Lyanna XVI

Saying goodbye to Renly was the hardest part. The boy cried, begged and pleaded, and finally threw a huge tantrum when Lyanna told him that she must leave for King's Landing on the morrow, and no, it was impossible for him to go with her.

"Why do you have to leave me too, Lya?"

Lyanna took Renly into her arms. "The king has commanded me to come, to be a witness in a trial. I cannot refuse, Renly. I have to go."

Her father had not requested her to appear as a witness for his defense. Neither had Rhaegar. It was the crown calling her as a witness in the joint trial of Rickard Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen.

Witness for the prosecution. What could King Aerys possibly think Lyanna knew about the matter?

I know nothing!

That, was not precisely the truth.

I will lie.

Of course she would lie. To save her father. To save -

"Then let me come with you," Renly was pleading, his hands tightly holding Lyanna's dress, tears streaming down his face.

"Stannis would not wish that. You must stay here at Storm's End," Lyanna replied, wiping off the tears from Renly's cheeks. It was strange how quickly she had grown to love this boy. He was not always an easy boy – prone to throwing tantrums, sometimes very difficult and demanding, and desperate for attention in the way that her own brothers never were – but Lyanna had grown to love the boy nonetheless.

"Stannis is not here! He left us. He left us, and now you're leaving me too. Everybody leaves," Renly said, his voice muffled by his sobs and the tears.

"Stannis didn't want to leave us. And I don't want to leave you now. But sometimes grown-ups have to do things we don't want to do, Renly."

Sometimes. Even that was a lie. 'Most of the time' would be closer to the truth, Lyanna thought. But Renly was only a boy, and he was having enough trouble dealing with all the departures as it was.

In the end, Lyanna and Ned left Storm's End before dawn, when Renly was still sleeping. Maester Cressen escorted them to the gate. "It will be better for Renly not to see you leave, my lady," Cressen had counseled her.

"I should have gone with Stannis to King's Landing from the start," Lyanna said to her brother, halfway through their journey. They had traveled in silence for the most part, both lost in their own thoughts and fears.

"What good would that have done, Lya?" Ned asked gently. "Stannis has nothing to do with Father's arrest."

"We don't know that," Lyanna said, looking away, refusing to meet her brother's eyes. "We don't. Maybe he is a witness too. For the crown. Or maybe he was the one who informed on Father and Rhaegar to the king."

"Do you really believe that of your husband?"

"I don't know what to believe. It was too much of a coincidence, Father getting arrested as soon as he left Storm's End. After Stannis wrote to say that Father could not stay a guest under our roof if he persisted on plotting against the king."

"Stannis is serving as Hand of the King. Father was putting him in an untenable position. Surely you must see that, Lya."

Lyanna sighed. "I know. I do see that. But I can't help wondering … if perhaps … if the Crown Prince had not been Rhaegar, had not been the man who … the one –"

"The man you loved," Ned continued for his sister.

"The man Stannis thought I loved," Lyanna amended her brother's statement. "Maybe Stannis would have joined Father in his plan. It was not war Father and Rhaegar and the other lords were looking for. They wanted a Great Council."

Even as Lyanna was saying the words, she doubted her own conclusion. Duty was her husband's god. He had a duty to his king, Stannis had told her, when he left to take up the appointment as Hand of the King. Even if Rhaegar had not been Rhaegar, even if Rhaegar had never held Lyanna's hand, had never whispered sweet words in her ears, had never tempted her to flee with him, his duty to his king would still be foremost in Stannis' mind.

She didn't know if that made things better, or worse.

"A Great Council to choose a new king, and to set King Aerys aside," Ned reminded her. "Even if they were not looking for war, King Aerys would be giving them one. He is hardly likely to sit around doing nothing, watching them depose him in favor of his son."

"He might not have had the choice, if no support is for him is forthcoming from any lord. Father brings the might of the North, Lord Tully the Riverlands, Lord Arryn the Vale. Prince Doran is Rhaegar's own good-brother, so Rhaegar would have Dorne's support as well. If the Stormlands were to join them, then –"

"It would still leave the might of Highgarden and Casterly Rock on the king's side, along with the Targaryen loyalists. And I am not so certain that Doran Martell is on Rhaegar's side," Ned said.

"Because the king named Prince Doran as one of the three judges in the trial?"

Ned nodded. "The king named Tywin Lannister and Mace Tyrell as the judges because he knew he could count on their support. It must have been the same for Doran Martell."

"Then the trial is a farce! Father would have been better off demanding a trial by combat."

"I suspect it will come to that, in the end," Ned said, sadly.

Lyanna regarded her brother thoughtfully. "Is that why you insisted on coming with me to King's Landing? So you can serve as Father's champion, if it truly comes to trial by combat."

Ned turned his face away. "I couldn't let you travel to King's Landing alone accompanied only by strange guards in your condition, Lya." He paused, before continuing. "What I do not understand is how King Aerys could be certain of Doran Martell's support. Rhaegar is the husband of Prince Doran's sister, the father to his niece and nephew. Why would Prince Doran side with the king and not with Rhaegar?"

Lyanna recalled the look of fury and hatred on Oberyn Martell's face on the night of Rhaegar's nameday feast, and she knew the answer to Ned's question. "Because he shamed her. Rhaegar shamed Princess Elia, and he shamed Dorne, when he named me queen of love and beauty at Harrenhal over his own wife."

"But what about Rhaegar's son? Prince Doran's own nephew. If Prince Aegon's father is found guilty of treason –"

"I suspect the king has promised Prince Doran that Prince Aegon's position would not be threatened. Prince Aegon would be named Crown Prince in place of his traitorous father, and Princess Elia would stay on in court as the mother to the Crown Prince, the heir to the throne," Lyanna replied.

"And she would agree to this, Princess Elia?"

She loved him, Lyanna thought. That was the worst of it. Elia Martell loved her husband, even after he had betrayed her, even after he had shamed her for all the world to see.

Could Lyanna say the same about her feelings for her own husband? She didn't know. That was the worst of it; that she had not known, and still did not know.