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Published:
2016-08-13
Completed:
2023-07-30
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1,720
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3/3
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An AU Where Ned Stark Is A Good Liar

Summary:

Really, it's in the title. An AU Where Ned Stark Is A Good Liar

Notes:

Disclaimer: don't own the characters, fan work, not for profit, please don't sue, etc.

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Chapter 1

Chapter Text

The Bridegroom

 

The Tully knights and maesters and septas followed by Catelyn's carriage rumbled into the courtyard of Winterfell where Ned and his household waited for them. 

Footmen leaped to place the wooden step in front of the carriage door. Ned came forward to assist Cate and baby Robb safely down them. 

Ned and Cate greeted each other fondly. Cate proudly showed Robb to his father. Ned tickled his Robb's chin and kissed him on the forehead.

"He's an heir any man can be proud of, milady."

"I'm glad your son pleases you, milord."

"Well, lets go inside and get you settled in. You must be hungry and tired."

"Oh, yes. Thank you."

"There is one thing you should know. Robb will have a playmate."

"Oh?"

"Yes, before my brother Benjen took the Black, he fathered a son. The mother died in childbirth. Ben was heartbroken by her death and asked me to take the child. Nothing I could do would persuade Ben from going to The Wall and leaving the poor boy. I know I should have asked you first before bringing him home, but I couldn't stand the thought of my own kin being orphaned or being sent off to live with strangers."

"Poor darling. We shall love him as our own. He'll make a fine playmate for Robb."

Chapter 2

Chapter Text

Hand of the King

 

"Betroth my Sansa to your heir, Joffrey? I have an even better idea! Why not leave Myrcella and Tommen here at Winterfell instead? You yourself have said war is threatening in the South lands. They'll be safe as houses up here in The North."

"But Winter is coming!"

"Yes, but they'll be surrounded by Starks. The safest place to be in the North is Winterfell with the Stark family in residence. We've been surviving here for over eight thousand years. That's why our bannermen follow us without question."

"I'm not sure..."

"Look, you want me to be The Hand and give you my best advice, right?"

"Yes."

"Well, my advice is that Myrcella and Tommen should be kept away from King's Landing in case of war....which you believe Westeros is on the brink of."

"And what of my heir, Joffrey? What of his safety?"

"Have Joffrey sent to his Uncle Stannis since he has no sons of his own and probably never will."

"Send Joffrey away from King's Landing?"

"You say King's Landing is a corrupt, festering pit of vipers. You stay because it is the capital of united Westeros under the Targaryens. But the Targaryens have fallen from power and you are the founder of new dynasty so why not have a new capital for your new dynasty? In a place that's loyal to Baratheons? Like Storm's End!"

"Move the capital out of King's Landing to Storm's End?"

"Sure. Leave the sewage and the corrupt nobles behind and take the best of the city and court with you."

Chapter 3

Chapter Text

The Quiet Wolf Is Rabid

Eddard Stark was eight years old and tomorrow his father would agree to send him off to foster with Jon Arryn, Lord of the Eyrie. 

It was a warm Autumn and Ned had decided that it was a perfect day for a nap under the Heart Tree in the godswood. (He may or may not have been hiding from his very tiring siblings.)

And it was lovely right up until his dream self plummeted into a nightmare. 

He'd dreamed of a Direwolf with it's throat torn out by the Stag's antlers. 

Young Ned gasped in fright and sat up with a start. After a moment of hard breathing he got ahold of himself to mull over what he dreamed. A pack of wolves was never just a mother wolf with a litter of pups. 

Next year was the start of a three year winter. 

This time...this time he would not mistake Robert Baratheon for a brother-friend, nor Jon Arryn as a surrogate father.

He only had three siblings, not four; Brandon, aged nine years, Lyanna, aged five years, and Benjen, aged four years. 

He only had one father and that was Rickard Stark. Jon Arryn was kin to the man who tossed Torrhen Stark's daughter out the moongate. The Vale had been at war with the North for nearly two millennia. 

Ned would make sure that Lyanna Stark never set foot in Harrenhal, even if it meant dosing her morning ale with sweetsleep. 

He narrowed his eyes. Maester Aemon Targaryen and Maester Walys Flowers were moles planted in the North to undermine House Stark. Those two conniving old men should die in their sleep before their loose lips cause Lord Rickard any more trouble. 

~~~

Lyanna and Benjen Stark and Brandon Stark all came down with a bad case of bloody flux just days after Ned Stark came home from the Vale. 

Sadly, all the Starks would miss the Great Tourney at Harrenhal put on by Lord Whent. 

Shy and retiring Ned told his father he had no desire to attend alone and Rickard Stark wasn't going to leave Winterfell when his heir was so ill. 

The same disease decimated House Bolton and the Dreadfort. Only Lady Bethany Ryswell survived of House Bolton. Half of House Bolton's bannermen and smallfolk were dead. House Ryswell of the Rills invoked Widow's Law on Lady Bethany's behalf since the Bolton bloodline was extinguished.    

The false Spring ended and Winter resumed. 

Ned requested to found a cadet branch of House Stark in Moat Cailin. His father, Rickard Stark readily agreed. 

Lord Eddard of Moat Cailin told Lord Howland Reed and the other Crannogmen about his weirwood dreams. They were the last people south of The Wall that believed in greenseers. 

~~~

With return of Winter, Eddard Stark travelled down the King's Road to King's Landing to trade the North's leather and furs for food. 

He nearly didn't make it back, he told his family. 

The bridge over the confluence of the Trident and Greenfork Rivers, the same bridge connecting The Twins, ancestral castles of House Frey. That very same bridge went up in a blaze of green flames. 

According to witnesses a large, un-manned barge filled with casks floated down the Greenfork and bumped against the piers of the stone bridge, too large to pass under them. Then smaller boats that were set ablaze drifted down the river into the longer barge. 

While the men of House Frey were poking at the barge and trying to put out the flaming dinghies, there was a very large explosion!

How large?

The whole bridge was gone and half of each castle was torn away. They looked like those toys made for children where the side opens up and the rooms and doll furniture exposed. 

There was a rumble and both the half-castles collapsed into twin heaps of rubble on either riverbank. 

Such bad luck it happened during Lord Walder Frey's nameday feast. All his descendants were there for the celebration. 

They're saying the explosion was strong enough to shift the Greenfork back to its original course. The Trident River flows under the Inn at the Crossroads again. Just like when it was built, you can drop a fishing line out the windows. 

Ned and his Crannogmen had the great good fortune of traveling by cart up the King's Road and missed all the excitement. 

 

Prince Rhaegar Targaryen and Dorne rebelled against the Iron Throne and Aerys the Mad eventually. The North only found out about it once all the dust had settled...because Ned had made sure to have all the crows demanding Lord Rickard Stark assemble his bannermen shot down by the Crannogmen. 

The Starks were shocked! Shocked to hear that war had broken out in the south. They'd heard not a word of it! Travel and communication was so very difficult in The North during Winter! 

The Southron lords had been pretty well divided but Prince Rhaegar was prevailing toward the end. 

Everyone had thought the Maesters had convinced Mad King Aerys into surrendering when King's Landing went up in a great green ball of flame starting with the Red Keep. 

Lord Rickard Stark and his children hugged and wept on Eddard Stark who'd been visiting King's Landing to arrange another shipment of grain to White Harbour. 

How lucky dear Ned was to have escaped the chaos! 

No member of the Targaryen royal family remained alive! Mad Aerys had packed wildfyre beneath the Red Keep and all over the city! He'd killed them all rather than abdicate. 

Sad!

Various surviving houses were marching on the smoldering ruins of King's Landing to claim the puddle of melted metal that had been the Iron Throne. 

House Lannister would have been first in line to sack the city but Lord Tywin's banners had gotten word that the Iron Islands were sacking the Westerlands. Before the Lannister's fleet could cast off and sail to King's Landing, all the ships had been torched at dock in Lannisport. 

The Ironborn had even infiltrated Casterly Rock via it's secret tunnels!  

The Westerlands and Ironborn were slaughtering each other at a prodigious rate! 

~~~

House Stark politely stated that as soon as Summer rolled around they would take a knee to whoever was the new King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, and Protector of the Realm...probably. 

Eddard had talked Lord Rickard into letting the Southron lords sort it out for themselves without Northern interference. The North had taken the knee for Targaryens with dragons, not Andels without dragons after all. 

In all the history of Westeros, and after the Conquest especially, Six of Seven Kingdoms of Westeros had never been any great friend to the North. In Winter was the only thing they'd gotten from those lords was price gouging for food and usurious rates for loans. 

Let the North trade directly with Essos instead. 

Braavos had shipyards and a fleet. The North had lumber. A mutually agreeable bargain could be made between the two. 

The Southron kingdoms descended into chaos and when Summer finally came the small folk began to flee North. 

Eddard Stark had talked his father and elder brother into letting the refugees stay if the men-folk over a certain age agreed to join the Night's Watch. Given the choice between celibacy and death, most would choose to take the vows. 

 

Notes:

Benjen was a teenager when Jon Snow was born. He was the Stark in Winterfell during Robert's Rebellion. He joined the Night's Watch after the war was over and Ned returned to Winterfell and had his own heir (Robb). Some time during Robert's Rebellion, Ned sent Jon to Winterfell, since he was already there when Catelyn arrived. It's implied that Benjen knows that Jon is Lyanna's son. I don't think he'd have any problem claiming the kid as his since he and Lyanna were very close.