Not Alone (A Skyrim Fanfiction)

Chapter 26

Chapter 26

     “Dragonborn General?” a voice asked from the entrance to the tent.

     Upon the dramatic entrance of the dragons, obviously everyone who hadn’t already known I was Dragonborn had immediately realized that very fact.  I had already resigned myself to it as unavoidable before Odahviing had returned from scouting, but the looks that spoke partially of fear and partially of admiration that followed me everywhere I went were still rather annoying.  Worse still than the looks, however, was the way suddenly no one knew what to call me.  I was their general, and yet I was also the revered Dragonborn.  So what did they do?  Well, combine the two into Dragonborn General, of course. 

     In fact, why not mash all my titles together?  Dragonborn General Guildmaster.  It had a kind of nice ring to it.  Well, it did right now, anyway.  I had no doubt that later it would annoy me to no end, but at the moment I was so tired that not much seemed to matter.  I had caught only a few hours of sleep and even now it was still early morning.

     “What is it?” I turned to see a slightly confused looking soldier standing just inside the tent flap.  Probably he didn’t even know what to call me. 

     “The Harbinger would like to speak with you, sir.” 

     The Harbinger herself shouldered the man out of the way as she entered the tent without waiting for me to respond.  The soldier took the opportunity and vanished from view. 

     Cerawyn placed her hands on the table and stared at the blue flag denoting the location of Whiterun for a moment.  When she finally spoke her words came slowly and carefully.  “It seems you have once more been withholding information from me.”

     “Not just you,” I pointed out.  “I didn’t want to advertise my identity as the Dragonborn.”

     “Perhaps not just me, but Jarl Vignar and many of the captains knew.”  She continued to study the same blue flag.

     “Most of the soldiers didn’t.”  Even as I spoke the words I winced inwardly.  That had been entirely the wrong thing to say.

     Cerawyn looked up from the map, fixing me with a piercing stare.  “Are you equating the title of Harbinger to that of a common soldier?”

     “No, that’s not what I meant at all,” I said, frustrated with my poor choice of words.  “The Jarl and the captains already knew.  I hadn’t spoken of it to anyone who didn’t, including the soldiers, and it didn’t seem like something that merited discussion.”

     “I suppose that inviting dragons into the camp also wasn’t something that merited discussion?” she asked, the steel in her voice now clearly audible and sharper than my Daedric sword.

     Was that what she was so angry about?  I had thought she had come here to berate me for not being honest about who I was, not about my decision to accept the dragons’ offer of assistance.  She was blowing both way out of proportion either way.  Sure, Jarl Vignar had had many choice words for me about inviting dragons to live right next to his city, but he had eventually accepted that we needed them to fight and he had never been this riled about it.

     Come to think of it, I had never seen Cerawyn riled up about anything.  This outburst seemed very out of character for her.  “I couldn’t just tell them to wait somewhere while I discussed the option with my advisors.  Dragons like decisive, instantaneous action, not political discussion.  Asking them to wait would have been injurious to their relationship with the army.”