#shireen baratheon as lightbringer

[jonsnowunemploymentera]

I have a couple of jumbled thoughts about how King Arthur’s legend connects to ASOIAF, mainly in relation to the three children of destiny in the story. I’m talking about Daenerys Targaryen, Bran Stark, and Jon Snow. I was mainly thinking about how each of them would fit into the concept of a “once and future king” - really the idea of the return of the true king - and the concept of “pulling a sword out of a stone” as a miracle that proves the true king’s identity (i.e., Arthur pulling a sword out of a stone to signify that he is the true king of the Britons).

Daenerys

So right off the bat, Dany is a very obvious Arthurian parallel. She’s already got the prophesied savior thing down but what’s most interesting is that she’s already had her pulling a sword out of a stone moment; hers happens at the beginning of her story/hero’s journey. At the end of AGOT, she birthed dragons from stone, an act that cemented her status as Azor Ahai and also the true Targaryen heir. It’s interesting to think about how Azor Ahai and King Arthur intersect because part of the Arthurian legend (that makes him the once and future king) is that when Britain is covered in darkness and needs him most, then Arthur shall be reborn. Dany’s dragons are born at the tail end of AGOT to parallel the return of the Others in the beginning of the book. So Dany takes on the role of King Arthur in that way. Darkness has returned to Westeros and as the legend of Azor Ahai goes, the king must return (with his mythical sword) to lead/save his people.

Dany birthing the dragons from stone essentially signifies her rising as the true king to save her people from the darkness. Dragons have been likened to swords in ASOIAF so Dany, the king who is risen again, pulls three metaphoric swords out of stones. No one can deny that she is the true king either because she is the only one to have woken dragons in centuries. And thinking about Arthur and his sword in the stone, he pulled his out publicly; there were witnesses who could attest to the miracle. That’s the same thing with Dany. The birth of the dragons (the metaphoric swords) was done publicly - that’s why she is hailed as “the Unburnt”. Her miracle being a public spectacle is very important.

Another thing about Dany being a very public (and undeniable) true king is that she is set to contrast Stannis Baratheon. Stannis is introduced in ACOK as Azor Ahai but almost immediately, it’s clear that he is not the prophesied hero. He does not check any elements of the prophecy; in fact his wizard tries to shoehorn him into the prophecy instead of having him be a more organic hero. And Stannis supposedly pulls a sword out of a stone, by forging Lightbringer, but his is fake. Stannis’ Lightbringer is not the real deal. Its fire does not give off any heat (as noted by Maester Aemon) and he has woken no dragons from stone. Melisandre is trying to create an opportunity for that to happen though, which might be how Shireen dies (as Stannis tries to recreate Azor Ahai’s Nissa Nissa).

But then Dany has woken dragons from stone. Dany’s Lightbringer is literally fire made flesh. So while Stannis is not Azor Ahai, Daenerys is. And it’s also interesting that both Dany and Stannis claim to be the true king of the seven kingdoms. So GRRM gives us two versions of the true king, but one seems to be more aligned with fantasy conventions than the other. Note that Melisandre refers to Azor Ahai as the king in her ADWD chapter. So if Azor Ahai is the true king and if Dany is Azor Ahai, then Dany is the true king (I’m talking about this from a purely fantasy perspective).

So yeah, Dany is pretty close to King Arthur in how she fulfills the role of the prophesied savior. And as the sword in the stone proved that Arthur was the true king, then the dragons prove that Dany is the true savior (as noted by Maester Aemon).

Bran Stark

Bran, on the other hand, is a little trickier to pinpoint. He doesn’t have anything that outwardly (and obviously) marks him as the prophesied savior; contrast this to Dany who has her three dragons and is Azor Ahai Reborn. It even seems like his story is moving him further and further away from the Arthurian framework. We all know that quote from GRRM about how Bran appears to be a young King Arthur in the beginning of AGOT, that is until he gets defenestrated by Jaime Lannister. Bran can’t follow in King Arthur’s footsteps to become a knight, but he does gain magical powers and becomes the closest thing to a wizard boy in ASOIAF.

But I don’t think that Bran’s connections to the mythical king are severed. That’s because he’s still connected to the Fisher King myth (which is an Arthurian myth). Bran’s story seems to be a reconstructed version of young King Arthur’s; the fantasy version. In a way, I’d argue that Bran is a weird blending of the knight, the wizard, and the king. That’s because as Bran builds his magical powers, he sits on a weirwood throne; this weirwood throne connects him to his regal lineage. He’s the (soon to be) last greenseer all while being the reigning (though exiled) Prince of the North and of Winterfell. The two destinies (wizard and king) are not separated imo, but rather combined. He’s got elements of both Arthur and Merlin. He’s the Fisher King and he is also Sir Percival; instead of waiting for someone to heal him and the land, he will do it himself. Like Daenerys, Bran is a magical child of destiny. He seems to be following the last hero’s footsteps and will definitely be one of the saviors of the world. So his weirwood throne is quite indicative of the blending of the wizard and the king.

One of my favorite quotes about Bran is how he thinks that Old Nan is conflating him with the previous Brandon Starks who lived before him. To Old Nan, he is Brandon the Shipwright and Brandon the Burner; he’s Brandon the daughterless and Brandon the Breaker; and he is Brandon the Builder come again. In the same way that Daenerys is the accumulation of House Targaryen’s legacy, Bran Stark is the physical manifestation of House Stark and its history and magical calling. So in a sense, Bran is the ‘once and future king’. Like his ancestors, he is and will be the King of Winter. So then I have to wonder what his ‘pulling a sword out of a stone’ moment will be. I don’t think it’s happened yet actually. I think it’s something that might happen much later in the story.

First, we have to identify what Bran’s sword will be. Dany has her dragons (figurative swords) so I think it’s also possible for Bran’s to be non-literal. I think it will be his magic, whatever powers he manages to gain as he trains under Bloodraven (who imo, is the twisted Merlin to Bran’s Arthur). Since Bran is connected to the myth of the Fisher King, I think his story is more about healing. This already seems to be the case as he’s connected to Brandon the Builder who arose during the age of heroes. Brandon the Builder is credited with having crafted (or having helped to craft) several magical structures all over Westeros; he presumably built these after the Long Night. So I think that’s going to be the same for Bran the Rebuilder. Once the wars are fought and the dawn has come again, Bran Stark will follow his ancestor’s footsteps to help the land heal by building new structures all over Westeros.

Like Dany, I think Bran’s miracle has to be a public spectacle so that it can serve justification for him rising to kingship. The true king is the one who heals the land after all. So I’m thinking of his sword in the stone moment being more akin to Aragorn in LOTR. In Return of the King, Aragorn is hailed as king because he’s a healer. The people hear stories of a healer and this serves as the signal that their true king has returned to them. If Bran is to follow the Fisher King/Arthurian framework, I can see this being his ending. He will be shown to have healing abilities, and this causes the people to rally behind him and proclaim him king. There’s even real world basis for this since there was the belief, in medieval times, that the king’s hands had healing powers.

Perhaps for Bran the Rebuilder, healing = building. And building will require magic. Perhaps he will start to build things slowly throughout ADOS until after the Others are finally defeated and his work is presented to the world. What that looks like though, I’m not entirely sure. But if it’s a physical structure that represents the return of light and life (and healing) to the land, I’m thinking that it could be similar to the Hightower which is said to have been built by Bran the Builder (or his son). The Hightower has a beacon of fire at its top which provides light for incoming ships. Also note that the Hightower is likened to a sword in the books so it’s essentially a sword (made) out of stone; that it’s a fiery sword gives Lightbringer vibes. But building a physical structure takes years and we may not have time for that, so perhaps Bran may raise a magical structure that will serve as the foundation for something much bigger. He could even enlist the help of the children of the forest (and giants lent by Jon Snow) before they die completely.

A few other closing thoughts about Bran, I’ve said before that Bran is a reconstructed version of young King Arthur. I plan to do a deeper dive of this later on but there are times where Bran seems to be following some of Arthur’s footsteps. If anyone has read The Once and Future King by T. H. White, Bran (imo) seems to be a reconstructed Wart. Like Wart, Bran’s journey is kickstarted by the arrival of the king. There’s hunting, knights, and monsters involved in both stories. Wart also meets a wizard, Merlin, who introduces him to a world of magic. Merlin teaches young Wart how to become different animals at one point in The Sword in the Stone. That sounds an awful lot like what Bran Stark is currently doing. Bran is going to Merlin’s Bloodraven’s school of magic, and is learning to assume the conscious of different beings (ravens, weirwoods, his direwolf, even poor Hodor). So I expect Bran’s sword out of a stone moment, like Wart’s, to happen towards the end of the story; except Bran’s sword won’t be literal but figurative.

Jon Snow

If there’s a character who will probably follow the Arthurian framework to a tee in ASOIAF, I bet that it’s Jon Snow. Jon is King Arthur, down to his very conception and birth; Rhaegar and Lyanna seem to be GRRM’s version of Uther and Igraine, but some would argue that they also parallel Lancelot and Guinevere and/or Elaine and Lancelot. In this way, Jon has connections to the Fisher King myth, and he could also be a blend of Arthur and Galahad. Jon is the prince in hiding (like Wart was in The Sword in the Stone), and he might even be the true king; remember that the black bastard is the real king of the castle. And along with Daenerys, Jon is the other half of the Azor Ahai/prince that was promised legend.

Many readers have noted that Jon’s story parallels Dany’s, but few recognize that his story and Bran’s are also linked. Where Jon shares Valyrian legends with Dany, he also shares some of the northern legends (e.g., the last hero) with Bran; so the legends of ice and fire converge and blend into Jon Snow. I believe that Jon and Bran are two separate versions of Wart from TOAFK. But where Bran’s story is an upended version where a few detours lead to the boy-wizard and the boy-king blending into one, Jon’s story follows the narrative beats of an archetypal hidden prince who is destined to be king; so really Wart’s story without the many diversions which is the more archetypal blend of the knight/warrior and the king. Just like Bran’s story, there are knights, monsters, wizards, and kings in Jon’s; though Bran’s story is a great deal more fantastical. What’s interesting is that Merlin is a little more hands off in Jon’s story than in Bran’s. Bran is eager to learn magic from his wizard mentor but Jon is not. So Bran gets the full experience of being tutored by a wise wizard mentor whereas his brother is left to his own devices; imo I think this is because Bran is Arthur as the wizard whereas Jon is Arthur as the knight. Jon has Bloodraven (arguably one of ASOIAF’s Merlin figures) who takes a more hands off approach with how he offers guidance; Bloodraven gives him cryptic advice in the form of Mormont’s raven. But Jon also has Melisandre, who is Merlin if the wisened old wizard mistook Arthur for someone else; this is how Stannis gets to the Wall to be directly contrasted with Jon Snow. One wizard knows Jon is the true king but the other doesn’t (or rather, chooses to ignore all the signs that point to his special status).

But what Jon has over Bran (and Dany) is that he has a very literal sword - Longclaw. So again, he is the typical fantasy blend of the king and the knight/warrior - as we would expect of the hidden prince. Because Jon has a literal sword, I’d expect his sword out of a stone moment to be less figurative and closer to the Arthurian framework. I don’t mean that Jon will literally find a rock and pull a sword from of it, but that he will wield a literal sword that will be representative of his identity as the true king. More specifically, I think Jon will at some point in the story wield Lightbringer, the flaming sword of heroes. There’s a bit of seeding for this in ADWD, where Jon dreams of himself armored in black ice and wielding a sword that burns red. Here, Jon is very obviously being marked as the legendary hero (further confirmed by Mel’s numerous visions).

So if Jon will wield a literal sword but if he won’t pull it out of a literal stone, what will be the miraculous moment for him? It could be that his literal death and rebirth will be the public spectacle needed to cement him as the hero reborn, but it could be something else that marks him as Azor Ahai. Jon has to actively “pull the sword” so his Lightbringer can’t be something that comes by accident/passively. Imo Jon has to actively forge/create Lightbringer for it to count as a sword out of a stone moment. Since Dany is our blueprint for fulfilling the Azor Ahai miracle, I have to note that multiple things happened in her last AGOT chapter. The first was the birth of the dragons and the second was her surviving the fire. So Jon’s “sword out of a stone” miracle will have to be separate from him surviving/rising from death. And Dany’s miracle signifies her role as Azor Ahai: she is the mother of dragons, the fire to the Others’ ice. So what’s Jon’s Azor Ahai role?

I think GRRM has already given us a peak of what Jon’s role as Azor Ahai will be. In ASOS, Jon has one of his recurring Winterfell crypt dreams and at some point, he sees that the world is plunged into darkness. Once that happens, he remarks that “a light had gone out somewhere”. Well earlier in the book, Jaime Lannister had a seemingly prophetic dream where he was in the bowels of Casterly Rock holding a flaming sword. At some point, the flames of Jaime’s sword go out and death rushes in. I mean to do a much deeper analysis of how these dreams are connected but to keep things short for now, I think Jon saw the light of Jamie’s sword going out.

Why do I mention this? Well I think this will be Jon’s pulling a sword out of a stone moment. Jon sees the light go out and darkness setting in. So I think that his role in the upcoming war for the dawn will be to restore the light which has gone out from the world. As it was said that Arthur would restore Britain after a period of darkness, Jon will restore light to Westeros after the Long Night; since he was the one to see the light go out, then he must be the one to bring it back. And restoration is pretty recurrent in Jon’s story. Part of his arc as the leader of the Night’s Watch is that he is trying to restore the order back to its true purpose; I think this is represented in his ASOS and ADWD dreams, where we see light going out of a sword (ASOS dream) and light coming back and being wielded as a sword by Jon (ADWD dream). Another act of restoration - specifically the restoration of light - happens when Jon lets the wildlings through the Wall. He remarks that light comes to Castle Black in places where darkness had settled long ago.

So it might be that Jon’s Lightbringer, a flaming sword, will serve in part as a symbol of light returning to Westeros. We have Lightbringer as a sword, but we also have Jon as the one to literally bring the light; what is Lightbringer - the sword or Jon? It could be a bit of both. Jon is the sword in the darkness and he is the fire the burns against the cold, as stated by his Night’s Watch vows. And if he is reborn in a funeral pyre (as some readers believe) then he would be a dragon woken from stone. There’s a lot of potential for different things to serve as Jon’s public miracle. He could be the sword to be lit up or it could be that a different (literal) sword has to be obtained.

But since Jon is very closely following Arthur’s story, I expect that it will be an actual sword that will herald him as the true king risen. We have a lot of foreshadowing of Jon ending up as some sort of king and given that he is a deconstruction (not subversion) of the fantasy hidden prince-to-king archetype, I expect this rise to kingship to happen at the end of his story (as it happened for Aragorn, Cor, Seoman Snowlock, etc.); of course, GRRM will put his own spin on it. I’ve actually started to come around to the idea that Jon won’t be king in Winds but in Dream. I think that might be more aligned with some of the themes presented in the story. Because Stannis says that the correct order is to save the kingdom to win it. Given that this is said in a Jon chapter, I think it’s meant to serve as the blueprint/foreshadowing for the true Azor Ahai’s (Jon Snow) journey. Jon will save the kingdom, which will then lead to him to winning it. And if we go back to Jon being one of GRRM’s deconstructed/reconstructed Warts, then Arthur became king at the end of The Sword in the Stone. Which might mean that Jon’s flaming sword of light might be forged toward the end of ADOS to signify his rise to kingship; and to parallel Dany’s sword in the stone appearing in book one.

[westerosoliviapope]

Invented a smut/fic site in my universe called Night Songs (lol) where a certain young lady posts mob romance smut about her boss.

Naturally, this made me think: what other kind of stories would be on Night Songs?

A Prince Viserys Vampire Daddy series

An extremely popular #AntiAzyssa tag—Azor Ahai stabbing Nyssa Nyssa with Lightbringer is a bad look. Unless you like that sort of thing.

Sansa/Margaery shippers. They think Margaery and Renly are a farce. Not exactly wrong.

Florian & Jonquil spice. S1 of Six Maids in a Pool was fine, but they went too light on the sex in S2.

A vast library of fics in the fandom of Shireen Baratheon's YA fantasy series, Dancing Shadows. Top tags include: Soft!Patchface and Dark!MerKing

Oh. And lots of Rickon Stark Wild Wolf fics. Esp after his Chivalry, Quarterly cover.

[hollowwhisperings]

ASOIAF Prophecies As Punchlines:

cersei lannister learns she's to be "replaced" by someone "younger and more beautiful": cersei raises myrcella to be an intelligent politician & pointedly dotes on her. myrcella ends up as queen, the younger & more beautiful heir to her mother's legacy.

cersei learns a [younger sibling] will kill her by the neck: cersei reforms her attitudes to her brothers, pointedly doting on them; cersei has 3 kids and remembers to dote on the two younger siblings of the 3; cersei, long-reconciled with her brothers & well-loved by her children, retires to a castle in the riverlands. she dies mid-journey north, pain relief provided by a maester with elder siblings, in the region of westeros named "the neck".

aegon v & his kids learn that "the prince who was promised" is to be borne of the line of his grandkids aerys & rhaella. aegon v prevents his teenaged kids, jaehaerys & shaera, from wedding their own kids to each other while underaged & unwilling. aegon v finds nice, non-relative spouses for aerys and rhaella. when they are both of age & married, not to each other, THEIR kids (cousins) are tentatively betrothed: they are princes promised to each other, prophecy fulfilled.

rhaegar asks maester aemon about this "prince who was promised" prophecy he read in a book. maester aemon patiently explains to his great-grandnephew the mysticism of Contract Law & the importance not of "who" is promised but to "WHOM" he is promised. rhaegar dutifully doublechecks his debts & debtors to make sure any kids of his don't get promised to, say, an eldritch sea god or an uncle tree-wizard.

rhaegar learns his wife, elia, cannot have another pregnancy after their 2nd child's birth. rhaegar believes he must have three children: elia reminds rhaegar that adoption is a thing & that his parents are unlikely to survive to raise his kid brother forever. rhaegar takes an intetest im the wellbeing of his mother, "adopting" viserys by making him his squire before taking his family from court to dragonstone. viserys grows up looking to his brother as a father figure, looked up to by his niece & nephew (who call him "brother"). elia & her children live, rhaegar has his "3 heads", no lords paramounts get murdered while protesting the royal kidnapping of their underage daughters.

dany learns she will have 3 great loves, equated with pyres. dany shrugs this very disturbing imagery off & goes about living her best life. on her deathbed, wrinkled & surrounded by adopted family, everyone retroactively checks off dany's prophecies to see how they ended up being fulfilled, knowing that prophecies happen regardless of personal intervention.

jaime has a dream about getting abandoned & then saved by brienne of tarth. jaime remembers tyrion describing myths of "green seers": jaime recalls his eyes are green & notices he is sitting on a tree stump. jaime resolves to ensure lady brienne has plentiful resources available to her, and thus him, & endeavors to endear himself to her (in his hour of need, brienne comes to his rescue: armed, armoured & with a medically trained maester. jaime never dies of exposure after getting lost in a snowstorm).

melissandre sees in her flames: azhor ahai reborn! melissandre starts drafting a List of interpretations alternate to "stabbing loved ones = get magic victory sword".

melissandre later reminds stannis of sexual innuendo & his being kin to 'that dragon mother girl': shireen, beloved daughter of stannis by his less-loved wife, successfully adopts daenerys into the family & gets to borrow one of her dragons to keep everyone warm for the winter. more people survive & no children are burned as hypothetical victory fuel.

[kellyvela]

I don't understand why certain fans feel that AA and his killing his wife Nissa Nissa as sacrifice to save the world is romantic and used this parallels for their pairing. I was always felt icky when I first get to know about AA and how he perceived a hero for killing his beloved to save the world. Because if you killed your beloved then what is the meaning of the world you desperately wanted to save. For some people Jon was AA but I never believed that he will do something to his belove.

The forging of Lightbringer:

Do you know the tale of the forging of Lightbringer? I shall tell it to you. It was a time when darkness lay heavy on the world. To oppose it, the hero must have a hero's blade, oh, like none that had ever been. And so for thirty days and thirty nights Azor Ahai labored sleepless in the temple, forging a blade in the sacred fires. Heat and hammer and fold, heat and hammer and fold, oh, yes, until the sword was done. Yet when he plunged it into water to temper the steel it burst asunder.

"Being a hero, it was not for him to shrug and go in search of excellent grapes such as these, so again he began. The second time it took him fifty days and fifty nights, and this sword seemed even finer than the first. Azor Ahai captured a lion, to temper the blade by plunging it through the beast's red heart, but once more the steel shattered and split. Great was his woe and great was his sorrow then, for he knew what he must do.

"A hundred days and a hundred nights he labored on the third blade, and as it glowed white-hot in the sacred fires, he summoned his wife. 'Nissa Nissa,' he said to her, for that was her name, 'bare your breast, and know that I love you best of all that is in this world.' She did this thing, why I cannot say, and Azor Ahai thrust the smoking sword through her living heart. It is said that her cry of anguish and ecstasy left a crack across the face of the moon, but her blood and her soul and her strength and her courage all went into the steel. Such is the tale of the forging of Lightbringer, the Red Sword of Heroes.

—A Clash of Kings - Davos I

Reminds me of this dark tale that I read in The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini:

That same night, I wrote my first short story. It took me thirty minutes. It was a dark little tale about a man who found a magic cup and learned that if he wept into the cup, his tears turned into pearls. But even though he had always been poor, he was a happy man and rarely shed a tear. So he found ways to make himself sad so that his tears could make him rich. As the pearls piled up, so did his greed grow. The story ended with the man sitting on a mountain of pearls, knife in hand, weeping helplessly into the cup with his beloved wife’s slain body in his arms.

—The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini

So, yeah, that's not romantic, at least nor for you or me.

We know so little about Azor Ahai, and maybe he wasn't that great because legends and prophecies can be misleading, deceiving. And that's GRRM's full intention. He hates being predictable.

@trinuviel has written about Azor Ahai and the Red Sword of Heroes extensively. You can check her metas here.

I think that Melisandre will use the tale of the forging of Lightbringer to make Stannis burns Shireen, and that won't be romantic either... And Stannis wont be a hero...

Thanks for your message.

[makerkenzie]

ASOIAF spec: Nissa Nissa as metaphor

My little idea of the day: 

Based on the story of the original Azor Ahai tempering his sword by stabbing his wife through the chest, all the current-era characters interested in the prophecy assume the new hero will have to murder someone he loves in order to create the new Lightbringer. 

But what if Nissa Nissa...doesn’t have to be a person? In fact really is not supposed to be a person? What if Nissa Nissa is a metaphor of the hero sacrificing the most important part of his life to serve his heroic duty? 

(And while we’re at it, there’s no reason why Lightbringer has to be a literal sword. Lightbringer is the big weapon that makes the difference in the war.) 

The tragedy is that certain people genuinely believe the destined hero will have to kill someone he loves so he can do what needs to be done. So, someone will be killed...and that killing will not achieve the desired result.

Speculation in plainer language: Melisandre convinces Stannis to burn Shireen, as she’s his Nissa Nissa and their killing her will be the forging of his Lightbringer. So he sets his only living child on fire, thinking this will be the thing that finally makes it possible for him to be the hero Westeros needs. 

Unfortunately, Stannis learns too late that he was never going to be Azor Ahai and Shireen was not meant to play the role of Nissa Nissa. There is no Lightbringer for him.

Instead, the fire (smoke) and the tears (salt) surrounding Shireen’s death create the conditions needed for Jon to be reborn as Azor Ahai.

That brings me to some more discussion questions.

If we go with the idea of Jon as Azor Ahai, then:

1. What is his Lightbringer?

2. What is his Nissa Nissa?

[poorquentyn]

How do you interpret the Slayer of Lies prophecy?

Glowing like sunset, a red sword was raised in the hand of a blue-eyed king who cast no shadow. 

That’s definitely Stannis, given Lightbringer, the shadowbabies, and those famous Baratheon blues. The lie Dany must slay is that he is Azor Ahai–he’s not, she is. 

A cloth dragon swayed on poles amidst a cheering crowd. 

That’s definitely Aegon; he’s the “mummer’s dragon” (the mummer being Varys) paraded before Westeros. The lie Dany must slay is that he’s her nephew–he’s not. 

From a smoking tower, a great stone beast took wing, breathing shadow fire.

This is the tough one. I’ve heard theories that it refers to Melisandre sacrificing Shireen, given “stone dragon,” or Jon Connington, given the greyscale, but the lie in both cases would seem to overlap with one the first two, and I think it’s weird that in a series of images-in-threes, two of the “slayer of lies” set would refer to the same lie.

So here’s my thinking: the first two are both kings who are in some way usurping Dany’s destiny. Is there a third king attempting to do that?

“Crow’s Eye,” Asha called, “did you leave your wits at Asshai? If we cannot hold the north—and we cannot—how can we win the whole of the Seven Kingdoms?”

“Why, it has been done before. Did Balon teach his girl so little of the ways of war? Victarion, our brother’s daughter has never heard of Aegon the Conqueror, it would seem.”

“Aegon?” Victarion crossed his arms against his armored chest. “What has the Conqueror to do with us?”

“I know as much of war as you do, Crow’s Eye,” Asha said. “Aegon Targaryen conquered Westeros with dragons.”

“And so shall we,” Euron Greyjoy promised. “That horn you heard I found amongst the smoking ruins that were Valyria, where no man has dared to walk but me. You heard its call, and felt its power. It is a dragon horn, bound with bands of red gold and Valyrian steel graven with enchantments. The dragonlords of old sounded such horns, before the Doom devoured them. With this horn, ironmen, I can bind dragons to my will.”

Asha laughed aloud. “A horn to bind goats to your will would be of more use, Crow’s Eye. There are no more dragons.”

“Again, girl, you are wrong. There are three, and I know where to find them. Surely that is worth a driftwood crown.”

“The bleeding star bespoke the end,” he said to Aeron. “These are the last days, when the world shall be broken and remade. A new god shall be born from the graves and charnel pits.”

Then Euron lifted a great horn to his lips and blew, and dragons and krakens and sphinxes came at his command and bowed before him.

So I think the beast breathing shadow fire could refer to a dragon ensorceled by Dragonbinder, flying from the smoking ruins of the Hightower as part of Euron’s attack on Oldtown:

“I saw towers by the sea, submerged beneath a black and bloody tide. That is where the heaviest blow will fall.”

If so, the lie Dany must slay is that Euron is destined to end the world. He isn’t–she’s destined to save it.

[frazzledsoul]

Why do you think revenge against the Freys is being taken from the Starks? Lady Stoneheart/UnDead Cat is the one taking revenge and who will probably be responsible for the second Red Wedding and she's been a Stark half her life, and as she was murdered by the Freys and saw them murder her son, I think she's the right person for the revenge plot (I hate, hate, hate, how they had Arya take her plot in the show)

Lady Stoneheart leading a second Red Wedding against the Greys and the Night Lamp theory are two different things. Can they both happen? Uhh, not the person to ask, but I'm guessing....no?

Look, Catelyn (undead or not) is my least favorite Stark, but she's definitely got an investment in striking revenge. So no, her murdering the last of the Freys is not taking revenge away from the Starks. I have no problems with this theory.

I have serious problems with any theory that has that egotistical, daughter-burning, religious fanatic Stannis Baratheon being given the triumphs that belong to the Starks just so he can become another monarch that abuses them. I cannot say this enough times.

The Night Lamp theory is the worst meta I have run across in some time. So Stannis is the one that ends up killing most of the Freys (not the Starks) by burning a weirwood forest (thus spitting on the Starks, the North, and their religious beliefs), this desecration causes his fake Lightbringer to become the real Lightbringer (stealing the Azor Ahai prophecy from Jon, Dany, Arya, and every other worthy candidate who is not Stannis Baratheon), thus causing the Northmen to rally to his cause and proclaim him as the True King (I guess they're just going to forget about that weirwood stuff and the Northern Conspiracy and all that). Then he'll be the crusading hero that takes down the Boltons, stealing that victory from the Starks AND be hailed as King of the North (again, stealing it from whatever Stark gets that birthright).

All the victories, the glories, the moments of triumph that should have belonged to Jon and Arya and Sansa are being given to Stannis. ALL OF THEM. What purpose is there in rooting for him to win this war? Everything special that belonged to them was given to Stannis instead. He's just another pointless monarch that owns them. Even Jon was murdered before he could fight for it on his own. It's the Stannis Baratheon show. And Stannis is a piece of shit.

I wouldn't feel this way if the show hadn't already done better and Stannis hadn't already proved to be someone who deserves nothing because of what he did to Shireen. But you know what? GRRM refuses to write, so the show got there first. And if his version of the story only seeks to punish the Starks more, it's not the one that I accept.

Realistically, I suspect that all of these Stannis-centered theories are trash and that Stannis's hubris catches up to him pretty soon. He wouldn't have been excluded from show canon this early on if he was going to be an important part of the endgame.

[nooneeverlookedforagirl]

I think that everything we know about Azor Ahai points toward him being the bad guy.

"Azor Ahai, beloved of R'hllor! The Warrior of Light, the Son of Fire! Come forth, your sword awaits you! Come forth and take it into your hand!" A Clash of Kings - Davos I

Melisandre lifted her hands above her head. "Behold! A sign was promised, and now a sign is seen! Behold Lightbringer! Azor Ahai has come again! All hail the Warrior of Light! All hail the Son of Fire!” A Clash of Kings - Davos I

"He stands before you," Melisandre declared, "though you do not have the eyes to see. Stannis Baratheon is Azor Ahai come again, the warrior of fire. In him the prophecies are fulfilled." A Storm of Swords - Samwell V

First, we are told that Azor Ahai is a hero. Our source for this is the red woman, Melisandre. Let’s briefly review what we know about Melisandre.

Do I need to explain that burning little girls is bad? That if the woman who burns little girls in R'hllor’s name tells us that R'hllor’s beloved is come to save the world, that maybe we should be dubious?

"Burnt," said Salladhor Saan, "and be glad of that, my friend. Do you know the tale of the forging of Lightbringer? I shall tell it to you. It was a time when darkness lay heavy on the world. To oppose it, the hero must have a hero's blade, oh, like none that had ever been. And so for thirty days and thirty nights Azor Ahai labored sleepless in the temple, forging a blade in the sacred fires. Heat and hammer and fold, heat and hammer and fold, oh, yes, until the sword was done. Yet when he plunged it into water to temper the steel it burst asunder.

"Being a hero, it was not for him to shrug and go in search of excellent grapes such as these, so again he began. The second time it took him fifty days and fifty nights, and this sword seemed even finer than the first. Azor Ahai captured a lion, to temper the blade by plunging it through the beast's red heart, but once more the steel shattered and split. Great was his woe and great was his sorrow then, for he knew what he must do.

"A hundred days and a hundred nights he labored on the third blade, and as it glowed white-hot in the sacred fires, he summoned his wife. 'Nissa Nissa,' he said to her, for that was her name, 'bare your breast, and know that I love you best of all that is in this world.' She did this thing, why I cannot say, and Azor Ahai thrust the smoking sword through her living heart. It is said that her cry of anguish and ecstasy left a crack across the face of the moon, but her blood and her soul and her strength and her courage all went into the steel. Such is the tale of the forging of Lightbringer, the Red Sword of Heroes.  A Clash of Kings - Davos I

The pages that told of Azor Ahai. Lightbringer was his sword. Tempered with his wife's blood if Votar can be believed. Thereafter Lightbringer was never cold to the touch, but warm as Nissa Nissa had been warm. A Dance with Dragons - Jon III

Let’s break down this passage. First, Azor Ahai tries to temper his sword in water. Then he tried a lion’s heart. After that failed, he stabbed his wife in the heart.

What we know of this savior - and I use the word lightly - so far is that the god who loves him also encourages burning little girls and that Azor Ahai murdered his own wife.

Davos was remembering a tale Salladhor Saan had told him, of how Azor Ahai tempered Lightbringer by thrusting it through the heart of the wife he loved. He slew his wife to fight the dark. If Stannis is Azor Ahai come again, does that mean Edric Storm must play the part of Nissa Nissa?" A Storm of Swords - Davos V

In response to these thoughts, Davos attempts to save Edric from the fate that eventually befalls Shireen. We do not mock him for this, it is a heroic act. He endangers himself to protect an innocent child.

If saving Nissa Nissa from Azor Ahai is a good thing, where does that leave him in the story? The murderer is usually the bad guy, if Stannis burnt Edric he would be the bad guy, why then is Azor Ahai lauded as a hero?

Melisandre said, "Azor Ahai tempered Lightbringer with the heart's blood of his own beloved wife. If a man with a thousand cows gives one to god, that is nothing. But a man who offers the only cow he owns . . ."

"She talks of cows," Davos told the king. "I am speaking of a boy, your daughter's friend, your brother's son." A Storm of Swords - Davos VI

Here again we get the implications shoved into our faces by the writing.

We are meant to sympathize with the innocent child and with Davos, not with the insane woman who wants to murder children. Perhaps we are also meant to sympathize with Nissa Nissa, rather than the insane man who shoved a sword through her chest.

Why do we believe Melisandre’s claims that Azor Ahai is a hero?

It seems far more likely that the savior awaited by people who burn people alive, the savior beloved by the gods who approves of burning people alive, the savior that murdered his own wife and is called a hero for it, is actually not the savior.

I firmly believe that no matter who Azor Ahai is, their actions will not be heroic. That doesn’t mean that they can’t save the world, but it does mean that if they do it will only drag humanity deeper into the void from which it is struggling to escape. Murdering children to defend humanity from the Others is no better than what the Others themselves do.

[sarahtude]

ok that crew going beyond the wall... I am HERE FOR IT

Jon - *obviously* he is the prince who was promised. Half Stark, half Targaryen, the song of Ice and Fire blah blah blah. Resurrected by the Lord of Light.

Beric Dondarrion - resurrected by the Lord of Light. And his bad ass sword, Lightbringer, I mean come on, that thing is sweet

Thoros of Myr - red priest who resurrected Beric 

the Hound - had his own little run in with fire, now runs with Beric an reads the flames and all that jazz

Tormund - wildling and *KISSED BY FIRE* (I see u my fellow redhead)

Jorah - ok so like I know he is one of the few people ever to survive greyscale (like Shireen *BARATHEON*) but also his connection to fire could be his creepy obsession with Danaerys “Dracarys” Targaryen

Gendry - works with fire forging steel. I think he is really significant in some way but I can’t figure out why??? Maybe Melisandre got the wrong Baratheon in her visions???