Includes SPOILERS for House of the Dragon season 2, episode 4.

House of the Dragon season 2, episode 4, reveals that Aegon’s understanding of High Valyrian is quite sloppy, yet he’s able to command his dragon in battle. The action-packed episode showed the Targaryen king suit up for the Battle of Rook’s Rest, where Criston Cole had laid a trap for the Black faction, unbeknownst that Aegon would arrive. “The Red Dragon and the Gold” added a new member to House of the Dragon’s dragon roster, with Sunfyre making its first full appearance on screen.

Earlier in the episode, a confrontation scene at Aegon’s small council meeting sees his brother Aemond resorting to the use of High Valyrian so that only the pair would understand. Aemond demonstrates adequacy to the language, while Aegon seems to understand it but does not properly know how to speak it, which he is embarrassed about. Something that’s been consistent in both Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon’s timeline is the use of High Valyrian to command dragons, raising questions about Aegon’s communication with his.

Aegon Has Probably Trained Sunfyre To Understand The Common Tongue

Sunfyre Is Young Enough To Have Been Trained Differently

It’s important to note that while the dragons in George R.R. Martin’s universe have connections to human riders, they aren’t a particularly intelligent species. They obey simple voice commands that they’ve memorized, much like a dog could be trained to sit. In this sense, Sunfyre is a young dragon whose only rider has been Aegon, so he could have found any number of ways to communicate with it, including voice commands in the common tongue.

An older dragon like Vhagar or Meleys, who had other previous riders, wouldn’t be as easy. For Aemond to bond with Vhagar and ride her, he probably had to use High Valyrian to communicate his commands. He’s shown using the language to give Vhagar orders in the episode, as is Rhaenys with her dragon. As for Aegon, he’s never seen actually speaking to Sunfyre, but this seems the most likely outcome. He also possesses some understanding of the language, which could be the bare minimum for giving Sunfyre commands.

Dragons Don’t Necessarily Only Understand High Valyrian Anyway

George R.R. Martin’s Dragon Rules Are Pretty Vague

The rules of dragonriding and bonding with human companions are a bit vague, but Martin’s recent blog post provided a bit of insight into their intelligence level and confirmed he’s planning to share more information in future volumes of A Song of Ice & Fire. As of now, there’s no reason to suspect they only understand High Valyrian, as Daenerys speaks to her dragons in the common tongue in the books. Overall, there’s not enough information to suggest that High Valyrian is necessary for dragonriding in House of the Dragon.