House of the Dragon Season 2, episode 7: Why is House Beesbury at war with the Hightowers?

In "House of the Dragon" Season 2, episode 7, it's made clear that House Beesbury is causing problems for the Hightowers. Why?

With so much focus on Team Black and Team Green in House of the Dragon Season 2, it can sometimes be tricky to keep track of all the other Houses and their allegiances.

Take the brief Small Council meeting in King's Landing in episode 7, for instance, during which an update on the war effort gets quickly derailed by the arrival of a visiting dragon. Just before Prince Regent Aemond (Ewan Mitchell) goes charging off on Vhagar, Lord Jasper Wylde (Paul Kennedy) gives the following info on the Hightowers.

"Lord Ormund Hightower makes slow progress," he says. "There is great concern that his host is threatened on two fronts by armies allied with House Beesbury."

This comment is easy to miss or forget, but it will likely prove crucial further down the line. The Hightowers — one of Team Green's main allies as Queen Dowager Alicent's (Olivia Cooke) lot — are having difficulty joining the war effort because another House is at their throats: House Beesbury.

But who exactly are House Beesbury, and why don't they like the Hightowers?

Why is House Beesbury at war with the Hightowers?

House Beesbury has a pretty good reason to hate the Hightowers, but we have to jump back to House of the Dragon Season 1 to find it.

Basically, back when the war was about to kick off in Westeros following King Viserys' death, then Master of Coin Lord Lyman Beesbury (Bill Paterson) was one of the few Small Council members to protest against Aegon II (Tom Glynn-Carney) being placed on the Iron Throne over Viserys' named heir, Rhaenyra (Emma D'Arcy).

Lord Beesbury's resulting death wasn't the goriest in House of the Dragon, but it was certainly a memorable one: Ser Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel) shoved him so hard back into his seat that his head was crushed against the little marble of office that everyone in the Small Council has.

That's right: The reason House Beesbury now hates the Hightowers, and Team Green are having to fight a war on a whole other front, is down to Westeros' very own public enemy number one, Criston Cole. Yet another piece of evidence to add to the "men's egos causing wars" list.

New episodes of House of the Dragon air Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on HBO and Max.