As alarming and stunt-like as it seemed when we first learned that Ed Sheeran would appear in an episode of Game Of Thrones, his actual cameo proved to be much less distracting than it could’ve been. Playing a Lannister soldier who crossed paths with Arya Stark on a journey to King’s Landing, Sheeran was really just there to sing a little tune and humanize the dudes that Arya had believed to be straight-up evil ever since their army slaughtered her entire family. It was a fine sequence, but some Game Of Thrones viewers were disappointed that Sheeran’s character didn’t get killed—either by super-assassin Arya herself or in the enormous, dragon-assisted battle that occurred shortly after their meeting. As far as anyone knows, then, Lannister Ed Sheeran is still somewhere out in Westeros, adding weird rap breaks to his songs and doing that audio loop trick he likes in his live shows.
Apparently, Sheeran himself now wishes that weren’t the case, if only because he selflessly knows that it would make people happy for his Game Of Thrones character to be dead. Speaking with BuzzFeed while playing with some cats (classic BuzzFeed), Sheeran said that he thinks his character is still out there “chillin’”, and while he had fun being on the show, it would’ve been “redemption” for the people who didn’t like his cameo if he had been “brutally, brutally murdered.”
The character who sings songs and looks like Ed Sheeran doesn’t appear in George R.R. Martin’s original books, but maybe, as a favor to the kid, he can add a paragraph to Winds Of Winter where Ed Sheeran gets killed.