[Harrenhal — Locations]
While Brienne is bathing alone in baths of Harrenhal, Jaime approaches and slips into the opposite corner. He makes a snide remark about Brienne unable to protect Renly and for being the reason he died. She stands defiantly, and he quickly apologizes, claiming that Brienne has protected him better than most. Jaime begins to open up to Brienne, and tells his side of what happened the day he slew the Mad King. He reveals to a shocked Brienne the truth of that day, something he has never told anyone else: Aerys's final orders were for Jaime to kill his father, and to burn the entire city and its inhabitants with wildfire .
Along their travel back to the Capital, the group stops for Qyburn to medicate Jaime's healing stump. Jaime notes that Qyburn's work is more effective than Grand Maester Pycelle and asks why he was expelled from the Order of Maesters. Qyburn tells him that it was because his experiments were "too bold." When Jaime mocks him, Qyburn subtly bashes him for all the lives he has taken while in the Kingsguard. Qyburn informs Jaime that Selwyn Tarth offered 300 gold dragons for Brienne's return, but Locke refused; believing that Lord Selwyn has all the sapphire mines in Westeros. Locke, feeling cheated, would make Brienne the men's entertainment for the night. Jaime senses a feeling of obligation to Brienne, knowing it is his fault for Locke believing there is a fortune in sapphires in Tarth. He approaches Steelshanks and tells him they are to return to Harrenhal. Jaime threatens that he will tell his father upon arrival in Kings Landing, that Steelshanks chopped his hand off. Or, he says he could tell his father that Steelshanks saved his life.
Jaime gradually grows distant from Cersei too: he refuses her demand to kill Tyrion, since he believes Tyrion is innocent, and Joffrey meant nothing to him. Cersei teases him "Was it your hand they hacked off in Harrenhal, or your manhood?." She feels he has changed (which he did, as a result of Brienne's positive influence and his maiming), and does not like that.
Tywin decides to leave Harrenhal to drive Robb's armies from the Westerlands . He names Gregor castellan and leaves Arya to serve him. Arya seeks out Jaqen, intending to name Tywin as her last target to protect Robb, but is unable to find him in time. When he returns from patrol she asks him to help her escape and he refuses, saying that it was not part of their arrangement. She gives Jaqen his own name in response, refusing to take it back unless he helps her. Jaqen kills several guards that night, allowing Arya to walk out of the castle with Gendry and Hot Pie.
During Season 2 of the TV series, she serves as Tywin's cupbearer. In the novels, she serves Roose Bolton, who captured Harrenhal from Amory Lorch after Tywin leaves with his army to defend the Westerlands. Thus, none of the scenes between Tywin and Arya happened in the books. She still flees from Harrenhal with Gendry and Hot Pie, but she does so without using Jaqen H'ghar's help; though in the novels she does use Jaqen's help to open Harrenhal to Roose Bolton and the Northmen.
Arya's third and final choice was similar but somewhat condensed from what happened in the books. In the TV series, she asks Jaqen to help her escape, so he kills the Lannister guards. In the books, Arya asks Jaqen to help her free a large number of Northern prisoners-of-war who are being held at the castle. Jaqen refuses at first, then Arya chooses him as the third man to die. Jaqen asks her to change her choice, and she agrees on the condition that he helps her free the prisoners. He enlists the help of Rorge and Biter . They get large pots of boiling soup as the prisoners' dinner, but when they get to the dungeons, they throw the boiling-hot soup on the guards and slay them, free and arm the prisoners, and take Harrenhal from the Lannister forces. This is remembered as the "weasel soup" incident, because at the time, Arya was using the alias "Weasel" (naming herself after a little girl she took care of earlier in the book before being captured). Soon afterward, Jaqen leaves, after giving Arya the coin. He explains that if she ever needs to find him again, she should give the coin to any man from Braavos and say "valar morghulis."
Roose Bolton becomes the master of Harrenhal as a result, and Arya becomes his cupbearer . Arya does not leave because she feels safe with the Northern soldiers, but at the same time she still keeps her true identity secret because she isn't sure if she can trust them yet. She overhears Roose and his men discussing the capture of Winterfell and Bran and Rickon's deaths, and refuses to believe the news. Arya continues serving Roose until she finds out that he is leaving Harrenhal in the hands of Vargo Hoat , a particularly cruel sellsword, and that she will remain there with him. Unsure of what to do, she goes to the castle's godswood and prays to the old gods . The weirwood face responds to her with her father's voice, reminding her that she is Arya Stark and she must be strong. In response, she enacts her escape from Harrenhal, bringing along Gendry and Hot Pie, with the intention of reaching her family at Riverrun. She kills the guard at the gate to get out and they ride away on stolen horses.
When Arya learns of Joffrey's death in the novels, she is not happy about it, not because she wasn't the one to kill him or watch as she wishes in the TV series, but because Joffrey's death doesn't matter as much since Robb was dead too. Also, in the novels, Arya and the Hound do not encounter Brienne and Pod , nor do they encounter Rorge and Biter . At the Crossroads Inn, Arya and The Hound fight Polliver , the Tickler and a Sarsfield squire. Arya kills the Tickler (who is assassinated at Harrenhal by Jaqen in the series) and the squire, but it is the Hound who kills Polliver. The Hound is severely injured during the fight, his wounds fester and he falls from his horse. After this, Arya refuses to give him a merciful death, and leaves him to die on his own. She does not take his silver (but later wishes she had). She rides to the Saltpans and searches for a ship that will take her to Jon at the Wall. All she can find is a ship headed to Braavos, which she boards using the coin Jaqen gave her.
In sharp contrast to Arya's "sugarcoated" portrayal in the show, in the books she gradually loses her humanity, her soul growing darker to the point that she kills people who have never done her any harm. It may be the result of the hell Arya has been through: forced to kill in self-defense; watching her father being unjustly executed while she is powerless to do anything; traveling in the company of questionable people (Yoren's caravan, the Brotherhood and the Hound); helplessly watching people being slaughtered like sheep on the way to Harrenhal; running away from one captivity to another; held at the mercy of inhuman monsters like the Mountain and Vargo Hoat; the last straw might have been the duel between Beric and the Hound, which made Arya realize there is such thing as justice - the only rule is "might makes right."
As Arya's plotline progresses and her soul grows darker, murder becomes her prime solution for every encounter; before she kills a guard at Harrenhal, she does not consider other options, like sneaking past him or knocking him unconscious. Only if the objective circumstances do not allow her to commit a murder (when she considers killing Gendry and a woman who cheats her at Saltpans) - she tries less violent way. In the fourth and fifth novels, she murders people who have not done her, her family or friends any ill - Dareon and the old insurance seller. Unlike Ramsay, Arya does not draw a sadistic pleasure from killing; it has become a need for her, the way a vampire needs blood. It seems she does not really care whom she kills; if someone from her death list happens to be nearby (Rafford), she'd kill him, but she is no hurry to look for those who are responsible for the destruction of her house.
Robb leaves Roose in command of Harrenhal with a detachment of the Northern army while Robb leads his main host back across the Riverlands to Riverrun. Karstark angrily says that this is a waste of time, though Robb points out that his uncle, Edmure Tully , will reinforce their army. Karstark maintains that it will make no difference since the Lannisters now outnumber them over two to one. Robb asks if Karstark has lost faith in their cause, and Karstark says he still believes in revenge. However, he later says that he thinks Robb lost the war the day he married Talisa.
Robb and his advisors meet with "Black Walder" and Lothar Frey to discuss an alliance for his planned attack on Casterly Rock. The Freys carry Walder Frey's demands for an alliance, which includes a formal apology from Robb, the castle Harrenhal and all of its lands and incomes, and for Edmure to marry Roslin , one of his daughters. Edmure is reluctant to marry a woman he has never met but is eventually convinced by the group to go through with the arrangement.
Littlefinger is elevated to Lord of Harrenhal in reward for brokering the alliance. He jokes that now he must get started on producing some heirs. Hence, Sansa's betrothal to King Joffrey is broken so that Joffrey can marry Margaery. Sansa is overjoyed at that she no longer has to marry Joffrey but tries to look heartbroken.
Unlike in the show, Littlefinger does not go to Harrenhal, neither before nor after he becomes its lord. He explains to Sansa it is because of the curse, which caused the destruction of every house that held Harrenhal, and the death of every individual who served as its castellan: Lady Whent, Tywin, Amory Lorch, Vargo Hoat, the Mountain and Polliver.
Catelyn, still Robb's prisoner, is among the Northern forces that march on Harrenhal , only to find the castle abandoned, and the 200 prisoners slain . Among the dead, Catelyn identifies the body of Ser Jaremy Mallister , her father's bannerman. Robb then orders his mother imprisoned within the fortress.
Robb and his advisors meet with Black Walder and Lothar Frey to discuss an alliance for his planned attack on Casterly Rock . The Freys carry Walder Frey 's demands for an alliance, which includes a formal apology from Robb, the castle Harrenhal and all of its lands and incomes, and for Edmure Tully to marry Roslin , one of his daughters. Edmure is reluctant to marry a woman he has never met, but is eventually convinced by the group to go through with the arrangement.
After both are delivered to Harrenhal , where Jaime's infected stump is treated by Qyburn , Jaime shocks Brienne by joining her in the communal bath. Jaime mocks Brienne, saying she was unable to protect Renly. Brienne stands up defiantly, and Jaime apologizes to her. He begins to confess what really happened when he killed the Mad King , to which she asks why he never told his side of the story before now. The stress of relating the tale, combined with his already weakened state, causes him to collapse into her arms. She calls aid for the "Kingslayer", at which he whimpers that his name is Jaime.
After Brienne remains at Harrenhal when Jaime is sent away by Roose Bolton , Vargo Hoat ( Locke in the TV series) attempts to rape her, but she fights him off, biting off his ear in the process. Jaime is amused when he later learns that the wound festered, driving Hoat half mad with the pain.
The bloody brawl at the Inn at the Crossroads is significantly different than in the show: the people whom Arya and the Hound encounter are Polliver , the Tickler and a squire. Polliver demands that the Hound comes with them to Harrenhal . In the ensuing brawl, the Hound kills Polliver, but is severely injured by the Tickler (whom Arya kills). Significantly, the Hound and Arya never encounter Brienne; Arya does take his money and leaves him to die, but his terminal condition results from the infection of his wound from the Inn, not any new injuries sustained in additional combat.
Following the assassination of Ser Amory just outside Tywin's chamber, Gregor is tasked with finding the culprit. Tywin fears that he was the intended target and has Ser Gregor hang over 30 of their own men. Gregor suggests an infiltrator from the Brotherhood Without Banners was responsible and Tywin dispatches him to pressure the smallfolk of the Riverlands into giving up the members of the Brotherhood. Tywin marches back to the Westerlands and leaves Gregor to serve as castellan at Harrenhal.
Robb and his army get to Harrenhal, finding that Gregor has left the castle with his men. To their horror, they discover that Gregor has executed the remaining 200 Northmen and Rivermen prisoners at Harrenhal, leaving their bodies to rot.
Gregor's men-at-arms are known as "the Mountain's men." His cruelty and brutality are clearly mirrored in them. The best thing that can be said about them is that they are less vile and violent than the Brave Companions, Vargo Hoat 's sellsword company. Gregor leaves them at Harrenhal when Cersei summons him to fight on her behalf; when Jaime arrives at Harrenhal on his way to the besieged Riverrun , the new castellan of Harrenhal, the pious Ser Bonifer Hasty, insists Jaime take the Mountain's men with them, as he won't have such sinners in his service. Jaime agrees to this, reasoning he can use them as cannon fodder if he has to storm Riverrun. After Riverrun is taken, Jaime orders them to escort members of the surrendered garrison who wish to take the black to Maidenpool so they can take ship for Eastwatch-by-the-Sea (adding in a threat to kill them if any of the prisoners come to harm). After dealing with their antics in Maidenpool, Randyll Tarly outright insists the lot of them should be sent to the Night's Watch .
Harren thought the walls of his massive castle could withstand any assault, but he did not realize that dragons could simply fly over them. In the Burning of Harrenhal , Aegon used his dragon Balerion to roast King Harren and all of his sons alive within their own tower. Harrenhal was blasted with dragonfire and left half-ruined.
Afterwards, Aegon granted Harrenhal to his bannermen of House Qoherys , which eventually became extinct. They were followed by Houses Towers , Harroway , Strong , and Lothston . All of them, like the Hoares and Qoherys before them, died out, leading to the castle to be considered a cursed place. Several tales are told of Harrenhal, including the tale of Mad Lady Lothston , the flaming ghosts of Harren and his sons, and of servants who go to sleep and are found turned to ashes the following day.
Harrenhal is seen as something of a white elephant: while it is technically the biggest castle in Westeros, it is so ridiculously large that the surrounding area cannot possibly produce the necessary food to support the massive army needed to fully man it. Rulers of Harrenhal usually lose money and resources simply by possessing it. As a result, Harrenhal is rarely if ever fully manned. Moreover, it was never fully repaired after being blasted with dragonfire by the Targaryens three hundred years ago, which combined with the fact that the garrison is never as large as the fortifications require, means that Harrenhal really isn't one of the most defensibly formidable castles in Westeros.
The surrounding lands subject to Harrenhal are actually some of the richest and most fertile in all of Westeros, being located in the watersheds of both the Trident River and Gods Eye lake. In peacetime, a noble House can actually become quite wealthy from holding Harrenhal - provided that they hire only a skeleton force to defend it instead of a full garrison. It is a testament to the sheer size of the castle that even the most productive farmlands in Westeros cannot support enough troops to fully garrison it. Nonetheless, the unwary often see Harrenhal as a great reward or prize in war, without pausing to consider that there is actually little net profit in holding it.
By the time of the War of the Five Kings , Harrenhal was held by House Whent , until they were stripped of it and the castle was given to House Slynt as a reward for Janos Slynt 's betrayal of Eddard Stark . However, due to the area being a warzone, Slynt never actually occupied the castle and was stripped of it when he was sent to the Wall . In Season 2, it is used as the main forward base for Tywin Lannister 's army in the Riverlands during his campaign against Robb Stark . However, the Lannisters later withdraw their forces to defend King's Landing in the decisive Battle of the Blackwater . At the beginning of Season 3 the abandoned castle is re-captured by the Northern army (Robb Stark's maternal grandmother was a Whent, so he has some direct claim to the castle), and Robb left a detachment of the Northern army under Roose Bolton to hold the castle. After Bolton left to attend the wedding of Edmure Tully and Roslin Frey , the castle is manned by his crony Locke . However in Season 4, Locke is seen at Bolton's side back in the North. After this, Petyr Baelish was Lord of Harrenhal, until he was executed in the Season 7 finale by Arya Stark on orders of Sansa Stark . It now is unclear who is Lord of Harrenhal and who holds the castle in real terms.
Daemon flies to Harrenhal with Caraxes to take it for the Blacks . Arriving in the midst of a severe storm, he lands Caraxes atop Kingspyre Tower, overpowers the minimal resistance offered by the castle's guards as he descends, and bursts into the castle's great hall, declaring he is claiming it. Harrenhal's castellan, Ser Simon Strong willingly bends the knee to Daemon and declares his loyalty to Rhaenyra , explaining afterwards that he despises his lord and great-nephew Larys, since he murdered his father and brother to claim lordship of Harrenhal. Daemon orders Simon to begin repairs to Harrenhal that it might sufficiently garrison an army, and summon his liege lord, Grover Tully , to Harrenhal so Daemon can treat with him.
Catelyn recognizes Willis Wode , a knight of Harrenhal at the Inn at the Crossroads and asks him if he is loyal to Lady Whent and Catelyn's father , Whent's liege lord. He replies this is the case, and she asks his aid in restraining Tyrion and receives it.
Following the Lannister defeat at the Battle of Whispering Wood , Tywin announces that he will take his army of 30,000 men, capture Harrenhal and use it as the forward base for his army in the Riverlands while Robb's numerically superior forces consolidate near Riverrun .
Arya, Gendry , and Hot Pie are taken prisoner and taken to Harrenhal, which serves as a rallying point for the Lannister troops warring in the Riverlands. Here they are witness to horrific torture inflicted upon the smallfolk by Lannister torturers in search for the Brotherhood Without Banners . The torturers are led by the Mountain , the Tickler and Polliver . Later, Tywin arrives to take command over the forces operating the Riverlands and scolds the Lannister torturers for not putting the smallfolk to work serving the war cause.
Among the terms Walder Frey sends Robb to renew his alliance with House Stark , he demands Harrenhal and all its attendant lands and income. Despite Edmure Tully 's protests, Robb agrees to this demand for after the war is over. Harrenhal never passes to House Frey .
Concept artist Kimberley Pope explained the elements she came up with for Harrenhal's design: "I added the thorns, dead trees, and suggested it would be nice to have the lake as a sulphuric crater, toxic and dead, still suffering from the devastation brought about by the burning of Harrenhal." The walls of Harrenhal's major towers are also supposed to appear so large that to characters inside the complex they seem like mountains in the background.
Production Designer Gemma Jackson said that in order to develop the look of Harrenhal, she visited Cambodia and the ruins of Angkor Wat to get a feel for how a vast but crumbling castle complex should appear, with many broken walls overgrown with vines and creepers. Many of the walls were broken when it was burned with dragonfire, and more have since fallen into ruin but not been repaired, because the entire castle is too big to adequately maintain. To emphasize this, the paths through the Harrenhal set were designed to be deliberately confusing, so the camera is never quite sure what is right around the next bend: informal "entrances" to different sections of the castle will suddenly appear as characters pass through large broken gaps in old walls. The Lannister troops have also haphazardly assembled some wooden constructions in their makeshift camp within the older stone walls - and because all of the trees were burned away long ago, they mostly just broke up whatever old rotting furniture or half-burned support beams they could find within the castle itself and hastily hammered them together into new forms. The combined effect gives Harrenhal a confusing, maze-like quality. Jackson also added large broken stones around the bases of many of the walls, to emphasize that they are crumbling into ruin, and their upkeep is so neglected that no one even expends the effort to clear the fallen stones away.
Since Harren's death the castle has passed through a number of other noble houses ( Qoherys , Harroway , Towers , Strong , and Lothston ), each of which has come to ruin for one reason or another. Also, almost every castellan to command the castle's garrison has come to a horrific end, even after getting far away from the castle. This has led to the common superstition in Westeros that Harrenhal is cursed, which is the reason Littlefinger never set foot there ever since he was granted the castle; he thinks little of it as "Cavernous halls and ruined towers, ghosts and draughts, ruinous to heat, impossible to garrison." Prior to the War of the Five Kings House Whent, loyal vassals to Lord Hoster Tully of Riverrun, held the lordship of Harrenhal.
Ser Bonifer Hasty has been recently appointed by Jaime to be the castellan of Harrenhal. He is aware of the curse but is not concerned, claiming that a pious man like himself (unlike the former castellans) is armored by his faith. So far nothing ill happened to him, but it does not mean much because he has been in his new office only for a short while, too short for the curse to take effect.
Harrenhal is considered extremely ill-reputed place not only due to the alleged curse: according to Jaime, Harrenhal has seen more horror in its three hundred years than Casterly Rock had witnessed in three thousand. It is said that Harren and his sons still walk the halls by night, afire, and those who look upon them - burst into flame.
Due to its central location in contested borderlands, since its construction Harrenhal has fallen to hostile siege more times than any other major castle in Westeros (within the same three hundred year time period). Aegon the Conqueror infamously burned and half-ruined the castle not long after it was finished using his dragon Balerion. It was also attacked during the Faith Militant uprisings - or rather, the early localized rebellions against Aegon I's sons which later coalesced into a wide-scale conflict. A rebel leader styling himself Harren the Red, claiming to be Harren the Black's bastard, established himself at Harrenhal but was crushed. It was probably attacked during the First Blackfyre Rebellion. Ironically, the one major continent-wide war which Harrenhal was not directly besieged in was Robert's Rebellion - yet in many ways, the spark of the rebellion began at Harrenhal. It was during a great tournament at Harrenhal that Rhaegar Targaryen controversially crowned Lyanna Stark as the Queen of Love and Beauty - and his later abduction of Lyanna set the entire war in motion.
By the War of the Five Kings, Harrenhal had fallen into such disrepair that Shella Whent's household had completely abandoned three of the five great towers of the castle, letting them fall into ruin. Even in the two remaining towers, they only occupied and continued to service the bottom fifth of each tower - put another way, only about two fifteenths of the castle's potential living space was actually being used and maintained.
After House Lannister takes Harrenhal, most of its household keep on serving the occupiers. However, Arya, Jaqen H'ghar , Rorge , and Biter free the Northern prisoners after Tywin and the Mountain leave the castle under the command of Amory Lorch. The Brave Companions seize the chance to turn on Lorch and deliver the castle to Roose Bolton, who was commanding the Northern forces east of the Trident, with whom they had previously made a deal. Later Roose leaves Harrenhal to attend Edmure Tully's wedding , granting the command of the castle to Vargo Hoat . Hoat is killed by the Mountain. When the Mountain is called back to King's Landing , he gives the command to Polliver, who is killed by the Hound.