Brienne of Tarth
Brienne of Tarth, the only daughter of Lord Selwyn Tarth, stands apart from every other woman in the Seven Kingdoms. She is huge, broad-shouldered, and strong, with a face that men call ugly and a body that no gown can make graceful. Yet she is also a knight—the first woman in living memory to be formally knighted, though the honor was granted by the man she most admires, Renly Baratheon. After Renly's murder, she swore her sword to Catelyn Stark, who sent her on a quest to bring her daughters, Sansa and Arya, to safety. That quest defines Brienne's arc in A Dance with Dragons, though she appears only briefly, in two crucial scenes that bookend her long, fruitless search through the riverlands.
Identity and Background
Brienne is the heir to Tarth, an island in the narrow sea, but she has never been comfortable in the role of a highborn lady. From childhood she was too tall, too strong, too clumsy for the delicate pursuits expected of her sex. She learned to fight instead, and when Renly Baratheon came to Tarth, she fell in love with him—not with the hope of marriage, but with the devotion of a squire to a lord. Renly, amused or touched, made her a knight of his Rainbow Guard, and after his death she transferred that loyalty to Catelyn Stark. The oath she swore to Catelyn—to find and protect her daughters—becomes the moral center of her story, a vow she pursues with a literal-minded, almost religious intensity that sets her apart from the cynical schemers around her.
The Quest and Its Cost
Brienne's search for Sansa Stark takes her through a war-ravaged riverlands where every village is burned, every road is dangerous, and every stranger is a potential enemy. She travels with a young squire, Podrick Payne, whom she rescues from hanging, and a cynical hedge knight, Ser Hyle Hunt, who once made a wager to seduce her. The three of them wander from ruin to ruin, following rumors that always prove false. Brienne refuses to give up, even when the trail grows cold, even when she is mocked, beaten, and nearly killed. Her stubbornness is both her greatest virtue and her tragic flaw: she cannot abandon a vow, even when keeping it means walking into a trap.
The Trap at Pennytree
Late in the book, Brienne finally finds what she has been seeking—not Sansa, but a lead that might bring her closer. She rides into the village of Pennytree, where she encounters Jaime Lannister, who has just finished negotiating the surrender of Raventree Hall. She tells him she has found the girl he once sent her to find—Sansa Stark—and that she can take him to her, but only if he comes alone. Jaime, who has been haunted by his own oath to Catelyn Stark, agrees. The scene is charged with tension: Brienne's face is scarred, her voice is hollow, and she will not meet his eyes. She is not lying, exactly, but she is not telling the whole truth. The girl she has found is not Sansa; it is a trap, set by the vengeful ghost of Catelyn Stark, now called Lady Stoneheart, who means to hang Jaime for his crimes.
Change and Ending
Brienne's appearance in A Dance with Dragons is brief but decisive. She has been broken by her quest—starved, wounded, and forced to watch innocent people die because of her failure. When she finds Jaime, she is no longer the naive idealist who set out from Tarth. She has learned that honor is not enough, that the world does not reward loyalty, and that sometimes the only way to keep a vow is to break it. Her final words to Jaime are a plea and a warning: "A day's ride. I can take you to her, ser… but you will need to come alone. Elsewise, the Hound will kill her." The lie is thin, but Jaime follows her anyway, and the reader is left to wonder whether Brienne is leading him to his death or to some impossible redemption. Her story ends on a knife's edge, unresolved, as she disappears into the riverlands with the man she once despised and now, perhaps, loves.
