Battle of the Bastards

After Robb Stark and most of his bannermen are slaughtered at the Red Wedding, the throne rewards House Bolton with rule of the North for their betrayal. With Joffrey and Tywin Lannister already dead, Roose Bolton looks to secure that position and, through Petyr Baelish's arrangements, agrees to marry his son Ramsay to Sansa Stark, until then a Lannister hostage.

The marriage turns into a trap for Sansa, who only manages to flee Winterfell with Theon's help during Stannis Baratheon's failed assault on the castle. She crosses the frozen land to Castle Black, where she finds her half-brother Jon Snow, newly returned to life and about to leave the Night's Watch.

The birth of a son to Roose and his new wife leaves Ramsay's inheritance in doubt. To keep it, Ramsay kills his own father and sets his hounds on his stepmother and the infant, left as sole lord of the Dreadfort, of Winterfell, and Warden of the North.

Sansa asks Jon to help her take back Winterfell, and he, weary of fighting, resists until a letter arrives from Ramsay threatening to kill the wildlings traveling with them and to hand Rickon and Sansa herself to a worse fate unless they surrender. Jon decides to march on the castle.

Houses Karstark and Umber, still bitter toward the Starks, side with Ramsay, so Jon and Sansa can only add the Free Folk and the North's lesser houses: Mazin, Hornwood, and Mormont. House Glover refuses, still stung by getting no help when Balon Greyjoy invaded their lands.

Sansa sends Brienne to the Riverlands to seek her great-uncle Brynden Tully's aid, but he won't abandon Riverrun and dies soon after when the Freys and Lannisters take the castle. Without telling Jon, Sansa also writes to the Vale, asking Littlefinger for help.

On the eve of the battle, both sides meet to parley. Ramsay offers to pardon Jon if he hands over Sansa and bends the knee; Jon, knowing Ramsay has broken his word before, proposes single combat instead, to spare both armies. Ramsay refuses, confident his troops are larger and better armed.

When Ramsay threatens to kill Rickon, Jon Umber answers by throwing Shaggydog's severed head at his feet. Sansa, unshaken, tells Ramsay he will die the next day and to sleep well while he still can.

Back at camp, Jon plans to use Ramsay's temper to lure him into a pincer while Tormund avoids a head-on clash with the enemy's horsemen. Sansa scolds him for not consulting her and warns that she knows Ramsay better than he does; Jon promises to protect her, but she answers that no one can anymore.

That same night, Davos and Tormund talk about how little good came of believing in their old kings, Stannis and Mance. Jon visits Melisandre and asks that, if he dies in the battle, she not bring him back again; she answers that this is not hers to decide, but the Lord of Light's.

At dawn, the Stark army takes position by a treeline to avoid being surrounded from behind, while the Boltons display flayed corpses as range markers. Ramsay brings Rickon onto the field, and the instant the boy runs for Jon, kills him with an arrow.

Beside himself, Jon charges alone at Ramsay's lines, and the rest of his troops follow. Ramsay's archers fire into both sides to cut off any retreat, and the Bolton infantry closes a shield wall around the Starks, who start falling by the score.

Just as the battle seems lost, a horn sounds: the Knights of the Vale, with Sansa and Lord Royce at their head and brought by Littlefinger, charge the Boltons' exposed flank and break their encirclement. Tormund kills Jon Umber in single combat.

With no troops left in the field, Ramsay withdraws to Winterfell to hold out behind its walls; Jon pursues him with Tormund and the giant Wun Wun. Ramsay counts on surviving the siege, but Wun Wun breaks down the main gate and lets the Starks and the Arryns through, who cut down the remaining Bolton garrison.

Riddled with arrows and spears, Wun Wun falls to his knees and Ramsay finishes him with a shaft through the eye. Ramsay, with no army left, mocks Jon for finally accepting the duel he himself once offered, and shoots at an unarmed Jon; Jon blocks the arrows with a shield and beats him down.

About to kill him, Jon stops when he sees Sansa arrive and leaves the last word on Ramsay's fate to her. He has Ramsay locked in the kennels, and the flayed man's banner falls as the direwolf flies over Winterfell again after three years.

The victory comes at a heavy price: of the 2,400 men who marched out for the Starks, only about 800 remain standing, and no house in the North has strength to spare. With Rickon dead, Winterfell is left in the hands of a bastard son, Jon, and the eldest daughter, Sansa.

Sansa goes down to the kennels to see Ramsay; he tries to taunt her, but she tells him that his house and his name will soon be forgotten. Ramsay's own hounds, starved for seven days, turn on him and devour him.

With Ramsay dead, the Starks finally settle the score House Bolton left open at the Red Wedding. The men of the North proclaim Jon King in the North, and the deaths of Harald Karstark and Jon Umber leave Alys Karstark and Ned Umber at the head of their houses.