6.
The Dragon's Behest

The wound smelled of seared flesh, and it was tender to the touch. Daniello fidgeted for hours that night, doing his best to sleep beside the fire, yet every once and awhile, when it was most inconvenient, the bandaged wound at his belly would itch. Not simply itch, but ravenously itch. Every time he would move to scratch it, however, the crone of a woman named Lydia swatted him with rock-like hands.

"You open that wound, child, and I'll open the back of your head." In spite of her sharp tone, that morning she checked his wounds and spooned him a bowl of soup. "Are you hungry, Rokie?" she asked as she gave Daniello's head a ruffle.

Rokon shook his head. His shoulder had been sutured shut, knots of medical twine swollen against fissured flesh, but the Orc bore the weight of his wound with small complaint. It must have been ease to him, Daniello figured; it was as if each battle marked itself upon his body, a lesson never to be forgotten.

"If you don't mind me asking," Daniello began, between mouth-fulls of stew, "how did you become so adept at first aid, miss?"

Lydia snorted. "Who do you think patched this one's wounds?" She jabbed a thumb at Rokon. "After a lifetime of adventuring, you'd best be good at first aid. Are you sure you aren't hungry, Rokie?"

"I have plenty of mass to spare." Rokon stood, heaving the weight of his injured shoulder with a grunt. "There is something I need to do." He lumbered across the room, donning his bloodied furs, and made for the door.

"Are you alright?" Lydia asked.

"Bleak Falls Barrow. Rest easy, Daniello. Eat and gather your strength." With that, he was gone.

Lydia sighed. Her hands moved to her eyes, and she gave a yawn. "That man, I swear… Are you well, child? Do you need anything?"

Daniello nodded. "I believe so. I… Saying 'thank you' might be unbecoming, considering the events, but… I am grateful."

"Needn't you worry about it. How did this disaster come to happen? Were you being attacked, or -"

"- It was my fault." Daniello interjected. "He went out to save me. I got in over my head, you see, and it… It's best to say he was looking out for me."

"It seems to be in his nature."

"Are you two, erm, married?"

"Legally." Lydia smiled, and poured herself a cup of water. "He owns land around the country. Never one for numbers, that man, and so I tend to our accounts."

"Do you know who he is?" Daniello's words began to fumble. Rokon had been kind enough to answer almost any question he had during the night, yet a choice few Daniello's queries went ignored. Wrapping his mind around the idea, even still, baffled him. All of the stories bespoke of the Dragonborn as a Nord; in some tales, a man, and in others, a woman. But never an Orc, least of all… a very fat orc.

"Who he is?" Lydia squinted. A ray of sunlight glimmered through the curtains, over her shoulder. "Child, are you certain who he is?"

Daniello shook his head.

The woman snorted. "Then it is best you ask him."

"Why?" Daniello wondered if he had more questions than senses.

Lydia rolled her eyes. "You're too young to understand. Adults are complicated, young man. Seldom are they as they appear, or how they present themselves. You would do best to learn that."

I already know that, Daniello thought bitterly. Or, at least he thought he knew that. Could the Dragonborn spoken of in the stories be the same man whom lived them? In truth, now that he considered the tales… they never often spoke of who the Dragomborn was, only what he did.

If that were the case… Who was the Dragonborn?

It did not take long for Lydia to retire after her sleepless night. She checked Daniello's bandages once more, making certain the wounds had not come to infection, and soon made her way upstairs. Daniello found his feet a moment later, dressed down in his muddied clothes (which, to his discomfort, were still wet with blood). Whiterun bustled in the early morning, from the faint smell of the nearby Blacksmith's forge heating up to the distant chatter up the road, where shop keeps began to set up their stalls.
How much had changed in a night? Yesterday morning, he had been a guttersnipe seeking vengeance against vicious thugs. Now those thugs were dead, but what remained of his quest? His journey, his excursion… and The Masque of Clavicus Vile. It was all that remained. The gnawing urge to find it, put it to use, and wield it against those he thought were his foes. But what did that mean anymore? Who were his foes? Or, as the thought pervaded, was he merely a child playing at the game of gods? Searching for meaning where he, Daniello, had none?
But he needed the Masque, that much he knew. If last night had proven anything, it was that he could not prevail in his life without it. Power could make anyone someone, and now more than ever Daniello felt like nobody at all.

The road to Bleak Falls Barrow had a trail of dried blood. Daniello climbed to the top, where the steps of the Tomb began, yet he found Rokon several feet away, under the shade of a snow-dusted pine tree. The Orc wielded a spade, and along the ground sat several graves.

"I thought you would be resting," Rokon said. He plunged the spade into the ground and upended tufts of snow and dirt. A haggard grunt left his lips as he stepped over the grave, and latch his hefty hands on a dead bandit's ankle.

"Perhaps I should be." Daniello watched him drag bodies across the dirt - the very bodies of the bandits he had slain the night before. What is he doing? Daniello squinted his eyes, and Rokon gently laid each body into a freshly dug grave. The stories never told of the gravedigging hero, he thought. When does the Dragonborn dig graves for his foes? "Why are you burying them?"

"I took their lives. It is my responsibility to see them buried."

"I don't see why," Daniello said. "They tried to kill us."

"They had names." Rokon began to shovel the dirt over the graves. "Families and friends. A man does not turn to banditry because he is evil. He plunders because he is hungry."

"Or greedy," Daniello offered.

"Yes." Rokon rested his shovel against his shoulder, his breathing labored. "I do not blame the man for cutting the purse from my belt. I blame the events that forced his hand."

Daniello said nothing, for the idea itself seemed foreign to him. What are you saying? That people cannot be blamed for their actions? That we are all byproducts of a events? Is their no responsibility for the things we do? He did not, or rather, could not agree. Everything in life had a price, and those who weighed the price and decided it was worth dying for, even the hungriest of bandits, should be held accountable for their actions.

"Found things in their loot. One of them had my golden claw."

"That was me," Daniello said quickly, and as the words left his mouth, his lips twisted as if he'd sucked a lemon. Speaking the truth had a flavor most sour. "I… I stole it from you. I was angry, Rokon - I'm sorry."

Rokon inclined his head. "I understand. You had your reasons."

Daniello, at first, said nothing. He's a step away from pacifism… This was not the hero he had imagined - not in the slightest. "I have to go soon, sir. There is somewhere I must go, and to be frank, I'd rather not bother you or your wife for long with my… antics."

Rokon's throat rumbled a sigh, whether of deliberance or concession, Daniello did not know, but after a moment of silence the Orc gave a nod. "Soon."

"Soon?" Daniello cocked his head to the side. "I'm confused."

"We leave soon."

"But you don't know where I am going," Daniello said, baffled. "You don't know what I'm trying to accomplish."

The Orc stepped over one of the graves, and retrieved his emerald axe. "I spent years helping others achieve their goals, boy. Tell me - if you could not fend off meager bandits, how will you go about facing a Spriggan? Or even Giants?" Rokon scoffed. "This 'somewhere' of yours… Where is it?"

"Haemar's Cavern," Daniello said. "It's in Falkreath - but, I need gold before I go. Five hundred gold, even, and that's not nearly - "

Rokon snorted. "Haemar's Cavern? What will you find there?"

Daniello bit his lip.

"A man won't tell his business?" Rokon asked.

"Am I a man, or a boy?"

"That is for you to decide." Rokon reached into his pockets, and fished out the golden claw. With a toss, he sent it through the air.

Daniello caught it. The claw glittered, solid gold and jeweled with precious gemstones. "But this is your property."

The Orc marched passed Daniello. "Sell it. Return to Whiterun and ready your things."

"When do we leave?"

"Next week." Rokon started off down the mountainside, leaving Daniello with the whistle of lonely winds, and the smell of freshly dug graves. None of that mattered to him. His spirits had been lifted.