Littlefinger suggested Sansa use Brienne to murder Arya.
Sansa sent Brienne away (and the following is my theory) to get her and Pod out of the crossfire of the impending showdown and keep Brienne from accidentally putting a spanner in the works of whatever plan Sansa is cooking up to deal with Littlefinger.
You could see Sansa sigh and let her shoulders slump as soon as the door shut behind Brienne–a fun bit of an actress acting that her character had just quit acting
This leaves only 4 players (Sansa, Arya, Bran, and Littlefinger) and one audience (the Lords of the north).
Sansa now knows for certain what Littlefinger is up to (as he overplayed his hand vis a vis his suggestion about Brienne), has the wikipedia Bran if she needs research, and Arya just told her that if she was jealous of Sansa, she could kill her right there and take over her life, but instead handed her the dagger, turned her back, and left the room unarmed. Sansa now has an enormous advantage over Littlefinger, and he does not understand this yet.
I thought he pointed out (not this explicitly) that Brienne is obliged to protect both sisters and would probably get in the way of any attempt on Arya’s life.
There is no way in hell Brienne would ever agree to kill Arya. I do not think she would kill Arya in defense of Sansa and would instead try to intervene in some other fashion.
As such I saw Sansa sending Brienne away as clearing the board for some future scheme.
I think Littlefinger is playing his game here. He actually wants Brienne to leave, but he can’t come right out and say it. Note that is never specifies who would be attacking who. At this point, Sansa hasn’t found out that Arya is all face-changing assassin-y. So she figures she already has basically all of Winterfell protecting her, maybe it would be best to get rid of Brienne in case she moves against Arya. I think she’s playing right into Littlefinger’s plan.
They were talking about Arya going to the nobles with the message she stole, the “planning to harm the other in any way” referred to Arya harming Sansa. He would not openly suggest Sansa harm her sister, only that she protect herself.
Littlefinger says Brienne would be “honor bound to intercede” if she thought one of the sisters was going to harm the other. That is a LONG way from Brienne killing one of them. As I said before, Brienne would work to resolve the issue but would bend over backwards to avoid killing either one and would sacrifice her own life willingly before resorting to that. I am sure Littlefinger knows that too (he has particularly good reads on most people most of the time).
It is my opinion Littlefinger wants Brienne out of the way to further his goals and is manipulating Sansa to do that. Sansa thinks she is being smart here but it is Littlefinger pulling her strings on this.
That just doesn’t track with the conversation they were having. They were talking about Arya harming Sansa, “get Brienne out of the way or she might defend you” simply doesn’t make sense.
Right, but he’s playing the long con. While he’s saying “You should have Brienne defend you against Arya,” he’s also putting in Sansa’s head “Of course, if you want to be preemptive and attack Arya, Brienne would stop you.”
Who, out of all the people in Winterfell, has the most to gain by Brienne being gone? Littlefinger.
I agree mostly but I disagree with the characterization that Littlefinger is saying “have Brienne defend you” on the one hand. Heck, Brienne will do that anyway and as mentioned Brienne would not kill Arya if there was any way to avoid it. It is more the second bit he is insinuating to Sansa.
LF: Perhaps Lady Brienne can help. She’s sworn to protect both of Catelyn Stark’s girls. Did she not?
Sansa: She is.
LF: And if one of you were planning to harm the other in any way, wouldn’t she be honor bound to intercede? (emphasis added)
Sansa: She would.
Sansa has neither means nor ability to harm Arya in any way. The worst she can do is kick her out of Winterfell.
Arya, on the other hand, can harm Sansa politically, by making the raven message public, or could just flat out murder Sansa.
So replace the first bolded bit with “Arya”, and you get:
LF (imaginary): If Arya is planning to harm you in any way, wouldn’t Brienne be bound to intercede?
So, first he is saying that Sansa should not wait until Arya does something–if she suspects that Arya is planning something, that is reason enough to act. Second, he is saying that Brienne is the person to carry out that action.
Personally, I don’t picture Brienne suggesting that her and Arya play 3 out of 5 chess matches and the loser chills out. What I heard was Littlefinger (1) explicitly wanting Brienne in Winterfell, and (2) implying that Brienne would be able kill Arya if Arya does not back down.
On the other hand, I do realize that this is just one of many possible interpretations, and do not in any way maintain that this is the correct one.
I’ve only read the thread up to this post. I may comment on other posts as I come to them.
When it was clear one of their party would die, I wondered why they didn’t just wait for him to expire and then wait until he turns. Seems less dangerous, taking back one of your own who was killed by an undead bear that had been re-killed, than to go up against the zombie army.
Danaeris could have flown north and seen the undead for herself, but the mission was to bring back a ‘walker’ to display to Cersei.
Sansa has a literal army at her beck and call. At the time she gets rid of Brienne, all she knows is Arya is a good sword fighter. She doesn’t know she’s gone all murderbot.
Number one rule, don’t trust Littlefinger. If he’s saying “have Brienne defend/attack/etc.” then that’s not what he really wants.
By cold logic, sure, but I can see how hauling around an undead JoeBob that everyone was eating dinner and laughing with just days before might be a bit more problematic on a human level.
Littlefinger is not telling Sansa to sick Brienne on Arya.
Brienne would not do that and both Littlefinger and Sansa know it. If Arya was walking across the room with sword in hand vowing to kill Sansa Brienne would probably try to talk Arya down or knock her out or something. Anything before killing her.
Brienne is one of the most open books as a character gets in GoT.
It’s perfectly consistent. She didn’t get around to killing Tywin. She wasn’t as skilled and as used to murder yet. And she had other people she wanted to use her three wishes for. She has always hated Sansa and has suspected her motives. It would be inconsistent for her to suddenly treat her as her beloved sister.
Did Tywin ever make it to her list anyway? She always been about going against people who have directly harmed the people close to her. Tywin at the time was just waging a war, but hadn’t done anything too bad yet.
I’m saying it’s inconsistent for Arya to criticize Sansa for not doing more when she herself did not do more. Sansa levels this same criticism when she asks what Arya did when she was at the Sept of Balor. She didnt’ have a response.
I’m saying, Arya’s criticism is not internally consistent. It’s unreasonable to expect that Sansa could do more as a prisoner.
