AN: It is usually my custom to go through favourites profiles to see if they have any interesting stories, or have read any interesting ones. The 250 emails I got telling me who's been having a look at this made this custom impossible though, which on one hand is bad, but on the other shows a clear interest in the story, which is obviously good. In general, I'm pretty pleased to be starting this back up. I'll go through and answer some of the reviews from the first chapter after I post this.
As the greatest problem with UV was characterisation and demonstrating why people were doing stuff, we're going to begin very early. There won't be any battles for a while, but rest assured, we'll eventually get onto the dragonslaying and the Elf Wars. Behold therefore, our Hero:
Chapter 1
Harald thought it was going to rain.
The skies were darkening, and clouds were starting to fly in like giant birds, covering the sun.
If it did rain he would get wet, and cold.
Uncle had told him to keep the sheep up until dusk, but with the clouds going overhead Harald would have no idea when that would be, a few hours surely.
Harald didn't want to be out in the rain, not with all the caves of Bloodweaver Spiders that were about in the hills and cliffs around the farm. His cousins made fun of him and told him horrible stories about them. He had his sling but that was for wolves and foxes, he'd never tried it on the big spiders.
Would a rock kill a spider? Stamping on the little ones worked fine, but he didn't know if you could do the same to the big ones.
He abruptly stood up and peered around him at the countryside to make sure there weren't legions of spiders boiling out the ground to eat his sheep.
Happily, there weren't, the only things moving around in the valley were his cousins and their flocks.
That being said there did seem to be a man on a horse coming up the mountain. He was probably a traveller going to the great castle away to the south. Most travellers went along the King's Road at the bottom of the valley though so Harald wasn't sure why he was coming all the way up here.
As the traveller got closer Harald could tell more about him, his horse was particularly fine, a large animal, but not as large as a knight's charger he had seen once pass along the road. The man himself was cloaked and hooded and seemed to have dark skin.
Harald had seen a Redguard once at market; a man on his way from Wayrest to Rivenspire. Harald thought he was a trader, couldn't remember what sort.
But when the rider came closer Harald saw that his skin wasn't just dark, sallow and gray, as if he were a corpse.
Perhaps he was a demon. Or some sort of undead monster. Harald had heard about them in church.
But if the man coming up the slope was indeed a demon why was he riding a horse? As Harald understood it demons had wings, or appeared in a puff of smoke. Perhaps the horse was also a demon.
He wondered if demon horses liked apples.
Witches could travel about through mirrors, but there weren't any mirrors around Harald, considering he was up a mountain. Harald was also unsure of whether a witch was a demon or not, the priest had not been clear on that point.
The rider peered up at Harald, and dismounted from his horse and started climbing up the side of the mountain instead. The slope was too steep for a horse, even if the sheep had hopped up it fast enough. The incline was also covered in large tufts of heather and a few hawthorn trees. Such a large horse wouldn't be able to make it past them, even the sheep had a trouble of it, with the branches being covered in wisps of wool.
Eventually the man struggled up to the crest of the mountain and went toward Harald, who was thinking about what to do. He had more or less decided that the man was not a demon, or that if he was, he was surely the most unimpressive demon that was ever created. Harald therefore had to decide whether to speak to the man or to run away. It seemed unlikely that the man would attack him, and if he did he had his sling and, being a child, would be much more nimble than the man, and could run away quickly. But Harald also had his dozen sheep to look after, if he left them he'd spend all day herding them back together. Even if the possibly demon-man ran after them trying to eat them.
The stranger came to a stop a few feet away, looked around him, and sat down on a large mossy rock. He had a fearsome appearance, with red eyes and very sharp cheekbones and brow. He pulled down his hood and Harald saw his black hair was caught up in a tail behind him. Though his features were strange to Harald's eyes, he did not look evil. Perhaps he was simply unwell.
"Hello." Harald said to the stranger, "Are you lost? The road to the castle is south of here."
The man regarded Harald thoughtfully. "I do not believe I am lost." He said slowly. "I am looking for someone."
"Well there's only us here, and the MacGregors in the next glen." Replied Harald, thinking it unlikely that the stranger was looking for either family.
"Indeed." Remarked the stranger.
It being apparent that the visitor wasn't going to just leave, Harald thought he ought to introduce himself, it was only polite after all.
"My name is Harald," he announced.
The stranger regarded him evenly. "You have your father's look about you."
Harald's eyes widened. "Really? Did you know him?" Harald knew very little about his father, other than that he was called 'Ruarc' and that he had died soldiering for the Emperor.
The stranger smiled, and it lit up his face and made him look far friendlier, "I knew your grandfather better." He said, "But I knew your father well enough to call him a friend."
"Who are you then? And how did you know him?" asked Harald, he had many questions, but those seemed the most important.
The man stood and bowed "I am Llirelyn Vinothren, of Wayrest. Can you read?"
Harald noticed that he ignored the second question, but thought little of it, he could just ask him again late. He shook his head rather shamefully. His Uncle could read, as could some of his cousins. He also thought that the man had a strange name, but perhaps such things were expected of foreigners, which this man clearly was.
"Well," replied the man, "we will have to see to that, I shall teach you. Then you may read this." He explained, and fished a letter from beneath his cloak. "Suffice it to say, your father desired that I take on guardianship of you till you are a man grown."
"What would that mean?" asked Harald, he did not understand what the man was saying, but it seemed that the man wanted to take him away.
"That you would come with me and live in my house in Wayrest, and that I should educate you till you are a man."
"So you would be like a new father to me?"
The man frowned, "No, not a father, an uncle perhaps, if you wished." He motioned to a few of the sheep wandering around, "Though you may wish to stay and continue farming…"
"No." Harald quickly said, "I don't like farming."
The man smiled again, "I don't imagine you do, your father certainly didn't."
"If I came with you, will you tell me more of my father?" asked Harald, given how little he actually knew about his father learning more was his main concern, the man said Harald resembled his father, this made Harald think that his father must have known the man fairly well. Also, if Harald did learn to read he could read the note from his father, and if it didn't say what the man said it did Harald could just run away.
"I will tell you what I know, and I have many of his possessions in my keeping that are rightly yours." Said the man.
Harald thought, and yet did not, he was conscious of his yearning for news of his father, what sort of man he was, and what he did in life, but he had other questions he didn't fully comprehend, but he had great curiosity about the world and the stranger represented outside the little sheep-filled valley of Harald's childhood.
"Alright."
