The COTF Master Plan: Part 3

[The Fattest Leech]

@40 Thousand Skeletons thanks for the response. I'm driving through D.C. On the way to a show at the moment, so I will reply in full later. 

[Jon Tarstark]

Interesting and thought-provoking points but I think for the most part you're just stating the obvious - yes, God controls everything.

I think you got it wrong at the start and therefore your theory got a little bent out of shape.

I do not believe the Gods are dead/undead greenseers. I just don't get it??

I believe BR could search the weirnet but that being the height of his power.

I also believe BR is not the Three Eyed Crow. I believe Bran to be, have been and will always be the Three Eyed Crow. He, from the future, sent his dreams and whatnot back to himself. I believe Bran to be the only person able to time travel, but he has already done this, already having affecting the past from the future and therefore it will not change again. 

I believe Bran to be every Brandon Stark that has ever lived(still haven't come up with the exact details). This theory started out when I learned Bran knew every brick and stone in Winterfell, believing him to be some sort of reincarnation of Brandon the Builder and it grew with Old Nan's ever faithfull story of a hero(Bran the Builder) going far north and finding the COTF as I instantaneously knew Bran would. Bran's visions of the Godswood in Winterfell also furthered my theory - Bran tasted the blood, because it was his throat being slit. 

I also believe Coldhands is... yep you've guessed it, Brandon Stark. 

 

I know I'm just giving my beliefs and not backing them up with anything(it's been a long week) but feel free to question any of them and I'll come back to you with the relevant points/quotes.

 

[kissdbyfire]

25 minutes ago, Jon Tarstark said:

Interesting and thought-provoking points but I think for the most part you're just stating the obvious - yes, God controls everything.

I think you got it wrong at the start and therefore your theory got a little bent out of shape.

I do not believe the Gods are dead/undead greenseers. I just don't get it??

I believe BR could search the weirnet but that being the height of his power.

I also believe BR is not the Three Eyed Crow. I believe Bran to be, have been and will always be the Three Eyed Crow. He, from the future, sent his dreams and whatnot back to himself. I believe Bran to be the only person able to time travel, but he has already done this, already having affecting the past from the future and therefore it will not change again. 

I believe Bran to be every Brandon Stark that has ever lived(still haven't come up with the exact details). This theory started out when I learned Bran knew every brick and stone in Winterfell, believing him to be some sort of reincarnation of Brandon the Builder and it grew with Old Nan's ever faithfull story of a hero(Bran the Builder) going far north and finding the COTF as I instantaneously knew Bran would. Bran's visions of the Godswood in Winterfell also furthered my theory - Bran tasted the blood, because it was his throat being slit. 

I also believe Coldhands is... yep you've guessed it, Brandon Stark. 

 

I know I'm just giving my beliefs and not backing them up with anything(it's been a long week) but feel free to question any of them and I'll come back to you with the relevant points/quotes.

 

I for one have quite a few questions regarding the ideas you presented... But I'd rather wait until you have the time to flesh them out before I ask anything. After all, some of my questions may be answered then. 

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

On 7/16/2017 at 2:24 PM, Jon Tarstark said:

Interesting and thought-provoking points but I think for the most part you're just stating the obvious - yes, God controls everything.

No, there is no real God. There is no omnipotent creator. There are only powerful telepaths. However, the most powerful telepathic entity in the story, the weirnet, happens to already bear the moniker "the old gods" and so that's what I stick with for simplicity sake. And the "old gods" do not have altruistic, godly motives; their motives are very human and self-serving, and they (including Bloodraven) are not to be trusted. GRRM is an atheist, and I don't think he writes any stories where gods are real. But yes, the weirnet can potentially do things we would normally attribute to a god, like controlling the weather.

On 7/16/2017 at 2:24 PM, Jon Tarstark said:

I think you got it wrong at the start and therefore your theory got a little bent out of shape.

I do not believe the Gods are dead/undead greenseers. I just don't get it??

I believe BR could search the weirnet but that being the height of his power.

Ironically, in retrospect, I am trying to point out something that should be obvious when I am talking about the greenseers, but GRRM is super clever and for some reason it was not obvious to anyone, hence no one coming up with the theory until I did, as far as I know.

Maybe this isn't what other people thought, but I was personally tricked into thinking that Bloodraven's tree-bound situation was unique, a new ad hoc setup created by the COTF specifically for him, and that he really was just being kept alive past his natural span of years so that he could train Bran. And the passage where Bran (as Hodor) is wandering around and finds a room filled with singers "enthroned like Brynden" I found to be innocuous and didn't think anything of it. It was just another weird thing in ASOIAF that I lacked the ability to explain, so I read it and moved on to the next paragraph without thinking about it. And then I did this again... on three more subsequent rereads. But THEN I finally paid attention to that part.

That one paragraph calls the whole situation into question. It appears that rather than Bloodraven being unique, this method of attaching a greenseer to a weirwood seems to be standard practice. So the reason given to us for Bloodraven's tree-bound status (he is being kept alive to train Bran) appears to be a lie. He would have been kept alive regardless because that is what they do to every greenseer.

And working from that logic, we can easily reexamine the basic info about weirwoods and come to some startling but straightforward conclusions. Why does their sap look like blood? Because it is blood. Why do the COTF literally believe, as Jojen says, that the weirwoods are the old gods? Because the trees literally are the old gods. Why does a race of people who live underground (the COTF) worship trees as gods? Because the "god" part (the greenseers) is below ground with the COTF. Why is it implied that the COTF are planning to do the same thing to Bran? Again, because hooking up greenseers to weirwoods is standard practice. Why is every weirwood important to the COTF? Because every weirwood has a living greenseer attached to it that will die if the tree is cut down, and the power of the old gods would be diminished.

But more importantly for the story, this conclusion about the standard practice of creating tree-people helps to explain what is in the crypts at WF (a greenseer, which I will going into a bunch more detail on in a future post), and the nature of the House of the Undying (because the Undying likely utilized the same tree-person mechanism themselves).

On 7/16/2017 at 2:24 PM, Jon Tarstark said:

I also believe BR is not the Three Eyed Crow. I believe Bran to be, have been and will always be the Three Eyed Crow. He, from the future, sent his dreams and whatnot back to himself. I believe Bran to be the only person able to time travel, but he has already done this, already having affecting the past from the future and therefore it will not change again. 

I believe Bran to be every Brandon Stark that has ever lived(still haven't come up with the exact details). This theory started out when I learned Bran knew every brick and stone in Winterfell, believing him to be some sort of reincarnation of Brandon the Builder and it grew with Old Nan's ever faithfull story of a hero(Bran the Builder) going far north and finding the COTF as I instantaneously knew Bran would. Bran's visions of the Godswood in Winterfell also furthered my theory - Bran tasted the blood, because it was his throat being slit. 

I also believe Coldhands is... yep you've guessed it, Brandon Stark. 

I know I'm just giving my beliefs and not backing them up with anything(it's been a long week) but feel free to question any of them and I'll come back to you with the relevant points/quotes.

This is all quite possible. I actually go back and forth on the weirnet itself having time travel abilities, as I stated in the OP. I definitely used to lean more toward the weirnet having the power to time travel, but the more dots I connect, the more I am starting to lean the other direction honestly.

I am extremely confident, however, that Bran has the power to time travel, employing "rules" similar to what GRRM has used in past stories, i.e. Bran can send his consciousness back in time but never his body. And the timeline can actually be altered, as far as I can tell. That point is super contentious on the forum and I have no idea why. Most people will argue endlessly that anything other than a "circular time loop" is a paradox, while I make the opposite argument. A circular time loop is itself a paradox, because the circle has no beginning, no origin, no cause. There is no chicken or egg to start with.

Feel free to respond, but I can probably sum up some of your evidence for you off the top of my head :

• BR seems confused when they ask if he is the TEC. He responds that he used to be in the NW, which is not at all what the question was. The odd part that throws us off, though, is that he does claim to have visited Bran in his dreams. So the question is, who sent which dreams? I definitely think that BR sent Bran dreams of flying or climbing (but probably flying) from the time Bran was born, leading Bran to engage in his climbing escapades, for the sake of crippling him later. But Bran may be the one responsible for the TEC dreams, as you suggested.
• Which "iteration" of the timeline we are witnessing is an interesting question, but I think your conclusion is correct. I think we are witnessing a timeline that Bran has already gone back and manipulated, so we should definitely list Bran as a suspect for any crazy supernatural activity.
• Bran has some connections in the text to Brandon the Builder, and his journey is remarkably similar thus far to that of the Last Hero. I personally think Brandon the Builder, the Night's King, and the Last Hero are all the same person, and yes, it is possible that Coldhands is that person. Leaf claims that Coldhands was killed long ago, and that's in COTF years. He definitely isn't Benjen. Personally, I think it is more likely he became the first WW. It is implied (with a lot a speculation taken into account) that Azor Ahai somehow genetically altered himself to bond his blood to dragons, also giving his descendants (the Valyrians) their trademark purple eyes and silver-gold hair and potential resistance to common illness. And Brandon genetically altering himself on the ice front would be a fitting parallel, on top of helping to explain the origins of the WWs.
• Bran tasting his own blood is another theory I have heard before, the basic premise being that Bran is basically transferring his "soul" from one Brandon to the next through the weirwood, or something crazy along those lines.

[Ser Petyr Parker]

Personally, I hate it when writers rely on things like this - characters playing the odds on the assumption that multiple events will all lead to the presumed most likely result. It just doesn't really make sense, even if you truly can identify the most likely result every time. If you had a biased coin that gives you heads 75% of the time, the most likely result, by far, is of course to get heads. So if you toss it twice, the most likely result is heads twice, right? Well, yes, it's the most likely result, but the chance it will happen is only slightly over 50/50.

On 11/07/2017 at 2:00 AM, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

But how could they get the twincest and Bran's climb to physically cross paths? Well, they could have easily predicted that Jaime and Cersei would choose to have sex on an upper floor of the abandoned First Keep. The twins couldn't exactly leave the castle, and theyeeded a place where there was no risk of anyone barging in on them (ironically). So all the OG had to do was lure Bran to the windows of the First Keep. How did they do this? With some friendly crows of course!

Can we be so sure the place Cersei and Jaime went was really the only place to go?

Was it really so predictable that Jaime wouldn't go hunting too? Maybe he would prefer to stay with Cersei, but he is a Kingsguard.

Was it predictable that Bran would be climbing in that exact place at the same time? He climbs a lot, but not every day. And he was going to his favourite place, but it seems he goes to all sorts of places, and he picked one of two routes to get there.

Finally, I don't see any signs that the crows specifically encouraged him to go that way this time.

So let's go back to the coin and probability thing. Let's say (and I think this is very generous) that there's a 90% chance Jaime would stay to have sex with Cersei, a 90% chance they would the location they did, a 90% chance that Bran would go climbing on that day, a 90% chance he timed his climb to coincide with the sex, and a 90% chance he decided to climb that way. That means there's a 59% chance of all four events happening the way they did, and this is just a small part of the chain of events.

 

Anyway, all this relies on the gods setting things up in quite specific ways so that the (supposedly) predictable result will occur. But it also relies on Bran being crippled by the fall but not dying, and you can hardly say that was the most likely result of the set up. To influence that, they would need much more direct control of the world than to set up a very complicated Batman Gambit.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

3 hours ago, Ser Petyr Parker said:

Personally, I hate it when writers rely on things like this - characters playing the odds on the assumption that multiple events will all lead to the presumed most likely result. It just doesn't really make sense, even if you truly can identify the most likely result every time. If you had a biased coin that gives you heads 75% of the time, the most likely result, by far, is of course to get heads. So if you toss it twice, the most likely result is heads twice, right? Well, yes, it's the most likely result, but the chance it will happen is only slightly over 50/50.

Can we be so sure the place Cersei and Jaime went was really the only place to go?

Was it really so predictable that Jaime wouldn't go hunting too? Maybe he would prefer to stay with Cersei, but he is a Kingsguard.

Was it predictable that Bran would be climbing in that exact place at the same time? He climbs a lot, but not every day. And he was going to his favourite place, but it seems he goes to all sorts of places, and he picked one of two routes to get there.

Finally, I don't see any signs that the crows specifically encouraged him to go that way this time.

So let's go back to the coin and probability thing. Let's say (and I think this is very generous) that there's a 90% chance Jaime would stay to have sex with Cersei, a 90% chance they would the location they did, a 90% chance that Bran would go climbing on that day, a 90% chance he timed his climb to coincide with the sex, and a 90% chance he decided to climb that way. That means there's a 59% chance of all four events happening the way they did, and this is just a small part of the chain of events.

 

Anyway, all this relies on the gods setting things up in quite specific ways so that the (supposedly) predictable result will occur. But it also relies on Bran being crippled by the fall but not dying, and you can hardly say that was the most likely result of the set up. To influence that, they would need much more direct control of the world than to set up a very complicated Batman Gambit.

I'm not sure if you read my entire grand theory. 

But this is a fair argument to make, and that is exactly why I have stipulated that the weirnet may be utilizing time travel, so they can effectively try their plans over and over until it works out how they want.

But it is technically possible for them to predict all these seemingly hard to predict events. We must keep in mind that they enter people's dreams and have a certain measure of direct influence over people, or at least certain characters. So while you only consider it a 90% chance that Jaime would take advantage of the final hunt to have sex, it may actually be something like a 99.9% chance, because they have the power to enter Jaime's mind. They both know his thought process and can influence it with dreams, like when Jaime dreams of Brienne and then rescues her as a direct result. And Bran probably lives to climb because he was sent influential dreams about flying or climbing from birth. Bloodraven even claims he was present in Bran's first dream.

As for Bran's fall, they likely predicted that Bran would save himself with his telekinesis, which would have been specifically "unlocked" in Bran's moment of free fall. In fact, this was likely a big factor in why they made Bran fall. They wanted him to use telekinesis for the first time. This concept of gravity suppressing telekinesis was established in Nightflyers, and it may or may not apply to asoiaf.

[SerProle]

Working my way through all the parts of your theory, similar questions have been on my mind so its rather fabulous to discover your explorations.

Since I am on a reread at the moment, I have to say that Bran's fall seemed suspicious to me right from the start, too many coincidences, and I thought so the first time as well. As if something/someone had been waiting for it to happen in order to take advantage. On that note, what about the idea of patience being something we might attribute to the OG? They don't really exist on human time, could it be that they are happy to wait for opportunities to nudge otherwise coincidental occurrences to their advantage, not necessarily needing to plan every thing in a controlling sense? How much actual manipulation on a strict schedule is really needed for their master plan?

I find searching the forum very challenging, has there been some good theorizing on Bran's first vision that is essential reading? It just seems very dramatic right at the start of the book, the visions seemingly into closed environments without any trees (Cat on the boat, bedrooms), the global view, beyond the curtain of light, the ice spikes with the bones of dreamers, the dragons of Asshai. Have there been good theories about all of that and why it is there right at the start of the whole story? Any links would be hugely appreciated;)

In terms of there possibly being more than one major entity behind the scenes, is there anything in 1000 worlds about both the Findi and the Hrangan existing on the same planet? If they both colonized parts of space, would they have overlapped in some way? Since I don't like the idea of any of the gods being real, I totally agree with you that this seems very unlike GRRM or any of his existing stories, I'm trying to find ways of allowing for another player that isn't just the OG/their agents and the humans. Could there be two hive minded consciousnesses on Planetos with different centers of power? Sothoryos and Ulthos seem vast and perhaps more important than we think. Is Asshai their colony among the humans? Two hive minds would seem to allow for plenty of Kimdissian machinations at multiple levels, not just among the humans.

I've wondered myself if part of the reason GRRM is struggling with the remaining books is that he doesn't want the resolution to feel like cheating or a trick, like, time travel or explicit sci fi will turn out to be true in way that leaves people feeling angry rather than thrilled. He has a lot more at risk now, with the popularity of the series and the show. I mean, if the books were more conventionally fantasy, it seems far simpler to wrap things up, even with all the characters and subplots. But if this is his magnum opus, and he wants to present something really unique, a sci fi epic cloaked in convincing fantasy in a way that the reader is never really at rest with either because both are plausible, that would be rather special. But difficult to pull off too perhaps lol.

[Damon_Tor]

1 hour ago, SerProle said:

I've wondered myself if part of the reason GRRM is struggling with the remaining books is that he doesn't want the resolution to feel like cheating or a trick, like, time travel or explicit sci fi will turn out to be true in way that leaves people feeling angry rather than thrilled. He has a lot more at risk now, with the popularity of the series and the show. I mean, if the books were more conventionally fantasy, it seems far simpler to wrap things up, even with all the characters and subplots. But if this is his magnum opus, and he wants to present something really unique, a sci fi epic cloaked in convincing fantasy in a way that the reader is never really at rest with either because both are plausible, that would be rather special. But difficult to pull off too perhaps lol.

A dark part of me has entertained the thought that GRRM does not intend to finish the novels at all: that he knows no ending will satisfy us as well as the endings we invent for ourselves.

[SerProle]

1 hour ago, Damon_Tor said:

A dark part of me has entertained the thought that GRRM does not intend to finish the novels at all: that he knows no ending will satisfy us as well as the endings we invent for ourselves.

Haha well there is that quote floating around out there where he jokes about starting a big fantasy series with the intent of not finishing it, so it isn't tinfoil to think it is a real possibility. Again, more to lose now by far in some ways, if he cares about what people think.

If he is like normal humans he probably swings all over the place on any given day, he probably has days where he finds savage joy in the idea of not finishing it. And other days where he feels it is his mission to finish it, sort of keeping faith with these characters he loves (and I do believe him when he says he loves them). Maybe it is the last motivation that counts more than pleasing fans or the world or something.

As a fan, I do have some anxiety about the ending. I know quite well the endings that I don't want to see. Would I choose not having an ending, or an ending I personally find very disappointing or even really awful? I suspect lots of fans have wondered this as well.

[SerProle]

I wanted to mention the author Greg Egan who writes science fiction where the science is intense and demanding, particularly when it comes to physics, the multiverse, time, consciousness. Definitely an author to look for and enjoy. I almost wish he were advising GRRM in case time loops or time travel end up being in the ASOIAF series, because he would know how to pull it off that doesn't come off as a cheap trick lol. If GRRM is going to do it, he better make it convincing.

[StarkofWinterfell]

You lost me when you said that it is implied Brandon and Ashara did it. It was Ned and Ashara!

[Damon_Tor]

1 hour ago, SerProle said:

As a fan, I do have some anxiety about the ending. I know quite well the endings that I don't want to see. Would I choose not having an ending, or an ending I personally find very disappointing or even really awful?

That's... that's a hell of a question.

Part of the problem with that question is that no matter what George does, there will be an ending: the HBO ending.

[SerProle]

35 minutes ago, Damon_Tor said:

That's... that's a hell of a question.

Part of the problem with that question is that no matter what George does, there will be an ending: the HBO ending.

I still hate watch the show, partly for the simple reason of finding out 'what happens next' as I would for any show I've been watching for multiple seasons, but also partly to eliminate a lot of possibilities for the books lol. I simply can't imagine GRRM ending his series the way the show will end, even if certain final outcomes may be the same. The reasons for getting there will be different, the contexts will be different. The more open GRRM gets about there being 'the show' as separate from the books, the less anxiety I have about it. There are still plausible and well thought out book only endings that I dislike, but even those would be more interesting than the HBO ending.

One of the things I really like about the books, especially as I came to them late, is that they really are open to so many different interpretations. In a way, GRRM has so many options, maybe too many. As some have pointed out in these threads, GRRM may not be recycling earlier ideas. But my own belief is that he is, although in a different way. We may not end up with literal Hrangans or a volkryn or a fully explained COTF master plan, but I really really really doubt we will somehow end up with literal gods and prophecies. That would be so new to GRRM's works. 

He is clearly a person who in real life pays attention to and cares about certain things. To imagine that his endings would somehow reinforce violent religions/gods, genocidal wars, and give credence to those who make claim to certain privileges and powers based on heritage seems contrary to everything that GRRM believes and mentions in public. Far more likely, in my mind, that he goes back to earlier themes about being fooled by hive minded consciousnesses, false prophets leading to catastrophe, and battles within human hearts as characters deal with the tragic lonely nature of human existence and how to create meaning and honor in impossible circumstances. (No badass will win the GoT lol.)

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

4 hours ago, StarkofWinterfell said:

You lost me when you said that it is implied Brandon and Ashara did it. It was Ned and Ashara!

LOL, no it was clearly Brandon. Ned has no skill with the ladies, while Brandon was quite a womanizer. It was Brandon who asked Ashara to dance with Ned. And Barristan has a very high opinion of Ned but thinks that the Stark who had sex with Ashara at Harrenhal "dishonored" her. And Ned offered Howland Reed a place in his tent that night, which means he was not having sex with Ashara.

[Damon_Tor]

1 hour ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

LOL, no it was clearly Brandon. Ned has no skill with the ladies, while Brandon was quite a womanizer. It was Brandon who asked Ashara to dance with Ned. And Barristan has a very high opinion of Ned but thinks that the Stark who had sex with Ashara at Harrenhal "dishonored" her. And Ned offered Howland Reed a place in his tent that night, which means he was not having sex with Ashara.

Or he offered Reed his tent because he wasn't planning on being in it.

Eh?

[StarkofWinterfell]

Quote

He looked at her uncomfortably. "My aunt Allyria says Lady Ashara and your father fell in love at Harrenhal—"

-Ned to Arya, ASOS Arya VIII 

Quote

Even after all these years, Ser Barristan could still recall Ashara's smile, the sound of her laughter. He had only to close his eyes to see her, with her long dark hair tumbling about her shoulders and those haunting purple eyes. Daenerys has the same eyes. Sometimes when the queen looked at him, he felt as if he were looking at Ashara's daughter …

 

But Ashara's daughter had been stillborn, and his fair lady had thrown herself from a tower soon after, mad with grief for the child she had lost, and perhaps for the man who had dishonored her at Harrenhal as well. She died never knowing that Ser Barristan had loved her. How could she? He was a knight of the Kingsguard, sworn to celibacy. No good could have come from telling her his feelings. No good came from silence either. If I had unhorsed Rhaegar and crowned Ashara queen of love and beauty, might she have looked to me instead of Stark?

 

He would never know. But of all his failures, none haunted Barristan Selmy so much as that.

-Ser Barristan Selmy, ADWDThe Kingbreaker

 

This seems like Barristan is saying that Ashara would've turned her gaze to him instead of "Stark" but as Allyria says, that Stark was Ned.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

10 hours ago, SerProle said:

Working my way through all the parts of your theory, similar questions have been on my mind so its rather fabulous to discover your explorations.

Since I am on a reread at the moment, I have to say that Bran's fall seemed suspicious to me right from the start, too many coincidences, and I thought so the first time as well. As if something/someone had been waiting for it to happen in order to take advantage. On that note, what about the idea of patience being something we might attribute to the OG? They don't really exist on human time, could it be that they are happy to wait for opportunities to nudge otherwise coincidental occurrences to their advantage, not necessarily needing to plan every thing in a controlling sense? How much actual manipulation on a strict schedule is really needed for their master plan?

Certainly! And this is a concept I have considered as well. They may be operating on sort of a Littlefinger-chaos strategy, taking advantage of every little opportunity as it arises. Ultimately, this would help to better explain some theories, but contradict others. Fundamentally, I lean away from this being the case because it seems that they have very specific plans for Jon, Dany, and Bran simultaneously, which would involve about a million moving parts. And it would seem to be terribly inconvenient to have, say, 2/3 of their "current plan" succeed and then Jon get hit by a stray arrow or something, delaying their ultimate plans by a large amount of time. But as you said, they may simply be really patient because, you know, they are effectively immortal. Off the top of my head, this would help explain 2 big things: The first is the tragedy at Summerhall. The COTF were directly involved with that, and at face value it seems like it didn't go "according to plan". But then - on the other hand - maybe the tragedy was just part of their super convoluted plan. The second thing is a random crackpot theory of mine that lacks evidence, which is that 1) Tyrion is a chimera (literally 2 people fused together in the womb) and specifically is the combination of Tywin's son and Aerys' daughter, his black eye coming from Aerys, and 2) Jaime and Cersei are the result of a failed first attempt at Tyrion, possibly explaining their twincestuous connection and Jaime holding onto Cersei's foot as she was pulled out of Joanna's womb, and 3) as a result of this, Tyrion is potentially one of the most powerful telepaths/skinchangers/magical people in the world, getting a double dose of Joanna's special genes (ultimately originating with Rohanne Webber) and a dose of Aerys' special genes. So going along with idea of being "patient" and exploiting opportunities, the failed first experiment was still made use of, and on their second try they managed to create Tyrion. The idea of using teke to genetically alter someone in the womb has been used by GRRM before, so it is something we should be ready for in asoiaf. In fact, it is almost certainly happening to an extent to achieve desired gender, at least in the case of the Stark's direwolves. As Jon pointed out, there were 5 wolves, 3 male and 2 female. Ned's children were meant to have them. And then a male runt of the litter for Jon. So both the number of wolves and all their genders matched up perfectly. And of course, the biggest advantage with simply being ultra-patient is that it would theoretically eliminate the need for time-travel. However, they would be much more at risk should their plans go wrong, like if dragons got totally out of control and started burning every weirwood.

10 hours ago, SerProle said:

I find searching the forum very challenging, has there been some good theorizing on Bran's first vision that is essential reading? It just seems very dramatic right at the start of the book, the visions seemingly into closed environments without any trees (Cat on the boat, bedrooms), the global view, beyond the curtain of light, the ice spikes with the bones of dreamers, the dragons of Asshai. Have there been good theories about all of that and why it is there right at the start of the whole story? Any links would be hugely appreciated;)

I was absent from the forums for a long period of time prior to posting the parts of this grand theory, so I personally don't know of any good theories on it off the top of my head. My take is that the dream serves 2 primary purposes for Bran. The first is that it is simply the next step in his training. Others have speculated, and this may be the case, that Bran actually skinchanged an ice dragon when he finally learned to fly. And this would probably be enabled by the fact that he was in a coma, which is like dreaming on steroids, allowing Bran to perform feats he wouldn't be able to do while awake. Certainly, regardless of the specifics, it seems that one of the goals was to get Bran to fly. The other primary purpose was to manipulate Bran's motivations, which seems to happen fairly often to characters in asoiaf. The TEC (whether it is BR, or Bran himself, or the greenseer in the WF crypts) told Bran to put away the thoughts of Jaime and instead focus on the fact that winter is coming.

11 hours ago, SerProle said:

In terms of there possibly being more than one major entity behind the scenes, is there anything in 1000 worlds about both the Findi and the Hrangan existing on the same planet? If they both colonized parts of space, would they have overlapped in some way? Since I don't like the idea of any of the gods being real, I totally agree with you that this seems very unlike GRRM or any of his existing stories, I'm trying to find ways of allowing for another player that isn't just the OG/their agents and the humans. Could there be two hive minded consciousnesses on Planetos with different centers of power? Sothoryos and Ulthos seem vast and perhaps more important than we think. Is Asshai their colony among the humans? Two hive minds would seem to allow for plenty of Kimdissian machinations at multiple levels, not just among the humans.

This is a huge question. I will summarize my current thoughts on the matter.  

There was probably never any overlap between the Fyndii and the Hrangans, because the Fyndii live closer to the galactic core than human space, and the Hrangans live further from the core than humans. The Double War probably prevented any overlap that may have otherwise occurred. But really, who knows.

Related to the Thousand Worlds however, I think there are 3 major general possibilities for big picture players who are not the weirnet. First, there could simply be other factions of powerful telepaths who have achieved something similar to the weirnet. The Undying of Qarth are potentially an example of this. And it may even be that the OG manipulated events to have Dany kill off the Undying, who would have effectively been rivals to the OG. However, as I explained in the OP and argued further in this dedicated thread, I think the Undying are still alive and were totally fine the whole time, and are probably working in concert with the OG. Anyways, on that same point, it is also possible (though I really hope this isn't the case) that the weirnet itself is split into factions, and that the "WF faction" managed to cause the destruction of High Heart on purpose, again to kill off rivals. But again I don't think this is the case. But there certainly could be super powerful players we don't know about or just don't know enough about, like the Shrouded Lord. I would certainly be on the lookout for humans trying to come up with ways to defeat the weirnet, similar to humans fighting the Hrangans. The Citadel could certainly be seen as a human-constructed rival to the weirnet. Books act like one-way telepathic connections, as I have explained (and as shown by Sam's chapter in the CB library), and all the maesters wear chains and are in constant communication via raven, so they are all permanently connected to the Citadel. And When they die, their writings live on. Jojen even specifically compares the weirwoods to books when explaining them to Bran. But all that said, the fate of the Citadel is in some ways directly tied to House Hightower, and the current Lord Leyton has a habit of looking himself in the tower with his virgin daughter Malora, the Mad Maid, consulting books of spells. And it may be that Leyton is in cahoots with Marwyn, as his son Gunthor had a mysterious private conversation with a man on the Cinnamon Wind. And it may be that the OG have been busy sending Malora visions, thus her moniker of the Mad Maid. Which is a long way of saying the OG may have been responsible for the original "Oldtown would burn if they fought Aegon" prophecy and have been manipulating the Faith, Hightowers, and maesters ever since.

Second, there could be a volcryn-type player, which in asoiaf would specifically be the red comet itself. I am 99% that the timing of the comet is not coincidental. Some player is responsible for the appearance of the comet, whether that be the OG or the comet itself or someone else. It is definitely a supernatural comet though. The biggest piece of evidence for this is that Old Nan can smell the comet and claims that heralds dragons. Science check - you can't smell a comet . But I trust Old Nan, which means she must be able to sense the comet telepathically. And of course, Dany's dragons were born when the comet first appeared. Now, we should bear in mind that the only explanation given for the origin of volcryns in Nightflyers is that they evolved inside gas giants. In the Thousand Worlds universe, mankind conspicuously never explored the insides of gas giants, because warp drive was invented right before they explored Jupiter, and warp drive made it much more enticing to explore other habitable planets farther away. We know there are other planets in the asoiaf solar system, presumably with some gas giants present. So it is totally possible that there is some crazy alien inside a gas giant near Planetos. I doubt it... but it is possible.  

Third, and the explanation I actually think is a likely possibility, there could be a "fire-net", or more specifically a "star-net". Obviously Mel and some other people are fond of burning people alive. Dragons burn people alive as a general tactic. The Dothraki believe that the stars are a giant herd galloping across the sky and that when they die their souls join the stars. And ultimately, we are all made of exploded star dust in the first place. I could absolutely see GRRM using the literal stars of the galaxy as a sort of galactic-scale neural network that can facilitate consciousness. And eventually, Planetos may be consumed by its sun, which is obviously Earth's fate, and this could mean that everything that ever lived on Planetos would then be absorbed into the star-net. Now this star-net concept sounds really weird, but let's explore the origin of the volcryn for a moment.

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Damoosh legends say the volcryn are refugees from some unimaginable war deep in the core of the galaxy, at the very beginning of time. They abandoned the worlds and stars on which they had evolved, sought true peace in the emptiness between.

“The gethsoids of Aath have a similar story, but in their tale that war destroyed all life in our galaxy, and the volcryn are gods of a sort, reseeding the worlds as they pass. Other races see them as god’s messengers, or shadows out of hell warning us all to flee some terror soon to emerge from the core.”

“Your stories contradict each other, Karoly.”

So in classic GRRM fashion, he provides us with several, seemingly contradictory explanations, and the real answer is likely that there is a bit of the truth in each answer. For the sake of this discussion, let's focus on that first bit: the volcryn are refugees from a war deep in the core of the galaxy, at the very beginning of time. Well, I doubt it was truly the "beginning" of time. But I take it to mean it was the first conscious life in the galaxy. So what life could have existed in the early days of the galaxy, at the same time that the volcryn evolved within giant gas planets? It could have been the stars themselves, aka the star-net.

My big issue with a second hive-minded player being involved is that I would think it would make the plot nearly impossible to decipher, even once we knew the ending. I could be wrong of course. But my current best guess is that there are key human pawns (mainly the pov characters), key human players (LF, Varys, Mance, Marwyn, Doran, Euron, and some less important ones too), and the one weirnet secretly in the background of everything manipulating all of them.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

1 hour ago, StarkofWinterfell said:

This seems like Barristan is saying that Ashara would've turned her gaze to him instead of "Stark" but as Allyria says, that Stark was Ned.

The story from Edric "Ned" Dayne is not to be trusted (I think Edric is honest, he was just lied to like everyone else). Edric repeats the standard public narrative, that Ned broke Ashara's heart and then she committed suicide. This is obviously false, because Ashara's brother (unknown name) proceeded to name his son "Ned". The clear implication is that rather than simply killing Arthur and driving Ashara to suicide, Ned actually did some sort of favor for House Dayne, one that was worthy of them naming the new heir after him. Additionally, Ashara's body was never found, which is ultra conspicuous. So if we conclude the public narrative is basically false, we should assume that Edric is just wrong about pretty much everything he claims. For instance, I highly doubt that Wylla is Jon's mother.

And on top of that, the Ned-Ashara-Brandon romance is a classic GRRM love-triangle, of which there are a million in asoiaf and in all his other stories. And generally speaking, male pov characters like Ned tend to be reflections of GRRM. GRRM is not like Brandon Stark or Daario; he is like Ned Stark and Quentyn, and in his youth he did not end up with the girl. A young GRRM wouldn't have had the game to get together with Ashara or Dany, and Ned has the same problem.

The big question is, WHY did GRRM have Brandon ask Ashara to dance for Ned? And the follow-up question is, why did GRRM make Barristan's thoughts on the matter ambiguous as to whether he was referring to Ned or Brandon? Well, since the public story is that Ned and Ashara had a romance, it is clear that Brandon is actually the Stark who "dishonored" Ashara at Harrenhal. And that makes this line from Harwin amusingly ironic:

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"I doubt there's any truth to it. But if there is, what of it? When Ned met this Dornish lady, his brother Brandon was still alive, and it was him betrothed to Lady Catelyn, so there's no stain on your father's honor.

 

2 hours ago, Damon_Tor said:

Or he offered Reed his tent because he wasn't planning on being in it.

Eh?

LOL I doubt it . I just can't picture Ned having the confidence to sleep with Ashara. He couldn't even dance with her without Brandon asking for him. And all the clues point to Brandon.

[SerProle]

So much to think about re your exploration of the volkryn and the comet, I need to find out where I kept my digital copies of those stories lol, hassles of computer changes. And I had not seen that thread about the Undying so I will read it.

I tend to think as you do, that as much fun as it would be to have more than one hive minded player, its just so complicated already, GRRM is swamped enough lol, so perhaps a wise choice to keep it to one.

Having just read some relevant bits of GoT with your ideas in mind, I couldn't find anything in Cat's abduction of Tyrion that gave me any clues about an agent that could be causing the influence towards this catastrophic decision. No dreams, weirwoods, odd characters, it seems like its just her terrible impulses. In fact right now, I'm overwhelmed with urges to yell in frustration at how bad Ned and Cat both are at making decisions lol, every one seems worse than the last. If causing human chaos was an OG goal, they could hardly have asked for better agents than Ned and Cat lol. 

I really dislike the idea of time travel in the series, so its personal resistance to that part of your master plan. I grant that it may indeed be a part of the story, and I need to pay attention more to indications, especially those bits of Tyrion later on. But to have it play such a key role, as the OG try to get things their way, seems almost too easy, in the same way it would be if gods were real or magic solves all problems. 

Chance seems to be important in GRRM's stories, even with schemes and betrayals and behind the scenes players, nothing in my memory suggests certainty about much. Is there a way that time travel or powers along those lines are substantially limited? Not a final trump card by any player? More like the 'weak' magic idea for those who like magic in ASOIAF? Or gods and prophecies only existing in the sense of how people believing in them bring some of it to pass?

Physics and multiverse theories are much more widely known now, even in laymen's terms and in fiction, so GRRM will have to definitely know his stuff if he wants to include time travel in some form now and be convincing about it. Or it will come off as cheap and tired and what we think of now as cheesy bad 80's sci-fi lol.

Even if Hodor and Bran are connected in some time travel way (I am not a fan), already you see plenty of criticism about this because it is no longer fresh, sci-fi has moved on lol. GRRM really does have some challenges he probably didn't anticipate due to the time its taken him to finish the series, and of course to the internet and google. People can fact check his ideas in an instant lol. Like gold melting in a cooking pot to pour over Viserys lol, a really bad choice in hindsight and one that every person watching with me noticed even way back then in the show.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

On 8/6/2017 at 6:52 PM, SerProle said:

So much to think about re your exploration of the volkryn and the comet, I need to find out where I kept my digital copies of those stories lol, hassles of computer changes. And I had not seen that thread about the Undying so I will read it.

I tend to think as you do, that as much fun as it would be to have more than one hive minded player, its just so complicated already, GRRM is swamped enough lol, so perhaps a wise choice to keep it to one.

Having just read some relevant bits of GoT with your ideas in mind, I couldn't find anything in Cat's abduction of Tyrion that gave me any clues about an agent that could be causing the influence towards this catastrophic decision. No dreams, weirwoods, odd characters, it seems like its just her terrible impulses. In fact right now, I'm overwhelmed with urges to yell in frustration at how bad Ned and Cat both are at making decisions lol, every one seems worse than the last. If causing human chaos was an OG goal, they could hardly have asked for better agents than Ned and Cat lol. 

LOL, yes Cat's and Ned's terrible decisions basically launch the Wot5K, and the whole story as we know it, into motion. The influence of the OG is not obvious, but it is there. Let's go over some of the key events.  

First off, it is clear (assuming that the basic premise of my grand theory is even remotely correct) that LF has been acting as basically the primary pawn for the OG plans. I think this is the case for 2 main reasons. 1) LF potentially had his third eye opened during his near death experience after being terribly wounded in his duel against Brandon. 2) I don't think it was a coincidence that LF's dagger was used by the assassin, and LF seemed ready for the reveal. It even played perfectly into his plan. Now, maybe LF is simply a master improviser who truly thrives on chaos, but I don't think so. And this show of ignorance makes me extra suspicious:

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Varys giggled like a little girl. "Oh, yes. I suppose I am guilty. I hope you forgive me, kind lady." He eased himself down into a seat and put his hands together. "I wonder if we might trouble you to show us the dagger?"

Catelyn Stark stared at the eunuch in stunned disbelief. He was a spider, she thought wildly, an enchanter or worse. He knew things no one could possibly know, unless … "What have you done to Ser Rodrik?" she demanded.

Littlefinger was lost. "I feel rather like the knight who arrives at the battle without his lance. What dagger are we talking about? Who is Ser Rodrik?"

I think LF knew exactly what dagger they were talking about.

The first step in LF's plan was to spread word about the twincest. Renly and Stannis both somehow (separately) found out about it and carried out their respective contingency plans. Renly plotted with Loras to replace Cersei with Margaery, and Stannis shared the info with Jon Arryn so they could gather evidence to show to Robert. Pycelle was loyal to the Lannisters and aided in Jon's death after seeing the expression on Cersei's face, and Varys was still trying to maintain peace at least until after Drogo's son was born. And Barristan seems ignorant of the twincest (and certainly was not the source of the rumors). So by process of deduction, we can assume that LF somehow found out about about the incest and then shared this info with the other members of the small council (at least Renly and Stannis), and LF even led them on the same bastard hunt he lead Ned on in AGOT. Here is a hilarious quote from AGOT Ned VI, after Jory learns from Jon's stable boy that Jon and Stannis mysteriously visited a brothel:

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"Which brothel?" Ned asked.

"The boy did not know. The guards would."

"A pity Lysa carried them off to the Vale," Ned said dryly. "The gods are doing their best to vex us. Lady Lysa, Maester Colemon, Lord Stannis … everyone who might actually know the truth of what happened to Jon Arryn is a thousand leagues away."

And then later LF finally reveals the location of this brothel to prevent Ned from leaving KL:

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"When do you mean to return to Winterfell, my lord?"

"As soon as I can. What concern is that of yours?"

"None … but if perchance you're still here come evenfall, I'd be pleased to take you to this brothel your man Jory has been searching for so ineffectually." 

That adventure of course led to the confrontation between Ned and Jaime, and Ned's leg was broken... by his own horse, which kept him in KL. As soon as Ned woke up, he tried to speak with Robert about everything, but Robert was in no mood for talking. This is just after Robert strikes Cersei:

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"Your Grace," Ned Stark said, "we must talk …"

Robert pressed his fingertips against his temples. "I am sick unto death of talk. On the morrow I'm going to the kingswood to hunt. Whatever you have to say can wait until I return."

"If the gods are good, I shall not be here on your return. You commanded me to return to Winterfell, remember?"

Robert stood up, grasping one of the bedposts to steady himself. "The gods are seldom good, Ned. Here, this is yours." He pulled the heavy silver hand clasp from a pocket in the lining of his cloak and tossed it on the bed. "Like it or not, you are my Hand, damn you. I forbid you to leave."

And why was Robert so intent on going hunting?

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"You are quite certain these were more than brigands?" Varys asked softly from the council table beneath the throne. Grand Maester Pycelle stirred uneasily beside him, while Littlefinger toyed with a pen. They were the only councillors in attendance. A white hart had been sighted in the kingswood, and Lord Renly and Ser Barristan had joined the king to hunt it, along with Prince Joffrey, Sandor Clegane, Balon Swann, and half the court. So Ned must needs sit the Iron Throne in his absence.

Of course, we all know that white harts are rare and magical:

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It would have been unkind to say so, however, so Sansa took a sip of milk and changed the subject. "I had a dream that Joffrey would be the one to take the white hart," she said. It had been more of a wish, actually, but it sounded better to call it a dream. Everyone knew that dreams were prophetic. White harts were supposed to be very rare and magical, and in her heart she knew her gallant prince was worthier than his drunken father.

And then, as I explained in the OP, the hart was eaten by wolves, Robert decided to go after a monstrous boar that had been sighted instead, and the boar killed Robert.

Anyways, back to LF. So we have established that LF spread the twincest rumor, led Jon Arryn and Stannis on a bastard scavenger hunt (which he later repeated with Ned), and poisoned Jon Arryn. Now, the key catalyst for the Wot5K was the assassination attempt on Bran's life, in which the assassin famously used LF's dagger. LF lost the dagger to Robert at the tourney on Joffrey's name day, just a fortnight before Jon Arryn was killed by LF. And Robert specifically says Jon was still healthy at the tourney.

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Robert shook his head. "I have never seen a man sicken so quickly. We gave a tourney on my son's name day. If you had seen Jon then, you would have sworn he would live forever. A fortnight later he was dead. The sickness was like a fire in his gut. It burned right through him."

So Jon Arryn died, Robert predictably chose Ned to be his new hand, and traveled to WF with the dagger (and with Cersei and Jaime). And then we all know the rest of that story. LF had Lysa send the letter blaming the Lannisters for murder (making Ned accept Robert's offer to be HotK), Bran witnessed twincest, Jaime defenestrated him for love, the assassin was killed by Summer, Cat went to KL to investigate the fancy dagger, LF claimed he lost it to Tyrion at the tourney, Cat abducted Tyrion, Jaime fought Ned and fled, tensions escalated, Robert was killed by the boar, LF betrayed Ned in the coup, and finally LF convinced Joffrey to kill Ned, forcing Robb and the north into full-scale war against Tywin. As you can see when it is all summarized like that, LF is directly responsible for a substantial portion of the events.

So for the most part, Cat and Ned were easily manipulated by LF's actions, and most of what they did was rather predictable. But there are 2 events that LF definitely did not have full control over and would have required direct assistance/knowledge from the OG: the assassination itself, and the meeting of Cat and Tyrion at the inn.

Of course, as I have gone over a few times now in multiple threads including this OP, the only person who could have planned for the assassin to fail was Summer, who is in fact a wolf. And the mere presence of LF's ultra fancy dagger implies that it was meant to fail. If the assassin had succeeded in his mission, whatever it was (it could have been to kill Cat, we don't actually know his target), he presumably would have escaped and taken the dagger with him. So credit to the OG there.

And then we have Cat and Tyrion meeting at the inn. I have speculated that the OG could potentially arrange this meeting with or without time travel, simply by properly timing Bran's assassin (which caused Cat to leave WF) and then using bad weather to slow down either Cat or Tyrion by just the right amount of time to force that encounter. But then there is one more variable we need to account for: Marillion.

I forget who suggested this to me, but someone else speculated that Marillion may in fact have been working for LF since AGOT. Marillion of course ends up being central to the Eyrie plot. He once tried to rape Sansa before Lothor Brune (another LF employee) intervened, and that could have been an elaborate ruse to manipulate Sansa. And then he took the blame for Lysa's murder and we really aren't sure what happened after that, but whatever happened he was in LF's control. It is even possible he was never tortured and is still alive. Specifically, it may be the case that Marillion entered LF's employ after the tourney on Joffrey's name day (the same day LF lost the dagger and poisoned Jon Arryn). Here is Marillion's backstory:

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"That's where I'm bound," the youth said. As she had suspected, he was more interested in telling his own story than in hearing theirs. Singers loved nothing half so well as the sound of their own voices. "The Hand's tourney means rich lords with fat purses. The last time I came away with more silver than I could carry … or would have, if I hadn't lost it all betting on the Kingslayer to win the day."

"The gods frown on the gambler," Ser Rodrik said sternly. He was of the north, and shared the Stark views on tournaments.

"They frowned on me, for certain," the singer said. "Your cruel gods and the Knight of Flowers altogether did me in."

I imagine that a desperate and broke Marillion may have received an offer from LF to become his spy/agent. Of course, the OG definitely could have controlled the outcome of the jousting because it is horse-based. And LF probably knew the outcome ahead of time, which is why he bet the dagger; he lost it on purpose. After all, LF had plenty of money, why wager a rare Valyrian steel weapon? Side note - Marillion offers to play music for a silver, if they have any. In fact, it is implied that Cat has been carrying the bag of silver that was supposedly (but not actually) left behind by Bran's assassin, and she gave 60 of the 90 silver stags to the 60 oarsmen on Storm Dancer. So Cat probably has 30 silver stags on her person.

So did Marillion really have the opportunity to force the encounter between Cat and Tyrion? It is definitely possible. Let's assume for the sake of discussion that the OG had the power to manipulate the travel times of Cat and Tyrion and force them to arrive at the inn on the same day, Cat slightly before Tyrion, and that they sent their pawn LF a vision informing him of this. LF could instruct Marillion to go wait at the inn, keep a spot on the benches empty across from him (as in, just tell everyone who isn't Rodrik that his "friend" is sitting there and will be right back), and be friendly with Cat and Rodrik (to be recognized based on their physical descriptions) when they arrive. And then when Tyrion shows up, get Tyrion's attention and make sure Tyrion notices Cat, and then follow them to conduct further intelligence gathering. He may have even had instructions ahead of time to remain at the Eyrie, if LF knew that Cat would take Tyrion there. This part is probably the biggest stretch for the theory, but hypothetically if my theory is correct, we really should expect GRRM to make these things as subtle and difficult to believe as they appear. He is trying to write a story and fool all the readers, and even to fool smart readers who are paying close attention.

So to summarize, LF did most of the work, and his potential employee Marillion may have sealed the deal on Cat abducting Tyrion.

On a final note on that subject, let's look at the assassination itself. As I said, the OG probably had little need to influence Cat or Ned through dreams, because LF was manipulating them quite effectively. But Cat was definitely under their influence during the assassination, and in the period up to it. Let's review: Bran fell. Approximately 12 days later everyone left WF. And 8 days after that, the assassin came. According to Luwin, Cat hardly slept for that entire period, which is actually 20 days. This fact is not obvious when you read the chapter, because Robb doesn't explicitly say "20 days". He just says "since Bran's fall", but if you actually figure out the timeline, it has been about 20 days since Bran's fall. So Cat went 20 days with almost no sleep? That is absolutely inhuman. But as I explained in the telepathy section of the OP, not sleeping is one of the symptoms of telepathic communication, most notably with Mel who specifically has a goal of eliminating the need for sleep entirely and instead spends her nights gazing into a fire looking for visions. And what has been going on for those 20 days? Summer, a conduit for the OG, has been constantly howling (at least at night) outside Bran's (and Cat's) window. Sound, at least in the story A Song for Lya, is a powerful medium for telepathic connections. And Tyrion makes note of Summer's terrifying howls when is reading in the WF library.

Another sign of the OG's telepathic influence over Cat is her meeting with Jon. Curiously, Bran's eyes are open during their meeting.

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She was holding one of his hands. It looked like a claw. This was not the Bran he remembered. The flesh had all gone from him. His skin stretched tight over bones like sticks. Under the blanket, his legs bent in ways that made Jon sick. His eyes were sunken deep into black pits; open, but they saw nothing. The fall had shrunken him somehow. He looked half a leaf, as if the first strong wind would carry him off to his grave.

This of course conflicts with Cat's later statement:

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The maester was shaken. "Yes, my lady. Hullen rode south with Lord Eddard, so—"

"My son lies here broken and dying, Luwin, and you wish to discuss a new master of horse? Do you think I care what happens in the stables? Do you think it matters to me one whit? I would gladly butcher every horse in Winterfell with my own hands if it would open Bran's eyes, do you understand that? Do you!"

And then when Bran wakes up, the only indication seems to be that he has indeed opened his eyes for the first time in months:

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The crow opened its beak and cawed at him, a shrill scream of fear, and the grey mists shuddered and swirled around him and ripped away like a veil, and he saw that the crow was really a woman, a serving woman with long black hair, and he knew her from somewhere, from Winterfell, yes, that was it, he remembered her now, and then he realized that he was in Winterfell, in a bed high in some chilly tower room, and the black-haired woman dropped a basin of water to shatter on the floor and ran down the steps, shouting, "He's awake, he's awake, he's awake."

Additionally, Tyrion and everyone else described Bran as being "asleep". They did not know if he would ever "wake up". If Bran's eyes had been open the whole time, that would imply some sort of brain-damaged vegetative state, rather than a coma, and this language would seem a bit off. But really, barring author error (which is possible) there is definitely something crazy going on in that scene with Jon. Let's back up a couple paragraphs. This is just before that quote about Bran's eyes, from AGOT Jon II:

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Part of him wanted only to flee, but he knew that if he did he might never see Bran again. He took a nervous step into the room. "Please," he said.

Something cold moved in her eyes. "I told you to leave," she said. "We don't want you here."

Once that would have sent him running. Once that might even have made him cry. Now it only made him angry. He would be a Sworn Brother of the Night's Watch soon, and face worse dangers than Catelyn Tully Stark. "He's my brother," he said.

WE???? Who is "we"? The only other person in the room is Bran, who is in a coma and does not share his mother’s opinion of Jon. If she is referring to Bran, that is a really strange thing to do. No, the clues point to someone else. Something cold moved in her eyes. Summer is howling all the time, and Bran mysteriously has his eyes open in this scene. And Cat is holding Bran's hand, which we will later see has a telepathic effect on her as well. Cat seems to be speaking for herself and the old gods. It is the OG’s plan to send Jon to the NW, and Cat is helping them do just that.

Anyways, let's get back to the chapter with the assassin (AGOT Cat III). So Cat hasn't slept for 20 days, she yells at Luwin (says she would butcher every horse to open Bran's eyes), and Robb enters. Then we get the next suspicious quote:

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"I'll make the appointments," Robb said.

Catelyn had not heard him enter, but there he stood in the doorway, looking at her. She had been shouting, she realized with a sudden flush of shame. What was happening to her? She was so tired, and her head hurt all the time.

This seems to be a callback to A Song for Lya, which I highly recommend reading if you haven't. A key plot point in that story was that Lyanna 1.0 woke up every morning with a terrible headache, and the implication is that the Greeshka was telepathically communicating with her in her sleep and causing the headaches. Something very similar seems to happening with Cat. And then this entire passage is just super suspicious:

Quote

"Rickon needs you," Robb said sharply. "He's only three, he doesn't understand what's happening. He thinks everyone has deserted him, so he follows me around all day, clutching my leg and crying. I don't know what to do with him." He paused a moment, chewing on his lower lip the way he'd done when he was little. "Mother, I need you too. I'm trying but I can't … I can't do it all by myself." His voice broke with sudden emotion, and Catelyn remembered that he was only fourteen. She wanted to get up and go to him, but Bran was still holding her hand and she could not move.

Outside the tower, a wolf began to howl. Catelyn trembled, just for a second.

"Bran's." Robb opened the window and let the night air into the stuffy tower room. The howling grew louder. It was a cold and lonely sound, full of melancholy and despair.

"Don't," she told him. "Bran needs to stay warm."

"He needs to hear them sing," Robb said. Somewhere out in Winterfell, a second wolf began to howl in chorus with the first. Then a third, closer. "Shaggydog and Grey Wind," Robb said as their voices rose and fell together. "You can tell them apart if you listen close."

Catelyn was shaking. It was the grief, the cold, the howling of the direwolves. Night after night, the howling and the cold wind and the grey empty castle, on and on they went, never changing, and her boy lying there broken, the sweetest of her children, the gentlest, Bran who loved to laugh and climb and dreamt of knighthood, all gone now, she would never hear him laugh again. Sobbing, she pulled her hand free of his and covered her ears against those terrible howls. "Make them stop!" she cried. "I can't stand it, make them stop, make them stop, kill them all if you must, just make them stop!"

She didn't remember falling to the floor, but there she was, and Robb was lifting her, holding her in strong arms. "Don't be afraid, Mother. They would never hurt him." He helped her to her narrow bed in the corner of the sickroom. "Close your eyes," he said gently. "Rest. Maester Luwin tells me you've hardly slept since Bran's fall."

"I can't," she wept. "Gods forgive me, Robb, I can't, what if he dies while I'm asleep, what if he dies, what if he dies …" The wolves were still howling. She screamed and held her ears again. "Oh, gods, close the window!"

"If you swear to me you'll sleep." Robb went to the window, but as he reached for the shutters another sound was added to the mournful howling of the direwolves. "Dogs," he said, listening. "All the dogs are barking. They've never done that before …" Catelyn heard his breath catch in his throat. When she looked up, his face was pale in the lamplight. "Fire," he whispered.

Fire, she thought, and then, Bran! "Help me," she said urgently, sitting up. "Help me with Bran."

Robb did not seem to hear her. "The library tower's on fire," he said.

Catelyn could see the flickering reddish light through the open window now. She sagged with relief. Bran was safe. The library was across the bailey, there was no way the fire would reach them here. "Thank the gods," she whispered.

Robb looked at her as if she'd gone mad. "Mother, stay here. I'll come back as soon as the fire's out." He ran then. She heard him shout to the guards outside the room, heard them descending together in a wild rush, taking the stairs two and three at a time.

This is a whole bunch of crazy shit. First Cat is unable to move because Bran is holding her hand. And pay close attention to the language there: Bran is holding her hand, not the other way around, even though Bran is in a coma. Then Cat trembles from the howling, which is clearly having an effect on her mind. Robb opens the window, which explicitly makes the howling grow louder, and Cat protests, saying that Bran needs to stay warm. That part is actually the strangest thing in the whole chapter. Tyrion earlier informed his family that Summer's howling seemed to help Bran. Specifically, when they opened the window, Bran's heart beat stronger. Why in the world would Cat have closed the window? She says that Bran needs to stay warm, but she obviously could have left the window open and sent for more blankets. Cat seems to be subconsciously aware that the howling is affecting her mind.

Then Grey Wind and Shaggydog join in. On a side note, I actually think that this 3-wolf telepathic howling was the coordinating signal for the 2 agents of the OG to carry out their orders, like blowing a horn to signal a military attack. That is, Mance Rayder set the library on fire and planted the bag of silver (which he explicitly brought with him to WF) in the stables, and the possibly mentally challenged assassin prepared for the guards to run off and then carried out the attack. Anyways, the combined howling of the 3 wolves is too much for Cat. She shakes, sobs, covers her ears against the "terrible howls" and begs Robb to make the howling stop even if he has to kill all the direwolves to do it. That, by the way, is an insane and extreme proposition. She then falls to the floor without realizing it, which sounds an awful lot like a seizure (another symptom of telepathic control, i.e. Thistle, Hodor, and Robert Arryn), and she screams and covers her ears again and says "Oh, gods, close the window!"

So in other words, the OG staged every aspect of the assassination. They caused Bran's fall and coma, kept Cat from leaving his side, set the fire, sent the assassin, killed the assassin, and planted the dagger. They may have even been powerful enough to directly influence the physical actions of Cat and the assassin during their fight, either through teke or through telepathic influence. The assassin did "move faster than she would have believed". And Cat laughs hysterically after the man is killed. This insane response makes sense, given what she has gone through and her severe sleep deprivation, but I also like to think that on a meta level, it is GRRM laughing at the readers, being amused by the complex conspiracy he has written and hidden in plain sight.

So those are my main thoughts on Cat's and Ned's terrible decisions. I am going to post a response about time travel in a bit.