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A sprightly summer breeze carried the morning in from Shipbreaker Bay. Lord Steffon breathed deeply, savoring the salty air of the sea and the cool, wet, piney scent of last night's rains. He would pray for the mild weather to continue through the night; even a short trip up to the Vale would be dangerous on a stormy sea.
Despite the recent rains, the ground was firm beneath his boots as he stepped out onto the castle grounds.
"My lord!"
"Ser Gawen," Steffon called. "Are you training my sons today?"
The master-at-arms nodded. A gust of wind buffeted his sandy brown hair which he flattened with a gloved hand. "As always, my lord."
"Good. I should like to see some sparring from them," Steffon said as Ser Gawen fell in beside him.
"I'm certain they will be pleased, my lord."
Steffon smiled. He liked to see his sons at their training, but he tried to arrange his visits as surprises—to keep the boys on their toes, of course, but also because he liked to see the smiles break upon their faces when they saw him. They would surely be expecting him today, however. Lord Steffon would be departing on the morrow and taking his eldest son with him; this might be the boys’ last brotherly spar for quite some time.
The lord and his knight stepped into the wide training yard just behind the armory, but they discovered that someone had beaten them there.
A small boy was waiting in the yard. He stood rod-straight with fists on his hips and his feet firmly planted in impeccable form. He was fully suited for battle, with a yellow studded brigantine buckled over a shirt of mail. His face was hidden behind a visored helm, but his little hand moved to grip the hilt of his wooden sword as the two men approached.
Ser Gawen frowned. "Why aren't you wearing your training gear, Stannis?" There was a hint of a scold in his voice.
The boy shifted his stance.
"I wouldn't wear training gear in a real battle."
“Aye, and you wouldn’t be fighting your brother with a tourney sword, either.”
“The leather gear’s too light. We’re training, not play-fighting.”
The helm muffled the boy's complaint, but Steffon had no trouble picturing the irritable scowl on his son's face. Steffon chuckled; Stannis, naturally, did not. Young Durran the Dour, his mother called him. Little Stannis had never jested in his life, yet his father enjoyed the boy's pithy lines. He was a clever lad, always quick with a matter-of-fact remark.
Suddenly a great hoot of laughter carried across the yard.
"Ah, and here's Robert," Ser Gawen said.
Robert, Steffon's eldest, had taken one look at his little brother and burst into laughter.
"What are you doing?" Robert guffawed.
The smaller boy raised his visor and glared. His dark blue eyes were as fierce and stormy as the sea in a squall.
"Waiting on you," Stannis said. "You're late."
Both men laughed at this, and Robert as well, but the younger boy's eyes narrowed in suspicion. Stannis was ever wary of ridicule.
"Go suit up," Ser Gawen told Robert. "Don't keep your brother waiting."
Stannis scowled from his helm as Robert bounded away, still cackling.
Ser Gawen turned to his lord. "Your sons are shaping up to be fine warriors, Lord Steffon."
"I don't mean to discount your skill in training, ser," Lord Steffon said with a smile, "but my sons couldn't be anything less. It's in their blood."
"Aye," Ser Gawen agreed. "Robert is truly the Laughing Storm come again. He's already asked Noye to make him a war hammer. He's too young to yield one yet, of course, but he's a fearsomely strong lad. Jon Arryn will no doubt be impressed by him." The master-at-arms paused and glanced at Stannis as if he’d suddenly remembered the boy was still there. "And young Stannis here," Gawen said loudly, clapping the boy on a padded shoulder. "His sword work's more precise than that of some knights twice his age!"
Stannis might have smiled, but Ser Gawen's awkward pat knocked the visor back down over his face.
Lord Steffon laughed. "I don't doubt it, ser."
Soon, Robert strode out from the armory, wearing a quilted leather vest and half-helm, gripping a wooden tourney sword by the hilt. He was exceptionally tall and broad-shouldered for a boy his age—the Laughing Storm reborn indeed. Steffon’s grandfather had been a beast of a man. He himself had never grown quite so large, but his own son was sure to surpass him. Robert towered over Stannis although the younger boy was barely more than a year his junior. Steffon's sons were both tall for their ages, and in time they might reach a similar height, but that scant year proved crucial in childhood. Stannis leapt through the same growth spurts as Robert did but only after Robert had grown even taller.
Ser Gawen opened his mouth to call them to arms, but Robert had already begun galloping toward his younger brother. He raised the sword above his head in a heavy threat.
"Haaaa!" Robert shouted.
Stannis said nothing, but he visibly braced himself against the coming onslaught. His knees bent slightly, and he drew his sword and held it squarely before him. He caught Robert's downswing above his own head, stepping one foot back under the sheer force of his brother's hand. He spun out from under the threat and parried, all with the impressive precision Ser Gawen had praised. Stannis' sword work was borne from diligent labor and good coordination, but Robert's skill was something more. Robert's swings and steps were precise and fluid, as if his training had sculpted some natural fighter's instinct within him. A smile broke upon Lord Steffon's face as he watched the match. His sons would both make him proud, he knew, but Robert—for Robert, there would be glory.
The smaller boy was breathing heavily by then, but his movements remained quick until in his single-minded focus, his back foot caught on a stray stone and he fell hard on his back. Robert seized the chance to knock the sword out of his loosened hand, and as Stannis lay splayed on his back, Robert leapt down upon him in victory. He flipped up Stannis' visor and jabbed the point of the wooden sword at his neck.
"YIELD!" he yelled into his brother's face. "Yield or I'll cut your head off!"
"Then cut my head off!" Stannis shouted. "I'll NEVER yield!"
Lord Steffon laughed heartily, but all too soon the scene before him devolved into a mad wrestle. The tourney swords were cast aside entirely. Robert grabbed Stannis by the front of his brigantine, laughing as his brother's little fists bounced harmlessly off his chest and Stannis growled with a ferocity too large for his size. While moments before they had seemed to be promising young warriors, it was now abundantly clear they were barely more than wild little lordlings.
"Stop!" Ser Gawen bellowed, waving his arms as the boys rolled around on the dusty turf. He managed to grab Stannis' skinny arm and pull him from the tangle, and Robert leapt to his feet once the fun was finished.
"Brilliant work, boys," Lord Steffon boomed, "aside from that pitiful scramble at the last."
Robert pulled off his half-helm and laughed, shaking out his mane of thick black hair. "Stannis isn't a graceful loser, Father. You'd think he would learn—"
"—to ring the helm on your oafish head!" Stannis finished. "Just wait 'til I'm taller than you."
"And that will be never!" Robert crowed.
Stannis removed his own helm, his thin mouth twisted in a pout and his cheeks flushed from exercise and embarrassment.
“Anyway,” Robert continued loudly. Robert did everything loudly. “There’s nothing like victory in battle to whet a man’s appetite. I’m off to break my fast,” he called over his shoulder, striding back to the armory while playfully swinging his sword.
Ser Gawen sighed in defeat, but Lord Steffon only laughed.
“You have my full permission to take the boy in hand, Ser Gawen,” Steffon joked. “But having seen Robert in a fight, I understand your reluctance.”
The knight forced a laugh. “Well, I suppose that’s all for this morning, then. We were grateful for your presence, my lord.”
Lord Steffon nodded and waved his dismissal, and the master-at-arms followed Robert into the armory. Little Stannis remained, however, scuffing his boot in the dirt and frowning at the ground.
“All right, Stannis?” his lord father asked. “You fought well today.”
Stannis didn’t look up. “I lost,” he snapped.
“So you did,” Steffon brusquely agreed.
At the sharp tone in his father’s voice the boy looked up. Stannis had the coal black hair of their family line and striking blue eyes as well. There was something of the boy's mother in his deep-set eyes, Steffon often thought. Lady Cassana's eyes were a greenish blue and hooded with bluish shadows; some ladies tried to create the effect by rubbing color over their eyelids but never achieved it. The boy had his mother's shadowy eyes, but bluer, and far more somber than Cassana's ever were. How Steffon and his laughing lady had come to have such an ill-tempered child, he would never know.
“Robert won the spar, but you fought well nevertheless.”
“Robert always wins the spars,” Stannis whined.
“And so he does. You might never best your brother, Stannis, and it matters not. Robert will be lord of Storm’s End one day, it will be your duty to serve him—not to challenge or best him."
The boy’s face softened. He glanced away from his father’s face, nodding absently.
“Then I should be glad to have Robert as my brother,” the boy muttered. “Thank you for your counsel, Father.”
“Good,” Steffon said gruffly. “Here’s another bit counsel for you: stop being so serious all the time.” He reached for the boy so quickly that Stannis only had time to widen his eyes in horror as his father pulled him into a hug and rudely ruffled his hair.
“Augh!” Stannis shouted. “No! Get off!”
Steffon let him go with a pat on the back. “Go on, then. Take off that nice armor and meet us in the solar. We’ll break our fast together. And be nice for your mother—no more complaining.”
“Yes, Father,” Stannis mumbled, rushing off with his clanking mail.
Steffon smiled as he watched him go then turned to head back to the castle. Perhaps that had been unchivalrously done, but he was determined to force a laugh from Stannis by the boy’s tenth name day. The wind picked up again, and Steffon’s mind was pulled back to the next day’s journey. It might do his younger son some good to be away from his brother, Steffon mused. Surely the other castle boys were no match for Stannis; he would best them all with ease, Steffon knew, but he would never best Robert no matter how hard he tried.