According to Game of Thrones lore, a wildling King-Beyond-the-Wall blew it sometime in forgotten ages past and woke the giants from the earth. In the present, it appears that if the horn is blown it will bring the Wall tumbling down.

Winter has come. The seventh season of Game of Thrones is off and running and with only seven episodes, HBO doesn’t have time to hold our hands and explain things like where characters are, the history of new locations, or how the actions of one character affect the powder keg that is Westeros’ political climate. Luckily, between all of George R.R. Martin’s novels, and The World of Ice and Fire historical tome, there’s plenty of ways to fill in the blanks and we’re here to help. Obviously spoilers will abound, so proceed at your own peril.

Over the years, readers of George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire saga have had to come to grips with the fact that people, places, and events that are important in the novels have been excised from the HBO adaptation. Characters such as Lady Stoneheart have been cut entirely while others such as Jeyne Poole or Arianne Martell had their storylines given to more prominent players in the game. Plots involving everyone from Mance Rayder and Victarian Greyjoy to Quentyn Martell and Young Griff have been left on the cutting room floor. This is not to say these characters won’t have major parts to play in Martin’s novels, but the tale Game of Thrones is telling doesn’t need this many tertiary characters rolling around, bumping into each other and extending the story.

So while Game of Thrones will never see the living corpse of Catelyn Stark hand Dondarrion’s flaming sword to Jon Snow, that sword is still in the show. Dondarrion has it and — based on the trailer — will be using it sooner rather than later. But that isn’t the case for two crucial artifacts that Martin has set in motion in his novels: the two horns. The first is the Horn of Winter, a legendary horn known to the Wildings. The second is the Dragonbinder, a horn in the possession of Victarion Greyjoy in the novel but not even a blip on the radar on the show. While it’s entirely possible neither or these horns will appear in the show, the sheer power they possess would propel the series along towards the inevitable war with the Night King, which makes them candidates to show up as deus ex machinas when the time is right. But first, what are these horns?

The Horn of Winter, otherwise known as Joramun’s Horn, is an ancient magical artifact with the power to bring down the Wall. In the “Age of Heroes” Joramun became the first King-Beyond-The-Wall. Like all good legends lost to the mists of time, no one knows how Joramun came into the possession of such a powerful weapon. I’d say we don’t know if it even exists, but if Martin has hammered home anything it’s that skepticism of magic is the road to death in Game of Thrones. Also lost in the thousands of years of retelling is how the Horn is supposed to bring down the Wall. All the stories say is that blowing the Horn will “wake the giants from the earth.” While some would say that is merely a metaphor of the massive earthquake that would be necessary to bring down 700 vertical feet of ice, I have to wonder if the “giants” are the mythical ice dragons that live beyond the Shivering Sea. Allegedly, ice dragons of old were larger than any Valyrian dragon and melted upon their death. If you were building a giant wall and needed more ice than could be conceivably hauled by sled, would you perhaps use the Horn to lure ice dragons to their deaths to become building material?

Which leads me directly into the second legendary horn: the Dragonbinder. Found in the smoking ruins of Valyria by Euron Greyjoy (if you believe him), this Horn is said to bind the will of any dragon that hears it to the master of said Horn. There’s only one problem: anyone who blows the Dragonbinder ends up cooked from the inside out. So whomever is blowing the Horn is not its master. In A Dance With Dragons, a red priest tells Victarion that he can become the Dragonbinder’s master but it will be paid with a blood price. Should Victarion master the Dragonbinder, Danerys and her dragons would be vulnerable. My personal take, however, is somehow the Dragonbinder will end up in Tyrion’s hands. Call it a hunch.

Now, both of these horns have been described in similar ways. The Dragonbinder is as real as anything, made from a six foot long black dragon’s horn and covered in both Valyrian glyphs and bands of red and gold Valyrian steel. Blowing into Dragonbinder causes the horn to glow red and then white as the heat inside increases. Meanwhile the Horn of Winter has yet to make an appearance in A Song of Ice and Fire, but it isn’t a large a leap to think it is similar in design to the Dragonbinder. The false horn that Mance showed Jon Snow and that Melisandre consequently burned was an eight-foot-long black horn with glyphs of the First Men and bands of gold. It seems reasonable that Mance and his people would base the false horn on stories they’ve heard of what the real one looked like. And if the Valyrian Dragonbinder is designed to bring fire dragons to heel, one could imagine the Horn of Winter might do the same for ice dragons. Of course, this makes me wonder if there’s a horn out there that could call to the mythical and allegedly extinct Sea Dragons…

Should Game of Thrones need either artifact to hasten about the war with the Other, the question then becomes where are they? None of the principal players are still in Essos, meaning a jaunt to Old Valyria to retrieve the Dragonbinder is out of the question. The Horn of Winter is still out there somewhere, perhaps hidden in a secret area beyond the Wall by the Children of the Forest. But the easiest solution would be to combine the Dragonbinder and the Horn of Winter into a single entity and hide it deep within the confines of The Citadel. It’s an elegant solution. The Citadel is already where the most dangerous and exotic magic is kept on lockdown. Everything from glass candles to the secret mysteries of Asshai and Yi-Ti are somewhere in the bowels of Oldtown. And lucky for the North, Samwell Tarly is currently at the Citadel and isn’t afraid to break the rules to gain knowledge. It wouldn’t take much to imagine Sam finding mention of the horns in a forbidden book and going on a spelunking adventure to find it. Perhaps he’d even take greyscale-ridden Jorah along for the ride. After all, if Jorah is going to die, it might as well be because the blew the horn that would simultaneously wake the sleeping ice dragons and bind them to Dany’s will.

The season finale of Game of Thrones just wrapped up Season 6 with an amazing conclusion. The writers this season have plowed ahead full speed, moving the show’s many stories forward at breakneck speed. (WARNING: Spoilers ahead. Seriously.) In just one episode, Game of Thrones killed off at least five major characters in one big explosion, turned Arya into a psychopath, and gave us a new King in the North. So much has happened in the past few weeks. Even so, some theories and plot elements from the book never made a Season 6 appearance. Here are the major events we didn’t see in Game of Thrones Season 6 and the odds of ever seeing them at all.

Lady Stoneheart

Let’s get this one out of the way. In case you’ve somehow missed this significant book spoiler, Catelyn Stark is actually alive (sort of), leading the Brotherhood Without Banners in the Riverlands. Just like Jon Snow’s rebirth, Catelyn has come back from the dead, though maybe a little worse for wear.

Some fans predicted that, despite the showrunners and Michelle Fairley declaring her well and truly dead, Catelyn would appear as Lady Stoneheart in Season 6.

Season 7 Odds: Slim to none. The Brotherhood Without Banners did return this season when the Hound signed up to join their merry band, but there was no undead woman in their ranks. We’ll likely never see Catelyn’s return outside the books.

The Horn of Winter

Also known as The Horn of Joramun, The Horn of Winter is a fabled horn that could bring the Wall crashing down. According to legend, Joramun was a King-Beyond-the-Wall who raised the Giants with his magic horn. It was said that by blowing the horn again, the Wall could come toppling down. If you recall, Mance Rayder allegedly had the horn back during his siege on the Wall. Mance threatened to blow the horn if Jon didn’t give the free-folk safe passage through the Wall.

We were shown the horn being destroyed when Mance was executed. However, Tormund Giantsbane later told Jon that the horn was a fake. The real horn, if it exists, was never found. Could the Horn of Winter still play a crucial role in the war to come?

Season 7 Odds: Very high. During Benjen‘s cold goodbye, he told Bran the Wall has magic spells that prevent the undead from passing through. If the White Walkers hope to pose a threat to Jon Snow’s unified North, they must find a way to actually move south.

The Wolf Pack

Game Of Thrones What If Mace Had Blown The Hornets

All but two of the Stark Direwolf’s lie dead. Ghost, Jon Snow’s wolf, is burying bones somewhere in Winterfell. Where is Arya’s wolf, Nymeria? The show makes a brief hint towards Nymeria’s whereabouts, which are made much more explicit in the books. Nymeria is currently leading a huge pack of wolves through the Riverlands, killing and eating wild game as well as Lannister soldiers.

Season 7 Odds: Slim to decent. Direwolf CGI is expensive, and the showrunners have clearly favored investing their budget in epic battles and flying dragons, which explains Ghost’s absense during the Battle of the Bastards. With Arya back in Westeros though, there’s a chance the huntress reunites with her Direwolf.

The Three Heads of the Dragon

Book readers are intimately familiar with the prophecies delivered to Daenerys in the House of the Undying. One of these prophecies states, cryptically, that “the dragon has three heads.” George R.R. Martin has confirmed that this alludes to each of Dany’s dragons having one dedicated — even destined — rider. He’s also confirmed that these riders need not be Targaryen. The dragons grew massive in size in Game of Thrones Season 6, but only Dany ever rode a dragon.

Game Of Thrones What If Mace Had Blown The Horns

Season 7 Odds: Decent. Why have three dragons when you can only ride one? Now that Tyrion has fully committed to Team Dany, maybe he could be one of the heads. At the same time, the show never actually gave us the “three heads” vision, so this could be a storyline Game of Thrones completely abandons.

Game Of Thrones What If Mace Had Blown The Horned

The Death of Cersei

Game Of Thrones What If Mace Had Blown The Hornet

Back around episode 8, I predicted the Hound would kill Cersei in Season 6. I was clearly wrong. Still, we know from the fifth season that young Cersei visited a witch and received a prophecy that all three of her children would die — which we now know came true. We also know the witch predicted Cersei would die at the hands of the “Valonqar,” which means younger brother in High Valyrian. Is her death imminent?

Season 7 Odds: Very high. With no more children to protect, the time has come for Cersei to die. My new prediction? Jamie will kill Cersei within the first few episodes of Season 7. He is the “younger brother” after all, and he’s already killed one king for trying to blow up King’s Landing. Whose to say he won’t do it again for the Queen that actually did use Wildfire on her own people.