Wake The Dragon I (Azor Ahai)

[Sydney Mae]

Wings shadowed her fever dreams.

"You don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

Daenerys is in a long hallway.  At the far end is the red door.  This red door is her goal.  The doorway to her future.  It is figuratively the house in Braavos where she spent her childhood under the care of Ser Willem Darry and King Viserys the Third.  The door is more than that though.  That door is their kingdom idealized by Viserys.  Westeros.  The red door is the objective for the future but also memories of her past childhood.

"You don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

The next scene is her life with the Dothraki.  Drogo, Jorah, and Viserys feature in this part of the dragon dream.  Jorah stands in front of her dragon eggs and tells her the last dragon was Rhaegar.  The red door felt farther away as if the goal is increasingly out of reach.  Barriers are in her way.  Rhaegar and Viserys stand between her and the throne making the red door out of reach for the time being. 

". . . don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

Viserys was abusing her verbally and physically.  The molten gold kills Viserys.  Now the path to the throne is clear. 

". . .don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

She could feel the cold behind her.  If it caught her she would die a death that was more than death, howling forever alone in the darkness.  The red door is far ahead.  She ran faster.

". . .don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

This part is about the son she lost, Prince Rhaego.  She mourned the son and cried for the loss.

". . .want to wake the dragon . . ."

Ghosts lined the hallway, dressed in the faded raiments of kings and holding swords of pale fire.  Her ancestors holding swords similar to Dawn.  They had hair the color of silver, gold, and platinum.  Their eyes were opal, amethyst, tourmaline, and jade.  Her ancestors, Azor Ahai, the Emperors during the time of the Great Empire.  "Faster" they told her.  Faster she ran towards the red door.  And Daenerys Targaryen flew.  This is a decision point.  Daenerys Targaryen, Azor Ahai, made her choice to wake the dragons and become the successor to these kings.  

". . .wake the dragon . . ."

The cold starts to recede.  She flew across the Dothraki Sea towards the red door and towards what lies beyond, Westeros.  Towards her home.  Towards her kingdom.  Towards what she inherited from Viserys. 

". . . the dragon . . ."

She see her brother, Prince Rhaegar mounted on a black stallion.  She hears Jorah, "the last, the last."  Dany lifts the visor and the face inside was hers.  Another important turning point in the story.  Daenerys chose to become the dragon and to rule the Seven Kingdoms as Rhaegar and Viserys were destined to do.  She has more power.  Rhaegar was a dragon only because of lineage.  Viserys was anything but a dragon if not for his family.  Daenerys is the real deal the dragon.  Instead of a black stallion her mount is the black dragon, Drogon.

This is the second most important chapter in "A Game of Thrones."  Only the last would have more impact.  The dream guided Dany to her chosen path. The Path of the Dragon.  I interpreted this to mean she had a choice but probably not much.  The dream also clarified who Rhaegal, Viserion, and Drogon truly are.  They are the three most important males to Dany.  Rhaego, Viserys, and Drogo.  The dragons are their spirits and they will watch over Dany. 

The chapter continues and Dany learns what happened to her husband and son.  Jorah did not actually see Rhaego.  We only have the words of Mirri and the Dothraki women.  The Dothraki are superstitious and were easily led by the witch.  We will never know if what she said about Rhaego is true.  This great chapter ends with Dany becoming Azor Ahai after ending the life of her husband and repeated the cycle.  Nissa Nissa is the man this time.  George R. R. Martin crafted literary art in the dream section.  I loved it. 

 

Edited April 12 by Sydney Mae

[Evolett]

Very nice, straightforward and to the point. There are quite a few parallels between Dany's and Bran's waking dreams. In both cases  the cold will lead to their deaths - Bran:

Quote

There was nothing below him now but snow and cold and death, a frozen wasteland where jagged blue-white spires of ice waited to embrace him. They flew up at him like spears.

 

Dany is urged on by her ancestors while Bran is encouraged by the crow (does this tell us something more about the crow?). 

 

9 hours ago, Sydney Mae said:

Faster she ran towards the red door.  And Daenerys Targaryen flew.  This is a decision point.  Daenerys Targaryen, Azor Ahai, made her choice to wake the dragons and become the successor to these kings.

Both have to choose to die or fly to be able to fulfill their future roles, Dany as an aspect of Azor Ahai and Bran as the next Greenseer. 

Quote

Now, Bran, the crow urged. Choose. Fly or die. Death reached for him, screaming. Bran spread his arms and flew.

 

The two dreams clearly identify the cold/winter as the enemy force, Dany fleeing from it and Bran actually seeing into the Heart of Winter itself. Does this suggest the two have a common cause and are meant to work together? 

[Moiraine Sedai]

“A death that was more than death. Howling forever in the darkness.”

I don’t think this is about becoming Dosh Khaleen.  DK isn’t exactly bad because of the power the crones have over the Dothraki.  It’s an interesting line. It’s full of meaning. The most intriguing word is “forever”.  Is this the fate of the ghosts in the hallway? They didn’t run fast enough and darkness took them?  

[Mourning Star]

I agree it’s an important chapter, but I don’t agree with all of the interpretation above.

I think the red door is both literal, and represents her past.

For instance, the op notes Dany is hurtling down the hallway towards the red door, “home”, Westeros.

I think this is a direct reference to Dany’s first chapter:

Quote

Somewhere beyond the sunset, across the narrow sea, lay a land of green hills and flowered plains and great rushing rivers, where towers of dark stone rose amidst magnificent blue-grey mountains, and armored knights rode to battle beneath the banners of their lords.

In the wake the dragon dream chapter:

Quote

She could smell home, she could see it, there, just beyond that door, green fields and great stone houses and arms to keep her warm, there. She threw open the door.

“Banners of Lords” are, of course, also called “Arms”.

So what are the “Arms to keep her warm”?

Quote

The red door was so far ahead of her, and she could feel the icy breath behind, sweeping up on her. If it caught her she would die a death that was more than death, howling forever alone in the darkness. She began to run.

Dragons don’t howl. Not ever in the series, not once.

But you know what does howl, a Direwolf.

And what do we know about the Direwolf? It is the sigil (arms) of House Stark:

Quote

Remember the sigil of our House, Arya."

"The direwolf," she said, thinking of Nymeria. She hugged her knees against her chest, suddenly afraid.

"Let me tell you something about wolves, child. When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies, but the pack survives.

The lone wolf dies, alone and howling in the darkness, the pack survives with arms to keep them warm.

5 hours ago, Evolett said:

There are quite a few parallels between Dany's and Bran's waking dreams.

I agree with this as well, although again with a different interpretation. For one, Dany is running away from the cold darkness, Bran is falling towards it.

I think there is also a literary (almost literal interpretation of the language) way to read Bran’s dream, like I tried to show with Dany above.

5 hours ago, Evolett said:

There was nothing below him now but snow and cold and death, a frozen wasteland where jagged blue-white spires of ice waited to embrace him. They flew up at him like spears. He saw the bones of a thousand other dreamers impaled upon their points. He was desperately afraid.

"Can a man still be brave if he's afraid?" he heard his own voice saying, small and far away.

I think Bran has seen the blue-white spires in the waking world already:

Quote

Something about the way the raven screamed sent a shiver running up Bran's spine. I am almost a man grown, he had to remind himself. I have to be brave now.

But the air was sharp and cold and full of fear. Even Summer was afraid. The fur on his neck was bristling. Shadows stretched against the hillside, black and hungry. All the trees were bowed and twisted by the weight of ice they carried. Some hardly looked like trees at all. Buried from root to crown in frozen snow, they huddled on the hill like giants, monstrous and misshapen creatures hunched against the icy wind. "They are here."

And beneath the hollow hill, impaled on the roots of the frozen trees are the bones of a thousand dreamers:

Quote

"Bones," said Bran. "It's bones." The floor of the passage was littered with the bones of birds and beasts. But there were other bones as well, big ones that must have come from giants and small ones that could have been from children. On either side of them, in niches carved from the stone, skulls looked down on them. Bran saw a bear skull and a wolf skull, half a dozen human skulls and near as many giants. All the rest were small, queerly formed. Children of the forest. The roots had grown in and around and through them, every one. A few had ravens perched atop them, watching them pass with bright black eyes.

I think both Dany and Bran are on for a big surprise when they realize the meaning of their prophetic dreams!

[Here's Looking At You, Kid]

This is a coming of age and accepting your role moment for a person of Dany's lofty stature.  There were only three choices.  Go to Vaes Dothrak, sell the eggs and go with Jorah, or take up where Viserys left and take back Westeros from the usurpers.  She will need to become the Mother of Dragons, Mhysa, and Azor Ahai before she reaches Westeros.  She became Mother of Dragons and Azor Ahai by the end of the book.  She becomes Mhysa two books later.  

 

[chrisdaw]

She was dying and her soul had gone inside the egg, that's what waking the dragon means, death and second life as a dragon, it is her 'home' beyond the red door. The process was occurring for her, Rhaego and Drogo (and Viserys and MMD), but Dany didn't die, she survived so her soul snapped back to her body. Her soul brings back dragon blood with it, so she's able to survive a night in a funeral pyre. Drogo's and Rhaego's souls have made it into the eggs and on waking and in her near death state Dany understands this, that's why she thinks the eggs are the most important things in the world.

Quote

 

"Yes, Khaleesi." Quick as that Jhiqui was gone, bolting from the tent, shouting. Dany needed … something … someone … what? It was important, she knew. It was the only thing in the world that mattered. She rolled onto her side and got an elbow under her, fighting the blanket tangled about her legs. It was so hard to move. The world swam dizzily. I have to …

They found her on the carpet, crawling toward her dragon eggs.

 

Note the someone, the eggs are now a someone, Drogo and Rhaego.

The same thing, getting 99% dead and soul into a dragon egg only to be pulled back out and survive, will have happened to Rhaegar at Summerhall. Having gone that deep and back will have given him a healthy mix of dragon blood too and that will have granted him Dragon Dreams and prove the reason he was obsessed with pursuing prophecy, he's constantly being hit with wake the dragon style dreams. It's why he's going to have an understanding of how to wake the dragon, that it requires at minimum a Rhaego style sacrifice, and hence why he's a sad sack writing songs about the deaths of kings and is morose at the birth of his son, he's spent his life believing first himself and then his children are going to be needed to be sacrificed to wake the dragon.

[Son of Man]

21 hours ago, Sydney Mae said:

Wings shadowed her fever dreams.

"You don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

Daenerys is in a long hallway.  At the far end is the red door.  This red door is her goal.  The doorway to her future.  It is figuratively the house in Braavos where she spent her childhood under the care of Ser Willem Darry and King Viserys the Third.  The door is more than that though.  That door is their kingdom idealized by Viserys.  Westeros.  The red door is the objective for the future but also memories of her past childhood.

"You don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

The next scene is her life with the Dothraki.  Drogo, Jorah, and Viserys feature in this part of the dragon dream.  Jorah stands in front of her dragon eggs and tells her the last dragon was Rhaegar.  The red door felt farther away as if the goal is increasingly out of reach.  Barriers are in her way.  Rhaegar and Viserys stand between her and the throne making the red door out of reach for the time being. 

". . . don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

Viserys was abusing her verbally and physically.  The molten gold kills Viserys.  Now the path to the throne is clear. 

". . .don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

She could feel the cold behind her.  If it caught her she would die a death that was more than death, howling forever alone in the darkness.  The red door is far ahead.  She ran faster.

". . .don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

This part is about the son she lost, Prince Rhaego.  She mourned the son and cried for the loss.

". . .want to wake the dragon . . ."

Ghosts lined the hallway, dressed in the faded raiments of kings and holding swords of pale fire.  Her ancestors holding swords similar to Dawn.  They had hair the color of silver, gold, and platinum.  Their eyes were opal, amethyst, tourmaline, and jade.  Her ancestors, Azor Ahai, the Emperors during the time of the Great Empire.  "Faster" they told her.  Faster she ran towards the red door.  And Daenerys Targaryen flew.  This is a decision point.  Daenerys Targaryen, Azor Ahai, made her choice to wake the dragons and become the successor to these kings.  

". . .wake the dragon . . ."

The cold starts to recede.  She flew across the Dothraki Sea towards the red door and towards what lies beyond, Westeros.  Towards her home.  Towards her kingdom.  Towards what she inherited from Viserys. 

". . . the dragon . . ."

She see her brother, Prince Rhaegar mounted on a black stallion.  She hears Jorah, "the last, the last."  Dany lifts the visor and the face inside was hers.  Another important turning point in the story.  Daenerys chose to become the dragon and to rule the Seven Kingdoms as Rhaegar and Viserys were destined to do.  She has more power.  Rhaegar was a dragon only because of lineage.  Viserys was anything but a dragon if not for his family.  Daenerys is the real deal the dragon.  Instead of a black stallion her mount is the black dragon, Drogon.

This is the second most important chapter in "A Game of Thrones."  Only the last would have more impact.  The dream guided Dany to her chosen path. The Path of the Dragon.  I interpreted this to mean she had a choice but probably not much.  The dream also clarified who Rhaegal, Viserion, and Drogon truly are.  They are the three most important males to Dany.  Rhaego, Viserys, and Drogo.  The dragons are their spirits and they will watch over Dany. 

The chapter continues and Dany learns what happened to her husband and son.  Jorah did not actually see Rhaego.  We only have the words of Mirri and the Dothraki women.  The Dothraki are superstitious and were easily led by the witch.  We will never know if what she said about Rhaego is true.  This great chapter ends with Dany becoming Azor Ahai after ending the life of her husband and repeated the cycle.  Nissa Nissa is the man this time.  George R. R. Martin crafted literary art in the dream section.  I loved it. 

 

So there are two of the three treasons.  The third we later find happened when Ser Jorah got her son killed.  Daenerys herself said so in her thoughts.  MMD murdered Drogo and Rhaego for revenge.  For blood.  Viserys threatened Daenerys for glory, kingdom, and wealth.  Which is good enough to pass for the treason for gold.  Dothraki law made her Khaleesi and Viserys holds no status.  Therefore what he did was an act of treason.  Jorah got her son killed and he did it for love. 

Time is not linear and it's not an arrow when seen by the dead.  The Undying are dead.  They make no distinctions between past, present, and future.  They gave Daenerys a blast of all three simultaneously. 

Daenerys and the Daynes are strangely connected.  The pale swords and Dayne's family sword are too similar to be random coincidence.  Lightbringer lit when AA murdered his wife.  The Glass candles lit after Daenerys suffocated Khal Drogo.  It is no coincidence.  Drogo was NN.  Daenerys made a promise to give Ser Jorah his own Valyrian steel sword in the future and he will be her champion to lead her army against the Others. I think she meant to give the pale sword.  For Queen or Empress it's not fitting to lead an army.  Her work is ruling.  It works out.  Jorah redeems his honor and completes Jeor's job.  Daenerys gets to do the job she's been learning back in Mereen. To learn ruling is why she stayed in Mereen and she is learning. 

[Moiraine Sedai]

The Daynes probably branched off of the Pearl Emperor. Azor Ahai is Dany but it doesn’t mean she will strike the fatal blow that kills Dark Bran Stark and bring the light back to Westeros. A Dayne subject could do that. Dayne and Stark get their rematch and the outcome won’t be the same as it was in the tower of joy. 

Edited April 10 by Moiraine Sedai

[Tai Pan]

"and my karma, my karma which I did not choose, my karma is to be shogun"  (Toshiro Mifune, ending of Shogun, 1980)

It's karma for Daenerys to become Azor Ahai and claim Westeros.  Who would ever choose a dark prison and serve for eternity.  It wasn't a choice of Red Door or Azor Ahai.  It was dark prison or accept the job and be Azor Ahai. 

The Red Door she took.  The house where she grew up had a red door.  Red Door is Westeros.  It is a part of Westeros where they dwelling in Braavod because Viserys was the king and she was the princess.  The house with the red door is like Westeros in exile.  I think of it like it's an embassy and a temporary residence of the royal family.  Choosing Azor Ahai is a choice to return to Westeros. 

[Sydney Mae]

On 4/8/2024 at 9:29 PM, Evolett said:

Very nice, straightforward and to the point. There are quite a few parallels between Dany's and Bran's waking dreams. In both cases  the cold will lead to their deaths - Bran:

Dany is urged on by her ancestors while Bran is encouraged by the crow (does this tell us something more about the crow?). 

 

Both have to choose to die or fly to be able to fulfill their future roles, Dany as an aspect of Azor Ahai and Bran as the next Greenseer. 

The two dreams clearly identify the cold/winter as the enemy force, Dany fleeing from it and Bran actually seeing into the Heart of Winter itself. Does this suggest the two have a common cause and are meant to work together? 

Dany is Azor Ahai.  Bran is the Greenseer.  I think the two are fated to oppose.  

[Sydney Mae]

Updated the title to Wake the Dragon I (Azor Ahai).  Same topic.  

Edited April 12 by Sydney Mae

[The Lord of the Crossing]

The Gods are putting on a play.  The cast over the thousands of years remain the same but they do not get the same roles each time.  The soul is not reincarnated into the same body every time.  Azor Ahai was reincarnated into male bodies in the past but this is the first time Azor Ahai is reincarnated into a female.  And this female has dragons, brains, beauty, and every trait necessary to win against the dark ice.

The Ghosts in the dream are not one family.  How can you get different eye colors in one family.  Azor Ahai is not reincarnated into the same family.  Daenerys is Azor Ahai but not because she is Targaryen.  She is Azor Ahai because the Gods chose her. She is the most capable to lead the Light and Fire against the Dark and Ice. 

The story of the Amethyst Empress and her younger brother is none other than Cersei and Jaime.  Brienne is a tiger in fighting skills and personality.  Jaime takes Cersei's life, per the Valonquar prophecy, and marries Brienne.  They will fail to keep  Westeros strong and the Wolf of Night, Bran, will send the wights to attack the kingdom.  All these troubles befell on the kingdom because the Maiden Made of Light, Daenerys, has disappeared.  Jaime and Bran will continue the Lannister-Stark feud.  The war will be bloodier than the last Lannister-Stark contest because Bran has more weapons.  The land will suffer and the people will bleed. 

[H Wadsworth Longfellow]

On 4/8/2024 at 12:16 PM, Sydney Mae said:

Wings shadowed her fever dreams.

"You don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

Daenerys is in a long hallway.  At the far end is the red door.  This red door is her goal.  The doorway to her future.  It is figuratively the house in Braavos where she spent her childhood under the care of Ser Willem Darry and King Viserys the Third.  The door is more than that though.  That door is their kingdom idealized by Viserys.  Westeros.  The red door is the objective for the future but also memories of her past childhood.

"You don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

The next scene is her life with the Dothraki.  Drogo, Jorah, and Viserys feature in this part of the dragon dream.  Jorah stands in front of her dragon eggs and tells her the last dragon was Rhaegar.  The red door felt farther away as if the goal is increasingly out of reach.  Barriers are in her way.  Rhaegar and Viserys stand between her and the throne making the red door out of reach for the time being. 

". . . don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

Viserys was abusing her verbally and physically.  The molten gold kills Viserys.  Now the path to the throne is clear. 

". . .don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

She could feel the cold behind her.  If it caught her she would die a death that was more than death, howling forever alone in the darkness.  The red door is far ahead.  She ran faster.

". . .don't want to wake the dragon, do you?"

This part is about the son she lost, Prince Rhaego.  She mourned the son and cried for the loss.

". . .want to wake the dragon . . ."

Ghosts lined the hallway, dressed in the faded raiments of kings and holding swords of pale fire.  Her ancestors holding swords similar to Dawn.  They had hair the color of silver, gold, and platinum.  Their eyes were opal, amethyst, tourmaline, and jade.  Her ancestors, Azor Ahai, the Emperors during the time of the Great Empire.  "Faster" they told her.  Faster she ran towards the red door.  And Daenerys Targaryen flew.  This is a decision point.  Daenerys Targaryen, Azor Ahai, made her choice to wake the dragons and become the successor to these kings.  

". . .wake the dragon . . ."

The cold starts to recede.  She flew across the Dothraki Sea towards the red door and towards what lies beyond, Westeros.  Towards her home.  Towards her kingdom.  Towards what she inherited from Viserys. 

". . . the dragon . . ."

She see her brother, Prince Rhaegar mounted on a black stallion.  She hears Jorah, "the last, the last."  Dany lifts the visor and the face inside was hers.  Another important turning point in the story.  Daenerys chose to become the dragon and to rule the Seven Kingdoms as Rhaegar and Viserys were destined to do.  She has more power.  Rhaegar was a dragon only because of lineage.  Viserys was anything but a dragon if not for his family.  Daenerys is the real deal the dragon.  Instead of a black stallion her mount is the black dragon, Drogon.

This is the second most important chapter in "A Game of Thrones."  Only the last would have more impact.  The dream guided Dany to her chosen path. The Path of the Dragon.  I interpreted this to mean she had a choice but probably not much.  The dream also clarified who Rhaegal, Viserion, and Drogon truly are.  They are the three most important males to Dany.  Rhaego, Viserys, and Drogo.  The dragons are their spirits and they will watch over Dany. 

The chapter continues and Dany learns what happened to her husband and son.  Jorah did not actually see Rhaego.  We only have the words of Mirri and the Dothraki women.  The Dothraki are superstitious and were easily led by the witch.  We will never know if what she said about Rhaego is true.  This great chapter ends with Dany becoming Azor Ahai after ending the life of her husband and repeated the cycle.  Nissa Nissa is the man this time.  George R. R. Martin crafted literary art in the dream section.  I loved it. 

 

George put a lot of love in Dany's chapters.  He made sure it was a tour-de-force piece of work and those Dany chapters were among the best in all of the books in "A Song Of Ice and Fire."  Yeah. I'm biased because I love Dany but even the haters can't deny how good those are.  Good enough to stand on their own in a separate novella which won George an award. 

The DK made their proclamation in Vaes Dothrak that she will bring the stallion who mounts the world and who will unite all of the khalasars.  The old ladies were looking past Dany because she is a girl but it turns out she will be the one to do what the stallion is predicted to do, unite the Dothraki. 

[Pontius Pilate]

Dawn was made from the heart of a fallen star.  it's made from a piece of meteor.  We think now it is a one off and no others were made.  The vision says otherwise.  Dany will need to find the swords and give them out to her best people.  The Dayne boy Arya met on the road will earn his spurs one day and will ask for Dawn.  

 

[James Fenimore Cooper XXII]

I think the ghost kings with swords are trapped in the spirit world.  There were killed in battle.  The Others turned their bodies to wights.  Their souls can't pass into the next stage because their bodies are still moving around under the control of the Others.  The souls are still bound to the body.  Cat died but some of her soul was recovered because the body has not broken down. 

 

[Lady Topspin]

The swords making up the Iron Throne were touched by Balerion's fire.  They belonged to the lords who knelt and submitted to the Targaryens.  I feel they hold the power to fight the Others just as effectively as Dawn and the other swords made from the fallen star.

[U. B. Cool]

On 4/17/2024 at 9:12 AM, James Fenimore Cooper XXII said:

I think the ghost kings with swords are trapped in the spirit world.  There were killed in battle.  The Others turned their bodies to wights.  Their souls can't pass into the next stage because their bodies are still moving around under the control of the Others.  The souls are still bound to the body.  Cat died but some of her soul was recovered because the body has not broken down. 

 

And it could nicely explain the second fire.  The fire to light for death.  Dany will burn the corpses to liberate their souls.  The Targaryens burn their dead and this could be their reason.  To give them rest and allow their souls to leave the body.  The Targaryens are unique and unusual people.  If they are even people and not gods.  

Edited April 22 by U. B. Cool

[Darth Sidious]

Dawn could be the Lightbringer. Jon Snow will most likely find his own Darkbringer and fight the new Sword of the Morning. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if a wight Jon Snow fought Edric Dayne in the future.  I think so.