Blacks

The Blacks were the faction supporting Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen’s claim to succeed her father, King Viserys I Targaryen. They developed from a court party into a rival royal court on Dragonstone, where Rhaenyra’s supporters organized their resources and asserted her right to rule after Aegon II’s accession. Their claim rested on Viserys’s designation of Rhaenyra as heir and the oaths sworn to her, but it faced a powerful counterclaim grounded in the precedent of male succession, Aegon’s coronation, and the symbols and institutions already in his hands.

Formation and Name

During Viserys’s reign, a party of powerful lords supported Queen Alicent and the rights of her sons, while another party supported Rhaenyra. Viserys tried to maintain peace between his wife and daughter, distributing gifts, gold, and honors to both sides. The court continued to hold feasts and tourneys, but the opposing parties were already visible in the hostility between their dragons when they passed near one another.

The names Greens and Blacks became customary after a great tourney at King’s Landing in 111 AC, held on the fifth anniversary of Viserys’s marriage to Alicent. The queen wore green to the opening feast; Rhaenyra wore Targaryen red and black. The colors gave the competing court parties a recognizable shorthand. The Blacks’ name thus arose before the open war: it marked a division already present in the royal household, rather than a faction first assembled on the battlefield.

The conflict also had a dynastic history. At the Great Council of 101 AC, the assembled lords chose Viserys over Laenor Velaryon by a reported margin of more than twenty to one. Many later treated that decision as a precedent against a woman inheriting the Iron Throne or transmitting the claim to her descendants. Viserys did not accept that this settled his daughter’s case: he continued to intend that Rhaenyra and her sons would succeed him, and presented each of her Velaryon boys with a dragon’s egg in the cradle. The eggs hatched as Vermax, Arrax, and Tyraxes, while Viserys publicly affirmed Jacaerys’s future place as heir. The Blacks therefore had royal designation and prior oaths to invoke, but confronted a succession custom that many lords understood to favor a male claimant.

Supporters and Sources of Strength

The faction’s most consequential ally was Corlys Velaryon, Lord of Driftmark, whose support brought the power and wealth of House Velaryon to Rhaenyra’s cause. Corlys attended the council on Dragonstone with Princess Rhaenys. A group of lesser lords also sat with them, including the lords of Claw Isle, Rook’s Rest, Stonedance, Sharp Point, and Duskendale. They considered themselves loyal to Rhaenyra, though they knew that Aegon II would regard them as traitors and had already summoned them to King’s Landing to swear allegiance to him.

The Blacks’ advantages were substantial but uneven. House Velaryon’s wealth and fleet gave Rhaenyra an advantage at sea, while Daemon Targaryen brought experience from the Stepstones. Rhaenyra also had dragons, a source of power that could serve both in battle and as a visible demonstration of the strength behind her claim. Some older lords might remember the oaths sworn when Viserys named her Princess of Dragonstone and heir. Her former popularity as the Realm’s Delight, however, did not guarantee that those who had once cheered her would now risk their lives for her.

Against them stood the resources already gathered around Aegon II. His faction held King’s Landing, Oldtown, and Lannisport, described as the realm’s largest and richest cities. Aegon occupied the Red Keep and sat the Iron Throne; he wore the Conqueror’s crown, wielded the Conqueror’s sword, and had received an anointing before a public crowd. His council included Grand Maester Orwyle, and the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard had crowned him. For many observers, his being male strengthened his claim. The Blacks, by contrast, had to turn Rhaenyra’s prior designation and their own allegiance into effective rule from outside the capital.

The Black Council and Its Strategy

After the news of Aegon’s accession reached Dragonstone, Rhaenyra called a council of her own, known as the black council in contrast to the green council at King’s Landing. She presided with Daemon and Maester Gerardys. Her sons Jacaerys, Lucerys, and Joffrey attended, along with Ser Erryk Cargyll and Ser Lorent Marbrand. The island’s garrison comprised thirty knights, a hundred crossbowmen, and three hundred men-at-arms, a force considered adequate for defending the fortress but not for conquering the capital.

The council planned to build a foothold on the mainland and make the opposing king respond to pressure. Daemon was to attack Harrenhal on Caraxes, securing a place large enough to shelter a substantial host and attract riverlords who had not yet openly declared for Rhaenyra. At sea, Corlys would command the Velaryon fleet in a blockade of the Gullet, restricting shipping in and out of Blackwater Bay; Rhaenys would fly above the ships to deter attacks by dragons. Meanwhile, envoys would seek support from Riverrun, the Eyrie, Pyke, and Storm’s End. The plan did not begin with an attempt to storm King’s Landing: Daemon judged the Blacks too weak to take it by force and hoped instead to provoke Aegon into an imprudent attack.

Jacaerys proposed that he and Lucerys carry the messages themselves, arguing that dragons could persuade lords more swiftly than ravens. Rhaenyra permitted them to go only as envoys, not combatants, and required both to swear solemnly on a copy of the Seven-Pointed Star. Jacaerys received the longer and more dangerous route, to the Eyrie, White Harbor, and Winterfell; Lucerys was sent to Storm’s End. Rhaenyra refused to send Joffrey, who was only eleven. The missions made the young princes active instruments of the faction’s diplomacy, while the conditions she imposed showed the risks she was trying to contain.

Rival Coronations and the Faction’s Claim

The Blacks’ first public assertion of Rhaenyra’s queenship followed the arrival of Ser Steffon Darklyn, who had left Aegon’s Kingsguard and brought the stolen crown of Jaehaerys the Conciliator to Dragonstone. Before the assembled garrison, Daemon placed the crown on Rhaenyra’s head. She named Jacaerys Prince of Dragonstone and heir to the Iron Throne, while Daemon claimed the title Protector of the Realm. Her first act as queen was to declare Otto Hightower and Alicent traitors and rebels. She nevertheless offered her half-brothers and Helaena the chance to come to Dragonstone, submit, and be forgiven, presenting their shared blood as a reason to avoid the ultimate crime of kin-slaying.

The competing coronations made the division unmistakable. Aegon II had been crowned at the Dragonpit with the Conqueror’s crown, in a ceremony attended by a crowd whose size the accounts dispute. Rhaenyra’s coronation took place on Dragonstone before three hundred witnesses, with the older crown carried there by defectors from Aegon’s Kingsguard. The two ceremonies claimed royal authority through different combinations of inheritance, ritual, and allegiance. Once news of Rhaenyra’s coronation reached King’s Landing, Aegon declared her and Daemon guilty of treason and demanded their arrest and deaths. The Blacks had moved from a faction opposing Alicent’s party at court to an organized rival sovereignty, and their claim now made war the means by which either side would try to secure the realm.