Cache found at the Fist of First Men by Ghost - who left it? Any ideas?

[bemused]

Oh, rats! I type so slowly ( and made so many edits ) that I feel like my post #29 , above, got lost in the shuffle..

Lamprey .. I actually think the text holds many ,many hints that Benjen is alive.. it's common sense that says he must be dead. In fact, that so many characters point out that it's common sense is , in itself , suspect IMO ..especially when confronted with things like .. Jon thinking he's probably dead ,but feeling otherwise.. Bran's spontaneous , "The children will help him .. the children of the forest"

I'm convinced he's on a rogue mission , but others may not agree with me on what that mission might be.. that's ok.

Butterbumps!... as in my edit above , speaking to Jon could have resulted in Jon not following his path which is important to later events in defense of the realms of men.. and Jon was not really in a position to have his advice followed.. At this stage Mormont and Qhorin are not really aware of how serious the Other's threat is , ( or maybe I should say how advanced it is ). Mormont has only seen the two wights , no Others.. Qhorin may only have heard rumours , or reports of wight sightings.. (can't quite recall , offhand).

I think Jon might not have trusted CH anyway, and CH would have had to concoct some story to account for himself, other than merely an interested party. Don't you think Jon would have insisted he speak to Mormont ? If they thought he was a wildling, he probably would have been "put to the question" , as Qhorin's captives were . He couldn't really present himself as NW..no-one would know of him...I can't think revealing himself would have been very helpful , under the circumstances ( As lamprey says , the hands would have been a "dead" giveaway ;) )

ETA; Chett would certainly have resented Jon. He knows it was Jon's suggestion that resulted in Sam replacing him. He was present. Jon didn't outright say he should be ditched , just that Aemon could use Sam's help .. but that was the end result.

[John Hulboy]

I believe benjen hid the dragonglass. I don't understand if he was around at time ghost found it why would benjen not warn them what there up against. he is on a secret mission his men all came back with blue eyes.benjen has been gone along time im starting to think whatever happened during the long night.the starks made a pact with whites.the way they say there must always be a stark at winterfell.and seems a lot of starks went to nights watch.there house words WINTER IS COMING . IM REAL INTERESTED..when did ww first start showing up ned hears about them early in got from deserter.ned was left out or was it so long ago that the starks forgot the pact.the true enemy an no one knows nothing about them .how long were wildlings fighting others an walkers.30years but ned an riccard have any idea an they are lords of the north.no communication,why didn't mance get a message to mormont or ned.off topic but I really think it all might be connected

[John Hulboy]

Royce and the other 2 are killed in early pages of 1st book .maybe 10 walkers surrounded Royce an they fought one on one the wights were laughing an tauting.they were on move an taken out all they encounter from what we hear they fought the giants an other wildlings how come no one knows the threat to realm and mankind.stannis is gonna mine dragonstone but loses it.the realm is not ready to battle white walkers .then bowen stabs jon as he is preparing to battle the others army.bringing as many wildlings over wall is best thing in my opinion. when dead come for you kinda scary..lol

[bemused]

Instead of editing yet again..Lamprey..I'm not sure BR would have wanted to teach the NW a lesson or weed them out . Many good men died, too .

I think he was engaging in the same sort of win/loss reasoning we see with Jon later ,in Moletown and in his thoughts about Hardhome.

If Mormont's company had been at the wall , they might have been able to defend against Mance , but think of the 100,000 wights that might have been the result.

So he sends them the obsidian hoping they'll find out it's use sooner rather than later. He probably can't tell how many will survive, but trusts that some will. We don't know how much he can see of the future, but I'd bet that like Mel , he sees multiple possible outcomes and has to try to support the ones that would be most favourable to his / CoTF goals. He has to weigh the loss of the NW men against the gain of the wildlings ( potentially ,300 vs.100,000 ) while doing what he can to limit their losses and make them remember the use of obsidian.

[Mithras]

Instead of editing yet again..Lamprey..I'm not sure BR would have wanted to teach the NW a lesson or weed them out . Many good men died, too .

I think he was engaging in the same sort of win/loss reasoning we see with Jon later ,in Moletown and in his thoughts about Hardhome.

If Mormont's company had been at the wall , they might have been able to defend against Mance , but think of the 100,000 wights that might have been the result.

So he sends them the obsidian hoping they'll find out it's use sooner rather than later. He probably can't tell how many will survive, but trusts that some will. We don't know how much he can see of the future, but I'd bet that like Mel , he sees multiple possible outcomes and has to try to support the ones that would be most favourable to his / CoTF goals. He has to weigh the loss of the NW men against the gain of the wildlings ( potentially ,300 vs.100,000 ) while doing what he can to limit their losses and make them remember the use of obsidian.

We may not know his true intentions until TWoW. But the dragonglass weapons may have a deterrent effect on Others. I wrote in various threads that the Others are too few in numbers that they do not risk themselves against dragonglass weapons. Wildlings have dragonglass weapons and the Others always hunted them in stealth. They even seem to save their wight reserves and do not spend them if there is a much better gain. Sending two wight assasins to take out LC was worth the risk. Same as the Battle on the Fist, where they destroyed a significant part of the NW. Attack on Hardhome will be the same. Some wights will be killed but many more will be created.

I cant say how good BR sees the future but Jon was very close to death in front of Mance's tent just before the attack of Stannis's host. Varamyr and his animals were waiting to kill him in his first move. He was already lusting for Ghost. Only when the eagle was burned by Mel and Varamyr went mad, Jon was able to save his skin. That was a close one for me.

[bemused]

I don't think the wildlings have dragonglass weapons ,at least , not that I recall. They're certainly not prevalent. Though they remember that the others and wights exist , they still can't have seen much of them until recently..

The others are the reason Mance was able to get the wildlings to come together. It had been a long time since that last happened.

Anyway, the arrowheads ( coupled with well trained archers ) are very important, because that gives the defenders range..

Have to go , for now..

[WardenOfTheSouthernMarches]

If Benjen wanted to arm the NW with dragonglass, why bury it in a random location?

He could not have possibly known that Ghost would find it.

Coldhands would have known the BR could direct Jon to the cache.

I think its pretty likely to be CH.

[Ghost's Shadow]

For me Coldhands did it, and there's a possibility that Bloodraven warged Ghost to direct Jon to it, though he could also have just followed Coldhands' smell there, I suppose.

[bemused]

WotSM..The Fist isn't a random location. Even if we don't know all the methods by which BR can see things, it's for sure wherever a raven can fly, he can have at least a bird's eye view and maybe perch on a branch where he can hear what's being said. Therefore, he can see where Mance is , where Mormont is , where Qhorin has been on his way to meet Mormont and that he captured and questioned wildlings about Mance.

Qhorin ( I'm sure ) wouldn't ask to take Jon with him simply because he likes and admires Benjen. In Qhorin's case and Mormont's .. wouldn't BR have had reason to try to influence their dreams? Both men seem to have a sense that Jon should be groomed for leadership.. from square one.

What I'm saying is, that CH could have buried the cache ..with input from BR, or that Benjen could have buried it ..with input from BR , or that they might both have been involved ..with input from BR.

For this , at least, BR wouldn't have to see too far into the future. Both he and Benjen, as a former LC and a First Ranger, could probably have predicted Mormont's strategy after he heard Qhorin's report. Though Mormont and Qhorin don't yet know the extent of the threat from the others.. BR and Benjen may well have an idea of where the Others are likely to strike. (They tried to remove Mormont once , already. )

[Mithras]

I don't think the wildlings have dragonglass weapons ,at least , not that I recall. They're certainly not prevalent. Though they remember that the others and wights exist , they still can't have seen much of them until recently..

Leathers laughed at that. “You want the free folk to fight beside you against the common foe. How are we to do that without arms? Would you have us throw snowballs at the wights? Or will you give us sticks to hit them with?”

The arms most wildlings carry are little more than sticks, thought Jon. Wooden clubs, stone axes, mauls, spears with fire-hardened points, knives of bone and stone and dragonglass, wicker shields, bone armor, boiled leather. The Thenns worked bronze, and raiders like the Weeper carried stolen steel and iron swords looted off some corpse … but even those were oft of ancient vintage, dinted from years of hard use and spotted with rust.

It is curious that Jon did not mention any wildling dragonglass weapons before but in ADwD, he remarks them. I might be missing but Jon should tell of dragonglass knives during his time with the wildlings. Or GRRM came up with a new idea in ADwD.

WotSM..The Fist isn't a random location. Even if we don't know all the methods by which BR can see things, it's for sure wherever a raven can fly, he can have at least a bird's eye view and maybe perch on a branch where he can hear what's being said. Therefore, he can see where Mance is , where Mormont is , where Qhorin has been on his way to meet Mormont and that he captured and questioned wildlings about Mance.

Qhorin ( I'm sure ) wouldn't ask to take Jon with him simply because he likes and admires Benjen. In Qhorin's case and Mormont's .. wouldn't BR have had reason to try to influence their dreams? Both men seem to have a sense that Jon should be groomed for leadership.. from square one.

What I'm saying is, that CH could have buried the cache ..with input from BR, or that Benjen could have buried it ..with input from BR , or that they might both have been involved ..with input from BR.

For this , at least, BR wouldn't have to see too far into the future. Both he and Benjen, as a former LC and a First Ranger, could probably have predicted Mormont's strategy after he heard Qhorin's report. Though Mormont and Qhorin don't yet know the extent of the threat from the others.. BR and Benjen may well have an idea of where the Others are likely to strike. (They tried to remove Mormont once , already. )

:agree: I think Qhorin was a unorthodox ranger like Benjen (when I say orthodox, I mean fools like Thoren). Qhorin certainly heard the direwolf of Jon. After Jon saw the wildling camp through Ghost's eyes in his dream, Jon said it was only a dream but Qhorin said it was a wolfdream and wanted to hear the whole story. When Jon was finished, he was certain that Jon was a warg and the first thing he said was that the old powers are rising. I think that is why he wanted Jon to come with him to know him better. He was already suspecting of old powers and crazy shit going on.

I also agree with that input from BR should be a must in burying that cache. The ranging party was capable of noticing any person if he followed the party. Thus, the burial of the cache with a precise timing suggests that it is only possible if a greenseer is watching the move of the rangers constantly.

Also there is a historical meaning of the cache, CotF giving dragonglass weapons to NW every year.

I find it plausible that if Benjen is alive and somewhere close, he might have counselled with Qhorin before he joins the NW at the Fist and advised him to take Jon.

Another interestinn thing is, when Jon came to Fist with Mance, Mance said now he understood why they suffered very few attacks from Others lately in Frostfangs. Because the Others were gathering their scattered forces to strike the Fist. BR should have noticed that.

[Lady Winter Rose]

Why would Bloodraven want to help NW? Maybe they have common enemy, but that doesn't make them friends.

I agree dragonglass might be brought by CH via BR and Children and that CH don't need a cloak. But I think CH had a cloak when he met Bran and his companions? There's also good posibility NW would not look favorably on any undead.

But I really want Benjan to be the one who buried the cache.

[Mithras]

Instead of editing yet again..Lamprey..I'm not sure BR would have wanted to teach the NW a lesson or weed them out . Many good men died, too .

I think he was engaging in the same sort of win/loss reasoning we see with Jon later ,in Moletown and in his thoughts about Hardhome.

If Mormont's company had been at the wall , they might have been able to defend against Mance , but think of the 100,000 wights that might have been the result.

So he sends them the obsidian hoping they'll find out it's use sooner rather than later. He probably can't tell how many will survive, but trusts that some will. We don't know how much he can see of the future, but I'd bet that like Mel , he sees multiple possible outcomes and has to try to support the ones that would be most favourable to his / CoTF goals. He has to weigh the loss of the NW men against the gain of the wildlings ( potentially ,300 vs.100,000 ) while doing what he can to limit their losses and make them remember the use of obsidian.

Another interesting thing is, when Jon came to Fist with Mance, Mance said now he understood why they suffered very few attacks from Others lately in Frostfangs. Because the Others were gathering their scattered forces to strike the Fist. BR should have noticed that.

I think we came up with an interesting point here. Does BR want an oldschool, ignorant NW taking hold at only 3 castles on the Wall and shutting the gates to desperate wildlings? Or does he prefer Jon leading a revolutionized NW consisting of many wildlings who had taken the vow and know the real enemy they had to face, watching all the castles? I also want to ask you, where does that repopulating the gift idea of Ned, Benjen and later Jon come from? From Mystery Knight, we learn that BR was not shy of taking heads when it comes to that. He may even plant the idea of Great Ranging to Old Bear so that the Others turn their attention to the Ranging Party and Mance's people will not be troubled all the way to CB and take the castle without any resistance. Seems like a conspiracy but we may learn more of his seemingly grim decisions later.

Edit: That may explain why Benjen didnot return to CB or to the Fist as well. Because the reason for the Great Ranging was the Benjen's disappearing. If BR saved and contacted Benjen, he should have told him to stay out.

[Ahura Mazda]

Benjen Stark.

There must be thousands of corpses and goods belonging to dead Wildlings and Men of the Nightwatch in the forests, even some belonging to wights or ancient remains of white walkers. Also, Ghost is a wolf, hence he doesn't know anything about obsidian properties and how that stuff can help against White Walkers.

So Ghost has no reason at all to target the particular scent of such mantle in the forest, and even less reasons to drag Jon there. He isn't a wolf trained to look for things on his own and be rewarded.

Hence his actions may have only two possible explanations:

- Someone who knew the obsidian glass was there purposely warged into Ghost to lead Jon there. I can't think of anyone else than Bran capable of such a task, though Bloodraven might have been able. In such a case it might have been Coldhands who put those things there.

- Benjen Stark left that stuff there with his own coat, because he knew Ghost did smell his scent in Winterfell and would have been able to track it once NW men would have gone near the Fist of the first men, which is somewhat an obvious intermediate stop for NW.

I want to believe in the second choice, because I don't find particularly relevant for Bloodraven to be involved for this and dislike him warging a Stark Wolf. Also, i like the idea Benjen is alive.

[butterbumps!]

Butterbumps!... as in my edit above , speaking to Jon could have resulted in Jon not following his path which is important to later events in defense of the realms of men.. and Jon was not really in a position to have his advice followed.. At this stage Mormont and Qhorin are not really aware of how serious the Other's threat is , ( or maybe I should say how advanced it is ). Mormont has only seen the two wights , no Others.. Qhorin may only have heard rumours , or reports of wight sightings.. (can't quite recall , offhand).

Is your argument mainly one of plot purposes? As in, CH wouldn't introduce himself or speak to Jon because the plot wasn't ripe for this yet?

Here's the thing-- I don't think CH needed to tell Jon anything extensive, or that would require him to be in a leadership position. Simply explaining that "this is the horn Mance is looking for," "use this to kill Others, not wights," and "a friend sent me," would have been rather useful info to pass on to Mormont. If Mormont didn't believe him, that's ok, it's not as though Jon's finding the cache made any huge difference in how the story went outside of Sam. I don't see why CH would have resisted talking to him on the basis that Jon needed more power before this; any explanation would have been an improvement over burying this anonymously.

I think Jon might not have trusted CH anyway, and CH would have had to concoct some story to account for himself, other than merely an interested party. Don't you think Jon would have insisted he speak to Mormont ? If they thought he was a wildling, he probably would have been "put to the question" , as Qhorin's captives were . He couldn't really present himself as NW..no-one would know of him...I can't think revealing himself would have been very helpful , under the circumstances ( As lamprey says , the hands would have been a "dead" giveaway ;) )

ETA; Chett would certainly have resented Jon. He knows it was Jon's suggestion that resulted in Sam replacing him. He was present. Jon didn't outright say he should be ditched , just that Aemon could use Sam's help .. but that was the end result.

Jon might have insisted CH speak to Mormont, but being a wight with ostensibly super human strength, I think CH could have gotten away pretty freely.

If CH doesn't touch Jon's bare hand, then there's no reason, in the complete darkness save for a single torch, that Jon would necessarily know this guy was dead. There's no "dead giveaway."

If Jon came back to Mormont saying a "friend" gave him the stash and instructions, but ran away, I sincerely doubt that Mormont would have sent men out looking for him, given their position at the time. However, if the man was Benjen, and he made a break for it, I think Mormont would have set men out to find him, being as how setting up at the Fist was done for the purpose of finding Benjen.

[bemused]

Butterbumps!.. I don't know if I'd say just for plot purposes... maybe ... I don't think the time would have been ripe, because Jon still needed some ripening , but I don't think it necessarily follows that that would be the only explanation for burying it anonymously.

Let me start by saying that Benjen is my favourite candidate ( or BJ with CH) , but I can see how it could be CH, using BJ's cloak. ..And I meant the "dead giveaway" would come if Jon tried to take him to Mormont, bring him into the light ..a lot could have gone wrong. Besides the hands, I think Jon , or anyone , might have wanted to see his face..that would be a problem ... and if they tried to get too close to him with the torch, that might be a problem.. Bran and co. notice how he shies away from fire.

Sam only takes the chance to trust him because otherwise , it's certain death... Bran and Co.only trust him because of Sam's story, and they're disposed to go with the way that opens for them because they've been following Jojen's and Bran's dreams and are already immersed in the mystical / mysterious.. Jon's not there yet, and neither is Mormont.... Might Jon not have raised an alarm ? ( Maybe, maybe not , since he slipped out on his own .)

I'm not sure Mormont wouldn't have sent a couple of the more seasoned rangers after him, if he ran off ..They're there on the lookout for Benjen , on the lookout for Qhorin and increasingly apprehensive about the whereabouts of Mance and what he's up to. I think a mysterious "friend" who doesn't want to stick around might be something they'd want to look into. Although they've seen the 2 wights and know about Craster in a very general way (Mormont may only believe he's exposing his male offspring ), they still have no real concept of the Others , their numbers , including wights, etc... So, while I don't think a message relating to something not in their experience ..the Others... would have made much difference to the outcome at the Fist, it might have alerted them to the danger , just not the scale of it.

BR may have believed that the slaughter at the Fist was inevitable , warning or no ...except , a warning might have made Mormont less willing to send Jon out . If Jon is important to BR's efforts, I'd think he'd want Jon away from there , where he couldn't have made much difference in the coming attack, and might have been killed.

Depending on the importance of having an experienced adult in the Stark bloodline both on the Wall and ruling Winterfell , which is still unknown ( though I feel pretty sure of it ), the survival of both Benjen and Jon could be of great importance to BR.

I guess I'm saying that , if it's CH , not speaking to Jon is part of the plot , not just a detail arranged so as not to interfere with the plot ( if that's what you meant).

[Mithras]

Some people do not like the idea that BR secretly warging into Ghost (like it is some kind of cheating) but I think this is the best explanation for the cases where Ghost acts weird. One of Ghost's crazy moods happened while he was leading Jon to the cache and another happened here:

Jon did not think sleep would come easily, but he knew the Halfhand was right. He found a place out of the wind, beneath an overhang of rock, and took off his cloak to use it for a blanket. “Ghost,” he called. “Here. To me.” He always slept better with the great white wolf beside him; there was comfort in the smell of him, and welcome warmth in that shaggy pale fur. This time, though, Ghost did no more than look at him. Then he turned away and padded around the garrons, and quick as that he was gone.

Here Ghost went through the Milkway to spy on the wildling camp only to be spotted and clawed by Varamyr's eagle. In Jon's dream Bran opened Jon's third eye and then Jon saw through Ghost's eyes.

ETA: Bran was hiding in the darkness of the crypts in WF while Jon was dreaming. Are we sure that Jon saw Bran in his dream or was it BR acting as Bran? Jon saw Bran with a weirwood face and Mel saw BR with a wooden face with Bran having a wolf's head beside him. I dont think Bran would appear as a weirwood in spirit world before eating that paste and marrying to the trees.

Why did BR want the Jon's party to be spotted and hunted by the wildlings? Did Qhorin knew everything from the beginning? Was pushing Jon into the arms of Mance his only mission? If he was contacted by Benjen and/or BR before he joined with Old Bear at the Fist, that explains all these. In fact, the more I think, the more likely it comes to me that Qhorin was preparing Jon to his time with wildlings all this brief time.

[Iona]

ETA: Bran was hiding in the darkness of the crypts in WF while Jon was dreaming. Are we sure that Jon saw Bran in his dream or was it BR acting as Bran? Jon saw Bran with a weirwood face and Mel saw BR with a wooden face with Bran having a wolf's head beside him. I dont think Bran would appear as a weirwood in spirit world before eating that paste and marrying to the trees.

I've always interpreted it to be something Bran really did, but that it was the future Bran who's tapped into the weirnet who then takes part in the events. We get hints of him being able to "call out to" younger Ned in that first practice run he has after eating the paste, and people generally think Bran will be a lot more skilled once he practices a little. It's not your typical time traveling stuff where he can just go back and screw things up, I sort of see it like all the things Bran would be doing in the future happened in the time-line of events we get to see.

[Master of Puppets]

Benjen who is also Coldhands IMO

[newagezombie]

Benjen.

It's possible he encountered wights when he went out, or heard about the others, and decided to find where they came from or their purpose. It's also possible he may have run into CH or BR and the CotF, who could have given him the dragonglass and/or told him about the Others.

My theory is that he went to the LoAW to find out more about the Others, and left a stash of dragonglass so he would have an extra source (when Sam stabbed the Other with the dragonglass dagger, it was too cold to pick up again), he could also have left them there for when he was going back to the wall.

Ghost could have been warged by BR or have smelled where the wights were, and led Jon on a windy path to avoid them.

I don't think Benjen is on a rogue mission necessarily, I just don't think he's satisfied with all he's seen. If he encountered wights/Others and heard about a massing of wildlings, he would probably want to find out more about the wights/Others, meaning travelling much further north, and explaining why he hasn't returned to the NW yet.

Also, a theory for TWoW: GRRM said we'd see more of the LoAW, so it's possible that BR and Bran will warg to ravens or something else and encounter Benjen there, seeing as how Bran can't really move there himself and Jon might have trouble gathering a force to go there himself for a number of reasons.

[Inquisitor Glokta]

Ok all of you suggesting it was Benjen, think is such a massive a-hole, that would allow a lot of his brothers to get killed on the fist, by not warning them of the approaching danger? (For all he knew, they DID NOT KNOW about the ww/wights)

This is absolutely NOT Benjen's character. If it turns out it was Benjen, who left the stuff there, he would jump right into the top 5 worst characters for me, for endangering hundreds of men he called brothers.

99% that it was Coldhands, who actually has access to children of the forest and therefore access to dragon glass.

Ofc one can argue CH = Benjen, as others have already elaborated, this would explain him avoiding the NW.