Catelyn Stark

Catelyn is born at Riverrun, the eldest daughter of Hoster Tully and Minisa Whent. Two brothers die in infancy, so until Edmure is born her father treats her as his heir. She grows up close to her sister Lysa, with whom she invents a private language, and to Petyr Baelish, her father's ward, whom she comes to love like family.

At twelve she is betrothed to Brandon Stark, heir to Winterfell. Petyr, who has been in love with her for years without her knowing, takes it badly.

When the wedding date is set, in 282 AC, Petyr challenges Brandon to a duel and comes out of it badly hurt; Catelyn is sure he'll die, but he survives, and she never sees him again. Brandon leaves promising to return soon, and doesn't: King Aerys II has him killed after he rides to challenge the crown over his sister Lyanna's disappearance. Petyr sends her a letter she burns unread. Her father has already chosen who she'll marry instead: Brandon's younger brother, Eddard.

Catelyn marries Eddard after the Battle of the Bells, having never seen him before. Lysa marries the elderly Jon Arryn the same day. Both husbands ride straight back to war, and Catelyn spends her first year of marriage alone at Riverrun, where Robb is born in 283 AC.

When she finally reaches Winterfell with her son, she finds Eddard already has a baby there, Jon Snow, by a woman he never names. She never fully forgives him for it, and through every year they live under the same roof she makes sure the boy knows he isn't family.

She and Eddard have four more children — Sansa, Bran, Arya, and Rickon — and she makes a name for herself among the northern lords. She once comforts Lynesse Hightower, newly arrived and homesick, telling her that she too struggled to love Winterfell at first. She stays true to the Seven, and Eddard has a sept built just for her.

When Robert's court arrives at Winterfell, Catelyn gets a letter from Lysa accusing the Lannisters of killing Jon Arryn, the Hand of the King. It puts her on guard just as Robert offers the post to Eddard. Catelyn objects, but he takes it anyway.

Soon after, Bran falls from a tower and lies unconscious for weeks. When an assassin comes to finish him off, Catelyn cuts both hands defending him, and rides to King's Landing to warn Eddard. There Petyr tells her the dagger belongs to Tyrion Lannister; on the way back she has him arrested and takes him to the Vale. Tyrion survives the trial, but the war is already moving.

Robb calls his father's bannermen, and Catelyn talks him into putting Roose Bolton in command of the infantry instead of Greatjon Umber. When the army needs to cross the Trident, she negotiates passage with Walder Frey by promising, among other things, Robb's hand to one of his daughters. She stays with the army against her son's wishes, to visit her dying father, and watches Robb win at the Whispering Wood. When word comes that Joffrey has executed Eddard, she argues for peace at the war council in Riverrun, to get Sansa and Arya to safety; the northern lords don't listen, and Lord Umber proclaims Robb King in the North.

Catelyn travels south, to Bitterbridge and then Storm's End, trying to ally Robert's brothers Stannis and Renly against the Lannisters. The mission fails: she's there when Renly is murdered, and fleeing the scene she takes Brienne of Tarth with her, who serves her from then on.

Eddard's bones reach Riverrun, sent by Tyrion as acting Hand. Catelyn has them taken north, to be buried in the crypts of Winterfell beside her brother, sister, and father.

When word — false — reaches her that Theon Greyjoy has killed Bran and Rickon, she frees Jaime Lannister on her own, Robb's prisoner since the Whispering Wood, and puts him in Brienne's charge, hoping to trade him for Sansa and Arya, held captive in King's Landing.

Edmure has her placed under arrest at Riverrun for freeing Jaime, but Robb forgives her once he tells her he's married Jeyne Westerling, breaking his promise to the Freys. Catelyn later attends Edmure's wedding at the Twins.

Something about the ceremony doesn't sit right, and she stays on guard all night. It doesn't help: the Freys turn on Robb and his men in the middle of the feast and kill them all, her included. Westeros comes to call it the Red Wedding.

Three days later, Beric Dondarrion brings her back, giving his own life for hers. She returns maimed: half her hair is gone, the rest white and brittle, her skin softened from days in the water, and the wound in her throat never closes — to speak she has to cover it with her hand, and even then she's hard to understand.

She no longer answers to the name Catelyn. They call her Lady Stoneheart, or the Silent Sister, or the Merciless Mother, or the Hangwoman, and she leads an outlaw band separate from Beric's own. She hangs Petyr Frey and Merrett Frey for what happened at the Twins, and there are stories of a hooded woman near Fairmarket and the Hag's Mire who vanishes into the Neck when Black Walder chases her.

Her men run into a small party led by Brienne of Tarth, still searching for Sansa on Jaime Lannister's orders. Lady Stoneheart sees that Brienne carries Oathkeeper, a Lannister sword forged from Stark steel, and names her a traitor: kill Jaime, or hang alongside Podrick Payne. Brienne refuses both — and just before the hanging, she shouts a single word.