You're the Head of a Noble House - Westerlands Edition IV

[James Steller]

Imagine you're the Lady of a Noble House in the Westerlands (assume it's been around for as long as the others).

Disaster has struck your House. Two months ago, your husband, a brave but reckless man, travelled all the way to the south of the Westerlands and died in a battle defending his homeland against raiders from the Reach, along with many of his best knights. You are left to run your household, which includes your four children.

Meanwhile, your husband's extended family desires to take over and claim your husband's house from his widow. They immediately came to offer you their sympathies when they heard of his passing, but you can tell they arrogantly see you as an outsider who only married into a lordship with your feminine wiles. The truth is that your father was a very wealthy knight who squired your husband as a young man when he first laid eyes on you. His parents died young, and so none could stop him from choosing his own wife, as he was Lord of his house. His uncles, aunts, and cousins never forgave him for choosing love over politics, and mocked you from the shadows.

Now you are in danger from them, and whatever family connections The current king of Casterly Rock, Tywell II, is married to your aunt (the older sister from House House Hawthorne), but the royal family are currently visiting the Nightfort at the Wall, and will not be back for who knows how long. This leaves your position vulnerable, and even if you do try to message the king and speak of what is happening, what can he do until he returns?

To make matters worse, your family is scattered. Your 16 year old son and heir is a good lad, but overly adventurous. He's currently undertaking a tour of the Free Cities, and you have no idea where he might be at this given moment. He left with the cream of your husband's bodyguards, including your older brother, an anointed knight with his own reputation who your heir is squired to, but you fear that an uncle or cousin of your deceased husband might travel east, greet your son as their kin, and murder him when his guard is down.

At the same time, your younger brother, who is the master of Lord Farman's fleet, has sent you a letter saying that he owes several powerful men large sums of money that he doesn't have. He begs you for help. If he cannot repay his debts, he will very likely be murdered or else he must flee to the Wall. To repay him would cost you more than a third of your house's income, and if your husband's family finds out, they may use the information against you.

Your 14 year old daughter is in Kayce, a lady-in-waiting to the eldest Kenning daughter. She is also set to marry the Kenning heir when she becomes a woman. However, her cousin is also a lady-in-waiting of Lady Kenning, and you fear that she may poison your daughter. There is no way you can withdraw your daughter to the safety of your home without insulting House Kenning, who will withdraw their offer of marriage in response. On top of that, she has written to you saying that she thinks her cousin is trying to seduce the heir herself.

Your 11 year old son is still at home, but three offers have been made from lords to take him in as a ward. Lord Crakehall offers to take him, and eventually wed him to their only heir, currently a healthy and beautiful 15 year old, and essentially make your son the next Lord Crakehall, provided you quietly pay off their house's debts to the Lannisters in the wake of the disastrous battle which also killed your husband. Paying this debt means you cannot pay the debts of your brother. Another house which offers to take in your second son is Lord Marbrand, on the condition you marry your heir to his daughter, who was left heavily scarred and blinded in one eye when a dog attacked her in her childhood. The third offer comes personally from Lord Triskall, a landed knight newly made a lord for his highly commended war service to the king. Lord Triskall offers to take your son as a ward, but also wishes to offer his hand to you whenever your heir assumes command of his house. He is 29, four years younger than you, with a once-handsome face covered in battle scars, but is reputed to be an honest man who is openly devout to the Gods, particularly the Warrior. He also adds that if you and he were to marry, but no children are born to your union, your second son would be named his heir and would be allowed to keep his name.

Your 10 year old daughter, meanwhile, has fallen ill. Your maester and septa are both unsure of what caused this illness, but they are finding it difficult to heal. It has occurred to you that she fell ill just a day after your husband's relatives visited to offer their condolences. You have held a meeting with the only two people you know you can trust: your aging parents. Your mother suggests that they must have done it, as they want to scare you, but your father is unsure. Why, he asks, would they not poison you or your son as well and be done with it? If anything they would need to do it quickly before the king and his family return from the Wall. You are still not sure whether they did it or not. Which makes it all the more worrisome now that you've received a letter from your uncle and aunt by marriage, offering their own maester to heal the child, as he studied specifically in medicine and healing at the Citadel. Are they innocent of poisoning her? Is she just ill? What if she actually is ill but your relatives are going to order this maester to poison your child and then the rest of you?

How do you run this household?

 

[King Viserys Targaryen IV]

Firstly I have to make a deal to save my Son's House. I make the deal with Lord Triskall for my hand in marriage. He is younger than me and a fierce warrior. Plus he can protect his house and my son's till he returns. I tell Lord Triskall that it will not be necessary to ward my son and I make a deal with Crakehall to ward my son and to marry his heir. I will pay off his debts to the Lannisters, provided that they help me keep my house and send a retinue to the free cities to find and return my son, and continue to help my son defend against any future threats.

I have already given birth to four children, providing an heir for Lord Triskall should not be a problem.

I also send a letter to my Aunt, the Queen, telling her of the current situation and that should something happen to my children or my self that my dead husband's family should be held accountable. I ask her to send a letter of condolences to the family and a thank you for send the Maester to heal my daughter, but also with a thinly veiled threat that if something should happen the King and Queen will serve swift justice.

As for my daughter, I enter into negotiations with the cousin's parents to marry my eldest son. Cousin's marrying cousins is not a big deal and might ease tensions with my husband's family as it would be a way for them to gain some access to the House once again.

Because this could lead to my son being poisoned, I make sure that part of the agreement is that she comes and stay with me (watched like a hawk) till my son returns (they wont kill him in the free cities because they need him alive). If I get the sense that she is untrustworthy I might arrange for an accident before the wedding happens.

I also let my dead husband's family know that my new husband Lord Triskall, the King and Queen of Casterly Rock and my second son's future Father-in-Law Lord Crakehall will all be part of the events.

This removes the cousin from posing a threat to my daughter (both mortal and marriage).

My brother's debts are not my concern, I tell him the Wall would be a good place for him.

As for my sick daughter, I tell my Husband's Uncle to go ahead and send his Maester but I tell my Maester of my suspicions and I tell him to watch him like a hawk. I also post guards with the Maester so that he is never alone at anytime. If the Maester is successful and my daughter is healed, I ask the King and Queen to arrange a proper marriage for her.

When my eldest son returns with his bodyguards and my brother the Knight, I ask my brother to remain in my  son's service to help guide him and the House and to protect him from My dead husband's family.

 

So, in the end, my eldest son is head of our House and married to his cousin that should quell a in family rebellion, my daughter is the future wife to the heir of Lord Kenning, my second son is the future husband to the heir of Lord Crakehall, I am to be married to Lord Triskall and my future children will be heir to House Triskall and my youngest daughter (if healed) is set to marry with the King's blessing.

So I am directly tied to four houses (five if you count the youngest) and the Queen of Casterly Rock.

 

 

[Ser Frasier of House Crane]

I immediately send a raven to the Nightfort to report on my situation. I doubt King Tywell can do anything about it at the moment, but best he stays informed.

 

I dispatch my younger brother to fetch my son. I would probably do this the second that my husband’s death reached me. I would ask that they send me progress reports via raven every so often so that I know how things are going. If my brother can get my son back to me quickly, we will discuss helping him afterward.

 

I send a message to House Kenning saying that because of my husband’s recent passing, I would like for my daughter to spend a bit of time with us, and I would also ask that her cousin come along with us to act as support for a grieving daughter. It would only be for a short while, but enough to where I can get the cousin’s claws out from the Kenning heir for a time.

 

I marry Lord Triskall, but send my second son to Lord Marbrand. The Crakehall debts are too much to take in and very little reward at this time; I would hope that I have implored the importance of inner beauty with my son, and I do hope that the Marbrand girl is at least a decent sort. I would do my best to give Lord Triskall an heir of his own, though.

 

I ask for Lord Triskall’s maester to look at my daughter.

[Equilibrium]

Well writing to the king is a must, yeah, he is probably not about to break his neck rushing from the Wall but he can instruct someone to keep the matter in hand. Of course embelish the story to it's limits, no weak suspicions or subjective views, just nice facts that show that my husbands relatives are carrying out assassinations and preparing military actions against my family.

All of which is of course a ruse, because cousins will continue to be a threat even if the king asks them to play nicely. I marry the Triskall, and announce that I am going to his castle and I wish to choose the most fitting relative to hold the estates in my son's stead. Of course Triskall will hear all the manner of stuff about evil relatives coming to take my son's heirloom by force, sending assassins after him and poisoning my daughter, sickness really did come in handy. Then he will be easy to persuade that killing of my husbands relatives is the only thing that can save my son, so they will be ambushed on their way to my castle and killed one by one. Then we keep quiet until king comes back and I persuade him with help of my dear aunt that cousins were preparing an attack and poisoned my daughter and all that so he will close the matter once and for all. 

My younger brother will get the money, so he can get to the Free Cities as fast as possible to warn my son and brother about the scheming relatives. He will get some extra for the effort and then he can join my son's retinue in the Free Cities and afterwards stay there and became sailor or pirate, which beats going to the Wall.

Well cousin at Kenning's is soon to became severed from the family tree assuming her ma and pa will want in on that family requisitioning of my lands, so I as closest thing she has to a guardian will recommend sending the girl to the Silent Sisters.

Second son goes to Crakehall, he gets nice lands and nice wife, and Lord Crakehall could be persuaded to lend a hand with the bashing of the evil conspiracy of my husbands relatives. But even that is not all, as I now owe the money to Lannisters any chances of punitive action because of my massacre of my husband's relatives is decreased from slim to none.

When I call my husbands uncle and aunt for the family council about managing the lands in my son's stead, I make sure to ask them to bring the maester. We of course spare the maester and then section off him and my daughter in some part of the castle. Being maester he should be smart enough to realize it is in his best interest for my daughter to get better.

 

 

 

[Floki of the Ironborn]

There's no use in writing to the king. By the time he gets the letter, it might be too late. I need to act fast and have my story prepared for when he comes back.

First of all, I pay off my brother's debts. But that means he has to swear by all the Gods that he will never gamble again, and if he ever comes back to me asking for help, he might as well just flee for the Wall as soon as possible. And in the meantime he must also help me. I need him to speak to any and all captains he can to find out if my husband's relatives are leaving the Westerlands. A master of Fair Isle's fleets would have a good idea of who to ask about these things. Since he's so deeply in my debt, I have him set up spies to make sure I know if my in-laws or anyone working for them is leaving for the Free Cities to find my son. But that said, if I have no hope of knowing where he is, I'm sure they won't know much either. So I won't worry too much about him.

As to my elder daughter, she needs to learn how to get her hands dirty and getting away with it. I instruct her to spike her cousin's drink with milk of the poppy so that she sleep soundly, and then smother her with her own pillow at night. Nobody will suspect her, and she'll have some terrible nightmares, but I'll remind her that her sister was poisoned and they want to kill her too. She'll marry the Kenning heir and spend her life forgetting about what she had to do. It's cruel, but that's Westerlands politics, and at least she'll be alive and safe.

As valuable as the Crakehall offer is, it comes at too steep a price. Lord Marbrand, meanwhile, is an equally powerful house in the Westerlands, and I'm sure his daughter is a nice woman who will give my heir children. No doubt he'll already know who she is, and he'll know her story, so when he gets back I'll sit him down and warn him to keep her a happy wife, as the gods have been cruel enough to her already. And since I'll have spent his life making him learn to respect women, as well as understand that there are things more important than lust, he'll understand and will do his duties as a husband.

I accept the maester, but I keep him in the company of my own maester at all times, as well as keep two guards with my youngest daughter at all times. I drop hints at how the queen has written to me, praying for her favourite grand-niece to feel better.

Then, once my son gets married and takes charge, my daughter's wedding to the Kenning heir is secured, my second boy is safe in Ashemark, and my little girl seems on the mend, I will return to Lord Triskall and marry him. After all that intrigue, threatening, spying, and maneuvering, it'll be high time I have some fun again. And it'll also be nice to relax in a quiet knightly estate with a rugged man to make new heirs with.

[Floki of the Ironborn]

Wow, I just realized that the king you named is the one who unknowingly ate his own son in the tale of the Rat Cook!

[James Steller]

Wow, I just realized that the king you named is the one who unknowingly ate his own son in the tale of the Rat Cook!

Heh, yup. This round of scenarios will be more rooted in actual Westerosi history than before. Things like the Dornish War, the Blackfyre Rebellion, the pre-Targaryen era, stuff like that.

[1000th Lord Commander]

Complicaited, let's see how we can handle this.

I write to my younger brother and say that I cannot help him, but I ask him his intentions. If he intends to flee to the Wall, I wish him well and give him a detailed note to give to the Queen and King, detailing my best wishes for them, and asking that they return to set the kingdom to rights after such a terrible battle. If he wants to flee to the free cities instead, I give him a similar note to give to his older brother, who can then guard my son on his journey home. I send my father with a trusted retiune to whichever my brother isn't going to.

I send my mother to Kayce, to assist her grandaughter in her time of grief. In reality, she will be there to advise her, with an option on poisoning the cousin if it becomes nessecary, but the best option seems to be to fake her flowering, and get her to marry the heir soon.

I make Lord Triskall the guardian of my second son, and accept secretly his future offer of marriage. I also ask him to send a band of good men to help protect my estate.

I offer my heir to Lord Marband's daughter regardless, with the same request of a band of good men. When my heir returns home, I will have a chat with him about how much looks aren't everything. I also seem to have some wealth with which to swear in a few hedge knights and hire some sell swords.

When I have some loyal men sworn to me, I will despatch all the various cousins, uncles and the like to take charge of my remaining men, or anyone I don't trust, and ask them to avenge my husband. I task them to lead a devestating raid deep into the Reach, and lay waste to as much as they can, and hopefully be thinned out in the process. They can't refuse without it seeming dishonourable.

Once I have all the various hangers on out of my house, I wait to see if the girl improves. If she does, she was ill, but recovered. If she doesn't, I cautiously accept the offer of the maester from my gooduncle, and get a food taster.