Melchior part 2, Big City Initiation

We were now traveling, seeing the wide world!  Towards the end of the first day, we saw a fort in the distance, and as we approached there was a skirmish happening between Imperials and Stormcloaks!  The civil war I had only every heard rumors of was unfolding before our very eyes.  Emma and I saw an Imperial soldier monitoring the action from a hill top, and we snuck up behind him and knocked him out, taking his armor and weapons.  Then, a bit spooked, we skirted the battle, spending an extra day climbing over a steep mountain instead of walking through the pass containing the fort.  It was tough climbing, but we could see Whiterun in the distance from the peak!  We guessed we'd get there tomorrow.

We picked our way down the mountain the next morning, and come to the main road towards the city in the afternoon.  But it drew dark as we approached the outlying farms, and we encountered a strange clownish man with a broken-down cart, apparently trying to take his dead mother to her burial... but he complained that the local farmer won't help him fix his wheel.  I went to the farm and convinced the dullard to do the right thing and help someone in need.  Then we moved on to Whiterun, destroying a pair of wandering skeletons in the moonlight.  Odd that they should be just loitering in the tubdra so close to civilization... anyways, we entered town just as the next morning was dawning.

An Imperial soldier was hassling some poor blacksmith woman, trying to get her to make weapons for the Legion.  I interrupted and got him to leave, then did some business with the flustered smith.  I sold her some stuff, then wandered around the market district and sold more junk to a friendly Breton named Belethor.  Taking a lunch break after than, I overheard an old woman being harassed by some Imperials calling themselves Battleborn.  She was evidently distraught about her missing son, so I offered to help the poor crone find out what happened to him.  Fralia Gray-Mane was her name, and she introduced me to her other son who recruited Emma and I to go spring the missing son from a Thalmor interrogator, (those vile elves, working with the Empire of course).  The prison was waaaay northwest though, so I explained that I would need to stop home first and see my folks for the first time in years.  After planning to meet up with this Gray-Mane guy later, Emma and I hired a carriage and set out for my hometown of Markarth.  We would catch up on sleep during the ride.