A Feast for Crows ÔÇö Cersei III
Lady Taena whispers honey and poison in the queen's ear; the Kettleblacks climb, the small council shrinks, and Margaery's smile grows more suspicious daily.
The chapter retold
Lady Taena of Myr, a Tyrell-aligned lady of the court, insinuates herself into Cersei's confidence, whispering encouragement laced with poison ÔÇö flattering the queen's judgment, stoking her suspicions of Margaery, and positioning herself as the one truly loyal friend in a court of schemers. Cersei, flattered and lonely in the specific way of someone who has just seized power and cannot yet trust anyone who might want to take it back, elevates the low-born Kettleblack brothers to key positions of trust, while her small council quietly shrinks as the competent men drift away or are pushed out. Margaery, still married to Tommen and radiating public charm, becomes an object of daily, escalating suspicion in Cersei's mind.
The chapter tightens Cersei's isolation from anyone who might actually check her judgment ÔÇö Taena is not a co-conspirator so much as an enabler, agreeing with whatever Cersei already wants to believe. The Kettleblacks' rise plants the specific instrument (Osney Kettleblack, chiefly) that Cersei will later use in her scheme against Margaery, while the steady erosion of steady voices around her ÔÇö the very thing she engineered in her second chapter ÔÇö starts to look less like consolidation of power and more like a woman sealing herself into a room with only flatterers for company.
This movement: The Kingsmoot
- On Old Wyk the drowned god's captains vote: Asha offers peace, Victarion strength ÔÇö and Euron Crow's Eye offers dragons.
- The Crow's Eye takes the driftwood crown with a horn said to bind dragons, and sends Victarion to court Daenerys.
- Cersei's small war on Margaery begins: spies, whores, and a walking corpse under Qyburn's care.
- The Sand Snakes are locked away as Dorne seethes over Oberyn; Arianne plots a queen of her own.