Unaligned

Hizdahr zo Loraq

King of Meereen (by marriage)

House: one of the Great Masters of Meereen, of the ancient line of Loraq

King-consort of Meereen by his marriage to Queen Daenerys Targaryen, last confirmed held for questioning in connection with an attempt on her life whose true author the chronicle cannot yet confirm.

A Great Master of one of Meereen's oldest pyramids, Hizdahr zo Loraq built his standing with Daenerys Targaryen not through force but through patient negotiation — brokering the peace with Yunkai that ended a costly siege and persuading the queen, against her own instincts, to reopen the city's fighting pits as the price of that peace and, not incidentally, of his own hand in marriage. He got both: Daenerys wed him and crowned him her king, a match the text presents less as romance than as statecraft on both sides, useful to a queen trying to hold an increasingly ungovernable city and to a nobleman with every reason to want a Great Master's name attached to hers rather than opposed to it.

The arc of Hizdahr zo Loraq

This carries the character’s road through the published novels. Read on only if you do not fear to know.

When poisoned locusts nearly kill Daenerys at the very feast celebrating the pits' reopening — a feast held, and insisted upon, at Hizdahr's own urging — suspicion falls hard on the new king. Skahaz mo Kandaq names him outright as the Harpy behind the killings, and Hizdahr's own confectioner, under duress, confesses to poisoning the dish, though the confession comes wrapped in a claim that the Sons of the Harpy had taken his daughter hostage to force his hand. Skahaz and Ser Barristan Selmy take Hizdahr into custody rather than harm him outright, pending proof neither the confession nor anything else in the published record quite manages to supply — and the Sons of the Harpy's killings, notably, do not stop after his arrest.

Where the books leave Hizdahr zo Loraq: Hizdahr zo Loraq's marriage to Daenerys bought Meereen a peace of sorts and himself a crown, and then bought him a cell — arrested on suspicion of ordering the poison that nearly killed her, and left, by the last published word, still unproven guilty of anything beyond very poor timing.

These partings name deaths, endings, and roads not yet ridden in the books. Unveil them only if both roads are known to you — or if you do not fear to know.

In the timeline

SourcesADWD · DaenerysADWD · The Queen's HandTWOIAF · Beyond the Free Cities

Did Hizdahr zo Loraq try to poison Daenerys Targaryen?

The books never settle it. He is arrested and held on suspicion after his confectioner confesses to poisoning the locusts, but the confession is coerced and the Sons of the Harpy's killings continue after Hizdahr's arrest — evidence the text lets the reader weigh either way.

Why did Daenerys marry Hizdahr zo Loraq?

His negotiated peace with Yunkai, and his insistence on reopening Meereen's fighting pits to satisfy the city's Great Masters, made the marriage a political necessity for holding a city she had conquered but not yet secured.