He listens but seldom talks - and he learns; about growing cabbages, and how to curdle cheese, about the best season for sowing wheat and how to help deliver a calf.
When he is not asleep, Ulfric watches the guttering flame of his candle dance in the ever-present draft and awaits the footsteps that will announce that he has company.
It is the only way to measure the passing of time down here. The jailor arrives sometime in the morning with food and a new candle and his other visitor comes in the evening to stay for an hour or two and when he leaves Ulfric curls up on his pallet and hopes for sleep to find him before the flashbacks do.
oooo
The lad pities him, he can tell. He brings clean water and food and Ulfric begins to feel grateful, because bad as things are they would be infinitely worse without those little gifts. He knows he shouldn't make much of it; the elves used a similar tactic on those of weaker wills, those who broke under the gentle pressure of a promise – to never be familiar with the underground rooms from which the smell of blood and the screams of the tortured welled up. Those who never had to suffer the rack and brand, or the hunger, pain and humiliation like their comrades who had not sold their honour for a few rotten comforts.
Even so, the day his friend does not show up, Ulfric worries. He wonders if they are going to change their approach now, if he will be asked for some small, seemingly insignificant favour. If he will have the strength to resist.
His hand twitches at the thought and he tries to massage the cramps out of it. His knee is stiff and his shoulder has become nearly immovable, from the damp, most likely. Not even his Nord blood can keep the cold at bay, and it seeps into his very bones, a brittle, sharp ache that makes him shiver and his teeth chatter.
But worst of all is the helplessness. His anger had kept him pacing through the first days, weeks even, but Ulfric finds it more and more difficult to keep his strength up. He spends hours lying on his shabby cot, indifferent, and stares at the stone walls. Tries hard not to think that his last bath must have been months ago and to ignore the spreading itch or the lesions where he had scratched himself bloody.
Dungeons are always crawling with vermin and he wonders if he is one of them, different only because he is aware of his own fate.
oooo
The day the footsteps come again – not the cautious shuffling gait of the weary jailor who has the unfortunate task of emptying his chamber pot, but the heavy, brisk spring of a warrior – Ulfric sits up, excited all of a sudden and with his heart beating wildly. He has learned to recognize his visitor by his step during the long months with nothing else to look forward to, but to listen to a voice that was not his own, muttering prayers.
"Where have you been?" Ulfric's tone is accusing when the lad comes into view at the bottom of the stairs.
"Out", the soldier replies unfazed and Ulfric is not sure if he is happier to see the man, the lamp he lights to drive away the heavy oppression of the surrounding darkness or the bag he places next to the bars. "Training." He grins, the fierce grin at odds with his calm voice and otherwise tranquil behaviour.
Ulfric does not ask what training entails; after all, it was him who bestowed the honours upon the warrior for holding back the Forsworn in battle.
"So, the Greybeards", the lad says cheerfully, sitting down on the same low stool that had taken up permanent residence next to Ulfric's cell, like they had never interrupted their talk. Like he had not abandoned Ulfric these past weeks. "Who are they?"
The Jarl's son considers not to answer, to counter his damned happy demeanour with icy silence, but his resolve quickly crumbles. The jailor never talks and the gods too keep silent. Ulfric is weary of the quiet. The only connection to the outward world that he has is the man before him, and he is willing to share any news and to come down here, for whatever reasons. Maybe he feels guilt over his own rise to fame or responsible for the man who paved the way he now walks.
There is also a simpler truth. Ulfric does not want to be alone.
He moves to the cell's front, dragging over his pallet and leans against the wall. "I see I should start at the beginning."
He takes his time thinking about how he can best explain the solemn, hard grandeur that surrounds High Hrothgar and its residents. "The Greybeards live in seclusion near the top of the Throat of the World, the great mountain of Skyrim. The tallest mountain of all Tamriel. They're masters of the Way of the Voice. Of Shouting."
The soldier's brows furrow and he looks confused; and the thought strikes Ulfric that he has to go back even further, that not everybody has grown up on the tales of old.
"What do you know about Shouts?", he asks with a sigh.
"Less than you, I guess", comes the reluctant answer.
Ulfric watches the lad's jaw set in a stubborn expression and snorts, partly in amusement and partly in disdain for such ignorance. Too proud to admit that he knows nothing. "That wouldn't be hard", he replies and continues, "I know more than most. I was chosen when I was just a boy to become a Greybeard myself."
He does not speak of his feelings, the pride of his father, the apprehension of being there all on his own, or the relief when his sisters accompany him. Of how the air is laden with history and can make you feel light-headed from the height or of the solace one can find in the tranquillity of the monastery.
"The Way of the Voice is an ancient, spiritual form of magic in which you project your vital essence into a Thu'um or Shout", Ulfric explains and sees as the lad rolls his eyes towards the ceiling. He has to chuckle despite the longing ache in his chest and the memories, now bittersweet.
"Quite a mouthful, isn't it?", the soldier asks with a small smile pulling at his lips and Ulfric feels himself responding in like before he resumes.
"Anybody can learn how to use the Thu'um although it would take most years before they could even attempt a single Shout."
"Most people? But not you." The lad regards Ulfric with sharp eyes. He may be uneducated, but he is clever.
"No, not me." Ulfric is not willing to discuss that. "And, of course, the Dragonborn is rumoured to be different", he diverts the talk, aware that the other man will notice, but with hope that he will not ask. He never did, so far.
The lad sits up straighter at the mention of the legendary figure. "Who's that?"
"The old tales tell of Dragonborn heroes who slew dragons and took their power. Of course, they are just that: tales."
"So they are not real?"
"Of course they are", Ulfric scoffs. "But they are also a thing of the past. Many possessed the blood of dragons back then; Wulfhearth, whom we call Ysmir, Jurgen Windcaller and, of course, Tiber Septim. Talos. The founder of the Empire and the Septim bloodline; he was the last. There has not been a Dragonborn in almost six hundred years since his death."
"How does it work? Taking a dragon's power?"
Ulfric has asked himself the very same thing on many a night. After all, the Greybeards' purpose was to find and guide the dovahkiin and many volumes on the topic filled the library, yet none could give an answer to that very question and Ulfric has read them all. "Nobody knows for sure."
"You have a theory about that?"
"Many. And I doubt you would understand a single one."
Instead of taking offence the soldier just sighs and stretches out his legs. "Says the man who asked why we plant in First Seed. Don't call others stupid if you can't feed yourself", he rebukes offhandedly, accustomed to the occasionally less than courteous replies by now.
Ulfric grunts in answer, because there is truth in that. For all his knowledge he is the one behind bars.
"Go on", the other man prompts, eager for more.
It takes the Jarl's son a while to compose himself. "It was a great honour to have been summoned", he starts, faltering, before he resumes more firmly. "The Greybeards speak to very few- in fact, they hardly speak at all, for their voices are so powerful they could bring down the very mountain they stand upon. I spent almost ten years at High Hrothgar, learning the Way of the Voice. They taught me how to Shout."
"Do you miss it?" The question stings in its accuracy and slices through Ulfric's self-imposed detachment.
"I miss a lot of things and the peace of High Hrothgar is not the least of them." It comes out more harshly than he wanted it to.
The lad actually winces. "I'm sorry."
"Save your pity." Ulfric neither wants it, nor does he need it. He had lived through worse, without the churl.
The soldier nods, but soon after he cocks his head, points his chin in the prisoner's direction. "What's wrong with your hand?"
"Nothing", the Jarl's son replies automatically, his heartbeat picking up. His visitor is too perceptive for his own good. Ulfric decides he no longer wishes for this talk to continue and gets up to withdraw into the corner that is his sleeping place.
The other man's next words stop him dead in his tracks.
"The guards tell me they heard you screaming." When there is no reaction from the prisoner, the soldier quietly adds "Every night."
After all this time one remark is all it takes to give Ulfric the cold sweats. He'd retreat further if his muscles had not locked so hard he can barely force his mouth open to hiss, "Get out!"
The lad cowers down in front of the cell under the hateful glare of the older man, still speaking softly. "You move like you're in a lot of pain." He looks around, as if seeing their surroundings for the first time. "I guess this place isn't exactly helping, either."
There is no reaction from the Jarl's son; he does not give the impression of having heard a single word.
"I'll try to put in a good word with the Jarl for you", the blond soldier finally says and Ulfric chokes on his next breath at the mention of the man who put him here in first place, his hands balling into fists.
After a long moment in which neither moves, the soldier leaves. He does not come back this time.
AN: I'm working on the next chapter of HT, it should be up this week.