Never had Davos felt greater heat, not even when wildfire raged around him at the Battle of Blackwater Bay. The heat coming off of the the red priestess was excruciating, but still he held her up.
He stole a glance at the woman at his side and wished he hadn't. Her once smooth skin now looked like something porcelain dropped from a great height onto a hard surface. Cracks and fissures riddled her skin, and the hot light of fire bled through the gaps.
He didn't know how she could still be alive… wasn't entirely sure she was alive.
He saw movement around him and glanced around, seeing the soldiers from Bear Island, Lyanna Mormont, Bronn, and a handful of others gathered around to make a ragtag barrier between Davos and Melisandre and the gate, now heaving from an assault on the other side.
The gate shuddered again.
"Hold the line." Shrieked Lyanna, her voice small but still commanding.
"Hold the line." Davos repeated to himself. The pain of Melisandre's burning flesh against his own was excruciating, but he couldn't let go, not when every second he bought might save another life.
Melisandre's eyes opened and she drew a wild, rattling breath, turning her shattered face to meet Davos gaze.
"I was wrong. I see it now." She said in a voice not quite her own. "Azor Ahi is not the prince that was promised. There is duality in all things. To end the long night, there are two. One was born to kill a king. The other to rise to a throne."
"Doesn't matter." Davos said, his attention drawn away as the gate came crashing down a a giant wight charged through.
"Thrice must he be cleansed." Melisandre raved.
The wight giant tore through the line, flinging full grown men like rag dolls.
"Once by water." Melisandra reached up, placing a burning hand on Davos cheek. He winced but did not pull away. "Once by the blood of a lion."
Bronn grabbed Lyanna and dragged her away from the fray, kicking and screaming, as her men fell.
"And once by the beating heart of his love." The red woman continued, the fissures widening and the fire within glowing brighter.
Davos heard screams, and it took him a moment to realize they were his own and her flesh burned his.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the flash of a battle hammer.
"Only then shall the sun rise, when snow falls at the Iron Throne." Melisandre finished. Her hand went to the necklace at her throat, flickering with live flames. She ripped it free of her neck and an explosive wave threw Davos away from her.
And then the light was gone. The night seemed even darker in the absence of her flames. Davos blinked into the darkness, trying to make sense of it. She was gone. She was dead. She'd been right. Dead before dawn.
A firm grip grabbed Davos arm and pulled him to his feet.
"Come on, old man." Gendry said gruff, his words muffled be the blood streaming down his face from a clearly broken nose. "You saved me once, s'time I returned the favor."
Arya let out a breath at the sight of Jon entering a dark room. His familiar face was a balm in the raging chaos of her mind from the torrent of moments Bran was exposing her to.
Then she spotted the red woman before the fire and her pulse sped up with anger.
"What is this?" She asked Bran.
"Witness." Bran said.
"My lady. You weren't at the war council." Jon said to the priestess.
"I'm not a soldier." The red woman said.
I see a darkness in you. And in that darkness, eyes staring back at me: brown eyes, blue eyes, green eyes. Eyes you'll shut forever. Arya shuddered at the words she didn't like to remember, especially since they'd proven so true. As much as she despised the red woman, she put a fair amount of stock in her words.
"Any advice?" Jon asked
"Don't lose."
"If I do, if I fall…" Jon shifted uneasily. "Don't bring me back."
The red woman looked almost penitent as she said, "I'll have to try."
"I'm ordering you not to bring me back." Jon insisted.
"I am not your servant, Jon Snow."
"You are in my camp. I am the commander."
"I serve the Lord of Light. I do what he commands." The woman replied, unbending.
"How do you know what he commands?" Jon challenged, clearly not willing to concede this point.
Suddenly, the ever confident red woman looked uneasy and shaken."I interpret his signs as well as I can."
She studied the flames for a moment, her beautiful brow furrowed in thought. "If the Lord didn't want me to bring you back, how did I bring you back? I have no power. Only what he gives me and he gave me you."
"Why?" Jon asked, whether to challenge her or from some desperate need to understand his continued existence, Arya wasn't sure.
"I don't know." The priestess admitted. "Maybe you're only needed for this small part of his plan and nothing else. Maybe he brought you here to die again."
"What kind of god would do something like that?" Jon asked.
"The one we've got."
Jon stared into the fire for a moment and then recoiled as though seeing something within the flames. Arya looked at the flames in hopes of catching a glimpse of what had troubled her brother. Instead, all she found what an overwhelming memory of her water dancing lessons in King's Landing.
What do we say to the god of death?