Game of Thrones Fans May Have Missed Varys' Attempt to Kill Daenerys

Last night's Game of Thrones had no shortage of shocking moments, but it sounds like one potential plot twist might have been hiding in plain sight. As a new post from Esquire points out, the episode's dynamic between Lord Varys (Conleth Hill) and Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke) almost got much more complicated.

Spoilers for this week's episode of Game of Thrones, "The Bells", below! Only look if you want to know!

The episode opens with Varys writing a memo about Jon Snow's (Kit Harington) true parentage, as a kitchen girl named Martha arrives with news. As Martha explains to Varys, Daenerys "won't eat", which Varys responds to with "We'll try again at supper."

Martha then reveals that she worried Dany's soldiers were watching her, which prompted the following exchange:

"Of course they are," Varys explained. "That's their job. What have I told you, Martha?"

"The bigger the risk, the bigger reward," Martha replied.

While the significance of this scene might fly over some people's heads, many have taken it to mean that Varys was attempting to poison Dany through her food. Considering how much Varys was motivated to see Jon on the Iron Throne instead of Dany, it certainly doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility. An exchange from the show's first season seems to support this hint, when Ned Stark is trying to investigate the murder of Jon Arryn, only to be told by Grand Master Pycelle that poison is the weapon of "women, cravens, and eunuchs" (of which Varys is the latter).

Of course, Varys didn't get much time to actually follow through with poisoning, as Dany found out about his betrayal and killed him soon after.

"I took it very personally," Hill said of Varys' death in a recent interview. "I took it as a person, not as an actor or an artist. I understood the reactions of previous actors who had been in the same position a lot more than I did at the time. You can't help feeling that you failed in some way, that you haven't lived up to some expectation that you didn't know about. The only thing that consoles you is people who worked a lot harder than you are in the same boat. So that helps. I don't think anybody who hasn't been through it can identify with it. They think, 'What's all the fuss about? You're all finishing anyway.' But you take it personally, you can't help it."

"All brilliant. All noble. He was absolutely true to his word the whole way through," Hill added. "All he wanted was the right person on the throne and a fair person on the throne. He said it so many times in the scripts. I don't have the distraction of love or desire or any of those things. And the people he needed to see clearly were both in love. So that makes perfect sense. And now with hindsight, I'm okay, but I really was inconsolable."

Game of Thrones airs Sundays at 9/8c on HBO.

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