Gods Eye

At the centre of the Gods Eye stands the Isle of Faces, thick with weirwoods, where singers and storytellers say the pact between the First Men and the Children of the Forest was sealed. That truce gave rise to the Order of Green Men, sworn ever since to guard the island's trees.

Tales also speak of a Green King who once ruled these waters, and of how the Andals, for all their iron and their new Seven, never managed to take the island.

Harren Hoare, King of the Isles and the Rivers, raised Harrenhal on the lake's northern shore, and that stone would become his undoing. When Aegon Targaryen landed to conquer the continent, the Battle of the Reeds and the clash at Sauces Tristes were fought along the Gods Eye's southern shore.

Two of Harren's sons died on the lake itself, caught by Balerion as they rowed back to Harrenhal. Aegon finished conquering the region by burning the castle with Harren still inside it, then marched from his camp beside the Gods Eye to face Mern IX Gardener and Loren Lannister. Bernarr Brune, meanwhile, hunted down and killed the rebel Harren the Red in a village west of the lake.

In the year 43 after the Conquest, Prince Aegon, son and heir of King Aenys I Targaryen, died at the hands of his own uncle, King Maegor I Targaryen, in a clash the realm remembers as the Battle under the Gods Eye.

During the Dance of the Dragons, the Gods Eye became a battlefield once again: the fight remembered as the battle of the lakeshore was fought on its western shore, while the Butcher's Ball broke out to the south.

Upon the lake's own waters, Princes Aemond and Daemon Targaryen killed each other astride their dragons, Vhagar and Caraxes. Ser Addam Velaryon, riding Seasmoke, later flew over the lake to reach the Isle of Faces.

Aemond's body was recovered years afterward, the sword Dark Sister still lodged in his eye socket; no trace of Daemon was ever found.

Near the lake, House Butterwell built the castle of Whitewalls. During the reign of Aerys I an old wooden inn with turrets stood there along the water, and Ser Duncan the Tall and Prince Aegon Targaryen crossed the lake in ferryman Ned's boat to reach the tourney held at Whitewalls. The castle was destroyed after the failed Second Blackfyre Rebellion.

Years later, Lord Walter Whent held his own great tourney at Harrenhal, along the same lake's northern shore.

In these years, those who live near the Gods Eye say the wolf packs have grown bolder than ever. Yoren leads his group of Night's Watch recruits to an abandoned village on the southern shore, Arya Stark hidden among them disguised as a boy. There Ser Amory Lorch's men catch up with them, and only a few survive the slaughter.

Fleeing on along the lake afterward, Arya passes villages and castles burned by Lannister men. She and Gendry are eventually captured in a village by the Gods Eye by Ser Gregor Clegane's men, who take them to Harrenhal.

Arya learns that Lord Beric Dondarrion was hanged by Amory Lorch at Cascadas Bravas, near the Gods Eye. Meera Reed, meanwhile, tells Bran the tale of the Knight of the Laughing Tree, a story that takes a crannogman as far as the Isle of Faces, out in the middle of the lake.

Leaving Harrenhal, Ser Jaime Lannister takes the road that skirts the lake instead of a more travelled stretch of the Kingsroad.

Back at Harrenhal while he pacifies the Riverlands, Jaime Lannister is presented with Vargo Hoat's head by Gregor Clegane's men. Jaime orders Josmyn Peckledon to throw it into the waters of the Gods Eye.