Volker Yernese

Volker Yernese is the son of Aldo, and Frida Yernese making him a member of House Yernese and following the death of his father during the Battle of Yerness he became the Partriarch of House Yernese.

Invasion of Yerness
Main Article : Invasion of Westbridge, Battle of Yerness

For the Invasion of Westbridge to be a success the Lucernian army had to do something about the threat of the large Westbridge which was anchored in the massive fortress of Yerness. Yerness Island was basically a massive port on the south of the island which contained the vast majority of the Westbridge fleet, and then four large castles at the north, west, east, and center of the island with the most powerful being the center fortress called Castle Yernede. Controlling Yerness would also mean the difference between an easy boat ride for rienforcements in the cast that the battle drug on for days or longer, so it became clear that Yerness could not be ignored and needed to be taken. The difficult task of taking Yerness fell upon House Swan, alongside its vassals in House Clegane, House Yerness, and House Black along with many of their sworn houses. In order to actually take the fortresses their were several options.

Option A: They could use the Lucernian Fleet and land on top of the actual Fortress of Yerness from the south. This was a very risky option as the fortress was heavily gaurded from this angle, and if they were spotted they would have no means of laying siege as they would simply be wiped out.

Option B: They could go up the eastern side of the Rhine River and then use hundreds of small boats to ferry their troops to the island itself. This option would allow for them to put the fortress under siege, as the only means of stopping an attacker from landing on the eastern side was the small Castle Menmont controlled by House Menmonet. This castle was under construction after a brief civil war in the house had heavily damaged it.

In the end Option B was chosen by House Swan, and they along with the rest of the army travelled north to Lorderon where they took boats as far north as possible before travelling on foot to the eastern bank of the Rhine.



Castle Menmont
The broken Castle Menmont was of vital importance to the defence of Yerness as a whole but the calls for resources to rebuild the castle from Westrbridge had met with nothing and thus they had to do it all themselves and for this reason the rebuilding, and repairs were drastically behind schedual. House Clegane led by Mathew, and his brother Hedrik led the initial boats across the waters and they quickly eliminated the sentries that watched the water for anyone coming across. With the sentries eliminated the other houses landed on the banks of the castle except for House Black of whome landed farther north and would be taking control of the small village of Downden as the base of operations for their siege of Yerness.



Taking the Castle
Matthew, and Hedrik Clegane led their forces into the depths of the castle, as they planned to move from within while the forces led by Charlie, and his nephew Brody Swan would lead House Swan, alongside House Yernese in a breakthrough of the castle itself. With the sentries down the castle had minimal defences that late at night, and thus the forces broke through all over the place with minimal casualties, but House Swan ran into a problem when Jordin Menmont barred the front gate of the keep and thus blocked them into the courtyard which they now had near complete control over. Without siege weapons they attempted to find other ways in but basically waited for House Clegane to complete their side of things. Matthew and Hedrik moved with their small force inside the castle completed unaware to House Menmont who as Hedrik moved into the throne room was preparing to send Ravens away to warn the rest of the island. With this House Menmont surrendered and Castle Menmont along with House Menmont were not under Lucernian authority.

Downden
When House Black arrived with their near five hundred men on the outskirts of Downden they moved quickly into the village and took the entire village under their control. With the village under their control they sent word to Castle Menmont that the next stage was ready to begin.



Movement
With Castle Menmont taken the forces of House Swan moved completely unhindered towards their next goals. House Black moved with its sworn houses towards Castle Irinsi where they waited for a small fleet to arrive before they would hit the castle during the next night. House Mangles broke off from House Black and moved between Castle Yerness, and Castle Yernede and from here they would attempt to stop anyone from making it towards Castle Yerness. House Clegane moved towards Castle Yernede and through the day they spent the day surrounding the Castle from all sides, and constructing siege machines, and defences for their archers. Archers were placed throughout to stop any Ravens that attempted to get away. While this was going on House Swan made a coast line boat ride towards the port of Yerness where they prepared to take the Port from the front where it had no business being suprised in. While House Swan moved in this direction ten ships from the Lucernian Navy moved towards the port and prepared to make sure no boats were able to sail away.