Now that we know a fair bit more about Aaravos and his motivations in canon rather than interviews or TDP short stories, and because 6x09 confirmed some juicy pieces of speculation I’ve had for a while (staff, Sol Regem, and First Elf—Archdragon relations I’m looking at you), I thought it’d be a useful overview of what we can glean from everything we get about Aaravos — and Leola — in 6x09. So let’s get into it:

First Elves and the Archdragons

I talked about the potential peer-adjacent relationship the First Elves might’ve had with the Archdragons in contrast to the First / Star Elves and primal elves a few months before S6 aired. This was largely due to things such as Zubeia saying things like “In the name of the dragons of the First Elves” (4x03) and the fact that primal elves are seen routinely in subservience to the dragons, specifically Archdragons (the Dragonguard, the draconic monarchy at all, bringing gifts to Rex Igneous, etc). There were also lines where Zubeia was spoken of in a similar manner as Aaravos that felt indicative of something:

EZRAN: Zubeia, Queen of the Dragons, your heavenly majesty… (4x03)

ZUBEIA: Our adversary was literally a being from the heavens. (4x04)

This is of course entirely literal when it comes to Aaravos, and hyperbolic praise towards Zubeia, but the parallel imagery / association stuck out to me, as well as Ancient Draconic specifically being the language of primal magic (already theorized in said meta to have been a gift from the First Elves to ‘primal’ elves and/or dragons). Given all this, I’d posited that “Archdragons at least once upon a time had been contemporaries of the First Elves if not peers”.

Now thanks to 6x09, we can say it seems that this was true.

Sol Regem — or as he was going by then in his youth, Anak Araw — was a contemporary of not just the First Elves in general, but presumably their highest court in the Cosmic Council. He was the sole witness in Leola’s trial, and there to oversee her arrest.

We also know that this point that the Cosmic Council / Order was involved enough that they dictated what merited the 'Order’ and that they’d intervene to punish those who broke it, however well intentioned, so we know that the Draconic monarchy must’ve existed with their blessing, if not created by their hand for there to already be a hierarchy and trust established.

We don’t know if the other Archdragons we’re familiar with were around, such as Zubeia or Avizandum, but I’d be willing to wager that Luna Tenebris was at least, given that we know she’s presumably not much younger than Sol Regem as she was the immediate Dragon monarch after him as far as we know. So it seems right now the hierarchy was as follows:

1. The Cosmic Council, maintaining their Order
2. Aaravos? Plus other First Elves who aren’t council members?
3. The Draconic Royal Family
4. The Archdragons
5. The primal elves
6. Other misc Xadian creatures (rock creatures, mushroom guys, etc)
7. Humans

which was the hierarchy that was supposed to be maintained, but then humans were given/shown primal magic by Leola, and this led to the great upset by presumably putting them on 'the same level’ as ordinary primal elves.

Speaking of which, let’s talk about humans, specifically Aaravos’ view on them.

Aaravos’ view on humans

Aaravos shares very little about his view on humans in 6x09 directly. We see his views filtered through Claudia in 4x07 (“Aaravos believed in us when all other elves and dragons thought we were worthless, stupid, dirty animals. Aaravos believed we could be better. So he gave us magic!”) but given how much what she says parrots what Ziard says (“When humans starved and struggled, helpless and pathetic?” / “We were starving and wretched and helpless”), how much that perspective holds up is of course debatable.

All that said, Aaravos’ view on humans then is very much not, it seems, what his initial view on humans were through his dynamic with Leola. We know this in a few ways:

1) Aaravos’ home with Leola was on Earth. This is presumably a decision made by Aaravos before she came into his life, which indicates a fondness or fascination with mortals / Earth his kind didn’t typically have. Alternatively, it was a decision made because of Leola’s fascination once she was a bit older, but one he was wholeheartedly supportive of.

2) Regardless, both options in 1. take us to the same place, which is that it is unlikely that Leola would’ve been able to form the friendships she did without her father’s support and approval, both of which were readily given. Aaravos is happy and unsurprised to see her playing with a human girl, which would mean having a positive to neutral view on humanity.

3) The Cosmic Order was broken, and Leola punished, for the “crime” of sharing primal magic with humans. This was a law Aaravos was familiar with ahead of time, as he immediately understands during the trial that it would’ve been an issue.

4) Therefore, the most straight forward way for Aaravos to sow discord/chaos and further what Leola died over was to continue teaching humans primal magic. This may be what he eventually did with the Key and the book, and was possibly his original plan, despite the 'chaos’ it would lead to.

(Side note: this line makes me think that Aaravos, as well as the other First Elves, are all basically timeblind by default.)

Basically: there’s a definite piece of the story we’re missing about how Aaravos went from witnessing humans having primal magic to actively cultivating dark magic with them. We also know he presumably stole a staff from the Starscraper, took its gemstone out (Laurelion’s necklace that Claudia wears?) and replaced it with a stolen quasar diamond, using moon magic to hide the theft of the stone but not the staff. This transition of “humans are okay / I’ll help them” (especially considering he reaffirms that Leola loved this world and all its creatures) to “I’ll ruin everything and it doesn’t matter what the collateral damage is” was always what I think we as a fandom expected to have happened, but it’s still nice to have confirmation.

Speaking of which, time to finally talk about

Aaravos and Sol Regem

I’d speculated since Oct 2022 that Sol Regem and Aaravos had a potential personal beef between them, given Sol Regem’s rage only really comes out in his confrontation with Ziard (3x01) after it’s conveyed that the staff was a “gift from one of the Great Ones”.

(It also was a chance to provide stronger characterization for both of them than if there hadn’t been a connection in a series that already has very limited time, but I digress).

However, it seems that Aaravos and Sol Regem’s issues go even further back than just “Sol Regem snitched on Leola and was instrumental in her execution” given that the second Aaravos hears about the golden dragon, his face changes from confusion/fear to anger:

Like he knows that if Anak Araw is involved in anything, it can’t be good. This makes me lean towards Aaravos having a more positive view of humanity before everything, with this being the root of the issue that caused Sol “you are lesser beings” Regem to have their initial disagreement, and it all spiralled from there.

Conclusion: What did 6x09 Teach Us?

Confirmation on:

1. Aaravos had a positive view of humans and at some point during his revenge scheme, this changed
2. Sol Regem and Aaravos have a long, personal, and treacherous history with each other (“Tell me, betrayer”)
3. Aaravos stole the staff and a quasar diamond
4. The First Elves and dragons / Archdragons were peers with one another and worked in collaboration

New questions it asks:

1. What caused Sol Regem and Aaravos to initially have problems with one another?
2. Are the First Elves aware that Aaravos game humans dark magic?
3. If they are, why wasn’t that known by more Xadians at the time?
4. Why did Sol Regem testify against Leola?

Guess we’ll have to see what answers S7 gives!