Josmyn Frey

Addam Frey

Lord Josmyn Frey is the Lord of the Crossing and Warden of the Northern Border in the Kingdom of the Trident. He is of middling height and raven of hair.

## **Biography**

Josmyn Frey was born as the second child and first son of Lord Franklyn Frey. The healthy young lad was born rather late in his father’s life, with only an elder sister and a host of stillbirths having come before. Due to his father lacking male heirs late into his life, the young boy was acclaimed as ‘Gods-given’ by the court of the Twins, as the succession was now secure. Growing up as the heir of one of the most powerful houses of the Trident, the boy was given the very best of educations, though he never took well to reading nor writing, reported by the Maester to be an issue of the boy getting the letters mixed up in his head. While his father tried his best to teach his son, the lessons would not take, seemingly only making the boy wroth and sullen, leading Lord Frey to send for learned men who could try and teach his son, but to little avail, with only little headway being made. The young lad would often take out his anger on other children in the castle, becoming known as a little demon who would terrorize other children and the serving staff, with only his kin being relatively safe from his bouts of anger.

Trying to escape from his studies, Josmyn would often hide amongst the men-at-arms and knights of the household, who would regale him with stories as well as giving him instructions in martial matters. The heir of the Crossing would find himself fitting in much better with these common, soldierly, types rather than with the Maesters and learned men his father surrounded himself with, creating a rather large rift between father and son. While avoidant of anything to do with reading or writing, the young Josmyn did take a shine to tales of knights and heroes, though due to being embarassed to ask a Maester, the servants or especially his father to read them to him, he would sneak off into the library with a cousin, Dickon, who would read the stories to him. Despite being years younger than Josmyn, Dickon, being a bright albeit frail boy, would seek, like the heir himself, to escape from his family troubles. The two would become fast friends and grow close, managing to use each other for support in their daily struggles. This state of things would, however, be ended when the young Josmyn was sent off first as a page and later as a squire to Riverrun. The young lad would find himself much better suited to the mindset of the more martial court of the Tullys. He would take lessons from both the Lord himself as well as the knight he was squired to, Ser Alesander. However, there was a lack of noble wards his own age at Riverun, like he had had with Dickon at the Twins, aside from two girls, Gwyn and Perraine. It would be in the company of these two that the young heir of the Crossing would spend most of his time, with the girls managing to somewhat tame the little terror that was Josmyn. Still, while the girls would provide ample company, the lack of male wards of his status would make the boy a tad sullen and awkward.

The war of the Trident, a pivotal moment in the life of all Riverlands would prove no less an occasion for Josmyn. Serving as a squire to Ser Alesander, Josmyn was in the thick of the fighting from the very first to the very last. The Battle of the Hollow Hill was a rather rude awakening for the young squire about the realities of warfare, when the Gardener knights cleaved a bloody path through their ranks and sent them wheeling back to Riverrun, in which they would be penned up until the Lannisters arrived. Sitting at siege was deadly dull, but what’s worse, it was nerve-racking, with no knowledge of how his kin fared back at the Twins, whether they had manages to resist the Valeman onslaught. The state of things would, once again, be upset by the arrival of the Lannister reinforcements, who, along with their Tully allies, would throw the Gardeners back for a time. The push forward would be a slow and bloody affair, with the climactic battle taking place in Stoney Sept. The fighting would be fierce, with battles fought over every house and corner, the tide turning this way and that, with men dying by the hundreds as the Lannister and Tully forced were pushed back, step by step. And then the knights of the Vale arrived and chaos was unleashed in full measure. The battle inside Stoney Sept would be more a chaotic meleé than a battle, with each side fighting each other and no clear lines being drawn. It would be Josmyn, separated from his knight, that would rally a group of Riverlands to his cause with a remarkable dash of leadership and lead a berserker charge to capture the Peach brothel, allowing for the Tully and Lannister marksmen to gain vantage over the town square. It would be after the battle that the Heir of the Crossing would be knighted in front of the inn, gaining his spurs at the age of 16, though some soldiers mockingly dubbed him the Knight of Peaches.

After the conclusion of the war and the end of his squirehood, the young knight would return home. His father’s lands would be relatively intact, spared most of the fighting due to an orderly retreat into the Twins, sparing the Freylands of battles east of the Green fork, even though the Freys had devoted troops to the cause of Lord Mallister, who repelled the Valemen from the Green and Blue forks. With the Fletcher dynasty limping to it’s doom, it fell to the Freys and Mallisters to try and prop it up. Lord Frey was appointed as Lord Coin-Master in King Tristifer’s council, albeit at the condition of becoming the king’s go-to for loans and the king had a royal thirst for gold. But Lord Frey, being no man’s fool, made the best of new position, negotiating favourable conditions for the loans as well as getting to work on expanding his own influence, starting to position his own men in positions of power in the royal administration, as well as expanding the royal bureucracy, using the money lent to the crown to do it, prompting the king to go further into debt to Lord Frey even as the loaned money went to pay Frey’s cronies, who, in turn, would be forced to pay tribute to their patron. With the King seeking only to distract himself as he marched to his own demise and Lord Mallister too busy or uncaring of financial matters, Lord Frey had free reign to conduct his machinations. Tournies, feasts and royal travels, the King would jump at any possibility of distraction and fund any such events, with Frey whispering in his ear on behalf of any Lord seeking to host these grand affairs, for a fee, of course. It was an oft repeated jest that Lord Frey’s vaults were seemingly endless, even as millions of golden dragons would be loaned out to the crown, but the treasury seemingly always able to accomodate King Tristifer’s needs.

This plethora of tournies and feasts suited Ser Josmyn, and other young knights, quite well. Tourney season was open on the Trident and young nobles eager to prove their worth flocked to take part. While not much of a lance, the young heir of the Crossing would still prove himself an able tourney knight, with his prowess in the melee not easily denied by any man. His success in the lists, however, would owe a fair bit to the machinations of his father, who often, desiring the fat gold purses offered by King Tristifer, engaged in rather rigorous tournament-rigging. It did not take long for Josmyn to become well known along the Green and Blue forks as a formidable tourney knight, with the heir of the Crossing becoming a crowd favourite, a sensation that the young knight took to rather well, losing much of his former sullen and sulking nature.

However, with his father old and in ill health, the young heir was looked to to start taking charge of his father’s responsibilities, something that he was not quite up to par with. While the military duties of a warden came naturally to Josmyn, the duties of a toll-keep and counter of coins was a matter much more difficult. Still, his father did his best to try and educate his son on the needed matters, as well as starting to shift the loyalties of the royal administrators to his son, but this would only serve to flare up old troubles, as Josmyn, still only barely literate, was a hot-headed young man uninterested in counting coppers or dealing with trivial administrative matters. Still, bit by bit, old Lord Frey’s persistence wore through, with Josmyn managing to gain a handle on his father’s great matters. Upon his father’s demise from a bloody cough, Josmyn would be named lord of the Crossing and Lord Coin-Master barely six moons before Tristifer’s own demise, having already become Warden of the Northern Border a year before. Barely having managed to pick up his duties as Lord Coin-Master, the King would follow his father into the afterlife. And now Westeros waits with bated breath to see who succeeds the Fletchers. Whoever the heir, however, the new Lord of the Crossing is headed to the Council of Harrenhal with a determination to *Take his Toll*.

## **Timeline**

275 A.A. - Born at the Twins

284 A.A. - Sent as a page to Riverrun

286 A.A. - Becomes a squire to Ser Alesander Tully, Heir of Riverrun

290 A.A. - Fights alongside the Tullys in the opening battles of the War of the Trident and continues to fight until Battle of Stoney Sept

292 A.A. - Fights in the Battle of Stoney Sept and is knighted in it's aftermath for his courage

293 A.A. - Wins his first tourney at Harroway, winning the melee and overthrowing several notables in the lists

295-297 A.A. - Attends several tournaments along all the forks of the Tridents, becoming a well-known among the forks as a tournament champion

297 A.A. - Due to his sire's illness, is named the Warden of the Northern Border and assumes some of his father's other duties

298 A.A. Is named Lord of the Crossing after his father's death and assumes his spot on the King's council for six moons before the King's own demise, after which he has been waiting for the new King of the Trident to be named

## **Supporting Characters**

Luceon Frey. 47. Castellan.

Maester Maynard. 32. Maester.

Ser Humfrey Haigh. 27. General.

Ser Luceon Charlton. 54. Scout.

Ser Medgar Nayland. 33. Bastion.

## **Family Tree**

http://www.familyecho.com/?p=START&c=jqsizamfid&f=299534395331431904 (A bit of a work in progress in regards to cousins and their marriages)