Heresy 217 Dreams and Dust

[Matthew.]

1 hour ago, JNR said:

But to me, it is quite plainly Summer's own thinking.  It may be rendered in third person, but it is clearly Summer's perspective, not GRRM's, and we know this because GRRM knows the words swords and armor and would use those words.

I acknowledged wolf dreams in the prior post, and they're precisely why I wouldn't go so far as to say with 100% certitude what GRRM aspires to stylistically within the HOTU, but if I'm going to take the wolf dreams into account, I must also take the aforementioned Will and Victarion chapters into account, as well as writing like this:

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The moon was a crescent, thin and sharp as the blade of a knife. A pale sun rose and set and rose again. Red leaves whispered in the wind. Dark clouds filled the skies and turned to storms. Lightning flashed and thunder rumbled, and dead men with black hands and bright blue eyes shuffled round a cleft in the hillside but could not enter. Under the hill, the broken boy sat upon a weirwood throne, listening to whispers in the dark as ravens walked up and down his arms.

...

The moon was a crescent, thin and sharp as the blade of a knife. Summer dug up a severed arm, black and covered with hoarfrost, its fingers opening and closing as it pulled itself across the frozen snow. There was still enough meat on it to fill his empty belly, and after that was done he cracked the arm bones for the marrow. Only then did the arm remember it was dead.

Part of the appeal of third person limited writing is that the author can still bring a certain amount of their own voice to the prose; as a point of contrast, Roger Zelazny was a poet, but is mostly meticulous in maintaining Corwin's prose as the style of the Amber novels--direct, often terse. Zelazny sets aside his own 'voice' and effectively narrates in a way that feels true to Corwin. ASOIAF, regardless of the actual POV character, more consistently exhibits GRRM's voice for narrative descriptions, which I don't think is a bad thing. Were the narration to fully embrace character voice, this would be a more bizarre read, like Ulysses.

Edit: To belabor the point, we might on the one hand observe that the author makes deliberate word choices in wolf dreams that are suited to the subjectivity of the viewpoint (a wolf), but even that is in pursuit of interesting prose--OTOH, one will find plenty of eloquent narration in Victarion, Brienne, Cersei, and Arya chapters, rather than tethering all prose to the language level and intellect of the corresponding character; that tends to be limited to their internal monologues.

So I must disagree that things like "dying prince" fit as Dany's thoughts--at the least, I see it up for debate. In particular, that is a moment in which Dany is being bombarded and overwhelmed as the Undying feed, so I'm not sure she had much time for interpreting (much less developing particularly poetic interpretations) in the moment, and mostly began to analyze what she'd seen after the fact. 

[Melifeather]

3 hours ago, St Daga said:

Stone kings looked down on her from their thrones, their faces chipped and stained, even their names lost in the mists of time.

 

3 hours ago, St Daga said:

and other beasts she could not name.

 

1 hour ago, Matthew. said:

I still think the assumption that "beast" is Dany's definition is a potentially erroneous treatment of the text, that it is excessively leaning toward discussing the text as though it is first person, with the POV as the narrator, which is not the case.

Dany includes the 'stone kings' in the list of 'other beasts'. The entire passage is about statues that she saw. Stone likenesses of lords, animals, and other creatures.

 

20 minutes ago, St Daga said:

It's possible that the comet is still noticeable in the sky, but it has been there for so long, that people have stopped mentioning it or even thinking of it. That is something that I had not considered.

I realize this is a fantasy novel, but real world comets are lucky to be visible for a few months. I think the last time the comet is mentioned in present tense is when they call it Joffrey's comet in ACOK Sansa chapter 1 since it was said to herald Joff's ascent to the throne.

 

Bran VI describes a gate as a black iron snake. Of course we know it's not an actual snake:

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He ran toward the sound, his brother racing beside him. The stone dens rose before them, walls slick and wet. He bared his teeth, but the man-rock took no notice. A gate loomed up, a black iron snake coiled tight about bar and post. When he crashed against it, the gate shuddered and the snake clanked and slithered and held. 

Bran VII is when the great winged snake that roared flame is mentioned:

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Yet as one smell drew them onward, others warned them back. He sniffed at the drifting smoke. Men, many men, many horses, and fire, fire, fire. No smell was more dangerous, not even the hard cold smell of iron, the stuff of man-claws and hardskin. The smoke and ash clouded his eyes, and in the sky he saw a great winged snake whose roar was a river of flame. He bared his teeth, but then the snake was gone. Behind the cliffs tall fires were eating up the stars.

Bran/Summer describes seeing a black iron snake 'coiled' about the bar and post of the gate. The rest of the description makes it sound like the black iron snake was a chain. So while I agree that the great winged snake isn't an actual snake, I don't think it was a dragon either. It certainly had the shape of a snake - long like the chain - but it had a 'roar' that looked like a river of flame. Couldn't this description simply be smoke and fire shooting high into the sky? Maybe Maester Luwin had flammable liquids in the tower that exploded?

[Brad Stark]

Summer's vision stands alone as the only time in all of asoiaf we have 'signs and portents' outside a context we expect to see them. 

Dany is told she will see visions in the HOTU. Mel looks into the fire to see vision.  Bran is led by BR.  Several people see things in dreams. 

But summer sees his vision as if it were right in front of him, with no obvious reason he'd see anything that wasn't there.  Did I miss a reason he might hallucinate?  Or am I right that this is unique.?

[Black Crow]

4 minutes ago, Brad Stark said:

Summer's vision stands alone as the only time in all of asoiaf we have 'signs and portents' outside a context we expect to see them. 

Dany is told she will see visions in the HOTU. Mel looks into the fire to see vision.  Bran is led by BR.  Several people see things in dreams. 

But summer sees his vision as if it were right in front of him, with no obvious reason he'd see anything that wasn't there.  Did I miss a reason he might hallucinate?  Or am I right that this is unique.?

The direwolves are themselves creatures of magic. They can communicate over great distances. We don't know the extent of their powers, but its entirely possible that he can"see" things.

[Janneyc1]

Combining the two stories: 

1. Great Stone Beast to Wing from a smoking tower, breathing shadow fire. Perhaps the gargoyles atop Winterfell or Dragonstone could be petrified Gargoyles come to life? I personally think it could be a metaphor for Jon Connington. 

2. Winged Snake, breathing fire. 

About Summer's vision, he says that he smells men and horses and fire and then sees his fire breathing winged snake overhead. Are we overthinking this? It wasn't uncommon to throw burning pitch from a catapult in medieval times and Ramsay wouldn't care about casualties. Has Summer ever seen a battle before? 

[Matthew.]

42 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

Dany includes the 'stone kings' in the list of 'other beasts'. The entire passage is about statues that she saw. Stone likenesses of lords, animals, and other creatures.

If we expand the scope of the vision, I think the stone kings are an interesting potentiality. The main reservation I have is that I am strongly inclined to view that string of visions as having a structure: Three deaths that helped to shape Dany's path, three figures/factions to which Dany is to be a 'bride' (with bride not necessarily being literal, just as daughter isn't literal), three lies to slay. 

Granted, there's no reason I'll turn out to be remotely right on that front, but when I think of the 'stone beast,' I'm not only trying to determine what the stone beast actually is, but in what sense it might be a lie--so are there some ways we can incorporate the stone kings into that concept?

A sincere question, as there's a couple interesting things going on around Winterfell at the moment that might potentially lay the groundwork for the spawning of a 'lie' that also relates to the crypts--a king attached to a shadowbinder that is about to siege Winterfell, Jon's recent death, and Mance searching the crypts.

[Tucu]

If we look at the wider quote we can see that the "snake" appeared in the middle of the battle after the fires started and before the screaming ends. We don't get any mention of some of the men noticing a flying snake so we can probably discard a real dragon. Maybe Summer saw some vision of a different time or a metaphysical monster...or just some flame and smoke rising.

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Yet as one smell drew them onward, others warned them back. He sniffed at the drifting smoke. Men, many men, many horses, and fire, fire, fire. No smell was more dangerous, not even the cold smell of iron, the stuff of man-claws and hardskin. The smoke and ash clouded his eyes, and in the sky he saw a great winged snake whose roar was a river of flame. He bared his teeth, but then the snake was gone. Behind the cliffs tall fires were eating up the stars.

All through the night the fires crackled, and once there was a great roar and a crash that made the earth jump under his feet. Dogs barked and whined and horses screamed in terror. Howls shuddered through the night; the howls of the man-pack, wails of fear and wild shouts, laughter and screams. No beast was as noisy as man. He

 

 

[Janneyc1]

7 minutes ago, Tucu said:

If we look at the wider quote we can see that the "snake" appeared in the middle of the battle after the fires started and before the screaming ends. We don't get any mention of some of the men noticing a flying snake so we can probably discard a real dragon. Maybe Summer saw some vision of a different time or a metaphysical monster...or just some flame and smoke rising.

looking into it with the perspective of him not seeing a mythical creature, I think that he saw a catapult throwing a thing of burning pitch or something like that. 

[Tucu]

9 minutes ago, Janneyc1 said:

looking into it with the perspective of him not seeing a mythical creature, I think that he saw a catapult throwing a thing of burning pitch or something like that. 

That image could fit, but there was no siege as Theon opened the doors and let the Bolton men in. This is from the previous Theon chapter:

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Some time later, Theon found himself on the ground. He rolled onto his stomach and swallowed a mouthful of blood. Close the gates! he tried to shout, but it was too late. The Dreadfort men had cut down Red Rolfe and Kenned, and more were pouring through, a river of mail and sharp swords. There was a ringing in his ears, and horror all around him. Black Lorren had his sword out but there were already four of them pressing in on him. He saw Ulf go down with a crossbow bolt through the belly as he ran for the Great Hall. Maester Luwin was trying to reach him when a knight on a warhorse planted a spear in his back, then swung back to ride over him. Another man whipped a torch round and round his head and then lofted it toward the thatched roof of the stables. “Save me the Freys,” the Bastard was shouting as the flames roared upward “and burn the rest. Burn it, burn it all.”

The last thing Theon Greyjoy saw was Smiler, kicking free of the burning stables with his mane ablaze, screaming, rearing…

 

[Brad Stark]

12 minutes ago, Janneyc1 said:

looking into it with the perspective of him not seeing a mythical creature, I think that he saw a catapult throwing a thing of burning pitch or something like that. 

A mundane explanation of what Summer saw fits with the text but not with the ssm. 

[Black Crow]

Hence my contention that what Summer was actually seeing was a "metaphorical" vision of something nasty let loose by the destruction of Winterfell.

[Melifeather]

52 minutes ago, Matthew. said:

If we expand the scope of the vision, I think the stone kings are an interesting potentiality. The main reservation I have is that I am strongly inclined to view that string of visions as having a structure: Three deaths that helped to shape Dany's path, three figures/factions to which Dany is to be a 'bride' (with bride not necessarily being literal, just as daughter isn't literal), three lies to slay. 

Granted, there's no reason I'll turn out to be remotely right on that front, but when I think of the 'stone beast,' I'm not only trying to determine what the stone beast actually is, but in what sense it might be a lie--so are there some ways we can incorporate the stone kings into that concept?

A sincere question, as there's a couple interesting things going on around Winterfell at the moment that might potentially lay the groundwork for the spawning of a 'lie' that also relates to the crypts--a king attached to a shadowbinder that is about to siege Winterfell, Jon's recent death, and Mance searching the crypts.

Are you asking in what way could the stone kings be a lie? It could be a lie that they're dead. The iron swords across their laps suggest the need to prevent the crypts from opening. Their tombs are stone "eggs". 

As for lie spawning - Ramsay claims he has Mance in a cage. Is that true or did someone else write the Pink Letter? 

It appears that soon there will be a repeat of the Lord of Winterfell joining with the King Beyond the Wall to take down the Nights King. Is it possible that Joramun was also once held in a cage? I think the old story is a lie and the actual events were more like the current one. Certainly the old-guard of the Watch could say they had to mutiny against LC Jon Snow, claiming he was "ensorcelled". He was caught "sacrificing" the integrity and safety of the Wall by allowing the wildling Others through.

Will the wildlings continue on to Winterfell even if Jon has to be left behind? Will they attack once they see Mance in a cage? Or will they be forced to join the current Lord of Winterfell?

[Matthew.]

46 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

Are you asking in what way could the stone kings be a lie? It could be a lie that they're dead. The iron swords across their laps suggest the need to prevent the crypts from opening. Their tombs are stone "eggs". 

As for lie spawning - Ramsay claims he has Mance in a cage. Is that true or did someone else write the Pink Letter? 

Sure, I'm just spitballing based on the underlying idea.

Some additional thoughts: if we treat the stone kings as "stone beasts," the First Keep is a drum tower (so it could be the smoking tower), and Melisandre is still near enough to play a role in the shadow fire.

To throw out something I considered in relation to your post, speculation about Melisandre performing a resurrection or 'dragon waking' ritual more commonly assumes a ritual performed at the Wall, but we might also make the case for a ritual performed at Winterfell, potentially with dire consequences. If there are spirits in the crypts, Melisandre might unintentionally release something. For example, spirits returning either in Stannis' body, Jon's body, or in Melisandre's stone dragon, fulfilling the "lie" portion of the vision.
 

48 minutes ago, Black Crow said:

Hence my contention that what Summer was actually seeing was a "metaphorical" vision of something nasty let loose by the destruction of Winterfell.

Just to piggyback on this, not only is Winterfell razed, but with Bran and Rickon's departure, that chapter is the exact moment at which there is no longer a Stark in Winterfell. And, on the more crackpot front, Bran and co. have stolen a couple of the swords from the crypts, the ones that are ostensibly there to keep the spirits locked in their tombs.

[Janneyc1]

30 minutes ago, Matthew. said:

Just to piggyback on this, not only is Winterfell razed, but with Bran and Rickon's departure, that chapter is the exact moment at which there is no longer a Stark in Winterfell. And, on the more crackpot front, Bran and co. have stolen a couple of the swords from the crypts, the ones that are ostensibly there to keep the spirits locked in their tombs.

I have long believed that Bran and Co. let out some of the Kings. I have this pet theory that I am developing, but the gist is that certain people are able to access magic easier than others. Part of that is being "Magic Touched" as I call it and I think Theon might have gotten touched. In my opinion, his torture granted him the ability to use a small amount of magic and I think he was onto something when he was rambling about there being ghosts in the Hall. 

[JNR]

3 hours ago, Matthew. said:

if I'm going to take the wolf dreams into account, I must also take the aforementioned Will and Victarion chapters into account, as well as writing like this

Well, here's my take on it:

• That is a Bran chapter

• The POV is therefore Bran's and the text comes to us through his perspective

• Bran's perspective is augmented by Summer's knowledge because Bran can and does skinchange Summer

So when the text refers to things outside the cave, there's no logical problem because Summer is going outside the cave and Bran knows and sees what Summer does.  (We can take this principle even further because Summer is cognizant of his littermates in a limited but psychic way... and therefore so might Bran be. )

If Bran thinks of himself as a broken boy in the third person, we can't be too surprised; he was profoundly disappointed to find the 3EC had no power to heal his legs and enable him to walk.

3 hours ago, Matthew. said:

Zelazny sets aside his own 'voice' and effectively narrates in a way that feels true to Corwin.

Agreed, but that's a far easier job because there's only that one voice and one set of knowledge to maintain throughout. 

GRRM has many POV characters and hence must constantly find ways to make character A's POV third person prose sound different from character B-Z's prose, and often (not always) he does.

I do think we agree the Victarion thing is just breaking the rules... though I also think he had quite a good reason to break the rules there.

[JNR]

3 hours ago, Matthew. said:

that is a moment in which Dany is being bombarded and overwhelmed as the Undying feed, so I'm not sure she had much time for interpreting (much less developing particularly poetic interpretations) in the moment, and mostly began to analyze what she'd seen after the fact

Sure.  Let's apply this to the dying prince vision.

I think she instantly assumed in that moment that it was Rhaegar, having repeatedly been spoonfed myths of Rhaegar including this very scene by Viserys:

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Her brother Rhaegar battling the Usurper in the bloody waters of the Trident and dying for the woman he loved.

So it was an easy and kneejerk identification by her, just as for most readers. And IMO that is why, in her text, it's a "prince" who "murmurs a woman's name."  

She is mapping her predetermined concept onto the vision.  The text, which is her POV, reflects her take on what she saw.

But the actual identity of the person she saw is not going to turn out to be Rhaegar.  Because Rhaegar, while riding, took a giant steel spike to the heart, and that spike was slammed home with all of Oreo Baratheon's famous strength.  

And barring some incredible miracle, Rhaegar had no chance of subsequently getting off the horse, standing on his feet, dropping to his knees, and still conscious, murmuring a name.   So I understand Dany making that mistake, but it's still a mistake.

[Brad Stark]

Some of the COK above what I posted is interesting:

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“I have come for the gift of truth,” Dany said. “In the long hall, the things I saw . . . were they true visions, or lies? Past things, or things to come? What did they mean?”
. . . the shape of shadows . . . morrows not yet made . . . drink from the cup of ice . . . drink from the cup of fire . . .
. . . mother of dragons . . . child of three . . .
“Three?” She did not understand.
. . . three heads has the dragon . . . the ghost chorus yammered inside her skull with never a lip moving, never a breath stirring the still blue air. . . . mother of dragons . . . child of storm . . .

We have another reference to ice and fire.  Is this significant?

We have "child of three" followed by "three heads has the dragon".  We've seen the dragon of three heads many places, but we usually assume this is 3 people who are children of someone - e.g. Targaryens, decedents of Aegon the Conqueror, Rhegaer's children, etc.  This almost implies we are talking about one person (Dany) with 3 parents.

Then we have "child of storm".  Could Dany be a secret Baratheon?  Is child of 3 a child of storm, a child of ice and a child of fire?  Or is this just a reference to Dany's title of Stormborn?

We do have another ice reference further down - a blue rose on the Wall.  This is pretty obvious if you believe in J=R+L, but it is hard to explain otherwise.

[Matthew.]

3 hours ago, JNR said:

So when the text refers to things outside the cave, there's no logical problem because Summer is going outside the cave and Bran knows and sees what Summer does. 

What Bran can see wasn't really what I meant - though I will note that the characterization of the moon doesn't fit the 'wolf language' either - I meant the atmospheric framing and repetition. 

I don't find it necessary to establish the logic for why Bran the character would look at a half moon, think "the moon was a crescent, thin and sharp as the blade of a knife," and then think that precise thought, verbatim, a month later, when it is more fitting to view this as narration from GRRM that is establishing the tone for the chapter. 

Similarly, there's no problem with what happened in the Victarion chapter. I'm not citing these as criticisms of GRRM, I'm citing them to show that there's no reason as a reader to hold ASOIAF accountable to the rules of first person narration when the author made a deliberate choice to not utilize first person narration--he wanted the comfortable middle ground that third person limited occupies between first person and third person omniscient.
 

3 hours ago, JNR said:

So it was an easy and kneejerk identification by her, just as for most readers. And IMO that is why, in her text, it's a "prince" who "murmurs a woman's name."  

I agree that the figure might not be Rhaegar, but for different reasons; the narrator framing the scene as depicting a "dying prince" who murmurs a woman's name, to my mind is misleading because the narrator is accurately characterizing the vision, but leaving it ambiguous enough for the reader to leap to the wrong prince.

The problem I have with the idea of it being Dany's thoughts is that, as you cited, there is the Rhaegar/Elia moment where the narrator is sharing her internal monologue, and the way she thinks during that scene doesn't align with the presentation of the dying prince--ambiguous labeling of figures makes sense for the narrator, it makes less sense for character thoughts, that he would be a "dying prince" rather than "Rhaegar" or "her brother."

Put another way, the common analogy for third person limited is that it's "like a camera over the POV character's shoulder;" so the point of contention would be, is the narration presenting what the camera sees, or Dany's interpretations of what she thinks she sees? Given the surrounding context, I lean toward the former.

[Brad Stark]

11 minutes ago, Matthew. said:

What Bran can see wasn't really what I meant - though I will note that the characterization of the moon doesn't fit the 'wolf language' either - I meant the atmospheric framing and repetition. 

I don't find it necessary to establish the logic for why Bran the character would look at a half moon, think "the moon was a crescent, thin and sharp as the blade of a knife," and then think that precise thought, verbatim, a month later, when it is more fitting to view this as narration from GRRM that is establishing the tone for the chapter. 

Similarly, there's no problem with what happened in the Victarion chapter. I'm not citing these as criticisms of GRRM, I'm citing them to show that there's no reason as a reader to hold ASOIAF accountable to the rules of first person narration when the author made a deliberate choice to not utilize first person narration--he chose third person limited because it exists in a comfortable middle ground between the openness of third person omniscient, and the narrowness and intimacy of first person. He is, for example, not obligated to limit his prose to the vocabulary and grammar of a child in Bran chapters, nor to narrate action sequences as a stream-of-consciousness muddle.
 

I agree that the figure might not be Rhaegar, but for different reasons; the narrator framing the scene as depicting a "dying prince" who murmurs a woman's name, to my mind is misleading because the narrator is accurately characterizing the vision, but leaving it ambiguous enough for the reader to leap to the wrong prince.

The problem I have with the idea of it being Dany's thoughts is that, as you cited, there is the Rhaegar/Elia moment where the narrator is sharing her internal monologue, and the way she thinks during that scene doesn't align with the presentation of the dying prince--ambiguous labeling of figures makes sense for the narrator, it makes less sense for character thoughts, that he would be a "dying prince" rather than "Rhaegar" or "her brother."

Put another way, the common analogy for third person limited is that it's "like a camera over the POV character's shoulder;" so the point of contention would be, is the narration presenting what the camera sees, or Dany's interpretations of what she thinks she sees? Given the surrounding context, I say the former.

I think you put more time into this passage than GRRM, who probably was more concerned with poetic wording to set the mood than which specific character's viewpoint was chosen. 

 

If this is 3rd person limited - Dany's viewpoint, either she recognized her brother from the previous vision and would refer to him as 'Rhaegar', or she has no recognition of him and no way of knowing the man is a prince (vs a King, a Knight, etc).

If this is 3rd person omniscient - a similar problem exists.  Here the narrator knows it is prince Rhaegar, but it still makes a lot more sense to describe him either as 'Rhaegar' outright or simply 'a dying man'.  Describing the man as a prince from a 3rd person omniscient viewpoint is nondescriptive, purposeless and just bad writing.

We have the same problem with 'a blue-eyed king'.  What identifies the man as a King?

I believe the passage is meant to be from Dany's POV, as we have the sentence "Her silver was trotting through the grass" which would be "Daenery's silver was trotting through the grass" or "Daenery watched her silver trotting through the grass" in 3rd person omniscient.

If we really want to get nit-picky, we can suppose the men were wearing arms, crowns or other symbols that Dany would clearly and unambiguously recognize as belonging to a Prince and King respectively, and GRRM wanted to avoid tediously breaking the tone by writing "Rubies flew like drops of blood from the chest of a dying man, she recognized the crown of the Prince of Dragonstone on his head as he sank to his knees in the water and with his last breath murmured a woman’s name".  Far more tedious if you have to describe why the next man is a King too.

But I agree the problem still stands.  If this is Dany's POV, we have a man that Dany believes is a prince but might not even be a prince at all, and the reader is probably meant to interpret as Rhaegar.  If this is 3rd person omniscient, we can be sure this is a prince but we don't know which one.  If we are looking for a non-obvious interpretation, this could be a future event, or something that could have happened but never will.

 

I interpret the moon largely the same way.  This is Bran's POV, and GRRM is using some poetic license to foreshadow dark, ominous things, like the bronze sickle the white haired woman in Bran's vision uses to cut the man's throat - and likely the sacrifice of Meera and Jojen.  This is not completely unfounded, as Bran likely is in a dark ominous mood given the state of Meera and Jojen, and having gone so long believing everything would be alright once they found the 3 eyed crow and now realizing it won't be.

 

[Frey family reunion]

20 hours ago, Matthew. said:

Dany's dragons (or any living dragon), perhaps not, but a petrified dragon, or dead dragon within a petrified egg might be a "stone beast," particularly in the narrative voice GRRM is utilizing in that chapter--which is purposely surreal and ambiguous.

Given that it is included in the "slayer of lies" group of visions, I take it as a given that it is not a true dragon of any variety - not one of Dany's, or any others that might theoretically live or be awakened - but I do think it is something that will be raised by Mel in a failed attempt to reawaken a dragon; furthermore, I'm not reading the vision as a literal representation of a future event, but as a symbolic representation (in much the same way that the cloth dragon or winter rose are representative)--that the "stone beast" will take wing in the form of a terrible shadow drawn out of the stone, rather than there being a literal moving stone beast flying about. 

I tend to agree.  At this portion of her vision quest, many of the images appear to be less literal than the images she received earlier.  

My gut instinct is that the image may refer to Tyrion Lannister.  A stone beast flying from a tower evokes a stone gargoyle come to life.  And there have been a number of images linking to Tyrion to a gargoyle.  However, Tyrion has never been described as a “beast” in the story, or even “beastly”.

We’ve had a wide variety of critters throughout the series that have been described as beasts.  And while the dragons have been referred to as such, the animals that has been most commonly referred to as beasts are actually the direwolves.  

My thought is to first look at characters that have already been characterized in the story as a “beast”.  

In association with being a warg, Jon has, on numerous occasions, been referred to as having the “mark of the beast”.

When the Freys discuss the Red Wedding they refer to Robb as a beast.

Ramsay Snow has been described as a “beast in human skin”.

Rorge as the beast in the Hound’s mask, and Gregor Cregan’s has also been referred to as a beast.

Of course then we would have to decide how the rest of the vision would apply.  The “stone”, the smoking tower, taking flight, and the shadow flame.  

The most interesting character who has been referred, although obliquely, to as a beast, is Petyr Baelish.

First from Eddard Stark:

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And the truth of Jon Arryn’s death still eluded him. Oh, he had found a few pieces, enough to convince him that Jon had indeed been murdered, but that was no more than the spoor of an animal on the forest floor. He had not sighted the beast itself yet, though he sensed it was there, lurking, hidden, treacherous.

Then from Tyrion Lannister:

Quote

Tyrion shivered. Now there was a nasty suspicion. Perhaps the direwolf and the lion were not the only beasts in the woods, and if that was true, someone was using him as a catspaw. Tyrion Lannister hated being used.

While, I’m not sure that Petyr is to blame for the assassin attempting to kill Bran, he is certainly the party trying to frame Tyrion as the murderer.

And as for the stone bit:

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“The device painted on the shield was one Sansa did not know; a grey stone head with fiery eyes, upon a light green field. “My grandfather’s shield,” Petyr explained when he saw her gazing at it. “His own father was born in Braavos and came to the Vale as a sellsword in the hire of Lord Corbray, so my grandfather took the head of the Titan as his sigil when he was knighted.”
“It’s very fierce,” said Sansa.
“Rather too fierce, for an amiable fellow like me,” said Petyr. “I much prefer my mockingbird.”

And he is from the area of Westeros that names their bastard children “Stone”.

And the most famous smoking towers in Westeros are the towers of Harrenhal:

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“So,” Lord Petyr continued after a pause, utterly unabashed, “what’s in your pot for me?”
“Harrenhal.”
It was interesting to watch his face. Lord Petyr’s father had been the smallest of small lords, his grandfather a landless hedge knight; by birth, he held no more than a few stony acres on the windswept shore of the Fingers. Harrenhal was one of the richest plums in the Seven Kingdoms...

Littlefinger took a moment to adjust the drape of his cape, but Tyrion had seen the flash of hunger in those sly cat’s eyes.

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“Pod tells me that Littlefinger’s been made Lord of Harrenhal.”
“An empty title, so long as Roose Bolton holds the castle for Robb Stark, yet Lord Baelish was desirous of the honor.”

And finally, as pointed out by Snowfyre, just like Sansa is a type of apple Petyr Baelish leads us to the bael which is also a type of fruit,otherwise known as a stone apple.