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The Court of the Others
The leadership of the Others, the ancient race that once tried to destroy mankind during the Long Night. Now, after thousands of years of dormancy, they've awakened to threaten the world again. open/close all folders
In General
- Adaptation Species Change: The composited Marvel villains that they are based on are re-imagined as Others, who are interpreted here as spiritual entities called titans. In fact they are the same species as the Children Of The Forest, their differences being merely ideological.
- Composite Character: They have elements of certain Marvel villains mixed in. Notably, each seems to be a Big Bad of their respective franchise.
- Demonic Possession: Once upon a time, their race practiced Fusion Dance in order to explore Westeros. Then the Mad Titan decided he didn't really like to bother with sharing his body...
- The Dreaded: Thor admits that they make him tremble. Remember, Thor is a Warrior Prince, and a Physical God who loves fighting, so when you can make someone like that tremble, you know you're a force to be feared.
- The Fair Folk: Oh boy, yes. They come from the lands beyond the Wall, bear mythical abilities that allow them to possess people and perform various forms of magic, and their endgame is the conquest of all of Westeros.
- Greater-Scope Villain: They aren't very prevalent in the main story of the first book, but their presence is felt by many characters in the second book and they're set to become the main Big Bad later down the road.
The Night's King
The Night's King, the Mad Titan, Thanos
The leader of the Others, who is starting his long-prophesied campaign to conquer Westeros.- Big Bad: Just as in the regular canon, he's shaping up as the ultimate foe the side of good will need to defeat.
- Composite Character: After a series of hints to this throughout A Crack of Thunder, Chapter 53 finally confirms that he's Thanos.
- Decomposite Character: Here, the book's canonical Night's King was only a human thrall whom the Night's Queen carefully buttered up so as to make him feel important. The true Night's King is much more feared and dangerous.
- Demonic Possession: During the war between the Children and the First Men, he possessed the body of a man whom the Children believe could have been king of all his people... and then decided that he didn't feel the need to share control of that body.
- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: "Thanos" is clarified to mean "Mad Titan" in the language of the Children. When Rickon first speaks his name to Robb, the latter notes that despite having never heard the name before, it sends a chill down his spine.
- Tricked-Out Gloves: Uses "a great gauntlet of infinite power", likely the Infinity Gauntlet.
The Night's Queen (Spoilers)
Warning! This character is considered a major Walking Spoiler for the ending of Book 1 and throughout Book 2. As a result, all spoilers for this character are unmarked.
The Night's Queen
The only Other able to cross into Westeros ahead of their invasion, courtesy of Demonic Possession.- Arc Villain: More subtle than most examples, but becomes this for Tyrion in A Crack of Thunder.
- Animal Eye Spy: Unlike with Varys, her "little birds" are quite literal, as she kills and reanimates them to spy for her. Given that the body she's using has latent warging powers, it's possible that she's combining this with her own ability to create wights.
- Badass Boast: "Do you fear me? Think me a beast? I am no queen or monster. I am the Goddess of Death."
- Composite Character:
- Tyrion has a nightmare where she has the appearance of Satana Hellstrom.
- She calls herself "the Goddess of Death," showing that Hela's in there too.
- The Corrupter: It's heavily implied she uses her secret meetings with maids and all sort of people to brainwash or convert them, and there are increasing hints Sandor is slowly becoming an Other.
- Since they are described as pale, gaunt and blue-eyed, it's possible she's turning them into wights.
- Demonic Possession: Currently possessing Sansa's corpse, though it's implied that the real Sansa may still be in there as well.
- Entertainingly Wrong: Her answer to the "who does the sellsword kill?" riddle is that all four men die, because none of them thought that the woman in the room with them may have been the real threat (an addition no one else references). The first person to peg her as both dangerous and not human was Bronn, a sellsword, who came to this conclusion after meeting her once. Taking it beyond the literal terms of the riddle, Sam also figures out that she is dangerous, and he's also completely beneath the Night's Queen's notice.
- Even Evil Has Standards:
- She's disgusted by Joffrey's pettiness and lechery and finds Cersei extremely tiresome to deal with.
- She's also disgusted by Littlefinger's obsession with Catelyn and how he lusts after Sansa.
- Fan Disservice: When her newly-grown possessed corpse awakens and flashes her tits to Sandor, the Hound's very reasonable reaction is a Freak Out.
- Healing Hands: She manages to entirely wipe away Sandor's burns, leaving him with a normal face.
- Humanoid Abomination: A White Walker puppeting the corpse of a young girl after modifying it to suit her more? Bronn was not wrong to call her a what rather than a who.
- Lady and Knight: The Dark Mistress to Sandor's faithful Hound.
- Let's You and Him Fight: Discussed. She considers setting up Littlefinger and Joffrey for one of those.
- Locked into Strangeness: After her reanimation of Sansa's corpse, she gained snow-white skin, faded red hair (which further bleaches as time goes by) and Creepy Blue Eyes.
- Logical Weakness: Anyone sane enough fears wildfire, but she's even more justified in her fear of it since she belongs to a race of ice-people.
- Manipulative Bastard: Is able to deceive Tywin, making him believe she's the spirit of his dead wife.
- Mistaken for an Imposter: Tyrion refusing to believe she's really Sansa Stark when he gets to see her after her death is quite justified: not only she's way older than she's supposed to be, her whole appearance changed, leaving Tyrion fuming about the fact the only thing the "fake" got right was her red hair, which is still the wrong shade of red. Granted, he's right that she isn't actually Sansa. It's just that he thinks she's a entirely different person rather than one of the leaders of the White Walkers who has taken control of her dead body.
- Mugging the Monster: Five Flea Bottom men try to rape her during the riot in King's Landing. The one who gets his neck snapped is by far the luckiest.
- Neck Lift: Does this to a would-be rapist during the riot in King's Landing, followed by a Neck Snap.
- Not So Stoic: She twitches when the Wall is mentioned.
- Seeing Lady's stuffed corpse leaves her freaking out, not least because she doesn't remember giving (apparently very detailed) orders to recover it. The fact that she whispers "help me" as Sandor leaves implies that her control of Sansa's body may not be as complete as she thinks...
- Obfuscating Stupidity: Plays the ditzy, naive noblegirl to the hilt and relishes in the fact that everyonenote believes it to be the real her.
- Plot-Relevant Age-Up: She made Sansa's body five years older when she resurrected it. It's one of the reasons why Tyrion refuses to believe her the genuine article, as she's supposed to be barely into puberty.
- Possession Burnout: Keeping Sansa imprisoned within her body helped stave this off. However, when Sansa found a way to escape, the body began decaying. The Night's Queen fixed this issue by transforming Sansa's body to become more like an Other.
- Statuesque Stunner: By the time Sandor meets her again in A Web of Lies, she's made Sansa's body nearly six feet tall. She then makes her body grow even taller right before his eyes, making her over six feet tall. The Night's Queen also does a little Breast Expansion and hair lengthening in the process.
- Transformation of the Possessed: Aging Sansa's body to adulthood was only the start. Sansa's hair turns from red to blonde, she becomes more and more pale, and she keeps growing taller.
- The Vamp: She gives Sandor a peek of her newly-mature body to seduce him to her cause. Sandor is just as freaked as aroused because she's supposed to be dead and in her early teens.
- Since she didn't update her wardrobe, her dresses clung very much to her form, which makes her quite indecent. Tyrion muses she looks like a Dornish madam. Later Joffrey gives her new dresses but they aren't much better.
- She idly considers using her charms and a Wounded Gazelle Gambit to trick Joffrey and Littlefinger into killing each other.
- She makes use of various perfumes and varnishes her nails to make herself more alluring and exotic.
- She takes it even further in A Web of Lies by taking over the entire prostitution industry in King's Landing.
- Villainous Breakdown: Had one offscreen after Tywin's death in A Shield of Man. Sandor recalls she was furious and panicking, realizing she had to leave the Tower of the Hand immediately since she no longer had protection. By the time Sandor sees her again, she's recovered and established a new power base.
- Walking Spoiler: Pretty much everything about her spoils much of the ongoing plot and the threat of the Others.
The Commander
The Commander a.k.a the Red Skull
The leader of the Others' armies.- Adaptational Heroism: Downplayed. He's still a villain, but where Johann Schmidt in the comics was evil even before he became the Red Skull, Johann in this story was a friend of Steve's whose body was taken over by an Other after he died.
- Appropriated Appellation: Ygritte mockingly calls him "Red Skull", which he seems to like the sound of.
- Arch-Enemy: To Steve, dating back to the War for the Dawn.
- Axe-Crazy: Jojen claims he's going to "coat his head with the blood of the Night's Watch". If literal, this dude seriously needs therapy.
- The Brute: Considered the most vicious member of the Court.
- Composite Character: Between an Other and the Red Skull. He also has shades of Bucky/The Winter Soldier, being a friend of Steve's who died and came back as a villain (though this friend actually died, unlike Bucky who was thought to have died).
- The Dreaded: His skull-like face is said to be the last thing any of his targets will see.
- Flat "What": His response to Jeor attempting to distract him from fighting Ygritte using childish taunts.
- Mad Scientist: Alongside his work as a commander, he also experiments on humans to try and create more powerful servants with the souls of titans.
- The Man Behind the Man: He's the Other that Craster directly worships.
- Manipulative Bastard: Used wights made from wildlings to lead a surprise attack on Eastwatch in order to sow division between the prospective Night's Watch/Free Folk alliance.
- "Not So Different" Remark: He claims Steve is no different from him and seems to see no difference between him using thralls to do his dirty work and Steve fighting alongside humans. Whether he actually believes this or is just trying to mess with Steve’s head is anyone’s guess.
- Unholy Matrimony: With another Other, the female Sarkissian. He outright abducts Ygritte to give his lover a vessel beautiful enough to be worthy of her, and is infuriated when it's implied the sacrifice turned the tables on Sarkissian.
- We Used to Be Friends: His host body was once Steve's friend Johann. He uses this fact to mock Steve repeatedly.
The Traitor (Spoiler)
Warning! This character is a major spoiler for the ending of Book 2. All spoilers are left unmarked.
The Traitor a.k.a. Azor Ahai, a.k.a. Steve Rogers, Captain Westeros
The Court's most mysterious member, of whom absolutely no information has survived. In Chapter 54 of Book 2, he is revealed to be Steve Rogers, Azor Ahai.- Ambiguously Evil: They're part of the Court, but Rickon views them awakening before most of the other members as a good thing. Combined with their title, it raises the question of who they have and/or will be betraying. With the reveal that he was once Steve Rogers, Azor Ahai, it becomes clear that he is firmly on the side of good.
- Anti-Hero: While he falls under Ambiguously Evil above, Chapter 30 of A Crack of Thunder implies that their plan involves allying with Benjen Stark, though it's not clear why. He is shown to be firmly on the side of good with his Big Damn Heroes entrance. Finally subverted when his true identity is revealed.
- Big Damn Heroes: Saves Jeor Mormont, Mance Rayder, and Ygritte when a group of Others attempts to kill them.
- Composite Character: Seemingly one with Coldhands, the undead Watchman fighting against the Others in canon.
- Famous Ancestor: As a son of Lann the Clever and the legendary Azor Ahai, you can bet he's this to the Lannisters.
- Fish out of Temporal Water: Having slumbered for thousands of years, he's out of date on how culture has evolved. In particular, he's shocked to find that most noblewomen no longer fight, hunt, and work alongside their subjects, not understanding why people would obey them if they don't earn the right to it.
- Foil: To his own descendant Jaime Lannister. Both are peerless warriors originating from the Westerlands who committed treachery in order to protect countless innocent people. But Steve is very much a Nice Guy and The Cape, while Jaime is The Oathbreaker and a jackass. They also become different flavors of undead, Steve being an icy Other and Jaime the fiery Ghost Rider.
- Ideal Hero: A bonafide hero that Thor fondly remembers for his bravery and honor. His several millennia after the War for the Dawn hasn't worn him down at all, and he continues to fight in the name of all that is good.
- Innocent Blue Eyes: Being an Other, the Traitor has their typical Occult Blue Eyes, yet his stubborn defense of mankind slots him in this trope.
- I Have Many Names: His birth name is Steve Rogers, but he was known to the North as the Nomad, to the Free Folk as Azor Ahai, and as the Lord Captain of the Knights of the Dawn, all in addition to being the Traitor of the Others.
- Inadequate Inheritor: While not feeling this about himself since his service was honorable back in the day, he does feel that his brother's family has fallen far and become exactly what the Lannisters originally rebelled against. Though he does have mixed feelings about Jamie and Tyrion.
- Living Relic: From the War for the Dawn.
- Pals with Jesus: Several millennia after the War for the Dawn, Thor still remembers him as a great shield-brother and speaks fondly of him.
- Related in the Adaptation: He's the second son of Lann the Clever, and thus distantly related to the Lannisters.
- Slavery Is a Special Kind of Evil: He hates slavers. Considering that the Casterlys enslaved his mother, it’s hard to blame him.
- Spanner in the Works: Rickon seems oddly relieved that the Traitor was the second of the Court to awake after the Night's King. With the revelation that he's Steve Rogers, the heroes just got some unexpected and much-needed backup.
- Token Good Teammate: On two levels; before he betrayed the Others' plot to ruin Westeros in order to side with humanity, he was the second son of Lann the Clever so is this to the Lannisters.
- Un-person: Absolutely no knowledge about him seems to exist in Westeros beyond the name. Though given The Reveal of his identity, it would appear this is because of millennia of Legend Fades to Myth turning him into an in-universe Decomposite Character.
- Walking Spoiler: With the revelations made at the end of Book 2, it's pretty hard to talk about him without bringing up that he's the Westeros counterpart to Captain America and is the Azor Ahai from the original Long Night.
- You Remind Me of X: When Tony Stark sees Steve, he briefly mistakes him for Jaime Lannister due to their strong physical resemblance.
The Winter Soldier
One of the Commander's thralls, formerly Steve's best friend Bucky.
- Artificial Limbs: His left arm is made out of either Valyrian Steel or the improved alloy Steve's shield is made from.
