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Sean Bean Saves Westeros - Book 1: Sean Lends a Hand by High Plains Drifter

A song of Ice and Fire & Game of Thrones Xover Rated: M, English, Adventure, Eddard S./Ned, Eddard S., Words: 109k+, Favs: 1k+, Follows: 737, Published: Jul 22, 2014 Updated: Feb 1, 2015 423Chapter 13 - Robb (II)

Robb (II)

He tried hard not to stare at his father. No one, other than Roose Bolton, said much after the Lannister's trio of lackeys unceremoniously left the tent, and what the Lord of the Dreadfort did say was in his usual, annoying half whisper. Most of the great lords hid behind their cups of wine, some cleverly and some obviously, but all clearly just as disturbed as Robb at witnessing the honorable Lord of Winterfell break the sanctity of the parley by striking one of the false King's ambassadors; and that more than once. By ones and twos, as convenient excuses of duty or nature calling were made, the tent emptied of Lord Mallister, Lady Mormont, Lord Cerwyn, Ser Stevron, the Greatjon, and finally the pale Flaying Lord, until only Ser Olyvar and family remained.

"T'was ill done, Lord Eddard," said the Blackfish sternly, the first to speak in the reduced gathering.

"Uncle!" his mother protested.

Edmure cleared his throat and nervously plucked at the silver Trout shaped silver clasp holding together the ends of his river blue-green colored cloak. "No, Cat. Uncle Brynden has the right of it. My goodbrother has cast a stain; though only a small one, mind" he interjected quickly, "on the honor of his House."

'And by association on all the Houses serving him, including you, Uncle,' Robb continued to himself, acknowledging the unspoken concern of his father's departed chief banners.

His father at first said nothing. He simply closed his eyes and downed the rest of his wine in a single long draught. "Honor," he whispered disgustedly. "What do they know of honor? The leeches Lord Roose so loves have more honor than those slimy eels."

"They have none, my lord," Ser Brynden acknowledged with a curt bob of his head. "Which helped make your plan to turn the dogs against themselves so fiendishly clever. Still, there was no reason to …"

"No reason?!" his father shouted. "When Lord Baelish lusts after my daughter Sansa and whores her best friend, the child of my own Steward, in his brothels? When that foul white cloak can slay smallfolk at a whim and call it justice? When Lord Varys rips the tongues out of small children!?"

"The Father shall weigh their miserable souls when the Stranger marks them. But it is your soul, Lord Eddard, a soul I thought noble, that concerns me," the Blackfish chastised. "There are codes a true knight abides by; sacred laws followed by both the First Men and the Andals," the Blackfish chastised. "I fear you have foresworn them and that the Lannisters may now violate their word when next we meet."

"You fear Cersei may violate her word?" his father choked incredulously. He shook his head bitter and grabbed the nearest goblet discarded by one of the departed lords. "And do you have any fear for the six children I've just sent off to the black cells beneath the Red Keep? To Illyn Payne's tender mercies?" he asked, before swallowing the dregs from his chalice.

A small look of discomfort flitted over Ser Brynden's face. "Well … it is …"

His father turned away from the Blackfish in disgust and addressed the man's nephew. "And what of you, Edmure? Does their fate not bother your sense of 'Family, Duty, Honor'?"

Uncle Edmure shrugged indifferently. "They were spies, proven guilty before the Seven by the very words they wrote down to your questions, goodbrother. Their lives are forfeit. What matter if they are children?"

"Children. I feared for the fate of children once," his father said with a long drawn out sigh, while picking up another cup. In a louder, pained voice, he continued. "I mourned the death of Rhaegar's offspring at the claws of the Lion, even though he, ultimately, was to blame for my father's, my brother's, and my sister's deaths. When I confronted Cersei, and told her I knew of her heinous sin with her brother, still I thought of the children. I begged her to take them to Essos, away from Robert's inevitable wrath. And what did that earn me?" He took a swallow of wine. "Robert death; and myself betrayed, thrown in a black cell, not to know what had become of my Arya and Sansa. Oh how they then played on my fears; visiting me now and again to stoke them, but always showing me a way out. 'Such a small lie to make, Lord Eddard, for the good of the realm,' they'd say. Until, at last, I, Ned Stark, Lord of Winterfell, Warden of the North, Hand of the King, willingly proclaimed my treason against the rightful King Joffrey, the Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, to ensure, I hoped, I prayed, my children's safety." Robb's father spat on the floor to show his feelings for the bastard and the lie they'd wrenched out of him.

His mother reached out and clutched at his father, briefly drawing him to her arms.

"No Cat, no," he muttered, pulling free. "Where was my honor then Ser Brynden? Lord Edmure? I forsook the memory of my King, my friend, my brother. I forsook my duty to the Kingdom. I forsook my personal honor, all for children. Well!? Where … was … my … honor then?! And how do I get it back?"

No one answered.

"I thought not," his father said like a curse. He drank again. "I'll never, never worry where my honor stands against the likes of them, who chopped my head off and called it mercy. Well they won't have it again! And I'll be damned if I let you stupidly serve it up to them on the silver platter of my so called honor!"

"Ned," his mother pleaded.

"S'alright," his father slurred, suddenly sounding both very drunk and very tired. "Everything … s'alright. We'll get Sansa back … somehow."

Robb's mother began to weep openly.

"Brynden, Edmure, kindly take my … my lady wife with you to your tents for the night, it's been an o'er long day and I fear I'm poor company for her now," his father commanded.

They nodded in agreement.

"Neeeed," his mother moaned softly.

"Come, Cat," Uncle Brynden whispered, taking her hand and tugging it gently.

Reluctantly she started moving, but never taking her eyes off her husband.

It hurt Robb to see his mother so unhappy, so weak; she'd been such a tower of strength for him on the long, unsure march from Moat Cailin to Riverrun.

Father appeared indifferent to her needs and returned her weepy gaze with hard, still angry eyes. "Ser Olyvar," he announced. "Make the rounds of the camp, then go to bed; we'll be up early tomorrow, lots to do."

His old squire bowed his head.

"Robb, you've a young bride waiting you," the Lord of Winterfell announced, dismissing him. He then turned his back on his family to search for another cup of wine.

The others had the decency to obey their distraught lord and leave. But Robb stayed rooted to the spot, staring at a man he hardly recognized. That man began humming a curious tune, one Robb had never heard before.

The Lord of Winterfell found an unemptied cup, stopped his humming long enough to grunt, and then raised the wine towards his lips, where he paused, as out of the corner of his icy grey eyes he spotted Robb over the rim, standing motionless. The cup lowered a bit. The humming ended. "I'm not who you remember, am I?" he asked quietly.

"No, father," Robb answered.

The man nodded his head slightly in acknowledgement. "I'm not who I remember either." And then the humming started up again.

The young man bowed and turned to go. "Come Grey Wind," he called. From the point in the tent farthest away from his father, the large dire wolf stood up, stretched a moment, and padded softly after him.

As he stepped foot out through the large tent's side flap, a short, slender figure clasped on to him.

"Arya?" he whispered.

"Robb, I'm scared for father," a girl sniffled.

"Shhhhh." Definitely Arya Underfoot. "Listen," he said softly into his sister's ear.

Back inside the tent, his father's humming grew louder and then turned to half sung words.

"Wheear 'ast tha bin sin' ah saw thee, ah saw thee?

On Ilkla Mooar baht 'at

Wheear 'ast tha bin sin' ah saw thee, ah saw thee?

Wheear 'ast tha bin sin' ah saw thee?

On Ilkla Mooar baht 'at

On Ilkla Mooar baht 'at"

His father started a new stanza.

"Tha's been a cooartin' Mary Jane

On Ilkla Mooar baht 'at …"

"What's he singing?" Arya asked, evidently confused.

Robb shook his head. "Nothing I've ever heard."

"Is it the old tongue?" his sister wondered.

"Nooooo," he answered doubtfully. "I think … I think it's the common tongue, but with an odd accent."

"Tha's bahn' to catch thy deeath o' cowd

On Ilkla Mooar baht 'at

Tha's bahn' to catch thy deeath o' cowd …"

"Your … bound to catch thy … death of cold?" Robb translated quietly into Arya's ear as his father kept on with the sad melody. "On Ilkley Moor … without a hat. On Ilkley Moor without a hat."

"Then us'll ha' to bury thee

On Ilkla Mooar baht 'at …"

Arya's grip on Robb's arm tightened. "Then us will have to bury thee," she uttered softly, picking up on the brogue words herself.

"Then t'worms'll come an' eyt thee up

On Ilkla Mooar baht 'at

Then t'worms'll come an' eyt thee up

Then t'worms'll come an' eyt thee up …"

His sister squeezed him with every ounce of her wiry strength. "Then the worms will come and eat thee up. Oh, Robb," she shuddered.

The pit growing in his stomach positively lurched and heaved too. 'Father can show an icy face to the world better than anyone,' the young man thought. 'But this? What's wrong?' For the most part Robb hadn't enjoyed all the killing in the Whispering Woods or outside Riverrun. Only deep in the night, when he woke from blood filled dreams to see Grey Wind twitching asleep on the rug beside him and the slumbering Roslin, did he guiltily admit he had some taste for the blood lust that had come upon him in battle. Never could he imagine though that the man before him, the giant of his childhood, the hero of Robert's Rebellion, could ever be disturbed to the point of unbalance by all the killing normal to war.

"Should we get mother?" Arya whispered.

"No," he replied, and patted his sister's head to reassure her; to reassure himself through the closeness with his pack mate. 'I wish Jon were here,' Robb wistfully thought, wanting to share this burden with his pack brother who now guarded the Wall, two thousand miles away. Images of Jon all clothed in black, marching through the dark atop towering blocks of ice, Ghost by his side, filled his mind. He sighed, releasing the vision, only to have it replaced by another, that of a familiar smirking smile. 'Or Theon.' He wrinkled his mouth, still not understanding why his father had commanded his friend to remain behind in Riverrun and learn how another Great House run its business. 'Father never did warm to Theon. And now he's almost outright hostile to him.' Robb wondered what lies about the fosterling had reached his lord father's ears.

"… Then us'll all ha' etten thee

On Ilkla Mooar baht 'at

That's wheear we get us ooan back

On Ilkla Mooar baht 'at

That's wheear we get us ooan back

On Ilkla Mooar baht 'at

On Ilkla Mooar baht 'at"

When his father's rough base voice finished the last verse of the eldritch sounding tune, he drained the cup in his hand, and then declared angrily to no one, "That's where we get our own back."

'No, definitely not the man I remember,' Robb thought, drawing his sister away from the tent flap. 'But then I'm not the boy I was either, am I?' he suddenly realized. 'I was a King.' He remembered how uncomfortable and heavy that weight had laid on him. And then he noticed Arya was still looking up at him, her barely seen eyes pleading for answers to her worries. "We'll talk to mother in the morning, alone. Alright?"

Arya nodded.

"But first, we need to talk. Father's been different since … after … you know."

Anger and pain and memories swelled up in his sister's face. "Ilyn Payne cut his head off," she growled.

Robb scrunched up his lips. "Well … yeah." The usual doubts that nagged at him whenever he thought of his father's changes returned. "I guess that might alter his perspective a bit," he said, feeling stupid for having said it.

"Ya think!" Arya snapped.

Robb sighed. He really didn't know what to think.

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