GHOST
All he remembered was red.
Red snow. Red eyes. Red blood, red hair, red ruby, and the red of the flames that devoured him, wrapped him as tenderly as a mother with her babe. But he had never known his mother. Perhaps he had been born there, in the smoke and steam and snow, except he knew that he had died. Or was meant to, at any rate. It was impossible to recall, to form any coherent thought. There was only light. Red light.
He had one distant, fragile memory, and he struggled to hold onto it, for it reminded him who he was. Watching Wun Weg Wun Dar Wun tear apart Ser Patrek of King's Mountain, shouting at the queen's men to put the blades away before they provoked the giant further, turning to see Whit Whittlestick slashing at his neck. . . fumbling for Longclaw, more shouts, screams, Bowen Marsh standing before him with tears on his cheeks, and the dagger in his belly, the one in his back, the one between his ribs. The way the wound smoked in the frigid night air, and the roiling darkness that crashed over him like a tidal wave. Cold. He remembered that too. It was in him to his bones, if he even still had them.
He drifted. He was not awake, he did not know how much time had passed. Time itself existed at a far remove, something at the other end of that light, and he was scared to go much deeper into it. Yet if he went too far away from it, he began to become aware that he was waking up, and the pain that hit him then was almost indescribable. I cannot wake and live. He was certain of it, without knowing how. Whatever flesh awaited him was too damaged to house his soul.
I have become a ghost, then. It would have made him laugh, but he had no mouth or breath with which to do so. He was not at rest in the hereafter, and he was not alive; he was caught halfway between. At times he felt as if both sides were in battle for his soul, as if they would rend the flimsy thing like the silk of a lady's gown. But my lady wore fur and skins and leathers, and killed an old man for building a fire. Then as if Ygritte had been summoned by the words, he would see her hovering above him, but he could never touch her no matter how hard he struggled. Sometimes she looked angry, other times merely sad. You know nothing, Jon Snow, she would whisper, and vanish, a grey-fletched arrow sprouting between her breasts and turning her to ashes.
He saw many things, for that matter. There was Lord Eddard, headless, and Lady Catelyn, eyes burning like corpse-candles in the shredded ruin of her face. There was Robb with snowflakes melting in his hair, as he had looked on the day they said goodbye for the last time, and then there was Robb with his head savagely hacked off, his mutilated body oozing blood as he looked up with Grey Wind's mournful dead eyes. There was Sansa trapped in a castle of ice, with a huge burned shadow with the head of a dog looming above her, and a black-blooded shadow the size of a mountain towering above them both. There was Bran entangled in the roots of some monstrous tree, his own body growing fainter and more distant every day, and then there was baby Rickon surrounded by a thousand blue-eyed specters in a land of always winter. Snow. All of them. Snow, snow, Snow.
And then there was one he did not see. Where is Arya? Even in his delirium, he knew she was not there with the rest of the shades of his dead family. Instead, he flew into a land of red mountains, the sunlight as brilliant as the edge of a spear and the sand blowing in the wind. There stood a man with a sword as pale as milkglass, and two more, one with a helm forged in the shape of a black bat and the other who wore the device of a white bull. And behind them all, a faceless woman who wore a crown of blue roses lay in a bed of blood. Promise me, Ned, she cried, and crumbled away.
The red beat against his skull. I am burning in a cage of ice. Then he was twisting and struggling, and faintly, through a haze of pain, he caught a glimpse of Winterfell. He knew it was Winterfell, even though it was burned and desolate and half in ruins, sacked and soot-stained, forty-foot drifts of snow climbing its towers. He flew above it to the godswood, where the hot pools bubbled and the red face stared up at him, ancient lips moving. Jon, it whispered. Jon, Jon, Jon.
He tried to speak, but the words were only dust. The tree became Bran's face and then someone else's, with long white hair and one red eye and a red birthmark on its hollow cheek. Red. Always red. The tree lifted a trailing branch. Smoke, it said. Smoke and salt. A thousand eyes and one.
Jon Snow did not know the face, yet somehow it seemed part of him nonetheless. Who are you?
I am you, it answered. But you are more.
And the darkness began to close in, swallowing him, until he began to panic. Don't go, he wanted to scream, at whatever phantoms were walking the netherworld with him. Don't leave me!
His only answer was a faint and fading whisper. Kill the boy, it told him. Kill the boy, and let the man be born.
Something that might have been harp music sounded far away, in sweet, low, mourning chords. A song so sad the dead would weep. Then the entire world went black, and Jon recognized that he was about to wake. He struggled violently, but he had no choice. He rose upwards. What am I waking into?
And then he contorted, gasped, choked, and opened his eyes to find himself curled up on a sheet of ice.
Jon merely lay there for several moments, exhausted by even that simple effort. The world would not stop spinning, and the walls of the cell were translucent, veiled with hanging draperies of icicles. The cold was like nothing he had ever encountered, fierce and painful as being hit in the chest. Yet it was queerly bracing as well.
At length, he attempted to get to his feet. Yet something was wrong. He could not stand up straight, was on hands and knees, moving about on all fours. Claws clicked on the ice, and he tried to look around to see what was behind him. But his head did not move as he was accustomed to. His nose was keener and his eyes. . . what was wrong with his eyes? And then he looked straight ahead, and got the most horrid shock of all.
His own body lay in front of him. The grey Stark eyes were open and staring vacantly at the ceiling, the hands folded on the chest in preparation for a tomb-carver, the long brown hair lying untidily around the solemn, gaunt face. It was naked but for a light shroud draped over it, and the half-healed knife wounds showed through the cloth, vivid weals on throat, side, belly, the one in its back obscured only by virtue of the fact that the corpse was lying on it. Its chest did not rise and fall. Its flesh was cold and pale and hard, bloodless.
The shock was so titanic that Jon's head went light. I am dead after all, he realized. There could be no denying it, not with the proof so paramount before him. But then what am I? How can I be thinking, how can I know who I am, if I am not –
Then he looked down. The legs beneath him were four in number, not two. And they were covered with heavy white fur, ending in broad paws, not feet. He had been more correct when he knew, when he said that he had become a ghost. My wolf. I'm in my wolf.
Understandably, all things considered, Jon went slightly mad.
He began to gallop in frantic circles, skidding and sliding, tearing gouges out of the ice with his claws. He could feel something rising in his head, something that did not belong to him and yet did, something that must be Ghost's own soul, buried deep when Jon had invaded his body. Wildness, wolfblood. It grew stronger and language vanished only ice fire ice fire ice fire, burning always burning –
A door opened, and the red woman stepped inside.
On sight of her, every one of Ghost's hackles rose and stood, bristling. He bared his teeth, backing protectively toward Jon's body. If the female came too close, if she tried to touch him – he would rip, teeth dig deep and taste the flesh and blood as red as the ruby that pulsed at her pale vulnerable neck –
Slowly, carefully, the red woman knelt. She held out both long-fingered, elegant hands, a gesture of pacification. "You do not need to be afraid of me, brother," she said, in that voice rich and mellifluous with the accents of Asshai. "Please, be calm. In time, all will be as it was meant to be."
Melisandre. It was Jon who knew that name, and while he quelled Ghost's desire to tear out her throat, this did not engender any sudden desire to trust her. In fact, it made him leerier than ever, and he had already discovered one of the signal disadvantages of his new body: he had no voice. For a brief, completely ludicrous moment, he found himself wondering if a wolf's paw could hold a quill.
What did you do to me? That was the first and most pressing question of all. Where am I? That was the second.
The red priestess smiled. "You are safe, Jon," she said reassuringly. "You are in a place where no one will find us. Not until you are ready."
Ghost pawed the floor threateningly, attempting to secure a more specific answer. But the cold, the ice, the sense of both protection and malevolence. . . he knew, somehow. The Wall. We are inside the Wall itself.
"As for what has been done to you, it does not come from me," Melisandre went on. "You may thank god for his gift of good healing light, for the fire that flooded your lungs. Elsewise, you would have gone to the ice and dark of the Great Other. That is what awaits if you deny R'hllor's power once more, Jon Snow. You must know that."
Jon did not care about her red god now that he was a wolf, any more than he had when he was himself. I want my body back, he thought at her angrily. I want my men. I want my little sister. Arya. Where is Arya?
Either Melisandre did not understand this, or chose not to. "You were saved for a great purpose," she said, her red eyes gazing intently into his own. "But there is more trial before you yet. This is only halfway. Only death may pay for life, Jon Snow, and this is a life dearly bought. You have not yet burned. You must."
What in damnation is she talking about? All Jon could remember was burning. When Melisandre reached out a hand toward him, he backed away. She will make me into some sort of sacrifice if I let her. But what? For what?
"A great storm began four nights ago," the red priestess went on. "It will not cease until Castle Black and all else is veiled in drifts fifty and a hundred feet deep. You are finally in your wolf – it took many spells, many fires, many workings for me to find you, but some of it was your own, for you are a skinchanger in truth now. And not a moment too soon. The servants of the Great Other are very strong. They march on the Wall in a force not seen since the Long Night. In less than three weeks, they will be here – and the snow will not have stopped. Think of what that means, Jon. Think."
How do you know? Jon had too much bitter experience with Melisandre's so-called foretelling to swallow this without several spoonfuls of salt.
This question the red priestess opted to answer. "I have seen it in my fires," she said. "Beyond all doubt. I know that I have erred before, but there was no mistaking this. The very heralds of winter and woe. The ancient evil." Her ruby flared and winked, pulsating like a heart. "Whether it takes them an hour or a day or a hundred days, they will attack the Wall, and they will break it. This is no undisciplined rabble of wildlings, Lord Snow. This is a more-than-mortal foe with a strength that your crow brothers, led by Bowen Marsh as they now are, can never hope to match."
Bowen Marsh? Of all the men? Ghost wheeled around, as if there was somewhere else he could possibly go in the cramped ice cell.
"The wildlings who fled to Hardhome are all dead," said Melisandre levelly. "As you feared. Their wights march down Storrold's Point even now, and some are said to have made it across the bay to Skane and Skagos. Eastwatch-by-the-Sea will soon be under attack as well. And what's more, your sister is here at Castle Black. Ser Justin Massey brought her before he fled to Braavos. When the Others breach the Wall, she will be the foremost of their victims. Think of her, Lord Snow. Think of what she's suffered. Is this the end you would write to her story?"
Arya. Jon's stomach did a flip. Was that why he hadn't seen her in his hallucinations, was it truly a portent of her death at the hands of the Others? How is she? Is she well? Has someone thrust a sword through Ramsay Bolton's black heart yet? At the moment, there was nothing he wanted to do more than run out and do it himself. In lieu of a sword, which customarily required hands to wield, Ghost's teeth and claws would more than suffice.
Once again, Melisandre did not deign to provide an answer. "So, Lord Snow," she said, sitting back on her heels. "The predicament is clear. As currently constituted, the Night's Watch will be torn to shreds, the Wall will fall, and the realm and all of mankind with it. You and I as well. Unless. . ."
Unless? Ghost bared his teeth again, and Jon had to shove him back down. Have you warned them?
Yet as Melisandre continued to gaze at him, the truth became unthinkably clear. Ghost tensed, desperate to spring, and only half of Jon wanted to stop him. You didn't tell them. How can you possibly not have told them?
"Because." Melisandre slid closer. She even smelled red, like the heart of a brazier. "There is no point in telling them, not if you do not agree to save them. You can, Jon. There is a sacrifice you can make."
A sacrifice? More than this one? Jon cocked Ghost's head, hoping to convey ironic skepticism without the service of eyebrows. Nothing good ever followed when the red woman began to talk this way, but trapped here, he had no way to gainsay her or prove that she was lying – if she was. Do I dare run the risk?
"You must give yourself to R'hllor." Melisandre's voice dropped to a croon. "You must walk to the end of the path you have already set out upon. I know you are strong enough, Lord Snow. One man could turn the tide of this battle. Just you, against the lives of all those you know and love. You do not have to lose still more."
Unwillingly, Jon saw Arya's face again, and Robb's, and Ygritte's. And Sam and Grenn and Pyp and Dolorous Edd and Satin and Val and all the others. They seemed to be gathering around him, as if they were paying court. Then, one by one, they began to fade.
What is this? All of Jon's suspicions appeared to be bearing out. He was aware of a dull panic buzzing in the back of his head. She saved me only to sacrifice me. She saved me as a bloody gift to R'hllor, asks me to give whatever I am left to her fires. Yet if it was the only way to save the Wall. . . take Melisandre's word for it and trust that all would take place as it should, if he did not want to remain in Ghost for the rest of his afterlife. . .
I am no oathbreaker. No matter what Bowen Marsh or Mance Rayder or Janos Slynt or Alliser Thorne or anyone had thought, Jon intended to keep his vows even with his own body lying not a dozen feet from him. It was entirely possible that he had never woken at all, and this was only an increasingly unhinged fever dream. He could even still be lying in the bloodstained snow in the bailey, and when his heart struggled out its last beat, everything would go dark. Silent. At an end. Forever.
"This is no dream, Lord Snow," Melisandre said. "But all will end soon, if that is truly what you wish."
Jon turned back, suddenly terrified of what might come next. Her face was utterly devoid of jesting or levity, her red eyes unblinking. She reached out, and somehow he found Ghost walking toward her. As if mesmerized, the white wolf reached the red woman and lowered its head.
Melisandre touched his fur, with one hand and then the other. Her fingers burned. Her hair fell loose in long scarlet waves, she whispered a prayer or invocation or incantation in a language he did not know. Then her fist closed, and when she opened it, she drew out a knife made of some strange dark stone, with runes that smoked like the ruins of Valyria.
An unholy terror seized Ghost. All of Jon's carefully crafted rationalizations fled, and all he knew was that he had to be thrown back into the ravening darkness, the fevered visions, with a return that grew twice as dangerous and uncertain – if at all. It occurred to him dimly that Melisandre had said nothing about a rebirth.
The spell was broken. He wrenched away. He went up on his hind legs, scrabbling at the unyielding ice. Jon Snow, the Twice-Murdered. It lacked a certain something as an epitaph.
"Be calm," Melisandre ordered. A hot crimson darkness lapped at his vision, and the ice suddenly became too hot to touch. He collapsed back.
"There is a tale," she said. "About a smith and a sword and his beloved wife. I told you. Only death can pay for life. Only sacrifice can beget victory. Only light can hold back the darkness."
Azor Ahai, Jon thought dimly. Fire and blood.
"Think of your sister, who is here," Melisandre said. "Think of your brothers, who are gone. Think of what you know yourself, what you have seen in the darkness beyond the Wall. And trust. And burn."
Still he tried to flee, but now she had him firmly by the scruff. Wolf and woman struggled, red eyes and red eyes, one with knife and the other with claws. The ice blazed with flame. And outside, very far away, a voice that might have been Satin's, screaming. "Jon! Jon! JON!"
Then the bite, as hard and dark and cold as it had been that night in the snow. And at last, Ghost made a sound: a strangled, gasping whine as the rune-graven knife pierced him to the heart. The wolf scrabbled and fell, sides heaving. Blood stained the ice.
You know nothing, Jon Snow, one voice said. The other whispered, Kill the boy, and let the man be born. And, agreeing, he died.