A feverish restlessness had taken hold of the city, as carts laden with provisions piled up along the weathered walls. The closer she drew to the Palace, the more the rest of the city seemed to recede, as if Windhelm had already begun to fold in on itself.

  And that smell… sharp and warm, metallic and cloying. It lingered, out of place, almost alive beneath the wind. Markab felt her focus slip, her body reacting before her mind could catch up.

  She straightened at once. That instinct had no place here.

  Forcing her attention away from what her senses insisted upon, she took the main road, the one that led straight to the Palace of the Kings. Its black stone mirrored the dark mass of the coming storm.

  The Palace of Kings had changed so many times that she’d long lost count.

  Its stones had seen feasts and revolts, sieges and mourning, triumphs and coronations, so many faces drifting past through the decades. But never silence.

  What she heard today -or rather, what she no longer heard- had no precedent. It had seeped into the joints of marble and stone, into the iron hinges of the doors, into the very breath of the guards. No voice, no echo of steel, no sign that life still lingered here.

  And yet, the sentinels walked their rounds, trading posts with a heavy precision honed by despair and anxiety. Souls holding their breath, clinging to routine as to the last fragile thread that kept them from collapsing.

  Only the cook, whose muffled grumblings Markab’s too-sharp hearing could still recognize, reminded her that life hadn’t fully abandoned this place.

  This silence was no rest, it was a warning. An anticipation.

  She forced herself to dismiss the image of the Palace already stilled, as it might one day stand if the rebellion were lost. Passing the throne room, her gaze brushed over Ysgramor’s seat. A low unease took root in her chest.

  Tearing herself away from the thought, she crossed the corridors, ignoring the guards who greeted her as she passed, until she reached the chamber adjoining the Jarl’s throne, the War Room.

  Once draped in the banners of Eastmarch and Windhelm, glowing with warmth and gold, it had been stripped bare. Now there were only maps, lists, and the endless scrolls of scout reports.

  General Galmar Stone-Fist stood inside, already armored at this early hour. Arms crossed, brow furrowed, he glared down at the map spread before him, covered with red and blue markers. The red of the Empire had devoured almost everything. He didn’t look up when she entered, wholly absorbed by the disaster to come.

  She left the room through another door and climbed toward the upper floors, the Jarl’s quarters. The corridors remained guarded, but the half-light there felt oppressive rather than calm. Most lamps had not been relit. The black stone of the Palace swallowed the light whole, snuffing out all warmth.

  A warm glow leaked through a half-open door, cutting sharply through the gloom. It was the only sign of life on this suffocating floor. Inside, the gravelly voice of the court mage carried… rough, without a trace of courtesy. Now and then, another voice, calmer, deeper, answered him.

  Markab stopped in the doorway and leaned against the frame. She didn’t announce herself. She waited. She needed her anger to settle before speaking.

  Stolen novel; please report.

  “Do it quickly. There are matters that cannot wait.”

  “They’ve waited a week. They can wait another hour,” Wuunferth replied dryly.

  The burn ran from shoulder to hip, a pale, ridged ribbon of ash. She noted its progress: primitive, but healing. Not enough to kill. Just enough to mark.

  As the tunic fell back into place, the dull tension in her chest returned. It was a reminder of what it always cost to follow him.

  Wuunferth gathered his vials without so much as a glance in her direction and left. The door down the hall slammed shut moments later.

  “Charming as ever,” she muttered.

  The familiar voice drew Ulfric’s attention. Sitting at the edge of the bed, he was fastening his belt.

  “He’s gentler with the dead,” he said with a crooked smile.

  She didn’t answer.

  The silence between them wasn’t hostile, merely saturated. Too many things to say, too many reasons not to. Too much anger buried under duty. Too much duty drowning in resentment.

  Markab stepped inside and closed the door.

  “You should stay in bed,” she said flatly.

  “And miss the next disaster? Not a chance.”

  The tone was weary, but the flame in him hadn’t dimmed. He survived everything, even what he destroyed.

  A flicker of irritation rose in her.

  It wasn’t his wound that troubled her, nor his stubbornness, but that familiar blend of pride and blindness she knew too well. The bitter words pressed against her teeth but stayed there, unspoken, for fear they would wound more than they would heal.

  “Helgen,” he began, voice low.

  “The ashes were still visible from the mountain passes,” she replied. “But none of ours among the dead.”

  She approached the table where a map of the hold lay unfurled. Her gloved fingers traced the parchment absently, following the winding roads through the marshlands.

  “If they survived, they’ll be hiding,” she concluded.

  Ulfric nodded slowly.

  “The dragon…” he started, then fell silent.

  She turned too quickly, too sharply.

  The movement betrayed everything she had wanted to contain. Their eyes met. For an instant, the war, the palace, the cold… all of it vanished. Only the two of them remained, separated by that thin line between loyalty and fatigue.

  Then she looked away, jaw tight.

  Another storm was rising over Skyrim. The week she’d spent on the road, from barrow to barrow, had been grimly productive. No word of further attacks after Helgen, but she knew the calm wouldn’t last.

  In the corridor, she heard the familiar rhythm of Galmar’s armored boots. A knock, then the door opened. He entered, face closed, already bracing for a conversation too long delayed. He inclined his head toward Ulfric, more a gesture of the shoulders than of respect.

  “Ulfric.”

  The tone was clipped, stripped of all warmth.

  “Galmar,” Ulfric said without taking his eyes off Markab. “You’re here for the council?”

  The old warrior nodded. He spotted Markab, returned a brief glance, and followed Ulfric out.

  Markab remained, one hand resting on the table. The parchment crackled faintly under her palm. Her eyes traced the red lines crawling between the mountains; a silent blaze already devouring the province.

  The anger she’d held back turned into something older: fear. The kind one hides, just to keep standing.

  And the dragon was only one of its faces.

  For the first time since the messenger had burst into the Palace with news of the ambush, she allowed herself the thought she’d refused until now. One that fed a bitterness she could neither justify nor uproot.

  If the execution had gone as planned, Skyrim would wear another face. And despite herself, Markab might have felt relief… buried beneath the grief.

  Instead, chaos spread. Resentment and fatigue seeped into her, like mist between the stones.

  Her eyes lingered on a single point on the map: Riften. The memory of that strange encounter breathed into her a trace of warmth, something that felt like a fragile hope. Markab still did not understand at first what had drawn her toward the young woman. Around her -Ruby- an unseen web seemed to take shape. Woven of chaos and fate.

  At last, a faint smile touched her lips. Perhaps something good could still grow from the ruin.