Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Sixth Moon 283 AC

Eleanor isn’t, in general, a particularly big fan of funerals.

That’s a common opinion, she’s sure. No one enjoys the ritual bits of mourning the dead, not the viewing, not the saying a few words choked on tears, and really none of the horrible atmosphere. 

It’s probably worse that this is the second one she’s had for a brother in a six month period. Her last brother. 

Shit. 

Said brother’s widow comes to stand beside her, draped in rich black garments similar to her own, only the best for House Mooton. Fine embroidery of salmon and waves and jewels inlaid into the fabric of their dresses, and a dark linen shawl over the woman beside her’s hair. 

“Lady Mooton,” The widow greets. 

“Lady Mooton,” Eleanor responds, wryly. 

They watch on as William Mooton’s funeral pyre floats off into the ocean, Eleanor’s hands clasped behind her back as she frowns. 

“He’s...very dead then,” Margery, Eleanor’s sister in law murmurs, a grimace pulling at her pretty lips.

Eleanor snorts. “Quite.”

Margery, after subtly looking about and making certain no one is paying attention to the two of them, lightly smacks a hand against Eleanor’s arm with a scowl. “This isn’t funny! We are his only inheritors, Eleanor. Two woman inheritors,” Marg hisses. 

Eleanor gives her an annoyed look. “Allow me to enjoy the ambiance before I am faced with the sudden pressure to marry some pompous fool and birth little heirs, dear Margery.” 

“What if my father calls me back to his home?” Margery continues, uncaring for Eleanor’s own plight, the rude woman. 

“He will not. You were married for a moon, I’d say legally that keeps you a Mooton for the end of time. Besides, what need does an unlanded knight have for widowed daughters in the middle of a war?” Eleanor says quietly, taking a step to wrap an arm around her shoulders. Any onlooker would think it over the fool drifting off to sea right now, but it's fully to reassure her fellow Lady of Maidenpool of her place in her home. 

Gods, they are terribly young to be dealing with this. Well, less so Eleanor, if one counts the period of time she wasn’t made to shit in a pot and recite sweet hymns about seven faced gods. 

Oh Earth, how she misses it so. Especially its standards for hygiene and plumbing. 

Seagulls caw and cry, and the waves pull too and fro into the beach, unconcerned with the problems of the humans that stand on its ancient shore. Eleanor breathes in the smell of smoke and salt, glancing to her side at frowning Marg, her  chestnut hair curling from the careful bun the servants had twisted it into this morning.

Damn damn damn. Eleanor is Lady of Maidenpool. Margery is Lady Dowager, but Eleanor is the only Mooton by blood left of her house, and it’s expected she will take the primary title from the woman beside her. 

Frankly, Margery would probably thank her. She had no interest in governing from a young age, ever since she came to their port city as a ward at tiny seven, missing teeth and pigtails. 

“Since you insist on doing work during such a somber event,” Eleanor says quietly as her brother’s boat pyre sinks into the water. “We’d best hurry back to the keep. We have work to do. Specifically about this fool war.”

Robert Baratheon’s rebellion. 

She’d tried to warn her brothers, sway them to the winning side, but her second eldest brother Myles was knighted by Rhaegar Targeryon himself, the Prince’s squire since he was a boy. And William, the idiot sinking to the ocean floor right now, well, he followed where Myles walked, despite being the elder of the two. 

She hates that they were stupid. She hates that they are dead. 

She can do nothing for them now, no matter how much her heart aches at being the last of her family in this life by blood. 

She squeezes her arm around Marg a little tighter. Not totally alone, at least. Two seventeen year old girls left to run a port city, what could go wrong? Well. Seventeen give or take on her part, but again, not the point. 

They head back to the keep silently, a somber procession as people take a day's vacation from work for the event. 

They don’t really care, William was not loved, not even well liked, but the uncertainty of both male heirs gone is likely heavy on all of them on top of the war. 

Ugh. Patriarchal societies just set themselves up for failure, don’t they?

Once they make it into Maidenpool’s keep Eleanor heads for her newly inherited solar, and Marg excuses herself to change out of her funeral garb and hide away from any semblance of responsibility. Eleanor calls for her maester as she tries to figure out where her brother put anything in the barely used room, official documents and papers left in the same places her deceased father left them three years ago if the dust can be believed.

Maester Lark comes in, peering wide eyed as she finally manages to find some ink in the stupid desk and grumbles unladylike profanities to herself. 

“My Lady, I had not thought you would turn to work so soon,” He says, like a liar. The man has known her since she was ten, frankly he’s learned if anything she’s consistent in her quiet disregard for things she’s meant to care about. 

Honestly, she’s living on extra time right now, she can do whatever she pleases so long as it doesn’t leave her stabbed or burned for witchcraft or whatever it is her septa said happens to infidels. 

“Do you know where Robert Baratheon’s army was most recently?” Eleanor asks instead of answering him. 

“Enroute along the Trident, if most recent reports serve correctly, my Lady,” Lark says, something like anxiety creeping into his voice. “Why?”

“I want a raven sent informing him of our support, and apologizing but what men we could have pledged will take some time to raise,” Eleanor says frankly, dipping her quill in ink and writing quickly, knowing the man wouldn’t care about pretty scrawl. 

It’s a lie, most of Maidenpool’s men lie prepared, standing at the ready for any sort of word from the King, but she doesn’t care if it’s seen through. Baratheon slew her brother in battle, chest smashed in, he will not kill more for his cause in the Trident. 

Lark pales, shutting the door quickly.

“My lady, that would be treason. We lie at the edge of the crownlands themselves—!” 

Eleanor looks up, ink streaking her small fingers, pale eyes hard. “I am aware. But I know how to hedge my bets, Maester Lark, and we will not be winning the pot with a man who stole the Warden of the North’s daughter and a mad king. Change is here, and I will not have our house be any further decimated by it.”

Maester Lark is silent, tan face locked in an uncharacteristic grimace. 

“Very well, Lady Mooton. I will see it done.”

Eleanor hands him the letter, quickly sealed in pink wax with the ring passed down her family line from the time they were petty kings, from her father to her brother, and now to her. 

She’s glad that her damned future knowledge can do this, at least. She doesn’t know if William and Myles were always doomed to die, one to a hunting accident and another to this war, but it doesn’t matter now. 

She has Margery and Maidenpool to think of, and she will not see either destroyed. 

Maester Lark leaves the solar quietly as Eleanor settles in the wooden chair her father had favored, not yet changed by her brother. She needs to look over the family accounts, see what security they have, and check when the last census was. She can already feel a headache beginning behind her temple, throbbing.

She watches dust mites float in the air through the light of her candles and the windows behind her desk.

A mess. This is a mess. Why was she reborn important?

Maidenpool is a rich port, the first link from the Riverlands and northern Crownlands to the Narrow Sea and lies in the middle of the most well trodden road to Kings Landing. And following that logic, the Mootons are rich. Richer than the Tully, their own liege lords, along with the rest of the Riverlands. 

That puts a heavy target on their backs, but right now, it’s just another asset of Eleanor’s to try and do some good for her city and surrounding lands. 

There’s about to be serious unrest, especially with the battle of the Trident around the corner. With the change in regimes will come displaced people in war, uncertainty, and likely more than a few idiots willing to try for more power while the power structure is malleable. 

What does that mean for her, you ask?

Well. First she’s doubling down on her home front. On the half chance the rebellion doesn’t go as planned, she’s openly declaring nothing for either side and quietly doing a census to see how many able bodied men are under her. William had already put their men at the ready months before, waiting for the word from their king, but if push comes to shove Eleanor can start enlisting every man who could even sort of hold a sword. Unideal, she’d prefer a highly trained, smaller force to pure numbers, but sometimes numbers work. She doesn't think it will be necessary, though. Some of these papers she's found of William's are...telling. He had three mercenary companies in talks to protect the city should this war continue longer. 

He should've told her, but then again, she knows why he didn't. The last fight they had about this war was not pretty.

Regardless, after this war she has more plans. Social programs, firstly. 

Eradicating poverty in her little slice of the world would be good, but poverty is complicated. She’ll need to research what the average livable wage is in the city and increase literacy, at least. State funded boarding houses would be good as well. 

So much work to do. Ugh, at least if she actually does it well she’ll be remembered in the future as that one cool noble with the progressive ideas. 

Eleanor sighs deeply, rubbing her tired eyes with her palms before leaning back and looking up at the old stone ceiling of her solar, making shapes out of the abstract lines between the stones. 

There’s a quiet knock at the door, before it opens, revealing Marg. She’s still clad in a dark gown, Eleanor is as well as per the allotted time close family is meant to be in mourning in polite society, but Marg looks lovely regardless of dreary dresses and veils.

...Eleanor is going to pretend she didn’t think that last bit.

“Marg, my light, my love,” Eleanor says dryly, leaning forward once again and resting her arms on her desk. “You know, with you taking control of the household and me the city, it’s almost as if we never lost William at all.”

“We would be a far happier couple than William and I were,” Marg says, handing over a stack of papers. “But woe, my dearest friend was not born a man.”

If only gay rights were a thing here. How sad she is, a lesbian trapped in the Seven Kingdoms. 

She should look into adoptions. Soon. She’s not marrying a man, she’d rather be burned, or whatever it is they do to gays around here.

Hm. Yes she should also look into trying for that social change, though with the foothold the church has in the city thanks to Jonquil’s Pool she might need to be...subtle. About it. Very subtle. Subtle and keeping in mind what happened when the Faith Militant were created and how they felt about the gays.

“El?”

Eleanor blinks and looks over at Margery, and then her mouth decides to be foolish.

“They say the priests to the Old Gods once performed same sex marriages,” Eleanor says faux idly. “The Seven faces are a cruel mistress.”

Marg gives her a long look. Eleanor tries not to sweat.

“ Anyways, ” Eleanor says, standing from her chair, looking over the papers she’s been handed. “That funeral cost less than expected.”

“I’m aware, I made sure of it,” Marg says, settling on the couch shoved against the wall to the side of her desk. Eleanor’s father had put it there after an afternoon too many of her coming in to read the books he kept in his solar. 

She misses him.

“Not a half penny to spare for the departed?” Eleanor asks, ignoring that stray thought.

“We’re at war,” Marg says, shifting so she’s laying on the long couch. “And, evidently, on the rebelling side. Would you care to explain that decision? You were angry when Myles died, we all were.”

Eleanor sets the papers down, one hand fiddling with the sleeve of her dress. “I told them who I felt would win this conflict, and neither listened. I am angry he is dead, but I have investment in being on the victor’s side. For Maidenpool and House Mooton.”

“You’ve always been weighed with duty haven’t you,” Marg says with a frown. “Your face was so serious when I met you I thought you hated me.”

Eleanor sputters, wide eyed. “I could never hate someone I’ve just met!”

“I recall you thinking differently about more than a few suitors.”

“They pranced about like peacocks or snapped a finger and expected me to follow, that is quite different, I assure you,” Eleanor huffs, crossing her arms.

“Lies, my best friend is a liar!” Marg says in a false mournful tone, covering her face with one draped hand, before peeking at Eleanor through her fingers. “Lord Blackwood was a catch, I think.”

“Yes I was a fan of the dour disposition Tytos had. We would’ve been happily miserable together,” Eleanor states blandly.

“I can see it now, you, birthing black haired babes who’s first words are ‘Damn Brackens!’. I should’ve married Lord Jonos, then we could’ve been a pair.”

“Every visit would be entertaining, I’m sure.”

There is a brisk knock on the door, and Marg quickly moves to a more proper position on the couch. Laying down with her shoes up on the armrest would be a bit compromising.

“Yes?” Eleanor calls. “Who is it?”

“It is I, my Lady, I have news,” Comes Maester Lark’s voice through the old wood, a nervous shake to his voice that has Eleanor’s brows furrowing.

“Come in then,” Eleanor calls back, sharing a look with Marg.

The door opens and shuts quickly, the middle aged man’s hand trembling a bit as he holds out a small stag sealed letter.

“I’ll be damned,” Eleanor grumbles, sliding her thumb under the seal and unrolling the paper, eyes tracing the words.

“It seems we chose a very good time to turn coats,” Eleanor says, finishing reading and holding out the letter to Marg. “Lord Baratheon has defeated Rhaegar at the southern Trident, east of the Saltpans. He’s calling what allies left unraised to join him in capturing Kings Landing.”

“By the gods,” Marg says, dark eyes wide as she skims the paper before standing and handing the letter to Lark. “Well done, Eleanor.”

“Well done indeed,” Lark says to himself as he reads. “But will his victory at the Trident mean victory in taking the capital?”

“The heir to the throne, the man who started this mess, lies dead,” Marg counters. “I’d say Baratheon is the sort to finish the job, though.”

Eleanor begins pacing, glad at least that the most of this mess is done.

What if she sends her men and then the wildfire ends up blowing? 

Ah, they’ll have bigger problems if Jaime Lannister doesn’t live up to his honor. Damn it all, she’s raising her banners.

“Lark, please bring Ser Oscar, as well as the Steward. We need supplies and men, yesterday,” Eleanor orders, pausing her pacing only to give Maester Lark a serious look, before returning to her desk and pulling out a few new sheets of paper. 

“I’ll take my leave,” Marg starts quickly, heading towards the door after Lark.

“No, no you have a better head for numbers than me. Would you mind helping with the calculations while we have this...lovely meeting?” Eleanor asks, standing and pulling a chair to sit beside hers at the desk.

Marg grimaces, but does as Eleanor asks, settling in the chair beside Eleanor’s.

“Ser Oscar won’t be pleased,” Marg says, likely thinking of the man’s reaction to being made to leave his training yard.

“Ser Oscar is pleased by nothing, frankly an opportunity to wet his blade might mellow him.”

For the next few hours there is a sudden burst of energy and movement in the keep and Maidenpool, a sudden call to arms and the people being made aware of House Mooton’s new allegiance. 

If there are naysayers, they say nothing where the guards can hear, though it isn’t likely there are many. The Targaryen are not well loved by Maidenpool, not since one of their Queens was almost assassinated in Jonquil’s pool. Incest is still a...touchy subject, for many in Westeros. A gross peculiarity reserved only for pale haired, violet eyed dragons in human skin. Hence a queen almost being murdered while pregnant with her brother’s child in the pool reserved for “pure” women.

Regardless, her brother had been expecting that he’d need to raise an army before he died, if for the opposite side, so the process is relatively painless if tedious. Swords and armor need to be delegated, supplies gathered, widow’s funds set up in advance for every man enlisted, though she’s not the only one praying most won’t be needed. 

Work. It is a grand amount of work. But Eleanor isn’t going to be one of the fools not involved in this conflict even if she came in late. Though, frankly, her lateness can be attributed to her only just inheriting. She did pledge to the cause immediately after she gained her titles. 

By the end of the week she has five thousand men, jesus-fucking-christ her city and surrounding lands are bigger than she thought and she hasn’t finished that census, and has kept most of her farmers and essential men in place at home. Go her. She made a fairly good recruitment campaign with the high pay she's offering.

(They’re sellswords, she’s very aware a lot of them are sellswords. It's a win if men who sell their skills but keep their lives choose to be under her command.)

Don’t ask how she managed to organize them in little over a week, she doesn’t know, and she blames Ser Oscar’s uber serious hidden glee at getting to lead an army in his older years. 

Robert’s army is swooping from the Saltpans to Maidenpool to take the road to King's Landing, so now is just the waiting game to get her men picked up.

Picked up. It’s like they’re going to school instead of going off to take a city. 

They’re arrival is estimated in two more weeks, so within that time her only orders to the soldier’s superiors are to try and train the more green warriors up enough that they don’t die, along with some basic first aid.

The last one is probably unexpected, field medics are under utilized in Westeros, the field of healing seemingly “reserved” for the Maesters, but if she’s going in late she’s going with style. Her men are clad in good armor, well supplied, and she intends to bring them all back. So. Training some field medics it is, even if they're sort of rushed and will only learn how to compress and clean wounds. 

The riches she’s inherited are going to good use. William is rolling in his watery grave, he thought the best use of their wealth was for fine garbs, prostitutes, and hunting. Perish the thought of tax money being spent on the people. 

Most of the medical training is being overseen by men Maester Lark trusts to actually teach from the pamphlets she’s made.

She doesn’t expect two weeks to do overly much, but the trainers are headed off with the army, so there’s at least a hope they keep it up and even be useful for saving lives themselves.

Besides organizing troops, there’s the preparing for a feast, just in case Robert is intent on a break from conquest before he heads away. She already needed copious moon tea on hand just to be able to provide family planning for her women on staff, now she just has a good reason to order it. 

Hm. She should look into less gross ways to make condoms. The only kind as of now involves pig intestines and hope. 

Eleanor leans back, sighing as her back cracks, before reaching high above and stretching out her weary arms.

Candlelight glows soft in the solar she’s been practically living in the past week, and she’s fairly certain she’s been wearing the same dress since yesterday.

...It’s a good thing she’s known for her strange cleanliness and unreasonable bathing schedule- well, no, that’s a lie. In Maidenpool, and only in Maidenpool in her experience, cleanliness is associated with holiness, thanks to the pool she and all her ancestors can’t avoid not bringing up for more than a day. The damned sweetwater pool is central to the local culture; it's not her fault. 

Ugh.

She’s going to sleep, and she’s going to sleep for twelve hours at least . No one is stopping her. 

The day Robert Baratheon’s army is spotted enroute a few miles away is the day Eleanor tries not to regret all of her previous life decisions. 

She was at Harrenhall, practically everyone in the realm was at Harrenhall, she’s interacted with him a total of once in passing, she doubts he even remembers her name. She wishes she had the luxury of forgetting his.

She should’ve ran to Essos when she could, this is going to be a mess or painless and she’s leaning towards mess. Especially with the entirety of his forces at his back, some thirty thousand men.

She gives the men technically under her command a morale boost while they wait, or at least what she hopes is a morale boost. As their liege, traditionally she or one of her children would be leading them into battle. As is, she has little military training outside of archery and horsemanship, she would be a hindrance. So, the next best thing is a rousing speech and promises that any woman left widowed or child orphaned will be taken care of in honor of their sacrifice. With an emphasis that she doubts they’ll die.

Eleanor is not built for the more public parts of leadership, especially not with how...serious, her counterparts are in Westeros. She’s blunt, casual, and not exactly skilled in public speaking.

That being said, she makes sure to sprinkle in promises of bonus pay for every civilian they protect. Does it turn some heads? Yes. Does she care? No. She’s a weak hearted woman, blah blah blah, of course she wants them to keep the war crimes down.

Once again she is glad for her generations heavy coin purse. She’s no Lannister, nobody is a Lannister, but again. Main trade hub between the Riverlands and the capital, along with the main link to the Narrow sea. Kaching kaching.

Eleanor also quietly makes it known in a private meeting with the battalion leaders, the men in charge of a thousand men each, that rapers are having their pay cut and maybe some other things cut. She doesn’t specify how much, but she’s certain the look on her face is enough to translate her ultimate displeasure with any who will require a pay cut.

With that, she sends a runner asking if Baratheon is barreling through to Kings Landing or resting for a moment to restock on supplies, and then promptly naps in Marg’s chambers, where no one can find her for an hour or two.

...alright it was three hours, but she left in time for the runner’s return. That’s all that matters.

“Afternoon, Mister Tommard,” She says in greeting to the panting man, waving a servant to give the poor guy some water. While he recovers the message he carried is placed in her hands and she wastes no time opening it.

“Damn, well, at least I prepared supplies in advance,” Eleanor says with a sigh, looking at the quiet servant who handed her the message and Mister Tommard his water, Danelle. “Danelle, tell the Steward that Lord Baratheon is resting for two days here.” 

Dannelle nods once, before quickly leaving the Solar. Tommard, barely older than Eleanor, moves to stumble out before she stops him. “Don’t be a fool, sit on the couch before you have a heart attack.” Eleanor shakes her head, settling at her desk and looking over a few petitions from the smallfolk. “And you don’t have to talk, focus on saving your breath.” 

Petition number one is a farmer, rightfully pissed that when the now deceased Prince’s army came charging past towards the Trident they burned and pillaged his fields. He wants compensation. She approves it easily, writing a note to the side to set aside some percentage of their already in place crop taxes for this purpose for the next time.

Petition number two is a- why is she being asked directly to approve a divorce. Don’t they already have people in place for that? Or was it the Sept who handles it? Damn, she can’t remember. Well, it is a legal construct before a religious one. The man is unsatisfied with his wife’s inability to have a child- oh it’s just some poncy merchant, that’s how it got on her desk. 

Ugh. She approves the request, but attaches a request to the page for her steward to seek out the wife so she can speak to her herself. Frankly, the woman is better off divorced from him, but she can negate the harm to her after that by trying to find her employment at the keep, and make the man cough up some funds for her as a severance fee.

“Ah...Lady Mooton?”

Eleanor looks up with a startled blink, suddenly remembering there is another person in her solar with her.

“Oh, Mister Tommard, are you feeling better now?” Eleanor asks, taking in the nervous looking young man on her couch. 

“Yes, very good, milady, I was wondering if I may...go? Now?”

Ah. Right. This is like being called to the CEO’s office as an intern. No wonder he’s nervous. 

She forgets, at times, that she is now in a terrible place of privilege. She should endeavor to remember from here forward. 

“Of course, of course--!” She starts, before remembering. “Ah! Wait! May I ask you a few questions on your current living conditions and happiness with your employment?” She asks, quickly pulling out a few new bare sheets of paper. “Oh, this isn’t a trick nor am I, well, intending on doing anything ill to you. I simply have been meaning to ask someone who is actually a part of the smallfolk about what the smallfolk need most.”

Tommard looks overwhelmed. Hm, that was a bit much, wasn’t it?

“Er, would you like to have a chat?” Eleanor tries again, slower this time. 

“I suppose?” Tommard says, though it is more like a question. He sits back down on the couch and continues to look nervous. 

“Great, wonderful, ah, to start, do you know how to read and write?” Eleanor starts.

“I learned from the septas when I was younger how to spell my name, but that was all,” Tommard says, a flush growing on his face. “Us smallfolk aren’t needing the written word like you are, milady.”

“I would argue everyone should have a right to the written word, but I do not think not being able to read is something to be embarrassed about,” Eleanor says, not very sure how to reassure the man she’s not doing this to kick down, or anything. “How many people do you know who can read?”

“Ah, none? I suppose? Merchants will fuss about but I was born at the docks. No need for it for my ilk,” Tommard says. “May I...ask why you would like to know, milady?”

“I’m interested in creating schools for the common folk,” Eleanor explains easily. “It isn’t right that just because I was born in a castle and you at the docks I am the only one allowed to read.”

The rest of the conversation is still a bit awkward, but Tommard noticeably brightens when she mentions what changes she’s hoping to make for the smallfolk. After about an hour they bid goodbye, her handing him a note to give to his superiors to let them know she was the one keeping him behind for so long, and him thanking her for the bare minimum of asking about what he thinks the smallfolk need most.

Eleanor feels ill, at times, thinking of her position over theirs. She is the oppressor, she deserves no praise for removing the boot from any of their necks.

Then, of course, right as Tommard leaves the door, she is notified of Robert’s arrival.

Dear old gods, let these two days go quickly so she can get back to her important shit.

Chapter Text

Seventh Moon, 283 AC

Robert is about how she remembers.

More tired, she can see it in his face, the man likely slayed a hundred men at the trident and is intent on slaying more, but still the infamous Robert Baratheon. 

“Lady Mooton, sorry about the brother.”

See? Same lack of tact.

Eleanor stares in deadpan, taking in the finely armored, black haired man in her courtyard with a professional eye. He’s backed by twelve other lords of various notability, including Eddard Stark and his foster father Jon Arryn. Tired and worn down looking, the lot of them. 

“I’m certain you would be less sorry if I were adding less men to your cause,” Eleanor says dryly, waving over the salt and bread from one of her servants. Marg, standing just slightly behind her, makes a microexpression that implies she’s trying not to roll her eyes.

Robert lets out a laugh, biting from his bread with a tear of his teeth as it is passed to his second in command, Eddard Stark. He hasn’t changed much in the two years since Harrenhall, though he seems to have much more pronounced cheekbones and a deep solemnness in his face. 

Eleanor supposes so many losses in your family in just under two years will do that to you.

She offers rooms to what lords she can, but more than a few are staying in the camped tents with their men, specifically the Northern lords. She doesn’t mind it at all, the less lords her servants have to clean up for after this is through the better. 

...Maybe a little cleaning up should be done though, Eleanor can still smell, ah, battle on some of them. It isn’t a flattering smell. 

On the note of smells, by the gods she’s going to have to sit next to Robert fucking Baratheon during this feast. Eleanor would say she’s going to need a drink, but she honestly doesn’t trust any of these fools in her castle and if she’s drunk she can’t handle whatever stupidity they bring. 

Alright, perhaps she’s being a bit too unfair, she’s only just met half of them, but she really has no faith in lords for good reason. And that good reason is, well, just looking at Westeros a lot of things. Actually, now that she thinks about it there are many more reasons coming to mind than is good for her anxiety levels this evening. 

Regardless, after all the hubbub of the arrival it's time to get ready for the feast. After Marg does a last minute check in with the Steward the two ladies of house Mooton, it’s last ladies, return to Eleanor’s chambers to get ready together. 

“You know,” Marg says, contemplatively as one of their servants ties her dress. “This would be an opportune time to, how have you said it before? ‘ Scope out ’ our options for marriage. Er, rather, remarriage in my case.”

Marg is admirably practical considering she’s been widowed for a month now. Then again, that’s always been her nature. 

Eleanor grimaces deeply all the same at the thought of marriage, though. She can’t help it. She’s quite terrible at pretending to be straight, isn’t she? 

Oh she was never even pretending was she. She’s made far too many pining looks at her sister-in-law to really say she’s been trying at all. Damn.

“Oh don’t look so sour,” Marg says, rolling her eyes. “If it’s the consummation bits you’re so concerned about it’s not so bad.” 

“I’m more so concerned with a man threatening my authority in my own keep,” Eleanor says, tone bland, like a liar. “If you would like to remarry I will never stop you, but I think I will still look for better alternatives.”

See, she’s not actually concerned with a man ruining her control in that situation. It’s a good excuse, but ultimately false. If she were truly concerned she’d just marry a weakling third son of a third son or a Vale knight, but as it stands she just…

It’s foolish, considering the circumstances. Gay men and women throughout history in Westeros have likely had to force themselves to make an heir or two and be done with it, but Eleanor is a bit of a different case, isn’t she?

Eleanor remembers a time when her name was not Eleanor, and she grew into adulthood with the right to marry whoever she wanted, man or woman. And that…creates complications, in her sensibilities for what she is owed in this life, and what she cannot stand for.

Damn it all, if only her fool brothers had had some bastards like proper idiot lords. Any child of Mooton blood in this generation with no living parents would do.

She blinks.

Hm. There’s an idea for later. How many children in Maidenpool, she wonders, have strawberry blonde hair and blue eyes. Really, there must be some. Running about.

Oh Christ she is not contemplating fraud to ensure she has an heir.

...Yes. Yes she is. Plans for later, presumably a long enough time to look like she’s actively searching for them after being tipped off. Her fingers itch for her notebooks and a pen and--

“Eleanor?” Margery says.

Eleanor blinks, suddenly aware that she is no longer being pulled this way and that, hair now curled in a simple bun and body wrapped up in a dress proper for a woman of her status and wealth. By that she means it covers her like a nun and is more expensive than a year's worth of rent.

“Yes, I totally agree,” Eleanor says on instinct, stupidly.

Marg gives her a look. And gods she does look beautiful, chestnut hair falling in pretty waves and dressed in Mooton reds and oranges. Eleanor could spend hours just looking at her. Little beauty marks on her neck, the way her smile is always a bit lopsided and her eyes curl when she’s happy. 

Pining and loathing, oh how they come hand in hand.

“Of course you do, now come on, my dearest friend with her thoughts ever lost in the clouds.” Marg says teasingly, stepping up and looping her arm in Eleanor’s, dragging her out of the room.

“If I am so dear don’t take me to that room full of men eager to shove their sons at me,” Eleanor says with a sigh, lightly bumping her shoulder into her friend’s.

“You need an heir,” Marg says, lower, just a bit more seriously as they walk.

“I need a drink,” Eleanor says, scowling and pointed.

They arrive at the feast first, barring the earliest of lords at the lower tables, and Eleanor settles at the center of the high table with Margery at her left. Their current dynamic is probably strange by most standards, the expectation is that if there are two women vying for the title of ‘Lady of the House’ they will fight for it, but to be frank, Marg is happy to take over more the traditional roles of Ladyship while Eleanor handles the Lordship, head of house jobs. Eleanor spent years in her father’s solar snooping about, probably more time than even Willam spent, she’s just plainly more suited to it.

And, honestly, Eleanor could never fight with Marg over something like that. Beyond her hormonal, foolish crush, she’s known her since they were children, and she’s her best friend. Titles and work are not worth destroying that over. Not for all the prestige in the world.

Eleanor has a small conversation with Marg about the lords expected to be in attendance, a good few storm lords, riverlanders, northerners, and valemen. Though Marg had been informed at least one had taken ill with battle wounds and wouldn’t be able to attend. 

The Lords and Knights look tired when they begin to trickle into her hall, and she does not envy them for their ability to be warriors and generals. She’s quite happy to never be in or take direct part in that kind of human suffering. Without guns it’s. Worse. So much worse. The guns created more death, for certain, but so much faster and farther away.

Swords and hammers are decidedly more…violent. She remembers how Myles looked when his body was sent home for burial.

Eleanor tries not to contemplate on how Myles fell to this very company of men. Even less so is she interested in thinking of how he’d feel on her harboring them. Because he is dead, and she is alive, and she tried to warn him. 

Eleanor takes a breath. 

And then Robert Baratheon and Ned Stark come in, one Jon Arryn following just behind them as Robert laughs boisterously.

“Fair Ladies Mooton!” He says in greeting, sitting at Eleanor’s right. “A great keep you both have.”

“Thank you, it runs in the family,” Eleanor says, taking a careful drink of her watered down sweetwine. 

“You’re very kind, Lord Baratheon,” Marg says with more tact, smiling. She has always cared more for niceties than Eleanor.

Robert laughs. He is a fan of laughing, apparently, for a man wracked with rage over his lost betrothed.

She’s likely foolish, speaking so plainly to a future king, but she’s done it so long it’s been made into a well known trait, if a third born daughter can be well known at all. She’s been very lucky, all things considered.

Her father was an older man made kind in his age and favored her over her brothers, putting off giving her a new betrothal after her original stormlander betrothal died in a horsing accident. Then her prospecting marriage to Jaime Lannister, of all fucking people, was ruined thanks to his rising to the Kingsguard at Harrenhall. And, well, there’s been a war on since then, so even less chances for her elder brothers to try and send her off to start making lordlings.

Very lucky. Well, it’s not like anyone ever pays the salmon clad, ‘ wisdom and strength ’ born Mooton’s any attention, save recently, which is greatly inconvenient to her.

She likely couldn’t be born in a better place in this shithole world. Go her.

The feast starts from there, the hall packed with lords and their sons and far more drinking than Eleanor has ever been at ease with. Eventually, after enough liquid courage has been dispensed, the first second son comes walking up to the high table. 

“Ser Duncan Hasty, my Lady,” He introduces himself, tall and dark haired, eyes a deep brown. 

Eleanor supposes he’s handsome, from an objective standpoint. Unfortunately despite his long hair, he is a man. 

Pity. 

“It’s good meeting you, Ser Hasty,” Eleanor says, nodding. “Are you enjoying the feast?”

“Yes, you’ve arranged it well in such short notice,” He says, and here he fumbles, not having planned past the greeting. Eleanor didn’t really give him much to work with. 

“I was expecting, once I received word from the Trident, that it would be prudent to prepare for when Lord Baratheon’s army passed through for King’s Landing.” Eleanor takes a sip of her wine, looking at said man at her right as he flirts blatantly with one of her servants. 

Baratheon’s head perks up at the mention of his name, looking over. 

“Ser Hasty!” He bellows. 

Eleanor shares a look with an amused Margery, before taking another bite of her salmon as Ser Hasty is so unfortunately drawn into a conversation with the gregarious Baratheon beside her. 

Every interaction from a lord or knight going forward ends mostly like that, her being perfectly polite and the future king being utilized to the fullest. Inbetween, Eleanor and Marg engage in their usual banter they take in public. Quietly observant and entertained by their surroundings. 

And, towards the end of the night, Baratheon finally catches on. 

The air is full of laughter and merriment, and a few bards have taken up playing a more raunchy tune probably better fit for a tavern by the docks. 

“Well this isn’t fair,” Robert starts, leaning over faux conspiratorially. “I’m doing all the talking for you.”

“I’m certain you enjoy their company far more than I do,” Eleanor says, watching Ser Hasty sing along to the song drunkenly. “And, it distracts you from my serving girls.”

Robert blinks, as if he just realized she has a brain, and then laughs. Which is unfortunate, because women with brains are interesting. And interesting women are prone to early deaths; see, Lyanna Stark. 

Oh gods let her frank personality not invoke any feelings in this very powerful idiot. Lyanna Stark was frank in her disinterest and she, well. 

She’s likely at that damned tower with the Sword of Morning. With a baby Jon.

Oh here comes the survivor’s guilt. Woe is her, cursed with knowledge and too selfish to share. Something something already spilt milk something something existential dread. 

Robert’s face sobers, a frown pulling under his dark beard.

“I am sorry about the brother, Lady Mooton. He fought well, from what I remember.”

Ugh. No, please have no deeper emotional complexities and get out of her castle.

“I know Myles fought well,” Eleanor says, looking out at the hall, Marg taking her hand under the table. “You owe me, I think, for so many men after that. That’s all I ask, that you remember that.”

She turns and gives him a heavy look. “And cherish your own brothers. I’ve heard of the siege at Storm’s End, I hope you are able to get to them in time, truly.”

Something settles between them then, Eleanor thinks. She has lost two brothers in the past months, and he is close to losing his own.

And then it is over, and the feast ends by hours end, at least for her and Marg. She hears that planning for moon tea came in handy the next day over breakfast. 

The army is gone soon enough, resupplied with men and food both. They’ll be tired of salted fish by the end of the march, Eleanor’s sure of it.

Eleanor settles heavily into her desk chair, her father’s old carved thing but with a few more cushions for her poor butt. 

Now is just the waiting game until she receives word of Robert’s coronation. By then she can ride to the smelly capital, swear allegiance, and go back home for the real work to begin. 

Real work being swinging the benefits of education to the Sept so they don’t start kicking up a fuss, avoid letting the maesters get word she’s doing it either. Street Cleaners, sewage collectors as to stop polluting the water around the city, investing money into public housing for the homeless. 

Work. Work, work, and more work, all relying on her not getting noticed much by her fellow nobility. 

Ah, and, there’s the classic. 

She needs to, drum roll please , reinvent the printing press. 

She can see it now, a thousand fics read in a past lifetime of garbage tech uplift and fix-it that somehow always ended in the male lead having a harem. Ugh. 

But in all seriousness, she could make a fortune selling them just to the Citadel. Eleanor is not a fan of hoarding information that can benefit the masses and the human race as a whole, but she’ll need to build up a reputation for the ‘Mooton brand’ before she releases the schematics so she can still come out on top. 

Hey, abusing capitalism is perfectly fine when it's to fund socialist policies, and she stands by that. As long as she’s the only one doing it. No one here has even heard of Marx let alone read him. Not that Marx is a person to base all of her theory on—Never mind. In conclusion, she’s got no faith in the elite not to take advantage of capitalism if she explains her practices. Well, she supposes capitalism isn’t accurate when referring to the current economic system though, it’s definitely feudalism. 

Double never mind, she can already feel a headache coming on.

She is not even attempting forwarding technology besides the printing press, with her luck Westeros would figure out gunpowder if she tried to invent anything more complicated and then they’d all be doomed. Contemplating a War of Five Kings with muskets involved is enough to turn anyone anti-industrialist. 

In the meantime, while she’s waiting for this war to be over, Eleanor sets forward to get some of her plans into action.

“So, you think it is feasible?” Eleanor asks. 

Arlow, the Blacksmith she’s enlisted to her cause, nods. “You’ll need some skilled craftsmen to make them, at least a carpenter. My skills are in shaping metal, and I doubt you want this all made from metal.”

No. She absolutely does not. That would be more expensive than her poor heart, and wallet, could stand.

“Thank you for your advice, you’ve been a great help to me,” Eleanor thanks, collecting her papers. “Do you know any carpenters who would be keen on joining this project? Hopefully with equally tight lips?”

Arlow chuffs, scratching his short, graying red beard. “Anyone can be tight lipped for the coin you’re offering, milady. Especially for you.” And before she can ask further on that statement, he’s continuing. “I’ll have my apprentice run over with a few names tomorrow, boy needs something to do. Was that all you’d be needing, milady?”

Eleanor nods, adjusting her hold on her papers and signaling her sole guard at the door. Edmer, the guard, looks similar enough to her in features to pass as a brother, and that is useful for when she wanders about incognito. He is also tickled pink by the idea of being a hidden lady’s sworn, secret escort. So it really works out for all parties. 

“Good evening to you, Master Arlow. I’m certain I’ll be seeing you soon.”

Arlow grumbles his goodbyes, turning to do whatever a blacksmith does when no one is looking, and Eleanor exits, Edmer at her side and already chattering about whatever comes to mind. 

She’ll need to start sweetening up the local Septon and sisters of Jonquil's Pool next. The sweetwater pool is an important tourist destination but it’s also tied to the faith, which means the faithful have a little more say on what she does to the city than makes Eleanor comfortable.

If they think her education efforts are in some way against the Sept, they will complain. Loudly. Loudly enough to make the people of her city distrusting of her intentions. 

Eleanor takes in a deep breath and looks up into the blue sky, Edmer easily leading the two of them through the busy streets and back towards the keep. It’s loud, the hum of people all going about their lives and calling for people to buy their wares. 

It’s strange how…normal it is. One would think a place like Westeros is always filled with cruelty and the fantastical, but at the end of the day it is just a continent of mundane people living their lives in whatever way they can. The owner of the street food stall they pass by doesn’t care about who’s king, or even who’s lord of maidenpool really, so long as they can still take care of themself and their family. 

Eleanor thinks if more nobles just existed as normal people for a while they’d be less prone to dramatics and intrigue, but that’s just her.

Eleanor is notified of the battle’s end in the ungodly early hours of the morning, dozing on the couch in her solar when a nightgown clad Lark comes through the door, waving a small letter.

“An urgent message, my Lady!” He says, jerking Eleanor out of her sleepy state, grabbing the letter and fumbling with her fingers as she opens it, eyes bleary. 

“Siege of the city, something something-- oh shit,” Eleanor mumbles, eyes wide and blinking.

Huh. They won. And no undue explosions happened.

Go her, not butterflying the nation into chaos. Er, more chaos.

“Go us,” Eleanor says with a deep, bone weary sigh. “I say we deal with the new regime in a few hours, how about you, Maester Lark?”

“Very agreeable, Lady Eleanor.”

“Woooooh.”

After some needed hours of sleep, news is spread through the keep, and then the city proper. Celebrations are held, a holiday from work for most, and a festival is being planned for the estimated return of the soldiers. Eleanor begins preparations to ride for the capitol, intent on getting her swearing done before she does anything else, leaving Steward Ronnel and Marg to watch over things for the three weeks she’s gone, more or less. 

She’ll be bringing along Edmer, and eleven other sworn swords, along with a few servants. She doesn’t trust the hired help in the Red Keep, anyone with a few brain cells that sometimes knock against each other doesn’t trust them, and she makes sure to give anyone coming with her the promise of increased pay as long as they don’t get up to any spying against her.

...yes, she flat out told them that. Yes, they were very concerned. Listen, she has no patience for espionage and the like unless it’s actually worth it. This is not worth it. She’s known almost all of the people she’s bringing since she was a preteen, the only reason they’d turn coat is if she wasn’t paying them enough. 

“Remember the last time we went to Kingslanding?” Margery says with a small grin as she and Eleanor look over some last minute accounting paperwork, Steward Ronnel looking like he’s about to burst a blood vessel from the stress. 

Eleanor grimaces. Deeply. Yes, she can’t forget it. Myles had dragged them into the stinking city proper to shop. And then they were almost mugged. 

No thank you. Never again. 

To be fair to the beggar, Myles was being an annoying prick and didn’t even try to hide his coin purse. It was practically a ripe fruit for the picking. 

Then, of course, there was when they walked in on a lady and lord having a tryst in a corridor. They were married. Just not to each other. Or, of course, the one and only time they saw the Mad King, in which he was shouting at Rhaegar about...honestly she can’t remember anymore. But it was an uncomfortable experience. Lots of spit flying from what she could see.

“My, how glad I am to go back,” Eleanor says, dryly, marking down a sum at the bottom of her page. 

“Oh how envious I am,” Marg says in a teasing agreement. “I’m certain the new King will smell far better than the last, at least.”

“Marg,” Eleanor says, stifling a snort. “Baratheon lives on the training field. Don’t be generous.”

Eleanor leaves a week after the taking of Kingslanding, clad in dark riding leathers, red and yellow house colors minimal. They aren’t aiming for an opulent show, the hope is they can reach Kingslanding in a week, stay a week to ensure her men are organized enough to pull out the bulk of her forces, and then leave. She has dresses more fitting of her station packed, of course, but this is more of a “let’s get this over with quickly” than anything.

The first two days are quiet, nothing but pines and the occasional luck farm to avoid any pillaging.

Then of course, they meet their first set of bandits.

Mismatch armor and weapons, some wielding pitchforks and spears, others rough looking swords. She wonders how many of them are deserters.

“Hand over your valuables!” The ringleader says. There’s twenty bandits, and only thirteen roughly adept in fighting people on her end. Her servants, just two, have wisely ducked into the small wagon they’ve been pulling along with gifts for King Baratheon.

What? Alright, so maybe that slows them down a little , but it never hurts to butter up your already buttered up new liege. 

Edmer looks at her, sword drawn.

Eleanor sighs.

“From what farms do you men hail from?” Eleanor asks them, head tilted.

That, evidently, wasn’t what the ringleader expected, as he flounders for a moment, adjusting his grasp on his likely stolen sword.

“The ones pillaged by every one of you rich fucks.” One shouts.

Hm. Well, fair.

“I’m sorry that happened, then,” Eleanor says, frowning. “I am actually about to meet with the king to swear allegiance, I can try to ensure you are all compensated. For now, I’ll gladly share my supplies.”

“What?” Ringleader says.

“Dorin,” Eleanor calls to one of the men stationed next to the wagon.

“My lady?”

“Could you please give these men a quarter of our rations? Actually,” Eleanor looks at the sky, calculating in her head. “Hm. Give them half. We can restock at Duskendale.”

Eleanor fully admits she mentally prepared for this specific situation and packed extra food. She has an overactive mind that enjoys back up plans. Marg thought she was foolish for it. Eleanor will be sending home a very smug letter once they get to Kingslanding. 

The rations are distributed to the aghast bandits, a few of her men giving her strange looks about her unnecessary mercy blah blah, womanly kindness blah blah. They don’t back talk though. She only keeps good help like that.

...That’s a joke. They’re allowed to tell her when they’re bothered by something. Eleanor would never be a bad boss like that.

“Who are you?” Ringleader asks. He’s the most surprised out of all his men, watching with wide suspicious eyes as she gives probably life saving food to them. She can see the gauntness in their frames, a two year long war is still war, if shorter than usual for this world. 

“Lady Eleanor Mooton, it’s good to make your acquaintance, ignoring the sword waving,” Eleanor says. “And you?”

Ringleader’s eyes go wider. “Ammen, my name is Ammen, you’re the Lady of Maidenpool?”

“Unfortunately. I will tell you now that I am not totally certain that I can sway King Baratheon to aid you, those at the top can be dismissive to the plights of smallfolk in ways that I find...distasteful.” Eleanor sighs, giving her horse beside her a reassuring scratch under the chin. “But know that Maidenpool is open to aiding those left without a home thanks to the war. You may petition my steward or labor officer if you’re in need of it once you reach the city, you should be able to find the labor office close to the keep, presumably with a very long line.”

They leave the bandits an hour after they meet them, singing her praises for the bare minimum. She feels like shit. These people deserve more than what she can offer, and she hopes her soldiers weren’t involved in this mess.

“Kindhearted to a fault, my lady,” Edmer says cheerfully as they ride.

“Yes, that’s me, kind hearted. Not at all simply doing what’s right,” Eleanor says blandly, looking over at the sworn shield.

“Oh, modest too!” 

Eleanor looks up at the sky in exasperation. “Sure, Edmer, whatever you say.”

She pulls out her notebook and starts drafting the letter she’ll be sending, along with a few notes on how to deal with the refugee influx she’s probably going to have to deal with. Plans plans and plans for those backup plans. This is the way to victory.

Chapter Text

  Eighth Moon, 283 AC  

Eleanor smells King's Landing before she reaches it. 

She wants to bash her head into a wall. Unfortunately, no walls are easily accessible to her, just the occasional villa and farm. 

Ugh. 

"Remind me again why we need to do this?" Eleanor grumbles stormily, already feeling dread fill her body with every step of her mare.

"Because you've pledged roughly five thousand men and would like to bring them home?" Edmer says, ever dutifully. 

"Damn. You make a good point, Edmer."

Eleanor enters the city two weeks after it's taking and is very long-suffering about this. 

The smell is terrible, just like she remembered, coupled with the corpses they've only just cleared out and the smoke of fires that just stopped burning. Ignoring that the city is the same, packed with too close buildings and dirtied stone roads. She'd honestly rather be out in the field just outside where her men are camped and start the preparations to pull most of them out, but meeting the King takes priority. 

Stupid propriety and social rules. 

People crowd the roads alongside them, clearing the way for her and her entourage. Some look injured, and most look exhausted. Eleanor will ask for the death count when she can; she wants--   needs to  know how much suffering this change in kings has caused. Needs to rectify it somehow with every burnt building passed.

The ride to the Red Keep takes an hour, and people turn to eye her suspiciously. Just another noble here, soon to be one of many in the coming months. Another well-dressed fucker who might ransack the city. 

Speaking of, she's curious to see what members of the court didn't flee at the news of Baratheon on his way and how quickly they got to kissing boots.

They ride through the gates, goldcloaks doing much of the guarding this high up. Interesting. 

Eleanor dismounts solidly, handing her mare's reins to a stableboy and a silver stag for his trouble, eyeing the tall towers and red sandstone. The courtyard has a few bloodstains that haven't come off yet.

"Lady Mooton!" An all too familiar voice booms. 

Damn. Can't even bathe before seeing him. 

"Your Grace," Eleanor greets, looking up at the man with a lifted eyebrow and a small bow. "No crown yet?"

Robert laughs. "Not a change at all in a month's time. Crowns apparently take a while to craft, and I haven't been officially crowned quite yet."

"Pity, I was excited to see if I could hold it and compare head sizes," Eleanor says, tone unchanging. "Where do you want me publicly swearing? I'm intent on clearing out the bulk of my forces soon."

"Don't bother, Lady," Robert waves her off. "The only men to pledge more men than you are the Wardens. Everyone knows where you stand. How about a feast, eh? Payback for yours." And then he's already walking away in some direction, and Eleanor is smart enough to know she's meant to follow.

"Joy of joys, will I be made to watch you tug at servants again?" Eleanor is even less good at politeness after long rides and smelling King's Landing. Marg would be rolling her eyes about now.

Robert laughs. It doesn't comfort her.

Eleanor ends up being handed off to Robert's hastily appointed steward, who then directs her and her entourage to the rooms they'll be using, fitting of her station and how funny the King thinks she is. Once she enters the chambers assigned to her, Eleanor promptly locates every secret entrance and peephole and jams them shut. For safety. 

Her guards and servants watch her do this with increasing concern, eyeing their surroundings with a greater degree of suspicion. Which is a good thing. That's why Eleanor did it in front of them.

"Do you see why I gave you all a pay raise?" Eleanor asks once she's done, slumping into a plush, yellow chair with a sigh. She needs to change. And bathe. Hopefully soon, and not in that order.

"Yes, m'lady," Dannelle says, voice ever soft and eyeing the walls with suspicion. "Don't you worry, we'll make certain no one comes round your rooms without your say so."

Well, not what she was going for, but Eleanor will take it.

Eleanor gets the bath she wants pretty quickly after that, her guards settling into a rotation around the group's rooms and her outstanding servants, saints, really, helping her into her far more "proper" clothes, a primarily red dress with small yellow highlights in the form of embroidered fish and little squiggly lines meant to imply water.

It's practical, it fits, and the sleeves are fashioned so she can push them up to her elbows if needed. She's satisfied. Eleanor never really took to the more complicated aspects of fashion and sewing, which is likely a handicap in her current circumstance. Or it would be if she lived in a large court and didn't have enough money to afford seamstresses to do the work for her.

Go money, making life easier since...ever.

Her hair is pulled back into a simple bun, her riding clothes taken off for a wash, and Eleanor sets out to get business done.

She needs to speak to the King, inform Ser Oscar of her arrival, and preferably avoid one Jaime Lannister the whole time.

Listen, she's barely met the man, but she hasn't forgotten that they were almost unfortunately tied together in holy matrimony. If she's seen even in the same room as him, his sister might hear of it and, well,

Eleanor doesn't like the idea of being poisoned. Or stabbed. Or any other ways a person can be assassinated for pissing off the future Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. She will proceed to avoid actions that gain her ire. 

Frankly, even wearing her house colors of yellow and red makes her nervous. Soon-to-be Queen Lannister would  not  appreciate them being matchies.

Eleanor sends one of her guards down to the Mooton camp to bring Ser Oscar a summons so they can begin planning this messy operation and sets out of her rooms in search of the King. Wherever he is.

"Where to, m'lady?" Edmer practically chirps as he sidles up beside her, a proud Mooton salmon emblazoned on the fabric tossed over the front of his armor. So very official.

"Hell, probably," Eleanor grumbles, trying to remember the damn floor plan of this castle wing. She's been in this part of the castle before, she's sure of it! Probably. Maybe it all looks the same. 

"Which one? Ah, don't tell me, I enjoy surprises," Edmer goes along with the bit easily. Eleanor ends up politely asking a passing servant if she knows where the King is at the moment before being led out by a door she's passed three times and nudged in the direction of what she assumes will be the Small Council's meeting room. 

Hm. Should she knock?

Eh, might as well. YOLO, and all that.

And then, of course, before she can knock, loud shouting is heard inside of the Baratheon variety, and Eleanor wisely stands back as the door slams open. In all his six foot-seven glory, a pissed-looking Robert shouts some parting words back at the room.

 "I'VE JUST LOST HER, AND YOU WANT ME TO MARRY SOME LANNISTER GIRL?!"  Robert bellows, red-faced, hands clenching and unclenching as he stares in at probably one Lord Jon Arryn. Maybe a Lord Tywin Lannister if he's feeling ballsy enough. And by the looks of it, rage makes up quite nicely for balls.

This might be the wrong time to offer consultancy on the state of the realm and the Crownlands' smallfolk.

"AND UP YOURS, SPIDER!"

Hm. Yes, definitely the wrong time.

Robert turns and spots Eleanor slowly attempting to edge away, a deadpan grimace slotted onto her face. She really has around three facial expressions, most of which are negative or exasperated.

"What do you want?" Robert asks through gritted teeth. Wow, trying for courtesy in this state. She should be flattered.

"I'm figuring it might be a bad time. I'll come back after you've destroyed a few training dummies," Eleanor says idly, noting the way Edmer beside her is at attention, ready for orders. Very cute, wouldn't help, but very cute. 

 "Later,"  Robert says before bellowing again. "KINGSLAYER! Get your fucking sword. We're fighting!"

Drat.

Out of the room comes Jaime Lannister next, every move more akin to a big cat on the prowl than the swagger she remembers him having two years ago.

He tilts his head in recognition before giving Eleanor a smirk that could range from mocking to amused. He's got eyebags for his eyebags, and something in his face is colder now. He's only eighteen.

Eleanor stares on, unimpressed.

"Ser Jaime."

"Lady Eleanor. Pity about the brothers."

"Pity about the cloak."

" NOW , LANNISTER!"  And there goes Robert, already halfway down the hall.

"My lady."

"Ser."

And there he goes, jogging after the new King. Hm. It'd be a pity if Jaime were crushed by Robert's hammer so soon, though probably better for the lack of...incest babies. Who knows.

Then, of course, out comes the man's father, a look that could be described as annoyance marking his face. 

"Lady Mooton."

"Lord Lannister. Lovely weather, isn't it?" Eleanor says blandly.

"You were remarkably quick to turn from your brother's allegiances."

Eleanor lifts a pale eyebrow. "It became evident they weren't on the winning side. House Mooton needed a win, I would say." 

Tywin looks at her for a long moment, likely intending to unease with his dead stare. Which is laughable. She makes that face like it's a competitive sport. She's an Olympic gold medalist at dead stares.

"Have you considered your marriage prospects?" Tywin asks, likely calculating how he can still tie her and her claims to his brood. Unfortunately for him, Tyrion Lannister is eleven, to her knowledge. Even if she weren't gay, she wouldn't enter a betrothal with him. Blegh. 

Go autonomy. No male relatives to order her around.

"Ah, are you so attached to having me as a good daughter? Flattering, really," Eleanor says with a small smile, one that doesn't reach her eyes. Clearly a tease. "No, I have not. I'm quite busy with running Maidenpool as is."

Tywin's eyes narrow just slightly, opening his mouth to probably say something very cutting and/or sexist, but alas, the Spider has slinked over in all his androgynous glory.

"Lord Lannister, my apologies, but I believe Lord Arryn has a few parting words for you," Varys says, bowing his head politely.

Tywin frowns deeper than usual, a feat for him, and gives Eleanor one final long look. 

"You realize what I offer you," Tywin says, and Eleanor smiles blandly. Lady of the Rock, presumably. Mooton is a strong bloodline to have a foot in, and Eleanor has proven to be adept and intelligent. A good match for a dwarf son he has no interest in teaching how to be a proper Warden of the West.

Unfortunately, she's not playing long games. She already has a keep and a city of herself, riches that will begin to rival him once she's through. No dice.

"Of course, Lord Lannister. And you must realize why I am declining."

Tywin struts back into the council room and firmly shuts the door behind him as if she never said anything.

Hm. Well, that went better than expected.

"You play dangerous games, Lady Mooton," Varys says before her. "I don't believe we have met. Varys, at your service." He bows.

Eleanor would groan if she had enough in her for it. She shouldn't have left her rooms; on that note, she shouldn't have left her damn castle. A formal letter swearing allegiance would have sufficed, she's sure. Maybe a wagon of wine and giant hammers.

"Lady Eleanor Mooton, as you already seem aware," Eleanor says, bowing her head in turn. 

"Yes, quite; it is not often a woman can raise five thousand and order them bonuses for protected smallfolk," Varys says, smiling. It reaches his eyes, but those are easy to trick with. Just because Eleanor doesn't bother doesn't mean she doesn't know this game. She chooses blunt dry wit as a statement, and that only works when you know when to do it. 

"What can I say, I've a woman's heart. Violence upon innocents doesn't suit me, nor should it anyone else." 

That comes out particularly cutting after Tywin's recent murders of the Prince and Princesses, which hadn't been her intention. She won't really take it back, though.

"Wise words," Varys says. "Will you be staying in this newly forming court?"

Laughable. Actually laughable.

"The game has never been one I cared much to be an active contender in," Eleanor says, tilting her head. "And the city smells of shit. So, no."

"You must forgive me, Lord Varys, but I have never ending duties to attend to, and an unreasonable number of men to return home. Good day," Eleanor says, giving the man a nod and starting off, Varys saying a parting goodbye.

Nah. Whatever was going on in his head? Nah. No thank you.

Eleanor and Edmer turn the corner, walking in silence.

"My sword is always ready, my lady." Edmer says with duty and honor. Eleanor doesn't roll her eyes, but it is a close thing.

"And I appreciate that, Edmer, now let's go anywhere but here."

Ser Oscar is just as gruff as Eleanor left him, though seeming a bit put upon that by the time the rebels' main forces arrived at the city the Lannister forces were already mid pillage.

The officer's tent at the center of the Mooton camp is a practical thing. At its center is a large table for standing over and organizing orders and reports, along with a few chairs and Ser Oscar's cot shoved into the corner. Eleanor and Oscar are alone for the moment standing over said large table.

"It was no sight to describe to a lady, Lady Eleanor, I will tell you that much," Oscar says, grim as they stare down at the papers and orders and damned shit they have to do to finish this war they joined at the last minute. Eleanor wants her men back at home where they can work and make her money, thank you very much.

"Tell me anyways," Eleanor says plainly, looking over their meager losses. Less than a hundred men. Tywin's brutality may be just that, brutality, but she's lost only seventy-eight men thanks to it. Unlucky souls who simply met a stray arrow or blade from the leftover city guard. 

(Or to Lannister's unhappy at being stopped from doing war crimes, but that isn't going to be their official cause of death. She is glad for their sacrifice regardless.) 

There's a whole pile detailing requests for bonuses, thanks to the sight her men walked in on there were plenty of civilians to be protected, and most requests are even corroborated by fellow witnesses. 

"The Lannisters raped and burned this city halfway through by the time we arrived," Oscar says, tapping a finger on the worn wooden table. "Nothing honorable about it, and that was before we heard what they did to the Princess and her children."

"Do you know what they did with the remains?" Eleanor asks, looking up from her papers.

"Being prepared to send back to Dorne, to my knowledge," Oscar says, shaking his head. "Damn mess it is. Both the remains and the Dornish's wounded pride. Ser Gregor Clegane, they say, is the one to kill them. Tossed the children's bodies before the throne for his liege. Nasty nasty business."

Eleanor feels sick at the thought of it, rolling through impossible possibilities in her mind. To be frank, she couldn't have saved the children, nor their mother. She hadn't acted quickly enough to, what, secure them as her own prisoners before Tywin did? It's terrible, what was done to them, cruelty unnecessary, damn their claims to the throne. 

But, thinking on what ifs only distracts her from what she   can   do. Eleanor won't let any children die for the sins of their fathers if she can help it, from this point on. Which is a stupid thing to claim and decide on, at this point, but it still stands.

"There is an acute unfairness to the world that this happened," Eleanor says, finally, after a thoughtful silence. "How soon do you estimate until we can move out?"

Oscar scratches at his graying beard, dark eyes trained on the table, unfocused. "Should we start preparations today? A two weeks, three at most. There's talk of staying, ensure there's no surprise last uprisings, but I say the chance of that is low. This city has not the will for it. And if they did? I imagine only the damned Lannisters would be targets."

Eleanor nods, pulling out new, bare pieces of paper.

"To work, then. Issue pullout orders to the Battalion leaders, begin checks that we've enough supplies, the like. If we've extra, and I have a feeling we do, I suggest we disperse rations out to the smallfolk. They need it more than us, now."

"By your order, Lady Mooton."

"By your counsel, Ser Oscar."

With that started, all that's left to deal with is a feast, and Eleanor isn't exactly excited.

Nobility are already flocking back to the capital to start sucking up, the city is being cleaned of any leftover discontent and corpses, and life goes on. Just with a new dynasty at the head of it.

Eleanor is draped in silks and linen, the only show of wealth she'll bother with. Jewelry, save her house ring, get in the way. Dark reds, yellows and oranges color her dress, carefully embroidered and lined with salmon. She feels very loud, color wise, she knows next to all the other idiots she'll fit right in. 

"I'm in hell," Eleanor says, dryly, staring up at the ceiling.

"King's Landing, actually," Her servant Annette says, Eleanor looking over to stare at her dead eyed. Annette flounders, tacking on a "M'lady," at the look.

"Well spotted, Annette, well spotted. Be glad you're not the fool meant to attend gatherings in King's Landing," Eleanor grumbles, tugging at the collar of her dress. "I'm off, comrades, wish me luck."

She heads out of the room and waves for Dorin to walk her, Edmer on a break as of current. 

Dorin, unlike Edmer, walks a step behind Eleanor as is proper, which annoys Eleanor, in a fond sort of way.

"Woe, my sworn man walks a step behind. I am now forced to crane my neck to speak to him," Eleanor says with a long sigh.

"My apologies, m'lady." Dorin doesn't even flinch. She respects it.

"How sincere," Eleanor says, looking at their surroundings as they walk on, the feast hall being ever so far. "Your brother is one of the battalion leaders, yes? Have you had the opportunity to speak to him yet?"

"Briefly, we are both left busied by our duties."

Eleanor hums.

"I'll give you both leave to spend time together, once we return to Maidenpool. Though I suppose the planned festivities count as leave enough."

She sees Dorin smile, just slightly, in the corner of her eye.

"You're a generous liege, Lady," He says, all deep umber tones in his voice. Dorin's a good shield, honest and loyal, and from what she's seen, deadly swift with an axe. 

"Moreso the only reasonable one, from what I've seen," Eleanor says with a wry roll of her eyes. "You've been with my House long enough to know as much."

"Generous all the same."

At this rate she's going to get an ego the size of the Pacific. And there is no Pacific here. Troubling.

The Feasting hall is large, brightly lit, and already filling with nobility once Eleanor and Dorin step inside. A high table set up above it all, and more following in a line, a hierarchy already forming among the flock, fighting for the closest seats and the most opportune seats to whisper at the new King. Eleanor can already see the little truces and rivalries forming, and it plainly annoys her. Lords and Ladies acting like children in hopes of gaining, and taking, from one another.

Ugh. Fuck Feudalism. 

Eleanor stands idly, for a moment, considering the least offensive option that has her mostly left be. She taps her chin, once, then twice.

...House Mooton, while often forgotten, is one of the richest houses, and has just been thrusted into the limelight thanks to her contributions in the war and unmarried status.

Damn. She's not getting left alone unless she secures a spot at the high table.

Grasping courtier it is. She takes everything back about her fellows being childish and annoying.

Eleanor settles her resting face of death, and struts to the high table.

Robert grins when he spots her, earlier rage evidently soothed. 

"Lady Eleanor!" He greets. First name basis, are they?

"Your grace," Eleanor greets, offering a small courtesy as she stands before him, all too aware of Lords Lannister and Arryn with their eyes on her. "I ask you a small favor."

"Oh?" Robert says, leaning in merrily.

"Put me somewhere at this high table before the graspers remember I'm unmarried and rich."

Robert practically howls in laughter, already deep enough in his cups to lose what inhibition he does have, banging a hand on the table.

Eleanor holds back the urge to look heavenward. Better not bare her neck to wolves.

"Jon," Robert gasps out, looking to his foster father. "Ask, ask whoever's next to your wife to move," He pauses to giggle. " Please."

"Many thanks, oh gracious King of mine," Eleanor says dryly, with a parting exaggerated bow, all too aware of how the hall has become hush with the scene, settling next to Lysa Tully as a Lord she should probably know the name of scowls at her from where he's been made to move. She now lies third to the King's right. How interesting.

"Lady Arryn, I believe we've met before," Eleanor says in greeting, Dorin settling somewhere behind her, near the Kingsguard. The current one on duty unfortunately being her almost spouse. Pity.

"Eleanor Mooton," Lysa says, lips going thin more with worry than displeasure. "Father had wanted you for Edmure."

What is with wardens and wanting her for their sons? What about her is so appealing? She assumes it's because of her family's middling prestige, but there's other third born daughters running about besides her. 

...Well, one less than there was a year ago. Sorry, Lyanna. Thirdborn gang forever.

"How unfortunate for Edmure," Eleanor says, offering the same aged young woman a small smile. "It's a good thing that's less than likely, these days."

Lysa nods, slowly, as if trying to piece some insult to her words but finding none.

The night goes about as expected, after that. Eleanor makes some attempts to coax an already closed off Lysa Tully from her shell while avoiding overeating the needlessly opulent meals of the Redkeep, foal and meats and stews spiced, but not in any way that's remotely enjoyable. A show of wealth, rather than a real attempt at good food.

The Dornish are going to freeze up on their spices by the end of the month. Sell less and less and hike the prices up in retaliation. Eleanor can already see it. Which is why she made sure to put forth money into the burial gifts the now deceased Princesses and Prince were being sent back homeward with, along with a letter of condolences.

It's not only foolish ploticking. She mourns for the innocent woman and her children. Hates the Mountain for his cruelty. She knows the loss of a sibling twice over, and does not blame the Martells for their grief. 

Eleanor supposes this is a more...smart, way of directing her stifled grief than shouting at the King two seats away from her.

Speaking of, Lysa and her husband have now departed, and his highness is drunkenly waving for her to scoot two seats over so he can bother her. Damn.

With a grumble Eleanor scoots, taking her almost cinnamon roll like pastry and goblet with her to settle next to the man, unimpressed. The hall is drunken enough that her less than ladylike behavior will go fairly unnoticed.

Music is lively around them, and people dance drunkenly in celebration that this stupid war is about through. 

"What?" She offers, already realizing that that kind of push at his authority won't have her beheaded.

"The high seat to your liking?" Robert says with wiggled eyebrows. Eleanor has finally placed his energy. Frat boy. Blooded frat boy. 

Joy.

"Yes, very few people have made attempts to marry me," Eleanor says, before taking a bite of her cinnamon roll thing that isn't but is a cinnamon roll.

"I wish I could say the same," Robert says with an exaggerated sigh, placeholder crown tilting out of place with the action. "The Lannister girl, you ladies all know each other, is she...you know?"

Eleanor resists looking back at said Lannister's twin just behind her.

"Know is a strong word," Eleanor says, blandly. "But I'm familiar enough with her temperament. She's…" 

Eleanor really does look at the ceiling, at this.

"Don't disrespect her. She holds grudges, and she'll make your life hell for it," Eleanor settles on, looking back down at the King, patting his shoulder. "And...hm. Permission to speak freely?"

Robert waves her on.

"Whatever you do, don't mention Lady Stark to her, King Robert," Eleanor says quietly, speaking quicker when he opens his mouth to shout. "She wants what any wife wants, liege, and it's your respect and devotion. No matter what you do, don't make her feel like she's just a piece to fill the place of a...deceased woman."

"She'll never be what Lyanna was," Robert says darkly, something dangerous in his eyes.

"She doesn't have to be," Eleanor says with a shrug, all too aware of the thin ice she's treading. "No one has to replace another person. Oh, and I've heard of your whoring. She will   not  like the whoring."

Why is she having guy talk with the King of the Seven Kingdoms?

Someone save her.

Robert huffs, grumbling something to himself about honest Mootons and warhammers, downing his tankard.

"And now you see why I'm avoiding marriage," Eleanor says blandly, biting her pastry.

"You women have it far easier," Robert says with a huff.

"We women get to watch our men take as many lovers as they like and raise their dutiful sweet babies," Eleanor says under her breath.

"What was that, Mooton?"

"Nothing, your grace. Just the womanly woes of a woman. We met barely a moon ago, why are you coming to me for advice?" Eleanor asks, eyes narrow.

He better not try and marry her. Fuck Maidenpool, she   will  leave for Essos. With Marg, of course. And her money. And her sworn shields. Hm...how big of a boat would take the staff? She'll need to look into that.

"You're the honest sort, you'll tell me to my face when I'm shit," Robert says. "And Ned was the only other with the balls to tell me so, and he's run west for Storm' End. Honorable   fuck.  Why couldn't he see? The dragons had claims, and we couldn't risk it anyhow."

Now that is a can of worms she's not touching.

"How flattered I am to be the only woman to be considered for such a dubious position, joy," Eleanor says, downing her own drink. Robert is too deep in his own to hear it anyways, off in angst land.

She still hasn't spoken to him about the smallfolk. Best do that in the afternoon tomorrow. When everyone's slept off the hangover.

Eleanor stares down at her own goblet and grimaces. She may be dealing with a bit of a hangover too. Well, a problem for the future, less lucky her.

Chapter Text

Eighth Moon, 283 AC

Eleanor is annoyed. Immeasurably annoyed. She has often been annoyed this past week, mostly blaming it on the fumes in the Red Keep and the time it’s taking to get back to her nice castle. 

She’s in a small council meeting at the moment, listening to talk of repairs to the city and keep, news from Eddard about the march to break the siege in Storm’s End, and other various news the new head of state needs to hear about. 

She probably shouldn’t be allowed to hear any of this, being some random noble who happened to have a couple thousand men to give to the cause at the last minute, but Eleanor thinks Robert just doesn’t care enough to make her wait outside the room before it’s her turn to speak.

Speaking of.

“And you had something to say, Lady Eleanor?” Jon Arryn asks, oblivious to her internal musings and annoyance at her life choices.

“On my way to the city, I was reminded of a problem already heavy on my mind,” Eleanor says simply, glancing from the faces of each of the men at the table to rest on the King, who seems to be making a grand attempt at not being bored. New trait to add to his profile, ADHD. People with ADHD were more statistically likely to be depressed, anxious and fall into substance abuse in her last life, to her foggy memory. He fits two of those qualifiers if the timeline continues as is.

Plus, he’s been shaking his leg this entire meeting. ADHD, blooded frat boy it is.

“And that is?” Lord Varys inquires, face attentive.

“I was attacked by bandits. And- no, your highness, this isn’t a call to arms. I willingly gave them my rations and told them to head to Maidenpool for jobs,” Eleanor says, folding her hands in front of her, onto the old, paper strewn table. “They were farmers and villagers, and their homes were burned or otherwise ruined in the war. I propose implementing reimbursement, lest the Crownlands, and other holds, be turned destitute and crime ridden.”

“We pay the smallfolk not to rob eachother blind?” Robert asks, eyebrows raised.

“No, we pay the smallfolk for the damages done to their farms and homes thanks to the nobility’s quarreling,” Eleanor says, shaking her head. “They’re hungry, give them the ability to buy food and the tools to farm it, and they’ll be better again, given time. I have no knowledge of the state of the crown’s treasury, but perhaps a few less tourneys and feasts for a few months will cover it.”

There’s but a second of silence before-

“Preposterous!” Pycelle, the useless Grand Maester, says, sounding aghast. “Your grace, listen not to the sweet tunes of this woman. The smallfolk will more likely spend the money on beer before tools and shacks!”

Eleanor levels him with an unimpressed look that has him flinching back. Pycelle is also a coward, on top of being useless. 

“Were you starving and homeless, would you spend a silver stag on beer or a meal?” Eleanor asks, tone bland.

“It matters not! I am above the average smallfolk, my lady, as we all are. Such charity would be wasted- - !” 

“Enough!” Robert shouts, annoyed, Pycelle shrinking into himself quickly and bowing his head. Robert waves a hand at Eleanor. “Mooton. Talk.”

“I don’t have enough knowledge of the way the Crownlands are structured and run in comparison to the Riverlands, and thus couldn’t give you a proper plan as to how to implement this, but I would be willing to help. The state of the Crownlands affects my own hold, thanks to our proximity, my King.” Eleanor taps her fingers onto the table quickly for a moment, before laying her hand flat against it. Then, she adds dryly. “Though I am wary to pledge more time spent anywhere near your court.”

Robert looks at her for a moment, bouncing leg stilled and thinking. 

“Fine, but you’ll be figuring out if it’s feasible. Might as well save yourself the trip back for the coronation in a moon.”

Drat and damnation. 

Eleanor sighs. “Many thanks, oh wise and considerate king.” 

“Jon, I order Lady Eleanor, until later notice, er,” He looks back over at Eleanor, once again holding his thinking face. “...Liason to the Smallfolk. Or something. Let her see whatever she wants, it isn't as if we have a Master of Coin to keep her from looking at the finances.”

Don’t bang your head against the table, Eleanor, this is the burden of taking “I work for the people” seriously, unlike every other schmuck in a thousand mile radius.

“Thank you for taking the easiest route available to you, your grace,” Eleanor says, trying not to fel like this is a death sentence.

“You’re welcome, my Lady, now, Kingslayer! Get over here, time for a drink in anywhere but this damn room,” Robert calls, evidently losing his patience with governing now that the only interesting part of the meeting has concluded.

He stomps out, blonde kingsguard walking leisurely behind him, and so Eleanor is left in a room full of old men. Well, ignoring Varys, but he’s no better.

It’s very quiet. 

“Lord Hand, if it is convenient I’d like to see the finances so I can make haste after this coronation.”

“...Very well, Lady Mooton.”

Eleanor sends a raven to Marg to let her know she’ll be staying for a month longer, at least , due to annoying circumstances. She’s a bit short tempered at the moment, she admits, but even staying here for a week has been very tiring. The courtiers who have crawled out of the woodwork have been showing up in odd hallways to chat about Maidenpool and her virtue and “Oh please, please, won’t you marry my little Archibald? He’s a good man!”.

Gross.

Eleanor made sure to pay off one of Pycelle’s scribes to take Marg’s reply to her when it came in a day later. She doesn’t need Pycelle looking at her mail. No one needs to know her personal business, especially not Lord Tywin Lannister’s pocket Maester. 

When she disrupts the monopoly the maesters have it’s going to be so sweet. She only trusts Lark because she pays him enough to not send the Citadel her business, though he insists he would never.

Psh. As if. The street cred he’d get for letting the order in on her mad plots would be immeasurable. 

Like that printing press.

Eleanor could weep. She wants to go home and work on her thrice damned printing press. Life is unbearably unfair.

Regardless of her woes, though, Eleanor looks through tax statements and the recent count of the treasury. There’s gifts to be expected with the coronation, sorries from those who opposed the rebels now wishing to buy favor. She can use some of that, once she has it, but for now she has.

Well, she was joking about needing to use those gifts. The crown is fucking rich right now. Unsightly rich. More rich than the Lannisters and Tyrells stacked on top of her own wealth.

How in the seven fucking hells did Robert spend the inherited riches of the Targeryons in one and a half decade?

Frankly, just thinking about being anywhere near this kind of coin and capital is giving her hives, let alone using it for shit.

If nothing else, at least she has no worries about how much her humanitarian efforts will cost the crown. Now she just needs to build the infrastructure required to hand the money out. 

First she needs to ensure there won’t be officials skimming off the top before the money gets to the people, so some anti corruption measures will have to be figured out. Some sort of system to check and, if there is wrongdoing, punish. 

Then there’s setting up a system for people to apply for these payments, especially with the presumably low literacy rate. Honestly she should ask around about doing a census for just the Crownlands, and a separate one for Kingslanding proper, because one of those is going to be an even more monumental task than the other. Cough, the overcrowded city, cough. 

Work. So much work. 

“Lady Eleanor,” One of her sworn shields calls from beyond the door of her new, temporary solar, knocking three times. 

“What is it, Jonquil?” Eleanor calls back. “Just come in.”

The door opens, a servant coming into the room quiet as a mouse, holding out a small note. 

Eleanor tilts her head, quietly thanking and tipping the girl before opening it. Sealed with a small Arryn falcon.

...Interesting.

Lysa Arryn is inviting her to spend time with her in the gardens. Now, if she’s willing. 

Eleanor gives her papers one long, withering look.

Yes, she’ll risk a break with the potentially very traumatized and soon to be insane Tully sister. It’d be nice to take up a pet project to prevent her from letting a certain Baelish anywhere near the king and his money. Frankly even the king can’t be trusted with his money, at this rate. She’s fucking aghast at how it was all spent. Was Baelish loaning it out? Eleanor’s got nothing.

Eleanor heads out of the Solar with Edmer at her back, eyeing the hallways like another Lord or Lady will appear with marriage proposals at any moment until they make it to the gardens.

The air is cool with the growing evening, and, unlike the city below, the gardens smell just of plants and flowers. Eleanor can spot groups of two and three wandering through the foliage, no doubt brainstorming plots and hidden motives, ever busy with their games and power. 

Eleanor comes upon Lysa sitting nervously on a stone bench, a Tully blue cushion under her. Nearby, an Arryn guard almost seems to be dozing. 

“Lady Lysa,” Eleanor says in greeting, waving for Edmer to stand guard a little ways away. 

“Lady Eleanor,” Lysa says, looking over quickly, blinking. “I had not thought you would be so quick to take up my offer.”

“Ah, anything for one of my former lieges,” Eleanor says, settling in the bench beside her. “I do believe we are the only ladies of the Riverlands stuck in this castle. We’d do well to stick together, I think.”

“Yes,” Lysa says, nodding, fiddling with one of the rings on her finger. “I had thought the same, which is why I invited you here.”

The following silence is definitely awkward. Not painful, but teetering towards it.

“My husband says Cersei Lannister will be marrying the king, after his coronation,” Lysa says. A couple wanders past them, turning to whisper something to each other just before they leave Eleanor’s sight. Birds are chirping.

Eleanor barely withholds her grimace. “Yes. King Robert is reportedly thrilled.”

“Is he?” Lysa asks, looking at Eleanor with owl-like blue eyes. “You seem close to him.”

And isn’t that biting her in the ass. The man seems to think she’s funny enough to keep around.

“Officially? Yes. Very thrilled. Unofficially to anyone who will listen? Absolutely not.” Eleanor leans back, legs crossed and hands resting on her lap. “To be fair to him, there’s a cruelty to going to war for a woman to only be made to marry another. It’s necessary, if a bit tragic.”

Lysa nods, pinching her lips and looking away, a hand going to her stomach. “Yes, I suppose it is.”

Very few people know of Lysa Tully’s affair with one Petyr Baelish, even fewer are aware she got pregnant. So few that Eleanor only knows because of her past. 

“So. How is marriage to our dear Hand,” Eleanor broaches, carefully.

Lysa stiffens, expression dropping just a smidge. She’s going to need to get better at hiding her feelings, the court will eat her alive. And unlike Eleanor, she seems like the sort who would care if people were cruel to her in whispers. 

“He is a kind and dutiful husband,” The statement is all wooden and reeks of septa training kicking in. 

“He’s old,” Eleanor says, frank, watching Lysa jerk her head over to look at her. “And thrice widowed. It’s alright to be a bit put out.”

“Not so loudly,” Lysa says, very quietly, reaching over and grasping Eleanor’s arm. “My- I am only useful for my marriage prospects. My...father, will hear of it if I complain.”

A bit paranoid, though if Eleanor’s father made her drink ungodly amounts of moon tea to the point of overdose she’d be a bit afraid of him hearing of her complaining too.

“You’re not in the Riverlands,” Eleanor says, patting the hand clasping her upper arm. “The worst he could do is threaten to tax the goods imported from the Vale more heavily, and that would only harm his relationship with Lord Arryn.”

They finish their little meeting up soon after, Eleanor promising to meet with her again. She’s not the brand of crazy she was in canon, yet, just a scared, sad teenager. Eleanor can deal with scared, sad teenager. 

Before her men return to Maidenpool, eager to indulge in the festivities that await them, Eleanor puts in some feelers to see how many would be willing and suited to help assist in her efforts to repay the smallfolk. It turns out a grand many of them are after hearing that more than a few have truly received bonuses for protecting innocents during the sacking. 

At least this time she’s going to mostly be paying them out of the crown’s pocket, rather than her own. 

The census is only just beginning, with her hiring some of those same soldiers lucky enough to know their numbers and dispersing them with orders on which areas they’re meant to check. It’ll take at least five months to complete, to her dismay, as the crownlands are around four-hundred miles and she only has so many men who can count well. The last census was two years ago, done by Varys, apparently, in preparation for a possible war not with Robert, but with Rhaegar, but after so much destruction she’d be stupid to assume the number is the same. 

She also starts the, somehow more grueling, attempt at a separate census for the city.

“I want every man, woman, and child in this city counted, as well as listing their jobs, their ages, and place of birth, if possible,” Eleanor explains to one of the men she’s having lead the soldiers she’s assigning to this task, one sellsword given a good word by his battalion leader. He’d been very quick to act when they entered the sacking, seeing dollar signs in the carnage with every smallfolk protected.

The sellsword, Haegon, nods his head. “I’ll see it done, m’lady, no worries about it. Dunno how many of the men you’ve handed me know their letters well enough, but I’m sure they can learn enough before the next, say, second moonturn.” 

The second she gets back to Maidenpool she’s getting those schools started, she can’t function in a world where people don’t even know the basics because of idiotic classism. It puts a wrench in all of Eleanor’s damned plans. She’d try for some sort of public education here, but with the Great Sept literally based in the city she doesn’t know how well that’d go. She is not about to have her own Faith Militant walk of shame. 

Ugh. At least becoming the second education capital of the Seven Kingdoms, next to Hightower, will bring in fuck tons of money. Oh, she could start a college, she should write that down. 

Most people work and learn through guilds and apprenticeships. Official places of learning are almost unheard of, this side of the Narrow Sea, though Eleanor has heard Dorne is home to a fairly popular college of bards in Sunspear. 

This is all ignoring the Citadel of course, who holds a monopoly here in education. 

Fucking Citadel. 

Haegen leaves with his orders, and Eleanor quickly writes down ideas for a first venture into trade schools. 

No doubt she’ll need heavy consultation from those who actually hold expertise in these trades, and a way to ensure she doesn’t piss them all off changing the apprenticeship format. 

She needs more consultants. And money. So she can make more money and then spend it all on her people. 

And maybe Marg, she’s allowed one vice in spoiling her best friend. Who is currently taking care of Maidenpool...instead of her. 

Eleanor grimaces. A month is starting to look more like a year. She fully intends on at least touching base with a visit after the coronation and before the impending royal marriage, handling some shit. 

Annoying. She’ll schedule a meeting with a seamstress for more court wear, she only packed for a month, not this endeavor. 

Actually she needs two proper dresses for the damn royal events. Ugh. 

“Annette,” Eleanor says, looking over at her two servants talking amongst themselves on the couch of her solar. The younger of the two perks up at the sound of her name. 

“Lady?”

“Take this note to, er,” Eleanor thinks. “Have the two of you become friendly with any of the servants of the previous regime?” 

Dannelle nods, Annette looking over to her. “A few, m’lady. They’re the ones still taking care of the castle, the armies didn’t bring servants.”

“Did any of them serve directly under a high Lady?” 

Dannelle grimaces. “Yes, I know of some. Princess Elia’s.”

...oof. 

Eleanor fishes a bag of coin out of her desk, grabbing a few stags. “See if they know of a good seamstress, and give them the coin for the trouble.” Eleanor pauses in thought. “And ask where they’re currently stationed doing work. I’ll gladly employ them. This isn’t saying I’m not glad for the two of you, but they are more familiar with the city and keep, and that’s useful.”

Dannelle nods along and shares a look with Annette that definitely implies they weren’t afraid of that at all. Another plus in the “good boss” book, go her. “Of course, m’lady. I’ll go speak to them now.” And with that, the woman bows out of the room, Annette left frowning.

Eleanor and Annette make long, meaningful eye contact. 

“Do you wanna learn how to read?” Eleanor asks.

“I’ll be honest, Lady, it sounds like a lot of work,” Annette replies, a grim look slowly growing on her face as she senses the danger. 

“Yes, but then you’ll be able to give people secret messages. You’re underestimating the fun bits.” 

“If my lady orders it so.”

“You’re being difficult on purpose and I respect that. Pull up a chair.”

Eleanor spends the rest of her afternoon showing Annette the basics. How to spell her name and the alphabet. Annette gets frustrated at points, which is fair, so Eleanor happily repeats anything she needs repeating and explains whatever needs explaining. 

Dannelle appears again towards the tail end of it, an older, dornish woman walking after her.

“M’lady Mooton, this is Myrria.”

The older woman, Myrria, steps forward, curtsying with decades of ease. 

“Well met, Myrria, Eleanor Mooton, happy to make your acquaintance,” Eleanor says, before gesturing to a chair in front of her cluttered desk. “I’ll be frank with you, I’m offering a job for the unfortunate duration I am stuck in this city, and after, if it strikes your fancy.” 

Myrria sits down carefully. “I’m...flattered, Lady Mooton. Dannelle said you had need for a good seamstress?”

Eleanor nods. “Preferably one that can work quickly. I have the coronation in a month and I wasn’t expecting to be in the city in the meantime. I’m woefully not knowledgeable enough in the best tradespeople here like I am in Maidenpool. I was hoping you knew of your previous lady’s favored seamstress.”

That gets settled quickly, Myrria taking Annette with her to see the seamstress and schedule an appointment before she’s booked full by all the ladies headed into the capital by the day. Eleanor can at least breathe a little easier knowing that she’s started that off, and refocus her attention on the final preparations to get her men home and field questions from Haegon and others about the census shit. 

Speaking of, she needs to contact some people who actually live in these areas to understand the terrain she’s going to be working with and how to most efficiently section things out. Specifically the house heads that hold each sectioned off portion of the crownlands. 

Ugh. Terrible. Speaking to other ponced up, very disgruntled about the new regime, Lords with nothing better to do now than be difficult with no more war to wage. 

Fuck it, she’s taking a nap. She’ll deal with this in a few hours. 

She doesn’t get to nap for a few hours. She has a royal servant at her door. Why is Robert bothering her?

That’s it. She’s fucking getting some pants from her seamstress in spite and she’s going to wear them all over court. She’s going full butch. Fuck you, gods.

“Bloody fucking hell,” Eleanor groans, rolling off her couch she moved into the solar for specifically napping purposes, and making an attempt at straightening out her hair before giving up and grabbing a pencil to turn her hair into a shitty bun, stumbling all the while to the door and opening it with a grimace. 

“Apologies for the inconvenience, Lady Mooton,” The dark haired woman says with the composure of someone who’s seen way stranger in this castle than a disgruntled noble. “His Grace requests your presence in the throne room.”

Why is this chucklefuck- you know what, she’ll bite.

“Thank you for informing me. Would you like a dragon for your trouble? I think I'm going to give you a dragon. Out of my paycheck for the stupid shit I’m doing for that idiot…” Eleanor grumbles all the way back to her desk, rummaging and tossing the valuable coin to the woman. “Spend it on something nice. Like a ticket out of this stupid city. Or food, I’m not one to judge.”

Eleanor smooths out her dress as she walks, Dorin keeping pace behind her. If it were Edmer he’d be laughing at her plight. She would’ve given him a very stern look. Eleanor is glad it’s Dorin. 

“Dorin, do I look at least sort of respectable?” Eleanor asks, as they get closer and closer to the hall.

“You’ve looked more ruffled during smaller occasions.”

“Thank you, Dorin, for the honesty. Now make sure to look very imposing and scary.”

“Of course, my Lady.”

Eleanor struts past groupings of nobles loitering outside the hall and through the grand doors, spotting King Robert on his throne looking very bored. 

He’s summoned her for entertainment. Her nap has been ruined. Eleanor is not saving him when the workers rise up for that, ass. 

She watches him spot her and his face light up. 

“Lady Mooton!” Robert bellows, successfully catching the attention of every soul in the hall and focusing it on her. 

“Your Grace,” Eleanor greets as she gets closer, deadpan. “I was napping. Aren’t you meant to be holding court?”

She offers a small, courtesy bow, as an afterthought. For propriety blah blah blah. 

Robert laughs, as he does. “Things were getting dull, I thought your cutting commentary on the petitions would liven things up.”

“Ah, yes,” Eleanor says, looking up at the obscenely tall ceiling. “Promoted to Jester. Am I meant to crouch beside the throne and whisper quips?”

Regardless of her own complaining, she ends up on a stool next to the King as nobility not so subtly beg forgiveness for their lack of support, blah blah blah, and Eleanor is left to wonder how her life got here because she absolutely should not have been dropped into a place of this much influence so suddenly and she’s very suspicious at the universe for starting it.

She doesn’t want to be important! She wants to nap and govern Maidenpool until they’re the educational capital of the world, or something! This is inconvenient to her!

Fuck the game, she’s busy!

Gods, all this mess just because Robert wanted to latch onto someone vaguely rational because stupid honorable thick headed Ned Stark didn’t like his condoned child murder. 

Well, she doesn’t like it either, but she didn’t walk out on the new ruler of everyone. That would be stupid for specifically her position. She vaguely remembers Maidenpool being sacked in the books, a lifetime ago, and she intends to at least try and prevent the political fuckery that gets them there.

Or get enough money out of the treasury that they have enough food and troops to keep from being sacked. Either one.

“I think listening to petitions of the smallfolk would be more entertaining than this,” Eleanor says dully, after yet another lord not so subtly waved his marriageable daughter around even though Robert is to be married. She supposes even a royal bastard has uses, if that’s his angle.

Wait. Royal bastards. Eleanor should look into how many of his brood have been born and take them on. A little just in case for if they have a little blonde haired Joffrey in the future running around. Killing cats. 

Ugh. She doesn’t have near enough knowledge in psychology to even touch that mess. 

Robert looks almost thoughtful at her words, which is horrible, and then-

“Well, Liaison to the Smallfolk, why don’t you set that up for me?” Robert says, looking over with a grin. 

Eleanor gives him a deadened look of dread. 

Robert laughs.

“Do you know how many lords are practically crawling up the castle walls to have a seat in the small council?” Robert snickers, the child. “The Maiden of Maidenpool doesn’t even want it and yet here she stands. Funniest shit I’ve seen in weeks.”

This is all an elaborate prank show and one day someone will finally jump out from behind one of those stone pillars and free her from this hell. 

Wait. The Maiden of Maidenpool??

Before she can ask, though, Robert is standing suddenly and shouting about needing to do kingly business, also known as visiting the whore house and drinking unhealthy amounts of alcohol. 

Eleanor rubs her eyes. She’ll head back to her solar and write whatever down about setting up petitions for the smallfolk and finally finish her damned nap. And, with a wave for Dorin to follow, she’s off. 

Chapter Text

Eighth Moon, 283 AC

The seamstress, an elderly dornish woman who’s been sewing for far longer than Eleanor has been alive, doesn’t care if she goes full butch as long as she’s paying. 

Eleanor stands, poked and prodded and measured as the seamstress, Mellei, grumbles to her assistant about the change in style thanks to the Stormlords taking power. Apparently it meant a different cut of jacket and dress along with a shift to deer horned imagery among seamstressing circles.

“Twelve different ladies have came to me asking for horns in their embroidery and twelve will get their damned horns if they wish to be so obvious about it,” Mellei says as Eleanor is turned to face in another direction, Eleanor calling up memories of her first mother turning her this way and that for hairdresser reasons. It’s a fond memory, it isn’t helped by the visual similarity between her old mother and this woman.

Damn the gods for making her pasty pale in this life, she only avoids sunburns by virtue of dumb luck and too much time around her desk and library. 

“How many tried for lions?” Eleanor asks, glancing down at the woman from the little platform she’s stood upon.

“ None ,” Mellia says with a wicked finality in her voice. “Damn the Lannisters to the darkest of the Seven Hells, I’ll not sew a single lion till the end of my life. I sewed Elia Martell’s every gown, measured her babes for shifts, I’ll serve no Lannister, I’ll honor no crest of theirs.”

...How can she argue with that?

“I respect that, Madame Mellei,” Eleanor says instead of anything else, focusing her eyes back onto the door cutting them off from the front of the seamstress’s shop, Dorin and Edmer standing just outside, no doubt annoying each other. Soft light trails into the room from a stained yellow window. 

Eleanor is ushered out of the measuring room with assurances of completion by the formal events upcoming, her own clothes given priority thanks to both her high status and money, and with a wave of her hand Dorin and Edmer are following her out of the shop. 

“It’s going to take half a decade to walk all the way back to the damn keep,” Eleanor grumbles to the shields, eyes on their surroundings with earned wariness. 

She’s not particularly afraid of being mugged, through what feelers she’s put out anyone wearing a salmon crest is treated the opposite of how a lion is, and that’s fucking saying something. The only thing keeping Lannister men from being beaten in the street is their swords and garish armor. And even then there’s still a few more adventurous, pissed , individuals who shot their shoot. So to speak. 

And got stabbed. 

Rip. 

“Now, Lady, some fresh air is good for us all,” Edmer says with a cheer that is nauseatingly real. He’s being cheeky, she swears it, and yet it's genuine. 

“Nothing is fresh in this city, least of all the air. My nostrils, they’ve numbed to the smell, but I know it’s there, waiting,” Eleanor says cryptically, tracing the saunter of lesser nobility among servants and merchants, shops of quality items and amenities surrounding them. 

Wealth is the stinkiest of the filth, if she’s honest. The way she sees the top flaunt it, living in the same city where children starve a street over. Do they not care? Or are they too blind in their self importance to even see?

Guillotines. No, she can’t, Eleanor hasn’t got enough infrastructure yet. 

...maybe after the ice zombies. 

No! Bad commie! Shush! 

Eleanor runs a hand down her face. Edmer is chirping about the clouds with a stone-faced Dorin, who shoulders the attention without complaint. 

Eleanor looks up, eyeing said cloud of current discussion. 

“No, I agree with Dorin, that’s not a cat, it’s a suspicious looking deer,” Eleanor hums. 

“Betrayal,” Edmer says, not even changing tone, no doubt smiling wider. “The two of you simply hold faulty eyes, Lady. I’m certain that’s a sleeping cat.”

“Mayhaps you turn your eyes to our surroundings, rather than the sky, lest our lady be taken off guard in a crowded street,” Dorin says with a sigh, the put upon sort that Eleanor knows is only half serious. 

Edmer huffs. “What an interesting proposition. Fine fine, my fellow shield, I’ll strive to be as stoic and watching as you.”

“Good. It will do wonders for my head.”

“Ouch! My Lady, I’m afraid I’m wounded by Ser Dorin, I beg leave to nurse it.”

“No leave for you until we’re out of this shithole.”

“Fair, Lady, fair.”

They make it back to the keep in one piece, at least. 

— 

Eleanor has unfortunately remembered what inflation is. 

Eleanor is very put upon by this. 

“Fuck. Fuck you! Fuck fuck f—!”

Eleanor speeds through her solar, grabbing papers left and right and cussing in new and innovative ways for her confused and frazzled staff to see. 

“I can’t just throw a mountain of coin at a couple thousand peasants, the merchant class will up the prices— I need to buy supplies and distribute from there, Dannelle!”

“Yes M’lady?”

“Get me someone with a head for numbers and connections to the city’s merchants, I need bureaucracy and I need it now!” Eleanor orders, writing furiously. “I’ll need a system of applying for specific supplies, the roads won’t be able to handle this much wealthy foot traffic, guards? Guard towers? Need to prevent corruption. System of reporting? Motherfucker-!”

Someone knocks on the door just as Danelle speeds out with a final “Will do, M’lady!”, leaving a surprised Varys standing watching Eleanor at the doorway.

“What schemes are you plotting, Lord Varys? I am quite busy trying to estimate the approximate costs of instituting a more robust system of guards on the Kingsroad,” Eleanor says, looking up only for a moment before grabbing another paper related to- She isn't sure anymore. She peers down at it for a moment in perplexed confusion before remembering the tax statements she requested a week ago. Why did she need that?

“I see you are. I was only coming to ask on how the census was going, perhaps to offer my more experienced expertise,” Varys says, voice smooth and politely apologetic for the intrusion. 

Right. He had headed the last census. She should just make him utilize his spy network to get it all done quicker. 

Er. Well she doesn’t want to let him know she knows he has enough spies for that, does she?

Food for thought. 

“Very kind of you, I however will have to schedule for another time, Lord, I’m currently drafting up plans to beef up the crownlands central infrastructure, because I forgot about a fundamental part of economics.” Well, is it possible to deal with that much inflation in feudalism? ...She won’t be the one to find out. She absolutely will not. “I assume you also wanted to pick my brain about something? You sneaky types always do that. Feel free to ask now.”

Varys reevaluates his internal profile of her in real time, Eleanor can see it in his face, the way it shuts down into this faux pleasant smile. What ever could be her motivations? Why the blunt honesty? How does she gain?

Eleanor has been alive for too long. She is born of the nauseating void and broken pieces of soul. The honest answer is she’s too tired and too busy to bother with intrigue. It’s inefficient and annoying. Her only gain is having improved the lives of those least fortunate. If only people could look out from under their masks and guises to see it. 

“Why do you assume I must have some ulterior motive?” Varys asks with a chuckle, stepping inside the solar. Jonquil’s hand lays on his sword by the door in warning, eyes going to Eleanor’s, waiting for the word.

Eleanor doesn’t roll her eyes, but she does shake her head. 

Bloodthirsty, the lot of them. Not everything is solved in violence and blades.

“No person goes by the spider and expects people to be unwary of their pretty webs,” Eleanor says, pausing her writing to look at him, frowning. “Everyone in this castle has a motive and a plot, usually several. Now I ask, what do you want of me truly, Lord Varys?”

Varys stares at her for a long moment, and she stares back.

“Why?” He settles on. How descriptive. 

“Why what?” Eleanor says.

“Why are you in Kingslanding, Lady Eleanor?” 

What a great question. She asks herself the same one every night!

“Because my King commands it. Because I intend to be here for the coronation. Because there is work to be done and no one willing to do it,” Eleanor says standing up straight from where she was leaning over her desk. “Certainly not for the smell.”

Varys chuckles. How glad she is to amuse.

“You do not understand the power you now hold, do you? A girl of ten and seven, unchecked control of the treasury and a King’s ear. You realize what a stir you’ve made, correct?” 

“I am uncomfortably aware, and positively aghast,” Eleanor cuts in, making Varys blink. She isn’t seventeen. Not really. And her baby face seems to be making impressions. “I’ll tell you now so we both understand where we stand. I have no intention of gaining power. I have no intention of playing games in this city of shit and gold. I am here only to do what is my duty, and that is to rule and care for the smallfolk of this realm.”

“You may drop the mask, my Lady,” Varys says. 

“It’s not a mask. I exist to serve my people. I hold lands, titles and money for them. And it seems I am the only one who realizes it.” Eleanor shakes her head, running a hand down her face. “To be born of privilege is to hold the duty of using it for good. Does that answer your questions about my character and intentions?”

Varys stares. And stares. 

“Yes. I do believe it does,” He says, slowly. 

“Great, now unless you have extensive knowledge of the merchants in the city or know when the Kingsroad was last repaired and checked for damages, I really am busy.”

“Of course,” Varys says, looking at her with unreadable eyes, more so than usual. “We will speak later, then, Lady Eleanor.”

“I don’t doubt it.”

Varys leaves the room as silent as he came, and later several lists are found on her desks detailing the exact information she’d offhand mentioned needing in the conversation, and a few minutes before in her rambling. 

….nice?

Eleanor is gonna assume this won’t bite her in the ass and just roll with it. 

That being said, she has plans. Many plans. And she needs more scribes, which will be a pain because she’ll be outsourcing from the Kingslanding population rather than Maidenpool’s, meaning spies. It’s inevitable, she’d be surprised if at least one of her entourage hasn’t been approached yet to spy, but for now her suspicions of subterfuge are low with this bunch. 

Well, she’ll just have to debrief the scribes that if they’re spying she wants to know who and what they’re paying. It probably won’t work, but, honesty has never hurt anyone. 

….except maybe one Lord Stark who hasn’t lost his head yet. He was stupid honor honest. Eleanor is “I couldn’t give two shits” honest. It’s very different. 

For one, she couldn’t care less about honorable things to do or oaths or hierarchy, she’ll play along, but she lets people know what she’s about from the start and that she doesn’t care. 

She’ll probably still end up dead, but, what can you do? Everyone dies, she’s just hoping she wakes up somewhere with plumbing this time. They say third time’s the charm. 

And so Eleanor Mooton dedicates the next week to hiring scribes, firing the first five for being blatant in their spying, and one for being too good at hiding it, and gets started on trying to figure out what the hell the control system is for Kingslanding. 

Obviously King is first in charge, first and final say on whatever he wants, Hand comes second and does most of the work, the Smallcouncil comes in clutch with overseeing the broader needs. Master of Ships, Master of Whispers, Master of Coin, etc but they are far more concerned with the kingdom itself than the individual city. 

So, Eleanor looks over to the Castle Steward, a wiry man given a promotion when his predecessor was killed in the taking of the castle. He’s charged with the daily running of the castle, he must know the hierarchy the city itself runs on, right?

“The city guard watch the streets, the merchants have a guild that throws their weight at the hand, and probably you now, Lady, same with the lesser trades,” Renolf says, hands clasped behind his back, shrugging. 

“So the city doesn't have any one official in charge of each district?” Eleanor asks, feeling the headache coming on. 

“No, I don’t think so.”

Eleanor looks to the ceiling asking for divine intervention. None comes. 

“Right. Thank you, Steward. I’ll be shouting in my solar for the next half hour if you have need of me,” Eleanor says, tone like wilting flowers and other very depressed things she can’t think of at the moment. 

“Er, very welcome, Lady Mooton?” 

How this city survives in it’s unreasonably populated state Eleanor has no fucking clue. She doesn’t know who she wants to shout at, but they’ve got a storm of insults coming. 

Eleanor walks to her solar already formulating a plan to draft up lines between the city’s districts and finding some way to let them vote up a representative. It’ll be strange, but the new regime is young and can’t afford to spend time telling her not to let the plebeians think they have a say in anything. 

Fuck. If she does this “Liaison to the Smallfolk” is going to be a real title with actual necessary duties. And she doesn’t trust any of the ponced up idiots around her to do it right. 

“Lady Mooton!”

Never speak of the devil, lest he appear. 

Eleanor pauses her walk only to give King Robert Baratheon, first of his name, King of the Andals, the Rhyolnar, and First Men, Protector of the Realm, a look. 

“You, you’ve given me responsibility. Damn you,” Eleanor says, eyes narrowed. “Do you know how hard it is to find scribes who won’t sell copies of what they write to the highest bidder? I’ve hired and fired six within the week, and I already need more staff. My hair is greying, I can feel it.”

She’s sure she looks hysterical, a small woman pointing a finger at a bear of a king, in the middle of a well walked corridor no less. It’ll be the talk of the court for a day, at least. 

Robert laughs at her. Eleanor contemplates hitting her King. She’s sure one Ser Jaime Lannister can see it from where he’s watching the interaction because he gives her a warning look. 

“This city is shit, and I can’t leave now because you lot will ruin all my hard work.” Eleanor glares. “I want money. And a nice comfy chair.”

“Sure, sure, Lady Eleanor, and I’ll even throw in a feast in your honor, if it soothes your temper,” Robert chuckles. “Damn, I haven’t laughed like that in days. Shouting at your king?”

Eleanor scoffs. “You wanted honesty, I’ll give you honesty. I haven’t slept since yesterday and I’ve got a bone to pick with every Targeryon who dared let this capital survive as bloated and half assed as it is. Now if you excuse me, I have a new system of bureaucracy to draft up. Because that’s what I do now, apparently.”

Robert shakes his head, obviously not caring about what work she’s actually doing, just the amusement at her attitude. Fine, she doesn’t give a shit. She’ll just fix this stupid city for her health. Whatever. 

She parts ways, but shares a serious look with Jaime as she goes, cold green eyes meeting unbothered blue, a smirk mirroring a grimace. 

Yes, they probably should speak. Soon. About the whole green bombs thing. 

She’ll send a message later, for now she has other things to do. Like sleep. And sleep. 

--

It’s when Eleanor’s brain is most sucked up in thoughts of infrastructure and order that the Lannister Entourage shows up, golden and storybook in their look. 

Fancy horses, fancy carts, fancy carriages, and blondes all around. There’s so much shine to the group that Eleanor’s eyes would water, if she were there to see it. 

To be frank she forgets that they’re coming, locked up in her solar taking a power nap. A servant informs her of the feast in the evening to celebrate the King’s bride being in the city, and Eleanor dons one of the outfits she had shipped from Maidenpool to the city. It’s not royal wedding quality, but, well, what can you do? There’s still another week for her clothes to be ready, and the coronation is a week after that. 

“Jonquil, I warn you now, we will be surrounded by golden armor,” Eleanor says with a sigh as she sets out with the sworn shield, trailing from her quarters to the dining hall. 

“Seems a waste of gold paint,” Jonquil says thoughtfully. “I’m much fonder of our swathes of fabric.” For emphasis, the young man tugs at the red, yellow salmon patterned strip of fabric crossing his chest.

“Agreed,” Eleanor says. “I’m simply glad red is our primary color, matching with the Lannisters seems less than...optimal. If you were of your own house, what colors would you choose?”

Jonquil clasps his pommel, thinking. “Pink, like the city’s walls. Maidenpool’s.”

Eleanor nods. “It would suit you. Who knows, mayhaps you’ll start your own knightly house one day. We’re still young.”

“Not so young as you, Lady Eleanor,” Jonquil says with a good natured huff. “I remember my squiring, you were half my height and still babbling.”

Eleanor rolls her eyes. “It is ever so unfortunate to be surrounded by people who’ve known you from childhood. I didn’t babble. Babble implies what I had to say wasn’t meaningful.” 

“Of course, Lady. Your brothers were-,” Jonquil cuts himself off, the air of comradery dimming. 

Eleanor grimaces. 

“They certainly were something, those fools,” Eleanor says, instead of anything else. Wounds best be left to heal.

They reach the dining hall in silence, the melancholy kind.

Jonquil becomes stoic guard when they enter, and Eleanor the exasperated lady she always is in polite society. The time for melancholy is not around piranhas who smell emotional distress like blood in the water. 

Ignoring any possible nobility headed towards her to speak, Eleanor heads straight for the high table, now having a good enough reason to hang around there with her seat on the council. 

His high and greatness isn’t in yet, but his soon to be bride is, settled at what will be the left of Robert’s seat. 

Eleanor can feel the intrige wafting off the woman, holding a grimace deep down inside and greeting her. 

“Lady Lannister, soon to be Queen Baratheon, it’s good to see you again,” Eleanor says, giving a rank appropriate bow to the T. 

See, part of choosing to ignore social rules is having to know how to follow them. And Eleanor knows Cersei, she’ll think any choice to ignore social rule is to oppose her directly, on purpose, and will immediately seek ways to retaliate.

…listen. Eleanor was at The Rock for a week. That was more than enough time to get what Cersei took personally, even if they were fourteen at the time. 

Three years can change a person a lot. Not the Princess of The Rock, though. Especially if she continues down her canon counterpart’s path.

Cersei is a vision of beauty, as much as a eighteen year old in Westeros can manage. Which is more than you think, there’s something in the water here that makes some nobles prettier than they should be. Probably years of careful breeding and culling of the weak.

(By careful breeding she excludes the inbreeding, which usually only makes habsburg chins, not striking jawlines.)

“Lady Eleanor,” Cersei says, examining her spoon. “Here to give your congratulations, like the rest?” 

Eleanor hums. “Condolences, more rather. King Robert is certainly...something.”

Cersei breaks the power play in an instant, too fast to be smooth and poised, revealing her age, looking at Eleanor with pinched lips. She opens her mouth to speak, but, quite unfortunately, the man himself is announced entering the room with the Arryns, and Cersei pulls herself together in record time, the picture of a pretty Lannister wife. 

Eleanor would clap if she had the energy. 

“Lady Eleanor-!” Terrible choice, talking to her first in front of his betrothed, “Good to see you graced us with your presence past your work.”

“King Robert, you need only look at the bags under my eyes to know I needed a break, though I’m unsure of how this….feast, counts as one,” Eleanor grumbles, before zeroing in on Lysa and offering a arm, giving a nod to her husband as well, of course.

Lysa takes the arm and they go to settle in their usual seats. 

“I cannot believe he spoke to you first,” Lysa says conspiratorially as they walk. 

“Me neither, dear Lysa, me neither. And I’m certain dear Cersei will not forget it,” Eleanor says with idle dread, pulling out a seat for Lysa first before settling, Jonquil standing silently a few feet behind them. 

“She’s quite beautiful though, isn’t she?” Lysa says, glancing over at Cersei as Robert sits beside her. “They make a handsome pair.”

They do. Greek god looking Robert, dainty, high cheekboned Cersei. If only the personalities were as handsome Eleanor wouldn’t mind being stuck in this city. 

“They do, though I am more concerned about how their…strong willed personalities will react to each other.” The answer is not well. Not well at all. 

Lysa tilts her head, but then Jon is seated beside her and she offers a weak smile to him. 

Poor girl. 

Robert stands from his seat once its clear most of the court had piled into the hall, a goblet in hand. The hall hushes. 

“Evening to all of you, glad to see I’ve already got your attention.” Robert looks around, gazing through the crowd with a leader’s ease. “I’m sure you’ve already noticed, but I’d like to announce the arrival of my—,” and here, something in his face almost sours, an ache from deep within showing. “— betrothed. Lady Cersei Lannister.”

Cersei stands here, a soft smile on her face that would never be there naturally. 

“Let’s give a grande welcome to your future Queen,” Robert says, before practically chugging his wine. 

…ouch. Poor guy. 

The hall cheers though, goblets raised for Cersei, and Eleanor takes a polite drink of her own watered wine. 

“I’m starting to see what you mean,” Lysa murmurs to her under the noise of merriment. Yes. Yes, she’s sure she does, Eleanor thinks as she takes in the way Robert settles heavily into his seat and the almost mirror looks of hidden displeasure on the Lannister twins faces, all their father. 

Speaking of said father, from his seat beside Cersei Eleanor can see the same expression! Apples and trees, apples and trees. 

Lannisters. 

The night goes about as she’d expect. Robert heeds her advice, surprisingly, and doesn’t grab at any serving girls, but he does get very drunk to make up for this, so the good and bad sort of equals out into “same old Robert”. Tywin retires, and Cersei follows a little while later. 

“Your Grace, may I be escorted back to my quarters by my brother? We have much to catch up on,” Cersei says to Robert, all honey. 

Gross. So gross. They’re gonna fuck, they’re totally gonna fuck. 

“Sure sure, Kingslayer, attend to your sister,” Robert says waving her off. 

“Certainly, my King,” Jaime says smugly. 

Horrible word choice Robert. Ew. 

Some of Eleanor’s disgruntlement must show on her face because— Cersei gives her a smug look? What? Is she flexing that she’s—??

Cersei. What the fuck. That would be so suspicious if she didn’t already know. 

“Have a good evening, you two,” Eleanor says, voice drier than the desert. 

“Of course, Lady Mooton,” Jaime says. 

Ew. So Ew. Why, GRRM? 

The two walk out, and the Arryn’s take their leave now that it’s socially acceptable to do so, Eleanor saying her goodbyes to Lysa before scooting to sit beside the king, ungracefully. 

“You look like you need a hug. And a nap,” Eleanor observes, looking at the man with his face in his hands. 

“It wasn’t meant to end like this,” Robert says, quiet. 

Oh, this is not a conversation for feast halls. 

“That’s my shared opinion on most things,” Eleanor says, expression softening only just so. “Do you want to talk about this farther away from graspers?”

Robert just sighs, then waves for one of his Kingsguard and stands from his chair. 

“I’ll be departing, you lot don’t stop the party for me though!” Robert shouts, before starting to stride out, Eleanor following easily, Jonquil walking just behind her without a word. 

Eleanor settles into a stride beside him, steps silent compared to his loud ones, moonlight fanning through the windows and candlelight at their sides. 

“Godswood?” Eleanor offers. 

Robert only nods, eyes in some faraway place rather than here. 

Leaves and foliage crunch underfoot once they reach the area, stopping at a small stone bench likely older than their grandparents. 

They settle in their seats, Eleanor leaning back against the bench back and looking up at the leaves. 

“How are you feeling?” Eleanor offers first. 

Robert looks down at her with furrowed brows and a scowl. 

“You know how I feel,” Robert bites, and then— “Lyanna is— is gone and I’m left with some Lannister girl, shoved at me by her father.” There it is. 

“They all think me stupid. Think a pretty girl is all it takes to distract me,” Robert hisses, running his hands through his hair. 

“It’s okay to be angry she’s gone,” Eleanor says. 

“I won the war,” Robert says. “But I lost the thing I was fighting for. That’s not how these things are meant to end, she should be alive, by my side in Storm’s End, hunting and fighting and living. ” 

And there is the unfairness of life. 

“And yet she isn’t. And yet we have to continue without her,” Eleanor says closing her eyes. “But you can rage about it now. Cry. Scream. We’re as alone as we’re going to get right now. Hit a tree or something, or, and this is a strange prospect, talk it through. Make peace with it.”

“You’re callus,” Robert says, that Baratheon rage starting to boil in his voice. 

“I’m kindred,” Eleanor says sharply, eyes snapping open, peircing him. “You killed my brother, the other died to a broken neck. I know unfairness, do not think me stupid.”

This doesn’t mention the whole trauma about dying thing, but she made peace with that years ago. No point in crying about long gone spoiled milk. 

“It’s okay to be sad. But you must manage it, Robert. Whether we like it or not, you’re King. You must have heirs, and they can’t have Stark hair or eyes. So do what you need to do while we’re in a forest, the Old Gods won’t judge, and then we’ll try our best to keep moving.”

Robert punches a tree. 

It decays from there. 

Listen, Eleanor is no therapist, she doesn’t know how to make someone work through their grief, but establishing that he’s gotta work through this shit in some way is what matters right now. If that’s punching trees and shouting “fuck” into the sky for all the neighbors to hear, she won’t judge. 

After twenty minutes and some messy knuckles, Robert sits heavily onto the bench again, panting, and with a wild look in his eyes. 

“Feel better?” Eleanor asks.

“Feeling something,” Robert rumbles. “Why don’t you want to get married?”

Eleanor evaluates the man. 

“Swear on Lyanna you won’t tell a soul,” Eleanor says, tone even.

Robert looks at her, eyebrows raised. 

“Sworn.”

Eleanor grimaces. 

“I don’t like men the same way you don’t much like men, dear Robert, and quite like women the way you like women, though much more respectfully,” Eleanor says. 

Robert looks like he’s buffering for a few long moments. 

“That….can happen?”

An almost hysterical laughter bubbles up from Eleanor’s throat. 

“And it’s more common than you’d think. Just not very….opportune, in a world where blood heirs matter.”

Robert hums, then laughs himself, and then the both of them are laughing. An asshole, grieving King and a lesbian, disgruntled Lady laughing in a forest. 

“Damn. Maiden of Maidenpool for as long as you’ll let, then?” Robert giggles to himself. 

“Indeed. And—wherever did you come up with that nickname?” 

“Court gossips are much better at handing out nicknames than I.”

“Court gossips—? All flattering things, I’m sure.”

“They think we’re fucking,” Robert cackles. 

Eleanor makes a face of horror, he gets going again with a guffaw. 

A good night, even if the Lannister twins definitely fucked, dude. Gross. 

Chapter Text

Eighth Moon, 283 AC

Gods, if Eleanor could ride for Maidenpool right now she would and she would never turn back. 

Marg’s latest letter lays crisp on her desk, her pretty script asking for her thoughts on how to address the growing shack town outside the walls of new refugees trying to flood the city in hopes of employment and a safe place to sleep. Pay them to help build real houses, Eleanor supposes, but she itches to be there and have her hands right on the work herself. 

And, ignoring that, Marg said she misses her! Eleanor is dying. She’s wilting. She wants to banter about stupid nothings with her best friend, and she is stuck in thrice damned King’s Fucking Landing.

Stupid corronation, stupid wedding, stupid king. 

Eleanor scrubs her face with her hands, stops because that will block her pores, and then does it again, harder, for good measure.

“Everyday I wake up,” Eleanor declares into her office, to her bemused looking staff who have been watching her mini....well, breakdown would be too harsh, wouldn’t it? 

“Do you need a break, Lady Mooton?” One of her new pages asks, a squirrely looking boy named Yorrik, who’s a distant cousin to the Tullys. 

“Don’t we all?” Eleanor asks idly, before starting out of the room. “I’m going into the city and handing people money.”

Yorrik the Squirrelly Page sputters, but two sworn shields are at Eleanor’s back with easy practice, along with two servants. 

“Finish up those reports on the census, boys, I want to look them over when I get back,” Eleanor calls without looking back. “You’re doing great.”

...what? The pages are like fifteen, they need good encouragement! And deodorant. Which she has given to all her staff. 

The city smells like shit, but they don’t need to.

Eleanor makes haste through corridors, headed for one of the servant exits she’s scouted as to avoid any nosy nobles. Hm. Should she invite Lysa? The woman needs time away from scheming, gods know Eleanor does. 

They change routes for the Lysa’s rooms, unfortunately down more trodden halls than the original route, but, what can you do? 

“Mooton!”

Drat and damnation. 

“I really must take less well known routes,” Eleanor grumbles as a bigheaded king comes trotting towards her. 

“You’re as much of a grouch as my brother,” Robert says, rolling his eyes. Jaime Lannister, who definitely fucked his sister last night, is trailing after his liege, along with another Kingsguard Eleanor hasn’t gotten the name of yet. Big forehead. 

“Speaking of brothers, didn’t they arrive this morning?” Eleanor asks, eyebrow raised. Now that she’s paying attention, Robert looks a bit….frazzled. He’s breathing a little uneven. Wait. Was he—

“Yes.” Oh the finality in the tone confirms it. He’s hiding. “What are you doing?”

Great segway, Robby, sure no one can see the subject change from a mile away. 

“I was about to get Lady Lysa and go for an outing to the city, hand out money to the poor,” Eleanor says, frowning. Don’t ask to co—

Robert’s face lights up. Oh for fucks sake —

“Are you? You’re always doing charity for the smallfolk, yes, that’s perfect. Very kingly to hand out money to the people, surely it’ll be fine. I’m coming!”

“Your Grace, if we do that you will require far more guards, the smallfolk are…restless, after the change in power,” The nameless Kingsguard interjects, very pointedly avoiding saying “People are still pissed after the sacking, and you’ve got a Lannister on your leash.”

“Must you use my philanthropy as a vessel to avoid your betrothed and brothers?” Eleanor asks, though it’s half hearted at best. It’s happening, Robert’s already made up his mind. 

“Yes,” Robert says, unashamed. “And shut it, Arden, you speak when your king has spoken to you.”

Rip nameless Kingsguard also known as Arden. Rough luck. 

“The man had a point,” Eleanor points out. “The smallfolk are fans of me, but you’re a king. You’ll need more guards, at least in case we get mobbed.”

Ugh. Logistical nightmares also known as “Robert wants to do a thing he used to be able to do and is now pissed he can’t just do because he’s a fucking king” .

Robert gives Eleanor a look, Eleanor stares blankly back. 

“It’s this or we go in disguise, Baratheon, and I do not want to change,” Eleanor pushes, testing the water. Arden looks at her in visible surprise, the amateur, and then shifts the look to his king when said king scoffs at her. 

“What, don’t want to look nicer for Lady Lysa ?” Robert prods, the ass, and Eleanor gives him a decidedly unimpressed look. 

“Do you want your damned outing or not, this gold is burning a hole in my pockets.”

Silence. 

“Oh fuck off,” Robert says, turning and narrowing his eyes at Arden the New Punching-Bag for one annoyed king. “Go get your fucking guards, no more than ten, and fetch Lady Lysa while you’re at it, by the King’s order!” He shouts, shooing the man. 

“Yes your Grace!”

Poor guy. 

“Where did you get that one?” Eleanor asks, watching him run, clanking along. “You made him a Kingsguard recently, haven’t seen him before.”

“Elevated him this morning,” Robert huffs, arms crossed. “Jon was getting antsy at having only two Kingsguard, as if I couldn’t clobber any assassins fool enough to come into the keep!”

Oh. Right, she hadn’t seen any besides Jaime and Barrisan Selmy. Suppose she thought the rest were hiding somewhere, she was busy doing her job. 

“You’re right, you should really be investing in a taste tester,” Eleanor says, dryly. 

Robert gives her a look, she raises her hands in surrender. 

In the end it takes all of thirty minutes to be out of the keep and on an Official Royal Visit to give money to those less fortunate, something something real good PR after being technically at fault for the whole sacking thing, even if he didn’t make the order. 

Yikes. Sucks to be on the team with the war criminals, but, well, the other team were war criminals too so. 

Geneva doesn’t even exist, best not think about it. 

Robert rides his big ass warhorse at the front of the procession, Eleanor right at his side with her much smaller mare, Lysa just behind them with the Kingsguard and Eleanor’s Sworn. The lower Baratheon House guard follows on foot, turning them into a real spectecle. 

“I take it back,” Eleanor grumbles as Robert waves at the forming crowds, tossing coin. “Next time we’re going into the city in disguise and just buying street kids food.”

“What? Isn’t this great?” Robert asks, clueless. 

“Great for your ‘Usurper’ reputation—don’t give me that look you know I’m not agreeing, let me finish—but I am not exactly a fan of all this attention.” And, as if to punctuate her words, flowers are thrown at Eleanor, and she sputters. 

“You have an orchid in your hair,” Lysa comments behind Eleanor, above the cheering crowd. 

“Feel free to take it, Lysa dear, I’m sure my hair won’t miss it,” Eleanor says back, pulling it from her head and tossing it to the woman. Lysa fumbles with the catch, Ser Arden coming to her rescue and grabbing it…almost falling off his horse in the process. 

Eleanor pinches her nose bridge. No wonder she doesn’t remember the fool from canon, he probably got killed. 

Well, it’s the thought that counts. 

Eleanor, upon looking up and back at behind her, notices one Jaime Lannister staring at her. In a very Lannister way. 

That can’t be good. 

“Did you want an Orchid as well, Ser Jaime?” Eleanor asks blandly. 

He blinks slow, like a cat. Very unnerving. 

“No thank you, Lady Eleanor. But, you know, I do think my sister would’ve,” He says, carefully idle. 

Oh, is that what this is about? 

….oh it does probably look a little bad that she is making an appearance at the king’s side, the day after his betrothed, who he is vocally dissatisfied with, got to the city. 

Hmm, she may not have thought out the optics of this before getting on a horse and being in the middle of an impromptu mini parade. 

“Bah, it’s fine, Kingslayer, in a month the woman can have all the orchids in the kingdom if she wants,” Robert scoffs beside Eleanor, oblivious as he soaks up the crowd’s praise, tossing a whole bag of coin to a beggar.

“And I’ll add,” Eleanor says, carefully. “—that I don’t want any orchids at all. So she can have them.”

Eleanor Mooton and Jaime Lannister, with a broken betrothal and all his sister’s grievances between them, make very pointed eye contact as Eleanor attempts to convey her meaning with bare minimum subterfuge. 

“One could be confused with how often you’re seen with them,” Jaime offers, a tad less hostile, but eyes still cold. He probably wouldn’t appreciate it if she mentioned the look was all his father. 

“Sometimes orchids keep being thrown at you.”

“Shut it about the damn flowers and start throwing money, Mooton!” Robert says, shoving a heavy bag of coin into Eleanor’s chest. 

Eleanor rolls her eyes. “As my king commands.”

Needless to say it was a great reputation boost for everyone involved, and Eleanor likes to hope Jaime told Cersei Eleanor has no interest in her soon to be husband, but, well, Cersei is Cersei. 

…maybe it’ll work itself out?

Yeah. Let’s go with that. 

--

Eleanor works through paperwork with the temperament of a man on his death walk to the guillotine. Unbearably, unreasonably, annoyed.

Regardless of storms on Eleanor’s horizon, she’s got problems in front of her, that being her ever growing need for educated workers to assist on her census and now starting to deal with the lords of the Crownlands who are less than pleasant with more than half of them still being Targaryen sympathizers. 

If Eleanor gets one more infuriating letter stalling them telling her about their ability to handle a census on each of their lands she’s tattling to Robert and their holdings will be swiftly fucking reallocated. For fucks sake, Lord Edgerton sent her a letter talking about his prospects as a potential husband instead of answering “When was your last census?”. 

She’s gonna kill them. Not actually, but oh she is tempted. Her next letter was delivered by physical messenger, along with a contingent of Mooton arms for “safety”. She ignored the entire contents of his letter and had her reply sealed with the King’s fucking crest. 

Shithead. “Fertile fields ripe for crops, in need of a woman’s gentle, stewarding hand” her goddamn ass. She asked for population records and soldier counts, not his best fucking tinder pickup line. 

Eleanor hopes her soldiers looked suitably unfertile and very unwelcoming. Cunt. 

The Targaryen sect will calm down in a few years anyways, she doesn’t think they’ll last long with their only hope of return to the old status quo across the narrow sea and impoverished. The ones who have already started kissing up to their new overlord are the smartest of the batch. 

Sometimes, and only for half a second, Eleanor can almost hear The Rains of Castmere ringing in her ears when she’s reading letters from Crownlands nobility. Not the way anyone should start their new rule off with, not after the sacking and the murdered prince and princesses, but. Some of these old guard….ugh. 

Eleanor signs an order for more paper, setting it to the side for one of her pages to handle, and thinks. As always. 

Should she get married?

It’s such a stupid question, really. How else will she continue her House’s lineage? Marg is only a Mooton by marriage, the title of House Head would likely fall to one of her more distant cousins instead of to any child of a second marriage of Marg’s, so. 

Fuck. 

Nausea boils up from her stomach, sudden, bubbling viciously. Her mouth is terribly dry. 

Fuck. 

What a mental block to have, thinking about marrying and—and having a child with some man. Playing dutiful wife, just like the septas say. Sex is a duty , you know, for bearing sweet babes for your Lord husband and is to be endured. You must attend to his needs. 

Imagine telling a real eleven year old that. She’d been disgusted enough as a fake one. 

“Lady Eleanor?” 

Eleanor looks up, suddenly, noting she’s snapped her quil in her hand and Dorin is crouched beside where she sits at her desk. 

Ah. Minor panic attack. What a throwback to childhood. 

“I’m fine,” Eleanor says, closing her eyes and working through breathing exercises. One, two, three, breathe in. One, two, three, breathe out. 

“Do you need anything of me, milady?” He asks, quiet, gentle. 

“A drink, please, nothing very alcoholic,” Eleanor says, slowing her fast beating heart. 

“Of course.” And with that he’s waving one of her dumbfounded new pages off to get that. 

“This is hell,” Eleanor breathes out, serious. 

“We’re far from the worst of sinners,” Dorin says, not disagreeing. “I’ll take you to your chambers once you have your drink and calm down.”

“I fucking hate this city.”

“I know.”

She’s more calm by the time the shaking page comes in and hands her some sort of lemon juice water that she prays was properly purified but knows probably wasn’t. 

Note to self, try and bully the castle chefs into properly cleaning things—

No. Not right now. Rest , stupid. Shut up your twice damned mind. 

“Are you ready to go to your chambers?” Dorin asks as Eleanor sets her cup down onto a coaster on her desk. 

“Yes. I want to sleep until next month when I can leave,” Eleanor says, bland, and stands from her chair. “You have the afternoon off, Willam.”

The page nods, uncertainly, and Eleanor starts out the room with Dorin in tow. 

They walk through the hall, quiet. 

“If my betrothal hadn’t fell through, I’d have run.” 

“I know.”

“Did you?” Eleanor asks, looking to the man who still walks two steps behind her despite years of familiarity. 

“I did. And I do,” Dorin says, and she has the inkling he isn’t just talking about running. 

Eleanor figures it’s always been pretty obvious, hasn’t it?

She looks back forward, red dress swaying with every step.

“There’s an unfairness to it all,” Eleanor says idly. “I’ll use every ounce of my privilege for good and still lose something to a world unforgiving. Something so simple, so easy, for most, and yet unattainable.”

A gentle hand lays on her shoulder.

“It is, Lady Eleanor.”

Damn.

“Play Cyvasse with me?” She asks, once they get to the door.

“Of course.”

Damn.

Chapter Text

Ninth Moon, 283 AC

The worst part about being in the capital and in a position of authority is suddenly you’re not able to hide when everyone in their mother starts showing up for the coronation and upcoming royal wedding. Very very inconvenient. Eleanor is feeling personally inconvenienced by this.

“Lady Mooton, my deepest condolences on the loss of your brothers, I know you were quite close,” Tytos Blackwood, recently inheritor of House Blackwood’s Lordship, says solemnly. Around them Blackwood’s entourage unloads what offerings of gifts and belongings brought with them.

Eleanor tries her best not to frown awkwardly. She’s been told by Marg it’s an unflattering face.

“And I to the loss of your father, Lord Blackwood.” Eleanor pauses, rifling for something else to say, but Tytos beats her to it, thankfully. Less thankfully when she hears the words.

“I will keep this short, as I have heard of your reluctance for marriage from my own holding, but should you wish to join our houses, I would respect you and your own personal claims, and the claims of our children,” Tytos says uncharacteristically quick, almost nervous. 

What about her. Is so. Appealing. That she cannot get a days rest between being accosted by single men. What is this, a fucking self insert? Is she sparkling and glowing? She knows for a fact she’s got some undereye bags and didn’t brush her hair this morning, just shoved it up in a bun. She is intending to wear mens fashion for the rest of her days. She is literally known for being a recluse, bookish and blunt woman, probably the worst you could be in Westeros.

“Lord Tytos, why are you-” Eleanor begins, but is interrupted by an almost panting lord Jonos Bracken, not yet Lord, capital L, of his house, but with the way his father is aging he’ll likely inherit soon.

“Lady Eleanor, do not listen to this fool Blackwood,” Jonos says scowling at his Sworn Enemy for reasons no one is even alive to bother with knowing the details of. “Their house is one of dishonor, unworthy of a Lady of your stature! Allow me the honor of courting you, instead.”

You know, both of these offers would be more serious sounding if the men offering them weren’t sixteen and fifteen, respectively. They may have fought in the war, but Jonos is barely growing whiskers on his chin.

Gods, Westeros is so bleak. These two should be in highschool, courting their failing grades in Algebra 2.

Tytos’s face loses any trace of nerves, turning with all his significant height to loom over the younger boy.

“Stay your tongue about dishonor, Bracken , this has nothing to do with the quarrels between our houses. Lady Eleanor is not a prize for us to fight for.”

Jonos, who probably only heard the bits about staying his tongue and quarrel, is beginning to flush red with anger. 

These two are the exact same as they were five years ago, if taller.

“I am not in the market of finding a husband at this time,” Eleanor interjects, already calculating how fast she can leave this courtyard full of potential gossips and rivermen. “But I am flattered by both of your offers. I’m afraid my duties are a bit more pressing as of current. Speaking of which--” Eleanor looks at her shield on duty, Edmer, who is looking very smirky about all this. “I must attend to some of those right now, right, Ser Edmer?”

Edmer practically preens at the opportunity to start bullshitting. 

“Oh for certain, My Lady, what with the state of affairs in you know what, being away for even this long is sure to bode some complications.”

“Agreed, without my staying hand, oh, the horror,” Eleanor agrees, turning back to the two, ugh, suitors . “I must be going, lords, I do hope you enjoy your stay in the capital.” 

--

It’s unfortunate that that was not where the marriage proposals stopped, as every noble flooded into the capital to get a feel for their new liege. 

Logically, Eleanor understands she’s a pretty good catch, in terms of wife material. Born to a wealthy, influential family, now leading that same now almost accidentally extinct house, holding a position on the small council, and she’s pretty nice to look at to boot. No wonder everyone is throwing themselves and their sons at her.

That being said, Eleanor is still extremely annoyed that they are bothering her. She is busy.  

She’s slowly drafting plans to create more robust infrastructure in the city, the first of that being talking to people from each unofficial district on making said districts official. She can’t exactly draw some arbitrary lines on a map of the city and force the citizens to comply.

…okay she could and no one in the small council or the nobility would notice or give a shit. But she’s not an asshole. That would be Targaryen behavior. A Targaryen would just put down some lines and call it a day, considering themself a saint for doing literally anything for their subjects.

Eleanor is currently in a meeting with some influential Tradesmen, staring down at a map of the city debating where their upper trade district ends and the lower trade district, and noble housing begins.

“Naerys’s Street isn’t apart of the luxury trades, the only shops they have are spill out from the Blacksmith’s quarter,” One portly man scoffs. “The line should start at the end of the Pleasure district.”

They’re mostly arguing over the finer details. Eleanor is only here to reign them in and make the final lines, honestly.

Light fans in from the windows of her Solar, and Eleanor idly contemplates the dust mites floating in the rays. Arguments muffled around her ears.

Her door opens. Loudly.

Eleanor refocuses and turns seeing who’s bothering her when she expressly told her guards to not let anyone in unless they’ve got something actually important to say. Then again, she left defining that to their own discretion. 

That’s her bad as a boss. She’ll be more specific next time. 

And by specific, she means tell them expressly not to let people trying to marry her in. 

“Lady Mooton!” Says bane of her existence, one Lord Hayford, the same lord who waxed poetically about fertile fields needing a guiding feminine hand when she asked for his census data. 

“Why are you bothering me?” She figured the armed force with her letter would imply to this fool she was uninterested. 

“Ah, your dry wit is even more funny in person, my Lady,” Lord Hayford says, laughing.

…How much of a scene would it cause if she had him dragged out of her Solar? Why in the seven hells did Edmer let this idiot in?

“I’m so glad to amuse you,” Eleanor says, tone cool. “As gladdened as I am to see you I am busy with Small Council work.”

Hayford, the fool, smiles. “Oh yes, I am aware of your hobbies in politics, don’t worry.”

One of the traders openly gasps. 

What.

“Edmer,” Eleanor says.

The sworn shield, who has been standing at the door sort of awkwardly, immediately grabs the man and tosses him out of the room. 

Eleanor gives Edmer a look, the door closing soundly as Lord Hayford sputters.

They will be having words.

Eleanor massages the bridge of her nose, feeling a migraine begin to brew in her head. She takes a slow breath in, feels it fill her lungs, spread out through her chest. 

Exhale.

“Back to business then, men.”

--

“New rule. Do not let eligible bachelors into my Solar unless they’re dying or are here on actual business.”

“Yes, er, got it, Lady Eleanor.”

“Why the fuck did you let him in?”

“...thought it’d be funny.”

“I will literally send you back to Maidenpool.”

“You would be so bored without me!”

“You would think so, wouldn’t you.”

(Eleanor doesn’t send Edmer back to Maidenpool. She swears it's only because he’s one of her better sworn shields.)

--

It is a sunny day in Kingslanding, the birds are chirping, the sky is a glorious blue, and-

Robert has somehow gotten it in his head she is a safe person to hide from his responsibilities with. 

“My King, someone needs to tell the poor castle steward what foods you want served at the coronation feast,” Eleanor says idly, writing a letter to Prince Doran. He had sent thanks for the gifts and kind words after his sister’s death, she was simply replying to said thanks. 

Most people would take this opportunity to say some pleasantries and milk something out of the grieving man. Eleanor is not most people. She, foolishly, does feel a heavy sort of remorse for Elia’s death, especially for her children. She couldn’t have done a thing, but the human mind is stupid sometimes. 

Her repentance will be in offering only kindness and friendship to the Martells. Gods know Robert won’t, and Lord Arryn’s letters to them will be only paltry apologies. 

“Haven’t I got a Hand for that? Jon knows what I like,” Robert grumbles, lounging on her couch, like the twenty year old he is. She forgets how young he is.

A castle of orphans and teenaged (or barely older) rulers. What could go wrong?

“You’re right,” Eleanor says, writing. “But you could still pretend you like your job.”

Robert scoffs. “Like you do?”

Eleanor looks up and makes some pointed eye contact. “If I didn’t like this job I’d have left for Essos by now. Run a bookshop. Play competitive Cyvasse.”

She would’ve gotten painfully bored eventually, but if she didn’t enjoy taking care of people she’d be gone.

Robert rolls his eyes. “Boring. I’d join one of those savage Dothraki hordes.”

He would.

“Do I look like Dothraki material?” Eleanor asks dryly, before turning back down to the letter.

“What are you writing?” Robert says instead of answering her question. The answer is obvious anyways.

“A letter,” Eleanor says, leaning back and rereading her work so far. Blah blah I’m so glad my message reached you blah blah if you have need of anything just ask blah blah I feel extremely bad my men didn’t make it in time to protect your sister, niece and nephew. 

Eleanor rubs a hand down her face. Yeah. That’ll work. Maybe include two more commas.

Robert lumbers over to her seat at her desk and peers down at her letter.

“Doran Martell?” He asks, narrow eyed.

“Someone needs to smooth over relations with Dorne,” Eleanor says, sighing. “In the very least I don’t want them taxing me higher for Dornish imports and exports, Maidenpool is too important to the Riverlands economy.”

Robert grunts, leaning away from her personal space bubble now. “Hadn’t thought about that.”

He wouldn’t.

“I wish the sacking went differently,” Eleanor says, crossing her arms. “So many innocents, so much needless death. There’s still burnt down buildings outside the walls and in the outer rim, someone needs to rebuild them.”

Robert sort of blinks like he also hadn’t thought about that stuff, and Eleanor just hopes Lord Arryn is on it. 

“Aye, sounds bad,” Robert says, slowly, looking down at some of her other papers on her desk, arranged in a messy pile system depending on the projects they’re for. “...How many smallfolk died, that night?” 

Eleanor looks up at him, lips pulled in a grim line. “The census will tell. But from first hand reports, two thousand to three thousand, maybe more. It’s a big city.”

If she hadn’t given her men the orders to protect smallfolk…she doesn’t want to think about it. More. So many more.

“Welcome to ruling, King Robert,” Eleanor says, leaning back in her seat. “Us fools are in charge of so many lives now.”

“Call me Robert, Mooton,” Robert says, and Eleanor feels some sort of cosmic weight land on her shoulders. An understanding that this path leads only to ruin. 

“As you wish, Robert.”

There's silence for a moment. 

“The dragon children weren’t my fault,” Robert says to the air.

“But it wasn’t not our fault,” Eleanor says. “If we want to be better than our predecessors, your predecessors, we must be the kind of regime the people love. That means preventing the murders of innocents.”

“They were a threat to my legitimacy,” Robert says dangerously. 

“Would you rather be remembered as a just king, or a ruthless one?” Eleanor asks seriously, standing to face him.

Robert glares. “A stupid question.”

“An honest one,” Eleanor says, shrugging, voice idle as if they’re speaking of the weather. “What is your legacy, Robert Baratheon? First of his name, King of the Andals and The First Men. You didn’t make the orders to have them killed, but what you need to know is would you have?”

Robert, who was blustering and puffing his chest, hesitates.

“There’s one little Targaryen wandering the world right now, and one waiting to be born,” Eleanor says, walking away from her desk to start pacing. “Both of them are younger or the same age as your brother Renly. What are you thinking of doing with them? Rains of Castamere?” 

“It isn’t simple, Mooton, the older boy won’t be a boy forever. If I am not careful he could be used as a rallying cry and have both our heads on spikes,” Robert says. 

“True,” Eleanor says. “But the babe did nothing wrong. Imagine, being born into a world already out to have you dead. The boy is what, seven? You’d have ten years to make him love you and never even think of rebelling.”

“What, you want me to raise a fucking dragon babe in hopes it doesn’t grow up to spit fire at me?” Robert asks, scoffing at the idea.

“Better have my possible enemies close than far away where they can do things without your interference” Eleanor shrugs, pausing her pacing. “Though I use the term “enemy” loosely in reference to an infant and a seven year old.”

“You’re too kind, a woman’s heart,” Robert says, arms crossed.

“I’m practical, and kind. And it has nothing to do with my being a woman, I know plenty who would agree with having the children killed.”

Cough Cersei Cough.

“Come now, ten years to endear two children to you? You could raise Viserys with Renly, make him feel like he’s a part of the family. The baby would be even easier. Don’t tell me you’re not up for such an easy challenge,” Eleanor goads him. 

“They’re the mad king’s spawn, Eleanor.”

“Ignoring the effects of the incest, if they aren’t well adjusted we lock them in a tower until they die of old age.” 

“Or we could kill them now,” Robert says darkly.

“And erase the chances of them being well adjusted and normal people?” Eleanor asks, dry. “I’m not a betting woman, but I would take that chance. For better or worse. The war is done, Robert, and now we must take steps to secure ourselves in peacetime. We need to look good in those history books.”

“Who gives a damn about history books?” Robert says, walking over to her couch and sitting heavily, stress lining his young face. “War was easier. Being a commander was easier than this mess.”

“It is. In war you just kill people and start looking for the next idiot to kill, hoping you’re not someone else’s next idiot.” Eleanor sits beside him. “Sometimes what is right is not easy. And what is easy bodes ill consequence.” 

“By the gods, why don’t you be king instead, if you’re so opinionated about it,” Robert grumbles. “I miss Ned, then again, he’d be on my ass just like you.”

Eleanor hums, feeling extremely kindred with Lord Stark. She’s basically doing his job right now, making sure this oaf doesn’t get them all killed.

“He was upset about Elia and her children, wasn’t he? I don’t doubt he’d be on my side about this.”

Gods, how horrible it is to share an opinion with Ned “I was so honorable I got my head chopped off” Stark. Eleanor should hire a taste tester.

Robert looks like he’s about to enter a rant about how the whole dead kids thing wasn’t that deep and definitely wasn’t his fault even if he reportedly laughed with vocal bloodlust when he spotted the bodies, but Eleanor doesn’t say anything else so he stifles it.

To be clear, Eleanor has no real hopes of convincing the man to grab the Targaryen kids and raise them here as to prevent Daenerys’s climb to very scary dragon queen. She would very much like to do anything to stop it, she rather likes not being burnt to a crisp and avoiding lots and lots of civilians also meeting that fate. But. 

Well, Robert is not a man who sees past his biases and urge to hit his problems with a hammer. And, unfortunately, that means he sees even delicate matters like this as nails. Easily smashed nails.

But she was testing something though. Eleanor is honestly curious if he’s even put much thought into things like legacy, and what he wants to be. 

(The answer is he hasn’t. At all. The idiot is twenty.)

Eleanor idly considers what conversation topics she could broach that won’t set the ruler beside her off. There’s always his favorites, whoring and drinking, but Eleanor isn’t really one for either of those things. No disrespect to sex workers, of course, all lovely people she’s sure, she’s just a bit too far in the closet for it all.

“So. Speaking of your brothers.”

Robert groans.

Well that’s telling.

“How is Renly?” Eleanor asks, because it’s preferable to broaching the already growing resentment between Robert and Stannis.

“Skinny,” Robert says gravely. “If the siege hadn’t been broken when it was…”

Eleanor has only seen glimpses of the boy, mostly confined to his rooms and the very occasional feast. She wonders how much he understood about the situation, being barely seven. 

“Luckily it was,” Eleanor says, slouching back into her comfortable seat and closing her eyes. Grabbing a throw pillow along the way to clutch to her chest. “You’re guilty about it.” 

“Guilty men don’t win,” Robert says.

Eleanor opens an eye, raising an incredulous eyebrow.

“Tywin Lannister.”

Robert grumbles a few curses to himself instead of answering that rebuttal.

“The old man is probably pissed you’re avoiding his daughter,” Eleanor says idly. 

“Well, I’m king, aren’t I? Can’t I find peace in my own castle?” Robert asks, running a hand down his face. “I thought it was all feasts and parties and a little ruling. Why in the seven hells is the High Septon bothering me about some quarrel between the septons? Even Jon is on my ass about this coronation and the upcoming wedding, one I didn’t even ask for!”

Robert stops using his inside voice towards the end of that last bit.

“It’s fair to be frustrated,” Eleanor says, closing her eyes again and letting out a breath. “It’s a lot of responsibilities that you didn’t even want. And it seems its coming from all sides. Both family, and from everyone else.”

She can certainly relate, though most of her responsibilities are all her own doing. If she wanted she could grow fat and happy in Maidenpool not giving a damn about anything or anyone else.

But what’s the point in a second life if she doesn’t feel satisfied with what she’s completed in that time?

“No one bloody listens to me,” Robert says. “They’re all lost in their damned plans. Ones I didn’t ask to be apart of. I’m King, and yet I feel-” Robert breaks off into a frustrated grunt. Emotions are very hard to express sometimes she gets the gist.

“I understand.” It’s important for him to get verbal affirmation like that. “I feel like you feel that you’ve lost control of your life.”

“Exactly!” Robert says. 

“What makes you feel in control?” Eleanor asks.

Silence. Very deep thinking, probably. She hears the couch move and footsteps start pacing back and forth.

Steps pause.

“Fighting,” Robert says firmly.

Makes sense. Blooded frat boys do like getting into fights.

Er, so do acclaimed military commanders and warriors. Which he is.

“Set a part of your day everyday to train, spar with other men. Hell, start training some of the guards,” Eleanor opens her eyes and looks into his stormy grey ones, a few feet away. “You’re stuck doing a lot of stuff you don’t feel like you’re good at. Focus on doing the things you like doing when it's not responsibility time.”

“Doesn’t change that I’ll be in a hundred Small Council meetings,” Robert says, scratching his beard.

“You and me both, Baratheon, you and me both,” Eleanor sighs. “We can’t make all our lives just what we enjoy. Humans aren’t made to have no stakes.”

The ultra rich back on earth had issues with depression because they literally had no problems or responsibilities. Unfortunately, sometimes you need to be under a little chosen stress to feel alive and worth while.

Or at least that’s how she thinks about it. She’s still pro everyone having their needs met. People just need to pick their purpose and stick to it. 

But what does she know? She’s old. And there’s so many different ideas for how you’re meant to live she’d be a fool to discount them all in favor of her personal way of life.

“Aye. A mystery only the gods know, making us the way we are,” Robert says, nodding.

A servant steps inside the Solar, bowing to Robert before addressing Eleanor.

“Madame Mellei has asked me to fetch you for your final fittings,” The boy says, trying not to fidget being in the same room with the King of Westeros.

“Duty calls,” Eleanor says, sliding to her feet and tossing her pillow at Robert. “I hope you know I put in a lot of effort to look nice for your coronation, you’d better not mess this up having them serve food neither of us like.”

Robert groans, throwing the pillow back at the couch. “Fine fine, damned Mooton, I’ll go speak with the steward. Off with you.”

“Off with you, this is my Solar,” Eleanor says dryly, leaving the room already anyways, looking at the boy who’s meant to escort her. “How are you feeling today young man? Here, have a dragon for your trouble, it comes out of his paycheck.” She points a thumb back at the snorting king without looking back, already waving for her shields to follow.

She’s gonna wear such nice pants to this coronation. Absolutely ruin some old noblewoman’s day with the scandal.

Chapter Text

Ninth Moon, Coronation of King Robert Baratheon, 283 AC

The most beautiful part of the Great Sept of Baelor are its windows.

Lining the walls far above are hundreds of windows. Most have stained glass depictions of the seven, and on occasion, dragons. Light streams down from them, washing those below in faint color.

Eleanor lifts two fingers, catching some of that orange light on them as the High Septon drones on through his prayers and the hopes for the new king. Pomp and ceremony, and unbearably annoying. 

The sept was cleaned extensively for this, years of grime washed from the marble. The Mad King wasn’t a man for prayer, and the Great Sept was left underutilized. 

And it is now being very, very utilized, if a crowd of a few hundred nobility together in like sardines means anything. 

The crowd spans from the unreasonably large doors all the way to the front dias, some ten feet from where the Septon is putting himself to sleep with his own words. It’s like a sea of brightly colored fabrics and low humming words, everyone taking the opportunity to gossip while stuck in the same place for two hours. 

And Eleanor, unfortunately, finds herself at the center of more than a little of that gossip, standing at the front with the rest of the small council. 

It is a less than optimal placement. 

Eleanor, were she allowed to choose, (and she isn’t; Jon Arryn would have her head should she go against his carefully thrown together plans for this event), would stand in one of the farthest back corners. Safe from prying eyes and able to have a chuckle with her sworn shields while she waited for this to be over with. Maybe even bring a book to amuse herself with. 

Instead, she stands with some of the most important (and most conniving) people in the realm. The Small Council. 

Well, not too conniving yet. There’s only five of them, including herself, only two of which being known schemers.

Dressed in fine blue robes and stoically observing the proceedings, Hand of the King Jon Arryn, stands to her far right. He is saying something gently to Lysa, who is very pale and very unhappy at being around so many people. Poor girl. Eleanor will talk to her later, if only to agree on the absurdity of this whole affair.

To Eleanor’s left is a frowning Lord Commander Barrison Selmy, followed by Grand Maester Pycelle, Lord Tywin, and Robert’s soon to be bride, Cersei Lannister. 

And, ever unfortunately, to her direct right lies one Lord Varys, Master of Whispers, dressed in unassuming formal robes that leave him almost shapeless beneath them. 

Eleanor huffs out a disgruntled breath, drawing her hand away from the light, and stares dispassionately at the side door. 

If Robert would hurry up and start walking his way to his crown, they could get this part over with and move onto the slightly more entertaining feasting. You know it’s grave when she prefers social functions to what she’s doing at the moment.

“...and by their light, I call forth Robert Baratheon, first of his name,” The High Septon finally drones, lifting a frail hand and beckoning towards the entrance Robert is lumbering through.

Cheers rise from the crowd, and a grinning Robert waves as he walks, soaking in the attention before he settles, kneeling before the septon. 

“The beginning of a new dynasty,” Varys says idly, under the humming chatter of the crowd.  

Eleanor doesn’t look at him, but she’s all too aware of who he’s talking to.

“Quite,” Eleanor says.

The septon is saying new prayers, something about hope and vitality and a new era. Eleanor is skeptical. They lie on a path that leads to five kings and then ice zombies. 

“One can only hope it ends on better terms than the last,” Varys says, all too casual. 

Finally Eleanor looks, frowning as she examines his unmoving gaze on their unlucky new King, smelling the incense and candle smoke in the air. 

She speaks as she eyes the way Robert’s cloak pools around him, so yellow it’s almost gold, careful black embroidery lining it. Stags and horns abound.

“Monarchies seldom end on better terms. Regime changes and violence, they’re old bedfellows.”

“Well said, my lady.”

What strange positions Eleanor puts herself in. 

“Could it have been said worse?” Eleanor murmurs.

The crown settles on Robert’s kingly head, delicate gold resting in curls black like charcoal. 

Noise fills the sept, echoing up and up, probably shaking those hundreds year old windows and their glass dragons. 

Eleanor shifts her eyes from the now standing king back to Varys, this time meeting his own dark eyes. And in a moment, something like understanding forms between them, practical strangers with barely aligning goals. 

Eleanor grimaces, looks to the high ceiling and claps along with the crowd. She hasn’t a fucking clue what she’s doing or what understanding may have passed. At least she’s wearing pants.

The Red Keep has many halls fit for feasting and merriment, it’s hundreds of years old and has been a seat of power for just about all of them. 

Various Targaryens got it in their heads to add onto their overgrown mcmansion, competing to see who could add the most inane secret passages, or rooms too large for any practical purpose.

That being said, Westeros’s nobility is filling one of those large halls that no reasonable party could ever fill. Robert Baratheon, First of His Name, King of the Andals and The First Men, is not a man for reasonable parties, and he’ll be making that very clear over his hopefully long and fruitful reign.

At least Eleanor can hope it is both long and fruitful. She’ll be trying her best to avoid a Joffrey situation in her lifetime, if she can. She can only handle small doses of crazy at a time and Joffrey seems like too much for her. 

Speaking of unhinged Lannisters, Eleanor sort of loathes the fact that her house colors are so similar to them. White, gold and red leave no room for winning. At this rate she’ll start wearing more pink than Maidenpool’s walls just to stand apart. 

Eleanor steps through the massive hall of just beginning drunken merriment. The smell of food, wine and candles fills the room, they’re at the first food course of seven, at the moment. 

It’s all so fucking wasteful. She’s organized with the castle steward to have excess food handed out among the servants, along with any beggars spotted near the Red Keep. What person can actually eat seven fucking meals? It's ridiculous! She’s aware Lord Arryn is only doing this to show off their wealth to the rest of the nobility but she hates it all the same. 

Eleanor walks to the high table, ignoring the looks she’s garnering with her more masculine clothes, and spots Lysa poking at her soup before she looks up and sees Eleanor, face brightening. 

“Eleanor!” Lysa says in greeting once Eleanor is close enough, setting down her spoon with nervous fingers.

“Lysa,” Eleanor greets. “Bored?” 

“Is that how it looks?” Lysa asks, concerned. “Gods, how do you manage that blank face all the time Eleanor? I wish I could look so unbothered.”

Eleanor could’ve sworn her resting face was closer to disgruntlement than blankness, but you learn new things everyday. 

“It’s probably best if you don’t look as unbothered as me, people assume I’m up to more than I say with a face like mine,” Eleanor says. “You’re fine just as you are, Lysa.”

Lysa shakes her head, opening her mouth to disagree, but the King is entering the room and Eleanor needs to get seated before he does. 

She walks around the long table, eyeing the gentry as more than a few eye her back. Some with envy, some with ill intent, all with interest. 

Eleanor feels uneasy. Not a rare thing, barely even notable at this point, but she feels…something, in the air. Maybe it’s all the people, some few hundred all watching the high table and Robert’s slow walk to it with Cersei on his arm. Maybe it’s her lunch reacting poorly to her stomach. Who knows. 

Cersei looks the picture of a golden, radiant queen next to Robert. She’s draped in Lannister finery, wearing a red dress that probably took a full year to make with its pearl embroidery. She’s pleased by the display, Eleanor knows it. Robert looks visibly less pleased to have her next to him, though. 

If Jon weren’t making him, Eleanor has no doubt Robert would avoid the woman like the plague. So Jon is making him walk in with her on his arm, and Eleanor is glad she didn’t have to be present for the shouting match it probably took. 

Being king means heirs. Cersei’s position as the new queen must be secured so that Robert’s position as king is secure. 

Eleanor sits in her chair beside Lysa, adjusting her high necked collar. Her seamstress is a miracle worker with how fast this outfit got done. Fine fabrics turned into an even finer masculine cut fit, and she looks better than most of the men here in it. 

Cheers fill the hall as Robert and Cersei sit down. Eleanor grabs her goblet and takes a long sip of the wine inside, she’ll be needing it for this affair. 

Speaking of affairs, that rumor about Eleanor and Robert is still boggling her mind and causing unnecessary tittering from the courtiers she has to speak to. They think they’re being subtle, mentioning the King and the time he spends with her with shifty eyes and schemes churning in their brains. 

All are met with the same responses of “Yes the King won’t leave me alone” with a blank face and dry tone. She doesn’t understand the fascination. Or rather she does understand their motives, but thinks the reasons are stupid and their plans are even more worthless. 

People are starving right outside this keep in a city that smells of shit and despair while these wealthy nobles are lost in a rat race of their own making. 

It makes her feel ill. All of it. Eleanor knows she’s playing the game wrong, knows she’s making enemies in her pointed disregard, but she can’t change what she is. She can’t change the nausea that creeps in when she stares at the ceiling in her grand quarters in a castle with every amenity available to her, a raging sickness telling her that this is wrong. 

Ugh. 

Robert stands from his seat, a goblet in one hand, looking like a regal king of old. Eleanor idly wonders what it would be like to wear the antlered crown on her head, because he has a fat head and there’s no chance it’d fit most people. She supposes his future heirs will need to commission a new one if it becomes an issue. 

A hush fills the large hall, tables and tables of courtiers and nobles from across the seven kingdoms going silent and watching their newly crowned ruler. 

“I’ve never been much for ruling,” Robert starts with, and Eleanor can feel Jon Arryn’s headache grow from a few seats away. 

“I came into this after a hard fought war, and while I may have gotten the short end of the stick, sitting my ass on that pointy throne—” Here, laughter sounds. “—know this. I’ll do right by you, by all of you. That I swear by my hammer and by all the blood spilt to get us here. And at that, let us feast!”

Cheers and clapping surround Eleanor, she herself clapping as she watches Robert down the wine in his goblet and sitting back in his seat heavily. 

“Gods willing he’ll avoid getting too drunk,” Eleanor murmurs, Lysa nodding and grabbing her first serving of food. 

People on the lower tables have already started moving amongst themselves, not even feigning interest in the food over the possibility of gossip. 

Speaking of the possibility of gossip…

“Lord Varys, it’s quite interesting that you’ve managed to be right beside me this whole day,” Eleanor says, looking over to her left where said man sits. 

She’d been attempting to ignore it, but really, what could this man possibly need to be around her so much for? Surely he’d rather be wandering through the lower tables and jump scaring people when he shows up over their shoulder.

Maybe he’s bored. The universe seems to like damning her with bored men.

“I would be glad,” Varys says with good humor as he gets a serving of pheasant with nonchalant hands. “Lord Arryn was very set on positioning the Lannisters beside you instead.”

Eleanor grimaces deeply, contemplating the reality where she’d be stuck next to her almost good-family for the rest of the evening. Ghastly.

“That doesn’t answer why you decided to rescue me from such a fate,” Eleanor says. 

“I thought we could both do well with an amicable conversation partner,” Varys says, looking over with a courtly smile.

Intrigue, it’s slowly closing in. Eleanor is going to break out into hives.

“It’s funny how good the lot of you are at saying things that are completely true, and meaning something else entirely.” Eleanor shakes her head, and so the feast goes on like that.

Eleanor eats and chats with her seatmates, all the while watching Robert with the corner of her eye to see how drunk he’s getting. She wonders if she could talk to Jon about cutting him off on formal occasions so he doesn’t do anything stupid.

Keep in mind, he does things that are stupid when he’s sober, but they can at least avoid more stupidity.

Eleanor is not interested in talking to Robert herself about it though, sounds like a good way to be on the receiving end of the Baratheon Bellowing he’s getting very well known for. Jon in the least is a father figure to him and might survive the encounter.

It’s funny. They’ve just all collectively decided to put a random schmuck on a throne, and now they have to do whatever he says. Absurd even.

Humans really are just monkeys that learned how to farm, everything has gone downhill since then.

Wait, did people evolve in Westeros? Or were they born of clay and earth or something suitably fantastical? Why has she never wondered this before? She needs to write this down. 

“Eleanor?” Lysa chimes beside her, and Eleanor turns to look at the woman. 

“Er yes?”

Lysa furrows her brows at her. “Are you alright? You look a bit strange.”

No. She is not alright. She needs to know if evolutionary theory still applies in the land of useless politics and rude magic. 

“Yes, I’m fine,” Eleanor says, like a liar. “What did you need?”

Lysa does not look like she believes her, and Eleanor is alright with that.

“I was asking if you were going to go down and dance, I know you have a few suitors who are interested,” Lysa says, pointing to the musicians that are starting up and the few couples already heading down.

She would rather do anything else, including surveying a sewer, but the look Lysa is giving her implies she doesn’t want to go down and dance on her own and is looking for a friend here.

Eleanor sighs but stands from her chair all the same. Lysa’s happy look makes it worth it as she walks down towards the dancefloor with Eleanor at her side.

Eleanor must now scope out every man who’s now looking at her with interest and pick the least offensive ones to dance with. Lysa doesn’t have this problem, since her uncle the Blackfish immediately offers to dance with her. Drat and damnation.

It would have been nice to have her brothers here, for this moment. 

“Lady Mooton!”

Gods no. 

Eleanor turns, and there is Edwyn Frey, third in line to succeed his prolific great-grandfather and just as nasty. Unluckily for her, he isn’t married yet. 

“Lord Edwyn, what is it you need?” Eleanor says, praying he is just trying for a short conversation and won’t ask her to--

“A dance, preferably,” Edwyn says, because men live and survive to inconvenience her. 

Eleanor sighs. Could she get away with declining?

Probably not. 

Ugh.

Well, the next fifteen minutes of her life are gone and she’ll never get them back.

“By your lead, Lord Edwyn.”

Chapter Text

Ninth Moon, Coronation Feast of King Robert, 283 AC

Cersei Lannister

Cersei Lannister is no fool, not the silly beautiful girl others assume. She benefits from such assumptions, caters to them, and understands their necessity. And so the gentry forgets she is a lion, and when her claws finally come loose, they will never forget again. 

Cersei delicately takes a sip from her goblet of wine, face schooled into a gracious smile. Fingers rubbing the cool metal and flinty eyes unmoving from the dancing before her. 

It should be a glorious occasion, outpaced only by her wedding. Finally, she would be marrying what she deserves. A king. Not the one she had wanted, but a king nonetheless. Robert is brutish where Rhaegar was dignified, bellowing where Rhaegar was smooth. 

But he has the crown, and she had been optimistic that with that wolf bitch Lyanna gone, she would be able to slowly ease Robert’s aching heart and make a good marriage for herself. Not one as romantic as the one she had imagined with Rhaegar, but she would be loved and feared. The most powerful woman in the Seven Kingdoms.

Cersei was late to stake her claim, however. 

Dancers twist and twirl to a Stormlands song, some drivel composed about Orys Baratheon, Argella Durrandon, and thunder. Cersei’s eyes remain locked on one figure towards the center, watching as she talks with some Frey cousin. Eleanor Mooton unashamedly dances in her silly doublet and trousers for the whole court to see.

How could that boyish woman have gotten Robert Baratheon’s attention? And how will Cersei see to it that she loses that attention?

She had asked her father for advice upon realizing the apparent affair. Lord Tywin had said Robert would be bored with Mooton within the month once he discovers she is more interested in being a lover to her work than to her king. It was no true affair, or else Tywin would have done something.

Cersei’s father is wrong. It has been a month, and yet Robert’s attention is unerringly spent on the conniving Mooton, so Cersei must do something about this before it sets a precedent. 

She will not rule a court where she must contend with some mistress . She is a Lannister. It doesn’t matter how many times Eleanor Mooton decides to try and wiggle her way into Cersei’s affairs. She will not succeed here, just as she didn’t succeed in that silly betrothal to Jaime. 

“My king?” Cersei says, voice sweet like the tinkling of bells. She turns to her right to look at her betrothed coyly, fluttering her eyelashes. 

Robert pauses whatever he says to Jon Arryn about the training yard and gold cloaks—annoyed at her daring to intrude, clearly, but stifling it.

“Yes, my Lady?”

Cersei smiles, curling her eyes with it to fool even the greatest of mummers. “Why don’t we dance? I believe the next song is starting in but a moment.”

Robert pauses, pursing his lips and flicking his eyes over to look at the dancers and back to her. Is she so awful that he’s desperate to find an excuse to be rid of her? Cersei bristles inside her skin, all jagged edges.

“I suppose if the lady wants. Be warned; I’ve got two feet left and get distracted all too easily.”

Robert stands, holding out a large arm for her to grab. She takes it, standing gracefully and allowing him to lead her down from the high table and into the thrum of nobility. The song is ending now, and the bards begin a new one with a lively pluck of their lutes.

Cersei’s golden gown shimmers in the candlelight as she begins the starting steps with Robert, and she takes only a moment to admire how perfect the two of them are, at least physically. Anyone could see she is a queen and he is a king. All those around Cersei are doubtlessly envious of them, of her. 

She glances to the right, where Mooton has taken the arm of the Blackfish. Mooton doesn’t even look at her, likely distracted by trading dour grimaces with the older man. Perhaps she’ll marry him and leave Cersei’s soon-to-be husband alone. She’s sure the two of them would be properly miserable and grumble about duty every time they fuck.

“You look good tonight, Lady Cersei,” Robert says as they circle one another, arms locked.

Cersei demures, smiling graciously. “You’re kind to say so, King Robert. Your crown suits you.”

Cersei's crown is still in the workshop with the finest of blacksmiths and jewelers. It will suit her better than Robert’s does him, of course, but one cannot win every battle, especially against her.

They unclasp their arms, holding hands instead and bowing to one another. 

Robert preens a bit at the praise, smiling more easily. “So everyone says. I’m still left wondering how anyone sits on the iron throne without hurting their poor bum.” 

Cersei laughs at the jape, even if it’s boorish.

“It’s not as though the mad king is alive for you to ask his opinion. I wonder how he would react?” Cersei says, listening to the murmurs of conversation around her and eyeing Robert for weakness. 

He laughs before twirling Cersei, the air around her only blurry colors for a moment before she’s standing still again, golden hair swaying. 

“He’d only want to shout about traitors stealing his prized seat cushion, I bet. We’re better off in mystery,” Robert says, grinning. Finally.

“I like you far more anyway. You’re more regal on the throne than Aerys ever was,” Cersei says, leaning in just close enough and saying the words faux conspiratorially. 

Robert laughs again, this time with less feeling. Then the song is over, and they both separate to bow once again.

Before Cersei can beg him to dance one more song, an all too familiar hand is taking hers. 

Jaime. 

“May I steal my sister away from you for a dance, your grace? I promise to return her,” Jaime says, smirking. It’s a perfect mirror of her own if one ignores the imperfection of a dimple on his left cheek.

In a good life where everything is as it should be, Cersei would not need to bother with this King, and she and her other half would be born Targeryens. Free to marry one another and hold the kingdoms in their palms. 

“Oh, by all means, Kingslayer, have your fun,” Robert says with a waved hand. Then he’s walking off into the idling crowd, brushing past silks and velvet to cheers and congratulations. To Cersei’s unending frustration, he finally stops before that bitch Eleanor Mooton, offering a broad palm to her with a playful bow. 

“Such a sour look when I’ve just rescued you,” Jaime says as the next dance begins. He is oblivious to his interruption’s effects, the thick-headed fool. 

“I don’t want to dance anymore,” Cersei says cooly, watching the king and the bitch circle one another for a moment before Cersei forsakes the floor for one of the balconies. 

Every victory has been soured since Rhaegar stole the wolf girl and ran off to Dorne. She gets her King, but it’s the wrong one, and he’s only concerned with whoring and fighting. She has her twin, but he is sworn to protect the man she’s marrying, and they can never be who they are in the open. She must fight for every scrap of respect in this court even as she is the highest ranking among the fool women, thanks to Mooton’s usurpation. 

Why does Mooton get a seat on the small council? The ear of a king? The allowance for wearing trousers and pretending to be a nobleman?

Jaime follows after Cersei like a dog, metal armor tapping against itself and grating on her ears.

The air is cool when she steps out onto the balcony and turns to face Jaime. 

“He is fucking her, isn’t he?” Cersei says lowly, so low no one but the two of them could hear it above the wind. 

“Not so far as I have seen,” Jaime says, frowning. Completely unobservant. Cersei doesn’t know why she bothered asking a man about such a thing, even if he is Jaime. Women are far more knowledgeable about this sort of trickery. “Why does it bother you so? She’s uglier than you and only cares about bureaucracy. She’ll be gone in but a week, likely never to return if she’s so serious about how much she hates it here.”

“Because I am meant to be queen, and he is courting her more than me,” Cersei says with narrowed eyes. “What if he gets it in his thick head that she is a preferable queen?”

“Our father would see her dead by morning,” Jaime says slowly before laughing. “Lannister men got Baratheon this city. No doubt Jon Arryn would have the king locked in the maidenvault until he agrees to the marriage if it came to that.”

“No man should need to be locked in the Maidenvault to want to marry me,” Cersei hisses, pursing her lips and glaring at her twin.

Jaime stares at Cersei for a long moment. Then, saying far louder than they had been whispering, “Of course I’ll escort you to retire in your rooms, my dear sister. What brother would I be if I didn’t?”

Unsaid, of course, is that Jaime will be showing her how he would need to be locked away to be kept from her, not the other way around. That he will be showing her how very much he means it.

Jaime holds out an arm, and Cersei takes it with sudden hunger.

For now, she’ll have what she wants. Later, when her mind is clear, she will plan for what she needs. Her father knows personally what damage a flaunted mistress can bring, and Cersei has learned from him far better than her brothers.

She may be a woman, but she is a lioness, and she was born first.

No one will forget that when she is through. 

Eleanor Mooton

"You're less drunk than usual," Eleanor says. This will be her last dance. Her legs are aching from all the walking she's done for the last week. She went back and forth from the Red Keep and down to various districts to meet with influential people who didn't have the time to come up the hill to her. 

Did she ride her horse on occasion? Yes. Did she decide to punish herself and walk like a normal plebian in plainclothes a few times? Also yes.

She needs the exercise anyway; her lifestyle involves a lot of sitting at a desk, ruining her eyesight, and writing in candlelight. That doesn't mean she has to like her attempts at self-care, though. 

"Jon threatened to lock me in my rooms and throw away the key if I ruined the feast with my merriment," Robert grumbles, the last part a direct quote from the man from Robert’s tone. "You would think a party dedicated to my crown would be a reasonable occasion for some real celebration. Lord Jon Arryn disagrees!" 

Eleanor and Robert circle one another, and Eleanor wishes the Westrosi nobility had better dance culture. She may not have a dancing bone in her body these days, but she had a short clubbing phase in her old life. Mostly short because the brawl with two cops put an end to it after three weeks, but it had been a fond, hazy three weeks. 

Woe is her. She'll just have to cope and be thankful tasers don't exist in Westeros. Ice zombies? Another matter entirely.

"This party is for good impressions. Whatever afterparty you stumble into with people you actually like the company of later on is your business," Eleanor says with a huff of laughter. "Our Lord Hand will appreciate the discretion."

Robert seems as though he's greatly considering sneaking off to have a little afterparty already, but manages to stay his impulses long enough to recognize he can't slip away until more people are drunk and it's more socially acceptable.

"Wise counsel from one of my wisest council members," Robert says sagely, before grabbing Eleanor's hand and twirling her so fast she's almost instantly dizzy, making an undignified sound in surprise. 

Robert laughs like an ass, and Eleanor resists the urge to kick the fool in the shin. 

"You're going to have the seventh course on your jerkin if you keep at it, and I'll pay off your laundresses to see that it stains," Eleanor says threateningly, ignoring the way some noble in blue looks over at her wide-eyed from where she's dancing with a lord. 

"Kings can have new jerkins made," Robert says with a wave of his hand. Thankfully the song ends, and Eleanor just removes herself from the situation before she commits some form of unforgivable treason. 

Unfortunately, leaving the dance floor means she's free to be harassed by the general public. 

"Lady Mooton! I've heard such great things." A lord appears before her with pale hair, umber skin, and a too-cheerful disposition.

For one of the few valyrian-looking nobles left, he seems utterly unbothered by the regime change. 

“It seems we’re on unequal footing, then. You know my name, and I don’t know yours,” Eleanor says, racking her brain to figure out if they’ve met before. He’s either a Velaryon or a Celtigar, and from her experience, Celtigars are far paler and far more dour in disposition. 

Oh damn it all, she remembers now.

“Monford Velaryon, though I’m ever sad to see I have failed to make an impression on you previously,” Monford says in good humor. She had seen him, what, a year before now? He stayed in Maidenpool to rest before returning to his father’s seat, Castle Driftmark.

Gods, of course Eleanor would forget what the damn heir to Driftmark looks like. What was she even doing that week he was there? 

Ugh. She was probably doing her brother’s job while William played host and had a hunt. 

“Forgive my poor memory, Lord Monford. I’ve been drawn into conversations by many gentry over the past weeks. It’s all begun to blur.” Eleanor grasps at straws, trying to remember anything about the man before her. “How is your ship?”

Manford grins wide, and clearly, this is the correct sort of question because the man begins to talk about his lovely galley Yvonne and how they’re putting all new sails on her next week, along with repairing her deck after a nasty run-in with some pirates. 

Towards the end of his almost monologue, it becomes clear to Eleanor that she has nothing to worry about regarding this man trying to court her. He's already deeply involved with his ship, practically exclusive. It’s enough to have her relax and enjoy the ambiance for at least two minutes!

“Really? How interesting,” Eleanor says for the fourth time, letting the man carry out the conversation almost entirely alone. 

“Indeed! I’ll be taking her back to Bravos soon, but I'm wary of risking her new sails after that nasty business with the oil fire last time. What adventure is there in keeping a beautiful ship like her at the docks, though?”

Eleanor nods seriously. Finally, she’s found another human who just says what they mean. Even if their honest truth is to share their special interest for ten minutes uninterrupted, it’s better than nothing!

“Ah, but the night grows late, and I am sure you wish to talk to far more interesting conversation partners. If you want to see Yvonne before leaving for Maidenpool, you need only ask,” Manford says, and before she can disagree, he’s wandering off to wherever strange sea lords spend their time at parties. 

She almost wants to call after him (if only to use him as a social buffer against the schemers), but alas. Even Eleanor observes some social courtesy. The barest minimum, but still some. 

The hall is almost too warm now, as feast halls tend to become a few hours in with enough alcohol and food consumed. Courtiers dance and walk and huddle together at tables marred by forgotten meals. Servants cluster close to the walls or wander with more food and drink plates. 

Eleanor lets herself soak in the noise, the perfumes, and the garishly bright clothes. She wonders who made the boots on these people’s feet, crafted the tables and chairs they lounge in, and finally wonders where she can find the good spiced wine.

Wherever Robert is, most likely. Oh well. Instead, She’ll find Lysa and see if she wants to try the new imported mead that Eleanor saw the castle steward ordering for the feast. 

Eleanor wakes up hungover. Not surprising, considering she vaguely recalls downing five undiluted bottles of the fancy honeyed Florent mead with Lysa and then… some other alcoholic beverage. One that burnt on the way down and left a disgusting aftertaste in her mouth, still present when she blearily blinks at the sunlight.

Eleanor is not in her bed. She’s on a couch, which doesn’t belong to her either. Eleanor rubs her aching fingers against the fabric, feeling the finely uplifted threads that are probably expensive, detailed embroidery. She hopes she didn’t puke on it. She’s not usually a puker, but bad things always happen to reasonable people.

Eleanor reaches up to cover her eyes with a groan, her head pounding. She’s glad she had the foresight to take out her bun at some point, or else it’d have been infinitely worse. 

“Are you awake?” Eleanor hears Lysa mumble somewhere to her far-off left. 

“No. I’m dead, and this is at least the third hell,” Eleanor replies lowly, afraid to set off the drummers in her skull any more than she already is. “I’m afraid to open my eyes and let the blasted sun in. Where are we?”

“My rooms,” Lysa says before Eleanor hears some rustling, and Lysa groans. “I think… Ser Jonquil carried you. I remember something about the library and you lying on the floor.” 

Hopefully Eleanor didn’t do anything too awful. It would be embarrassing if she caused property damage. Or worse, recited poetry.  

Knowing Jonquil, he’ll be sure to tell her all about it as soon as her headache is gone and her guard is down. It’ll be a completely innocuous anecdote, and then she’ll learn she scaled a tower and used someone’s underpants as a flag. Maybe not so extreme, but one can never know in this economy.

“I say we lay here and pray away our headaches awhile,” Eleanor says, and Lysa grumbles in agreement. Eleanor is so glad Lysa and Jon don’t like each other enough to share rooms. That would be an embarrassing situation she’d die from. 

They spend at least an hour lying there, trading grunts and complaints, before Eleanor finally decides it's time to get her clothes changed and have a long bath. Outside the entrance to Lysa’s rooms is Dorin, who looks at her in a way that reminds her of her father, but doesn’t offer any comments. 

“Don’t look at me like that,” Eleanor says, most certainly not whining. Gods, she’s such a child. She needs to start acting her age. Er, combined age. Not seventeen. She’s had enough of acting seventeen till her seventies.

“I have no idea what you mean, my lady,” Dorin says, lying. He, unlike her, looks perfectly composed this morning. Eleanor is almost certain he relieved Jonquil after the man dropped her onto the couch and has been staring at the hallway for six hours. It’s unfair for him to be so put together.

To Eleanor’s left, an Arryn guard snorts. If she were morally bankrupt like her fellows, she’d have him punished for that. Like making him drink whatever she drank last night and seeing him deal with the hangover. 

Eleanor is gracious, though, and just starts towards her rooms, Dorin following her without pause. 

“Was the evening good for you all? Before you were dragged off to watch the door, at least,” Eleanor asks once they’re heading down the Tower of the Hand’s steps. She’s left squinting against the early sunlight from the windows to her right, wondering about medieval sunglasses and boatloads of money.

“You aren’t the only one who’s hungover,” Dorin says, humor bubbling from under his facade of professionalism. “Jonquil is in a similar state to you, I’m sure.”

Hm. Eleanor does remember chanting for him to chug at some point. 

“I suppose we’ll all suffer together. Maybe we should all take the day off and skip the tourney's opening day. Solidarity and all that,” Eleanor says. 

“Or this is a good lesson in temperance,” Dorin says, and now he sounds like her father too. Drat and damnation.

“And hubris, I’m sure,” Eleanor grumbles as they finish the stairs. She’s almost to her quarters, thank the gods, those stairs always have her breathing heavy on good days. 

Almost home. Eleanor has a week's worth of tourney-ing, then it's back to Maidenpool for at least a month. Maybe even two! She’ll survive a tourney with a bad headache if it means she goes home.

Chapter Text

Ninth Moon, 283 AC

A hundred black stag banners flap undaunted in the afternoon sun. 

“Are you certain you want to enter the melee lists like this, Jonquil?” Eleanor asks her shield, noting how he’s squinting and wincing in the light. He is much more hungover than she is.

“What victory doesn’t come with a few trials?” Jonquil asks pleasantly, or at least does his best to sound pleasant. He’s always been very courteous. Eleanor would rather not watch him get stabbed because he’s got a killer headache.

Eleanor looks up skyward, contemplating the many towers of smoke billowing up into the cloudless blue sky. It’s an offensively nice day outside, and the tourney grounds are bustling with activity all around them. She can smell savory food and hear a thousand voices talking over each other. There’s a clang of metal somewhere distant. 

Eleanor sighs. 

“Please don’t die. You are much more useful to me fighting in real battles than pretend ones,” Eleanor says finally, looking back down at the finely armored man before her. 

Jonquil smiles genuinely, kind brown eyes mirthful behind his squint. “If I do, I’ll be sure to make it look impressive.”

“Of course you will. I’d hate for you to embarrass me.”

Jonquil walks off to get ready for the melee with a quiet laugh. His pink cape flaps behind him, embroidered salmon swimming in the wind. Eleanor shakes her head.

“No one can ever say our Jonquil isn’t motivated,” Edmer quips beside Eleanor. He’s painfully allergic to silence for a man who’s job is to stand like a statue and stare at walls. 

“If only it were contagious. You would benefit from it,” Eleanor tells her sworn shield wryly, only more amused when he gasps dramatically. 

Eleanor steps out of the way of a wagon, lifting her skirt in some attempt to avoid dirtying her hem with the packed dirt and scraggly grass of the tourney grounds. She’s sure it’s a useless effort. The laundresses who will be made to clean it will be unhappy regardless. 

She would’ve worn trousers today, but she decided to save most of those for when she’s traveling in a week. 

“I’m nothing if not motivated, my lady! Who else would follow their liege’s schemes so easily?” Edmer asks, grinning. 

“Someone who has the tact not to talk about those schemes. Like Jonquil. Now, let us go on to the stands and watch him best both his hangover and the competition.”

The tourney isn’t awful, Eleanor admits. After a quick bath and a meal her hangover has disappeared, though poor Jonquil isn’t so lucky. He still hasn’t told her what exactly they did last night, but Eleanor is willing to bet he’ll spill when the time is most annoying. 

Jonquil is Eleanor’s most courteous guard, but he’s still one of hers. He just shows his inexplicable urge to annoy Eleanor differently than the others. He has— or, well, had that in common with her brothers. William loved bothering her with inane questions or reminding her of embarrassing things she did when they were younger. 

Eleanor swallows away a sudden tightness in her throat as she walks through the crowd towards the melee’s stands. Brushes past finely clothed courtiers who offer greetings if they recognize her. That’s the strangest part of being in the Small Council, even if it is with a farcical title with no historical power. Everyone wants to be on your good side, and barring that, know how to effectively position themselves against you. 

Both of those things are not mutually exclusive, of course. Much easier to backstab someone who sees you as a friend. 

By the old, the new, and whatever other fucking gods, this place is infecting Eleanor already. She thinks she can feel her hangover returning with every pounding second. Or maybe it’s just a regular tension headache?

She should distract herself with practical things. Like the way the census is progressing. 

Ugh. The census. Right now they’ve finally gotten to the part where people start being counted, but that will take time, at least three months by her people’s estimation. She’s managed to draw up districts, tentatively, and she just needs Robert’s signature on her proposal. Or, barring that, Lord Jon’s. The hand or the king, it doesn’t matter. As long as it brings her one step closer to being free of this city.

Eleanor thinks she can hear birds chirping, and peers up at one of the tents, seeing a few bluejays perched and preening atop the canvas. It’s so cheery. 

Everytime she thinks something disparaging about this place, it seeks to prove her wrong. How rude. 

Eleanor side steps around a pile of horse shit, and immediately corrects her previous statement. Nevermind. Still a shitty, awful city. Just with bright patches. 

She walks up onto the stands when they finally get close, and she pauses, eyeing her options for where she’ll be least bothered. There’s different clusters of people. Some being cliques of the usual courtiers, others being more restricted to regions. She can see stormlander houses closer by where the king’s box is, Estermonts and Grandisons. 

Eleanor’s gaze shifts to the cohort of riverlanders, seeing that both of the lords of Bracken and Blackwood are already looking at her. Gods save her. 

She looks back at the stormlanders, and sees one Stannis Baratheon somewhat separate from the rest of them. There’s a two foot radius of aversion around him, which bodes ill for his probable mood. 

He’s glowering at his surroundings with a gaunt, clean shaven face. Back and neck held so straight it must hurt. Lord Stannis is sulking, but Eleanor isn’t quite sure why. 

Well. She supposes she’ll just find out. He seems like a good enough buffer to keep graspers away from her. Even if she has to deal with his complaining. 

With a huff Eleanor trudges up the wooden steps of the stands, eyes staying on Stannis Baratheon’s dour mug. He hasn’t noticed that she’s coming, not until she’s already shuffling down the row of seats and settling at his side. Edmer makes himself useful and sits a row up, having a higher vantage to see possible threats. 

People may like to pretend the war is over, but Eleanor knows death by disgruntled Targeryon sympathizer is still possible for at least the next three years. Longer for people like Robert, or his hand. 

“Lady Mooton,” Stannis says through gritted teeth, looking very unhappy to see her. 

“Lord Baratheon. Forgive me, I’m using you as a social buffer,” Eleanor says honestly, adjusting her skirt and peering up at the tall man. He’s stiffer than a board, even with the foot between the both of them. 

“I would think you would wish to sit closer to my brother.” The words come out like a barb, probably relating to the rumors that Eleanor is fucking the man. Eugh. Disgusting. Even if Eleanor did like men, she wouldn’t be interested in Robert . He’s too stupid.

Said man is late to the tourney, the King’s box still empty save Cersei and two attendants. Eleanor’s sure Robert is probably hungover and will probably be in a shit mood when he appears, at least until he starts seeing people cutting each other. 

…Jonquil had better avoid fighting Jaime Lannister, Eleanor thinks he may try harder to mortally wound him when he sees Eleanor’s house colors on him. Jaime is fighting in the melee, isn’t he? He’d be bored to tears just watching the thing. 

Eleanor levels Stannis with a very dry look. 

“And listen to him complain about how Lord Arryn wouldn’t let him join the melee the whole time?” Eleanor asks, watching Stannis’s hands tighten on his lap. He’s dressed finely, black and gold embroidery lining his doublet, and neatly stitched leather trousers. Actually, he looks like he’s dressed for a horse ride. 

Eleanor’s eyes flick down to his boots. Riding boots. 

She looks back up at his face again, watching his black brows furrow. Watching her like one may watch a drooling and hungry bear.

“You were supposed to be headed to Dragonstone, weren’t you?”

She remembers hearing something about that in the last small council meeting. So far as the small council knows, the last of the Targeryons are still hiding on the rocky island, blockaded. 

Eleanor has a feeling the children have already been spirited away to Braavos. Hopes they have been. Thinks about Martell orange and Targaryen black shrouds and broken little bodies before a throne. 

Stannis’s jaw clenches again, and Eleanor worries about his dental health. He already has a vitamin deficiency from the siege, so his enamel is probably weakened. He’s going to crack a tooth before he turns twenty.

How old is he now? Eighteen? Nineteen? She thinks she remembers someone mentioning that he’s the same age as the Lannister twins. 

“Yes. Our king has decided that the issue of Dragonstone can wait a week,” Stannis says. He really sounds like he’s in pain when he says it. Would it be inappropriate for Eleanor to say he should stop gritting his teeth?

“Our king has a strange sense of priorities,” Eleanor says instead of what she’s thinking. Turns from him to look out at the various men finally entering the packed dirt of the arena. “If you leave after the third day of the tourney he’ll probably let you. He’ll be too distracted by the wine and the women.”

“I cannot disregard the orders of my liege as mere suggestions .”

Eleanor forgot that he’s a stickler for rules. She can respect that, but it’s going to make his life infinitely worse. Eleanor values order, but rules can be bent provided you have a good enough reason.

“I’ll speak to him about it when he’s in an agreeable mood. We also have the privilege of offering our liege our opinions, though he can choose to ignore them.”

The murmurs of conversation around them have lowered, stormlanders nearby openly eavesdropping. How nosy.

Stannis adjusts his seat, clothes softly rustling and the wood beneath him creaking. His stormy eyes are still burning into Eleanor’s skull. 

“Why have you sat next to me? I have no wish to play games, Lady Mooton.”

Eleanor sighs, and looks back at Stannis from where she was looking at Jonquil in the small arena. She’s sure she looks appropriately exhausted.

“People are avoiding you because of your obvious anger. I am attempting to avoid being drawn into inane conversation by grasping courtiers, and you are high enough rank that they will keep their distance.”

Stannis’s face progressively relaxes as Eleanor speaks, though he doesn’t lose all of the tension in his body. Jaw finally unclenched. Eleanor is sure that if he had a dentist, the dentist would approve. 

“...I am not angry,” Stannis says finally after a small silence.

Said just like an angry person would. 

“Admitting to our feelings helps us control how we react to them. It’s alright for you to be displeased when you feel unheard,” Eleanor says, voice lowering enough to try for privacy. It’s not possible, what with the stands becoming more and more packed by the second.

Stannis blinks, confusion only increasing. Eleanor wishes there were therapists in Westeros. She is not qualified to be doing all of this emotional labor for people who don’t even have toilets. 

Eleanor looks away from him, just in time to see Jaime appear on the field. Golden armored and shining in the afternoon light. White cloak trailing behind him as if in taunt. Eleanor wonders how dirty it will be after the end of the matches today. 

“Anyways. Who do you think is going to win?” Eleanor says, shifting the conversation back to safer topics. 

In her periphery Eleanor sees Stannis subtly rub his hands on his trousers, finally releasing them from tight, white knuckled fists.

“I am unsure. I heard that an Estermont will be competing, Ser Lomas.”

Stannis is related to the Estermonts, isn’t he? Was Lomas a cousin or an uncle? Eleanor wishes she paid more attention to house family trees when she was still being taught by her maester. She remembers sneezing over dusty tomes while Marg laughed at her. William off to the side dozing. Myles had already been sent off to foster, by then. 

“Your mother was an Estermont, wasn’t she? Is Ser Lomas your uncle?” Eleanor asks. 

“Yes. He is an able swordsman. One of the best in the Stormlands.”

Likely not better than Jaime Lannister, but it’s unsportsmanlike to compare regular people to freaks of nature like Jaime. Eleanor saw him spar a few times for the short time she went to Lannisport, and then again saw him at Harrenhall. 

He was never going to be an average swordsman. The way steel sings in his hands, swift like it’s just an extension of his arm—

Eleanor tries to avoid giving prideful men more to be proud of, but Jaime Lannister has the skill to back up every boast when it comes to fighting. 

“Do you like fighting, Lord Stannis?” Eleanor asks. 

“Not all men can be as gifted in it as my brother,” Stannis says swiftly in response, as if Eleanor were using the opportunity to throw an insult at him. 

Gods, this one already has a brother complex and he hasn’t even dealt with being relocated to Dragonstone and had his claims handed off to his baby brother.

“No, and thank the gods for that. I’d rather less men die to hammers in the chest as is,” Eleanor replies dryly. Thinking about Myles’ burning casket. 

“I— my apologies. I was not thinking about your brother and my brother…” Stannis says awkwardly. Eleanor is surprised he knew that her brother died to Robert at all. Most people seem to have ignored that fact unless they want to use it to add to the drama of Eleanor spending time near Robert.

Myles would have loved Eleanor coming to this tourney, begged a favor off of her and everything. He always complained that she never visited him enough. 

Gods, she can’t stop reminiscing today. She really needs to get a hold of herself. 

“It’s forgiven. Oh, look. The first match is starting.” Eleanor waves a careless hand. There’s nothing really to forgive. If Eleanor had thin skin she never would have bothered coming to Kings Landing. 

“Yes. The match.” Stannis looks constipated, which is an improvement from trying to burn the middle distance with his eyes alone. Eleanor counts it as a win. 

—

Robert does appear in time for the first melee match, though he looks ruffled and is glaring at the sunlight as if it personally offends him.

Lomas Estermont, though good, doesn’t make it past his second match. Jonquil somehow lasts until the break from the bouts in the evening. 

His next match tomorrow will be against Jaime Lannister. Eleanor’s hopes for him are low, though she thinks Jonquil could handle any random grunt or assassin. 

Eleanor walks down to the area where the contenders have crowded, their squires and family or friends coming to speak to them. Jonquil looks up from where he’s wiping away the sweat on his brow to smile widely at Eleanor and Edmer’s approach. 

“Look! He’s not dead,” Edmer says cheerfully in greeting.

“He just hasn’t fought anyone impressive enough yet. Give it time,” Eleanor drawls, eyes glancing over at where Jaime Lannister is sitting, waving off a Lannister squire and watching his surroundings. He reminds her of a big cat lounging.

Jonquil laughs, good natured and much less hungover than earlier. His long dark hair sticks to his forehead. “I do live by my word, milady. Did you both enjoy the show?”

Eleanor is unmoved by sweaty, armored men trying to beat each other into submission with sharp sticks. Maybe if the knights were women…

Oh dear. Nevermind. She’s not sure she could handle watching that. Pretty women with big muscles and shiny armor offering her crowns of love and beauty. Grappling and trying to stab each other. 

Eleanor subtly adjusts the linen sleeve of her dress. This tent is far too hot.

“You weren’t favoring your left leg this time, that’s good. Dorin would say you should make your slashes tighter.” Edmer steps close enough to adjust the way Jonquil’s right pauldron sits on his shoulder. 

“Dorin is never satisfied. What say you, Lady Eleanor? Am I meeting your expectations?” Jonquil hums, looking at Eleanor with mirth. 

“You always meet my expectations, Ser Jonquil. If you could somehow spread that to Edmer, however, I’d be in your debt,” Eleanor says, smiling widely despite herself. One good thing about this life is how she has good friends, even if she’s also their boss. A thought that poses a bit of a moral quandary. She’ll contemplate power imbalances later.

Jonquil tenses, and Edmer follows quickly, both of their eyes going to Eleanor’s right. Edmer’s hand twitches towards his sword pommel.

Eleanor follows their gazes, and notes that Jaime Lannister walks very quietly for a man in armor. 

“Someone should put a bell on you,” Eleanor comments before she can stop herself, wondering why the man has elected to creep up on her. “What kind of padding do you have on that armor to avoid clanking loudly?”

“Oh, don’t mind me. I simply had a question,” Jaime says, with a glint in his green eyes that implies he’s going to say something very insulting very soon. Is he bored? Shouldn’t he be tired from all the sound ass kickings he’s handed out today?

“It had better not be a proposal. I was very clear with Lord Tywin on my feelings on the matter,” Eleanor says, bemused. She doubts he even knows his father was trying to get her to marry his brother. 

Something in Jaime’s face changes. He’s suddenly wrong footed. “What do you mean?”

Oh, great. His father didn’t say anything about it. And now they’re in a tent full of witnesses.

Eleanor sighs, reaches up to massage her nose bridge. 

“He wanted to see if I was interested in a betrothal with your brother, Tyrion. Presumably due to your vows ending our betrothal. Did he not inform you?”

“No,” Jaime says shortly, scowling.

“That’s unkind of him,” Eleanor says bluntly, crossing her arms. “I apologize for my assumption, then. It’s no slight against your brother, he’s a sweet boy. He’s just far too young.”

An eight year age difference is bordering excessive, even in Westeros. Especially when the woman is the older partner. 

Jaime looks like this isn’t at all how he expected for this conversation to go, working his jaw and searching Eleanor’s face for some kind of insult. He’ll find none. Eleanor doesn’t care enough to try and start a fight with him. How unfortunate of her to stand in the way of his shitstirring.

Jaime turns to look at Jonquil, that meanness back in his eye as he looks the other man up and down.

“You’re my first opponent tomorrow, then?” Jaime asks, tone condescending. 

“Yes,” Jonquil hums, an easygoing smile back on his lips but his eyes sharp. “I hope we can both enjoy ourselves.”

“Don’t break my things, Ser Jaime,” Eleanor says in warning, looking at the man’s pretty blonde head with some annoyance. 

“These are matters of swordsmanship, Lady Eleanor. You wouldn’t understand,” Jaime says, looking back at Eleanor with a smarmy smile, and somehow he’s only more condescending. What the hell brought this on? 

“Gods I’m glad you took the white cloak,” Eleanor huffs, tiring of this interaction. “I’m going to the feast. Ser Edmer, Ser Jonquil, follow please.”

“Yes, it would be so inconvenient for you to be married to a Lannister lord, wouldn’t it?” Jaime asks, looking down his strong nose at Eleanor. “Less time to scurry with your books and endlessly complain, if you had a husband.”

Eleanor thinks that if she were forced to marry Jaime Lannister, it may be almost as bad as marrying Robert, which is already a low bar. Envisioning a future where she has to contend with Cersei Lannister’s murder attempts, Tywin Lannister micromanaging her life, and Jaime Lannister’s shit attitude—

She’d have to jump into the sea and let herself sink. It would be a far more pleasant fate. 

“I would have plenty of time to scurry and complain regardless. I just would have to suffer your nagging alongside it. Tell your sister I say hello, Ser Jaime. She was dressed very nicely today.”

With that, Eleanor removes herself from the situation. She still needs to talk to him about the wildfire, preferably in a place with fewer witnesses, but she’s not dealing with whatever mood he’s in. Eleanor already spent the whole afternoon sitting beside Stannis Baratheon and his emotional regulation issues. Now she’s subjecting herself to fucking Robert. 

Men. Men are the problem. Eleanor is spending far too much time with men.

…would it be excessive to write Marg a letter? She’s going to see her in two weeks. Surely she doesn’t want Eleanor bothering her. 

Eleanor mentally drafts the letter she’s going to send on her walk away from the tent, Edmer and Jonquil following close behind. Jonquil is technically on an off day today. She’ll have to pay him a little extra this week for being such a good sport about following her.

“I apologize for my words earlier, Jonquil. You are not a thing. I was just speaking to him in a way he could understand.”

“You called me stranger things last night, so it’s forgiven.”

Eleanor peers back at the sweaty man with narrowed eyes. The setting sun washes both him and Edmer in soft oranges and yellows, pink cloaks bouncing behind them. 

“What do you mean by that?”

Jonquil simply smiles, a flash of teeth with raised eyebrows and ever constant mirth blooming in his eyes. So annoying.

—

Jaime Lannister

His sister looked nice today?

Jaime frowns deeply at the retreating form of Eleanor Mooton. She is, perhaps, the most vexing of wenches he has ever met. Always sarcastic, always bored, and completely uninterested in Jaime. Not for his titles, wealth, or looks. None impress her. 

Not even the new king himself takes her interest, even if Cersei seems convinced of otherwise. Eleanor Mooton was more likely to fuck the Mountain than Robert Baratheon. Whether Baratheon wanted otherwise was up in the air, considering how much time he was spending with her.

Jaime scoffs, running his tingling fingers through his hair. The fighting was a tease today. None of his opponents could compare to the Sword of Morning. None of them could compare to Jaime’s blade, either. Weaklings emboldened by a war they barely survived. 

Jaime had watched the Mooton sworn sword’s bouts, curious at why the woman bothered with always being guarded. Surely they would have to be half decent if she was wasting gold on them following her like loyal dogs. 

Jonquil. Named for the maiden who Florian the Fool peeped on in Maidenpool some hundreds of years ago. A girlish name for a pretty man dressed in pink. Most obnoxiously, he’s actually skilled. Not on Jaime’s level, of course, but he would at least be an interesting fight.

Jaime trudges out of the tent, waving off his squire Lannisport cousin when he runs after him with a jerk of his hand. 

“But Ser Jaime—” Damon Lannister whines, blinking his big watery green eyes. 

“Go. I have no need of you at present,” Jaime says bluntly, not looking back at the boy. Why his father insisted on saddling him with such a weak willed boy, Jaime will never understand. Standing together and uplifting your fellow Lannisters is all well and good, but there are limits. Jaime can’t even remember how he’s related to the one and ten year old, and yet he’s been left to babysit him like a septa for the past month.

Thankfully, the boy stops following Jaime. Jaime rubs his face as he takes in the surroundings, mind unsettled for some reason. 

Why had Eleanor complimented his sister? Such a silly thing to say to him. Cersei always looks nice. She looks more than nice . Was it some sort of insult?

Jaime scowls, stomping around a loud group of drunken Riverlands men singing some jaunty tune. The sun hasn’t even set and they’re already up to their gills in ale.

“—and that lady maiden said, bear no bastards unto me, blessed now I am, by the seven unto me!” The fools sing off key, one plucking at a shiny new lute with little skill. 

Jaime wonders idly if Eleanor is actually a maiden, as the courtiers love to call her. Perhaps she fucks those guards of hers and has no time for other men. Especially pretty girly Jonquil with his long locks— 

He stops, suddenly, peering back at the men making fools of themselves. Song floating around his ears but unheard. 

Eleanor had no interest in marriage. Eleanor complimented Jaime’s sister . Eleanor spends a great amount of time with Lysa Tully, slept in her chambers last night if the rumors are to be believed. 

Jaime’s mind churns strangely, thoughts connecting and twisting in disarray. 

…is she a sword swallower? Perhaps there is some better term for that, considering she is a woman and there would be no swords involved. 

Jaime stands for a moment, staring stupidly at a lordling plucking his ugly lute and making a nuisance of himself. 

Did Eleanor Mooton hold no interest in Jaime because he…wasn’t his sister? Does Eleanor Mooton want his sister’s affections?

Jaime swallows, mouth suddenly dry. 

He cannot remember Eleanor ever insulting Cersei, even when Cersei did her best to scare her away from Casterly Rock when they were children, long before Jaime took the white cloak. Always the same blunt indifference, weathering the taunts with an even temper. 

What should Jaime do with this information? Tell Cersei? Tell his father? Anything but tell his father, Tywin Lannister couldn’t care less about Eleanor Mooton’s proclivities so long as it doesn’t jeopardize Cersei’s upcoming nuptials. Cersei would…

Gods. Jaime doesn’t want to know what Cersei will do if she knows. Surely Cersei would never do anything with another woman! Especially not one she hates so openly.

Jaime thinks on Eleanor Mooton’s pretty pink lips and wide, all seeing blue eyes, some strange sickness rising in his throat. He had told Cersei that the woman wasn’t as pretty as her, and it was true, but she is still a beautiful maiden. A reddish blonde, but still blonde. Fair skinned and with light eyes, though they’re not the green the Lannisters favor. She’s close in height to Cersei, too.

“Do you care to join us, Kingslayer?” one of the lordlings playing at mummer calls, swaying on his feet as they finish their song. The title makes his temper flare.

“I’d rather listen to a drowning cat’s wails than join your attempt at singing,” Jaime says instantly, and turns on his heel to walk quickly to the tent that the king and many others will be feasting in. That Cersei and Eleanor will be feasting in. He feels suddenly disquieted that the two of them may be able to spend any time near one another without his presence to remind Cersei of who she really wants. 

Not that he’s worried about it. That would be absurd. What does a woman compare to a man? Especially a man like Jaime?

—

Eleanor Mooton

The feast is less tolerable than the usual fare, mostly because all of the nobles are riled up from the fighting. The laughter feels louder, the bards play raunchier songs, and Eleanor would like to go to sleep. 

She’ll leave early tonight. Fuck Robert, if he complains about it she’ll just ignore him. She doesn’t care if he was put on the throne by the seven faced gods themselves, she is exhausted. 

“You look tired, Lady Eleanor.”

Someone put her down now before she bites.

Eleanor peers to her left, where Jon Arryn is looking at her with a sort of paternal concern. Lysa was buffering between the two of them, but she already left the feast. She’s been nauseous all day from drinking last night, poor girl. She didn’t blame Eleanor, at least, and said she would very much like to do it again.

“I should say the same to you, Lord Arryn,” Eleanor says with a wry little twist to her lips. Jon Arryn looks like he hasn’t had a good night of sleep in months. “Of the two of us, you have the harder job.”

Being hand seems like it gets you killed and doesn’t nearly pay enough to be worth the hassle. 

Jon frowns. “You can call me Jon, my lady. We have spent enough time near one another to be afforded that much. Are you feeling well?”

“I’m faring much better than poor Lysa, don’t worry. I simply tire of how loud our companions are.”

So fucking loud. A lord at one of the tables below cackles so loud he starts coughing, and one of his friends calls for more wine. 

“They are very lively this evening,” Jon says with bemusement, peering down at where Robert has settled among some stormlords, downing a pitcher’s worth of wine all on his own. 

“Do you need assistance with anything before I leave for Maidenpool in a few days, Lord Jon?” Eleanor asks, watching Robert pat the back of the man beside him. His Estermont uncle, who lasted two bouts in the melee. 

“I only ask when you plan to return, my lady. You have been an even-tempered voice during Small Council meetings, I admit.”

A compliment! How nice. It won’t convince Eleanor that it’s worth the trouble of staying here for longer than necessary, but she appreciates the thought. 

Eleanor rubs a finger over the stem of her goblet, feeling the smooth silver beneath her skin. 

“In time for the royal wedding in three moons. If I have need to return earlier, I will, but I grow anxious to put my lands into order. I have stayed in the capital far longer than planned,” Eleanor explains with a frown.

She expected to be here a week, if not a week and a half. A moon and a half is fucking excessive. 

“Well founded anxieties. You’ve only just inherited your lands,” Jon says with a solemn nod as Eleanor looks back at him. “If you have need of counsel, do not hesitate to send a raven. You have already proven your usefulness to the crown.”

What a weighty thing to offer. The counsel of the hand to the king and Warden of the Vale. 

Eleanor needs to find some way to deflect this. She doesn’t like the idea of owing him anything, even if he seems to be a good sort.

“Thank you, though that’s not what I’m concerned about.” Eleanor says, before taking a sip of her wine. Arbor red. There’s been so much more arbor red served since Cersei came to the city.  “My brother had little interest in governing. When my father died it was me that truly took the responsibilities he left behind. William preferred it that way.” 

Her brother wanted only to hunt and drink and kiss beautiful women. He was boring in that way.

“The influx of refugees in Maidenpool has proven a logistical problem for my good-sister, though, so I need to personally see that it’s fixed,” Eleanor finishes with a wave of a hand.

Marg, lovely intelligent Marg, has little to no interest in governing. She’s handled things well on her own, and consulted Eleanor by letter on things she can’t manage herself, but some things Eleanor needs to handle personally. 

Marg has two things she loves, and it’s painting and gossip. She is very capable at both. All other things quickly bore her. 

Eleanor doesn’t mind that. She’s happy to do the rest, mostly because she has no interest in handling half of the more social problems Marg deals with for her. They suit each other's strengths and weaknesses well. 

“Yes, your good-sister. Her name is Margery, is it not?” Jon asks, tapping an idle finger on the ornate table. The wood of the high table is some expensive kind, lacquered and polished to shine. It’s wasted on them. People just spill wine and food all over it.

“You’re right. I miss her, she would find the capital far more entertaining than I do,” Eleanor says with a sigh. 

Jon nods, and he gets a weird look on his face. All too knowing. It raises Eleanor’s hackles. “I can understand. It was hard leaving my second wife, Rowena, when I would have to visit the capital.”

…what.

Did— did this man old enough to be Eleanor’s father just clock her? And then tell her to her face that he’s clocked her?

Eleanor blinks, very slowly. 

“What are your thoughts on Lady Jeyne Arryn, the Warden of the Vale? The one from during the Dance,” Eleanor asks, since everyone is already getting too drunk to give a shit about what she’s saying. Mentioning one of the most notorious Westerosi lesbians in the past three hundred years is far too on the nose in polite company.

“She was a skilled leader and a credit to house Arryn. Few have as prosperous reigns during times of crisis,” Jon summarizes simply. He’s still looking at her with something fatherly in his face. It’s ruined by how he’s married to a girl Eleanor’s age, but she has to give him credit for trying.

“I’m glad we both agree.” Eleanor rubs a hand down her face. “Well. I am going to retire to my quarters, Lord Jon. I trust you’ll watch our king in case he over imbibes?” 

“Of course. Rest well, Lady Eleanor. I will see you on the morrow.”

Eleanor is going to go to sleep and forget this happened. Maybe write her letter to Marg first, of course. 

Chapter Text

Ninth Moon, 283 AC

Robert Baratheon

Robert takes a long draw of the goblet in his hands, his mouth tingling with the cloying grasp of the wine, his mind sluggish. 

“Did you sleep last night?”

Robert peers up from where he’s seated against the cold stone wall, squinting bleary eyed at the woman before him. Reaches up to move stray black hairs out of his face and his fingers brush the metal of his crown.

Eleanor Mooton looks down at him with a look of such disappointment that Robert thinks instantly of Ned. Ned, who would not attend his coronation. Ned, who swore he would stand at his side for the rest of their damned days. 

“What’s tha’ matter?” Robert asks harshly, using a heavy hand to grab at the pitcher of wine beside him. 

Eleanor moves with swiftness that makes Robert’s head dizzy and his eyes cross, and the pitcher is out of reach, handed to one of her guards. 

“Oi!” Robert shouts, dropping his empty goblet with a bouncing clank and stumbling to unsteady feet. The kingsguard who’s been watching him and dozing off, what’s his fucking face, Arden Royce, goes to help Robert up. 

Robert pushes the smaller man away, watching him clamber back with some satisfaction. “Get your fuckin' mitts off me, I can stand on my own!” 

“Robert, the tourney starts in two candle turns,” Eleanor says, watching him stand with a furrowed brow. “You’re drunker than a myrrish pirate and in the middle of a random corridor. What are you doing?”

Can a man not drink away his fucking sorrows in peace?

“Fuck off, Mooton, I’m fine,” Robert says, trying to take a step forward, not really sure where he’s headed, but stumbling. 

“Shit!” Eleanor hisses, and two small hands go to his side, doing their best to right him back into a standing position. He sees her look sharply at the stupid looking Royce. “Grab him, I don’t care if he told you not to, he’s going to brain himself on the stone!”

“Er, yes! Yes my Lady!” and there Arden is grabbing his other side. Robert huffs. 

“I’m not tha’ fucking drunk.” Robert turns to glare down at Eleanor, and the woman has the gall to glare back at him. 

“Oh, you’re not that drunk? I’m sure your poor walking abilities are from exhaustion, then,” Eleanor replies sarcastically, before looking away from him to one of her guards. The one that looks like her, with the wry comments and hair. Robert’s fairly certain he’s some bastard brother or other, but hasn’t gotten around to asking. 

Gods. How could Ned tell Robert he had a bastard in a letter? After they both spent so much time with little Mya? How could he leave him like this?

“Find Lord Arryn and inform him of the state the king is in, Edmer. We’ll try and walk him back to his chambers before anyone sees him,” Eleanor orders. Her man nods before departing swiftly. Presumably in the direction of the Hand’s tower. 

“Don’t tell Jon,” Robert tries to order as the two arses at his sides start walking him in the direction of his rooms. 

“You’re ridiculous,” Eleanor says, ignoring him like the cold shrew she is. “Why would you drink yourself into such a state? What’s wrong?”

Always feelings with this woman. Maybe Robert wanted to be drunk? Is that so bad? Maybe Robert wanted to be so drunk that his chest wouldn’t ache anymore. 

“Ned hates me,” Robert says before he can stop himself, then curses. “No, forge’ I said that. I order— I order you as your king to forget .”

“Kingship doesn’t grant you the power to erase memory,” Eleanor says with a sigh, readjusting her grip on his arm, bunching up the fabric of his doublet beneath her fingers. 

It bloody well should! What other use is that fucking uncomfortable chair?

“Why do you think Lord Stark hates you?” Eleanor asks, quieter this time, looking up at him with those stupid big blue eyes. Kinder than he deserves, considering what he is. 

“He has a bastard,” Robert says slowly, spilling his brother’s secrets so easily. “I never though’ he would— he never went to brothels. Never cared for it.”

Robert swallows, wishing for more wine. The corridor feels endless, every step taken as if his feet are weighed down by his warhammer. He was supposed to go down to the training field this morning.

“Told me in a fucking letter. Didn’t even bother to come to my coronation, and he tells me he’s got a son in a letter.”

All this over those dead fucking dragonspawn. Damn Tywin Lannister. Damn the Mountain. Fuck all of them. Robert blinks rapidly, the candle sconces around them making the stone floor in front of him look dreamy soft.

“I’m sorry,” Eleanor says, patting his arm carefully, as if he’s made of glass and not more than a full foot taller than her. “Drinking won’t mend the rift between you both, but I understand why you’ve done this.”

Robert snorts, stepping carefully forward. One foot in front of the other. “I can’t mend for shit. My mother— she had me try embroidering, once. I must’ve been only seven. Twas to punish me for something. I’ve never seen a stitch so fuckin’, so fuckin’ lopsided.”

He misses his parents. How long have they been dead now? Five years? 

Robert needs to see Renly today, when he’s not drunk. Needs to be a better brother to him and Stannis both.

“I’m shit at it too, so you’re in good company,” Eleanor says. Her hands feel cold through the heat of his doublet. The good sort of cold, like a cloth the maester puts on your forehead when you’re feverish. “You aren’t going to do this again while I’m gone, are you? We just got a new king. I’m not keen on dealing with another new one.”

The pain in Robert’s chest returns, and he’s desperate to escape it. He looks away from Eleanor Mooton and her kindness. What does she see in him, if she doesn’t want to fuck him? What’s so good that she bothers with him?

“‘Don’t like wine anyways,” Robert lies with a heavy tongue. Then, does his best to tell the truth. “Won’t get this drunk again.”

Eleanor sighs, hands tightening on his arm. 

“I’ll hold you to that, Rob. You look proper miserable when you’re this kind of drunk.”

He feels miserable. 

“You’re good at words,” Robert says suddenly, an idea grasping his head suddenly. “You’ll help me write— you’ll help me send Ned a letter, before you leave. A good one. Like you did with Prince Doran.”

Yes. That’s what’ll fix whatever is happening between Robert and Ned. A well thought letter. Maybe a visit, after the stupid wedding. Robert needs to meet Ned’s boy, needs to go down to the Vale and bring Mya home. 

Little Mya. How could he leave her alone? She has her mother, true, but she needs him. He’s her father. A child needs their father. 

By the Father, Jon is going to tan his hide when he sees him. Damn Eleanor and her bastard brother guard.

“I’ll help you write that letter as long as you let Stannis leave for Dragonstone today, Robert.”

“Deal,” Robert says instantly, before his mind can catch up to what she asked. It’s fucking Eleanor Mooton. She can’t have asked for anything that’ll do him wrong. 

“You’re a good friend to me, Eleanor Mooton. I won’t forget that. I won’t. Even when I’m sober and spitting mad.” If she cared for men he’d have half the mind to elope with her here and now. That would see the old lion hissing. She’s not Lyanna, no woman can compare to Lyanna, but at least she cares if he brains himself on the stone floor. 

Eleanor sighs. She does it so often. Robert wonders how a maiden can sigh so much and mean it.

“You’re my friend as well, Robert. Now we’re turning a corner, so please don’t fall on me.”

—

Jonquil

It had been an eventful morning. That much Jonquil knows for certain.

He’s been with house Mooton for a long time. Squired under Ser Oscar, the head of the household guard back at Maidenpool. Befriended Lord William, since they were boys of the same age. It was a good post, greater still when he finally came to an age where he could be knighted. 

He did not expect that post to find him sworn to the care of Lady Eleanor, nor did he expect that post to lead him to fight a member of the kingsguard in a tourney.

Jonquil draws his blade, shifting his stance in the packed earth of the arena. Watches his opponent smile and tilt his head with sly grace. Jaime Lannister’s sword is held aloft with little care as he watches Jonquil. Waiting with his long blonde mane fluttering in the breeze.

Lady Eleanor’s favor is warm where it’s tied around Jonquil’s sword arm’s wrist. She snorted when he asked for it earlier, but tied it nonetheless. The embroidered pink salmon swimming on its edges are far too neat to be Eleanor’s own work, so he’s sure the handkerchief was a gift from her lady Margery.

“I’ve been told by my lady to not die in today’s match, unless it is impressive. Let us both not disappoint her, Ser Jaime,” Jonquil calls with a smile.

The air is already growing hot in the afternoon sun, and though Jonquil isn’t sweating yet, he knows he will be soon. This will be one of the most intense fights of his life so far, and he has to still himself from being exhilarated at the prospect.

Jaime Lannister. A man of eight and ten, knighted and brought into the kingsguard at five and ten. Once heir to the Warden of the West. Prodigal with a sword in his hands, and able to fight against the Sword of Morning himself.

He is also a rude, smug cunt who insists on disrespecting Lady Eleanor at every opportunity. Such a thing simply cannot stand.

“I will try to be impressive, Ser Jonquil. Tell me, what did you ever do to your mother to be given such a name?” Ser Jaime asks, slowly edging closer, stance still far too casual. 

“She had already named my elder sister Florian,” Jonquil says truthfully, eyes unmoving from the man and his stance steady. Not stiff, Dorin would have him running spars for hours if he saw him being stiff. Steady like the trunk of an ancient tree weathering a storm.

Ser Jaime lets out a chuffed laugh, some surprise shining in his face. It looks better than the smugness he seems prone to. It’s a pity he always ruins his good looks with cruelty.

“I’m sure Florian is much prettier than you, though that seems a high bar,” Ser Jaime comments, and then—

Movement. It begins with an exhale. 

A slash aimed at Jonquil’s throat is swiftly blocked, sparks flying from where their swords connect and then disengage. Another slash comes fast from Jonquil’s right, and he shifts out of the way, listening to the air part for the blade like a river parts for a rock in its center. 

The world becomes small in moments like these. Reduced to nothing but the man in front of Jonquil, his own body and the blade gripped in hand. 

“So fast,” Ser Jaime huffs, and Jonquil wonders if this is how he always fights. Trying to distract his opponents with banter.

Jonquil’s blade jerks out, mind chanting to keep his slash tight and uniform, and makes contact with Ser Jaime’s own blocking blade. He pulls back and goes in for another swing, just barely able to make contact with Ser Jaime’s chestplate before the other man steps back. Out of reach. 

“You enjoy the sound of your own voice, Ser Jaime,” Jonquil says, eyes flicking to the small scratch on the man’s golden chestplate. 

“Many say as much,” Ser Jaime replies, smirking. “It’s a very good voice.”

They make contact again, and now it becomes clear Ser Jaime was playing with him before. Testing his reflexes. A barrage of slashes come, one for each breath he takes, light enough that the kingsguard moves from one attack to the next with every block and dodge Jonquil makes. Distantly, Jonquil can hear the crowd cheering past the rushing blood in his ears. 

Sweat drips down Jonquil’s face, and Lady Eleanor’s favor is tight like a brand around his wrist. He shifts out of the way of a stab made by Ser Jaime, the man’s green eyes glittering darkly as they watch his every move. Jonquil thinks it’s fitting to compare this Lannister to a lion. What with his long hair and the focus of a predator. 

“You fight like you’re begging for a challenge,” Jonquil observes through his panting breaths as they circle each other.

“Are you saying you’ll be that challenge?” Ser Jaime asks, and he’s still looking at Jonquil as though he’s going to rip his throat out, no matter his smirk.

“I’m still standing, am I not?” Jonquil asks, and before he finishes he’s ducking under another sweep of Ser Jaime’s blade and slamming his dulled sword into the man’s side, hands shaking with the force of metal hitting metal. The clang rings in Jonquil’s ears like a wardrum. 

Ser Jaime curses, and Jonquil takes a cut to his sword arm in retribution before he can move out of the man’s way. The barrage begins again, harsher this time, and everytime Ser Jaime’s sword connects with his own he feels the vibrating clash of the blades up to his shoulders. 

Jonquil hopes, somewhat idly, that he does not die in this battle. He swore to Eleanor’s brother he would see her safe when he watched him die in that muddy forest. He cannot waste that promise on a tourney title.

Jonquil gains two more cuts, one for each arm, and wrists that have started aching with every blocked blow. 

Can he win this battle?

Frustration seems to begin boiling in Jaime Lannister’s gaze, and it looks far more honest than anything Jonquil has seen on him before this. A twist to his lips and a furrow to his brow, golden locks sticking to his face. 

Jonquil takes a slice to his cheekbone, and steps back, far enough that Ser Jaime doesn’t pursue him. He watches the man watch him, and decides. His heart beats quickly in his chest, but his mind is calm. Cunning.

Ser Oscar always did praise him for that. Said the mind was where a battle is truly won or lost.

Ser Jaime will not tire before Jonquil does. They could last far longer, for Jonquil is skilled at evading blades and blocking them, but that is not the spirit of this game. 

Jonquil cannot defeat Jaime Lannister. He is man enough to admit as much before the other man truly dips into his battle lust and does something drastic. 

There’s a growing frenzy in Ser Jaime’s eyes, an interest that bodes ill for Jonquil’s health.

“I forfeit,” Jonquil calls, to the outrage of the crowd. He keeps his eyes on Jaime Lannister. 

“What?” Ser Jaime asks, anger pulling at his handsome face. Again. Wasted on such a cunt. 

“I cannot best you at my current skill level. It would take time, but you will defeat me should we continue,” Jonquil explains, sheathing his blade with a smooth shhk . “I wouldn’t wish to tire you before you face your other opponents.”

Ser Jaime looks only more enraged by this, grip tightening around the grip of his blade and violence in his eyes. “So you are a coward?”

Jonquil laughs, amused. It tugs at the cut on his cheek and blood drips hot down the side of his face, but he doesn’t mind. He still feels light with the bout, blood pumping fast and skin humming from his toes to his head. “You may think of me as such, Ser Jaime. I do not mind.”

Before Ser Jaime can do something he may regret later, Lord Arryn, the Hand to the king, has his yeller shout from the top box. 

“Ser Jaime Lannister wins this bout. Please remove yourselves from the arena!”

Ser Jaime stares at Jonquil for a moment longer, a moment that seems to last forever but really only takes four breaths. Then, he slams his sword back into its sheath and stalks off of the arena. 

Jonquil follows at a distance, sparing a glance to where his lady is in the crowd.

Lady Eleanor offers a smile to him, along with a thumbs up.

Well. So long as she approves, he is satisfied. Though Jonquil is tempted to see if Ser Jaime will spar with him again after this. That fight was very enjoyable.

—

Eleanor Mooton

“Is everyone accounted for?” Eleanor asks, tugging at the ends of her riding gloves and looking at her household. 

Finally, finally they’ll be leaving. Thank the old gods, the new ones, and every other god save the red one. Fuck the red one. He’s never done anything good for her. 

A wagon, a dozen horses, and the entire household Eleanor was keeping in the Red Keep will be coming along with her. Well, most of them. A few of the scribes are tasked with sending her updates on the census, and Myrria the servant will be keeping the rooms that they had used tidy in the coming moons until they return. 

She is nervous about leaving a few of her scribes alone without a protector. But, Myrria said she would keep an eye on them. So she leaves them. 

Dorin has already mounted his horse beside Eleanor, and his dark eyes sweep the group keenly. No details left unseen, and hopefully none of their own unaccounted for. 

“All are in place, milady,” Dorin affirms after a moment, turning to look down at her from his black horse. “Are you ready?”

Eleanor hums. “I’ve never been more ready in my life.”

Finally, back to Maidenpool. Back to Marg. Back to Eleanor’s own, normal, easy problems. Sure, they have a bit of a refugee crisis on their hands, but there can’t be as many of them as there are downtrodden smallfolk in King’s Landing! 

Eleanor mounts her horse swiftly, a smile worming its way onto her face despite herself. Home is but a week’s worth of travel away! Pink walls and a safe keep where she isn’t constantly surrounded by spies and miscreants intent on marrying her. 

“Lady Eleanor!” an all too familiar voice bellows. 

Eleanor groans, even if it’s unladylike. She can’t help herself. 

“If no one is dying, Robert Baratheon, you had better have a good reason for this!” Eleanor says, turning to see Robert making his way down the front steps of the keep and past the few observers watching her party leave. Bored nobles with little else to do other than gossip. 

“By the old and the new, I’m just saying goodbye woman!” Robert scoffs, stopping beside her horse with a few servants trailing after him. Jaime Lannister is also striding behind him, and from the expression on his face, still in a snit about his fight with Jonquil.

Eleanor doesn’t understand the drama. Did Jaime actually want to maim Eleanor’s sworn knight? He’s so unreasonable.

“How sentimental. I appreciate the thought, your grace, but really I—” 

Eleanor is cut off by Robert, who rolls his eyes at her.

“Yes, yes, you’re desperate to escape. Give me your damned hand so I can free you,” Robert says, holding out a broad, calloused palm. 

Eleanor raises an eyebrow, unsure of where this is going, and lays her hand in his own.

He reaches up with his other hand and tucks some kind of perfectly round stone into her grasp. Eleanor blinks, lifting it up and looking at it in the light. 

“What’s this?” Eleanor asks, wondering if they’ve reached a stage in their friendship where he shows her strange stones he’s found. 

“For the Small Council. We had to craft new ones, since the old ones were lost in the sacking. You’re meant to drop it into the round holes in the table when you attend meetings,” Robert explains with a careless wave of his hand. “Jon was going to wait to hand yours off when you came back, but I didn’t mind the walk.”

Eleanor peers at the pink rock, or perhaps jewel? It shines in the morning light, polished. The light refracting within it tints the leather of her gloves just a little pink.

“What’s it made out of?” Eleanor asks curiously.

“Sapphire. Don’t ask me from where, I don’t know and don’t care to know. Just don’t lose it in the next three moons or Jon will be on both our asses.” Robert looks at Eleanor’s household with a furrowed brow. “Will you be alright with just twelve guards?”

So long as they all are wearing Mooton crests, Eleanor isn’t very concerned. 

“They’re very good guards,” Eleanor says dryly, eyes flicking to where Jaime has begun glaring at Jonquil. “And it’s a short journey. Don’t worry your head about it, Robert.”

Robert hums, crosses his arms. “Well. You’ll be one raven away. Should you face difficulty, the crown will answer.”

Eleanor really doesn’t want or need that, but sure. Whatever. Let’s declare that little old Eleanor Mooton is worth all that power. 

“Don’t go declaring things like that willy nilly, Robert. People are going to take advantage of you,” Eleanor says before she can stop herself, and hands the strange stone to Dorin. He pockets it swiftly to somewhere safe. “Do not overindulge while I’m gone. I remember your promise.”

“Bah! You’re worse than Jon.”

She’s far less on his ass than Jon Arryn. 

“Be safe, be smart, and do not displease your betrothed, King Robert Baratheon, first of your name. I’m serious. I am not coming back to a shit show,” Eleanor says, adjusting her reins, as she looks at him beseechingly. She’s only barely taller than him while horsed. 

Robert sighs. “Of course Mooton. I’ll be sure to eat my greens and wipe my arse as well. Leave, if it so pleases you.”

“It does , goodbye Robert. Move out!” Eleanor orders, looking back at her household and kicking her horse into a trot. 

Three moons of properly knowing that man and somehow Eleanor is invested in his health and safety. She can’t let him get depressed and be gored by a boar. It would be annoying. 

(It would feel a little bit like it wasn’t worth forgiving him for killing her brother, if she lets the man die. She doesn’t admit this to herself. She doesn’t want to think about dead brothers right now.)

Ah. She feels like she’s forgotten something. She blinks as she exits the Red Keep’s gates, and looks back, eyes landing on Jaime Lannister. 

He stares back, unimpressed. 

Oh. The wildfire.

…well. It won’t blow up in the next three moons, surely. 

Gods. Eleanor really hopes it doesn’t. Oh dear oh dear. Best stop thinking about it and focus on how nice the air will smell soon. 

—

The next few days of travel are almost blissful, even though they have to camp two nights when they don’t make it to an inn in time. 

Eleanor spends every night writing in her journal, thinking on how to handle the problems before her. This, this was where she shines. Thinking. Legislating. Planning. Not dealing with fucking shit headed fools with little idea that they should wipe their asses, and less of an idea of how they are responsible for real people’s lives. 

She’s done her best to keep her opinions to herself, her father would be so proud of how well she managed to avoid cussing out every courtier she encountered at the Red Keep, but fuck. All of them, all of them were useless. Worse than useless. They found their own ignorance to be a further sign of their privilege. That their complete separation from the smallfolk was an indicator that they were the right sort of person. 

Every one of them will die in the coming hardship. Or at least most of them. They think themselves so great and untouchable, and that will be their undoing. Should Eleanor not be able to steer the war of five kings away from happening, gods, even if it doesn’t, they still have the ice zombies to contend with. Daenerys Targeryon’s dragons, her dothraki horde, and her unsullied.

How many people will die? Innocents slaughtered for the inaction of the people who should have protected them?

This all ignores that the Ironborn are supposed to rebel within the next decade. All Eleanor can remember about that, timeline wise, is that Arya Stark is a very small child for it. Perhaps a baby. 

So. Eleanor writes. Not about all of the aforementioned future troubles, even if they’re important, but about Maidenpool’s troubles. Maidenpool has been, and always must be her priority. 

Her father did not personally leave his lordship ring to her when he died, but she knew. She knew when she sat beside him in his room, the whole place dark and his breathing shallow. The air thick with the stench of rot and his pale hand in her own. She knew when he looked at her and said to “Take care of your brothers, and the city. You’re the only one with the head for it, my El.”

Fat lot of good she did for her brothers.

When they enter Eleanor’s lands, they come across a marker first. The kingsroad is long, but there’s only so many paths to particular places. 

Eleanor eyes the empty farm that marks the border between house Mooton’s lands and house Rykker of Duskendale. It’s a husk of a house and barn, burnt from the fields by the road all the way to the buildings. New plants have grown where wheat and barley once did, along with a few scraggly pine saplings.

Not recently burned, but ever since the war the family that lived there has been dead. The home is a shelter only for travelers and animals.

“How many refugees in Maidenpool do you think could be farmers?” Eleanor comments idly to Dorin. He’s kept close to her side over the journey, while others scout further down the road in pairs. 

The war isn’t over until the next harvest in peace. She may have made efforts to keep bandits off her own lands, but she can only do so much. 

“Many of them are farmers who have lost their homes, are they not?” Dorin replies. 

Completely true. Eleanor would like very much to put those of them who are skilled in it back into the fields before they all starve to death. 

When bread gets more expensive, you know you’ve doomed yourself as a feudal lord. Your head is next. 

“The labor office censused what trades people held prior to the war, so hopefully I’ll have a very tidy list on my desk when I get home,” Eleanor says dryly, not expecting that at all. Nothing is ever that easy. Especially not since Rhaegar Targeryon abducted Lyanna Stark. Two years of shitty, shitty luck. 

“By the Crone, I hope your foresight is right, milady,” Dorin says in that even tone of his. The kind that lets her know for certain he’s being just as sarcastic as she.

They continue on, the sun not high yet but ambling slowly to its peak. From that little farm onward, they still have another full day’s travel to get to Maidenpool. If they pushed their horses hard and were being chased by a crowd of bandits, they could maybe reach the gates by midnight, but that would be excessive. 

And it would stress out her scribes. They’re all young men, she needs to keep them in good health since most of them don’t travel often. Gods, she’s in charge of a gaggle of teenage boys. How could their parents just leave them with her? She could be a horrible person!

Finally, they set up camp to rest for the night. Eleanor loves the luxury of an inn, but doesn’t mind camping. Even if it’s medieval camping. 

“Lady Mooton,” one of the scribes, Steffon Frey, asks. 

Loathe as Eleanor is to admit, the boy is sweet enough and good enough at his letters and numbers that she let him into her household. She’s untrustworthy of people who kill people at weddings generally, but for now, Steffon the Sweet is one of many great grandsons of the old leach Walder. Almost completely removed from the succession unless dozens of his relatives die. 

“What do you need, Steffon?” Eleanor asks, looking up from where she’s writing to blink at the thirteen year old. 

Perhaps she should put lord in front of his name, but that feels excessive. He’ll inherit no holdings and his father sent him off to find his own way in the world already.

“Maidenpool, what can you tell us of it? Ser Edmer only teases when we ask,” Steffon asks, frowning. 

Eleanor hums, tapping her chin with her pen. 

“Well, the most notable parts are the pink walls, and the pool it’s constructed around. The maiden pool,” Eleanor says, searching her mind for anything that would be interesting to a teenager. “What would you like to know? The foods? The locations? The sort of people who live there?”

“Are there pirates?” another scribe, Yorrik Rivers, chimes in. The distant Tully cousin.

“No, not usually. A lot of mercenaries as of late, but they should be leaving port soon enough once they realize most of the fighting is done,” Eleanor says contemplatively. They would be off to more interesting prospects. 

Eleanor has heard some interesting gossip about fighting near Pentos, some spat between them and Myr, but Eleanor is already busy trying to pay attention to whatever the hell is happening in Westeros. No time for worrying if Myr is pissed about the taxes on lace or something similarly unimportant to Eleanor’s current daily life. 

Watch her think that and then it bites her in the ass. That would be something that happens to her. 

At least Dorne hasn’t been up-charging Maidenpool like they’ve started doing everywhere else. Small mercies. 

“Will we have our own rooms in the keep?” Steffon asks. It’s the sort of question Eleanor expects from a son of a family so large they’re infamous. 

“That depends on what Lady Margery decides,” Eleanor says with a shrug. “She handles the management of the household in most cases, along with my steward Ronell.”

Ronell. He must be bursting a blood vessel at all the movement in the city from the refugees. Eleanor almost feels bad. 

“Is she—” Yorrik starts, then stops, mouth shutting with a clack. He looks to his fellows with a sort of awkward look on his squirrelly face. 

Steffon looks as though he steels himself, before looking Eleanor in the eye with an adorable sort of seriousness in his ferret-like face. 

“Is she a kind lady? Do you much like her?”

What is this, twenty questions?

“I think I like Marg most out of anyone in this world, living or dead,” Eleanor says with a snort. “She likes children, so don’t worry about her being a scary taskmaster or some other. Honestly she’ll probably treat you better than I do, as I’m—“

“Socially inept,” Edmer chimes in from where he’s playing cards with Jonquil, Dannell, and a few of the other guards. 

“As my guard says. Socially inept,” Eleanor repeats with a dry tone, looking back down at her journal. She was writing about crop yields and rotations. She needs to speak to some farmers and be sure she’s not pulling things out of her ass. 

“Is Ser Edmer your bastard brother?”

Eleanor chokes on air, a hysterical laugh suddenly leaving her. She looks up, peering at the teen who asked that. 

“What— Why would you think that?” Eleanor asks through incredulous giggles. 

“You both look so similar!” Yorrik continues, face reddening. He is a bastard, so Eleanor shouldn’t be surprised that he’s more willing to voice the idea.

And Edmer does look like he could be related to her. She does pick him to go with her to do undercover things as smallfolk specifically because he looks so similar to her. 

Eleanor looks over at Edmer. He’s given up on the game of cards and is grinning at her unrepentantly. 

“Well, Edmer? Do I need to dig my father up from the shore and ask what he’s done with your mother?”

One of the scribes makes a shocked little noise. Surely that wasn’t so crass?

Edmer rubs his scruffy chin, putting on a face of faux contemplation. Posed like a maester thinking about the great questions in the world and not a silly knight that needs to bathe once they get to the city.

“I’m not sure, milady. My mother would likely be the better historian. We should dig her ashes up first.”

So many dead parents between them all. No wonder everything is always going to shit in the seven kingdoms. All the adults keep dying!

“To answer your question, Yorrik, no. We’re not half siblings, though it would be convenient. I could marry him off and make his children my heirs,” Eleanor says, staring at Edmer shrewdly. She could still do that, if she wished to besmirch the good name of her dead father. She doesn’t remember hearing anything of him going to brothels, but Eleanor’s mother was dead for a long time. She doesn’t doubt he went at least once. 

Edmer raises his hands, shaking his strawberry blonde head like she’s just told him to jump off a bridge. “No thank you, Lady Eleanor. Marriage disagrees with me!”

Marriage disagrees with him— well. Eleanor supposes she really isn’t one to judge. Especially since she’s well aware of Edmer’s bisexuality. She’s seen the way he flirts with some of the other guards, and serving wenches. 

“No, milady, I think darling Edmer wants a pretty bride from a noble house!” Jonquil says cheerfully, reaching over and wrapping an arm around Edmer’s shoulders, shaking him. “Don’t you want eight children, Edmer? It’s your responsibility to save house Mooton, you cannot leave your lady sister to the wolves!”

“By the gods, I hope not,” Edmer grumbles, looking discomforted at the idea. 

Eleanor leaves the two of them to entertain her scribes, returning to writing in her journal. 

Maidenpool. She’ll see it tomorrow. Then, to work.

Chapter Text

Ninth Moon, 283 AC, Maidenpool

Eleanor Mooton

The first thing Eleanor notes when Maidenpool’s gates come into view, is that the shanty town isn’t as bad as she feared. 

Perhaps King’s Landing gave Eleanor far too low expectations for the state of things as of late. Nothing, and she means fucking nothing, can compare to the state of Fleabottom. 

She hasn’t a clue how she’ll fix that, but it will likely involve a lot of social programs and soap. Mostly the social programs. The soap is mostly for her stupid, highborn sensibilities. 

As is, hastily constructed buildings of wood and even tents surround Maidenpool’s pink walls at Fool’s Gate. Eleanor takes them in with sharp eyes. Fire hazards. Barefoot children run and play by the busy road, and a few stalls have been set up before the entrance to the city. She thinks she sees a penned pig with a brood of piglets being watched over by a bored faced child.

“This is doable,” Eleanor says under her breath, more to herself than anyone else. 

A census was taken a moon ago of those living in the shanty town, but more have likely come since, wary and lacking prospects in other lands. Eleanor knows for a fact the farms all along the trident were burnt, and many widows will have abandoned them. 

“Lord William is spinning in his watery grave,” one of the guards, Ser Cleos, mutters, peering at the surrounding shacks with a frown. Ser Cleos would know, considering he was often tasked with following William into month long hunts. 

“It’s a good thing, then, that I’m handling this and not my brother,” Eleanor replies distractedly, watching the people around them. Mostly women, and mostly children. It’s to be expected. The majority of the men of fighting age were drawn up into the levies of the crown or the rebellion. 

She needs to get to her solar and soon. Eleanor has to familiarize herself with what’s changed since Marg’s last letter, and then she needs to start hearing petitioners. The people need to know she’s returned. 

“Lady Mooton!” a washer woman, if her clothes are to be believed, cries by the gates, turning to look at the other woman she was walking with. “Lady Mooton has returned!”

Oh great. Now Eleanor needs to worry about crowd crush.

Word spreads quickly, and by the time they reach the walls. Well.

Eleanor does her best not to step on anyone with her horse once they get to the gates. A thick crowd of people is gathering and cheering at the sight of her, so she has to maintain an even trot to avoid trampling anyone. 

“It’s good to be home,” Edmer says, horse close behind Eleanor’s in case the crowd grows rowdy. Dorin is ahead of her, along with a few men on foot clearing the path for the horses and wagon.

Eleanor’s eyes are on the keep crested at the hill leading up from the gates. The pink stone is washed bright in the sun. 

“Do you think Marg will meet me at the castle gates?” Eleanor says, trying not to sound like a lovesick fool. 

Edmer laughs at her, the ass. He smells like a horse anyways, so she doesn’t care for his opinion. 

By the time they reach the keep, Eleanor has had a crown of flowers shoved into her hands that she’s dutifully placed on her head. It’s wildflowers, all plucked from the nearby forest she’s sure, but none are poisonous. Well wishes are shouted, along with one man shouting that bread has gotten too expensive and she’d best fix it. 

Eleanor laughs at that. She shouldn’t, but she does.

Guards keep the crowd from following them past the gates of the castle, and Eleanor has to stop herself from jumping off her horse and running into the keep to find Marg. She swiftly dismounts, thrown daisies falling off of her as she hands her reins off to a familiar stableboy. 

Then, the doors to the castle open, and there is Marg. 

Eleanor grins, wide bright like she’s a child again, joy rushing over her mind like a flash flood. 

Marg walks quickly, and Eleanor notes she’s wearing a higher waistline gown. She looks beautiful. The morning light is bright, and her cheeks are flushed from rushing through the castle. Eleanor traces the hook of her nose, the shine in her dark eyes curled with her smile. Looks at her lips and her little beauty mark on her chin. 

Her hair is up in a bun, the sort she likes to do when she’s painting. As she gets closer and Eleanor walks towards her, she can see paint smeared on her long fingers. 

“When did you get a crown?” Marg asks with good humor as they stop before each other. She reaches up and fiddles with the weaved flowers on Eleanor’s head. 

“I was handed it by a very insistent girl on my way through the baker’s row. I didn’t have the heart to deny her,” Eleanor explains, reaching for Marg’s hands and taking them into her own. “You’re wearing a new dress.”

It’s a gold and white thing that suits her complexion—

Eleanor blinks. Stares at her friend’s stomach. 

“I didn’t want to tell you over a letter,” Marg says, squeezing her fingers around Eleanor’s own. “In case I lost it or someone thought to use it against you.”

Eleanor is speechless for once in her entire life. She has no clue what to say. 

Marg is pregnant. There’s a very noticeable baby bump over her stomach, fabric gracefully falling over it. Embroidered waves of gold line Marg’s hemline. They shine brightly enough that Eleanor is inclined to believe they really are gold. 

Eleanor is gaping. She can’t stop gaping. 

A baby. Marg is going to have a baby. Eleanor thinks she’s going to faint. 

“What the fuck,” Eleanor says weakly, even though that’s probably not the appropriate response to becoming an aunt. Or, really, a co-parent. William is a bit too dead to parent the baby. 

Eleanor looks up at Marg’s face and rushes forward, pulling her into a hug even if it’s unbecoming. Carefully trying not to jostle her or do anything that could hurt her. Her mind is rushing with a sort of animal fear, now, mixing with guilty glee. Women die in childbirth, Eleanor’s own mother died giving birth to her! 

Marg—

Gods. If Marg wants it terminated they’ve had too many witnesses. It’ll have to look like a miscarriage. She’s too far along for that to be safe now, though. 

If she’s carrying to term, fuck. She needs to make sure the whole room she delivers in is cleaner than a high septon’s copy of the seven pointed star. Thank the gods Eleanor lives in Maidenpool, where cleanliness is considered godliness.

“We need midwives,” Eleanor says rapidly as Marg’s hands rest firmly on Eleanor’s back. “We need— have you been well? Is there anything I need to do? Anything you need?”

“This is why I didn’t tell you over letter,” Marg says with a fond sigh. “I’m with child, not an invalid.”

Eleanor pulls away even if it physically hurts her, hands resting on Marg’s shoulders. 

“Of course not! You’re more than that. I just— gods, Marg. William has done something good for us after all,” Eleanor says, even if it’s ever strange to think about her brother having sex with Marg. She was there on the wedding night, she knows there was a bedding.

“I hope it’s a girl,” Marg says with a delightfully sharp look in her eyes. “William was insistent about having a brood of little boys to take hunting.”

Eleanor chuffs a laugh, tracing the features of Marg’s face over and over again. How she missed her mind. “Even if it is a girl, I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s as obsessed with hunting.”

A baby. What was Eleanor supposed to do with a baby? She could fuck it up, make it evil and traumatized or something. At least Marg is here, Marg usually knows what to do in these sorts of situations. Eleanor is good for much different problems, even if she does her best. 

Eleanor wishes she could kiss her, but. Alas. Lesbians aren’t allowed to be in love out in the open. 

And! Marg probably doesn’t like her in such a way! 

…even if they had kissed once, when they were fourteen and Jaime Lannister had been sworn to the kingsguard earlier in the day. Eleanor wills herself not to think of that hidden alcolove in Harrenhall. Surely that didn’t count. 

Margery Mooton

If Marg put much stock in the gods, she would be thanking every one of them that Eleanor is back. Kneel before the Mother, the Maiden, and the Crone for hours till her knees are scraped and bruised. Till dripping wax from the offering candles ruins her dress and scalds her.

She’ll settle for being glad for Eleanor’s wits and her finally being able to detach herself from King’s Landing on her own merits. 

Was it a boon that Eleanor gained the attentions of their new brutish Baratheon king? Certainly. A seat on the Small Council would only elevate house Mooton and Eleanor herself. 

But Eleanor, sweet, beautiful, oblivious Eleanor, is being taken advantage of by fools with only plans and plots for more. 

Marg watches the woman stomp through her solar like the seven devils are on her ass, peering down at her numbers and flipping through the notes Marg has left her. She’s always fetching when she’s worked up like this. A fire in her pretty eyes and a sternness in her smooth voice. 

“I need these fucking people in the fields before I lose more silver feeding them in destitution,” Eleanor declares with some heat, eyes roving the sheet before her as if it has personally slighted her. She looks to one of her little scribes, the one introduced as Steffon Frey. Firstborn son of Walton Frey, who is thirdborn son of Stevron. Stevron being old Walder Frey’s heir, should he be lucky enough to outlive his nasty father. 

A child so insignificant he’s been lucky to be snapped up by the Mootons. Marg can have empathy for that, as the firstborn daughter of an unlanded knight. 

Her father has been badgering her about funds for platemail for one of her brothers. She’s ignored all of his ravens thus far. The man got rid of her before she was eight namedays old and he wants to talk about family ties? Preposterous. 

“Steffon, I need you to do some calculations for me,” Eleanor orders, and the boy jumps to attention. Marg notes the reverence in his eye as he takes to her task. Adorable that he’s already so taken with Eleanor. “Percentages of how many women, men, and children we have. Then, percentages of their trades.”

“Yes, my lady,” Steffon says with a little crack in his voice, taking the papers she hands him with a seriousness in his boyish face that’s amusing.

Marg peers out the windows of the solar, watching the sunlight bleed in from behind Eleanor’s desk and thinks. She does much thinking. Not as much as Eleanor, for that is an excessive amount of thinking, but enough thinking to make a maestor look like an ignorant brute. 

Marg reaches down and presses a hand to her stomach. 

Eleanor won’t marry. 

She knew this would be the case, after Jaime Lannister took the white cloak. By the Seven, she was glad for it, glad for an excuse to keep her by her side, but now…

All of house Mooton’s future lies on the babe growing in Marg’s belly. Boy or girl, it will be heir to a dying house. Marg could remarry, certainly, but any of her children wouldn’t have the right blood, no matter if Eleanor adopts Marg into her house formally. That would only complicate things, especially if the man she marries has grasping family members. 

Eleanor mumbled something about finding bastards of William’s, but Marg has her doubts. No woman has come forward with a blonde haired babe. William favored visiting one brothel close to the docks, The Swarthy Maiden, but none of his favorites have children that look like him. 

Marg frowns. They could lie and keep a child that looks enough like him in the wings, a spare in case Marg’s babe dies in the birthing bed, or, worse, dies young. Marg’s hand tightens around her stomach. 

“What are you thinking, Marg?” Eleanor asks, breaking Marg’s musings. 

“Succession. Are you sure you don’t want to marry?” Marg asks, looking at her friend and almost sighing when she sees the immediate look of disgruntled disgust overtake her pretty face. Yes, Eleanor will likely never marry, not unless the High Septon in King’s Landing makes it legal for two women to marry. 

If only Eleanor had more flexible tastes like Marg. It would be more convenient. But, Marg loves Eleanor as she is, even if it damns their whole house to ruin. It’s a thing she and William agreed on before the fool fell off a horse and put them in this mess. 

“Must I?” Eleanor asks, looking all of her age in that moment. Seven and ten and acting as though she’s being told to eat ugly looking greens. How Eleanor can seem so old and so young at once, Marg has no clue. 

“As is, we have only an unborn babe as an heir to your holdings, Eleanor,” Marg says bluntly. “You have no first cousins to have take your name.”

Marg had already pursued that avenue, and was very unhappy to find they wouldn’t have some convenient relative to pass the whole house onto like one Jeyne Arryn a hundred years ago. The late Lord Willis Mooton was an only child, and Eleanor’s mother, a Peasbury, had only an unmarried sister and the current Lord Peasbury for a brother. A stormlander. 

Marg is not handing off the wealth of these lands to a damned backwater stormlander, no matter how profitable the Peasbury farms are. 

Eleanor pauses, peering at the two scribes standing in the room and the castle steward, Ronell. Measuring if they’re worth letting in on secrets she has no business speaking with witnesses, no doubt. Always so obvious in her calculation past the blank face. Mayhaps Marg is just so familiar with her that it’s easy to see what she may be thinking. 

Eleanor looks back at Marg. 

“Surely William had at least one bastard,” Eleanor says dryly.

“He didn’t. I checked,” Marg says with a similar tone. 

“Why couldn’t he love whores like he loved riding around the woods?” Eleanor says mournfully, putting a hand to her forehead and massaging a headache. The other scribe, Yorrik Rivers, makes a noise in the back of his throat. Similar to a dying goose. He’s a distant cousin of the Tullys, with all the red hair and freckles but none of the loveliness of Lady Catelyn and Lady Lysa. 

He’s still at an age where he’s ungainly and growing into his body. Perhaps he’ll become more handsome like the Blackfish if given time. 

“Mayhaps we could worry about Maidenpool’s more pressing issues, m’ladies,” Steward Ronell says, looking up from his table full of numbers and details on the farms in the Mooton lands. He’s scrubbing a worried hand through his beard. “Lady Eleanor is still young yet, and the war is finally over. I would wager these damned refugees pose more of a threat than a succession crisis.”

Bold of him to say as much, but neither Eleanor nor Marg have ever had an interest in simpering underlings. Other Lords may relish in shoving lowborn noses into the dirt, but good counsel is good counsel. William was too weak willed to go against such ideas when he was alive, and Lord Willis—

Well. Nevermind. She still can’t think of her foster father, good-father now, overmuch, even three years after he’s gone. And the maester says melancholy is bad for the babe. 

“You’re completely right, Ronell,” Eleanor says quickly, grasping at an excuse to avoid thinking about marriage with obvious desperation. “I’ll need to meet with the labor officers tomorrow. Tonight, I’ll see to the people’s concerns in the main hall. Can you organize it?”

“As m’lady wills,” Ronell says dutifully, even as that peculiar vein in his forehead starts bulging with stress. Marg will have him see the maester about that, it can’t be good for him to be taken by ill humors everytime Eleanor comes home. 

Marg sits back and watches Eleanor work, glad to hear her voice again, no matter the circumstances. Marg will need to grill the new scribes on their loyalties. She doesn’t doubt Eleanor and Ser Dorin both have already pressed them, but it never hurts to be thorough. Especially when Marg is the one responsible for managing possible spies and sneaks. 

The Tullys keep watch on them through Ser Oscar, though the old man is blunt in that that’s why he was sent to the Mootons some four decades ago. The Frey have a squire of one of the household knights. The neighboring Rykker have both a serving girl and a laundress. 

Spies. Spies, Marg deals with, and Eleanor handles the rest. It’s neater that way. Eleanor finds the sneaking to be too impractical and tedious when she can use her blunt charisma to learn whatever she wants from others. Marg loves it about her, especially when she knows the woman is capable of acting with decorum and chooses not to. 

Not everyone can be charmed into docility. Marg won’t let any fool take advantage of house Mooton, even if it means she must use some dishonorable means. 

Honor is for knights. Marg is a woman. She rubs her belly, and hopes once again for a baby girl. Even if it’s an inconvenient want. They have already had one Lady take the lordship over Maidenpool. Why not another?

Eleanor Mooton

A thousand fucking refugees. A thousand. 

It’s not the kind of numbers Eleanor is used to dealing with in King’s Landing, but still. Absurd! 

She supposes she should be more exact. It’s nine-hundred-eighty-three. She figures it doesn’t matter if she rounds up, since they could have missed a dozen or so in the count. 

Eleanor sits at the high backed chair of her father with solemn concern, nodding along with a disgruntled merchant and his worries. 

“—and it’s unseemly to have them pittering around in front of the city, m’lady, no matter the piety in taking them in! I beg of you, cast these beggars from our lands before they invite more ruin.” 

He has a lot of bluster for a man who makes all of his money by owning trade ships. She supposes that will give you a big head, being a merchant with growing prospects, especially when you’re used to being listened to. 

“Master Seapin,” Eleanor interrupts before he can take up any more of her time. “I hear your concerns. However, it is the duty of a noble house to guard their subjects from harm and starvation. The people outside and within my walls will be seen to, provided you have patience.”

“My lady, you are good and merciful, the Maiden smiles on you,” Master Seapin says, gesturing with a thick hand. “but those wastrels are not the responsibility of your house, none would charge you with such! They are castoffs of other lesser lords lands—”

Eleanor scowls, and the man shuts his mouth with an audible clack. Any murmuring in the hall of waiting petitioners goes silent. One of Eleanor’s salmon banners flaps ominously by the door. 

“Do you decide the responsibilities of my house?” Eleanor asks, sitting up in her chair and looking down at him with great judgment. “Speak carefully, Master Seapin. Are you the one who chooses what souls are and are not under the care of house Mooton?”

“No, of course not, my Lady,” Master Seapin says quickly, face reddening and bowing his head.

“I understand your fears, but those who camp outside Maidenpool’s walls are smallfolk of the Riverlands, and they have come to my lands to seek aid. I would be a poor Lady to turn them away, especially when my own farms have been burnt and lay empty,” Eleanor explains, still eyeing the man sharply for inconveniencing her. 

“Yes, my Lady. I apologize for my words, I did not mean to speak above my station.” Master Seapin looks chastised, at least, but he is also a man forty years her elder, so it’s likely he resents having to listen to her at all.

Ugh. She hates the groveling, and hates herself more for inspiring it. 

“It’s good of you to tell me your fears and how you feel, Master Seapin, I welcome it,” Eleanor says with a sigh, leaning back against her chair. “But I will not let the hungry and destitute die for my own inaction. It is not just piety. It is what is right. Have patience, and my results will speak for themselves. You are dismissed.”

“Thank you for your time, Lady Mooton.”

Archibald Seapin walks away from the dias with a slump to his shoulders and a frown on his wrinkling face. He’s not the only man with concerns like his own, but she’s sure her response will make all the others in line know this is not a thing she’ll be amicable to changing her mind on. 

“State your name and your profession for the Lady,” Ser Oscar instructs the next in line, a young woman with a baby on her front. 

“Arla, m’lady. I’m a whore at the Mermaid’s Fishden,” she says bluntly. Eleanor appreciates the honesty and knows that this next complaint will, at least, not be a waste of her time. 

“Well met, Arla. What do you need of me?” Eleanor asks, smiling.

Eleanor could see why Arla was a prostitute, considering her buttery, long blonde hair and oval face. She looks like she’s stepped out of a pre-raphaelite painting. Even frowning as she is, she looks gorgeous. 

“A man in your army, from the Daring Rangers, he has a daughter he won’t claim,” Arla says, reaching and petting the head of her black haired babe. Eleanor feels a headache coming on. A mercenary with little interest in his bastard. Great.

“Are the Daring Rangers still in port?” Eleanor asks. They had better be. She’s going to be having words with the captain. 

“Aye. He’s being a great fu— a great lout and is saying the babe can’t be his. She has his hair and eyes! He has great pouches of silver he wastes on the betting house and he won’t spare a coin for his own kin,” Arla huffs. 

Arla has blonde hair, and the baby is dark haired. Eleanor believes her that the child takes more after the father. 

“I’ll have my men bring him to me and we’ll decide on the matter together later, Arla. Do you have enough money to care for the babe for another week?” Eleanor asks. Two of her scribes are writing down the details of each concern being brought to her, so she’ll be able to look back and find the details of this case. 

Arla worries her pretty lip between her teeth. “Aye, I can keep her fed another week. My madame ain’t happy I had little Eva at all, but I’ve been staying with a friend.”

Eleanor pulls out her own coin pouch, pulls out two dragons. What’s the harm?

“Here’s coin to tide you over, should the man not be agreeable to seeing to his daughter. Ser Oscar, hand her the coins for me, please,” Eleanor says, dropping the coin into the man’s weathered hand and watching Arla go wide eyed at it when he holds it out to her. 

“Oh— no m’lady! That’s too much!”

Eleanor suddenly wants to give her two more, just to spite the humility. She resists. 

“You deserve security for both yourself and your child, Arla. This is the least I can provide,” Eleanor says with a wave of her hand. “One of my scribes is going to speak to you now to have the details of where you live so that I may summon you in a week's time. Be well.”

Eleanor does like listening to petitioners, even if some of them can be tedious. 

Eleanor paces her solar and plots, desperate for the leave to go bother her blacksmith about her long left idle printing press project. 

Right now, she has greater concerns. 

The people outside the city need proper homes, and she needs to have carpenters put to that task as soon as possible. She can’t have people living in tents, it’s inhumane. They’ll catch a cold and die. 

Eleanor is not going to be responsible for that. Oh no. They’re getting proper houses with proper fireplaces and they won’t share quarters with pigs! That’s final!

Well. Unless it’s a beloved pet pig who is house trained. But they’ll have to make a very good case for it. 

Then, of course, there’s the farms to be considered. The Mooton lands weren’t so ravaged as other houses, but along the kingsroad many farms had been pillaged. It’s to be expected, considering two separate armies marched down them both headed for the Trident and leaving it. 

Eleanor needs some of her wayward people back on those farms, which means the farms need to be repaired and the fields cleared. She’ll need carpenters to survey the farms along the kingsroad, hell, she needs to look at her tax statements to be sure about how many farms exist down that road. 

Tax collectors, they would probably know. She’ll talk to Ronell about it, after she finds someone to be his assistant. The man seems like he’s going to go into cardiac arrest with stress and Eleanor is not training a new steward on top of this. Ronell has four daughters and a son, doesn’t he? Surely at least one is worth making an assistant! 

“Ronell,” Eleanor says abruptly, looking over at where the man is reading through their numbers of grain stores. Eleanor hopes they have enough to tide them over until the next harvest, the Reach is spitefully overcharging every rebel on grain from what she’s heard. That includes the entire desperate Riverlands. 

Eleanor will need to write Robert about that, or, better, write Jon Arryn about it. 

“Yes, m’lady?” Ronell asks, looking up at her with a blink. 

“You need assistants. I am working you into an early grave.”

Ronell gets a stricken face that almost sends Eleanor into a panic. “Am I not doing good service to m’lady? Have I made some mistake?”

“No, Ronell, I’m worried for your damn health!” Eleanor says with a huff, waving away his earnestness. “You’re a man with too many fingers in too many pies, you need to delegate. Gods know I need to take my own advice as well. Find four assistants to help you with your duties and run them by Marg, by week’s end, please .”

Ronell has been steward since before she was born. She can’t lose him because she overworked him. Her father would disapprove. 

Ronell sighs, scratching a hand on his salt and pepper bearded chin. The panic seems to leave him all at once, leaving him slumping. 

“Aye, m’lady. I am getting on in years, aren’t I? Just yesterday you were a wee babe trailing after your Lord father’s heels.”

Eleanor looks away, focusing instead on the map on the table of her holdings. 

“I remember many comparisons to ducklings,” Eleanor replies, startling a small chuckle out of the steward. 

“You were the most serious of ducklings, I assure you. And your Lord father the most doting of ducks.”

Now Eleanor laughs. For a moment the weight of endless tasks lifts from her shoulders. 

At least she’s home and surrounded by family, friends, and allies. That’s more than she can say of King’s Landing. 

“Let’s take a break, Ronell. Do you think the city will burn if we spend a candle turn drinking spiced wine?” Eleanor asks, smiling wide. 

Ronell gives the papers before them one final dread laden look, then nods. 

“The city will stand while we’re occupied, Lady Eleanor. I believe there’s a few bottles of a new vintage from the Reach in the cellar.”

So Eleanor day drinks, and her steward catches her up on the latest gossip within the keep. All in all? It’s a good homecoming. 

Chapter Text

Tenth Moon, 283 AC, Maidenpool

Eleanor Mooton

The past few months have been tedious, trying, and infuriating in turn. Eleanor Mooton had plans, and now she's cleaning up messes that she wouldn't have had to in the first place if she'd been at Maidenpool this whole damn time. 

Luckily, some things are going better than others. 

“The letters were the worst of the trouble, milady. The press machine itself was easy to construct,” master Arlow the smith explains dutifully, watching a carpenter adjust the press. 

"But you believe casting pages for a few short prayer books would be possible?" Eleanor asks. 

"More than possible. We could get it printed by the week's end, so long as you hand over a book today. No clue how you want the paper bound, though. You'll need to look around for a good binder here in the city." 

Eleanor nods, gesturing a hand to her scribe to write that down and eyeballing the new contraption plucked straight from her vague dreams and memories. Brought to life here in Westeros by the expertise of a master smith and carpenter with more ideas about how to make machines than Eleanor has ever had. 

A proper, functioning printing press. And it only took her a few months. 

Gods be good, the maesters are going to gut her for this once they catch wind of it. Eleanor is doing her best to ensure master Arlow and his two apprentices are being paid well enough for their silence, along with the carpenter and his three assistants. That's seven possible leaks to account for. Here's to hoping they all don't gossip about it with their family and friends. 

"I'll have a short prayer book sent down to you from the keep by day's end, master Arlow. Thank you again for your discretion and your work, and that goes to you as well, master Brandon," Eleanor says, offering the carpenter, master Brandon, a nod. 

"Ye're paying mightily well for us to keep our gobs shut, Lady Mooton. A man would be soft in the head not to do well for ye," master Brandon says agreeably, leaning away from the printing press and wiping his hands off on his thick leather apron. 

With a few final notes and swift goodbyes, Eleanor leaves the warm workshop she'd acquired for the printing press production and out into the morning chill of the city. Eleanor can smell the sea in the air and hear the disgruntled squawks of a few seagulls. There's a quartet of the birds down the street fighting over some morsel. A raven seems to be sneaking up on them just as Eleanor looks away.

Steffon Frey, her scribe, stumbles out the door behind her. He's fumbling with a few of his papers as he reorganizes his clipboard. One of them flies out of his grasp in his efforts. 

Ser Jonquil clears the door of the workshop just as the paper begins its descent to the road. His hand shoots out and he catches it just before it lands in a puddle. 

"Oh no-- many apologies, Lady Mooton, Ser Jonquil!" Steffon says, flushing bright red with embarrassment as Jonquil gently returns the paper to him.

"It's alright, Steffon. I've dropped worse things," Eleanor says with a sigh. She reaches up and rubs at her eyes, hoping her tiredness will flee with each swipe of her palm. She's never enjoyed waking up early, and especially not for business. "I suppose I should have brought another scribe, so you wouldn't have to deal with all those papers alone."

"No! It's alright, m'lady. I'm able. I don't need any help," Steffon insists. He would be more convincing if he weren't so young. Every time Eleanor looks at one of her scribes her mind starts thinking about child labor laws and whether she should give them all tutors. Surely their education doesn't need to end at thirteen or fifteen? They're all good with sums and writing, but any growing young man needs time to pursue hobbies and learn histories. 

Then again, they do learn a lot while they're on the job with her. Like how tedious getting much of anything done that isn’t extorting people is. Feudal life is quite well suited for extortion and murder, and not much else. Even farming is inefficient. 

Well. Farming is always at least a little tedious, but she digresses. 

"What do you like to do in your free time, Steffon?" Eleanor asks, starting down the street towards the labor office. That's their next stop of the day. Eleanor wants to see personally what the office needs. Steffon and Jonquil follow, Jonquil with practiced ease and Steffon with just a moment's hesitation. 

"Oh, I don't know. Reading, I suppose. You have many books in your library, and Maester Lark lets us read most of them." 

"And you'll have more books to read soon, provided we can borrow a few copies from the Red Keep when we next return," Eleanor says with a hum. 

Steffon brightens, opening his mouth to speak before pausing and looking around. He continues in a secretive tone. "Because we'll be able to make our own copies with the machine, Lady Mooton?" 

"Many many of our own copies." Eleanor grins, feeling the morning sun warm her face as it peaks over the roofs. Finally her sleepiness begins to pull away from her bones. 

"Do you think it will be hard to convince the Grand Maester to lend us books?" Steffon asks. "I went to the Red Keep's library, and we were told no books were to leave there." 

"With the way I'm about to fix the king's city, I doubt it will matter if the Grand Maester wants to lend the books or not."

And it won't. One word from Robert will likely mean Eleanor can borrow as many books as she likes. It does help that Robert doesn't care for reading and likely wouldn't care about how expensive it will be if she accidentally damages any of his books. Which she will not. She would rather do any number of unpleasant things than risk damage to any of the Red Keep's old manuscripts. 

In an ideal world, she could bring a printing press back with her to King's Landing. This is not an ideal world, not yet. Not until she can organize some sort of deal with the faith to provide chapters of the Seven Pointed Star for them. With the faith's backing and stake in the press, the Citadel won't have as much room to fuck with her. She doesn’t want them pressuring her into handing over the blueprints or sabotaging her machines. 

She would like to encourage more people within Maidenpool to take up writing so not all of the market is holy books, but she'll need to improve literacy rates first. Schools are in order, likely also in conjunction with the faith. 

A meeting with the Septa of Jonquil's Pool will need to happen, Eleanor thinks. And with the Septon of the adjoining Sept. 

Eleanor turns the corner of the street, getting a view of a growing line before the Labor Office. She sighs, deeply and with great feeling.

"Are you ready to do more writing, Steffon?" 

Steffon shuffles his papers again, and Eleanor starts towards the office. Hopefully going early in the day will mean she won't get mobbed. It would be a very unfortunate way to die, and she’d feel bad for poor little Steffon. He may be a Frey, but he’s the least objectionable of the Freys she’s met.

—

(A letter written in a sloppy hand, not unlike the one Eleanor received months ago thanking her for swearing to his cause. Now with far more familiarity and complaining. The titles at the end seem to have been added by a different, far more elegant hand.)

Mooton, 

Ned said my letter was welcome, but that he won't be coming to my wedding. “His lands need to be put to order.” Damn him. His wife named his son for me, did you know? Robb Stark. I know he misliked the way the princess and her children died, but what was I to do? The lion had them killed before I even got through the gates. Will he assign blame for the rest of our lives for that? Will I ever meet the boy named for me? Was my apology not enough?

I don't usually write. Not a man for reading, but all I've had around me are Lannisters and Jon since you left. It would drive any man to words. I'd take even Stannis's straining silences over Tywin Lannister's glaring and Jon’s muttering about weddings. 

How fare your lands? Any bandits in need of killing? Gods, say yes. I'll be there within the week. The war is almost through and there's no killing left to be done. I wish I had foisted the chair on Jon and left for the Stormlands. Damn my blood, damn my Targaryen grandmother. She’s glaring up at me from the sixth hell. 

Write back soon. The only thing I've been looking forward to is drinking and whores. But you have asked me not to overindulge, you septa, and you said the whoring would anger my wife. What lord doesn't visit whores? Besides her damned father. That man has no passion for anything besides gold. He's funding the wedding by himself, making up for his late arrival to the war. He's almost as bad as the Frey.

Baratheon

First of his name, King of the Andals and the Rhoynar and the First Men, Protector of the Realm, Lord Paramount of the Stormlands, Lord of Storm's End

Ours is the Fury

—

(A reply. Far better handwriting, though hurried. An air of irreverence bleeds through each letter. There’s a little smudge at the edge of the paper that looks almost as if someone had too much ink on their hands and left an imprint when holding the sheet.)

To the King Robert Baratheon, First of his name, etcetera etcetera,

There are no bandits. At least, none my own men cannot bring to justice. Do not come here, lest my good-sister hang me for having her organize a grand feast. She is pregnant, as it turns out, and I am not one to irritate a woman in such a state. You will irritate her greatly. Before you ask, the child isn't being named for you. I'm sure you'll have plenty of courtiers with squalling little Roberts and Berts and Robins for you to contend with in the next five years. 

If you do suggest any names, I will be obligated to share them with her. Whether she listens is another thing entirely.

On the matter of Lord Stark:

Lord Stark likely is putting his lands to order, even if he may be angered still by the deaths of the royal children and Princess Elia. You know how many men the north raised for you far better than I. All of those men must be returned to their towns and villages and farms. The next harvest will depend on them. 

I will say that you having apologized for the whole affair likely bought you more good-will with him, even if it wasn't enough to bring him back south so soon. 

Be patient, though I know it brings you physical pain. Your brother Lord Stannis is still trying to secure the queen and her children, if Rhaella even lives. Should he take them, you will need to ensure they aren't killed if you don't want all to remember you as the king who had the last of the Targaryen children killed. I have a feeling Lord Stark will dislike that even more, atop of the business with Princess Elia. 

All I will say is betrothals and the Wall are convenient ways to avoid Blackfyre related problems. Though I am loath to say a boy of seven should be sent to such an awful place. The rest of the council will probably say to kill him instead. You can assume how I feel about such a plan of action. I hate to even put such words onto paper, the old and the new know your new Grand Maester and Master of whispers read all of your correspondence.

I will return for your wedding, perhaps with Margery, my good-sister, in tow. She is not far along, but I worry for her health at Kingslanding. I'll likely need to employ a taster. 

On whores, since you must complain to me as though I am your personal septon and not a friend giving excellent advice: 

Your soon to be wife does not suffer competition well, nor does she like even the implication of being supplanted. If I were you I would be afraid to even look in the direction of a brothel, let alone a serving woman. And I have on good authority Lord Tywin does go to brothels, he's just discreet. A trait you may need to emulate. 

Perhaps spar more instead? There are plenty of bored knights in the castle with you. I hear hitting things is almost like fucking, and it may help you find the last few members of the Kingsguard you need. With more Kingsguard, you’ll have more excuses to get up to things Lord Jon wouldn’t approve of. 

Be well, write back when you have more complaints. Be careful what you write down and who you hand the letter to. Or don’t, I am not the King between us. 

Your friend, 

Eleanor Mooton

Lady of Maidenpool, Liason to the smallfolk, Terribly bored of looking through tax reports, bereft of other titles in comparison

Wisdom and Strength

—

"Should we be worrying about names when we don't know if it will be a boy or a girl?" Eleanor asks from her desk, looking up from a few reports to watch Margery Mooton flip through a dusty Mooton genealogy book. She's sneezed at least twice so far from turning pages, and it's making Eleanor wonder about the state of care in the library. 

"Better to get things over with early, in my opinion. Maester Lark thinks it will be a boy, on account of me already showing so much. I'm not so sure," Marg mutters, scowling down at the names of Eleanor's ancestors. 

"I heard you could pee on a toad to show if it's a boy or a girl," Eleanor replies thoughtfully, pondering about where to procure a few toads. It does seem unfortunate to subject a toad to such a thing.

"You sound like Lark! I'm not relieving myself anywhere near a toad!" Marg says with a huff, shutting the book swiftly. She sneezes again. 

Eleanor shakes her head, looking back down at her reports. She'd just sent off a letter to Robert, and now she's left worrying about more important things. Like all of the empty farms and depopulated villages on her land.

And names, apparently. How odd it is to decide on someone else’s name. It seems like the sort of thing that is easy to fuck up.

“William, if it’s a boy,” Eleanor offers. It’s a paltry suggestion, she doesn’t really want to risk her possible nephew being much like his father. This will be the person she is trusting to keep Maidenpool running and treat her people well when she’s dead. William was a poor steward and a poorer leader. For all that he was her brother. 

Marg curls her lip. “Myles, or Willis, for your father.”

Marg and William hadn’t been very good at being married, for the short month they were. Eleanor blames it on Marg having been raised with them. It’s a bit like marrying your sister, and when you aren’t a Targaryen (or a Lannister) that doesn’t really have much appeal. 

“Poor boy. We’ll just hope it’s a girl. Girl names are far more varied,” Eleanor says dryly. 

“If it isn’t, I’m afraid I may have to pick a girlish one in protest.” 

“Jonquil would be my choice. Ser Jonquil would surely appreciate the gesture.” Eleanor skims another report, frowning deeply at it. Three deserted villages close to their border with house Paege, several farms looted and in disrepair close to there as well. It’s to the west, closer to where Rhaegar's armies would have had to run through to reach the bulk of the riverlands. 

Eleanor wishes she could kick the dead man for it and his army’s “foraging”. She settles for being satisfied he died sopping wet and at the other end of a very big hammer. 

Eleanor makes a few quick notes for her labor office, then sets the report onto a related pile. 

“My mother was named Alysanne,” Margery says suddenly, tone different. There is no teasing. Just a sudden soberness that has Eleanor looking up and paying attention. 

Marg is looking down at the Mooton book, fiddling with her long sleeves. She’s wearing a gold dress today, paired with a necklace of interlocking rose-gold salman and ruby earrings. She looks beautiful. 

Marg’s mother died just before she was sent to foster.

“Then your daughter should be named Alysanne,” Eleanor states, as though there is no other way of things. “Or a son should be Alyn. Simple.”

“There haven’t been any Alysanne’s in the Mooton family. You did try and kill the good queen,” Marg says, looking up and tapping the Mooton book with a wry twist to her lips. 

Eleanor rolls her eyes. “I wasn’t there, don’t lump me in with them. And I could have sworn it was the septas who tried to kill her. The Mootons have always been good friends of whomever is warming the iron throne.”

Good friends of Targaryens, mostly. Eleanor is just broadening the family tradition to include all monarchs. How modern of her. How progressive.

She really should get to designing some guillotines. Not for her, but maybe her grandnieces and nephews will appreciate it. Better to set them up to lead the mob than be eaten by it. 

Hm. Then again, they might deserve the mob. She’ll simply strive to raise children who aren’t stupid enough to think they are immune to consequence and hope for the best. A great emphasis on charity, public works, and paying people well. 

Better yet, Eleanor should just look into writing down more laws protecting the smallfolk, ones with Robert’s signature and a big stick attached. In case of dissenters. 

Marg leans back upon Eleanor’s sofa, letting out a soft breath. She presses a hand to her stomach.

“Alright. Alysanne or Alyn Mooton. It feels a bit more real when they have a name,” Marg mutters. 

“It’ll be even more real when you’ve got them in your hands,” Eleanor agrees. “I wonder, will I become regent when they’re born? I inherited Maidenpool on account of them not being born yet, but one would argue I’m just here to keep the seat warm until they’re six and ten now that we know of them.”

Marg grimaces, probably recognizing that any teenager who isn’t Eleanor will likely be far worse at governing. “It’s a mother’s duty to protect the claims of her children, isn’t it? Perhaps we keep them well distracted and educated until it’s time to retire to some Dornish estate. Five and twenty, at least.” 

“I do love fruit, they have plenty of that in Dorne.” 

This is likely the least maternal conversation two women expecting to raise a child have ever had.

To all the gods, save the red one and drowned one, Eleanor prays they don’t fuck this up. 

Eleanor stands from her desk and stretches, listening to her bones crack and feeling her muscles ache from all the sitting. 

“Oh, would you like to go to the royal wedding?” Eleanor asks, walking around her desk to stand before Marg. Eleanor picks up the discarded Mooton book at her side and fiddles with it, checking if it’s truly as dusty as she thought. She opens it and blanches at the state of it, before sneezing. 

Marg huffs, tugging the book out of Eleanor’s hands and tossing it to the far side of the sofa. “And risk someone slipping me moon tea?” 

“We’ll have a taster, and anyone who looks too suspicious can have a stern talk with Dorin,” Eleanor says, wiping her hands off on her gown. 

“I suppose it would be nice to watch if the couple is as poorly matched as you say.” Marg reaches up and takes Eleanor’s hands, before she wipes any dust and ink too deeply into the fabric. Her own hands have charcoal on them, likely from sketching. It’s funny, seeing the splotches of dark dark ink on Eleanor’s fingers intertwined with the smudges of charcoal. 

She hasn’t been painting as much since she got pregnant. Eleanor doesn’t blame her, medieval paint is terrible for you. 

“They look like an excellent match, but then they open their mouths,” Eleanor says, smiling as Marg rubs a thumb over her knuckles. 

“I suppose I could be convinced to leave the keep,” Marg sighs. “But you have to ride in the wheelhouse with me, I won’t be able to ride a horse.” 

Ugh. The things Eleanor does for love. 

“We’ll bring my horse, just in case. Never know when a woman needs to make a daring escape with a damsel in hand.”

Marg guffaws. “A damsel? You needed me to save you from a rat!” 

Eleanor flushes, sputtering. “It was a very big rat, monstrous, even. Maybe I’m the damsel in this analogy! You’re pregnant, not incapable!”

Eleanor doesn’t want to talk about the rat. She didn’t know they got that big until she came to Westeros. She feels ill even thinking about it. And really, Marg has always been better at using sharp implements than Eleanor. 

Without preamble, Marg laughs some more and presses a kiss to Eleanor’s hands, then releases them. Eleanor blinks. Before she can register what’s happening Marg is already standing and leaving the room. 

“Don’t stay up too late, El, I expect you to break your fast with me on the morrow!”

Marg opens the door to Eleanor’s solar and leaves with a quiet goodnight to the guard outside it. The door shuts, and Eleanor is alone. 

Eleanor stares at the door, then her knuckles, then brainlessly wanders back to her desk and starts drafting another letter to Robert. She’ll probably burn it before sending it, but one really must express their feelings somehow.

—

(A burned letter with far too many scratched out thoughts related to Harrenhall, the old gods, and beautiful, olive skinned and dark haired women.)

—and I haven’t a clue how you bed so many women. Just loving one is making me mad, though you wouldn’t understand that metaphor. Maybe that kiss at Harrenhall wasn’t just because she was excited for me? Jaime had just been sworn to the kingsguard, you see. Neither of us wanted to be married to each other. 

Gods. Why am I writing to you? You would say just bed her and be done with it, and bed the rest of my household while I’m at it. Then to tell you all the entertaining details over drinks. Scandalous and likely to get me killed by the faith. I should just talk to Edmer and hope he doesn’t gossip.