Criston Cole

Criston Cole’s career traces a striking reversal: the young knight Rhaenyra Targaryen called her “white knight” became a leading opponent of her claim, Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, and Hand to Aegon II. His ascent rested on martial skill and royal favor; his later influence helped harden the rival court factions into armed enemies. He died in the field during the Dance of the Dragons, where his opponents refused to make his death a chivalric contest.

Origins and Rise at Court

Cole was born the son of a steward serving Lord Dondarrion of Blackhaven. At three-and-twenty, he came to royal attention at the melee held in Maidenpool to celebrate Viserys’s accession. He knocked Dark Sister from Daemon Targaryen’s hand with a morningstar, pleasing the king and angering the prince. The victory also brought him into contact with the young Princess Rhaenyra: Cole gave the seven-year-old the victor’s laurel and asked for her favor to wear in the joust. He defeated Daemon again in the lists, unhorsed both Kingsguard twins, Arryk Cargyll and Erryk Cargyll, and was finally unhorsed by Lymond Mallister.

In 105 AC, the death of Ser Ryam Redwyne opened a place in the Kingsguard, and Cole was appointed to fill it. His appearance and charm made him popular among the ladies at court, especially Rhaenyra. She asked Viserys to appoint him as her personal shield and protector, and the king granted the request. Cole thereafter wore her favor in the lists and remained beside her at feasts and entertainments. His place at court was therefore more than that of a celebrated fighter: he was publicly identified with the princess and her household.

The Princess’s Champion and the Queen’s Party

Cole’s connection to Rhaenyra became a visible political emblem. At the great tourney in King’s Landing in 111 AC, held on the fifth anniversary of Viserys’s marriage to Alicent Hightower, the queen wore green and the princess red and black. Those colors gave the two court parties their familiar names: the greens and the blacks. Cole entered the tourney wearing Rhaenyra’s favor and unhorsed all of the queen’s champions, including two of her cousins and her youngest brother, Gwayne Hightower. His triumph made the division between the princess’s supporters and the queen’s supporters public spectacle.

That alignment did not last. The accounts leave uncertain whether Rhaenyra scorned Cole or Cole rejected her; they agree that afterward his former love turned to loathing and disdain. The companion who had been her constant protector became one of her bitterest foes. By Rhaenyra’s wedding to Laenor Velaryon in 114 AC, Cole had turned to Alicent’s party and wore the queen’s favor. At the wedding tourney, he fought in a fury, injured Harwin Strong, and struck down Laenor’s champion, Joffrey Lonmouth. Joffrey died six days later without regaining consciousness. Viserys was angered that a joyful celebration had become a source of grief and recrimination, while Alicent soon requested Cole as her own personal protector. The change in his allegiance was thus marked both by court ceremony and by a fatal consequence.

Afterward, Cole served as Lord Commander of the Kingsguard and stood openly against Rhaenyra. Laenor returned to Driftmark, while Harwin became the princess’s foremost supporter at court. Cole, no longer at her side, was now identified with the queen’s faction. The personal reversal and the political split ran together: the man once displaying Rhaenyra’s favor in tournaments came to represent the camp that contested her succession.

Succession, the Council, and the Kingmaker

By the eve of the crisis in 129 AC, Cole was still Lord Commander, while Otto Hightower served as Hand. As Viserys’s health failed, the king left more of the realm’s government to his Hand and small council. When the council debated what should follow the king’s death, Cole argued that Rhaenyra’s son Jacaerys Velaryon would inherit after her. He attacked the prospect of a bastard succeeding to the Iron Throne and made allegations about Rhaenyra’s conduct and Laenor’s private life. These were arguments made in a succession struggle, not neutral findings; their function was to present her rule as a danger to the realm and to strengthen the case for Aegon II.

When Viserys died, Alicent went to the king’s bedchamber with Cole. After they confirmed the king was dead, she ordered the room sealed and guarded, and the servant who had found the body was taken into custody to prevent the news from spreading. Cole returned to White Sword Tower and sent Kingsguard brothers to summon the small council. The meeting took place in the queen’s apartments in Maegor’s Holdfast, with Cole among the central figures present as the court moved to determine the succession. His position as Lord Commander gave him a direct role in controlling the first response to the king’s death as well as a voice in the political deliberations that followed.

Under Aegon II, Cole became Hand. When the young king grew impatient with Otto’s efforts to negotiate support from the Triarchy, he removed Otto and gave Cole the chain of office. Cole urged Aegon to treat opposition as treason rather than seek support as a petitioner. The captured lords who had supported Rhaenyra were then offered a chance to swear fealty; those who refused were executed, and their heads displayed above the city gates. Cole’s appointment therefore marked a shift from argument and diplomacy toward coercion, with immediate consequences for those who had pledged themselves to the rival claimant.

Defeat and Death at the Butcher’s Ball

Even as Rhaenyra and her dragons took King’s Landing, Cole and Aemond Targaryen were advancing on Harrenhal. Their campaign brought Cole into the path of the northern force known as the Winter Wolves, led by Roderick Dustin. When the opposing forces faced one another, Cole warned that a battle would cost the northmen lives. Dustin answered that they had come prepared to die. Cole then offered to fight a small group of opponents himself, framing the confrontation as a personal combat.

Pate of Longleaf rejected that arrangement. From the ridge, Red Robb Rivers and two archers fired on Cole, killing him before the fight could become the duel he had proposed. Pate said there would be no songs celebrating Cole’s bravery and held him responsible for the many deaths caused by the war. With their commander dead, Cole’s followers lost heart and fled; the queen’s forces pursued them, killing hundreds. Garibald Grey called the encounter butchery rather than battle, and Mushroom’s name for it, the Butcher’s Ball, endured.

The name Kingmaker captures the political identity Cole acquired through his service to Aegon, but his final scene strips away the heroic version of that title. He had risen through tournament victories and a position close to the royal family, and had tried to make his death a test of personal courage. His enemies instead refused the terms he offered, killing him from a distance and leaving his army to collapse. The former champion’s end, and the battle named for its one-sided slaughter, completed his transformation from the princess’s celebrated protector into a principal agent of the war against her.