Heresy 194 Underworld

[Black Crow]

Welcome to Heresy 194, the latest edition of the quirky thread that takes a slightly different look at the world of Ice and Fire and in particular at the Starks and what's beyond the Wall. If you're a regular or have at least been here before it needs no further introduction. If you're new, this is the premier thread for discussion and answers concerning the Others, the Three-Fingered Tree-Huggers and everything that goers with them, including crows, ravens, the Morrigan and all those other bits of Celtic folklore from the Wild Hunt to Bran the Blessed, which seems to get mixed into the story - and not forgetting Conrad's Heart of Darkness and a rather darker version of Narnia than you may be used to.

It is however a friendly and welcoming thread. Don't be afraid to ask and above all don't be afraid to join in. We have been around for a few years now and are currently working towards our bicentennial with some specially commissioned essays on a variety of topics.

For Heresy 194 we have Sly Wren's thoughts on the Underworld.

[Black Crow]

The Crypts are Alive!

Or: The Dead have Eyes—Again and Always

VERY SHORT VERSION:

Of all of the novels’ underworlds, only the Stark underworld is “alive,” not just a place of visions and facing the past in dreams. It is the living past interacting with the living. The Stark dead are not “dead.” They are sleepers in a frozen hell who will wake. The Others are already ranging. They will soon ride south, killing all in their path. A Wild Hunt with ice spiders as hounds.  But the Stark Dead have Hell Hounds in their crypts, waiting to rise with them. A reverse Wild Hunt to counter the Others’ ranging.

NOTE: A huge shout out to @Darksister1001 for her help with finding a lot of these quotes.

1. In the novels, we go into multiple underworlds. All of them are tied to standard tropes: revelations, guilt, and long nights of the soul.

—@Sweetsunray has nailed a lot of this in a lot more detail than I have: http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php?/topic/138237-the-chthonic-cycle-part-1-4-the-persephone-hades-demeter-and-isis-of-winterfell/

—But a very quick run down:

·         House of Black and White.

·         Bloodraven’s Cave.

·         Ned in the Black Cells.

·         Arya under the Red Keep. Plus the “well” she sees there, with its spiral stair.

·         Jaime in the tunnels, finding the dragon mosaic and hearing Rhaegar’s voice.

·         Jaime’s dream under Casterly Rock with shades tied to his guilt and insecurities.

·         Dany in the House of the Undying—visions and illusions. And living dead.

·         Dreams of the dead: Jaime of his mother, Dany as Rhaegar, Tyrion climbing the stair, etc.

2. The Winterfell Crypts have multiple things in common with these places:

·         Repository of the dead

·         Tied into the Weirnet via the godswood

·         Place to go in dreams for understanding: Ned’s nightmare of Lyanna, Bran and Rickon’s seeing Ned, Jon’s recurring dreams.

·         Place of refuge: Bran and Rickon hide from invaders.

·         A spiral stair, like the Black Gate and the well in the Red Keep.

·         The Black Gate down its spiral stair.

3. But they are also unique:  

·         The spiral stair is only meant to admit Starks. Like the Black Gate only admits sworn brothers. As though this is a “portal” just for Starks.

o   Rickon even showed them the deep vaults under the earth where the stonemason was carving father's tomb.  "You had no right!" Bran screamed at his brother when he heard.  "That was our place, a Stark place!"  But Rickon never cared. Clash, Bran I

·         In none of the places listed above are the dead completely one-family specific--Starks.

·         And in none of these places are the dead “kept” in their tombs, waiting.

·         Even the Wildlings, who know the Others and wights are real and know about Winter, burn their dead. They don’t “crypt” them, even though they believe in the living nature of shades:

o   We opened half a hundred graves and let all those shades loose in the world, and never found the Horn of Joramun to bring this cold thing down!" Storm, Jon IV

4.  In Winterfell, Starks see the dead both in dreams and in current reality. A frozen hell.

·         The Winterfell crypts are tied to living dead. And to the fate of the living when they die.

o   It was always cold down here. Their footsteps rang off the stones and echoed in the vault overhead as they walked among the dead of House Stark. The Lords of Winterfell watched them pass. Their likenesses were carved into the stones that sealed the tombs. In long rows they sat, blind eyes staring out into eternal darkness, while great stone direwolves curled round their feet. The shifting shadows made the stone figures seem to stir as the living passed by. Game, Eddard I

o   Ned stopped at last and lifted the oil lantern. The crypt continued on into darkness ahead of them, but beyond this point the tombs were empty and unsealed; black holes waiting for their dead, waiting for him and his children. Ned did not like to think on that. "Here," he told his king. Game, Eddard I

·         Bran and Rickon seek their living father among the dead in the crypt.

·         The crypts protect the living Bran and Rickon from Theon and Co.

·         Theon’s feast with the dead.

·         Bran thinks Summer and Shaggy are calling for their living siblings—AND Lady’s Shade. Clash, Bran I

·         Ned’s nightmare of the angry Kings of Winter, growling direwolves, and Lyanna’s statue weeping tears of blood. Game, Eddard III

·         When the kids play in the crypts, Jon’s a living ghost. That Arya does not fear: he’s family.

·         And the shadows in the crypts look alive, even for the wolves.

o   In the light of the guttering torch, shadow wolves twenty feet tall fought on the wall and roof. Game, Bran VII.

·         The living dead are “frozen” still with eyes like ice. This is the “frozen hell” Ned dreams of.

o   Sansa cried herself to sleep, Arya brooded silently all day long, and Eddard Stark dreamed of a frozen hell reserved for the Starks of Winterfell. Game, Eddard IV

5. So, why a frozen hell? Because they are waiting and watching, only for the Starks.

·         The iron longswords on the Stark statues traditionally should keep the Starks in their tombs.

o   By ancient custom an iron longsword had been laid across the lap of each who had been Lord of Winterfell, to keep the vengeful spirits in their crypts. The oldest had long ago rusted away to nothing, leaving only a few red stains where the metal had rested on stone. Ned wondered if that meant those ghosts were free to roam the castle now. He hoped not. The first Lords of Winterfell had been men hard as the land they ruled. In the centuries before the Dragonlords came over the sea, they had sworn allegiance to no man, styling themselves the Kings in the North. Game, Eddard I

·         With the swords rusted away and with the Wildling burning tradition, the swords as binding the dead makes no sense. No—the swords and watchers are waiting for invaders.

o   "Any man of the Night's Watch is welcome here at Winterfell for as long as he wishes to stay," Robb was saying with the voice of Robb the Lord. His sword was across his knees, the steel bare for all the world to see. Even Bran knew what it meant to greet a guest with an unsheathed sword. Game, Bran IV

·         Not only to warn invaders, but to punish the failed Starks. Ned shows this—knows the Starks are unhappy with his idea of leaving Winterfell. And believes he has failed Lyanna.

o   For a moment Eddard Stark was filled with a terrible sense of foreboding. This was his place, here in the north. He looked at the stone figures all around them, breathed deep in the chill silence of the crypt. He could feel the eyes of the dead. They were all listening, he knew. And winter was coming. Game, Eddard I

o   The Kings of Winter watched him pass with eyes of ice, and the direwolves at their feet turned their great stone heads and snarled. Game, Eddard XIII

6. So, why would the dead need to wait and watch in a “frozen hell?” To fight back the Others and their dead army.

·         We don’t know how the Last Hero turned the tide in the Battle for the Dawn. Or how he drove back the Others and their army. But we do know what the Others did when they came.

o   "In that darkness, the Others came for the first time," she said as her needles went click click click. "They were cold things, dead things, that hated iron and fire and the touch of the sun, and every creature with hot blood in its veins. They swept over holdfasts and cities and kingdoms, felled heroes and armies by the score, riding their pale dead horses and leading hosts of the slain. All the swords of men could not stay their advance, and even maidens and suckling babes found no pity in them. They hunted the maids through frozen forests, and fed their dead servants on the flesh of human children."[ snip. . . ]

o   “And the Others smelled the hot blood in him, and came silent on his trail, stalking him with packs of pale white spiders big as hounds—" (Game, Bran IV)

·         The Starks have their own hounds for protection, even against “other” Starks and their wolves:

o   And Summer came, shooting from the dimness behind them, a leaping shadow. He slammed into Shaggydog and knocked him back, and the two direwolves rolled over and over in a tangle of grey and black fur, snapping and biting at each other, while Maester Luwin struggled to his knees, his arm torn and bloody. Osha propped Bran up against Lord Rickard's stone wolf as she hurried to assist the maester. In the light of the guttering torch, shadow wolves twenty feet tall fought on the wall and roof. Game, Bran VII

·         And those Starks and their dire-hounds are NOT partial to invaders or even to Starks who fail:

o   The Kings of Winter watched him pass with eyes of ice, and the direwolves at their feet turned their great stone heads and snarled. Game, Eddard XIII

·         Plus, there’s a good chance the hellish hounds have fought each other before at the Wall.

o   The Nightfort had figured in some of Old Nan's scariest stories. It was here that [. . . snip] blind Symeon Star-Eyes had seen the hellhounds fighting. Storm, Bran IV

7. So, living Starks with and army of cold, dead Starks with eyes like ice. Hunting the Others and their “armies of the slain”—that could make a lot of sense. But what will wake these frozen Starks, to interact with the living as no other dead can in the novels? Jon.

·         He’s been dreaming of going into the Winterfell crypts alone into darkness at least since he got to the Wall. But he only sees the Stark dead wake in his dreams AFTER he comes to the Wall and the night RIGHT before Ghost finds the wights. Jon recalls this dream in the same chapter where he kills the wight.

o   Last night he had dreamt the Winterfell dream again. He was wandering the empty castle, searching for his father, descending into the crypts. Only this time the dream had gone further than before. In the dark he'd heard the scrape of stone on stone. When he turned he saw that the vaults were opening, one after the other. As the dead kings came stumbling from their cold black graves, Jon had woken in pitch-dark, his heart hammering. Even when Ghost leapt up on the bed to nuzzle his face, he could not shake his deep sense of terror. He dared not go back to sleep. Game, Jon VII

·         This dream has been around for a while:

o   Somehow I know I have to go down there, but I don't want to. I'm afraid of what might be waiting for me. The old Kings of Winter are down there, sitting on their thrones with stone wolves at their feet and iron swords across their laps, but it's not them I'm afraid of. I scream that I'm not a Stark, that this isn't my place, but it's no good, I have to go anyway, so I start down, feeling the walls as I descend, with no torch to light the way. It gets darker and darker, until I want to scream." He stopped, frowning, embarrassed. "That's when I always wake." Game, Jon IV.

·         Jon is a shadow, like the dead.

o   All in black, he was a shadow among shadows, dark of hair, long of face, grey of eye. Clash, Jon I

·         Jon’s prank on his siblings thus seems dead on with symbolism: he’s the rising dead who’s no threat to the living Starks.

o   When the spirit stepped out of the open tomb, pale white and moaning for blood, Sansa ran shrieking for the stairs, and Bran wrapped himself around Robb's leg, sobbing. Arya stood her ground and gave the spirit a punch. It was only Jon, covered with flour. "You stupid," she told him, "you scared the baby," but Jon and Robb just laughed and laughed, and pretty soon Bran and Arya were laughing too. Game, Arya IV

BOTTOM LINE: The Stark crypts are alive with dead waiting to rise for the final battle. Jon and light (Dawn) will wake the waiting Starks—the “long pale flame,” waking the shadows/shades. Then the dead will rise and fight the Others’ dead army.

From the “dark hall of the dead where the living fear to tread”—but Jon, the living dead, will tread that hall and wake his army.

Bran heard fingers fumbling at leather, followed by the sound of steel on flint. Then again. A spark flew, caught. Osha blew softly. A long pale flame awoke, stretching upward like a girl on her toes. Osha's face floated above it. She touched the flame with the head of a torch. Bran had to squint as the pitch began to burn, filling the world with orange glare. The light woke Rickon, who sat up yawning.

When the shadows moved, it looked for an instant as if the dead were rising as well. Lyanna and Brandon, Lord Rickard Stark their father, Lord Edwyle his father, Lord Willam and his brother Artos the Implacable, Lord Donnor and Lord Beron and Lord Rodwell, one-eyed Lord Jonnel, Lord Barth and Lord Brandon and Lord Cregan who had fought the Dragonknight. On their stone chairs they sat with stone wolves at their feet. This was where they came when the warmth had seeped out of their bodies; this was the dark hall of the dead, where the living feared to tread. (Clash, Bran VII)   

 

[LordBlakeney]

So how does Jon "wake the sleepers?" Is it with a horn, like the cracked one filled with dragonglass Ghost and Jon discovered near the Fist?

I've always thought Bran would be responsible for raising the dead under Winterfell - he's being trained as a greenseer to do something important to the end game. 

I wonder if there is a clue in how the dead are raised in the Night's King story. He took the "woman with skin as white as the moon and eyes like blue stars" as his bride. Remember how Bran needs to be "wed" to the trees to awaken his greenseer abilities through the weirwood paste? I wonder if the Night's King was "wed" not to a literal woman but a weirwood tree? This "wedding" resulted in strange sorceries, binding men to his will, and sacrificing his "offspring." If the weirwoods are needed to raise the dead or create the Others, then it makes sense to say that the Night's King as a greenseer and his weirwood tree as his "bride" were copulating in a sense.

I guess there were be another dimension to this idea if you agree with the suggestion of some people that the Night's King and Azor Ahai were one and the same. Nissa Nissa would be this weirwood. Reading some of the great stuff by @LmL in his Skinchanger zombie series with meteors and fiery weirwoods and the interaction between fire and greenseer magic makes me wonder.

Glad there a smart people on these forums who are building some creative and profound ideas about what we're reading! I really enjoy reading the exchanges. So do you guys think its possible the Night's Queen was a weirwood? Though she had blue eyes in the story, maybe the red of current weirwoods has something to do with the sacrifices/sorcery the Night's King was cooking (or maybe there is a link to be drawn to the seemingly "inverted" weirwoods found in Quarth). What would be the implications on the legends of the Night's King if that is the case, and how does that fit into bridging the gap to the underworld? (Which seems to be a function of the weirwoods in the current story, and I agree with the original post that the underworld spilling forth from the Stark crypts is key to the end game of the series)

I hope I'm still on topic and didn't ramble too much! New to forums. 

[LmL]

1 hour ago, LordBlakeney said:

So how does Jon "wake the sleepers?" Is it with a horn, like the cracked one filled with dragonglass Ghost and Jon discovered near the Fist?

I've always thought Bran would be responsible for raising the dead under Winterfell - he's being trained as a greenseer to do something important to the end game. 

I wonder if there is a clue in how the dead are raised in the Night's King story. He took the "woman with skin as white as the moon and eyes like blue stars" as his bride. Remember how Bran needs to be "wed" to the trees to awaken his greenseer abilities through the weirwood paste? I wonder if the Night's King was "wed" not to a literal woman but a weirwood tree? This "wedding" resulted in strange sorceries, binding men to his will, and sacrificing his "offspring." If the weirwoods are needed to raise the dead or create the Others, then it makes sense to say that the Night's King as a greenseer and his weirwood tree as his "bride" were copulating in a sense.

I guess there were be another dimension to this idea if you agree with the suggestion of some people that the Night's King and Azor Ahai were one and the same. Nissa Nissa would be this weirwood. Reading some of the great stuff by @LmL in his Skinchanger zombie series with meteors and fiery weirwoods and the interaction between fire and greenseer magic makes me wonder.

Glad there a smart people on these forums who are building some creative and profound ideas about what we're reading! I really enjoy reading the exchanges. So do you guys think its possible the Night's Queen was a weirwood? Though she had blue eyes in the story, maybe the red of current weirwoods has something to do with the sacrifices/sorcery the Night's King was cooking (or maybe there is a link to be drawn to the seemingly "inverted" weirwoods found in Quarth). What would be the implications on the legends of the Night's King if that is the case, and how does that fit into bridging the gap to the underworld? (Which seems to be a function of the weirwoods in the current story, and I agree with the original post that the underworld spilling forth from the Stark crypts is key to the end game of the series)

I hope I'm still on topic and didn't ramble too much! New to forums. 

Thanks for the mention, glad you're enjoying the discussion.  I discuss a lot things relevant to waking the dead at Winterfell, zombies in general, green men and horned people, the last hero, etc.

Have any of the Heretics taken a look my Sacred Order of Green Zombies essays / podcasts? It also kind of builds on @sweetsunray's terrific Winterfell Crypts Catholic Underworld essays.

[sweetsunray]

6 minutes ago, LmL said:

Thanks for the mention, glad you're enjoying the discussion.  I discuss a lot things relevant to waking the dead at Winterfell, zombies in general, green men and horned people, the last hero, etc.

Have any of the Heretics taken a look my Sacred Order of Green Zombies essays / podcasts? It also kind of builds on @sweetsunray's terrific Winterfell Crypts Catholic Underworld essays.

There's nothing Catholic about Winterfell Crypts. Catholic Hell has no queen The crypts have

[LmL]

9 minutes ago, sweetsunray said:

There's nothing Catholic about Winterfell Crypts. Catholic Hell has no queen The crypts have

Ha ha ha ha ! Autocorrect for the win!

[ravenous reader]

2 hours ago, LordBlakeney said:

I've always thought Bran would be responsible for raising the dead under Winterfell - he's being trained as a greenseer to do something important to the end game. 

Yes, Bran's the central character and GRRM's most secret alter ego!

2 hours ago, LordBlakeney said:

I wonder if there is a clue in how the dead are raised in the Night's King story. He took the "woman with skin as white as the moon and eyes like blue stars" as his bride. Remember how Bran needs to be "wed" to the trees to awaken his greenseer abilities through the weirwood paste? I wonder if the Night's King was "wed" not to a literal woman but a weirwood tree? This "wedding" resulted in strange sorceries, binding men to his will, and sacrificing his "offspring." If the weirwoods are needed to raise the dead or create the Others, then it makes sense to say that the Night's King as a greenseer and his weirwood tree as his "bride" were copulating in a sense.

I guess there were be another dimension to this idea if you agree with the suggestion of some people that the Night's King and Azor Ahai were one and the same. Nissa Nissa would be this weirwood.

Yes, indeed.  Very nice!  Must be synchronicity -- we are all coming to the same conclusion!

2 hours ago, LordBlakeney said:

I hope I'm still on topic and didn't ramble too much! New to forums. 

Welcome to the forum.  No worries -- sure I can 'beat' you at rambling!  

[LynnS]

5 hours ago, LordBlakeney said:

I wonder if there is a clue in how the dead are raised in the Night's King story. He took the "woman with skin as white as the moon and eyes like blue stars" as his bride.

That's a interesting thought.  What if the White Walkers are not all male as we suppose them to be given the story about Craster's boys.  We know of 6 WWs from the Prologue of Thrones; but they aren't identified as male.  Only that they are twins of each other and they are shadows that reflect their surroundings.  Which lines up with 6 direwolves and 6 Cotf that Bran has met.  Also the Cotf are dappled like deer and wear clothing that could be described as (combat) camouflage.  At one time the NW traded with the CotF, so it may not be out of the question to think that the NK loved them or was perhaps even paired in a sense with one of them just as the current Stark kids might be paired with a WW, a direwolf and one of the CotF.

To reiterate Ravenous Reader's comparison:

Snowylocks…Jon Snow…Ghost -  white fur,  hot red eyes

Quote

 

- They walked, with Ghost pacing along beside Jon like a white shadow.

- Silent as shadow, the pale direwolf moved closer and began to lick the warm tears off Samwell Tarly's face.

- And suddenly Ghost was back, stalking softly between two weirwoods. White fur and red eyes, Jon realized, disquieted. Like the trees …

 

Coals…Rickon…Shaggy Dog - black fur, eyes burning like green fire

 

Black knife…Arya…Nymeria-  grey fure, dark golden eyes that gleam like two golden coins

Leaf... Bran... Summer - yellow eyes

Lady and Grey Wind now both deceased along with one of the WW's. But also grey fur with yellow eyes.  Not sure this bodes well for Summer.

Shaggy Dog and Ghost seem to be set up for opposition... black and white; green and red.

I'm not certain that Craster's boys are killed in a blood sacrifice.  They are 'given to the wood' and in sense Bran has been 'taken by the wood'.  I suspect they are 'taken by the wood' as well and are connected in some way to the monstrous weirwood at Whitetree village.  Given Craster's mother's connection to Whitetree; a wooden head with wooden teeth and a maw large enough to engulf a sheep.  I suspect that infants need to be fed and ice dragons like their sheep cooked.

 

 

 

[LordBlakeney]

1 hour ago, LynnS said:

What if the White Walkers are not all male as we suppose them to be given the story about Craster's boys.

I tend to think that the gender of the rank and file Others won't be hugely important - I don't really see how it would be significant. Everything I've read suggests they aren't really alive, but a different kind of life that almost transcends gender. 

 

6 hours ago, LmL said:

Have any of the Heretics taken a look my Sacred Order of Green Zombies essays / podcasts? It also kind of builds on @sweetsunray's terrific Winterfell Crypts Catholic Underworld essays.

 These essays make a lot of sense to me, the Others being a group of corrupted greenseers. Maybe some of them were originally women, @LynnS, but after the event that transformed them I don't think traditional procreation was an option. I do think the Night's King story is a legend about the creation of the Others, and I'm inclined to think the myths about Azor Ahai, the Last Hero, and the Bloodstone Emperor are all tied together as well. The language of Bran being wed to the trees makes me think the Night's King taking a weirwood as his bride - and probably a few other steps having to do with steering meteors and fire magic and dragonglass - led to the creation of the Others, the result of him giving her his "seed and soul." (All of this being a rehash of stuff all over these forums)

The Black Gate and the description of the Night's King bride jump out at me. Why is it called the Black Gate when it is a white weirwood that glows like the moon (and like NQ)? Also the eyes - they aren't red like other weirwoods or blue like the Others; they're white. Are there any other weirwoods with weird colors like that? Also this weirwood has a lot more control over its face than the other weirwoods - it can open and close its eyes and mouth as well as speak. Plus its not even all the way at the bottom of the well in the Nightfort - what else could be down there in that magic underworld? From what I've read several people on here seem to have theories percolating about all this and I can't wait until they're developed enough to be shared because I can't quite wrap my head around all of it!

5 hours ago, ravenous reader said:

Welcome to the forum.  No worries -- sure I can 'beat' you at rambling!  

I decided I needed to jump in before Winds of Winter comes out and this website explodes from the influx of new material from which to draw conclusions. It's gonna be like @LmL's moon explosion raining a thousand fiery theories down on Westeros (.org)

 

[LmL]

12 minutes ago, LordBlakeney said:

I decided I needed to jump in before Winds of Winter comes out and this website explodes from the influx of new material from which to draw conclusions. It's gonna be like @LmL's moon explosion raining a thousand fiery theories down on Westeros (.org)

Yes, it's like a very prolonged calm before the storm.

[Melifeather]

5 hours ago, LynnS said:

I'm not certain that Craster's boys are killed in a blood sacrifice.  They are 'given to the wood' and in sense Bran has been 'taken by the wood'.  I suspect they are 'taken by the wood' as well and are connected in some way to the monstrous weirwood at Whitetree village.  Given Craster's mother's connection to Whitetree; a wooden head with wooden teeth and a maw large enough to engulf a sheep.  I suspect that infants need to be fed and ice dragons like their sheep cooked.

 

12 hours ago, Black Crow said:

They hunted the maids through frozen forests, and fed their dead servants on the flesh of human children."[ snip. . . ]

 

Old Nan's story about the Others has them feeding their dead servants on the flesh of human children. Couldn't this "feeding" actually be child sacrifice? Isn't this a direct reference to the method on how to resurrect the dead to a different sort of life? Of all the reports of the wights that have come into contact with the Nights Watch, no one has witnessed the wights eating the dead like zombies. No, I think this report is describing how child sacrifice is necessary to raise "dead servants" which appear to be the white walkers.

[LordBlakeney]

1 hour ago, Feather Crystal said:

Old Nan's story about the Others has them feeding their dead servants on the flesh of human children. Couldn't this "feeding" actually be child sacrifice? Isn't this a direct reference to the method on how to resurrect the dead to a different sort of life? Of all the reports of the wights that have come into contact with the Nights Watch, no one has witnessed the wights eating the dead like zombies. No, I think this report is describing how child sacrifice is necessary to raise "dead servants" which appear to be the white walkers.

Just like how the death of Daenerys' child is part of the sacrifice to hatch the dragons! And maybe something similar with the shadow babies that Melisandre pops out after getting busy with Stannis.

[LynnS]

6 hours ago, LordBlakeney said:

I tend to think that the gender of the rank and file Others won't be hugely important - I don't really see how it would be significant. Everything I've read suggests they aren't really alive, but a different kind of life that almost transcends gender. 

 

 

To clarify; I'm not talking about procreation in a literal sense.  I don't believe coitus was involved with the NK and his starry eyed lady especially if either or both of them wightified.  She's starting to sound like a WW to me and sacrificing his 'seed' sounds like a curse.  He may have been 'wed' in some sense to a weirwood and it doesn't appear that he was attached to it by the roots. Being wed to the godhood to use the Catholic parlance in other words.

2 hours ago, Feather Crystal said:

Old Nan's story about the Others has them feeding their dead servants on the flesh of human children. Couldn't this "feeding" actually be child sacrifice? Isn't this a direct reference to the method on how to resurrect the dead to a different sort of life? Of all the reports of the wights that have come into contact with the Nights Watch, no one has witnessed the wights eating the dead like zombies. No, I think this report is describing how child sacrifice is necessary to raise "dead servants" which appear to be the white walkers.

The Wildlings serve cruel gods.... so far we have seen the sacrifice of adults to the wierwoods.  Attaching a human host to the roots of a tree is feeding the tree and why I think Bran has the impression that they are giant grave worms.   Craster's boys are given to the wood.  I think they are given wierwood cradles specifically at Whitetree.

The difference between the cold gods preserving life in a sense for their own ends and the Red God that consumes life where death pays for life. 

I won't dismiss the wildlings killing Craster's boys entirely since Val says that Shireen is 'unclean' and should be killed right away.  Perhaps Craster's boys are unclean in another sense. 

[Melifeather]

28 minutes ago, LynnS said:

To clarify; I'm not talking about procreation in a literal sense.  I don't believe coitus was involved with the NK and his starry eyed lady especially if either or both of them wightified.  She's starting to sound like a WW to me and sacrificing his 'seed' sounds like a curse.  He may have been 'wed' in some sense to a weirwood and it doesn't appear that he was attached to it by the roots. Being wed to the godhood to use the Catholic parlance in other words.

The Wildlings serve cruel gods.... so far we have seen the sacrifice of adults to the wierwoods.  Attaching a human host to the roots of a tree is feeding the tree and why I think Bran has the impression that they are giant grave worms.   Craster's boys are given to the wood.  I think they are given wierwood cradles specifically at Whitetree.

The difference between the cold gods preserving life in a sense for their own ends and the Red God that consumes life where death pays for life. 

I won't dismiss the wildlings killing Craster's boys entirely since Val says that Shireen is 'unclean' and should be killed right away.  Perhaps Craster's boys are unclean in another sense. 

 

After I had posted my thoughts regarding how the Others "feed" the children to their "dead servants" I also thought it could mean that the greenseers are the dead servants. This actually makes more sense, because we already suspect that the weirwoods drink blood and that blood sacrifice is necessary to work ice magic. So giving children "to the wood" is the same thing as feeding them to the weirwoods, which in turn is feeding the greenseers. In conclusion that would identity the greenseers as being the dead servants. 

Poor Bran may already be dead! He likely cannot be divorced from the trees and he may never physically mature past the age he is now.

[LynnS]

21 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

 

After I had posted my thoughts regarding how the Others "feed" the children to their "dead servants" I also thought it could mean that the greenseers are the dead servants. This actually makes more sense, because we already suspect that the weirwoods drink blood and that blood sacrifice is necessary to work ice magic. So giving children "to the wood" is the same thing as feeding them to the weirwoods, which in turn is feeding the greenseers. In conclusion that would identity the greenseers as being the dead servants. 

Poor Bran may already be dead! He likely cannot be divorced from the trees and he may never physically mature past the age he is now.

I think that's probably getting closer to the truth of the matter.  Can Bloodraven really be said to be alive? He's a talking corpse attached to the roots of a weirwood tree.  He might qualify for the smell of Death in Jon's weirbran dream.

Strictly speaking, it was the sacrifice of Dany's unborn child that paid for her life and Euron seems bent on reproducing that formula.

Spoiler

He means to sacrifice his salt wife and their unborn child along with 'holdy blood' (the Damphair) who is also king's blood along with several other sorcerers.  But you have to be dead to be reborn.

If Craster's boys are being used to create a form of white shadow; it's worth noting that Melisandre only requires Stannis blood to do that.  I wonder what it will take to raise Jon Snow.

[PrettyPig]

1 hour ago, LynnS said:

She's starting to sound like a WW to me and sacrificing his 'seed' sounds like a curse.  He may have been 'wed' in some sense to a weirwood and it doesn't appear that he was attached to it by the roots. Being wed to the godhood to use the Catholic parlance in other words.

Maybe it's the other way around.    Old Nan says the NK may have been a Stark...the Starks have the weirwood at Winterfell.  Weirwoods produce seeds, which are used to make the weirwood paste that (supposedly) enhances the abilities of a greenseer like Bran, a Stark, or Bloodraven, a Blackwood (a house also in possession of a very old yet dead (?) weirwood).   

If you think of "seed" in the plant sense instead of the human sense, perhaps the NK - if a Stark - somehow gave his pale queen some unauthorized 'root access', you could say...the seed of a special tree that does...something.     His corpse queen wasn't the weirwood  - HE was.

Interesting also that the bowl out of which Bran eats his red LSD paste is made from weirwood, with twelve faces carved upon it.    Twelve faces, twelve companions, twelve prior Lord Commanders of the NW.

 

Sorry BC and Sly Wren, this has absolutely nothing to do with the Underworld, really.

 

[ravenous reader]

14 minutes ago, PrettyPig said:

If you think of "seed" in the plant sense instead of the human sense, perhaps the NK - if a Stark - somehow gave his pale queen some unauthorized 'root access', you could say...the seed of a special tree that does...something.     His corpse queen wasn't the weirwood  - HE was.

That's interesting.  Can you elaborate a bit more on what you mean by the last sentence?  Are you suggesting the NK is the corpse queen in a kind of gender inversion?

[LynnS]

17 minutes ago, PrettyPig said:

Maybe it's the other way around.    Old Nan says the NK may have been a Stark...the Starks have the weirwood at Winterfell.  Weirwoods produce seeds, which are used to make the weirwood paste that (supposedly) enhances the abilities of a greenseer like Bran, a Stark, or Bloodraven, a Blackwood (a house also in possession of a very old yet dead (?) weirwood).   

If you think of "seed" in the plant sense instead of the human sense, perhaps the NK - if a Stark - somehow gave his pale queen some unauthorized 'root access', you could say...the seed of a special tree that does...something.     His corpse queen wasn't the weirwood  - HE was.

Interesting also that the bowl out of which Bran eats his red LSD paste is made from weirwood, with twelve faces carved upon it.    Twelve faces, twelve companions, twelve prior Lord Commanders of the NW.

 

Sorry BC and Sly Wren, this has absolutely nothing to do with the Underworld, really.

 

That's making sense to me!  Also consider that  BR says that the dreamers are calling him at one point.  Who are the dreamers?  I don't think he's talking about people asleep in their beds but people attached to the roots of weirwoods.  If BR is the 'last greenseer' then we are either being told a lie or you don't have to be a greenseer to be attached to some roots.  Dead servants feeding off the flesh of children?

[PrettyPig]

Just now, ravenous reader said:

Are you suggesting the NK is the corpse queen in a kind of gender inversion?

Not really....I meant that the NK - especially if a Stark (or another family that worshiped the Old Gods) - was influenced/persuaded by the corpse queen to give her his "seed"...meaning, somehow allow HER into the weirnet that he as a representative of this Old Gods family would be a 'guardian' of.     He is the personification of the weirwood - by giving her his seed, she became wedded to the trees in the way that Bran did when he ate the seed paste.    Obviously this was an abomination that could not be allowed.

[Brad Stark]

The horn that wakes the sleepers, and the Giants woken by horn of winter.   Could these be either the dreamers BR refers to or the dead Kings of Winter?  We think of someone physically big as a giant,  but we also use the term for someone well known or accomplished,  couldn'ta powerful king or wizard be a giant, even if not large in stature?