You. I like you. Yes, I like you too. Before I start this, let me answer the question that’s often asked: Yes, I’ve read the books up to A Dance with Dragons. So In that particular book is the scene where Jon gets betrayed by the men of the Nights’ Watch (minus Olly who doesn’t exist). In the book, as Jon lays dying, he says the word “Ghost” and then it’s all fade to black. There is no conclusion…
I like to imagine in my speculation on TWOW how things might just continue to go sideways for Justin Massey.
Justin’s first order, after leaving Stannis’ camp, will be to “deliver her [i.e. “Lady Arya”, really Jeyne Poole] to Lord Commander Snow on [Justin’s] way to Eastwatch”. Easy enough, Justin probably thinks (especially since he himself has no reason to doubt Jeyne’s purported identity - more on that in a moment), he’ll get a warm reception from the pro-Stannis Lord Commander Snow for having his “sister” returned … but uh oh, I think Justin will hear on the way there that Jon has been murdered by his black brothers and Castle Black is in chaos between the Night’s Watch, free folk, and queen’s men. No use bringing Jeyne-as-Arya to her “brother” if that person is not just dead but the victim of an assassination/de facto coup; the same Night’s Watch members who so recently violently killed Jon probably wouldn’t look too kindly on his “sister” showing up at their doorstep. Oh well, Justin might think, better take Jeyne-as-Arya with me instead and figure out what to do from there.
So Justin might then skip to his second order from Stannis: to collect Stannis’ loan from the Iron Bank in Braavos and hire at least 20,000 sellswords with the money. Easy enough, Justin might think; even if he himself failed to convince Stannis to grant him a title or lands to impress the free companies, he is still prepared to “[g]o to them with both fists full of golden dragons”. But, uh oh - I think Justin is going to fulfill Stannis’ prediction that “[i]n Braavos you may hear that I am dead. It may even be true”. Negotiating payment by the Iron Bank on Stannis’ loan and debt agreement might be a good deal harder with the main signatory dead (and his legal heir being an underage girl thousands of miles away with no knowledge of the agreement). Even if he could convince the Iron Bank that would-be Queen Shireen will make good on her father’s word to pay back the Iron Throne’s debts, would he be able to convince sellsword companies to risk their necks for the sake of an 11-year-old girl, heir to a dead pretender, in faraway Westeros?
But then, perhaps, good news for Justin! (Or what he might believe is good news, at least.) I think that as he’s deciding what he’s going do in Braavos, he’ll run into the real Arya Stark (because there is absolutely no way in my mind that Arya, who has had such a strong theme of personal identity throughout her storyline but especially during her time in Braavos, would not have any opinion on seeing Jeyne Poole, a girl who literally grew up with her, be referred to as “Arya Stark”) Well, now maybe Justin decides to cut his losses and try to return to Winterfell with the real Arya. If Stannis is dead (so he thinks) and it’s a losing proposition to make good on his claim to Westeros, he, Justin, might as well take what he can get - and a restored Kingdom of the North, with the rightful (again, so he thinks) Stark heiress, is not a bad concession prize for a landless knight with no hope of reclaiming his ancestral territories. (Ir’s incredibly creepy and gross to speculate whether Justin would imagine himself as Arya’s future husband, but given Justin’s previous marital ambitions with both Val (as the “wildling princess”) and Asha (as the would-be heiress to the Iron Islands), the thought might be in his mind.)
But, uh oh … what Justin Massey doesn’t know, and can’t know until he shows up, is that he doesn’t have the last best Stark. No, far from it - Winterfell is going to be the center of a factional dispute over which of the suddenly reemerged Stark heirs has the senior claim to the North. Justin Massey might have the real Arya Stark, but now he has to contend with elder sister Sansa and legitimated elder brother Jon and legitimate younger brother Rickon (and maybe even Bran too). As an underage girl, Arya has at best a hotly disputed claim over her siblings (and that’s without Arya herself I think probably being way more interested in reuniting with her family than in trying to fight with them over who gets their butt on the high seat of Winterfell). Plus, even if he could convince the factions that Arya was the superior choice, Justin might find out that the freaking apocalypse is nigh; rather bad timing to claim a castle when otherworldly eldritch slaver ice monsters are knocking at the door.
I’m really curious to see how much whatever “The She-Wolves of Winterfell” (which I’m just gonna call “The She-Wolves of Winterfell” for the purposes of simplicity but I know that won’t be its final title) parallels what might be coming up for our Starklings in TWOW.
So what I’m imagining at this point is that “The She-Wolves of Winterfell” will begin with Dunk and Egg showing up at Winterfell to take service with the Starks against the ironborn. This is, after all, was Dunk and Egg’s plan at the end of “The Sworn Sword” and into “The Mystery Knight”, and while it was put on pause while they attended the Whitewalls tourney, during the course of the story Dunk still reaffirmed their intent to head north; as he explained to Kyle and the disguised Bloodraven, “Lord Beron Stark is gathering swords to drive the krakens from his shores for good”. However, given the indication from GRRM’s statements that Beron Stark will have already been wounded, possibly fatally, by the ironborn, I think Dunk and Egg are going to show up to Winterfell to find that, instead of Lord Beron marshaling an army to fight the ironborn, Beron is dying, and various Stark factions are using the lack of a strong male leader (and indeed, that leader’s possibly upcoming death) to open up questions about the succession; fighting the ironborn has been put on indefinite pause while the ladies debate who should be controlling Winterfell, and if there is any talk of the war against Dagon, it might be only in the context of what any faction’s representative should do against Dagon’s army - should he/she sit the high seat of Winterfell, of course (e.g. “if I/my son were in charge we would do x”).
I could see Dunk and Egg being totally caught off guard at this development. They came to swear their swords (or, at least, Dunk’s sword) to Winterfell - but who would they even be swearing to, when nobody can agree who exactly represents Winterfell? Even if I’m not sure who specifically the She-Wolves will be, I can imagine the different factions trying to convince Dunk and Egg to support them, especially if Egg’s royal status is no longer a secret (as “The Mystery Knight” ended with Egg wearing his father’s ring openly instead of stuffing it in his boot); this was Prince Maekar’s son, along with a man who by Egg’s cover story was Maekar’s agent in foiling the conspiracy at Whitewalls (even if Dunk himself had to explain to Bloodraven that that was far from the “true truth”), so their arrival at Winterfell could only mean official royal support for whichever faction they endorsed. Lorra Royce might be arguing for her and Beron’s eldest son Donnor; Myriame Manderly and/or Robyn Ryswell might be fighting for regency rights as a recent widow but face bias and blame - “if you had only had a son we would never be in this position” sort of thing - with Myriame perhaps even getting pushback about her heritage - “it was a mistake for Rodwell to marry you, the Manderlys are no true northmen” (also I’m calling it right now, Robyn Ryswell is going to be like her modern-day relation Barbrey Dustin née Ryswell - a smart, ambitious, older childless widow); Alys Karstark might be hoping that her son Beron makes a recovery and so put the Stark dynasty back on course; Wylla Fenn might suggest that her bastard son Lonnel, as the son of a Stark lord with noble northern lineage on both sides, should have the right to rule; Serena Stark might argue that as the legitimate (and presumably at that point only surviving, given Elio Garcia’s comment that Robyn Ryswell was Jonnel’s second wife) child of Cregan’s heir Rickon, she and her daughters should be considered the rightful heirs to Winterfell; Cregan’s daughters (especially the youngest, Lyanna) and/or Beron’s sister Arsa might take Serena’s argument but apply it to themselves, arguing for their own right to sit Winterfell.
So I’m imagining Dunk and Egg think they have to come up with a way to reconcile all of these factions. I can’t begin to speculate on the whole plot, but I would not be surprised at all if part of their argument is that the Starks have, pun fully intended, bigger squids to fry than debating the rulership of Winterfell. While the Starks of Winterfell argue among themselves about who should be its lord, the Greyjoys under Dagon are turning the northern coasts into their playground for pillage. While the crown under Aerys I had admittedly left the Starks high and dry (again, pun intended) against Dagon by refusing to give aid, now the Starks are hurting themselves instead; this intra-Stark conflict is proving a major distraction, undermining the ability and indeed responsibility of the Starks to respond to the Greyjoy crisis. Perhaps Egg will tell the quarreling Starks that if they can settle on a single candidate, he will have his father lead royal troops to help the Starks defeat Dagon once and for all (as we know from Victarion that while Dagon “bearded the lion in his den and tied the direwolf’s tail in knots … even [he] could not defeat the dragons” - but if they refuse and continue their private war among themselves, he would have his father assert the crown’s control over Winterfell and the North directly. (Indeed, if this story takes place after “The Village Hero”, then I’m curious whether Dunk and Egg would use the recent Pennytree affair, as I think it will go down in that story, to reiterate the point - the crown can take away your lands if you won’t do your part to maintain the king’s peace, we’ve done it before and we will do it again.) Again, I’m not sure what the exact story would be - it’s not like there is a suggestion Donnor Stark did not succeed his dad, after all - but I like the idea that this will let both Dunk and Egg stretch their political muscles, solving a crisis through diplomacy rather than force.
Where I think this could be really interesting (besides on its own, obviously) is how that might loosely parallel what we could see with the Stark kids coming back to Winterfell in TWOW. I firmly believe that all the surviving Starks are going to return to Winterfell in TWOW, but perhaps more importantly (and certainly so for this discussion), there are at least a few factions now, and maybe even more in the future, which are aiming to seat certain Starks in Winterfell’s high seat - all without knowing about the other factions or their plans. As was the case in the time of Beron’s possibly fatal wound, there is a surplus of potential Stark heirs at the moment; likewise, as might have been the case in Beron’s time, there is no perfect, uniformly agreed upon candidate for Stark rule. Jon Snow, like Lonnel Snow before him (hey, their names even rhyme!), was the (at least so it’s supposed, for Jon) bastard son of a Stark lord, with some argument to rule Winterfell - from at least his nobly born mother in Lonnel’s case, from the legitimization witnessed by Maege Mormont and Galbart Glover in Jon’s. (I don’t think it’s at all coincidental that Lonnel’s mother is a Fenn - that is, a crannogwoman - given that it’s a crannogman, Howland Reed, who is probably currently sheltering Maege and Galbart and who knows the truth of Jon’s parentage.) Sansa and Arya are legitimate, but female in a world and specifically in a dynasty which has not only never had a ruling woman but has specifically skipped over female heiresses, as in the case of Serena and Sansa, daughters of Rickon. (Again, is it coincidental that these were two sisters, one of whom was even named “Sansa”?) Bran and Rickon may have no specific parallels in “The She-Wolves of Winterfell” (other than, as legitimate sons of the former Stark lord, they would be in the same position as Donnor and his brothers), but they might likewise be debated as potential heirs - Bran for being disabled in a highly ableist society, Rickon for being very young and subject to a long, potentially troublesome regency (and perhaps any bias against Myriame Manderly might echo bias against Rickon’s chief supporter, Wyman Manderly).
I don’t think the Starklings themselves will fight each other for Winterfell, to be clear; I think they’ll just be happy to see and be with each other again after long and harrowing experiences for them all. However, I could see where we might have this same sort of factional quarreling, with the Stark kids themselves perhaps stepping into Dunk’s and Egg’s roles. After all, it’s very possible that as this debate is going on, news is going to come of Euron in the south and/or the Others beyond the Wall (the latter of which both Jon and Bran have good reason to know and warn about); this parallel may be especially potent with Euron (who may in turn empower the Others by bringing down the Wall), given that Euron is the most serious ironborn threat since his own great-grandfather Dagon, and is trying to outdo Dagon in his apocalyptic ambition for world domination. So the Stark kids might tell the quarreling factions around them that their energies need to be put not into deciding which one of them gets Winterfell but in preparing to fight the greatest enemy of humanity and, in fact, all living things.
