House of the Dragon Season 3, Episode 1 Recap: The Wait Is Over

It has been almost two years since House of the Dragon season two left our screens, so don’t feel bad if you’re entering season three with what feels like a bout of amnesia. A lot has happened in those two years—Trump was reelected, Katy Perry went to space, and the Knicks won the NBA Championship. Who has had time to reminisce on the battle between Team Green and Team Black? A quick scan of a season two recap may make you feel prepared to dive into “Salt and Sea, Fire and Blood,” but as the action kicks off in the season three premiere, one feels almost like they were dropped in the middle of an all-important college exam, only to realize they never did the assigned reading.

Case in point: we reenter the world of Westeros to find Rhaena, Rhaenyra’s step-daughter and the youngest of Daemon’s daughters with the late Laena Velaryon (see, I’m already confused again), bonding with a wild, unclaimed dragon with a severe underbite, Sheepstealer. After failing to claim a dragon when she was younger, Rhaena was tasked to act as a sort of au pair for Rhaenyra’s younger sons and escort them to Pentos, where they will be safe as the war continues to escalate. It is at a stop at the Eyrie along this journey that Rhaena comes upon Sheepstealer, who allows Rhaena to claim him, and finally makes the young girl feel like a legitimate Targaryen.

Sheepstealer quickly lives up to his name as he provides the starving Rhaena with some roasted sheep. It is a specious sign that the two have bonded, but Rhaena will soon find out that one shared meal does not a duo make.

While Rhaena is going through a bit of a coming-of-age, her cousin, Aemond, has proven he hasn’t changed a bit. We are reintroduced to the one-eyed prince as he attempts to find his brother, King Aegon. He learns Aegon has fled King’s Landing with the help of Larys Strong, the Clubfoot. Last season, Larys convinced Aegon—who, like Sheepstealer’s sheep, is burnt to a crisp after Aemond attacked him with dragon fire—that his best course of action is to hide and wait out the war, only to retake the throne after the two sides slaughter each other. Unfortunately, Larys and Aegon don’t get very far. They are stopped by Rhaenyra loyalists and asked to pledge their allegiance to Team Black. The faithless Larys immediately bends the knee, but Aegon is none too keen to express his devotion to his half-sister. As the captors prepare to take both of their heads, Larys steps in, revealing Aegon’s royal identity and convincing the captors to deliver them alive to Rhaenyra for a hefty reward. Larys may have saved their lives for the moment, but their future isn’t looking too bright.

Unaware that Aegon is currently being hand-delivered to her, Rhaenyra gathers her council at Dragonstone to announce her new plan. Last season, Queen Mother Alicent snuck over to Dragonstone in an attempt to form a peace treaty with Rhaenyra. The proposal was simple: Alicent would send Aemond to Harrenhal, and with Aegon bedridden, that would leave his wife, Helaena, for Alicent to manipulate. Alicent promised that Helaena would open King’s Landing’s gates, allowing Rhaenyra to enter the city as conqueror and take the Iron Throne. In return, Alicent wanted her children spared. After some negotiations, Rhaenyra insisted Aegon had to die as a usurper, but Alicent and Helaena could live.

Now, this plot sounds too good to be true, which is likely why Rhaenyra’s son and Hand to the Queen, Jacaerys, doesn’t buy it. It’s hard to gauge Alicent’s intentions—she’s been lying for two seasons straight—but at this point, her aims are irrelevant. She returns to King’s Landing to find that Aegon has fled, and Aemond refuses to leave. In fact, he’s gotten comfortable on the Iron Throne himself.

Daemon—who spent the majority of last season hallucinating at Harrenhal—is back on the battlefield fighting for his Queen, and this time, he has troops from the North on his side. He is successful in his latest endeavor, likely aided by the fact that Aemond was supposed to join the fight against him, but has left the Green Hand of the King, Ser Criston Cole, and Alicent’s younger brother, Gwayne Hightower, to face Daemon on their own. Also waiting for Aemond’s arrival are the three newly-crowned dragon riders discovered by Rhaenyra last season in an attempt to round out Black’s dragon army. The trio is tasked to attack Aemond and his dragon, Vhagar, upon his arrival at Harrenhal, but get antsy when he fails to show. It is the appearance of last season’s self-proclaimed witch, Alys Rivers, as well as a faun-like creature that looks to have stumbled out of Narnia, which leads Ulf—the most uncouth of the new riders—to flee the scene.

But perhaps Ulf has left too soon. He will miss the feast Aemond plans to hold at Harrenhal in Alicent’s honor. The mercurial prince announces his intentions after his mother convinces him that he must head to Harrenhal. It takes a good amount of pandering to get Aemond to agree to leave King’s Landing, but eventually he relents, sealing the deal with a kiss on his mother’s lips, which she accepts with open eyes and the draining of whatever dignity she still held.

That finally brings us to the sea, where naval commander Lord Corlys Velaryon, the Sea Snake, is defending the water on behalf of Rhaenyra. It is there that the Sea Snake’s legions are attacked by a foreign alliance, the Triarchy. Last season, Ser Tyland Lannister sailed to Essos in order to acquire more manpower for Team Green. It was there he met Admiral Sharako Lohar of the Bitchfist (yes, that is her boat’s name), and the two made a deal to take on Team Black together. Unfortunately for Tyland, once the headstrong Lohar comes face-to-face with her longtime enemy, Corlys, her deal with Team Green goes out the window. It seems Lohar’s only goal is to shove the Bitchfist right up Corlys’s you-know-what. So, she attacks with all her might, leading to a spectacular battle scene that leaves arrows soaring, swords swiping, and blood spraying.

When Rhaenyra hears of the battle, she prepares to join the fight, but is stopped by her son, Jace. Despite being Hand of the Queen, Jace is only a teenager. His frontal lobe is barely developed. He is fed up with Rhaenyra constantly ignoring his advice, and he feels threatened by the three new dragon riders. He is also clearly under the influence of some lingering misogyny, despite his mother’s proven strength. So, he locks Rhaenyra in her room to “protect her” and takes flight alongside his betrothed, Baela (whom he apparently feels is fit for battle, despite the fact that she’s just a teenager, too), to head to Corlys’s aid.

After some initial bloodshed on the side of Team Black, things start looking up. Baela and Jace arrive on dragonback and begin to light up the Triarchy’s ships. Corlys, meanwhile, takes advantage of Lohar’s one-track mind and bates her into a narrow corridor he’s sure will wreck her ship. Unfortunately, Lohar proves indefatigable. She strikes Jace’s dragon, Vermax, with a dagger and survives the chase with Corlys, only to ram the Bitchfist into his ship and attack his troops in an all-out battle. Corlys falls overboard, leaving his illegitimate son, Alyn, to take on Lohar. The two engage in an intimate battle in the water, one that ends with Alyn slicing Lohar’s throat.

Around this time, Rhaena enters the picture with Sheepstealer. As stated before, Rhaena is a new rider, and she hasn’t mastered her steed just yet. Sheepstealer burns ships without distinction, lighting up allies’ and enemies’ vessels alike. He then starts chasing after Baela’s dragon, Moondancer. This leads the three dragons into a dance through the sky as Jace and Vermaz attempt to save Baela and Moondancer from Sheepstealer. In the hubbub, Vermax gets hit with another dagger, one that drags him into the ocean with Jace still aboard. Jace is able to free himself before he drowns with his beast, but upon resurfacing, he is immediately hit with numerous arrows, ending his life as he floats among the wreckage.

After two seasons of lead-up, the war is officially underway. While it may have taken the entirety of “Salt and Sea, Fire and Blood” to get our bearings, Westeros once again feels like home—albeit a very violent one—and we are ready to dive into battle. If the Battle of the Gullet, as this episode’s conflict is called, is any indication, it’s going to be a bloody one.