This is why Varys did it

[King Ragnar]

I don't know if this has been stated before but maybe I've got an explanation why Varys seemingly plays along with Robert in the plan to assassinate Dany. Arya overhears Varys' and Illyrio's conversation in the dungeons (with the dragonskulls) and Varys says something like "Drogo will wait until his son is born, this delay may be a problem".

When Robert hears of Dany's pregnancy he gets pretty pissed off and Varys, among others, agree with him that it's best if they had her killed.

Maybe Varys saw an opportunity here to get rid of the delay (= Dany's pregnancy = Dany) and he thought Drogo would seek revenge on Robert, which is how Drogo, and Viserys with him, get to the 7K.

 

Thoughts?

 

[Shouldve Taken The Black]

I think Varys knew he simply could not say no to Robert, so played along while warning Jorah and telling him to make sure Dany is kept safe (hence Jorah’s intervention with the wineseller).

There doesn’t really seem to need to be any more complex explanation than that.

[King Ragnar]

deleted

 

[King Ragnar]

30 minutes ago, Shouldve Taken The Black said:

I think Varys knew he simply could not say no to Robert, so played along while warning Jorah and telling him to make sure Dany is kept safe (hence Jorah’s intervention with the wineseller).

 

There doesn’t really seem to need to be any more complex explanation than that.

 

But why take the risk? Why not just tell Robert the attempt failed? A lot could go wrong. 

[Shouldve Taken The Black]

20 minutes ago, Lord Ragnar said:

But why take the risk? Why not just tell Robert the attempt failed? A lot could go wrong.

I think you’re under the impression Varys ordered the attempt. He didn’t, it was simply announced that there was a lordship in it for whoever killed Dany. Varys could hardly stop it from happening, it was Littlefinger’s idea after all, and he’d damn sure know whether it had been announced or not. Once it was ordered, all Varys could do was issue the announcement and then make plans to stop any attempts.

[King Ragnar]

2 minutes ago, Shouldve Taken The Black said:

I think you’re under the impression Varys ordered the attempt. He didn’t, it was simply announced that there was a lordship in it for whoever killed Dany. Varys could hardly stop it from happening, it was Littlefinger’s idea after all, and he’d damn sure know whether it had been announced or not. Once it was ordered, all Varys could do was issue the announcement and then make plans to stop any attempts.

 

My mind might be fogged by the show but I was indeed under the impression that Varys made the arrangements for the attack.

[black_hart]

Remember Robert backtracking on the issue later and Varys reply to Eddard? Ha, found it.

Eddard XIII:

Certainly Varys had once been young. Ned doubted that he had ever been innocent. "You mention children. Robert had a change of heart concerning Daenerys Targaryen. Whatever arrangements you made, I want unmade. At once."

"Alas," said Varys. "At once may be too late. I fear those birds have flown. But I shall do what I can, my lord. With your leave." He bowed and vanished down the steps, his soft-soled slippers whispering against the stone as he made his descent.

[Shouldve Taken The Black]

1 minute ago, Lord Ragnar said:

My mind might be fogged by the show but I was indeed under the impression that Varys made the arrangements for the attack.

It’s not made 100% clear, but I think Littlefinger suggests rather than paying for an assassin, simply to announce that whoever kills her gets the lordship. Varys certainly would have been expected to disseminate that information, but not to organise the attack.

[Lord Varys]

Varys and Illyrio played Robert and the Small Council and through them Jorah, Dany, and Drogo.

The plan was to make it official that Robert wanted Dany and Viserys III dead and then set up an agent of Varys and Illyrio's choosing to fail in an assassination attempt. The caravan of the wine seller comes from Pentos, he has closed cask (allegedly) containing poisoned wine. Did the wine seller poison the wine himself? Most likely not. He was given it by Varys/Illyrio's people who were perceived to have acted under Robert's orders (which they actually did, through Varys).

But Varys and Illyrio both would have sent letters to Jorah warning them about the poisoner they themselves sent to convince Drogo to invade Westeros. And if you remember that the wine seller didn't actually intend to poison Dany at his shop but rather hand her the poisoned cask so that she and Drogo (and presumably Viserys III, too, had he still be alive) could share it later on. That means there would have been ample time for Jorah to get the message, and prevent them from drinking.

To ensure that nobody is actually killed or in danger of being killed we can also assume that Varys/Illyrio never gave the wine seller and actually poisoned cask. They just told him he was poisoned and he would believe and act as if it was poisoned.

Some independent wine seller from the Free Cities would never have received word about the lordship Robert this quickly, nor would such a person have been as mad as actually try to murder a khaleesi in the middle of Vaes Dothrak all by himself. He must have been assured by Varys/Illyrio that a costly poison which cannot be detected (like the Tears of Lys) was in the cask so that the poisoning could never be traced back to him. But some independent guy most likely has neither the connections, money, or expertise to come up with something like that this quickly.

[Russellstiltskin]

Not suere how you're darriving at these assumptions...The assassins that belong to a guild or are highly skilled independents would be LESS likely, imho, to attempt the assassination: the guild's policies seem to be that they are specifically sought out for a job, then decide whether or not to accept, and, based on risk and profile of target(s), they set their price accordingly; whereas an independent would be more likely to find out about the offer at all, the price of a mere lordship (with no specified lands or incomes) weighed against the risk of ANY attempt on a Khaleesi in the midst of her khalasaar may seem unworthy to an assassin of any wealth or reknown, leaving the more desperate, and less likely to succeed, killers. I'm not on board with the wine being devoid of poison, too big of a leap given the text, iirc. We never hear of a second party, which would make sense given the wineseller's fate, which is tantamount to torture, giving credence to the idea he poisoned/procured it himself. I came away feeling that if Jorah hadn't been there to save her, likely thanks to the letter, the wine merchant may have succeeded, however clever or unclever his ruse may have been. Jorah is Varys' ace in the hole here, not the wine. Think about his interaction with Tyrion concerning Shae's whereabouts and existence as Tyrion's kept woman: T says something like " if the Queen asks, you will tell her some clever lie," to which V replies  " no, I will tell her she's a camp follower you've kept in service since the battle on th Gr Fork...a spider must buy his life anew each day." My point being that while V may be about his own business away from the sm council, he covers his eunuch ass quite masterfully there, never lying really, yet using timing and clever misdirection to headfake the others when need be.   Oh, fyi: could be wrong, but Viserys isn't technically the third of his name as he neither ruled  nor sat the Iron Throne, and I think it's generally accepted that the Targ dynasty was deposed afterRR, leaving him a King in name, perhaps, but even that is debateable, me thinks...

[Lord Varys]

9 minutes ago, Russellstiltskin said:

Not suere how you're darriving at these assumptions...The assassins that belong to a guild or are highly skilled independents would be LESS likely, imho, to attempt the assassination: the guild's policies seem to be that they are specifically sought out for a job, then decide whether or not to accept, and, based on risk and profile of target(s), they set their price accordingly; whereas an independent would be more likely to find out about the offer at all, the price of a mere lordship (with no specified lands or incomes) weighed against the risk of ANY attempt on a Khaleesi in the midst of her khalasaar may seem unworthy to an assassin of any wealth or reknown, leaving the more desperate, and less likely to succeed, killers. I'm not on board with the wine being devoid of poison, too big of a leap given the text, iirc. We never hear of a second party, which would make sense given the wineseller's fate, which is tantamount to torture, giving credence to the idea he poisoned/procured it himself. I came away feeling that if Jorah hadn't been there to save her, likely thanks to the letter, the wine merchant may have succeeded, however clever or unclever his ruse may have been. Jorah is Varys' ace in the hole here, not the wine. Think about his interaction with Tyrion concerning Shae's whereabouts and existence as Tyrion's kept woman: T says something like " if the Queen asks, you will tell her some clever lie," to which V replies  " no, I will tell her she's a camp follower you've kept in service since the battle on th Gr Fork...a spider must buy his life anew each day." My point being that while V may be about his own business away from the sm council, he covers his eunuch ass quite masterfully there, never lying really, yet using timing and clever misdirection to headfake the others when need be.   Oh, fyi: could be wrong, but Viserys isn't technically the third of his name as he neither ruled  nor sat the Iron Throne, and I think it's generally accepted that the Targ dynasty was deposed afterRR, leaving him a King in name, perhaps, but even that is debateable, me thinks...

The problem is that Varys and Illyrio don't have any interest to either kill Dany, Viserys III, and/or (especially) Drogo. Yet Dany intended to share the wine with Drogo, and presumably also her brother had he still been alive.

If Drogo had been killed there wouldn't have been a Dothraki invasion of Westeros. And if Dany and Viserys III had been killed without it being identified as a poisoning there wouldn't have been an invasion, either.

But Varys and Illyrio wanted to arrange such an invasion. We know that for a fact thanks to the conversation Arya overheard beneath the Red Keep.

Just counting on Jorah to prevent the assassination is quite risky. What if Jorah was sick when the caravan arrived? What if Jorah had died on the journey through the Dothraki Sea?

In addition, there is the captain of the caravan, another Pentoshi, who shows up rather quickly after the commotion. He might have been Illyrio's man, too, ensuring that nothing happened to Dany while also giving the impression her life was in real danger.

George himself referred to Viserys as 'Viserys III' in a description of the man he sent to Amok. We also know that Queen Rhaella had Viserys crowned king on Dragonstone after his father's death. He may never have sat the Iron Throne but he is as much a king as Stannis, Renly, Robb, or Balon/Euron. And he clearly was seen as a rival pretender by Robert and other lords in Westeros, especially the Targaryen loyalists (Doran Martell, Raymun Darry, etc.).