Part I: Last Seed
Chapter One: Destruction (Tirdas, 19th of Last Seed; Middas, 20th of Last Seed)
Backtracking to Bruma had taken her almost two full days. It was time she wasn't happy to waste, but she hadn't known what else to do. She had no idea where her siblings had disappeared to, and she'd honestly hoped when they had been separated in the skirmish, they had backtracked as well. That didn't seem to be the case, however, as she sat alone at the inn, munching on some cooked beef and baked potatoes that she rinsed down with a bottle of spiced wine.
She worried about them. What would they do? She had all of their coin in her possession. If they made it to civilization, how would they secure shelter? She knew Nesta, and maybe even Aerenwen and Mari, could use their skills to hunt for food. But what of the other two?
She'd secured herself passage in a traveling caravan to the Skyrim city of Helgen the following day. Once there, she'd do whatever she could to find her brother and sisters, even if she had to hire mercenaries to do it.
She couldn't believe her eyes. The town of Helgen lay in utter destruction. The smoke could be seen rising for miles, and many in the caravan had wondered what they were heading toward. No one imagined, however, the entire town would be in ruins as the result of a dragon attack.
The disaster had happened two days before, and the clean up had commenced.
From what she overheard, it sounded like the town would basically be abandoned, but for now, people searched the rubble.
Priests of Arkay and their hired help dug through collapsed buildings, pulling out bodies to give those who lost their lives in the tragedy proper burial rites. Imperial soldiers sifted through the remains of the fort that had been there, hoping for survivors and, most likely, important documents and the like that had been housed there. A few Thalmor emissaries looked on from horseback, and the Altmer woman had immediately made herself scarce, finding a seat on a nearby boulder to watch the others work and hopefully avoid the Thalmor's detection.
She wasn't sure where to go now. The caravan she had traveled with was splitting in two. Some were traveling west to Falkreath, others east to Riften. Helgen had seemed like a good place to start looking for her siblings, the closest settlement in proximity to where they had been separated, but now she didn't know where to start.
A man wearing a hood and sticking to the shadows of the nearby forest had been watching her. It was beginning to make her uneasy, but eventually, he approached her, obviously also attempting to avoid detection from someone.
"I lost some good comrades in this mess," the man commented as he sat on a rock slightly behind her, facing away from the ruined town. "It was horrid. I was here. Sometimes I ask myself why I survived when others lost their lives."
She nodded, understanding his thinking. She'd wondered the same of her family. She didn't know if they were dead, but she didn't know if they were alive either, and if they weren't, why was she?
"Did you lose anyone here?" the stranger asked.
"I'm not sure, honestly," she replied. "I was traveling with my siblings. We were separated a few days ago. I've only just arrived here, but if any of them were ahead of me, they could have been here for this."
The man turned to her then, revealing his face hidden beneath his hood for the first time. He was obviously a Nord, large and muscular with blonde hair and a full beard. "Was one of them a bit quiet, more on the serious side, with almost red hair?"
Her golden eyes nodded, and she turned to face the man more fully. "Yes! That sounds like Aerenwen!"
"Aerenwen, yes," the man replied with a nod. "That was her name. I couldn't remember."
"So she was here? You met her?"
"Aye," he paused a moment and glanced around them, making sure no one else was within hearing distance. "I suppose if you're her sister, I can tell you who I am. My name is Ralof. I'm a soldier with the Stormcloak army. The Imperials call us rebels."
She nodded, having heard a bit about the civil war in Skyrim from her fellow travelers on the caravan.
"We were ambushed by the Imperial army about a day's ride south of here, just across the border," he continued. She realized that was the fighting she had seen and avoided the night she and her siblings were split up. "I was captured, along with our leader and several other good men and women, including your sister."
"Aerenwen was captured?" she asked, shocked. "Why?"
"A case of mistaken identity," he answered with a shrug. "She was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and General Tulius was so pleased with himself for having outsmarted Ulfric Stormcloak for once that he didn't much care who he took down alongside him."
"What happened?"
"We were brought here by carriage to be executed," Ralof replied. "One of my comrades, Joric, was beheaded. Your sister was set to go next. That's when the dragon struck. In the confusion we were able to escape. I helped your sister, and we sought shelter in one of the wall's towers. The plan was to head up to the top of the wall and climb down the other side, but the dragon knocked the wall in and obstructed our path. I lost some more friends in the rubble then, and I told Aerenwen to go on ahead of us while I checked to see if Jarl Ulfric was still alive. The next time I saw her, she was heading into the keep with an Imperial soldier and a small child. I offered for her to come with us, but she chose to go with Hadvar instead."
The woman sighed. "So you don't know if she's alive or not?"
The man shook his head. "I suspect she is, though. Hadvar and I may be on opposite sides of this war, but we grew up together. He's a good and honorable Nord. If there was a way out of that keep, he'd make sure your sister and that boy got out even if he lost his own life in the process."
That made her feel better.
"What's your name, elf?" Ralof asked.
"Elain," she answered, extending her hand to meet his in a handshake.
"Aerenwen was worried about you all, you know," he told her. "Even riding in a wagon with a knot on her head and her hands bound, heading for a wrongful execution, she was more concerned with what had happened to the rest of you."
Elain chuckled. "That sounds like Aerenwen. She was our warrior. She watched over us all."
"She was kind to me, made me think twice about the animosity my kind tends to have toward yours because of the Thalmor," Ralof continued. "She was my friend for a time, and that's why I approached you. You resemble her enough, I thought you might be one of the ones she was looking for, and you looked a little lost like she did when she woke up in the back of that wagon."
"Thank you," Elain replied. "At least I know where one of them ended up for a time and that she had a fighting chance." She was quiet for a moment, looking around at the vast wilderness around her - a snow-covered coniferous forest, high mountain peaks - the landscape was foreign to her. "Do you have any idea where they might have gone? If she and this Hadvar survived, do you know where he would have taken her?"
"Not really," Ralof answered after some thought, "but Hadvar was an Imperial soldier. His sense of duty would have had him wanting to check in with his superiors as soon as possible to tell them what happened here, and they're headquarters are in Solitude. My guess is he would have headed there, and I suppose your sister could have gone with him, not knowing where else to go."
Elain nodded. "How far is Solitude?"
"Quite a ways. It's to the north, on the opposite end of Skyrim. A good two days travel on horseback. Longer on foot."
Elain sighed.
"Look, those of us that survived Helgen have been camped out in one of our army's camps nearby, waiting for the Imperials and Thalmor to thin out before we traveled anywhere. We'll be heading back to our headquarters in the city of Windhelm soon. Why don't you come with us?" Ralof offered. "Your sister won't be there, but my Jarl has connections throughout Skyrim. Perhaps we can help you find them all, and at the least, I can help you get your feet on the ground."
"Thank you, Ralof," she replied with a smile. "That's very kind."
Elain still didn't have all the answers she was looking for, but at least now she had a plan. Everything started with a plan.
Author's Note: And here is the start of Elain's story. If you haven't read the stories of her three sisters (Aerenwen, Mari, and Nesta), the first parts of each have been posted and can be found on my profile. The stories need not be read in any particular order, nor is it absolutely necessary you read them all, but they will eventually crossover when the siblings find each other again. This part of Elain's story will have several chapters and will follow her through the month of Last Seed, then we will move on to the last two siblings.