It didn’t take Dardeh too long to walk to Riverwood, with the last song he’d heard in Whiterun playing in his head over and over. “Down with Ulfric, the killer of kings…” He shook his head. To think that he’d been in the same wagon with the man, and both of them prisoners headed for the headsman’s block. Living near Markarth, at the far end of the province, the civil war had seemed far away, something that didn’t really concern him day to day. He’d been up to his ears in it ever since he’d come back across the border. At least he didn’t have to fight in it. He stepped into the Sleeping Giant Inn shaking his head.
There was a big, dark-haired Nord behind the bar. A middle-aged Breton woman with a broom swept the floor in front of it. He walked up to her and cleared his throat to catch her attention.
“Um, excuse me? I’d like to rent the attic room, please.”
Her gaze snapped to his and her eyebrows rose. Her expression was wary.
“Attic room, eh? Well we don’t have an attic room, but you can have the one on the left. Make yourself at home.”
Dardeh handed over ten septims and headed toward the room she’d indicated. Ok, he thought. That’s who has the Horn. She knows exactly who I am. Now to get the thing away from her and head back up the mountain.
There was a quiet knock on his door, and the woman slipped in. She gave him a small but cautious smile.
“So. You’re the Dragonborn I’ve been hearing so much about. I think you’re looking for this.”
She handed him a very old, curved object shaped like a young ram’s horn. Dardeh looked it over and sighed. All that for this? All right. He slipped it into his pack and looked back up at the woman.
“We need to talk,” she said. “Follow me.”
You’d best believe we need to talk, lady, and you’d better have some good answers for me.
She led him across the inn to a large room with a double bed.
“Shut the door.”
He raised an eyebrow. She wasn’t facing him, so he couldn’t tell what was going on by reading her face. Please gods no. He sighed, turned, and swung the door shut. When he turned back to her, she had disappeared; there was an opening where there hadn’t been a moment before. Stairs led down to a substantial room below. There was an enchanting table, an alchemy station, chests and weapon racks, and a large table in the center of the room. Once he’d reached the bottom of the steps she nodded at him.
She had a different air about her, down here in this room. This was someone who was used to being in charge.
“Good, now we can talk. The Greybeards seem to think you’re the Dragonborn. I hope they’re right.”
Dardeh couldn’t help it; he snarled at her. I’m tired. I’ve almost died more times than I can count. You people all seem to think there’s something special about me and now you’re giving me this?
“You’d better have a good reason for dragging me here.”
She nodded. “It was the only way I could make sure this wasn’t a Thalmor trap. I’m not your enemy. I already gave you the horn, right? I’m just trying to help you. I just need you to hear me out.”
Dardeh sighed and shrugged. It won’t hurt to find out what’s going on here. “All right. I’ll listen. So you’re the one who took the horn?”
The woman grinned. “Surprised? I guess I’m getting pretty good at my harmless innkeeper act.”
“I’m…” I’m annoyed. Really, really annoyed. “I’m not amused, and I don’t feel like playing games, if you don’t mind. I did well to make it out of Ustengrav with my skin. You’d better start explaining. Fast.”
She glared at him. “I’ll explain what I want when I want, got it? You’d already be dead if I didn’t like the look of you when you walked in here. But I had to know if the rumors were true.”
Dardeh tossed his head back and laughed.
“I’d be dead? Really? Well isn’t that something. I’ve killed four separate dragons and absorbed them when they died. Absorbed them. Let that thought percolate for a moment.” He shook his head. This isn’t how I should be behaving, he thought, but this woman is too much. “No, I don’t think so. But if you start explaining who you are and why you took the Horn, right now, I’ll stay and listen. Otherwise, I have a few thousand steps to climb.”
She stared at the floor for a moment and took a deep breath, then blew it out and looked back at Dardeh. “My name’s Delphine. I’m part of a group that’s been looking for you – well, someone like you – for a very long time. If you really are Dragonborn that is. Before I tell you any more I need to make sure I can trust you.”
Dardeh almost walked out; he moved toward the foot of the stairs. Then he turned to face Delphine again.
“You know, I really don’t need to prove a single thing to you. Would you like to see a dragon bone? I can go pick one up off the grass in Whiterun where I killed that dragon. Or you could run on out to Eastmarch and find the one I killed out there. What exactly is it that you expect me to do for you? And for what reason?”
This whole thing is bringing out the worst in me. I’m starting to take myself seriously. This is ridiculous.
Delphine frowned. “Can you do it? Can you devour a dragon’s soul?”
“That’s what I just told you. I absorbed something from them. Whether it’s a soul or not I can’t say, but it certainly feels that way when it happens.”
“All right. You’ll have a chance to prove it to me soon enough.” She walked to the table and pointed at a map lying there. “The dragons weren’t just gone somewhere for all these years, they were dead. My predecessors killed them. And now something’s bringing them back to life – their burial mounds are emptying out. I need you to help me stop it. I know where the next one will happen. If we succeed in killing that dragon I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”
Dardeh chewed on the inside of his mouth for a moment. I can do that, all right. Maybe I’m the only one who can. He thought back to the dragon in Eastmarch. If it wasn’t right to leave that one out there, maybe it wasn’t right to leave the others. “All right. How do you know this?”
She nodded. “Fair question. That stone you brought back to Whiterun was a map of the burial sites, and I’ve plotted out the ones that are empty now. The pattern is pretty clear. It’s spreading from the southeast, down in the Jeralls near Riften. The one in Kynesgrove is next if the pattern holds.”
Dardeh sighed. “That makes sense. I killed one out on the tundra down there. All right. Let’s go kill a dragon. You won’t mind if I take the soul, I presume.”
“Don’t push it.” She glared at him. “Let’s get going. We can travel together or split up and meet there, your choice.”
You know, Dardeh thought, I can’t think of anything I’d like less right now than to travel halfway across Skyrim with you. If it’s ok with you.
“Let’s meet in Kynesgrove. I have a couple of things to do before I leave. I know the way.” Sort of. I’ve been at least to that side of the province.
Dardeh walked back up the stairs while Delphine was changing into her travel clothes. He stepped over to the bar and bought a tankard of ale, and tossed it back, then sighed. OK. That’s better.
Delphine led him to the door and pointed up the road that led to Whiterun. “Kynesgrove is this way. I’ll meet you there.”
He nodded. “Yeah. I’ll be behind you.”
He watched her figure dwindle into a speck before starting to trudge down the road himself. There aren’t that many people in the world that I really dislike. And that’s one of them.
_________
He could hear the dragon roaring as he ran up the path behind Kynesgrove. He pulled his bow out, and armed the dwarven arrows he had bought from the Bosmer at the Drunken Huntsman in Whiterun. Glad I got my armor back. Adrienne Avenicci had charged him an arm and a leg to repair the steel plate, but it had been worth every penny already; he must have run across a dozen wolves and a couple of bears on the way to Kynesgrove, and hadn’t sustained more than a scratch.
He looked up to the sky and was even happier that he’d spent the money. This wasn’t just any dragon; it was the big black one he’d seen at Helgen. Not a doubt about it. Not just any dragon. When did I ever imagine I’d be thinking such a thing?
The beast was circling around one of the great circular mounds, the like of which dotted the entire landscape of Skyrim. Dragon burial mounds. He’d never known what they were and had walked over several in the Reach as a child.
Suddenly there was a roar from the sky above. Within the roar, Dardeh heard words.
“Sahloknir, ziil gro dovah ulse!”
A light, whirling and soaring, emerged from the dragon mound. There was a rumble, and the surface of the dirt began shaking, moving.
“Slen tiid vo!”
I know this, Dardeh thought. He just called to a dragon, told it to rise. Its name is Sahloknir.
There was a sharp, cracking noise, and the dirt of the mound fell away. A huge skeleton rose from within the circle of stones.
Dardeh drew his bow and fired at the skeleton, but to little effect; the skeleton was shimmering, and flesh was reappearing on it in the reverse of what happened when he absorbed a dragon soul. The skeleton-becoming-dragon roared.
“Alduin, thuri! Boaan tiid vokriiha suleyksejun kruziik?”
Sahloknir just named the black one for me. Alduin, is it? I know that name. He’s the World-Eater.
Dardeh fired arrow after arrow at Alduin, and nothing happened. They bounced off the beast’s black hide as though they were made of meat rather than metal. The dragon circled around Dardeh and called down to him.
“Ful, losei Dovahkiin? Zu’u koraav nid nol dov do hi.”
Ah but I do know what you said, Dardeh thought as he drew his swords and ran toward the skeleton that had nearly reconstituted itself into a dragon. You called me the false Dragonborn and said I don’t understand your tongue. He shouted into the sky.
“Yes I do, Alduin. Watch me!”
Dardeh dashed to the dragon’s back end and began attacking its tail, then backing to get out of the beast’s reach. He saw Sahloknir gathering breath.
“FUS-RO!”
The blast from his Shout struck Sahloknir just as it was opening its mouth, and staggered it backward. Dardeh attacked again with his swords, and the dragon started to bleed. He danced around it, slashing whenever he got within reach, then rolling or backing away. But it was going too well; Sahloknir turned and, before Dardeh could step aside, blasted him with flames.
Dardeh staggered, cried out. His pulse started pounding in his ears. I’ve lost. I’m going to die.
I can’t die. I have to keep going.
He ran, burning and gasping for breath, for the edge of the burial site’s clearing, to where he could drop down and get at least a tiny bit of cover. The heavy armor held in heat just as well as it held in cold, and he felt as though he was still burning as he ran. Tears of pain were streaming down his cheeks as he cast every bit of healing magic he could muster with his left hand and wrestled potions from his pack with the other.
It hurts so much. I’ll never be able to move soon enough to kill the dragon.
Yes I will. But I have to get it while it’s on the ground.
Sahloknir was shifting in circles, roaring, and even though Dardeh hadn’t regained his stamina or health well enough to run, he had to do something. He shifted position just enough to get a decent vantage point for bowshots and began unloading dwarven arrows into the dragon as fast as he could draw. Alduin was still overhead, roaring in what sounded like laughter to Dardeh. He looked up at the black beast, snarled, then forced himself out onto the mound and drew his swords.
One more try.
Again, Dardeh dashed for the back of the dragon and began his assault on it. Sahloknir turned again, preparing to shout fire, but once again Dardeh used Unrelenting Force to interrupt the fire. He ran to the edge of the mound and drew his bow.
Sahloknir must have been nearly dead already, Dardeh thought as his arrow sank into the dragon’s neck. It crashed to the ground and began smoldering and crackling as Dardeh approached.
Behind him somewhere, Dardeh heard Delphine approaching, her steps crunching on the soil.
“I’ll be damned, you did it! That was well done. Come on, I’ve been wanting a closer look at one of these buggers.” The footsteps stopped. “Wait, something’s happening. Gods above!”
Dardeh snapped at her as flames began to erupt from the corpse.
“Stay away from it if you don’t want to get burned.”
Once again the soul of the dragon rushed to surround him, swirling and roaring and entering him as though it had belonged there all along. Dardeh closed his eyes and took it in. I’m almost beginning to enjoy this. I don’t think that’s a good thing.
He opened his eyes and turned to face Delphine.
“Good enough for you?”
She had the good sense to look embarrassed. “It’s true, isn’t it? So you really are Dragonborn. “
He couldn’t help it. He sneered. “I did tell you so.”
“I owe you some answers, don’t I? Go ahead. Whatever you want to know.”
Dardeh stuffed a few dragon bones and scales into his pack. Then he and Delphine walked down the hillside, to the Braidwood Inn in Kynesgrove below, and each had a tankard of ale while she told him about her theory. It had to be the Thalmor behind the returning dragons, she thought. The war had been effectively over with the capture of Ulfric, but then the convenient appearance of Alduin had set him free and the war was back on. Between the war and the dragons, the Empire was stretched thin, and weak, and the only group that benefitted from that was the Thalmor. But she had no proof.
“If we could get into the Thalmor Embassy…”
What’s this ‘we’ business?
“You mean me, don’t you?”
She sighed. “Well yes. They know me. They’ve been hunting me for years because I’m the last of the Blades.”
Dardeh sighed. “All right. How do I get in there?”
She looked thoughtful. “I’m not sure but I have an idea. Let me work on it for a bit. Meet me back in Riverwood. If I’m not there by the time you get there, I won’t be long behind you.”
“All right.”
Dardeh left the inn and started trudging west once more.
He thought about how close he had come to dying this time, and what had kept him going even when it looked like everything was hopeless. Alduin, according to legend, was the World-Eater. Everything and everyone that was important in the world could disappear if that was true.
That by itself was good enough reason to keep going in spite of the pain of dragon fire, but that hadn’t been all. He’d thought again about the blonde Nord man he met in Whiterun.