Ohh, I can picture Lyonel saying "A tiny version of you? That's dangerous." especially since Lady D already has him around her finger. A baby girl looking just like her, would be the (sweet) death of him 🤌🏻😍
Heirs of the stag-
Lyonel Baratheon x Lady D - BABY FEVER
MASTERLIST - SEND PROMPTS - AO3
@multyfangirl I love you for this. Ok I’m gonna lowkey make everyone broody and horny reading this. Even me. And I’m never having children. Ever. Ever.
TW; Childbirth, blood and gore. Can you tell I don’t subscribe to the rose tinted view of motherhood. Yes I based the lullaby Lyonel sings off an actual one I love so much. It’s Cornish and it warms my heart. Check it out.
You wake to humming.
Not the usual kind that Storms End brings. Not the lash of sea. Or the bite of wind. The knock of thunder reigning from above. This seems gentler; more honeyed and far less stormborn.
Singing. The dulcet tones of an old song.
“Dreams like the castles that sleep in the sand….Soft is the wind… soft is the wind. Slipped through the fingers or held in the hand.”
A Stormlands lullaby. A nursery rhyme about the sea and winds. Of oceans, magic, and enduring love. The tale woven from the shores of the very rocks you set upon. Something that never cowered nor surrendered.
Your bleary eyes crack open to bring the small world of the bedchamber back to you.
Grey washed and salt licked, like much else in your bedchamber. Beeswax candles shiver low on the sides. Giving the room a faint lick of honey. The fire is a warm roar of flames in the hearth.
The old bed creaks and groans when you move. Muggy headed and sore, sore all over it seems. It’s like you’ve been chucked from the highest ramparts and been bowled around in the tides, bashed about to bits on the rocks. Stomach, thighs, and arms tender. Eyes raw. Everything about you wanted to weep, bleed, or leak. But despite it all, you’re so happy.
You rise from the pillows. From the lulling goosedown warmth of the mattress. The light coming in is thick with cloud. Threaded with the usual cry of gulls. The thrash of the sea backing every moment.
It feels serene now. Like the storm has rushed through and now it’s finished with you.
The air is awash in the calm perfume of lavender oil. The old aroma of iron and blood that’s been washed off the stone floors. Off the bedding. All the pain, sweat, screams and strife that came before this moment, trickling away.
Your eyes focus across the bedchamber. Where your son, your newly born babe, fusses in his carved wooden cot. Wrapped in yellow blankets. Little warbles and squeaks fluttering in the air like fragile birdsong.
Lyonel is leaning over the bassinet. Humming to him.
Light paints itself in chalky bold stripes down his hair and face by the window. His ringed hand reached out to caress his sons chubby cheek. Stroking a knuckle down skin so soft, he’d never felt the like. Laundered silk.
There is much joy and serenity to be had around the keep. For mother and babe are hale. Your son’s lungs are strong. A true Baratheon through and through.
One who gave a shrieking loud cry that pierced the walls as soon as you birthed him. Lyonel’s smile and resounding laugh had split his face like thunder when he heard it. It tugged and pumped fierce, pounding blood through both your hearts.
“Hear that? Lady Storm? Listen to our boy.” He awards. Smoothing sweaty locks of hair out your eyes as you heaved for breath.
“I can see your resemblance already.” You pant for a breath. Voice wearied and no fucking wonder.
He chuckles. Squeezes you tight. Peppers kisses down your sweat slick jaw. Awed. Relieved. Wild with love at your strength.
“You did it. My love. You did so well.” You don’t miss the way a salty tear or two from him drips and splashes hot down your shoulder. His hard brow aligned to yours. Knocking his stubborn head to your own. You squeeze him back as much as you were able.
You watch the plethora of people attending your babe. Washing him. Checking him all over as he squirmed and fussed. All under your careful supervision. And the looming threat of Lyonel’s black-eyed wrath if they didn’t let you hold him, your child is brought straight over to you after he’s been examined.
“Given your age…” The Maester had grumbled as he handed you the writhing, squirming bundle. “The complications were, thankfully, few. Praise the gods my lady.”
The man stands there and crosses his arms. Chain at his chest clacking. The shift of his rough hewn robe as he moves his arms.
The many eyes still in the room watches you tuck the linens back around your boys face, so you could see his wrinkled little brow and dark black eyes. Warbling cries from his mouth come.
That scent of a bathed newborn reaching you. Pure milky soft skin. Innocence. You nuzzle your lips to his head. Whirls of black hair stick to his soft scalp. Place him alongside your heart, so he can hear his mother.
Lyonel piped up from the side of the room. Eyes goring into the man. Offended. Tunic laying open at the neck. Stinking of sweat. Tired, and clinging at the last fraying rope of his patience.
“Must all due credit go to your fucking gods? I’d think we can spare Lady Baratheon some of that, for actually having been the one whose body bled and split open to deliver my son.” He warns darkly. Voice like flint. Arms crossed.
“Lyonel.” You chide weakly. Eyes drowsy. Still blood and sweat wicked from your labours.
Even in your birthing bed, not having delivered your first born, and then the gory nightmare of the afterbirth an hour previous, A lady’s work is never done: still you had to mediate your husbands temper.
“Enough blood has been split in this room. We don’t need more.” You encourage. Voice croaking. “Not on this auspicious day. Come over here and see your son.” You arbitrate.
You swallow the tick of your annoyance. You’re far too tired to decimate at present. You’ll store it for later on. “I Thank you. Maester. For your help.”
Your husband hadn’t left the birthing chamber. Not for one minute as soon as your pains started. He didn’t disappear to revel and drink with his bannermen, your countrymen and both sets of your cousins.
Even though you’re sure they’re all roaring drunk, in the round hall by now. Toasting to a boy heir, to the fruits of the laughing storm and singing bawdy folk songs. He stayed.
You’re certain you’ve sprained the bones in his hands. You’ve bitten out sobs and cried his name, cursed it in places too. He was there. All throughout. Unwavering. Storm steady. Mouth in your ear. Bathing your sweat away with a cloth. Encouraging you. Kissing your head.
He can survive a battlefield for certain, and there was no way - in his own words - ‘in the seven cunting hells’ that he would abandon you alone, to yours.
At the very least, he’s getting in practice as a proud, stomping, fatherly stag. Watching over his wife and his young from the first.
He lopes himself to your side, insult not forgotten in those dark scowling eyes, but he buried a kiss in your hair. Curled around your back as you held the baby. Arm around your shoulder. Settling into the pillows at the headboard of your bed.
The stooped old midwife you’d insisted on having fetched from Blackhaven, was washing her hands in a wooden bowl the other side of the room. Watching this whole tableau with a flick of a smile, glittering eyes. Anrea.
Lyonel is ninety percent certain the woman is a white witch. But you’d insisted.
The maesters of the citadel lacked one thing when it came to knowing of childbirth; some things just couldn’t be taught or learned. You wanted a competent midwife. You refused their suggestions of yet more men.
You wanted Anrea here from your sixth month. You had her. Lyonel assumed he pays her in ravens, or magic beans or some such. But after meeting her, he was left with little doubt that she was the one he wanted to help pull his baby out of you.
She has hair like white rope long since frayed. Gathering back at her neck and and held with a comb. Robes of long, lavender cloth and shawls of lace. Her face and neck bore a thousand wrinkles, each sagging into the other. One eye was green, the other dark brown.
She smelled of yellow camomile and dried rustling lilac and has a voice like scraping stone. She used plants and potions of her own making to wilful effect. She required no payment from you, but a room and board, and a patch of the godswood to grow her own herbs. She was having brewed for you, a tea made of seaweed. To restore strength and iron.
Lyonel defied the gods to produce a more stout woman. Crone she may be, but Anrea may aswell have been spat out to this realm, by the warrior himself.
She was fierce and forthright and knew everything there was about the birthing bed. And every instruction she gave rang true. Every hitch of breath or pull of muscle. She knew. Told you to lie on your side to prevent tears and it had worked. And guided you through the hell of it all. Calm as a millpond.
“He’s healthy as an ox. My lady. He comes from a strong mother.” She insists. Coming over. A bony hand reaches and folds the cloth down. Rings of iron and amber replaced on her clean hands.
“Big lad he is. You quickened well. Though I’ve oft heard tale of the sheer strength of Baratheon seed. You stags do produce big, dark sons.” She sends Lyonel a coy, pointed look over your shoulder.
“I’m honoured you think so. Anrea.” He smirks. The humourous nature of the comment not lost on him.
“I should know. I delivered your grand sire. Huge chunky brute he was. Near killed your great-grandmother in coming.” She tells in plentiful amusement. Watching your babe as she said it.
Lyonel frowned. He was set to ask exactly how old this woman was, but her instructions cut him off. There’s dark magic at work here, and he dare not intrude on it.
“Let him feel your skin. Your heartbeat. It will soothe him. Help the bond.” She tells you. Unfolding the blankets. “Soon we’ll help him latch and try a feed, My lady.”
She turns her well meaning ire on the rest of the bedchamber.
“Out with you. Mother and father only.” She turns and barks to the room. Like a pestered grey old hound.
Maids and attendants shuffle to obey her whims. Carrying blooded linens or disposing of dirtied water.
The Maester was miffed at having to follow a woman’s orders, but you’d made it plain he was to listen. Or Lyonel told him he could fuck right off back to Oldtown.
He glares at Anrea as he leaves. She sights his scowl and scoffs at it. “Doddery idiot. What good is wearing a fucking chain around your neck like a damn nanny goat. Bunch of know it all cunts.” She mutters as she shuffles to the side.
No doubt pummelling some foul green ingredients into a paste with a pestle and mortar, for that tea she spoke of, for you. Aswell as having made some balm for between your legs, to ease the sting. Cold compresses would help too. And ice baths.
“Can I hold him?” Lyonel asks. “She didn’t give me any instructions.” He speaks out the side of his mouth. Whispering conspiratorially.
“Do you dare move.” You tease.
He frowns. “I have a decent stake in his creation. Be fair.”
You chuckle. He fusses a little, but lyonel makes sure that enough of his skin is on display for the babe to feel. That wiry chest hair of his falling against the babes skin. Feeling the slow dub of his fathers heart too.
You smile. Shuffling him over into his waiting arms. As Anrea had coached him. (More line terrified him into the correct hold) supporting the head, back and neck.
Easy arms around him. He’s a baby. Man. Not a fucking mace. Loosen your grip. She’d snapped.
“So. My Lord storm-“ you begin.
Leaning over and smoothing over his little wiggling foot as he squirms. Spit wet cries coming from his mouth. Belly no doubt full of milk you’d just fed him. That should buy you silence for a little while.
“What shall we name him?” You decide. Laying your head on his arm. Watching the turn of his chin as he looks down at him. Salt and pepper hair flopped in his tired eyes.
“What was that name you liked-the one from House Swann, you told me about. The one from one of the old sailor songs.”
Your face must be a picture. You tilt your head. Amazed he even remembered that. He learnt of it at his time as your betrothed, at Blackhaven after the Ashford Tourney. The song was about a sailor who fell in love with a syren. Story was she gave him lungs to breathe in the sea. And they ruled together under the tides as gods. Jorys & Eyla.
“Jorys.” You ask.
Lyonel grinned. You saw the weight of it settle in his eyes. The choice laying shape. “Aye. That one.”
Bouncing the babe a little in his arms as a yawn cracked across his scrunched face. Gummy eyes closing. Arm waving around.
He knew babies were supposed to be beautiful; and maybe so in the eyes of the beholders and parents they were. But at this stage he looked like a wormy, wriggly thing, that was as wrinkled as a week old piece of fruit.
When the words leave him about the name, the babe grumbled an odd sleepy, gurgle of a noise. One that sounded like agreement.
“See-“ He laughs. “He approves already. Anointed by none other than himself.”
“Jorys Baratheon.” You hum. “I like it. It sounds elegant. Learned. But youthful.” Smoothing a fingertip over that ink dark Baratheon hair. Like wisps of spun cotton.
You both watch as you toy with playing with the whorls of them. Pushing them back and following the wave.
“I thought you’d want something from your house. Orys. Or Ormund. Borros. Those battle-scarred, bold names that echo through bloody rebellion and Baratheon sieges.” You seek. “Please don’t suggest we name him Argilac.” You hope.
“I’d ask to be slain if my parents gave me that name.” He remarks.
He lays those stout, heavy names aside. Endless petitions from cousins and relations. Harren. Durran. Hal. Randar. Borrath.
Time to remind this first born child and heir, and all the rest of the toadying cunts, that he came from Baratheon and Dondarrion stock. All too easily these days he sees how a mothers house infulence is squeezed out of a child when they’re born, like oil from a rag.
He doesn’t want that. He wants this little stag to wear lightning bolts and be proud of it-
“We’ve plenty of time for those overdone stag names. Maybe the next one…” He turns and catches your eye. You spy the glimmer that sat there. The wicked one.
“Next one?” You raise a brow.
“Lyonel. I love you very much. With all my heart. But right now, in this bed. My answer has to surely be fuck right off.” You declare. Leaning over and kissing his cheek.
“Fair.” He grins. All dimples and cheeks.
You hear Anrea chuckle dryly from across the rooms. Like grated metal. As she pummels something in her stone mortar. “Good woman.”
Though where you’d leaned to kiss him, he does turn and catch your mouth with his own. Presses on you a slow, lippy kiss that absolutely shouldn’t have stirred you as much as it did.
The baby fussed in his hold. Little arm whacking out to brush against his fathers chest.
“Now. Little stag. I was here first. Those tits belong to me first of all.” He leers.
“Hit him harder, Jorys. For your mother.” You ask.
“He wouldn’t dare face my wrath.” Lyonel answers. Pecking you softly on the lips again. A slow, melting kind of kiss.
“Oi. Any more of that nonsense. I’ll have you gelded. She needs to heal for two months before you can even think of producing a second heir.” Anrea fairly shouts from across the room.
Lyonel breaks from you. Wets his lips. Tries not to look too cowed.
“Should we tell her that nonsense is the reason she’s stood here?” He quips.
Anrea puts her hands on her hips. Danger.
“She’d make a terribly good advocate for those who wish to remain chaste.” He mutters.
“Behave. Or she’ll make you stand out in the hall like a naughty boy.” You tease.
He looks pleadingly into Jorys face.
“See what I put up with? I hope you know I’m being ganged up on, here, my lad.”
“Does you no harm.” Anrea puts in under her breath.
You hide your chuckle into Lyonel’s shoulder. Though your whole body shakes with laughter. You wipe away tears. Blessed day indeed.
The memories of your sons name day make you grin. It feels years ago, as opposed to mere days. Only just this week gone. The celebrations still bleed through the walls like sea salt.
A tourney is being prepared. Poor Willard is flung under the wagon as you are still much too feeble to help plan much beyond feeding schedules and the glories of colic cures.
Pavilions are being raised. Game and pigeon pies, salted pork and cod, wine and mead, ordered in by the wagonload. Rooms prepared. Games announced. Bannermen called to celebrate. A caravan train from Blackhaven and Highgarden will soon arrive. Family gathered to toast to the child of the laughing storm. All laden with name day gifts for your son. Some will bring gold or trinkets. Others fine weapons or books. Some may come with the hope of future alliance to a daughter stuffed in their pockets.
Lyonel wants to put a small circlet crown of deer horns on his babes head. Smother him in gold too. He’s had the castle seamstress make him up a little cloak, embroidered with black stags. You’re sure a gown of excellent black and yellow velvet is being designed for you. Plenty of stag gold ornamentation to ply upon your persons. A comb for your hair. A belt, or a new clutch of yellow jewels.
You’re sure he’ll don his own antler crown too. In a couple of weeks time, when you’re well enough to leave the bed, you’ll welcome all stormlanders across your threshold to revel in the joys. Tables groaning with food. Knights ready to joust. Lord, Lady, and baby Storm at the head of it all.
You shuffle up in bed. Mouth dry. Eyes still iron heavy. Body feeling like a bag of stones. You were told it will be a while before you’re batting at full strength again. To take it easy in the mean time. Manage the feeding. The cloth changes. The cries that come at night.
An excellent nanny, Bertha, one who’d tended you years ago, had been readily employed come take him to the nursery to soothe when you needed rest. Anrea was hanging around too. She was loathe to be gotten rid of quite so soon. Lyonel wants to give her a parcel of land and a sainthood as thanks.
You turn to spy a breakfast tray left for you. A pot of Anrea’s green tea left steaming. Porridge layered with fruit, and salted, fried fish on the side. Hearty bacon and boiled eggs. She was trying to stuff you with food and iron already. Healthy mother. Healthy milk. Healthy babe.
You watch serenely across the room in the pleasant morning light. Lyonel’s song reached across the flagstones like whispers of hot honey as he sang. Low. So as not to wake you. But truth be told your ears pricked the second you heard Jorys shift and unsettle.
“Whispered and tossed on the tide coming in…” He sang gently.
Leaning down and plunging his hands in the crib. Plucking the weight of his son out. Cradling him close to chest. Big ringed hand cupping the back of his little head. Blankets flopped over his black tunic clad arms.
Still singing as he takes the babe to the window. Bares him to the morning light. Lets him hear the sounds to which he’ll grow up on, like daily bread, gulls, tides, storms that roll in.
Though Jorys is more interested in sleeping against his fathers shoulder, eyes closed as he slumps into his hold. Still milk wearied, full and sleepy.
Lyonel is speaking to him like he was wide eyed and able to see the span of his sea stained lands.
“See this my little stag…This will one day be your kingdom. You can rule over the tides and the sky. Look after all our dour, weather hardy Stormlanders.” He lovingly pats his sons back. Chuckling as he regales him the tale.
“They’ll adore you. I dare say. You’re strong and loud, judging by the way you cry at night. Which is a good thing. We are not designed to fall gently on the world. No Baratheon can ever be counted as meek. Certainly not one blessed to have a mother like yours, either.”
The next words bloat and warm your weary heart.
“She’ll give you all that I can’t. Little storm. She’ll teach you patience. Negotiation. The wherewithal to grow into a good, kind boy. A temperate one. And an even better man. To hold yourself tall and never falter. All the boring minutia of running this place that she somehow takes and turns into sense. How to read someone at ten paces. I still don’t know how she does that. Fucking witchcraft, I tell you.”
“And need I say, she will show you how to be so stubborn, you’d have a better chance of wooing iron islands rock. Lord only knows how I won her over. I must be a very lucky bastard.”
You smile. His little spiel so heartfelt it makes you grin. Tears swimming to your eyes. You watch as Lyonel turns his head. Kissed his scalp. Sweet soft black hair tickling his lips and scratchy beard.
“I’ll teach you about the finer things. Like fishing and sailing. And most importantly, hunting. Hawking. Making merry…” He decides. “We’re good at that around here. Got to have something bright to do when winter storms roll in.”
“We can go raise tents in the Kingswood and hunt for boars or deer. When you’re old enough, I’ll take you out on shipbreakers bay. The shipwright can make you a little brig all your own. I’m having it called ‘Stormchaser.’ I hope you’ll like it. You’ll dance through the waves one day. I know it.”
“I hope you’re not influencing our son with dangerous hobbies. Lord Storm.” You speak up. Reaching over to the bedside for your cup of tea.
Lyonel spins to you. Jorys bounced in his arms. Squirming little. Sleeping lots. A stocky, lumpy weight in his arms. That smelled like sweet warm milk and lilacs from the laundered blankets.
“Simply having a heart to heart with my boy. He needs to know how things will work around here.”
You hold your teacup and saucer in your lap. Having supped it. “At one week old, he may still be a little young for sailing and ships.”
Lyonel’s huge, beaming smile reminds you of the sun.
“I chartered my first sailing course at nine.” He tells you proudly.
“Don’t wish him grown too fast.” You ask. “Savour the littleness. Being able to hold him like that in your arms. Before we know it he’ll be bowling around us. All antlers abd bluster.” You remark. “Then he’ll be a boisterous hormonal lad and gods help us then.”
“You’ll temper him. I’ve no doubt. With that same wilful look you give my cousins when they behave like the arse end of a mule.”
“Well they do.” You remark. Cutting. “Especially Hal. You’d think he was raised by Wildlings.”
He chuckles. Crossing to the bed. “You must be feeling a little recovered. If you’re able to spar with me and correct Hal’s behaviour.”
“Hal’s behaviour is never not in need of correcting. Besides, I’m on the mend. Just don’t ask me to sit a horse anytime in the next month.” You compel. Easing out the covers. Your belly still bloated from the birth. You’re told it will ease over time.
“Anrea said to rest. Bed rest. And I’m far too scared of that witch woman to disobey her whims. She’ll put a curse on me if anything happens to you.” He warns you. Moving to where you stand.
You wrap yourself in your brocade gown. Lightning silver. Shuffling your feet into slippers. Your hair is loose down your back. You’ll need a bath soon. As you suspect, will Jorys.
“Let me stand up. I’m sick of laying down. Being fed on every two hours like a milk cow.”
“You’d make a lovely bovine. My sweet wife. The best in the barn.”
“You do know how to charm your way into your wife’s heart.” You surmise archly.
Coming to meet him in the middle. Stood by the fire. Light bleeding its smooth way onto your silks. You hook your hands to his elbow.
He turns his head to kiss you. You’ve found he kicks up a royal Baratheon tantrum if you kiss the babe, before him. You splay your hand across his back. Kiss him til your legs feel weak.
“Morning bab.” You coo lovingly. Kissing his sweet head. Breathing in the smell of him. Lilacs and warm soft milk. An irresistible wash of powdery baby skin. His face twitches, tongue lolls from his lips, but he doesn’t wake. Milk drunk.
You both look at him. Drunk on the combination of love, awe, and lost sleep.
He tended him a couple times in the night when he fussed. Though he lacked the tits to be able to calm him properly. A walk down the halls and a hushed cuddle seemed to do the trick.
One thing no one warned you about. Was how much love you’d feel in looking at the baby you’d made. You’d kill or bleed for this little lump. He tore you open. Both heart and body. Made you see that such stirring love was possible. It seemed a wretched, powerful, terrible thing. That it could exist so strongly. You’d never known a thing like it, save for the way you loved Lyonel.
“I’ve been thinking.” You start. Stroking his little head.
Lyonel urges you on. Eyes meeting your own.
“What I said. The day he was born… about there not being another.”
“Oh?” He buoys a dark brow. Looking insatiably curious. But half wary Anrea would burst out of the nearest shadow and whack him in the balls for daring to think where this is headed.
“I think I may have spoken too rashly. On the subject.” You remark.
Watching with rapt and beautiful adoration, the way your sons tiny hand, clenched in a chubby fist around Lyonel’s fingertip.
“Given time, think I would be open to another. Can’t have Jorys being lonely. We do have a lot of cavernous Storms End to fill…” you add. Hoping.
He smiles down at you. “You’re serious, my savage storm?” He checks.
“Deadly.” You nod.
Lyonel scoops you close. Free arm banded across the back of your waist. Body pressed to his. This awe inspiring body. The one that’s born his child. And nourished him. And still you’d throw yourself into the bloody fray and risk another. Just like that.
He kisses you like his namesake. All smirk and passion. Darkly and happily humming into your mouth. Hand sliding up your brocade silk back. Getting lost in the hair at the nape of your neck.
When he pulls back, Jorys is clamped between you, like a little Stormlands barnacle, to his fathers chest. His forehead nudged to yours. Nose to nose.
“Maybe it’ll be a girl next time-“ You dare to hope.
His smile makes your knees weak. You gently cup the side his sharp jaw. Greying bristles under your fingertips. Jorys babbles. Your finger goes to his soft, waving little fist. He curls around you like a little limpet. You feel so whole and happy, you don’t know how you’ll ever stop.
“A tiny version of you…” He laughs. Voice all charm and heavenly gravel. “Now that’s dangerous.”
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