Here’s how Littlefinger is going to try to fix things with Sansa after the whole Ramsay debacle

It’s about time something went right for Sansa Stark. The poor girl (now woman) has been put through the ringer time and time again, all culminating in her horrible marriage to (the even more horrible) Ramsay Bolton. TBH, she needs a well-deserved break.

Fair warning: Season 6 spoilers ahead. So if you’re not yet caught up on the series, now’s the time to turn back. Here’s a Tyrion Lannister GIF in the meantime: 

It was a relief when Sansa was rescued by Brienne of Tarth (and Podrick Payne) and finally allowed Brienne to swear an oath to her. She now has one badass by her side to try and protect her at least a little. But Brianne can only do so much to protect Sansa. And she certainly can’t protect her from Littlefinger, who doesn’t exactly fight the same way knights do.

So it’ll be interesting to see what happens when Sansa finally confronts Littlefinger again, since the last time they were together he had left her to marry (that scumbag) Ramsay. Knowing that Sansa is one of the few people Littlefinger has shown any care for (no matter what his ulterior motives may be), we can only assume that he had no idea about Ramsay’s reputation, let alone the kind of danger she’d be in around him.

But nobody knows Littlefinger (or his intentions) better than the man himself. Or, at least, the actor Aidan Gillen who plays Petyr Baelish (aka “Littlefinger”) on the show (except, of course, George R.R. Martin, but he knows everything, so that hardly counts). And during an interview with Time, the actor discussed how he sees his character’s likely future based on the current events of the show.

“To the viewers who have seen so much of Ramsay Snow, they’ve seen him do all these cruel acts. And you feel like the world knows his reputation. But in the world of our story everyone does not know. A lot happens behind closed doors, or closed gates,” he told Time.

And before you point out that Baelish is a character that’s very in the know, Gillen acknowledges that and says he still doesn’t think Littlefinger realized what awaited Sansa when he left her in Winterfell.

“I know it seems unlikely Petyr Baelish, who knows everything, would be unaware of his reputation and the depths of his cruelty. In a way, this shows a new side of him, a faltering, and I do want to make amends. I like Sansa, you know? So I’m trying to find something humane and gentle and maybe even warm in the midst of my treachery and calculation – which is pathological. That stuff is so much part of Littlefinger I barely notice it. I’m always talking to people about his ‘paternal warmth’ and they’re like, ‘What are you talking about?’ But you can only do what’s on the page.”

Littlefinger is going to have a lot to make up for if he hopes to win back Sansa’s trust (and ours, because the audience is firmly Team Sansa at this point).

But if the trailer for the next episode is any indication, we’ll likely have our answer about how the Littlefinger/Sansa confrontation actually goes down soon enough. We just hope that, for once, somebody actually protects Sansa and gives her some long-overdue back-up. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=

You hear that, Brienne? We’re all counting on you. You got this.