The bones of the great beast lay half-buried in the snow, ribcage split in a toothy grin. Blood blackens the slope all around me. Is it mine? I can’t feel my shield arm. How long has it been snowing?
I had just left the crumbling prison fort. When I came upon it, a necromancer tried to scare me off with a show of lightning, so I crushed his skull, stripped him naked and tossed his corpse from the parapet. His companions inside faired little better; conjurors are no threat if you strike quickly. I helped myself to the potions, gems and reagents, leaving the Jarl’s bootlick to gather armfuls of enchanted wizard robes. I knew a khajit trader who would give me a few coins for them; this Lydia was useless in a fight but a serviceable pack mule.
Mules are more pleasant. Her whining followed me up the hill away from the broken spires and coin or not I was about to rip the tiny head from her body when I saw it: A blood dragon, asleep on a rocky perch at the crest of the hill, massive body casting a long shadow in the afternoon sun. I made ready my mace and headed straight for it. The beast must have heard the rattle of my armor because as I approached it reared up, spread it scaly wings and lurched into the air with a roar I felt in my chest. It circled us, Lydia attempting to bring it down with arrows and a cast-off hunting bow. She’d have had better luck complaining it out of the sky. I banged my mace on my shield and stood my ground, waiting. The dragon came in low; I raised my shield. But when the fire hit it was hard as stone. My vision went white and the only sound was the blood in my ears.
When I regained my wits I smelled charred flesh: the skin on my arm, neck and face was blacked and blistered. I opened my mouth to scream, but the dragon’s breath had ignited the air and seared my throat and lungs, and I could manage only a rasp. I fumbled in my pack for the healing potions I had taken from the necromancers. My throat wasn’t working, but I choked and spluttered and got the potions down. A light filled my body, pushing the agony into darkness. I got to my feet and looked around. The force of the impact had thrown me across the hill and I had tumbled down the slope behind some rocks. I could see Lydia standing her ground, sword and shield in hand, as the dragon swatted at her and tried to bite her in half. I was behind them; I felt the berserker rage inside me let loose and I raced up the hill, everything gone red. I let go a frenzy of blows. I must have connected because the dragon bellowed in rage and took to the sky. It circled back around, seemed almost to hover in place above me and roared another gout of fire. But this time I was ready. I sprinted away into the trees, using them for cover. It seemed like the whole forest was set ablaze, but I was protected from the full blast. I felt the earth shake as the dragon hit the ground. I wheeled to face it, swinging fast and moving from side to side, ducking behind trees where I could. My mace bit deep into the lizard’s head; I felt its teeth shatter. I got my shield under a massive blow from its claw, and my arm went numb. Then there was a crack of lightning as Lydia’s enchanted sword sliced deep into the blood dragon’s wing, and it howled. I heard Lydia’s bones snap as the dragon’s great tail came down, and then she was face down in the snow. She didn’t get up.
It turned to regard me, and for a moment we faced each other. The berserker rage was leaving me, and I felt weak; I was breathing hard, shield arm hung limp at my side. The dragon could no longer fly, and black ichor ran from its mouth where I had broken its jaw, but of the two of us it was in better shape. There was no way I could take it down without help. The dragon raised up its head to let loose another stream of fire; I ran, blindly stumbling down the hill and off a ledge. I landed hard on my side, but the fall saved me as the dragon’s fire passed harmlessly overhead. I could no longer see it, but could hear it pounding through the forest after me. I got to my feet and lept down the rocks into a small ravine. I could see a cooking fire off to the south — when had it gotten dark? — and set off towards it. I could hear the dragon following behind, its massive footfalls shaking the earth as I ran. Trees off to my left exploded in a fireball, but I kept running. A small copse of trees stood between me and the cooking fire, looming closer. Someone was about to get a nasty surprise.
I burst through the trees and into the shaggy, stinking face of a mammoth. Malacath preserve me! The thing roared at me and I fell back, stumbling to my right. I heard deep, angry shouts, and I realized too late that I had run from a half-dead blood dragon straight into a giant’s camp. The enraged giant raised a club longer than I am tall and was about to mash me into a green Orcish pulp when suddenly it was enveloped in a blast of fire from behind. The dragon had caught up to me, and in trying to finish me off with its horrible breath, it had hit the giant instead. Where a direct hit from the dragon’s fire breath had sent me flying and left me near death, the giant only seemed to be annoyed by this further interruption to its dinner. It turned and brought down its massive club on the dragon. I crawled some distance away and watched dragon and giant, silhouetted against the camp fire, trading blow after blow. Finally the giant was felled by a blast of fire, and the dragon turned back to me. Oblivion take this beast! But the giant had done its work well; the great lizard was crippled, barely moving. It was coming straight for me, fueled by nothing but rage. I drank my final potion — a stamina draught — and got to my feet, and with a cry lept straight up onto the dragon’s head, and, holding onto a horn with one hand, brought my mace down again and again into the lizard’s skull, pounding with everything I had left until at last the horrible beast dropped its head to the ground and lay still on its side. I was tossed away by the impact, and landed in a heap in a bank of snow, where I now lay.
The stars are out. I am alive, for now at least. Perhaps in the morning I can make it to a town. There is a black shape coming towards me from the camp. Another giant, angry at being disturbed by a foolish orc woman? But no, it’s Lydia. She stands over me, and helps me to my feet. “I am sworn to carry your burden,” she says. She almost sounds like she means it.
