The Dunmer woman collapsed at his side, her knees buckled and she fell to the floor. Teldryn Sero rushed to the woman's aid. He knew it was bad at first, but he didn't know it was life threatening.
Teldryn insisted that she take a day to rest before they explored the Dwemer ruins but Nadia was stubborn. The woman would have died long ago if not for him. Sometimes, people would wonder why he still followed her, kept up with her antics. He used to question it himself, but realization kicked in. He was smitten. The Dunmer woman caught his eye as soon as she had set foot inside the Retching Netch. Her black armor and cloak that she wore concealed her face. Her figure was average, except that she was on the slightly thinner side than the average Dunmer.
He introduced himself as Teldryn Sero, blade for hire. That is, if you had the coin. She was quick to accept his offer, and with that, they had been on their way. Since that day, they had been companions for the better part of two years. In that time, they had gotten attached to each other.
Now wasn't the time for musing, Teldryn knew this. He picked up his companion and found a small space to set her. The last of their potions had been used up ages ago, and Teldryn knew only basic healing spells. He pulled off her armor careful to try and not further injure her. Her abdomen was covered in her blood, pouring from a large gash. He focused a healing spell there, and his fingers tingled with a warm energy flowing through them. He focused it on her wound and the skin closed, though looked a bit scarred. He was unsure how much damage was done internally, but that should have been taken care of with the spell as well.
He stopped using the spell in case he used all of his magicka. He dug around through Nadia's alchemy ingredient satchel and made a healing salve using blue mountain flowers, which was something she had taught him how to do. He knew the minor side effects that it had, but that did not matter to him. He just needed her to make it through the night. He spread the salve on the small cuts that peppered her arms, torso, and thighs.
He took her helmet off last and her white hair tumbled out, splaying on the ground. Some of the hair was tinged with pink, and he brushed it out of her face to reveal a cut on her forehead near her eyebrow. He searched around in his bag and found a tunic. He ripped a long strip of it off and set it aside, while using the rest of it to wipe the blood from her face. He applied the last bit of salve to her cut and wrapped the makeshift bandage around her head.
He examined her body and frowned. She had many scars from her rough life, most notably the one on her face, running from her brow to her lip, crossing through her right eye. Nadia had told him it she had gotten it from a fight in a bar, where a drunk man had cut her face with a broken wine bottle. She told him that it had happened about 120 years ago and could not remember the man's name. The Dunmer woman had been closer to him in age than he originally thought, with him being close to 200, while she was only 158. With her childlike innocence, he had thought of her to possibly only be in her twenties.
He was afraid to fall asleep with her, in case she awoke and needed him. Teldryn busied himself with polishing their weapons, her armor, and his chitin helmet. The rest would have to wait.
He checked on her a short while later and noticed her breathing was less labored. It seemed as of now that she just needed her rest. He picked her up and set her inside his bedroll. She shivered just a bit, so Teldryn took his armor off and changed into his trousers. He climbed in the bedroll and cuddled Nadia, trying desperately to keep her warm. Teldryn wrapped his arm around her. He noticed she was a thin woman, but he never realized just how skinny she was compared to him. He would have to make sure she ate more. He planted small kisses on her face: one on her forehead, one on the scar on her eyebrow, one on her cheek, the tip of her nose, her chin, and a quick peck on her lips. He laid his head down on her shoulder.
His mind drifted to thoughts of her. Some about their future together, living in one of her many homes. Or maybe, they could build one somewhere, just the two of them. It could be close to Riverwood. Teldryn really liked the small village. In others, they were kissing, holding each other, even making love. Teldryn loved Nadia, and he wanted to be certain that she loved him back. He didn't want to lose her. Especially to that damn Farkas in the Companions. Everytime Nadia would stop in to visit them, Teldryn noticed Farkas eyeing her like a snack. To say Sero got jealous about it would be a bit of an… understatement.
Teldryn wasn't planning on falling asleep on her. It just sorta happened that way. When Nadia awoke to a warm body next to her, saying she was startled was an understatement. She looked over at the man next to her. She didn't expect Teldryn Sero to be holding her while they had slept. A small smile spread on her face, but vanished just as quickly when she noticed her head throbbing and the rest of her body aching, especially her abdomen. She wanted to stay in Teldryn's embrace forever. He was always so warm. Though she knew it wouldn't last forever, it was still nice.
She looked at him. He looked so young when he was asleep. All the wrinkles in his face had seemed to fade away and he looked so relaxed. She wanted to kiss him, that much was certain. But she was unsure if Teldryn had the same feelings. Nadia didn't want to risk losing the person she valued the most in her life over a silly kiss. And even if he did return her feelings, then what? Would they marry? Have children?
But if Teldryn was asleep, she could get away with just a small kiss, right? She had always wanted to know what the Dunmer's lips tasted of. She let the thought sit in her mind for just a moment. Maybe she would go for his cheek instead. The more she thought of it, the more she wanted to do it. Hell, she's slain dozens of fire and frost-breathing dragons, if she can do that, she can kiss someone.
Even if that someone was none other than Teldryn Sero.
When Nadia gathered the courage to lightly peck him on his cheek, she wasn't expecting it to wake him. His ruby red eyes bore into her scarlet one. "I'm sorry, Tel. I didn't mean-" he cut her off with a kiss. It was passionate and everything they both could have ever needed. He tasted of ash yams. Nadia loved ash yams almost as much as she loved Teldryn.
Eventually she broke the kiss and looked up at him. "You could've left me here. You didn't need to save me, Tel." Her voice was raspy. Her throat hurt with the rest of her body
"I love you too much to do that, Nadia, and you better know that," he replied. Teldryn couldn't even think to leave her in a time like this. They both had made a promise not to leave each other's side, and he intended on keeping it. He dug around in his knapsack for a moment and handed her an apple. "Eat this."
She accepted the round fruit and munched on it. Teldryn refused when she had offered him a piece of the fruit. "You need it much more than I do at the moment," was all he had said to her. She scarfed the rest of it down, tossing the core in a random direction.
"We should probably get going soon Tel," she said with a bit of a cough.
"Not until you rest some more. I'm not going to risk losing you again." Teldryn was usually pretty easy going about when Nadia wanted to go somewhere. Her sense of adventure was astounding. But not today. She needed more rest, and he would make sure that she got that.
She sighed with discontent, "then can you at least lay with me? It's chilly in here."
"As you wish," he said as he crawled back inside the bedroll that somehow managed to fit both of them. Probably because she was so skinny. Too skinny. Teldryn knew that he would have to try and get her to eat more. Being underweight was never a good thing. "I love you, Na."
She yawned and wrapped her arms around him. "I love you too, Tel."
Hullo humans! Sorry I haven't uploaded anything in awhile! If somehow you've read my trash *ahem* I mean fanfics before, you may have noticed I went on a purge of all my old fics. Not sorry. Oooof. I've never written anything for the TES fandom so yea I'm sorry if this is actual garbage. If ya didn't know, Nadia is my Dunmer DB. She lost an eye during a bar fight with a drunk dude, but I used the one blind eye when I made the character cuz you can't have them with one eye which is total BS imo. Maybe I'll write that too in the future. Who knows. Anyway, reviews are cool, uh ty for reading. I'm bad at these. Sorry for rambling.
~~Dodongo