While his parents were unraveling in the Great Hall, Lyonel and I were wandering across the courtyard, our footsteps echoing against the wind swept stone. The boy was practically buzzing with energy now. The brooding heir of Storm's End had vanished, replaced by a nine year old whose wormd had suddenly become much larger and more interesting.
"So, the Green Hills," Lyonel said, walking backwards for a few steps just to look me in the face. "Is it really true that there are places where you can't see a single wall? Just... fields and trees forever? And you built a whole town there? Like, with real streets?"
I chuckled, adjusting my pace to match his. "Real streets, real markets, and the best bread you've ever tasted in your life. And no one tells you when to wake up or how to stand unless they're telling you to plant more turnips."
Lyonel's eyes went wide. To him, who had been raised in a fortress where every corridor was a lesson in discipline and every meal was a ritual of silence, the idea of a place where you could just be sounded like a fairy tale. "That sounds... insane. Doesn't it get boring? Just looking at crops all day?"
"Boring?" I laughed, shaking my head. "Kid, when you're the one who decides where the roads go and how the money flows, it's never boring. Every day is like playing a game where the pieces are real people and real gold. Besides, I've got two thousand soldiers who would follow me into a volcano if I told them there was better grain on the other side."
Lyonel looked at me with something approaching reverence. "I wish I could have seen it. My father says the world outside Storm's End is full of chaos and danger."
"It is," I said, pausing to look up at the towering battlements above us. "But chaos is where all the fun is. That's why you can't just stay behind walls your whole life, Lion boy. Eventually, you have to go out and see what the world is made of before it comes and knocks on your door."
Lyonel nodded seriously, as if I had just given him the most important piece of wisdom in the Seven Kingdoms. "I'm going to see it too. Someday."
I stopped walking and looked at him properly. The way he carried himself the straight spine, the measured words, that way he assessed everything like a general reviewing a battlefield. It wasn't just the Baratheon blood; it was a lifetime of being molded into a shape that suited his father's expectations.
"You don't sound like a nine year old," I said, my tone curious but not mocking.
Lyonel snorted, a sound that was almost identical to the one I'd made earlier. "Neither do you."
I smiled, but it didn't reach my eyes. "Well, let's say I was forced to become an adult. I didn't really have a choice in the matter." I shrugged, turning back toward the castle walls. "But you are not. At least not yet."
Lyonel didn't even flinch at the implication. He just shrugged his shoulders with a casualness that would have horrified his mother. "I had to learn. My father is drilling me into his heir almost every day. When you hear about politics, troop movements, and the ways of educated men every single day, you learn." He looked up at me, his blue eyes sharp. "It's not fun. It's like... memorizing a book that's already been written."
I felt a pang of kinship with him. Different as our prisons were mine made of neglect and his made of expectation we both knew what it felt like to have our childhoods stolen to serve someone else's vision of what we should be.
"Yeah," I said, reaching out to pat his shoulder. "I know the feeling. But here's a secret, Lion boy: once you know how the book is written, you can start changing the pages."
Lyonel looked at my hand on his shoulder, then back at me. "How do you change the pages?"
"By making yourself indispensable," I replied with a wink. "Like my grain. People don't care if the baker is a nice man or a terrible one, as long as he's the only one with bread."
I laughed, the sound echoing off the ancient granite as I gave him a firm, playful shove. "Anyway, show me your castle, Lord Baratheon," I said, tapping his back with more force than intended. The impact made him stumble forward with a surprised grunt.
He didn't hesitate. With a burst of Baratheon energy, he lunged at me, his face twisted into a grin that matched my own. I spun on my heel and bolted toward one of the arched passages, my laughter ringing out loud and bright.
"Catch me if you can, Lion boy!" I called over my shoulder, my boots skidding on the cobblestones as I ducked behind a buttress.
"You're dead, Vaegon! Dead!" he yelled, his footsteps thundering after me.
For a few moments, we weren't princes, heirs, or political variables. We weren't the children of broken promises and prophecy. We were just two boys running through a fortress, playing a game of chase that felt more real than any council meeting or diplomatic negotiation. The wind whipped past us, the stone walls blurred, and the only thing that mattered was the chase.
I ducked around a corner, my heart hammering against my ribs not from fear, but from the sheer joy of the moment. I could hear him close behind, his breathing heavy, his laughter almost as loud as mine. In that moment, beneath the shadow of Storm's End, the past felt very far away.
***
The three days passed in what felt like a heartbeat. For the first time since arriving in this world, I hadn't been counting the hours until I could escape or planning my next move. I had spent them with Lyonel, exploring every hidden crevice of Storm's End, and with Shireen, telling her stories about the Green Hills that made her eyes shine with wonder.
As I stood on the pier, preparing to board my ship, the familiar weight of the storm wind pulled at my clothes. I turned to Stannis. "In a week, the first grain will arrive," I said simply.
Stannis didn't speak. He didn't nod. He just looked at me with those pale eyes, and for once, there was no judgment in them. Beside him, Selyse was biting her lower lip, her gaze fixed on me with an expression that looked painfully like maternal guilt. It was unsettling. They were looking at me not as a merchant or a prince, but as the child who had been left to die in the dark.
I tilted my head, genuinely confused by their reactions. I glanced at Lyonel, but he just shrugged, his face betraying nothing.
I reached over and gently patted Shireen's head, then turned to the boy. "I hope I'll show you Dragonstone next time," I said.
My voice held a note of sadness I couldn't quite hide. I was leaving behind the only person in this entire gods forsaken world who understood what it meant to live under the crushing weight of expectation and shitty situations. I had come here looking for a trade route and I had found something far more valuable: a friend.
Lyonel waved his hand dismissively, though his jaw was tight and his voice wavered. "Don't start crying, Veg. I'll come. I'll make my father send me."
I smiled at him, a real smile that didn't need a mask. "I'll hold you to that, Lion boy."
As I stepped onto the gangplank and the ship began to pull away from the pier, I watched the Baratheon family stand against the backdrop of their grey fortress. The distance grew, but for the first time, the world felt a little less empty.
***
On the pier, the last glimpse of Vaegon's ship faded into the grey haze of the Narrow Sea. The silence that settled over Storm's End felt heavier than before, more hollow, as if the departure of the boy had taken some of the castle's stolen vitality with him.
Stannis stood like a statue of old iron, his gaze fixed on the empty horizon. Selyse remained beside him, her hands clasped tightly before her, her face pale and unreadable.
Then, the silence was broken.
"Father." Read this novel at g.com for the best experience.
The word was quiet but carried the unmistakable authority of someone who had stopped asking for permission and started making demands. Stannis didn't turn immediately, but his shoulders stiffened.
Lyonel stepped forward, standing beside his father. He wasn't slouching. He wasn't looking at the ground. He stood with his chin up, his sky blue eyes bright with something far more dangerous than childish whimsy: conviction.
"I would like to leave for Dragonstone," Lyonel said, his voice steady despite the wind. "I can learn far more in a growing territory like the Green Hills than I can here behind these walls. There is life there, Father. Real life."
He paused, taking a breath that seemed to steady his entire body. "And I want to help my friend."
The admission hung in the air between them. For years, Lyonel had been the perfect heir, the dutiful son who accepted every lesson and every expectation without complaint. But this was different. This wasn't an obligation; it was a choice. It was the first time the boy had spoken not of what he was suppresssed to do, but of what he wanted to do.
Stannis turned slowly. His face was a mask of granite, but his eyes searched his son's face with an intensity that could have burned through stone. He looked for deception, for weakness, for the flightiness of youth. But all he found was the same stubbornness that ran through the Baratheon blood like molten steel.
"You wish to leave your post?" Stannis asked, his voice low and dangerous. "To play at being a farmer's companion?"
"I wish to learn how to build something, Father," Lyonel countered, refusing to flinch. "Dragonstone is rebuilding itself. I want to learn how to do that for our own lands."
Stannis stared at him for what felt like an eternity. Then, without breaking eye contact, he spoke.
"Very well. If you wish to learn from a boy who builds grainfields out of rock, then you shall go. But you go as a Baratheon, not as a tourist. You will learn his methods, you will learn his discipline, and you will return when you have something worth bringing home."
He turned back to the sea, but his voice carried one final warning. "Do not make me regret this, Lyonel."
Selyse's voice cut through the tension like a soft blade. "But not yet."
Stannis turned to look at his wife, his expression questioning, but Selyse didn't back down. For once, the coldness that usually defined her demeanor had melted, replaced by something raw and maternal a feeling she had clearly been suppressing since the moment I had stepped onto her docks.
"First, you must show him you will be useful, Lyonel," she said, her voice steadier than I would have expected. "He has been alone for far too long. A child who has known only neglect deserves more than just a playmate. He deserves allies."
She reached out, her pale fingers brushing against Lyonel's black hair in a rare gesture of genuine warmth. It wasn't the stiff, performative affection she showed in court; it was the touch of a mother who recognized the loneliness in her son because she saw it mirrored in the boy who had just left.
"Go to him when the first ships arrive with the grain," she continued, her eyes meeting Lyonel's with newfound resolve. "Show him that the Stormlands do not merely take they also give. Show him that even a house as stern as ours understands the value of loyalty."
Lyonel nodded, accepting the touch. The fire in his eyes hadn't dimmed; if anything, it had burned brighter, tempered by his mother's words.
Stannis watched them both, his jaw working silently. He didn't approve of the sentimentality he would never admit to it but he recognized the wisdom in it. A bond forged in shared purpose was stronger than any contract written on parchment.
"Very well," Stannis growled, though the edge in his voice had dulled. "Prepare yourself. When the grain comes, you will go. And you will go as a representative of House Baratheon."
The decision was made. The gears of fate were turning, and somewhere across the water, in the green hills of a new world, a boy with black hair and dragon's blood was waiting for the storm to arrive.