According to show-runners D.B. Weiss and David Benioff the original pilot episode of Game of Thrones was unforgivably bad. So bad, in fact, that despite fan demand for it, nearly none of the episode has ever seen the light of day—even on the darkest corners of the Internet. Among the scenes lost on the cutting-room floor is one in which A Song of Ice and Fire author George R.R. Martin appears in his one and only cameo on the series, playing a guest at Daenerys Targaryen’s wedding feast. When Emilia Clarke replaced original Daenerys actress Tamzin Merchant, Martin’s footage got the ax.

Tamzin Merchant on The Tudors, Emilia Clarke on Game of Thrones Left, Courtesy of Showtime; right, courtesy of HBO.

Nearly a decade later, Martin was offered another chance to show his bearded, Westeros-ready face in the show’s eighth and final season—but this time, the author declined the honor, claiming he was too busy working on the long-delayed The Winds of Winter. Is that the only reason why?

Speaking with Entertainment Weekly, Martin said: “David and Dan invited me to a cameo in one of the final episodes, which I was tempted to do. But I didn’t think just for the sake of a cameo I could take the time to return to Belfast.”

Martin is, by all reports, redoubling his efforts to complete this highly anticipated book, going so far as to hole up in a cabin to avoid distractions from the outside world. But Martin has also apparently been distancing himself from the TV series, which outpaced his writing years ago now. The last script Martin wrote for the series was for Season 4—which aired in 2014. When comparing an early draft of his script to the episode that eventually aired, it’s easy to see how far the show had already diverged from Martin’s vision.

Season 4 was also the year of an infamous sex scene between Jaime and Cersei Lannister, which played out as non-consensual on the screen—another departure from Martin’s book. “The whole dynamic is different in the show,” he said at the time. “The setting is the same, but neither character is in the same place as in the books, which may be why Dan & David played the sept out differently. But that's just my surmise; we never discussed this scene, to the best of my recollection.”