THEON: Where the North has its honor, and the South its chivalry,
the Iron Islands has its strength.
YARA: We call ourselves the ironborn, and we are warriors
feared throughout the Seven Kingdoms.
THEON: Or so we used to be.
Unlike their mainland cousins,
the First Men of the Iron Islands never bowed to the Old Gods.
YARA: Theirs was the Drowned God, who made the ironborn to reave and sack
and write their names in salt, steel, and song
that his enemy, the Storm God, could not wash away.
We raised our kings from our own ranks,
and used beaten foes as thralls to work our mines and farm our land.
THEON: Or as salt wives, if a woman was pretty enough.
Such was the old way,
and while we followed it, we held sway wherever the waves were heard.
When Aegon came demanding fealty,
King Harren the Black ruled as far east as the Trident.
YARA: Other kings, like the Starks, could kneel, but Harren was ironborn,
and the ironborn must be beaten.
In Harrenhal he had the mightiest castle in Westeros and the army to defend it.
THEON: But Aegon did not intend a siege.
He mounted his dragon and roasted Harren and all his sons in their tower,
and the old way with them.
Because of Harren's defiance, Aegon pushed the ironborn back to our islands,
and gave the Riverlands to the Tullys,
but he did allow the ironborn to choose who would lead them.
YARA: House Greyjoy had always been one of the greatest houses of the Iron Islands.
We trace our descent from the Age of Heroes, and the legendary Grey King,
who took a mermaid to wife and made war upon the Storm God for 1,000 years.
THEON: Blessed by the Drowned God, the Grey King fought and slew Nagga,
the great sea dragon, and took her fire for his own.
YARA: This history made our ancestor, Vickon Greyjoy, the natural choice
to lead the ironborn after Aegon's conquest.
For 300 years, House Greyjoy ruled the ironborn.
We styled ourselves Lord of the Iron Islands, King of Salt and Rock, Son of the Sea Wind,
Lord Reaper of Pyke.
THEON: In truth, we were thralls.
Our people still chanted, "What is dead may never die."
But the old way had died.
YARA: Until the Targaryens followed their dragons into the grave,
and our lord father, Balon Greyjoy, rose against the new king, Robert Baratheon.
He seized our ancient crown and sent our Iron fleet against the Lannisters at Lannisport
burning all their ships before any could weigh anchor.
THEON: Though Robert and Eddard Stark would later defeat him,
they understood us no better than Aegon.
The Greyjoy's sigil is the kraken, what it grasps once, it will never surrender.
BOTH: What is dead may never die,
but rises again, harder and stronger.