Chapter Text

===== Frijor =====

From the North strides a knight, fire-heart, eyes of ice
Maiden tall, winter-mane, mountain-shield
Seeking glory in flame to forge true royal claim
That her homeland may triumph, not yield.

For the first time in centuries, the dark metal doors were wrenched open. Through the cascade of ancient dust stepped two figures, broad and armored. The first, a towering woman, tore off her helm and shook it clean, her white-maned head whipping right, then left, icy-blue eyes narrowing in the darkness.

“No flames,” she said. “All the dust. The Silver Hand must not have gotten this far.”

“I don’t like this,” rumbled the other, an even more mountainous Nord man with coarse black hair and stubble, torch in hand and a greatsword slung over his shoulder.

“Hm. Wait. Do you hear that?”

He paused and cocked an ear. “Hear what?”

“It sounds like… chanting? From the far end. I think this gets wider. Hand me back the torch.” He did so. She advanced, torch in one hand, shield ready in the other, the man following with his greatsword. Soon, the tk of their footfalls started to echo around them. Wider, indeed.

They reached a set of steps leading up to a central dias. There, the meager light from the torch fell upon a black pedestal - and the chunk of metal atop it.

“That must be it,” said the man. “Grab it, and let’s go.”

She stared at the broken piece of metal as she set down her shield. It was darkly colored, but the firelight revealed a strange purplish tint to it. Somewhere in her mind, a warning ran forward shouting and waving its arms - but her fatigue was louder, her impatience faster. Her gauntleted hand snapped up the chunk.

The doors slammed shut with the resounding CLANG of iron on iron, the darkness beyond the torchlight now absolute.

“Shit.”

All around them came the cracking and banging of falling stone.

“Frijor,” called the man, “this place is collapsing!”

“No, Farkas,” said Frijor, hastily jamming the chunk into her satchel and refixing her helm. “It is waking up.”

Two pale blue eyes lit up in the darkness, glare-to-glare with Frijor’s. Then across from them, another pair. Then another. Another five. Another dozen, accompanied by a growing chorus of growls, hollow and hateful. Blades sliding, armor clinking, padding footfalls on stone - but which ones were closest?

The first draugr broke the ring of torchlight, all sunken skin and sinew with an axe raised high. A bat with her shield and a kick to its core sent it sprawling back into the bristling shadows. Behind her came a whoosh, a crunch, a stifled gnarl, a clatter of armor. Farkas had her back, but she was fighting one-handed - she could not risk the torch.

Two more draugr, a greatsword held high, a mace swinging. Her shield-bash to the greatsword pommel sent the swing into the mace-wielder instead, and her backswing cracked the other’s collarbone.

Four more lurched into view. Weapons rang against her shield like hailstones on a roof. “Farkas! Big swing!” She swiped out wide and balked them a moment, all Farkas needed to come about and cleave them across.

Blow-by-blow, draugr crumpled and clattered about the duo’s feet, blue pinpoint eyes winking out as they struck the floor. Almost over, Frijor thought. No sooner had she done so than more cracking and banging answered her, unseen sarcophagi sundering in the dark, more growls, more icy glares boring through the shadows.

The torch had dwindled to little more than a candle, its light barely reaching past their shoulders now. “They’re gonna overrun us!” barked Farkas. “We need light.”

We need light, Frijor repeated in her mind. We need fire.

Yol

Frijor heard something, a word, a chant. She had heard it before when they entered, but now with her ears full of the draugrs’ coal-throated war cries and the din of battle, she realized it was coming to her mind, her very heart.

Yol

She did not understand it, but it sounded familiar. It reminded her…

The ashes of Solstheim were hot on her knees, the searing wind making her feel every stinging scar and scrape on her body. She strained through ash-caked tears to behold the obelisk that towered up to a cloud-wreathed sun. “All-Maker,” she choked, all those years ago, “I will bow to none but you, for when I am grown, my power will be greater than all but yours.”

”All-Maker,” she said now in the vanishing torchlight, over the ringing of blows on her shield, her knees nearly buckling under the onslaught. “You brought light where there was nothing, a dawn when none had come before. Grant me that power, rekindle my hope.”

“What are you saying?” Desperation cracked through Farkas’s voice.

“I’m saying, ‘Get down!’” She grabbed Farkas by the collar of his armor and threw him to the floor, standing over him as she felt her rage, her desire to fight, her will to live turn molten in her chest. “Fire heart!” she roared, shedding her helm once more, her snowy mane wild. “My breath is the Sun!”

Light lanced from the seams of her armor, illuminating the ranks of draugr, a dozen blades raised high. With a sound like a huge bell being rent in half and a smell like a smokeless blaze, a fiery white nova erupted from Frijor and engulfed all.

Frijor’s vision cleared after a moment. The bright light was gone, but the utter darkness did not return - the Sun Flare had relit the long-dormant braziers and torches, and at last she could take in the entire room. But first, her shield-brother.

Farkas was still below her, propping himself up on one arm as his dark eyes blinked about, his sight not yet recovered. He took the hand she offered and was hoisted upright. They surveyed the still-smoking draugr bodies strewn about them, many of them flung back to their now-visible coffins that lined the chamber.

“What the hell was that?”

Frijor beamed. “A glorious finish to a worthy fight.” She was panting, she realized now. She clutched a hand to her chest. It felt like something had seared her throat and burned a hole through her sternum.

“I meant the giant fireball. Are you a mage?”

Her smile soured. “No, I am not. That power was borrowed from the All-Maker. I would need to return to my homeland to bear it again.”

“Damn. Well praise the All-Maker, then.”

Frijor grinned again before something caught her eye. A large shrine of some kind stood at the back of the room, a wall that curved to form an alcove lined with deep-cut runes. One of the runes burned with wisps of blue and orange flame. As she stared at the rune, her vision of all else dimmed and darkened, the fiery tendrils snaking out around her, writhing to the ghostly chant.

Yol

Fire erupted around her as blazing meteors struck the flagstones, marred with craters, scorch marks, blood stains. Screaming figures ran through the smoke, stumbling as the earth shuddered under the onslaught.

Something massive crashed above her, showering her back with shards of stone. She turned to face a stone tower, and her gaze followed it upwards. Crowning the spire was a twisted black shape, flexing and unfolding its… wings? Within the uncoiling mass, two red embers kindled, a gaze that burned her soul and chilled her blood. A maw opened beneath the eyes, a jagged V-shaped blaze licking about teeth of torn iron, its voice crashing over her like the rumbling of an avalanche.

“Dir ko maar, Dovahkiin. YOL-”

The air screamed, and all was fire.

”Hey, Frijor.”

Farkas’ gruff voice snapped her out of her trance. She blinked, seeing no fire but the braziers, the rune on the wall before her no longer glowing. No more meteors, no more screams. Her shield-brother stood halfway up a short wooden staircase, leading to an alcove with more opened sarcophagi. The central one, Frijor realized, had no wall behind it - hopefully an exit.

“I don’t wanna stay here any longer than we have to. Let’s head back.”

”Hm.” Frijor scanned the room again, spurred by the feeling that she was missing something, some connection to that vision, but the only thing of note here was stuffed into her bag. Hesitantly, she joined Farkas at the stairs and pointed at the wall of runes. “Do you know what that is?”

Farkas sniffed and shrugged. “It’s an old monument. A lot of Skyrim’s old ruins have ‘em. Vilkas says they’re from the time of dragons. No idea what they say, though.”

Dragons? “But you’ve never… heard anything from them? Or seen anything?”

“Heard anything? It’s a wall. It looks like a wall, and it sounds like one too.”

Frijor sighed as they entered the tunnel. Why was it all so familiar?

Dusk was darkening over the Whiterun tundra when they climbed from the entrance pit of the ruin and started their march back to the city, which was now only a little cluster of lights twinkling from across the plain. As their little sphere of torchlight made its way through the deepening blues of night, Frijor ruminated all the while on her vision. It didn’t frighten her - certainly not, heroes do not know fear - but some creature of uncertainty was gnawing at her breast and would not leave.

That is, until they ascended the steps to the longhouse of Jorrvaskr. Farkas threw open the doors to a joyous roar that quailed her doubts and rekindled her heart. The great bonfires were ringed with tables piled high with roast meat and decked with foaming tankards, each set before a warrior of her new order. They called to them:

“Hail, Companions!”

“Got a tale for us?”

“Come drink your aches away!”

Apart from the carousing chorus of newer Companions stood four living legends: Aela the Huntress with her wild red hair; the scarred and busted face of old Skjor; Vilkas, Farkas’s leaner, sourer twin; and at the center of them all, directly between the two bonfires, towered Kodlak Whitemane, fully armored and true to his name, eyes gleaming among his wrinkles and scars.

Frijor held down the fluttering in her chest and put on her cockiest smile as she took the metal chunk from her pack, holding it aloft for the company. Cheers renewed with a percussion of tankards, and Kodlak gestured to the side of the hall. There hung a handful of similar fragments, arranged in their original shape of a battle-axe, pieces still missing here and there. She marched through the fanfare and firmly stuck the fragment into its place as part of the axeblade. As she returned to the center, Kodlak held up his hand, and the hall fell silent.

“Brothers and sisters of the Circle,” he began, gravelly and ceremonious, “today we welcome a new soul into our mortal fold. This woman has endured, has challenged, and has shown her valor. Who will speak for her?”

Farkas stepped to her side. “I stand witness to the courage of the soul before us.”

“Would you raise your shield in her defense?”

“I would stand at her back, that the world might never overtake us.”

“And would you raise your sword in her honor?”

“It stands ready to meet the blood of her foes.”

“And would you raise a mug in her name?”

“I would lead the song of triumph as our mead hall reveled in her stories.”

“Then the judgment of this Circle is complete. Her heart beats with fury and courage, that have united the Companions since the days of the distant green summers. Let it beat with ours, that the mountains may echo, and our enemies may tremble at the call.”

The entire hall answered, “It shall be so.”

* * *

Farkas’s huge frame dominated the circle of battle-beaten faces clustered about the table. “So Frijor yells, ‘Get down!,’ and I duck, thinking she’s gonna make some big move.”

“Hah! Funny way of saying that I threw you down like a wet rag.” That got a few snorts. The dark-haired young woman at Frijor’s shoulder gave a lighthearted laugh.

Farkas barely blushed, to his credit. “Yeah, yeah. Anyway, suddenly I can see the floor, and my back is getting hot like I’m laying in the sun. Then everything goes from black to white, and my ears get blown out by a noise like nothing I’ve ever heard, all ringing and roaring. When I finally get up, all the fires in the room are lit up again, and there’s smoking draugr draped over everything, some flung straight back to the coffins they came from.”

“That’s amazing,” wowed the young lady. Ria was her name. Frijor liked her - she was a big girl with trusting eyes and a folksy smile, but with eager strength behind her farmgirl naivete.

Frijor’s deeply tanned face was starting to show a blush, if not from flattery, then from the mead. “Well, just don’t expect me to do it again. It’s not a gift the All-Maker grants without trial.”

Farkas shrugged, “Even without it, you did a lot of damage for only having a shield. I’d be glad to be your shield-brother again.” He raised his tankard to her.

Her icy eyes warmed, and she returned the gesture. The whole crowd cheered, “Hail!” and joined the toast.

Eventually, the warriors dispersed, some to their bunks, some to clear the cluttered tables at the nattering of Tilma, the old cleaning matron. As Frijor gathered up tankards by the fistfull, she noticed Aela leaning up against a pillar, staring at her with her dark green eyes. The huntress’s gaze reminded her of a falcon’s, in that you could not tell her intentions because she looked at everything like prey.

At last she spoke, her voice deep and clear. “It seems you and Farkas endured a tougher trial than expected.”

Something in her voice told Frijor that she was not preparing a compliment. "Nothing we couldn’t handle.”

“So it seems. Although I cannot help but wonder if some of that danger could have been avoided.”

Frijor put down the tankards, her eyes freezing over again and her voice cooling to match. “Oh?”

Aela detached herself from the pillar and stepped forward. “A responsible shield-mate would not have walked into so obvious a trap.”

She’s right, said her shame, but she stifled it. “We came for the fragment. What could we do but take it?”

“Relit the braziers first, at least, so you would not be fighting blind.”

She’s right. “Farkas and I made it out, didn’t we? We triumphed.”

“Only by the grace of some borrowed power. Certainly not your own guile.”

Indignant rage pushed her shame aside, but before it could pass her teeth-

“There are many among us,” said Kodlak, suddenly between them, “who ‘borrow’ strength, in one way or another.”

Frijor wondered what he could mean, before remembering what Farkas had revealed earlier in their delving…

Kodlak continued, “It is not shameful to rely on others. For what else are the Companions to each other?”

Aela did not soften, but she fell silent.

No sooner had Kodlak moved on than a staggering weight fell into Frijor’s shoulder, her nostrils filling with an even stronger reek of alcohol. “Hey, don’t take it personally, New Blood,” drawled Torvar, a straw-haired Nord whom Frijor had yet to see sober. “The Lady Huntress ‘s jus’ pissed ‘cos she couldn’t track down ‘er latest quarry.”

The look Aela gave Torvar made Frijor realize that the huntress had been going easy on her.

“What quarry was this?” Frijor asked.

Aela did not take her eyes off Torvar until he had slunk away, lucky to not have an arrow shaft sprouting from his chest. At last she answered, “We received reports from Riverwood, Helgen, and Ivarstead of some unseen monster roaming the mountain passes about the Throat of the World.”

“Unseen monster?”

“The tips came in a few days ago,” said the dry voice of Skjor. The hardened Nord man had laid his stiff body across a nearby bench. “Strange cries have been heard in the area, roars from something big and loud. But nobody’s seen what could be making the racket.”

“There were no tracks,” Aela said evenly, suppressing a sour tone. “I only heard the roar once, and at a great distance. When I chased it, I came upon nothing but some scorched grass.”

The creature in her breast stirred again and tensed, like a hunting hound at last picking up a trail. She had been missing a piece of herself since her vision at the runed wall - no, since long before that, since her youth on Solstheim, her whole life, even. But this mysterious beast, the scorched grass, and the fire-breathing monster in her vision…

Yol

“I think,” she said at last, “I should like to seek this beast myself.”