How Long Has This Been Going On, Alicent and Ser Criston?

Photo: Ollie Upton/HBO

In true Game of Thrones fashion, there was a cruel child murder on our television screens this weekend, but let’s talk about what really knocked audiences off their couches: Ser Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel) and the Dowager Queen Alicent (Olivia Cooke) getting it on all over the Red Keep. As is House of the Dragon’s custom, much seems to have transpired in the short span between seasons one and two. When did this sexual chemistry develop — and so fervently, as we witnessed them having sex twice in the season premiere? Even kinkier, their second tryst, which Helaena interrupts, takes place in Rhaenyra’s old bedroom. These two really match each other’s freak. But seriously, how long have Criston and Alicent been engaging in hate sex? (I refuse to believe it’s love.) We have a few ideas.

Theory one is harebrained, but follow us: What if they’ve been having sex for as long as Daeron Targaryen has been alive? Yes, what if Daeron, Alicent and Viserys’s fourth and unseen child, is actually a Cole bastard? Daeron is an important player in George R.R. Martin’s Fire & Blood, but we have yet to see or hear of him on the show. Though Daeron hasn’t been included in Daemon’s constant count of dragons — in the book, he has the cobalt-hued Tessarion — showrunner Ryan Condal has confirmed Daeron will join the series “all in due time.� Meanwhile, Martin wrote on his blog that the youngest Hightower-Targaryen is “down in Oldtown.� In Fire & Blood, Daeron is sent to Oldtown to serve as a cupbearer.

Is there a curly-haired, vaguely Latino-looking boy hidden away in Oldtown? It would be a satisfying explanation for why Daeron hasn’t been mentioned on House of the Dragon, especially since Rhaenyra and Daemon’s young children, Aegon III and Viserys II, have been shown in brief glimpses. In the same blog, Martin writes, “YES, Alicent gave Viserys four children, three sons and a daughter.� Not to be incredibly pedantic, but “Alicent gave� leaves room for a much different interpretation than “Viserys and Alicent had.� If the show is posing Rhaenyra and Alicent as inextricably linked, it would be quite fascinating for Alicent to bear a bastard of her own and hide him away as long as possible.

Theory two is much simpler and more probable: Ser Criston and Alicent have been together since around Viserys’s death. Alicent has been dutiful and has sacrificed, and she, like everyone, deserves an era of fucking hot but terrible men. Who can blame her when her sex life has been so miserable? We already know nothing gets Team Green hornier than the thought of usurping Rhaenyra’s throne … except maybe Rhaenyra existing. Both Cooke and Frankel recently discussed the fact that Alicent “had her eye on Criston Cole� since she was a girl, which adds more color to her rift with Rhaenyra. And as Cooke told Elle about Alicent’s state of mind after Viserys’s death, “You never see it, but I’m imagining in the throes of grief and despair and also confusion, Criston Cole has always been there, and I think something just blossomed from that.� The timeline still seems unclear to Cooke, but it does sound as if the two needed to grieve … together.