"The seed is strong!" In the Tower of the Hand, the aged Great Lord of the Eyrie, the Hand of the King Jon Arryn, murmured to himself as he paced his study.
On the wall hung the sword Lady Lysa had made for him. In King's Landing, whenever he sat the Iron Throne in Robert's stead, he would wear it. Silver threads traced patterns of open mountain skies along the blade. The hilt was shaped like a falcon's head, and the guard spread into twin wings.
"As High as Honor!" Great Lord Jon stared at the falcon sword, pain flickering through his thoughts. As High as Honor. He ought to be like an eagle soaring above mountain ravines, free and unbound—not trapped in the webs of King's Landing.
On his desk lay a massive tome borrowed from the equally aged Grand Maester Pycelle: The Lineages and Histories of the Great Houses of the Seven Kingdoms, With Descriptions of Many High Lords and Noble Ladies and Their Children. The book was ponderous and mind-numbingly dull.
"I may have found the truth," Great Lord Jon thought.
Every one of the king's bastard children had hair black as night.
That was fact. Whether it was Edric, Mya, the newborn of a whore in King's Landing, or those Across the Narrow Sea. And then there was the queen's conduct. Queen Cersei had grown prouder with each passing year, cruelty in her nature much like her father's. She was bold enough to commit adultery. In the past, Great Lord Jon had believed the killings of those bastards were merely temper. Now, it seemed far more like the destruction of evidence.
History offered proof as well. No matter how far Great Lord Jon traced back through the brittle, yellowed pages, whenever gold met coal-black, it was gold that yielded. Grand Maester Malleon recorded the last union of stag and lion more than ninety years ago: Tya Lannister wed Gowen Baratheon, the third son of his house. Their only child, a nameless boy who died in infancy, was described in Malleon's chronicle as: "Large of frame, hearty of appetite, with a head full of black hair."
Thirty years before that, a Lannister man married a Baratheon girl. She bore him three daughters and one son. All had black hair.
"Poor Robert…" Jon silently accepted Stannis's deduction. The children of Queen Cersei Lannister carried none of House Baratheon's blood. They were the product of the Kingslayer and the Queen's incest.
"Just like Lann the Clever, stealing sunlight to dye his hair gold. House Lannister truly are descendants of liars and thieves."
"I must set the realm back on the proper path and resolve this matter. But I cannot move openly. Slaying children would stain my honor and enrage House Lannister. I need a careful plan—send the Kingslayer to the Wall, deal properly with those children, and avoid draining the strength of this new dynasty."
In the newly established Baratheon dynasty, it had always been Great Lord Jon who oversaw the grand design. "That damned Lannister woman—and the Kingslayer." The Baratheon dynasty had no dragons; its foundations were already thinner than most. It relied on a patcher like Great Lord Jon to hold it together. Drawing House Lannister close through marriage to the Westerlands, reconciling with House Martell to maintain a surface unity—these had all been his arrangements.
Yet Great Lord Jon had never imagined that his brilliant move of wedding into House Lannister would now prove the root of chaos. At the time, he had considered only the immense strength of the Westerlands and the need to secure the fledgling dynasty.
As he wrestled with his thoughts, his wife, Lysa… Tully, stepped into the study.
Lysa bore the blue eyes of House Tully. Her lips were small and severe, and her long auburn hair fell in soft waves to her waist.
Time had not been kind. In her youth, Lysa had been pretty and slender, full-bosomed, delicate and shy. After marrying Jon Arryn and enduring multiple miscarriages before finally giving birth to Robert, her figure had grown heavy. Though two years younger than her sister Catelyn, she looked a full decade older. Her body was thick and slack, her pale cheeks powdered.
"Did you call for me, my lord?" Lysa asked as she entered.
"Nothing urgent. Our Sweetrobin is nearly of age. Boys of his station, once a little older, are made squires, foster sons, or cupbearers. I am thinking of sending him to Dragonstone, to serve as Lord Stannis's foster son."
The Hand of the King Jon Arryn looked at his wife, forcing a measure of gentleness into his expression.
He was older even than her father, Lord Hoster. Though theirs was not a marriage of love, such a disparity of years inevitably bred indulgence. Promoting Littlefinger, arranging matters concerning the Blackfish—Lady Lysa's whispers at his bedside had always carried weight.
"You're going to take my Sweetrobin away from me? No! You can't! Enemies are everywhere!" Lysa shrieked, her voice breaking into hysteria.
She had suffered five miscarriages—two at the Eyrie and three in King's Landing—and two stillbirths before finally bearing a son, Robert Arryn. After the last stillbirth, she had slipped into paranoia, convinced that danger surrounded her on all sides.
"My dear lady, you must calm yourself. Robin is already six years old. He is the heir to the Eyrie, not a babe still nursing at his mother's breast. Everything I do is for the Vale—and for him," Great Lord Jon said, looking steadily at his wife.
"I always knew it! You never loved me. You married me only for my father's army! I still remember his words—he said I should thank the gods that a great lord was willing to wed a woman who had lost her virtue! I hate him. And I hate you!"
"Those matters… why drag them up again?" Great Lord Jon's aged face was lined with helplessness. Because of Lysa's lost maidenhood before their marriage and the great gulf in years between them, there had never been love in their union.
"Enough, my lady. I only wished to hear your thoughts." Great Lord Jon softened his voice, coaxing her gently. At last he guided Lady Lysa—still muttering angrily under her breath—out of the room.
The chamber fell quiet once more, leaving only the elderly yet sharp-eyed Great Lord Jon standing alone.
In that silence, he found himself thinking of his two late wives. If only they were still alive—along with the lively, healthy heirs he had once cherished. Some had died on the battlefield; others had perished at the hands of the Mad King.
"For that cold, jagged Iron Throne… I must hold my ground. For now, I can only stand with Stannis."
He and Stannis had never been close. Sending Robert Arryn to Dragonstone was a decision Great Lord Jon had weighed carefully. Across the Seven Kingdoms, there were precious few great lords he could truly trust.
If the scandal came to light, Great Lord Tywin would surely turn against King's Landing. Winterfell was too cold, and Robin's health too fragile—and Lysa had always hated her sister. As for Renly, Great Lord Jon did not trust that boy either.
"The realm must return to the proper line of succession. If the King and Queen's marriage is invalid, and the King has no trueborn heir, then by right the throne passes to Stannis," Great Lord Jon thought. "He is stern and unyielding, and few love him. But once his brother's marriage is set aside, he becomes the first lawful heir. Only when Robert sires a new legitimate heir would Stannis's claim be displaced."
In that regard, Jon and Stannis were alike. Both held fast to what they believed was right.
"If Robert's line stands empty, how will the ambitious move?" Great Lord Jon's thoughts darkened again. "The bastard and the dragon princess Across the Narrow Sea. That smooth-tongued Renly. And Great Lord Tywin lurking in Casterly Rock."
Yet those were secondary concerns. The pressing matter was the succession scandal and the question of deposing the queen.
"I must endure," Great Lord Jon told himself. "Only by staying alive and strong can I weather this crisis—not just for Robert, but for my own son."
"Lysa will understand my intentions… once I explain it all to her."
He clung to that hope.