Ned

It started with one. Shortly after the law allowing the genetic testing went into effect. Cat had learned about her polycystic ovaries only a three months before, and his sister's death was still fresh for both of them. It had just seemed right.

"Maybe is a blessing, in its own way. We could help some of them. The children who are like us."

The first one was a boy, ruddy complexion and eyes that stayed a pure ice blue long after he reached nine months. His parents had gotten the test done in utero, and even though his father had been too disgusted at the idea of raising a mutant to keep the child his mom had held fast and borne the boy to term. They were grateful to her for that at least, for giving them Robb. Adopting him had been the highest point in both their lives to that point, and, for a moment their world had felt complete. Cat's face has shone with happiness as she held the infant, the worry that was too often there vacating her eyes. She looked content. She looked like a mother.

But a year had passed and she began to mourn the loss of a babe as a toddler emerged, rushing into the world of wobbly fat legs. So he'd proposed a second. Why not? They were more than well off, two trust fund children of robber barons who'd found each other in a moment of clarity as their "abnormalities" had begun to manifest. They had Winterfell, and the investments tucked away in mutual funds managed everywhere from New York to Tokyo. He worked. If anyone could support a second child it was them.

And that's how they'd found Sansa, another newborn fresh from her mother's arms, given up for the mutated gene that set her apart, that set themapart. Her eyes were a deeper blue than Robbs, a cornflower to his ice, but gods she was a beauty in Catelyn's arms.

The next one they hadn't planned. It had been an emergency call, from his connection at the mutant adoption agency they'd gotten the first two through. Attempted infanticide, really ugly stuff. The child had survived though, and when Cat saw those grey eyes staring up at her, so like his, well, neither of them had the heart to say no. That's how they'd gotten Arya, still bruised but defiant for her six months, challenging them with every clenching of her tiny fist.

Seeing her, and the scars already weaving their way across her tiny body, had changed something in him. This wasn't just about them now, about he and Cat making their perfect family. It was about all of these children, about their kind surviving in a world that didn't want them. The kids were all too young to even know how their mutations would manifest, and yet each one of them had been given up at birth, or worse. There were thousands more like them, and here they sat, living in his twenty-four bedroom estate, feeling generous for having taken in three.

He talked Cat into two more, both boys, over the next three years. She loved both, really and truly loved them, though perhaps not with the passion she'd felt for Robb and Sansa. But when they'd signed the papers on Rickon she'd drawn her line in the sand.

"He's the last one, Ned. I love them all, truly I do, even if Arya strains my patience from time to time. But I can't do more than this. I just don't have it in me to love more than five. Please. Let's be done now. Let's be a family now, and give these kids all the love we have to give."

So he'd agreed and for a time, it had been alright. They made the plans for the school together, converted Winterfell into a haven together, began to take on students from the surrounding counties. Gifted students. Mutant students.

And then the call had come. The contact from the adoption agency, the same one who'd talked him into Arya's adoption, with another emergency situation.

"I told you Barristan, it's not that I don't want to shelter more children, but Cat insisted after Rickon…"

"I know Ned. And I wouldn't call unless it was a special case, honestly I wouldn't."

"They're all special cases Barristan."

"Not like this one, Ned. This one, he's…"

"I shouldn't even be taking this call, Barristan no matter what he is—"

"He's Lyanna's Ned. He's hers. That's why I had to call you."

He froze, not sure what to say, not sure how to silence the thrumming of his heart, which was pulsing through his body so loudly he thought he might be deafened by the sound.

Lyanna. His sister. His mutation had been shame enough for his family, shame enough to have him partitioned off and sent to the upstate, far from Manhattan society and the prying eyes of gossip columnists. And his was a tame mutation. How offensive could the power to heal possibly be? Sure he couldn't play sports with the other boys like he used to, people would notice if a scraped knee disappeared before the game even ended, but really he could pass. For his parents though, it was a mutation nonetheless, and it had earned him a semi-permanent state of banishment.

That is, until Lyanna's incident.

"Pheromones. That's what it is, it's a pheromone mutation nothing more, nothing less," the doctor had explained to their parents. "Once she's through puberty things should right themselves."

That was one way of seeing it, seeing the mutation that had caused the newspapers to declare his sister the "Helen of Tribeca," that had caused grown men to break out in brawls as she walked past, to abandon their wives and children in order to seek the favor of the fifteen year old school girl taking the train to class. Still, the doctor may have been right, maybe it would have settled as she got older, learned to control it, but Lyanna, his carefree, defiant Lyanna, hadn't made it that far. She'd been kidnapped out of her bedroom by one of the most notorious mutants on the planet just a month shy of her sixteenth birthday. Her kidnap alone had spurred a whole bevvy of anti-mutant legislation, legislation which had led to his adoptive children's abandonment. Free testing for the gene for every mother admitted to an American hospital. Gods what a nightmare.

And yet, all the political posturing, all the zero tolerance rhetoric, hadn't been enough to save her in the end. Her body had been left on the steps of St. Patrick's Cathedral, less than a block from Rockafellar Center, the pain of birth still creasing her young face. No word of the child.

Until now.

"You're sure."

"Quite sure, we blood test them all, after all. Legally, I should… I should report it but I figured if I could get a hold of you you'd prefer to be able to keep it quiet. Within the family, if you could."

"No of course, thank you Barristan."

"The thing is Ned, its not an easy case. He's a nice enough kid, a bit roughed up from foster care, but polite and appreciative as they come."

"So, what's the problem? Has he manifested early?"

"No… no not yet. He's only seven, after all. But Ned, well, you know what the theory always was about mutants mating with other mutants. It does get stronger, get stronger with the generations. He's a class four, Ned. I can't ask you to take him without making sure you understand, especially not with—"

"Arya is out daughter and we love her, Barristan."

"I know, and you're good people for that, but when she does come of age, just please don't expect it to be as delicate as it is with Robb and Sansa. It will be different with her Ned…"

"I know. Cat's knows. We're ready, Barristan, you need not worry."

"Mmm. Yes well. He'll not be as, disruptive as she will, but Ned he's got real power, Lyanna's boy. The kind of power that makes people uneasy. I couldn't leave him in foster care to discover that on his own. I need to find a home for him, and if its not with you, we'll there's people who'll take pity on him just for your sister's sake…"

"No. No, Barristan we can't have him growing up with that over his head. Gods know."

"I don't know that I'll be able to place him otherwise. Like I said, this is a courtesy call. I just didn't want you to find out on the news."

"No. No, Barristan. That can't happen."

"Ned, I've got no choice—"

"I'll take him."

"Ned, this isn't a spare couch we're talking about here, this is a child."

"I know what we're talking about, Barristan. I said I'll take him. And I meant it. There's no way I could let my sister's son go to any home but my own anyway. The thought is inconceivable. I'll take him."

Cat would understand, he reasoned with himself. When he told her, she'd know he'd done right.

"What's his name?"

Things were always easier when you personalized them. When you put a name to them. He'd bring her around, sure thing.

"Jon. His name is Jon."