Game of Thrones Trailer: "Price for Our Sins" (SPOILERS)

Here's another trailer for the upcoming second season of HBO's Game of Thrones, this one based on the second novel in the series, A Clash of Kings.

I actually read the second book in the series, but that was a long time ago.  However, I've been hanging around the forums and the ASOIAF Wiki, so I've got a good idea of what's happening:

*Danaerys and her khalasar are passing through the red wastes and taking casualties.  I think the woman she's holding is one of her handmaidens, who doesn't survive the journey.

*Cersei looks like she's feeling a bit guilty over the death of Eddard Stark--at least that looks like Eddard-- just before she broods about how this is the price of their sins.  It's dark enough that it could be the captive Jaime Lannister, but with the dark hair, it looks more like Eddard.

*We've got Catelyn lecturing Robb about the cost of power.  In the longer version of that scene in the last trailer I posted, she's talking about how she wished he could follow his heart, so again, it looks like we'll be seeing Jeyne-gate.

*There's Melisandre the Red Woman, a witch who believes Stannis Baratheon is some kind of messiah and has the icons of the Seven burned wherever she goes.  And I guess that's Maester Cressen who is leery of her influence.

*It looks like Theon Greyjoy is still with Robb when he makes his "free and independent kingdom" speech.  It looks like someone else is getting dunked in the water, so I'm guessing that's when Theon returns to the Iron Islands and his religious-zealot uncle insists of reconsecrating them to the Ironborn's Drowned God.

*That woman offering herself sexually to some guy is actually Margaery Tyrell and that's Renly Baratheon there.  In one of the earlier trailers when you see it at a distance, I thought it was Robb Stark and Jeyne Westerling.  Given how them getting it on came about because she was comforting him over the apparent death of his brothers, I imagine them actually sleeping together would come on more slowly.

*And just when Varys makes the comment about "the shadow on the wall," we see Melisandre in the throes of what looks like childbirth.  Looks like we'll be seeing her birthing homicidal shadow-babies.

*The ships and the fire look like the Battle of the Blackwater, but I thought that came much later in the chronology.  Maybe it's Stannis's siege of Storm's End?  But in the middle of it, that's Sandor Clegane in the dog-faced helmet.  He wasn't at Storm's End if I remember right, but he was at the Battle of the Blackwater.

Just remember people--April 1st is when it premieres.

In Which the Starks Don't Get Screwed... (Spoilers)

Last night I went to http://www.fanfiction.net/ to see what kind of A Song of Ice and Fire stories were available.  Here's one I found, which I was the first to review:

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/7022988/1/what_well_be

It diverts from the canonical timeline before Ned leaves for King's Landing but we first see the divergence after Petyr "Littlefinger" Baelish leaves Ned and Catelyn alone after their meeting--Catelyn reveals to Ned that she is pregnant.

The "butterflies" (successive changes caused by the first change) from the canonical timeline cascade after this.  Although Ned is still executed, things go much better for the Stark family.  I had to ask the writer for some clarification as to why things went differently, since I've only read A Clash of Kings, the second book in the series, and that was when I was in high school.  Those of you who've read the first book (A Game of Thrones) might have an easier time of it.

I like the Starks more than any of the other families due to their moral, honorable nature, but the bad decisions Ned and Robb make due to following honor before reason lead to all sorts of horrible things happening to their family.  Ned doesn't move against Cersei when he has the chance, Robb sends his friend--who is also his diplomatic hostage--back to his homeland to secure an alliance and said hostage's father invades instead, Robb promises a marital alliance with the Frey family and breaks it to marry a girl whose virginity he took (and is therefore going to have problems finding a husband) after Frey troops die in his service, then he trusts the Freys when the Frey patriarch says he's willing to reconcile...

Irnan (the author) explained how the "butterflies" worked.  I don't want to post them here because that would ruin the story, but they sound plausible to me.  That makes things all the more tragic when you realize how easily things could have gone better.

It would have been better if the dialogue snippet revealing the cause of all this would have been in the actual story instead of the synopsis on the author page.  I sent Irnan a suggestion about how this could be done (another letter at the beginning).

Still, I think it's worth a read.  And if you all could post reviews, that would be nice.  I'm the only one so far.