Time passes differently when you're three.
A week feels like a year. A year feels like a lifetime. And every day is split into two categories: Things I am allowed to do and things I am apparently too young to do "because I'll hurt myself."
Which is ridiculous, because I've already survived the Void, divine soul surgery, and being force-fed mashed potatoes by a woman who thinks salt is a personality trait.
But today is different.
Today, I'm leaving the longhouse.
Not just stepping outside for a few minutes with guards hovering like paranoid hawks.
I mean leaving leaving.
We're going to the Temple of the Nine Divines.
Well… the Temple of the Eight now.
Because politics.
Because elves.
Because some extremely smug High Elf Kinlords in the Summerset Isles decided the Nords needed a religious "correction," and the Empire—our Empire—agreed to it in exchange for peace that smells suspiciously like surrender.
The White-Gold Concordat.
Even at three years old, the name makes my skin itch.
Talos worship was "banned" which would be like the worship of Jesus getting banned on Earth.
Not in the practical way, at least not yet. Nobody in Winterhold is going door to door demanding to inspect shrines under floorboards. But the ban exists. It's been announced. It's official. It's written down in the kind of ink that gets people killed eventually.
And the Nords?
The Nords are restless.
The general attitude I've overheard—repeated with different levels of alcohol and stupidity in my fathers throne room—can be summarized as:
Elves telling us who to worship? Bah. We wiped out the Snow Elves when they got uppity. Be careful, High Elves, or you'll be next.
Which is… not exactly nuanced, but I'm not going to pretend I don't understand the emotion.
It's not even just about Talos.
It's the humiliation.
The Empire banning the worship of the man who became a god, the man who conquered the continent, the man who represented the idea that humanity could rise and win.
To Nords, that feels like betrayal.
To my father, it's also a useful tool.
Because unrest can be pointed. Directed. Managed.
It's just that today, my father isn't managing unrest.
He's managing me.
And he's nervous.
He thinks he hides it well, the way Jarls always do—straight spine, calm face, voice like a winter wind.
But I can see magic.
Not just spells. Not just wards. I can see truths people don't realize they're wearing.
My father's aura doesn't glow like a mage's. He's not magically gifted. But he burns with a dense magically enhanced physical vitality, the Titanborn blood pushing strength through his frame like a slow drumbeat.
And today, I can see something else braided into that.
A tightness.
A knot of anxiety he's trying to swallow.
Because we've spent the last three years mostly keeping me out of sight.
My eyes are… a lot.
Insert Image of Magni Titanborn here
People in Winterhold are superstitious. Poor. Bitter. Always looking for someone to blame for the taste of seawater in their lives.
So my father chose the slow approach. Let the rumor spread first. Let people adjust to the idea of "the Jarl's strange blessed child" before actually showing them the strange blessed child.
And now?
Now he's ready to unveil me like a prize bull.
Or a prophecy.
Or both.
I'm dressed in noble clothes that feel expensive and uncomfortable, like they were designed by someone who hates children. A little fur-lined tunic, a belt that keeps slipping because I'm still shaped like a barrel, and boots that make me feel taller than I already am.
Which is saying something.
I am, objectively, a huge three-year-old.
The kind of huge that makes people's eyes widen before they remember manners.
My mother fusses over me while the servants finish tying things and smoothing things and adjusting things.
She steps back, hands on her hips, and smiles.
"Oh, look at you," she says warmly. "You look so cute, honey."
I immediately scowl in the most dignified way a three-year-old can scowl.
"Mooooom," I say, dragging it out like a dying mammoth. "I'm not cute."
She laughs, and it's not the polite laugh nobles use. It's real. Tired. Fond.
"Of course you're not," she says. "You're handsome."
I preen so hard I nearly fall over.
My father watches the exchange with the faintest hint of a smile—then clears his throat, back to business.
"Magni," he says, and I turn to him, already practicing the posture of a future ruler. "Do you know who will be at the temple today?"
I clasp my hands behind my back, chin up, like I'm some miniature courtier.
"Who, father?" I ask, tone serious.
He looks pleased that I'm playing along.
"Everyone that matters in Winterhold," he says. "The heads of clans. The shield-thanes. Housecarls. Merchants. Business owners. Priests."
He pauses, eyes narrowing slightly.
"It is time to show you to the world, my son."
Oh, I like the sound of that.
"It is time," I agree solemnly.
Then I strut toward him like a tiny peacock with an overinflated sense of destiny.
My father's hand settles on my shoulder—not pushing, not guiding, but steadying. A wordless reminder that no matter how big I am, I'm still three.
Still his child.
Then we step outside.
The cold hits like a slap.
Winterhold's air always tastes of snow and salt and old grief. The wind has teeth here, and the sky looks lower than it should, like it's trying to press the town back into the earth.
Guards fall in around us instantly. Not a huge entourage—Winterhold can't afford that kind of display with everyone else on duty—but enough to make a statement.
This isn't just a family outing.
This is a declaration.
We walk through streets that are more broken than paved. Past houses patched with driftwood and stubbornness. Past people bundled in furs, shoulders hunched against the wind.
And they stare.
At first, they stare at my father.
Then they see me.
Whispers spread like fire in dry grass.
"That's him."
"The blessed one."
"His eyes…"
"By the Divines…"
I keep my face calm, because I am a noble and also because it's funny watching adults struggle to process my existence.
Some people look fascinated.
Some look awed.
Some look afraid.
A few look angry, the kind of anger that comes from envy and hunger and the fear that the world favors someone else again.
A fisherman mutters under his breath, not quite quietly enough.
"Why would Magnus of all gods bless a Nord?"
My guard glances toward him sharply. The fisherman shuts up immediately and stares at his boots.
Good.
Let them learn early.
Power isn't just what you can do.
Power is what other people believe you can do.
My mother walks on my other side, her face composed, but her eyes alert. The Ravencrone blood in her watches everything twice.
I wonder, not for the first time, if she sees more than she lets on.
If she has dreams.
If she's already had a vision of me standing on a mountain of bones, wearing a crown that's made of dragonbone.
I wonder.
I hope so.
If she's a mystic, that's a resource.
And I like resources.
We pass an old man selling dried fish who bows his head respectfully. A woman with tired eyes makes a warding sign against evil when she sees my eyes, then flushes with embarrassment when my mother catches her.
My mother doesn't say anything.
But the woman hurries away anyway.
The temple comes into view, its stone dark against the snow. Not large, not grand compared to the temples of Solitude or Whiterun, but sturdy in the way Nords prefer their faith: practical and unyielding.
As we approach, I notice something that makes my skin prickle.
Wards.
Not strong ones. Not the layered, ancient humming lattice I feel from the College.
But there are faint protective runes etched into the stone near the door. Old blessings to keep sickness, bad spirits, and worse luck away from the threshold.
I see them with my magic sight like pale lines of blue-white light.
The priest has been maintaining them.
Good.
Inside, the temple is warmer. Candles burn. Incense hangs in the air. The smell of wax and old stone mixes with pine and prayer.
And the people really are all here.
I can feel it immediately, the weight of attention turning toward us as one.
Heads of clans in fur cloaks with their best jewelry. Merchants and business owners wearing thick rings and careful smiles. Shield-thanes and housecarls standing like carved statues, hands never far from sword hilts.
They all look at my father.
Then they all look at me.
My father's grip on my shoulder tightens slightly.
He steps forward, voice carrying.
"People of Winterhold," he begins.
And then he stops, because a housecarl with a scar running down his cheek and arms like tree trunks—has already pushed through the crowd.
Insert image of the housecarl here
He eyes me like he's assessing a weapon.
"So," he says, voice rough with amusement. "This is the little firecracker I've been hearing about."
My father's posture shifts. Pride comes off him like heat from a forge.
"Aye," Korir says. "This is my son. Magni."
The housecarl crouches slightly to look at me closer. He doesn't flinch from my eyes, which earns him points.
He looks me up and down like I'm livestock.
Then he grunts. "He's a big boy."
I lift my chin and give him my best dignified stare.
I am, indeed, a big boy.
"How old is he now?" the man asks.
My father answers, "Just over three."
The housecarls' eyebrows climb.
Before he can say anything else, a portly man—merchant, judging by the fine cloak and the way he smells faintly of coin—pushes forward, eyes wide.
"Over three?" he repeats, disbelief thick in his voice. "He's… he's huge."
He glances at me like he's imagining me carrying crates for him in fifteen years.
"He'll make a good warrior," the man says, half to himself. "If he keeps growing like this… gods. I wish the guards on my caravans were that big. Might finally stop losing shipments to trolls."
He mutters the last part like it's a personal grudge.
"Damn trolls."
I store that away.
Caravans. Trade. Security. Winterhold's economy is in the gutter. Merchants want protection. Trolls are a consistent problem on roads in Skyrim.
That's not just a complaint.
That's an opportunity.
My father starts doing what he came here to do: he introduces us.
He moves through the temple like a man working a room, greeting clan heads, acknowledging merchants, exchanging careful words with priests.
And always, always, he brings the conversation back to me.
My son. Magnus-blessed. Strong. Healthy. The future.
People nod. Smile. Murmur.
Some look hopeful.
Some look calculating.
I see it all.
And as we make the rounds, I find my gaze drifting, again and again, toward one corner of the temple.
A statue.
Dusty.
Neglected.
Half-shadowed like someone is pretending it isn't there.
Talos.
The hero-god the Concordat wants erased.
The Ninth Divine whose worship is now "illegal" in official terms and quietly thriving in private ones.
The statue hasn't been torn down. Not here. Not yet.
But no one stands near it.
No one lights candles there openly.
It sits like a dare.
Like a reminder of what the Empire agreed to sacrifice.
I feel something stir in my chest, a strange mix of anger and admiration.
Talos wasn't a saint. He was a conqueror. A warlord. A builder of empires.
And then he became a god.
Whether that was earned or stolen, I don't know.
But I do know this: Skyrim remembers him, even when it pretends not to.
My father finishes introductions.
Finally, after what feels like an hour but is probably twenty minutes because time moves weird in child bodies, he guides us toward the center of the temple.
The priests gather.
The murmurs lower.
My father's voice drops, quieter now, meant for me alone.
"This is the important part," he says. "We offer thanks. We ask for guidance."
I look up at him with wide, innocent eyes.
Inside, I'm vibrating.
Because I remember what Akatosh told me, long before I had a body.
Go to the temple of the Nine.
I will convince the others.
You will need every advantage.
So yes.
I'm excited.
I'm also slightly terrified, because divine attention is never gentle.
We step forward.
The candles flicker.
The air feels heavier, like the temple is holding its breath.
And somewhere deep inside me, the Gatekeeper's presence shifts—subtle, alert.
«This location is saturated with structured faith energy,» he observes quietly. «It may act as a conduit.»
I swallow.
Good.
That means something is going to happen.
Not yet.
But soon.
My parents kneel.
I kneel with them, small hands folded, eyes looking focused in the candlelight.
The priests begin their words.
And as the first prayer rises, I feel the world tilt ever so slightly… as if 9 ancient, vast, and interested entities have turned their gazes toward Winterhold.
Toward me.
So I hold perfectly still.
And I wait.