Alysanne Blackwood

Alysanne Blackwood, better known as Black Aly, was a Blackwood archer and political actor whose influence reached well beyond the battlefield. As the sister of Samwell Blackwood and aunt of Benjicot Blackwood, she fought for the riverlands during the Dance of the Dragons; later, her intervention with Cregan Stark helped preserve a royal pardon, and her practical response to the needs of widows and returning soldiers helped shape the region’s recovery.

Identity and Early Reputation

Alysanne was the younger sister of Samwell Blackwood and the aunt of Benjicot, Lord of Raventree. The accounts describe her as a huntress, a horse-breaker, and an exceptional archer, with a tall, slender build, strong arms, and long black curls. Her reputation joined physical courage with a forceful manner: she was counted among the women who could ride and fight alongside the lords and soldiers of the riverlands rather than remain at a distance from their campaigns.

Her name also appears beside Sabitha Frey’s in accounts of the women supporting the young riverlords. The two were often in one another’s company and had shared a tent while on campaign. The detail places Alysanne within a circle of women whose authority rested not only on family rank but on their visible participation in the war. She was Samwell’s sister, Benjicot’s aunt, and a formidable presence in her own right.

The Burning Mill and the Riverlands Campaign

Alysanne’s first defining battlefield story is attached to the Battle of the Burning Mill. When Samwell Blackwood surprised the Bracken force beneath a riverside mill, the ensuing fight continued for hours as the mill burned. Samwell and Amos Bracken killed one another in single combat. According to the account, Amos was then killed by a weirwood arrow that passed through the eye slit of his helm and into his skull. The arrow was supposedly loosed by Alysanne, who was sixteen at the time. The narrative explicitly leaves the claim uncertain: it may be true, or it may be a family legend. That uncertainty is part of her early reputation, linking her to a consequential act without presenting the story as established fact.

The battle’s defeat left the Brackens in retreat, but the reversals did not end there. While they were away, Prince Daemon Targaryen led a force that captured Stone Hedge. Raylon Rivers yielded after Lord Humfrey Bracken and his remaining children, wife, and paramour were taken captive. The defeat broke House Bracken’s position in the riverlands and weakened the remaining supporters of King Aegon II there. Alysanne’s battlefield legend thus belongs to a wider sequence in which military losses changed the balance of power across the region.

Later, as the conflict resumed, Alysanne returned to the field with three hundred bows beside Benjicot. When the riverlords gathered against Borros Baratheon’s army at the Battle of the Kingsroad, Benjicot led men from the woods in the attack that helped turn the battle. Alysanne and her archers also brought down Borros’s horse; the stormlord continued fighting on foot and died in the battle. Her presence among the archers makes her part of the force that overcame the last great army supporting Aegon II, not simply a figure in stories about earlier fighting.

The Lads and the Political Settlement

After the Battle of the Kingsroad, Benjicot and the Tully brothers emerged as the young leaders of the riverland host. Bound together by battle, they became known collectively as the Lads. Alysanne accompanied her nephew at court and council in King’s Landing, where she encountered Cregan Stark. The account presents their attraction as mutual: the widowed Lord of Winterfell sought her company, and her fearlessness, stubborn strength, and blunt manner appealed to him.

Their connection acquired political consequence during the dispute over the fate of Corlys Velaryon. The young Prince Aegon had called for Corlys to be spared and restored to office, but Cregan Stark, then Hand of the King, could have disregarded the prince’s command and proceeded with the execution. Mushroom’s account credits Alysanne with persuading him to let the edict stand. She argued that keeping Corlys alive would serve the realm and prevent further deaths if Alyn Velaryon sought vengeance. Cregan initially insisted that traitors should die; Alysanne pressed the case for peace and then made a personal appeal, promising him the boon he chose in return for granting hers.

Cregan accepted her request and asked for her hand in marriage. Alysanne agreed, and the bargain connected a political act of restraint with a personal commitment. The episode makes her more than an adviser who happened to be close to the Hand: she identified the danger of prolonging retaliation, found the argument that could reach Cregan, and helped secure a decision that spared Corlys. The account offers competing explanations for Cregan’s leniency, but presents Alysanne’s role as the most persuasive one.

Marriage and the Widow Fairs

In 132 AC, Benjicot travelled north to Winterfell to witness his aunt’s marriage to Cregan. Winter had already taken hold, and the journey lasted three times as long as expected. Snowstorms cost the party half its horses, while outlaw attacks carried off much of its food and all the wedding gifts. Despite the difficult passage, the wedding was described as splendid. Alysanne and Cregan pledged their troth before the heart tree in Winterfell’s godswood; at the feast, Cregan’s four-year-old son Rickon sang for his new stepmother.

Alysanne’s influence continued after the wedding. Cregan had brought a large host south, many of them men whose return to the North would bring hardship to the families they had left behind. Alysanne proposed that they instead settle among the widows of the riverlands, many of whom had lost husbands in the war and were raising young children. With winter approaching, the men could offer needed labor and support, while the widows could offer them homes. More than a thousand northmen later accompanied Alysanne and Benjicot back to the riverlands.

The resulting Widow Fairs were held at Raventree, Riverrun, Stoney Sept, the Twins, and Fairmarket. Hundreds of marriages took place. Men who did not marry instead pledged themselves as guards or men-at-arms to riverland lords; some became outlaws, but the settlement was judged successful overall. The northmen strengthened the houses that welcomed them, particularly House Tully and House Blackwood, and helped revive and spread the worship of the old gods south of the Neck. Alysanne’s proposal therefore addressed several consequences of war at once: the return of soldiers, the need of bereaved households, and the weakened communities of the riverlands.

Significance

Alysanne’s story repeatedly joins combat to reconstruction. At the Burning Mill, she is remembered—though not with certainty—as the archer who killed Amos Bracken. In the later campaign, she commanded three hundred bows beside her nephew. At court, she used her standing with Cregan to argue against a new cycle of vengeance; after the war, she helped turn the problem of a displaced northern host into a settlement that served both soldiers and riverland families.

These episodes give her authority across different settings: battlefield, council, marriage, and postwar resettlement. The accounts preserve uncertainty around the most dramatic claim about her first battle, while giving a clearer sequence of later choices and consequences. Black Aly’s significance rests not only on being a warrior woman in a war led by rival houses, but on how she carried that capacity for action into the work of securing peace and rebuilding life after the fighting.