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2025-05-29
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The King of Knights (ASOIAF Daemon Blackfyre SI)

Summary:

Daemon Blackfyre is the closest thing to King Arthur in ASOIAF yet he failed to achieve his true potential. What if he didn't? What if, with the help of some memories from another life, he truly became the King of Knights? This is the story of his legend, written like it's the historical chronicles of Arthur Pendragon. AU, Canon-Divergence, OC-SI, Transmigrator.

Chapter 1: A Defiant Beginning

Notes:

This particular story explores the concept of Daemon Blackfyre taking his King Arthur Pendragon parallels all the way to their peak logical conclusion, hence the reason for the title, which is one of the epithets of King Arthur (or is in Fate/stay/night at least lol). Technically an SI/transmigrator facilitates this, but you can imagine it as an AU if you like because unlike most SI/transmigrators, this story is written purely as a historical text, like Fire and Blood or World of Ice and Fire. Watsonianly this contributes to the whole King Arthur aesthetic, making it like Chaucer's Canterbury Tales or some King Arthur fairytale.

The Doylist reason for this is because I don't have time or passion to commit to a full length traditional narrative story while I'm still working on Divide and Conquer (ASOIAF Aegon I SI) and after D&C I don't intend to write any more ASOIAF stories as I have a lot of plans for a fic in another fandom, namely Star Wars. Nonetheless the creative juices wouldn't stop flowing for a Daemon Blackfyre idea and lacking any proper fic based around him in the fandom, I thought to fill the empty niche before I go with a short historical story for him.

Hope you all enjoy! Just bear in mind this is probably the single greatest piece of Daemon Blackfyre glazing you have ever seen XD. There are quite a few alterations to canon due to the nature of the AU/SI and simply the lack of details we have on this era anyway. See if you can spot them! All credit to the artist for their phenomenal artwork! Chapter 2 will be written and posted sometime in the coming weeks after I finish writing the next chapter of Divide and Conquer. Stay tuned!

Lmk your thoughts in the comments below or over on Discord!

Chapter Text

The following texts are abridged excerpts from Grand Maester Raemon’s The King of Knights, a book cataloguing the entire life and reign of the great King Daemon I ‘Blackfyre’ Targaryen. Many of these excerpts have also been used in other books with Raemon’s permission, including Archmaester Gyldayn’s Fire & Blood, Being a History of the Targaryen Kings of Westeros and Maester Yandel’s The World of Ice and Fire.

For all the great deeds he would later accomplish, the legendary King Daemon had a rather turbulent beginning. Late in the year one hundred and seventy after Aegon’s Conquest, Princess Daena gave birth to a bastard son she named for her grandfather, "for the Prince Daemon who had been the wonder and the terror of his age".

She would not name the father, and it was for this act of defiance against the strictures of her pious brother, Baelor (called the Blessed but more commonly referred to by many as the Befuddled nowadays), that Daena would earn herself the name of Daena ‘the Defiant’.

Baelor would later fast himself to death in 171 AC, as ‘penance for his sister’s sins,’ and Daena attempted to claim the Iron Throne, as was her right she argued as the eldest daughter of King Aegon III and sister to both Daeron I and Baelor. Many refused her claim, however. Ten years of seclusion in the Maidenvault had left Daena with few allies and having a bastard had sunk her worth in the eyes of many.

Daena attempted to pressure her uncle, Viserys II into relinquishing the throne to her with the threat of publicly declaring that the father of her son Daemon was indeed her cousin Prince Aegon, as many suspected. Viserys II however refused to be cowed by his niece and Daena followed through with the threat.

It did not accomplish what she had hoped it would, beyond causing a minor scandal and further worsening the relationship between Prince Aegon and his siblings, Princess Naerys and Ser Aemon, the Dragonknight, a member of the Kingsguard.

Defeated, Daena had no choice but to accept her uncle’s ascension to the throne that should have been hers. Like Rhaenys, the Queen Who Never Was before her, Daena had been robbed of her rightful inheritance and she never forgot it.

A small consolation prize at the very least that had been given to her was her uncle’s public acknowledgement of her son’s paternity and permission for both of them to live comfortably all their lives in the Red Keep, with a generous financial allowance. This was continued even after Viserys II died a year later I 172 AC from a sudden illness and his son, Daemon’s father, came to the throne as Aegon, the Fourth of His Name.

For the next twelve years, Daena and Daemon continued to live at court, and little would change their circumstances as a disgraced and disinherited princess and her bastard son. Nonetheless, Princess Daena continued to cultivate her connections and gain allies. One of these connections was Lady Barba Bracken, one of many ladies in waiting that had been sent to be at the side of her and her sisters in the Maidenvault during Baelor’s reign.

Upon his ascension to the throne, Aegon IV openly took Barba as his mistress and named her father as his Hand of the King. Daena had helped to facilitate this, thinking it would give her increased influence over the King through her friend. Her efforts would backfire on her, however.

Barba gave birth to a son, Aegor Rivers, only two weeks before Queen Naerys nearly died in childbirth, and her father then began speaking of the King taking Barba as his new Queen with Naerys lingering near death and this greatly displeased Princess Daena who saw it as a betrayal of their friendship that Barba would seek to advance herself and her son at the expense of Daena and her own. And perhaps some part of Daena still had familial loyalty and affection to her cousin Naerys as well.

Once Queen Naerys had recovered, all of these suggestions by Lord Bracken had become a scandal and Prince Aemon the Dragonknight and Prince Daeron, Naerys’ brother and son, forced the King to dismiss Barba and her father from court.

Daena did not intervene on behalf of the Brackens in this incident, still feeling betrayed by their grasping. However, many years later, after the execution of Barba’s younger sister, Bethany, and their father in 178 AC for Bethany’s unfaithfulness to the King as his seventh mistress, the Brackens’ favor at court had fallen to an all-time low and Princess Daena saw the opportunity to drag them back into her sphere of influence and offer them a lifeline.

Daena had earned much favor with her cousin the King in the intermediate years. Though never a formal mistress, she had continued to lay with him on occasion, plying his affections and ensuring he thought of her fondly. Her son Daemon had also earned much favor with the King, excelling in all aspects in the training yard which pleased him greatly, as did Daemon’s filial and obedient attitude whenever his father visited. The perfect image of a dutiful son. Quite unlike his supposed older half-brother Daeron who continued to be at odds with the King.

Princess Daena put this favor to use and arranged, with the King’s permission, for Aegor Rivers to come to court at last as her ward, to serve as a companion to her son. This she later noted in her private journals, was aimed to make the Brackens dependent on her for any favor and influence at court, reminding them of their place while drawing them back to her side as an ally.

It also provided her son Daemon with a true brother, as he had rather childishly begged for her to bring Aegor to court for him to befriend. Though Daemon had very many friends, for he was charming and his strength in the yard impressed many, he lacked much familial interaction apart from his mother. His father King Aegon was affectionate but distant, while Queen Naerys and Prince Aemon knew not what to think of him and his elder ‘brother’ Daeron was distant to him as was his other half-brother Brynden ‘Bloodraven’ Rivers and Daeron’s sons, who were all closer to each other than they were to him.

As Daena admitted in her journal, she would likely not have gotten the idea at all had it not been for her son’s pleading. Yet once it had entered her mind, it would not leave, and it was not long before she succeeded in having Aegor brought to court where he took to her and Daemon readily, becoming the best of friends and closest of brothers with Daemon and coming to see Daena like an aunt or second mother of sorts.

This was not the only sibling that the young Daemon convinced his mother to adopt either. After the death in childbirth of both Queen Naerys and Serenei of Lys, the King’s ninth and last mistress, in 180 AC, Daemon ended up convincing his mother to extend some motherly affection to his eight-year-old trueborn sister Daenerys and newborn bastard sister, Shiera Seastar, and raise them as their own.

Daemon and Aegor were both exceedingly close to Daenerys who favored their company over their other brother Brynden, whom all three disliked, and the sons of their distant older brother Daeron, Baelor, Aerys, Rhaegel, and Maekar. Serenei of Lys’s cold and haughty attitude towards others at court had also left her newborn daughter with no family or friends aside from the ever distant and hedonistic King Aegon IV.

Both Daenerys and Shiera were thus left without any family to really turn to besides Daena, Daemon, and Aegor, and they welcomed them and took them in. Princess Daena later wrote in her journal that taking in Aegor, Daenerys, and Shiera was perhaps the best decision she had ever made in her life.

Things continued to churn for the next three years. Daemon and Aegor continued to grow in strength and stature at the training yard while their rivalry and distance with Daeron, his sons, and Brynden simmered. Daenerys and Shiera meanwhile continued to grow closer to Daena, Daemon, and Aegor, and a mutual though at the time childish and innocent affection began to fully bloom between the adolescent Daemon and Daenerys, one that Daena and Aegon IV both greatly approved of.

In 183 AC, when he was only twelve years of age, the young Daemon proved himself like never before. Not only did he win a squire’s tourney at such a young age, but he had also disguised himself and entered the knights’ tourney as a mystery knight in a suit of plain black armor, reaching to the quarterfinals before finally being unhorsed and unmasked. It was an incredible display of martial potential and skill, something unheard of in one so young.

So pleased with his son was King Aegon, that he personally knighted the boy and bestowed upon him the Sword of Kings, Blackfyre, shocking the entire court. He then shocked the court even more when he formally legitimized Daemon as a Prince of House Targaryen in line to the throne after Daeron and his sons, and betrothed him to his younger half-sister Daenerys.

It was a meteoric rise. In a single day, Daemon had gone from a bastard with a promising future as a knight to a Targaryen prince bestowed a Targaryen bride and the sword of all Targaryen kings. Many began murmuring then that the King intended to name Daemon his heir in place of Daeron whom he had quarreled with many a time (and whom many whispers suggested was actually the son of Aemon the Dragonknight and not the King).

Others also started to remember the claim of Princess Daena to the throne and whispered that her son, Daemon ‘Blackfyre’ as he was now nicknamed, was the rightful heir to the Iron Throne twice over. Furthermore, as Daemon was now a prince, many also started calling him the Black Prince, after the mystery knight’s suit of armor that many saw as having earned him his new status and favor with the King.

All the while, Prince Daeron and his sons and favored brother Brynden could only stare at Daemon’s rise in jealousy and horror.

The final years of Aegon IV’s reign would be filled with much confusion after this incident. Rumors spread that King Aegon sought to arrange a betrothal with Rohanne of Tyrosh, the daughter of the Archon, for either Daemon’s second wife or Aegor’s first. That the King sought to legitimize the remainder of his bastards in addition to Daemon, or that he would formally name Daemon as his heir in place of Daeron. None of these things would ever materialize beyond hearsay however for the King expired in 184 AC, wasting away from sheer corpulence and obesity.

His death brought his eldest ‘son’, Daeron, Second of His Name, to the throne. Daeron was in all aspects, very much unlike the rest of his supposed brothers. He was not a warrior by any means, instead keeping company with maesters and other wise men. Unfortunately, such company did not in turn make Daeron wise. He was gentle and kindhearted his supporters said, but this would later be revealed as little more than a façade hiding his weakness and spiteful jealousies.

He was also far too influenced by his Dornish wife, Myriah Martell. So much so that Daeron immediately schemed on how to join Dorne into the realm ‘peacefully’ upon his ascension and make amends for his father and namesake’s ‘provocations’. And though he had cleared the corruption his father had enabled in the court, he replaced it with Dornish influence for Dornishmen soon dominated all the positions at court save for those on the Small Council itself, and Dornish nobles made up the majority of the courtiers.

Rumors had spread in the realm (some say spread by Aegon IV himself) for many long years before his ascension that Daeron was Falseborn, and in truth the bastard son of Aemon the Dragonknight and Queen Naerys and not the true son of King Aegon IV. To many this seemed plausible given the closeness the two had for each other and how much they far preferred each other’s company over their brother’s. Others also pointed to how unlike each other the two were (and those who had much to dislike about the King thought Daeron far nobler than he and much more alike to the Dragonknight than the Unworthy).

No such suspicions had ever fallen on Daeron’s sole living trueborn sibling, Princess Daenerys, for Aegon IV had by then become King and had the authority to ensure Aemon and Naerys were kept as far away from each other as possible at all times. For Daeron himself however, the rumors only continued to grow, and once Ser Aemon and Queen Naerys had both perished, there were none left who could truly refute them, as Aemon had done through trials by combat while they both still lived.

We pause here for a moment to consider Princess Daena’s views on the matter, as she relates in her private journals. In the words of the princess, it was without a doubt in her mind that Daeron was indeed Aemon’s son. The entire family had long known that Naerys loved Aemon and not Aegon and even Viserys II would later come to regret that he had married her to Aegon instead of Aemon.

Daena herself had initially far preferred Aemon to Aegon and in her youth she had held it not against her cousin Naerys for laying with “by far the worthier brother”. This would change later in her life however for reasons that would soon become clear.

While Princess Daena’s elder brother, Daeron I, the Young Dragon, had still lived, the family had been much more united. Despite their immense differences with each other, both Aegon and Aemon had greatly loved Daeron and seen him as a younger brother and king worth following, so much so that he could mediate and bring cooperation between them like no other could.

In those days, there was not truly yet the notion that Daeron the Younger was Aemon’s bastard son and those that suspected that was the case even within the family said nothing to keep the peace. Prince Aemon, according to Princess Daena’s journal, had even been the one to suggest that Naerys’ newborn son be named Daeron and the then Prince Aegon had for once, eagerly agreed with his brother. In later years it would come to be japed that Daeron II was named for Daeron I by both his fathers.

When Daeron I was infamously slain by sinful Dornish treachery under the sacred truce banner of the Seven in the year 161 AC, Prince Aemon was captured alive after failing to protect him, as was his duty as a Kingsguard.

Neither Aegon IV nor Princess Daena ever quite forgave Aemon for this failure, and the Princess, who had idolized her eldest brother was greatly distraught. At the height of her second brother Baelor’s reign, while she was imprisoned within the Maidenvault, Daena once pleaded with her cousin Aemon to set her and her sisters free, arguing that as the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard he had the ability to see it done.

Prince Aemon had refused, citing his oaths and vows to obey the king even if he disagreed with his decisions. Princess Daena had grown wroth then and told him that he already failed as a Kingsguard once before, what was stopping him this time? When Prince Aemon had refused to answer and walked away, Daena had shouted at him that he should have died in Dorne instead of Daeron.

The once close bond between cousins fractured permanently on that day and it affected Daena’s relationship with Naerys as well. Daena would begin drawing closer to her other cousin Aegon and this eventually led to the conception of their son, Daemon Blackfyre.

Upon the death of Baelor, when Daena and her son were denied the throne she saw as rightfully theirs, Daena grew wroth with the entirety of her uncle’s family. She never forgave Viserys II for as long as he lived, seeing her uncle as a traitor who had left her to languish under Baelor’s imprisonment before stealing her throne, and some of this resentment had passed onto Viserys II’s children as well.

Though she later reconciled with Aegon IV, partly out of genuine feelings seeing how he treated their son with favor, and mostly out of pragmatism to win even more favor, Daena’s hatred for Aemon and by extension, Naerys, only continued to grow.

The affair and bastard son she had once blamed them not for having now stood between her son and his rightful throne, and she no longer saw Aemon as just a failure but as the worst of usurpers, one who sought to utterly supplant the line of Daena’s father, Aegon III, and even his own brother, Aegon IV. Idly she even began to wonder if Aemon had purposely let her brother Daeron die that day in Dorne, knowing that Baelor was unlikely to have children and Daena and her sisters did not have enough support to claim the throne. All part of a master plan to seize the throne for his bastard son.

This of course is exceedingly unlikely, for despite any of the flaws he may have had, Aemon the Dragonknight greatly loved his cousin as aforementioned and it is rather contrived to think he could have conceived of such a plan twenty years in advance and predicted such a specific outcome. Nonetheless that Daena even began to suspect this spoke of the volume of sheer hatred she began to develop for Aemon and his supposed bastard son, Daeron.

She considered it a personal insult and complete and utter disgrace that her brother’s namesake dishonored his memory and constantly advocated for peace and friendship with the people who had murdered him and desecrated all decency and civilized customs in doing so. Daeron II’s very name drove Daena’s hatred of him when he failed to live up to it and she more than anyone else fueled the rumors that Daeron II was Falseborn during the reign of Aegon IV.

Even Aegon himself refused to believe he was cuckolded at first and many to this day wonder if the Unworthy ever actually believed it or if he was simply that spiteful to Daeron that he allowed the rumors to spread and even contributed to spreading it himself alongside Daena.

For their part, it is suggested that Aemon and Naerys never developed the same animosity towards Daena despite her ceaseless attacks upon them, perhaps sympathizing with her deep down and knowing her anger was righteous yet also aware it would ruin either of them should they let her have their way. Even when it was exceedingly obvious that men like Morgil Hastwyck who openly cast aspersions on Queen Naerys’ fidelity had been egged on by Daena or Aegon IV, neither of the two did anything beyond Aemon killing any who dared speak those rumors openly.

The opinions Daena held on Aemon, Naerys, and their supposed bastard son Daeron were repeated to her own son Daemon, and oft subtly reinforced by his father Aegon as well. Daemon however had grown up admiring the Dragonknight’s skill and chivalry as a paragon knight and wondered at the truth in his mother and father’s words, especially when the Lord Commander would often sneak him some sword lessons and advice whenever neither of his parents were watching.

In many ways it is tragic that such hatred and bitterness had grown to complicate the bonds between kin, and whatever the complete and utter truth of Daeron II’s parentage was, it died with Aemon and Naerys, the former defending his brother against the vengeful Toynes in 179 AC and the latter in childbirth with a child who died with her a year later in 180 AC.

Aemon and Naerys had only ever shown him kindness and despite their distance and at times rivalry with each other, neither Daeron nor his sons had ever been rude or uncourteous to Daemon growing up, further complicating his thoughts on the matter. Baelor in particular, Daeron’s eldest son, was of age with Daemon and the two had trained together on occasion and developed a mutual respect.

The one exception to this surprising cordiality however was Brynden Rivers. Almost instantaneously both Daemon and Aegor hated Brynden. Though there were some underlying reasons for it such as the Bracken-Blackwood rivalry and Aegor’s bitterness that his mother had been supplanted by Brynden’s, the three’s personalities clashed violently and some accounts even suggest that Daemon’s hatred of Brynden exceeded even that of Aegor’s at times, though it was never clear why as he had little reason to truly hate Brynden at first beyond supporting his favored brother.

There were a number of incidents in the boys’ youth escalating matters further. The two would grow especially wroth whenever Brynden attempted to spend time with either Daenerys or the young Shiera Seastar and drove him away however they could from them, often with violence if need be.

Many a time Daemon and Aegor claimed that Brynden was spying on them and Brynden even went so far as to claim that they had tried to take his life a few times. Such bold and slanderous accusations never amounted to anything but it did much to damage relations between Daemon and Aegor and the sons of Daeron who locked ranks behind their most favored and trusted uncle at the behest of their father who had befriended Brynden’s mother, Melissa Blackwood, once upon a time.

Nonetheless despite all the complex interpersonal relations within the family and at court, things were peaceful for the earliest years of Daeron II’s reign. Daeron II displeased many with his overtures to the Dornish but he seemed so much more capable and less corrupt than his predecessor, Aegon the Unworthy, that many were willing to tolerate it or even accept his ‘eccentric love for the Dornish’ at the start.

Daemon himself would soon be distracted from his burgeoning rivalries with Daeron’s side of the family by his blossoming romance with Daenerys. With their betrothal formalized by their father, the two fell deeper and deeper in love and both would only continue to grow in beauty, stature, and repute at court.

By the year 186 AC, Daemon had come of age. He was tall and powerful, with broad shoulders, muscular arms, and a flat stomach, an appearance fit for a warrior king that contrasted sharpy with that of the mild and scholarly King Daeron with his thin spindly legs and small pot belly in the eyes of some. Many even likened Daemon, the Black Prince, to portraits of Aegon the Conqueror, with his clean-shaven face, silver-gold hair, and deep purple eyes.

He had matured into a man of considerable skill and strength, mastering all weapons of war, but with his favored Blackfyre in hand, he was said to fight like the Warrior himself. He distinguished himself time and time again in tourneys around the realm, winning his first true knight’s tourney at fourteen. Always adorned with a costly and ornate suit of black and red plate, with a distinctive warhelm arrayed with batlike steel dragon wings on the sides.

Exceedingly charismatic with a welcoming smile and pleasant demeanor, he won friends easily, and many women were drawn to him, though he only ever had eyes for his beloved Daenerys.

Daenerys was in 186, four and ten, not yet of age, but already blossoming into an exceedingly beautiful and clever woman of great charm and popularity at court. Daemon’s darling, and darling of the whole realm beside she was called, and that became her own epithet in time. Daenerys the Darling (of the Realm). In later years, many would say that only her own half-sister, Shiera Seastar, could rival her beauty and charm.

The two were perfectly matched in the eyes of everyone. A most handsome couple. The picture-perfect image of beautiful princess and dashing and brave knight out of all the childhood songs and tales all had grown up loving. Daemon had even been promised land upstream along the Blackwater Rush by their elder brother Daeron II to raise a keep once they had wed after Daenerys came of age, and this act of good will did much to reconcile the two sides of the family from any bad feelings and distrust that had developed. All seemed to be perfectly set for the couple and indeed for the realm as a whole.

That is why it came as such an immense shock when, late in 187 AC, Daeron broke the betrothal and announced the wedding of Daenerys to Maron Martell at the dawn of the new year of 188 AC.

Ever since he had come to the throne, Daeron had been negotiating with his goodbrother, Prince Maron of Dorne, the terms and conditions for Dorne to peacefully join the realm and bend the knee. Many terms and conditions were agreed upon such as House Martell having the right to keep their royal title ‘Prince of Dorne, the autonomy to maintain their own laws, the right to assess and gather the taxes with only irregular oversight from the crown (with only minimal taxes to begin with anyway) and other such matters. The continuation of Dornish influence at court and the predominance of Dornish courtiers would also continue.

One key demand that Maron had asked for however, was a Targaryen princess to seal the pact through marriage. Daeron’s supporters argued that Daeron had initially attempted to offer Shiera but that Maron had rejected it, Dorne may not hold prejudices against bastards but they would not consent for a bastard as the wife of their Prince he said, and besides that Shiera was far too young to be a bride.

Faced with no other choice, Daeron broke the betrothal between Daenerys and Daemon and in the eyes of many, sold his sister to the Dornish to maintain his desired peace deal with Dorne. Many of the king’s critics and supporters of Daemon and Daenerys would whisper that Daeron was not nearly as reluctant to do this as he claimed and the deal with Dorne only gave him the pretext to deny Daemon a match that could further strengthen his claim to the throne since Daenerys was the only trueborn child of their father whose paternity was beyond reproach.

Daemon and Daenerys refused to accept their broken betrothal however and conspired to elope together. They were aided in this by many allies at court who thought Daeron had gone too far, an opinion that became even more widespread once the exact terms of the agreement and the exceedingly unprecedented concessions given to Dorne therein became common knowledge. That Daeron had spat on all traditions of filial piety by openly breaking a betrothal his father had explicitly arranged, simply to sell his sister to Dorne, only worsened things in the minds of those who aided the two star-crossed lovers.

Chief among the allies who aided the two was Ser Quentyn Ball. Known as ‘Fireball’, Quentyn was the master-at-arms of the Red Keep and had been the man who had trained Daemon and all the other young princelings in the Red Keep, including all of Daeron’s sons and his three half-brothers. He was renowned as one of the paragon knights of the realm and his efforts in training the princelings had been noticed by King Aegon IV, who had promised him a place on the Kingsguard at the next opening.

Unfortunately for Quentyn, Aegon IV died before he could honor his promise and when Quentyn reminded Daeron II of his father’s promise in 186 AC, the King turned him down, gently, but a rejection nonetheless, in favor of naming Ser Willem Wylde to the Kingsguard. Many suspected that Daeron mistrusted Quentyn who was exceedingly close to Daemon (so much so that Daemon would admit later in life that Quentyn had been more his father than Aegon IV had been) and wished not for him to be one of the seven swords trusted with guarding his person.

Nonetheless, Daeron’s refusal to honor his father’s promise to Quentyn Fireball had already caused a minor scandal at court and along with his breaking of Daemon and Daenerys’ betrothal, was seen as an indicator that Daeron was a king who would not honor the word of his predecessors. The insult was particularly grievous to Fireball as he had set aside a betrothal of his own to remain eligible for the Kingsguard after Aegon IV’s promise and all of that sacrifice had now been for nothing.

When he heard that the boy he had trained and all but raised had been slighted as he had been, Quentyn pulled on every connection he had at court to help spirit Princess Daenerys away from her guards and chaperones and allow the two to be wed as they rightfully should be.

Out of spite and at Fireball’s gleeful suggestion, Daemon and Daenerys would end up eloping and consummating their marriage the week before her planned wedding to Prince Maron, at a time when the entire realm and all the Dornish nobility had already gathered in the capital, including the spurned groom himself.

With the entire realm as their witness, the two declared their marriage and dared the King to do anything about it in open defiance in the Great Hall of the Red Keep. Some accounts claim that Daeron had been of half a mind to have Daemon arrested in that moment and Daenerys forcibly marched to the Great Sept of Baelor but the humiliated and cuckolded Maron vehemently declared that he would not have ‘used goods’ for a wife and many of Daemon’s friends and allies, and even some who had not previously thought much of him but had been displeased by Daeron’s heavy-handedness, rallied to his side.

Daeron was left with no choice but to back down. However, he made it clear that Daemon and Daenerys were no longer welcome in court and the land that had been promised to Daemon was now forfeit.

“The price of your disobedience,” all accounts agree Daeron had said to Daemon.

“If this is the price of love, the punishment for honoring our father’s word, then I gladly pay it, Your Grace,” Daemon had retorted.

The very next day, Daemon and Daenerys left King’s Landing with Daena, Aegor, Shiera, Ser Quentyn Fireball (who had been removed from his post as master at arms) and a great host of their other friends and allies in tow. Daeron meanwhile was left to try and salvage his deal with Dorne but the price the furious and humiliated Maron Martell demanded was so high even Daeron balked.

In addition to all of the previously agreed upon terms, Dorne would now pay little more than a token tax to the Iron Throne, Maron would become Hand of the King, the next opening on the Kingsguard would be filled by a Dornish knight, the Small Council seats would all be given to Dornishmen, and a law would be made that at least one seat on the Small Council and half of the minor court positions be reserved for Dorne in perpetuity. Several more additional concessions were obtained as well, such as the right for House Martell to grant charters, including city charters, in their own name and power in Dorne instead of that going to the Crown as it should have.

Even worse than continuing to remain independent in all but name, Dorne now all but ruled the rest of the Seven Kingdoms too, and when Daeron eventually acquiesced to the additional demands, he confirmed to many their worst fears. Their king was ruled by his Dornish wife and goodbrother, and he had sold the kingdom to a foreign power that had slaughtered tens of thousands of their countrymen and broken all norms and customs of decency to kill a beloved king, Daeron II’s own namesake, whose memory he desecrated.

Dissent and unrest grew enormously as a result and all who were displeased with the ill-rule of Daeron had the perfect claimants to rally around. Daemon Blackfyre and Daenerys the Darling.


The star-crossed lovers