Trouble never comes alone Options

[jack cloudy]

Yes, so I just couldn't resist and had to get this off my chest. We'll see how long it lasts. Same deal as with redemption, I'll be using this post as a character list and the first part will be in the next one. For now the list is simple.

A question. Should I add a separate entry for Spar at the very bottom that is basically the extra-spoilers edition?

Spar: A female Imperial and the main character of this story. Is guided by 'Them'.
(Portrait)

Silent Fist: A Companion Spar hires to escort her into Bleak Falls Barrow. He doesn't speak, wear shirts or use weapons. Click here for portrait

Faendal: A wood elf who lives in a small village known as Riverwood. He works as a hunter and lumberjack.

Lucan Valerius: The shopkeeper of Riverwood.

Jarl Balgruuf: The Jarl of Whiterun, a city located in the center of Skyrim between the fronts of the Imperial and Stormcloak factions.

Hrongar: Jarl Balgruuf's brother. Looks like he walked off the set of a Conan-film.

Irileth: A Dunmer who serves as Jarl Balgruuf's bodyguard.

Proventus Avenicci: Jarl Balgruuf's steward.


Vilkas: One of the Companions, a mercenary group in Whiterun
Vignar Grey-Mane: Formerly of the Companions, now retired.

Ulfric Stormcloak: The rebel leader in Skyrim, once on of the Emperor's generals.

Arkarik: Someone Spar was supposed to meet in Cyrodiil.

This post has been edited by jack cloudy: Aug 1 2013, 06:34 PM

[jack cloudy]

Oops, fixed it.


And it's time for part two. But first, a recap!



Spar was given the mission of recovering an artefact for Whiterun's court wizard. To accomplish her task she hired on a Companion by the name of Silent Fist. After some trouble involving spiders, zombies and a lich, Spar found the artefact. Her return to Whiterun was made difficult however by the attack and relentless pursuit of a dragon. Finally out of options, Spar chose to face the dragon on her own and try to stall for time so that Whiterun's army could bail her out. By the time the army arrived, the dragon had already been slain by the Companion Spar had hired.

We pick up the story some time later.


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CHAPTER 2.1: Tale of a Black Demon


Whiterun outskirts


If I thought that one dead dragon meant the end of Whiterun's troubles, I would have been mistaken. If one dragon could fly straight out of myth, so could others, and Whiterun's forces engaged in a crash-course on dragon fighting. But a dragon was unlike any known opponent, so simply teaching the optimal tactics and formations wasn't enough. First the tactics and inventions had to be invented. To that end Jarl Balgruuf formed a council. On it were himself, his brother Hrongar, the chief captain of his guards, Irileth, Farengar, and myself. I didn't relish the attention but I was one of the few who had seen a living dragon up close in detail. One of the few who had seen what did and what didn't hurt a dragon, how it might fight. But most importantly, I was the only one who could put into words what I'd seen.


Even with so much expertise unleashed upon the same problem, it wasn't easy. The Jarl had little time for anything after running his city, and Farengar seemed more interested in researching the corpse we had than finding ways to make more. There was also a clashing of egos. While Irileth and I were of the opinion that magic would be crucial in any battle with dragons, Hrongar was adamantly opposed to the idea. After we'd argued for half the day on just that one point, Caius the captain pointed out that it didn't matter anyway. The only combat-capable mages in Whiterun were Farengar and the Thalmor. Not the kind of thing one could build an army around and training more would be impossible for various reasons. And we couldn't exactly put all our hopes on one man. What if Fist got a cold or something?


I couldn't say I was happy with what we did come up with after a few weeks of breaking our heads. The methods we devised and rolled into our training program were less of a way of killing dragons than it was to keep up a constant stream of near useless arrows while minimizing casualties. I wasn't eager to test our theories. Fortunately we received no confirmed sightings of flying lizards, though there were plenty of rumours. And not just of dragons. Bandits, savage lizardmen, an Orcish warlord, giant wolves and even vampires, everything one could imagine was out there if you asked the refugees. It told me how fearful the rebellion must be for the small villages and farms. Neighbour pitted against neighbour, never knowing if a raiding group was coming down to burn your home and field. In a way it was worse than the Great War. At least back then we knew our enemies and allies.


It was all too mindnumbing. I took every chance I got for self-improvement, just to get away from all the futility. I worked out with the troops, studied my spelltomes and even convinced Silent Fist to try his hand at teaching me the magic yells. On top of that I occasionally joined patrols outside the city walls. It was one of these that brought me where I was now, high up on the forested mountainside to the east. On my belly in the snow, pressing a fist into my guts to keep it from growling, the other holding up my scarf to catch the clouds spilling from my mouth.


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Between me and Whiterun was a camp consisting of three tents, some crates and two campfires. One of the fires was in use right now to make a meal of the day's catch. Six men and women sat on fallen logs and smacked their lips appreciatively.


Bright-haired Nords who wore their affiliation on their swordarms in the form of blue scarves. They treated the coarse fabric with more care than even their weapons, making efforts to keep them clean and stroking them often as they spoke among each other. It was a Stormcloak camp I was looking at. General Stormcloak had set up several of these along the mountains and forests to the east of Whiterun. While the camps were too small to pose a threat to the city, this was still an act of war. Hrongar, Irileth and even Proventius had all urged their Jarl to remove these camps, whether by force of arms or diplomacy. But Jarl Balgruuf did not retaliate.


It puzzled me. Imperial doctrine was to engage any known threat pre-emptively, before it could grow sufficiently to cause large-scale damage. A doctrine that had stunningly failed in the leadup to the Great War. General Stormcloak's camps were such a threat. At the moment all they could do was interdict the trade route between Whiterun and General Stormcloak's own city of Windhelm or raid outlying farms. Fortunately they hadn't done the latter in respect of Whiterun's neutrality, yet. But we all knew it was only a matter of time. And yet the Jarl did nothing.


I couldn't understand the General either. He wasn't a man of open conflict, of regiments marching in unison, of the codes of formal warfare and conduct as laid down by Uriel Septim I. The Thalmor torturers made sure to excise that. The General I knew was someone who believed in striking at the heart of the enemy at the expense of all else. None of this nibbling at the edges of a vague front that now cut Skyrim in half. He would set up camp for no longer than a single day, and move during the night. These people had been around long enough to set up and harvest hunting traps, and to talk loudly about when their next resupply would be or when the main army was going to move. In fact, they expected to stay here throughout the winter which even for Nords couldn't be comfortable. It was as if someone else was running this war.


I had to wait quietly till the dark of night before performing my own extraction. Just three days before we received some heavy snowfall. I'd thought it was a sure sign that winter had come, but the weather turned around again and the snow was now a wet grey sludge. It made sneaking much harder. Not only was it difficult not to leave signs of my passing, but the squelching sounds each time I moved were hard to suppress, no matter how slow I went. And that was when I could see where I was going. My current position wasn't perfect either. One of the Nords had but to turn and climb a little up the mountain to spot me. That said, they had so far shown no interest in what happened in the direction that didn't let them spy on Whiterun.


They left only one soldier to keep watch while everyone else went to bed. That was rather negligent but suited me fine. I circled back around and carefully made my way down to the road. It was a clean night, with Masser and Secunda looming above amidst the stars. Not a sound to be heard except that of my own feet. No, not just my feet. Something splashed through the snow outside my own rythm.
"Did I get spotted leaving the camp?" The Nords wouldn't strike on a single traveller in the middle of the night and I carried no fire. At this distance I should be invisible to them.


"Ecwuse us, fwend." A voice called out from behind me. They weren't the Stormcloaks from the camp. I would have recognized any of them after spying on them for so long. None of them stumbled over their own teeth. I quickly scanned the area before me and seeing no threats on that side, turned around. Two people stood behind me, barefooted and wearing just a few rags.
"We aw fwarmers fwom Ivawstead. Could you pewhaps heljp us with zomefing?" Skin iced over, dry eyes and most importantly, their breath left no trace in the air. All the marks of a walking corpse, but lacking the fire of the Draugr and they looked too fresh for one. Nevertheless, I'd seen their kind before. My hands went behind my back for the knife as I watched them.
"Vampires. So that story was true after all."




OOC: I shamelessly stole the teeth problem from Elisabeth. Trying it out myself to get an idea of what it would sound like was rather awkward though.