What About Laenor?

Photo: HBO

House of the Dragon has never been shy about bending the written histories of its source material, Fire & Blood. God knows the history books don’t get everything right. But dragonrider lore is a bit more fickle in the world of Westeros, and one of HotD’s major deviations from George R.R. Martin’s book, the “death� of Laenor Velayron, now challenges an important dragon-riding tradition: the idea that dragons cannot claim more than one rider at a time.

See, in season one, Rhaenyra Targaryen’s first husband, Laenor, absconded with his lover Qarl Correy so that Rhaenyra and Daemon could fake their deaths and Rhaenyra could marry Daemon. In Fire & Blood, Laenor’s death is far more definitive: He’s stabbed to death by Correy for reasons that never become clear, though scholars theorize that Prince Daemon paid him a handsome sum to carry out the plot in order to free up Rhaenyra for marriage. (A theory HotD clearly builds upon.) There’s no hint in Fire & Blood that Laenor fled to live his best gay life (though congrats to Rhaenyra for getting to do that in HotD too). Because Laenor is dead in the book, his dragon Seasmoke is free to bond with Laenor’s half brother Addam of Hull later on. But with Laenor’s death averted in the series, Seasmoke bonding with Addam in episode six raises questions for book readers.

While Martin’s dragon lore isn’t written as gospel, the author himself has recently written, “[dragons] bond with men … some men … and the why and how of that, and how it came to be, will eventually be revealed in more detail in THE WINDS OF WINTER and A DREAM OF SPRING and some in BLOOD & FIRE.� We all know we might not ever get to read Winds, so in the meantime, Martin’s books scatter dragon-bonding evidence throughout. In A Song of Ice and Fire, Daenerys Targaryen speaks about the precious bond between dragon and a singular dragonrider, and history significantly backs this up. No one, not even Aegon the Conqueror, has ever claimed a dragon bonded to a living rider. There’s even more damning precedence in Fire & Blood. (To be very sensitive to spoilers, we’ll redact some specifics of the event where someone tries to ride a claimed dragon.) “She had never known another rider. Though [redacted] was known to her by sight and scent, a familiar presence whose fumbling at her chains excited no alarm, the great [redacted] she-dragon wanted no part of [redacted] astride her … Once in the air, [redacted] twisted beneath [redacted], fighting to be free of this unfamiliar rider.�

So, if Laenor is still alive in HotD, how can Addam ride Seasmoke? Clearly the show is taking great pains to demonstrate that Seasmoke is the one doing the claiming. The dragon is seen flying above Addam in multiple scenes, and in “Smallfolk,� Seasmoke makes it clear that any rider (RIP Ser Darklyn) won’t do. He wants Addam, Corlys’s bastard son. (In the book, Addam and Alyn’s mother Marilda claimed that Laenor was their father, but if he could’ve given a woman kids, we probably wouldn’t be in this situation. The book’s historians are also skeptical and ultimately determine that Corlys was their father). It’s rare, if not completely unprecedented, for a dragon to actually chase down a potential rider, as Seasmoke did with a terrified Addam at the end of last week’s episode, and it proved to be a successful bond, as Rhaenyra is told that Seasmoke has been spotted with a new rider and immediately flies off on Syrax to find him.

What’s going on here? Is Laenor dead? We never saw him reach Pentos — perhaps he died on his way, or had a good six years there before dying in another manner. House of the Dragon pokes at this idea in “The Burning Mill,� when Mysaria asks Rhaenyra about Seasmoke as he flies in front of them. “My late lord husband’s dragon,� Rhaenyra tells her. “He’s grown restless of late. We cannot know why.� Mysaria replies, “Maybe he’s lonely,� and Rhaenyra looks bewildered. Did she realize that Laenor is in trouble or dead here? Or was this scene actually just a set-up for that kiss? I originally thought this conversation would prompt Rhaenyra to try to reach out to Laenor, but nearly four episodes later, that seems to be bottom of the Queen’s to-do list. If Laenor is still alive (and an offscreen death for the show’s rare happy ending would certainly be disappointing), then perhaps Seasmoke’s restless nature grows from being left behind. Laenor lives, but his bond with Seasmoke is as good as dead, so Seasmoke is free to find a new rider. (To be clear, this would be a completely new bit of dragon mythology that the show is casually dropping with no fanfare.)

But like it did with the introduction of Daeron, Alicent’s absent fourth child, perhaps House of the Dragon is saving Laenor’s return for a plot point in a later season. Maybe Laenor is alive and plans to seek out Rhaenyra and/or Seasmoke later on. It would be a massive book departure for Leanor to reappear from the grave, and there’s not an easy space in the source material to reintroduce him in a significant way. It would be tough to discuss Seasmoke custody during the already time-consuming Dance of the Dragons. Maybe “The Burning Mill� scene and Addam’s new bond is the end of the “Where’s Laenor?� question. Our main characters are in the midst of a great war and Laenor is as good as dead to everyone else. Perhaps it’s time to follow Seasmoke’s lead and move on.