The Red Keep

The Red Keep is the royal castle of King's Landing, the fortified residence of the king and the home of the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms. It crowns Aegon's High Hill, the tallest of the three hills of the capital, overlooking the city and the Blackwater Rush where it empties into Blackwater Bay.

The Red Keep takes its name from the pale red stone of its walls. It was begun under Aegon the Conqueror and completed under his successor Maegor the Cruel, who, it is said, put to death the masons and laborers who built its secret passages so that none might know all its hidden ways but the king.

Geography and structure

The castle is a strong fortress of red stone, ringed by a great curtain wall with massive drum towers. Within stand the royal apartments, the Tower of the Hand, the throne room that houses the Iron Throne, the kitchens, the dungeons known as the black cells, and Maegor's Holdfast, a castle-within-a-castle surrounded by a dry moat lined with iron spikes, where the royal family shelters in time of danger.

Honeycombing the Red Keep are secret passages and hidden stairs, the legacy of Maegor's builders, which allow those who know them to move unseen through the castle and to spy upon its chambers. The dragon skulls of the Targaryens once hung in the throne room before being removed to the cellars under King Robert.

History

The Red Keep has been the seat of the rulers of the Seven Kingdoms since the days of the Conqueror. Every Targaryen king after Aegon held court there, and after Robert's Rebellion it passed to House Baratheon and the council that ruled in the king's name. It was within the Red Keep that the Mad King Aerys II was slain on the steps of his own throne by Jaime Lannister during the Sack of King's Landing.

In the story

The Red Keep is the center of court intrigue throughout A Song of Ice and Fire. Eddard Stark serves there as Hand of the King and uncovers the truth of Cersei Lannister's children before his fall. The Small Council plots within its walls, Varys and Littlefinger spin their webs through its passages, and Sansa Stark is held there as a hostage. During the Battle of the Blackwater, the royal women shelter in Maegor's Holdfast while Tyrion Lannister leads the city's defense.