It cuts to Tyrion Lannister watching with dread. The episode cuts to Cersei Lannister, the queen for a few moments more, watching with grim inevitability as the dragon flies toward her. She takes to the air on Drogon’s back, and we are led to believe she’s flying to the castle. She looks upon the Red Keep, the castle her family built, which she was smuggled out of in her mother’s womb, the building she believes to be her birthright. She is near tears, exhausted and overwhelmed. The camera holds on her face for a long, anguished moment, as actress Emilia Clarke rolls through everything from triumph to gutted despair. She hears the tolling of the bells - the sound she’s been told, over and over again, means surrender, acquiescence to her rule.
At the start of Game of Thrones’ penultimate episode, “The Bells,” Daenerys Targaryen sits high above the streets of King’s Landing, on the back of her beloved dragon Drogon.
