Chapter 20 – Reek – He plays Theon well

Theon, or rather Reek now, should relish the freedom he’s being given even if it is temporary.  Who knows the next time Ramsey will loosen his leash this much.  I think Ramsey broke him like a dog just for a purpose such as this.  He can now send him around as Theon Greyjoy as he needs but back with Ramsey he is just Reek (rhymes with weak).  Ramsey is a lot more dangerous than he might seem up front.  He’s smart and cruel and deadly.

When Theon leaves he is Reek, but it is interesting how quickly he falls back into his old ways and mannerisms as Theon.  I think that is an act though.  I think he’s totally broken and he is now Reek playing the role of Theon rather than Theon being Reek most of the time.  Theon Greyjoy is basically dead at this point.  It was really interesting to see how readily the Theon-memories try to rush back and how quickly Theon squashes them.

So Reek is sent as Theon to take back Moat Cailin from the Ironmen, but it doesn’t prove to be too difficult a task.  These Ironmen seem to be pretty weak and pathetic compared to the ones we’ve seen before.  Theon waltzes in and puts Ralf Kenning out of his misery (which seemed insanely terrible I might add).  Then, he manages to convince the men that they’d be much better off yielding and going home.  Of course, as I could have guessed, Ramsey doesn’t let any of them live and has them all murdered instead.  It was chilling when he asked Theon what he wanted as a reward and hinted at Theon asking to go home.  But, I think that Theon has become Reek well enough to read Ramsey’s tone and words and he smartly declines and asks only for some wine.  I think that if he had asked to go with the others, he’d have been granted his wish and killed alongside them.

Roose Bolton arrives at the end of the chapter and Ramsey is eager to show his success.  I liked seeing Theon/Reek’s memory of how he used to mock Roose when he was the ward of Ned Stark.  That was definitely something the old Theon would have done.  In a strange way, I think he’s actually stronger now even though it took a lot for him to get there.  If he survives all of this, he might actually make a good ruler.  The last thing that Roose Bolton does is present us with Fakarya and it’s nice to finally get an answer to the question of who she is.  Sure enough she is being played by Jeyne Poole, one of Sansa’s friends who we haven’t seen in so long.  Theon recognizes this immediately.  I can’t imagine others won’t except that maybe everyone who knew the real Arya is dead now.  Nevertheless, it stinks for Jeyne as she will have to deal with being Ramsey’s wife.