This was a sad Monday for Game of Thrones fans with the seventh season having officially ended. We are still suffering from the withdrawal symptoms, contemplating our meaningless existence for the next 2 years.
However, fans just cannot sit with their hands folded in the interim, they have got their analytical glasses on and sometimes you just have to give it to them for their eye for detail.
Fans at thehooknew have come up with a theory giving us a plausible reason as to what may have piqued the Night King’s interest to march south of the wall. Turns out, the Night’s Watch might be the ones to be blamed. Yes, the same people who are entrusted with the job of keeping the Southerners safe from these undead white creatures.
Just to brush our memories, we all know the Children of the Forest created the Night King and the White Walkers to fight the First Men, but things got out of hand and the First Men and Children jointly restricted the walkers north of the wall.
It is assumed that this was done through a pact – the White Walkers would stay on their side of the wall, and in return, the southern humans would leave them be, and not use fire magic like Valryian steel and dragonglass against them. Regular human sacrifice could be another part of the pact as it was the only means to increase their numbers.
Craster’s sacrifices suddenly make so much sense! Gilly’s creepy dad who had sex with his own daughters and offered all the male children to the White Walkers, and in return, they did not cause him any harm.
All was going well, until the intrusion of one of the members of the Night’s watch.
As fate would have it, apparently, fan favourite Samwell Tarly is behind the wrath of the Night King. The pact was unknowingly broken by him when he tried to be the knight in shining armour for his lady love, Gilly, protecting her child from a White Walker and killing it in the process. This violates two of the terms – use of dragonglass and denial of human sacrifice.
According to the theory, this is what set the Night King off and now he’s on his way to show who holds the true power. If Samwell Tarly is really the reason we got to see the wall fall like a house of cards, well, he has done more things for love than anyone else in the show!
Knowing Samwell, it would be priceless to see the look of guilt on his face.
What do you think are the chances of this theory coming true? I guess it’s high time for Bran to do his time travelling and give his brother a heads up as to how to defeat the walkers.