A Mother
...
The clearness of her mind returned to her in the morning of the day at which she was meant to leave Pike and to be brought back to Harlaw, to live with her brother and sister and to regain her lost strength.
But she refused to leave on that morning, she straightened herself and lifted her chin stubbornly and refused to step onboard of the ship which would take her to the Island of her birth. Her husband looked at her as uninteresting irritation but then again, he had never thought much of her as a wife in all their years of marriage. She had always been useful for him because of her family and because she gave him heirs but otherwise, she was just a woman to him.
And then, when he did his useless and bloody thoughtless rebellion, she had lost first her two oldest boys to death and her last boy to the winners and then her mind and thus she became even more uninteresting to him.
But now, now her mind was awake again and she remembered the years wandering around barefoot in her damned husbands Keep and she also remembered things that she should have no knowledge about. Things which seemed to have happened but in the future.
At first, see thought herself still sad and mad and with her mind numbed and in illusions, only now of a different kind. The first few days, she still had thought about these strange memories as dreams of an more punishing way against her family but after a couple of days, these thoughts passed and as she felt her mind ever more clearer and her body slowly growing stronger, she accepted that these strange memories of a future time were given to her as a warning.
And in the last few days, she thought to herself that such a warning, such a knowledge could maybe even used to change some things, so that other things would change too.
Her daughter, her only remaining Child here, had once more came back from a tour and had been astonished that she, her mother, had been well in mind and getting better in body and her daughter had been joyful for that, in her own slightly rough ways.
Lady Alannys decided on that morning to test her thoughts about changing some of the things of the future memories, if not for her own gains but then at least to do the best to protect her girl.
One of the strange memories were of what her brother had told her from a future time, about the brothers of her husband and Euron, the thrice damned and most evil minded of them at the most.
She remembered that about a moon after she had arrived on Harlaw, Euron had been banned by her husband for what he did to Victarion's woman and how Victarion raged against that but accepted her husband's will. And then, many years later in the future, Euron had returned and destroyed her family even more. And she herself, well her memories had showed her that she was still trapped in her mind and mostly frail body on Harlaw and thus useless to save her girl and her turned boy.
But now she had those memories of years in the future and she had still sixteen days left to the time of when her husband would ban Euron and thus let her dangerous goodbrother escape the real punishment that he deserved.
She decided to use this knowledge, to make sure that her children would not have to endure what the future memories had shown her. No, she would make sure that Balon Greyjoy and all his cursed brothers wouldn't endanger her last children, wouldn't hurt her girl in anyway.
Would it make her a kinslayer, she asked herself for a moment. But then Alannys shrugged, straightened her shoulders and took a deep breath to calm herself. Her mind felt balanced at the thoughts and she banished any thoughts of guilt from her heart.
She would make sure that her direct kin would protected from her husband's evil and dangerous blood and that would of course mean that she would be a kinslayer of the kin of her children but her girl and her faraway boy would thus be protected from all evil kin by their father's side in the future and that would be good enough for her, Alannys herself.
Yes, she would make sure that her children would be protected from the evilness of their father and uncles.
It was a mother's duty after all to protect her children by all means necessary
...
A Father
...
It had started nearly a footnote ago that his world changed for him and those he hold dearest to him.
He had been mock fighting his former squire, Daemon Sand who he had knighted himself when it happened the first time to him. Daemon had suddenly stopped the training and mock fighting and looked at him with eyes full of horror and shock.
"My Prince, stop. Stop fighting my Prince, I must have hit you somewhere hard on your head. You are bleeding heavily. Don't you feel any pain?" Daemon had asked him full of worry.
But he hadn't felt any pain, only the rush of a good fight . Nonetheless they stopped and he left the training ground to go to his rooms to clean himself as he must truly looked awful by Daemon's reaction.
While he was on his way to the rooms he shared with Ellaria, everyone who he passed looked at him like he was a beast from Sothorys or to be more exact like something that escaped such a beast.
He could see worry and shock in everyone's eyes and it had started to worry him.
And then, when he arrived in his rooms, well the reaction which greeted him there was the worst one. Ellaria saw him and screamed like nothing he had ever heard. Her screams were full of anguish and sorrow and pain.
She was nearly running towards him then, her hands were touching his head, stroking along his cheeks and his lips and carefully fluttering over his lids. When she saw that he just stared at her, she then tugged him with her towards the table where her mirror was laying upon and then he looked at his own face in the mirror.
His whole head was bloody, blood was coming slowly from his eyes and out of his mouth and nose and also sluggishly from his head.
He cleaned himself with Ellarias help and halfway through the cleaning then the rush of first the fight and then the shock left him and he finally felt pain. He took a potion of his own stock and something to sleep and then Ellaria started to softly sing for him as she did normaly for their daughters and he finally could rest.
In that night he dreamed things he had not lived through, of future times and events he had known not to have happened and of his last fight for the first time and he woke from it with a gurgling scream if tortured pain. Ellaria was by his side and he heard that from everywhere people came running towards his rooms. Sleep eluded him for hours then.
It only got worse from there on and he kept interrupting everyone's life around him too unwillingly, night and day.
For in the nights he woke up screaming and during the days his body and especially his head started to suddenly show signs of horrible torturous proceedings but whenever he had finished washing the blood away, then his face was whole again and all which looked destroyed and with blood on was then looking whole and undisturbed again.
It was a horror for all around him during these days and Ellaria had made sure that their young daughters were all far away from him, so that they would not be shocked.
For him though, for him the nights were worse than the days. He dreamed of years still to come, of dead Stags, executed Wolves and false Lion Kings. He dreamed of poison and then every dream ended with him fighting the murderous mountainlike Monster who had murdered Elia.
And every dream ended with the confession of the Monster and than with his, Oberyn's painful death. Crushed teath and gorged out eyes included. The last thing he always heard then before he woke up drenched in sweat and still feeling all the pain, were Ellaria's screams.
It had to end. Nearly a fortnight now of nights like these, of bloodfilled days with disappearing wounds, of terrorfilled nights and always the same endings of his dreams.
It was enough now, not only for him but he could see that those around him could not endure this much longer too.
He would go to where his life always ended in his dreams. Maybe he could than finally find out the reason for them.
And so Prince Oberyn Martell left for King's Landing after a fortnight of torturous dreams and awful days. Ser Daemon Sand and a few more Dornishmen accompanied him but he had asked Ellaria to stay at Home with their daughters and the rest of his family.
If he really would die in that godsbedamned City then he did not want Ellaria to have to watch that.
But he hoped not for death, only for answers. And maybe to find a way to destroy Gregor Cleagane without dying himself.
To King's Landing then, to the Stag who stepped over Elia's broken body and those of her children to climb the ugly throne. To the Lion's den and the fat Stag and hopefully it will end with answers and dead opponents only.
...
A Crone
...
She woke up in her bed in Ironoaks, as she had done for most of her life. This time though she woke up with the vague and nebulous remains of her last night's dream clinging heavily as a shadow on her consciousness through the whole day.
Her youngest boy, Wallace looked at her with an uncomfortable look in his eyes at the evening meal and she briefly wondered if she behaved different throughout the day.
The dreams came back to her in the night, clearer and more realistic too. When she forced herself awake in the morning, she actually remembered real bits and scenes but they made no real sense to her still and she felt as if her mind was searching for more information the whole day, because she simply could not concentrate on the most simple things.
It went worse during the next couple of days, at night her dreams showed her things about people she knew, some she despised, some she respected or even liked and during the days she barely managed to stay awake any longer.
All her sons and other family members grew desperately concerned about her but then came the day, after the most detailed dream ever for her, the day on which she woke up and told her sons to make ready of a heavily guarded transportation for her.
All looked at hers like she spoke in riddles but she only told them to make sure that she would have enough guards and other necessities ready in two hours.
She must go to King's Landing and the Lord Hand, their own Highest Lord of the Vale, Jon Arryn himself.
Her sons tried to make her she reason but she just starred at them with her deeply circled eyes, signs that her last couple of nights and days had been troubling and she told her sons once more in a steely Voice now, that they should organize all necessities and enough Guards for her to reach Gulltown.
Two and a half hour later, Lady Anya Waynward left Ironoaks with her second son and thirty Guards.
She hoped that they all would reach the Harbor City without any problems, she really needed to reach the Capitol as soon as possible and then she would need to tell the Lord Hand quite a bit of rather unfortunate but none the less much needed informations.
...
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