The tale of Princess Aerea remains one of the most haunting and enigmatic. Born to the Princess Rhaena Targaryen, herself a figure steeped in the shadow of Maegor the Cruel’s reign, Aerea was the only known person to travel to Valyria and live.

How could the gods be so blind or so uncaring as to permit such horror? Or is it possible that there are other deities in this universe… against whose malice the kings of men and the gods of men are naught but flies? I do not know. I do not want to know…

Septon Barth, Fire & Blood

As a child Aerea was timid and bookish, keeping to the histories and court, while her sister Rhaella had an adventurous spirit, spending most time at the stables or dragon pits. In their early years, Rhaella was sent to Oldtown to be trained as a septa while Aerea was kept at court. During one of Aerea’s trips to visit Rhaella in Oldtown, her personality shifted into that of her sister. Many believe the twins were switched so they could live the lives they wanted.

When the now-adventurous Aerea returned to Dragonstone, she was ready to claim her dragon. Balerion the Black Dread, the dragon that conquered Westeros, was now riderless with the death of Maegor and being the largest, was the the perfect choice for her. In the middle of the night in 54AC, unbeknown to her mother, Aerea claimed Balerion and stole off into the skies.

Aerea’s mother, had believed that she had simply left Dragonstone and returned to King’s Landing, but upon arrival found that Aerea had not been seen. Ravens were sent to all the lords of Westeros to report any sighting of Aerea or Balerion. Later, agents and informers hired by the king’s Master of Coin, were given the mission of finding Aerea and Balerion across the Narrow Sea. Most reports proved useless, and none gave the desired result. Meanwhile, Rhaena flew her own dragon, Dreamfyre, across the Seven Kingdoms in search of Aerea.

On the morning of the thirteenth day of the fourth moon of 56AC, more than a year since her departure, an afflicted Aerea returned clinging to a severely wounded Balerion’s back. She was nearly unrecognizable, stick-thin, and whatever she still had for clothes were in tatters. She looked on with bloody eyes and matted hair muttering “I never…” before collapsing. Ser Lucamore of the Kingsguard carried her away to be treated by Grand Maester Benifer.

“The Death of Balerion” by Hristo Chukov

Benifer treated Aerea in his chambers with Septon Barth, who had been summoned to administer the rites for the dying. The maester forbade everyone, even the king and queen, from entering, only Benifer and Barth saw to her treatment.

Aerea was running an incredible fever, so much that her skin was hot to the touch, even through Ser Lucamore’s armor. Benifer began treating with milk of the poppy, then an ice bath, but nothing helped. Barth would remark “The girl was burning. Her skin was flushed and red and when I laid my hand upon her brow… it was as if I had thrust it into a pot of boiling oil”. By the hour of the bat that day Aerea had died.

It was announced that Aerea had died of a fever, which was only part of the truth. Her body had “something inside her, something moving”, Ser Lucamore would say. Benifer left no account of Aerea’s death, but according to an account in Barth’s private papers, Aerea’s fever was one unlike anything he had seen before. The septon described her as burning, with a red skin and having barely an ounce of flesh upon her bones, appearing gaunt and starved.

Barth reported that “swellings” moved underneath the princess’s skin, possibly searching for a way to escape and causing a great pain. He wrote “I pray that I shall soon forget some of the things she whispered”, and that she often begged for death. It seemed to Barth it was as if Aerea was cooking from within. Her flesh grew darker until it resembled charred meat; smoke came from her mouth, nose, and her nether regions. Aerea’s eyes cooked within her skull until they burst. When the princess was lowered into the tub of ice, “slimy, unspeakable things” making horrible sounds emerged from under her skin—one as long as his arm—but the “creatures of heat and fire” died from the cold of the ice.

“The Death of Princess Aerea” by Doug Wheatley, Fire & Blood

The origins of the creatures that lived inside Aerea are unknown. Barth speculated that Balerion, not Aerea, had chosen Valyria as their destination; as likely the only living creature in the world that had known Valyria before it was destroyed, the dragon had returned home.

Aerea’s ride to Valyria had substantial effects on Westeros. Barth began studies that caused him to later write “Dragons, Worms, and Wyverns”. King Jaehaerys would later issue an edict forbidding any ship suspected of having visited the Valyrian islands or sailed the Smoking Sea from landing at any port or harbor in the realm. Any Westerosi who visited Valyria would be executed.

A raven was sent to Aerea’s mother Rhaena, but by the time it arrived she had already been cremated. A distraught Rhaena traveled to the Red Keep to collect her daughter’s ashes. Although King Jaehaerys offered to have the ashes interred on Dragonstone with other Targaryens, Rhaena stated that Aerea had hated Dragonstone, and had wanted to fly. She took Aerea’s ashes into the sky upon Dreamfyre and scattered them “upon the winds”.

“Voyage of the Sun Chaser” by Atlas of Ice and Fire