There’s no doubt he is one of the most subtle creatures in all of seven kingdoms, surviving his way through various monarchs. Marrying his way into them, leveraging on the weakest links, always finding a way to move forward. And when he arranged for Sansa to get raped by Ramsay, by marrying her off he knew it was only a matter of time for a Stark to regain her command in Winterfell after ousting the Boltons. 

He got what he wanted when he came to Sansa’s rescue in the Battle of the Bastards, and thought he could control her. Too bad, Eastwatch shows his desperation for the first time as he goes on a scheming overdrive, trying to control the outcome.

There is growing unrest in the North about Jon’s departure to Dragonstone, and the allies to Winterfell seem to be losing their patience. This is exactly where Littlefinger is trying to cash in, and he’s also honey-trapped an important piece of information and led Arya to it, to draw a wedge between the sisters. 

He realises he cannot control them all at once, and which is why he was watching Arya, watch him and then watched her as she quietly exited his room after breaking in.

As he lets Sansa into how his mind works, when he tells her – ‘Fight all your enemies in your mind all the time. Everyone is your enemy, everyone is your friend. Every possible series of events is happening, all at once. Live that way and nothing will surprise you.’ Sansa knows him all too well to not use him for his counsel, and still maintain a safe distance from his schemes. Arya has the man on her kill-list. 

Bran is not someone even Littlefinger will be able to manipulate once he realises his true power as the three-eyed raven, and we got a hint of that when Bran gave him a little preview by repeating Littlefinger’s line from the third season ‘chaos is a ladder’ much to the befuddlement of our scheming prick.

I’ll be honest and say I’ve been a massive fan of this character, who deliciously uses the people he’s fighting against themselves. But in a show which has bumped off so many of our favourite characters, it’s a mystery how Petyr Baelish still manages to keep his head on his shoulders. Especially after the kind of hate he’s getting after the latest episode. 

And as he tries to turn Arya against Sansa, it will be interesting to see if the Stark sisters fall into his desired trap, or Arya’s training as ‘no one’ allows her to figure out that she knows that he knows that she knows about the scroll he hid for her to find so easily.

And if that happens, how much longer will he survive in Winterfell? Will Winter finally come for him this season? Let’s hope it does.