Cersei is going down - and it'll be all by her order
Words by Jadie Troy-Pryde
The Game of Thrones season 7 finale came and went quicker than an angry Dothraki soldier on horseback. The clunky storyline between Sansa and Arya came to an end and Littlefinger's long game was cut short, undead dragon Viserion chucked up some icy fire at the wall and made an entrance for the White Walkers, and fun sucker Bran absolutely ruined the boat romp between Daenerys and Jon Snow by reminding us that they're related. Thanks, Bran.
But there's one character whose grisly end has been the talking point throughout this season - Cersei Lannister. While we all initially thought that her twin/boyfriend, Jaime, would be responsible for the Mad Queen's downfall, it seems that the latest theory about Cersei's death is much more likely considering Jaime has skipped town to help out with the wight fight up north.
However, before we get tied up in Game of Thrones season 8 spoilers, there's a huge hint that we all missed in the season 7 finale which suggests that before Cersei meets her maker she's going to face a betrayal of epic proportions.
To recap, in the last episode Cersei told Jon and Dany that she would send her armies to help fight in the north and put their own war on hold. Of course, it later came to light that she was telling a big, fat porky about the entire thing and was just waiting for the aunt and nephew duo to leave their posts so that she could reclaim the land they had acquired. Sneaky.
She told Jaime that she had ordered Euron Greyjoy to skip over to Essos and recruit a band of guys called The Golden Company. She's hoping that these men will join her, and help her reclaim authority in Westeros considering the Lannister's are currently pretty low down in the power foodchain. Cersei then casually told Jaime she'd have him killed if she so wished, causing him to - quite rightly - get the hell out of there.
But there's a huge problem with Cersei's plan, because The Golden Company are probably already aligned to Dany and Jon. Soz, hun.
The foreign army is made up of exiled knights, the founder of which is Aegor Rivers who was a legitimised bastard of a Targaryen king back in the day. They're known for never breaking a contract, and Cersei has taken a loan from the Iron Bank to pay for these mercenaries to fight for her and ultimately kill Jon Snow - but will these mostly Targaryen-blooded fighters really want to go after Jon (real name Aegon) considering their family history?
In the book, A Song of Ice and Fire, Rhaegar's first born son with Elia Martell had not been murdered by Robert Baratheon's men as we first thought. Instead, Varys had swapped the babies so that the prince Aegon lived, and he is secretly a part of the Golden Company. During this time, the men of the company break a contract to fight for Rhaegar's son for free.
So the question is - if they're tasked with fighting against the second Aegon Targaryen (the beautifully man-bunned Jon Snow as we know him) will they follow Cersei's orders, or will they break the contract to protect the rightful heir to the Iron Throne?