Pyke is the seat of the Seastone Chair, and after Dalton Greyjoy’s death it became the focal point of a contested succession and a Lannister attack. Its political importance is shown through the struggle over who would rule the Iron Islands: the child Toron Greyjoy remained on the chair, but only after factions had fought over his claim and defenders turned back an assault on Pyke’s walls.

The Seastone Chair and the Succession

Dalton Greyjoy left no rock wife, and his heirs were two young sons born to salt wives who remained on Pyke. Under Ironborn law, the Seastone Chair passed to the elder son, Toron, who was not yet six. His mother could not act as regent as a rock wife might have, leaving the child’s inheritance exposed to competing claims and making a struggle for power inevitable.

After Dalton’s death, that struggle divided the Iron Islands into three camps. His sisters and their husbands seized Toron and put his mother to death; his cousins joined the lords of Harlaw and Blacktyde in raising Toron’s half-brother Rodrik; and the men of Great Wyk rallied to Sam Salt, who claimed descent from the black line. Pyke’s succession thus sat at the center of a conflict extending across the islands, with the boy’s legal claim far from secure.

Lannister Assault and Its Aftermath

The three-sided fighting had lasted half a year when Ser Leo Costayne brought a Lannister fleet against the Iron Islands, landing thousands of soldiers on Pyke, Great Wyk, and Harlaw. The campaign failed to establish Lady Johanna Lannister’s preferred rule. Costayne was killed on Great Wyk, and most of his ships were seized or sunk.

The violence nevertheless exacted a heavy price. Hundreds of longships and fishing boats were burned, along with homes and villages, and thousands died of starvation after the Lannisters carried off stored grain and salt fish or destroyed what they could not take. At Pyke, Toron’s defenders beat off the assault on the walls, leaving him on the Seastone Chair. His half-brother Rodrik was captured and taken to Casterly Rock, where Lady Johanna had him gelded and made him her son’s fool.

Pyke’s Political Significance

Pyke’s importance in these events lies not in a detailed account of its streets or defenses, but in its position as the seat of succession. The Seastone Chair gave the struggle over a very young heir a fixed center, while the inability of his salt-wife mother to serve as regent weakened the protection that might otherwise have guarded his rule. Even as rival claimants and outside forces fought across the islands, the outcome at Pyke determined whether Toron retained the chair.

The assault’s failure preserved Toron’s place there, but not an untroubled inheritance: the account places his survival amid a wider contest that brought severe losses to the Iron Islands and removed rival claimants by force. Pyke therefore stands as both the dynastic center of the Greyjoy succession crisis and the point at which the child king’s claim endured the Lannister attack.