New TWOW chapter - timeline implications [spoilers]

[Lord_Pepsi_Cupps]

I really like the new Alayne chapter, and it has some great hints about the timeline. This is my first stab at timeline stuff and I'm also medicated at the moment if something doesn't make sense.

How long has Sansa been at the Gates of the Moon?

(1) Sweetmilk

Sansa casually thinks that the Maester would have given Sweetrobin a dose of sweetmilk before the party. From Feast, giving another dose was a huge deal, the maester was very opposed, and said no more doses "for half a year, or more". Now, we know from Sansa's thoughts she has absolutely no intention of harming SR, but of course LF may well be planning a sweetmilk OD for SR. Still, he would have to move slowly on this (or risk being found out), so if we don't want to say it's been six months since the last dose (assuming LF has been applying some pressure on the maester, but not too much), we can at least assume a couple of months; probably a few months.

(2) Sweetrobin's hair

SR's hair has grown halfway down his chest, not having been cut since before Lysa died. Sansa mentions it's grown past his shoulders, meaning it was normally shorter that (or rather, it was shorter than that when Sansa arrived at the Eyre), so if it's halfway down his chest, that's probably 15-20cm growth. 15cm is apparently a year's worth of growth at normal hair growth rates - but remember, this is from before Lysa died, so it includes the time they spent up at the Eyre after that. Probably not a full year all up, but quite a bit of time - again suggesting a few months spent at the Gates.

(3) Tourney

The first contenders started arriving a month ago. When inviting them, how much heads up time would LF have given them? A moon's turn? Two?

This seems like a big tourney, it would have taken time to organise. LF moved quickly, but I think months rather than weeks.

We also don't know how long they'd been there before Sansa had the idea to have a tourney in the first place.

Again, all this together suggests a few months at least.

How does this line up with other story arcs?"

Oswell Kettleblack arrives from Gulltown on a lathered horse the night before Sansa meets Harry. Did he just deliver he news that Cersei (or rather, his sons) are imprisoned? Sansa explicitly thinks about Cersei killing dwarfs to find Tyrion, so if it had already been known in the Vale that Cersei was imprisoned, Sansa would definitely have thought about it. This seems like the likely news then.

Oswell would have rushed to get to LF with the news ASAP (his lathered horse), so we assume that the morning of Harry and Sansa's meeting is a few days to a week after Cersei's arrest (or perhaps a few days after the Kettleblack brothers are subsequently arrested, depending on which of these events gets Oswell to leave KL).

SO:

- Everything that happens to Sansa in Feast happens during the early Cersei Feast chapters;

- a significant amount of time passes at the Gates of the Moon (six months at the outside);

- it seems even now Sansa is still not caught up with the ADWD epilogue timeline, since they've apparently only just heard about the arrests - so they're not even up to the walk of shame yet, and of course there's the little matter of Aegon.

[Tyrion's Third Wife]

I got the feeling of at least 6 months to a year simply by her familiarity with the Vale, its ihabitants, routines, etc. She is utterly at home.

[Merunka is the Fury]

Well organized. I think it reads like at least a second chapter for her. So, I guess they'll be some more catching up to do. Its possible LF does know about some of the things we do, and has hidden them from Sansa.

[ZG1234]

Really fun chapter to read. Sansa has really taken a step in the direction of becoming a political force in her own right--the idea for Lord Robert to have a Kingsguard-like entity protecting him and holding a tourney to determine its members was really great. It looks like she's taking some of the same steps Jon took in the fifth book in terms of becoming a political power. I think the Winged Knights will be of particular importance to her when she finally moves against Littlefinger and reveals who she really is.

Harry seemed like an arrogant prick but he probably has heard Bronze Yohn, Lady Waynwood and the rest run Littlefinger--and by extension, Sansa (or Alayne, I guess) too--down.

I'm excited to read another Sansa POV tourney chapter--her Hand's Tourney chapter from AGOT is one of my favorites of the entire series.

[The Holy Goat]

Good thinking, and I agree that it's probably at least 3 months since her last chapter. But I just want to point out that it has to be quite some time after Cersei's arrest, if that is indeed what Oswell talked to Petyr about. After all, not only would a ship have to travel from King's Landing to Gulltown with word of it, but Oswell would have to catch word of it and then ride to the Gates of the Moon, which would've taken several days, even if he rode as fast as he could. So, I think it would take more than a week, perhaps as much as two for those news to reach Littlefinger.

[Lord_Pepsi_Cupps]

I'm not so sure Sansa understands the point of the Tourney. She had this nice idea but it's based in her fairytales; LF jumped at it because it's a way to surround Sweetrobin with the finest knights in the Vale and also give those knights renown, so they have credibility around the Vale. After three years with SR, what kinds of stories will be going around little Lord Arryn? LF wants to maximise the impact of SR's childishness and instability, and this is a great way to do it; his Winged Knights will likely also be sons from some major houses, magnifying the effect of SR's behaviour around them. Sansa doesn't get this yet.

[Lord_Pepsi_Cupps]

News of Cersei's arrest would travel very quickly, by raven - wouldn't wait for boats with something this huge. It would be known in Gulltown within a day or two, then it's a question of how quickly Oswell can get to the Gates.

[Balerion the kitten]

I actually didn't like the chapter that much. I felt it was more of a fan fic rather than GRRM, I've read all the other sample WoW chapters and didn't get that vibe. Although it did give some interesting plot lines and like you said gave us an estimate of how long she's been there.

[Arataniello]

There is also a passing reference to the seasons in the new chapter. Given similar comments in the last published Alayne chapter (the journey down the mountain), I don't think much time at all has passed. A few months at the most.

[Lord_Pepsi_Cupps]

There is also a passing reference to the seasons in the new chapter. Given similar comments in the last published Alayne chapter (the journey down the mountain), I don't think much time at all has passed. A few months at the most.

They're in the Vale proper, which is low-lying and shielded by mountains - so perhaps stays warmish for longer?

[Lord_Pepsi_Cupps]

I actually didn't like the chapter that much. I felt it was more of a fan fic rather than GRRM, I've read all the other sample WoW chapters and didn't get that vibe. Although it did give some interesting plot lines and like you said gave us an estimate of how long she's been there.

It feels odd because Sansa is so much different here than what we've seen before - you can tell she's wizened up in the meantime and definitely gotten gutsier. She had a long period when she was basically stagnating, and that ended when she came down to the Gates of the Moon as Alayne. Since then, she's clearly matured - that's what felt strange to me on first read.

And if you think about it, Harry the Heir was introduced in 2004, that's 11 years of expectations about who he's going to be. To see him so quickly and get so much story goodness from him right away (the rudeness, the dance at the ball) seems almost too much.

This boy... is not going to end well. I think he will actually turn out to be a diamond in the rough for Sansa and they'll hit it off (hope for Sansa, finally), but LF will blow it up out of jealousy (maybe masking it as an attempt to marry Sansa to Aegon, as the now better match). This might well be part of LF's undoing. In any case, Harry the Arse might not even make it through TWOW.

[Arataniello]

They're in the Vale proper, which is low-lying and shielded by mountains - so perhaps stays warmish for longer?

Correct. But something similar is said in both this NEW chapter and in the last Alayne chapter in Dance. So the two chapters cannot be separate much in time.

[Colonel Green]

Well organized. I think it reads like at least a second chapter for her. So, I guess they'll be some more catching up to do. Its possible LF does know about some of the things we do, and has hidden them from Sansa.

I don't think the major events in question could ever be hidden from her. Cersei's arrest, Aegon's invasion of the Stormlands, etc. would be the Westerosi equivalent of front-page news. Everybody would be talking about them.

The one piece of news I really wonder about is fake Arya. Now, granted, Littlefinger would just say "oh, it's a fake that I arranged with Cersei and also, your best friend, who I forced into prostitution, think no more on it", but still, I'd have thought she'd ponder on the idea of somebody posing as one of her dead family at least a little bit.

[Chinoiserie]

I would seem that the big news have not reached Vale, the atmosphere seem quite relaxed there. And it seem that winter is not there yet. The tapestries seem to have arrived only recently (or maybe Royce is just showing them off now that he has an audience from the tourney guests). Those things would imply that only a short time (2 months max) has passed since the last Sansa chapter. Sansa could get adjusted fast, she is young and had spend time as Alayne for many months now.

But I wish it would be more time. I would like if Sansa could turn 14 (she was not yet last time we saw her, she made Alayne older than her). And Sweetrobin seems to have matured and Alayne and Myranda seem to be friends now. But those cold be just symptoms of the time-skip that never materialized and it is not as if Sweetrobin is still not childish and the girls are best friends now.

As for the Sweetmilk, Littlefinger could have just been manipulating the maester again and this is an important event anyway.

I do not know about the hair.

[Bright Blue Eyes]

News of Cersei's arrest would travel very quickly, by raven - wouldn't wait for boats with something this huge. It would be known in Gulltown within a day or two, then it's a question of how quickly Oswell can get to the Gates.

If that particular piece of news travelled by raven, it would get sent to the Gates of the Moon way before Gulltown.

The (winter) seats of Lords Paramount have that advantage.

[joluoto2]

A few months, I think.

[Anya, Vengeance Demon]

News of Cersei's arrest would travel very quickly, by raven - wouldn't wait for boats with something this huge. It would be known in Gulltown within a day or two, then it's a question of how quickly Oswell can get to the Gates.

Yeah, news of Cersei's arrest would be quick. I could see it taking longer for news of Aegon's landing to make it to the Vale, because King's Landing doesn't want to advertise the arrival of another pretender and Jon Connington would want to prioritize communication with potential allies like Doran Martell.

Also, while this might be a bit before the epilogue of ADWD, I don't see the point of keeping the Vale months behind everything else.

[Lord Damian]

The timeline revolves around Kettleback and it is somewhat hard to guage. I think Sansa has a lot of cathching up to do to where we are with the incident at the wall with Jon which seems to be the latest the entire saga is at this point.

[Lord_Pepsi_Cupps]

But I wish it would be more time. I would like if Sansa could turn 14 (she was not yet last time we saw her, she made Alayne older than her). And Sweetrobin seems to have matured and Alayne and Myranda seem to be friends now. But those cold be just symptoms of the time-skip that never materialized and it is not as if Sweetrobin is still not childish and the girls are best friends now.

Yeah I keep thinking about how much of this stuff is still just making up for the time skip that never happened.

Sansa is probably the most challenging character in that sense, because she needed to wizen up considerably, and also begin maturing sexually. This is hugely different to who she was when she started. Arya has been slowly becoming a more extreme version of herself, which is easier to do believably.

I suspect a big part of keeping Sansa out of ADWD is to maximise the amount of time the reader spends away from her (11 years and counting). That way, it's a little bit more believable if she's matured considerably in the meantime, even though it's technically only been a few months in-world.

[Anya, Vengeance Demon]

I suspect a big part of keeping Sansa out of ADWD is to maximise the amount of time the reader spends away from her (11 years and counting). That way, it's a little bit more believable if she's matured considerably in the meantime, even though it's technically only been a few months in-world.

But for many readers the amount of time that they spend away from Sansa won't have anything to do with the publication history, because they wouldn't have started reading the series before 2000.