Chapter Text
The Spriggan-Child
Middas, 25th of Sun’s Dawn 4E 187
Farkas met her when she had first left the glen, as she was bumbling about in the wilderness, searching for a road, for other people, for something . After hours of walking, of searching, with the moon now overhead, she finds something. A sabre tooth tiger.
Her nerves were on the fritz, otherwise she would have used a spell her guardians taught her to tame wildlife; but she was overwhelmed by the sights and sounds and smells of a new place. The animal has her pinned, but moments from sinking its teeth into her flesh, her screams for help are answered. A warrior, with long black hair, piercing blue eyes, and a sword almost as big as the young woman herself comes to her aid. He lets out a howl that almost doesn’t sound human, and thus begins a scuffle.
His eyes dart from the saber tooth to the shaking girl now with her back against a tree, sitting on the ground, almost trying to hide in plain sight. She’s terrified, and his heart breaks for her. At that moment he felt like he'd do anything to defend her.
“I’ll protect you,” he promises her, his eyes locking with her one blue and one brown ones, wishing that he was able to wipe the tears from her eyes. Why was the white of one of her eyes green, he wonders. Was she sick?
His greatsword is swept out of his hands at some point, but he keeps on fighting, even with his bare hands. The look in his eyes is almost rabid, animal. The tiger swipes at the warrior’s face, grazing his face, giving him a wound that runs in thick claw marks from forehead to earlobe on the right side of his face. She is frozen by fear, violence something she had never truly witnessed before, only in fights between animals in the glen. This was something else.
The warrior swings his fists for a few last times, and the saber tooth falls to the ground. The warrior has blood pouring out of the slashes on his face, his vision quickly fading in that right eye. He almost collapses against the tree that she is curled close to, hugging her knees. His head falls and rests onto her left shoulder, his breath ragged and rough.
“I might… pass out on you. Or die. Who knows. But you’re safe now, I promise. Wake me if anything else comes.” After the words quietly drop from his lips, his consciousness begins to fade. His vision is gone in that eye now, his body in such a soreness of pain, but his heart content. He saved her. Sure, she was a stranger. But he saved her. She seemed.. special, like magic, to him. Something worth risking his life for in a heartbeat.
As the blood from the warrior’s wound begins to seep into her clothes, she is brought back to reality. Her instincts kick in, and she realizes how imperative it is that she helps this man who risked his life to save hers. Her hands fumble with the tie of her alchemy bag strapped to her waist, her nerves still high.
She had never even seen another person before. Her spriggan guardians taught her the language of the humans so that one day if she did leave she could understand. She could never figure out how to speak it, though. Only to comprehend. But the spriggans didn't think she’d leave so soon. Their anger was explosive, vibrant, loud. And that anger, that fear of losing the child, was displayed in the deliverance of a wound. Her eye, stricken with the power of nature, a stray ball of energy released in anger. Somehow it made the multitude of green tattoos she’d been given seem more fitting. Like she was part forest, part woman. Whatever she was, she had to help his man, and quickly. She manages to whip up a combination of plants that should help with his pain, and makes a fire. Putting it in water would make it easiest to give him in his current state.
The life of a human is frightening. The saber tooths in the glen didn’t bother her and her spriggan family at all; they simply co-existed. Outside of the glen, there was none such of a truce, it seemed. But there was clearly good in this big world, she thinks, staring at the man slumped against a tree as she warms her hands on the fire.
She rips off the bottom hem of her tattered dress, and dips it in the water, which has almost reached a boil. Thank goodness for that abandoned cart she’d come upon earlier. The pot was already more than worth its weight in salmonberries. She gently wipes the man’s face with the wet fabric, exposing handsome features under all of that blood. Placing the dress-rags aside, planning to rinse them in a creek she heard nearby, she puts the plants in the pot, and waits until the mixture changes into a vibrant herbaceous color. Taking the pot off of the fire, she hums as she works, rinsing the rags in the creek, waiting for the medicine to cool.
The girl bites her lip, wondering if it was worth it to go back to that abandoned carriage. Maybe it had something he could drink out of? She’d never needed anything other than her hands to drink from before, so she wasn’t sure how it worked. The pot would work, mayhaps. She’d seen a pot before, one of the spriggans had found one in a hunter’s camp. They gave it to her, to make medicine drinks with. She rather liked the taste of herbs and berries in the luscious spring water. But… that was all behind her now. She has to focus on the present. On the now.
She returns from the creek, and cleans his face once more. The cold rags seem to make him stir, which she feels a tad bit guilty for. But in a way, it was perfect timing. She picks the wilted plants from the pot, and discards them, tossing them in a nearby bush. The pot had cooled enough for Selli to grip the bottom, and tilt the contents gently into the warrior’s mouth. Perhaps understanding what was happening, he drinks the whole pot quickly.
“Thank you,” he croaks. “I hope that was medicine, at least.”
She smiles, and nods.
“Phew.” He tries to sit up, but she puts her hands on his shoulders, stopping him. She shakes her head: no. “Oh, fine, fine. I… damn this hurts,” he mumbles, hand reaching for his face. Her hand flitters to the wound, too, and it covers his own. She looks in his eyes, trying to convince him wordlessly that it will be okay.
He falls asleep once more, this time in a much more healthy state. She takes to cleaning the blood from his sword, and from his armor, as well as forming a makeshift eyepatch, keeping the wound safe from the elements. She even dares to explore her immediate surroundings, foraging some food and finding more medicinal plants.
When she returns, munching on a wild carrot, the man is awake. Moving, even. He shakily stands, and scans the forest. He smiles weakly when he notices the young woman emerging from the brush.
“Hey,” he says. His voice was so deep. Did all humans sound like that? It felt like the polar opposite of a bird’s song, but it had the same effect on her heart… It made her happy. “The name’s Farkas. I’m a Companion. Who’re you?” he asks, tilting his head to the side.
She looks at him with a sad expression. How could she explain she doesn’t know how to speak his language? Or to speak at all? Spriggan-speak was more of a lilted song than this human speak was. She softly pats her throat, and shakes her head. Shrugs. Pausing for a moment, she realizes that maybe spriggan-song would help. And magic. Maybe it could explain what she couldn’t.
She closes her fingers, making a fist for a second, and when she opens it there is a ball of green energy. Leaves and various plant matter swirl in the ball of magic.
“A Spriggan?” he asks, incredulous. The question is more to himself than to her.
She nods, and lets out a common spriggan-song she’d been sung to as a child. It was a short but beautiful little thing, about the falling leaves of autumn.
He seems to vaguely understand what she was trying to explain. Somehow she was… a spriggan? But she looked like a Nord, just like him. “What can I call you?”
She co*cks her head to the side, not really understanding.
“Your name?”
She shrugs.
“You don’t have a name?” he asks, in disbelief.
She shakes her head. What was a name?
“Okay, well, I’ve gotta figure out something to call you… Hey, what was in that tea you made?” he asks, pointing to the pot.
Tea? Her medicine? So many new words. She pulls out a small yellow flower from her pouch.
“I think that’s celandine,” he mumbles. “Celandine. That could be your name, for now. Until you pick one, that is.”
She nods, humming a little jingle to the syllables of her new gift. A name! How grand that seemed.
“So, Celandine. Are you lost?”
She nods.
“Do you have a home to go back to?”
She shakes her head.
“Well, would you like to come with me to Whiterun?”
She thinks for a moment. What has she got to lose? She shrugs, then nods yes. Whatever a city is, it must be safer than the open forest.
“Alrighty then. Let’s take turns on watch and sleep, then we’ll set off. You should get some rest. I’ll keep you safe,” he declares, pointing with a nod of his head to his sword that’s leant against a rock.
She smiles. He was so… different, from everything she knew. But he seemed good, kind. She curls up in a small ball, accustomed to sleeping on the forest floor.
“Hey, Celandine. It’d be better if you were on the other side of me, y’know? More defended,” he points to a patch of ground near him, which is indeed safer. Protected by a rock outcropping.
She moves to this spot, and yawns. She was tired.
“Here,” he quietly adds, covering her with a cloak as she falls asleep. The warmth of his hands as he placed the warm fabric on her body is the last thing she registers before she falls asleep.
