On the Strength of Promises and Hope

"Promise Me, Ned." Robert's Rebellion is over and won, and Ned Stark finds himself at the Tower of Joy with his dying sister's words ringing in his head. He makes the promise and takes the newborn babe, but he makes one other decision in this universe which starts to unravel his careful plan from the very beginning--endangering not only the baby boy, but Ned, his new wife, his own infant son, and all he holds dear; pitting him against the man he has called brother; and creating potential chaos in Robert Baratheon's new reign just as it is beginning.

A pre-canon AU plot set in an otherwise book compliant Westeros spanning the years from the end of Robert's Rebellion to the end of the Greyjoy Rebellion.
Written for the ASoIaF BigBang on tumblr.