#like do they have regular Targaryen/Valyrian features in this?

[an-abyss-of-stars]

☮ Rhaemond 70s Era Fic ☮

The year is 1978, 22yr old Rhaena Targaryen, is a singer/songwriter on tour in the States with her band Black Star. A folksy/bluesy rock band with music that rushes waves of ecstasy and ethereal beauty over whatever size crowd they play for. Rhaena graces the stage with all the grace and majesty of a fairy Princess or a glorious Goddess-like enchantress. Silver tresses and colourful flowing cape-like gowns that twirl and spiral with her every move, her sleeves hang like wings and flow as such as she spins and glides across the stage. She's known for losing herself in her music, as if she leaves her body on the stage and ascends to a higher place, her voice hypnotizing and mesmerizing her audience.

She's a marvel.

She's unreal.

A must see live.

With songs that spoke of mythical tales, dragons and burning lands, magic and royalty. And yet the song that was topping the charts recently was about a tortured lover, a dark figure who could not be shaken no matter how hard she tried. It was a song that left her screaming soaring notes out into the air, with so much anguish and internal rot, her rasping notes playing on par with the ripping final guitar solo.

And yet, the effervescent Rhaena Targaryen was not romantically tied to anyone, as far as the public knew.

They couldn't place the man she spoke of, but her emotional tale still ripped at the audience just right, connecting the feeling and the emotion...an unrequited love gone wrong.

An aggressively beautiful voice paired with the perfect music backing her. With a band that consisted with her as their lead vocalist, her twin sister Baela as both vocals and their lead guitarist, their half-sister Aemma as the keyboardist as well providing backing vocals with her other half-sister Aerea their bassist. Rounding out the band were Rhaena's two cousins, Aegon as their drummer and Daeron as their 2nd guitarist.

Black Star as a band and their music, was a growing sensation. So much so that Rolling Stones magazine had sent their very best writer to cover them, someone who reluctantly knew the genre well...knew the band even better...and after analyzing the lyrics, was quite certain he knew who that popular song was really about...

In 1978, 24yr old Aemond Targaryen, had worked his way up the writers ranks at Rolling Stones magazine. He'd always been an avid lover of music and culture, and while he could hold his own decently enough on guitar, it was more of a private activity as opposed to a career path. No, his talents lay on the written page, with his added photography skills. In his time at Rolling Stones he'd had the opportunity to interview some of the best the 70s had to offer. From Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham from Fleetwood Mac, Ozzy Osbourne and Tony Iommi of Black Sabbath, Dio, Buck Dharma of Blue Öyster Cult and even Donna Summer.

He'd worked his way from covering lower up and coming musicians and bands to meeting some of the greats. So it was to his surprise and slight disappointment when his chief editor slapped down a newspaper on his desk that read in bold letters "Black Star Shooting All The Way To The Top" and asked him to immediately jump on the task.

Maybe it was because he hadn't heard that band name in years...ignored it purposely for 4 years to be exact. Maybe it was because the moment his brothers had told him they were moving to Germany to "solidify their sound-" he stopped listening all together. Burning at the fact that his pretty little cousin...the one woman he wanted to stay within his orbit...was moving across the world to a whole nother continent, let alone country, just to get away from him.

Possibly it was because Aemond had been the one who fucked all it up to begin with. He'd been an idiot then, told her he loved in a letter...only for her to drive up just to see him making up with his on again off again girlfriend, Alys Rivers.

Rhaena had never let him explain, she wouldn't hear a word of the truth, the fact that Alys had practically lunged onto him, kissed like it would be forever. Only to turn around and dump him the week afterwards, Alys had said it was because "his heart wasn't in it", and truthfully it never was...

Only, Rhaena was back. And now there was a song playing on the radio, one that seared through him as it practically detailed the whole of their backforth relationship. There were technically three songs about him to be exact, although the other two seemed far more covert in their delivery. And now he was being forced to follow her...and the band…on their tour for their final 3 shows. Rolling Stones wanted it all, close and personal candid shots, interviews with the whole band, but most importantly he was meant to shine a light on their mysterious enchanting lead singer. To have her decode the songs and lyrics on their latest record.

If Aemond could look past the bitter sting of regret and the annoyance of how fate seemed to be weaving his life around. Then maybe he could see this for what it was, an opportunity to win her back...just maybe…

[horizon-verizon]

So do you think Jon would get more of the anti-Targ and anti-Valyrian hate that Dany does if he had all the physical features? I'm not sure how much being "connected" to their heritage makes a difference since 1. Jon doesn't have negative feelings toward the Targs and 2. Everyone's rooting for him to CONNECT to his heritage. Is it because he hasn't yet? Or does it come entirely down to misogyny?

If we're talking about the in-world's people's reaction to Jon, he'd probably have to not be brought up in Westeros if he had the Targ-"typical" features bc that would immediately expose him as being a scion--bastard or not--of the Targs. Robert was out for blood.

If we're talking abt readers' reaction to Jon, there's be more xenophobic sentiments, but it'd still be far better than Dany. You'd hear a lot of Jon "redeeming" his father's house and how fitting that a "bastard Targaryen" gets to do that. Gets to excoriate the abnormal parts/Targ parts through that "poetic" rejection.

They want him more to connected a Targ heritage bc they want dragons as they know, even those who try to deny it, that these dragons if not necessary for the Long Night, are "cool" and can be used to create a kingdom for their fav. you know, boring regular-degular, conventional male-centered fantasy storylines like that.

Doesn't matter that Jon doesn't have negative feelings towards the Targs. They do, and that's all that matters, really, in their simplistic morality play storylines where the characters only serve as either self inserts or allegories for Marxist progressiveness or performative activism masking Euro-centrist patriarchal bias.

[navree]

Why there is such obsession with old Valeryia in this fandom and thinking everything related to that empire is superior to anything else ?

I mean, I can sorta get it, it sounds cool. This ancient and vast empire of untold riches with their powerful city is cool, this decadent empire running on blood magic and curses and sordid deeds and deals in the dark is cool, a pseudo-democratic society that's filled with rich people vying for control and power and doing whatever's necessary to get it is cool, a society built around the fact that these people not only have fire magic but also literal fucking dragons they can ride around on and have a special connection to is cool, a society of amazingly and inhumanly beautiful people with otherworldly features is cool.

There's a lot about Valyria that can be fascinating, that it's this great shining monument of gold and marble built on the back of one of the most heinous evils, slavery, a society of beautiful and powerful people who are as corrupt and greedy as anyone else can be, soaring dragons and also blood magic and practices of sordid taboos like enchantments and incest, it's got all the building blocks of something incredibly fascinating to work with. And when you factor in the Doom, this huge cataclysm whose effects are still felt by the time the story takes place, this huge annihilation that wiped out nearly everything we could ever know about this world, this thing that reshaped the world as we know it (not only just in Essos, but in literally beginning the dying of magic in the world that's only been recently rekindled with the birth of Dany's dragons), it just gets even more interesting. It's also worth that two of the societies that Valyria is based on are the histories of Ancient Rome and the myth of Atlantis, both which continue to fascinate us well into the modern day right now. There is, genuinely, a lot that can be done about Valyria, and on its own merits it does make sense to me that people are interested in it.

There's also the fact that we are exposed to Valyria and Valyrian culture primarily through the Targaryens. And listen, guys, the Targaryens are incredibly popular. Dany is quite possibly the most popular character George has ever created, and she's certainly the most iconic to come out of both ASOIAF and GOT, and this has extended to her dynasty, gotten people invested in where she came from while we wait for more information about her. There's a reason why the precipitous drop in popularity that GOT saw in its last season, culminating in its complete oblivion, came as general audiences saw how badly they were planning to execute their planned arc with Dany; there's a reason why the most detailed supplementary reading we've gotten has been a history of the first half of Targaryen rule; there's a reason why the only spinoff that's currently happening (and rekindling a completely dead public interest in GOT and a waning general interest in ASOIAF) is a Targaryen spinoff. Targaryens are popular, which means that their stories are popular, and therefore the culture and society that they came from and continued to be influenced by are popular. Valyria being interesting to the fans not just for what it was in and of itself, but also just due to the popularity of Dany and Targs in general, that also makes sense.

But why people consider it inherently superior to all other cultures? That I'm not really sure. I find Valyria interesting as shit, but do I consider it superior? Nah, none of these cultures are greater than any of the others, there's good things and drawbacks to regular southron Westerosi culture, Northern culture, Dornish/Rhoynish culture, and especially Valyrian culture, that's kinda the point. GRRM built a real world, and societies in that world have good things and bad things about them and none are inherently better than the other unless you're really into, like, social Darwinism or some shit. The problem is fandom culture, and how it's evolved. Now it's not enough to just like something, now you gotta like something because liking it is the objectively moral and correct thing to do. It's the inverse of this view we're seeing that you have to prove your dislike of something, be it a ship or character or overall piece of entertainment, based on its varying "problematic" aspects, rather than just admitting that they don't like something. Now, they've gotta like something, like Valyria, because it's The Best, rather than just admitting that sometimes we like things cuz we like things, and it has no bearing on the kind of person we are outside of that fandom.

And if fandoms at large could kinda stop doing that, that'd be so so so great.

[justadram]

Meta Monday: Dragons

“Dragons are fire made flesh, and fire is power.”--Quaithe to Daenerys in A Clash of Kings

In honor of all things ghastly, this week we’re talking about the fantasy genre beast to end all beasts, the dragon, and examining its role in ASOIAF and medieval history. Good or bad, it’s not entirely clear yet the role dragons will play in Westeros, but one thing is for certain: they feature heavily in modern fantasy and have been the stuff of nightmares for centuries.

Indeed, the presence of dragons in modern fantasy is one of the biggest holdovers from the medieval imagination. Medievals loved a damn dragon tale. You could talk dragons with just about anyone in Western Europe, and they’d know what you were yammering on about. What a dragon looked like, however, differed from place to place. Some of them were snake like creatures that slithered and killed via constriction, some had limbs and wings, some spewed venom, others fire. The Beowulf dragon, for example, is serpent like. The Norse Fáfnir is a slithering, venomous serpent too. While Chrétien de Troyes’ Yvain slays a fire-breathing dragon.

The main types of dragons were the Continental dragon or fire-breathing dragon we all know that inspires modern fantasy writers, the mostly wingless Lindworm of Germanic tradition, the limbless and wingless Germanic sea serpent, and the two-legged and winged wyvrn.

A variety of dragon-like creatures can be found in ASOIAF as well. The wyvern is a dragonish beast from Sothoryos that doesn’t breathe fire, but is still one of the reasons that continent is sparsely populated. The firewyrm, on the other hand, is a wingless fire-breathing underground creature, which tunnels through earth and stone. Additionally, there are two legendary species: sea dragons and ice dragons. The former might still be found in the Sunset Sea; the latter in the Shivering Sea and White Waste.

The ice pressed close around them, and he could feel the cold seeping into his bones, the weight of the Wall above his head. It felt like walking down the gullet of an ice dragon.--Jon Snow, A Storm of Swords.

Depictions of scales, four legs, wings, and fire breathing are the norm in modern fantasy. GRRM’s dragons differ in one key area: they have two legs and use their wings in the same way a bat does--both to fly and as forelegs. Another agreed upon detail from the past and our present is dragon size: they end up big, but they start out small. Daenerys’ dragons start out the size of cats and firewyrm brood are the size of a human arm. Likewise, the dragons in Ragnars saga loðbrókar (hello, Vikings fans) start out small enough to be put in a jar. All end up large enough to do major damage. Many modern fantasy and medieval dragons are also treasure hoarders, who prefer to live underground in caves, a predilection not shared by ASOIAF dragons, who require open spaces to grow and aren’t greedy for anything but food seemingly.

Medieval dragons were also fantastical in that they happened to other people, often far away and in the distant past. Christendom tended to think of dragon-slaying as happening in the distant east. St Elizabeth the Wonderworker slayed a dragon by stomping it to death in Constantinople in the 6th c.; St Margaret was eaten by a dragon in Antioch and burst from its stomach by God’s grace, killing it in 303; St Theodore killed a dragon in Asia Minor before 306; St George slew his famous dragon in Cappadocia or Libya before 303. Many of these accounts were popularized in the west in the 11th and 12th centuries, the same time as  Chrétien de Troyes was popularizing the knight errant, who sometimes slew dragons. These saintly dragon-slayings supposedly happened in the east, because the east was viewed as pagan and dragons were stand-ins for the devil.

Although dragons are presently in Westeros on HBO and soon on their way in the books, they similarly originated elsewhere, far away, long ago. There are competing claims as to the origin of dragons in the world. Valyrians claim they spawned from the volcanoes on the Valyrian peninsula. In Assai, they say ancient people tamed dragons and brought them to Valyria. They also might be from the Shadow Lands. Or Valyrian bloodmages could have created dragons from wyverns.

We shall not pretend to any understanding of the bond between dragon and dragonrider; wiser heads have pondered that mystery for centuries. We do know however, that dragons are not horses, to be ridden by any man who throws a saddle on their back.--The Princess and the Queen, GRRM

The Targaryens, who originally hail from Valyria, are dragon-riders. So, while many people rightfully fear dragons, Targaryen power is built upon the relationship between rider and dragon. There is a positive relationship between the beast and rider. Dragon riding is modern fantasy fare--but not all medieval dragons were considered purely evil. Most famously, the Welsh are represented in their mythology by the red dragon, who will ultimately defeat the Anglo-Saxons or white dragon: not an evil portend, but one of future victory.

Some were also not so far away. In England, dragons happened closer to home with some regularity. Anglo-Saxons settled Knotlow (now in Derbyshire) in 700 and called the hill there Wormhill, the lair of a dragon. The Bisterne Dragon of Hampshire was dispatched by a Sir Maurice Berkeley in the 15th c., saving the village from its milk thieving ways. Celtic legend surrounds Bignor Hill in Sussex. The Lambton Worm in Durham was dispatched by John Lambton upon his return from the crusades. A similar legend exists of the Linton Worm, along the Scottish borders. Etc, etc.

Elsewhere, they also could make trouble closer to home, often during the period of conversion from Germanic paganism to Christianity. St Clement of Metz tamed the Graoully, a foul dragon, in return for the local population’s conversion. St Olaf killed a sea serpent in Valldal, Norway by chucking it into the mountains. Umbria had a few troublesome dragons, including a wyvern in Terni and a dragon in Fornole, respectively dispatched by a knight and a pope. Holy men and women often feature as dragon-slayers, since dragons became symbols of Satan after the Christianization of Europe.

Dragons were by and large something to be dispatched, defeated by the hero either in pagan or Christian tradition. And while Daenerys looks upon her dragons as children, even she has trouble controlling Drogon and locks the other two up, when a man claims Drogon ate his daughter. Not everyone looks kindly upon them: they are to be an instrument of conquest, as they were in the Wars of Conquest against the Seven Kingdoms. To those about to be conquered, they are feared, as much as they were feared as Satanic symbols.

However, for all the long history of dragons being better off dead, they are also creatures steeped in surprising magic. For example, in Germanic tradition, Siegfried is gifted with invulnerable skin after he kills and is bathed in the blood of a dragon. Their magic can be expansive.

This is no doubt true in Westeros as well. We are told that when dragons went extinct in the world of ASOIAF, the winters became longer and the summers shorter. Their magic is tied to the seasons, tied to the very thing which now threatens Westeros, as surely as their flames do. And they may play a key role not in the subjugation of Westeros to Targaryen rule, but in the fight for Westeros, as they face the undead army that approaches from beyond the Wall.

“Necromancy animates these wights, yet they are still only dead flesh. Steel and fire will serve for them. The ones you call the Others are something more.”--Melisandre, A Storm of Swords.

After all, dragonglass, which the smallfolk say is made by dragons, is one of the few things that can kill an Other. The other is dragonsteel, which Jon and Sam believe is Valyrian steel, the outcome of a lost process of forging with magical properties, possibly forged by dragon. All things dragon seem to point to the possible defeat of the Others, which means we might want to keep those dragons around just a little bit longer.

*Meta Monday appears on Mondays when I’m feeling inspired. Feel free to follow me or the tracked tag: Meta Monday.

**If you have a topic you’d like to see addressed by a medievalist, please send me an ask. Past topics are here.

[nobodysuspectsthebutterfly]

Do you think Targaryens age he same way and at the same rate as others? Like do they ever go bald? And then there was Elaena too who seemed to get better with age. Do you think Valyrian genes are different here? Thanks.

Certainly Targaryens age like normal people? Consider Amok’s Targaryen portraits, and the descriptions GRRM provided for them. In particular, let’s look at Jaehaerys I and his queen, Alysanne:

JAEHAERYS I. The Old King. The Conciliator. Jaehaerys reigned for fifty-five years. Let’s show him late in his reign as an old man, as that is how he is best remembered. Wise and dignified. Despite his years, still unstooped, but his face and hands are wrinkled, and his long white beard reaches to his waist.

GOOD QUEEN ALYSANNE: Alysanne was the queen, consort, and sister of King Jaehaerys I, the Old King, and like him she lived a long life. Since you pictured him as an old man at the end of his reign, I figure it would be most appropriate to do her the same way, rather than as the young woman she was when Jaehaerys first ascended the Iron Throne. […] Tall and straight, unbowed by time, she had high cheekbones, clear blue eyes. Age left crow’s feet around her eyes and laugh lines about her mouth, but her face never lost its strength. […] In old age her hair turned white as snow.

As GRRM told Amok to set this depiction late in Jaehaerys’s reign, they would have been in their 60s at the time. (Alysanne died around age 64, Jaehaerys at 69.) They’re described as, and look like, regular 60-year-olds to me. (If not even older since life expectancy and makeup and plastic surgery has led us to expect that people don’t look old till their 70s.) They have wrinkles, their hair has turned white. Just like normal people.

Mind you, Jaehaerys and Alysanne are a bit of an exception since, well, most Targaryen kings (and others we know the lifespan of) haven’t lived nearly that long, through disease or chance or war or other events. (Aenys: 35, Maegor: 36, Viserys I: 52, Daemon: 49, Rhaenyra: 33, Aegon II: 24, Aegon III: 37, Daeron I: 18, Baelor: 27, Viserys II: 50, Aegon IV: 49, Daeron II: 56, Aerys I: mid-40s, Maekar: mid-50s; Aegon V: 59, Jaehaerys II: 37, Aerys II: 40. Note GRRM also says that Aerys II was prematurely aged due to stress, and looked far older than he actually was.) Aegon the Conqueror was 64 when he died (of a stroke), but we don’t have any pictures of him at that age – perhaps Fire and Blood will change that as it’s supposed to have many illustrations, maybe there will be a portrait of the matured and wrinkled Aegon with his sons and grandchildren.

As for male-pattern baldness, like I said, most male Targaryens don’t seem to live long enough for their hair to start receding or growing thin.(Though I’m surprised Daeron II was never mentioned to be balding, considering his general unassuming appearance compared to his half-brother Daemon Blackfyre.) If Aerys I or Maekar or Aegon V did, we’ll probably see them in the Dunk and Egg stories eventually. (Or other Targs of that era.)The ones we know of are just lucky, I guess. It’s that silver-gold hair of theirs, GRRM loves it too much to suggest they’d ever lose it. ;)  Although their hair does turn white, at least, if they do get old enough.

(edit: Gosh, I forgot about Maester Aemon somehow -- but he in particular was over 100 years old, bald, wrinkled, and blind; luckily granted long life, but aged normally.)

Really, nothing GRRM has ever said about most Targaryens suggests they age any differently than others. The fact that he specifically said that Elaena was “one of those women whose features improve with age, and men said she was more beautiful at seventy than she had been at seventeen” means that she is an exception, that most women, even Targaryen women, don’t age that way. (It’s also to differ her from her sisters, Rhaena who was “lovely” with “feminine beauty” at 14, and Daena who was also beautiful in her youth but probably died before age 30.) Furthermore, rumors that Shiera Seastar “bathes in blood to keep her beauty” started up when she was in her late 20s/early 30s… which means that nobody was expecting a half-Targaryen/half-Lyseni (Valyrian descent) to retain the beauty of her youth. Rhaenyra was also noted to have aged badly:

Childbirth exacted a toll on the princess; the weight that Rhaenyra gained during her pregnancies never entirely left her, and by the time the youngest boy was born, she had grown stout and thick of waist, the beauty of her girlhood a fading memory, though she was but twenty years of age. According to Mushroom, this only served to deepen her resentment of her stepmother, Queen Alicent [Hightower], who remained slender and graceful at almost twice her age. –The Rogue Prince

So… nope, I don’t think Valyrian genes are any different than regular people, when it comes to their aging at least. (Other things, however…) Hope that helps!

[sanjuno]

It’s too late for a GoT/Code Geiss isn’t it? Not sure if Britanian Royalty as Targaryens is awesome or terrifying. Lelouch as Viserys and Nunnally as Daenerys would be, interesting. So would Lelouch as Aegon.

Technically, yes, but what the hell. One more for the Old Gods!

8/7 GoT Crossover Fix-its: A Code of Fire and Ice

So I know it’s kinda becoming a theme with these fix-its, but one of the best ways to fix GoT is to give Robert a legitimate heir that Tywin Lannister and the rest of the Baratheon Loyalists will support on the Iron Throne, so I’m going to sling Lelouch in here as a replacement for Cersei’s first canon pregnancy. (Also it’s hilarious to me how many of the Britannian names from CG sound like they belong in Westros.)

So Lelouch Baratheon is born within a year of Robert and Cerise’s marriage. The gods make it very obvious that they approve of the Baratheon rule in the form of the new Crown Prince. Lelouch is black of hair and violet of eye and the red shadow of a dragon spreads its wings over his heart. The Targaryen loyalists grumble, but the common folk chatter about the Crown Prince being chosen by the gods themselves to inherit the Dragon Throne.

Lelouch Lamperouge vi Britannia is kicked out of the World of C by the Dimensional Supervisor and told to go make miracles again in a new world. He’s born prince (again), then son of a warmonger (again), and the empire that he will someday rule was created through violent subjugation of indepentandt countries by refugees who just happened to have superior force multipliers (again). At least Dorne and the North manages to keep some of their cultural individualism. The world is primitive and the politics even mores, but it’s not until Lelouch look at his new baby brother and realizes that there’s no way Joffrey is Robert’s son that Lelouch realizes how hilariously outmatched the other players in the Game of Thrones are. Especially when compared the the Demon Emperor. The first thing Lelouch does is Geass Cersei into skipping her Moon Tea because Joffrey reminds him of Victor and that’s not on.

The twins are born with dark silver hair the colour of rainclouds, their eyes lightning bright Baratheon blue. Nunnery and Rolo Baratheon are doted on by Lelouch, and it’s agreed on by most of the servants that the twins learn to walk as fast as they do just so that they can follow their eldest brother more closely.

Lelouch is 100% involved in everything that happens in the Red Keep and realizes with some hilarity that his parents have switched roles. Cersei’s the one who reminds him of Charles, obsessed with eugenics and her brother and gaining power so she can rule. Robert is the one who reminds him of Marianne, having won a crown through War and rising above his birth station by killing off all his rivals.

Lelouch starts undermining his parents in every way he can as soon as he’s capable of coherent sentences. When Nunnally and Rolo are born Lelouch adjusts some Baratheon names to suit them and is delighted when they start helping him torment Robert and Cersei.

Arms training is hilarious to watch because Lelouch is still lazy as fuck but he’s also aware that people are going to try and kill him with pointy metal at some point. As the children grow it’s pretty obvious that Joffrey is Cersei’s favourite and the brat only gets more spoiled because Joffrey doesn’t even have to pretend to be a decent person because he’s the spare and not the Heir to the Iron Throne. So Joffrey’s still convinced that he’s hot shit with swords because of his “bloodlines” and Lelouch can smell the crazy from across the courtyard. So Lelouch takes his arms training seriously because Joffrey is all but rabid.

Lelouch is used to the idea of half-siblings, so the “stain” of bastard birth doesn’t really concern him, but Joffrey is the kind of cruel and delusional person that would try to kill off his litigate siblings to become the heir and causes bad reputations for all the other illegitimate children. One of Lelouch’s best jokes on his mother is that he’s collecting Robert’s bastards and setting them up to be the core of his household, because familial relations are a surefire way of ensuring loyalty when you leverage it the right way. Especially since there are already rumours about the Queen killing the Kings bastards if she gets her hands on them. Which means that Lelouch’s many half-siblings are well aware that he saved them from being killed or forced to live in exile. So Cersei is all but frothing at the mouth over the sight of so many Baratheon-coloured children. Plus the Baratheon Herd have all fallen prey to Lelouch’s cult of personality, and their loyalty to their Royal sibling makes Joffrey look bad in comparison.

Now once they get old enough Rolo and Nunnally are also going to train hard. Lelouch manages to arrange things so that Nunnally (and Robert’s other daughters) also get arms training. Nunnally is Whitecloak Legend level of good with a rapier. Lelouch and Rolo are shameless about letting their sister fight their battles for them. Rolo is primarily an assassin and Lelouch is a strategist, neither of which really lend to Robert’s “bash it with a hammer” approach to combat. Lelouch avoids tourneys by expressing admiration for Northern Values and Robert lets it go without argument.

Robert is painfully easy to manipulate even without Geass and Lelouch almost feels bad about it. Not bad enough to stop, but it’s still sad that Robert tore apart a Kingdom or Seven for love of a woman who died before he was ever crowned. Lelouch straight up delights int tormenting Cersei because she’s like the worst parts of Victor and Charles combined into one bitchy, petty, brother-fucking package. Irony is that Cersei does love her children while also hating that three of said children are obviously Robert’s while also loving the Targaryen features that they got from Robert while also loving Jaime’s children the most.

Lelouch corresponds with Tywin on the regular, and asks for Joffrey to be named Tyrion’s heir, as Tyrion is Jaime’s heir, as both lack offspring of their own. The logic progression of inheritance is enough to soothe Tywin’s long-stung pride and he agrees. Cersei is now kept busy fighting to keep Joffrey from being fostered with Tywin and is too distracted to scheme much. Lelouch is giving Joffrey until he’s fifteen to stop being a monster otherwise Joffrey will never see his sixteenth birthday. Lelouch has trimmed his family tree before, so become a “kinslayer” again doesn’t bother him.

Lelouch, Nunnally, and Rolo throw off the legitimacy questions, because of Valyrian and First Men blood magic nonsense, and so Jon Arryn is pretty obviously poisoned be another set of players in the Game. Instead of the Lannisters falling under suspicion, Cersei is being her usually overdramatic self about getting tasters for her children’s food. Super paranoid Queen is super paranoid. Lelouch has Lysa confined to the Tower of the Hand when she tries to run off with Robin. He calls is “giving her time to recover her spirits” and he makes sure that Robin is handed over to Stannis for proper fostering because Robin will be “safe” on Dragonstone and that way no one can accuse Tywin of anything underhanded.

Irony is that Lelouch is called the Black Prince because he’s the only one of his “trueborn” siblings with actually black hair. He thinks this is hilarious since he’s already collected something like five or six of Robert’s bastards for training in various fields by the time the epithet starts being used. Lelouch is heard to publicly say that “they are not any less my siblings for being my father’s natural children” when he hears the reasoning behind the nickname, and that pretty much means he’s got their loyalty for life.

Robert will want to go North when Jon Arryn dies, of course. Lysa is going to be dropped off at Riverrun on the way up. Lelouch is aware that Robert wants a Stark/Baratheon marriage and starts scheming. Tommen is betrothed to Shireen so the Baratheon name will stay on Dragonstone, and because Tommen isn’t forceful enough to displace Shireen’s authority as the Lady of Dragonstone. Rolo has been made Renly’s Heir “until Renly marries and has a son of his own”. Lelouch offhand mentions that the Targaryen’s denied the Starks a Royal Princess as a bride, and Robert stops looking at Lelouch as is now giving Nunally some consideration.

Lelouch wants Nunnally to be happy with her husband, and he knows that he can’t avoid her marrying forever, not in their current world, so the Starks sound like the best of a bad lot. For now Robert is torn between having Lelouch marry one of the Stark daughters, and having Nunnally marry the Stark Heir, so Lelouch can keep that indecision up until he’s satisfied with the choices for the matches that need to be made for the siblings that Lelouch likes. That’s why Tommen was matched with Shireen. Tommen is a bit like how Clovis was before he got into politics and he needs a smart wife who won’t be mean to him. That the match was politically expedient was just gravy.

Lelouch lays eyes on the eldest Stark daughter with her red hair and dreams in her eyes and nopes the seven hells out of that. Sansa is far too similar to Shirley for Lelouch’s comfort. Of course, then he gets ambused by Jon and Arya Stark and immediately recognizes Suzaku and Kaguya.

/…/

Jon Snow has eyes like glacier ice, sometimes Stark grey, sometimes dark as pine needles. Shifting and mercurial as the bastard’s moods, shadowed by the tangle of his dark brown hair. Catelyn Stark doesn’t know how to react to the boy who Ned has claimed is his blood, but she looks at Jon Snow and it’s not Ned she sees. (No, who she sees is Brandon with his wild energy and vibrant ferocity. There is some of Ned’s solemnness in the boy, but…) 

When the fever takes him Catelyn Stark prays for Jon Snow’s recovery, she prays and she begs and she offers the gods all she can. Catelyn makes a vow to do better by him, to be better, and when Jon Snow wakes up the first thing he does is apologize. Jon tells the Lady Stark that he’s sorry for hurting her by being alive and that he’ll try not to bother her any further. Catelyn, who has all those Southron prejudices against bastards softens towards the boy. This is her son’s brother, and that angle of thought is enough for her to start healing from the hurt she felt.

So there Starks are far more peaceful this time around, with less buried resentment lurking in their interactions. Suzaku has years of dealing with Nunnally and Cornelia and their anger at him over the slights done to their respective favourite siblings to help him get on Catelyn Stark’s good side. Of course, Suzaku also sulks a lot over being alone in the new world. At least until Arya is born and Suzaku realizes that she’s Kaguya and then he regrets ever voicing the complaint. Old gods please, he doesn’t need the chaos gremlin take it back.

Kaguya has a much easier time of it than canon!Arya because she knows the importance of appearances, and so she does the bare minimum of training in Westrosi “ladylike” pursuits so that she can fit in with the new world setting, but other than that she starts looking into training with the unfamiliar weapons. This time “Needle” is a set of hair sticks and Mikken is tasked with learning how to craft tessen. Arya is still the “wild” Stark daughter, but this time she’s canny enough to get what she wants without getting in trouble for it. Arya and Jon bond during hunting trips and long horseback rides.

Robb, Theon, and Jon are the terror of the keep and Suzaku is glad to have friends. Kaguya is delighted by the idea of her large family and refuses to let anyone push Jon aside. She saw where isolating Suzaku from his family led last time and she’s not going to let it happen again. So things are better for Jon, and he’s not planning on going to the Wall. Not much else changes with the Starks until the Royal Party shows up. At which point Suzaku and Kaguya nearly lose their shit because Lelouch is there.

/…/

Across the Narrow Sea, Viserys Targaryen sells his sister to a Dothraki Horse Lord and goes to bed dreaming of conquest.

Daenerys Targeryen rolls her eyes, steals everything she can carry including the three dragon eggs that she can feel the life stirring in, dyes her hair green, and takes off into the night. CC is done with this bbullshit, she’s going to go find her accomplice.

/…/

Then there are politics and plotting and ice zombies. Jon becomes Lelouch’s sworn sword, Lelouch is betrothed to Arya, the War of Five Kings never happens, and people are very confused by how well the Black Prince’s betrothed gets along with his mistress.

The dire wolves are still a thing, and at some point Lelouch, Suzaku, and CC all end up riding dragons. Then it’s all over but for the fire and the screaming.