Blood of Dragons

On the eve of the lists for Lady Bethany Bracken's nameday, the court gathered beneath a great red pavilion near the tourney grounds for a showing of the helms of the knights who would ride on the morrow. Braziers warmed the canvas walls, rushes covered the muddy ground, and every table seemed to glitter with some new marvel of steel, gold, enamel, or painted heraldry. Lady Bethany herself was escorted through the displays by King Aegon, with the white cloaks of the Kingsguard close behind, while Lord and Lady Bracken played gracious host to the court. A grand array of helms were presented,…

Four-score knights gathered, defying the fog that descended upon the city and its stubborn, treacherous chill, to honor the new Lord Plumm. Or, more precisely, heed the king's call, for the child, less than a moon old, spent the day in a crib fussing in his swaddling cloth, while King Aegon merrily presided over the sport, flanked by Princess Elaena on one side and his sweetheart the Lady Bethany on the other. The Hand and his lady wife HALANNA were there, surely basking in His Grace's love for the damsel, as were the princess's household, headed by Lady JANNIA Buckwell. The queen, the princes…

A rare sight, that of pious, gentle Queen Naerys leaving the confines of the Red Keep; but so Her Grace did, sojourning with Princes Daeron and Baelor, and Prince Aemon as their leal guard, to Hayford to attend the games thrown in honour of Lord Hayford's daughter. First, a Tower of Love, blighted by rain and mud but no less appealing to the eye as ladies, headed by the Hayford maiden, were cooped up high in a wooden mock-holdfast, while eager knights sought their favour with sweets, coins and pretty -or lusty- words. When at last the women lowered ropes, the field erupted in melee, laughing…

The seventh moon had only just begun to wax when the King’s return from the Riverlands transformed the Red Keep. His Grace -- even more rotund then when he left -- was met by a grand celebratory feast in the Maidenvault, hosted by the proud Lord Hand Kennoth Bracken to honor the King’s homecoming and the ascent of his daughter Bethany as the royal mistress. The hall was crowded well beyond its usual measure, thick with torchlight, perfume, wine, and expectation. Nobles from across the realm gathered beneath the banners of crown and dragon, eager to mark the King’s return and observe the…

Day 4 of Month 6, 177 AC For three weeks, the court of Prince Maron Nymeros Martell was gripped by a specter from the past, a legacy of the Young Dragon?s invasion and the overthrow of his rule: the fate of the infant son born to Lady Alia Dayne and the cruel Ser Wallace Chester, and whether a youth styling himself Lyonel Dayne arriving on a Hightower ship was that lost child returned from the dead. Rumors had flown ahead of their arrival in the Planky Town, and many were the curious Dornish nobles who came to look on him, and to jeer. But the youth and his escort proceeded to Sunspear and…

A sleek grey galley flying the banner of House Hightower arrived in Planky Town under a clear autumn sky, but its coming was no surprise. Rumors from Oldtown had raced ahead of it, claiming a great scandal and a name long thought buried: Lyonel Dayne, the infant who had vanished from Starfall during the uprising that ended the conquest of Dorne by the Young Dragon. Escorted by Ser Malwyn Hightower -- grandson to Lord Hightower and an agent of the Bank of Oldtown -- and a company of knights and men-at-arms, a fair-haired, blue-eyed youth came up on the deck. He seemed frightened by the gathered…

Outside Riverrun's stout red walls, where the swift Tumblestone quarrels with the placid Red Fork before their union, a village of tents and pavilions had sprung up. No camp for war, this -- rather a place of splendor and celebration, for Lord Kermit Tully had called a tourney to mark his five-and-sixtieth nameday. He might jest that he was a lad no longer, yet his vigor belied the years, and his grip upon the Riverlands was firm as ever. After near half a century as his liege, his bannermen came gladly to honor him -- and to bask in the rare glow of royal attention. For word had spread that…

The court of King Aegon IV remains aflame -- not with war, but with spectacle, whisper, and the slow-burning rivalry between Bracken and Blackwood that has played out in the King's absence, while he loiters in the Riverlands on an extended progress. The factions loyal to his Hand and to his mistress have taken to subtler battlefields: the hunt and the yard. In the Kingswood, Lord Kennoth Bracken, the Hand of the King, hosted a grand hunt and feast beneath the turning leaves. A noble stag was brought down, Ser Othan Bracken delivering the killing shot. The fireside celebration that followed was…

There was no great fanfare, no trumpets nor bells. Just a dockman's hoarse shout -- "Sail! King's colors!" -- mostly lost in the morning din of gulls, ropes, and rising tide. Yet the _Royal Spear's_ return did not go entirely uncelebrated. She came into port as quietly as any ship might, bearing the battered marks of her journey: cracked railings, Braavosi planking, weather-worn sails, and the weary souls of her crew and passengers. The royal war galley, presumed lost to storm in the journey south from White Harbor, glided once more into King's Landing's harbor Among those aboard were Ser…

After a storm-bitten crossing and a long, trying sojourn in the Secret City, the Royal Spear is on the last stretch toward Gulltown. She came to Braavos in a sad state, storm-wrecked, paid her dues at the Chequy Port, and found a city too busy mending its own to spare favors for strangers with too little of value except their grand names. A small party trod the Moon Way to the merchant-captain Elanzo Manterys, who at first offered only hospitality. But then Ser Luthor Rivers tugged an old thread, of kin among the Valaros family, and talk of tradeables turned his temper. With Manterys's…

Day 25 of Month 3, 177 AC. Six days out from White Harbor, having just passed the Paps, the royal fleet met nature's rage in the Narrow Sea. On the horizon a storm could be seen brewing, and by noon it as was among them, a black wall of a storm come shrieking out of the northwest. The Prince Daemon, bearing Prince Daeron Targaryen, and one of the escorts fought to claw westward for the shelter of the Fingers. But the Royal Spear, commanded by Ser Orbert Farman, was not so fortunate. As the gale struck full, the Royal Spaer labored under shortened sail. Then came the sharp CRACK of parted…

Over the last fortnight, the city of White Harbor has been a stage for both lively festivities and quiet political maneuvering in the wake of the marriage of Lord Manderly's heir to Lord Royce's grand-daughter. The air has been filled with the sounds of merriment as lords and ladies from across the realm gathered for a season of contests, from feats of strength to snowball fights. Even the ancient godswood in the Wolf's Den drew curious eyes, with its immense heart tree pushing through walls and windows. Amid the revelry, undercurrents of alliance swirled. Rumors spread of private talks…

White Harbor roared with life, as the heart of the city was overtaken by a spectacle not seen in years: a grand horse race through its cobbled streets. Organised at the behest of Princess Daena the Defiant herself, the event saw the nobility of North and South alike thundering through snowy lanes, cheered by packed crowds from Fishfoot Yard to the outer alleys. Ten laps were declared through the course, those placing being marked until the overall victor was decided. By the end of it, the very stones of White Harbor rang with hoofbeats and thunderous acclaim. Snow drifted from a pale sky as…

On a chill, fog-wrapped morning in the waning days of the eighth moon, three lean black-sailed galleys slipped like specters into White Harbor's inner docks -- ships of Eastwatch-by-the-Sea, come on their periodic missions to trade for supplies and to collect new recruits. Their hulls were salt-eaten and ice-scarred, their crew clad in the black of the Night's Watch, hard-faced and silent as they made fast beneath the mist-shrouded walls of the city. What first seemed a resupply mission swiftly proved otherwise. At the fore of the company was Ser Adron Mooton, First Ranger of the Watch…

What was promised as a contest of arms became instead a test of will, endurance, and blood. The great melee held upon the fields beyond White Harbor drew four companies of knights and men-at-arms -- forty to each side. Two bore the colors and heraldry of the South and two bore the arms of northern houses, the white and grey of House Stark at their head. Over hours from dawn to day, they clashed in village, hollow, and wood, the fog rolling low and the din of war echoing through the vale of the White Knife. Marshals cried themselves hoarse holding the lines together, driving bands of men nearer…