A Black-Haired Beauty

Chapter Fourteen.

With a soft hum Ida smiled as gently rubbed her damp rag on to her baby's skin, the smile growing as Gendry laughed with the sort of pure delight that only a baby could have. She knew that all the people who lived around her looked at her and pointed and jeered and called her son a bastard but she didn't care, not even a little bit. Gendry wasn't a bastard, not to her. He was her son.

"You're my little prince, you know that?" She asked as she pressed a kiss to his forehead, in another life perhaps he would've been the prince of all seven kingdoms but that wasn't to be, Ida wasn't some highborn lady who thought her farts smelt like roses, she was a tavern wench who got felt up by men who though that because she was a woman that they simply could.

And then one day a King had come to their tarven, she had no idea why as their tarven was hardly something a noble would walk into without complaining about the smell but they didn't complain, you couldn't when it was the king. The king certainly did not complain about the ale, Ida didn't think she had ever seen a man drink so much and be able to keep standing but keep standing the man had.

Who would ever think that a king could also be the life of a party? The man hadn't only nearly drank them out of business but he had joked and flirted and she had to admit that in a way the man was quite charming and was certainly generous with all the money he was spending.

That night everyone went home with several gold dragons in their pockets, more money than they had ever seen before or would likely ever seen again, and Ida left with something extra, she had left with Gendry. She hadn't regretted sleeping with him, sure he was a married man but from what she had heard the queen was hardly the warmest woman in the world and the man clearly needed some comfort.

When she had realised that she was pregnant she was more than a little worried, would the king find out? What would the queen do if she found out? Would her child be taken from her? But her entire pregnancy she had not heard a word from the king or anyone noble or anyone who looked they had enough to eat well, she was a one time thing it seemed and she had been forgotten.

And that did not bother her at all, she did not care for riches and she certainly had no interest in being a king's mistress all she wanted was to live as peacefully with her son as she could and so far she had gotten her wish, and Gendry was her son, not the king's bastard, her son. She might call him her little prince but she had no intention of ever telling him the truth, he would just wind up getting himself killed if he ever tried to do something foolish like claim a throne that he had no right too, even Ida knew that her son had no right unless the king acknowledge him.

But she didn't want that, she just wanted peace and for her to grow, strong and happy. Which was not going to happen if she left the little mucker in the wooden tub any longer, he was already starting to resemble a prune. "All right little mite, time to get out." She mummed as took the boy out and wrapped him up in a small towel. She dressed him in a shirt and some pants that were both a few sizes to big and placed him inside a small cot that she had set up on the other side of the hovel.

She had to admit, she might not want to be the king's mistress but she had hoped for perhaps some money to keep her quite, she wouldn't have spoken either way but they did not have to know that, most of those gold dragons had been spent before she realised she would have another mouth to feed and the last of the coin had gone to buying a nice cot, it was the nicest thing in her little hovel by far.

Her stomach growled like a lion and Ida couldn't help but wonder when she had last eaten, she had gone more that a few days without anything she knew that much at least, looking after a babe was full time work and she wasn't well like by anyone and she didn't trust anyone around here to watch Gendry so she could go and get a bowl of brown, she would kill for some brown right now. The last time she had some the meat had been rabbit and it was one of the best meals she had ever had.

The thing was that even if it was for the poorest of King's Landing you still had to pay for it and even two coppers was a strain on her right now, considering she hadn't been able to go back to the tavern for months and the money she had saved was now almost completely gone, she couldn't deny that she was more than a little worried about it now.

She bit her lip and glanced at her door for a moment before she glanced back at Gendry who was gumming on his fingers, she hadn't had her milk since yesterday and the boy was clearly hungry, she needed to feed them both. There was a woman near one of the bowl of brown shops had a goat and Ida knew that if she scrounged then she could get herself a bowl of brown and a bottle of milk for Gendry.

With a heavy sigh she pressed a kiss to her babe's head and made her way to the door, she would be back before she knew it and Gendry would be fine, she would only be out for a few minutes. Everything would be fine.

Ida opened the door, stepped out, closed it and began to walk down the cobblestone path before she could change her mind, she had to do this. She knew that she had to do this but it didn't help ease the knot in her gut or the sense that something terrible was going to happen.

As she walked down the cobbles she couldn't help but feel guilty as she looked around her, she might not be drinking wine or have some lordly husband but she had a roof of her head and some clean clothes some days of the week, all around there were people sitting and looking at her with jealousy, they were so thin, like their skin was a trap that had been stretched over their bones and they were either dressed in ripped clothes or naked as the day that they entered the world.

Ida picked up the pace and began to hurry down the street, she wanted to get home as soon as possible.

The goat woman was a bad tempered and ugly old woman but after a few minutes she had left her little hovel with a bottle of goat's milk, it looked odd but the woman hadn't been beaten to death or ripped apart for being a cheat so if it kept Gendry alive for a few more days while she found some more money then that was all she cared about. Besides, you couldn't be picky in Flea Bottom.

She quickly rushed and grabbed a bowl of brown and the man who handed her the bowl took pity on her and handed her a chunk of bread that looked and smelt that it had only just turned stale. The meal was small, the vegetables were all limp and brown and she didn't even want to think about what the meat is, with luck it might be pigeon, but it filled her up and she felt better than she had done for days even through she had rushed the meal.

She began to make her way home, she still felt bad about leaving Gendry on his own but it had barely been ten minutes from what she could tell, and she couldn't trust anyone with him. She couldn't trust anyone at all but it didn't matter cause she was heading home and everything was going to be fine.

She turned on to her street and she felt her stomach beginning to tense as she noticed that the street was entirely clear, all the people had vanished. As she began to near her home her breath caught in her throat at what she saw, men dressed in crimson and black armour with swords were standing outside her hovel and the door was wide open. The bottle of milk slipped out of her hands and shattered against the cobbles as she ran over to the them.

"Back off wench, King's business." One of the men said, she could see his green eyes through the slits in his helmet. He looked like no gold cloak and he was certainly not a king'sguard.

"I live here, this is my home and I've done nothing wrong. You can't do this!" Ida shouted as she tried to look past them to see inside but they were both tall and broad and she couldn't see anything. Why wasn't Gendry crying? What were they doing here? She hadn't told anyone.

Suddenly from inside Gendry let out a cry which sounded more like a shriek and Ida glanced at the guard's cold and unfeeling green eyes and she couldn't stop the scream escaped from her mouth as she charged past the guards and as she got into the hovel her blood ran cold at the sight before her.

Gendry was whimpering with tears in his eyes as he was held in the arms of another man dressed in the same armour. as the other men but that wasn't what had made her stop. Clutched in the other man's hand was a silver dagger which was currently only inches away from her baby boy's throat. The man seemed as thrown by her as she was off him and he didn't move.

She was broken out of her trance when she felt hands encircling her wrists and holding her back, she couldn't turn her head to see but the voice that spoke out identified which of the two guards it was. "Don't just stand there with your mouth hanging open like a fucking half-wit, cut it's throat and be done with it."

"No! No please don't!" Ida shouted as she tried to break out of the man's grip but he was far stronger then her and the metal of his gauntlets bit into her skin and she told herself that it was only the pain of the cuts they were forming that was making her cry. "Please he's just a babe, I haven't told anyone I swear! I swear! By all of the seven I swear! Please don't do this!"

The guard turned his gaze from Ida to the guard who was holding her back. "I...I can't. He is just a babe and no one knows and if the King finds out-

"The King isn't going to find out! He is not! But the queen will find out if you don't do this now and I do not personally want to know what she will do if we fuck this up not to mention what her father will do not cut that babe's throat but I do it and then I fucking cut yours!" The guard shouted and the guard that was holding Gendry looked between Ida and Gendry before he sighed and began to lower the knife down.

Ida began to scream and scream, louder and louder until it began to sound like she was a wild animal instead of woman. She thrashed in the guard's grip but it still did no good and she began to feel everything below her wrists becoming wet. Another guard stepped in front of her and reeled his hand back.

As his fist collided with her eye and everything went black, Gendry stopped crying.

Cersei took a sip of her wine as she looked over the paper in front of her, it was one of several lists that Varys had given her and to say she was upset that her dead husband had enough bastards to fill out multiple lists did not quite describe the rage that she was feeling, if she hadn't grown so fond of him she might have even tried to slip poison into his wine.

Not as if that would be easy anymore considering that he barely drunk any wine anymore, two or three cups if there was a feast and one or two cups with dinner. It pleased her a great deal, he had not been drunk in an extremly long time.

A soft cooing noise made her turn her head and she smiled as she saw Jon being propped up by several soft pillows while Joffery was playing with his feet, she couldn't stop the gentle smile from spreading on her face as she saw her two boys getting along so well. She watched them quietly for a few minutes before there was a soft rap at the door.

"Enter." She spoke and the door opened and one of her guards walked into the room, she was always supposed to be guarded by members of her husband's guard but one of the conditions so her father paying back her husband's debt was that there was a small group of men that answered to her father first protecting her. She knew this one was the captain of the guard, Leon or something similar to that.

"Your grace, I simply wished to let you know that everything on the list you gave us has been completed." He said as he stepped forward and handed the list over to Cersei who took it and looked down at the list with smile. every name was run through with a thin black line.

"Thank you, that will be all." She said and the guard nodded before he left the room and shut the door behind him, she folded the list and placed it to the side. She would burn it later.

Her eyes went back to Joffery and Jon whose attention had not been taken by the guard, it was all for them. She would do anything for her sons.

Anything.

End of Chapter Fourteen

I am really sorry Gendry fans but...yeah, if you hoped for him to have a major role later on in this story then I am afraid that your hopes have just been dashed.

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