3. The Beginning of the Darkness.

Sanjay didn't have any lessons of any kind that afternoon, and he decided to use his hours of freedom to leave the house and go out to the streets of Qarth, where his friends were waiting for him to go and play. They were waiting for him down the street in which he lived, and he ran to meet them with a big smile on his face. When he saw the big group of children- most of them were sons of men from Cersei's guard and army- his smile became wider. By the time he reached them he was breathless, but not at all tired.

"Sanjay!" his best friend, Aylard, exclaimed when he saw him. Aylard was a boy from Westeros; he had dark blond hair and happy green eyes. He was a little bit older than Sanjay, but he was smaller than his friend in size.

"There he is!" another one of his best friends, Galot, exclaimed to the other boys. Galot was also from Westeros; he had curly brown hair and hazel eyes. He was six years of age and he was taller than Aylard, but still he was smaller than Sanjay.

Sanjay's other best friend was Jarvis, who was from Essos unlike Aylard and Galot. He had tan skin, short black hair and dark brown eyes, and he was one of the loudest boys of the entire group; he always got in trouble and got his friends in trouble as well, but he had such an innocent face that he was able to get out of it almost always. His eyes, however, were mischievous. He was Sanjay's age, though a couple of months older.

"Come on!" another boy exclaimed. Sanjay didn't know all the boys in the group, but he followed them nonetheless when they started running to go somewhere where they could play, as always. All the boys were carrying wooden toy swords, and they played pretending that they were valiant knights and great warriors, defeating their enemies, conquering castles and entire cities, exploring far-away lands and slaying dragons.

They arrived at one of streets in Qarth in which the palace of Cersei Lannister was located. The street was wide and there wasn't a lot of people there, making it easy to play without bothering anyone or being told to go somewhere else. They decided to break into two groups. Each group would be a different army, and their game would be a glorious war. Each group was deciding who their captain would be, and Sanjay's group decided to make him captain. He smiled, feeling proud of himself for it, and he positioned himself at the head of his group- his army. The captain of the other group came forward as well and rose his wooden sword in the air.

"I will win this war!" he exclaimed, trying to sound triumphant even with his childish voice. "I am Aegon the Conqueror, and I will take the Seven Kingdoms for myself!"

Sanjay rolled his eyes. The boy that had spoken was Armin, the annoying son of one of Cersei's knights. He had black hair, just like Sanjay, and grey-green eyes. He was the tallest boy in the entire group, though Sanjay was not much shorter than him. He was about to start training with his father so that he could someday become a knight too, and while Sanjay had no problem with that, he did have a problem with how rude Armin could be about it sometimes. He was always considering himself above everyone else in the group because he was highborn, and he often treated the other boys badly. He was friends with the other highborn kids, though he didn't treat them much better than he did the other kids. He used his superior training as advantage over the boys who had never been next to a knight in their lives to win every game. Sanjay never did that, he hated to not play fair, and he deeply disliked Armin.

"You can't be Aegon!" one of the boys protested. "You have black hair!"

Almost all the boys laughed, and Armin shot an annoyed glare at the boy that had pointed that little detail out.

"Fine," he spat. "Then I will be King Robert Baratheon!"

The boys in his team cheered, and some chanted "long live the king!" already feeling completely in mood for the game and to start that fake battle of theirs. Armin then looked at Sanjay with an air of superiority to him, and shot him a challenging glare while he pointed at him with his wooden sword.

"And who will you be, Waters?" Armin asked, using Sanjay's bastard name instead of his given name. Sanjay clenched his jaw, but he didn't say anything about it and acted as if he hadn't heard the insult behind Armin's words.

"I will be..." he started saying, though he hesitated. Who would he be? He tried to think of any great warriors and knights and kings, but all the people that came to his mind were Targaryens, and Armin had not been allowed to play a Targaryen for having black hair just like him. Sanjay wanted to be Prince Rhaegar Targaryen, but he bit his tongue and didn't say his name. Besides, Rhaegar had lost to King Robert in the war and Sanjay didn't want that to cause him to lose against Armin. He continued thinking, until an image from Ellyn's book of the Houses of Westeros appeared in his mind, and he smiled. He rose his sword in the air just like Armin had done before. "I will be Robb Stark, the King in the North!"

Some of the older and highborn kids gasped upon hearing the name, but no one said anything. Sanjay stared at Armin, waiting for the boy to said anything against him being King Robb, but Armin said nothing. He just kept challenging Sanjay with his narrowed grey-green eyes, until he finally shouted:

"Attack!"

The game started then, and both teams charged against each other and fought. Well, fighting for them meant yelling really loud and clashing their wooden swords over and over again. Most of them didn't even hit the other boys, and they chased each other around a lot, almost crashing against people that walked by. Armin was hitting other boys, and he was doing it real hard, making some of them cry. He was doing it on purpose, and he smiled when he hit them, thinking himself victorious. Sanjay also hit some people, but he didn't do it as hard as Armin was, and he wasn't doing it on purpose, not really. He felt as if some kind of instinct was taking over him, making him feel the need to hit them even when he wasn't conscious that he has hitting them with his wooden sword. He just saw openings in their pathetic defenses and went for it, feeling as if he was really in a real battle, fighting against enemies for dominance over a kingdom. And he felt happy. He wanted that to be him when he was older: Sanjay Waters, a great and powerful knight, the best soldier in the whole wide world.

Soon, Sanjay and Armin were facing each other. Armin was taller than Sanjay, and he was older, and crueler, but Sanjay was stronger. Their wooden swords clashed in the air between them.

"You can't beat me!" Armin exclaimed, pushing Sanjay away and attempting to hit him with his sword.

Yes I can, Sanjay thought, but he didn't say it out loud.

He charged against Armin again, while the other boys continued play fighting around them. Some curious citizens of Qarth stopped and looked at the children, amused, but the boys payed them no mind. For them, that game was serious.

"No one can beat me!" Armin exclaimed.

"That is what you think!" Sanjay protested, not keeping his thoughts to himself anymore. He tried to hit Armin, but the boy blocked him.

"I am King Robert Baratheon!" Armind said, reminding everyone who his character was. "I won the war against the Mad King and I will win you! I will behead you, Young Wolf, just like you were beheaded the last time!"

Sanjay frowned. Beheaded? The King in the North had been beheaded? He hadn't inquired a lot about the story of the man when he saw him in the book, and Ellyn had not wanted to tell him. If Robb Stark had been killed during the War of the Five Kings, then perhaps it hadn't been the best choice for Sanjay to pick for that game.

His momentarily distraction almost got himself hit by Armin's wooden sword, but he took a step back and dodged. He focused on the game again.

"Perhaps I will behead you!" he shot back to Armin, surprising the boy.

Armin suddenly gasped, and so did the boys that were behind him. They stopped fighting and stared at something that was behind Sanjay. He frowned, not understanding why everyone had suddenly stopped playing, and then he turned his back on them to see what what happening. He almost gasped as well when he saw Cersei Lannister and her guards standing there; she had interrupted her stroll outside of the palace to look at the playing boys with curiosity. She had her head tilted a bit to the side, and she was staring at Sanjay and Armin.

"Who is going to behead who?" she wondered, and her voice made Sanjay shudder. He didn't like that woman, and he knew that she did not like him.

Armin spoke before he did. "He says he is going to defeat me, but he can't! No one can defeat me!"

"I see... And who are you?"

"I'm Robert Baratheon, your Grace!"

If Armin noticed the disgust in Cersei Lannister's expression upon hearing the name of her deceased husband, he certainly didn't show any signs of it. The woman looked at the boy with distaste for a couple of tense seconds before turning her gaze to Sanjay.

"And you, Sanjay? What... valiant hero have you chosen to interpret?"

"I..." he said, hesitating. He hadn't expected to see the Queen there. He remembered then what Ellyn had told him, that Cersei did not like the Starks and that she didn't like Robb Stark. He gulped, not wanting to say the truth, but he knew that any other boy would say it if he didn't or if he lied. "I am Robb Stark... Your Grace."

He did see the way in which Cersei's features became hard and cold. Her green eyes narrowed and glared at him, and he shuddered when he felt the heaviness of the hate in them, and it was all directed towards him. He had definitely made a mistake choosing to play as Robb Stark, but he did not apologize. Why should he? It wasn't as if Cersei had forbidden him to ever mention the name of the King in the North.

"Where did you learn that name?" Cersei hissed, failing to hide the rage in her voice.

Sanjay shrugged; he did not want to put the blame on Ellyn and say that he had found out about the King in the North from a book she had bought for him.

Cersei glared at him some more, and then she laughed. The sound startled Sanjay, and he looked at the woman frightened. What was she laughing? He had thought that she was mad at him...

"Of course..." Cersei murmured. "Of course that you would choose Robb Stark to play as him... Traitors are drawn to traitors..."

Traitors? Sanjay wasn't a traitor! Then why did that woman say that? She kept laughing as if she had heard the funniest jest on Earth. She looked at the other boys who had stopped playing and where staring at her as feeling as puzzled as Sanjay was.

"I don't know why you want to play with him," she told to the other children. "Why would you want to get near this... this bastard?" she asked, full of spite, and then she glared at Sanjay again. He took a step back, hurt by her words. Why was she talking to her friends like that?! "This... scum. He is nothing but a bastard born from a traitor and a whore. He is nothing. Worthless."

Sanjay felt tears stinging in his eyes, and soon enough he felt them streaming down his face. His whole body was shaking terribly, and his grip on the wooden sword became so tight that he thought that it might break. He felt his pride being stabbed, and he felt the judging stares of his friends and the other boys on him. They had never thought any less of him because of his bastard status, they just considered him another boy just like them, except Armin of course. But now that the Queen was openly insulting and humiliating him, the other boys glared at Sanjay accusingly. Bastard, he could read in their eyes. Traitor. Son of a whore.

Aylard, Galot and Jarvis weren't looking at him like the other boys were, but it didn't matter. Sanjay felt worse than he had ever felt in his life. He turned around, looking at everyone in the eyes, and when his gaze met Armin's he saw the boy smirking. Sanjay glared at him, feeling hate for the first time in his life. He wanted to glare at Cersei too and let her know how much he hated her as well, but he knew he couldn't. If he did then he might really be a traitor, and things would be so much worse.

Lowering his eyes to look at the ground, Sanjay dropped the wooden sword and ran away. He thought he heard Armin and some of the boys laughing cruelly as they watched him running away, but he didn't go back and punch them like he wanted to do. Instead he just ran and ran and ran through the streets of Qarth until he arrived at his home. The door was open, so he just ran inside and closed behind him. He ran to the interior of the house, where Ellyn was at the table working on some needlework. His sudden appearance startled her.

"Ellyn!" the little boy cried, running towards the woman. As soon as she saw his face, red and damp with angry and desperate tears, Ellyn gasped and took her hand to her chest.

"Good gods, Sanjay!" she exclaimed, putting her needlework aside and kneeling on the floor to welcome the crying boy into her arms. He threw his arms around her and cried in her shoulder while she tried to calm him down. "Sshh, sshh, m'boy... It's alright. What happened?!"

"We were- we were playing..." he sobbed. "And Lady Lannister- the Queen... She came and- she told everyone that I- that I... That I am a bastard! The bastard son of a- of a traitor and a- and a- and a whore!" he knew enough to know that that was not a good thing, though he didn't know why. He heard Ellyn gasp beside him, and he knew that she knew why it was a bad thing. That just made Sanjay even sadder, and he cried harder than before. "I told you she hates me! And now everyone will hate me too."

"No one will hate you, Sanjay," Ellyn assured him, though she didn't convince him. "You are a very especial boy, and the Queen is wrong."

"How do you know?" Sanjay wondered, still crying. Ellyn didn't know who his parents were, so she couldn't know if the Queen was wrong in what she had said about Sanjay or not.

"Because I know. I know you, and I know that you are the best boy that there is in this despicable world."

"But I am a bastard!" he cried.

"So what?! Many great people are bastards, and that you were born as one is not your fault! You are not what you were born as, you are what you decide to become." Ellyn moved a little bit away from Sanjay and looked at him in the eyes with complete seriousness. She needed him to know that she meant what she was saying to him. She needed to teach him an important life lesson. "Wherever you are, wherever you go, people will always brand you as something. It happens to everyone, no matter who you are. Back in Westeros everybody was called some bad name or another for any reason. That will always happen, and in your case right now what they are calling you is 'bastard'. Now, will you let that word become you? Or will you grow into a fine man and make a new name for yourself? One that says who you really are, and of which you are proud of?"

Maybe Sanjay was too young to understand her wise words. Maybe he was too scared, too innocent, too unknowing of the world and of life still to fully comprehend what Ellyn was trying to tell him. But he was old enough to understand that what Ellyn was saying was that he didn't have to be scared or sad for what they were saying to him, and slowly he stopped crying. When he was done sobbing Ellyn smiled at him and cupped his face between her hands, which made him smile as well and feel silly for having cried so much before.

Ellyn smiled when she saw that her words had had the desired effect, and she hugged Sanjay again. She wiped the tears off his face and then she took his hand and led him to the bedroom, where they sat on his bed. Ellyn picked up the book about Westeros again, and opened it to show something to Sanjay.

"Look, these are some of the great men and women of Westeros that were insulted for something. They were all shamed for different things, but they all had great things as well."

Sanjay did not know that a highborn person could be insulted, and he was fascinated when Ellyn told him about them. It made him feel a little better.

"Look, Sanjay," Ellyn showed him one of the pages, which had a drawing of a man in a black cloak. He had brown hair and grey eyes, and Sanjay did not know who it was. "This is the current Lord of Dragonstone and Prince of Westeros. His name is Jon Targaryen, but do you know what his name was before the end of the war?"

Sanjay shook his head. He did not know, but he was curious. Ellyn smiled before telling him:

"Jon Snow. He was a bastard of the North."

Sanjay's eyes opened wide with shock, and he gaped while he stared at Ellyn.

"The Prince of Westeros was a bastard?!" he exclaimed, amazed.

Ellyn nodded, and Sanjay looked at the book awestruck. Maybe being a bastard wasn't that bad...

Sanjay and Ellyn kept reading the book during many hours, until the sun hid in the horizon and the sky became dark. Ellyn and Sanjay had dinner, and then the little boy went to bed. He asked Ellyn for one last story, just one more, and the woman complied. She sat on the side of Sanjay's bed and told him about the House that he chose.

"The Starks," he said when Ellyn asked him what House he wanted to hear about. Ellyn hesitated, but in the end she did read to him about them.

She told him about Ned Stark, and how he had been a leader of Robert's Rebellion. She told him of how he became Hand of the King, and of how he was executed by orders of King Joffrey Baratheon. She told Sanjay about Lady Catelyn and her son Robb Stark, and of how the War of the Five Kings started and the Starks marched against the Lannisters in several battles. She told him about how treason was the downfall of the Starks in the Red Wedding, and she told him about the brave daughters of Lord Ned and Lady Catelyn; Lady Arya and Lady Sansa. She told him of how they went to find the Dragon Queen in Slaver's Bay and rode the dragons with her to Westeros to take the Seven Kingdoms back. She told him of how Bran Stark became Lord of Winterfell and began to rebuild it, and of how Rickon Stark was given the Eyrie. Sansa Stark became Lady of the Dreadfort and married Sandor Clegane, the man she had fallen in love with. There was nothing on Arya Stark in the book, but Ellyn told Sanjay about how she had heard through gossip of the highborn people that she had recently fallen in love and married a former bastard named Gendry Waters, who was now Lord Baratheon, and had been given Storm's End and rule over the Stormlands. That amazed Sanjay even more.

After Ellyn was done telling Sanjay about the Starks, the boy closed his eyes and quickly fell asleep with a smile on his face. Ellyn brushed his black hair away from his face with her fingers and smiled upon seeing the peaceful expression on his face.

"Sweet dreams, m'boy," she whispered, leaning in to give Sanjay a good night kiss on the forehead.

She stood up and went to her room. She wanted to sleep, for she felt exhausted. She was always tired after a long day, but that day had been her day off and still she felt awful. She had been feeling like that for a long time already, and she didn't know why, but it was bothering her. But what bothered her the most was the pain...

She decided to forget about it. She would go and see a healer the next day if she still felt like that, but at that moment it was too late and she was convinced that what she needed was a good night's sleep.

She sat on her bed with the book on her lap. She sighed, distracted, and thought about the events of the day. What Sanjay had told her after he arrived at the house crying had made her really angry at Cersei Lannister, but there was nothing she could do against it. Cersei Lannister was her Lady and her Queen, and Ellyn was a simple servant; if she protested to the highborn woman for her treatment of Sanjay she could end up being severely punished. Even worse, the Queen might decide to take Sanjay away from her! Ellyn put a hand on her chest and gasped, feeling that that would be the worse thing that could happen to her. She loved Sanjay, she felt like he was her own son, and she would not let anyone take him away from her... Ellyn knew that she shouldn't be so fond of the boy, that she had just been hired to take care of him and nothing more, but she couldn't help it. Sanjay was so good, so sweet and innocent, and he definitely was like a son to her. Ellyn would do anything for that boy, and that was why she hated to see him cry because of the cruel words of that woman.

Ellyn sighed, and grimaced when she felt a deep pain in her belly that almost made her whimper. She shook her head, convinced that it was nothing, but the pain wouldn't go away. To try to take her mind off that matter, Ellyn opened the book on her lap, wanting to read a little bit while she waited for the pain to fade. It opened on the page dedicated to Sansa Stark.

Ellyn had spent a long time that day reading the pages of the Starks out loud, so she wanted to turn the page and look for the noblemen of the Vale, but something stopped her and made her look at the image of the young Stark woman painted in the page. Ellyn found that lady to be fascinating and mysterious, and incredibly brave. Yes, she had been the cause that Cersei Lannister had had to run away from Westeros and take her people with her, Ellyn included, but Ellyn didn't resent Lady Sansa for it. Everybody knew that she had suffered much, though Ellyn was immensely curious to know all the details of her story, the secrets that not everybody knew...

Married to Sandor Clegane, now Lord of the Dreadfort.

Ellyn looked at the picture of the woman. Sansa Stark was beautiful, with her thick auburn hair and her big and bright blue eyes of the same color of the sky... Then she remembered Sandor Clegane, the Hound. Ellyn had seen the Hound once or twice during her trips to King's Landing. He was huge, scary, rude and awfully burned. Ellyn pictured that man with Sansa Stark and frowned. They had nothing in common! But if the rumors were true, they truly loved each other...

She has the same eyes as Sanjay, Ellyn thought distractedly while she looked at the picture of the young woman, which was extremely well painted with a lot of skill.

Right after she thought that, Ellyn frowned. The same eyes as Sanjay... It wasn't the first time that Ellyn thought that Sanjay had the same eyes as the Tullys of Riverrun, and Sansa Stark was half a Tully so logically her eyes also reminded Ellyn of Sanjay's. She would have dismissed it as a curious coincidence like every other time she thought that, except that that time she realized something. She looked more closely at the picture of the woman.

She doesn't look like Sanjay, she thought while looking at the woman's auburn hair, feeling stupid because of the doubts that were growing inside of her. But this is just a painting...

Married to Sandor Clegane.

Sandor Clegane had had black hair, and he was huge. Ellyn had never seen a child bigger than Sanjay, and the lad wouldn't stop growing. If he continued at that pace he would end up towering over most men. Ellyn pictured an older Sanjay in her mind; he was very tall and very strong, with black locks of hair that fell over his eyes, blue like sapphires. For some reason, he looked both fierce and gentle. Much to Ellyn's surprise, what she pictured in her mind when she imagined and older version of Snajay was Sandor Clegane, but with the elegant features of Sansa Stark and blue eyes identical to the Tullys...

It can't be! Ellyn exclaimed in her mind. No, it can't be... I am just imagining all of this, it doesn't make any sense...

But it did. It did make sense. Sanjay was given to Ellyn as a newborn babe, and that had happened...

Nine moons after King Joffrey became betrothed to Margaery Tyrell, Ellyn realized, having calculated the timeline in her head. The whole kingdom had heard of that betrothal and of the fact that Sansa Stark had been cast away. After the treason of Lady Sansa and the Hound was discovered.

Not wanting to jump into conclusions, Ellyn gathered more evidence in her head that confirmed her suspicions. But what else did she need, really? It was all right there. King Joffrey had given the child to Ellyn. Why would the King give away a newborn babe if he wasn't an important bastard? Cersei Lannister hated the boy, even though she had no reason to do it... And she called him the son of a traitor and a whore.

That was it. Sanjay was the bastard son of Lady Sansa Stark and Sandor Clegane.

She had to tell him! Ellyn almost jumped off the bed, but she stopped herself. She couldn't tell Sanjay! What would Cersei Lannister say or do if she found out that Ellyn had discovered the truth and told Sanjay? Then she would definitely be punished, and Ellyn did not want that.

She took a deep breath, and decided to keep that secret to herself until Sanjay was older. Once he grew up more and Ellyn considered that he was ready then she would tell him what she had found out that night... But what could he do with that information? Nothing. Sanjay was stuck with Cersei Lannister in Essos, and his real parents were at the other side of the world.

Maybe that is why Sansa Stark attacked King's Landing with the Dragon Queen, Ellyn thought then. She was trying to find her son. She was trying to get revenge.

For a second she hoped that one day the woman could be reunited with her child, and Ellyn felt sad for her. How awful it must be, to have a child ripped out of your arms and taken away from you. Ellyn had lost a child, but at least she knew that her babe was at peace and safe in the heavens with the gods. Sansa Stark had no clue of what had happened to her son...

And then Ellyn became afraid that she would be separated from Sanjay if he was ever reunited with his parents, and she decided that maybe she did not want the woman to find her child. Not yet, at least.

I am being too selfish, Ellyn scolded herself mentally.

She left the book on the bed and stood up. She needed a glass of water, and she also needed to calm down. Her discovery had upset her.

The pain came back as she was walking to the small kitchen of the house, and this time it actually made her whimper and bend over. The pain became stronger, and she cried in pain. She tripped and fell to the floor, and then she started coughing like she had been doing in the last moons. However this time the coughing was more severe than it had ever been, and she felt weak and unable to breathe. She was suffocating, her lungs were on fire.

She covered her mouth with her hand, and it was splattered with blood. Some of the blood fell to the floor and the liquid stained the stone.

"Ellyn?" she heard Sanjay's sleepy voice calling her from his bedroom, wondering what was wrong. "Ellyn?!"

No, don't come here. You don't have to see this!

She wanted to tell him that she was alright and tell him to go back to sleep, but she couldn't even speak. More blood poured out of her mouth as Sanjay appeared next to her. When he saw her like that, the little boy gasped horrified and ran to her side.

"Ellyn! Ellyn! ELLYN!"

He kept calling her name and shaking her, not knowing what to do. He was just a four year old boy, and he was scared, and he was crying and he had no idea of what was happening. Ellyn saw the terror in his eyes and the tears streaming down his cheeks again. Her vision became blurry and covered with dark spots.

Please don't cry...

Sanjay ran away from her side and made for the door of the house. Ellyn could hear him as he ran down the street, crying and screaming, calling from help from somebody, anybody.

No... This shouldn't be happening... This can't be happening, I can't leave him alone...

"Please, help!" Sanjay screamed. He repeated it over and over again in all the ways that he knew how to say it; the Common Tongue, Valyrian, Qartheen, Dothraki... No one answered. "Please! HELP! PLEASE!"

Sanjay's desperate pleas for help were the last thing that Ellyn heard before she closed her eyes and everything became black.