Jon Snow

Jon Snow shivered at the cracking of a whip overhead. There was a thud as the lash struck flesh, then a female groan somewhere in the coffle behind him. He had been spared the stroke, this time at least. Along his bare back, thighs and buttocks he knew he bore many other welts from this ghastly procession of slaves and captives.

It had been like this ever since Winterfell had fallen in the Great Thaw. The sun had shone bright over the crimson Lannister pennants and shields as the walls had crumbled and a white flag flown high above the Broken Tower. That had been Sansa’s doing; Jon and Arya would have fought to the last if every Stark bannerman hadn’t thrown down their arms.

That wretched day had been the last time Jon had seen his sisters. Here in King’s Landing, stripped bare and chained to all the other prisoners of war, he was not even sure if they were alive.

For all he knew, that could be a blessing. He had been unfortunate enough to witness the others’ fates and punishments, seeing lions in chainmail break down Daenerys’ door and strip all their prisoners right there in the Winterfell Keep. For the entire march down the King’s Road from the North, neither Jon nor any of his subjects had been permitted a single stitch of clothing.

They only thing any of them had to wear were iron collars and the stains of seed from their red-garbed tormentors.

Jon had mastered the ability to cut himself off from the atrocities of the present, to look without seeing and hear nothing but his past regrets. Still, the sound of another whip-crack broke him out from a reverie as the entire procession came to a halt.

They had arrived at a crossroads. Here, lines of Lannister guards kept back the baying crowds, while right in the centre of the fork a platform had been erected.

“Fucking hell,” Ygritte breathed from behind him.

It appeared that Cersei Lannister wanted to display her victory for all to see. A gigantic red flag, thirty foot high, was draped as a backdrop to the depravities being committed in the Lannister name. A woman with short black hair and a simple tunic emblazoned with a golden lion was reading out names of attainted traitors to the tune of blaring trumpets from each side of the dais. Behind the announcer were the pillories. Some of the low-born or simply overlooked prisoners had already been imprisoned for quite some time by the looks of it.