The Trident

The Trident does not rise from a single channel but from three: the Red Fork, the Green Fork, and the Blue Fork come together to form the longest and largest river in Westeros before pouring into the Bay of Crabs. Its many tributaries turn the Riverlands into a region threaded with waterways, the fastest way to move goods and people across the land while peace holds.

Each of the three branches has its own character, and anyone who travels the region soon learns to tell them apart: the red one is wide and slow-running, the green one runs alongside the Kingsroad, and the blue one breaks apart into smaller branches further inland. Only two points along the whole system allow an easy crossing, the Ruby Ford and the Twins, which makes both crossings mandatory for anyone moving through the Riverlands.

The Red Fork is the widest and slowest-running of the three branches, a channel that winds through tree-covered islets, sandbanks, and stranded driftwood. Upstream of Riverrun it grows darker and muddier, and the lands of House Bracken stretch along its banks.

Riverrun stands on its bank, and further south, past the Inn of the Kneeling Man, the river widens and slows again between muddy banks and reed beds. Along its course also lies the Ford of the Puppet, the crossing where the battle of the same name was fought.

North of the Inn at the Crossroads, the Kingsroad runs alongside the Green Fork through fertile valleys and woodlands, passing villages and the castles of the river lords. Further north, past the Ruby Ford — where Robert Baratheon won the crown at the Battle of the Trident — there is no other crossing until the Twins, the seat of House Frey.

At the Twins the Green Fork runs fast and deep, which makes that house's bridge the mandatory crossing for that stretch of the river.

The Blue Fork rises near Waterhead and washes the bank at Stoney Sept before losing itself in ever-smaller branches. To cross it, one must go from Sevenstreams to Bitterbridge — the only known crossing along its whole course.

Beyond Sevenstreams the river scatters into lesser channels, and it is the least documented of the three branches that make up the Trident.