'Game of Thrones': What the hell happened to the White Walker baby from season 4?

The White Walkers on Game of Thrones know how to pull off a dramatic entrance. They’ve been in the wings for years now — eons, even — just waiting for the perfect moment to take over the world. But they had to tease us first: a little ambush here, a little demon baby there. Now, on the eve of season seven of the HBO series, they’re finally ready for the spotlight. Cue: the Night King bursting into the Red Keep singing “I Am What I Am.”

As the White Walkers prepare for their starring role, one question remains on everyone’s minds: What the hell happened to that baby from season four?

Game of Thrones fans will recall that episode four of season four ended with the reveal that the Night King has been converting the infant sons of Craster’s Keep into White Walkers. Shortly after one of Craster’s cronies left Craster’s son out in the woods, a White Walker goon appeared to take him back to the Lands of Always Winter. The Night King then laid a poorly-manicured claw on the baby and turned the child’s not-creepy human eyes into super-creepy White Walker eyes.

The Night King’s goal seemed obvious at the time (strength in numbers), but it is unclear now if the baby from that scene has grown up, and if he’ll play a major role in the wars to come. As we know, White Walkers are a magical humanoid, so it seems likely that they would grow up like normal humans. But that would mean that the baby from season four probably isn’t a grown-up White Walker yet, which would indicate he isn’t ready to join any invading armies. So maybe the Night King is just acquiring babies because they’re adorable. Or maybe he’s literally going to attack Westeros with a terrifying army of babies.

White Walkers also don’t reproduce like normal humans (unless you count converting babies into ice zombies as normal), so we can’t really make any assumptions here. Maybe baby White Walkers grow up more quickly than their human counterparts? The baby from season four could be speaking in full Skroth sentences by now.

The few other facts we know about the White Walkers (they can be killed with Valyrian steel, they can be killed with obsidian, blah blah blah) are only relevant to those that have to fight them. The rest of us just want to know what the hell happened to that baby. We’re waiting, George.

Game of Thrones will return to HBO on July 16.

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