Eddard Stark - Lady Rhaenys Baratheon

When Ned Stark was fifteen years old, he fell in love with his best friend's betrothed.

It wasn't love at first sight, as in the songs his sister Lyanna secretly loved. When Ned first met Rhaenys Targaryen, he didn't even care that she was as beautiful as she was whispered to be. Instead, he was glad that she seemed kind and clever, that she behaved warmly towards her betrothed. He didn't want Robert to be stuck in an unhappy marriage.

Rhaenys' efforts to get on well with Robert went beyond simpered courtesies and pretty smiles. They extended even to him, the second son of the Lord of a faraway land most Southerners considered to be boring and uncivilized.

"Lord Eddard," she called out to him once in the gardens of the Red Keep. "Please walk with me."

Surprised – but not unhappily so – he took her arm and they started walking in the shades of the trees.

"You are my betrothed's closest friend so I hope we can be friends as well," said Rhaenys.

"Hmm... as you wish, Your Highness," replied Ned, cursing his lack of social grace.

"Would you tell me about the North, Lord Eddard? I have a great fascination for this land. I read that, beyond the Wall, old frightful things still live, all but forgotten by men."

Ned couldn't help but chuckle softly.

"The Others and the Children of the Forest only live in old wives' tales, my lady."

"They say the Northmen have long memories. I would hear these old wives' tales, if it pleases you."

"Of course, Your Highness. I didn't mean to give offense."

"It is quite alright, Lord Eddard. I know this request must surprise you but I trust you not to judge me for it."

"I would never dare judge you," said Ned. They shared a smile. Rhaenys' was almost impish.

Ned never thought he would be regaling a Princess of the Iron Throne with some of Old Nan's scariest stories, but Rhaenys was listening to him with rapt attention, eyes shining.

"Do you believe in these stories, Your Highness?" he dared to ask when he was finished.

"Most stories have a grain of truth in them."

"You have a peculiar mind, my lady."

"I've always been a peculiar princess. When I was young, I was such a bookworm than my Septa quite despaired of me."

For the first time, Ned allowed himself to really look at Rhaenys. She was wearing a silk dress in a shade of blue that went well with her eyes. Her hair had been brush till they shone like spun silver and arranged in an elaborate Southron hairstyle. She looked every inch, every hair a Princess of the Iron Throne.

"I know what I look like," said Rhaenys, as if she had read Ned's thoughts. "But you will learn quickly that things here aren't often what they seem."

She was right. Ned had come to King's Landing with few expectations, yet even the things he held to be self-evident were apparently wrong. The King did not rule the Kingdom. Tywin Lannister did. The Queen's duties were mostly fulfilled by her daughter.

The Red Keep was Rhaenys' small kingdom, the court her playground. She knew every gossip and had a hand in the organisation of every feast. The noblewomen knew it, and fought to spend an afternoon sewing with her in the Maidenvault.

Yet the atmosphere around Rhaenys was refreshingly honest. She had chosen her closest companions well. Both Elia Martell and Ashara Dayne seemed to genuinely care for her. Ned had gotten to know them rather well, as he was often left with them when Rhaenys and Robert wandered a few feet away.

Elia Martell had a kind heart and a sharp wit, though her tongue could be even sharper about the court' most sycophantic nobles. Ashara Dayne was the most attractive woman Ned had ever met. Her charm did not only reside in her fair face and her curvaceous body. She was a delightful tease that could draw even Ned out of his shell.

Had he met her in any other circumstance, one glance from the lady Ashara would have left Ned a quivering mess. Yet every time he looked into her violet eyes, he saw Rhaenys' looking back at him.

He often spoke with the Princess. About Ned's adventures with Robert in the Eyrie, about her life in King's Landing, about their family. Rhaenys' sole brother was still a babe of three and she enjoyed Ned's stories about his siblings, especially Lyanna.

"I quite admire your sister. She is so fierce. Had we been closer in age, I would have written to your Lord father's to invite her to King's Landing to be my lady-in-waiting."

"I don't think King's Landing would have suited Lyanna,"

"Like a she-wolf among perfumed peacocks, you mean?"

Ned couldn't help but laugh at the image. Rhaenys smiled sharply at him – a genuine smile, not the polite one she wore for the court.

"I would have tamed her eventually."

Ned thought for a while before replying.

"If someone could, that would be you, my lady."

"I was a little like your sister once. I rebelled in whatever small ways struck my fancy. Eventually, I learned that we all have to accept our fates. The only way we can have some control over our life is by using the weapons that have been given to us. They say courtesies are a lady's armor. Your sister will learn it soon enough."

"My sister is not you, Your Highness. I... I fear that she will make quite a poor lady. Her beauty and her strength lay elsewhere."

"Ned, your sister may be a child but one day, she will marry the son of a Great House. She may never become a refined Southron lady but eventually, she will play the game. They all do."

Rhaenys sounded almost disgusted. For all that she was deft at manipulating nobles, she clearly didn't enjoy it. "Give me a good book any day, or a quiet conversation with cherished friends, and I will be perfectly happy," she had told Ned once.

He didn't matter what they talked about in the end. Even the silences between them were comfortable. Ashara Dayne put him at ease but it was with Rhaenys he felt true kinship.

And thus Ned found himself standing behind his best friend in the Great Sept of Baelor, his face hot with shame. His pathetic crush on Robert's betrothed had to end there and then.

Rhaenys and Robert's faces were turned toward the High Septon so Ned could only see their backs. Yet, he could tell even then that they were the perfect couple. Ned's friend was a tall, broad-shouldered man with a body that made women swoon. Rhaenys, standing next to him in her maiden's cloak of scarlet and black, was almost as tall as her soon-to-be husband but lithe and womanly. She was as fair as he was dark, as beautiful as he was handsome.

The wedding all went in a blur. One moment, Robert was wrapping Rhaenys in a cloak of gold and black embroidered with prancing stags. Another, Rhaenys said her vows, looking shy, demure and everything a blushing bride was supposed to be – so unlike her – before Robert replied, crowing his own vows at the top of his lungs – so like him.

Then, they kissed and, suddenly, it was over.

The newly-married couple turned towards Ned. Rhaenys looked every bit as regal in Baratheon yellow and black as she did in Targaryen scarlet. There was fire in her eyes and she looked happy. Ned wished he was.

The feast was especially joyous. Rhaenys spoke lively with every guest. Robert made japes and laughed loudly, though he had merely wetted his lips at every toast. Before the wedding, Ned had lectured his friend sternly about the bedding: "The Princess Rhaenys is a maid. She doesn't need a man half in his cups for her wedding night. You will have to be very gentle with her." Robert had agreed readily and Ned's esteem of his friend had grown. Perhaps he would change his ways and become the husband Rhaenys deserved.

When they finally called for the bedding, Ned helped the Kingsguard shorten it. He caught Ser Arthur Dayne's grateful look and smiled at the man. It seems there were still some true knights after all.

After the wedding, they rode for Storm's End. It was a small party, as Rhaenys had to leave behind nearly everyone she knew, including her ladies-in-waiting. She was no longer a Princess of the Iron Throne but a Lady of House Baratheon and she would have to make new acquaintances in the Stormlands.

If Rhaenys felt any pain at the separation, she did not show it. She made short work of getting everyone in her new household to like her. Lord Steffon and Lady Cassana Baratheon were especially fond of their new gooddaughter.

"You can see that our Rhaenys will be a good mother," said Lady Baratheon once with stars in her eyes. She was looking at Rhaenys who was cradling her youngest son Renly, a babe of one.

From the Lord and Lady of the castle to the lowest scullery maids and stable boys, Rhaenys' name was on the lips of everyone in Storm's End. Ned tried hard not to listen to the maids giggling that the handsome young Lord and his lady wife had done it in every room of the castle, including the Lord's solar. He wouldn't put past Robert to have done just that. Of Rhaenys, he was not sure.

Perhaps she did it to keep her husband from bedding other women. Perhaps she enjoyed it, and who was he to judge her for finding pleasure in her own marriage bed?

The only thing that enraged Ned was that Robert was still wenching. Had his friend no honor? Rhaenys, ever the perfect lady, pretended not to see it but Ned could see the pain in her eyes when she thought no one was looking.

One day, he could bear it no longer and apologized for his friend's behavior, his throat tight with shame.

"Oh Ned," replied Rhaenys. "I truly do not mind."

"Then, what is the cause of your pain, my lady, and is there anything I can do to alleviate it?"

Rhaenys was silent for a long time before she whispered:

"Queen you shall be. The Realm will love and bleed for you."

"I beg your pardon, Lady Rhaenys?"

"When I was thirteen, I visited this witch, Maggy. She told me that I would be Queen."

"A wrong guess, obviously, since your brother was born three years after."

"I will be Queen, insisted Rhaenys, but Robert won't be my King. He can't be."

"Do not let this vile witch's words trouble you, my lady. She told you nothing but lies."

Yet Ned could see that Rhaenys' heart was not at peace. Even the birth of her daughter did not bring her true joy.

Rhaenys' every fear proved true when they brought back her husband from his hunt in a litter. Robert was a very good hunter but he had drunk too much and had been half in his cups when the boar had gored him. His passing was quick, a small mercy for his wife of scant more than a year.

The death of Robert shook Storm's End to the core. No one could have predicted that the heir to Storm's End, a good, strong lad of seventeen, would die so young.

His foster brother's death was like an open, bleeding wound in Ned's heart. Yet no one mourned him more than Rhaenys. She wept bitterly during the whole burial, looking both sad and furious at the same time.

Lord and Lady Baratheon both offered her to stay and raise Visenya at Storm's End. Rhaenys had politely declined, saying that it would be easier for her to deal with her grief amongst her old friends and family.

Ned also asked Lord Baratheon if he could take his leave. With Robert and Rhaenys gone, there was nothing for him in Storm's End. He longed for the North, for the halls of his childhood and the company of Brandon, Benjen and Lyanna.

Ned and Rhaenys departed Storm's End on the same day. He would escort his friend's widow as long as he could, for, when their roads parted, he would probably not see her again for many years. He had no reason to come back to King's Landing and the Starks seldom went to tourneys.

He still loved her. He had loved her in Targaryen scarlet and in Baratheon yellow and he loved her still in mourning black. But it could never be. Not because she was a Princess by blood – too highborn for a second son – but because she was still Robert's wife. The ghost of his friend would forever stand between them. If Ned ever endeavored to forget it, even for an instant, the girl babe in Rhaenys' arm – so like Robert – would have reminded him well enough.

Still, he would miss her.