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[Book Spoilers] R+L=J, A+J=T and other theories on HBO V.4


Suzanna Stormborn

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7 minutes ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

You don't think Euron might claim Viserion first? I feel like that could be one interpretation of the "white lady" in Aeron's vision. 

Put it this way. If Tyrion claims Viserion now (and Brown Ben Plumm gets Rhaegal as in Lord Varys's theory), I find it difficult to see how any party opposing Daenerys (such as Aegon or Euron's camp) will claim a Dragon in time to set up some kind of Dance of the Dragons v2.

Surely Dany's opponents need to gain that Dragon before she arrives in Westeros, in order to get time to master the dragon and develop some realistic battle tactics with it. In fact, most likely they will use this Dragon to wreak havoc in Westeros BEFORE Dany arrives, forcing her to confront them with Dragons of her own.

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2 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Put it this way. If Tyrion claims Viserion now (and Brown Ben Plumm gets Rhaegal as in Lord Varys's theory), I find it difficult to see how any party opposing Daenerys (such as Aegon or Euron's camp) will claim a Dragon in time to set up some kind of Dance of the Dragons v2.

Surely Dany's opponents need to gain that Dragon before she arrives in Westeros, in order to get time to master the dragon and develop some realistic battle tactics with it. In fact, most likely they will use this Dragon to wreak havoc in Westeros BEFORE Dany arrives, forcing her to confront them with Dragons of her own.

I haven't read the Battle of Meereen chapters in a long time, so my memory's a little shaky in that respect, but I'm not really convinced that Tyrion will ride Viserion, at least not yet. I see it as much more likely that the Ironborn will claim Viserion using the dragon horn, allowing Euron to eventually claim him. 

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3 minutes ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

I haven't read the Battle of Meereen chapters in a long time, so my memory's a little shaky in that respect, but I'm not really convinced that Tyrion will ride Viserion, at least not yet. I see it as much more likely that the Ironborn will claim Viserion using the dragon horn, allowing Euron to eventually claim him. 

I have this vision in my mind of the Horn sounding and the Dragon in earshot of it (presumably Viserion, but maybe Rhaegal), turning around in mid air and disappearing over the Western horizon like a homing pigeon, heading straight for the Horn's master, Euron.

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Tyrion picked up an alabaster white dragon covered in blood at the exact second the Second Sons declared for Dany. We know that Viserion gets injured from the scorpions moments after this. Ill eat my hat if Tyrion and BBP dont go save and bond with wounded viserion in opening chapters of WoW, leading to one of them riding him.

 

my guess is BBP, who then dies not too long after. Then Tyrion will finally ride Viserion.

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46 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

I'm afraid you don't suggest good reasons for many of your views, just statements of opinion couched as fact. Like Euron not getting a dragon, or Arya and Sansa not engaging in conflict, or that Aegon's queen will have time to have a kid, or that Bael's story is anything other than a fabricated myth, etc. etc.

I'm not saying Euron couldn't become a dragonrider eventually. But if he was to become a dragonrider soon he would have to be in Slaver's Bay right now - which he is not. Arya and Sansa have the potential to end up on different sides but they don't have any potential for a personal conflict on the show level. If they ever are together in Winterfell again then they wouldn't be enemies in this clichéd and ridiculous manner. Aegon's queen - if he marries - will have a lot more time to have a child than Jon and Dany would - or any other character who isn't old enough to have a child.

Why should be believe that the story of Bael is a fabricated myth? And if you believe that the Starks go back in unbroken and direct male line to Brandon the Builder I really can't help you. That is completely unbelievable.

46 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

And in-universe, a patriarchal line is repeatedly viewed as superior to a female based one. That is unambiguous in the story. Whatever our modern views might be. And I don't see House Stark's status being diminished after all is said and done, comparatively to that of House Lannister or any other House.

LOL, that is the belief of some people in the story, but not George R. R. Martin's belief. He is not going to reinforce that in the end. Arya makes it clear that 'the woman is important, too' as early as AGoT. And there is also a reason why Sansa and Arya are POVs and not Rickon. Rickon isn't a main character - if there are Starks who deserve to rule in the end it's Bran, Sansa, or Arya. And since Bran is most likely not going to rule anything - never mind whether he lives or dies - we would have to settle for Sansa or Arya. And it is pretty clear that Sansa will be the winner then. She is the only Stark who is groomed to rule anything.

46 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

And Martin was quite clear that Arya and Sansa have personal issues to resolve. The Show has obviously latched onto that, but once again, in a ham fisted illogical way.

Sure, they have different personalities. But that's nothing they could not work out in one long conversation. That's what they would do if they ever met each other again at Winterfell.

46 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

As for Brown Ben Plum. It seems likely that the entire reason for his "drop of Dragon blood", was simply to set the precedent for Dragons reacting warmly to some Targ blood, so that the scene in the Show where Drogon fawns over Jon has a proper foundation once the two meet in the books. I doubt that the lowly Brown Ben Plum is destined to ride a dragon.

Those things have nothing to do with each other. Brown Ben has Targaryen blood, and this fact in itself is likely going to be relevant in some way. Perhaps he is going to fail as a dragonrider, perhaps not. But there will be dragonriders with Targaryen long before Jon comes around. Jon is going to be the last dragonrider in the story, By the time he comes around we'll have long figured out how the dragonrider thing works.

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3 minutes ago, Suzanna Stormborn said:

Tyrion picked up an alabaster white dragon covered in blood at the exact second the Second Sons declared for Dany. We know that Viserion gets injured from the scorpions moments after this. Ill eat my hat if Tyrion and BBP dont go save and bond with wounded viserion in opening chapters of WoW, leading to one of them riding him.

 

my guess is BBP, who then dies not too long after. Then Tyrion will finally ride Viserion.

What would be the point of BBP in that scenario? Other than lessening the impact of Tyrion mounting Viserion after BBP has already watered down the novelty of the act?

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13 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

I'm not saying Euron couldn't become a dragonrider eventually. But if he was to become a dragonrider soon he would have to be in Slaver's Bay right now - which he is not. Arya and Sansa have the potential to end up on different sides but they don't have any potential for a personal conflict on the show level. If they ever are together in Winterfell again then they wouldn't be enemies in this clichéd and ridiculous manner. Aegon's queen - if he marries - will have a lot more time to have a child than Jon and Dany would - or any other character who isn't old enough to have a child.

Why should be believe that the story of Bael is a fabricated myth? And if you believe that the Starks go back in unbroken and direct male line to Brandon the Builder I really can't help you. That is completely unbelievable.

LOL, that is the belief of some people in the story, but not George R. R. Martin's belief. He is not going to reinforce that in the end. Arya makes it clear that 'the woman is important, too' as early as AGoT. And there is also a reason why Sansa and Arya are POVs and not Rickon. Rickon isn't a main character - if there are Starks who deserve to rule in the end it's Bran, Sansa, or Arya. And since Bran is most likely not going to rule anything - never mind whether he lives or dies - we would have to settle for Sansa or Arya. And it is pretty clear that Sansa will be the winner then. She is the only Stark who is groomed to rule anything.

Sure, they have different personalities. But that's nothing they could not work out in one long conversation. That's what they would do if they ever met each other again at Winterfell.

Those things have nothing to do with each other. Brown Ben has Targaryen blood, and this fact in itself is likely going to be relevant in some way. Perhaps he is going to fail as a dragonrider, perhaps not. But there will be dragonriders with Targaryen long before Jon comes around. Jon is going to be the last dragonrider in the story, By the time he comes around we'll have long figured out how the dragonrider thing works.

I'm afraid you're conflating a bunch of stuff here.

I'm not claiming the Show version of the Arya-Sansa conflict is in any way accurate. But there is an SSM stating clearly that Arya and Sansa have some significant issues to resolve. This is going to be a significant point in the convergence of their character arcs later in the series. An event that will no doubt have a dramatic impact on the plot. Most likely, the idea that it coincides with a resolution to Littlefinger's plot arc has a basis in truth. The Show probably just redirected this drama North to Winterfell, because they injected Sansa into the Northern plot, first in place of Jeyne's arc, and then in place of Rickon's intended arc. Hence, for the Sansa-Arya-Littlefinger drama to play out in the Show, they had to place it in Winterfell, when it will be resolved long before the characters return to Winterfell in the books, most likely.

As for Rickon. He wasn't given a POV because Martin outright stated that writing children were the most difficult part of the books for him, and Bran was difficult enough at age 7. He was not even going to attempt writing from the POV of a three year old. That has nothing to do with Rickon's future. I find it ironic that I distinctly recall you yourself stating in the past that Rickon's main purpose in the story was likely to continue the Stark line. Something you now seem to argue against.

Sansa may well rule in Winterfell - as Rickon's guardian until he comes of age. Which in the books would be 10-15 years after the end of the series. She will rebuild Winterfell after the Battle for the Dawn, as foreshadowed by the Snow castle, but I think Rickon will be the heir.  I think the Show had to kill him in order to make Sansa's plot work in the North, when in the books she is not intended to go North until the end of the series. Her plot could not work with Rickon alive and well and the true heir to Winterfell.

As for Jon. I don't even claim he will be a dragonrider. And even if he will be, of course there will be others before him. Tyrion, most likely. And whoever gains control of one of the Dragons with the Horn. Maybe it will be Rhaegal who is captured by the Horn, if Viserion is indeed down and injured early in the Meereen battle. I was wondering how they would isolate the effect of the Horn to only one Dragon. Drogon was conveniently removed from the scene just before the Horn arrives. But the other two should both be in earshot of its sounding. If Viserion is injured and unable to fly, and somehow otherwise occuppied as a result, then maybe Rhaegal will be the captured one. This makes sense, actually.

But I still don't see the point of BBP mounting Viserion for a short while before Tyrion takes over. It just diminishes Tyrion's accomplishment then.

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24 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

I have this vision in my mind of the Horn sounding and the Dragon in earshot of it (presumably Viserion, but maybe Rhaegal), turning around in mid air and disappearing over the Western horizon like a homing pigeon, heading straight for the Horn's master, Euron.

That is about as childish a plot idea as the whole thing the show comes up. I mean, you know how far away the Arbor is from Slaver's Bay, right? And it goes against established characters there. Moqorro has messed with Victarion and Euron's plans and Victarion himself intends to betray Euron. How on earth could Euron be in control of Dragonbinder when he didn't even know that sounding the horn would kill the man who blew it? The man is powerful but he isn't omniscient nor an expert on Valyrian sorcery.

Dragonbinder will have some effect but we don't know what it is going to do exactly because we don't even know what it was made for, originally.

41 minutes ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

You don't think Euron might claim Viserion first? I feel like that could be one interpretation of the "white lady" in Aeron's vision. 

As @Suzanna Stormborn has said we have the bloody white dragon piece which is a very strong sign in the Viserion-Tyrion direction. There is no white lady in Aeron's dream but rather a tall shadow shaped like a woman with white fire in her hands. That doesn't exactly point to Viserion.

Besides, from what we know from the sample chapters Viserion is the dragon who is retreating from the battle after snatching a corpse in midair. He flies back to his lair in Meereen to eat his price. Rhaegal is the one who flies out across the bay, and he is thus the one who will be first affected by Dragonbinder. Victarion intends to sound the horn three times since Dany has three dragons, but we don't know how horn or dragon should know which dragon is meant by each horn blow. Rhaegal will be affected by the first horn blow and then something is going to happen. Something Victarion is not exactly going to expect. Most likely something that prevents the other thralls from sounding the horn a second or third time.

Viserion is then likely only going to be claimed after the battle. If nobody claims any dragon they will just continue to live in their lairs in Meereen. They have no reason to go anywhere.

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14 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

That is about as childish a plot idea as the whole thing the show comes up. I mean, you know how far away the Arbor is from Slaver's Bay, right? And it goes against established characters there. Moqorro has messed with Victarion and Euron's plans and Victarion himself intends to betray Euron. How on earth could Euron be in control of Dragonbinder when he didn't even know that sounding the horn would kill the man who blew it? The man is powerful but he isn't omniscient nor an expert on Valyrian sorcery.

Dragonbinder will have some effect but we don't know what it is going to do exactly because we don't even know what it was made for, originally.

As @Suzanna Stormborn has said we have the bloody white dragon piece which is a very strong sign in the Viserion-Tyrion direction. There is no white lady in Aeron's dream but rather a tall shadow shaped like a woman with white fire in her hands. That doesn't exactly point to Viserion.

Besides, from what we know from the sample chapters Viserion is the dragon who is retreating from the battle after snatching a corpse in midair. He flies back to his lair in Meereen to eat his price. Rhaegal is the one who flies out across the bay, and he is thus the one who will be first affected by Dragonbinder. Victarion intends to sound the horn three times since Dany has three dragons, but we don't know how horn or dragon should know which dragon is meant by each horn blow. Rhaegal will be affected by the first horn blow and then something is going to happen. Something Victarion is not exactly going to expect. Most likely something that prevents the other thralls from sounding the horn a second or third time.

Viserion is then likely only going to be claimed after the battle. If nobody claims any dragon they will just continue to live in their lairs in Meereen. They have no reason to go anywhere.

Yes, I think Moqorro has foreseen that Victarrion will die in blaze of fire, likely roasted by one of the dragons if you ask me. And of course it won't work out exactly as planned. Nothing ever does. Most likely the idea of capturing all three dragons is what will fail, but the first one will succeed. Euron is tied to the Horn with blood, already. There is no indication that his physical distance from where the binding happens has any impact on the efficacy of the act.

In fact, one might logically argue that since sounding the Horn results in death, the ancient Valyrians would likely have delegated that role to expendable slaves, while the Horn's master was sitting safely somewhere in his Tower, waiting for the capturing effort to succeed. That the Hornblower is then expended would be of no concern to the Dragonlord/sorceror.

I just think that the Horn plot is utterly stupid if it does not bring Euron a dragon. It has to pay off for him, else he looks like a doddering idiot for placing so much stock in it. The dunce here is Victarrion, who Martin has openly stated is dumb as a stump. Euron has played him. For him the outcome will be quite unexpected. But for Euron it is going to generate some major gain. In the form of one dragon (but no, not three as he may have intended).

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15 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

That is about as childish a plot idea as the whole thing the show comes up. I mean, you know how far away the Arbor is from Slaver's Bay, right? And it goes against established characters there. Moqorro has messed with Victarion and Euron's plans and Victarion himself intends to betray Euron. How on earth could Euron be in control of Dragonbinder when he didn't even know that sounding the horn would kill the man who blew it? The man is powerful but he isn't omniscient nor an expert on Valyrian sorcery.

Dragonbinder will have some effect but we don't know what it is going to do exactly because we don't even know what it was made for, originally.

As @Suzanna Stormborn has said we have the bloody white dragon piece which is a very strong sign in the Viserion-Tyrion direction. There is no white lady in Aeron's dream but rather a tall shadow shaped like a woman with white fire in her hands. That doesn't exactly point to Viserion.

Besides, from what we know from the sample chapters Viserion is the dragon who is retreating from the battle after snatching a corpse in midair. He flies back to his lair in Meereen to eat his price. Rhaegal is the one who flies out across the bay, and he is thus the one who will be first affected by Dragonbinder. Victarion intends to sound the horn three times since Dany has three dragons, but we don't know how horn or dragon should know which dragon is meant by each horn blow. Rhaegal will be affected by the first horn blow and then something is going to happen. Something Victarion is not exactly going to expect. Most likely something that prevents the other thralls from sounding the horn a second or third time.

Viserion is then likely only going to be claimed after the battle. If nobody claims any dragon they will just continue to live in their lairs in Meereen. They have no reason to go anywhere.

My thinking was that in order to have a second Dance of the Dragons, Aegon is going to need a dragon of his own. And if Aeron's vision is prophetic, we know that Euron is going to find some way to take the Iron Throne as well, which will also probably involve some sort of mythical creature. This is all speculation at this point, of course, but I think Tyrion riding a dragon this early on would hinder the plot a bit. 

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48 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

For fuck's sake, everyone in both continents going to ride one of these dragons?  Tyrion, Brown Ben, Victarion, Euron, Aegon, Bran, I'm sure I'm missing an other handful of people.

No wonder the author can't finish the story.

Yes exactly. 

Although i dont and never have thought for one minute that Bran would ride a dragon.

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As for the Ice Spear. I would imagine that it wasn't the shard of ice or the force of the projectile that downed the Dragon, but some kind of magical attribute that the Night's King bestowed upon the weapon. I must admit I found it weak, and most likely just utilized for visual effect, to resemble a surface to air rocket downing a fighter jet or something dramatic like that. I would have thought a cloud of icy air could have enshrouded the dragon, or a blizzard as Lord Varys suggested could have engulfed it or some such type of more natural type of magic. But that wouldn't have looked as dramatic.

I still think that weirwood arrows could do something, with the appropriate blood magic spell cast onto it. Whether that will come into play in the books, I don't know.

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What really are people's confidence that the horn actually binds a dragon to the horn's master (however someone actually becomes its master, which is not clear other than that it seems to require blood). But there are no stories of anyone other than a member of a dragonlord family in old Valyria getting a horn and binding to a dragon. Wouldn't there be some suggestion that occasionally someone else got a dragon that way? Instead all of the stories are that there were specific dragonlord families that had dragons and the Targs are the only ones that survived the Doom and its aftermath.

Other than Moqorro -- who might have his own agenda -- and Euron -- who definitely has his own agenda -- what evidence is there that the horn can really bind a dragon to the horn's master? If Euron really believed this to be the case, would he really have given the horn to Victarion who would then have plenty of time to become the horn's master?

As far as I can tell, the only other reference in any of the books (even including the side books) to a horn affecting a dragon is a statement in Daenerys X from A Dance With Dragons: "The dragonlords of old Valyria had controlled their mounts with binding spells and sorcerous horns." To me that suggests that the spells were used to bind the families to the dragons (how the Targs and other dragonlord families became able to bind a dragon as long as they had the right "drop" of blood descended from the original blood that activated the spell -- and why incest became so necessary). But the horns would not be used for the same purpose. If horns could be used to bind the dragon, then the incest would not be necessary because anyone could become master of the horn. I understand that reference in ADWD to mean that once a person is bound to the dragon, the dragon is better controlled using the horn -- but the person still needs to be bound using the blood connection created by the original binding spells.

The next sentence in that paragraph is "Daenerys made do with a word and a whip." In other words, Dany uses the whip to help control Drogon (presumably in some manner analogous to how the dragonlords used horns) but the binding was not accomplished through the whip. The binding was done presumably in the way that the side books have described by actually mounting and forming the bond. The horn might make it easier to approach the dragon for the purpose of binding -- or might be used to make the dragon easier to control after binding -- but the horn actually causing a binding between dragon and horn master does not seem consistent with this evidence.

So this evidence suggests to me that the horn may help to control the dragon in some way -- but the horn does not seem likely to be able to create the "lifetime bond" that a dragon can have with a person with dragonlord blood.

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14 minutes ago, UnmaskedLurker said:

What really are people's confidence that the horn actually binds a dragon to the horn's master (however someone actually becomes its master, which is not clear other than that it seems to require blood). But there are no stories of anyone other than a member of a dragonlord family in old Valyria getting a horn and binding to a dragon. Wouldn't there be some suggestion that occasionally someone else got a dragon that way? Instead all of the stories are that there were specific dragonlord families that had dragons and the Targs are the only ones that survived the Doom and its aftermath.

Other than Moqorro -- who might have his own agenda -- and Euron -- who definitely has his own agenda -- what evidence is there that the horn can really bind a dragon to the horn's master? If Euron really believed this to be the case, would he really have given the horn to Victarion who would then have plenty of time to become the horn's master?

As far as I can tell, the only other reference in any of the books (even including the side books) to a horn affecting a dragon is a statement in Daenerys X from A Dance With Dragons: "The dragonlords of old Valyria had controlled their mounts with binding spells and sorcerous horns." To me that suggests that the spells were used to bind the families to the dragons (how the Targs and other dragonlord families became able to bind a dragon as long as they had the right "drop" of blood descended from the original blood that activated the spell -- and why incest became so necessary). But the horns would not be used for the same purpose. If horns could be used to bind the dragon, then the incest would not be necessary because anyone could become master of the horn. I understand that reference in ADWD to mean that once a person is bound to the dragon, the dragon is better controlled using the horn -- but the person still needs to be bound using the blood connection created by the original binding spells.

The next sentence in that paragraph is "Daenerys made do with a word and a whip." In other words, Dany uses the whip to help control Drogon (presumably in some manner analogous to how the dragonlords used horns) but the binding was not accomplished through the whip. The binding was done presumably in the way that the side books have described by actually mounting and forming the bond. The horn might make it easier to approach the dragon for the purpose of binding -- or might be used to make the dragon easier to control after binding -- but the horn actually causing a binding between dragon and horn master does not seem consistent with this evidence.

So this evidence suggests to me that the horn may help to control the dragon in some way -- but the horn does not seem likely to be able to create the "lifetime bond" that a dragon can have with a person with dragonlord blood.

Truth is we just don't know at this point. There are various possibilities.

1. It doesn't work at all. Which makes the Horn plot pretty pointless.

2. It can temporarily distrupt the bond between rider and Dragon, but that seems somewhat unlikely to me, and would not produce much gain to the Horn's master, other than a brief tactical advantage during the heat of battle.

3. It can only work on an unbonded Dragon (meaning only Rhaegal and Viserion at this point). I kind of favour this option. Meaning that for a new family to bond a dragon lineage to it for the first time, a Horn would be used. Thereafter, this bond is carried on through the blood of both the rider and the dragon, to their respective descendents.

4. The horn provides some kind of temporary ensorcelment of the Dragon that wears off after a while. Maybe the Horn just lures the Dragon to Westeros, but once there Euron finds he cannot control it. And then Aegon arrives and claims it as his own through his Blackfyre blood.

5. Some other scenario we haven't even imagined yet.

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I gotta say, all of these scenarios sound pretty forced and terrible to me, I was never a huge fan of the dragonbinding horn and was hoping it was a red herring, but since it's the cover of the book that isn't out yet, I have to assume that it's going to bind a dragon.....but all of this begins to sound much more high fantasy+cliche than what has gone before. 

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36 minutes ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

My thinking was that in order to have a second Dance of the Dragons, Aegon is going to need a dragon of his own. And if Aeron's vision is prophetic, we know that Euron is going to find some way to take the Iron Throne as well, which will also probably involve some sort of mythical creature. This is all speculation at this point, of course, but I think Tyrion riding a dragon this early on would hinder the plot a bit. 

Aegon doesn't need a dragon of his own for there to be a Second Dance. The Dance of the Dragons was a civil war between a male and a female Targaryen claimant and since that likely going to be repeated in Aegon vs. Daenerys that in and of itself could be enough for this war to be called 'the Second Dance of the Dragons' by some people - either in retrospect or while the war is still waging.

In fact, it should make a poor Dance in any case if you reduce it to the dragons. During the Dance the Targaryens had about twenty dragons - in the Second Dance there will be only three - at least presumably - and none of them will be as large as Vhagar, Meleys, Vermithor, or Dreamfyre.

Aegon or Euron could certainly profit from the fact that they acquire a dragon of their own but that is hardly a necessary condition for the war to be called that way. Nor do any of Dany's enemies need dragons to defeat her. Her dragons won't be of much help on the battlefield anyway. That is another point where the show is clearly wrong - Dany's dragons will never grow to the monstrous sizes they have in the show.

54 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Yes, I think Moqorro has foreseen that Victarrion will die in blaze of fire, likely roasted by one of the dragons if you ask me. And of course it won't work out exactly as planned. Nothing ever does. Most likely the idea of capturing all three dragons is what will fail, but the first one will succeed. Euron is tied to the Horn with blood, already. There is no indication that his physical distance from where the binding happens has any impact on the efficacy of the act.

That still doesn't make any sense. Euron isn't there. And dragons aren't machines. They can't be remote-controlled. If Euron was there he could claim one of the dragons. But he isn't, so that whole thing is not going to happen or has to wait. Victarion could claim one of the dragons - after all, he is going along with what the Valyrian glyphs say. We don't know whether Euron could translate those. And even if he did - now Victarion's blood is on the horn so he should become the dragonrider, not Euron. If the horn worked the way Moqorro claims (or rather indicates) it does.

54 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

In fact, one might logically argue that since sounding the Horn results in death, the ancient Valyrians would likely have delegated that role to expendable slaves, while the Horn's master was sitting safely somewhere in his Tower, waiting for the capturing effort to succeed. That the Hornblower is then expended would be of no concern to the Dragonlord/sorceror.

Or a dragonlord sounding the horn doesn't die because the blood of the dragon protects you from the magical effects?

54 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

I just think that the Horn plot is utterly stupid if it does not bring Euron a dragon. It has to pay off for him, else he looks like a doddering idiot for placing so much stock in it. The dunce here is Victarrion, who Martin has openly stated is dumb as a stump. Euron has played him. For him the outcome will be quite unexpected. But for Euron it is going to generate some major gain. In the form of one dragon (but no, not three as he may have intended).

Euron didn't send Victarion and the horn to Slaver's Bay to steal him some dragons. He sent him there to bring him his future queen, Daenerys Targaryen, and her three dragons. Dragonbinder doesn't seem to be meant as an instrument to steal dragons - from Euron's POV - but rather as some kind of marriage gift. I mean, Euron wants Dany and the dragons to claim the Iron Throne. He has to strike some sort of deal. He knows she has dragons and a growing army of followers. 

Victarion is set up by him to die in the process of the whole mission - after all, he is a potential rival - but that doesn't mean his mission is any less important. Euron would have his own people among Victarion's men to ensure that some sort of understanding is reached with Daenerys.

But just sounding the horn upon reaching Meereen clearly wasn't the plan - it is something Victarion came up with after he met Moqorro.

31 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

As for the Ice Spear. I would imagine that it wasn't the shard of ice or the force of the projectile that downed the Dragon, but some kind of magical attribute that the Night's King bestowed upon the weapon. I must admit I found it weak, and most likely just utilized for visual effect, to resemble a surface to air rocket downing a fighter jet or something dramatic like that. I would have thought a cloud of icy air could have enshrouded the dragon, or a blizzard as Lord Varys suggested could have engulfed it or some such type of more natural type of magic. But that wouldn't have looked as dramatic.

George is going to not ignore basic physics when or if he is going to kill a dragon. But Dany's dragons won't be that effective against mortal and undead enemies anyway, considering their size. Especially not if the weather conditions are bad. Even Meraxes and Balerion weren't of much use during a rainstorm - as both Rhaenys - during the Last Storm - and Maegor - during the Battle of Stonebridge - learned. At least as fire-breathing monsters. Their teeth and claws were still deadly if you were stupid enough to attack them. But that shows that even huge dragons are not super weapons you can make use of under any circumstances.

31 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

I still think that weirwood arrows could do something, with the appropriate blood magic spell cast onto it. Whether that will come into play in the books, I don't know.

Well, people trying to kill the dragons might rediscover this method but I doubt it is going to be the Northmen or the Starks. More likely the Faceless Men/Braavosi, maesters at the Citadel, or even Aegon's followers.

32 minutes ago, UnmaskedLurker said:

What really are people's confidence that the horn actually binds a dragon to the horn's master (however someone actually becomes its master, which is not clear other than that it seems to require blood). But there are no stories of anyone other than a member of a dragonlord family in old Valyria getting a horn and binding to a dragon. Wouldn't there be some suggestion that occasionally someone else got a dragon that way? Instead all of the stories are that there were specific dragonlord families that had dragons and the Targs are the only ones that survived the Doom and its aftermath.

Other than Moqorro -- who might have his own agenda -- and Euron -- who definitely has his own agenda -- what evidence is there that the horn can really bind a dragon to the horn's master? If Euron really believed this to be the case, would he really have given the horn to Victarion who would then have plenty of time to become the horn's master?

As far as I can tell, the only other reference in any of the books (even including the side books) to a horn affecting a dragon is a statement in Daenerys X from A Dance With Dragons: "The dragonlords of old Valyria had controlled their mounts with binding spells and sorcerous horns." To me that suggests that the spells were used to bind the families to the dragons (how the Targs and other dragonlord families became able to bind a dragon as long as they had the right "drop" of blood descended from the original blood that activated the spell -- and why incest became so necessary). But the horns would not be used for the same purpose. If horns could be used to bind the dragon, then the incest would not be necessary because anyone could become master of the horn. I understand that reference in ADWD to mean that once a person is bound to the dragon, the dragon is better controlled using the horn -- but the person still needs to be bound using the blood connection created by the original binding spells.

The next sentence in that paragraph is "Daenerys made do with a word and a whip." In other words, Dany uses the whip to help control Drogon (presumably in some manner analogous to how the dragonlords used horns) but the binding was not accomplished through the whip. The binding was done presumably in the way that the side books have described by actually mounting and forming the bond. The horn might make it easier to approach the dragon for the purpose of binding -- or might be used to make the dragon easier to control after binding -- but the horn actually causing a binding between dragon and horn master does not seem consistent with this evidence.

So this evidence suggests to me that the horn may help to control the dragon in some way -- but the horn does not seem likely to be able to create the "lifetime bond" that a dragon can have with a person with dragonlord blood.

We can speculate a lot about that but we simply do not yet know what the horn is supposed to do.

What I definitely agree with is the fact that it makes little sense to assume that anyone can use that horn or that Euron had it already figured out when he gave it Victarion. The fact that he didn't know that it would kill the guy who blew it during the Kingsmoot is evidence for that.

If all it took to make use of such a horn is to smear blood on it and have some other guy blew it then pretty much the entire ancient world should have been dragonriders. And the idea that the Valyrians actually wrote the manual of the horn on the horn itself is actually completely ridiculous if you think about it. That is about as likely in a book like this as is the idea Littlefinger and Varys always speak the truth at council, or something of that sort.

It is much more likely that whatever Moqorro had Victarion do is going to have the opposite effect.

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22 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Truth is we just don't know at this point. There are various possibilities.

1. It doesn't work at all. Which makes the Horn plot pretty pointless.

2. It can temporarily distrupt the bond between rider and Dragon, but that seems somewhat unlikely to me, and would not produce much gain to the Horn's master, other than a brief tactical advantage during the heat of battle.

3. It can only work on an unbonded Dragon (meaning only Rhaegal and Viserion at this point). I kind of favour this option. Meaning that for a new family to bond a dragon lineage to it for the first time, a Horn would be used. Thereafter, this bond is carried on through the blood of both the rider and the dragon, to their respective descendents.

4. The horn provides some kind of temporary ensorcelment of the Dragon that wears off after a while. Maybe the Horn just lures the Dragon to Westeros, but once there Euron finds he cannot control it. And then Aegon arrives and claims it as his own through his Blackfyre blood.

5. Some other scenario we haven't even imagined yet.

I agree those are all possibilities. My point is that many people seem to assume that the horn can bind a dragon to its master -- and we have reason to believe that it likely is not that simple.

Also, while Rhaegal and Viserion are not bound -- they are from a line of dragons that presumably are already subject to a "spell" that makes them bindable only to a Targ (assuming that unbound dragons really were specific to a dragonlord family and not able to be bound to any dragonlord of any family) -- so how can the horn make them also bindable to a new bloodline? That would mean that one dragonlord family could have taken a dragon from another family's dragon line and be able to bind it by use of a horn. Which again -- makes the whole incest thing unnecessary (unless they somehow lost all the horns). So I don't see how the horn can create the ability to bind a dragon (more likely just control or "calm" the dragon to make the binding process easier than what is described in the side books). And most to the point, I don't see why so many people merely assume it most likely will work as Euron and Moqorro advertised.

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