Author's note: This chapter may not seem important but it is to me, it plays a small role in the next chapter. I hope you enjoy. Thank you for the reviews, favorites and follows.
Disclaimer: I do not own Game of Thrones. I own Lyrina.
Chapter 27: Children.
The child King in the north wanted to be free, he demanded his lands be free from the rest of Seven Kingdoms. Cersei could not get over the audacity in the boy's demands. He wanted Sansa back, he wanted Cersei to stop trying to save her daughter and they wanted to be free. They would never be free. She had accepted that her daughter married the wolf, no doubt of love, but she could not let it continue as much as she wished to. They were at war and if her daughter had just convinced the boy to go home everything would be different. If her son had not killed Ned Stark everything would be different.
Her son had killed every bastard Robert fathered in Kings Landing, every innocent child, she did not care but she could see how he became corrupt. She had heard the rumors of what he had done to her daughter, she had seen the bruises on Sansa but still she was his mother. She was his mother even when he was brutal, when he was vile and she could not blame him for what he was. She was the one who had relations with her own brother. How could she condemn him for loving his own sister? It would have been pimplier if Lyrina and Joffrey loved each other as she loved Jaime. The family would still be together, and her daughter would not have fallen for the enemy.
Cersei loved her daughter and wanted her daughter to have every happiness she could but it was not possible. She could not continue to allow her daughter the right to love the man who her family was going to slaughter. It would be safer if her daughter was home, she could get over the wolf. Once Lyrina was home, she could forget the wolf, and when the time came for him to pay for his crimes she would not mourn him. They had just married, she was not with child, there was time for Cersei to save her daughter. She knew her daughter would kick, scream and beg to be with him at first. Cersei knew that once they got her back to Kings landing she would run, and never look back but she would not allow that. Love was fickle, and it could change, she just needed her daughter to see that the wolf was not the man she thought. Once her daughter saw things from the other side of the field, the other side of the battle she would realize the monster she had married. Her daughter was still her blood, still her little Princess.
"Do you love your children, Cersei?" She hated her brother, but he sent away the commander of the city watch so she had to speak to him.
"You know I love my children, Tyrion."
"So did the mothers of the children you killed. Each of them loved their children as well and your son killed them." Tyrion did not understand, he would never understand.
"He did what he must."
"If his claim is true than why must he kill the bastards of his father? Unless of course those horrid rumors of you and our brother are true." Cersei wished to wipe the smirk off the monster's face.
Tyrion was nothing but a monster. He had killed her mother, took her away from the family that loved her. Cersei would never see her mother again, her mother was not there at her wedding, or at the birth of her children. It was all his fault.
"You are so very funny brother. But nothing compares to your first joke, when you tore our mother open on your way out, leaving her to bleed to death."
"I was a child with no control, which is more than I can say for your son. Do you know what other rumors I hear around this Castle, dear sister? The rumors about your son."
Cersei was sick of listening to her brother's vile word. She got up and would not sit there any longer.
"You say you love your children but you sent away your daughter for eleven years, sister. You find her again, and you shove her into the arms of the enemy. Do you know what your son did to her in that room, why his sheets were stained with blood every morning and why his men could hear her cry out? Do you know? Because I am dying to know."
She did not know what her son had done but it did not matter. Lyrina was a stubborn girl, she did not listen well. Cersei had no doubt her brother was just trying to help his sister, trying to love her.
"Goodbye, brother. Don't speak of my children as if you care for them. You know nothing of the arrangement with my daughter, you do not know my daughter."
"I fear I know the real her more than you do. We actually took time to get to know one another in Winterfell."
Cersei left her brothers room with anger boiling inside her. She was always so good at being the queen, at being proper but Tyrion brought out the worst in her. He knew nothing of motherhood, he knew nothing of being a parent to children. She had always done what she thought was best for her children. She trusted her father when he told her Lyrina was not ready. She trusted that being away would bring her daughter up right. She did not doubt that sending her to get the boy to return to Winterfell, she did not think her daughter loved the boy. She had been so convincing but she knew now. She knew her daughter loved the wolf, but she could not let it be. Joffrey wanted his sister home, and Cersei knew he would not stop until he had her. She was still her child, and bringing her home was the only way to spare what was to come.
She had to get word to her daughter, she had to convince her daughter to come home. She knew after the letter she sent with the wedding dress that her daughter would think she could stay with him but she couldn't. Cersei wished there was no war so her daughter could be happy, but it was not possible, it would not be possible until her husband bent his knee. Cersei would give her daughter a choice, get her king husband to bend a knee or come home. If she chose neither than Cersei could not promise her safety in the war.
Cersei wanted all of her children safe but Lyrina had to save herself now. All Cersei could do was hope their blood was enough.
Catelyn Stark just wanted to be with her youngest sons, she wanted to see them. She had no doubt Bran and Rickon needed her, she had no doubt that they wanted to see her. She knew if her husband was not going home she needed to, someone had to be there for them. They were both much too young to be alone, much too young not to have their mother around. But her eldest needed her, and she knew he was right.
Catelyn knew that if she got Renly on their side they could win the war, and the sooner they won the war the better. She wanted her whole family home, she wanted every member of the Stark family home. She wanted to see Sansa safe again, she wanted to see Arya causing trouble, wanted to see her little boys grow up. She wanted to hold her husband, and be held, she just wanted her husband. She was being so strong for everyone else but when she learned Ned was alive she broke down, she did not want to be strong any longer she just wanted to be held in her husbands arms again.
She saw Robb suffering, she saw how the war turned her young boy into a stoic man. She watched his anger turn him sour, and viscous. She saw the look in Lyrina's eyes the day she left for the Iron Islands. There was something brewing between them, something that only ending the war could fix. Robb was her child and Lyrina her daughter not only by marriage but by love, she could not let them tear each other apart. She would help as best as she could until the war ended.
Catelyn Stark would do anything to spare her children and family from the pain this war would bring. Ending it soon was better than letting it kill them all.
Jaime Lannister was not naive, he knew what people said about his son, he knew what his niece said about his son. He knew it was all true, he knew his son was becoming a monster. He could blame Robert, blame the dead King, for never loving Joffrey but he knew it was not his fault. Joffrey was his and thus he was his responsibility. Whatever harm his son had done it was his responsibility, it was his cross to bear.
When his niece told him the twisted tale of what Joffrey had done to her, he truly did not wish to believe it. He did not think his son would try to force himself upon his own sister but Jaime was wrong, he knew that. He knew that what the girl said was true and that killed him. Jaime could not, and would not, ever stand for a man forcing himself upon a woman. He had to listen to the mad king rape his wife on countless nights, the kings own sister and he could do nothing. Now his own son tried to do the same to his own sister, Lyrina was right, his son was the next mad King.
His son may have been mad but he was still his son. When Jaime returned to his family, he would make sure his son got punished but he would still love his son. He loved all his children and he loved their mother. His sister, his children and his brother were the most important people in his life, he would die for them. His father was his blood, his niece was his blood but as much as cared for them it could never compare to the love he felt for his siblings and children. All Jaime could do was plan his escape and his imminent return to his family.
Ned Stark regretted staying at the Wall everyday but he had to. His daughter remained in he clutches of a twisted young boy, he learned that. He heard the rumors that reached the Wall by guards who Joffrey had kicked from his service, rumors of the things the King had done to his own blood. Ned could only imagine the horrors that the boy inflicted on Sansa. She was his daughter and there was nothing he could do to save her, nothing short of putting his entire family in harms way.
Once he got word that Sansa was safe, once he knew that his return would not harm anyone, he would go home. He would go to his young sons, and his daughter Arya. He would stay with them until the war ended, he would look after them. But until that could happen all he could do was sit at the Wall and wait. Sit at the Wall and plan his vengeance on the family who planned to destroy his.
He had faith in Robb, faith in Lyrina and faith in his bannermen, his son would win the war. His son would free the North and sit upon the Iron Throne. They would bring a peace to the kingdom that had not been seen in hundreds of years. He knew when Robert bid them to be married as children that they would bring something good into the Seven Kingdoms but he never planned for this. No one planned for a giant war but he could only hope the men would rally behind the young woman's claim.
He needed all his children to be safe and he knew the only way his family would make it out alive was if his son won. If Robb lost the war it would spell ruin for everyone he loved, the only ones who would no doubt be safe were Jon and himself. Ned would not live with himself if everyone he loved died while he sat hiding like a coward in the far north. He had to play the game though, he needed to play the Queen's game if he wanted his family to live. Soon though he would leave the Wall, and the fury of House Stark would rain down upon the Lannisters.
Two families fighting on opposite sides of the war with only one thing in common, they were fighting for their children. Jaime and Cersei would do anything to keep their small family safe, keep the children they bore safe. Cersei wanted her daughter with Robert safe as well, even if she was a constant reminder of the man she hated. Ned and Catelyn Stark would do anything with their children even if it meant being away from them. The time would come when the House Stark was united once more, and when that happened the South better fear the Winter they would bring. Lions love their cubs and wolves love their pups. Both would die before they let harm come to their children.