Chapter Text
R'hllor
“Ehrmmm....." the Lord of Light, the Heart of Fire, the God of Flame and Shadow, cleared his throat, an embarrassed look on his otherwise inhumanly beautiful face.
He looked around the high table at his immortal and otherworldly family, the Gods of Old for the streams and forests and stone, the Seven that were actually Six, the Drowned One and even the One of Infinite Faces; and he.... shuddered.
They were all staring at him, unmoving, as if carved in stone, all waiting for his explanation. An explanation that for the life of him, he was not able to provide.
He closed his eyes in frustration and dropped his head on his hands in defeat. This was going to be so very painful.
“That happened so yeah...." he dared to raise his head and peek around at the unamused faces surrounding him. "That was not what I had planned...” he mumbled with a sigh, only to wince and screw his eyes up.
“Clearly not, cousin” the Drowned One snorted, before dissolving into incredulous laughter. “I don’t think that any of us expected this specific turn of events” he choked in between bouts of uncontrolled amusement.
“Melisandre shouldn’t have been chosen. That’s where it went wrong” the Crone interjected; her black cavernous eyes boring into his red ones. And then she smiled a wide and toothless smile that made him shudder in disgust. Why did his aunt insist on that specific look, he would never understand.
“How did it go?” his cousin continued, eyes twinkling with joyous mirth. He smirked and cleared his throat and then with a squeaky voice he struggled to get the next words out “Blue eyes, brown eyes, green eyes.”
And this was followed by bursts of hysterical laughter from all of the others.
Of course, it was.
R’hllor sighed. He fucked up. He already knew that.
It wasn’t even a small fuck up that he could have easily rectified with a wave of his hand and a fire vision. Nooooo. He actually managed to fuck up big time. Not that end of-the-world big bang and boom big time that usually was expected from some of the more unrestrained of them – like The Warrior who was known for his impulsive decisions and acts. Or The Drowned One, who let’s face it, had anger management issues – being famous for basically drowning when you were supposed to be known as the God of the Seas could and would make anyone just a little mad, he supposed.
So yeah, failure would have been expected from his cousins. But for him – the actual bloody Light, to fail and fall this hard was a big surprise.
The last time he had failed at something was ages ago when out of a very, very, and most unwise prank he managed to set himself on fire before the temple of his twin brother. Flint stones were involved, although there were no straws, and that specific event led to the weird habit of his red acolytes burning people at the stake. Purification, bleach - as if he enjoyed the smell of burned human flesh. He was a God, not a Bolton, for eternity’s sake!
So back to the incident as they later agreed to name it. A habit that he failed to stop from.... well, habiting, no matter how many times he tried to do so by sending out thousands upon thousands of visions to his adepts. For the life of him, he couldn’t understand why his priests and priestesses refused to perceive that burning live people on his behalf was not something that he actually desired or enjoyed. Not that burning dead people was better, but he could at least grasp the reasoning for the necessity of it.
So yeah, excluding that small and hopefully soon-to-be-forgotten fuckery that happened a long time ago, he had been very successful as a God. Only his twin brother had a more significant following and a better record, because let’s face it, there’s no way that you can fuck up death. Or dying. Or being dead. And well his brother was the many-faced god of death, the Stranger that was not really a Stranger at all, the Valar Morgulis and all that well erm, shit that followed in it's wake.
He shook his head in dismay.
“You must fix this, the prophecy must be fulfilled” The Mother interjected, and he could see the tiniest bit of pity in her wide blue eyes. And amusement. Shit!
“Can’t we just let it go? The Night King is dead, and we could all use a vacation” his other cousin gruffly interjected while letting his mallet fall from his hand to the ground. A delicate hand sneaked around his muscled shoulders, soft hands kneading gently to release the building tension.
R’hllor perked up. Perhaps with a little support....
“My love, that was not what we agreed upon.” The Maiden softly corrected her husband, The Smith. His cousin sighed in resignation, nodded and then rested the back his head on his wife’s lovely white arms.
And oh well - he waved his support a fare the well.
It was good while it lasted, or almost - he thought before brushing the same thought away.
“The prophecy must be fulfilled” The Father insisted as well, a note of steel in his otherwise calm and measured tone. “Arya Stark was never supposed to kill the Night King. Fix this R’hllor.”
He sighed, feeling tired to the bones.
“Errrm yeah. About that” he cringed and stopped at the sound of his own voice squeaking.
And now his other cousins joined in the laughter as well.
He dropped his shoulders and cleared his throat. He could do this, he would do this, he was The Flame!
“I need help.”
Ok, so maybe the flame needed to be kindled by a spark from time to time, but it was still a flame!
The Father looked at the Crone and the Mother, and then with a nod encouraged him to continue.
“I want to go back to the beginning and bring visions of fire and death, of ice and doom...” he could hear his own voice rise with the words in excitement. He was the Flame, he was Fire and Visions, and Shadows and -
“Wait, isn’t this why we’re gathered here in the first place?” his cousin, the God of the Seas interrupted, dark eyebrow raised in disbelief.
“Yes but...” he sputtered, his mind going blank at having his speech stopped mid-sentence.
“Alright, then I want in.” The Drowned One interrupted again. “I will also use visions of..... what was it? Oh yes, visions of fire and death, of ice and doom....” he continued in a low, forcefully gruff, and still highly amused voice.
Perfect.
Should this go to the seven hells in a basket, he would not be the only one held accountable. And should the fuckery reach world ending -
“And so do I” his normally quiet and disinterested twin stated from his end of the table. “I also will use visions of fire and death, of ice and doom.” His voice was dry as the desert, most definitely raspy, and oh so dramatic in its deathly heraldic tone.
Alright, it was official.
Should they fail the fuckery will definitely be of the world-ending consequence. And not the quiet one like everyone will die a frosty death and then pooooof - the end.
Nope. Nopedy. Nope. Nope.
This one would be of the loud, grand and abso-fucking-lutely epic kind of ending. A big boom, a loud bang, fire raining from the heavens above, earth shuddering and shattering and opening to swallow those that were not burned – damn, that’s a fucking theme already and the repeat was not at all to his liking...
So yeah, that was actually an ending that they had to prevent – the cleanup would take ages and they were overdue a vacation, eternity damn it!
The rules of the game – errrrm world, had been decided a long time ago by all of them. Regulations must be observed, any deviations must be unanimously agreed upon. And this prophecy, this era of heroes was his to manage, his to uphold, his to guide to the prediction of fire and blood, to a new age of dragons that has been foretold.
And he really, really needed help as he had already screwed up his first go.
He was fucked, wasn't he?
He groaned and with resigned dread took in the twinkling eyes of his smug bastard of a cousin, the amused but somehow bored expression of his twin, and the general approval of his family.
He was fucked, but at least he wasn’t alone, and that had to count for something.