The Crystal Kingdom

## A New Flock of Sparrows

In the year 359 AC, the height of summer was upon Westeros, and much of the southern reaches of the continent were in the grip of a severe drought. As crops withered and livestock grew thin and died, growing numbers of smallfolk abandoned their lands and begin to wander in search of better conditions.

Septon Owen, an itinerant preacher, began to attract increasingly large crowds of followers with his eloquent oratory. Followers called him Owen the Orator and Owen Goldentongue. His teachings drew upon the legacy of the Sparrows and the Brotherhood without Banners, advocating a simple and humble style of life, charging the strong with protecting the weak and for those with plenty to share with those who had none. Like the High Sparrow, Owen went barefoot and wore only a simple woolen robe. At first, Owen and his flock of Sparrows were largely ignored by the nobility as they wandered through the eastern Reach, southern Riverlands, northeastern Stormlands and Crownlands, but as his numbers swelled, his movement became bolder. Owen formed the coterie of hedge knights that gravitated to him into a new Warrior’s Sons and also revived the Poor Fellows to protect his followers in defiance of the ban against holy men and women bearing arms.

The following year, Owen and his followers began to hold religious trials in the villages where they stayed and enforcing punishment on blasphemers, adulterers, rapists and other sinners. A few moons later, they began to strip septs of their valuable accoutrements to buy food for the poor, and attacked wealthy merchants to take their wares. Owen’s fiery rhetoric argued that the true sacrilege was for septs laden with riches to stand empty while their devout worshippers starved. He denounced the rich hoarding wealth and flaunting it in their vanity while the poor suffered. When both the High Septon of King’s Landing and the High Septon of Oldtown condemned Owen’s movement, he declared that it was a scandal in the sight of the gods that the faith should be divided and subservient to the whims of kings. Owen’s popularity with the smallfolk confounded efforts to capture him and disband his flock as many were happy to give him shelter and claim to have no knowledge of having ever seen him when questioned by soldiers.

## The Chastisement of Tumbleton

In the eleventh moon of the year 360 AC, Owen’s followers stormed a wedding feast thrown by House Footly at Tumbleton. Hundreds of Sparrows stormed the pavillions where the wedding was occurring. They smashed the casks of wine, seized the food and wedding gifts, and set upon the wedding guests. The mob stripped Lord Footly and his guests of their fine clothing and jewels, and sheared off their hair as divinely-ordained punishment for their vanity.

## Enemy of the Realm

When word of this event reached Highgarden, Lord Tyrell charged Lord Caswell with raising men to put an end to the new Sparrows once and for all. Owen and his followers slipped away into the Kingswood, and Lord Caswell’s force was denied permission to cross into the Iron Throne’s territory in pursuit. The Sparrows next appeared at Fawnton, and surprised soldiers of House Cafferen who were not expecting to encounter a large, armed mob. Owen’s followers disappeared again after sacking Fawnton’s marketplace, and King Aemon called upon Lord Connington to raise men to deal put down the Sparrow revolt. At the same time, he commissioned his Master of Whisperers to try to turn the smallfolk against Septon Owen. Rumors began to spread that the Septon was hiding away a hoard of riches for himself, and his followers brought him maidens to deflower in order to make them ‘brides of the gods.’ Septon Owen declared anyone opposed to their divine mission as ungodly agents of evil.

## A Crystal Kingdom

In the year 361, Septon Owen declared himself the rightful High Septon, chosen by the gods themselves, at Stoney Sept and preached that he was to bring about a new godly kingdom that would sweep away the wickedness that had infested both the Iron Throne and the Golden Throne. Lord Connington’s force closed in on Stoney Sept, and engaged Owen’s Faith Militant. The Sparrows won their first encounter thanks to sheer numbers and zealotry and Owen proclaimed this a sign of favor from the gods that their cause was just. The Sparrows closed themselves up in the town, and Lord Connington put his army into camp to wait for reinforcements from Harrenhal. Once Lord Strickland’s forces linked up with the Connington forces, they orchestrated the storming of the city.

The sky turned black the morning of the battle, and the drought ended with violent thunderstorms and hail. The assault was postponed, and the Sparrows once again celebrated the gods’ favor in their cause. On the third day, the rains finally let up enough that the assault on the town went forward. The Sparrows had thrown up barricades in the streets and fought hard against the forces of the Crown. They slowly gave ground as the day went on until they were forced to abandon the city and spirited Septon Owen away with them against his strenuous objections. Lord Connington drove the fleeing Sparrows south across the muddy countryside--toward the waiting army of Lord Caswell along the Goldroad. Both sides later denied that they had been in communication with one another or had in any way coordinated their efforts. Septon Owen’s body was found after the battle, slain by the arrow of an unknown archer.