Hardhand: The Life and Times of King Harwyn Hoare

by wildlingking

This book tells the life story of the legendary King Harwyn "Hardhand" Hoare, the grandfather of Harren the Black, from his childhood on the Iron Islands all the way to his reign as the first King of the Isles and the Rivers.

Prologue: Childhood on the Iron Islands

I am Harwyn Hoare, the first King of the Isles and the Rivers, known among my Ironborn brethren as the Hardhand. I was born on the island of Orkmont as the third son of King Qhorwyn Hoare, ten years prior to the Doom of Valyria. In my life I have been a prince, a raider, a slave, a sellsword, a king and a conqueror. I have been hailed as a hero and cursed as a tyrant. I have left thousands dead in my wake, and with chains of iron I have forged a greater legacy than any Iron King before me. This is my story.

The first memory I have of my childhood is from the day that my mother died. If memory serves me right it was a cold and foggy day, the beginning of a winter that would last for five years. I was no older than four years that day, a silly little kid with no real grasp of the world beyond the walls of Orkwatch, as our ancestral home was called. My father Qhorwyn was a tall and lean man with a plain face and the typical dark eyes and hair of the Hoares, and mild-mannered and shrewd in nature. That day he took me and my older brothers Halleck and Harlan to the beach to see the waves claim the dead body of our mother, Queen Gysella. I hardly even remember what she looked like, only her pale and bluish skin and the grey robes she had been clad in. We were told that an illness had taken her, and that was as much as I ever learned about the cause of my mother's death.

"The Drowned God will welcome her in his watery halls," Qhorwyn said as Gysella disappeared under the waves, and I remember Harlan crying. Personally, I was too young to grasp the finality of her death back then, believing that one day mother would simply return to us from below the waves. It took years for me to fully realize that she was gone forever, and by then she had become a distant memory in my mind.

I was a restless and unruly boy in my childhood, always getting in trouble of one sort or another. I would often bother the servants and retainers of Orkwatch by stuffing their boots with horseshit, leading a flock of chickens into their rooms while they were away, putting worms into their stew, or something else of that nature. My father wasn't particularly harsh when it came to punishing me for my belligerency, at worst giving a few stern words and then locking me into my room for the rest of the day. Looking back now it is clear to me that King Qhorwyn never had much interest in parenting, and disciplining me was just an inconvenience pulling him away from his favorite pastime of planning the kingdom's economy with his advisors.

If there was one thing I did however, that never failed to truly raise the ire of my father it was fighting with my brother Harlan. Harlan was two years older than me, and while he certainly was a more well-mannered and proper child than I he sure did know how to annoy me with his subtle and cunning ways. A mocking grin when I got in trouble for something he had squealed on me, or a whisper into my ear about how stupid I was when I struggled with the reading and writing lessons given by the old and hard-of-hearing Maester Elbert. Often Harlan's teasing would get me to start a fight with him, and then afterwards he would tell our father that I had gotten aggressive for no reason. Usually such quarrels were quickly forgotten and moved past, but there was one time that our fighting got significantly more serious than ever before.

It was a cold and rainy day towards the end of the winter that had already lasted for four years. The food reserves had begun to run low even in Orkwatch, leaving the people of the castle feeble and depressed. As the king's son I would be among the last people to be affected by such things, but even I remember being left hungry by the meager meals of salted fish. Perhaps that goes to partially explain why both myself and Harlan were so on-edge at this particular point in time. I was eight then, Harlan was ten. I had just recently started practicing swordplay with the castle's master-at-arms Fergon Tawney, a haggard middle-aged man with a sour face and humorless nature. After my training session that day I was heading towards the armory to put away my sword and shield, when I heard the voice of Harlan behind me.

"You fight like a girl with palsy," I remember him saying with a mocking tone. I stopped in my tracks, and instead of continuing to walk towards the armory I turned around, screamed from the bottom of my lungs and charged against Harlan. To this day I remember the surprised and frightened expression on his face as I slammed against him with my shield. We both tumbled to the muddy ground, but I was the first one back up and immediately struck my sword against Harlan's forehead, sending him back down as he tried scramble up on his feet. Thankfully it was just a dulled training sword, or else I may have killed my brother then and there.

Halleck, then thirteen years old, quickly rushed to pull me away from Harlan and took the sword from my hands, throwing it to the ground. However, Harlan then grabbed the sword and begun swinging it at me with frenzied screams. He managed to get in a few painful hits on my ribs and legs before being subdued by Halleck. At that point Fergon had also rushed in to help keep me in line.

"Damn you both!" Halleck roared with the kind of power and authority I could only admire and respect. "You are brothers, not enemies. Get it to your heads before one of you ends up killing the other!"

Clearly Halleck wanted Harlan and I to make peace, but father had quite a different solution in mind. Instead of taking us into a room together to talk things through as I had expected, Qhorwyn decided to send Harlan away as a ward to one of his vassals, that vassal being Torgon Greyjoy the Lord Reaper of Pyke.

I remember feeling conflicted while watching the longship that took my brother to Pyke disappearing into the horizon. Harlan and I had always had our quarrels, but there had been moments of good between them as well, rare as they were.

"You'll see him again, Harwyn," Halleck calmly assured me, tapping his hand lightly on my shoulder. "And then you can make peace with him."

In the years following I started to leave my pranks and belligerency behind, concentrating more and more on my training with the sword. Harlan had not been exactly wrong when he had ridiculed my fighting skills, as I was by no means a natural talent. However, I was determined to prove him wrong, and through hard work and sheer stubbornness I developed my skills. First with the sword, then with the axe, and finally with the bow. As a thirdborn son of the Iron King there were very few prospects in life for me aside from being a warrior, so I wanted to be a good one. "Discipline, patience, decisiveness. These are the things you must learn if you wish to be a great warrior," Fergon always told me, and those words stuck with me.

As the next summer came trade on the Iron Islands begun to flourish once again, with merchant ships from Seagard, Lannisport, Oldtown, Arbor and sometimes even from further beyond visiting Orkwatch every week. I loved dwelling at the harbor during those days that the foreign ships were docked there, watching the crewmen unloading gold, silver and exotic goods from their holds and then loading them again with the iron, lead and tin they had traded their goods for. I often tried to converse with the captains of these ships, and while many ignored me or outright rejected my company, some did humor me by sharing their tales from the many seas they had sailed and the distant lands they had visited. By far the most fascinating of these tales was told to me by a Dornish trader named Gerdan, who arrived to Orkwatch a week after my eleventh nameday. He was an experienced seafarer who had sailed everywhere from the Shivering Sea to the Jade Gates of the distant east, or so he claimed at least. He told me that a year prior to our meeting a great cataclysm had happened in Valyria, its fiery mountains known as the Fourteen Flames having all exploded at once, filling the air within hundreds of miles with fire, ash and molten stone. With theatrical gestures and almost poetic vividness to his words the Dornishman described to me how even dragons had burned as the flames consumed the great cities and fertile lands of the dragonlords, and how chaos was bound to unfold in Essos now that the mightiest empire that had ever been had fallen. Back then I didn't know how much of the man's story was true, but regardless of that it sparked in me the interest to see the world beyond the shores under my father's rule.

As the prosperous trade kept making King Qhorwyn wealthier and wealthier he kept investing more and more of that wealth into expanding his fleet and forging new weaponry. I remember thinking that my father was probably preparing for some great war to come. Of course, I would eventually come to learn that he had no such intentions, but at the time I would daydream about sailing to war against the kingdoms of the green lands side by side with Qhorwyn and Halleck, maybe even Harlan. I had heard countless times the stories of the legendary raiders and iron kings of the past, from the Grey King himself to Qhored the Cruel to Dale the Dread to Hilmar the Cunning, and I hoped that one day my own name would be revered in such glory as well.

I was thirteen by the time I saw Harlan again, as we traveled to Pyke to attend the wedding of Lord Torgon's eldest son Wynton Greyjoy and his bride Amanda Saltcliffe. Harlan had grown a lot since leaving Orkwatch, now almost a man grown, towering myself with a whole foot and sporting a thin stubble around his mouth. I had expected him to be hostile towards me, or at least annoying like he used to, but instead he showed hardly any interest in me whatsoever. He did briefly ask how I was doing while chatting with me and Halleck, but for the most part he concentrated on telling about the hijinks he had gotten into with his friend Mandon Greyjoy, the younger brother of Wynton. I also did apologize to him later that night for what had happened between us five years ago, but Harlan merely shrugged it off and said that we had both been dumb kids back then. He seemed almost like a different person from the annoying big brother I once had, but at least there was peace between us.

Wynton Greyjoy's wedding was where I saw for the first time Alys Greyjoy, the younger sister of Wynton and Mandon. She was a year older than me, a pretty girl with lush dark hair and enchantingly beautiful blue eyes. It was the first time I ever felt such desire and infatuation towards a girl, but I was nowhere near enough of a man to act upon those feelings in any meaningful way. I talked with her briefly and she was kind and friendly towards me, but that was about it.

It was also during this wedding that I first met Ravos Drumm, the great-grandson of the famous Hilmar the Cunning and wielder of the Valyrian steel sword Red Rain. He was a tall and pale man with dark hair, pointy beard and a wolfish grin. At the time he was on his late twenties and already had a fearsome reputation as a reaver. I listened eagerly as he drunkenly recounted his stories of raiding and pirating on the Narrow Sea.

"So, do you fancy to be a reaver once you've grown up, Prince Harwyn?" Ravos asked me with a sharp smirk on his face.

"Aye, I will sail and raid further than any ironborn before me," I boasted confidently, to which Ravos chuckled amusedly.

"And have you ever captained a longship, my prince?"

"No, not yet."

"Well, you should learn to do that before you get too cocky, boy."

And so, as we returned to Orkwatch I began to pester and beg my father to give me a ship and crew to captain. He refused my requests, saying that captainship was something to be earned. However, he did allow me to join the crew of the Opulent Lady. She was one of the many longships in King Qhorwyn's fleet tasked with buying and transporting timber from the lumberyards of the Rock and the Riverlands to the royal shipyards of Orkmont.

The Opulent Lady was captained by an old and hardened seaman named Regnar, who had in his youth been a raider and a sellsail. When I joined his crew of fifty men Captain Regnar was on his mid-sixties, and his harsh lifestyle had certainly not made him look any younger. He was bald and wrinkled, his bushy beard white as snow and his skin reddened and roughened by decades of sailing. However, the old man still retained some strength and pride in his frame and posture. I have no doubt it was at least partly because of my royal status, but Captain Regnar treated me with respect and we got along well from the very beginning.

I had of course sailed many times in the past with my father as he had visited some of his vassals, but it was working on the Opulent Lady that made me truly understand what it was like to work in a longship's crew. Life on the seas was harsh as I quickly learned, and there were several days among those first few weeks-long voyages during which I thought I would die on the sea and never set a foot on solid ground again. However, over the months after joining the crew I learned to pull my weight and endure the hardships of sailing like an ironman should. It was also during those months that I came to realize that even the greatest captain is nothing without a strong crew he can rely on. And as part of Regnar's crew I befriended and came to trust many good men, such as the Raging Ralf, Urrathon Ironmaker, One-eyed Jason, Toothless Tom and Norne the Giant. Some of them were old and hardened men like their captain, while others were almost as young as I was.

I had been a part of the Opulent Lady's crew for about six months when we happened to visit Seagard on one of our voyages. The coastal town governed by House Mallister was larger and arguably prettier than any of the towns one could find on the Iron Islands, but what fascinated me the most were the banners and soldiers in the colors of House Durrandon decorating its streets. Of course I already knew that the Storm Kings had conquered the Riverlands centuries ago, but to see with my own eyes their authority reaching all the way to this town a thousand miles away from Storm's End was awe-inspiring. I did not yet know how frail that authority was.

As we made our way to spend the evening in one of Seagard's taverns, One-eyed Jason told a story about a war that had taken place in the Riverlands some forty years prior. A bastard knight named Ser Addam Rivers had proclaimed himself King of the Trident and risen in rebellion against the Durrandon rule. However, such major river lords as Mallister, Blackwood and Tully had remained loyal to the Storm King, swiftly crushing Ser Addam's rebellion. One-eyed Jason told he had been one of about three-hundred ironmen hired by Lord Mallister to cleanse his lands from the rebel forces.

"The bastard put us to scour the rebel hideouts from the marshes north of Oldstones, while marching south with his own men to join Lord Blackwood's host," Jason grumbled, shaking his head slightly. "The worst months of my bloody life hunting those rats in the wetlands, but at least the pay was decent."

"During the times of Qhored the Cruel ironmen would've used such an opportunity to conquer instead of fighting as sellswords," Urrathon Ironmaker remarked dryly. He was a strong young man on his late teens, clearly just as inspired by the glorious past of the Ironborn as I was.

"Well those times are long past, if they ever were more than stories," Captain Regnar said calmly. "A man must do what is required of him to support his kin. Once that may have been raiding, now it is something else."

"Trust me, you boys have it good now," Toothless Tom lisped in-between gulping his ale. "It's better to make a decent living with hard work than to die in needless wars."

"Conquest isn't needless," I argued eagerly. "Our ancestors knew that strength in arms is what truly matters, and those who have it control the world. Blades are meant to be blooded, and if we did that today we could still make the weak men of these green lands bow to us."

"Careful, prince," Regnar chimed in with a thin smirk. "You're going to get us thrown out of the tavern with talk like that," he said amusedly, and we all laughed.

The first time I returned home to Orkwatch for longer than a day or two was after having worked on the Opulent Lady's crew for little over a year. The occasion in question was Halleck's wedding with Marla Blacktyde, the only daughter of Lord Maron Blacktyde, and lords from all over the Iron Islands had been invited to witness the royal wedding.

I remember watching with awe and envy as the priest of Drowned God blessed Halleck and his bride with seawater, announcing them husband and wife. After the ceremony my older brother held a powerful speech for the attending lords, and I remember thinking that he would one day make a great king. Inspired by Halleck's display of confidence and charisma, I mustered the courage to approach the beautiful Alys Greyjoy. It was the first time we saw each other since her brother's wedding over a year ago, and while I had certainly grown to be more of a man since then her presence still made me feel nervous. I told her about my adventures on the Opulent Lady, making it all sound perhaps a bit more exciting than it truly was, and she in turn told me about the goings on of Pyke, my brother Harlan being included in many of her stories. We got along well, and towards the end of the evening we made our way to the beach together. It was chilly, and I offered her my cloak. As we sat there watching the crescent moon shining on the night sky, I told her about my feelings. I can't recall which words exactly did I use to confess my love, but no doubt they had all the elegance and finesse of a lovesick teenage boy. However, what I will always remember is Alys' response. She gave me a gentle kiss on the lips and smirked seductively. "When you're a man grown, Harwyn Hoare, come claim me."

I returned to work on the Opulent Lady again after the wedding, but my head was in the clouds with imagining a blissful future together with the fair lady of my dreams. My crewmates took notice of this as well and were quick to deduce something had happened at the wedding. "I think this is the quietest our young prince has ever been," Raging Ralf noted with his gruff voice just a few days after I had re-joined the crew. "Lad must be in love."

I continued to work on the Opulent Lady, and by now I was more at home sailing the seas than on land. A month or two after my fifteenth nameday something significant happened as we were getting back from one of our journeys to Banefort. One morning we woke up after a night on the sea to find Captain Regnar dead, his heart having given out in middle of the night. We gave our farewells to the captain and threw his body to sea so he could find his way to the watery halls.

"Drowned God had a need for a strong oarsman," Toothless Tom said with a doleful tone as Regnar's corpse sank under the waves.

"What is dead may never die," the whole crew spoke in unison.

Then it was time to choose a new captain for the Opulent Lady. First to speak up was One-eyed Jason. "I sailed together with Regnar for nearly three decades," he boasted. "He trusted me more than any other man, and I was always loyal to him. Make me your captain, and I will promise to lead you with the same experience and reliability that Regnar did."

Much of the crew muttered approvingly, and a moment of silence followed. "Anyone wish to challenge Jason's claim to captainship?" Raging Ralf asked sternly. I glanced around myself, surprised to see that no one was going to do it. So, I stood up myself.

"I challenge," I spoke up confidently, gathering the attention of the whole crew. Some looked at me with surprised expressions, others with doubt or amusement. "I know I am young, barely a man in many of your eyes. However, I have been raised a warrior, and the sea is in my blood. Same blood runs through my veins as once did Qhored the Cruel's, and I am hungry for glory! Jason is an experienced seaman and would make a fine captain, I do not deny that, but what he offers you is just more of the same. Under his captainship the Opulent Lady will remain nothing more than a merchant ship, offering you all a pay just good enough to make do. I could give you much more than that, as the captain of this ship I could give you the world! You would no longer have to be content with living modestly, because I would take us to riches that could make you all live like princes!"

My words were received with cheers, distinctly louder than the reaction Jason had gotten. The old man narrowed his one eye as he glared at me. "Then we shall have a vote," he said calmly.

"Those who are for One-eyed Jason raise your hands!" Raging Ralf commanded. Twenty and two men raised their hands, among them Toothless Tom. "And those for Prince Harwyn, raise your hands!" Ralf roared, now raising his own hand. Twenty and seven men raised their hands, among them Urrathon Ironmaker and Norne the Giant. And so, I became the captain of the Opulent Lady.

Just a few weeks after I had been made captain news arrived to the Iron Islands about Riverlands being engulfed by another rebellion. A woman named Jeyne Nutt had been crowned Queen of the Trident, starting a war with the Storm King. Upon hearing these news I immediately made my way to Orkwatch to confront my father about his plans regarding the situation.

King Qhorwyn sat behind his desk with crossed arms as I explained to him that this would be an excellent opportunity to attack the Riverlands from the sea. "War is bad for business," he simply responded to me, his toneless voice devoid of passion. "My fleet will stay put, and once the Storm King has crushed this rebellion we shall re-establish trade with him."

With disappointment I stormed out of my father's office, deciding to approach my brother Halleck instead. As the heir to the Seastone Chair he would've had enough pull to at least arrange a large raiding party to attack Seagard now that it was vulnerable.

"What you're suggesting would be treason, brother," Halleck told me sternly. "Forget about it. Qhorwyn is our king and his word governs."

"So, are we going to war?" Raging Ralf asked eagerly as I returned to the Opulent Lady.

"No, we aren't," I answered apathetically. "Turns out our king lacks the courage."

"Oh well," Ralf said with a shrug. "Where shall we go then, captain?"

I remained quiet for a moment, considering carefully what options I had. I could've continued transporting timber and other goods from the Rock to the Iron Islands, but I had promised my crew more than that. Raiding fishing villages in Cape Kraken or Stony Shore could be done even with just a single crew, but there wasn't much glory or riches to be found in that. There was also always the possibility of sailing somewhere far away to the south and east, and I had heard the plunder there was easy and plentiful now that the Free Cities were waging wars against each other. However, there was still one thing left for me to do on the Iron Islands.

"We sail to Pyke."

It was a dark and rainy day when the Opulent Lady arrived in the harbor of Lordsport, the end of summer being near. I instructed my crew to stay in the town and took a horse for myself from the stables, riding through the rain to the ancestral home of House Greyjoy.

"Who are you and what's your business?" asked the guardsman atop the gatehouse as I approached the castle's gates.

"I am Prince Harwyn Hoare, the third son of King Qhorwyn," I announced myself proudly, managing to keep up my composure despite shaking slightly from the cold under my soaking wet clothes. "I have come to claim Lady Alys Greyjoy as my bride."

The guardsman stared at me with some confusion, but after a moment he commanded the gates to be opened regardless. I rode into the courtyard enclosed by a curtain wall – the only part of Pyke that remained on the mainland. As I dismounted my horse I was approached by Lomys Sharp, the castle's stout and balding master-at-arms. I repeated the purpose of my visit to him, and he also gave me a confused look. "If you could wait here, my prince," he then said politely, before hurrying to the stone bridge connecting the mainland with the Great Keep.

I took shelter from the rain by the stables, keeping my eyes locked on the doors of the Great Keep, waiting for my love to run out to meet me at any moment. However, the first one to come out of those doors wasn't Alys, but rather two young men. As they got closer I recognized them as my brother Harlan and his friend Mandon Greyjoy.

"Harwyn, what on earth are you doing here?" Harlan asked with a small grin on his face as he approached me.

"I've come to claim my bride, Lady Alys," I stated nonchalantly. Harlan and Mandon shared an amused glance, after which my brother took a few steps closer to me. "What are you talking about?" he asked with a small chuckle.

"You heard what I said," I responded calmly. "I've come to claim Alys as my bride."

"She's not yours to claim, little brother," Harlan said, his tone slightly more serious now.

"Yes, she is," I insisted sternly. "She promised herself to me at Halleck's wedding."

A tense silence followed my words, filled only the sound of rain drumming against the roofs. Thin smirk formed on Harlan's face, and he let out a sigh. "I don't know what she said to you back then, but that was over a year ago," he said quietly. "Things have changed since then. I am to marry Alys."

I felt my whole body tensing up. I looked Harlan to the eyes, and to my shock the look in them was sincere, he wasn't trying to fool me.

"Has your father not mentioned anything to you about this?" Mandon asked with a raised eyebrow, and I shook my head. "It's the first I hear of this," I muttered, anger boiling inside me. "And I refuse to accept it."

"Calm down, little brother," Harlan said coldly. "There is nothing to do about it. Just leave and forget all about this, you'll find a suitable bride for yourself in time."

I ignored my brother's words and unsheathed my sword, pointing it towards him. "I challenge you to a duel," I growled, stepping into the rain again. "To yielding or death, for the hand of Alys."

"Are you mad?" Harlan asked with a stifled chuckle.

"Draw your sword or I will kill you where you stand!" I roared, which finally made Harlan realize I was serious. After a moment of hesitation, he did indeed draw his sword. "If this is really what you want, brother," Harlan muttered under his breath.

I struck first, and the sound of steel clashing against steel rang through the air as my brother parried my sword with his. I was on the offensive, trying to get through Harlan's defense with aggressive swings and thrusts. However, he was quick on his feet and handled his blade with precision, managing to always keep it between himself and my attacks.

After successfully parrying a slew of my attacks Harlan charged for a counter offense, striking with speed and accuracy that I struggled to keep up with. After deflecting one of his downward swings I almost slipped and fell to the muddy ground, just barely regaining my balance to block Harlan's next strike.

As I stared my brother to the eyes the words of Fergon Tawney echoed in my mind – discipline, patience, decisiveness.

"Give up, brother!" Harlan yelled through the rain. "We can still end this before it gets ugly."

I took in a deep breath and charged for another attack. Harlan parried my first, second, third and fourth strike, but then I noticed his posture faltering. With brutal decisiveness I seized the opportunity, landing a harsh strike on my brother's left knee. With a painful scream he lost his balance, and I knocked him down to the muddy ground with guard of my sword. I kicked the sword out of his hand and hovered my blade a couple feet above his face. "Do you yield?"

"You fucking bastard," Harlan muttered with anger. "You'll never have Alys."

I raised my sword with the full intention to strike it down and kill my brother, but then I heard a familiar voice shouting from behind. "STOP IT!"

I lowered my sword and turned to see Alys racing over the bridge through the rain. "Stop it," she repeated as she got closer. She fell down on her knees next to Harlan, to make sure he wasn't hurt.

"Alys," I said with a gulp, and she turned to look at me, her blue eyes wide open in shock. "Alys, I've come to claim you. Like you asked me to, remember?"

"I'm sorry, Harwyn, but things have changed," she said, just a hint of shame in her words. "I'm to marry Harlan."

"I defeated him!" I bellowed in rage. "I put my life in the line to win your hand, and I prevailed!"

"I don't care!" Alys responded sharply, helping Harlan back on his feet. "Look, I am sorry if you feel you've been wronged, I truly am. However, I will marry your brother, and that's the end of it. Please, try to understand."

I stood there in silence, staring blankly at my brother and the girl I thought I had loved. "You'll regret this one day," I muttered bitterly, before sheathing my sword and turning my back for both of them.

It was at this moment that I knew I would have to leave the Iron Islands behind.