Daenerys Targaryen

Viserys hands Daenerys to Khal Drogo and treats his sister as a bargaining chip. With help from Ser Jorah Mormont, an exiled knight, she learns to live among the Dothraki, earns Drogo's respect and gets pregnant. When Viserys threatens her in front of everyone, Drogo kills him with a crown of molten gold.

Drogo is wounded in a fight and Daenerys asks the healer Mirri Maz Duur for help. The spell goes wrong: she loses the baby and Drogo is left unresponsive. Daenerys smothers her husband, ties Mirri to the funeral pyre and walks into the fire with the eggs. The next morning she rises from the ashes unburned, with three newborn dragons.

With what's left of her khalasar, Daenerys crosses the desert to Qarth. No one there will fund her war, and the warlock Pyat Pree steals her dragons. At the House of the Undying she gets them back, and Drogon burns Pyat Pree at her word.

In Astapor she buys the Unsullied, an army of slave soldiers, in exchange for a dragon. At the handover she orders Drogon to burn the slaver and frees the army. She gains Missandei as her interpreter, and the Unsullied choose Grey Worm as their commander. Ser Barristan Selmy joins her service, the sellsword Daario Naharis switches sides, and the freed slaves of Yunkai call her Mhysa, mother.

Daenerys takes Meereen through a slave revolt and crucifies 163 masters, one for each child left dead along the road. She decides to stay and rule. She learns that Jorah once spied for King Robert and banishes him. When Drogon kills a child, she chains Rhaegal and Viserion in the catacombs.

The Sons of the Harpy, former masters in masks, kill Ser Barristan. To buy peace, Daenerys agrees to marry Hizdahr zo Loraq and reopen the fighting pits. Jorah returns with Tyrion Lannister. At Daznak's Pit the Sons of the Harpy attack, and Drogon swoops in and carries Daenerys away. The season ends with her surrounded by a khalasar in the Dothraki Sea.

The Dothraki take her to Vaes Dothrak, where khals' widows live out their lives. Before the gathered khals, Daenerys sets the temple on fire with everyone inside and walks out unharmed again. The Dothraki kneel, and she sends Jorah, sick with greyscale, to find a cure.

Back in Meereen, she burns the slavers' fleet with all three dragons. She allies with Yara and Theon Greyjoy, leaves Daario behind and names Tyrion Hand of the Queen. The season ends with her fleet sailing for Westeros.

Daenerys lands at Dragonstone, her family's castle, and plans the invasion with Tyrion. The plans go wrong: Yara's fleet is destroyed and the Lannisters take Highgarden. So she strikes in person, with Drogon and the Dothraki, at the Lannister supply train, and burns Randyll and Dickon Tarly for refusing to bend the knee.

Jon Snow arrives asking for help against the dead. When his party is surrounded beyond the Wall, Daenerys flies to save them, and the Night King kills Viserion. Jon pledges himself to her and they become lovers, unaware that the Night King has turned the dead dragon into one of his own.

At Winterfell, the North gives her a cold welcome. Jon tells her he is the son of her brother Rhaegar and heir to the throne. In the Long Night, Jorah dies defending Daenerys. Then Euron Greyjoy kills Rhaegal and Cersei executes Missandei in front of her. Daenerys has Varys burned for treason.

In King's Landing the bells ring for surrender, but she burns the city with Drogon. Before her army, she promises to liberate the whole world. Jon kills her with a dagger in the throne room. Drogon melts the Iron Throne and carries her body away.

In George R.R. Martin's books, Daenerys is 13 at the start and one of the point-of-view narrators. The show made her older. In the books she also has visions and prophecies the show left out. Emilia Clarke took the role after the original pilot, in which Tamzin Merchant played Daenerys.