7 Times The "Game Of Thrones" Books Actually Foreshadowed The Show

That zombie ice dragon was perhaps the biggest reveal of season seven. But it didn't come out of nowhere. The books have actually hinted at the potential existence of ice dragons before, since Jon has compared the Wall to an ice dragon several times, and ice dragons are mentioned in the companion book, A World of Ice & Fire:

Colossal beasts ... said to be made of living ice, with eyes of pale blue crystal and vast translucent wings through which the moon and stars can be glimpsed as they wheel across the sky. Whereas common dragons (if any dragon can truly be said to be common) breathe flame, ice dragons supposedly breathe cold, a chill so terrible that it can freeze a man solid in half a heartbeat.

In the books so far, ice dragons still hold a mythical status... but so did White Walkers, and they turned out to be all too real. Some fans even speculate that there might be an ice dragon hidden inside the Wall, and that it'll come bursting out at some point. Other fans think that Euron will use his dragon horn to nab a dragon and mess with it, or that the White Walkers will indeed get themselves an undead ice dragon and Jon Snow will be the only one who can tame it (he is the perfect combo of ice and fire, after all... and he's also undead).

In the season seven finale, Bran and Sam go out of their way to tell us that Jon's parents, Rhaegar Targaryen and Lyanna Stark, were secretly married before Jon was born — so he's not a bastard, he's actually the true heir to the Iron Throne (and Dany is his aunt... yikes). In the books, we haven't even confirmed the identity of Jon's parents yet. But, the books do actually hint at a possible secret wedding between Rhaegar and Lyanna. Rhaegar "abducted" Lyanna just outside of Harrenhal, which is right nearby the Isle of Faces, an island of weirwood trees. George R.R. Martin has promised that the Isle of Faces will feature in the overarching plot, and, as a Stark, Lyanna would want to be married in front of a weirwood. And guess who can see through weirwoods? Bran, it's Bran. So it seems like Bran will also "witness" Lyanna and Rhaegar's low-key destination wedding ceremony in the books.

Also in the finale, Cersei tells Jaime that she's going to hire the Golden Company to win back Westeros. If you haven't read the books, you probably gasped at this huge revelation... and then promptly asked, "Wait, what's the Golden Company?" This is the rare instance in which the books are actually ahead of the show, because the Golden Company rolls up and takes over part of the Stormlands at the end of book five. The Golden Company is a sellsword army founded by a Targaryen bastard—so they have a lot of baggage with Targaryens. In the books, they've come to Westeros following Aegon Targaryen (who might actually be a Blackfyre in disguise, don't worry about it), but in the show, it looks like Cersei is going to be putting that Highgarden gold to good use and hire a bunch of badass soldiers on elephants to take back her kingdom.

As Jon Snow rightly points out... maybe the witch who murdered your husband shouldn't be your primary gynecologist? For a while now, Dany has been saying that her dragons are "the only children she'll ever have," because the witch Mirri Maz Duur told her so:

"When the sun rises in the west and sets in the east," said Mirri Maz Duur. "When the seas go dry and mountains blow in the wind like leaves. When your womb quickens again, and you bear a living child. Then [Khal Drogo] will return, and not before."

In the books, at least, this prophecy seems to be coming true: Quentyn Martell, the "Sun's son," has traveled from west to east and died. The Dothraki Sea is suffering from a drought. The pyramids of Meereen are being burned into ash by the teenage dragons (and "The Mountain" is now a weird zombie guy). And Dany gets her period again after many months, right at the end of A Dance with Dragons, just as Drogo's former khalasar returns to her. So... season seven Jon Snow seems to be right, in a roundabout way, and maybe Dany can have kids now. Maybe Jon and Dany will even have a kid together, which would make for one very confusing family tree.

The deep cut levels of foreshadowing here are just nuts. OK, so Sansa has Littlefinger put to death in the finale, and everyone watching at home cheers and pumps their fists in the air because it's about time. But it was also heavily foreshadowed in the books: when Arya first sees the Titan of Braavos, she imagines it stepping over the walls of Winterfell. Sansa builds a snow version Winterfell while at the Eyrie, and Littlefinger steps right over the walls. Littlefinger's original house sigil was the Titan of Braavos, a stone giant, before he re-branded to the mockingbird. The creepy woods' witch called the Ghost of High Heart has a vision of a Sansa at the Purple Wedding, and then sees her later "slaying a savage giant in a castle built of snow." So Sansa was always meant to kill that toxic asshole Petyr Baelish. Good riddance.

You don't plant a Wall-destroying magic horn at the beginning of the series if it's not going to destroy the Wall at the end of the series... right? In the books, Sam is likely in possession of the Horn of Winter, which has the power to bring down the Wall. In the last moments of season seven, we see our friend the ice dragon blasting a hole in the Wall, which is admittedly way more dramatic. Either way, the books have heavily implied that the wall can be felled by magical means, and there's hardly anything more magical than a zombie ice dragon.

...and yes, she's still his aunt. At least they don't know that yet? Either way, Jon and Dany finally hooked up after a full season of flirtation, while in the books they still haven't met each other. Never fear, though, because there have been a lot of hints that they're meant to be, starting with Dany's vision of a "blue flower" growing out of a "wall of ice" and "filling the air with sweetness." Blue winter roses were the favorite flower of Jon's mother, Lyanna, and Jon is pretty clearly associated with walls of ice. Their chapters often mirror each other in the books, such as Dany hearing a lone wolf howl just as Jon is being stabbed by the Night's Watch. Plus, they very clearly represent the titular "ice" and "fire" of the series, they have color-coordinated pets (Ghost is white with red eyes, Drogon is black with red eyes), and both have proved themselves compassionate (if too idealistic) leaders. We might have to wait a bit longer for their steamy romance in the books, but the hints were planted as far back as book one.

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