The War of ConquestThe History of Westeros
In the century following the Doom of Valyria, known as “the Bleeding Years”, the last remaining possession of the Freehold was its western most outpost, the island and fortress of Dragonstone. The island was ruled by House Targaryen and the then head of the family and Lord of Dragonstone, Aegon Targaryen. The ambitious Aegon had a desire to conquer more land but rejected a call from the Free Cities of Essos to reunite them and become the leader of a new Freehold on the continent. However, Aegon did join with the Storm King, Argilac, Braavos, Tyrosh, Myr and Lys in a war to break the domination of Volantis at the end of the “Bleeding Years”, but he had no long term plans for the region. Instead, he set his sights on grabbing conquests in the continent of Westeros.
In Westeros itself, Harren the Black, the King of the Iron Islands and the Riverlands, was nearing the completion of his vast castle near the lake of God’s Eye. He called the castle Harrenhal and it was to be the largest fortress Westeros had ever seen. The building of this castle highlighted Harren’s ambitions and it was believed the Iron King was looking for further conquests to add to the Riverlands. The King of the Stormlands, Argilac Durrendon, had grown afraid of Harren and decided to propose an alliance with Aegon in an attempt to create a buffer zone between the Stormlands and the Riverlands. Argilac offered the hand of his daughter, Argella and a considerable area of dowry lands, although much of the land was in the Riverlands and, infact, in the possession of Harren. Aegon refused as he was already married to both of his sisters, Visenya and Rhaenys, but instead offered the hand of his best friend and reported half-brother, Orys Baratheon. Argilac took this for a grave insult and not only refused Aegon’s offered, but had the hands of his envoys cut off and sent back to Aegon with the message, “These are the only hands you will receive”. Aegon was infuriated. He called his banners to the fortress of Dragonstone and took war council with them and his sister-wives. He then sent ravens to all the rulers of the seven kingdoms calling on them to bend the knee and save their people and titles or face a horrible war and certain defeat, stating “There will be only one king”.
He ordered the building of the Painted Table in the main hall in Dragonstone, seeing all Westeros as one land despite the fact it was split into seven kingdoms. He was now determined to unite the continent.
Aegon Targaryen and his two Sister-Wives, Visenya and Rhaenys
He received an offer of marriage and alliance from the Queen Regent of the Kingdom of the Mountain and the Vale, Sharra Arryn if Aegon named her young son his heir. He also received a message from Mariya Martell saying that she would be his ally against the Storm King but she would not swear fealty to him. Aegon rejected both offers and no other rulers in Westeros would submit.
Aegon landed at the mouth of the Blackwater Rush beside three hills with his two sister-wives and a host of less than 2,000 men. Upon the highest hill, Aegon ordered the construction of a temporary motte and bailey, his first holding on the mainland of Westeros. Aegon’s sister-wives crowned him as king. They moved quickly to claim the allegiance of the local lords. Most notably the lords of Massey’s Hook and Rosby swore fealty to Aegon.
Aegon and his host then moved south to take revenge on the Storm King. Argilac, hearing of Aegon’s landing and marched north, living up to his nickname of “the Arrogant”. He raised his levies and gathered an army of 26,000 soldiers and marched north, leaving the shelter of his fortress of Storm’s End to meet Aegon in open battle. His idea was to surround and annihilate Aegon and his host and gain the reputation for defeating the last Valyrian.
The two armies met each other in the county of Galemont. Argilac led his army himself from the front under his banner of the crowned stag on a field of gold. Aegon’s army was led by his bastard brother, Orys Baratheon and his uncle, Daemon Velaryon, Lord of Driftmark and fought under the Targaryen banner of the three-headed red dragon and a field of black. The numerical superiority of Argilac soon began to tell as he quickly began to surround the Targaryen host, but Aegon himself was nowhere to be found on the battlefield. Just as his host was reaching breaking point, Aegon revealed his most powerful and hidden weapon. For the first and only time, Aegon and his sisters unleashed all three of their dragons, Balerion, Vhagar and Meraxes. Together the fire of all three dragons burned 7,000 men, including Argilac himself. The Storm King’s army was sent fleeing and Aegon had won his first victory in the Battle of Dalemont.
Orys Baratheon leading the Targaryen army at the Battle of Dalemont
After the battle, Aegon secured the fealty of all the lords of the Stormlands and declared Orys as Lord of Storm’s End and the Stormlands as a reward for his valor and loyalty. Argella Durrendon, the daughter of Argilac, declared herself the Storm Queen and continued to hold Storm's End. Orys and a small force laid siege to Storm’s End but the garrison immediately surrendered and handed Argella over to Orys. She was brought to Orys naked and in chains. Orys then ordered her execution to end any dispute to his lordship of the Stormlands, thus ending the Durrendon dynasty.
Following this victory, Aegon immediately moved forward. In an attempt to secure his rear and flanks, Aegon marched south with his dragon, Balerion, and Orys as well as 1,500 troops from Dragonstone and 8,000 levies of uncertain loyalty raised from the Stormlands to subdue Dorne and add it to his conquest. Mariya Martell had heard the stories of what had happened to Argilac and was determined to avoid the same faith. She put her castellan, Lord Tremos Gargalen in charge of her forces. She ordered him to raise her levies and have them gather at Yronwood. Her plan was to ambush the Targaryen forces in Stoneway and defeat them before their dragons could be brought to bear.However, a mix up in communication between Prince’s Pass in west Dorne and Sunspear in east Dorne led to a lot of confusion and meant that the Dornish forces got split in half in the Red Mountains. As Aegon and his forces moved south through the mountain pass they encountered the first Dornish contingent and made short work of the disorganised army. Moving further south they clashed with the second Dornish force in Yronwood. The second army put up a stronger fight than the first but it too was then overwhelmed.
The disorganised Dornish forces were no match for Balerion the Black Dread
With the Dornish military in full rout and totally scattered, Aegon pressed on his advantage by marching his army east, straight for Sunspear. He had been informed that Mariya Martell was in the city and wanted to force her to surrender before she could gain control of her forces once more.
It took the Targaryen forces several weeks to cross the Dornish desert but when they finally reached Sunspear, the Martells were still inside the city. The siege went very quickly with no hope of relief. When the city fell, Aegon found Mariya inside and forced her to swear fealty. She agreed and Dorne was added to Aegon’s kingdom.
Further to the north, Aegon had sent his two sister-wives along with 2,500 men to capture the Vale of Arryn. The Kingdom of the Mountain and the Vale was ruled by Ronnel Arryn who was just a young boy as the time of Aegon’s invasion. His mother, Sharra Arryn, ruled as Queen Regent at the time in his stead. As the Targaryen forces marched into the Vale, Sharra, fearing for her son and the Arryn dynasty, sent a massive army to the Bloody Gate and locked herself, her son and her most trusted knights in the Eyrie. Seeing this, Visenya simply rode her dragon, Vhagar, past the gates and straight into the courtyard of the Eyrie. Upon hearing this, Sharra Arryn rushed out to the courtyard to find her son seated upon Vhagar. When he saw his mother he told her that Visenya promised him he could ride the dragon and asked his mother if it was ok. When the regent saw this, she acknowledged King Aegon's supremacy and swore fealty to the Targaryens.
With the east coast of southern Westeros under his control, Aegon decided that the time was right to move against the vast riches and manpower of the west. He gathered all his forces on the Blackwater and decided to make a statement by marching north-west and taking on Harren the Black and his new fortress of Harrenhal. When Harren Hoare heard of Aegon’s attack, instead of submitting he decided to call his banners thinking that the combined might of the Iron Islands and the Riverlands would be able to defeat Aegon. But when he sent ravens to the lords of the Trident he found that many of them had ignored his call and sided with the Targaryens instead. Surrounded and with no chance of victory, Harren snuck out of Harrenhal just before Aegon’s forces began to lay siege to it and retreated to the Iron Islands. There, he raised an army of Ironborn and any Riverland lords that still followed him and marched back to Harrenhal to face Aegon and relieve the garrison.
Harren’s forces landed at Seagard and sailed down the Blue Fork of the Trident to catch Aegon’s army unawares. However, with 5,000 reinforcements arriving from the Vale and ferocious fighting from Orys Baratheon and his troops from the Stormlands, the Iron King’s troops were overwhelmed and defeated. Following the battle, the garrison in Harrenhal surrendered to Aegon. Harren fled back to the Iron Islands but was unable to regain his former strength. He still refused to bow to Aegon but died a natural death a few months after the battle. His son Harwyn inherited his rule and decided to bow to Aegon’s rule. In return, Aegon decided to appoint Harwyn as lord of the Iron Islands. In the lands of the Trident, Aegon created a new title. The Lord of the Riverlands and granted that title, Riverrun and Harrenhal to Theomar Piper, one of the first of the River lords to swear fealty to Aegon.
Following Harrenhal’s surrender, Aegon led his army, now numbering 25,000 with reinforcements from the Vale and the Riverlands, west towards the Westerlands and against King Lorren Lannister. Just like Harren, Lorren, feeling that Aegon needed to be stopped, refused to bend the knee to Aegon and instead sent a message to Mern Gardener, the King of the Reach, asking to form an alliance. Mern agreed and between them they managed to raise 60,000 troops between. Regardless, Aegon brought his forces west, straight towards Casterly Rock. However, while marching through Oxcross the Targaryen army ran into an army of 20,000 coming south to join the main Lannister and Gardener forces. Aegon defeated this first Lannister army. Two more times between Oxcross and Goldshire the Targaryen forces, with the help of Aegon’s dragon Balerion, defeated the combined armies of the Westerlands and the Reach. Realising that he could not claim victory and seeing the destruction of his lands and killing of his people through constant battles, Lorren Lannister decided to kneel to Aegon and become his vassal. Aegon allowed Lorren to stay as lord of Casterly Rock and the Westerlands and appointed him Warden of the West.
Lorren Lannister and Mern XI Gardener surveying their army before a battle in Goldshire
Aegon then led his army south to finish off Mern and his forces. With the Reach surrounded by Aegon’s kingdom and with Mern as the last free Andal king in Westeros, Mern decided that he could no longer fighter against the Targaryens and their dragons so he agreed to accept Aegon as his king. In return Aegon allowed House Gardener to stay as kings of the Reach and appointed Mern as Warden of the South.
In Oldtown, the High Septon had been fasting for seven days and seven nights under the dome in the Starry Sept. When he was finished, he announced that the Faith would not oppose the Targaryens because the Crone had shown him that to do so would mean the destruction of Oldtown in dragonflame. When Aegon and his army arrived at Oldtown, the gates were wide open and they were welcomed to the city which submitted totally to him. The High Septon then anointed Aegon and proclaimed him as King of Westeros, cementing his rule in the south.
Following his coronation in Oldtown, Aegon flew north on Balerion along with his two sisters. The King in the North, Torrhen Stark, realised that he could not fight Aegon and instead bent the knee in submission. Aegon accepted this and made Torrhen lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North, completing his conquest of Westeros.
Torrhen Stark, "The King who knelt", granting his sword to Aegon and accepting him as his liege, completing Aegon's conquest of Westeros