Chapter Text
“What is that thing?” Victarion stared at the strange creature being held up by its scruff by his eldest brother. At twenty he had never seen something like it. Squirmy and child-like with wide black eyes like the Greyjoys along with their black hair but it had scaly pointed ears and a lashing black scaled tail. “Don’t tell me Alannys gave birth to that?”
“She didn’t,” Balon replied, “it replaced our son. Take care of it.”
“Are you certain?” That thing didn’t look capable of replacing a baby. It looked like a baby itself. “Looks like a baby.”
There was a wordless snarl from his brother before the thing was shoved into his chest for him to take it. Uncaring if he grabbed it or not, Balon released its scruff. Victarion struggled to wrap his arms around it.
“That’s not my son,” Balon said while turning away. “Remove it.”
“It has the Greyjoy eyes and hair-”
“Stolen from my actual son,” he was cut off, “my Theon’s gone, get that thing out of my sight.”
Victarion watched his brother walk back towards the Great Hall doors then looked down at the squirming baby in his arms. It looked like it could possibly be Balon’s kid. The nose was Alannys’ even with the patchy black scales. He lifted the thing to be at eye level and noted that it was a boy before pausing and lifting it a little higher. Or a girl? It had both parts.
The thing’s scaly tail had a tuft of black fur on the end the match the line of it along the spines where it connected to a trail of black fur up its back. Where it met at fluffy black baby fine curls at the base of its skull. Little patches of black scales covered its bare skin. Victarion lowered it again to look at the wide black eyes staring at him. They matched Balon’s, Aeron’s, and Euron’s crow eye. It might look a little strange but he was fairly certain it was Theon, the baby Alannys had given birth to not a month ago while he was at sea.
And if he was his nephew then he couldn’t go through with killing him like Balon wanted. He wasn’t a kinslayer, especially not babies.
He took him to his wife instead. Young, pretty thing from the Orkwood family close to five years his junior. Marylin had been promised to Aeron but everyone knew that his little brother had no interest in women. She was sweet and cooed over his nephew when he brought him home. Even with his strange looks.
They had no midwife for the baby but goat’s milk worked well enough until Victarion could find one. There were always a few among the salt wives. A plump Lysene woman was the one that he found that didn’t give him trouble considering her own babe had died in the cradle not so long ago. She had questions but he didn’t answer them. Not even when she demanded answers about why Theon looked the way that he did.
It took him raising a hand to her to get her to take care of the baby without any more questions. Marylin shied away from him after that but if was she scared of him then so be it. This got his nephew cared for until he could get him back to Alannys without Balon taking his head. Long enough for Theon to be a little older and easier to conceal.
“What is that?” Aeron peered down at the four month old baby in the cradle. His less than sober little brother had finally dragged himself out the inn at Lordsport to help him with their nephew.
“Theon,” Victarion answered, reaching into the cradle to pull the blanket back up over his chest. Tucking the baby’s tail under as well. “Balon asked me to kill him.” Soft breaths fell over his finger when he held it under a small nose just to be certain he was still breathing.
“Ya didn’ do that,” his brother pointed out. “Looks like a sea rat.”
Victarion looked at his brother in the low candle light to judge if he was joking or not. There was a less than sober look turned on him. “What in the storm hell is a sea rat?” He asked, not able to recall such a creature. Aeron was known to believe in strange things born from his copious amounts of drinking from a very young age. Even at seventeen he drank more than a hardened sailor at port.
“That thing,” Aeron gestured to their nephew. “It’s scaly and furry, babies aren’t like that.”
“He’s not a sea rat,” Victarion disagreed, turning his brother around so they could leave the room and let the baby sleep. Marylin glanced up from the needlework she was doing by the hearth in the main room. “Where’s Euron, he was supposed to be with you.”
A very sour look crossed Aeron’s face at the mention of their second eldest brother. “Drowned God be generous and take him,” his brother spat, “I don’t know.” That wasn’t surprising. Victarion knew well enough that Aeron drank because of Euron even if he denied it. “Better he doesn’t know. Best to keep the little sea rat here with you.”
“Father’s been making plans with Robert Baratheon’s rebellion,” he said, leading his brother out of the house, “nothing’s been decided yet but there’s a chance we’ll be called out for war. Can’t trust leavin’ the brat with the wife and the midwife.”
Not that he didn’t love his sweet wife. He simply didn’t trust her or the midwife with his nephew’s life. “What and giving ‘im over to Euron’s gonna be better?” Aeron asked incredulously. “I’ll take yer place. Let me command the Iron Fleet, you watch the sea rat.” Victarion stared down at his brother to wait to see if he was joking. Black eyes were wine bright but utterly serious.
“You barely know how to sail,” he said, “worse with a sword. You’re better fit to watch a baby than you are for war.”
“Then why bother mentionin’ Euron?”
“He’s our brother and Theon’s his nephew too.” Even if their second eldest brother couldn’t care less about their nephews and niece. He cared more about reaving, pirating, and tormenting Aeron. “I don’t expect him to keep watch of Theon, that’s on you if Father calls us to war for that stag. He simply needs to know that he exists still.”
Aeron looked far from pleased as he glanced over his shoulder at the closed door of the house. A bitter curse was spat at the ground before his brother walked away from him. Victarion knew he was off to find Euron even if he didn’t want to be.
“Well that’s a thing.” Euron held their nephew up to the sun while Victarion watched on closely. There wasn’t an ounce of trust in his body for his second eldest brother. “Looks like Balon, can’t believe he’d deny him being his.”
Theon was old enough to laugh and smile now with the first tooth starting to come in. And he had a gummy smile for his third uncle where he hadn’t for the other two. Victarion tried to not get upset at that. Like knew like and if Theon was to turn out like Euron then it would be best to try shoving him in the opposite direction. They didn’t need another Greyjoy running around hellbent on terrorizing everyone in sight.
“I’ll take him off your hands,” Euron said while bringing their nephew into a hold across his chest. “Wouldn’t want you to lose time making your own squalling brat with that pretty Orkwood girl.”
“No.” Victarion resisted the urge to take Theon back from the unsafe looking hold. “I was just letting you know he was alive.”
“Oh, I dunno,” his brother mused with a bounce of the baby in his arm, “I think I like the idea of having this thing crawling around Silence. He might scare off the gulls.” Euron used his free hand to prod at Theon’s single tooth. “He might eat one with that sharp thing.”
As if to prove his uncle right, Theon tried to bite down on Euron’s finger. Too long and too pointed ears twitched underneath the mass of black hair as Euron snatched his finger back. Unlike normal baby teeth, Theon’s single one was sharp enough to draw blood it seemed. Victarion watched the dark drop slide down his brother’s finger with a wonder of it the midwife would have bite marks on her nipples soon. No doubt she was already dealing with that one tooth making trouble.
“Sharp,” Euron muttered while sticking his bleeding finger into his mouth. “Oh, very well, you can keep him.” Their nephew was held out to him and Victarion was quick to take him into a more proper hold. “You wouldn’t happen to know where Aeron is, would you? I must say that I’ve missed our baby brother.”
“I wouldn’t, no.”
That was a lie. Aeron was currently drowning in wine in his back room hiding from their brother. The seventeen year old had slunk off to find Euron a few weeks ago and came crawling back with his metaphorical tail between his legs stinking of a three day’s binge of black tar rum. Victarion hadn’t asked what happened and didn’t intend to. Whatever went down between his brothers was hardly his business.
Especially when Euron gave him a thorough look over. The knowing glint in blue and black eyes made his hair stand on end but Victarion stood his ground. “You’ve got grays, little brother,” Euron said while turning away, “careful, stress’ll kill ya.”
Victarion chose to hold his tongue. He knew he had grays, he’d had them since he turned five and ten. They never bothered him. What did get under his skin was how Euron liked to comment on his looks at every meeting. He’d done it for nearly seven years now and it still ticked him off. At twenty-seven, he would have expected his second eldest brother to move on from the strange obsession he had with all of them.
Aeron had it the worst. Had since they were young. It was easier to turn a blind eye to his brothers and so Victarion mostly ignored the drunken ramblings of Aeron. If Euron wanted to torture their baby brother then that wasn’t his business. And if Aeron chose to hide in his home to get away from their elder brother then that’s simply what he’d do.
Theon was left with Marylin, Aeron, and the midwife when Victarion went to war a few months later as commander of the Iron Fleet for his father. He had taken over the position from his uncle two years prior when the Drowned God had taken him. They came up on the Shields to engage the Reach against the Tyrells and their bannermen marching with the Targaryens. Where they held the coast against any returning fleet from those laying siege to Storm’s End and blocking any ship from leaving their harbors. Euron had disappeared to bother the coasts of Dorne during their hold out but that was expected of his brother.
It took close to five months before the war was over. Father had fallen to leave Balon as Lord of Pyke and Euron returned from his own venture to join them on the return home. Free men from the reign of the Targaryens but Victarion knew it would only put them under the heel of Robert Baratheon. Greyjoys knew no peace and this coming stretch was to be a wait until Balon made his own move as the new lord.
The return home was expected to be a welcome one. What Victarion found was Aeron alone with Theon and a dead wife to a late term miscarriage. It was probably bad luck but he took the Lysene midwife out to the shore and drowned her. He knew it wouldn’t bring his wife back but perhaps it would make the Drowned God look kinder upon him in the coming years. Truly it left him to care for his nephew alone as Aeron disappeared to drink and hide from Euron.
At a little over a year old Theon was a menace. All sharp teeth and food aggressive like the worst hound in the kennel. Some of his scales had started to disappear and his ears were closer to normal with only small pointed tips. His tail remained and the shaggy mane of black curls. Even that strip of fur down his spine was still black and fuzzy under his shirts. But he was moving on his own across the floors of his home and Victarion had to keep a closer eye on him when he was home instead of when Aeron was watching him.
It wasn’t until the boy started babbling with proper words that Victarion brought him back to Pyke. To present him to Balon and Alannys. Theon was almost two and toddling at his side with more balance that his siblings had been at his age given his tail. A little hand held one of his fingers on the walk through the courtyard while Theon had his thumb stuck in his mouth, wide eyes staring at everything.
Balon was glaring him down the moment he entered the Great Hall but in that same instant Alannys was crying out for her baby and running. Victarion didn’t try to stop her from scooping up Theon into her arms but nor would his nephew release his hand. His sister by marriage was crying and sobbing gratitudes as she yanked him into a hug. It left her son pressed between them but little Theon didn’t seem to mind. It felt strange but he returned the embrace with his free arm. The other was still held out awkwardly where Theon held tight onto his finger.
“Thank you,” Alannys mumbled into his shoulder again with a tight grip on the back of his cloak. Her frazzled brown and gray curls were scratching under his chin but he tried to ignore it the best he could. “I thought he was…Balon said-thank you!”
“It was no trouble,” Victarion replied despite how much trouble it actually was.
She parted from him a moment later but couldn’t go far with Theon’s tight grip on his finger. The baby was staring at his mother with wide black eyes and his thumb still in his mouth, showing no fear of being dropped. He had never feared that. Not even Euron held him with a single arm around his little waist or picked him up by the backs of his shirts. As if a drop wouldn’t harm him.
“Let go of your uncle, sweet one,” Alannys said, “it’s time you met your siblings.”
There was a squashed word said around his thumb as Theon looked up at him. Victarion only extracted his finger from his nephew’s hold and stepped back to let Alannys walk away. The well of tears in black eyes tried to wound his heart but he turned away from them. Theon was back with his mother where he belonged.