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Arya's End Role and Death: A Reconsideration


Lady Barbrey

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I don't know about all of you, but I am very curious about what Arya's role will be in the battle with the Others I assume is coming. I have the following speculation: Arya has incredibly strong associations to Death - literally and in terms of the many underlying mythologies; might she not be able to take on necromantic abilities and raise an army of wights from the Winterfell crypts and Barrowtown to battle the Others?  It seems unlikely, but here's what makes me speculate:

-Arya is at least a tyro skinchanger, not just a warg, because she saw through the eyes of a cat

-Arya is on her way to becoming a Faceless Man, a skilled assassin who can take on not only the appearance but the memories of those whose lives/roles she inhabits in disguise - now why was this weird anomalous bit of magic chosen by George as something Arya must have?  To me, I believe it must play a role in the endgame.

-Arya is the strongest-willed character in the series; we're told to skinchange humans or higher creatures, this is the most necessary trait of a skinchanger

-Arya is a Stark, and the Stark crypts have played a significant role in the story, giving to me at least the uncanny feeling that old Starks might break out of their statued tombs at any time (raised by the Others? Or a Stark?)

-Arya seemed in some ways to find an affinity with the dragon bones in the Red Keep; she changes from being terrified of them to almost finding them friendly and gains courage.  It was just an odd moment but did make me wonder at the time if she had an unrealized affinity with dragons; but perhaps not at all,  or perhaps it wasn't dragons but with the dead.  I'm going with the latter for now.

-the Night's King was probably a Stark, though we're not sure because Old Nan names other possibilities (I myself think him likely to be a bastard Stark with the last name Snow, from Ygritte flinching and telling Jon Snow he had an evil name - and what evil character resides in Wildling history we definitely know about?  The Night's King, so bad the Wildlings and Northman formed their first and only alliance to battle him. The Westerosi erased his name from written history but obviously the Wildlings didn't from oral history).  Why would it take two combined armies to take down the Night's Watch without a Wall?  Because they were risen dead men? Because they were wights? I've always thought the story was about the Others trying to rise again, and it makes sense if the Wildlings and Northmen thought so too and tried to destroy them early.  How is this related to Arya? If the Night's King was of Stark blood, and transformed into a being capable of raising the dead, Arya and her family have that bloodline possibility too (as do, many of us believe, Craster's family, including Gilly).

-Why Arya and not Jon or Sansa or Bran to raise the dead if it is in fact possible? My belief it would be Arya is based on her death associations, so numerous I don't need to list them to any of you.  And let's face it, with the masks of the dead, she is already in one way doing it already, raising the appearances and memories of the dead if not their actual carcasses. It makes one wonder about death magic, and whether the Faceless Men must have an affinity too, or is it just the magic that goes into making the masks?

-Aside from the literal, there is the mythological. Sweetsunray did an excellent analysis of Winterfell as a kind of hell, Ned as representative of the impartial death god. To my mind,  Arya in particular is associated with her symbolism to all kinds of death representatives, from Valkyries to Hel herself.  Something to remember is the title of the series, A Song of Ice and Fire. It's ironic of George that he's put the symbolism of the main enemies of the Others on the wrong side of the Ragnarok battle as the main enemies to the gods of Norse myth: Bran the wolf-boy Melisandre sees as the Fenris wolf, Dany (and/or Jon?) The dragon-rider as the great serpent, and Arya as Hel (and her armies of the dead). Of all the myths, references, allegorical pieces, this is the main one running throughout, as signified, I would argue, by the title of the series.

There are other points I could bring in here, but there are in fact just so many of them showing Arya related to Death, I'm hoping these are sufficient for this post.

Lastly, I wanted to mention I'm a little overwhelmed by the Others' wighting powers.  Three dragons and human armies just don't seem enough to kill them when they can just keep raising more corpses.

Besides whatever reset magic Bran might do, or magical swords Jon might wield, surely something huge must be coming from Arya to even the odds.

Lots have speculated that Arya might accomplish a key assassination.  I'm taking it one step further I guess.  If Arya kills an Other and takes his face, blue eyes and all, I'm assuming she'll have his memories too.  Memories that tell her how to raise the dead.  And she has exactly the right bloodline of death magic and skinchanging, the right personality of willpower and ruthlessness, to do so.  Moreover, she has the crypts of Winterfell, the barrows of Barrowton, and all the recently fallen to create an army of her own.  Hel and her army of the dead.

Thanks for reading.  Hope you haven't read it all before, though the chances aren't good on this forum! This is speculation by the way, not really a theory, but it does hold together I think even if George is taking us an altogether different direction.

 

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Arya, in my opinion, has no role to fight the white walkers.  If anything, Arya is one of the baddies because she joined a death cult who does the same thing that the white walkers do, kill people.  They worship death.   Arya is so messed up now that I don't see her making it back home in one piece. She has become something sickening.  An 11 year old who murders people without remorse.   I predict she will die while working on her hit list. 

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1 hour ago, Noble Lothar Frey said:

Arya, in my opinion, has no role to fight the white walkers.  If anything, Arya is one of the baddies because she joined a death cult who does the same thing that the white walkers do, kill people.  They worship death.   Arya is so messed up now that I don't see her making it back home in one piece. She has become something sickening.  An 11 year old who murders people without remorse.   I predict she will die while working on her hit list. 

Well I have to admit I don't like where George has gone with her arc, but then again I'm not too happy about any of the main arcs - Dany an arrogant entitled queen to be who thinks nothing of siccing Dothraki hordes on the people of Westeros, Tyrion a self-pitying whining boor and rapist, Bran slowly dying to himself and abusing Hodor, Sansa still stuck in approval seeking mode with Littlefinger, and Arya, as you say.  All of them lost to themselves from their frightful experiences and with luck coming out the other end in the next books changed, grown up, with new and better purpose if possible.  Jon's the only one who has grown up but hasn't changed much for the worse.  He and Sam are actually better.  Jaime too, and he's gone a long way towards redeeming himself from attempted child murder.  So we'll see.

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12 hours ago, Lady Barbrey said:

Well I have to admit I don't like where George has gone with her arc, but then again I'm not too happy about any of the main arcs - Dany an arrogant entitled queen to be who thinks nothing of siccing Dothraki hordes on the people of Westeros, Tyrion a self-pitying whining boor and rapist, Bran slowly dying to himself and abusing Hodor, Sansa still stuck in approval seeking mode with Littlefinger, and Arya, as you say.  All of them lost to themselves from their frightful experiences and with luck coming out the other end in the next books changed, grown up, with new and better purpose if possible.  Jon's the only one who has grown up but hasn't changed much for the worse.  He and Sam are actually better.  Jaime too, and he's gone a long way towards redeeming himself from attempted child murder.  So we'll see.

Great observations! And why we're all dying for the next book in the series. Very few of the main characters are on an upward arc by the end of Dance w/Dragons. Arya has gotten really good with the killing thing, but I'd dispute the "no remorse" accusation. Jon, sadly, is presumed dead. And I won't believe otherwise until GRRM says so.

Daenerys seems remarkably humble and self questioning to me, not "arrogant and entitled." What you call "entitled" is her full acceptance of the responsibilities of ruling. This contrasts with the Usurper, whose concept of ruling was getting everything he wanted, in excess, and leaving the work to his appointed lackeys. The "arrogant" part is simply the behavior of the ruling class, which we as democratic societies no longer value. It was - is - a requirement for motivating others to obey. Maybe you're subconsciously having trouble with the fact that she's "a young girl"?

Witness a similar situation with Arya (back on topic!). When she, Hot Pie, Gendry, and doomed Lommy were left alone following the massacre by Amory Lorch ("Ser"), it was Arya who automatically took the leadership role. Was that "arrogant" or "entitled"? In her opinion, she had a good idea of what they needed to do, and told the boys to follow. Although both older than Arya and male (only Gendry knowing otherwise), her commanding aspect had the boys following her lead and doing her bidding. Her "arrogance", if you will. She had grown up in the "commanding" class and took it for granted, while the boys had grown up in the "bow your head and follow orders" class.

Plus, they were city boys - none of them knew what birdsongs were, they could barely climb trees, they didn't know which way was north, they didn't ride well... Arya as offspring of a lord, was well taught in all these "rural" activities. That, and the sword instruction.

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On 11/02/2018 at 8:14 AM, zandru said:

Great observations! And why we're all dying for the next book in the series. Very few of the main characters are on an upward arc by the end of Dance w/Dragons. Arya has gotten really good with the killing thing, but I'd dispute the "no remorse" accusation. Jon, sadly, is presumed dead. And I won't believe otherwise until GRRM says so.

Daenerys seems remarkably humble and self questioning to me, not "arrogant and entitled." What you call "entitled" is her full acceptance of the responsibilities of ruling. This contrasts with the Usurper, whose concept of ruling was getting everything he wanted, in excess, and leaving the work to his appointed lackeys. The "arrogant" part is simply the behavior of the ruling class, which we as democratic societies no longer value. It was - is - a requirement for motivating others to obey. Maybe you're subconsciously having trouble with the fact that she's "a young girl"?

Witness a similar situation with Arya (back on topic!). When she, Hot Pie, Gendry, and doomed Lommy were left alone following the massacre by Amory Lorch ("Ser"), it was Arya who automatically took the leadership role. Was that "arrogant" or "entitled"? In her opinion, she had a good idea of what they needed to do, and told the boys to follow. Although both older than Arya and male (only Gendry knowing otherwise), her commanding aspect had the boys following her lead and doing her bidding. Her "arrogance", if you will. She had grown up in the "commanding" class and took it for granted, while the boys had grown up in the "bow your head and follow orders" class.

Plus, they were city boys - none of them knew what birdsongs were, they could barely climb trees, they didn't know which way was north, they didn't ride well... Arya as offspring of a lord, was well taught in all these "rural" activities. That, and the sword instruction.

No, it is not because Dany is a young girl.  Sigh.  I am the OP however and this is all off-topic.  I guess no one found the original speculation interesting.

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OK, I'll bite.

First off, though, I don't think she is on her way to becoming a Faceless Man.  Her training has, to this point, been far too haphazard and dilatory for me to believe that that is (or ever was) their intention.  And if it wasn't already apparent, the events of the preview chapter should establish she is entirely unsuited for the job in any case.

I do like the suggestion that she is intimately connected with death.  I don't think it has to do with raising the dead, though.  After thinking on it, if anything, it may be the opposite; that she has the power to make death permanent.

This would be a very useful power to have in the face of wights and White Walkers, who are effectively undead.  Of course, I have no reason to actually believe this, but it does make a sort of sense.  Use the wolfpack, which Martin has said will be important, to disable the wights, then kill them. 

Despite the above speculation, though, I think that her role will be more prosaic.  Use the wolves to go after the wights, and become a warrior queen of sorts (like her wolf's namesake) in the battle itself.  It mayalso be that she leads a group (northerners? wildlings?) into exile, like Nymeria.  To be honest, I find Arya's role to be the hardest to figure out.  That she will be an assassin, though, is something I doubt very much.  I certainly hope not.

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It is fitting for Arya to die a violent death.  After all, Arya joined a cult of killers and death worshippers.  She has been killing innocent people.  She lives for revenge.  She feels no remorse, no guilt.  I want her to die in TWOW before she makes it too far out of Braavos.

Arya doesn't really have anything to offer to fight the Others.  Quite the opposite, she brings them raw materials to convert to their zombie battalion.  Arya is not a force for good in this story, people.  

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3 hours ago, Agent Orange said:

It is fitting for Arya to die a violent death.  After all, Arya joined a cult of killers and death worshippers.  She has been killing innocent people.  She lives for revenge.  She feels no remorse, no guilt.  I want her to die in TWOW before she makes it too far out of Braavos.

Arya doesn't really have anything to offer to fight the Others.  Quite the opposite, she brings them raw materials to convert to their zombie battalion.  Arya is not a force for good in this story, people.  

We are all entitled to our own opinions but I whole heartedly disagree with pretty much all of this. She is a tragic figure. She is a little girl & in her short time alive she has witnessed & been subject to more violence than most people would see in a full lifetime. She has lost everything & everyone near & dear to her. No one walks away from that unscathed (no pun intended) She wants revenge on those who have wronged her but more than that she doesn't want to be helpless anymore. Who can blame her for that? She grasps onto the only time since this whole nightmare began that she didn't feel helpless (When Jaqen gave her 3 lives) I think it's only natural that she wanted to be able to do what he did. She wants to survive, people are funny that way. She has been desensitized to killing & is surviving the only way she knows how. She is no Saint that's for sure but nor is she evil. She has plenty to offer in the fight against the others, as the other posters have noted & as for her not being a force for good I'll say this: there was a time where no one could have convinced me that Jaime Lannister would be a force for good yet here he is. Not a saint by any stretch of the imagination but trying to fight for the good. 

To the OP: I love the topic & wish I had more to add. Arya is so fascinating to me that I speculate wildly & without evidence on her future. An odd thought occurred to me while reading your post, I have absolutely no evidence to suggest this but with all her connections to death would it not be fitting if she became the Warrior Queen & led the army of the dead? That's my tinfoil for the night anyway 

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It's Dany that will raise the dead, riding the Nightlands, death itself bending the knee to her, all who die fighting in her name will be reborn. WFTD Arya is the Last Hero and Nymeria. Last Hero seems to suggest she'll make contact with the COTF, which might mean Bran by that stage, and in doing so she'll turn the tide of the war. Foreshadowing on the Nymeria line says she'll lead an exodus into the sea.

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On 2/11/2018 at 6:39 AM, Lady Barbrey said:

Well I have to admit I don't like where George has gone with her arc, but then again I'm not too happy about any of the main arcs - Dany an arrogant entitled queen to be who thinks nothing of siccing Dothraki hordes on the people of Westeros, Tyrion a self-pitying whining boor and rapist, Bran slowly dying to himself and abusing Hodor, Sansa still stuck in approval seeking mode with Littlefinger, and Arya, as you say.  All of them lost to themselves from their frightful experiences and with luck coming out the other end in the next books changed, grown up, with new and better purpose if possible.  Jon's the only one who has grown up but hasn't changed much for the worse.  He and Sam are actually better.  Jaime too, and he's gone a long way towards redeeming himself from attempted child murder.  So we'll see.

Jon is worse than Arya and Sansa.  He had a duty to put aside family concerns and put his job first.  He chose instead to screw with the Boltons even when he knew it could cause problems for the NW.  Sansa and Arya are nobody who no longer have a duty to anything.   Arya is a cold blooded murderer but how is that different from Bron?  They should both hang but what they do is trivial compared to the lord commander who betrayed the NW and tried to steal the bride of a nobleman.

And to respond directly to the topic author.  I am not so sure that one skinny rapier will be of any use against the white walkers.  Were it not for Martin's leaked letter, I would expect Arya to die before the end of the books.  Like soon.  Because of that letter and only because of that letter, I think Arya will not die until near the end.  She will die but not until close to the end. 

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30 minutes ago, Curled Finger said:

It's an interesting premise if Arya really is so tied to death instead of her story being one of hope.  

Spoiler

Take what she did in the spoiler chapters for Winds and it appears she is already traveling the road of darkness.   Have you ever read a GRRM story where the people are happier at the end?  I do not recall such.  Many will be dead.  The ones who survive, most will be maimed, broken, and lonely. 

 

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On 2/11/2018 at 9:46 AM, Noble Lothar Frey said:

Arya, in my opinion, has no role to fight the white walkers.  If anything, Arya is one of the baddies because she joined a death cult who does the same thing that the white walkers do, kill people.  They worship death.   Arya is so messed up now that I don't see her making it back home in one piece. She has become something sickening.  An 11 year old who murders people without remorse.   I predict she will die while working on her hit list. 

LMAO

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7 hours ago, chrisdaw said:

It's Dany that will raise the dead, riding the Nightlands, death itself bending the knee to her, all who die fighting in her name will be reborn. WFTD Arya is the Last Hero and Nymeria. Last Hero seems to suggest she'll make contact with the COTF, which might mean Bran by that stage, and in doing so she'll turn the tide of the war. Foreshadowing on the Nymeria line says she'll lead an exodus into the sea.

Do you think Arya will be able to skinchange Ravens and communicate with Bran and possibly the CoTF that way? 

Ravens can speak the True Tongue and Arya wonders this in ACOK:

"Do the ravens remember Maester Tothmure? Arya wondered. Are they sad for him? When they quork at him, do they wonder why he doesn't answer? Perhaps the dead could speak to them in some secret tongue the living could not hear."

If she is also the grey girl from Mel's vision, Arya's role near the Gods Eye and the Isle of Faces will be very important.  

 

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6 hours ago, Noble Lothar Frey said:
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Take what she did in the spoiler chapters for Winds and it appears she is already traveling the road of darkness.   Have you ever read a GRRM story where the people are happier at the end?  I do not recall such.  Many will be dead.  The ones who survive, most will be maimed, broken, and lonely. 

 

Spoiler

So you think Raf from the Mercy chapter is an innocent? He is a pedophile rapist and murderer. He participated in the gang rape of a 13 year old girl. Jon would have taken his head the second he heard his crimes. Are you seriously defending this scumbag just so you can hate on Arya? 

 

 

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On 13/02/2018 at 10:05 PM, a black swan said:

Do you think Arya will be able to skinchange Ravens and communicate with Bran and possibly the CoTF that way? 

Ravens can speak the True Tongue and Arya wonders this in ACOK:

"Do the ravens remember Maester Tothmure? Arya wondered. Are they sad for him? When they quork at him, do they wonder why he doesn't answer? Perhaps the dead could speak to them in some secret tongue the living could not hear."

If she is also the grey girl from Mel's vision, Arya's role near the Gods Eye and the Isle of Faces will be very important.  

 

Think it will relate to language, to take a stab at specifics she's going to learn the COTF language and it will enable magic like talking to animals, elemental magic and warping, the typical sort of thing attributed to forest dwelling natives. Or Bran will and communicate to her what she needs to say. Probably Bran is in the control room and she's carrying out the work on the ground, and the language of the COTF, the water magic of the Rhoyne, the magic constructions of castles and the wall, the COTF caves and other such things are going to pay off in their stories come the WFTD and the shackles on magic get released.

She's certainly Mel's grey girl but I'm not confident on the water being the God's Eye.

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On 2/12/2018 at 11:07 PM, Noble Lothar Frey said:
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Take what she did in the spoiler chapters for Winds and it appears she is already traveling the road of darkness.   Have you ever read a GRRM story where the people are happier at the end?  I do not recall such.  Many will be dead.  The ones who survive, most will be maimed, broken, and lonely. 

 

Spoiler

She's pretty much damned already.  Dareon, the old insurance man at the bar, Raf.  She's not traveling the road of darkness.  She has arrived in darkness.    She's so desensitized to death, blood, and killing to the extent that she feels nothing.  Arya is totally fucked up.

 

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Really interesting topic.  It has once or twice crossed my mind that it would be useful for Arya to kill a WW or and Other and take his face to infiltrate the Night King's inner circle and yes to learn more about them and possible vulnerabilities.

We have several characters in training here, mostly Stark kids incidentally.  The one that I think will not contribute a huge amount to the magical side of the story seems to be Sansa.  To me what she is learning now will play an important role in the reconstruction period where politics will be more needed than magic.  I see her as either a great lady or one who makes a political marriage that can put two opposing houses on the same side and gets on with the rebuilding.  Now, Bran and Arya do appear to have a more magical side and arc for sure.

I am not going to go into great lengths into this here because it would be off topic but I feel that her and Tyrion have very parallel arcs in that they started out sympathetic, circumstances drove them to darkness but I am really certain that they will get out of that phase.  Not psychologically unscathed, of course not, these phases of darkness leave scars but I don't think either of them are beyond redemption, but as I said that is for another topic.  Now, yes we are all a bit shocked at how detached she appears to have become.  In fact the only thing, ironically, that seems to get in the way of this detachment is her desire for revenge.  We seem to have 3 major characters hell bent on revenge, namely Arya, Tyrion and LSH.  Tyrion's obsession with revenge is showing cracks, like that dream about Jaime when one of his heads was weeping.  He is trying to become unfeeling on purpose in his despair for part of ADWD but he seems not to be succeeding.  He is battling personal feelings versus (even when malicious) strategic thought.  Same goes for Jon in terms of duty versus personal desires and family bonds.

Okay where am I going with this?  Well our heroes (or villains if you rather see them that way) are conflicted, including Sam.  Useful as it would be to have someone so cool headed that can act rationally especially when facing such a huge threat as the Others, it would not make a human story, for we may as well toy super soldiers for that (which at first sight is what the WWs appear to be).  Human beings are tempted, often they give into their temptations, they can act irrationally because of their hurt (Arya, Tyrion, LSH)  or their love (Jon and Sam) but those are the guys we got in our story.  Even ever so dutiful, apparently ruled by duty alone, Stannis has fallen pray of some significant weird influences that don't seem all totally rational either.

This being said, out of that bunch of people, I think Arya has the higher chance of becoming detached enough to be effective.  Yes, she has many skills that could help including her warging abilities.  Personally, sorry if a it OT again, I think she will give up on revenge once she witnesses first hand what LSH is doing and give her the gift.  I am basing this on total speculation but it seems an interesting premise in terms of narrative.  After that, she will become more detached than she is now in terms of her priorities not being so very "personal."  I see the FM and, to an extend, various orders in this series including the NW and the Maesters guild as a sort of attempt to "assimilate" (yes in the sci-fic sense) its members, for love, sex, revenge etc makes them vulnerable and they could depart from being the "perfect robotic soldier."  I certainly don't expect Arya to become that sort of robotic soldier but giving up, at least to a point, her obsession with revenge could make her a more detached (and probably rational) player.  I think she definitely will play a role against the Others.  Also I am convinced that the Winterfell crypts and their dead will play a role but, again, that is another huge topic.

I am 50/50 on whether she will survive the very, very end but she is definitely been trained for a plot purpose.  Else, why would George written all those many pages on her and the Faceless.  Okay, it could be just for characterisation and making her chose humanity or "assimilation" but this feels weak to me.  I really, really think all the people either currently "in training" or in deep internal conflict will play an important part.  The road and the final destination's details is what I am not yet sure about...

My apologies that this post is a bit all over the place.

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We haven't yet seen Arya have any motivation to leave Essos at this point, which leaves her out of the whole Westerosi storyline with the Others, etc. However, at some point word will arrive that Lord Commander Snow has been killed by his own men. They, if identified, will be added to Arya's list - but, Jon being dead, may not provide enough incentive for her to leave Braavos.

Suppose it does. Suppose Arya hops a ship to Eastwatch by the Sea and by foot to Castle Black, bent on revenge. Suppose Jon is running with the pack in Ghost. Ghost would remember Arya's scent and what's left of Jon would remember his little sister. They'd try to get together. This being George RR, the two would pass each other in the night, as it were, probably several times, and never manage to meet. Jon's consciousness would eventually fade to black. (heh)

This leaves Arya haunting the north. At Castle Black, she'd soon learn that the assassins were ripped to shreds and/or hung minutes after killing Jon (remember, it was done in front of pretty much everyone in the garrison), so her work is already done. Might as well head south to Winterfell and go after the Boltons, right? But snow has been falling by the foot with freezing temperatures and wind. Arya would meet the fate that Jon japingly prophesied - freezing to death with Needle in her hand. Arya fades to black. We won't see her again until "A Dream of Spring", when a hungry stag digging for forage comes across her preserved corpse. Or, more disturbingly, Ghost and his pack dig her up during the long Winter and enjoy the meager feast her skinny body provides.

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