(Spoilers) Sons of the Dragon Reading at LonCon Today

[Ibbison from Ibben]

I hope Fire Eater will forgive me for usurping his role as foreshadowing detector, but -

We have a Brune (Benard, squire to Alyn Stokeworth) bringing down Harren the Red, King of the Rivers. The current Lord Paramount of the Riverlands, Petyr Baelish, is served by Lothar Brune. The Brunes hail from Crackclaw Point, and that noted expert on the region, Nimble Dick Crabb, informs us that all the families from Crackclaw Point are loyal Dragon Men. LF would appear to have a Dragon Mole in his camp.

[Ibbison from Ibben]

If any political motivations were behind the move, than I'm sure Viserys II (in his capacity as Hand) was the one responsible for it.

Part of Baelor's plan was of course to appear so befuddled that all positive results of his actions were attributed to his uncle. And it worked! :drunk:

[yolkboy]

Was there a Q&A with George at LonCon as well, or was it just the reading?

Grrm's timetable....

there was a panel with Connie Willis - this was fun but no asoiaf info here. There were q's at the end, but nothing really came from it. One person asked why he detailed clothes more in asoiaf than fevre dream.

then the reading. He invited questions at the end for a couple of minutes. Nobody would put their hand up at first, so I asked if he was enjoying writing. He gave a funny reply, including that fake history is like real history just with dragons. Again, nothing much came out of the q and a, he has stock answers for anything requiring him to give away his precious secrets.

then he did a signing and that was it.

BTW grrm interview here

grrm did a podcast for guardian too here

[Wmarshal]

I hope Fire Eater will forgive me for usurping his role as foreshadowing detector, but -

We have a Brune (Benard, squire to Alyn Stokeworth) bringing down Harren the Red, King of the Rivers. The current Lord Paramount of the Riverlands, Petyr Baelish, is served by Lothar Brune. The Brunes hail from Crackclaw Point, and that noted expert on the region, Nimble Dick Crabb, informs us that all the families from Crackclaw Point are loyal Dragon Men. LF would appear to have a Dragon Mole in his camp.

This is brilliant.

[stunningsteve]

[i'm pretty sure that Aethon was the son of Daemon Velaryon, the Master of Ships who died during the Conquest. Aethon would be of the same generation as Aegon, whereas Daemon would be closer in age to Aegon's father Aerion.] This marriage raised no objections, since husband and wife were only cousins, not siblings. Unfortunately we don't know if they were first or second cousins, but my guess is the latter (i.e. I expect that Daemon Velaryon had a Targaryen wife). Alyssa had the silver-gold hair of the Valyrians, nothing on her eye color, though.

I would rather guess that Daemon was Aegon's uncle through his mother. So Aethon and Aegon would be first, Aenys and Alyssa second cousins.

[Grievous]

I just have to say THANK YOU for this thread! Apologies for the zero content post, but I think some props are deserved for the contributors who bring the goods and the great discussion.

[RumHam]

Minor thing, but I'm curious. Does anyone who was there remember Martin using the term "Lord Paramount" at any point in the reading? There's been a minor debate about if it's the right term since Littlefinger is the only one who actually gets the title in the books.

Thanks for that and all your notes!

[Arataniello]

Minor thing, but I'm curious. Does anyone who was there remember Martin using the term "Lord Paramount" at any point in the reading? There's been a minor debate about if it's the right term since Littlefinger is the only one who actually gets the title in the books.

Thanks for that and all your notes!

To my recollection, he did not use that term at any point.

[Mithras]

Lodos is a well-known south-western wind in the Aegean Sea. It brings high seas and violent squalls. That priest-king Lodos sounds like a pawn of the Storm God considering the origin of the name.

Aenys was a weak man similar to Aeron. Aenys had a cruel younger brother who usurped his heir’s birthright. Aeron has a cruel older brother who usurped Seastone Chair from Victarion (the chosen of the Drowned God) according to Aeron. Aenys grew stronger after bonding with his dragon and Aeron grew stronger after being drowned in the rebellion and bonding with the Drowned God as he claims.

I think the inversion here might take place as the successor of Aenys (fAegon) might deal with Euron (a pawn of the Storm God according to Aeron) decisively and send his pickled head to Aeron Greyjoy after smashing Euron's army against the walls of Oldtown. How would Euron fans howl to that?

[Lord Varys]

The supposed priest-king Lodos isn't Lodos but a pretender claiming to be him. I tried to make that clear when I said that he wasn't the real deal. I guess we will get the story about the real Lodos in due time.

On Aethon/Alyssa:

Could be. But the preview about the Conquest told us that Valaena also was half-Targaryen, meaning that Aerion's father may have had a sister or cousin who married into the Velaryon family. It would also be possible that there was still a Targaryen cadet branch on Dragonstone, going back to Aenar's cousins, or to Maegon or Aelyx and Baelon, who only produced girl(s) around the time of the Conquest. One of them could have been married to Aethon.

[DNDM]

Great stuff here. Thanks Lord Varys and Arataniello !

Two questions:

- this chapter was entirely written by Archmaester Gyldayn, right? He was not used as a source by another maester?

- I seem to recall from a previous reading of this chapter that the Vale's uprising was a big thing, with some kind of conspiration involved. Did we got, by chance, the name the conspirators gave themselves/were given by the Targaryens loyalists?

[HexMachina]

I asked this in Small Questions a while back, but in light of the reading I suppose I'll ask again here. If incest was a Valyrian custom, do the Velaryons and Celtigars practice it at all?

[shockwave]

So Baelor the Blessed/Beloved/Befuddle 's plan to build the Great Sept in King's Landing and move the seat of the High Septon to the capital was actually a savvy political move to undermine Hightower control of the Faith. ? ! I can buy that. I've always figured Baelor was underrated.

probably just a lucky concidence

or not a politicial move on baelor's part, but Viserys II saw the benefits. Or Viserys II suggested it to Baelor, who didn't see the political advantage

[Mithras]

So Baelor the Blessed/Beloved/Befuddle 's plan to build the Great Sept in King's Landing and move the seat of the High Septon to the capital was actually a savvy political move to undermine Hightower control of the Faith. ? ! I can buy that. I've always figured Baelor was underrated.

I am not sure Baelor the Befuddled was able to come up with such a plan. More like he was a complete pawn of the Faith. Perhaps Viserys II persuaded him to build that sept as Veltigar proposed. But about undermining the influence of Hightower over the Faith, I am not so sure.

Do not tell anybody but I have a theory that three heads of the dragon were three hills upon which the KL was built. Giving one of the heads (Visenya's Hill) of House Targaryen to the complete dominance of the Faith might not be a good idea.

[Ibbison from Ibben]

I find it very strange that Aegon 1.5 hadn't bonded a dragon of his own by the time he married Rhaena. There's no real reason for him to wait for Quicksilver the way Maegor waited for Balerion, since Quicksilver is relatively young. Does anybody have any guesses about this?

The fact that Aegon 1.5 didn't have a dragon may explain why Rhaena didn't have Dreamfyre with her at Crakehall. It would be a bit embarrassing for Aegon, heir to the throne, to be dragonless while his wife wasn't. This is assuming that Rhaena had already bonded with Dreamfyre, but that seems to be a very safe assumption.

[Maia]

The fact that Aegon 1.5 didn't have a dragon may explain why Rhaena didn't have Dreamfyre with her at Crakehall. It would be a bit embarrassing for Aegon, heir to the throne, to be dragonless while his wife wasn't. This is assuming that Rhaena had already bonded with Dreamfyre, but that seems to be a very safe assumption.

Well, that would explain why Rhaena didn't just escape Maegor on dragonback after Aegon 1.5 was killed, I assume. As we know from TPaTQ, younger dragons are swifter flyers than the older ones, so Balerion couldn't have overtaken her. OTOH, if Quicksilver came to his dead rider's son, why didn't Dreamfyre come to her actual rider? Not to mention that with all the brewing unpleasantness, it would have made more sense for them to have at least one dragon along for security reasons.

Maybe, there wasn't a dragon for Aegon 1.5 to bond with? Sure, there had been hatchlings rejected by Maegor, but were they still around by the time Aegon 1.5 was old enough? Or, maybe Aegon 1.5/Alyssa decided to take a page out of Maegor's book and wait for an older dragon to become available. Visenya was over 60 at the time, after all, so it made a certain amount of sense for him to set his sights on Vhagar.

[Rhaenys_Targaryen]

Perhaps Aegon had bonded with one of the hathligs mentioned, but the dragon had died (like Rhaena of Pentos' dragon)

[Maia]

BTW, it seems that tradition of Targaryen children getting eggs in their cradle and bonding resulting hatchlings hadn't been established at that point? Or was Aenys the first example of it, given that it sounds like he bonded with his dragon at an exceptionally young age? Maegor was offered hatchlings from Dragonstone, there is no indication that he had hatched one of them himself.

And, of course, there is the oddity of Balerion, Meraxes and Vhagar apparently not procreating prior to the Conquest. Or did the Targaryens purposefully prevent the eggs from hatching at the time, because their holdings couldn't support more than 3 old dragons at the time?

[Grievous]

I find it very strange that Aegon 1.5 hadn't bonded a dragon of his own by the time he married Rhaena. There's no real reason for him to wait for Quicksilver the way Maegor waited for Balerion, since Quicksilver is relatively young. Does anybody have any guesses about this?

The fact that Aegon 1.5 didn't have a dragon may explain why Rhaena didn't have Dreamfyre with her at Crakehall. It would be a bit embarrassing for Aegon, heir to the throne, to be dragonless while his wife wasn't. This is assuming that Rhaena had already bonded with Dreamfyre, but that seems to be a very safe assumption.

That is a bit odd, considering the news from the reading saying there was a bunch of hatchling around the 20s AC. There are also three Targaryens around whose possible dragons are as of yet unknown. Aegon's and Rhaena's twins, who were likely to be too young (and may have died young?), and Viserys, who may well have had a dragon before he died.

[Rhaenys_Targaryen]

That is a bit odd, considering the news from the reading saying there was a bunch of hatchling around the 20s AC. There are also three Targaryens around whose possible dragons are as of yet unknown. Aegon's and Rhaena's twins, who were likely to be too young (and may have died young?), and Viserys, who may well have had a dragon before he died.

These twins would have been born after the marriage of Rhaena and Aegon (in 41AC), and up to 9 months after Aegon died, somehere in Maegor's reign. So these children would have been old enough to bond with a dragon in Maegor's reign the earliest, and for Maegor, that would have been a dangerous thing to allow.

With half a dozen hatchelings, I find it that the dragons of Rhaena, Aegon, Viserys, Jaehaerys and Alysanne might have been amongst those. Aegon's dragon could have died young, like the dragon of Rhaena of Pentos, leaving him free to bond with Quicksilver after Aenys died.

With five Targaryen children who survived the cradle, and 6 newly hatched dragons, the numbers are kind of even.