"Onmund! Put the flames out, now."

Onmund stood in the wheat field, his hand alight with a weak fire spell. He hadn't meant for the argument to escalate this far, but they refused to listen to him. He was going to study sorcery whether they gave him their blessings or not. He'd been in love with magicka since he was a little boy.

XXX

Onmund's mother had sent him to the Windhelm market place to buy some meat, but while making his purchase a pretty elf woman caught his eye. She was fencing wears and her stand was full of shiny scraps.

"Trinkets, odds and ends, that sort of thing…" she trilled in an airy voice when he asked what she was selling, her golden eyes hovering over him inquisitively. He tried not to let her stare bother him, but he knew she was judging his age and didn't want his grubby hands clutching her wares. Or at least that's what his mother always said.

A stack of books caught his eye. He ran his fingers across their aged spines, coaxing them to reveal their contents.

"You read, little Nord?" The tall elven lady said with a smirk.

"I know what you're thinking," he said, giving her an icy stare, "that I'm just a kid wasting your time."

"That's not what I said." she replied leaning forward on the table. Her gold, almond eyes were inches from his and her sweet breath warmed his cold, wet face. "I asked if you could read."

He looked at his feet, ashamed. "Yes." He replied, "But not because I'm supposed to, but because I need to be able to buy things and run numbers. I'm becoming a farmer."

"Oh yes," she drawled, opening the top book. "Only people with sticks up their arses know how to read. Don't want to throw yourself into that lot by being proud of the skill."

He looked up at her, eyes wide as she withdrew his secret. "I love books," he said in a hushed voice, "but my parents think reading will fill my head with nonsense and ruin my career."

"And how old are you, dear?" She asked with a cool smile.

"Ten." He replied, leafing through a book titled Kolb and the Dragon.

"Ah yes, don't want to throw away all those years of hard work."

"You're a weird lady," he replied, blushing as he realized he said it aloud.

She gave a small chuckle and looked him over once again. "Your parents are right though. Books will only fill your head with fantasies." He looked at his shoes, hearing the phrase for the hundredth time. "But that's why you should read tomes." She pulled out a worn, red leather book from under the counter and slapped it onto the table. Dust flew into his face and he resisted the urge to cough.

"Tomes?" He said, rubbing the dust from his watering eyes. "You mean spell books?"

"These aren't books filled with nonsense," she said sliding it towards him. "These books are filled with power. They will teach you things that'll make you strong, strong enough to show your parents you were meant for something bigger than farming cabbage."

"Wheat." He corrected, looking at the rune embellished on the cover. "Something bigger than farming wheat."

XXX

"Why can't you see the power I have as good?" He shouted back, his voice dying slightly in the wind. But the flame in his hand did not waver. It remained strong. "I've found what I want to do in life, what drives me to be the best person I can be. Why can't you just be happy for me?"

"Life isn't about being happy, boy!" His father shouted back, fists clenched. "It's about surviving. Your mother and I have worked all our lives on this farm and we raised you to take our place. We're literally handing you a life!"

"But it's not the life I want!" Onmund cried back, nearly laughing at their inability to understand. "I love you both, and I'm grateful for all you've done, but this is not who I am. I'm not a farmer, and I'm never going to be like Vidmund!"

His mother, standing behind his father, grasped her heart at the name. "You wicked child… bringing your brother into this," she hissed lowly, her voice only reaching his ears because of the wind. "He loved you and wanted what was best for you, how dare you try to guilt us with his loss?"

"Onmund, why do you always have to be so difficult?" His father exasperated. "If you hate farming that much, I could put you in a trade school. You're good with a bow, why don't you become a hunter? Or you like books and what not, you could become a shop keeper! Just why does it have to be this damned magicka nonsense?" His father began to approach him, but Onmund threateningly lowered his hand to the harvest, making them pause.

"I want to do something meaningful with my life!" he shouted back, sorrow in his voice. "Magicka can destroy and create, it can wound and it can heal. It opens up our life to endless possibilities. You just have to be willing to learn." "You're a Nord, Onmund!" His mother yelled, her face red. "Every time you do this magick you disgrace your people and embarrass us. And those heretical mages don't want you anyway, they'll laugh at your attempts and persecute you. I forbid you throw your life!"

Onmund looked down at the wheat. Why didn't they understand? Plenty of people in Skyrim practiced magick and it never bothered them before. Why was it suddenly a problem now that he'd fallen in love with it?

He sighed. Maybe they really did want what was best for him. Maybe they feared he wouldn't succeed and it'd be a waste of time and money.

No. That was not the case. He'd tried to show them his abilities and skills for the past five years, and all it got him was beating with a broom and his spell books thrown into the hearth. They didn't want him to become a mage apprentice. They wanted him to live on a farm

He flicked his eyes up to them, the blue irises colder than the Windhelm air. "Do you care more about the farm," he asked in a tight voice, "or your last son's happiness?"

They didn't answer. So he set the wheat on fire.

Onmund turned from the blaze and his parents' desperate curses to save the crop. They had already forgotten they had a son.

XXX

"Thank you, sir." the boy said, throwing a coin purse at the driver. The man made a rigid grab at it then quickly withdrew his arm back for warmth.

"You sure you want me to leave you up here, boy?" He chattered, visibly quivering in the cold. "It's not the nicest place to visit, and there won't be any carriages up here for at least another month. You'll be frozen and out of coin by that time. They don't call it Winterhold for nothing." The man looked around, trying to peer at the small, half demolished town through the white sheet of snow. There was virtually nothing in site that indicated the town was here, besides the signpost by his carriage and the looming, blue auratic monstrosity in the distance.

"The cold never really bothered me," the boy replied, grabbing his pack. "You know, Nord and all."

"Yeah, yeah," the driver waved him off jealously. "But where are you planning on staying or working. Not many options up here for your kind."

The boy slung the bag across his back, jostling the hoard of books it concealed within. "The reason anyone comes this far North of course. The College of Winterhold."

The driver tipped his furry hat as the young man trudged through the deep snow in the direction of the behemoth fortress that magically shown through the snow blind sky.

"Good luck, boy."