A/N: As a reminder for my long-time readers: I changed the title of the story to 'Lyarra' from 'Bastard in the Cradle' (the first arc). This story has been spinning in my head for over a year and is self-indulgent. Let me know your feelings with a review!
The Bastard in The Cradle Arc
Chapter Six
The kindness the king had for Yadira did not extend to Camille's uncle. Arthur's punishment was to be announced soon, and even after an attempt by her father to convince Robert otherwise, the king was determined to condemn him.
Eddard was able to get Arthur released from the Black Cells so that he could sleep in a clean room with windows and a privy, but that was it. The only people allowed to see Arthur were Baratheon men watched and guarded this room constantly, and Arthur was allowed to wear the linen clothes the smallfolk would wear. No silks of any kind or even Dornish style robes. Everyone in Camille's household shows their worry differently: Yadira barks orders; Essine stares out windows in long silences, Ernatta sniffles. They fear one night his guards will 'fall asleep' or 'be overcome', and Arthur will find his end as Princess Elia and her children did. After hearing about Lord Lannister and the king and the bloody bodies, she worries too.
Worse, Camille could not see what was happening in the Great Hall. Before, in the Black cells and the bedchamber, she would have to scurry around as a rat, and see him, and watch him until she woke. She heard Arthur's prayers, and listened to his silences, and watched as he trained, and grew tired as he ate. He was still there now as he waited like everyone else did Robert's decision. Camille did not want him to die. She had begun to like her uncle, and Camille knew it would make her mother cry.
Camille and all the household for ordered to stay in her rooms by Eddard, and though they try to preoccupy her, it is them that are distracted. Essine soon gives in with her watery eyes and sniffles, crushing the small bubble of quiet in the room. Camille tries to just focus on her cousins, Theryse and Aurelia, and they talk. It is all gestures and sounds, and common sense. Before Essine begins to completely cry, Yadira announces to them all that there would be no formal lessons today. Camille sighed in relief, happy to be free of the torture Yadira does with the sitting and waving curtseys.
They seem to all languish quietly in their seats in her airy room before when her usher Ladron, Ernatta's husband, bolts in with the squire, her cousin Felix, close behind him.
He is here to deliver the news. Camille looks only briefly as Essine turns to him dabbing at her eyes across from Yadira before he starts.
Felix recites the story: the court was full of people, and he stood near Lord Stark while waiting for the king to announce his decision. He waited until the very end. Half the court was in disbelief and the other half rejoiced, depending on whom they are sworn to. Lord Stark was stone. Eddard told him to take the official notice of the king and go immediately to his lady Aunt Yadira. His dejected face puts everyone in the room- all her ladies, and the servants–into a low mood.
Essine takes the letter first, before ordering him back to Lord Stark and to stay out of trouble. Felix bows once to her, then to Yadira, and then to his mother, and leaves. After his departure, Essine unfolds the paper in the royal seal in her hands. There is a silent moment as she reads it, her face without emotion.
"He will not die," she intones. It was a strange thing to say, Camille thought. Yadira must have thought the same because she extends her hand for the letter. She watches Yadira's eyes as she reads the letter once, twice, thrice, and folds the paper up. She calls for Viana, one o her other handmaids, to go to the kitchens and gather as much food as possible, and for Odall, further back on the wall, and to have the letter resealed, and go with guards to send it to her Aunt in Starfall. Ariadne should know of her son's fate first. She insists. Everyone else watches in confusion, while she and Theryse and Aurelia play with their dolls momentarily forgotten.
"Ser Arthur has been removed from the Kingsguard, stripped of his knighthood, and for his actions during the war, will do penance in the Camlone Septry."
"Camlone Septry? I have not heard of that Sept before." Ernatta murmurs, looking around for someone to say what they know. She is leaning forward on the settee—something Yadira would never let her do—staring as Odall gathered an usher and six guards, both Dayne and Stark, hurrying away.
"That is the point, I believe. Our cousin will be far from our reach now."
Essine was more vocal in this, protesting the removal of his knighthood— he was the one to call for Yadira to save Lyanna Stark, and this is how he is treated? What of the Lannister? Was his father's gold that valuable? Yadira orders everyone back to their work, having Ernatta send them for a nap, and pulling Essine close into a closet, hushing her. Camille was glad for the nap to check on her uncle again. In her bed Essine and Ypolita sit next to each other on stools as they are encircled by airy silk hangings and with a little smile, slips from sparrow to cat to another little bird, to get to her uncle.
The king had not waited before sending Arthur to his imprisonment. It was already midday, the sun slowly descending, without a single cloud in the sky to block the burning light. Yadira had hurried to get to the yard, a basket in the hands of her youngest handmaid, the auburn-haired Aldoryssa. Camille has to slip into a greyhound to watch her uncle be escorted by a dozen men, her governess not far behind. He would not even have proper transportation—it looked like one of the wayns used those wretched souls in the country. Yadira had forcefully declared she was permitted by Lord Stark to say goodbye to her cousin, and the Stark men she took had the guards allow it. But only barely, standing out in a sort of halo, as if Yadira would pull out a sword and slay them all herself.
Her governess gave a single circular look on the cart, and could barely hold her disdain, while Aldoryssa seemed to struggle with the basket. Yadira calls for him to be unchained—he has no weapons—and the gaoler sneers but does it regardless. Yadira, and her maid give him a long glare until he backs away, and a Dayne guard takes his place after she gestures. Yadira takes the basket from her handmaid and she steps back, as Yadira places it in his lap. Now a little bird on the cart, she sees her uncle sort through the food, and spots a small bag of leather as it easily undoes itself. Gold and silver and copper.
"This is for the servants," he says under his breath. Yadira just gives a half smile, patting his hand.
"We want you to be well fed on your way to the sept."
"I will not need it."
"A precaution. The weather will not always be as fair as today, cousin."
"Do not—" Yadira puts the cloth over the food, and kisses both cheeks.
"You must go to uncle in Braavos, or my nanna in Pentos," she whispers, pulling away.
The driver of the cart shoos people away as he prepares to head out of the yard. Arthur looks alarmed as the cart begins to move slowly.
"They expect you to fight it,"
Yadira keeps the slow pace, a saunter as he begins to move away. Aldoryssa quickly stays a few paces behind her as she does. The dust kicks up leaving swirls against her black gown. "Do you have anything else you would like to say?" Her voice carries over the noise.
"Tell the king to get better cats. The rats scurried around my cell and door every night."
Yadira lets out a laugh, and then regains her decorum, waiting until he is out of sight in the crowds of the city. Camille feels terribly embarrassed.
From what Camille could gather in her wanderings the days afterward, the Camlone Septry was a small community at the tip of the Seaan Peninsula. At Camlone her uncle would work gardens and fields and 'hold his peace unless in prayer' what she later found out meant was utter silence unless praying. That seemed horrific to Camille.
The most interesting fact to her was that the sept was in the lands of House Mallister in the Riverlands. That was where Hoster ruled, she remembered, and Camille wondered if he had anything to do with where he was sentenced. Essine certainly did and told Yadira so. Not that it changed her governess' moods at meals toward him. It was unbearable to Camille. Yadira was polite and smiling as ever, even giving grateful words to the king for his mercy. Either way, she wondered what her mother would do when she heard the news.
Other news from court said the Hand was more interested in the wedding than the king. She believed it. Her father held little interest in the Lannisters, seeming to look through the man, and his son Jaime, and the king fed off of that. Soon enough the soon to be queen was arriving, and it was all the court would speak of. Camille did not even get to see the new queen arrive, stuck in her rooms with her lessons and Baby Jon.
Yadira had attended, though, that and the welcoming feast, and the next morning as she was being bathed, Yadira told everyone about it in rapid Dornish. Ernatta was to bathe her as Essine held her towels, and Ypolita the platter for the combs and creams. Yadira sat on a stool while her ladies held her clothes—a stiff gown of Braavosi cloth, a raisin colored samite undergown and soft linen shift of sheer silver and a platter with all her jewels. They laughed at the story while she and Theryse and Aurelia played in the tub more than bathed.
"You say the streets were empty?" Ernatta says, putting a pan of water over her head.
"I said half empty," Yadira giggled. "Lord Lannister's men were cheering for her, though the smallfolk of the city seemed less enthused."
"And what did she do?"
"Well, she pretended that she didn't care. So did her father, but everyone else saw."
"What did they expect after what he did?"
"For them to be grateful he let them watch her 'joyous entry' into the city. I struggled to keep my face the entire time."
"No. You?" Essine bit her lip in laughter. "And Lord Stark?"
"Oh, as flint faced as ever," Yadira said with a glance at Essine. "But we stood so long for everyone arrive, I know I saw him count everyone in the crowd."
The women all giggle.
"But the king-"
"The king doesn't care, he wants her gold, and the Hand her father's peace to not turn cloak again." Camille agreed, remembering the way the king seemed to like every woman he saw, and the words of reasoning Jon Arryn had to give the king about the marriage.
"Come now, cousin. You know women with yellow cunt hair are always a favorite." Essine whispered the end, but Camille had heard it and couldn't help her own laugh then, deciding to mess with her ladies.
"Cunt! Cunt!"
The ladies all gasped at once coming close to the tub chiding to not repeat that word. Camille gave a naughty smile and went back to her floating boats in the tub. With the look Yadira gave Essie, she giggled at her joke. It was fun to be a baby sometimes.
Camille was clean now, but the water was still warm. She was enjoying the relief in her small closet from everyone, even her father's people, who watched them without blinking it felt like. Soon her cousins were taken out of the tub and dried, Ernatta getting the creams from Odall. The other handmaids took Theryse and Aurelia out to the bedchamber to change. It was then when she was splashing she straightened her hand and watched as the sudsy water seemed to part along the line she made and curve up like soft clay. She was in awe. Camille had never done this before. Her whole body tingled.
"Lyarra."
Camille released her hand, the feeling quickly leaving and the water splashing down. Camille slowly looked up to her governess. Yadira stood there, clutching her towel, eyes wide.
"I knew," she said, and went to her, pulling her up and kissing her face. "I knew, my little one. You are like us." Camille trembled in her arms. Like who? Yadira had grabbed her hands then and as she dried her spoke softly of the Rhoynar and their water witches. What they did. What she did. What Yadira would teach her. As much relief as she felt, it was not all she could do, but she was not going to ruin this. Somehow Camille had gotten lucky.
Eddard visited her every day for prayer. His visits were the only break from her daily schedule of Yadira's morning torture, and she otherwise had meals talking to Renly or Lord Howland, and being fitted for clothes with Theryse and Aurelia. During prayer, Camille learned to recite what little her father did in the godswood, wooded and silent. It was strange and lulling and it made her sleep heavily when she was finished. It was the forests and the sea and castles she saw in these dreams and she felt unable to stop them, and unable to leave, like she did when she would slip into animals. Yadira would watch her grogginess and give her little smiles in return. It was the gift growing, she would insist.
Meanwhile, she had also been busy for her household for the upcoming wedding, gaining the richest fabrics as she served 'The King's Beloved Brother Lord Stark'. Whatever they felt about Eddard, Camille was shocked how much her kin used his name to get what they wanted. The goldsmiths too eager to comply, and the merchants too happy to give them their wares. Yadira had chosen aquamarines for the occasion. She also had Camille fitted for seven black gowns of Braavosi cloth, more under gowns of purple in shades of mulberry, plum, and eggplant and new translucent shifts. There were no words for the awe of the handmaids when a triple-pile velvet damask the color of silver and white had been delivered. Yadira, Ernatta, and Odall would all wear the cloth with Camille for the wedding. Odall fainted she was so excited. Yadira's other two handmaids wept at being left out.
While she enjoyed dressing up, Ypolita told all of her gossip from the court: Lady Cersei's party had already started their quest for power. First was a complaint about living in the Maiden's vault until the wedding, which Jon Arryn had said only the queen resides in the Queen's side. Then there had been a debate between her aunts Genna, Rohanne, and Cerissa, and the king's women of the court, mainly his cousins and older aunts. It was about who would have what positions in the queen's household. Jon had ended that, saying that the king still is undecided on the structure of the Queen's Court. He did not want to be so much like the dragons. And then there were those who brawled, and the drunken exploits of all those living int he city, and the wagers on who would win the tourney which many people betted on Ser Jaime Lannister.
On the morning of the wedding, Camille was scrubbed pink and perfumed with her mother's scent, and then dressed by her handmaids, while Yadira recited what the day entailed and her expectations. Camille was dressed soft white translucent linens, then an eggplant-colored undergown of satin with jewels crusted all on the cuffs and up the sleeve of yellow gems, and then her plush white velvet gown, with hanging sleeves that had only two inches above the ground. For her jewels, they were gold, with aquamarines pinned in her hair, on her forehead, in her ears, with the rest in a choker, necklace, on her wrists, and fingers. When Camille looked in the mirror, she could only stare at her reflection. She had forgotten how she had looked. She did not recognize herself. Camille's skin was too light, her curls too loose, her eyes startling. Essine had noticed her staring into the mirror and chuckled.
"Vain at two," she laughed. "A true Dayne."
Yadira agreed, and she shied from the mirror then.
It was then she, Yadira, Ernatta, and Odall were all put into a great litter drawn by two horses in the front and two in the back, sheer coverings of silver fluttering as they were surrounded by men with armed with swords, shorter swords, and axes, all frightening looking. Eddard was leading the group on his horse, with Lord Howland, and other lords just behind him. Yadira gave instructions on what to do, what to say, and to always smile, and Camille greeted them all in the perfect courtesy a two-year-old could, and they gave the smiles she expected, amused by her. On the way to the Great Sept of Baelor, Camille preoccupied herself with looking outside at the city. They held the pomander in front of her nose to block the smell as they passed through certain areas. This world endlessly fascinated Camille. The clothes they wore, their homes, the food, and the items they sold in the market place, it was surreal. Ernatta spoke to Odall and Yadira, letting her stare out to the streets. So long as she wasn't trapped in the walls of her nursery, Camille would not give them much trouble.
They all murmured in Dornish at the crowds. It looked full enough for her, but Yadira insisted that you could barely move during Princess Elia's wedding, everyone from both sides of the narrow sea ready to watch her ceremony. People didn't throw very many flowers either, she insisted, or cheer so for the Lannister girl and the west in all their finery was near tacky, insisted Odall. Camille had to admit the people who had arrived with the queen wore a great deal of jewelry and fabrics with long trails and wide sleeves that used a lot of bulky fabric.
They ascended up the hill to the Great Sept. There the dome of glass and gold is set off by seven crystal towers, each of which had a bell that vibrated through her body as they rung. Being held by Yadira, they are one of the few who were allowed on the platform with the king, looking down at all the others. The High Septon, with a large crystal crown and cloth of gold robes, gives longs prayers and leads them through the doors into and underneath suspended globes of colored glass. Through this hall of rainbow light, they enter through another set of the double-doors, being greeted by seven broad aisles, great windows of colored glass, and candles abound.
The greatest amount of candles is by the stature of the father and the mother, where their small party, following Eddard, goes to until they are at the very front of the steps directly beneath the place where the king waits.
The people all have their murmur as they file in and wait, Robert standing high up between the statues, handsome beyond belief in his black velvets and cloth of gold and his crown. Renly was not too far away, and Camille gave a grin at the sight–he was in the same colors, though much less impressive being a child. He smiled back when he saw her. Stannis stood beside him, but she didn't bother to look that high. He scowled enough at her.
Soon after the doors opened.
Tywin stood tall in crimson silks, lions roaring all around his clothes, rings on every finger, gilded in gold. Lady Cersei stood in a cloth of gold dress slashed with crimson silk- every corner and crease in the dress had gems, and in her hair were a hundred gold pieces and rubies that glittered. A thick necklace was around Cersei's neck of a lion, and other lesser ropes of gold handing upon her gown, or in between her breasts in the low cut front. She was as gilded in gold as her father, and behind them, a flood of girls had come holding an extremely long train, all dressed in crimson gowns slashed with cloth of gold and gleaming tiaras. When Lord Lannister lets go of Cersei so she may ascend the stairs, the handmaids spread her great train upon the steps, and then the floor, and then the aisle. She had counted forty-nine maids.
In her head, Camille recited what she remembered of her favorite songs from earth: the ceremony lasted an eternity. Robert and Cersei had begun their ceremony and said the seven vows, with the seven blessings invoked, and the seven promises exchanged. Longer than her graduations, waiting at the DMV, or waiting during layovers between flights. When the wedding song had been sung, the challenge was invoked, but no one said a word.
Robert removed the red cloak from Cersei and received a folded cloth from Stannis, who maneuvered around the long trail of the gown. The entire sept roared its cheers as they kissed.
The feast after the wedding lasted long after Camille had become full, getting a sample of each dish as she always did. They allowed her to sit next to her father on the high dais, both of them changed into the cloth of silver robes and matching jewelry. The singers sang, the fools played, and bears danced as everyone laughed. At the sight of Lord Hoster's frown in the celebrations, Camille could only give a dimpled smile.