Disclaimer: I own nothing. All things recognizable are property of G.R.R. Martin, David Benioff, D.B. Weiss, & company, & the asoiaf wiki.

A/N: This is a complete AU where the Sack of King's Landing does not happen.

A/N 2: I do not quite know how this fic came about, but, this idea behind it has been swirling around the mind for some time. Hope readers enjoy this.

Chapter 1: Jaime, 283 AL

Jaime Lannister does not look up from the child in his arms and tries his hardest not to even let a stray snicker escape from his lips. If he started laughing now he might not stop. His father certainly would disapprove or think he went mad. Ser Barristan Selmy, who Jaime thinks may well become the new Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, even when or if Ser Gerold can be found, would also.

No, it was best for him to wait and watch. That is what the rest of them: his father; Ned Stark; and, Pycelle, were doing with grim confusion and no slight amount of alarm. He'd rather not become the center of attention. This night proved to be far too strange to welcome such scrutiny.

That he was standing in the corridor in Maegor's Holdfast where the royal apartments are was not so strange. The strange part was seeing Jon Arryn, Robert Baratheon, and Elia Martell in a shadowed corner of this corridor having a discussion.

He'd been alarmed when the righteously furious Robert Baratheon slammed into this most private part of the Red Keep. In the next moment, seeing Rhaegar Targaryen's widow standing next to him with her babe at her breast and her daughter pressed to her side, Baratheon deflated into frustrated bewilderment. The others who flooded in afterward were no different. Judging by the look on his father's face then and Jaime, even now trying to avoid looking too much in his direction, knew the rebel lords failed to encounter a living Aerys in the Throne Room.

If they were surprised with Princess Elia's lack of mourning at King Aerys' death, or his, for that matter, Jaime had been only too happy to offer up how the King had the intention of burning the city down with all of them in it. Baratheon, who'd been eyeing them with suspicion and anger winced. He, however, did not elaborate on how he shoved a cup of wildfire down the Mad King's gullet or had killed the King's favorite pyromancer before returning here.

At that, Baratheon laughed so loudly and for so long that Jaime thought the man went mad. The others believed it was a fitting end to the Mad King, yet, their reactions were far more suitably subdued; Ned Stark and Jon Arryn looked relieved while Ser Barristan looked pitying and oddly disappointed. His father, however, started to look speculative.

Speculation turned to annoyance when Arryn, Baratheon, Stark separated themselves to converse in low tones. Worryingly, more than once the trio of men glanced back at the widow and young children. He doubted he would be able to do anything to save any of them, if it came to that. Then again, he reasoned if any of these men were going to harm them they would have done so already. He had heard nothing which indicated their even being put under arrest. He takes no comfort in that. He knows what it is to be a hostage without chains about your wrists and to reside in a gilded cage. He knows worse.

Still, soon after, Jaime found himself with a babe in his arms while Ser Barristan scooped up Princess Rhaenys because Ned Stark came to escort Princess Elia to where Baratheon and Arryn stood, waiting. The look on Arryn's face had been encouraging; the smile on Baratheon's face looked hungry. Hungry for what, Jaime did not know. Her reluctance to be separated from her children to be anywhere near those men was obvious, but, she walked towards the waiting stag in measured steps. He stood there, child in his arms, watching as they spoke.

Though Jon Arryn level at least one admonition after Baratheon had gotten too brash, to Jaime it seemed a wasted effort when a few sharp words coming from Robert Baratheon were nothing when one lived with Aerys Targaryen. Though he'd rather not ruminate on what that meant for him to think that way, he could almost consider it an improvement on what he had known while living here. He would never voice that observation; he could do without looks of shock and disgust which would come his way. He kept his mouth shut and watched in the chance anyone did more than speak loudly. He came close to it when Baratheon let out howls of rage here and there, but, he did not move from his spot.

More than once Baratheon turned towards him and Ser Barristan with narrowed eyes which softened each time. Jaime tasted fear every instance, stiffening when he realized Baratheon had been looking at the children, not at the knights holding them. Briefly Jaime wondered if he could still call the boy a 'prince' and the girl 'a princess', but, there was more important things to think about; among them the way their mother was not exempt from Baratheon's gaze. It was unsettling, but, the man was doing nothing untoward.

Shortly after, Jaime unconsciously straightened as she made her way back to them, seemingly not caring that the rebel lords were still whispering between themselves. By the time the woman plucked the child out of his arms and the daughter returned to her mother's side, those men also made the short trek back and she remained mute.

His father looked even more annoyed when Arryn finally spoke, because he spoke only to her. "It is quite late, Princess, if it is no trouble, would you mind seeing to some rooms for us?"

Pycelle, looking as disturbed as Jaime felt, twitched while his father frowned more deeply. As if that was not perplexing enough her reply nearly shook him. "No, not at all, Lord Arryn. Is there anything else? Perhaps, my lords are famished?"

His eyes go wide. Surely, it was not the right time for her particular wit? Aerys would not have been appreciative of it, which is why he is shocked when Baratheon laughs. "Just to the rooms for now, my Princess."

He and Lord Arryn share an indecipherable look. "Well, there is one more thing, if you would…"

"Yes, my lord?" Jaime was certain he did not imagine the stress on the word, "Lord" though he clearly sees the way she stiffens.

If the man heard it he gave no indication, saying, "It is late tonight, however, is there anywhere a person might speak to another tomorrow?"

After a moment, she hesitatingly replies, "I suppose, now, the King's Solar…is available. Ser Barristan can show you, unless you would prefer elsewhere?"

This time it was Ser Barristan who nearly stumbled while standing still. The others, aside from Baratheon, did not fare much better. Baratheon simply smirks. "More than suitable."

Jaime almost jerks forward when the man steps closer to her and goes to pat Princess Rhaenys on her tiny shoulder and runs a finger down the cheek of the sleeping infant. Gentle as the actions turned out to be Jaime feels a chill go up his spine watching Princess Elia's lips tighten and her shoulders square. "When you've seen about the rooms for us, get those children to bed and yourself to yours. It is quite late."

What was this macabre game of civility? Was this overture supposed to be kindness?

"I would like to keep my children with me." He blinked at that. It's quite brave, he supposes, given the circumstances, and the way Baratheon was acting, it was not so surprising of a request, if one was in any position to make any.

Barristan looks towards him, "Jaime, you would accompany them."

Arryn cuts in, "I would have some of mine escort you both." Arryn gestures to two seasoned warriors who nod. Jaime does not understand how Barristan can stand there and give encouraging looks, but, he does not want to question too much tonight.

She looks equally nonplussed, but, does not argue and Jaime understands the impulse all too well; this was just a different jailer.

"We will speak in the morning, Princess."

Not knowing what to say or do Jaime remains mute in the face Baratheon's gruff yet oddly conciliatory words. Bile rises in his throat as she whispers her thanks and turns to leave. One glance at his father's face ensures he'd rather follow her than stay behind to "talk".

He continues to say nothing while he watches her do as "requested" and instructs some of the ladies she finds to see to rooms for those men who have taken over her home. Jaime can still find no appropriate response to any of this when she also ensures the ladies know to guide the newly arrived lords to those rooms she instructed them to see to.

When they are alone, save for the sleeping children he finally asks, "You are not worried?"

She frowns. "I am. Very much." He bites back a response about how with the way she ignored the Arryn guards following her and went about her business she certainly did not seem to be.

When she offers nothing more he asks, "What did you and they speak about?"

He refrains from commenting on the few aborted attempts when she tried to speak. When she does finally have the words she speaks with a frown on her face and a sigh in her voice. "The King's death shook them. They were not expecting that, but, they seemed relieved." He was quite sure.

She laughs. The sound has a hysterical edge to it. "I cannot blame them."

He lets that go unremarked upon, as well. "What is to happen now? They must have said something."

Her expression cracks as she looks down at her sleeping children. "I suppose Lord Baratheon, Lord Arryn, and Lord Stark have their plans for what happens next. I doubt they would trust me even when they seem to want to reassure that my children and I would be safe." Despite the scene earlier she does not trust them.

He wants to ask more, but, thinking better of it, he leaves the room, not bothering with some platitude about trying to get some rest. He doubts she will get any. Wondering how and why his father and a Kingsguard like Barristan the Bold came to have joined the rebels, he knows he will not get any either. Besides, it is not as though he trusts the Arryn men standing at attention a few feet across from him.

When nothing untoward occurs between them, figuring he'd know something one of them even asks, "What happens next?"

He was the one frowning now. "I do not know."

He still did not know the next morning when Ned Stark set out for somewhere no one would tell him about while Baratheon makes himself at home in King's Landing.

It had been a long while before Ned Stark returned; from Dorne of all places. With him, he brought news of a dead sister and his newly born bastard, and, more importantly, three living, formerly missing, Kingsguard. Soon after Ned Stark, along with those of his men who accompanied him in trying to find his sister, went to break the Siege of Storm's and to treat with Baratheon's former enemies.

Despite the hasty exodus of stone-faced Northmen from King's Landing, he was more disturbed by 'his brothers' unwillingness to say more than they had been doing their duty. And yet, even when Ser Barristan had been named Lord Commander, they said they would serve. Strongly suspecting Prince Rhaegar's wife and children still living in King's Landing on Baratheon's and Arryn's sufferance had much to do with it, he believed them. He still wondered when there was much to be unsure of. Baratheon was bold and brash. Given their role in keeping his betrothed hidden away who knew what Baratheon, as angry as he was after learning of her death, would do to his 'brothers'?

He learned exactly what when he had been summoned to the Throne Room. He had not been the only one. "Princess Elia", Jaime thinks. How funny was it that she was a hostage and the form of address was still the same? Arryn and Baratheon said more than once the Princess Dowager was equally a Princess of Dorne, but, it was odd.

She was allowed, one could say almost expected, to act as mistress of the Keep, despite being guarded at all times by men loyal to the former rebels. It might have shocked his 'brothers' more though he wondered what this particular summons was about.

Whether today was intended as some sort of twisted jape or a matter of having an audience, Jaime did not know, but, he could not believe the gall of Baratheon to ask her what he should do with these returned knights. This was hardly the first time the man asked questions of her, but, Jaime was just as shaken as the three other Kingsguard were. Grimly, he suspects that to be the purpose.

She swallowed. "What help can I be when these decisions are not for me to make?"

Minimize oneself and keep a polite tone to avoid making trouble. Sometimes, it worked for Aerys; here, Baratheon simply smirks. "Oblige me, my Princess. I desire to have your thoughts on the subject. Why should I not kill them or send them to the Wall? What good were they as Kingsguard? They were not anywhere near guarding the last one." He flinches and his throat constricts while he tries not to look his 'brothers' in the eye. He killed the old king and here he was. These were far better men and they looked as though they were preparing to be punished.

"The Kingsguard serve for life and they have broken no vows to warrant either fate."

A mocking smile, "Is that all?"

"They offered fealty. It would be the height of wastefulness to disregard it when Ser Barristan was given the same choice." The new Lord Commander flinched though neither Baratheon nor Princess Elia was looking at anyone else but each other.

Baratheon walks towards her, looking almost amused. Jaime thinks it is good she does not take a step back though she clasps her hands together in front of her, weak barrier as it was. His voice, holding no shortage of dismissiveness, grows unnecessarily loud in the silent hall. "You know there is a difference. Ser Barristan nearly gave his life after fighting valiantly. You would trust these men who are only here now. Do you not wish to know why they remained gone or why they were hiding in your homeland while others, such as your uncle, were fighting and dying?" Jaime winced. He also saw the three men bristle. Baratheon, though, took no small amount of glee in that and in seeing her flash of anger before she smoothened it out.

Seconds ticked away before she gave her soft-voiced reply. "Kingsguard are warriors, true, yet, that is not their chief purpose. Where they were there was no king. In the absence of the king, if their prince ordered them any act, for good or ill, they would obey as is their duty. A man would be fortunate to be shown half of that loyalty. There is a king here in need of Kingsguard. That is all I need to know."

Baratheon jauntily nods and turns to the knights and promptly accepts their service before waving her away. Jaime can see the three newly reinstated Kingsguard wish to look anywhere save at Baratheon, yet, seeing how Princess Elia acknowledges neither them nor the Baratheon guardsmen who move to follow her out of the hall, he knows there can be no succor for them there, either.

It was soon after that when Jaime found himself standing before the Great Sept of Baelor with what seemed to be half the population of King's Landing. None of them know the favor he did them and they would never know.

Even as a king, Aerys proved more trouble than he had been worth. Though Jaime was hardly the first to think that, it was past the time to move on from the dead. That was why they were all here now.

Years ago he would not have imagined the sight before him. He knew his father had not imagined this spectacle either. Though his father accepted the position of Master of Laws, after Robert Baratheon announced to all and sundry of his plans for marriage and those plans had decidedly not involved Cersei, thank the gods, his father did not have much to say.

Instead, Jaime watches as Lord Robert Baratheon of Storm's End, the Regent of the infant King Aegon Targaryen, the Sixth of his Name, placed a black velvet, stag embossed, Baratheon one across the shoulders of Princess Elia Martell of Sunspear.

That Baratheon chose not to take the crown was surprising, but, given the circumstances, understandable. This, however...She had not been present when Baratheon made the announcement to the Small Council, he had been. While his father's face had been impassive, Pycelle's face was anything but when Baratheon replied to the Grand Maester's questions regarding the fitness of the Dornish widow as Baratheon's future wife. "What does it matter if she gives me an heir or not? Lyanna was the one I wanted a life and children with and she would be here with me if that damned Targaryen hadn't stolen her. I need a reason to keep the children and wife close. This is as good a means as any."

The sheer impudence of those words, however, was surpassed by those shared between Baratheon and Arryn later. "Lannister is not the only man we have to please or hold at bay. So his girl is beautiful. What does it matter? She isn't Lyanna! You keep telling me Lannister is a smart man. If he wanted more from us than a seat on the council he should have been smarter and slithered out of under Casterly Rock before I crushed Rhaegar bloody Targaryen's chest in. If Lannister wants a Baratheon husband for his daughter, he can still have one. Pycelle is so damned fond of squawking about the Martell woman's barrenness. He can start squawking to Lannister about Stannis being my heir, then."

Now, during the exchange of vows, as if on cue, some fool behind him whispers, "Was it not kind of Lord Baratheon to do right by Prince Rhaegar's family?"

Jaime almost laughed. Right had nothing with it. One could swallow Arryn's claims of backing Aerys' grandson as king was a matter of reconciliation between warring factions and not holding innocents responsible. Jaime knew better than to think the same of Baratheon. Aerys took far too many liberties and so had his son. King Aegon would be taught by "better" men. It was a matter of care at the beginning and Baratheon seemed only too happy to oblige, even if it meant he took no crown for himself.

During the feast Jaime watched as the groom drank and made jokes while the bride spent much of the speaking to her brothers and the eldest of her newest good-brothers. Lord Stannis, even on the day of his brother's wedding, seemed positively dour. Sourly, he thinks this one isn't worthy of Cersei, but, his father saw the opportunity and took it. The youngest brother, Renly, he thinks, is about Tyrion's age. The boy kept sneaking pudding to Princess Rhaenys intermittently, with Baratheon laughing while Princess Elia looked on indulgently. The bride smiled at the groom as well, but, Jaime knew the smiles she gave Baratheon were very similar to those she used to give Prince Rhaegar when they were in front of witnesses in the days after Harrenhal and when he returned to take command of his father's forces. They were the same ones she gave to King Aerys when he required her presence. If Baratheon knew how little warmth her smiles contained he gave no indication, but, he smiled too.

No one openly questioned the lack of her brothers' displeasure at this wedding, but, then, it was no secret how displeased Dorne had been with her last husband. He supposed they figured the match was well worth making if it meant their Princess' still living son was still a king, even if in name only and the boy had been put to bed before the feast.

If one did not know any better, one could say Baratheon had been courting Princess Elia since the man learned of his betrothed's death. Jaime did know better, not that it mattered when the bride walked into the Great Sept on her own and her voice had held no hesitation when she said the vows making her Lord Baratheon's wife and he put the cloak on her back.

Though there was no bedding ceremony and Lord Commander Selmy would be given the 'honor' of guarding their door that night, Jaime knew the marriage would be consummated.

Still, the next morning he had been rather relieved Barristan had no reports of anything untoward occurring.

The first time after the wedding he goes to the nursery his lips twitch though there was little humor in the circumstance. Princess Elia, now he supposed, also Lady Baratheon, wearing jewelry once belonging to Cassana Estermont, was seated in a chair with her son in her lap while Baratheon, who sat across from her, laughed along with whatever his new 'daughter' was telling him.

Had these two been anyone else, Jaime would have thought the scene in front of him to be rather sweet, but, he knows politics when he sees it and he had seen enough of their 'courtship' to know better.

In the next council meeting Princess Elia was seated next to her new husband. She was there at his invitation and with her hand in his, no less. She did not speak much, but, she spoke at his urging and he seemed perfectly content in leaving much of the actual governing to Arryn. Jaime supposed it was just as well Aegon would grow to be king if the Regent had little interest in ruling.

Not for the first time Jaime thought it could be worse. He lived through worse.

Gerold, Arthur, and Oswell call Baratheon 'thief' and 'usurper' in secret, but, Baratheon took no crown, though he took something just as valuable. Many others compare him to the founder of his house, Orys; only they say he is better. Jaime frequently hears talk of how lovely a family Baratheon, the Princess, and the children make when they are seen together.

For his part, when he sees Baratheon playing at family with the remnants of Prince Rhaegar's he wants to do nothing but laugh. When he is alone he does. Only, he knows if there is anyone else laughing more than him it is Baratheon himself.