Daemon Targaryen and Nettles' Relationship

Daemon Targaryen and Nettles share an intimate but deliberately unresolved relationship, and its uncertainty becomes a political crisis when Rhaenyra suspects Nettles of betraying her and orders her execution. The chronicles portray daily companionship, practical care, and a tearful separation, but do not establish that Daemon and Nettles were lovers. Their bond is therefore shaped both by what Maester Norren records and by what the surviving accounts cannot prove.

Daily Companionship and Uncertain Intimacy

The Chronicles of Maidenpool, written by Lord Mooton’s maester Maester Norren, describe Daemon and Nettles as spending their evenings and mornings together: they supped at night, broke their fast together, and slept in adjoining bedchambers. Norren presents Daemon as attentive to the young woman, teaching her the social courtesies he considered necessary and advising her on dress, bearing, and grooming. He records several gifts, including an ivory-handled hairbrush, a silvered looking glass, a velvet cloak, and riding boots. Taken together, these details suggest a relationship expressed through ordinary routines and sustained personal attention, rather than only through their shared danger in the skies.

Norren also records that Daemon helped Nettles wash and that the pair sometimes bathed together. This account has encouraged suspicions that their closeness was sexual, but it does not prove that Daemon had carnal knowledge of her. The chronicler distinguishes the evidence from the conclusion: the recorded intimacy makes an affair seem more plausible than some of Mushroom’s stories, yet the precise nature of their nights remains unknown. The difference matters. Their bond is presented as unusually close, but neither the chronology nor the testimony removes the possibility that Daemon’s care was protective or paternal in character; Norren himself compares his attentiveness to a man’s fondness for a daughter.

Their companionship also had a shared purpose. During their time at Maidenpool, Daemon and Nettles repeatedly took to the air to search for Aemond and Vhagar, without finding them. Their days were thus bound to an unsuccessful pursuit, while their repeated meals and time under the same roof made the relationship visible to others. The account offers no clear declaration of what either understood the bond to be. It instead gives the reader observable acts—shared routines, instruction, gifts, and the hunt—and leaves their meaning contested.

Rhaenyra’s Suspicion and the Break

The relationship becomes politically dangerous when Rhaenyra asks Mysaria whether Addam Velaryon and Nettles might betray her. Mysaria answers with an accusation about Nettles’ intimacy with Daemon and predicts that Nettles will bear his child. This is a claim made in council, not an established fact. Rhaenyra nevertheless treats it as a reason to distrust Daemon: she believes Nettles has compromised his loyalty and attributes the bond between them to sorcery. Her response turns uncertain private intimacy into a question of military allegiance and royal authority.

Rhaenyra orders Luthor Largent to arrest Addam Velaryon and sends a separate, secret instruction to Lord Mooton concerning Nettles. The order authorizes Lord Mooton to have her killed if she is found at table or in bed. It is not merely a rebuke to Daemon or a demand that Nettles leave court; it makes the relationship the stated grounds for lethal action against her. The contrast with Norren’s account is stark: the same routines that he records as signs of Daemon’s attention are interpreted by the queen as evidence that he cannot be relied upon.

Norren recounts bringing Rhaenyra’s letter to Daemon and Nettles during supper. He says that the prince’s expression changed as he read it and that he asked whether Lord Mooton’s men were waiting outside. Norren had come alone and falsely assured Daemon that neither Lord Mooton nor anyone else in Maidenpool knew the letter’s contents. That concealment gives the scene its immediate tension: the couple learn of the danger, but Daemon is not yet surrounded or taken captive. Norren’s brief exchange with Daemon ends in an observation that the chronicles preserve without explaining what was said afterward. The account records the rupture and the danger, not a reconciliation or a settled account of their feelings.

Separate Departures

At dawn, Daemon helps Nettles saddle Sheepstealer. Before flying, Nettles follows her established practice of feeding the dragon; on this occasion she gives him a black ram, described as the largest in Maidenpool. Her riding leathers are stained with blood from the task, and Norren records that her cheeks are wet with tears. No farewell is spoken between them. Sheepstealer rises into the morning sky, while Caraxes cries from below so loudly that the windows in Jonquil’s Tower shatter. Nettles turns toward the Bay of Crabs and disappears into the morning mists.

The departure is not described as a voluntary end to a romance, nor does the record say that Daemon asks Nettles to stay. Its circumstances are more concrete and more precarious: Rhaenyra has ordered Nettles’ death, Norren has shown Daemon the letter, and Nettles leaves on her dragon. The absence of spoken farewell leaves their attachment unresolved, while her tears and Daemon’s help in preparing Sheepstealer make the separation more than a simple change of location. She is never seen again at court or castle.

Daemon returns briefly to the castle to break his fast with Lord Mooton. He thanks his host, says that he will not be seen there again, and announces that he is flying to Harrenhal. His stated purpose is to meet Aemond if his nephew dares face him, and he intends to face him alone. The two departures therefore point in different directions: Nettles vanishes toward the Bay of Crabs, while Daemon turns toward the confrontation that will determine his fate. The account does not show them meeting again.

What the Record Can and Cannot Establish

The relationship survives in conflicting kinds of testimony. Norren’s chronicle supplies specific domestic details and presents him as an eyewitness to the letter’s arrival and Nettles’ departure. Mysaria supplies the allegation that Nettles shares Daemon’s bed and will bear his child, while Rhaenyra treats that allegation as truth. The narrative does not confirm the prediction. It likewise refuses to turn the closeness Norren describes into proof of a sexual relationship. The tension between observed companionship, hostile accusation, and limited historical certainty is central to the account.

Daemon’s death remains uncertain in the sense that his remains are never found, but the chronicler rejects singers’ stories that he survived and later returned to Nettles. The reported reunion offers a consoling ending to a bond interrupted by flight and battle; the history declines to endorse it. Nettles’ disappearance and Daemon’s unverified return thus leave their relationship without a confirmed final meeting. What the record securely preserves is the sequence of attachment, suspicion, threatened execution, and parting—not the lovers’ reunion imagined by later song.