Eyes on the Red Keep

WARNING: Game of Thrones/A Dance with Dragons spoilers.

I think one of the hardest scenes I ever read in any book was Cersei Lannister's walk of atonement chapter. It's an odd thing. When she's captured by the High Sparrow, you actually feel a bit of delight, because she'd basically laid this trap for herself. She gave the High Sparrow power, armed his followers, and allowed him enough rope to hang her, so to speak. If there is ever a moment when I was happy to see a character get what they deserved, it was then.

Once she confesses her sins (well, at least confesses to the ones that won't get her or her children killed), she's allowed to go back to her home, the Red Keep across the city from where she's being held. To do this, she is paraded through the city. She is naked, her hair is shaved (though just cut off very short on the show), and a big announcement is made about the whole thing.

As she walks through the city, she is called every name you can  imagine. People insult her. They threaten her, they sexually harass her, and they throw every nasty thing they can find at her. Some even throw stones.

The beautiful thing about this scene is that no matter how much I may have disliked Cersei's actions before hand, and no matter how clearly I could see the path that led her here, when I read the scene, my heart ached for her. It was humiliating and emotionally violent. She tried to keep her head held high and just walk without shame, but by the end, she was horrified, crying, and running to get away from  the crowd.

Cersei is a villain from chapter one of this whole thing. She is relentless in her actions and does fairly vile things to get what she wants. And before, I did say I disliked her actions but not her because I always loved the character. I can love a great villain, and she does have some of the best lines in the book. Even still, I'd accepted that she would pay for her crimes. Not everyone will in this story, but Cersei, I knew, eventually would.

When this walk happens though, everything about what this character may have done fades into the background. She eclipses what she was and perhaps even the story itself to touch on a kind of universal nerve. We're all social creatures and being publically shamed is a huge fear for many of us. This scene is devastating to the point that you don't feel sympathy for Cersei, you are horrified for her. It's one of the scenes that is just as good on the show as it was in the book. By the time Qyborn finally wraps a cloak around her and comforts her, you feel so much relief for her.

The scene also has a very subtle shift in where Cersei's strengths lie. She'd always relied on her beauty, station, power, and money to ensure that whatever she wanted would happen. In any society, these attributes can take you far, but all of them are fleeting. By the time Cersei makes her walk, she has been stripped of beauty, power, and wealth. The walk itself demonstrates that her station has been taken from her as well.

And yet, as she walks, she finds a new strength. She keeps her eyes focused on the Red Keep, on her home. As people scream at  her, harm her, humiliate her, and threaten her, she kept moving forward. By the end, even as she is breaking down in so many ways, she still continues forward, eyes on the Red Keep. When she gets there, she is at her breaking point, but she DID make it.

I don't know what will happen to her story from here, but I certainly hope the High Sparrow learns a very important truth. You can only take from someone what you know they have. When they find more to themselves that what you saw, you are usually in a lot of danger.