Skyrim - The Whiterun Guard

Dovah

Drops of rain fell of my helmet as I wiped the blood off of my breastplate. In front of me was a dragon, a dead one. It looked much larger from this short distance. I never noticed how terrifying those creatures arev until now when I examined the beast's glossy red scale.

I put the arrow between my fingers back into its quiver while looking around the watchtower to see if anyone was injured. We were lucky, only one person died today. That was less than usual. The man who slaughtered the dragon was already walking away from the site, headed to Whiterun. I could see him walking in a distance with the city's walls in the background. Looked like he was in a hurry like always. I'm sure he was headed to Jarl Balgruuf to claim his great reward for removing yet another beast from the surface of Tamriel. But what do we get? All I could do now is to head back into the city, take some rest at the barracks and maybe spend my last septims at a jug of Hulda's cold mead. Then get home and greet my family and spend time with the kids. But a reward? No, that's too much for a simple guard like me. Even if I single-handedly would slaughter a giant with the Dragonborn just watching, he would get all the credit for it.

I remember when mom used to tell stories of the old Dragonborn. It got me so excited and made me want to explore tamriel and discover new cities. That's why I became a guard, to explore and discover. Not to spend time in the same ugly barrack every day and live off a terrible pay to barely support my loving wife and my two daughters. I made the wrong choice.

"Come on, let's go back!" Irileth shouted as she started heading back to Whiterun. We all followed her lead and did exactly as she said. We wanted to keep our jobs after all.

As I picked up my sword I dropped earlier I heard a noice from a distance, a familiar sound. It was a dampened howl from the mountains.

"The dragon's coming our way" I said, looking at Irileth. She was looking up to the sky searching for the creature.

"I know" she answered with a voice that told me to shut up.

Suddenly, the dragon appeared from behind the mountains. Howling with rage while closing in on us. Irileth drew her sword, I tightened the grip around the sword in my hand and the other guards did the same thing. I slowly forgot the weight of the sword as I realised that this time, we had no Dragonborn to protect us. Our odds against a dragon were not on our side this time.

This dragon was bigger, more frightening and even angrier than the last one. And it only got worse as it approached us. Before anyone could do anything, the giant of a dragon grabbed one of us in it's mouth and rose to the sky again. It ignored the rest of us and flew off in the same direction as the Dragonborn went, to Whiterun.