Everyone loves Jaqen H’ghar. It’s hard not to; dude’s pretty tight. Arya first meets him in A Clash of Kings; he is a prisoner from the black cells of King’s Landing, bound for a life on the Wall.

But he’s not, is he? He’s a Faceless Man, one of the mysterious assassins from the free city of Braavos. There’s already plenty of speculation about where he is in the books. Based on the first and last chapters of A Feast for Crows, Jaqen H’ghar is now in Oldtown, impersonating a maester candidate named Pate. Why? Well, that’s for the end of the essay. In the first section, we’re going to look at what it takes to hire a Faceless Man…and why one would be in the Black Cells. In the second section, we’ll look at some potential motives for hiring a Faceless Man. Then we’ll take a look at Jaqen’s post-ACOK movements to see what the Faceless Men might be up to as a whole.

Take a breath and bite the coin, we’re going to have a wild ride!

Hiring a Faceless Man

Our first mention of the Faceless Men comes long before we see them on-screen. In A Game of Thrones, the small council under Robert Baratheon briefly discusses hiring a Faceless Man to kill Daenerys Targaryen. Petyr Baelish makes an interesting comment:

“Do you have any idea how costly they are? You could hire an army of common sellswords for half the price, and that’s for a merchant. I don’t dare think what they might ask for a princess.”

However, we have a quote from GRRM that adds some dimensions to this comment –

“The Faceless Men don’t post a list of prices on their door. The way it works, you go to them and tell them who you want killed, and then they negotiate the price. The more prominent the victim, the more difficult to get to, the more dangerous for the assassin and the guild, the higher the price.”

Essentially, the Faceless Men never charge more than their contractor can afford – the price is high and dear, but is always within the means of that person. So a beggar could offer up everything he owns, his favorite dog, his child, whatever the Faceless Men ask – but he could pay it, in theory.

Why does this make Littlefinger’s comment interesting? Because it suggests that Baelish has had experience with the hiring process of the Faceless Men. Littlefinger is a wealthy, wealthy man, not least because of his complex embezzling schemes. Moreover, Littlefinger loves to hide little jokes for himself in his offhand comments. I’m going to quote Stephen Attwell of Race for the Iron Throne on Littlefinger and his personality:

“…he’s clearly talented at manipulating people whose character he’s familiar with, he is very decisive in seizing his chances, but he’s also reckless and impulsive. His spiriting away of Catelyn, the dramatic way he revealed his ownership of the dagger, and the way he will later needle Eddard all speak to a deep-seated need to prove his superior intelligence to those around him and insert himself into the foreground.”

I find it entirely within the realm of possibility that Littlefinger is purposefully dangling actions of his in front of the small council, taunting them in his mind. To revisit his quote about Faceless Men:

“Do you have any idea how costly they are? You could hire an army of common sellswords for half the price, and that’s for a merchant. I don’t dare think what they might ask for a princess.”

Now, I can’t think of any merchants who have actually been assassinated that we know of. Indeed, there aren’t many named merchants in the series…except Illyrio Mopatis, of course. But that’s getting into the area of wild speculation. The long and short is: I believe Littlefinger hired a faceless man to kill a merchant who was somehow causing trouble for him.

Could this Faceless Man be Jaqen H’ghar?

Well, not necessarily. I don’t think Littlefinger had anything to do with hiring Jaqen H’ghar, even with his immense funds. Instead, I think we should ask: why would a Faceless Man be in the Black Cells? Faceless Men make a point of not getting caught – and we later see Jaqen commit some crazy-insidious murders without ever being so much as implicated. He changes his identity after going full murder-loony, a perfect escape mechanism. I’m going to make an assertion: he was in the Black Cells on purpose. But why?

There is exactly one character who, in almost every book, has been somehow lurking in the Black Cells: Varys. Varys led a double (or triple, or quadruple) life as Rugen the Undergaoler in the Black Cells. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to assume that Varys was somehow the reason Jaqen was in the Cells. The real question is: was Jaqen hired to kill Varys, or hired by Varys?

A City Full of Murderable People

The first option is an interesting one, but seems unlikely. Who would have the motive and means to assassinate Varys? You might be saying “LITTLEFINGER! LITTLEFINGER! YOU SPENT ALL THAT TIME TALKING ABOUT LITTLEFINGER!” But I don’t think Littlefinger would try to kill Varys. In one of his interactions with Ned or Cat, he tells them that he has Varys by the balls…or would, if Varys has balls. Littlefinger likely knows nothing about Varys’ plans regarding Aegon and Dany – and even if he did, why would he assassinate Varys? What does he gain by assassinating Varys?

There is only one answer I might consider: Varys knows the truth about the dagger. When Littlefinger tells his lie about the dagger to Catelyn, Varys is present and would be able to bring up the truth. While he had no motive to do so at the time (Varys seems to have adopted a “wait-and-see” approach to Pety’s plans), there’s no telling what Varys might do in the future. Littlefinger might well want to take Varys out of the picture. But I doubt he’d buy a Faceless Man for the job; it’s more his MO to use indirect underlings who can be cleaned up easily, and there’s no reason to pay the doubtless-exorbitant fees for a Faceless Man when he could just hire some Blood-and-Cheese-style cutthroats to do the job for cheap.

Let’s turn to the alternative. What if Varys hired a Faceless Man? He and Illyrio doubtless have the resources; casually acquiring three dragon eggs is no mean feat in this story. But who would Varys’ target be?

There’s Robert Baratheon, but Varys and Illyrio, per their conversation in Arya’s chapter, don’t seem ready to make the move to destabilize Westeros quite yet. Besides, Robert’s death is too messy for a Faceless Man. They seem to specialize in single-instance “accidents” – a poisoned coin to look like a heart attack, a pack of savage dogs, a fall from a high bridge. Basilisk venom could have been used on the boar, but that adds a whole level of logistical complexity that just isn’t necessary, given that we know Cersei and Lancel were feeding the king drugged wine. Bob seems safe, so to speak.

What about Ned? He might be a candidate. Going back to Arya’s chapter, Illyrio says to Varys “One hand could die. Why not another?” Now, I think this actually refers to Jon Connington’s fake death, and that Illyrio is suggesting they black-bag Ned and recruit him for their long con. Besides, if you hire a Faceless Man, you probably know who your target is. You’re beyond conversations about “well maybe we should kill Ned – no maybe not.”

There are millions of candidates, of course. King’s Landing is a city full of murderable people. But let’s jump ahead a little and see if what we can learn from Jaqen’s post-ACOK movements.

Movements of the Faceless Men

My source for the following section is the ASOIAF timeline document – highly recommended.

Jaqen leaves Harrenhal. Then, about 90 days later, Balon dies at Pyke. Now, it should take about 30something days to get from Harrenhal to Pyke – easy peasy lemon squeezy. However, I’m not convinced that Jaqen is the one who killed Balon Greyjoy. In fact, I believe the Dusky Woman is a Faceless Man (or Woman), and that Euron hired her to kill both of his brothers. Crazy? Maybe, maybe not. Think of the other Faceless Men Arya sees in the House of Black and White. They all get an adjective: the Kindly Man. The Handsome Man. The Fat Fellow. The Stern Face. The Starved Man. The Plague Face. I don’t think it’s out of the question that GRRM is hinting to us that the Dusky Woman might be Faceless as well as tongueless. We know the Faceless Men aren’t always men, although they do tend to prefer men to women.

Let’s assume, then, that Jaqen H’ghar leaves Harrenhal and returns to Braavos. It’s about a month and a half to Braavos from Harrenhal, assuming he’s able to find a ship somewhere on the east coast. In Braavos, perhaps, he is given his next assignment: go to Oldtown and research the dragon egg that Euron gave the Faceless Men as payment for killing his brothers. It’s only about 25 days by boat from Braavos to Oldtown, and the timeline works pretty nicely. About 160 days pass between Jaqen leaving Harrenhal and Jaqen killing Pate in Oldtown, so that gives enough time for a 45-day trip to Braavos, time in the House of Black and White, and then a 25-day trip to Oldtown.

My point here is this: there are 160 days (again, roughly) between when Jaqen leaves Harrenhal and when Jaqen shows up again in Oldtown. That’s a period of time long enough for him to have gone almost anywhere in the relevant sphere of Narrow Sea/Westerosi politics. He very well could have gone to Pyke and killed Balon. But how would he know to kill Balon? And besides – how would being in the Black Cells help him kill Balon? If his end goal was Balon, why would he be in the Black Cells? Even if he was the Faceless Man who killed Balon, he would have had to get that assignment from somewhere – and that somewhere, in my opinion, is home base, in Braavos. Faceless Men probably make the crossing often – the crew of the Titan’s Daughter certainly know how to handle having a Faceless Man on board. I believe Jaqen returned to Braavos after Harrenhal – and the fact that he shows up again in Oldtown implies to me that he was considered successful in his mission as Jaqen H’ghar. After all, he isn’t Jaqen anymore, he’s The Alchemist – and he keeps that face, and the Faceless Men (as far as we know) haven’t punished him for messing up his assignment. Which raises the question: what’s his “real” face? I’d argue that the Alchemist is his “real” face, and that Jaqen was an assumed identity.

This all leaves us with two options: either Jaqen killed his target, or his target died before he could reach them.

It could well be Ned Stark. Varys may have wanted to eliminate Ned Stark on the road to the Wall, although that may have had the destabilizing effect that Varys wanted to avoid. After all, he seemed pretty genuinely committed to keeping Ned alive (and like I linked above, I think he may have wanted to black-bag Ned and recruit him for the Illyrio/Varys conspiracy cause).

Conclusion

Look, let’s not beat around the bush: Jaqen H’ghar is a big fucking mystery. His presence in the Black Cells is nigh inexplicable; our only hope is that his presence in Oldtown means we’ll finally get some closure on the motives of the Faceless Men. In terms of people who die in accidents between his disappearance at Harrenhal and reappearance at Oldtown, the list is strangely short: Balon Greyjoy. But as I’ve outlined, Balon doesn’t seem like the original target.

I’m going to lay out my own proposed idea for what Jaqen was up to, but you’re free to draw your own conclusions.

I believe Jaqen was involved in Varys’ plans to either black-bag or kill Ned, but that those plans went pear-shaped with the death of Ned Stark. Jaqen bided his time, looking for a good chance to escape. He did so with Arya’s help, but had to stick around to take care of his life-debts. Once free of that obligation, he returned to Braavos, where he received orders to go to Oldtown and get access to the secrets of hatching dragon eggs.

That’s not too crazy, right?