why did varys pay for gendry’s apprenticeship? assuming it was him

agentknitter:

racefortheironthrone:

Because Robert isn’t an unkind man and would want his bastard child taken care of and Varys would be the man to do that discretely, because Varys doesn’t cause unnecessary harm to children (while being bang alongside the idea of necessary harm to children), and because Varys would want a bastard of Robert’s on hand to de-legitimize Joffrey/Tommen when the time was right. 

Here’s a brain itch: did Robert know about Gendry? 

Because if he did, then Gendry is, properly, Gendry Waters. But I always had the impression that Robert was unaware of Gendry’s existence, and Varys’ detective work/general spy mastering led him to Gendry a decade or more before Jon Arryn and Stannis worked it out. 

Totally agree that the reason Varys paid Tobho Mott for Gendry’s apprenticeship was to have a son of Robert Baratheon who absolutely looked the part at hand for when the time was nigh to expose Cersei’s incestuous bastards to trigger chaos for Team fAegon. 

Awareness is not the same thing as acknowledgement, I would argue. My guess is that Varys came to him and told him “that serving wench is pregnant, your grace,” and Robert said “take care of it, won’t you, Varys.”