History of Westeros

Blackfyre Rebellions: Part 7 – Bloodraven

The first of THREE Bloodraven episodes and part 7 of our Blackfyre Rebellions series. This one covers the time from his birth until the death of King Daeron II.

Six years ago in King’s Landing, Dunk had seen him with his own two eyes, as he rode a pale horse up the Street of Steel with fifty Raven’s Teeth behind him. That was before King Aerys had ascended to the Iron Throne and made him the Hand, but even so he cut a striking figure, garbed in smoke and scarlet with Dark Sister on his hip. His pallid skin and bone-white hair made him look a living corpse. Across his cheek and chin spread a wine-stain birthmark that was supposed to resemble a red raven, though Dunk only saw an odd-shaped blotch of discolored skin. He stared so hard that Bloodraven felt it. The king’s sorcerer had turned to study him as he went by. He had one eye, and that one red. The other was an empty socket, the gift Bittersteel had given him upon the Redgrass Field. Yet it seemed to Dunk that both eyes had looked right through his skin, down to his very soul. Despite the heat, the memory made him shiver. – The Sworn Sword

Outline

Blackfyre Rebellions: Part 1 – Aegon IV the Unworthy (spoiler free)

This episode covers the life of Aegon IV the Unworthy, the man who fathered the Blackfyre Rebellions. A King who used the Iron Throne to serve his needs, caring little for the realm. He made life miserable for his sister Naerys and brother Aemon the Dragonknight while siring Bittersteel, Bloodraven, Shiera Seastar and Daemon Blackfyre himself.

“Aegon the Fourth legitimized all his bastards on his deathbed. And how much pain, grief, war, and murder grew from that? I know you trust Jon. But can you trust his sons? Or their sons? The Blackfyre pretenders troubled the Targaryens for five generations, until Barristan the Bold slew the last of them on the Stepstones.”

“…no king before or after would practice so much willful misrule.”

“Treason . . . is only a word. When two princes fight for a chair where only one may sit, great lords and common men alike must choose. And when the battle’s done, the victors will be hailed as loyal men and true, whilst those who were defeated will be known forevermore as rebels and traitors.”

He was the son of a common blacksmith and had been given to the Faith while young. But his brilliance made itself known, and in time he came to serve in the library at the Red Keep, tending the king’s books and records. There King Jaehaerys became acquainted with him”

 

“…his body so swollen and obese that he could no longer lift himself from his couch, his limbs rotting and crawling with fleshworms. The maesters claimed they had never seen its like, whilst septons declared it a judgment of the gods. Aegon was given milk of the poppy to dull his pain, but elsewise little could be done for him.”

 

“His last act before his death, all accounts agree, was to set out his will. And in it, he left the bitterest poison the realm ever knew: he legitimized all of his natural children, from the most baseborn to the Great Bastards—the sons and daughters born to him by women of noble birth. Scores of his natural children had never been acknowledged; Aegon’s dying declaration meant nought to them. For his acknowledged bastards, however, it meant a great deal. And for the realm, it meant blood and fire for five generations.”

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HoW Progress: Daeron II the Good

We recorded our second Blackfyre Rebellions episode yesterday afternoon, continuing our progress towards the Redgrass Field. Normally we are able to release the episode to Patreon/donators the same day, but we had tickets to the Season 5 early premiere in Atlanta and that took up our evening. So editing is occurring right now, and early release folks will get the episode starting by tonight most likely, then throughout the week.

Full release will be late Sunday the 4th/early Monday the 5th!

We had Steven Attewell of Race for the Iron Throne on as a guest. He’s extremely knowledgeable about ASOIAF, medieval history and in particular the Blackfyres because he just wrote a 4 part essay series on Tower of the Hand called “The Blacks and the Reds” (part 1 here).

We were able to do more free form discussion on the topic, since Steven has plenty of podcasting experience on top of his expert level grasp of the material. So this episode has a hybrid, half-scripted/half-discussion feel to it. We had to rush a bit at the end as we’re not used to timing unscripted discussions and we ran out of time before getting to everything. But surely, like some other things, we will get better with experience. The stuff we cut at the end will simply be moved to another one of the Blackfyre Eps. I knew in advance there was a chance this would happen, so it was a simple adjustment. Ashaya is not in it, though it has nothing to do with the illness she had last time. She was scheduled to not participate in this one, and will be back for the next episode. We talked a lot about Dorne, the Great Bastards, the two Baelors (the Blessed and Breakspear), how awkward it was to be Aegon the Unworthy’s son and even Crusader Kings II and Telltale Games.

So overall it was pretty smooth and I’m happy with how the episode came out. I love that there is so much excellent material to play with before we even get to the rebellion itself.

-Aziz

History: Golden Company & War of the Ninepenny Kings (spoiler free)

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