Update: I finished it. It'll all be up by the end of April.
It didn't take long for Jorrvaskr to adjust to its new harbinger, and it didn't take long for its new harbinger to adjust to her new role. For the most part, the whelps were all agreeable enough with the fact that she'd been chosen, and although the Circle did not tell them how they knew Kodlak had wanted her, they knew that she'd been the one Kodlak had named. As such, they did not complain.
Apparently, too, the jobs that the Companions took care of mostly went through the Circle members who weren't Harbinger. That was something Cry found odd, but she had come to the conclusion under Kodlak's leadership that he wasn't necessarily a leader, more like someone who offered guidance and advice when a Companion sought it from them.
Cry had never been one to give out advice, really, but since it was the task she now claimed, she did her best. And, really, it wasn't as hard as she'd thought it would be. Aside from advice giving, the Circle would bring different jobs to her, ask her if they were worth the coin, which Cry thought was a task she was better suited to.
When she wasn't working as harbinger, she was spending more time with her Companions, Vilkas especially. Oftentimes, he would approach her, asking if she wanted to go hunting, and Cry would say yes. More often than not, Farkas or one of the whelps would tag along with them, which meant that they were never truly alone. Cry didn't think she would mind such an outing, however.
She learned a lot about Vilkas while they were home at Jorrvaskr, as well. He was the one to come see her in the harbinger's quarters the most, and they would sit at the corner table in the sitting room for hours, talking about everything and nothing. Cry was amazed to find that she never got tired of hearing Vilkas talk, and the sentiment seemed to be returned. She only wished she could be completely truthful with him, as he seemed to be with her.
Finally, they got a chance to take an outing of their own, without anyone else coming along with them. Farkas had gone with Torvar on a job in Rorikstead, and Aela had gone out hunting with Njada and Ria. Athis was busy with his two-handed weapon training. Cry decided to take advantage of this, and approached Vilkas where he sat at the long table in the mead hall, reading, as usual.
"What are you reading this time?" she asked him, and he glanced up, smiling a bit.
"Fiction, actually," he said, setting the book down. "I took your advice, and you're right; it can be just as interesting as history."
Cry grinned, and gestured with her head towards the doors of Jorrvaskr. "How do you feel about some giant hunting?" she questioned.
Vilkas made a face of apprehension. "Just the two of us? That doesn't sound very wise."
"It isn't, and that's what will make it interesting," Cry told him. "Let's go!"
Without waiting for a response, she turned and headed for the doors. She sensed him following along behind her, and she smirked, picking up her pace a bit as she made her way through Whiterun towards the main gates. Vilkas kept up with her, rather easily.
Once they were outside the gates, Cry broke into a run, heading for the plains, where giants were known to roam. Vilkas chased after her, and she heard him breathing, heard him running on her heels. Cry laughed, pumping her arms as she raced across the grassy ground, leaping over a stream in her path. She heard Vilkas do the same, and land on the other side of it, stumbling a bit.
"Hah!" she called back to him. "You need to work on your balance!"
"Coming from you!" Vilkas shouted back, although his voice was much closer than she expected it to be. Suddenly, she hit the ground, hard, Vilkas on top of her.
"Ouch," she complained, although she was giggling as well. She elbowed at him. "Get off me, you big oaf!"
Vilkas chuckled, and rolled off of her. Cry flipped onto her back as well, and they stared up at the sky for a moment, both getting their breath back. Cry exhaled, and glanced over at him, admiring his profile. He turned his head to look at her as well, and she quickly turned her attention back to the sky.
"All right," she said, and she flipped herself up to her feet, leaning over to help him up as well. "C'mon, we have giants to catch."
"This is not a good idea," Vilkas told her, following her towards a large rock. They both leaned around it, and Cry caught sight of a giant first. She nudged Vilkas.
"There's one, over there," she murmured. "And it looks like he's alone. We can take him easily. I'll go around, distract him, and you get him from behind."
"Cry…" Vilkas said, warily.
"Charge!" Cry said, and she raced away from the rock, running around until she was within sight of the giant. She waved her arms in the air, and jumped up and down. "Here, you big stupid!" she shouted up at him. "Look here!"
The giant made an angry noise, and stomped his feet a little. He pulled out his club, a big wooden thing, and waved it in her direction. Cry dodged backwards, avoiding it based on its shadow, and looked for Vilkas. She spotted him standing near the rock, waving his arms wildly, and she made a face, wondering why he wasn't following along with her plan.
When she felt the ground move beneath her feet, and heard grunting from behind her, felt hot air on her back, she realized why. Slowly, she turned around, only to find herself face to face with a mammoth.
"Shit," she said, quietly, and then she ducked down as the mammoth shook its head at her, attempting to get at her with its tusks. She slipped beneath its belly, and scooted out from beneath it on her stomach, using her elbows and knees to propel her forward.
Once she was out of shadow, she jumped to her feet, and raced in Vilkas's direction, almost positive a look of terror existed on her face. The thought was confirmed for her when she saw the grin on Vilkas's own. He joined her as she sprinted past the rock where he stood, meeting her stride for stride.
"Told you," he said, panting a bit.
"Shut up!" Cry retorted, and she picked up her pace when she heard the giant bellow. "Now is definitely not the time."
They two of them ran once more for the gates of Whiterun, leaving the giant and his mammoth behind them. They didn't stop running until they reached the doors of Jorrvaskr, which they fell against, breathing hard. After a moment, Vilkas burst into laughter, and Cry snorted in response.
"I can't believe you thought that was a good idea!" Vilkas said, still laughing, and Cry offered him a playful glare over her shoulder as she pushed her way into Jorrvaskr first.
"It seemed like a good idea, at the time," she said, and Vilkas chortled, walking past her. "Stop laughing at me!"
"I just…" He stopped himself, and let out a breath, before he looked at her, his eyes twinkling. "You amaze me."
Cry's shoulders fell, and she ducked her head, grinning. "I do?"
"Yes," Vilkas responded, and then he shook his head. "But don't ever do that again."
"Don't tell me what not to do," Cry said, and she shoved him, amiably. "I'm your Harbinger, remember?"
He nodded. "All too well."
"Cry."
She turned away from Vilkas, and saw that Farkas had approached. She raised an eyebrow, and smiled at him.
"Back already," she said. "Must have been an easy job."
He shrugged slightly. "It was." He then held out a letter towards her. "This came for you, while you were out," he said, looking between her and Vilkas with a knowing expression.
Cry snatched the letter from him, and offered him a warning look. "Thank you, Farkas," she said.
He nodded, and then turned around, walking away from them again. Cry glanced down at the letter, and felt her face drain of color when she saw the emblem on the seal.
"Cry?" Vilkas must have noticed her change in mood, because he was suddenly gazing at her with concern in his eyes. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing," Cry said, quietly. "I just… I need to read this. I'll talk to you later."
She walked away from him, holding the letter from Delphine tight in one hand. She hurried down the stairs into the living quarters, pushing her way through the doors and practically sprinting down the hall to her sitting room. Once there, she closed the door, and then sat down at the table in the corner, setting the letter down on the table in front of her.
She had been expecting it. Of course she had. The whole reason she was even here with the Companions was because of what was most likely in that letter. Delphine and Esbern had figured out the location of Sky Haven Temple, and they wanted her to come to wherever it was, to finish what they had started, to find out what exactly she was meant to do about Alduin, the World-Eater.
And yet… for a while, she had forgotten about it. She had allowed herself to get wrapped up in the Companions, in her new role as Harbinger, and, as much as she hated to admit it, in Vilkas. What had been the day they had just spent together, if not an outing shared by a couple?
She shook away the thought. The last thing she and Vilkas could be was a couple, especially now that she needed to get back to her Dragonborn duties, and whatever fate they had in store for her. Esbern's fears about Alduin's return were doing nothing to brighten the outlook she had on her future, but she supposed that, if she was meant to die in order to defeat Alduin, then so be it.
And that meant that she could not let herself linger here in Jorrvaskr, as the Harbinger of the Companions, or with Vilkas, for any longer than she already had.
She reached for the letter, ready to open it. Before she could even pick it up again, there was a knock on the closed doors to the sitting room. Cry dropped her hand to the table. She already knew who it was on the other side, and she did not want to face them.
"Cry?" Vilkas sounded worried. "Could I come in?"
She let out a sigh. She really shouldn't let him in, but she knew she would have to talk to him sooner or later, and she figured it would only get to be harder if she waited.
So, she stood up, and went to the doors. She pulled one of them open, and Vilkas immediately backed away a few steps.
"Are you all right?" he asked, and she nodded, once. "You don't look it."
"Thanks," she said, and tried to force a smile, but she couldn't bring herself to it. Vilkas noticed, and the crease between his eyes deepened.
"Do you want to talk about it?"
"I can't, really," Cry said. She turned around, walking back over to the table, but leaving the door open. Vilkas followed her into the sitting room, closing the door himself. He turned around to face her, again, and Cry shrugged one shoulder. "It's just… something that I let myself ignore for a while is suddenly rearing its ugly head again, and I need to… to deal with it." She sighed. "It's kind of my destiny, I think."
"You believe in that sort of thing?" Vilkas queried, and she shrugged again, both shoulders this time.
"I'm sort of bound to believing in it," she said. "There's really no other explanation, so…" She looked at him. "I might need to leave the Companions."
"What?" Vilkas sounded like he thought she was kidding. "You can't just do that. You're our Harbinger."
"I know," Cry said, "which makes this so much harder." She turned her gaze to the floor. "You'll be able to handle it, while I'm gone, won't you?"
"Well, maybe, but you're not leaving, so I won't have to."
"Vilkas -"
"Cry." She paused, and glanced up at him. He looked… strange. There was an expression on his face that she didn't think she'd ever seen on anyone before. He looked helpless, confused, and obstinate, all at once. "You're not going."
"You can't really stop me," Cry mumbled.
"I love you."
She bowed her head, and closed her eyes, tightly. "See, that's what I was hoping you wouldn't say," she whispered.
"It isn't as though I've been trying to hide it," Vilkas said, and then he paused. "Although, maybe you just couldn't tell, because I really don't know how to show it."
"You've done your best," Cry said, and then she looked at him again. "I still have to go, Vilkas."
"Then, can you at least tell me where?" he asked, gently. Cry shook her head.
"It's better if I don't," she said, and then she turned around. "I think I'm going to go to sleep. If you want, we can try to talk about this again in the morning, when I… well, I guess I won't be better rested, but I'll have had some time to think." She began to head towards her bedchamber.
"Why do you push me away?"
Cry stopped walking, and bowed her head. There was genuine hurt in Vilkas's voice, something she'd never thought she'd hear.
"I'm trying, here, Cry. Can't you lend me a hand?" he asked, and she inhaled, slowly.
"I can't love you, Vilkas," she said, her voice soft. "As much as I want to, I can't."
"But why?" She sensed him move closer to where she had stopped, just outside the doors to her bedchamber. "Why can't you?"
Maybe you should tell him, Cry thought to herself, and then she cursed the thought. That wouldn't help the situation whatsoever; he'd only get angry with her.
"I just… I have a path that I'm set on, and… and you're not part of it, even though I wish you could be."
"That's not the first time you've said that," Vilkas said after a moment. "You seem dead set on thinking that fate is supposed to pull you miles away from me." He reached out, and placed a hand on her arm, grabbing it gently. When Cry didn't pull away, he turned her around to face him, and reached a hand up to cup her cheek.
"I've never felt the way I feel about you before," he whispered, gazing at her. "So, who's to say that you're not my destiny?"
"It's not that easy, Vilkas," Cry said, her heart aching. Gods, she loved him so much. "It might seem like it, with us both here, inside Jorrvaskr, not thinking about what's outside, but I have to, and if you knew, you'd realize that it's hopeless, you and me." She pulled away from him. "We can't just rewrite the stars."
"The stars shouldn't be the ones to decide things," Vilkas insisted. "You are the one I was meant to find, I know it."
Cry frowned at this, and had to turn around again, because she had been so close to getting away from him, to disappearing into her bedchamber. "What do you mean?"
Vilkas looked desperate. "I… I fell in love with you, before I even met you."
Cry's heart dropped. He knows. He knows I was the daughter of the general that he knew the name of, the one who smiled at him. He knows, and he knows what I did to all those Forsworn, how I had to leave Skyrim. He knows, and yet he's… he's still willing to be with me.
"Kodlak said that it had to be that I fell in love, that there was no other explanation for it." He held out his hand to her. "I… I treated you so awfully, because I… I think I was afraid to admit it, to admit the fact that you were the one I had felt, that night."
He's not talking about the parade. This is something different, something more recent.
"What are you talking about?" she asked him.
"There was a night, several months ago," he said. "I was outside, and I looked at the sky, and I realized how beautiful it was. I'd never noticed it before. When I told Kodlak about it, he said that… that noticing beautiful things for the first time was a sign of being in love. I didn't know what the old man was talking about, because there was no one I could have fallen in love with." He gazed at her. "But it was you. I know it was."
Cry shook her head. She didn't want to hear this, not when she was trying so hard to get away from him, so that it wouldn't hurt more when she left than it already was going to. "It's impossible."
"It's not impossible," Vilkas told her. "The fact that I'm here right now should prove that to you."
She gazed at him for a moment, and for that moment, she allowed herself to consider it, consider what it would be like if she didn't push him away any longer, if she let him in. All she had to do was tell him who she was, tell him what she was supposed to do. Maybe even showing him the letter from Delphine would be helpful in her explanation. It was sitting on the table to her right. All she had to do was pick it up, and hand it to him, and then answer any questions that he might have.
That was it. If she could just do that… then she could have him, could love him the way she wanted to, the way he loved her.
And then the moment passed, and she shook her head again, lowering her gaze. "You know I want you," she whispered. "It's not a secret I try to hide." She let out a breath. "But my hands are tied, Vilkas. I'm sorry."
She turned away from him, and headed into her bedchamber, closing the door behind her, practically right in his face. She then leaned back against it, and closed her eyes, inhaling slowly in order to keep her tears back.
He knocked on the door. "Cry. Cry, please don't just walk away from the conversation like that." She bowed her head. "Please. I just… I just want to know…" He trailed off, and she knew why. There were so many things he probably wanted to know, so many things that he deserved to know, that he couldn't give name to just one.
"Please," he said again instead, sounding as though he were prepared to stand out there all night, waiting for her to come out.
Cry squeezed her eyes shut, willing him to go away. Eventually, the knocking on the door faded, and she thought that maybe he had gone.
After a moment, however, he spoke again: "Cry, I don't need to know why you can't tell me. I don't even want to know what it is. I just… I want you to stay, for however long you can, and… and if you really, really have no choice, then you can go. But… but let me love you, first. Let me show you that I can love you, and that… that you should want to come back to me, once you do whatever it is you have to do."
Cry's eyes opened. She moved away from the door. She turned around to face it, and opened it. Vilkas blinked at her, once they made eye contact, and then he exhaled, slowly, and straightened his shoulders. "Will you let me?"
Cry's response was to close the space between them, latch her arms around his neck, and kiss him, deeply. It had been a while since she'd kissed anyone, aside from the thief in Riften, but this was so much different than that had been. This was… love, not passion, although there were definitely some passionate undertones, especially in the way Vilkas grabbed at her waist, pulling her tightly against him. But within the kiss itself, it was love, and Cry knew it was love, even though she'd never been in love before in her entire life.
She knew it was love, and she decided that she was not going to let it go, not until she absolutely had no other choice.
They pulled away at the same time, both having run out of breath. They lingered close, however, breathing the same air, although she didn't think they were thinking the same thoughts. They might have been sort of the same, however, except maybe for a few things.
She saw that was true, in the way Vilkas was looking at her, and from the smile on his face. She grinned back, and then hugged him close, her hands around his shoulders. She pressed her face into his neck, breathing him in. Despite the day they had spent outside, she thought he smelled pretty good, and decided that was probably just the werewolf.
"Not too bad, for someone who's extremely out of practice, eh?" he asked, chuckling.
"It was a little sloppy," she murmured back, smiling against his skin. "We'll need to work on it."
"Glad to see you won't be lacking in sarcastic comments," Vilkas said, dryly, and it was Cry's turn to laugh. She lifted her head, and met his eyes. Vilkas brushed a strand of hair out of hers. "I can understand, what it means to realize how beautiful something is for the first time, and recognize it as love." He smiled a little when Cry frowned at him. "You know what I mean."
"Do I?" Cry asked, in the same dry tone he'd used moments before.
"Things can change," Vilkas said. "You know that."
Cry huffed out a breath. "I do," she muttered, thinking about her first impression of him, the day she'd first joined the Companions over a month ago.
"Then don't be mad," Vilkas concluded. He kissed her again, with more softness this time. "You're right; we should get some rest. We had a long day today."
"It was a good one, though, wasn't it?" Cry asked, and he grinned.
"It had its ups and downs."
"Hey, at least neither of us was hurt," Cry told him, and Vilkas nodded.
"True. Thank the Gods for that." He raised an eyebrow. "That's probably the last time I allow you to dictate an outing, however."
Cry rolled her eyes. "You're no fun."
He pressed his forehead to hers. "I didn't mind running with you," he murmured, and Cry tilted her head until their lips met. She hummed into the kiss, and Vilkas had to be the one to pull away, smiling slightly. He ran his thumb over her cheek. "There are more interesting ways to run out of breath, I suppose," he teased.
"Ew," Cry said with a laugh. "Don't ever say something like that again."
"Not so good?" Vilkas asked, and Cry shook her head. "All right, I'll do my best to refrain."
"Not from the kissing though."
"No, of course not," Vilkas, and to prove it, he kissed her again. And again. And again. And all thoughts of Sky Haven Temple, of dealing with the dragons, faded from Cry's mind.
