#she's from solstheim her mother is from the northern skaal village and her father is a redoran warrior

[nelbii]

i haven’t drawn anything in aaaaaaagesssss

Currently working on my dragonborn’s design and backstory

Her name is Pilfink uwu

[born-of-ravens-and-kings]

The Tale of the Winter-King I: The Beginning

Okay, so I made this tumblr a while ago, then did nothing with it. Me and my girlfriend have this thing though, where she watches me play games over Skype. I basically turn on my webcam and point it at the television. I’ve started writing up the exploits of one of our Skyrim characters though, one you might find familiar in some respects, but very different in others. It’s a bit of a long one, especially for the first chapter and especially for my first proper post, so upon the advice of my darling girl, I’ve put the whole thing a mouse click away. So, if you’re interested, prepare for a tale of magic and monsters, sons and snow, the wild and the seat of Winter itself. And yes, I know the dates don’t necessarily match up with canon, but I didn’t realise that when I wrote the initial version and I like it too much to change. Enjoy!

From whence he came we did not know, but into the battle he rode, on a brilliant steed of pallid white. Elf we called him, for Elf he was, yet unlike any other of his kind we had ever seen before that day. His spear and armor bore the radiant and terrible glow of unknown magicka, and so adorned this unknown rider seemed more wight than warrior.

What troubled, nay, frightened us most at that moment was the call that rose from the Elven ranks. It was not fear, not wonder, but an unabashed and unbridled joy, the kind of felicity felt by a damned man who has been granted a second chance at life. For at that time the Elves were as damned and near death as ever they had been during the great skirmishes of Solstheim. The Battle of the Moesring was to be the final stand between Nord and Elf on our fair island. Led by Ysgramor, we had driven the Elven scourge from Skyrim, and were intent on cleansing Solstheim of their kind as well. Our warriors, armed with the finest axes and swords Nord craftsmen could forge, cut great swaths through the enemy ranks. The slopes of the Moesring ran red with Elf blood. 

Why, then, would our foe rejoice? Could one rider bring such hope to an army so hopeless?

To most of our kind, the meaning of the call was clear, but the words were but a litany of Elven chants and cries. There were some among us, however, the scholars and chroniclers, who knew well the words and shuddered at their significance.

"The Snow Prince is come! Doom is at hand!"

There was then a great calm that overcame the Elves that still stood. Through their mass the Snow Prince did ride, and as a longboat slices the icy waters of the Fjalding he parted the ranks of his kin. The magnificent white horse slowed to a gallop, then a trot, and the unknown Elf rider moved to the front of the line at a slow, almost ghostlike pace.

A Nord warrior sees much in a life of bloodshed and battle, and is rarely surprised by anything armed combat may bring. But few among us that day could have imagined the awe and uncertainty of a raging battlefield that all at once went motionless and silent. Such is the effect the Snow Prince had on us all. For when the joyous cries of the Elves had ended, there remained a quiet known only in the solitude of slumber. It was then our combined host, Elf and Nord alike, were joined in a terrible understanding -- victory or defeat mattered little that day on the slopes of the Moesring Mountains. The one truth we all shared was that death would come to many that day, victor and vanquished alike. The glorious Snow Prince, an Elf unlike any other, did come that day to bring death to our kind. And death he so brought.

Like a sudden, violent snow squall that rends travelers blind and threatens to tear loose the very foundations of the sturdiest hall, the Snow Prince did sweep into our numbers. Indeed the ice and snow did begin to swirl and churn about the Elf, as if called upon to serve his bidding. The spinning of that gleaming spear whistled a dirge to all those who would stand in the way of the Snow Prince, and our mightiest fell before him that day. Ulfgi Anvil-Hand, Strom the White, Freida Oaken-Wand, Heimdall the Frenzied. All lay dead at the foot of the Moesring Mountains.

For the first time that day it seemed the tide of battle had actually turned. The Elves, spurred on by the deeds of the Snow Prince, rallied together for one last charge against our ranks. It was then, in a single instant, that the Battle of the Moesring came to a sudden and unexpected end.

Finna, daughter of Jofrior, a lass of only twelve years and squire to her mother, watched as the Snow Prince cut down her only parent. In her rage and sorrow, Finna picked up Jofrior's sword and threw it savagely at her mother's killer. When the Elf's gleaming spear stopped its deadly dance, the battlefield fell silent, and all eyes turned to the Snow Prince. No one that day was more surprised than the Elf himself at the sight that greeted them all. For upon his great steed the Snow Prince still sat, the sword of Jofrior buried deeply in his breast. And then, he fell, from his horse, from the battle, from life. The Snow Prince lay dead, slain by a child.

With their savior defeated, the spirit of the remaining Elven warriors soon shattered. Many fled, and those that remained on the battlefield were soon cut down by our broad Nord axes. When the day was done, all that remained was the carnage of the battlefield. And from that battlefield came a dim reminder of valor and skill, for the brilliant armor and spear of the Snow Prince still shined. Even in death, this mighty and unknown Elf filled us with awe.

It is common practice to burn the corpses of our fallen foes. This is as much a necessity as it is custom, for death brings with it disease and dread. Our chieftains wished to cleanse Solstheim of the Elven horde, in death as well as life. It was decided, however, that such was not to be the fate of the Snow Prince. One so mighty in war yet so loved by his kin deserved better. Even in death, even if an enemy of our people.

And so we brought the body of the Snow Prince, wrapped in fine silks, to a freshly dug barrow. The gleaming armor and spear were presented on a pedestal of honor, and the tomb was arrayed with treasures worthy of royalty. All of the mighty chieftains agreed with this course, that the Elf should be so honored. His body would be preserved in the barrow for as long as the earth chose, but would not be offered the protection of our Stalhrim, which was reserved for Nord dead alone.

So ends this account of the Battle of the Moesring, and the fall of the magnificent Elven Snow Prince. May our gods honor him in death, and may we never meet his kind again in life. - From 'Fall of the Snow Prince', an account of the Battle of the Moesring as transcribed by Lokheim, chronicler to the chieftain Ingjaldr White-Eye

Among the Skaal of Solstheim, there lived a woman named Skadi. Three days before the battle, whilst wandering along the Northern shore of the island, she came upon the Prince and his retinue. Though she was of the Skaal and thus a skilled hunter, she failed to avoid their notice. She was captured, and brought before the Snow Prince. 

The moment she entered his presence, she was overcome by his beauty. Skin, pale as the purest snows, eyes the colour of a sharp and bitter frost. The moment he beheld her, his cold and emotionless facade melted away. The Falmer and the Skaal had lived on Solstheim for as long as any of her people could remember. If they had not lived together, side by side, they had always at least lived peaceably. For his part, he knew by her dress that she was not like the others of her race, the vengeful Nords who even now slaughtered his people. 

The Snow Prince ordered her released from her bonds and invited her to be his guest until the day of battle, for he could not risk revealing his position. For three days, each shared company with the other.

For three nights, each shared knowledge of the other.

On the morning of the fourth day, he sent her back to her people with what provisions his forces could spare and his promise to come for her should he succeed.

He never returned.

But though he did not know it, the Snow Prince was to have an heir.

When Skadi discovered what had happened, she was devastated and for months afterward, went about as though her own life was over, tormented by the thought of what might have been.

When Skadi discovered that she was pregnant, the light came back into her eyes and among the Skaal, it was said that she moved with such lightness of step that she did not e'en disturb the snow.

Yet her mind was also troubled by a cloud of fear. The Nords had done all they could to remove the Falmer from Solstheim and from Skyrim and though they had treated the father with such respect in death, she did not think it likely that they would treat the son of the Snow Prince so well in life.  

The Skaal are by nature a trusting people, but they are by no means stupid.

And Skadi was a skilled hunter. She knew how to hide herself from beast and man both and she had heard tell of a new city in Skyrim, built by Ysgramor himself where the White River met the Sea.

When she was near to term, she bartered passage on a ship and made her way there, to Windhelm. She earned her living as a tanner, as she had done for her village.

One day, as she was making a delivery to the steward of the High King, she felt a pain in her abdomen. Her waters had broken.  

Her son was born in a servant's bed, in the Palace of Kings itself.

The Snow Prince had come once more.

The boy was fine and strong and if anyone noticed a point to his ears or the particular whiteness of his skin, none remarked upon it.

And Skadi named him Jokul, in the manner of her people.

As the years went by, she watched her son grow, seeing reflected in his every movement his father. Whenever they ventured out into the city, she bade him go about hooded and cloaked, so certain was she that none should know his heritage.

If Jokul ever asked of his father, she said only that though she had known him only a brief time, he had been fair and brave and gifted and that that, by the All-Maker, would have been enough for her.

Their days were hard and often meager, for Skadi's years were advancing upon her and she could not work as well as she used to, but they were for the most part happy and content, together in their little home.  

Then, on Jokul's tenth birthday, he made a blade of ice in his hand. It was small and brittle and broke almost immediately, but he was delighted with it. When he showed it to his mother, she wept, though with joy or sorrow he could not tell. She bade him put on his hood and cloak and to go to the Palace, to ask for an old friend of hers and beg her to tell the Court Wizard of his gift, that he might be properly trained in its use. 

This Jokul did, and though the old mage seemed dubious, he agreed to take him on as pupil, even allowing the boy a small stipend when he had realised that he could not learn and help his mother both.  

Amazed at this generosity, Jokul rushed home to tell his mother the good news, only to find that she had died in his absence, seemingly at peace and with a smile on her face. 

At her funeral, he swore that he would make her proud of him and he was more than true to his word. Jokul grew into a great man and a powerful mage, skilled in the Clever Craft and deft with a blade.

In time, he found love and was married. He and his wife had a son, who like his father went on to discover his own gifts and on and on it went, down through the ages, the unbroken line of the Snow Prince enduring long past the time of Ysgramor's kin.

But not a one of them guessed the truth of the matter. In time, their proud history was forgotten and the sons of the Snow Prince became little more than faces in a crowd.

As the blood grew thinner and thinner, their gifts too diminished and the Nordic attitude to magic became so far removed from their forefather's reverence that those who did discover their power rarely chose to develop it.  

In the one-hundred and seventy-fifth year of the Fourth Era, a boy was born in the city of Winterhold.

His mother, Nál, died giving birth to him and his father, whose name was Fárbauti, beat him for it. This went on until the day of the boy's tenth birthday.

On that day, after a particularly brutal thrashing, the boy spoke to his father. There was something different in his voice. Something hard and cold. After he had heard what his son had to say, Fárbauti simply walked away, striding into the storm and the howling wind.

After the Great Collapse in 4E 122, when so much of the city had crumbled away into the sea, Winterhold was no longer the city it once was, no longer that which Shalidor had built.

On that day, the boy looked around at his home, at what it had become and his resolve was set. Things would be better. He would make them better.

And, as his eyes fell upon the College, he knew how he would do it.

The College would never have accepted a child to study among them, so he would need to go elsewhere and so he began to plan. It took him the better part of a year, but he eventually worked it all out. With nothing but the clothes on his back, what little money he could scrape together and a Steel Dagger from his homeland to remind him of why he was leaving and why he would one day return, the boy set off.

He travelled South, to the Jeroll Mountains and crossed them into Cyrodiil. From there, he walked the Silver Road until he reached the Imperial City and the Red Ring, following it around to the Green Road in the Nibenay Valley.

The journey had taken him three weeks on foot and his birthday had come and gone. The boy was eleven when he arrived in the City of Bravil, cold and wet and hungry, for it had been raining that day and (as he had not seen a deer for a week and a half) his supplies were running out.

Despite these problems, he wasted no time in finding out where the local chapter house of the Mage's Guild was to be found and presenting himself to the Archmagister as a pupil.

He did not have money for training, but new members had been hard to come by of late and the Archmagister could see that the boy was tired. He allowed him to stay, giving him the opportunity to pay off his tuition by working for the Guild Hall.

The boy stayed at the Guild Hall, but to his regret and great annoyance only had enough time to master the Flames spell and some rudimentary Healing magic before the dissolution of the Mage's Guild the following year.  

With his education incomplete and nowhere to go but back to the road, he elected to spend some time travelling Cyrodiil.

For thirteen years he wandered the land, the boy growing into a man. He shed his Nordic accent in favour of an Imperial one, learning cunning words and biting wit as he listened to whispers at doors or stood crouched in the shadows of a darkened room.

In the cities, he learned to play the game of court, to move people like pieces on a board. 

On the roads, his blade served him well, as did what little magic he knew, keeping away beasts and bandits in the night.

For thirteen years he wandered until, in his twenty-fifth year, a beggar in Bruma informed him that Civil War had broken out in Skyrim.

The Snow Prince would come again.

He had met many people on his travels and had been given many names, after the fashion of the Nords.

They called him Silvertongue. Long-Knife. Liesmith. One day, they will call him something more than that.

For the moment, however, he has but one name. One name that is truly important.

Loki.