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Chapter Text

Sansa's screams tore the relative calm of the road outside the inn. She screamed at the top of her lungs and fought with all she had against the man who wanted to take her away by force, but there was nothing that she, a fragile highborn girl, could do against the Mountain. He took her with one enormous hand only, lifted her up and placed her on the saddle of his horse and tied her to it with rope, so that she couldn't move. All that she could do was keep screaming as she was taken away; she pleaded for mercy, she begged, she cried…

… but no one listened.

One last teeth-wrenching scream was heard before she became suddenly silent and disappeared into the distance atop the Mountain's destrier.

"NED!"

Cersei Lannister could understand how Sansa felt at that moment. She had also had had a child taken away from her, though in not quite the same way. Myrcella had been taken away to keep her safe from the dangers of war. Sansa's child, on the other hand… Well, only the gods knew if she would ever see him again.

Cersei had to admit, she was admired. She had always considered Sansa, that little dove, to be a stupid, worthless, useless girl… But in the moment that her newborn son had been violently ripped from her arms, she had fought like a mad wild beast. There were visible marks that she had left on Joffrey's skin when she had thrown him to the floor and had started beating him in a fit of mad rage and grief. The King's face, neck and hands were scratched and bleeding. It was most likely that he would also have a blackened eye later that day. Cersei would have never thought that the Stark girl would have such spirit, that there could be such strength in her. When she had fought for her son, the wolf inside of her had finally truly fully awakened.

But then again, she had just become a mother. And mothers did anything they had to do for their children, Cersei knew that very well.

They were all riding in silence, travelling through the Riverlands to return as soon as possible to King's Landing. The baby had been crying when they took him out of the inn where they had found him and his mother, thanks to the information provided by Gregor Clegane through a raven that he had sent to the King. However, the little bastard, Eddard, was now peacefully quiet in the arms of on of the members of the Kingsguard. Cersei could see him from where she was, and she couldn't help but notice the babe's widely open eyes. They weren't like the eyes of most newborns, unfocused and half close and grey of colour, no. This babe had big blue eyes of the same color as the sky, and they were staring right at the face of the knight that was holding him. That blue colour… Tully blue. It was easy to see that he was the son of Sansa Stark, but ahrd to imagine that he was also the Hound's offspring.

He does have the Clegane size, she thought, noticing how the baby appeared to be several moons old, instead of merely ten days old. He was a very big, strong, healthy babe. It made Cersei despise him all of a sudden. Of course that perfect Sansa Stark had to have a perfect babe, it couldn't have been any other way! A sudden bitterness invaded Cersei's heart as she looked upon the babe, but also, the fact that he seemed to be so perfect made the satisfaction of having ripped him off his mother's arms so much bigger. Cersei urged her horse to get closer to her son Joffrey's, andonce she was by his side she stared at him with a stern face.

"What are you going to do with him?" she asked.

Joffrey stared back at her with an annoyed expression. He was still furious because of the way in which Sansa had beaten and humiliated him back at the inn.

"What?"

"The bastard," Cersei said to clarify her question. There was a ring of disgust in her voice when she pronounced that word, and her usual tone of superiority was noticeable as well. "What are you going to do with him? I suppose that the most obvious course of action would be to kill him… Or better yet, leave him in the woods and let the wild beasts do the job for you."

"No," Joffrey said, rather harshly and aggressively. His response shocked his mother, who did not understand.

"No?" she asked, confused. She tilted her head to the side a little as she looked at her son and frowned. "Then what are your plans?"

"I will find some wench to take care of the bastard. But I'm not going to kill him. I promised Sansa that she would never see him again, so he will be away from court."

"But why keep him? If you don't want Sansa Stark to see her bastard ever again, the easiest thing would be-"

"If I don't kill him, my punishment to Sansa will be far greater than it could ever be if I get rid of the pup," at that moment, Joffrey's features were twisted by a sinister grin that spread over his face. His eyes were taken over by the same dark shadow that was in them when he ordered Ned Stark's execution. Cersei had to admit, it scared even her to see her son with such an expression. "Only I will know what truly happened to the little monster."

Cersei understood then.

"You are going to do the same thing you did with Sandor Clegane," she murmured, and Joffrey nodded.

Upon discovering the affair that his bethroted and his sworn shield were having behind his back, Joffrey had been angered. He wanted to punish them, and while in the not-so-distant past his idea for the perfect punishment would have been to execute them both, his mind had become more twisted recently. He had made Sansa believe that her lover was decapitated, when in truth he had been sent far away to the Wall. Sandor Clegane was alive, but Sansa thought him dead. Now, Joffrey planned to do the same thing with the Hound's bastard pup.

Cersei kept silence for a few seconds, pondering over what Joffrey had said. He wanted to make Sansa suffer beyond any limits. It was his right; after all, she had committed treason against him, the King, by lying with another man. She deserved it.

"You want to make Sansa believe her babe is dead."

For a moment Joffrey didn't respond, but his grin widened.

"That is the thing, mother… She saw me taking the babe, not killing him. She believes that bastard is alive… Knowing Sansa, she has hope. But no one else knows about the babe, nor will they ever know about him. They won't see him, hear of him. It will be like he doesn't even exist. So when Sansa tries to find the pup, or have any news of him, everybody will think that he is dead! For all they know, she ran away from King's Landing pregnant and in great distress. Gregor Clegane found her in the woods, alone and not pregnant, and the babe was nowhere. He was born dead. And I was never here."

Just as Joffrey finished saying those words, there was a loud noise and screams started to be heard behind them. Cersei looked back, and her eyes found the image of the inn that they had just left being devoured by flames, burning to the ground. Some screams were coming from inside the place, and two members of the Kingsguard that had stayed behind were walking away from the fire. Their swords were dripping blood.

They have killed them all, Cersei realized, staring at the raging flames in the distance. Those who had survived the slaughter were being burned alive at that very moment.

She did not care. She did not feel a thing; those people were only peasants, no more valuable than cockroaches. But it did shock and impress her how many precautions Joffrey was taking to make sure that Sansa would never, as he had promised, find her way back to her son again.

"No witnesses," she whispered, and Joffrey nodded with pride.

"Exactly. No one and nothing left to prove to Sansa that what she remembers is real."

"You want her to think she is mad."

"No. I want her to become mad."

A chill ran down Cersei's spine and she shivered, moving uncomfortably on her saddle. She had to admit that Joffrey's intentions were... monstrous.

She deserves it, a voice said in the back of her mind after she imagined even a bit of the horrors that awaited in Sansa Stark's future. She brought it upon herself, for being a whore. what Joffrey is doing is the right thing.

---

That night they reached a second inn, but they did not go inside. Joffrey made everyone stop riding before they reached the inn and then he sent one of the knights that was accompanying him (who wasn't a member of the Kingsguard and thus drew no attention from everyone else) to go inside the inn. He gave orders to the knight to fetch a certain person. Cersei did not recognize the name that her son said, and she wondered who that person might be. It was a woman's name, and she felt curious.

She came to realize on her own who that person was went the knight came back with a young woman. She was normal looking, with long straight hair and big dark brown eyes. She was dressed as a simple peasant, but she looked healthy. Cersei knew then what her son Joffrey wanted her for: to take care of the little bastard, away from Court.

When the young woman, Ellyn, was in front of the King, she knelt on the ground and bowed her head.

"Your Grace..."

"Stand up," he ordered, and so she did, but she kept her head bowed. "I was told that you were fit to take care of a babe?"

"I... yes, Your Grace."

"Do you have any children?"

"My... newborn died... a fortnight ago, Your Grace," the young peasant woman said, trying to keep her voice from breaking after recalling that painful event. Joffrey was not moved by that confession.

"Then you can still nurse a newborn babe. They told me you had already been given information about what your job would be and some instructions. Did you tell anybody that we were coming?"

"No, Your Grace, I didn't tell anyone, I swear," Ellyn said, shaking her head.

"Good. Not take the babe and make him shut up!" Joffrey ordered, annoyed. The baby had started crying half an hour earlier, and by now he was kicking and screaming. More than once, Joffrey had appeared to be tempted to leave him alone in the woods for the wolves to finish him off, just like his mother had suggested earlier that day. Cersei knew that the babe was kicking and screaming that way because he was either hungry or had soiled himself, but she couldn't take care of the babe's needs. And even if she could, she wouldn't do it. She did not want to touch that bastard or have him near her. She did not want to look into those bright blue eyes of his.

Ellyn approached the knight that was holding the babe and took him in her arms. As soon as she saw the babe's rosy face she smiled full of tenderness, feeling again a bit of that motherly love that she had lost when her newborn died.

"I will take good care of him, Your Grace," she promised, looking away from the babe just a second to stare at the King. "Is there anything else you wish from me?"

"No. Just don't tell anyone where you got him, and don't tell anyone we were here, or I will have your head and also your whole family's. And travel to King's Landing three days from now. When you arrive, there will be a house ready for you in Flea Bottom."

"Th-thank you, Your Grace..." the girl said, even though there was nothing to be thankful for. However, she did not want to anger the King.

"I will do as you say, Your Grace... But may I ask what is the babe's name?"

"He doesn't have one," Joffrey lied. Sansa had named her bastard Eddard, like her father, but that wasn't a common name and it would be too obvious. People could figure out who that bastard was just by learning his name if they knew the whole story behind Sansa Stark's pregnancy. "Name him whatever you want, I couldn't care less."

Ellyn stared back at the baby, who seemed too big in her arms. After a few moments, she smiled again.

"He looks like Sanjay to me, Your Grace."

"As I said, I don't care, you stupid girl! Just make him shut up already, before I decide to kill him and kill you as well for being incompetent!"

Ellyn took a step back, frightened, and she looked at the King with an alarmed expression. She hugged the babe- Sanjay- tightly against her chest in a protective way, and then she relaxed and bowed her head to the King again.

"I'm sorry, Your Grace... I will not disappoint you."

"You better not," he snarled before making his horse move away again. He wanted to be gone from that place and reach King's Landing as soon as possible. His knights and Cersei followed him, and no one glanced back to look at the peasant woman and the bastard baby.

Cersei had been watching the whole exchange of words between her son and the peasant girl in silence, not daring to intervene while her son spoke and gave orders, specially when he was so unnerved. When they were far away from that inn and had long ago left the woman and the bastard behind, Cersei approached Joffrey, who was now calmer than before.

"After the bastard is in King's Landing, what are you going to do with him?" she asked. "He is of no use to us, you could just tell the commoner to travel far away with him and disappear."

"He has Stark blood in him. The Starks are weak, and they value their bastards. Maybe in the future, having that bastard in our power will be a benefit for us. Besides, he also has Clegane blood, and the men in that family are strong and fierce warriors, obedient like dogs. He could make a fine sworn shield in the future."

"You want him to become a sworn shield? He is the son of Sandor Clegane, a traitor!" Cersei exclaimed, alarmed with her son's announcement. How could he want to trust his or his future heir's life to the bastard offspring of that man... and of the Stark whore?!

"Don't worry, mother... The Hound was weak in the end, but he was the exception in the family. He was given too much freedom to do what he wanted. However, if we train the basted to be a good dog like his other relatives, he could turn into the second Mountain. Gregor Clegane is his uncle, after all, there must be some of his fierceness in his blood."

"You expect the bastard to turn like Gregor Clegane? What if he is not like him? What if he turns out to have his father's weakness? Or worse, his mother gentleness?"

"He won't. We will raise him right," Joffrey said with confidence, and with sadistic enjoyment. "Sansa's child will be a monster."

Joffrey did not love to see his promise fulfilled. A couple of moons later, during his wedding feast, he was poisoned. The Imp had been accused of the murder, but the little monster had managed to escape.

Cersei was loosing everything. She only had her youngest son, Tommen, left, and a dream of revenge on all those that she believed were responsible for her pain.

She thought that the Stark girl must have been behind Joffrey's murder. For almost a year they had believed the girl to he dead after her husband, and his entire household perished when Clegane Keep was burning to the ground one day for unknown reasons. They never found Sansa's body, but they just assumed that it was one of the burned corpses that no one could recognize.

However, her spies had informed Cersei earlier that day that Sansa wasn't dead. She was very much alive, and in company of her lover Sandor Clegane. They had been reunited, and Cersei hated them for it. She hated that they had found their way to each other. Why did everything have to work so nicely for Sansa Stark, while her own world was crumbling to the ground around her? It wasn't fair!

The bad news didn't end there. Not only were the Stark girl and her lover together once more, but they were also coming to King's Landing to get their own revenge. They had travelled and managed to find the Mother of Dragons, Daenerys Targaryen. They had an army, and dragons, and they were coming to burn King's Landing to take Cersei's kingdom away and kill her.

She would not have it. She knew that even with the biggest army, she couldn't win against three grown fire-breathing dragons, it was impossible. If she stayed in Westeros they would find her and they would kill her.

She didn't have anything left in that place anyways. Her son was dead. Her brother Jaime didn't love her anymore. He father was dead. At least her daughter Myrcella was safe in Dorne. The only valuable things that Cersei had left with her were her son Tommen, her life, and her throat for blood and revenge. Revenge for her son's death, her father's death, the loss of everything that she had, her crown...

She wasn't going to let them defeat her, so she took part of the Lannister army. Her father had brought them to the city, and they were hers after he died. She couldn't take all of them, they were too many men and there weren't enough ships at that moment in King's Landing, so she took the best five thousand soldiers. They were ordered to board the ships with Cersei and Tommen one night, and by the time that the city was sacked by Daenerys's dragons and her army, Cersei was well away from King's Landing, crossing the Narrow Sea to reach the Free Cities.

She was happy because she and her son were safe, and they had managed to take a small army with them to defend them if it were necessary. That army would do them much good when they were in the Free Cities. On the other hand, she was also furious. She was furious because they had forced her to escape, to run away in fear like a scared rat. She was a lioness of Casterly Rock! And she would have her vengeance... She would have her vengeance of the new Dragon Queen, and the Starks, and Clegane, and every single worthless bastard that had stepped in her way!

The cry of a baby brought her back to reality after she had been hours on the deck of the ship, staring into the horizon, lost in her own thoughts. She turned around, enraged, only to find that pathetic commoner woman, Ellyn, trying to get the bastard baby to be quiet. The woman had travelled to King's Landing just as Joffrey had commanded her, and she had been raising the babe who was now a little bit over a year old. He had grown a lot and appeared to be much older than he really was. Cersei had ordered the woman to come with them because she could not bear the thought of Sansa Stark reaching King's Landing and finding her bastard son there. Cersei wanted to continue Joffrey's plan, and never let Sansa see her son again. But now, away from Westeros and lost in the middle of the Narrow Sea, Cersei hated that baby more than she had ever done before.

"Give him to me!" she hissed to Ellyn, taking the baby away from the commoner's arms. The woman tried to protest, but Cersei was already walking away towards the railing of the ship.

"Wait, Your Grace, please don't!" Ellyn cried out when she saw Cersei's intentions. She wanted to throw the bastard overboard and let him drown in the Narrow Sea, or allow the sea monsters to eat him. She had never ever desired so much to get rid of a human being, except that time when she plotted her husband's death.

"It is all your fault..." she hissed full of hate, not looking at she baby as she approached the railing and extended her arms, still holding the babe. "If it weren't for you, if you didn't exist... you who're mother and your traitor father wouldn't have come back. They would have never sought out the Targaryen girl, and I wouldn't have had to flee! I hate you..." she clenched her jaw to the point where it became painful, but she didn't care. She could just focus on her hate and her grief, and on how much she wanted to make Sansa Stark suffer. The only way that she could think of doing that right now was to kill the person that was the reason why the girl had travelled half around the world to get an army and ruin Cersei's life.

She was about to throw the baby overboard, she was ready for it... But then she lowered her gaze, and her eyes met the babe's.

They were wide open and staring right back at her. They were Tully blue, and for a moment Cersei felt like it was Sansa Stark staring back at her, instead of her bastard infant.

She remembered then Joffrey's plans for that child. He was like his mother, but he also strongly resembled his father. They only had to put a little effort into him, and make sure that he grew up with the useful characteristics of the Clegane men...

Being out the monster.

Cersei forgot all about her desire of throwing the child overboard. She held him with more care in her arms, and a sky smile appeared on her face.

"Yes..." she murmured as her plans for the future started evolving in her mind. "You will be my revenge... You, little Sanjay."

She turned around and walked away from the railing of the ship, approaching Ellyn again; the woman was watching in terror, not knowing what the Queen was going to do with the child. But Cersei had other intentions, she didn't want to harm the little bastard... Not at that moment, at least.

"When the time comes, you will destroy the Starks for me, Sanjay."

Without another word, she have the babe to Ellyn, who took him and walked away from the Queen as fast as she could. Cersei watched the commoner woman taking the bastard away, and she saw the infant was still staring at her with his big, Tully blue eyes. Instead of being bothered by those eyes, for the first time Cersei felt happy.

Oh, Sansa..., she thought. One day I will come back, and I will bring your son back to you... And you will wish that that day had never come. You will wish that he had never been born.

Chapter Text

3 years later.

"Sanjay, what are you doing?" Ellyn asked from the door of the small room.

It was long past Sanjay's hour to wake up from bed, but the little four-year-old was still hiding beneath the bed sheets. When he heard the woman's voice he lazily opened one of his big blue eyes and looked at her.

"I'm tired," he said with a voice that sounded too baby-like for him. Even though he was only four, Sanjay was already almost as tall as some boys three years older than him, and it was shocking the contrast that there was between his aspect and his real age.

Ellyn chuckled and approached the bed, sitting on it. She smiled at the boy and touched the tip of his noise playfully.

"Well, if you hadn't stayed up until past midnight last night, then you wouldn't be tired today!" she exclaimed, earning a low grunt as a response. "What were you doing up so late, young man?"

"I couldn't sleep..."

"Why? You usually sleep all through the night!"

"I had nightmares."

The smile disappeared immediately from Ellyn's face, and it was replaced by a worried frown.

"Oh. Again?"

Slowly, Sanjay nodded. He grabbed the sheets and his himself more underneath them, leaving only his jet black hair in view.

"What was it this time?" Ellyn asked.

"A lion," Sanjay said, recalling his dream. "It was coming to eat me!"

Ellyn's worried expression disappeared and she laughed in a sweet and joyful way. Sanjay usually scowled when people laughed at something he said, but he knew that Ellyn wasn't laughing at him so he smiled a little bit. If Ellyn was laughing, then it meant that what was worrying him wasn't so bad.

"Sanjay, you don't have to be afraid of lions! There are none around here!"

"Yes there are! Aylard told me that his father told him that there are white lions!"

"That's in the Great Grass Sea across the Red Waste. You don't have to worry, the lions won't come. And the other lions are even farther away, in Casterly Rock!"

Sanjay's eyes opened wide when he heard the name of that location, recognizing one of the great castles in Westeros, the land far, far, far away from where they lived, beyond the Free Cities and the Narrow Sea! Full of excitement characteristic of a boy his age, he jumped in the bed and got rid of the covers. He looked at Ellyn with wide and pleading eyes lighted up with awe.

"Westeros!" he exclaimed and he clapped his hands. "Tell me more about it, Ellyn! Please!"

"But Sanjay, you need to get dressed! You can't stay in bed all day!"

"I won't!" he promised. "Please! Please! I will get dressed if you tell me stories! I promise!"

Ellyn sighed, defeated. She knew that she had to give up trying to get Sanjay get out of bed before she told him some stories about Westeros, because he was stubborn like no one else! While most toddlers and little boys were stubborn, yes, Sanjay was three times more headstrong. He might be only four years of age, but he always got away with what he wanted! Apart from his stubbornness, the fact that he was one of the most adorable infants that she had ever seen in her life helped him a lot to get what he wanted, because it was difficult to deny him anything.

Besides, Sanjay had promised he would get dressed after hearing stories, and he always kept his promises no matter what. Ellyn wondered where he had gotten that from, but it didn't escape her notice that the little boy not once told a single lie.

"Alright, little one, we'll do it your way..." she smiled. She got up from the bed and walked to a small wood table that was out against the wall of the room, and on top of it rested a small book.

Ellyn was a commoner and had grown up poor in Westeros, but both her parents served a noble family in a castle and that had given her the opportunity to learn how to read, which helped her to become a better servant when her turn to take a job in the noble household came. When she came to Essos and found that book some moons ago in a market, she decided she needed to have it. The money she earned was enough to buy it, and so she did purchase it. It was a book about the recent history of Westeros, which talked about the War of the Five Kings. She knew it was a good idea to have it so that she wouldn't forget where she came from, and so that she could someday explain to Sanjay where his roots were. She had thought she would have to wait until Sanjay grew a bit older to tell the stories to him, but Sanjay was a very smart boy.

She returned to the bed, where the little boy had made some room for her, and she sat there at his side. She opened the book. It was illustrated with images of the castles of Westeros, the sigils of the great Houses, and there were some illustrations of who appeared to be some of the lords and ladies of those Houses. It was an expensive book, but with the money that Ellyn always received from Cersei Lannister, and the money she earned in some jobs that she took, it was more than enough to buy it. It was worth it.

She opened the book, and it opened on the page of House Tully. Sanjay gasped with excitement.

"My favorites!" she exclaimed, and Ellyn raised her eyebrows.

"Really? Why?" she wondered, tilting her head to the side.

The four-year-old shrugged.

"I don't know... I like their hair!" he said, putting his hand on the page, touching the drawing of a Tully woman with auburn hair. "It's very pretty..."

"Yes, it is. The members of that House were famous for their hair. And their eyes."

She had seen one of the Tully ladies once. Ellyn had been surprised by her beauty, but most of all by her blue eyes. They were impressive, like the sky of the clearest day of summer. She had often found herself thinking that Sanjay's eyes had that same tone of blue...

"I don't like the fish," Sanjay said, wrinkling his nose and snapping Ellyn out of her thoughts. Sanjay turned some pages and when he found what he was looking for, he pointed at it. "I like their sigil!"

The falcon of the Vale. Yes, Sanjay liked birds very much...

"That is where I am from," Ellyn told him, smiling and remembering the little town in which she had grown up, next to the impressive mountain where the Eyrie was. "When I was older I went to Dorne, and then I moved to the capital, King's Landing."

"That's where I am from, right?"

"Yes."

"Who is this?" Sanjay asked then, pointing to the image of a young man with auburn hair and blue Tully eyes with an iron crown on his head in the form of swords and a wolf by his side.

"That is Robb Stark, the... the King in the North," Ellyn whispered, and Sanjay looked up at her frowning.

"Why are you whispering?"

"Because it is a secret. You see, Lady Cersei doesn't like it when people call Lord Stark the King in the North. He was at war with her son and many bad things happened."

"What things?"

"I will tell you when you are older."

Sanjay wanted to protest, but he knew that when he was told that something was better kept a secret until he was older, it was for a good reason.

"Besides, Lady Cersei doesn't like his sister, Lady Stark."

"Why not?" Sanjay asked again.

"Because she won the war against the Lannisters. She helped the Dragon Queen conquer the city... and that is why now you and I live here."

"I like it here!" Sanjay exclaimed. "But why did Lady Stark help the Dragon Queen? I've heard she's bad..."

"Because Lady Stark wanted to marry a man, and they wouldn't let her. So she fought and ended the war that her brother had started."

Actually, that wasn't the real story, but Ellyn didn't know all the details and she didn't know how to explain it any better, so she thought that was as close as she could get. Rumors about Sansa Stark had spread all over Westeros back in the day, and the wenches talked in the kitchens about how the the King's betrothed had betrayed him with none other than the Hound. What happened between that and more than a year later, when Sansa Stark helped Daenerys Targaryen attack King's Landing with her dragons, Ellyn didn't know. She wished she did, though.

"Who was the man, a knight?" Sanjay asked. The little boy loved knights, and he got overly excited with stories about them and how valiant they were, doing good for the people and rescuing fair maidens and the people that were weaker than them.

The Hound wasn't a knight as far as Ellyn knew, but he was of the Kingsguard before he committed treason. She shrugged.

"More or less. Not exactly but I guess you could say so."

Satisfied with the answer, Sanjay turned the pages, and he found an image of the sigil of House Lannister, with the golden lion on a field of crimson. Sanjay wrinkled his nose, not very happy about the image of the lion.

"I don't like this House very much."

That took Ellyn by surprise.

"Why?! Lady Lannister is our Lady! Well, she is our Queen. She gives us everything that we need to live and more," she said, looking around at the small but fairly accommodated house in which she and the child lived since almost three years ago. Back in Westeros she couldn't have afforded to live in a place half the size of that one, or eat good food every day and buy new clothes for her and the child that had been placed under her care.

"I know, but..." Sanjay murmured, suddenly sounding very sad. He pouted, which he only did when he was very disappointed or worried about something that he had done. "She doesn't like me."

"Don't say that!"

"It's true!" the little boy protested. "She has a bad face when she sees me, she's never happy. She doesn't let me play with the other boys, she always tells them to go away. She's mean," he pouted again. "What did I do? Why doesn't she like me?"

Ellyn sighed, not knowing what to say. What Sanjay was saying was, sadly, true. Cersei Lannister did not like Sanjay, and she was displeased whenever the boy was anywhere near her. It didn't go unnoticed to Ellyn how the Lannister woman always referred to Sanjay as "Waters" and seldom said his given name; the boy was just a bastard to her, and she made sure to express how shameful that was in her eyes. Sanjay was right, that woman did not like him, and Ellyn still had no idea why even after four years of having taken care of the boy under Cersei's orders. A chill ran down her spine when she remembered the day they escaped King's Landing and the Lannister woman had ripped the baby off her arms and almost threw him overboard to let him drown or be eaten by the sea monsters.

She could not tell that to Sanjay, of course. That was not a proper thing to tell a four-year-old, and Lady Lannister (or Her Grace, as she was still addressed as by some people) would be extremely displeased if she were to find out that Ellyn had told Sanjay about that. So instead, she decided to simply shrug her shoulders.

"I don't know. I don't think she dislikes you. She's just a busy woman and has much in her mind and often acts in ways that might look aggressive to you," she said. "But she's a kind woman. She gave you to me to take care of you."

Sanjay didn't say anything in response. He entertained himself looking at the pages that had Tyrell and Baratheon illustrations, and after a few moments of silence he looked at Ellyn again.

"Can I be a lord when I grow up?"

Ellyn laughed a little bit, amused by the question. Oh, the innocence that small children possessed...

She shook her head, heartbroken to have to said "no" to him.

"No, Sanjay. Only sons of lords can become lords..."

"Oh..." he murmured, disappointed. He thought about something for a few minutes before asking, more hopeful: "And a knight?"

This time Ellyn nodded.

"Yes, you can be a knight."

"Good! I'm going to be the bravest knight of them all!" he exclaimed with renewed excitement.

"And the tallest and strongest, if you continue growing like this!" Ellyn exclaimed, admiring again how much the little boy had grown. If she didn't know him, she would think he was much older.

Sanjay smiled, pleased with himself. Ellyn chuckled, and then she closed the book about Westeros.

"Well now, what did you promise me before?"

In less than the blink of an eye, Sanjay was already jumping out of bed and running towards the tub in which he usually took a quick hot bath in the morning to be clean for the day. Ellyn laughed and followed him; she helped undress him and bathe him, and then Sanjay put on his own clothes, saying that he was already a big boy and wanted to do things himself. Ellyn found herself feeling sad with how quickly the boy that had been given to her as a ten-day-old babe was growing up. She felt very motherly instincts towards Sanjay, and truth was that she feared what would be in store for him I the future. The Lannister woman wanted him for something, yet she did not love him? What were her plans? When would Sanjay be old and big enough for those plans? Would the little and sweet boy that she had cared for like a son be safe?

As she broke her fast in company of the child, she wondered silently what secrets laid there behind his existence. She often wondered about those kind of things, although she had been told not to ask questions, but she couldn't help it. Who were his parents? Why had he been alone at such a young age? Why did the Queen have an interest in him, yet hated him so much?

Even if she didn't want to think about it, Ellyn couldn't help but worry about what would happen to that boy when... When she wasn't able to take care of him anymore.

"Are you sad, Ellyn?" Sanjay asked then, breaking the silence that had reigned over them for the past minutes. She snapped out of her thoughts and smiled.

"No," she said, shaking her head.

Sanjay wasn't very convinced. He had always been fairly good at reading people's emotions, specially Ellyn's, so he frowned when he got that answer. However he didn't say anything.

"We are going to be late!" Ellyn exclaimed then. She had to go to her lady's palace to do her job. Since Sanjay had grown up and she was finally able to leave him alone, she had taken a job alongside the wives of the soldiers in the Lannister army that had fled with Cersei to Essos and worked as a seamstress. While she worked, Sanjay spent time with a master that Cersei had assigned to the boy so that he would become a great rider. Despite the dislike that Cersei Lannister had for the little boy, Ellyn was surprised by the things that the woman gave to the boy. She had also made sure that he could learn to read and write.

They hurried to clean up after themselves and ran out of the house, throwing themselves to the streets of Qarth.

Qarth had been their home for the past three years thanks to Cersei Lannister. She had travelled with her people by ship until they reached the glorious city, which was the farthest they could get from Westeros without starving first. They couldn't stop in the Free Cities because Queen Daenerys Targaryen would immediately find them there, and neither could they go to Slaver's Bay because those cities were under the rule of the Dragon Queen as well. Qarth, however, had declared war upon the new Queen, and they gladly invited the enemy of the Mother of Dragons inside their walls. Cersei had quickly made sure that her and her people's places in the city were permanently secured by doing what she always did best... take a lover. It wasn't common knowledge, but gossip was always quick to spread, and not many secrets could be kept in that city... Secrets couldn't be kept anywhere, really, and the people of Qarth weren't really quiet about private matters like those.

Cersei Lannister's relationship with one of Qarth's rulers was what kept her treated like the Queen she was back in Westeros: she lived in one of the biggest and most beautiful and luxurious palaces in the city, surrounded by servants and jewels and gold and the most exquisite fabrics, the best food and the sweetest a wines of the world. She desired for nothing. At the same time she had protection, and her army and the people that had come with her from Westeros were taken care of as well, even though they were treated like the commoners they were, but they couldn't complain about anything. Ellyn certainly couldn't complain about anything! She had everything she could want to watch after Sanjay and herself, even though she did need to make extra money for some things. The fact that Cersei have her a place to live and money to buy just enough food didn't mean that no more things were needed from time to time. After all, she wanted Sanjay to have the best. The poor boy deserved as much.

They reached the stables of the palace where Cersei lived in Qarth, and Sanjay raced inside followed by Ellyn. His master, a Dothraki man that had left his khalasar years ago after an accident that left him unable to ride a horse, was already waiting for the boy. Ellyn looked nervously at the copper-skinned and dark-eyed man; he always intimidated her.

"Rakhi!" the riding master said in Dothraki in a rather disdainful way. He always spoke to little Sanjay in a harsh tone, although the boy didn't mind. Although the man spoke the Common Tongue, he always ordered Sanjay around in his native tongue, and the boy was quickly learning to understand the language; he better understand the orders that were given to him of he wanted to avoid being reprimanded. Ellyn hated it when Sanjay's masters treated him harshly in any way, but there was nothing she could do to avoid it. She wasn't his mother after all, and she wasn't paying for his upbringing. "Gwe!"

"Ai!" Sanjay responded also in Dothraki. He looked at Ellyn one last time before running off to start his lesson. "I'll see you later, Ellyn!"

She waved goodbye for a couple of seconds and saw him run towards the end of the stables, where the pony that he always rode was waiting for him. Sanjay wasn't old enough to ride a normal sized horse and that was the reason why he rode a pony, but the animal was big enough to look like a small horse instead of a pony, and it was very ill-tempered. Ellyn was afraid of Sanjay mounting that animal: it was a black wild beast. She feared that someday it might throw Sanjay off it's back, but the boy always managed to easily climb on the beast's back in a matter of seconds as if it was the easiest thing in the world, and then he rode the pony (or small horse) with the same incredible ease.

She couldn't stay in the stables anymore, and Sanjay was going to leave with his master for his lesson that morning anyways so she left and made her way to the entrance of Cersei's palace. Once she was inside she walked through the hallways full of wealth towards the room where every day she and the other women gathered to work. Cersei refused to have them all love off her money without anything in return. Only a very small number of women had come with her, around ten, and all the other women had been left behind in Westeros because there was no place for them in the ships or because they were in Casterly Rock and not in the capital with their husbands. A great number of Lannister soldier didn't even have wives.

The women were already in the room, sitting down on comfortable cushions while working on their needlework. The room had big windows that allowed the air to come in and maintain the place fresh so that they could work. Some of the women were talking, telling each other stories of sharing a little bit of gossip. They greeted Ellyn when she arrived.

"Good day, Ellyn," one of them, a dark haired woman called Sarah, said with a gentle smile. They were of much better birth than Ellyn, the only difference between them was that they were married to soldiers and she wasn't, but their background was almost the same and so they never mistreated the young woman when she was in their company.

"Good day," she said, smiling as well. She took her usual place sitting on a cushion and picked up her day's work. She had been working on a dress sewing some flower embroidery into it for the last two days.

"You were a bit later than usual today, Ellyn," Sarah mentioned casually while she focused on her needlework as well.

"Yes, I got distracted back in the house. Sanjay wanted to hear some stories, and I couldn't say no," she smiled.

"Stories?"

"He is a very curious boy," Ellyn explained.

"I've always been curious about the origins of that boy, haven't you?" Sarah asked, frowning. "He isn't your son, isn't he?"

Ellyn shook her head, and Sarah continued speaking while the other women sewed and listening.

"It's rather interesting how Queen Cersei treats him," Sarah mention in a hushed voice. She didn't really want unwanted eavesdropping ears hearing that. "It's known that she doesn't like him."

"She hates him, actually," a blonde petite woman, Lysa, said then, joining the conversation. "Everybody can tell."

"However she makes sure that you care for him, hires masters for him?" Sarah added, raising her eyebrows. "I've heard that she allowed him to learn to read and write alongside the richer children. And hasn't she hired a master rider to teach him how to ride?"

"A Dothraki rider, yes," Ellyn nodded, not taking her eyes off the the roses she was sewing into the fabric.

"The Dothraki are the best riders in the world!"

"Queen Cersei is just very generous, that is all..." Ellyn said, trying to take importance off the matter. She didn't like the amount of attention that Sanjay called from everyone else because of how odd everything about him was. Even she thought there was something suspicious, but she didn't want other people sticking their noses in things that were none of their business.

"Oh, I don't think that is all, Ellyn!" Lysa exclaimed then, rather excited, and the other women nodded. "There is something odd about that boy. I think he's a very important bastard, and you don't know about it!"

Ellyn shot daggers through her eyes. She hated it when people openly called Sanjay "bastard", but there was nothing she could do about it. After all, it was the truth, but she found it very distasteful. Lysa didn't notice the way in which Ellyn was looking at her.

"An important bastard? What do you mean, Lysa?" Sarah asked with genuine curiosity.

"Well, he is not just some commoner's bastard, that is for sure. And he's from King's Landing... If Queen Cersei hates him but at the same time cares for him, could it be that he is a Lannister bastard? What is he's a bastard of the Imp?!"

"Impossible," Ellyn scoffed, amused by such a stupidity. "Does he look like a Lannister to you?" Sanjay completely lacked the Lannister look, with his black hair and blue eyes.

"Besides, look at his size!" Sarah chuckled, provoking an explosion of laughs from the other women.

"Might be he's a Baratheon bastard? He has the looks, with that hair and the blue eyes... I've heard King Robert was like that, and he had many bastards... He looks like a strong boy, too!"

"A Baratheon bastard? Isn't he too young to be one of them? If he were a year older or so, I could believe it..."

The women continued their speculation, but Ellyn decided to stay out of it and keep to her needlework quietly. She didn't care about all the gossiping going on around her, even though she couldn't deny she did want to know who Sanjay really was... Maybe someday, hopefully, Lady Lannister would reveal it...?

Not an hour had passed when she started feeling unwell. At first she thought it was the heat, characteristic of Qarth, and she dismissed the dizziness that she was feeling and the discomfort inside of her. She tried to focus on her needlework again, but a minute later she started coughing and she dropped the fabric and the needles to her feet, and she bent over while coughing. She covered her mouth with her hands.

"Ellyn?" Sarah asked, alarmed. "Ellyn, are you alright?!"

The woman made an attempt to stand up and go to aid her friend, but Ellyn raised her right hand and stopped her. She was still coughing, though a bit more lightly now, and she covered her mouth with her left hand.

"I'm fine, cof cof, Sarah, don't... Cof! ...worry... Cof cof!"

"Are you sure?"

"I'm fine!" Ellyn insisted, feeling her throat sore and something wet in her mouth and in her hand.

She managed to convince Sarah, who returned to her needlework. Ellyn coughed a couple more times and then recovered. She had a foul salty taste in her mouth and tears in her eyes. She tried taking a deep breath and then she looked at her hand...

...There was blood on it.

She quickly cleaned her hand in her long dark skirt and looked around to make sure no one had noticed what had just happened to her. Luckily for her, all the other women were focused on their work and didn't pay attention to the blood in her hand. If news that she was sick reached Cersei Lannister, Ellyn was sure that the woman would kick her out to the street and she would place Sanjay under somebody else's care. It was the last thing that Ellyn wanted, but she knew that it would happen of she wasn't careful.

She hadn't felt very good for some time, but she didn't think that it was anything serious. However, now having seen the blood that she had spat into her hand, she was afraid.

"Ellyn, are you sure you are alright?" Sarah insisted, putting down her needlework for a second to look at her. "You look pale!"

"I'm fine," Ellyn said again, nodding her head and hiding the part of her skirt that was now stained with her blood. "It was just a bit of coughing, nothing else."

The hours passed quickly, and soon her work day was done. Once she was finished with that day's needlework she put everything away, ready for the next day, and after saying her goodbyes she left the room and the other women behind. She didn't want to stay in the palace any longer than she needed to because she wanted to be on time to pick Sanjay up from the field where he practiced his horseback riding inside the city, not far from the palace. In most days it wasn't possible for him to practice outside the city walls, even though his Dothraki master thought that riding in the Garden of Bones under the dessert sun would make him strong and fierce. Well, Ellyn didn't want Sanjay to be strong and fierce, she wanted him to be safe, so she was glad when most of the days the guards would not open the city walls for the boy to go outside. There were special areas in the city that were used as riding fields and were owned by the rich people of Qarth, and Sanjay could always rode in the one that now belonged to Cersei Lannister's household.

The sky was already turning dark. The days were short because it was winter, and the nights were very cold. Ellyn did not appreciate the weather, but she tried to avoid complaining because she knew that in Westeros it was much worse. In Qarth at least she had shelter and food and a hearth fire to keep her and the boy warm, and she wouldn't starve or freeze to death in the winter nights like she probably would have done back in the Seven Kingdoms.

She walked through the streets of Qarth until she reached the field in which Sanjay was riding under the close watch of his Dothraki master. Usually Ellyn went to pick him up at the stables, or he was already done with his lessons in the days that she went to the field. That day, however, when she arrived the boy was still riding, even after having been hours and hours on too of that enormous and ill-tempered pony.

Ellyn knew already that Sanjay was a very good horse rider. He was a natural, actually, and she had always wanted to see with her own eyes just how well he rode. Everyone who had ever seen him had expressed to her their amazement with the boy and how skilled he was a such a young age, when most Westerosi boys couldn't even gallop properly at an older age that him.

Even though he had been galloping for many hours already, Sanjay didn't look tired at all, at least not from the distance. His face, normally cheerful and relaxed, had an expression of deep and in breakable concentration as the big pony galloped through the place at a high speed. Ellyn hadn't expected Sanjay to ride so fast! Her heart skipped a beat when the pony reached the corner and turned around all of a sudden, making it look for a second like Sanjay was dangerously close to falling, but the four-year-old knew well was he was doing and he had his legs tightly wrapped around the pony's sides and his feet firmly placed in the stirrups. But what surprised Ellyn more wasn't that; it was that Sanjay wasn't holding the reigns, but a bow and arrow instead.

The bow was small, for for his size. Sanjay held it firmly with one hand and pointed with the arrow towards a target placed on top of a wooden pole several yards away from him. His Dothraki master shouted an order in his native language, and Sanjay shot the arrow. Ellyn watched it fly towards the target on the pole and hit it right in the middle, sending it flying off the pole. Ellyn stared in awe, amazed that the boy had managed to hit that target. Surely it had been beginner's luck? Or had he been doing that for a long time and she just didn't know?

She confirmed hat it wasn't beginner's luck when she saw Sanjay shoot five more arrow. Into other targets at different distances and hitting all of them right in the middle. She didn't know whether she should be proud of his skill, or horrified. What was he doing, shooting arrows at such a young age?! He was no Dothraki savage, he was a little boy from Westeros!

She was still a bit in shock when suddenly she saw the Dothraki master open a small cage that was at his side and releasing a pigeon from inside of it. The pigeon flew away over his and Sanjay's head while the boy was still galloping on his pony, still holding the now and another arrow in his hands. The master shouted the same order as before, but this time Sanjay hesitated. The man yelled the order yet again, and Sanjay obeyed.

He raised his bow and arrow and shot the pigeon down. Ellyn gasped.

"Sorohis!" shouted the Dothraki master, and Sanjay halted his pony. He jumped off the saddle and went to retrieve the arrows from the shot targets before meeting with his master.

The man started talking to Sanjay (or rather shouting) both in Dothraki and in the Common Tongue, but Ellyn could not hear what he said. She saw Sanjay looking down at his feet, and then his master shouted something else before smacking Sanjay in the back of the head. Ellyn gasped again and took a step forward, wanting to go and protest, but something stopped her. After saying something else, the man took the pony's reigns and sent Sanjay away. He walked in Ellyn's direction and looked surprised when he saw her standing there waiting for him.

"Ellyn!" he exclaimed.

She was still angry about the Dothraki man's behavior towards the little boy, and she was also still a bit in shock over what she had just witnessed.

"Sanjay, that was..." she tried to find the right word to describe what she had just seen, but she couldn't seem to find one, "crazy," she finally said, realizing that that was the only fitting word that she could come with. "How long have you been doing that?!"

"Since I stopped falling from the pony while galloping," Sanjay said, which meant that he had been shooting arrows almost since the beginning because he had stopped falling very early after getting on the animal for the first time.

"Why?!"

Sanjay shrugged.

"It's what the Queen wants."

Ellyn was shocked as well by the answer.

"Cersei Lannister wants you to learn to shoot arrows?"

Sanjay nodded.

"But why?! You are so young!"

"So that I become a great warrior, apparently. That's why my master was angry with me. I'm too slow shooting the birds, he says. A real warrior will not wait for me to shoot him when he tries to kill me, he says. I must not hesitate. Hesitation is for the weak, and there is no place for the weak in the world," he said, and his expression turned sad suddenly. "I don't want to shoot the birds, but I don't want to be weak. I want to be a knight, and knights are not weak."

"You are not weak, Sanjay..." Ellyn murmured, not really knowing what to say. What kind of things were they teaching that poor boy?! But if those were the Queen's orders, she was no one to contradict them... She kneeled on front of the boy and pulled him into a right and protective entrance. It was the only thing she could do at the moment. "You are not weak at all. You are the strongest boy I've ever seen in my life."

"Really?"

"Yes, really," she nodded. Then she let go of him and stood up. She looked into his bright blue eyes, still so innocent, and wondered for how much time they would keep being so pure and innocent. How long would it take for the Lannister woman to destroy that goodness in Sanjay, if she continued with the plans she had for the boy?

She sighed. They both had had enough for one day. She took his hand.

"Let's go home."

Upon hearing those words, Sanjay smiled. It made Ellyn smile too.

Chapter Text

Sanjay didn't have any lessons of any kind that afternoon, and he decided to use his hours of freedom to leave the house and go out to the streets of Qarth, where his friends were waiting for him to go and play. They were waiting for him down the street in which he lived, and he ran to meet them with a big smile on his face. When he saw the big group of children- most of them were sons of men from Cersei's guard and army- his smile became wider. By the time he reached them he was breathless, but not at all tired.

"Sanjay!" his best friend, Aylard, exclaimed when he saw him. Aylard was a boy from Westeros; he had dark blond hair and happy green eyes. He was a little bit older than Sanjay, but he was smaller than his friend in size.

"There he is!" another one of his best friends, Galot, exclaimed to the other boys. Galot was also from Westeros; he had curly brown hair and hazel eyes. He was six years of age and he was taller than Aylard, but still he was smaller than Sanjay.

Sanjay's other best friend was Jarvis, who was from Essos unlike Aylard and Galot. He had tan skin, short black hair and dark brown eyes, and he was one of the loudest boys of the entire group; he always got in trouble and got his friends in trouble as well, but he had such an innocent face that he was able to get out of it almost always. His eyes, however, were mischievous. He was Sanjay's age, though a couple of months older.

"Come on!" another boy exclaimed. Sanjay didn't know all the boys in the group, but he followed them nonetheless when they started running to go somewhere where they could play, as always. All the boys were carrying wooden toy swords, and they played pretending that they were valiant knights and great warriors, defeating their enemies, conquering castles and entire cities, exploring far-away lands and slaying dragons.

They arrived at one of streets in Qarth in which the palace of Cersei Lannister was located. The street was wide and there wasn't a lot of people there, making it easy to play without bothering anyone or being told to go somewhere else. They decided to break into two groups. Each group would be a different army, and their game would be a glorious war. Each group was deciding who their captain would be, and Sanjay's group decided to make him captain. He smiled, feeling proud of himself for it, and he positioned himself at the head of his group- his army. The captain of the other group came forward as well and rose his wooden sword in the air.

"I will win this war!" he exclaimed, trying to sound triumphant even with his childish voice. "I am Aegon the Conqueror, and I will take the Seven Kingdoms for myself!"

Sanjay rolled his eyes. The boy that had spoken was Armin, the annoying son of one of Cersei's knights. He had black hair, just like Sanjay, and grey-green eyes. He was the tallest boy in the entire group, though Sanjay was not much shorter than him. He was about to start training with his father so that he could someday become a knight too, and while Sanjay had no problem with that, he did have a problem with how rude Armin could be about it sometimes. He was always considering himself above everyone else in the group because he was highborn, and he often treated the other boys badly. He was friends with the other highborn kids, though he didn't treat them much better than he did the other kids. He used his superior training as advantage over the boys who had never been next to a knight in their lives to win every game. Sanjay never did that, he hated to not play fair, and he deeply disliked Armin.

"You can't be Aegon!" one of the boys protested. "You have black hair!"

Almost all the boys laughed, and Armin shot an annoyed glare at the boy that had pointed that little detail out.

"Fine," he spat. "Then I will be King Robert Baratheon!"

The boys in his team cheered, and some chanted "long live the king!" already feeling completely in mood for the game and to start that fake battle of theirs. Armin then looked at Sanjay with an air of superiority to him, and shot him a challenging glare while he pointed at him with his wooden sword.

"And who will you be, Waters?" Armin asked, using Sanjay's bastard name instead of his given name. Sanjay clenched his jaw, but he didn't say anything about it and acted as if he hadn't heard the insult behind Armin's words.

"I will be..." he started saying, though he hesitated. Who would he be? He tried to think of any great warriors and knights and kings, but all the people that came to his mind were Targaryens, and Armin had not been allowed to play a Targaryen for having black hair just like him. Sanjay wanted to be Prince Rhaegar Targaryen, but he bit his tongue and didn't say his name. Besides, Rhaegar had lost to King Robert in the war and Sanjay didn't want that to cause him to lose against Armin. He continued thinking, until an image from Ellyn's book of the Houses of Westeros appeared in his mind, and he smiled. He rose his sword in the air just like Armin had done before. "I will be Robb Stark, the King in the North!"

Some of the older and highborn kids gasped upon hearing the name, but no one said anything. Sanjay stared at Armin, waiting for the boy to said anything against him being King Robb, but Armin said nothing. He just kept challenging Sanjay with his narrowed grey-green eyes, until he finally shouted:

"Attack!"

The game started then, and both teams charged against each other and fought. Well, fighting for them meant yelling really loud and clashing their wooden swords over and over again. Most of them didn't even hit the other boys, and they chased each other around a lot, almost crashing against people that walked by. Armin was hitting other boys, and he was doing it real hard, making some of them cry. He was doing it on purpose, and he smiled when he hit them, thinking himself victorious. Sanjay also hit some people, but he didn't do it as hard as Armin was, and he wasn't doing it on purpose, not really. He felt as if some kind of instinct was taking over him, making him feel the need to hit them even when he wasn't conscious that he has hitting them with his wooden sword. He just saw openings in their pathetic defenses and went for it, feeling as if he was really in a real battle, fighting against enemies for dominance over a kingdom. And he felt happy. He wanted that to be him when he was older: Sanjay Waters, a great and powerful knight, the best soldier in the whole wide world.

Soon, Sanjay and Armin were facing each other. Armin was taller than Sanjay, and he was older, and crueler, but Sanjay was stronger. Their wooden swords clashed in the air between them.

"You can't beat me!" Armin exclaimed, pushing Sanjay away and attempting to hit him with his sword.

Yes I can, Sanjay thought, but he didn't say it out loud.

He charged against Armin again, while the other boys continued play fighting around them. Some curious citizens of Qarth stopped and looked at the children, amused, but the boys payed them no mind. For them, that game was serious.

"No one can beat me!" Armin exclaimed.

"That is what you think!" Sanjay protested, not keeping his thoughts to himself anymore. He tried to hit Armin, but the boy blocked him.

"I am King Robert Baratheon!" Armind said, reminding everyone who his character was. "I won the war against the Mad King and I will win you! I will behead you, Young Wolf, just like you were beheaded the last time!"

Sanjay frowned. Beheaded? The King in the North had been beheaded? He hadn't inquired a lot about the story of the man when he saw him in the book, and Ellyn had not wanted to tell him. If Robb Stark had been killed during the War of the Five Kings, then perhaps it hadn't been the best choice for Sanjay to pick for that game.

His momentarily distraction almost got himself hit by Armin's wooden sword, but he took a step back and dodged. He focused on the game again.

"Perhaps I will behead you!" he shot back to Armin, surprising the boy.

Armin suddenly gasped, and so did the boys that were behind him. They stopped fighting and stared at something that was behind Sanjay. He frowned, not understanding why everyone had suddenly stopped playing, and then he turned his back on them to see what what happening. He almost gasped as well when he saw Cersei Lannister and her guards standing there; she had interrupted her stroll outside of the palace to look at the playing boys with curiosity. She had her head tilted a bit to the side, and she was staring at Sanjay and Armin.

"Who is going to behead who?" she wondered, and her voice made Sanjay shudder. He didn't like that woman, and he knew that she did not like him.

Armin spoke before he did. "He says he is going to defeat me, but he can't! No one can defeat me!"

"I see... And who are you?"

"I'm Robert Baratheon, your Grace!"

If Armin noticed the disgust in Cersei Lannister's expression upon hearing the name of her deceased husband, he certainly didn't show any signs of it. The woman looked at the boy with distaste for a couple of tense seconds before turning her gaze to Sanjay.

"And you, Sanjay? What... valiant hero have you chosen to interpret?"

"I..." he said, hesitating. He hadn't expected to see the Queen there. He remembered then what Ellyn had told him, that Cersei did not like the Starks and that she didn't like Robb Stark. He gulped, not wanting to say the truth, but he knew that any other boy would say it if he didn't or if he lied. "I am Robb Stark... Your Grace."

He did see the way in which Cersei's features became hard and cold. Her green eyes narrowed and glared at him, and he shuddered when he felt the heaviness of the hate in them, and it was all directed towards him. He had definitely made a mistake choosing to play as Robb Stark, but he did not apologize. Why should he? It wasn't as if Cersei had forbidden him to ever mention the name of the King in the North.

"Where did you learn that name?" Cersei hissed, failing to hide the rage in her voice.

Sanjay shrugged; he did not want to put the blame on Ellyn and say that he had found out about the King in the North from a book she had bought for him.

Cersei glared at him some more, and then she laughed. The sound startled Sanjay, and he looked at the woman frightened. What was she laughing? He had thought that she was mad at him...

"Of course..." Cersei murmured. "Of course that you would choose Robb Stark to play as him... Traitors are drawn to traitors..."

Traitors? Sanjay wasn't a traitor! Then why did that woman say that? She kept laughing as if she had heard the funniest jest on Earth. She looked at the other boys who had stopped playing and where staring at her as feeling as puzzled as Sanjay was.

"I don't know why you want to play with him," she told to the other children. "Why would you want to get near this... this bastard?" she asked, full of spite, and then she glared at Sanjay again. He took a step back, hurt by her words. Why was she talking to her friends like that?! "This... scum. He is nothing but a bastard born from a traitor and a whore. He is nothing. Worthless."

Sanjay felt tears stinging in his eyes, and soon enough he felt them streaming down his face. His whole body was shaking terribly, and his grip on the wooden sword became so tight that he thought that it might break. He felt his pride being stabbed, and he felt the judging stares of his friends and the other boys on him. They had never thought any less of him because of his bastard status, they just considered him another boy just like them, except Armin of course. But now that the Queen was openly insulting and humiliating him, the other boys glared at Sanjay accusingly. Bastard, he could read in their eyes. Traitor. Son of a whore.

Aylard, Galot and Jarvis weren't looking at him like the other boys were, but it didn't matter. Sanjay felt worse than he had ever felt in his life. He turned around, looking at everyone in the eyes, and when his gaze met Armin's he saw the boy smirking. Sanjay glared at him, feeling hate for the first time in his life. He wanted to glare at Cersei too and let her know how much he hated her as well, but he knew he couldn't. If he did then he might really be a traitor, and things would be so much worse.

Lowering his eyes to look at the ground, Sanjay dropped the wooden sword and ran away. He thought he heard Armin and some of the boys laughing cruelly as they watched him running away, but he didn't go back and punch them like he wanted to do. Instead he just ran and ran and ran through the streets of Qarth until he arrived at his home. The door was open, so he just ran inside and closed behind him. He ran to the interior of the house, where Ellyn was at the table working on some needlework. His sudden appearance startled her.

"Ellyn!" the little boy cried, running towards the woman. As soon as she saw his face, red and damp with angry and desperate tears, Ellyn gasped and took her hand to her chest.

"Good gods, Sanjay!" she exclaimed, putting her needlework aside and kneeling on the floor to welcome the crying boy into her arms. He threw his arms around her and cried in her shoulder while she tried to calm him down. "Sshh, sshh, m'boy... It's alright. What happened?!"

"We were- we were playing..." he sobbed. "And Lady Lannister- the Queen... She came and- she told everyone that I- that I... That I am a bastard! The bastard son of a- of a traitor and a- and a- and a whore!" he knew enough to know that that was not a good thing, though he didn't know why. He heard Ellyn gasp beside him, and he knew that she knew why it was a bad thing. That just made Sanjay even sadder, and he cried harder than before. "I told you she hates me! And now everyone will hate me too."

"No one will hate you, Sanjay," Ellyn assured him, though she didn't convince him. "You are a very especial boy, and the Queen is wrong."

"How do you know?" Sanjay wondered, still crying. Ellyn didn't know who his parents were, so she couldn't know if the Queen was wrong in what she had said about Sanjay or not.

"Because I know. I know you, and I know that you are the best boy that there is in this despicable world."

"But I am a bastard!" he cried.

"So what?! Many great people are bastards, and that you were born as one is not your fault! You are not what you were born as, you are what you decide to become." Ellyn moved a little bit away from Sanjay and looked at him in the eyes with complete seriousness. She needed him to know that she meant what she was saying to him. She needed to teach him an important life lesson. "Wherever you are, wherever you go, people will always brand you as something. It happens to everyone, no matter who you are. Back in Westeros everybody was called some bad name or another for any reason. That will always happen, and in your case right now what they are calling you is 'bastard'. Now, will you let that word become you? Or will you grow into a fine man and make a new name for yourself? One that says who you really are, and of which you are proud of?"

Maybe Sanjay was too young to understand her wise words. Maybe he was too scared, too innocent, too unknowing of the world and of life still to fully comprehend what Ellyn was trying to tell him. But he was old enough to understand that what Ellyn was saying was that he didn't have to be scared or sad for what they were saying to him, and slowly he stopped crying. When he was done sobbing Ellyn smiled at him and cupped his face between her hands, which made him smile as well and feel silly for having cried so much before.

Ellyn smiled when she saw that her words had had the desired effect, and she hugged Sanjay again. She wiped the tears off his face and then she took his hand and led him to the bedroom, where they sat on his bed. Ellyn picked up the book about Westeros again, and opened it to show something to Sanjay.

"Look, these are some of the great men and women of Westeros that were insulted for something. They were all shamed for different things, but they all had great things as well."

Sanjay did not know that a highborn person could be insulted, and he was fascinated when Ellyn told him about them. It made him feel a little better.

"Look, Sanjay," Ellyn showed him one of the pages, which had a drawing of a man in a black cloak. He had brown hair and grey eyes, and Sanjay did not know who it was. "This is the current Lord of Dragonstone and Prince of Westeros. His name is Jon Targaryen, but do you know what his name was before the end of the war?"

Sanjay shook his head. He did not know, but he was curious. Ellyn smiled before telling him:

"Jon Snow. He was a bastard of the North."

Sanjay's eyes opened wide with shock, and he gaped while he stared at Ellyn.

"The Prince of Westeros was a bastard?!" he exclaimed, amazed.

Ellyn nodded, and Sanjay looked at the book awestruck. Maybe being a bastard wasn't that bad...

Sanjay and Ellyn kept reading the book during many hours, until the sun hid in the horizon and the sky became dark. Ellyn and Sanjay had dinner, and then the little boy went to bed. He asked Ellyn for one last story, just one more, and the woman complied. She sat on the side of Sanjay's bed and told him about the House that he chose.

"The Starks," he said when Ellyn asked him what House he wanted to hear about. Ellyn hesitated, but in the end she did read to him about them.

She told him about Ned Stark, and how he had been a leader of Robert's Rebellion. She told him of how he became Hand of the King, and of how he was executed by orders of King Joffrey Baratheon. She told Sanjay about Lady Catelyn and her son Robb Stark, and of how the War of the Five Kings started and the Starks marched against the Lannisters in several battles. She told him about how treason was the downfall of the Starks in the Red Wedding, and she told him about the brave daughters of Lord Ned and Lady Catelyn; Lady Arya and Lady Sansa. She told him of how they went to find the Dragon Queen in Slaver's Bay and rode the dragons with her to Westeros to take the Seven Kingdoms back. She told him of how Bran Stark became Lord of Winterfell and began to rebuild it, and of how Rickon Stark was given the Eyrie. Sansa Stark became Lady of the Dreadfort and married Sandor Clegane, the man she had fallen in love with. There was nothing on Arya Stark in the book, but Ellyn told Sanjay about how she had heard through gossip of the highborn people that she had recently fallen in love and married a former bastard named Gendry Waters, who was now Lord Baratheon, and had been given Storm's End and rule over the Stormlands. That amazed Sanjay even more.

After Ellyn was done telling Sanjay about the Starks, the boy closed his eyes and quickly fell asleep with a smile on his face. Ellyn brushed his black hair away from his face with her fingers and smiled upon seeing the peaceful expression on his face.

"Sweet dreams, m'boy," she whispered, leaning in to give Sanjay a good night kiss on the forehead.

She stood up and went to her room. She wanted to sleep, for she felt exhausted. She was always tired after a long day, but that day had been her day off and still she felt awful. She had been feeling like that for a long time already, and she didn't know why, but it was bothering her. But what bothered her the most was the pain...

She decided to forget about it. She would go and see a healer the next day if she still felt like that, but at that moment it was too late and she was convinced that what she needed was a good night's sleep.

She sat on her bed with the book on her lap. She sighed, distracted, and thought about the events of the day. What Sanjay had told her after he arrived at the house crying had made her really angry at Cersei Lannister, but there was nothing she could do against it. Cersei Lannister was her Lady and her Queen, and Ellyn was a simple servant; if she protested to the highborn woman for her treatment of Sanjay she could end up being severely punished. Even worse, the Queen might decide to take Sanjay away from her! Ellyn put a hand on her chest and gasped, feeling that that would be the worse thing that could happen to her. She loved Sanjay, she felt like he was her own son, and she would not let anyone take him away from her... Ellyn knew that she shouldn't be so fond of the boy, that she had just been hired to take care of him and nothing more, but she couldn't help it. Sanjay was so good, so sweet and innocent, and he definitely was like a son to her. Ellyn would do anything for that boy, and that was why she hated to see him cry because of the cruel words of that woman.

Ellyn sighed, and grimaced when she felt a deep pain in her belly that almost made her whimper. She shook her head, convinced that it was nothing, but the pain wouldn't go away. To try to take her mind off that matter, Ellyn opened the book on her lap, wanting to read a little bit while she waited for the pain to fade. It opened on the page dedicated to Sansa Stark.

Ellyn had spent a long time that day reading the pages of the Starks out loud, so she wanted to turn the page and look for the noblemen of the Vale, but something stopped her and made her look at the image of the young Stark woman painted in the page. Ellyn found that lady to be fascinating and mysterious, and incredibly brave. Yes, she had been the cause that Cersei Lannister had had to run away from Westeros and take her people with her, Ellyn included, but Ellyn didn't resent Lady Sansa for it. Everybody knew that she had suffered much, though Ellyn was immensely curious to know all the details of her story, the secrets that not everybody knew...

Married to Sandor Clegane, now Lord of the Dreadfort.

Ellyn looked at the picture of the woman. Sansa Stark was beautiful, with her thick auburn hair and her big and bright blue eyes of the same color of the sky... Then she remembered Sandor Clegane, the Hound. Ellyn had seen the Hound once or twice during her trips to King's Landing. He was huge, scary, rude and awfully burned. Ellyn pictured that man with Sansa Stark and frowned. They had nothing in common! But if the rumors were true, they truly loved each other...

She has the same eyes as Sanjay, Ellyn thought distractedly while she looked at the picture of the young woman, which was extremely well painted with a lot of skill.

Right after she thought that, Ellyn frowned. The same eyes as Sanjay... It wasn't the first time that Ellyn thought that Sanjay had the same eyes as the Tullys of Riverrun, and Sansa Stark was half a Tully so logically her eyes also reminded Ellyn of Sanjay's. She would have dismissed it as a curious coincidence like every other time she thought that, except that that time she realized something. She looked more closely at the picture of the woman.

She doesn't look like Sanjay, she thought while looking at the woman's auburn hair, feeling stupid because of the doubts that were growing inside of her. But this is just a painting...

Married to Sandor Clegane.

Sandor Clegane had had black hair, and he was huge. Ellyn had never seen a child bigger than Sanjay, and the lad wouldn't stop growing. If he continued at that pace he would end up towering over most men. Ellyn pictured an older Sanjay in her mind; he was very tall and very strong, with black locks of hair that fell over his eyes, blue like sapphires. For some reason, he looked both fierce and gentle. Much to Ellyn's surprise, what she pictured in her mind when she imagined and older version of Snajay was Sandor Clegane, but with the elegant features of Sansa Stark and blue eyes identical to the Tullys...

It can't be! Ellyn exclaimed in her mind. No, it can't be... I am just imagining all of this, it doesn't make any sense...

But it did. It did make sense. Sanjay was given to Ellyn as a newborn babe, and that had happened...

Nine moons after King Joffrey became betrothed to Margaery Tyrell, Ellyn realized, having calculated the timeline in her head. The whole kingdom had heard of that betrothal and of the fact that Sansa Stark had been cast away. After the treason of Lady Sansa and the Hound was discovered.

Not wanting to jump into conclusions, Ellyn gathered more evidence in her head that confirmed her suspicions. But what else did she need, really? It was all right there. King Joffrey had given the child to Ellyn. Why would the King give away a newborn babe if he wasn't an important bastard? Cersei Lannister hated the boy, even though she had no reason to do it... And she called him the son of a traitor and a whore.

That was it. Sanjay was the bastard son of Lady Sansa Stark and Sandor Clegane.

She had to tell him! Ellyn almost jumped off the bed, but she stopped herself. She couldn't tell Sanjay! What would Cersei Lannister say or do if she found out that Ellyn had discovered the truth and told Sanjay? Then she would definitely be punished, and Ellyn did not want that.

She took a deep breath, and decided to keep that secret to herself until Sanjay was older. Once he grew up more and Ellyn considered that he was ready then she would tell him what she had found out that night... But what could he do with that information? Nothing. Sanjay was stuck with Cersei Lannister in Essos, and his real parents were at the other side of the world.

Maybe that is why Sansa Stark attacked King's Landing with the Dragon Queen, Ellyn thought then. She was trying to find her son. She was trying to get revenge.

For a second she hoped that one day the woman could be reunited with her child, and Ellyn felt sad for her. How awful it must be, to have a child ripped out of your arms and taken away from you. Ellyn had lost a child, but at least she knew that her babe was at peace and safe in the heavens with the gods. Sansa Stark had no clue of what had happened to her son...

And then Ellyn became afraid that she would be separated from Sanjay if he was ever reunited with his parents, and she decided that maybe she did not want the woman to find her child. Not yet, at least.

I am being too selfish, Ellyn scolded herself mentally.

She left the book on the bed and stood up. She needed a glass of water, and she also needed to calm down. Her discovery had upset her.

The pain came back as she was walking to the small kitchen of the house, and this time it actually made her whimper and bend over. The pain became stronger, and she cried in pain. She tripped and fell to the floor, and then she started coughing like she had been doing in the last moons. However this time the coughing was more severe than it had ever been, and she felt weak and unable to breathe. She was suffocating, her lungs were on fire.

She covered her mouth with her hand, and it was splattered with blood. Some of the blood fell to the floor and the liquid stained the stone.

"Ellyn?" she heard Sanjay's sleepy voice calling her from his bedroom, wondering what was wrong. "Ellyn?!"

No, don't come here. You don't have to see this!

She wanted to tell him that she was alright and tell him to go back to sleep, but she couldn't even speak. More blood poured out of her mouth as Sanjay appeared next to her. When he saw her like that, the little boy gasped horrified and ran to her side.

"Ellyn! Ellyn! ELLYN!"

He kept calling her name and shaking her, not knowing what to do. He was just a four year old boy, and he was scared, and he was crying and he had no idea of what was happening. Ellyn saw the terror in his eyes and the tears streaming down his cheeks again. Her vision became blurry and covered with dark spots.

Please don't cry...

Sanjay ran away from her side and made for the door of the house. Ellyn could hear him as he ran down the street, crying and screaming, calling from help from somebody, anybody.

No... This shouldn't be happening... This can't be happening, I can't leave him alone...

"Please, help!" Sanjay screamed. He repeated it over and over again in all the ways that he knew how to say it; the Common Tongue, Valyrian, Qartheen, Dothraki... No one answered. "Please! HELP! PLEASE!"

Sanjay's desperate pleas for help were the last thing that Ellyn heard before she closed her eyes and everything became black.