History Recap / GameOfThronesS2E6TheOldGodsAndTheNew

Once in the safety of the Red Keep, Joffrey starts storming around screaming about traitors and treason and wanting heads. Tyrion delivers an ''epic'' TheReasonYouSuckSpeech, not to mention [[CrowningMomentOfAwesome a full-armed slap]], doing what little he can to disabuse Joffrey of the notion that being king makes him invincible. Sadly, it doesn't really take, and Tyrion stalks off, trying to find out if anyone knows what became of the Stark girl.

** Tyrion gives Joffrey a very vitriol filled and well deserved one during the street riots, basically telling him that being King doesn't mean he can just do what he wants, [[CrowningMomentOfAwesome punctuated by him slapping Joffrey across the face.]] [[Recap/GameOfThronesS1E2TheKingsroad Again.]]

* [[WouldntHitAGirl Wouldn't Behead A Girl]]: Why Jon Snow can't bring himself to execute Ygritte.

* IDontLikeTheSoundOfThatPlace: Ramsay Bolton's keep is called 'The Dreadfort'. Presumably it's not the kind of place one goes on a lovely summer holiday.

* DeathByAdaptation: Poor Irri. Who is left to say "It is known"?

* SurroundedByIdiots: Seems to have become almost a RunningGag with Tywin, whose subordinates have escalated from being merely useless to him to actively helping the Starks with their incompetence. Lorch is lucky to walk away with his head still on his shoulders after sending important information intended for their allies to a Stark bannerman because of his inability to read the names accurately.

* ShapedLikeItself: Robb is rather flustered when his mother catches him talking to the Lady Talisa.
-->"She's been helping with the wounded, she's been very...helpful."
* ShowSomeLeg: Osha screws Theon until he falls asleep so that she can sneak Bran and Rickon out of Winterfell.

Her dragons have been taken by a cloaked man who has three of them in locked a new box, headed for a tall tower.

Back at ''Robb's camp''', the King-in-the-North is not pleased with the contents of the message Maester Luwin got off, and even less with the updates Roose Bolton has received from Barrowton and the Dreadfort, which include Ser Rodrik's death. Robb is all for abandoning the war against the Lannisters and striking north at once, but Bolton convinces him to deputize Bolton's bastard son (name not given here, but in the books it's Ramsay Snow), who can mobilize enough men to retake Winterfell on his own. Robb consents.

** Tywin is quite friendly and even indulgent with Arya, while he treats nearly everyone else with utter contempt.

* DeletedScene: [[spoiler:Doreah is shown to be involved in the theft of Dany's dragons, when she garrotes Irri to death while discussing the delights of EroticAsphyxiation.]]

As the royal party begins the walk back up to the Red Keep, peasants stand by to yell abuse. One flings cow poop at Joffrey. It's kind of amusing just how quickly the swords come out. Joffrey starts screaming that he wants the man who threw it, and then that he wants everybody--"Kill them! KillEmAll!!!"--and suddenly we have a full-fledged riot on our hands. Gold cloaks and crimson-clad Lannister guardsmen wade in with swords, the Kingsguard sneaking Tyrion and Cersei away, and the Hound grabs Joffrey in one arm and starts striding away. "I want them executed!" Joffrey exclaims. "They want the same for you!" the Hound replies. The High Septon is left behind and gets, quite literally, torn apart.

* VillainousRescue: Sandor Clegane saves Sansa from rapists during the riot.

** Joffrey doesn't care that Sansa has disappeared into the riot. Tyrion points out that if she dies, Joffrey's 'uncle' Jaime also will die. "You owe him a lot you know." Joffrey's teeth-clenched expression indicates he knows exactly what Tyrion's getting at.

* MythologyGag: In the books, House Stark trace their lineage back to a semi-mythical boy named Brandon the Builder: it was he who raised the Wall; who positioned Winterfell over hot springs, so that warm water races through its walls like blood through veins; who built Storm's End, with stones so cunningly joined that there are no snags or pinnaces for the gales off Shipbreaker Bay to tear at. InUniverse, this is presumably where Arya got the idea of claiming her father was a stonemason.

* ArmorPiercingQuestion: "Theon... did you hate us the whole time?"

* DeathGlare: Cersai says that she hopes Tyrion loves someone deeply, and then has that person taken away from them. Seeing as that's already happened, Tyrion just gives her a cold look and walks away.

Maester Luwin hustles into his tower apartments and bolts the door behind him. Outside comes the sound of battle; evidently the war has come to Winterfell. He manages to get a messenger raven off before attackers bust down the door.

Arya enters another war council with a decanter of wine, interrupting a rather awkward confrontation: Lord Tywin Lannister fixing Ser Amory Lorch with a DeathGlare and asking, "''Can you read?''" As it turns out, though, Lord Tywin isn't just being a bully: Lorch sent a messenger raven, containing important orders, not to Lord Damon of House Marbrand but to Lord Marlin of House Dormond... in the North, where those orders will doubtless fall into the hands of Robb Stark. To prove the point, he turns to his servant: "Girl, fetch me ''The History of the Greater and the Lesser Houses''. It's the one on the-- Ha-ha. My ''cupbearer'' can read better than you." Arya, of course, fetched it without needing further instruction. She's not doing a good job of hiding in plain sight, though fortunately Lord Tywin seems amused by her. A look of panic spreads across her face, however, when the guard announces that Lord Petyr Baelish is without and desires an audience with Lord Tywin. She spends the entire interview doing a kind of agonized dance to keep herself facing away from him as much as she can; Littlefinger looks perplexed, but Lord Tywin is typically enough to distract him. In the end, it's ambiguous as to whether he actually identifies her; please use discussion pages, Dear Troper, if you'd care to debate the matter with other viewers.

Beyond the Wall, Qhorin Halfhand is staging his raid. Basically, it goes off without a hitch: the rangers strike from all sides and the wildling scouts are slain, save one, who surrenders to Jon Snow. He had her at swordpoint, but... [[WouldntHitAGirl Well, yeah]]. Her name is Ygritte, and the rangers cannot afford to take her prisoner, so they leave Jon to [[IDidWhatIHadToDo do what needs to be done]]. Jon readies Longclaw, steadies it, shifts his grip, fidgets... can't do it. Ygritte makes a break for it and Jon tears after her. By the time he has caught her again he is lost and nowhere near his brothers.

Myrcella Baratheon weeps as a royal barge ferries her out to a sailing ship which will transport her to Dorne. She's not the only one: Tommen is kind of sniffly too, to Joffrey's contempt, and Cersei, though her face is iron, tries to put some sort of curse on Tyrion wherein Tyrion will love someone, truly love someone, and Cersei will take that person away from him. Tyrion, who of course [[Recap/GameOfThronesS1E9Baelor has already had this happen to him]], just gives her this bemused look.

Half a word away and in rather less danger of rapine, Daenerys Stormborn stalks the courtyard of the Spice King of Qarth. He's the same guy who almost succeeded in turning her away at the gates two episodes ago, and things go about as well as they did then: Dany's {{Badass Boast}}s are easily deflected by the Spice King's PolitenessJudo and PassiveAggressiveKombat, with an added dose of TheReasonYouSuckSpeech. Helping her is a poor gamble, as she has no army, no friends in Westeros, and absolutely no return-on-investment. While she claims to have dragons, for good or ill she's been extremely secretive of them; no one in Qarth has actually seen one yet. He's rather smug about it, but the JerkassHasAPoint.

As Arya cleans up Lord Tywin's solar, she finds a piece of parchment with orders concerning Robb Stark written on them. Lord Tywin, happening by, asks who taught her to read, and she has to invent a stonemason's lineage to get by. Tywin talks about how he taught Jaime to read, despite his son's dyslexia--they would work at it for hours until he got it right. "He hated me for it, for a time. For a long time." He also talks of his own father, whom Tywin describes as loving, but weak: "He almost destroyed our house and name. [[RedOniBlueOni I'm cold]]." As he ruminates, Arya snags the parchment. Unfortunately, the first person she runs into is Ser Amory Lorch. She gambles on his illiteracy, but as it turns out he can read enough to know it's a piece of parchment she oughtn't have. Arya gives him the slip and then rushes straight for Jaqen H'ghar.

Robb Stark moves among his men, looking after them in general; but his eyes are drawn to Lady Talisa. They are in the process of flirting it up when Catelyn finally arrives, Brienne in tow. She's reminding him of his betrothal to Lady [Somebody] Frey when Roose Bolton trots up with a message--one we last saw being tossed out the window by Maester Luwin at Winterfell...

Somewhere beyond the Wall, Jon Snow is well and truly lost. Like any typical man he refuses to stop and ask for directions--though, when the only person to ask directions ''of'' is Ygritte, a wildling raider and his sworn enemy, that hesitation turns out to be a little more forgivable. Eventually he stops them on the spot and declares they will make camp there. Of course, they have no supplies, and it's time to do the [[IntimateHealing share-body-warmth]] thing. [[ButIWouldReallyEnjoyIt Ygritte starts wiggling to get comfortable.]] Jon's vows hold, but his temper doesn't, and Ygritte falls asleep with a bit of smug smile on her face.

Robb is not pleased with the contents of the message Maester Luwin got off, and even less with the updates Roose Bolton has received from Barrowton and the Dreadfort, which include Ser Rodrik's death. Robb is all for abandoning the war against the Lannisters and striking north at once, but Bolton convinces him to deputize Bolton's bastard son (name not given here, but in the books it's Ramsay Snow), who can mobilize enough men to retake Winterfell on his own. Robb consents.

Shae tends to the head wound Sansa took in the riot, and Sansa unburdens herself--the mob hated me, why?; I don't understand any of this; I hate the Lannisters--to her confidant. It seems this OddFriendship is actually taking off, as Shae is coming to care for Sansa despite her own efforts.

At Winterfell, Osha again petitions Theon for a chance to serve under him. She unlaces her dress to make it precisely clear what she means. After a SexyDiscretionShot (in which, actually, the previous paragraph happened), Osha creeps past a sleeping Theon and goes to visit a guard at the Hunter's Gate. She tells him that Theon ordered her to visit all the guards and, you know, keep them warm. They smooch until she slits his throat, at which point Rickon, Bran, Hodor, Summer and Shaggydog emerge from the darkness. The small party slips out into the night.

Daenerys is pedeconferencing with Daxos, possibly on their return from the Spice King's manse. Evidently, no one is interested in supporting her, except for one guy who will sell her a ship if she sells him her body. Daxos spouts some "IDidWhatIHadToDo" philosophy, but all those thoughts fly from Dany's head when she returns to the dwelling Daxos assigned her and finds half her ''khalasar'' slaughtered on the floor.

* [[WouldntHitAGirl Wouldn't Behead A Girl]]: Why Jon Snow can't bring himself to execute Ygritte.

* OffWithHisHead: How Theon executes Ser Rodrik. In contrast to the way this trope is usually played, Theon isn't able to take his head off in one swing, and hacks at it furiously before eventually kicking it loose.

* EmpathicEnvironment: The rain turns from a drizzle to a downpour after Theon cuts of Ser Rodrik's head.

** Rodrik Cassel is executed by Theon instead of dying further along as he did in the book.