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Lydia was walking with her thane as they traveled along the path. They were talking about this and that, nothing too important. When she noticed her thane freeze and stop walking. She followed his line of sight to an overturned cart with a few bodies strewn about.
Her thane broke into a run towards the cart and she had to sprint to keep up with him. When they reached the cart the dragonborn dropped to his knees in front of the body of what seems to be a civilian merchant, Lydia looks around identifying more bodies of merchants, a couple bodied with the fur armor that was typical of bandits, and one or two that seemed to be mercenaries most likely to protect the merchants. While cataloging this she missed her thane stand up and more to lay his hand on the cart.
Now she knew that her thane was a powerful mage, and how sometimes when overly emotional he lost grip his on his power. Like how he radiated warmth when happy or how when upset he gave of sparks unconsciously trying to keep people away. Knowing this however did not prepare her for the temperature drop that occurred as she approached the cart. It was a warm day but she could see her breath as she laid her hand on the dragonborn's shoulder, looking into his eyes she saw a fury that she had never seen before. His eyes softened upon realizing who he was looking at, but his fingers still were trailed by frost as he dragged them across the wood of the wagon.
"Lydia," he spoke suddenly "I know that I told you that I got taken to Helgen with the Stormcloaks because I stumbled into an imperial ambush correct?" She nodded not quite understanding where he was going with this. "I don't think I ever actually told you why I was not paying attention to the point of bumbling into an ambush" he took a breath to steady himself as the temperature began to slowly rise again.
"I was raised by my father, I never knew my mother whether she ran off or died I have no idea, dad didn't like talking about her, I didn't really care much my dad was all I needed," tears were starting to gather in his eyes, but he wiped their before they fell. "He worked as a mercenary, taking mostly protection jobs, so I spent most of my life on the road and when I found out about my magic I swore that I'd help him out, so once I was old enough he let me help out with guarding the merchants." The tears were free flowing now and he didn't even try to wipe them away.
"it was just a normal job, me and my father were in front of the carriage, and I had said something that he laughed at, he was always laughing like that, he had a deep throaty laugh that always made me feel so much better no matter how badly I was feeling, and he had opened his mouth to say something and then suddenly he was falling back with an arrow between his eyes." His voice already thick with emotion gets thicker and he has to struggle to continue speaking, "He was dead before he even hit the ground. It was a bandit ambush, and they walked out of the trees and were screaming something but I couldn't hear them I was just standing there staring at my dad, the most important person in my life, just lying there dead." He paused again trying and failing to get a hold of himself before continuing " and suddenly something inside of me just snapped and I ran, I had promised those merchants that I would do anything even lay down my life for them but I just ran and left them to those bandits. So I get an arrow in my shoulder but I just kept running and running and running completely unaware of what was going on around me, so like an idiotic coward I ran right into the Imperials." He finally reached his limit and broke down and began sobbing in earnest, Lydia after letting him talk believing that he needed to say everything brought him into a hug and squeezed him with all of the strength that she could muster as he slumped against her.
After the crying petered out into the little hiccups that happen when someone cries out all of the tears that they possibly can then into nothing, he reached his arms around Lydia and returned the hug while whispering, for who's sake he didn't know, "I've been trying not to think about it, but I saw the cart and it made me think about it, and then it finally hit me that I would never hear his laugh again or, or," he struggled trying to figure out the millions of little things that he would miss.
"I understand, you don't have to say anything else." Lydia spoke up for the first time after they had seen the cart. He shifted himself so that his back was against her chest and they sat in silence for awhile amongst the dead mourning for them and the others that they have lost.
"You know what? He would have really liked you" the dragonborn spoke breaking the silence that surrounded the two.
"Do you really think so?"
I don't just think so," he said standing up "I know so" he offered her his hand pulling her up when she grabbed it. "After all how could he not like my closest friend?" They shared a small smile between themselves before wordlessly deciding between themselves to continue along the path towards their destination.