers, “he — he deserves good things.”
That his sister won’t give him, she doesn’t say.
Now.
He wouldn’t really be doing this, normally.
But.
He hasn’t been with anyone in ages, she really is something and sure as hell he never was the kind of person who danced around this.
He moves closer. “Maybe,” he says, “you would be amenable to… pass the time.”
She stares down at him, her eyes going wide.
“Ser, you aren’t — you aren’t —”
“Oh,” he says, “I am. I never quite cared for women without a personality,” he says, and she gasps when he kisses her, though he doesn’t press — if she doesn’t want it he wants to make it clear he will stop.
Except that then she tentatively kisses back as if she cannot believe he would do that.
Roland figures it’s high time he makes sure she gets how a good kiss is supposed to feel like.
Hopefully whoever this Ser Jaime is can actually put two and two together and do it first thing when he comes back, but he’s quite sure that he will.
He would be surprised if Eddie doesn’t manage to get this man’s head straight.
TWO
So.
Eddie had figured out that the guy who suddenly showed up after Roland disappeared into thin air had not been coming from a nice time lately — who would, when they’re obviously gaunt, their hair is growing not exactly evenly and they lack a hand? Definitely not a dude who’s spent the last six months of his life having fun.
But.
The moment the guy had taken into stride that he was currently stranded in another world and accepted some food, Eddie had realized that he was actually a delight to talk to — or better, he had actually laughed at some joke he made and retorted with a worse one and at that point Susannah had raised her head to the sky and said that she was suddenly missing Roland very, very much —
And then the guy, Jaime, had said something about his sister that had rubbed Eddie the wrong way.
The real wrong way.
So he had asked Susannah and Jake if they could have a moment alone and they hadn’t protested — Susannah probably grasped the gist — and now they’re around the fire and Eddie doesn’t really know how the hell to say it nicely, so he figures he will say it bluntly. After all, they have gotten along until now.
“Man,” he says, “now, not to pry or anything, but. Uhm. What you just said.”
“About Cersei?” Jaime asks, his voice suddenly turning somber.
“Yeah. I mean, again, not to be the kind of person who can’t worry about his own fucking business even if I kind of am, but — as someone who had… issues with his brother, like, bad issues, I might — ah, fuck this noise. Man, are you listening to yourself when you say that you two are the same person? Because no one is the same person as someone else. Like, tell me to fuck off if you don’t want to talk about it, but —”
“It’s — it’s fine,” Jaime says, sounding surprised. “It’s just — I mean. It’s something she always said.”
“She said,” Eddie points out. “Always.”
Jaime shrugs. “I can’t remember a time when she didn’t say it. But it always… felt right. I guess. Until now.”
“… Can I ask how? If you want to, of course. I mean. Wouldn’t want to —”
“I,” Jaime says, “am apparently in another world, talking to people who go around with those frankly absurd weapons, because I switched places with… how did you call this Roland?”
“Dihn,” Eddie waves.
“Yes, well. Even if I tell you, it’s not likely you will refer that to people who might kill me for having laid with my sister and you’re one of the first people I meet who isn’t put off by what I have to say, so fuck that. Whatever. I don’t mind. Well, I — came back. After losing this in war. And — she, uh, was disgusted at it. And I’m pretty sure she wants me to kill our other brother, and I cannot do that, and I just — I don’t know.”
“… She wants you to kill your brother,” Eddie replies. “A brother you don’t hate, I guess.”
“No!” Jaime replies at once. “No, of course not, I love him, I always did, and —”
“And she didn’t?” Eddie prompts.
Jaime’s face falls. “No,” he finally says. “I tried to make them get along. It… did not work out. It never worked out.”
“So,” Eddie says, “just walk me through this here, but — you just said she always told you that you two were the same person and you never questioned it even if from what I heard you behave in a complete opposite way and she’s a power hungry machine when you’re anything but?”
“She’s what?”
“Haven’t you just said that she craves being a queen?”
“Uh, yes —”
“And haven’t you gave up a throne when you could have just claimed it?”
It’s probably sad that the guy looks like he has realized it now.
Except that Eddie doesn’t think he looked that much more dignified when he figured out that Henry was bad for him.
“I… guess,” he says, slowly. “Oh. Fuck. I never bloody —”
“Hey,” Eddie says, patting his shoulder, “if I told you how I figured out my brother fucked my life you wouldn’t feel half-bad about this.”
“… Well, now that you said it, you know you have to tell me.”
That sounded almost like he wanted to know.
Fuck, Eddie missed having friends. Not that his friends weren’t Henry’s before, therefore… shitty, but still. It’s not like Roland is just a friend at this point, so — yeah. This guy’s the next best thing he’s had to it for a while, so he will just milk it until he can.
“Listen, when I joined Roland here, he — he basically grabbed me from where I was and pulled me here after my brother died, and he — shit, where you come from I guess you don’t have heroin, anyway, he got addicted to something bad after he went to war, came back, got me addicted to it, too, and — selling this shit was illegal but he involved me with his — with the person who sold it to him, and Roland basically saved my hide ten times and then got me here after… well. After Henry died. My brother, that is. So, basically I could have died if it was up to him. But. He also… I realized it after. He spent my life making me think he had sacrificed it to look after me when in truth he just… never wanted me to get a life myself, if I’m making myself clear.”
Jaime’s face goes a shade paler.
Aha.
“He always made sure I’d feel like I owed him to be there, and like I had to because he sacrificed so much for me, and my mother just… said the same, so how was I ever going to know better? I didn’t until I met Roland and he made me figure it out. He barely even had to say anything because the more I talked the more I realized I deserved better than that shit. And took me what, twenty-two years? I wouldn’t have figured it out at all if Roland hadn’t showed up and dragged me here blathering about destiny, not that I’d have survived the next three days anyway all things considered. Now, just for science, can you just… tell me straight? Don’t worry, this place is free from judging anyone on bad life choices taken because of your sibling.”
Jaime nods, taking a breath. “I just. I told you, she always was just like that. She took the lead in almost everything and I followed because… she was right. I guess. Which probably sounds… strange now, I guess, but I never really asked myself if there was anything wrong with it, and even when she hated Tyrion — my brother, I mean — and I didn’t I just — didn’t.. really see it?”
He goes on. Eddie about shudders when he discusses their childhood, and when he gets to how he exactly joined the Kingsguard he about feels like vomiting, and by the time he’s admitted that he hates that he never could be close to his own children, Eddie decides that the moment Roland comes back he is informing him that someone in the universe could beat the both of them put together when it came to shitty family members.
“You know,” he says after Jaime falls silent, “I could have killed for Henry to be… like you were with your brother. Just so you know. That said… my friend, you do realize that you’re what, thirty?”
“Three and thirty —”
“You’re thirty-three and you never realized that you have a personality? That’s not hers? When yours is actually not bad at all?”
“… It’s not.”
“Nah,” Eddie says, “jokes in questionable taste are a sign of having an excellent personality. Also, uhm, again, not to pry, but. You know that… it sounds like your sister’s in love with herself and she wishes she was you and so — well. Sorry, but considering everything, and considering that I do have an idea of how it is to fall in love with people, that doesn’t sound… like it.”
“How else would it be?”
“… You never felt attracted to anyone else in your entire life?”
“No,” he says, shaking his head.
“Pal. Pal. My friend. You cannot tell me that in thirty years you never got hard looking at a woman that wasn’t her.”
At that, he opens his mouth. Then closes it. Then his cheeks go red. “Uhm. It was a fluke. That was because I had been away from Cersei too long.”
“… A fluke. Just, give me a summary, will you?”
Jaime shrugs and does.
The more he describes how he and this Brienne of Tarth met, the circumstances of the aforementioned boner and how he came back for her and saved her life from a damned bear, Eddie can’t fucking believe his ears.
“Jaime,” she says, moving closer, putting a hand on the man’s shoulder because he’s sure he’ll need it, “you’re telling me that you met this woman, you spent your time staring at her breasts —”
“She barely has any to speak of!” He protests.
“And who noticed that? You, because you looked at them! Anyway, you stare at her breasts, then you fight her and it obviously turns you on because you waxed poetical for five minutes about how good she is at doing that, then you wax poetical about how pretty her eyes are, then she keeps you alive after they cut off your hand, then oh wait you said you told her something you never confessed anyone, not even your sister, and then she gets you hard? And then you dream of her and go back to save her life instead of going to your sister, and oh, you want to gift her a priceless sword, and you’re telling me that was a fluke? Man, I think you need to know something before I break it down to you, but —”
“What should I know now?”
“First, if you haven’t been with anyone for a year and went through what I would call a traumatic experience, I think any fucking woman showing up naked in front of you would get you hard.”
“… Would it.”
“Yes, it’s a normal reaction, Jesus Christ Almighty,” Eddie shakes his head. “Anyway. Never mind that Roland is less stunted than you about this and fuck if Roland can’t be stunted when it comes to his feelings, but. All of that? Means you are attracted to this other woman.”
“… I am?” Jaime blurts, and fuck, he hadn’t even realized.
“That’s… how it works, yes. I mean, sorry but if everything else wasn’t proof enough… you think she’s hot.”
“What does that mean now?”
“Uh, right. Middle Ages. If you get hard when you look at her, it means you like her. On top of all the rest. And I have a feeling you have no idea because it never happened to you before and when you were fifteen you were busy guarding a madman, but if I were you, first thing I’d do when I go back wherever you come from? Hit that. Now.”
“… Why should I hit her now?”
“No, no, it means you should kiss her and show her a good time.”
“Yes, well, I frankly doubt that she would want me to.”
“From what I heard, she wouldn’t say no if a guy who looks like you did it, and I surely hope Roland is telling her the same because if he’s in your place — oh. Wait, what were you about to do when you showed up here?”
Jaime’s eyes go darker.
“I had Brienne summoned to give her the sword,” he sighs, “but Cersei wanted to talk to me first or so they told me. Why?”
“… Oh, well. I think you will find, when you go back, that Cersei might have received a fair scolding.”
“… From this Roland?”
“If I know him, and I do, he wouldn’t let her finish a sentence. You most likely want to make good use of that. Anyway, really, hear me out — you are absolutely into this woman. As, well, happens to everyone at some point. Also, whatever horrible things you did in your life, you sure as fuck don’t deserve to live thinking you don’t have a personality, so — please do consider that you don’t want to let your sister tell you what you should want. Or who.”
Jaime nods, obviously thinking about it. “Shit,” he says, “are you sure you don’t have something stronger than water?”
“I feel you,” he says, patting his shoulder. “Maybe there’s something left in Roland’s bag.”
“Fuck, I hope so. I think that having just found out that I’ve been a damned idiot and ruined my entire life without even realizing I was doing it, I think I need a drink. Or fifteen. Damn, now I understand why my brother drowns his sorrows in wine.”
“Fair,” Eddie says, “but, from your friendly neighborhood former addict to way worse things than wine, that is just… I mean, you do that because you don’t want to face your issues. Which I absolutely fucking get, I mean, I didn’t figure out that I was one of those people who need people to need them while I thought Roland was dying and I was in withdrawal without wishing I could get another fix or ten, but hey, now I’m as thriving as it gets in this fair wasteland and I don’t miss heroin at all.”
“Heroin being… your milk of the poppy or whatever?”
“No idea what that is, but if people take it to dull their senses and then become addicted it’s… a fair comparison. Really, the moment you’re back there tell your sister to mind her own business, tell your girl you actually do like her and see how your life changes for the better.”
Jaime nods as they stand up, shaking his head. “Fuck,” he says, “I just — realized something else.”
“Such as?”
“That I never talked about this to anyone because I couldn’t tell my brother and there was… no one else.”
Eddie’s going to re-evaluate Henry’s shitty friends in retrospective. At least they did exist.
Gods, he is the first closest thing to a friend to a guy from the fucking middle ages with a trauma baggage that would make his and Roland’s look manageable putting them together.
Sure as hell Roland did deliver when he promised all kinds of adventures on the other side of the door.
“Then,” Eddie says, leading him back to the camp, “believe me, finding yourself a couple of friends wouldn’t go amiss. Just some advice.”
“Oh, you have dished more than enough,” Jaime snorts back, “but… I think I needed to hear it.”
“Good,” Eddie says, slapping his shoulder. “Now, at some point the universe is going to right itself, so while we all wait for it, please try to come up with the least politically correct things you can come up with while we eat, it’s not often that I get to corner Susannah with that.”
Jaime does smile half-genuinely at that. “I doubt that would be a fucking problem. I feel like I need to curse, right now.”
Eddie doesn’t even hide that he’s delighted at the prospect.
“Please,” he says, “do. That would be splendid. But don’t do that in front of the poor woman when you go back, women do like to get sweet-talked a bit before they fall prey to our charms when it comes to cursing.”
It’s probably sad that the guy doesn’t seem to even have considered that angle before he nods and they hurry back towards Susannah and Jake.
Very well.
Before he goes back to Westeros or whatever it’s called, in between the three of them they can probably teach him how to hit on someone without being an utter disaster at it.
End.
