"Cassana! Wait for me!" She was a girl of eight, and her brother, two years younger, was calling her name, chasing her, struggling to keep up with her. She ran faster, her feet making almost no sound on the castle floor. She wanted to hide. She wanted a moment to herself, just a moment, only a brief moment of not being saddled with a baby brother with his constant needs and his questions and his crying.
"Robert! Wait for me!" Her second son had never shouted, even as Robert left him further and further behind. Even as they grew further and further apart. Renly would shout. Her baby. Her youngest. Renly would shout for all the world to hear. Of her three sons, he had made the loudest noise coming into the world. The loudest noise, but very little tears. Robert had arrived early, impatient to see the world, his cries sounding like cries of joy and wonder, his tears abundant and overflowing.
Stannis had not cried at all, not at first, not until Maester Cressen had smacked his bottom, hard. It was her most difficult labor, two days of pain and blood and screaming, two days of Steffon looking paler and paler and getting more and more apprehensive. She could not recall Stannis' tears and the sound of his crying; they were lost in the haze of her own tears and her own cries of pain and fear.
She was ten and the maester was teaching her about Aegon Targaryen, his sister-wives, their dragons, and the Conquest of Westeros. "The Targaryens wed brother and sister, the teaching of the Seven notwithstanding, because they were the blood of Old Valyria," the maester had replied to her barrage of questions. "That's why half the Targaryens are mad," her grandmother had scoffed.
Rhaegar Targaryen had no sister to wed. "Someone with the blood of Old Valyria, someone worthy of the Targaryens and our dragon blood," the king had said to Steffon. "You won't find her in Westeros, you must cross the Narrow Sea to find a bride for my son." She had not wanted to go while Renly was still a baby in his crib, but she wanted her husband to make the trip alone even less.
She was fifteen and her father was talking about husbands. "A good match, for my beautiful daughter. If only you are not so headstrong, so stubborn. Men do not want stubborn and rude wives." She did not think herself rude; she spoke her mind and asked awkward questions, true, but she did not think herself rude.
"Your father is setting his sight too high," her mother had grumbled. "House Baratheon is not just our overlord, they are also connected to the royal family."
"It will happen," her father had said with confidence. And it did happen. She suspected it would not have happened if Steffon Baratheon still had living parents. The Estermonts of Greenstone were not nearly grand enough for the lord of the stormlands and the grandson of a king. Left to his own devices, however, he had married her.
"With this kiss I pledge my love," they had said, Steffon and Cassana, at their wedding. She had said the words not believing them. Love could not be pledged, it grows if nurtured, wilts if ignored, was her belief. She had worked - oh how she had worked! - on their marriage, right from the start. Her husband was oblivious to most of it, believing in their marriage vow as if it was truly sacred. She had not begrudged him that. Most of the time, at least, she had not begrudged him that. She envied him his certainty and complacency, however, something she could not afford herself.
An heir and a spare a year apart, and everyone had breathed a sigh of relief. Her father especially. "My grandson will be Lord of Storm's End one day. My grandson, with the blood of the Estermont flowing inside him." Another child had been late in coming, she had feared at first that this baby would feel isolated and separated from his much older brothers. But Robert and Stannis and their constant battles had taught her that proximity in age was not a guarantee of closeness. Love him, she had prayed silently, as she watched them holding Renly for the first time. And love each other, she prayed even more desperately.
"I do solemnly proclaim Steffon of House Baratheon and Cassana of House Estermont to be man and wife, one flesh, one heart, one soul, now and forever," the septon had declared at the wedding. "And cursed be the one who comes between them."
Was the sea cursed now? Or the storm? Or King Aerys? For coming between her and Steffon. She could not see him, not anymore. That was her second last thought. Her final thought was of her sons and their tears.