To anyone following my other story, you should be getting a new chapter soon as well. I just happened to be closer to finishing this one, so I figured I'd get it done first.
Also, thank you to everyone for the wonderful feedback on the first chapter! I honestly didn't think I would get anywhere near that amount of reviews for a first-time Skyrim writer, so a huge thank you to everyone who reviewed, favourited, followed, or simply clicked on the chapter. I hope to make your time worth it.
Dawn of the Dragons
Far from the land of Helgen, in the foggy marshlands of Hjaalmarch, a dark-haired and fair-skinned young woman was facing an entirely different, yet not quite unconnected, calamity.
"Joric?" Idgrod the Younger, known as Id to most, shook the shoulders of her limp brother, her tone panicked and desperate. "Joric, wake up."
Standing above the collapsed children of the Jarl, ten-year-old Agni rocked anxiously on her heels, all thoughts of hide-and-seek banished from her mind.
"He was fine before, Id, I swear! We were just playing, honest, and then he fell, and—"
"It's one of his dreams," Id breathed, laying a hand upon her young brother's forehead and feeling the sweat that stained her palm. Joric's eyes could indeed be seen moving rapidly beneath closed lids, as often happened whenever he or Mother had a vision, but those, those happened at night! Occasionally he'd get flashes during the days, sure, but never like this. H-He was barely breathing!
Calm, Id. Calm. But she could hardly restrain her frantic gasps enough to choke out, "Agni, get a guard. Or Gorm, or-or anyone who can help!"
Agni nodded and took off without another word. Id turned back to her brother, brushing the hair from his face and cradling his head in her hands. "It's going to be all right," she murmured, though her distraught tone betrayed her true thoughts. Oh, why couldn't she have the Foresight too? Then at least she might understand what was going on!
Agni returned before Id could scream in frustration and fear. Behind the child, skulking under a hood as per usual, was the gruff and reclusive wizard Falion.
Id's heart sunk. Of course Agni would have gone immediately to her adoptive father for help, but Id—along with everyone else in the town of Morthal—had never felt comfortable in the Redguard wizard's presence. But her mother trusted him, and he knew magic, which meant he had to understand the Foresight.
"C-Can you help him?" Id stammered as Falion knelt beside her. "He was running around, just fine, then suddenly he collapsed and—"
"He's having visions," Falion interrupted, laying a hand on Joric's forehead. From the way his palm glowed, Id could tell he was not just wiping off sweat as she had done.
She nodded, feeling utterly useless as she squeaked out, "I don't know what to do."
"First, we need to get him out of the muck."
The wizard's tone was condescending, as though Id should have thought of that to begin with. The girl's self-esteem shrunk even further as she realised, of course, she'd been stupid to let her brother wallow in the muddy swamp banks while she panicked over his prone form.
She murmured apologies to no one in particular. Falion rolled his eyes and slid his arms beneath the Jarl's young son. Id winced as her brother's head lolled to the side without support, but she didn't dare ask Falion to be gentler. Besides, the wizard had already set off, striding away from the marsh where the children had just been playing with Agni hot on his heels. In another moment, he was through the stone walls that marked the entrance to town, gone from sight. Id, once again, had been left behind and forgotten.
For a brief moment, she wondered for how long she could remain here in the mud before someone came looking for her. She shot the thought down almost as soon as she'd had it, however, shaking her head and hurrying to her feet. Joric was her responsibility, and she must make sure he was all right.
It was only as she ran back into the town proper that she realised how ridiculous she must look. Jarl Idgrod's daughter, future ruler of Hjaalmarch, and here she was racing across the bridge like a madwoman, dress covered in mud, hair flying wildly about. Her face turned red as guards and citizens of Morthal openly stared at her passing. She even thought she saw Aurilie and Jolinn whispering and giggling to each other atop the bathhouse porch. The older—prettier—girls had always looked down on Id, Jarl's daughter or no.
Id strained her ears to hear what the women were saying as she passed, only to lose focus on the road in front of her. A large patch of mud caught her unawares; her shoe slipped right through it, sending her sprawling backwards into the dirt.
This time, Id was sure she could hear laughing from the girls and many of the other passersby. Scrambling up with as much dignity as she could muster, she set off after Falion at a fast walk, face burning as her slip played over and over again in her head.
Stupid, stupid, stupid. No one's going to want you as Jarl if you keep this up.
Her heart twisted in shame. First her lack of Foresight, and now her lack of . . . everything. Would she never stop being a disappointment?
Fortunately for her, Falion was not planning on taking Joric to his house. Instead, he turned off the road early, striding straight for the tallest building in the town. Two towering stories of strong wood and a bright roof of thatched straw set against the dull clouds, Highmoon Hall had been Id's home since she was born and a frequent place of respite from the disdainful glares that seemed to follow her wherever she went.
Breathing a sigh of relief, Id hurried to follow Falion and Agni inside, grateful, as always, for the door she could shut on all the staring eyes.
If only her shame was so easy to block out.
"Young master Joric!" There was Gorm, her mother's Housecarl, appearing instantaneously as per usual. An expression of concern looked most out of place set against his heavy brow and hard jaw, but there he was rushing to Joric's side as if the boy were his own son. "What in Oblivion happened? Give him here, I'll—"
Falion pulled the boy away just as Gorm reached out. The Housecarl stopped before the Redguard, and the two men exchanged a glare of mutual dislike—prideful wizard on one side, intolerant Nord on the other.
"Hand over the young master at once, mage."
"He's to be taken directly to Idgrod. Where is she?"
"Jarl Idgrod, you insolent daedra fu— . . . friend," Gorm finished with a glance at the two girls by Falion's side. Id had a feeling 'daedra friend' had not been the insult he'd been going for. "And she's indisposed. Now, give me the boy."
"You have asked so politely," Falion said drily. Though as his hood shifted, Id caught a glimpse of his eyes beneath the shadows; the ire within his dark gaze betrayed his attempt at appearing unbothered. "But I think I'll still be taking him straight to Jarl Idgrod, if it's all the same to you."
"It is not, you—"
"That's enough, Gorm. Let him pass."
To the right of the modest throne room, a simple wooden door had opened. Through it hobbled a pale, older woman tall of stature, but bent of back. With hair as black as a crow's crown and wrinkles carving deep ravines across her face, Jarl Idgrod Ravencrone did indeed live up to her name. Yet for all her years lived, she was still the strongest woman Id knew, and to see her mother so feeble now, having to be helped along by her shorter husband just to remain upright, was more than unnerving.
"My dear." Aslfur, Id's loving father, kept a firm grip on his wife's arm, shuffling along with her even as he pleaded for her to turn back. "Please, you shouldn't be out of bed—"
"I said I'm fine, Aslfur," Idgrod the Elder said, offering her husband a grim smile as she shook her arm out of his. "My son needs me. Don't be such a worrywart; I can walk by my—"
As soon as her foot hit the ground, her next step became a stumble, which nearly became a collapse, had Aslfur not leapt forward in time. Id's heart caught in her throat as she watched her mother, as fiercely independent as any Nord woman, requiring a shoulder to lean on just to keep herself upright. Joric had been bad enough, but now . . . oh gods, what was going on?
Id, being Id, could not help but moan aloud in fear, even if it meant revealing to her family once more how weak she truly was.
"I-Id . . ." The senior Idgrod's eyes flickered to those of the younger, and she raised a limp hand in a poor attempt at a casual wave. "It's nothing to worry about. Just a bit of a dizzy s-spell . . ."
Her words trailed off in a wince, face wrinkled even more than usual as the Jarl's eyes screwed shut and her brow knit painfully together.
"Iddy?" Aslfur shook his wife gently, then with increasing force as her eyes remained closed. "Idgrod!"
"It is . . . just the visions," the older woman gritted out, her eyes still shut as she gazed upon something the others could not see. "They are . . . ah, quite s-strong today . . . But no matter, where . . . where is my son?"
Despite Aslfur's protests that Idgrod need be more concerned with her own wellbeing, Falion stepped forward and lay the boy at the Jarl's feet with surprising care. Id's mother knelt immediately, pulling an unsuspecting Aslfur with her as she placed her free hand over the young boy's eyes.
"My son," Idgrod murmured, voice hoarse and strained. "What do you see?"
There was no immediate response, but Idgrod seemed not to mind. Of course she didn't—she and Joric shared the power of the Foresight, needing no words to form a connection. Once more, no matter how selfish it was, Id felt painfully left out at the sight of her mother, brother, and even her father all huddled together in a mass on the floor while she looked on, alone.
The sensation was short-lived, drowned by other, more important ones as her younger brother let out a terrified gasp. Bolting upright, chest heaving as though he'd just withstood an army, Joric's eyes flew open, staring in horror at sights unseen before him.
"M-M-Mother?" the boy stammered, fear evident in his tone. His hands scrambled about in front of him as though he were blind to the woman kneeling right at his side.
"Shhh, my child." Immediately, Idgrod placed her hand in Joric's, a gesture that seemed to calm the boy, if only minutely. "Tell me, what do you see?"
Joric squeezed his mother's fingers tight in his trembling grip. Id's heart ached when she caught sight of tears brimming in her brother's unfocused eyes. She was supposed to be the one who protected him, who watched and comforted him. But just like with everything else, she was powerless to actually do anything.
"A-A man," Joric whispered, pointing one quavering finger at a figure who wasn't there. "A man with a fire within him. A-And a fire around h-him . . . oh gods, no, this is w-wrong, this is wrong."
"I know," Idgrod said, her voice as hushed as her son's. Her eyes too had taken over the same faraway, unfocused look. "The blood-soaked snow tower holds no king, the World-Eater awakens—"
"And the Wheel turns," Joric continued, his words flowing eerily well in the wake of his mother's. "But upon none. No one, there-there's no one there! Only fire and death and a dragon, a huge, black dragon."
Aslfur stared from his wife to his son. Falion looked on grimly, while at his side, Agni bit her lip and gripped his hand tight. Gorm looked at a loss for words. And Id . . . Id had no idea what to do. She wanted to cry, or leave, or yell at her brother to stop scaring her so. What did he mean, a-a dragon? Was he actually seeing . . . and if this was the Foresight . . .
A scream was building in Id's throat, one that couldn't be repressed for long, but fortunately before she broke, her brother did. Letting loose a bloodcurdling wail, Joric thrashed in his mother's arms, tears streaming down his face.
"No!" he shrieked, his tone full of pain and devoid of hope. "No, no, no! It can't be, not like this! Th-The Dragonborn—"
Id's head jerked up. She of course knew the stories, same as any Nord child. The Dragonborn, master of the Thu'um, with the heart of a man and the soul of a dragon, was the ultimate warrior of Tamriel. But they had all died out with the Septim line ages ago, so what was Joric on about now? The Dragonborn . . . what, Joric? The Dragonborn—
"—is dead."
Every pair of eyes in the hall jumped to Idgrod Ravencrone when she spoke. Even her son looked to her—like the sun burning through thick fog, the cloudiness in Joric's eyes disappeared as his stunningly amber irises shone though.
"Y-Yes," he choked out.
Idgrod drew her son into a hug just as he burst into sobs.
For what felt like an eternity, Joric's cries were the only sound to be heard in the resonant throne room. No one else knew what to say—and really, what could they say? It was the first time any of them had seen their Jarl or her son subject to such violent visions, and ones that made no sense at that. Usually, Id's mother and brother were simply good at predicting a good season for harvest, or when the marshes would flood next. This business with dragons and Dragonborns was . . . baffling.
"Idgrod," Aslfur said after a long silence broken only by Joric's sniffling. "What . . . What was that?"
Id expected her mother to recover, to plaster on another one of her wise smiles and recite some proverb on patience or virtue. That was how she always dealt with troubling situations.
But not today. Today, her frown deepened, and her eyes held none of their usual brightness as she murmured, "Nothing good."
Miles away in a town on fire, Ralof was indeed dealing with "nothing good".
Flaming rocks were raining from the sky, the screams of the dead and dying were deafening in his ears, and yet all Ralof could focus on was the charred body of Leander Neleus before him. In that moment, the man known throughout the Stormcloak ranks for his perseverance and tenacity felt like giving up. The smell of scorched flesh filled his lungs, weighing him down with the scent of hopelessness. He felt he had no chance at survival now—none of them did, which was a bizarre thought because really, what could one scrawny Imperial have done against a dragon? Why did he feel like he mattered so much?
Ralof didn't know. He also didn't care. The fight had gone out of him, and he was, if not ready to accept death, at least not willing to resist it.
This was, however, not so for some of his fellows.
"Ralof! Dammit, get up!"
Hands appeared at his wrists, undoing his bonds and yanking him up none too gently. Too surprised to resist, Ralof stumbled as he found his footing and found himself staring into the face of Aldor Sweet-Salve.
The blond man was small for a Nord, and weedier too. Perhaps that was why he'd joined the Stormcloaks as a healer, rather than a warrior. Staying off the battlefield as he did, a few amongst their ranks had even labelled the quiet man as a milk-drinking coward, but as the young man dragged Ralof away with a fierce look in his eyes, the older Nord realised the rumours held no truth to them.
"I am not going to die out here," the healer muttered, glaring up at the sky as though daring the dragon to attack. "And neither are you," he snapped at Ralof, who was stumbling and tripping over the uneven ground. "For the sake of the gods, pull yourself together and run!"
Aldor's last word was lost in the explosion that followed. A meteor plummeted down, landing no more than a foot behind them with such force, it blew them both off their feet.
Aldor cursed, struggling onto all fours before a hand was offered. This time, it was Ralof pulling the healer up, and Ralof leading the way as they sprinted through the cratered courtyard of Helgen. Leander Neleus's corpse had been forgotten as self-preservation kicked in; Ralof had a sister and a nephew and a life, dammit, and he was not going to lose it today.
"The tower!" Aldor yelled behind him, just barely audible over the latest roar of the dragon.
Ralof forced himself to keep his eyes ahead, focused on the half-ruined structure and refusing to look at the beast lest he fall pack into a pit of despair. He could hear the flap of its wings, its dreaded shouts as it blew blast after blast of fire at the hapless citizens of Helgen. None of that could matter right now; all Ralof could do was run.
With a burst of speed brought on by the dragon's flying directly over their heads, Ralof and Aldor sprinted across the exposed courtyard and practically flew through the open door to Helgen's one remaining intact tower.
"YOL TOOR—"
Whipping around, Ralof slammed the tower door shut just as the dragon finished its cry that had killed Leander. Even with a barrier between them, Ralof could feel the heat from the beast's cursed flames. And this door was mostly wooden—it wouldn't hold for long.
"Shit!" a higher voice than Aldor's screamed. "Shit, shit, SHIT!"
Ralof turned, only now noticing the others in the tower with him. Three of his fellow Stormcloaks had made it here as well, thanks the gods. Noris, one of the youngest and newest recruits, was the boy upright, and the boy cursing as he paced restlessly across the stone floor. He had to go out of his way to avoid Bern and Eina, who were both lying on the ground, barely aware of the newcomers. Ralof's stomach turned as he noticed the blood beneath the two of them.
Aldor was there in an instant, racing to Eina's side as she coughed up crimson spit. "Don't move," the healer murmured, sounding calmer than Ralof had thought possible for the situation they were in.
"What does it matter?" Noris all but screeched, rounding on Aldor. "She's dead anyways! We're all dead anyways! There's no way this tower will last, and then that dragon will come in here and—"
"Oi!" Bern shouted, glowering as he grabbed Noris's tunic with his uninjured arm. "Shut up, would you? Who do you think this is helping?"
"It's all right, Noris." Ralof had no idea how he could stand to be reassuring when his mind was filled with panicked screams, but here he was attempting to comfort the younger Nord. "We're not dead yet."
"Yet," the boy emphasised, brushing off Ralof's soothing pats and opting to pull his own hair out instead. "Yet, maybe, but we will be soon. Does no one realise what that is out there? A dragon. We are being attacked by a fucking—"
"Noris," Aldor cut in quickly. The healer rose from Eina's side and turned towards the panicking soldier, placing his hands on Noris's shoulders so the boy could not turn away. "We are going to get out of here. Trust me."
The boy was unconvinced. "How?" he wailed.
Aldor glanced towards the door, then to the stairs at the back of the tower. "You were a scout, right?" he said to Noris, who nodded nervously in response. "One of the best. Ulfric always spoke highly of you."
Ralof doubted Aldor had ever spoken to Ulfric personally—even he hadn't, and he was one of captains in the ranks—but the praise, even untruthful, did its work. The fear in Noris's eyes dimmed ever so slightly, and through the terrified fog, a spark of pride could be seen.
"So scout for us," Aldor said, pushing the boy towards the stairs. "Go up to the roof and analyse the situation."
And there went the short-lived pride. Noris gulped, eyes wide. "By m-myself?"
"You can do this. Just peek your head above the ramparts, then run back here to tell us what's going on. If we have the information, then we can form a plan, and then we can escape."
With that last word, the boy was hooked. Nodding furiously to Aldor, he took off across the tower, taking the steps two at a time as he raced upwards.
Bern raised an eyebrow as the healer began to evaluate his arm. "You really think we can come up with a plan to escape?"
"I don't know," Aldor said, poking the bloody skin and earning a wince from Bern. "But I do know I can't think at all with that boy yelling in my ear."
Bern chuckled. "I see."
His smile quickly turned to a grimace as Aldor continued to examine is arm. Ralof, not wanting to feel useless, went to Eina's side, though he lacked any sort of skills to help her.
"Hey," he said weakly, brushing her limp brown hair away from her closed eyelids. "You awake?"
Her lip quivered, then her eyes slowly opened. "Y-Yeah." She coughed, spitting up another wad of blood to join the puddle beneath her. Ralof couldn't see the site of the injury with her hands wrapped around her stomach as they were, but he knew it was bad. "But I'm s-so . . . tired . . ."
"Stay with us." He laid a hand gently on her cheek. "We still need you in the fight against the Empire."
"B-Bullshit." But she managed a small smile, and her eyelids stopped drooping down quite so much. "H-Hey, did you . . . see U-Ulfric out there?"
Ralof's blood ran cold. His dread must have been evident in his expression, for Eina trembled and murmured, "Oh, gods."
"I'm sure he's f-fine," Ralof stammered. "He is Ulfric, after all."
But truthfully, he didn't believe a word of it. Gods above, what had he been thinking? His leader had been out there, bound and gagged, and he'd been more worried about some welp of an Imperial he'd only just met. Why, why had he not searched for Ulfric, helped him to the tower?
In the state he was in, he wasn't much of a comfort to Eina; it was a relief, then, when Aldor came over to take his place.
"Well, Bern's not got a broken arm, at least." The healer sighed, dropping to Eina's level. "Let's see how you're doing. Ralof?"
He was so caught up in his fear for Ulfric, he could barely answer. "Y-Yes?"
"Check on Noris, will you? He's been up there too long. If that damned kid has gotten himself killed, I swear . . ."
Ralof nodded and left Aldor to his work. Though he felt awful for it, he couldn't say he wasn't at least a bit relieved to be away from the winces and muffled cries of Eina. Knowing she was so close to death, when there was nothing he could do to help . . . it cut him deeply. As it had each time he'd been placed in a similar situation.
Would there ever come a day when his friends stopped dying?
Ralof followed the curving stone steps around the tower's walls to the second level of the building. Though the air up here lacked the stomach-turning scent of Eina's blood, it was no easier to breathe with all the dust floating around.
Ralof coughed, glancing around the level littered with broken stones and crumbled mortar. The dragon, it seemed, had gotten here before any of them, half-collapsing the tower in which they now stood. It was a wonder it had held this long at all.
Noris was not deterred, however. Across the dark, gloomy space, Ralof could just see the boy's vibrant red hair as he flung himself back and forth, lugging stones away from the collapsed staircase at the other end of the room.
"We can still get to the roof!" he shouted upon glimpsing Ralof emerging from below. "Just have to . . . ugh, move a few more of these . . . urk, rocks, and then I'll squeeze through and—"
It all happened so fast. Ralof heard the roar through the walls, so powerful it froze him in his tracks, rendering him unable to so much as warn Noris. The younger Nord was oblivious to his surroundings anyways, so focused on clearing the rubble he never heard the noise, even as it grew louder and louder and louder.
When the dragon's head smashed through the tower wall, Ralof thought his heart would give out and die right then and there.
The world dissolved into chaos, a mess of sounds and colours Ralof could barely make sense of. Seeing a dragon afar was stunning enough as was, but to have it so close, barely an arm's breadth away . . . Ralof's knees turned weak at the sight. His mind couldn't even form a thought, too paralysed with fear as the beast's hate-filled eyes flickered around the room.
It noticed Noris first. The young Nord was cowering on the other side of the level, screaming for Ralof to help as the dragon turned on him. But once more, Ralof was powerless to do anything but watch as another fell victim to the flames.
It was pain that snapped him out of his frozen state. The dragon's fire was so hot, it melted away the very stones surrounding the hole it had created. Noris was reduced to nothing but blackened bones in seconds, and Ralof, even out of the line of fire, could feel blisters rise on his exposed arms as he threw them across his face. Before he knew it, he was stumbling, then falling back down the staircase he had just used, oblivious to the pain, only thinking of escaping the dragon's wrath.
Someone on the lower level gave a shout; before Ralof could trip over the last step and smash his head into the stone floor below, a body appeared behind him to break his fall.
Aldor let out a grunt as the bigger Nord plowed into him, knocking them both to the floor. Fortunately, neither had been injured—in the fall. Ralof's arms still bore horrific burns that made Aldor's jaw drop when he spotted them.
"Your skin . . ." Ever the healer, he scrambled up to take Ralof's arms in his hands, analysing the blackened flesh beneath his fingers.
Ralof winced and pulled away, stumbling back towards the steps. Thank Talos, the immediate danger was gone; the hole where the dragon's head had been was empty, and through it, Ralof could just see the beast flying off to continue terrorising Helgen. His heart filled with relief—
-and plummeted when he finally grasped exactly what he'd witnessed on the second level.
"N-Noris?" Aldor whispered, only worsening Ralof's guilt.
His desolate expression was all the answer the healer needed. Sinking to the floor beside a horror-struck Eina, Aldor buried his head in his hands, shoulders shaking.
"Oh g-gods. I just sent a b-boy to his d-death."
Ralof looked around the tower, feeling hopelessness threatening to take him once more. Would it really be so bad? His three companions had already succumbed. Bern had retreated to a corner, curled around his arm, grim and resigned. Eina was on her way out, but was just conscious enough to be aware and terrified of the fact. Aldor had been keeping them all going, but even he had broken now.
They were doomed.
"No."
Ralof could not be more shocked to hear word come from his own mouth, but as soon as it did, it gave him strength. Damn right, no. A Nord never gives up. Not without a fight.
He was getting out of here. Alive.
They all were.
Aldor looked up, shocked, as Ralof hauled him to his feet. "Help them," he ordered, pointing to the two injured Stormcloaks and ignoring the pain in his arms as he did so. "Get them ready to travel."
"Travel?" Bern said incredulously. "Where?"
Ralof thought back, far back. In his youth, he'd often travelled to Helgen; much of this town had been built from his family's lumber. He'd courted a girl from here, the daughter of the little hamlet's leader . . . Ingrid. Yes, Ingrid with the golden hair, the adorable dimples, and the paranoid father. It had been Dagfinn the Fearful who had ordered the construction of Helgen's keep, and who had been so overly suspicious of everyone, he'd ordered a secret escape route be built in the bowls of the building. Few knew of its existence.
Ralof was one of these few. Ingrid had told him, when they had tried to run away so many, many years ago.
He could only hope it was still there.
"To the keep!" he shouted over the sound of an explosion outside. "There's a secret tunnel that leads to a cave not too far from here. If we go out that way, we can escape the dragon!"
"And how are we supposed to make it all the way there?" Bern shot back. "Three of us are injured, and Aldor couldn't even carry Eina on his own. Face it, Ralof, we're all dead."
"No, we are not."
His tone cut harshly through the air, so commanding Aldor jumped to his feet, and even Bern flinched. No longer were they dealing with Ralof the Scared, Ralof the Useless, Ralof the Despairing. This was Ralof the Captain.
"I believe my rank outclasses yours, does it not?" Ralof snapped at Bern, who nodded mutely. "Then this is an order. We are getting out of here, and we are getting out alive. Do I make myself clear?"
Vidran, Leander, Noris, perhaps even Ulfric—it ended here. No one else was dying.
Not on his watch.