Chapter 40: Chapter 40: Discussion
Within the main hall of Winterfell, there was a cacophony of noise, booming laughter and banging on the tables as the men told jokes and stories of their escapades as they awaited for Ned to join them.
Ned was currently dealing with some marital issues, Catelyn had joined them reluctantly to tour Kandor, upon finding out who and what Aiden was, she immediately wanted nothing to do with Aiden or the Targaryens anymore.
To her Aiden was a demon, a false god come to destroy this world. She blamed Aiden for her father's fall, to her the Targaryens had made a deal with the Devil himself to raise the Devil's child. She was a devout follower of the Faith.
The Faith of the Seven taught that there is only one god, but that one god had seven aspects, or faces. The less educated thought that they taught there were seven different gods, thus they called them the New Gods to differentiate them from the Old Gods. Depending on their need depended on which face they prayed to.
They believed the seven aspects were the Father who represented judgement and justice, the Mother was loving and protective, the Warrior was courage, the Smith was the mender of broken things and righting the wrongs of the world of men, the Maiden or Maid guarded womens chastity or innocence, the Crone was wisdom and the Stranger was death.
The Faith taught that all other gods weren't gods but were Devils and Demons who wished to steal the faith of the one true god. It was their god who created the marvels of the world and lived amongst the stars.
So upon finding out that Aiden's city was amonst the stars, she instantly turned cold the rest of the tour, her thoughts were solidified after seeing the robotic assistants that brought them food and drinks and the moving pictures, or televisions.
She didn't believe Aiden's words one bit regarding it being science, who could blame her, if you time travelled with your smart phone, lighter or even a pen or pencil back to the 1800's, you would have been burned at the stake for being a witch. They would've seen it as magic, not a tool.
Same goes for if you were transported to the future by even 100 years, although you wouldn't be burned at a stake hopefully, you would think that everyone could use magic since they would have technology you couldn't imagine.
Although you may recogize some things, since you had a better understanding of technology over those in the 1800's, like not mistaking a car for a beast, you would still think they ran on magic since they wouldn't operate the same way as your used to.
If you went, say a few millions of years into the future, then you would be completely clueless. This was basically what Catelyn was going thru, the technological gap between Krypton and Planetos was in the millions of years, not hundreds.
She may be educated but the level of education Planetos had was abysmal, if someone from our modern era who only completed high school was transported there they would be an absolute genius on Planetos.
It also didn't help that she immediately likened Aiden to a Devil, so anything he said was a lie or a trick to shake peoples belief in her God. She hated that her children had so much fun, she endured the tour in silence, which Ned and the others picked up on, especially Ashara and Elia.
Immediately after returning to Winterfell Catelyn removed her bracelet and tried to destroy it, no matter what she did it wouldn't break, not even after throwing it into the fireplace did it show any sign of damage.
When she tried to remove the bracelets from her children, they didn't budge which provoked her thoughts that they were magic and Aiden a Devil. The truth of the matter was the children didn't want to give them up, the bracelets could only be removed by the wearer, they wanted to keep going back to Aiden's city.
It was beautiful and full of wonder, it had things to do such as parks and rides, games, movies and music, great food and animals they had never seen. Even Sansa, who was usually very obedient to her mother, refused to remove the bracelet.
"Ned, you are going to fix this! You are going to make up with King Robert and turn over those Devil worshippers!" Catelyn shouted at her husband.
"Cat, I love you, but I will do no such thing. Do you have any idea what you are asking me to do? Are you truly blind to the truth?" Ned stated as he shook his head.
"Yes I do! Ned he is a Devil, it is he that has caused you to lose sight of the truth. He has tricked you and manipulated you to turn on your best friend and brother! He wants to destroy this world Ned! If you don't fix this I will!" Catelyn replied angrily.
Ned's face went stern after hearing her response, "Really? And how would you fix it Catelyn?"
"I will go to King Robert and the High Septon myself, tell him where those devil worshippers are and lead them here myself if I have too. I'll not have my family associated with false gods." Catelyn answered, but then began to step back after seeing Ned's fury rise.
"Your family!? You have no idea what the fuck your saying! Aiden didn't turn Robert against me, Robert did that by himself! He constantly wanted to kill my sister and nephew, he ordered the murder of innocent women and children! If you are willing to condone such actions, then your New Gods are cunts and I will tear down the Sept I had built for you here in Winterfell. You are being unreasonable and blinded by your religious fanaticism, we worship the Old Gods here and killing innocent men, women and children is frowned upon." Ned said angrily.
His wolf blood boiled at her obvious threat against his sister and nephew, he began to feel that he had allowed too much of the teachings of the Faith to reside within his home. He made a mental note to remove the septon from Winterfell, he didn't want this kind of teaching to be passed down to his children.
What made it worse was that he knew Aiden wasn't a Devil, he didn't believe him a God either per say, but he did believe that his abilities were divine. Never once had Aiden ever portrayed himself as anything more than human. He respected those that respected him.
This was evident in how he fought in the tournament, he gave each knight honor and respect. Boris the Belly didn't receive that same treatment because of his own actions, thus earning him his humiliating and memorable defeat.
Even after a few months of the tournament ending, many new names had been added to Boris in taverns. Boris the Belcher, Bowel Blower Boris, Boris the Shitter, Boris the Bitch, amongst many others.
Ned respected Aiden and felt he was honorable, not just because he saved his and Robbs life, but he had also donated all his gold he won from the tournament to the people of other kingdoms, including the North.
Ten thousand gold dragons was a lot of gold, most commoners may earn one to five gold over the course of their entire life working, most had never even seen a gold dragon before since they usually only delt in copper pennies, half pennies, groats, half groats, and the occasional copper stars. It was extremely rare they even delt with silver stags, let alone gold dragons.
To equal one gold dragon; it took 210 silver stags, or 1470 copper stars, or 2940 copper groats, or 11760 copper pennies. Obviously that is during peace times and can fluctate depending on the economic situation of the kingdom, but on average five copper pennies could feed a person for a couple days.
Most of the time however, commoners didn't even use coin, they bartered or traded for the goods they needed. They would trade furs, leather, cloth, or food for what they needed rather than use coins. To commoners, coins were used only when they travel or didn't have something to barter with that the person wanted.
So the ten thousand gold dragons was a whole lot of food for the northerners, it would keep many northerners from starving in the coming winter, which was a regular occurrence in the north.
It was actually normal in the north for elderly people to walk out of their homes in the middle of the night, while the rest of their family slept, to purposely freeze to death or get killed by a wild animal just so the rest of their family wouldn't starve.
If it was really bad even young parents did the same, as long as they had a child old enough to survive on their own, they would sacrifice themselves to not have their children starve. This was why kids weren't children for very long, especially in the north, as soon as the child was old enough to walk, they were started on training and taught how to survive on their own.
Seeing Ned's serious and stern face Catelyn shivered, "You wouldn't dare."
"Aye, in fact tomorrow I will be removing Septa Mordain from Winterfell. You can keep your sept for now, but I'll not have my children forced into a religion that is fine with killing innocent people. We are Starks! We worship the Old Gods, I'll not force you to worship the Old Gods, it is against our teachings to do so, but you will respect our customs, as we respect yours. Should the children choose to follow the Faith that will be their own choice. If I hear anymore talk of you turning Lyanna over to Robert, I will burn that sept to the ground myself!" Ned responded then turned around and stormed out of the room, leaving Catelyn in shock.
She felt crushed that her husband didn't believe her, she couldn't understand how Ned didn't see things the way she saw them, no human could do the things she heard Aiden could do. Flying, frost breath, heat vision, speed and strength beyond comprehension, these were things humans couldn't do.
Catelyn took a deep breath, and pondered on what to do. After a few minutes she decided to take action secretly, she took out parchment and began to write a letter to the High Septon, detailing Aiden as a Devil and who is taking over the North, how he was manipulating Ned and the realm to steal their very souls.
She didn't doubt Ned would send away Septa Mordain, so she planned to give her the letter to deliver to the High Septon so that the Faith could combat the "Devil who walks amongst men."
Ned stood at the top of the stairs, trying to calm his anger. He too felt betrayed, he couldn't understand why his wife couldn't see things for what they were. Aiden had saved him and their entire family from a fate worse than death, yet she wanted him dead because of a belief.
It would be one thing if Aiden was a mass murderer, or had done evil things, although he did kill thousands on the way to Winterfell, those were soldiers, not farmers or civilians. There was nothing wrong with killing on the battlefield, it was either kill or be killed when it came to battle.
After Ned took a few deep breaths to calm his mind for the meeting with the other lords of the north, he proceeded down the stairs to the meeting hall. Hearing the joyful banter of his vassels as he neared the hall was relaxing.
As he stepped into the hall, Ned was surprised to find Aiden within the hall sitting next to Dacey Mormont who was wearing a beautiful green dress.
"Aiden, thank you for joining. I wasn't sure where you went off to, my guards only stated you flew off heading northwest." Ned said with a relieved smile.
"I had to go take care of an Ironborn invasion, they tried to retake Bear Island, but it's been handled. The Ironborn are now attacking Westerlands and have a decent sized fleet heading to Dorne. Euron Greyjoy has killed his brother Balon and assumed the title of Lord, he is claiming his attacks are under the banner of the Targaryens but as we know he is just being opportunistic. He sent a force to Bear Island to provoke you to kill his nephew Theon." Aiden explained, shocking all the lords in attendance.
"I said before, Lord Stark, we should've just wiped those cunts out instead of allowing them to bend the knee. Those fucking squids never learn." Greatjon Umber growled in anger.
"Aye, I knew that fat fucker Robert wouldn't be able to keep the Ironborn from attacking, they probably knew our forces were shorthanded so saw an opportunity. Did they attack Deepwood Motte?" Galbert Glover stated before asking Aiden about his territory's condition.
"They only focused on Bear Island, they were mainly after the wood and knew that even if Deepwood sent reinforcements, they would've easily repelled them. So your territory is safe Lord Glover." Aiden stated which brought relief to Galbert.
Although Deepwood Motte was a coastal city, like Bear Island, they didn't have a port, only a few docks since anytime they attempted to build a port, the Ironborn would attack and destroy it.
Iron Islands wanted full control of the sea in the area, that was why they had attacked both Seagard and Lannisport in the beginning of Balon's Rebellion, they wanted to have the only port on the western coast of Westeros. It was also why Gorold had only used a single ship to monitor Deepwood since they didn't have many ships, and the ships they did have were smaller, they were fishing boats and small merchant ships since they didn't have a port.
"I say we attack those squids and end those fuckers entirely." Lord Rickard Karstark stated thru gnashed teeth.
The North has always had deep hatred for the Iron Islands, it was as if they were each others nemesis, considering every time the Ironborn attacked the mainland, they always attacked the North the most.
Even during the Greyjoy Rebellion, although they did attack Seagard and Lannisport, most of their excursions hit the coastal villages of the North.
"Not yet, they will have their due, but right now they are balancing the scales a bit. If we attack them now, then Tywin can focus on the Reach and Riverlands, which we will need to establish trade for food. However I do have some ideas on what we can do to capitalize on the situation, that is if my lords are willing to listen." Aiden stated as he looked around the table.
"Aye, I too have some thoughts I'd like to share, as I am sure many of us do. But before we speak of the South, I do believe we need to discuss what to do with the Bolton lands, that should be resolved first." Ned stated loudly so that each lord heard him clearly.
So began the first meeting that would solidify bringing back Targaryen rule.
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