The Best of Them

I’ve seen a LOT of comments about how the Loras/Renly relationship was created just for the TV show, that it came out of nowhere, that it was barely even hinted at in the books. Many people claim there were only 4 or 5 hints in the book, so I took it upon myself to go through them (sorry, only up through A Storm of Swords) to see what hints I could find. There were 21 of them that, in my opinion, were blatantly obvious. I left out the 5 in A Game of Thrones that were more ambiguous, but even so, A Clash of Kings should have made anyone suspicious, and if you got through A Storm of Swords without seeing it, then we were reading different books.

21 Quotes Demonstrating that Renly and Loras Were Always Gay

All page numbers are for the 2011 Bantam Books paperback edition. Italics mark my own comments. Parentheses in between dialogue denote action within the book; anything without quotes is also action/narration within the book. “…” stands for my own omission. “.  .  .” is an ellipses within the book.

• rainbow-striped cloak (A Clash of Kings, p340) The rainbow may not have been a gay symbol in Renly’s time, but it sure as hell was in Martin’s.
• the king shouted his approval with the rest. “Loras!” She heard him call. “Loras! High Garden!” (ACoK, 341)
• From time to time, King Renly would feed Margarey some choice morsel off the point of his dagger, or lean over to plant the lightest of kisses on her cheek, but it was Ser Loras who shared most of his jests and confidences (ACoK 348)
• Renly: “You’ll be pleased to know she came to me a maid.” Stannis: “In your bed she’s likely to die that way.” (ACoK 478) I literally can not think of a better way to say THIS CHARACTER IS GAY in a fantasy setting than stating that he will probably never have sex with his wife
• Renly: “I wonder where I can get a sword like that. Well, doubtless Loras will make me a gift of it after the battle.” (ACoK 480)
• Renly: “Enough, my lords. If I had a dozen vans, all of you should have one, but the greatest glory by rights belongs to the greatest knight. Ser Loras shall strike the first blow.” Loras: “With a glad heart, your grace.” (The Knight of Flowers knelt before the king.) “Grant me your blessing, and a knight to ride beside me with your banner. Let the stag and rose go to battle side by side.” (ACoK 483) For extra gayness, compare Loras’s response to the others’. His is practically a marriage proposal.
• Renly: “Loras, stay and help me pray. It’s been so long I’ve quite forgotten how.” (ACoK 483)
• “It’s said the Knight of the Flowers went mad when he saw the king’s body, and slew three of Renly’s guards in his wrath…” (ACoK 530)
• “[Margarey] was wed to Renly Baratheon, as you know, but Lord Renly went to war before the marriage could be consummated.” (ACoK 906) Most couples in Westeros consummate the marriage on the wedding night. Margarey and Renly were married for eight months. And he didn’t go off to war a couple hundred miles away; she went with him.
• Sansa: “That was when Lord Renly was killed, wasn’t it? How terrible for your poor sister.” Loras: “For Margery?” (His voice was tight) “To be sure.” (A Storm of Swords p79)
• Margery: “Renly was brave and gentle, Grandmother…Father liked him as well, and so did Loras.” Olenna: “Loras is young.” (ASoS 81)
• Loras: “House Tyrell continues through my brothers. It is not necessary for a third son to wed, or breed.” Tyrion: “Not necessary, but some find it pleasant. What of love?” Loras: “When the sun has set, no candle can replace it.” (ASoS 167-168)
• “Renly’s little rose?” (ASoS 529)
• Varys had suggested the woman to him; in former days, she had run Lord Renly’s household in the city, which had given her a great deal of practice at being blind, deaf, and mute. (ASoS 794) Interesting that Renly is the one who needs especially quiet staff, and not Littlefinger, Robert, any of the Lannisters, etc. 
• Loras: “You!” (And now Loras Tyrell had seen Brienne)… “Are you a craven as well as a killer, Brienne? Is that why you ran, with his blood on your hands? Draw your sword, woman!” (ASoS 847-848)
• Jaime: “Now sheathe your bloody sword, or I’ll take it from you and shove it up some place even Renly never found.” (ASoS 848)
• Loras: “I buried him with mine own hands, in a place he showed me once when I was a squire at Storm’s End. No one shall ever find him there to disturb his rest… I will never betray Renly, by word or deed. He was the king that should have been. He was the best of them.” (ASoS 923)
• The arrogance had gone out of Ser Loras the moment he began to speak of Renly. He answered truly. (ASoS 923)
• Loras: “Renly gave me the van. Otherwise it would have been me helping him don his armor. He often entrusted that task to me. We had.  .  .  we had prayed together that night.” (ASoS 924) Ellipses are always significant.
• The Knight of the Flowers had been so mad with grief for Renly that he had cut down two of his own Sworn Brothers, but it had never occurred to Jaime to do the same with the five who had failed [his son] Joffrey. (ASoS 925)
• Littlefinger: “And it relieved him of the difficult task of trying to find lands and a bride for a third son, never easy, and doubly difficult in Ser Loras’s case.” (ASoS 936) The Knight of the Flowers is probably the most celebrated third son in Westeros; he’s young, chivalrous, handsome, skilled, and from a powerful family. Yet it is “doubly difficult” to find him a bride—the logical conclusion is that Loras is the one resisting, not the thousands of girls who swoon at the sight of him.