Blood of Dragons

While the realm has been calm since the ascension of Aegon, the Fourth of his Name, many would say that this has little enough to do with him: it has been his small council and the other office-holders of the Crown who have done the work. What has Aegon done, then? Enjoyed the fruits of wearing the crown, largely in commanding entertainments to please him, and all the while desporting with his mistress, the Lady Melissa Blackwood. The King's Hand, Lord Bracken, has proved capable enough at holding meetings and delegating to others, but there has been a slow creep of kinsmen (by blood and by…

A moon and more since the whispers first began, and now it has come to pass: Prince Daeron and Princess Mariah have taken ship to Dragonstone, moving their household there to take up the rule of the ancient Targaryen stronghold. Their leaving did not go unmarked by the court, nor by the kingslanders, as an event was made of their leaving the city. Queen Naerys herself was there to see her son off (as well as her infant daughter Daenerys, who she entrusted to the prince to foster on Dragonstone), carried down in a palanquin escorted by Prince Aemon the Dragonknight and others of the Kingsguard.…

As the weeks and moons have passed, the court of King's Landing was heartened as Queen Naerys recovered from her harrowing delivery. Having been much-missed, especially by those ladies and lords who had piously remembered her in their prayers to the Seven. Chief of all these were her brother Prince Aemon, and her son Prince Daeron, who with his wife Princess Mariah of Dorne had been often at her bedside to read from _The Seven-Pointed Star_ or to bring her grandsons to her so that they might cheer her. When at last Princess Naerys was strong enough to leave her chambers to walk in the fresh…

The aftermath of the dismissal of Lady Barba Bracken, sent back to Stone Hedge with her royal bastard Aegor Rivers, was not entirely what some expected. There were members of the court who expected King Aegon to explode with anger at them, especially the members of the small council. Others thought the king would instead unleash his outrage at the Prince of Dragonstone, Daeron, and mayhaps his own brother Prince Aemon the Dragonknight for having led the intervention. But that is not what happened. Oh, the king did sulk, and assuaged himself with his usual recourses: wine and women. But as the…

Queen Naerys lingered still near death, her surviving infant Daenerys was cared for by wetnurses, Lady Barba enjoyed all the king's favors with her infant son at her breast, and the court continued to fret over the situation. Matters came to a head when rumors ran rife that the Hand, Lady Barba's father Lord Kennoth, had openly spoken of Barba becoming queen when (not if) Naerys succumbed to the weakness that had gripped her since the delivery of her daughter and her stillborn son. Who was angriest among the great names at court was hard to judge: Prince Aemon the Dragonknight, who had…

A fortnight has passed since Lady Barba Bracken, the king's royal mistress, gave birth to a natural son. In that time since, the lady has been most pleased with herself, as has been her lord father the Hand, and indeed as has been the king himself. Aegon, Fourth of His Name, had even had her nurse the boy Aegor in his audience chambers as he greeted lords and officials. Rumors run rife that he means to bestow on the boy some great parcel of land and make him a lord so that his mother might benefit from the revenues. There are those on the small council who are said to be resistant to such…

A son! King Aegon, Fourth of His Name, has a new son! The bells of the royal sept were rung soon after the birth, and some few in the city below took it up. The king was not himself present for the birth -- he was away hunting, or so the claim went, though there were whispers of his having stopped on the way of the city at the Street of Silk and simply had never left it -- but a great swath of gifts were already at hand and prepared to be delivered, depending on the outcome of the birth (and the child's gender). The mother, blessed with such fruitfulness, was gifted bolts of samite and…

The king has returned! Nearly four moons have passed since King Aegon, Fourth of His Name, departed the royal city of King's Landing to take his first royal progress. Accompanied by his Hand, Lord Bracken, and his pregnant mistress, Lord Bracken's daughter Barba, his ultimate aim was to visit Stone Hedge and while away time there. The journey to Stone Hedge was uneventful enough that much of the gossip left in the wake of the progress had to do with a king seemingly devoted to his own pleasures and a mistress willing to indulge them, from making use of the chambers of Lord and Lady Buckwell to…

Since his coronation a fortnight earlier, King Aegon, Fourth of his Name, has taken to being king with an alacrity that surprised few. Yet, unlike his late father, he has not done so by issuing a wave of edicts and beginning measures to change laws, correct injustices, or strengthen ties across the narrow sea. While it is true that he named Lord Bracken as his Hand as his first official act, the expected changes to the small council have -- to the surprise of some -- not yet happened, and all because both the king and the Hand seem entirely focused on the pressing matters of the Hand's…

After seven days, of preparation of the body by the maesters and then lying in state in the royal sept, King Viserys's body was moved to the outer yard of the Red Keep and placed upon a great bier. In days now long past, it was the custom that a dragon would set a king's bier and body alight, but the dragons are gone and only a torch -- carried by the new king, Aegon -- was used as the solemn court watched. The only notable absence was Princess Naerys, said to be too affected by the death of her father to show herself publicly. But a different rumor has run through the court, and has been all…

Two days earlier, Lord Alyn Velaryon took his leave of the court and of Westeros after his sojourn in the dungeons. He had been commanded by King Viserys to depart forthwith to Volantis, to serve as an envoy to the courts of the triarchs there, although it was widely understood that this was simply a more politic way to put him into exile. His Grace left it an open question how long this embassy would last, and Velaryon seemed resigned to it. Not everyone was, however: Princess Elaena was said to have locked herself in her rooms in protest, and her elder sister Daena had attempted to cajole…

It was on the 9th day of the 3rd month that Princess Elaena was brought to the birthing bed, belly great with child, and it was on that same day that she was delivered of her burden. It was a surprisingly swift labor, and she weathered it well for one so young and put through such extremities, for a midwife soon announced after the bawling baby boy was expelled form her wound that a second child, a twin, was on its way, a baby girl. Both seemed healthy and well-made, missing no parts and unblemished, their eyes purple like their mother's... and their father's. Lord Alyn Velaryon, the master of…

These are strange times in King's Landing, with a scholar from far, mysterious Yi Ti having captured the attention of half the court, rumor of new conflicts stirring in the Free Cities, unrest at the king's continuing failure to choose a Hand to share some of the burden of all the tasks he has set for himself and his reign. All seems well -- or seemed well, in any case, until an unexpected discovery set the court into chaos: Princess Elaena, the king's niece, was with child. The uproar that followed cannot be overstated, so soon after her elder sister Daena herself had already given birth to a…

In the months since Prince Aegon's return from Dragonstone, he has carried on with his ways, and so has King Viserys. His efforts to improve the running of the realm has continued apace, adjusting the codes of laws, arranging for new mints, reorganizing some of the royal household, and more. But the small council, that he has not touched -- so far. Rumors are always rife, that he means to make changes to better suit him and the Seven Kingdoms, yet so far he has declined to make any immediate choice. After all, this small council has largely been of his own choosing, men he has known long as…

The unexpected sight of sails from the east, sails belonging to royal galleys flying royal banners, caused a stir in King's Landing. More than a moon before, Aegon, Prince of Dragonstone, had sailed with his household and hanger-ons to take possession of the ancient seat of House Targaryen with its walls and towers shaped by Valyrian magic. He had done so, all said, at the behest of his lord father, Viserys the Second of His Name, and all agreed that the prince was not greatly enamored of the notion. Though he did as he was bid, it was clear he had no love for Dragonstone. The prince spent…