The tower groaned and shook around Brim in a highly worrying fashion, but still she hurtled up the spiral of stone steps after Ralof. It seemed like the wrong direction to be running in a collapsing building, but when faced with a choice between being crushed by falling debris, walking out directly into a fire, or falling to her death, she supposed it didn't particularly matter. A girl can only contemplate her impending demise so many times in one day before the charm wears off. The dragon's guttural roar made the very air vibrate around them, and it almost seemed like the attack was beginning to focus in on the tower itself. It knows we're in here, she thought. It knows I'm in here. She had made enemies over the course of her twenty-three years, but what a dragon could have against her, she had no idea. As the air burned through her lungs and her muscles began to ache from exertion, she was certain of one thing: she wanted to live, and she would do anything and everything in her power to make sure that happened.
She heard the whumph! of the dragon's wings alarmingly close on the other side of the stones just seconds before the side wall exploded inwards.
"Get back!" she yelled and pulled against the Nord's grip, flattening herself to the wall and halting his forward progress just in time to keep him from running full tilt into the dragon's massive head. The dragon screamed in what sounded to her like frustration, its breath a column of flame. Brim felt the heat of it singing the hairs on her exposed arms as she threw them up over her face, but the dragon had not been able to maneuver its head in the opening to reach them with the inferno. She heard screams of pain and fear from below and knew that others probably had not been so lucky.
The dragon twisted with a growl and wrenched its head from the opening, flapping off. Ralof, panting, pulled her forward up to the hole in the side. The rest of the staircase leading up had collapsed downwards, preventing further progress, and Brim could see patches of blue above them.
"Through the gap, there's an inn on the other side. Jump through the roof," the Nord yelled at her through the din.
Are you mad?, she wanted to reply as she looked through the hole, judging the distances involved, but her throat was choked with stone dust and soot. That was a long jump, even if her hands had been free to help balance, and it would be easy enough to break a leg or impale herself on the splintered wood of the roof timbers if she landed wrong.
"Go," he urged, insistently, "I have to protect the Jarl. We'll find another way out and catch up with you. Find a place to hide if you can."
Brim was about to argue, but she could hear the remaining support beams in the tower creaking as if they might snap at any moment. When they went, the tower would fall. And she did not want to be where she was standing when that happened. Taking a deep-breath, she focused on the place she wanted to land, an open spot where the inn's roof had been ripped away to reveal what must have been a loft or attic room, and took a running leap into empty space. I've come this far, don't fail me now, you bastards, she prayed.
As she fell through the air, she heard a furious, unearthly shriek nearby, the dragon swooping out of the sky to gather her up. By now, she was almost certain that the monster was after her particularly. Brim added her own scream to the thunderous noise, closing her eyes tightly as she imagined enormous claws ripping through her flesh like an eagle snatching a sparrow out of the air. But the pain never came and an instant later she hit the thatch of the roof and clung for dear life, digging her boots into the thick mat of reeds for purchase as she scrambled over the edge of the hole and into the attic. The dragon roared wrathfully, having been denied its prey, as it shot upwards once more.
~~0~~
They never said this job would be easy, Hadvar thought to himself as he dashed around the back of the tower, sweating profusely and covered from head to toe in dirt and blood. Most of the blood wasn't even his own. But they never said anything about fighting dragons either.
He had been separated from the commander and the rest of his detail in the panic that had ensued after the dragon's initial attack and, in the process of trying to find them, he had stumbled upon the wreckage of the smithy. Gunnar the smith had been trapped inside, still alive by the grace of whichever god had been paying attention to the old man's prayers, and Hadvar could not leave him there to die in the rubble. The rest of the family was nowhere in evidence. They could only hope that his daughter and grandchildren had gotten away and were not entombed inside the charred ruins of the house. As he rounded the corner of the crumbling tower, the dragon's dark shadow passed overhead again and he stopped, breathless and filled with sickening dread as he looked for any cover from the next onslaught. The beast seemed to everywhere.
His eyes landed on two figures in the dirt path between the tower and one of the outbuildings that was set against the stone wall of the keep. One was an adult, bloodied and pulling himself along the ground at an agonizingly slow pace. Hadvar could see even from this distance that one of the man's legs was twisted at an unnatural angle. It looked to be Torolf, a mercenary whose family lived in the town and who he had drunk ale with often enough at the inn. The second figure, a child, must be his son Hamming, frantically trying to help drag his father to safety.
Before he could rush forward to assist, another figure shot past him, pelting along the dirt path. It was the rogue Imperial, the one who had not been on the list but who had been condemned anyway. Gods-speed, he thought. Anyone who survives a beheading and a dragon attack in one day has paid their debt to society by my reckoning. However, as she passed the boy and his father, a dark form dropped like a falcon to land in the yard in front of her, filling the space between the buildings like the black, gaping maw of Oblivion itself.
"Hamming, you need to get over here!" Hadvar shouted desperately in warning. It would be impossible to reach Torolf, but the boy might just make it. The child stared, gape-mouthed, at the dragon as if his feet were frozen to the ground, while his father screamed at him to run. The prisoner skidded in the dirt, cursing, as she scrambled to reverse her direction.
"Move, move, move!" Hadvar heard her screech at the boy, frightening him into action as Torolf used what strength he could muster to shove the child back in Hadvar's direction. The smith moved forward and gathered Hamming up just as Hadvar saw the dragon's head rear back.
"Gods! Everyone get back!" he exclaimed in alarm, dragging his charges towards the back wall of the compound as a wave of flame, hot enough to melt stone, scorched through the passageway. For one brief terrible instant, he saw the dark outline of Torolf's crumpled form against the flame and the pale, determined face of the Imperial as she tried to outrun the blast, and he closed his eyes tightly and pressed his forearm over his face, unable and unwilling to watch them burned alive.
The dragon launched itself back into the air once more with a deafening clap of wings and Hadvar looked up to see it arc away over the compound, circling, planning where it would strike next. The old smith clutched the boy, now weeping hysterically, to his chest to keep him from trying to dash back to his father. There was no chance that Torolf had survived a fire that hot and no child needed to see what was laying in the road. At least we saved Hamming, he thought, and cast around desperately, trying to determine a way to get them out of this mess.
A groan sounded nearby and he whirled to see, beyond all reason, the girl convict uncurl and emerge from behind the rubble of the collapsed wall of the outbuilding, alive and unburned. Someone or something is watching over you, Hadvar thought, incredulously, and then pulled himself together.
"Still alive, Brim?" he asked, recalling the name she had given him as he helped her up. Her wrists were still bound together and she was having trouble regaining her feet. She blinked up into his face, as if surprised to hear her own name.
"Aye," she coughed, and he nodded back to her.
"Stay close to me if you want to keep it that way," he replied, trying to sound as authoritative as he could. I don't care what you've done, I'm not letting a bound and defenseless woman be slaughtered if I can help it. He looked around, trying to determine any avenue through which they could escape.
"Begging your pardon, but we need to bloody well get out of the open before it comes back," Brim suggested, vehemently, the blurred tones of her city accent strange to his ears. He nodded and made a decision. The dragon was too fast to escape on foot, even if they could get out of the gates. There was a basement under the keep, a deep one, and tunnels that lead out in case of just such an emergency. That might be their only chance. The smith and the boy, though, were in no condition to move that quickly, and they would be too large and slow-moving a group. I don't want to die, he thought, and was ashamed of himself for it. The girl was staring at him intently, though, and something had to be done.
"Gunnar, take care of the boy. It sounds like the dragon has been diverted to the main part of the keep. Find a place to hide and stay undercover until it's over," he told the old man and then glanced at Brim. She seemed wily and strong enough that, between them, it might just be possible to make it through the caverns underneath. "You're with me. Come on."
"Gods guide you, Hadvar!" he heard the smith call as he hurried towards the keep with Brim in tow, trying to avoid crossing open places as much as possible as they ran.
Same to you, old man, he thought. Divines grant that I haven't just signed both of your death warrants.
~~0~~
Brim was starting to feel optimistic about her chances of survival again as she pounded along behind the young soldier, jumping over fallen debris and trying to stay low. She had been worried that he would insist on bringing the baggage with them, not that she had anything against the old man and the nipper. It wasn't their fault that they were a liability, poor souls, but in a contest between her life and the lives of miscellaneous bystanders, Brim knew exactly where her priorities fell.
"Stay close to the wall," Hadvar shouted back to her. She jumped down from the gutted foundation of one house and followed him into the dog-run behind another. She had no idea where they were going, but the soldier knew the layout of the town better than she did and she was prepared to take a leap of faith. It had served her well so far.
Ahead, Brim could see the town's main road and heard the screaming of the soldiers above the fray as they milled around in the open space, desperately trying to defend themselves.
"Die! Why won't you die?" a panicked voice shouted from somewhere on the other side of the house they were behind, joined by a different voice that exclaimed hopelessly, "It just keeps coming…"
It's not finished what it came here to do yet, she thought, icy fear prickling up her spine once again, just seconds before she felt the terrifying heat and rush of air as an immense body descended over her, crashing onto the walltop overhead. She collided with Hadvar and fought frantically to get free and run, but he wrapped his arm around her and hugged her back against the wall with him as the great black wings enveloped them, the dry, fetid stench of fire, blood, and death choking the air.
"Don't. Move," he rasped in a terrified whisper, but the monster that had landed on the walltop above them was concentrated on the courtyard, not on them. Brim could only watch in horrified fascination as its huge talons, like ebony scythes, clenched and unclenched, the wing tendons creaking and snapping. Finally, after what seemed like a long, long moment, the creature took off again, mercifully unaware of their presence right at its feet, and all she could hear was a ringing in her ears after its deafening roar.
Time seemed to move in irregular jerks as Brim followed the soldier out into the courtyard. There was death all around her, men fighting, screaming, and shouting at each other, tripping over their injured and deceased comrades. It was too much for her brain to take in all at once, and so ever after she would be left only with flashes of images…the man kneeling in the dirt in the center of the compound staring in wide-eyed shock as he tried to hold his own entrails in with his hands, General Tullius with bloodied armor shouting as his men gathered around him, bodies burned beyond recognition strewn along the road. I'd have never have made a soldier, she thought, gritting her teeth and redoubling her pace to get away from the carnage. Let these damned heroes throw their lives away for a handful of septim a week, I want to live.
"Ralof! You damned traitor!" she heard Hadvar shout, angrily, ahead of her as she followed him into the yard of the fortified keep, the smoking ruin of the crumbling tower visible just over the wall. The big blonde Nord had hefted himself up and over a section of wall that had crumbled in the attack and was running for the door of the keep. He stopped, falling into half a crouch as he looked at both of them warily. Brim could see Hadvar's jaw clench in an expression that belied what seemed to her a distinctly personal grudge, not just the general anger one feels against someone on the opposing side of a dispute. Oh, we know each other, do we? she thought, as Hadvar continued, "Get out of our way!"
"We're escaping, Hadvar. You can't stop us!" Ralof bellowed back, and Brim decided that she had absolutely just reached her limit for the day. Oblivion's gates, they might as well just line up and wait for the dragon to come and fry them up like so many sausages.
"What is this, a bleeding knitting circle? Let's….oh, hells!" she started, just as the massive black form of the dragon filled the sky behind Ralof, hurtling down in a shallow dive directly at her with its claws outstretched, its great gaping jaws open, and the flaming coals of its eyes blazing triumph. She turned without a thought, streaking towards the nearest door of the keep and into the darkness within. Whatever waited in there could not be worse than the death from above that was bearing down on her outside.
And that's almost exactly how my first play through of the Skyrim opening went. No great moral or ideological choice on who I wanted to run off with, I just happen to arrive at the keep at the exact moment that the dragon AI decided to swoop down almost right in my face and I ran for the nearest visible exit trailing a line of expletives and probably digital poo as well. :) I didn't even realize there was a choice until my second playthrough.
Thank you for the very insightful and detailed reviews, I'm so pleased to hear that you guys like the character and the story so far. Writing Brim is sort of liberating, because she gets to say and do all the things my more straight-laced characters really wanted to do but were too honourable and polite to actually pull off.