The Provenance || Jon Snow | Game of Thrones

9.07

The explosions are palpable but rather quiet to the crowds around him, made louder just one moment later as the people surge back at the nearby sound of Viserion as he shrieks and takes out another scorpion. The people seem alarmed by the blue flames of the beast, and Oberyn supposes he would be too if not having seen them before—and how hot they burn. But within that moment of chaos that only seems to grow with each moment—the streams of Lannister soldiers never ending but still waning with respect to the forces of Daenerys Targaryen—Oberyn recognizes how grossly one-handed this battle is as the front gate explodes nearby, his ears ringing with cries and war before being shoved roughly to the side.

And though he supposes the man must not have recognized him—for else, he would not have done it—Oberyn looks to the perpetrator as he dashes off...only to realize it is Jaime Lannister himself. Without a moment's hesitation, Oberyn turns after the man he knows will lead him to Cersei...the one person he may get his vengeance on. And Oberyn is solely focused on that plight, now that his duty to the Mock Queen is done.

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Qyburn slowly sidles up to Cersei in that perpetual creep that often has her flinching in alarm when he finally speaks, perpetually quiet but truly silent in his footsteps. And while it would have caught her off guard on any day prior, today she is far more lost to the moment—as she stares out at the vast scene before her, of dragons and conquest and breathing as she recognizes the man behind her. But she pays little mind to the man whose expressions seem convinced of their loss, looking only to the view afront her eyes with hope that their final plan is in the works. And yet, she's not so lost to her madness to see that there are now three dragons, of which the closest one is not of its brothers, but icy and spewing blue flames on the screaming men below—unnatural.

Qyburn coughs, "Your Grace—"

"All we need are a few good shots," Cersei verbalizes what she has been repeating to herself. They only need three arrows to destroy the advantage that Daenerys has—just three.

But Qyburn—not completely out of sense—stares at her, knowing that Cersei can see the fire in the bay and upon the walls. And he has to wonder whether he's truly lost her, pointing out, "The scorpions have all been destroyed, Your Grace."

"The Iron Fleet hold Blackwater Bay," Cersei remembers. "The scorpions have injured one of her dragons before. Euron can do it again."

But Qyburn's brows fall with confusion at her startling lack of vision, "Your Grace, the Iron Fleet is burning. And one of the dragons is undead. It won't fall."

"The wildfire then—" she tries.

But Qyburn cuts in with the only chance that they had, extinguished, "—Has been neutralized, your Grace. The gates have been breached. The Golden Company—"

"Our men will fight harder than sellswords ever could," she recognizes that those men are lost before he even says it, reasoning, "They will defend their queen to the last man."

He wants to tell her it's an inevitable loss, that there is no way to defeat an already dead dragon. But Qyburn also remembers how Cersei has defeated the impossible before, and so he just bows his head, "Yes, Your Grace."

"The Red Keep has never fallen. It won't fall today," Cersei tells him, and yet, she knows who is at play here...who it was that rose the undead dragon...who it was that neutralized the wildfire.