Chapter 1: The Murder of High King Torygg

The afternoon was calm and the breeze was pleasantly crisp. The skies over Solitude were clear of snow clouds for once, but a bite to the air promised a frosty evening to come.

"Which song will you start with?" father asked as we walked the incline toward the Blue Palace.

I glanced at him; was he really interested? We'd seen little of him in the past three weeks. He'd been in Whiterun on Thane business, of which he frustratingly refused to tell me any details about, and attended on the High King up at the Palace since he'd returned.

His sea-blue eyes were trained on our path, too distracted if he wanted to talk.

I humoured him, regardless; "I'm starting with Matthild Built This Place. Master Viarmo had no complaints, and Ataf agreed it's benign enough for the Palace crowd."

Father nodded thoughtfully, his eyes sparkling as he turned to regard me. The distraction I had caught a moment ago was gone. "A strong song about a strong woman. But is the melody not too plain for you?"

I smiled at the compliment and shook my head. "Ataf and I have been collaborating, expanding on the traditional-"

"Ah," he cut me off as we reached the gate. "There's that name Ataf again," he sighed, but in good humour. "I shall have to make a visit to this Ataf, if I hear his name many more times in my house."

I dipped a small curtsy to the Haafingar guards on duty as we stepped into the courtyard. They nodded back, though seemed bored, slouched against the grey-brick wall. The garden was overgrown with wild thistles tangling between the shrubberies, but the intended lines were still there, and the thistles gave the order a little wild chaos, which was more pleasing for its disarray.

"You know it's not like that, father," I frowned. "He was helping to expand the story. He has trouble with music, but Ataf's talent with written word is enviable when it comes to heightening the tension of a tale. Everyone at the College values his input."

"You do not need to validate your acquaintances to me," he insisted loftily. "I trust your judgment, Celeste. But you cannot blame a father for being skeptical of a man's intentions with regards to his daughter. You'll understand, when you have daughters of your own."

I huffed, adjusting my lute strap around my shoulder and hip. Perfect. Now father thinks I'm chasing boys at the College, or that they're chasing me.

Perhaps if I didn't reply, the matter would drop, because neither was true. The College was for professional bards who wanted to learn and train in the arts of music-making and story-telling, not dalliances.

And as for understanding when I had my own daughters? Well. I was nineteen; I didn't expect daughters of my own for quite some time.

"Hail, Thane Passero," the doors to the Blue Palace were opened by one of the guards, and he called to my father as he stepped over the threshold.

"Hail," father replied warmly, kindly, though his status didn't require him to reply to a soldier with anything.

I remained silent as they had not greeted me, and stepped into the entryway, keeping a single step behind my father. I trained my eyes forward and took a deep breath, holding myself up, determined not to stare.

I am a bard; I am an artist, I repeated to myself calmly. I deserve to be here.

I was being given a great honour that evening. I was performing for the High King and Queen, and their guests.

Yes, of course it had been engineered by my father, for as the High King's Thane, he had influence over who might be chosen to entertain at the Blue Palace. I knew it, and everybody at the College knew it. There had been little asked on the matter of why I, the youngest member of the Bard's College, was performing in court. More attention had been given to my choice of songs and poems so I might bring further esteem to the College. Master Viarmo had drilled me full of appropriate ballads a week earlier, and when I told him I intended on beginning with Matthild, the Altmer had huffed and said nothing.

This was all anyone could expect by way of approval from the Headmaster. His praise would be hard won and given only after my performance was reported on by the other courtiers; perhaps even the High King or Queen themselves, if they deemed it worthy enough.

Giselle had been intolerable when she had heard of my good fortune. My twin had thrown a proper tantrum like a two-year-old, accusing our 'unfair' father of giving me opportunities to make connections at the Palace, and her none.

Mother had sided with Giselle as usual, asking father if this would not be a worthy opportunity to introduce Giselle to Sybille Stentor, but father had calmly replied that this was to be my moment, and my twin might have hers another day. My sister had only been placated once she'd been promised a trip to Radiant Raiment to be fitted for a new set of robes while father and I were up at the Palace.

I hid my amusement at the memory of Giselle and mother leaving for their shopping trip, both wearing smug yet mutinous expressions, and tried not to let my snotty sister's competitive attitude seep into and effect my calm.

Focus. Giselle will be back in Winterhold soon, and won't be your problem until the next term break.

Besides, it wasn't my fault Giselle came home from the College of Winterhold at every opportunity and immediately complained about how bored she was in Solitude, as though Winterhold, of all places, was the height of society! She could stay at the College with her friends if she wished, or even travel abroad if she liked. With my mother's parents living in Wayrest and my father's in the Imperial City, several regions of Tamriel were open to both of us to explore.

I had never taken to travel, promising myself I would only roam once I had completed my studies, so what I found could be properly transformed into ballads worthy of each source of inspiration. And in truth, a part of me was in no hurry to leave Solitude; despite our lineage, Skyrim was, and always would be my home.

I hoped. My smile levelled out. There had been rumours of greater dissent amongst the Jarls recently. Father had assured us it was a small conflict that would be resolved at a table, not on a battlefield, but I was not so certain. Though the bard's tales I had been learning all my life were heavily overdramatised, they had taught me much about the way a Nord settled disputes. The bawdy Ragnar the Red was a prime example; the shield-maiden Matilda engaging Ragnar for merely talking too much, and striking his head from his shoulders as penalty for his boasting.

I shuddered for summoning that loathsome tune, and began quietly humming the melody to Matthild to resolutely push Ragnar out. It was always, always, requested at performances; there was not a bard in the whole College who didn't have a level of disdain for that particular dirge.

They will not request it here, I assured myself. And, regardless of the habits and preferences of the rabble, the Jarls of Skyrim were unlikely to resort to an expensive war if it could be avoided. It would serve nobody to do so.

Father smiled warmly as he turned to offer me his arm. I rest my hand on his elbow as I smiled in thanks and continued humming.

"Hmm. It is lovelier than I remember it sounding," he noted pleasantly.

My chest glowed with pride. Even if I didn't manage to win the hearts and minds of the courtiers or the King or Queen with my offering, at least I could sing for my father.

The staircase leading up to the reception room arced gracefully around an indoor garden full of verdant green ferns and plump red snowberries, and was flanked by large marble urns brimming with bright purple deathbells. This was not my first visit to the Blue Palace, though it was the first time I would perform, and it was the first I had seen of the deathbells.

I smiled again, pleased by my choice of dress; I had inadvertently managed to coordinate with the Palace's current interior decor. My eyes were the same blue as father's, and the shade matched the blue of the accent stones set into the Palace's namesake tiles. My hair was wound into a high plaited bun, comparable to the strips of brown stone that criss-crossed the floor. Finally my straight, beige dress was edged in fine lines of red and purple ribbon, reminiscent of the snowberries and deathbells that decorated the hall.

Mother had approved of my hair, but had told me that the dress was too drab and last season, and had tried to press some horrible blue number with fur around the collar and hem onto me at the last minute. But I had insisted the beige dress had been chosen by my teacher, as it suited my performance, so I was not at liberty to change.

It hadn't been, but I often found it was simpler to spin whatever was required to avoid disagreements with mother, rather than engage, especially when it involved fashion. Her tastes were so garish, and so pompously High Rock. I preferred a more traditional Nord style, particularly when I was about to perform a traditional programme of Nord songs.

The reception room was shorter than I remembered it being, but perhaps it was an illusion created by the number of tables and chairs clustered throughout it. I hastily averted my eyes from the throne, where the handsome High King Torygg sat next to his pretty wife, Queen Elisif the Fair. What I did see during my fleeting glance made laughter bubble in my chest, though I was able to restrain myself in time. Queen Elisif, only five years my senior, was wearing the exact same blue dress that my mother had tried to make me wear that afternoon. And despite the dress being tailored specifically for her, it did not suit her frame; rather, it completely obscured it.

That could have been embarrassing, I thought, as I followed father to the tables to the right of the throne where the Thanes positioned themselves during sessions. Lady Bryling pursed her lips and gave me a speculative once-over as she nodded a curt hello, her armour more dress-like than functional, and Lord Erikur's eyes were guarded as they raked over me, his fur robe a little shabbier than a Thane would usually allow.

I dipped respectful bows to them as was required of me, and then we ignored one another. As the daughter of their equal, and as my father had made it public that neither my sister nor I were to be courted until we completed our studies, I was of no interest to them.

I unstrapped my lute before I lowered myself onto the seat father indicated I should take. It was next to a small table arranged with a bottle of water and another of wine, my father's favourite, and a platter of fruits.

Father took his seat the other side of the table and engaged Thane Bryling in quiet conversation, leaving me to my preparations. He would introduce me to the High King and Queen once everybody had arrived, I supposed.

Several other courtiers arrived while I fine-tuned my lute for what must have been the hundredth time that day. I recognised most of those who gathered, though none paid me any mind. Lady Vici arrived last in a green number and wearing a gold and ruby circlet around her thin head as though she were a queen; she paid the Thanes no mind and immediately hovered by Falk Firebeard, the Queen's steward. I hid a smirk at the woman's audacity and lowered my head to listen closer to the quiet notes I was picking out on my lute.

When it was finally time to begin, the High King stood.

"Welcome, my honoured friends and guests," his voice brought a calm to the hall. My fingers stilled immediately and I gave the High King my full attention.

He continued addressing the assembly, outlining the proceedings, and I waited with bated breath, wondering if father was not to introduce me at all; if the High King would speak my name when he mentioned the evening's entertainments. Nerves pooled in my belly, and I revelled in it: they always managed to sharpen my focus.

The High King's robes of office clung to his shoulders and hung around his form, his red hair long, and swept back, and his beard trimmed neatly. What I liked most about High King Torygg was his eyes; kind, and pale blue, like a cloudless winter's sky at midday. The man was very good looking, and I felt a flush rise in my cheeks when I remembered my father was sitting right next to me. He would be relentless in his mocking if he had any inkling of where my thoughts had taken me.

I turned away from the High King of Skyrim as movement captured my, and most of the room's, attentions. High King Torygg's voice trailed off and a heavy silence filled the room.

A pair of men were walking toward the thrones, and when they stepped into the light I recognised the one in the lead as the Jarl of Windhelm, Ulfric Stormcloak. I had never met the man, but I had seen him about Solitude occasionally. There was no mistaking him or the air of arrogance that accompanied his every move. He was as large as a bear, with windswept blonde hair flowing around a chiselled face like an unruly mane. Behind him strode a fearsome, grizzled older man wearing what looked like an entire bear's pelt over his leather armour. The poor beast's head had even been fashioned into headgear. The man's name eluded me, but it was clear from his stance and expression that he meant business.

Father must have noticed my unease, for his hand landed on my arm. I tore my eyes from the two intimidating men to stare at him.

"Relax, Celeste," he said in a lowered voice. "They may look fierce, but it is merely their way. They are-"

"Torygg," Ulfric's voice cut over my father's; a booming baritone that commanded all eyes in the room to bear witness.

There were gasps at Ulfric's lack of respect; his neglect to call High King Torygg by his title.

My eyes flitted quickly to the High King and Queen. Queen Elisif always seemed tense, but she was suddenly as still as a startled rabbit, her eyes wide. I was relieved when I saw the High King's crossed brows smooth out, and his mouth cracked an attractive half-smile. "Ulfric Stormcloak," he held out his hands to the Jarl in greeting. "I am more pleased than you can imagine that you changed your mind. Welcome, my friend."

Jarl Stormcloak glared down at Torygg's offered arms, and in the weighty silence that followed, raised his cold, hard eyes to the High King's.

"Nothing has changed," the Jarl addressed him with a snarl.

I clutched my lute, only because it was in my arms, and shrank back into my seat at the ferocity behind his words. Why did these eastern Jarl's always insist on making a scene? It was clear that this was some sort of joke between the two of them, but it was damned frightening to the rest of us amidst the rumours of friction flitting about.

"Time changes all," the High King replied with a sigh and lowered his arms. "What is it that you need, Ulfric?" he added, in a tone of resigned disappointment.

"I need what all of Skyrim needs," Stormcloak spoke through clenched teeth.

With a startle I realised he was restraining himself.

"A King who will fight for his people, not against them," he continued in what sounded like a well-prepared speech.

"Careful, Ulfric," Queen Elisif cut in sharply, though she remained seated. "You go too far."

It's not a joke, I realised in horror.

"Peace, both of you," High King Torygg tried to laugh it off, glancing between his wife and the angry Jarl. "Ulfric, join us – give me another chance to explain to you why Skyrim needs to work with the Empire."

The conversation paused again. There was a subtle shifting of bodies during it; the High King's housecarl inched closer to him and my father rose to sidle in front of me.

I peered around my father in a rush – terror was filling me, but I had to see what happened next.

The Jarl of Windhelm shook his head and his stern frown curled further down in distaste. "I can no longer stand by while the people of this land are impoverished by an Empire who cares nothing for them and a King who refuses to speak for them."

The High King's manner changed from patient and mediating to cold, very swiftly; the ice in his tone sending a chill down my spine. "What would you have me do? Declare war on them and cast our loved ones to the Imperial Legion's, or worse, the Dominion's armies?"

"Your cowardice at the prospect of battle is proof of your unworthiness to rule, boy," Ulfric Stormcloak grated.

There were louder gasps around the room now, my own amongst them. My father shifted his feet and positioned his hand over his sword handle, in readiness.

For what?!

"You do not choose who rules this country, any more than I do," the High King reminded him. "I caution you to remember this, regardless of your intentions today."

What's going on? There was simply no way that Jarl Stormcloak could be allowed to say such treasonous things and get away with it. He would be replaced, that much was certain; perhaps even executed. What did he hope to achieve?

The room had grown cold, as though the doors had been left open to let the chill of twilight seep in. All eyes were locked on Ulfric Stormcloak to see how he would counter Torygg's warning. I prayed to the Divines he would relent, knowing in my heart that he wouldn't. It was not the Nord way.

The fearsomely large man narrowed his eyes, but his mouth – that perpetually down-turned mouth – rose at one corner in a smirk, as though he had gotten exactly what he had wanted from the High King.

"Fus," Ulfric's reply left him in a whisper, but the walls of the palace trembled.

I gripped my lute tighter as his foreign word reverberated through me and, deep within my soul, the word force pounded and echoed in my ears. My eyes widened as the High King bowed before Ulfric Stormcloak. The Jarl's voice had somehow pushed the High King down onto one knee. I willed Torygg to rise and call for his guard and end this. The stewards, Thanes and housecarls all leapt into action and Queen Elisif cried out in horror for him to stop.

"Don't, Ulfric," High King Torygg gasped, raising his eyes to the blonde man towering over him. The movement seemed to cause him a great amount of pain. "You will cast Skyrim into a war that-"

Ulfric cut in over whatever the High King might have said.

"Ro-DAH!"

The walls of the Palace shook again with a greater ferocity than before. I startled up out of my chair as the same deep, thrumming thump in my head came again, only the words were different now; balance, and push.

High King Torygg was flung off his feet and toppled against his own throne, flopping against it like a rag-doll. Before anyone could act, the Jarl of Windhelm surged forward, sweeping aside his cloak and grabbing the short sword that hung on his hip.

"No," I whispered, my eyes glued to the High King. "Please, get up," I willed in a voice that none would have heard over the mounting uproar.

As the housecarls nearest the High King and Queen leapt to their defence, the bear-clad man behind Stormcloak surged into action with an ear-shattering roar of his own; though this one didn't make the walls rattle, or topple anyone.

As the bear-wearing man swung his axe in a wide arc to keep the attendants from stopping Ulfric Stormcloak, the Jarl of Windhelm plunged his blade up into the crippled High King, straight through the centre of his chest.

In the confusion that followed, there was screaming that came to me through a whole lot of hazy panic. In what should have been the crowning glory of my otherwise short career, I knew I was about to die, and silently begged the Divines for mercy. If only I had not chosen to become a bard. If only I had gone to Winterhold with Giselle. If I had trained to be a mage I might have been able to help the people flying and falling around me. But I could only stare, and grip my lute in front of me, and pray.

My father turned back as he drew his sword, yelling for me to run deeper into the Palace. At the same moment my attention snapped to the double staircase leading up to the reception room as it was choked by large, fierce guards, all wearing the Windhelm blue.

Most surrounded Ulfric Stormcloak, and spirited him away, while a handful remained to continue fighting with the enormous bear-wearing Nord.

I managed to scuttle to the hallway leading into the Palace when a scream of pain, barely discernible over the other sounds of battle, made me whip around.

It was my father. I stilled as I watched his sword fall from his grip and clatter on the stone floor before his feet. The bear-clad man who had flanked Ulfric withdrew his war axe from my father's chest.

My father fell to his knees but his murderer had already turned away, rallying the Windhelm guards to his side as they fought their way to the exit. Fury and fear warred within me and I found myself back in the reception room and on my knees next to my fallen father.

Any words I could have uttered to ease his passing into the afterlife; be it to Sovngarde as Thane of the High King who had died in battle, or to Aetherius with our ancestors; failed to come. He was already gone. The bear-clad one had cut so deep that a small relief coiled through my otherwise surging grief; it had been quick, and he had not suffered.

While the usurpers fled the Palace and the High Queen was spirited away by her Thanes; while the stewards and Haafinger soldiers guarded the fallen High King; while my spirit both simultaneously died and blazed with a white-hot indignation and a vow to avenge my father's death, I watched, unable to cry, and held his slackened hand. His blood seeped into my dress and stockings and flowed around my lute by my side.

Once the clamour had ceased, somebody retrieved me. They extracted my hand from father's and picked up my lute. I heard someone speaking words, words about the Temple of the Divines and preparations, from across the room.

When I turned to see who had taken my hand, I met my sister's widened eyes. Her face was as white as a sheet and stained with tears, and her dark hair, usually so neat and enchanted to be perfectly straight every morning hung limply around her cheeks in disarray.

"Giselle," I choked hopelessly and embraced her, stopping to hug her on the curved staircase landing.

My sister clung to me, quaking in my arms.

"When I - I thought you were dead," she told me through a sob. "All I could think about was how we had parted, about how I had envied you and-"

"It's all right," I cut in, holding her more securely for a moment before I withdrew. "We couldn't have known."

"It's not all right," Giselle's gaze flickered to our fallen father; her lower lip trembling. "I didn't say good bye, Celeste. I barely said good morning to him. I was so angry."

Oh. Oh of course. She was already making what had happened about her. She was trying to be nice – that much was plain – and any observing us would say that we were both in shock.

But her words brushed over me with that detached selfishness she always carried about with her, and I bristled as I understood that she had not come to the Palace to retrieve me at all. She had said it herself; she had thought I was dead. She had brought herself to the Palace to gather information about what had happened, to satisfy her own curiosity, to use what she found here as fodder for gossip with her friends.

I scowled and turned hastily, descending the stairs. "Does mother know?"

My words were shorter than I meant them to sound.

Giselle kept by my side and shrugged helplessly in the corner of my eye. "I'm not sure," she sighed heavily, still recovering from her tears. "I was at Lord Erikur's, talking to Melaran, when he charged in and told us."

When we reached the exit to the Palace, she passed me my lute roughly. "Why am I still carrying this?" she asked in frustration.

Calm down, I told myself as I reclaimed my lute and held it against me protectively. She's upset, you're upset. The last thing you need is an argument.

I wanted to snip at her, desperately wanted to, as though doing so might ease the pain. But I resisted the urge and glanced down to my beloved instrument instead. There were spots and smears of deep red marring the finely-polished wood. I hurriedly slung it around me and marched across the courtyard. My sister didn't bother trying to keep up with me this time.

My breath created puffs of white in the calm of the evening, and I glared up at the clear, starry sky.

Skyrim is without a High King, I told myself plainly. This would mean war. The Empire would not – could not – ignore what had happened, and those loyal to Ulfric would rally to fight for him as he tried to make himself king. As though the murderer had a right to rule Skyrim.

And your father is dead because of him.

I breathed the frigid air in and felt tiny flecks of ice on the breeze cut into my throat and burn through my lungs. It did little to distract me.

He's dead.

I reached Proudspire and Giselle was barely two steps behind me. I realised as I stared at the entrance that we had not passed my mother. She might not have been notified yet. That meant I would have to tell her what had happened, and that she would get to blame me.

Where is she, I wondered furiously, preparing for the argument to come.

Giselle's scream made my breath catch in my throat and my anger fled. My head spun as I whirled around and saw my sister staring in anguish at a small, crumpled figure in the garden.

The shadows of night made it difficult to make out what it was at first glance, but Giselle's cry had made it obvious who it was. While my sister seemed frozen to the spot wearing her mask of terror, I leaped toward the figure, crashing down onto my already-battered knees as I gingerly turned the head-shaped part of the collapsed body toward us.

I stared down at our mother in wan disbelief. Her brown eyes were fixed on me in fear and her mouth was partially open, in what might have once been an attempt to scream. Her dark hair tumbled out of its bindings, and felt sticky in places.

"Don't touch her!"

Giselle was by my side in an instant, pushing me forcefully out of the way as she took my place by our mother's side. I fell onto my back at the force of her shove and my lute cracked ominously under me. The shock of seeing our mother dead and forgotten in our front garden – and for what reason?! - dulled me to everything else; my sister's actions; what the cracking might mean for the lute father had gifted me when I had been accepted into the Bard's College; even the mud squelching between my fingers where they splayed on the ground beneath me.

As my twin threw herself over mother's form and sobbed, I sat where I had fallen and glanced idly around the garden. Guilt poured into me. I had been steeling myself for a fight with her, and she had been dead. The woman who had brought me into the world, who had loved me despite our disagreements, was gone.

The lanterns that usually lit the garden had been extinguished, but I caught a flicker of movement that shouldn't have been there anyway; something stringy, flapping on the high rock wall. I turned my eyes down to push myself up, and noticed what I should have registered earlier.

The grass had been trampled.

I eased up as I sauntered toward the high wall between our home and the Sea of Ghosts, and caught the gently flapping material as it flickered within reach, tugging it down from the briar it had been caught on.

Of course it was blue. The blue of Windhelm. The blue that the soldiers with Ulfric Stormcloak had worn.

I clenched the material in my fist and turned back to my grieving sister. How in the act of assassinating Skyrim's High King had the usurper had managed to uncaringly murder both of our parents? It was absurd. Things like this only happened in Bard's tales, and even then were the work of vague legends fluffed up by artistic license.

I left my sister where she was, knowing that she would not want me to comfort her. It was difficult enough putting one foot in front of the next. I retreated through a haze to my bedroom, and dully glanced around it, taking in the surrounds.

Unslinging my lute, I wondered when I would turn into a sobbing wreck like Giselle. The wood clunked and cracked in a way that it shouldn't have; I frowned and turned my attention to it.

Then I finally saw that when Giselle had pushed me, I had landed on it heavily enough to splinter the entire body. The tailpiece had fractured and the strings hung limply by the pegs, frayed where they had snapped.

The emptiness I had been feeling somehow broadened. With a shaking hand, I placed it on my armchair and made myself look at the lute properly, to assess the damage. It was recoverable. It had to be recoverable.

I rose and backed away, unable to tear my gaze from my shattered, beloved lute. Yes, someone at the College would help me fix it. I swallowed a lump in my throat as the backs of my knees met my bed edge. Nodding for emphasis, I leant back, flopping onto the covers, to stare at the ceiling. I could smell blood - I was reeking of it - but I didn't have the will to move. If I was on my bed, perhaps the past few hours had been nothing but a horrible nightmare.

Samuel and Aleine Passero are dead, I reminded myself sternly. Tonight you watched Ulfric's man cut your father down. You found Windhelm colours snagged on your garden wall. You did not dream it.

For hours I tried to push away the thoughts tormenting me that insisted on replaying the incident again and again. Eventually, I accepted that sleep would not come, so I rose and lit a candle at my desk.

And I wrote. I scribbled furiously in my journal, documenting the night's events, hoping that if I put it to paper the bard within me would be satisfied, and let me rest.

Documenting historical events was what I had pledged to do, in a sense; to pass along our history through fable and song. We twisted the truth as we liked to make a better story; one that might inspire love or hope or clemency in the hearts of men and mer.

But I would not distort the truth of this tale, and I knew that while I wrote it, I would never sing it. If some bard in the future chose to twist my words to suit their song, so be it. But I would be faithful to the story. I would tell any who would listen to me what had truly happened at the Blue Palace on the night that Ulfric Stormcloak murdered High King Torygg.

Where was Giselle, and what would become of her studies? I mused dimly over my sister's future at a pause in my writing. Had she come into the house or was she still in the garden with...?

I shook my head, lowering my eyes to my journal. No, I doubted she would return to the College straight away given Winterhold's allegiance to Ulfric. Perhaps she and I would live in Proudspire together, for a time. Perhaps we wouldn't kill each other in that time.

The thought of losing Giselle struck me and I sucked in a breath as though I'd been struck, lowering my quill. I stared at my shaking hands and realised that I didn't care what she did next because all I cared about was that she lived.

I pushed aside my journal and stared at what I had written. The strange, foreign words that Ulfric Stormcloak had spoken to the High King, staggering and then throwing him across the room, glared up at me. I peered back at them with a confused frown.

Fus, Ro, Dah.

Force, balance, push. They'd flown effortlessly from the Jarl of Windhelm's lips like a terrible song, and their effects had shaken the very world around us, and changed it forever. I recalled the odd, thudding whisper Stormcloak's words had pushed through my mind, rasping up from deep within when they had been spoken. A bard would give anything to be able to move their audience with three little syllables.

If it takes me the rest of my days, I vowed with a scowl, I will find some way to use these words against him.


A/n: There I was, working hard at my original fic after completing To the Last Septim when Celeste pounced on me and demanded that her story be told. There is no need for yet another Skyrim fanfiction but she simply wouldn't take no for an answer. So, while I hope to avoid another 2-years-in-the-writing epic, here she is. The idea is to largely follow the Main, Civil War and Companions quest lines, and I'll tag more characters once they're integrated. Rated T for now, but as Skyrim is generally quite a violent place, it may go up to M later.