Chapter Thirteen: The Execution
At nightfall, everyone at Castle Black files into the courtyard and surrounds the pyre for Mance's burning. It seems attendance is as mandatory for an event like this as it was for the reaping for the Hunger Games. Even the other prisoners are present, clinking in their shackles, though it's the lack of black that gives them away. Brown leather and fur keeps them warm, same as Mance.
Wildlings, I realize. Or free-folk, as Jon calls them. One catches my eye as I look to the group on my left. He's taller than all the rest, with messy orange hair and a thick beard. Though he's appropriately solemn, his glance is too curious, so I break eye contact and edge closer to Gilly.
She, Sam, and Tollett (first name Eddison, or Dolorous Edd, as I learned at supper) stand between Jon and me. I get the feeling that he arranged this on purpose, or maybe it's a case of "boys on one side, girls on the other." Either way is fine, but if it's the first one, I don't blame him for wanting to put distance between us. I remember where I was at days after Peeta's death. I know where I'm still at now. I need the distance just as much as he does.
I see Shireen sitting with her mother on a balcony, Buttercup resting in her lap. She sneaks a solemn half-smile at me and strokes Buttercup for comfort. Earlier, she came by to tell me in a hushed, conspiratorial tone that her father said she could keep playing with him.
"Mother doesn't like him, though," Shireen had said, her face falling a bit. "She says he's ugly and deformed. He's missing part of his ear so she says it must mean he gets in fights. I think it means he's brave."
"He is brave," I'd agreed, though I gave Buttercup a look that said this is the only compliment you're ever getting from me. I didn't even mention his fear of storms and dead people. "He's survived some terrible things."
"Like what?" she'd asked, her blue eyes round with wonder.
I'd shrugged. "Fire. Explosions. Living with me."
Shireen had giggled then, but her mother had come up behind her like a ghost and escorted her up to the balcony where they're sitting now.
Her mother, Stannis's Queen Selyse, I can already tell doesn't like me much. A tall, thin woman, she sits stiffly and regally with her hands clasped in her lap, waiting with great anticipation to witness a man's fiery death. Though she must've noticed the subtle exchange between her daughter and me, because now her cold eyes have locked directly on me, and her lips are set in a firm, tight frown. I can't say I blame her. I did sing a morbid and rebellious song to her husband's prisoner and give her daughter a truly hideous cat to play with.
Ser Davos, King Stannis, and Melisandre stand in front of us, waiting by the pyre as some of their men fetch Mance from his prison cell. Melisandre looks over her shoulder at me with a small smile, as if she's pleased that I'm present for such an occasion. As if it's something of an honor. I think if someone doused this fire ant in grey ash, she would be a lot like Coin. Except Coin never smiled this much.
The squeak of a door hinge turns her attention away from me, and we all watch in silence as two soldiers escort Mance down the stairs to his own personal pyre. The only sounds in this courtyard at first are the crackling of torch flames and the clinking of shackles, though my ears start to pick up on something familiar. With each slow, shackled step, Mance carries the tune of The Hanging Tree in a low hum, and only lets it die down after he has come to a stop in front of Stannis.
Our eyes meet briefly, but I'm not exactly cheered by the reprise of the song, or by the fact that he's taken it to heart. Not when I know what I'll have to watch because of it. I feel the true meaning of the song in the air tonight, stronger than I've ever felt it before.
King Stannis, it seems, is not terribly amused either.
"Mance Rayder, you have been called The King Beyond the Wall," Stannis says. "Westeros only has one king. Bend the knee, I promise you mercy."
Another silence falls. Mance looks at all of us – the free-folk, the Night's Watch brothers, Stannis's company – all gathered round to witness a death, be it him or his dignity. His gaze flicks past me to Jon, who I'm sure must be silently pleading with him right now, then to the king once more.
"Kneel and live," Stannis tells him.
Mance takes a moment to consider his words, gives his surroundings a cursory glance. "This was my home for many years," he says at last. "I wish you good fortune in the wars to come."
I knew this was coming, but disappointment sinks to the pit of my stomach anyway. I can feel it coming off of Jon and the others in waves. Stannis must've given a nod, because the two soldiers grab hold of Mance and bring him up to the stake, re-shackling him there.
Feeling for my attached camera, I try to remember if any of my devices are still on or not. Or if I want them to be. This moment feels crucial, but I'm not the Capitol. I don't need to get people's deaths on film, nor does Beetee or anyone else need to be subjected to it. But my fingers seem to have a mind of their own and activate the camera regardless.
As if sensing her cue, Melisandre steps up to the foot of the pyre and turns to her audience, likely in the center of my footage.
"We all must choose," she proclaims. "Man or woman, young or old, lord or peasant, our choices are the same. We choose light, or we choose darkness. We choose good, or we choose evil. We choose the true god, or the false."
Even standing so close to a brazier, chills travel freely through me and turn my arms to gooseflesh. I have a vague understanding of how religion shaped my world in the past, but for decades, Panem was its own religion. The Hunger Games was the god that the Capitol worshiped, and all the districts were forced to bow to it. Whatever Melisandre is going on about is something else. Something just as dangerous.
I watch as she walks over to one of Stannis's men, delicately takes a torch from his hand, and returns to her place in the center.
"Free-folk, there is only one true king, and his name is Stannis," says Melisandre. Gilly's eyes follow the torch in fear as Melisandre uses it to gesture to Mance. "Here stands your king of lies. Behold the fate of those who choose the darkness."
Turning, she wields the torch like a magic wand, lighting the pyre in various places with graceful little taps. Perhaps she thinks herself a painter, and the torch her brush, but this is nothing like art. This is not the beauty that Peeta spread across his canvases.
Real or not real? I am about to watch a man burn to death. The spitting and crackling of the flames and the rising smoke say real. The terror in Mance's eyes says it too, and I feel panic start to thrash about in my chest. It rumbles upward, tightening my throat. Gilly's breath hitches like she is about to cry, but I'm not. If I have any tears for Mance, a fire inside me has turned them to steam.
Yes. I'm angry. Angry that Mance didn't listen to Jon or take the nightlock pill. Angry that I have to witness this. Angry that I have stepped into another world where everyone must burn, living or dead.
Mance is suffering before my eyes. He's tried moving his feet to avoid the flames, but they reach him just after his fear does, giving taunting licks before starting to climb upward. The Capitol would find a death like this slow and dull, like starvation. That's why they pelted me with fireballs in the arena. At least then I would be incinerated quick, like Prim. They might not have to look at my face as horror and agony takes me first.
I can't watch this. My pulse is racing and I'm sweating almost as much as Mance. With the nightlock no longer an option, there is still one way I can put an end to this. My thoughts flit to my weapons, struggling to remember where I left them. Can I get to my bow in time? My feet don't give my brain enough time to figure it out – I'm weaving through the crowd, slipping through cracks, darting around corners.
If I have to be the Mockingjay in this world too, then so be it. I'm not returning to this courtyard without my bow and quiver.
But when I do slip my quiver over my shoulder and head back to look for a high point, a thought stalls me. I push forward anyway and it gives chase up a flight of steps. It sounds like Effie and Peeta and Prim, like a conscience or someone trying to talk some sense into me. Like Haymitch in the earpiece in District 8.
Can I do this? The thought plagues me, even as I find a good spot and pull a black arrow from my quiver. Can I already make a spectacle of myself?
I arm my bow and aim for Mance's head, but the thought bites down and doesn't release.
There will be ramifications for what I'm about to do. Banishment if I'm lucky, execution if not. I don't care what happens to me. But if I put a king's prisoner out of his misery on day one, I'll likely make things a lot more difficult for Jon. Like it or not, as long as I'm here, he's partially responsible for me. Ser Alliser said so himself. He already has it out for Jon; what will happen if I actively defy royalty?
I've just made friends with Jon, something I'm not usually very good at… but can I really let Mance suffer just to avoid making trouble for him?
My fingers twitch at the bowstring, anxious to let the arrow fly. Every second I delay prolongs the torment that I told myself I wouldn't watch. But what am I doing, except aiming and watching?
Mance's screams fill the night air, chilling me more than the snarls of the dead. I can't listen to this. Everyone else is doing nothing but I have to do something. My arm shakes as I pull back the bowstring. I'm the Mockingjay, I have to…
A bow releases and an arrow hits Mance with a thud, neither of them mine. Cut off in mid-scream, he gapes down at the arrow protruding from his heart, then he looks up to seek the archer. The shot turns a lot of heads, Stannis's included. It takes me longer to process, because my own heart has stopped and I'm still dumbstruck at the bow that I've lowered, the arrow that I've yet to fire.
I follow everyone else's stares and see Jon at a different high point, with a bow of his own in hand. He lowers it after a moment, watches until Mance's head lolls, then turns away and storms off.
The fire climbs higher, but its ladder is a corpse hanging limp at the stake. The night is silent as a dead man burns.
Finding my breath, I put my arrow back in the quiver, then slink backwards and silently find my way down from my own secret shooting spot. Still trying to make sense of what just transpired. It doesn't hit me until I return my weapons to my room.
The mercy kill is Jon's. He is this world's Mockingjay. The thought fills me with twice as much relief as it does admiration.
Jon Snow is the Mockingjay, which means I don't have to be one anymore.
A/N: Tempted as I was make Katniss do the mercy kill (and for months the temptation has been strong), I had to give it to Jon, for a multitude of reasons. But hey, Katniss came pretty close!
Thank you all for your follows/faves/reviews! Very soon this will be my second most viewed fic, all in a matter of three months, and that boggles my mind. Utterly grateful for your encouraging comments. Next chapter is slow-going but I'll keep at it!