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Patchface Prophesies


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I just saw this on Bran Vras post in the thread about Ramsey's hunting ritual and the game played by westerosi kids "monsters and maidens".

One of the Davos Povs, Asos:

When the fool saw Davos, he jerked to a sudden halt, the bells on his antlered tin helmet going ting-a-ling, ting-a-ling. Hopping from one foot to the other, he sang, “ Fool’s blood, king’s blood, blood on the maiden’s thigh, but chains for the guests and chains for the bridegroom, aye aye aye.”

Is it just me or has patchface just predicted the Red Wedding? The fool is off course the Frey that Cat kills iirc. Robb is the King. Blood on the maiden's thigh refers to Edmure's success in impregnating his wife and off course Edmure and the guests who arent killed all end up Frey prisoners...

Are there any other Patchface prophecies that have been discovered? We need to start parsing through everything that fool has ever whispered...

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The white raven from the Citadel, who speaks with secret auctorial voice whether from magical realism or from being inhabited by a greenseer, recognizes Patchface as a lost lord. That’s because Patches is descended from Prince Aerion Brightfire, the mad Targaryen monster who for his excesses was banished for a time to the Free Cities across the Narrow Sea.

Before Patchface’s death by drowning, he was a bright boy and clever. He was sold into slavery at Volantis, where the Volanteens marked him with a facial tattoo per their custom. His gift of prophesy comes from his hidden Targaryen ancestry. We learn all we need to know about Patches in Clash’s prologue:

Patchface had come to them as a boy. Lord Steffon of cherished memory had found him in Volantis, across the narrow sea. The king — the old king, Aerys II Targaryen, who had not been quite so mad in those days, had sent his lordship to seek a bride for Prince Rhaegar, who had no sisters to wed. “We have found the most splendid fool,” he wrote Cressen, a fortnight before he was to return home from his fruitless mission. “Only a boy, yet nimble as a monkey and witty as a dozen courtiers. He juggles and riddles and does magic, and he can sing prettily in four tongues. We have bought his freedom and hope to bring him home with us. Robert will be delighted with him, and perhaps in time he will even teach Stannis how to laugh.”

It saddened Cressen to remember that letter. No one had ever taught Stannis how to laugh, least of all the boy Patchface. The storm came up suddenly, howling, and Shipbreaker Bay prove d the truth of its name. The lord’s two-masted galley
Windproud
broke up within sight of his castle. From its parapets his two eldest sons had watched as their father’s ship was smashed against the rocks and swallowed by the waters. A hundred oarsmen and sailors went down with Lord Steffon Baratheon and his lady wife, and for days thereafter every tide left a fresh crop of swollen corpses on the strand below Storm’s End.

The boy washed up on the third day. Maester Cressen had come down with the rest, to help put names to the dead. When they found the fool he was naked, his skin white and wrinkled and powdered with wet sand. Cressen had thought him another corpse, but when Jommy grabbed his ankles to drag him off to the burial wagon, the boy coughed water and sat up.
To his dying day, Jommy had sworn that Patchface’s flesh was clammy cold.

No one ever explained those two days the fool had been lost in the sea. The fisherfolk liked to say a mermaid had taught him to breathe water in return for his seed. Patchface himself had said nothing. The witty, clever lad that Lord Steffon had written of never reached Storm’s End;
the boy they found was someone else
, broken in body and mind, hardly capable of speech, much less of wit. Yet his fool’s face left no doubt of who he was. It was the fashion in the Free City of Volantis to tattoo the faces of slaves and servants; from neck to scalp the boy’s skin had been patterned in squares of red and green motley.

“The wretch is mad, and in pain, and no use to anyone, least of all himself,” declared old Ser Harbert, the castellan of Storm’s End in those years. “The kindest thing you could do for that one is fill his cup with the milk of the poppy. A painless sleep, and there’s an end to it. He’d bless you if he had the wit for it.” But Cressen had refused, and in the end he had won. Whether Patchface had gotten any joy of that victory he could not say, not even today, so many years later.

“The shadows come to dance, my lord, dance my lord, dance my lord”
the fool sang on, swinging his head and making his bells clang and clatter.
Bong dong, ring-a-ling, bong dong.

“Lord,”
the white raven shrieked.
“Lord, lord, lord.”

“A fool sings what he will,” the maester told his anxious princess. “You must not take his words to heart. On the morrow he may remember another song, and this one will never be heard again.”
He can sing prettily in four tongues
, Lord Steffon had written...

Then much later in Dance, we have his scariness confirmed by the Red Seeress herself:

Ser Malegorn stepped forward. “I will escort Her Grace to the feast. We shall not require your … steward.” The way the man drew out the last word told Jon that he had been considering saying something else.
Boy? Pet? Whore?

Jon bowed again. “As you wish. I shall join you shortly.”

Ser Malegorn offered his arm, and Queen Selyse took it stiffly. Her other hand settled on her daughter’s shoulder. The royal ducklings fell in behind them as they made their way across the yard, marching to the music of the bells on the fool’s hat.
“Under the sea the mermen feast on starfish soup, and all the serving men are crabs,”
Patchface proclaimed as they went.
“I know, I know, oh, oh, oh.”

Melisandre’s face darkened. “That creature is dangerous. Many a time I have glimpsed him in my flames.
Sometimes there are skulls about him, and his lips are red with blood.

A wonder you haven’t had the poor man burned.
All it would take was a word in the queen’s ear, and Patchface would feed her fires. “You see fools in your fire, but no hint of Stannis?”

“When I search for him all I see is snow.”

The same useless answer.
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We don’t know that what the Red Priests see in their flames can’t be things that have already occurred. If so, then the skulls that Melisandre sees around Patches could well be those of Lord Steffon and his company, all of whose deaths paid for Patchface’s life.

Of the lips red with blood I am less certain, but it could again be connected with the deaths of the Storm Lord and his host.

We don’t know if Mel is correct about seeing enemies. We have strong reason to believe otherwise, in fact. She’s not all that accurate a seeress, preferring to overlay her visions with her desires. But if I’m right that Patches is descended from Aerion Brightflame, then one can almost see why she fears him.

I wonder whether Mel could drink wildfyre and live?

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I'd never given a thought that he might be one of Aerion's descendants, but it makes a weird sort of sense. I can see it.

But to the OP, yes, he seems to have predicted the Red Wedding and Renly's death, with the shadows.

You can sort of see patterns and meanings. "Under the sea," for instance, seems to refer to death.

Here's a neat interpretation: "Under the sea, the mermen (Manderlys) feast on starfish soup (starfish resemble hands — Davos) and the serving men are crabs (House Borrell of Sweetsister, who delivers Davos to White Harbor)."

There are creepier ones. One says something about "marching into the sea and back out," which indicates people dying and being resurrected. "And I will lead them!" *shivers*

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So the white raven is referring to Patchface as lord? and thus as a Targ? Instead of just repeating the last word like a parrot or referring to Stannis, Patchface's lord---who, after all, uses his "shadow" to kill Renly and what's-his-name who's holding Storm's End.

Didn't pick up on that. Then again, I'm one of those people who absolutely hates the prophecies and allegories and gets nothing out of them until a re-read project. Like I'm reading to my kids now, and recently read Patchface's RW lyric in ASOS and knew what it was. I realize some people really enjoy decoding them (and are good at it) and it's one of the common tropes of the genre. But (for example) I got nothing out of Dany's visions in the House of the Undying until re-reading after having read all the books........

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“Under the sea” also works as a code-phrase for something done in secret, since you never know what lurks unseen beneath its waves. In fact, that reading is necessary for Apple’s “neat interpretation”.

Calling Patchface a lord doesn’t make him a Targ, but if it is Brynden Rivers himself behind the white raven croaking out clues incognito (or would that be inravito? ; ), then it is much more likely that the lordship derives from his royal Targaryen kingsblood, much as Lord Brynden’s own does.

Plus Brynden knew Aerion, and as the once and future Protector of the Realm and éminence grise behind the Iron Throne, it makes sense that Bloodraven should keep an eye or three on Aerion’s descendents, wherever they are.

No, what makes Patches a lost scion of House Targaryen is his gift of prophecy, which in The Mystery Knight, Lord Brynden remarks is something visited upon House Targaryen from time to time irrespective of which side of the bed they should happen to be born on.

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Doth I detect ... snark? :P

Mais non, mademoiselle! Pas de snark, jamais!

Honest! I meant no snarketry at all.

I very much liked your reading of Patches’ jingle. I hadn’t ever thought about the relationship between the starfish, the five-pointed star that is the human hand, and (Ser-now-)Lord Davos’s appointment as Stannis’s Hand. Hm, but now that you mention it, can’t the starfish regrow a severed limb? I wonder how that relates to Davos’s own apocopated digits. Curious question, eh?

Neither had I paid enough attention to the arms of House Borrell and how those might relate here, although those of House Manderly I had indeed noted.

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Now I have to go back and read all the Patchface. I can't believe I wrote him off as a creepy idiot. What god(s) are backing his prophecy? We know the Old Gods and R'hllr can give it, but where does Patchface fit into it?

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Now I have to go back and read all the Patchface. I can't believe I wrote him off as a creepy idiot. What god(s) are backing his prophecy? We know the Old Gods and R'hllr can give it, but where does Patchface fit into it?

I’m pretty sure I recall that somewhere out there in the wild blue internet there exists a compendium of every single pronouncement which has from Patchface’s mouth issued. If someone finds that, could you please link to it here for all to read?

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Here are a few I've found.

"Under the sea, the crows are white as snow, I know, I know, oh, oh, oh. "

Could be: Jon dying and warging into Ghost, Night's Watch men dying and walking underwater as wights (dead things in the water), something else with Night's Watch men dying (wights -> white).

“We will march into the sea and out again. Under the waves we will ride seahorses, and mermaids will blow seashells to announce our coming, oh, oh, oh.”

Could be: We'll die and be resurrected. Are seahorses dead horses?

"In the dark the dead are dancing."

Obvious one: Dead people are rising as wights.

"Under the sea, men marry fishes. They do, they do, they do."

Could be: I dunno, a Tully?

"“Under the sea, smoke rises in bubbles, and flames burn green and blue and black,” Patchface sang somewhere. “I know, I know, oh, oh, oh.”

Could be: The Doom of Valyria, or the Blackwater.

"Under the sea, the birds have scales for feathers."

Could be: Dragons.

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"Under the sea," for instance, seems to refer to death. Here's a neat interpretation: "Under the sea, the mermen (Manderlys) feast on starfish soup (starfish resemble hands — Davos) and the serving men are crabs (House Borrell of Sweetsister, who delivers Davos to White Harbor)." *shivers*
Interesting. How is Manderley feasting on Davos though? To me that implies a less than positive relationship, and here I've been assuming Manderley was all good and awesome in the Davos storyline. But if he is feasting on Davos, that does not bode well ...
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Interesting. How is Manderley feasting on Davos though? To me that implies a less than positive relationship, and here I've been assuming Manderley was all good and awesome in the Davos storyline. But if he is feasting on Davos, that does not bode well ...

Think of "feasting" as "making good use of."

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I had never picked up on the White Raven's "Lord, Lord Lord!"

Interesting.

Here's another unique thing about Patchface... I have no clue what his angle is or what he's going to do. I like to think I have a general grasp on most characters and what they'll be doing from here on out....but for Patchface, I haven't the foggiest. Where did the prophetic flashes come from? I don't even have a theory. I'm at a total loss. <<The secret Targ via Aerion is intriguing and would provide some sort of an answer, but I fear he's about 50 years too young if my radio math is correct>>

As for Mel's prophesy regarding patchface... Mel's fire visions regarding death tend to have a considerably higher accuracy rating than non-death-related prophesies.

What I can say, is that I am entirely confident that Mel is right and he's going to do something really, really, really bad. Maybe he kills Shireen, or somehow is killed and becomes a wight then does his killing... maybe he's already dead and has been putting on a very good "i'm alive" act.

Once again, it seems I put more stock in Mel & her visions than the average bear.

Patchface is an enigma. Martin obviously had a plan for him fairly early on. Only adds to the confusion/mystery.

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Why is it certain that 'starfish soup' refers to Davos? And who are the 'crabs'?

Maybe starfish soup is Patchface's way of saying 'Frey Pie'. ;)

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