Game Of Thrones Obituaries: The Mountain And The Viper

We pay our final respects to another Game of Thrones character. Warning, spoilers await inside...

By David Crow | June 2, 2014 | | 0

This article contains major spoilers pertaining to Game of Thrones: “The Mountain and the Viper.” It is written in the hand of a Dornish barker.

SUNSPEAR, DORNE — Let it not be said that the Capital knows not how to treat the royal heritage of Dorne!

After nearly 20 long years and a cycle through the seasons, another child of Sunspear has gone to King’s Landing, and another life has been stolen by those vile monsters who now call themselves Baratheons, yet look ever so much like Lannisters.

We Dornish have a right to be proud! What devil or sorceress was ever so great as Nymeria, whose blood flowed through Prince Oberyn Martell’s veins. We are the kingdom that never bent the knee to the Targaryens like the kneelers and cowards of Lannisport, and the always-scheming Tywin Lannister. Thus, we are once again targeted by the vermin of a Capital whose leadership grows more questionable with every passing war—an incredible feat as the factions multiply by the hour!

Prince Oberyn Martell, brother of our fair ruler Prince Doran, traveled North to mend the bad blood with the Lannisters since their greatest crime, and he brought a little taste of Dorne to their sycophantic courtiers and parlor japes masquerading as leaders. Alas, it would appear that the Red Viper was bitten by a venom far more volatile than any potion he learned from the Maesters of Oldtown.

Born 258AC, Oberyn had a thirst for life that could not be quenched, though he had done his damndest in 30 years to relish every possible flavor. He was a member of the most cultured and free-thinking House of Westeros, and Oberyn was as cunning as the desert is dry. It is there that he honed his earliest skills as a learner in Oldtown, attempting to become a maester. However, the educated man’s chains turned out to be too chafing for the good prince, who also valued getting his hands dirty with a variety of experiences and substances besides the maester’s potion, quickly earning him the nickname “Red Viper.” Aye, he loved that name almost as much as he loved his sister Elia.

She was only one year Oberyn’s elder, but in many ways his closest companion. They grew up together and traveled together, including to Elia’s wedding with the last good king of Westeros, Aerys II. The Lannisters called him mad, but the madness with which they have ruled the Seven Kingdoms in subsequent years proves more is the folly to he who believes their lies.

Indeed, it was the greatest liar of them all, Tywin of the Rock, that summoned his Mountain upon Elia after sacking King’s Landing when he had approached as friend and savior. Gregor Clegane, a gargantuan brute of dubious nobility, was unleashed upon Elia for whom he smashed her wailing babes against palace walls before her very eyes, and then proceeded to rape her with their blood on his hands. Tywin and his stooge King Robert Baratheon let this monstrous crime go as unpunished as the blasphemous act of kingslaying, committed by Tywin’s own son.

It is true that the Martells and people of Dorne are closer to the Targaryens than they are to the sheep who claim themselves to be lions. When Aegon the Conqueror came to Westeros he truly did conquer…except for Dorne. In the deserts where his dragons proved useless, he nor two centuries worth of successors could bend Dorne to their rule. Instead, the Targaryens and Martells married as equals beginning with King Dareon II’s reign and continuing on to our lost Elia.

It is Elia’s death for whom Oberyn mourned over the years. After spending two decades traveling the world and flattering it with countless bastards to enjoy, he returned home from Essos and created eight more bastard daughters, the adorable Sand Snakes of the Water Gardens. The four most recent beauties were birthed from his final paramour’s loins, the exquisite Ellaria Sand. A perfection that the Maiden would aspire to, Ellaria is a fellow worshipper of the Lysene love goddess that graces the pleasure houses, and there was no pleasure Ellaria did not share with Oberyn in all shapes and form.

Alongside Ellaria, Oberryn pilgrimaged to the Capital and brought common sense back to Lannister depravity. In short time, he was able to enjoy the sight of a choking “Baratheon” king and sit on the Small Council. He even judged the short-legged but big-hearted Tyrion Lannister, who is clearly the best of his family. If he is innocent, it speaks volumes of his dysfunctional lion pack, which cannibalizes its own, and if he is guilty, then he did the world an immeasurable service on the day of our previous king’s wedding.

For his part, Oberyn saw through the embarrassment and shame that Tywin’s family has brought to the Seven Kingdoms and stood as Tyrion’s champion on the field of battle against the Mountain…a man who raped and slaughtered one of our beloved queens. And that monster in his dying breath also took Oberyn’s life too in the end. But not before the Red Viper bared its teeth, revealing a nip that will surely guarantee the Mountain a most unpleasant descent into the deepest of the Seven Hells.

Because of the Lannisters squabbling, our prince is dead. Doran will do as he must, but this dysfunctional bile that apparently can be mistaken for blood and kinship at Casterly Rock has cost Sunspear dearly once again. And it will be the last time. Thank the Seven Gods that we have Myrcella Baratheon here in our fair Water Gardens where she can be educated free from the monsters she calls kin. Indeed, Tyrion wisely sent her to our arms for safe keeping, and we shall keep her especially safe until the moment is right. One can imagine just the thought of it would make the Red Viper smile. As does final victory, bringing Elia’s horror one-step closer to absolution.