r/AsoiafFanfiction

Title: The first cut is the deepest

Author: FenceSittersAnonymous

Rating: Mature

Language: English

Length: 118K

Status: In-Progress

Summary: After dying at the hands of Jon Snow, betrayed for the final time by her own blood after years of agony and torment, Daenerys wishes more than anything that she could have her time again – regret and guilt etched into every prayer.

Except she doesn’t wake up in 298 AC, walking out of her husband’s pyre as she had prayed for. No. She wakes up in 209 AC, deep in the Dragonmont with Drogon by her side.

A Targaryen alone in the world is a terrible thing, and now she's going to learn why.

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(I hope that it’s not me beating a dead horse, because I’ve seen the flame wars around the topic of Catelyn) But I’ve only recently found out about a real-life example on what happened when fathers favored bastards — I think it shows that Catelyn’s paranoia concerning Jon wasn’t as ridiculous in medieval society’s eyes as we readers (who have the advantage of reading Jon’s and Ned’s minds) know it to be.

In the 12th century, there lived Prince Yaroslav Osmomysl of Galich. He favored his concubine and his bastard son Oleg so much that he banished his actual wife and his son and heir Vladimir from the principality (when the kid was only about fifteen!). And before he died, he wanted Oleg to inherit. Vladimir, naturally, disagreed, a long civil strife with treasons and poisonings and rebellions ensued, and no one actually won for more than a few years. And as for posterity, both brothers sank into obscurity soon afterwards, until Vladimir was pulled out of it about 700 years later — by getting featured in the opera Prince Igor, as one of the most disgusting villains of opera in general, and with all the blame for the family strife pinned entirely on him.

Thankfully, Catelyn doesn’t know anything of the above (I don’t know if even GRRM knows — though it does seem to be what he would be interested in: an interfamilial war for the throne with no winners that ends in the dynasty dying out in the male line, hm, now where have we seen that before…). But it shows that yes, favoring a bastard could be a dangerous sign and could very much mean future trouble for the legitimate son. The Blackfyre Rebellions at least never succeeded — but some RL analogues did, if briefly.

In The Hedge Knight, it's established that Baelor wears the armour meant for his son, since he wasn't expecting to fight or joust. As we know, Maekar clobbers him over the head with his mace, and that caves the helmet inward and does irreparable damage to Baelor's skull.

I've seen people on Reddit talking like Baelor died because the armour was ill-fitting and not meant for him, but is that really what killed him? If Valarr had been wearing that armour as intended, would Maekar's mace have been less effective against it?

Fifth re-read of ASOIAF and I wondered while reading Ned's chapter where he dreams of ToJ and Robert takes him back as hand, that Ned nearly tells him, but Robert cuts him off and then it just... Never comes back up? Like he's not gonna explain the catspaw, show Robert the dagger *he* won? Tell him about the tourney that Robert would know the truth of?

So, as always, I began writing. Before I publish it, I was wondering what opinions anyone had on this and whether or not anything would come of it. I appreciate any ideas or opinions :)

//this is my first time writting a ff or posting in here please be gentle, be happy if someone wanted to pick this up or if something like it already exists

Ned stark is alone, his father and elder brother murdered, his sister passing in childbirth. And his youngest brother leaving for the wall. He rides solom with his babe of a nephew home to his new wife in winterfell. As his eyes cast down to the dark haired babe he ruminates on how unprepared he is for his lordship, and promises himself that no Child of his will be unprepared for the life ahead of them, and that he should help Robb and Jon grow with the love of siblings…

In that moment the stark paramount decides to sire many children, his wife after all is quite beautiful.

And thus began the fruitful manage of Ned and catlien stark, much to the envy and jealousy of the many wives of westros. After all how can one woman be so lucky

Caitlin Tully was gossiped about when she was to be married to a stark, having to leave the south and live amongst the northern barbarian, but at least she did her duty and provided the lord paramount with an heir, Cersei chuckled when she had been told that the honorable lord stark had brought home a bastard, she was infinitely less amused when her first son was stillborn and she heard news that lady stark had given birth to a healthy daughter neigh 9 months from eddards return, she was then furious to hear that the trout was already carrying her third child before she had a first, not that robbert was any use, Jamie’s seed surly would produce proper results.

After jofferys birth the court learned of the stark family’s 4th child being born hardly 2 years past since Robert’s rebellion

12 years latter:
Cersei stepped forth from the wheelhouse into the mud caked courtyard of winterfell, tired and resentful of the journey when she stoped dead. her gaze had past, first from the mud to the gawking smallfolk the the practiced rows of stark men at attention and finally the the large pack of individuals garbed in grey and black, with the stark direwolf embroidered on tunics dresses and cloaks. assembled before the royal precession stood neigh a full score or black and red haired children lined to the right of whom she knew to be lord and lady stark

The stark matriarch held a subtle smile before closing to a guarded expression as she curtsied, the Queen felt a stab of jealousy as she looked upon the clearly pregnant woman next to her children numbering eight and ten if you counted the bastard, which galled the queen whom only managed to have three successful births after much complications. How could one woman be capable of baring seven and ten children in the span of four and ten years of marriage…

Each chapter would be seen from the lense of the gossip between the high lady’s as they pity and mock lady stark until they are left baffled and jealous of her and envious on what is clearly a very attentive husband, let alone what are clearly strong genes

Writing help too!

I’ve started work on a New Valyria AU that involves a more steady conquest by Aegon, as a book written by a maester covering the history of House Targaryen.

One difficult point I’ve run up against is what Master of Laws Edmyn Tully does or looks for when testing people in a royal service examination. The idea for the AU is that Aegon wants a unified royal army after the debacle of the First Dornish War (Rhaenys doesn’t die) but the lords aren’t willing to hand over more than a small fraction of men, and Edmyn’s the one who defends them to the king.

Annoyed, the king, but most Visenya, tell Edmyn to do something then with the five-thousand or so foreign sellswords, local lordlings, and Ironborn that don’t want to serve the Isles or the Riverlands into something resembling a royal service that would eventually evolve and be refined under later kings into a civil bureaucracy.

My idea was having a test that measures problem solving skills, basic math, literacy and history, and internal portfolios overseen by the master of laws. If Tully had three secretaries, I was thinking Justice overseeing judges or marshals of some kind, Works for infrastructure and roads to be maintained, and Waters for shorelines and rivers/waterways.