#just thinking about what it means that dany named drogon after drogo

[sunny12th]

Dany's names for her dragons, and her reasoning behind them, are pretty interesting. What I find most interesting though is that she ends up claiming and riding Drogon, the dragon named for her first husband who bought and raped her. We aren't given any reasoning behind his naming but I believe it must come from Dany's dragon dream. In this dream, her physical and emotional pain is burned away and she is then able to reconnect with life and those around her.

"'Khaleesi,' Aggo murmured, 'there sits Balerion, come again.'

'It may be as you say, blood of my blood,' Dany replied gravely, 'but he shall have a new name for this new life. I would name them all for those the gods have taken. The green one shall be Rhaegal, for my valiant brother ... The cream-and-gold I call Viserion ... His dragon will do what he could not.'

'And the black beast?' asked Ser Jorah Mormont.

'The black,' she said, 'is Drogon.'"

Viserys is another of Dany's abusers but her explanation for naming a dragon after him makes some sense. All she ever wanted was for Viserys to take care of her as a brother should, now she has a chance to fulfill that need in another way. She'll care for Viserion as his mother and eventually Viserion will care for her.

It also might offer some foreshadowing for Viserion's fate. If I had to guess which dragon would die, I would predict it'd be Viserion dying to protect Dany. This would fulfill Dany's wish that he 'do what [her brother] could not,' which is to say that Viserion will protect and care for Dany. I'm not totally convinced any of the dragons are going to die but, again, if I had to guess then I would say Viserion will shield Dany from some danger and die as a result. Viserys died because he threatened Dany's unborn child, Viserion might die to protect Dany (and possibly another unborn child).

This might also be foreshadowing for whoever ends up riding Viserion. Viserion's rider will do what Viserys could not - they'll protect and love Dany. I've always thought Jon should bond with Viserion (if he gets a dragon) because 1) Viserion is cream and gold which matches the colors Jon is usually associated more than Rhaegal's green and bronze and 2) Jon will do what Viserys couldn't. That's pretty much a given, Jon will love and protect Dany. Something Viserys never could. Viserys also planned on marrying Dany, something he couldn't do, and it also seems likely Jon will marry Dany.

Based on the above passage alone, one might assume Dany would eventually ride either Viserion or Rhaegal. Viserion will do what Viserys could not, he'll love and protect Dany. Best way to do that is as her mount. The bond they never had as brother and sister will manifest as rider/mother and dragon. Rhaegal is named for Dany's "valiant brother" whose memory gives her strength several times throughout the series. She even has visions of herself in Rhaegal's armor, fighting men in ice armor on the Trident - foreshadowing future battles against the Others in Westeros.

Yet she ends up riding Drogon first - the largest and fiercest of the three. "Balerion, come again." There's foreshadowing in that as well. Balerion was the Conquerors dragon and Daenerys will be a conqueror in her own right. She'll be known as "Aegon the Conqueror with teats." With this, it does make sense that she would eventually ride Balerion's reincarnation. Drogo also was a well-renowned warrior, he never cut his braid, and had a khalasar of 40,000 mounted warriors. Naming Drogon for Drogo might be a way for Dany to keep some of Drogo's strength with her. His strength had been her protection when he was alive.

She named her three dragons for "those the gods have taken" but Dany could just have well named Drogon after another member of her family. Her father, mother, or even Aegon the Conqueror. She could have named him after Ser Willem Darry, the only real caretaker she ever knew. There's no explicit explanation given in the text for Drogon's naming so we're left trying to piece it together. Or, I'm left because this is has been bothering me for years now. Let's look at the dragon dream that I believe is the catalyst for Dany naming Drogon after Drogo.

"She would kill herself rather than go on, she decided one night … Yet when she slept that night, she dreamt the dragon dream again ... There was only her and the dragon. Its scales were black as night, wet and slick with blood. Her blood, Dany sensed. Its eyes were pools of molten magma, and when it opened its mouth, the flame came roaring out in a hot jet ... She opened her arms to the fire ... let it cleanse her and temper her and scour her clean. She could feel her flesh sear and blacken and slough away, could feel her blood boil and turn to steam, and yet there was no pain. She felt strong and new and fierce. And the next day, strangely, she did not seem to hurt quite so much...

She touched one, the largest of the three ... Black-and-scarlet, she thought, like the dragon in my dream...

From that hour onward, each day was easier than the one before it. Her legs grew stronger; her blisters burst and her hands grew callused; her soft thighs toughened, supple as leather."

The dragon dream is the turning point for her. Riding her Silver becomes easier and she "began to notice the beauties of the land around her." The dream manifests in reality when Dany's physical pain alleviates and she begins to grow stronger each day. Her experiences with Drogo begin to change as well - she begins to experience pleasure during their sexual interactions, just as she begins to find pleasure and joy in life with the Dothraki. Drogo does nothing to help her, these changes come from Dany (and her dragon dream) alone. She even begins to take control in their sexual encounters (or as much control as a bridal slave can, I guess). Their relationship changes and they become more affectionate to each other. All of this stems back to her dragon dream - cleansing her, tempering her, and scouring her clean.

Dany seems to realize it is the black-and-scarlet dragon she dreams of ("Black-and-scarlet, she thought, like the dragon in my dream..."). This specific dragon is reaching out to her, despite not yet being alive, at her lowest - when she has resolved herself to suicide. This dragon transcends death and life to connect with Daenerys and burn her pain and weakness away. Dany may have claimed Drogon in the fighting pit but it feels like Drogon claimed her first. She claimed him as a mount but he claimed her first, as his mother.

Since she recognizes her black-and-scarlet as the dragon from her dream, the dream that took away her pain from Drogo's rape and led her to gain some control in their sexual encounters, Dany associates this specific dragon with Drogo. With the pain he inflicted on her, the resilience she needed to survive, and the flames in her dream that didn't burn but left her stronger than before. She also places the black-and-scarlet egg by Drogo's heart on his funeral pyre - a place of intimacy and love but this also reminds me of Dany eating the stallion's heart to give Drogo's unborn son strength.

I've always wondered about the dragons breastfeeding from Dany when the pyre was ashes. Maybe, before they started breastfeeding, they ate Drogo while he burned. They do eat cooked meat, after all. This will probably never be confirmed but I love the idea of Drogon eating Drogo's heart to gain his strength.

Drogon specifically is the dragon Dany recognizes from her dragon dream. He burned away Dany's pain (inflicted by Drogo) and made her strong enough to change her relationship with Drogo. He woke beside Drogo's heart and possibly ate his heart too. Dany fears and loves Drogon, as she once feared and loved Drogo.

[esther-dot]

In s7 Dany told Jon that she was sold and raped. It means she acknowledge that Drogo raped her. Then why is her dragon named after her husband? Not only that she was basically shouting that Drogo has promised her 7 kingdoms which she get in s8. She even told Jon that Viserys was not good person. Yet she named her dragon after him. She even compared her grief of loosing her brothers to Jon's. It was confusing as hell.

It was confusing as hell! This is a really difficult topic since none of us agree on exactly where Martin stands on certain things, none of us know what D&D were attempting to do, and the combination and contradictions of all their ideas was ultimately, difficult to comprehend. 😂

One of the showrunners didn't buy that Dany would be "seduced" on her wedding night, so he chose to make it explicitly a rape scene, and Martin has complained about that decision multiple times, so their perspectives on Dany's relationships differ. I wouldn't be surprised if left entirely to their own devices, D&D would have never entertained the idea of Dany falling in love with Drogo, of her naming her dragon after him. But Martin did write that, so we ended up with some of Martin's ideas, some of D&D's, and it's just a little confusing to pick through it.

A lot of people really like the idea of taking extremes (love/hate), and making them cohabit a single relationship, as a way of….kinda examining the breadth of a human's feelings, how complex relationships can be, and I think Martin is very interested in that. Not just relationships, but the individual having so much potential for contradictory feelings. Doing so allows him to look at nooks and crannies of what people are.

So, you get Dany who loves her brother but also watched him die, was ambivalent about his death because it was to protect her/her child, but then goes and names one of her “children” after him. It makes no sense! Except, she believed they were the last Targaryens, distinct from other humans (basically), and if you look at other mortals as lesser, I suppose it might make you feel a little closer to someone of your own ilk, even if they’re awful.

Jon can’t quite cope with the different sides of Ygritte, her almost shy smiles and tears over a song, her ease with murdering an innocent man. She forces a sexual relationship on Jon, she also tries to protect him. This idea of caring for a person while being disgusted by some of their actions, of caring for a person even though they abuse you…it is something Martin is intrigued by. Viserys, although an abusive pos, kept Dany alive, Martin may have seen it as an examination of all that.

Actually, now that I think about it, Drogo gave her the silver which tasted like freedom, the first freedom Dany had known, so naming a dragon after that, the initial feeling and then the power she’s achieved since, perhaps that makes it a little more understandable? The scene of her riding the horse reads like she's flying and certainly feels related when you read how she experiences flying on Drogon. The dragon eggs are a wedding gift, it is Drogo's funeral pyre in which she births them. They are entwined in her relationship with him. Maybe that's the explanation there?

Or, Rhaegar was the Targ heir, Viserys obsessed over getting the crown, Drogo promised her armies to the cause, it's probably more about the connection to the throne than any of the other things. I mean, showwise, Jon was the rightful heir (Rhaegar's son who rode Rhaegal), Viserion (like Viserys) turned against Dany, it was Drogon that burned KL and (momentarily) "won" Dany the throne. In that way, those names make a kind of sense….I suppose it’s likely a blend of foreshadowing and characterization.

As for talking about losing her brothers, if you believe that s7 was D&D trying to sell a genuine romance, you need points of connection for characters, things that allow them to understand each other, that could have been their shitty way of doing that. If you think D&D were tryin to write a one-sided romance, you look at a comment like that and think D&D were showing how out of touch Dany was with Jon that she didn't even know how losing someone you never knew and someone else you watched get melted isn't exactly the same thing as losing your best friend, the brother you hero worshipped, or watching a baby brother die before you as you risk your life trying to save him.

Just depends on whether you're in the "D&D gave zero fucks" or in the "there was more to it that they dropped last minute" camp. :)

[asongoficeandthrones]

A Clash of Kings First Read - Chapter 12

(POV: Daenerys I.)

Setting: The desert (Red Waste? Red Lands?). And Vaes Tolorro, aka the city of bones, aka a ruined city.

Favorite character: Daenerys, without a single doubt. She says it herself (If ever she had truly been a girl, that time was done.), but she's grown so much (through pain, unfortunately), and now she's finding the strength to lead her entire khalasar, and I'm all for strong women (or girls, because even if Dany herself says otherwise, she is technically fourteen).

MVP: Jhogo, and to an extent Daenerys. Because it is Daenerys who orders him to go southeast, but he is the one to come back with the two men and the woman from Qarth. Which means that maybe he saved them all? (Or doomed them all if the people from Qarth mean ill, but I'd rather not think about that and stay optimistic...)

Things I loved/liked:

Dany being strong for her people: They are not strong, she told herself, so I must be their strength. I must show no fear, no weakness, no doubt. However frightened my heart, when they look upon my face they must see only Drogo's queen.

The naming of the dragons!! For her two lost brothers (Rhaegar = Rhaegal and Viserys = Viserion) and her lost husband (Drogo = Drogon). And the apparently fiercest of them being named after the apparently fiercest of the three. And the story Dany tells her blood riders about the ancient dragons, Vhagar, Meraxes and Balerion the Black Dread. They sounded terrifying, but it was great to learn more about them! So yeah, everything about the dragons.

Dany trusting in herself to follow the comet she had taken as a good omen, against the advice of her khalasar. Because technically, even though they did lose a lot of people (a third of their number), she was technically right to follow it. So in a way, I guess the comet was a good omen?

The description of Vaes Tolorro, which goes from being beautiful to being ruined to being a symbol of hope.

Things I disliked/hated:

Jorah's story. Not because I hate Jorah, because I don't, but because what Lynesse did to him was just... wrong (even though it was his actions that condemned them to exile, it was all for her, and then she left him for another man... ugh).

The poor Dothraki dying... And Doreah! I did not expect that! And Dany at the moment Doreah died: She gave Doreah water from her own skin, cooled her brow with a damp cloth, and held her hand until she died, shivering. Only then would she permit the khalasar to press on.

Quotes: Those quoted above, which represent Dany very well, and this one from Dany to Ser Jorah:

"Do you hate her?" "Almost as much as I love her," Ser Jorah answered.

because it almost moved me to tears.

Thoughts overall: Sad but full of hope too.

[kaerinio]

on daenerys' fertility - pt. three of three tw: child loss, fertility, pregnancy, miscarriage, blood

pt. one ; pt. two

𝐀 𝐌𝐎𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐎𝐅 𝐃𝐑𝐀𝐆𝐎𝐍𝐒

so, can daenerys conceive? my answer is yes. however, conception may come with some difficulties/complications because . . . who knows what effectS the blood magic mirri performed has on dany's reproductive system, especially since it's not valyrian sorcery? but, daenerys does not believe that she can conceive due to her own feelings surrounding herself regarding rhaego, and her willingness to believe mirri as a form of coping. should she become pregnant, she will have a difficult time fully believing it at first, even if the signs are all there, because she remembers how it rended her very soul to lose rhaego after loving him so deeply; she simply can't allow herself to have that hope, even though she longs to be a mother.

depending on how one interprets it, she conceives a child with daario ( i prefer to think of the baby being daario's and not hizdahr's, particularly because daario is the man dany chooses for herself, for her heart. ) in adwd and suffers a miscarriage out on the dothraki sea:

By midday the water would be tepid, but in the chill of dawn it was almost cool and helped her keep her eyes open. As she splashed her face, she saw fresh blood on her thighs. The ragged hem of her undertunic was stained with it. The sight of so much red frightened her. Moon blood, it’s only my moon blood, but she did not remember ever having such a heavy flow. Could it be the water? If it was the water, she was doomed. She had to drink or die of thirst. - daenerys 10, adwd.

seeing so much blood frightens her because it is completely abnormal for her usual menstrual cycle. she's never experienced something so heavy. the thought of a miscarriage doesn't even cross her mind. she's thoroughly convinced by both herself and mirri that she cannot have children.

this aside, if we are to believe mirri's omen, i believe that, in a metaphorical sense, it is complete. it is through:

in adwd alone, we watch as the sun rises in the west and sets in the east, represented by quentyn martell, a young lord whose sigil is the sun, who is born/rises/comes from the west to die/fall/set in the east. we see the dothraki sea, a literal sea of grass, which was a beautiful green when daenerys first explored it in agot, go dry. what the mountains blowing in the wind like leaves means? now, this is something that i don't believe we have insight into yet. the more i think about this prophecy/omen, the more it seems to have to do with things dany has encountered, so i am going to chalk this up to something happening to the mother of mountains . . . something that sets up why every single khalasar is on its way to/is in vaes dothrak prior to the unification ( still working on this ). and, her womb does quicken again, at least, in my interpretation.

it is right after we learn of this miscarriage that in just a few pages, we see that khal jhaqo, a former member of drogo's ko, discover her standing beside drogon, who returned to her in meereen. i believe that we have a couple of things working together here. first, we have khal jhaqo, who had been one of khal drogo’s most trusted friends, who also took a large portion of drogo’s khalasar, discovering dany as she stands beside the dragon she named for her late husband, who most certainly has drogo's spirit ( represented in the fact that drogon's egg is place by drogo's heart during the pyre burning ). it's interesting that drogon waits with daenerys, especially since he's been quite unruly, refusing to listen to her ( for reasons of forcing her personal development and recognition of herself to drive forth prophecy ).

this prophecy is being undone, and her rebirth and rise after the birth of her dragons contributes to it because it is through the birth of her dragons and the strength/direction she gains through them, that she has been led to all of the moments described in mirri maz duur’s prophecy as being impossible.

this is so long, but ultimately, yes, i believe daenerys can conceive, but it is an incredibly delicate matter, as, even though she is favored by valyrian sorcery ( at her birth as tptwp and in her continued honoring of it and her dragons ), her reproductive system has been affected, in some way, by mirri's magic ( magic that had the intent to stifle prophecy ). and, if she wants to build her house, as she is destined to, she must always remember who she is ( by continuing to honor valyrian magic/sorcery and her dragons ), which, the whole stranded on the dothraki sea moment cements inside of her. she must do what her ancestors failed to do. additionally, i feel like there will have to be some magical aspect that accompanies any future pregnancies, even if it's just having someone with magical abilities/knowledge to care for her, or if it's just as simple as engaging in magical thought/intent/or will during conception, being near the dragons, or spending most of her time on dragonstone during her pregnancy. rhaego's conception was guided by magical instinct; the birthing of the dragons followed magical instinct; her future pregnancies must follow a similar pattern.

[a-secret-bolton-vampire]

Daenerys Stormborn, Part 1: From Pentos, to Vaes Dothrak, from Qarth, to Slaver's Bay

I've decided since this tiny post; I'll write about Dany. But there's so much I can talk about that I will most likely write between other essays (unless I feel otherwise). Daenerys Targaryen is my favourite character in ASOIAF. She's an incredibly complex character, and one whose fate interests me quite a lot. Of all the endings in the show, Dany's made me the saddest and angriest. Not only did they rush and make her turn a "twist" that happened on a dime, but it fed into the Mad Queen theories that I really despised.

Can't a powerful women with dragons not go mad with power and become prone to hysteria? Also, can said woman not be murdered by her lover/nephew as a way to give said lover more pain instead of having any meaningful end to her arc? And can said woman not have been "an insane tyrant the whole time"? I may one day vent on season 8, but I won't. Instead, I want to attempt to make sense of the ending we saw in the show, and how it applies to the books. Bit by bit, I will build up to Dany's ultimate role in the series. But first, we need to set the groundwork for it.

(CW: Rape)

The Last Dragon

The first we see of Daenerys, she is a very shy girl who was under the thumb of her physically and psychologically abusive brother Viserys. With no agency, she was married off as essentially a marital slave to be raped by Khal Drogo. However, after some meaningful dragon dreams, Dany began to try and take advantage of her surroundings to give herself power. Of course, Viserys didn't like this very much. Dany was everything Viserys wasn't.

Whereas Viserys was incredibly narcissistic and had no real feelings for anyone other than himself, Daenerys shows empathy to those lower than her. While Viserys was prone to violent outbursts of intense rage and did not think things through very well, Dany is more measured, perceptive, and intelligent (not to say she's infallible, nobody in this world is infallible). As Daenerys became more and more loved by Drogo and the Dothraki, Viserys found himself jealous that she was better received than him, the lawful heir to the Targaryen dynasty.

This culminated in Viserys threatening to cut Rhaego out from her, and Drogo pouring molten gold onto his face to kill him. Good riddance, fuck Viserys. Anyways, she then tries to convince Drogo to cross the narrow sea to invade Westeros, but he stubbornly refuses until an assassin hired by Robert attempts to poison her and is caught, at which point he vows to do so. In her first real experience with war, when the khalasar sacks a Lhazareen village, Dany is disturbed to see all the innocent men being massacred and the women being gang raped, so she decides to take the women under her protection, which earns her resentment from some of Drogo's bloodriders.

I don't think Dany was quite aware of what war and conquest would look like until the village, and she was horrified by what she saw. During the sack, Drogo was wounded slaying Khal Ogo, and with Dany's urging, one of the women she took under her protection, Mirri Maz Duur, agreed to heal his wound. Of course, being a maegi, she is hated and not trusted by the Dothraki. Regardless, Mirri heals Drogo's wounds and they continue on until Drogo collapses from a fever, having removed the poultice of his wound.

From there, Dany's hold on the khalasar is weakening. Her power is really tied to Drogo's, as Dothraki society is extremely misogynistic and views women as lesser beings. Desperate to save him, she turns to Mirri for any magic she could use to heal him. This decision is what finally breaks the khalasar, several of the bloodriders try to kill her, and in that time, another one of the women Dany rescued, Eroeh, was gang raped and murdered by Jhaqo and Pono. The result is Daenerys being left with what can't be more than 100 people out of the original 100,000 or so people in the khalasar.

However, Dany suffers another crushing loss; her child Rhaego. While Mirri says that death may pay for life, and she sacrifices Drogo's horse, the real price was Dany's unborn child. She did so because Rhaego was to be the stallion who mounts the world, a prophesied leader of all Dothraki who would become a great conqueror. In addition, Drogo is "healed", but permanently left in a catatonic state. When Dany asks Mirri when he will be back to normal, Mirri says;

"When the sun rises in the west and sets in the east," said Mirri Maz Duur. "When the seas go dry and mountains blow in the wind like leaves. When your womb quickens again, and you bear a living child. Then he will return, and not before."

Dany seems to take this to mean "never", and is heartbroken, so she mercy kills him by smothering him with a pillow.

Throughout the first book, Dany has a series of dreams and visions involving dragons, the most telling of which was her "wake the dragon" fever dream she had during Mirri's ritual. As a result, and to get vengeance for her husband and child, Dany decides to tie Mirri on a stake to Drogo's funeral pyre, as well as placing the dragon eggs with Drogo. Then, when it is lit, and Mirri burns alive, Dany walks into the flames. Everyone thinks she is mad, that she is out of her mind, but Dany seems to think this is all part of her destiny.

And sure enough, when the fire burns out, she is unburnt (save for her hair), and she has three newly hatched dragons. The "wake the dragon" dream also features, near the end, her opening the red door of the house she stayed in as a young child in Braavos, and finding herself under the visor of Rhaegar's helmet, as Jorah repeats "the last dragon". Dany's journey in the first book is about taking control of herself and her family's legacy.

Early on, she realizes that Viserys will never conquer the Seven Kingdoms, and although Viserys originally had Dany marry Drogo to get an army of his own, the khalasar eventually became Dany's army. And when Viserys died, Dany decided it was her responsibility to do what he could not; take back the Iron Throne for her family. And then, at her absolute lowest, when she has lost practically the entire khalasar, her husband, her child, she gains three dragons.

Viserys believed that his name made him a Targaryen, that being King meant he was a true Targaryen. His anger was a tool to assert his dominance as a Targaryen, to get others to bend to his will. He has immense pride for his family, which turned into unchecked narcissism. But for all his talk, Viserys was no true Targaryen, and no true dragon. Dany even thinks this just after he dies.

He was no dragon, Dany thought, curiously calm. Fire cannot kill a dragon.

Dany has brought dragons back to the world, a symbol of the power Targaryens had, back to life. She was not killed by the fire of Drogo's pyre (of course, she isn't fireproof, this was a one time weird occurrence). She is a true dragon, a true Targaryen, who is truly following in the footsteps of her family.

The Lost Dragon

During the Drogo pyre fire (hah), a red comet appeared in the sky. Believing that she has a bigger purpose, and that the comet was sent for her, she and her khalasar follow it, into the Red Waste. Despite thinking this is a sign for her future, she is mostly lost and unsure what to do. With enemies all around, the Red Waste is the only way to go. They find the abandoned city of what she calls Vaes Tolorro, and she sends out her bloodriders to look for what is around.

Eventually, Jhogo returns with three representatives of Qarth; Xaro Xhoan Daxos, Pyat Pree, and Quaithe. They bring her back to Qarth, where she is showered with gifts and given part of Xaro's own palace to stay at. She begs an audience with the Pureborn, the descendants of the kings and queens of Qarth, but they reject her plea for aid in conquering Westeros. Xaro meanwhile suggests marriage, but only as a means to steal her dragons for himself. Quaithe gives very cryptic and vague as hell prophecies to Dany.

With no one left to turn to for aid, Dany decides to seek answers from the warlocks at the House of the Undying, drinking shade of the evening and having numerous visions. When she finally finds the Undying, they seem to be trying to steal her life force, only for Drogon to set them alight. After that, with no way to leave Qarth and refusal to be sent off with any ships, Dany is stuck, and is the subject of an assassination attempt by the Sorrowful Men, sent by Pyat Pree, only for it to be thwarted thanks to Barristan.

On surface level, Dany's ACOK arc is less eventful and straightforward than AGOT; she remains in roughly a single location the entire time, with only two major events occurring (the Undying visions & the attempted assassination). However, after such a journey in AGOT, it makes sense for her story to slow down a bit before speeding back up in ASOS. After finally embracing the responsibility of carrying the Targaryen legacy her brother failed to live to, Dany now has to deal with the fact of how important she is and what her next moves are.

Despite Qarth being so beautiful and splendid, with seemingly everyone ready to provide aid for her quest to conquer Westeros, it is all an illusion. They see someone who is now one of the most powerful people in the world, someone they can use to manipulate for their own ends and gain power for themselves. Quaithe tells Dany as much:

Last of the three seekers to depart was Quaithe the shadowbinder. From her Dany received only a warning. "Beware," the woman in the red lacquer mask said. "Of whom?" "Of all. They shall come day and night to see the wonder that has been born again into the world, and when they see they shall lust. For dragons are fire made flesh, and fire is power."

Dany thinks to herself that there must've been a reason the comet led her to Qarth, as part of her belief that she is heavily tied to destiny.

"The comet led me to Qarth for a reason. I had hoped to find my army here, but it seems that will not be. What else remains, I ask myself?"

So what was the reason she was in Qarth? In my opinion, it was partly to teach her a lesson in not trusting people, but mostly knowledge. The House of the Undying is a massive moment in the series, as it lays out many future events of the series before us (and her!) that are very cryptic and hard to uncover. I will one day examine the full scope of the visions of the Undying, but I want to focus on the narrative reason for this.

Daenerys has a strong sense of destiny. The hatching of the dragons, the red comet, the visions, they all have to mean something, lead toward this grand destiny of hers. I think that a lot (but not all) of the visions Dany experiences are relevant to her future, and lay out a lot of what she will experience/do in the last two books. The prophecies she learns (especially concerning being the "slayer of lies", "three treasons", "three fires", and "three mounts") stay with her into ADWD, where Quaithe once again appears and asks she remember the Undying.

Prophecies are also very common in Greek tragedies, and also appears in Macbeth, a tragedy written by Shakespeare, wherein Macbeth seeks out the knowledge of the witches again out of fear that he will lose his position as king. Daenerys is aware that there will be three treasons committed against her, as well as three fires she will light, and three mounts she will ride, and that there are three heads of the dragon. She constantly considers in ADWD whether these prophecies are coming true, that she finds confusing and suspicious, frustrated even.

In short, the Undying is not just a window into the future, but more of an exploration of the effect prophecy has on a young person like Daenerys who so strongly believes in destiny. She also learns in a vision of Rhaegar about something called "the song of ice and fire", which seems to be extremely significant, and that she will be at the centre of the climactic events of the series.

In the end, it is not herself or the Qartheen who get her out of Qarth, but a disguised Barristan Selmy, sent with three ships by Illyrio to bring her back to Pentos. Dissatisfied with her time in Qarth, she decides to return to Pentos with Barristan... but Pentos is not where she ends up, not even close.

The New Dragon

After leaving Qarth and the return west, Jorah, mistrustful of Illyrio, instead convinces Dany to turn the ships to Astapor and buy Unsullied slave soldiers to help in her conquest of Westeros. Stopping by Astapor, she finds a hellish place, red bricks, tortured slaves, and narcissistic slave masters who have no regard or empathy for anyone other than themselves. Disgusted by what she has seen, Dany formulates a plan entirely in her own head; she decides to buy all the Unsullied by giving Drogon over to Kraznys.

Only she didn't. She only did that to gain control of the Unsullied, before burning the masters and freeing all the slaves. As she tells Xaro later in ADWD, despite being surrounded by slaves with the Dothraki and in Qarth, she did not see how horrible it could be until she got to Astapor and saw how the slaves were tortured. She had the power to try to end it, and decided to take it upon her hands. So instead of heading to Westeros, she decides to liberate Yunkai and Meereen as well.

It's easy to be frustrated at Dany's Essos arc, especially since it doesn't really interact with the Westerosi plot where the majority of the action is taking place, but I think it's important that Dany repeatedly is given an option to go to Westeros, but instead stays in Essos. Progressions in real life are rarely linear, and I applaud GRRM for being able to have clear character arcs while not having the progression be entirely linear and staying true to life.

After Astapor, Yunkai fears what will happen to them as she approaches and hires two sellsword companies for aid. Instead, Dany purposefully lies to the Yunkish envoy and the sellswords, and gives the later wine to get drunk on (and an offer to join her) while she attacks at night. Daario, a lieutenant of the Stormcrows, is won over by Daenerys, kills his fellow captains, and defects to her side. Yunkai is defeated, and the slaves are let go. However, unlike Astapor, Dany does not put an end to the Wise Masters. For this, she is hailed by the freedmen as "mhysa!" or "mother". The Second Sons also join Daenerys after the battle.

Then they move on to Meereen, who has decided to crucify a little slave girl for each mile as a marker from Yunkai to Meereen. When she arrives, the Meereenese champion is easily defeated, and Mero, the former captain of the Second Sons, attempts to kill Dany in her camp, but is promptly killed by Arstan Whitebeard, who is then revealed to be Barristan, who reveals Jorah has been spying on Daenerys for King Robert.

Daenerys takes Meereen and crucifies the 162 Great Masters as retribution for the 162 slave girls crucified. When Barristan explains why he did not tell her who he was, she accepts and forgives him, but she finds she cannot forgive Jorah and banishes him. And of course, instead of leaving for Westeros, she decides to stay in Meereen, after learning that Astapor has been left in the hands of a butcher king named Cleon, overthrowing a council she had instilled when she left, and proposing war against Yunkai, which she just liberated.

Worried about what the effects would be if she simply left Meereen for Westeros, she decides to stay in Meereen and rule as its queen. I decided to call this section "the new dragon" because of Daenerys dismantling an institution her own ancestors helped found. The Ghiscari of Old Ghis had slavery of their own, which they ended up teaching to their new conquerors, the Valyrians. Then, after the Doom, slavery continued again, only this time it was now being practiced by the Free Cities, who are in constant trading with the masters of Slaver's Bay.

As she notes, they keep to the Ghiscari gods, and their symbol is of the harpy, a symbol of Old Ghis, but they no longer speak Ghiscari, instead speaking High Valyrian. Slavery was something the dragonlords of Old Valyria engaged in routinely, and that legacy is still all over Essos. In a way, she is undoing the sins of her ancestors past, and trying to make the world a better place and fighting injustice by using her dragons.

In contrast to ACOK, where she seems as yet undecided on what exactly her destiny is, she seems to be taking control of it in ASOS, becoming Mhysa, the Breaker of Chains, a saviour to those who have been enslaved. It is at this point that she starts to gain a serious following, one that I only assume will continue to grow in Essos. Because of her actions in fighting against slavery, she not only becomes a real saviour to the freedmen, but she also becomes a messianic figure to the followers of R'hllor, as a reincarnation of Azor Ahai.

This is where Dany goes from being simply the last Targaryen, the last dragon, and into a legendary, almost mythic, god-like figure. In my future essays, I will expand upon this aspect of her, since it is going to be really important moving forward, but the start of that is here in ASOS. And thus, this will be where I am concluding part 1. AGOT had Daenerys starting low, but eventually learning to rise up and realize she has to be the one to carry on the Targaryen legacy, after knowing Viserys would never live up to it.

ACOK had Dany questioning her destiny, as well as figuring out what her next step is after the miraculous birth of her dragons. And ASOS concludes her act 1 arc, by having her take control of her destiny and becoming a truly legendary figure who is changing the world. In part 2, I will be discussing in depth the thematic and personal struggles Daenerys faces as she is ruling Meereen in ADWD, and what those struggles and their resolution means for her future.

[aboveallarescuer]

Dany longing for a home, people to belong to and peace and safety in general

As I was rereading ASOIAF, I made it my goal to compile all* the book passages demonstrating either certain key attributes of Daenerys Targaryen (e.g. that she's compassionate and smart) or aspects of hers that are usually overstated (e.g. that she's ambitious and prophecy-driven).  Doing such a task may seem exaggerated, but I'd argue it's not, for many, many misconceptions about Dany have become widespread in light of the show's final season's events (and even before).

It must be acknowledged that it can be tricky to reference, say, ADWD passages to counter-argument how she was depicted in season eight (which allegedly follows ADOS events). Dany will have had plenty of character development in the span of two books. However, whatever happens to Dany in the next two books, I would argue that there is more than enough material to conclude that her show counterpart was made to fall for flaws that she (for the most part) never had and actions that she (for the most part) would never take. (and that's not even considering the double standards and the contradictions with what had been shown from show!Dany up until then, but that's obviously out of the scope of these lists)

Another objection to the purpose of these lists is that Game of Thrones is different from A Song of Ice and Fire and should be analyzed on its own, which is a fair point. However, the show is also an adaptation of these books, which begs the questions: why did they change Dany's character? Why did they overfocus on negative traits of hers or depicted them as negative when they weren't supposed to be or gave her negative traits that were never hers to begin with? Another fact that undermines the show=/=books argument is that most people think that the show's ending will be the books', albeit only in broad strokes and in different circumstances. As a result, people's perception of Dany is inevitably influenced by the show, which is a shame.

I hope these lists can be useful for whoever wants to find book passages to defend (or even simply explore different facets of) Dany's character in metas or conversations.

 *Well, at least all the passages that I could find in her chapters, which is no guarantee that the effort was perfectly executed, but I did my best.

Also, people could interpret certain passages differently and then come up with a different collection of passages if they ever attempted to make one, so I'm not saying that this list is completely objective (nor that there could ever be one).

Also, some passages have been cut short according to whether they were, IMO, relevant to the specific topic of the list they're in, so the context surrounding them may not always be clear (always read the books and use asearchoficeandfire). Many of them appear in different lists, sometimes fully referenced, sometimes not.

I listed the passages back to front because I felt doing so highlighted Dany's evolution better.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To justify the existence of this list, let's see examples of widespread opinions that I feel misrepresent Daenerys Targaryen:

Power is what Daenerys wants and that's really all she wants. She lusts after the Iron Throne with a hunger that is truly baffling. She's not from Westeros, or at least she's never really lived there her entire life. (x)

~

Why does she want to be queen so badly? Is it to bring a more just era of rule to the land? [...]

Why? What will she do with this power? Will she be a good and just monarch or will she be more like her father, the Mad King? More and more I suspect that she will be a very bad queen, only interested in doing what is right only if it helps her secure the Iron Throne. (x)

~

Her ruthlessness can't just mean nothing. She's far too power-hungry and far too cold to end up as a good person, ruling magnanimously over a peaceful land. (x)

Never mind that demanding that Dany asks herself why she wants to be queen is not understanding how the Westerosi pseudofeudalistic system works (or that she outright states that "justice ... that’s what kings are for" in ASOS Dany III).

Is power really all Dany wants, to the point of "lust[ing] after the Iron Throne" (particularly gross wording)? Is Dany "only interested in doing what is right only if it helps her secure the Iron Throne"? Is Dany "far too power-hungry and far too cold to end up as a good person"?

I would argue these claims certainly cannot be made after reading the books (some can't even after watching the show's first 71 episodes, but the show can be all over the place and ... I digress), so take a look at these passages.

A Dance with Dragons

ADWD Daenerys X

The hill loomed larger down here. Dany had taken to calling it Dragonstone, after the ancient citadel where she’d been born. She had no memories of that Dragonstone, but she would not soon forget this one. Scrub grass and thorny bushes covered its lower slopes; higher up a jagged tangle of bare rock thrust steep and sudden into the sky. There, amidst broken boulders, razor-sharp ridges, and needle spires, Drogon made his lair inside a shallow cave. He had dwelt there for some time, Dany had realized when she first saw the hill. The air smelled of ash, every rock and tree in sight was scorched and blackened, the ground strewn with burned and broken bones, yet it had been home to him.

Dany knew the lure of home.

~

Daenerys Targaryen was no stranger to the Dothraki sea, the great ocean of grass that stretched from the forest of Qohor to the Mother of Mountains and the Womb of the World. She had seen it first when she was still a girl, newly wed to Khal Drogo and on her way to Vaes Dothrak to be presented to the crones of the dosh khaleen. The sight of all that grass stretching out before her had taken her breath away. The sky was blue, the grass was green, and I was full of hope. Ser Jorah had been with her then, her gruff old bear. She’d had Irri and Jhiqui and Doreah to care for her, her sun-and-stars to hold her in the night, his child growing inside her. Rhaego. I was going to name him Rhaego, and the dosh khaleen said he would be the Stallion Who Mounts the World. Not since those half-remembered days in Braavos when she lived in the house with the red door had she been as happy.

~

No, Dany told herself. If I look back I am lost. She might live for years amongst the sunbaked rocks of Dragonstone, riding Drogon by day and gnawing at his leavings every evenfall as the great grass sea turned from gold to orange, but that was not the life she had been born to. So once again she turned her back upon the distant hill and closed her ears to the song of flight and freedom that the wind sang as it played amongst the hill’s stony ridges. The stream was trickling south by southeast, as near as she could tell. She followed it. Take me to the river, that is all I ask of you. Take me to the river, and I will do the rest.

The hours passed slowly. The stream bent this way and that, and Dany followed, beating time upon her leg with the whip, trying not to think about how far she had to go, or the pounding in her head, or her empty belly. Take one step. Take the next. Another step. Another. What else could she do?

~

“Drogon killed a little girl. Her name was ... her name ...” Dany could not recall the child’s name. That made her so sad that she would have cried if all her tears had not been burned away. “I will never have a little girl. I was the Mother of Dragons.”

~

In the stream or out of it, I must keep walking. Water flows downhill. The stream will take me to the river, and the river will take me home.

Except it wouldn’t, not truly.

Meereen was not her home, and never would be. It was a city of strange men with strange gods and stranger hair, of slavers wrapped in fringed tokars, where grace was earned through whoring, butchery was art, and dog was a delicacy. Meereen would always be the Harpy’s city, and Daenerys could not be a harpy.

ADWD Daenerys IX

She pushed herself to her feet, splashing softly. Water ran down her legs and beaded on her breasts. The sun was climbing up the sky, and her people would soon be gathering. She would rather have drifted in the fragrant pool all day, eating iced fruit off silver trays and dreaming of a house with a red door, but a queen belongs to her people, not to herself.

~

Treachery on treachery, the queen thought wearily. Is there no end to it?

~

In Westeros the septons spoke of seven hells and seven heavens, but the Seven Kingdoms and their gods were far away. If she died here, Dany wondered, would the horse god of the Dothraki part the grass and claim her for his starry khalasar, so she might ride the nightlands beside her sun-and-stars? Or would the angry gods of Ghis send their harpies to seize her soul and drag her down to torment?

ADWD Daenerys VIII

Every child knows its mother, Dany thought. When the seas go dry and mountains blow in the wind like leaves … “They call to me. Come.”

~

Dany slid her arms around him and let him have his way. Drunk as he was, she knew he would not be inside her long.

Nor was he. Afterward he nuzzled at her ear and whispered, “Gods grant that we have made a son tonight.”

The words of Mirri Maz Duur rang in her head. When the sun rises in the west and sets in the east. When the seas go dry and mountains blow in the wind like leaves. When your womb quickens again, and you bear a living child. Then he will return, and not before. The meaning was plain enough; Khal Drogo was as like to return from the dead as she was to bear a living child. But there are some secrets she could not bring herself to share, even with a husband, so she let Hizdahr zo Loraq keep his hopes.

Her noble husband was soon fast asleep. Daenerys could only twist and turn beside him. She wanted to shake him, wake him, make him hold her, kiss her, fuck her again, but even if he did, he would fall back to sleep again afterward, leaving her alone in the darkness. She wondered what Daario was doing. Was he restless as well? Was he thinking about her? Did he love her, truly? Did he hate her for marrying Hizdahr? I should never have taken him into my bed. He was only a sellsword, no fit consort for a queen, and yet …

I knew that all along, but I did it anyway.

“My queen?” said a soft voice in the darkness.

Dany flinched. “Who is there?”

“Only Missandei.” The Naathi scribe moved closer to the bed. “This one heard you crying.”

“Crying? I was not crying. Why would I cry? I have my peace, I have my king, I have everything a queen might wish for. You had a bad dream, that was all.”

“As you say, Your Grace.” She bowed and made to go.

“Stay,” said Dany. “I do not wish to be alone.”

“His Grace is with you,” Missandei pointed out.

“His Grace is dreaming, but I cannot sleep. On the morrow I must bathe in blood. The price of peace.” She smiled wanly and patted the bed. “Come. Sit. Talk with me.”

ADWD Daenerys VII

If she had been some ordinary woman, she would gladly have spent her whole life touching Daario, tracing his scars and making him tell her how he’d come by every one. I would give up my crown if he asked it of me, Dany thought … but he had not asked it, and never would.

~

Khal Drogo had been her sun-and-stars, but he had been dead so long that Daenerys had almost forgotten how it felt to love and be loved. Daario had helped her to remember. I was dead and he brought me back to life. I was asleep and he woke me. My brave captain.

~

“...Bring your frog to court tomorrow. The others too. The Westerosi.” It would be nice to hear the Common Tongue from someone besides Ser Barristan.

~

She went to the parapet and stood there gazing down upon the city as she had done a hundred times before. It will never be my city. It will never be my home.

~

It was close to sunset before Daario Naharis appeared with his new Stormcrows, the Westerosi who had come over to him from the Windblown. Dany found herself glancing at them as yet another petitioner droned on and on. These are my people. I am their rightful queen. They seemed a scruffy bunch, but that was only to be expected of sellswords. The youngest could not have been more than a year older than her; the oldest must have seen sixty namedays. A few sported signs of wealth: gold arm rings, silken tunics, silverstudded sword belts. Plunder. For the most part, their clothes were plainly made and showed signs of hard wear.

~

When she saw the name Ser Willem Darry, her heart beat a little faster.

~

This was done in Braavos, while we were living in the house with the red door. Why did that make her feel so strange?

ADWD Daenerys VI

Dany tried to speak and found no words. She remembered Ben’s face the last time she had seen it. It was a warm face, a face I trusted. Dark skin and white hair, the broken nose, the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. Even the dragons had been fond of old Brown Ben, who liked to boast that he had a drop of dragon blood himself. Three treasons will you know. Once for gold and once for blood and once for love. Was Plumm the third treason, or the second? And what did that make Ser Jorah, her gruff old bear? Would she never have a friend that she could trust? What good are prophecies if you cannot make sense of them? If I marry Hizdahr before the sun comes up, will all these armies melt away like morning dew and let me rule in peace? Daario’s announcement had sparked an uproar. [...] “Be quiet! I have heard enough.”

[...] She wanted to scream, to gnash her teeth and tear her clothes and beat upon the floor. Instead she said, “Close the gates. Will you make me say it thrice?” They were her children, but she could not help them now. “Leave me. Daario, remain. That cut should be washed, and I have more questions for you.”

[...] He kissed her.

[...] “I thought you would be the one to betray me. Once for blood and once for gold and once for love, the warlocks said. I thought … I never thought Brown Ben. Even my dragons seemed to trust him.” She clutched her captain by the shoulders. “Promise me that you will never turn against me. I could not bear that. Promise me.”

ADWD Daenerys III

Dany could feel the warmth of his fingers. He was warm in Qarth as well, she recalled, until the day he had no more use for me.

~

That only made him chuckle. “The Dothraki horselords call the Lhazarene the Lamb Men. When you shear them, all they do is bleat. They are not a martial people.”

Even a sheepish friend is better than none.

~

Dany had never known a home. In Braavos, there had been a house with a red door, but that was all.

~

Westeros. Home. But if she left, what would happen to her city?

~

The next morning Dany woke as full of hope as she had been since first she came to Slaver’s Bay. Daario would soon be at her side once more, and together they would sail for Westeros. For home.

~

Take these ships and sail away, or you will surely die screaming. You cannot know how many enemies you have made.”

I know one stands before me now, weeping mummer’s tears. The realization made her sad.

~

Dany seated herself upon her bench again to gaze across the blue silk sea, toward distant Westeros. One day, she promised herself.

ADWD Daenerys I

She had been dreaming of a house with a red door when Missandei woke her. There had been no time to dress.

A Storm of Swords

ASOS Daenerys VI

Up here in her garden Dany sometimes felt like a god, living atop the highest mountain in the world.

Do all gods feel so lonely? Some must, surely. Missandei had told her of the Lord of Harmony, worshiped by the Peaceful People of Naath; he was the only true god, her little scribe said, the god who always was and always would be, who made the moon and stars and earth, and all the creatures that dwelt upon them. Poor Lord of Harmony. Dany pitied him. It must be terrible to be alone for all time, attended by hordes of butterfly women you could make or unmake at a word. Westeros had seven gods at least, though Viserys had told her that some septons said the seven were only aspects of a single god, seven facets of a single crystal. That was just confusing. The red priests believed in two gods, she had heard, but two who were eternally at war. Dany liked that even less. She would not want to be eternally at war.

~

The dragon has three heads. There are two men in the world who I can trust, if I can find them. I will not be alone then. We will be three against the world, like Aegon and his sisters.

~

She looked away until she heard the doors open and close. Then she sank back onto the ebony bench. He’s gone, then. My father and my mother, my brothers, Ser Willem Darry, Drogo who was my sun-and-stars, his son who died inside me, and now Ser Jorah ...

~

She was Daenerys Stormborn, the Unburnt, khaleesi and queen, Mother of Dragons, slayer of warlocks, breaker of chains, and there was no one in the world that she could trust.

ASOS Daenerys V

“Khaleesi, it was only at the start, before I came to know you ... before I came to love ...”

“Do not say that word!” She backed away from him. “How could you? What did the Usurper promise you? Gold, was it gold?” The Undying had said she would be betrayed twice more, once for gold and once for love. “Tell me what you were promised?”

“Varys said ... I might go home.” He bowed his head.

I was going to take you home! [...] Was there no one she could trust, no one to keep her safe?

ASOS Daenerys IV

Dany found herself wondering whether he was right about Daario. She felt very lonely all of a sudden. Mirri Maz Duur had promised that she would never bear a living child. House Targaryen will end with me. That made her sad. “You must be my children,” she told the dragons, “my three fierce children. Arstan says dragons live longer than men, so you will go on after I am dead.”

~

Dany looked at Missandei. “What are they shouting?”

“It is Ghiscari, the old pure tongue. It means ‘Mother.’”

Dany felt a lightness in her chest. I will never bear a living child, she remembered. Her hand trembled as she raised it. Perhaps she smiled. She must have, because the man grinned and shouted again, and others took up the cry. “Mhysa!” they called. “Mhysa! MHYSA!” They were all smiling at her, reaching for her, kneeling before her.

ASOS Daenerys I

Across the still blue water came the slow steady beat of drums and the soft swish of oars from the galleys. The great cog groaned in their wake, the heavy lines stretched taut between. Balerion’s sails hung limp, drooping forlorn from the masts. Yet even so, as she stood upon the forecastle watching her dragons chase each other across a cloudless blue sky, Daenerys Targaryen was as happy as she could ever remember being.

~

The narrow sea was often stormy, and Dany had crossed it half a hundred times as a girl, running from one Free City to the next half a step ahead of the Usurper’s hired knives. She loved the sea. She liked the sharp salty smell of the air, and the vastness of horizons bounded only by a vault of azure sky above. It made her feel small, but free as well. She liked the dolphins that sometimes swam along beside Balerion, slicing through the waves like silvery spears, and the flying fish they glimpsed now and again. She even liked the sailors, with all their songs and stories. Once on a voyage to Braavos, as she’d watched the crew wrestle down a great green sail in a rising gale, she had even thought how fine it would be to be a sailor.

~

They are my children, she told herself, and if the maegi spoke truly, they are the only children I am ever like to have.

A Clash of Kings

ACOK Daenerys V

It was not by choice that she sought the waterfront. She was fleeing again. Her whole life had been one long flight, it seemed. She had begun running in her mother’s womb, and never once stopped. How often had she and Viserys stolen away in the black of night, a bare step ahead of the Usurper’s hired knives? But it was run or die. Xaro had learned that Pyat Pree was gathering the surviving warlocks together to work ill on her.

~

Her bloodriders would sooner have returned to their great grass sea, even if it meant braving the red waste again. Dany herself had toyed with the idea of settling in Vaes Tolorro until her dragons grew great and strong.

~

It was good to hear men speaking Valyrian once more, and even the Common Tongue, Dany thought as they approached the first ship.

ACOK Daenerys III

Part of her would have liked nothing more than to lead her people back to Vaes Tolorro, and make the dead city bloom. No, that is defeat. I have something Viserys never had. I have the dragons. The dragons are all the difference.

~

“...The Qartheen have a curious wedding custom, my queen. On the day of their union, a wife may ask a token of love from her husband. Whatsoever she desires of his worldly goods, he must grant. And he may ask the same of her. One thing only may be asked, but whatever is named may not be denied.”

“One thing,” she repeated. “And it may not be denied?”

“With one dragon, Xaro Xhoan Daxos would rule this city, but one ship will further our cause but little.”

Dany nibbled at an onion and reflected ruefully on the faithlessness of men.

ACOK Daenerys II

She wondered whether Aegon’s Red Keep had a pool like this, and fragrant gardens full of lavender and mint. It must, surely. Viserys always said the Seven Kingdoms were more beautiful than any other place in the world.

The thought of home disquieted her. If her sun-and-stars had lived, he would have led his khalasar across the poison water and swept away her enemies, but his strength had left the world. Her bloodriders remained, sworn to her for life and skilled in slaughter, but only in the ways of the horselords. The Dothraki sacked cities and plundered kingdoms, they did not rule them. Dany had no wish to reduce King’s Landing to a blackened ruin full of unquiet ghosts. She had supped enough on tears. I want to make my kingdom beautiful, to fill it with fat men and pretty maids and laughing children. I want my people to smile when they see me ride by, the way Viserys said they smiled for my father.

But before she could do that she must conquer.

A Game of Thrones

AGOT Daenerys VIII

Dany did not want to go back to Vaes Dothrak and live the rest of her life among those terrible old women, yet she knew that the knight spoke the truth. Drogo had been more than her sun-and-stars; he had been the shield that kept her safe. “I will not leave him,” she said stubbornly, miserably. She took his hand again. “I will not.”

~

“All I can do now is ease the dark road before him, so he might ride painless to the night lands. He will be gone by morning.”

Her words were a knife through Dany’s breast. What had she ever done to make the gods so cruel? She had finally found a safe place, had finally tasted love and hope. She was finally going home. And now to lose it all ... “No,” she pleaded. “Save him, and I will free you, I swear it. You must know a way ... some magic, some ...”

AGOT Daenerys VI

“The stallion who mounts the world has no need of iron chairs.”

[...] “It was prophesied that the stallion will ride to the ends of the earth,” she said.

“The earth ends at the black salt sea,” Drogo answered at once. He wet a cloth in a basin of warm water to wipe the sweat and oil from his skin. “No horse can cross the poison water.”

“In the Free Cities, there are ships by the thousand,” Dany told him, as she had told him before. “Wooden horses with a hundred legs, that fly across the sea on wings full of wind.”

Khal Drogo did not want to hear it. “We will speak no more of wooden horses and iron chairs.” [...]

Savage beasts he did not fear, nor any man who had ever drawn breath, but the sea was a different matter. To the Dothraki, water that a horse could not drink was something foul; the heaving grey-green plains of the ocean filled them with superstitious loathing. Drogo was a bolder man than the other horselords in half a hundred ways, she had found ... but not in this. If only she could get him onto a ship ...

~

“My princess. How may I serve you?”

“You must talk to my lord husband,” Dany said. “Drogo says the stallion who mounts the world will have all the lands of the earth to rule, and no need to cross the poison water. He talks of leading his khalasar east after Rhaego is born, to plunder the lands around the Jade Sea.”

[...] “The khal has never seen the Seven Kingdoms,” he said. [...]

“But he must ride west,” Dany said, despairing. “Please, help me make him understand.” She had never seen the Seven Kingdoms either, no more than Drogo, yet she felt as though she knew them from all the tales her brother had told her. Viserys had promised her a thousand times that he would take her back one day, but he was dead now and his promises had died with him.

“The Dothraki do things in their own time, for their own reasons,” the knight answered. “Have patience, Princess. Do not make your brother’s mistake. We will go home, I promise you.”

Home? The word made her feel sad. Ser Jorah had his Bear Island, but what was home to her? A few tales, names recited as solemnly as the words of a prayer, the fading memory of a red door ... was Vaes Dothrak to be her home forever? When she looked at the crones of the dosh khaleen, was she looking at her future?

~

You could never tell what treasures the traders might bring this time, and it would be good to hear men speaking Valyrian again, as they did in the Free Cities.

~

If I were not the blood of the dragon, she thought wistfully, this could be my home. She was khaleesi, she had a strong man and a swift horse, handmaids to serve her, warriors to keep her safe, an honored place in the dosh khaleen awaiting her when she grew old ... and in her womb grew a son who would one day bestride the world. That should be enough for any woman ... but not for the dragon. With Viserys gone, Daenerys was the last, the very last. She was the seed of kings and conquerors, and so too the child inside her. She must not forget.

~

But the Western Market smelled of home.

As Irri and Jhiqui helped her from her litter, she sniffed, and recognized the sharp odors of garlic and pepper, scents that reminded Dany of days long gone in the alleys of Tyrosh and Myr and brought a fond smile to her face. Under that she smelled the heady sweet perfumes of Lys. She saw slaves carrying bolts of intricate Myrish lace and fine wools in a dozen rich colors. Caravan guards wandered among the aisles in copper helmets and knee-length tunics of quilted yellow cotton, empty scabbards swinging from their woven leather belts. Behind one stall an armorer displayed steel breastplates worked with gold and silver in ornate patterns, and helms hammered in the shapes of fanciful beasts. Next to him was a pretty young woman selling Lannisport goldwork, rings and brooches and torcs and exquisitely wrought medallions suitable for belting. A huge eunuch guarded her stall, mute and hairless, dressed in sweat-stained velvets and scowling at anyone who came close. Across the aisle, a fat cloth trader from Yi Ti was haggling with a Pentoshi over the price of some green dye, the monkey tail on his hat swaying back and forth as he shook his head.

“When I was a little girl, I loved to play in the bazaar,” Dany told Ser Jorah as they wandered down the shady aisle between the stalls. “It was so alive there, all the people shouting and laughing, so many wonderful things to look at ... though we seldom had enough coin to buy anything ... well, except for a sausage now and again, or honeyfingers ... do they have honeyfingers in the Seven Kingdoms, the kind they bake in Tyrosh?”

[...] Her handmaids trailed along as Dany resumed her stroll through the market. “Oh, look,” she exclaimed to Doreah, “those are the kind of sausages I meant.” She pointed to a stall where a wizened little woman was grilling meat and onions on a hot firestone. “They make them with lots of garlic and hot peppers.” Delighted with her discovery, Dany insisted the others join her for a sausage. Her handmaids wolfed theirs down giggling and grinning, though the men of her khas sniffed at the grilled meat suspiciously. “They taste different than I remember,” Dany said after her first few bites.

“In Pentos, I make them with pork,” the old woman said, “but all my pigs died on the Dothraki sea. These are made of horsemeat, Khaleesi, but I spice them the same.”

“Oh.” Dany felt disappointed, but Quaro liked his sausage so well he decided to have another one, and Rakharo had to outdo him and eat three more, belching loudly. Dany giggled.

“You have not laughed since your brother the Khal Rhaggat was crowned by Drogo,” said Irri. “It is good to see, Khaleesi.”

Dany smiled shyly. It was sweet to laugh. She felt half a girl again.

~

She did take a dozen flasks of scented oils, the perfumes of her childhood; she had only to close her eyes and sniff them and she could see the big house with the red door once more.

AGOT Daenerys IV

Every khal had his bloodriders. At first Dany had thought of them as a kind of Dothraki Kingsguard, sworn to protect their lord, but it went further than that. Jhiqui had taught her that a bloodrider was more than a guard; they were the khal’s brothers, his shadows, his fiercest friends. “Blood of my blood,” Drogo called them, and so it was; they shared a single life. The ancient traditions of the horselords demanded that when the khal died, his bloodriders died with him, to ride at his side in the night lands. If the khal died at the hands of some enemy, they lived only long enough to avenge him, and then followed him joyfully into the grave. In some khalasars, Jhiqui said, the bloodriders shared the khal’s wine, his tent, and even his wives, though never his horses. A man’s mount was his own.

Daenerys was glad that Khal Drogo did not hold to those ancient ways. She should not have liked being shared. And while old Cohollo treated her kindly enough, the others frightened her; Haggo, huge and silent, often glowered as if he had forgotten who she was, and Qotho had cruel eyes and quick hands that liked to hurt. He left bruises on Doreah’s soft white skin whenever he touched her, and sometimes made Irri sob in the night. Even his horses seemed to fear him.

Yet they were bound to Drogo for life and death, so Daenerys had no choice but to accept them. And sometimes she found herself wishing her father had been protected by such men. In the songs, the white knights of the Kingsguard were ever noble, valiant, and true, and yet King Aerys had been murdered by one of them, the handsome boy they now called the Kingslayer, and a second, Ser Barristan the Bold, had gone over to the Usurper. She wondered if all men were as false in the Seven Kingdoms. When her son sat the Iron Throne, she would see that he had bloodriders of his own to protect him against treachery in his Kingsguard. ~

“Please, bring me one of the dragon’s eggs.”

Irri fetched the egg with the deep green shell, bronze flecks shining amid its scales as she turned it in her small hands. Dany curled up on her side, pulling the sandsilk cloak across her and cradling the egg in the hollow between her swollen belly and small, tender breasts. She liked to hold them. They were so beautiful, and sometimes just being close to them made her feel stronger, braver, as if somehow she were drawing strength from the stone dragons locked inside.

She was lying there, holding the egg, when she felt the child move within her ... as if he were reaching out, brother to brother, blood to blood. “You are the dragon,” Dany whispered to him, “the true dragon. I know it. I know it.” And she smiled, and went to sleep dreaming of home.

AGOT Daenerys III

“Have you forgotten who you are? Look at you. Look at you!”

Dany did not need to look. She was barefoot, with oiled hair, wearing Dothraki riding leathers and a painted vest given her as a bride gift. She looked as though she belonged here. Viserys was soiled and stained in city silks and ringmail.

~

“What do you pray for, Ser Jorah?” she asked him.

“Home,” he said. His voice was thick with longing.

“I pray for home too,” she told him, believing it.

Ser Jorah laughed. “Look around you then, Khaleesi.”

But it was not the plains Dany saw then. It was King’s Landing and the great Red Keep that Aegon the Conqueror had built. It was Dragonstone where she had been born. In her mind’s eye they burned with a thousand lights, a fire blazing in every window. In her mind’s eye, all the doors were red.

AGOT Daenerys II

Dany had never felt so alone as she did seated in the midst of that vast horde. Her brother had told her to smile, and so she smiled until her face ached and the tears came unbidden to her eyes. She did her best to hide them, knowing how angry Viserys would be if he saw her crying, terrified of how Khal Drogo might react. Food was brought to her, steaming joints of meat and thick black sausages and Dothraki blood pies, and later fruits and sweetgrass stews and delicate pastries from the kitchens of Pentos, but she waved it all away. Her stomach was a roil, and she knew she could keep none of it down.

There was no one to talk to. Khal Drogo shouted commands and jests down to his bloodriders, and laughed at their replies, but he scarcely glanced at Dany beside him. They had no common language. Dothraki was incomprehensible to her, and the khal knew only a few words of the bastard Valyrian of the Free Cities, and none at all of the Common Tongue of the Seven Kingdoms. She would even have welcomed the conversation of Illyrio and her brother, but they were too far below to hear her.

So she sat in her wedding silks, nursing a cup of honeyed wine, afraid to eat, talking silently to herself.

AGOT Daenerys I

When he was gone, Dany went to her window and looked out wistfully on the waters of the bay. The square brick towers of Pentos were black silhouettes outlined against the setting sun. Dany could hear the singing of the red priests as they lit their night fires and the shouts of ragged children playing games beyond the walls of the estate. For a moment she wished she could be out there with them, barefoot and breathless and dressed in tatters, with no past and no future and no feast to attend at Khal Drogo’s manse.

Somewhere beyond the sunset, across the narrow sea, lay a land of green hills and flowered plains and great rushing rivers, where towers of dark stone rose amidst magnificent blue-grey mountains, and armored knights rode to battle beneath the banners of their lords. The Dothraki called that land Rhaesh Andahli, the land of the Andals. In the Free Cities, they talked of Westeros and the Sunset Kingdoms. Her brother had a simpler name. “Our land,” he called it. The words were like a prayer with him. If he said them enough, the gods were sure to hear. “Ours by blood right, taken from us by treachery, but ours still, ours forever. You do not steal from the dragon, oh, no. The dragon remembers.”

And perhaps the dragon did remember, but Dany could not. She had never seen this land her brother said was theirs, this realm beyond the narrow sea. These places he talked of, Casterly Rock and the Eyrie, Highgarden and the Vale of Arryn, Dorne and the Isle of Faces, they were just words to her. Viserys had been a boy of eight when they fled King’s Landing to escape the advancing armies of the Usurper, but Daenerys had been only a quickening in their mother’s womb.

Yet sometimes Dany would picture the way it had been, so often had her brother told her the stories. The midnight flight to Dragonstone, moonlight shimmering on the ship’s black sails. Her brother Rhaegar battling the Usurper in the bloody waters of the Trident and dying for the woman he loved. The sack of King’s Landing by the ones Viserys called the Usurper’s dogs, the lords Lannister and Stark. Princess Elia of Dorne pleading for mercy as Rhaegar’s heir was ripped from her breast and murdered before her eyes. The polished skulls of the last dragons staring down sightlessly from the walls of the throne room while the Kingslayer opened Father’s throat with a golden sword.

She had been born on Dragonstone nine moons after their flight, while a raging summer storm threatened to rip the island fastness apart. They said that storm was terrible. The Targaryen fleet was smashed while it lay at anchor, and huge stone blocks were ripped from the parapets and sent hurtling into the wild waters of the narrow sea. Her mother had died birthing her, and for that her brother Viserys had never forgiven her.

She did not remember Dragonstone either. They had run again, just before the Usurper’s brother set sail with his new-built fleet. By then only Dragonstone itself, the ancient seat of their House, had remained of the Seven Kingdoms that had once been theirs. It would not remain for long. The garrison had been prepared to sell them to the Usurper, but one night Ser Willem Darry and four loyal men had broken into the nursery and stolen them both, along with her wet nurse, and set sail under cover of darkness for the safety of the Braavosian coast.

She remembered Ser Willem dimly, a great grey bear of a man, half-blind, roaring and bellowing orders from his sickbed. The servants had lived in terror of him, but he had always been kind to Dany. He called her “Little Princess” and sometimes “My Lady,” and his hands were soft as old leather. He never left his bed, though, and the smell of sickness clung to him day and night, a hot, moist, sickly sweet odor. That was when they lived in Braavos, in the big house with the red door. Dany had her own room there, with a lemon tree outside her window. After Ser Willem had died, the servants had stolen what little money they had left, and soon after they had been put out of the big house. Dany had cried when the red door closed behind them forever.

 [...] “We will have it all back someday, sweet sister,” he would promise her. Sometimes his hands shook when he talked about it. “The jewels and the silks, Dragonstone and King’s Landing, the Iron Throne and the Seven Kingdoms, all they have taken from us, we will have it back.” Viserys lived for that day. All that Daenerys wanted back was the big house with the red door, the lemon tree outside her window, the childhood she had never known.

~

“Those three are Drogo’s bloodriders, there,” he said. “By the pillar is Khal Moro, with his son Rhogoro. The man with the green beard is brother to the Archon of Tyrosh, and the man behind him is Ser Jorah Mormont.”

The last name caught Daenerys. “A knight?”

“No less.” Illyrio smiled through his beard. “Anointed with the seven oils by the High Septon himself.”

“What is he doing here?” she blurted.

“The Usurper wanted his head,” Illyrio told them. “Some trifling affront. He sold some poachers to a Tyroshi slaver instead of giving them to the Night’s Watch. Absurd law. A man should be able to do as he likes with his own chattel.”

“I shall wish to speak with Ser Jorah before the night is done,” her brother said. Dany found herself looking at the knight curiously. He was an older man, past forty and balding, but still strong and fit. Instead of silks and cottons, he wore wool and leather. His tunic was a dark green, embroidered with the likeness of a black bear standing on two legs.

She was still looking at this strange man from the homeland she had never known when Magister Illyrio placed a moist hand on her bare shoulder.

~

“I don’t want to be his queen,” she heard herself say in a small, thin voice. “Please, please, Viserys, I don’t want to, I want to go home.”

“Home?” He kept his voice low, but she could hear the fury in his tone. “How are we to go home, sweet sister? They took our home from us!” He drew her into the shadows, out of sight, his fingers digging into her skin. “How are we to go home?” he repeated, meaning King’s Landing, and Dragonstone, and all the realm they had lost.

Dany had only meant their rooms in Illyrio’s estate, no true home surely, though all they had, but her brother did not want to hear that. There was no home there for him. Even the big house with the red door had not been home for him. His fingers dug hard into her arm, demanding an answer. “I don’t know ...” she said at last, her voice breaking. Tears welled in her eyes.

[rainhadaenerys]

I don’t even know why I keep reading anti Dany metas. I keep expecting that maybe they’ll have some reasonable argument, but they never fail to surprise me in how stupid they are, and how much they distort things. There’s this new meta that’s supposed to be some deep analysis of ADWD, and of how Dany is a bad queen. They keep harping on how Dany is bad because she thinks of “floppy ears” and because she dislikes the Meereenese. And this is such a ridiculous thing to say. This has no bearing in whether Dany is a good ruler or not. A ruler doesn’t have to like all their subjects to be a good ruler. In any government, you will always have people with different ideologies, and you are not obligated to like your political enemies. The people Dany dislikes are the Meereeense slavers. Those are the Meereenese that she hates, not the Meereenese freedmen or poor people. And again, this doesn’t make Dany “a bad ruler”. It doesn’t mean that Dany isn’t supposed to be a queen. The person also says that Dany hates Meereenese culture even when it’s not related to things that are oppressive, but this isn’t true. The culture that Dany hates is the culture of the slaver class, not of her freedmen. And again, whether Dany hates that culture or not doesn’t make her a bad ruler. She can hate the Meereenese slavers while still ruling and ruling well. Oh, and the meta also says that Dany “makes” people shave, but this isn’t true at all. The Shavepate choose to shave their heads on their own will to symbolize their alliance with the new regime, for their own personal reasons:

"My queen," growled Skahaz mo Kandaq, of the shaven head. Ghiscari hair was dense and wiry; it had long been the fashion for the men of the Slaver Cities to tease it into horns and spikes and wings. By shaving, Skahaz had put old Meereen behind him to accept the new, and his kin had done the same after his example. Others followed, though whether from fear, fashion, or ambition, Dany could not say; shavepates, they were called. Skahaz was the Shavepate … and the vilest of traitors to the Sons of the Harpy and their ilk. - Daenerys I ADWD

Daenerys doesn’t “make” people shave, or else everybody in Meereen would hve shaved, which is not the case.

Then they proceed to take many decisions of Dany that were very much reasonable, and try to distort it into something bad. Dany grants a rich woman her clothes and jewels back but not her house. And she does this because there were already freedmen living in the house. First, Dany decreed a pardon for everything that happened during the sack (which is necessary to keep peace in Meereen), so it’s not like she needed to give the woman anything. Dany was still conciliatory in giving the woman back her jewels and clothes. The woman was not homeless: she was living with her brother. But the freedwomen in her house would be homeless if Dany decided to give her house back. Dany’s decision was probably the best and most conciliatory decision she could make, but of course this anti would harp on why it’s horrible for a rich woman to lose her house. Funny how antis never worry about the freedwomen that would be homeless if Dany decided in favor of the rich woman.

Then they talk about Dany not punishing the crimes that happened during the sack, and completely ignore the fact that decreeing a pardon was necessary to keep peace in the city. If Dany had decided to punish the former slaves for rising against their masters, and to punish former slavers for their crimes against the freedmen, she would have war within Meereen, and I’m pretty sure antis would be harping about what a stupid ruler Dany is and how she is incapable of being conciliatory. But here, Dany shows herself to be conciliatory and makes a very reasonable decision that was probably the best decision she could make, and antis go talking about what a bad ruler she is.

Then Dany makes the decision that people will have to go to the temple and swear a sacred oath to get the money for their lost animals (that Drogo ate). Which is a very intelligent decision. Dany is not wrong in saying that some people will lie about Drogon burning their animais and bring burned bones to her that they burned themselves, just to get her money. In fact, Dany keeps receiving claims that Drogon burned their animals even after Drogo left the city and Dany chained her dragons:

Dany did not want to talk about the dragons. Farmers still came to her court with burned bones, complaining of missing sheep, though Drogon had not returned to the city. - Daenerys IV ADWD

So Dany is absolutely correct in saying that some people are deceiving her. Making people swear a sacred oath is smart, especially considering that the Shavepate’s suggestion was much more brutal (to whip everyone), and Dany refused his suggestion. But look at what this anti says about Dany because of this:

The pronouncement was received in sullen silence. You would think they might be happier, Dany thought. They have what they came for. Is there no way to please these people?

This quote says a lot about Daenerys. In her mind, the people should be happy because she’s willing to give them back what they lost, failing to consider how much trouble it would be for them to gather up the bones of their dead animals, bring them to Dany’s pyramid, and wait all day for just the chance to be heard by her. Dany thinks many of them lie about Drogon to try and get money or sheep, and thinks they should just be happy she’s giving them anything at all.

Like, wow. How is it such trouble to bring the bones as proof? Isn’t that what all the shepherds were already doing? And actually, this anti is incorrect, because they would not need to speak directly to Dany, they would just have to swear an oath at the temple. And the idea that Dany thinks “people should just be happy she’s giving them anything at all” is so false. This is definitely not what Dany thinks:

“No, Magnificence.” Reznak bowed. “Shall I send these rascals away, or will you want them scourged?”

Daenerys shifted on the bench. “No man should ever fear to come to me.” Some claims were false, she did not doubt, but more were genuine. Her dragons had grown too large to be content with rats and cats and dogs. The more they eat, the larger they will grow, Ser Barristan had warned her, and the larger they grow, the more they’ll eat. Drogon especially ranged far afield and could easily devour a sheep a day. “Pay them for the value of their animals,” she told Reznak, “but henceforth claimants must present themselves at the Temple of the Graces and swear a holy oath before the gods of Ghis.” – Daenerys I ADWD

I mean, what they say about Dany is a freaking lie. Dany is willing to help people, she never thinks “they should be happy I’m giving them anything at all”, what she actually thinks is “some claims were false, she did not doubt, but more were genuine”. But hey, antis lying through their teeth about Dany is nothing new. Besides, going back to the decision, how in hell is Dany unreasonable for this? This “meta” was supposed to prove that Dany is a bad ruler, but I think these decisions (the pardon, being conciliatory and not leaving freedwomen homeless, and asking people to swear an oath to avoid people cheating her) all prove that Dany is actually a very good ruler.

The anti also talks about how Dany is hypocritical for chastising a man for forgetting the name of his slave, but for also forgetting Hazzea’s name. But this is such a false equivalence. The man forgot the name of a woman who worked for him for years, showing that he never cared to even learn the name of his slaves. Dany remembered Hazzea’s name even though she only heard it once, and she never knew the girl, and only forgot Hazzea’s name when she was sick and hallucinating in the Dothraki sea. How the hell are these two things comparable? And Dany just told the man to buy a new loom for the woman, it’s not like she was whipping him through the streets, but the way antis talk, a slave being compensated for her years of service with a loom is the most heinous thing. Like, wow, Dany is so evil and such a bad ruler for this, right? *sarcasm*

Oh, they also say Dany is a bad and immature ruler because she throws fruits at Xaro. Even though Xaro is already someone she knows, and Dany doesn’t do this with anyone else. Apparently, things like this (or hanging her feet and not sitting in a queenly position) make Dany a “bad ruler”, despite the fact that this has little bearing in whether Dany is a good ruler or not (I mean, I think ending slavery and feeding her people are more important things than sitting correctly, but hey, since when Dany antis are reasonable or logical?), and in fact, Dany is usually very courteous:

In the afternoon a sculptor came, proposing to replace the head of the great bronze harpy in the Plaza of Purification with one cast in Dany’s image. She denied him with as much courtesy as she could muster. A pike of unprecedented size had been caught in the Skahazadhan, and the fisherman wished to give it to the queen. She admired the fish extravagantly, rewarded the fisherman with a purse of silver, and sent the pike to her kitchens. A coppersmith had fashioned her a suit of burnished rings to wear to war. She accepted it with fulsome thanks; it was lovely to behold, and all that burnished copper would flash prettily in the sun, though if actual battle threatened, she would sooner be clad in steel. Even a young girl who knew nothing of the ways of war knew that. – Daenerys I ADWD

They also talk about how Dany is bad for rejecting the peace, completely ignoring all the bad things that peace would bring, and how it benefited the slavers and was bad for the slaves. Oh, and apparently Dany is bad for wanting to forbid the fighting pits, saying that Dany should make regulations to stop people from being forced into the pits as if that was possible, even though the text shows us that it’s very difficult to avoid the fact that some people will indeed be forced and it’s difficult to regulate that, and that poor people would end up in this place.

They also talk about Dany’s mistake in leaving Astapor in Yunkai, ignoring the fact that this is wrong, Dany’s mistake wasn’t simply that she left, but that she left Astapor with no army, and that she left the masters in power in Yunkai. And none of these things make Dany a bad ruler in Meereen. These were mistakes that Dany did in ASOS, not in ADWD, because Dany was very inexperient and didn’t have good advisors. But Dany learns from these mistakes. Saying Dany is a bad ruler because of this makes no sense, because this happened in the past, and Dany has learned and will no longer make the same mistakes (and in fact, she doesn’t do the same mistake in ADWD, she doesn’t leave Meereen unprotected). But Dany antis expect Dany to be a good ruler from the very beginning even though she never had any experience before. They expect her to have never made any mistakes.

Finally, they talk about the wineseller’s daughter, and say that “It is one thing to torture someone you only suspect of being involved in a crime, but it is even worse to torture girls just to get at their father“, which is not what happened at all. First, we don’t know if they were girls, the text never says this. Second, the wineseller’s daughters were suspects. They were arrested with their father and were the only ones in the shop whe the poisoning happened. Dany is not “torturing people that she knows are innocent”. Like, I don’t like Dany allowing torture either, but I hate how Dany antis always distort what actually happened (usually by saying that the wineseller’s daughters were just little children that Dany knew were innocent”, which is not true), and I also hate how Dany antis use double standards and completely forget that torture is normal in this world, and even Jon Snow practices it (he does it for other reasons, but he does it). And this antis also conveniently ignores that once Dany realizes the Shavepate is forcing people to confess, she actually forbids torture (she is the only character to forbid torture).

Anyway, sorry that this post is such a mess, guys, I know it’s very badly written and disorganized. I wrote in a hurry, and mostly because this meta I just read annoyed me. But I think the post really shows how Dany antis will really do anything to distort things, and turn even the things Dany does right into bad things. The only “bad thing” here is the torture, but this is also a double standard against Dany. Anyway, is Dany a good ruler? Yes, she is.

[lupinusalbus]

Season 8 Plot:  Jon and Dany are Tainted; Sansa Rises (Part 1)

There was so much wrong with seasons seven and eight of Game of Thrones, especially with the portrayals of most of the major characters. Many of the show characters are quite different in some aspects from what they are in the books, but we know that many of the end points will be very similar. We also know that Martin likes to subvert expectations about “heroes”.  This may mean both Jon and Dany are slated to be sullied as characters in TWOW, not just Dany alone. What follows is my theory of why the writing in season 8 went down the way it did.  It doesn’t mean I believe the writing and characterizations were actually good.  In part 2, I will get more specific about what I think the writers were actually trying to accomplish, muddled as it was.  If we look at the skeleton outline of what happened towards the end of the series, however, it looks something like this:

Jon is disillusioned, but his reunion with Sansa inspires him to take up the Stark’s seemingly hopeless cause

Dany arrives at Dragonstone and plans her conquest

Jon and Sansa take back Winterfell, their relationship deepens

Jon’s personal renewal upon being named King in the North causes him to continue his mission to act against the Night King.  This leads him to his fateful meeting with Daenerys Targaryen.

Dany falls in love with Jon and agrees to fight in the North after losing a Dragon trying to rescue him.    Jon kneels to Dany; they go North with her armies. Meanwhile, the Night King breaks through the Wall with Viserion.

Jon learns about his true heritage.  In the meantime, Dany has received a chilly reception from the Starks, especially Sansa who wants to continue with Northern Independence. 

The Night King is defeated; killed by Arya Stark.  Heavy losses are suffered by Dany’s armies and the Northern forces.  Dany is disturbed by the implications of  Jon’s lineage when she sees how much the Northerners love him.  Their sexual relationship becomes troubled as Jon experiences qualms about it. She asks Jon to keep his true parentage a secret.

Jon tells the Starks who he really is.  Sansa tells Tyrion, who tells Varys.  Meanwhile, Dany and Jon head South separately to fight Cersei.

Dany loses Rhaegal. Missendai is executed by Cersei; Dany becomes more paranoid and isolated.

Varys plots to overthrow Dany in favor of Jon Snow.  He is discovered and burned alive.  Jon reaffirms his political fealty to Dany but again rejects her advances and she concludes that she must rule by fear in Westeros.  Dany knows that Sansa has plotted against her.

Dany and Jon move to attack King’s Landing.  Tyrion frees Jaimie who was captured by Dany’s forces while sneaking into King’s Landing.

Rather than accept the surrender of Cersei’s forces, Dany goes “mad” and burns King’s Landing and much of the populace to cinders.  Her forces and the Northern forces commit atrocities.  Jaimie and Cersei die; Jon Snow is horrified by what Dany has wreaked.

At her victory rally at the Red Keep, Dany announces her plans to liberate the world.  Tyrion throws his Hand’s badge down the steps in a dramatic display and Dany has him arrested.  Tyrion convinces Jon that he must act against Dany before it’s too late.

Jon kills Dany as they kiss in front of the Iron Throne and Drogon absconds with her body. Jon is arrested off camera.

Bran is named King; Tyrion is his hand.  Sansa secures the North’s continuing independence.  Jon is sentenced to go back to The Wall in an apparent compromise between Gray Worm and the Starks.

Arya sails off to explore unknown territory under the Stark Banner, Sansa is named Queen in the North, Jon sets out beyond The Wall to resettle the Wildlings.  It’s unclear when or whether he plans to return.

(More Below the Cut)

The biggest story arc in the final two seasons is that of Dany and Jon’s political/personal alliance and subsequent military actions. Almost all of the other stories play out against this backdrop.  If we could encapsulate Dany’s story in a nutshell, it could be divided into her life before and after she met Jon Snow.  Soon after she met him, she decided to decimate much of the Lannister army in the Loot Train attack, which gave her an advantage against Cersei.  Dany was weakened by going North with Jon and fighting against the Night King, both militarily and personally.  It can be argued that her relationship with Jon Snow brought about her downfall. We don’t know whether Jon and the Starks could have defeated the Night King without Dany, however it looks like this is at least a possibility because of the way the story played out.  The Stark’s plan essentially outwitted the Night King by using Bran as bait, and when he went down, the entire AOTD went down with him.  Had it played out a bit differently, it’s conceivable that it could have been done without Dany.  At any rate, Dany’s journey to the North eventually weakened her in more ways than one.

Dany and Jon at the Battle for Winterfell (HBO)

Dany’s Love for Jon Snow - a Fateful Event

As I wrote previously, Dany’s relationship with Jon was very different from her previous two.  In her marriage to Drogo, Dany began as the weaker partner who  was basically treated like a piece of property; however improbably, they did grow to love each other. Gradually, she gained power to the point where Drogo ended up dying because Dany demanded that he stop some rapes that were occurring after a raid.  In her relationship with Daario Naharis, Dany was the dominant partner.  She easily left him behind when she sailed for Westeros.

After Jon arrives at Dragonstone to seek Dany’s help against the Night King, Dany becomes infatuated with him.   Jon’s personal integrity, conscientiousness and restraint represent  an advancement for Dany compared to her past relationships.  However, these very qualities of Jon’s are also what will seal her doom.  

We don’t get to see very much of Jon and Dany’s relationship before she finds out that he is a Targaryen and technically her rival for the throne.  However, Jon has bent the knee to Dany, and as such he is obligated to be deferential.  When Jon learns of the true circumstances of his birth from Samwell Tarly, he immediately reacts to Sam’s suggestion that Dany should not be Queen by calling it treason.  During the Battle for Winterfell, the two seem to work in tandem although Jon prioritizes Bran’s safety over Dany’s.  This happens immediately after Jon tells Dany about his birth, and after the battle it causes a rift to develop in their relationship.

In the scene after the celebratory feast at Winterfell, Dany tells Jon that she loves him.  Jon is ultimately unable to make love to her which leads Dany to have a melt down over his parentage.  Jon swears that he doesn’t want the throne and will be loyal.  But he then takes exception to Dany’s demand that he keep his secret from Sansa and Arya.  Although Jon continues his political loyalty to Dany, their emotional attachment is now deeply disturbed.

There is no doubt, however, that Dany wishes to continue their relationship.  In the scene of the two together at Dragonstone, she tries to heal their rift, and he again rejects her advances.  And just before her death, Dany envisions them working side by side together as Targaryens; probably in a marriage as has been their custom.  Although we can argue about what love means to a flawed character like Dany, there is no doubt that her feelings for Jon Snow continued until the end.

This scene at Dragonstone between Dany and Jon is pivotal and provides an important glimpse into Dany’s dark side.  We don’t see whether Jon was summoned or if he just showed up to talk to Dany; but we do get to see her reaction to being thwarted.  Jon’s qualms about continuing their physical relationship (read as rejection by Dany) is seemingly projected onto Westeros at large by Dany with the implication being that the lack of love being shown her is what causes her to unleash her fury.

Jon’s Faustian Bargain

The impending invasion of the Night King placed Jon in a difficult situation with regard to his relationship with Dany, since persuading her to help him was paramount.  As King in the North, his commitment was to protect his people and the Starks.  He keenly feels the weight of his responsibilities, just as he did when he was Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch.  His instinct is usually to try and unite rather than divide and also to first look to people’s best qualities rather than antagonize them.  This is why many in the Night’s Watch felt him to be a natural leader.  Those who would take different tacks, such as Alesair Thorne would always be a problem or  threat to people such as Jon who are more visionary in nature.  

In spite of his prowess and bravery in conflicts and on the battlefield, Jon does not enjoy these pursuits. His natural inclination is that of an idealistic protector who possesses a strong sense of right and wrong - an honorable man in the mold of his foster father, Ned Stark.  In spite of not being a “true” Stark, Jon has loved the Stark family and wished to defend and avenge them during the War of the Five Kings and the Battle of the Bastards.  In love relationships, Jon is cautious, but “loyal and true”, as Ygritte tells him.  His natural impulse is not to dominate or use women, like many of the men on Game of Thrones.  Jon sometimes shows a bit of chauvinism when interacting with his sisters, but we can’t expect him not to display these qualities from time to time in the world of the show.  All in all, he is an exceptional and admirable person with a good conscience, though not as shrewd as the book character.

One reason that Jon’s relationship with Dany becomes so problematic is their clashing world views.  Jon could not have helped but see this early on in their interactions because of Dany’s dictatorial and regal style.  Of course there was another side to Dany which she sometimes demonstrated with intimates, but Jon’s natural inclination is to be wary of people who behave arrogantly.  Although its difficult to determine exactly what the show’s writers were trying to do with Jon’s character during season 7, it’s safe to say that Jon was unlikely to have sought a romantic relationship with Dany, but instead was drawn into it because of her attraction to him.  From the outset, their  overall motives were not  compatible:  Dany’s was to conquer Westeros; Jon’s was to save it.  And while Dany’s slogan of breaking the wheel may have given her traction with enslaved peoples, in Westeros it tended to fall short.

Much of the drama of season 7 was about whether or not these two characters would get together, as allies and/or as lovers.  There are really only three possibilities for Jon’s inner feelings about his relationship with Dany, although we know Dany’s feelings for Jon.  The first is that Jon loves or at least admires her sincerely; the second is that he is manipulating her and feels no love (but does have sexual desire); and the third is that he is drawn into the relationship because of a combination of the dire circumstances they are facing and Dany’s obvious ardor for him.  The third possibility makes the most sense to me and does not completely preclude political motives on his part.

Jon’s relationship with Ygritte is something of a model for his later relationship with Dany.  Ygriite was the aggressor, and although she may have started down that path as a way of engineering her escape, her feelings for Jon soon became genuine.  In any case, Jon wasn’t the pursuer initially in that relationship, and Ygriite’s personality tended to overpower his.  Their relationship was messy because of external factors and Jon eventually had to “return to himself” by leaving Ygritte.  There is a similar dynamic at play in Jon’s relationship with Dany.   The possibility that Jon could be lead astray by a woman also seemed to be something that Sansa feared had happened upon Jon’s return to Winterfell with the Dragon Queen;  she had hinted as much to Jon early in season 7, before Dany had even come into the picture.

The show presents Jon as having given up his crown in order to gain Dany’s assistance.  This is how Jon explains and justifies what he did to the Northmen in an assembly and also to Sansa and Arya.  Jon giving up the crown seems to be the issue that upsets the Starks and others more than Dany’s mere presence  in the North with her forces.  Especially for Sansa, Northern independence should not have to be on the table anymore, but Jon has given it away without consulting her.  To Sansa, Jon has fallen under the spell of a usurper whom she doesn’t trust.  However, near the end of season 7 Dany had first offered to fight with Jon without his having bent the knee, which is what Jon purportedly had wanted all along.

The fact that he then bends the knee anyway suggests that he has in some sense become more sympathetic to Dany.  Perhaps he feels that he must give something up to her because she lost a dragon in her attempt to rescue Jon and the others.  Perhaps he really doesn’t value the crown; but if this is the case, why did he accept it, especially knowing how much it means to Sansa?  Jon most likely feels that he is playing it smart by putting aside his pride but also has some kind of feeling for Dany after her rescue attempt and offer to fight with him.  Like Ygritte, Dany is a warrior who physically puts herself on the line, and this is attractive to Jon.

In Jon’s eyes he is trading his crown (and Northern independence) for Dany’s support; but mixed into this bargain is an emotional bond.  The attraction seems stronger on Dany’s side, but Jon has allowed himself to be drawn in, and as Varys observes, to be overshadowed by Dany’s all-consuming quest. But  just as in his relationship with Ygritte, there is a side of Jon to which he must ultimately remain true - his loyalty to the North and his real family.

Was Sansa Right All Along?

At the beginning of Season 7,  Sansa advises Jon that he needs to be smart because Robb and Ned Stark had made stupid mistakes.  Sansa’s overall assessment seems to be that Ned and Robb were naive and had underestimated their enemies.  Sansa first gets this feeling about Jon around the time of the Battle of the Bastards.  She doesn’t approve of Jon’s decision to attack Ramsay’s army with the low number of men they have been able to muster.  She also correctly intuits that Jon will fall into a trap that Ramsay is likely to be preparing.  In the end, Sansa saves the day by having requested help from Littlefinger and the Knights of the Vale, but it turned out that her misgivings about Jon were accurate.  

In season 8, Sansa’s misgivings about Dany are also eventually proven correct when Dany evolves into a destructive tyrant and burns King’s landing.  All along Sansa and Arya had expressed their distrust of Dany to Jon, but Jon does not really listen and goes on supporting Dany.  Jon claims more than once that the Starks just don’t know Dany well enough yet, implying that they’ll eventually come to like her, and he also expresses to Dany a belief that they all can live together.  Presumably he means they can all co-exist in Westeros.  

Sansa and Arya get nowhere with Jon when they try to talk to him before he leaves for Dragonstone.  At this point, Jon also tells them about his true identity as the son of Lyanna and Rhaegar.  It is soon after this that Sansa moves to protect Jon and the North by revealing his secret to Tyrion Lannister. 

From the perspective of how Game of Thrones ends up, the most prescient character all along was indeed Sansa.  Her insight into Jon’s tendencies began at the Battle of the Bastards and is foreshadowed by her comment to him about  needing to be smarter than Ned and Robb.  Sansa also remarks to Dany that men do stupid things for women, which can only be taken at face value by the audience.  Dany’s remark about “who is manipulating whom”, probably does not imply true canniness on the part of Jon but is actually a reference to Dany’s own infatuation with him combined with her desire to placate Sansa.

Jon had kept the interest of the North in mind by focusing on the threat of the Night King, while Sansa had all along remained motivated by continuing the Northern independence which Jon’s crowning had reinstated.  Her distrust of Dany was based upon several factors, but insight into Dany’s true propensities that later turned out to be correct was probably a major driver.  This is not really spelled out by the show; we are only given lines like Arya’s to Jon about Sansa being the “smartest person I know.”  This possibility seems to have pretty much escaped Jon, who is focused on the Night King and his sense of indebtedness to Dany.

Sansa and Jon (The Starks) bring about Dany’s Downfall

Jon’s character arc in season 8 appears to only confirm Sansa’s misgivings about him.  Here are a few actions by Jon which were likely perceived as alarming by Sansa:

He bent the knee, which we know Sansa disapproves of, not only because Dany is a Targaryen but because Sansa has become devoted to the cause of Northern independence.  Sansa wanted Jon to remain King in the North.

Sansa perceives Jon’s “love” for Dany (which he probably admitted to her in episode one) as a sign that he is again vulnerable to making poor judgements as she saw him do in the past and which remind her of other male Starks.

Jon’s repeated assurances that Dany will be a good queen despite evidence to the contrary.

Jon’s fealty to Dany even after learning of his parentage.  What did Sansa think of this?  We didn’t get to hear, but her spilling the beans to Tyrion tells us she believes it to be a mistake.  We have to believe that Sansa told Jon as much after Bran revealed the truth about him, and he wouldn’t listen.

What stands out about Sansa during all of this is that she trusted her own judgements over Jon’s and ultimately acted upon them in opposition to Jon’s instructions.  Since Sansa is correct about Dany, she is shown to have the best judgement and therefore lives up to her implied “smartness”.  Of course Jon’s character arc of naivete and blind devotion is deeply disappointing and antithetical to some of his past actions.  Yet Sansa’s misgivings about his judgement are seemingly proven true in the end.  Jon’s decision to kill Dany, which was portrayed as being more about protecting Sansa than about Dany’s fitness, was not reached until almost the last minute, and only after a discussion with Tyrion in which he seems to defend Dany.  Unfortunately this is what the show gave us, but in the end, the Starks are mostly on the ascent because of Sansa and Jon.  It is likely that Sansa telling Tyrion about Jon’s Targaryen heritage contributed to Dany’s burning of King’s Landing.  This is evidenced by her paranoia, self pity and instability in her scene with Jon after Varys’s execution.  Soon afterwards, Jon ended Dany’s life and the tipping point for him   was almost certainly his (late) realization that Dany would likely try to kill Sansa.

Part 2 will be about the plot the writers may have intended to portray.

[fangirlfanwritings]

Jon x Targaryen!reader Request

Can I request a GoT one-shot, where R is Daenerys' younger twin sister (and the lover of Jon instead of her) and she becomes the new Queen of Westeros? Unlike Dany, she was never so hellbent on taking the Iron Throne, instead devoting herself to helping people (by healing, or killing enemies as she had been trained in art of combat by the Dothraki and Unsullied). People know of her immense kindness and deep regret over her sister's actions - which make her a perfect candidate for the Iron Throne

You sat on your horse behind the troops of men that were ready to storm King’s Landing in your sister’s name. Jon instructed some of the men and made his way towards you. You hopped of the horse and took his hands. “You’re shaking,” he noted.

“The love of my life is about to storm into a war zone...again. I can’t help but be worried.”

“I’ll be just fine.” You nodded and kissed him deeply. He left your side and went to the front of the line, ready for your sister to fly in on her dragon. You wanted to join the fight and, having been trained by the best you knew you could handle it, but your sister and Jon prohibited it.

******

Your eyes went wide at the scene before you. Daenerys flew over the city and commanded Drogon to set it aflame. You wept silent tears thinking about all the people inside the city. You had begged her not to do this. You pleaded with her not to set the city and her people on fire. She promised you she wouldn't do it unless it was necessary. Yet the bells had rung and she did it anyway.

You saw Jon appear from the city walls and you willed your horse to go as fast as you can. You threw yourself down into his arms and cried.

As soon as the city’s flames started to calm you entered with Jon at your side. He sent the Northern men back towards Winterfell, now eager for them to get far away. Ash rained down and looked like snow that you had seen in the North. You blinked back tears, trying not to show weakness. You heard the cries of a child and strayed from Jon’s side. “Y/N.”

You ignored him and let yourself in a charred house. You followed the muttered sound until you saw a small child crouched behind two brick walls that had managed to keep her from getting burned. “Hello, little one.” You knelt down and gently touched her shoulder. She looked up at you with red eyes and dirt on her face. “Are you ok?”

“I can’t find my Mother and Father.”

“Why don’t you come with me, little one.” You took the small child into your arms.

“It’s not safe to come into the buildings,” Jon told you from where he waited behind you.

“Even more reason this child shouldn’t be in there.” You walked with her towards the castle and spoke to the Unsullied. “I want you to split up and search the city. I want all those you find to be politely escorted to the building we are using to treat the injured.”

“Those are for our men, Princess.”

“I don’t care who they are for,” you hissed. “These are my people and they will take priority. They didn’t ask for this,” you whispered the last part. “Take your helmets off and search the city. Insure any citizen found is taken to triage and treated with medical attention.”

You looked to one of your handmaidens. “After I meet with my sister I will be there to assist in healing the people. Send a messenger out to the nearest city to collect extra tools and get toys for the children. They will need something to cheer them up.”

The tone in your voice was one you hadn’t heard in many years. Commanding and ruling wasn’t your passion. You spent your time learning to protect yourself after the years of torture your face, healing those that were hurt, and playing with orphaned and injured children. From what you were much like Rhaegar.

You walked into what was left of the Keep’s walls and saw your sister’s armies lined up and cheering her on as she flew in on Drogo. She stepped forwards as you and Jon made it to the top of the stairs. She spoke with a fire and confidence in her unlike anything you’d ever seen. But you had heard of it before. Viserys had often told stories of your Father and how he had been like this.

You were looking at a Mad Queen.

You looked over to Jon and reached for his hand, squeezing it fiercely.

******

You entered the holding cell Jon was in and took in his bruised face. “Y/N.”

“I came as soon as I heard.” You bent down and ran a thumb gently over his black and blue face. “Why did you do it? Why did you tell them it was you? You could have blamed anybody.”

“I did it for the people,” was all he said. “I’m sorry.”

“I know what she was. We couldn’t have stopped her. What you did,” you paused. “It was for the better. Your siblings should be here in a fortnight. We are going to get you out of here.” You kissed him gently. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

******

You tapped your foot eagerly as you waited for Tyrion and Jon to be brought into the pit. Grey Worm came out with only Tyrion in tow. “Where is Jon Snow,” you demanded.

“He is our prisoner.”

“So is Tyrion, yet here he stands.”

“Jon Snow is out prisoner and will be punished accordingly. He killed our Queen, we deserve his head.”

“There are over a thousand Northern men out there to tell you why killing Jon Snow is a bad idea,” Sansa informed him. “If you want him gone so badly then let him return to the North with us.”

“He needs to answer for his crimes.”

“Jon commited his crimes here. Let our King or our Queen decide,” Tyrion spoke up.

“We have no Queen and King.”

“So elect one.” Your head went on a swivel as you looked at Tyrion.

Grey Worm seemed to accept it. “Make your choice then.” You looked around at your fellow Lords and Ladies, waiting to hear who which of them they would support.

You watched as Lord Tully stood up and began delivering his speech for ruling. “Uncle, sit down.” You couldn’t help but smile at her. She had the confidence in herself. She knew how to lead the people. She would make a great Queen. Just as you were about to vouch for her Bran spoke up.

“Princess Y/N.” He stopped looking blankly into the air and looked at you. “You have lead alongside Daenerys and acted as her counterpart. You tried to keep her on the right path, doing what was best for the people. The people of Westeros have always been your first concern. Those in King’s Landing have saw how you treated those who were injured and cared for those left without a home. Word has spread of your kind nature and tender heart. They will support your claim to the throne.”

“I never wanted the throne,” you informed Bran and the rest of those in attendances. “And after what my sister did I can’t believe that the people will want to see me on the Iron Throne; or what will be placed in its place.”

“The people are already speaking of your kindness and have voiced support for you. They trust you in a way they never trusted your sister,” Sam spoke.

“Princess Y/N, should we agree for you to take the throne will you accept?” You looked at Tyrion and nodded.

“I never wanted to sit on the throne, I wanted to help the people. Now, it would be my honor to rule to provide a better life for the people of the 7 Kingdoms. They deserve better than what the Kings and Queens of late have given them. Should you support me I will make it my mission to see that the people are taken care of.”

“All in favor of Princess Y/N Targaryen please say ‘aye’. You watched as all the Lords spoke up in favor of you taking the throne. Sansa was the last to answer and she turned slightly towards you.

“Y/N, I am happy to consider you my friend. But the North lost many men in the war. They have seen too much to forget and can not kneel to another Southern Queen.” She turned back towards the rest of the Lords. “The North will remain independent, like it was for thousands of years.”

You nodded with a smile. “I accept and look forward to seeing your Kingdom flourish.”

“Then with a unanimous agreement I name you Queen Y/N Targaryen, First of her name, Queen of the Andals and the Rhoynar, and the First Men", Lady of the Six Kingdoms, and Protector of the Realm.”

“As my first order I pardon Tyrion Lannister and name him Hand of the Queen.”

“My Queen, I am not worthy. After everything that’s happened…”

“He is a traitor. He needs to be punished.”

“Which is what I am doing. He will be placed to serve in a job he hates until the end of his days. He has made many mistakes and will spend the rest of his life fixing them.”

“What of Jon, my Queen,” Arya asked.

“Jon Snow will be charged with being the Captain of my Queen’s Guard.”

“No,” Grey Worm argued. “He killed our Queen. He deserves to lose his head.”

“He killed your late queen, my sister,” you seethed. “I am your Queen now. You have looked to me for guidance since Dany’s death and I haven’t steered you wrong. Have I?” He stayed still. “Have I,” you nearly yelled.

“No, my Queen.”

“What Jon did he believed was for the better of the realm. That is what my sister believed as she carried out all her action; the actions you followed. Now it is my turn. You and your men are leaving soon, leaving me in need of a man who knows war. Jon is the best we have, whether you like it or not. He will be put to work and will not be allowed to venture back up North. That way he shall no longer have access to a family.” You waited to see his reaction. Realizing he wouldn’t win he nodded.

******

Jon was lead into the throne room and was surprised to see you at the head of steps, his siblings beside you. “Leave us,” you commanded the Unsullied and soldiers. They closed the doors and left you with Jon and the Starks.

“My Queen,” he knelt at the foot of the stairs.

“Rise, Jon Snow, the Commander of the Queen’s Guard.”

“The Queen’s Guard? Grey Worm is letting me keep my head?”

“Due to the Queen’s command,” Arya grinned and hugged him.

He looked sadly at you. “That means we can never marry. I can have no children.”

You stepped down in front of him and smiled. “Haven’t you heard? The new Queen is allowing the head of the Queen’s Guard to have a family. She’s looking forward to it, in fact.”

[serpentlopez]

[TEXT] Hot Mess

Who: Eliana, Charlie @serpentchar

What: E+C text for the first time since E was arrested for assault.

When: Tuesday Afternoon, 11am.

Where: Text Messages

Notes: Mentions of Sheriff Hummel, Pastor Wilde, @northsideking and heads up, there is spoiler talk in regards to Game of Thrones!

Eliana

Thank you. For getting me out. I didn’t say it yesterday.

Charlie

Of course, love. Thank you not necessary, but you’re very welcome. I couldn’t just let you rot in there.

Eliana

Technically you could have.Would have kept me from doing what you don’t want me to do.

Charlie

I know, and believe me the thought occurred to me but I couldn’t do that.I love you too much to let you rot in the NS

Eliana

I appreciate that. Deputy Dewey wouldn’t have been able to handle my sexiness.

Charlie

Right? You would turn that place into Pamela Anderson’s jail house. It’d be fun. Then I might just join you

Unless the fucker deputy tried to use his position to force you to do shit.

Then I’d have to kill him

Eliana

I like the way you think.

Nah. I’m sure he couldn’t handle all this.Though Kurt might end up with a new mother before I’m done

Charlie

He’d probably fuck himself into a heart attack. Or a coma.Lmao how’s that? You gonna charm your way into the Sheriffs pants?Least the old man could die happy with a good fuck right?

Eliana

Charm? Baby girl, you’ve seen my tits in nothing but a bra and my leather boots.I’d be Mrs. Sheriff and then actually get some shit done around here

Charlie

Exactly. I support this plan. I mean you’d have to get past Deputy Fuckface to get to him but you could do it. Suggest a threesome. I’m sure they would agree?Who in their right mind would?

Eliana

Look. If I can get him, Pastor Wilde and whoever else the fuck it was for Aidens game; I’d be infamous

Charlie

I really need to see you fuck Pastor Wilde. That would be the greatest thing ever.I’d film it.Blast it everywhere

Eliana

I bet I could.

Charlie

You should

Eliana

He helped me get to the SS when I first moved here before I met you

Charlie

You could do things for him his wife would never even think of

Eliana

Him and his kids

Charlie

See. Opening already.

Eliana

I’d just walk in and tell him I need to confess.. get on my knees..He’d probably blow his load before I could touch him.Don’t tempt me. I’ll do it.Though with King back, it’s still killing me that kid didn’t want to fuck me.

Charlie

Fuck em both at the same time

Eliana

You’re indulging the hell out of me and I approve.

Charlie

Tell the good old pastor that you need to confess. Talk about how we had a hot threesome in the church. That you couldn’t help but wonder what it would be like if he were there.I am wholeheartedly loving this. We need good leverage sometimes.

Eliana

You’re not wrong about that. It would definitely have to be filmed then otherwise it’s my sexy but slutty word against his

Charlie

I would 100% be down to film this. Sex with Kingston would be hot. Probably get me all hot and bothered.

Not so much the good ol boy pastor, but im sure you’d be the ride of his life

And evidence is definitely needed

Eliana

Oh I’m sure I could send them both straight to heaven while I’m riding them to hell.

Charlie

Hot

More the son than the father

Eliana

Definitely the son.I mean come on

How do you not fuck someone named King?!He needs a concubine.

Charlie

Exactly. Not a concubine. He needs a Queen.

Eliana

Are you trying to gently remind me all the sex I’m goin to be missing out on??

Charlie

I mean even as a concubine you’d be missing out on sex. Concubines weren’t allowed to fuck anyone else either.

Eliana

Oh.Well fuck that noise.

He can be the concubine.

Charlie

Concubines were usually women who were considered past the marrying age, which was like mid-20sish, and they were only allowed to fuck the person they were serving. Maybe the other concubines if they were lucky, but they’d better not fall in love.

Yesss

You need concubines

Eliana

You’re such a nerd. How do you know that??

Charlie

I might be a badass but I’m also a nerd. Most people don’t know this. You’re not allowed to share this. You could always work in a brothel. Sleep with as many men as you wanted. But I don’t know if they got paid. I don’t think Littlefinger paid his girls or guys

Eliana

Game of Thrones. Now you’re talking.

Charlie

I love you. No one loves Game of Thrones like I do except you.

Eliana

I miss GOT nights with take out, alcohol, and lusting

Charlie

We could bring them back. Restart the series.I am all down for that

Eliana

Yes please. That ending was a travesty.

Charlie

OOOOH GET THE PASTOR TO WATCH GOT WHILE YOU BLOW HIM.

It really did. That whole last season was justNoI can’tIt didn’t happen

Eliana

When he cums, he better be shouting MHYSA or what’s the point?

Charlie

Exactly

Eliana

No. It didn’t happen. None of it happened. I’m totally good up until the long night but after that? No.

Charlie

Exactly. I’m good until Arya killed the Night King, but the rest of that shit? Fuck that. They fucked up Dany so badly it makes me shake with rage. I understand power going to someone’s head but damn man.

Eliana

But it was literally a cop outAnd the way she was killed?She deserved better.AND DONT GET ME STARTED ON FUCKING BRAN BEING THE NEW RULER

Charlie

Bran the fucking Broken. Man fuck off.I’m still waiting on this final book dammit

Eliana

And the way my lover Jamie went out after all his growth?I refuse to believe it’s real

Charlie

No. Not at all. I was so mad that they had Jamie just abandon all this bullshit.

Eliana

I’m pissed that Arya didn’t get to kill Cersei

Charlie

I’m just happy that Drogon survived.

Eliana

But they killed his brother is such a. Shitty way!

Charlie

Omg me too. I have to admit I didn’t think she was actually dead when the roof caved in.I thought the bitch would have survived somehow.

Eliana

But no. Just buried. Such shit

Charlie

THEY KILLED BOTH HIS BROTHERS IN SUCH A RUDE AND UNNECESSARY WAY AND IM STILL BITTER

Eliana

Fuck that show. Seriously.

Charlie

Seriously.We could have written it so much better.But I stgIf Martin doesn’t finish the last book soon I’m gonna kill him

Eliana

We could have. I doubt the dude is ever gonna finish that book. He’s old af and only writes like a page a day.

Charlie

He told the writers how he was gonna end the series in case HE DIED BEFORE HE FINISHED WRITINGLike what the fuck man

Eliana

Wait. So he’s writing it the way it ended on the show?

Charlie

But then when the series ended he said that’s not how he was gonna do it but he supported them or some bullshit thing

He said something along the lines of ‘maybe that’s how it ends maybe it’s not’

Eliana

They got to have their stupid ending.After everything dany went through

Charlie

He better write a better one

Eliana

Ugh. Fuck them all.

Charlie

Seriously.

Eliana

I’d still fuck the shit out of 90% of that cast

Charlie

I’d fuck Jon though...

Same

Eliana

Jon. Dany. DROGO.

Charlie

Ugh so MUCH DROGO

Fuck me to death

Damn

Eliana

Jamie. Tyrion. Robb. Sansa.Hell, the fucking dragons

Yes please!

Charlie

I mean I don’t want to fuck the dragons. They’re my babies.

Eliana

That’s why you were mother of dragons

And we fixed up that shirt to say “lover” or dragons for me

Charlie

Yes. 100%.

[ragnarssons]

I’m sorry I’m new to the music side I haven’t really paid attention but you kind of made me open my eyes and so I was listening to all the music and was just wondering how you could tell which ones were made/written for dany. I’m sorry if that’s a stupid question I didn’t know how to word it.

Well it depends, do you mean this season or in general? About the “Stay Here for a Thousand Years” or all the tracks in general? So to be clear, on Game of Thrones, all of the “Houses” have a particular theme. The Lannister theme is reminiscent of the Rains of Castamere, it’s kinda their vibe. Cersei as Queen taking on her own had a new vibe added to that, and it was the piano theme that appeared on ep6x10 and came back several times through s7 and s8.  House Stark is representated by the cello, so cello heavy themes are House Stark and characters related to House Stark/storylines related to House Stark. House Stark Theme | which is reminiscent to The Last of the Starks which is their final piece. Where is added this idea of “epicness”, future, possibilities brought by these characters’ storylines: Sansa becoming Queen, Arya sailing away, Jon going North. It still has this cello vibe, core of House Stark and their theme, but it doesn’t have the same melancholy/sadness it used to have for a very long time when House Stark was to the ground, over and over again. (note, it’s also mixed with the Game of Thrones main title, mostly because it’s the final theme of the season and that’s where they closed the episode- it also kinda proves that the story was about House Stark - at least on the show - they opened the show, they’re closing it). We also have added to that one, Arya’s House of the Undying Theme, these bits of Arya’s theme when she was with the Faceless Men and she left - I don’t remember the name of that piece, but it’s played here. Jon Snow’s theme, is also heavily featured in the last track: this one. Sansa’s theme at its core is still really the one of her family: sad cello often played over her scenes, for a very long time. And then it morphed into this “joyfully melancholic cello” (I don’t know how to describe iiiiit) that plays also at some point - well during Sansa’s coronation. It first appeared during her “The Lone wolf Dies but the Pack Survives” scene with Arya on s7. Anyway, all that to say that the Starks have had a vibe that’s always been reminiscent in all the House Stark characters, and it’s come back and been mashed up together for their very last scenes. It really is really beautiful and it just shows how the characters have morphed, how their House is still what it was at its roots but how they’ve grown and what the legacy of these characters are. The theme starts with notes that are very reminiscent of Ned Stark, and evolves into something that is Arya, Sansa and Jon’s identity. Anyway, as for the rest we have the Lannisters, it’s really generally circling around the Rains of Castamere vibes, it’s always there. What is cool about the Lannisters is mostly Cersei: Cersei has a theme from s5 and going. But her theme is heavily related to the High Sparrow and the faith. It starts as this theme, mix of a Lannister theme and an organ. And it merges into this gorgeous theme for Cersei’s revenge: the organ comes back, but this time, to symbolize the Faith’s destruction rather than Cersei’s.As for Dany, well she was the only one of her House. So actually most if not all of the House Targaryen themes are hers. They’re all about her, tbh. Ramin Djawadi has composed a lot of pieces for Daenerys- like A LOT, I think she has nine soundtracks for s5 alone, for example. The first whispers of her theme are here, technically, on the first steps (literally) of Daenerys towards her destiny, when she meets Khal Drogo. The ironic thing, is that Dany’s theme also starts with some light cello. Not as “deep” as House Stark, but it’s still cello and it has its importance later on. Before that, she has no theme, it’s Viserys’ theme (kinda) that steps over her. The drums are only whispers at that point, and then it grows bigger and bigger as she gains power. This one, is the final version of her s1 theme- BEFORE her dragons are born. Now in the end of the video, we can hear a new version of her theme; the appearence of voices as she’s become something else, the Mother of Dragons. The one who brought magic back into the world! On s1 her theme grew as something like a Dothraki warrior theme, she’s become the Unburnt + Khal Drogo’s Khaleesi, something that is hers but not totally. So her theme has pieces of instruments that were used for the Dothraki related themes- especially the the Armenian duduk flutewhich is used to symbolize the Dothrakis in Ramin Djawadi’s music. Dany’s music grows bigger and bigger as she gains her roles and goes through victory after victory: as I said, by the end of 1x10 when the dragons are born, the “ah ah ahhhhhs” are appearing, because that’s how her theme merges. The “ah ah ahhhhs” are related to the dragons. To Daenerys, becoming more than the Khaleesi of a man, who is proving her strength on a “human level”. She’s something else, she’s more, she’s “the stuff of legends” that people will sing about. The final version of this theme, is at the end of s2 when the dragons finally breathe fire, at the House of the Undying. Name of the track? Well, Mother of Dragons, of course! Which is a perfect balance of “victorious Dany”/Mother of Dragons and Unburnt Dany. And Mother of Dragons really becomes the strong basis of ALL the Daenerys’ themes coming forward. At her core, Daenerys is the Mother of Dragons, the victorious, the Unburnt once again at the end of s2. S3 adds to that, as Daenerys becomes the Breaker of Chains. It’s this theme: and yet you notice it always has the same basis- the flute, the “ah ah ahhhhs”, everything that has made Dany and Dany’s theme so far. This is when she starts building her army, when she starts to conquer. Herself doesn’t know clearly WHY yet, at the beginning of ep3, Daenerys does get this army in order to have an army to sail to Westeros. Her journey on s3 is slowly becoming the Breaker of Chains and the “Mhysa” of the people- hence why s3 for Dany ends with the Mhysa theme. And even tho the basis of Daenerys’ theme, which are the instruments that we can hear in the background are the same, here, it’s really a sung music. It’s a whole music, that could be transcribed as in universe, people singing across the world, everything that Daenerys Targaryen has accomplished. She’s officially become the Mother of the People: Mhysa as they call her. And let’s remember that because it comes back to what I said about her s8′s theme. All that morphes into her usual theme, her “Dany theme”, with the Dohtraki vibes, the Mother of Dragons vibes and all. And here, her theme is Big! It’s Dany full force, Dany at her peak, Dany embracing an unexpected destiny that will lead her to greatness. The “ah ah ahhhhhs” are growing and growing, because it’s truly a moment where she reaches the top: she has three growing Dragons, an army, Ser Barristan, Ser Jorah, a close friend (Missandei), and she’s adored. And that’s where Breaker of Chains really appears, after s3, onto s4. Daenerys didn’t just free the Unsullied because she wanted an army, now she has a new quest, a new purpose, a new destiny. A new title to her long list: Khaleesi, Mother of Dragons, Breaker of Chains. We start with the same flute, the same vibes, what has been Daenerys’ theme ever since the beginning of the show, it’s still here. And it’s morphing into a lament - basically Dany lamenting for the children she sees crucified before reaching Mereen - and it merges into more of a “justice”/revenge theme where she follows her path: we know which one, where she conquers the city and abolishes slavery. The “Dany notes” - like really, how to call them I can’t really transcribe them on a post like that - are still here, and they’re growing and growing. The Mhysa theme is also all merged into this one, truly is one of the best Dany themes. S4 is where Dany kinda “stops” for a while. She decides to stay in Mereen. So there is no real progression in her theme for a while. Her next theme is Forgive me, at the end of s4 (it’s featured on s5′s soundtrack but it appears on s4 first but it gets bigger on s5 after 5x08 when Daenerys really does banish Jorah again). It’s a tragic theme, where Dany kinda loses a lot of her “superb” because her Jorah betrayed her: Dany is really falling from grace at the end of s4. It’s also really the first time Jorah and Dany have a theme: a theme that will come back later on the show, on s5 “officially” and on s6 and merges back into something big because that’s where she accepts him again. At the very end of s4 for Dany, the Breaker of Chains theme comes back, but only the lament part: because in becoming a leader of the people, Daenerys had to choose to chain her dragons. The idea of breaking chains is becoming harder and harder for Daenerys. These are Dany’s biggest betrayals: she was the victim of one, with Jorah, and the second one where she betrays her children and tbh, basically, her Oath as their Mother and a Breaker of Chains. Dany’s next pivotal moment is A Dance of Dragons, so we have the Daenerys theme mixed with the Sons of the Harpy’s one. And it basically becomes a war theme. Daenerys’ war theme: Daenerys with what she has, her dragons who are loyal to her and will follow her as proved by Drogon on this very same episode, her army, everyone loyal to her. It’s also where the French horns appear on her themes: and that’s to symbolize the FORCE of her now full grown dragon(s). And they’ll be part of her theme going forward. And this theme will then also come back to Daenerys’ theme going forward. We still have the flute, the magical notes that are always related to Daenerys as a Mother of Dragons, especially since it’s the moment she sees Drogon again after a while. And then it merges into something more, once again: Daenerys embracing another one of her destinies. Daenerys becoming a dragon rider, and we’re back with the “ah ah ahhhhhhs”. Daenerys’ next big theme after that is Khaleesi. We finally have a theme called Khaleesi for her: and here it’s very reminiscent of Daenerys the Unburnt, Daenerys the Khaleesi that she was on s1. Daenerys freeing people from oppression once again, and the praises are coming back: this time tho, they’re chanted in Dothraki and not in Valyrian like in Mhysa. She becomes a Khaleesi in her own rights, she proves HER strength to all the Khalasar and they all bow to her: this theme has become more about her than about the Dothraki. Her next theme is Reign. And it has everything: it’s Khaleesi Dany, Queen Dany, Mother of Dragons Dany, Unbent Dany, Daenerys Targaryen. That is higher than her peak. She’s accomplished everything she has to accomplish in Mereen and Essos: she has eliminated her enemies, the threats to her “new order” and she’s come out of it, victorious. And Daenerys’ final Essos-y theme is Winds of Winter: again, a theme that is sung in Valyrian and is a CRAZY theme. It’s basically chanting Daenerys coming, the “hero” coming. It’s full of hope, and yet it’s still Daenerys’ theme, it’s what it has morphed into after everything she’s been through: drums, voices, horns, everything is here! Tbh to me that’s why 80% of Dany’s storyline in Westeros is disappointing, because this theme seemed so promising. To me it’s really GoT’s most epic theme ever. After s7, Daenerys became very stagnant. Daenerys’ theme on s7 starts with Dragonstone: it sounds like the accomplishment of Daenerys. She’s back home, she’s where she thinks she belongs, everything that is Daenerys is here, with a part of ���accomplishment” and excitment that is added to the whole lot. Daenerys is home, and we have the flute coming back for that: Daenerys at her basis, the flute playing while she walks around the beaches at Dragonstone for the very first time, reminiscent of the baby she was when she was born here. And then we have the voices swelling again, reminding us of the woman she has become: when she sees the Red Doors, which are a big goal to book!Dany even tho it was never expressed from show!Dany. And then we have this amazing piece where she’s walking to her Destiny, and it stops when she reaches the Throne. The Unburnt, Queen, Khaleesi theme comes back. She’s, symbolically, steps away from her Throne, her final goal. Her lifelong dream. The spoils of War basically has Daenerys’ horns symbolic of her Dragons. It is kinda the stuff of nightmare in this soundtrack, but mostly when it’s seen from a Lannisters perspective. If I were to say “there was a foreshadowing of Mad!Queen Dany” I’d say it’s this piece of music, that did a better job to kinda “announce it” or make us fear for it, than the writing of the show ever did. It still has notes of victorious Dany, but this time, it’s over the ashes of things we know: the Lannisters theme and even tho we can freely hate Cersei, by this point of the story, she has detached herself from her usual “Lannisters theme” and became more of an “independant” person. So yeah, the Lannisters theme here is mostly about Jaime and hearing these two sounds clashing has something of a tragedy. She has a theme she shares with Jon: it’s called Truth and everyone knows which one it is, lol. It plays when they sleep together. The cello is back, proeminent in this theme: it’s a thing both Jon as a Stark and Dany from her original theme have in common. It has the three “magical notes” as I call these coming from Daenerys theme, and the “swelling” of Jon’s theme coming from his House Stark heritage. It’s basically the clashing, body and soul of Jon Snow and Daenerys- not really as representative of their Houses, but as people. Like Rhaegar and Lyanna. That’s why there isn’t “more notes” of House Stark and House Targaryen themes. It’s about Jon and Daenerys as people, not truly about their House or their name. This soundtrack has a variation in See You for What you Are which plays during their 7x06 scene and during their 7x04 scene in the cave. Now as for s8 since I can’t say I really comprehend Dany’s journey, it’s really hard to say. What I could see as a soundtrack really related to Dany on s8 is “The Bells” - and yes, it’s THAT far. It’s basically the music playing during Dany’s downfall. The pure lack of foreshadowing during all this time could be transcribed through that as well: we have no soundtrack, up until this point, kind of implying Daenerys going mad. Nothing telling us that Daenerys is “turning” from what we’ve seen of her so far, for 7 seasons. And again, it’s not totally about Daenerys for a very long time; it’s mostly a countdown with a music swelling and swelling for dramatic purpose. And then around the middle of the track you have this tragic, almost war cry, last “scream” of hope, that dies slowly as Daenerys “turns mad” and these three “magical notes” that were so symbolic of Daenerys so far, are dying and are becoming more and more distorted by the music swelling and swelling. That’s really symbolic of some kind of madness, of rage, of “power” taking over Daenerys and who she’s been so far: again, an amazing piece, far better than the writing of the season itself. And it merges into “the Last War” which is basically, the horror. And it’s basically everything Daenerys has been the symbolic of for so long, being turned “dark”, all her victories being reduced to something very very dark where there is no victory, no hope, the voices don’t swell. It’s really about how Daenerys’ force as a character becomes more destructive than liberative. And then when the voices rise and the music explodes, it’s all about horror more than anything heroic. The thread of Daenerys’ character is still here and everything turns to ashes: her goals, everything she’s stood for. We hear the French horns but they’re symbolic of destruction and despair here. We hear her Dothraki theme but it’s not strong in the sense of victory. It’s strong as in “stepping on everyone else”. The “ah ah ahhhhhs” are no longer going up, they’re going down. That’s basically Dany’s downfall. And apparently Ramin has chosen to turn Daenerys from Mhysa, Mother of Dragons, as “Master of War” because this theme is for her as well. Thank you, Ramin, for not calling it “the Mad Queen” or whatever bullshit. And this one is a very sad theme: we do hear all of Daenerys’ “core values” but all of it is twisted by the same “dark effect” we hear in the Last War. Following Dany’s downfall through the soundtrack is actually very sad. The same instruments are used, but not with the same “impact”, Daenerys’ essence is twisted. And what do we have at the end of it? A lament. A lament because Daenerys as we knew her and loved her, is dead here. She was dead before Jon stabbed her. And the lament sings the notes that were before, so representative of Dany the hero, Dany liberating people in the right way. Really, it’s heartbreaking. She touches the Throne, she’s THERE, she’s won, but she’s lost herself in doing so. And the music is not victorious, it’s not hateful, it’s not “evil”, it’s tragic. Ramin doesn’t want you to hate Daenerys with these themes, he wants you to mourn for her.In her final moments of love and trust - after everything - with Jon, it’s “Be with me” that plays, and we have some of Daenerys’ “light” coming back, swelling, before DYING. Really dying, because Jon kills her at that moment. The flute came back, symbolic of Daenerys’ long lost innocence, who she was when she started this journey on 1x01. Again, no hatred, no destruction, no “evil Queen”: Daenerys is a tragic hero, whose flame is killed, like that. The swelling comes back on The Iron Throne for Drogon’s grief, Drogon coming for his Mother, but the Mother of Dragons’ theme is tragic here too. Drogon has lost his Mother. Really, whatever shit D&D did to her, this soundtrack is an ode of love to Daenerys and it’s really beautiful- I think I said it 500 times already. The way Daenerys’ final piece explodes with sadness and tragedy. She’s not a monster, she was not “the enemy”, the world destroyed her (I would even say the world of MEN destroyed her) and that’s what Ramin Djawadi wants us to remember of her. In the additional pieces, we have “Stay for a Thousand Years” that is about Daenerys. Now yes, it has the “Truth” vibes, that could have us believe that it’s about Jon and Daenerys. BUT, the lyrics are the Mhysa’s song lyrics. It’s Valyrian, and everything Valyrian is 100% without a doubt, related to Daenerys. It’s about Daenerys. Daenerys is also the one voicing her desire to “Stay here for a Thousand Years” on the show, when they reach the cascades with Jon. This theme is about how Daenerys died for love, how tragic it ultimately is. It’s about how what could have been of Daenerys had they stayed there for a Thousand Years like Daenerys wanted at some point, when she was sky high, happy and in love with a man who wasn’t a threat to her. No, this song is not about Jon, it’s about an “ideal” of Daenerys that died when war came and duty came, and ultimately tore Daenerys down: she lost love, she lost faith, she lost her core duty as a savior and a hero. It’s really a mourning piece for Daenerys’ character as a whole, the woman she was before she fell from grace and became… whatever D&D wrote her to be in the end. And that’s totally my interpretation, but the fact that these lyrics, about Daenerys the savior, Daenerys the hero, being sung over a melody that is called TRUTH is a way for Ramin to say who Daenerys truly was. She was not “the evil Queen all along” like HBO and D&D and the actors are trying to have us believe right now. She was a hero for a very long time, and that’s how she should be remembered. All that to say that as you can hear through all of this, the Dany related themes all have the same… “back bone”, the same vibes, the same identity. And that’s how you can tell a certain theme is about a certain character.TLDR; probably a wayyyy too long answer to a question that probably didn’t require that much. But I love Ramin Djawadi’s music too much not to dive into it, especially when it’s about Daenerys so *shrugs* it’s a whole journey. Djawadi’s entire music dedicated to Daenerys is a journey. Each character had an identity in the music itself, and that’s what makes it so powerful. It’s not about the moments, it’s about the characters, and them morphing and changing and evolving. The music, as the story, follows them. Because ultimately, as I say that a lot of times, the story should be about the characters and not the other way around. What drives the story and everything around it, are the characters. It shouldn’t be shock value or plot twists, or the story over the characters. That’s what tanked GoT in the last two seasons (at least, if not more for some characters like Stannis or the Sand Snakes, for example) in my mind. How the characters became simpler and simpler (or extras, like Jon on s8) while the story tried to become what it wasn’t meant to be.

[khaleesa]

Direwolves, Dragons, and Identity (Oh My!)

I've been thinking a lot today about direwolves and dragons as symbols of their human counterparts, particularly with regards to Jon, Ghost, and Rhaegal.

For the past few weeks, viewers have observed that Ghost hasn't been seen with Jon (or at all, probably because of budget). On the other hand, Jon has been spending a lot of time with the dragons and has even learned to ride one (though not well; compare this with Dany taking to dragon riding right away--though of course if Drogon is the reincarnation of Khal Drogo, she already has a degree of experience in that regard).

During this time, Jon has also just learned his true parentage: Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen, whose houses are, naturally, represented by direwolf and dragon. (Fittingly, Jon's direwolf is named Ghost--like the ghost of the mother who's haunted Jon all his life--and Daenerys named the dragon specifically for Rhaegar.)

Jon always knew he was a Stark (Snow), so on a basic identity level, nothing changes for him with the reveal; he's still a Stark. But his bonding with Rhaegal coincides with his discovery of his paternity. Could Jon's growing affinity for dragons and his distance from his direwolf symbolize Jon struggling with his true identity? It would seem he's moving away from Stark (Snow) while taking tentative steps toward Targaryen.

Interestingly, Ghost turns up during the Battle of Winterfell. Maybe even more interestingly, he isn't with Jon. (To go off on a brief tangent, Ghost actually runs into the first charge beside Jorah Mormont, who at one time owned Longclaw, which now sports a white wolf's head pommel and belongs to Jon.) Meanwhile, Jon rides Rhaegal into battle, but he doesn't achieve much while doing so. They crash into Daenerys and Drogon, they fail to bring down Viserion, the wight dragon. Eventually, Rhaegal falls, Jon goes off on foot, and that's the last we see of his dragon in the 8x3. (Which honestly isn't so unlike Rhaegal’s namesake…)

Jon’s ineffectiveness with Rhaegal in battle, combined with the fact that while he can ride, he's not at all adept, could suggest that Jon doesn't find Targaryen to be a very good fit for him.

Rhaegal’s disappearance isn't the last of Jon and the dragons in the Battle of Winterfell, however. After wandering through the chaos within the castle gates, Jon eventually confronts Viserion, facing the flames and letting out a roar. This could be Jon actually confronting his Targaryen side, but it could also be a rejection of it, since he presumably means to destroy Viserion. In any case, Arya kills the Night King, which in turn kills Viserion once and for all. Perhaps another hint that Stark will come out ahead of Targaryen in Jon's identity crisis?

(This, of course, could all just be wildly overthought and finding symbolism where none truly exists, at least in the show. It'll be interesting to see what happens in 8x4, when both Ghost and Rhaegal are back.)

[kylandara]

The show does not do subtlety very well. As a result, many people who watch the show think Daenerys has been a hero with the best of intentions, someone who is fighting for other people’s freedoms and to make the world a better place. And if you think that’s who she is and who she’s supposed to be, then her turn to outright brutality in the episode “The Bells” is nothing short of shocking.

The problem is, that’s never been who Daenerys is or who she’s supposed to be. This is much clearer in the books (though many book readers still miss it) but the evidence is still present on the show. The problem is, the show often emphasizes visual spectacle over character development, and it does visual spectacle very, very well.

So the things that stand out in people’s minds are scenes like the people of Meereen chanting “Mhysa”, which means “mother”, after she’s freed the slaves, while the music soars. Or they remember her flying on Drogon over the Dothraki hordes and rallying them to do something they’ve never done before — board ships and sail across the sea, and they are so in awe of her that they do it. Or they remember her walking naked out of the fire with baby dragons on her shoulders, or naked out of the fire where she burned the Khals, who are certainly presented as though they deserve it.

But Daenerys is not really about saving other people or making the world better. She wants to rule because she has experienced powerlessness and never wants to experience it again. She was abused by her older brother, Viserys, who basically sold her into sexual slavery so he could get an army to invade Westeros. After she was sold to Drogo, she was dependent on him for her safety, and though she came to love him, when he died she was told she had to go to live with the other former khaleesis in Vaes Dothrak, the city of the Dothraki, and that she’d never be able to leave again once she arrived there.

Instead, she took control of her own destiny. The magical awakenings of her dragons gave her power, and once she had it she knew she’d never be abused or dependent or sold again. Ever since then she’s been seeking after power, first in Qarth and Astapor and Meereen and among the Dothraki and then, ultimately, in Westeros. She wants power for herself, not for others. She wants to be seen as a great ruler, but in the books it is clearer that this is out of a desire to be loved rather than out of a desire to help people. She WANTS adoring crowds cheering her name. That’s what she’s after. That’s why she’s doing this. So when she tries to act as a good ruler, it’s more because she thinks that’s how to get what she wants: power and adoration, than because she’s genuinely trying to “break the wheel.”

This is a really important point: the fundamental thing Daenerys wants is to be powerful enough that no one can hurt or control her again, and to be loved by the people she rules over.

Not convinced? Think about her list of titles. Everywhere she goes, and any time she gives anyone an audience with her august presence, she either recites, or (more often) has someone (usually Missandei) recite her long, and ever growing, list of titles. “Daenerys Stormborn, mother of dragons, the unburnt, breaker of chains…” yadda yadda yadda. Yeah, folks. This is not normal. While it’s certainly true that kings and queens often had lengthy titles, the whole list was only used on the most formal of occasions. Dany clearly takes pleasure in hearing the full list of her titles and accomplishments read aloud at every opportunity. It’s grandiose. More than that, it’s megalomania. She wants everyone to know how great and powerful she is, and how much her followers love her.

Indeed, one of the things the show has tried to highlight in the final season is her frustration that the people of Westeros do not love her. They hardly know her, and to them she’s a foreigner at the head of a foreign army of Unsullied and Dothraki, who are both culturally very different from the people of Westeros. But rather than give people time to come around to her, she is frustrated that there are no adoring crowds here. That moment, when she flies over the Dothraki and rallies them to cross the sea with her? That moment, when the people of Meereen greeted her as their “mother”? Nothing like that has happened here. She thought maybe she’d get that once she helped defeat the army of the dead. When she didn’t… when the people of the North were grateful but still did not love her (in keeping with their reputation as being notoriously wary of outsiders), she was upset.

Because she’s not trying to free people or make the world better except when it serves her goal of building her own power and securing the absolute love and adoration of those she intends to rule. The books do a better (though still imperfect) job of setting this up, though they haven’t clearly shown what direction she will take as a leader. But the show does try to tell you this about her. It’s just that this narrative is overwhelmed by the legend that the visual spectacles, from her emerging from the fire with the dragons to her standing on the decks of the ships sailing for Westeros in the end of season 6, have built for her: a legend that she genuinely is a messiah, a savior, and that her intentions are good and pure.

When you really look at her this way — that she is someone who wants power so she is never vulnerable again, and that she wants and expects the people she rules to love her absolutely — her behavior this season starts to make more sense. She is threatened by Jon because the Iron Throne is the ultimate guarantee of her security and independence; when she is the absolute, uncontested ruler of the Seven Kingdoms she will never be vulnerable to exploitation the way she was at the start of the story. She sees Jon’s potential claim as a threat to this; she will not share power with him (the most obvious solution) because she would not have that security of total power and total independence from anyone else.

And when her forces attack King’s Landing — the city built by her ancestor, Aegon the Conqueror, on the place where he first landed in Westeros 300 years earlier (hence “King’s Landing”) — she doesn’t just want the people there to surrender to her. Before the battle, she talks about how the people of Meereen rose up against their masters when she attacked the city. This is what she wants to see happen here. A Targaryen Queen has returned to the Targaryen city to drive the usurpers from the throne! Why did they not rise up? Why did they not proclaim her their Queen and storm the Red Keep in her name and hang Cersei from the walls?? This is what they should have done, as far as she’s concerned. They should greet her as a liberator, not a conqueror. They should join her fight, not surrender to her.

They. Should. Love. Her.

And they don’t.

So her claim to the throne that she thought would give her the power she needs is threatened by Jon, and the city — her family’s city, the symbol of all they lost and all she was trying to take back — will cower in fear before her but will not love her. And so she snaps.

And she always had it in her to do this. She has repeatedly fed people to her dragons when they’ve crossed her. She has repeatedly in the past burned her enemies alive, from the Khals of the Dothraki to Randall and Dickon Tarly. She has been cruel, even vicious, before. It’s just that the show presented those acts in ways that allowed viewers to believe the people she was being cruel to deserved it.

Until now.

Daenerys is a wonderful character. She is complex and charismatic and she’s strong and she’s a survivor. But she’s not the benevolent savior she wants people to see her as, and she’s not “good”. She is, and always has been, capable of evil. You just had to be willing to see it, and to look past the spectacle.

Could the show have done a better job with this? Yes, it could have. But the seeds were always there

[userseokkie]

Daenerys only killed people who deserved it. Xaros stole her dragons and she was going to be held hostage for all eternity. She only crucified ppl who did the same to children to prove a point to the other slaves. And the Dothraki were going to take turns raping her and the Tarlys betrayed their leige.

Listen. i’m not gonna pretend that Daenerys killing people, be it her enemies or not, is the vilest thing that could ever happen because I’m not kidding myself. This is war, and death is a part of war. Everyone in the show has done heinous things at one point or another and I don’t hold them to a different standard than her. War means doing stuff that you’re less than comfortable with, and killing is part of that. 

But your argument seems to very conveniently forget other examples of Daenerys killing people, and if you’re going to ignore canon, then I won’t. Canon can’t be something you choose and pick from in order to sustain your analysis because lmao as one wise woman said recently, the bravest thing we can do is look TRUTH in the face

Daenerys has ALWAYS been comfortable with murder. Since season 1, i believe she’s reacted distinctly to the death of other people, including but not exclusive to her enemies. And that has set a precedent. She gradually becomes comfortable with death as the means to an end. She didn’t burn alive A MILLION CIVILIANS in Kings lading last episode as an act out of the blue. This has been in the making for a long time, and you seem to list these killings because they’re the ones that make more sense in a war setting, but you KNOW damn well she’s killed more than that:

She burned Mirri maz duur alive in order to light the pyre that gave her the dragons. did the witch cross her? absolutely. still, she was murdered with needless cruelty in order to fulfill one of Daenerys’ goals after having been repeatedly raped and beaten by Daenerys’ husband

She locked up her servant Doreah in a vault and left her to die, much as Cersei left the Sand snakes and Ellaria to starve and rot chained in a dungeon. I’m not saying you give a pat on the back to the people who conspire against you, but she was the one who always talked about mercy for someone who is her personal slave. you don’t lock them up to have them eat each other and then rot to death

She crucifies the slave masters in Meereen as retaliation for the child slaves, but she literally doesn’t give a fuck who is responsible for that and why, which is evidenced when Hizdahr zo Loraq tells her his father opposed the slaves being brutalized like that, and asks to bury his father properly. I would argue this isn’t so much an act of cruelty from her part as much as it’s a demonstration of how performative her brand of justice is. Doesn’t matter who pays for injustice, so long as it is paid. She doesn’t have mercy for the innocent and the ones who could repent, she just wants to send a message of “don’t fuck with me”

She cuts the head off Mossador, a slave she freed and became part of the Meereen small council, when a Son of the Harpy is brought to them to stand trial. Mossador, rightly believing Dany is only pretending to have a trial, kills the accused because fuck me Daenerys had NOT once given a “fair trial” to any of the enemies who wronged her before. She litcherally murdered every single person in Meereen who had something to do with slave trade, the same as she did in Yunkai, the same as she did in Qarth. So Mossador kills the traitor, and what the fuck does she do? She CHAINS HIM, A FORMER SLAVE SHE HAD SAVED. the “breaker of chains” brings him in front of the public in chains and CUTS HIS FUCKING HEAD OFF. even after he begs for mercy. he killed a SON OF THE HARPY who was plotting to murder daenerys. he didn’t rape a child. he didn’t murder an innocent peasant. but fuck that right?

She burnt one of the noble leaders of the Meereen council alive after she couldn’t fucking control her dragons. This council that SHE set up was to have the Meereenese have a SAY on what’s going on in the city, because she came here to free the slaves and then stayed as queen, but as a foreginer she didn’t know the costumes, the culture or the identity of Meereen. She brings them down to the catacombs where Viserion and Rhaegal are locked up, and forces them forward until one of them is BURNED ALIVE and then brutally torn apart. That’s so fucked up considering afterwards she admits her mistake of refusing to open the fighting pits again despite advise from the council.

She burns down the fucking temple of Dosh Kaleen, with all the dothraki inside of it, INCLUDING women and children. How hypocritical to ally herself and care for the dothraki when they could serve her for her army, but when she’s captured by a Khal who promises no harm will come to her for being the widow of Khal Drogo, she demands to be taken back to Meereen. That doesn’t happen obviously, because that’s dothraki law, but when they take her to their temple, THE ONLY PERMANENT STRUCTURE the dothraki culture has, instead of using dialogue to convince them to join her, or even killing the Khals who oppose her but freeing the rest of the people the same way she used to do w slaves, she just fucking burns them all down. They NEVER did anything to her. She could’ve just fled out of there, but noooo she had to make sure all was fucking destroyed because they wouldn’t SERVE HER. 

During the battle of the Goldroad, she takes prisoners of war, after the extermination of the Lannister and Tarly armies at hands of Drogon. And she tortures these prisoners of war to death. She gives them a choice to bend the knee to her or die. Remember, as much as you don’t like it these are the facts: The Lannisters have never been sworn to the Targaryens in something other than name, the targ dynasty was effectively ENDED by a Lannister. The Tarlys were sworn to the Tyrells, NOT the Targs. if the tyrells suddenly decide to switch allegiance bc it’s convenient for them, then that’s on them. They were always fucking weak, Olenna knew that. Randyll Tarly rightly refuses to trade his honor for his life, claiming he owes no loyalty to a Targaryen. FACT. Tyrion suggests she sends them to the Wall then, but the law states that she cannot bc she is not his queen. FACT. The battle was won by Dany, she had hold of Highgarden and did not need to kill the men because the territory was already hers. FACT. What does she do? instead of imprisoning them or even giving them a quick execution, SHE FUCKING BURNS THEM ALIVE. PRISONERS OF WAR. i don’t care what your fictional tastes are, i don’t give a FUCK who you stan in this show. Prisoners of war are ALWAYS held captive and given HUMANE treatment, OR they are executed in a QUICK manner. they ARE NOT BURNT ALIVE WITH DRAGON FIRE. that only happens during a battle, not afterwards. it’s like rounding up the survivors after an armed conflict and THEN nuking them. it does not deserve an explanation, it doesn’t get better with “context”. it just doesn’t go. she’s the “queen” SHE HAS THE CHOICE. and she chose fire and blood. 

So yeah anon, “she only kills people who deserve it” is a factual lie. i call bullshit. i think you blindly justify whatever you don’t agree with about her because the thrill of having your fave riding dragons and being the only one with that much unchecked power gives you a rush. I think when you say she only kills people who deserve it, you’re trying to convince yourself a leader who has made themselves in this manner CAN be anything other than authoritarian, and that she won’t go crazy or that once she sits on the iron throne, she will rule with mercy as her highest principle. SHE WON’T. You can stan her all you want, but recognize the fact that she is not the kind hero she’s been telling you and herself that she is. A kingdom built on the fire of the dragon and the blood of her enemies is corrupt to the marrow, because unchecked power always leads to unchecked violence.  

[silver-wedding]

Children, Trauma, and Family

Jon and Dany’s child will be important to the overall political narrative, but one has to consider just how precious a baby would be for these two. The children Dany will give birth to may be considered Targaryens, but a royal dynasty would be secondary in their minds.

Jon always believed that he would have no children simply because he was a bastard. He outright refused to have sex because he never wanted such a stigma to be placed on his potential children.

Jon even denied that he ever wanted a family to Benjen, which is something his uncle saw through immediately. The reality was that he wanted to have a baby boy of his own, but never dared to dream of becoming a father.

Ygritte broke him out of this fragile delusion, and ignited the desire for a family he had hidden within himself. Jorah would later remind Jon that he could finally pursue this for himself.

Daenerys has never been subtle about her own desire to be a mother. The title “Mother of Dragons” has always hinted as much, which describes Dany’s motivations far more than any other nickname she has earned.

For as long as she could remember, Dany wanted to have a family that loved her. She was just a lonely girl with nothing but a name that caused her more harm than good, and a previously devoted brother that transformed into a monster.

With the loss of her unborn son and Drogo, every hope went into finding “home” without really knowing what she was looking for. Even when arriving at her ancestral seat of Dragonstone, Dany did not find the place of belonging she always longed for.

When Jon and Dany first met, they were two people who had lost all belief in ever finding true love again. They had placed all of their motivations into ambitious goals for the sake of others, rather than face their own deep seeded fears.

After all, who would ever dare to love a dragon?

Trauma and Duty

Both might have thought, “Will I ever find love again? Am I even worthy of that love? What if I lose them yet again?”

They could have told themselves, “I found the one I was meant to be with, but I couldn’t save them.. Why should I dwell on my lost love when my people need me? I am not even strong enough to protect the ones I love the most.”

Ever since Jon and Dany lost their lovers, they went down the path of obtaining power in order to find the resolve they needed to avoid such pain again. Jon did not want to be reminded that his only chance of truly living died with Ygritte. Daenerys did not want to remember that her only shot of a loving family was lost with her pregnancy, unborn son and husband.

If one cannot live for themselves, why not live for whomever is left?

For Jon, this meant preparing others as much as he could for the horrors beyond the Wall. Previously he was angry when denied the role of Ranger, but after his experiences only cared for increasing the chances of survival for the only family he knew was left.

Jon did not envision himself as Lord Commander at quite a young age, but he took on the role because enough of them believed him capable. This was his chance to shape the Night’s Watch into the force capable of protecting the realm like he initially believed them to be.

Dany’s marriage showed her that too many people suffered at the hands of the physically powerful and wealthy. When a crucified slave told her that he would rather die than accept the water she had offered, Dany decided right then and there to throw down the gauntlet against the atrocities of slavery.

If she could not have her family, then she would at least make sure as many people as possible would not share in the pains that she had experienced herself. To succeed in such a monumental task would mean having the strength to find her home in Westeros, and to become a ruler capable of protecting those she loved the most.

Family

For a long period of time, Jon had no idea if any of the Starks were still alive. Even if he could leave the Night’s Watch, he had no home or family to come back to. As far as he had known, Ygritte would have been the family that filled the void the Starks had left in his heart.

With her gone, he only had the Night’s Watch to hold onto, and tried to hold onto the Freefolk as well despite the immense hatred shared between both factions. 

After being betrayed by the men he called brothers, he could only feel the pain of losing yet another family despite fighting to bring them together.

As a result, Jon became completely devoted to stopping the Army of the Dead even if it killed him. His desire to live became secondary to the survival of Westeros itself.

Daenerys’ passion lit the flames of emotion that he had buried within himself. She had a drive quite unlike anyone he had ever met, and pulled at his own morals in ways he had not considered.

For Jon to shift towards opening himself up towards love and even courting Daenerys himself, shows just much he has truly fallen in love with her. Despite all the pain he felt in the past, Jon is willing to make himself feel vulnerable again by giving into his feelings.

In her early childhood, Dany had a brother in Viserys. He was good to her and taught her everything she knew about the Targaryens. Once he faded away into the abusive man we saw for ourselves, she had truly been alone. With the loss of Drogo and most of the Dothraki, home only seemed further and further away.

By using the confidence she gained while leading what remained of her people, Dany found a surrogate family for herself on the journey to end slavery in Essos. People that not only truly believed in her mission, but in Daenerys herself. Jorah, Barristan Selmy, Missandei, Grey Worm, Daario, and even Tyrion Lannister became the family she never had.

Despite the challenges and losses along the way, they managed to turn Slaver’s Bay into Dragon’s Bay, and bring about a change the world thought impossible.

However the people she had gathered together were seen as outcasts, former slaves, savages, and even traitors. Daenerys not only wanted to find a home for herself, but had to find one for the people that followed her.

By accepting one massive mission after another, she never had to look at her own personal vulnerabilities and needs. Dany never need dare think of love, or risk losing everything to ruthless enemies that would have no mercy for her new family.

Children, Revelations, and New Challenges

When she met Jon, Dany began to show her true face again as her emotional armor wore down the more she connected with him. This was a man who seemingly came out of nowhere to challenge her mind, spirit and heart all at once.

By the time of their reunion after Viserion’s death, shared trauma made them realize a powerful bond for one another. Dany could not bare the idea of Jon dying as she tried to rescue him, just as he could not bare seeing Dany in tears over her loss.

Of course with the idea of love reemerging within both of them will come the same insecurities and fears they held all along.

Jon will feel the need to protect Dany from anything that comes her way in battle. He might even make it a point to argue that she should stay away from the Great War entirely, with the discovery of her pregnancy.

Even when Daenerys is the only one capable of flying Drogon, the greatest asset in the army of the living.

Dany will have similar feelings. She will not want the father of her children to place himself on the front lines, despite his capability as a commander and experience in fighting White Walkers.

Before such fears and points of tension appear, I believe that Daenerys’ pregnancy will be one of the happiest moments in the series. Consider how often they have both been denied family throughout their entire lives, and the reaction to their love resulting in a child being born during one of the biggest turning points in Westeros’ history.

I can all but guarantee a lot of happy tears and kissing.

Daenerys believed she was incapable of getting pregnant, and that she would be the last Targaryen. To have such a tragedy turned on its head when she lived with this knowledge throughout her entire journey will be powerful.

Jon will finally be able to have the family he always longed for, and will not allow any barrier to stand between them. His courtship of Daenerys when he previously only thought of the Army of the Dead is proof enough of that.

However, there is one problem to all of this. Any child born between them would be considered a bastard, something Jon would never allow to happen. Given that Daenerys is a Queen she could legitimize her children, but the stigma would still exist.

So what is the solution?

Marriage.

This would in fact, be the solution to many of the problems that the couple could face in Season 8. So really, it’s more a matter of when it will happen than if it will happen.

When they were worlds apart, Jon and Dany somehow found one another despite the odds being massively against them.

With a second chance at love, I doubt these two will ever let go of one another.

[minervacrawley]

The Wound, the Lie and the Thing you Need to Learn Part #2

This is the second part to that post: https://minervacrawley.tumblr.com/post/165976476052/the-wound-the-lie-and-the-thing-you-need-to-learn

Telling you why narrative-wise Jonsa is endgame and J*nerys is not.

It finally centers the triangle Cersei/Jaime/Brienne as well as Dany/Jon/Sansa.

Cersei’s wound is a little more complicated so let’s start with the lie she blatantly tells Sansa: „Love only your children since love makes you weak. But it is a mother’s obligation to love her children.“. This lie was formed through the losses she experienced, so her wound is losing the persons she loved, first her mother to death, than her husband to his first love and her firstborn son to death. All of it made her weak and she loathed being weak. She needs to learn that love is worth feeling weak. The death of every of her three children feeds into her lie end she is (understandably) devastated every time. Now that they are gone there’s no reason for her to ever feel weak again, since there’s nothing left that really matters to her. That’s the other lie she tells Jaime: „The only ones that matter are us.“ stemming from her wound that only her other close family (Jaime and her children) were ever truly fond of her. To overcome this she needs to embrace the truth that other peoples’ lives are valuable, too. (I think that’s, to some degree, her reason for not ordering Ser Gregor to kill Tyrion: He’s a Lannister after all and there are only a few left of them.)

The only person left with enough impact on her is Jaime, her other half. He is trying to hold her back from doing too cruel things, trying to reason with her but he fights a lost cause. Cersei is already a slave to her lie(s), resisting every attempt so convice her of the truth. She is clearly trapped in a negative character arc.

Jaime isn’t easy, too. I think his wound is being blamed his entire life for the one really heroic thing he did (aka killing the Mad King and being known Kingslayer for it). All his childhood Jaime dreamed of being a true knight and when he finally saved the lives of thousands of innocents all he earned was the disgust of the common folk and even more of the lords. (“Stark? You think the honorable Ned Stark wanted to hear my side? He judged me guilty the moment he set eyes on me. By what right does the wolf judge the lion? By what right?“) So his lie may be „No one ever wanted to hear my side. They see me as the Kingslayer so why should’t I act on this reputation?“ James sees no reason to ever behave in a honorable way. He needs to learn that it is not the opinion of others for one thing he did but the sum of all his actions that define him and there are persons that will acknowledge the truth. Over the course of the story he experiences another wound: losing his swordhand and therefore his ability to wield a sword. That forms the lie „Without my hand I’m no more the best swordsman of the Seven Kingdoms, I’m nothing.“. He needs to learn that he’s more than his abilities with the sword.

Cersei can never help him to find the truth but does the exact opposite: telling him there is no need for honorable actions, she’s never shown interest in his explanation of Aerys’ death and she abandons him after he loses his hand. She even tries to „fix“ him by giving him his golden hand, as if he is not worthy with only one hand. She frequently urges him to betray the little whats left of his belief in chivalrous behavior (planning to betray Dany and Jon). She is the personification of hies lies.

But there is a personification of his truth, too and that’s Brienne. She the first (we know) to show interest in his part of the history and believing him, she’s the one to force him to not give up life after losing his limb, she shows him he’s a man if he is the prestigious fighter or not, she forces him to actually think about his life ("You have a taste…one taste of the real world, where people have important things taken from them, and you whine and cry and quit. You sound like a bloody woman!“), she provides a possibility to be chivalrous again (the Bear and the Maiden fair) and she forces him to consider his loyalties and what’s really important in the world („Fuck loyalties!“). It is Briennes influence on Jaime that finally prompts him to leave Cersei, the lie, behind and rides off to embrace the truth. He shows through his actions that he a) considers himself useful without his swordhand and b) is willing to do the thing he perceives as honorable.

Brienne herself has to deal with her own wound, for me it’s being scorned or laughed at only for being a warrior woman that does not fulfill common beauty standards. Her lie is „There will never be someone to acknowledge the person I am or love an ugly warrior woman.“. She is sure there will be no match for her, the only man she considers worthy would have to defeat her in battle. Something not many men are able of. She vows herself to the only man that acknowledges her abilities, but even to Renly she’s only a sword (and not his preferred kind of sword). Brienne needs to learn that even for an unusual woman like her there will be someone that appreciates her whole self. The first person to show her that truth is Catelyn, treating Brienne with respect. But the most important to help her in overcoming her lie is Jaime. In the beginning he teases her, but he is the one to be be a true knight by rescuing her (something she never dreamt of to happen, herself as the damsel in distress) while praising her swordsmanship. He gives her his own sword, showing that she’s precious to him. With him she can be herself with all her singularities and not feeling odd. He is a man capable of being her equal.

Now to the Dany/Jon/Sansa relationship. Dany’s wound is growing up expelled from her home to the stories of her more and more lunatic brother, her only family left who sold her like a broodmare. Through Viserys she formed the lie that „I can only find peace if my family sits on the Iron Throne. It is means everything.“ and „Our family ruled well for centuries so we are the rightful heirs to the throne.“. She needs to learn that she can find happiness without being the queen of Westeros and that the throne is not more valuable than anything else as well as that birthright does not make a good ruler. With the love of Drogo she experiences real happiness. He could have been the one to help her overcome her first lie, but he just wanted to help her get the throne what supported her lie. Then she lost her beloved husband and their son and remained presumed barren, another wound only to strengthen her lies which adjust to: „I can only find peace when I sit on the Iron Throne. Drogo and Rhaego died for it, there’s nothing more important.“ and „I’m D*en*rys St*rmb*rn, the last dragon, mother of dragons and therefore rightful queen of the Seven Kingdoms. I’m no ordinary woman.“ That’s the mindset of a conqueror and she acts like one. In the beginning she tries to be a good ruler: she frees the slaves, wants to make the life of the simple folk better, she’s interested in her peoples’ problems, she locks her dragons away when they threaten the safety of her people and she listens to her advisors. But then something changes. Over her character arc, almost every person feeds into her lie of being the rightful queen by brith and those opposing that find an often gruesome death. All of that strengthens her belief in the lie and leads her away from the truth. She grows into the personification of entitlement to finally fully adopt her position of mother of dragons, not men.

Jon, on the other hand, suffers from the wound of growing up as a bastard. He’s constantly reminded of his status by his stepmother, his half sister and later by the men of the Nightswatch with Alliser Thorne leading the way. His Lie is „Due to my baseborn status I don’t deserve neither a lordship nor a family of my own.“. Despite that this is his heart’s desire. That’s his reason to become a member of the Nightswatch, being convinced that he will never achieve it. Jon needs to learn that it’s not your birth but your actions that make you worthy. Sounds familiar?

When you compare that to Dany you see that they are, like in so many areas, two sides of the same coin. Both of them believe that: Birth decides if you’re a good/worthy ruler. Dany on one side sees her birth as a reason why she’s going to be a worthy queen while Jon on the other side sees his birth as a reason why he does not deserve to be a ruler.

They can’t learn something from each other since they essentially believe in the same lie.

While Dany is on a path of fully embracing that lie since every defeat or win feed into it:

listening to Tyrion and not winning Castlery Rock the way she thought = defeat

listening to Tyrion and sending her allies to triumph over Kings Landing = defeat

finally embracing her position as mother of dragons and riding Drogon into battle (aka fire and blood) = win

To name a few.

She rejects the truth presented by Varys and Tyrion, two of her impact characters.

She won’t overcome her lie and fulfilling her character arc when she finally wins the war with fire and blood and sits on the Iron Throne since that would be the ultimate confirmation to it. She is head over heels into a negative character arc and resists every attempt to convince her of the truth. (Just like Cersei.)

While Dany is someone sure in every action she takes, Jon’s thinking a lot, scrutinizing everything he does. What will be the right decision?

His path is that of more and more embracing the truth. It’s the opposite. One person to show Jon the truth is Sam when he suggests Jon as the next Lord Commander and he’s actually chosen. He gets that title (and the trust of his men) due to his actions beyond the Wall. It’s not important as what kind of person he’s born but what he decides to do. He realizes that he’s groomed into his successor by Jeor the Old Bear himself. Jon even learns the bad side of that truth: If you do something your subjects does not approve you will have to bear the consequences. The betrayal by his men feed into his lie of being no good ruler. When he’s resurrected he is ready to leave his position behind but then there gallops another impact character into his life: Sansa. She’s the reason for him to finally accept his position as a leader. She pushes him into it (just like Gilly did with Sam). If he won’t accept his role and accepts being the rightful ruler of the Wildling-Northmen-army their brother will die, their home will fall and Sansa herself will be abused by Ramsay. After winning the BotB he still struggles with his position. He can’t overcome the feeling that he does not deserve to be Lord of Winterfell / King in the North. He is no real Stark so the title belongs to her. Sansa attacks this lie, telling him „You are a Stark to me!“, saying she treated him the wrong way in their childhood and insists that Winterfell’s master bedroom (symbolizing the North itself) belongs to him since he is the rightful king. Something he reached by proving that he deserves that title through his actions. What intensifies all of her actions is the fact that she was one of the reasons for the development of his wound and lie.

In some sense, Sansa is Jon’s Brienne, the personification of his truth, while Dany is his Cersei, his personification of the lie.

„Yes, but Jon is in fact no bastard but the rightful heir to the Iron Throne due to him being Rhagar’s and Lyanna’s true born son. Won’t that destroy his lie for him?“

No, since he has to overcome his lie all by himself to fulfill his character arc. Instead, I think that will only feed into his lie. He is no bastard to a honorable man but the product of a love (?) that more or less caused the death of his mother, his father, his uncle, his grandfather(s), his half-siblings, his stepmother, his grandmother and some thousands of men. He descends from a family known for their madness and lunatic rulers, just like his late grandfather. Makes everything even better for a person like Jon who is excels in feeling guilty. He will feel even more unworthy due to his actual birth. And I’dont even talk about the trauma of not being Ned Starks son, the man he idolized like a god.

„And what’s about Dany?“

Jon being revealed as true heir to the throne will attack her beliefs just like it did his. Dany has to realize that it’s not her who’s the rightful queen. She lost so much she hold dear in pursuit of her goal (her husband, her son, a lover, even her brother) and now they tell her there is someone with an even bigger claim? That’s like working your whole life for a job, sacrificing your private life, risk everything you hold dear only that your new lover gets that job… due to him being a man? I think that will be the moment for her to fully embrace her position as mother of the dragons. She will be the queen by right of conquest. No one can tell me that she would settle in being queen consort.

Finally, Sansa. She starts believing that „Who’s beautiful on the inside is beautiful on the outside, too.“  and that „I only will be happy being the wife of a real hero like the one in the songs. Just like Joffrey is.“. These lies will be crushed during season one, creating her wound of being left alone by her family with the enemy as pawn in their games. She witnesses the death of her household, the beheading of her father, the disappearance of her sister who’s maybe death. And she took part in it cause she trusted Cersei. That forms the new lies that „There are no true heroes left. No one will ever save me.“ and „The only person I can trust is myself. Every other person will betray me.“. Sansa experiences betrayal from almost every person she met: Cersei, Joffrey, the Tyrells, Dontos,  her aunt, Littlefinger, even Clegane left her alone to her inability to trust him. She needs to learn that someone does not have to look like a hero to be one and that there are persons left she can utterly trust.

There are already some metas how Jon proves to be a true hero to Sansa (beheading Janos Slynt etc.). He does not look like a hero on the outside (he’s a bastard, part of the Nightswatch with their falling reputation) but his actions make him one. He is the one to attack Ramsay, trying to save their little brother and their home and avenging herself. Theon and Brienne count as unlikely heroes, too.

But even more important, Jon is the one to restore her trust in other people. Since her father’s death there was no one not following his own agenda with her, but then comes Jon who’s only concern is her safety. Who says „We need to trust each other!“ and „I will never let him touch you again!“. He helps Sansa to overcome her lie by showing trust in her, biggest proof is him giving her the North. Jon is Sansa’s first impact character, convincing her that if there exists one person she can trust it’s him. Her trust in him is shown in her actions in season seven: „Jon is the real king.“, „The throne belongs to Jon.“. Probably Arya and Bran will help her to fully embrace the Thing she Needs to Learn.

So, that’s it. I’m sorry for some awkward sentences, I was staring at my laptop for hours but I loved the exercise.