Fall of King's Landing

Aemond Targaryen and Ser Criston Cole had gathered an army and set out for Harrenhal, leaving the capital thin on men and its gates poorly watched. Queen Rhaenyra and her uncle Daemon read the absence as an opening.

Daemon, mounted on Caraxes, and Rhaenyra, on Syrax, circled above King's Landing and wheeled over Aegon's High Hill. To the east, Lord Corlys Velaryon's fleet entered Blackwater Bay.

The sight of dragons overhead threw the city into panic. The gates were shut and there was nowhere to run; some began digging under their own houses hoping to escape dragonfire. With King Aegon II bedridden, Aemond and Criston Cole away, and Queen Helaena unable to take command, it fell to the dowager queen Alicent Hightower to try to organize a defense, sending riders after Aemond and ravens to loyal lords.

Alicent did not know that the gold cloaks, the city watch, had switched sides: they were still loyal to Daemon, who had once commanded them. Grand Maester Orwyle was seized just as he was about to send the ravens. Ser Gwayne Hightower, the dowager queen's brother and second-in-command of the watch, uncovered the betrayal and tried to raise the alarm; he was caught before reaching the stables, and the watch's own commander killed him. The gates opened for the army carried in on Corlys Velaryon's ships. Only the River Gate held for several hours, defended by thirteen Hightower knights and a hundred men-at-arms; the rest fell quickly. With hope gone, Alicent ordered her people to surrender.

Ser Otto Hightower was executed for treason. Alicent Hightower and Helaena Targaryen were taken captive, and Ser Tyland Lannister was thrown into the dungeons and tortured for word of where the crown's treasury was hidden. Grand Maester Orwyle and several hundred others ended up locked in the black cells.

Aegon II, though, escaped through the secret passages of Maegor's Holdfast with Lord Larys Strong's help, taking his children, Princess Jaehaera and Prince Maelor, with him and escorted by two of his Kingsguard. Rhaenyra ordered the Knights Inquisitor to hunt them down and punish anyone who had helped them.

Rhaenyra finally sat the Iron Throne, though the iron cut her, and some took it for a bad omen. The city, which had first welcomed the fall of an unloved king, soon grew tired of daily executions and the taxes Rhaenyra raised to pay for the war: before long people were calling her, behind her back, "King Maegor with teats."