Maegor's Breath

After an almost year long autumn, what was expected to be just another winter swept over Westeros shortly after the year’s turn to 75. This winter, which would be called the **Winter of a Hundred Kings** throughout the North and **Maegor’s Breath** south of the Neck, was harsher than any other in living memory. The southern name came from a remark made by Prince Aemon, who said that it was almost as if Maegor’s ghost was just above them, breathing his fury.

Early on, piercing winds foretold the harsh blizzards that would become so prevalent during the winter, and several believed that Maegor's Breath was the wrath of the Seven, unhappy with Targaryen rule. Regardless of whether it was the Seven or just plain bad luck, the cold would take many lives. A large-scale outbreak of dragonblight would take even more, and contaminate many food supplies. By the coming of spring in 78, Westeros was at the end of it's rope.

## Regional Overviews

### The Crownlands

For a good portion of 75, the Crownlands did not feel winter’s harsh touch. Airs were cool, but the worst of the strong winds did not strike King’s Landing until later into the year, when the first of many blizzards hit. A thin layer of ice froze over the Blackwater shortly into 76, which gradually thickened as the winter dragged on.

King Rhaegar was by nature a cautious man, and usually kept large stores of food in case of a prolonged winter. But, it mattered not when several food stores all across the Crownlands became infected by Dragonblight, requiring them to be burnt down. Not all stores were affected, but House Targaryen was quite possibly affected the most, leading to taxes being increased all around the board.

### The Westerlands

The Westerlands would not feel the first stirrings of winter until late 75, and while the snows were never deep enough to completely hinder trade and movements, it was one of the worst winters on record in the last few centuries.  The mountains saw the worst of it, with the lords there in the most dire of circumstances. Lords Lefford, Marbrand, Lydden, and Brax were the most affected by the snows.

The Dragonblight plague was not as harsh as it was in some of the other regions, but it was enough to cause some food storages and enough dead to warrant Lord Tommen Lannister, himself already in failing health, to command the dead of the disease to be burned as soon as they ceased breathing.  The stores of Lannisport and Casterly Rock managed to remain intact, which allowed for the Lannisters to distribute aid to those that were in most need of food during the winter.

### The Vale

Without the North to inform the rest of the realm of the severity of the coming winter, such a duty fell to the poor souls of the Vale of Arryn and the Riverlands. The Three Sisters would feel the snap first.

In mid 75 AC, the waters around the Sisters began to freeze, trapping their ships and dinghies alike, rendering them unable to sail, while their wells would experience much the same, and those crops they could not harvest in time took to a harsh snap. The Lord Sunderland had urgently ordered the ravens fly to the rest of the Vale in wake of the arrival of the cold, but alas, his birds proved too meek for the winter, with all returning to the rookery before even taking flight of a hundred yards. The mainland would have to discover of the severity of this winter for themselves.

Nigh only two moons later, the Vale of Arryn felt winter’s cruel kiss. Nigh all movement throughout the Vale came to halt in these next months. The mountain passes filled so terribly with snow even the most expert journeymen had trouble, and travels that would have taken a day in other season came to take five. The Lords of the Vale stayed warm inside their castles and waited. The people of the Vale starved, froze, and died, coming to find rather a penchant for looting and spilling blood. Yet there was little the Lords of the Vale could do.

With the end of winter, outbreak came. A plague. Some blame the Crownlands, others say Northerners engineered it, while some still turned to the Clawmen for suspect. But alas, the saying that became popular within Gulltown, where a great number of bodies, both living and dead, would come to be burned was that “them Targaryens did it, the Gods are angry with them folk”.

Alas, the people of Gulltown would be forced to - for the most part - suffer this plague on their lonesome. When word of the plague reached the Eyrie, Lord Gunthor Arryn made the pragmatic choice, and ordered Gulltown shut off from the rest of the Vale. Ships were burned, merchants cried out for their lost profits, the gates were barred, men from Runestone and Ironoaks were stationed outside the walls of Gulltown with pikes, and the plague did not spread.

At least, it did not spread until 79 AC. Through the Riverlands it came, that much was undeniable. Whether through trade or what have it, it came. Wickenden, the Redfort, they reported it first, and then so it spread like wildfire, for the next year, the Vale whole would suffer a most grave reaping.

### The Stormlands

As the Winter hit the Stormlands, the storms of Shipbreaker Bay got even worse as it went on, preventing many of the ships that came through the region from Essos from reaching their destination.  Economic growth began to stagnate as what little money was coming in was being used to buy up as much food as possible from other regions, and to insure any fishermen that risked their lives and livelihoods to go out to their favorite spots.

Luckily for the Stormlands, their less dense population than other regions helped them escape the worst of the Dragonblight, though the houses in the Kingswood were still hit roughly by the disease.  As stored food was found to be diseased in many areas, a number of it was burned while Lord Raymont ordered some kept for study by the Maesters as to what could have possibly caused this outbreak. They would, unfortunately, find nothing useful and so it was burned as well.

### The North

As always, the Northerners were the first to feel the sting of a real winter. In the beginning of 75, blizzards began blowing stronger and more frequently until soon enough it felt as if the skies would never be seen again. Crops withered and died quickly in the beginnings of the storms with rivers and lakes freezing completely over soon after. The North was caught unprepared for the sudden natural onslaught and thousands across the massive land froze to death in their hovels and castles. Travel across the new Kingdom froze down to a standstill and news from outside their domain froze with it; the North was essentially blind to anything happening outside of their own protective walls.

In its own strange way, The Winter of a Hundred Kings, though as deadly and destructive as the winters of ages before, saved the North from a worse fate than the rest of Westeros. The biting cold that sterilized everything it touched in fact held the Dragonblight ravaging the other lands from taking a hold in the North.

Only a handful of holds, predominantly in the White Knife region, were affected by the blight. The maesters reported no more than a few hundred casualties were from the disease and as the waning months of the deadly winter came to pass, the North was ready and able to secure its borders to keep the southern plague away.

### Dorne

As much as the Winters in the North are always the strongest, in Dorne, they are hardly more than minor inconveniences, by some even preferred to the hot summer days. Nonetheless, there were some negative effects the Winter of 75 AC, which showed its full effect on Dorne almost a year after it was noticed in the North, with the crops of Dorne being used to warmer temperatures, and thus yields reduced still, especially as, in contrast to other regions, the Winter did not bring an increase in precipitation that could have benefitted the agriculture of the southernmost land of Westeros.

Just as with the Winter in the years before, the outbreak of the Dragonblight among the general population affected Dorne less than the lands of the Iron Throne, since Prince Cletus Martell, as regent for his young nephew Prince Nymor, decided to focus his trade routes eastward, while closing off the roads that led into Dorne through the Red Mountains and stopping and quarantining ships from House Targaryen’s Realm in the ports before they could unload their wares. Thus, the plague that ravaged Westeros left hardly a mark on Dorne, and the Principality remained unchanged from the years before, at least by natural means. Instead, a change of leadership had occurred in the meantime, when Princess Mara Martell died in 76 AC, but for reasons unrelated to the conditions of the world, but from the strains put upon her when birthing her fourth child Sarella.