S2·E5 — The Ghost of Harrenhal

The hour retold

The shadow does its work in the first minutes: Renly Baratheon, the war’s presumptive winner, dies in his own tent in front of Catelyn and Brienne, and a hundred thousand swords go looking for a new king. The rest of the hour is the scramble. The storm lords bend to Stannis; the Tyrells ride for Highgarden with Littlefinger murmuring in their wake; and Brienne, blamed for the murder she watched, swears her sword to Catelyn Stark on the road — the beginning of the story’s most stubbornly honored oath. Renly’s death is the season’s pivot, and nobody swung a sword for it: the show’s wars keep being decided by things that do not appear on the muster rolls.

In King’s Landing, Tyrion follows a rumor into the guts of the city and finds the alchemists’ guild sitting on thousands of jars of wildfire — the substance with which the Mad King meant to burn the capital — and does the responsible thing, which is to confiscate the stockpile for himself. At Harrenhal, Arya, now cupbearer to Tywin Lannister of all people, spends the first of Jaqen’s three owed deaths on the Tickler, and the torturer is found with his neck broken and no one to blame. And off the Stony Shore, Theon, stung by his crew’s contempt, stops thinking like a raider and starts thinking like a Stark ward who knows exactly which castle is barely garrisoned. The plan is clever. That is the tragedy.

What happens

• The shadow kills Renly in his own tent; his hundred thousand scatter to Stannis and Highgarden.
• Brienne, blamed and hunted, swears her sword to Catelyn Stark.
• Tyrion discovers the alchemists' wildfire stockpile — and takes it for himself.
• Theon sails to raid the Stony Shore, and thinks bigger: Winterfell is barely garrisoned.
• Jaqen H'ghar owes three deaths; Arya spends the first on the Tickler.

The people of the episode

The fallen — spoilers

• Renly Baratheon — A king killed by a shadow with his brother's face, in front of his own guard.