(AN: "Stop right there, criminal scum! Nobody follows a story without reviewing it on my page!" Lol, just for the heck of it. But seriously, my drive to write anything right now is zero.)
(On another note, though, there is something I would like to bring up as far as the cities in Skyrim go. Whiterun, by far, is the most significant and the one that most of the players spend quite a bit of time in. Windhelm is the home of the Stormcloaks, Riften of the Thieves Guild, Winterhold of the Mages' College, Solitude of the Imperials and the Bard's College [what little there is of it, which will change in one of my smaller stories I'm planning], and Falkreath pretty much just has the Dark Brotherhood for a while. Morthal has nothing - not even a smithy, unless you build one in Heartfire, which would make sense if that is your spouse's shop, since it would be a need filled with a healthy income of gold - Dawnstar has nothing until the Dark Brotherhood comes there, and Markarth sucks. Really, it is not in any danger of the dragons, its only problems are the Reachmen and it has no weight to the main quest. You could, in fact, play through the entire main quest [possibly those of Dawnguard as well] without ever visiting Markarth or having the need to visit there. Yeah, that insignificant.)
(Having said that, the towns of Morthal, Falkreath and Dawnstar are really uninteresting. Thankfully, my "fanon" version of Skyrim in this story is "semi-modded" [not all those "lore-friendly" ones that make Windhelm all bright and technicolor-y and spam every city with a thousand trees until it looks like freaking huorns have invaded Skyrim]. There is one decent Dawnstar mod which gives the city a wall, a lighthouse and such, which is what I will be depicting in this chapter, as well as more ships in the harbor.)
(Just as a warning, this chapter is one of the reasons that this story is rated M [and it's not for the violence]. If the doings of a certain daedric prince disturb you, know now that you have been warned.)
Dawnstar
Though Eirik had passed through the Pale several times throughout his time in Skyrim, he had not once seen the fabled port-city of Dawnstar, ensconced among the north-western edge of the mountains that made up the majority of the north-eastern corner of Skyrim. The city itself, while he had not seen it from the coast after the event in Ysgramor's tomb due to the amount of fog they had to cross through, he now saw as he, along with Mjoll, Lydia, Crixus, Torgrim and the elf, mounted the hill which stood at its south-western end.
Like everything in the Pale, it was covered with snow. The old stone walls were practically buried underneath the heavy stone drifts outside, while on the other side, the snow had been cleared up around the roads and paths. Here the icy winds from Atmora ever blew upon the coast, leaving the town cold and shivering: the heroes wore their cloaks and had their hoods pulled down over their heads to keep out the cold. The city of Dawnstar was built upon three levels, with the lowest level being around the coast. The second level held many houses dotting the lanes, while on the third, that nearest to the base of the arm of the mountains flung this far north into sheer bluffs above, there was a tall palace, a modest-looking inn, a barracks flying two banners - a star with four points and a single circle in the center, and the Imperial Red Diamond - several houses around the edge of the cliffs and a small temple around what appeared to be a modest market-place.
"There it is," Crixus said, gesturing to the city. "Dawnstar. It's doing much better now that that Stormcloak lover Skald the Elder has been driven out. See how the port has opened up again!"
Eirik said nothing, but kept his eyes on the many Imperial soldiers walking the streets. Crixus noticed this and chuckled.
"They're here to keep the peace," he said. "Unlike your Ulfric Stormcloaks' occupying force in Windhelm, only there to secure his tyranny."
"So an Imperial garrison keeps the peace," Eirik said. "But Windhelm guards are an occupying force?"
"And a force of oppression," Crixus stated.
"Since when have you ever cared about the Dunmer?" Eirik asked.
"There's a lot you don't know about me," Crixus replied. "Now, get your arse down to the Windpeak Inn on the third level. It's the sign with the sun rising over a mountain peak. Torgrim and I have business to do, securing a ship and such."
"Wait a minute," Lydia spoke up. "What about this one?" She gestured with her head to the elf behind her.
"What about her?" Crixus asked. "I see you brought her out of Breezehome. Am I supposed to thank you for that?"
"You arrogant bastard!"
"I would have collected her in good time," Crixus replied. "Don't think that I'd leave a mer woman defenseless in the hands of three drunken Nords." He turned to Torgrim. "Be so kind as to relieve the huscarl of her burden."
Torgrim brought his horse up alongside Lydia and picked the elf up off her horse and held her upon his shoulders. Crixus and Torgrim then made their way to the shore level while Eirik groaned in frustration, then turned his horse towards the third level. They did not have to look far to find the Windpeak Inn, which they discovered was just inside the wall, near the gate of Dawnstar. Here they tied their horses up and passed on into the warmth of the inn. The journey through the Pale had been filled with blinding snow and freezing cold and they were eager to put a door between them and the encroaching night and its cold.
"I'll see to getting us some rooms, my thane," Lydia said as she made her way to the bar. Meanwhile, Mjoll and Eirik made their way to the hearth to warm their hands.
"I hope that we leave soon," Eirik said. "I don't like the idea of spending the night in an Imperial hold." He gestured towards the other tables in the common room, which had several off-duty Imperial soldiers drinking and laughing among themselves. It held all the makings of a potential bar-fight and he didn't feel like going alone against at least seven or nine others.
"I hope so as well," Mjoll said. "But for other reasons. Haven't you noticed the locals as we passed through here?"
"Not really," Eirik answered. "I wasn't paying close attention to them."
"They look like they haven't had a proper night's rest in months," Mjoll replied. "I think this was part of the note that Madena sent me. I should like to ask her about it, though I'm not entirely certain if I have the note with me anymore. I should very much like to ask around while we're waiting."
"By all means," Eirik replied.
Mjoll went about the patrons, asking about the nightmares and such in a bit of a low voice while a young bard sitting on a stool by the fire-place was fingering her lute. Lydia returned with news of their room and told him that she had taken the liberty of purchasing some food for them. As they sat down to ripe cheese and cold ale, Lydia shared with Eirik a little of what she had learned from the bar-keeper Thoring.
"Not much to tell about this place," she began. "When the rebellion broke out, Skald closed the ports. The official story was that he didn't want to be trading with those who had betrayed Talos. A lot of stories about that one, so they say: I hear that he used to beat his servants and keep his steward from joining the war. Well, as you can imagine, once the Empire took control of this place, they moved to get another Jarl in here as soon as possible. The new Jarl is Brina Merilis, a Nord from Bruma who came up with General Tullius and the Legion when the war broke out."
"Placing Imperials in high places, I see," Eirik stated.
"Well, she's a Nord, like as not," Lydia continued. "And from what I've heard, she's very popular among the people, so they have no qualms about her being here. She claims to have retired, though she does keep a rather large cohort in the city. But she's hardly the biggest concern among the people of Dawnstar: for them, it's these nightmares. I'm not sure how long ago they started, but ever since then, the people in and around Dawnstar have been suffering from the most horrific nightmares. Thoring wouldn't say for sure, he looked rather disturbed when I asked him what they were like, but he did let on that screams fill the air every night and the whole town wakes up in a cold sweat."
At this moment, Mjoll joined their table from where she had been talking with an orange-robed priest.
"I've done a little asking around," she began. "And I think I found the one I was looking for." She gestured over to the priest, who gently waved at her in reply.
"A Dunmer?" Eirik asked.
"He's a priest of Mara," Mjoll replied. "So I believe he can be trusted. His name is Erandur. He told me that there could be a way to save the people of Dawnstar from the nightmares."
"How?" Eirik asked.
"Do you remember seeing that tower on the top of the bluffs to the east as we came to this place?" Mjoll asked. Both Eirik and Lydia murmured an 'aye.' "He says that the place was called the Tower of Dawn in the early days, but that it is also known by another name: Nightcaller Temple. He says that the source of the nightmares is that place."
"I take it you're going there to defeat this evil and restore peace to Dawnstar?" Eirik asked.
Mjoll sighed. "Love, listen to me. You know that I would follow you wherever you choose to go, that I trust you with my life as I have trusted no one else save for Aerin. But this was what I was warned about, what I was begged to come help with. Before I met you, I dismissed it because it was not 'my beast' of Riften, and continued to do so. But now that I have Grimsever, I do not wish to leave the cry of Dawnstar unheeded." She paused, then looked Eirik earnestly in the eyes.
"I know you wanted to go to Solstheim," she said. "Believe me, it would be good to look upon the netch pastures with you again. But I have yet another beast to slay and I cannot ignore them any further." She sighed. "This is where we must part ways for a time."
Eirik did not respond at once. The thought of losing Mjoll was suddenly very real, now that she had no protection from her gift. They were married and was not he, therefore, supposed to stand at her side just as she stood at his while they stormed the gates of Castle Volkihar or fought in the Battle of Heljarchen Vale?
"You know," he said slowly at length. "That you are free to go as you will and do as you wish. I...cannot protect you...either of you, if you choose to depart now."
Mjoll smiled. "You needn't worry yourself, dear. I'm more than capable of defending myself. I doubt that I will be very long in this task. I daresay that by the time you return from Solstheim, you might find me waiting for you on the docks of Dawnstar."
Eirik smiled and planted a kiss on her cheek. "I will pray for your safety every night we're apart."
After they finished their meal, they retired to their rooms. Mjoll and Eirik fell asleep in one bed with their arms wrapped around each other while Lydia sat in the corner, quietly drinking off a bottle of Honningbrew mead and trying to ward off sleep as best she could. The only light in the room was the flicker of a candle on the short, squat dresser pushed up against the wall, which made every shadow dance in its light. The effect was hypnotic, but Lydia, not one to doubt the rumors she had heard and not wishing to prove them true, fought the urge to sleep with renewed vigor.
Eirik was in a mist of darkness. It was a greater dark than the night under stars or the mists of the World-Eater. He saw nothing but a low, quiet rumble made him distinctly aware that he was not alone. Then a bright light appeared from the east, brighter than the sun and of a white light. Slowly the light began to fade, though it lost none of its glory, until it appeared to him in a form which he had seen before in his dreams. It was the shape of a woman, tall and worshipful, clad in transparent white garments that glistened like starlight. In her right hand she bore a star and upon her brow was a coronet of many shining stars.
"It has been long, my champion," said Azura. "Since I appeared to you. You must go to my shrine in the mountains, there I will speak to you once again and tell you what you must do."
"Have I not ended the prophecy?" he asked. "Have I not saved the dawn from the night eternity?"
"Yes, mortal," Azura replied. "But there is so much more for you to achieve as my champion, bringing my light to my servants once again. Long have they resisted me, though I am their true guiding light. You, my champion, are placed appropriately to bring them back into the light." Then, to Eirik's surprise, he saw that the daedric prince held aloft her hand and the star in her hand disappeared. Then she reached up to her shoulders and parted her garments, revealing her pale, glistening shoulders.
"And the rewards," she added. "Shall be great."
Azura let her robe fall to her ankles, then gracefully moved towards where Eirik lay, standing before him in all of her glory. Slowly her hands reached up and removed the shimmering coronet, and as the light faded from her face, Eirik was surprised to see that her face was the face of a Nord woman with red-golden hair, blue woad-paint and a scar beneath her left eye. Around him the dream seemed to shift and he saw that it was not Azura but Mjoll, his beloved, sitting naked upon his lap as had been so before his final fight with the World-Eater. Every movement of her body, every sound issuing from her lips and every touch with which she caressed his chest, made Eirik happy and assured of how strong and invincible he felt when in her presence.
Mjoll bent forward, leaning her head down until her face was obscured by her long hair hanging down, then let out the most ungodly neigh. With a swish, she brought her head back up and, to Eirik's shock, he saw a horse's long face where the face of his beloved once stood. He quivered at the repulsion of the sight, then heard helplessly as the horse spoke with a deep voice.
"Am I not beautiful, love?"
Suddenly there was a great weight pressing down upon Eirik and he saw that her sturdy, warrior's body had become that of a horse, squatting down upon him with all of its girth. He couldn't move, he couldn't even wedge himself out from beneath the weight of the mare as it grunted and neighed against him. Suddenly the bed upon which he lay turned to a thousand creeping black spiders, crawling and scurrying upon his back, eager to sink their fangs into his flesh. A hand suddenly rose up out of the vermin and seized Eirik's neck from behind. The mare was gone, but instead he saw the cold stone floor of Castle Volkihar and the devotees moving frantically in their mad rituals. The iron-strong hand bent his head upward until he saw the beast glaring down upon him with venomous hatred. Pain erupted from behind as he suddenly realized that the beast, the daedric prince of vampires and domination, was riding him from behind. But that was Serana's memories, not his own. He struggled to look down but the grip of the beast was strong.
The hand gave and became a slimy tendril, wrapping around his neck. He found himself being wrapped in tendrils like the black webs of some massive spider. The castle vanished and there was darkness once again, but then the eyes appeared. Thousands of squarish goat eyes leered out at him from the darkness as more and more black tendrils began entwining him like the coils of some massive serpent.
"Once a servant of the daedra," the sleepy voice of Hermaeus Mora spoke. "Always a servant of the daedra."
The darkness was suddenly filled with the mocking voice of Harkon Volkihar, taunting him from the darkness as the thousand black arms of Hermaeus Mora were dragging him down into the abyss. He came to a jolt as he saw a man with a sickeningly elvish face: in one hand he held a mask with two horns upon it and in the other he held the head of Mjoll, severed from its body, and at his feet lingered a dog.
"I gave her this gift," the elf-faced man said. "With the stipulation that she remain a virgin to keep it. You stole it from her with your cock. Her blood is on your hands."
The face turned into that of an Argonian, calling him a snow-back and threatening to take Mjoll from him. Then the face shifted again and there was Alduin, roaring at him with maw wide open, a hunger to devour the world. The eyes, though, were not the eyes of the dragon. He could see an old man's face laughing at him, twitching intermittently into that of a woman with dark hair and a nose that reminded him of someone he had seen before. Then the dragon's face turned back into an elf's face, but there was nothing human about it: it was taunting him from out of the depths of the dungeons of Castle Dour in Solitude. The elf laughed as he mocked him of what he would do to him, as the two faces danced within his eyes as well, and then there was a bright, blinding light.
Eirik found Mjoll laying before him upon the bed in Breezehome. In her arms was a little infant wrapped in swaddling clothes. His heart broke with happiness as he saw the joy on her face and the crinkled face of the newborn, swatting fat little arms at the air.
"Come, love," Mjoll said. "Hold your firstborn in your arms."
Eagerly, he reached down and took the child from her. He was surprised how the baby fit easily into his hands as he held the child up. Whether boy or girl, the babe bore the face of Mjoll and her eyes were brown like his eyes. The baby began to cry and Eirik saw the face was starting to turn red.
"What are you doing?" Mjoll asked, alarm slowly building in her voice as she heard the baby's cries. "Stop! What are you doing?"
To Eirik's horror, he saw that the baby was starting to bleed. He saw no cut or wound, but blood was pouring out of its very skin and the baby was now screaming at the top of its little lungs. His baby was dying in his own hands and he didn't know why, nor could he stop it. Why was Mjoll blaming him? She could see that he had done nothing other than to hold the child in his arms as she had done. The baby's screams filled his ears as it was now a mass of blood that was melting through his finger-tips.
"What are you doing?!" Mjoll screamed, tears streaming from her eyes in disbelief.
The voice of the elf-faced man appeared to him again: her blood is on your hands. He found himself kneeling on the ground, cradling Mjoll in his arms. He knew that she was dying, though he knew not why. She could not speak but was spewing something sickly and yellow out of her lips and onto his hands: he saw with a shiver that the yellow things were maggots. He looked down at her and tried to assure her that she would not die; he would find some way to save her. But no answer came, only more yellow maggots, mixed now with blood. He cried out for anyone, but they were all gone. Lydia lay on the ground at his right hand, the great-sword of the Skaal, his sword, buried in her back. To his left he saw Serana's head lying away from her body, a trail of blood leading to where it had been ripped off, the blooded Dawnbreaker sword lying between her legs.
"What have I done?" Eirik muttered through tears. "What have I done?"
Mjoll's body gave one last sickening convulsion, spewed blood-covered maggots out once more, then came to a halt. In horror he heard once more: her blood is on your hands. Then the body began to rot before his very eyes, falling away into burned and cracked flakes, half like a Falmer and half like a draugr corpse, with each flake falling apart into a mass of a thousand black creeping things. The face was rotting first and he watched in abject helplessness and horror as the face he loved crumbled to ashes and dust and maggots.
Eirik cried out and gripped tightly at the soft, warm thing before him, squirming beneath the covers and crinkling straw as the horror began to set in. He caught his foot on thin air and his eyes snapped open. He was not in darkness, but in a rented room in the Windpeak Inn in Dawnstar. Mjoll was not dead, but sleeping just a few inches away from him: neither a horse nor a mound of blood-soaked maggots, but a living, breathing woman. She stirred within her dreams, moaned in fear and gripped the pillow slightly, her breath quickening. Then Lydia appeared, alive and well as she had always been.
"Are you well, my thane?" she whispered.
In the distance, the still of the night was broken by a scream several blocks away, near the docking level of the city. Eirik was gasping heavily and swiftly, his heart beating against his chest like the hammer upon the anvil. He reached up to touch his burning forehead and found that he was drenched in sweat. Lydia placed her hand upon his shoulder and he shivered at how cold her hand was against his shoulder.
"What's the matter?" she asked again. "What happened?"
Eirik tried to explain what he had seen, but all that came out of his mouth were stammered phrases of incoherence, making no sense to himself nor to Lydia. With each renewed attempt to explain what he had seen, he seemed to make even more of a fool out of himself: he knew what he had seen, he knew what it was, and yet he could not speak those words plainly.
"It was just a dream, my thane," Lydia replied, gently patting his shoulder.
"It-It...it was so real," Eirik stammered, tears streaming down his face. Lydia reached up and wiped the tears from her thane's eyes.
"But it wasn't," Lydia continued. "That's the good thing about dreams, my thane: they end."
"Don't make me go back," Eirik muttered. "Don't make me go back!"
"Back where?"
"Back to sleep," he said. "The monsters...the horrors, the images, the creeping, crawling things: they'll get me again!"
Lydia didn't understand what her thane was saying, but she saw the horror on his face. She had gone through fire and death with him and had seen him stare down the World-Eater with not even half as much fear as she now saw in his eyes. She gently patted his shoulder again.
"You don't have to go back to sleep," she said. "Come here, my thane. Let us sit against the wall and watch the candle burn until morning comes." She rose up from the side of Eirik's bed and led him over to the side of the wall, where she had sat with her food and wine, warding off sleep.
"I guessed that it wouldn't be a good idea to sleep in this town," she said. "You're welcome to join me. There shouldn't be more than three hours left until dawn."
Eirik sat down shiveringly next to Lydia. Seeing that he was apparently still cold, she took her cloak, which had been resting against the back-rest of a chair, and wrapped him in it while she sipped from her mug.
"You're a good woman, Lydia." Eirik said. "You serve me well."
"You treat me well, my thane," Lydia responded. "You're not bad in a fight and I enjoy our time together."
"I never tell you how grateful I am for your service," Eirik returned.
"And you never need to, my thane," Lydia said, wiping a tear from her own eye. She had heard the words of the Tongues, the three heroes that had fought at her thane's side in Sovngarde against the World-Eater. She held a place of renown among them already, so they had told her, and she would not begrudge her duties as huscarl to the Dragonborn, the savior of Skyrim: as long as he carried his own burdens, though.
(AN: I know they say in the game that Vaermina's nightmares don't happen to visitors, but I couldn't resist doing something genuinely messed up, especially involving daedric princes. Tell me what you think of it: part of me feels that I was a bit too Namira with this dream sequence.)
(While I don't know what will happen to Mjoll in the long-run [at least as far as 2024E is concerned], I did have something planned and it does carry weight to the "main quest" of this story. Like Russell T. Davies, show-runner of the first four seasons of nu-Doctor Who [the real bamf, and not for bad reasons like Stephen Moffat], I feel that a story of this size and scale should have a fair amount of foreshadowing and everything should be connected to the final conflict/climax of the story.)
(Don't forget the reviews!)
