BRAN
"Burn them all."
"Burn them all."
"Burn them all."
"Burn them all."
"BURN THEM ALL."
"BURN THEM ALL."
Bran reeled. He couldn't see, couldn't breathe. Stuck, Stuck, Stuck.
"Help," he cried out, seeing a flash of black hair. "Help me!"
But his brother...cousin...didn't hear him...couldn't reach him...
He felt like he was falling, constantly, constantly falling.
"HODOR!"
"BURN THEM ALL!"
He turned, and he was face to face with a grisled face with white-blonde hair, mad eyes gleaming.
"BURN THEM ALL!"
He turned again and he saw Hodor fall to the ground in the Winterfell courtyard, but also saw him being torn to death, holding the door...
He ran, ran as far as he could.
"BRAN!"
Meera was saying goodbye, and he only sat there, cold, and unfeeling...
There was snow. Snow everywhere. It surrounded him. It was so cold. So cold.
He turned, trying to run the opposite direction...
But he stopped dead, blue eyes bored into his.
"You are not ready," the Night King's mouth said, but it was the old man's voice he heard. "You are not ready to become the Three Eyed Raven."
It was a thousand years ago, but it was also only twenty, or was it the future he saw? He stood in the Red Keep behind the Iron Throne. He stood where he knew Winterfell to be, but it was not there, and he stood at an empty, gaping, mawing open weakness in the landscape where a Wall should be, where a hundred thousand dead stood before him, waiting, staring, and there he was...he was always there, the Night King...atop his Dragon...
"We have to burn them!" he found himself shouting. At who, he did not know. "We have to burn all of them! It's the only way!"
Perhaps Jon would hear him, or Arya, or Sansa, or even the Dragon Queen...yes, the Dragon Queen, she was their only hope...she could stop it...
He heard Dragons cry, heard ravens caw. He didn't know who he was screaming at, only he knew he had no fire...
"BURN THEM ALL!"
They rushed at him, the dead, they were screaming with their decaying mouths, gnawing at him, crawling up him, twisting his neck...
He spun as he fell, deep, deep, deep...
"BURN THEM ALL!" he shouted..."PLEASE BURN THEM!"
Was it his voice screaming, or was it Aerys?
He didn't know, didn't know anymore...
"JON HELP," he shouted, screaming. "HELP ME PLEASE."
Ice piled up around him, men moved, moved so fast, and huge boulders of ice piled around him...
The Night King stared greedily at him...
Fear gulped at his heart...
"BURN THEM ALL, PLEASE!"
He landed, hard, at Castle Black, with a startling case of vertigo. There were men all around him, hard men. They were all shouting at one another, and he clutched at the table in front of him. A man next to him looked around, and gave him a disgruntled look.
"You alright there, Brandon?" he said, voice rough.
Bran stared at him.
"You can see me?" he said, his voice was raspy, deep. His hand flew to his face and was met with a thick black beard.
The man laughed at him.
"You've lost it man," said the man. "Guys, Brandon's gone loony again," he called, and there was a roar of laughter around the room.
Bran steeled himself, trying to get his bearings.
"What you seeing this time, Brandon? Mad Kings? Bastards? Dragons? Three-Eyed Ravens? What is it now, man?"
"We have to build a wall," he found himself saying.
There was another roar of laughter.
"Man thinks a wall will keep those bastards out. Have you not seen them climb? Good Gods, man, there's nothing that's going to stop them."
"Not an ordinary wall. A giant wall. A wall made of ice. Tall enough to not be able to climb. Tall enough to keep the Others out."
Silence met the statement. Then there was a slow rumble of muttering.
"A well-guarded, well-manned wall. Keep the monsters in the North, and the men in the south. It's the only way to stop them."
The muttering increased.
"You may be mad, boy, but you've got a point."
"We'll use enchantments to keep them out...keep them from going any f-"
He spun, suddenly, swiftly, and he was flying, high above. The Wall lay before him. He flapped his wings. They were big and strong. He was faster, now, faster than he had ever been before.
He roared.
It was a vile sound and hurt his ears.
He wanted his mother, and his brothers. Bran could feel the ache deep in his heart. And he was cold, too cold. All of his fire had died. What was a dragon without fire? He missed his mother, wanted to curl up in her arms and have her pet his scaly head and tell him everything would be fine...But he couldn't breath fire. His fire had died.
Or had it?
He heard a screeching wail, and he tried to resist, but it welled up deep inside him, and spilled from his mouth, hot, hot, so hot it was icy, and blue, and it hit the wall with a jarring crash. He saw the ice melt, saw it fall...heard the screams of men.
He hated it. He wanted them to stop. But he wanted them to join him...yes, that would make them stop...they wouldn't care enough to scream then...there would only be forward...
He roared again, screeching and wailing in pain. His body was decaying, he could feel it...he had to resist, but he couldn't. The fire burned hot as it was released from him again without his control.
"Burn it all..." he thought, feeling it all in his icy heart, and suddenly he wasn't the one flying, he was the one on top of the flyer, and it was wrong, so wrong, he wanted to scream and claw at himself..wanted to die...
"Burn it..." it was a hissy, icy, terrifying voice, it did not speak the common tounge, but some Other language, known only to the dead...
Was he dead?
Did his icy heart beat?
The wall melted before him, and he tried to escape...
He wanted to go home...
"And how do we go home, sweet sister? We go home with an Army."
An army of the dead, yes, that was the way, then he could go home...
No, the reational part of his brain screamed. No! You'll kill everyone!
He was falling, tearing at himself, he had to escape...had to warn them, had to build...
"Bigger! Taller! More enchantments!" he called. "They can't get through!"
Ice and stone and earth piled in front of him, but it wasn't enough, it wasn't enough...giants moved, piling ice on top of stone but it wasn't enough...
"Bigger! Taller! More!"
Bran ran, and they were right on his heels. They were coming through! They were on the Kingsroad! And they tore at him, tore at his heels.
They needed more...more, more. The wall wasn't enough...
"We need a castle," he said.
"Brandon, the Wall's enough, haven't we-"
"No!" he slammed his fist on the table angrily. "We have to protect the realm! They will get through the Wall!"
"Brandon, come now. We put enough enchantments on that thing to be sure...if they ever got through, they'd die. Surely. Don't be ridiculous."
Bran ignored them. They knew nothing.
"We need a defensible castle, one that will serve as a base should they ever get through. We have to stop them."
They were all around him, crawling at him, and he could swear he was already dead...
He jumped, trying to throw them off.
"We have to burn them all!"
Razor-sharp blades poked at him, everywhere. He shifted uncomfortably. He hated the damn thing, cursing his ancestor.
"Burn them all!"
He called to his servants, living, breathing. They would not be for much longer if they didn't listen. The spider crawled next to him, he skittered across his skin. Bran flinched away from him.
"Burn who, my King?"
"BURN THEM ALL!" he spat in his face. Why didn't they understand?
How could they not see? They were crawling in through the doors. They were in the city. They were everywhere. Screaming. Rotting. Disgusting, foul things. He saw them everywhere. There was one tearing at Varys' bald head right now...
"BURN THEM! BURN THEM! BURN THEM ALL!"
He heard screaming...was it his or his daughter's? He didn't have a daughter...
Rhaella lay before him in a pool of blood, was it Rhaella? She looked different. Younger. Her blonde hair was everywhere, and her eyes were violet, like his, not indigo like his sister's...
She screamed out in pain, clutching at her swollen belly. Blood pooled between her legs, and he saw the crown of a baby's silver-blonde head...He heard sounds of fighting beyond the doors, and swung them open to see.
"NO DON'T YOU'LL LET THEM IN!" she screamed, staring at him in horror.
They were everywhere, they crawled at him, they ran at him with their hoarse cries. Men stood all around the door fighting them off, and he heard his baby girl screaming in pain...Daenerys, he thought wildly, though he knew no Daenerys. His daughter...his heir...
"FATHER!" she cried, screaming.
He had to burn them, had to protect her...the only way to get rid of them was to burn them.
"BURN THEM!" he cried, screaming. "BURN THEM ALL!"
He grabbed a torch and threw it at them, and they were set ablaze...his hand burned from the fire...but he was the blood of the dragon, he couldn't burn...
People were screaming...he saw men dying...he didn't know who...Daenerys was crying. He heard a baby wailing. Saw Dothraki fall and die and rise again...
"NO! BLOOD OF MY BLOOD!"
Dothraki ..."WHORE!" he screamed, and he was on his throne again. How dare his heir be a Dothraki whore? He was yelling, screaming at a child...
"What?" said the small, weak woman, she smelled like piss and wine and like barbarian filth. Just like the babe he smelled in her arms.
"That is no grandson of mine. That is no true Targaryen. He smells Dornish, get him away from me."
He was swirling, falling, falling, they were pounding at the gates, all seven of them, crawling up the walls, they were everywhere, if they didn't do something, they would all become them.
"BURN THEM ALL!" he screamed.
Nobody listened...
He swirled again, dizzy, dizzy, dizzy, and he fell...
"Brandon!" he heard his mother scream. "How many times have I told you? No CLIMBING!"
But he had to climb, had to climb all the way, up, up, up, beacuse they were chasing him. His hand slipped on the ice and he barely caught himself. It was a long way down. It was longer still a long way up. He had to keep going.
The dead's screaming rung in his ears.
"Burn it all..." said the hissy voice. And he saw more of the wall fall, the wall he'd worked so hard to build...
He had to get to his castle, he needed Winterfell, NOW, because they were coming.
"They're coming, they're coming..."
"Brandon, they're all dead, they're not coming..."
"They will, they're coming, faster, faster, build faster...stronger walls..."
"If you want stronger walls we can't build them fast."
"Fine, fine... just build the damn things, before they're all over us again..."
He was swirling, and suddenly he was in the crypts.
His own face stared back at him from a statue.
"It doesn't look like him," said an old man. Bran turned, but he never saw his face, and he was falling again...
He was on an island in the middle of the lake surrounded by seven Weirwoods. He heard them whispering, the children of the forest. They were all staring at him.
"You are the one," they whispered to him. "You are the one that will destroy the world."
"No," he cried. "No, I don't want to!"
They whispered at him, and suddenly it was not summer but Winter, and there was snow and the dead everywhere. He surveyed the frozen lake surrounding him impassively, unfeeling. Where were they? Where were the children? They could set this right, they must, they would...
It had been so long...
Bran swirled, and he was choking. He couldn't breathe. There was fire and ash. He stood in the throne room of King's Landing. The dead stood all around him, but he was the only one who could see them. The living looked at him with pity in their eyes.
"DON'T YOU SEE THEM?" he shouted hopelessly. "They're everywhere! We have to burn them!"
"Burn who, your Grace?
"ALL OF THEM!" he thundered, gesturing around him at the dead only he could see. "BURN THEM ALL!"
He swirled, and swirled, and swirled, and he'd been stuck for hours, saying it over and over and over again because they wouldn't listen, they wouldn't listen, and always those blue eyes surrounded him. He cowered in fear and the base of his throne, the swords tearing at his bloody palms.
"Burn them all," he begged, crying. "Burn them all, burn them all, burn them all burn them all burn them all burn them all..."
And he stood, standing in the middle of the hall, a thousand dead staring at him with those empty blue eyes.
He found a living...the spider...it was the spider...the spider would do his bidding...
"My King, they're in the city, they've come for us, what should we do?"
He stared with wild eyes. How could they ask him that? They knew. If they were everywhere...if the dead were everywhere...they had only one choice.
He looked Varys straight in the eyes, grabbed him by the shoulders. The Spider recoiled at his touch, turned away form his foul breath, but it didn't matter. None of it mattered. They had to kill the dead.
"Burn them all," he said simply, as if he thought Varys should already know.
Varys back away, tears in his eyes. Bowed.
"Yes, your Grace," he said.
And suddenly, he felt paralyzed. He looked down. A sword sprouted from the folds of his robes, the wrong end of it, stopping his heart dead. He looked up.
There was Jon, Jon, Aegon, his heir, Jon, his brother, cousin, grandson...he didn't know. His heir. He was staring at him with wide, fearful eyes. He had to tell him, had to tell Jon before he moved past this moment, perhaps Jon could get him out of this horrible nightmare...had to warn him...warn him they were coming...
"Burn them all," he said, and he felt like screaming beause his tongue would say nothing else...and he felt his throat open, and saw the blood spatter across his grandson's face, and everything went black.
It was a long time before he felt anything again, and when he did they were needling pinpricks of ice. He sat backwards on the back of the dead dragon, and in front of him, staring at him with cruel indifference, was the Night King. The wall was fallen, and he heard dragons in the distance, sounds of fighting that lasted weeks...
"Why are you doing this?" he asked, but he heard hissing. He couldn't tell if it was his own voice or the Other... "Let me go... Let me go past...I need to get past...please..."
"Why?" asked Bran.
The Night King turned his terrible blue eyes on him.
"Because you need to get past..."
"What?" he cried, and he was falling again, but there was an Other with him, cling at him, gnawing at him.
"BRANDON," it cried. "PLEASE LET ME GO PAST!"
They struggled, struggled for control...Was he Bran or was he the Other? He didn't know...
"Let me go!" he screamed, he wanted to wake up from this nightmare, but he needed to get past the wall...
"Please," the voice hissed, screamed.
"But you'll kill everyone..."
"Death is only the next part of life..."
"No..."
"You want to be with me...you want to die...only in death is there power, only in death will you truly be free..."
"No..."
"Let it go, Bran, let it go, and you will walk again...you will see your mother and father again..."
"No...!" he cried. "They're dead!"
"You will rise with your ancestors, our ancestors...with all the buried dead, they were foolish to bury their dead...together we will go..."
"Go where?"
A pair of blue eyes met his.
"To death...I have to die, only the children can kill me...I must go to the island, I must die, I'm so tired of this pain...I want to go home..."
Bran screamed, clawed at him, they struggled, but he broke free, and he was flying again, and he was a Raven. There was calm, the wind at his face, the air beneath his wings carried him home, home to Winterfell.
Perhaps he was dead, perhaps the Night King had won, and now he was flying, flying, flying free, and he would go home...
"Bran! Wake up! Please wake up! Don't die! Bran you can't die! Please wake up!"
He was flying...
A/N: o.o
So, there's that...