Melsi

Melsi is the femslash ship between Melisandre and Cersei from the Game of Thrones fandom.

Canon
Canonically, Melisandre of Asshai and Cersei Lannister have never met.

One feature shared by both women is a fascination with fire and magic. Melisandre is a red priestess of R'hllor, and trusts in the flames to see the future. Meanwhile, Cersei burns the Tower of the Hand in the novels, and burns the Great Sept of Baelor in the television series. Cersei believes deeply in a prophecy that her children will die, that a younger queen will replace her, and that a younger sibling will kill her. Some fans like to imagine Melisandre as a foil to Maggy the frog, who will instead soothe Cersei with positive visions about the future.

In both the novels and the series, Cersei comes to hate the predominant religion of the Seven Kingdoms, the Faith of the Seven. They have arrested her in both versions, and in the show, she kills all the members of the Faith. Both are willing to commit immortal acts to further their agenda, such as Cersei killing her husband's illegitimate children, and Melisandre burning Shireen in the television show (although she showed some remorse).

Cersei and Melisandre have also been enemies, albeit indirectly, for a majority of the series and novels. Cersei supported her children on the throne, while Melisandre was a key advisor to Cersei's brother-in-law Stannis, who tried to claim the throne for himself. A theme in several fanfics is reimagining Stannis and Joffrey's war; in some fanmade scenarios, Stannis and Melisandre successfully capture Cersei, but Melisandre takes pity on her, leading to a romance. Later, Melisandre helped support Jon Snow, who fought against Cersei seeking independence for the North. However, some fans are also interested in the period of time after Stannis's death and Melisandre's exile from the North, which provided an opportunity for the pair to have a more neutral relationship.

Some fanfics even place the pairing as happening after both women die in the final season of the television show, imagining that they would be together in an afterlife of the World of Ice and Fire.

Fanon
Melsi is not a particularly well-known ship in the fandom. Melisandre is usually shipped with Stannis in het circles, and with Selyse in femslash circles. Meanwhile, Cersei is often shipped with Jaime or Rhaegar, or Taena for femslash. With fewer than 30 fanfics currently on AO3, it can be considered a rarepair.

The first Melsi fanfics on AO3 date to 2015, including a few femslash drabbles or inclusion in multishipping works, with some exceptions, such as a reimagining of the Battle of the Blackwater. However, Melsi began to gain a serious albeit small group of followers in March 2018, in the gap between Game of Thrones Series 7 and Series 8. Within the space of a month, one user uploaded eight different Melsi fanfics to AO3, and proceeded to upload more in the following months. This inspired other users to write fanfics in a space of a month.

Healing tends to be a major theme in Melsi fanon. Both women have experienced trauma, Cersei having lost a child (or all of her children, in the TV version of events) and been abused by her late husband Robert, with Melisandre having been a slave in her childhood. Fan works focus on Melisandre's powerful healing powers and how she could use them on Cersei.

A large majority of Melsi works include AUs of some kind. This includes modern AUs, as well as simply imagining different outcomes to the various wars of Westeros. Before the premiere of the eighth season, however, sequel fic was common. As Cersei had seemingly been abandoned by Jaime and Melisandre was exiled from Jon and Daenerys's lands, fans liked to imagine that the two could team up and fall in love in the following season.

Trivia

 * One fan asked Cersei Lannister's actress, Lena Headey, to say "Cersei and Melisandre are soulmates, ruling the Seven Kingdoms in lesbian bliss. Melsi rights!" Headey agreed to the request.

Fandom
FAN FICTION