映像特典～北部のスタークへの忠誠心

The North is the oldest and largest of the Seven Kingdoms, but House Stark has not always held it. When Bran the Builder raised Winterfell and founded our line, we were vassals to the Barrow Kings, who claimed descent from the First King and thus dominion over all the First Men. But after the Long Night, it was our house who built the Wall and set the Night’s Watch to guard the realms of men whilst our king sat in his barrow. My ancestors eventually revolted, waging what singers call the Thousand Years War to free our lands. Other families joined us, recognizing that the North is a cold and hard land and needed a king who served its people before himself. Finally, the last Barrow King bent the knee, and House Stark became the Kings of Winter.

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Yet we were kings in name only. For by then, the North had fractured into petty kingdoms, and my ancestors would struggle to unite it again for thousands of years. Rodrik Stark wrestled an Ironborn lord for Bear Island and granted it to House Mormont when he won. A younger son of our family, Karlon Stark, won his own keep after he put down a rebellion and founded House Karstark, one of the most powerful in the North. When the Manderlys were exiled from the Reach, my ancestors shielded them and gave them a home at the mouth of the White Knife in return for holding the river against pirates and invaders. Now they’re one of the wealthiest houses in the North.

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I’m not so naive to pretend that the entire North welcomed Stark rule. The last Warg King was slain at Sea Dragon Point along with all his sons and beasts. The last Marsh King died at the hands of King Rickard Stark, and House Reed has held the swamps of the Neck ever since. Houses Greenwood, Towers, Amber, Frost. None survive today as more than names in dusty old books. But my ancestors never wanted to destroy their foes root and stem. The Umbers of Last Hearth and the Glovers of Deepwood Motte bent the knee and became loyal vassals of House Stark. The Red Kings of House Bolton wore cloaks made from the skins of Stark princes they’d flayed, and one of the Boltons was even known as the Redarm because he liked to plunge an arm into the bellies of captive Starks and pull out their entrails with his bare hand. The North deserved to be wiped clean of them. Yet my ancestors spared them after their defeat because they believed the North couldn’t afford to fight itself any longer.

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Time soon proved them right. When the Andals swept into Westeros, they obliterated all the kingdoms of the First Men except the North. Each of the southern kingdoms fought the invaders on its own, but the North fought as one. When the Andals tried to sail on the White Knife, the Manderlys fell on their ships. When the Andals tried to march an army through the Neck, the Reeds fell on their soldiers. King Theon Stark even sailed his own army to the Andal homeland for vengeance and slew hundreds of Andal warriors. When he returned, he planted their heads on spikes along our coasts, a warning to other would-be conquerors. The warning was heeded for thousands of years, until Aegon the Conqueror.

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The south had already fallen to Aegon and his dragons. Only the North remained. My ancestor, King Torrhen Stark, marched the North down to the Trident and beheld Aegon’s army, larger than Torrhen’s own by half and with three dragons circling overhead. Many northern bannermen wanted to attack anyway, claiming northern valor would carry the day. Others wanted to fall back to Moat Cailin and make a stand there. But Torrhen had heard how the armies of the Rock and the Reach had burned on the Field of Fire and had seen the fires still glowing beneath the rubble of Harrenhal. He knelt and laid his ancient crown as Aegon’s feet and rose a king no more but Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North. Some Northerners still sneer at my ancestor as The King Who Knelt, forgetting that because of Torrhen, they’re alive today to sneer. Their ancestors didn’t leave their burned bones at the Trident, and their twisted swords didn’t fill Aegon’s new throne.

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Now many say that House Stark is dead and gone, and House Bolton holds the North. But the North remembers who united it. The North remembers who defended it. And the North remembers who stole it. Long ago, my ancestors spared the Boltons, trusting their oaths of fealty. I shall correct that mistake. Even the North can forget when there’s nothing left to remember.

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