Did House Of The Dragon Tease Jacaerys Velaryon's Death?

In HBO's pop culture juggernaut "Game of Thrones," characters often repeat the High Valyrian phrase "valar morghulis," which roughly translates to "all men must die." Unfortunately for the cast of characters in the show's first major spin-off — and prequel — "House of the Dragon," which has also become a huge success for the premium network, this is true for them too; Westeros is a particularly deadly place, and within the first two seasons of "House of the Dragon," a number of major characters have already fallen. So what about Jacaerys Velaryon, played by Harry Collett?

As the eldest son of Rhaenyra Targaryen (Emma D'Arcy), Jacaerys Velaryon, often just called "Jace," is in a pretty precarious position two seasons into "House of the Dragon" as his mother, leader of the Black faction, wages war against her own relatives in the Green faction (which, led by Olivia Cooke's Alicent Hightower, would keep Tom Glynn-Carney's King Aegon II Targaryen, Alicent's eldest son, on the throne instead of Rhaenyra). By the end of Season 2 of the series, the war is in full swing, and in the Season 1 finale, "The Black Queen," both Jace and Rhaenyra are gutted when Jace's younger brother Lucerys Velaryon (Elliot Grihault) is killed by his own uncle, Aegon II's younger brother Aemond Targaryen (Ewan Mitchell), and Jace sticks by his mother's side as she fights for the Iron Throne. So does the series foreshadow Jace's death, how does he die, and where does he end up in the Season 2 finale of "House of the Dragon?"

When we first meet a (very young) Jacaerys Velaryon in Season 1 of "House of the Dragon," the show brings quite a lot of attention to his brown hair and fair skin ... largely because he looks nothing like his supposed father, Rhaenyra's husband Laenor Velaryon (John Macmillan). That's because, until Laenor fakes his death in that same season and escapes the war known as the Dance of the Dragons for good, Rhaenyra has an affair with Ser Harwin Strong (Ryan Corr), the Lord Commander of the City Watch of King's Landing and one of the most formidable knights in the realm; Harwin secretly fathers Rhaenyra's three eldest sons Jacaerys, Lucerys, and Joffrey. (Jacaerys has a handful of half-siblings born later when, after Laenor's apparent death, Rhaenyra marries her uncle Prince Daemon Targaryen, played by Matt Smith). 

Jace, as evidenced by a conversation that he has with his presumptive cousin — and potential fiancée — Baela Targaryen (Bethany Antonia) in Season 2, knows perfectly well that Ser Harwin was his father; he was close with the knight as a young boy, and Ser Harwin helped train him in combat before his death (at the hands of his own brother, Matthew Needham's conniving Larys Strong). Life has been tough on Jace, to say the least, and after losing his real father and his brother, he's much more serious in Season 2, and devoted to his mother and her cause — he even travels across Westeros, including to the Wall, to try and find allies for her cause.

In George R.R. Martin's Targaryen family history "Fire & Blood," which serves as the source material for "House of the Dragon," we learn Jacaerys Velaryon's fate ... and based on the trajectory of the show, we'll probably watch this harrowing moment in Season 3. The Battle of the Gullet takes place when Jacaerys' uncle (not by blood), the "Seasnake" Corlys Velaryon (Steve Toussaint), engineers a blockade between Driftmark and the Crownlands in a body of water called The Gullet, but unfortunately for the Black faction, the Greens bring the Triarchy with them as allies. (The Triarchy and Seasnake have been enemies for years, and specifically, the name "the Triarchy" refers to a coalition of free cities from Essos who, on the orders of Abigail Thorn's Admiral Lokar, team up with Jefferson Hall's Greens spokesman Tyland Lannister.)

During the battle, according to Martin's book, Jace's dragon, Vermax, is fatally injured ... which leads to Jace's death as well. After Vermax is hit by a Triarchy ship and gets his stomach brutally slashed open, Martin writes of the dragon, "His flight jerked to a violent end, Vermax went down smoking and screaming, clawing at the water. Survivors said he struggled to rise, only to crash headlong into a burning galley. Wood splintered, the mast came tumbling down, and the dragon, thrashing, became entangled in the rigging. When the ship heeled over and sank, Vermax sank with her."

So what about Jace? Martin continues, and it's not good. "It is said that Jacaerys Velaryon leapt free and clung to a piece of smoking wreckage for a few heartbeats, until some crossbowmen on the nearest Myrish ship began loosing quarrels at him," the history reads. "The prince was struck once, and then again. More and more Myrmen brought crossbows to bear. Finally one quarrel took him through the neck, and Jace was swallowed by the sea."

So did "House of the Dragon" foreshadow Jacaerys Velaryon's death at the end of its second season? In a very literal sense, yes; it's in the finale that Tyland and Lokar come to an agreement that the Triarchy will back the Greens, and they set off for what certainly seems to be the Battle of the Gullet. Corlys also heads towards the Gullet with his own fleet of ships, so it feels safe to say that, pretty early in Season 3, we'll see the Battle of the Gullet, including Jace's terrible demise. (Rumors swirled, during Season 2 of "House of the Dragon," that the season would end with the Battle of the Gullet, but instead it simply set up both that battle and Rhaenyra's sacking of King's Landing for the next outing after the episode count was shortened from ten to eight.)

There's a smaller — and yet somehow bigger — moment in Season 2 of "House of the Dragon" that foreshadows Jace's manner of death, though. In the season's second episode, "A Son for a Son," Westeros is reeling after assassins killed the eldest son of Aegon II and his sister-wife Queen Helaena Targaryen (Phia Saban) in the premiere, and Jace finds his fiancée, cousin, and steps-sister Baela Targaryen on the mountains outside Dragonstone with a crossbow. Baela, whose father Daemon is responsible for the murder of the (very young) royal prince, is working out some frustration with a crossbow, so anyone who has read "Fire & Blood" knows the significance of that weapon. This likely wasn't unintentional, and based on how tender and emotional the scene is between Baela and Jace, it's particularly heartbreaking to show a crossbow in this moment.

At the end of "House of the Dragon" Season 2, Jacaerys Velaryon is ... not in a particularly good place, to be honest, thanks to the introduction of new dragonriders that could, in his mind, threaten his title as prince. As established, Jace knows that he's the bastard son of Ser Harwin Strong, and the whole reason these new dragonriders, called "dragonseeds," can mount their respective steeds is that they have some Valyrian blood but are bastards nonetheless. In the season's penultimate episode, "The Red Sowing," Rhaenyra assembles dragonseeds from across the realm and throws them into a literal dragon's den to see which succeed — after discovering that Addam of Hull (Clinton Liberty) was chosen by the wild dragon Seasmoke as a rider — and two new riders emerge, with the massive dragon Vermithor choosing Hugh Hammer (Kieran Bew) and the powerful Silverwing choosing Ulf White (Tom Bennett).

Jace is not only frustrated with the poor manners of some of the dragonseeds — particularly Ulf, who spends his time at Dragonstone wildly overstepping his boundaries — and even though he and Rhaenyra are closer than ever, he seems extraordinarily troubled by the entire dragonseed endeavor. Unfortunately for him, the worst is yet to come.

The first two seasons of "House of the Dragon" are available on Max now.