Let’s predict what happens in The Winds of Winter

In the North

Across the Narrow Sea and to the north in Westeros, the Battle of Winterfell is looming. In the Pink Letter from A Dance with Dragons, Ramsay claimed to have defeated Stannis’ northern army in battle. Yet in a sample Winds chapter written from the viewpoint of Theon Greyjoy, Stannis is very much alive. So either Ramsay was lying, which definitely seems like something he would do, or Martin is toying with the timeline.

Anyway, in the sample chapter, Stannis plans to have Theon Greyjoy executed, hoping to gain favor with his northern allies by exacting justice for the murders of Bran and Rickon Stark. If Theon dies, we’ll likely watch the Battle of Winterfell largely through Asha’s eyes. 

Stannis is preparing his position to defend against a coming attack from Roose Bolton’s vanguard, led by Hosteen Frey. Tensions are high in Winterfell among the Northern lords, Freys and Boltons, so they wish to avoid a long siege. This may be what Stannis has planned all along. He is an experienced battle general after all.

Personally, I like the idea of Stannis using false beacons to lure his enemies onto a frozen lake he’s purposefully weakened and then plunging them into the depths. (This theory is called the Night Lamp, and you can read about it in more detail here.) If Stannis ends up defeating the vanguard with such a strategy, it could have a lot of ramifications for the lords inside Winterfell, but the situation there is too complex to predict with pinpoint accuracy. There are a lot of different pieces moving at the same time.

There’s a moment from Game of Thrones that could play into this. We learn on an Inside the Episode feature that the sequence where Shireen is burned alive came directly from George R.R. Martin himself, meaning it will come to pass in some form on the page. Perhaps Stannis’ strategy fails, or even if it succeeds, his army is still bedeviled by heavy snows and he’s unable to take Winterfell, requiring (in his mind, anyway) drastic measures in the form of child sacrifice.

However, on the show, Shireen, Melisandre and Selyse are with Stannis as he marches towards Winterfell, whereas in the books they remain at Castle Black. So how does the party meet back up?

One theory has to do with Ser Justin Massey, whom Stannis has asked to escort “Arya Stark” (actually Jeyne Poole) back to Castle Black. With all of the uncertainty there following Jon’s death, perhaps Selyse, Melisandre and Shireen flee, and Massey runs into them on his way back. The news about Jon Snow will force the knight to bring them all back to Stannis, where the Queen and Red Woman will push for a sacrifice to beat back the snow.

Image: Game of Thrones/HBO

Let’s talk about Jon Snow. Readers know death isn’t easily escaped in A Song of Ice and Fire, and those that do manage are changed by the experience, like Catelyn Stark and Beric Dondarrion. Martin hasn’t commented on the death of Jon Snow for some time, but given how crucial Jon is to the later seasons of Game of Thrones, it’s pretty likely that he’ll be resurrected somehow. But will he be the character we knew?

During a signing tour in 2005, Martin talked a little about what a character loses when they die and come back. “Death is hard,” he said. “The character gets more and more removed from his or her former life. The main thing remaining, what brings Beric back, is the sense of purpose, the mission he has yet to accomplish.”

If Jon snow does come back from the dead, what sense of purpose would animate him? What mission has he yet to accomplish that would push him forward? Would he come back basically unchanged as he does on the show, or would he be more like the disconnected Beric Dondarrion, or even the frighteningly altered Lady Stoneheart? Might he come back but not be a POV character anymore?

The next Stark up is Bran. As he continues his training beyond the Wall, Martin might use Bran to take readers further north than ever before:

"“You’re definitely going to see more of the Others in The Winds of Winter… What lies really north in my books—we haven’t explored that yet, but we will in the last two books.” – GRRM"

The Game of Thrones showrunners have confirmed that the shocking “Hold the Door” twist involving Hodor came from Martin himself, so expect it right around the corner, very probably in a Bran chapter.

And Bran won’t be the only Stark boy making an appearance: Martin has said that Rickon will return, as well. This most likely means a chapter told from the perspective of Davos Seaworth, who is currently traveling to the mysterious island of Skagos in search of Rickon and Shaggydog. Martin has also said that the wildling Osha will return; we expect she’s been helping keep Rickon safe this whole time.

In the South

Let’s begin in the Vale, where Sansa Stark will continue to play the role of Alayne Stone, Littlefinger’s bastard daughter. As Littlefiner solidifies his control over the kingdom, Alayne is tasked with seducing Harry the Heir, the handsome squire who would ascend to rule the Vale should Lord Robert Arryn perish.

It’s evident from her sample chapter that Sansa is learning to play the game. As of now, Petyr’s plan is to eventually marry Sansa to the heir of the Vale of Arryn and then to reveal her true identity to the Lords of the Vale, eventually reclaiming Winterfell in her name. In A Dance with Dragons, Stannis Baratheon wants to bestow Winterfell on Jon Snow, now Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch, but Jon insists the castle is his half-sister Sansa’s birthright. However, with everything Sansa has gone through being a pawn to other players, it wouldn’t be surprising if she decided to go her own way.

Image: Game of Thrones/HBO

Further south, the fight between Prince Aegon and the Tyrells will have major ramifications for the south and King’s Landing. It will include the Golden Company, Jon Connington, Mathis Rowan and Gilbert Farring. This battle was originally set to occur offscreen, but apparently Martin decided to write the battle out, so let’s assume it’s included.

The clash between the Tyrells and Prince Aegon could bring Highgarden to the forefront. Martin has hinted for years that Willas and Garlan Tyrell may eventually become bigger players. If they do appear in the sixth book, it will likely be because of this conflict, and the continual fraying of the Lannister-Tyrell alliance.

We know what Arianne Martell will be up to thanks to her sample chapters, where she’s traveling to meet with Aegon and Jon Connington, after they’ve already taken Storm’s End.  One could see the potential of a marriage between Aegon and Arrianne, but it may have to wait until after Aegon fights the Tyrells descending from King’s Landing.

All of this means that by the time Daenerys gets to Westeros, another Targaryen — if indeed that’s what Aegon really is — could have already established a firm foothold. Assuming Game of Thrones showed us the broad strokes, Dany will eventually leave Essos and sail to Westeros with a Dothraki horde, hopefully sometime in The Winds of Winter. Could we be in for another Targaryen Civil War, a second Dance of Dragons?

Martin has said Dany will embrace the words of House Targaryen: “Fire and Blood.” Her fever visions of Viserys Targaryen in the Dothraki Sea in the previous book seem to support this. How she handles the situation with Aegon — does she treat him as enemy or a potential ally? — could lay the groundwork for some of the things we saw Daenerys do in the final season of Game of Thrones.

As for King’s Landing, it will be a mess. With Kevan Lannister and Grand Maester Pycelle dead, anything could happen. If we go by what happened on Game of Thrones, Cersei will be backed into a corner and seem to have little to no power, but could come back and surprise everyone by killing her enemies — Margaery Tyrell and the High Sparrow — with one stroke. Might the destruction of the Sept of Baelor come to pass on the page? Thanks to Jaime, we know that King Aerys Targaryen stored caches of wildfire under the city during Robert’s Rebellion, and they’ve been Chekhov’s guns for a while now.

It’s hard to predict what will happen with Brienne and Jaime. At the end of A Feast for Crows, the undead Catelyn Stark, now leading the Brotherhood without Banners as Lady Stoneheart, is convinced Brienne and her squire Podrick Payne are about Lannister business and gives her a choice between the sword and the noose. She is to prove her loyalty by killing Jaime Lannister, or she will die. She refuses to choose but before she is hanged to death, she yells out a word.

The next time we see Brienne is at the end of A Dance with Dragons. She finds Jaime and asks him to help her save Sansa from the Hound, but they must ride alone, or the Hound will kill Sansa. Martin confirmed at Miscon back in 2012 that the word Brienne screamed was “sword.” George also said that Brienne had made the decision to swear her sword to Lady Stoneheart in order to save the innocent Podrick from the noose.

Jaime’s fate is uncertain. He may die or he may not. Either way, we’re miles away from what happened on the show, where Stoneheart doesn’t exist at all. Here, it sounds like she’ll be a major player. “After Catelyn is resurrected as Lady Stoneheart, she becomes a vengeful, heartless killer,” he told Esquire China in 2017. In the sixth book, I still continue to write her. She is an important character in the set of books.”

And while we’re talking about events in the Riverlands, let’s not forget that there’s a giant wolf pack running around, led by Nymeria, Arya’s direwolf. “You know, I don’t like to give things away,” Martin told Mashable in 2014. “But you don’t hang a giant wolf pack on the wall unless you intend to use it.” It’s also interesting that Arya, even in Braavos, has been communicating with her wolf with her warging abilities, even though it’s not entirely clear to her what’s happening. Perhaps Arya could affect events in the Riverlands from across the Narrow Sea?

So while we don’t know exactly what’s coming in The Winds of Winter, there’s still a lot of information to work with. This installment has the potential to be the best of the series so far, with the interweaving storylines having become very complex. Martin is basically writing multiple novels all stitched together.

Until the next book is released, whenever that may be, we hope these predictions help tide some people over.

"“There are a lot of dark chapters right now in the book that I’m writing. It is called The Winds of Winter, and I’ve been telling you for 20 years that winter was coming. Winter is the time when things die, and cold and ice and darkness fills the world, so this is not gonna be the happy feel-good that people may be hoping for. Some of the characters [are] in very dark places…In any story, the classic structure is, ‘Things get worse before they get better,’ so things are getting worse for a lot of people.” – GRRM, 2016"

To stay up to date on everything fantasy, science fiction, and WiC, follow our all-encompassing Facebook page and sign up for our exclusive newsletter.

Watch Game of Thrones for FREE with a no-risk, 7-day free trial of Amazon Channels