Resh POV

Almost as soon as she said those words Resh snapped and grabbed the woman roughly, "I don't give a fuck about that! I have a friend who is dying, and the first thing you bring up is the one thing I care least about, if she dies you're next on the list, you didn't help at all."

"It's not my problem when some stupid Nord gets herself killed, but now I have proof that you're the dra-" she was cut off quickly when Resh tightened his grip crushing the flesh of her arms and making her cry out in pain.

"It is your problem. You're meant to be a dragon slayer expert, but you did nothing, you could have helped, or at least done something," Resh shouted, barely keeping himself from squeezing her arms even harder and shattering the bones.

"It doesn't matter now, you have to help me now. We need to get back to the Sky Haven Temple, there we can start to rebuild the blades," Delphine carried on, completely ignoring his obvious anger.

Resh growled and dug his nails in deeps enough to part the leather and draw blood, "If you think for one fucking second I am helping you think again. You're lucky I haven't just killed one of the last members of the Blades for being such a insensitive bitch!"

Only now did Delphine start to realise the danger she was in, and had to hold back tears as his hands cut deeper and deeper into her, "Please… stop!" he didn't though and his eyes narrowed even further, "I can help, just stop it!"

Resh suddenly let go allowing her to retreat a fair distance. He didn't know any healing magic, and didn't think Brelyna did either, but this 'Delphine' was a Breton, so probably had some knowledge in magic, maybe she could do something worthwhile. Not fighting when you could have is usually punishable by death in Akavir.

The Tsaesci growled, "You had better know restoration, or you don't deserve life."

"Just because I'm a Breton doesn't mean th-" she stopped when he took a step closer to attack her again, "I have potions though, not many, but enough to help."

"If you manage to keep her breathing I will consider helping you on whatever pointless tasks you have," Resh muttered, he probably wouldn't get round to it considering the women's complete cowardice by not showing up to attack the dragon, but still, he would be thankful if she earned a reprieve by saving Kayci.

Brelyna POV

Needless to say Kayci was in an awful condition, Brelyna was surprised she was still breathing, she was literally hanging on by a thread. She was so worried she was completely ignoring the sounds of Resh yelling at someone in the background.

For a moment Brelyna had the horrifying thought that she might actually be dead, and she had made a mistake seeing her breathe. She was jolted from her tears when Kayci's eyes snapped open, revealing a melted mess of what was previously eyeball. It must have been horrifically painful, as seemingly impossible amounts of juices and white fluid spilled from her left and most likely blind, eye. The right one was faring slightly better, but there would still have to be some kind of immediate medical attention to keep that one working.

After hearing the shocked and sorrowful noise Brelyna made upon seeing it Kayci clamped her eyes shut, liquid still leaking from the gaps where her small chunks of her eyelids had been completely melted away.

A silence between them lasted for a good few minutes before Kayci finally collected herself. "Where's the other one?" Kayci coughed out, struggling for breath, "I thought I would be killing two dragons."

Brelyna looked at her completely astounded at her words and how serious she had been, "Are you joking?! your skin is blackened and cracked and you can't even move, and you want to fight another?"

The other woman looked at her like she was insane, and had an almost emotionally hurt expression, "You don't think I can do it? sure I can just let me…" Kayci grunted as she twitched in an attempt to stand but only opened all the cuts on her skin even more than they were. "Another few minutes and I'll be fine, I could take three more with my eyes closed, I just need to stretch a bit."

"You're crazy," Brelyna muttered under her breath, before immediately fussing over her fallen lover and keeping her from trying to stand again. "You still managed to kill this one though, so congratulations, you're the second dragonslayer currently alive."

Kayci chuckled, before breaking into a harsh cough and getting blood all over her as well as tearing some of her weak skin, "I guess so, where is it by the way? I'm hungry…"

It was now Brelyna's time to laugh, "Calm down love I don't think you can eat a dragon. You need rest, you're going slightly delirious."

Kayci's eyes snapped open again in indignance, only for her to immediately close them at the pain, and the tearful gasp Brelyna let out upon seeing her eyes again, "I'm not delirious! I'm a Tsaesci! a giant snake thingy! I can eat anything I want to!" she chirped, still sounding as ridiculously cheerful as she could even in a time like this.

"Sure you are…" Brelyna giggled, finding Kayci's creative imagination very funny and good at raising the mood in such a tense situation. "There's only one thing you're good at eating and you'll get more than enough of that when we get back to the College." the Elf smirked still wiping away tears, and teasing her about the crazy things she was saying when half dead.

"But I am!" she squeaked, her tone getting adorably high pitched as she got more and more indignantly annoyed. Fortunately her voice hadn't been wrecked by the flames, so it was still perfect rather than hoarse as one would expect. "I'm eight and a half feet long! I could poison you with a bi-"

"Calm yourself," Brelyna whispered, putting a finger to the other womans lips to stop her talking, "You have a very creative mind, when we get to the College you should try writing when you are recovering, I reckon your fictional characters could be very detailed if you put more thought into them."

"They're not fictional! they're me!" she spluttered, unable to see why Brelyna didn't believe her.

Brelyna smirked and folded her arms in mock annoyance, "You haven't been sneaking any more of that moon-sugar have you? I'm sure a… what was it? Tsaesci like you shouldn't be doing something like that."

The Tsaesci in question would have reacted to the sheer audacity of her lovers words, but was interrupted when the old woman, followed shortly by a very very very pissed off looking Resh, stepped up to her.

"Delphine here has some health potions for you," Resh started, glaring at her to prompt her pulling them out, "And she's going to use every last one of them to heal you."

The Bretons eyes popped open at the words 'all of them', her shock was only met with the stern and deathly look on Resh's face, "But they're expensive! I can't use all of them, what if I need them?"

Resh hissed, "I repeat, 'every last one of them' and then you're going to be just fine."

The older woman gave a begrudging sigh and pulled out all of the small red vials she had, "This will be enough to keep you going for a good week or so, maybe even save that eye of yours. But that's the best I can do, you'll need to get to the College where they can heal you with magic if you want to live."

Kayci eagerly drank down everything the woman gave her, not liking the idea of going blind. She would lose all fighting prowess she have and then have nothing. After almost 15 minutes of solid drinking Kayci was convinced she was more potion than she was snake, with all the liquid rushing through her she was sure she would be fine in no time.

Although that could have just been the side effect of being high from too much medicine taking, despite this it actually felt pretty good, at least the pain had stopped. Before the red bottles she had to hold in her screams of excruciation, mostly for Brelyna's sake than for her own.

Lydia finally spoke, having had nothing to add up until now, "The closest city is Windhelm, we should reach there as quickly as possible and then get a carriage to Winterhold it means we'll get there in a few days, and Kayci probably has twice that much time. We could also buy her some more clothing seeing as her armour is nowhere to be seen."

It was true, Kayci really should have gone for more protective clothing, the skimpy leather she had worn before didn't protect her in the slightest and had completely burnt away into dust. Leaving the woman with not only completely ruined and melted skin, and former beauty almost completely destroyed and nearly unsalvageable; but she was stark naked too, the only thing covering her dignity were the large burn marks and blood in the way.

Kayci just hoped Brelyna would still like her this way, it wasn't like she'd have many other options after this…

Resh POV

Resh couldn't believe how unbelievably fortunate Kayci was when it was revealed her ring to make sure she didn't freeze was still functioning. Somehow, despite her entire body being little more than a cinder the steel band around her finger was completely fine, giving Resh hope that there would be no doubt she would live through this.

Even so, Kayci's injuries made the journey far harder than it needed to be, Lydia guessed it would only take about two hours at most, but in fact it took them the better half of the day. She was unable to walk so Resh, being the strongest, had to carry her the whole way, only to have her complain every five minutes about the position he was carrying her in, or the pain from the shaking of his steps.

It got to the point where he was playing with the idea of just knocking her out to make it easier, but reasoned that she would probably get her own back, which wasn't something Resh particularly wanted to go through.

He was just happy that they weren't attacked on the journey, he didn't doubt he and the other two able fighters in the group could drive anything off. Resh had long since driven Delphine off, after she had handed over every potion she had, Resh told her 'to go fuck herself' and leave, so that was the last he would be seeing of her for a while.

Windhelm itself was a miserable looking city to say the least, not in the same sense as Morthal though. Unlike that glorified village Windhelm was huge, definitely well built, and clearly a mighty stronghold. It just looked so… depressing and worst of all snowy.

Fortunately, like Kayci's, Resh's own ring could protect him from harsh bite of the wind, it still didn't make him like the icy weather conditions any more. He missed Akavir weather, where it was always sunny and perfect, well at least if you stayed in the Tsaesci territory.

The guards of the city seemed quite shocked at the entrance of a large man carrying a half dead woman so rushed over quickly to help, going so far as to offer to carry her to the local inn. Resh didn't like the idea of leaving her alone, but supposed it would save a lot of time considering he didn't know where the inn was, and was getting sick of escorting her everywhere.

The two men staggered slightly under the weight of her, being a Tsaesci she was slightly denser than the average Nord even when in human form, but they managed, Brelyna rushed to open the door for them and quickly followed them off, not wanting to leave her lover alone.

His impression of the city got even worse when he stepped through the doors of the city, not only was it a snowy hell, but the first sight he was greeted with was two Nords cornering an innocent Dunmer, he was thankful Brelyna had been too focused on Kayci to notice them.

"You come here where you're not wanted, you eat our food, you pollute our city with your stink and you refuse to help the Stormcloaks," the first man he saw growled, getting in the Dark Elf's face, after the poor woman had presumably done nothing.

"But we haven't taken a side because it's not our fight," she snapped, trying to push past him only to be caught by the forearm and kept from moving.

The second man, who had the look of a beggar so therefore shouldn't be criticising anyone spoke up, "Hey, maybe the reason these gray-skins don't help is because they're Imperi-"

Resh stepped in here, not letting the disgusting excuse for a man finish, in his culture anyone like him or the other Nord that treated others so badly was usually referred to as 'food'. "Why don't you two leave her alone? I think it would be preferable to me making you."

The man glared at him for a moment, hesitating slightly due to Resh's far superior size, "You. You a Dark Elf lover? Get out of our city, you filthy piece of trash."

Resh took a step closer so that he was within hitting distance, "Insult me again and you will regret it," he hissed, the beggar had been clever enough to run while he had the chance. But for some reason the other idiot, presumably the ringleader of the two stayed defiant.

"Don't like it? Too bad. This is our city. Ours! Don't think I can take you? One hundred septims says I can punch you back where you came from!" Resh almost laughed at that, the man went barely up to his shoulders, he could probably knock this racist bigot into a coma with one hit, which is what he planned on doing considering the outright discrimination this idiot shouted at the Elf.

Even when Resh wasn't as kind as he was now to other races he never went out of his way to be cruel to them, or accuse them of things for no reason, he was just a bit elitist of his own race, which he guessed he still was even now in a few ways.

"Two hundred says I knock you out in less than ten seconds," Resh challenged, knowing that the idiot would probably accept the deal. He was actually pleased with this fight happening, not only was he going to teach a racist a lesson, but he didn't actually have any money either, so it meant he would actually have something to buy the clothes he said he'd get for Kayci with.

"All right. Fists only. And none of that magic stuff, either," the man said, raising his fists to get ready, "Let's go!"

Rolff was the first to lunge, although his punch was extremely sloppy, and although to another of the mortal races would be considered strong, was nothing to Resh as he quickly grabbed the Nords arm, lifted him and then grabbed his head with his other hand.

Resh held him there for a few seconds smirking at him. "Four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, and ten," he finished the last number by smashing the mans head into the wall beside him, causing a stomach turning 'squelching' sound to be made. Resh didn't even smack his head that hard and the man was out cold, blood streaming out of his forehead, the Tsaesci wouldn't be surprised if he was dead, and to be honest he hoped the bastard was.

"Well, that was easy," Resh laughed before reaching down to grab his well deserved coin, a small crowd had gathered, but he was pretty sure he wouldn't be in much trouble, the man was a racist after all he doubted the city liked to tolerate people like him. Also they had agreed to a brawl so it was all consensual, even if the guy did get seriously injured.

The Dunmer they had been harassing had also stayed to watch, and she seemed very shocked at what had transpired, not only had that prick been dealt with so quickly and easily, but by a Nord no less. "Thank you for that," she said, spitting on Rolff's body, "That arsehole has been picking on us for too long. It's not everyday I see another Nord stick up for people like me."

"I'm sure someone would have done it sooner or later, there are some people that just don't deserve the air they breathe, I won't be here very long, so if there is anyone else like that let me know," Resh told her, feeling sorry for the woman. Not noticing the flash of jealousy in Lydia's eyes.

She knew it was probably just the hormones kicking in after the first month, but why couldn't Resh fight for her honour like that more often ?

The Dunmer sighed, "I think it might be hard for you to deal with all the Stormcloaks, the whole lot of the are just like him."

Resh did a double take at that, according to Ralof the Stormcloaks were the best thing since sliced bread. But if this woman was saying otherwise, and had experience from the Stormcloak centre, maybe Ralof was just was ignorant as the man bleeding on the floor. "Really?" he asked.

"Yeah, their leader is worse. I bet if he ever did come to power over Skyrim, which I hope he won't, his first order of business would be to kick out all of us 'Gray-skins' as he calls us, and practically enslave the Argonians," she muttered, lowering Resh's opinion of this anti-empire faction even more.

"If I can I guess I'll have to deal with him too," Resh growled, although unsure he could kill a Jarl of a city, if he was anything like the Elf had described he would be happy to give it a shot once he had an opportunity. "Maybe I'll join the Legion to help end this war if he's that racist."

"Who did this to my brother!" shouted a loud voice from behind them, as a relatively large man covered in bear pelts ran other.

Regardless of his size Resh was still taller, one of the perks of being a Tsaesci was being able to look down on everyone he came across, "I did, you don't have a problem with that do you?" he said, grinning with condescension, if this man was anything like his brother he'd knock out this idiot too.

"Yes it's a problem!" he shouted practically fuming. "What if you killed him?!"

"Then he would have deserved it for being a racist bastard, you should really clean people like that out of this city," Resh glared back, the confrontation had drawn an even larger crowd than before, and even Lydia seemed shocked at what he was doing.

Galmar grew even angrier, "You did this for those grayskins?! what have they ever done for you to act like some Dark Elf lover?" so far his words made it quite clear to Resh that he was no different to his brother, and he mentally prepared for another fight in case the man tried to attack him.

"I think minding their own business is more than enough. Something you should take to heart as well, so unless you plan on doing something about this I'd suggest fucking off," Resh snapped, pushing the smaller man away, his strength sending him stagger back a few metres.

"You can't tell me to fuck off! I'm Ulfric's right hand man!" he growled, pushing him back, although not nearly with as much force as Resh had despite probably trying twice as hard.

"If that's the case and he lets worthless excuses for people like you in charge then I'm definitely joining the Empire then," Resh retorted not caring for the man's attitude at all. His words caused a stir throughout the crowd, most of them were unsure what to do, no one would ever state any desire for the Legion in Windhelm on fear of persecution, but some stranger had done it to the second most important Stormcloak.

Most of the crowd were relatively annoyed at his words, such as the guards, or other supporters of Ulfric, but there were others, like the Dunmer who seemed pleased, although they all kept it to themselves. The Dunmer in case they were picked on, and all Stormcloaks were silent out of fear of Resh.

"Are you aware of who you're talking to right now," Galmar whispered, murder in his voice, the crowd were caught in a deathly silence.

Resh couldn't help but laugh, "You literally told me ten seconds ago, I wasn't aware you Stormcloaks had such short attention spans. I knew you were all idiots, but I didn't know how much you really were."

The tension of what seemed like half the gathered city felt like it could be cut by a knife. And in the background Lydia sighed just hoping he won't be arrested for causing a disturbance in yet another city. 'Why does Resh always have to get into situations like this?'