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Chapter 2 - Of Brandon and Ashara
🕑 Added 2023-04-07 07:12:33 +0000 UTCDisclaimer: I don’t own the characters or the world appearing in this story, they are creations and property of the fantastic George R. R. Martin. I’m not sure if I can claim my OCs as my own, so I’ll play it safe and dedicate them to GRRM.
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[Year - 283 AC]
“Gasp!” Harry desperately sucked in air, trying to quench his thirsting lungs. His limbs flailed about wildly as he struggled. Although, however much he pulled, his lungs seemed unable to take in much.
Harry’s consciousness had returned just like it did the last time. Very abruptly.
As he tried to gather his bearings, he found that breathing was proving to be an incredibly difficult task; every pull of breath was demanding. It was as if his body had forgotten how to breathe and he was learning it all over again. Adding on to the suffering, his eyes weren’t working as they should either and he vaguely realised that he was bawling his lungs out as if his life depended on it.
For a long while, that was all he knew. He cried and tried to breathe. But eventually, with a lot of effort, he regained control over his respiration, allowing him to breathe again. That granted him leave in setting aside some energy to concentrate outwards.
Through his blurry vision, he could guess that people were scuttling about – frantically at that. Some of them were crying. His blurry eyes didn’t help any – he could hardly see anything and he could hardly hear anything over his own bawling. Thus, he concentrated on trying to stop bawling.
Listening in on his surroundings, he could pick out an old voice amongst the cacophony of crying women. He tried latching on to that.
“–eak constitution worked against her, my lord. She’s passed on. There was nothing we could do,” croaked out the voice.
There was a moment of silence that followed the old man’s statement.
“Leave us,” said a different voice, probably the lord.
Harry was picked up, and it took just a moment for him to understand his situation. He had just been borne. He was a baby again.
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Nine long months had passed since his birth into the Dayne household. And Harry had spent a majority of that time being upset.
For some inexplicable reason, he had expected to just be dropped into the world and figure out a way from there. He hadn’t expected to be born again. He couldn’t help but feel cheated. He’d even worked so hard on configuring the perfect body…
Subjectively, he could see that the current scenario was better. People don’t just appear out of nowhere, after all. As a lord, he would have access to things that he would have had to work very hard for otherwise. He could definitely see the advantages of his current state. But, sometimes it got really hard to look at the advantages when he couldn’t even walk properly.
At present, Harry was leafing through a few books, acting as if he was having fun flipping through the pages. He would read a few sentences, flip some pages, flip them back, quickly take in the next few sentences and repeat. It was a pain, but he had to make himself look like any normal child. He wasn’t even a year old – he couldn’t parade around reading complex text when he hadn’t even been taught the alphabet.
It hadn’t been easy getting his hands on the books either. Of course, Lord Dayne would never let a babe anywhere near a book – however, Harry’s repeated tantrums had allowed him the privilege of getting access to a few low-importance books. His first quest from the system had pretty much forced him to do all could to get his hands on some text.
“Alice, what’s the time?” Harry asked in his mind.
“It’s 8:13 am, Harry,” Alice’s reply echoed through his mind.
“Right! Anytime now…” Harry thought to himself. He was shaking in excitement.
Harry was born the son of Brandon and Ashara in this lifetime. It hadn’t been hard to figure out, the entire castle had mourned the death of the Lady Ashara. He’d only had to look into the minds of a few maids to get the information he needed. While he’d gotten the information he needed, it had also left him confused. The popular theory had been that it was Ned who’d been in love with Ashara, hence the knowledge of Brandon’s involvement had been very confusing, to say the least.
He wondered whether choosing black hair with grey and purple eyes had forced fate and brought them together.
He thought back to what he knew of their deaths. His mother had passed away due to blood loss during childbirth. It had already been a late-term birth, which had weakened her significantly. Adding to that all the loss she’d suffered through the year; it had taken a lot out of her. As for his father – he had passed on along with his grandfather when they’d confronted the man king.
Honestly, Harry didn’t know how to feel about this. He found it extremely hard to think of these people as his parents. His mother had only been a young lady of seven and ten, whereas his father had been slightly older at one and twenty. It was especially hard to convince himself when he still had vivid memories of his parents from his past life. So he just left it be – it was better that way. He had a lot to do and parental relations would only hold him back.
Although it got to him at times. He was just so alone – all the time.
Apart from his parentage issues, there was one other little thing that perplexed him. What was Jon Snow doing at Starfall? In the beginning, before he’d confirmed his parentage, Harry had wondered if he’d been born as Jon Snow. However, the knowledge that his eyes were of different colours had relieved him of that burden. Also, the fact that he had the real Jon Snow in front of him helped as well.
Harry had begun noticing this during his first month – that there was one other baby in the nursery apart from him. However, his poor eyesight had prevented him from properly laying eyes on the other baby. What bewildered him the most, however, was the fact that the wet nurse cared more for the other babe than for him. This had boggled Harry’s mind. After all, he was Lady Ashara’s son, nephew to the lord of the house. He wondered who could possibly be more important than him in the Dayne household. The only name that came to mind was Edric Dayne, though he shouldn’t be born for several more years.
However, then he had learned of the wet nurse’s name. Wylla. This had confused him yet again because he knew that name, although he couldn’t remember why. He had kept thinking of why he knew the name of a wet nurse – why could her name have possibly imprinted itself in his memory? For the next four months, he immersed himself in digging through his knowledge to find the tidbit of knowledge he knew he had of the woman. The knowledge eluded him like a dream would after rousing.
In the fifth month after his birth, his eyes finally started clearing up and he finally laid eyes on the boy. The boy was a Stark, that much was extremely clear. Everything cleared up for Harry in but an instant. Wylla was one of the women rumoured to have been the supposed mother of Jon Snow. Ned himself had uttered the woman’s name to King Robert, and Edric Dayne had also alluded to it at some point. The other baby was Jon Snow.
The more he thought of the happenings over the past year, the more Harry realised that the world was following the books rather than the television show. He thought back to his encounter with Kr’Tall – had he not been clear about what he wanted? By the Mother– the man could read his damn mind, how could he not have known?
The entire year had been one issue after the other. As if it had to top everything that had happened, he’d gotten screwed by the system as well.
Harry was extremely familiar with systems from his past life. The moment he’d heard the words ‘Gamer’s Mind’, his mind had started racing – oh, the possibilities! He’d only needed to take one look at his status to let go of all his dreams of dominating the entire world.
[ Status
Name: Undecided
LVL: 1 [Status Effect: Growing Up]
[Growing Up: The Keeper’s status grows with time. All stats will rise to ‘1’ by 13 years of age. The process can be sped up by working hard or through quests]
STR: 0.1
END: 0.1
DEX: 0.1
CHA: 0.1
INT: 0.1
WIS: 0.1
Points: 0
Perks
Gamer’s Mind
Gamer’s Body
Skill
Mind Reading ]
What kind of a sick joke was this? He’d himself jokingly stated that it would take a million years, but this was too much.
Not all was lost, however. The system did say that he could work hard to gather strength – he could do that… sure.
Although, there wasn’t much allowance for him to increase his strength currently. He couldn’t exactly start jogging and lifting weights as a babe not even a year old. Hence he turned to books; if he couldn’t physically become stronger, he could at least sharpen his mind. Mayhaps he would get lots of points and rise to be the wisest of warriors?
Alas, the endeavour wasn’t proceeding as well as he’d expected it to. Harry had a connection to the system – a sixth sense of sorts. It told him that reading books would increase his intelligence and wisdom; but at a much slower pace than he expected. He couldn’t even comprehend how many books he’d have to read to get even a single-point increment.
It hadn’t been completely in vain, however. He’d gotten a quest out of it.
[Quest: Read 100 books]
[Rewards: Skill (Observe), 1 point]
The quest appeared once he’d begun reading his second book. It had given him quite the scare with how it had popped up. The quest just appeared and he could neither accept nor deny it – it was present, and he could do it if he wanted to.
At present, he was in the middle of reading his ninth book. His intelligence and wisdom points hadn’t budged a single decimal the whole time.
“When do you reckon they’ll reach the castle?” Harry asked in his mind.
“I don’t know Harry,” Alice replied in her usual calm voice.
He chuckled to himself. The maid looking after the nursery glanced at him fondly.
Harry had made it a habit of conversing with Alice in his mind. At nine months, his vocal capabilities were nothing extraordinary, so Alice was his only option to share an intelligent conversation. His vocabulary at the moment consisted only of the words – ‘Book’, ‘More’ and ‘Harry’ – in the exact order he’d learnt to utter them. The last word, in particular, had confused the maid who took care of him; since there was no one by the name of ‘Harry’ in the castle.
It was Alice and the maids that had kept him company at the castle. His aunt Allyria would drop by at times – but as a young girl, she was much more interested in other things than her nephew. His interactions with Lord Dayne were better left unmentioned.
Suddenly there was some commotion outside the room and a maid rushed in. The one in charge of the nursery stood to address the new intruder but she ran straight to Harry.
‘They must have arrived!’ Harry thought to himself.
Closing his book, Harry stood and presented his hand to the maid – it was finally time to meet his uncle.
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His life had changed too much. The last two years had flipped around his entire life. He’d lost most of his family over the span of a few months. Ned wouldn’t wish this sort of curse on anyone; not even upon his worst enemy.
He’d only been a boy – barely come of age. Spending his days learning the way of the sword and enjoying his time at the Vale. That’s what his life had been. He’d never wanted to be Lord Stark – hell, Benjen had spent more time at Winterfell than him.
Why him? He’d only been the spare…
His father had been a good warden, a little too ambitious if anything. His brother would have made a better warden once he’d succeeded – if he’d managed to keep his cock in his breeches.
Ned thought of that accursed maester. Walys. Everything had started going to shit when his father gave his ear to that man. Why did his father have to turn his attention towards the South?
Now, at twenty namedays, Ned found himself with the title of the warden, a wife meant for someone else and a nearly extinct family. All because his father wasn’t happy with his lot in life.
‘At least I’m already working towards increasing the numbers,’ Ned thought rather wryly.
He’d gotten news – ages ago, it seemed like – that his wife was with child. She must be expecting the child.
‘No, not expecting,’ Ned reminded himself, ‘the child must nearly be a year old by now.’
Ned’s musings came to a halt as his party reached the castle walls. The gates had already been raised and there were men waiting to escort them inside. It was to be expected – they had sent word ahead of time. There was no need for surprises; both sides had had enough surprises to last a lifetime.
Starfall was bustling with activity, no doubt word of their arrival had spread even amongst the smallfolk – the Sword of the Morning had been popular, after all, even amongst the commoners.
The ride to the castle proper passed by in a haze and Ned found himself passing his horse’s reins to the stable boy soon after. Tensions were running thick, they were deep within unfavourable territory. However, there would be no fighting today. Ned had had enough of it, and he doubted the Daynes would risk treason at this point.
“Welcome to Starfall… Stark,” he heard a voice say to his side.
“Thank you, Lord Dayne. I just wish the occasion had been a better one,” Ned replied, turning to the man. ‘There is no need to get offended,’ he said to himself.
“An occasion where you don’t come to my house after killing my brother, you mean?” Lord Dayne spat, not being able to keep his emotions in check.
Ned saw Howland tense, while some of the others palmed their swords.
“No,” Ned stopped them with a glance and a raised hand. Turning back, he locked his gaze with Lord Dayne. “They had my sister, Lord Dayne. Ser Arthur was a good man– probably the best of men. But he helped the prince take my sister… and then tried to keep me away from her. Now she’s lost to me. He made his choice.”
Lord Dayne did not answer.
“I am not here for your hospitality. Let us finish this exchange, maintaining civility, and then we’ll be on our way,” Ned spoke with a resigned tone.
Abruptly there was a disturbance to the side. Ned tensed, fearing the worst – his own hand reached for his sword.
He turned to see two children being led towards them by two maids.
One of those maids, he identified, and it made his blood run colder than when he’d expected to be attacked. Glancing at the child in her arms made him wonder if he would have preferred being attacked.
The other child was younger. He had his hand held by the other maid and was walking towards them with wobbly steps. Ned could see, however, that the child seemed to have Stark blood in him. The child had dark hair, which could have been a Dayne trait as much as it could have been Stark. Although, the grey eye could only ever be from a Stark. The purple eye gave him pause, however – probably a Dayne trait? Ned was colossally confused as to who the child could be.
Noticing his confusion, Lord Dayne voiced out. “Ashara’s son, through your brother,” he said, gesturing to the child.
Ned only nodded, not being able to find his voice. His mind went blank. This changed so many things. Ashara had been with child?
Ned had known that his brother had married her. Brandon had gotten quite infatuated with the girl at the tourney, but Ned had dismissed it as another mark to his brother’s tendencies. Hence, when they got secretly married after, he had been surprised. However, he couldn’t say whether it had been a pleasant surprise. He’d known that there would be repercussions, especially from Hoster Tully.
The war, however, had swept everything under, and Brandon’s marriage had gone unnoticed.
Looking at the child, Ned’s heart clenched. He’d not been very happy with his brother’s choices, but to see that he’d passed on without ever having laid eyes on his son. All the pain he’d pushed away the past year– he felt it all rushing back.
“And where is Lady Ashara…?” Ned asked, already fearing the answer.
“She did not survive childbirth,” Lord Dayne said in a slightly strained voice.
“I see,” Ned said, offering his condolences. Looking at the man standing opposite to him, Ned realised that the Dayne had also lost a brother and sister. The war had taken a lot – from both of them.
He turned towards the other maid and the child she held; his heart clenched yet again. Dark brown hair and grey stormy eyes.
He needed no one to tell him about the other child.
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The rest of the exchange didn’t take much time to conclude. The only reason they’d made the trip was to return the sword, which didn’t take long. Both parties had not been in any mood to dawdle and after nearly two years, everyone was looking forward to going home. The only hiccup was the addition of two children to the group.
Ned thought it a little ironic how they lost three Starks to the war and came out with three children with Stark blood in them. He wondered if it were all a cruel prank the gods played on them.
He was of two minds about his bastard’s mother. He wanted the child to have a mother growing up, but he could give him a better life at Winterfell. He couldn’t even contemplate bringing the woman along. He was already skirting around propriety by deciding to raise a bastard within the castle; he couldn’t insult his lady wife any more than that.
The journey back was largely uneventful.
His relationship with Robert had become heavily strained since the sacking of King’s Landing. He’d always known that Robert could be quick to anger, but the fact that he was unable to see sense in admonishing Lord Tywin for murdering children. Ned couldn’t live with such a stain to his name. Hence he tried to finish his business as quickly as possible and leave at the first available opportunity.
However, looking ahead at the journey to Riverrun – it almost made him want to turn back and stay a few more weeks at King’s Landing. Only his eagerness to meet his son had allowed him to hold on tight and usher his horse onwards.
Lord Tully had been furious, both with his bastard and Brandon’s son. Ned had never liked him to begin with – the man was an opportunist and whatever honour he had in him was not enough to redeem him in Ned’s eyes. The man hadn’t even waited to get through mourning, before marrying off his daughter. Catelyn herself seemed to be a proper lady and he didn’t have any strong thoughts about her. She was pretty to look at and it had been a good match– or it had been a good match when they thought him to be the next Lord Paramount, but now, he couldn’t really say. He had expected some disappointment on their part, but, when Lord Tully started insinuating Brandon’s son to be a bastard, he couldn’t stand for it. Not wanting to fight the man at his own home, Ned had chosen to leave instead.
Catelyn had also been upset about his bastard, as he’d expected her to be. He could only wish that she’d forgive him as time passes on.
In the sixth month of the year 284 AC, Ned returned to Winterfell, ready to take the seat as the Stark of Winterfell – until a time came when his nephew would be ready enough to assume the role himself.
