A splitting headache woke her up.
Her throat was sore, she was parched and she felt the light uncomfortably sting her even under her closed eyelids.
Bishop's arm was draped around her stomach, still asleep, he flexed it around her from time to time pressing her closer to him, her back to his chest and her backside nestled to his groin making her uncomfortably aware of their closeness. He was really warm though…
She opened her eyes carefully, still getting blind sighted by the bright morning sun.
She tried to untangle herself from him but his arm grappled her more tightly and he let out a subconscious grumble. His face moved closer to the back of her head, burying itself in her hair.
His arm loosened the grip for a while and she thought she would be able to move, but the palm of his hand still rested firmly against her stomach as he pressed himself closer to her, groaning lightly in between his calm heavy breathing.
"Bishop," she put her hand on his, shaking it lightly to wake him up.
He stirred half-heartedly, nuzzling his head deeper in her tresses, his hot breath tickling the back of her neck. Unconsciously, his hand moved up, making her yelp in surprise as it reached her breast, squeezing it lightly.
"Bishop!" she cried out, her voice hoarse as she firmly took his hand in hers and snagged it away from her chest.
"Huh… what?" he finally awakened, pulling himself away from her, lying on his back. "Ow… fuck," he placed his hand on his forehead, dragging it down across his face.
She sat up, a sharp pain stinging her brow. She put her head in her palms, trying to ease the pain, but it didn't help.
Bishop moved to sit on the bed beside her, letting out a weary smirk: "Well, we still have our clothes on."
She chuckled lightly into her hands, daring to raise her head and look at him: "Yeah, though you were getting kind of… cuddly just now."
He raised his eyebrows at her, hissing in pain promptly, rubbing his forehead with his fingers. "'Cuddly'? I don't get 'cuddly', ladyship," he shook his head.
"Right…" she rolled her eyes with a smirk.
"Besides, you didn't seem to mind last night," he chuckled, punching her arm lightly.
She blushed, the images of last night's happening flashing in her head. There were a lot of things she didn't mind last night. She was really glad for the promise he gave her, her inhibitions seemed to be completely obliterated by the alcohol and she hardly wanted for her first time being this intimate with someone to be the result of a drunken stupor.
"So… any regrets?" he smirked, getting up from the bed and checking if nothing was missing from his pack.
She thought about that for a little while. They got a little wilder together than she would have expected last night and the memory of her horrible singing and dancing on the bar did make her flush in embarrassment, but she did notice herself smiling at the memories.
There was that punch, but she chased the thought from her mind quickly. For some reason it made her think of her father again and she refused to let her mind get into that.
"No," she gave him a warm smile. "Though I'm not sure I can show my face in there," she smirked, inclining her head towards the door to the common room.
"Please, they loved it," he laughed.
They gathered their things and headed out to the common room, ordering a breakfast and an ale to chase away the hangover at least a little.
"There's our famous bard," the serving girl chuckled as she brought them their order.
"Sorry, about that," Aeyrin mumbled, blushing fiercely.
The woman smiled at her, pulling up a chair to their table for a while as the rest of the tavern was completely empty.
"Don't be. It was probably the most entertaining song we heard around here in some time," she laughed "I'm Lynly, by the way. What brought you two here?"
"I'm Aeyrin and this is Bishop. We're traveling to the monastery," Aeyrin have her a friendly smile.
"Oh. You're pilgrims? You look more… armed then regular pilgrims," she gave them a wry smile. "Anyway, you should know that the passes are snowed under. Only half the mountain is accessible for the pilgrims. Taking on the rest is too dangerous right now," she gave them a sympathetic nod.
"We can handle the passes," Bishop grumbled, drinking deeply from his tankard.
"If you think you can get all the way to High Hrothgar, maybe you could help Klimmek. He delivers some supplies for the Greybeards but couldn't get there for the past two weeks."
Aeyrin agreed to deliver the supplies and they talked to Lynly a while longer. She mentioned the Greybeards' summons for the Dragonborn excitedly – apparently the news from Whiterun reached them and they have been eagerly awaiting the call ever since. It was also why so many pilgrims were around at that time, hoping to meet the Dragonborn when they arrived.
Aeyrin got really uncomfortable about that and neither of them mentioned anything about her identity. Bishop asked Lynly what she knew about the Dragonborn, to make sure no one would suspect Aeyrin and she expectedly gave him a few vague rumors, some about a stout and brave Nord, some about a foreigner coming to the Nords' rescue, all filled with awe and admiration towards the legendary hero.
They left after breakfast, Karnwyr running circles around them excitedly after a boring night.
They stopped by Klimmek's house to pick up the supplies, made sure the Eldergleam sapling had enough water and was secure enough not to be thrown from Aeyrin's pack by the mountain winds and headed towards the famed Seven Thousand Steps.
…
They started their ascent to High Hrothgar before midday.
The path was winding before them and while the stone steps were largely broken and hidden in the soil, they still provided a clear guidance up the mountain.
They passed a few pilgrims, praying and meditating at some stone tablets. Aeyrin insisted on stopping to read them and ponder of their spiritual meaning on the way despite Bishop's exaggerated eye-rolls.
The journey was a bit uneventful, the pilgrims mostly ignored them, none of them even considering that either of them could be the Dragonborn they were hoping to meet. They probably didn't look heroic enough for their liking.
The higher they got, the chillier the wind became.
Bishop didn't seem to mind but Aeyrin wrapped herself tightly in Bishop's worn cloak. It was always cold in Skyrim but it was never that much worse than anything she experienced travelling around the Jerall Mountains in Cyrodiil. Now she finally started to experience real Skyrim weather. This was the highest mountain in Tamriel, so it was likely the coldest place there was. Hopefully. She worried about how much worse it would get, especially if the higher parts of the trail were really snowed under.
"Already?" Bishop laughed at her as she shivered under the cloak. They were still not even in the thick of it. There was some white powder on the ground, but the trail was still tamped down by the pilgrims. It wasn't even snowing yet… and there was no hint of that unpleasant ice rain that was almost constant in the north. Bishop never went up the mountain to High Hrothgar, but he assumed the cold couldn't rival the peaks around Winterhold.
"How are you not cold?" Aeyrin shook her head, trying to push the cloak over her nose and ears. After a while she gave up, letting her hair down from her practical ponytail so that it could cover her freezing ears, sighing in frustration when the tips of them still protruded from her gold-blond mane.
The cold was getting worse as they reached the areas which pilgrims no longer traveled to. The snow under their feet wasn't trampled anymore and they had to wade through it a little.
Soft flakes started to fall on their heads, the wind picking up speed from time to time, slapping into their cheeks.
Bishop still didn't feel that cold, but he fished out one of the blankets from his pack and draped it over the freezing Bosmer at his side.
…
Soon enough they were wading through knee-deep snow, huffing and puffing in exhaustion.
Karnwyr fell into a snowdrift more than once as he tried to tread atop the white blanket as lightly as possible.
After a while, a strange growling disturbed their ascent, as they spotted a white furry beast ahead, hiding into the snow promptly. Bishop managed to convince Aeyrin that she wouldn't be able to fight the beast in snowbanks this high and took it out stealthily in several well-aimed shots.
They continued on, neither of them knew how far they still had to trek.
They were getting so tired from the difficult walk, but the snowbanks were no place to rest. The snowfall gained on intensity gradually, impairing their vision as the wind howled in their ears.
Aeyrin's fingers and toes felt like they were frozen solid as she continued on, her breath getting thinner and thinner and her eyes threatened to close at every snowflake that attacked them – she couldn't allow that however, if she closed them for longer, she could step away from the trail, plummeting down the mountain because she didn't see the edge. Not that it was easy to see the edge even with eyes opened – the light blue skies melded dizzyingly with the heavy snowfall and the tall banks.
Suddenly their grueling journey was interrupted by a loud roar, drowning out the howling winds.
They shared a concerned look – the sound was all too familiar.
In the distance, sunrays reflected a glint of a silvery scale, the outline of the large beast barely visible in the heavy gale.
The beast was heading straight towards them – there was no retreating, no place to hide and there was no way they could ever fight in the high snowdrifts – not when it was just the three of them against a dragon.
"Stand back!" Aeyrin cried out at Bishop as he slowly stepped back away from the edge of the mountain, towards the Cliffside.
Karnwyr was whimpering as he tried to hide in the snow, away from the edge, keeping a wary eye on Bishop and Aeyrin in turns.
She turned towards the approaching beast, stepping back to have as much of the snow in front of her and still be a comfortable distance from her companions. There was no other way she could think of.
"FUS!"
The invisible force swept the snowbanks into the whirling wind, clearing the trail enough for her to be able to move.
Her muscles were weary but her determination was strong, she took out her shield and waited for the beast to approach closer as arrows whirled around her head, using the strong wind perfectly to hit the mark.
The dragon stayed some distance away, hidden by the blizzard.
She hid herself behind her shield, peeking from atop, awaiting the fire or the ice, her feet ready to roll her sideways to avoid the bulk of the attack.
"FUS RO DAH"
The sound roared through the skies, catching Aeyrin off guard.
That sounded like the same Shout she did.
She realized herself and rolled away, but it was too late. The force hit her hard, harder than she thought possible. It felt like all the bones in her body quivered uncontrollably, threatening to break. Maybe some of them did break – it was impossible to tell, there was just an intense pressure everywhere, pain spreading through her body. She felt a strange dread for a second, the fact that she used the same force against people before, hitting her with a singe of guilt. It threw her down the path, luckily keeping her on the mountain but smashing her against the cliff side.
She felt a warm liquid at the back of her head as everything began to spin. She fell face-first into the snow, the cold strangely pleasant on her face.
Bishop's eyes went wide as he saw her flying through the air. He saw the direction she was thrown in – not off the mountain, luckily, but who knew what damage she suffered.
He aimed quickly, shooting arrow after arrow at the beast, his aim a bit more shaky than usual – it needed to die quickly so that he could get to her as soon as possible.
The dragon roared, he managed to see a vague fiery light, knowing what it meant, he ran ahead, dodging the incoming flames. Once the attack stopped, he immediately located the beast in the gale again, shooting with wild abandon.
At last he heard a pained roar and the beast soared high into the sky with great speed.
He waited, expecting it to plummet towards him, but there was nothing.
Did it escape? Maybe he wounded it badly.
He pricked up his ears and narrowed his eyes, searching the skies.
Nothing.
Good. He wasn't sure what state she was in – she might not have survived absorbing the soul.
He ran back along the trail, seeing her lying face down in the snow.
He pulled her out of the bank as quickly as he could, her lips blue with frost, her eyes closed, her head stained with frozen blood.
He cradled her in his arms, taking her back towards the scene of the battle – the snow was melted there in large part. He laid her on the ground, quickly shuffling in his pack, searching for a healing potion. Fortunately, he managed to sit her up and force some of the liquid down her throat, making her cough and gag badly.
"Ladyship, can you hear me?" his voice was panicked.
She didn't answer but some color returned to her face.
It was no use; the snowfall and the cold were only making things worse.
He had to get her to safety. Now.
He fastened his pack on Karnwyr's back, giving him an apologetic look, he grabbed hers, careful not to hurt the sapling, and secured it on his own back. Then he took her in his arms again, determined to make the rest of the journey as quickly as possible.
Luckily the monastery wasn't very far, but he was utterly exhausted.
The cold wasn't that bad for him, but the snowbanks were too high and the Aeyrin's weight with all her heavy equipment wasn't helping the matters. His legs were shaking badly, but he wouldn't let up, climbing the steps towards the large stony building with great effort.
He pushed into the heavy metal door, not enough energy to concern himself with knocking. He nearly fell inside as the door gave way, a surprised old man in grey robes with a long beard staring at him as he approached slowly.
"The Dragonborn… help her," he managed to say between heavy breaths.
He fell to his knees but still held Aeyrin tightly in his arms, the feeling in his fingers long gone. He noticed the man reach him but his head was spinning and his vision darkening. A lot of voices were murmuring in the background.
Then all went quiet.