House Mallister (Nine for a Penny)

====

Lord Ryman rose to become the Lord of Seagard following his father Garrick's death. He was a quiet boy, who grew to be a wise and able Lord, beginning an ambitious reconstruction project of the ruins of Oldstones, and securing the Mallister line through his many sons.

Peace did not last long when Lord Ryman rose to his station, however. Within a year, the Band of the Nine had launched an invasion of the Iron Throne, claiming the throne for the last Blackfyre, Maelys the Monstrous. Lord Ryman dutifully raised his banners for King Jaehaerys, and him and his brother Denys marched alongside the Riverlands host, with his first born son Tristifer serving as Brynden Tully's squire throughout the war.

The first major engagement would come in Cracklaw Point, as the combined Crownland, Vale, and Riverland armies threw back Maely's Stepstone host into their ships, but as they marched back into the Bay of Claws they were met by a Reachman and Northern host, who engaged them in front of Castle Darry. The battle went on for two days before the forces of the Black Dragon gained the field and drove away the loyalist forces.

The war continued however, and while the loyalist forces regrouped they were dealt a horrendous blow as both the Stormlands and Iron Isles declared for the Black Dragon, adding their hosts to his own. It's said that after their betrayal, King Jaehaerys fell deathly ill, dying upon the Iron Throne shortly thereafter, and passing the crown to his ill prepared son, Aerys II. With the King dead, the loyalist forces in full retreat, and fresh armies flying the banner of the Black Dragon, King Aerys fled across the Narrow Sea with his family, and Maelys the Monstrous became the first Blackfyre to sit upon the Iron Throne.

His reign would last barely half a year though when he was murdered by a member of his own famed 'Band of Nine'. The crown then passed the Maelys cousin, the little known member of the Targaryen family Maegor, the only son of Aerion 'Brightflame'. King Maelys reign would however last long enough to see some of his promises fufilled, with the the crossing stripped from the Riverlands, and the Stoneway from Dorne.

The civil war thus resolved little. The crown had passed from the Targaryens, to the last member of House Blackfyre, to the Targaryens once more, serving only to fuel new animosities between rival lords and sow discontent within the realm. The Iron Isles, granted independence by King Maelys, thus refused to bend the knee to the new Targaryen king, and instead reverted back to their 'Old Ways' of raiding and pillaging. It wouldn't be until many years later, when Lord Ryman's two sons Tristifer and Jeffory were men grown themselves that the King would finally relent to his Lord's demands that the Ironborn be brought back under the crown.

Lord Ryman's heir and eldest, Ser Tristifer Mallister, was the one to lead the Mallister forces again the Iron Isles, engaging in a number of pitched battles, and leading the left flank of the royalist forces during the Battle of Orkmont. He was said to have burst into fits of laughter as the Ironborn threw themselves against his shieldwall, earning him the nickname of the Laughing Falcon. The Ironborn were brought back under the crown, but soon afterwards Lord Ryman passed of an unknown illness, the title of Lord of Seagard, and now Lord of Oldstones, would pass to his son and heir, Tristifer 'the Laughing Falcon' Mallister.

Lord Tristifer Mallister (8252 -
Early in Tristifer's life a wave of greyscale inflicted the court of Seagard, killing countless members of Lord Ryman Mallisters court. Tristifer and his brother, Jeffory, caught the deadly disease, but for some reason were spared - though heavily disfigured by the disease's affliction. Tristifer himself lost three fingers from his hand when his father Ryman tried in vain to amputate the disease from his son at the behest of his maester. The disease continued instead, covering Tristifer's entire upper body before it finally became malignant - the same going for his younger brother.

Though it would impair his physical appearance, it would do nothing to dampen his pride, and perhaps even drove his ambitions further, for Tristifer execelled in his martial studies. He was a crude and boistrous youth who never made friends, but quickly became one of the Riverland's foremost knights, besting Lord Brynden Tully in a tournament on his fifteenth nameday. By his seventeeth, he had crushed a Iron Islander army on Orkmont and gained the nickname of the Laughing Falcon.