Rhaenys Went to Hell: the Dornish Letter Mystery

[Musashisamurai]

Thing is, if Aegon had received any word that Rhaenys was alive, he would have destroyed her captors, even maybe at the cost of (their) lives. This same guy makes it a law that anyone who strikes a Targ will have that hand cut off; same guy destroys Harrenhal when they don't yield. I find it highly unlikely he would just let this slight go-even if not Aegon, but later Daeron I. If you were told one of your ancestors had been tortured to death in a place you were to war with, I think Daeron would have destroyed that castle and house.

Plus, there would be stronger rumors she survived and that Aegon was cowed by her as a hostage

[Jon Fossoway]

I'm reading your post. Just pointing out that I always found the Ullers to be the Boltons of Dorne. Save for the climate, dornish and northmen are said to be found barbaric by the other regions.

EDIT: Interesting. A more logical insight into the nature of the dark magic may well be the "curse" over Aegon's children: an ill health Aenys and a crazy Maegor.

I also believe Rhaenys got reeke'd until her death. He may have lived many years, demented and maimed.

[FittleLinger]

I'm reading your post. Just pointing out that I always found the Ullers to be the Boltons of Dorne. Save for the climate, dornish and northmen are said to be found barbaric by the other regions.

EDIT: Interesting. A more logical insight into the nature of the dark magic may well be the "curse" over Aegon's children: an ill health Aenys and a crazy Maegor.

I also believe Rhaenys got reeke'd until her death. He may have lived many years, demented and maimed.

Same thoughts - plus Hellholt and Dreadfort...

[LmL]

Thing is, if Aegon had received any word that Rhaenys was alive, he would have destroyed her captors, even maybe at the cost of (their) lives. This same guy makes it a law that anyone who strikes a Targ will have that hand cut off; same guy destroys Harrenhal when they don't yield. I find it highly unlikely he would just let this slight go-even if not Aegon, but later Daeron I. If you were told one of your ancestors had been tortured to death in a place you were to war with, I think Daeron would have destroyed that castle and house.

Plus, there would be stronger rumors she survived and that Aegon was cowed by her as a hostage

Agree with all of that 100%

[LmL]

I'm reading your post. Just pointing out that I always found the Ullers to be the Boltons of Dorne. Save for the climate, dornish and northmen are said to be found barbaric by the other regions.

EDIT: Interesting. A more logical insight into the nature of the dark magic may well be the "curse" over Aegon's children: an ill health Aenys and a crazy Maegor.

I also believe Rhaenys got reeke'd until her death. He may have lived many years, demented and maimed.

Same thoughts - plus Hellholt and Dreadfort...

You guys are my type of people. Heh heh heh *cackles maniacally*

Good catch as to the Boltons being equivalent to the Ullers. Hey! I wonder if that implies the same foreshadowingfor the Boltons as it may for Euron capturing Dany? Doesn’t really seem like the Boltons do magic anymore though. They just effing cut people into little bits slowly in a dungeon. Nice folks.

Hope someone up there gets around to some killing soon. ;)

[NGParadox]

I always connected the letter to the Aenys rumours, many believed he was possibly another mans child due to his mothers frequent nights with other men an Aegons long marriages only resulting in 2 children and Maegor being born very late on.

I think she survived and the dornish tortured her and she told them Aenys was not his, even though Aenys was not his, Aegon always made it seem his mother was his fav and Aenys was all he had left of her.

The knowledge they tortured his love and anger it could harm his reputation and her son made him grip the letter so tightly maybe he got crazy paper cuts.

Also, on her having kings blood, I believe she would because even though she is not born of Aegon, they have the same parents and thus share the same blood.

[Steelborn]

On a more interesting note: the title of this thread would be a good horror movie title.

[LmL]

On a more interesting note: the title of this thread would be a good horror movie title.

Haha, thanks, I was trying to ride the balance between click bait and appropriate titling.

[LmL]

I always connected the letter to the Aenys rumours, many believed he was possibly another mans child due to his mothers frequent nights with other men an Aegons long marriages only resulting in 2 children and Maegor being born very late on.

I think she survived and the dornish tortured her and she told them Aenys was not his, even though Aenys was not his, Aegon always made it seem his mother was his fav and Aenys was all he had left of her.

The knowledge they tortured his love and anger it could harm his reputation and her son made him grip the letter so tightly maybe he got crazy paper cuts.

Also, on her having kings blood, I believe she would because even though she is not born of Aegon, they have the same parents and thus share the same blood.

I like you're thinking here. I forgot about the rumors of Aenys parentage. Your version of the story has a poetic sadness to it... Definitely could be the truth. It is really strange that mighty Aegon the conqueror had only two kids, with each being f--ked up in some way.

The other thing that may connect is the Vulture King rebellion. It started as soon as Aenys took the throne and lasted a while, and Sunspear didn't really do jack to stop it. At the heart of it was the Blackmonts, perhaps they were still using kings blood at this point? Probably impossible right?

[MaesterSam]

The only thing that make sense as a reason for Aegon to instantly agree to peace and never attack Dorne, either in vengeance or to rescue his sister, is they had him by the balls. The only thing I can figure is using Rhaenys' blood to strike at Aenys.

Setting aside the issue of what is technically "king's blood," you can do blood magic with any blood, and I maintain that with the Targaryen royalty dragon rider blood along with the blood of the dead dragon itself, a dark sorcerer worth his salt could wreak mischief. To strike at Aenys with his mother's blood makes a certain amount of sense, doesn't it?

A threat that Aegon takes VERY seriously is the only explanation that makes logical sense. Otherwise, it's revenge if Rhaenys is dead, or a rescue mission if she's alive. Of course, they've been burning all of Dorne for two years, but probably with the assumption that Rhaenys was dead. If she was alive in on lee way Aegon the supremely confident conqueror would be going down to rescue. She was dead. The letter was a threat, verified on Dragonstone. Does anyone else have a plausible idea for what Aegon could have verified on Dragonstone? I couldn't think of anything else, but that doesn't mean there isn't another possibility.

What if the Hullers used Rhaenys' blood to create the dragon binding horn that is now in Victarion's possession? We know it works by blood magic, and binds a dragon to a master, presumably. How better to create such a horn than with the blood of a dragonlord?

The letter told Aegon of the horn's creation.

He flew to Dragonstone b/c that's where they kept all their records on dragonlore. Which he read and confirmed that such a thing is possible; maybe it had happened once before or maybe he actually possessed books on blood magic?

Having confirmed that the Dornish weren't lying, he knew he could never fight Dorne as they could wrest his dragon from him.

And it sure would fit nicely if the Hellhorn came from Hellholt. ;)

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

I guess I'm in the camp that thinks (wants?) the letter really was either the offer to put Rhaenys out of her misery or the threat to kill Aenys. Or at least, something along those lines. Even if it didn't provoke a Harrenhal-esque retaliation from Aegon, something in it freaked him. It seems like the support against this stems from the logic that "if that had been in the letter, Aegon would have destroyed them. Aegon didn't destroy them, ergo it wasn't in the letter." And I'm not sure that's the best logic to use. Isn't the whole point of Dorne's successful resistance that the dragons and army weren't sufficient to overcome them? If Aegon was so fully capable of taking out the Dornish if he wanted to ... well why the hell didn't he when he was trying to conquer it? And before the letter came, if Aegon would have instantly gone to rescue Rhaenys, why didn't he, if he thought she was alive? And if Aegon would have avenged her if she was dead, why didn't he, if he thought she was dead? He didn't have to wait for the letter to rescue her or avenge her, if that's what he was always going to do.

I think the Dornish had him by the inbred nuts and maybe some people don't like to admit that.

[LmL]

What if the Hullers used Rhaenys' blood to create the dragon binding horn that is now in Victarion's possession? We know it works by blood magic, and binds a dragon to a master, presumably. How better to create such a horn than with the blood of a dragonlord?

The letter told Aegon of the horn's creation.

He flew to Dragonstone b/c that's where they kept all their records on dragonlore. Which he read and confirmed that such a thing is possible; maybe it had happened once before or maybe he actually possessed books on blood magic?

Having confirmed that the Dornish weren't lying, he knew he could never fight Dorne as they could wrest his dragon from him.

And it sure would fit nicely if the Hellhorn came from Hellholt. ;)

Holy Crap do I like that a lot!!! That's the kind of dastardly deeds I am expecting from Dark Lord Uller! That dragon horn has no explanation - we never hear about the Targs using one, even during the Dance of the Dragons when they desperately needed to tame wild dragons. We know very little about Valyria of course, but we've never heard a damn thing about a horn.

I'm going to look over the section for horn related imagery... George always leaves clues.

[LmL]

What color is the horn and what color was Meraxes???? Can't look it up at the moment....

[Musashisamurai]

She had golden eyes and silver scales, as per the wiki

The horn was red gold, valyrian steel (Targ colors?)

[Pablius]

It doesn´t need to be blood magic...Rhaenys is held captive, she writes a letter and to prove it she tells Aegon..."go and see, Aenys has a birthmark in the form of a peach in his butt", and so Aegon goes to check it out

There, simple

But of course, blood magic is far more cool!

[Musashisamurai]

Meraxes was the second largest dragon then-largest than caragar but smaller than balerion. I don't know how the 3 dragons compared though, to ordinary dragons-but Meraxes was bigger than Caragar, which was the largest dragon after Balerion died.

I think we can say Meraxes was pretty large too

[LmL]

It doesn´t need to be blood magic...Rhaenys is held captive, she writes a letter and to prove it she tells Aegon..."go and see, Aenys has a birthmark in the form of a peach in his butt", and so Aegon goes to check it out

There, simple

But of course, blood magic is far more cool!

I cannot fathom Aegon the conqueror knowing his beloved sister was alive in a dungeon and doing nothing. That doesn't fit with his character. He had to be convinced he even needed a KingsGuard at all. For him to never, ever go near Dorne again reeks of the same mystery why Valyrians never took over Westeros, a land rich with the gold and gems they so desired. The theory is that they were afraid of the CotF warging their dragons - I'm a fan of that one - and this horn would serve the same purpose. A clue is given in the part where it tells of Aegon and Visenya burning everything in Dorne EXCEPT Sunspear... The book suggests that maybe the Targs were playing politics - or perhaps they were afraid of some weapon. The idea is introduced.

If the horn is red, we need to figure out what color Meraxes horns were.

[LmL]

Visenya's dragon was called Vhagar. As far as I know there is no Caragar. Sorry if I'm missing something. Anyway the quote goes like this:

"Think how big the dragon must have been to bear two of these upon his head. Bigger than Vhagar or Meraxes. Bigger than Balerion the Black Dread."

Definitely seems unreliable. How does Victarion know the size of Vhagar or Meraxes? Even if you saw one of them one time- how close did you get? Unless the horn is dramatically bigger than anything else, you couldn't really make that call, especially having never seen them. Isn't the horn like the size of a man? 6 feet? That's not that big. Look at the pictures in the Worldbook - pretty much all the pictures show horns bigger than people.

[LmL]

Oh poo. The wiki says Meraxes skull was returned to Kings Landing. I think we would hear about a missing horn. Probably a dead end.

[SeanF]

I guess I'm in the camp that thinks (wants?) the letter really was either the offer to put Rhaenys out of her misery or the threat to kill Aenys. Or at least, something along those lines. Even if it didn't provoke a Harrenhal-esque retaliation from Aegon, something in it freaked him. It seems like the support against this stems from the logic that "if that had been in the letter, Aegon would have destroyed them. Aegon didn't destroy them, ergo it wasn't in the letter." And I'm not sure that's the best logic to use. Isn't the whole point of Dorne's successful resistance that the dragons and army weren't sufficient to overcome them? If Aegon was so fully capable of taking out the Dornish if he wanted to ... well why the hell didn't he when he was trying to conquer it? And before the letter came, if Aegon would have instantly gone to rescue Rhaenys, why didn't he, if he thought she was alive? And if Aegon would have avenged her if she was dead, why didn't he, if he thought she was dead? He didn't have to wait for the letter to rescue her or avenge her, if that's what he was always going to do.

I think the Dornish had him by the inbred nuts and maybe some people don't like to admit that.

Rather like the Pink Letter, this provokes endless speculation.

Initially, I thought it was like Ramsay's letter to Asha. " I send you a piece of Queen. Linger in my lands and share her fate". But, that wouldn't sit well with the conciliatory gestures of sending back Meraxes' skull, and sending Deriah to Kings Landing.

I'm not sure that an offer to put a badly-tortured Rhaenys out of her misery works. Aegon could grab Deriah, and threaten to torture her, until Rhaenys was released. And, any hold that Nymorr might have over Aegon would end with Rhaenys' death.