Thank you all for the new reviews, follows, and favs. I made it to 100, so here's a celebration. Another update without a year's wait! Yippee!

I have decided to condense some of my chapters. Instead of one major thing happening each short chapter with a "nonaction", poetic chapter (dreams, memories, exposition) between each, I'm going to mosey on along so if I take forever to update, at least I am giving up some of the good stuff and I can finish this story faster. I feel quite terrible for having drug you all along for years with extended silences. I am thankful for you all. I know this story is changing from a kinky fill to something I hope will be deeper, and I hope this does not disappoint. The wait is long, but I think I will earn my M rating over and over. I doubt I will make author's notes again unless I need advice, so see you at the ending! Please, message or review if you have questions or suggestions for scenes you'd like to see. Although I've nailed down my broad plot, this was a kmeme prompt after all, so yes I will consider some situations I could add in for more content. I'm excited to get to use my additional characters soon. Yes, characters, not just the slave girl. See if you can guess who will make a larger appearance! : ) Also I had (to me) a neat idea, with probably no lore basis or any bit of sense, but I quite like it. Since this is my last A/N, when you read it next chapter you should definitely let me know how you feel about it!

A breeze flows through the thick field of static, electricity, fiery currents between them, unaware of how its innocent rustling of leaves and flower buds is enough to bring a ringing to her ears. That is all she hears, the ringing, the piercing high pitched squeal as the clanky cogs in her mind turn. The dragons go to Riften. Why? Has the world gone so mad, so wrong, in her absence that an army now flies to ravage its first city?

She looks out to the clear skies, can imagine spirals of ash and smog, the screams of souls wrenching free of broken bodies, flames licking up into the horizon. She turns to him again, sees he has risen to his full height. His neck, as thick as a tree's trunk, stretches high in to the sky. He is even larger than his towering brethren. That is something she cannot get used to, being around such a massive being without constant fighting and bloodshed. Without the adrenaline in her veins, the pounding in her head to kill kill kill, she drinks in the enormity of him and feels incredibly small.

She has to crane her own neck practically perpendicular to her spine just to catch his eyes, but catch them she does. It is not the first time her mind remarks on the way those huge orbs mirror the very thing she is imagining, brilliant blue cut by radiant red. A fire in his own eyes that burns all the way down to his black soul. She thinks it may consume her as a heat blooms in her stomach, but she quickly blinks the thought away, fighting not to question where it came from. She won't even consider confronting the warmth pooling within her. "You really wish to start a war, Alduin?"

His monstrous head turns, one eye peering down at her with haughty mirth. The scales along his mouth crinkle as they curl up into what can only be his best smirk, sliced across his face like an open wound, sharp fangs bleeding through. "The war is won, Kulaas. I have claimed the world." He lowers his head smoothly, the muscles in the curvature of his neck tensing and loosening as they balance the new position of his weighty skull. Her own throat tenses, her heartbeat clear in the veins of her throat. She thinks only she can hear it, the racing beats as she fills with rage and… fear. But he can hear it, see it, smell her entire essence around him, practically taste her on his tongue. Oh, how he wants to.

He falters. Taste her blood, of course. He wants to kill her, that is all. She will be a meal, a triumphant, special meal, but still just food for his fury. A spot to remove in his cleansing of the world. That is all. That is all.

She stomps away, ever so childish. Her arms fling out dramatically, and a simple unfurling of his wings bathes her in darkness. She ignores his one-up-man-ship.

"And you really think that they'll just bend over, let you kill them? A city ran by criminals might be the last place you should test your might." Her hands find her hips. He appreciates the way they curve beneath the thin brown tunic, wide and supple, so unlike the hard, sharp haunches of the females of his kind. Yes, his pet was exemplary for her kind, but no match to those species superior to her. He almost felt pity, to know she could not comprehend her infinite inferiority. But he will teach her, he will inform his little entertainer while she loses everything she has ever known, her family, her friends, her lovers, her acquaintances, her kind, until she begs to be put out of her imperfect misery. And then he will hold on to her even longer. He will not let her go until they are the last beings in existence, just him and her in the dark plane left when he has consumed Nirn. Never again would Akatosh dare to take his birthright, to threaten him with a challenger who was so soft, so weak, so pliant that she became his slave. His.

He steps forward, taloned wing crushing the stone and dirt beneath as the ground gives way to his force, sinking in on itself. "I will not kill them all. Surely some will be so desperately selfish as to offer their life in service? As you serve me."

"I will never serve you." She doesn't know why his simple mocking remark inflames her as it does (she should be use to this, should be calm and one step ahead) but her chest and throat swell with power. She does not feel that magic stopper her throat; there is no gag this time. His eyes widen, almost imperceptibly so, but she is trained to pick up his minutest of expressions, and to savor them.

"FUS RO DAH!"

Her shout, her expertly mastered Thu'um, strikes him with such strength his head actually pulls back, the edges of his wings flapping in the gales. Stones behind him crack and splinter, taking all her rage, desperation, fear, disgust, pain, loneliness, and something else, something small and somehow both warm and dark, something foreign and unfathomable. Or, at least, something she does not wish to comprehend. Her soul alights within her, the swirling force somehow perceptible within her physical form. It licks at the edges of her body, trying desperately to escape into this reality, to swallow Alduin's. She has felt this dance before, but knows it will likely never complete. Unlike the other dragons, Mirmulnir and Sahloknir and Viinturuth and so many others, his soul will not be so easily claimed. But, she muses, neither will hers.

Alduin straightens, takes a deep breath she can practically feel as the air around her is sucked into his maw. His icy gaze pins her and then his eyes turn to molten lava. She feels the terrible, desperate desire to run, run as fast as she can, but she steadies her legs. Slowly, she takes a step back, each small distance gained immediately lost as the Dragon King stalks closer. Like a predator, he lowers close to the ground, flat, smooth, sleek, and oh so dangerous. Enraged.

That contemptible little rat.

The adrenaline starts to pump through her, so harshly she can practically feel her veins swell with every bursting surge. Her breath quickens, shallows. Her eyes glare up into her captor's, challenging him. She has created quite a… situation, but it was wonderful to feel her voice, her real Voice, rip through her throat. It was even more pleasing to see Alduin's head snap back, unprepared for her daring move.

But she has suffered many days, physically and mentally, her body practically malnourished. Her strength simpers and leaves her to face the monster she has awakened. She steels herself for his shout, raises her arms to somehow deflect whatever wind or fire or ice he is about to send her way.

But, sickeningly, he does something unexpected. Instead of an earth shattering roar, she hears the soft whisper.

"Hah."

Immediately she feels her mind splinter, her eyes glaze. No no no NO. He will not bend her will, he will not take control so easily. She will not be dominated. She will not be restrained. Her body is rooted in its spot, awaiting Alduin's command. Her fragile synapses fire and blow out as she sends direction after direction to her limbs but none listen. Her own body will not obey her.

"Dov."

The strangest sensation envelops her. She has been frozen but now she is truly, completely still. Her soul, once stirring inside her, fighting frantically to reach Alduin's, moves no longer. It is painful and it is wrong to feel her entire essence seized in this beast's terrible spell.

Please, he cannot hear her, please no more. Release me.

Her lips must be moving, silent but pressed on by her last reserves of power, and she hears it again. His laugh. He rests his jaw flat against the ground, peering up at her with wide eyes, mocking the way in which he always saw her. Tiny, helpless, weak. His tongue, long and soft and warm, curls against her ankle. She wants to scream, oh please just let her scream. But she is silent; her mind, body, and soul ready to obey his every command. He yanks suddenly and she flies backwards, crashes, and his tongue drags her even closer to him. The slimy appendage is as strong as a man's arms, pulling her effortlessly while her tunic tears across the stones and sticks in the garden. She feels tiny rivulets of blood trace her battered back. But the physical pain is nothing as she stares straight ahead, eyes lost in the sky, unable to even glace down without his permission. She is terrified, her dream, her nightmare, rushing back to her, flooding her senses as his tongue trails up her calf, licking across her goosebumped skin. She feels him inside her all over again, ripping her apart, breaking her open, taking over her body for his own calculated curiosity.

But this is not some wolf in sheep's clothing, some darkened man in the recesses of her mind speaking with Alduin's voice. This is the beast. This is her demon and she is in its personal Hell.

His wings fall to either side of her head, cloaking her in darkness, imprisoning her yet again. He leans down to meet her eyes, his snout presses into her chest. A simple push and he buries her into the ground, crushing her ribs. She coughs, fears they may break, but resolves her eyes to be expressionless, or at least not as horrified and jumbled as she feels.

"Do not ever dare to strike me again, Dragonborn. I keep you alive as a trinket, as a show of your race's pathetic inadequacies, as a reminder that Nirn has no hope. At any moment of any day I can kill you, be rid of you, and lose not a single thing. Zu'u dein hin laas. Do not forget. Your only hope is to please me enough to earn your keep. Without a future you have no hope of escape or of triumph. Though, you will never have such wishes come true." He lifts a wing, the talon curling over her throat. He streaks it across her flesh and it opens like butter, a thin, angry welt rising to release droplets of her blood. His tongue snakes out again, licking up the irony substance. He moans, feral, a rush of hot air fanning out from his nostrils. This, she knows, is his most revolting sound.

Tears form at the corners of her eyes and do not ask his permission to fall. He is a dragon, but in this moment it is his seeming humanity that makes him most dangerous. She is dreaming all over again. She is being broken, tarnished, utterly damaged beyond repair all over again. She is not just scared, she is appalled. Bile chokes in her silent throat.

She looks into his orb, shudders at the clear nictating membrane slides over it. There is something strange there, something so threatening, something so angry. But he does not stare at her. He does not stare at anything, obviously lost in his own mind.

Her fingers begin to twitch and she readies herself to thrash against him, to hit and scratch and bite and do anything she can to wriggle out of this beast's grasp. To bring his teeth down upon her and finally kill her.

But he does not make her struggle. She watches him, wide eyed, stunned, and he finally snaps out of his thoughts. He catches her gaze. His eyes darken, she thinks with shame but quickly changes her mind. Such a narcissistic creature could not possibly know the word.

And then he rises and his wings take him to the sky, his tail whips up her paralyzed form as he flies away. The tip grazes just enough to leave a mark across her stomach. The gusts beneath his wings push her down and lash her hair wildly. Stones and debris pelt her skin as they scatter from his take off.

And then he is gone.

When her body returns to her control, she stands slowly. She looks along the walls of the garden for any beings watching her.

And then, she runs. She runs straight back to the room Alduin has deemed her prison.

The black dragon glides through the sky, turning on his side, dipping low to the horizon only to fling himself up with such force that trees bend their trunks away from his powerful wings. A strange, bothersome buzzing runs through his body and he throws himself through the air as if able to simply shake it off like drops of water.

Ever since he came into this world, he has only known one thing. That he must find her, beat her, and in doing so conquer the whole human race. They are pathetic, small creatures, with no sense of responsibility. They collectively pour all their hope into one being, of course someone other than them, to rise to the needs and wants of the people. Crush that one vessel of courage and the rest fall back, showing their bellies and begging for a savior. That is one good thing, he thinks, that the Dragonborn possesses. She takes care of herself, no matter how poorly. The only worthy rival in all this world. He would expect a disappointment, a boredom to come from her easy defeat. But instead he feels something wholly different, an excitement, and it disgusts him. No, she disgusts him. He has never felt so unnatural, so wrong before and it is all her fault. His heart thrums in his chest, accusing him. He must kill her. But he will not.

What is he becoming?

He turns to a village tucked quietly against the base of a mountain. In all his eons, he has never once questioned himself. He roars, splits the sky open. Meteors crush the town to dust.

He is still not satisfied. He cannot think of what would placate him.

Days become weeks and the Dragonborn settles into a basic routine. She rises in the morning, eats whatever has been placed outside her dorm, practices the same dances Vilkas has taught her, bathes (alone), and then walks through the palace on the same reconnaissance mission she will always have. Learn the routine of others and look for holes to slip through. She tries to listen for any details of Riften, but hears nothing. In war, silence is never good. The defeat of Riften must have been so easy as to be unremarkable.

She has not seen, nor heard of, Alduin in all this time. Whatever happened in the garden she pushes down and out from her mind. The best way to beat something is to know it, and not understanding Alduin as clearly as she once thought has unsettled her greatly. Her plans have melted away and reformed, superficially. Step 2, contact the Companions, however that may happen. Warn them of the impending battles. Hopefully supply them with something more than just "Be ready." Step 3, escape the palace. Step 4, confront, and defeat, Alduin with her brothers at her side in battle.

Step 1, she resolves, is to contact Paarthurnax. Oh how she misses him. She has made many friends: Vilkas, that clever mercenary Marcurio, Lydia, Derkeethus. But none compare to Paarthurnax. He was her teacher; he truly sheltered her under his wings. Yes, the Greybeards helped her. The Companions welcomed her. Each person has given her something, conversation or skills or items. But Paarthurnax was the being who was able to calm her, to guide her properly. She had spent weeks at a time atop that mountain with him, learning, practicing, failing, and finally triumphing. All Shouts she tested with him. All stories she shared with him. All hopes she held in him. And when the sun would dip below into the valley, as darkness fell, she would curl up beside him to sleep. He never questioned her, never admonished her, never pushed her away. He would just fall asleep as though their friendship was the most natural thing in the world. He reminded her of her father but also something else, something she could never place.

It was both ironic and terrible that his brother would be her greatest threat and doom. That Paarthurnax had trained her precisely to kill Alduin, and that one goal she had never reached. She had failed them both. And if there was anything to drive her to escape, it was the desire to prove to Paarthurnax all the time and energy he had invested in her was worth something.

She wanted to show that she deserved the dragon soul that made up half of her being. That she was not just some strong human, but that she was as much dragon, inside, as he or Alduin was. The latter would never accept this, hell bent on his genocide, but Paarthurnax could understand, if she could just prove it.

She did not know where this need for reassurance arose from, surely she could feel her soul inside of her, could feel the strength it gave to every Thu'um, could feel that she was the destiny the world needed.

And it still needed her. She could not give in now.

Another punch meets the table she has set on its side, splintering the wood. Her kick lands, her heel digging into the dent she has just made. The table is not quite as unyielding as Alduin's scaly hide, but if she closes her eyes she can see his face whipping back from every hit and Fus Ro Dah she can manage.

She pauses, panting and pouring sweat. Her legs are mushy from fatigue. The Alduin of her mind lies defeated at her feet.

This, this is what she is good at. Working. Growing stronger. This is what she will focus on, not Alduin's strange glances, not her own confusing thoughts, not her broken past and certainly not her uncertain future.

She sits on the floor, exhausted and needy for oxygen. She leans forward to take in her appearance in the shiny black granite. She sees it then, the scar across her throat. She touches it gingerly with her fingers and can almost feel his tongue sliding across her skin again. She growls and claws at the line, her blunt nails digging it open again, blood budding from the wound. She continues to slash away at her own neck, ripping the freshly-healed skin. The scar that forms now will be from her own doing, not his.

Satisfied, she brushes the blood away and rises to begin her habitual exploration of the grounds. The slave children spot her self harm and shrink away, but she merely smirks, ruffles one boy's hair as she passes by with all the fluidity of a queen.

When she conquers The World Eater, a queen is exactly what she will be.

Kulaas - Princess.

Zu'u dein hin laas. - I keep your life.