Mortal (Book 3)

Chapter 1

Dragonborn--

I need to speak to you. Urgently.

Rent the attic room at the Sleeping Giant Inn in Riverwood, and I'll meet you.

--A friend

I crumple the note in my fist and prepare to throw it, but I stop and drop it in my bag behind me. I won't barter with thieves over a precious relic like the Horn of Jurgen Windcaller. Whoever left this for me is more likely to meet the wrong end of my axe than coerce even one septim out of me.
"What does it say..?" Lydia asks.
"Damn thieves. They knew we were coming, whoever they are. They want to meet and come to some sort of deal for the Horn. My plan is that we find them, take the Horn, and throw their body in the damn river." I growl.
"Where?" She asks, as if not completely opposed to it.
"Riverwood. We came all this way for nothing." I tell her, wiping some dried blood off of Wuuthrad. It took me a while to get used to the heavier blade, and it still swings much slower than my greatsword ever did. However, one swing could kill a man, whereas one swing from my greatsword would just wound him.
I sigh. Lydia scratches her head. The big, empty crypt moans.
"I suppose we should start heading back out." I tell her.
"My thane, I saw something. A lever, it looks like.. Just over there." She says, pointing behind the large coffin. I suppose this coffin belongs to Jurgen Windcaller, the founder of the Greybeards and owner of the Horn, which has now unfortunately been stolen. I've seen more coffins than I can count by now, but none have given me chills like this one does. The whole thing is something of a pyramid and from the top sprouts an arm and hand. I assume the hand at one point held this horn, but I found it holding a note. A stupid, worthless note. Hardly worth my time.
Lydia, being her usual helpful self, has found a lever opening a tunnel that I believe leads out of the tomb, along with some gold. Though she seems rather pleased, I am anything but.

~

"I'd like the attic room." I tell the innkeeper, dropping some gold on the bar. The innkeeper appears to be a Breton woman somewhere in her fifties, wearing the small, wrinkled glare that most old Breton women come to have. I recognize her, I just don't know how; I've been to Riverwood many times now, perhaps I've seen her before. She glares at the money, then wrinkles her nose.
"Well... We don't have an attic room, but you can have that one over on the left." She says, taking the gold.
I try to walk to the tiny room calmly, but I think something gives it away because Lydia takes a seat at the bar to order some wine, leaving me to pout. When I shut the door I'm ready to explode and tear the room apart, but I don't have time before the door opens again.
"So this is the Dragonborn I've been hearing about? You're tiny." The innkeeper says. So that's where I know her from; She was the woman in Farengar's study that stole the Dragonstone shortly after I retrieved it. I would smile at her comment, but I'm not really in the mood.
"I'm the same height as you." I tell her. She smiles, highlighting the lines around her mouth.
"My name is Delphine... I suppose you were looking for this." She says, holding the horn out to me the way you would hold a dead skeever.

~

Delphine has proved to be the strangest of traveling companions. She told me that "we" were going to Kynesgrove, a small village in Eastmarch, just down the road from Windhelm. However, while I had planned to stay in the inn and sleep for the night, it seems Delphine had planned on leaving immediately.
She's given me only the tiniest bits and pieces of information she can spare, which doesn't include telling me who exactly she is. However, she has told me what she knows about the dragons. She believes that the dragons are coming back, being resurrected from their ancient graves. I've seen the dragon burial mounds before, there's one just up the hill from Rorikstead; we used to play on it as children, not knowing what it was. Thinking about it now gives me chills. Thinking about Rorikstead being burned to the ground by a dragon makes me sick. There's hundreds of these burial mounds across Skyrim, some of them close to civilization and some of them in the wilderness. They're just as dangerous either way, in my eyes. Delphine says she's found quite a few of them empty, in a pattern. There's one near Kynesgrove, and she expects that the next dragon will attack there.
Lydia and I take the short road back to Whiterun and catch a carriage to Windhelm. I'm tempted to make a short stop to the Palace of the Kings, but I would regret it if the dragon were to attack Kynesgrove in my absence. I promise myself to stop there on my way back.
As soon as the village is in sight, a woman in dirty farm clothes runs straight for us, terror in her eyes.
"Run! There's a dragon.. It's attacking!" She gasps.
"Calm down ma'am. Where did you last see it?" I ask her.
"Just up the hill, over the old burial mound..." She tells me, pointing to a path up the hill. I thank her and fight my way through the rushing crowd of terrified villagers. The only ones that don't run are the Stormcloak guards assigned here, and I make a mental note to tell Ulfric of their bravery.
"You! Make sure the townspeople get somewhere safe. I'll take care of the dragon, just go!" I tell a shaking female guard.
"Yes, Dragonborn— I mean Stormblade." She says, saluting me before calling the other guards with her.
We fight our way to the top of the steep hill, but what I see stops me in my tracks. It's not just any dragon screeching as it soars overhead, it's the dragon; the one that attacked Helgen on the day of my execution. I've come to know his name, from the ancient legends; Alduin. He's still just as dark and menacing as I remember, if not more. However, he hasn't seemed to notice us yet. If he has, he doesn't care. We crouch by a boulder, waiting to see what it does.
"Steady now... Just watch it. This is what we came for." Delphine whispers, suddenly crouched behind us. I almost jump out of my skin— when did she get there? Alduin suddenly speaks, making me jump again.
"Sahloknir, ziil gro dovah ulse! Slen tiid vo!" He says in the voice that haunts my nightmares. Slowly, the skeleton of a dragon pushes it's way through the burial mound. It looks up at Alduin, and speaks as well. Fresh skin spreads over its bones like fire, making it more menacing by the second.
"Alduin, thuri! Boaan tiid vokriiha suleyksejun kruziik?" He says. They continue to speak in the dragon language; it's strange for me to listen to... I almost understand what they're saying, but it doesn't make sense and I could never even hope to translate. Suddenly, the dark dragon turns and looks at us, but I can feel his red eyes burning into me.
"Ful, losei Dovahkiin? Zu'u koraav nid nol dov do hi. You do not even know our tongue, do you? Such arrogance, to dare take for yourself the name of Dovah." He says, nothing but contempt and pity in his voice. "Sahloknir, krii daar joorre." It doesn't much for me to translate that.
"He's going to kill us." I mumble.
"What?" Delphine says.
"Attack!" I command her, and she immediately jumps into action. As we slice at the dragon's impenetrable scales and dodge his flames, I catch a glance of Alduin flying away over the horizon.
What a coward.