'Damn it!' Baelor cursed inside his mind. That disgusting, old, putrid zombie can't be more unpleasant because the day doesn't have more time! How dare he send me and my sister away from our mother?
'I don't want to be a bastard in all but name! That's no life for a prince of the blood.'
'Shit, now what?'
'...Shithead...' This feels like seeing money about to drop into your lap, only to be taken away the next second. What's the use of being reincarnated in this world if I'm going to enjoy peasant life once again? For that, I might as well have stayed back on Earth as a simple salary slave. Nay, now that I came here, I wanted to experience the luxury of royal life, being tended by maids and servants 24/7, you know? Even to take a bath and get dressed, they would have it done for me without me needing to move a finger.
"Craven!!!" he angrily thought. That fucking old dog only knows how to give shit to his daughter. He has no bloody conscience, nor a shred of pity for her at all! Always doing whatever the fuck he wants without caring about her.
Then he says everything is for her good. "Pah, lies, all lies."
Baelon's little face was scrunched as he had his eyes wide open, looking at the carriage ceiling, immersed in his mind, trying to numb his fatigue because of the company he had surrounding him. He was resting inside a crib, and beside him were his twin sister Visenya and another baby girl, the daughter of the milkmaid, whose name he had yet to learn for either of them. The milkmaid's daughter was making sounds and crying from time to time, with Visenya accompanying her in the choir, making Baelon wish he could puncture his eardrums to get some peace.
The small group in the carriage had been traveling without stop ever since leaving King's Landing, having left the capital of Westeros long ago, out of sight, while they traveled the Goldroad all the way to the west across the Crownlands. The sun was already high in the sky, suggesting that midday was approaching or perhaps had already passed.
The lord commander had long ago fallen asleep on his seat, even amidst the noise that surrounded him, while wearing his armor in high alert. The woman lazily looked out the window at the passing views, her eyes filled with wonder at everything she saw, all while playing with the babies inside the crib.
Harrold opened his eyes as he stretched in his seat. He felt hungry as his belly started to protest. He looked from his side out of the window and narrowed his eyes as he saw, far away across the woodland expanse, a hamlet. They had the Blackwater Rush to their left, maybe a few miles away. They were still maybe half a day's travel without stopping to reach the settlement beside the crossing of the river, which connects the Gods Eye and the Blackwater Rush. When they got there, it would be nightfall, and hopefully, they would find an inn to pass the night.
He moved his sight to the woman he had taken from the pleasure house in a whirlwind, being lucky to find her quite quickly. He didn't know how much it would have cost to retrieve her; he had just taken her when she hadn't been fearful of the little princess and had been willing to feed her, leaving the rest to the king's men.
Having observed her for a while during the journey to find out what kind of woman she was, he couldn't help but think she was quite comely, the red-haired one. A young woman who had become a mother quite young, like the princess—well, even the Queen was the same.
"What's your name, woman?" Harrold asked, not even knowing her name.
The young woman was startled at the sudden question from the knight in armor. She timidly and humbly replied quickly, "Grace, Ser. That's my name." The man had never said a word to her and had even ignored her after they left together, only having told her to take care of the little babies.
"Grace..." Harrold mumbled her name. "It's a good name." He smiled. Seeing her apprehensive look, he tried to appease her. "Don't be afraid around me, Grace. I will not eat you; I'm not that hungry yet."
Grace, hearing the lord commander's jest, couldn't help but giggle a little as her face softened. Then Harrold's belly growled in protest.
After a short moment of awkward silence as their eyes met, "Haha," Grace and Harrold laughed at the same time.
"Ser, it seems your tummy says otherwise."
Harrold coughed to hide his embarrassment. "It seems it is time for lunch. Are you hungry?"
"Yes, Ser. Yet I don't dare to impose. When you say it's time to eat, that's when I shall eat."
"Don't be a fool. If you are hungry, just say so. You are the one who will feed the babies. You need to be strong and well-fed for that."
"I can't have you being unable to do the task; that's why I brought you here for!"
"Sorry, Ser. Then... in that case, I would like to eat, Ser."
"I would also like to thank you... for taking us from the pleasure house..." Grace said, a bit ashamed but with a grateful smile.
"It's alright, it's alright. There is no need for that." Harrold waved her off. "It will not be long till we get to eat something."
Baelon was attentively listening to the exchange as they talked. A bit surprised, but not by far, that the pretty red-haired sister was named Grace and had been a lady of the night, working as a social worker for the community in King's Landing.
"Wua—wuaaaa—wuaaaa!!!" Grace's daughter started crying loudly from the crib, and soon Visenya too started crying after her, seemingly anxious to join the choir.
'Oh, Lord, please just...' Baelon groaned with closed eyes.
"Why are they crying now?" Harrold furrowed his brow as he looked at the babies.
"Sorry, Ser. I will take a look at them." Grace quickly apologized and stood to look at the little girls.
She first checked whether they had dirtied the cloth swaddling them. Finding them clean, she exhaled in relief, not having the need to clean them.
"Umm, Ser. The babies are just hungry too."
"Then feed them. Don't wait for my order to do so."
"Then... I will feed the babies. I hope you don't find it troublesome seeing my nudity while I feed them. I know some people find that beneath them."
"Oh!" Harrold then found it a bit inappropriate for him to be there while she fed them. He awkwardly moved half his body out of the window and knocked on the carriage while yelling to the front, where a man wearing a breastplate and a helmet was leading the two horses, a sheathed sword and iron shield resting beside him. "Stop the carriage!"
"What?" the young man yelled, asking.
"Stop the damn carriage, you fool!"
"At once, lord commander!" The man quickly started slowing down the horses. "Oh! Ooh!" he grunted at them.
"I will leave you to feed the kids. When you are done, tell me so we can continue." Harrold quickly said, leaving the carriage.
"What are we doing, lord commander?"
"I'm not the lord commander anymore, kid. Call me Harrold."
"How could I? 'Ser' will be then." The lad grinned at him.
"Alright, see as you like, Jenkin." Harrold nodded. "We will stop here for a while. The woman needs to feed the babies."
"There are a lot of folk coming and going around the Goldroad, Ser. Is it wise to stop here? Maybe we should keep traveling to the hamlet in the distance..."
"Don't worry. The kids need to eat, and the woman wouldn't be able to feed them if we are on the move. Besides, we just look like the retinue of a nobleman with the armor and this carriage."
"Who would dare make trouble? We will be here for a short rest. When she finishes, we continue and have a good feast; the King pays. Take the chance to rest and move your legs."
"I don't see the time we get there, Ser. I'm quite hungry. We didn't have breakfast or anything at all since leaving." Jenkin said, rubbing his hands together to get a bit warm. It was a cold day.
"Soon, we will have some." Harrold said as he moved away from the road to take a piss. "Be alert. I will be back in a moment."
....
Inside the carriage, the atmosphere had become considerably relaxed and easy for Grace after Harrold stepped outside and left her alone with the three babies. The sudden absence of the stern but seemingly good knight made her feel a strange mixture of relief and uncertainty, because although he had never treated her cruelly and had even been surprisingly courteous toward her during their brief conversation, she still did not know enough about him to feel completely at ease in his presence.
He was clearly a knight of some importance, judging by his armor, his bearing, and the way the young driver, who seemed like a city guard, had addressed him, but Grace knew nothing about knights or nobles beyond what she had learned through hearsay and the occasional customer who happened to belong to those circles.
As far as she knew, she had simply been swept away from the place where she worked and grew up all her life by a powerful-looking man who had needed a milkmaid in a hurry, and it just happened she had her baby not long ago; now she was traveling somewhere beyond the city she never left in her life without even knowing where the road would eventually take them.
She turned her attention back toward the crib, as the little ones made a fuss. Grace smiled to herself as she looked at them, already recognizing the signs. She had become familiar with the different cries and little movements babies made when they wanted something, and despite how strange the entire situation was, this part at least felt easier to her than having the need to serve men when needed back at that place.
"All right, all right, little ones, I know what you want," she murmured gently as she leaned over the crib and carefully lifted her own daughter into her arms.
The baby immediately quieted as Grace settled her against her chest, and the young mother smiled faintly while adjusting her position. She had never imagined that one day she would find herself caring for more than one infant at once, yet here she was, sitting inside a richly furnished carriage with two children who clearly belonged to someone of high status and her own daughter resting beside them. The whole thing seemed almost unreal, and every time she thought about it too much, she felt as though she had somehow stepped into a story meant for somebody else.
Still, this was the work she had signed for.
Grace lowered her upper dress and released her plump and milk-rich big breasts, her sweet scent filling the air inside the carriage as she began feeding her daughter, watching with quiet affection as the little girl quickly settled into the familiar rhythm of chewing at her pink tip. She gently stroked the baby's hair with one hand while her gaze drifted toward the other two children inside the crib as she shushed the baby girl softly, trying to calm her down that she would be next in line to be fed.
The little princess was lying beneath her blanket, staring upward with those strange purple eyes that had terrified but also marveled her ever since she first saw her. There was something almost unsettling about the child's appearance, not because she found her ugly, but because she had simply never seen anyone who looked like her. The small raised formations along part of the baby's skin resembled scales, and her eyes were not quite like those of an ordinary newborn. Yet the more Grace looked at her, the more difficult it became to think of her as anything unusual at all after past the first shocking impression. She was just a baby, helpless and dependent upon the people around her.
Grace wondered about her mother. She wondered what sort of woman could have given birth to such a child and then allowed her to be taken away or, worse, even have left behind.
Of course, Grace had no idea whether the mother had willingly given up the child, whether the separation had been forced upon her, or whether there was some terrible reason behind it all. Nobody had explained anything to her. Harrold had simply told her and a few other women, that the children needed to be cared for; anyone willing could be released from the place, their debts to the establishment paid if they had any; they would also receive a handsome stipend of pay each moon, house, and food if they were to come; they would work exclusively like a maid and milkmaid tending to the children's needs. Many liked the conditions but recoiled when they looked at the child's looks, but Grace didn't, and she also wanted to get away from that life, but she had been born into it and couldn't get out, and the man that whispered sweet nothings in her ear every time he paid for her time never took her away from that place even after leaving her with child. She had already been nursing her own daughter; she was apparently suitable for the task, so she took the chance.
That was the extent of what she knew.
She did not know who the babies were; she did not know why they were seemingly being hidden, and she certainly did not know why a knight who carried himself as though he were accustomed to standing beside nobles had gone into a pleasure house to find a wet nurse.
Grace could not help feeling that there had to be more to it.
Her daughter eventually slowed her feeding, and she gently lifted her upright and rested the baby's head against her shoulder while softly patting her back. After a moment, the little girl gave a tiny burp and settled against her mother with a sleepy expression.
"There we are," Grace whispered with a warm smile. "Much better."
She carefully placed her daughter back into the crib and then reached for Visenya.
The little princess immediately began making quiet noises as Grace picked her up, almost as though she had been waiting for her turn. She couldn't help but smile at that.
"You were waiting patiently, weren't you?" she whispered as she settled the baby against herself.
Visenya began feeding soon afterward, and Grace relaxed slightly as she watched the little girl drink. She found herself looking at the baby's face again, studying those unusual eyes with open curiosity as the little baby fed while also looking back at her with curious, innocent eyes.
"You're curiously pretty, aren't you?" she murmured softly.
The baby obviously could not understand her, but Grace found herself talking anyway, because speaking to the little ones made her journey into the unknown feel less bleak.
She knew she should probably be frightened about everything that was happening, yet whenever she looked at the babies, her fears diminished. Babies had a way of making even terrible situations feel smaller for a little while. They needed feeding, warmth, sleep, and affection, and those were things Grace knew she could give them.
What she did not know was where they were going.
She did not even know how far they had already traveled.
She certainly did not know anything about the man outside other than the fact that everyone seemed to defer to him and that he looked like a knight. She had barely learned his name herself, and even that had come only after he had asked hers first.
Grace briefly remembered their strange little conversation from earlier, when he had attempted to make a joke about not eating her because he was not hungry yet. She had been so startled that she had laughed, and then his stomach had betrayed him a moment later with such an obvious growl that the two of them had ended up laughing together despite how awkward everything had been. It had been the first time since being taken away that she had genuinely relaxed.
She wondered whether he was truly as stern as he appeared, or whether he was simply tired.
Perhaps he was also worried.
Grace shook her head slightly, realizing she was thinking too much about a man she barely knew.
She returned her attention to Visenya, who was continuing to feed quietly. The child's little hand had curled against Grace as she drank, and Grace instinctively placed one finger against it. Visenya's tiny fingers closed around it almost immediately.
The gesture made Grace smile.
"Well, aren't you affectionate?"
Then, from the crib, there came a soft whimper.
Grace turned her head as she looked at Baelon stirring. At first, he merely moved his arms beneath his blanket, his face scrunching slightly as though he had been disturbed. Grace continued feeding Visenya, assuming that the boy would settle down again, but instead he began making increasingly insistent sounds.
"Eh... ehh..."
Grace glanced over at him.
"Are you hungry too?" She wondered, as that child never made a single sound or caused any trouble since she saw him for the first time.
The little boy made sounds and kicked his legs beneath the blanket as if answering her question.
'I'm hungry now, after seeing everyone eating but me.' Baelon groaned. 'Feed me too, woman.'
Grace laughed quietly. "You've been very patient, haven't you?"
Baelon made another irritated little noise. Inside his own mind, however, there was considerably less patience than Grace imagined. 'Finally.'
He had spent far too long lying there listening to the others cry and fuss all the way while he had been forced to endure the indignity of being a little baby. Being trapped inside a baby's body was frustrating enough, but having to rely entirely upon other people to figure out what he needed was even worse.
She shifted Visenya carefully in her arms, allowing the baby to finish before gently lifting her away and placing her back into the crib, and then she picked Baelon up.
"You really were hungry," Grace said with an amused smile.
Baelon looked up at her for less than a breath before latching with incredible eagerness, leaving afterimages, into the pink engorged nipple resting in the white pointy slope.
"Aaahmm....You....Mmmhm...Why are you different than them???...Don't....Don-t be so aggressive....Ufhm...."
'I don't wanna. It's delicious.' Baelon continued nursing without interruption, even if she protested. But more than protest, she seemed quite content and aroused. "...And enjoyable. Sweet!"
Grace gently brushed a strand of her red hair away from her face and looked down at him, her cheek blushing a fiery red hue as little beads of sweat appeared on her forehead and her body started to warm up with little tremors of pleasure coursing through her whole being. Baelon matched her look as he looked upwards while chewing as he pleased while drinking her warm milk as he rested on her arms.
"You have quite the appetite compared to the little girls."
She wondered whether he and Visenya were twins. They certainly seemed to be related, and she had noticed that Harrold always referred to them together. She wondered who their parents were and what had happened to them. She wondered whether the children belonged to some noble household and whether she would eventually be expected to live among nobles herself.
The thought made her nervous.
She had never known or belonged in such a world.
She was a young woman who had learned to survive by doing what work she could find, and she had never imagined herself wearing fine clothes, living in a castle, or speaking with lords and ladies. The idea of suddenly being surrounded by people of that sort frightened her far more than she wanted to admit.
Whatever secrets surrounded them, they were still babies, and babies deserved someone who cared for them.
Outside the carriage, Harrold was speaking with the driver, his voice faintly audible through the walls. Grace could not make out every word, but she could hear that they were discussing the road ahead and the settlement they hoped to reach before nightfall.
She listened briefly before looking back at Baelon.
The little prince was already beginning to become sleepy, his movements slower now that his hunger had been satisfied.
Grace smiled and adjusted him carefully against herself. "Sleep, little one. You've had enough for now."
'I came, I ate, I slept,' Baelon thought, satisfied. 'Later, shit and pee, then rinse and repeat.' He closed his eyes after that brilliant and deep philosophical insight and soon fell asleep.