"I know who you are, Lord Eddard," Gerold Hightower said.
To which Ned replied, "And I you, Ser Gerold."
Oswell and Arthur both rested easy in the clearing. Even outnumbered three to one Ned wouldn't have felt good about his chances of winning through force of arms. Arthur Dayne was the deadliest man with a sword in all of Westeros. Jaime Lannister had said the Stranger danced in the shadow cast be the Sword of the Morning. Eddard had little use for the new Gods, but even he had to concede that Lannister wasn't likely wrong.
Eddard reached into one of the bags attached to his saddle and drew out a heavy parchment scroll which he handed across to Gerold.
The Lord Commander of the Kingsguard inspected the seal and opened it to reveal not one scroll of parchment, but five. He didn't complete the first page before he looked up. "Is this true?"
"Since I haven't read it—"
"King Aerys—"
"Dead," Eddard said, as both Oswell and Arthur made protesting sounds.
"Princess Elia… Aegon…"
Eddard nodded.
"Ser Jaime failed in his duty," Arthur said.
Eddard stared at Arthur, the man was not a friend, but he'd once entertained the notions of being his good-brother. And for all he loathed the way Lannister broke his oaths, he felt compelled to defend those he had held. "Jaime Lannister is like a mother lioness with one surviving cub."
"You swear then, Princess Rhaenys lives?" Gerold asked.
"Aye," Eddard said.
Gerold stared at him for perhaps a minute before snorting and nodding his head like an irate bull that was his namesake. "Ser Oswell, take Lord Stark to see his sister."
Eddard wordlessly unbuckled his sword belt and passed arming sword and Ice alike to Howland Reed. "Stay here," he said in a low voice. He glanced at Arthur, "and don't start anything."
"Ned!" Lyanna said as he ducked to enter the great room at the top of the tower. She looked pale, and despite the heat her bed was heavy with blankets. A maester, young-looking with broad shoulders and finely-fingered hands, but whose chain was heavy with links, bowed and murmured an injunction not to upset her as he bowed himself out. "Did Rhaegar come with you?"
"No," Ned said.
"But he did tell you?" she pressed.
"I…" words failed him, and he forced himself to clear his throat. "Lyanna. Prince Rhaegar is dead."
"What? No!" she tried to push herself up only to collapse back on the bed, at the same time as a protesting sound drew both their attention towards a heavily built, but richly carved, cradle. "Eddard," she said in a low voice, "what did you do?"
"Nothing," he protested.
"Don't tell me that," Lyanna's eyes flashed which was never a healthy sign. "We were going to come and tell you, and then I got pregnant and the maester said I shouldn't travel. Rhaegar told me about Brandon. How he marched into the great hall of the Red Keep and demanded Rhaegar 'come out and die.'"
Eddard winced. Wolf blood, his father had called it. Something Brandon and Lyanna more than enough for three generations of Starks. But even so that had been a moment of madness at least as great as any Aerys had had.
"He swore to me that he'd tell you, Ned," Lyanna hissed furiously. "That he'd tell you even if he had to find you on the battlefield. What did you do?"
"I—" and again words failed him and left Ned hanging his head. "I told his messenger that Robert was my captain, and that Rhaegar needed to treat with him."
Lyanna chuckled mirthlessly, falling limp in the bedding as chuckles turned into sobs. "And Elia?"
"Dead," Ned said helplessly.
Lyanna looked at him bleary-eyed. "Was it you, or Robert?" she didn't give him time to answer. "I suppose he killed our children too."
"Tywin Lannister," Ned said. "Or his bannerman." No need to tell her the details of what Gregor Clegane had done. No one should have to know such things. "Jaime Lannister killed them and saved Rhaenys."
"And Aerys?" she asked.
"Dead," he said, feeling like he at last had been asked a question he knew how to answer properly, "on Jaime Lannister's sword."
Lyanna made another choked-off sobbing laugh. After a moment she struggled to sit up in the bed again. He stepped forward to help but an angry hand stopped him. "I'm weak and tired, not crippled or near-death."
In a more comfortable position, she nodded. "Meet your nephew, Jeanaerys."
King's Landing had been tense the day he left.
When Eddard arrived with news of his nephew's birth the city felt like it was watching a troupe of mummers cavort with barrels of wildfire.
Some weeks later and the tension had yet to ebb. In fact, it only ever grew worse as Lords great and small, and knights landed and not, poured into the city.
"The Queen delivered a daughter, but died in the birthing," Jaime told him.
The man next to him made a sound.
"Ser Jaime—" Eddard began.
"Prince Oberyn," Jaime said. "You favor your uncle and sister both."
"Lord Stark told me you slew Elia's killers," Oberyn said.
"Yes."
"Yet you did not save her, you and your brothers."
Jaime paused. "I was the only one of us in the Red Keep, and I had duty before the Throne."
Having just crossed the courtyard, Oberyn paused to look out a window across the self-same courtyard towards the looming edifice of Maegor's Holdfast. After a moment he grudgingly nodded. "My niece?" he asked.
"This way."
But instead of opening the door of the office in the White Sword Tower that he had been using, Jaime instead locked it. He dismantled an armor rack made of heavy iron bars, and slotted the bars into brackets shaped like hooks to hold foul-weather clothes to further block the door. Only once he was convinced the door was secure did he go to a wardrobe, which he opened to reveal racks of paper, ink, quills, and other items of need.
"I doubt anyone knows all of the secrets of the Red Keep anymore," Jaime said as he rolled the supplies out of the wardrobe on hidden wheels and hinges to reveal a second door. "But the Kingsguard has long used this as a place of refuge, out of sight of the court."
Eddard blinked. Did he just imply that the Kingsguard had a chamber for their mistresses?
Jaime knocked twice, then pushed the door open.
The room thus revealed was narrow, but long and spacious. The ceiling was high. The windows looked out onto the bay, and brought with them a cooling sea breeze that smelled heavily of saltwater and fish, rather than the stink of the city.
Lyanna was sitting up in her bed, Rhaenys at her side, slumped back against a thick pillow with her mouth half-open. Her son sprawled, audibly snoring in their laps. "If you wake them," she warned in a low growl, "you can have the pleasure of getting them to sleep again."
Oberyn, who had started to reply, stopped.
"You must be Oberyn," Lyanna said. "Elia talked of you."
"Only the good things I hope?"
"That you were unable to father sons, but hasn't stopped you from trying," Lyanna said.
Oberyn grinned. "She never spoke of you."
Lyanna paused. "Prince Lewyn?"
"Never spoke of you."
Lyanna closed her eyes, rested her head back against the headboard, and murmured a word that Eddard hadn't expected her to know. "Elia said she was the only one with any brains."
Eddard choked as Oberyn cocked his head to one side. "She told Doran and I the same."
Lyanna opened her eyes and looked at Oberyn. "I loved Elia just as I loved Rhaegar. Is that going to be a problem between us?" she asked.
He looked at the children. "I had wished to see my niece."
"Your niece and nephew," Lyanna said in that same low voice, "are sleeping. Don't you dare wake them."
Oberyn's grin faded. "Do you really think you can get all seven Kingdoms to follow some little wolf girl who claims to be, what, Princess-regent, until her son comes of age?"
Jaime watched Eddard's jaw moved, and wondered if that was what he'd looked like when Eddard had looked at him cradling Rhaenys on the throne, then down at Aerys' corpse, then back
"I don't need all seven kingdoms," Lyanna said. "I need enough to back me that those who would actively oppose me don't." An arm draped around Rhaenys' shoulders. "Because the first thing a successful rebellion does is kill all the prior claimants to the throne."
There were rituals for court.
The King was the last to arrive and the first to depart.
A supplicant was supposed to approach only so close before kneeling, someone called to testify was supposed to stand in a particular spot—
The doors of the Throne Room swung open and those waiting outside, the paramount lord, lords and ladies of lesser houses, courtiers and knights, pushed forward.
There was a gasp as people recognized a figure dressed in greys and the drab black mantle of mourning, already sitting when the doors opened. Not on the looming hulk of the iron throne that tradition and custom decreed be the only chair in the hall. Instead she was seated on a heavy, magnificently carved wooden chair (in another chamber it would have been called a throne in its own right) at the foot of and two one side of the real throne.
A moment of pure rage thundered across Robert's face as he recognized Lyanna, and Eddard watched his foster-brother hide it behind an icy mask.
Tradition decreed that the Kingsguard stand watch at the foot of the dais when the King or heir was present. Ritual made it an odd number so that one could always stand directly in front of the Throne. Instead there were only two.
Two dead, one left to escort Prince Viserys and the newest princess from Dragonstone, another recovering from injuries at the Trident, and…ser Jaime.
The doors closed with a booming thud.
Ritual meant the first voice should be the call to order from the Hand (if both King and Hand were present), or the Seneschal of the Red Keep if not. Instead an icy voice hissed into the echoing void left by the doors closing, "there will be order, my Lords and Ladies."
Eddard nodded slightly. Lyanna's cool tones might as well have been the shout she wasn't strong enough to voice. He was so used to Lyanna moving, running only if she couldn't ride, never at a canter if she could gallop. But her voice came out so correct, cool and formal, that he wondered which of them her infirmity bothered more.
"I am Lyanna," she said, "daughter of the late Rickard Stark, wife of the late Rhaegar Targaryen, mother of his trueborn son Jaenaerys, and likewise Rhaenys. Grand Maester Pycelle, would you present any evidence the Citadel has to confirm these claims?"
"Er?" Pycelle asked. "Um, yes… Yes, of course. A certificate of marriage between the former Crown Prince, Rhaegar, and Lady Lyanna Stark is on file with at the Citadel. While an annulment of Prince Rhaegar's marriage to Elia of House Nymeros Martell—"
"Princess Elia," Lyanna interrupted.
"Er… Princess Elia, that is, is not. Um, an annulment, that is. However, that absence does not conflict with customs, traditions, or laws concerning such…relationships with House Targaryen. So, eh, the Crown Prince's wives are, um…collectively the mothers of his children."
"Thank you," Lyanna said. "High Septon Hewyard?"
"The Faith have record of a marriage between Crown Prince Rhaegar and Lady Lyanna Stark," the High Septon spoke slowly, his voice was as clear as the crystals in his crown, though colored with…distaste. "Performed before witnesses, and a Heart Tree as she worships the Old Gods. We have no record of an annulment of the marriage between Crown Prince Rhaegar and Princess Elia. As custom, tradition, and law allow such unions between House Targaryen, the Faith has no choice but to recognize both marriages as legally binding…and leave the matter to the Gods; Old, New, and Rhoynarish alike."
There were Targaryens, Eddard thought, who would have the Septon dead for adding that last part, but Lyanna simply nodded.
"Ser Gerold?" Lyanna asked.
"My Lady," Gerold Hightower said, stepping forward and lifting off his helm. "My sworn brothers and I have guarded you at our Prince's behest. We recognize your son as his heir. His firstborn son being deceased. We recognize Jaenaerys as our present and lawful King."
Which, Eddard thought, wasn't what she'd asked at all. But as the High Septon had mostly repeated the Grand Maester, it made Ser Gerold's proclamation all the more compelling an agreement.
Lyanna nodded as Gerold took up his post once more. "My Lord and Ladies, shall I continue to call witnesses to attest that my son and I are who I claim we are, or shall we move on to more pressing business?"
"My Lady, that is, your Grace? Um… Lyanna…"
Eddard closed his eyes as Mace Tyrell began to drone. How had the man managed to keep Stannis penned up, even with an army?
It took about a minute before Lyanna interrupted him, and when she did it was with a 'My Lord' rather than an arrow to the knee or asking Eddard to thump him.
That, Eddard thought. That right there was how unwell she was feeling.
"Er…yes?" Mace asked.
"My Lord…do be quiet," Lyanna said. "Anyone else? No? Then moving along," she said without giving anyone else a chance to object. "I will be serving as Regent until my son's majority," she said. "With advice and tutors from the seven Kingdoms. A small council to assist in governance thereof. And the appointment of various persons to oversee various things that need doing.
"Before we get to that, I summon Ser Jaime Lannister."
There was a quiet commotion as people realized Jaime wasn't one of the three armed and armored knights standing in front of the dais on which the throne loomed. The crowd parted and Jaime, wearing the arms and regalia of a King's Guard stepped forward.
"Ser Jaime, you stand accused of treason, of Kingslaying, of slaying the King's Hand, of failing your duty and breaking your oaths that led to the deaths of Princess Elia, and Crown Prince Aegon. There were no witnesses to the Kingslaying, but only to your presence in this very room with a bloody sword by two—a knight and a lord—who were part of the sack of the Red Keep. As such I turned the matter over to the Kingsguard to judge.
"Ser Gerold, your verdict if you please?"
Gerold Hightower once again took off his helm. "My Lady. A member of the Kingsguard swears many oaths. Oaths to protect the King, obey him, to keep his secrets, to offer counsel when asked and silence when not, and defend his name and honor. We have questioned witnesses to the last weeks before the Sack. We have questioned those present during the Sack, as to our sworn brother's actions. And we have questioned Ser Jaime as to his actions, his conduct, and the confidences the late King Aerys shared with him.
"As such we have found that Ser Jaime was caught between Oaths and loyalties that no man would envy, and discharged his duty in a way that no man could better. But in doing so Oaths were broken, as was his faith with the Brotherhood." Ser Gerold paused.
From the slight change of his posture, Eddard thought Ser Arthur didn't agree with what was being said. But also didn't disagree with it enough to make a point of it.
"Having not reached a guilty verdict for a crime with which he must answer for his life, but likewise not being able to countenance his presence among the Brotherhood, we ask leave, by unanimous vote including Ser Jaime's own, that he be released from his Oaths as a brother of the Kingsguard."
"Very well," Lyanna said. "Ser Gerold, I command that this night be Ser Jaime's last as a member of the Kingsguard. That he might have every opportunity to say his farewells to those who were his brothers, and on the morn leave for forever the White Sword Tower. I command that you detail in full his deeds in the White Book, that he be held up as an example and to all future Brothers of your order. And as your appointments are for life, I order that you induct no new member in his place until such time as his mortal demise. These orders to stand until and unless confirmed by the next King."
"Yes, My Lady," Ser Gerold said.
"Ser Jaime Lannister," Lyanna continued. "The status of your broken oaths is a matter for you and your Gods. Likewise, I find no cause for which I can strip you of your knighthood."
"Yes, My Lady," Jaime said thickly.
"However," she said as though he hadn't spoken. "I cannot deny that Princess Rhaenys has been attached to you since you saved her life, and avenged the murder of her mother and brother, during the Sack. I would have you as her sworn shield, and as member of the regency council. That said, I realize that these sudden changes affect all of House Lannister as much as they do you. I grant you three days to discuss matters with your Lord. Come to me after to settle matters."
Lyanna turned her head slightly in dismissal, but her voice continued in that same even tone as she turned to the next point she meant to address. It wasn't fast, or boundless in energy, but there was a relentlessness to it.
She'd learned this court, Eddard realized. The way these southroners talked instead of acting. But she wasn't going around in circles the way Jon Arryn's lessons had. It wasn't the half-steps, the measured phrases that mingled yes and no and forced the listener to decide which was meant. It was the kind of bold, cut right through the middle of everything action that he would have expected of Bran…if his older brother could have ever used words when a sword would have done just as well.
My father had only ever allowed himself to care about two things. My mother was the second. The first is the family legacy.
Eddard nodded slowly. The Oaths the Whitecloaks swore were just as binding as those of the Black. I will hold no lands. I will father no children. In a move Lyanna had just given Tywin Lannister back his favored heir, attested that Jaime should retain his knighthood, made a show that even if his was no longer a formal member of the Kingsguard she considered him so, one worthy of emulation even, and she had offered him actual power as well. Tywin Lannister hadn't exactly been diminished, but he himself reaped no benefits—or penalties—for his part in the rebellion or how his bannermen had slain Elia or Aegon.
She'd had the North already. With Catelyn it'd bring in the Riverlands. Jon had risen in rebellion to protect those fostering with him. Even if he didn't actively support Lyanna, it wasn't likely he'd actively oppose her either. With claiming Rhaenys as her daughter, and professing her love for Elia, she had Dorne as well. And now whichever way they chose, the Westerlands would support her. 'Next King' she had said, not King 'Jaenaerys.' And there was precious little chance that any other King would so let Jaime Lannister, proven King-slayer or no, so close to the Red Keep.
That left the Reach and the Stormlands.
The Reach had been loyal to the Targaryens. But would they be loyal to a Northerner who claimed to have married into the house in secret, proclaiming a regency for a heir none of them new existed?
And Robert… Eddard didn't have to even look at his best friend to know Robert Baratheon was fully in the grip of the Words of his House. He hadn't lashed out…yet. But…a storm was coming.
The words brought a smile but very little humor to Eddard's face. It wasn't the lost throne. Gods new and old alike knew that Robert had very little interest in ruling. What ate at him more, Eddard wondered. That Lyanna had denied him the chance to slay the last three, the last four Targaryens? Or was it, in pressing her claim to be wedded to Rhaegar, she had taken everything Robert claimed about his feelings for her and thrown them back in his face?
A/N: okay, this is out of my system. Now I've got an idea for a prequel. Joy.
