On the northern shore of the Gods Eye, north of the Isle of Faces, stood the greatest castle in all the Seven Kingdoms: Harrenhal.
Three hundred years ago, Harren the Black had enslaved the entire Riverlands to construct a fortress unlike anything Westeros had ever seen.
Yet on the very day the final stone was laid, Aegon the Conqueror arrived atop his dragon with only a small army at his back.
Harren refused to kneel.
Certain of his castle’s invincibility, he shut the gates and mocked the invaders beyond the walls.
The first test would also be its last.
Perhaps every army in Westeros combined could never have breached Harrenhal’s colossal walls.
But dragons do not need gates or siege towers.
They could fly.
The House of Hoare vanished beneath dragonfire, reduced to ash alongside the king who had built the fortress.
The curse of Harrenhal seemed to begin that very night.
The families who inherited the castle afterward met similarly grim fates.
House Qoherys.
House Harroway.
House Towers.
House Strong.
House Lothston.
Each rose, and each fell.
And now the current rulers of Harrenhal, House Whent, appeared destined to follow the same path.
Once, the Whents had ranked among the most powerful houses of the Riverlands.
The current Lord of Harrenhal, Lord Walter Whent, had four sons and a daughter.
His younger brother, Ser Oswell Whent, served in King Aerys II’s Kingsguard.
The family was prosperous, influential, and seemingly secure.
Then came the great Tourney at Harrenhal, the grandest tournament in the history of the Seven Kingdoms.
Two years later, disaster struck.
Lord Walter’s brother, eldest son, and second son all died during Robert’s Rebellion.
Because House Whent had supported the Targaryens, they faced punishment after the war.
Though Lord Walter’s great-uncle by marriage, Lord Hoster Tully, intervened and preserved their titles, more than sixty percent of their lands were confiscated.
The family’s power collapsed almost overnight.
The tragedies did not end there.
Not long afterward, Lord Walter’s third son succumbed to illness.
Six months ago, King Robert Baratheon summoned the lords of the Seven Kingdoms to crush Balon Greyjoy’s rebellion.
Soon after Lord Walter departed with his forces, his youngest and last surviving son, William Whent, fell gravely ill.
Before long, he slipped into a coma.
His life hung by a thread.
Even Maester Tothmure eventually shook his head and abandoned hope.
Yet against all expectations, William awoke.
Not only did he survive, he gradually recovered.
The entire castle celebrated what seemed like a miracle.
No one knew that William had truly died once already.
The boy who had awakened was no longer the same William Whent.
And unlike everyone else, he knew what lay ahead.
When the War of the Five Kings began years later, only Lady Shella Whent would remain at Harrenhal.
That meant Lord Walter and their only daughter would also die in the years to come.
After the war, Lady Shella herself would pass away, House Whent would lose Harrenhal, and the once-proud family would vanish into history.
Nor was the curse limited to the castle’s lords.
Anyone connected to Harrenhal seemed doomed.
Janos Slynt, granted Harrenhal by Queen Regent Cersei Lannister, would be executed by Lord Commander Jon Snow.
Tywin Lannister, who once occupied the castle, would be slain by his own son, Tyrion.
Ser Amory Lorch, appointed castellan by Tywin, would be fed to a bear by Vargo Hoat.
Roose Bolton, who seized Harrenhal, would be murdered by his bastard son Ramsay.
Vargo Hoat himself would die at the hands of Ser Gregor Clegane.
Gregor Clegane would later fall to Prince Oberyn Martell.
Polliver, another castellan of Harrenhal, would be killed by Sandor Clegane.
Petyr Baelish, Lord Paramount of the Trident and Lord of Harrenhal, would ultimately die at Arya Stark’s hands.
The curse of Harrenhal was terrifying beyond words.
======== Five months earlier, almost the moment he emerged from his coma, William had sensed a cold presence lingering around him.
Because he had completely assimilated the memories of his previous life during his unconsciousness, he knew he now lived in the world of A Song of Ice and Fire.
What he could not determine was whether this strange perception was the cheat granted to a transmigrator, or an innate gift William Whent had always possessed.
Either way, once he recovered enough to explore Harrenhal, he became certain of one thing.
The castle truly was shrouded in some supernatural force.
Standing beneath the shadow of the five massive towers, William gazed upward toward the heavens.
The chill seeped deep into his soul.
Did I cross time and space for this?
Was I brought here to confront whatever power haunts this place and change both my fate and the fate of House Whent?
At last, he pulled himself from his thoughts.
Today he will depart for Oldtown.
There, he would serve as a squire to Ser Garth Hightower and begin his journey toward knighthood.
Below the steps of the castle’s main keep stood a crowd gathered to see him off.
Lady Shella struggled to hold back tears.
Her eyes were nearly as red as her hair.
Her husband had only recently returned home after six months away.
Now her only remaining son, barely nine years old, was preparing to leave for a city thousands of miles away.
Any mother would find such a farewell unbearable.
Yet she had insisted on sending him to Oldtown.
Though she lacked William’s ability to sense mysterious forces, she was descended from House Lothston.
The old tales surrounding Lady Danelle Lothston’s studies of dark magic had always seemed a little too persistent to dismiss entirely.
Likewise, she believed the stories about Harrenhal’s curse more than most.
Deep down, however, she had always clung to hope.
When William lay dying, regret nearly consumed her.
Thankfully, the Seven had shown mercy and given her another chance.
After Lord Walter returned home, husband and wife spent a long night discussing their son’s future.
In the end, they agreed that William should grow up far away from Harrenhal.
Thanks to the friendship between Ser Oswell Whent and Ser Gerold Hightower, as well as the bonds forged during the Greyjoy Rebellion, Lord Walter had become close to Ser Garth Hightower.
Upon receiving Walter’s letter, Ser Garth gladly agreed to take William under his guidance.
William’s older sister, Minisa, was equally heartbroken.
The two siblings had never been separated since birth.
Though William often seemed lost in thought after recovering from his illness, he smiled more often than before.
In many ways, he had become more interesting.
Many others felt the same.
Including Maester Tothmure.
To them, the boy who had recovered from death’s door was more polite, more mature, and far more likable than before.
For the first time in years, they felt hopeful about House Whent’s future.
Yet no matter how reluctant anyone felt, farewells could not be postponed forever.
Lord Walter gave a nod to Ser Raymond Grell, captain of the guard.
The carriage began to move.
Escorted by mounted knights and watched by countless eyes filled with affection, worry, hope, and sorrow, William departed into the distance.
========= Two Years Later 292 AC, Oldtown Glop vat Votis and Moken Rota sat in silence inside a modest inn room.
There was no wine on the table.
In truth, before being taken in, they had struggled even to find food.
Their disastrous journey to Horn Hill had left the two warlocks from Qarth utterly destitute.
The whipping ordered by Lord Randyll Tarly had humiliated them, but it was the execution of their unfortunate intermediary that truly drove them into despair.
Thousands of miles from home, unable to speak the Common Tongue fluently and publicly branded as frauds by a respected lord, they quickly found themselves unable to survive in this foreign land.
After weeks of wandering and hardship, someone finally approached them.
A noble wished to meet them.
The news nearly brought them to tears.
Now they waited anxiously.
Their mysterious patron had generously covered their travel expenses to Oldtown and paid for their lodging and meals.
Still, if this meeting went poorly, neither man knew how they would ever return home.
As they waited, footsteps echoed outside the room.
The door opened.
An inn servant entered alongside a noble-looking youth.
The boy appeared to be around eleven years old.
His clothing was rich, his bearing refined.
One glance was enough to tell he came from high birth.
The servant bowed respectfully.
“This is Lord William Whent, son of the Lord of Harrenhal.” The two Qartheen immediately stood.
Though their grasp of the Common Tongue was limited, words like lord and count’s son required no translation.
Both quickly offered awkward bows.
Glop forced out an introduction.
“My lord, I am Glop vat Votis.
This is my assistant, Moken Rota.” William smiled.
In fluent Valyrian, he said, “All men must die, but sorcery endures.” Both men froze.
After a long moment, Glop cautiously asked, “My lord…
you speak Valyrian?” “I’ve studied a little under Archmaester Marwyn.
Unfortunately, I rarely have the opportunity to practice.
I hope to learn much more from two masters such as yourselves.” Marwyn the Mage.
The famous archmaester who devoted himself to the higher mysteries.
Among students of the arcane, his name carried immense weight.
The moment Glop heard it, he felt a sense of kinship with the young noble before him.
One of us!
The hardships of recent months had stripped away much of Glop’s arrogance.
What he needed now was a patron, someone willing to fund his survival and eventually his journey home.
As for William, most of his time in Oldtown had been consumed by knightly training.
His studies at the Citadel progressed steadily, but Marwyn had yet to formally teach him the deeper arts of magic.
If these two warlocks possessed genuine knowledge, they might provide the breakthrough he sought.
Each had something the other needed.
The partnership formed almost immediately.
After the introductions, the three sat down together.
This time, the table overflowed with wine and fine food.
The conversation flowed freely.
They discussed the mysteries of Valyria, the histories of forgotten empires, lands beyond the Wall, and the distant regions east of the Shadow Lands.
Naturally, the subject eventually turned toward sorcery and spells.
“…Certainly, qualities such as courage are impossible to measure, making many spells difficult to verify.
But this healing incantation is different.
Once cast correctly, wounds visibly recover before your eyes.
My lord, allow me to demonstrate.” The wine had clearly gone to Glop’s head.
Ignoring the increasingly frantic signals from Moken, he began chanting.
Strange sounds rolled from his tongue.
His hands traced unfamiliar patterns through the air.
An unmistakable sense of mystery filled the room.
Moken silently groaned.
We’re finished.
This is exactly how the last disaster started…
With one hand covering his face, he peeked through his fingers toward William.
The moment the chanting began, William felt his heart skip a beat.
A mysterious power stirred within him.
It flowed in rhythm with Glop’s words.
Outwardly, his expression remained calm.
Inside, however, waves crashed through his mind.
This feeling…
It’s the same power.
The same force I’ve sensed since waking up.
Wait.
He probably can’t actually perform magic.
If his spell is resonating with the power inside me, that means he’s reciting the incantation almost perfectly from memory.
Even without understanding it?
That’s actually impressive.
When the chanting ended, William immediately applauded.
His praise sounded completely sincere.
“A master truly is a master.
I may not understand the spell itself, but it certainly sounds extraordinary.” Glop accepted the compliment with a dignified nod, recovering some of the pride expected of a Qartheen warlock.
Across the table, Moken finally released the breath he had been holding.
Wiping sweat from his forehead, he thought happily: At least our livelihood is safe.
He joined the applause with genuine enthusiasm.
The meeting ended as a complete success.
Both the host and guests left satisfied.
Soon afterward, William officially hired Glop as an advisor and with that, his true study of magic began.