Kadence

Is there a Book Spoilers EP401 Discussion thread? There's a No Spoilers edition that's a couple pages, but I can't find the Spoilers edition.

I thought this was pretty cool - there's a minor reference to Joffrey in an espn.com article by J.A. Adande: http://espn.go.com/nba/playoffs/2012/story/_/page/Adande-120504/nba-playoffs-gregg-popovich-spurs-effect He compares the behavior of petulant NBA superstars to that of Joffrey :) Just thought it was interesting to see a completely random ASOIAF reference in an ESPN article.

I'm not sure about this but - isn't Mathis Rowan the one who was besieging Storm's End? As I recall, him and Mace were besieging Storm's End, but when Marg's trial happened Mace rode back with most of the forces. I'm assuming Rowan took command of the leftover troops. So yes, there's a very good chance Tarly is the one leading the army. And he's probably got some buddies in the Golden Company. The whole situation with Arianne/Tyrell army/Connington might get interesting in terms of negotiations. Tarly and Dorne might wait for the other to commit before choosing a side. I could see Tarly besieging the castle, but talking secretly to Connington - then when Dorne inevitably declares for Aegon, Tarly sees where the wind is blowing and picks what he perceives as the winning side. When it comes to this stuff about fake supply line theories and such, I think people forget there was a Tyrell army already besieging the fortress. They aren't going to just let some supply train or mummers through :) Connington would have had to fight the Tyrells as well. Which means perhaps they pretended to be Stannis' cavalry or something and that's the "guile", who knows. It's very possible he knows something about the castle being from the area, but he had to be Lord of Storm's End in name only. Remember that it never fell - Stannis held it. So he was never really Lord of Storm's End, just promised it if they won the war. Also there's a good chance that's just a typo and it meant Lord of Griffin's Roost, not Storm's End.

This is a very excellent analysis of Tarly's personality, and why even beyond the political slights and lack of credit that he's had to endure from Mace, he might be more inclined to Aegon and Griff just because they aren't fat dolt Mace and puppy boy. Whether Tarly is already plotting to join Aegon - I don't know. People use his intense dismissal of Aegon as a "protesting too loudly" type of thing, thus indicating he's already gone to Aegon. But I'm not sure. I think maybe he really does think Aegon is nothing at the moment. But I'm confident that whether or not he's with Aegon now, he will end up with Aegon later. Tarly has been built up heavily in the books - "the best soldier in Westeros" or whatever he was called. He clearly is going to have a major role. And there was also I believe heavy foreshadowing in Kevan's thoughts on Tarly. He said that among the Tyrell people, Tarly was the truly dangerous one. I believe this was foreshadowing that Tarly would eventually turn against the Lannisters, perhaps even being involved in the killing of Tommen. Because Kevan's thoughts of Tarly being dangerous just seemed like strong foreshadowing that Tarly would be dangerous to them (the Lannisters), and not to their enemies, as they think. Do we have confirmation on who is leading the Tyrell army to Storm's End?

I think it's unclear whether Bloodraven realizes you can interact with people in the present, like Bran did with Theon. He said you can't interact with the past but I don't think he clarified about the present. I'm not sure if Bran is more powerful than Bloodraven thinks a greenseer can be, or if Bloodraven knows you can talk (however subtly) with people in the present.