The series focuses on several noble houses of Westeros and a complicated, multiparty war for the Iron Throne that features shifting conflicts, alliances, and betrayals. Key houses include the Starks, who rule in the North; the Lannisters, a wealthy family from the West who have married into the royal line; the Baratheons, who at the outset hold the Iron Throne; and the Targaryens, who once controlled the Iron Throne using dragons but who have been nearly wiped out by the time the story begins.