The wind screamed across the Redgrass Field, and with it came war.
Banners snapped like thunder in the gust, each standard bearing dragon or sword, fire or crow. Red dust rose in plumes beneath a thousand hooves and boots, staining steel and cloth and skin alike. When men spoke of that day in years to come, they would remember the color—a field soaked not in water, but in blood.
Daemon Blackfyre had come at last.
He rode at the head of his host, Blackfyre in hand, the ancient blade alive with dark light. His sons rode beside him—Daemon the Younger and Aegon—gleaming in black armor, silver filigree, and crimson cloaks. Beneath the banner of the black dragon, the lords of the stormlands and Reach had flocked to him, eager for the glory he promised, or the vengeance he would unleash.
Across the field stood the royal banners, the red three-headed dragon of House Targaryen waving above ranks of spearmen and horse. The vanguard was commanded by Lord Donnel Arryn, tall and stern in the white and blue of the Vale. They met the Blackfyres first—and they shattered first.
Daemon's charge split the vanguard like a sword cleaving flesh. His hammer-blow struck home just after midday, as the sun beat down upon bronze and mail. The loyalists held for a time—Arryn men are hardy, and death is no stranger to their mountain blood—but not even they could withstand Daemon Blackfyre astride his warhorse, swinging the blade of Aegon the Conqueror.
Within the hour, Lord Donnel was down, his banner trampled in the mud. Chaos reigned.
And yet the crown had not broken.
From the south, Ser Gwayne Corbray came thundering with a fresh host—the white cloaks of the Kingsguard flanking him as his riders slammed into Daemon's flank. Their leader bore no sigil but the white cloak upon his back and the cold steel of Lady Forlorn, the Valyrian blade of House Corbray, in his mailed hands.
Daemon turned to meet him, and for a moment, the battle itself seemed to pause.
Steel sang.
They circled each other amid a swirl of corpses and banners. Gwayne's blade was quick, like lightning flashing through a storm. Daemon's was fire, brutal and unrelenting, driven by strength and grace.
For an hour they fought—blade against blade, history against destiny. Each stroke rang across the field, echoing louder than warhorns. The Blackfyre host roared. The royalists prayed. Neither man yielded.
Until the red flash came.
Daemon struck—a low arc that caught Gwayne across the face, the Valyrian edge slicing through the eye slit of his visor, blood and gore blooming in its wake. Ser Gwayne fell to one knee, gasping, and still raised his sword. But Daemon's next blow broke it, and with it, the last of the Kingsguard's resistance.
On a distant hill, Brynden Rivers watched from beneath the shadow of a weeping tree.
He was clad in his colors—smoke and scarlet—his pale face half-hidden beneath the cowl of his cloak. Beside him stood his chosen—the Raven's Teeth, a band of longbowmen and swordsmen as silent as stone. Their bows were carved from weirwood, white and cruel.
They bore no banners of the crown.
Instead, they bore Brynden's own standard—a white dragon with red eyes, its wings flared, breathing flame of crimson upon a field of black.
Not a soul saw them approach. Not a soul would see them vanish.
Brynden watched as Daemon lifted Blackfyre over his head, a signal to his host that the battle was his. The Blackfyres roared, sensing their victory.
And still, Bloodraven said nothing.
His one red eye turned not to Daemon, nor to the wounded Corbray.
It turned toward the ridge to the west—to a lonely slope soon to be soaked in blood. The Weeping Ridge, they would call it. Not yet. But soon.
He raised one pale hand. The Raven's Teeth shifted, their bows ready, their eyes sharp.
And still Brynden did not speak.
The time would come.
And when it did, a thousand eyes—and one—would see it all.