A Knight Of The Seven Kingdoms: Dunk's Trial Ends In Death — Read Recap

You can take the quirky spinoff outta "Game of Thrones," but — as this week's "A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms" attests — you can't take the "Game of Thrones" outta the quirky spinoff.

Episode 5 toggles between a heartbreaking (and violent) flashback to Dunk's youth and the heartbreaking (and violent) action of Dunk's trial by combat. By the time the installment comes to an end, a few people are dead, even more people are bloody, and Dunk's fate is decided definitively.

Read on for the highlights of "In the Name of the Mother."

Baelor is giving Dunk's team last-minute advice, including, "These men mean to see you dead. They will fight savagely." That invokes a new round of stress-puking from Raymun and Dunk. Baelor assures them that he'll handle the Kingsguard, who have taken an oath that will keep them from harming him. "Be vigilant," Baelor says in closing. "Don't die."

Egg is near tears as he hands Dunk his lance. "You'd best be here when I get back," Dunk warns him, echoing what he told him a few episodes back, but it's a loving moment of levity: "Rob me, and I'll hunt you down, with dogs." Egg smiles."Woof!" he responds.

Then, it's time to rumble! There's a fog over the tournament field as the action gets underway, and Dunk winds up with a lance through his middle after Aerion's first pass. The Targaryen prince hits him with a morningstar a moment later, and the big knight goes down. Everything goes to black.

We're then treated to an extended flashback to Dunk's childhood as an orphan in King's Landing. He had a companion, a scrappy female friend named Rafe, with whom he scavenged scraps of metal to sell. We see them saving their earnings in order to buy passage to the Free Cities, though Dunk worries that maybe his mother isn't dead and might come back to find him — and if he isn't around, what would she do? Rafe mocks him for the fantasy, but it's toothless: They love each other, she points out, and they should leave together while they can.

So the next morning, they try to do just that... except the price of the fare has doubled, and they don't have enough. They're still smarting from the disappointment when Alester, a slimy guy from whom Rafe stole the day before, and some of his friends corners the kids. In retribution, he takes Rafe's bag of coins, and she surreptitiously lifts the dagger from his belt as she walks away. But Alester quickly realizes what's happened, grabs it back from her, and slits her throat with little fanfare.

Dunk immediately attacks the man, jumping on him and biting his ear; in the fight, the boy gets stuck in the shin with a spear. He's outnumbered and it's not looking good, but then someone yells, "In the name of the Mother, leave that boy be!" And then Ser Arlen, who is mightily drunk, stumbles out of a nearby and very decrepit watering hole to jump to Dunk's aid.

As the knight fights off Alester and his man, Dunk kneels at Rafe's side and cries as he's unable to help her. She dies. Ser Arlen kills Alester and his accomplice, then walks away as Dunk cradles Rafe's head in his hands.

Dunk is in a bad way, his wound festering and his heart broken, when he hears Arlen's voice in the alley outside his hovel. So he follows the man as he leaves Flea Bottom, hovering nearby as Arlen camps and staying just far enough back that Arlen doesn't see him during the day. This continues for a while, until the elderly knight sees Dunk collapse one day as he comes over a ridge. He brings Dunk water and orders him to "Get up."

Just like that, we're back in the present, where Dunk struggles to get up from the muck. He barely succeeds before Aerion, on foot and with morningstar in hand, hits him hard. They wind up rolling around in the mud together, with Aerion alternately bashing Dunk with his shield and stabbing him with a blade. That blade eventually goes through Dunk's hand — a wound that makes Egg blanche from where he's watching in the stands — but it doesn't stop him from picking up a dropped sword and staying in the fight.

Aerion gets another sword, as well, and they keep at it, though it's clear that they are both badly hurt and losing steam by the second. There's a lot of sticking, a lot of poking, every once in a while a horse screams through the scene, and at one point Aerion jams a sword into Dunk's thigh. Eventually, Dunk rips off his helm and just starts swiping with abandon; on one of his wild passes, his sword slices through what looks like Aerion's femoral artery.

The young Targaryen falls. Not long after, Dunk — who is drooling blood as though something very important inside needs to be patched, pronto — sits heavily, stunned. Egg yells for him to get up. Aerion yells for him to yield. Dunk seems mightily out of it indeed as he leans to one side and then falls over.

Egg implores his knight to get up, the boy's voice rising in terror after Aerion informs the crowd that Dunk is dead and the trial is over. But it's not! Dunk somehow musters the energy to stand again, and everyone cheers as the bloody, dirty, nearly insensate pair go at it again. Dunk winds up straddling Aerion and punching him in the face until the prince whispers that he yields: Dunk has won.

The hedge knight drags Aerion by the leg and makes him repeat what he said so everyone can hear. "I withdraw my accusation," the Targaryen wheezes, and that's that. The horn is blown. The crowd cheers. Dunk has won.

He's hauled away and seen to. While Steely Pate is dealing with Dunk's armor, the knight asks if anyone died. "Beesbury and Hardyng, in the first charge," Raymun tells him. Then Baelor comes in and Dunk kneels at his feet. "I am your man," Dunk says, and Good Brother Targaryen acknowledges that he needs good men. Then he asks Raymun for help taking off his helm, and things start to get even worse than you thought they were.

Steely Pate helps Raymun remove Baelor's helmet... and half his skull comes with it. Baelor turns in a slow circle, looking confused, then falls to the ground. Dunk rushes to grab him, begging him to get up, but his champion is dead. Dunk cries huge, heaving sobs as he apologizes — to Baelor, to everyone — and Egg draws near as the episode cuts to black.

Now it's your turn. What did you think of the episode? Hit the comments, and let us know!