2 : Just the beginning

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Stannis did visit the next day as he said he would. It was short and not very sweet. Not to say it was awful but Stannis' lack of charm and charisma was definitely apparent to me. He came in quietly around lunchtime the after my first arrival and said to me, "The Maester says after today and tomorrow of rest, should you be well, that you can resume your normal duties. Ensure you do them to the best you can following your weakness."

Duty. His youngest brother narrowly avoided death, wait, did he, I? avoid death? Unimportant, I am here, and I think, therefore I am. Sure, that phrase works here I think. Anything to not go insane. Anyways, I narrowly avoid death and he comes to me speaking about duty. A 5 year old. What duties do most five year olds have other than being a general nuisance? Sure the old Markas had begun to "Train" with his sword soon after his nameday, and was taught by the maester, but neither of those were particularly challenging. And weakness?! Good lord this man is a Therapists worst nightmare.

"Yes brother, I will try my best. Are you well? Maester Cressen told me others got sick too." While not my favorite person, some common courtesy might help me endure myself into my new brother's eyes.

With a small frown, which really just seemed like his normal demeanor, he said "I did not catch the fever. Maester Cressen believes you caught it from one of the sailors or a servant's child." "Oh, of course" was the best I came up with on the spot. "Rest well, Markas, you are a Baratheon and I expect you to perform well after all this time away from them." With that he turned and left. That man could cool the flames of hell with his passion.

Two more days. That was the length of time I was forced to remain in my room. On the second I managed to convince Maester Cressen to accompany me onto a nearby balcony for some sun and fresh air. I think he simply took pity on me because he could see me going stir-crazy.

An unfortunate downside of nearly two whole days of downtime was that I was left alone to my thoughts often. Stannis' new bride Lady Selyse stopped by both days and read some stories then asked me to pray with her. She only stayed for an hour or two each day but I enjoyed the time, even with her voice sounding sharper than some swords. She was kind and seemed different then how I remembered her to be. She wasn't cheery by any means, but she was assuredly not the loathsome figure I knew. She was tall, probably on the same level as my brother Stannis. She wasn't pretty much the way Stannis wasn't handsome. Her ears were large, her eyes pale, and her nose as sharp as her voice. Her mouth was a stern similar to her resting expression, and had an unfortunate line of hair resting just above it on her lip that was just too dark. Yet for the time she was with me she seemed like a normal older sister caring for a brother. She was a tad distant, but she was also new to the family and knew little of me. I had to imagine living a loveless marriage with Stannis was not going to help her

But when Lady Selyse was gone, and the Maester left to tend to other things, thats when my thoughts came to me in full force. I was most likely never going back to my old life. While I knew I couldn't get hung up on this, I also knew that just pushing my feelings to the side forever wouldn't be healthy and might cost me in the future. So I let myself cry. It wouldn't be strange for a five year old to be crying if I was caught and I genuinely needed the outlet. I was gonna miss my mom for sure. She had done everything she could to make sure I had what I needed and also helped me believe in my art from a young age. Then my dad, while not overly affectionate, still had proven he loved me without any doubts. My older sister, while we argued whenever we met, was still one of the people I knew always had my back. Something that the Baratheons never seemed to form. Then there was my cat, who I had found in a box outside one day when she was younger. She didn't make me as sad as my proper blood family, but she was all alone now and I would have to hope that my sister or parents took her in.

So I spent an unknown amount of time crying. Not the most impressive display, but also necessary. I will mourn today and remember tomorrow. I would strive to be as decent a person as I could while not becoming a wet rag in the world of Westeros. I will not start murdering children just so I can prevent a future insurrection from , I tell myself I won't, there's a long time between now and a death of natural causes and I can only promise myself that my moral compass won't stray.

Throughout those two days I accomplished two things, outside of emotionally divesting myself. I began my studies with Maester Cressen on the second day. It was nothing extreme, mainly him having me try to recall lords and ladies and whose house they were in and occasionally what their history was if they were particularly relevant such as major houses. Going past that however, what I truly accomplished was a formulation of my plan. It went as follows:

First, get out from under Stannis' hold. I know he's Shipmaster so I could probably Convince Robert he's too busy. Then become a ward for someone less, obstinate. Or at least less, him. Neddard Stark was the ideal, but there was always others. The Vale was a bad call as they wouldn't be joining the war and would have Petyr Baelish's eyes upon it. Dorne is a no go due to their loathing of Rober for pardoning the monsters known as Lorch and the Mountain. Mace Tyrell is an option if I want to learn about politics. I'm young enough, in body at least, to undergo some training. There I would definitely be a pawn but I would know I was a pawn so there is some benefit in knowing your place. Then Tywin Lannister, although he scares me. Robert and Cersei's marriage was still new but they would not be getting along already with his drinking and hurting her, then there was the whoring. Another Stormlander was possible but none came with the strength of name when I am already a Baratheon. Riverlands seems excellent. The Blackfish is renowned for his part in the War of the Nine Penny Kings. Once again, he leads to the Vale though. The Freys are out. So out of the major houses my own, Lannister, Martell, and Arryn are out. Stark, Tyrell, and Tully are in.

Now to accomplish that I'll need to get to King's Landing to convince Robert. Something tells me the man doesn't read very often, and I don't want my message arriving to him after someone else reads it first and influences his decision.

Following that I need to do my best not to mess up anything before the War of Five Kings. I don't remember everything but anything I do remember goes out the window if I do. There will be an some things I can't not change by just existing, but minimizing those things would help.

Now who to support in that was another excellent question. As a Baratheon my opinion was going to matter. I could set my own stake for the throne even. Make it the war of Six Kings! But no, that seems idiotic. Joffrey and Stannis both claim legitimacy, while Renly claims competency. The only other angle I can think of is religious reasoning and it's very unlikely people will believe the seven have chosen me. No, I plan on playing King maker. Or Queen maker. If Dany never goes insane then she seems the most well fitting for the job. With the backing of Varys and Illyrio Mopatis, she has some heavy resources at her hands. Dragons not even included.

Joffrey is loathsome but leads to Tommen, who would be manipulated by his future bride or mother. I don't blame them for their birth through incest but everyone else will. Both are out. Stannis would lead with an iron fist, but will make Shireen's future husband king unless he figures out that making children normally requires more than the yearly visit. Not to mention his hardline rule of the law and his inability to work around the construct of it. Plus his lack of supporters. Not really ideal. Renly might be an okay king. Being homosexual doesn't mean much to mean as long as he would produce heirs with his bride. Anything to keep me off the throne and out of the line of sight of everyone. There's always Griff, the possible son of Prince Rhaegar. A wild card but certainly a viable candidate. But the unknowing would always kill me, and both Varys and Illyrio would both lie. However, the joining of him and Dany has some merits. So maybe don't act against him but don't work for him? I'll come back to that eventually.

No, the choice seems simple. Daenerys Stormborn of house Targaryen it is. If she goes insane then I'll need to pull a Jaime Lannister. Preferably outside the range of a dragon's breath.

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The end of the two days meant I was finally free to explore Dragonstone, and it certainly seemed meant for an island that held dragons at one point in time. The absolute scale of the fortress was immense! Not to mention the very hard to miss nods to dragons, or on occasion their smaller replicas. Surrounding the forge and the armory was a set of carved dragon wings encasing the structures. Many staircases seemed to be designed as if stepped dragon tails, and innumerable torch sconces were shaped in the form of a grasping claw. It would have all come off to me as trying to hard if I wasn't sure that dragons truly did live here at one point. Then, along the balustrades and the walls were carvings of other foreign creatures. Dragon like being I assumed were wyverns, gargoyles, manticores, a few minotaurs, and others. Strangely enough I found a direwolf statue at one point leading me to believe that all of these story creatures might have truly existed or still do in certain areas of my new world. I would kill for such a mount. Few things seem to evoke emotion such as a monstrous mount, especially when they come from the stories children were fed to scare them into good behavior as younglings.

Maester Cressen met with me for two hours every day to ensure my tutoring wasn't going folly. There was an apprentice maester requisitioned from the citadel whom spent that time plus an additional three being my primary teacher. Acolyte Meryn Flowers was a quiet man. He told me he was 19 years old and had been submitted for maesters training from his lord father. He didn't tell me who that lord father was but told me that he himself was from the eastern part of the reach. His darker than normal skin tone led me to believe he was more likely a sand than a flowers but I had no way of knowing. His was shorter than average, and had black hair that was cut short. His brown eyes constantly looked around when he went places searching for something to draw their attention.

He was an easy teacher to have, rarely getting irate when I drifted off from my overly easy studies. He said he was impressed with my sums. I would hope so considering the work given to me, but knew I would have to keep a somewhat lax pace unless I wanted to alert them something was different. I attempted to act the part of a five year, asking inane questions and using the famous word, "why", in rapid succession after getting an answer. Thankfully, old Markas was an adequate student for a five year old so the changes, while noticeable, weren't insane. No, my scholarly studies were going swimmingly, and according to Maester Cressen after a lesson I had been given a week after my illness, I was improving at a remarkable rate.

My martial training began as a struggle however. Master-at-Arms Manfred Cobber was not an easy man to get along with. He spoke few words and didn't seem to know when I should stop training. As he never told me when to. The Bulky Brute who looked more blacksmith than soldier stood tall and had a slight forward lean to his neck. Middle-aged, bald, and with a slight paunch I could tell he was beginning to lose his touch. His face seemed too small for his features as everything on his face was large. Mouth, Nose, eyes and bros, they all seemed to compete for space. The beard he held was greying on the ends and was slightly longer than seemed appropriate for a man in Stannis' purview

The first day after my release I went to him in the training yard, which unsurprisingly was lined with dragons and other mythical creature statues from above. I told him I was ready to really train because the memories I had of the previous training sessions all involved old Markas either sitting around watching other soldiers or swinging the sword haphazardly around or in circles without paying much attention to Manfred.

After squinting his overly sized eyes, he gave me a small wooden sword, and a barrel lid with a handle and leather strap attached to it. He then motioned me to a spot and told me to start swinging. After the initial few he shook his head, stopped me, then swung his own blade while holding a sword next to me. He simply pointed to his feet, then hips, then shoulders, and showed me three more slashes from above his right shoulder down towards his left thigh. I nodded and he watched me swing a few more. This was how the first day went and when I was gasping for breath he simply pointed to a barrel of water nearby. After catching my breath I went back over and he squinted at me again. He had me drop the sword and started crouching in place with an athletic stance meant for stability. From there he had me do some shield thrusts, or maybe shield bashes? I lunged the shield forward with the flat side, not the edge. I had seen Captain America do both but this seemed more for pushing someone back than it was for injuring someone. I lasted all of a minute before my thighs ached and I was forced to stand up. My right arm and shoulder were already destroyed from the sword swings and the constant holding of the shield had made my left weak. The shield movements didnt help. After standing up he nodded, had me drop the shield, then just kept having me squat whenever I could. After five different times of me doing the squats and resuming a standing stance when the pain became too much for me he just walked off towards the other men in the yard. Didn't say a word to me. I wasn't sure if that was a dismissal so did three more sets of squat sits, each lasting shorter than previous, with the last probably being less than ten seconds, before I gave up and put the sword and shield away.

The walk up the stairs to my bedroom was torture. Each step felt taller than a mountain, and pushing open the door to my room felt like more than a ton. I had asked a servant to bring me food to my room and after eating some chicken and vegetables fell asleep still covered in sweat and grime from exhaustion.

The next day was the real task. Now I felt everything ache. Can teeth ache? I think my teeth ached on the second day. Lady Selyse was upset when I waddles my way into the dining hall for breakfast. She seemed even more upset when she came near me and saw the grime still on me from the previous day. She had servants immediate prepare a bath in my room and had someone bring my breakfast there for after my bath.

Manfred seemed surprised to see me the second day, and slightly less the third. By the fourth he seemed to barely care I showed up, merely showing my the motions for that day and eventually wandering off whenever he felt like it. It was thus my days carried on for a few weeks.

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Author's Note : Hey all, I really appreciate the feedback I've been given. I hope this doesn't come across as defensive because I've enjoyed reading all the comments and questions given so far and tone is not easy to convey through text. To answer a few questions I should have anticipated and a few more I am anticipating :

Morality : Yes, you can get by very efficiently in Westeros being a brutal cutthroat person. However that leads to few friends and many enemies. You are forced to stay ahead of everybody to maintain the status quo, as Tywin Lannister learns. The MC is new, and his morals will change as he further adapts to westeros. He comes from the same civilized areas as most of us do so his morality is more adjusted to ours still. Killing children isn't an easy idea to his mind, nor is cold hearted murder in general. He will be forced to take lives and probably order the taking of other lives as well. This will put on a strain on him but it is a part of westeros. A King's Business is an interesting read if you're looking for someone more ruthless.

The Emotions : This isn't a question I've seen but I'm attempting to preempt it. This MC is human. He will become angry, sad, confused, and happy like anyone else. I will be adding a few other POV's to better illustrate certain scenes or the foreshadow events and changes to plotline. These will never be full chapters as far as I have planned and if they are will always be followed by another chapter as so as I can. This is mainly because my preference for stories is from the main characters POV normally.

Ambition : A trait both admirable and dangerous. Being the fourth in line is the MC's place. But if lore happened completely seperate from the MC and he got replaced after the war of five kings, He would be First. This won't be happening as that'd make for a wildly different story, but the MC isn't worried about his place in line of Baratheon succession. The MC is ambitious in the way that he feels the need to influence the world to survive at this current moment of the story. His goals are large and overarching in that he wants to stop the others from killing everyone, including himself.

Name : I will be reposting this to a comment by Tunak23 who asked about the name Marcus, which is an excellent question i meant to answer in the first author notes when I talked about GRRM's form of naming conventions. In fact I will be changing the name after doing slightly more research. So now it is changing from Marcus to Markas. Essentially the same but is a name previously in the lore and maintains world building. The initial name of Marcus was because I wanted something different from already known characters, one especially in the form of Marq piper, and I liked the name Lucas but felt it too close to Lucerys, which is a Targaryen/Velaryon name. I decided to mix the two I was bouncing between. A lack of foresight I have since changed. In case you're curious, there is already a Markas Warth of house Blackguard which borders the reach and the crownlands for the Stormlands. This should meet my desire for the name, and the need for an appropriate name for world building. Thanks again for keeping me in check Tunak23!