I thought we needed a thread to discuss something heavily used by martin and that it's not prophecy, greensight or amusingly crackpotty: foreshadowing... And i'm going to start with a few shiny bits my magpie brain collected from tumblr and westeros.

* You know how "to go east you must go west" blah blah and to "touch the light you must pass beneath the shadow". This has often been associated with Asshai, but GRRM said in several interviews we'd probably never get to see Asshai... Well... here's another option...

Even so, she kept one hand on Needle as they slipped between his legs. More arrow slits dotted the insides of those great stone thighs, and when Arya craned her neck around to watch the crow’s nest slip through with a good ten yards to spare, she spied murder holes beneath the Titan’s armored skirts, and pale faces staring down at them from behind the iron bars.

And then they were past.  The shadow lifted, the pine-clad ridges fell away to either side, the winds dwindled, and they found themselves moving through a great lagoon.

So basically, if you go to the city of braavos, you have to pass beneath the shadow. Interesting, isn't it?

* Now the next bit i am almost convinced it's gonna happen. At the crossing of the river, remember when she fights off the branch that looked like a kraken and that's heavily regarded as foreshadowing an encounter with the Greyjoys? Well, when you add it to this:

"If I had wings...I'd just fly away, fly up past the moon and the shining stars, and see all the things in Old Nan's stories, dragons and seamonsters and the Titan of Braavos, and maybe I wouldn't ever fly back unless I wanted to"

it's hard NOT to think that arya will cross paths with dany (or another dragonrider) and the greyjoys.

* Next one, I don't know what to make of, but something's certainly cooking in this kitchen, imo.

Stannis says this to Jon:

"By right Winterfell should go to my sister Sansa."

"Lady Lannister, you mean? Are you so eager to see the Imp perched on your father's seat? I promise you, that will not happen whilst I live, Lord Snow."

let's get passed by the Stannis might die part for a minute cause this would also work if Stannis faked his own death

Spoiler

as it is seriously hinted i am told in one of the TWOW released chapters

Now he means winterfel, but if rhaegar is jon's father... can that mean foreshadow tyrion going to dragonstone? perched. like a bird. or a gargoyle. Tyrion has been often compared to a gargoyle:

Tyrion Lannister was sitting on the ledge above the door to the Great Hall, looking for all the world like a gargoyle.

Motionless as a gargoyle, Tyrion Lannister hunched on one knee atop a merlon.

They hacked off her brother’s head in the hope that it was mine, yet here I sit like some bloody gargoyle, offering empty consolations.

 When the moonstones hung from Sansa’s ears and about her neck, the queen nodded. “Yes. The gods have been kind to you, Sansa. You are a lovely girl. It seems almost obscene to squander such sweet innocence on that gargoyle.”

 and so on... (there's too many to quote). and now that tyrion is connected to greyscale, the gargoyle connection seems even more fitting.

Now see this

That only annoyed her further. “Your head may have glass eyes, but I do not. There are gargoyles on Dragonstone that look more like the Imp than this creature. He’s bald, and twice my brother’s age. What happened to his teeth?”

Davos had a thirst. He took his leave of his sons and turned his steps toward the inn. Out front squatted a waist-high gargoyle, so eroded by rain and salt that his features were all but obliterated. He and Davos were old friends, though. He gave a pat to the stone head as he went in. “Luck,” he murmured.

just like how tyrion's head used to be patted for luck in one of the free cities. So will Davos and Tyrion meet? Will Tyrion spend some time in Dragonstone?

and there's some other bits that could be related, though i'm not sure what could imply... he survives? he goes blind from greyscale?:

The entrance to the crypts was in the oldest section of the castle, near the foot of the First Keep, which had sat unused for hundreds of years. Ramsay had put it to the torch when he sacked Winterfell, and much of what had not burned had collapsed. Only a shell remained, one side open to the elements and filling up with snow. Rubble was strewn all about it: great chunks of shattered masonry, burned beams, broken gargoyles. The falling snow had covered almost all of it, but part of one gargoyle still poked above the drift, its grotesque face snarling sightless at the sky.

 compare with what moqorro says:

“Dragons,” Moqorro said in the Common Tongue of Westeros. He spoke it very well, with hardly a trace of accent. No doubt that was one reason the high priest Benerro had chosen him to bring the faith of R’hllor to Daenerys Targaryen. “Dragons old and young, true and false, bright and dark.And you. A small man with a big shadow, snarling in the midst of all.”

“Snarling? An amiable fellow like me?” Tyrion was almost flattered.

-- Edited by DonalNoyesArm on Thursday 2nd of May 2013 12:35:47 PM