Jaime's weirwood dream

[Castellan]

This is a very long post because I have the whole dream here, with my annotations, in the spoiler, and a couple of paragraphs of comment at the end.

I relate the dream to the idea put forward in several posts that Jaime and Brienne, like Beric and Catelyn may be killed and revived, in line with the way AA forged Lightbringer, (in fire (Beric), water (Catelyn), a lion’s breast (Jaime) and a beloved’s breast (Brienne)).

Even if you don’t buy into that, I think the dream is interesting because it’s full of death and Hades imagery and is related to similar imagery in regard to the dungeon under the Red Keep. I am going to put up a follow up post about the Red Keep.

Naked and alone he stood, surrounded by enemies, with stone walls all around him pressing close. The Rock, he knew. He could feel the immense weight of it above his head. He was home. He was home and whole.

[He feels home and whole but it sounds to me like he is in a crypt – naked and alone, with stone walls all around him pressing close. He is below Casterly Rock, with the weight of it above him.]

He held his right hand up and flexed his fingers to feel the strength in them. It felt as good as sex. As good as swordplay. Four fingers and a thumb. He had dreamed that he was maimed, but it wasn't so. Relief made him dizzy. My hand, my good hand. Nothing could hurt him so long as he was whole. [Continuing the pathos of someone feeling home and whole when they are not, now he thinks he has woken from a dream in which he lost his hand. He also thinks 'nothing could hurt him so long as he was whole', but the reader knows he is not whole. ] Around him stood a dozen tall dark figures in cowled robes that hid their faces. In their hands were spears. "Who are you?" he demanded of them. "What business do you have in Casterly Rock?" They gave no answer, only prodded him with the points of their spears. [I wonder if the men with spears represent a burial party. This is a classic ‘person who doesn’t realise he is dead’ scene to me.]

Have a look at this link, the pallbearers don’t have spears but to me the hooded figures give it a similar symbolism. This is a very famous medieval tomb.

http://hominisaevum.tumblr.com/post/26379338731/the-tomb-of-philippe-pot-philippe-pot-1428-1493

He had no choice but to descend. Down a twisting passageway he went, narrow steps carved from the living rock, down and down. I must go up, he told himself. Up, not down. Why am I going down? [Down implies hell; entrapment; burial and also evokes Dany in the House of the Undying, when she is told always to go up, never go down.] Below the earth his doom awaited, he knew with the certainty of dream; something dark and terrible lurked there, something that wanted him. [‘Below the earth his doom awaited’ – he is going to hell.] Jaime tried to halt, but their spears prodded him on. If only I had my sword, nothing could harm me. The steps ended abruptly on echoing darkness. Jaime had the sense of vast space before him. He jerked to a halt, teetering on the edge of nothingness. [Seems like the end – this is the abyss] A spearpoint jabbed at the small of the back, shoving him into the abyss. He shouted, but the fall was short. [This reminds me of the moment when the outlaws shoved him forward to fall on the ground, before they cut off his hand.] He landed on his hands and knees, upon soft sand and shallow water. There were watery caverns deep below Casterly Rock, but this one was strange to him. [It seems at this point that this could be good news – it might be possible to escape from a cavern or sea cave – and instead of tumbling into an endless abyss he has had only a short fall. Note that the surroundings foreshadow the bearpit and also the enclosure at the Whispers where Brienne kills Shagwell with Oathbreaker.] "What place is this?" "Your place." The voice echoed; it was a hundred voices, a thousand, the voices of all the Lannisters since Lann the Clever, who'd lived at the dawn of days. [Oh-oh, not good news after all – he seems to have found his final resting place with all his ancestors, in a crypt under Casterly Rock] But most of all it was his father's voice, and beside Lord Tywin stood his sister, pale and beautiful, a torch burning in her hand. Joffrey was there as well, the son they'd made together, and behind them a dozen more dark shapes with golden hair. [The presence of these three in a line with other ancestors implies that they too are dead; although the fact of Cersei carrying the torch could mean she alone is still alive, since later Jaime learns that as long as his sword flames he will live. Perhaps by the time something like this scene does come to pass, Cersei will be alive, but Tywin and Joffrey dead. It also perhaps just represents the family being present at an interment] "Sister, why has Father brought us here?" "Us? This is your place, Brother. This is your darkness." [Everyone has to face their own demons; they are not going to die together after all; Cersei will not save him. Also, there is the child-like pathos of his fear; he speaks as a child in Tywin’s presence.] Her torch was the only light in the cavern. Her torch was the only light in the world. She turned to go. "Stay with me," Jaime pleaded. "Don't leave me here alone." But they were leaving. "Don't leave me in the dark!" [abandonment by Cersei; and in his later dream he remembers abandonment by his mother: ‘but already she was moving away, her skirt whispering lullabies as it brushed across the floor. Don’t leave me, he wanted to call, but of course she’d left them long ago’. [something terrible lived down here. "Give me a sword, at least." "I gave you a sword," Lord Tywin said. It was at his feet. [Isn’t this where swords are laid - at the feet of the of the dead in crypts? Also, this was before Tywin gave Jaime Oathkeeper, so as other posters have pointed out, this is a bit of weirwood foresight.] Jaime groped under the water until his hand closed upon the hilt. Nothing can hurt me so long as I have a sword. As he raised the sword a finger of pale flame flickered at the point and crept up along the edge, stopping a hand's breath from the hilt. The fire took on the color of the steel itself so it burned with a silvery-blue light, and the gloom pulled back. [Is Jaime now undead like Beric, with a flaming sword?] Crouching, listening, Jaime moved in a circle, ready for anything that might come out of the darkness. The water flowed into his boots, ankle deep and bitterly cold. [Don’t wish to be creepy but this evokes what happens in a grave to me. I suppose water also symbolises Catelyn and the Tully’s.] Beware the water, he told himself. [I think maybe it does mean Catelyn] There may be creatures living in it, hidden deeps [Lady Stonheart is a certainly a scary hidden creature] . . . From behind came a great splash. Jaime whirled toward the sound . . . but the faint light revealed only Brienne of Tarth, her hands bound in heavy chains. "I swore to keep you safe," the wench said stubbornly. "I swore an oath." [Does her arrival mean someone has just killed her? Do you have to be dead to be in this dream? Or is Brienne alive?] Naked, she raised her hands to Jaime. "Ser. Please. If you would be so good." The steel links parted like silk. [Something vaguely sexy about this, I think] "A sword," Brienne begged, and there it was, scabbard, belt, and all. [As someone pointed out in another post, later in King’s Landing he gives her Oathkeeper, scabbard, belt and all] She buckled it around her thick waist. The light was so dim that Jaime could scarcely see her, though they stood a scant few feet apart. In this light she could almost be a beauty, he thought. In this light she could almost be a knight. [OK, so here we begin to find out what the dream is about on the most immediate level -– guilt about leaving her with Vargo – and his seeing her as a woman.] Brienne's sword took flame as well, burning silvery blue. The darkness retreated a little more. "The flames will burn so long as you live," he heard Cersei call. "When they die, so must you."[Like Beric’s sword, which flames because of the blood magic which has raised him from the dead] "Sister!" he shouted. "Stay with me. Stay!" There was no reply but the soft sound of retreating footsteps.[rather like the sound of his mother’s skirts murmuring lullubies] Brienne moved her longsword back and forth, watching the silvery flames shift and shimmer. Beneath her feet, a reflection of the burning blade shone on the surface of the flat black water. [The black water and complete absence of light evokes Lethe or one of the other rives in Hades] She was as tall and strong as he remembered, yet it seemed to Jaime that she had more of a woman's shape now. [Yep he likes her.] "Do they keep a bear down here?" [He has worked out what Vargo may do with her; or the weirwood is telling him] Brienne was moving, slow and wary, sword to hand; step, turn, and listen. Each step made a little splash. "A cave lion? Direwolves? Some bear? Tell me, Jaime. What lives here? What lives in the darkness?" "Doom." No bear, he knew. No lion. "Only doom." [Two things coming together here. The dream as a message that Brienne is in danger; the dream as a message that Jaime’s soul is in danger] In the cool silvery-blue light of the swords, the big wench looked pale and fierce. "I mislike this place." "I'm not fond of it myself." Their blades made a little island of light, but all around them stretched a sea of darkness, unending. [If they do become undead warriors in a deteriorating Westeros, this would just about symbolize their situation] "My feet are wet." "We could go back the way they brought us. If you climbed on my shoulders you'd have no trouble reaching that tunnel mouth." Then I could follow Cersei. He could feel himself growing hard at the thought, and turned away so Brienne would not see. [A strange reversal of the bath scene where he was embarrassed and confused because he got an erection when he saw Brienne. Maybe he is mentally ‘correcting’ his error in the bath because he ‘knows’ its Cersei he wants. In any case, Jaime still hasn’t given up on Cersei. But read on, its as if this bad thought summons the ghosts] "Listen." She put a hand on his shoulder, and he trembled at the sudden touch. She's warm. [yeah yeah]"Something comes." Brienne lifted her sword to point off to his left. "There," He peered into the gloom until he saw it too. Something was moving through the darkness, he could not quite make it out . . . "A man on a horse. No, two. Two riders, side by side." "Down here, beneath the Rock?" It made no sense. Yet there came two riders on pale horses [traditional personification of death – rider on a pale horse – one for each of them? The pale horse is followed by Hades, in the Bible], men and mounts both armored. The destriers emerged from the blackness at a slow walk. They make no sound, Jaime realized. No splashing, no clink of mail nor clop of hoof. [They’s dead hosses alright] He remembered Eddard Stark, riding the length of Aerys's throne room wrapped in silence. Only his eyes had spoken; a lord's eyes, cold and grey and full of judgment. "Is it you, Stark?" Jaime called. "Come ahead. I never feared you living, I do not fear you dead." [Ned was the first to judge him for killing Aerys. He senses he is about to be judged.] Brienne touched his arm. "There are more." He saw them too. They were armored all in snow [Don’t worry, I’m not dragging Jon Snow into this interpretation], it seemed to him, and ribbons of mist swirled back from their shoulders. The visors of their helms were closed, but Jaime Lannister did not need to look upon their faces to know them. Five had been his brothers. Oswell Whent and Jon Darry. Lewyn Martell, a prince of Dorne. The White Bull, Gerold Hightower. Ser Arthur Dayne, Sword of the Morning. And beside them, crowned in mist and grief with his long hair streaming behind him, rode Rhaegar Targaryen, Prince of Dragonstone and rightful heir to the Iron Throne. "You don't frighten me," he called, turning as they split to either side of him. He did not know which way to face. "I will fight you one by one or all together. But who is there for the wench to duel? She gets cross when you leave her out." "I swore an oath to keep him safe," she said to Rhaegar's shade. "I swore a holy oath." "We all swore oaths," said Ser Arthur Dayne, so sadly. [His last words to Ned Stark. Jaime wouldn’t know about those words, of course, so the dream is certainly a weirwood dream] The shades dismounted from their ghostly horses. When they drew their longswords, it made not a sound. "He was going to burn the city," Jaime said. "To leave Robert only ashes." "He was your king," said Darry. "You swore to keep him safe," said Whent. "And the children, them as well," said Prince Lewyn. [a more cutting point, from Elia’s relative] Prince Rhaegar burned with a cold light, now white, now red, now dark. "I left my wife and children in your hands." "I never thought he'd hurt them." Jaime's sword was burning less brightly now. [on the defensive, losing] "I was with the king . . . " "Killing the king," said Ser Arthur. "Cutting his throat," said Prince Lewyn. "The king you had sworn to die for," said the White Bull. The fires that ran along the blade were guttering out, and Jaime remembered what Cersei had said. No. Terror closed a hand about his throat. Then his sword went dark, and only Brienne's burned, as the ghosts came rushing in [they will slay him^}

However else you interpret it, the dream certainly reminds Jaime of his need for honour and at the same time shows him that Brienne needs help. Helping Brienne may save him from the hell of his conscience. We also see Cersei giving way to Brienne in his affections.

But considered in the light of the notion that Jaime may be killed by UnCat and then raised from the dead like Beric, and that this might also happen to Brienne, the sequence sounds alarmingly like: He is newly dead in the first paragraph. At the time he dies Tywin and Joffrey are also dead, but Cersei may be alive. (This would fit the timing of when he goes off with Brienne, presumably to the BWB) He is now going down to judgement. But he is given a little time first – he will live as long as the sword flames. Brienne turns up possibly dead and manacled and is given a magic sword too. Then Jaime’s sins or guilt overwhelm the flaming sword and he is killed (again and finally) by the ghosts of the dead and Brienne is left alone with her flaming sword.

The account of the forging of the first Lightbringer was that AA forged it in 1. Fire 2. Water 3. The breast of a Lion 4. The breast of his beloved can be taken to refer to 1. Beric 2. Catelyn 3. Jaime and 4. Brienne. The first three attempts are failures. So perhaps Jaime is a failure the way Catelyn has been, his past overwhelms him – just as Catelyn’s desire for revenge dominates her.

[The Mad Wolf]

Nice interpretation.

[High-born Plumber]

Awesome post!

[Swordofthemornin]

The hand around his throat says to me he will hang from a tree.

[DreamSongs]

Nice Castellan. I really liked the link of the Hominis Aevum. Truthfully, I don't recall of ever hearing about Philippe Pot, but I found a couple interesting associations on that link...

Philippe Pot (1428–1493) was a Burgundian nobleman, military leader, and diplomat. He was the seigneur of La Roche and Thorey-sur-Ouche, a Knight of the Golden Fleece, and the Grand Seneschal of Burgundy.

When you look at Jaime's post-ASOS efforts on behalf of the Crown, its pretty easy to draw the associations.

[peterbound]

I think the association with hell being 'down' is a leap in logic that's not really supported by either the old gods, the seven, or R'Hillor. You might be projecting your own faith system on that one.

Might have something to do with the crypts.. ya, or the oppressiveness of the earth (or in this case the Rock, and all it's history), but to say he is going to hell is a stretch.

[ArabellaVidal]

I think the association with hell being 'down' is a leap in logic that's not really supported by either the old gods, the seven, or R'Hillor. You might be projecting your own faith system on that one.

Might have something to do with the crypts.. ya, or the oppressiveness of the earth (or in this case the Rock, and all it's history), but to say he is going to hell is a stretch.

I agree. A lot of the caverns, caves imagery throughout the novels signifies change. In outlook, relationships, choices. E.g. the Hound's and Arya's encounters with tBwB, Jon and Ygritte, Bran and the Reeds.

I also found it interesting that while in this dream Jaime is told that this is 'his place', beneath Casterly Rock, his doom, destiny, choice, Jon's dream of himself in the crypts of Winterfell, also underground, he is told that this is not his place. The statues reject his presence amongst the Starks.

Both dreams occur at points of conflict for the characters. Jaime decides that honour will give meaning to his life henceforth. Jon will decide between being Jon Stark and being Jon Snow.

Of course, as the original post says, these dreams are not just the visual projections of the subjects' subconscious but supernatural dreams. They foreshadow their choices and reveal truths about identity and provide information that the characters are unaware of.

It would be interesting if you analyse Jon's dream as well. Jon also falls in the dream and the crypts get darker, a light going out somewhere. In Jaime's case, he is abandoned to the dark by his sister/lover, his father and his sworn brothers. In Jon's case, its the death of Ygritte and Robb and Grey Wind. But while Jaime is provided light through the swords and the company of Brienne, Jon can only see the sad glow and ghastly presence of the grey dire wolf.

I like how you annotated the text, giving some rather interesting ideas.

[Maester Pangloss]

It would be interesting if you analyse Jon's dream as well. Jon also falls in the dream and the crypts get darker, a light going out somewhere. In Jaime's case, he is abandoned to the dark by his sister/lover, his father and his sworn brothers. In Jon's case, its the death of Ygritte and Robb and Grey Wind. But while Jaime is provided light through the swords and the company of Brienne, Jon can only see the sad glow and ghastly presence of the grey dire wolf.

Perhaps this shows how they will "live on" after their death.

Jon will live on in hire Direwolf - which he will warg into after his assassination.

Jaime will live on through Brienne - either by her support of him, or maybe by impregnating her?

[Castellan]

I came across this thing I posted ages ago. I just noticed that though it only got 7 replies and sunk quickly down the thread it got a lot of views, so i feel a bit pleased.

Just commenting on the post below. I am an atheist. My parents are atheists. Never been to church. I am not basing it on my beliefs or even on the most widely current ideas about hell that non Christians pick up from Christians - that its down and fiery.

I am basing it on Western literature - Dante's vision of hell in the Inferno - which he derived from the classics and mixed up with Christian ideas. GRRM has picked up the central idea from that - in Dante. hell is cold, dark, and icy while heaven is full of light and heat. Ice opposed to fire. His descending circles of hell include sinners of all kinds from the least to most serious and and the bottom layers is reserved for those who betrayed their leige lords.

And yes I think GRRM is slightly familiar with western literature!

I think the association with hell being 'down' is a leap in logic that's not really supported by either the old gods, the seven, or R'Hillor. You might be projecting your own faith system on that one.

Might have something to do with the crypts.. ya, or the oppressiveness of the earth (or in this case the Rock, and all it's history), but to say he is going to hell is a stretch.

[Avlonnic]

Very nice interpretation along with the citations/quotations. This is quite deserving of a bump to expose it to new readers and refresh those of us who had forgotten it. Thank you, Castellan.

[Hrafntýr]

Nice opening post, Castellan! In the interval since you wrote this, Kyoshi created a wonderful thread that I think you might find of interest, if you haven't already seen it: A Feast for the Dead, a Snow in the Tombs, a Dream in Dust. It compares and uses to illuminate one another Theon's and Jon's dreams of the Winterfell crypts and Dany's visions in the HotU; iirc it was later expanded to incorporate Jaime's weirwood dream, but even if not, I suspect that you'll find some points of comparison with what you've done here.

[Castellan]

Thanks I'll have a look at Kyoshi's thread, sounds very interesting.