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Invasion of Yerness
Main Article : Invasion of Westbridge

{| class="collapsible collapsed" style="clear:both; width:100%; background-color:#FAFAFA; color:#000000; font-size:100%; padding:1em; margin-top:1px; -moz-border-radius:1px; -webkit-border-radius:8px; border-radius:25px;" ! style="text-align:left; color:#000000; line-height:2em; background-color:#1C1C1C; padding-right:10.5em; | Invasion of Yerness Charlie I need you to take your forces and take the island. If we do not hold the island all manner of things could come to pass. Maybe the Empire decides to send a fleet. Maybe its the Valerians, or Tevinter, but the thing to remember is that if we hold that island no one is sending any fleets at us.
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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 of which are shown in the table. 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. A struggle broke out between the remaining gaurds and the overwhelming forces of House Clegane who was now inside their walls.

Hedrik Clegane watched as Vormin Menmont slew two men by himself and made his way over to the old fighter. Vormin Menmont was a well known fighter, and looking at him was looking at a large man covered completely in armor leaving little weakenesses open to an enemy. As the two fought Vormin found himself a true match but as they continued to fight the rest of House Menmont surrendered around them after members of House Clegane unbarred the gate and allowed in the rest of House Clegane, and House Swan. Even with his house surrending around him Vormin continued to fight and despite Hedrik`s offer to stand down Vormin refused, and thus after a few more minutes of fighting Hedrik slew Vormin through a slash across the neck which was the only place not covered by armor.With this House Menmont surrendered and Castle Menmont along with House Menmont were not under Lucernian authority.

Taking Dowden
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.



Taking the Port

 * "The Port of Yerness was the resistence on the island of Yerness. The moment that port went down every single defender on the island understood their island had fallen."


 * -Charlie Swan

With basically every settlement in the entire island of Yerness under the control of the forces of House Swan they would prepare for one of the final attacks when House Swan ambushed the port of Yerness from the front, and a major seaborne attack as well. The entire attack waited until night had come, and by this point the defenders still had no idea that anyone was taking the island from them and because of this they were unaware for such large numbers to attack them. The Lucernian Navy would make their way into the port using no lights on the boats to conceal their movements and once they were inside the port they dislodged the forces of House Crakehall, and House Dogget of whom quickly took control of the port area, and House Crakehall led by Jonas Crakehall would take control of the keep from which a great massacre of the defenders in the keep would awaken the town to the attackers.



Capturing the Gate

 * "House Dogget's supreme failure to silently take control of the keep led to my forces being bogged down in a fight we didn't want to be invovled into."


 * -Jonas Crakehall

After the massacre at the keep and the raising of the alarm House Dogget was forced to deal with a growing number of defenders of whom were making a stubborn defence of the central and southern gate to such an extent that the attack on the central gate was so fierce that they were forced to pull back. Once they had pulled back a small force led by Garon Dandrill would hold the central gate defenders in place while the remainder of House Dogget moved against the southern gate. The southern gate was already hard pressed to defend themselves, and with this influx of attackers they were pushed out of the gatehouse or killed. House Dogget was able to gain control of the southern gate, and from here the forces of House Swan would swarm into the town, and with the control of the keep the entrance, and the waters the defenders surrendered all across the port.