Heresy 189

[Arry'sFleas]

37 minutes ago, Black Crow said:

We are very explicitly told that his third eye opened in that darkness so we're not talking about memories from the future or anything to do with the weirwood but about a personal link with his brother through his direwolf.

I i agree, Bran opens his third eye in GoT when he sees beyond the curtain of light, at that point he becomes a greenseer, albeit an untrained one. But that should not stop him from tapping Jon on the shoulder, so to speak, and get Jon to embrace his skinchanging ability, a more mundane achievement. Because, this is happening is real time,  Bran does not need to see the future or the past at that point in time.

[Tucu]

7 hours ago, LynnS said:

Then Jon wakes.  This dream of surveying the land has a kind of 3EC quality to it, similar to Bran's coma dream.  He can see over a vast territory, horses look like ants swarming but he can see close detail as well.  I don't think this is Ghost's doing or Bran in the Crypts.  He may well dream of himself in the future.  There is a point where he will become much more powerful but we haven't seen that yet in Bloodraven's cave.  Jojen tells Bran that he is the Winged Wolf and that the 3EC has been trying to break his chains.  Bran is still chained to the earth.until we see him appear as the weirwood sprouting from the ground and growing before Jon's eyes.   Bloodraven says:

"In time, Bran will be able to see beyond the trees. And that past, present, and future are one. Nor will your sight be limited to your godswood."

Bran will be unbound by time and unchained from the earth.  He will not depend on the weirwoods but may appear as one.  He is no longer the apprentice but the 3EC.  We haven't yet seen this transformation  but when this occurs Bran can show up at any point in the timeline past and present.   This appearance to Jon is the first indication that Bran is unbound by time.  Why would GRRM make this a possibility if he hasn't already used it? 

How would we recognize it if it isn't odd and out of step with what we know and placed in chapters in just this way.

 

 

That part of the dream was from Ghost POV standing over a cliff/mountain. So it doesn't require much more power than a connection between Ghost, Jon, Bran and maybe Summer. We already know from other chapters that Ghost can sense what the other direwolves are doing, so that part is covered. We also know that Bran was in the crypts at the time, so the part of darkness and death can be explained by that.

The whole dream is ambiguous enough to support multiple explainations. Time manipulation is one of them; but it raises questions like why the Starks are suffering so much if they have a time manipulating god on their side.

 

 

 

[LynnS]

2 hours ago, Black Crow said:

Given the ambiguities in all of this I'm still reluctant to go with the time-travelling business.

When Bran tells Jon that he likes it in the dark, he isn't speaking from the Heart of Darkness but from the darkness of the Winterfell crypt. We are very explicitly told that his third eye opened in that darkness so we're not talking about memories from the future or anything to do with the weirwood but about a personal link with his brother through his direwolf.

I'm having a closer look at Bran's chapters in the Crypts and the Cave of the Greenseer and I'll answer your point one way or the other.

[LynnS]

2 hours ago, Arry'sFleas said:

I i agree, Bran opens his third eye in GoT when he sees beyond the curtain of light, at that point he becomes a greenseer, albeit an untrained one. But that should not stop him from tapping Jon on the shoulder, so to speak, and get Jon to embrace his skinchanging ability, a more mundane achievement. Because, this is happening is real time,  Bran does not need to see the future or the past at that point in time.

Which brings Hodor to mind.  Maybe the door fell on his head while he poking around in the crypts and that's why he came out saying Hodor.  Now that would be mundane.  

[LynnS]

42 minutes ago, Tucu said:

The whole dream is ambiguous enough to support multiple explainations. Time manipulation is one of them; but it raises questions like why the Starks are suffering so much if they have a time manipulating god on their side.

I think it's possible.  I think the warg bond or wolf blood is what makes it possible.  I don't think it's something that would be used often; perhaps only in relation to the Starks or wolf blood in particular.  We're 5 books into the story, if it's been used, where is it?   It requires rigorous testing, so I'm not offended that it's being questioned. 

[Melifeather]

All wargs and skinchangers have a third eye. The wolf-dreams that the Stark kids experience are their third eye fluttering open during sleep. They don't realize that they have a third eye, and Bran learns to open his in the darkness of the crypts before leaving Winterfell. But he does not slip into the weirwoods until he eats the paste. A connection needs to be made to slip into the weirwoods and the paste makes that possible. Therefore when Jon saw Bran as a weirwood sapling it was after Bran was wedded to the trees, and when Bran said he saw Jon while dreaming in the crypts he was actually "remembering" a future event.

[Brad Stark]

Jon seeing Bran appear in a dream as a weirwood does not require Bran to actually become one.  This could just be foreshadowing.  If I dream about a weirwood with my wife's face, that doesn't make her a greenseer, it just means I spend way too much time on this forum.

[Tucu]

37 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

All wargs and skinchangers have a third eye. The wolf-dreams that the Stark kids experience are their third eye fluttering open during sleep. They don't realize that they have a third eye, and Bran learns to open his in the darkness of the crypts before leaving Winterfell. But he does not slip into the weirwoods until he eats the paste. A connection needs to be made to slip into the weirwoods and the paste makes that possible. Therefore when Jon saw Bran as a weirwood sapling it was after Bran was wedded to the trees, and when Bran said he saw Jon while dreaming in the crypts he was actually "remembering" a future event.

Skinchanging skills seem to be latent and activate on its own while untrained skinchangers are sleeping. The same might be possible for greenseers; the weirwood paste might just allow better control of the powers. BR exhibited some greenseer powers long before he dissapeared to join the trees.

[LynnS]

33 minutes ago, Brad Stark said:

Jon seeing Bran appear in a dream as a weirwood does not require Bran to actually become one.  This could just be foreshadowing.  If I dream about a weirwood with my wife's face, that doesn't make her a greenseer, it just means I spend way too much time on this forum.

LOL! Me too.

[Melifeather]

3 hours ago, Tucu said:

Skinchanging skills seem to be latent and activate on its own while untrained skinchangers are sleeping. The same might be possible for greenseers; the weirwood paste might just allow better control of the powers. BR exhibited some greenseer powers long before he dissapeared to join the trees.

How so? I don't recall any instances of Bloodraven using the trees prior to becoming a greenseer. He's a skinchanger...no doubt about it, but he used ravens as his familiars.

[Melifeather]

3 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

Jon seeing Bran appear in a dream as a weirwood does not require Bran to actually become one.  This could just be foreshadowing.  If I dream about a weirwood with my wife's face, that doesn't make her a greenseer, it just means I spend way too much time on this forum.

Wolf-Bran said he didn't like the dark, and that was Bran when in the crypts. Weirwood-Bran told Jon he liked the dark, so obviously he was in the cave with Bloodraven when he reached out to touch and talk to Jon.

Lets try a different tact...when Bran was in the crypts and said he talked to Jon, where is the corresponding passage of the discussion?

[Tucu]

9 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

How so? I don't recall any instances of Bloodraven using the trees prior to becoming a greenseer. He's a skinchanger...no doubt about it, but he used ravens as his familiars.

The main one is the thousand eyes reference repeated in the novellas and ADwD.

A few from ADwD:

- "I have watched you for a long time, watched you with a thousand eyes and one" (BR speaking)

- "Was this the enemy? A thousand red eyes floated in the rising flames. He sees me. Beside him, a boy with a wolf's face threw back his head and howled" (Melissandre visions on the fire)

- "Only a little strength remains in his flesh. He has a thousand eyes and one, but there is much to watch. One day you will know" (Leaf talking about BR)

- "A thousand eyes, a hundred skins, wisdom deep as the roots of ancient trees. Greenseers. " (Leaf talking about the powers of a greenseer)

In the novellas the "thousand eyes and one" is repeated multiple times, but this is the longest tale of BR powers:

"A thousand eyes, and one. Some claimed the King's Hand was a student of the dark arts who could change his face, put on the likeness of a one-eyed dog, even turn into a mist. Packs of gaunt gray wolves hunted down his foes, men said, and carrion crows spied for him and whispered secrets in his ear. Most of the tales were only tales, Dunk did not doubt, but no one could doubt that Bloodraven had informers everywhere."

 

[Melifeather]

34 minutes ago, Tucu said:

The main one is the thousand eyes reference repeated in the novellas and ADwD.

A few from ADwD:

- "I have watched you for a long time, watched you with a thousand eyes and one" (BR speaking)

- "Was this the enemy? A thousand red eyes floated in the rising flames. He sees me. Beside him, a boy with a wolf's face threw back his head and howled" (Melissandre visions on the fire)

- "Only a little strength remains in his flesh. He has a thousand eyes and one, but there is much to watch. One day you will know" (Leaf talking about BR)

- "A thousand eyes, a hundred skins, wisdom deep as the roots of ancient trees. Greenseers. " (Leaf talking about the powers of a greenseer)

In the novellas the "thousand eyes and one" is repeated multiple times, but this is the longest tale of BR powers:

"A thousand eyes, and one. Some claimed the King's Hand was a student of the dark arts who could change his face, put on the likeness of a one-eyed dog, even turn into a mist. Packs of gaunt gray wolves hunted down his foes, men said, and carrion crows spied for him and whispered secrets in his ear. Most of the tales were only tales, Dunk did not doubt, but no one could doubt that Bloodraven had informers everywhere."

 

He was a greenseer by blood, but the thousand eyes and one are the many animals he used to spy. That being said greenseers wedded to the trees have no concept of time. They are the acorn, sapling, tree, and stump. Bloodraven said he watched for thousands of years because he saw Bran's coming through the weirwoods, but he couldn't have seen through the weirwoods until he was wedded to them and that would've been after he left the Wall.

[Tucu]

34 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

He was a greenseer by blood, but the thousand eyes and one are the many animals he used to spy. That being said greenseers wedded to the trees have no concept of time. They are the acorn, sapling, tree, and stump. Bloodraven said he watched for thousands of years because he saw Bran's coming through the weirwoods, but he couldn't have seen through the weirwoods until he was wedded to them and that would've been after he left the Wall.

We are told 7 times in the novellas and 1 time in AFfC that bloodraven has a thousand eyes. And then in ADwD were are told 7 times that one of the greenseer powers is to have one thousand eyes. I take this repetition as GRRM hinting that BR already had some greenseer powers by the time of The Sworn Sword.

[Yield.]

18 hours ago, JNR said:

Problem is, Bran remembers having done it.  Also from ACOK, we have:

If it were a future Bran doing it backwards in time, then Bran in ACOK should have no concept of this event having happened.

True. The fact that Bran doubts the veracity of the experience can also been seen as his present self not having initiated the contact. There is nothing here that excludes the possibility of future Bran having connected with both his past self and Jon through Ghost.

 

16 hours ago, Tucu said:

At Queenscrown, Bran saw Jon via Summer so I don't think that ASoS extract it is related to Jon's dream about Bran being a tree. There is an extract from ACoK Bran VII while they were in the crypts when Bran remembers touching Ghost and talking to Jon:

"He could reach Summer whenever he wanted, and once he had even touched Ghost and talked to Jon. Though maybe he had only dreamed that".

So Jon's dream could be a consequence of Bran's natural greenseer powers or future Bran's actions or even Bloodraven providing a link between Jon and Bran or Bloodraven impersonating Bran.

Or Bloodraven using both Bran and Ghost/Jon at the same time. The thing that stands out in this contact is that Bran appears as weirwood when no other contact between wolves ever has that kind of imagery in it. Nor indeed do any of the other contacts between wolf and Stark siblings. Mind you there is no indirect contact between Stark sibling save this one. No other Stark has contacted their brother or sister's wolf at all, which is strange. If the wolves can connect with each other at anytime, as proved by Ghost in Dance, then why have the Starks not connected with their siblings while in their wolves? Arya dreams of Nymeria nightly at one point, Bran is constantly in Summer, and Jon is frequently in Ghost. How have we had no contact between Starks while in their wolves? Strange coincidence that.

 

9 hours ago, Black Crow said:

Given the ambiguities in all of this I'm still reluctant to go with the time-travelling business.

When Bran tells Jon that he likes it in the dark, he isn't speaking from the Heart of Darkness but from the darkness of the Winterfell crypt. We are very explicitly told that his third eye opened in that darkness so we're not talking about memories from the future or anything to do with the weirwood but about a personal link with his brother through his direwolf.

 

The problem here is that Bran at this point in the story has no idea he will ever be wed to a tree. In fact he's no idea he truly is a greenseer and no connection yet to the weirwoods. Bran's still doubting the truth of what Jojen is telling him, and his connection to the Winterfell heart tree is just a ritual/religious one. So why have him appear as weirwood? Foreshadowing? That's about as subtle as an anvil on the head if that's the only reason Martin put that little scene in the way he did. Or is it that the Starks can't speak to each other without the use of the weirnet and their wolves? There must be a reason why this is the only instance of two Starks having a conversation directly.

[Melifeather]

13 minutes ago, Tucu said:

We are told 7 times in the novellas and 1 time in AFfC that bloodraven has a thousand eyes. And then in ADwD were are told 7 times that one of the greenseer powers is to have one thousand eyes. I take this repetition as GRRM hinting that BR already had some greenseer powers by the time of The Sworn Sword.

Are you asserting that he was spying through the weirwoods before he was wedded to the trees? Or something else?

I do think Bloodraven was able to change the present by affecting the past, and he did have an uncanny way of knowing when to be somewhere, like Lord Butterwell's tourney, which makes me think he was able to go back in time to tell himself what would happen in the future.

So if anything, the passages about Bloodraven likely support time travel.

[Matthew.]

25 minutes ago, Tucu said:

We are told 7 times in the novellas and 1 time in AFfC that bloodraven has a thousand eyes. And then in ADwD were are told 7 times that one of the greenseer powers is to have one thousand eyes. I take this repetition as GRRM hinting that BR already had some greenseer powers by the time of The Sworn Sword.

He was born a GS, but I'm with Feather in that I've always interpreted the "thousand eyes" as specifically meaning he was spying through ravens and crows during his mortal years, especially when he was south of the Wall. I suspect he had no more understanding of his own gifts than the Starks do of theirs--save Bran, who is receiving guidance.

I don't think he started greenseeing in earnest until after he'd disappeared north of the Wall and (presumably) underwent the same weirwood paste communion that Bran underwent to begin merging with weirnet. If anything, his interest in studying arcane texts with Shiera Seastar and Aerys I may suggest that he understood he was a sorcerer, but had no deeper wisdom - such as weirnet - to draw upon, and was desperate to find information that would increase his understanding of what he was experiencing.

[Tucu]

14 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

Are you asserting that he was spying through the weirwoods before he was wedded to the trees? Or something else?

I do think Bloodraven was able to change the present by affecting the past, and he did have an uncanny way of knowing when to be somewhere, like Lord Butterwell's tourney, which makes me think he was able to go back in time to tell himself what would happen in the future.

So if anything, the passages about Bloodraven likely support time travel.

I am not sure how far to take it. I think BR was using some greenseer powers while he was Hand of the King. It might have been his natural greenseer powers or it might be that he met the CoTF early in his life but remained a free-range greenseer.

If BR has the ability to manipulate time he didn't use it to stop the Tragedy at Summerhall or change the outcome of Robert's Rebellion. Maybe he couldn't or these events had to happen for a higher purpose. We can speculate in a similar way for for Bran; why didn't he save Ned, Cat and/or Robb; or why he left Arya and Sansa so suffer?

[LynnS]

19 minutes ago, Tucu said:

 We can speculate in a similar way for for Bran; why didn't he save Ned, Cat and/or Robb; or why he left Arya and Sansa so suffer?

Because there is a terrible price to pay for interfering in the fates of men.  It's a monkey's paw situation.  This is the warning that MMD gives Dany before she calls on the ancient powers to save Drogo and why the Faceless Men (the grumpkins of Old Nan's story with their 3 wishes) never kill someone they know or take a life for revenge.  Because of the unintended consequences.  It's the same warning that BR gives Bran about 'bringing back the dead',  MMD tells Dany that she paid a terrible price when she learned the ritual; and it may have been the knowledge that it will cost her own life on Drogo's funeral pyre. The terrible knowledge...

But it's not the only way that Bran could intervene in the past.  I detailed this upthread.,,, I'm looking for the page...16

[Melifeather]

18 minutes ago, Tucu said:

I am not sure how far to take it. I think BR was using some greenseer powers while he was Hand of the King. It might have been his natural greenseer powers or it might be that he met the CoTF early in his life but remained a free-range greenseer.

If BR has the ability to manipulate time he didn't use it to stop the Tragedy at Summerhall or change the outcome of Robert's Rebellion. Maybe he couldn't or these events had to happen for a higher purpose. We can speculate in a similar way for for Bran; why didn't he save Ned, Cat and/or Robb; or why he left Arya and Sansa so suffer?

I think there's a slight difference between changing the past and affecting the past. Bloodraven may not have been able to prevent Summerhal or Rhaegar's death on the Trident, but he may have been able to affect the past in order to change the future.