The giant marble dome and seven gleaming crystal towers of the Great Sept of Baelor were visible from all across King’s Landing. Even when wandering through Flea Bottom, it was possible to catch a glimpse of the spires in between the crowded alleyways. Watching over the city from the top of Visenya’s hill, the Sept was a source of pride of all the people in the city.
Now it stands in ruins. The once magnificent plaza is now a graveyard for the so many lives lost that day. Valar morghulis, ‘all men must die,’ as the saying goes. There will be more to replace them, but the Great Sept is gone and we may never see its like again. A feat of architecture and engineering from a bygone era, the Sept was build by Baelor the Blessed, 9th King of the Targaryen line. Baelor was not just a King, but a Septon as well. He dedicated his life to helping the smallfolk of the Seven Kingdoms. What a symbol of hope it must have been for the smallfolk to always have the Great Sept to look upon.
For over 130 years she stood. Through countless Blackfyre rebellions, through the War of the Ninepenny Kings, through Robert’s Rebellion, the King’s Landing riots under King Joffrey and countless other trials. It was on the stones of this very Sept that the traitor Ned Stark was put to death. Not even Stannis Baratheon’s siege could harm the mighty Sept. In the end it was not war or pillage that destroyed the Sept of Baelor, but the treachery of the Queen Regent.
The crown was nearly bankrupt before war of the five Kings and now it is in far worse shape. In the midst of this unrest it is hard to imagine securing the resources to rebuild. It is harder to imagine the newly crowned Queen undertaking such a Holy project.
The Queen has erased over a hundred years of history with one candle and gallons of that vile green liquid. When the rulers of the realm turn against the people, against the gods, against history, against the heart of the capital itself, then what hope is there for the smallfolk?
The Realm’s only hope lies to the East, across the Narrow Sea to Essos to the lands of the Dragon Queen. May she return and usher in a new Golden Age, may she throw down the false Queen Cersei and rebuild the Great Sept with tenfold the splendor of the old. Surely Cersei’s days are numbered.
