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Sansa Stark, wed to Joffrey Baratheon, will bear him a son, the heir of the throne, and when the crunch comes she will choose her husband and child over her parents and siblings, a choice she will later bitterly rue.
From the original 1993 outline for what would become A Song of Ice and Fire.
The summer that followed the endless winter filled the air with flies. They were everywhere: in the gaps between leaves and along the edges of doors, in the lacework of curtains, and hovering over glasses of watered-down wine. The flies advanced through the castle with more success than Stannis's army ever had. They danced on the tables at meals, dodging the hands that swung at them and daringly darting toward the roast venison. They tapped their feet on bare bones, on the white jellies of marrow; on the perfumed clothes of the nobles and the dirty aprons of the servants. The flies came like an invading army, in swarms, riding the air with their sharp little wings.
The ladies at court began to use perfumes made with lavender and basil, which were said to repel them, and even lemon, in desperate cases. Every room had a bowl of apple cider vinegar, a trap that proved ineffective; for every fly that fell, three more emerged to take its place.
Even the throne room had been invaded. They circled the young king on his throne of swords, landing on his golden crown and rubbing their legs together maliciously.
Where do they come from? Each person had their own theory. From across the sea, from ships laden with spices and colorful dyes of foreign lands. From some corpse hastily buried deep within the fortress, rotting somewhere—a body no one has yet found, but the flies have.
The king had ordered every corner of the Red Keep to be searched, but there was no corpse, and the flies kept coming, from everywhere and nowhere, one after the other.
Some maesters urged caution, for the flies could signal the beginning of a sickness. Others, like Grand Maester Pycelle, called it nonsense, claiming it was a symptom of the heat.
And after the flies, more slowly, came the news: Stannis Baratheon, the only remaining bastion against the young king, was dead. The High Septon said: Flies carry death on their wings; it's a bad omen, the one true king is dead. He said it to the masses, and the words detached from his tongue and rolled through the city, down the streets, and crawled across the ground, rotting the ears of the soldiers, the merchants, the whores, the cooks, the servants. And after blackening the ears and hearts of the smallfolk, it spread through the castle like wildfire, inflating everyone with its black smoke, until no one could breathe without swallowing the words of treason.
Above the city’s silence, Sansa watched the High Septon. Suspended dramatically above the ground, his head was thrown back over a pike, his mouth agape. A large gash ran from the center of his forehead to the middle of his face, and upon closer inspection, it was clear that his entire skull had been hollowed out. The crown was missing, popped off like the top of a refreshing dessert, and the brain had been extracted, leaving only its wrinkled base and a blackened, twisted skull. The brea had darkened and deformed the bone until it no longer resembled anything human
"I did the same to your father's head when I cut it off, remember?" Joffrey asked from beside her, fiddling with his red velvet doublet. He rarely wore his father's colors.
You didn't cut off his head, Sansa imagined herself saying, Ilyn Payne did. You only gave the order. My father would have cut off your head himself.
"You didn't take my father's brain," she said instead. Joffrey made a bored gesture with his hand.
"Blame my mother's new pet. Qyburn likes to examine human bodies. That doesn’t matter, what do you think?" He gestured to the view around them—a dozen heads hung from the castle’s walls like earrings. It was a grotesque spectacle, one she would have preferred to miss. There was a reason she barely visited the Red Keep’s battlements; she didn’t want to know, and she looked harshly at her lord husband for bringing her here. It shouldn’t stink like this, she thought absently, as she played with the pendant Joffrey had gifted her on her name day. The brea should prevent the smell. She wondered what his husband’s head would look like covered in brea, mounted on a pike.
"It's an interesting way to decorate the walls," Sansa said cautiously. She felt as empty and indifferent as she always did when Joffrey forced her to look at the heads of his enemies, like a very tiresome cat that kept leaving dead prey at his owner’s feet.
"Don't be stupid," Joffrey retorted sharply. "It's a warning. So everyone knows what happens when they rebel against me. Once they bring me Stannis's head, I'll put it in the center of my collection."
Joffrey had been issuing the same kind of warning for the six years of his reign, but it never had the desired effect. Dissenting voices rose despite the fear, or perhaps precisely because of it.
“It will be a fearsome sight,” she agreed. She brushed away a fly dancing around the golden lions embroidered on her purple gown. The fly flew off, its buzzing echoing insistently in the courtyard. It was unpleasant music, the song of the flies. A dull noise that dulled the senses and drove you mad with rage, until all you could think about was getting rid of that painful humming.
Joffrey nodded, satisfied. It was easy to appease him these days. Sansa recalled a time of fear and rage, when she was still a child, incapable of accepting her fate. Her husband had been harsh with her then, but Sansa knew it was her fault. She should never have tried to resist. A man hardly accepted a no for an answer; a king even less. It had been a pointless fight.
She had grown tired of those.
She watched another fly land on the straight bridge of her husband's nose before he swatted it away. She imagined the fly carried death, as the High Septon said, and that it had marked Joffrey with its tiny legs. If flies bring death, we'll all be dead in this city before the year's end.
“You were right,” the king said awkwardly. Surprised, Sansa looked at him properly. He had grown into a handsome man: his golden curls fell over his forehead in perfect ringlets, his straight chin and broad shoulders made him the spitting image of his uncle Jaime. He’s a comely monster. “My mother doesn’t respect my authority. I’m the king; she shouldn’t question me.”
“A mother will always see a son before she sees a king.”
“That’s why I’m going to send her to Casterly Rock,” he paused, barely looking at her, but Sansa had learned to understand his silences as well as his words. He never asked for her opinion, even when he wished to know it.
She couldn’t say her true thoughts, so she said instead: “She’ll be happy to hear that. She’d served for so long in the capital, I’m sure she wishes for some peace and quiet.”
She could not imagine Cersei Lannister ever enjoying peace and quiet, but that wasn’t what Joffrey wanted to hear. The Hound was right, I am a little bird singing the songs they taught me. But she didn’t want to think of the Hound; she had stopped praying for him a long time ago. Wherever he is, it’s still better than this place.
“And you?” Joffrey asked, closing the distance between them until they were face to face. “What do you wish for?”
For your death, she thought. Except it wasn’t quite true. For this swarm of flies to take you away to rot.
“I wish for nothing but my husband’s triumph and my son’s health,” she answered placidly. She kept her hands clasped at her front when Joffrey cupped her cheek with a hand covered in glittering rings. It’s fine, he never hits me himself. She breathed deeply as another fly danced around her husband’s crown. It buzzed as it content, playing with the sharp edges and walking around the black diamonds.
“And what will happen when Robert grows up?” His beautiful blue eyes were hard. They look empty, like sapphires. “Would you undermine him as my mother does with me?”
She denied it quickly, “Of course not, Your Grace. I know my place.”
He seemed happy to hear that, the ice in his gaze warming into a pleasant wave. He’s so easy, she thought with giddiness. It had taken so much work to get to this point that she almost considered halting her plans.
In a way, she would miss this sense of triumph—the knowledge that she could control the king with a few sweet words and a pretty smile.
He grabbed her chin more firmly and bent his head to kiss her. Sansa hated his kisses. They were an affectionate touch, a gesture of tenderness. Joffrey kissed her when he was pleased with her, and it was always sweet and gentle. They were the kisses Sansa had dreamed of as a child; the kisses of a knight devoted to his lady. They made her forget the beatings and the cruelties and the blood of her family that her husband held under his fingernails. They made her forget herself.
It was blessedly short, and yet it left her with her heart pounding and her face ablaze. Joffrey smirked when they parted, and a fly tried to taste his glistening lips. He frowned, swatting her away.
“We need to do something with these flies,” he muttered to himself. “I have to talk with Lord Tyrell.”
Sansa blinked, trying to order her thoughts. “About the flies?”
“About his damn granddaughter,” he clicked his tongue, annoyed. “He wants to marry that toddler to our son. He’s as persistent as these flies.”
“Would that be so terrible? The Tyrells are powerful allies, Margaery and I are good friends, and her daughter and Robert are playmates.”
“It’s not about the idea, it’s the conceit. One should never demand anything from a king.”
Sansa said nothing to that, because she had learned when to keep quiet. Joffrey frowned again, shaking his head, the rubies of his crown glittering under the sun.
“I have a meeting with him, so I won’t walk you to your apartments.”
“That is fine,” she smiled. “I know you are busy. Thank you for sparing some time for me today.”
He shrugged, looking mildly embarrassed before leaving quickly, the Kingsguard following behind as a swarm of big, white flies. Only Ser Balon was left behind, watching her. She ignored him, looking over the stone battlements to the horizon. The sun was setting over the sea, coloring the world in purple shadows. It was beautiful. There was beauty to be found everywhere. Even in the most wretched of places, the sun shone through.
No matter his complaints, Joffrey would cave to Lord Tyrell's insistence. He would betroth their Robert and little Alicent, and once he did…
He’s pushed away his mother and the rest of his supporters. No one wants another mad king, and it’s easy to depose a king who has an heir. The Tyrells want to rule.
The beheaded heads seemed to laugh around her. I might be the mad one, she thought. It was madness what she was doing, after all. Treason. Like her father and brother.
Flies buzzed around her. Sansa felt them landing on her skin, her dress, her hair. They bring death. Those flies came from the depths of the Red Keep, from the rot that festered in the castle’s heart. They came from the fields and the battles, from landing on dead bodies teeming with maggots and feeding on them. Those flies had fed on death, and they carried it clinging to their legs, their wings, their mouths. They had the dead on them, inside them, above them, everywhere.
They landed on the High Septon’s head and then tried to kiss her lips, and when Sansa swallowed, she swallowed the taste of death.