We know Sansa has a connection to the Seven through her wishes, but do you think the same could be said of the Old Gods? Also, do you see magic in her future storyline like the rest of her siblings? Thank you!
Of course, she has a connection to the Old Gods too. GRRM confirmed all the Stark children are wargs, even if Sansaâs abilities didnât have the chance to manifest at the same time as her siblings since she lost Lady so quickly. Skin changing was already inherently in her and still is. Itâs just that the ability is dormant for the most part. The connection between Sansa and Lady never weakened either. I already wrote about this here a while back, and it may have to do with Ladyâs bones and hide being interred in Winterfell. She still longs for her, dreams of her, and even feels her direwolfâs presence close by sometimes. I donât think sheâs aged-out (if thatâs possible) of ever skin changing an animal since sheâs still younger than Robb and Jon when they received their direwolf pups.Â
Sansa was also bonding with the old blind dog on the Fingers, but their time together was also cut short. Dogs are the easiest to skin change according the Varamyr prologue, so in theory Sansa could have started to have âdog dreamsâ if sheâd stayed in physical contact with the dog. Her time in the Vale has had her separated from animals, but that doesnât mean it will always be so. Thereâs always the possibility of skin changing a bird like a falcon perhaps. Â
And ya know, she does have a greenseer little brother that she was always close to that might be able to help her grow her magical side. Maybe even break in an animal for her to make it easier to slip into perhaps? Thatâs a thing. Â
Slipping into Summer's skin had become as easy for him as slipping on a pair of breeches once had been, before his back was broken. Changing his own skin for a raven's night-black feathers had been harder, but not as hard as he had feared, not with these ravens. "A wild stallion will buck and kick when a man tries to mount him, and try to bite the hand that slips the bit between his teeth," Lord Brynden said, "but a horse that has known one rider will accept another. Young or old, these birds have all been ridden. Choose one now, and fly." -- Bran III, ADWD.
I donât see any evidence that the door is permanently shut on her skin changing something eventually.Â
But if you mean does she have a connection to the Old Gods through prayer, the answer is yes too.
The night the bird had come from Winterfell, Eddard Stark had taken the girls to the castle godswood, an acre of elm and alder and black cottonwood overlooking the river. The heart tree there was a great oak, its ancient limbs overgrown with smokeberry vines; they knelt before it to offer their thanksgiving, as if it had been a weirwood. Sansa drifted to sleep as the moon rose, Arya several hours later, curling up in the grass under Ned's cloak. All through the dark hours he kept his vigil alone. When dawn broke over the city, the dark red blooms of dragon's breath surrounded the girls where they lay. "I dreamed of Bran," Sansa had whispered to him. "I saw him smiling." -- Eddard V, AGOT.
It might be something that Sansa dreams of her greenseer brother in the godswood after theyâve received word of Bran awakening from the coma where his own third-eye was opened by the three-eyed crow. If this scene isnât a glimpse of the future in ADOS, Iâll eat my hat.Â
Sansa is a person of faith who observes both her religions, albeit for a time she favored the aesthetics of her motherâs faith more than her fatherâs. Â
She prayed in both the sept and the godswood for her father, unfortunately to no avail on that one. In the crisis of her captivity, she makes more space for the Old Gods in her religiosity. Â
By the time she reached the godswood, the noises had faded to a faint rattle of steel and a distant shouting. Sansa pulled her cloak tighter. The air was rich with the smells of earth and leaf. Lady would have liked this place, she thought. There was something wild about a godswood; even here, in the heart of the castle at the heart of the city, you could feel the old gods watching with a thousand unseen eyes.
Sansa had favored her mother's gods over her father's. She loved the statues, the pictures in leaded glass, the fragrance of burning incense, the septons with their robes and crystals, the magical play of the rainbows over altars inlaid with mother-of-pearl and onyx and lapis lazuli. Yet she could not deny that the godswood had a certain power too. Especially by night. Help me, she prayed, send me a friend, a true knight to champion me . . . -- Sansa II, ACOK.
I donât think Sansa ever really turns away from her belief in the Seven to embrace the Old Gods as much as some claim. Itâs the Seven she prays to during the Blackwater and the Mother she invokes when she sings for Sandor Clegane. She wants to light candles in the sept to ask the gods to protect Margaery and Loras. Itâs more that sheâs disillusioned with some of the earthly institutions and that causes a momentary flash of anger at the gods for (in her mind) never hearing her prayers.Â
When sheâs in the Eyrie, a place devoid of spiritual connection or comfort, Sansa feels the pain of loss of both her religions.
It was the old days she hungered for. Prayed for. But who could she pray to? The garden had been meant for a godswood once, she knew, but the soil was too thin and stony for a weirwood to take root. A godswood without gods, as empty as me. -- Sansa VII, ASOS.
Even the gods were silent. The Eyrie boasted a sept, but no septon; a godswood, but no heart tree. No prayers are answered here, she often thought, though some days she felt so lonely she had to try. -- Sansa II, AFFC. Â
During this period of time, Sansaâs faith has taken a real beating from being manipulated and coerced into being a part of Littlefingerâs crimes. Cynicism and corruption appear to be winning for the time being as Littlefinger rises and succeeds in the Vale. The presence of spirituality in her inner dialogue has grown ever more faint and weary; however, as Iâve shown above, a restoration of faith is likely as she progresses toward Winterfell and reuniting with her siblings. Does that mean she will begin to embrace the Old Gods (and magic) and to let go of the Faith of the Seven? Maybe, we have to wait and see. Or itâs possible she expands her consciousness to accept more of both in her life.Â
Martin is a lapsed Catholic and atheist himself, but he never treats Catelyn or Sansaâs religiosity with the Seven as a joke or as less than religions that have demonstrable magic attached to them. I think it helps to keep in mind GRRMâs position on the nature of the relationship between characters, religion, and magic:
âWell, the readers are certainly free to wonder about the validity of these religions, the truth of these religions, and the teachings of these religions. I'm a little leery of the word "true" â whether any of these religions are more true than others. I mean, look at the analogue of our real world. We have many religions too. Are some of them more true than others? I don't think any gods are likely to be showing up in Westeros, any more than they already do. We're not going to have one appearing, deus ex machina, to affect the outcomes of things, no matter how hard anyone prays. So the relation between the religions and the various magics that some people have here is something that the reader can try to puzzle out.â
