Chapter 6 4
I lay in bed that night, full of doubt, all of it on account of that letter. I turned the thought away in every direction I could, yet it kept coming back. After another day I struck a bargain with my conscience and sent a raven to the Royces to say I would be arriving shortly.
The reception at Runestone was cool. It did not trouble me. My mind was turning over questions about Lady Elena Royce's son. I did not draw it out. I demanded to see the boy. Lord Royce looked as though he wanted to say something but thought better of arguing with me.
Standing outside the door to the room, I felt something rise up in me that I could not name. I pushed the door open without regard for the nursemaids' protests, and...
I saw my son. He had light, sandy hair. Bright blue eyes. An aquiline nose. But what finished me entirely were the dimples in his cheeks when he smiled.
I stayed at the castle one day. Elena was away at a friend's wedding, but that was of no consequence. Robar and I came to terms without difficulty. He had two conditions: marriage to his daughter, and acknowledgment of Axel as my heir.
The next two months I spent laying the groundwork for Axel to be recognized as my lawful heir. There would be many displeased faces, and so the wedding and the recognition did not take place until a month had passed.
After the acknowledgment, Elbert, together with the Belmores and their allies, tried to claw back his position, but the Arryn-Royce alliance stamped it out entirely.
What pleased me most was my sister's letter of congratulation. I had been bracing for her disapproval. Explaining the concept of responsibility to Eddard proved difficult, but the boy is sharp and I trusted he would come around in his own time. Robert congratulated me with full sincerity and then began to grate on me about honor.
When Axel came to live in our ancestral seat, the place seemed noticeably brighter. The Eyrie had always been short on children, and only Robert and Ned had driven away the gloom, though they had grown up fast, much as they remained the castle's favorites. Axel was winning over the hearts of the Eyrie's people at a remarkable pace.
...
In 280 AC, joy came to the Eyrie. Lady Elena Arryn was with child. At the feast, young as he was, Axel conducted himself like a little knight, and this made me prouder of him still. He behaved with all the bearing of a true knight, though he caused more trouble than he helped, and so I gave him a task of his own: to choose a name for the child. He had earned it.
I was already preparing to depart for the royal wedding of Rhaegar Targaryen and Elia Martell when my wife's labor began. I was overcome by the most powerful enemy I know: helplessness. I did not know what to do with myself, and the not knowing only made me angrier, but after three hours it was over.
My little girl. She was blue and white, not breathing, not moving, hanging limp in the maester's hands like a cloth doll.
I had always known the gods were cruel. That is their nature. But this was too much. What had a small, innocent girl done to deserve this? What was her crime?
I walked out of Elena's chambers and stood waiting for a moment when we might find some comfort in each other. I was so submerged in my grief that the maester's words did not reach me. When what he had said finally broke through, I could not hold myself together.
Elena had followed her daughter.
I walked as far from those cursed chambers as I could get. Robert and Eddard tried to say something to me, but I could not hear them, or did not want to.
I went down to the wine cellar, took the first bottle my hand found, and did my best to find comfort at the bottom of it.
How do I tell Axel, some distant part of my mind thought, just before the mercy of oblivion took me.