George R.R. Martin - The Rise of the Dragon: An Illustrated History of the Targaryen Dynasty, Volume One (Australian Edition)

E RTA A LTINZ

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First published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2022

Copyright George R.R. Martin 2022

Cover illustration Larry Rostant

Cover design by Claire Ward HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2022

Title-page illustration by Erta Altinz

George R.R. Martin asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the authors imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

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Source ISBN: 9780008557102

Ebook Edition October 2022 ISBN: 9780008557119

Version: 2022-09-21

Valyria after the Doom.

P AOLO P UGGIONI

THE HISTORY OF Westeros stretches back thousands of years, but the period in which House Targaryen unified the various realms into the Seven Kingdoms as we know them covers less than three hundred. The history of the family goes back further than that, however, to its beginnings in the Freehold of Valyria. The Targaryens were an ancient and noble lineagedragonlords who bred and rode the great beasts that had extended the Freeholds power across western Essosyet they were still a relatively minor family among the great Valyrian houses. When Aenar Targaryen sold his lands and properties and moved his entire family and their dragons to Valyrias westernmost outpost, the isle called Dragonstone in the narrow sea, his rivals thought him a coward. Little did they know that his daughter, Daenys the Dreamer, had foretold the Doom of Valyria. Twelve years later, the Freehold was destroyed in a cataclysm when the volcanic Fourteen Flames erupted, shattering the Valyrian peninsula and the empire along with it. In the chaos that followed, all the dragonlords of Valyria perished, along with their dragons apart from the Targaryens on their rocky isle of Dragonstone.

What follows in this book is a guide to the first half of that period, beginning with Aegons Conquest through the end of the regency of Aegon III Dragonbane.

The Field of Fire.

R EN A IGNER

A map of Westeros.

F RANCESCA B AERALD

BEGINNING IN THE year 2 BC (Before the Conquest), Aegon Targaryen and his sisters launched their invasion of Westeros with the intention of unifying the entire continent under their rule. Opposing them were seven individual kingdoms, each with a unique history stretching back thousands of years. Before discussing the events of the conquest, it seems prudent to take a moment to examine each of these varying realms, and their rulers, as they existed at the time.

The stormlands are centered around the rainwoodthe heavily forested south-eastern region of Westerosand are bordered to the north by the Blackwater River, to the south by the Dornish Marches, and to the west by the Reach. Legends claim that the first Storm King was Durran Godsgrief, who gained the enmity of the gods of wind and sea when he won the love of their daughter, Elenei. Durran raised a succession of castles for himself and his Elenei that the gods then repeatedly destroyed, until a young boy helped Durran raise a seventh castle. Due to its massive curtain walls and drum tower, this castle could withstand the gods fury, and was ever after known as Storms End. The boy would become Bran the Builder, and House Durrandon ruled for thousands of years from its seat at Storms End.

The Storm King Arlan III expanded the realm by conquering the riverlands some four hundred years before the Conquest, stretching the domain of House Durrandon from the narrow sea to the Sunset Sea. Yet three centuries later, the Storm King Arrec lost the riverlands to Harwyn Hoare, a king of the Iron Islands. Arrecs two subsequent attempts to regain the riverlands failed, and a third attemptunder Arrecs son, Arlan Vended in Arlans death. Arlan Vs successor was his young son Argilac, later known as Argilac the Arrogant, who would be the last of the Storm Kings.

As a boy, Argilac turned back an attempted Dornish invasion, and his reputation only grew from there. He joined an alliance with several of the Free Cities against Volantis and killed King Garse VII Gardener at the Battle of Summerfield. His only heir at the time of the Conquest was his daughter, Argella.

Argilac the Arrogant.

T HOMAS D ENMARK

Although the histories of Westeros seem certain that the Iron Islands were settled by the First Men, the priests of the Drowned God on the Iron Islands claim that the ironborn are a people apart, created in the image of their god. Whatever the truth, the Iron Islands have a long history of maritime activity, fishing the rich waters, trading tin and iron ore, and sending reavers and pirates to pillage and make war on the greenlands.

The archipelago contains thirty-one islands, of which there are seven major inhabited ones. Legends claim that the Grey King ruled the isles in the Age of Heroes, but any details of his reign are lost to the mists of time. What is more certain is that each isle had a salt king and a rock king, each elected to these offices, until the priest Galon Whitestaff convinced the ironborn to unify by electing a High King at the first ever kingsmoot.

The centuries-long era of these High Kingscalled the driftwood kings for their wooden crownsbrought the Iron Islands to the apex of their power. During the reign of Qhored the Cruel, the ironborn held much of the western shore of Westeros under their dominion. These gains were slowly lost, howeverespecially after Urron Greyiron and his supporters slaughtered his rivals at the last kingsmoot, establishing the first hereditary high kingship. The turmoil that followed on the Iron Islands made it easier for the mainland kingdoms to drive out the ironborn, until the great Kingdom of the Isles and the Rivers was reduced once more to just the Iron Islands.