Hi everyone! This is a story about Gwenivere, a Breton-Nord mix who dreams about mastering arts and skills at a Skyrim college. It looks as if the dream is impossible until she makes a once-in-a-lifetime encounter.

Feedback is much appreciated. I may include a list of songs that might guide the reader into the feel of the characters. I do not own the Elder Scrolls game, nor any songs I might mention. I merely made up dearest Gwen. Enjoy~~

She'd rather do just about anything than pull turnips in the spring time. Pulling turnips was a sweaty, long, and hardly productive chore she had to do when the farmhands managed to squirm out of the job. The half-blooded girl took a moment to painfully straighten her back and wipe the sweat from her forehead. Even in the land famous for its frozen tundras, spring work made her sweat enough for her clothes to uncomfortably stick to her body. The sun she normally prayed for in the darkness to warm her skin was now something she resented. Pulling turnips was the absolute bane of her existence.

"Gwen, dear." The girl spun around to face her mother, a matronly Breton lady of about forty summers. Her name was Lilith, and she contained a comforting aura about her. Laugh lines were beginning to form at the sides of her almond eyes, and she never quite gained her figure back after her fourth child. Something she attempted to keep discreet, but always managed to reveal, was her background. Lilith was something of a socialite back in High Rock. She came from a wealthy lineage, but was rumored to have been shunned for running away with a Nord man. Her children didn't even know how she ended up in the land of Skyrim.

Many a time, her accent would poke through or she would practice table manners that were alien to the crude northern people. She never spoke of her past, except for irrelevant details about the buildings of High Rock or the foods she used to eat there. Nevertheless, the townsfolk remember her for the pretty sight she once was.

"I need some fresh water. Take a breath, and go fetch some if you feel so kind." She spoke.

Gwen knew that in Lilith's overly polite language, that meant she was allowed to take a bath. Insisted to, rather. The young woman sniffed at the collar of her shirt and bluntly agreed. Her mother reached into the basket she was toting and pulled out fresh, clean clothes that belonged to Gwen.

The young girl nodded and thanked her mother as she made her way east to a lake that the settlement often designated for such matters. On her way, her thick braid pat her back as she swerved and ducked her way through the forest. Her feet were bare, as many farmers' were when the weather permitted.

Her family was not particularly rich, but they weren't dirt poor either. Her father, Arvid Steel-Runner, owned enough farmland to feed themselves and three other farmhands. The hires consisted of an old, civilized Orc named Ghuurz, a runaway Bosmer called Lihendor, and a middle aged Nord, Vulik, who spent more days in his cups than in the field. They slept in a different cabin, but everyone ate and drank together as one family.

Not to mention Gwenivere had a handful of siblings. Her favorite out of all of them was Reisaar, her single older brother. However, she hadn't seen the likes of him lately since he got married last summer and was expecting his first child. The peculiar family just didn't feel the same without his jokes or his annoying, booming laugh or his words of surprising wisdom that would catch Gwen off-guard. Being the next in line to find a husband and move out, it seemed that her parents were paying extra attention to her lately. Perhaps that was why her mother insisted for her to bathe more often.

The last thing Gwen wanted was to be a mother. But she wanted to move out, that was for sure. She wanted to see the other holds and try every kind of spiced wine. She wanted to make her own living, and never have to pull a foot-deep turnip out of the ground again in her life. More than anything, she dreamed of going to a college. Any one, it didn't matter to her. She would be content with just seeing one in her lifetime; to run her hand across the cold stone walls that housed vast amounts of knowledge.

Her mother taught her English, Elven, all kinds of literature, and some lessons in magic. From her father, she learned Nordic as her first-language, basic farming and smithing concepts, and even a little of the Ancient Dragon language only few still practiced. According to her, being vastly cultured was a rarity in the brutal land she was born in.

If anyone knew Gwen, they knew her to be an extremely polite and knowledgeable young miss, much like her mother. She developed a deep love affair with Lilith's books and a burning desire to learn.

However, she cared a great deal about her family. She never let herself rebel against them out of a loyal love and obedience. Unfortunately for her, the only way to see anything outside of the Rift would be to marry into it. Marriage meant a new life, but it also meant children. So Gwen found herself wedged in between her conflicted aspirations a lot of the time.

The brunette sighed as she reached the banks of the cool, lapping water. She quickly scanned the shoreline for mudcrabs or any other predator that might be about. After deciding it was safe, she sat the pile of clothes on a rock nearby and pulled the sweaty tunic off her head that exposed her undergarments. Gwen quickly waded in the water and let the clean lake dull her aches and pains away.

She hadn't been in the water for five minutes when she heard a piercing scream rip across the sky. This sound was far different than that of a sabre cat or even a mammoth. She whipped her head up, deep enough in the water that her feet couldn't touch the muddy ground. Several moments of confusing, eerie silence ticked on by. Even the water seemed to be holding its breath before a giant flying monster appeared over the tree line.

Dragons had been the equivalence to campfire stories for children in the small settlement she lived in. Sure, they were a terrifying threat to any of the cities full of vulnerable citizens, but never was one spotted here. Shittier yet, they were strictly for the Dragonborn to deal with. The revered Dragonborn would never waste his time in the forsaken backwoods of Riften. The last Gwenivere had heard, he must have been the political waterboy of High King Ulfric since the war ended.

No one was there to save her. Guards, soldiers, mages… No one had the capability to take down such a beast who didn't share the soul of a dovah. Gwen whispered any last prayers and confessions to the Divines as she trembled at the gloriously horrendous beast.

She was terrified, but oddly entranced by the creature's powerful grace as it danced in the sky above her with an array of metallic colors. She tried to swim to the closest protruding rock to hide behind, but not before the monstrous lizard pinpointed the scent of her blood.

What will happen next, I wonder? S.W.