sweetsunray

I don't agree with this type of reasoning. Each person is responsible for their own choices. Renly is as much responsible for insulting his brother, whom he knows to be a man of the law. Mel is also responsible for her manipulations, that imo begin the moment Stannis carries that glamored sword with a ruby in it. There's a great parallel with two short stories here when it comes to Stannis, Mace Tyrell and Storm's End: the Fortress and Under Siege. George wrote the Fortress in college for his minor in history. He was meant to present a historical paper, but asked his professor if he was ok with it if George wrote a fictionalized story on a historical event: the inexplicable surrender in 1808 of a fortress of Sveaborg by the Swedes to the general Jan Pieter van Suchtelen (a Dutchman) who was the strategic mind during the Russian-Finnish war. They were but few weeks away of being reinforced and the thaw, and yet the Swedes surrendered this fortress which was too hard to take by force. The surrender of this fortress eventually led to the Russians being able to annex Finland from Sweden. Finland didn't acquire their independence until 1917, when Lenin started a revolution against the Romanovs (same family ruled Russia back in 1808). In his story, George has a fictional historical colonel disagree with the planned surrender and he attempts a mutiny, but is caught and executed, and the surrender went through. George got an A for it and his professor tried to send it in to be published, which got George his first rejection letter. So he shelved The Fortress (I think 1967 or 1968). But in 1984 he took it out of the drawer again (never throw anything away, is his motto), and he added a cynical hedonistic dwarf and time travel to it. This story became Under Siege. In a nutshell, proto-Tyrion is a mutant in a post-apocalyptic world (the world went BANG), but scientists managed to make time-travel-machines that can send a mutant's mind to a host-mind in the past. They hope to mentally influence certain historical characters (like a whispering voice of emotion or conscous), in the hope that they these historical characters will do certain stuff differently and therefore the apocalypse doesn't happen. Proto-Tyrion's host in the past is the same fictional colonel at Sveaborg in 1808. And proto-Tyrion is their last chance and hope. All the other mutants have not returned or woken up from their mental time travel, failing in their mission somehow. Proto-Tyrion seems to be having some influential success with the fictional colonel Antonnen (same guy of the Fortress). And proto-Tyrion's bosses order him to influence Antonnen in such a way that he will be present at a meeting with the Russians, under flag of truce, and then assassinates Jan Pieter van Suchtelen. This of course is a suicide mission. Not only would Antonnen end up dead, but he would be reviled for his dishonor of the flag of truce. Of course if you read The Fortress, Antonnen dying won't change much of his fate, but it could possibly change the fate of the planet. You're starting to recognize the moral conundrum, right? I hope? Proto-Tyrion doesn't like it, for he considers Antonnen a good honorable man. Anyway, they're all sure it's going to work out, have a hedonistic feast to basically celebrate all of their non-existence. Because if the apocalypse doesn't happen, their present ceases to exist, no mutants, but they would just be someone else and wouldn't know it. So, after the celebration, proto Tyrion is sent to the past, to his host, but he pushes Antonnen to make a completely different choice. Yes, the parlay happens, but proto-Tyrion convinces Antonnen to flee Sweden, sail for the US, get rich and fat and have "fun" there. So, in a way proto-Tyrion corrupted this good man, but also saved his life, and reasons nobody could have been sure that the assassination of Jan Pieter van Suchtelen and the non-surrender of Sveaborg would prevent the apocalypse almost 2 centuries later. The whole Fortress and Under Siege concept is picked up again by George with Stannis and Storm's End. But this time he puts a man at Storm's End while under siege during Robert's Rebellion who "just does his darn duty". He's not like the Swedish commander who gives up so close to being relieved and reinforced in the first story. And he's not one for "fun" so he can't be manipulated to sail off for Essos and eat "peaches". Renly and his peach therefore represent proto-Tyrion's temptation of Antonnen to just live his life in the US than bother with Sveaborg. But he does have a similar mental influencer in Mel, later in life, in that she can see glimpses of the future and believes in a disaster and that Stannis is the man, the sole man, who must and can prevent "the apocalypse". Unlike proto-Tyrion she is convinced that the future she sees can be twarthed, and she has no qualms in sacrificing anyone for this end. She refers to Stannis as being a righteous man (and George does too after he decided to sail for the Wall and to come to the Wall's aid). But imo he is most of all a man who does his duty. Even though he believes in law and strict application of it, he is most of all governed by what he believes his duty to be. And therein lies the danger: the most terrifying creature is not a true just man, but a dutiful man, because what he will do depends on what he believes his duty to be. Albeit, Davos figures this out and uses it to convince Stannis to sail for the Wall. Inherently though it's implied that the capture or surrender of SE so it falls in a Targ's hands spells doom coming to Westeros, with the Fortress and Under Siege in mind. I would suggest "keep reading": though no doubt Stannis will come to a dishonorable end, a black page in Westeros history, capturing SE will not. It will prove to be far more important than we believe it to be now. My point here is that when it comes to a besieged castle that heralds the beginning of the end, George will let it fall in the wrong hands eventually, and that no matter what the character most associated to this, he will make you mad think of either road taken as a waste, leaving you with a very bitter taste: Antonnen's death after mutiny to try and stop a surrender, Antonnen fleeing for the US to have his peach, Stannis for doing the assassination that could save the world.

I'm not sure yet. It depends imo what Drogon actually is, what type of soul went into him. When we consider Dany's three dragon dreams it sort of becomes ominous. Is the spirit dragon she sees "herself" or is it some "demon" in another dimension (like darklyn plain) waiting for someone to bring him back into the world? That's how George's starts: Saagael in a tower waiting for someone to do the fire and blood ritual so he can leave his hell and enter the world to bring an endless night. Her first and second dream would match with that. In the original old story two thieves who've stolen rubies (yes rubies) hide in an old temple. They build a campfire and then go to sleep. One of them doesn't like creepy crawlies and chooses an elevated slab to sleep away from the ground. The other thief wants the rubies all to himself. So he waits until the one on the slab sleeps and kills him. His mate was sleeping on an altar. So now we have a fire & blood ritual. And the demon who was wating in his tower in the other dimension appears through a crack in the temple. Instead of thanking the thief who did the deed, he sends the soul and mind destroying bolt at the thief (called Jasper). Dr. Weird notices something evil has come into the world, races to the source and finds Jasper: breathing and heart beating, but blind and otherwise unmoving, because his mind and soul is destroyed. Jasper is just a shell. Dr. Weird refers to him as a "fool" for what he did. The description of soul-destroyed and mindless Jasper is very much like how Drogo ends up. And in her third dream, Dany sees the wings of a dragon while she's with Drogo, and then later Rhaego. We also see how the dream-dragon burns Drogo. It could be interpreted as a demon with wings destroying Drogo's soul and mind. So, you could interprete it as Dany being manipulated by a demonic and intelligent supernatural entity that wishes to be born in the flesh, and beguiles Targs into doing this for him or it. We could even think of it being the same "soul" that was Balerion. I always feel there was some desperation from Balerion's part when he flew off with Aerea to Old Valyria. He was getting older, and if he was a smart entity, he had some egg lying in wait for him to be reborn in. But Farman stole three eggs. If those are Dany's eggs, Farman fled with the black-red egg, which would turn to stone away from the volcanic hot area at Dragonstone. So, he needed new eggs to be incubated. Aerea was that effort potentially. So, basically I'm including the possibility that these "names" of Valyrian gods but also being names of dragons are some type of fire & blood thing where certain other-dimensional entities (gods) can be born in the flesh. Some are more benign and just having fun. Others like the black-red one craves for dominion. ETA: Not saying we should interprete such events and dreams that way, but George certainly leaves that possibility open + allusions to fertility issues for Balerion riders + dropping the name Saagael as a worshipped god in Lys and by Lara Rogare brought. He may remain ambiguous on that, as he was about MMD. Conclusion: if this is a possibile interpretation for the black red dream dragon of Dany, we could then ask ourselves - would we rather have him bound to flesh as the very last dragon or in his darklyn plain. Dany has had dreams and visions from all type of sources, but she only seems to have had 3 dragon dreams: before the eggs hatched. If I consider the possibility that there's some other dimentional demon might be behind it, then the dragon flesh may be fun, but is also a bit like the teeny tiny living space that comes with being a genie ... physical restrictions

About Targs: Aegon on Balerion plays the demon part against the fool in green-gold motley of House Toland of Ghost Hill, during the First Dornish War. Aegon burned the "champion" but found Ghost Hill empty. Later on he gets a letter (a weapon written by a hand) from Prince Martell (with the golden spear on red sunburst) and he flies immediately back to Dragonstone. So, the combo of House Toland + the letter of Martell sends the "demon" back to where he came from. But Aegon gets to be king of a peaceful realm after. Notice that the sole sister by his side is the one who rides a green-bronze dragon (Vhagar). And that Maegor the Cruel doesn't lose his grip in the realm until Visenya's death. So, as long as the black-red dragons aren't the sole dragons and have green allies (even villainous ones like Aegon II and Aemon during the Dance), they're being mitigated or safe. But a black-red dragon alone in the world is a most terrifying thing.

Dr. Weird is not really GRRM's creation. But Keltner's: http://www.internationalhero.co.uk/d/drweird.htm One of the first of GRRM's stories published (in 1967) was Only Kids are Afraid of the Dark, which featured Dr. Weird. He really liked the hero ('cause he's a weirdo: a time traveler that got shot when he stepped out of the time machine by burglars and isn't allowed to be properly dead until he catches back up chronologically until the day his former self steps into the time machine - and George always liked "weird" stuff). It was published in SSC #10. So, basically the tenth story of the superhero world that Keltner had been creating. Keltner loved what George was doing so much with Dr. Weird that he asked him to write more about him. George featured that particular story as the first of the selection of short stories for Dreamsongs I, under the section "Four Colored Fanboy". He still likes him But no he's not Dr. Strange inspired.

By the end of Arianne II (excerpt) she learns that Aegon and Jon Connington have captured and control over Storm's End. It seems to baffle the mind how he could have done so, with not even 5000 men, no elephants, when Mace Tyrell didn't even manage that with 20 000 men. Yes, GC = 10000 k, but the ones of the Stepstones haven't joined yet (we are meant to believe). Aegon also needs to leave some men behind at Cape Wrath and Estermont (and Tarth) to occupy the lands and castles, even if with token sergeants and soldiers. Supposedly they "marched" on Storm's End. Even although Mace Tyrell brought the majority of his siege host to KL once his daughter was arrested. Since he journeyed fast with that host at the time to KL, it's safe to say he traveled mostly with the cavalry. What remained with Rowan would be mostly foot and bowmen. But that doesn't mean that remainder host with Rowan is small: likely between 5000-8000, just to at least lock SE from the land (cause Paxter Redwyne sailed south). There's no way that Aegon confronted that army with 4000 men and then stormed the castle and captured it (like Loras allegedly did). That's just nonsense only Cersei can fall for. It's possible that Lord Rowan is a "friend in the Reach", and turned their cloak, but that wouldn't help much with capturing SE. If Tyrell's 20k couldn't do it, then 9-17k (estimate of adding 1/2 GC + rowan min and adding full GC + rowan max). And I'm sorry, but 24 elephants are not going to do it either. There's only one major component that could lead to capture: the surrender of SE. But with just 200 men who expected to be besieged at some point, they would still have some stock. And if Mace's 20k didn't do it, then how did Aegon do it? Well how did Stannis do it? The castellan was Cortnay Penrose and his second in command, was Lord Elwood Meadows (a green young man of about 20). Stannis knew that once Cortnay was dead, Elwood would surrender. And Elwood did. Now, Stannis did not make Elwood his castellan. He chose a man who remained loyal to him after the defeat at the Blackwater: others fled, surrendered, knelt to Joffrey. But not this guy: Gilbert Farring. So, we have an utter loyal Gilbert Farring in command who will not surrender, and a younger man who will surrender the moment his commander dies. So, somehow Gilbert Farring got killed. Aegon has no Mel to make a shadow baby with, so that's not the solution. But a crew could have sailed into the cave with the landing, pretending to resupply SE with food (they would be getting to live on lean meat now, those 200), like the Onion Knight once did. This allowed them a welcome or at least some of the "smugglers" to get close to Gilbert Farring, kill him and then bring in more to outnumber the 200 inside (minus 1) and force Elwood to surrender the castle. But how would the GC have such a ship? It was a Volantene fleet that dropped them off all over the place: Stepstones, Estermont, Cape Wrath. Scattered because of a storm after Lys, and they sailed back home. The GC doesn't have any ships of their own and they don't have any crews. Ok, Estermont might have some cogs. But they would never trust that crew. (there's a reason why I'm not including Tarth yet). No, they found an ally, or should I say two allies on the Stepstones - Aurane Waters and Sallador Saan. We know that Aurane Waters basically conned Cersei and the crown in building him three war drommonds. The crew he put on those ships were poachers, thieves and young men as captains of his own choosing. Cersei allowed him to put them in the water to "stop Mace Tyrell", but when she was taken captive, Aurane sailed away with those very expensive new drommonds, never to be seen again. Meanwhile at the Stepstones some "new pirate" who calls himself "Lord of the Waters" has made the Stepstones his base, and he has three-decked warships. Like drommonds? Bg enough to take elephants on board and 5000 men of the GC stranded on the Stepstones? Maybe that would be a little bit too much even for the drommonds. And then we have Sallador Saan, who sailed from Eastwatch and was supposed to deliver Davos at White Harbor for his diplomatic missions. But a storm did destroy a majority of Saan's ships. He was also fed up with Stannis' promises and he doesn't like to work for free, which he has been doing for 2 years now. He even threatened to throw Davos overboard so he could swim to White Harbor. He didn't do that. Davos was still an old friend. Instead he dropped him off at the Sisters. Davos thinks to himself how Sallador always goes on about "gold". And when Davos asked what Sallador planned to do, he said he was going to do pirating at ... yes... the Stepstones. But that's difficult if you have lost the majority of your 27 ships and must limp to the Stepstones with the remainder and there's also a "rival pirate" with 3 warships. But these two men would also know each other. Aurane Waters is a bastard of House Velaryon and House Velaryon had sworn fealty to Stannis on Dragonstone. And then 5000 golden company men arrive with elephants, seeking aid to get to the Stormlands. But they have to wait a while, because Paxter Redwyne is sailing south and passing through the Stepstones. And then we learn something interesting of Velana Toland of Ghost Hill: she's the one who tells of this new pirate, but also tells Arianne it was a good thing she didn't come by sea to Ghost Hill. And she even explains why. "Since the Redwyne fleet passed through the Stepstones south to Dorne, ships with strange sails have been seen crawling Cape Wrath, the straight of Tarth and Shipbreaker Bay. If you don't pay attention you might mistake those for the Volantene fleet (which is the likely intention of George). But that cannot be. The Volantene fleet didn't go that far north. The closest they got to Westeros was Cape Wrath and Estermont. They wanted to get home asap. They wouldn't have sailed into Shipbreaker Bay, a notorious stormy bay you don't sail unless you know it. And well, Salladar Saan knows it. And he knows well enough how Davos got to be the Onion Knight, and he would be a familiar face to Gilbert Farring. Sallador Saan (corsair and smuggler for Stannis) could sail up right into the cove with the landing, claiming he's resupplying them on the order of Stannis and he has wine. He either invites Farring for a drink in his cabin or gets invited in the castle for a drink. And voila, there's a normal assassin inside the castle and the rest of the SE skeleton crew gets subdued. Meanwhile other ships and Aurane Waters sail to Tarth to capture the seat of Brienne's ancestral home. What is the final clue: Haldon tells Arianne she will sail for SE. Haldon isn't just going to trust any merchant or sailor to get her to SE. And well that area was after all crawling with ships with strange sails. So, the ship that is sailng Arianne to SE must be one of those ships and must be an ally to Aegon. This is how SE got captured, and the whole GC (except for those that remain at the various castles) with elephants is at SE. Once Rowan saw that, he likely joined Aegon's army too. All of a sudden we have an army of 14000-17000 men who can use Tyrell's own stone throwing mechanisms at Mace Tyrell. And Mace Tyrell is either even numbered or outnumbered. And Mace isn't the military genius that Randyll Tarly is said to be.

@Phylum of Alexandria The Dr. Weird template is somewhat complex: green gold is the superhero suit without the suit he is a grey ghost with white face he uses a trick against a black-red demon (with batwing buckle) where he dresses up a fool with his own green-gold suit and paints the fool's face white. He does this because the demon only has the power to destroy souls and minds, but not physical bodies. The fool is someone who is a physical shell, with empty/broken mind and soul. Dr. Weird then animates the fool, but each time the demon attacks him (thinking the fool to be Dr. Weird), Dr. Weird leaves the body in time, so that he himself is not hit (for he is spirit and thus could be obliterated by the villain). Meanwhile the demon cannot harm the fool any worse than the state he's already in. (think Drogo status before being pillowed) Dr Weird strikes at the demon (using the fool) with his "golden arm/hand" and as the bolt or spear of light leaves his arm, it is described as a sunburst or sunbeam. The trick is usually triggered around the time a maiden may end up sacrificed. So, the Stark sigil is not that neutral really. Those are the colors of Dr. Weird without his superhero suit. Yes, Renly has the green-gold of Dr. Weird. Since his green-gold armor is used by Garlan to give the impression that he's Renly's ghost going against Stannis, we can see how the Tyrells and Renly (fool) fit into the template. But they are ultimately not the true Dr. Weird, since they are more busy with the IT than protecting the realm of men from demons. Much of the KL plot during the Blackwater revolves around the women in the red keep fearing rape, if KL would fall to Stannis. At present, the Tyrells are green-gold by themselves as well and a maiden queen (meaning young woman) is at peril. The Lannisters: yes, they have green gold. Tywin's eyes are green flecked with gold. Jaime has green eyes and wears golden armor. During the sack of KL by Tywin, a young woman (Elia and her daughter Rhaenys) were at peril. But nobody saved them. Instead the sun/son of the former Hand (green eyed with fleck of gold) killed the black-red Mad King dressed in his golden armor. There's our sunbeam. Oberyn Martell's fight repeats the description of golden sunbeams being reflected from Oberyn's spear just as he gets his chance to strike the Mountain with the poison on his spear. He also keeps repeating his accusations of the Mountain raping and murdering his sister Elia Martell. So, it's there, but Oberyn Martell comes too late. He cannot rescue his sister, only seek justice for her. While the Mountain is a human (dumb and brutish) monster (with a headache), via Oberyn's poison and Qyburn's whatever-he-does, Oberyn ultimately created a ghostly demon. And his own brain got splashed, so he's the fool. In other words, it's all going wrong there. Aegon, JonCon and the GC possibly having a pick in allies: the Martells (the golden spear on sunburst) of the Greenblood (river in Dorne) and the green-gold Tyrells. Aegon and JonCon are both "ghosts" and JonCon is a grey ghost because of his greyscale. The dragon of Aegon II (of the Greens), golden Sunfyre devours half of wild, elusive white-smokey Greyghost, as well as black-red Rhaenyra. This is a villainous Dr. Weird who eats its own. His one-eyed brother Aemon rides Vhagar who is green-bronze (almost gold). So, there are many Dr. Weirds and many fools that can be put to use. They're wrong or fake Dr. Weirds. The true Dr. Weird amongst them though are imo the Starks who focus on the actual demons, rather than vengeance or IT or getting another shot at rectifying mistakes of war... with Bran as the superduper Dr. Weird.

Bran would still be handicapped. Joffrey didn't push Bran out of a window. Cat would indeed remain north and Tyrion gets to KL. Jaime wouldn't ambush Ned in the streets of KL over Tyrion and remains in KL. Ned intended to leave with his daughters ASAP before anyone else and go back home, since he had resigned from being Robert's Hand when Jaime confronted him in KL. Robert had time to put the pin back on him, because Ned was unconscious for long enough a time and bound to bed, and Robert had Jaime's rash actions as an excuse to defy Cersei enough. Sansa would still protest against the dissolvement of her betrothal to Joffrey and might end up making the same argument about Joffrey not being like Robert - being right too in the positive sense in that case. So, Ned would realize the incest sooner, while Robert is in KL making noise about wanting Ned's head over resigning, but also has to content with Tyrion and Jaime on top of Cersei. Tommen's and Myrcella's kindhearted character made little difference to Ned when it came to them being children of incest. Nor did Joffrey's horrible character prevent Ned from making the offer to Cersei. Still sounds like a powder keg to start a war between Starks and Lannisters, regardless of Robert's breathing status or Joffrey's character or Tyrion's arrest. Jaime remaining in KL as well as Tyrion being there combined with Ned realizing the incest as he is making ready to leave, might actually prompt him to go straight to Robert instead of Cersei. Robert intended to make Jaime warden of the east. The sole way then to ensure Robert would not do that is by exposing Jaime as not just a man who slept with his queen and fathered bastards on her, but did so breaking his vows of a kingsguard. The moment Jaime is arrested for treason against the crown and his office as well as Cersei, Tywin goes to war.

I think ultimately a sphinx is a greenseer, so you pay a greenseer either with knowledge/info (something you know) or you a penny. We have "pennytree" after all Remember also GoHH: she tells the BwB what she's seen in her green dreams, but only if she gets her song. It's a "trade" ETA: Another word for a penny could be "a copper", since asoiaf pennies are made of copper. Anyway in ancient Greece and related nearby islands (like Rhodes) they began to put heads of gods or patrons on one side of coinage, and a city on the other side. But also visual puns. Coins of rhodes put roses for example on one side, because the Greek word for "rose" is "rhodos". So giving a "copper" or a "penny" may be paying the gatekeeper with a cryptic pun or riddle. You give the "sphinx" a riddle they can ask the next visitor. Sort of like Golem and Bilbo exchange riddles.

@Seams I've been doing some research on electrum, which is the metal of the archmaester that Sam (and Ameon) believed to be the Seneschal. And basically between Norren, Walgrave and Theobald (lead), I came up with a trio that hints at the Dr. Weird template. First the electrum (Norren's metal, who isn't seneschal anymore): a natural metal that also goes by the name of greengold (Dr. Weird's colors) and was used to make coin in ancient civilisations such as Egypt, etc. It's a natural alloy of silver + gold + trace copper. It's light yellow to greenish tinge. interesting for this thread, the Louvre has a cup of the 7th/8th century BC made out of electrum from Cyprus that depicts in the upper decoration band the "works of hercules" (greek) in the middle decoration band a frieze of spinxes in the bowl a king defeating his enemies, he looks Egyptian interesting to find both greek and egyptian imagery on either side of these sphinxes, because the Citadel's outer green stone sphinxes are male (egyptian) and female (greek). Whereas Alleras unites both. Using the pronouns "they" and "them" for Alleras fits perfectly in that sense. it is also the latin name for amber, the resin that evergreen trees shed, because there are light-yellow and greenish ambers. Myth: the son of the sun god Helios went in search of his father, found him in the east (starting the day) and after promising to grant him a wish, the son begged him for the boon to ride his chariot (with two wild horses). Helios warned he wouldn't be able to really control the horses, but his son insisted. And so he rode those chariots, could not control the horses, and the chariot came too close to earth, scorching parts of it, then he pulled too far away from the earth freezing other parts. The stars complained with Zeus, and after too many of those, fed up, Zeus threw his lightning bolt at Phaeton on the chariot and killed him. His sisters turned into black poplar trees (evergreens) and they wept tears of electrum/amber. The name Phaeton means "sunbeam", which is how Dr. Weird's one and only powerbolt is described against his opponent defeats the demon. Because amber has electrostatic features, our modern words of "electron" and "electicity" derive from the Latin name for Amber, aka "electrum" I wasn't so sure whether George knows of that electrum cup with the sphinxes in the Louvre, but at the very least he chose electrum to hint at green-gold with sunbeam powers and lightning bolts in relation to a catastrophe of ice and fire. So, then I looked at the Walgrave-Theobald thing. So the archmaester of ravencraft was supposed to be the Seneschal, but he has "lost his wits" (dementia) and Theobald whose rod and mask is lead volunteered and stepped up to be the Seneschal. To me that suggests we should unite aspects of both men. And what we get is a "white masked fool" (another ingredient to the Dr. Weird template). Walgrave has "lost his wits". His mind is broken. People whose mind are broken fall under the category of "fool". Lead is a metal known for lead poisoning, which affects mental abilities, and which the Romans already noted can lead to insanity or madness. At some point, lead was hugely popular in cosmetics to "whiten the face". All we know of Theobald is that his rod and mask are made of lead. Lead by itself does not look white of course, but the cosmetics with lead can be said to be a "lead mask" Dr. Weird puts white face make-up on the face of the mind-broken man he called a "fool" (for his actions) and dressed him in the greengold superhero suit, to make the "fool" be mistaken for him I'm doubting this isn't coincidence anymore, neither the electrum and lead in relation to the men mentioned in the convo about "who's Seneschal?". Overall it suggests that the Citadel is "the fool", the decoy for a villain to strike at, before Dr.Weird can hit the villain with the sunbeam/lightning bolt coming from his golden arm. I've also took a closer look at Lorcas in relation to "the fog thinning with a pale sun coming through". It suggests Sam is starting to "time shift" (metaphorically), but not yet to the earliest times. There's still some fog, just thinner. So that implies he's time shifting to pre-Andal invasion times, the FM days post LN. We know this because this time-shift occurs at the Seneschal court, not at the oldest part of the Citadel with its "wooden gate". It occurs while Sam is on the bench waiting for his name to be called by Lorcas (the only man of note at this moment) and it still will be a while before the Sphinx (Alleras) shows up. So, it invites us to take a second look at Lorcas. Initially, Lorcas' quill and writing as well as Sam telling him he brought letters from his LC to give to the Seneschal marks it as "post Andal invasion era". But what is Lorcas actually doing? He's just writing down "names". Meanwhile "letters" aren't just a written down message several paragraphs long. To "learn your letters" is an expression that means you're "learning the alphabet". The First Men had the "runic alphabet", and they used the "runes" to carve "names" into commemorating stones. So at a second closer look, we can think of Lorcas as a FM writing down runic names. Him not wearing a maester's chain corroborates that. He represents a before-Citadel-as-we-know-it FM wise man. Runes are not just "alphabet letters" but they also serve as "phonemes" (sound meaning) and "idiograms" (symbolic pictures representing an idea or concept). Another writing system and "alphabet" where the "letters" are also "phonemes" and "idiograms" are Egyptian hieroglyphs. And this is where we "time shift" to when Sam drowses off: to the "dream time". He wakes up abruptly when he "hears a name being called that isn't his". In other words, Sam hears "phonemes". Then someone speaks to him, he turns and sees the Sphinx, an "idiogram". And since idiograms are symbolic pictures of an idea or concept, we are most definitely pressed to look at this meeting in a symbolic context and certainly analyze the Sphinx as a representation of an idea that goes all the way back to the Dawn era (the dream time) and early Age of Heroes.

Not necessarily, no. Depends on the distance between each. But clearing shrub and sapplings away from "parklane trees" is a thing to give them optimum height.

True. I was only joking. I don't think that's the answer. I'm not even convinced that the Wall-weirwoods are all this giant sized. It may be that only the one of the Nightfort is that giant sized, and if so, then it is due to magical reasons: a special wildfire greenseer choosing it for his second life. Other weirwoods have carved faces, but that would be the sole one with a moving face that operates like a gate to pass through. Though Theon saw Bran's face appear for a moment in the WF tree. Jon has noted that the height of the Wall can be deceptive. That in some places, the ice isn't all that high, but on top of a hill ridge made from stone and soil. The wildlings chose such a spot to climb the ice of the Wall for that reason. It's also the spot where the Wall shudders like a tree and shakes off Jarl and a good chunk of ice. So, that seems to indicate a location where there is a weirwood tree, but nowhere as high as that of the Nightfort. ETA: but even then they are still larger than most we've seen. I think another reason is the clearing of the forest for 2 miles from the Wall. This allows the trees to monopolize the nutrients in the soil. Winterfell's tree has to share with 3 acres of wild godswood

They never suffer a lack of water?

White Harbor and Wolf's Den are at the end of the White Knife. Do we know of any White Knife? Isn't there one far down south. It's rather long, light and very very sharp, and it can give off white light apparently. As for two wards fighting. What happens if one ward "yields"?

It is true that the Citadel ended up broadening their "expertise" to other subjects. The biggest problem is the monopoly they attained in "we can judge truth from lies", while they cannot do so at all and a lot of their beliefs, judgments and counsel are built on lies, including their own lies. George illustrates this perfectly in Ned's and Cat's bedroom when Luwin brings them Lysa's message. In that scene, he performs the prior role of the pet raven a la Mormont's raven perfectly. He got the message via a wooden box with a lens (to see) in it, and a false bottom with a hollow compartment beneath it, and Lysa's message in it. George makes an allusion to a "tree with eyes" and "hollow hill" here. But the lens is Myrish, which is the first indication that it's a lie.* *everything Myrish is deceit: cfr. Arya trains to lie in front of a Myrish mirror. George can't always use Arbor Gold for it. He mixes it up. Luwin completes his deliverance of the letter to the person it is intended for to a T, just as a raven would. The message is not for Ned Stark (the lord), but for his wife only. Just like a skinchanged messenger raven would deliver the message only to the intended ear in the past. Interesting here is that Ned puts on a "ward"robe when Luwin enters, but Cate touches the letter with the seal while naked. She's exposed. Luwin wants to retreat but is made to stay. The letter ends up being written in a private language that Lysa and Cat developed as girls, aka the language of children. The language of the cotf is the True Tongue that no man can learn to speak, except Lysa and Cat aren't cotf, so the message in their private language that no other man can "read" is not true. Cat reads it and burns the letter. Luwin again offers to retreat, but once more he is told to stay in order to counsel them, which also used to be a black raven's task (well the sknchanger's or greenseer's task). "Ward"robed Ned has come to the correct conclusions: to stay out of the mess. But it is Luwin's counsel both on him becoming Hand and "what of Jon?" that ends disastrous. Ned is a head short. The attempt on Jon's life may have harmed the magical protection of the Wall. If Luwin really had been a raven skinchanged by a greenseer: at the very least he'd be able to tell truth from lie. I believe George will have the Citadel go the Alchemist route. The Alchemists used to have a bigger position when it came to "learned" men, who made themselves out to be more knowledgeable and magically more powerful on a variety of subjects than they really were. But they can make a lot of wildfire. At least that bit was true. The Citadel will end up being exposed to "know nothing" on most stuff. But they will retain a few fields in which they truly are experts and can be of benefit. That "electrum" sounds promising

The famous sphinx riddle to Oedipus actually includes "speaks with one voice". So someone who can speak and be man, beast and skinchanger.

True, and adding the white ravens as carrion eaters and telling the season change also works. There's only one family that accurately predicts the season: Starks with "Winter is coming" associated with skinchanging predatory wolves.

We can even go even more precise with the riddle "They guard a gate. They see, hear and talk. They are green. They are black. They are frozen fire. They predict that winter is coming. Who or what are they?" Brandon the Builder Stark.

Good questions. George did set up the white ravens in aFfC as a mystery to be solved, and tied to the Citadel's origin, when he does two things aFfC prologue: Archmaester Walgrave wants to be used as food for the white ravens after his death aFfC Aemon's phrase "the sphinx is the riddle, not the riddler" In mythology, sphinxes eat the people who fail to answer their riddle correctly. Hence, Walgrave's wish ties to the "sphinx" who is the riddle. Alleras is the stand-in sphinx of old: gatekeeper, someone who knows who you are and where you come from via supernatural means. Marwyn is another stand-in part for the sphinx (with his big hands to better "strangle" someone with): someone who can see wherever he wants, listen and speak to someone wherever he wants, even dreams. Finally the white ravens who will eat you when you die. Who or what can do all that? Greenseers can.

Strangulation is a symbol for Odin, who hanged himself from the world tree to be able to read the runes (prophesy). And this is linked to greenseeing in the series: Beric was hanged Brandon Stark was choked, but stands in most likely for Brandon the Builder Stark Either someone is either marked as one-eyed or hanged/strangled/choked. Notice Alleras dress: green, doeskin, and a brigandine. Alleras's clothes can be compared to Meera Reed's and Arya's. Meera: lambskin breeches, sleeveless jerkin armored with bronze scales Arya in the RL after Acorn Hall: breeches, brown doeskin jerkin studded with iron Alleras: doeskin breeches and green cloth sleeveless "jerkin" studded with iron (a brigandine), which is worn for armor All three transcend or fall outside of traditional dualistic gender roles, with Alleras possibly even being a trans character. So, Alleras stands for a green magic related person who had a "sphinx" role in the far past. The entrance of the Citadel has two green sphinxes as "gatekeepers", one male, one female. Alleras is both. When Sam arrives at Oldtown the city is so fogged up that he can only make out the beacon of the Hightower. Fogged up implies that the present has covered up or hides the true past. If we imagine the Citadel at least before the Andal invasion we must strip off the outer layers of the construction to the heart of it. First we see those two green sphinx statues at the gates, along with Scribe's Hearth and book shops. We can strip them away. The old FM world and Dawn age did not have scribes or books. Behind those "new/modern" gates we have King Daeron I's statue and the septry before arriving at the Seneschal's court. We can strip those away as well. At the lobby of the Seneschal's court we first meet Lorcas, an acolyte in a maester robe (without chain), who marks down names of visitors with a quill. He is at some point referred to as "gatekeeper". So, this indicates that the location of the Seneschal's court are older gates, truer gates than the prior ones. But it is still not correct, because this maester writes with a quill. Sam has to wait in the lobby for hours on a bench. While he does he notes that the "fog is thinning" and a "pale sun" is starting to get through. In other words, we are getting closer to a reveal of how it was in the past. Sam drowses off and "wakes" abruptly. This is another reference to going further back in time, behind the fog, and now getting to a deeper truth. That's when Alleras addresses him. They ask him why the Night's Watch has come to the Citadel, and introduces themselves as Alleras, also called the Sphinx by others. The Sphinx is also a gatekeeper in mythology. So, through Alleras, Sam meets a representative of the true gatekeeper of the Citadel of the past. Someone "green" who knows who they are via supernatural means. Notice that both Lorcas the false gatekeeper and Alleras are acolytes. The false one dresses in maester robes, while Alleras in the green and brown breeches and brigandine. The Sphinx therefore predates maesters or scholars. It is the sphinx who takes Sam to a wizard watching the goings-on all over the world via magical means (green and black glass candles) and with which they can communicate. The glass candles do similar stuff as weirwoods and ravens do. The glass candles are from Old Valyria, so they were not the actual means of "knowing things" during the Age of Heroes or Dawn era. It were weirwood trees and greenseers. And well the building with the wizard (Archmaester Marwyn) was built around a yard with an ancient weirwood and a lot of black ravens. So, the wizard in olden days would have been a greenseer. Before the Sphinx takes Sam to the wizard (aka the tree), they ask Sam what they want with Archmaester Theobald (the current Seneschal). It is not confirmed what Theobald is archmaester of, but his "mask" is "lead". We do not have confirmation what "lead" stands for, but if I were to make a reasonable guess, that would be alchemy. Alchemists searched for a method to turn lead into gold. Tyrion alludes to the maesters having overtaken the Alchemists when he visits that guild in King's Landing to look at the wildfire stash. I think we need to check what metal a "penny" is made of, because that is what the Sphinx tells Sam he needs to give to the gatekeeper of this proposed Alchemist hayday, and they add that for "silver" Lorcase would carry Sam on his back to the lead Archmaester himself. But the green sphinx shortcuts the Alchemist time to the oldest part of the Citadel, passed another gate. So, as the gates go, the outer gates represent the modern Maesters (with chains) and Citadel. The middle gates, older but not original, represent the hayday of the Alchemists (without chains), who write names (runes) and would consider it a miracle if they could turn a penny into silver. The Isle of Ravens lies behind a wooden gate and is covered with moss. It therefore represents the days of origin: the green weirwood days with ravens. Aside from the wizard we also have Archmaester Walgrave beneath the White Rookery of the white ravens. But in olden days, there wouldn't be a rookery either. What does Walgrave want to happen to his body when he dies? He wants his body to serve as food for the white ravens. And what is a sphinx supposed to do when someone fails to answer their riddle in traditional mythology? They eat that person. So, the white ravens are being aligned to the role of the sphinx as well. The true sphinx therefore imo was a greenseer who people could come to for testing and training. This sphinx also had "oracle" white ravens who would only fly off upon the change of seasons. 'The sphinx is the riddle, not the riddler" then can be translated as "They know who you are and where you come from without introduction. They can see without human eyes, appear in your dream and speak to you without being there. They can tell when a new season is upon us. They will eat you when you're dead. Who or what are they?"

Here Bran makes a huge anachronistic mistake: (black) ravens don't need a rookery or a maester, especially not skinchanged ravens. All they require is a place to roost, and they do so at a weirwood. Before the Andal invasion and the massacre of skinchangers and greenseers, there was no need for a rookery or a maester as councelor: lords and kings would have had pet ravens like Mormont's raven to councel them. There wasn't any need for libraries either, because the weirwoods are the libraries, and FM had no writing. The Andal septons introduced writing. Writing was an Andal thing. Maesters learned writing from the septons. And if there was no writing, there also was no need for maesters to teach kids to learn it. So before Andal invasion: no rookery, no councelor, no library, no writing, and no teacher such as a maester required. These are the main tasks of maesters at households at present. It becomes really hard to think of a reason why maesters would have as a position at a household of a king or lord with the FM. Healing? There are healers that aren't maesters, and they do the job just as good as maesters do, if we go by Mance's story. So, prior to the Andal invasion: no maesters at households. The Citadel exists, but it would have had a far lower number of pupils and teachers. It doesn't have a library (no writing remember, and no books). They don't bother with black ravens, because they deliver messages orally via skinchanging. Tyrion points out that the rise in prestige of "maesters" is a more recent thing. That the guild of the alchemists used to be their rivals, and that the alchemists used to be bigger than the Citadel. And yet, after the Andal invasion the Citadel ends up supplanting first and foremostly the pet raven's position. Suddenly kings and lords are without speaking ravens anymore, but the black ravens still hang around in the weirwood tree. And their singers and old nan storytellers have tales on how black ravens used to talk and deliver messages. Can't something be done with the black ravens? At this point the Citadel claims to have maesters trained in ravencraft and these maesters can write messages. So, these kings say, "okay send me one of those. We'll see how it goes". Initially the kings and lords are illiterate themselves. This immediately bombards the maester who's only there to send ravens with parchment on their feet to and fro to the councel position: they read the messages for the king and lord. At some point in time (and potentially very quickly), some heir finds out that their maester is actually the third son of an enemy and that the maester in question wasn't completely honest about the written message and sent the heir's father into an ambush that got this lord/king killed. So, the heir kills the treacherous maester, demands a new one from the Citadel, but one who will teach him to read and write (and his own heir) and is bound to serve their castle loyally. And so, maesters also get to be teachers. Since writing was an Andal thing and the septons were the first to write things down, they would have done so in their own language. No real need to try and write in a language that has no written version (except for runes). So when maesters learned "their letters" from the septons, they did it in the Andal language. And when they taught it to the lords' children, they also taught it in the Andal language. So, we go from Old Tongue to Common Tongue. That's the big history picture of before Andal invasion and after Andal invasion. But it raises the question more and more: what then were they studying in the Citadel at the Isle of Ravens (the oldest part of the Citadel) before the invasion? They weren't writing, not reading, black ravens took care of themselves, not really healing, not teaching. The likely answer is that they were stargazers. Why do you study stars? To try and predict seasons. But why then would the Citadel have claimed they had maesters specialized in ravencraft to help kings and lords out with their ravens after the raven-speech-collapse? Because they were studying the white ravens too. So, in the early days, the Citadel was doing two things: studying white ravens and stars. Enter Peremore's story: a sickly boy bound to his bed and all he could see of the world was what he could see beyond his window. And he didn't get to grow up old or into adulthood either. all type of professions brought to this boy and he loved their debates and disputes. What were they debating if that led to an order that began to concentrate on star gazing and studying white ravens? Trying to predict the length and change of seasons, and the white ravens somehow are a crucial key to it. Peremore would not have seen much of the stars and heavens from his window. But he would have seen the weirwood tree with black and white ravens. And something about the comparison between both species prompted the question he wanted answered and his pets were set to task to answer it. If the white ravens predate the Citadel and were part of the season-question, that can only mean the white ravens never left the isle of ravens in comparison to the black ones, but only did so when seasons changed. Apart from studying the stars at the Citadel and the white ravens on the isle, they would have wanted reports from other areas, so they had traveling maesters and they acquired glass candles to watch for season signs in Essos (at a later point). All to try and come up with a theoretical prediction model. This would have been a learning curve. So, even if we assume the Conclave is now able to predict independently and accurately (as with the False Spring), that they decide when the white ravens flies, there would be a very long history of the Conclave having it wrong a lot. If they had it wrong a lot, then it follows they could never have gained such a prestigious monopoly on "the maesters know better". The resulting prestige of most learned men amongst people and the accuracy of the white ravens contradicts an actual learning curve when it comes to seasons. If they never bothered at the Citadel with the black ravens (as we see, since the black ravens are at liberty to roost and hop and shit and fly wherever when Sam arrives at the oldest part of the Citadel), then how did they manage to portray themselves as knowing how to use black ravens with written messages, after the Andal invasions. Why would these maesters have wanted to learn writing and reading. The traveling maesters making observations figured out that they could take the Citadel's black ravens along in cages on their mules. They could release them wherever on the road and they'd fly to the Citadel weirwood tree. And they'd write their reports on parchments, bind it to the legs of the black raven. And so when some king noticed that these traveling stargazing weirdos with chains around their neck were using ravens, he wanted one to do the same for him. And all these elements are concentrated in the oldest part of the Citadel: the white ravens in the rookery, the black ravens in the yard, the glass candles and the archmaester of magic, the Archmaester of Ravencraft teaching writing and "letters". They are at present the least prestigious positions and scoffed at, but George putting those together within such a close proximity in the oldest building points to them being the fundamental tasks of origin. We only lack the quarters of the star gazing. But as this is referred to as "navigating by stars" and the oldest castle is associated with pirates, I think it's a safe bet to expect stargazing links being done at the Isle of Ravens as well. When you want to know the origins of a settlement, order or keep, looking at what's positioned at the heart of it and the first things built beneath or around it is a huge indicator. With Winterfell for example the First Keep is built just outside the crypts' entrance while the weirwood and the godswood of 3 acres are the center/heart, hills or vales were never leveled, and the crypts go too deep to be anything but a natural cave system with deep fissures going through the mantle (hence hot springs and hot pools). With the Wall it is the Nightfort with its weirwood Gate. And whenever old weirwoods are at the heart of a large construction, we know some old weirwood magic drew those building around it, and that it's original purpose or draw was nothing like the Andalized Westeros of the present. So no writing, no reading, no library, no rookery, no mechanical training of ravens, but magic, skinchanged talking black ravens in weirwoods, and oral histories. And for the Citadel, legendary white ravens that only fly when the erratic seasons change.

Let's try the alternative you're saying: that they are mechanically trained by maesters to know their "home" (all the important castles and keeps that didn't exist until after Andal and Targ conquest), and there's no magical element involved in it. Then maesters would have to breed and raise white ravens in the castles of the lords and kings. Then they need to train them: let them fly around to go back "home" (the castle) at greater distances, etc. Until eventually they can send caged white ravens either by ship or a baggage train to Oldtown, where they are then kept indoors so they don't escape and fly home, when the "maesters know" it's a new season. Kids spend a lot of time near the rookery or a maester's office beneath it. Kids are curious. They'd be asking to see the white "chick" being raised, etc. Castle Black wasn't raising any white ravens, because then Sam would have been put to task with them already at CB. Given the direct response to seeing a white raven by kevan, selyse to shireen (off page) and Shireen wanting to see it, etc multiple generations have only ever seen white ravens at change of seasons. All evidence points to the white ravens only being seen in the rest of Westeros at change of season, mysteriously knowing to hop in tower offices of castles they were never raised at. If they are bred and raised at the Citadel, then they know where to go without the above mentioned training, and thus magic is in play.

Black ravens can fly out in the morning to return to their home-weirwood by nightfall. They don't need training for that. Gradually, George has revealed that ravens don't need a rookery: see Raventree Hall and Theon witnessing the ravens in WF's godswood gathered in the weirwood during Jeyne's wedding to Ramsay. George even adds the poetic hint of mists or fogs separating or lifting to reveal a new tableau, aka "how it was before maesters". He includes Bran's ironic thoughts about BR's implied claim that skinchanging was how CotF taught the First Men to learn True Tongue and use ravens for vocal messages in the Old Tongue. Bran remembers Old Nan claiming the same thing and how Robb laughed at such a claim. Bran thinks that all of his siblings could fly in ravens, and how "they could then all live in Luwin's rookery". The Citadel knows that black ravens always come home and they leave them their freedom at the Citadel: they're all on the walls and the yard with the tree. Apparently they don't bother with a rookery for them. The white ravens are more intelligent than their black brethren. They may not know Common Tongue, and may not even need to be skinchanged. And yet they keep these in a white rookery: to breed and to study closely for their moods and out of sight. That the Citadel leaves a dementing archmaester beneath them and has the dumbest most easily fooled novice serve Walgrave and the white ravens daily seems to have been done on purpose: keep brighter minds away from the white ravens and only dumb fools who can make nothing of whatever Walgrave says on either his good or bad days close to the expert. Alleras confirms that the castle at the Isle of Ravens is the oldest one. She also claims allegedly it was a pirate's keep during the Age of Heroes, but she says that while they cross the Honeywine, aka "sweet as honey lies" or "golden wine" (Golden Arbor). And fake-Pate promisis Sam that he will have a "great view" on the Honeywine (lies) from the White Rookery. The castle was built to study the white ravens. Now take Yandel's connection to Walgrave. Yandel was an unwanted child left at the scrybe's hearth (a place where acolytes read and write for any illiterate in need for it). He is then given to servants to be raised within the Citadel. So as a boy he was a servant. Some maesters were kind to him, and archmaester Walgrave taught him his letters. This interaction was what prompted Yandel to enter the order. He got his first link when he was 13, 2 years after Robert's Rebellion was done, and completed his chain in 7 years, quicker than Maester Aemon even. It puts this very bright, inquisitive boy learning to read and write, in Archmaester Walgrave's rooms right beneath the White Rookery around the time of the False Spring. Around the time that every maester in Westeros sent reports about green shoots, weeping walls, etc and "most of the Citadel believed spring season". A serving boy would have picked up on those beliefs and discussions amongst maesters and noted that that white ravens did not fly. He certainly would have asked about it to Walgrave. And whatever Walgrave said, led to Yandel writing as primary source that the Citadel is still confounded about predicting the length and change of seasons. Meanwhile maester Cressen makes it out to sound as if the Conclave "knows". Walgrave knows Cressen. Since he's in the late stage of dementia, Walgrave is "time-shifting" when he mixes eighteen year old Pate up for Cressen. Cressen chose to become a household maester, but Walgrave remained all of his life at Oldtown and the Citadel. This means that Walgrave and Cressen were acolytes or novices together in their youth, and that Cressen knows no more about the white ravens than the average acolyte (whatever the Citadel claims). Walgrave though is said to have forgotten more about ravencraft than most maesters ever know of it: aka, Walgrave knows/knew white ravens the best of any other maester alive. The manner in which Yandel writes that statement about the Citadel being confounded has the tone of "it is known". You only do that if you believe it is indeed a given and known to everybody. But Cressen's statements about the Conclave claims the opposite. This would mean that Yandel learned of it as a young boy in such a non-secretive way. It is something he ended up believing every other maester and lord just knows. If he had known it was something that might draw the ire, he would have cut it out. So, I'm wondering whether he ended up with poison in his porridge one day. Pate and Yandel are also each other's reverse mirror in understanding and intellectual brightness. Pate began as a novice at the same age that Yandel forged his first link. But Pate hasn't even forged one link in 5 years since he began. And though he is a "novice" in title, he serves no better purpose than a servant. He pretty much works down the ladder. Meanwhile Yandel worked himself up from a destiny to be a servant to a maester, who as far as we know, chose to remain in the Citadel. Add that Yandel writes fondly of Archmaester Walgrave, while the old man is only an archmaester out of "courtesy", and we can infer that Yandel still regards Walgrave as a mentor unlike any other maester or archmaester, in spite of what everybody else thinks of him now. Eventually, George wrote and revealed a lot of puzzle pieces about the glass candles almost like an info dump upon Sam's arrival at the Isle of Ravens. Books won't tell us more about dragons than Tyrion can or we can learn from Dany and her dragons. True Tongue and truth is tied to ravens and ballads. So, any real valuable truth that Samwell will witness and discover is tied to the white ravens of the Citadel, and all clues point to the white ravens having been Peremore's riddle he put to his pets.

Purple moss = wildfire to me. Moss is green. Jojen's eyes are green moss. Purple is well the eye color of dragonblood. So, purple moss is a greenseer/green dreamer/skinchanger with dragonblood.

In aCoK we learn and see a white raven for the first time. Shireen comes up to see it at Maester Cressen's office and rookery, asking him whether her mother is right when she claims that a white raven means that the summer has ended. Cressen answers it is true, explains they only fly from the Citadel, that the Conclave has considered measurements and reports all over the realm and declared summer to be over, and let the white ravens fly. He also words these messengers in a dubious way: they carry the most important message. In this way George leaves the reader with the impression that the white raven comes with a written message claiming the whole Conclave (imo) bullshit. It does not carry a message. Cressen was waxing poetic: its mere sight "tells" the receiver all they need to know. Kevan Lannister points this out to us in his Epilogue in aDwD . And Maester Yandel (who was taught his letters by Archmaester Walgrave, the senile maester of the white rookery) reveals that the Citadel is still confounded in trying to predict the change of seasons correctly. Hmmm, so Maester Cressen's claim about the Conclave is bullshit. Yandel (imo unwittingly) reveals one of the Citadel's big secrets: they have long sought to learn to predict the change of seasons, but have no reliable scientific method. And yet these ravens still fly out. And when they do fly out, they are correct. Take for example the Year of the False Spring. All the maesters from all over Westeros most assuredly would have sent reports of weeping walls, celestial observations, green shoots, etc, enough to convince a majority at the Citadel that a change of season was upon them. And yet "they" did not send the white ravens... or perhaps the white ravens refused to fly out when the Conclave believed they would? What I mean to argue is the following: it is not the Citadel or a Conclave who determine when the seasons changed on any observation sent to them from all over Westeros. It are the white ravens who inexplicably know, and what the Conclave truly does is watch the white ravens for signs of them wanting to fly out, but they are trying to keep this a secret. Though white ravens are not the same species as black ravens, their natural roosting behavior can be extrapolated from black ravens: ravens don't really require a rookery. They roost in their home-weirwood. And the Isle of Ravens has a yard with a very old weirwood. We are told explicitly that the white ravens are kept apart in the white rookery, apart from the black ravens. But the ancient weirwood with stones raised around it, points to the weirwood predating the Citadel (as would be the case for most castles). Beyond the wall, villages did not plant their weirwoods. They settled near and around an already existing weirwood. And the way of life of the Free Folk is pretty much a glimpse into the days of the Long Night. So, if there was no white rookery, those white ravens would just roost in the weirwood, like the black ravens. And I very much doubt that back in ancient times these black ravens attacked them. But why would they lock them up in a rookery? To avoid being exposed as failures, an emberassment to their first task ever given to them. What would our bedridden Peremore have seen from his window? He would have seen white ravens in a weirwood tree, never flying out, while black ravens flew to and fro. What question would have arisen? "Why do the white ravens remain, while the black ravens fly off and come back again?" And his "Old Nan" by his bedside would have told him a story that as long as people remember the white ravens only fly off when the seasons change. But as Old Nans are wont to do, she could not tell him why they did so. This would have only deepened Peremore's curiosity, and so he had every type of person claiming to have knowledge come and laid out the mystery about the white ravens to them and wanted their answers. Healers would have talked about birds knowing the seasons by the greens that shoot. Singers would have sung tales about well The Singers that sing the song of Earth (but the singers are gone from The Isle of Ravens). (Drowned) Priests would have claimed the birds could tell from the waves (sea) and storms (sky). Etc, etc. In other words these "scholars" argued passionatel about the biggest mystery of the series - why are the seasons so variable and how do only the white ravens know? They did not find the answer in Peremore's lifetime, but were set to task by his brother. And so in order to test their theories, the "scholars" had to observe the white ravens. The mystery of the white ravens was their first and major riddle to solve, and what they began to study. From this grew the Citadel. But their failure at solving it, became an embarrassment, and the white ravens in the weirwood a reason for younger maesters and accolytes to mock their elder archmaesters. It becomes difficult to maintain a seat of intellectual superiority when those damned white birds up in their tree prove you know nothing really. And of course they also needed to breed them: for their tests, to continue the task, but also to protect their own reputation. The story of the False Spring indicates that without the white ravens, the Conclave would have made a complete fool of themselves before long if they did not have the white ravens deciding it for them. The white ravens are their primary task, their origin, their constant prove of failure, but also their greatest treasure, for without them they would be unmasked as pretenders to knowledge they do not actually possess. This is likely also the source why they dislike magic, and why it is dangerous in their eyes: if you realize that the seasons are so erratic because of magic and that the determination of the change of seasons by the white ravens is also magical, then their reason for existing becomes null and void. ETA: And so, the Citadel's perfectly fine with a senile Archmaester Walgrave at the White Rookery. Nobody will believe whatever he claims to say. Only the stupidest of novices like Pate can be set to take care of the man, which is great too, because they don't want smart novices around those birds to figure their secret out. But enter Sam who has seen magic, fought magical Others, was saved by a magical dead guy, went through a magical gate, and has quite a lot of contact with a magical black raven. And enter Euron who'll end up destroying the Citadel and its conclave, and then we'll see through Sam's POV the white ravens only fly when they know it's time to announce winter has come.

It's a "bloody hand". And blood of a bloody hand of a person with hot/spice/fireblood has power. Beric's bloody hand Weirwood leaves looking like a bloody hand Mormont's raven drawing blood from Sam's hand after Jon says "close the door" and Mormont's raven expressed it was a bad idea for Jon to send his hostage/ward (Mance's son) away Arya's play: red lettering of the title and capitalized by George, "THE BLOODY HAND" and also painted above the lettering, for those "who couldn't read" Qorin Halfhand who put his bloody hand in a wildling's face, blinding him, so he could finish him with the other. The blood of the bloody hand is the seal/strengthening, because it's a self sacrifice of one's own blood. ETA: yes, "spiced" stands for "hot" or "fire"... think of the spiced sausages on the market in Vaes Dothrak. It's something he used as well in Song for Lya. ETA2: stew is begotten via "slow cooking" or in this symbolic case "slow heating" for hours.