The Gates of the Moon is the lower castle of the Eyrie, a mountain stronghold whose strategic importance exceeds its physical scale. In the Vale’s political crisis, it is the seat held by Nestor Royce and the point at which the demands of the Lords Declarant become an immediate military threat. It also serves as the essential passage between the inaccessible heights of the Eyrie and the Vale below, turning geography into both protection and vulnerability.

Setting and Physical Form

The Gates of the Moon is presented as a sharply diminished fortress rather than a grand castle. From the Eyrie, Sansa Stark, living under her Alayne Stone identity, can see its towers and keeps reduced to the size of children’s toys. Around its walls, the forces of the Lords Declarant emerge from their tents, making the lower stronghold appear almost swallowed by the encircling host. The visual contrast establishes the imbalance between the castle’s defenders and the political coalition gathered against them.

When Alayne descends from the Eyrie with Robert Arryn, the place proves even smaller than its name suggests. It is a crescent-shaped wall of old unmortared stone enclosing a stony ledge and the yawning mouth of a cavern. Its interior contains storehouses, stables, a long natural hall, and carved handholds leading upward toward the Eyrie. Broken stones and boulders cover the ground outside, while earthen ramps provide access to the wall. The description makes the Gates of the Moon feel less like a complete independent fortress than a rough waycastle formed by mountain, stone, and necessity.

Its location gives the stronghold an extraordinary vertical relationship to the Eyrie. The upper castle lies six hundred feet above, while the Vale spreads far below in green and gold. The Gates of the Moon therefore occupies an intermediate threshold: it is below the Eyrie but still far above ordinary ground, connected to the high castle by a dangerous descent and to the valley by the mountain road. The surrounding grandeur of the Giant’s Lance and the frozen heights intensifies the sense that human fortifications are precarious interruptions in an overwhelming landscape.

Political and Military Role

Nestor Royce holds the Gates of the Moon with fewer than three hundred men. That force is plainly inadequate against the six Lords Declarant, each of whom has brought roughly a thousand men. The coalition includes Benedar Belmore, Symond Templeton, Horton Redfort, Anya Waynwood, Gilwood Hunter, and Bronze Yohn Royce. After Lysa Arryn’s fall, the six gathered at Runestone and pledged to defend Robert Arryn, the Vale, and one another. Their public language condemns “misrule” and “false friends and evil counselors,” leaving the Lord Protector’s position under direct pressure without naming the office itself.

The crisis becomes concrete when Young Lord Hunter and his levies arrive. Nestor Royce closes the Gates against them, using the stronghold’s position to deny the Lords Declarant immediate access even though his garrison is vastly outnumbered. The act is defensive rather than triumphant: the walls can delay or contain the opposing forces, but the numbers outside demonstrate how little room Nestor has for error.

Petyr Baelish recognizes the same imbalance. He keeps only a garrison of twenty men, while Bronze Yohn and his allies can raise twenty thousand. If Nestor’s cousin chooses to move against him, Petyr admits that he cannot stop it by force. The Gates of the Moon thus becomes the practical center of a conflict that is formally about governance and the protection of the young lord of the Vale. Its walls embody the narrow military foundation beneath Petyr’s authority.

Gateway Between Heights and Vale

The Gates of the Moon is also defined by movement. Travel between the Eyrie and the valley requires passage down the mountain, and the stronghold provides the lower station for that journey. The descent is made in a bucket, after which travelers emerge inside the waycastle. Twenty mules, two mule-walkers, and Myranda Royce await Robert and Alayne there, showing that the site is not merely a defensive position but a logistical hub for traffic through the mountain.

Robert’s arrival reveals the difference between the ceremonial remoteness of the Eyrie and the practical world below it. The young lord climbs out of the bucket within the rough enclosure, and Myranda Royce kneels in the snow to greet him. The scene places family recognition, transport, animals, stores, and weather within the same cramped space. The Gates of the Moon is where the Vale’s lofty politics must meet the material requirements of roads, pack animals, supplies, and bodily movement.

Narrative Significance

The stronghold’s narrative force comes from the tension between appearance and function. It is physically unimpressive, yet it controls the route to one of the most defensible and symbolically elevated seats in the Vale. Seen from above, it looks tiny beneath the assembled Lords Declarant; experienced from within, it is a cavernous, rough-edged shelter capable of receiving travelers and securing the mountain passage.

That contrast mirrors the political situation surrounding Petyr Baelish and Robert Arryn. Authority appears to reside in the Eyrie, but the pressure that may determine its future gathers below, around a fortress defended by fewer than three hundred men. The Gates of the Moon therefore functions as a threshold in both spatial and political terms: whoever controls it can regulate access to the heights, while whoever threatens it can expose how vulnerable the elevated order truly is.