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Bran will not be able to warg a dragon!


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6 hours ago, chrisdaw said:

Trying to skinchange a dragon will result in what happened to Varamyr when Mel microwaved him. To survive inside the dragon will be to survive inside fire, like that character that walked into a funeral pyre. She can't skinchange though, and never will be able to, it will be her second life, she has to first die and be reborn a dragon.

That is what I put forth as an idea, too. Dragons are fire made flesh. It should be rather risky to merge your soul with such a creature and not, you know, burn. And we do know that skinchanging means that you take on aspects of the animal you control. It isn't a one-way road.

In that sense, we can certainly all agree that Jon Snow is likely going to be able to control a dragon via skinchanging - thanks to the fact that he happens to be a dragonlord descendant as well as a skinchanger. And the same would have gone for Bloodraven, too, while he was still mobile. He could have become a dragonrider with the ability to skinchange his dragon, exerting much more control over the beast than the average Targaryen dragonrider of the past seems to have had.

Chances that he can do that right now are pretty low, though. Bloodraven seems to be a rather weak greenseer, and he seems to be pretty far gone already.

However, there are hints that the skinchangers and greenseers of the Children may have made no small impact on the ancient Valyrian dragonlords if what Yandel mentions in the TWoIaF section covering the history of Oldtown is true. I don't think they could wrest away control of the dragons from the Valyrian dragonlords but I could see skinchangers and greenseers trying to take control of the dragons sever/damage the bond between dragon and dragonlord, driving the creatures mad and result in the deaths of a significant number of dragonlords and other Valyrians.

This all under the assumption that the ancient Valyrian dragonlords did show up at Oldtown in ages past, and made an attempt to conquer lands in Westeros while the Children were still a considerable force down in the Reach.

The reason why I don't think 'normal' skinchangers (i.e. such without dragonlord blood/who didn't go through the rituals which created dragonlords in the first place) can control dragons is simply the fact that there is no indication whatsoever that the Children of the Forest ever weaponized the Westerosi dragons in their fights and battles against the First Men. A single dragon of considerable size controlled by the brain of an intelligent being could have driven the First Men to extinction. Pretty much nothing could stop a dragon with the intelligence of a Child of the Forest. And if they had controlled multiple dragons this way the Children would have won the war very quickly.

From a story-telling POV it would be also somewhat strange to have Bran do things Daenerys and Jon Snow (and any other dragonlord descendants) may be set up to do. If Bran could control a dragon via skinchanging then Jon's apparently special parentage would have pretty much no narrative purpose on the magical level - although Daenerys might turn out to be as special as he is thanks to her own Blackwood ancestry. Genetically she would be as much half-Blackwood as Brynden Rivers is.

Bran could indeed come forth and challenge the control the Others have over their wights with his powerful greenseer abilities. If the wight spell sort of resembles the whole skinchanging thing then it is possible that skinchangers and greenseers can interfere with it. After all, Coldhands pretty much seems to be a skinchanger who reclaimed his wight body after he began his second life. He is not Bloodraven's puppet. Bloodraven does not speak with his mouth. If he did, we would know it by now.

In the end, we also have to ask ourselves what the hell the narrative point of skinchanging a dragon could be. From what we know about the dragonlord way of controlling a dragon this method seems to be very effective and thorough. Dragons bound to dragonriders don't run amok or kill people on a regular basis. The only way when skinchanging a dragon could come in handy is when it is used as a weapon in the final battle - a suicide attack or an attack where escape is not really an option. Toasting wights and Others by the hundreds and thousands could easily enough be done by 'conventional dragonriders'.

If someone - say, Jon - were to go to the Heart of Winter in the end to confront the creature(s) there and finally end the threat of the Others and wights for good and all then having the ability to remote control a dragon and ensure that nobody gets out of that place alive might be a crucial part of victory.

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16 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

That is what I put forth as an idea, too. Dragons are fire made flesh. It should be rather risky to merge your soul with such a creature and not, you know, burn. And we do know that skinchanging means that you take on aspects of the animal you control. It isn't a one-way road.

In that sense, we can certainly all agree that Jon Snow is likely going to be able to control a dragon via skinchanging - thanks to the fact that he happens to be a dragonlord descendant as well as a skinchanger. And the same would have gone for Bloodraven, too, while he was still mobile. He could have become a dragonrider with the ability to skinchange his dragon, exerting much more control over the beast than the average Targaryen dragonrider of the past seems to have had.

Chances that he can do that right now are pretty low, though. Bloodraven seems to be a rather weak greenseer, and he seems to be pretty far gone already.

However, there are hints that the skinchangers and greenseers of the Children may have made no small impact on the ancient Valyrian dragonlords if what Yandel mentions in the TWoIaF section covering the history of Oldtown is true. I don't think they could wrest away control of the dragons from the Valyrian dragonlords but I could see skinchangers and greenseers trying to take control of the dragons sever/damage the bond between dragon and dragonlord, driving the creatures mad and result in the deaths of a significant number of dragonlords and other Valyrians.

This all under the assumption that the ancient Valyrian dragonlords did show up at Oldtown in ages past, and made an attempt to conquer lands in Westeros while the Children were still a considerable force down in the Reach.

The reason why I don't think 'normal' skinchangers (i.e. such without dragonlord blood/who didn't go through the rituals which created dragonlords in the first place) can control dragons is simply the fact that there is no indication whatsoever that the Children of the Forest ever weaponized the Westerosi dragons in their fights and battles against the First Men. A single dragon of considerable size controlled by the brain of an intelligent being could have driven the First Men to extinction. Pretty much nothing could stop a dragon with the intelligence of a Child of the Forest. And if they had controlled multiple dragons this way the Children would have won the war very quickly.

From a story-telling POV it would be also somewhat strange to have Bran do things Daenerys and Jon Snow (and any other dragonlord descendants) may be set up to do. If Bran could control a dragon via skinchanging then Jon's apparently special parentage would have pretty much no narrative purpose on the magical level - although Daenerys might turn out to be as special as he is thanks to her own Blackwood ancestry. Genetically she would be as much half-Blackwood as Brynden Rivers is.

Bran could indeed come forth and challenge the control the Others have over their wights with his powerful greenseer abilities. If the wight spell sort of resembles the whole skinchanging thing then it is possible that skinchangers and greenseers can interfere with it. After all, Coldhands pretty much seems to be a skinchanger who reclaimed his wight body after he began his second life. He is not Bloodraven's puppet. Bloodraven does not speak with his mouth. If he did, we would know it by now.

In the end, we also have to ask ourselves what the hell the narrative point of skinchanging a dragon could be. From what we know about the dragonlord way of controlling a dragon this method seems to be very effective and thorough. Dragons bound to dragonriders don't run amok or kill people on a regular basis. The only way when skinchanging a dragon could come in handy is when it is used as a weapon in the final battle - a suicide attack or an attack where escape is not really an option. Toasting wights and Others by the hundreds and thousands could easily enough be done by 'conventional dragonriders'.

If someone - say, Jon - were to go to the Heart of Winter in the end to confront the creature(s) there and finally end the threat of the Others and wights for good and all then having the ability to remote control a dragon and ensure that nobody gets out of that place alive might be a crucial part of victory.

I'm not sure if skinchanging a dragon is possible. Not because of the (in my view) illogical idea that the fire will burn the skinchanger, but for another possible reason. Just on the former, the skinchanger becomes the creature he skinchanges. Hence, you take on the tolerances and qualities of the skinchanged creature. Bran himself would die of the cold if naked in the snow, but inside his wolf he tolerates the cold quite easily. Similarly, he takes on the hunger for flesh, hunting and running under the moonlight that is characteristic of his wolf.

Similarly, if it is possible to skinchange a dragon, you will take on the physical properties of the dragon, which means you will be tolerant to its internal fire. Varamyr felt the pain of Mellisandre's fire, because the eagle is not tolerant to fire. Hence, the pain that the eagle felt, Varamyr felt too. By contrast, if the dragon does not feel the fire, the skinchanger will not either.

The reason why skinchanging a dragon might be impossible, however, is because skinchanging is an ability closely linked to nature, and dragons are not natural creatures. They are magically bred hybrids, which may be one semi-plausible reason to make them resistant to skinchanging.

Anyway, I am undecided on the issue. The point of why the children didn't warg dragons is valid, but it may be that George just didn't think of that at the time. Why not warg into a horde of venomous snakes, and make them slither into the midst of a sleeping human army, killing men in their thousands? Why not warg into a herd of mammoths, and stampede human villages out of existence?

A dragon is clearly on another level to any other living beast. But at the same time I don't think the military value of warging in a primitive era of Westeros, when large wild beasts likely outnumbered humans by a significant number, has been fully explored either.

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17 hours ago, Megorova said:

Yes, it is! Bran will warg into Hodor, and carry his own body out of that cave. They will escape from the Children. Because Children are evil. Next time when Bran will wake up, when the Three-eyed crow will wake him up, he will see that the weirwood roots grew thru his body. The weirwood will grow from inside of him, like an alien parasite, out of that paste. Because that paste is full of weirwood seeds, so they will grow in him. That's what they meant, when they said that this paste will wed Bran to a tree. He will literally become connected to weirwood network. And those roots will bind Bran's body to the cave's floor. That's what Jojen saw in his vision:

You are entitled to your theories, but please don't state them as facts. As to you the quote you are referring to:

17 hours ago, Megorova said:

ACOK, Bran IV: " “I dreamed of a winged wolf bound to earth with grey stone chains,” he said. “It was a green dream, so I knew it was true. A crow was trying to peck through the chains, but the stone was too hard and his beak could only chip at them.” "

I believe this is recognised by most people as referring to the 3 Eyed Raven trying to awaken Bran's abilities and allowing him to learn control of them. I don't think this is meant to mean any more than that, although I will admit that most prophecies and dreams are hard to decipher and can mean multiple things. 

17 hours ago, Megorova said:

And there's no need for Bran to warg into a dragon. Because all three dragons will have riders: Drogon - Dany, Rhaegel - Rhaego, Viseryon - Jon.

And it is highly unlikely, that it is possible to warg into a dragon. Because dragons are fire made flesh. And what happens with human consciousness/soul, when it is warged into something with fire, we know from what happened to Valamyr, when Melisandre burned the eagle, in which he was warged. Warging is power from Old Gods, thus it doesn't work on dragons, because they are creations of R'hllor.

I feel like if Bran were to warg a dragon, it would be because the dragon is riderless. I don't think we'll ever see all 3 dragons with a rider at the same time.

I do agree with you that it is highly unlikely to warg a dragon because of the idea of "fire consumes, and ice preserves." Based on this, I would postulate that if ever Bran does warg a dragon, he'd only be successful if it was an ice/Other dragon. I am 50/50 on whether this would be a sacrificial move on Bran's part though, hence why I believe Bran warging a dragon is a last ditch effort.

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On 3/11/2018 at 10:53 PM, E.S. Dinah said:

I watched this interview after following the link elsewhere in the forum and George said something that got my attention at approximately 30 minutes into the interview.  Based on what he said, I don't think Bran Stark will get to skin change a dragon.  I would like dragons to have immunity from being skin changed.  

 

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I don't think the Dragonbinder will work.  

 

I don't think Bran will be able to do that.  His magic is ice based magic.  Dragons are fire made flesh.  The mother of dragons should have exclusive rights to command all dragons.

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The language GRRM is setting it up with makes it not the case that one simply tolerates the fire, but rather their soul feeds the dragon's flame. Fire consumes. What feeds a dragon's fire? The brighter the person burned in life the hotter the dragon's fire in death. Those ghosts with the pale fire swords are those who went before, their fire consumed, eventually exhausted, thus pale and no longer red.

Dany will have burned brighter in life than anyone ever, and so when she dies (the red door, the shadow) will become the hottest fire (the light) breathing dragon there's ever been. A useful thing her dragon will be against the Others and an Ice Dragon.

 

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6 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Similarly, if it is possible to skinchange a dragon, you will take on the physical properties of the dragon, which means you will be tolerant to its internal fire. Varamyr felt the pain of Mellisandre's fire, because the eagle is not tolerant to fire. Hence, the pain that the eagle felt, Varamyr felt too. By contrast, if the dragon does not feel the fire, the skinchanger will not either.

Well, that's not an argument against anything since there really are people who are imbued with fire - Beric, Catelyn, Melisandre, Moqorro, and now even Victarion. While those people might still feel the fire inside them - and perhaps even feel pain - they can tolerate it.

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The reason why skinchanging a dragon might be impossible, however, is because skinchanging is an ability closely linked to nature, and dragons are not natural creatures. They are magically bred hybrids, which may be one semi-plausible reason to make them resistant to skinchanging.

That isn't a good argument, either. There is no natural vs. unnatural dichotomy in the story, nor are dragons and other magical creatures (including the Others and wights) ever described as unnatural in a fundamental sense.

People condemn certain magical creatures and practice as abominations but that actually extends to skinchangers and certain practices of skinchangers. Haggon certainly would consider Brandon Stark an abomination (and rightfully so, considering what he does to Hodor). Skinchangers are no longer fully human and 'normal humans' know that - which is why they fear them and do not tolerate them. Varamyr's family did not embrace his gift. It made him an outcast.

Besides, even if dragons were classified as 'unnatural' that shouldn't have an effect on the ability of the skinchangers to enslave them. After all, they seem to be able to do the whole thing even to human beings if they are strong enough.

However, the strangeness/alien aspect of the whole thing shouldn't be underestimated. Haggon implies that those skinchangers interested in non-mammalian animals (i.e. animals not closely related with human beings) are very far removed from being 'normal'. Considering that dragons are not only the ultimate predators but also very unusual magical creatures it is very likely that it is very difficult to subdue such an animal if it was theoretically possible.

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Anyway, I am undecided on the issue. The point of why the children didn't warg dragons is valid, but it may be that George just didn't think of that at the time. Why not warg into a horde of venomous snakes, and make them slither into the midst of a sleeping human army, killing men in their thousands? Why not warg into a herd of mammoths, and stampede human villages out of existence?

I guess they would have done stuff like that. Keep in mind that the Children originally wanted to co-exist with the First Men, inviting them to live with them. It was only when the humans had multiplied so much, becoming a pest that had to be exterminated to ensure the survival of the giants, the Children, and most of the wildlife, that the Children turned against the First Men.

One assumes that they cleansed vast reaches of the northern reaches of Westeros of humanity only to see the vermin multiply again and retake those lands again and again.

And once the First Men had figured out that cutting down the weirwoods was weakening the magic of the Children it wouldn't have been that difficult to counter their magics. Even more so when the connection was made that those powerful greenseers were usually hanging out at those weirwood groves. Being not all that mobile they could be dug out and put down rather easily, one assumes. And even if that was too dangerous/difficult, cutting down/burning their precious trees would have broken their powers very effectively.

There is a reason why the First Men (and later the Andals) targeted the weirwoods. This wasn't just superstition.

And the fewer greenseers/skinchangers the Children had, the fewer strong animal attacks they could wage on the Children. The advantage of a skinchanged dragon simply is that the creature would be airborne. It could not be hunted down or trapped if it had human-like intelligence. 

Wolves, mammoths, lizard-lions, etc. could all be dealt with by professional hunters, intelligent or not. They cannot fly away. And they cannot hide from domesticated hounds, either. They would sniff them out wherever they hid.

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A dragon is clearly on another level to any other living beast. But at the same time I don't think the military value of warging in a primitive era of Westeros, when large wild beasts likely outnumbered humans by a significant number, has been fully explored either.

We might get a glimpse of that in the future if Bran has some detailed visions of the past. But I think the crucial part here is the fact that the Children were always greatly outnumbered by the First Men. They wouldn't have had all that many skinchangers - and even fewer greenseers - back then, never mind that those they had may have been very powerful.

Also keep in mind that the First Men may have always had skinchangers of their own. This is a talent that's in your blood, they could have figured out to make use of it long before the Pact.

In fact, it is even possible that the whole dragonriding thing is just a variation of the skinchanger theme. The first dragonlords could have been skinchangers who figured out how to permanently bond with dragons.

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On 3/12/2018 at 8:23 AM, E.S. Dinah said:

I watched this interview after following the link elsewhere in the forum and George said something that got my attention at approximately 30 minutes into the interview.  Based on what he said, I don't think Bran Stark will get to skin change a dragon.  I would like dragons to have immunity from being skin changed.  

5 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Similarly, if it is possible to skinchange a dragon, you will take on the physical properties of the dragon, which means you will be tolerant to its internal fire

I think you are onto something here. I don't think dragons can be warged either, because if they could, the greenseers of the old would have done it. Yet we don't know any tales of dragons in the northern areas or dragons getting out of control. So far in the story, only the ones with blood of Old Valyria can control dragons.

And it's probably not because of fire or anything. The animals greenseers warg are natural creatures like wolves or direwolves. Direwolves have some magical warging connection on their own, but they are a species with their own natural habitat not connected to anyone's magic. Dragons are not natural creatures per se. No one knows where dragons come from, only that Valyrians managed to tame them somehow. Also, dragons are obviously connected to fire magic and in particular this soulbound magic. Dany practically manages to bring them back from extinction with magic! Because of this dragons probably cannot be warged. 

Also, the last Dany chapter in ADWD has some strong hints as to how the dragon-rider bond works. Dany realizes that Drogon cannot be tamed or controlled like a horse. Remember when she whips Drogon like a horse on the right to make him go left (because horses flee from danger), Drogon goes right. Dany thinks that's his instinct to attack. But it could be because Dany intends Drogon to go right. There's this soulbound connection between the rider and the dragon. Old Targs placed dragon eggs in the cradles of their babies to form a connection. In Daznak's Pit, Selmy notices the dragon and the rider screaming as one when the dragon gets hurt. This is the special aspect that makes it possible only for Targs to control dragons. They dragons are their "blood," magic creatures made out of the souls of their kin and bound together, most likely. This is probably the reason why no other groups has been able to control dragons even back then when there were wild dragons ready to be "tamed." 

6 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

In that sense, we can certainly all agree that Jon Snow is likely going to be able to control a dragon via skinchanging - thanks to the fact that he happens to be a dragonlord descendant as well as a skinchanger. And the same would have gone for Bloodraven, too, while he was still mobile. He could have become a dragonrider with the ability to skinchange his dragon, exerting much more control over the beast than the average Targaryen dragonrider of the past seems to have had.

Sounds possible, maybe the other two heads are Jon and Bloodraven. But then again, it sounds a bit too good to be true so it probably won't work. I think if you can ride the dragon, you already have solid control over it. Dragons are not known to act out like horses. Also, in Dany's case, Drogon seems to come to her rescue and fly to her whenever she needs even without any warging ability. 

On 3/12/2018 at 8:23 AM, E.S. Dinah said:

 

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I don't think the Dragonbinder will work.  

 

it probably doesn't work the way Euron says it does. Because A. there are no horns used ever by dragonlords in recorded history. I checked TWoIaF for dragon horns being blown by dragonriders to control the mounts, and no mention of those whatsoever. The original Targ trio doesn't have whips or horns, as Dany suddenly "remembers" in ADWD. This is probably a deliberate mislead on GRRM's part. As Moqorro's translation goes, no "mortal man" can blow the Dragonbinder and live. So this is obviously a special magic horn, not a common horn used by dragonriders. Wonder who blew these horns. 

The "dragon" the horn binds may not be the animal, but the rider, or the magic that binds the dragon and the rider together. Maybe it was used by Valyrians to control wayward dragonlords or something. Imagine being able to control a human, a powerful one with dragons, without making kin sacrifices to get one's own dragons. 

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27 minutes ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

And it's probably not because of fire or anything. The animals greenseers warg are natural creatures like wolves or direwolves. Direwolves have some magical warging connection on their own, but they are a species with their own natural habitat not connected to anyone's magic. Dragons are not natural creatures per se. No one knows where dragons come from, only that Valyrians managed to tame them somehow. Also, dragons are obviously connected to fire magic and in particular this soulbound magic. Dany practically manages to bring them back from extinction with magic! Because of this dragons probably cannot be warged. 

See above. Even if dragons were 'unnatural' in any real sense, skinchangers and greenseers aren't seen as natural and normal, either. It is clear that the greenseer/skinchanger magic can be as abominable - or even more abominable - than the fire-and-blood magic of the dragonlords. As of yet, no Targaryen we know of has mind-raped/enslaved another human being, but Varamyr tried and Bran actually did it and continues to do it.

27 minutes ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Also, the last Dany chapter in ADWD has some strong hints as to how the dragon-rider bond works. Dany realizes that Drogon cannot be tamed or controlled like a horse. Remember when she whips Drogon like a horse on the right to make him go left (because horses flee from danger), Drogon goes right. Dany thinks that's his instinct to attack. But it could be because Dany intends Drogon to go right. There's this soulbound connection between the rider and the dragon. Old Targs placed dragon eggs in the cradles of their babies to form a connection. In Daznak's Pit, Selmy notices the dragon and the rider screaming as one when the dragon gets hurt. This is the special aspect that makes it possible only for Targs to control dragons. They dragons are their "blood," magic creatures made out of the souls of their kin and bound together, most likely. This is probably the reason why no other groups has been able to control dragons even back then when there were wild dragons ready to be "tamed." 

It is pretty clear that the dragonlord/dragonrider connection with the dragons is a more exclusive bond than the skinchanger thing. Skinchangers usually are whores who keep harems of multiple enslaves animals (like Varamyr or Bloodraven/Bran) - or at least have the potential to do this - whereas the Targaryen dragonriders (and presumably/possibly the Valyrian dragonlords, too) exclusively 'married' only one dragon at a time.

It is true that a dragonrider's control over his mount is less complete than a skinchanger's control over his animal(s) but it might also be a more equal relationship. A dragon can reject a dragonrider. But a skinchanger can break any animal if he has sufficient strength. A potential dragonrider cannot run around and plan or actively train/try to break a dragon's will. You seem to have one attempt to mount a specific riderless dragon, and one attempt only.

27 minutes ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Sounds possible, maybe the other two heads are Jon and Bloodraven. But then again, it sounds a bit too good to be true so it probably won't work. I think if you can ride the dragon, you already have solid control over it. Dragons are not known to act out like horses. Also, in Dany's case, Drogon seems to come to her rescue and fly to her whenever she needs even without any warging ability. 

Dany is half-Blackwood, too, as much as Bloodraven. She could turn out to be a skinchanger/greenseer, too. Nothing indicates that she is at this point, though. But then - we actually don't know what made Bloodraven a skinchanger/greenseer. His Blackwood blood, his Targaryen blood, or simply chance.

Bloodraven and the Children give Bran statistics in ADwD. They don't tell him that skinchanging/greenseeing is a magical talent that is strong in certain bloodlines (unlike the dragonriding thing of the Valyrians which most definitely runs strong in certain bloodlines).

27 minutes ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

it probably doesn't work the way Euron says it does. Because A. there are no horns used ever by dragonlords in recorded history. I checked TWoIaF for dragon horns being blown by dragonriders to control the mounts, and no mention of those whatsoever. The original Targ trio doesn't have whips or horns, as Dany suddenly "remembers" in ADWD. This is probably a deliberate mislead on GRRM's part. As Moqorro's translation goes, no "mortal man" can blow the Dragonbinder and live. So this is obviously a special magic horn, not a common horn used by dragonriders. Wonder who blew these horns. 

The implication is that Dragonbinder is indeed a horn created and used by the ancient dragonlords of Valyria. Aenar and his Targaryen descendants apparently didn't have or need any such horns, but that doesn't mean they weren't used by the really powerful dragonlords back before the Doom.

What their purpose was is completely unclear. We know from the Targaryens in recorded history that they didn't need such horns. Thus the speculation that such horns came in handy when you wanted to steal dragons from their riders (say, during those many Valyrian civil wars), or to tame/subdue wild dragons to make them more docile to claim them. Or perhaps even to severe the connection between dragon and rider to neutralize the dragons of an enemy faction.

It might even be that such horns played a role in the original creation of a dragonlord (bloodline). Meaning that Victarion might be able permanently bind Viserion and Rhaegal to his bloodline, making himself, Euron, Aerion, Theon, Asha, and all their Greyjoy cousins potention dragonriders instead of the many Targaryen descendants and cousins that ran around in Westeros.

I don't think the latter theory is very likely. I think Dragonbinder has been created by the dragonlords of Valyria for the dragonlords of Valyria, making it very unlikely that Victarion Greyjoy of all people will be able to make use of the horn the way he thinks he can. I think Dany's dragons won't react kindly to an 'unworthy person' trying to use the horn to subdue. But the horn blows could very well cause the dragon(s) to seek out worthy potential riders - which would, at this point, likely be Tyrion and Brown Ben Plumm.

27 minutes ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

The "dragon" the horn binds may not be the animal, but the rider, or the magic that binds the dragon and the rider together. Maybe it was used by Valyrians to control wayward dragonlords or something. Imagine being able to control a human, a powerful one with dragons, without making kin sacrifices to get one's own dragons. 

There is no reason to assume the original dragonlords needed kin sacrifices or anything of that sort to bind themselves to the dragons. All we know is that the dragonlords have 'the blood of the dragon' - whatever that means. That indicates some sort of blood connection/interrelatedness not blood sacrifices. 

If the Valyrian dragons do not also have 'the blood of the human' it is actually more likely that the first dragonlords drank, ate, or otherwise consumed dragon blood or parts of dragons to become like them - or that they mated with dragons to create human-dragon hybrids from which they are all descended.

It is certainly possible that blood sacrifices also played a role there, but in light of the stuff they pulled off that would seem to be somewhat profane. Pretty much everybody does blood sacrifices for spells - but only the Valyrans bonded with dragons. It must have been some real crazy shit what they pulled off back in the day.

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29 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

Even if dragons were 'unnatural' in any real sense, skinchangers and greenseers aren't seen as natural and normal, either.

But the animals they warg are. 

 

29 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

Skinchangers usually are whores who keep harems of multiple enslaves animals (like Varamyr or Bloodraven/Bran) - or at least have the potential to do this - whereas the Targaryen dragonriders (and presumably/possibly the Valyrian dragonlords, too) exclusively 'married' only one dragon at a time.

I didn't get the sense that skinchangers necessarily enslave the animals they warg into. Even Varymyr. They are like sitting in the passenger seat enjoying the ride looking and feeling what the animal is seeing and feeling. Things can go wrong when the skinchanger wants to take the wheel for whatever reason, as seen with Bran and Hodor. 

31 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

You seem to have one attempt to mount a specific riderless dragon, and one attempt only.

A dragon only allows one rider at a time, but the dragon allows other people to ride as long as the bonded rider is mounted. When the dragonrider dies, another rider can take its place if the dragon allows, as seen with Vhagar. The rider doesn't try to mount the dragon unless there's a bond present. 

34 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

Dany is half-Blackwood, too, as much as Bloodraven. She could turn out to be a skinchanger/greenseer, too. Nothing indicates that she is at this point, though. But then - we actually don't know what made Bloodraven a skinchanger/greenseer. His Blackwood blood, his Targaryen blood, or simply chance.

Bloodraven and the Children give Bran statistics in ADwD. They don't tell him that skinchanging/greenseeing is a magical talent that is strong in certain bloodlines (unlike the dragonriding thing of the Valyrians which most definitely runs strong in certain bloodlines).

Dany isn't half Blackwood, she has a Blackwood ancestor, her great-grandmother I think, the one who marries Egg. She may carry the trait but I don't think she's a warg. It's been plenty of time to showcase her warging abilities. 

With Bloodraven, it's very likely the First Men blood that gives him the skinchanging ability. There are no non-First Men trying to skinchange. It's another blood thing not a sorcerer ability one can learn. 

37 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

but that doesn't mean they weren't used by the really powerful dragonlords back before the Doom.

What their purpose was is completely unclear. We know from the Targaryens in recorded history that they didn't need such horns. Thus the speculation that such horns came in handy when you wanted to steal dragons from their riders (say, during those many Valyrian civil wars), or to tame/subdue wild dragons to make them more docile to claim them. Or perhaps even to severe the connection between dragon and rider to neutralize the dragons of an enemy faction.

Valyrians did not fight each other. There are no recordings of Valyrian civil wars. They fought that Ghis Empire and other peoples. It was during the Dance of the Dragons that blood of the dragon turns on each other. And it ends disastrously, with Targs losing their dragons. As it's mentioned in the books, kin killing is a sin. Killing magical creatures like direwolves and dragons that you are supposed to protect always ends in complete disaster. 

No one really knows how the Valyrians tamed dragons, which is one of the biggest mysteries of the story. Valyrians claimed to descend from dragons. There may never have been any wild dragon populations before Valyrians bonded with them. Septon Barth at least believes that Valyrians somehow created the dragons using wyverns, a naturally occurring species. The wild dragons come later, when some dragons of that are unclaimed and roam around free until a rider claims them.

Valyrians probably didn't need horns to tame dragons. This horn is probably made by Valyrian sorcerers using some twisted form of magic. The horn even has their sigil "blood for fire, fire for blood," which is peculiar. It probably binds the souls of the people who blow it and die, hence the screaming. I gave my best speculation as to why Valyrians would need such a horn, considering that dragons are strongly bonded to riders. 

47 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

There is no reason to assume the original dragonlords needed kin sacrifices or anything of that sort to bind themselves to the dragons. All we know is that the dragonlords have 'the blood of the dragon' - whatever that means. That indicates some sort of blood connection/interrelatedness not blood sacrifices. 

If the Valyrian dragons do not also have 'the blood of the human' it is actually more likely that the first dragonlords drank, ate, or otherwise consumed dragon blood or parts of dragons to become like them - or that they mated with dragons to create human-dragon hybrids from which they are all descended.

It is certainly possible that blood sacrifices also played a role there, but in light of the stuff they pulled off that would seem to be somewhat profane. Pretty much everybody does blood sacrifices for spells - but only the Valyrans bonded with dragons. It must have been some real crazy shit what they pulled off back in the day.

probably yes. The blood sacrifice idea comes from how Dany births her three dragons. As it goes, Valyrias claim to be kin of the dragons. But these are two different species, so they probably can't mate as some people speculate. The human dragonriders are very much human, they don't have dragon-like attributes. Some Targs have an obsession with fire, but that's probably because of the prophetic dreams they seem to inherit from Daenys. 

See the "blood for fire, fire for blood" in the light of Dany's pyre scene. She sacrifices her husband, baby, and enemy to birth the dragons. And these are genuine sacrifices. It's not like Mel burning something for Lord of the Light. Dany loses a part of her life in return for her dragons. She then calls the dragons her children, her kin. This is probably not a metaphorical thing. The Valyrian mages probably created dragons using some type of sacrificial magic, which binds their souls to the dragons. The Valyrian sphinxes have human heads and dragon bodies, indicating this bond. 

This is of course speculation based on what we have read so far. we can safely say that's there's a special connection between Valryians and dragons, something not replicated by any other peoples, not even mages elsewhere. If Valyrians did mate with something for dragons, it could be from the mysterious people from the Shadow that  supposedly "disappears" into annals of history. Maybe these Shadow people didn't disappear, they just married into pre-dragon Valyrian communities, creating the silver haired, purple eyed Valyrians with a unique dragon affinity. In any case, something did get sacrificed for the magic. Blood for fire. 

Valyrians are not recorded as having used any instrument to control dragons either (though Dany remembers whips for some reason). Then Euron shows up with a magic dragon horn. I'm thinking the dragon that this thing can bind may not be the dragon at all, but the human rider, sometimes also called dragons. And you are right, it most likely doesn't work the way Euron tells Victarion. Let's face it; if this thing existed how come none of Valyria's powerful old enemies ever try using it? 

It's also a possibility that the Dragonbinder is not Valyrian in its origin. It's assumed to be so because of the glyphs. But it could have been created by another group or a person familiar with Valyrian magic. Possibly one of the many slaves the Valyrians kept? 

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3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

But the animals they warg are. 

'Warg' isn't a verb. And even if it was, it only refers to the bond between a skinchanger and a wolf.

If skinchangers can control human beings I see no inherent reason why they shouldn't be able to control dragons, too. Dragons may be magical animals but they are animals.

Dragons could be special creatures too powerful or strange for the run-of-the-mill skinchanger to control, but that would likely have to do with what they are, not where they come from.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

I didn't get the sense that skinchangers necessarily enslave the animals they warg into. Even Varymyr. They are like sitting in the passenger seat enjoying the ride looking and feeling what the animal is seeing and feeling. Things can go wrong when the skinchanger wants to take the wheel for whatever reason, as seen with Bran and Hodor. 

Some animals like dogs like to be controlled. Others, like wolves, have to be seduced. Others - like Varamyr's bear and shadow cat - did not want to be controlled, fought against Varamyr, and broke free of his control once he nearly lost his mind.

The fact is, no creature likes being controlled by a skinchanger. The wolves of the Starks only get along with this kind of unnatural relationship because they were (unconsciously) and then consciously groomed since their very birth (and perhaps even before that, if we assume the wolf and the stag were sent to the Starks by Bloodraven).

When it has a choice, the direwolf roams free. It doesn't lick the hands of human masters.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

A dragon only allows one rider at a time, but the dragon allows other people to ride as long as the bonded rider is mounted. When the dragonrider dies, another rider can take its place if the dragon allows, as seen with Vhagar. The rider doesn't try to mount the dragon unless there's a bond present. 

Sure, dragons allow other people on their back if they are accompanied by its rider. There is no question about that.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Dany isn't half Blackwood, she has a Blackwood ancestor, her great-grandmother I think, the one who marries Egg. She may carry the trait but I don't think she's a warg. It's been plenty of time to showcase her warging abilities. 

Sure, since Dany's parents and grandparents were all siblings she pretty inherited as much genes from Betha Blackwood as she inherited from Aegon V. She has one set of parents (obviously), one set of grandparents, and one set of great-grandparents.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

With Bloodraven, it's very likely the First Men blood that gives him the skinchanging ability. There are no non-First Men trying to skinchange. It's another blood thing not a sorcerer ability one can learn.

There is no proof for that. Bloodraven and the Children give Bran statistical data about how many people within a certain number of people are skinchangers and how many people within a certain number of skinchangers are potential greenseers. There is no indication that they believe certain bloodlines bring forth more skinchangers and greenseers than others.

In fact, there is no indication that more Starks, Blackwoods, etc. were skinchangers when compared to others.

Varamyr hopes that some of his bastards inherit the gift, but none do, making it unlikely that this happens often. Neither were there any skinchangers in his immediate family.

If there skinchanger/greenseer bloodlines then the Children should also not the likes of Bloodraven or giants (!) to serve them as greenseers. They would have their own bloodlines and could have their own people serve them in that capacity.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Valyrians did not fight each other. There are no recordings of Valyrian civil wars.

Sure there were. Prince Daemon tells us himself when he ponders that dragon fighting dragon is an ugly thing as any maester knowing the history of Valyrian would tell you. The Valyrian dragonlords did use their dragons to fight each other.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

They fought that Ghis Empire and other peoples. It was during the Dance of the Dragons that blood of the dragon turns on each other. And it ends disastrously, with Targs losing their dragons. As it's mentioned in the books, kin killing is a sin. Killing magical creatures like direwolves and dragons that you are supposed to protect always ends in complete disaster. 

The Dance wasn't even the first civil war in Westeros in which dragon fought dragon. Maegor had Balerion rip Quicksilver to shreds, and Jaehaerys I, Rhaena, and Alysanne were prepared to unleash their dragons against Balerion and Maegor.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

No one really knows how the Valyrians tamed dragons, which is one of the biggest mysteries of the story. Valyrians claimed to descend from dragons. There may never have been any wild dragon populations before Valyrians bonded with them. Septon Barth at least believes that Valyrians somehow created the dragons using wyverns, a naturally occurring species. The wild dragons come later, when some dragons of that are unclaimed and roam around free until a rider claims them.

Could be. Or not. Breeding dragons isn't the same as creating dragons. If wyverns and firewyrms were crossbred to create fire-breathing winged dragons then this would be great breeding but it isn't something that's unnatural.

And since we know that there are old dragon bones being found in Westeros it is not very likely that dragons were created in Valyria. There is no indication that dragons only spread to Westeros after the rise of Valyria in the east.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Valyrians probably didn't need horns to tame dragons. This horn is probably made by Valyrian sorcerers using some twisted form of magic. The horn even has their sigil "blood for fire, fire for blood," which is peculiar. It probably binds the souls of the people who blow it and die, hence the screaming. I gave my best speculation as to why Valyrians would need such a horn, considering that dragons are strongly bonded to riders. 

'Blood for fire, fire for blood' isn't necessarily all that mysterious a phrase. It expresses the interconnectedness of Valyrian magic which was rooted in fire and blood.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

probably yes. The blood sacrifice idea comes from how Dany births her three dragons. As it goes, Valyrias claim to be kin of the dragons. But these are two different species, so they probably can't mate as some people speculate.

That is what magic would be for. There are rumors that Valyrians mated humans and animals to created twisted half-breeds in Gogossos. If that's true the ancient Valyrians could also have done that to themselves.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

The human dragonriders are very much human, they don't have dragon-like attributes. Some Targs have an obsession with fire, but that's probably because of the prophetic dreams they seem to inherit from Daenys. 

There are some Targaryen monstrosities with rather inhuman/dragon-like attributes. And you have also to keep in mind that there would be hundreds of generations between the present-day Targaryens and the first Valyrian dragonlords and their 'dragon parent'. More than enough time to breed for the desirable 'human-like' traits and outbreed the uglier 'dragon-like' attributes. Those stillbirths and monstrosities usually don't live to breed - and if they do, the dragonlords were not likely to marry their beautiful children to scaly monstrosities with forked tongues, tails, and rudimentary wings.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

See the "blood for fire, fire for blood" in the light of Dany's pyre scene. She sacrifices her husband, baby, and enemy to birth the dragons. And these are genuine sacrifices. It's not like Mel burning something for Lord of the Light. Dany loses a part of her life in return for her dragons. She then calls the dragons her children, her kin. This is probably not a metaphorical thing. The Valyrian mages probably created dragons using some type of sacrificial magic, which binds their souls to the dragons. The Valyrian sphinxes have human heads and dragon bodies, indicating this bond. 

There is no indication that Dany even remotely plays in the same league - or did anything remotely similar - to what the ancient Valyrians did. She didn't create dragons. She didn't bind her bloodline to a dragon bloodline. She didn't acquire 'the blood of the dragon' for herself and her descendants. She just woke some dragons from stone. Dragons that were already there, in those stone eggs, reaching out to her.

Whatever the Valyrians did would be very different. They worked a spell that put its mark on history for thousands of years, even till this day. It is they who enabled Dany to do what she did. As of this point, she is nothing but a pale shadow of her distant ancestors - at least in the field of magic.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

This is of course speculation based on what we have read so far. we can safely say that's there's a special connection between Valryians and dragons, something not replicated by any other peoples, not even mages elsewhere. If Valyrians did mate with something for dragons, it could be from the mysterious people from the Shadow that  supposedly "disappears" into annals of history. Maybe these Shadow people didn't disappear, they just married into pre-dragon Valyrian communities, creating the silver haired, purple eyed Valyrians with a unique dragon affinity. In any case, something did get sacrificed for the magic. Blood for fire. 

Whatever the Asshai'i did is pretty much irrelevant. There is no indication that they build a society of dragonriders based on fire and blood. The Valyrians did. Could be that other cultures - like the Asshai'i gave them pieces of the puzzle, and it is even possible that other individuals (like special skinchangers and powerful sorcerers) also bent dragons to their will, but only the Valyrians figured out a way to make that bond permanent and use the advantages that gave to their descendants to build a vast empire.

3 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Valyrians are not recorded as having used any instrument to control dragons either (though Dany remembers whips for some reason). Then Euron shows up with a magic dragon horn. I'm thinking the dragon that this thing can bind may not be the dragon at all, but the human rider, sometimes also called dragons. And you are right, it most likely doesn't work the way Euron tells Victarion. Let's face it; if this thing existed how come none of Valyria's powerful old enemies ever try using it? 

The idea would be that only the Valyrian dragonlords had such horns - and perhaps only they could use them. Against each other. Euron likely never went to Valyria. But the Undying of Qarth might have been there - either as allies of certain Valyrian dragonlords back before the Doom, or perhaps after the Doom in the ruins. They could also have taken possession of such a horn during one of the many wars of the past. We know there are dead dragons in the Red Waste. 

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On the side, the same as someone won't be able to skinchange a dragon without burning the language and stark omission to this stage of the series makes it very likely underwater creatures can not be skinchanged because the skinchanger will (eventually) drown. And that there is a way around it, that the Ironborn are all over it, and if it isn't literally their drowning ritual that's the solution then it is at least a symbol of it. What is dead may never die.

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On 3/11/2018 at 10:53 PM, E.S. Dinah said:

I watched this interview after following the link elsewhere in the forum and George said something that got my attention at approximately 30 minutes into the interview.  Based on what he said, I don't think Bran Stark will get to skin change a dragon.  I would like dragons to have immunity from being skin changed.  

 

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I don't think the Dragonbinder will work.  

 

I'm sure Daenerys will find two wingmen to guard her flanks.  Her dragons came from Asshai so they are not genetically bonded to the Targaryen family.  Anybody who descended from one of the noble families of Valyria has a chance.  I want the second rider to come from the Dothraki and the third to come from Dorne.  

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On 3/13/2018 at 7:02 AM, Lord Varys said:

That is what I put forth as an idea, too. Dragons are fire made flesh. It should be rather risky to merge your soul with such a creature and not, you know, burn. And we do know that skinchanging means that you take on aspects of the animal you control. It isn't a one-way road.

I'm not so sure that Bran will skinchange a dragon; but I do think it's possible if someone is transformed by spiritual fire as seems to be the case with Dany at one point.  You can't burn if your soul is wreathed in flame.

Quote

A Game of Thrones - Daenerys VIII

No, Dany wanted to say, no, not that, you mustn't, but when she opened her mouth, a long wail of pain escaped, and the sweat broke over her skin. What was wrong with them, couldn't they see? Inside the tent the shapes were dancing, circling the brazier and the bloody bath, dark against the sandsilk, and some did not look human. She glimpsed the shadow of a great wolf, and another like a man wreathed in flames.

Dany can't see the soul within the great wolf but she can see the soul within the great dragon.

Dany's transformation:

Quote

A Game of Thrones - Daenerys III

Yet when she slept that night, she dreamt the dragon dream again. Viserys was not in it this time. There was only her and the dragon. Its scales were black as night, wet and slick with blood. Her blood, Dany sensed. Its eyes were pools of molten magma, and when it opened its mouth, the flame came roaring out in a hot jet. She could hear it singing to her. She opened her arms to the fire, embraced it, let it swallow her whole, let it cleanse her and temper her and scour her clean. She could feel her flesh sear and blacken and slough away, could feel her blood boil and turn to steam, and yet there was no pain. She felt strong and new and fierce.

If Jon is raised by fire in the manner of Beric or Lady Stoneheart; he could potentially warg a dragon although I don't think Targs skinchange dragons but can soul transfer to the dragons for which they are bonded.  I think this is the riddle of the sphynx - the dragon with the head of a man or woman.  The great dragons are the dragon gods of the Targs.

The similarity between Dany's vision the great wolf and the man wreathed in flame is similar to Melisandre's vision of Jon in the flames:

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - Melisandre I

Death, thought Melisandre. The skulls are death.

The flames crackled softly, and in their crackling she heard the whispered name Jon Snow. His long face floated before her, limned in tongues of red and orange, appearing and disappearing again, a shadow half-seen behind a fluttering curtain. Now he was a man, now a wolf, now a man again. But the skulls were here as well, the skulls were all around him. Melisandre had seen his danger before, had tried to warn the boy of it. Enemies all around him, daggers in the dark. He would not listen.

 

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13 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Some animals like dogs like to be controlled. Others, like wolves, have to be seduced. Others - like Varamyr's bear and shadow cat - did not want to be controlled, fought against Varamyr, and broke free of his control once he nearly lost his mind.

There's your answer to the dragon question. Dragons have strong wills, like direwolves, so it's probably impossible to skinchange into. Skinchangers can't necessarily control humans either. Bran can enter Hordor's mind, because he has this autistic condition and he also quickly gets scared and retreats. And the magic of dragons probably fries the brains of skinchangers that try anyway. 

14 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

There is no proof for that. Bloodraven and the Children give Bran statistical data about how many people within a certain number of people are skinchangers and how many people within a certain number of skinchangers are potential greenseers. There is no indication that they believe certain bloodlines bring forth more skinchangers and greenseers than others.

In fact, there is no indication that more Starks, Blackwoods, etc. were skinchangers when compared to others.

Varamyr hopes that some of his bastards inherit the gift, but none do, making it unlikely that this happens often. Neither were there any skinchangers in his immediate family.

What statistics? But we can say Starks are more likely to warg than, say, the Lannisters, the descendants of Andals. The trait is rarely passed down, but if these greenseers practiced incest like the Targs, it would be more likely to be passed down. So it's probably a recessive trait that exists in this bloodline. The First Men got it from the CoTF I think. It's a uniquely Northern trait, like dragon affinity is unique to Valyria. 

14 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Sure there were. Prince Daemon tells us himself when he ponders that dragon fighting dragon is an ugly thing as any maester knowing the history of Valyrian would tell you. The Valyrian dragonlords did use their dragons to fight each other.

Can you give the quote, I don't remember this. The WOIAF Valyria chapters don't mention any civil wars. Did the dragon fighting happen towards the Doom? Then that would mean a lot. 

14 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

The Dance wasn't even the first civil war in Westeros in which dragon fought dragon. Maegor had Balerion rip Quicksilver to shreds, and Jaehaerys I, Rhaena, and Alysanne were prepared to unleash their dragons against Balerion and Maegor.

Are you getting this from TWOIAF or something else? ASOIAF wiki says Maegor had Balerion rip out Quicksilver's throat. That explains his death later, being rejected by the Iron Throne and maybe even killed by it. The same happens to Rhaenyra (rejection not the murder), from what I recall from the Princess and the Queen audiobook. And Maegor's line doesn't even continue after that. As I said, there are consequences to dragon fighting dragon. Also, I'm not sure if Maegor  fighting Aegon the kid qualifies as a civil war in the sense of Dance of the Dragons, which was an actual war.

14 hours ago, Lord Varys said:


And since we know that there are old dragon bones being found in Westeros it is not very likely that dragons were created in Valyria. There is no indication that dragons only spread to Westeros after the rise of Valyria in the east.

But how old are these dragon bones? There's a theory going around that Valyrians did visit Westeros back in the day to fight off WW during the first Long Night, hence the dragon bones all over the world. The rise of Valyria is, what, 5,000 years ago. But Valyrians tamed dragons before that. Their dragon affinity obviously predates their imperial ambitions. Dragon bone fossils could indicate that perhaps there were wild dragons roaming here and there. But it could also be that Valyrians or their Shadow people flew these all over the world. 

14 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

That is what magic would be for. There are rumors that Valyrians mated humans and animals to created twisted half-breeds in Gogossos. If that's true the ancient Valyrians could also have done that to themselves.

If Valyrians actually mated with dragons or wyverns or whatever, then the result would be a new species. But Valyrians are very much humans not half-humans. In Gogossos, it's the torturers that do this, not Valyrian high lords. And it also sounds like the results of blood magic rather than experimentation. Dany's baby ends up being a twisted, half human thing with a tail and wings after MMZ curses it. So like that rather than two different animal kingdoms/genuses (?) actually being able to produce offspring. 

 

14 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

There are some Targaryen monstrosities with rather inhuman/dragon-like attributes. And you have also to keep in mind that there would be hundreds of generations between the present-day Targaryens and the first Valyrian dragonlords and their 'dragon parent'. More than enough time to breed for the desirable 'human-like' traits and outbreed the uglier 'dragon-like' attributes. Those stillbirths and monstrosities usually don't live to breed - and if they do, the dragonlords were not likely to marry their beautiful children to scaly monstrosities with forked tongues, tails, and rudimentary wings.

Those "monstrosities" are the result of blood magic or sorcery isn't it? Like with Dany's baby. I don't get how Valyrians, if they are the result of a dragon parent, would want to outbreed dragon-traits. Why would they want to be more human, considering the older creator generation would be dying out, leaving the younger inter-species ones to fend for themselves? Why would they choose human and not dragon? If they did manage to mix these genes, why not have humans with wings or something? We can't also rule out the possibility of the Shadow people, who are more likely to have mated with ancient Valyrians than dragons. It would also explain the "disappearance" of the group, as in the population got absorbed into the Valyrian one.  

14 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Whatever the Valyrians did would be very different. They worked a spell that put its mark on history for thousands of years, even till this day. It is they who enabled Dany to do what she did. As of this point, she is nothing but a pale shadow of her distant ancestors - at least in the field of magic.

Dany is obviously not creating a new species here, if that's how dragons came to be. But she does manage to bring fossilized dragon eggs back to life, which requires sacrifice. Dany is not doing any magic here. She just has the desire to wake the dragons and makes sacrifices, apparently instinctively performing a powerful magical ritual that many of her Targ ancestors, even with more knowledge, failed to do. While the others before her had the magical blood traits, only Dany manages to make the sacrifices; genuine blood sacrifices I mean, not like Aerys the Mad throwing random people into the fire. That seems, to me at least, a key factor in how dragons come to be and why Valyrians can control them. 

15 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Whatever the Asshai'i did is pretty much irrelevant.

What Asshai? The tale is from Asshai, but the supposed original dragon tamers are not from Asshai. They are described as people so ancient and they were in the Shadow and tamed dragons. 

15 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

The idea would be that only the Valyrian dragonlords had such horns - and perhaps only they could use them. Against each other.

Well, they were mortal, so they probably couldn't blow it and live. So wonder what blew the horn if no mortal man could do so and live. Valyrians understandably had petty problems, but they don't seem to have fought dragon to dragon in a major way. That would have been the end of them. Maybe towards the Doom that was what happened. Maybe Dragonbinder does what the name suggests, let non-Valyrians control dragons. Maybe GRRM came up with the idea later in the story and that's why we don't see horns or a major magic horn earlier. There's a horn of Winter, and this could be the Summer counterpart. Just throwing in some ideas here. 

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19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

There's your answer to the dragon question. Dragons have strong wills, like direwolves, so it's probably impossible to skinchange into. Skinchangers can't necessarily control humans either. Bran can enter Hordor's mind, because he has this autistic condition and he also quickly gets scared and retreats. And the magic of dragons probably fries the brains of skinchangers that try anyway. 

Bran and Bloodraven are greenseers. They can control many animals at the same time. While animals (and humans) might fight against being controlled by them, their powers seem to be so great that this isn't necessarily all that much of an issue.

For Varamyr it was a great success to become Sixskins. Bran and Bloodraven both are far beyond that already, and that only if you count the ravens they control.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

What statistics?

Bloodraven's statistics:

Quote

“Only one man in a thousand is born a skinchanger,” Lord Brynden said one day, after Bran had learned to fly, “and only one skinchanger in a thousand can be a greenseer.”

One should assume that Bloodraven would have mentioned it if certain bloodlines had a greater likelihood to produce skinchangers and greenseers than others. In addition, if this was the case the Children would have long ago started breeding their greenseers and skinchangers just as the Valyrians bred their dragonlords. It would have been a necessary requirement during their war with the First Men.

And we also know that there are giant greenseer predecessors to Bloodraven in that cave, strongly indicating that all species have that magical talent. The First Men are not different by blood from the Andals or the Rhoynar, only by their culture and religion. Not to mention - you know - that all the Rhoynar and Andals in Westeros are First Men, too, just as as most of the First Men (especially the noble bloodlines who enter into arranged marriages) are also of Andal descent.

The Blackwoods may keep the old gods, but that doesn't make them less Andal than, say, the Tullys, Brackens, Strongs, or any other family in the Andal kingdoms with First Men roots.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

But we can say Starks are more likely to warg than, say, the Lannisters, the descendants of Andals.

We cannot really say that because the Lannisters might very well be older than the Starks, being founded before the Long Night by the First Man Lann the Clever on those Casterly girls (who were also First Men, of course).

The Lannisters eventually intermarried with the Andals, just as the Gardeners, Durrandons, and Hightowers did, but there is no indication that this had any impact on their magical talent. Because, again, there is no indication that Andals lack the potential to become skinchangers and greenseers. Their culture may not help them pursuing or discovering such talents and careers, but that has no bearing on the innate talent.

If we look at Bloodraven then there is actually no indication the man knew he was a skinchanger during TMK. He is a sorcerer and interested in magic, but neither Maynard Plumm nor Bloodraven himself is accompanied by or particularly familiar with (an) animal(s). One should assume that Bloodraven wouldn't have troubled himself with wearing a glamor and personally infiltrating Whitewalls if he could have just used, you know, a raven, a cat, a dog, or some other animal to spy on Daemon II Blackfyre and his followers.

And it might very well be that he only discovered he was a skinchanger when he met other skinchangers up at the Wall - after all, we know that skinchangers always recognize each other. The culture down in KL was not likely to encourage young Brynden to delve into the mysteries of skinchanging. The Targaryens would have explored other types of magic.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

The trait is rarely passed down, but if these greenseers practiced incest like the Targs, it would be more likely to be passed down. So it's probably a recessive trait that exists in this bloodline. The First Men got it from the CoTF I think. It's a uniquely Northern trait, like dragon affinity is unique to Valyria.

There is no indication that the Children or First Men greenseers ever practiced incest or married close kin. In fact, if we consider the wildling culture it is exceedingly unlikely that the ancient First Men did stuff like that. And we do know that there were skinchangers in other places like the West (I think the story of the Banefort skinchanger who had lions devour a Lannister is only in the unabridged version of the story on George's page, but it is there) and the Iron Islands (where the Farwynds are reputed skinchangers controlling the spotted whales there - likely George's versions of orcas).

And again - there are giant greenseers, too. While there is a chance that Children and First Men intermarried, there is small chance that giants and Children ever intermarried.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Can you give the quote, I don't remember this. The WOIAF Valyria chapters don't mention any civil wars. Did the dragon fighting happen towards the Doom? Then that would mean a lot. 

Nope, the Valyrian history was apparently full of such conflicts. And even TWoIaF makes clear that those struggles were constant, due to the fact that multiple houses vied for control of the Freehold. Those times when only one family controlled the Freehold were exceedingly rare, apparently.

This is what Daemon Targaryen has to say on the matter:

Quote

Surprisingly, Prince Daemon agreed with his wife. “In the Stepstones, my enemies learned to run and hide when they saw Caraxes’s wings or heard his roar … but they had no dragons of their own. It is no easy thing for a man to be a dragonslayer. But dragons can kill dragons, and have. Any maester who has ever studied the history of Valyria can tell you that. I will not throw our dragons against the usurper’s unless I have no other choice. There are other ways to use them, better ways.”

There is no indication either that dragons, the world, or fate care about dragons killing dragons or people slaying their close kin. That's not nice and all, but there is no indication, either, that the gods or fate or anyone on the grand scale of things cares about stuff like that.

The Dance was stupidity but not necessarily something the Targaryens were later punished for.

Besides, the dragonlords of Valyria putting dragon against dragon wouldn't have necessarily have been close kin. They were marrying their own brothers and sisters, and if you do that for only, say, ten generations of so then you are only very distantly related to the other noble family in your neighborhood doing the same. Many dragonlord families may have effectively been only related to themselves, basically.

Killing rival dragonlords and dragons would then have been nothing to be ashamed of, nor anything particularly bad.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Are you getting this from TWOIAF or something else? ASOIAF wiki says Maegor had Balerion rip out Quicksilver's throat.

This is the description of Quicksilver's end from TSotD:

Quote

Prince Aegon ordered a charge, hoping to break through the Kingslanders before the other loyalists fell upon his flanks, and mounted Quicksilver to lead the attack himself. But scarce had he taken wing when he heard shouts and saw his men below pointing, to where Balerion the Black Dread had appeared in the southern sky.
King Maegor had come.
For the first time since the Doom of Valyria dragon contended with dragon in the sky, even as battle was joined below.
Quicksilver, a quarter the size of Balerion, was no match for the older, fiercer dragon, and her pale white fireballs were engulfed and washed away in great gouts of black flame. Then the Black Dread fell upon her from above, his jaws closing round her neck as he ripped one wing from her body. Screaming and smoking, the young dragon plunged to earth, and Prince Aegon with her.

It also mentions that there were battles between dragons and dragonlords back in Valyria.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

That explains his death later, being rejected by the Iron Throne and maybe even killed by it.

Maegor was never 'rejected' by the Iron Throne. He just died while sitting on the thing. And there is no indication whatsoever that the throne itself killed him by its own volition (it is just a chair, chairs don't have wills of their own), nor is it particularly likely that this was an accident.

Superstitious morons ascribing agency to artifacts doesn't make it so. That's with Rhaenyra bleeding on the throne (after having spent and entire day and night in armor, first on dragonback and then on the Iron Throne with her skin not exactly being accustomed to that kind of finery) or Viserys I, Aerys II, and Joffrey cutting themselves on the throne means pretty much nothing besides them being clumsy.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

And Maegor's line doesn't even continue after that.

You would have to prove a causal link there. Besides, you do recall that Prince Aegon fought his royal uncle, too, right? And Jaehaerys I, Alysanne, and Rhaena did, too. Yet neither of those lines ended nor were they punished by fate in any way. Aegon's daughters Aerea and Rhaella lived. And Jaehaerys and Alysanne were the most fertile Targaryen couple ever.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

As I said, there are consequences to dragon fighting dragon. Also, I'm not sure if Maegor  fighting Aegon the kid qualifies as a civil war in the sense of Dance of the Dragons, which was an actual war.

It was a battle, not necessarily a drawn-out war. And it involved the fight between two dragons.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

But how old are these dragon bones? There's a theory going around that Valyrians did visit Westeros back in the day to fight off WW during the first Long Night, hence the dragon bones all over the world. The rise of Valyria is, what, 5,000 years ago. But Valyrians tamed dragons before that. Their dragon affinity obviously predates their imperial ambitions. Dragon bone fossils could indicate that perhaps there were wild dragons roaming here and there. But it could also be that Valyrians or their Shadow people flew these all over the world. 

It could also be that dragons are, in the end, just natural creatures, and the Valyrians just made them much larger, more effective weapons. Since there is no indication that the First Men or Andals had any troubles with wild dragons after the Long Night, I doubt that there were dragons there in those days. And nothing indicates Valyria was there before the Long Night.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

If Valyrians actually mated with dragons or wyverns or whatever, then the result would be a new species.

That may be the case - but then, magic obviously allowed them to make their human-dragon hybrids as human as possible. The Valyrian dragonlords can interbreed with 'normal humans' and produce viable, fertile offspring. That makes them, perhaps, a sub-species of human beings, but not a new species.

You also have to keep in mind that magic should allow them to only partially 'dragonize' their offspring. Human-dragon hybrids do not necessarily have to be 50% dragon and 50% human. Not when sorcerers are doing the thing.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

But Valyrians are very much humans not half-humans. In Gogossos, it's the torturers that do this, not Valyrian high lords. And it also sounds like the results of blood magic rather than experimentation. Dany's baby ends up being a twisted, half human thing with a tail and wings after MMZ curses it. So like that rather than two different animal kingdoms/genuses (?) actually being able to produce offspring. 

The point is that if the Valyrians on Gogossos could produce human-animal hybrids then the first dragonlords of Valyria could also have done a similar thing to themselves. If this works in Gogossos with slaves it could also work in Valyria with Valyrians.

Dany's child isn't the only monstrosity the Targaryens produced in their history - Maegor, Rhaenyra, Laena Velaryon, possibly even Aerys II and Rhaella - they all produced weird stillborn children. And while Dany's child may have died during Mirri Maz Duur's ritual, Rhaego could have still been a twisted, half-human creature before that. All Dany knew is that he was alive and kicking before she entered the tent. She didn't know how he looked.

Now, I assume the magic in the tent reacted with 'the blood of the dragon' in Rhaego and caused the child to manifest dragon-like attributes before its life force was used to heal/revive Drogo, but we'll likely never learn what actually happened there.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Those "monstrosities" are the result of blood magic or sorcery isn't it? Like with Dany's baby. I don't get how Valyrians, if they are the result of a dragon parent, would want to outbreed dragon-traits.

They would only want to outbreed them to the point that they were viable creatures, and recognizably human who were still able to become dragonriders. The whole thing is all about controlling dragons. That's the point of the entire enterprise.

If they actually mated with dragons in a literal sense in the beginning one assumes there was one person who fucked or got fucked by a dragon, and then the offspring of that union, in turn, mated with normal humans until the dragon aspects were lessened and lessened until the standard silver-golden haired and purple-eyed Valyrian showed up. And then they had to introduce the incest thing to not outbreed the ability to control dragons.

But that's only the idea if there was a literal human-dragon mating thing. If not, then they could have just magically included or introduced aspects of dragons into themselves, making the whole thing less messy.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Dany is obviously not creating a new species here, if that's how dragons came to be. But she does manage to bring fossilized dragon eggs back to life, which requires sacrifice.

We don't know whether those eggs were truly dead. Dany feels they are hot, and she feels that there is life inside them. It still requires magic to bring it forth, but it is not created by the spell. It is already there. Else Dany could just as well have created dragons out of thin air.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Dany is not doing any magic here. She just has the desire to wake the dragons and makes sacrifices, apparently instinctively performing a powerful magical ritual that many of her Targ ancestors, even with more knowledge, failed to do. While the others before her had the magical blood traits, only Dany manages to make the sacrifices; genuine blood sacrifices I mean, not like Aerys the Mad throwing random people into the fire.

Dany certainly may have been destined to do what she did. But again - that has nothing to do with the origins or dragons or the dragonlords of old.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

That seems, to me at least, a key factor in how dragons come to be and why Valyrians can control them. 

There is no reason to believe that. Death can pay for life, fine. But nobody ever said anything about death paying for your and your family's ability to control dragons.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Well, they were mortal, so they probably couldn't blow it and live. So wonder what blew the horn if no mortal man could do so and live.

The Valyrian dragonlords saw themselves as being above gods and men. They were not seeing each other as 'mortal men' in a figurative sense. They were above mortal men, never mind the fact that were still mortal in the literal sense.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Valyrians understandably had petty problems, but they don't seem to have fought dragon to dragon in a major way.

See above. Dragons killed each other back in Old Valyria.

19 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

That would have been the end of them.

How so? There could have been rules for that kind of thing. And forty dragons ripping to pieces 5-10 of a stupid family daring the challenge a much more powerful dragonlord family wouldn't be the end of Valyria. Half the city might not even realize or care that this happened.

Nobody ever said that those Valyrian dragon civil wars were all-out wars like the Dance. After all, dragons were not the only source of power in Old Valyria. There were sorcerer (princes) there, too, and we have no idea what they could do. If I had to guess I'd say some dragonlord controlling one dragon may have been very unwise to challenge a guy whose spells were controlling the Fourteen Flames...

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On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

the Children would have long ago started breeding their greenseers and skinchangers just as the Valyrians bred their dragonlords.

Weren't the Children more likely to be greenseers or skinchangers than humans anyway? Isn't this an ability they have passed on?

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

And we also know that there are giant greenseer predecessors to Bloodraven in that cave, strongly indicating that all species have that magical talent. The First Men are not different by blood from the Andals or the Rhoynar, only by their culture and religion. Not to mention - you know - that all the Rhoynar and Andals in Westeros are First Men, too, just as as most of the First Men (especially the noble bloodlines who enter into arranged marriages) are also of Andal descent.

They are all humans, like duh. But this ability only exists in the far north. That is telling, at least to me.

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

And it might very well be that he only discovered he was a skinchanger when he met other skinchangers up at the Wall

Wasn't he known as the guy with a thousand eyes or something? He probably had the ability but may not have perfected it until he came to the wall. Kind of like Bran. 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

There is no indication that the Children or First Men greenseers ever practiced incest or married close kin. In fact, if we consider the wildling culture it is exceedingly unlikely that the ancient First Men did stuff like that. And we do know that there were skinchangers in other places like the West (I think the story of the Banefort skinchanger who had lions devour a Lannister is only in the unabridged version of the story on George's page, but it is there) and the Iron Islands (where the Farwynds are reputed skinchangers controlling the spotted whales there - likely George's versions of orcas).

And again - there are giant greenseers, too. While there is a chance that Children and First Men intermarried, there is small chance that giants and Children ever intermarried.

I think there are descendants of Children and humans. There could be descendants of giant women and children. Or this ability could be something that was passed down by a third group (!!!) now that you have mentioned it. I've totally forgotten about the Farwynds but that's sounds like a major hint. There was a mysterious group there (the seastone chair) before the Ironmen showed up. The greenseeing so far seems to be unique to the north, and skinchanging, without the queer Iron islander group, seems to be too (what Banefort?). We don't hear about this occurring in southern areas or Essos in a major way, like foresight. The placement of these abilities seem to be important to the story. But I dunno, in the end it may not matter. 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

Nope, the Valyrian history was apparently full of such conflicts. And even TWoIaF makes clear that those struggles were constant, due to the fact that multiple houses vied for control of the Freehold. Those times when only one family controlled the Freehold were exceedingly rare, apparently.

That's the political feuding like in the KL hold. There are no mentions of these feuds going to the point of civil war where Valyrians pitted their dragons against each other in the book or TWOIAF. 

 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

There is no indication either that dragons, the world, or fate care about dragons killing dragons or people slaying their close kin. That's not nice and all, but there is no indication, either, that the gods or fate or anyone on the grand scale of things cares about stuff like that.

The Dance was stupidity but not necessarily something the Targaryens were later punished for.

Couldn't Daemon have been referring to Maegor making Balerion kill Quicksilver? 

Actually there is. What happened to the Targs who started the Dance? What happened to the house only a handful of generations later? 

Ned kills Lady and later he dies in a very similar manner-- beheaded for something he had nothing to do with by the royals and their advisers he (temporarily at least) trusts. Varys later tells Tyrion that Ned's fate might have been divine retribution of sorts when they meet to discuss city security in ACOK, is it?

If Valyrians made their dragons, magical creatures, fight, then that would have resulted in a major calamity. Maybe that's what happened towards the Doom. 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

Killing rival dragonlords and dragons would then have been nothing to be ashamed of, nor anything particularly bad.

I very highly doubt this. Valyrians may have had their political fights, but dragon killing would not have gone anywhere good, especially if sacrificial magic was used to create those bonds. 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

Viserys I, Aerys II, and Joffrey cutting themselves on the throne means pretty much nothing besides them being clumsy.

weren't they all terrible in some way? You sound like the maesters scoffing at "superstitions" of whitewalkers and skinchangers. 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

Besides, you do recall that Prince Aegon fought his royal uncle, too, right? And Jaehaerys I, Alysanne, and Rhaena did, too.

Didn't Quicksilver's rider die with it? The others didn't do battle with Maegor on dragonback. 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

And nothing indicates Valyria was there before the Long Night.

No not Valyria, but Valyrians, or whatever they called themselves in pre-imperial times. They would have existed and they obviously tamed dragons before they went on conquering. 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

Dany's child isn't the only monstrosity the Targaryens produced in their history

MMZ curses Rhaego because she doesn't want him to be born. It's the blood magic that made the baby deformed and be born dead. Dany sees Rhaego in a vision and in the House of Undying as a tall lord with copper skin and silver hair. So we know he wasn't deformed in the womb. There are other stories of deformed Targ babies, like in Princess and the Dragon. It could be as you say a genetic defect in the line. Or it could be the result of blood magic like what we see with MMZ. The many enemies of Targs, fire magic, dragons, etc may have wanted them gone forever. Isn't that Shepherd at the end of Dance who urges people to kill dragons a good contender for a Faceless Man, the enemy of Valyrians and dragons? 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

But that's only the idea if there was a literal human-dragon mating thing. If not, then they could have just magically included or introduced aspects of dragons into themselves, making the whole thing less messy.

Oh geez, how could humans literally mate with dragons, which is a non-mammalian creature also an animal that are massive as adults? Even the two-year (?) old Drogon is massive and he hasn't even reached puberty yet (as far as we know). Maybe Valyrians are the result of whatever those Shadow people did. That would explain the unique silver hair and purple eyes. But all this is just speculation at this point until GRRM gives at least a partial explanation to how Valyrians  got their dragons. 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

We don't know whether those eggs were truly dead. Dany feels they are hot, and she feels that there is life inside them. It still requires magic to bring it forth, but it is not created by the spell. It is already there. Else Dany could just as well have created dragons out of thin air.

I think this points to dragons being magical creatures and all. Those eggs were fossilized when Dany gets them. With any other creature this means the eggs would be dead and no longer viable. But dragon eggs apparently don't die just like that, they are just activated or brought alive by magic. Dany apparently gets this instinctively. 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

Dany certainly may have been destined to do what she did. But again - that has nothing to do with the origins or dragons or the dragonlords of old.

How do you know that? If fossilized eggs were brought to life by sacrificial magic, then how could that have zero connection to the dragons of old Valyria? 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

Death can pay for life, fine. But nobody ever said anything about death paying for your and your family's ability to control dragons

It's the magic god. Sacrifice in return for magic stuff and powers. Like in those old Hindu epics. 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

The Valyrian dragonlords saw themselves as being above gods and men. They were not seeing each other as 'mortal men' in a figurative sense. They were above mortal men, never mind the fact that were still mortal in the literal sense

No they didn't. If the "mortal men" phrase in the horn is purely figurative, then why do those that blow it die from literally burnt lungs? 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

See above. Dragons killed each other back in Old Valyria.

We don't know that. If they did, then it most likely caused the Doom. 

On 3/15/2018 at 5:39 PM, Lord Varys said:

How so? There could have been rules for that kind of thing. And forty dragons ripping to pieces 5-10 of a stupid family daring the challenge a much more powerful dragonlord family wouldn't be the end of Valyria. Half the city might not even realize or care that this happened.

Nobody ever said that those Valyrian dragon civil wars were all-out wars like the Dance. After all, dragons were not the only source of power in Old Valyria. There were sorcerer (princes) there, too, and we have no idea what they could do. If I had to guess I'd say some dragonlord controlling one dragon may have been very unwise to challenge a guy whose spells were controlling the Fourteen Flames...

It's the magic! They didn't get their dragons out of nothing and killing magical creatures have consequences. It's just speculation at this point on my part (as it is yours). Also, dragons literally fighting dragons would not have been good for imperial stability. We know that the Valyrian empire stood strong until the Doom. All the magic in Valyria would have been connected to the dragons, people, that volcano fire magic. Isn't it also speculation that the volcanoes were being magically controlled? Valyrian sorcerers were obviously very advanced, why would they end up in some petty political fight? Something tells me these are the sort of things GRRM is never going to answer. 

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2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Weren't the Children more likely to be greenseers or skinchangers than humans anyway? Isn't this an ability they have passed on?

Not as far as we know. Again, I gave you Bloodraven's quote on the matter. Right now the Children of the Forest have no greenseers at all. They are dependent on human albino and crippled human child.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

They are all humans, like duh. But this ability only exists in the far north. That is telling, at least to me.

That isn't true, either, as I've already pointed out. There were skinchangers in the southern parts of Westeros, too. And there might still be. And the issue with the whole thing is that your culture/environment has to allow or enable you to explore your innate magical talents. If you are a skinchanger or even a potential greenseer the people around have to help/allow you to make use of that gift. If they don't - and if nobody teaches you how to do it - you won't become a (good) skinchanger and most definitely not a greenseer.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Wasn't he known as the guy with a thousand eyes or something? He probably had the ability but may not have perfected it until he came to the wall. Kind of like Bran. 

Sure, he was known as having a thousand eyes and one, but that just means that he had a lot of spies, not necessarily that he controlled animals. He could have controlled some, yes, but as of yet we have no evidence that he did while he was Hand of King Aerys I. In TMK he uses a glamor to infiltrate Whitewalls. If he had familiar, an enslaved animal at his side, he could have just sent that creature into the castle. But he didn't do that. He went himself, in the guise of Maynard Plumm.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

I think there are descendants of Children and humans. There could be descendants of giant women and children. Or this ability could be something that was passed down by a third group (!!!) now that you have mentioned it.

Again, there is no textual evidence that anybody sees skinchanging/greenseeing as a trait that runs in bloodlines or is inherited genetically. There are no skinchanger or greenseer bloodlines or dynasties.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

I've totally forgotten about the Farwynds but that's sounds like a major hint. There was a mysterious group there (the seastone chair) before the Ironmen showed up. The greenseeing so far seems to be unique to the north, and skinchanging, without the queer Iron islander group, seems to be too (what Banefort?). We don't hear about this occurring in southern areas or Essos in a major way, like foresight. The placement of these abilities seem to be important to the story. But I dunno, in the end it may not matter. 

We don't have any detailed information on the magical traditions and cultures of Essos. Skinchangers could exist there, too.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

That's the political feuding like in the KL hold. There are no mentions of these feuds going to the point of civil war where Valyrians pitted their dragons against each other in the book or TWOIAF. 

But in TPatQ. Prince Daemon confirms that dragons killed dragons back in Old Valyria. And he compares what he and Rhaenyra would have to do in the coming Dance with what the Valyrians of old did to each other and the dragons, indicating that the internal dragonlord infighting involving dragon battles was about as bad - or even worse - than the Dance of the Dragons.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Couldn't Daemon have been referring to Maegor making Balerion kill Quicksilver? 

No, he explicitly referred to the history of Valyria, not the history of Westeros. And Daemon Targaryen knows much more about the history of Valyria than you or I.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Actually there is. What happened to the Targs who started the Dance? What happened to the house only a handful of generations later? 

There is no causal link to any of that. Aegon III, Jaehaera, Viserys II, and their descendants had nothing to do with the Dance.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Ned kills Lady and later he dies in a very similar manner-- beheaded for something he had nothing to do with by the royals and their advisers he (temporarily at least) trusts. Varys later tells Tyrion that Ned's fate might have been divine retribution of sorts when they meet to discuss city security in ACOK, is it?

People imagining causal links and connections doesn't mean they are there.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

If Valyrians made their dragons, magical creatures, fight, then that would have resulted in a major calamity. Maybe that's what happened towards the Doom. 

No, because we actually do have a couple of theories about the Doom, and no such theory indicates that dragons killing dragons had anything to do with the Doom.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

I very highly doubt this. Valyrians may have had their political fights, but dragon killing would not have gone anywhere good, especially if sacrificial magic was used to create those bonds.

How do you know that? You have no idea how those bonds work, nor do you have any reason to believe that dragons killing dragons has any effect on the dragons or their riders.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

weren't they all terrible in some way? You sound like the maesters scoffing at "superstitions" of whitewalkers and skinchangers. 

The Iron Throne is just a chair. There is nothing magical about that thing, or the fact that old, sick, mad, clumsy, or agitated people risk injuring themselves when fervently gesticulate or otherwise work themselves in a frenzy on a chair with as many sharp barbs and spikes as the Iron Throne.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Didn't Quicksilver's rider die with it? The others didn't do battle with Maegor on dragonback.

If dragons killing dragons is 'a sin' then Jaehaerys, Alysanne, Rhaena, and their children and grandchildren should have suffered the consequences of that sin as much as Aegon III, Viserys II, and their descendants did, no? Yet they prospered and thrived.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

No not Valyria, but Valyrians, or whatever they called themselves in pre-imperial times. They would have existed and they obviously tamed dragons before they went on conquering.

We don't know whether Valyria was founded before or after the first dragonlords tamed dragons. Could very well be that the city of Valyria already existed at that point. You don't need dragons to found a city, after all.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

MMZ curses Rhaego because she doesn't want him to be born. It's the blood magic that made the baby deformed and be born dead.

There is no proof for this claim of yours.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Dany sees Rhaego in a vision and in the House of Undying as a tall lord with copper skin and silver hair. So we know he wasn't deformed in the womb. 

The vision of Rhaego was a vision of what could have been. Rhaego could have been not deformed in the womb or he could have been deformed in the womb. We don't know and have no way of knowing. All we do know is that Rhaego was not dead in the womb when Dany entered the tent. There is also no reason to believe Mirri cursed Rhaego. He likely was the sacrifice Dany and Mirri used to heal Drogo, but that doesn't mean Rhaego was cursed.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

There are other stories of deformed Targ babies, like in Princess and the Dragon. It could be as you say a genetic defect in the line. Or it could be the result of blood magic like what we see with MMZ. The many enemies of Targs, fire magic, dragons, etc may have wanted them gone forever.

There is no proof for such things in the sources we have.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Oh geez, how could humans literally mate with dragons, which is a non-mammalian creature also an animal that are massive as adults? Even the two-year (?) old Drogon is massive and he hasn't even reached puberty yet (as far as we know).

That is why I implied that this whole thing would have been 'messy'. It would have been a very ugly thing but we really don't know what dragons and humans can do with each other in this world, if they really want to. Nor do we know what powerful sorcerers can help them accomplish. It is pretty clear that a human-dragon mating would only have worked with magical assistance. But if such assistance was given it could have worked, no?

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

But all this is just speculation at this point until GRRM gives at least a partial explanation to how Valyrians  got their dragons. 

We don't need a detailed explanation. We have the traditional belief that the dragonlords of Valyria had 'the blood of the dragon'. That is enough for me to imply that there might be a literal kinship between Valyrian dragonlords and their dragons. It is, after all, what 'having the blood of the dragon' is supposed to mean in this context.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

I think this points to dragons being magical creatures and all. Those eggs were fossilized when Dany gets them. With any other creature this means the eggs would be dead and no longer viable. But dragon eggs apparently don't die just like that, they are just activated or brought alive by magic. Dany apparently gets this instinctively. 

Sure, which makes the whole miracle less miraculous because the spell was just an accelerant. It didn't create anything, it just activated or awakened something that was never truly gone.

And that's why what Dany - who inherited the blood of the dragon from her Valyrian ancestors - did is no way near in the same magical league as the stuff the Valyrians of old did - who first established a permanent link between humans and dragons.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

How do you know that? If fossilized eggs were brought to life by sacrificial magic, then how could that have zero connection to the dragons of old Valyria?

Because there is no indication that sacrificial magic had anything to do with the stuff the Valyrians of old did to establish their link with the dragons.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

No they didn't. If the "mortal men" phrase in the horn is purely figurative, then why do those that blow it die from literally burnt lungs?

It may be a reference to the fact that 'non-mortal men' in the figurative sense - Valyrian dragonlords - do not die when blowing the horn because the blood of the dragon setting them apart from mortal/lesser men allows them to blow horns like Dragonbinder.

And that could very well be the reason why nobody ever successfully used such a horn against the Valyrians.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

We don't know that. If they did, then it most likely caused the Doom. 

Sure we do. You cannot dismiss Prince Daemon on that one. And again - nothing indicates the Doom was caused by a silly conflict between some dragonlords involving dragons killing each other. Dragons weren't all that special in Valyria, anyway. The dragonlords had hundreds of dragons.

2 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

It's the magic! They didn't get their dragons out of nothing and killing magical creatures have consequences. It's just speculation at this point on my part (as it is yours). Also, dragons literally fighting dragons would not have been good for imperial stability. We know that the Valyrian empire stood strong until the Doom. All the magic in Valyria would have been connected to the dragons, people, that volcano fire magic. Isn't it also speculation that the volcanoes were being magically controlled? Valyrian sorcerers were obviously very advanced, why would they end up in some petty political fight? Something tells me these are the sort of things GRRM is never going to answer. 

Valyria was never an empire, it was always a Freehold. It never had an imperial hierarchy or bureaucracy. And there was constant infighting which apparently also included dragons fighting and killing other dragons.

Valyrian magic was rooted in blood and fire, not necessarily in dragons. Dragons were part of their power structure, a very important part, especially in the military department, but we really don't know the extent of the power of the most powerful Valyrian sorcerers. They could very well have been more powerful than dragonlords and their dragons. After all, we do know that the fires of the Fourteen Flames burned hotter than dragonfire. And the spells of the sorcerers of Valyria controlled the Fourteen Flames.

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23 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

That isn't true, either, as I've already pointed out. There were skinchangers in the southern parts of Westeros, too.

You only mentioned the Iron Islands, and that other reference that I couldn't really find. Zero skinchangers in Essos so far too. 

23 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

he was known as having a thousand eyes and one, but that just means that he had a lot of spies,

From what I got from it, this is what the people believe, that he has many spies. They don't know about his special ability. Wasn't he able to see through animals, like cats and ravens, to gather information? They don't have to "enslave" animals, just see through their eyes, like Arya or Bran earlier. 

23 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

There are no skinchanger or greenseer bloodlines or dynasties.

Why would there be? If the ability wasn't genetic, we would see more of it, like foresight that seem to exist everywhere. We do have plenty of details about Essos and all the magic stuff, like in Asshai, but the skinchanging is mentioned only in the northern parts of Westeros with a very minor exception in an Iron Islands clan. 

23 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Prince Daemon confirms that dragons killed dragons back in Old Valyria. And he compares what he and Rhaenyra would have to do in the coming Dance with what the Valyrians of old did to each other and the dragons, indicating that the internal dragonlord infighting involving dragon battles was about as bad - or even worse - than the Dance of the Dragons.

One line from Daemon, but none of that is mentioned in the two chapters about Valyria in TWOIAF or anywhere else in TSOIAF books. The Princess and Queen was recently released, it's possible GRRM is adding something new that wasn't there before. 

23 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

People imagining causal links and connections doesn't mean they are there.

If it's a casual link then why would GRRM have Varys mention it?

23 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

No, because we actually do have a couple of theories about the Doom, and no such theory indicates that dragons killing dragons had anything to do with the Doom.

The theories from maesters may all be bs if what the FM say is true.Perhaps the line "no one knows what caused the Doom" is uttered with pun intended. 

23 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

How do you know that? You have no idea how those bonds work, nor do you have any reason to believe that dragons killing dragons has any effect on the dragons or their riders.

In the books none of the riders outlive the dragons in fights that end with the dragon dead. Dragons typically outlive their riders. Even Rhaenys (most likely) dies when Meraxes is downed. We already have an indication that the dragon-rider link is soulbound in a way. Targs keeping dragon eggs in the cradles of potential riders, the one-rider rule, and Dany's chapters in ADWD. References to dragons as kin, the sacrifices required to re-birth dragons, other references to sacrificial magic...it's all pointing to kin sacrifice that lead to Valyrians' control of dragons. Or something similar. These are not horses, as Dany remarks, so turning magical dragons against each other wouldn't have ended well for anyone. It really doesn't in the books. The Targs responsible for the Dance is finished for good and the house ends up losing all their dragons. And sometime after that, the Targs are finished too. It less only about a century for all this to happen. 

23 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

The Iron Throne is just a chair. There is nothing magical about that thing, or the fact that old, sick, mad, clumsy, or agitated people risk injuring themselves when fervently gesticulate or otherwise work themselves in a frenzy on a chair with as many sharp barbs and spikes as the Iron Throne.

Do we actually have info on just random sick, mad, etc, people hurting themselves on the throne? No. There isn't an epidemic of most people sitting on the throne and getting jabbed. Ned does it, and he's fine. Just very specific people. The throne doesn't necessarily have to be magical. 

23 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

If dragons killing dragons is 'a sin' then Jaehaerys, Alysanne, Rhaena, and their children and grandchildren should have suffered the consequences of that sin as much as Aegon III, Viserys II, and their descendants did, no? Yet they prospered and thrived.

Jaehaerys and  Alysanne don't kill dragons. Maegor dies and his direct line dies with him. After the Dance, Targs lose their dragons, the throne, and even their seat. Who is thriving here? Now only Dany survives, and Jon if he is Rhaegar's son, but only because they seem to be children of prophesies. And Bloodraven is barely human anymore. 

23 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

We don't know whether Valyria was founded before or after the first dragonlords tamed dragons. Could very well be that the city of Valyria already existed at that point. You don't need dragons to found a city, after all.

I think we can say that Valyria was always there, it just grew in prominence and prosperity overtime. At least one legend (of the shadow people) recalls an ancient time when Valyrians didn't have dragons. But back then Valyria wasn't a big city either. We are told that Valyrians learned to tame dragons "sheltered" among the volcanoes. We can say for certain that by the time the world was learning about Valyrians, they had dragons. They may not have always had dragons, but their prosperity is tied to them. 

23 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

There is no proof for this claim of yours.

Yes we do. MMZ proclaims she curses Rhaego because he would have grown to be a conqueror. In Dany's vision, she sees grown-up Rhaego's heart being consumed by flame and him being "snuffed out." That's the blood magic killing Rhaego, or rather making it that he never comes into existence. 

23 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

The vision of Rhaego was a vision of what could have been. Rhaego could have been not deformed in the womb or he could have been deformed in the womb. We don't know and have no way of knowing. All we do know is that Rhaego was not dead in the womb when Dany entered the tent. There is also no reason to believe Mirri cursed Rhaego. He likely was the sacrifice Dany and Mirri used to heal Drogo, but that doesn't mean Rhaego was cursed.

The vision is what Rhaego would have been had he been born, if MMZ had not done that blood magic to kill him in the womb. MMZ even admits to doing it. She doesn't heal Drogo either, she curses him. It's the ritual she does in the tent, to curse Drogo and murder Rhaego. Dany miscarried because of it. If Rhaego was naturally deformed, then in Dany vision she would have seen him as he was, pre-cruse. But that's not what happens. 

On 3/16/2018 at 10:29 PM, Lord Varys said:

There is no proof for such things in the sources we have.

The Faceless Men want the Valyrians gone. They would have had their eyes on the last remaining Valyrians. There's enmity there that can't be ignored. Jaquen H'gar is strongly indicated to be in Citadel to steal a book about how to kill dragons. The first time we see a deformed Targ baby is with Rhaego after him being affected by blood magic. GRRM wrote about all other deformed babies afterwards. What makes you think he gave those babies the same deformities if the miscarriages were natural? 

On 3/16/2018 at 10:29 PM, Lord Varys said:

It is pretty clear that a human-dragon mating would only have worked with magical assistance. But if such assistance was given it could have worked, no?

Maybe not in a strictly biological sense. The sorcerers may have performed a ritual that merged two creatures together for whatever reason. There are also stories of centaurs, horse-human hybrids, and some bones have been unearthed. Were these also the result of some type of magical mating? Or are they naturally occurring creatures? Are Valyrians  really a subspecies of humans and dragons? I guess we will have to wait and see. 

On 3/16/2018 at 10:29 PM, Lord Varys said:

And that's why what Dany - who inherited the blood of the dragon from her Valyrian ancestors - did is no way near in the same magical league as the stuff the Valyrians of old did - who first established a permanent link between humans and dragons.

Quote

Dany is not a sorcerer and no one says she is. Also, the idea that it was the old Valyrians that did magic to connect their blood to dragons is another speculation. Maybe they did get it from those people from the shadow. Also, it was GRRM who described the event as "miraculous." It was clearly a very special thing, and maybe something like this did happen to a Valyrian a very long time ago and he or she passed along the trait. 

On 3/16/2018 at 10:29 PM, Lord Varys said:

It may be a reference to the fact that 'non-mortal men' in the figurative sense - Valyrian dragonlords - do not die when blowing the horn because the blood of the dragon setting them apart from mortal/lesser men allows them to blow horns like Dragonbinder.

Ah, so the horn is like dragons, only Valyrians are capable of using it. So someone like Dany will be able to blow it and live you mean? Not a bad idea but wouldn't the purpose be a bit redundant? Blood of the dragon can already control dragons, so why Dragonbinder? 

On 3/16/2018 at 10:29 PM, Lord Varys said:

And again - nothing indicates the Doom was caused by a silly conflict between some dragonlords involving dragons killing each other. Dragons weren't all that special in Valyria, anyway. The dragonlords had hundreds of dragons.

If dragons were killing each other, that would not have been a silly conflict. Just because they had hundreds of dragons, that would not mean they wouldn't find the creatures special. Valyrians had dragon imagery everywhere. Look at Dragonstone. They called themselves dragons. That shows how special dragons were to them. All the more so because only they had dragons. 

On 3/16/2018 at 10:29 PM, Lord Varys said:

Valyria was never an empire, it was always a Freehold. It never had an imperial hierarchy or bureaucracy.

After the Freehold starts conquering other nations and exerting control, then it does become an empire. They don't have to call themselves the Valyrian empire. They did have an imperial bureaucracy with archons appointed to control conquered areas. They didn't have an emperor in the traditional sense. Then again, neither did the British. It was always king or queen whatever not emperor or empress. Valyrians didn't have to call themselves imperials to be imperials. 

On 3/16/2018 at 10:29 PM, Lord Varys said:

And the spells of the sorcerers of Valyria controlled the Fourteen Flames.

This is something a bunch of maesters believe to be true. It's based on something Barth wrote, but not exactly. So it may not be true. Doesn't something inexplicable but very much like the Doom happen in Hardhome too, even before Valyria? There were no sorcerers there controlling flames. Also, the sundering of Dorne's land bridge to the east recalls how the peninsula was splintered after the Doom. 

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5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

You only mentioned the Iron Islands, and that other reference that I couldn't really find. Zero skinchangers in Essos so far too. 

It is in the West. Go to George's page and read his complete history of the Westerlands.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

From what I got from it, this is what the people believe, that he has many spies. They don't know about his special ability. Wasn't he able to see through animals, like cats and ravens, to gather information? They don't have to "enslave" animals, just see through their eyes, like Arya or Bran earlier. 

We have no evidence that Bloodraven actually was aware of or used his skinchanger abilities back when he was Hand of the King. If George wanted to give us that impression then Dunk wouldn't have Maynard Plumm in TMK but a weird/eerie animal which followed and watched him the entire time (or Plumm would have been accompanied by such an animal). An animal he would meet again in Bloodraven's tent in the end.

What we do have evidence of is that Bloodraven already knew how to use glamors back in TMK.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Why would there be? If the ability wasn't genetic, we would see more of it, like foresight that seem to exist everywhere. We do have plenty of details about Essos and all the magic stuff, like in Asshai, but the skinchanging is mentioned only in the northern parts of Westeros with a very minor exception in an Iron Islands clan.

We know where skinchanging and greenseeing come from. It is a rare magical talent the Children, the giants, and humans beings have. There is no indication that it is a hereditary trait. 

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

One line from Daemon, but none of that is mentioned in the two chapters about Valyria in TWOIAF or anywhere else in TSOIAF books. The Princess and Queen was recently released, it's possible GRRM is adding something new that wasn't there before. 

TPatQ wasn't recently released. It was released long before TWoIaF and is actually part of the texts TWoIaF is based. George doesn't have to give us details on Valyrian history to confirm or make it so that there were dragons fighting dragons back in Old Valyria. All he needed to do was to have a character mention this fact. And he had Prince Daemon do just that.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

If it's a casual link then why would GRRM have Varys mention it?

People believing things doesn't make them so. That is a common misconception.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

The theories from maesters may all be bs if what the FM say is true.Perhaps the line "no one knows what caused the Doom" is uttered with pun intended. 

We have evidence indicating that the Faceless Men caused the Doom, yes.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

In the books none of the riders outlive the dragons in fights that end with the dragon dead.

That is usually due to the fact that they ride their dragons when they are killed. Rhaenyra and Aegon II survive the deaths of their dragons, though. As do Jaehaera, Aegon III, Baela and Rhaena, and Viserys I.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

We already have an indication that the dragon-rider link is soulbound in a way.

There is a mental connection, yes, but I don't think 'soulbound' is the right way to describe that.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Targs keeping dragon eggs in the cradles of potential riders, the one-rider rule, and Dany's chapters in ADWD. References to dragons as kin, the sacrifices required to re-birth dragons, other references to sacrificial magic...it's all pointing to kin sacrifice that lead to Valyrians' control of dragons. Or something similar.

No, there is nothing indicating that. Blood sacrifices are part of many magical rituals, often times in a rather arbitrary manner. Since we don't know any details as to how the first dragonlords became dragonlords we have no reason to assume that blood sacrificed played any role there. They could have been a part of that ritual, but we simply don't know. Dany using a blood sacrifice to hatch her dragons points nowhere. It has nothing to do with the first dragonlords. We don't even have a reason that the way the Valyrians first bonded with their dragons is even an important point that's going to be revealed in the story.

Valyria is not exactly at the center of this story, you know.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

These are not horses, as Dany remarks, so turning magical dragons against each other wouldn't have ended well for anyone. It really doesn't in the books. The Targs responsible for the Dance is finished for good and the house ends up losing all their dragons. And sometime after that, the Targs are finished too. It less only about a century for all this to happen. 

Robert's Rebellion takes place nearly exactly 150 years after the Dance. And that war didn't really finish the Targaryens, did it?

The Valyrian dragons were bred for war. And they died in war, just as the Targaryen dragons did. Killing and being killed was their purpose in life. There is no indication that dragons do not like to kill each other. In fact, Vermithor attacks two other dragons all by himself, and he, Tessarion, and Seasmoke rip each other to pieces without any rider influencing their actions. Have those dragons 'sinned', too? And what about Sunfyre and Grey Ghost? Sunfyre killed that dragon simply because he could, presumably.

Or the Cannibal. He fed on dragon eggs and hatchlings.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Do we actually have info on just random sick, mad, etc, people hurting themselves on the throne? No. There isn't an epidemic of most people sitting on the throne and getting jabbed. Ned does it, and he's fine. Just very specific people. The throne doesn't necessarily have to be magical. 

LOL, most of the people up there had severe issues. Joff is an unruly young child who gets agitated when he cuts himself on the throne in ACoK. Aerys II was a well-known madman who was apparently simply not willing or capable to sit still on the throne, leading to the many cuts he suffered up there. Rhaenyra sat on the throne for hours and hours in full armor, after she had taken KL. There is no indication that she cut herself, simply talk about blood dripping down her legs - which most likely came from a delicate woman unaccustomed to armor wearing armor for a day and a night - first on dragonback during the day and then on the Iron Throne during the night. Viserys I was a fat and sick man when he ascended the Iron Throne and cut himself up there when delivering a judgment. Fat and sick men are more likely to cut themselves on a monstrosity like the Iron Throne than young and agile men, no? And Maegor was simply killed on the throne - either he killed himself, or he was murdered up there.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Jaehaerys and  Alysanne don't kill dragons. Maegor dies and his direct line dies with him. After the Dance, Targs lose their dragons, the throne, and even their seat. Who is thriving here? Now only Dany survives, and Jon if he is Rhaegar's son, but only because they seem to be children of prophesies. And Bloodraven is barely human anymore. 

But Jaehaerys and Alysanne's half-uncle killed a dragon, no? And their brother Aegon tried to kill a dragon and used his dragon to attack another, as they later intended to do, too. Surely they sinned as much as Rhaenyra and Daemon's descendants, no? Those whose dragons later died.

Yet the Targaryens and their dragons thrived during the reigns of both Jaehaerys I and Viserys I, never mind the fact that the Targaryens and their dragons attacked and killed each other after the death of King Aenys.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

I think we can say that Valyria was always there, it just grew in prominence and prosperity overtime. At least one legend (of the shadow people) recalls an ancient time when Valyrians didn't have dragons. But back then Valyria wasn't a big city either. We are told that Valyrians learned to tame dragons "sheltered" among the volcanoes. We can say for certain that by the time the world was learning about Valyrians, they had dragons. They may not have always had dragons, but their prosperity is tied to them.

There is no such legend, just the claim that the people of Asshai supposedly taught the Valyrians how to bond with the dragons. But there is no proof that this is true.

The point is just that we don't know when the Valyrians were dragonlords. Valyria could have stood for a hundred years before the first dragonlord claimed his dragon.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Yes we do. MMZ proclaims she curses Rhaego because he would have grown to be a conqueror. In Dany's vision, she sees grown-up Rhaego's heart being consumed by flame and him being "snuffed out." That's the blood magic killing Rhaego, or rather making it that he never comes into existence. 

She says she took care of Rhaego. But there is no talk about her cursing him.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

The vision is what Rhaego would have been had he been born, if MMZ had not done that blood magic to kill him in the womb. MMZ even admits to doing it. She doesn't heal Drogo either, she curses him. It's the ritual she does in the tent, to curse Drogo and murder Rhaego. Dany miscarried because of it. If Rhaego was naturally deformed, then in Dany vision she would have seen him as he was, pre-cruse. But that's not what happens. 

Dany saw an alternate reality. We have no way of what reality, just that it was one of many possible alternate realities. We cannot draw any conclusions about the 'real reality' from visions about alternate realities.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

The Faceless Men want the Valyrians gone. They would have had their eyes on the last remaining Valyrians. There's enmity there that can't be ignored. Jaquen H'gar is strongly indicated to be in Citadel to steal a book about how to kill dragons. The first time we see a deformed Targ baby is with Rhaego after him being affected by blood magic. GRRM wrote about all other deformed babies afterwards. What makes you think he gave those babies the same deformities if the miscarriages were natural? 

Because it may be a consequence of having the blood of the dragon that some of your children do not look normal and are not exactly viable. The fact that people want to kill dragons doesn't mean anybody poisoned the Targaryens or their children.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Maybe not in a strictly biological sense. The sorcerers may have performed a ritual that merged two creatures together for whatever reason. There are also stories of centaurs, horse-human hybrids, and some bones have been unearthed. Were these also the result of some type of magical mating? Or are they naturally occurring creatures? Are Valyrians  really a subspecies of humans and dragons? I guess we will have to wait and see. 

We have no reason to believe those centaurs were not 'natural creatures'. But we do know that the Valyrian dragonlords acquired the ability to bond with dragons at a certain point in history. They permanently changed. They didn't have the blood of the dragon forever.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Dany is not a sorcerer and no one says she is. Also, the idea that it was the old Valyrians that did magic to connect their blood to dragons is another speculation. Maybe they did get it from those people from the shadow. Also, it was GRRM who described the event as "miraculous." It was clearly a very special thing, and maybe something like this did happen to a Valyrian a very long time ago and he or she passed along the trait. 

Even if the Valyrians were taught the spells to bond with their dragons - they would have still gone through those spells themselves. The Valyrians are the Valyrians.

There is no reason to believe that any Valyrian had ever to do something like Dany did. There were dragons back in Valyria. A lot of them. And they were thriving there. There was no reason why anybody should try to hatch dragon eggs with magic.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

Ah, so the horn is like dragons, only Valyrians are capable of using it. So someone like Dany will be able to blow it and live you mean? Not a bad idea but wouldn't the purpose be a bit redundant? Blood of the dragon can already control dragons, so why Dragonbinder? 

No idea, really, while we don't know what exactly the horn can do. But if Moqorro lied and the person blowing the horn is actually supposed to be the one to control the dragon(s) then I'd not be surprised if people with the blood of the dragon (like Dany, Brown Ben Plumm, and Tyrion) could actually use the horn to do whatever it is supposed to do.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

If dragons were killing each other, that would not have been a silly conflict. Just because they had hundreds of dragons, that would not mean they wouldn't find the creatures special. Valyrians had dragon imagery everywhere. Look at Dragonstone. They called themselves dragons. That shows how special dragons were to them. All the more so because only they had dragons. 

Sure dragons are special. And beautiful. And dangerous. But their purpose was to be used as weapons. And weapons can break.

5 hours ago, Ghost+Nymeria4Eva said:

After the Freehold starts conquering other nations and exerting control, then it does become an empire. They don't have to call themselves the Valyrian empire. They did have an imperial bureaucracy with archons appointed to control conquered areas. They didn't have an emperor in the traditional sense. Then again, neither did the British. It was always king or queen whatever not emperor or empress. Valyrians didn't have to call themselves imperials to be imperials. 

The point here is that Valyria never had a really imperial center. It was run by two scores of powerful families who didn't exactly live together in unison. And their political system was even more egalitarian considering that any free landowner in Valyria could elect officials.

Many of those dragonlords hated each other. And they fought against each other occasionally on dragonback, using their dragons to kill, you know, their dragons. And presumably each other along with them.

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On 3/13/2018 at 5:48 AM, chrisdaw said:

I've not forgotten anything. It will be the case that dragons can not be skinchanged because the skinchanger can not survive the fire and they are forced out else they are consumed and die. It is the point of that scene, of fire consumes and ice preserves. And that's what the Valyrian dragon riding family's did that no-one else ever has, they worked out how to survive the fire.

Probably they first did it by swapping an unborn-in-womb child's soul with a dragon's soul, the child dies or becomes the dragon second lifed and the mother's blood is dragon contaminated. No-one else discovered how to do it because no-one else was willing to sacrifice their children with the same enthusiasm as the Valyrians.

Bloodraven is half Targaryen--you know, "a Valyrian dragonriding family that worked out how to survive the fire." Combine that Valyrian dragonriding (surviving fire) blood with the Blackwood skinchanging  and greenseeing blood and what do you get?

Valyrian sorcery is rooted in fire and blood, not fire and souls. All the evidence we have from the series suggests that the consciousness-swapping is earth magic, so it's unlikely the Valyrians were using it. The most likely way they got to control dragons was blood-bonding, which the text actually supports.

The mother's blood would not be "dragon contaminated" by a soul-switching. Souls and blood do not intermingle. Much the same way that physical fire will not burn a non-physical consciousness. 

You've had some interesting ideas, but this completely unsubstantiated Valyrian baby-sacrifice is the worst. 

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