Home of the Dragon has been deft at calling again to earlier episodes — and the season 1 finale, episode 10, was no exception. It featured a sure pale web page torn from a big guide, a callback to the very first episode. It is so vital it virtually prevented the declaration of warfare between the greens, aka King Aegon’s supporters, and the blacks, aka Queen Rhaenyra’s clan.
However for those who’ve watched the finale, you realize issues took a bitter flip. Let’s talk about the importance of that torn web page within the spoiler-packed part beneath.
Warning: Spoilers forward.
What does the torn web page say?
Otto Hightower, aka the Hand of the King, produces the torn web page at an opportune second within the hopes of stopping warfare. In episode 10, he and a small delegation meet with Queen Rhaenyra on the Dragonstone Bridge. They current “beneficiant phrases” — possession of Dragonstone fortress, Driftmark island, locations of “excessive honor” at court docket — on behalf of King Aegon in alternate for peace and acknowledgment of Aegon’s kinghood.
This goes down horrifically — till Hightower unfolds his trump card: A torn web page from an previous, massive guide.
The previous pale web page bares a big image of a girl in a crown standing over ocean waves and what seem like crimson snakes. The previous model writing reads: “Lashed along with ropes and cables, Nymeria’s fleet dispersed on the coming of the primary storms, sweeping them throughout the ocean, east, west, and south into corsair infested pockets of the Basilisk Isles.”
What guide is the torn web page from?
This passage is from an enormous fictional tome titled Ten Thousand Ships. It tells the historical past of warrior queen Nymeria and first appeared in episode 1, when Septa Marlow instructs childhood mates Alicent and Rhaenyra to review it. Within the Purple Hold’s godswood, Alicent quizzes Rhaenyra on the guide’s contents, together with which husband Nymeria takes when she arrives in Dorne (the reply is Lord Mors Martell).
The dialog strikes to Rhaenyra and her worries about her dad and mom — King Viserys and Queen Aemma — who would possibly quickly have a new child son. Rhaenyra says she hopes her father will get the son he is all the time wished. In the meantime, that is what she desires”
“I need to fly with you on dragonback, see the nice wonders throughout the Slender Sea, and eat solely cake.”
Rhaenyra proceeds to disclose she did examine the guide earlier than ripping out the particular web page. She palms it to Alicent and explains, “So that you bear in mind.”
Queen Rhaenyra has rather a lot to mull over.
Ollie Upton/HBO
What does the web page imply?
Evidently, Alicent has stored this childhood memento for twenty years. In giving it to Rhaenyra through Otto on the bridge, she would possibly hope it reminds Rhaenyra of an easier time when each ladies have been freed from obligation to their households. It was a time once they actually liked one another and would by no means dream of waging warfare with the chums on opposing sides.
“Queen Alicent has not forgotten the love you as soon as had for one another,” Hightower says on the bridge. “No blood want be spilled, so the realm can stick with it in peace.”
Initially, this candy memento evokes Rhaenyra to stay open to peace. Sadly — and unsurprisingly, given Home of the Dragon is a couple of civil warfare in Home Targaryen — this takes a tragic flip when Alicent’s son Aemond largely unintentionally kills Rhaenyra’s son Lucerys.
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