The secret of the Tower
Year 293 A.C, the Old palace:
One day, Arianne found herself summoned to the solar of her father. Somehow, she felt that it had to be important, that it must be a secret that she needed to know.
"You asked me to come here, Padre?"
Lord Vorian Dayne was there as well. Bidding his daughter and heiress to sit down on the other chair in front of his writing desk, Doran nodded to the current Lord of Starfall who placed a lot of parchments on the desk from a small box for Arianne to see.
"Princess, you have been told about the true manner of death for Lyanna Stark, right? As witnessed by the midwife Wylla, who was present during that event."
She nodded. Even without mentioning the detail that Ashara had commited suicide there in order to make it become a murder-suicide with Arthur as a personal punishment for her brother because he had chosen to follow Rhaegar into his folly over protecting Elia and her children, it was not exactly a secret for Dorne and the rest of Westeros that Lyanna Stark had died in the Tower of Joy. Officially her death was from a fatal fever after starving herself because she had felt a massive despair over the deaths of her father Rickard and oldest brother Brandon, but thanks to Wylla the truth was known.
"Yes, she died after a post-term birth, and her stillborn child with Rhaegar had dragon-like birth defects that sometimes show up in House Targaryen."
Pointing at the map, Vorian then told Arianne more details on what had happened that day:
How he and loyal soldiers had surrounded the Tower to ensure that Eddard Stark and Howland Reed could not leave. The demand to Lord Stark that if he wanted to bring Brandon's bastard son Jon Snow with him back home and be able to bury Lyanna in Winterfell before his son Robb had spent his whole first year of life without ever meeting his sire, then Ned and Howland would have to build cairns for the eight deceased warriors who had been slain in the combrat outside the Tower, using the stones from the tower because there was no way Vorian would let it remain as a memory for royalists still royal to the fallen Dragon Prince, as the price for being allowed to leaving Dorne unharmed. Also, Lord Stark would give his stillborn half-Targaryen niece a proper burial in the ruins of the bottom floor of the Tower, because no matter what personal feelings that Ned would likely feel about the poor child, Vorian refused to see the baby dumped into a hasty digged hole in the ground and then covered over in the desert sand as if she had never existed.
"Arthur still lies in a grave there, and I have made it clear that his name shall never again be used by House Dayne, as punishment for his choice. Ashara was buried at Starfall with all honors because she ensured that he could not escape the consequences of his actions. Yes, he followed the orders of his Prince, but he was still a Dornishman who betrayed the Martells by not stopping Rhaegar from making Lyanna Stark his mistress, betraying his marriage vows to Elia, and insisting on "only following orders" will not last long as a excuse."
Only following orders. Arianne recalled the letter from Holly where she had told the Martells what had happened the night when prince Aemon Baratheon was born. Of how Barristan Selmy had been killed by a wraith that looked very alike Rhaella Targaryen, and given the magic that had awaken in House Martell now, the Martell heiress did not doubt that some of the magic could have reacted on the feelings of Rhaella against the Kingsguard members who had never saved her from Aerys.
"So Gerold Dayne was sent to the Hellbolt because he came alarmingly near to finding the little grave that would have the bones of a newborn infant if it was dug up."
It would not take long to link the missing pieces together for anyone who knew enough details from rumors; That Rhaegar and Lyanna had been missing for several months together because the Rebellion had lasted for nearly a whole year from start to end, the death of Lyanna Stark in the Tower of Joy, that the three Kingsguard members had been there there yet not following Rhaegar back to the capital, and why Eddard Stark refused to mention more details about her passing outside it being caused by a fever.
"Aye. We have not been able to stop rumors from spreading, of course, even with Wylla and the soldiers promising to not tell any details, but thanks to the Tower being torn down to build those cairns for the dead, no one would be to find it unless knowing in which area of the Red Mountains to start the search," Doran spoke up, and his daughter listened once again on how Vorian had actually used this information to do something unexpected;
"You are BLACKMAILING Lord Stark about the details of Lyanna Stark's true death and her child in exchange for the North annually sending Dorne timber for ships!?"
Vorian smiled an innocent smile, that did not look so harmless now when Arianne knew what she just had been told.
"Lord Stark has laid a lot of energy on making his sister seem like an innocent maiden who was taken against her will. The questionable circumstances of her disappearance with the Prince and whether it was a kidnapping or voluntary elopement with him to escape her intended marriage to Robert Baratheon have, of course, given rise to various kinds of rumors about the girl. And since Eddard Stark has two daughters of his own now… if they were to arrive south, perhaps seeking a southern husband because lady Catelyn Stark may wish at least one of her children to not marry a Northern bannerman family, well…"
She could see what he hinted at. The actions of Lyanna Stark would affect her nieces and how they could be viewed in the south of Westeros, despite the three daughters of House Stark never meeting. That was how the current social reputation of a particular family worked in society; House Dayne had worked hard to seem trustworthy again among their fellow Dornishmen after the actions of Arthur, but Allyria Dayne and her nephew Theodore, the young son of Vorian, would still face difficulties in finding a potential partner in the marriage market due to the events ten years ago.
"I understand. A warning for Lord Stark that his sister is affecting the future of his own daughters, even from beyond the grave," Arianne summoned up the tale that she had been told.
~X~X~X~X~X~X
At Starfall, Allyria was placing some fresh flowers on the grave of her older sister, as she often did. She did not remember much of Ashara, but she had always thought of her sister as being the protector to Princess Elia that Arthur had failed to be.
"It is hard work to keep curious people away from the ruins of the Tower of Joy, sister, but brother Vorian hopes that with the passing of more time, it will be worth it because eventually, no one will be able to remember where it once stood."
Despite that it would be one-sided conversations with no chance of getting a response from the cold bones of Ashara, the youngest Dayne sibling of their generation would often be here at the grave when she felt that she needed to get troublesome things off her chest and even sometimes update her sister about the latest news and events in Dorne.
"You agree that it was only fair that Eddard Stark could not leave Dorne without some conditions, right? After all, his sister was involved in shaming Princess Elia so openly, not once but twice with her husband."
Allyria doubted that Ashara would have thought much of the Stark brothers after Harrendal. After all, Brandon was betrothed to Catelyn Tully and while Rickard Stark had betrothed his only daughter to the young Lord Baratheon, it did not necessarily mean that he intended to get southern spouses for all four of his children. House Dayne was among principal houses sworn to House Martell and Arthur had been a Kingsguard member, but that status alone would not be enough to make Ashara a possible bride for a second son to a Lord Paramount, especially not one who had such vastly different customs than Dorne.
"It is not enjoyable to hear people north of the Red Mountains whisper about you bearing a bastard to one of the Stark brothers about nine months after Harrendal and that this was the reason to why you was not at Dragonstone when Elia had to send away the rest of her Dornish ladies-in-waiting, but it helps to take away focus from questions about whether Lyanna got pregnant by Rhaegar or not."
Rather than being banished from the court at the Targaryen ancestral castle for being pregnant out of wedlock with a bastard sired by one of the Stark brothers or, heavens forbid, some other creepy nobleman who believed that Dornish women were shameless from a early age, Ashara had left Dragonstone for a very different reason not long before that Rhaegar had vanished with Lyanna: Vorian and his nowadays wife would finally have their wedding and he had wished both Dayne sisters to act as her bride-maids.
The Rebellion had prevented Ashara from returning to her service as a lady-in-waiting to Elia because Vorian found it too dangerous to let his sister leave Starfall with all the fighting going on, and naturally her absence from court caused the false rumour of her unexisting bastard child.
"Ashara, do you find it silly that I am thinking of trying to win the heart of a Rohirric noble rather than finding a husband here in Westeros? I think that Princess… no, Queen consort Elia would love to have some more Dornish-Rohirric marriages, to further strengthen the alliance between Dorne and Rohan. I want to clean the name of our House from the taint that Arthur caused ten years ago when I was only half my current age, and why not try to help the Princess that you were in love with?"
Allyria's strongest memory of Ashara was being held by her sister as they cuddled together under a blanket to watch the starry night sky together though the window in Ashara's bedchamber, and the whispering in her ear where her sister confessed to that she was in love with Elia in terms of a romance feeling rather than just friendship, a sign of that Ashara had been drawn to women over men.
"As I would even look at the Stark siblings, when the two Tully sisters were seated right behind them and I was trying to figure out why Lysa Tully seemed so downhearted during the whole tourney! When I tried to get closer to her and perhaps even ask if she needed a shoulder to cry on, everyone seemed to think that I was asking for a dance! I did not mind a turn with prince Oberyn, but I was less pleased with Barristan Selmy, Jon Connington and Eddard Stark ending up dancing with me as well! Sure, I can understand the younger Stark brother being too shy to personally ask and that his brother helped, but had anyone else tried to ask for a dance after the middle Stark brother, then I would have stormed out!"
By what Allyria recalled of that tale, Ashara had not even gotten anywhere close to Lysa Tully to ask if she could help the younger daughter of Hoster Tully if there indeed was something troubling her. As far as Ashara knew, Lysa had been saddened over that the handsome, still unbetrothed Jaime Lannister had gotten accepted into the Kingsguard, crushing any dreams about marrying him and becoming the next Lady of Casterly Rock.
"But you know, Ashara, I think you would be very pleased with our nephew being indirectly named after the second Prince who wed Elia, and he is a far better husband and father to her children."
Feeling better after this long talk, Allyria caressed the engraved name of her sister's sarcophagus one last time, and then promised to return another day when she had other news to tell her. Then she went out of the family vault, feeling the afternoon sun warming up Starfall as a sign that their harvest of fruit in the fruit garden this year would be rich indeed.
~X~X~X~X~X~X
Author note: I headcanon that Ned wanted to hide the truth of Lyanna dying in childbirth, and that he claimed her fatal fever was a result of her becoming ill at the news of that her father and brother had died because of what looked like a abduction of her by Rhaegar.
For better details on Ashara being the one to kill Arthur, please reread chapter 9, "A missing Princess and her children" in Foreign Lands
In this crossover AU Ashara was a lesbian, and Elia her first major crush. Thanks to those feelings, she felt even more betrayed by that Arthur chose Rhaegar over Elia, and felt that her brother was a traitor towards his homeland for his choices.
In canon there is no mention of which birth year Allyria have, but personally I headcanon her to be born several years after Ashara as a surprise baby for the precious Lord and Lady Dayne who died when she was still a child, which would explain why she is the aunt of Theodore Dayne (in canon Eric Dayne) rather than a older sister, based on that she in canon was betrothed to Beric Dondarrion around year 294 or 295 A.C. As Robert's reign was peaceful then, it would be rather doubtful that she would be a teenage bride, and Allyria being in her early twenties would also explain the age difference between aunt and nephew when he was born in 287 A.C, four years after the events at the Tower of Joy. Also, if Ashara was sixteen and Arthur about twenty-three years old in 283, there is a possibility that Vorian, Arthur, Ashara and Allyria may have siblings that sadly died in the cradle or lost in miscarriages, to explain the age gap between Arthur and his two sisters