Winning the Game of Thrones: The Host of Characters and their Agendas (30 page)

Ser Ilyn Payne

“He hasn’t been very talkative these last 20 years. Since the Mad King had his tongue ripped out with hot pincers.”

played by Wilko Johnson

In the books, Ser Ilyn was captain of the guards for Tywin Lannister and joked that Tywin as Hand was the real ruler of Westeros: Aerys had his tongue cut out for the insult. King Robert made Ser Ilyn his new King’s Justice when he married Cersei as a goodwill gesture to the Lannisters. He frightens most people, including Sansa. He is the one to execute Ned Stark, and keeps his sword Ice for a time.

Brotherhood without Banners

This is also the name of Martin’s fan club, which throws parties for him at conferences.

Beric Dondarrion

played by Richard Dormer

In Season One, Ned Stark sends him to bring justice to Gregor “The Mountain” Clegane. When the War of the Five Kings begins, he takes on leadership of the Brotherhood Without Banners, soldiers who defend the land against all the marauding armies. Most of the scenes in Harrenhal contain mention of their deeds, an irritant to the Lannisters. It’s eventually revealed that Beric has died multiple times, each time being brought back by Thoros of Myr.

Thoros of Myr

played by Paul Kaye

Thoros of Myr is a red priest, from the same religion as the red priestess Melisandre. In the book, he travels to Westeros when he discovers King Aerys’ obsession with fire, while in the show, Melisandre mentions he was sent to convert King Robert. Either way, King Robert liked him as he fought in tournaments with a flashy flaming sword coated in wildfire. Later, he joins the Brotherhood and discovers that after the dragons’ return he has developed true powers…

Night’s Watch

Lord Commander Jeor “The Old Bear” Mormont

“I’ll not sit meekly by and wait for the snows. I mean to find out what’s happening. The Night’s Watch will ride in force, against the Wildlings, the White Walkers and whatever else is out there.”

played by James Cosmo

Jeor Mormont is the Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch. He ends season one by leading a great ranging north of the Wall to investigate sightings of White Walkers. He once led House Mormont until he took the black. Jeor’s sister Maege and her daughters rule Bear Island.

Jeor chooses Jon Snow as his personal steward and is likely grooming him for command. When Jon slays a wight and saves him, Jeor gives him the House Mormont ancestral sword Longclaw. He is killed at Craster’s holding when he loses control of his men and a fight breaks out.

Maester Aemon 

played by Peter Vaughan

Aemon is the maester (healer, loremaster, and message-sender) at Castle Black. He was born Aemon Targaryen, great uncle (on the show, just uncle) to Mad King Aerys, though few remember his history. He’s also the older brother of Egg (Aegon V) from the
Dunk and Egg
 tales. He’s about a hundred years old and blind. He, like other maesters, decides it’s his duty to take no part in the War of the Five Kings. In Robert’s Rebellion, he likewise stayed away from the fighting and let his identity vanish under his maester’s chain. Samwell Tarly is assigned as Aemon’s steward. See the
Targaryen family tree
.

Yoren

played by Francis Magee

This Night’s Watch recruiter meets Tyrion when he visits the Wall. Yoren rescues Arya from King’s Landing and escorts her north, disguised as one of his many boys. He defies Joffrey’s soldiers when they come to kill
Gendry
, and he’s killed for it in season two.

Ser Alliser Thorne 

“You’re boys, still. And come the winter, you will die...like flies.”

played by Owen Teale

The Night’s Watch Master-at-Arms is cruel and malicious. He’s responsible for training new recruits and nicknames Jon “Lord Snow.” He’s crueler to Sam, whom Jon takes under this protection.

Samwell “Sam” Tarly

“I read it in a book”

played by John Bradley-West.

Samwell Tarly is the oldest son and former heir of Lord Randyll Tarly, the head of House Tarly. He thinks of himself as a coward and is relieved to become Maester Aemon’s steward. He also becomes Jon’s close friend and takes his oath beside him at the heart tree. At Craster’s Keep. Sam falls for Gilly, one of Craster’s daughter-wives.

Qhorin Halfhand

“So it is possible for someone to survive on their own out here?”

“Possible for the Halfhand” – Jon Snow and Commander Mormont

played by Simon Armstrong

Qhorin Halfhand is an experienced ranger scout, missing half his hand from a wildling battle. He leads a small scouting party including Jon north of the Wall where they capture Ygritte and Qhorin convinces Jon to kill him and turn spy in Mance Rayder’s camp. He dies at the end of season two.

North of the Wall

Mance Rayder

“Mance was one of us once. Now he’s one of them...we need to be more like them – do things their way.” –Qhorin Halfhand

played by Ciarán Hinds

Mance Rayder, once a noted ranger of the Night’s Watch, deserted his post and fled north of the Wall to become wildling leader and King-Beyond-the-Wall more than a decade ago. He’s been recruiting nearly all the wildlings to stand united against the White Walkers. The Night’s Watch regards him as a traitor and enemy threat. Though he’s mentioned earlier, he first appears in season three.

Ygritte

“You know nothing, Jon Snow.”

played by Rose Leslie

Lovely red-haired Ygritte fights for the free folk under Mance Rayder. She takes a liking to Jon Snow and expects him to show loyalty only to her as she offers to him.

Tormund Giantsbane

played by Kristofer Hivju

A Wildling leader under Mance Rayder, he commands Jon and Ygritte’s assault on the Wall.

Craster

played by Robert Pugh

Craster is a disturbing ally who marries his daughters and has no sons. In fact, he sacrifices them to the White Walkers. After Commander Mormont, Sam, and the others are injured in battle they return to Craster’s Keep. He’s less than friendly, and is finally killed when his stinginess leads to violence.

Gilly

played by Hannah Murray

Craster’s daughter-wife and pregnant with a son. Sam cares for her and attempts to rescue her on their first meeting. When he returns to her home, she’s giving birth to a son, doomed to be sacrificed by her father. They escape together, heading south for the Wall.

House Targaryen in Exile

Seat: Dragonstone and King’s Landing (formerly)

Sigil: A three-headed red dragon on a black background

Motto: “Fire and Blood”

See the
Targaryen family tree

Symbolism: The Celtic dragon was an ancient symbol of fertility, wisdom, and immortality. This creature was worn on kings’ torques as a sign of royal rule. Druids revered the serpent and its counterpart the dragon as a source of healing, along with the egg-shaped stones they believed it laid. Daenerys finds the power within these stone eggs for herself, along with the power of divine rule.

Daenerys

“Not a queen, a Khaleesi.”

played by Emilia Clarke

Daenerys was born to Queen Rhaella on Dragonstone, following the death of her father King Aerys at the end of Robert’s Rebellion. Her mother died in childbirth and the king’s Master-at-Arms, Ser Willem Darry, spirited Daenerys and her older brother Viserys across the sea. He eventually died, and with no protector, Viserys was called the “Beggar King” as he courted wealthy friends but had to sell all their assets including their mother’s crown to survive. Viserys was abusive, but Daenerys’s only protector. At last,
Illyrio Mopatis
arranged a marriage between Princess Daenerys and Khal Drogo. Drogo could provide ten thousand Dothraki warriors for Viserys to lead to Westeros.

Drogo gave his bride a stunning silver mare. In the book Drogo is more sympathetic toward his twelve-year-old bride; on the show, he’s more brutal and terrifying. In both stories, Daenerys accustoms herself to being Drogo’s khaleesi, and begins to claim power and determine her own destiny.

In Vaes Dothrak it’s proclaimed that Drogo and Daenerys’s unborn child, the Stallion Who Mounts the World, will conquer all known lands. Daenerys loses Drogo and her unborn child when she trusts a Maegi to tend his festering wound, but she enters his pyre and emerges with her dragon eggs, hatched. From there, she travels to the city of Qarth on the edge of the Red Waste and then Astapor, Yunkai and Meereen in Slaver’s Bay, seeking an army and ships to carry her to Westeros.

Viserys Targaryen

“You’ll wake the dragon!”

played by Harry Lloyd

Daenerys’s brother is brutal, with a noticeable trace of his father’s madness. He is the one to teach Daenerys about Westeros before his death and she remembers him with conflicted feelings. When an angry Viserys sheds blood in Vaes Dothrak and threatens Daenerys, Drogo kills him by pouring molten gold on his head.

Khal Drogo

“A khal who cannot ride is no khal at all.”

played by Jason Momoa

Drogo is khal of a khalasar of ten thousand. He comes to love and value Daenerys, helping her cultivate her independence. He sinks into catatonia at the hands of Mirri Maz Duur, and his funeral pyre awakens Daenerys’s dragons.

Rhaego

Drogo and Daenerys’s son. He was to be the Stallion that Mounts the World before he was killed before birth.

Ser Jorah Mormont

“There are times when I look at you, and I still can’t believe you’re real.” – Ser Jorah to Daenerys

played by Iain Glen

Jorah is a knight from Bear Island in Westeros and the son of Jeor Mormont, Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch. Young, he married a greedy woman, Lynesse Hightower. He began arresting poachers and selling them into slavery to pay his debts, as she could only be satisfied with great luxuries. He fled across the sea before Ned Stark, his liege lord, could arrest him. However, in the Free Cities, his wife left him for a wealthier man.

At Daenerys’s wedding, Jorah offers his fealty to Viserys, and gives Daenerys several books of stories and histories about Westeros. Before much time has passed, however, he transfers his loyalties from dragon king to dragon queen. Originally, Jorah joins Daenerys as a spy for Varys, and passes along important information such as her pregnancy. However, Jorah comes to love Daenerys and turns his back on King’s Landing despite the offer of a royal pardon.

See
Ser Barristan the Bold
(under King’s Landing)

Doreah, Jhiqui and Irri 

“It is known”

Daenerys’s handmaidens. Doreah, a trained courtesan, advises Daenerys and sleeps with her brother. In the book, she dies in the desert and Irri and Jhiqui follow Daenerys through all her adventures. On the show, Doreah betrays Daenerys with Xaro Xhoan Daxos and she leaves them both to die. Irri dies guarding Daenerys’s dragons.

Aggo, Jhogo/Kovarro, and Rakharo

Daenerys’s bloodriders. At the wedding,
Drogo’s bloodriders offer Daenerys
 
fine weapons – a whip, an
 
arakh
, and a
 
dragonbone
 
bow – and, as per tradition, she gives them to her husband, protesting that she is only a woman.
When Drogo dies, Daenerys offers Drogo’s three greatest warriors, the “blood of his blood,” these weapons and asks them to be her bloodriders. They refuse, as there has never been a female khal. When she emerges from the flames with her dragons, they kneel and pledge service. On the show, Rakharo is killed by a rival khal, but the bloodriders survive in the books.

Mirri Maz Duur

“Life must pay for life”

played by Mia Soteriou

The Lhazareen witch is a godswife who studied in Asshai and learned magic and prophecy. Khal Drogo’s khalasar enslaves her and Daenerys saves her. As a reward, Mirri Maz Duur makes Drogo a healing poultice. On the show, she seems malevolent, but in the book, Drogo rips it off and ignores instructions, leaving it ambiguous whether it was poisoned or his own stubbornness dooms him. Regardless, Drogo’s wound festers and he falls fatally ill. Daenerys asks Mirri Maz Duur to preserve him with blood magic. However, sacrificing Drogo’s horse is not enough, and Daenerys’s baby miscarries. Drogo lives but has no awareness, and Daenerys must sadly end his life. She binds Mirri Maz Duur to Drogo’s funeral pyre and kills her, but also ironically proves Mirri’s insistence that life can bring forth life – her sacrifices awaken Daenerys’s dragons.

Dragons

The dragons are Viserion (white), Rhaegal (green) and Drogon (black, the largest and fiercest), named after her two deceased brothers and her late husband, respectively. In Qarth, Daenerys is given a crown decorated with three dragons in those colors. The dragons get progressively larger in each book, until they’re rideable by the fifth one, if no longer especially tame…

Missandei 

played by Nathalie Emmanuel

A slave of the free cities, she translates for Daenerys, though the khaleesi doesn’t really need the help. Missandei also advises Daenerys on the local culture after the khaleesi frees her.

Grey Worm

played by Jacob Anderson

Grey Worm, the head of Daenerys’s unsullied army, keeps the random name he drew from the pot the day she freed him (in the book), as he considers it lucky. He proves devoted to her.

Independent Characters

Illyrio Mopatis