In Game of Thrones world, things rarely happen by coincidence, especially magical things. That is why the way Beric Dondarrion kept getting resurrected have always had us – and Beric himself – wondering. Well, now we know. In Game of Thrones Season 8 Episode 3 ‘The Long Night’, Beric Dondarrion died for the seventh and final time, protecting Arya Stark and fulfilling a destiny long in preparation, but revealed only now. Massive spoilers ahead, so read at your own risk!
Let’s cut straight to the point.
In the nail-biting final moments of ‘The Long Night’, Arya Stark stabbed the Night King in the heart with her Valyrian Steel Catspaw Dagger and shattered him into a million pieces. But she may never have reached this point had it not been for Beric Dondarrion.
Arya battling the Dead in Game of Thrones Season 8 Episode 3 ‘The Long Night’.
Earlier in the episode, Arya is overrun by a massive group of dead people and looks almost close to death. Until Beric throws his flaming sword at the dead, freeing her from their clutches. But this leaves him without his own weapon, and he is unable to ward off the attacking hoard. Beric is fatally injured before Arya and Hound could take him to safety and dies in Arya’s arms. Melisandre tells a distraught Arya that Beric has finally fulfilled his destiny, the one for which the Lord of Light brought him back from death’s door six times. His destiny? To sacrifice himself for the one destined to kill the Night King and end the Long Night forever – That is, Arya.
Beric Dondarrion is overrun by the Dead in Game of Thrones Season 8 Episode 3 ‘The Long Night’.
We first get a hint that Beric has some special role to play back in Season 3 when Melisandre visits the cave of Brotherhood Without Banners. We learn that Beric has already been resurrected five times by his friend the Red Priest Thoros of Myr. Thoros is hardly a godly man; he drinks, kills, and bends the rules of his religion at will. Yet the Lord of Light allowed him to bring Beric back – a significantly magical and spiritual feat – not once but five times in a row. Why keep him alive, if not for a higher purpose?
Thoros of Myr resurrects Beric in a scene from Game of Thrones Season 3.
It had not been easy for the consummate warrior. Each resurrection took a little bit of humanity away from him, and he had been ready for death for a long time. Thoros died in Season 7 during the fateful expedition beyond the Wall, and both Beric and the audience knew there will be no coming back if he falls this time.
But even through all this, Beric never lost the qualities made him a hero in the first place; fighting for the weak and believing in a higher purpose. In his heroic death this week, Beric Dondarrion lived up to the values he had nurtured all through his many lives and deaths, and finally served his true purpose.
