Rhaenyra: As the first century of the Targaryen dynasty came to a close, the health of the Old King, Jaehaerys, was failing. In those days, House Targaryen stood at the height of its strength, with ten adult dragons under its yoke. No power in the world could stand against it. King Jaehaerys reigned over nearly sixty years of peace and prosperity, but tragedy had claimed both his sons, leaving his succession in doubt. So, in the year 101, the Old King called a Great Council to choose an heir. Over a thousand lords made the journey to Harrenhal. Fourteen succession claims were heard, but only two were truly considered. Rhaenys, the King's eldest descendant, and her younger cousin, Prince Viserys Targaryen, the King's eldest male descendant.
King Jaehaerys I Targaryen: [flashback, the day of the Great Council] It is declared by all lords paramount and lords vassal of the Seven Kingdoms that Prince Viserys Targaryen be made Prince of Dragonstone.
Rhaenyra: Rhaenys, a woman, would not inherit the Iron Throne. The lords instead chose Viserys, my father. Jaehaerys called the Great Council to prevent a war being fought over his succession. For he knew the cold truth. The only thing that could tear down the House of the Dragon was itself.
Aemma: You will lie in this bed soon enough, Rhaenyra. This discomfort is how we serve the realm.
Rhaenyra: I'd rather serve as a knight and ride to battle and glory.
Aemma: We have royal wombs, you and I. The childbed is our battlefield.
Otto: You've not been seen in the Vale or at Runestone for quite some time.
Daemon: I think my bronze bitch is happier for my absence.
Otto: Lady Rhea is your wife, a good and honorable Lady of the Vale.
Daemon: In the Vale, men are said to fuck sheep instead of women. I can assure you the sheep are prettier.
Otto: No one here can know what Daemon would do were he king, but no one can doubt his ambition. Look at what he did with the gold cloaks. The City Watch is fiercely loyal to him. An army two thousand strong.
Viserys: An army you gave him, Otto. I named Daemon Master of Laws, but you said he was a tyrant. As Master of Coin, you said he was a spendthrift that would beggar the realm. Putting Daemon in command of the City Watch was your solution!
Otto: A half-measure, Your Grace. The truth is, Daemon should be far away from this court.
Viserys: Daemon is my brother. My blood. And he will have his place at my court.
Mellos: Let him keep his place at court, Your Grace, but if the gods should visit some further tragedy on you, either by design or accident...
Viserys: Design? What are you saying? My brother would murder me, take my crown? Are you? Please. Daemon has ambition, yes, but not for the throne. He lacks the patience for it.
Otto: The gods have yet to make a man who lacks the patience for absolute power, Your Grace.
Viserys: Did you say it?
Daemon: I don't know what you mean.
Viserys: You will address me as Your Grace, or I will have my Kingsguard cut out your tongue. "The Heir for a Day". Did you say it?
Daemon: We must all mourn in our own way, Your Grace.
Viserys: My family has just been destroyed. But instead of being by my side, or Rhaenyra's, you chose to celebrate your own rise! Laughing with your whοres and your lickspittles! You have no allies at court but me! I have only ever defended you! Yet everything I've given you, you've thrown back in my face!
Daemon: You've only ever tried to send me away. To the Vale, to the City Watch, anywhere but by your side! Ten years you've been king, and yet not once have you asked me to be your Hand!
Viserys: Why would I do that?
Daemon: Because I'm your brother. And the blood of the dragon runs thick.
Viserys: Then why do you cut me so deeply?
Daemon: I've only ever spoken the truth. I see Otto Hightower for what he is.
Viserys: An unwavering and loyal Hand?
Daemon: A cunt! A second son who stands to inherit nothing he doesn't seize for himself.
Viserys: Otto Hightower is a more honorable man than you could ever be.
Daemon: He doesn't protect you. I would.
Viserys: From what?
Daemon: Yourself. You're weak, Viserys. And that council of leeches knows it. They all prey on you for their own ends.
Viserys: I have decided to name a new heir.
Daemon: I'm your heir.
Viserys: Not anymore. You are to return to Runestone and your lady wife at once. And you are to do so without quarrel, by order of your King.
Rhaenyra: Everyone says Targaryens are closer to gods than to men, but they say that because of our dragons. Without them, we're just like everyone else.
Viserys: The idea that we control the dragons is an illusion. They're a power man should never have trifled with. One that brought Valyria its doom. If we don't mind our own histories, it will do the same to us. Targaryen must understand this to be King. Or Queen. [Rhaenyra looks at her father as his words sink in] I am sorry, Rhaenyra. I have wasted the years since you were born wanting for a son. You are the very best of your mother, and I now believe, as I know she did, that you could be a great ruling Queen.
Viserys: There's something else that I need to tell you. It might be difficult for you to understand, but you must hear it. Our histories... They tell us that Aegon looked across the Blackwater from Dragonstone and saw a rich land ripe for the capture. But ambition alone is not what drove him to conquest. It was a dream. And just as Daenys foresaw the end of Valyria, Aegon foresaw the end of the world of men. 'Tis to begin with a terrible winter gusting out of the distant north. Aegon saw absolute darkness riding on those winds. And whatever dwells within will destroy the world of the living. When this Great Winter comes, Rhaenyra, all of Westeros must stand against it. And if the world of men is to survive, a Targaryen must be seated on the Iron Throne. A king or queen strong enough to unite the realm against the cold and the dark. Aegon called his dream "The Song of Ice and Fire." This secret? It's been passed from king to heir since Aegon's time. Now you must promise to carry it and protect it. Promise me this, Rhaenyra. Promise me.
Corlys: I fear that the eyes of our enemies are presently fixed on the Red Keep. The Queen has passed. A girl has been named heir to the Iron Throne, the first in its history. The King's brother, so disinherited, has claimed the Targaryen seat on Dragonstone without challenge. And now, a foreign power has established a colony in our most critical shipping lane.
Viserys: You paint such an aspirant portrait of my reign, Lord Corlys.
Rhaenys: It is an honest one, cousin. At the moment, the Crown is perceived as being vulnerable.
Viserys: And a blind incursion in the Stepstones is the only way to demonstrate that we are not?
Corlys: To elude a storm, you can either sail into it or around it. But you must never await its coming.
Rhaenys: Whether it's to my daughter or to someone else's, your father will remarry sooner than late. His new wife will produce new heirs, and chances are better than not that one of those will be male. And when that boy comes of age, and your father has passed, the men of the realm will expect him to be heir, not you. Because that is the order of things.
Rhaenyra: When I am Queen, I will create a new order.
Rhaenys: How I wish that could be, Rhaenyra. But the men of the realm already had their opportunity to appoint a ruling Queen at the Great Council, and they denied it.
Rhaenyra: They denied you, Princess Rhaenys. "The Queen Who Never Was". But they bent the knee to me and called me heir to the throne.
Rhaenys: Do you remind your father's men of that as you carry their cups? Here is the hard truth, which no one else has the heart to tell you. Men would sooner put the realm to the torch than see a woman ascend the Iron Throne. And your father is no fool.
Mysaria: I have been sold as property more times than I care to count, beginning in a homeland I can no longer recall. Most of my years have been spent living in terror.
Daemon: You're safe with me, I swear it.
Mysaria: You are Targaryen. You can afford to play your stupid games with the King, but I cannot. I didn't come into your service wanting gold. Or power. Or station. I came to you to be liberated.
Daemon: Liberated. From what?
Mysaria: Fear.
Viserys: I wish I had known better what to say to you in the aftermath. I struggled to realize that my daughter had so quickly become a woman grown. But I know she understands what is now expected of me.
Rhaenyra: The king must take a new wife.
Viserys: I could never replace your mother. No more than I intend to replace you as heir. But you are my only heir and our line is vulnerable, too easily ended. And by marrying again, I may begin to ensure that we are better defended.
Rhaenyra: Against whom?
Viserys: Whomever may dare to challenge us. [pause] I do not wish to make us estranged.
Rhaenyra: You are the king. Your first duty is to the realm. Mother would have understood this. Just as I do.
Corlys: You've heard of the trouble in the Stepstones?
Daemon: Some Myrish prince is feeding Westerosi sailors to the crabs.
Corlys: I have been petitioning the King to send my navy into the territory, but he's denied me.
Daemon: It was never my brother's strongest trait.
Corlys: What?
Daemon: Being king.
Corlys: The Crabfeeder is backed by powerful entities within the Free Cities who wish to see Westeros weakened. And the King's failures have allowed him to accumulate strength. If those shipping lanes fall, my house will be crippled. And I will not have Driftmark beggared while our King idles himself with feasts and balls and tourneys.
Daemon: I will speak of my brother as I wish. You will not.
Corlys: Waiting in the Stepstones is a chance for you to prove your worth to any who might yet doubt it. We are the realm's second sons, Daemon. Our worth is not given. It must be made.
Viserys: Since you came of age, I've been slowly drowning in a lake of parchment flung from every corner of the realm. Marriage proposals, all. And I have tried often to discuss it with you, but you've refused me at every turn.
Rhaenyra: That is because I do not wish to get married.
Viserys: Even I do not exist above tradition and duty, Rhaenyra!
Viserys: Many in my line have been dragon riders. Very few among us have been dreamers. What is the power of a dragon next to the power of prophecy?
Alicent: The hour is too late, husband.
Viserys: When Rhaenyra was a child, I saw it in a dream. As vivid as these flames, I saw it. A male babe born to me wearing the Conqueror's crown. And I so wanted it to be true, to be a dreamer myself. I sought that vision again, night after night, but it never came again. I poured all my thought and will into it. And my obsession killed Rhaenyra's mother.
Alicent: Viserys...
Viserys: I thought Rhaenyra was the way out of my abyss of grief and regret. And naming her heir would begin to set things right.
Alicent: Oh, it did.
Viserys: I never imagined I would remarry, that I would have a son. What if I was wrong?
Alicent: Rhaenyra will be a good queen.
Otto: It wouldn't matter if she were Jaehaerys himself born again. Rhaenyra is a woman.
Alicent: What of my son? Would you have me raise a man to steal his own sister's birthright?
Otto: It is Aegon that's being robbed. He's the firstborn son of the King. To deny that he is heir to the throne is to assail the laws of gods and men. The road ahead is uncertain, but the end is clear. Aegon will be king.
