Skyrim: Tale of Valur

Chapter One: Embers of Sorrow

[AUTHOR'S NOTE: So, to start off, I just want to say that this is technically the very first Skyrim fanfiction idea I ever had. It would follow the main quest and other major story lines if I wanted to take it beyond chapter one, but I never got around to ever actually writing it. And you'll see I have certain recurring themes in all my works lol What can I say, I like the trope of the small, or otherwise incapable, being capable. And the unrelated becoming family. Helps me work through my own childhood traumas, I guess lmao. But yeah. Enjoy basically the prototype of certain other characters of my other works?]

Chapter One: Embers of Sorrow

Valur huddled beside the crackling campfire, his gray eyes fixed on the large slab of sizzling meat upon the makeshift spit roast. The scent of the charred flesh filled his nostrils, only serving as morbid reminder of the cruel loneliness that had befallen him once again.

He was but a Nord boy, only nine winters old, yet already too familiar with the frailties of life. He drew his small legs to his chest, burying his head upon his knees, uncaring of the uncomfortable press of his boney caps against his freckled cheeks. His scruffy honey brown hair caught the icy howl of the wind, but it was the horrid howl of his companion that still rang his ears.

The memory of the Spriggan's attack still seared his mind like the flames seared the meat...

The way Meeko's eyes, once full of warmth and loyalty in the scraggly wolfhound, had turned cold and feral under the twisted magic. Valur's grip on his knife tightened as he fought back further tears. He had been forced to make an impossible choice - slay the beast that Meeko had become or succumb to his once loyal friend.

As the meat cooked, over the wood that had been the Spriggan, Valur's thoughts drifted to Hjemly, the kind Nord who found him stuck in a snare in the woods. Valur had been all alone, surviving the wilderness for two months after losing the only living relative he had. A sickly grandmother, too feeble to make it out of the house fire...

Valur had managed to use the resourcefulness and knowledge she had taught him to live off the bounties of the woods, when he had grown lost trying to find the road to help. But he had been slowly starving, slowly succumbing to the elements. It was a blessing to have gotten his foot caught in the rabbit snare Hjemly had set.

It was Meeko who had come upon him first, ready to sink his teeth into the neck of an ensnared rabbit for his master. Instead, the warm dog found Valur and playfully pounced the unexpected prey until a laughing Hjemly shooed him off and untied the boy from the bind.

Hjemly took him in. Shared his home with him. It may have been but a small shack, but it had been Valur's home for nearly three years. Hjemly had been his home.

A disease had stolen Hjemly away...

Valur's memories fresh from that night it started just weeks ago.

[ Valur's small hands grasped the worn wooden foot post of the bed frame, his eyes fixed on Hjemly struggling to pull himself to sit up. Hjemly's strong arms seemed uselessly rigid, but he managed with groaning effort to sit up against the headboard and fling the blanket off his feverish form. Valur's eyes drifted to the wolf bite bandaged upon Hjemly's leg, the boy knowing it to be the culprit of his adopter's festering ailment. Valur's eyes drifted back up to Hjemly's. The man's once vibrantly green eyes now dull as the grass on a winter's day. Sweat glistened on his brow, pooling in the gauntness already taking root under his eyes. His receding dark hair, usually combed neatly into a ponytail, sat around his head like a matted mane, some strands stuck to the sweat of his face, some clung in his beard.

"Valur, lad...," Hjemly's voice, weak but warm, beckoned the boy, "Come closer, little rabbit."

Valur's freckled nose scrunched, his stomach sinking at the weakness in Hjemly's voice. He stepped near, seeing the rigidness even in the slight turn of Hjemly's head. The man's arm slowly lifted, struggling but determined to cup the boy's chin in a calloused hand.