Stokeworth, a Crownlands seat near King's Landing, appears as both a precarious refuge and a contested political stronghold during the Dance of the Dragons. Its changing banners trace the danger of declaring for one claimant and the rapid transfer of power after Aegon II's death.

Setting and Rhaenyra's Flight

As Rhaenyra fled King's Landing, the account associates Stokeworth with a brief, uncertain welcome: the young lord's castellan gave her hospitality for a single night, while warning that her pursuers would come and that he lacked the power to resist them. Her flight was already perilous; half her gold cloaks had deserted, and broken men had attacked her camp. The temporary shelter at Stokeworth offered no lasting protection.

The same passage describes Rhaenyra finding Rosby's gates barred, on the orders of a young woman whose claim she had set aside in favor of a younger brother. The narrative places that rejection alongside the castellan's warning, showing how the queen's earlier decisions and the shifting balance of power narrowed the welcome available to her as she fled toward Duskendale.

Aegon II's Punitive Campaign

After Rhaenyra's death, Aegon II sought vengeance against those who had supported her. He sent royal forces and stormlanders under Borros Baratheon against Rosby, Stokeworth, Duskendale, and nearby keeps and villages. The lords under pressure lowered Rhaenyra's quartered banner and raised Aegon's golden dragon, but submission did not spare them from punishment: they were brought in chains to King's Landing and compelled to do obeisance before the king. Release came only after they agreed to pay heavy ransoms and provide hostages to the Crown.

The campaign's coercive terms turned outward compliance into a source of further resistance. Rather than securing the realm, the punishments hardened the late queen's supporters against Aegon II; reports of forces gathering in the North and Riverlands followed. Stokeworth's ordeal thus formed part of a wider effort to compel loyalty that helped renew opposition to the king.

The Change of Banners

After Aegon II's death, Stokeworth and Rosby submitted without bloodshed. They pulled down Aegon's golden dragon and raised the red dragon of Aegon III, marking a swift change in allegiance as the new king's supporters took control of the Crownlands.

The sequence gives Stokeworth a compact but revealing role in the conflict: first, a temporary shelter unable to protect a fleeing queen; then a target of reprisals that demanded ransom and hostages; finally, a town that changed its allegiance without a fight when the political balance shifted. Its banners register the pressure exerted by competing rulers on local strongholds and the difference between compelled submission and the bloodless transition that followed Aegon II's death.