Doreah

Doreah is the handmaiden of Daenerys Targaryen. She is a former bedslave sold into slavery at nine. After getting discovered by Illyrio Mopatis, she got taken to Pentos, where she got bought by Viserys Targaryen, the Beggar King. After Daenerys’s wedding to Khal Drogo, she became one of her servants as she got given as a gift.

Personal Details

• Name: Doreah.
• Allegiance: House Targaryen, Khal Drogo’s Khalasar.
• Year of Birth: 278 or 279 AC in Lys.
• Year of Death: 299 AC, in the Red Waste.
• Culture: Lysene.
• Position: Handmaid.
• Eye Color: Blue.

Appearance and Personality

Doreah is a beautiful woman with distinctive Lysene features of blonde hair and blue eyes. She is the oldest of Daenerys’s handmaids, and Her unusual look makes her stand out. Her beauty and pleasuring skills made her job training the naive Dany in the art of seduction after she married Khal Drogo, a Dothraki warlord, and became his Khaleesi.

Biography

Doreah was born in the Free City of Lys in Essos, and there is little information about her parents or family. At nine, she got sold as a slave to a pleasure house in Lys and remained there for more than ten years. When Illyrio Mopatis visited the city of Lys, he came across her and bought her from the pleasure house to his mansion in the city of Pentos. As he was also accommodating the last Targaryens, she met Viserys, who bedded her and took her for himself.

Relevance in A Song of Ice and Fire

A Game of Thrones

During Daenerys’s wedding to Khal Drogo, Viserys gives Irri, Jhiqui, and Doreah as wedding gifts to his sister. Being Daenerys’s handmaiden, Doreah’s role becomes to teach her the womanly arts of love as she had served in a pleasure house. Though her mistress is naive, she begins teaching her how to make her husband fall for her even more. Daenerys opens up and uses Doreah’s advice to become better at pleasing Drogo.

With Drogo’s Khalasar heading for Vaes Dothrak, Viserys becomes irritable and tries hurting his sister. However, she gets rescued by Jhogo and saves her brother from getting killed. When she enters her tent, Daenerys touches her dragon eggs and realizes they are warm. She then remembers the stories from the books given to her by Ser Jorah Mormont and tells her Dothraki handmaids, Irri and Jhiqui. They then tell her that the dragons are dead.

Doreah tells a story of the origin of dragons. She narrates a time when there were two moons in the sky. She talks about how the second moon got too close to the sun and cracked to release the first dragons. The maid then tells her the last moon will break and free the dragons. Hearing her story, her fellow handmaiden makes fun of the story, stating the moon is a goddess. After hearing the story, Daenerys asks her to stay with her for dinner.

To appease her brother, a pregnant Daenerys holds a feast for him and buys him clothes from the markets of Vaes Dothrak. She reminisces about how the Khal’s bloodriders share everything and is glad she did not get shared also. She sends Doreah to get her brother and reminisces about Westeros’s past, wishing that her father had not gotten betrayed by the Kingslayer and Barristan Selmy, who went over to the hands of the Usurper. Viserys walks in, dragging Doreah, and threatens his sister. When she meets the doh khaleen, a prophecy gets made that her unborn son will be the stallion that mounts the world. A ceremony gets held, and Dany prevents Doreah from handing her a sandsilk cloth. 

In Vaes Dothrak, Viserys gets irritated by the Dothraki and confronts Khal Drogo to give him an army. Drogo feigns acquiescence but kills him with molten gold. Upon Drogo’s death, the people watch as Daenerys walks into the flame of his funeral pyre with her dragon eggs. When she emerges with three newly-hatched dragons, Doreah and the small remains of the Khalasar kneel in fealty.

A Clash of Kings

After the death of her husband, Daenerys marches into the red waste with her dragons, Drogon, Rhaegal, and Viserion, seeking a safe place to camp with her small Khalasar. Along the way, many people in the Kahalasar die, including Doreah, who dies of wasting disease. Later, Dany sends out her bloodriders, Aggo, Rakharo, and Jhogo, and one returns with three strangers from the city of Qarth, Xaro Xhoan Daxos, Quaithe of the Shadow, and Pyat Pree.

Appearance in Adaptations

In HBO’s tv series, Doreah’s character got portrayed by actress Roxanne Mckee. Debuting in ‘The Kingsroad,’ Roxanne starred in the first and second seasons as a recurring character and was Daenerys’ handmaiden.

Season one

Doreah pleasures Viserys and tells him she once saw a man who could change his face and a pirate covered in gold who flew colorful sails. Though amused by the story, he reminisces on the destruction of his house at Robert’s hand, and his mood sours. Doreah tells Dany the story of the dragons but gets dismissed by Dany’s other handmaidens. Later, Daenerys asks for help from Doreah, and she shows her how to use her sexuality to make herself worthy of Drogo’s respect. 

Doreah, as part of Daenerys’s retinue, inspects the markets of Vaes Dothrak. After a narrow escape from getting poisoned, Drogo promises his wife the seven kingdoms. Doreah remains by Daenerys’ side as her husband raids Lhazar to obtain slaves for the invasion. Daenerys insists the Dothraki refrain from raping the captives, and Doreah watches as Drogo defeats a dissenting warrior who does not want to comply. Drogo gets injured during the invasion and dies at the hands of Mirri Maz Duur. When her husband’s funeral pyre gets lit, she walks into the flames and comes out with three dragons.

Season Two

Doreah continues serving Daenerys and follows her into the red waste. When one of Daenerys’s bloodriders, Kovarro, returns, he tells her of Qarth. Upon reaching the city, the ruling elders, the Thirteen, refuse to let Daenerys in, but after threatening to burn them with her dragons, they comply. Doreah and her mistress enter under the protection of Xaro Xhoan Daxos, the wealthiest man in the city after he invokes sumai. To learn more about her host, she asks Doreah to seduce some of Xaro’s fellow citizens to get more information. 

Xaro buys Daenerys clothes and gifts, and Irri watches with a frown when her mistress leans on the stone balcony of their residence with Doreah. Doreah remarks that Daenerys looks like a princess when she wears the clothes Xaro gave her. However, Irri objects, saying her mistress exceeds the title of a princess. An ensuing awkward silence persists. Irri advises her mistress to wear the dress to the reception planned by Xaro. 

Daenerys holds a lump of raw meat to Drogon on the edge of the balcony of Xaro’s mansion. She instructs him by saying Dracarys, an old Valyrian word for Dragon fire, to breathe flame on the lump of meat, and the dragon feasts on the cooked morsel. When Doreah reaches for another piece of meat, her mistress tells her to let Drogon sleep in his wooden cage. 

Xaro throws a reception, and Doreah attends. She flirts with the men at the event. However, Daenerys’s men get killed after the event, and she goes missing. Believing she is dead, Daenerys travels to the House of the Undying and retrieves her dragons. She then finds a sleeping Doreah in bed with Xaro and learns she betrayed her and was working with the conspirators. Daenerys then has her locked in the merchant prince’s vault, where she dies.

Doreah: An Unfortunate Tale

Doreah’s story is one of the unfortunate tales in A Song of Ice and Fire novels. Born into slavery, she served others with no regard for herself until her death in the second book of A Song of Ice and Fire. Though she influenced Daenery’s journey, her story remains a tragedy.

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