“You’re not really alive, you know.” John jerked around. The red robes of the figure behind him stood behind him stood as a bright contrast to the endless landscape of snow and ice. He knew those robes but not the old woman wearing them. “I knew a red priestess named Melisendre,” John said. “She was younger than you, though. Much younger. And beautiful.” The old woman laughed, sounding like an old woman and at the same time, sounding like the red priestess he once knew. “I am her.” “Why the disguise?” “This?” she put her hand against her cheek, running it along the wrinkled flesh. “This is no disguise.” “So the other you, the young witch that raised me from the dead, that was the disguise? How old are you?” “Older than you would believe.” She lowered her head, looking sad. A sharp, cold wind blew through the valley and she pulled her robes tighter around her. John knew it was cold yet he barely felt it. He barely felt anything anymore. “The Red God me alive. As he does you. I did not bring you back to life. Rhllor did.” “And yet you say I’m not really alive.” She made a gesture that might have been a shrug. “Not in the sense that you used to be. Not as others knew you.” That statement hit him in the gut like the stab of a blade. The looks on the faces of those he loved as they saw him again, resurrected like something unnatural. Like he was a Wight. Samm, Brann, Sanse... they spoke to him with familiarity and yet they knew something was wrong. Even Aria, so tall and confident that he had barely recognized her, seemed to sense something was wrong when she put her arms around him again. And Ghost... the thought of his wolf dug the blade in deeper. John would never forget the way he growled at him when they’d met again and he’d gone to put his hand through the beast’s fur. He’d recoiled as if John were an Other, no longer recognizing him. The last John had seen him, he’d run off north of the Wall, disappearing into the trees. He’d hope to find him as they’d traveled north, deep into the endless winter where the Others hailed from. He’d seen no sign. “Why are you telling me this?” John asked, angry and sad. “Why are you even here?” “Because you are integral to His plan.” "Because you are integral to his plan. You are the Prince that was Promised." John scoffed. "I don't even know what that means. Nobody does. It's nonsense like all prophecy." "You are wrong, John Snow. John Starkk. John Targaryan." She raised a wrinkled eyebrow. "Azor Anai." "That's not me!" He found himself yelling. He reached for Long claw before remembering it was gone, the Valyrian steel blade melted when he'd stabbed it between the eyes of the First Tree. He shivered as he remembered the way the Others merely fell apart, their strange crystal forms disintegrating like ice hit by stone. John had cried as he'd done it. The First Tree was the oldest, the mightiest of the Elder Gods. But the Others were tied to it in a way he would never understand. And yet he couldn't help but think that he'd been too late. The Horn may not have brought down the Wall but the wards were gone. The Others had ravaged their way to the Neck. They may have made it as far as Dorne if not for the Dragon Queen and her beasts, who had only come to aid the realm against the northern threat after destroying half of it in her war with her nephew Aeggon. My half-brother, John thought incredulously. By the time she won her Throne, there was no throne left to claim. King Landing was now a slagged ruin thanks to her dragons. Now the Queen had no throne, had only one dragon left and if the rumors were true, was succumbing to the same madness as her father. John thought of her then, with her violet eyes and her hair as white as sunlight. He'd only met her briefly at the battle of Moat Callen. At the time, he didn't know what he knew now. She was his aunt. His aunt! He still couldn't believe it. His father was not his father. His real father didn't die at the hands of the Lannisters. He died at the hand of Robert bloody Baratteo's hammer. She was more his family than Aria and Sansa and Brann and Rikkon and now she was the Mad Queen and he'd likely never see her again. The thought made him feel more alone than ever. "I'm not part of your prophecy.". "You destroyed the Enemy." Melisendre said it with conviction. "You slew the Enemy by your own hand. Think of all those lives lost getting you this far. Do you think they followed you because you were a Stark or a Targaryan? No, they followed you because you are Azor Anai." John did think about his lost brothers then, following him on what would be their last ranging. Pipp, Ed, so many more. He left them when it got too cold to follow. He knew better than to hope that he'd find them alive. Only he, inhuman as he was, didn't feel the bite of the cold as a normal man should. "The Lord's light keeps you warm when others succumbed to the cold," The Red Woman said, as if reading his thoughts. "Do not mourn your friends. They served a greater purpose." "Well that purpose is served now." "Not just yet." She stepped closer to him. "Your greatest purpose has yet to be fulfilled." John stepped away from her. "What do you mean?" She stepped closer still. "The Lord sent dragons back into the world, his ancient creatures, and even they could not rid him of the Enemy and yet you have. You have removed the final obstacle that stood in his path." "What path?" "Rhollor means to take his Kingdom. With the Enemy gone, nothing stands in his way now. He has searched for a vessel and now he has found it. It was not Stanis, it was not even the Queen of Dragons. It was you." "His... vessel?" John felt terror at the words. Melisendre's eye grew wide and John thought he saw flames in them. "Oh Lord, I may not have been the wisest of your servants but I have been the most faithful. Come to claim your vessel, this man who you restored to life and brought down your Enemy." The snow around John began to melt. A little at first and then a lot. His body felt warm, hot, painful. He wanted to scream. His skin felt like it was on fire and yet there were no flames. "What is happening?!" "Don't fight it!" Melisendre had to yell over a din that filled the air, a cacophony that came from nowhere and everywhere. "Let him take you!" No! John wanted to yell but no longer had the voice. The pain was all consuming now. He felt the flames yet there were none. He fell to his knees and then to his stomach. His eyes closed. John snow knew no more.

Epilogue: Melisendre

  She approached the body lying on the bare ground where the snow had been. He looked no different than John had. He did not move, he did not breathe. 

Have I failed? She thought and despair filled her. She couldn't fail now, not after being so certain. Melisendre knelt down to touch the body. It was like touching fire. As if awakened by the touch, the body began to stand. The red priestess fell to her knees, head to the warm ground. "Stand. Do not grovel." The voice came from the body but it was not John's. It was a terrible voice like shadow wrapped in flame. "My lord... is it really you?" A sword materialized in his hand. It was made of fire. "I am Rhllor, yes." He said, the ground shaking with his voice, his eyes like cavernous . "And I have come to cleanse this world with fire." He looked at her then, his eyes stripping her soul bare. She was more afraid than she’d ever been. Why was she so afraid? This was supposed to be joyous, supposed to be wonderful. “You have served well.” The voice was louder now, it burned in her ears. “You shall serve me one last time. My blade requires blood.” This was it. The moment she’d prepared all of her life for: to give herself to the lord of light. A tear rolled down her cheek, steaming into vapor. She spread her robes apart, baring her heart and the ruby necklace that hung at her breast. The gem glowed, burnt against her skin. There was much pain, but that didn’t matter now. The blade plunged itself into her flesh. The pain was greater than she’d ever known, but at the same time, she welcomed it; welcomed an end to her long life, an end to her servitude, an end to a lifetime of sacrifice. The pain purified, her skin crumbling like parchment and her innards turning to ash. There was joy of a sort, but it quickly turned to horror. When the blade met her body, she made a connection. A connection with a god. It was not something mortal eyes were meant to see. She saw a world bathed in flame, yet the world looked strange like she didn’t recognize it. Somehow she could feel millions of lives burning and dying and yet they seemed unfamiliar. She saw her own world, but older. Somehow she knew it was older. A man stood in the middle of a battlefield, surrounded by men in strange armor with emblems on flags and shields that she didn’t recognize. The man in the center was Rhllor. He wore a different body but the fiery eyes and the flaming sword were the same. He held up his sword and it pulled in all light. The world started to darken in the middle of the day. The men around him started falling to their knees screaming, the closest ones turning to ash. The Long Night, Melisendre thought. The God she served had caused the Long Night. She opened her mouth to shout, to protest, but even if she had a voice left to speak, there was nobody around to hear. She fell to her back, the world going dim, whether from her eyes clouding with death or from her god’s blade blotting out the sun, she did not know. Light and shadow. Her lord of light was also lord over the shadows. Was the Enemy truly the enemy, or rather a protective force to prevent what was happening right now? The last thing she saw was stars in the sky. Stars in the middle of the day. There was no more.