Frey family reunion

So he forced her handmaids into pulling down a tower? And then let them wander the desert? What a gentleman.

If you want to nitpick, you can argue that when GRRM says their answer was “correct” he meant that this was the answer he wanted to hear to give them the job. In other words that they didn’t just do a shallow read of the story, but were able to piece together some subtle (?) clues that George placed in the story. While I feel fairly confident about Lyanna being Jon’s mother, I would note that George has stated on one of his audio commentaries for the show, that when he set out to write the story, he wanted to write it with a twist that would surprise a reader like his mother. His mother, George explained, would always figure out the twists in the Twilight Zones they would watch together, before the show revealed them. He wanted to be able to to make a twist that would surprise even her. My guess is that George’s mother would probably have pieced together the clues he’s laying out concerning Rhaegar and Lyanna. So the question is what is George’s super secret hidden twist that would even fool his mom?

I think today, they would call it a toxic relationship.

Yea, I think you missed that bit. While I disagree with Mourning’s theory about Old Nan, I think his observation that Bloodraven was the watchful weirwood in Bran’s dreams was brilliant. That bit would have never occurred to me. He’s just suggesting that Bloodraven is not the chatty crow.

I understood what you were talking about, my question is what did Ned do with them? After all, if everything is supposed to be so hush hush, what do with all of these loose ends running about? Or do you just leave them to starve? I mean you already have Ned forcing them into pulling down a tower that had been their abode just a few minutes ago, what do you do with them then?

So Ned forced some Dornish servants into indentured servitude, to pull down an inhabited tower? Afterwards did he also have them dig their own shallow graves to silence what they saw? Or did he just make them pinkie swear? Then they sawed up Lyanna, put her in a big pot to boil, so they could carry her bones? And then they decide to trek through enemy territory with a baby in tow, through the Mountains of Dorne, just so they could get a sword back to their enemy House Dayne? When they could have returned the sword at any later time? The more people you start to insert into this scenario, and the more unnecessary actions you put in the scenario the less likely it becomes. I think based on the evidence at hand, I would at most put one additional person at the tower, the wet nurse Wylla. So the delineation of responsibilities should be fairly clear. Howland dug the graves, Ned pulled down the tower to mark the graves, and Wylla saw to the infant. They then rode off on three horses. Ned’s horse, Howland’s horse, and presumably the red stallion for Wylla and the boy. And the reason they made the decision to take an arduous, dangerous journey to Starfall should be pretty simple, they weren’t returning a sword to Starfall, they were returning a child to her mother, who was in Starfall. ETA: And let’s not forget that while we’re treating this as some type of uninhabited wilderness, it really wasn’t. Prince’s Pass was inhabited and controlled by House Manwoody. And in case you forgot, Lord Manwoody was one of the lords that accompanied Oberyn to King’s Landing to get justice for Elia. And more than that, he along with Damon Sands acted as Oberyn’s squire before Oberyn’s duel with the Mountain. The fact that Damon Sand was in truth a prior squire of Oberyn’s makes it a decent bet that Lord Manwoody could have also been a former squire of Oberyn. A long winded reason to say that House Manwoody was probably pretty close to Elia’s very protective brother. Which makes it an even odder place to bring servants and maesters, and set up house for your pregnant paramour, a decision that has apparently caused a lot of anger among the Dornish, that you are putting her amongst.

I’m not arguing with you. I think the pledge that Aemon refers to carries as much weight as the oath. Jon also seems to imply that they swore a vow not to get involved in what he planned for the Bastard of Bolton:

If Ned had remembered that the mysterious “they” pulled down the tower, I might agree with you. But he remembers that he pulled down the tower. And it’s not like Ned to hog all the credit. The bigger the production the less likely it would have happened. After all he just needed something to mark graves, and then he and Howland needed to move on. I don’t see a Dornish construction crew coming out and hooking the horses up to harnesses. I think we’re getting a bit carried away here.

Nah, I think all of the towers you showed are too big, for a single person to tear down and would provide way more stones than what would be needed to make eight cairns. Thus no reason to pull the tower down. I’d guess about a four to five foot high base perhaps surrounding a subterranean vault. Probably not someplace you would bring your pregnant girlfriend for her honeymoon. Of course I’m not visualizing an inhabited dwelling, my guess, is it might have been more useful as a furnace and chimney.

You’re right technically not a vow, but a pledge:

I’ve seen an interview where he kind of sort of concedes that they got their guess right about Lyanna. At least that was my take on the interview. I’ll try to go back and see if i can find what I’m thinking about. Re: D & D, if memory serves it was a print interview where they indicated their reveal was not necessarily George’s reveal. Of course I’m doing what I hate other posters doing, because I’m basically going off my memory. I’ll do a little research on both and see if I can locate the interviews I’m thinking about.

Yep, it was Stannis’ wife that was the fanatic. He was pretty skeptical up to the point that the three kings died after Melisandre’s leech show. That’s when he started to take the idea of sacrificing Edric Storm pretty seriously.

Maybe. I’m just not convinced that Quentyn ever held himself out as a dragon, to qualify as a false one. He was hoping that the Valyrian line in House Martell might be enough, but there is nothing false about this. When he did misrepresent himself, it was as a frog not a dragon. Now usually these flame visions, I thought were supposed to decipher future events. So I’m not sure Moqorro would also be looking at Tyrion’s past involvement with “dragons”, but I suppose it’s possible. I thought the same thing when I first read the passage, but now I’m unsure. As for “Bright Dragon” I usually look to similar phrasing in the same book that the prophecy is contained in. And both Young Griff and Dany were repeatedly referred to as Bright Prince and Bright Queen respectively in ADWD. Both are also roughly of the same age, so I suppose the bright and young dragons could refer to both Griff and Dany. Then perhaps the false and true is how they become differentiated. I still see Bloodraven as the best answer to both the “dark” dragon and the “old” dragon. So perhaps we’re looking at a three way conflict: Griff vs. Dany vs. Bloodraven.

While I was being a bit snarky, I'm fairly serious about the fact that based on Eddard's own description of events, and making an assumption that they left this location with an infant, they would not have taken the time to have pulled down a tower that would have taken a great deal of time and effort to have torn down. My guess is the tower was already a ruin. When Ned starts his dream, I think he describes it as how the events appeared as they first unfolded: In other words, I think the tower was already long fallen when he first encountered the knights in the Prince's Pass. Which is why he was able to single handedly (no mention of Howland Reed's help in his memory) pull down the remaining stones, and why they were only enough to make eight cairns. If the tower was a structure capable of long term habitation, I don't think he would have taken the time and effort it would have required to have pulled the thing down. Not just to use as grave markers. And not if he had an infant to deal with. So if you want to use an in story example, look to Bran's Tumbledown tower. some remaining stones hidden in the undergrowth circling a vault underneath.

I think I misspoke, you’re correct regarding the philosophies of Meera and Jojen. This was the quote Preston focused on: