Chapter One: Introductions, Transitions, and Ambitions

Petyr Baelish was a genius.

When he'd been words on a page, it was easy to forget what that meant. Yes, he made everyone's favorite characters miserable. He fucked up an entire continent, simply to feed his ambition. He was also unhealthily obsessed with a woman who'd forgotten about him—and when he'd failed to secure her love, he transferred his unwanted affections to her daughter.

But as a seven year old, Petyr had done nothing yet. He hardly resembled the creepy megalomaniac he'd become in a few decades. Besides the genius part, that was.

In fact, he was actually an adorable child. Being his sister and all, I would know.

"Alys?" Petyr asked in his squeaky, solemn voice. "Have I done this correctly?"

I leaned over, scanning the parchment covered in numbers. As I predicted, the work was flawless.

"Yes. Well done, Petyr." I smiled at him. Despite being older by a year, Petyr deferred to me. Since my new family didn't have a Maester to teach him, I took care of his schooling. This being my second life, I knew more than he did, though Petyr was gifted with far more natural intelligence. Seven year old boys should not be able to solve complicated math problems or memorize family trees after reading them once.

"At it again?" Grisel, our former nursemaid and current caretaker, bustled in. She was a kind woman, even if she had no idea how to handle abnormally smart children. "You'll lose your eyes, reading such small letters. And the candle's wearing down, too,"

Petyr looked at her with wide, apologetic eyes, and Grisel immediately relented.

"Alright, alright. Just a little longer, and off to bed."

His cheeks dimpled as he smiled at the plump woman. Petyr's ability to manipulate others was almost scary. Even now, I could see where his political acumen had come from. He was a friendly kid. Which was part of why he was still alive.

I had considered killing him before. If Petyr was dead, then Westeros would be relatively intact. So many people would find their life expectancy to have increased. But there were a few flaws to that.

First, Petyr's death meant that my future knowledge would be rendered completely useless. He was a catalyst for so many different events that removing him from the game would change everything. Knowledge was power, and in this craptastic world, I needed all the power I could get.

Also, Petyr hadn't done any stupid shit yet. He was innocent. Now that I existed in this universe, perhaps I could keep him from doing the really stupid shit. Well, if I survived past my tenth birthday.

Finally, Petyr was genuinely likeable, eager to please and clever to a fault. I'd started to think of him as my little brother, not just a character in a book. Maybe I was stupid for getting attached. But I didn't have much to lose.

I had died once before. I didn't worry about dying again.

My new father wasn't impressive. Jonos Baelish had no outstanding qualities, being neither smart, charming, nor handsome. Add to that his fading martial prowess, and he was basically worthless in Westeros. Jonos might have been a lord, but he wasn't a good one. That wasn't entirely his fault, though. House Baelish's holdings consisted of one feeble tower, a few acres of rocks, and a swamp "village." It was the work of a miracle that Petyr had risen as far as he had.

Or the work of a bored, vaguely guilty lord. In other words, Hoster Tully—who still wrote to his old, wartime friend. The monthly letters consisted of perfunctory greetings and platitudes, but they always caused Jonos to puff up with pride. This month's correspondence, however, was special. This time, the letter contained an offer to foster Jonos' children at Riverrun.

Children. Plural.

Well. I certainly welcomed a change of pace. The dreary tower offered little entertainment. Of course, Petyr was excited beyond measure. He'd only heard stories about the outside, and a mind like his was always craving for something new.

Thus, with no ceremony, Petyr and I were sent off to Riverrun.

In the light of the sunrise, the three-sided castle looked pink. Also, it was in the middle of a fucking river, which I did not appreciate after days of rough travel. Petyr, on the other hand, looked about ready to fall to his knees and start worshiping the place.

I nudged him with his elbow, startling him out of his awe.

"It's just a castle," I huffed. "Stop acting like a fool."

Petyr turned away from Riverrun, incredulous and annoyed. "Just a castle? This is the seat of a Lord Paramount! We're at the greatest keep in the Riverlands!"

In my humble opinion, skyscrapers were much better than castles. While Riverrun was the nicest thing I'd seen in Westeros, it was also… alright, the travel had made me cranky. Riverrun was actually gorgeous. But I was in no position to appreciate the architecture. My opinion would improve once I'd had a long, hot bath.

"Maybe you're right." I clasped Petyr on the shoulder. There was no need to rain on his parade… yet. "It's good enough. And it's our new home, too."

"Yes," he breathed."Our new home."

Hoster Tully had a kick-ass beard. Long, red, and luxurious, it put all the other facial hair in Riverrun to shame. His brother Brynden had a less impressive beard, but he made up for it with his eyebrows. They both (the brothers, not the eyebrows) welcomed us kindly. Thankfully, their welcome didn't last long. We were soon sent to our new quarters, and as I suspected, my opinion of Riverrun did improve after a bath.

Then we met the Tully children.

Catelyn was pretty and poised for a preteen. She did everything properly, and the way she tried to play hostess was rather cute. Lysa was a slender and starry-eyed girl who clearly idolized her sister. Edmure, well, was kind of a brat. A good-hearted brat, but a brat nonetheless. To my surprise, Petyr seemed excited to meet the other children, but he payed no particular attention to Catelyn. Since he'd grown up with another girl, maybe he wouldn't become infatuated with the first attractive woman who smiled at him. Hey, I could dream.

Which reminded me of my number one goal: prevent that fucked-up love triangle from happening. And if that failed, I had to prevent Petyr from doing fucked-up shit because of that love triangle. He'd be far more effective if he didn't pine over a woman who had no romantic feelings for him. My secondary goals included ingratiating myself into the Tully family. Petyr and I had no power at the moment. We were entirely dependent on Hoster Tully's whims. So I had to make his kids like me, and preferrably find some other source of security.

That way, if I failed miserably and Petyr ended up challenging Brandon to a duel, at least we wouldn't be kicked out of Riverrun. Or if we were kicked out, we wouldn't be completely helpless.

Petyr was off with Edmure, learning useful stuff, while I was stuck doing embroidery with the girls. Now, my embroidery skills weren't Picasso-level, but I was pretty good for a kid.

"Excellent work, Catelyn!" praised Septa Celia. Of course, the septa blatantly favored the Tully sisters—more specifically, the older one. Which was to be expected. I was barely nobility, and my father wasn't the one who employed her.

Catelyn blushed with pride. "Thank you, Septa."

"Did I do well, Septa Celia?" asked Lysa, holding her cloth up. The handkerchief she worked on had the same pattern as Catelyn's: a delicate silver trout with a red river as the border. Unfortunately, Lysa's trout wasn't delicate, and the rivers looked more like roads.

"Your stitches are far too uneven." The septa sniffed, making her upturned nose flare. "You may want to attempt a simpler pattern."

Lysa visibly deflated, shoulders drooping as she stared at her work. Catelyn frowned and turned to me.

"What are you making, Alys?"

I showed her my half-finished design.

"A mockingbird. It's for Petyr."

"A mockingbird?" piped up Lysa, sufficiently distracted. "I thought your sigil was the Titan of Braavos."

I shrugged. "It is, but I thought he'd like this better." If I remembered correctly, Petyr had changed his sigil to a mockingbird. I didn't blame him. The Titan head was damn ugly.

"Mockingbirds are pretty," Lysa agreed.

I smiled. "Good singers, too. Even if they do copy others' songs." And lay eggs in other birds' nests. Really, it was a fitting symbol for both of us.

After a moment of contemplation, I started embroidering a second bird next to the first.

Our roles had switched somewhat. While I still taught Petyr the knowledge from my old world, it was his turn to teach me. After his lessons with the Maester, he would join me in the library and tell me what he'd learned. Petyr really was a good brother. He'd just finished telling me about Daeron I Targaryen's rule and the conquest of Dorne. Now, we were sitting in comfortable silence, reading our respective books. Though I'd been doing my best to brush up on my Westerosi history since coming to Riverrun, there were still plenty of gaps in my knowledge.

"I wonder what the current Targaryens are like."

Startled, I looked up. "What?"

Petyr tapped his finger against the page of his book. "If the Tullys have a home this nice, imagine how the Red Keep must be."

I laughed. "Trust me, Petyr. You don't want to become involved with those dragons."

That inbred, insane, and inept family may not have deserved their especially brutal end, but they sure as hell didn't deserve to be anywhere near the throne. In many ways, the exemplified everything wrong with feudalism. Aerys hadn't yet degenerated into the murderous madman he'd be known as, but the Seven Realms were still rumbling in discontent. It hadn't helped that the relationship between Aerys and Tywin had become strained recently.

"Why not?" He tilted his head. "They're the most powerful."

I lowered my voice, though there was no one in the library besides us two. "Because I have a feeling that they aren't going to last for much longer. Besides, our goal shouldn't be to emulate the nobility, but to destroy them."

"Why is that?" Petyr's voice showed only curiosity. He, of course, didn't know anything about what would happen. Maybe one day I'd tell him what I knew. But for now, I'd stick with vague hints.

"Because they're the problem. Braavos has no kings or queens, and thought they're just a city, they're richer than any one of the Realms." I smiled. "It's a matter of potential. In Braavos, even a former slave can become the head of the Iron Bank. But in Westeros, no one but the nobility has power. And among them, that power is reserved to a certain few nobles."

"Nobles that aren't us," he said slowly.

I nodded, proud that he had picked up my train of thought. "Though that isn't going to stop us, is it?"

"Of course not." Petyr waved his hand, gesturing for me to proceed. I hadn't used my influence to reduce his ambition. Instead, I'd done my best to temper it with knowledge.

"Anyway, we're the exception. We're in a position to change our fortunes, but others are not so lucky. There may be a fisherman who would make a better ruler than any man in line for the throne. Thanks to this corrupt system, he would never get the chance to rule. In the end, everyone suffers." My old world wasn't perfect, but it sure as hell was better than this one.

"Careful, sister." Petyr's eyes widened, though it was more mocking than truly shocked. "Your words are approaching treason. And besides the excuse of altruism and hypothetical benefits, what do we gain from your venture?"

"Is it not humanity's goal, its obligation, to improve society's condition?" I spread my hands apart. "What more reason do we need to make things right?"

He rolled his eyes, a mannerism he'd picked up from me. "As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist," he quoted at me. "For isn't morality the herd-instinct of the individual?"

I sighed. "I should have never told you about Nietzsche."

Petyr smiled. "But you did."

"I also told you about Adam Smith, didn't I?" I retorted. "No society can flourish when the greater part of it is poor and miserable. And don't tell me that you overlooked the power vacuum."

It was his turn to laugh. "Yes, yes, I remember, and I do understand the implications of your goals. We'd be positioned well, I assume. But what are your plans to get there?"

"There are two ways to bring down the nobility. It could happen gradually, through economic prosperity and careful reform. Or it could happen all at once, though war."

"Or both," added Petyr. "But I have a feeling that more of the second would be better for us."

"And I have a feeling that war is in the air."

He made a sound of understanding. "The same one that will lead to the dragons' downfall?"

"Perhaps. If we play our cards right…" I trailed off.

"Then we might end up closer to the top," he finished, satisfied.

I was being facetious about my motivations, of course. Societal change that happened through sudden and violent war was almost never permanent. Take the French revolution, for example. Sure, a large contingent of nobles died, but Napoleon and his lackeys filled the power vacuum that resulted. And it was basically impossible to transition from a feudalistic society to an egalitarian one. It would be nice, yes, but it was a pipe dream.

However, I could change it a little bit. More importantly, I could change it so that Petyr and I would be near the top. The Realms would be thrown into chaos, with or without us. Taking advantage of it was the best option. The ladder couldn't climb itself, after all.

Hopefully, we wouldn't end up ruling ashes. But if we were... well, we could always change our sigil to that of a phoenix.

AN: This is a self-indulgent, hesitant foray into one of my favorite fandoms. The chapter is a bit short for me; I prefer my chapters to be closer to five-thousand words. I'm mostly testing the waters here. But that's besides the point. The next chapter will contain the duo's interactions with the Tully family, among other things.I appreciate all feedback. Thanks for reading.