Skyrim is the property of Bethesda Softworks. Thanks for the faves and follows over the last week or so. It's good to hear from you again Chris. Recent guest reviewer: 1, I'm stoked that you're so excited about the coming story. 2, you pose a good question about Vignar's behavior. Since you asked, other readers are probably wondering the same thing. My explanation is at the bottom of the chapter.
And before I forget, thank you both for your reviews.
I strode through the pointed arches over the southern pass into Labyrinthian. By the time my boots clomped on the cracked paving stones I was fuming with anger. All I had wanted to do upon my return was manage the Companions and make an honest woman of Aela. Instead I got to spend the week walking over windblown compacted snow and wading through waist-deep drifts. At the city wall I was challenged by a sentry.
"Who approaches the refuge of Jarl Balgruuf in his exile?" a grim, worn-down Nordic voice demanded.
"A long-absent Thane returning to his lord, Vilkas," I replied, feeling the first hint of happiness in days.
We collided with bone-crushing force and for a few heartbeats I was able to match his tremendous strength.
The elated man turned and guided me through the crumbling thoroughfares with an arm around my shoulder. Everywhere I looked, faces peered out from old homes and snow-dusted alleys. For a moment I thought Bromjunarr was a living city again, but the more I looked the thinner the illusion became. The men and women eking out a living in the stone houses were mostly people I recognized from Whiterun's militia. Sprinkled among them were a handful of soldiers from the Legion. The rest were the men and women of the Companions. There were no children within the city walls; nor any merchant or tradesman not tied to the arts of war. There was only the pretense of genuine life in the streets of Labyrinthian. The city felt eager to shed these few hundred souls and return again to its isolation and secrets.
Of course I was recognized almost immediately and cries of, "The Harbinger has returned!" and "The Dragonborn comes!" preceded me through the streets to the central barrow where Balgruuf and his bodyguard Irileth made their beds and makeshift court. Among all the familiar faces I looked for two in vain.
"Thane you've returned!" Jarl Balgruuf exulted as I bowed. His embrace was as strong and genuine as Vilkas's. He gripped my shoulders and smiled broadly, giving me time to look more closely at my Jarl. His beard was filthy and untrimmed. It framed a sunken and pallid face. As far as her dark complexion would permit, Irileth looked even worse. "Perhaps our fortune is turning at last, eh?"
I couldn't wait any longer, I was growing ever more worried with each face that didn't belong to one of two women. "Forgive me Lord, but where is Aela? Where is Lydia?" I blurted out.
"They've gone to look at the word wall in Shalidor's Maze," a gravelly voice said from behind me. I jolted in surprise and turned to see Farkas's chest inches from my face, perfectly silent in his armor as always. "Aela's been in mourning for you since the dragons flew over and you didn't return. We're afraid of what she might do. Lydia and I never let her be alone."
I shot a pleading look at Jarl Balgruuf.
"Go Thane. Do not keep her waiting any longer," he commanded.
At the back of the great hall sheltering Shalidor's Maze is a word wall in good condition. Aela was kneeling in its broad enclosure, her beautiful rust-colored locks bound beneath a mourner's shawl. Lydia stood watching her from a few feet away. I stepped softly, delighted to see them and heartbroken by their grief at the same time. I was about to call to them when Lydia spoke.
"We could retrieve Revenant from Vignar. Maybe find the shrine of Akatosh in the south and leave it as an offering. He'd have liked that," Lydia suggested.
Aela craned her neck to look up at the alien letters scratched on the face of the wall. "Farkas told me once Ieago could understand the words if he looked long enough," she remarked as if Lydia had said nothing. The word for 'fear' burned brightly above their heads.
"I wonder what they say," Lydia replied dutifully.
I broke my silence, "Most of them are memorials. This one is a proverb. It says: The dragon is my guide, I shall not be lost. Though I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, I will fear no evil: for he is with me," I informed them.
A tidal wave of red and raven hair engulfed me in hugs, kisses, and tears. I buried my face in the side of Aela's neck and breathed deeply of her familiar, loving scent. We clung together a long while. I was loathe to let either woman go. They refused to allow me out of their sight as the three of us walked back to the open city and through the gathering crowd at Balgruuf's barrow. He and Irileth were waiting for me in front of a curious statue made of eight crumbling busts bracketing a ruined dragon head. A map was spread out on one of the cots. At a glance I saw a small collection of red flags ringed by a tight blue border.
"What happened?" I breathed.
By turns Jarl Balgruuf, Centurion Cipius, Commander Caius, and Vilkas filled me in on the disastrous three months after the Dragon Truce. After my departure with Odahviing, the dragons had stopped their marauding to await the result of my challenge to Alduin's lordship. Taking it as a sign of my success, Ulfric renewed his campaign.
The Stormcloak army marched on Whiterun with shocking speed. The city, still damaged from the previous battle, was in no condition to repel another siege so the Legion and most of Balgruuf's household withdrew. Vignar remained, having been appointed the new Jarl by Ulfric Stormcloak.
The 9th Skyrim Legion under Legate Rikke held the west watch tower for a brief time. Then they held Fort Greymoor once Ulfric drove her from the tower. Then Fort Sungard. Then Rorikstead. Now she camped at Robber's Gorge, three-quarters if the way to Haafingar. Ulfric's inexorable advance west halted only by the first deep cold of winter. Falkreath fell under the pressure of two of its neighbors switching sides in rapid succession and the arrival of another rebel army from the Rift. Reclaiming Winterhold had been a matter of sending a garrison from Windhelm. The single cohort the Empire had stationed in the isolated town was now scattered in camps across the ice of northern Skyrim.
Rather than face the shame of exile at Blue Palace, Jarl Balgruuf took his court to Labyrinthian. His children were now in Elisif's care with the other displaced royals she was offering asylum to. Centurion Cipius and his centuries were with Balgruuf at Legate Rikke's orders.
Only fifty Companions were in Jorrvaskr when Ulfric's men came to revenge themselves for our part in the First Battle of Whiterun. Most escaped under Vilkas' command to Fort Dunstad; only to meet with disaster there. Ulfric had been eager to menace Hjaalmarch before the end of the year. He sent one of his armies from Windhelm to meet with Jarl Skald's militia and take our castle. Knowing the fight could only have one result, the Circle and my Housecarls withdrew west to Labyrinthian as well.
Imperial failure in Skyrim was imminent: General Tullius possessed a sure grip on Haafingar alone and a tenuous grip on Hjaalmarch that extended only to the city of Morthal. His three legions were depleted and scattered across the occupied holds. The isolated cohorts raided and burned, but lacked the teeth for a heavy blow or to break through the Stormcloak lines and rejoin their commands. All this happened before the arrival of Skyrim's two surest peacemakers: the months of Morning Star and Sun's Dawn.
"We have the supplies to get through the winter and Farengar assures us that the ruins are safe to shelter in," Commander Caius was finishing, "But when spring comes, we'll have to retreat unless we want to be cut off when Ulfric takes Morthal."
"What about Stormcloak positions in the rest of Skyrim?" I asked. The blue flags showing camps and forts hugged the cluster of red and thinned conspicuously outside that tight cordon.
"We don't know Thane," Centurion Cipius confessed, "The legions have been taxed just staying together. And you just saw how hard it is to travel this time of year."
"What are you thinking Dragonborn?" Balgruuf asked after watching me over the map for a minute.
"I'm thinking of how to end that gutless bastard and get your ass back in its throne," I replied with a hand over my mouth in thought.
"We can't do much Thane. We barely have 800 soldiers here," Centurion Cipius said.
"I agree Centurion, but the loyalists in Skyrim need a victory, even if it's a petty one."
"What do you have in mind?"
I gestured to three blue flags that menaced Morthal from the east. "Stonehills mine, Kjenstag ruins, and this camp between Ustengrav and Mzinchaleft. If they disappear, Morthal has no threats within two day's march. The loyalists will have a victory. Best of all Ulfric's legitimacy will be called into question."
The Nords in the room nodded their approval, but the rest looked confused. "How is that?" Cipius asked.
Vilkas explained his people's logic to the non-Nords, "Because it will be made known that the Harbinger and the Dragonborn has chosen to side with the Empire. Our greatest culture-heroes will have rejected a jarl that many look up to as one who represents all that is Skyrim." He shot me a 'we need to talk' look as he finished.
"When do we begin?" Cipius asked.
"Before sunrise Centurion. Have one of your centuries ready to march on Kjenstag. Commander Caius, have the same number ready to rush Stonehills. I will have one hundred Companions with me to that remote camp. When all is said and done, we'll meet at Kjenstag and see about holding the places we take."
It was a beautiful morning, but cold even by Skyrim's brutal standards. The breath of one hundred warriors froze before it left our noses. Mist floated up from the pools of the Drajkmyr Marsh behind us, flaring and burning yellow and gold in the rising sun. We were well dressed for the cold: thick fur-lined armor and wool over our faces, leaving only our eyes exposed.
The Stormcloak camp had yet to realize its peril. Aela and a few other archers were hidden in the rocks and thin woods above the camp. The charge into the camp would wait until I dealt with the lone guard pacing across the south approach.
I crept up in the last threads of the morning mist and paused behind the idle soldier as she gazed to the south. Elenwen's dagger slid effortlessly into the base of the ill-fated woman's skull and upwards without a sound. I lowered her to the ground and sheathed the blade, switching to Revenant. Her excited hiss drew the Companions forward and the mêlée began with a roar. Farkas rushed to my side and we tore through the first few Stormcloaks while our warriors swept past us. Alea's archers spread confusion everywhere.
The rebel soldiers retreated quickly. The Companions stripped the camp of anything remotely valuable while I took notes on the officer's map and grabbed whatever journals and letters looked important. When we were satisfied, we set fire to the fur huts the Nords favored over tents and anything else we could not carry.
We arrived at Kjenstag three days later to find that the other captains had met with similar success at the cost of only a few trifling wounds. A brief discussion followed and we decided to abandon the camps we knocked over. Loaded with plunder and buoyed by our minor success, we withdrew back up the winding ramp to Labyrinthian.
After reporting to Balgruuf, I met with the Circle in the empty building they had adopted as their own. I told them my thoughts and with their help laid out a plan to cope with a problem the Companions had not known for generations.
Psalm 23 is so badass. I couldn't help myself.
The next two paragraphs are a long explanation of the author's thinking. It is all strictly opinion on my part and might not be terribly interesting.
Unfortunately, first-person narratives do not let us explore other characters when they are not in the narrator's immediate vicinity. This can make characters as complex and active as Vignar appear erratic in their behavior. It is my guess that people like Vignar Gray-Mane, Olfrid Battle-Born, Commander Caius, and Hrongar of Dragonsreach would all be Thanes. They would command the Jarl's militia, provide the housecarls (professional soldiers) that train the militia's volunteers, and advise the Jarl's councils. It is my opinion that Vignar would take these roles seriously. Though he would chafe at doing so for a lord he saw as defiant or indifferent toward the man he holds as Skyrim's lawful king. He would seek any way out consistent with his sense of honor. In this case being named by Ulfric as Whiterun's new Jarl was that way out: It was done without violence to Whiterun and under the authority of Vignar's king.
Ieago, a newcomer to the city aristocracy, likely did more harm than good by publicly humiliating an elder statesman like Vignar and did little to affect his behavior in the following battle. (Farkas and Vilkas have a different and closer relationship with Ieago. I maintain that a kick in the ass is what the brothers needed). ANYWAY, in their roles as first among equals in the Companions, the two men understand the pressures that inspire the other's behavior. It is that spirit of respect that drives Vignar's actions toward Ieago and the reason Ieago so rarely speaks ill of a man with whom he often strongly disagrees.