Chapter Text
Chapter 1: Pilot
I rose from my sleep to be surrounded by lavish furnishings, a featherbed, gold-adorned curtain drapings and pillows which I could melt into. My pyjamas, or whatever my clothes were, were made of silk, so buttery-smooth I could run my hands along them like water. The clothes were dyed a rich green, almost greener than the leaves themselves. I rose from my bed, and stared at my body in the mirror.
I was a nine-year old child, and not a physically gifted one either, being that I was quite short and very scrawny. Also, I was white in this new life, and a redhead.
That’s fun.
Maybe that’s why I seem to be so rich.
The red hair was disappointing, but I could dye it if I wanted to. We win some, we lose some, I thought to myself.
I went over to what I thought would be a bathroom and saw a closet, clothes in such volumes it would make some people cry of ecstasy. In my previous life, I wasn’t a particularly fashion-obsessed man. I took care that my clothes had quality, and couldn’t care less about the quantity.
Being a lawyer, even for just six months, was an expensive business, and you were expected to be at your best the whole time, in every sense of the word. The suits I bought were custom-tailored, expensive pieces, meant to show fine craftsmanship.
I wonder how I died. I thought to myself.
Dying at 25 in some places wasn’t surprising but I had always tried to keep in shape. I never had alcohol, never took drugs, always had eight hours of proper sleep (that was always hard after I passed the Bar and began working) and overall took care of myself. I even had a skin regimen to keep it clean, and free of any blemishes or marks.
I never wore make-up, unlike some people I knew, but an important skin routine was necessary if I wanted to get the girls, something I was getting closer and closer to doing before.
I shed my silk pyjamas, and began to do stomach crunches on my bed. I want to be buff in this new life, and I had every intention to do so. Even though this was some medieval hell-hole, as I went into my actual bathroom and stared at my chamber-pot and privy, disgusting as it was, I wanted it to be a successful hell-hole for me. The things I didn’t get to do in my previous life, I wanted to do in this one.
Suddenly, I heard a knock on the door, and heard it being opened, by a serving woman. She was hot, I thought to myself.
Her face was like staring into a movie actress’, and her figure was curvy, not overtly so, yet she had enough fat on her to suck me in. Her hair was long, bound into a cute braid, which she had wrapped around her neck.
If I wasn’t nine years old, I probably would have tried to bed her.
I can save that kind of pleasure for later.
“Lord Ormund? Your cousin, Queen Alicent’s child has been born, a healthy boy. “
Oh shit. I’m Ormund fucking Hightower, from the Dance of the Dragons, and I’m barely a nine-year-old child now. I remembered him, from both the book and show, about how he was amazing at raising Prince Daeron the Daring into a perfect, charming knight, one of the few people in that entire war to be a good person.
Also. He lost. I don’t want to lose. I want to live.
Being burned to death by a dragon, or being slain by a man with one working hand, both of those fates are shitty.
I don’t really want to die like that, which leaves me one option.
Try and win the Dance of the Dragons before it even starts.
I searched through my brain, thinking through my memories from my past life. I was nine years old, and given my first son, Lyonel was born in 116 AC, when I was eighteen, I realised the boy I had come to this world for was…
“Prince Aegon is his name, after the Conqueror. Your cousin is resting, following the birth.”
This was surely a sign. I was connected with this boy, in some form or fashion. Our fates were tied together, in some way, and I needed to know how. Why specifically now?
What made coming into this world now special?
“May I see him?” I asked the serving woman, after climbing off my bed, still naked, following the stomach crunches.
Shit. I thought. Forgot to put my clothes on. I didn’t want them to get sweaty, after all
“Once you change into suitable wear perhaps. Your clothes are laid out for you, my Lord.” she said, pointing to the chair next to my bed.
“Good. You are dismissed.” I said, letting her leave the room. I was sure she didn’t want to see my naked, scrawny body for long.
I rolled over to the other side of my bed and stared at my clothes, in all their glory.
Rich velvet, I thought to myself, running my hands across them.
“Very fancy.” I whispered to myself, as I put on my underwear and vest, before dressing in the velvet.
I was, after all, the heir and only son of Lord Hobert Hightower, and as a result, needed to be adorned in the finest clothes money could buy.
The Hightowers were the third-richest house in the realm, after the Lannisters and in first, the Velaryons. I was going to ensure the Velaryon Age was dead in the water, of course.
I had no intentions of letting the Velaryons do nearly as well as they did in the real timeline, of course.
The Velaryons had dragons. I had my wits alone. I was determined that my wits would win.
I finally got my clothes on, and splashed my face with some water from the bathing sink. Westeros did not have face cream, or for that matter any good skin products, but I was determined to not let that get in the way of me looking like the comeliest man alive.
I opened the door of my chambers and led myself out of the room. I was clearly in King’s Landing, that suspicion confirmed when I saw the small dragons around my room earlier, but only then I realised I was in the Tower of the Hand. I was clearly residing with my uncle, for the time we were in King’s Landing, perhaps only to be present for my cousin’s birth..
Two Hightower guardsmen led me out of the chambers and accompanied me as we wound our way slowly to Maegor’s Holdfast. On the way, I found my cousins, Bryndon and Gwayne, who were clearly worried for their sister.
“Cousins!” I welcomed them as I embraced them. Given how Fire and Blood was written, I didn’t know what the relationship between Lord Ormund and his cousins was like. I then tried to be welcoming to them, thinking that the safest option.
They, unfortunately, were rather confused by my embrace of them, and pulled away.
“Is this another one of your silly japes?” Gwayne replied, to my confusion.
So I had chosen wrong, I thought to myself. It made no matter. I would act to ensure House Hightower was a unified, united family.
Japes were off the table, so long as they served to disunify our family.
“Now you’re the uncle of the Crown Prince, I have to treat you with more respect, do I not?” I replied.
I wanted to make it seem natural, my change in personality.
I knew Viserys would never name Aegon heir, at least in my reality, but I chose to act with a positive attitude.
If he didn’t name him heir, I would name him King myself, and place the Crown on his head myself.
I would be the Kingmaker in this timeline, not bloody Ser Criston Cole. And I would ensure that rapist, pedophile cunt Daemon Targaryen died screaming,
Me and Aegon were connected somehow, given we were both given to this world at the same time, and I needed to ensure he would grow up to be a far better man than he was in the real timeline.
A proud, true, noble prince, Jaehaerys the Conciliator reborn.
I already began plotting my thoughts in my mind, as I reached Maegor’s Holdfast.
I will take Aegon to squire in the Hightower when I become a knight, and he turns ten years old. I will ensure he never drinks alcohol once, or at least doesn’t do so in excess. And most of all, I will ensure Sunfyre survives and thrives, and Aegon will never have to drink milk of the poppy ever.
I finally made my way into Maegor’s Holdfast.
The Red Keep was dark and still as Cayn and Tomard, my guardsmen (I had learned their names from their gossip) escorted me across the inner bailey.
The moon hung low over the walls, ripening toward full. Still dark. I thought to myself.
On the ramparts, a guardsman in a gold cloak walked his rounds. The royal apartments were in Maegor’s Holdfast, a massive square fortress that nestled in the heart of the Red Keep behind walls twelve feet thick and a dry moat lined with iron spikes, a castle-within-a-castle.
Ser Arryk Cargyll guarded the far end of the bridge, white steel armor ghostly in the moonlight. Within, Ned passed two other knights of the Kingsguard; his twin, Ser Erryk stood at the bottom of the steps, and Ser Harrold Westerling, the Lord Commander waited at the door of the queen’s birthing chamber.
Three men in white cloaks, I thought, remembering Robert’s death in the timeline of the main series, and a strange chill went through me. Ser Harrold’s face was as pale as his armor.
I had only to look at him to know that something was dreadfully wrong. The royal steward opened the door.
The smell of the room was awful. Like Ormund in the show, clearly I was unable to deal with ungodly smells. I felt a queasiness in my stomach, and it felt like I was going to vomit with a force so hard it would make the Black Dread question himself. Thankfully, I found the smelling salts my father helpfully attached to my clothes, and took great deals of sniffs, slowly calming my nose down once more.
Inside, I saw a healthy baby boy, being nuzzled against the breast of my cousin, Queen Alicent. Marrying her was not a wise decision in hindsight, for Viserys, but I was glad of it.
The Hightower blood, with unimpeachable blood rushing through our veins, untainted by the Targaryen madness, would provide a counterweight to the mad Targaryens.
I brought my fingers against baby Aegon’s forehead, and he immediately stopped his breastfeeding. He squirmed hard to look at me.
“May I hold him?” I asked my cousin, who was double my age.
“You may.” she said quietly.
My uncle helped ease Aegon out of his daughter’s hands, and passed him to me. The baby seemed so fragile, yet according to the whispers he heard around him, Aegon was only smaller than Maegor at birth, Maegor being the largest, plumpest child to ever be born.
Well that explains the pale looks. I thought to myself.
As soon as I put my hands on Aegon, he started crying. But not crying in sadness, oh no.
He was happy to see me, as if he had found his actual father.
I took a finger and ran it through his wisp of hair. It was mostly silver, except for one red streak. I continued to hold him as I walked around the room. I took him to my mouth as I whispered words into his ear.
“My King, now and forever.”
He only grew more excited after I had whispered those words, and I passed him back to my cousin, as he grew ever eager to suckle from the teat once more.
After my performance, His Grace himself spoke to me, Viserys Targaryen.
“Excited to see your baby cousin, boy?” He said in a soft tone.
I put on my best nine-year-old impression before saying.
“He’s going to be the best King ever, your Grace!” I emphasised King, to fully get my point across.
“Now, now, child. My daughter Rhaenyra is still the Princess of Dragonstone.” Viserys said.
My uncle and the other members of the Small Council raised objections, before Viserys hushed them.
“Let us not sully this day with talks of succession. I have a living son, my Lords, and I intend to celebrate it.” Viserys said, walking out of the room.
I asked my uncle if I could speak to him, here and now.
“Aegon and his descendants will sit the Iron Throne. I swear it by the old gods and the new, ice and fire, copper and tin. I will die for his claim, if necessary, and so will the whole of House Hightower. Send Aegon to squire for me when the boy turns ten. I will mold him into a knight the Conciliator will be proud of to have as a son. “
“Well-spoken words, nephew. For a nine year old at least. We will discuss this once more when you come of age. I dare say your father would be displeased if he heard the words you spoke to me.”
I stormed out of the room, furious at my uncle, before colliding headfirst into my arch nemesis, Prince Daemon Targaryen. When Aegon saw him, he instantly burst out into crying.
That boy knows something, I swear it.
“Hightower whelp.” he replied crudely, whispering.
“Aunt-fucker.” I whispered to him. I watched as his eyebrows rose in shock. I had my suspicions when I read Fire and Blood that Gael’s child wasn’t from some sellsword or whatever it was.
It was from her nephew, Daemon. The babe was stillborn and Gael killed herself when Daemon married Rhea Royce and killed their child together.
Daemon picked me up by the scruff of my neck, before I kicked him, hard, in the balls, leaving him startled.
“Fire cannot kill a dragon, fool.” he said, as Otto shouted for him to put his nephew down.
Otto was an ass, but he was forever loyal to family, and forever hateful of Daemon.
Behind Daemon came his niece, Rhaenyra, the heir to the Iron Throne, before Aegon was born obviously.
The first thing I shall do as Hand is make a succession law, one only able to be overturned if seventy five percent of the Lords say yes.
I did not seek out war for war itself, and a succession law would do much to secure the realm.
After I exchanged pleasantries with Princess Rhaenyra, I left the birthing chamber, eager to be left undisturbed, with only my guards following me.
Rhaenyra will never sit the Iron Throne as long as I live. I thought.
The “Whore of Dragonstone” will remain that, a footnote in the pages of history.
I asked my guards to take me to the Red Keep’s library, so I could read up on the history of the realm, to not be an abject disappointment to my parents.
The minute details in the books I read were incredible, as I realised the amount of missing information from the main series was incredible. Hundreds of years of lineages were recorded and explaining, allowing me insight into the world I’d never thought I would be able to have.
However, I realised one thing that I had so perilously forgotten. I needed to write down every detail from my previous life, relating to technology and to the future of Westeros.
I practically begged the Grand Maester for an inane amount of parchment, all within a leather-bound book, before writing furiously in my chambers. The morning turned into the afternoon, and the afternoon turned into the night.
I wrote down every detail I could remember from my chemistry, biology and physics classes, before moving onto the future of Westeros itself. I was a huge fan of the book series in my previous life, and I intended to exploit that knowledge. Finally, as the moon reached its peak, I had finished writing a masterpiece.
Thousands of words on technological advances Westeros could only dream of as of now. Thousands of words on the future of Westeros, and the outcome of the Dance of the Dragons.
Now, I hated dragons. But they’d be incredibly useful whence the Long Night came, and so I let them be. It’s a lesser of two evils situation, you get me?
As I finally finished my writing, I stuffed the books in a hidden compartment of my chests of belongings, before I heard a firm knock, and opening of my door.
It was my father, and it was the first time I had seen him since being transported to this world.
“Ormund, my son. “ he said, caressing my cheek.
“You are the last piece of my wife I have left to me, and every day the maesters tell me of the progress you’ve been making in your studies, or the master-at-arms says you’ve improved at fighting, I feel pride for you no man can match. When you spoke to Prince Daemon, you may have been the first boy or man to make him tremble.”
“What did you say to him anyway? It makes no matter. "
“I am dying, Ormund. I will not live for much longer. There are “crabs in my belly” are what the maester’s are telling me.”
“When I die, you will be Lord of the Hightower. I have waived your regency, given your precociousness if I do not live to your coming of age. Our House is the Beacon of the South, Ormund.”
“Our words are, “We Light the Way”. Otto is my brother, but he’s a grasping idiot often, and far too brash. I saw the way baby Aegon adored you. When I die, raise that boy like your own son. Swear it, on your mother’s bones.”
“I swear it.”
“The Hightowers will light the way to a better Westeros. One led by your cousin’s son, not the Princess Rhaenyra. And most importantly of all, you will be Aegon’s protector, not anyone else. I’ll ensure it till the day I die.”
Those were the words my father left me on as we boarded a ship to sweep our way around the Stepstones back to Oldtown.
I, Lord Ormund Hightower, would protect Aegon Targaryen with my life and my blood. Nothing would ever stop me.