Daemon II Blackfyre

For other characters who share the same name, see "Daemon".

Daemon II Blackfyre
Biographical information
Died	Imprisoned in the Black Cells and most likely starved to death
Political information
Title(s)	King of the Andals and the First Men (claimant) Lord of the Seven Kingdoms (claimant) Protector of the Realm (claimant)
Personal information
Culture	Valyrian
Father	{Daemon Blackfyre}
Mother	{Serena Blackfyre}
Sibling(s)	{Aegon Blackfyre} {Aemon Blackfyre}
World of Westeros
Season(s)	1, 7, 8
Appeared in	"Prophecies of the Known World"

"Politics can also explain the prophecies of Daemon Blackfyre the Second, a Targaryen bastard rumored to possess the family gift. While posing as a hedge knight, he told a future Lord Commander of the Kingsguard that he dreamt of a dragon hatching at Whitewalls Castle and took it as a sign he'd win the Iron Throne. Perhaps if he'd slept a bit longer, he'd have dreamt of the King's Hand putting down his rebellion a day later, before it even began."

―Samwell Tarly

Daemon II Blackfyre was a member of House Blackfyre.

Biography

Background

Daemon II Blackfyre was the third son of Daemon Blackfyre, a legitimized bastard son of King Aegon IV Targaryen and his cousin Daena Targaryen, by Serena Blackfyre. He had two elder brothers: Aegon and Aemon Blackfyre. He was imprisoned in the Black Cells and most likely starved to death.

Season 1

Daemon II, along with his siblings is mentioned in the House Targaryen entry of the book The Lineages and Histories of the Great Houses of the Seven Kingdoms.

Season 7

Daemon II is mentioned in Prophecies of the Known World. According to the entry, Daemon, while posing as a hedge knight, told a future Lord Commander of the Kingsguard that he dreamt of a dragon egg hatching at Whitewalls, and took it as a sign that he would win the Iron Throne. A day later, however, Brynden Rivers put down Daemon's rebellion before it even began.

Season 8

Daemon is mentioned under the entry of Ser Duncan the Tall, in The Book of Brothers, which the new Lord Commander of the Kingsguard Brienne of Tarth was flicking through.

Family tree

Template:House Blackfyre family tree

In the books

In the A Song of Ice and Fire novels, Daemon II was the third son of Daemon Blackfyre. He appears in The Mystery Knight, the third novella of the Tales of Dunk and Egg series. His two older brothers died childless, so when they were slain along with their father at the Battle of Redgrass Field, Daemon II became the nominal head of House Blackfyre as it fled into exile.

Daemon II was an attractive man with classic Targaryen features of silver hair and purple eyes. He even had prophetic dreams, a trait passed down through the Targaryen/Blackfyre bloodline. Secretly, Daemon II actually wasn't a great fighter: all of his practice duels and jousts had been publicly staged, and the knights he allegedly lost to had actually been paid to feign defeat.

George R.R. Martin has confirmed that Daemon II was a homosexual. He apparently never fathered any children, meaning that his younger brother Haegon Blackfyre was his direct heir.

Daemon II attempted to instigate another uprising in the name of House Blackfyre in the year 212 AC, sixteen years after the First Blackfyre Rebellion. To accomplish this, he posed as a common fiddler (by dyeing his distinctive silver hair black), and attending a large tournament being held by House Butterwell at Whitewalls, in the Riverlands. While there, he hoped to surreptitiously recruit many of the well-armed knights in attendance to his cause.

Due to a series of events, however (which Ser Duncan the Tall and Aegon V Targaryen participated in), Daemon II revealed his true identity and faced the hedge knight Ser Glendon Flowers in a Trial by combat, in the format of a joust. Despite having been badly tortured the night before, and still suffering from his injuries, Glendon unhorsed Daemon II on the very first tilt, revealing to all gathered at the tournament that he wasn't the great fighter he thought he was, much less a legendary fighter like his father Daemon I. Any support he had quickly evaporated, and the "Second Blackfyre Rebellion" turned out to be more of a failed plot than an actual war like the first rebellion. Brynden "Bloodraven" Rivers soon arrived at the tournament with a royal army and arrested him. Bloodraven intended to keep him alive and imprisoned, however, to discourage his uncle Bittersteel and the other Blackfyre supporters in exile from crowning Daemon II's younger brother Haegon as the new head of House Blackfyre.

Not only was Daemon II secretly terrible at martial combat, he wasn't even a very good actor. Much of his plot hinged around pretending to be a commoner named "Ser John the Fiddler" to infiltrate a tournament inconspicuously, and secretly win over knights to his cause. Daemon II, however, continued to dress in fine expensive clothing, which raised obvious suspicions about how a common fiddler could afford fine silks. Moreover, Daemon II also talked down to high-ranking noblemen as if he was their equal or superior - not realizing that commoners would never speak so rudely, and causing many to grow suspicious of him (even Ser Duncan, born a street urchin and not very politically savvy, quickly realized "John the Fiddler"'s behavior was very odd).

See also

• Daemon II Blackfyre on A Wiki of Ice and Fire (spoilers from the books)