Spattered and Caked. Big Walder Killed Little Walder

[OtherFromAnotherMother]

24 minutes ago, Bironic said:

Mainly for two reasons: How did Big Walder kill LW? Little Walder is bigger, stronger, more capable of killing, fighting, hunting etc.

I laid this out in the OP. BW most likely stabbed LW given the fact his gloves are caked with blood and he has blood spatter on his upper torso. If BW attacked LW (perhaps in suprise) with a knife or dagger then a 9 year old being bigger than another 9 year old really doesn't matter, right?  

Also, where do you get the information that LW is more capable when it comes to killing, fighting, and hunting?

24 minutes ago, Bironic said:

Second BW is intelligent: By killing LW he destabilizes the already precarious situation for the freys in the north. As long as roose is in control, he is quite safe, if it comes to tensions between Roose's allies, the freys are the first to get killed. Stannis is the most obvious winner if it comes to blows between Roose's allies, so the man who did the deed had the intention to boost Stannis cause. Why should BW do that? If Stannis and Roose meet in battle, BW could very well die, get executed by vengeful northmen, killed in the battle, or burned at stake by Clayton Suggs.

Yes, one of the results of LW's murder is Roose sending out Frey's and Manderlys. However, I'm not so sure this was BW's motivation. As I stated in the OP, the motivation could be one or both of two things: succession and how LW is growing similar to Ramsay. The evidence from the text is in the OP.  

[Bironic]

1 minute ago, OtherFromAnotherMother said:

I laid this out in the OP. BW most likely stabbed LW given the fact his gloves are caked with blood and he has blood spatter on his upper torso. If BW attacked LW (perhaps in suprise) with a knife or dagger then a 9 year old being bigger than another 9 year old really doesn't matte, right?  

Also, where do you get the information that LW is more capable when it comes to killing, fighting, and hunting?

Yes, one of the results of LW's murder is Roose sending out Frey's and Manderlys. However, I'm not so sure this was BW's motivation. As I stated in the OP, the motivation could be one or both of two things: succession and how LW is growing similar to Ramsay. The evidence from the text is in the OP.  

He goes to hunt and play with Ramsay and his men, while BW doesn't. So he has more training in hunting, probably in fighting certainly in torturing or killing if we look at what ramsay does and likes best. It's also said that he is bigger and he is one of the Crakehall-Freys, said to be the strongest and best fighters amongst the Freys. The Crakehalls themselves have also a tradition of strong and good fighters. BW reminds me more of Lame Lothar, who is also a blackwood-Frey IIRC.

Yes I don't think it was his motivation either, but he is certainly clever enough that his actions would lead to this. And the unrest within Ross^s camp can't be in his best interests. Even if jumping a few steps in the ladder of succession and killing off a bully certainly is.

I work with children and there are size/strength differences between nine year olds who matter quite much when they fight with bare hands. I agree that knives are game changers though, and I have never seen anyone in a knife fight. But I assume a bully like LW would probably not walk around without a knife/weapon. So at the very least BW should have been wounded as well. If it was a surprise attack why was BW so full of blood? looks more like a prolonged fight to me.

Don't get me wrong I like your theory and I think there's a good chance that it is true, I just think that there are other possibilities we can't rule out yet. Such as a Manderly man doing the deed.

[HouseFossoway]

I just realized that Big Walder is Lothar Frey's nephew, and Lothar Frey only has daughters. So, if Lothar were to become the lord of the crossing, then Big Walder would be his heir. At the very least, Big Walder might be more loyal to his full blooded uncle then to his half relatives, making it easier for Lothar to turn Big Walder into his agent.

Could Big Walder be working with Lothar Frey to remove potential challengers for Lothar, like the descendants of Lord Walder Frey by Amarei Crakehall (including Hosteen, and Little Walder), who are all ahead of Lothar, to bring power to the descendants of Lord Walder Frey by Alyssa Blackwood? Merrett did mention that most freys only trusted their full blooded siblings and relatives, and not the half-relatives. And Hosteen, would be a major threat to any power grab made by Lothar.

[OtherFromAnotherMother]

21 minutes ago, Bironic said:

He goes to hunt and play with Ramsay and his men, while BW doesn't. So he has more training in hunting, probably in fighting certainly in torturing or killing if we look at what ramsay does and likes best. It's also said that he is bigger and he is one of the Crakehall-Freys, said to be the strongest and best fighters amongst the Freys. The Crakehalls themselves have also a tradition of strong and good fighters. BW reminds me more of Lame Lothar, who is also a blackwood-Frey IIRC.

They are both squires for Ramsay Bolton. They are usually together. They both are there when Ramsay kills the old man for calling him "bastard". The only separation we get from the two is that BW doesn't take part in LW's "games and cruelties". Yes, LW is more like Ramsay, but I don't think there is any evidence from the text that BW does not join the hunts and LW does. Being that they are both squires I would guess that they both went on the hunts.

Quote

Little Walder had become Lord Ramsay's best boy and grew more like him every day, but the smaller Frey was made of different stuff and seldom took part in his cousin's games and cruelties.

Do you have a quote of one of them hunting with Ramsay and the other not? I can't find anything of the sort other than back in CoK when LW goes hunting with Theon and BW does not. But BW does laugh at LW for saying he went on lots of hunts, implying that he only went on one hunt and didn't get near the boar.

CoK, Theon IV:

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"Let me come too. I want that wolfskin cloak." A boy stepped forward, no older than Bran. It took Theon a moment to remember him. "I've hunted lots of times before," Walder Frey said. "Red deer and elk, and even boar."

His cousin laughed at him. "He rode on a boar hunt with his father, but they never let him near the boar."

 

43 minutes ago, Bironic said:

If it was a surprise attack why was BW so full of blood? looks more like a prolonged fight to me.

Again, I don't know whether or not it was a surprise attack. That is speculation. But remember Hosteen says LW was "butchered like a pig" so I would assume that LW was slashed many times though. Maybe because the killing had a personal element to it? And I don't think we know how much blood is on BW. I don't think we can say he is "so full of blood". Spattered is only particles or drops and caked has no relation to any specific amount of blood, only enough blood to appear crusted.

[velo-knight]

1 hour ago, Bironic said:

I work with children and there are size/strength differences between nine year olds who matter quite much when they fight with bare hands. I agree that knives are game changers though, and I have never seen anyone in a knife fight. But I assume a bully like LW would probably not walk around without a knife/weapon. So at the very least BW should have been wounded as well. If it was a surprise attack why was BW so full of blood? looks more like a prolonged fight to me.

Doesn't living in the TV age sort of confuse us on this point? I'm pretty sure TV dramatically under-shows just how much blood you have and how far your arteries and heart can pump it out of your body. It could be totally one-sided and still very messy.

28 minutes ago, HouseFossoway said:

I just realized that Big Walder is Lothar Frey's nephew, and Lothar Frey only has daughters. So, if Lothar were to become the lord of the crossing, then Big Walder would be his heir. At the very least, Big Walder might be more loyal to his full blooded uncle then to his half relatives, making it easier for Lothar to turn Big Walder into his agent.

Normal agnatic-cognatic primogeniture seems to rule in the 7 Kingdoms, except for the Iron Throne itself. A daughter should come before a brother or nephew.

 

[HouseFossoway]

1 minute ago, velo-knight said:

Normal agnatic-cognatic primogeniture seems to rule in the 7 Kingdoms, except for the Iron Throne itself. A daughter should come before a brother or nephew.

 

According to Grrm, the laws of succession work as follows:

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The short answer is that the laws of the seven kingdoms are modelled on those in real medieval history ... which is to say they were vague, uncodified, subject to varying interpretations, and often contradictory.

what the wiki has to say is:

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Male-preference primogeniture is customary, but not binding, for most nobles. A man's eldest son is his heir, followed by his second son, then his third son, and so on. In theory, the youngest son is followed in the line of succession by the eldest daughter, after whom come her sisters in birth order.^[9] In practice it is usually sons, then whoever can manage to convince the local overlord that he ought to inherit.

 

[velo-knight]

7 minutes ago, HouseFossoway said:

 

According to Grrm, the laws of succession work as follows:

what the wiki has to say is:

 

I don't see how that makes Big Walder heir. It seems now like he'd have to appeal to his overlord, likely Baelish or a restored Tully. If it's the latter, he shouldn't even bother: the only Freys likely to inherit under those conditions are Edmure's own progeny or maybe Olyvar.

[HouseFossoway]

4 minutes ago, velo-knight said:

I don't see how that makes Big Walder heir. It seems now like he'd have to appeal to his overlord, likely Baelish or a restored Tully. If it's the latter, he shouldn't even bother: the only Freys likely to inherit under those conditions are Edmure's own progeny or maybe Olyvar.

Unless Big Walder feels fairly certain that the Freys will hold onto their somewhat functional role as lord paramounts of the riverlands, which might seem likely to big Walder at that point.

[velo-knight]

2 minutes ago, HouseFossoway said:

Unless Big Walder feels fairly certain that the Freys will hold onto their somewhat functional role as lord paramounts of the riverlands, which might seem likely to big Walder at that point.

..fair enough. I do like the idea of BW working with Lame Lothar. Do you think anyone else in the Blackwood-Frey faction could be in on the plot?

[bent branch]

The blood on BW is a red herring. The biggest two biggest clues in the story are that LW's body has a pink frost and the blood on BW is not dried. Frost develops on an item NOT because it is cold outside, but because the item with the frost is colder than the ambient air temperature. If you have ever had a cold drink in a frosted glass on a hot day you can understand this concept. The glass in this scenario is frosted because it has been chilled to a low enough temperature that it can condense moisture from the air as frost. Because LW is covered in frost we can be sure his body is very cold. Even if the temperature was 40 below, it LW would have had to have been killed the night before for his body to be that cold. If BW had killed LW the night before the blood on him would have been dried. Since the blood on BW isn't dry, it wasn't deposited on BW at the time of LW's death. Therefore, the blood on BW serves no purpose as evidence in LW death.

[OtherFromAnotherMother]

3 hours ago, bent branch said:

The blood on BW is a red herring. The biggest two biggest clues in the story are that LW's body has a pink frost and the blood on BW is not dried. Frost develops on an item NOT because it is cold outside, but because the item with the frost is colder than the ambient air temperature. If you have ever had a cold drink in a frosted glass on a hot day you can understand this concept. The glass in this scenario is frosted because it has been chilled to a low enough temperature that it can condense moisture from the air as frost. Because LW is covered in frost we can be sure his body is very cold. Even if the temperature was 40 below, it LW would have had to have been killed the night before for his body to be that cold. If BW had killed LW the night before the blood on him would have been dried. Since the blood on BW isn't dry, it wasn't deposited on BW at the time of LW's death. Therefore, the blood on BW serves no purpose as evidence in LW death.

George describes the blood as "caked" which means formed into a crust or compact mass. In what way is the blood stil wet? What, in the text, makes you believe the blood on BW is not dry?

And your definition of frost is off as well. Frost is a state of coldness sufficient to cause the freezing of water (dictionary.com ). But yes, his body is extremely cold. We know this because the text says "the cold outside had frozen his blood".

[bent branch]

I have not given a definition of frost. Instead I gave a scientific explanation of how frost forms. It is not difficult to understand. As I said, if you have ever had a cold drink in a frosted glass on a hot day, you can figure out that LW was killed the night before. I wouldn't be surprised if GRRM thought of it while he was sitting there in New Mexico having a frosted drink.

Moving on to "caked". In the same section where LW's body is described section we have this passage:

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The doors of the Great Hall opened with a crash.

A cold wind came swirling through, and a cloud of ice crystals sparkled blue-white in the air. Through it strode Ser Hosteen Frey, caked with snow to the waist,  a body in his arms.

 

Am I to understand that the snow is "dried"? What does that look like? Here snow is behaving like a thick liquid, clumping up on Ser Hosteen. Now we were told that BW dug LW's body out of a bloody snowbank. This bloody snow was caked on BW's gloves.

LW was killed by the Hooded Man. Evidence for LW having been killed by the Hooded Man:

1)  LW's body was found in a bloody snowbank directly across from the entrance to the crypts soon after Lady Dustin had the entrance cleared.

2)  When Theon met the Hooded Man, the HM was walking away from the area where LW was buried in the snowbank.

What happened is that LW caught the Hooded Man coming from crypts and the HM killed LW to keep him from raising the alarm. Hooded Man than buried the body in the snowbank to keep the body from being discovered too soon. This explanation is far more logical than BW killed LW and fits with the story. Theon having an imaginary friend and BW killing LW are meaningless within story.

[OtherFromAnotherMother]

1 hour ago, bent branch said:

Am I to understand that the snow is "dried"? What does that look like? Here snow is behaving like a thick liquid, clumping up on Ser Hosteen. Now we were told that BW dug LW's body out of a bloody snowbank. This bloody snow was caked on BW's gloves.

Blood would have to be dry in order to cake. It would not be able to crust or form into a compact mass if it were still wet. Did you look at the other examples from the books of blood becoming "caked" I posted in the OP? Each time it is dry. 

Snow, on the other hand could just be snow. It can form into a compact mass and stick to Hosteen while stil being snow. It would still be defined as caked because it forms a compact mass on Hosteen.

The definition of "caked" does not require a substance to be wet or dry. Caked means "to form into a crust or compact mass". Of course, blood would not be able to crust or form into a compact mass unless it were dry. Snow can be snow.

Is the word "caked" the only reason you thought the blood was wet? 

 

[OtherFromAnotherMother]

1 hour ago, bent branch said:

This bloody snow was caked on BW's gloves.

The text does not say "bloody snow". The text only says "caked with his cousin's blood".

[bent branch]

11 minutes ago, OtherFromAnotherMother said:

Blood would have to be dry in order to cake. It would not be able to crust or form into a compact mass if it were still wet. Did you look at the other examples from the books of blood becoming "caked" I posted in the OP? Each time it is dry. 

Snow, on the other hand could just be snow. It can form into a compact mass and stick to Hosteen while stil being snow. It would still be defined as caked because it forms a compact mass on Hosteen.

The definition of "caked" does not require a substance to be wet or dry. Caked means "to form into a crust or compact mass". Of course, blood would not be able to crust or form into a compact mass unless it were dry. Snow can be snow.

Is the word "caked" the only reason you thought the blood was wet? 

 

 

8 minutes ago, OtherFromAnotherMother said:

The text does not say "bloody snow". The text only says "caked with his cousin's blood".

No. I don't think the blood was wet because of the word caked, although it is obvious you think the blood is dry only because of the word caked. If BW had just dug LW out of the snow, then his gloves were either wet or caked with snow. There is literally no way BW's gloves were dry. Read Holly's death scene in order to understand how GRRM imagines what the snow looks like once someone has bled out after being covered with snow. Another clue that the blood is still wet is the horses screaming in terror. If all of the blood was dried or frozen the smell would be less and the horses would be nervous, not terrified.

I have this theory that people who think LW killed BW come from areas that don't commonly experience harsh winter conditions. LW being killed by BW makes no sense if a person is familiar with cold temperatures and heavy snow. I feel confident that I am right because I know GRRM lived in Iowa, a place that experiences harsh winters.

[OtherFromAnotherMother]

24 minutes ago, bent branch said:

I don't think the blood was wet because of the word caked, although it is obvious you think the blood is dry only because of the word caked.

Blood would have to be dry in order to cake. How would it form a crust or compact mass if it were wet? Did you read the OP with the examples of every other time George uses "caked blood"? Each time it is dry. 

24 minutes ago, bent branch said:

If BW had just dug LW out of the snow, then his gloves were either wet or caked with snow. There is literally no way BW's gloves were dry.

Why do you think BW had just dug LW out of the snow? 

 

24 minutes ago, bent branch said:

I have this theory that people who think LW killed BW come from areas that don't commonly experience harsh winter conditions. LW being killed by BW makes no sense if a person is familiar with cold temperatures and heavy snow. 

Lol. This would certainly not apply to me then... 6 inches of snow outside right now. After a mild day where some of it melted.

[bent branch]

58 minutes ago, OtherFromAnotherMother said:

Blood would have to be dry in order to cake. How would it form a crust or compact mass if it were wet? Did you read the OP with the examples of every other time George uses "caked blood"? Each time it is dry. 

Why do you think BW had just dug LW out of the snow? 

 

Lol. This would certainly not apply to me then... 6 inches of snow outside right now. After a mild day where some of it melted.

Not if the blood is in the snow.

Because that is what the story says.

Actually, I think it might apply to you. We usually get about 7 feet/2.1 meters and the high temperature for today was 7.9F/-13.4C and the low is 1.7F/-16C. Our daylight total during winter is about 4.5 hours a day and our water mains are buried 12 feet down because the ground usually freezes to about 10 feet with the sustained cold temperatures. The story being told about BW killing LW seems just silly to me when I consider what truly harsh winter conditions are like. But we will see where GRRM goes with this.

I'm taking my achy, old bones to a warm, tropical island tomorrow so I probably won't see any response you make after this point for over a week. But have a great week!

[OtherFromAnotherMother]

1 hour ago, bent branch said:

Not if the blood is in the snow.

Because that is what the story says.

There is no mention of snow on BW in the text. The blood on BW is not from the snow. The story does not say anything about BW digging out LW from the snow. 

1 hour ago, bent branch said:

Actually, I think it might apply to you. We usually get about 7 feet/2.1 meters and the high temperature for today was 7.9F/-13.4C and the low is 1.7F/-16C. Our daylight total during winter is about 4.5 hours a day and our water mains are buried 12 feet down because the ground usually freezes to about 10 feet with the sustained cold temperatures.

That sucks. 

1 hour ago, bent branch said:

I'm taking my achy, old bones to a warm, tropical island tomorrow so I probably won't see any response you make after this point for over a week. But have a great week!

Have fun!

[Shouldve Taken The Black]

On 12/12/2016 at 4:03 AM, bent branch said:

Actually, I think it might apply to you. We usually get about 7 feet/2.1 meters and the high temperature for today was 7.9F/-13.4C and the low is 1.7F/-16C. Our daylight total during winter is about 4.5 hours a day and our water mains are buried 12 feet down because the ground usually freezes to about 10 feet with the sustained cold temperatures. The story being told about BW killing LW seems just silly to me when I consider what truly harsh winter conditions are like. But we will see where GRRM goes with this.

I love the idea of GRRM researching the process of blood freezing in sub-zero temperatures before deciding whether to use terms like "frosted" or "caked".

I think all this debate about how drenched BW was in blood, etc. is a bit overcomplicated. LW was dead, BW was covered in blood. This could have come about from BW finding him dead, or it could be because he killed him. I lean towards the latter theory because, a) the wildlings deny involvement, yet admit to the others, and b ) BW is clearly uncomfortable with the direction LW is heading.

I don't think it has anything to do with the succession, there are lots of obstacles between BW and the succession, and murdering your cousin to get you one step closer seems a bit hardcore. I also doubt there's any conspiracy between Lame Lothar and BW. It doesn't seem likely that Lothar would entrust such a mission to a nine year old. The link between Lothar and BW is interesting though, as I think Lothar, for a time at least, is going to come out on top of the succession dispute, either as the Lord of the Crossing or the "king maker".

I reckon BW simply had had enough of the direction LW was heading, and decided to kill him. It may have been a reaction to a particular thing LW did or intended to do, or because he had had enough. Others have said this on here, but he's just nine - he doesn't need a really logical reason. He's an armed child in a violent culture with an increasingly sociopathic cousin he has to spend almost every waking moment with. Stabbing him probably seemed perfectly logical at the time.    

[Ferocious Veldt Roarer]

On 11.12.2016 at 9:59 PM, bent branch said:

The blood on BW is a red herring. The biggest two biggest clues in the story are that LW's body has a pink frost and the blood on BW is not dried. Frost develops on an item NOT because it is cold outside, but because the item with the frost is colder than the ambient air temperature.

Not exactly. It needs to be sufficiently cold (somewhere below water's freezing point at least), there must be some humidity in the air to become frost, and some surface the frost forms on. It doesn't necessarily need to be colder than air. It might have been cooling along with the ambient air, and have roughly the same temperature.