Maester Aemon
The blind old maester of Castle Black, a hundred years in service on the Wall ÔÇö and, though few now remember it, a son of a Targaryen king who once stood near the throne.
A soul of House Targaryen, born at King's Landing, sworn to The Night's Watch.
The fuller tale
Season Five
Jon rides for Hardhome; Maester Aemon dies at the Wall with Egg's name on his lips.
How it ends for them
On the screen. Died of great age (S5┬ÀE7)
Aemon Targaryen, maester of the Watch for sixty-seven years, died old and blind and gentle in his bed at Castle Black, laughing with his brother Egg in his last dreams. 'And now his watch is ended.'
On the page. Died at sea (AFFC, ch. 36)
Sam carried the blind old maester south to save him from Melisandre's fires, and the sea's chill caught him past Braavos. He died aboard the Cinnamon Wind at a hundred and two, dreaming of his brother Egg and murmuring of a dragon with three heads.
On screen he dies as he lived, in his bed at Castle Black, ancient past reckoning, laughing softly with people sixty years dead ÔÇö ÔÇ£Egg, I dreamed that I was oldÔÇØ ÔÇö while Sam and Gilly keep the vigil. The Watch burns him with full honors, and even Alliser ThorneÔÇÖs eulogy is gentle: a hundred years of service ended without an enemy in the world.
The books give him a sailorÔÇÖs death instead. Carried south to escape the red woman, he weakens past Braavos, and at one hundred and two years old dies aboard the Cinnamon Wind, tended by Sam and Gilly, dreaming of his brother and murmuring about dragons ÔÇö the last work of his life, the riddle of the three heads, spilling out with his final breaths. The crew commits him to the sea. In both tellings the same words close the account, and nowhere in the saga do they land harder: and now his watch is ended.
Their chapters, book by book
A Game of Thrones 1 chapter that name them
A Storm of Swords 1 chapter that name them
A Feast for Crows 3 chapters that name them
Where the page and the screen part
The show keeps Aemon at Castle Black to the end; the books send him on one last journey. When Melisandre arrives hunting kingÔÇÖs blood, Sam smuggles the old man south by sea to keep him out of her fires ÔÇö through Braavos, where the news of Daenerys reaches him, and out onto the long water aboard the Cinnamon Wind. Dying, he burns bright: it is book-Aemon who works out that the prophecy of the prince that was promised may point at Daenerys, that the dragon must have three heads, and who charges Sam to reach the Citadel and send help to her. The show, having no Citadel voyage to give him, folds his farewells into Castle Black and hands his prophetic function to other mouths. Both tellings agree on the essentials: the refused crown, the blindness, Egg, and a death gentler than any other Targaryen is granted.
Their journey
Where the two tellings send them to the same place the road runs whole; where they part, the screen keeps the left and the books the right.