-Chapter 2: The Dragon-
There was a beat of silence after the dragon spoke, where the only sounds were the rough winds of the blizzard. The storm raged against the barrier surrounding town but the dragon's magic held it back effortlessly.
Within this newly created eye of the storm, there was total stillness. Not a breeze. Nor a single snowflake.
And at the center of the sudden clearing, sat the dragon.
The mortals stared. And it stared back at them.
The mages were no where near the dragon. On opposite sides of the hold capital nearly. Yet despite the distance, it's presence was overwhelming.
It felt like death incarnate.
Like the ultimate predator.
Soran swore in his mind as he ran down bridge to catch up with the rest of the party.
As his feet moved his mind struggled to cope with the vast perspective shift. The murky fog of the blizzard had shattered. Replaced by the clear and immediate awareness of the dragon. And of Winterhold's complete decimation.
After the hold's long and tragic history of disaster and reconstruction, it was over. Wiped out. Every building was destroyed. By rocks, claws, and ice. The only thing left untouched was the stone tower that the beast now perched upon.
It loomed over the group of mages, lounging above the leveled hold. A twitch of its talons dug clean ribbons into the stone tower. And as the mortals stood stunned it leered towards them; like a cat watching a songbird.
Soran wrenched his mind back under control. Pushing the implications away. Gods, were there moredragons?! And focused on his immediate survival.
That was his usual plan. Always focus on the problem at hand. Or you die.
Alright Soran, it's just another day. His nonsensical thoughts blared in his head. Analyze the problem, what do you know? He slowed his breathing. Placing a barrier of false calm on his frenzied thoughts.
It saw us from across the city and through the blizzard. Soran realized, warily watching the dragon that sat and stared at the group. 'It's eyesight must be like that of a hawk. Or better.' His gut clenched as looked over the massive beast. The lore on dragons was extensive. And all of it portrayed them as ruthless and deadly monsters.
Nigh unkillable beasts that had reigned over the ancient nords.
As he reached the end of the bridge he could see out into the town and the unending bodies within its streets. Soran recognized too many of them.
The baker , the shopkeepers, innkeeper... at least the fallen guards had helmets to hide their faces from me.
-
-
The silent moment was intact for a second more. Then the dragon unfurled it's enormous wings, and leapt into the air in a smooth bound. It's wings pushed downwards and sent up clouds of snow and dust from the rubble below.
The mages instinctively stayed near the bridge. It was the only stone structure left standing in the town, besides the tower the dragon had leapt from. The dragon looked big enough to tear any wooden house to pieces.
As the mages scrambled together trying to direct themselves. Tolfdir, the old alteration master, darted around the end of the bridge. Hands held high with magical power, he transformed the decrepit stonework as he moved. Altering the form and structure to better ward off the dragons breath. He extended the covered stone walkway into a semi-fortified structure.
The old nord passed the courier who lay dead nearby. His presence didn't bode well for the newcomers following in his footsteps. Letters he had yet to deliver were scattered throughout the area. His satchel was cut open by shards of ice, much like the rest of his body, frozen and bloody upon the snow. Left in the shadow of the crumbling walkway.
The rest of the group followed in Tolfdir's wake. Making a commotion as they attempted to take control of the situation. Phinis was the first to act and he began summoning a fire atronarch.
"The dragon must be powerful with ice magic! A breath attack most likely." Savos Aren spoke up to the group. The evidence lay in icy bodies littered through the broken hold.
Savos and Tolfdir plotted while Colette, the restoration master, examined the scene. She kneeled next to the courier and felt his chest. Soran wasn't sure why, it seemed a waste of precious time as the man was clearly dead.
Meanwhile death loomed in the sky above, lazily gliding closer.
-
Colette stood up from the body after a moment, seemingly satisfied, and called out to the group.
"The couriers corpse is still warm despite the icy magic which slew him. He did not die long ago."
She looked back to them, impassioned "There must be survivors! There are always some in an attack like this. The chaos saves one while it damns the rest."
Savos nodded in confirmation. Then the arch mage pressed two fingers against his temples, and his eyes lit up blue; then he immediately cried out and nearly fell as his eyes flickered back to the normal red of a dark elf.
"Ahrggh!.. My detect life spell failed, the life force of the dragon is too powerful it blots out everything else. It's like staring into the sun."
Colette stilled. "We would need to look for survivors without magic."
As Soran walked though the blood and letters, he watched the dragon with a heart full of dread. The others moved around him.
Tolfdir and Savos chanted within the makeshift fortress, combining their considerable arcane might to cast a multi target alteration buff; mass ebonyflesh. The long chant served as a rhythmic background to the frantic preparations.
Phinis chugged potions of regeneration and resist frost. Before he summoned another flame atronarch.
Colette had called together Onmund and Brelyna. She wanted to form a group to look for survivors.
It's a terrible idea, splitting the group in the face of this unknown danger.
Soran feared her decision would doom them all, so he spoke up. "Stop. This idea of splitting the group is madness, you're risking all of our lives. We should stick together."
But they didn't listen.
Colette deemed the rescue more important than his warnings, and Savos agreed with her judging by the nod he gave as he continued chanting. They stayed long enough for Tolfdir and Savos' buff to be bestowed to the whole group. "Mass Ebonyflesh" the two masters intoned as the chant was completed. Energy rushed through the space around them; distributing a telekinetic barrier to each nearby mage; a thin sheet of invisible armor that was harder then steel.
Then Colette's group broke from the rest, taking Onmund and Breylana with her. Jzargo slunk into the background, trailing after them.
They disappeared into the broken city. Cutting our fighting power in half. Goddamn it!
As soon as the dragon had spoken, Soran's mind shifted gears. The words hammered into his soul, drawing him from an easy hunt to defeat some outmatched deadra into a fight to the death, where the odds were no longer so clear.
As he watched his only friends walk away into the ruins, he gauged his magika stores, 100%, and focused his concentration on manipulating the arcane energy. Shocks rattled across his skin as he flowed the energy through his being.
Not yet casting a spell. But preparing to.
All the while the dragon rose in the air. Too far away for a precise shot. So Soran waited patiently for his moment. Analyzing for weakness. Ready to strike.
Eyes, wings joints... tales tell of scales highly resistant to spellfire... I'll need to hit something more vulnerable-
Abruptly the dragon moved, quitting its slow glide and dropping towards them like an arrow, beating its wings and diving towards the college and the mages. But before it was too far upon them it deviated. Banking sharply the dragon turned to the bridge connecting the college to the town.
As it moved for the walkway the sky shook once more and reality quivered with the monster's voice.
FO KRA DIIN ( frost cold freeze )
Frost erupted from the dragons jaws and blasted the bridge and college courtyard, instantly covering the stones with a thick layer of ice. The attack froze deep into the structure, cracking the ancient rocks.
Then the dragon dove towards the bridge.
WULD ( whirlwind )
With a burst of energy and a cacophonous shout the beast's body accelerated sevenfold in but a moment. Before hitting the bridge it flared his wings and twisted its legs upwards, impacting the ice covered stones with its talons. The ancient structure was overcome in an instant, the dragons immense momentum crushing the bridge.
The only path connecting the city to the college was gone, turned to broken rocks that were thrown against the icy cliffs surrounding Winterhold.
With its momentum spent, the dragon beat its wings again and launched back into the sky, flying better than the swiftest hawk. Fire thrown by one of Phinis' atronarchs splashed uselessly on his side. Despite their unerring accuracy, the living ballista was too weak to damage the magically resistant reptile.
The dragon's entire maneuver took place in moments.
'What in oblivion was that!? Is he trying to trap us!? No.. he cut us off from the rest of the college. Soran's mind raced and he looked about with wild eyes. The speed was astonishing.
Terrifying.
Soran barely registered the others around him as he looked onwards to the dragon. It had already flown back halfway across the city. Flying leisurely once again. That infuriated Soran like nothing else could.
It thinks it can kill us without a fight!
He looked back onto his group; Phinis was summoning more creatures from oblivion while Tolfdir and Savos were quietly having an intense discussion.
Colette and the others were still gone from view. Hopefully there was some survivors who could help defeat the dragon.
Seeing no immediate plan but trusting the arch mage to work one out, Soran started his own offensive.
He sighted the grey dragon as it was smoothly gliding away and began filling his hands with electricity, using much more magicka than he had on the bandits earlier today.
He grabbed his forearm to brace his arm, then began to rapidly form the electricity into an orb above his hand. He compressed more and more energy into the small space, folding the electricity into itself. Again and again.
The ball of lightning vibrated with a high drone. It was nearly a third of his mana pool, but it was necessary. Even hundreds of years after their seeming extinction , information on dragons was abundant and Soran had learned some surface level knowledge about the beast. Namely their immense magical resistance. He needed a powerful attack to pierce its hide.
Said dragon was hurtling through the sky. It hadn't spoken since it's initial taunts and magical outbursts and was flying away to set up another pass. Soran carefully raised his arm and locked eyes on the massive creature; looking towards it's thin wings.
He narrowed his eyes with increased focus, clenched his teeth, then condensed the lightning once more before quickly firing it out in a white beam the width of a large apple.
The spell traveled the distance from Soran to the dragon immediately. Splitting the air with a crack!
He was aiming for the shoulder joint where the wings met the body but distance and speed threw off his accuracy. The spell ended up in the dragons wing membrane, burning a clean hole through the leathery skin.
'Ha first blood to me...
..though can I really say that standing in the ruins of this city?' Soran thought grimly.
Looking on, the dragons stride had not even faltered from the strike. It's only response was a minute flight adjustment. And a turn of the head to stare directly back at Soran.
Despite being attacked from behind it seemed to know exactly where the spell came from. Fear swelled deep in Sorans heart as man and dragon briefly locked eyes. Despite the distance between him and the soaring dragon, Soran quickly looked away from its burning eyes. Even from hundreds of paces away he could see them watching him. With its back facing horns and terrible eyes it looked like a dremora straight out of Dagon's court.
With Colette, Onmund and Brelyna
/
Colette surveyed the disaster scene with the calm of an experienced medic. She pushed her anger deep down in her psyche, right next to her panic, and searched for signs of life.
Casting detect life had only shown a washed out field of light as they dragons life-force blotted everything else. And she'd never mastered alteration well enough to alter the spell to pick out the weaker life forces. She needed to search the ordinary way.
This is wasn't the first time she'd seen a scene like this. Death and destruction strewn about, bodies mangled by magic and might. But it was definitely the worst example.
She had known what she had to do as soon as the dragons magic revealed the carnage. She quickly gathered Onmund and Brelyna with her. They were skilled restoration mages, but more importantly we're not as combat ready as Jzargo and Soran, certainly not good enough to face a dragon.
As she directed the trio through the streets. now cluttered with piles of broken wood and shattered stone, her thoughts went back to the beast. And the immense magical powers it had displayed.
'Why is there a dragon in the 4th era!? The ancient nords defeated them long ago. Is it alone? Gods forbid...if there are more.' She thought as she looked for survivors amongst the bodies. A powerful restoration mage could restore those who were a breath away from death. But it was useless on the dead.
The guards in the street were beyond hope. Seeingly crushed flat onto the road.
There were so many.
So many bodies.
The huge stones from the jarls towers had crushed dozens of people, sometimes tearing through them like an arrow through a rotten apple.
And those that escaped the stones were frozen by the dragon's breath; entombed in ice, stabbed with frozen knives, and white with hoarfrost.
The restoration master and her two assistants moved quickly through the streets, attempting to stay hidden in the cover of the broken buildings. They stopped behind a crumbling wall to survey another ravaged street.
"What in oblivion was that!!?" Onmund shouted. Brelyna stood next to him quietly, in shock.
"Quiet Onmund" Colette snapped. "We can't give away our position. The power it displayed... We need to hold out and gather information. " she spoke softly. Focused.
She looked over towards the wagon the merchant had carted over to Winterhold , or rather it's frozen remains. Just earlier today it had been left next to the inn at the edge of town. But now the inn was destroyed. And the a dragons ice breath had knocked the wagon outwards into the large snowberry thicket separating the city from the icy plains.
The cargo that the merchant payed so much coin to protect was now strewn about the bushes.
But looking back towards the bushes Colette saw movement in the wagon.
In the broken, ice covered wagon was a hooded woman, the soothsayer, the merchants second in command. She was digging through the remains, oblivious to the watching mages.
She stopped her search and looked up towards the dragon, before quickly grabbing a long wooden tube and strapping it to herself.
As she moved out of the wagons wreck she spotted the aid group. Her eyes widened, she looked back at the dragon and towards them again, before quickly moving towards them.
"That thing left no survivors." She stated blatantly when she approached. She gave no introduction. Her tone was flat and she seemed dazed.
"What?" Squawked Colette and before the mage could ask more the soothsayer continued on.
"Once it blasted through the city with rubble it hunted down every survivor, every man hidden in his home, crushed. Those in the rubble, frozen. Every single one. I've been watching it from the snow berry bushes since the attack began. I was knocked with a stone from the first volley. I crawled into the bushes when I awoke." She talked quickly, without breaking for breath.
The group stilled. Attention shifting back to the dragon. It had swooped down on the other side of Winterhold again, firing it's icy breath. The magic smashed into something, ringing like a massive bell.
Colette turned back to the rattled stranger.
"Woman calm yourself and breathe." Colette told her refocusing the group. She continued on, "Tell us about the beast."
The soothsayer stilled for a moment, caught off guard, then slowed down and began to breath once more, "The dragon, it's a dragon. It knows where we all are. Every one left alive. I hid away from everyone so it wouldn't find me too."
Jzargo's voice suddenly stood out from the rest.
"Explain yourself, it could sense their locations?"
The cat appeared from behind them to the surprise of all present. But the soothsayer barely registers the new presence, immediately answering.
"Yes, after the flying rocks broke through the town the dragon went and killed everyone remaining with its ice magic. It fired into the broken homes. Those that ran were picked off in the storm... it was so quick." She trailed off numbly then returned with brutal focus. "It knew where they were, it hunted every last one down."
But her burning gaze quickly dulled and she moved her eyes past Jzargo to look blankly at the one standing wall the used to make up the main Winterhold inn.
"I need to go. Please." She stepped backwards from the group as she spoke. "It has surely seen you all. I don't want it drawn to me. Please I must leave." Then she quickly turned, cloak shuddering as she disappeared into the snowberry bushes.
Minutes ago, with Soran, Savos, Phinis, and Tolfdir.
And the dragon
/
Phinnis' second flame atronarch spun into existence with a puff of warm air, and the conjurer quickly directed it to join its sister in bombarding the dragon. The spells were barely noticed against monster's hide. It was turning around now. Back towards the small shelter at the bridge.
Towards its new prey.
It's eyes had remained fixed onto Soran since the lightning spell tore a hole in its wing. The young mage had been near burned out from his overpowered lightning beam spell. He had put enough power to cut through steel into that blast, and it missed. All that energy wasted.
fuckfuckfuckfuck
Lightning bolts blasted out of Soran's hands striking the beast. But the aim was untrue. He aimed for the eyes but the weaker spells were more difficult to direct. And the dragon's evasive maneuvers threw him off further. The bolts scattered uselessly across the grey scales on the dragons chest and snout.
The lightning didn't even break the dragons gaze. Still locked onto Soran.
Fuck
Soran stared at the dragons eyes knowing he was moments from death, when Savos Aren walked out in front of him radiating might and heat. The powers of the Dunmer arch mage roiled the air around him. The power of countless souls from countless venerated ancestors was being pushed back into the mortal plane, into the arch-mages hands.
"Have courage Soran, we have a plan. Tolfdir is working as we speak. I need only stall the dragon for a few moments." The dunmer's rich voice was still calm despite the heat and magic sizzling in the air around him.
And the dragon flying towards them.
The arch mage braced himself. Finely channeling the magic energy, he wrenched his arms apart and tore a hole into the fabric of Mundus. Above his head, a portal was opened to one of the countless minor realms of Oblivion. To one filled with unnatural flames. Hungry and nigh demonic.
The iridescent fires eagerly spilled forth from the dimensional breach before being caught in Savos Aren's grasp. He struggled to control the fires but he was stronger than than their base intelligence. His will strengthened by the power of his ancestors. His will was their will and their might was his to wield. He molded the outbreak into a large stream of fire that burst from the tear in space towards the dragon.
A massive lance of living fire. Full of colors. A continuous column of flame pouring out of the portal.
A split second of thought passed through the dragons mind before it abandoned defense and dove through the flames, undeterred in its path to attack the mages. Even as it's scales charred and boiled it's innate resistance let it close in further.
As it flew through the column of fire it built up It's own powerful magic. Icy winds billowed from his maw once more in a torrent that scattered the flames and moved towards the casters.
FO KRA DIIN (frost cold freeze)
As the fire spell was pushed back, Savos opened the tear wider to draw out more flames. But the dragons magic quickly gained ground.
Realizing he was the one being overpowered Savos Aren quickly changed course. He shut the portal and widened his stance while the now unimpeded ice magic sped towards them. He moved his hands forwards before pushing outwards. Golden lines raced through the air in wavy patterns as he formed a circular ward in front of them. The approaching frost could be seen through the distorted air.
"Aegis Shield!" He shouted.
The barrier rang like a bell as the attack struck and the ice magic broke upon the shield like water falling onto a stone. Scattering outwards.
Cold winds shot past the edges of the protective circle and destroyed the nearby flame atronarchs. Phinis was further back and as he saw the approaching frost he tried to dive into Tolfdir's fort to save himself. But he was too slow and the deflected magic shoved him hard into the wall. His ebonyflesh spell flared into light with the impact.
He slumped over next to the dead courier as the freezing winds washed over him.
Savos stumbled to a knee at the sheer power he was forced to wield. The ancestor flames surrounding him went out as he righted himself, enduring his exhaustion in silence.
Meanwhile Phinis Gestor leaned heavily upon the wall, covered in a thin frost. He managed to push himself into a sitting position as his teeth rattled. He probably wound have been unconscious or dead without the potions he had drank earlier. He slowly cast a litany of healing spells. Then reestablished mental connections with his remaining daedra. They had enough problems without them breaking free of his control.
Several summoned creatures flew out of their hiding place in the rubble towards the dragon. To hopefully distract the dragon from slaughtering the mages. Two watchers and two wraiths cut silently through the air.
The watchers were floating black orbs covered in blue eyes and spiked tentacles. They nimbly flew around the flying spirits and fired white eye beams that burned the scales on the dragon's back.
The wraiths were the vengeful souls of the recent dead, pulled from beyond the veil. Summoned back from the grave to attack their dragon that sent them there.
They clawed uselessly at their killer before the dragon spun in the air and smashed through them with its wings. Sending them back to the afterlife.
It roared in victory before shifting towards Soran. Baring it's fangs towards its new prey. Though it's face was now charred black from Savos' fire. It's eyes still gleamed with demonic light.