I kinda want a one-shot of the event that led to Hagun Stark. Like it doesn't need to be too detailed but the reactions of the people on his birth and how King Brandon felt hearing about his 'Army breaking'🤭
The birth of Hagun-Sakumo took place at a pretty sensitive time - King Brandon had only young daughters, and his queen was already belaboured to the point of bedrest.
This was also before the House Law and other cadet branches were established, and, you know, the fact that the Prince of the Moat has a known immortal thane who is absolutely loyal to a fault pretty much established that. If 'Princess Ned' had admitted his/her true sex, he'd become an actual contender for the Winter Throne - hence why Ned didn't do so after their kingly father 'Rickard Extreme' passed on, because Ned Stark is... well, still Ned Stark.
Plus, whether male or female, any marriage that Ned could declare to this godlike figure could establish the Stark of the Moat as a challenge to the Winterfell branch, and in this hypothetical the Stark children of the Moat could claim some divine lineage as their right to power down the road. Furthermore, marriage is a double-edged sword that could open the Winter Throne to 'outsider' influence - look at the Fujiwara clan and how they used marriage politics to control the Emperors of Heian Japan for centuries. Tobirama is very well-regarded, a true pillar of the country, but he is officially not of House Stark of Winterfell, and House Stark needs to maintain that... polite fiction, I guess, or be regarded as puppets to the Magnar on the Wall.
The birth of a male child to the Moat, even one born out of wedlock, was a chance that King Brandon seized - by legitimising Hagun Snow into a Stark, not only does Brandon add a much needed male Stark into thefamily, he also removes any legal basis by which Tobirama could conceivably claim influence via the bloodline. Then, engaging his daughter to Moat Cailin was a strategic union that reinforces his daughter's claim and any future Stark Kings from that blood-union.
(At that time King Brandon didn't ask Beira's opinion either, but it worked out - Sakumo chugged his Respect Women Juice long beforehand, and shinobi have history of women holding power anyway, so Beira couldn't find a more perfect consort. Then the fact that the man broke a castle on his lonesome to save his kidnapped wife smoothed it out much more, and all their sons inherited that martial strength which also conferred both actual supernatural power, and the prestige of hinted divine lineage, to the main Stark line. It got to the point that after Hagun-Sakumo died (partly old age, partly in braving winter storms to deliver much-needed food supplies) he was posthumously declared King-consort and buried next to Beira. The couple just officially wrote into the House Law that future Einherjar could choose their own spouses since trying to matchmake one of those against their will is an easy way to start up a one-man rampage.)
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