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If you think Varys saved baby Aegon, explain your timeline


Bael's Bastard

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16 minutes ago, Lord Lannister said:

Pretty sure Joffrey and Tommen have definitively proven that actual paternity doesn't matter, only that people believe what they're told.

Yup. The point of Joffrey and Aegon will be to prove that blood is irrelevant in terms of legitimacy, only what people believe matters in terms of legitimacy.

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I think this baby swapping game is a lie, it is the good old fairy tale, like the Prince and the Pauper.

I am more inclined to believe that Aegon is a Blackfyre and that he is Illyrio's son with his second wife, Serra.

Serra might not have the Blackfyre name, but she could very well come from the lineage, she could even be a bastard of that house.

I know this thread is if we believe baby Aegon was saved by Varys, but I don't think so.

I remember reading in A Dance with Dragons Tyrion being given children's clothes that were in Illyrio's house. I am quite sure that belonged to Aegon when he was a child.

There's the issue with Jon Connington, like, why is he backing up someone who is not Aegon?

I do think that at this point Jon Connington just want to go home, maybe he agreed on the plan just for the sake of having a chance to get his property back and maybe have a chance to avenge Rhaegar, since we know he loved him.

I can say this is one of the bigger mysteries in A Song of Ice and Fire.

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15 minutes ago, Alyn Oakenfist said:

What ever the case is Jon Conn definitely believes him to be legit, and Aegon probably believes it too.

Yes, if he was raised by the real deal, he will surely believe it, Jon Connington just knew Aegon as a newborn baby, so it could be easily to fool him, since the boy had the "Valyrian" looks.

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To reiterate, as someone who already leans towards AeGriff being fake, for the purpose of this thread I have zero interest in theories about AeGriff being fake, or why he is fake.

This purpose of this thread is for people who believe he is real to elaborate on and explain their idea of a timeline and how it all went down.

To those who have responded accordingly, thank you, I am reading your posts over and will respond soon.

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On 1/8/2021 at 5:33 PM, Bael's Bastard said:

To reiterate, as someone who already leans towards AeGriff being fake, for the purpose of this thread I have zero interest in theories about AeGriff being fake, or why he is fake.

This purpose of this thread is for people who believe he is real to elaborate on and explain their idea of a timeline and how it all went down.

To those who have responded accordingly, thank you, I am reading your posts over and will respond soon.

Sorry about the delay replying. busy leading up to Christmas, NY, family and all that, and the lunatics have pretty much taken over around here so its less and less interesting to even bother to pop in for a visit.

 

I think there is plenty of room for a wide variety of timeline scenarios in which fAegon is in fact Aegon. So I'm actually a bit puzzled by the question really. From my point of view its more a case of what objection could one have, timeline wise?

Varys claims to have done a switch. We've seen a substitute used in  Myrcella's case. Which shows that its a reasonable preparation to have made and could have been made before events got out of hand, in preparation, or as a last minute secret-passage switch as shit was going down (assuming the substitute had been prepared, but not yet switched of course).
I don't see any reason to suppose Varys doesn't have several months at least in which to prepare such a potential substitute, which may or may not even be used, or could have entirely other purposes planned (such as a similar use as Myrcella's substitute).

Varys had the capability to get Tyrion out of KL when there was much less chaos and a far more desperate search for a much more identifiable subject. It clearly would be significantly easier to smuggle out a 1 year old child during or immediately after the Sack. Or even several weeks later. Especially when no one is looking for such a child.
We've seen, through Arya's unwitting eyes, that Varys has 'command' of the hidden passages and ways inside the Red Keep - such that Illyrio was able to secretly visit him there without anyone's (well, there's Arya!) knowledge. Not to mention the arranged comings and goings of Shae, and even Tyrion's trip to visit (and eventually kill) Tywin). It seems entirely reasonable that he could spirit Aegon away safely and perhaps even hold and care for him there for several weeks or even months if needed.
Aegon was a year or so old so may not even require a wetnurse by that time, though he would require a minder - I assume mid-long term pacification drugs would be too risky at that age.

From there, to Essos, in any number of ways. Especially when the child is 'known' to be dead.

One way that I think ties in very nicely at multiple levels, including the general timeline, is the 'suicide' of Ashara Dayne. Who supposedly dived from the Palestone Tower into the sea and whose body was never found. Who was the friend and companion of Aegon's mother. Whose brother was the closest companion and ally of Aegon's father. Whose own story and timeline doesn't really fit very well with the suggested reasons for her apparent suicide.
If a ship was offshore, and Varys had arranged with her to take Aegon to Essos in exile... The timing of that appears to be within a month or two of the Sack, roughly, which could comfortably fit with a general timeline for Aegon's escape and hiding and travel to Essos.  

I don't mean to turn the question back to you - I mean, I don't mean to be difficult by doing so, but I guess I'll repeat myself. There are entirely reasonable options, multiple options, at almost every step along the way. So in order to answer the question more usefully, I almost have to ask, where's the problems you see, that you have to ask such a question?

 

 

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38 minutes ago, corbon said:

I think there is plenty of room for a wide variety of timeline scenarios in which fAegon is in fact Aegon. So I'm actually a bit puzzled by the question really. From my point of view its more a case of what objection could one have, timeline wise?

Varys claims to have done a switch. We've seen a substitute used in  Myrcella's case. Which shows that its a reasonable preparation to have made and could have been made before events got out of hand, in preparation, or as a last minute secret-passage switch as shit was going down (assuming the substitute had been prepared, but not yet switched of course).
I don't see any reason to suppose Varys doesn't have several months at least in which to prepare such a potential substitute, which may or may not even be used, or could have entirely other purposes planned (such as a similar use as Myrcella's substitute).

I have difficulty seeing a preparation for this thing to have taken place over a period of months unless we go with a scenario where Varys wanted, for some reason, to steal Rhaegar's son. While Rhaegar was still at KL training the army there would be no need to protect Aegon by means of a substitute. Instead, if Rhaegar was concerned for the safety of his heir or family in general he would have sent them to Dragonstone - like King Aerys II did later with Rhaella and Viserys after the Trident.

And overall we would go with a scenario where Varys took care of Aegon at the behest or with the permission of Elia Martell.

Hence, the idea, that the plan to do this would have been considered seriously only after the Trident - and also, in part, because the Mad King blamed the Dornish for Rhaegar's death and was now really using Elia and her children as hostages. In that sense, such a thing would not only have been done to protect Aegon from the rebels but also from his own royal grandfather.

38 minutes ago, corbon said:

We've seen, through Arya's unwitting eyes, that Varys has 'command' of the hidden passages and ways inside the Red Keep - such that Illyrio was able to secretly visit him there without anyone's (well, there's Arya!) knowledge. Not to mention the arranged comings and goings of Shae, and even Tyrion's trip to visit (and eventually kill) Tywin). It seems entirely reasonable that he could spirit Aegon away safely and perhaps even hold and care for him there for several weeks or even months if needed.

That only works in a scenario where such a switch was done before Elia and the children were kept under guard in Maegor's Holdfast. There are no secret tunnels and such in the walls of Maegor's, they only exist in the other parts of the Red Keep. The only secret tunnel in Maegor's is the king's own escape way (used by Aegon II and his children during the Dance) and that one is unconnected to the other tunnels, meaning that Varys would have to take a long detour to use this tunnel to get inside Maegor's to get Aegon out.

In that sense, we would have to go with Varys using a disguise to get inside Maegor's - septon/septa, maester, servant, wetnurse, etc. - or to meet with Elia outside Maegor's - the castle sept, godswood, etc.

I guess there is also a chance that they did the switch during the Sack - Varys is curiously absent from Aerys' side after the king agrees to let Tywin and his men inside the city - since the chaos after the Sack began may have allowed Varys easy access to Maegor's and Elia's apartments, but that would be a last minute thing then, and somewhat strange considering Elia and Varys both would have known that Rhaegar's son was in considerable danger after Robert's victory at the Trident. But it is possible that it took this long to find a suitable child or to be able to go through with the switch.

38 minutes ago, corbon said:

Aegon was a year or so old so may not even require a wetnurse by that time, though he would require a minder - I assume mid-long term pacification drugs would be too risky at that age.

Yes, chances are pretty good that Varys would entrust the boy to some woman - either his wetnurse or some other servant/companion of Elia's. Lemore most likely would be exactly this woman in a scenario where Aegon is truly Rhaegar's son.

38 minutes ago, corbon said:

I don't mean to turn the question back to you - I mean, I don't mean to be difficult by doing so, but I guess I'll repeat myself. There are entirely reasonable options, multiple options, at almost every step along the way. So in order to answer the question more usefully, I almost have to ask, where's the problems you see, that you have to ask such a question?

I think he is rather set in his opinion that Varys wouldn't do such a thing because he was hellbent on destroying the Targaryens. But even if he truly planned the end of Aerys and Rhaegar both ... this wouldn't mean he also wanted to see the children dead. Or that he would walk away from the opportunity to acquire a Targaryen child as 'raw material' to mold into a king of his making.

It is like Robb wanting to destroy Joffrey ... without ever wishing Myrcella or Tommen harm.

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On 1/5/2021 at 6:00 PM, Lord Varys said:

I'd say if you seriously consider this the switch would have taken place after the news of the Trident arrived and the king refused to allow Elia and the children to accompany Rhaella and Viserys, the new Heir Apparent (and most likely new Prince of Dragonstone) to Dragonstone. It would have been a precautionary measure like Cersei sending Tommen away as it became clear that KL would be besieged by Stannis.

It would have been then that Elia finally realized she and her children were in major trouble because the king believed the Dornish had betrayed Rhaegar and they were no longer members of the royal family but effectively hostages against Dorne (who Aerys may have believed had joined the rebels for some reason). The scenario there actually does included the Mad King threatening to kill Elia and her children when the rebels come knocking because he seems to have believed that Lewyn's men were now with Robert.

If Rhaegar ever talked to Elia or Varys about what might happen if he did not defeat the rebels - and that's certainly possible although I'm not sure how likely - then such a scenario could have come up as a contingency plan before. There could have been plans how to save what was left of House Targaryen if Robert was victorious.

The prospect of a siege was very realistic and there was a good chance that a victorious Robert would kill at least all male Targaryens once he had taken the throne.

All that - in combination with Elia fearing that the Mad King himself could harm her children - can definitely explain why such a switch took place.

On Varys' side his knowledge about the wildfire plot and the effects this might have on all the people in the city may also have played a role - for Elia, too, if she knew about that.

It also helps to explain why it only involved Aegon and not Rhaenys, too - because the danger to her was less (Robert could marry her to his heir), but also because she was an older child known by sight to more than a handful of servants. Aegon was still a babe at the breast, apparently, so only Elia and whatever wetnurses she employed would have intimate contact with the child. If they had wanted to fool not only Robert's rebels later but also the king himself they couldn't switch Rhaenys and Aegon.

With Aerys II viewing Elia and the children as hostages such a switch would be done without the knowledge and permission of the king, meaning Varys and Elia would have to go behind his back, too. The king might not give a babe in a cradle a second look, but he would realize if his granddaughter suddenly looked different.

And if the rebels won then the longer the switch remained a secret - which would likely last longer if only Aegon is replaced with an impostor - the better Aegon's chances are to get away and hide from the rebels for good.

A switch at the last moment sounds less likely, although not impossible. Varys could have contacted Elia before, gotten her agreement, and used the the time between Trident and Sack to find a baby with Valyrian features which could pass for Aegon. Most likely not the pisswater prince - that really sounds like the kind of story little Aegon was told to feel less bad that another child died in his place - but rather some slave child with Valyrian features from the Free Cities provided by Illyrio.

Hell, if you think about it ... the dead Aegon could even have been Illyrio's son by Serra, if there was a switch. And then Illyrio's affection for the boy is born from the fact that he is the child he got in place of Serra's boy ... sort of like Gilly eventually also grows fond of Mance's son.

The switch could then have taken place only during the Sack with Varys being able to enter Maegor's and Elia's aparments in the confusion without anybody notifying the king. Varys is curiously absent during the Sack of King's Landing after that original council meeting. And he is also not with Aerys II when Jaime murders him.

But I find that less likely. I'd expect the switch to have taken place some days, perhaps a week before the Sack, since that could also explain why Elia had already somewhat bonded with the child, being terrified by the way the boy was treated by Gregor later on.

How exactly the switch would have been made I have no clue. What's clear is that it couldn't have been done in complete secrecy since there are no hidden tunnels in Maegor's besides the king's escape tunnel. One could think about a wetnurse in Varys' employ smuggling the impostor child in and Aegon out, about Varys making the switch while Elia went to the godswood or the castle sept with the children, or Varys visited Elia in disguise, dressed as a septon or maester or even as a wetnurse.

However, what would be clear in such a scenario is that Varys' Aegon plan only came into being after Robert had taken the throne and the fake Aegon had died without being revealed as an impostor by the rebels ... and in a manner that could be used to cast doubt whether the real Aegon had been killed after all once it was time for him to claim his grandfather's throne.

Now, the original plan would have likely been to get Aegon to Doran at Sunspear ... and the reason why this wasn't done afterwards would have to do with Varys' opinion how a future king should be raised (not pampered in a castle but in a more humble environment), not with him intending to betray poor dead Elia's trust.

I'm not sure whether to go with a real or a fake Aegon, to be honest. Both scenarios have great potential. They are different, of course, but neither of them would cheapen the story.

However, if Aegon is not Rhaegar's son then I definitely prefer a complete pisswater prince scenario, i.e. a scenario where Aegon isn't some weirdo bastard branch Targaryen descendant through the Blackfyre or any other line but the idea that he is a nobody by birth, and only grows to prominence and power as the mummer's dragon. A king created completely from scratch ... by a guy who also rose from nothing to prominence and power.

Personally, I'm convinced that Aegon is a fake but this is the best and most plausible description of the baby switch that I've read. Hats off to you, sir!

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On 1/12/2021 at 1:59 PM, Lord Varys said:

I have difficulty seeing a preparation for this thing to have taken place over a period of months unless we go with a scenario where Varys wanted, for some reason, to steal Rhaegar's son. While Rhaegar was still at KL training the army there would be no need to protect Aegon by means of a substitute. Instead, if Rhaegar was concerned for the safety of his heir or family in general he would have sent them to Dragonstone - like King Aerys II did later with Rhaella and Viserys after the Trident.

I disagree as a general concept. I think the Myrcella case shows that 'substitutes' are used from time to time as necessary, if not often, and its not unreasonable for Varys to prepare a substitute option for Aegon (and possibly Rhaenys too, though obviously that one wasn't used). Not necessarily aimed at the precise switch situation which eventuated, but for a general case.
Even more so if he had his own plans in mind.  
Not to mention that I rather expect he took the rebellion more seriously a lot earlier on that the Targaryen's did and may well have been preparing for a wide set of eventualities for many months before the sack.

On 1/12/2021 at 1:59 PM, Lord Varys said:

There are no secret tunnels and such in the walls of Maegor's, they only exist in the other parts of the Red Keep.

The only secret tunnel in Maegor's is the king's own escape way (used by Aegon II and his children during the Dance) and that one is unconnected to the other tunnels, meaning that Varys would have to take a long detour to use this tunnel to get inside Maegor's to get Aegon out.

Well... Thats what Varys told Tyrion... :ph34r:

But Maegor had all the builders and craftsmen involved in its construction killed. So who really knows the truth there?
All I know is that Maegor is the one responsible for the tunnels and passages etc, and its his keep, and he had all the builders etc killed. But one character with a vested interest says there is only one (famous) passage in it - which I take with an enormous grain of salt.
And even then, the timeline may allow the use of that passage. Varys could been on the move the moment Aerys' ordered the gates opened for Tywin, in which case the order has to get to the gates, they have to be opened, and Lorch and the Mountain have to fight their was through the rest of the Red Keep before they can get to Maegor's and begin scaling the outside.

On 1/12/2021 at 1:59 PM, Lord Varys said:

I think he is rather set in his opinion that Varys wouldn't do such a thing because he was hellbent on destroying the Targaryens.

That has no bearing on explicitly timeline related questions. He must have some timeline 'objection' to be asking about how people's timelines 'can work'.

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3 hours ago, Ewan McGregor said:

Aegon died.  fAegon is nothing but a fake, a lie that Dany will slay.  He will be the one responsable for the Grey Pague comign to Westeros, through Jon Conn.

Good morning to you too Sheev, sry, McGregor!

PS

I'm surprised how all your accounts have the same Double spacing, humorless certainty of your wishful fanfic etc. How is FAegon responsible for JonCon's actions? Shouldn't it be the opposite? This is what I mean by wishful 

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2 hours ago, corbon said:

I disagree as a general concept. I think the Myrcella case shows that 'substitutes' are used from time to time as necessary, if not often, and its not unreasonable for Varys to prepare a substitute option for Aegon (and possibly Rhaenys too, though obviously that one wasn't used). Not necessarily aimed at the precise switch situation which eventuated, but for a general case.
Even more so if he had his own plans in mind.  
Not to mention that I rather expect he took the rebellion more seriously a lot earlier on that the Targaryen's did and may well have been preparing for a wide set of eventualities for many months before the sack.

If you remember Rosamund Lannister so well, you do also remember that she was used as a decoy during Myrcella's potentially dangerous sea voyage. There is no indication that the children of any king were using decoys while living at court.

And regardless how the war stood, the Targaryens weren't losing it until after the Trident. The situation was tense before, Robert was a real threat, but they had a plan how to defeat him in battle.

Did anybody prepare decoys for Joffrey and Tommen while Stannis was not yet besieging KL? Did Stannis ever prepare a decoy for Shireen? Did the Starks ever use decoys after the war started? Not that I recall.

But the important thing here just is that there is no reason to assume the actual switch was made before the Trident ... unless you make a whole lot of presuppositions to explain why this would make sense.

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Well... Thats what Varys told Tyrion...

And it is something that's corroborated by Westerosi history as given by FaB - Blood and Cheese didn't know a way into Maegor's, only Aegon II and his children could escape Maegor's via the passage Varys mentioned while Rhaenyra was taking the Red Keep.

But the best corroboration for this is ADwD ... where Varys has to draw Ser Kevan out of Maegor's and to Pycelle's apartments to murder him. He cannot do that in Kevan's own bedchamber. Which, if you think about it, would have been the better scenario. If George wanted to show us that there are secret tunnels in Maegor's Holdfast, too, then Pycelle would have visted Pycelle in Maegor's, and Varys would have come out of the walls there. That would have made a much better and more scary scene. Because it would have also revealed that Tommen himself isn't safe from Varys inside Maegor's.

But it doesn't figure with how the Red Keep is envisoned by the author. And it is actually one of the better little details because it does indeed make no sense that Maegor would construct a castle where people could sneak into his own apartments and inner sanctum to kill him in his sleep. The point of those tunnels is to spy on the king's court, not the king himself.

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But Maegor had all the builders and craftsmen involved in its construction killed. So who really knows the truth there?
All I know is that Maegor is the one responsible for the tunnels and passages etc, and its his keep, and he had all the builders etc killed. But one character with a vested interest says there is only one (famous) passage in it - which I take with an enormous grain of salt.
And even then, the timeline may allow the use of that passage. Varys could been on the move the moment Aerys' ordered the gates opened for Tywin, in which case the order has to get to the gates, they have to be opened, and Lorch and the Mountain have to fight their was through the rest of the Red Keep before they can get to Maegor's and begin scaling the outside.

Technically it would be possible for Varys to enter Maegor's through the king's escape tunnel - if he has the keys for that one, knows where it ends, and can get there in time. All of which isn't very likely. After all, only a moron would construct this specific tunnel in a way that would allow anyone to enter the king's apartments from the outside. Then assassins could kill the king using this way. Instead, it would stand to reason that it is way you can open from the inside, but not the outside.

And there are further complications - Elia and the children didn't live in the king's apartments, so Varys and the replacement baby would still have to leave the king's apartments and get inside Elia's apartments without drawing any attention to themselves. And the same on the way out.

In fact, if you think about that - the details of Red Keep and its tunnels are actually part of the reason why the Aegon switch may not have taken place. Because Varys couldn't get to Elia in time. Not before the Sack and not during the Sack. If the Mad King had put men he trusted implicitly in charge of protecting/guarding Elia and the children then there may not have been an opportunity for such a switch. And as things stand, that's not unlikely.

But if you want to go with this scenario then the best guess is that the switch took place outside Maegor's or by means of secretly smuggling a child inside and the real Aegon outside - without using any tunnels.

This certainly is doable, too, if you think what Littlefinger could get into Sansa's cell in Maegor's ... as well as what Sansa could do while living inside. But it would be more tricky than just having Aegon disappear into the walls.

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12 hours ago, corbon said:

I disagree as a general concept. I think the Myrcella case shows that 'substitutes' are used from time to time as necessary, if not often, and its not unreasonable for Varys to prepare a substitute option for Aegon (and possibly Rhaenys too, though obviously that one wasn't used). Not necessarily aimed at the precise switch situation which eventuated, but for a general case.

I know that Rhaegar is generally regarded as some sort of idiot, but I have a really hard time believing that he had no contingency plan for his family in KL. I wouldn't be surprised if we end up finding out at some point that he had a hand in the switch or left instructions.  

Myrcella's hair was dyed brown by the septa to hide her while Rosamund was to be sacrificed. Theon murdered the miller's sons and replaced Bran and Rickon with them.

I don't think it's a coincidence that we see a baby switch at the Wall under Jon's watch either. Two babies born a month or two apart, switched out. Only those who spent a lot of time with them, namely Gilly and Val, would know the difference between them.

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23 minutes ago, Alexis-something-Rose said:

I know that Rhaegar is generally regarded as some sort of idiot, but I have a really hard time believing that he had no contingency plan for his family in KL. I wouldn't be surprised if we end up finding out at some point that he had a hand in the switch or left instructions.  

Myrcella's hair was dyed brown by the septa to hide her while Rosamund was to be sacrificed. Theon murdered the miller's sons and replaced Bran and Rickon with them.

I don't think it's a coincidence that we see a baby switch at the Wall under Jon's watch either. Two babies born a month or two apart, switched out. Only those who spent a lot of time with them, namely Gilly and Val, would know the difference between them.

Well that turns him from an idiotic dick who put his family in harm way, to a dick who knowingly put his family in harm's way and threw his daughter and wife to the lions.

Either way you put it, he's still a massive dick that either unknowingly endangered his family, or he did it knowingly and decided his son is the only one worth saving.

And before you say he couldn't have found Rhaenys a double since by all accounts she looked part Dornish, I'm sure there's plenty of Dornish prostitutes on Driftmark, Dragonstone and Lys and plenty of Lyseni ones in Dorne to get a double from

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On 1/11/2021 at 6:58 PM, corbon said:

I don't mean to turn the question back to you - I mean, I don't mean to be difficult by doing so, but I guess I'll repeat myself. There are entirely reasonable options, multiple options, at almost every step along the way. So in order to answer the question more usefully, I almost have to ask, where's the problems you see, that you have to ask such a question?

 

 

@corbon

I should have been more clear, but I'm not asking people to submit their idea of a timeline with the intention to tear into them for it. I am just curious about different peoples' ideas of how they see the timeline playing out.

To you and everyone else that has commented, some stuff has come up that has made it difficult to respond to everyone right now, but I just wanted to touch base and thank you all for commenting and discussing. I will respond properly ASAP.

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On 1/5/2021 at 7:00 PM, Lord Varys said:

I'd say if you seriously consider this the switch would have taken place after the news of the Trident arrived and the king refused to allow Elia and the children to accompany Rhaella and Viserys, the new Heir Apparent (and most likely new Prince of Dragonstone) to Dragonstone. It would have been a precautionary measure like Cersei sending Tommen away as it became clear that KL would be besieged by Stannis.

It would have been then that Elia finally realized she and her children were in major trouble because the king believed the Dornish had betrayed Rhaegar and they were no longer members of the royal family but effectively hostages against Dorne (who Aerys may have believed had joined the rebels for some reason). The scenario there actually does included the Mad King threatening to kill Elia and her children when the rebels come knocking because he seems to have believed that Lewyn's men were now with Robert.

If Rhaegar ever talked to Elia or Varys about what might happen if he did not defeat the rebels - and that's certainly possible although I'm not sure how likely - then such a scenario could have come up as a contingency plan before. There could have been plans how to save what was left of House Targaryen if Robert was victorious.

The prospect of a siege was very realistic and there was a good chance that a victorious Robert would kill at least all male Targaryens once he had taken the throne.

All that - in combination with Elia fearing that the Mad King himself could harm her children - can definitely explain why such a switch took place.

On Varys' side his knowledge about the wildfire plot and the effects this might have on all the people in the city may also have played a role - for Elia, too, if she knew about that.

It also helps to explain why it only involved Aegon and not Rhaenys, too - because the danger to her was less (Robert could marry her to his heir), but also because she was an older child known by sight to more than a handful of servants. Aegon was still a babe at the breast, apparently, so only Elia and whatever wetnurses she employed would have intimate contact with the child. If they had wanted to fool not only Robert's rebels later but also the king himself they couldn't switch Rhaenys and Aegon.

With Aerys II viewing Elia and the children as hostages such a switch would be done without the knowledge and permission of the king, meaning Varys and Elia would have to go behind his back, too. The king might not give a babe in a cradle a second look, but he would realize if his granddaughter suddenly looked different.

And if the rebels won then the longer the switch remained a secret - which would likely last longer if only Aegon is replaced with an impostor - the better Aegon's chances are to get away and hide from the rebels for good.

A switch at the last moment sounds less likely, although not impossible. Varys could have contacted Elia before, gotten her agreement, and used the the time between Trident and Sack to find a baby with Valyrian features which could pass for Aegon. Most likely not the pisswater prince - that really sounds like the kind of story little Aegon was told to feel less bad that another child died in his place - but rather some slave child with Valyrian features from the Free Cities provided by Illyrio.

Hell, if you think about it ... the dead Aegon could even have been Illyrio's son by Serra, if there was a switch. And then Illyrio's affection for the boy is born from the fact that he is the child he got in place of Serra's boy ... sort of like Gilly eventually also grows fond of Mance's son.

The switch could then have taken place only during the Sack with Varys being able to enter Maegor's and Elia's aparments in the confusion without anybody notifying the king. Varys is curiously absent during the Sack of King's Landing after that original council meeting. And he is also not with Aerys II when Jaime murders him.

But I find that less likely. I'd expect the switch to have taken place some days, perhaps a week before the Sack, since that could also explain why Elia had already somewhat bonded with the child, being terrified by the way the boy was treated by Gregor later on.

How exactly the switch would have been made I have no clue. What's clear is that it couldn't have been done in complete secrecy since there are no hidden tunnels in Maegor's besides the king's escape tunnel. One could think about a wetnurse in Varys' employ smuggling the impostor child in and Aegon out, about Varys making the switch while Elia went to the godswood or the castle sept with the children, or Varys visited Elia in disguise, dressed as a septon or maester or even as a wetnurse.

However, what would be clear in such a scenario is that Varys' Aegon plan only came into being after Robert had taken the throne and the fake Aegon had died without being revealed as an impostor by the rebels ... and in a manner that could be used to cast doubt whether the real Aegon had been killed after all once it was time for him to claim his grandfather's throne.

Now, the original plan would have likely been to get Aegon to Doran at Sunspear ... and the reason why this wasn't done afterwards would have to do with Varys' opinion how a future king should be raised (not pampered in a castle but in a more humble environment), not with him intending to betray poor dead Elia's trust.

I'm not sure whether to go with a real or a fake Aegon, to be honest. Both scenarios have great potential. They are different, of course, but neither of them would cheapen the story.

However, if Aegon is not Rhaegar's son then I definitely prefer a complete pisswater prince scenario, i.e. a scenario where Aegon isn't some weirdo bastard branch Targaryen descendant through the Blackfyre or any other line but the idea that he is a nobody by birth, and only grows to prominence and power as the mummer's dragon. A king created completely from scratch ... by a guy who also rose from nothing to prominence and power.

Thanks for your response @Lord Varys. I think you bring up some good points for how Aegon could have been plausibly saved. I think the issue of AeGriff's true ancestry comes down to whether we feel we can believe Varys, rather than whether it was possible.

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On 1/6/2021 at 5:02 AM, Mithras said:

Considering that all the relevant witnesses are dead except Varys, any switch scenario would still need to be revealed by Varys in the story. Do I need to tell the problem with this?

Very true, but that has more to do with how they will get people to believe he is real, than whether he is real. And I suspect that he will receive significant support, both from people that believe he is genuinely Rhaegar's son come back from the dead to save Westeros, and people who just see him as an acceptable regime change to get their houses, and Westeros, back on track.

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On 1/6/2021 at 7:32 AM, Alyn Oakenfist said:

I mean if Lemore really is Ashara which is pretty likely, then she could give quite a lot of insight about what happened.

I would be more open to Lemore being Ashara if George hasn't made Tyrion oblivious to anything remotely resembling Ashara's noted-by-everyone features. And I don't accept any of the excuses for why George would contain Tyrion's thoughts and mouth on this, right around the same time Tyrion couldn't countain his thoughts and mouth on AeGriff's features.

If not for that, I could probably get past pretty much every other objection. I could even see Ned being aware of it, although I think we'd have to examine how Ned thinks of baby Aegon (on a quick search, it seems he only thinks of his name once, when thinking about the rumor that Gregor was the one that murdered him).

But I can't get past that objection.

That said, I do think Lemore could have been associated with Elia, perhaps one of her ladies, or one of the Dornishwomen that came to court with her.

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