The Red Keep
129 AC
A chilly breeze blew into the window of the king's bedchambers and Viserys buried himself deeper into his blankets. The air from Blackwater Bay was always cool at night, but tonight as well as earlier that day, the breeze was unseasonably cold. The wind had changed direction that night and instead of blowing eastward, the current was flowing south and into the once cozy confines of the king's massive room. Not even the huge hearth within the chamber could stave off the chill that Viserys felt as he tried to keep his ailing body warm against the elements. As frail as he was, Viserys was still able to reach over with a shivering and mangled hand towards the cord to summon his faithful manservant Wesley to enter his chamber to close the window for him.
Within a few moments, Wesley entered his liege's bedchamber and he was by Viserys' side. The man must have been getting ready for bed or was sleeping when he dutifully answered his king's summons since he was dressed in his nightclothes. Viserys felt bad and he silently promised to himself to leave Wesley alone for the rest of the night until tomorrow.
"What would you like for me to do for you your grace?" Wesley asked, his tone full of concern with no hint of annoyance at all.
Viserys smiled softly and he gestured towards the offending window with his intact left hand.
"Can you please close the window for me Wesley? I am so sorry to have woken you." Wesley went off to do as told as the king continued speaking. "I would have done so myself but I have no strength left in my legs tonight."
"It is no problem my liege." Wesley spoke as he closed and latched the window shut, "your health has not been the best lately. Do not hesitate to call on me anytime if you need help with anything."
"I know I can always count on you Wesley…" Viserys said. Wesley had been in his service since he ascended the Iron Throne twenty-three years ago. Then, Wesley had recently become the manservant to Viserys's grandfather Jaehaerys, but his duty lasted only a day since the Old King died that same night. Instead, Wesley became the late king's grandson's manservant and he had served him faithfully and loyally since then. For his faithful service, Viserys helped to advance his manservant's family.
The king made Wesley's son Edmund into Prince Aegon the Elder's page when he was seven and his squire five years later. Edmund was still proudly serving Aegon and he eagerly waited for the day when he would become a full-fledged knight. To further Wesley's family into the upper echelons of society, Viserys helped to arrange for the marriages of his manservant's two daughters into rich but minor noble houses. Wesley had recently become a grandfather for the first time a month ago when his eldest daughter gave birth to a son and his youngest had recently announced that she was now with child for the first time herself. It was a long way from being the son of the Head Gaoler of the Red Keep and Wesley couldn't have been any happier or content with how his life had turned out.
After closing the window, Wesley turned to his king.
"Is there anything else you need of me your grace?" He asked politely.
The king shook his head. "No thank you Wesley, that will be all. Have a good night." Wesley bowed and he began to walk towards the door to leave when the king spoke again.
"Wait, there is something…"
Wesley turned around and he looked towards his king. Viserys' face was illuminated by the golden glow of the hearth's fire. Only twenty-six when he took the throne, Viserys was called the "Young King" by the people of the Seven Kingdoms, but now, he looked entirely different. The deaths of his first wife and their newborn son, coupled with the drama of his second wife over his daughter inheriting the Iron Throne before their firstborn son, and the scandals of his family had weighed on Viserys' face, weathering his flesh with wrinkles and wearying dark purple eyes that once sparkled with optimism and joy. Besides his face, Viserys' right hand still bore the two small reminders of the serious injury he had received on the Iron Throne when he sentenced Lord Corlys Velaryon's nephews and their wives and sons to be muted forever with red-hot pincers. He had gotten both his right ring and pinky fingers amputated and the king had suffered ever since from their painful removal three years earlier.
Wesley felt bad for his king. He didn't want his liege's peaceful reign to end with him as a broken and miserable man.
"Yes my lord?" Wesley asked, curious as to what his king had on his mind.
The king was silent for what felt like a full minute. Viserys looked from the floor, to the hearth and then to the canopy of his bed before his gaze focused back onto his manservant.
"Wesley, I have a question and I want you to answer me truthfully."
The manservant stiffened immediately and was taken aback. The king was so serious and he couldn't help but oblige.
"Of course my lord, what is it?"
"Do you think that Alicent will honor my wishes to have Rhaenyra crowned after I die? Will my sons? Will Ser Otto? Tell me Wesley, be honest with me…"
Wesley looked into his king's eyes and he sighed. He knew the answer and that the king was not going to like it.
"No your majesty, I believe your queen will not. Neither will your sons nor will your Hand. Why do you ask?"
"Because," Viserys said with a tone hinting towards defeat, "I have been thinking this over ever since my youngest daughter left with her children after visiting me tonight. Alicent usually joins me when our grandchildren come to visit and tonight she was absent. She is still angry with me after learning that Rhaenyra was planning on naming Jacaerys the Prince of Dragonstone."
Wesley nodded his head understandably. The most recent argument between the king and queen was very heated and Wesley, along with anyone else who was in the throne room that day, over a week ago, could do nothing but watch and listen. Since Viserys did not want to sit on the Iron Throne anymore after the incident with the Velaryon's, and during days when he was too ill to conduct his kingly duties from his bedchamber, he had his wife handle his affairs instead from the lofty and imposing seat. When he felt well enough to check on Alicent to see how she was doing, Wesley escorted his king when they came upon the queen discussing about Rhaenyra and her children with their second son Aemond.
"Mother isn't there anything you can do about this? Why does father let that fat whore have whatever she wants? The Seven Kingdoms can't have a lovechild as its potential king along with his bitch of a mother preceding him as queen…"Aemond had spoken with a tone of bitterness in his voice. In the beams of sunlight that poured through the high windows of the throne room, the prince's silver-gold hair shined like freshly laid snow and the beautiful, and very costly, star sapphire that was firmly lodged into his empty right eye socket glimmered with blue flashes when the light hit it. Wesley could remember the deep and very audible sigh that was uttered by the queen.
"I understand how you feel my son, it angers me too. Your father has always lacked common sense, especially when it comes to your spoiled brat of a half-sister and her brown haired spawn. Even if she named the "Younger One" as Prince of Dragonstone, I still wouldn't accept it. I don't think anyone here could afford to have a man with Daemon's blood flowing through his veins becoming king of the Seven Kingdoms. That can only spell great misfortune for all of Westeros for sure…"
The queen had been obviously referring to Rhaenyra's fourth born son Aegon. Alicent never called her step-grandson by his name, only referring to him by the aforementioned "Younger One" or as "Daemon's Prized Brat." Wisely on her part, Alicent was careful to bring up these names in front of her husband. But she didn't know that Viserys was present in the throne room and that he heard every word of it and once again, he came to the defense of his daughter and grandsons. His voice greatly startled Alicent and Aemond and they both turned as pale as the latter's hair when they became aware of the king's presence.
Queen Alicent stumbled over her words as the king tore into her for her callous remarks about his daughter and her children. Aemond tried to defend his mother, but he ended up getting chastised by his father as well. The argument grew with intensity when the courtiers who were members of the Green party defended their queen's anger. They protested that Jacaerys was obviously unsuited for the throne (taking precautions to not say 'bastard') and that the Targaryen Dynasty was going to be further tainted by the children he was to have with his fiancée and stepsister, Lady Baela Targaryen, regardless of the fact that she possessed pure Valyrian blood courtesy of her parents. If the reign of the Dragon Kings was to continue, it should be through Alicent's eldest son and in the future, his "pure born" son Jaehaerys.
The Blacks immediately spoke up to defend the honor of the princess and her eldest son. They pointed out that Aegon the Elder was not particularly well liked in the Seven Kingdoms for his drinking, overeating, and extramarital affairs. Speaking of which, the Blacks also brought up that shaming Rhaenyra as an adulteress was hypocritical since Aegon himself frequently cheated on his sister-wife with prostitutes and mistresses and had sired several bastards with them. They countered that Rhaenyra didn't chase around other men and she corrected her "folly" by later marrying her own uncle and giving birth to two sons born from pure Targaryen seed. The king and queen could only watch in stunned silence as the Blacks and Greens took up their argument with a fever pitch.
When swords were drawn, a frail Viserys immediately shouted for the hostilities to stop and it took the efforts of the castle guard and even the Kingsguard, and Ser Cole, to quell the fight before blood could be spilled. Ever since then, the queen and king hadn't spoken to each other. The distance between them was further compacted since Alicent had her own chambers in Maegor's Holdfast. Alicent had moved into her new room nine years earlier out of anger when her husband didn't punish Lucerys for cutting out Aemond's eye and instead forced her to "apologize" to her stepdaughter for fighting with her over the incident and the two hadn't shared their marital bed since then. Viserys was staring into the flames of his hearth before he spoke again, this time, his voice was as hard as stone.
"Wesley, summon Ser Steffon Darklyn and Lord Lyman Beesbury into my chambers. I need to speak with them."
Wesley blinked when he heard the command.
"Now my lord?" he asked incredulously.
"Yes now, get them immediately. When they are assembled, I want you to stay until I tell you to go, do you understand me Wesley?"
The king turned to look at Wesley and the manservant felt a chill slither up his spine like an adder creeping up towards an unsuspecting mouse. Viserys' purple eyes were now burning with fierce determination. Without needing to be told again, Wesley did as commanded. Despite being two and fifty, the same age as the king himself, Wesley's legs carried him all the way to the Whitesword Tower to rouse the Black affiliated Kingsguard knight. Thankfully Ser Steffon hadn't fallen asleep yet and he immediately answered the king's mysterious late night summons without question. Next, Wesley took off for Lord Lyman's chambers near the Tower of the Hand.
The eighty year old Master of Coin was sound asleep in his bed when the anxious manservant roused him from his slumber. Cursing at first for being awakened, Lyman immediately became silent upon hearing of the king's urgent request to see him. Despite being old, Lyman immediately got up and took his walking stick with him and he hobbled after Wesley to the king's bedchamber. When all of the men had been assembled, Wesley closed the door behind him and he stood by his king's bedside. Ser Steffon was the first to speak.
"Now that Lord Beesbury and Wesley are here your majesty, can you please tell us what you have in mind? What is so serious that you had to send Wesley to fetch us from our beds in the middle of the night?"
"My thoughts exactly Ser Darklyn." Lyman said. "What is going on here your grace?"
Viserys moved his gaze from the fire to the eyes of the three men who were with him now. He leaned forward like he wanted to whisper a secret to them. Lyman, Steffon and Wesley inched forward to listen better.
"Before I begin, I want to know that you three will keep what I am going to say to you in the strictest of confidence. Do you all understand me?"
The men nodded as they anxiously anticipated their liege's words.
"I have been thinking this over and tonight, thanks to Wesley, I can finally accept the truth that I have been willingly blind to all along."
Steffon and Lyman both raised their eyebrows curiously when they heard this.
"We all know that ever since the birth of my son Aegon, my wife and daughter have been at each other's throats. I have mediated between them each and every time they became wroth with each other. But I am not like my grandfather. He was able to make Houses Bracken and Blackwood end their family feud and make peace with each other for the first time in their history, but in the present day, I can barely make my own family put aside their differences and get along. The Iron Throne has permanently divided them and when I die, there won't be anyone here to keep the swords of the Blacks and the Greens sheathed this time.
Alicent will make sure that Aegon gets the throne and she will do everything she can to bar my daughter and her sons from their rightful inheritance. Otto wasn't satisfied when I married his daughter and made her my queen. He wants to have his grandson take the throne as king so that the power of House Hightower can become almighty throughout the Seven Kingdoms…"
All three of the men looked raptly upon their dying king. They absorbed his words and they became solemn as Viserys laid bare the troubles of his heart to them. It was a humbling experience…
"I ask you three to help me now." The king continued, "I love the children I had with Alicent with all my heart, but I love Rhaenrya just as much. She is the only child that survived being born during my marriage to my sweet and delicate Aemma… Even though she is a woman, Rhaenyra is my oldest child and she is more politically inclined than Aegon who is, forgive me, lazy and sullen. She will be a great queen and regardless of the legitimacy of Jace, Luke and Joff, they are my grandsons and Jacaerys will make a great king someday.
He has the blood of the dragon in him and from what Rhaenyra has told me, he has the skill of diplomacy, just like his great-great-grandfather…"
Lord Lyman wiped away some tears that had formed in his eyes and even the eyes of Ser Steffon and Wesley glistened.
"I know my end is near." The king continued, "I know I can trust you three. You all support Rhaenyra and I want you all to make sure that she gets the Iron Throne. I do not want any of the schemes of my wife and her father to come to fruition. Will you please help me?"
All three men nodded their heads and they began to plan the steps of their conspiracy. Four days later, Wesley checked on the king and he found him in his bed taking a nap. Seeing how still the king was, Wesley checked his pulse and he discovered that the king had died in his sleep. Almost immediately, Wesley put the plan that was devised by the king and his fellow conspirators into action. Wesley hailed a passing servant and commanded him to summon Ser Steffon and Lord Lyman at once saying that the king needed to see them about a certain matter that was privy only to them.
After they were summoned and told of the king's passing, Ser Steffon and Lord Lyman quickly went over their duties and then parted to fulfill their tasks. Steffon guarded the door to Viserys' bedchamber while Wesley immediately went to Aegon's Sept* in King's Landing to bring in Silent Sisters who he had arranged a few days earlier to be disguised as ordinary septas to come into the king's chamber for a session of "faith healing." In truth, they were to wrap up the body in a shroud and quietly sneak it out through a secret passage in the chamber. Lyman wrote a letter to Rhaenyra announcing her father's passing and how she must send her husband, former mother-in-law and oldest sons to King's Landing to secure her throne since she couldn't go herself due to being eight months pregnant with her sixth child. After he was done, Lyman quickly tied the message to a raven and after checking to make sure the letter was securely fastened, he released the bird towards the direction of Dragonstone.
Lyman fervently prayed that the message would reach the princess soon before Alicent and her family caught on to the conspiracy. The Master of Coin was more than happy to help keep the queen's brood off of the Iron Throne. Years earlier in 113 AC, when Viserys was looking for a potential husband for Rhaenyra, the king had considered Lyman's grandnephew, Ser Oscar Beesbury, as a possible son-in-law. However, Queen Alicent discouraged her husband's choice. Since both House Beesbury and Hightower were from the Reach and were two of the ruling House Tyrell's most powerful bannermen, the two were rivals.
Alicent didn't want another Beesbury in her court and she told her husband that Oscar was a known lecher and that he was cruel to women. This was a lie and it dealt immense damage to Oscar's reputation. Lyman could remember receiving a letter from his nephew Liam, the Lord of Honeyholt, and how it described the heartbreaking news on how his son had attempted to commit suicide due to Queen Alicent's lies. Lord Lyman never forgave the queen for what she had done. But there was another reason why he wanted to ensure Rhaenyra's ascension.
The old man remembered swearing an oath of fealty to the then eight year old princess in 105 AC during that memorable feast when Viserys named his daughter his heir to the Iron Throne. Lyman was a man of his word, and he was going to keep it no matter what. Ser Steffon Darklyn wanted to help Rhaenyra as well for the same reasons. He swore an oath to her that day too all those years ago. He also disliked the glaring flaws that were present in the queen's sons: Aegon's laziness and skirt chasing, Aemond's wild behavior and short temper, and Daeron, although kind and gentle, was a pushover and he could be easily manipulated by his family and courtiers to do their bidding.
Wesley meanwhile simply wanted to help fulfill his late king's final wish. His position regarding the succession of the crown was neutral but Wesley's loyalties were only to his king. Whatever he wished for, Wesley was determined to make sure that it happened. After he learned about the flight of the raven, Wesley, Steffon and Lyman continued with the rest of their plan and they began the long wait for Princess Rhaenyra to receive the letter. They wouldn't have long to wait...
*= The Great Sept of Baelor replaced the original, nameless sept in the canon story line.
And so the conspiracy begins. Fates will be altered and destinies rewritten... There will be many more OC's to come, both human and dragons, and I also intend to add music to accompany certain parts in my chapters as well in the future. Stay tuned for extra content as the story progresses! Thank you for reading and please review! :)
