#robert's bastards

[imjustapoorwayfaringgeek]

jett black hair, deep blue eyes, that square jaw... you must be one of Robert's

[randifrnz]

I now love the idea of asoiaf ending with Renly and Stannis both dying (and Shireen even though I hate it but I think she really is going to die in the books too). With no more Baratheon, Bran, the three eyed raven, goes and finds the last three Baratheons, Robert's bastards, Mya Stone, Gendry Waters, and Edric Storm. And so the Baratheon line continues with them. I feel like that would be a cool way of coming full circle with Robert's hoe-ing and the plotline of the previous line of Baratheons dying out due to infighting.

[joannalannister]

Littlefinger tells us: 

"I've also heard whispers that Robert got a pair of twins on a serving wench at Casterly Rock, three years ago when he went west for Lord Tywin's tourney. Cersei had the babes killed, and sold the mother to a passing slaver. Too much an affront to Lannister pride, that close to home."

@rogue-rook asked:

hey, quick question, what passing slaver? was this at casterly rock, and if so, why was there a slaver over on that side of the continent? and if she sold the woman from king's landing, well, obviously some people know about it, that's yet another crime that could have brought her down?

GRRM hasn’t really elaborated on this, so all we can do is speculate, but I think all of this took place at Casterly Rock. 

(Assuming it happened at all. Remember that Littlefinger is speaking to Ned here, and he is trying to increase tensions between Stark and Lannister, and he knows what Ned’s hot-button issues are, specifically the murder of innocent children. I personally think this happened, given other things Cersei has done, but how much should we trust Littlefinger?)

I assume what happened is that:

Robert and his court visited Casterly Rock in 295AC to attend Tywin’s tourney. Robert had sex with a serving girl, probably in a manner similar to what happened with the Florent girl, in that it was semi-public and various people found out about it. 

Cersei stayed home at Casterly Rock for a bit while Robert went home

Cersei found out that this serving girl was pregnant

approx. nine months after the tourney, an Essosi ship came into port, either in Lannisport or Casterly Rock itself, to trade (perfectly legal) fine luxury goods to the Lannisters. (For example, Myr produces beautiful carpets, screens, lace, mirrors, and other expensive stuff the Lannisters (and other westermen) might want to buy.) The captain of this ship is kind of shady. 

Gregor smash :( 

Cersei found this shady ship captain and got him to take the new mother / former Lannister employee on board and sell her into slavery back in Essos. Illegal cargo hidden by his perfectly legal carpet trade (or whatever the shady captain traded in). 

Some things I’m wondering about:

How much did Tywin know? Did Tywin help Cersei? Did Cersei do her best to hide this from Tywin because it made her look bad and she’s desperate for her father’s approval and if she went running to her father it looks like she can’t take care of Things herself? 

Twins. It’s really interesting that the babies were twins, given that twins run in the Lannister family. Was this serving girl a descendant of a Lannister bastard? Were these twins a distant relation of Cersei’s? 

Did GRRM intend for me to wonder about this for years? When will I get answers to all my Casterly Rock questions? 

[thebluelemontree]

What do you think of Gendry meeting Mya. I don't know if we will see any of Robert's children ever meeting but I think that Mya meeting Gendry has the highest probability. They are both connected with the Stark sisters in some way and I think they would really like each other. And it will be interesting to see a sibling dynamic between the two. And personally I just want them to meet each other.

Oh, I’d be thrilled to see Gendry and Mya meet!  And I think, there’s no reason why that couldn’t happen and perhaps a few reasons why it probably will.

As you say, they are both connected to a Stark sister, but there’s even more.  It’s appropriate that Gendry has chosen to remain at the inn at the crossroads to protect Willow and the other orphans.  He’s living with Arya’s ghost since this is the last place Arya was confirmed alive when Sandor Clegane had the deadly brawl with the Mountain’s men.  They argued the last time they saw each other before Sandor kidnapped her from the BwB.  All the ravaging of the towns and villages must have filled Gendry with fear for what might have happened to her.  So he waits there, hoping that Arya is among the next group of orphans make their way to the safety of the inn.  Crossroads.  Riverlands.  The aptly named region where many paths meet and flow together, which has proven to be true over and over with many different characters.

Interestingly, Gendry and Mya are also connected by Ned and Catelyn Stark.  Catelyn and Mya spent a decent amount of time together when Mya escorted Catelyn up to the Eyrie.  Now Gendry is apart of the BwB that follows Lady Stoneheart.  To a lesser degree, they are also connected by Ned Stark, who saw baby Mya often when he was fostered at the Eyrie.  Ned goes to see Gendry at Tobho Mott’s armory as well as Robert’s other bastard, baby Barra, who he notes looks like Mya at the same age.  Mya, Gendry, Edric Storm, and Bella (the prostitute at the Peach) are the only known surviving children of Robert.  The only one who doesn’t know his parentage is Gendry; however, someone who does know who his father is, even mistook him for Renly at first, has already crossed his path at the inn and is still in the general area:  Brienne, who is also connected to both Stark sisters.  She may have started her Feast journey looking for Sansa, but she ended up tracking Arya’s path and has been heavily connected to Arya the whole time.  Brienne could be the one to tell Gendry who his father is and may alleviate some of his insecurity of being too lowborn for Arya.    

Back to Bella though.  She’s a half-sibling Gendry has already met, unbeknownst to both of them.  Good thing he declined to ring her bell.  If he can have one brush with a half-sibling, why not another?  Seems to me the pathways to Gendry learning of his parentage, what that will do for his character arc and personal insecurities, plus the knowledge that he has some siblings out there have already been laid down long before any potential meeting between Mya and Gendry.  That’s a good sign.      

Of the four bastards, Mya and Gendry are the closest in personality.  They are both shy, sullen, stubborn, and industrious.  They’ve both experienced bitter resentment at their lives being altered and hopes smashed by the will of the nobility.  Mya, who already had trust issues from her father’s abandonment, had believed with her whole heart she was going to wed her love, Mychel Redfort.  She’s blissfully innocent when she tells Catelyn about their plans to marry.  She gave him her virtue, and he left her to marry Ysilla Royce instead.  Now Mya’s loss of virginity is a source of gossip as if she were promiscuous.  She feels rightfully angry, brokenhearted, and most likely also stupid and embarrassed for believing a trueborn son of a blue-blooded family would wed a bastard girl.  Gendry showed signs on first meeting him that he was interested in becoming a knight, which Ned sort of recognized when he offered to have Gendry sent to him if he wished to learn to fight.  He was forging his own helm that he refused to let anyone, not even a high lord, take from him.  Then his life is turned upside down when he’s turned over to Yoren and sent to the Wall with a bunch of vile criminals for seemingly no reason.  He has knights sent after him to arrest him when he has no idea why.  For the first time in his life, he finally finds a connection with Arya and feels kicked in the teeth when he learns she’s highborn.  In his eyes, it’s the brutal class structures swooping in to slap his hand away from even the simple pleasure of having a friend.  All his life he’s been told what to do, where to go, what he’s allowed to be, and he’s pretty much sick of it, which is why he finds Beric and the BwB so appealing as opposed to serving again in a castle.             

Gendry and Mya are also the two that have the most issues with their father.  And even though Gendry has no idea who his father is, between the two of them, they have a pretty accurate read on what kind of father Robert really was:  drunk, careless, selfish, quick to abandon people when they lose interest, solving problems with his fists as a first resort (as he did with Joffrey and Cersei).  Gendry doesn’t have to know Robert personally.  All his evidence is in his absence and in the kind of men his mother brought home.   

Gendry ignored that. "At least your father raised his bastard, not like mine. I don't even know my father's name. Some smelly drunk, I'd wager, like the others my mother dragged home from the alehouse. Whenever she got mad at me, she'd say, 'If your father was here, he'd beat you bloody.' That's all I know of him." He spat. "Well, if he was here now, might be I'd beat him bloody. 

Mya shook her head. "I remember a man throwing me in the air when I was very little. He stands as tall as the sky, and he throws me up so high it feels as though I'm flying. We're both laughing, laughing so much that I can hardly catch a breath, and finally I laugh so hard I wet myself, but that only makes him laugh the louder. I was never afraid when he was throwing me. I knew that he would always be there to catch me." She pushed her hair back. "Then one day he wasn't. Men come and go. They lie, or die, or leave you.

Edric, Bella, and even Barra’s mother operate more on Robert Baratheon the legend more than the real man, and I feel like they are the opposite sides of the coin to Mya and Gendry.  Edric is Robert’s only acknowledged bastard.  He’s a really sweet kid too, but he has all the privileges and social advantages of being officially claimed and having a noble-born mother.  He believes this is a sign that Robert loves him and is involved in his life.  What he doesn’t know is that all his gifts supposedly sent from Robert were actually sent by Varys and Robert never actually gave a shit as Stannis recounts: 

And he worships Robert, as Renly did when he was young. My royal brother played the fond father on his visits to Storm's End, and there were gifts . . . swords and ponies and fur-trimmed cloaks. The eunuch's work, every one. The boy would write the Red Keep full of thanks, and Robert would laugh and ask Varys what he'd sent this year.        

Still neglectful and absent as seeing Edric at Storm’s End was probably incidental to other matters at hand.  He could turn on playing the fond father when it was easy.  When the boy was already right there in front of him.  Bella also takes pride in having a share of the king’s blood and the belief that Robert favored her mother above all others.  It makes her feel special like she’s more than just a common whore or a whore’s daughter.  It’s a small shred of care from Robert regarding her mother that she can hold on to.  But Robert for a brief moment showed the same favor to Barra’s mother, who was a virgin when Robert took her and believed that Robert would still care for her and her child.  When Ned tells Robert about Barra, his attitude is that a whore should have more sense, i.e., that she should have taken her moon tea instead of holding up bastard children named after him for the world to see.  Whereas Ned sees her as a poor innocent fifteen-year-old child who fell in love with Robert’s charms.  Mya hasn’t had any such illusions about Robert since she was old enough to understand her father wasn’t coming back, the same as Gendry.

Mya and Gendry have both been directly threatened by Cersei for being Robert’s bastards.  Gendry was hidden in Tobho Mott’s armory, probably by Varys, who has an interest in safekeeping some of Robert’s biological children so they can be used later as a basis of comparison to Cersei’s.  When Cersei learned of Barra, she sent Allar Deem via Janos Slynt to kill both the mother and baby.  Cersei also had Robert’s twins from a serving girl at Casterly Rock killed.  After Gendry is on his way to the Wall with Yoren, gold cloaks are sent with a warrant from Queen Cersei to arrest Gendry.  Long before that, after the fetal kitten incident, Robert made some comments about sending for Mya (a much more amiable child to distract him for a while) to be brought to King’s Landing.  In response, Cersei makes a not-so-veiled threat that Mya will be killed if Robert brings her to court.           

So yeah, for a lot of reasons I think it makes sense to bring these two together.  If you want my opinion on how they will reach each other, I believe Septon Meribald and Elder Brother will be a conduit of information that brings the parties of the Riverlands and the Vale together as I describe in this post.                 

[nobodysuspectsthebutterfly]

Hello there, Butterfly! The other day, I came across this theory about Bella not actually being Robert's daughter due to certain details not adding up. (There's a detailed explanation on the ASOIAF reddit in a thread named "(Spoilers published) lyanna was right about robert", but I couldn't include a link in the ask.) I don't particularly agree with it myself, but I figured I would ask someone who knows a lot more about ASOIAF than I do to see if there could be any bit of truth to this.

This thread? What a pedantic twit… but lucky for you, I am even more pedantic! He misread, and he’s wrong.

1) He says Baratheons have fine black hair, not thick hair. No, they have fine hair when they’re babies. Grown up, it’s thick:

The master called over a tall lad about Robb’s age, his arms and chest corded with muscle. “This is Lord Stark, the new Hand of the King,” he told him as the boy looked at Ned through sullen blue eyes and pushed back sweat-soaked hair with his fingers. Thick hair, shaggy and unkempt and black as ink. –AGOT, Eddard VI

The girl did have hair like the old king’s, Arya thought; a great thick mop of it, as black as coal. That doesn’t mean anything, though. Gendry has the same kind of hair too. Lots of people have black hair. –ASOS, Arya V

He is not Renly, Brienne realized. Renly is dead. Renly died in my arms, a man of one-and-twenty. This is a only a boy. A boy who looked as Renly had, the first time he came to Tarth. No, younger. […] A dark stubble covered his cheeks and chin, and his hair was a thick black mop that grew down past his ears. King Renly’s hair had been that same coal black, but his had always been washed and brushed and combed. –AFFC, Brienne VIII

Slim and sinewy, Mya looked as tough as the old riding leathers she wore beneath her silvery ringmail shirt. Her hair was black as a raven’s wing, so short and shaggy that Alayne suspected that she cut it with a dagger. Mya’s eyes were her best feature, big and blue. […] Yes, she thought, looking at her now, those are his eyes, and she has his hair too, the thick black hair he shared with Renly. –AFFC, Alayne II

And sometimes the hair’s not mentioned to be thick, just “coal” or “raven” black as in Edric’s case and re the bastards that Varys is aware of. But that Bella has hair that’s just like Robert’s, per Arya who met Robert, is very telling.

2) He says Bella doesn’t give her age to say she’s 16 or 17. No, but she strongly implies she was born nine months after the battle, otherwise what would be the point of saying Robert liked her mother the best when he was hiding in the Peach, or saying she was named for the battle of the Bells?

3) He says Bella’s eye color isn’t mentioned. It’s not, this is true. But neither is Barra’s. Renly has blue-green eyes. It’s the black hair that’s the important thing. (Though interestingly Shireen’s haircolor is never mentioned, only her big blue eyes and Florent ears.)

4) He’s like, how could Robert be fucking whores if he was so wounded he had to hide? I don’t know, how could Robert come out of the brothel with a sword in his hand to fight Jon Connington if he was so wounded? He healed up, well enough to fight, well enough to fuck. And this dude goes on to say they were moving Robert around, he had no time to be fucking whores… nothing says how short a time Robert stayed in the houses he was hiding, just that he was moved to hide him from JonCon, and you know how safehouses work – it wasn’t only minutes, it was days. And then he goes on to ask, “if he was fuckin’ whores, why was he ready to fight when the bells started ringing?” Uh. Dude. Nothing in Bella’s story implies Robert was getting busy at the exact moment the battle started. It’s not hard. OK, maybe it was a little hard. ;)

Furthermore, when Jon realized the battle was lost, he pulled out (as Robert had to do, aha!) of Stoney Sept, leaving it to the rebels. I’d bet Robert took some time to celebrate the win, hur hur hur.

5) He says Bella’s not mentioned in the appendixes as one of Robert’s bastards. Nope, but in her article in the canon World of Ice and Fire app, it says Robert’s her father.

6) What, exactly, would be the point of Bella relating the story of how Robert was hiding in the Peach before the battle of the Bells, how he liked her mother best, how she was named for the battle; of JonCon confirming that Robert was hiding in a whorehouse; of Gendry saying maybe he should ring that girl’s bell – if she’s not Robert’s daughter and Gendry’s not her half-brother? Why would GRRM write Bella at all if she’s some rando’s kid and has nothing to do with Robert? To be like “oh ho ho, you foolish reader, you thought she was his bastard but you’re wrong! Oh ho ho, Robert didn’t actually cheat on Lyanna while he was fighting a war in her name! He’s such an awesome guy!” As if.

‘Course, that reddit thread is full of Robert defenders who say he never raped Cersei and if he hit her she deserved it, that he’d have treated Lyanna so nice and never ever would cheat on her or abuse her once they were married, so I’m not surprised they think Robert fucking his way through the Peach is some kind of loyalist propaganda. Even though it’s being related by a daughter of one of the women who helped hide Robert when he was injured, in the Peach that’s an ally of the Brotherhood who call themselves Robert’s men… well. Anyway. Hope that helps!

[nymini]

"His name is Edric Storm, sire." "I know his name.”

[kieraembers]

Maya stone please!

Mya stone

thanks for the request and for drawing Ned Dayne, almost no fan art of that sweetboy. 

[nobodysuspectsthebutterfly]

Hey, I was wondering something about the Baratheon genetics. Does it just concern Lannisters or all families in terms of it being dominant? If Robert and Lyanna had children, could they have had brown hair and/or gray eyes, or just the black hair and blue eyes? If that's the case of it being dominant no matter what, then what about Baratheon ladies that marry outside the family. Wouldn't their descendants all have black hair and blue eyes as well?

What Ned determines after looking at a record of Baratheon-Lannister marriages, is that “always he found the gold yielding before the coal,” that they only produced black-haired children. He didn’t look at other Baratheon marriages, however, so we don’t know how dominant their coloring was over every family in Westeros. Though Ned does recall that all of Robert’s bastards had his black hair and blue eyes no matter what their mother looked like, so at least in his case “the seed is strong”.

What that means for other Baratheon marriages… well, Renly had blue-green eyes, so it seems some Estermont got through to him. :)  And I really wish we had a description of Steffon Baratheon – even though I think it’s possible his mother Rhaelle Targaryen was black-haired like her mother Betha Blackwood, it would be neat if he had a silver-gold Targ streak in his black hair, or purple-blue eyes, or something.

We don’t know what Jocelyn Baratheon looked like, but her mother was Alyssa Velaryon (of Valyrian descent and appearance, Targaryen on her mother’s side); when Jocelyn married Prince Aemon Targaryen, their daughter Rhaenys had a traditional Valyrian look. So that’s one case where the Baratheon appearance was very definitely not dominant, but as Rhaenys was over 75% Valyrian (with reinforced genes as Alyssa was her grandmother and her great-grandmother… oh Targaryens), it shouldn’t be surprising. There are probably other cases where the Baratheon appearance came up against another family with a definite look (besides Targaryens and Lannisters), but unfortunately we don’t have any other records so I can’t say.

As for Robert and Lyanna… considering the example of Robert’s bastards, I’d suspect that almost all of their children would be black-haired and blue-eyed. Possibly there’d be at least a few grey-eyed ones too (grey eyes are probably very similar to blue in the amount of melanin in the iris), especially if Renly’s eyes show the potential for variation. But it could be their eldest son would have brown hair and dark grey eyes, you never know…

edit, post-Fire & Blood: Turns out Jocelyn Baratheon had black hair and “dark eyes”. And GRRM retconned Rhaenys to have black hair (turning white by the time of the Dance) and violet eyes. Because I guess the “seed is strong” in Baratheon/Valyrian marriages too.