Rhaena Targaryen and Elissa Farman's relationship

Rhaena Targaryen and Elissa Farman’s relationship took shape on Fair Isle, where the widowed queen found a close companion in the lord’s independent-minded daughter. Their bond joined friendship and confidences with a shared appetite for freedom, and it became part of the household that gathered around Rhaena. Maester Smike’s suggestion that Elissa, rather than Rhaena’s husband, was the queen’s true love gives their intimacy a possible romantic dimension, but the account does not establish that interpretation as fact. Their clearest defining act is Elissa’s decision to leave the island with Rhaena when staying meant submitting to her brother’s plans for her.

Fair Isle and the beginnings of their bond

Rhaena’s connection to the Farmans began in a time of danger. After the Battle Beneath the Gods Eye, Lord Marq Farman gave her refuge on Fair Isle while King Maegor sought her capture and members of the Poor Fellows denounced her and her daughters. The suggestion that Rhaena later married Marq’s younger son, Androw, partly to repay his father’s kindness is presented as a possibility, not a certainty. Maester Smike proposed another explanation: that the queen had found her true love on Fair Isle, not in Androw but in his sister, Elissa.

Elissa was three years older than Androw and differed sharply from him in character. She was quick-witted and sharp-tongued, fond of horses, dogs, and hawks, a capable singer and archer, and above all devoted to sailing. Her family’s words, “The Wind Our Steed,” suited a young woman who had spent much of her childhood at sea. At fourteen she sailed her own boat around Fair Isle; by twenty she had voyaged as far north as Bear Island and south to the Arbor. She also spoke of crossing the Sunset Sea to discover what lay beyond it, a desire that alarmed her parents. These details establish the independence and maritime ambition that Rhaena’s friendship brought close to her own life.

Companions and confidantes

Rhaena and Elissa became like-minded companions, and the queen found a new confidante in her. With two of Rhaena’s oldest friends, Alayne Royce and Samantha Stokeworth, they formed a close-knit circle that Ser Franklyn Farman called the “Four-Headed Beast.” Androw was sometimes admitted to their company, but less often than the women; the account emphasizes the group’s distinct social intimacy rather than presenting him as an equal member of it.

The queen’s dragon, Dreamfyre, offered another measure of who belonged to that circle. Rhaena often flew with Elissa, Alayne, and Samantha, while she was never seen taking Androw with her. The account leaves open the possibility that Androw declined invitations, so his absence cannot establish that he was excluded. Even with that qualification, the repeated contrast places Elissa among Rhaena’s chosen companions in an activity associated with the queen’s power and adventurous life. Their closeness is conveyed less through declarations than through repeated acts of inclusion: confidences, shared company, and journeys into the sky.

Marriage, interpretation, and uncertainty

Rhaena’s marriage to Androw provides the central context for Maester Smike’s interpretation. Androw was the second son of Lord Marq, younger than Rhaena by nine years, and regarded by others as gentle and unsuited to martial or scholarly pursuits. When asked why she had chosen him, Rhaena answered that he had been kind to her. That kindness is presented plainly; the possibility that her attachment to Elissa was more profound comes instead through Smike’s later letter to the Citadel.

The account does not turn Smike’s claim into proof of a romantic relationship. It preserves the distinction between his interpretation and what the narrative directly shows: Rhaena relied on Elissa as a confidante, included her among her closest companions, and repeatedly shared experiences with her that she did not share with Androw. The evidence supports an unusually intimate bond and makes Smike’s reading intelligible, while leaving its precise nature unresolved. That uncertainty matters: Rhaena’s connection with Elissa is not reduced either to a political arrangement or to a confirmed love affair.

Leaving Fair Isle together

The balance on Fair Isle changed when Lord Marq died suddenly at his own table and Ser Franklyn inherited the island. The next day, Franklyn summoned Rhaena and ordered her to leave with her dragon, her friends, and Androw, but insisted that Elissa remain and marry a man of his choosing. Rhaena departed that night on Dreamfyre for Casterly Rock, telling her husband and companions to follow by ship with those who might love her. She discouraged Androw from confronting his brother, but her own departure was immediate and decisive.

Elissa was not among those who could simply follow the next morning. She intended to leave on her ship, the Maiden’s Fancy, but Franklyn arrived at the docks and tried to keep her on the island. Elissa openly defied him. A crowd of sailors, shipwrights, fisherfolk, porters, and other dockside residents—many of whom had known her since childhood—overwhelmed Franklyn’s small party, allowing her and Rhaena’s other companions to board safely and sail for Lannisport. The sequence makes Elissa’s choice reciprocal: Rhaena had left Fair Isle rather than remain where she was unwelcome, and Elissa refused to stay behind when her brother tried to separate them.

Rhaena and her party were welcomed by the Lannisters at Casterly Rock, where they were given apartments and hospitality. But the refuge soon proved uneasy: Rhaena suspected that servants were reporting on her household, and she recognized Lord Lyman Lannister’s interest in her dragon eggs as part of wider ambitions for an alliance and dragons. She concluded that she and her companions could not remain there. In this turn, Elissa’s significance is not merely that she accompanied the queen away from one home. She belonged to the trusted circle with whom Rhaena faced displacement and reconsidered where safety could be found, while the narrative leaves open whether that loyalty arose from love, friendship, or both.