This post contains major spoilers for House of the Dragon season three, episode five. If you want to avoid them like fire and blood, for now you can instead check out our coverage of episode four.
House of the Dragon put Tyland Lannister in the middle of the Battle of the Gullet. Sharako Lohar then put him in the sea. That was a big change from Fire & Blood. In George R.R. Martin’s history, the greens’ Master of Ships did not participate in the naval fight. Tyland was back in King’s Landing. He was still there when Rhaenyra took the city and Aegon’s small council hostage. But his fate remained unclear on HBO’s adaptation until he popped up in an unexpected way in season three’s fifth episode. Tyland not only survived the Gullet, he found his way to Rook’s Rest and his king.
In season three’s fourth episode, Larys and Aegon made their way to Rook’s Rest where the decapitated body of Meleys still hangs over the ruined castle. While Criston Cole might have won Rook’s Rest for Aegon, as Larys expected, it is not full of men loyal to the king in hiding. It’s a ton of survivors loyal to the king out a living after having their lives destroyed by the Targaryen civil war. To stay there they had to pretend to be survivors from Sharp Point, which Aemond burned to the ground. Aegon’s own scars from his brother at Rook’s Rest made the lie more believable.
“Mangleface” dealt with many indignities so him and Larys could live at the camp under its now dead “lord” who found Aegon’s crown and paid for his discovery with his life. They are biding their time (Larys is biding his a lot better than Aegon) until they can board a ship to somewhere safe, though they can’t agree on where exactly to go. And, an unexpected ally had an idea: his home in Lannisport. Despite his heavy armor, Tyland Lannister survived getting thrown into the Gullet. He, along with some cheap sellswords he has hired, found his way to Rook’s Rest where he came across Larys and Aegon.
That gives Aegon another capable person to help hide him while he works to reclaim the Iron Throne. It also gives Aegon access to a lot more coin than he had… in theory. Tyland is a wanted man, same as all the greens on the loose. He can’t just show up somewhere and announce who he and take out a loan. He would instantly become the most prized prisoner in the Realm, maybe even more than Aegon. Everyone knows how rich the Lannisters are. But Tyland might not need to do that anyway. He knows something Rhaenyra is desperate to find: where the royal gold went.
Tyland hid the crown’s coin to keep it safe. Lack of gold is causing major problems for Rhaenyra in King’s Landing. She can’t even pay the City Watch at the moment, let alone the crown’s many other debts both inherited and new. Aegon, Tyland, and LArys can potentially go get it right now and pay off anyone they need to with it.
The unexpected return of Tyland, both in location and in purpose, is an interesting development for the show, but another frustrating one for readers.
Warning: We’re now going to get into spoilers from Fire & Blood that could prove true, even in minor ways, for House of the Dragon.
On House of the Dragon, Tyland returned in a hood that hid his face. That’s a reference to his fate in the real history of the Dance of the Dragons. As also seen on the show, a desperate and grief stricken Rhaenyra quickly turned to violence after taking King’s Landing. In Fire & Blood, few suffered as directly and as cruelly as Tyland Lannister. He refused to reveal the location of the crown’s gold, so Rhaenyra turned him over to her torturers. They gelded, blinded, and mutilated him. He still never talked.
Years later, it’s said his appearance was so grotesque ladies of the court would faint when seeing him, so he took to wearing a silken hood to hide his face. He became known as “the hooded hand.”
Tyland’s disfigurement mirrored the metaphorical destruction of Rhaenyra’s humanity. Will something similar happen on Fire & Blood? It certainly could if he’s taken hostage and sent to King’s Landing. Rhaenyra needs gold just as much as Aegon, and if she was willing to unleash the City Watch on her own subjects for calling her sons bastards, what will she do to a traitor who stole all her money?
Mikey Walsh is a staff writer at Nerdist. For the record he is anti-torture, even for the greens. You can follow him on Bluesky at @burgermike. And also anywhere someone is ranking the Targaryen kings.