Ser Adrian Stone I/ Artys Arryn II
271 A.C
Ser Adrian Stone I
Ser Adrian was watching his page of the last 2 years square off against two older squires. The younger boy had become quickly popular on the training yard and because of his natural skill and ferocity when he fought, the lesser squires shirked away from fighting him. Coupled with his long sandy blonde hair and sky-blue eyes he presented a striking image even at a young age. Although one could easily confuse him with a child several years older than his actual age due to being a much larger size and the lack of the usual baby fat.
The two armored boys moved in concert to try and break Artys' guard and land a clean strike. He hummed approvingly as Artys moved into the gap exploiting their over confidence and breaking the two up preventing them from working together. Artys although large for his age was smaller than the other two yet his blows made them recoil and numbed their fingers. He was quick and his movements sharp constantly keeping the pressure on both squires. He moved like water, his strikes flowing from one to the next. Unleashing a whirlwind of steel upon the two squires he dominated them.
As the fight continued Ser Adrian could see the two squires flagging their arms began to tire and their strikes became sloppier. Artys though looked unfazed, although some overconfidence began creeping into his fighting and he began to lose his technique as he was getting too confident of his victory.
Artys feigned a low groin stab at Amos and changed it into a slash aimed at Robyn's throat hitting the boy on the padding surrounding his neck.
Ser Adrian barked out, "Robyn, dead! Get out of there," Using the distraction Artys kicked at Amos' shield knocking him over and then delivering a savage thrust at the gap between the armor at his armpit. Finishing the spar in brutal fashion.
'The young falcon is getting complacent, his speed and strength has given him an advantage but is also weakening his technique. I am going to make him practice each sword technique until his arms are incapable of holding his sword anymore. For the next few weeks, he can end his training with that. That should teach him a lesson,' Ser Adrian decided after analyzing the fight. To really pound it into Artys' head he called over one of the knights training by the side. "Amos and Robyn get cleaned up! Artys stay there, you are going to have a spar with Ser Gerold!"
What followed was a one-sided beat down that resulted in Artys learning a lesson he would never forget, never get complacent. Ser Gerold, quickly advanced on Artys who was recovering from the previous spar, their blades clashed together and in a contest of strength they were initially balanced. Soon, though age won out, Artys although strong was only 7 and as such as pushed back stumbling. Seeing the blade flashing out of the corner of his eye he hastily raised his shield deflecting it upwards. Attempting to counter stab Ser Gerold, Artys never saw the lightning quick downwards slash on his helm crumpling his legs and dropping him to the floor. Ser Adrian was quite sure he had curbed his young page's ego.
Artys Arryn II
I lay aching on my bed, my whole body screamed in protest, that bastard Ser Gerold didn't hold back. I'm sure I must've done something to piss him off, maybe ensnared his wife with my cute looks, who knows.
It was supposed to be my seventh name day today, it felt surreal that I had been living in Westeros for 7 years already. I had followed my plan and for the first 6 years of my life I had slowly made my way through the Library of Heavens Path and read as much as I could. I obviously was not able to read everything in those 6 years, but I had begun new studies with Maester Coleman and so I decided to absorb the library into my memory. I had reached the age now where I could start to flaunt my genius while working hard on the new concepts taught by the Maester exclusive to Westeros. I had also managed to convince my father to make me a page at the age of 5 to the Master-at-Arms of the Eyrie a hard man known as Ser Adrian Stone, a bastard son of a local noble and a washerwoman. Although bastardry was looked down upon by the Faith and many in the Vale, Ser Adrian had managed to work his way up to his position and was certainly skilled enough for it. I had been spending my time with him in the mornings and afternoons doing my duties and beginning to work on my fighting capabilities. It was soon obvious the effect the Super Soldier serum had on my body the more I worked.
While I lay there wallowing in self-pity after my beating my door slammed open and a loud voice hammered my ear drums, "Artys! Where are you, I heard you fought Ser Gerold and got smashed!" Urgh, just what I need after getting my head kicked in, Robert Baratheon at full volume. I looked out the corner of my eye and gave him the dirtiest look possible.
"I feel like I have just had my head kicked by a donkey, please shut up Rob!" At least he had the gall to look a tad sheepish before his face bloomed into a smile and he started talking at full volume again. Tuning him out I looked to the side of him, where a quieter slightly smaller boy stood. Iron grey eyes and black hair, it was Eddard Stark, already having become the 'Quiet Wolf' at age 10. He gave me a wry smile and I smiled back. Turning my attention back to Rob I caught the end of him saying we should head to the kitchens and get some food. Hauling myself out of bed I agreed and started to get changed so I could head down and eat something.
While we were walking, I began thinking about how my goals are proceeding. My first goal to get a horse breeding center running had surprisingly gone much easier than expected. Using the excuse that I loved riding at the age of 5 I managed to get father to buy a large number of mares from breeds in the Vale used for war. This coupled with using my large personal allowance when on a trip to Gulltown, allowed me to convince a Braavosi merchant to bring me some Dothraki stallions when he was next in port. Jumping at the chance of having close relations with a future Lord Paramount he set sail for the Disputed lands between Myr, Tyrosh and Lys to see if he could find some. The Dothraki are well known for fighting in the Disputed Lands and sometimes Khalasars clash and horses are lost or traded away. So, a few moons later, I had myself 40 new stallions to start breeding with my mares, and a somewhat regular supply coming from Essos.
Obviously, this is extremely expensive, but just about affordable for the heir of a Lord Paramount. So, for the last 2 years I had been breeding these mixed horses and then picking the best from the new batch who would begin breeding once again this spring. The ones that weren't what I want were sold at an affordable price to other lords which did reimburse some of the costs. According to current projections I should have 2-3,000 of the new horses in around 6 years' time. As the numbers grow so does the need for money. To gain revenue I need land and that is what I plan to persuade my father to give me in four years' time when I make my grand entrance to the people of the Vale during the planned tourney at the Gates of the Moon to celebrate the anniversary of King Artys I Arryn victory at the Battle of the Seven Stars which would be held in 275 A.C.
"Hey, Artys are you okay? You haven't been hit too hard on the head, have you?" I was dragged from my thoughts by a small elbow and looked up at Ned who was looking at me with some concern.
"Nah, no need to worry Ned, just thinking through the mistakes I made during the spar with Amos and Robyn." I responded, giving him what I hoped was a reassuring smile, changing topic I grabbed him by the arm and pulled him along after Robert, faux whispering, "If we don't hurry that big oaf is going to eat everything we better run!" We charged past Robert, while he shouted and ran after us. All in all, life was good in the Eyrie.
After eating some food, I left Ned and Rob and headed up to my mothers' room. I knocked on the door and waited until I heard her call me in. I saw her sewing on the balcony overlooking the mountains and valleys beyond the Eyrie.
"Ah, Artys, how kind of you to remember you have a mother, now that you're all grown up and started to spar with the older boys, I thought you had forgotten me." She lamented with a false sigh. I knew she was pretending but I loved her little signs of affection. She was probably the most important person to me in my life. I had thought that having had parents already, I would struggle to bond with my new family but in fact it was the opposite, since my previous family had died I didn't realize how starved for familial affection I was until I was brought to Westeros. I would do anything for her, I had originally decided to gain power for myself, but now my actions had become for my family too. I would not let anyone take them away from me.
"Mother!" I whined like the child I am (hormones am I right?), "You know that you are my favorite person in the castle, I told you yesterday, how could you forget!" Finishing her off with a pout to bring my cuteness up to max and ensure that bolt hit her in the heart. Maximum damage.
Weaponizing my cuteness was a trick I learned early on as a get out of jail free card and it worked on all the women in the castle. Although, there were a few maids I was wary of, they looked borderline scary. Knowing I had won this round I jumped up and sat next to my mother and appreciated the view. The books and the show could never do justice to the Eyrie. Built on top of the tallest mountain in the Vale, with sheer cliff faces hundreds of meters high below us it was a spectacle. Tall towers reached up into the sky with their tips covered by clouds, it looked mythical, like something out of a fantasy novel, oh wait. Jokes aside, I was certain that this was not human made, there had to be some sort of magic involved, much like The Wall in the North. There was only one way in, and it was a narrow road over a long bridge. This was probably in my nonbiased opinion the most beautiful and defensible castle in Westeros. Yes, yes, I may have not left the Vale, but I was pretty confident nothing could beat the Eyrie.
Soon lunchtime approached and my lessons with Maester Coleman followed shortly afterwards. Maester Coleman was odd, he was immensely intelligent, but he lacked any social skills so trying to draw information from him could be excruciating. To be honest I think that is part of the reason that Robert has already started skipping a few lessons and started spending more time in the training yard. Recently it has just been Ned and me. As usual it was the basic math problems and some history of Westeros, which I am quite certain has been through the citadel approved wringer a few times seeing as there are some bits that they teach completely different to the GRRM source material, but hey, that doesn't really bother me. All I need from the maester is him praising me to my father and some bits of archaic knowledge about the differences between Westeros and Earth, so that my knowledge can be updated and tweaked for future plans.
As the maester droned on about some math related to multiplication. I zoned out and started thinking about how to use my future knowledge politically. Knowing that the alliance between the Stark's, Tully's, Baratheon's, and the Arryn's will be coming to fruition around 7-8 years from now I need to ensure that I don't get dragged into that mess. Why you ask? Mainly because if Lyanna Stark is getting married to Robert, Brandon or Ned is getting Catelyn then I am saddled with Lysa and to be frank, fuck having Petyr Baelish's sloppy seconds. Hopefully, I can convince my father to hold back. The close relationship we have with Ned and Rob should be enough to persuade people that House Arryn is invested in the alliance without having to marry me off to Lysa. I have toyed with killing Petyr, but then I realized his whole ascent to power doesn't exist anymore. He was reliant on Lysa using Jon to elect him to Master of the Coin after the rebellion. Now though, my mother is still alive, I am the heir and so Lysa won't be able to get him that opportunity. Just by existing I think I have made a major change to canon, but that is only in the future. I still hadn't decided who I wanted to tie myself to now though. With my reduced aging I could wait a few years though. 'Hahhh,' I sighed, so much to do, so little time. For the time being though, I was waiting for the tourney, the lynchpin that all my plans hung on. Hugging my mother goodbye after making some more small talk I headed to the training yard to put some more hours in, preparing myself for the tourney.