Chapter Text
1.
Okay, so let me see if I can explain to you how things run up in this bitch—Margaery Tyrell is the Queen of the Queen Bees. She’s shrewd, smart and sexy—but she never uses her power as the unofficial leader of the female student body against those who are beneath her (i.e.: everyone). She’s Glinda the Good Witch, steadfastly trying to raise poor unfortunates up to her level. (That’s how Brienne got sucked in.)
Margaery’s best friend is Sansa Stark—adorable ginger band geek, and if you think that didn’t warrant a LOT of comparisons to Alyson Hannigan from American Pie, quotes included, then you’re wrong. But she’s freckled and friendly and forthright, always giving people the benefit of the doubt. She and Margaery have been nearly inseparable since they were eleven, when Sansa had a crush on Margaery’s brother Loras and the brunette was forced to break it to the redhead that Loras “didn’t exactly play for their team”. Once Sansa got over her embarrassment, the three of them formed a strong friendship, which they added Renly to when the time came. Renly and Loras went to University of Westeros King’s Landing, and Margaery and Sansa followed a year later. The four of them rule supreme.
Melisandre Asshai comes from some crazy rich family in Essos, but was sent to live with her grandmother in Westeros after one too many flings with the pool boys—apparently her parents didn’t appreciate the high turnover rate at their house when it came to the hired help. She’s willowy and wispy and willful—if she has her sights set on you, you should be afraid. But she does do what she thinks is best, and most of the time the rest of the girls can stave off disaster.
Arya Stark is Sansa’s little sister, just two years younger—she was tiny and tough and tempestuous, a little tomboy, just over four feet of terror. She likes sports and dimly lit pubs like Brienne, and they’d spent a large part of their relatively short acquaintance smuggling Arya into bars after a disastrous day of classes.
If Margaery is Glinda the Good, UWKL’s head cheerleader is the Wicked Witch of the West. Cersei Lannister was probably the most beautiful girl you’d ever see up close, but it was a cold, unobtainable flawlessness that shone out of her from every pore. She was always surrounded by the rest of the cheerleaders and some of the jocks, but you couldn’t really say they were her friends. She was the Queen, so she held court. Well, all except for Shae Smith. She always sat next to Cersei, whispering in her ear what must have been truly awful things, if the stony smirk on Cersei’s face was any indication.
Most girls at UWKL made it their life’s goal to never be on the receiving end of that smirk—in fact, it had been that way since their days at King’s Landing High—and Brienne Tarth was no exception. She knew what she looked like, and knew everything the Golden Queen would say if she ever set eyes on her; it was doubtful Cersei would come up with anything new.
It was a total boon, then, that on her first week after transferring from Bitterbridge College that she stumbled upon where the rest of the freaks hid.