Salted seawater rolled up to stony shores in white-capped waves. A great moon surrounded by stars that cast their silver light down on the bay's blackwater was in the sky above. Ships from far away ports rested in the shallows for the night. In the distance, there was a storm over the waters keeping captains and their crews at bay. When the morning came and their crew crawled in from their night of laying alone at their inns or with one of Flea Bottom's desperate whores, they would set sail with their cargos. Some would sail North, others across the Narrow Seas to one of the many Free Cities of Essos.
Vernan was one of the captains among them.
Plagued with a sleepless night, one even the gentle rock of waves couldn't soothe, he had abandoned the captain's quarters and welcomed the kiss of warm summer winds against his cheeks. He could taste the salt on his skin as he ran his tongue over thin lips, leaving his mouth parched and desperate for a drink. Feet shuffled against the desk and his rough hands rubbed at the tired features of his face. Verna approached a large barrel of drinking water, his tired form leaning against it as he reached for a wooden ladle. The ladle was dipped into the waters, filling its spoon to the brim before it was raised to thirsty lips. Vernan drank it slowly with savoring sips only to choke on the final swallow.
The air that had once been silent was now drowned out by the wailing of cries. There were no homesick sailors, drunk and sobbing as they stumbled down the docks. No, these were the cries of a babe. Thick brows furrowed as Vernan pushed himself up off the water barrel, his dark eyes searching through the night for the child. His feet that had once moved sluggishly with tiredness now moved along the deck quickly. His unbuckled boots rattled with each determined step, and his trousers threatened to slip from his hips as he climbed from his ship and onto the slippery dock. It was still lined with cargo, casks of wine, fruits, and vegetables that couldn't be grown in the coastal cities of Essos, and baskets of thick linen waited to be taken aboard. It was there, with the linens blown over to cover his face that he found the babe. Eyes went wide as his large hands carefully took hold of the infant. Its face was red from wailing, a mess of black hair rested atop its head, and its skin was still marked with the blood of birth. The babe couldn't have been more than a day old. Vernan peered through the night in search of the child's parents and only found fishmongers seated in the sand with a fire at their feet as they cooked a fish for their dinner.
"Is this your babe?" he called out to them on his approach, his arms cradling the infant awkwardly now. He received only a feeble call; No. His eyes began to water with panic. To whom was this babe born to? Why had this child been deserted on the docks? Peeling back the thick fabric, he looked at the naked babe. A son. Someone had birthed a son. Pulling the babe closer to his chest, Vernan carefully walked the ramp onto his ship and disappeared into the Captain's quarters. The warmth of another soothed the babe to silence, but it would not be long until hunger took him. Until he craved his mother's milk that he would not receive. Mother's milk that Vernan could not provide him.
In the darkness of his quarters, Vernan cleaned the baby in his bathing basin. Each caress of his hand washed evidence of the mother away, leaving the child clean and cold in the night air. Then came the careful wrapping of the child in moth-eaten blankets to keep him warm enough for sleep. The captain wore a stupid grin as the black-haired boy drifted off in his arms. It brought silence back to the air and eased the panic in his mind. There was still time to find something to feed the child, he was sure he could find something aboard, and he quickly found himself questioning what he should do with the child. The babe had been abandoned, not a mother or father in his sight to care for him. He would have been a rude discovery at sea for any sailor, any would have been just as clueless as he, but unlike most, he didn't seek the comfort of a strange woman in the brothels of Flea Bottom. Vernan had a wife waiting for him back in Pentos.
Of all their years together, the gods had never been so kind as to bless Vernan and his wife Abagal with a child of their own. They had been trying since their youth, and now as age took them they feared that their time to have a child had come and gone - but now Vernan held a babe in his arms. A babe with no one to call mother and father. A babe who wouldn't know any better if a simple sailor and his inn-keeper wife had taken him in as their own. Placing the babe on his bed, Vernan stepped out onto the deck and peered his head over the side of the boat one final time. He looked up and down the docks and found no one - not even the fishmongers sat along the water's edge any longer, only the billow of smoke remained. No one would know where the unwanted child ended up - and no one back on the docks of Ragman's Harbour would question where he had come from. He would be a welcome sight to fishmongers and whores alike. There was no woman more deserving of a son than his Abagal and all knew it.
Dark eyes raised to the heavens, the bright stars peeking out from behind the clouds that had begun to consume the sky over the great city of King's Landing. He imagined each twinkle as the blinking eyes of his Seven Gods as they gazed down on him. Rough hands joined together over his heart as he spoke to his gods. "I ask the Father to be merciful when delivering justice onto those who played a hand in the abandonment of the babe that now lay in my bed. I ask the Mother for guidance, to help me find the knowledge of how to raise this child as my own. I ask the Maiden to keep the child innocent and for him to forever know he is loved. To the Crone, I ask to give the boy wisdom as to not follow anyone blindly. To the Warrior, I ask to give the boy courage and strength. To the Smith, I ask to make the boy a hard worker and never accept anything for free. And to the Stranger, I thank you for delivering this boy to me."