Chapter Two
At eight years of age, there were a few matters that Lyarra Snow took as unyielding truths in her life.
First, she was a bastard and thus, intrinsically inferior in the eyes of Lady Stark and those like her, compared to her trueborn siblings.
Second, her father, Lord Eddard Stark, was the strongest man in the world and nothing, neither armed men nor frightening storms nor going on a hunger strike for two whole days to be allowed in Robb's swordplay lessons, could gainsay him.
Third, Winterfell was her home, would always be her home and would never stop being her home, because no matter how much Lady Stark requested it, her father assured her that she would never be fostered elsewhere.
In the last few days, all of those assumptions had tumbled to the ground like a wavering tower of blocks left defenseless against Arya's wandering hands. Winterfell would not always be her home because her father couldn't stand against everything, as someone- a prince, no less- was demanding that she be raised in her mother's home.
Oh, and she had a mother. Lyarra Snow instinctively knew that she must have had one, everyone had a mother once, but now she had a mother. A name and story and face and everything. Aliandra Sand. The baseborn daughter of Prince Lewyn- she was the granddaughter of a Kingsguard knight!- and a cypto- crypto- someone who likes doing puzzles. The man that had arrived to take her away had told her this and while Lyarra was poised to dislike him at first, despite the pretty color of his tunic and the kind smile he offered her when they met, she couldn't. He had gifted her a golden locket shaped into a sun and inside, opened by a clever, delicate little copper latch, was a portrait of her mother. A pretty woman of sharp angles on her face and amber-gold eyes, with hair in thick black curls (like her!) and a satisfied smirk on her face.
It was the first piece of jewelry Lyarra Snow had ever received, and the most expensive gift too, but she valued it so much more for its history. Prince Lewyn had this commissioned for his daughter's birth. It had been her mother's once and now it was hers and the man, who had introduced himself as Uncle Oberyn though Lyarra was far too shy to call a prince by such a familiar name, had promised stories of his Cousin Aliandra too. Her father had a strange cast to his features when Prince Oberyn said such, one she assumed to be grief as he quickly interrupted any storytelling to introduce the tall, lithe man to Lady Stark. The woman had her lips pressed together so tightly that it had looked like she was sucking a lemon.
Lyarra didn't begrudge her father his grief but she was still a bit cross with him for stealing Prince Oberyn. He was the best (and only) source of stories about a mother that she had! Why did Father take him away before she could learn even the flimsiest detail of her mother's life?
Her anger over that, slight as it was, only added to the grief she felt at learning her mother was dead. It wasn't anything specific for Aliandra Sand herself but a simple longing to know the woman that brought her into this world. There was relief, too, that her mother hadn't abandoned her for being a bastard and guilt, because she was relieved over her own mother being dead. All of that was compounded by a detached sort of wonder that people were fighting over her.
Her, Lyarra Snow, the Bastard of Winterfell, that House Martell wanted to raise in Sunspear, while Father wanted to keep her at home. Father obviously didn't like Prince Oberyn, and the emotion was more than well-returned, a set that neither men had hid particularly well from the perceptive child. There had been all of that tension from dinner and Lady Stark was briefly distracted from staring down at her to fuss over Robb, who had declared another hunger strike in the face of her leaving to Dorne, despite his body still recovering from their last shared rebellion.
Lyarra had unexpectedly joined in the side of the enemy by picking up a butter-slicked roll and stuffing it in her brother's mouth, as he maintained his silent glare against an amused Dornish Prince. It's not that she wanted to leave Winterfell either, and in fact, her heart ached at the mere thought of it, but this wasn't a fight that they could sway either way. And if Lyarra did end up leaving, she didn't want her brother fainting of hunger pangs before he hugged her goodbye.
'Do I want to go to Dorne?'
The dark-haired girl didn't want to leave Winterfell, certainly. The castle was her home, this was her family. She was a child of the North and excepting some trying moments with her stepmother, had lived a happy life here. Winterfell meant her father's rare, booming laughter, Robb's hands squeezing hers when nightmares struck, Sansa delighting in braiding ribbons in her curls and Arya peering up at her with guileless grey eyes as shattered glass rained at her feet. Even baby Bran, not yet two years old, would toddle over to her when she coaxed him to. This was her family. She loved them.
'But I have family in Dorne too.' A lot of family. Prince Doran, her uncle, had three children of his own while Prince Oberyn was expecting a sixth daughter from his lover, Ellaria. He hadn't said it outright but by the words he hadn't said, particularly any claim of being wed, and Lady Stark's icy-cold eyes made Lyarra think that they were bastards. Like her. 'He speaks of them so proudly.'
It bewildered her. Father loved her, of course he did, but Lyarra was a bastard. She had supper in her own rooms whenever guests arrived and stood back with the high-ranking servants' children when the family was announced. No one had ever spoken as proudly of her as Prince Oberyn did of his children.
'I want that.' Lyarra wanted that pride. She wanted so many things. To travel the world, to read every book ever written, to learn to fight beside Robb… she wanted and wanted and wanted and sometimes, when it became too much, she closed herself under the coverlets, shrouded in body heat and darkness and scrunched her eyes so tightly closed that red blurs fell in the back of her eyelids. She told herself that she was a bastard and it was dangerous to want and that she must stop. Sometimes it worked, for a short while, and then she would see something or hear something that made her want again.
Prince Oberyn Nymeros Martell, with his smooth olive skin and quick-flitted grin and glittering eyes, made her ache in want too. She wanted to accept his offered hand and everything that came with it. She wanted a family that would introduce her- this is Lyarra, she is a Martell- and wouldn't be ashamed of her. She wanted him to brag about her, as he did Obara and Nymeria and Tyene and Sarella and Elia, her cousins that each had different mothers but were all claimed proudly by their father. She wanted to see the sands she'd been born into. She wanted to know of her mother's life.
But Lyarra wanted to stay in Winterfell too. 'I'm being selfish and if I keep wanting than I won't be having anything at all.'
x
Oberyn Martell wasn't all that impressed with Winterfell. For one, it was cold. This may have been self-evident as this was the main seat of the North but Gods, was it cold. A man's piss could turn to freeze into a sculpture within minutes of undoing his trousers, not that he was willing to test that theory lest he lost his balls along the way. Ellaria would be quite upset with him if he returned with that aspect of his anatomy damaged. She probably wouldn't mind injured knuckles all that much, which was good because Oberyn still hadn't ruled out breaking Ned Stark's overly large nose.
The reason for that neatly read into his second problem. He had expected his baby cousin's upbringing to be bad with the mad harpy's trout sister raising her but still found himself surprised when he arrived. No, that wasn't the right word at all. Lyarra Snow had, for all intents and purposes, a good life as a bastard north of the Red Mountains. She was well-fed, kept in well-stitched clothes, if those made of inferior fabrics to her siblings, and educated as a low level member of the gentry. Likely Ned Stark meant her for a landed knight, a high-ranked servant or an established merchant or craftsmen. It wasn't all that bad a life. The Viper had certainly seen bastards treated worse before. But while that would earn Oberyn's disdain as a youth, it inflamed ire now in a child of his own blood.
Lyarra was two years younger than his next eldest daughter, Sarella. She was only a year older than Elia and had either of the two, or any of his daughters, truly, been treated thusly by others, Oberyn would have been furious. He was infuriated now in the skittish, hesitant manner Lyarra regarded him. He was infuriated in the whispers his own servants had carefully gathered from Winterfell's younger ones- Ned Stark evidently couldn't keep a firm hand on his own castle- and he was infuriated twice more that Lyarra Snow's potential was being snuffed out.
Carding through the intelligence, one could find a curious, gifted child that loved to read and desired to learn to fight. A child that fearlessly explored the Godswood, ran after her eldest brother in his games and had advanced far in sums (unsurprisingly for any child of Ari's). A child who was slowly falling into the box drawn for her by a jealous, insecure woman, as a subtle distinction broke between herself and her siblings.
That Ned Stark would not allow his eldest daughter to learn the sword, as he had his son, Oberyn could accept. He didn't approve of it but he knew that many men shared such biases against their daughters. That he hadn't pushed for Lyarra to join her sister's harp and bells lessons or to take instruction from a dance master was inconceivable. That Lyarra almost headed to the lower tables when he arrived, before jerking backwards in remembrance of the upper dias, was intolerable. That her own half-siblings, though admittedly not in the plural, as the only redheaded girl seemed to follow her mother's dictates, were slowly growing distant from her by the Lady Stark's was unacceptable.
And it was cold. No Dornish child should ever have to be raised in this biting, unforgiving cold. That was practically torture in and of itself.
No, Oberyn had swiftly decided, penning his response to Doran, Lyarra Snow simply must return to Dorne. His brother may have had some doubts about pulling the child away from the only home she had ever known but after taking a look into that home, Oberyn now knew this to be the best decision. There would be pain at first, certainly so, for Lyarra was a child that loved her half-siblings fiercely, but the young were malleable. She would flourish better with the sun at her brow, without the ice creeping upwards to choke the flowers bud in the beginning.
They would also leave as soon as the proper horses could be arranged. It was very, very cold.
His decision made, the Red Viper rose to track down his errant little cousin. The last servant he had tagged on her movements reported that she had left to the Godswood. Having never seen one of the infamous bone-white trees of the North before, Oberyn would take the opportunity to assuage this curiosity as well.
'They're not all too subtle with their staring,' Oberyn noted, amused. Whispers spread like wildfire throughout the castle, as they often did, when he arrived. Many of these servants were smallfolk that hadn't the chance to travel outside of their isolated realm. Likely as not, he was the first Dornishman they'd seen yet, and as his reputation well-preceded him, they stared in the morbid fascination of one staring a deadly viper in the eye. All too aware of the poison at his bite but drawn regardless by the charm, the sensuality, of a beast wholly unknown to them. 'I'd bed the lady's maid had I the time.'
Not only was she a pretty woman of dark brown cut into a measured short style but whispers between the sheets might tell him more of Lady Stark's household. Oberyn had already seen a few vital flaws to the Stark's reign. There hadn't been a single foster child, excepting of course an Ironborn hostage, which held its own dangers. He hoped they had the sense to keep their Heir away from a boy almost certain to be his enemy one-day, when he returned home. The Ironborn simply could not survive on their rocky terrain without reaving for long and if a friendship should start, it would make the eventual battle all the more difficult. There was a Sept in the courtyard too. Oberyn wasn't all too vested in the Gods himself but even he wondered at its presence in the heartblood of the Old Faith. Then there was the lack of tail following him. Oberyn appreciated it but still wondered what the hells Ned Stark was thinking. He certainly wouldn't have trusted himself to wander a keep alone.
'At least Lyarra will be far away from here when the tower blocks fall,' he determined. The Viper had wondered if Lyarra was even the child's true name but when pressed for answers, Ned Stark claimed not to have heard her mother's choice and named her himself. Oberyn was fairly certain he was lying- and Ned Stark was, by the way, an awful liar unbefitting of Ari's lusts- but Ari was dead and gone. Lyarra the child had been raised and, unless she requested otherwise, Lyarra she would remain.
'Her health is good though. That is to her benefit.' Not many young girls could make such a trek as he was doing now. It was to his ease as a warrior with a lengthy stride but impressive for a child.
There weren't many trees in Dorne, the soil hadn't the nutrients to nurture such and the early forests had been rooted up long ago but there was an impressive variety here. Oberyn was studied enough to pick out the most common ones- oak, birch, pine, briar, ironwood- and appreciated it's subtle color shifts of gradients of green, black and brown. It was a dull, understated sort of beauty when one looked through their eyes alone. If one engaged the other senses though, there was a quiet splendor in the Godswood. A hush to the trees that almost felt godly itself and the scent of loam, tree rot and damp leaves that added life and decay both to the air. There was a soft crunch of leaves and branches as his calfskin boots picked their way through the serpentine trails, and the wind whistled eerily through swaying branches. It wasn't comforting in any manner but it felt… of balance.
'A good place to order your thoughts,' Oberyn idly summarized his next letter to his brother.
The air began to condense into silvery mist around him, warmth effused from the famous hot springs of the North. When he stepped by a break in the treelines, Oberyn saw a mighty Heart Tree of bark as pale as Dawn was, with leaves that were not blood red but a darker garnet, above a reflecting pool that was nearly opaque for the misty vapors rising above it. Roots rose directly from the water itself and on one, her back tucked securely to where three trunks rose to form an arched seat of sorts, was his baby cousin. Her knees were pulled up and she was turned away from him, body half angled to a face in the trees, an old woman with eyes bleeding red sap and a snarling sort of frown, one preceding battle, as he knew, beside her. Oberyn watched in curiosity as Lyarra spoke to this vengeful creature in the tone one does for an affection grandmother or a devoted elderly aunt.
Ari's gold sunburst locket was in her hand and Lyarra was showing it to the tree, speaking in an excited mummer of words he could not hear. Oberyn was a father of five, soon six hopefully, and he sent a brief prayer for Ellaria's safe delivery, daughters though. He well knew of what little girls might be happily sharing and while it amused him to see this, he worried that she had not another girl-child or a woman to speak to instead. Had Lyarra not any friends here?
'Silly question,' he amended afterward, 'Had she been allowed to make friends by the Lady Stark?'
Even had the woman not forbidden it herself, the attitudes of the Lady of the House always dwindled down to the servants. If Lyarra was unfavored by the trout, none would risk befriending her. Those that had the status to do so regardless, weren't here because the Starks, for some reason, did not keep fosterlings. No matter. She would make friends aplenty in Sunspear.
Oberyn deliberately stepped more strongly on the ground as he approached. He had no desire to scare the child.
Lyarra Snow had keen ears though. Her head whipped towards him so quickly that her short, dark waves corkscrewed off her chin. Wide, violet eyed blinked owlishly for a moment and then she flushed, such a sudden, deep crimson shade, that Oberyn was immediately amused by the reaction.
"Prince Oberyn!" Her young voice was light and airy, unlike either Aria's soft, husky tone of Ned Stark's firm timbre. This was in the way of girls though, so Oberyn thought nothing of it.
"Lady Lyarra!" He chirped back, hoping to put her at ease. Aware of the height and strength between the two of them, he paused several feet away from her reach. The waters of the reflecting pool lapped at his boots. "How are you on this fine day? I had arrived to see the Heart Tree for myself but am quite pleased at finding company here."
Her blush still strong, she scrambled down from her position and, this impressed him greatly, made a practiced leap from the root over the entirety of the pond and to the loamy ground. She hadn't even stumbled. "Have you ever been to a Godswood before?"
"I have not," Oberyn freely admitted. "There are a few in Dorne but they have all been petrified by the climate. They are trees of stones where the faces themselves cannot cry."
Lyarra cocked her head to the side, a little unhappy. "There aren't any Godswoods in the Dorne?"
"None that are live Heart Trees. We may take a sapling from here, if you should like."
The dark-haired girl considered this for a moment and then shook her head sadly. "Heart Trees must be planted to the ground. They cannot be uprooted for more than a sennight before they wither."
"And that would not be long enough for our travels, yes," Oberyn observed. He sat down gingerly on the ground, inwardly pleased when the child did the same, and indifferent to the stains on his trousers. "Where did you learn that?"
"Edderrion Stark's personal journal," she admitted. "I don't know how accurate it might be though. He traded with the Children of the Forest and claimed to burrow deep beneath the ground in his dreams."
"Sounds an interesting man," Oberyn commented. "And what else have you learnt of him?"
There was a wiggling to her posture as she hesitated over the next words. Oberyn knew that very well. The child had learned a detail that she found either delightful or scandalous or both and was trying to figure out whether it was safe to tell an adult. To encourage her, he leaned in with evident interest, quirked his lips up in a conspirator's grin. This won him a shy smile of her own and brightened eyes as the next words spilled from her lips.
"They called him Edderrion the Bridegroom because he ran away from three of his marriages and the family was constantly having to bring him to the altar." The words spilled out in the rush of a scholar astounded over her latest find. "Everyone thought it was because his childhood love, a girl named Aly, died before they could be wed! But that's not true because in the notebooks, he confessed that he didn't love Aly at all but did love her older brother, Alayn. Lord Edderrion loved a man!"
"Did he now?" Oberyn smiled when she nodded excitedly in response, awaiting his shock at the scandalous news. "Good for him then. Life is full of hardships but love can soothe pains in a manner that not even the greatest panacea in the world has done. Tell me, did he ever confess to the man?"
Lady Lyarra's dark violet eyes, and Oberyn presumed that those had been an inheritance from a Dayne ancestor skipped many generations, were even wider than before. "Confess?"
"To Alayn," the Viper confirmed. "It would be a happier tale if he confessed than if he did not, yes?"
Lyarra considered this and then nodded. "He did. Alayn worked as the Steward of Winterfell for all of his life and the journal said they were the dearest of friends. Edderrion still wed and he had a single child from that marriage but I think he was happy. Because he still had Alayn."
"To have those you consider precious near you is a great blessing. It was why Doran and I desired to bring you to Sunspear."
"I'm… precious to you?" Lyarra Snow seemed utterly mystified by this. "Why? We have never known each other before today."
"Perhaps not. But it is the way of the old generation to find all their children precious to them and you, Lyarra, as the daughter of my beloved- and only, admittedly- cousin, are a child of House Martell. We are kin, you understand." He looked closely at this child, receiving a tentative bow of her head. "Your mother, Aliandra, was raised in Sunspear, as was your grandfather, Prince Lewyn and his father, and his, before him. We would like you to live there as well, as you may be raised closely to where those precious to you once were and still are."
Lyarra Snow's face folded into a stubborn frown. "Winterfell is my home. Father lives here and all of my brothers and sisters too."
"Of course, they do," Oberyn said soothingly. "They are also your kin and I would not begrudge you to write them and occasionally visit. But this was a decision made by your father and uncle, the Prince, for your benefit."
"My benefit?" Lyarra's brow furrowed in confusion. It looked not unlike Sarella's when a perplexing question was presented to her, such as why she should leave to have dinner, when she could enjoy her book instead.
"Sunspear and indeed, all of Dorne, have much to offer you," Oberyn chose his words carefully. "Mine nephew, the Prince Quentyn, has been fostered to House Yronwood since he was a lad of eight years. It was done by my brother for his benefit as is fostering traditionally done."
The girl's violet eyes shuttered. "Lady Stark tried to convince Father to foster me out when I turned seven years of age. Father refused."
'She suspects that she's being sent away in punishment,' Oberyn realized, inwardly wincing. The trout was not making matters easy for him. "You will not be sent away to a bannermen in shame, Lyarra. You will return home, to your birthplace, the land of your blood, and receive there the lessons and guidance to become a lady both House Stark and House Martell can be proud of."
At her slightly loosened shoulders, he continued. "My love, Ellaria, has already prepared a room for you in Sunspear. It is plain, for we should like you to decorate it your will, but it shall always be yours for as long as you draw breath. Your cousins, eight in all, are eager to meet you. Doran has arranged a dowry for you-"
A sharp intake of breath met these words. Apparently Lyarra Snow was aware of dowering daughters. Her words came out in soft disbelief. "A dowry?"
"One equal to any of my daughters," Oberyn assured. In truth, it would be higher. Ned Stark had attempted to refuse it, offering to provide one of his own but Doran refused so. If she was to be a Martell bride, she should be given a dowry by House Martell. The Stark had instead insisted that it was a father's duty to see his daughter properly dowered and sent over documents providing his own, slightly more generous, offer. Doran had accepted and then added Ari's portion on top of that, almost equalling Arianne's dowry as the eldest child and only daughter of the Ruling Prince. If nothing else, Oberyn was impressed by the Quiet Wolf's determination there. "Do keep in mind that a child must be four-and-ten in Dorne to even consider a marriage and that mine brother will be corresponding with your father to choose a proper bridegroom. One unlike Lord Edarrion, I think."
This drew a small giggle from her. He continued onwards.
"More than that, Dorne provides a freedom to women that many other realms lack. Your father may have seen the advantage of raising you in a kingdom where a lady can wield steel in her hand."
Lyarra Snow was almost gaping at him now. "Steel?"
"My eldest daughter prefers the spear," the Viper spoke, as if in shared confidence. "The others have not yet settled on a weapon but they are learning the basics of each. I would have you join them in Sunspear."
A bemused smile crossed the child's face. "Father's letting me travel to Dorne to swordplay?"
"All fathers want the best for their children, Lyarra, and Dorne will be the best for you," was Oberyn's response. "You will be very happy there. I am certain of it."
x
Scrapped the Gerold and Lyarra pairing. It just didn't seem to fit by the time I was up to chapter two. I welcome any suggestions of replacement pairings, even if they're not the end goal, I don't mind writing rivalries over Lyarra's heart here. There's still time before anything develops in that direction, of course, as I intend to focus on her personal character growth and family bonds but I'm welcome to recommendations. I don't mind recycling characters from previous pairings either.