Work Text:
-Shipbreaker Bay-
Ned had always been a terrible swimmer, but Robert decided there was no need to tease his closest friend for it.
Winterfell hardly had the facilities to accommodate to such skills, perhaps the hot springs but between his fostering and Rickard’s strict hand with his younger sons, he seldom had time for it.
“The sea is no match for you Stark!” he roared with laughter, and watched Ned emerge from the waves, seaweed stuck in his hair. “One day it shall eat you whole!”
He could hear the Northern lordling spluttering from all the way up the beach where he sat with his brothers.
Damn Arryn, one moon back in his father’s lands and made to watch my brothers like a ploughing wet nurse. I could be hunting the Kingwoods for boar or hawking by the cliffs…
“We all saw you fall right on your arse when you tried to mount your steed Robert, there is no need for your hypocrisy,” Stannis said from beside him, a book in his hand.
His brother was ever the bore, looked nothing like a scholar and nothing like a warrior. A recluse, the courts had said and if it was not for his pride, he would have let them soil his brother’s name. Unfortunately, his father would have heard of the incidence at once, ears like a crow as they said, and he would have been knocked around the ears for his immaturity. So, he had defended the pale snot, one brother to the other.
Renly, who was far too busy picking flowers to notice he had naught but air knocking about his skull, was yet too small to comprehend Robert’s relationship to him. In his defence, Jon had been calling him more often than not to the Eyrie to learn a lord’s skillset, one that was not earned through the drinking of hooch and sticking his hands up fine girls’ skirts. Between his lessons and ones, begrudgingly from the maester, he had little time to indulge his brother’s airhead.
“Your brother is right as rain,” Ned called, wringing his hair as a mutt did and Robert found himself staring much too long for it to be suitable. “If my sister had seen you, she would have laughed the hair off her head.”
“Oh piss off! The lot of you,” he sat up and dusted his behind. “I’ll have you know that horse was spooked!”
“Yes, perhaps spooked by your breath more like,” Stannis said under his breath and Robert could have skinned the twit’s hide.
But he did not have a moment to catch his breath and give his swindling brother the cuffing he deserved, instead he watched as Ned removed his soaked tunic, beads of seawater collecting on his chest.
Robert felt a trickle of something unfamiliar deep in his gut. He could not will his eyes to tear away from his friend’s frame; lean but well-muscled with not an inch of fat on him. He heard what the men said at court, that Ned would never grow as built as Brandon nor tall, but Robert had rights to argue on his account. Ned was an extraordinary fighter, he was quick, nimble and stronger than any other Southroner in the tilting yard. Mayhaps Brandon kept his sword sharper but his friend knew how to assess a situation without running into it with the edge of his blade.
Despite his short stature, Ned often beat Robert whilst sparring, by trapping his foot around his Achilles and sending him tumbling down into the dust. To see that triumphant smile grace his lips was tenfold more exciting than winning a bout.
Losing Ned to pride was a rarity, and Robert yearned nothing more for his friend.
“Good morn! You got rocks for brains?” Ned called out to him, waving a hand in front of his face and breaking him out of his stupor.
What the bleeding Hells was that?
He shook his head for good measure and replaced his stupefied face with a grin.
“I won’t be the only one falling on my behind!” he exclaimed and rushed to wrestle his friend into the sand by ramming into him.
They went tumbling into the wet the sand, clawing and rolling around like pigs in the mud. They were both laughing and yelling curses, a sight to see from his friend’s usual grim manner. He would do anything to get a least a chuckle out of the Northern boy. Robert managed to pin his arms to the side and slide on top of his waist, holding him to ground with his thigh as Ned flailed uselessly on the ground, a look of pure frustration etched onto his long features.
In some parts, lords said that Ned was very much a man already, his maturity exceeding his years and his diligence was praised. Others saw him in the shadow of his brother, to be promised nothing more than a stronghold in the North or a knighting. Yet Robert had been tutored with him in the Vale, and he knew his friend excelled at sums and at history, with a memory that could bet a mummer off the table. You could ask the man the most niche house in the North and he would answer without a moment to think about it.
He listens and hardly talks, good ears for small folk complaints, a voice of the court had said. And when he does talk, he's the Quiet Wolf, not like that brother of him.
Robert knew his own skills were limited to that of his war hammer and telling different drinks apart.
Six and ten, and much too stupid, he had heard his father’s complaints to Jon Arryn ring like bells inside his head, hiding behind a door to eavesdrop, A man, not yet, but a boy.
Give him time, was Arryn’s response, his voice calm as a tether. He shall shed the boy soon enough.
Yet his father and his mother were away, doing Gods know what for the King this time.
Instead, Robert watched as his friend wriggled under him.
“You’re fat as an oaf! Get off me!” Ned demanded in his strong Northern accent that made the corner of Robert’s lips curl.
“And you’re short as a halfling! Not a chance!” he boasted, crossing his arms across his chest.
“Robert, I swear to the Gods above!” he said in his proper way, the honourable Eddard Stark here to save the day with his frown.
“You’d have to make me—”
Before Robert could get the rest of his exclamation out, Ned had kneed him so far up the bollocks he swore his ancestors right back to Durran could feel it. He let go of his friend who gave him a heart kick for good measure as soon as he stood up.
“Better a halfling than a boorish arse, heavier than a bag of stone!"
“Ah, you absolute cunt,” he groaned, clutching his crotch.
He could hear Renly laughing as young boys did at everything amusing, but Robert had a temper of similar length to his patience.
“Shut up you flower haired shit! Or I’ll ring your noggin louder than the Great Sept bells!”
His brother’s giggles immediately stifled.
“You’re a sore loser Robert,” Stannis stated without removing his eyes from his book.
“And you’re a sore sight!” he replied but was quelled by Ned’s silence.
He looked at his friend whose brooding face was flooded by the fleeting sun as it skipped the horizon.
A face marred by honour and the weight of a shadow he could never lift.
Perhaps that honour would liberate him one day.
But Robert knew nothing of it, so he looked away and scowled.