If the Imperial City was the ideal benchmark by which all other places were to be judged, Brim thought that Windhelm seemed like a vision from the capitol's blasted future. As the cart slalomed down the well-worn road out of the mountains and into an expansive river valley, she could see the ancient walls rising up ahead. Even at this distance, the city showed its age and she could see the scattered detritus of ancient human constructions that rose from the ground like bones in a forgotten graveyard. Even the clouds that hung over the city seemed old and threatening, the ravens wheeling overhead against a steel grey sky. Evylie lives here, Brim found herself asking? She could not imagine her sister, who had loved the sun, being happy in a place like this.

From the moment she disembarked in the stable yard among a rabble of merchants, reuniting family members, and spirited soldier hopefuls, Brim was left with the impression of too many people in too small a space. At first, she had thought that Windhelm, like Whiterun, had been built on a rise in the landscape. As she entered the gates and took the lay of the land, the countless memorial plaques and broken, sightless statues that dotted the city, she realized that this was an illusion. The city, as it was now, had simply been built and rebuilt upon the ruins of more glorious pasts. There are enough bones beneath these cobblestones to fill this place with a legion of ghosts for every living person here, she thought, uncomfortably.

More to her growing dismay, no one seemed to know the name Evyline Stroud. As she struggled to keep the attention of various patrons at the inn long enough to wheedle information from them, she racked her brain for anything from Evylie's letters that might jog their memory.

"She's a tall lady, southern lady. Dark hair and green eyes, like mine. Smiles too much, probably. Anyone?" she tried again, as the men hovering over their drinks this early in the afternoon regarded her with silent, half-hostile expression. "Married a soldier from these parts . . . what was his bloody name? Ivar, that was it. They have a little girl . . ."

When she got no reply in at the inn, she went back out onto the streets and wandered the crumbling maze of neighborhoods to see if she could recognize any landmarks, anything that Evylie might have described. The wind was turning chilly as the sun sank towards the horizon and Brim was starting to get worried. Finally, she approached a ragged-looking man who shuffled down the other side of the street. He looked to be in the prime of life, otherwise healthy and whole, but she could tell by the way he moved that he had difficulty moving far without pain. An injury or illness that had cost him his livelihood, maybe. His type were a septim a dozen in the City, survivors of the Great War that had been left irreparably damaged in either their bodies or minds or both, with nowhere to go but the streets. Still, Brim had a healthy respect for the street folk. They often knew more about a city and its people than anyone else.

He regarded her with some suspicion as she approached, but need won out over whatever prejudice the Nord might have against her Imperial looks.

"Spare a coin for a veteran?" he asked, hopefully, and she fished a coin out of her pocket with smile.

"What's your name, friend?"

"Angrenor," he replied, and his expression relaxed slightly from gratitude. "Divines bless your kind heart. This is the difference between food and going hungry for me tonight."

"Don't mention it. What's your story then, Angrenor?" she asked, and he grimaced.

"I was one of the best soldiers in the Stormcloak army before I took a sword through the chest, a year or two ago now. Lost most of the use of my sword arm. Haven't been able to work since."

Brim nodded sympathetically and looked around.

"So, you've been here awhile. Maybe you can help me, then." She described Evylie as she remembered her sister, and was disheartened to see the veteran shake his head until she mentioned Evylie's Nord husband.

"Ivar . . .," the beggar said, his ears pricking. "The only Ivar I know died in battle a year or so ago. Or, at least he went out with his unit of Stormcloaks and never returned. If you're looking for him, I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news."

"Do you know where he lived?" Brim asked intensely, eager for the first good lead she had had all day.

"Aye," the beggar replied and directed her to the house. Brim thanked him and pressed a further few coins on him for his trouble before hurrying off at a jog. The address seemed to be on the shabby end of the respectable side of town, a stone and wood-beam construction that looked like it could easily do with some repairs. An old woman with a thinning scraggle of white hair and rheumy eyes answered at Brim's hopeful knock.

"Evyline . . ." the crone mused, and then nodded slowly. "Aye, I remember now. I lived down the road before we moved here. Imperial girl, pretty thing. Died a few years back, left her husband and that poor child alone in the world."

Brim's heart fell into her stomach. That's why the letters stopped coming. For a while, Brim had thought her sister had simply gotten busy with life. She hadn't begrudged that to Evylie, and she had even been prepared to face Evylie's disappointment in her if that was the reason. But she had never thought to prepare herself for this. Why hadn't her husband or Tobie written?

'Was there a boy that lived with them? Tobias? What about the little girl?" Brim asked, quickly, as a dreadful thought suddenly sprang to mind. The crone eyed her curiously now, with more than a hint of suspicion, but shook her head and sighed as she tried to rub some warmth back into her skinny arms from the cool evening air.

"Can't say about the boy. All's I know is that Talos took the poor mite's father up to Sovngarde soon after, or so they say. Maybe he just found his solace in the bottom of a bottle somewhere, I don't rightly know. Never heard what happened to the child. Expect she went on to some other family somewhere."

Dispirited, Brim thanked the old woman and let her shuffle inside to the comfort of her hearth at last before turning to trudge back towards to the main town square in a near sightless daze. Evylie was gone. Tobie was as good as gone. If he was still alive, she had no idea where to even begin to look for him. I'm alone. It was a disconcerting, terrifying feeling. After her parents had died, she had not been alone. There had been her brothers and sisters and Uncle Renald, and finally the Guild. Even after Victorine had shunned her for her wantonness and Uncle Renald had followed Papa down into an anonymous convict's grave somewhere, she had not been alone. The Guild had been there, and the knowledge that Evylie and Tobie were still out in the world somewhere was enough. Now, with the Guild irretrievably far behind her and the last of the people she had loved, and who had bothered to care about her, gone without a trace, Brim could feel the crushing pressure of a much darker and more frightening world squeezing around her like a fist. It nearly took the breath from her lungs.

The market place traffic was filtering away by the time she reached the main plaza, and she stood and tried to think of what to do next. She would have to find somewhere to sleep tonight. And tomorrow? Her mind could not focus on something that far away just yet.

"Hey," a voice said and she turned to see the beggar she had spoken to earlier limping up to her. He smiled and then his expression softened in concern as he noticed the look on her face. "Did you find your sister?"

She drew in a hiss of breath between her teeth and sighed it back out a gain, shaking her head.

"No. She's passed on."

"Sorry to hear that," Angrenor replied, as if he meant it. He screwed up his face for a moment as if in thought. "Ivar had a little girl, as I recall. Your sister's child, too?"

"Aye, at least I think so. She seems to have vanished into thin air, too."

"I think I can help you there," he said, breaking into a smile, "Come on."

Not expecting much, but too raw from the loss not to clench at the slightest hope, Brim followed the old veteran through the plaza and another set of stone arches. He stopped next to a large iron brazier that burned in the wide space of a second square that lay in front of a huge stone building and pointed.

"There," he said, and Brim peered among the people to notice a girl of maybe eight or nine years old. The dress she wore was of a dark material and ragged, and she carried an equally ragged-looking basket with bunches of hand-picked wildflowers in it. Her pale, dirt-streaked face was turned up hopefully to the adults that passed by her with barely a notice. "That's Ivar's girl, I think. Poor thing. I give her a coin or two out of my takings when I can, she doesn't have much else."

Brim stared at the child, her heart accelerating wildly. From this distance, it could be possible. The child's brown hair was perhaps a little lighter than Evylie's had been, but the wiry build, the shape of the face seemed right.

"Thank you," she told Angrenor, but he stopped her before she could reach to give him another coin.

"Get her off of the street. That's charity enough."

She gave him a brief smile and then hurried across the plaza, slowing as she approached the girl. From this angle, the resemblance was undeniable. The child's face was a small reworking of Evylie's, the sharp Imperial features muted a little by her heavier Nord blood, though she still had the wide, high cheekbones of a Stroud. The girl looked up at Brim with blue eyes that spoke of desperation. The eyes were different, but Brim could see the ghost of her sister's much younger self staring out of them all the same.

"Would you like to buy a flower? Please?' the girl asked, and Brim knelt down, her head spinning, to be at eye level with the child.

"What have you got there?" Brim asked, trying to keep her voice steady. Eagerly, the girl began to pull bunches of flowers out of her basket to show her. Brim listened, unable to pull her gaze away. You're Evylie's, and no mistake. You're my niece. Finally, she picked up a spray of blue and purple flowers, fingering it as she tried to stop herself from gawking. "What's your name?"

"Sofie," the girl replied, her face still frozen in an expression of hope. Mama's name, Brim thought nodding. That clenched it.

"That's a fine name. What are you doing out here in the cold, Sofie?"

The girl stepped back slightly, her look going sad and embarrassed.

"I sell flowers to try and buy good. My mama died when I was little, and papa was a Stormcloak soldier. One day, he just never came back. I'm alone, but I try to do the best I can."

"Do you have any other family? Your papa's people, maybe?" Brim asked, her chest tightening as the too-familiar hurt in the girl's voice struck a deeply buried nerve, and Sofie shook her lowered head. Her chestnut locks fell like a tangled curtain to hide her face. So, that means Tobie isn't here somewhere, Brim thought. No Stroud would abandoned family like this. Not even Victorine would be that cruel, she had at least waited till Brim grown to cut her loose completely. Brim looked around. Darkness was falling and something had to be done. There was no way now that Brim could just send the urchin back off into the city with a coin and a pat on the head. Not after what she had already lost today.

"Your mama's name was Evyline, wasn't it? And your papa was Ivar?" she asked, and the girl's head shot up, her eyes widening.

"How did you know?"

Brim stood and tried to smile, holding out her hand.

"Your mama was my big sister. I'm your Auntie Brim. Come on, kitten, let's get you something to eat. I'm fair hungry myself."

Hesitantly, the girl took her hand and Brim walked with her back towards the Candlehearth Inn. It wasn't much comfort, and it raised a lot more problems than it solved, but this was something. Brim was in no position to offer real safety or shelter, but at least neither of them would have to be alone for tonight.

~~0~~

In the candlelight of the inn, Sofie ate as if it had been months since her last full meal and Brim had no doubt that that was probably the case. She paid the innkeeper the gold required to fill their bellies and enough for a room for the night besides. After a day like today, it was worth the expense. Brim had been fortunate herself when she was that age. After Papa died, Uncle Renald had stepped into the breach, old reprobate that he was. No doubt he had made a killing off of her clever fingers until she was old enough to move on from urchin work, but he had been paternal enough to see that she was fed, sheltered, and protected, and he had taught her the craft well enough that she had been able to step into his place after he had been pinched. Sofie had not been even that lucky, it seemed.

"Do you remember Tobie? He'd be your uncle, your mama's and my brother. Do you know what happened to him?" Brim asked, as they ate. The girl nodded and swallowed a huge bite of stew.

"He and Papa had an argument before . . . before Papa left. He said he wanted to join the Legion, and Papa said he was an ungrateful milkdrinker, and Tobie went away. He didn't even say goodbye."

Brim nodded. She couldn't imagine poor, sensitive Tobie as a soldier, but time changed people and it was better than hearing that he was moldering in a grave somewhere along with Evylie. Once she got situated, she would make some inquiries and see if she could turn him up. If he hadn't been killed in the fighting, then they could figure all of this out together like old times.

"I'm sorry to hear about your mama. She was always my favorite. If I'd have known you were up here all alone, I'd have sent for you." And then the kid would be alone down in the city instead. But that was a different problem.

"I don't remember much about her," Sofie said, sadly, and then looked up with an achingly hopeful expression, "Am I going to live with you now, Auntie Brim?"

Brim pursed her lips and considered this. She couldn't just leave the girl here. Small stranger that she was, she was still family. But Brim had enough problems to contend with without saddling herself with a child. She'd been out cutting purses on the street at Sofie's age, but Sofie didn't have either the constitution or the training for that. And Evylie wouldn't have wanted her daughter to follow in the family business.

"I don't know, kitten. We'll sort it out."

"I wouldn't be any trouble. I can cook and clean and . . ."

The piteousness of it all was just too much. Brim put on what she hoped was a comforting smile. The same smile, she reflected, that Uncle Renald had used on her long ago most likely.

"Don't worry yourself. What's an Auntie for if not to step in when you're in a pinch, eh? I'll take care of you, I just have to settle a few details."

This seemed to satisfy Sofie, who smiled. After they had each demolished a helping of apple pie, she took the girl up to the room she had rented and put her to bed. Brim had never seen herself as the maternal type, and it felt strange to play the adult role in this unexpected echo of her own childhood, but family was family. There wasn't much in Brim's cloudy moral worldview that was sacred, but you protected your own kin. No questions asked.

"I'm going to stay up and do a bit of thinking. In the morning, we'll see what's to be done about all this," she told Sofie. The girl slid into the narrow trundle bed and smiled as Brim went over to snuff out the candle.

"Auntie Brim?" she said, and Brim paused in the doorway, turning back to see her niece's eyes shining in the light from the hallway. "Thank you."

"Don't mention it, kitten. Go to sleep, now."

Brim closed the door behind her and leaned back against the wall, letting the back of her head fall onto the thick timbers with a muted thump as she stared up at the ceiling. Your idea of a joke, is it? The Divines declined to answer, and so she sighed and checked her belt pouch. She had enough coin to last them a few days. It would take at least that long to get a decent haul in thieving without her Family contacts, what with the time necessary to pick a good mark, scope it out, and come up with a backup plan. She could fall back on kiddie cutpurse tricks in the meantime, but that wouldn't bring in nearly enough to set up housekeeping. Taking the girl on the road with her was out of the question.

There had been a Guild in Skyrim, anyone who knew what to look for could see the hidden signs, but they were old and out of maintenance. That meant that the Guild was either weak or had collapsed in on itself entirely, none of which boded well. If they still existed, they would be underground and hard to find. She could always hire herself out as a mercenary for the time being, though she found that sort of work distasteful. As a rule, she didn't shed her own blood for coin, though she was not opposed to shedding someone else's. As Brim pondered the options, the Whiterun job came to mind. The Jarl had promised a substantial reward if she was successful, not to mention anything valuable that might be lying around an old ruin that she could pick up and sell. Something like that could be just the leg up she needed.

Well, m'lord, looks like you're going to get your Dragonstone after all, Brim thought and headed back downstairs. She'd relieve a few drunks of their pocket money tonight, enough maybe to keep Sofie in bread and a warm bed somewhere for a week or two, and be off in the morning. It was a gamble, but a necessary one now. And the gods seemed inclined to weight the scales in her favor lately. And I'm still the best thief in all of Cyrodiil. I can do this. For Evylie.

In the morning, she struck a bargain with Elda Early-Dawn the innkeeper of the Candlehearth. For a pouch of gold and the promise that the girl would assist the cook, Sofie would be allowed to stay and have a pallet in the scullery and a hot meal at night until Brim returned. The girl trailed after her down to the stables and waited with a forlorn expression while Brim located a coach that was headed back to Whiterun.

"There, now," Brim said, finally, as the other passengers were loading their belongings into the wagon. With a grunt, she knelt down and chucked her niece under the chin. "What's that face all about, eh? I'll be back soon."

"That's what Papa said," Sofie replied, solemnly. She could see the fear and the disappointment in the child's face.

"But I'm making you a promise," Brim replied, laying her hands on Sofie's thin shoulders, and raising her eyebrows, "If you make someone a promise, you have to keep it. Those are the rules. And we're family now. Strouds always come back for family."

The girl smiled thinly, and Brim rose and dropped a kiss on the crown of her head.

"Get along with you then. I'll be back soon, and we'll get ourselves a proper home, you and me. And I might see fit to bring some young lady a present, if she's well behaved for Elda and doesn't raise a fuss."

Sofie's smile broadened then and Brim winked at her before turning and climbing up to join the other passengers on the waiting coach. A few minutes later, she heard the snap of the driver's reins and the cart jolted forward. Windhelm receded into the distance. Brim was not blind to the fact that she had spoken to Sofie with her own father's words. I will come back, she told herself, fiercely, and then turned her thoughts to the task ahead. One problem at a time.

~~0~~

On a jagged mountain peak, high above the green, brown, and white patchwork that was Skyrim, an enormous black dragon roosted and gazed out over the world. In the blink of an eye, everything had changed. It was the land He remembered, but it was not the land He remembered either. Man and mer had taken over, insects infesting it with their wretched little hives. No glorious wings rode the winds of Skyrim any longer, save now His own. Their Voices had gone silent. Except for one.

Alduin flexed His great, sharp claws, carving gouges into the stone as He listened to the world, searching and sifting for the one that had drawn His attention almost as soon as He had exploded from the time scar at the Throat of the World. The limitations of this flesh disturbed Him still, but a more magnificent prison He could not have asked for. There were other Voices, faint ones, but they were mere affectations and meaningless babble. What He had sensed among that earlier conflagration of pretentious mortals was a true Voice, though young and not yet fully-formed; the infant aspect of a greater power wrapped inside of a dragon-like mind, though on a much smaller scale. Abomination. Or . . . salvation? Ahhh, Akatosh, brother-father god, You have blundered.

Whatever it was, it was beyond the reaches of His senses now. Curled in on itself, hiding. It would emerge soon enough, and there were other matters to contend with until then. As surely as the land had changed, He felt the change in Himself, the maturation of pride, the upsurge of ravenousness, the reorganization of constituent elements and forces to pull Him into harmony with this most affronting and intriguing future. The novelty of this flesh prison had intoxicated Him before, and He could see that that had been His mistake. It would not be repeated.

Unfurling His wings, He launched himself into space and caught the air currents, gliding like a deathly shadow over the world below. A plan was rapidly forming in his ancient, immortal mind. This incarnation would need allies to complete its purpose. He could sense the frozen souls of the dead dragons waiting beneath the earth, like the small flames of candles in a darkened room, and He wheeled in the sky towards the nearest. I will have my revenge for the outrage these mortals have visited upon Me. And I will be free of You, Akatosh. At last.

One thing I wanted to play with in this piece, aside from a more morally ambiguous Dragonborn, was the gods. The TES cosmology is pretty cool and involved if you really get into reading it, so I thought exploring the divine drama of the Skyrim questline might be an interesting parallel plot as well. I don't plan on going way deep into the obscure lore and arguments about how the gods work, this is just my interpretation + a few plot appropriate machinations. Additionally, Sofie is one of the adoptable Hearthfire kids for those of you who may not have the expansion yet.

Also, thank you so much for the follows and reviews. It's great to know that people are reading and enjoying, and concrit is more than welcome.