Unnamed Journal Volume 4, Issue 3 | Page 42

(although Rickon is killed). The grateful Lords of the North, who followed his doomed brother Robb before Robb was murdered at the Red Wedding, proclaim Jon Snow the King in the North. Uninterested in the honor, Jon again takes up the duty, to protect his home and the realms of men from the Others. He needs dragon glass, which can stop the Others and their horde of undead zombies. To get it he goes to Dragonstone, where he meets Danaerys Targaryen, the last of her family, who has hatched dragons from fossilized eggs, who has build an army by force and fraud, who has sacked the cities of Slaver's Bay and brought new justice to the downtrodden, and who has come home to Westeros to claim her father's throne. He is young and unmarried, as is she. He is comfortable with her dragons and able to hold his own with her. They become enamored of each other. He convinces her that the Others are real, that they are a matter of much greater importance than who sits the Iron Throne. She and He become the new power couple. Not everyone is pleased with this. Sansa Stark distrusts the dragon queen, and Bran Stark - a crippled boy who has become a mystic seer - discovers by traveling into the past Jon's true identity, and identity which gives him a better claim to the throne than Danaerys. The tension between them, thus started, holds for the fight against the Others, but when Danaerys heads south to claim King's Landing from the Lannisters, her ability to tell friend from foe collapses, and at her moment of triumph, she burns the city, reducing it to rubble. Jon has remained loyal to his dragon queen throughout this, forgoing his better claim, although the reality that he has fallen in love with his aunt does complicate his feelings. He has been loyal, because loyalty is honor, and without his honor Jon Snow is no one. But now, discovering that Danaerys is a threat to the peace of the world, does what no one else can, and slays her on the steps of the Iron Throne. Danaerys' captains capture him, and from the Lords of Westeros, demand justice. In a surprise move, the Lords of Westeros decide to elect crippled Bran Stark as King. Sansa sees her opportunity and declares the independence of the North. And Jon Snow, who is really Aegon Targaryen, is sent back to the Wall as punishment for regicide. He is last seen riding with the wildlings north of the Wall, to escort them to their homes. What do we see? This simplified version of the plot (Martin was a soap-opera writer for a time) tells us a few things about Jon Snow, and many of those things are admirable. But these admirable qualities were the product of his upbringing at Eddard Stark's hands, and his own natural gifts. He does not, like Frodo Baggins, have a wizard (who's an angelic being in diguise), guiding and protecting him. He does not, like Aragorn, gain from his contributions to the Great Battle. He is a servant of the Realms of Men, and when he is no longer needed, the powers that be discard of him, however regretfully. This is, quite frankly, the best that he could ever have hoped for, true born prince of the realm or no. And this is because the story he lives in is given over to pagan fury, pagan horror, and pagan sorrow. Westeros, and Essos, and the rest, are realms of chaos, with blood feuds and eternal hatreds briefly cooled by the dominance of a powerful ruler. It took the dragon lord Aegon Targaryen I to unite the Seven Kingdoms with Fire and Blood, and in the absence of strong rulership the Great Houses fall upon each other in an orgy of hatred and betrayal. Nothing