The Stormcloak Queen - A skyrim Fanfiction

[8] My thane.

"My thane" Lydia said in greeting from her seat in front front of the fire.

I raised my hand slightly in greeting before dragging my feet up the stairs to my bed.

I was so tired I didn't even bother with removing my armour, opting instead to just sleep in it.

As usual I was enveloped by nightmares as I slept.

I awoke to the smell of whatever Lydia was cooking, light was flooding the room and I could see the dust swirling around.

Gods I should clean more often.

Pulling myself from the bed, I stripped off my armour and washed at the small washbasin with a perfumed oil I had brewed out of deathbells and tundra cotton.

I quickly applied my eyeliner and left my hair loose, I pulled in my amour.

Running down the stairs I grabbed a sweetroll from one of the tables dotting breezehome.

"You need to sleep more often" Lydia commented, "how long had it been?"

"A week?" I said quizzically, sliding down the wall and leaning my head back into it. "I ran out of stamina potions, remind me to get some ingredients off Acradia." I said nonchalantly, as if the fact I had been avoiding sleep in favour of potions was something mundane.

"What!?" She exclaimed, concern seeping into her tone. "Do you know how dangerous that is? You can die from over use of those things!" She stressed.

"Look, I know to stop when I start getting double vision" I said yawning, which wasn't helping my point.

"You need to stop it Freya" she sighed.

"They're better than sleeping" I snapped at her causing her to go silent.

I knew I screamed in my sleep, I had awoken myself that way quite a few times, and I felt sorry for Lydia having to sleep under the same roof as me.

"So what's happening now that the high king is dead?" She asked carefully changing the subject.

"Civil war" I replied shrugging. "Whiterun's neutral, of course. That man couldn't just pick a side."

"He'll decide eventually, give him time." She said with an almost sad smile.

"Time is of the essence, speaking of essence, I'm going to Acradia's cauldron."

"That stuff is worse than skooma!" She shouted after me.

"Call me an addict then!" I said throwing up my hands as I backed out of the house and walked down the street.

Ignoring the advances of that gods forsaken bard, I walked into the alchemists.

"You look pale could be a case of ataxia,it's quite a problem back in Cyrodill.

That's because it's a skeever infested dump.

"Do you have stamina potions, or the ingredients for some? A bot 100 septims worth?." I asked, smiling.

I actually enjoyed alchemy, and I was quite good at it to be truthful.

But I was spending far to much on this.

"Take this instead, a sip before bed, it's a tonic for dreamless sleep." She said a frown crossing her features. "I know you not using those potions for combat thane."

Thanking her and paying her I headed out to the market, obviously Miakel was still there.

"Leave the woman alone"'I sighed standing next to Carlotta.

"I will tame that fiery mare" he said shaking his hand above his head. Theatrics I guessed.

"By the nine just shut up?" I muttered walking back down to breezehome.

Storing the potion away, I shouted through to Lydia as I worked on various potions.

"Are you coming to Eastmarch?"

"I'm not sure? Do you need me?" She called back.

"I don't think so I should be back soon, you can stay with the house."

"That's fine"

I looked down at the potions I was creating, I was just making poisons I'd never use and wasting my ingredients.

Right then, back to Windhelm.

"I side with Whiterun." I mimicked, standing in the war room of the palace of the kings.
The small amount of light coming through the latticed windows making the place look grim.

We were placing coloured flags on the hold capitals, forts and villages, making a war map.

"Mark everything in Whiterun imperial." I sighed placing my hands on the table and leaning forward, bringing my head closer to Ulfric's.

"Imperial?" Galmar said, raising a quizzical eyebrow.

"He'll side with them when it comes to it, this is just so Whiterun is left alone for now".

Ulfric brought his head up from the map, his intense hazel eyes meeting my sapphire ones, and I found myself lost in them.

"Jarl Laila sides with us." He said bringing me back to attention. "Mark everything in the hold with blue, do the same for dawnstar."

"This is... This is good, we have two of the three major ports and the docks in Riften, we have more than a fighting chance here." I said confidently.

"We're going to struggle to supply dawnstar with troops, it's surrounded with imperial holds." Galmar retorted.

"We will manage" Ulfric sighed.