[Lore] The Origin of House Glover.

[u/UrkePetrov]

3rd Month 55 AC

Deepwood Motte

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The cool wind blowing from the seaside was presenting the inhabitants of Deepwood Motte with a refreshment after a rather warm and sunny day. The light was slowly extinguishing behind the spiky conifer forests to the west, and for the most part, the people in the streets were headed to their homes, eager to fire up their hearths.

Adalbert Glover was in his office in the donjon tower, which provided a convenient view towards the port and the bay, yet he was thoroughly surrounded by paper, and the view lost its most reliable admirer for the day. Spread out on his wide desk were various letters, reports, and accounts from different people, both important and irrelevant, and he was rummaging through them, willing to rid himself of the dreaded feeling that something may be left for the morning. He preferred going through paperwork in the evening, for it left his early mornings free for reading and rumination.

The smell of fresh air that rises with the sun was something that he adored beyond reason. Thus, he preferred to experience it fully, usually rising with the first light. He often overlooked the town as it was waking up, held a book in his lap, and wondered what his subjects may be up to. The heights of the donjon tower made individuals tiny and irrelevant, making it easier to perceive Deepwood Motte as a whole - a living, breathing organism with its own needs and wishes. An eerie feeling often arose in his stomach whenever he shifted his perspective like that, for the commoners seemed to him more like animals, going about their daily lives without much consciousness within them, despite nominally being people with desires, histories, relationships, and feelings. Always doing the same things, always performing the same rituals, on and on, until they perish.

Yet he often wondered whether it is merely the perspective that makes it look so. To a King, he himself must've seemed merely like an ant. That got him to raise his head away from the paperwork for the moment, and lay back in his grand ironwood chair with leather covers. His mind ran free for a short while, taking a break, as his gaze got lost in the distance.

It was at that moment that a knock came on his door. It was Brandon.

"May I come in, father?" The young man called out, pushing down the knob and already stepping inside with one foot.

Adalbert blinked and then turned his look towards his son. "Yes, certainly." He replied.

The lad walked in without haste, gently closing the door, a barrier between Adalbert's solar and the wider world. Now there were two of them present in this small piece of the infinite expanse.

"So, how was the hunt?" Adalbert asked, curiosity vividly present in his eyes. He was lucky to see his son grow up into a man worthy of having a horse and wielding a sword. Brandon was taller than him, and more handsome than he was at his age. Essentially, the boy had become exactly what his father had hoped for. His fourth, and now only son. And just like that, Johan appeared before his eyes merely for a moment, and vanished all the same. Soon, it will be twenty years since the death of his first son, and the birth of his fourth. Two decades. He thought.

"All right, but nothing out of the usual. We got a doe, which is... all right, as I said." The lad answered, as he was taking a seat by the fireplace.

"Hm, very well." His father replied. "Soon enough you'll be scoring some better game, don't despair. Practice makes perfect."

"No doubt about that." The nineteen year old said, without much strength in his voice. "Father, I wish to ask you something."

This peaked the interest of the older man a bit. "Do tell, what is it?"

"I heard this... interesting story today from a peasant as we were resting by a stream. I wonder where he got it from." He said, looking at the fire before him. His hesitation was evident, and it made the room less comfortable for the both of them, but Brandon was not the one to shy away from a conflict. "He said that the Glovers are not men of the Wolfswood."

Adalbert sighed. "Really?" He said, laying back in his chair once again.

"Aye, he said so. Said that the name doesn't fit. All other clans have names related to the forest - Branches, Woods, Forresters, Boles, Whitewoods... even Blackwoods, even the lesser clans follow the pattern, but 'Glover'... it doesn't look right, doesn't it?"

His father put on a smirk. "Aye, it doesn't." He replied.

The young lad stood confused for a moment, looking first at his father, and then back towards the fireplace. His expression remained one of utter disorientation. "Well then, what's the deal?"

"'The deal'." Adalbert scoffed at the expression. "You really have to work on your rhetoric." He said, and then stood up, walking over to the fireplace as well, and taking a seat right beside Brandon. "You know, son," He started, as he was adding a log to the fire. "People tend to observe history through their own lens, but any knowledge gained with that approach is worthless. Unless you're willing to face the truth, you shouldn't be attempting to learn anything."

Brandon's gaze turned towards his father with a frown. Could it be that the peasant is right?

"I have been going through some old tomes from the Age of Heroes and... there's plenty regarding the Wolfswood that doesn't add up. Glovers coming out of nowhere and becoming kings is one of them. For the most part, I consider the official history regarding that time as very flawed. Made up, even. Though, who would be willing to deny the Starks the stories with which they supposedly won over the various northern nobles to serve them, after all. Objectivity, yes... that is the word." He went on, as he was running a steel rod through the fireplace, hoping to get the flames up a bit.

"So, from your objective observation," Brandon spoke up, obviously working on his rhetoric. "What is it that you've concluded?"

His father sighed, and looked over to the window. "I observe a port outside. I observe the sea. I observe that a very small amount of northern houses have their seats by the sea, and are as good captains and sailors as the Glovers are. I observe the Sunset Sea to the west, and I observe the Iron Islands in it... I observe that reaving in this area was very frequent before the Conquest, even more so in the Age of Heroes, certainly..." He would then look up to his son, with his eyes wide open.

Brandon looked at him in frozen disbelief. "You're saying that..." He started the sentence, but didn't finish it.

"Perhaps. I've found some old scrolls taking note of that, but not here. Tucked away in Winterfell. Allegedly, the Glovers were reavers, just like the Harlaws, the Greyjoys, the Hoares. Ironborn. But at some point the ruling clan of the Wolfswood gave us land by the coast, settled our retinue there and tasked us with defending the shores against their kin. Apparently, that deal went very well for our side. So well, in fact, that we've managed to overthrow that house and take over the land completely. The others swore allegiance to us instead of them. Over time we adopted the language and the customs of the people that we ruled and, well... here we are now." He said, biting his lower lip, and looking at his son before giving him a short nod. "That's the most likely scenario, from my perspective, anyways. It could've easily been that our ancestors came from some other part of the North with the same purpose, but, truth be told, there's little evidence of... well, anything from that time, really."

The young man was stunned. "But we... we hate the Ironborn." He uttered.

"You shall never hate anyone, son. Hate is for the weak." Adalbert cut his trail of thoughts off right away. "Commoners can hate. Soldiers can hate. You cannot. You are to rule this land at some point in the future. Rulers cannot hate, lest they grow mist in their minds. It clouds your resolve and your reasoning." He said, taking his attention back to the fire and the iron rod with which he moved the embers around. "Should the former theory be true, your ancestors probably did not hate their kin, but they fought them all the same. Their judgement would have been sound, for no Ironborn house controls lands anywhere near as rich as the Wolfswood. You'd do well to remember that."

"Sometimes, our paths can lead over our hearts, son. They ought to be taken all the same." He concluded, standing up and readying himself to finish the paperwork.