Heresy 219 and a whisper of Winter

[St Daga]

21 hours ago, Lady Dyanna said:

True. But I am reluctant to utilize real world symbolism etc. in my interpretations. I prefer to look at the context of its use. That being said, that particular brothel is interesting because of a former hand having had the tunnel made to avoid beeing seem. Then you wind up with a room that is decorated in Lanister colored stained glass. Hmmm.  Is this some form of echo or clue to what happened during RR? Or leading up to it. 

Sorry, I some how missed responding earlier. Not enough coffee this morning, I guess.

I had forgotten this detail and had to go looking for it. Yes, the yellow and red diamond panes of glass. Very Lannister, which could be our hint that it was Tywin who was the hand the secret passage was built for. I do think GRRM uses colors in this way.

So, what could that mean about the yellow and green glass at Winterfell. Does it have something to do with House Tyrell?

21 hours ago, Lady Dyanna said:

It’s certainly an interesting idea. I’m not sure if GRRM would get involved in that type of detail or not. On the one hand we do have some very detailed information on what’s being served for supper and the color and shapes of women’s nipples. On the other, it just seems too technical. One thing that I have noticed is that it seems like GRRM does use certain colors and descriptions to get us to pay attention. In any passage that I personally have questioned if some sort of echo of past events exists, I have nearly always found some descriptor that brings to mind another time and place. I’d need to read everything about the winter gardens to know for sure if something similar is happening there.

I think his detail has meaning, The color's of the glass window's must mean something. Red and yellow, yellow and green, etc. Does it link to certain houses? That makes the most sense.

21 hours ago, Lady Dyanna said:

I’m not 100% positive, but I think that when Jon is considering supplying the Watch through the winter he thinks of starting their own glass garden and I believe the glass was old and came from Essos, possibly Bravos? 

I am not sure where the glass at Winterfell comes from but Jon thinks of buying glass for the wall to have a glass gardens and he think of Myr. 

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Glass, Jon mused, might be of use here. Castle Black needs its own glass gardens, like the ones at Winterfell. We could grow vegetables even in the deep of winter. The best glass came from Myr, but a good clear pane was worth its weight in spice, and green and yellow glass would not work as well. What we need is gold. With enough coin, we could buy 'prentice glassblowers and glaziers in Myr, bring them north, offer them their freedom for teaching their art to some of our recruits. That would be the way to go about it. If we had the gold. Which we do not. ADWD-Jon VII

 

21 hours ago, Lady Dyanna said:

And this also reminds me that we have a House from the Reach currently in residence in the North after being banished from this area for an unknown reason. Ahhh. Too many connections. 

Oh, you don't want to get me started on my House Manderly tonfoil! 

[Melifeather]

16 minutes ago, St Daga said:

am curious where you found a source for Jon Arryn to be at the Battle of the Bells. I can't find that anywhere, and I have been looking. If you could point me in the right direction, I can stop squinting over the text. 

I’ll gather what I have and report tomorrow. I’m away from my notes.

[St Daga]

8 hours ago, JNR said:

Ergo, if Lyanna already had black hands of this sort, and somehow became this sort of wight, she died well before.  Her heart stopped.  Her blood pooled.  And yet after that, she was still able to think and talk and ask Ned for things.

In such a case, there would be no reason for Ned suddenly to hold her body in newfound grief.  Because Lyanna would not be gone in any new way. 

Actually, she would likely still be around, in the story ever since, still doing things and saying things, in just the same way Coldhands still is doing things and saying things.  It doesn't seem like that's the case.

It actually doesn't take the body long to pool blood after the heart stops beating. I am a nurse, I see that livor mortis in the course of my work. And the pooled blood area is purple, not black. However, I am not sure what time frame exists in GRRM's world. And yes, if she was in such a state, Lyanna could talk and think and ask for things. We have Cold Hands as an example. Of course, he can't cross the wall, it seems, so I am not sure how that would work, unless Lyanna was north of the wall.

I am sure it would be upsetting to see your sister as an undead zombie. And the story gives us plenty of death, like first death, and up to nine times for Varamyr and the idea of a final "true death". Perhaps Ned gave Lyanna her true death, and that is part of his grief.

Honestly, I get what you are saying, and I know that it seems like I am talking crazy talk, but I just am willing to consider the possibility of an undead Lyanna. Doesn't hurt to question the text! And agree to disagree! 

[St Daga]

3 hours ago, Feather Crystal said:

There's another detail that seems to confirm that Ned and Catelyn were wed prior to the Battle of the Bells - Catelyn said the first time she ever saw Ned was on their wedding day. If Ned had stopped at Riverrun long enough to negotiate with Hoster and then for Hoster to muster a small army, how was it that Ned got in and out without Catelyn ever seeing him? How long are you suggesting he was there the first time, if indeed there was a first and second time? And why would Hoster or any lord provide an army and then take the risk of the groom dying before reaping any benefit for their daughter? We know Walder Frey allowed it, but sorely regretted it and took revenge.

Honestly, I don't know. Catelyn says some odd things. Yes, she claims that she seen Ned for the first time on their wedding day. She also says they spent a fortnight together before he made her promises (interesting choice of words) and went off to war. She also thinks of how "they made Robb that night". So, she thinks they conceived Robb on their wedding night, but she claims that Ned and she spent two weeks together before he marched to war. That's odd to me. Did they only have sex one time, one night? Or they spent two weeks together but she knew from the moment of conception that Ned had given her a child? Her thoughts are such a mess and I find it easy to question her details.

 

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And was it really such a terrible thing, to want a pretty wife? She remembered her own childish disappointment, the first time she had laid eyes on Eddard Stark. She had pictured him as a younger version of his brother Brandon, but that was wrong. Ned was shorter and plainer of face, and so somber. He spoke courteously enough, but beneath the words she sensed a coolness that was all at odds with Brandon, whose mirths had been as wild as his rages. Even when he took her maidenhood, their love had more of duty to it than of passion. We made Robb that night, though; we made a king together.  ASOS-Catelyn V

 

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Brandon Stark had bid her wait as well. "I shall not be long, my lady," he had vowed. "We will be wed on my return." Yet when the day came at last, it was his brother Eddard who stood beside her in the sept.

 

Ned had lingered scarcely a fortnight with his new bride before he too had ridden off to war with promises on his lips. At least he had left her with more than words; he had given her a son. Nine moons had waxed and waned, and Robb had been born in Riverrun while his father still warred in the south. She had brought him forth in blood and pain, not knowing whether Ned would ever see him. Her son. He had been so small … AGOT-Catelyn VII

 

 

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I gave Brandon my favor to wear, and never comforted Petyr once after he was wounded, nor bid him farewell when Father sent him off. And when Brandon was murdered and Father told me I must wed his brother, I did so gladly, though I never saw Ned's face until our wedding day. I gave my maidenhood to this solemn stranger and sent him off to his war and his king and the woman who bore him his bastard, because I always did my duty. ACOK-Catelyn VI

 

Anyway, back to Ned possibly being at Riverrun twice, but only seeing Catelyn on their wedding day. I don't have a great explanation, except that perhaps Hoster did not want them to meet first, which does seem odd. Perhaps he was hiding something from one of them or the other.  Or Ned was never at Riverrun until their wedding, which was either before or after the Battle of the Bells. I don't think we will get a satisfactory answer to this until we get more information from GRRM.

And we see Margaery marrying Renly before a battle and then having to declare to many people that her wedding to Renly wasn't consummated so she could claim to be a maiden when she weds Joffrey. Hard to say if people believe her or not, or because Renly was known to be gay, they believed that. Perhaps it would have been better for her never to have wed Renly. When war is going on, I suppose it's a gamble either way. 

[LynnS]

10 hours ago, Feather Crystal said:

Doesn’t know there’s an extra spirit residing inside him? Bran understood the Hodor knew when he was being inhabited.

OK, I understand what you are saying now.  It's an interesting idea.  So the additional spirit is lurking then and has some influence over the host.  Not sure how this works for Thoros or Mel.

[Janneyc1]

11 hours ago, St Daga said:

Honestly, I don't know. Catelyn says some odd things. Yes, she claims that she seen Ned for the first time on their wedding day. She also says they spent a fortnight together before he made her promises (interesting choice of words) and went off to war. She also thinks of how "they made Robb that night". So, she thinks they conceived Robb on their wedding night, but she claims that Ned and she spent two weeks together before he marched to war. That's odd to me. Did they only have sex one time, one night? Or they spent two weeks together but she knew from the moment of conception that Ned had given her a child? Her thoughts are such a mess and I find it easy to question her details

Have we locked down the amount of time it took between Brandon saying goodbye and Ned marrying her? I've got a pet theory, but it only works if there's not much time in between those two events. 

[asongofheresy]

On 3/19/2019 at 4:07 PM, Feather Crystal said:

Since Daemon Blackfyre was legitimized, "Blackfyre" became a legitimized last name. 

Aerion's bastard was Orys Baratheon, which may be a legitimized name since he was given Storms End and was titled Lord Paramount of the Stormlands. Saera's children would most definitely be bastards with no recognized claim or even surname.

That didn't stop Saera's bastards joining Great council after Jaeman's death 

[JNR]

14 hours ago, St Daga said:

tonfoil

I like this typo as a word to describe all of Heresy (219 editions so far and counting).

14 hours ago, St Daga said:

We have Cold Hands as an example. Of course, he can't cross the wall, it seems, so I am not sure how that would work, unless Lyanna was north of the wall.

I think Othor's wight in AGOT shows us wights can function south of the Wall.  They just can't (in my strong opinion) cross it, not under their own power.  And Coldhands IMO would work the same way.

Re Lyanna being a wight, yes, we'll agree to disagree. 

Actually, I see no evidence Ned ever believed wights existed at any time in his life -- or for that matter, that he believed in magic as a whole (since wights require magic to work). 

I think Ned died without ever grasping magic was real, and that almost all the southron characters still think this way -- Cersei, Jaime, Littlefinger, and all the rest.  Even Sansa shows no sign of having comprehended her bond with Lady, possibly because Lady was killed too quickly. 

But they are all about to learn the truth.

[St Daga]

2 hours ago, Janneyc1 said:

Have we locked down the amount of time it took between Brandon saying goodbye and Ned marrying her? I've got a pet theory, but it only works if there's not much time in between those two events. 

I think it has been looked into. If not here, I know we have discussed it at LH. In one quote Catelyn almost makes it sound like she get's married on a preplanned day, but with a different groom. "But when the day came" she thinks, which sounds like a specific day, "the day". But... how can this be, since when Brandon rode off to KL, he promised to be back in a few weeks ("not be long" to marry her, but he ends up captured, Rickard needs to travel from somewhere to face Aerys in Kings Landing, then they both die, Aerys demands Ned's head, Jon Arryn sends back defiance (I love that line BTW), Ned needs to travel to the north, raise his banners, march an army south, and then marry Catelyn. That had to take longer that a couple weeks. So what is going on here? One person theorized that perhaps Catelyn got married on the same date as preplanned but a whole year later, but that seems like too much time. I really don't have a good answer for this. I sometimes wonder if GRRM does either?

[St Daga]

2 minutes ago, JNR said:

14 hours ago, St Daga said:

tonfoil

I like this typo as a word to describe all of Heresy (219 editions so far and counting).

Bahaha! Sometimes genius happens by pure accident! My fingers are often at war with my brain! 

 

4 minutes ago, JNR said:

I think Othor's wight in AGOT shows us wights can function south of the Wall.  They just can't (in my strong opinion) cross it, not under their own power.  And Coldhands IMO would work the same way.

Good point! And perhaps there is even more of reason that Coldhands can't pass the wall that hasn't been revealed yet.

 

6 minutes ago, JNR said:

Actually, I see no evidence Ned ever believed wights existed at any time in his life -- or for that matter, that he believed in magic as a whole (since wights require magic to work). 

I think Ned died without ever grasping magic was real, and that almost all the southron characters still think this way -- Cersei, Jaime, Littlefinger, and all the rest.  Even Sansa shows no sign of having comprehended her bond with Lady, possibly because Lady was killed too quickly. 

Well, Catelyn tells us that Ned doesn't put any faith in signs (and she could darn well be wrong), but that doesn't necessarily mean he doesn't believe in magic, or might have understood the warg bond his children have with their direwolves. We really have no idea what Gared said to Ned, so we can't know if it was about the Other's or not. 

I also guess it might depend on how we define magic. Each character might define it a bit differently, just as we all seem too.

 

11 minutes ago, JNR said:

Re Lyanna being a wight, yes, we'll agree to disagree. 

As I said, I think it's possible, and at least worth discussing. Currently, based on the color of the glass in the glass gardens, I think that comment was talking about the rose petals, but I could veer back the other way, too! And the blue eyes of death in Ned's dream could be about a blue eyed Lyanna! Icy, death blue eyes that hint at the Other's or wights... 

[Melifeather]

15 hours ago, St Daga said:

I am curious where you found a source for Jon Arryn to be at the Battle of the Bells. I can't find that anywhere, and I have been looking. If you could point me in the right direction, I can stop squinting over the text. 

There's not a whole lot connecting Jon Arryn's army to the Battle of the Bells. See Denys Arryn was confirmed as being killed there, and we haven't been given any information that he wasn't with the rest of the Arryn army.

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Connington wounded your grandfather Tully sore, though, and killed Ser Denys Arryn, the darling of the Vale. But when he saw the day was lost, he flew off as fast as the griffins on his shield. The Battle of the Bells, they called it after. Robert always said your father won it, not him.”

Here are passages that suggest only Stark and Tully forces came down upon Stoney Sept:

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And so he swept down on Stoney Sept, closed off the town, and began a search. His knights went house to house, smashed in every door, peered into every cellar. He had even sent men crawling through the sewers, yet somehow Robert still eluded him. The townsfolk were hiding him. They moved him from one secret bolt-hole to the next, always one step ahead of the king’s men. The whole town was a nest of traitors. At the end they had the usurper hidden in a brothel. What sort of king was that, who would hide behind the skirts of women? Yet whilst the search dragged on, Eddard Stark and Hoster Tully came down upon the town with a rebel army. Bells and battle followed, and Robert emerged from his brothel with a blade in hand, and almost slew Jon on the steps of the old sept that gave the town its name.

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“There is where you’re wrong,” Myles Toyne had replied. “Lord Tywin would not have bothered with a search. He would have burned that town and every living creature in it. Men and boys, babes at the breast, noble knights and holy septons, pigs and whores, rats and rebels, he would have burned them all. When the fires guttered out and only ash and cinders remained, he would have sent his men in to find the bones of Robert Baratheon. Later, when Stark and Tully turned up with their host, he would have offered pardons to the both of them, and they would have accepted and turned for home with their tails between their legs.”

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“He did indeed. And soon after, Ser Denys left his pregnant Waynwood wife to ride to war. He died during the Battle of the Bells, of an excess of gallantry and an axe. When they told his lady of his death she perished of grief, and her newborn son soon followed. No matter. Jon Arryn had gotten himself a young wife during the war, one he had reason to believe fertile. He was very hopeful, I’m sure, but you and I know that all he ever got from Lysa were stillbirths, miscarriages, and poor Sweetrobin.

I need to save this for now. Still searching for more...

[SirArthur]

28 minutes ago, JNR said:

Actually, I see no evidence Ned ever believed wights existed at any time in his life -- or for that matter, that he believed in magic as a whole (since wights require magic to work). 

I don't know. For me it has always been one of two scenarios:

1. He doesn't believe. End of story and the most likely case.

2. Wights are part of "the big secret" TM he knows of. And him denying their existence is part of him not giving away his knowledge. He was just a little bit too outright refusing in Bran I. That plus the Benjen and the ranger idea of "seeing strange things" from the intro chapter.  It just doesn't feel right that there is no communication between Ned and Benjen. 

[Melifeather]

The World of Ice and Fire only credits Jon Arryn with fighting his own bannermen that didn't support his defiance of Aerys, his taking of Gulltown, his marriage to Lysa Tully, and his part in the Battle at the Trident. So even if his heir, Denys, died at the Battle of the Bells, it's looking more and more like the bulk of Jon Arryn's army was not there. GRRM hasn't given us much of anything that explains what his main force was doing. Being that Whitewalls has been left off the map, I'm beginning to suspect it was left off on purpose. I'm thinking Jon Arryn was fighting battles to the east of Stoney Sept, and may have even battled near or at Whitewalls. That's just my guess. If I dig up anything about Whitewalls in the Mercy chapter I'll let you know.

[Melifeather]

I was thinking...if the bulk of Robert's army was defeated at Ashford, and Robert got separated from any survivors and was alone hiding in Stoney Sept, why did Ned and Jon risk so much to rescue him? Did they really need Robert? Because I don't think he had any men left.

If Robert didn't have any men left, then Hoster and Ned thought Robert was important for other reasons. Robert was Ned's friend, so he was willing to marry Catelyn to get Tully men. But Hoster's reasons must have been more complicated. Did he think Robert had the best claim, or did he have encouragement from someone else? Because If Tully men would enable Ned and Jon to succeed, they could have just made Ned their king, but apparently they didn't think Ned was worth the risk.

Hoster must have had encouragement to support Robert, which is why I suspect he too was communicating with Tywin Lannister. Robert was Tywin's choice, but Hoster would still want some kind of insurance to insure Jon Arryn's stayed with the alliance, which is why Hoster wanted Jon to marry Lysa. Ned had insurance too: Jon's heir, Denys, but I think this was also Hoster's idea. When Jon came to Riverrun to marry Lysa, he probably left Denys with Ned as part of the marriage proposal he made with Hoster. This is how Denys ended up in the Battle of the Bells, while Jon Arryn isn't credited with being there.

[dialt]

16 hours ago, Feather Crystal said:

As I've mentioned before, (and I've forgotten who the credit should go to) but the Prologues have a pattern of AGOT: Beyond the Wall, ACOK: a Maester, ASOS: Beyond the Wall, AFFC: a Maester, ADWD: Beyond the Wall, and I am predicting "a maester" in Winds. I think you have found another pattern, as well as many associations with death occurring at the throat. One person dies of a mortal wound, while a secondary character is strangled.

AGOT: Waymar died of sword wounds. Will was strangled.

ACOK: Cressen strangled by poison, Mel's necklace tight enough to strangle.

ASOS: Mormont died of sword wounds, but I don't recall Chett's injury. Was he strangled?

AFFC: Pate (assumed) strangled. 

ADWD: Varamyr died from a spear to his side, and because he was weakened by the death of the eagle. But he kills (while skinchanging) by attacking at the throats. Varamyr tried to skinchange into Thistle. While it's known Thistle gouged her own eyes out trying to keep Varamyr out, she probably choked on her own tongue.

I remember that... and If there's a pattern - and I believe there is one - we can surely bet or try to predict what's going to happen in the next prologue.

But I am more inclined to think that these details are there - mainly - to foreshadow/unveil something else. 

Take for istance ASOS's prologue: no one dies. Not in that chapter.

Chett, Mormont etc... will die later on. But still - in that prologue - you have Chett speaking/thinking of slying Sam's throat.

More importantly you have at least one throat cut or strangled (as something actually happening, as a memory, a plan, one way or another) in each one of the 5 prologues.

But that is only one of the connections between the 5 prologues. There are many more.

So I am starting to believe that all these connections/dots are the pieces of a puzzle that foreshadows something particularly important.

And I beleive, that is something tied to the endgame. My main guess is that it has to do with the Weirwood Trees and/or the creation of the Others (to what they what, who they are/were, etc...)
And if not to them, to something equally important in the great scheme of things.

I also believe, that AGOT BRAN I and all the BRAN povs of ADWD are tied to this puzzle.

For istance... Beside this one (about a dead frozen mother, with a cut throat):  

"There's something in the throat," Robb told him, proud to have found the answer before his father even asked. "There, just under the jaw."

.AGOT BRAN I

“Born with the dead,” another man put in. “Worse luck.”
“No matter,” said Hullen. “They be dead soon enough too.”
Bran gave a wordless cry of dismay. 
“The sooner the better,” Theon Greyjoy agreed. He drew his sword. “Give the beast here, Bran.”
The little thing squirmed against him, as if it heard and understood. “No!” Bran cried out fiercely. “It’s mine.”

Compare it to the following:

ADWD PROLOGUE - (Varamyr trying to save the dogs)

"No, Father, please", he tried to say, but dogs cannot speak the tongues of men, so all that emerged was a piteous whine.

ADWD BRAN III

"No," said Bran, "no, don't," but they could not hear him, no more than his father had. The woman grabbed the captive by the hair, hooked the sickle round his throat, and slashed. 

And..."Mercy" is another piece of this puzzle:

AGOT- BRAN I

"You cannot do that, boy," said Harwin, who was Hullen's son.
"It be a mercy to kill them," Hullen said.
Bran looked to his lord father for rescue, but got only a frown, a furrowed brow. "Hullen speaks truly, son. Better a swift death than a hard one from cold and starvation."

ACOK - Cressen had "mercy" for Patchface... (or not?)

"The wretch is mad, and in pain, and no use to anyone, least of all himself," declared old Ser Harbert, the castellan of Storm's End in those years. "The kindest thing you could do for that one is fill his cup with the milk of the poppy. A painless sleep, and there's an end to it. He'd bless you if he had the wit for it." But Cressen had refused, and in the end he had won. Whether Patchface had gotten any joy of that victory he could not say, not even today, so many years later.

ASOS -  Small Paul and Mormont's raven

"The Old Bear's raven," Small Paul said. "If we kill him, who's going to feed his bird?" [same poit made by Hullen, more or less, about the direwolves pupps] 
"Who bloody well cares? Kill the bird too if you like."

"I don't want to hurt no bird," the big man said. "But that's a talking bird. What if it tells what we did?"
(...) "Paul," said Chett, before the big man got too angry, "when they find the old man lying in a pool of blood with his throat slit, they won't need no bird to tell them someone killed him."
Small Paul chewed on that a moment. "That's true," he allowed. "Can I keep the bird, then? I like that bird."

ADWD - PROLOGUE

That was as a wolf, though. He had never eaten the meat of men with human teeth. He would not grudge his pack their feast, however. The wolves were as famished as he was, gaunt and cold and hungry, and the prey … two men and a woman, a babe in arms, fleeing from defeat to death. They would have perished soon in any case, from exposure or starvation. This way was better, quicker. A mercy. 

I haven't found anything 100% explicit in AFFC prologue. But let's look at this one... 

I ought to kill you, Pate thought, but he was not near drunk enough to throw away his life. Leo had been trained to arms, and was known to be deadly with bravo's blade and dagger.

So, Leo is deadly in a duel. People know it, he has to know it too. However, later on:

Pate: "Leave Rosey be," he said, by way of parting. "Just leave her be, or I may kill you."
Leo Tyrell flicked the hair back from his eye. "I do not fight duels with pig boys. Go away."

Now, if Leo knows how good he is in... slaying people, there's a chance that here, he's having "mercy" of poor Pate.

But however... these are the kind of things I am working on...

[St Daga]

2 hours ago, Feather Crystal said:

There's not a whole lot connecting Jon Arryn's army to the Battle of the Bells. See Denys Arryn was confirmed as being killed there, and we haven't been given any information that he wasn't with the rest of the Arryn army.

These are the passages that I looked at to. In the wiki page for The Battle of the Bells, on the rebel side, it doesn't list Jon Arryn as a commander, although it does list combatants to include the army of the vale. Perhaps Jon Arryn was not there but some or all of his army was? Perhaps all of the members that were included in the battle were a smaller force from each region, while the greater force never made it to Stoney Sept in time for the battle. That would make sense for why the rebel force moved north after the battle instead of pursuing the loyalist army south after they were defeated and retreated.

It also lists that Robert Baratheon was a commander, but there were no combatants from the stormlands, which does make it seem like Robert really could have been alone in Stoney Sept. But ... what the hell??? Of course, I don't always trust the wiki, but so far it seems to fit the information that the text is giving us.

Also the fact that Hoster Tully was badly injured might have been enough of a reason for some part of that army to take him home, back to Riverrun, and that might have included Ned, giving him an opportunity to meet and marry Catelyn.  It seems Jon Arryn was at Riverrun at some point, whenever the double wedding occurred.

1 hour ago, Feather Crystal said:

The World of Ice and Fire only credits Jon Arryn with fighting his own bannermen that didn't support his defiance of Aerys, his taking of Gulltown, his marriage to Lysa Tully, and his part in the Battle at the Trident. So even if his heir, Denys, died at the Battle of the Bells, it's looking more and more like the bulk of Jon Arryn's army was not there. GRRM hasn't given us much of anything that explains what his main force was doing. Being that Whitewalls has been left off the map, I'm beginning to suspect it was left off on purpose. I'm thinking Jon Arryn was fighting battles to the east of Stoney Sept, and may have even battled near or at Whitewalls. That's just my guess. If I dig up anything about Whitewalls in the Mercy chapter I'll let you know.

Sorry, I am just catching up. I would agree about Jon Arryn or the bulk of his army not being at Stoney Sept, at least based on the text we have. The idea about Whitewalls is interesting, but it is on the east side of the Gods Eye, I think, Also, didn't Bloodraven say that the castle at Whitewalls would be pulled down and there would no be a trace of it left for people to pay homage to this second Blackfyre rebellion, since people still flocked to the Red Grass Field to pay homage to the spot Daemon Blackfyre died. Perhaps the reason it's not on any maps is because it was eradicated, from the land and all maps, so people would not come there as a tribute?

I just reread Jaime's very similar threat to Edmure Tully in regards to Riverrun, which is a type of echo, I suppose.

50 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

I was thinking...if the bulk of Robert's army was defeated at Ashford, and Robert got separated from any survivors and was alone hiding in Stoney Sept, why did Ned and Jon risk so much to rescue him? Did they really need Robert? Because I don't think he had any men left.

If Robert didn't have any men left, then Hoster and Ned thought Robert was important for other reasons. Robert was Ned's friend, so he was willing to marry Catelyn to get Tully men. But Hoster's reasons must have been more complicated. Did he think Robert had the best claim, or did he have encouragement from someone else? Because If Tully men would enable Ned and Jon to succeed, they could have just made Ned their king, but apparently they didn't think Ned was worth the risk.

Well, the army of the stormlands is credited with fighting on the rebel side during the Battle of the Trident, so I don't think they were destroyed, just perhaps separated from Robert. I think Ned would risk almost anything to save Robert, because they were dear friends, more than brothers, etc. Perhaps Ned did Hoster a favor by marrying Catelyn. I still think it's possible that Brandon might have been her lover first, leaving her just as much soiled goods as Lysa was. I argue that maidenhood and maidenhead are two entirely different things.

As to claims, Ned says that Robert had the better claim. Of course, over the years, I have tried to drum up tinfoil in regards to the Stark's having some Targaryen blood and therefore a claim to the throne. I even had a nice theory about Aerea Targaryen, that wild little minx, but F&B took some wind out of those sails, although,,, the real Aerea was still in Oldtown at the end of that story. And Aerea sounds just like Arya! Anyway, back to Ned's claim... a good claim, but Robert's claim was better. I think there is plenty yet to be revealed about the rebellion, both activity and politics, and how it all played out.

[St Daga]

2 hours ago, SirArthur said:

That plus the Benjen and the ranger idea of "seeing strange things" from the intro chapter.  It just doesn't feel right that there is no communication between Ned and Benjen. 

I have always questioned this as well, although I do wonder how much Benjen and Ned talked before it was decided for Jon to go to the wall? I would have to say that Ned and Benjen did talk about things, and if Ned was going to believe some tinfoil, he would believe it from his brother more than Gared. AND I find it hard to believe that Benjen would not ask about Gared's execution and anything that was said. And I have come across ideas that claim Ned and Benjen were not on good terms, but Ned calls Benjen "Ben" a short, pet name, and wants him to be a part of Robert's visit to Winterfell, so I can't imagine they did not get along.

Ned didn't seem to worry about any threat north of the wall besides Mance Rayder, so perhaps the  Stark's do have some knowledge of Others/White Walkers/wights that we don't know about yet.

[The Snowfyre Chorus]

20 hours ago, Mullocose said:

Wait, is GRRM Racists? 

Actually, I'd put him more in the "Black Roses Matter" demographic.

[JNR]

36 minutes ago, St Daga said:

Ned didn't seem to worry about any threat north of the wall besides Mance Rayder, so perhaps the  Stark's do have some knowledge of Others/White Walkers/wights that we don't know about yet.

Well, if he knows they exist, that's got to be a worry. 

But as you say, he isn't worried about anything north of the Wall including Mance.

We also have his direct statement on this topic:

Quote

His smile was gentle. "You listen to too many of Old Nan's stories. The Others are as dead as the children of the forest, gone eight thousand years. Maester Luwin will tell you they never lived at all. No living man has ever seen one."

So I think Ned in AGOT has zero clue about the reality of these ancient mythological threats, and he never got a clue until the day he died.   If Lyanna was a wight, that would certainly come as news to Ned.

[The Snowfyre Chorus]

Theory: 

Quote

"If you're thinking about her baby, don't matter if the rose is black or wight."