Jordan asks, “Do we have an idea of how exactly the Dothraki would have gotten to the Reach?”
THROUGH THE POWER OF SCRIPT-WRITING. Just kidding. I mean, not totally. I’ve found it difficult to get a feel for the show because of the accelerated timeline. Journeys of months happen over the course of a single episode, armies muster in the blink of an eye, and the legendary castle of Highgarden was taken and looted in two minutes of screen time. So, it’s tough. But let’s figure this out.
After the sack of Highgarden, Jaime and the LOOT TRAIN presumably moved up the Kingsroad toward King’s Landing. The convoy took a rest along the banks of the Blackwater Rush, which winds west to east across the continent, skirting the southern walls of King’s Landing before emptying into Blackwater Bay. This suggests that, rather than following the Roseroad through the kingswood, skirting the Stormlands, Jaime took them off road, due north, toward the river. This is smart! The Kingswood is a notorious haunt for outlaws and the perfect place to ambush a lumbering convoy of wheat. By contrast, the plains south of the river offer clean lines of sight and plenty of options for movement. Still, Jaime, Bronn, Randyll, and DICKON got bushwhacked anyway! So how did the Dothraki get there?
That’s the tougher question. Dany would have had to load several thousand Dothraki onto ships, safely land the ships somewhere, offload, then ride out to meet Jaime’s Loot Train™. When Aegon the Conqueror invaded Westeros from Dragonstone, he landed at the wide, flat mouth of the Blackwater in the shadow of the hills upon which King’s Landing would one day stand. Aegon came with fewer than 1,600 men and, in those days, the area around the Blackwater was disputed by several parties and basically unguarded.
Dany’s logistical concerns are more complicated. Landing near King’s Landing is obviously a nonstarter and everyone in Westeros expects her to invade at some point.
So, best guess: Dany, like Jon Connington and the Golden Company in A Dance of Dragons, came ashore on Cape Wrath. We have no idea what’s going on with the Stormlands at this point in the show. House Baratheon is gone. The lords of the Stormlands would be aware of a large army marching through their lands. But lacking a banner to rally behind, what would they do about it? As King Robert said in Season 1, the best strategy against the Dothraki is to hunker down in a castle and wait them out. This is how it would be possible for Dany to march, unmolested, from the shore to the Blackwater Rush. It’s unlikely but not impossible.