It was all a mess. Cat would have never thought that Lysa would do something so stupid. Fear and helplessness gripped her heart. She held her sobbing sister close. A bastard!

"He wants to kill my child. He wanted to make me drink moon tea! I hate him! What can we do?" Her little sister pleaded desperately. They sat in the attic of one of the storehouses. A place they had always hid at, since they were little and wanted to share girl stories.

Her sister, the young girl, whose hand she had held since they had been little. Who had mimicked everything she had done and had ran to her with every little thing, so much that she had complained to their mother about it. But their mother had only laughed and pulled her on her lap. "She loves you so much, that she wants to be like you."

She had been seven back then and hadn't understood her. "She can't be me! I'm me, she has to be Lysa!"

She could remember her mother's smile as she combed her red hair. "And she will be. But for now you are her hero. A bigger and better hero than all those knights in the stories and she will always come to you for help. Don't turn her away when she does. Heroes don't do that."

Her sister had come to her again, asking for her help. She hadn't done this in years, but now she was here, begging her big sister for help. And Cat didn't know what to do. A Bastard! Her little sister was pregnant with a bastard. What a shame! But even a bastard would still be Lysa's baby and her nephew or niece, right? It was still family. Family, Duty, Honor. Family came before Honor.

"Don't worry. We will find a way." She kissed Lysa's red hair. "I promise."

Cat held Lysa until she fell asleep in her arms. She promised to protect Lysa's child, but she didn't know how. Lysa was so sure that their father would kill it. She can't belief it. He was their father and this was his grandchild. But maybe he thought that he would protect Lysa with it. Finally she laid her sister down on her bed and left her room to search for her father. She found him in his study. He was lost in thoughts. His hair was messy and his eyes sunken in. When she stepped in he looked up with a start only for his eyes to dull and his shoulder to sack when he recognized her. This had never happened before. Her father was always happy to see her.

"Cat my dear. What is it? I don't have much time, right now." He looked older and more worn than usual.

She straightened her back. "It is about Lysa. She-" But she couldn't finish her next sentence, because her father interrupted her. He stood up so fast that his chair fell over with a loud clatter.

"Have you found her? Where is she?" He grabbed her shoulders and pleaded fanatically. He loved Lysa and worried about her. He couldn't possible hurt her like this, could he? For a moment Cat wanted to tell him where she was, but she promised and kept quit.

"She is safe, don't worry." At least that she had to tell him. Some of the tension left his body and she could see relief on his face. "She said you want to kill her baby." The words blustered out of her, before she could stop them. She hoped he would deny it and all this was just a misunderstanding, but the way her father looked away and his jaw line tensed told her otherwise. "How could you?"

"Cat my dear. You have to understand."

"No, I don't! It is her child, your grandchild you want to kill!"

"It's a bastard!" She had never seen her father so angry.

"It's a baby. A Tully baby! Family, Duty, Honor! It's family. Lysa is family!" Tears stung in her eyes, but she stood her ground against her father, he looked taller and more threatening than ever before in her life. For Lysa. For her nephew or niece. For her family. For being a greater hero than the knights in all those stories for them.

Her father recoiled from her as if he was burned. He was starring at her with wide eyes, before stumbling back into an armchair. His head hung low and his shoulder started to shack. "I just want to protect her." He whispered. "She can't marry the father. She would only be unhappy with him. Even if she doesn't see it now. He will never love her for her. I want her to marry to a good man, who will honor her like she deserves."

Catelyn hadn't seen her father cry since her mother died. But now she saw tears leaking out of his eyes. He looked broken. Her father, the great Lord Hoster Tully of Riverrun, looked broken and forlorn. She stepped next to him and petted his shoulder.

"We can find a way, father."

"How? They will shame her for the rest of her life. I want her to be happy and she will have babies. Beautiful trueborn babies."

Catelyn wasn't sure what to do. She didn't want Lysa to be unhappy, because she couldn't marry, but she would sure be unhappy if her baby dies. "And if we don't tell anyone?" She knew those were the desperate words of a child, who thinks that it doesn't count if nobody knows.

"How could they not know?"

"We… we…" She bit her lower lip trying to find an answer. "Lysa and I are going to visit some relative and we will hide away until the child is born. We not tell anyone that it's Lysa's."

"And then? So you want to give the child away after it is born?" Her father looked up. Doubt was still written all over his face.

" No. We will say that it is a bastard. A Tully bastard, from Uncle Brynden or something." Her eyes shone with hope. "Please father. Uncle Brynden wouldn't say no and he has no wife he could shame. We will say it is his bastard and no one will be wiser." She begged her father and finally he nodded.

"So be it. Go tell your sister and bring her back here. I will see where you can go." He waved her away with tied eyes. She stepped towards the door, when she heard her father talk again. "It will be a shame on the honor of our house."

"But nobody will know."

"Nobody, but us."

"But we are family and Family comes before Honor." She looked straight at her father, with all the confidence and regal aura she normally reserve for being the acting Lady of Riverrun and stepped out of his study.

X

Catelyn felt sick, but she gave the maester the hot cloths. There was so much blood and Lysa was screaming so loud. She hurried back to her side. As few people as possible should know about this and because of that Catelyn had to help the maester as a midwife.

"I'm here Lysa. Everything is fine." She held her sisters and kissed it softly. Sweat was running over Lysa's face and bucked up as another contraction shook to her small body.

"Cat, it hurts so much. Make it stop. Please make it stop." She cried and begged her. Her eyes were glassy and unfocused.

"Don't worry Lysa. You are doing great." She assured her. But fearful looked towards the maester. The birth was nearly three weeks to early of that Lysa had been sure. Would all their hiding and secret forging for nothing? 'Oh please dear mother, don't steal my sister away from me. Let her live and the baby as well. Even if she give the world another bastard it is not the child's fault. Protect them from the stranger.' She prayed in her thoughts.

Finally after what nearly a day the maester pulled the slippery and blood bundle from between her sister's legs. But it stayed quiet. Shouldn't a child come screaming into the world? Lysa didn't seem to noticed. She laid back and breathed heavily.

"Maester?" Cat's voice was quiet. She didn't want to alert Lysa if it wasn't necessary.

"Not stand there and look like a cow!" The maester barked at her. She stumbled a step back. "Fetch me some water and more cloths!"

She let go if Lysa's hand and hurried to get him what he wanted. When she turned around again he held the babe at the feet and slapped its butt hard, but it only whimpered pitifully. When she stood next to the maester he snatched the cloths from her hands and rubbed the baby. It wasn't a gentle touch. Meanwhile Lysa noticed that something was amiss.

"Cat! What is going on? What is with my baby? Cat!" Her voice was shrill and panic filled. Catelyn couldn't breathe.

"Please no please." She whispered quietly. Tears welled in her eyes, but just as she wanted to give up a scream filled the room. It wasn't a very strong scream, but a scream. Cat laughed in relief. It lived. She took a look at the little screaming child. It wasn't beautiful or sweet or cute. It actual looked quite ugly. The head didn't look right and the skin had a violet tone. At some places she could see some kind of green slim sticking to its head. It was the smallest babe she ever saw.

"It's a girl." The maester grumbled to her as he trusted the bundle into her arms, before turning around to wash his hands.

"Cat?" Lysa's voice was still fearful.

"It's a girl, Lysa. It's little girl." She stepped next to her sister and showed her, her daughter.

"She is beautiful." Lysa said in a dreamy voice as she watched her daughter, ugly as she was.

"Of course…" No good could come from being honest know.

Lysa placed the tiny babe at her breast where it started to suckle greedy. "What do we call her?"

"I don't know." Cats was surprised, but deeply touched, by this question.

"We could name her after mother. Minisa." Lysa whispered affectionately.

"You can't. It has to be a name that Uncle Brynden would choose and he wouldn't name his daughter after our mother."

Lysa avoided her eyes and looked sad. "Yes, of course. Uncle Brynden…" It hurt Catelyn to see her sister so beaten.

"But we could name her after Grandmother Merianne. What do you say?"

"That's a beautiful name. Merianne. My little Merianne." Lysa kissed her daughter's head lovingly. Right now they were happy. All three of them Lysa, Merianne and Catelyn. It didn't matter, that Barndon Stark, her fiancé, was held prisoner in King's Landing or then Lyanna Stark was stolen by the throne prince or than Richard Stark, Lord of Winterfell and her soon to be Goodfather was riding to the King to free his children. It didn't matter that all seven kingdoms were holding their breaths, because right here right now they were happy, for just this small moment.

X

She had married Eddard Stark, Lord of Winterfell, for her father's swords and she had bore him a son. A perfect little Robb Stark. With red hair and blue eyes was he smiling for the whole world to see. He was playing with Merianne. She could already take her first steps and even said her first words. Five month after Merianne's birth did she and Lysa marry their husbands. After only one night she had fallen pregnant with Robb.

And then she had stood in front of her husband, who told her that he would bring his bastard son with him to the North. Not only the North but Winterfell. Into her new home. Where her trueborn children would live. Catelyn wasn't thinking clear. Red Rage had fogged her mind. She had wanted to hurt him, how he hurt her. She had stood in front of him and claimed Merianne as hers. Just do hurt him. To let him fell the shame she felt, but he had just starred at her in confusion and shock.

That had been this afternoon and now a few hours later she cried into her pillows. Had she really damned her only chance at a happy life for her pride and to deal a petty insult at her husband? An insult that hurt her so much more than him. She would be the whore who had a child before marriage. Her father came in and sat on the bed next to her.

"Oh my dear Cat." He gently rubbed her back. "My dear stupid child. What have you done?"

"I'm sorry father. But I was so angry and hurt and didn't think what I was doing." She threw her arms around his neck and cried into his shoulder. "I want to undo it."

"If only we could." Hoster rocked her back and forth and smoothed her hair. "If only we could."

She couldn't say how long her held on to her father like a little, scared child. But for once she wasn't the responsible one, the proper one, but the naughty one of his children. The one in trouble, but he didn't shout at her, but held her close. She knew that he was as angry about Stark's bastard as she was.

It was then that they heard shouting from the nursery. The wetnurse was screaming and running to her room. She can in without knocking and breathless stuttered. "The babes. They are gone!"

"Robb?" Cat whispered fearful.

"What? Gone? What do you mean gone?" her father thundered.

"They're not in their beds, m'lord."

Both forgot their sorrow and hurried out to search for them until some guards came up to tell them that Lord Stark had taken them with him. He had left the castle with Robb and Merianne on his arm and with a wetnurse with his own bastard. They had went to the Godwood. Her father and Uncle Brynden cursed and hurried out. She after them. The old stories of her childhood septon came back to her, about the barbaric practice of the old religion, about blood sacrifices to their tree gods. Was that was her husband was doing? Killing Merianne at the trunk of a tree to wash the shame she pushed on him away. As they ran through the forest she prayed to the gods. 'Good Mother, please protect this child. Father be just, she never did anything wrong. Wise Crone I'm begging you. Punish me for my foolishness, not Merianne. Please, by the seven be alright.'

They found them in front of the weirwood tree, with its ugly face and blood red eyes. The wetnurse stood a bit away and looked shocked when they came. Lord Stark kneed down, his giant sword next to him, with the three babes in front of him. He looked up when he heard them come.

"What do you think you are doing?" Her uncle growled at him. He grabbed her husband by the shoulder and his other hand balled to a fist. It was Merianne's happy cry at seeing everyone and her failed attempt to stand up that saved Ned from a punch in the face that evening.

Out of instinct did he reach forward to save her from falling over. "Carefully there little one." He smiled tenderly at Merianne and offered her his second hand to hold on to.

No, nobody who was so careful with a child could ever harm one. Of course she had heard how he had protested even against the death of the Targaryen children, but for a moment she had feared. But here he sat playing and pulling faces at the shame she as his wife threw at him. Then she saw something red at her forehead. Blood. But where did it come from. She hurried to his side and looked at all the children. All three had a red strip of blood on their head. Carefully she lifted Robb into her arms and touched his head and smeared it around a bit more.

"I presented him to the gods as my son and heir." Ned explained to her. She saw that Robb had a second line across his nose that the other two didn't have.

"What?" she whispered in disbelief. "Where does the blood come from?" She checked her son for any wound he could suffer, but her husband freed one of his hands from Merianne and showed it to her. It had a small wound that had stopped bleeding by now.

"It's a ritual to show once children to the gods and to claim them as kin before the gods." With those words he caressed Robb's cheek and smiled at him. A gesture that Robb returned happily with a toothless grin of his own. Her eyes fell on Merianne, who still held on to one of Ned's fingers to steady herself. She too had a red line of blood on her head.

"But why Merianne? She is not your daughter."

"No, but yours. And she is my son's sister. That makes her kin of my kin and blood of my blood." He playfully trapped her little fingers with his thumb. "It would be cruel to force her away from her mother and brothers. It is only right for you to take her with you and that makes her part of my household and my responsibility." He said it as if it was the most natural thing in the world that his wife could bring a bastard to his halls, because no shame could outweigh the cruelty to force a child from her mother. Never knowing that she would still grow up without her real mother. But for that moment she knew she could love him. Could love this gentle, sweet man, who couldn't blame a child for its parent's sins. Yes she could even forgive him his bastard and that he stood to it, when he stood as tall for Merianne.

A.N.

I got this idea from a story of my mother. How back in her days the parents took a child of a too young daughter under their name and bring it up as a sibling. I thought about what if Hoster Tully had done something similar inset of giving Lysa moon tea. And it gives me an interesting character to place into the Stark family. The bastard daughter of Petyr brought up by Ned. Tell me what you think about this idea.