Jon Snow Raises His Sword Beside Ghost — Print & Oil Painting

A single diagonal holds the picture together. The sword enters at the top right corner and travels down across the frame to the fist at the left, passing behind the head on the way, and everything else has been arranged around that line: the shoulders sit under it, the cloak falls away from it, and the red canopy behind opens where it crosses.

The armour is far richer than this character usually gets. Silver-grey plate with engraved panels down the breastplate, articulated tassets over the thigh, a heavy gorget at the throat, and on the left shoulder a full wolf's head cast in metal with its jaws open. Over it all lies a fur mantle of the same colour as the animal beside him.

Ghost occupies the lower right and is painted as a solid mass of white against everything dark. He sits rather than stands, front paws together, head level, muzzle closed, and takes up nearly a quarter of the canvas. The snow falling across the whole image is the same white, which quietly makes the argument that the wolf belongs to the weather.

The direwolf earned his name by making no sound at all, which is the one thing about him that never changes across any version of the story. A picture that gives him this much space and no visible movement understands that. Part of our Game of Thrones collection, near the pair standing together amid fire and sparks.