DISCLAIMER: The following contains heavy spoilers for George R.R. Martin‘s Fire & Blood and HBO’s House of the Dragon. Proceed at your peril.
Dragonriders, we’re officially in post-Season 1 territory, and I don’t know about you, but I’m itching for more House of the Dragon. Overall, I enjoyed this season despite some narrative hiccups and pacing issues. Showrunner Ryan Condal reassured fans that the time jumps are over, so who we have as the cast is who will stay for the remainder of the Dance of the Dragons.
The Dance is as entertaining as it is bloody and brutal, racking up a massive body count when all is said and done. I hope the writers take their time with Season 2 since we’ll meet new essential players for Team Black and Team Green. I also hope they’ll fill in the blanks between major events in the Dance while doling out the political intrigue, juicy drama and dangerous dynamics we’ve come to expect in this world.
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Even though we’re two years (SHUDDER) away from Season 2, I’ve compiled a list of predictions detailing what we might see. I’ll reiterate — the night is dark and full of spoilers, especially from Fire & Blood.
Blood and Cheese
Sure, Aemond didn’t mean to kill Luke and Arrax above Shipbreaker Bay, but that doesn’t mean Team Black won’t retaliate with fire and blood. In Rhaenyra and Daemon’s eyes, Luke’s murder was entirely premeditated, with Team Green pulling the strings. Enter: Blood and Cheese. Yes, book readers, their time is nigh — as Daemon says in Fire & Blood, “An eye for an eye, a son for a son. Lucerys shall be avenged.”
Mysaria will lend a hand in hiring Blood, a sergeant in the City Watch, and Cheese, a ratcatcher in the Red Keep. Daemon contributes significantly to this plan, given his King’s Landing connections. Blood and Cheese will slip into the Tower of the Hand, wherein they’ll bind and gag Alicent. Then, they’ll wait for Helaena to appear with Jaehaerys, Jaehaera and Maelor. The hired killers will inform Helaena that they only plan to kill one of her sons as recompense for Luke’s death. Helaena will offer herself before reluctantly naming Maelor.
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However, in a murderous twist, Blood and Cheese will spare Maelor and behead poor Jaehaerys as his mother, sister and younger brother bear witness to the horrific sight. Cheese will escape, but Alicent’s men will capture Blood. Larys tortures him for almost two weeks before he dies, inevitably giving up Mysaria as his boss and Daemon as his source of payment.
Jaehaerys’s murder is a pivotal turning point for Helaena and Aegon as both descend further into a maelstrom of grief, despair and rage. It forever changes them.
Jace Treats With Cregan Stark
We know Rhaenyra sent her sons as envoys to treat with important lords of the realm in the hopes of winning their support. While Luke’s journey had a fatal end, Jace will travel to the Eyrie, White Harbor and Winterfell. His trip yields successful results. However, Jace’s Winterfell pitstop is a highlight for book fans because it introduces us to the fabled Cregan Stark, a.k.a. the Wolf of the North. Like most in House Stark, he possesses unwavering loyalty and honor while taking no sh*t.
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Cregan and Jace become blood brothers in the book, forging an impregnable bond. According to Grand Maester Munkun, they secure an agreement called “The Pact of Ice and Fire,” wherein Cregan’s son Rickon will marry Jace’s firstborn daughter in exchange for the North’s support of Rhaenyra.
Now, the fool Mushroom claims Jace became smitten with a girl named Sara Snow, and the two wed in secret. I highly doubt the show will introduce Sara, as even the book questions her existence, and Mushroom’s accounts aren’t always accurate. Plus, Jace wouldn’t break his betrothal to Baela. If anything, Season 2 might bring Sara into the fold but not have her and Jace marry.
Battle of the Burning Mill
It’s a quick and easy landslide for Team Black, but I think we’ll see the Battle of the Burning Mill in Season 2. House Blackwood and House Bracken are notorious for their ancient rivalry, which deepens when the former declares for Rhaenyra and the latter for Aegon. Initially, the battle starts with Lord Samwell Blackwood sending raiders onto Bracken territory, causing Ser Amos Bracken to invade Blackwood lands in response.
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Amos and Samwell perish in the short battle, with Samwell’s sister Alysanne, a.k.a. Black Aly, purportedly slaying Amos with a weirwood arrow. Black Aly plays her part in the proceedings to come. After the Blackwoods successfully prevail over the Brackens, Daemon swoops in and seizes the Brackens’ castle. All in all, it’s a triumph for Team Black.
Aegon Fires Otto and Makes Criston His Hand of the King
Aegon loses patience with Otto. Otto incessantly fails him at every turn, at least according to Aegon. Otto sends letters to all corners of the realm to curry favor with the most powerful houses in Westeros. He even communicates with the magisters of Lys, Tyrosh and Myr, promising them exclusive trading rights if they rid the Gullet of the Velaryon fleet. At this point, the Sea Snake blocks all trade in and out of King’s Landing.
However, Aegon has had it up to here with the letters, folks. “My new Hand is a steel fist,” he informs Otto. I sincerely hope we hear this line in Season 2. Aegon fires Otto and replaces him with Criston Cole, a man who continuously and inexplicably fails upward. Criston’s first act as Hand of the King is to execute everyone languishing in the dungeons loyal to Rhaenyra. Unfortunately, this includes the badass Lady Fell.
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The Battle of Ser Erryk and Ser Arryk
I wondered if we would see this play out in the Season 1 finale, given how quickly the season moved through the timeline. But I’m glad the writers are waiting until we get to know Ser Erryk and Ser Arryk Cargyll. Well, at least Erryk. Criston dispatches Arryk to Dragonstone to enact revenge for the murder of young Jaehaerys. He can easily move about the Targaryen ancestral seat undetected, as most would mistake him for his identical twin brother.
The plan? According to the book, the objective of Arryk’s mission is a matter of dispute. Grand Maester Munkun believes he was sent to kill Rhaenyra, while Mushroom asserts Arryk was meant to kill Jace and Joffrey at Aegon’s behest. However, Arryk encounters Erryk in a twist of fate, and they kill each other. Arryk dies instantly, but Erryk perishes four days later in torment and unrelenting pain.
Finding Dragonriders and the Introduction of Three Wild Dragons
Remember when Daemon sang a High Valyrian lullaby to Vermithor in the Season 1 finale? We’ll see more of that bronze beast in Season 2, along with Silverwing and Seasmoke, as Team Black endeavors to find riders for these dragons. Many on Dragonstone will come forward to claim they’re “dragonseeds,” a.k.a. bastards of House Targaryen and House Velaryon. Jace will offer knighthood, lands and riches to anyone who can master a dragon.
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Of course, dragons are willful creatures who don’t cater to any potential rider’s whims. They need to trust whoever attempts to hop on their backs. Suffice it to say this experiment takes a deadly turn for countless people. Dubbed “The Red Sowing,” the task of claiming the riderless dragons is a bloody affair.
Besides the dragons above, we’ll see a few wild ones too. Sheepstealer, Grey Ghost and Cannibal are three beasts who’ve never had a rider. Season 2 might introduce us to Nettles, a young girl who feeds Sheepstealer sheep carcasses in a bid to claim him. She’s successful. In addition, she becomes entwined with Daemon during the Dance of the Dragons, although their relationship is a source of contention.
Vermithor finds a new rider in Hugh the Hammer, a.k.a. Hard Hugh, and Silverwing bows her head to Ulf the White, a.k.a. Ulf the Sot. Addam of Hull bonds with Seasmoke, formerly Laenor Velaryon’s dragon. Addam and his brother Alyn are purportedly bastards of Laenor, whose mother, Marilda, is the daughter of a shipwright (both boys eventually become Velaryons in name).
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Well, it’s a rumor, at least. Sources also claim they’re the sons of Corlys Velaryon. I’m going with the latter, as much as it pains me to think of Corlys being unfaithful to Rhaenys.
Aegon the Younger and Viserys Try to Escape to Pentos
Rhaenyra sends Aegon the Younger and Viserys to Pentos on a ship called Gay Abandon, hoping to keep them out of Team Green’s reach. The vessel is caught in the crosshairs of 90 warships flying under the Triarchy banners courtesy of Otto Hightower. Aegon the Younger manages to escape while clinging to his dragon, Stormcloud, as Viserys only has a dragon’s egg. He had never flown before. Unfortunately, Stormcloud dies of severe wounds at Dragonstone while trying to fly young Aegon to safety.
Poor Viserys doesn’t flee, but he puts his cleverness to good use by disguising himself as a ship’s boy and concealing his dragon egg. After suffering betrayal at the hands of one of the actual ship’s boys, Viserys is taken captive by Sharako Lohar of Lys.
The Introduction of Daeron Targaryen
We haven’t met Daeron Targaryen yet, the youngest child of King Viserys and Alicent, but since he contributes significantly to Team Green amid the Dance of the Dragons, it only makes sense that we’ll meet him in Season 2. Daeron flies Tessarion, a.k.a. the Blue Queen. I’m as excited to see Tessarion up close and in action (blue is one of my favorite colors) as I am Sunfyre. In Oldtown, Daeron is the cupbearer and squire to Lord Ormund Hightower, Otto’s nephew.
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While he doesn’t make moves until the Battle of the Honeywine in 130 AC, I think we’ll at least be introduced to him and how he reacts to Viserys’s passing/the start of the Dance. He doesn’t play his role until around midway through the war.
The Battle of the Gullet
Yes, the bloodiest sea battle in all of Westerosi history might occur toward the end of Season 2. House of the Dragon has taken its fair share of literary liberties thus far, occasionally showcasing events out of sequence. I could see this happening in the second season, yet I understand if the writers wish to wait until Season 3 to unleash this beast of a battle. It results in the gruesome death of Jace Velaryon and his dragon Vermax. The action transpires directly after Aegon the Younger and Viserys fall under attack from the Triarchy. Regardless, these two events must take place in quick succession.
Thousands perish, the Velaryon fleet loses a considerable amount of its strength and Spicetown suffers a brutal sacking, never to recover. The Battle of the Gullet is a grisly, blood-soaked affair. I don’t expect this prediction to come to fruition in Season 2, but if it does, bring it on.
Rook’s Rest and Rhaenys’s Death
Hot take: I think Season 2 should end with Rook’s Rest and Rhaenys’s death. Rhaenys flies to Rook’s Rest on Meleys after Lord Staunton dispatches a raven to Dragonstone, asking for assistance. Criston Cole and Team Green just finished sacking Duskendale, so they set their sights on Rook’s Rest. Unfortunately, Rhaenys and Meleys are cornered by Aemond on Vhagar and Aegon on Sunfyre, culminating in a grim battle between the three dragons.
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All three beasts fall to the ground, entangled, with Meleys dying almost instantly and Rhaenys burning to death. Her body is unrecognizable after the event. Corlys, angered and grief-stricken, blames Rhaenyra for his wife’s murder. Aegon and Sunfyre don’t leave the battleground unscathed: Sunfyre is so severely injured that they leave him where he fell, and Aegon suffers extreme burns, broken ribs, a broken hip and armor that melted into his left arm. It will take Aegon a year to recover, but he’s never the same physically.
I think ending on this note would make for such a badass finale, especially with that three-way dragon fight. It also significantly alters Team Green’s course for the rest of the Dance. Aemond steps in as regent for a while as Aegon convalesces.
A Hope (and a Prayer)
This is more of a personal hope than a prediction. I’d love to see Rhaenyra fly Syrax into battle for a few skirmishes in Season 2. Maybe not something as monumental as the Battle of the Gullet (mostly because I don’t want her to watch Jace die), but even one instance of battle-ready Rhaenyra burning the greens to ash would make my heart sing. Considering where we leave her in the Season 1 finale, this doesn’t seem a huge ask. She’s ready to wreak havoc!
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What are your theories for House of the Dragon Season 2? Sound off in the comments below!
House of the Dragon Season 1 is now streaming on HBO Max.
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