ok u cannot drop roose bolton vampire lore and not elaborate. what is this
in house bolton lore, there’s a lot of mentions of how they may have done more than just flay people back in the day. they might have taken the skin and worn it to skinchange into said people, sort of like how the followers of the many-faced god do in braavos.
the gist of the theory is that “roose bolton” has actually just been the same guy for centuries, skinning his sons and wearing their skin to continue living. in george rr martin’s book fevre dream, vampires extend their lifespan by drinking the blood of young, strong people—literally absorbing their life in the process. roose may have been continuously drinking the blood of his strongest sons to extend his life, then assume their place as the next “lord bolton.”
as for evidence that he’s a vampire, he shares a lot of undead traits with people/creatures like coldhands, such as his voice, which is described as “so soft that men had to strain to hear it.” he also has been known to associate with necromancers like qyburn.
the largest piece of evidence is his appearance and his use of leeches on his body. he’s described as pale with only his eyes moving, and there is a specific passage of ASOS where coldhands describes blood pooling in the extremities + skin becoming “white as milk” once the heart stops beating. roose’s leeches are on his legs, feet, arms, and chest, and he utilizes them frequently, even saying that “frequent leechings are the key to a long life. a man must purge himself of bad blood.”
he’s also described as having a weird smell, like coldhands, and eats next to nothing. descriptions of him eating have his food soaked in blood and practically raw, and he always goes after the extra blood lying around on the plate.
one of his lines talks about reek’s blood “smelling wrong.” who the fuck knows what “wrong” smells like in blood unless you’re a doctor or an animal (or a vampire).
all this evidence alone wasn’t enough for me, and it just made me go, “ehhh maybe.” but after reading fevre dream and seeing the similarities between damon julian + sour billy and roose + ramsay, as well as how george wrote his vampire lore, i was convinced.
this reddit post goes deeper into the theory, and the theory that roose is the night’s king.
