Chapter 2
Dovahkiin II
A deafening roar echoed across the now burning town, smoke rose like great pillars from the massive fires now spread across Helgen and the heat from the flames distorted much of his surroundings. His bare-feet ached from when he’d jumped from the tower into one of the buildings and his attempts at drawing in breaths filled his lungs with more smoke than air left his throat sore from coughing.
“Ralof! You damned traitor! Out of my way!” The brown-haired imperial who’d he’d followed until now had suddenly stopped and his sword was pointed at one of the stormcloaks who had been on that wagon with him, Ralof was his name if Jon remembered correctly, and the stormcloak had gotten his hands on an axe and had raised it in preparation for the confrontation he clearly thought was unavoidable.
“We’re escaping Hadvar. You’re not stopping us this time.”
“Fine! I hope that dragon takes you all to Sovngarde.” In a move that seemed to surprise both Jon and the blond man, the imperial soldier sheathed his sword and, with a last scathing look thrown at the other nord, made his way towards one of the two entrances to the keep.
Over the screams and yells of men and women and the roars from the dragon Jon heard the other man, Ralof scream at him, “You! Come on, into the keep!” Just as the imperial, who he now remembered had been called Hadvar by one of the other soldiers, also called out to him, “Come on! We need to get inside!”
Jon felt torn as he tried to decide who to follow but before he could take another step he felt an intense heat envelop him and a heavy weight settled on his chest pinning him down and preventing him from drawing any more smoke-filled breaths into his body, he cried out in alarm thinking the dragon unleashed his fiery breath upon him.
He awoke with a gasp desperately drawing in huge gulps of air into his lungs, his sheets stuck to his sweat-drenched body and his eyes wildly searched around the room for signs of flames and black-scaled world-eaters. After a few moments he finally took notice of the white-furred body curled up around him and with an embarrassed look halted his wild search for long-dead monsters in the dark as he realized what exactly the intense heat that had surrounded him in his dream was.
“Alright boy that’s enough, you know you can’t sleep in the bed with me anymore,” a pitiful whine answered him from somewhere in the pile of snow-white limbs pinning him on his bed, “Ghost, I’m going to give you five seconds to get down before I decide to let the children play with their favorite puppy in the market square again.” The threat of being subjected once more to the tender mercies of Solitude's youth spurred the giant wolf to scramble off the bed with a series of high-pitched yelps, no doubt the effectiveness of his threat was enhanced by the fresh memories of what the poor wolf had been subjected to when Jon had left him in the care of his good friends Tarrie and Endarie, the sisters who owned the clothes shop Radiant Raiment, when he went to clear out a vampire den with Serana.
Ghost being left behind in the two sisters care had been a punishment after he had gotten it into his head to try and play fetch with a candlestick in the Blue Palace when Jon had been busy with his duties as Thane, resulting in a large fire spreading inside the Palace but thankfully no one was hurt beyond a few servants and nobles ending up with singed clothes and sooty faces. Later a furious investigation by the guards was started led by Bolgeir Bearclaw, who suspected the culprits to be stormcloak sympathisers, if not stormcloaks themselves, and so when they found the source of the fire to be an overgrown wolf cowering under a table in the kitchen with a gnawed on candlestick next to him.
Jon had been sure he would burst into flames from the embarrassment, he could still see Erikur's smug face as he loudly proclaimed the direwolf a danger to the public and that he should be locked up, luckily since the damage wasn’t too great and no one was seriously hurt the only consequences Jon and Ghost faced was a fine to pay for the repairing and restoration of the damaged parts of the Palace along with a royal decree banning Ghost from ever entering the home of the High Queen again.
The incident had made Jon furious and Ghost had spent more than an entire month sleeping outside in the gardens of Proudspire manor as part of his punishment. Some time later when Serana came to him asking if he felt like helping her take care of a small group of feral vampires he’d used the opportunity to finish his wolfs punishment with leaving him behind in the hands of the two elven sisters, who had accepted his job offer only after doubling the pay and with a promise to try out some new additions to their collection, and even then with great reluctance and with visible disgust at the idea of taking care of what was in their opinion a dirty wild beast.
But Jon had paid no mind to their thoughts on it, simply content in the knowledge that his pyromaniac of a dumb mutt would not enjoy the experience. He had turned out to be right as the sight that greeted him when he entered the market square after parting ways with his vampire friend outside the gates had him frozen in shock and then doubling over in laughter, nearly falling to the ground as tears formed in his eyes and he had to lean against a wall to keep himself upright.
Apparently the seamstresses had delegated the duty of watching the wolf during the day to some of the children that often ran around the city, and the young boys and girls had at some point decided that Ghost needed a more colorful look which had led to him ending up covered in light pink dusting with only his face, belly and three of his paws still showing some of his original coloring. A crown of flowers had also been placed upon his head held in place by some thin string and a scarf of multiple colorful blots of fabric ranging from a pleasant dark blue to an eye-hurting shade of bright yellow, through his tears he noted that the fabrics of the scarf were of a far too high quality to have just been found laying around by the children and the presence of Tarrie underneath her shop's sign confirmed where the cloth had come from.
It had taken weeks to rid his fur completely of pink and every now and then Jon thought he caught a glimpse of pink in the now mostly restored coat of white fur but whenever he got a closer look there was nothing there.
The poor animal was still terrified of the children.
Shaking his head, Jon began to get up from his now sweaty and fur covered bed, he went to the wardrobe and got out some of his simpler clothes since he was just going to wear them until he got in a bath to wash off the sweat from his skin. This simple outfit was a pair of well-worn boots, a loose wool shirt with laces below the neck that he didn’t bother tying and a pair of buckskin-colored breeches.
Some time later he was relaxing in the stone bath in the cellar of the Manor and as he closed his eyes and leaned his head against the rolled up towel he’d put on the edge. Once he felt the tension seep out of his body and his muscles relax he waited a few more minutes before getting out to dry himself off, dress and otherwise prepare for another day in the court of Skyrim’s capital.
Feeling sentimental he choose a simple worn steel pin to hold his bear fur cloak up, lingering in front of the mirror he simply stared at it and thought of how long ago it had been since he’d put it on in his rooms in Winterfell the night he’d chosen to make his disappearance in order to make his own way in the world.
He shook his head before heading outside, Jordis silently fell in behind him as he entered the streets of Solitude and while he could protect himself fine without her it was comforting to know that if trouble should start, he had someone firmly on his side.
‘Here we go again.’ He thought as he neared the palace gates and mentally prepared himself for another day of mind-numbing politics.
*******
Jon Arryn I
He observed the man sitting opposite him in his solar in the tower of the hand as subtly as he could and once again noted the way his features seemed so…
So...
Foreign?
Strange?
Unnerving?
Yes, unnerving was perhaps the best word to use for how he looked, now Jon Arryn wasn’t a man to normally judge people based on appearance their was just something about these visitors of theirs, their tale was almost to fantastical to be true but a few passages found written in old tomes had mentioned a continent that was neither Essos or Westeros and that combined with the maps and items these guests had brought with them had convinced most of the truth of their statements.
The only other way to describe some of these travelers' features was inhuman…
That was ridiculous of course since what else could they be and Jon knew that people differed greatly in looks depending on where one originated from.
“... -fuses me, Lord Hand,” realizing he’d been asked a question Jon scrambled to respond whilst also mentally cursing himself for his stupidity, maybe he really was losing his mind to age like everyone whispered behind his back.
“Forgive me my lord but it seems old age is finally catching up to me, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble I’d appreciate it if you could repeat your question?” Jon hoped the man would believe his excuse as he put on the most genuine smile he could, the man stared blank-faced at him for a moment before a small smile appeared on his face, “It is no trouble at all my lord Hand, I was simply confused of when it comes to some of your traditions, and was hoping you could educate me a bit, I wouldn't want to accidentally offend someone after all.” The man's smile was friendly but his sharp slanted green eyes told the falcon lord that his observations had not gone unnoticed.
“Of course, I would be happy to answer any questions you might have, as you said after all we wouldn’t want you to offend anyone on accident, now would we?”
“Yes, of course,” the man's smile had widened but his eyes had narrowed and he suspected that just as Jon had studied him, the foreigner was now doing the same to him, “it was the issue of bastard names that confused me the most, it could be because I’m not as familiar with these lands as a native is but I’m quite intrigued by it actually.”
“Well, the basics are that most noble bastards are named after the region they are born in,” he noticed that the man had slightly leaned forwards as he began his explanation, “for example ones born in the North are called Snow and one from the Reach are called Flowers and so on and so forth.”
As he continued answering questions he couldn’t help but note the way the man's eyes had widened at the mention of the northern most kingdom's name for bastards and made a note to try and figure out why later.
That night his thoughts wandered to the people they had sent to this newly revealed land and questioned if it was indeed such a good idea to send so many important figures there, despite the foreigners assurances he was well aware that anything could happen on the open sea with no one around for miles.
The little sleep he got was troubled and he awoke feeling exhausted that morning, something that had become more and more of a frequent occurrence as of late. But he ignored it as he got up to prepare for his duties for the day.
The realm didn't run itself after all.