First Battle of Tumbleton

When Lord Ormund Hightower's army left the Reach for King's Landing, the city was still held by Queen Rhaenyra and her people. Before it could reach the capital it had to pass through Tumbleton, the seat of House Footly, and that was where the queen had staked her last hope of stopping it.

To bolster the garrison, two dragonriders — Ulf White on Vermithor and Hugh Hammer on Silverwing — flew in. They were joined by thousands of men from House Caswell and House Merryweather, soldiers who had come up from further south, and the survivors of the Butcher's Ball: Garibald Grey, Pate of Longleaf, Robb Rivers with his archers, and Lord Roderick Dustin leading the Winter Wolves. Another contingent arrived from Blackwater Bay.

Chroniclers disagree on the numbers — anywhere from six to twelve thousand defenders, with one account close to the events putting it near nine thousand — but either way the Greens closing in outnumbered them. Some had already slipped into Tumbleton disguised as refugees, and among the defenders themselves were men secretly loyal to King Aegon II.

Garibald Grey opened the battle by throwing six thousand men at Ormund Hightower's line, and Hightower's archers cut them to pieces. Robb Rivers covered the retreat of what was left with his own bowmen.

That was when Lord Roderick Dustin led the Winter Wolves out through a rear gate and fell on the Hightowers. Outnumbered ten to one, they still reached Ormund himself: Roderick killed him and his cousin Ser Bryndon before bleeding out from his own wounds.

Tessarion, Prince Daeron's dragon, appeared over the field, but being smaller than Vermithor or Silverwing, it wasn't enough to shake the defenders. With the Hightowers dead, many believed the day was already won.

It wasn't. Ser Hugh Hammer and Ser Ulf White turned their dragons on the very city they were meant to defend, and Tumbleton burned.

Houses turned to ash, and those who tried to escape across the Mander drowned or burned trying. Outside the walls, Pate of Longleaf was trampled and Garibald Grey died in Tessarion's flame.

Inside, the treachery repeated itself on the ground: Ser Roger Corne's men opened the gates to the Greens, and Lord Owain Bourney handed Ser Merrell over inside the castle itself. Lord Footly's men surrendered and were beheaded anyway.

With Ormund Hightower dead and no one left to rein them in, the Greens' victory dissolved into a sack that dragged on for days. Women of every age were raped, from the elderly to girls as young as eight, sparing neither septas nor Silent Sisters, while drunken soldiers killed old men and children alike.

Houses and shops were emptied out, and the wealthier townsfolk were tortured into giving up hidden fortunes; even infants ended up on spears. Ser Jon Roxton killed Lord Footly and kept Lady Sharis Footly as a prize, and Ser Ulf White was said to force himself on three maidens a night.

Prince Daeron asked Ser Hobert Hightower to bring the soldiers under control, but Hobert had neither the standing nor the will to do it. The lords turned on each other too: Lord Unwin Peake killed Lord Owain Bourney in the middle of a war council.

Word of what had happened at Tumbleton reached King's Landing, and the dowager queen Alicent Hightower is said to have laughed on hearing it and said they would now reap everything they had sown. Fear spread through the capital that it might share Tumbleton's fate, and Queen Rhaenyra had the gold cloaks seal the city gates.

Instead of pushing on to the capital, the green army stayed put at Tumbleton, bleeding men to desertion and looting with every day that passed. Disgust at the Two Traitors drove a group of highborn lords to form their own faction, the Abrojos, and not long after the Greens found themselves facing Ser Addam Velaryon and the army he had raised in the Riverlands, in what became known as the Second Battle of Tumbleton.