The Eyrie was colder than he remembered.
Of course, Robert had not been home in years, not since long before he had gone to foster with Lord Lannister at the Rock, and he had been so sick then that it only made sense that he not really remember how things had been. He could hardly remember his lord father's face, after all, or the precise auburn of his lady mother's hair.
And now his lord father was dead, and he was Lord Arryn.
Lord Lannister had delivered the news as stoically as if he were commenting on the weather, his face and voice perfectly calm as he changed Robert's whole world. The letter from Robert's lady mother had been written in scrawling, scribbled hand, a mess of tear stains and inkblots, as close to hysteria as he'd ever seen short of one of his own screaming fits, but there had been an official-looking letter from the King, as well, expressing his condolences upon the death of "a man we both held as a father."
Robert knew his namesake meant no harm by that, but still he could not find it in himself to have any sympathy for the King - he had only been a child when last he had seen the King, or his lord father, but he remembered well how heavy the burden of the King's love had rested on his father's shoulders.
It made no difference now, of course - Robert's lord father had been an old man, with a tendency to catch every cough that passed through King's Landing, and it seemed that his heart had finally given out. It was to be expected, everyone assured him, a man of his father's years, with the stresses of his father's work, but that was no comfort.
Oddly, Lord Tywin's formal, cool-eyed expression of condolence was more comfort than any other he received, if only because it was sincere, lacking in any sort of false sorrow or grief. Joy's, as well, was sincere, because Joy was his closest friend and understood that his own grief was a strange, oddly shallow thing. She had lost a father she hardly knew, too, and understood how difficult it was to sort grief from frustration and anger.
"You are lost in your head, my lord," Joy said, clambering out of the basket behind him. She was taller than him by a good measure - Robert had never grown as well as other boys, because of his sickness, so the maesters all agreed, and while he had grown a great deal these past few years, Joy took after her father's family, with long, strong limbs - but skinny, with a nose and cheekbones too broad for the rest of her face, and dark, dark skin that made her hair look fairer than it was, and Robert thought she was the most beautiful girl he'd ever known. "Come back here and show me your home, Robert."
Robert smiled, and offered her his arm - he liked being close to Joy, who never minded when he had to walk slowly.
"So, little falcon," she said, "this is your nest. It's very fine."
Robert blushed with pride - he had always been a little in awe of Casterly Rock, so for Joy to compliment the Eyrie felt almost a victory. She had spent most of her life in the splendour of the Rock, after all, in the magnificence and majesty that went hand in hand with the Lannisters' wealth. The Eyrie had its own austere beauty, he knew, but none of the innate strength that went with Casterly Rock - yes, the Eyrie was impregnable, but could it host an army? Could he take the people of the Vale within his walls and guard them safe from harm in times of war?
Lord Tywin would disapprove of such thoughts, would dismiss them as sentimental and useless, would dismiss the smallfolk as next to useless as compared with the various Lannister kin and other highborn folk in the city below the Rock, but Robert had spent hours upon hours discussing such things with Joy, and thought differently. Mayhaps he would have thought more along the same lines as Lord Tywin had he not spent so much time with Joy over the years, but he had, and so he had his own thoughts, thoughts he knew his mother would likely disapprove of just as much as his foster-father would.
"Come back to me, Robert," Joy said gently, squeezing his arm and smiling again. "You have made a habit of losing yourself in the mazes of your mind since we began our eastward journey, my friend."
It was true, he supposed - his time at Casterly Rock had made a habit in him of introversion, of spending time in his own head, because it was safer not to voice your thoughts where they might be overheard. He had learned that quickly, under the weight of a septa's sharp hands and a maester's vile potions, one of which had fallen in reprimand every time he spoke out of turn, the other of which was poured down his throat whenever even the slightest hint of one of his fits appeared.
It had not been easy at Casterly Rock, Robert supposed, but looking back, it had not been easy in King's Landing, either, nor at the Eyrie, during what little time he had spent here.
He was a disappointment to the Vale, he knew that well enough. He was frail and sick, and when last his lords bannermen had known him, he had been a spoiled brat with a ferocious temper quieted only by his father's disappointment and displeasure. Now, he had a better hold of his temper than anyone he knew short of Lord Tywin himself, and he hoped that he had a chance to speak on his own behalf when it came to choosing who would stand as his regent. He thought he might surprise his lords bannermen, if they gave him a chance to do so.
The household was assembled to greet him, as was to be expected - stern-faced Ser Vardis, turkey-necked Maester Colemon, Gretchel and Fat Maddy and Mela, Gyles and Terrence who had come closest of anyone to being Robert's friends before he went to the Rock.
And his lady mother. Gods, was that truly her? He didn't remember her being quite so…
"Oh, my own Sweetrobin!" she trilled, rushing forward to gather him close to her - he was glad that he was too tall to end up with his face pressed to her breasts, and glad that he had remembered the shade of her hair, despite his fears.
But he wished beyond all wishing that she had not called him by that confounded nickname. Particularly not in front of the household. Particularly not in front of Joy.
She looked awful, her face swollen and her gown ill-suited to a woman of her figure, and she looked old. Robert did not remember his mother as an old woman - she had been so young, compared with his father, with her beautiful hair and her bright eyes, but here, now, she seemed frail, silver in her hair and deep lines settling around her eyes and the corners of her mouth, eyes that were overflowing with tears and a mouth that was trembling with emotion.
"It is good to see you, Mother," Robert said, disentangling himself from her as carefully as he could - that seemed to upset her, too, although he couldn't understand why.
"Mother," he said, "this is my dearest friend, Lady Joy Hill. Joy, allow me to introduce my mother, Lady Lysa Arryn."
Robert watched his mother's face fall into a pout of such pronounced displeasure that Robert all but cringed back from it. Joy, at least, knew the proper forms and chose to observe them, dropping into a deep curtsy and bowing her head. Her hair was pinned back in a long, thick braid, and Robert could see the tight curls that had sprung loose, some of their own accord and others teased out by the high winds between Snow and Sky, bright against the dark skin of the back of her neck.
"It is an honour to meet you, my lady," she said. "Lord Arryn has always spoken most highly of you - I am glad to have the opportunity to know you."
Robert envied her ease of courtesy, envied that she never stumbled over her words or forgot a politeness. His lady mother seemed less impressed than he felt, still pouting, but she held out a much-beringed hand for Joy to kiss all the same. Robert recognised one of the rings as an Arryn signet, silver with the raised falcon in moonstone, but the others seemed new, and gaudy.
Gifts, mayhaps? But who would gift so new a widow with such ostentatious jewellery?
"You are welcome to the Eyrie, Mistress Hill," his lady mother said grandly, her voice high and her tone sharp, all in a way that made Robert feel ill at ease. Why was his mother so wholly changed from his admittedly uncertain memory of her? Where was the gentleness, the sweetness, the affection without being overbearing?
He had missed his mother. But this woman was not his mother, not as she should have been.
"Tell me, my lord," Maester Colemon said, watching Robert rather more keenly than he would have liked. He had not been left alone for a moment since his arrival, and Joy had been dragged away as soon as she had risen from her curtsy, presumably to bathe and dress, just as he had been, more or less. "How close are you to Mistress Hill?"
Even while he was in the damned bath, the maester had stood over him, inspecting his body from head to toe, as though in doubt of the ability of the maesters of the Rock to provide sufficient care. In truth, Robert already missed the Rock, where his limitations were as well known as his capabilities, and where no one thought to question his friendship with Joy!
"She is my dearest friend, maester, as I said while introducing her to my lady mother," Robert said, rubbing a towel through his hair while one of the servants who had come with him from the Rock - vetted by Joy, who Robert trusted entirely, so as to be certain that he was not in Lord Tywin's pay as a spy - rubbed ointment into his back. Robert's childhood illnesses had left his chest weak, and Maester Creylen had prescribed this ointment to protect him somewhat against the thin, cold air of the Eyrie. He had grown used to the warmth and sea-salt richness of the air in the Westerlands during his fostering, and could already feel the pull deep in his lungs that usually came from pushing himself too hard on horseback, or on those days when the maesters allowed him to enter the practice yard.
"That's as may be, my lord," Colemon said, wringing his hands and frowning over Robert's shoulder to the boy, who ignored him stoutly and kept rubbing the ointment in firm circles between Robert's shoulders. "But you must see why certain of us are… Concerned by your closeness. She is, after all, a Lannister, and the Lannisters are a… Difficult family to gauge."
"The Lannisters took me into their home these past years, maester," Robert said firmly. "And Mistress Hill more than anyone sought to make me feel a part of their family, as my father did for Lord Stark and His Grace the King when they fostered here."
Robert half remembered his father telling him tales of bold Robert Baratheon and quiet Ned Stark, when they had been his foster-sons, and knew that the closest he had come to such a companionship as had existed between the now-King and his uncle-by-marriage was his friendship with Joy. Robert loved Joy best of everyone in the world, as a friend and something more than a sister, which made his stomach sometimes feel muddled when she smiled at him, and would no more relinquish her company than he would the Weirwood Throne.
"Be that as it may, my lord," Colemon said, and Robert bit the inside of his cheek to keep from snapping at the maester. "It might seem… Inappropriate for your closest companion to be a bastard girl, particularly one from outside the Vale."
"Joy will remain a part of my household, Maester Colemon," Robert said, hoping to instill some of the chill dread he so often felt in Lord Tywin's presence in the fool maester. "She is to be made as welcome as though she were the Queen herself, am I clear?"
Joy always said that he went too far in her defence, but she had always leapt so readily into action as his champion, so how could he do any less for her?
"I missed you so during the funeral," his lady mother said, clutching his hand so tightly that Robert could not free himself to eat his meal. "I was inconsolable, thinking of you receiving such news without me at your side, my Sweetrobin."
"It was not to be helped, my lady," Robert pointed out as evenly as he could - in truth, it stung more than he had expected, to be told upon his arrival at the Bloody Gate that his father's funeral was long dealt with. His mother and her sensibilities aside, Robert had thought to have a chance to say a final goodbye to the father he had hardly known. To be denied that had hurt more than he had ever dreamed such a thing might, to a degree that Lord Tywin would have scorned - Lord Tywin was scornful of any emotional excesses, which was mayhaps part of why he so loathed the Imp.
That, of course, was a tangle best left knotted up in itself.
"I do so wish you would not call me my lady," his mother lamented, drawing him from his considerations. "Do you remember, my darling, that you used call me-"
"I am the Lord of the Eyrie now, my lady," Robert cut in, mortified at the idea of her asking him to call her Mummy before his household, before Joy, before Gyles and Terrence, who he hoped to befriend. "It would be inappropriate for me to show you anything less than the utmost respect, would it not?"
Her face fell, her lower lip pouting and wobbling, and Robert bit down on a sigh. He was tired enough from all the travelling, and from the extra effort required to breathe the damnable thin air in the High Hall, and he was drowsy from the tincture he had taken to quell the tremors that had started in his hands. He lived in fear of those tremors, for they were the only advance warning he ever seemed to receive of one of his fits.
His shaking fits did not seem so terrible as they had when he was a child, in Robert's private opinion. Now, he was more likely to shit himself than to bite through his tongue, and while that was horribly embarrassing, it was unlikely to be fatal. He dreaded them all the same, for the loss of control, for the chance that this one would prove to be fatal.
Maester Creylen, with a matter-of-factness that Lord Tywin expected of all his personal staff and attendants, had explained that it was only a matter of time, really. Some children outgrew the shaking sickness, but the frequency and severity of Robert's fits even after he turned ten left the maester and his colleagues inclined to think that Robert was not one of the lucky few.
"As High as Honour," his lady mother said, something sharp and bitter in her tear-soaked voice that took Robert by surprise. "Worse even than Family, Duty, Honour. Fine lies to live by, all of them!"
She tore away from the table before Robert could open his mouth to offer her some comfort, or even just to ask what in the gods' names she meant by all that venom, leaving him off-balance in a way that made him anxious, left his hands shaking in a way wholly different from the warning of his fits.
He loathed being embarrassed.
"I won't have it!" his mother shrieked, finally letting loose almost two weeks following his return to the Eyrie. "I won't have a funny-coloured Lannister bastard sullying my castle!"
"I think, my lady, you will find that it is my castle," Robert said furiously, "and Joy is my guest. She is nothing to you, and I will thank you to hold your tongue if you are of a mind to cast insults at my friends!"
Joy had charmed everyone else in the castle as easily as she had Robert, when first he had arrived at the Rock, trailing in Lord Tywin's wake, tied to his pony because Lord Tywin did not care to stop to collect him if he suffered a fit while riding and fell from the saddle. Joy, of course, had soothed him when he wept in the face of Lord Tywin's cruelty, had sung strange songs in a language he knew now to be Qohorik, her mother's legacy as much as the colour of her skin.
Personally, Robert thought the contrast Joy's fair hair and bright eyes made with her dark skin was part of what made her so beautiful, but he should have known his lady mother would come to this pass eventually. She had been intolerably rude to Joy since their arrival, and Robert simply was not going to tolerate it any longer. He was one-and-ten, almost a man, and he would not stand for his mother's histrionics a moment longer!
"I am not given to believe that my lord father allowed you to speak so, my lady, from what I know and have been told of him," he said coldly, "and I am not given to grant you such a liberty, either - if you wish to keep claim to the title of Lady of the Eyrie, act your part."
Tears flooded her eyes, of course - Robert had eyes not unlike hers, or at least how he assumed hers must have been before she became so fat. His eyes sat too big in his face, and bright Arryn blue, or so Joy said, while his mother's seemed lost over her overfull cheeks, of a deeper blue than his own but of a similar shape. Perhaps it was the similarity between them that caused him such irritation every time she started to weep, which was distressingly often.
"Enough," he said, before she could even begin complaining. "The Eyrie is mine, is it not? I am the lord of House Arryn, am I not? If this is true, then why should I not have my own friends as guests, regardless of the whims of my mother, who is not even my lady regent?"
"Why must you vex me so, Sweetrobin?" she complained. "I seek only to do my best by you, my darling, surely you must know that, and there are worthier companions by far than some foreign bastard to be found!"
"I have Gyles and Terrence, Valemen as true as myself," he said shortly. "And once my lords bannermen arrive, we will sort the business of my regency quickly enough, I am sure."
He watched his mother's face carefully then - every time there was a mention made of the regency, there came to her mouth an odd twist, and to her eyes a queer sort of brightness that made him wary. He sensed some plan afoot, one which would leave him an infant in her clutches once more, if she had her way.