Treason is brewing in Kings Landing. After King Viserys’ painful death in the final moments of the last episode of House of the Dragon and Alicent (Olivia Cooke) misunderstanding his final words, the dance of the dragon has begun and new images revealed by the series’ official Twitter account confirm it.
In the first image, we see Princess Rhaenys (Eve Best) with a very stoic expression on her face perhaps, receiving the news of her cousin’s death. During the last episode, we saw her pledging her alliance to Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy) with the throne of Driftmark going to her younger son, Luke, as well as her granddaughters getting betrothed to Rhaenyra’s sons. Another image sees Alicent speaking to her son Aemond (Ewan Mitchell), probably conspiring to crown Aegon II, as the king, before the news of the King’s death gets out. In the books, to get the support of Storm’s End, Aemond was sent to convince Lord Borros Baratheon to support Aegon’s claim by promising to marry one of his daughters. We’ve previously seen a young Aemond willing to marry for the sake of his duty.
Next up we see, a snap of the small council’s meeting and the master of the coins Lord Lyman Beesbury (Bill Paterson) talking to the council. Per the previously revealed trailer, we understand that he’s claiming the act of Greens as treason, given Ser Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel) standing right behind him, this objection could be costly for him. In another image, we see twins, Erryk and Arryk, in the previous episode Alicent mistakes Ser Erryk, for his twin Arryk. In the books, Erryk sides with Rhaenyra in Fire & Blood, while Arryk backs Aegon II’s claim to the throne. In the upcoming episode, things might take a similar turn.
Game of Thrones, the original series, always gave us strong penultimate episodes, be it ‘Baelor’ which featured Ned Stark’s (Sean Bean) death, or the ‘Battle of Bastards’ or ‘The Bells’ where Daenerys sets Kings Landing on fire; as such, House of the Dragon is expected to continue the tradition and Aegon II’s crowning seems to fit the bill. With Alicent’s misunderstanding, the series sets her intentions as righteous in her own right. Now both Alicent and Rhaenyra think they are doing the right thing as opposed to the malicious intent of many players vying for the Iron Throne in the original series.
A new episode of House of the Dragon drops every Sunday, meanwhile, check out the new images and trailer for the next episode below.
