Arielle was sitting at the table in her bedroom, mindlessly picking at a small bowl of fruit while Rona worked diligently to untangle and braid her hair into something more acceptable than what currently resembled a robin's nest.
Mid-morning light was pouring through the window, brightening the room with natural light and though the glass of the window was opaque, she could still see the thick clumps of snow that the sky was currently dumping on Windhelm. Not exactly what she would consider hunting weather, but it seemed that the Jarl and his housecarl did not mirror the sentiment. They'd left the castle grounds long before she woke for the day.
Lydia was sitting in the chair opposite her at the table and twirling the stem of a red mountain flower between her fingers, her face going through a series of emotions -ranging from irritation to awe- the longer she stared at it.
"At least yours was intact." Arielle said when the woman's expression turned sour again, her tone bitter as she worked to keep her eyes off the rather obnoxious sight she'd woken up to in her shared bed. Any thoughts she may have had about the Jarl no longer wanting her went straight out the window when he joined her in bed. If anything, he seemed almost more eager than before, as if her being with child so quickly had proven his virility and thoroughly stroked his ego. That's not to say she didn't enjoy it. Because, much to her shameful disappointment, she had. It was more or less the state of her blanket upon waking that had her mood thoroughly soured. The petals of what had to be at least a hundred red mountain flowers, distinguishable by their rich, deep red color were scattered across the fur blanket and the dais surrounding the bed.
Her first thought about it questioned whether or not she was actually awake. But sure enough, upon gathering a handful of the petals and feeling their silky texture between her fingers, she realized that she was, quite unfortunately awake. Heart's Day or not, it was an extravagant display and she pitied whichever servant had been tasked with dumping it all on her as she slept. She would have much rather had the single flower that Lydia had woken up to. But the Jarl of Windhelm was never known for subtlety. And she was sure, it was only a matter of time until he revealed yet another weighty piece of jewelry for her to wear.
Lydia exhaled a laugh at that. "You know.. in comparison to yours, it really doesn't seem so bad." she teased and Arielle pursed her lips before giving her housecarl the most unimpressed look she could muster.
As a girl, Arielle imagined many scenarios for celebrating Heart's Day with a lover. But not once did she picture the complete waste of perfectly good alchemical ingredients that she'd woken up to. "Very funny." she quipped dryly, her lingering irritation bleeding heavily into her tone.
"Don't you think it's romantic?" Rona asked from behind her and it took everything in her not to roll her eyes.
"I think it's.. excessive."
"He's excited for the child. It'll wane." said Lydia, turning her attention back to the red blossom between her fingers. Arielle frowned, thoroughly unconvinced by that before bringing her mug of what was now lukewarm tea to her lips. Her mind was still reeling from the most recent development, her unborn babe occupying the majority of her thoughts in the day since it's discovery. And that urge to seclude herself was still very prominent in her mind, so much so that she hadn't left her shared bedroom at all in the last day. Not that it did anything to keep people away, or from Ulfric delivering unnecessary displays of affection. No, she was sure that her feelings mattered just as little as they always had. "And what of Galmar?" she asked, if for no other reason than to keep her thoughts from straying deeper into a pit she was sure wouldn't be easy to climb out of.
Lydia exhaled a laugh across from her. "Well, I'd still like to throttle him, if that's what you're asking." she said, dropping the flower to the table top to bring a goblet of wine to her lips and Arielle did not miss the light pink blush that littered her cheeks.
"That sounds like a blossoming Nordic relationship." Arielle said, unable to stop the corner of her mouth from turning up as she looked over in time to catch the woman's dry look, clearly not keen to have the tide of teasing turned on herself.
"He's a persistent man, I'll give him that." Lydia said, and Arielle knew, if her housecarl did bring herself to accept Galmar's advances, it would be her and not him that wore the metaphorical armour in that relationship.
"All finished." Rona announced excitedly after placing the sapphire circlet on top of Arielle's freshly braided hair. No longer interested in picking at the offered fruit, she thanked the woman before leaving the table and crossing the room to her vanity. The heat emanating from the nearby fireplace seeped through her dress almost immediately, warming her thoroughly as she regarded herself in the large mirror. Rona had done a beautiful job, tiny intricate braids were neatly woven into one large one with the length secured by a single silver cuff, a stark contrast to the tangled mess she'd started the day with. A small smile came to her face when she looked behind herself in the mirror to see Rona already digging her skilled fingers into Lydia's brown locks before turning her attention to one of the glass bottles of scented oils she'd brewed in the library-turned-office. She removed the lid to wipe the dipstick across each of her wrists, applying a generous amount of the lavender oil there before mimicking the same motion on either side of her neck.
Her eyes wandered back to the hundreds of flower petals on her bed, her lips pursing in disdain and she heaved a heavy sigh as she stared at the ridiculous display. Aside from being unnecessary, she just couldn't let such an abundance of alchemical ingredients go to waste. Court had been canceled due to the holiday, leaving Arielle with an unexpected gap of free time and with a steady stream of injured soldiers returning home, she knew the healer Sonja would need all the extra help she could get.
A moment later and she was at the bed, scooping up handfuls of the petals to take back to her alchemy station for drying. "I can clean that up, my lady!" Rona said, her voice hitched in panic so unexpected that Arielle's hands stilled. She looked over to see the woman's fearful expression and Ulfric's words the previous day suddenly filled her mind. He wanted her to be comfortable and a deep frown came to her face as she wondered exactly what kind of orders -or threats- the staff had received to ensure her comfort was achieved. She knew all too well what the Jarl was like when he was angry and she could only imagine the repercussions he would unleash on the staff if he became displeased.
"I'm not cleaning." she said quickly, hoping to assure her. "I'm taking some of these to dry out." She looked unconvinced but relented anyway, leaving Arielle to her task while she continued to braid Lydia's hair. And by the time the top of the woman's hair had been braided into an intricate crown of brunette hair, Arielle had gathered a sizeable pile of petals and the two women made their way to the library.
It was several productive hours, and a couple dozen potions later when Arielle made her way to the dining room with Lydia in tow. The pair stepped through the open doorway with little ceremony, their entry going unnoticed at first, despite the handful of officers that filled the far end of the table. Her eyes found Ulfric standing at a liquor cart, his blonde braids looking slightly disheveled, presumably from his hunt and pouring himself a rather generous serving of an amber colored liquid that very much resembled a drink that once had her face scrunching from the burn it caused her throat as she swallowed.
The Jarl was deep in conversation with his housecarl and steward, though unmistakable was the look of disinterest on his face. "...not worried about a ship." she heard him say. He paused long enough to exhale a laugh and bring the clear glass to his lips, throwing back the full amount he'd poured. Just thinking about the taste of the vile liquid had her stomach rolling with nausea. "They wont dare touch shores on this side of Skyrim and if they do, they will be met with steel."
Jorleif let out an incredulous huff, looking as flushed and breathless as he ever had. "My Lord, I must urge you to reconsider. An Imperial vessel this close to Windhelm- it's too dangerous. If they decide to march-"
"Hogwash," Galmar spoke up from beside the Jarl, his gravelly voice even more rough from his irritation. "they're only scouting. If we diverge forces chasing some ship, it'll weaken our manpower elsewhere and that's what they bloody want."
"Galmar is right. Let them have their look." Ulfric said, pouring himself another generous drink. Arielle was halfway to the table that was set with fine china when the Jarl called out to her. She approached him, her eyes only now taking in the absence of his cloak and the shredded state of the linen shirt covering his bicep. Thick bandages covered his arm beneath his shirt but she could see the blood seeping through them. A look of confusion crossed her face at the sight. He knew she was skilled in healing, if he was injured why hadn't he just asked her to heal it? "What happened?" she asked, gesturing to his bicep only for the corner of his mouth to turn up in a wry smile.
"Snow cat. Our son will have his first blanket.. and rug." he said with no small amount of amusement in his tone. Of course, leave it to a Nord to find amusement in being mauled by a wild animal. "Read this." he said, holding a letter out for her. The red seal was already broken and she did not recognize the symbol pressed into the thick wax. Still, she did as asked and read the letter. Her lips parted from surprise when she realized it was from High Rock. The High King was offering an alliance, so long as the Stormcloaks managed to take all of Skyrim. She looked back at Ulfric in time to catch the look of satisfaction of his face and in his eyes. Though whether it was from her reaction or the letter itself, she wasn't sure. "It seems our neighbors fully support the idea of a half-Breton queen." he said and just like that, a deep frown came to her face and she passed the parchment back to him.
"Bout time they came around." Galmar drawled, earning the Jarl's attention. She didn't hear his response to that. Instead, her eyes migrated back to the wound on his arm. The thick wrappings heavily stained in blood. She doubted he was in any danger of dying, but surely the man was in pain and it just seemed so ridiculous that he would allow it to fester when she was all too capable of healing it, and quite easily at that. Irritation welled in her at the ridiculousness of it before she raised her hand to his arm, already coming alive in the soft glow of a healing spell while her free hand pulled at the wrappings to unearth the wound.
The next thing Arielle registered was the intense pain erupting in her wrist. It happened so fast it took several seconds for her mind to catch up to the fact that Ulfric was the cause of it. His large hand held her much smaller wrist in a vice grip, the delicate fabric of her dress' sleeve offering absolutely no protection from his grip that was so tight, she wondered if her bones might snap from the pressure. A look of pain crossed her face and her eyes went to the Jarl's ones that were narrowed into a harsh glare and he was fixing her with a look of rage, the likes of which she'd never seen before. "Do not do that again." he seethed, his already deep voice much lower in his warning before he released her. Her free hand clasped around her aching wrist, holding it tightly to her chest as if to shield it from further abuse while her mind raced through the many emotions that welled in her. Hurt, fear, shame.. but the strongest of all, was anger.
With each second that passed in the now dead-silent room, she grew ever more angry. "My touch offends you?" she asked incredulously, still trying to wrap her mind around the fact that he'd hurt her, again, when all she was doing was trying to help him. "Mine?!" she repeated, her tone laced with as much venom as she could muster. "You struck me and I did not deny your touch." His jaw went tight at that, and though she knew there would be punishment for this outburst, she was far too angry to care.
A small part of her mind registered Jorleif harshly whispering to the others already seated at the table behind her, ushering them out of the room as quickly as he could. But those thoughts were forced out of her mind by the burning rage she felt deep in her chest and she kept her angry eyes fixed on the Jarl. "You deflowered me in front of your men!" she spat, punctuating her words with a sharp jab of her index finger toward Galmar who was still standing but a few paces away." ..and I did not deny your touch."
She exhaled a laugh though there was no humor behind it before shaking her head in disbelief. "You force my body to feel things that I never asked to feel.. and I still do not deny your touch. But it is mine that somehow offends you?" He said nothing, only continued to stare at her with that same hardened look of irritation on his face. An exasperated exhale left her as she realized her anger was in vain. Everything she did was in vain. He didn't give a damn about anyone but himself, least of all her, and never would.
"Keep your precious wound, Ulfric. I hope it scars." she spat and with a final shake of her head, she turned from him and swept out of the room, all the while cursing her own foolishness. For what on Nirn was she thinking, trying to heal him? Her anger took her upstairs but she did not return to her shared bedroom. Instead she made her way to the now empty guest wing and once there, she pushed a familiar door open to be greeted by the coldness of a dark room. It was a room she had not seen the inside of for two months now, her very first one in the castle.
With the help of a mage light, she crossed the room to the fireplace and considered herself lucky to find wood there. Her anger was dissipating more and more with each second that passed, only to be replaced by a deep sadness. And once the fire was burning brightly with the help of another spell, this time one of fire, she let her sadness lead her to the bed. Once sitting on the soft mattress she pulled the sleeve of her dress back and a deep frown came to her face at the sight of the bruises forming there. She shouldn't be surprised that he hurt her again and she wasn't, not really. She was well versed in just how beastly he could be, but she would be lying if she said she didn't think her being with child would urge him some measure of restraint. Involuntary tears welled in her eyes and her mind couldn't help but question, what else would he do to her?
It was well into the night when the door to the guest bedroom opened. She knew it was late because there was no longer any hint of light coming in through the lone window, the sun having gone down a while ago now. The sound of steel boots connecting with thick rugs reached her ears. Ulfric, her mind assumed because he had yet to announce himself. He approached the bed where she lay facing the stone wall and although her tears had run dry, her eyes still stung from the puffiness that came with crying.
"Arielle." he said, confirming her suspicions it was him when his voice cut through the mostly quiet room. The fire burned brightly, generously bathing the room in soft light and heavy warmth and while she could not detect an ounce of his earlier irritation in his tone, she had no desire to look or speak to him. "Arielle." he said again, trying to rouse her. A long moment passed and when she still did not move, he sighed heavily before she heard the very distinguishable sound of him unbuckling his chestplate.
That caught her attention well enough and she rolled to her back, scrambling to sit up as a panic shot through her when her mind recalled their first night together. Was that what he had come to do? Had he come to hurt her again? "What are you doing?" she asked, her panic bleeding into her tone. He ignored her, unphased by her outburst and removed the chestplate, discarding it at the foot of the bed. "Ulfric-"
"Calm yourself." he said, with little emotion in his deep voice, his hands already working on the straps of his bracers. A dejected expression crossed her face and she dug her fingers into the fur blanket she sat on and steeled herself for what was about to happen, what she was sure would happen. "Your touch does not offend me. In fact, I would welcome it." he said after the first bracer landed on the blanket, quickly followed by the second and despite her best efforts to control herself, her muscles were strained in their tension from the fear her memories inspired. "Though I can't bring myself to allow your spell to touch my skin." He hesitated long enough for confusion to creep into her mind before he heaved a sigh and with little ceremony, his hands pulled his linen tunic up and over his head, baring the skin of his torso to her for the first time. She felt the blood drain from her face, her expression morphing into one of horror and the hand that clasped itself over her mouth did little to stop the sharp gasp that forced it's way past her lips at what she saw.
Her wide, shock-stricken eyes roamed every bit of his heavily muscled but marred and abused flesh. Scars of every size and shape littered his skin from the tops of his shoulders to the rim of his trousers and down each of his arms, leaving no inch of him unmarked. From large slashes that raked across his chest and abdomen to the smaller curved ones that filled in the gaps, it conjured a mental image of a spider's web, if the spider was high on skooma during the designing process. Each scar looked all too deliberate in it's placement and her stomach immediately rolled from the wave of nausea she was gifted by the sight of it and gods only knew what his back looked like. "Oh gods, what happened to you?" she asked around the hand that still hovered across her lips, her voice wavering as her mind tried to comprehend the unimaginable pain such injuries would cause.
Her eyes rose to his face, taking note of the tightness in his jaw til they reached his unreadable eyes. "I'm surprised a veteran's daughter hasn't heard of my capture in the Great War." Though she could not recall hearing that particular story from her father, her mind suddenly bloomed with the memory of a Thalmor embassy torture chamber. She remembered the horrific state she and the Blades had found a man named Etienne in, starved and beat half to death for information he didn't even have. She could only imagine the horrors they would inflict upon a prisoner of war. Even with the evidence in front of her, her mind could not begin to fathom such atrocities.
"Of course very few have seen the.. results of my interrogation by that bitch Elenwen." and he said her name with more venom than she'd ever heard in his voice. "Galmar, Wuunferth, Jorleif, a handful of prison guards in Markarth.. and now you." He sat on the edge of the bed, causing the mattress to dip from the weight of him and unintentionally gifting her a glimpse of his back over his shoulder and she could see that it was just as scarred as his front, further proof of the horrors that Elenwen inflicted upon him. "This is why we're fighting this war. Because this is what the Thalmor does to anyone that dares to object to their twisted ideals of superiority."
She shook her head, at a loss for words from the evidence of his suffering and fought the tears that threatened to well in her eyes. "Elenwen did this? Gods.. Ulfric..-"
"I didn't ask for you to pity me." he said, causing a frown to come to her face.
"There's nothing wrong with pity." she told him, raising her eyes to his once more, her expression morphing into one of deep sadness. "Are you really that prideful?"
If her words offended him, he didn't show it. His face was as unreadable as ever while one of her hands reached out to his left shoulder. His watchful gaze followed the tips of her fingers that traced one of the more prominent scars there. It was curved in it's shape and rough beneath her fingers, the skin raised like it had trouble healing or reopened at some point. No creature alive deserved the kind of horrific suffering he'd been subjected to and she couldn't fathom how he managed to survive. Her eyes dropped to the blood stained wrappings covering his bicep and her frown deepened. If he wasn't going to let her heal it, she sought to at least make sure it would do so on it's own without festering.
"Wuunferth has already treated it with a potion." he said when her small hands began working to unravel the thick bandaging.
"Wuunferth isn't a healer." she said, keeping her tone as neutral as possible as she continued to unwrap the wound til a series of gashes were exposed, claw marks running across his thick bicep. She was right about her earlier assumptions about it not being life-threatening, his chestplate had taken the brunt of the attack she was sure. But it was deep enough to require stitches for proper healing. "Stay here." she said, leaving the wrappings on the fur blanket beside him and crossing the room to the door. She opened it just far enough to poke her head out. A lone soldier stood guard at the end of the hallway and she called out to him, prattling off supplies she needed and he left, returning ten or so minutes later and she took the requested items, sending him back to his post before he could spare a glance inside the room.
She returned to the bed with her newly acquired supplies and laid them out, a bowl of water she had to reheat with a spell, a healing potion, a needle and thread and new dressings before she finally sat beside him on the mattress. Her hands dipped the hand towel in the bowl of steaming water, fully saturating it before wringing the excess moisture out and sliding the heated fabric across his wounded flesh. No part of him flinched, from the heat of the water nor the pressure in which she applied the towel. Instead, he was looking all too amused by her efforts but she did her best to ignore him, focusing her attention on cleaning the wounds as carefully as was possible considering the depths of them, part of her mind wondering if he even felt how deep they were. After all, these few claw marks were probably nothing in comparison to the rest of what he'd suffered through. Another part of her mind was preoccupied by sheer surprise of him actually allowing her to do this.
"If your intentions are to clean it.." he said, his deep voice cutting through the quiet in the room like a prow through water. Her hands stilled and she looked up to see the corner of his mouth was still turned up in a look of amusement. "you'll need a much firmer touch."
She didn't respond, only dropped her eyes back to her work and continued to clean the wound. When she was satisfied with the way it looked and the water in the bowl turned pink, she gently parted his flesh to apply the potion as deeply as she could before allowing his skin to come together again. And then she was threading the needle, only hesitating when she brought it to his flesh. She'd done this before, more than a few times an injured soldier or villager would be brought to her home in Helgen if the small temple there was overfilled. Other times, her mother would call for her if she needed help setting bones but she'd lent a hand to stitching more than a few times.
It just felt.. wrong, to inflict more damage to his flesh after what he'd already suffered. She looked up and he was watching her closely, regarding her with a look she couldn't quite decipher but she knew she needed to get on with it before he changed his mind and the wound healed wrong, adding more scars to his abused skin. A deep breath invaded her lungs before she pressed the needle into his flesh. Again, he didn't react but he did exhale a laugh and that only served to confuse her.
"Your compassion is.. confounding." he said and she kept her eyes planted firmly on the needle she was using to weave his torn skin back together. "I've no doubt our children will be lucky to call you mother." A frown came to her face at that, memories of her own mother forcing themselves to the surface. Oh, how she missed her. She could only aspire to be half as good as the woman that gave her life.
Her mind would not dwell on that for long, she quickly tucked those thoughts away for later rumination for no sooner was his wound stitched and freshly bandaged did he leave the bed to don his linen tunic. She wasn't sure what she expected him to do next but her frown did not budge when he rid the bed of the medical supplies only to step out of his steel boots, his hands going to work on the clasp of his trousers. After everything that happened, sex was the last thing on her mind, regardless of whether or not she enjoyed it, but she knew she would have no choice in the matter. Instead, she tore her eyes away from him and stood from the bed herself to begin the task of pulling her dress off her shoulders.
She kept her expression as blank as was possible while she rid herself of the dress and when the delicate fabric connected softly with the floor, she laid back down on the blanket, digging her fingers into the fur beneath her. Ulfric wasn't far behind, quickly joining her on the bed til he hovered just above her, his arms on either side of her body trapping her against the mattress. A deep breath invaded her lungs and her eyes fell closed with her acceptance that this was going to happen.
The next thing she registered was the now familiar softness of his lips against her collar bone, accompanied by one of his hands groping at the swell of her chest, touching her in exactly the right ways to ignite a fire in the pit of her belly and soon she was arching into his ministrations, her small hands grabbing his tunic in a tight grip and turning her face to the side to expose the length of her neck to him. With labored breaths that revealed his own arousal he eagerly claimed the offered flesh, greedily licking and sucking the expanse of her delicate skin in a way that only encouraged the arching of her back and the soft moans that crossed the threshold of her lips.
It ended as abruptly as it started when his hands vigorously pulled hers away from his tunic to pin them above her head and she yanked her left hand away from his with a hiss, a pained expression crossing her face at the pressure he'd placed on her still aching wrist. He stilled above her and her eyes opened, finding his zeroed in on her arm that was now clasped against her chest and though she could see no irritation in his eyes from her denial, she could not stop the way her pulse hitched or how her muscles tensed reflexively under his icy stare. The pain didn't last long, quickly fading back to that dull ache and she raised her hand, til it was positioned beside the one he still held above her head, closing her eyes once more and offering her neck to him again.
Fully expecting him to continue what he'd started, she was surprised when he didn't. Everything seemed to still around her, the only thing she could focus on was his rhythmic breathing that suddenly seemed so much louder than before and when it collided with her chest, it cooled her heated skin enough to cause gooseflesh in it's wake. Several more agonizingly long seconds passed and when he still did not move, she began fearing the worst, her face taking on a wince as she braced herself for whatever punishment she would be subjected to.
And then he was gone, the sudden loss of his weight above her startling her enough to search for him. Her eyes found him beside the bed, faced away from her and shoving his legs into his trousers. He took the time to don his steel boots before sweeping out of the guest room, immediately followed by the door connecting harshly with it's frame and leaving her behind, still half-aroused and confused as ever with a cocktail of thoughts and emotions to sift through. And although the darkened window still promised hours of night, she knew no measure of restful sleep would come.