I do not own Skyrim or any of the characters. My Dragonborn is named Gabriel.
Loss of Life
Gabriel craned his neck back and looked at Lydia. She was sitting in her usual chair in front of the fire trying to read a book but every couple of seconds she would glance at him. She did again and smirked returning her eyes to her book and keeping them there. For the past half hour, Gabriel had been using Magicka to make a tiny version of himself and Lydia fight a tiny version of Alduin in an endless battle in which no one injured anyone. The tiny Lydia and Gabriel were shooting arrows poorly at Alduin who dodged them making them vanish just past him in tiny wisps of smoke. Then Alduin would breath fire at them and they would avoid it and it would turn to smoke just before hitting the table. Every so often, either a Draugr Death Overlord or a Falmer Shadowmaster would show up and be swiftly either killed by Lydia and Gabriel or eaten by Alduin for power, which was wasted since he couldn't hurt them anyway.
Lydia and Gabriel had been married since a week after Gabriel had learned that he was the Dragonborn almost two years ago. Before that he and Aela had been together for a few months until she left him for Farkas. Not that Gabriel or Lydia were particularly broken up over it now. Everything Lydia had was from him. Her Glass Sword that was enchanted with Frost Damage and Fiery Soul Trap, her Ebony Mail that he had won from a Daedra, her Orcish Gauntlets and Boots that he had crafted himself, her wedding ring that he had enchanted with an Iron Flesh enchantment, a gold and ruby circlet enchanted to augment her one-handed strikes and blocking, and a necklace that haled her rapidly if she was wounded.
He wore his Nightingale armor, boots, and gloves all having been enchanted extra to protect him for the equivalent of Ebonyflesh, heal him, and regenerate his Magicka as quickly as his Archmage Robes, his wedding ring that helped regenerate his Magicka as well as making casting Restoration spells easier, the Gauldur amulet, and Morokei. He had his Nightingale Blade strapped to his side where Dawnbreaker once hung, and a Nightingale Bow slung across his back. Both were gifts from Karliah, a fellow Nightingale that had helped him stop a psychopath and had saved his life at least twice if not more.
"Are you okay?" Gabriel asked looking at Lydia again.
"No," Lydia said setting the book down with a ribbon in it to hold her place. "That book is depressing."
"What book is it?" Gabriel asked.
"Yours," Lydia said. "Some random person decided to track your stories and write them down. Apparently, you sleep with any and every girl you meet except me."
"And you believe that?" Gabriel asked.
"Of course not," Lydia said. "I know you're faithful."
"What so depressing about it?" Gabriel asked.
"My character plays the sappy, pathetic fangirl that is madly in love with you but doesn't have the guts or the brains to do anything but stare at you all the time," Lydia said. "Apparently, Hevnoraak nearly killed me because I was daydreaming about making out with you."
"They do know you saved me from him, right?" Gabriel asked and earned a shrug.
Just then, they heard the distinct roar of a dragon and both grabbed their weapons running outside and throwing their armor on over their clothes on the way. By the time they got outside, three buildings were burning and several hundred Winterhold Guards were standing in the streets and on the roofs of building firing every kind of arrow except Daedric and Falmer at the dragon. The problem was, there wasn't one. There were exactly ten, one of which was a massive black dragon with massive spikes all over its body and glowing yellow and blue eyes. The rest were all Elder Dragons.
We...are so...fucked, Gabriel thought staring at Alduin.
"RUN!" Lydia screamed knowing exactly what he was thinking.
The soldiers all looked at them for a moment seconds before Alduin sent a single fire shout at the ground below himself and sent a wall of flame shooting in all directions. It vaporized anything it hit and sent everyone present scrambling away from it, stampeding over anyone unfortunate enough to trip. Lydia and Gabriel were running along with them but they had a specific place they were going. The others would die. There was no getting around that. They had learned that when an Elder Dragon had broken into their safe house in Whiterun and killed almost the entire population of Whiterun in almost a minute. The Companions had all survived due to being at Ysgramor's Tomb to mourn him on the day of his death. Aside from them, only Adrianne, Ysolda, and a handful of others had survived.
Gabriel and Lydia ducked into their safe house and then sprinted to the basement that was basically a solid Ebony box with a hatch in the top. After a moment, they heard Alduin shout again then it was silent.
"I can't believe we just left them," Lydia said.
"We both know they would have just-"
They both fell silent as they heard wings beating slowly above them. It was so loud it couldn't be one pair but it was perfectly synchronized making Gabriel wonder if it really was more than one. Then, there was a crash, a loud splintering sound, and finally a triumphant roar as a massive splintering and ripping sound erupted around them before a thunderous crash went off. Then something began screeching and the entire top half of the safe house was wrenched skyward by an Ancient Dragon leaving the rest behind. Lydia and Gabriel stood rooted to the spot staring up at the swarm of what now must be a hundred Blood and Ancient Dragons hovering above them, wings beating in too perfect synchronization to be natural.
Then, Gabriel heard a dragon's short roar and a strangled gurgle. He looked toward Lydia but she was gone. It seemed as though everything slowed to a tenth of its normal speed. He heard himself calling for her, knew she didn't answer, and then saw something flash past his head.
He turned toward it and his heart sank. Before him, was a broken, bloody, and unmoving Lydia. She had bite marks covering most of her torso and ruining the Ebony Mail and she had burns covering her head, though her ring had protected her for the most part. He looked up and saw Alduin standing on the top of the destroyed shelter with fresh blood running down his jaws and a wicked grin on his face.
"Now, you die, Dovahkiin," Alduin said leaping back up to hover with the others.
Just as they all opened their mouths to incinerate him, another dragon roared as a grey dragon rivaling Alduin in size roared and crashed into Alduin loudly, instantly beginning to tear into his flesh.
"Flee Dovahkiin," Paarthurnax said. "Flee! We will hold them."
Just then, four voices all Shouted something at once and a massive dragon made of wind crashed into the swarm and exploded sending them all flying. Then, the voices Shouted again and storm clouds matching Alduin's scales in color formed over head as meteors, lightning, and rain began to pour out of the sky hitting and killing dragons right and left while the rain drenched everything and reduced everything's vision to barely fifty feet. Gabriel stood rooted to the spot watching the sky as rain stung his face and roars went off above him. Then, Fireballs, Ice Spikes, and Lightning Bolts began shooting up from the general direction of the college and Gabriel understood that even the College of Winterhold, that could easily have survived, was trying to give him a chance to escape, but still he couldn't make himself move.
"Gabriel!" a familiar, desperate, yet even voice shouted from beside him. "We have to move! Come on!"
Gabriel looked and saw Karliah trying, and slowly succeeding, to pull him away from Lydia. Suddenly his instincts, a tiny bit of sense, and no small amount of desperation, kicked in and he wrenched his arm free of Karliah's grip and returned to Lydia, beginning to drag her toward the hole that Karliah had somehow managed to cut in the floor from an underground tunnel. Karliah saw what he was doing and put her hand on his, intending to stop him.
"I CAN STILL SAVE HER!" Gabriel shouted over the roar of a very enraged dragon.
Karliah saw that he was desperate, confused, and, above all, determined to protect Lydia, even though she was already dead. She gave him a sympathetic look remembering having the same feelings when learning about Gallus's death.
"Then let me carry her and you keep us both safe," Karliah said.
Gabriel nodded and Karliah picked up Lydia, struggling slightly under the weight of Lydia's mangled armor. They moved to the hole and dropped through seconds before an Elder Dragon landed on he top of the wall and looked around for them. Gabriel used Throw Voice to draw the Dragon away then he and Karliah rushed through the under ground tunnel until they reached a massive cavern where Karliah stopped to rest. Gabriel used Aura Whisper to see how many of the others had lived and saw that Alduin was alive, as were about twenty Elder Dragons and thirty Ancient Dragons, and Paarthurnax, though just as he spotted Paarthurnax Alduin ripped his throat out using his teeth. Off to the side, he could see about a dozen humans fleeing, the dragons letting them go.
"They're all gone," Gabriel said. "Now what do we do"
"We keep moving," Karliah said. "And we figure out why they were all together."
"Alduin," Gabriel said simply. "Give me a minute to wake Lydia up."
"Wake her up?" Karliah asked. "Gabriel, she's dead."
"No," Gabriel said staring at the pool of blood around Lydia but not moving to stop it. "I can save her."
"I'm sorry Gabriel," Karliah said. "You can't. She's gone. We have to move. We have to leave her."
"No," Gabriel said. "I can-"
Karliah slapped him across the face and he simply stared at her.
"She is gone Gabriel," Karliah said forcefully, yet not unkindly. "We have to move and you have to let her go!"
Gabriel opened his mouth to speak but shut it again and knelt beside Lydia. He removed her necklace and ring then wiped a trickle of blood from the corner of her mouth and closed her eyes. Then, he stood and turned to face Karliah.
"I'm ready," Gabriel said and Karliah nodded.
They walked quickly through the cavern and into a tunnel on the far side then into a second one that had about ten Falmer Shadowmasters waking around. They hid silently and Gabriel tossed Karliah the bow she had given him then summoned a Bound Bow for himself. They both stood and began shooting and within seconds all of the Falmer were dead. Karliah held the bow out but Gabriel shook his head.
"It belongs to you," Gabriel said. "As does this."
He held out the sword and Karliah accepted it silently struggling not to cry at the memories both weapons brought to her. The sword had been Gallus's and the bow had been a gift from him. She opened her mouth to thank Gabriel but just as she did, an Elder Dragon crashed through the roof of the cavern and landed in the center of the room. Both of its wings were broken and it was severely wounded from any number of spells, arrows, and the Greybeards' Storm Call but it was clearly still able to fight as he sent a stream of fire at them. Gabriel shoved Karliah out of the way then held out his hand and a sphere of magic appeared around him blocking the fire.
"Run!" Gabriel said summoning a Bound Battleaxe and leaping off of the small cliff they were on at the dragon.
"No!" Karliah responded, picking up her bow.
Karliah stood and shot a single arrow into the dragon's mouth just before it could Shout at Gabriel then Gabriel landed on its snout and swung his Battleaxe into the dragon's face. The dragon roared in pain but it was cut short when Gabriel plated the Battleaxe in the dragon's throat, killing it and allowing the axe to vanish. Then he dropped to the ground as the dragon began to disintegrate and its soul was absorbed by him. Karliah watched in amazement before walking over.
"You're the Dragonborn," Karliah said. "That explains why they were after you and how you can shout."
"Sorry I never told you," Gabriel said.
"It's alright," Karliah said. "Now we need to move."
Gabriel nodded and they sprinted the rest of the way out of the tunnel and then made their way to Riften to hide for a short while. On the way, Gabriel sent a Flame Atronach to summon any and all remaining Blades and Companions to Riften. It wasn't going to end well anyway, but they could definitely use the help.
END
Read and review.