Here's the Significance of That Shocking 'Game of Thrones' Death

This post contains spoilers for Game of Thrones Season 7, episode 6, "Beyond the Wall."

This week, Game of Thrones delivered its most shocking (but not that shocking) death of the season: One of Daenerys' dragons died in a battle with the White Walkers.

The Night King hurled a giant ice spear at it and down, down, down it went. It was devastating.

But even more devastating was the moment at the very end of the episode, when the Night King resurrected the dragon as a Wight. That's right, we now have an ice zombie dragon on Game of Thrones.

But what does this mean? As we saw this week, the dragons are a big help in the battle against the Army of the Dead. They're also a big part of Daenerys' claim to the throne and her ability to take said throne from Cersei Lannister.

This shifts the power dynamic considerably. Gone are all the hopes that the dragons will just swoop in and save the day. It also means that the Night King is going to be that much harder to kill—the zombie polar bear was hard enough to kill, imagine that with a DRAGON. Will Cersei now how to let Jon and Dany borrow the Scorpion?

SO. MANY. QUESTIONS. Commence with the theories, Reddit.

Follow Marie Claire on Facebook for the latest celeb news, beauty tips, fascinating reads, livestream video, and more.