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Six children were something.
Especially six children who for the most part needed to grow up without a mother.
Maekar still missed Dyanna terribly three years after her death in childbirth and there wasn't a day where he wasn't made aware of his aching heart in some way. Whether it be a small reminder of the years he had spent with her or something new their children had learned that he couldn't share with her anymore.
There were days where Maekar lost himself into running Summerhall because it was the only way he could make the pain stop, the only way he would not lose himself in grief.
Among his six children he could barely relate with half of them on top of everything, despite how much he was trying. Dyanna had said it was easy to love them, that no matter how different they were they were all still one family.
Maekar had grown up with three brothers and they had always been close despite their differences, his own brood couldn't even come close to the bond he had shared with his brothers. His firstborn was a drunkyard, disinherited for a year now, Daeron preferred the company of whores over his own family and Maekar had been able to count it a lucky week if his firstborn hadn't been causing a ruckus again somewhere around the castle. Now Daeron was exiled, even though the public had been told he was travelling in Essos.
Aemon, Daella and Aegon either got along perfectly or screamed the castle down, that had been the case from the moment Aegon had been born to only yesterday. They were children still and he wanted them to remain in their innocence for as long as possible but they were also reaching an age where they had to stand up for the consequences of their actions. Soon enough Aemon would leave for the Citadel as Maekar's father had decreed for him, Daella would leave to attend Maekar's mother and learn how to be a Lady at court and he would have to find a place for Aegon to squire soon.
It would break them apart, and Maekar could by now only hope they wouldn't go apart in an argument.
The two children he could rely on at all times were the ones who might have secretly been his favourites. Aerion and little Rhae had never caused him much grey hair or worry, let alone anger or disappointed. He wasn't ruling it out that his baby girl could still grow into a troublemaker but for now Rhae was too content to be quiet and observe, and follow her second oldest brother around like a duckling wherever he went.
And Aerion.
Maekar didn't know what he would have done without his secondborn when Dyanna had died so suddenly and so terribly unexpected just hours after his youngest's birth. Aerion had only been two and ten then but he had without any hesitation stepped up to be not only strong for his younger siblings but for his father as well. He had always been the rock of their family, even as a little toddling boy already when they had still lived at court, Dyanna had always called him her little helper.
Aerion was responsible, certainly more responsible than Maekar had been at five and ten, he was reliable, he was smart and patient and he was Summerhall's future now. It couldn't put Maekar more at ease to know that the future of the gift he had been given by his father was lying in capable strong hands. Aerion was well versed in their history, in past and current politics and he was a fighter no less.
And beyond all that he was kind, he was charming and he held family above all else.
Which was why it was no surprise that when Maekar went looking for him as troubling news had once more come in, he found Aerion by the stables, talking with the stable master over the new horses that had been brought in to be trained for the guards. Rhae was being held on his hip, braids done up in the way Maekar knew she only let her brother do it, Daella was impatiently waiting at Aerion's right, papers held in her hands while Aegon hovered behind her in half done up sparring gear.
When they spotted him approaching, Aerion certainly being the only one who read his father's face right, the stablemaster excused himself to do his work and Aerion shushed his quickly complaining siblings when his attention was once more diverted from them, only Rhae smiled happily and stretched out arms for her father. Maekar took her and actually gladly accepted the hug he was given, he hadn't had a good morning.
"Aegon, Daella, I will have to speak with your brother, please do find other ways to entertain yourselves for the time being."
"But Father, he..."
"Egg, I will find you after," Aerion silenced Aegon's tantrum before it could begin and the six year old stomped off. "Ella, you know that Aemon can answer you those questions better than I can, so find him. If he doesn't know, you can come find me again and we'll see Maester Sydrum together." Daella sighed but nodded, she curtsied to her father and then left as well, more graceful than her little brother by far.
"Come on, let's walk."
They stepped up onto the battlements and Maekar excused the guards on the look out posts for a few minutes so he could be talking without any ears nearby who shouldn't hear it.
"Your cousin has apparently gotten married."
"Excuse me?" Aerion nearly choked on the surprise, blinking with complete surprise over that piece of news that Maekar had gotten from a letter that Baelor had sent him by raven just an hour ago. In lack of any connection to his own older brother, Aerion had always looked up to the three years older Valarr, and they had become close friends since their childhood years. That Valarr could have made such a stunt without Aerion even knowing anything about it just made all of this even more shocking. "Why didn't he come and talk to me himself?"
"Because you would have disapproved. I would have understood if Valarr had eloped with a highborn daughter from any Westerosi house because he didn't appreciate the betrothal to a foreigner. I really don't trust those Tyroshis and we can make alliances with them in some other way than giving them a future Queen. But son, your cousin married a smallfolk girl, overseen by a Septon, consumated. Your uncle is beside himself and your grandfather is raving."
"They won't take Valarr out of the succession, will they?" Aerion wanted to know and frowned heaily and then stiffened because the real reason on why his father had tugged him to the side dawned on him. "They're taking him out of the succession. They can't annull the marriage, the girl is pregnant, isn't she?"
"She is indeed with child."
"But... but they can't give the crown to Matarys." Aerion concluded because no they couldn't, as sweet as Baelor's secondborn was he could never be considered for the crown. With Aerys and Aelinor still being childless and Rhaegel's line having been excluded by the line of succession in a recent decision made by Maekar's father to clean up the in his eyes 'too many heirs' situation – the same situation that had led to Aemon's wish for the Citadel being happily granted, that left only one brother's line left open.
Summerhall's future had today become the future of Westeros.
"Come tomorrow, you will be the Crown Prince's heir, second in line to the Iron Throne."
And Aerion leaned against the nearest pillar and dragged a hand down his face, two minutes passed with him breathing himself through whatever was flying around his head but then Maekar could see how the part in him that was less sweet Dyanna and more steel Maekar took over. Duty over desire, Aerion had always been destined to be the perfect prince.
And now, he would be trained to one day become Crown Prince.
And then, at an hopefully even later point, he would become King.
Maekar's son would sit the Iron Throne.
And he would be left to figure out how to get Aegon into any shape of taking over Summerhall one day.