Dragonborn Ascendant (6)

A/N: As always, if you want to appear as a mention when I post chapter 4 on QQ, leave a coment or send me a message. And many thanks for all of you supporting me.

If there is something Skyrim is universally known for all across Tamriel, beyond being the homeland of the Nords, is its cold weather. People might dismiss it, but fact is, even during summer, at the peak of the season when the temperatures are at their highest, over half of the entire country is covered in snow and ice, and most of the areas that aren’t stay that way only because they are protected from the cold winds coming from the Sea of Ghosts or because of volcanic activity that makes the ground naturally warmer. When autumn comes, however, and winter nears, that starts to change.

Snow crunched over my feet, a thousand snaps popping at each of my steps as I carved a trench through the snow, a path which Aela followed, her attentive eyes darting in a search pattern, trying to pierce through the mist. A thick fog covered the mountain, a bleak whiteness that blinded us only a dozen metres away from where we stood. Only sharp senses and a keen intuition could warn us of any hidden danger in the path up ahead. A chill would go down my spine and the howling winds and the whistling gouts of air rushing down the mountain, cutting through rocks and passages.

If this was how autumn felt like, then I feared what winter would bring.

“Scared there, milk drinker?” Aela whispered right behind me, an act that sent an unpleasant tingle down my spine, and my head contorted for a moment as my fists clenched and unclenched and I grit my teeth. “You keep trembling and quaking in your boots. If you’re not careful there you might end up waking the dead with all this shivering.”

“Shut it, Aela,” I groused with a tight voice. “I wasn’t born a frigid bitch like you to endure this fucking cold.”

“Of course you were not,” she easily agreed. “Skyrim is, of course, a place of hard and enduring people. I wouldn’t ever expect a little bitch like you to ever handle a place like this.” She returned with a sharp smile. “Better men than you have failed surviving this place, I’m honestly surprised you managed to last this long.”

Why, this fucking- “I’ll show who’s the little-” I started with a low rumble, a snarl forming on my face as I stood ready to rage.

“Quiet now, Magnus.” She cut me before I could pick up steam. I felt my face twitch for a moment, and then in the span of a second have my expression morph through a myriad of displays of fury and indignation until I turned to face the woman.

She wasn’t even paying attention to me!

“No, you shut your fucking-”

“I said to shut your fucking mouth, damnit!” She snapped back, snarling and then lunging at me at a moment’s notice.

My eyes widened and the breath caught on my throat as the redhead leaped and tackled to the ground. I tried to thrash for a moment, to wrestle to regain control but Aela pinned me down expertly and leered back.

“Quiet!” She hissed, leaning down until our faces almost touched. Her hot breath tickled in my ears. “There’s a light. There!” She pointed out, and after a second staring dumbfounded at her, I managed to awkwardly turn my head.

And sure enough, in the distance there was a light blazing, something big, a brazier perhaps, lit beside a tall but relatively thin structure. A column maybe, or perhaps a pillar or a tree of some kind. And more to the left a shadow rose. Not quite looking like something part of the mountain but still something very distinctive and unique, which immediately gave it away as a manmade structure.

“Watchtower,” I whispered, getting a fraction of a nod from the woman on top of me. Then she covered my mouth and leaned down.

In the sudden silence my ears were able to pick up words carried by the wind like whispers.

“What do you see?” A voice echoed, it was low and had a certain rumble. Deep and grave. Male.

I strained my ears, to try and pick up whatever answer came next.

“Hard to say,” a softer voice replied. Smoother and quieter. Higher pitch. Female. “This mist makes it hard to see, but I think it’s just some foxes playing around. Wolves would have been much quieter, and we would have certainly noticed them by now.” She relayed. “Want me to scare them off? If they don’t fuck off then you go deal with them.”

Aela’s breath caught then, an almost inaudible hitch leaving her lips as she tensed, ready to spring into action at the slightest notice. So we waited with bated breath until an answer came.

“Fine,” the man sighed and I tensed.

My arm immediately snuck around and coiled tightly against the redhead’s waist, and I shifted, inverting our positions so the woman stayed underneath me, though she clung closely, grasping desperately as she threw wild and expressive looks at me. “Do it.” A voice rang out.

“Hold tight,” I whispered just as an arrow was shot, cutting through the air with a whistle as it flew over my head. I ducked with my head and, in an instinctive reaction I lifted the woman who yelped, arms going around my neck as her legs snapped around me, I darted to the side, running to the safety and coverage of a nearby rock.

My heart hammered in my chest, sounding like thunder to my ears in the eerie silence. A cold sweat trickled down my neck. It was cold, but I felt unexplainably hot with nervousness, feeling like I was about to overheat.

“There,” the woman talked another time, sounding closer, voice more clear. “I think I took care of them.”

“Aye,” the man grunted with a gruff voice. “I heard the yelp from here.”

“Right, then I’ll be going inside,” the woman returned. “I’m freezing my tits off here.”

And then there was silence.

I kept my attention on the spot where there was a fire, watching the shadows as they moved in an undulating dance. For minutes I waited for something, anything to happen, but all I managed to observe was stillness and absurd quietness.

“You’re insane,” Aela whispered to me with a small glare after I stepped back and stopped pressing her against the rock we had been using for cover. “Divines know that shouldn’t have worked. Fuck, how did you even manage to carry me?”

“Lucky us then,” I muttered back, electing to ignore her question, eyes going down to meet hers. Then a frown came to my face. “You’re trembling. Are you cold?”

“If this is another jest-” she started with a growl and a scowl quickly settling on her face. Except, I wouldn’t put up with her attitude this time.

“Are you cold?" I pressed, asking with a more forceful and demanding tone, and she clenched her teeth forcing herself to stop with the jittering, unwilling to meet my eyes and causing me to grimace. That was in part my fault. The furs we were wearing were thick, but even them wouldn’t be able to resist having their warmth sucked off by a freezing rock.

Worst of part it was that most of our things stayed on the ground at the same place we had been spotted.

A sigh threatened to escape, but instead I worked my jaw for a moment.

“Do you think you can sneak back and grab your bow?” I asked and the woman nodded, though she did frown in confusion and fired an inquisitive look my way. “Trust me for now.” Was my answer, and even if Aela seemed reluctant to comply, she eventually followed through with my plan.

My hand went to my belt where a dagger was being held. Gripping the leather handle tightly I unsheathed the smaller blade, casting a muffling spell on myself before I darted to the other side of the passage, finding another rock wall only six metres away from the stone I had rushed from. I winded down the path following that wall, carefully approaching the light source until the mist started to become hazy and almost clear, allowing for a foggy view of what precisely I was looking at.

It was indeed a brazier, a stone bowl big enough I could probably fit inside, crackling very lowly as a fire hissed, eating pieces of wood that sometimes snapped, releasing a few embers to the air. It sat in front of a dead tree, bark grey like stone and covered with a layer of frost. A man stood next to it, also covered in fur and thick hides, hands stuck out to catch some more warmth as he changed his weight from one foot to another. From his impressive height and equally large build, and particularly clued in by the massive battle axe strapped on his back, I suspected the man was an Orc, and thus a foe that would be particularly tough to take out if I failed.

I couldn’t see Aela from here. Not even a vague shape of her form.

I took a deep breath and stalked closer, quietly praying for the man to not turn and look over my way.

“Wha-?”

He did.

I leapt, jumping almost three metres from my spot to the Orc that managed to catch me and block my dagger before it could plunge into his neck, instead piercing deep into his arm. He grunted, a snarl leaving his lips even as we stumbled and went to the ground, snow breaking our fall and thankfully muffling the clattering that would have been caused by the axe.

We fought, a brief struggle that couldn’t have lasted more than a minute but had left me drained. Exhausted.

With my dagger on his arm, I cut the Orc some and he hissed, eyes red with rage. I pulled back and then struck another time, but he blocked once again and we fought, me huffing on top of him, trying to get past those arms and him fighting for his life.

Then, in a bout of sudden strength I was shoved back, falling with my back to the snow. The Orc took his chance then and got to his feet a fraction of a second before me, ample time for him to lunge upon me with outstretched arms. My dagger swivelled then, piercing his loins and eliciting an agonising howl that only seemed to fuel his anger. He stepped forward, I stepped back, stumbling on a step and slipping.

My eyes opened wildly as I fell, breath catching at my throat. The Orc smiled darkly, a murderous glint behind his eyes as his hands found themselves around my neck.

“I’ll enjoy killing you,” he snarled, but then the sneer on his face twisted as I plunged my blade on his stomach over and over, but the man didn’t seem to want to die, grip only tightening.

My vision swooned for a moment, and all I knew was that my hands made another gesture and the stone grip on my neck loosened and the Orc fell on top of me a moment later. Dead.

“Fuck!” I gasped, blinking the tears off my vision, scuttling away from the dead body, his spilled guts slipping from me to paint the ice a vivid shade of red. “Fuck.” That was close.

Too close.

“Magnus!” Aela’s worried cry startled me, and my head snapped in her direction for a moment. Her eyes were wild as she rushed in my direction, a clear emotion reflected in those emerald orbs. Worry. My eyes snapped in the direction of the watchtower door as a shadow moved and came to view. “I was-”

“Watch out!”

In the span of a second I threw myself on top of Aela once again, and a sharp sting pierced me on my side. I grunted, knees faltering and strength almost failing me before I rose once again.

“Magnus!”

My hand went inside the brasier, completely ignoring the flames in search of a big enough piece of wood. I found a stick, a branch of a tree half burned and turned into a crisp, embers still consuming the material. I threw it at the archer. Completely missed my mark too, but that was fine too, because when the next arrow flew it stuck on the frozen tree.

I rushed.

“Shit!” The archer cried, preparing another arrow, but by then it was already too late.

My shoulder slammed against the woman and we both tumbled to the ground, with me on top of her. She tried to struggle for a moment, to push me back so she could pull her own dagger but I was far too heavy and much stronger than her.

When my blade came down, it only took me a few seconds throwing my weight on top of the dagger before the metal tip started to bite into the woman, plunging slowly, agonisingly into her chest. Her eyes were wide open, darting frantically from one side to another into a panicked expression. The bandit woman even opened her mouth for a moment, to try and speak something, perhaps a plea of mercy or a call for help, but all that came out of her mouth was a wet gurgle and a cough of blood.was a wet cough and a gurgle of blood as she drowned with bloodshot eyes.

I panted, breathless, and when I was about to get to my feet.

"Gah!" An arrow whistled above my head another time, and I ducked, throwing myself back to the floor.

Another arrow flew and my eyes followed its trajectory just to find a third archer leaning against a wall up on the stairs. There was an arrow on his gut and another on his chest and the man held a vacant expression, eyes glassy. The bow he held on his hands then fell to the ground as he slithered down, arrow dropping from his hand.

Dead, I breathed, and then winced feeling a sharp sting on my ribs.

"Magnus!" I could faintly hear Aela's voice, but it felt distant somewhat, as if I was hearing her call me from across a large cavern. "F…!"

"Magnus!" I was shook awake, and startled, I stared frantically around, body tensed in a flight or fight instinct.

"Gah!" It was then that I gasped, feeling such an acute pain on my ribs my sleep evaporated.

"Good, you're awake," I heard, and I shook my head to disperse the fogginess in my mind. Aela grimaced together with my wince. "You madman," she whispered. "How are you even alive?"

"Luck," I breathed out. Or the universe conspiring for me to stay alive. I felt an ache on my back. The gods maybe, though they certainly don’t seem to mind if I’m whole and hale. "Is the arrow…"

"Aye," I could hear her swallowing her nervousness, as well as the gingerly touches her fingers traced the arrow's shaft body.

My ribs throbbed for a moment.

"The arrow managed to pierce your armour on the back," she whispered another time. "But the armour and the furs underneath did their job and stopped the arrow from going straight to your lungs." She said. "You are damn lucky."

"I am," I nodded, and we both easily agreed with something for once. "Can you… can you take the arrow off?"

"No. It's very well lodged. Might be in between your ribs if they didn't crack," she shook her head. "I'll have to break the body and then get you out of your armour before I can take the arrow head off you." Explained the huntress.

I took in a deep breath in the silence of her unasked question. “Do it.” I bit out with gritted teeth.

Never in my life I thought I would have been so deeply uncomfortable with the sound of a wooden stick snapping, but I was, and I shivered as Aela broke the arrow on my back.

“All right,” she breathed. “Now it’s taking off this armour.”

The good thing about armour was that, despite many of their designs being very complicated to put on by your lonesome, any child could undo the straps and belts keeping the pieces together. Not that I had much armour to be completely fair. I only had as a notable piece a single chestplate and nothing more. No shoulder pads, no grevas, not even a helmet. At least I had a pair of gauntlets - even if my arm and armpits were left woefully unprotected - and boots with shin protectors - despite my thighs being covered only with fur.

“Your coat is soaked,” Aela muttered, placing the armour plate down. “Take off this shirt. It’s ruined.” She ordered and I complied.

Her fingers felt like ice as they gripped the broken arrow tip. “Ready?”

“Just do it.” I grunted, and I immediately regretted my words a second later when she pulled the arrow. “Argh!” My vision swirled for a moment, and I lost my balance, feeling the strength leave my body.

Good thing I was already on the ground.

“There, it’s out, you’re fine, Magnus. You are fine,” Aela… not quite cooed but tried to sound comforting all the same. A side of her I wasn’t too sure on how to think about, especially since her tenderness felt surprisingly… nice?

...

What...?

Am I starving so much for a woman’s affection that having her simply take care of me changes my opinion so much? Or is it because she’s a-

A gasp escaped my lips in horrid realisation, though it might as well have been some lingering pain.

I… I think I might have to take up Farkas on his offer… I need to get laid.

Fuck, how many women do I know and just how many of them are warriors of some kind? Maybe I also need to interact with more normal women outside of Carlotta. I think I’ll try and strike up a conversation with Camilla back at Riverwood if I can.

I’m not sorry Faendal, Sven.

With the arrow finally dislodged from my ribs I was thankfully able to cast a healing spell to hasten my recuperation and close my wounds.

I was no master in restoration. Actually, I was fairly mediocre at it compared with the other arts I have pursued thus far, though I knew the priestess Danica at the Temple of Kynareth in Whiterun was a master of the art and I don’t think she would averse to teaching it or even just simply give me a few pointers before I go to the College of Winterhold to broaden my horizons. In any case, after expending a surprisingly small fraction of magicka to close my wound - I suppose all the constant healing while training with Vilkas combined with Farengar’s own teachings had another pleasant benefit - I was left spent, completely tired and ready to just simply collapse on my feet for a long and well deserved rest.

I also needed a thick fur coat to cover myself with, something which I’m sure the Orc could help me with, even if… Orc…

And a fire.

Definitely needed a fire.