Crown of Thunder (ASOIAF AU)

[Marielle]

Rain had been falling over Storm's End for three days, hard enough to scour the color from stone and man alike. It came slantwise from the sea, hissing over the yard, drumming on helm and horse and shutter until the whole castle seemed less built upon the cliff than nailed there by thunder.

Durran Storm stood beneath the broken shelter of the smithy roof and watched the clouds boil above Shipbreaker Bay.

He had been born to that sound, or so old Maester Colwyn liked to say when the wine made him sentimental. Born during a storm that split two oaks and drowned six fishermen. Storm's End had been made to withstand gods, kings, and weather. It did not listen easily to screams.

Neither did the men who ruled it.

"Again," Ser Cortnay Penrose said.

Durran lifted his practice sword. His shoulders ached, his palms were raw, and rainwater ran down his neck beneath his collar. Across from him, Edric Wylde rose from the mud with blood on his lip and murder in his eyes. Edric was a year younger, two inches shorter, and convinced that being trueborn made up the difference.

"Yield if you like," Durran said.

Edric spat red into the rain. "To a bastard?"

The watching boys laughed because they thought they were meant to. Durran smiled because he had learned young that showing anger gave other men a handle to hold.

"To the mud, then," he said, and came forward. Edric swung too wide. Durran stepped inside the blow, hooked a foot behind his ankle, and sent him down hard enough to splash half the yard.

"Yield."

For a heartbeat there was only rain.

"I yield," Edric said, the words squeezed between his teeth.

Ser Cortnay grunted. "Better. Not good, but better. You waste strength when pride would do the work for you." Then his voice cracked across the yard. "Enough. Get cleaned up. Lord Renly arrives before dusk, and I'll not have half the castle looking as if it crawled out of a ditch."

That made the yard stir.

Renly Baratheon had been named lord of Storm's End after Robert took the Iron Throne, though he had spent more time in King's Landing than among the rain-soaked stones of his own seat. When he came south, he brought bright cloaks, polished smiles, and the scent of roses from the Reach. Men liked him. Even the smallfolk cheered for him more easily than they had ever cheered for Stannis.

Durran had met Renly four times and had liked him twice.

He left the yard with the others, but instead of going to the barracks he crossed beneath the covered walk toward the sea wall. The guards there nodded him through. Some called him my lord when no one important was near, more from habit than law. Others called him Storm with that edge men used when they wanted to be correct and cruel at the same time. From the wall, the bay looked like a black mouth full of broken teeth. Waves smashed against the rocks below, and far out lightning flickered behind the clouds like pale veins under bruised skin.

The sight steadied him. When other boys had whispered bastard as if it were a curse, Durran had come here to listen to the sea throw itself against stone and fail. The storm did not care how a man was born. It broke kings and beggars with equal hands.

"You should not stand so close to the edge."

He turned. Maester Colwyn came limping toward him, gray robes clutched tight against the wind. He was a thin old man with red-rimmed eyes and ink forever staining two fingers of his right hand.

"If the storm wanted me, it has had years to take me," Durran said.

"That is exactly the sort of sentence carved on a young man's grave."

Durran stepped back from the parapet to humor him. "Ser Cortnay says Lord Renly is coming."

"Lord Renly is already inside the outer gate. He rides quickly when he wishes to be seen arriving before bad news grows stale."

Durran looked at him. "What bad news?"

The maester's expression shifted, and the rain seemed suddenly colder.

"Come with me," Colwyn said.

They walked in silence through the inner yard. Servants hurried past with rushes and clean linens. A pair of grooms led lathered horses toward the stables. Storm's End had been half asleep that morning; now it woke like a warhorse smelling blood.

In the rookery, the air was warmer and fouler. Ravens muttered in their cages, black eyes bright with secrets. Colwyn barred the door behind them, then took a rolled parchment from his sleeve. The seal had already been broken. Yellow wax, stamped with a crowned stag.

Durran stared at it.

"The king?" he asked, though he knew before the maester spoke.

"Robert Baratheon is dead."
------------------------
The words landed without drama. No thunder answered. No raven screamed. There was only the rustle of wings and the distant groan of rain against stone.

Durran waited to feel something grand enough for the moment. Grief, perhaps. Rage. Instead he felt a hollow pressure beneath his ribs, as if he had swallowed a stone too large to pass.

Robert had been his father in the way a mountain might be a man's father if his mother pointed to it often enough. Durran had Robert's black hair, blue eyes, height, and laugh. He had also inherited the king's absence. There had been gifts sometimes, and one visit when Robert had lifted him and said, Gods, he looks like me, before riding away before dawn.

"How?" he asked.

"A boar," Colwyn said.

Durran almost laughed. It came up sharp and ugly, then died in his throat. "Of course."

"The prince has been crowned. King Joffrey, first of his name."

At that, Durran did laugh. The ravens stirred uneasily.

Colwyn's mouth tightened. "This is not a jest."

"No," Durran said. "Jests are meant to be clever."

He had seen Joffrey once, years ago, a golden-haired boy in crimson velvet who had looked at Storm's End as if the castle smelled bad. Robert had been alive then, drunk and roaring and somehow still powerful enough to make every cruel thing seem temporary. Now Robert was dead, and that boy sat the Iron Throne.

"Lord Renly will speak in the hall," Colwyn said. "There will be oaths requested soon. Perhaps tonight."

"To Joffrey?"

"Not to Joffrey."

Durran understood then why the castle moved as it did. Renly had not come to mourn. He had come to gather.

"Stannis is Robert's heir if Joffrey is false," Durran said.

Colwyn watched him carefully. "You say if."

"I say what men with heads still attached to their necks say."

"Wise."

"Not wise. Practiced."

The maester looked away toward the cages. "There are matters of blood and law that become dangerous after a king dies." Durran felt the old familiar smile try to rise and refused it. "I am a bastard. I know the measure of my danger."

"No," Colwyn said softly. "You know the measure of the danger men allowed you to see."

Before Durran could answer, someone knocked hard on the rookery door.

"Maester," called a voice from outside. "Lord Renly asks for Durran Storm in the round hall."

Colwyn closed his hand around the parchment until it wrinkled. "Tell his lordship we are coming."

Bootsteps retreated.

Durran looked at the maester's fist. "There is another raven."

Colwyn did not answer.

"Maester."

"Not here." The old man moved past him, unbarred the door, then paused. "Whatever is said in that hall, listen more than you speak. Smile if you must. Do not promise anything."

"You sound afraid."

"I am old. Fear is one of the few habits that has kept me alive."

The round hall of Storm's End had been built for hard men and harder choices. Its walls were thick, windowless, and hung with banners that stirred only when the doors opened. The crowned stag flew above the high seat. Beneath it stood Renly, bright as summer in a castle full of rain, surrounded by lords Durran knew by face if not by affection. Ser Cortnay stood apart, arms folded.

Renly turned as Durran entered. "There he is. My brother's storm-born son." Every eye found him.

Durran bowed. Not too low. Bastards were expected to remember their place; Baratheon bastards were expected to forget it just enough to amuse people.

"My lord."

"You have grown tall," Renly said. "Robert would have enjoyed that." Would he? Durran wondered. Or would he have frowned into his wine and seen a mistake given shoulders?

"He was generous enough to start the work," Durran said.

That won a few smiles. Renly's widened.

"Gods, you even have his tongue."

"Only when I cannot find a better one."

Someone laughed too loudly. Renly came down from the dais and set both hands on Durran's shoulders as if they were kin who had shared more than blood. His grip was warm and practiced.

"This is a bitter day," Renly said. "For the realm and for House Baratheon."

"For all Robert's children, I suppose."

It was a small thing, spoken softly, but the hall heard it. Renly's smile did not falter. That was impressive. "Indeed."

He released Durran and turned to the assembled lords. "My nephew sits the Iron Throne. A boy of thirteen, guided by Lannisters, crowned before his father's body was cold. King's Landing is theirs for now. But the realm is not kept by gold cloaks and seals. It is kept by men, by loyalty, and by strength." The hall murmured approval. Durran watched faces instead of listening to words. Lord Tarth looked solemn, Morrigen hungry, Ser Cortnay at the rushes, and Colwyn at no one.

"By crowning you?" Durran asked.

The words were out before prudence could catch them. Somewhere behind him, Colwyn made a small sound, not quite a cough. Renly studied him, then stepped closer, lowering his voice enough to seem intimate while keeping it clear enough to carry.

"You loved Robert?"

Durran could have lied. The hall expected either grief or gratitude. Instead he said, "I wanted to."

Something crossed Renly's face then. Not anger. Not pity. Recognition, perhaps.

"Then help me keep what he won," Renly said. "Men know your face. Ride with me. Robert's son honoring Robert's brother. It will please the Stormlords."

There it was. Not a chain. A ribbon. Softer, prettier, and tied just as tight.

Durran looked toward the high seat beneath the crowned stag. He had sat there once as a child, when the hall was empty and the servants too busy to chase him away. For three stolen breaths he had imagined the castle was his because the stones had known his name before anyone taught him shame.

Outside, thunder rolled across the bay.

"If I ride," Durran said, "I ride as what?"

Renly's smile thinned at the edges. "As my nephew."

"Not your brother's mistake?"

Lord Morrigen muttered something under his breath. Ser Cortnay's eyes snapped up.

Renly took the insult better than most men would have. "As Robert's blood. That is no small thing."

"Small enough not to inherit."

This time the thunder came closer.

The torches along the wall guttered. One went out. Then another. A cold gust moved through the windowless hall, lifting the banners though the doors were shut. Men turned sharply, hands going to sword hilts. Durran felt the air press against his skin, as if the storm outside had leaned close to listen.

His heart was beating too fast.

Renly had gone still.

"Durran," Colwyn said from behind him. A warning.

Durran forced his hands to unclench. The gust faded. The banners settled. Rain struck the walls in a sudden roar, louder than before, then softened back into its endless drumming.

No one spoke. Renly looked not frightened, exactly, but careful. It was the first honest thing Durran had seen from him all day.

"Storm's End breeds strange tempers," Renly said lightly, though the words had to climb over the silence. "Perhaps we should all eat before grief turns us dramatic."

The hall accepted the escape because every man in it wanted one. Chairs scraped. Voices returned too quickly. Durran stood where he was until Colwyn touched his sleeve.

"Come," the maester whispered.

This time Durran followed without argument. They did not stop until they reached Colwyn's chamber. The maester shut the door, barred it, then went to the hearth. From behind a loose stone, he drew out a narrow oilskin packet tied with black cord.

Durran watched him place it on the table.

"What is that?"

Colwyn's hands trembled as he untied the cord. "A thing your mother made me swear to keep until the realm had need of it."

"My mother is dead."

"The dead are often better at keeping promises than the living."

Inside the oilskin lay a parchment, old but carefully preserved. The wax seal was cracked, yet enough remained to make out the crowned stag. Beneath it, in a large rough hand, was a name Durran knew from coins and proclamations.

Robert Baratheon.

Durran did not touch it. His throat had gone dry.

Colwyn read aloud, voice low.

"Let it be known before gods and men that Durran Storm, born of my blood and acknowledged by my hand, is to be held trueborn from this day, with all rights, dignities, and inheritance due to a son of House Baratheon, should the lawful issue of my body fail or prove false..."

The room seemed to tilt. Durran gripped the back of a chair.

"No," he said.

Colwyn looked up. "Yes."

"Robert would not have written that."

"He did not write it. He signed it. Lord Arryn had the wording made."

Jon Arryn. Dead. Robert. Dead. A letter that could make kings into usurpers and brothers into enemies.

Durran laughed once, without humor. "How many know?"

"I knew. Your mother knew. Lord Arryn knew. The king knew, if he remembered anything after the wine wore off." Colwyn hesitated. "And now, perhaps, someone else."

The rain stopped.

That was the strange part. Not slowed. Not softened. Stopped, all at once, as if a hand had closed around the throat of the storm.

Durran lifted his head.

From the rookery above came a raven's cry, sharp enough to cut through stone. Then another. Then wings beating against cages in panic. Colwyn went pale.

"Stay here," he said.

Durran was already moving.

He reached the rookery ahead of the maester and found the door open. Rainwater spread across the floorboards though the sky outside had gone still. The raven cages rattled. Feathers drifted in the air. On the table lay a fresh strip of parchment, weighted by a black stone slick with seawater.

Durran picked it up.

There were only seven words, written in a thin hand he did not know.

The first was his name.

Durran Storm is not the last one.

 

[DR2020]

very promising first chapter, have no idea how you will pull off him gaining a throne

 

[DR2020]

as a reader i got confused by the below:


"Durran picked it up.

There were only seven words, written in a thin hand he did not know.

The first was his name.

Durran Storm is not the last one."