6 Horrible Life Lessons from 'Game of Thrones': Season 5, Episode 9

1. If your team is about to lose, abandon ship—or, you know, just fly away on your dragon and leave the crew behind.

What Happened: Queen Daenerys Targaryen and co. got ambushed by the Sons of the Harpy. Thankfully, her baby dragon Drogon showed up and roasted a few of the haters. With the enemy still encroaching, Dany did her best How to Train Your Dragon impression, and flew to safety. Tyrion Lannister, Ser Jorah, Missandei, and Daario Naharis were left to fend for themselves.

The Lesson: When your most-trusted friends are outnumbered, do you stay and fight to the death, hand in hand? Uh, no. Forget those losers and take off on your mythical fire-breathing beast.

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2. Stalk people you hate, try to sell them oysters, and then plot your revenge.

What Happened: Ser Meryn Trant—a Lannister Henchmen and one of Arya's (many) least favorite people of all time—rolled up to Braavos with Colonel Sanders of House Tyrell. Upon noticing, Arya immediately forgot about her assassination duties and followed him into a brothel (where he requested little girls, ew!!! WTF, GoT??). As Lana, the oyster and cockle saleswoman, Arya gathered intel and plotted her next move.

The Lesson: Never miss an opportunity to get revenge—even if that means aborting your assassination mission for the Many Faced God and selling unrefrigerated seafood at brothels.

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3. Sometimes, being daddy's little girl involves self-sacrifice. Literally.

What Happened: To secure victory at Winterfell, Red Priestess Melisandre advised Stannis Baratheon to take the most sensible course of action: sacrifice his cute-as-hell daughter, Shireen, to the Lord of Light! The scene was so horrific that, while Shireen was tied to the stake, even her batshit crazy mom, Lady Selyse, wanted to stop it.

The Lesson: All children have to do annoying things for their dads, like taking out the trash, washing the dishes, and, uh, burning alive at the stake.

4. Rebel against your father (er, uncle) by wearing revealing dresses. Assert your womanhood. Do you! (And be totally oblivious to the fact that your groom's sort-of aunt is trying to kill you.)

What Happened: To get back at her dad/uncle for ruining everything, Myrcella lashed out at Jaime Lannister in the only way a teenager knows how: by wearing not-so-age-appropriate clothes found at Hot Topic, or in Myrcella's case, Dorne.

The Lesson: At age fifteen, you are officially an adult who makes style choices that you won't regret later in life. So what if your dad/uncle doesn't like your new look? It's your body.

5. Piss off the king until he's *this* close to beheading you.

What Happened: Ellaria Sand continued to protest Dorne's alliance with the Lannisters by spilling out her wine during a toast to Tommen Baratheon (note: it wasn't in a good this-is-for-my-homies kind of way). In response, the Dornish king made Ellaria pledge her allegiance—or else the dude with the big axe would have a word with her.

The Lesson: Not happy with the king? Do everything in your power—like kidnapping his future daughter-in-law and wasting good wine—to annoy him. Psh, he's not actually gonna behead you, right?!

6. Try slapping your sister in the face—it's fun!

What Happened: During a heated match of red hands AKA the hand-slap game, Tyene Sand got frustrated by her sister Nymeria's taunting, and then slapped her in the face.

The Lesson: Sibling rivalry is healthy. If you're pissed off at your sister for always winning, it's totally normal to whack her in the face during a friendly game of red hands. Nope, that doesn't make you a spiteful, sore loser. Not at all. In fact, you're the most beautiful woman in the world.

HBO