Which is a damn shame, because she seems to be the only cool head in the room — not to mention the only leader among her family and advisors vocally determined to prevent bloodshed and chaos, if she can help it. “When dragons flew to war, everything burned,” she tells her loyalists, recounting old history lessons taught to her by Viserys. “I do not wish to rule over a kingdom of ash and bone.
The episode’s most unexpectedly touching scene helps explain Rhaenyra’s restraint. A contingent of enemy ambassadors led by the Hand of the King, Ser Otto Hightower, arrive on Rhaenyra’s fortress island of Dragonstone, offering terms for a peace deal if Rhaenyra will bend the knee. She is disgusted. Daemon, as usual, is ready to kill.
Determined to gather as many dragons to the Black cause as possible, Daemon skips out on his duties to try and woo the enormous beast called Vermithor, dwelling in one of the island’s caverns. Meanwhile, Lord Corlys arrives, announcing that his forces have complete control of the Narrow Sea and can arrange a blockade of King’s Landing, hopefully setting up a relatively bloodless victory.
And that’s when Rhaenyra receives her worst blow of all. When Luke arrives on his tiny dragon Arrax, the great beast Vhagar rises up out of the background like freaking Godzilla, and its rider, Aemond One-Eye, awaits the kid in the hallway of the angry, illiterate Lord Borros Baratheon . Aemond, who sports a supremely bitchin’ sapphire in his vacant eye socket, demands an eye for an eye from the kid who half-blinded him all those years ago.