Interlude: Dragon (II)

Lake Yorgrim. Southeast of the Nightgate Inn, near to the unofficial border between the Pale and Eastmarch. It was also (according to a map that Whiterun was incapable of hiding properly) very close to several Dragon burial sites.

Julius' boots crunched through fresh snow as he made his way out onto the lake, briefly testing the strength of the ice before stepping across it.

Cold, this country. Back in Cyrodiil, if we wanted a river to freeze over I'd have to make it happen myself...

He'd visited Anga's mill earlier in the day, spoken to the natives, and been pointed to the skeleton of the Dragon that had been resurrected (and subsequently slain) nearby. An enormous thing, exuding menace even in death. Useful to study, but he'd began to worry that he wasn't going to get a chance to see a live one.

However, it seemed he was in luck.

He'd first spotted the dark speck in the distant sky, near the Throat of the World. But it had slowly grown and resolved as it grew closer, until the wings, head, and tail of its silhouette were easily discernible. It had flown from the bottom to the top of Whiterun hold in only a few minutes before banking west, looking to pass right overhead and follow the river down to Windhelm.

So fast. If only we could tame them for use in warfare...ah, but Alex said they were much too proud to be ridden. A shame.

It was funny in a way, Julius thought, as he pulled out the folded paper from his robes to check it once more. Of all his siblings, he'd never expected to need Alex's notes sent up from Cyrodiil. And of all those notes, he'd truly never expected it to be the notes on a long-extinct race of flying lizards.

Strange times. Well, we do what we must.

He waved one hand.

The evergreens on the nearby lakeside shivered, and a cacophony of quiet snipping sounds emerged from them. One by one the leaves drifted away from the the trees, fluttering over Julius' head and spreading out into patterns above the lake.

Julius waited until the Dragon was almost overhead, and then clenched his fist. As one, the leaves set alight, burning briefly and brightly.

In Dovahzuul, the message 'I challenge you, Dragon' blazed above the lake.

Now, the legends told that the Dovah's senses were sharper than those of the greatest birds of prey. And while Julius wasn't about to make exact judgements about their eyes' magnification, the fact that the creature suddenly tucked its wings and dove was proof enough it had seen him.

Julius lowered his stance, readying, as the Dragon came rocketing down towards him. The string of Dovahzuul it spouted on its way down, he didn't recognise. The blast of flame that it launched immediately afterwards, however, was something he knew how to respond to. He swept his hands up, and the water from the lake arced into the air, forming a dome around him. The flames crashed into the dome and enveloped it completely, the fire shining through the water even as the platform beneath his feet buckled. Some of the water vaporised, and Julius channeled more from the lake beneath him to reinforce the dome, unworried. There was plenty of icy water to draw from, and in a moment-

The fire relented, as the Dragon was forced to splay its wings and pull up from its dive to avoid crashing into him. Julius quickly reshaped the dome into a set of frozen spears, and then launched them up at the retreating Dragon, before hearing a loud crack and briefly stumbling.

The fire spreading around him had melted shear through the ice, leaving his own platform free to float across the lake's surface.

Hm. Alright.

He continued bringing up water from beneath him, launching more and more ice spears at the Dragon banking around the edge of the lake. After a few throws Julius was able to make a good guess for the speed and distance, and his attacks started landing almost every time. Not doing enough damage, though. Most of the spikes were glancing off the hardened scales on its back and head. Need to go for the wings and underbelly...

But by that point, it had already turned inwards, and began a beeline for him.

Julius knelt down, putting his hands on the ice beneath him and focusing.

He watched as the dragon pulled up with its wings, stretching out its two legs towards him with intent to grab.

He waited until it was much too late for it to stop. Then jumped to the side.

He landed, quite elegantly, on the surface of the water to the left of his platform.

He yanked upwards with his arms.

The Dragon's head tracked him, which was convenient for it, because immediately afterwards the ice that Julius had been stood on thrust up into the air (ice he had been increasing the size of beneath the water, until it was almost the depth of the lake). Buoyancy and magic propelled it into the sky, and the Dragon crashed straight into it, stopping very abruptly. Julius twisted one arm, and the ice shed the momentum from the impact and began to tip forwards.

The Dragon let out what Julius could only describe as a squawk, before the ice came down on top of it and sent it crashing underwater.

A wavefront splashed outwards from the point of sinking, and the newly created iceberg began to stabilise.

Julius waited, still water walking, as the wave passed by beneath him.

"...Hm." He muttered, after a few quiet seconds. "If a dunk in water is all it takes then-"

The surface of the lake erupted ("Nevermind!") as the dragon blasted into the air.

A blast of energy launched from its mouth, this time cold, and all the ice around Julius froze. All of it. The energy shield surrounding him crackled, covering in a layer of frost. His feet found themselves stuck, and the dragon landed on the ice in front of him (implying the attack had frozen almost the entire lake). Julius put his hands together to buff up his ebonyflesh just before the Dragon swept around and batted him with its tail.

The force behind the attack was enormous. Julius was promptly detatched from the ice at his feet and launched backwards through the air, bouncing once on the frozen lake before passing over its edge entirely and slamming into a tree, then slumping to the floor.

Any of those impacts would have killed an ordinary human.

Julius sighed, and got back to his feet.

The Dragon had been crawling across the lake towards him (presumably to enjoy a quick snack) but it stopped still the moment he moved, tilting its head in what just might have been surprise.

"Strike force is significant, but not enough pressure to penetrate the shield or overstrain the inertial dampeners..." he muttered to himself. "Wouldn't want to test those out against a bite, but one of those would mean exposing its mouth, so I could just launch something spiky down its gullet..."

If the Dragon could understand him, it didn't like what it was hearing. Its mouth opened again, and another cone of flame came rocketing out.

Testing further, Julius didn't even bother raising a dirt wall in front of him. He just focused his shield to absorb heat specifically, and let the fire wash over him. The pressure of the blast would have been enough to bowl him over, which he noted, before sticking his feet to the floor.

When the (he supposed it classified as a Shout) relented, the grass was fried, the earth was cracked, the tree behind was burning, and Julius was fine.

"Your magical power is enormous." He admitted, out loud. "I'd exhaust myself fast replicating some of these attacks. But they're also fairly simple. Alex explained your word-based magic; it's difficult for you to produce more complicated effects in the heat of battle, isn't it?"

The Dragon had clearly had quite enough of him. It spread and beat its wings, either to flee or prepare another attack, he didn't particularly care.

Julius stretched his hand out, and clenched it.

It was much more difficult than he'd expected to grip the Dragon with telekinesis. Living things (especially mages, with their higher magicka reserves) were harder to manipulate than simple objects, but his magic seemed to slip around the Dragon to an excessive degree. An inherent resistance, perhaps? Like certain Bretons? Interesting.

Still, he focused, and pulled. The Dragon's retreat was halted, the air around it shivering. Its wingbeats became faster and more erratic, and it let out a panicked roar. But despite its efforts, it couldn't manage to pull itself away from him.

With his other hand, Julius reached backwards, and fixed his will about the tree he'd been thrown into. He brushed his finger over his palm, and all the remaining branches snapped off, along with a good slice of the trunk, leaving the top a thick, sharp (still flaming) spike.

Wincing at his first real strain of the battle, he yanked, and the tree was uprooted from the earth.

The Dragon continued its attempts to escape, becoming more and more desperate. It brought its head back, then launched forwards another Shout. This one Julius recognised (his little brother had derived great pleasure from shouting it in his younger years), 'Fus Ro Dah'. The blast of force slammed into him, and he was forced to release the Dragon for a moment to focus his efforts on shielding himself.

The earth around him buckled by almost a foot, and the Dragon managed to pull away by a few wingbeats-

Before his hand stretched out, and he snagged it again.

This time, he didn't give it any more chances. His left hand launched forwards, and with it, the makeshift ballista bolt.

The Dragon roared one last time in protest, but found there wasn't anything it could do-

And then the tree trunk buried itself in its underbelly.

The force resisting Julius ceased, and he maintained his telekinetic grip for a few more seconds as the beast shuddered in mid-air...then went limp.

"So, intelligent, but not smart enough to realise it should have stopped trying to resist and dove for me." He mused. "Or was that its pride? Refusing to admit it couldn't beat me in a contest of strenth? Exploitable, if so..."

He let his grip fall. The carcass dropped, crashing down onto the ice before sliding over the edge into the lake.

So. Extremely dangerous, yes. But they rely mostly on fear and overwhelming force in a direct confrontation. With the right training, a group of well-disciplined and skilled soldiers could probably take one. Meaning the 'apocalypse' is at the very least going to be a slow one. We can focus more on how the things are coming back in the first place...

With such thoughts in his mind and his task finished, Julius Meteuse made his way back to the Thalmor Embassy.

Yeah...

Hot tip - How to make someone seem powerful: Have known characters fight a thing so the viewers understand how strong that thing is. Then have your person tear that thing a new one.

I reiterate that the elder Meteuse siblings are no joke. Xander has a big reputation to live up to.

The following chapter will release as normal next Saturday, and that will be the final chapter of this Act. Damn this one felt fast, but by word count I think it might be the longest...either way, I figured a big dragon fight was a good way to end it. I was like 'will they be mad that the finale is only tangentially related to the plot?' and then I was like 'wait, no, everyone loves Dragons.'

Well. I love Dragons. I hope that shows.

Next Time: Someone gets drunk, someone gets no sleep, and someone pulls a 'golden claw'.