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Six and One, Half Dozen of the Others


Darry Man

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From the Prologue of A Game of Thrones, you have six Others murdering the Night’s Watch brother, Ser Waymar Royce:

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”They emerged silently from the shadows, twins to the first. Three of them…four…five…"

And in his nightmarish vision in ASOS, Jaime's five slain KG brothers & Rhaegar are about to do the same: 

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”Five had been his brothers … and beside them … rode Rhaegar Targaryen… as the ghosts came rushing in."

Given @LmL's hypothesis that the Kingsguard symbolically represent the Others, these passages suggest a motif of six Others/kingsguard attacking a brother.

These thoughts kicked off an interesting Twitter thread involving several forum participants. I thought it worthwhile to share our discoveries with forum participants. Special thanks to Emma Smith for her contributions.

GRRM explicitly provides the motif of a dozen companions with the Last Hero, which we’ll call, for lack of a better term, “LH math”. We see this 12+1=13 formula repeated throughout the published works. 

Forum contributor @ravenous reader suggests that this newly uncovered motif could represent the “naughty greenseer”, aka the Night’s King:

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In the Prologue, the 1 of '1+6' could signify the victim and/or perpetrator of the abomination, respectively resurrected Waymar, and the unseen presence in the shadows, up the tree, who 'called' the Others & betrayed his brother... @LmL and I have dubbed him 'the void'.

I’ll call 6 + 1 the NK formula. Because I can.

This post is designed to capture every instance of NK math that I can find in the main five books. I’m sure there are more in The World of Ice & Fire and the novellas, but as you can see here, I think we have more than enough evidence of its usage.

Search the term “six” or “half a dozen” in the books, and look for a relation between seven “brothers” or with an otherwise in-kind relationship, with six of them in opposition to the seventh. The pattern comes up time and time again.

 

Six and One

Below is a list of all I can find so far.

Here’s Robert in AGOT:

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”In the south, the way they talk about my Seven Kingdoms, a man forgets that your part is as big as the other six combined."


Heh. Big part.

Tyrion admonishes Joffrey:

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Tyrion hopped off the last step onto the yard. "I beg to differ, nephew," he said. "The Starks can count past six. Unlike some princes I might name."

Catelyn relates her arduous journey to the Eyrie in AGOT:

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"My lady, you should have sent word of your coming," Ser Donnel Waynwood told her as their horses climbed the pass. "We would have sent an escort. The high road is not as safe as it once was, for a party as small as yours."


”We learned that to our sorrow, Ser Donnel," Catelyn said. Sometimes she felt as though her heart had turned to stone; six brave men had died to bring her this far, and she could not even find it in her to weep for them. Even their names were fading. 

Bran gets captured by Osha and the wildlings:

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”He's a fierce one, he is," mocked the short woman. Hali, they called her. "You mean to fight us, boy?"
”Don't be a fool, lad. You're one against six." The tall woman, Osha, leveled her spear.

Guess how long Eddard Stark lay in his fever after being attaked by the Lannisters?

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"Six days and seven nights." 


Knights?

Benjen Stark knows:

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”Ser Jaremy," the Old Bear asked gruffly, "Ben Stark had six men with him when he rode from the Wall. Where are the others?"

Two of these men came back as wights.

In AGOT, Barristan Selmy is ceremoniously slain in the Red Keep’s throne room, and requires a replacement:

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"Your Grace," Littlefinger reminded the king. "If we might resume, the seven are now six. We find ourselves in need of a new sword for your Kingsguard."

Eddard dreams of Jaime receiving his white cloak:

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He remembered Jaime Lannister, a golden youth in scaled white armor, kneeling on the grass in front of the king's pavilion and making his vows to protect and defend King Aerys.

Afterward, Ser Oswell Whent helped Jaime to his feet, and the White Bull himself, Lord Commander Ser Gerold Hightower, fastened the snowy cloak of the Kingsguard about his shoulders. All six White Swords were there to welcome their newest brother.

Things don’t go well for the first slave liberated by Dany:

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”Eroeh?" asked Dany, remembering the frightened child she had saved outside the city of the Lamb Men.

”Mago seized her, who is Khal Jhaqo's bloodrider now," said Jhogo. "He mounted her high and low and gave her to his khal, and Jhaqo gave her to his other bloodriders. They were six. When they were done with her, they cut her throat."

In ACOK, six gold cloaks confront the black-cloaked NW recruiter, Yoren:

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"Gold cloaks." His face closed up tight.

It couldn't be, Arya thought, but when she glanced back, they were riding up the kingsroad, six in the black ringmail and golden cloaks of the City Watch. One was an officer; he wore a black enamel breastplate ornamented with four golden disks. 

More six-plus-one math with the gold cloaks:

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Slynt spun on his heel like the watchman he'd once been, and strode the length of the Small Hall, boots ringing on the stone. He clattered up the steps, threw open the door . . . and came face-to-face with a tall, lantern-jawed man in black breastplate and gold cloak. Strapped to the stump of his right wrist was an iron hand. "Janos," he said, deep-set eyes glinting under a prominent brow ridge and a shock of salt-and-pepper hair. Six gold cloaks moved quietly into the Small Hall behind him as Janos Slynt backed away.

”Lord Slynt," Tyrion called out, "I believe you know Ser Jacelyn Bywater, our new Commander of the City Watch."

"We have a litter waiting for you, my lord," Ser Jacelyn told Slynt. "The docks are dark and distant, and the streets are not safe by night. Men."

As the gold cloaks ushered out their onetime commander, Tyrion called Ser Jacelyn to his side and handed him a roll of parchment. "It's a long voyage, and Lord Slynt will want for company. See that these six join him on the Summer's Dream."

This is an interesting motif we see a few times — six passageways meeting toward a vertical structure:

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How long the city had been deserted she could not know, but the white walls, so beautiful from afar, were cracked and crumbling when seen up close. Inside was a maze of narrow crooked alleys. The buildings pressed close, their facades blank, chalky, windowless. Everything was white, as if the people who lived here had known nothing of color. They rode past heaps of sun-washed rubble where houses had fallen in, and elsewhere saw the faded scars of fire. At a place where six alleys came together, Dany passed an empty marble plinth. Dothraki had visited this place before, it would seem. Perhaps even now the missing statue stood among the other stolen gods in Vaes Dothrak. She might have ridden past it a hundred times, never knowing. On her shoulder, Viserion hissed.

Bran receives a visitor for the feast of Winterfell in ACOK:

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Lady Donella Hornwood brought no tail of knights and retainers; only herself, and six tired men-at-arms with a moosehead badge on their dusty orange livery

Gilly hints at the NK formula:

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"Is it Craster who frightens you, Gilly?"

”For the baby, not for me. If it's a girl, that's not so bad, she'll grow a few years and he'll marry her. But Nella says it's to be a boy, and she's had six and knows these things. He gives the boys to the gods

Not sure what these means, but six Freys also were mentioned as participants in the Hand’s Tourney in King’s Landing in AGOT:

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The captives ate at their own table in the Hall of a Hundred Hearths, and could often be seen about the grounds. Four brothers took their exercise together every day, fighting with staves and wooden shields in the Flowstone Yard. Three of them were Freys of the Crossing, the fourth their bastard brother. They were only there a short time, though; one morning two other brothers arrived under a peace banner with a chest of gold, and ransomed them from the knights who'd captured them. The six Freys all left together.

In ACOK, even the Winterfell guard are not immune from this trend:

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Alebelly was the only one who paid the warning any heed. He went to talk to Jojen himself, and afterward stopped bathing and refused to go near the well. Finally he stank so bad that six of the other guards threw him into a tub of scalding water and scrubbed him raw while he screamed that they were going to drown him like the frogboy had said. Thereafter he scowled whenever he saw Bran or Jojen about the castle, and muttered under his breath.

Jon overhears a conspiracy brewing at the Fist of the First Men:

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Jon had hoped that the arrival of men from the Shadow Tower would lift the spirits in the camp. Only last night, he was coming back through the dark from a piss when he heard five or six men talking in low voices around the embers of a fire. When he heard Chett muttering that it was past time they turned back, Jon stopped to listen. "It's an old man's folly, this ranging," he heard. "We'll find nothing but our graves in them mountains."

Theon’s fate is sealed by a betrayal of six:

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Theon walked up and down before the prisoners, studying the faces. They all looked guilty to him. "How many are missing?"

Six." Reek stepped up behind him, smelling of soap, his long hair moving in the wind. "Both Starks, that bog boy and his sister, the halfwit from the stables, and your wildling woman."

In ASOS, three fugitives from Riverrun have a challenge on their hands:

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Ser Cleos froze at his oars. "Eighteen, you said?"

Six for each of us. I'd want eight, but these bracelets hinder me somewhat." Jaime held up his wrists. "Unless the Lady Brienne would be so kind as to unshackle me?"

Check out Jon’s first meeting with Mance:

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The tent was hot and smoky. Baskets of burning peat stood in all four corners, filling the air with a dim reddish light. More skins carpeted the ground. Jon felt utterly alone as he stood there in his blacks, awaiting the pleasure of the turncloak who called himself King-beyond-the-Wall. When his eyes had adjusted to the smoky red gloom, he saw six people, none of whom paid him any mind. 

Guess how many Westerlings travelled with Robb to Riverrun?

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When all the words were done, the Great Hall of Riverrun was empty save for Robb, the three Tullys, and the six strangers Catelyn could not place. She eyed them curiously. "My lady, sers, are you new to my son's cause?”

In ASOS, Sansa gets some help with her new fashion ensemble:

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Will they be ready in time for the king's wedding?"

”Oh, sooner, much sooner, Her Grace insists. I have six seamstresses and twelve apprentice girls, and we have set all our other work aside for this. Many ladies will be cross with us, but it was the queen's command."

Six grey beards and 12 green boys?

Arya discovers the fate of her father’s men:

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Only six Winterfell men remained of the twenty her father had sent west with Beric Dondarrion, Harwin told her, and they were scattered.

Six-plus-one is even ingrained in song:

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At Maidenpool, Lord Mooton's red salmon still flew above the castle on its hill, but the town walls were deserted, the gates smashed, half the homes and shops burned or plundered. They saw nothing living but a few feral dogs that went slinking away at the sound of their approach. The pool from which the town took its name, where legend said that Florian the Fool had first glimpsed Jonquil bathing with her sisters, was so choked with rotting corpses that the water had turned into a murky grey-green soup.

Jaime took one look and burst into song. "Six maids there were in a spring-fed pool . . ."

Arya runs into another survivor of the NK formula in ASOS:

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The small square keep was half a ruin, and so too the great grey knight who lived there. He was so old he did not understand their questions. No matter what was said to him, he would only smile and mutter, "I held the bridge against Ser Maynard. Red hair and a black temper, he had, but he could not move me. Six wounds I took before I killed him. Six!"

Harwin relates the Battle of the Bells:

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”Robert came out of hiding to join the fight when the bells began to ring. He slew six men that day, they say.” 

Tyrion procures some entertainment for his nephew’s wedding:

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Symon took a sip of wine. "Still . . . a singer's life is not without peril. We ply our trade in alehouses and wine sinks, before unruly drunkards. If one of your sister's seven should suffer some mishap, I hope you might consider me to fill his place." He smiled slyly, inordinately pleased with himself.

Six singers would be as unfortunate as eight, to be sure. I will inquire after the health of Cersei's seven. If any of them should be indisposed, my man Bronn will find you."

Here’s a big one from ASOS:

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"How many times?" Lord Beric insisted.

Six," Thoros said reluctantly. "And each time is harder. You have grown reckless, my lord. Is death so very sweet?"

He is not resurrected from the seventh.Another interesting one:

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Gilly gave him a puzzled look. "Did you only sing of six gods? Craster always told us you southrons had seven."

”Seven," he agreed, "but no one sings of the Stranger." 

Death.

In AFFC, Jaime is told that Pycelle has this NK math too:

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Of all the mourners, Grand Maester Pycelle had seemed the most distraught. "I have served six kings," he told Jaime after the second service, whilst sniffing doubtfully about the corpse, "but here before us lies the greatest man I ever knew. Lord Tywin wore no crown, yet he was all a king should be."

What a crotchsniffer.Jaime then notices that there were six prisoners in the Black Cells of the Red Keep:

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Longwaters sniffed again. "I am the chief undergaoler, my lord. I am above the undergaolers. I am charged with keeping the counts. If my lord would like to look over my books, he will see that all the figures are exact." Longwaters had consulted the great leather-bound book spread out before him. "At present, we have four prisoners on the first level and one on the second, in addition to your lordship's brother." The old man frowned. "Who is fled, to be sure. 'Tis true. I will strike him out." He took up a quill and began to sharpen it.

Six prisoners, Jaime thought sourly, while we pay wages for twenty turnkeys, six undergaolers, a chief undergaoler, a gaoler, and a King's Justice. 


There’s a couple of instances of six dragons being used as payment to someone delivering another somewhere. First, the ferryman who carried Arya and the Hound across the flooded Tumblestone demanded six dragons, though the Hound stiffs him. Then Dick Crabb is promised six dragons too:

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”Take you to the Whispers, m'lady."

Brienne did not like the way his fingers played with that gold coin. Still . . . "Six dragons if we find my sister. Two if we only find the fool. Nothing if nothing is what we find."

Crabb shrugged. "Six is good. Six will serve."

Lord Tywin heads home:

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Lord Tywin Lannister had entered the city on a stallion, his enameled crimson armor polished and gleaming, bright with gems and goldwork. He left it in a tall wagon draped with crimson banners, with six silent sisters riding attendance on his bones.

Here’s Dick Crabb again, repeating the math of six dragons with the dragon prince:

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”There was Crabbs and Brunes and Boggses with Prince Rhaegar on the Trident, and in the Kingsguard too. A Hardy, a Cave, a Pyne, and three Crabbs, Clement and Rupert and Clarence the Short. Six foot tall, he was, but short compared to the real Ser Clarence. We're all good dragon men, up Crackclaw way."

Arianne sets up six versus one:

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Arianne had hoped to reach the river before the sun came up, but they had started much later than she'd planned, so they were still in the saddle when the eastern sky turned red. Darkstar cantered up beside her. "Princess," he said, "I'd set a faster pace, unless you mean to kill the child after all. We have no tents, and by day the sands are cruel."

”I know the sands as well as you do, ser," she told him. All the same, she did as he suggested. It was hard on their mounts, but better she should lose six horses than one princess.

Guess how many Lords Declarant tried Littlefinger?

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Young Lord Hunter and his levies had joined the others two days past. Nestor Royce had closed the Gates against them, but he had fewer than three hundred men in his garrison. Each of the Lords Declarant had brought a thousand, and there were six of them. Alayne knew their names as well as her own. Benedar Belmore, Lord of Strongsong. Symond Templeton, the Knight of Ninestars. Horton Redfort, Lord of Redfort. Anya Waynwood, Lady of Ironoaks. Gilwood Hunter, called Young Lord Hunter by all and sundry, Lord of Longbow Hall. And Yohn Royce, mightiest of them all, the redoubtable Bronze Yohn, Lord of Runestone, Nestor's cousin and the chief of the senior branch of House Royce. The six had gathered at Runestone after Lysa Arryn's fall, and there made a pact together, vowing to defend Lord Robert, the Vale, and one another. Their declaration made no mention of the Lord Protector, but spoke of "misrule" that must be ended, and of "false friends and evil counselors" as well.

Cersei brushes off the Iron Bank:

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”I have spoken with Lord Gyles six times. He coughs at me and makes excuses, Your Grace, but the gold is not forthcoming."

Speak to him a seventh time," Cersei suggested pleasantly. "The number seven is sacred to our gods."

There’s something particular to do with men-at-arms:

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At a place called Sow's Horn they found a tough old knight named Ser Roger Hogg squatting stubbornly in his towerhouse with six men-at-arms, four crossbowmen, and a score of peasants. 

The Elder Brother on the Quiet Isle mentions another possible hint at NK math:

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Rhaegar's rubies?"

”It may be. Who can say? The battle was long leagues from here, but the river is tireless and patient. Six have been found. We are all waiting for the seventh."

Uh oh, Brienne is in trouble at the Inn at the Crossroads:

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He shrugged. "You'll meet them soon enough."

I may not want to meet them, Brienne thought, as the first riders came splashing through the puddles into the yard. Beneath the patter of the rain and Dog's barking, she could hear the faint clink of swords and mail from beneath their ragged cloaks. She counted them as they came. Two, four, six, seven. Some of them were wounded, judging from the way they rode. The last man was massive and hulking, as big as two of the others.

Jon Arryn’s sister does her part for her house:

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"Good. Now, Jon Arryn married thrice, but his first two wives gave him no children, so for long years his nephew Elbert was his heir. Meantime, Elys was plowing Alys quite dutifully, and she was whelping once a year. She gave him nine children, eight girls and one precious little boy, another Jasper, after which she died exhausted. Boy Jasper, inconsiderate of the heroic efforts that had gone into begetting him, got himself kicked in the head by a horse when he was three years old. A pox took two of his sisters soon after, leaving six. The eldest married Ser Denys Arryn, a distant cousin to the Lords of the Eyrie."

In the Prologue to ADWD, Varamyr Six Skins gets six skins:

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Haggon traded a dozen strings of amber and a sled piled high with pelts for six skins of wine, a block of salt, and a copper kettle.

Tyrion spies a standoff between some trees and a little statue in Pentos:

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Beneath his window six cherry trees stood sentinel around a marble pool, their slender branches bare and brown. A naked boy stood on the water, poised to duel with a bravo's blade in hand.

Jon Snow notices the money bequeathed to the NW by their fallen brother:

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The grant that the king had presented him for signature was on the table beneath a silver drinking cup that had once been Donal Noye's. The one-armed smith had left few personal effects: the cup, six pennies and a copper star, a niello brooch with a broken clasp, a musty brocade doublet that bore the stag of Storm's End.

Quentyn Martell gets into the action:

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”I have had enough of corsairs. Let's not buy a ship."

This is still just a game to him, Quentyn realized, no different than the time he led six of us up into the mountains to find the old lair of the Vulture King.

Daenerys needs some convincing to reopen the Meereenese fighting pits:

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Dany grimaced. Even her own people would give no rest about the matter. Reznak mo Reznak stressed the coin to be made through taxes. The Green Grace said that reopening the pits would please the gods. The Shavepate felt it would win her support against the Sons of the Harpy. "Let them fight," grunted Strong Belwas, who had once been a champion in the pits. Ser Barristan suggested a tourney instead; his orphans could ride at rings and fight a mêlée with blunted weapons, he said, a suggestion Dany knew was as hopeless as it was well-intentioned. It was blood the Meereenese yearned to see, not skill. Elsewise the fighting slaves would have worn armor. Only the little scribe Missandei seemed to share the queen's misgivings.

I have refused you six times," Dany reminded Hizdahr.

”Your Radiance has seven gods, so perhaps she will look upon my seventh plea with favor. Today I do not come alone. Will you hear my friends? There are seven of them as well."

Dany’s dragon Rhaegal gets a bit testy:

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Rhaegal had been harder. Perhaps he could hear his brother raging in the pit, despite the walls of brick and stone between them. In the end, they had to cover him with a net of heavy iron chain as he basked on her terrace, and he fought so fiercely that it had taken three days to carry him down the servants' steps, twisting and snapping. Six men had been burned in the struggle.

And Drogon …

Jon Snow takes some new recruits at the weirwood north of the Wall:

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The others were good men too. Good men in a fight, at least, and loyal to their brothers. Jon could not speak for what they might have been before they reached the Wall, but he did not doubt that most had pasts as black as their cloaks. Up here, they were the sort of men he wanted at his back. Their hoods were raised against the biting wind, and some had scarves wrapped about their faces, hiding their features. Jon knew them, though. Every name was graven on his heart. They were his men, his brothers.

Six more rode with them—a mix of young and old, large and small, seasoned and raw. Six to say the words. Horse had been born and raised in Mole's Town, Arron and Emrick came from Fair Isle, Satin from the brothels of Oldtown at the other end of Westeros. All of them were boys. Leathers and Jax were older men, well past forty, sons of the haunted forest, with sons and grandsons of their own. 

There are 18 in the party:

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Jon smelled Tom Barleycorn before he saw him. Or was it Ghost who smelled him? Of late, Jon Snow sometimes felt as if he and the direwolf were one, even awake. The great white wolf appeared first, shaking off the snow. A few moments later Tom was there. “Wildlings,” he told Jon, softly. “In the grove.”

Jon brought the riders to a halt. “How many?”

”I counted nine. No guards. Some dead, might be, or sleeping. Most look to be women. One child, but there’s a giant too. Just the one I saw. They got a fire burning, smoke drifting through the trees. Fools.”

Nine, and I have seven-and-ten. Four of his were green boys, though, and non were giants.

Not nine, but six:

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Nine, Tom Barleycorn had said, and nine there were, but two were dead and one so weak he might have died by morning. The six who remained included a mother and child, two old men, a wounded Then in battered bronze, and one of the Hornfoot folk, his bare feet so badly frostbitten that Jon knew at a glance he would never walk again.

Then, during the induction ceremony:

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One last thing remained before they could depart: the thing that they had come for. Iron Emmett called forth his charges, and as the rest of the company watched from a respectful distance, they knelt before the weirwoods. The last light of day was gone by then; the only light came from the stars above and the faint red glow of the dying fire in the center of the grove.

With their black hoods and thick black cowls, the six might have been carved from shadow. Their voices rose together, small against the vastness of the night. "Night gathers, and now my watch begins," they said, as thousands had said before them. Satin's voice was sweet as song, Horse's hoarse and halting, Arron's a nervous squeak. "It shall not end until my death."

May those deaths be long in coming. Jon Snow sank to one knee in the snow.  

Wyman Manderly eats his enemies:

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True to his word, Manderly devoured six portions, two from each of the three pies, smacking his lips and slapping his belly and stuffing himself until the front of his tunic was half-brown with gravy stains and his beard was flecked with crumbs of crust.

Theon takes poor fArya on her bedding:

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Lord Ramsay had already left the hall. His bride, forlorn and seemingly forgotten, sat hunched and silent beneath the banner of House Stark, clutching a silver goblet in both hands. Judging from the way she looked at him when he approached, she had emptied that goblet more than once. Perhaps she hoped that if she drank enough, the ordeal would pass her by. Theon knew better. "Lady Arya," he said. "Come. It is time you did your duty."

Six of the Bastard's boys accompanied them as Theon led the girl out the back of the hall and across the frigid yard to the Great Keep.

Stannis tallies his ironborn assets:

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Stannis looked at her as he might look at a dog who presumed to hump against his leg. “You earned those irons.”

“I did. Now I offer you my men, my ships, my wits.”

“Your ships are mine, or burnt. Your men … how many are left? Ten? Twelve?”

Nine. Six, if you count only those strong enough to fight.

Six nasty pieces of military tech face off against the Dragon Queen:

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The dry, scorched plains around Meereen were flat and bare and treeless for long leagues, but the Yunkish ships had brought lumber and hides up from the south, enough to raise six huge trebuchets.

Lord Manderly is wounded at Winterfell, but his men aren’t much better off:

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It took two score Dreadfort spearmen to part the combatants and put an end to the carnage. By that time six White Harbor men and two Freys lay dead upon the floor. 

Abel’s washerwoman Squirrel takes one last climb:

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Theon glanced at Squirrel. They are almost of a size. It might work. "And how does Squirrel get out?"

Squirrel answered for herself. "Out a window, and straight down to the godswood. I was twelve the first time my brother took me raiding south o' your Wall. That's where I got my name. My brother said I looked like a squirrel running up a tree. I've done that Wall six times since, over and back again. I think I can climb down some stone tower."

Tormund sets the bar pretty high for his fighters:

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The wildling gave him a shrewd look. "Aye, I might have. And you crows might decide to close that gate. A few fighters on t'other side, well, that way the gate stays open, don't it?" He grinned. "I bought your bloody horse, Jon Snow. Don't mean that we can't count his teeth. Now don't you go thinking me and mine don't trust you. We trust you just as much as you trust us." He snorted. "You wanted warriors, didn't you? Well, there they are. Every one worth six o' your black crows."

Jon receives word that Hardhome, cursed for six hundred years, is still a shithole:

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At Hardhome, with six ships. Wild seas. Blackbird lost with all hands, two Lyseni ships driven aground on Skane, Talon taking water. Very bad here. Wildlings eating their own dead. Dead things in the woods. Braavosi captains will only take women, children on their ships. Witch women call us slavers. Attempt to take Storm Crow defeated, six crew dead, many wildlings. Eight ravens left. Dead things in the water. Send help by land, seas wracked by storms. From Talon, by hand of Maester Harmune.

Cotter Pyke had made his angry mark below.

Guess how many ships landed in the Stormlands with fAegon?

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Black Balaq commanded one thousand bows. In his youth, Jon Connington had shared the disdain most knights had for bowmen, but he had grown wiser in exile. In its own way, the arrow was as deadly as the sword, so for the long voyage he had insisted that Homeless Harry Strickland break Balaq's command into ten companies of one hundred men and place each company upon a different ship.

Six of those ships had stayed together well enough to deliver their passengers to the shores of Cape Wrath (the other four were lagging but would turn up eventually, the Volantenes assured them, but Griff thought it just as likely they were lost or had landed elsewhere), which left the company with six hundred bows. For this, two hundred proved sufficient. "They will try to send out ravens," he told Black Balaq. "Watch the maester's tower. Here." He pointed to the map he had drawn in the mud of their campsite. "Bring down every bird that leaves the castle."

Stannis and Arya receive some visitors:

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”Friends," a half-familiar voice replied. "We looked for you at Winterfell, but found only Crowfood Umber beating drums and blowing horns. It took some time to find you." The rider vaulted from his saddle, pulled back his hood, and bowed. So thick was his beard, and so crusted with ice, that for a moment Asha did not know him. Then it came. "Tris?" she said.

”My lady." Tristifer Botley took a knee. "The Maid is here as well. Roggon, Grimtongue, Fingers, Rook … six of us, all those fit enough to ride. Cromm died of his wounds."

Ser Barristan potentially has some new knight companions:

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That made six. Six out of twenty-seven. Selmy might have hoped for more, but six was a good beginning. The other boys were younger for the most part, and more familiar with looms and plows and chamber pots than swords and shields, but they worked hard and learned quickly. A few years as squires, and he might have six more knights to give his queen. As for those who would never be ready, well, not every boy was meant to be a knight. The realm needs candlemakers and innkeeps and armorers as well. That was as true in Meereen as it was in Westeros.

Later in the same chapter, Selmy conspires:

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The Great Pyramid of Meereen had been built as an echo to the Great Pyramid of Ghis whose collossal ruins Lomas Longstrider had once visited. Like its ancient predecessor, whose red marble halls were now the haunt of bats and spiders, the Meereenese pyramid boasted three-and-thirty levels, that number being somehow sacred to the gods of Ghis. Ser Barristan began the long descent alone, his white cloak rippling behind him as he started down. He took the servants' steps, not the grand stairways of veined marble, but the narrower, steeper, straighter stairs hidden within the thick brick walls.

Twelve levels down he found the Shavepate waiting, his coarse features still hidden by the mask he had worn that morning, the blood bat. Six Brazen Beasts were with him. All were masked as insects, identical to one another.

Selmy encounters some kids in Dany’s chambers playing a telling game:

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By the time the old knight returned to the queen's rooms atop the pyramid, Prince Quentyn's corpse had been removed. Six of the young cupbearers were playing some child's game as he entered, sitting in a circle on the floor as they took turns spinning a dagger. When it wobbled to a stop they cut a lock of hair off whichever of them the blade was pointing at. Ser Barristan had played a similar game with his cousins when he was just a boy at Harvest Hall … though in Westeros, as he recalled, kissing had been involved as well. "Bhakaz," he called. "A cup of wine, if you would be so good. Grazhar, Azzak, the door is yours. I am expecting the Green Grace. Show her in at once when she arrives. Elsewise, I do not wish to be disturbed."

 

More Six

There are other conspicuous mentions of the term “six” that I haven’t included, but should be considered. There are many references to “six years” or “six hundred years” or “six feet” or “six yards.” There are also many instances of six wayns or baggage carts making up shipments of goods.

And Varamyr Six Skins tries to take his seventh in the ADWD Prologue.


Half Dozen of the Others

In AGOT, Mya Stone gets some exercise on her mules:

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Then it was up onto a new mule and out again into the starlight. The second part of the ascent seemed more treacherous to Catelyn. The trail was steeper, the steps more worn, and here and there littered with pebbles and broken stone. Mya had to dismount a half-dozen times to move fallen rocks from their path. "You don't want your mule to break a leg up here," she said. 

Theon has some friends with him:

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As the maester knelt to examine the wound, Bran turned his head. Theon Greyjoy stood beside a sentinel tree, his bow in hand. He was smiling. Ever smiling. A half-dozen arrows were thrust into the soft ground at his feet, but it had taken only one. "A dead enemy is a thing of beauty," he announced.

Jon Snow also has some friends:

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The guards smiled at him from their niches as he wound his way down the turret stair, carrying the sword in his good hand. "Sweet steel," one man said. "You earned that, Snow," another told him. Jon made himself smile back at them, but his heart was not in it. He knew he should be pleased, yet he did not feel it. His hand ached, and the taste of anger was in his mouth, though he could not have said who he was angry with or why.

A half dozen of his friends were lurking outside when he left the King's Tower, where Lord Commander Mormont now made his residence. They'd hung a target on the granary doors, so they could seem to be honing their skills as archers, but he knew lurkers when he saw them. 

In ACOK, Lord Mormont notes that Maester Aemon could have been king at one point:

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”How long ago was this?"

”Eighty years or close enough," the Old Bear said, "and no, I still hadn't been born, though Aemon had forged half a dozen links of his maester's chain by then…”

Same number as Oberyn Martell before he left the Citadel.

Robb’s direwolf is a Ghost-faced killer:

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Yet it was not the sword that made Ser Cleos Frey anxious; it was the beast. Grey Wind, her son had named him. A direwolf large as any elkhound, lean and smoke-dark, with eyes like molten gold. When the beast padded forward and sniffed at the captive knight, every man in that hall could smell the scent of fear. Ser Cleos had been taken during the battle in the Whispering Wood, where Grey Wind had ripped out the throats of half a dozen men.

Craster has his own hellhounds:

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”I’ve not seen Benjen Stark for three years," he was telling Mormont. "And if truth be told, I never once missed him." A half-dozen black puppies and the odd pig or two skulked among the benches, while women in ragged deerskins passed horns of beer, stirred the fire, and chopped carrots and onions into a kettle.

Fishermen don’t do too well when Stannis is nearby:

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Stannis would have reached the Rush days ago. The kingsroad ran from Storm's End straight to King's Landing, a much shorter route than by sea, and his host was largely mounted; near twenty thousand knights, light horse, and freeriders, Renly's unwilling legacy to his brother. They would have made good time, but armored destriers and twelve-foot lances would avail them little against the deep waters of the Blackwater Rush and the high stone walls of the city. Stannis would be camped with his lords on the south bank of the river, doubtless seething with impatience and wondering what Ser Imry had done with his fleet.

Off Merling Rock two days before, they had sighted a half-dozen fishing skiffs. The fisherfolk had fled before them, but one by one they had been overtaken and boarded. "A small spoon of victory is just the thing to settle the stomach before battle," Ser Imry had declared happily.

Qhorin Halfhand likes this math:

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At break of day, they each chewed a half-frozen strip of horsemeat, then saddled their garrons once again, and fastened their black cloaks around their shoulders. During his watch the Halfhand had made a half-dozen torches, soaking bundles of dry moss with the oil he carried in his saddlebag. He lit the first one now and led the way down into the dark, holding the pale flame up before him. Jon followed with the horses. 

In ASOS, Brienne’s little boat is attacked by Riverrun archers:

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They could see the sail moving behind the trees. The river galley came into full view at the top of the cutoff, twenty-five yards behind. Her bow swung hard as she came around, and a half-dozen arrows took flight, but all went well wide.

Jaime’s restraining chain meets the wrath of Brienne:

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He hoped she might strike the irons off his wrists as well, but Brienne was still suspicious. She split the ankle chain in the center with a half-dozen sharp blows from the smith's hammer delivered to the blunt end of a steel chisel. When he suggested that she break the wrist chain as well, she ignored him.

Lord Rickard Karstark loses his seventh and final battle:

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"It will not happen, sire," said the Blackfish. "Cat is right. Lady Lysa is too fearful to admit an army to the Vale. Any army. The Bloody Gate will remain closed."

”The Others can take her, then," Robb cursed, in a fury of despair. "Bloody Rickard Karstark as well. And Theon Greyjoy, Walder Frey, Tywin Lannister, and all the rest of them. Gods be good, why would any man ever want to be king? When everyone was shouting King in the North, King in the North, I told myself . . . swore to myself . . . that I would be a good king, as honorable as Father, strong, just, loyal to my friends and brave when I faced my enemies . . . now I can't even tell one from the other. How did it all get so confused? Lord Rickard's fought at my side in half a dozen battles. His sons died for me in the Whispering Wood. Tion Frey and Willem Lannister were my enemies. Yet now I have to kill my dead friends' father for their sakes." He looked at them all. "Will the Lannisters thank me for Lord Rickard's head? Will the Freys?"

”No," said Brynden Blackfish, blunt as ever.

Before Dany, the Targaryens tried and failed to restore their glory multiple times, as Stannis recalls:

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Your brother's blood," Melisandre said. "A king's blood. Only a king's blood can wake the stone dragon."

Stannis ground his teeth. "I'll hear no more of this. The dragons are done. The Targaryens tried to bring them back half a dozen times. And made fools of themselves, or corpses. Patchface is the only fool we need on this godsforsaken rock. You have the leeches. Do your work."

The Magnar of Thenn attacks the NW:

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It was then that he saw Styr. The Magnar was climbing up the barricade, over the gutted corn sacks and smashed barrels and the bodies of friends and foe alike. His bronze scale armor gleamed darkly in the firelight. Styr had taken off his helm to survey the scene of his triumph, and the bald earless whoreson was smiling. In his hand was a long weirwood spear with an ornate bronze head. When he saw the gate, he pointed the spear at it and barked something in the Old Tongue to the half-dozen Thenns around him. Too late, Jon thought. You should have led your men over the barricade, you might have been able to save a few.

Joffrey shows us the full extent of his appreciation of literature and education:

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”Have a care, Your Grace," Ser Addam Marbrand warned the king. "Valyrian steel is perilously sharp."

”I remember." Joffrey brought Widow's Wail down in a savage two-handed slice, onto the book that Tyrion had given him. The heavy leather cover parted at a stroke. "Sharp! I told you, I am no stranger to Valyrian steel." It took him half a dozen further cuts to hack the thick tome apart, and the boy was breathless by the time he was done. Sansa could feel her husband struggling with his fury as Ser Osmund Kettleblack shouted, "I pray you never turn that wicked edge on me, sire."

Iron weapons are no match for a juggler at Joff’s wedding:

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A juggler kept a half-dozen swords and axes whirling through the air as skewers of blood sausage were brought sizzling to the tables, a juxtaposition that Tyrion thought passing clever, though not perhaps in the best of taste.

Big hot pie coming through!

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”The pie?" Joffrey took his queen by the hand. "Come, my lady, it's the pie."

The guests stood, shouting and applauding and smashing their wine cups together as the great pie made its slow way down the length of the hall, wheeled along by a half-dozen beaming cooks. Two yards across it was, crusty and golden brown, and they could hear squeaks and thumpings coming from inside it.

Petyr’s ancestral home has NK math too:

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Within, the tower seemed even smaller. An open stone stair wound round the inside wall, from undercroft to roof. Each floor was but a single room. The servants lived and slept in the kitchen at ground level, sharing the space with a huge brindled mastiff and a half-dozen sheep-dogs

Six of mantels try and fail to reach the Wall’s gate before the willings figure it out. 

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The mantlets were slanting wooden shields, wide enough for five of the free folk to hide behind. The archers pushed them close, then knelt behind them to loose their arrows through slits in the wood. The first time the wildlings rolled them out, Jon had called for fire arrows and set a half-dozen ablaze, but after that Mance started covering them with raw hides. All the fire arrows in the world couldn't make them catch now. 

Arya threatens a woman, but thinks again:

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The woman chuckled. "It means you'll take what I give you, sweetling. Else we go down to the castle, and maybe you get nothing. Or even hanged, for stealing some good knight's horse."

A half-dozen other Saltpans folks were around, going about their business, so Arya knew she couldn't kill the woman. Instead she had to bite her lip and let herself be cheated. The purse she got was pitifully flat, and when she asked for more for the saddle and bridle and blanket, the woman just laughed at her.

She would never have cheated the Hound, she thought during the long walk back to the docks. The distance seemed to have grown by miles since she'd ridden it.

Melissandre has her own cadre of NK folk just before the Night’s Watch chooses its Lord Commander:

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When he turned, she was standing behind him, with half a dozen queen's men around her. Small wonder the yard grew so quiet. He had glimpsed Melisandre at her nightfires, and coming and going about the castle, but never so close. She's beautiful, he thought . . . but there was something more than a little unsettling about red eyes. "My lady."

”The king would speak with you, Jon Snow."

And right after the choosing:

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The king's men cleared the door when they told them of the choosing, and Three-Finger Hobb and half a dozen helpers went trotting off to the kitchen to fetch the food. 

In AFFC, the drowned god’s prophet encounters the motif:

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When he woke the day was bright and windy. Aeron broke his fast on a broth of clams and seaweed cooked above a driftwood fire. No sooner had he finished than the Merlyn descended from his towerhouse with half a dozen guards to seek him out. "The king is dead," the Damphair told him.

Jamie spies a confrontation of six on one under the Red Keep:

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Cersei rushed toward him. "Did you find them? Did you find the killers? How many were there?" Surely there had been more than one. One man alone could not have killed her father.

Her twin's face had a haggard look. "The shaft goes down to a chamber where half a dozen tunnels meet. They're closed off by iron gates, chained and locked. I need to find keys." He glanced around the bedchamber. "Whoever did this might still be lurking in the walls. It's a maze back there, and dark."

Even Podrick Paine gets in on the action:

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"Such as a maid of three-and-ten, with auburn hair?" said Ser Illifer the Penniless. "No, my lady. No one."

”I had a few," Ser Creighton put in. "Some farm boy on a piebald horse went by, and an hour later half a dozen men afoot with staves and scythes. They caught sight of our fire, and stopped for a long look at our horses, but I showed them a glimpse of my steel and told them to be along their way. Rough fellows, by the look o' them, and desperate too, but ne'er so desperate as to trifle with Ser Creighton Longbough."

Arianne Martell grows weary of her numerous suitors. Perhaps the seventh will be more to her liking:

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”You do not know my father. I have been disappointing him since I first arrived in this world without a cock. Half a dozen times he has tried to marry me to toothless greybeards, each more contemptible than the last. He never commanded me to wed them, I grant you, but the offers alone prove how little he regards me."

Methinks Prince Doran has another suitor in mind for her.

Manly man Victarion scares away some ships:

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All around the sea was full of ships. Some were burning, some were sinking, some had been smashed to splinters. Between the hulls the water was thick as stew, full of corpses, broken oars, and men clinging to the wreckage. In the distance, half a dozen of southron longships were racing back toward the Mander. Let them go, Victarion thought, let them tell the tale. Once a man had turned his tail and run from battle he ceased to be a man.

A Strange encounter on the Quiet Isle:

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Narbert led them along a pebbled path and through a grove of apple trees to a whitewashed stable with a peaked thatch roof. "You may leave your animals here. Brother Gillam will see that they are fed and watered."

The stable was more than three-quarters empty. At one end were half a dozen mules, being tended by a bandy-legged little brother whom Brienne took for Gillam. Way down at the far end, well away from the other animals, a huge black stallion trumpeted at the sound of their voices and kicked at the door of his stall.

Ser Hyle gave the big horse an admiring look as he was handing his reins to Brother Gillam. "A handsome beast."

Brother Gillam sighed. “The Seven send us blessings, and the Seven send us trials. Handsome he may be, but Driftwood was surely whelped in hell.”

The Boltons gain the loyalty of the North, though we cannot be sure of one of them:

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"Lord Stannis is striving to win the northmen to his cause," said Pycelle. "If he befriends the ironborn, he cannot hope . . ."

”The northmen will not have him," said Cersei, wondering how such a learned man could be so stupid. "Lord Manderly hacked the head and hands off the onion knight, we have that from the Freys, and half a dozen other northern lords have rallied to Lord Bolton. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Where else can Stannis turn, but to the ironmen and the wildlings, the enemies of the north? But if he thinks that I am going to walk into his trap, he is a bigger fool than you." 

Bearded men, ahoy!

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The boy has good instincts. "Outlaws don't blow trumpets to herald their arrival," Jaime told him. "I shan't need my sword. That will be my cousin, the Warden of the West."

The riders were dismounting when he emerged from his tent; half a dozen knights, and twoscore mounted archers and men-at-arms. "Jaime!" roared a shaggy man clad in gilded ringmail and a fox-fur cloak. "So gaunt, and all in white! And bearded too!"

”This? Mere stubble, against that mane of yours, coz." Ser Daven's bristling beard and bushy mustache grew into sidewhiskers as thick as a hedgerow, and those into the tangled yellow thicket atop his head, matted down by the helm he was removing. Somewhere in the midst of all that hair lurked a pug nose and a pair of lively hazel eyes. "Did some outlaw steal your razor?"

 

Jaime is a slow learner:

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That night he and Ser Ilyn fought for three hours. It was one of his better nights. If they had been in earnest, Payne only would have killed him twice. Half a dozen deaths were more the rule, and some nights were worse than that.

Oldtown delivers this motif:

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The next day was cold and misty. As the Cinnamon Wind was creeping past another plundered fishing village, a war galley came sliding from the fog, stroking slowly toward them. Huntress was the name she bore, behind a figurehead of a slender maiden clad in leaves and brandishing a spear. A heartbeat later, two smaller galleys appeared on either side of her, like a pair of matched greyhounds stalking at their master's heels. To Sam's relief, they flew King Tommen's stag-and-lion banner above the stepped white tower of Oldtown, with its crown of flame.

The captain of the Huntress was a tall man in a smoke-grey cloak with a border of red satin flames. He brought his galley in alongside the Cinnamon Wind, raised his oars, and shouted that he was coming aboard. As his crossbowmen and Kojja Mo's archers eyed each other across the narrow span of water, he crossed over with half a dozen knights, gave Quhuru Mo a nod, and asked to see his holds. Father and daughter conferred briefly, then agreed.

 

And if that weren’t enough, we get more:

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Sam was aghast. "They cannot mean to raid Oldtown."

The captain of the Huntress gave him a curious look. "These are no mere reavers. The ironmen have always raided where they could. They would strike sudden from the sea, carry off some gold and girls, and sail away, but there were seldom more than one or two longships, and never more than half a dozen.

 

Once again, in Meereen:

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The noble Grazdan had once owned a slave woman who was a very fine weaver, it seemed; the fruits of her loom were greatly valued, not only in Meereen, but in New Ghis and Astapor and Qarth. When this woman had grown old, Grazdan had purchased half a dozen young girls and commanded the crone to instruct them in the secrets of her craft. The old woman was dead now

Bran has his ravens:

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From a nearby oak a raven quorked, and Bran heard the sound of wings as another of the big black birds flapped down to land beside it. By day only half a dozen ravens stayed with them, flitting from tree to tree or riding on the antlers of the elk. The rest of the murder flew ahead or lingered behind. But when the sun sank low they would return, descending from the sky on night-black wings until every branch of every tree was thick with them for yards around.

On the Rhoyne:

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The youth cursed under his breath and flung his pole down onto the deck. The sound echoed queerly in the fog, and for a moment it was as if poles were falling around them. "Why should I run and hide? Haldon is staying, and Ysilla. Even Hugor."

”Aye," said Tyrion, "but I'm small enough to hide behind a duck." He thrust half a dozen torches into the brazier's glowing coals and watched the oiled rags flare up. Don't stare at the fire, he told himself. The flames would leave him night blind.

 

Here’s six Thenns surrounding a stair:

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Not all the fighting men were broken, though. Half a dozen Thenns in bronze scale armor stood clustered round one cellar stair, watching sullenly and making no attempt to join the others.

Dany persists:

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The priestess did not smile. "The Shavepate would feed them to your dragons, it is said. A life for a life. For every Brazen Beast cut down, he would have a child die."

Dany pushed her food about her plate. She dare not glance over to where Grazhar and Qezza stood, for fear that she might cry. The Shavepate has a harder heart than mine. They had fought about the hostages half a dozen times. "The Sons of the Harpy are laughing in their pyramids," Skahaz said, just this morning. "What good are hostages if you will not take their heads?" In his eyes, she was only a weak woman. Hazzea was enough. What good is peace if it must be purchased with the blood of little children? "These murders are not their doing," Dany told the Green Grace, feebly. "I am no butcher queen."

 

Jon gets some companions:

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Queen Selyse descended upon Castle Black with her daughter and her daughter's fool, her serving girls and lady companions, and a retinue of knights, sworn swords, and men-at-arms fifty strong. Queen's men all, Jon Snow knew. They may attend Selyse, but it is Melisandre they serve. The red priestess had warned him of their coming almost a day before the raven arrived from Eastwatch with the same message.

He met the queen's party by the stables, accompanied by Satin, Bowen Marsh, and half a dozen guards in long black cloaks. It would never do to come before this queen without a retinue of his own, if half of what they said of her was true. She might mistake him for a stableboy and hand him the reins of her horse.

 

The Merman and his kin:

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"Step out into the yard, you sack of suet, and I'll serve you all the bloody bits that you can stomach," Ser Hosteen said.

Wyman Manderly laughed, but half a dozen of his knights were on their feet at once.

 

 Theon goes into action with Abel’s six spearwives. Look at who he meets:

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Half a dozen seasoned Dreadfort men guarded the doors of the Great Keep. "Another bloody bath?" said their serjeant when he saw the pails of steaming water. He had his hands tucked up into his armpits against the cold. "She had a bath last night. How dirty can one woman get in her own bed?"

Then Frenya gets into a fight:

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As he leaned up against a merlon, breathing hard, Theon could hear the shouting from below, where Frenya was fighting half a dozen guardsmen in the snow. "Which way?" he shouted at Holly. "Where do we go now? How do we get out?"

Even floors are involved:

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Within the tent, they found camp stools and a trestle table, a rack of spears and halberds, a floor covered with threadbare carpets in half a dozen clashing colors, and three officers. 

Clashing at Griffin’s Roost:

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The first raven took flight as their grapnels were arcing above the curtain wall, the second a few moments later. Neither bird had flown a hundred yards before an arrow took it down. A guard inside dumped down a bucket of oil on the first men to reach the gates, but as he'd had no time to heat it, the bucket caused more damage than its contents. Swords were soon ringing in half a dozen places along the battlements.

Tyrion fights his temptation to take on swords:

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Tyrion glanced at it. "I cannot use a stirrup winch. My legs are not long enough. A crank would serve me better." Though, if truth be told, he did not want a crossbow. They took too long to reload. Even if he lurked by the latrine ditch waiting for some enemy to take a squat, the chances of his losing more than one quarrel would not be good.

Instead he picked up a morningstar, gave it a swing, put it down again. Too heavy. He passed over a warhammer (too long), a studded mace (also too heavy), and half a dozen longswords before he found a dirk he liked, a nasty piece of steel with a triangular blade. 

 

Finally, Kevan Lannister meets his makers:

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"I am sorry." Varys wrung his hands. "You are suffering, I know, yet here I stand going on like some silly old woman. Time to make an end to it." The eunuch pursed his lips and gave a little whistle.

Ser Kevan was cold as ice, and every labored breath sent a fresh stab of pain through him. He glimpsed movement, heard the soft scuffling sound of slippered feet on stone. A child emerged from a pool of darkness, a pale boy in a ragged robe, no more than nine or ten. Another rose up behind the Grand Maester's chair. The girl who had opened the door for him was there as well. They were all around him, half a dozen of them, white-faced children with dark eyes, boys and girls together.

And in their hands, the daggers.

 

 

The Others

There are likely many more example of this math in the books that I haven’t uncovered. For instance, Aenys II Targaryen had seven children. Did you know that? Only one survives to this day, that being the Mother of Dragons.

Again, this is just from the five main published books. What have I missed?

 

What does this mean?

Not sure. The Night's King Formula exists in the text, that we can be sure of. But what?

One of my hypotheses is that we will see this math play out in the aftermath of Jon Snow's assassination. We only count Wick Whittlestick and Bowen Marsh there, and Jon receives at least four wounds from daggers. I'll put money down that there were six assassins in all, and they will include at least Other Yarwyck, Left Hand Lew and Alf of Runnymudd. 

But there may also be a reveal of the grand proto-myth narrative, where possibly a brother of the Night's Watch, or someone to do with Azor Ahai, in which a greenseer hero will be assassinated before being brought back to life in some horrific manner.

Please share your findings below. I'm looking forward to what you can find.

 

 

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That is a huge list you made @Darry Man. I'm going to focus on the ones that make the most sense to me as the best, but like always it's a little random in choosing them. 

First, Jaime's dream. I agree with what you pointed out earlier where it was like 6 brothers confronting 7th who is a traitor. I think that is an important theme, but it is jumbled or  all together not present at some of them. Jaime is a traitor in two ways. Obviously he is the Kingslayer, but why is mentioned in this scene is his inability to protect Rhaegar's family. Aegon being killed, and the lie about him having been a stolen royal baby by Varys is a ToJ event. Jaime is the traitor brother who either allowed, or in some cases helped the NQ/NK baby be taken. 

 

Since Ned and his 6 good men was already mentioned, let's do that one next. Ned takes Jon, who either is named or plays the part of Aegon (Aragorn). Seems backwards this time, Ned and his 6 are all the baby stealing traitors. But they are opposite the Others/KGs still.  We speculated that 6 and 1 may be half of a whole with the whole being the last hero + 12 against another 1. The total is 14 either way. It's almost like half go with one leader while the Other half go with anOther. It's a trial of 7 vs 7.  It is at the ToJ that the dead brothers from the last example call Jaime their false brother. The traitor. 

 

Third is the one where this math is repeated 3 times. I even noticed it, but did not connect it to a larger pattern like you did. Tyrion and Janos are getting drunk, well Janos is.  Being drunk can symbolize someone who is about to be initiated into the tree cult of sacrifices. The Norse would get women drunk before putting them on a boat with a dead cheifton at his fire-boat funeral and burning them together. It is also like drinking Shade before entering the HotU in Dany's case. Not to get side tracked, but her time in Qaarth is full of initiation symbolism including that her Qaartheen dress with a bare breast she wears to see the Enthroned is a copy of what initiates into the Stone Masons wear in addition to being a Nissa Nissa reference. Anyway, Janos is getting drunk and eating cheese, which LmL pointed out the importance of in his last essay with Ramsay. He gives Tyrion a list of 6 men, there's his 6 followers, 6 and 1 leader. Tyrion insults him and Janos storms to the door. He opens it to find another 6 and 1. Bywater and his 6 silent gold cloaks move up quietly and take him captive to send to the Watch. Tyrion says to throw 1 of the 7 into the sea/see on the way there giving us our 3rd 6 and 1 math in one chapter. Ok, so I connected the first two to the stealing of the important baby with Aegon and Jon playing those roles. In this case it is Barra. She is the bastard daughter with a whore/hoare for a mother and a king for a father. The reason Tyrion is angry is because Janos and Deem kill/claim Barra.  The scene where Ned meets Barra and her mom has a shitload of RLJ in it including beginning at a brothel and Ned's three dead men being like the three Kingsguard with Jaime's being the larger force of Ned's.  The number of dead on each side is the same.  As odd as it may sound, killing the special child is the same as stealing it, like with Rhaego. I think the baby thief is a lord of the underworld in a way. This is part of Janos' punishment for baby stealing.  The rest is when Jon beheads him like his fellow baby thief Ned is beheaded.  Now that I think of it, Ned's execution is a good place to look for this math.  I hate bring up mythical astronomy since the Devil quit and can't comment, but the comet is the baby thief, and Janos was a bloody spear for a sigil. 

 

I have more to say, but I need to check the books and sleep first. This is the first thread worth coming back to the forums for in a while. I think I said I would start a beards thread. I may do that, but it's bed time. Thanks, great topic. 

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You got me curious and then I got board when you started listing six random things.

Seven is a sacred number to the well 7, 6 v 1 is an interesting idea, it strikes me though that the stranger is the 1.

 

The KG v Jaime, Jaime is death; death to the King and death of the KG.

Now what does that mean to the others? Does the black brother represent the historical death of the others after the battle of the dawn, or is it the first men/andals who represent the death of the cotf, who quite probably created the others?

 

Can the 1 always represent death?  Does he represent death?

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The 1 seems to represent either the Night's King or his corpse bride or the crone (who may also be the corpse bride) in a lot of these scenes - I'm going to go through each of these in a doc and see what I can come up with. For some of them, I'm not entirely sure where the +1 is and I don't have the books to hand to look at the surrounding context to see if it's in there, so I'll just make a note of them.

Thanks for putting together this resource @Darry Man!

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12 hours ago, Darry Man said:

This is an interesting motif we see a few times — six passageways meeting toward a vertical structure:

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How long the city had been deserted she could not know, but the white walls, so beautiful from afar, were cracked and crumbling when seen up close. Inside was a maze of narrow crooked alleys. The buildings pressed close, their facades blank, chalky, windowless. Everything was white, as if the people who lived here had known nothing of color. They rode past heaps of sun-washed rubble where houses had fallen in, and elsewhere saw the faded scars of fire. At a place where six alleys came together, Dany passed an empty marble plinth. Dothraki had visited this place before, it would seem. Perhaps even now the missing statue stood among the other stolen gods in Vaes Dothrak. She might have ridden past it a hundred times, never knowing. On her shoulder, Viserion hissed.

The 'missing statue' can be interpreted symbolically as the unseen god or Stranger -- the marble plinth is 'empty', echoing our 'void' concept of the abominable greenseeer NK in celestial terms.

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A Clash of Kings - Tyrion II

Varys smiled. "Some say knowledge is power. Some tell us that all power comes from the gods. Others say it derives from law. Yet that day on the steps of Baelor's Sept, our godly High Septon and the lawful Queen Regent and your ever-so-knowledgeable servant were as powerless as any cobbler or cooper in the crowd. Who truly killed Eddard Stark, do you think? Joffrey, who gave the command? Ser Ilyn Payne, who swung the sword? Or . . . another?"

'Another...An other!'  LOL

This one's my favorite; in it you can find both 'LH math (12+1)' and 'NK math (6+1)', with Jaime and the three-headed dragon playing the roles of LH and NK respectively:

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A Feast for Crows - Jaime I

Unless my brother murdered Varys too, and left his corpse to rot beneath the castle. Down there, it might be years before his bones were found. Jaime had led a dozen guards below, with torches and ropes and lanterns. For hours they had groped through twisting passages, narrow crawl spaces, hidden doors, secret steps, and shafts that plunged down into utter blackness. Seldom had he felt so utterly a cripple. A man takes much for granted when he has two hands. Ladders, for an instance. Even crawling did not come easy; not for nought do they speak of hands and knees. Nor could he hold a torch and climb, as others could.

And all for naught. They found only darkness, dust, and rats. And dragons, lurking down below. He remembered the sullen orange glow of the coals in the iron dragon's mouth. The brazier warmed a chamber at the bottom of a shaft where half a dozen tunnels met. On the floor he'd found a scuffed mosaic of the three-headed dragon of House Targaryen done in tiles of black and red. I know you, Kingslayer, the beast seemed to be saying. I have been here all the time, waiting for you to come to me. And it seemed to Jaime that he knew that voice, the iron tones that had once belonged to Rhaegar, Prince of Dragonstone.

The day had been windy when he said farewell to Rhaegar, in the yard of the Red Keep. The prince had donned his night-black armor, with the three-headed dragon picked out in rubies on his breastplate. "Your Grace," Jaime had pleaded, "let Darry stay to guard the king this once, or Ser Barristan. Their cloaks are as white as mine."

As I've long suggested (although the idea's fallen on deaf ears), I believe Jaime misheard the dragon (this is suggested by the uncertainty expressed by the word 'seemed'), who I suspect in actual fact may have said 'I know you kin-slayer!'  The LH and NK were blood relations.  Make of that what you will...

Additionally, there's a reference to the Night's King symbolism with the prince donning 'night-black' armor, with Jaime cast in the role of the renegade Kingsguard, or in symbolic terms the Other who broke his oath and deserted, escaping the clutches of the Night's King.

The 'verticle structure' you described or dragon mosaic nexus would then presumably represent the Night's King.  That's very appropriate, if you think about the converging pathways organized around the nexus as a spider web spun by a spider -- a predator -- sitting at the center of the web.  Sometimes only the web not the spider is visible, yet the telltale woven threads or puppet strings remain from which his presence as the architect may be inferred.  As an analogy, Varys the Spiderman (NK) organizing the 6 'white-faced child' assassins (Others):

12 hours ago, Darry Man said:

Finally, Kevan Lannister meets his makers:

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"I am sorry." Varys wrung his hands. "You are suffering, I know, yet here I stand going on like some silly old woman. Time to make an end to it." The eunuch pursed his lips and gave a little whistle.

 

The 'dog whistle' to the others -- the signal to kill -- is the power of what I've termed the 'killing word'.

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Ser Kevan was cold as ice, and every labored breath sent a fresh stab of pain through him. He glimpsed movement, heard the soft scuffling sound of slippered feet on stone. A child emerged from a pool of darkness, a pale boy in a ragged robe, no more than nine or ten. Another rose up behind the Grand Maester's chair. The girl who had opened the door for him was there as well. They were all around him, half a dozen of them, white-faced children with dark eyes, boys and girls together.

And in their hands, the daggers.

With his simpering 'sorries,' Varys is a 'sorrowful man'  -- evoking those assassins operating at the behest of the warlocks of the House of the Undying.  Similarly, Rhaegar was a renowned melancholic, his life overshadowed by much sadness and regret at 'what he had to do' (this is one reason, by analogy, I do not think his motives towards Lyanna are as honorable and loving as is commonly presumed).  You know who else was notoriously overcome by sorrow at what he 'had to do'?   AA, who in my book is just another of NK's names:

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Great was his woe and great was his sorrow then, for he knew what he must do.

"A hundred days and a hundred nights he labored on the third blade, and as it glowed white-hot in the sacred fires, he summoned his wife. 'Nissa Nissa,' he said to her, for that was her name, 'bare your breast, and know that I love you best of all that is in this world.' She did this thing, why I cannot say

 Aside from her 'motivation' (I think she was caught blindsided as he dealt her an underhanded blow against which she would have been helpless -- analogous to Lysa not suspecting LF's intentions until the very last moment as she was beginning to fall through the Moon Door); the question is, are these NK figures truly compelled to do the heinous things they do?  Otherwise stated, do they truly need to, or do they want to do the deed -- there's a subtle forensic difference.  (As I've mentioned, 'Nissanissa 'is almost an anagram for 'assassin' -- I'd interpret that to mean she was targeted for an assassination...a 'nissassination'! rather than being the assassin herself; although she does get her revenge for the violation from beyond the grave).

Another clue hinting at the unseen malevolent organizational principle is provided in the Prologue, where the 6 Other minions mysteriously move forward together as if as one (i.e. NK) at some invisible signal:

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A Game of Thrones - Prologue

A scream echoed through the forest night, and the longsword shivered into a hundred brittle pieces, the shards scattering like a rain of needles. Royce went to his knees, shrieking, and covered his eyes. Blood welled between his fingers.

The watchers moved forward together, as if some signal had been given. Swords rose and fell, all in a deathly silence. It was cold butchery. The pale blades sliced through ringmail as if it were silk. Will closed his eyes. Far beneath him, he heard their voices and laughter sharp as icicles.

As I've argued, this 'signal' was symbolically given by Will the naughty greenseer 'whispering his prayer to the nameless, faceless gods of the wood,' whereupon the Others initially appeared, as if on cue.  The 6 are the proxy assassins of the 1 -- so I tend to think of the 1 as the leader, although as @Archmaester_Aemma has pointed out it's difficult to form a clear impression, as the pattern in all the examples you gave does not follow through with any reliable consistency.

2 hours ago, Archmaester_Aemma said:

The 1 seems to represent either the Night's King or his corpse bride or the crone (who may also be the corpse bride) in a lot of these scenes - I'm going to go through each of these in a doc and see what I can come up with. For some of them, I'm not entirely sure where the +1 is

In my allegorical deconstruction of the Prologue as described in my 'Killing Word' thread, I see Will as the 'naughty greenseer' (NK) operating in conjunction with the magical tree (corpse bride/crone) -- in fact, he's stuck to it (you might even say 'wed' to the tree!) with 'sticky sap' ('weirwood stigmata' on hands and face) -- to summon the Others (6).

The Others 'emerge from the wood.'

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16 hours ago, Darry Man said:

 

From the Prologue of A Game of Thrones, you have six Others murdering the Night’s Watch brother, Ser Waymar Royce:

And in his nightmarish vision in ASOS, Jaime's five slain KG brothers & Rhaegar are about to do the same: 

Given @LmL's hypothesis that the Kingsguard symbolically represent the Others, these passages suggest a motif of six Others/kingsguard attacking a brother.

These thoughts kicked off an interesting Twitter thread involving several forum participants. I thought it worthwhile to share our discoveries with forum participants. Special thanks to Emma Smith for her contributions.

GRRM explicitly provides the motif of a dozen companions with the Last Hero, which we’ll call, for lack of a better term, “LH math”. We see this 12+1=13 formula repeated throughout the published works. 

Forum contributor @ravenous reader suggests that this newly uncovered motif could represent the “naughty greenseer”, aka the Night’s King:

I’ll call 6 + 1 the NK formula. Because I can.

This post is designed to capture every instance of NK math that I can find in the main five books. I’m sure there are more in The World of Ice & Fire and the novellas, but as you can see here, I think we have more than enough evidence of its usage.

Search the term “six” or “half a dozen” in the books, and look for a relation between seven “brothers” or with an otherwise in-kind relationship, with six of them in opposition to the seventh. The pattern comes up time and time again.

 

Six and One

Below is a list of all I can find so far.

...snip...

 

The Others

There are likely many more example of this math in the books that I haven’t uncovered. For instance, Aenys II Targaryen had seven children. Did you know that? Only one survives to this day, that being the Mother of Dragons.

Again, this is just from the five main published books. What have I missed?

 

What does this mean?

Not sure. The Night's King Formula exists in the text, that we can be sure of. But what?

One of my hypotheses is that we will see this math play out in the aftermath of Jon Snow's assassination. We only count Wick Whittlestick and Bowen Marsh there, and Jon receives at least four wounds from daggers. I'll put money down that there were six assassins in all, and they will include at least Other Yarwyck, Left Hand Lew and Alf of Runnymudd. 

But there may also be a reveal of the grand proto-myth narrative, where possibly a brother of the Night's Watch, or someone to do with Azor Ahai, in which a greenseer hero will be assassinated before being brought back to life in some horrific manner.

Please share your findings below. I'm looking forward to what you can find.

 

 

I can see why you use LH (Last Hero) Math for 12+1=13 examples.  You then go on to name a new formula 6+1=7 the NK (Night's King) Formula but I don't see much support for why you do so.  LML thinks that the Kingsguard symbolically represent Others?  Okay....   Then you go on to explain that Ravenous Reader thinks that 6+1=7 represents the Night's King who you also give the nickname "Naughty Greenseer".  I find myself wondering how this nickname came about?  Anyway, I don't feel that you have established enough of a link to the Night's King to warrant reading all 10,000 words of your OP.

But if you or anyone else on this thread can explain this Night's King/Naughty Greenseer thing I'd like to read it.

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14 hours ago, White Ravens said:

I can see why you use LH (Last Hero) Math for 12+1=13 examples.  You then go on to name a new formula 6+1=7 the NK (Night's King) Formula but I don't see much support for why you do so.  LML thinks that the Kingsguard symbolically represent Others?  Okay....   Then you go on to explain that Ravenous Reader thinks that 6+1=7 represents the Night's King who you also give the nickname "Naughty Greenseer".  I find myself wondering how this nickname came about?  Anyway, I don't feel that you have established enough of a link to the Night's King to warrant reading all 10,000 words of your OP.

But if you or anyone else on this thread can explain this Night's King/Naughty Greenseer thing I'd like to read it.

From @LmL's iconic essay 'The Grey King and the Sea Dragon' (recommended reading for getting up to date on some of GRRM's essential symbolic concepts):

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As I’ve said before, I’ve never bought the idea that the children of the forest were the greenseers who broke the Arm of Dorne and called down the hammer; rather, I’ve always thought it more likely that human greenseers were the ones who abused their access to magical power and caused this great disaster.  I’m thinking that eventually, all deeds ever committed by greenseers of any kind probably came to be attributed to the children of the forest, because the memory of human greenseers has almost completely faded.  I believe human greenseer kings were a thing in the Dawn Age, and we’ll be doing an examination of the evidence in support of that very soon.

I’ve also jokingly called these potential greenseers who broke the moon “naughty greenseers,” because I believe they were doing something quite naughty, for lack of a desire to use a more serious word.  These would have been treacherous, rebel greenseers who were violating the natural order.  Stealing from the gods, breaking the cycles of nature – that’s the idea. The children of the forest are content to pass quietly into the night, having elapsed their given time on the earth, but the anyone who tries to gain the cup of immortality is defying the life and death cycle.  The Grey King seems like such a figure, potentially, a greenseer who called down the black moon meteors in order to possess the fire of the gods.

It’s probably also pretty obvious to you that Azor Ahai fits this description as well...

Of course, the quintessential naughty greenseer is none other than our naughty child prodigy greenseer, Bran Stark himself, whom no-one could dissuade from climbing...Here's Old Nan's telling take on that transgenerational cautionary tale, no doubt referencing one of those naughty naughty Brandons of yore:

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A Game of Thrones - Bran II

His mother was terrified that one day Bran would slip off a wall and kill himself. He told her that he wouldn't, but she never believed him. Once she made him promise that he would stay on the ground. He had managed to keep that promise for almost a fortnight, miserable every day, until one night he had gone out the window of his bedroom when his brothers were fast asleep.

He confessed his crime the next day in a fit of guilt. Lord Eddard ordered him to the godswood to cleanse himself. Guards were posted to see that Bran remained there alone all night to reflect on his disobedience. The next morning Bran was nowhere to be seen. They finally found him fast asleep in the upper branches of the tallest sentinel in the grove.

As angry as he was, his father could not help but laugh. "You're not my son," he told Bran when they fetched him down, "you're a squirrel. So be it. If you must climb, then climb, but try not to let your mother see you."

Bran did his best, although he did not think he ever really fooled her. Since his father would not forbid it, she turned to others. Old Nan told him a story about a bad little boy who climbed too high and was struck down by lightning, and how afterward the crows came to peck out his eyes. Bran was not impressed. There were crows' nests atop the broken tower, where no one ever went but him, and sometimes he filled his pockets with corn before he climbed up there and the crows ate it right out of his hand. None of them had ever shown the slightest bit of interest in pecking out his eyes.

Later, Maester Luwin built a little pottery boy and dressed him in Bran's clothes and flung him off the wall into the yard below, to demonstrate what would happen to Bran if he fell. That had been fun, but afterward Bran just looked at the maester and said, "I'm not made of clay. And anyhow, I never fall."

'Climbing' is a metaphor for 'greenseeing.'  'Climbing up to heaven' and 'Reaching for the fire of the gods' is the original sin of hubris (i.e. being very 'naughty' and defying God's authority, leading to Lucifer's fall from grace and Adam and Eve's expulsion from the Garden of Eden, commonly referred to also as simply 'The Fall').  In the mythological tradition, it is represented by the archetype of Prometheus and his son Icarus.

Now, @White Ravens, be a good boy and catch up on your reading! :P:devil:

 

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28 minutes ago, ravenous reader said:

From @LmL's iconic essay 'The Grey King and the Sea Dragon' (recommended reading for getting up to date on some of GRRM's essential symbolic concepts):

Of course, the quintessential naughty greenseer is none other than our naughty child prodigy greenseer, Bran Stark himself, whom no-one could dissuade from climbing...Here's Old Nan's telling take on that transgenerational cautionary tale no doubt referencing one of those naughty naughty Brandons of yore:

'Climbing' is a metaphor for 'greenseeing.'

Now, @White Ravens, be a good boy and catch up on your reading! :P:devil:

 

Thanks for the link.  While I do appreciate GRRM's use of symbolism and metaphor in the books I view it as folly to try to predict upcoming events in Winds and Promise based on their interpretation. 

What I'm still hoping someone can define for me is the connection between the Night's King and the term "naughty greenseer".  I don't recall that the NK was ever referred to as a greenseer, naughty or otherwise.

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2 hours ago, White Ravens said:

Thanks for the link.  While I do appreciate GRRM's use of symbolism and metaphor in the books I view it as folly to try to predict upcoming events in Winds and Promise based on their interpretation. 

Too true.  As GRRM himself has cautioned regarding prophecy, or for that matter where any symbolic interpretation is concerned, it's never a good idea to get too 'cocky'!

As to 'upcoming events in Winds' -- 'Words are wind' or perhaps 'Winds are words' (words blowing in the wind, perhaps never to materialize in our lifetimes...; let that not detract from our speculation!)

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A Feast for Crows - Samwell V

He was not a man to be refused. Sam hesitated a moment, then told his tale again as Marywn, Alleras, and the other novice listened. "Maester Aemon believed that Daenerys Targaryen was the fulfillment of a prophecy . . . her, not Stannis, nor Prince Rhaegar, nor the princeling whose head was dashed against the wall."

"Born amidst salt and smoke, beneath a bleeding star. I know the prophecy." Marwyn turned his head and spat a gob of red phlegm onto the floor. "Not that I would trust it. Gorghan of Old Ghis once wrote that a prophecy is like a treacherous woman. She takes your member in her mouth, and you moan with the pleasure of it and think, how sweet, how fine, how good this is . . . and then her teeth snap shut and your moans turn to screams. That is the nature of prophecy, said Gorghan. Prophecy will bite your prick off every time." He chewed a bit. "Still . . ."

 

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What I'm still hoping someone can define for me is the connection between the Night's King and the term "naughty greenseer".  I don't recall that the NK was ever referred to as a greenseer, naughty or otherwise.

Good question!  It's never made explicit, so the connection has been inferred by many of us.  Herewith, a few provocative indications to consider:

  • He made his seat at the Nightfort -- one of @Wizz-The-Smith's 'hollow hill' locales, specifically associated with greenseer 'thrones'.  Additionally, the 'Black Gate' is a weirwood and there is a weirwood tree which Bran sees (possibly an extension of the gate) growing at the Nightfort 'breaking through the dome' like an arm groping for something in the sky (an image of 'reaching too high' or 'reaching for the stars'), which strongly implies a greenseer presence, at least historically:
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A Storm of Swords - Bran IV

No, Bran thought, but he walked in this castle, where we'll sleep tonight. He did not like that notion very much at all. Night's King was only a man by light of day, Old Nan would always say, but the night was his to rule. And it's getting dark.

The Reeds decided that they would sleep in the kitchens, a stone octagon with a broken dome. It looked to offer better shelter than most of the other buildings, even though a crooked weirwood had burst up through the slate floor beside the huge central well, stretching slantwise toward the hole in the roof, its bone-white branches reaching for the sun. It was a queer kind of tree, skinnier than any other weirwood that Bran had ever seen and faceless as well, but it made him feel as if the old gods were with him here, at least.

  • He 'ensorcelled' his brothers to his will, indicating that he's some kind of sorceror specializing in black magic like Bloodraven, a known greenseer:
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The Sworn Sword

"So close a thing . . . if Daemon had ridden over Gwayne Corbray and left him to his fate, he might have broken Maekar's left before Bloodraven could take the ridge. The day would have belonged to the black dragons then, with the Hand slain and the road to King's Landing open before them. Daemon might have been sitting on the Iron Throne by the time Prince Baelor could come up with his stormlords and his Dornishmen.

"The singers can go on about their hammer and their anvil, ser, but it was the kinslayer who turned the tide with a white arrow and a black spell. He rules us now as well, make no mistake. King Aerys is his creature. It would not surprise to learn that Bloodraven had ensorceled His Grace, to bend him to his will. Small wonder we are cursed." Ser Eustace shook his head and lapsed into a brooding silence. Dunk wondered how much Egg had overheard, but there was no way to ask him. How many eyes does Lord Bloodraven have? he thought.

  • He is specifically renowned (as related by Old Nan) to have known no fear -- that quality of 'hubris' associated with greenseers:
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A Storm of Swords - Bran IV

Yes, thought Bran, but it's blocked by stone and ice.

As the sun began to set the shadows of the towers lengthened and the wind blew harder, sending gusts of dry dead leaves rattling through the yards. The gathering gloom put Bran in mind of another of Old Nan's stories, the tale of Night's King. He had been the thirteenth man to lead the Night's Watch, she said; a warrior who knew no fear. "And that was the fault in him," she would add, "for all men must know fear." A woman was his downfall; a woman glimpsed from atop the Wall, with skin as white as the moon and eyes like blue stars. Fearing nothing, he chased her and caught her and loved her, though her skin was cold as ice, and when he gave his seed to her he gave his soul as well.

He brought her back to the Nightfort and proclaimed her a queen and himself her king, and with strange sorceries he bound his Sworn Brothers to his will. For thirteen years they had ruled, Night's King and his corpse queen, till finally the Stark of Winterfell and Joramun of the wildlings had joined to free the Watch from bondage. After his fall, when it was found he had been sacrificing to the Others, all records of Night's King had been destroyed, his very name forbidden.

  • Further, Old Nan teasingly suggests that he may have been a Stark named 'Brandon', thus potentially carrying the Stark genetic potential for magic ('Your blood makes you a greenseer...').  Also, in keeping with GRRM's penchant for the 'wheel of history' and how history tends to repeat itself, there have been other Brandons in the Stark family tree throughout history who may have been greenseers, notably our 'Bran' and 'Brandon the Builder' whom I strongly suspect was a greenseer, given his mastery over the True Tongue ('the song of stones...the wind through leaves...the rain upon the water' -- of which we have a definite suggestion that making leaves rustle in order to communicate is a greenseer facility --cf. Theon's encounter with Bran at the heart tree).
  • @LmL has made the 'heretical' proposal, with which I tend to agree, that the Night's King may have been responsible for precipitating the Long Night via the posited 'moon-breaking' (and the abomination of making Others with his corpse bride), rather than merely living in its wake, hence his name 'Night's King.'

My notes from twitter:

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As per @LmL AA is a villain not hero:

'A sword of fire, now, that would be a wonder to behold. Yet at such a cost...When he thought of NN, it was his own Marya he pictured, a good-natured plump woman with sagging breasts and a kindly smile, the best woman in the world.  He tried to picture himself driving a sword through her, and shuddered. I am not made of the stuff of heroes, he decided. If that was the price of a magic sword, it was more than he cared to pay.' ACOK - Davos I

If Davos is 'not the stuff of heroes' (who murder their wives), at which Davos 'shudders,' a word which GRRM uses to express fear, then the 'stuff of heroes' is someone who is 'fearless'...and 'all men must know fear'...So, by 'symbolic extrapolation' AA=NK.

As @AlaskanSandman has cleverly highlighted, GRRM has added cryptically that NK's fate is contingent upon that of BtB: "As for the Night's King (the form I prefer), in the books he is a legendary figure, akin to Lann the Clever and Brandon the Builder, and no more likely to have survived to the present day than they have."

'No more'='just as likely', possibly even implying some existential, more literal equivalence! Thus, one way of reading this is that NK=BtB.  AA paid a steep cost for the sword; likewise, please tell me what was the price BtB paid for the magical word 'gifted' by the COTF?

'He was taken to a secret place to meet...them, but could not at first understand their speech...the song of stones...wind through leaves...rain upon the water. The manner in which Brandon learned to comprehend the speech of the children is a tale in itself...not worth repeating'

'The manner' is 'not worth repeating,' as it's an abomination that shouldn't be repeated (as per @Voice a 'terrible knowledge' the acquisition of which entailed a terrible price. Maybe the sacrifice of a life, or at least the exaction from BtB of a 'promised' sacrifice).

Addendum: If @Voice is indeed correct in his assertion that the man known as 'Brandon the Builder' and that known as the 'Night's King' are one and the same person (he tells us he is currently writing up an essay to prove as much); and if you accept my argument that Brandon the Builder is a greenseer; then it follows that the 'Night's King' is a greenseer!

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10 hours ago, ravenous reader said:

From @LmL's iconic essay 'The Grey King and the Sea Dragon' (recommended reading for getting up to date on some of GRRM's essential symbolic concepts):

Of course, the quintessential naughty greenseer is none other than our naughty child prodigy greenseer, Bran Stark himself, whom no-one could dissuade from climbing...Here's Old Nan's telling take on that transgenerational cautionary tale, no doubt referencing one of those naughty naughty Brandons of yore:

'Climbing' is a metaphor for 'greenseeing.'  'Climbing up to heaven' and 'Reaching for the fire of the gods' is the original sin of hubris (i.e. being very 'naughty' and defying God's authority, leading to Lucifer's fall from grace and Adam and Eve's expulsion from the Garden of Eden, commonly referred to also as simply 'The Fall').  In the mythological tradition, it is represented by the archetype of Prometheus and his son Icarus.

Now, @White Ravens, be a good boy and catch up on your reading! :P:devil:

 

Bingo!  I'd like to thank the OP for their labor!  It's compelling, but I'm not completely sure that 6+1 or 12+1 is indicative of what will happen, only that when you encounter the equation within the reading that the symbology is present in the passage.

Which leads me to RR's post here and the notion about what the symbology means.  

The Stranger is the odd one, the wildcard, the rebel, etc, in my interpretation thusfar. 

Through @LML I've gathered how much he values RR's insight to the prose.  While I myself am no literary expert, it seems to me that Ravenous Reader is on the right track.  

Men/Women reaching for/trying to obtain power(s) that are/would be considered to be greater than any of their fellow brethren is certainly a fantasy trope, but done very well by GRRM.

So, in these cases of 6+1 where the one is maybe the Leader or the focal point, or perhaps even for 'whom the bell tolls' be it glory or despair, could this be the Stranger's 'Formula'?  In the case of the LH we see the greater good win out over selfishness in a sense, at least it's presented that way, but in the case of the NK though we can't be sure yet, the motives seem selfish.   The human heart in conflict with itself.  

The Stranger represents a variable in the equation.

You have:

Warrior, Father, Smith

Maiden, Mother, Crone

The Stranger seems to represent a variable in the cycle of life & death.

Males grow up being trained in martial prowess, partly out of necessity, partly out of choice to be Warriors, then if they live, they generally become Fathers and learn a Trade.

Ladies grow up being trained to do the work on the homefront as Maidens, flower and start bearing children and become Mothers, and later in life serve as the wise in Crones.

The Stranger is a departure from the norm.

But the story gets so much deeper with the magical nature of the world and with the weirwood element, it seems pretty clear that the Children either imparted knowledge on a human, ir they swindled it, but the end result is abuse of power or perhaps even that having that power is taxing the planet at rate it can't sustain or in a way that unbalances the natural order.

Great thread and concepts to have in mind fir the next book.

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On 2018-01-12 at 11:17 PM, Unchained said:

That is a huge list you made @Darry Man. I'm going to focus on the ones that make the most sense to me as the best, but like always it's a little random in choosing them.  

Yeah, it's definitely a bit random. Going through these mentions got to reveal a few patterns I hadn't noticed previously, which was the best part.

Except the title of the thread, of course. That was sheer genius.

On 2018-01-12 at 11:17 PM, Unchained said:

First, Jaime's dream. I agree with what you pointed out earlier where it was like 6 brothers confronting 7th who is a traitor. I think that is an important theme, but it is jumbled or  all together not present at some of them. Jaime is a traitor in two ways. Obviously he is the Kingslayer, but why is mentioned in this scene is his inability to protect Rhaegar's family. Aegon being killed, and the lie about him having been a stolen royal baby by Varys is a ToJ event. Jaime is the traitor brother who either allowed, or in some cases helped the NQ/NK baby be taken.  

I can see this. 

On 2018-01-12 at 11:17 PM, Unchained said:

Since Ned and his 6 good men was already mentioned, let's do that one next. Ned takes Jon, who either is named or plays the part of Aegon (Aragorn). Seems backwards this time, Ned and his 6 are all the baby stealing traitors. But they are opposite the Others/KGs still.  We speculated that 6 and 1 may be half of a whole with the whole being the last hero + 12 against another 1. The total is 14 either way. It's almost like half go with one leader while the Other half go with anOther. It's a trial of 7 vs 7.  It is at the ToJ that the dead brothers from the last example call Jaime their false brother. The traitor.  

As I think we discussed on twitter, this 6+1 formula definitely relates to the Trial by Seven concept. It could be that during the Long Night events, there was a trial by seven, where the leader of one side was struck down by the leader of the other side (LH perhaps?), and the LH raised the slain dozen to become his followers. Or maybe it was a different result. Even money is that this 6+1 theme is directly related to the 12+1, either occurring before or after a trial by seven event.

On 2018-01-12 at 11:17 PM, Unchained said:

Third is the one where this math is repeated 3 times. I even noticed it, but did not connect it to a larger pattern like you did. Tyrion and Janos are getting drunk, well Janos is.  Being drunk can symbolize someone who is about to be initiated into the tree cult of sacrifices. The Norse would get women drunk before putting them on a boat with a dead cheifton at his fire-boat funeral and burning them together. It is also like drinking Shade before entering the HotU in Dany's case. Not to get side tracked, but her time in Qaarth is full of initiation symbolism including that her Qaartheen dress with a bare breast she wears to see the Enthroned is a copy of what initiates into the Stone Masons wear in addition to being a Nissa Nissa reference. Anyway, Janos is getting drunk and eating cheese, which LmL pointed out the importance of in his last essay with Ramsay. He gives Tyrion a list of 6 men, there's his 6 followers, 6 and 1 leader. Tyrion insults him and Janos storms to the door. He opens it to find another 6 and 1. Bywater and his 6 silent gold cloaks move up quietly and take him captive to send to the Watch. Tyrion says to throw 1 of the 7 into the sea/see on the way there giving us our 3rd 6 and 1 math in one chapter. Ok, so I connected the first two to the stealing of the important baby with Aegon and Jon playing those roles. In this case it is Barra. She is the bastard daughter with a whore/hoare for a mother and a king for a father. The reason Tyrion is angry is because Janos and Deem kill/claim Barra.  The scene where Ned meets Barra and her mom has a shitload of RLJ in it including beginning at a brothel and Ned's three dead men being like the three Kingsguard with Jaime's being the larger force of Ned's.  The number of dead on each side is the same.  As odd as it may sound, killing the special child is the same as stealing it, like with Rhaego. I think the baby thief is a lord of the underworld in a way. This is part of Janos' punishment for baby stealing.  The rest is when Jon beheads him like his fellow baby thief Ned is beheaded.  Now that I think of it, Ned's execution is a good place to look for this math.  I hate bring up mythical astronomy since the Devil quit and can't comment, but the comet is the baby thief, and Janos was a bloody spear for a sigil. 

The scene with Tyrion and Janos really struck me here with the repetition. Obviously, GRRM is telling us something here.

I'm almost completely convinced now that the NN figure is a hoary whore figure, one who had a child. There are far too many of these instances to ignore, especially given GRRM's predilection for puns. There are also too many cases of people stealing (or "steeling") children for that to be a random occurrence.

On 2018-01-12 at 11:17 PM, Unchained said:

I have more to say, but I need to check the books and sleep first. This is the first thread worth coming back to the forums for in a while. I think I said I would start a beards thread. I may do that, but it's bed time. Thanks, great topic. 

Bears, beards, Barras, etc. Yep, this needs to be done.

At some point, I have to put together the hoary whore horses thing too.

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On 2018-01-13 at 2:39 AM, elder brother jonothor dar said:

You got me curious and then I got board when you started listing six random things.

I'm here to please!

I left out many instances of the term "six", etc too but I wanted to add even the most tangential references to the NK formula, just in case the motif wasn't obvious initially.

On 2018-01-13 at 2:39 AM, elder brother jonothor dar said:

Seven is a sacred number to the well 7, 6 v 1 is an interesting idea, it strikes me though that the stranger is the 1.

The KG v Jaime, Jaime is death; death to the King and death of the KG.

Now what does that mean to the others? Does the black brother represent the historical death of the others after the battle of the dawn, or is it the first men/andals who represent the death of the cotf, who quite probably created the others?

Can the 1 always represent death?  Does he represent death?

I think the seventh figure is represents death in some fashion. It always seems to be something that terminates the recurrence of the pattern, or indicates an impending death. Something like that.

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On 2018-01-13 at 5:13 AM, Archmaester_Aemma said:

The 1 seems to represent either the Night's King or his corpse bride or the crone (who may also be the corpse bride) in a lot of these scenes - I'm going to go through each of these in a doc and see what I can come up with. For some of them, I'm not entirely sure where the +1 is and I don't have the books to hand to look at the surrounding context to see if it's in there, so I'll just make a note of them.

Thanks for putting together this resource @Darry Man!

Yeah, I'm not convinced by some of these. I included some suspicious instances of the term just in case I was missing something in the text. The search engine only covers the paragraphs near the term sought, so perhaps there was mention of a seventh figure, eg, elsewhere in the chapter. 

It doesn't matter, though, as the pattern is definitely established elsewhere.

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23 hours ago, ravenous reader said:

Too true.  As GRRM himself has cautioned regarding prophecy, or for that matter where any symbolic interpretation is concerned, it's never a good idea to get too 'cocky'!

As to 'upcoming events in Winds' -- 'Words are wind' or perhaps 'Winds are words' (words blowing in the wind, perhaps never to materialize in our lifetimes...; let that not detract from our speculation!)

 

Good question!  It's never made explicit, so the connection has been inferred by many of us.  Herewith, a few provocative indications to consider:

  • He made his seat at the Nightfort -- one of @Wizz-The-Smith's 'hollow hill' locales, specifically associated with greenseer 'thrones'.  Additionally, the 'Black Gate' is a weirwood and there is a weirwood tree which Bran sees (possibly an extension of the gate) growing at the Nightfort 'breaking through the dome' like an arm groping for something in the sky (an image of 'reaching too high' or 'reaching for the stars'), which strongly implies a greenseer presence, at least historically:
Quote

A Storm of Swords - Bran IV

No, Bran thought, but he walked in this castle, where we'll sleep tonight. He did not like that notion very much at all. Night's King was only a man by light of day, Old Nan would always say, but the night was his to rule. And it's getting dark.

The Reeds decided that they would sleep in the kitchens, a stone octagon with a broken dome. It looked to offer better shelter than most of the other buildings, even though a crooked weirwood had burst up through the slate floor beside the huge central well, stretching slantwise toward the hole in the roof, its bone-white branches reaching for the sun. It was a queer kind of tree, skinnier than any other weirwood that Bran had ever seen and faceless as well, but it made him feel as if the old gods were with him here, at least.

  • He 'ensorcelled' his brothers to his will, indicating that he's some kind of sorceror specializing in black magic like Bloodraven, a known greenseer:
  • He is specifically renowned (as related by Old Nan) to have known no fear -- that quality of 'hubris' associated with greenseers:
  • Further, Old Nan teasingly suggests that he may have been a Stark named 'Brandon', thus potentially carrying the Stark genetic potential for magic ('Your blood makes you a greenseer...').  Also, in keeping with GRRM's penchant for the 'wheel of history' and how history tends to repeat itself, there have been other Brandons in the Stark family tree throughout history who may have been greenseers, notably our 'Bran' and 'Brandon the Builder' whom I strongly suspect was a greenseer, given his mastery over the True Tongue ('the song of stones...the wind through leaves...the rain upon the water' -- of which we have a definite suggestion that making leaves rustle in order to communicate is a greenseer facility --cf. Theon's encounter with Bran at the heart tree).
  • @LmL has made the 'heretical' proposal, with which I tend to agree, that the Night's King may have been responsible for precipitating the Long Night via the posited 'moon-breaking' (and the abomination of making Others with his corpse bride), rather than merely living in its wake, hence his name 'Night's King.'

My notes from twitter:

Quote

As per @LmL AA is a villain not hero:

'A sword of fire, now, that would be a wonder to behold. Yet at such a cost...When he thought of NN, it was his own Marya he pictured, a good-natured plump woman with sagging breasts and a kindly smile, the best woman in the world.  He tried to picture himself driving a sword through her, and shuddered. I am not made of the stuff of heroes, he decided. If that was the price of a magic sword, it was more than he cared to pay.' ACOK - Davos I

If Davos is 'not the stuff of heroes' (who murder their wives), at which Davos 'shudders,' a word which GRRM uses to express fear, then the 'stuff of heroes' is someone who is 'fearless'...and 'all men must know fear'...So, by 'symbolic extrapolation' AA=NK.

As @AlaskanSandman has cleverly highlighted, GRRM has added cryptically that NK's fate is contingent upon that of BtB: "As for the Night's King (the form I prefer), in the books he is a legendary figure, akin to Lann the Clever and Brandon the Builder, and no more likely to have survived to the present day than they have."

'No more'='just as likely', possibly even implying some existential, more literal equivalence! Thus, one way of reading this is that NK=BtB.  AA paid a steep cost for the sword; likewise, please tell me what was the price BtB paid for the magical word 'gifted' by the COTF?

'He was taken to a secret place to meet...them, but could not at first understand their speech...the song of stones...wind through leaves...rain upon the water. The manner in which Brandon learned to comprehend the speech of the children is a tale in itself...not worth repeating'

'The manner' is 'not worth repeating,' as it's an abomination that shouldn't be repeated (as per @Voice a 'terrible knowledge' the acquisition of which entailed a terrible price. Maybe the sacrifice of a life, or at least the exaction from BtB of a 'promised' sacrifice).

Addendum: If @Voice is indeed correct in his assertion that the man known as 'Brandon the Builder' and that known as the 'Night's King' are one and the same person (he tells us he is currently writing up an essay to prove as much); and if you accept my argument that Brandon the Builder is a greenseer; then it follows that the 'Night's King' is a greenseer!

Sorry to reply so late after you put so much effort into your reply. 

I read Wizz's Hollow Hills thread when it occurred on this forum but I'm not nearly as convinced as you are that a good case was made for the Nightfort being located over a hollow hill which hosts (or hosted) a greenseer.  The presence of tunnels below the Nightfort and other Night's Watch castles along the wall is just a logical development of coping with severe winters that last for years at a time.  Similarly, downtown Toronto has a warren of underground tunnels totaling over 30km that allow people to move between buildings and malls without going outside to brave the elements.  As for the Night's King using sorcery, I don't necessarily consider that to be linked to him being a potential greenseer.  We only have Bloodraven to refer to as an example of a greenseer so far, and yes he was a sorcerer, but we don't know if his sorcerous abilities have anything to do with him being a greenseer.  He was rumoured to use sorcery long before joining the Night's Watch when he was Master of Whisperers and Hand of the King during the reigns of Aerys I and Maekar I and he learned sorcery from (with?) Shiera Seastar, the woman he desired.  So, does being a sorcerer lead to greater potential to become a greenseer? Maybe.

I like the idea put forth by LmL that the Night's King may have actually caused the Long Night by breaking the moon but the string of supposition and metaphorical interpretations is too much for me to hold in my head and breath life and probability into.  And the confusion it adds to timelines gives me a headache.  The thirteenth lord commander of the Night's Watch creates the threat that the Wall was built to defend against centuries earlier. Or do I have that wrong? 

I am already familiar with AlaskanSandman's take on the SsM:  "As for the Night's King (the form I prefer), in the books he is a legendary figure, akin to Lann the Clever and Brandon the Builder, and no more likely to have survived to the present day than they have."  But I wholeheartedly disagree that 'No more'='just as likely".  I read it more like "No more=not likely".  It would be like saying Heracles is no more likely to have survived to this day than Icarus and Perseus.  The Age of Heroes was thousands of years of long time ago.

I also have a different take on how you interpret the words "not worth repeating".  I read those words as an almost humourous conclusion ie:  The manner by which he learned the speech of the children is a tale not worth repeating because it is a long, boring and abstract one.  It doesn't have to be an abomination.  :)

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On 2018-01-13 at 7:11 AM, ravenous reader said:

The 'missing statue' can be interpreted symbolically as the unseen god or Stranger -- the marble plinth is 'empty', echoing our 'void' concept of the abominable greenseeer NK in celestial terms.

Thanks for the great comments, @ravenous reader

In my essay on the Cosmic Tree, the nexus connects our being between the heavens (home of the saved souls) and the underworld (home of the damned). The empty plinth absolutely represents the god of death.

On 2018-01-13 at 7:11 AM, ravenous reader said:

'Another...An other!'  LOL

I know!

On 2018-01-13 at 7:11 AM, ravenous reader said:

This one's my favorite; in it you can find both 'LH math (12+1)' and 'NK math (6+1)', with Jaime and the three-headed dragon playing the roles of LH and NK respectively:

As I've long suggested (although the idea's fallen on deaf ears), I believe Jaime misheard the dragon (this is suggested by the uncertainty expressed by the word 'seemed'), who I suspect in actual fact may have said 'I know you kin-slayer!'  The LH and NK were blood relations.  Make of that what you will...

Additionally, there's a reference to the Night's King symbolism with the prince donning 'night-black' armor, with Jaime cast in the role of the renegade Kingsguard, or in symbolic terms the Other who broke his oath and deserted, escaping the clutches of the Night's King.

I noticed more than a few instances of a dozen along with a half-dozen, just like this. It suggests a relationship between the two.

I don't think it matters if Jaime misheard it, but the reader is meant to. I now read both descriptors as being interchangeable. 

I'm not sure exactly how the proto-myth went, but it could be something like an oathbreaking KG/NW brother.

On 2018-01-13 at 7:11 AM, ravenous reader said:

The 'verticle structure' you described or dragon mosaic nexus would then presumably represent the Night's King.  That's very appropriate, if you think about the converging pathways organized around the nexus as a spider web spun by a spider -- a predator -- sitting at the center of the web.  Sometimes only the web not the spider is visible, yet the telltale woven threads or puppet strings remain from which his presence as the architect may be inferred.  As an analogy, Varys the Spiderman (NK) organizing the 6 'white-faced child' assassins (Others):

No, the vertical structure is the axis mundi, or cosmic tree, best represented by the weirwood, or the plinth, or the spiral stairways to the WF crypt, etc. I never made the connection to the web before now, however. Given the hypothesis that the NK is an ember trapped in the weirwood, having him as a spider-like predator on the web makes perfect sense.

The NK trapped in a tree invokes Odin hanging himself on Yggdrasil or Jesus on the cross. He gives up his life to attain cosmic wisdom.

On 2018-01-13 at 7:11 AM, ravenous reader said:

The 'dog whistle' to the others -- the signal to kill -- is the power of what I've termed the 'killing word'.

More evidence to your theory!

On 2018-01-13 at 7:11 AM, ravenous reader said:

With his simpering 'sorries,' Varys is a 'sorrowful man'  -- evoking those assassins operating at the behest of the warlocks of the House of the Undying.  Similarly, Rhaegar was a renowned melancholic, his life overshadowed by much sadness and regret at 'what he had to do' (this is one reason, by analogy, I do not think his motives towards Lyanna are as honorable and loving as is commonly presumed). 

He is definitely a sorrowful man.

On 2018-01-13 at 7:11 AM, ravenous reader said:

You know who else was notoriously overcome by sorrow at what he 'had to do'?   AA, who in my book is just another of NK's names:

Aside from her 'motivation' (I think she was caught blindsided as he dealt her an underhanded blow against which she would have been helpless -- analogous to Lysa not suspecting LF's intentions until the very last moment as she was beginning to fall through the Moon Door); the question is, are these NK figures truly compelled to do the heinous things they do?  Otherwise stated, do they truly need to, or do they want to do the deed -- there's a subtle forensic difference.  (As I've mentioned, 'Nissanissa 'is almost an anagram for 'assassin' -- I'd interpret that to mean she was targeted for an assassination...a 'nissassination'! rather than being the assassin herself; although she does get her revenge for the violation from beyond the grave).

I'm on the NN was a hoary whore bandwagon. She got something in return for her sacrifice. I have to believe that AA was going to fulfill a promise of some sort, but the results were horrifically worse than he had imagined. I am not on board that AA wasn't evil person, nor was he a pure hero. He was a man, fraught with all the weaknesses and harm that come along with all the good. In any case, I'm not sure if NN was meant to invoke "assassination", but I have no better theory why GRRM decided to repeat the Nissa term in her name either.

It's not implausible, that's all I'm saying.

On 2018-01-13 at 7:11 AM, ravenous reader said:

Another clue hinting at the unseen malevolent organizational principle is provided in the Prologue, where the 6 Other minions mysteriously move forward together as if as one (i.e. NK) at some invisible signal:

As I've argued, this 'signal' was symbolically given by Will the naughty greenseer 'whispering his prayer to the nameless, faceless gods of the wood,' whereupon the Others initially appeared, as if on cue.  The 6 are the proxy assassins of the 1 -- so I tend to think of the 1 as the leader, although as @Archmaester_Aemma has pointed out it's difficult to form a clear impression, as the pattern in all the examples you gave does not follow through with any reliable consistency.

In my allegorical deconstruction of the Prologue as described in my 'Killing Word' thread, I see Will as the 'naughty greenseer' (NK) operating in conjunction with the magical tree (corpse bride/crone) -- in fact, he's stuck to it (you might even say 'wed' to the tree!) with 'sticky sap' ('weirwood stigmata' on hands and face) -- to summon the Others (6).

The Others 'emerge from the wood.'

Will hangs himself on the tree, a la Odin. Does he give the signal to the Others? I accept that he may have called him, but did he signal the actual slaying? I'm not sure.

 

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Maybe I just missed it, but I did not see this one on your list. From Bloodraven's cave:

Quote

"Bones," said Bran. "It's bones." The floor of the passage was littered with the bones of birds and beasts. But there were other bones as well, big ones that must have come from giants and small ones that could have been from children. On either side of them, in niches carved from the stone, skullslooked down on them. Bran saw a bear skull and a wolf skull, half a dozen human skulls and near as many giants. All the rest were small, queerly formed. Children of the forest. The roots had grown in and around and through them, every one. A few had ravens perched atop them, watching them pass with bright black eyes.

Does this make BR the 7th 'Last Greenseer' as @Megorova suggests?

Apologies if you had this one on your list and I just didn't see it. I did look twice, but have been drinking White Russians for quite some time now, so my focus is not what it could be.

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4 hours ago, Darry Man said:

I don't think it matters if Jaime misheard it, but the reader is meant to. I now read both descriptors as being interchangeable. 

And @ravenous reader

 

That one with Jaime in the tunnels is another that I would randomly choose to be one of the most important. The 6 tunnels meeting in one place is an interesting symbol. I think LH math can sometimes be 12 as one as well as 12 and 1. The prime examples being the dragon sign at the clanking dragon inn where 12 pieces make up the dragon, and at the inn of the crossroads where Cat's men draw a dozen swords as one to capture Tyrion. One entity made up of multiple individuals is some tripy stuff to think about, but George has basically told us this is a thing with the 7 gods who are one, the many faced god, and the godhood of the old gods which is all the people who have ever enters the weirnet. 

 

Kingslaying and kinslaying are definitely one in the same in some sense, probably a clue about a kingslaying in the past where the killer and king were related. Theon is called kinslayer a lot, and he is a traitor to a NK figure in Ramsay. Theon is like one of Ramsay's dogs which I think may be like the NK's Others or maybe ice spiders as big as hounds he uses to hunt hot-blooded people. The girls are reborn as those dogs, meaning the NK built himself a house of cards so to speak based on magic enslavement where all his servants have reason to hate him. It's a powder keg that needs a fire to light the rebellion against him (can you tell I noticed the ember that lights a fire symbolism around the resistance in the last Star Wars movie?). At least that's how I see it. The NK was a tyrant, and his slaves eventually had enough. Dany's whole arc is to be this fire that causes slave rebellions.  

 

Theon is like a NK slave that is not loyal. We can be relatively sure Ramsay will die by being ripped apart by those dogs I think. Is the hidden story here one where a single NK servant rebels and the rest follow? That's what I think.

 

I know I keep tying this back the rescue of the baby shown at the ToJ, but that is what is on my mind and that is related to this pattern I think. Theon is this rescuer, as Jeyne is a NQ figure who will turn out to be pregnant. I associate this rescuer with the King of Winter and the Grey King, assuming they are the same person. LmL tells me the rescuer is the child of the fire wife of the NK, and he is rescuing his half brother, the icy moon son. We do have a theme supporting this including Robb (KoW figure and son of fiery haired sister Cat) giving a last boon to Jon making him heir right before he dies. Theon and the Grey King are also fire moon children I think, the greenseers in the trees are like the fiery meteors falling from the dead moon. However, Dany the lighter of slave rebellions is the main fire moon child of the books. Will she likewise give an assist to Jon, the stolen NQ baby? I think we have been told she will. I am of the belief that everything said about fAegon that won't happen is something that will happen with Jon. Tyrion tells fAegon that Dany is a rescuer who will fly to his aid. This won't happen for him, but I think it will for Jon and when it does it will be a reenactment of the ToJ in a way. The aid given to the NQ baby by his rescuer. 

 

 

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4 hours ago, OtherFromAnotherMother said:

Maybe I just missed it, but I did not see this one on your list. From Bloodraven's cave:

Does this make BR the 7th 'Last Greenseer' as @Megorova suggests?

Apologies if you had this one on your list and I just didn't see it. I did look twice, but have been drinking White Russians for quite some time now, so my focus is not what it could be.

Good catch. I saw this one but didn’t include it because it could have appeared as merely part of a bunch of skulls. However, I think you can make an argument for its inclusion. 

 

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