Claiming an Empire

An Elder Scrolls Tale

By An Elder Scribe

Chapter 1: The Moot

Castle Dour, Solitude, Skyrim

20th of Last Seed, 4E 203

The courtyard before the entrance to the castle sat a-bustle, voices of Jarls and pages and courtiers alike filling the pleasant, seasonably cool air. Evidence of the Stormcloak attack on the capitol was still faintly apparent, the scars of magicka and arms left on the stone walls fading as time went on, repaired or forgotten and left to the elements. The brisk wind blowing over the northernmost granite shelf brought with it the scent of fresh change, reinvigorating the weariest of souls. High summer had arrived, and with it, the Moot.

Torygar Stormbreath himself, the Last Dragonborn, slayer of Alduin, Harbinger, Legate, Thane to all nine Holds, and student of the Way of the Voice, rode into the city limits, leaving his horse with the stable-hand at Katla's farm just east and south of the metropolis. With him walked Delphine, Grandmaster of the Blades' remnant forces. She was frowning, not unusual, given the occasion of their arrival. Her charge the Dragonborn, a tall, hardy example of the Nord people, walked as he had when setting off to Skuldafn, Alduin's roost. It was the stride of a doomed man, one determined to see an unpleasant event through to the end, and it unnerved her.

In inviting her to accompany him to the long-in-coming Moot, he had had the same mien and movement, determined to make the best of a situation not his making.

She spoke up as they made the halfway point from the city entrance to the castle's gate-arch, "Why did you drag me up here anyway? There's still more to do at the temple, and I can't afford to be away." She stopped, hand resting on the grip of her Akaviri katana, willing her charge to stand a moment and enlighten her.

"The Moot is an important event," the Dragonborn answered, not stopping or even slowing. "Doubly so since the end of the war. The people will want a sign of good tidings. I'm here to give it." Delphine watched him stride on, this man who had saved the world.

He was strongly-built, muscled to rival Ysgramor himself, by all accounts, possessed of a trueborn leader's confidence, and Divines-given talent for the Voice. The mixture of his dress seemed befitting an Imperial battle-mage, boiled leather and chain under plates of layered steel and dragon-bone, and draped over with a sleeveless greatcoat of deep-blue wool. A sword of Skyforged steel hung at his hip, its grip elongated to his designs. The man himself was youngish, no more than thirty years of age, shaven-headed, thickly-bearded, and with flinty steel-colored eyes peering out from the thunderhead of his worry-lined brow.

"We could use you back at the temple more often, too, you know," Delphine said, her voice jostling up and down the range as she jogged to catch up. "The recruits need you more than this lot does. Their bickering and voting for the new High King isn't worth the effort of listening." Torygar stopped, half-turning to watch her meet him in the street.

Slowly, in fits and starts, he smiled. "For a Breton, you're remarkably disinterested in politics. I'd have thought you'd have at least three of the Blades inserted into the throng of courtiers to provide intel."

"What makes you think I haven't?" she answered. As a matter of fact, she'd sent five spies to the Moot. Whatever her feelings about the day-to-day goings-on of Skyrim court life, it never behooved her to wade into something ill-prepared, especially where the Dragonborn was concerned.

"That's what I thought," he said, and continued on. "No matter the outcome, this is going to be one of the most important events of the Era. At least for Skyrim."

Delphine managed to frown more deeply. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Later," Torygar said. They had arrived at the castle's outer gate. "It's time." With a word, Torygar passed into the throng, which quickly parted before him. It was like watching the prow of a ship cut breakers at high tide. Delphine followed in his wake, if only to keep from being separated from him by the crowd.

An observant herald standing by the table around which the Jarls all sat espied the Dragonborn's approach, calling forth, "Torygar Stormbreath, Thane of All-Hold!" Nine faces turned to watch him, their talk struck dead in their throats. A trio of them rose, but Torygar waved them down.

"Please, my lords, stay. I only wish to bless this Moot with a word."

Jarl Siddgeir's lips curled into a sardonic smirk. "Hopefully not one of your Shouts," he said, much to the laughter of the Jarls gathered. The Dragonborn laughed with them.

"Would that a phrase of dragon tongue could name the new High King and have done, eh?" His good cheer melted away as quickly as it arose, washed free of his face by whatever heavy feeling brought him here. Delphine knew that look and girded herself for whatever he had to say.

Jarl Idgrod of Morthal gave voice to Delphine's worry. "You've got something dire to say, I can see it." Her tone was airy, as if she were struggling to see the words themselves, pluck them out of thin air.

The Dragonborn nodded to the elder Jarl. "As ever your foresight serves you well. I come not only to bless the Moot, but to offer up a nomination for the High King's seat."

Maven of Riften thumped a hand on the great table, impatient. "Well, out with it. Give us a name, and we can all vote me into the Blue Palace already." This brought a loud but short-lived series of exclamations from the other Jarls. Torygar waved his hands at them, asking for quiet.

"Please, please, hear me."

"We hear you, Thane," Balgruuf said, hoisting a flagon. Though divided from the first upon which side to join during the civil war, the Jarl of Whiterun was one of Torygar's staunchest allies. The Dragonborn nodded to him in turn.

"The seat of High King is not one I would wish on anyone; to lead is to take a great burden on yourself," the Dragon born began. "You become responsible for and answerable to the whole of Skyrim. You must protect her and show her the proper respect, as much she would show loyalty owed to the Empire. It takes a warrior and a statesman, one willing to fight, or beat swords into ploughshares. She is the last great bastion, the only remaining friend to Cyrodiil, and she needs a guiding hand and will."

"There is only one person I can name who is ready to lead us all into a new Era."

The Jarls seated began speaking again at once, a chorus of "Who? Which of us? Give us a name!" and more. Delphine stood by, listening with the gathered courtiers, leaning forward as if pressed to a door, listening for the barest snatch of a whispered secret. The Dragonborn raised his hands again for quiet, finally lowering them when the Jarls all fell silent.

"I would be High King of Skyrim."

If the previous bout of questions and support was loud, now it was deafening, all nine men and women shouting to be heard over one another in a general formless clangor. The raised voices turned on one another yet again as the arguments either for or against the Dragonborn began in earnest. Torygar raised his head, face lifted to the sky, and Delphine knew what was coming.

"Fus…RO DAH!" Torygar Shouted. The air snapped with a boom as if Mehrunes Dagon himself had clapped his great and terrible hands, and the Jarls fell instantly still, hands clapped over ears and faces agape with wonder. Delphine, too, dug into an ear with her little finger, smiling at their collective gawping. It still amazed them that here was a real true-to-life wielder of the Voice.

"I have served you all in turn, aiding your Holds' people, protecting them from threats outside your walls and boundaries, and given you my pledge of fealty. I slew the World-Eater in Sovngarde. Had but Shor been there himself, he would have blessed me for my ambition, had he seen into my heart."

"Now I ask you to let me serve you further. I ask you to let me lead, and bring Skyrim into an age of peace and rebuilding of what has been lost. Name me High King, let me wear the Jagged Crown and prove the strength of our loyalty for one and all. I am done."

They all stood or sat, staring at him, Delphine as much in shock as they. This she hadn't been…entirely expecting. Dragonborn were, by nature and tradition, leaders of a most singular stripe, but every action and indication on Torygar's behalf had given no sign that he'd had designs for the throne of Skyrim. From the gathered courtiers, a voice rang out, "Torygar! Dragonborn, King! High King!" And with that, they all took up the chant.

The Jarls looked at each other, all, silent and bewildered. The Dragonborn turned to the throng, raised his hands. All of them fell quickly still, and he turned back to the Moot. It was Balgruuf-of course it was-who spoke up first.

"We will have to deliberate this further, All-Thane," he said. "This matter bears more discussion."

Torygar nodded. "I understand. I'll leave you to it. Decide, and send for me. I'll be at the Skeever." With that, he turned and entered the swiftly-opening crowd. Delphine once again followed, catching him just as the crowd began closing behind him. As they ambled down the switchback ramp to Castle Dour's courtyard, the arguing began again, more subdued than before.

Delphine waited until they had both gained the Winking Skeever, settling in at a table set into a small alcove. Without even asking for them, a bar-wench delivered foaming mugs of mead, Black-Briar Reserve, naturally, compliments of the house for the Thane and his guest.

The Dragonborn took a single sip of his mead, nodding at its pleasing sweetness and after-burn. Delphine's pull was noticeably longer, foam lathering her lips as she murmured, conversationally, "Are you out of your ever-loving mind?"

Torygar simply smiled at her across the table, a calm, knowing grin. "No. I'm doomed. Dragonborn, remember?" Delphine's answering scowl left unspoken the question of how she could ever forget it. She simply glowered at him over the rim of her mug as she took another drink, halving its contents in the second go.

"Go easy. I expect we're going to be here a long while," Torygar said, still smiling at her.

"Honestly, what possessed you to do that?" she asked. "I'm really hoping I'm back at the Temple, knocked cold by one of the recruits by accident, and when I come to, this will have just been a bad dream."

The Dragonborn took another placid sip of his mead. "You know, for all her power-grabbing nature, Maven really has something here. A pity she didn't stick solely to brewing."

"Well?" Delphine growled, gripping the handle of her flagon tightly. Though iron, it would soon snap if she bore down on it long enough like she was.

"Like I said to the Moot, I want to serve. How best might I do if not as High King? I proved my worth to the whole country, despite my would-be terminal beginning." As he spoke, unhurried, unworried, the bar-wench who served them overheard him, and letting out a swift gasp, fled towards the bar.

"Perfect," Delphine said, draining her mead to the dregs. "Now the whole of Solitude is going to be talking about it before nightfall, if they aren't already."

"Tongues wag and the commonfolk have something to discuss among themselves. Let them. If they support me, too, all the better. If not, I'll go back to the mountain and live out the rest of my days as a Greybeard. Happily, even."

"You know that won't be happening," Delphine said. She sat up straight, looking down at the table between them, trailing a fingertip through a ring of moisture left by her mug. "There's still the Blades to keep up and running. You're responsible for that much, too."

"Believe me, I have no intention of letting the Blades stagnate and die slowly again," Torygar said, sitting back. He threw his arm over the chair's back, looking for all of Nirn like a man without a care or worry at all. "In time, they will be whole and prepared."

Something about that troubled Delphine. "Prepared for what?"

"For whatever threatens the Empire," the Dragonborn replied. "It lies in everyone's interest that the Blades regain strength and the public's not-too-public trust." He said this low, barely above a relaxed murmur. Delphine studied him for a moment, trying to peel away whatever under-meaning he implied.

Suddenly she turned to the bar, raising a hand and snapping her fingers for the barkeep's attention. "Another Reserve!" she called.

"Two, if you please, Corpulus," Torygar followed up. "It's going to be a long day, I think."

They sat and drank and talked. When they grew a mite too inebriated, they ate, and drank and talked some more. Plans for Sky Haven Temple, potential recruits for the Blades, the state of the Empire, possible covert incursions by the Dominion, and of course, of dragons.

They were still being spotted, by swineherds and traveling merchants, staying well outside the boundaries of the Holds and their respective outlier hamlets. Delphine's concern that they were up to something had grown with each missive brought back to her from her green-behind-the-ears field-agents. No reports of attacks, just sightings. No farmers and their families turned up missing or burnt to a crisp. Merchant caravans fled from the swiftly-drifting shadows of them as they glided by overhead, but were left unmolested.

"That you let Parthurnaax live after I urged you to kill him is what's causing it, I'm sure," she said, her voice slurring slightly at the edges.

"There's still more I can learn from him," Torygar replied. "About the Voice. About what it means to be Dragonborn. About greater mysteries of the Divines and their agents, too, I suppose. And let's not forget the history and names of dragons I've yet to meet. And might perhaps need to slay."

"I still say that great old lizard needs killing, despite all that," Delphine grumbled, speaking into her mug.

"I'm no Breton, Delphine. Betrayal and intrigue aren't my tools and trade. They're yours."

"Justice isn't betrayal. He deserves to die for what he did."

"So you've said. He asked me something, once, when I was still new to the Voice. 'What is better-to be born good, or to overcome your evil nature through great effort?' There's no doubt in my mind that he would try to…dethrone me, if you'll excuse the word, and lead the remainder of his kind in another war, if he so chose. But there's no doubt, either, that he means to do well by us, and the Divines. As far as I'm concerned, his efforts to give Man insight to the Voice, by which we won the Dragon War, have absolved him. That's all I'm saying on the matter."

"Gods, I wish you'd say less about it," Delphine said. Torygar only chuckled softly.

"Given my inborn talent, silence would have been a bad business for us mortals."

It was fully dark now, and the door to the Skeever opened. A herald stood on the threshold, peering about the bar for a moment before spying Delphine and Torygar at their table.

"My lord Thane," he said, approaching. "The Moot has requested your presence at Castle Dour at your leisure." He extended a scroll to the Dragonborn, a rolled-up tube of vellum sealed with a blob of red wax. The sigil of Solitude was stamped into it. Torygar nodded, taking the scroll and breaking the seal. Delphine sat rigid as he read it.

"Thank you. I'll arrive shortly," Torygar told the herald, and finished the last of his eighth mead of the day.

"What does it say?" Delphine asked. The Dragonborn simply handed her the scroll. Unrolling it, she read: We have decided. Come soonest. -Elisif

"Sober up, Grandmaster. Let's go see what the Moot has to say."

End Chapter 1