Fanfic / A Young Girl's Game of Thrones

Tanya dies during the assassination attempt on General Rudersdorf and reincarnates into a third life as Princess Myrcella Baratheon.

A Young Girl's Game of Thrones is a crossover fanfiction between The Saga of Tanya the Evil and A Song of Ice and Fire by Failninja who also wrote A Young Woman's Inevitable Dance of The Dragons. This fanfic can also be read here on Archive of Our Own.

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This fanfiction contains examples of:

• Abled in the Adaptation: Because he doesn't climb the tower and gets pushed by Jamie, Bran doesn't get crippled from the waist down.
• Abusive Parents: While Cersei loves her children, that doesn't necessarily mean she's a good mother. She spoils Joffrey rotten and fills his head with nonsense about how strong and fierce he is, despite all evidence to the contrary and being clear that he needs to be taught humility and responsibility. She barely interacts with Tommen because Joffrey is the child she paid the most attention to. And finally she's at odds with Myrcella for displaying independence from her desires and being friendly towards people she doesn't like (e.g. the Starks, her paternal relatives and the servants) and not Blind Obedience towards her, going has far as to slap her in the face and yanking her By the Hair while calling her a stupid little girl for making decisions for herself instead of going to her mother first. Robert admits to Ned that the main reason he doesn't abdicate the throne and leave King's Landing is because he dreads to imagine leaving his kids alone with his wife.
• Acquired Poison Immunity: After surviving an assassination attempt on the Kingsroad, Myrcella decides to start building up her immunity to some common poisons in case someone tries using it on her.
• Adaptational Early Appearance: Young Griff aka Aegon VI made his appearance in Dorne shortly after the red comet appears, which coincides with the events of the second book. Three full books before his first canonical appearance in the fifth book.
• Adaptational Villainy: Tywin in this story is even more cruel and ruthless than he is in canon, though this is largely due to him facing different circumstances than in the book series, rather than a change in character. In the face of the Riverland lords preserving their strength behind their castles to wait for the North reinforcements, Tywin attempts to lure them into open battle by not only burning and pillaging the lands as he did in canon, but also openly killing and crippling the people. He also intentionally sets Joffery up to die, due to Joffery openly killing Loras in court and causing the Reach to declare war on them, when they’re already outnumbered by Stannis’ forces. This stupidity, that’s even worse than the canon execution of Ned, combined with Myrcella flat out telling him Joffery is a sadistic idiot that will get them all killed, convinces him to kill his own grandson.
• Altar Diplomacy: Ned tells Stannis to use Shireen and the Stark children to secure more allies and stabilize the realm. Tywin plans to do the same with Cersei but, given her stupidly murderous actions, this does not sit well with either Kevan or Myrcella.
• Artistic License – Physics: The explanation Myrcella gives for surviving falling out of the Moon Door to cover up that she used magic is that she clung to the person who she knocked out with her and jumped off him just before hitting. This would not work in real life. Myrcella herself notes that it wouldn't work, but she relies on the fact that she's pretty much the only person in her army with a working knowledge of physics, and so nobody is able to call her on it.
• Ascended Extra:
  • Myrcella is the main protagonist of the story.
  • Lum, who in canon is very much a Bit Character is given some backstory and more expanded role in the fic as Myrcella's semi-regular lackey and the main POV for lower rank commoners.
• Assassin Outclassin':
  • The catspaw assassin sent by Littlefinger attacks Myrcella instead of Bran and is quickly disposed of via Slashed Throat.
  • Melisandre sends her shadow assassin to attack the Westerlands and Stormlands leadership during a war council to destabilize them before an attack, but it is thwarted by Myrcella before it could kill anyone.
• Authority in Name Only:
  • As Myrcella's regent, Ser Cortnay is technically ruler of the Stormlands until she's of age. In practice, he's her willing figurehead, passing along her orders to lords who may otherwise be disgruntled by taking orders from an 11-year-old.
  • Joffrey is technically the reigning King of the Seven Kingdoms and one of the two claimants to the throne. In practice though his power is basically zilch. Cersei as Regent is the one who arranged things in King's Landing, while Tywin and Myrcella are fighting for Joffrey's right as king with zero input from him against the rest of the realm. Considering how he actively makes the war effort more difficult, even his own nominal underlings either silently bypass him or are planning to oust him altogether just to get things done.
• Big Brother Instinct:
  • When Myrcella returns Bran to Stannis's faction safe and sound, the first thing Robb does is give his little brother a big hug.
  • Myrcella is the one that constantly looks out for Tommen, especially from Joffrey, their Big Brother Bully.
  • As Jaime realises that Tyrion is with Robert when Cersei orders the latter's assassination, he immediately rides out of King's Landing to his aid. When he finds him safe and sound, the first thing the brothers do is embrace each other in a hug.
• Big "NO!": Brienne's reaction when Lysa Arryn sentences Myrcella to die.
• Big "WHAT?!": Cersei's reaction to being told that she's going to be offered in marriage to any potential allies that the Lannisters can get at this point.
• Blaming the Victim: Melisandre engages in a mild version of this when she sees a vision that indicates Jon Snow is Azor Ahai, and promptly labels Stannis a pretender, even though all the claims of him being Azor Ahai are because of her.
• Broken Pedestal:
  • Myrcella thought for years that Cersei was a gracious and intelligent queen. When she discovered how crazy, petty and stupid Cersei was and how badly she'd destroyed Myrcella’s hope for a peaceful and comfortable life, things got ugly.
  I looked at her with contempt. This was the fool that I had looked up to and respected? I had made a colossal error here. Just like it was easy for me to simply act due to my station, the status of Queen did the same, only to a greater degree, for my mother. She was not an expert in the use of political power – she simply used her authority as the King's wife as a bludgeon.
  • Lord Royce has lost a great deal of respect for Stannis when he turned down Myrcella's offers in ways for him to be returned unharmed, e.g. Trial by Combat or Prisoner Exchange, so that he could execute The Mountain for his war crimes; appearing to him that his King cares more about upholding the law than the safety and wellbeing of his people. The only reason the Stormlanders don't execute him in retaliation is due to Myrcella's mercy in releasing him back.
• Brought Down to Badass: While she no longer has the overwhelming magical might she enjoyed in her second life, and lacks a computation orb to help her employ magic more affectively, Myrcella is as personally dangerous as many of Westeros most experienced warriors, due to still having enough magical power to boost her physical abilities, and retaining her fighting skills.
• Butterfly of Doom: Bran never falls from the tower in Winterfell, so he accompanies Ned south. The Catnapping never happens.
• By the Hair: Cersei does this to Myrcella when she's angry at her. This apparently has happened so many times that the girl has learned to move with her mother's hand instead of against it to make it less painful for her.
• Calling the Old Man Out: After Myrcella is traded for Sansa in a Prisoner Exchange, Cersei tries to blame her for "ruining everything". Myrcella gets sick of Cersei's shit and calls her mother out on how her stupidity nearly got her killed and unwillingness to take responsibility for her actions.
  Cersei: Do you know what you have done? You have ruined everything with your willfulness!
  Myrcella: (Looks at her with contempt.) What I have done? You could have told me that I was not allowed to leave the Royal Apartments, but you did not. You could have given better instructions to the captain of your household guard, but you did not. Or maybe you could have not cheated on father!
  Cersei: (Tranquil Fury) You mustn't believe whatever Stark lies you have heard. And you must not repeat them.
  Myrcella: I have no intention of throwing my position away. I'd be lucky not to be killed if enough of the Lords believed I was a bastard.
  Cersei: (Drinks more wine) This is why your going to visit the Stark girl has ruined everything. Lord Stark will make his filthy accusations for all the Seven Kingdoms to hear.
  Myrcella: (Shakes her head) No, mother. That was always certain to happen. When I visited the smithy for my brother's gift for his upcoming name day, Tobho Mott expressed surprise that the princess was visiting him too. Eddard Stark, Jon Arryn, and Stannis Baratheon have all visited, and they only did so to see Robert's bastard. Black of hair and looking just like a younger version of him. Stannis knows too.
  Cersei: (Trying her best not to freak out) They will spew their lies, but when they dare to take the field, Jaime and your grandfather will crush them.
  Myrcella: Stark was right, you moved against father too. Is he already dead?
  Cersei: (Flinches) What are you talking about, what move against your father?
  Myrcella: Come now, mother, I nearly died today. Stop keeping me in the dark. Do you know how many people I saw die? Do you know how close a Gold Cloak spear came to running me through?
  Cersei: (Shudders) You are still a child. Just quit being willful, and all will be well.
  Myrcella: He's dead, isn't he? That's why you felt confident about moving against Stark. I'll know soon enough; tell me.
  Cersei: I told you, stop believing in Stark lies. They sent assassins after Robert, I learned of it, and acted. I sent Jaime to stop them and then had Janos try to arrest the Starks. We will know soon if Jaime has made it in time.
  Myrcella: I grow weary of your falsehoods, Cersei.
  Cersei: Family is everything, Myrcella. All I do is to protect you and your brothers.
  Myrcella: Now that is something I can believe. And I can help; I have a vested interest in making sure I am protected. So, I will ask again for the final time, what did you do?
  Cersei: (Waveres, and then hardens her expression) You are a child not yet flowered. I will not be lectured by you or be called a liar by my own daughter. You are confined to your quarters, and you will speak to no one of the lies the Starks have told you.
  Myrcella: (Sighs) Very well, Cersei. I will see you on the morrow for breakfast.
• Calling Parents by Their Name: Myrcella starts calling Cersei by her name both to her face and out of earshot after she finds about her role in her father's assassination, which kicked off the war in the first place, showing she's pretty much lost all respect for the woman.
• The Chessmaster: Myrcella right off the bat shows that she's more than capable of duking it out with the big boys of Westeros in and out of war. Even Tywin becomes impressed by his granddaughter's capabilities.
• A Child Shall Lead Them: The 11-year old Myrcella becomes the ruling Lady of the Stormlands during a tumultuous civil war period. It's not as much a problem as one would think, as Myrcella has the mind of an adult and often relies on older, trusted men such as Ser Penrose and Barristan to lead as her proxies.
• Chocolate Baby: As per ASOIAF canon, Joffrey and Tommen are not the children of black haired blue eyed Robert Baratheon, but have the blond hair and green eyes that denote them as Lannister blood, as they are the products of the incestuous union between Queen Cersei and her twin brother Jaime Lannister. Subverted with Myrcella, however: while she shares the blond hair of her brothers, she has distinctive blue eyes very similar to those of King Robert. This leads many characters aware of her brothers bastardry to suspect that she is the only trueborn child of Robert. This is to the point that Stannis, who is declaring war for the Iron Throne on the claim that Joffrey and Tommen are bastards, refuses to accuse her of being illegitimate as well.
• Cold-Blooded Torture: Cersei puts Ser Loras through this.
• Cool Big Bro:
  • Robb is this to his younger siblings, especially Bran.
  • Myrcella is the cool big sis to Tommen, mostly for protecting him from Joffrey.
• Cool Uncle: Tyrion, Renly and Jamie to Myrcella. Kevan is a Great uncle variant.
• The Corrupter: Like Davos and Maester Cressen, Ned views Melisandre as this for Stannis. He later comes to view Myrcella as this, as well, and even states he fears her more than Tywin, because while the Old Lion may threaten his flesh, she can threaten everything he believes.
• Daddy's Little Villain: Many in the Stark-Stannis alliance view Myrcella as this to her mother Cersei and grandfather Tywin.
• Deadpan Snarker:
  • Tyrion Lannister, naturally.
  • When a shocked Lyn Corbray asks Myrcella how she survived getting thrown through the Moon Door, the girl merely quips that she landed in some bushes.
• Death by Adaptation: Lancel Lannister died during the attack on King Robert, along with Yohn Royce and his sons, Balon Swann, Boros Blount, and Renly Baratheon. Loras Tyrell dies when he defies Joffrey in open court. Brynden Tully was slain by Ser Barristan on the Trident. Later Randyll Tarly, Mace Tyrell and Jaime died to Tywin's wildfire. Nestor Royce was deemed an obstacle to Littlefinger's plots and was executed for it.
• Death Glare: After one incident where Joffrey bullies Tommen, killing a pet fawn in this case, Myrcella tries to talk to her older brother to make him stop. When words prove ineffective, she settles on giving him a stare down so potent, he behaved himself for a while.
• Death of a Thousand Cuts: After Tywin takes his forces south to confront Mace Tyrell, Myrcella refuses to engage Stannis' numerically superior force in a pitched battle and opts to slow them down by destroying the roads, laying traps, sabotaging potential resting locations and harassing them through various means. While the army maintains its size advantage, it's slowed down considerably, morale drops like a stone and the soldiery are made far more vulnerable to fatigue, wear and diseases.
• Defeat Means Friendship: Invoked by Myrcella as a way to soothe the former Stannis loyalists in the Stormlands. Sers Jasper Storm and Gladden Wylde are invited to join her Stormguard as soon as the trial of seven is over, and by the time she parleys with Stannis, Ser Gladden is willing to vouch for Myrcella on his own volition.
• Defeating the Undefeatable: Robb, Theon, Bran and few other of their soldiers were able to successful beat The Mountain and take him as a POW. This earns them a great deal of respect from their fellow soldiers.
• Devious Daggers: Myrcella's weapons of choice are two sets of throwing knives and a Valyrian steel dagger she took from her would be assassin. All of her weapons are usually well hidden too.
• Didn't See That Coming: While her cynical nature, experience, and paranoia makes Myrcella on guard against most threats, her assumption that people wouldn’t dare violate Westeros’ most fundamental tenants tends to blindside her. Such as, Littlefinger and Lysa Aryn violating Sacred Hospitality to immediately execute her via the Moon Door, and then shortly later being poisoned by a very delusional and insane Cersei.
• Disappointing Promotion: Jaime sees being made acting Hand of the King by Cersei as this, explaining to her that he never asked or wanted the position and was already happy just being a member of The Kingsguard.
• Distressed Dude: Poor Edmure can't go through one battle without being captured by the enemy. Luckily for him, Myrcella treats her POWs well and he doesn't stay captive for too long before being released back to his people.
• Dramatic Irony:
  • Ned is aghast to find out from Varys that Myrcella has been learning out different poisons, leading him to conclude that Cersei is teaching her 11-year daughter this so that she can murder her enemies on her mother's behalf. In reality, the princess is learning about them so that she can make herself immune to them and Cersei knows nothing about it (it would also be one of the few lines the Queen wouldn't cross).
  • Myrcella was appalled when she hears Cersei had threatened to cut Lord Beric piece-by-piece until he agreed to bend the knee, musing that even if it was just a bluff, threatening an important noble she was hoping to sway to her cause with mutilation was simply ridiculously stupid. A few chapters later, we found that Cersei did torture and maim an important noble, namely Loras, in the hope he'd bend the knee only to fail spectacularly.
• The Dreaded: Myrcella is this to Lum, who feels that if she were to represent any of the Seven, it would not be the Maiden but the Stranger. She is also this to the Gold Cloaks given how she killed so many of them in the attack on the Tower of the Hand that she was covered in their blood at the end of it.
• Dying Curse: While she doesn't actually die thanks to magic Myrcella invokes this concept when she is about to thrown through the Moon Door via flashing a Slasher Smile and promising that her armies are not going to surrender and that they will make the Vale pay for Lysa's treachery.
• Dying Moment of Awesome: King Robert's group didn't go down quickly or easily even though they were surprised and grossly outnumbered. Robert, Balon, and Yohn slew around a dozen men each before they were taken down fighting. Even Ser Boros, who was usually considered the most useless of the Kingsguard, managed to kill several opponents and died honorably as he defended his King. Robert also utterly thrashes the leader of the assassins, one Ser Lyn Corbray, with his bare hands and is only stopped because the rest of the ambushers pile on him from behind to bring him down.
• Eagle Squadron: Nestor Royce musters his house's forces to avenge the deaths of Jon Arryn and the men of the main Royce line, with knights from other Vale houses joining in. Lysa (or more likely, Littlefinger) allows them to fight for Stannis without formally acknowledging his kingship so that his political opponents will lose men and power and they can hedge their bets and enjoy the spoils should he win but disavow Lord Nestor to the Lannisters should they lose.
• Elite Army: The Stormlander host is this due to Myrcella taking only knights, proper men-at-arms and skilled levies into her army and sending everyone else home to apply their trade to minimize the impact of the war on the Stormlands economy. In addition to various practices from the Germanian Imperial War College and other sources being introduced, this results in a smaller but highly disciplined, flexible force that can run circles around larger armies and punch well above its weight.
• The Engineer: Myrcella has the Stormlander host largely equipped with shovels to turn them into ad hoc fighting engineers. While digging up fortifications was and is normal practice, things tend to be relatively basic in the field due to there being no standard logistics for it. Myrcella has them not only divert craftsmen to make it happen, she orders them to regularly dig up ditches and cavalry traps whenever they make camp, essentially having the Stormlands force act like Roman legions.
• Entertainingly Wrong:
  • Many of the Northern Lords believe that Myrcella is merely a mascot that the Stormlanders rally behind to boost morale. They also guess that Ser Barristan is the one spear-heading their military tactics on the battlefield with Tywin Lannister sending them the more ruthless orders to them to carry out. They conclude that if they succeed in killing the two men (especially Tywin), beating the Stormlanders will be a piece of cake.
  • When Tywin hears about the Trial of Seven, he assumes that Jaime ran off to take part in it and sends a raven message ordering him back to King's Landing to resume his duties as Hand. Jaime, who in fact had no knowledge of the Trial until well after the fact, is along with Cersei deeply confused as to what their father is talking about.
  • After seeing Myrcella's fighting skills when she fights off the shadow assassin, both Tywin and Kevan become convinced that Jaime taught her how to fight, with Kevan in particular thinking it was at Cersei's insistence in order to live vicariously through her.
• Equal-Opportunity Evil: Myrcella has no problems with having women, bastards and Lowborn in her Stormguard; in fact she encourages this as a method to motivate the lower classes.
• Everyone Has Standards:
  • Myrcella is (depending on how you view her), either a high-functioning sociopath with little real empathy towards anyone, or someone who simply doesn’t let her emotions get in the way of her pragmatism and self-interest, but either way she's not at all impressed by the spiteful and petty behavior of Joffrey and Cersei.
  • It made sense to Jaime that Cersei's assassination attempt on Robert and Ned was to cover up their incestuous affair, but even he thought it was monstrous to try and have Bran and Arya killed along with them out of petty spite. When he hears Tyrion, Lancel and the Lannister bannermen are caught up in the crossfire, he immediately rides out to rescue them.
  • While Arya has no problems the idea of Joffrey being executed, she protests to Stannis that Tommen should be spared. A product of incest or not he hasn't done anything to deserve it.
  • Ned has executed his fair share of criminals by his sword, but he's appalled by Melisandre having them burned on the stake as its a Cruel and Unusual Death compared to being beheaded. Makes sense he'd feel that way, since that's how his father was murdered by the Mad King.
  • Discussed with Roose and Robb. Roose explains to the young Stark that there are some things man is perfectly okay with doing for their king (e.g. give them a drink) and others things that they won't do no matter how loyal they are to them (e.g. being ordered to murder their own brother). The young wolf concedes the man isn't exactly wrong.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good:
  • Cersei can't wrap her head around why Myrcella is constantly Nice to the Waiter and befriends the Stark children. She sees that the former is beneath royalty like them and the latter as fraternising with "the enemy".
  • Littlefinger is genuinely surprised by Myrcella legitimately believing in personal loyalty and honor towards her underlings, as those are things he views as only being necessary to fake for the sake of getting what he wants.
  • However, as Tanya largely only acts for the sake of her own well-being, and not for their own virtue, all of these may be less of an example of evil not comprehending good, and more selfish entitlement not being able to comprehend Enlightened Self-Interest.
• Evil Uncle:
  • Played With. Stannis doesn't actually want the Iron Throne, but feels it rightfully belongs to him since his elder brother's supposed heir is not actually his son and Westeros runs on Heir Club for Men so he has a higher claim than Myrcella, Robert's only true blood child. Though Myrcella tries to frame him as this in order to undermine him.
  • Possibly with Renly as he send Brienne to spy on Myrcella under the guise of protecting her. He gets killed along with Robert before we find out what his plans for her were.
• The Executioner: Greatjon Umber got the honor of executing Gregor Clegane for Stannis. He draws it out by "accidentally" hitting the Mountain in the shoulder before properly chopping his head off.
• False Flag Operation: The men who attacked Robert's hunting party were dressed in furs to appear like Northmen and shouted "For the North!" just before they attacked. Absolutely nobody is fooled by this; people either suspect Cersei (rightfully), the Targaryens or Stannis as the culprit depending on their political leaning.
• Fingore: Cersei has several of the captive Loras' fingers cut off to try and force him to submit.
• Fire-Forged Friends: Bran and Tyrek didn't like each other when they first met as squires, but bonded during and after the attack at the Kingswood. When Myrcella arrives at Fawnton to pick them up on her way to the Riverlands, they are vocal about wanting to support each other despite knowing that their families are enemies.
• Fixing the Game: Lum gambles with some Stormlanders on the outcome of the Trial of Seven, making easy money because he knows that Myrcella will win.
• Flat "What": Cersei and Jaime's shared reaction to Tywin bringing up his belief that Jaime trained Myrcella to fight.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: Myrcella perfectly balances her siblings' most defining traits. She's assertive without being a cruel bully like Joffrey, and is kind without being an Extreme Doormat like Tommen. Despite this making her the Baratheon child who would be the best ruler over the Seven Kingdoms, the fact she's a girl puts her last in the succession, behind her uncles.
• Generation Xerox: Myrcella looks a lot like Cersei did when she was young, though thankfully lacks her mother's temperament and lack of foresight. She's taking active part in fighting in a war just like her father.
• Going Cold Turkey: Ever since Jaime helped Myrcella in her scheme to take control of the Stormlands, Cersei stopped having sex with him. The resulting sexual frustration led him to openly defy Joffrey when the latter decided to murder Loras on impulse, and she later uses the promise of sex to make him turn against Addam Marbrand and Tyrion's proposed coup.
• Good Is Not Dumb: While Ned and Robb Stark are often dismissed for their Honor Before Reason tendencies by their enemies, they prove time and again to be Smarter Than You Look, including when it comes to Myrcella's actions before and during the war.
  • While he doesn't like it, Ned goes along with Myrcella plan to use her as a Political Hostage in exchange for Sansa's safe return, as he had nothing else to bargain with Cersei to get his daughter back. However, Ned also takes note that Myrcella is doing out of Sacred Hospitality and has no problems killing others, he warns Robb that the girl will be a dangerous enemy to face in the war, something his son takes to heart on the battlefield.
  • When Myrcella bargains for a prisoner exchange with Stannis with Ser Gregor for Lord Royce, Robb is the first to figure out that that she doesn't actually want The Mountain back but instead banking on her uncle's Honor Before Reason attitude to turn it down to lose favor with the Knights of The Vale.
• A Good Way to Die: When Jamie discovers Ser Boros Blount and Robert's corpses amongst the dead assassins they took down with them, he remarks that Ser Boros died like a true Kingsguard, and that this is the way his King wanted to go out, rather than drink himself into an early grave.
  • Subverted for Jaime, himself. As he dies only after a singular brief battle in the entire war where he doesn’t kill anyone of note, and dies from smoke inhalation trying to rescue Joffery.
• Guile Hero: While she is capable of fighting thanks to some training and magic, Myrcella lacks a computation orb with which to properly do so, which is significant considering that she's still pre-teen and small for her age. Thus, she defaults to her intelligence, planning and speech skills to meet her goals. She tells Jaime and Tyrion that she can be persuasive and proves it when she convinces a dismissed and shamed Barristan, an imprisoned Beric Dondarrion, and eventually all of the Stormlands to declare for her.
• Handicapped Badass: Barristan's leg was injured in the Kingswood attack and, though it healed, he requires a cane to walk. Even then, he is still a capable fighter on horseback, a steady advisor and an excellent commander. This means that he was not able to join Myrcella's team during the Trial of Seven, but is able to lead the Stormlanders in the defense of their line and the counterattack against Stannis at the Trident.
• The Heretic: Myrcella portrays Stannis as this given his abjuration of the Seven and burning Westerosi lords in the name of R'hllor.
• Hero Antagonist: If Myrcella and the Lannisters are Villain Protagonists in this story, then the Starks and Stannis alliance are this.
• Heroic Sacrifice: The Blackfish stops Ser Barristan's decapitation strike on the R'hllorite Baratheons by taking the king's banner and leading them away from the main camp at the cost of his life.
• Hesitation Equals Dishonesty: Ned figures out that Myrcella is the only child Cersei birthed for Robert instead of Jamie due to this trope when she confronts her on her children's parentage.
• Honest Advisor: Stannis prefers people who tell it like it is—he has no patience for brown-nosers. He gets at least three in the forms of Ned Stark, Ser Davos, and Robb Stark, who he admits he values their counsel even if he doesn't always follow it.
• Hope Spot: Just when it seems like Jaime will help Addam Marbrand and Tyrion stage a coup against Cersei and Joffrey, she seduces Jaime to get him back under her sway; he proceeds to sell out the plot, only giving Tyrion enough warning to flee to the Stormlands before arrests are made.
• A House Divided: Myrcella decides to try and drive a wedge between the Vale knights and the rest of Stannis' forces by offering to exchange Nestor Royce (whom the Vale knights all want safely returned) for Gregor Clegane (whom the rest of Stannis' faction, Stannis included, want to execute for his crimes).
• Hypocrite: Cersei is even more of one in this story, as for all her preaching about the importance of family, she had absolutely no problem outright setting Tyrion, Lancel, and Tyrek up to be killed in her assassination of Robert, something Kevan calls her out on when he confronts her.
• I Gave My Word: Myrcella sees Bran returned to Ned and asks for nothing in return because she promised to do so back at the Tower of the Hand and because she sees this as more useful than holding him as a hostage.
• I Have Your Wife: Loras' captivity ensured that the Reach stayed out of the conflict until Joffrey murdered him in the middle of court, pushing the Tyrells firmly into Stannis' camp. The Redwyne twins yet live, and are also in the Red Keep, so that house is unable to contribute their navy or any soldiers to the fight.
• I Owe You My Life:
  • On his way to Stannis, Ned remarks to himself that he, his daughters and most of his people in King's Landing would be slaughtered if it wasn't for Myrcella watching his back during the fighting as well as offering herself as a Prisoner Exchange to Cersei. Its one more reason to him why he wants Myrcella's life to be spared in the war.
  • Tywin says this to Myrcella after she slays the shadow assassin that was just about to kill him. He and his brother now treat her with respect as their equal and take her words into consideration.
• Iconic Item:
  • Valyrian steel weapons tend to be rather distinct, which is precisely why Ser Lyn Corbray does not bring Lady Forlorn when he leads the ambush against the king's party in the Kingswood.
  • The catspaw's knife, which Myrcella took for herself, subverts this. Tobho Mott can't identify its maker or any possible previous owner because its make and fittings are way too simple despite the steel and dragon bone that went into its construction. At best, he figures it was made during Valyria's heyday because no one else would waste such precious material to make such a plain knife.
  • Lightbringer is tied to legend of Azor Ahai, with its lore stating that it was only completed when he stabbed it into the heart of his wife, Nissa Nissa. Myrcella uses this tidbit to sow some doubt among Stannis' supporters, implying that his sword was already aflame because he had done the same thing by betraying Robert.
• Icy Blue Eyes: Myrcella's eyes are blue just like her father's, Robert Baratheon, but carry the same coldness as her grandfather, Tywin Lannister.
• Ignored Expert: Cersei and Joffrey regularly ignore the advice of everyone else, even those they solicited from the members of the Small Council.
• Immune to Fate: Myrcella has stymied Melisandre's visions, changing them from almost certainty to mere possibility and sometimes denying them outright. This is most notable with the red witch's attempted decapitation strike, which she foresaw as a complete success and ended in outright failure upon meeting Myrcella's knife. That said, R'hllor has been indicating that Myrcella is indeed a threat, regularly portraying her as a blue-eyed demon and once even showing the horrors of the Rhine Front, but Melisandre has yet to connect that with the prepubescent child that she met.
• Implied Death Threat: It's unintentional, but Jaime Lannister, the Kingslayer, telling Joffrey that he reminds him of the Mad King comes across as this.
• Internal Reveal: Ned finds out from Tywin that Myrcella survived her attempted execution by The Vale and is back in the war effort.
• Irony: In his second life as Tanya, the salaryman’s advanced knowledge, ruthless pragmatism, and personal combat ability while still being a child, made her seem like a monster to the early industrialized era of the world. In his third life as Myrcella, those features, combined with basic courtesy and her being Nice to the Waiter, make her appear like a saint to the medieval era of Westeros.
• Jerkass Has a Point: Roose Bolton, of all people, talks Robb out of going behind Stannis's back to rescue his father from Tywin's securely guarded forces as such an act would be treason, as Stannis specifically ordered him not to do that, regardless of how sympathetic his motives are. He also points out there's no guarantee he'd be successful in his rescue mission; he would more likely be captured/killed in his attempt. The man is also correct in his speech to him that loyalty cuts both ways and there are limits to what a man is willing to do for someone else, king or not.
• Karmic Death: Several characters receive rather fitting deaths in this story.
  • Lyn Corbray, the assassin that killed Robert, is unceremoniously executed by Myrcella, the late king's trueborn daughter.
  • Jaime also receives this, as he goes through no Character Development in this story, and thus subserviently follows most of Cersei’s whims willingly, albeit unhappily, and even sabotages an attempt to oust her disastrous rule. He thus dies ignominiously of smoke inhalation from Tywin’s use of wildfire.
• Kill It with Fire: Tywin's solution to overcome the Reach's considerable numerical superiority is a wildfire trap in the Kingswood.
• Kin Slaying Is A Special Kind Of Evil:
  • Because he believes Myrcella is truly his brother's daughter, Stannis wants to avoid killing her at all cost because of this trope, despite being the opposite side of the war he's fighting and is a major threat.
  • Cersei tries this by proxy, hoping that Tyrion would get killed in Robert's assassination. He survives but their cousin Lancel doesn't, which incurs the hatred of his father, Kevan.
• Lack of Empathy: Downplayed with Tanya. While she doesn't have much in the way of genuine empathy towards anyone else and has to put effort into pretending she does, the princess is never cruel and does her utmost to come off as approachable to friend and foe alike. She does seem to genuinely care about those in her immediate circle to some degree as well. Though compared to Joffrey, Cersei, and even most nobility who see those of lesser station as beneath them, she's practically overflowing with empathy to the whole world.
• The Lancer: Ned shares this role with Davos, both for Stannis, giving him leal service and blunt advice on how they should proceed in the war. The Northern lord also adds his voice to oppose Melisandre and they both try to steer Stannis away from burning so many people.
• Lightning Bruiser: Brienne's fighting style has shifted from Stone Wall tactics in canon to this, primarily because her duty as a sworn shield means she has someone she must protect, potentially leaving them vulnerable if she had kept to her original defensive turtling. Her new training has her take advantage of the fact that she's as large, as strong and as fast as most knights to match them directly, going for high-aggression attacks and aiming for weak points so that she can seize and maintain the initiative.
• Like Father, Like Son:
  • Ned and Robb Stark, naturally.
  • When Myrcella tries to make her uncle look bad in the discussion for the Prisoner Exchange, Stannis calls her just as manipulative and deceitful as her mother, Cersei.
• Loophole Abuse: Myrcella uses the fact that there's no explicit rule against a woman being a knight to justify making Brienne one.
• Love Makes You Evil: Due to Jaime not leaving Kings Landing in this story, he gets a front row seat to just how monstrous, petty, sadistic, and short-sighted both Cersei and Joffery truly are after Robert’s death. He’s still so enamored and lustful over Cersei, he mostly follows her whims with only some grumbling, and even rats out Tyrion and Addam Marbrand’s proposed coup in order to sleep with her. Tyrion calls his brother out on this before he leaves King's Landing.
• The Magic Comes Back: As is the case in canon, the approach of the red comet heralds a return of magic to Westeros. Myrcella notes that her magic suddenly became more potent and easier to use during a skirmish against Stannis' forces while Robb Stark gains a level of Combat Clairvoyance in the same clash. Shortly after that fight, she heals Lum from a mortal wound.
• Miles Gloriosus: Lyn Corbray proves to be this. He’s a genuine Blood Knight, and purportedly a skilled knight, but believes himself the most skilled in all the Seven Kingdoms. However, all of his accomplishments, killing two Kingsguard during the assassination of Robert and later Albar Royce, were only after they were physically weakened and on their last legs, and a weakened Robert even knocks him down and smashes his face despite wearing a helm. During the surprise night attack be the Stormlands against the Vale army after Littlefinger’s treachery, he flees the battle due to being without armor, and sells Petyr out when caught.
• The Millstone: With Cersei and Joffrey on her side, Myrcella has a lot of work to do. Tywin is also this given how his excessive brutality in the Riverlands makes diplomacy and making peace after the war very difficult.
• Minored in Ass-Kicking: After being killed as a teenager in her previous life, Myrcella resolved herself to stay as far away from the frontline as possible and instead dedicate her life to a cushy life of a prim and proper Princess with her role within the court being mostly limited as a negotiator. However, she still has the killer instinct and combat experience of a former soldier, and keeps a plethora of hidden weapons on her person to ensure she's never completely helpless even in violent situation. She also tends to downplay her combat abilities, to lessen the chance of potential enemies taking her seriously.
• The Mole:
  • Lum the redcloak is ordered by Cersei to spy on Myrcella, but she quickly turns him after he witnesses her kill an assassin because she she scared him with her Troubling Unchildlike Behavior. The fact that she pays him and gives him financial advice solidifies his loyalty.
  • Brienne was initially brought in to become Myrcella's sworn shield and to inform Renly of her comings and goings. This subterfuge ends during the Battle of The Tower of the Hand where Brienne reveals she’s been spying, but reaffirms her vow as a sworn sword to keep her secrets for real this time.
  • Cersei appoints three Lady-In-Waiting for Myrcella. The only surprise is that they're not all this.
• Must Make Amends: Myrcella implores Robert to make up with Ned, as she's friends with the Stark children and doesn't want to see her father lose his long-time best friend who saved his life in his rebellion. Robert takes this to heart and goes to talk things out with Ned.
• My Master, Right or Wrong: Myrcella uses the fact that Barristan and the rest of Aerys' kingsguard were this for the Mad King to justify why he should stay in Westeros despite Joffrey being just as unworthy, though using the opportunity to transfer his loyalty to her. Brienne also swore and reaffirmed this to her princess, intent on being true to it after coming clean about her duplicity, which stays her hand after confirming that Cersei's schemes killed Renly.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Myrcella's method to find out who's The Mole among her three Ladies-in-waiting is by giving them each a different story about a man whom she has her eyes on, the same tactic Tyrion used to flush out Cersei's mole in A Clash of Kings.
  • The start of chapter 38 has the Stormguard presenting their ideas to Myrcella and each other like they're in a corporate team-building exercise, a nod to the princess' first life as a Japanese salaryman.
• The Napoleon: The narrative regularly points out that Myrcella has a small stature but a large presence.
• Necessarily Evil: How Jaime feels about Tywin's decision to expel the inhabitants of Flea Bottom from King's Landing — it's cruel, but it means less mouths to feed in the city, and gives them a chance to find food and coin elsewhere in the countryside.
• Nice to the Waiter: Myrcella treats the smallfolk of the Red Keep and King's Landing well, which earns her a reputation as a perfect princess and personification of the Maiden.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Ned laments to Myrcella that his warning of Cersei to save her children from when he tells their true parentage to Robert, has put himself and his children in danger and got a lot of people killed even before the war has started.
• No-Sell:
  • Myrcella is completely immune to any and all attempts to intimidate her. Whether it's indirect, like Joffrey getting the Hound to intimidate her into leaving, or something more tangible, such as Cersei ordering Ser Meryn to choke Rosamund Lannister to death and getting physical with her own daughter. As far as she's concerned, their petty tantrums are nothing compared her grudge match with Being X.
  • The shadow assassin is completely unfazed by attacks from Brienne, Ser Barristan and even the Mountain. The only thing that actually affected it is Valyrian steel.
• Not Quite Flight: Due to lacking a computation orb, Tanya/Myrcella isn’t able to truly fly with magic like she used to. Straight up and down is easy, but horizontal and diagonal vectors are more difficult due to gravity, forcing her to make a very prolonged In a Single Bound at best. This lets her infiltrate and conquer Harrenhal by being able to get over it’s massive curtain wall while carrying climbing rope for her troops, and also survive being thrown out the Moon Door.
• Not So Invincible After All: Despite being The Dreaded and the World's Strongest Man, Ser Gregor Clegane was defeated in battle by Robb and his army led by him and taken captive, with injuries that would prevent him from fighting well for weeks. This gets invoked by Ser Morton to use him as a prisoner exchange for Lord Royce: they beat The Mountain before and they could beat him again later after they get their captured comrades back.
• Number Two:
  • Myrcella has three. Ser Cortnay, who acts as her regent for the Stormlands. Ser Barristan, who acts as the commander of her war host. And last, but not least, Brienne, who is her most trusted confidant and sworn shield.
  • Kevan is this to his older brother Tywin.
• Odd Friendship: Myrcella and Arya get along quite well, with the former helping the latter out with her problems whenever they cross paths. This gets lampshaded by Robert to Ned with a "Not So Different" Remark.
  Robert: She views your Arya as a sister, did you know that? Your youngest girl is wild and Myrcella so prim and proper but then we were quite the opposite of each other too, eh?
• Oh, Crap!:
  • Cersei has this reaction he hears from Rosyn that her daughter Myrcella is at Tower of the Hand, where she ordered the Gold Cloaks to Leave No Survivors, and rushes off to belay that order.
  • Myrcella can only give a horrified "oh" when Ned informs that her mother is the one ordered the attack on them.
  • Ned has this look when Melisandre implies that she knows Jon Snow's true parentage.
• Only Sane Man:
  • Myrcella is this in her immediate family. Her mother is a Smug Snake, her father is The Hedonist, her big brother is Ax-Crazy, and her little brother is an Extreme Doormat, making her the only royal Baratheon to have her head screwed on straight which Robert acknowledges.
  • After Myrcella's departure to the Stormlands and Tyrion having no authority to do anything, Jaime becomes this for the Lannister leadership in King's Landing. He tries to keep aware of the Lannisters' political needs and tries to curb some of Joffrey and Cersei's worst ideas, to varying degrees of success.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business:
  • Tywin is left visibly shaken after the shadow assassin's attack, and he quickly comes up with a thin excuse to withdraw his forces south so that he has an excuse to run away.
  • Kevan shows himself to be Not So Stoic when confronting Cersei about Lancel's death, and noticeably smug when Tywin strips her of all authority, with Jaime noting how out of character this is for him.
• Open-Minded Parent: When Myrcella requests her father to have a say in any future Arranged Marriage she in, he obliges with Robert only wondering why she's asking now and not later when she becomes of age when its more urgent.
• Outliving One's Offspring:
  • Lancel's death hits Kevan hard, especially since he figures out it was the result of Cersei's plot.
  • Jamie dies trying and failing to save Joffrey which deeply affects Tywin and Cersei.
• Parental Favoritism:
  • Cersei favors Joffrey, while Robert prefers Myrcella. Poor Tommen...
  • Jamie is Tywin's golden son with Tyrion being The Unfavorite.
• Pet the Dog:
  • Zig-zagged with Myrcella. On one hand, Myrcella does treat her prisoners of war rather well, is very affable towards Tyrion and the Starks, and refers to her servants and soldiers by name rather than forget them like her other family members usually would. However, it's all based on pragmatism rather than any genuine kindness on her part. In her defense, she does genuinely appreciate Tyrion's intellect and the Undying Loyalty of Brienne and Barristan.
  • Garlan makes sure to not brutalize the Westerlander smallfolk his host encounters as he believes that the knightly vows he swore hold meaning. With this, he makes sure to keep foraging to a minimum and ordered no theft, no rapes and that villages are not deprived of the means to continue producing food. In a contrast to Stannis' actions from just the previous chapter, he even punishes the men who defy these orders.
• Praetorian Guard: Myrcella organizes Brienne and promising Stormlander knights into a personal Stormguard. She makes sure that this isn't like the Kingsguard, with the roster limit set to 20 instead of 7 and no one has to set aside their inheritance to join (there is a rule that one can't be a member while being a ruling lord, but the implication is that members can retire from the Stormguard to take up an inheritance should the matter come up).
• Pragmatic Hero: Nearly every decision Myrcella makes is motivated by pragmatism, namely doing what will both benefit her and maintain a good public image. She's still infinitely better than working for Joffrey or Cersei.
• Princess Classic: Myrcella presents herself as this in King's Landing with most people buying the act.
• Principles Zealot: Deconstructed with Stannis. While being a man who wants to uphold the Law of Westeros regardless of social status sounds on paper like he'd make a good king, however, he does so to the point where even Ned and Robb Stark find his Honor Before Reason tendencies to be detrimental to their war effort. Most notably where he’s so determined to execute The Mountain for his many war crimes that he turns down offers from Myrcella to exchange him for Lord Royce, and loses favor from the Vale.
• Puppet King: Tommen is becoming this.
• Puppy Love: Bran has a major crush on Myrcella.
• Pyrrhic Victory: Tywin succeeds in defeating the larger Reach force, however in exchange he lost a large part of his own force and eldest son to wildfire.
• Rank Up: Lum gets knighted after the Stormlanders shatters the Vale's army. Bronn, having distinguished himself off-screen, is similarly elevated on Ser Theo Redstone's recommendation.
• Rape, Pillage, and Burn: The brutality of Tywin's rampage on the Riverlands exceeds the cruelty of his campaign in canon, with him having captured and surrendering Riverlanders turned into sex slaves, labor slaves or meat shields in an attempt to demoralize the Riverlords and goad them into open battle. He stops this after Ser Barristan makes it clear that the Stormlanders will not stand for such savagery, and that they will execute any Westerlander they find engaging in this.
• Red Baron:
  • Thanks to her aggression during their training sessions, the Red Cloaks dubbed Brienne the "Terror of Tarth".
  • Myrcella later earns the moniker "Storm Queen" thanks to her many victories.
• Related in the Adaptation: Unlike her brothers, Myrcella is Robert's true biological child.
• Respected by the Respected: While Myrcella's dispatching of the shadow assassin did gain her some respect from Tywin and Kevan, they did not truly listen to her until after Barristan makes it clear that he's following her orders.
• Right Hand Versus Left Hand: The leadership of the Lannister side of the brewing war consists of Myrcella, Cersei, Joffrey and Tywin.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge:
  • After Loras' death, Mace musters the Reach's forces with plans to attack both the Westerlands and King's Landing in revenge.
  • After Myrcella is seemingly killed by being thrown out of the Moon Door, her loyalists and Tywin swear to burn the Vale down in revenge.
• Royal Brat: Joffrey is the poster child for this trope with her mother Cersei being a Psychopathic Womanchild version of this. This is defied by Myrcella and Tommen.
• Running Gag:
  • Just like her second life, Myrcella is still shorter than she should be even as a child, and is greatly irritated by it. Unlike in her second life where this was attributed to malnutrition, it’s implied Cersei drinking Moon Tea stunted her development somewhat.
  • Myrcella giving a different, ridiculous explanation for how she survived getting thrown out the Moon Door.
• Sacred Hospitality: This is Serious Business is the Westeros. So much so that even ruthless pragmatists like Myrcella and Tywin won't dare violate it, due the repercussions from such an act.
  • House Arryn violates this in a major way when they invite Myrcella for a Trial of Seven, only to say that they've already sworn to Stannis and that R'hllor does not recognize the practice. Then they see her executed via moon door with all haste, this after she had already been given bread and salt.
• Sanity Slippage: Cersei loses it even more so than in canon, as the simultaneous deaths of both Joffery and Jaime to her own father’s scheme, and then shortly later being told of Myrcella’s death, breaks her mind so thoroughly, that when Myrcella does show up, Cersei is so delusional she’s convinced her own daughter is really an imposter, and is willing to poison her. It’s also implied that she has actively replaced Myrcella’s life with Cersei’s own childhood experience in her own mind.
• Saying Too Much: When Myrcella accuses Stannis of sending a shadow creature to assassinate her, Davos comes to his defense and says that she wasn't their target. This confirms to the girl and Stannis's army that he did engage in dark magic to summon a dark creature in the first place, causing more than a few soldiers to lose respect for him. Davos later lambasts himself for not keeping his mouth shut.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: While Tywin has a point that they need to respond to Mace Tyrell's march towards King's Landing, his decision to withdraw the Westerlands force from the Crossroads seems to be heavily influenced by the shadow assassin's attack and the fact his army is losing to Stannis's.
• Self-Fulfilling Prophecy:
  • Cersei views the Starks and Tyrells as the enemies of her family. Despite neither house liking the Lannisters very much, they weren't really enemies until Cersei tried to have Ned, his children and Robert killed and Ser Loras is tortured and killed in public thanks to her plans going horribly wrong.
  • One of Melisandre's later divinations reveals that the reason why the earlier ones showed her Stannis being proclaimed Azor Ahai was because she was seeing a moment where people believed her after she told them that he was Azor Ahai, and that it only happened because of her actions.
• Silk Hiding Steel: Myrcella is a polite, well mannered young lady with an excellent reputation. She's also ruthless and deadly.
• Slasher Smile: Right before she jumps out the Moon Door Myrcella flashes an unhinged, murderous grin that shocks even Brienne. It makes her bloody promises of revenge all the more concerning.
• Smug Snake: Cersei and Joffrey aren't nearly as clever and infallible as they like to think they are.
• Sole Survivor: After the events of chapter 39 Ser Arys Oakheart is the last living Kingsguard knight.
• So Proud of You:
  • Robert sees only two good things come from his kingship, the first was kicking squid ass in Balon's rebellion, and the second was having Myrcella as his daughter.
  • Ned says this to Robb for looking after Winterfell in his stead and surviving his first battle, which included defeating and capturing The Mountain.
• Spanner in the Works: Myrcella is this for more than a few.
  • Cersei's plan to have the Starks in The Tower of the Hand killed in her coup would have worked had Myrcella and not been there at the time playing with the children. Not only does she fight alongside Ned, Brienne, Syrio, Jory and the Stark knights against the Gold Cloaks, she offers herself as a Prisoner Exchange for Sansa's safe return to her father, allowing the surviving northerners to successfully pull a Screw This, I'm Outta Here on Davos's ship to rendezvous with Stannis to prepare for war against the Lannisters.
  • Stannis begins the confrontation at the Trident with all the advantages: He had already had his host set up a superior defensive position that allows them to control most of the area, his numbers were steadily growing with the arrival of the Northerners and Riverlanders, and it's the Lannisters who are in a more desperate situation that would require them to attack. He is then convinced by Melisandre to abandon this to mount a simultaneous attack across the river while her shadow assassin attacks the enemy leadership while they're at a war council. On paper, he should have won either way. If they stayed back, they only need to let the Pro-Lannister force to bleed on their defenses, and with the attack, they're hitting an unprepared army with its command structure destroyed. Unfortunately, the one snag in this plan is Myrcella, who managed to kill the shadow with her Valyrian steel knife before it could do more than incapacitate Brienne and she had the Stormlander force prepare considerable defenses as standard practice, which allowed them to hold their ground against the Rivermen attacking their part of the line.
  • Myrcella's own scheming ends up indirectly sabotaging several of Littlefinger's plots by causing situations to unfold outside of his ability to predict. Which is why he conspires with Lysa to lure her into a trap and remove her from the board. Unfortunately for him, Myrcella thwarts even this plan by surviving thanks to magic.
  • Averted with Varys. Myrcella’s saving the Starks prevents the Seven Kingdoms from fracturing into separate factions, and makes the succession war less chaotic than in canon; which is easier for Varys to manipulate. As a result he calls for Connigton and Aegon to come to Westeros and claim the throne much sooner than in canon.
• Spared by the Adaptation: Several characters survived far longer than they did in canon. Lady and Nymeria were spared thanks to Tanya's interference. Ned, Jory, and Syrio managed to escape King's Landing thanks to Myrcella's help.
• Spotting the Thread: Myrcella notices illusory magic on Melisandre because prior experience taught her to look for it. She also sees that Stannis' flaming sword isn't actually on fire because there is no heat distortion, no smoke, the coloration didn't relate to its temperature.
• The Spymaster: Tyrion decides to aid Myrcella by emulating Varys and creating his own spy network, composed mostly of cripples who are Beneath Notice.
• Stating the Simple Solution: When Jamie explains Cersei's plan to kill her husband and Ned, an exasperated Tyrion points out she could have just slipped the King poison instead, as that would be less likely to lead to a civil war with Plausible Deniability.
• Stay in the Kitchen: Tywin tells Myrcella, the Lady Paramount of the Stormlands, that she has no place in the war councils and battlefields because she is both young and a girl, and that he expects her future husband to handle these concerns when she reaches maturity. She tells him that, if it bothers him so much, he can take it up with Ser Barristan.
• Stop Worshipping Me: Ever since the Trial of Seven, Ser Bonifer Hasty is of the belief that Myrcella is blessed by the Seven Who Are One and makes sure to spread it around whereever they go. This is only compounded by such events as touching the fake Lightbringer during the parley with Stannis, the lightning victory at Harrenhal and her seemingly miraculous survival from getting thrown out the Moon Door. She tried to stop him at first, but later decides to get mileage out of it when she later has Brienne knighted with the Stormlords' full support.
• Storming the Castle: Myrcella's army manages to attack and take Harrenhal against a superior force in one night, thanks to her using her magic to scale the nigh-insurmountable walls and opening one of the main gates to let the Stormlanders hit the weary and unprepared Riverlander-Northern force.
• Strong Family Resemblance: Myrcella is more than once described as a miniature-looking Cersei with Robert's blue eyes.
• Surrounded by Idiots: Myrcella comes to this conclusion about the Decadent Court in King's Landing, when they fire Ser Barristan from the Kingsguard.
• Sympathy for the Devil: Ned admits to Tywin, while in his captivity, that part of him feels sorry for the man for having to deal with the fact that Cersei and Jaime engaged in incest and war has cost him his eldest son, younger brother, nephew and grandson.
• Synchronization: Melisandre hypothesizes that there was one between Stannis and her shadow assassin, owing to the former's life force being used to create the latter. She thinks this was why it failed its mission, as Stannis may have wanted to avoid kinslaying after seeing Myrcella in the command tent, and why Stannis was rendered comatose after it was destroyed.
• Targeted to Hurt the Hero: Invoked by Cersei on Myrcella. She first has Ser Meryn flog Pate 47 times and then orders the knight to choke Rosamund Lannister while she has her daughter Forced to Watch in her grasp. Cersei threatens to have the woman killed if Myrcella doesn't get rid of Brienne and Ser Guyard. However, Myrcella coolly informs her that she doesn't know either of them that well and tells her if she is to go through it that she'll inform her father what she had done, convincing the Queen to relent.
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: Not all people who fight together are doing it willingly or happily.
  • Mace and Stannis don't like each other, and yet Mace was forced to throw his lot with Stannis since Joffrey doesn't leave him with a choice after Loras' brutal murder. Even then, Mace is mostly fighting the Lannisters independently from Stannis and making his distaste obvious.
  • While all Stormlanders accepted Myrcella as their Lady Paramount, not all of them truly enjoy fighting alongside Lannisters, nor are they loyal to Joffrey at all. Ser Barristan lambasted the Westerlanders for their dishonorable conduct in the Riverlands, and Ser Beric dislikes the Lannisters in general for his imprisonment. Jaime notes how Beric obviously finds Tywin's contemptuous treatment of Joffrey amusing.
• Torture Is Ineffective:
  • Cersei has Loras tortured to try to break him and make him swear fealty to Joffrey, thinking this would make House Tyrell follow suit. This fails spectacularly when Loras shows his maiming to an open court, denounces Joffrey and declares for Stannis. Joffrey kills him in a rage, along with any chance for peace with the Reach.
  • When Ned questions Tywin on why he isn't going to torture him, the old lion tells him it wouldn't likely work on a man of his caliber.
• Training Montage: There are a few training scenes shown, from Bran and the king's squires, as well as Myrcella's training of Brienne and the Redcloaks.
• Trial by Combat:
  • Myrcella challenges the Stormlords to a Trial of Seven to "prove" to them that Joffrey is the rightful king and that Stannis is a usurper, counting on its religious significance to both ensure they will accept and that they will turn to her cause if she wins. She even joins in the trial herself, proclaiming that the Seven would see her victorious because she is right. Her gamble pays off and she becomes the Paramount Lady of the Stormlands.
  • Lysa, at Littlefinger's direction, claims in a letter to Myrcella that she wants to hold one of these to settle the matter of the Vale's involvement in the war as part of a plan to lure Myrcella into a trap. Notably when Myrcella realizes the trap unfolding and attempts to invoke an actual trial by combat first by appealing to the law and then by poking at the Vale Lords' pride, Lysa utterly refuses to play ball and denies all attempts for it to happen.
• Troubling Unchildlike Behavior:
  • Tyrion, Lum, Ned, and Brienne find the 11-year old Myrcella's manipulative tendencies and indifference to bloodshed rather offputting.
  • Many Stormlanders, such as Theo Redstone, have pretty much stopped seeing Myrcella as a child after she killed Brus Buckler in the Trial of Seven.
• True Companions: Because he doesn't pull a Face–Heel Turn, Theon is this to Robb. Case and point, when Robb tells Theon that they're going to fight and defeat The Mountain on the battlefield, he merely quips that his friend doesn't aim small and charges in battle alongside him, no questions asked.
• Underestimating Badassery: Many people of Westeros dismiss Myrcella as an eleven year old girl, even after her deeds continue to grow throughout the war; attributing her accomplishments to those like Barristan the Bold, or as just wild tales. Myrcella often counts on this to give herself an edge over her enemies.
  • Interestingly this gets Zig-zagged by Littlefinger. He ends up coming to view Myrcella as a worthy player in the Game of Thrones, and thus lures her to the Vale so that she can be unceremoniously thrown out the Moon Door. He fails to kill her as he, like everyone else in the story, is unaware Myrcella has magic to survive a fall, and is even tricked into letting her elite troops go free. His scheme ends up only exposing himself.
• Underling with an F in PR:
  • Melisandre's foreign religion, complete disdain for local traditions and interest in burning people alive is NOT doing Stannis any favors, as Ned and Davos repeatedly tell him.
  • And then there's Joffrey, who is such a hinderance to the Lannisters as a ruler that Tywin eventually has him assassinated in battle.
• The Unfavorite:
  • Myrcella is this to both Cersei and Tywin but for different reasons, for Cersei it's due to the fact that Tanya is simply better at everything Cersei claims to be, for Tywin it's because she's a woman. Although her grandfather has reconsidered his opinion on her, due to her aid in the war effort and especially after she saved his life from a shadow assassin.
  • Joffrey was this to Robert, for being an evil little shit.
• Ungrateful Bastard: According to Littlefinger, Jon Arryn took him under his wing after his disastrous duel with Brandon led him to being kicked out of Riverrun, allowing him to work his way up to become Master of Coin on the Small Council. This didn't stop him from arranging his assassination for his schemes.
• The Unsmile: Those who pay close attention to Myrcella often note that when she smiles, it doesn't reach her eyes and it tends to creep them out. The one time her eyes smiled with the rest of her face, it was after Davos told her that the Mountain was executed and he noted that .
• Unwanted False Faith: Myrcella is deeply perturbed by Ser Bonifer Hasty beginning to perceive her as some sort of Seven-chosen messiah and preaching her deeds to everyone who will listen.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Myrcella is unintentionally this.
  • Having a sister/daughter who's better than him/her in every way is not doing wonders for Joffrey's or Cersei's mental stability. She also accidentally left Cersei thinking she had a crush on Robb Stark and later revealed Gendry's existence to her.
  • Myrcella's convincing of the Stormlanders to flip their allegiance to Joffrey secure the Crownlands from southern attack, allowing Tywin to focus on scouring the Riverlands.
  • When she tells her grandfather that Joffrey cannot sit on the throne when he comes of age as even if they win the current war, he'll just start a new one either unintentionally or because he can. Tywin decides to get him killed in battle via wildfire explosion, but unfortunately gets Jaime killed as he tries (and fails) to save his son, which in turn leads to Cersei's Sanity Slippage.
• Uriah Gambit: Tywin opts to face the incoming Reach host by deploying the Lannister and Lord Beric's marcher forces in the Kingswood where he prepared a wildfire trap with Joffrey and the goldcloaks taking the center formation to bait them in.
• Villainous Breakdown: Cersei has a big one in Chapter 40 when she learns about Joffrey's death. Becoming so overcome with with grief and rage that she actually tries to attack Tywin.
• Villainous BSoD: Cersei proceeds to devolve into this when she is then informed that Jamie died along with her eldest son. Tywin goes through this, too.
• Villains Want Mercy: Lyn Corbray winds up captured by Myrcella's soldiers and begs Myrcella to spare his life in return for giving information about Littlefinger's plot and his role in King Robert's death. However, Myrcella ends up throwing her knife into Lyn's throat after he lied about not being part of Robert's assassination.
• Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Tyrion vomits when he learns of Jaime's death.
• Wise Beyond Their Years: How many view Myrcella. Robb admits to his father that he felt like a dullard compared to Myrcella due to how much more knowledgeable the girl many years his junior was when he first met her.
• With Us or Against Us: What caused a rift between Myrcella and Cersei is the fact that the former moved to establish friendly rapport with Stannis, Renly, the Starks and others within reach. Her mother objected to that, saying that all non-Lannisters are enemies who should be kept at a distance, a mindset her daughter disagrees with. Their relationship has been adversarial ever since. Something that’s only been furthered by Cersei’s unwillingness to let Myrcella in on her plans.
• World's Most Beautiful Woman: Cersei is regarded as this in the Westeros. Her Uncle Kevan snarks that despite being called this she wasn't enough to satisfy Robert's lust.
• Worthy Opponent: Littlefinger, after having a few too many of his schemes derailed by Myrcella and seeing himself in her cleverness, decides she is simply too dangerous to let live. This results in him guiding Lysa into having Myrcella lured into the Vale under false pretenses, judged and seemingly executed. He in private admits to her that he sees her as one of the few truly noteworthy players of the Game of Thrones and refuses to consider an insanely lucrative deal she offers him where he could rule over multiple kingdoms simply because he believes she, like him, would never allow someone so smart and dangerous to live.
• You Are in Command Now: After Stannis is incapacitated at the Battle of the Trident and with no contingency made for this occasion, Ned becomes acting commander of the R'hllorite Baratheons as he is the senior-most lord with the largest intact force present. Thusly, he is also the one to represent his side in parley with the Stormlands Baratheon force following the fight. Once he gets back to his camp, he appoints Ned as Hand of the King and institutes a proper chain of command to keep things operating smoothly.
• Zerg Rush: Levy soldiers overcoming an armored knight's defenses by swarming them and knifing them where they're vulnerable is a known tactic in widespread use. It's normally done by troops who find themselves in a situation for it rather than any kind of dedicated unit. As part of Myrcella's military reforms, she has some men organized for specifically this task so that soldiers don't need to step out of formation to dispose of downed knights or to take them hostage.

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