With the show caught up to the books and only a couple of plot threads still to be adapted, it’s open season for Game of Thrones speculation…

 

Littlefinger will return with his army

Season 5 saw the normally untouchable Littlefinger brought low for the first time with the sacking of his brothel by the Faith Militant. But he’s not out of the game yet. By marrying Lysa Arryn, murdering her, and sending her son Robin to live with Yohn Royce, he has control of the Vale and the Eyrie. One of the most defensible positions in Westeros.

And with one of the Seven Kingdoms at his command, he can easily make good on his plan to raise an army and take Winterfell. But if Game of Thrones has taught us anything about Littlefinger, it’s that he’s more ambitious than that. He also has very few moral standards in the pursuit of power, with Varys saying of him that “He would see this country burn if he could be king of the ashes”.

As well as the Eyrie, Littlefinger still has control of Harrenhall and, even though he has lost his brothel, he’s almost definitely sitting on a fat pile of cash that will get him an army large enough to start seizing the rest of the country.

Nothing important has been said about Littlefinger for Season 6 yet (which is quite fitting for a character who hides in plain sight) but with hints of multiple characters and stories converging on the North, it’s likely that we will see him make a pretty big comeback. He has the money, the cunning, and the position to become one of the game’s major players, and the time for playing subtly is at an end. The rise of House Baelish is on the horizon.

 

Arya will return to Westeros

Thanks to a photo on Maisie Williams’ Instagram page, we know that Arya will still be blind for at least some of Season 6 and that, as she said in an interview with Entertainment Weekly, “She’s going to become very vulnerable”. But apart from that, anything’s possible

Based on the actions that led to her going blind and what Williams has said about the character’s Season 6 arc, it seems that the focus will be on her personality being slowly whittled down so she can truly be No One. Starting with her impulsive and reckless nature.

But even though Arya wants to be a Faceless Man, she won’t let go of who she is and what she really wants: to cross names off her list and find the other Starks. That has been her goal since travelling with Yoren in Season 2 and she’s never really forgotten it. She wants to be No One but not to stop being Arya Stark. It’s an insoluble equation. And considering her personality, it’s possible that she might abandon her training out of sheer impatience.

After Season 6, there’s likely not a lot more that can be done with Arya in Braavos after spending what could end up being twenty episodes there. And because we’re coming closer to the story’s end, Arya’s story will eventually mean going back to Westeros since, apart from Jaqen H’ghar and the Faceless Men, that’s where her entire life and everyone left on her list is.

 

Continued on next page…