What do you think the future hold for Aeron Greyjoy? Do you think he’ll call on the Drowned God to punish Euron? Given all the Lovecraft reference in WOIAF, is it possible the Drowned God may appear as some eldritch abomination? Or were the Lovecraft references just an easter egg and have no bearing on the main plot?

I think mostly an easter egg. You don’t want to over-egg the pudding – ASOIAF is about ice (White Walkers) and fire (dragons). Throwing in Deep Ones and Cthulhu, to say nothing of people’s speculation about a Grey Plague bringing about a zombie apocalypse on top of everything else, just muddles the story and reduces the impact of the main event.

For Aeron specifically, the reason why I don’t think he’ll cause Cthulhu to rise from the depths is that **Aeron is a false prophet**. He’s not a charlatan, he completely believes in his own connection to the divinity, but he’s not actually in communion with the Drowned God. We know what being a true prophet of the Drowned God looks like – it’s Patchface, and it’s terrifying divine madness and Cassandraic prophecies that no one understands.