How did Aemond One-Eye bond Vhagar ? | House of The Dragon

Why Aemond is called Aemond One Eye ? | Aemond One Eye bond with Vhagar | Aemond Targaryen | House of The Dragon | Dance of the Dragon | Aemond One Eye | Dragons and Riders | Vhagar

How do you bond with the dragon? like many aspects of the magic system of song of ice and fire dragon bonding was never been explicitly defined. It gives room to interpretations and more than likely there are many ways to bond with the dragon. Targaryens have often placed dragon eggs in the cribs of baby Targaryen. Also, some Targaryens grown up with their dragons. Most of you probably know of Nettles who seem to earn the trust of wild dragon Sheepstealer. By feeding him/her sheep every day.

Let’s look at one of the coolest dragon bonding in the history of Targaryens. Aemond One Eye and legendary dragon Vhagar. He bonded with Vhagar when he was only 10 years old and Vhagar was 172 years old. She was nearly as big as Balerion when she died at the age of 182years. So at this point 172 years old Vhagar is largest dragon alive. Yet feisty 10-year-old kid was able to bond with him, so how he did it?

He was able to bond with Vhagar because of three reasons. 1. Tired of constant humiliation by his brothers. 2. Lack of Fear, 3. Will power. However, in the show House of the Drangon they showed Aemond and Vhagar bonding scene, which is little different than the original book. We will look into both, first we will go by the book.

Book Version

The Family

This happens 10 years before the dance of dragons in 120AC. At point in time, we already have two factions in Targaryens The Blacks and The Greens. King Viserys I is still alive. On the one side there is his daughter Rhaenyra, Princes of the Dragonstone a person that he wants to be the heir to the Iron Throne. At this point in time, she has three sons Jacaerys, Lucerys and Joffrey. These three sons were probably royal bastards of Ser Harwin Strong but that’s different topic. The point is she allegedly had three sons to her husband Ser Laenor Velaryon.

On the other side The Greens, King Viserys’s second wife Alicent Hightower. Together they had three sons and one daughter Aegon II, Helaena, Aemond One-Eye and Daeron. All these children were younger than Rhaenyra. That’s why Viserys wanted her to be heir to the Iron Throne.

Year 120AC comes along and it was bad one for House Velaryon. Prince Deamon, King Viserys’s younger brother was married to Laena Velaryon at that time. She died giving birth to their third child and her Dragon was Vhagar. So Vhagar was open for new dragon rider. So Leana Velaryon died and soon after her brother was killed by his friend. As a result, King Viserys called everyone to Driftmark for his funeral. So now you got whole family coming together at Driftmark. The Blacks and The Greens and they can’t stand each other, even their kids hate each other.

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Dragons and Riders

Rhaenyre’s three sons were already bonded with hatchlings, whose eggs has been put into their cribs as babies. Jacaerys rode Vermax, Lucerys rode Arrax and Joffrey rode Tyraxes. On the other side Aegon II rode Sunfire the most beautiful dragon, Helaena rode Dreamfyre and their little brother Daeron was bonded to a dragon Tessarion.

So, of all these kids the craziest of them was 10-year-old Aemond was the only one who had not yet bonded with a dragon. King Viserys noted that they can stop at the Dragonstone after the funeral so Aemond could pick out either a dragon egg or hatchling “if the lad is bold enough.” Bold enough was an understatement for Aemond.

Aemond Bonding with Vhagar

As written in the Book “Even at ten, Aemond Targaryen did not lack for boldness. The king’s gibe stung, and he resolved not to wait for Dragonstone. What did he want with some puny hatchling, or some stupid egg? Right there at High Tide was a dragon worthy of him: Vhagar, the oldest, largest, most terrible dragon in the world.

 Even for a son of House Targaryen, there are always dangers in approaching a strange dragon, particularly an old, bad-tempered dragon who had recently lost her rider. His father and mother would never allow him to go near Vhagar, he knew. So he made certain they did not know, sliding from his bed at dawn whilst they still slept and stealing down to the great outer yard where Vhagar and the other dragons were fed and stabled. The prince had hoped to mount Vhagar in secrecy, but as he crept up to the dragon a boy’s voice rang out: “You stay away from her!”

The voice belonged to the youngest of his half nephews, Joffrey Velaryon, a boy of three. Always an early riser Joff had sneaked down from his bed to see his own young dragon, Tyraxes. Afraid that the boy would raise alarm, Prince Aemond slapped him, shouted at him to be quiet, then shoved him backward into a pile of dragon droppings. As Joff began to bawl, Aemond raced to Vhagar and clambered up onto her back.

Later he would say that he was so afraid of being caught that he forgot to be frightened of being burned to death and eaten. Call it boldness, call it madness, call it fortune or the will of gods or the caprice of dragon. Who can know the mind of such beast? We do know this: Vhagar roared, lurched to her feet, shook violently… then snapped her chains and flew. And the boy prince Aemond Targaryen became a dragonrider, circling twice around the towers of High Tide before coming down again. But when he landed, Rhaenyra’s sons were waiting for him.

We don’t have much to go with but we may as well try to decipher George R.R. Martin’s words. One thing is that earlier in the passage he mentioned that He was determined to bond with Vhagar. He wasn’t just trying to bond with any dragon, he wanted to bond with the legendary, the largest Vhagar. That shows his willpower. He was tired of facing humiliation for not having a dragon. In one go he proved everyone wrong who doubted his abilities. At the age of 10 he bonded with the largest dragon Vhagar.

And the second thing that comes out is that he was so scared of being caught that he forgot to be afraid of Vhagar. This is important as well because if you read Princes and the Queen which chronicles the dance of dragons. You will see that lot of scared people try bonding with dragons and they get either hurt or killed in the process.

Plus the way Dany bond with Drogon is way different than this. In the show Drogon comes to rescue her in Meereen which is like they already bonded. But in the books Drogon comes to fighting pit seemingly to kill and eat giant boar. He even attacks Dany but she controls him with her dragon whip. She basically conquers him, it’s much more badass than the show.

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Why Aemond is called Aemond One Eye ?

One thing we need to mention here is when Aemond landed he got into fight with all three of his high nephews. And one of them stabs him in the eye with dagger that is how he gets name Aemond One-Eye. When he got stabbed he yelled in pain with him his dragon Vhagar also roared. Like feeling pain of his rider, that’s Aemond One Eye and Vhagar bonding for you by the book.

House of the Dragon Show Version

In the show House of the Dragon, they portrayed this little differently. In the show Aemond walks to the Vhagar, we can see fear on his face. Vhagar sees his approach and opens his mouth to burn him alive. Immediately Aemond shouts some words in Valyrian and Vhagar changes his mind. Basically, they showed that Aemond commands Vhagar and controls her. Then he climbs on Vhagar. In that scene Vhagar also tests his rider by shaking violently, going straight up and diving straight down. After all these tests he accepts Aemond One-Eye as his rider. 

In the show they showed two sides of Aemond. One befor bonding with Vhagar, courageous but fearful. And after bonding with Vhagar, full of confidence. When he lands, he gets into argument with his half nephews. He calls them bastards of Ser Harwin Strong and they get into fight and one of them stabs him in the Eye. Later in assembly when fight broke out between Rhaenyra and Alicent over Aemond’s lost eye. Aemond says to his mother Alicent, “It was fair trade mother, I may have lost the eye but I gained Vhagar.

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