Barristan Baratheon

**Barristan Baratheon** is the Lord Paramount of the Stormlands and Lord of Storm's End.

## Appearance

Barristan Baratheon is tall and imposing figure. Coated in muscle and coarse black hair, he stands at six and a half feet tall and is normally adorned in either fine yellow silks or beautifully crafted plate. His eyes are a dark and stormy blue, and his face is tanned and covered in a thick jet-black beard and hair to his neck.

## History

Barristan Baratheon was born in 327 AC to Lord Orys Baratheon and Lady Myranda Mertyns. From birth he was a fierce and strong lad, terrorizing the other squires and, when they came, his younger brothers. His demeanor was immensely different around his sisters, who he guarded with a devilish and protective glare, merely begging the smaller boys to approach. He would be Lord Baratheon some day, as his father and his father before him had been, and any man who grew to ire him would soon feel the pain that would come from such a foolish action.

He squired for Ser Dafyd Tully, and learned much of swordplay from the man, becoming an incredibly skilled swordsman over the years, his blade becoming one with himself while he dreamed of wielding fabled Valyrian Steel and smiting down the foes of House Baratheon.. His knightly tutoring was surprisingly uneventful, consisting of mostly routine with a few flings with the ladies of the Riverlands, but eventually it came to a pass after long years in Riverrun. He was anointed in the Starry Sept of Oldtown at the age of twenty, following a long journey with his knightly master. After that, he took on a squire of House Tarth and returned to Storm’s End, where he remained until his father’s death two years later. A lord at twenty-two, Barristan set out to marry his siblings. His family had never been close with Dorne, but they were too close and too similar in power to ignore, and thus he arranged a match between his sister Marya and the heir of House Martell, a man named Qyle. Luckily, the two young people loved each other. Meanwhile, Barristan himself arranged a wedding to Lady Talia Tyrell

Over the following years, Barristan reigned over a peaceful and prosperous land, and though many days he dreamed that he was not shackled with lordly duty, over the years he began to appreciate the peace that ruling Storm's End brought, in a roundabout manner. It was not nearly as exciting of a duty as fighting with bandits in the Riverlands, but it still scratched the itch for power that Barristan had always felt. As he grew older, he realized that he rather liked being in control, even if that control barely held back the fury that ran deep in Baratheon blood. His hair-trigger grew heavier, and eventually he was truly peaceful.

The rise of Grazdan in the Stepstomes gave some worry, but Lord Barristan paid it no heed, for he didn't think anything of it at first. At the age of thirty-six, Barristan moved to unshackle his rage for the first time in years. Grazdan's whore of a wife had perished, and as 'punishment' he was moving to attack Dorne, the home of Barristan's younger sister Marya.

Edric, Barristan's second-youngest brother, insisting on taking a fleet to rebuke the King of the Stepstones, and Barristan let him. In brutal fighting, Edric was slain and returned to Storm's End. That was the breaking point, and Barristan could wait no longer. He demanded that they take action for his brother and for his sister, and raised the troops of the Stormlands to attack the Stepstones. The Crown moved with them, as did Dorne, but Barristan cared not for their reasons. What filled his mind was Marya Baratheon, and the corpse of Edric.

It was a long and hard siege, but when they finally broke through at Sapphire's Holdfast, Barristan surged over the walls leading the charge, and dove into the fray. As he slashed his way through the bloody mess that had engulfed the Pirate King's Castle, he saw Grazdan the Gruesome himself, backed by a hundred of his sellswords. Grazdan surely did not recognize Barristan's blood-covered plate or his wild blue eyes, but the enormous antlers sticking from his helm surely jogged the Essosi's memory. Barristan charged at him, flanked by more than two hundred men men, and the battle ended in a blur after almost all of the Stepstone's pirate army had been killed or captured, and among the corpse carts was Grazdan the Gruesome, killed in the chaos by some knight or another. To Barristan's horror, they found Marya dead among the captured and killed Martells.

Barristan was never quite the same after he had seen his sister’s brutally murdered corpse, and realized that he had failed in the one thing that mattered. He had chased down Grazdan because he had failed to protect Edric, and he had failed to protect Marya even when he had gotten there. He became mad quicker, though he never liked to admit it, and his smile and laugh rarely echoed around the halls of Storm’s End as it once had, accompanied by Edric and Ormund and so many others.

When Barristan returned home from the Stepstones, it took him a long time to lock the rage he had felt back in its cage. It was a useful tool once in a lifetime, but when Barristan Baratheon could not contain himself, the whole world suffered. His son Jon had his first son, and named him after Edric, the first Baratheon man to die in the Stepstones, but not the last. It was the Martells' fault, he was sure. They had done something to force Grazdan after them, and they had forced Edric to be slain on the sea, and Marya to be raped and murdered in the dungeons of Sapphire's Holdfast.

He had taken it to King Maekar many times, but the old king had bid him leave, and had never acted against the Dornish swine who had killed his sister and brother. Barristan bided his time, but he could never forget, and he could never forgive.

With the death of King Maekar, he sped to King's Landing as quickly as he could. For one, it was expected of him, and indeed, perhaps King Maekar's heir would be more willing to punish the Martells for their crimes against the staglord and his kin.

## Timeline

* 327 AC: Born
* 337 AC: Began squring for Ser Dafyd Tully
* 337 AC: Knighted
* 339 AC: Becomes Lord of House Baratheon
* 365 AC: Edric Baratheon dies chasing Grazdan’s ships, begins clamoring for Grazdan’s blood.
* 365 AC: Barristan Baratheon leads the charge into Grazdan’s fortress, becoming one of the men to charge Grazdan’s personal guard, though not the man to kill him in battle.
* 366 AC: Barristan pleas to King Maekar to enact revenge on the Martells for killing his brother and sister.
* 372 AC: Barristan travels to King’s Landing for the king’s funeral and the coronation of his heir, hoping that the new king will be more accepting to his pleas.