The Nightfort was a vast castle on the Wall, encountered by Queen Alysanne Targaryen during her northern progress. Its immense scale, oppressive atmosphere, and ruinous cost to heat made it an unsuitable stronghold for the Night’s Watch. At Alysanne’s urging, the Watch abandoned it and built the smaller castle of Deep Lake farther east, a change the queen herself financed.

Setting and the Queen’s Visit

First Ranger Benton Glover led Alysanne west along the top of the Wall, past Snowgate to the Nightfort, where she and her party descended and spent the night. She remembered the ride across the Wall as exhilarating but bitterly cold, with winds so strong she feared they would sweep the riders away. The journey’s exhilaration gave way to unease at the castle: its scale seemed to dwarf the men inside it, and Alysanne found the place grim and sinister, with a darkness and oppressive quality in the air. She was glad to leave.

A Castle Judged Unfit

Alysanne’s visit was not merely a sightseeing excursion. She spent afternoons discussing the wildlings, the Wall, and the Night’s Watch’s needs with Lord Commander Burley and his officers. She accepted that the Watch needed a castle between Snowgate and Icemark, but judged the Nightfort itself crumbling, overlarge, and ruinously expensive to heat. Lord Commander Burley could not dispute her assessment, but explained that the Watch lacked the money to build a replacement.

Abandonment and Replacement

Alysanne had anticipated the financial obstacle. She pledged her own jewels to pay for a smaller castle farther east, and Deep Lake was built over the following eight years. The Nightfort was abandoned before the new stronghold was completed, as Alysanne had wished. A statue of the queen stands outside Deep Lake’s main hall, while Lord Commander Burley also honored her by renaming Snowgate Queensgate. The Nightfort’s fate thus marked a practical reordering of the Wall’s defenses: rather than preserve a grand but deteriorating fortress, the Watch moved toward a smaller castle that the queen had made possible.