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Frey family reunion

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  1. I understand this position. If you can’t accept that the author would make a POV who represses her memories, then this theory isn’t for you, and I would anticipate probably not for most people. I think the big problem most would have is that the repressed memories would have to occur almost in real time. I think readers have an easier time with the idea that Eddard may have repressed memories from the fairly distant past concerning Lyanna, but having Sansa repress a memory from an event that just happened might be too much. I get it. A while back George responded to a question concerning the purple wedding, where the question pretty much assumed that Olenna did the poisoning. GRRM responded and then added that Olenna taking credit as being the poisoner was from the show only, and he might have a surprise up his sleeve. Of course that also implies that he might not have a surprise up his sleeve. ETA here’s the exact quote: I think if George does give a twist, I think Sansa actually being the poisoner may very well be the twist that he’ll give us. I just think he actually did lay the ground work for it in the text, which hopefully I pointed out. Of course maybe he decides not to give a twist, in which case I assume that the event played as Littlefinger describes. But as for Littlefinger, one thing that needs to be kept in mind is that he wasn’t actually at the wedding. So of course there is the possibility that he’s just as much in the dark as to why Joffrey was poisoned and who poisoned Joffrey, as Sansa claims to be. But of course Littlefinger is never going to let on, especially to Sansa, that he’s not in complete control of the situation. And the one thing the guy is very good at is thinking quickly on his feet. So perhaps he either thinks Sansa is playing her own game by feigning ignorance, which he plays along with, or he may genuinely not know who would have poisoned Joffrey if not Sansa, unless of course it was the one other person at the wedding who would have at some point possessed poison, and also possessed a motive for killing Joffrey. But as for your last point, no I don’t think I agree with it. There is no reason to assume that the audience would be laser focused on Sansa or what she was doing sitting next to Tyrion. But for the moment, let’s say you’re right and everyone is ignoring the king, the queen, the spectacle and everything else and just staring at the dias where Tyrion and Sansa are seated. That’s where Olenna would have had to go to poison the food or drink that Joffrey either ate or drank. Wouldn’t that mean that her presence at that exact moment also be noted? And the one thing that gets forgotten is just how small Olenna is. And she uses a walking cane. If she poisoned Joffrey’s wine it had to be after it was laid on the table in front of Tyrion. For Tyrion to pick retrieve the chalice he had to stand on the table to get it. How does the equally tiny Olenna put herself in a position to drop the poison in Joffrey’s chalice? And how would she do it without attracting attention to herself?
  2. You're twisting things up a bit too much. Olenna tells Sansa that she is leaving the day after next and wishes that invites Sansa to accompany her. In other words, leave with me the day after next. Because the hairnet is a only contingency plan, in case the Lannisters marry her to Tyrion. If Sansa is never married there is no need for a poisoning and Sansa just gets to have a nice hairnet with rare amethysts from Asshai. But no poison. Olenna has no intention of personally poisoning anyone, because she's not going to risk getting caught. The whole plot would be to get a desperate Sansa to do their dirty work for them. But Olenna is never going to personally contact Sansa with regards to the hairnet because it's too risky. Dontos remains the middle man both for Olenna and Petyr, because he can always be silenced after the fact, and no one is going to believe a drunk Dontos over Olenna. Dontos first gives Sansa the hairnet with the instruction to bring it to the wedding. That it will help free her. Then when she's married to Tyrion and truly desperate, Dontos approaches her again and tells her that Olenna is going to put something in her hairnet on the day of the wedding. She needs to drop what she's given int into Tyrion's food or drink and she'll be free of her marriage. What Olenna perhaps doesn't know is that Dontos is also passing on information for Petyr, for Sansa to find Dontos when everyone at the wedding is distracted and he'll get her out of King's Landing. When Olenna sees Sansa at the wedding with the hair net, that's Olenna's sign that Sansa is willing to go through with Dontos' instructions. Then and only then does Sansa get the poison through the hair net. Olenna also adds some very subtle encouragements of her own as she replaces the stone with the poison. Once again it's a contingency plan to make sure Sansa is available for marriage after Margaery's marriage to Joffrey takes place. Olenna would suspect that the Lannisters aren't going to maintain their hold of Sansa after her engagement to Joffrey is broken by marrying her to another Lannister, most probably Tyrion. Pety is counting on this happening. Now whatever verbal dance Petyr and Olenna play at Highgarden is anyone's guess. But it comes away with both agreeing that even if Sansa is married, there are ways that the marriage can be ended. Once Dontos becomes the go between, whether that be from Olenna to Sansa or Petyr to Sansa or both, Pety is always going to be kept informed about how Olenna is going to free up Sansa, if in fact they didn't spell it out to each other from the beginning. Which they might have if it only concerned Tyrion's death, but I'm fairly certain woudld not have if it concerned Joffrey's death. And no, Olenna's reasons for killing Tyrion aren't stronger than Petyr's. That's complete hogwash. Olenna's only motivation in killing Tyrion is to free up Sansa for Willas. Petyr has his own grandiose plans for an unmarried Sansa, but he also has a very personal motivation for killing Tyrion for when Tyrion played him for a fool in ACOK. And Petyr was also most probably responsible for Tyrion's attempted murder at the Battle of the Blackwater. This whole thing about Olenna trying to stop Tywin from taking the North, is your complete fan fiction. There's nothing to suggest this, other than Olenna wants Winterfell for her House. That's all there is to it. This is a power grab by House Tyrell, this has nothing to do with some noble scheme to save the realm from the Lannisters. Sansa has always been a valuable prize. Especially after Bran and Rickon are supposedly killed. Because that left her after Robb. And since Robb was in active war against the Iron Throne, it's pretty clear that if or when Robb lost Robb wasn't going to be alive to take Winterfell. That means Sansa has always been the key to Winterfell even before the Red Wedding. She's an extremely valuable prize, and that's not even taking into her account her Stark bloodline which I'm sure Olenna would also covet for her House. Her House still having a bit of an inferiority complex despite their status as the Head of the Reach. But yes, Sansa's marriage does force Olenna's hand into poisoning Tyrion, but that doesn't mean Olenna is going to personally drop the poison. It's too risky and Olenna would have no reason to believe that she would have the opportunity to do it without being caught. Manipulating Sansa to do it, though is a different story. Let Sansa take the risk, and have the poisoner be the one person that would be in the best position to poison Tyrion. Which has always been the weakest part of your theory that Olenna directly poisoned Tyrion. GRRM gave us no information that Olenna was in a position to drop the poison in Tyrion's pie. We know Olenna and Margaerys walked over when Joffrey was humiliating Tyrion with the wine, but we dont' have any reason to believe that she was still there after the pie came out, or that she had ever gotten close enough to have access to Tyrion's food. In reality, there is only one person that we know for 100% certainty was in a position to either poison Tyrion's pie, or poison Joffrey's goblet before he took his fatal swallow, and that's Sansa. Ummm, what? I'm sorry this makes no sense. Killing Tyrion doesnt' stalemate House Lannister. There's a ton of Lannisters out there they could have remarried Sansa to. None of this diminishes Tywin's power in the slightest. Tywin is the undisputed head of House Lannister, including uncles, cousins, ect. Whatever Lannister they would have married Sansa to after Tyrion's death would have still delivered Winterfell into the House Lannister's treasure chest. And I'm still not sure why you think that Sansa couldn't be married to Willas after Tyrion's death. You've never explained that. For all I know Olenna, has a stockpile of poison, but why bring more than one crystal to the wedding? She's only planning on one person being poisoned, so having more than one poison crystal does is create a chance of being caught with poison that causes symptoms of choking at a wedding where someone chokes to death. And her reason for passing it to Sansa is simple, as stated numerous times. Sansa has the motive to poison Tyrion, and Sansa has the opportunity to poison Tyrion, since she's the only one sitting next to Tyrion other than Garlan Tyrell. And Garlan doesnt' seem like the type that would agree to poison Tyrion. Olenna doesn't have the opportunity to do it, at least no unobserved. Remeber she's not much taller than Tyrion, and not terribly mobile. How you expect her to find a way to Tyrion's side to poison him without anyone observing this is anyone guess. Plus, why would she take the chance of doing it herself and getting caught. Like Petyr said, "clean hands". Always get someone else to do your dirty work for you. That's what Olenna wants from Sansa.
  3. Except that doesn't make any sense. Don't forget the purpose of using the Strangler. It's purpose is to be dissolved in wine and make it look like the recipient choked on his food. Not that he was poisoned. So why try to frame Tyrion for a poisoning and then use a poison that makes it look like the victim wasn't poisoned? The other problem was that it wasn't the jousting dwarves that implicated Tyrion, it was Cersei. And as we find out Cersei had been convinced by a childhood prophecy that Tyrion was going to murder her children. Which is why Cersei is the only one that comes to the conclusion that Tyrion poisoned Joffrey. There is no way that Petyr would have been aware of any of this. Had Cersei not pointed the finger at Tyrion, it's very possible that they would have thought that Joffrey choked on his food. In other words, Littlefinger was full of crap when he told Sansa that. But Littlefinger need to make it look like he's in complete control of the situation. And Littlefinger is very good at thinking on his feet, as we saw with how he used the valyrian dagger to his advantage. So Littlefinger claims credit for Joffrey's death (even though he has nothing to gain) and with implicating Tyrion, which he does have something to gain, but there was no way he could have known that Tyrion would have been blamed until after the fact. I think the true purpose of the jousting dwarves was something even more sinister. He was trying to further humiliate Sansa about being married to a dwarf, to make it easier for her to poison Tyrion at the wedding.
  4. Yes, go back and read my theory. This was my initial sticking point with this theory because I always assumed that the amethysts in the hairnet were all poison. And if Sansa was the poisoner how would Pety know that Olenna fooled with the hairnet. But then it occurred to me, that the hair net that Sansa was given could actually be what it was purported to be, a hair net with black amethysts from Asshai. But the magic in the hairnet lay in the fact that they looked just like the Strangler crystal. Thus, perhaps, Olenna did not receive the poison from Sansa at the wedding from her hairnet, but perhaps the reverse, Olenna provided the poison to Sansa by replacing one of the stones in her hairnet with the Strangler poison. And Sansa knew that she was supposed to drop this replaced stone into Tyrion's wine when the food was being eaten. To make it look like he choked on his food, and thus freeing her from her marriage. So the reason that Pety knew that Olenna fiddled with Sansa's hairnet, is that was always part of their plan, first concocted in Highgarden. That they would give Sansa the hairnet, Olenna would bring the poison, and transfer it to the hairnet on the day of the wedding. And they concocted this plan because they knew that with Joffrey's new marriage pact with Margaery, Sansa would be free to marry and Sansa would be too tempting a prize for Olenna to ignore. Pety also would have convinced Olenna, that the Lannisters would undoubtably just marry Sansa to Tyrion before Olenna could have a chance to get Sansa to Highgarden to marry Willas. Or perhaps Olenna would have come up with this on her own. Either way, my guess is that this impediment wasn't a big deal for Olenna. Because she had been rumored to use poison before. So that's how she solves her problems. And Petyr is undoubtably aware of this. Petyr allows Olenna to concoct the plan, all the while plotting to double cross her by using the poisoning as a way to smuggle Sansa on to his ship. But they wouldnt' give the poison to Sansa until she agreed to go along with the plan. And both Pety and Olenna believed that being married to the disfigured, despised, dwarf, who's family destroyed Sansa's family would be sufficient motivation for her to go along with it. So when Olenna sees Sansa with the hairnet on the day of the wedding, that had to be confirmation to her that Sansa was going to go along with the plan. And Olenna further tries to motivate Sansa, as she replaces the stone in her hairnet with the poison, by reminding her of her brother's murder, her being taken to Highgarden, and all of the food that Tyrion was going to eat.
  5. Except that who is going to set aside her marriage to Tyrion for her? Certainly not the King, whether it be Joffrey or Tommen. The Lannisters control the kingdom and they don't want to give up Sansa. So they aren't going to allow the marriage to be annulled, certainly not so Sansa could marry Willas. And of course at some point the marriage may get consummated. The Lannisters sure were pushing hard for it. If push came to shove, Sansa couldn't refuse Tyrion. So her only way out is to go through with a plan whereby it looks like Tyrion chokes to death on a morsel of food, and Sansa scoots out of King's Landing, hopefully to either the North or Highgarden where she'll be free to remarry. Yes when Dontos first gives her the hairnet, he only says that the hairnet is magical, and it will get her home and it will get her justice. My theory is that Sansa was fully informed as to what she needed to do only after she was married to Tyrion. At that point she'd be desperate enough to do what she needed to free herself of the marriage. And in this case, she would be told that Olenna would replace one of her stones and she needed to drop that replaced stone into Tyrion's wine when the food was served. And this was going to free her from her marriage. Now this conversation would have occurred "off screen" so the reader wasn't privy to it. But this conversation would have occurred between the Tyrion chapter where she was married to Tyrion and before the Sansa chapter where she was preparing for the day of the wedding. That's why on the day of the wedding we get these thoughts from Sansa: In other words, she knew that on that day she would either rid herself of her marriage to Tyrion and escape King's Landing, or be caught in the attempt to do so and be executed. Either way her suffering would be over. And the only way that she knew she'd be rid of her marriage to Tyrion is that her dropping the replaced stone into his wine or food was actually poison. Undoubtably she knew this even if it wasn't completely spelled out for her. And she knew she wouldn't be executed just by trying to escape King's Landing. But she would be executed if she was caught trying to poison Tyrion. But then after she committed the act, which was either attempting to poison Tyrion but fate intervened and her poisoned pie ended up in Joffrey's mouth. Or she successfully poisoned Joffrey by dropping the stone in his goblet. The realization of what she did was too much for her and she represses what she's done. If Sansa was truly ignorant of the plan to poison Joffrey, there was no reason for Sansa to assume that Joffrey had been poisoned. That's the point of using the Strangler, it's supposed to make it look like the recipient choked on his own food. That should have been Sansa's only thought at the time, that Joffrey was choking on the pie he wolfed down. But instead her gaze immediately goes to the empty socket on her hair net. There shoudln't have been any reason for her eye to go there and immediately equate it with Joffrey's death, unless deep down in her sub conscious she knew the significance of the empty socket, that it contained poison given to her by Olenna and she was responsible for getting it in the pie or the wine that Joffrey consumed.
  6. I think I’ve already address this. Sansa had every motivation in the world to poison Tyrion because it freed her from the Lannisters and the hell that went along with it. While Tyrion wasn’t a monster to her, her marriage to Tyrion left her to Joffey’s mercies. Remember, Joffrey telling Sansa that he was still going to have his way with her after her marriage to Tyrion. In her mind her only way free of the Lannisters and thus free of Joffrey was getting rid of Tyrion, and hopefully escaping either to back to the North or to Highgarden where she’d be married off to someone who could protect her. Joffrey made it clear to her that Tyrion wasn’t going to be able to protect her from him. But I’m not sure even with that motivation, Sansa could have gone along with the poisoning. At least not poisoning Tyrion, who had always been somewhat kind to her. But then just when perhaps she decided that she wasn’t going to use the poison, Joffrey comes up to their table, and lays is chalice right in front of her and Tyrion. So all of a sudden someone who she truly did hate and despise had opened himself up to being the victim of the poison she possessed. That’s why I think the choice of the poison being in the pie or the wine is so interesting. In reality it could really reveal a lot about Sansa’s character. If she ultimately decided to poison Tyrion she’d have to put it in his pie. Take a look at that chapter, Tyrion was out of wine and was about to ask the serving girl for more, when Joffrey brought in the dwarves and ended up dumping his wine on Tyrion. Tyrion watches them cut the pie and serve it, and then tells Sansa that they were leaving. The only thing in front of Tyrion at that time was his pie, Tyrion never did end up asking for some more wine. So if Joffrey was poisoned from the pie, then Sansa had made the decision to poison Tyrion to free herself from the Lannisters grasp. And I think the ultimate motivation to do that would have been her realization as to what happened to Ice, and equating Ice’s fate with hers. But then Joffrey eats the pie. But if Joffrey was poisoned through the goblet in his wine, I think that Sansa ultimately couldn’t’ bring herself to poison Tyrion, but when Joffrey approached with his goblet she made the sudden decision to poison Joffrey’s wine. And it goes without saying that Joffrey had provided her with plenty of motivation even if this wasn’t Sansa’s initial plan and it didn’t get her out of her marriage to Tyrion.
  7. It’s the discussion at the wedding I’m referring to. Olenna should know by that time that Tyrion was going to be poisoned and she tells Sansa when they were leaving. I don’t have any reason to believe that Olenna was lying. The Willas plan isn’t a bust, not once Tyrion is dead. Once Tyrion dies, Sansa is free to marry Willas. That’s why they need to get Sansa out quickly, they don’t want to wait for the Lannisters to find someone else to marry her. Keeping Sansa in King’s Landing for an extended period of time would have ensured that Sansa would have been remarried to a Lannister. And yes, the whole point/benefit of poisoning Tyrion, for Olenna, would have been to make Sansa a Tyrell. Which then gives the Tyrells a claim to Winterfell. But to do so they need to get her to Highgarden quickly after Tyrion’s death. Of course Olenna was in on the plan in the beginning. Do you think Dontos pulled her aside in King’s Landing and told her “hey just for your info, Sansa is going to have a whole lot of poison in her hairnet the day of the wedding, feel free to help yourself”. That’s absurd. The only way that Olenna knows about the hair net (and Petyr knows that Olenna knows about the hairnet) is if she and Petyr came up with this idea in Highgarden. Once it was settled that the Joffrey is going to break off his engagement with Sansa, Olenna is going to be very interested in laying a claim to Sansa. They both agree that the Lannisters will probably marry her off to Tyrion before they can bring her to Highgarden so they make the contingency plan concerning the hair net. Olenna is most probably the one who supplied it. But there is no reason for Olenna to go through with the poisoning if Sansa is not married after Joffrey’s wedding. Then they can take her to Highgarden without the need to poison anyone. Petyr ratted out their plan to the Lannisters because his plan to snatch Sansa for himself relied on the poisoning at the wedding. Plus he really hated Tyrion. So he felt the need to hurry up and get Sansa married before Joffrey’s wedding. This is Petyr’s way of ensuring the marriage to Tyrion takes place in time. Dontos does try to nip the idea in the bud, but Sansa doesn’t care. Once she is given the invite to Highgarden she feels no need to run off with Dontos on the day of the wedding. It’s only when she’s married to Tyrion that she has no choice but to go ahead with their plan. Of course their plan also concerns getting ride of her husband. Which is the only reason Sansa would go along with it. That’s the only way she becomes truly free of the Lannisters. I’d have to go back and look at the sequence, you may be right but it doesn’t matter. Olenna’s only concern is getting Sansa to Highgarden free to marry Willas. If she has to help poison a dwarf husband of Sansa so be it. But if she doesn’t that’s even better. Petyr’s secret plan to snatch Sansa for himself completely relies on the poisoning at the wedding. Hence, Littlefinger ensuring that Sansa gets married to Tyrion. The reason for the hair net is that is how Olenna is going to pass to Sansa the poison on the day of the wedding, through her hair net. Olenna is going to pass the poison to Sansa because Sansa is realistically the only one who’s going to be in the position to surreptitiously poison Tyrion at the wedding. But until then there is absolutely no reason to give Sansa the poison. They have to make sure that she’s willing. It’s her marriage to Tyrion that gives her the desperation to go along with the plan. (It’s also why on the day of the wedding Sansa tries to summon up the courage of her warrior brother). There is no way that Olenna is just going to blindly take a gem from Sansa’s hair net on the word of Littlefinger or Dontos that it’s poison. The only way that she agrees with this plan is that she helps come up with this plan. Olenna is not a pawn to do Petyr’s bidding. Olenna gives the hairnet to Petyr to have Petyr give it to Sansa. Petyr has Dontos give the hair net to Sansa, with the instruction to wear it on the day of the wedding. For Olenna, the hairnet will only be necessary if Sansa is married. Olenna supplies the poison, Petyr supplies the poisoner. Both keep their hands clean and get someone else to do the dirty work for them. In this case, it’s a young girl who both believe will be so desperate to get out of a marriage to Tyrion that she’ll be willing to do their dirty work for them.
  8. She told Sansa that she was going to bring her to Highgarden the day after the wedding because that’s what she was going to do. The whole point of poisoning Tyrion was to free Sansa up for a marriage into her House. Keeping Sansa in King’s landing that long would have just given the Lannisters an opportunity to marry her into someone else in their household, and the whole plan would have been for naught. So yes I think she had every intention of taking Sansa and leaving the next day regardless of how that looked. And what you are ignoring is that Tywin can’t stop her. That’s why they hurried up and married her to Tyrion. They know if push comes to shove, that the Tyrells are too strong for the Lannisters to control. And the Lannisters need the Tyrells more than the Tyrells need the Lannisters. And the other thing that Olenna is probably aware of is that even if they suspect foul play with regards to Tyrion’s death they aren’t going to look too hard into it. If anything, Tyrion’s death removes a problem (and an embarrassment) for Tywin. He will be safely assured that Tyrion will never get his hands on Casterly Rock. Tyrion even suspects that the reason that Tywin went to war over his abduction had little to do with any fondness for Tyrion and instead had to do with the Lannister reputation. That they would be seen as weak if they allowed Tyrion’s abduction to go unpunished. And that’s the one thing that Tywin detests, being seen as weak. Now if everyone believed that Tyrion choked on his dinner, then I think that Tywin would be happy to leave everyone with that impression, even if he had his own doubts. The only reason that Olenna would have to murder Tyrion is his marriage to Sansa, that’s it. So if she was indeed part of the plan early on, then it’s because she and Petyr anticipated that the Lannisters would marry her to Tyrion. So the necklace and the poison would be the contingency to something they were pretty sure was going to happen before she had a chance to leave after Margaery’s wedding. What I don’t think that Petyr or Olenna anticipated was that Tyrion would drag his feet about marrying Sansa. Undoubtably they thought that Tyrion would have jumped at the chance. But since he dragged his feet, suddenly there was a possibility that Olenna could have taken Sansa to Highgarden before she was married, and thus there was no reason to go along with the poisoning. And that’s what prompted Petyr to tell the Lannisters about Olenna’s plans, he gave them the impetus to hurry up and force the marriage to Tyrion. As for awkward, if Tyrion was the target than Sansa becomes the one person who would be in the best position to drop the poison. Why give the poison to Sansa, only to take it back from her at the wedding, when you aren’t going to be in a good position to poison the intended victim? It would have been far safer to have kept the poison yourself and bring it with you if you were planning on personally doing the poison. Leaving it with Sansa only increases the chance of it being discovered, or stolen, or left behind. So Sansa doesn’t get the poison until the time of the wedding, after she’s been married to the dwarf. So now she has a very strong motivation to go along with the plan, because she would be desperate to get out of the marriage. Olenna doesn’t have to take the risk of poisoning Tyrion herself (clean hands) and Sansa is in the best place to deliver the poison at the wedding. And if Sansa can’t bring herself to poison Tyrion, then it’s’ a shame and she’s stuck with her husband with no one to blame but herself. Which is why both Olenna and Petyr do everything they can to give her the additional motivations. In addition to the motivation of ending her marriage to the ugly, unpopular dwarf, Olenna reminds Sansa of her brother’s murder by the Lannisters, and of what’s awaiting her in Highgarden. And Petyr gets the jousting dwarves who’s purpose IMO, wasn’t to cast guilt on Tyrion for Joffrey’s death, but instead was to give Sansa an additional shame/motivation to drop the poison in Tyrion’s food. Does she really want to still be married to the joke of King’s Landing. Where Petyr missteps, is that Sansa really isn’t that shallow. And of course, Tyrion deftly turns the situation on its head and uses it to embarrass Joffrey. Instead the proper motivation for Sansa to perhaps go ahead with poisoning Tyrion comes from a completely unforeseen source. Sansa’s realization that Ice has been destroyed and remade into a Lannister sword. Something that she can directly relate with. So her only chance to prevent herself from being broken and remade into a Lannister is to poison Tyrion and get out of her marriage.
  9. Sansa’s trauma is that she murdered someone. That’s something that she can’t cope with. That’s the memory that she is swallowing, i.e. repressing. Girls with good hearts don’t murder. And yes, the hysterical part of the laughter implies a mental instability. She was starting to crack up. And while it’s possible that she has guilt over Arya and her father, those are emotions she’s had a long time to deal with. I don’t know if that would cause the sudden onset of hysterical laughing, especially after all the time she spent being punished for her decisions. But if she had just tried to kill Tyrion or successfully killed Joffrey, this was something new that she hadn’t had time to process. Hence her subconscious quickly repressing what she did to maintain her sanity.
  10. I’ll try to respond to some of your posts in a bit, but first I wanted to put out the fourth and hopefully last part of the theory. IV. The Aftermath. My suspicion is that GRRM likes to explore the idea of an unreliable POV narrator a bit with Sansa. Most here know about her false memory of the kiss she received from Sandor Clegane. But I think there may be a bit more than that. One of my favorite pet theories has to do with the fact George’s eye color “mistakes” often happen in Sansa’s POVs. Two that spring to mind are Renly’s green eyes as opposed to blue for Renly, and Loras’ golden eyes as opposed to brown. Interestingly enough, those might not be mistakes on the part of the author. He may intentionally be playing with the idea of Sansa’s point of view early in her experience in King’s Landing: So if you’re looking at blue eyes through a gold or yellow lens, they turn green, and if you look at brown eyes through the same lens they turn golden. If George did this on purpose, then that’s a neat trick. It’s also at least hinted that Ned may have repressed part of his memory of Lyanna’s death bed, a memory that creeps up on certain occasions. If so, then it wouldn’t surprise me if Ned’s daughter might also repress a traumatic event herself. So let’s go to the aftermath of the Purple Wedding. And So it’s fairly important to note when Sansa fled. Joffrey was still choking and Cersei had not yet accused Tyrion of having poisoned him. In fact at the time Sansa fled no one had accused anyone of a poisoning. Which makes sense because that’s the whole purpose of the Strangler, to make it look like the victim had choked on a morsel of food. So presumably, Sansa if she had been completely ignorant of the significance of her hair net, should have no reason to believe that Joffrey was poisoned or that anyone had murdered him. She should have thought that he just choked on the pie he was wolfing down. In addition, it is interesting that though Sansa talks about fleeing because of the awful sight of Joffrey choking to death, she is also following the game plan, for the evening. To flee while everyone is distracted. And she flees towards the hollowed tree where she had hidden her dark cloak. But here is the moment where I think Sansa repressed her part in Joffrey’s death: So why would someone telling her that she had a good heart have prompted hysterical laughter? What has Sansa done recently other than being the victim of the Lannisters, that would have made her laugh hysterically to the notion that she has a good heart? Is it possible that this prompted the response from Sansa because she knows what she just did. That she either tried to poison Tyrion to end her unwanted marriage or she successfully poisoned Joffrey? And when she swallows her laughter, she represses this memory, into her subconscious. Normally, when we swallow something it goes into our stomach. So when her tummy flutters, is that her subconscious threatening to bubble up? If she represses what she did, is the thought of Tyrion dying and thus freeing her, causing her tummy to flutter a sign that this is what she had intentionally intended? To poison Tyrion? But she’s buried the thought deep in her subconscious. So now, as she hurriedly tries to escape King’s Landing, if she’s ignorant of the poison in her hairnet and what surely caused Joffrey to be killed, why does her eyes go to the empty socket in her hairnet? Even if her conscious mind had repressed what she did, her subconscious knows, and it directs her attention to the hair net. And her subconscious starts desperately looking for someone to blame. And it lands on Dontos: It’s quite the intuitive leap for Sansa to jump to Joffrey choking on a pie, to her the stones in her hair net being poison which was used on Joffrey. Unless of course it’s really not an intuitive leap. Deep down, buried in her subconscious she knows the truth, and it’s buried deep down in her tummy.
  11. It was the bells, tolling. They ring for the death of a King, not for the death of a dwarf.
  12. It’s not the visual look of the Strangler crystals vs the amethyst that I have issue with. It’s the idea that they would withstand any physical handling. In other words, a salt crystal can look very much like a rock formation, but it can be fairly easily broken or crushed. That’s why I found it interesting that Cressen touched his crystal lightly. Perhaps he needed to to anvoid breaking it. And Sansa isn’t the only one handling the hairnet, we have her maids handling it as well. Also the sheer amount of the poison that a hairnet full of Stranglers makes me skeptical that all of the stones were actually poison. It would be extremely rare and incredibly incriminating, a huge overkill for killing one person. And I doubt that whoever could get their hands on so much poisons would be willing to poison one person and then lose the rest.
  13. When Olenna removes one of the stones in the hair net, she replaces it with the poison. So Olenna doesn’t have to choose a particular stone. As for Sansa, like I stated above, perhaps Sansa can tell based on where Olenna concentrates her efforts, or perhaps the pat on the head was directed exactly to the location where the stone was replaced. ETA: It would also be the one “stone” that would be the loosest in it’s setting, which would also be the giveaway. I suppose another possibility is that it was worked out ahead of time. Perhaps one of the amethysts was removed prior to the wedding, and that’s the location that Olenna inserted the poison.
  14. The first point you bring up, I’ll be addressing in my next (and last) part. As for the second part, it’s a fair point, and I’ve never worn a hair net so I’m speaking out of school a bit. But my guess is Sansa could tell which stone was removed based on the pressure of Olenna’s fingers. And in the event she couldn’t, Olenna might have given her a reminder before she takes her leave of her: She reminds Sansa about the food Tyrion’s going to eat and perhaps pats her right on the spot where she changed the stone for the poison, to give her a final reminder. ETA: One additional possibility that I thought of is that the stone that was switched would be the one looses in the settings, so that could also be the giveaway.
  15. But this domino effect only started with Tywin’s death not Joffrey’s. Joffrey as King and Cersei as regent with no Tywin would arguably be worse than Tommen as King with Cersei as regent. Joffrey was just as unstable as Cersei if not more so and there would be little she could do to control him. Tywin was the stabilizing element. And Petyr had nothing to do with Tywin’s death. So it wasn’t Joffrey’s death that contributed to the chaos. And as an aside, the whole “chaos is a ladder” thing is a show justification. It’s not a justification from the books. Petyr is definitely always improving his position, and he certainly manipulates killings to his advantage, but there is no indication that he is just trying to create chaos.
  16. Yes, it’s possible that Olenna just told Sansa that she would bring her to Highgarden the next day just to add incentive for Sansa to go ahead with the poisoning. But I have a feeling that Olenna was serious. That she was going to take Sansa and leave for Highgarden immediately, and dare the Lannisters to try and stop her. That’s one of the benefits of your House having what was probably the largest army in King’s Landing at the time. I don’t think that Olenna was planning on hanging around long enough, just in case some questions started to arise about Tyrion’s death. And if Sansa was a knowing participant she surely wouldn’t want Sansa hanging around any longer than necessary. Plus it just gives the Lannisters a chance to marry her to someone else. I think the Lannisters knew that they couldn’t stop the Tyrells from taking Sansa which is why they hurried up and married her off to Tyrion. No not really. The Tyrells are in league with the Lannisters even if it’s an uneasy alliance. They have no such alliance with the Vale. I think Sansa leaving with Petyr was a complete double cross by Petyr. He was going to use the Tyrell’s desire for Sansa to formulate the plan to poison her husband, and then he was going to swoop in and grab Sansa for himself.
  17. That’s going to be the next and I think final part of my theory. Sansa repressed what she did. And I think George gives us the exact moment when she represses what she did. I think George is using Sansa often to play the part of the unreliable narrator. And in this case, it was a mental defense mechanism for Sansa. She couldn’t handle what she did, so she represses it into her subconscious.
  18. Sorry, I meant to respond to your post earlier and I got sidetracked. I don’t think Olenna had any idea about Petyr’s plan to smuggle Sansa out of King’s Landing. I think she believed that it would appear that Tyrion choked on his food, and then they take her to Highgarden the next day to get married. Unbeknownst to Olenna, Petyr planned on using the Tyrion’s death as the distraction to get Sansa into his ship and to the Vale, conveniently now unmarried for his plans for her. In other words, Petyr was planning on using Olenna to help poison Tyrion and then double crossing her. I think Olenna was confident enough in the strength of her house (and her army) especially after the marriage of Margaery to Joffrey, that she wasn’t planning on asking permission for leaving with Sansa, she was just going to do it. Which is why the Lannisters hurried up and married Tyrion to Sansa, they knew if push came to shove they really couldn’t stop the Tyrells from taking Sansa to Highgarden.
  19. Part IV: The Wedding. This is my favorite part of my theory because it adds tremendously to Sansa’s character arc, if true. But to quickly recap: Whether or not Olenna had plans to kill Joffrey, those plans did not concern Sansa, Dontos, or Littlefinger. It would have been too risky, to have included those in a plan to kill the King. That doesn’t mean, however, that Olenna and Littlefinger didn’t plot to kill someone else at the wedding. My guess is that these two had a contingency plan to free up Sansa in the event that the Lannisters married her off to one of their own, most probably Tyrion. And that plan would have to include Sansa, because she would be the one in the best position to surreptitiously poison Tyrion. So they agree to give Sansa a hairnet with amethyst crystals which look exactly like the Strangler poison. And in the event that Sansa is forcibly married, Olenna will exchange one of those crystals with the Strangler poison, and all Sansa has to do is drop it in Tyrion’s food or drink. The Strangler will make it look like to all present that Tyrion choked on his food. So no suspicion should be drawn towards anyone. Unbeknownst to Olenna, Petyr had his own plans for Sansa. And his plan included using the distraction of Tyrion’s death for Sansa to flee with Dontos into his ship, thus double crossing the Tyrells. However, as the wedding approaches, Sansa remains unmarried, and then is told that after Joffrey’s wedding, she’ll be taken to Highgarden. Now all of a sudden Sansa has little interest with running off with Dontos on the day of the wedding. She wants to go to Highgarden. And if Sansa’s not married, Olenna has no motivation to help poison Tyrion at the weddding. She makes the mistake of telling Dontos and word gets back to Petyr, who decides he needs to prompt the Lannisters into acting, because he needs that distraction at the wedding to seize Sansa for himself. (And he probably also very much wants Tyrion dead). So he tells the Small Council about Olenna’s plans for Sansa, which prompts the Lannisters into rushing their marriage plans for Tyrion and Sansa. Now, Sansa is forced into a marriage with someone who is ugly, a dwarf, disfigured, generally despised, and a member of the family that has destroyed her family. Now is when Dontos would have fully filled Sansa in on the plan, because now, she would be properly motivated to do what they wanted her to do. Dontos tells Sansa that at Joffrey’s wedding, Olenna is going to replace one of the crystals in her hairnet. She needs to drop that replaced crystal into Tyrion’s food or drink. And then when the party goers are distracted she is going to run to a hollowed tree, change clothes, and Dontos will get her out of King’s Landing. She’ll be free of King’s Landing and her marriage. Whether or not they specifically tell Sansa that she will be given poison is unknown, but my guess is Sansa is smart enough to figure this on her own. So as the wedding approaches she knows what she needs to do, to get out of her marriage, and prevent herself from being turned into a Lannister. Olenna greets Sansa, and fiddles with her hairnet, replacing one of the stones with the Strangler poison, and in doing so she reminds Sansa of her brother’s murder, her promise to take her to Highgarden and all the food that Tyrion is going to eat. As the first dish is served, Tyrion notices that Sansa fiddles with her hair. This is when Sansa removes the poison that Olenna put in her hairnet. Tyrion even notices that Sansa appears unusually distracted but chalks it up to everything that Sansa has gone through. What I think Tyrion really noticed was Sansa trying to summon up the courage to poison him. Then out come the jousting dwarves. Petyr later tells Sansa that he was the one who convinced Joffrey to hire the dwarves for the wedding. Petyr claims it was just a lark on Tyrion, but I think Petyr had a more insidious reason for the dwarves. Littlefinger had to know that despite the motivation Sansa had to get rid of her husband, she might not be able to go through with it. So in Littlefinger’s mind, he thought he would give her an added incentive. In shaming Tyrion by making a mockery with the dwarves, he truly wanted to further shame Sansa over the fact that she was married to Tyrion. Petyr thought that this might make it easier for Sansa to act, to rid herself of this embarrassment of a husband. But this is where I think that Petyr shows that he truly doesn’t know Sansa. While Sansa is indeed very status conscious and perhaps a tad bit shallow, deep down that’s not the proper motivation to use to prompt her to finally act. She’s truly not that shallow a person. But one thing did happen at the party, that perhaps would have prompted Sansa to finally act and drop the poison in Tyrion’s food or wine. She noticed that Ilyn Payne no longer had Ice. And boom goes the dynamite. Sansa would have put 2 and 2 together and realized that Joffrey’s new Valyrian sword, was made from her family’s sword being destroyed and turned into a Lannister sword. And then she realizes that the same thing is happening to her. The Lannisters have broken her and were in the process of making her into one of them. Just like Ice. If there was a motivation for Sansa to act, it would have been then, when the pie was served. If she had decided to go ahead at that point and drop the poison it would have been in Tyrion’s pie. And then Joffrey comes along and eats it. Of course the other possibility, is that even with the motivation that Ice’s fate gives Sansa, that might still not have been enough for her to poison Tyrion. After all, out of all the Lannisters, Tyrion was easily the one that was the kindest to her. So even then perhaps her hand is stayed. And then Joffrey comes and puts his wine goblet down on the table in front of Tyrion and thus in front of her. And if there was one person alive that could drive Sansa to murder it was him. And she was the only one who would have the opportunity and access to Joffrey’s goblet at the time he was murdered. My next part is the after math, and the moment that Sansa represses the enormity of what she did.
  20. Actually killing Joffrey didn’t create a power struggle. If anything it lessened the chaos. Because Tommen becomes King and Tywin becomes the regent. So nothing about the power dynamics changes, Joffrey’s death just puts Tywin firmly in charged and Tywin is someone that is not easily manipulated. (Unlike Joffrey). What caused the chaos was Tywin’s murder. That’s when Cersei became regent. While Petyr acts like this was his idea, he really had nothing to do with this. Tyrion killed Tywin (or perhaps Oberyn poisoned him.). Either way, this wasn’t something that Petyr can claim credit for.
  21. But why so much poison if you were just looking to kill one person? And could the Strangler crystals, which could be dissolved in wine be able to maintain the illusion of being real gemstones for any length of time? Especially when they would be handled not just be Sansa but by her maids as well? Such as Shae did. Is there a reason that Cressen touched his crystal so lightly? Perhaps not to crush it. The more I thought about it, the more I became convinced that the hairnet was actual amethysts. Their magic lay in the fact that they looked like the Strangler crystal, to allow it to be substituted later when the time was right. My theory assumes that there was a coordination between Littlefinger and Olenna, so either one of them could have originally purchased the hairnet. Littlefinger’s job was to get the hairnet to Sansa and have her wear it at the wedding. Olenna’s job was to bring the poison to the wedding and give it to Sansa. That’s actually the main topic for my next part, who did Sansa actually try and poison? The reason that she would go along with a plot to poison Tyrion is that it frees her from a marriage with a Lannister. And that’s her greatest fear, that she’s being turned into a Lannister. The only way to truly free herself from that and marry someone of her choice (like a Tyrell) is to make sure Tyrion dies. But like you said, I don’t think she truly hates Tyrion. She on the other hand truly hates Joffrey. So when push comes to shove can she bring herself to poison Tyrion? And ultimately does she change course and target Joffrey when he presents her with the opportunity.
  22. You apparently didn’t read part 2 of my post. The reason that Olenna fiddles with Sansa’s hairnet is to substitute one of the gems with poison. The hairnet itself was just as it claimed to be, a hairnet with amethysts. Olenna’ a role was to get the poison to Sansa, who was in the best position to poison Tyrion. So Olenna fiddles with Sansa’s hairnet, reminds Sansa of her brother’s murder at the Red Wedding, of her promise to take her to Highgarden and reminds her of all the food that Tyrion is going to eat. And substitutes one of the amethysts with the poison. Then when the courses are being served, Sansa fiddles with the hairnet as well. That’s when Sansa would have removed the Strangler crystal Olenna placed there. She was getting ready to poison Tyrion. The real question in my mind is whether Sansa was able to make herself try and poison Tyrion? That’s Part IV.
  23. Part 3: The Conspiracy. I think I need to begin with the conversation Littlefinger had with Sansa back in the Vale. Because that’s the conversation where it seems certain that Olenna was the poisoner of Joffrey, after all Littlefinger says so, and who are we to doubt Littlefinger? The conversation over Joffrey’s “true” poisoner begins on an interesting note, Littlefinger goes over the cover story of Sansa’s new identity and … Sansa’s cut off when the fruits are served. But the conversation resumes and Sansa brings up her theory that Littlefinger had Ser Dontos poison Joffrey. I think at this point Littlefinger thinks Sansa is playing her own game, figure out someone to lay the blame on Joffrey’s death. And Littlefinger is happy to play along. The premise of this game, is keeping one’s hands clean, make sure there is no blood on them. Something that is highlighted in the imagery of the food eaten during this conversation: That’s when Petyr suggests that Olenna is the one who poisoned Joffrey. In the midst of a game where both participants are very conscious of keeping their hands clean. So now let’s start with both Olenna and Littlefinger’s motive for killing Joffrey, and then look and see if both would have had any motives for killing anyone else. Littlefinger provides a very compelling motive for Olenna wanting to kill Joffrey. She doesn’t want her granddaughter married to the abusive Joffrey and she feels that Loras would end up killing Joffrey. I can’t argue with the motive that Petyr paints. It’s a good one. Then Petyr provides how he helped things along. And that’s when things get a bit complicated. Petyr suggests that he just had his men provide rumors and stories about what a monster Joffrey was, and then subtly laid the groundwork for Ser Lora to join the Kingsguard. And apparently Olenna does the rest. Here’s where things start to ring false to me. First off, why would Littlefinger risk torpedoing the marriage between Margaery and Joffrey before it happens? It’s this alliance that gives Petyr his reward and frees up Sansa for his plans for her. Also, what Littlefinger leaves out is how he knew Olenna adjusted Sansa’s hair net and how he could be so convinced that Olenna was going to poison someone at the wedding that he had his ship parked out ready to smuggle Sansa out of King’s Landing. That’s more than just laying the groundwork and letting Olenna take matters into her own hands. That shows that there was a level of coordination between Petyr and Olenna, or Petyr’s catspaw Dontos and Olenna. So either 1. Olenna brought the hairnet to Dontos and instructed him to give it to Sansa to bring to the wedding, and Petyr got wind of this or 2. Petyr or Dontos simply told Olenna that she could get poison from Sansa’s hairnet at the wedding, and they were convinced that she would use it to poison someone. 3. Or the entire plan was coordinated by both Olenna and Petyr ahead of time. My problem with the first scenario is that it seems unnecessarily risky and overly complicated. If Olenna was planning on poisoning Joffrey herself, then why take the risk to give the poison to Ser Dontos, and have him give it to Sansa, only to take it back at the wedding. Why not just have Olenna bring it herself and avoid having two other persons with knowledge of you as the poisoner? Or the poison being lost, or stolen etc. etc. My problem with the second scenario, is that why would Olenna trust Dontos or Petyr and take poison being offered from them? Especially if your plan is to murder a King and you didn’t want anyone to know. Why would Olenna take such a risk? In fact the whole thing would seem like a bit of a set up. So that’s why I think almost certainly, this plan, concerning poison, hairnets and the wedding was coordinated between Olenna and Petyr. That’s the only logical conclusion why Petyr would know that Olenna would know the significance of Sansa’s hair net and Petyr would be so certain that the poisoning would happen at the wedding, where the distraction would allow Sansa to escape. So the question remains, would either party trust each other to plot the killing of a King? And how exactly does Petyr benefit from Joffrey’s death? The simple answer to the second question is that Petyr doesn’t benefit. He’s already shown that he can manipulate Joffrey, and Joffrey’s death only puts the Throne to Tommen which in reality puts Tywin in complete control of the Throne as regent. Tywin isn’t someone that is easily manipulated. I will concede that Petyr does have one possible motive to kill Joffrey, revenge for how Joffrey treated Sansa. So does that trump what Petyr loses in having Joffrey killed? But the more important question is the first, would Petyr and Olenna trust each other enough to plot the killing of a king? I’m not so sure that they would. Instead, could they have both agreed on a less risky target at the wedding, someone that both would have a motive to kill? So now let’s talk about their motives to kill Tyrion. Both of them have a very similar motive to kill Tyrion. He’s married to Sansa. And both have plans for Sansa that do not involve her being married. Olenna wishes to marry her to her Willas. And Sansa is quite a prize even before Robb’s death. She’s the daughter of one of the Great Houses, a House that unlike the Tyrell’s can trace their roots back to actual Kings. She’s certainly a prestigious pride for a House that is looking to increase their reputation. And when her brothers die then she becomes much more valuable, she becomes the key to inheriting Winterfell on top of Highgarden. So the same reason that the Lannisters covet Sansa would be the reason why Olenna would covet Sansa. And all it takes is killing the unpopular dwarf who is looked down upon by all the nobles. And of course Petyr has the same motive for killing Tyrion as well. He wants Sansa freed up for his own plans for her in the Vale. And he absolutely hates Tyrion and has already tried to have him killed once before. So it’s not a stretch that Sansa would be brought up in Petyr’s negotiations with Olenna as an added bonus to get the Tyrell’s to marry Margaery to Joffrey. Both had to know that the Lannisters would keep a hold of Sansa even after Joffrey and Margaerys are wed, and the way they would keep hold of her is marry her to a Lannister. And Tyrion is the obvious choice. So would Olenna and Petyr dare plot together to murder Tyrion? I think that’s something they would dare to do. And if Tyrion was the target, then the that brings me back to my original question, who would be in the best position to poison him at the wedding? This part has already gone too long and I’m chomping at the bit to get to the next part. The wedding. Which answers a number of questions, such as why Petyr brought the Tyrell’s plan to bring Sansa to Highgarden to the Lannisters, why did Petyr really suggested the jousting dwarves, and why it was so significant that Sansa realizes that Ser Illyn no longer has Ice.
  24. But on to part 2: The Amethyst Necklace and the Strangler. So, I’ve mulled this possibility over before, but my issue was always with how Petyr knew that Olenna had adjusted Sansa’s hair net if in fact Olenna didn’t take the poison from Sansa. In my mind, either Olenna took the poison from the hair net, or Sansa was the one who took the hair net from the poison. One possibility never crossed my mind until recently: Perhaps Sansa didn’t bring the poison into the wedding in her hair net, but instead Olenna brought the poison and gave it to Sansa by replacing one of her amethysts with the poison. That’s when everything fell into place. So let’s start by taking a close look at the poison the Strangler, in it’s crystallized form: We’re even told how they’re made: This reminded me a little of making salt crystals. Putting minerals in a liquid solution ultimately producing crystals from the mineral. Superficially salt crystals look like a crystal rock formation, but obviously they’re not as hard and can be easily crushed or broken. The fact that the Strangler can be dissolved in wine makes me think they are something like salt crystals. Perhaps they appear to be an amethyst but unlike amethysts they can easily be broken or crushed. So I looked to see how Maester Cressen handled his: My guess is that Maester Cressen touches the crystal lightly so as not to break or crush the crystal. So now I think about the amethyst hair net and try and decide if it realistically is a hair net full of Strangler poisons. Would the plotters have given such a thing to Sansa without her knowing the true nature of the crystals? What would happen if she handles them like one would handle a rock hard gemstone? Or perhaps if someone else handles the crystals? Like for instance Shae: So now that’s someone completely out of the loop who could reasonably be expected to have handled Sansa’s hair net. Would Strangler crystals have maintained their illusion under such manipulation? Or perhaps a better question, could the conspirators have reasonably relied on it? After all, the Strangler crystals are probably rarer and costlier than purple amethysts, even purple amethysts from Asshai. And certainly harder to replace. They’re also extremely incriminating. Could you trust drunk Dontos and then unwitting Sansa with them? All so you can just get the poison to Olenna at the wedding? If you trust Olenna enough to tell her about the poison, wouldn’t you just trust her enough to give it to her in the first place? Why the unnecessary “middle-man” in Sansa? And finally why so much poison? Seems like an unnecessary bit of overkill. But of course the possibility is that the hair net was always what Dontos claimed it was. It was truly deep purple amethysts, not poison. The magic in the hair net was the fact that the amethysts looked just like the poison. So if you wanted to pass someone poison, someone who was in the best position to poison the intended target, you replace one of the amethysts in the hair net with the poison. Which is what I think happened. Olenna was the one who brought the poison to the wedding and gave it to Sansa by replacing one of the stones with the poison. Even emphasizing to Sansa as she did it that she might be going to Highgarden soon: It’s fairly brilliant. As she gives Sansa the poison, she reminds Sansa of the Lannisters’ killing of her brother and of her promise of taking her to Highgarden. The same place where she had earlier talked to Sansa of marrying her to Willas. And then there is this: Wicked really. She pats Sansa on the head, reminding her of what she placed there while talking about all the food that Tyrion is going to eat. And yes, when the food starts to be served, look what Sansa does: Tyrion just notices Sansa fiddling with her hair, I think that’s when Sansa was retrieving the poison given to her by Olenna. She gets it when the food starts to be served. Because that’s when the poisoning is to take place. To make it look like the victim is choking on their food: I’m assuming you can see now who I think the intended target really was. I think Tyrion was the intended target of both Olenna and Littlefinger. But more on that in part 3, the Olenna Littlefinger conspiracy.
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