“Get moving, you bloody bilge rats! She’s like to take the whole damn ship with her at this rate!”
It was a sentiment that he’d expressed more than a few times in the past, but this time there might have been more to Yngve Seastrider’s words than booting his crew into gear. The old, gray-bearded mongrel was pacing along the deck like a caged wolf, hungry and apprehensive at once. The ship’s helmsman, a boy by the name of Jari, was doing his best to follow the captain’s commands, but their quarry was proving a harder chase than most. It seemed like they’d been pursuing her for a full half hour now, and with precious little to show for it but a battered and beleaguered crew.
But then, that was how it went in the dragon hunting business.
“By Hjalti’s rotten carcass, take your shot, girl!” The old man had a way of snapping her back to attention, she’d give him that. Gargreth tightened her grip on the handles of her turret. It was one of four massive ballistae that Edja had recently installed on the Dancer’s upper deck, two on either side. With a grunt of exertion, she swiveled the weapon around to line up her shot. Malphenor had beat her to landing the first hit, as was expected. The elf had eyes so keen, she’d seen him hit a leaping fish midair from a dozen meters off. His own harpoon was now embedded firmly in their quarry’s right leg, and you didn’t have to be an expert to tell that the big lizard was none too pleased by it. The dragonbone tips in the arrowheads had been a nice touch, and just about the only thing strong enough to pierce those nasty scales. It was a shame that the resource was too expensive to make whole harpoons out of it.
“Well!” Seastrider didn’t seem too keen on giving her room to think. “Are you going to shoot the damned thing, or were you planning on staring at the damn sky while she burns my ship to cinders?”
“I’m figuring the angle!” she shouted back at him, not bothering to look over her shoulder and ruin her shot. At least Mal had managed to keep the thing anchored in one relative part of the sky for her.
“Well quit your figuring and start fucking shooting!”
“I’m doing it! Try not to piss yourself, will you?” He was right, though. They didn’t have time for her to be hesitating over this. Gargreth might not have had a Bosmer’s eye for accuracy, but she was willing to bet she could crank this damned winch about twice as fast as the scrawny little elf. A heavy thunk, as she felt the wooden mechanism lock into place. Now all she had to do was let it fly.
Gargreth braced herself. She fired.
The javelin thundered through the air, ripping through the thick membrane of the creature’s wing and hooking itself on the skeletal framework. She couldn’t have hoped for better. “Alright! How’s that, old man?”
“You’re a damn gift wrapped in a few hundred pounds of dead weight, that what you wanted to hear? Now put that green arse of yours to work and pull her in!”
Now this, this was the part she was good at. As the dragon shrieked and struggled against her, Gargreth pulled back with every ounce of strength in her frame, wrestling back the crank further and further, inch by precious inch. Growing frenzied now, the dragon launched a molten hot ball of fire at the Dancer’s hull, only for it to crash harmlessly into a wall of ice that seemed to materialize from the very air around them. Their priestess was pulling her weight, as usual. But Lakh-Bo would be tiring fast now, and the old woman’s magic would be growing weaker with every volley she was forced to deflect. They had to get this thing in killing range, and now.
None of them wanted to admit that taking on a target this size might have been a mistake, her least of all, but as the dragon battled back against her and her elven compatriot’s attempts to reel it in, she couldn’t staunch the impending worry that they’d bitten off more than they could chew. Since the outbreak of this dragon crisis, the Golden Storm mercenaries had been at the forefront of the dragon hunting business, Yngve had seen to that. But this latest exploit to assert their relevance was beginning to look like it might be their undoing.
As if feeding on her doubts, the red drake reared back and released another plume of fire. This time however, it wasn’t aiming for the ship. The flames engulfed the metal chain attached to the spear lodged in its leg, and with a jolt the tether snapped. Suddenly, they were back at a disadvantage.
“Blast it all! She’ll make off with both of our damned harpoons, assuming she doesn’t roast us all and leave us for shark bait.” She dreaded hearing the next words that came out of the captain’s mouth: “Get that second chain unlatched, girl. Jari, try to get us out of here!”
The Golden Storm had never abandoned a chase, but Yngve Seastrider wasn’t about to risk lives for the sake of his reputation. But maybe just one life wouldn’t be so bad.
“I can’t do that, captain.” Gargreth could feel her jaw locking up, her fists clenching and unclenching on anxious impulse. “I’ve got an idea.”
“Like hell, you do! You get that damn thing loose in the next five seconds or I’ll drop you off with some pirates like I found your sorry arse!”
She had to grin at that. “Don’t worry. Think I found an easier way for you to get rid of me, if this goes south.”
She pretended not to hear the concern in Seastrider’s haggard old voice. “Goes south? It’s already gone south, you thick-skulled idiot! Whatever you think you’re planning—”
“Get this thing unhooked as soon as I’m over. You hear me, old man?”
“Don’t you even think about it you stubborn—”
She jumped. For a moment she was falling through thin air, before thickly corded muscle stopped her descent. Gargreth’s broad hands wrapped tight around the iron links of the harpoon’s chain, and as soon as she found a decent grip, she was climbing.
“This?! This is your big plan?!”
“The chain, old man! Unhook the chain!”
She didn’t bother looking back at him, and she certainly didn’t bother looking down. There was just her, the dragon, and a few dozen yards of chain between them. Lakh-Bo said that the dragons weren’t wild beasts at all, but warrior-gods, looking for the strongest challenger. Gargreth didn’t know if she was the strongest, but at this point she was definitely the craziest.
It was obvious that her little stunt hadn’t gone unnoticed, either. The dragon was watching her ascent, almost as if it were sizing her up as she climbed. She felt a sudden release of tension, what she could only assume was Seastrider releasing the chain, and suddenly she was swinging freely through the air.
“Thanks for the warning!” she managed to shout back at him, unsure if he could hear over the crashing of the waves and the howling of the wind. Auburn locks of hair whipped at her face like wisps of flame, but it was the imminent threat of dragonfire that concerned her. Sure enough, as she continued to drag herself up towards her target, a near-blinding flash of heat came rocketing toward her. Maybe, just maybe, she hadn’t fully thought this through.
At first, she didn’t register anything apart from the sudden chill. When she realized that she was still alive, and watched the icy barrier dissipate around her, she breathed out a sigh that was equal parts tension and relief. She’d have to remember to thank the old battleaxe, once she finished this.
She was getting closer now, almost within striking range. She must have climbed her way into the old lizard’s blind spot. It seemed to have given up trying to fry her, and was now resorting to raging and writhing around in an erratic attempt to throw her. If she could just hold on, there was actually a chance she could pull this off. She just had to wait for the perfect moment.
The dragon soared higher, higher. Perhaps it was trying to cut off her air supply with the altitude. A warrior-god would certainly be smart enough to think of that. What it hadn’t thought of, however, was the spear jutting through its mangled wing, and the three-hundred-plus pounds of angry Orc throwing it off balance. It couldn’t reach much higher, she guessed. Unfortunately, it didn’t need to.
Oh shit.
Gargreth barely managed to hold on as she felt her chain suddenly jerking away from her. The dragon dove, pulling her down, hard with its descent. She couldn’t let go. Letting go wasn’t just death, it was losing. The Golden Storm didn’t lose.
Again, her opponent redirected, this time racing upward again. She felt an involuntary cry escaped her as the bone and muscle in her arms were suddenly wrenched by the brutal change in velocity. Something was broken, or torn, or dislocated. She could damn well feel that. She held on.
The dragon was slowing down, marginally, giving her just enough warning to guess that it was about to try diving again. She wasn’t going to get another chance, or a better one than this. As the two combatants reached the height of their arc, Gargreth released her grip, letting her own upward momentum send her throttling over the dragon’s head as it turned to descend. For a moment as she flew past its great, reptilian eye, she couldn’t help feeling as if both parties understood what was about to happen.
Well, it was a helluva fight.
The screaming pain in her arms warned her against even attempting to draw her sword. Were this a proper fight, she doubted she’d even have the power left for a killing swing. As she draw the heavy iron blade from its sheath on her back, however, she thanked the gods that gravity would be doing half the work for her. Still, this had to be a clean cut. It wasn’t like she was going to get a do-over. Even with the roaring wind and throbbing pain stealing the air from her lungs, Gargreth did her best to draw in a focusing breath. The Stormlord Sword Dance was a discipline based on precise footwork and keeping one’s balance. She doubted that the great masters had midair combat in mind when they designed it, but then, Gargreth had never been the most orthodox student, anway.
Her breath expelled itself in a primal cry, and she spiraled downward, the lethal edge of her blade biting into scale, then flesh, then the bones in the defeated champion’s neck. She felt something in her arms give out as she forced the cut deeper.
The last thing she remembered was a shower of blood, before both bodies hit the water and everything went black.
“You did well to bring this to my attention. Go with honor.”
The two stout, stone-faced hunters bowed to their chief before seeing themselves out of the longhouse. The past few decades had been a slow crawl to restore any sort of communication between the stronghold of Armauk-Vras and the outside world. Even now, some thirty years after his father’s death and his brother’s exile, Ancath was hard pressed to find friends among the scattered Bretic hamlets that had once been the raiding grounds of his kin. He had worked tirelessly to dissipate the stigma that hung like a venomous mist over his clan, but a people who had been terrorized for generation upon generation was not quick to forget. He couldn’t say he blamed them. Even several of the other peaceful Orsimeri strongholds still refused his offers for trade. The more barbarous of his kin, meanwhile, had scoffed and scorned his refusal to continue his forefathers’ aimless crusade. He would not allow his clan to be marked as savages, but he knew better than anyone that some wounds never truly healed.
Whenever he did manage to foster contact from the outside, it was a godsend. The story his scouts had just brought him was more than that, however, it was a potential turning point for the people of Armauk-Vras. Dakog, the Black Iron Bandit, his brother, was finally slain. The last, vile remnant of the vengeful plague that once held his people in its grip was at long last extinguished.
With the limited lines of communication he had, Ancath had meticulously followed his elder brother’s exploits. His rampage through Wrothgar, the legend of the Unslain, his disappearance from High Rock and sudden resurgence in Skyrim just a few years ago. His exploits as Bossuet’s henchman had been hard enough on his stronghold’s reputation. This business of banditry, and the murder of a Daggerfall noblewoman, was yet another political blow that Armauk-Vras had not been ready to weather. Indeed, for a time he had felt as if the nightmares brought on by Dakog would never end. But now, after immeasurable disgrace, that chapter of Armauk-Vras’ history was finally being brought to a close. An army of Bretic knights had returned to Solitude, bringing with them news of the marauder king’s destruction. No doubt the clan would be eager to hear of this. There was just one small matter to attend to before he could break the news.
“Rugash,” the chief commanded the guard at his side. “Send for my wise-woman. I must consult with her on these developments.”
“She is here,” an old voice, an all but broken voice, echoed from down the hall as Ziva shuffled out of the darkness. “And she has a request for her chief.”
Ancath nodded down from his throne, silently dismissing his bodyguard. The titan of an Orsimer bowed as he made his exit, leaving chieftain and shaman alone. “How long have you been listening?”
She puffed out a breath of air that escaped her body like spirits from a derelict grave. “Not so long that I heard anything I did not already know.”
The chief frowned. The ways of his people aside, he ill-liked such cryptic speech. “You foresaw this, then.”
“I have seen much,” she responded noncommittally. “He is not dead.”
Ancath’s sharp features softened. Perhaps this final bout of grief was too much for her. “Ziva,” he whispered. “They brought his fortress to the ground. His bandits are scattered like dust.”
“Iron withstands even that which causes stone to crumble. Did they recover his body?”
There, she had him. “A search party is looking for it as we speak. It is only a matter of time before they return with—”
“They will return empty handed; he is alive.”
Wise-woman or not, he had little time for such flights of fancy. “I understand what this must be like for you, but this time there is no dispute. He’s gone.”
“Do not presume to spare my feelings,” she bit back at him, a fire in her eyes that had long been absent. “My son yet lives, yes, and I am as terrified by that truth as you are.”
He opened his mouth to speak, to reprimand her insolence. She ignored him. “They have not killed him, only revealed to him what he truly is. Once he knows, he will return to the place where it all began. He will return, here, and he will be our destruction.”
For the first time since his youth, Ancath of Armauk-Vras tried to push himself to his feet. The shattered limbs beneath him remained stiff and useless, as they always did. He collapsed back into his throne, catching himself gracelessly on his armrests, his fingers gripping the cold stone as if to choke the life from something already inanimate.
“I am the chief of this stronghold.” He could feel an old anger, like a scar torn open upon his breast. “I will not entertain these fantasies. My brother is dead. He is never coming back.”
She met his gaze evenly, unphased by his display. “He is not your brother.”
This was growing more and more absurd. “Do you mean to tell me…?”
“Chief Vorrog was not his father.” Her amber-colored eyes, now gray and milky, seemed to be focused on something distant and intangible. “He is nothing to you but the man who stole your legs.”
He felt tired, suddenly. The anger in him was too heavy, too hungry. The chief slumped in his seat. “What is it you want from me, Ziva?”
“I want you to promise me,” she pleaded. “That you will be ready when the time comes. I will not be here to help you prepare.”
More mysticism, more frustration. “You did not put me through all this to tell me you’re dying on me.”
For the first time since this debate had started, she could not offer him an immediate response. “I must beg my chief’s blessing,” she spoke at last. “To leave this stronghold. There is something I must do. Something you will understand only when the time comes.”
“The wise-woman needs no blessing from the chief.”
She mustered up a simple shrug. “Even so, I wish to have your good faith in this.”
Ancath sighed. “And what if I should tell you that you have none of my faith at all, at the moment?”
Of all things, he had not expected her to smile. “I have advised you for many years now,” the wise-woman said. “And in that time you have become like a son to me. Your mind, Ancath, is sharp as any blade, and I do not expect you to put your trust in the prophesizing of an old, done woman.
“When your mother passed, and you made me wise-woman, I know that it was not a choice borne of any love for me. You thought that by providing for me, you could overcome the vengeance in your heart, and the hatred you bore for my son. I would hope, however, that after all these years you have come to think of me as your friend. For that love you bear me, let me do what I must.”
This was madness, utter madness. But he could not deny her now. “I can give you a carriage and a small entourage. I trust that will suffice for your designs?”
“Hardly anything so extravagant. A horse will do. Preferably a gentle one. I am getting on in years, after all.”
He tried to smile at that. He couldn’t. “What do you intend, Ziva? To see him one final time? If what you say is true— if you truly regard me as your own son —then your final days should be spent here. This is your home.”
Again, she smiled at him. This time however, there was something else in the sobreity of her expression. “I will see him before this is done, yes, but that is not my purpose for leaving. Armauk-Vras is my home, and it cannot withstand his wrath. I must find the one force that can, and send it to you.”
“Why? Why must you? I have envoys at my disposal, ready to ride from here at a moment’s notice. Tell me where to send them, and I will have this force brought to us at all costs.”
“I cannot,” spoke Ziva, mother of exiles, wise-woman of her clan. “She does not yet understand, any more than you. Only I can show her the way, and I must find her before he does.”
“She?” At this point, he may as well have believed anything, even if it meant staking his hopes on an old woman and a single, mysterious warrior. “Where is she now?”
“On a ship,” the old shaman smirked. “Bound for Solitude.”
Despite having been filled with expectant anticipation of this exact moment since having felt the warmth of his cheeks, the sudden coughing and gasping startled her half white. She’d seen death before, blood and spit sputtering from haggard mouths as the last breaths of life were choked through their throats. Somehow this was different. The air hissed through the gape in his throat as he gasped, blood began to trickle fresh down his neck as though it had been cut fresh.
The entire scene distracted her, was so otherworldly and wrong, that she’d forgotten she was even present and involved with it until the hand seized her wrist. She felt like an elk, stricken, shocked, unsure of coming death. But in spite of herself, she could feel the words boiling up through her throat.
“Stop talkin, idiot! I’m trying to sew your damn fool head back on.”
That’s probably not exactly what she was wanting to say, least wise to an agitated orc who she knew from past experience could break her.
“Don’t squirm an whatever you do don’t try to sit up. Last thing I need’s to go chasing your damned head down the cliffside, y'hear?”
A moment passed as her body caught up to the casual sass of her voice.
His eye held to her for long, silent moments. Slowly, painfully, his breathing relaxed. He forced his muscles, rigid as if frozen by death, to slacken. His grip loosened, then released. Trying to keep steady, he uttered out a single command:
“Do it.”
Remember her? If she only knew. No, he didn’t remember her, didn’t remember anything but a name. Dakog. He was Dakog. Unslain seemed to ring a bell, as well. That, and the fact that he killed people. A lot of people. He couldn’t remember the reason, or if there was one. He couldn’t even recall doing it, beyond the vaguest outline of a memory. He just knew that he had, and that it didn’t seem to bother him.
Whoever this was, then, she must not have been too morally sound, to hang around the likes of him. He studied her in silence as she worked, unknowing or uncaring if the staring cause her any discomfort. After a minute or so, he was thinking clearly enough to formulate a question.
There’s not much of anything left here anymore but ash and ice. A few corpses so badly charred you couldn’t loot them if you tried. What’s left of the walls do little to keep out the cold and the snow, but Haze found some respite from the wind. Admittedly, she was far more morbidly fascinated by the bodies than she should have been. Black, dry, each one a landscape of skin melted to armor, frost collecting on the peaks like mountains. Namira certainly had painstakingly painted every grotesque detail, every crack and warp of the body, every crumpled torso with limbs bent in ways they shouldn’t.
It gave her a way to pass the time until the snow died down enough to see where she was going.
Shards of tower and rock disappeared into the white overhead. Some rust red of dried blood still clung to stones, ice, people. Everything was muted, intense, otherworldly. Black into white, only broken by rust. Silence and wind, only broken by the crunch of snow under her feet. Cold air, the smell of frost and char, only broken by…
Blood?
Is that fresh blood?
Hairs stood on her back as her hunting instincts drew her to full alert. It was a smell the bosmer knew well, and against such an empty palette it rung loudly, shook her. Who was there? Or what? There’s a fresh kill here.
Quietly, her hands drew the bow without her mind even registering the command was given. Wide eyes and perked ears, breath slow and silent as her heart raced against her efforts to calm it, she crept forward. Did what she could to track it. Her senses were limited but heightened, every icy flake of snow that crashed into her formerly numb face seemed to scream now. Every sound felt louder.
The outline of a body in a heavy suit of armor appeared in the snow. There was no one near it, but that didn’t mean nobody would be. Scanning every silhouette in the ghostly white surrounding her, she began to climb up the incline to the body. Still alive? Not possibly.
The frost was too thick on the metal for it to be fresh.
But then why did she smell warm, newly spilt blood?
The feeling of her foot hitting something in the snow sent a chill up her spine so sharply she swore a mage had shot an ice spike through her back. She went still.
Slowly, looking down…
A forehead, an ear stuck out from the snow. Dead. No worry there. Her heart sunk down from her throat. This one was soot black and awful, but if his ear was still there, maybe the rest of him was. And if he wasn’t melted into his armor…
then maybe he had some coin on him, yet.
A relieved smile crossed her lips as she reached down to brush the loose snow from his brow–
Warm. He was warm.
“My gods…” she hadn’t felt herself say it, but she’d heard it, as if it had been spoken to her rather than come from her. “I have to start a fire!” Odd words, given the remnants of the blaze that surrounded her. Still, with what minimal proficiency in the flame spell she had and whatever she could find on her to burn, she started a small campfire near a wall as quickly as her hands can work and then returned to the bigger task of digging up the poor sod. “Don’t you die on me now, you bast–” she began.
At some point, once uncovered enough, the head rolled down the hill a few feet.
For the first time in a long time, she felt sick. She’d seen a great many horrid, putrid, grotesque things. She’d admired the most of them. But this? This was ill. This was wrong. That head had no body. It had been buried in snow. And yet it was warm, not frozen or frosted, and the smallest streak of bright, fresh blood trailed in the snow behind it. White, black, rust, red.
Hesitant but compelled by a fascination driven in those who are intrigued by the disturbing and unsound, she retrieved the disembodied head. Held it gingerly. Felt its warmth. Steeled herself for some cruel daedric trick to bring the face to life. It never did. Not as she stared into its half closed, dead eyes, one still fiery amber as if the spirit still burned quietly within somewhere, and one, milky. White. Blind and ghostly. It still did not spring to life as she spoke to it, wiped some soot from its cheeks, turned it and examined it. One side was textured like molten and cooled skin, a texture she knew and loved. The other, dark, olive, leathery. He had tusks. Was obviously once an orc.
“I know this man…” it was a whisper, spoken as if she feared he’d hear her, or somehow hear the images that flooded back into her head of the day she mistakenly crossed an orc in the woods, bloody, raw, dangerous. How he’d left her after she prodded and poked the beast until it snapped. Something akin to fear, but different and indescribable overcame her. There were no other bodies in the snow that had not been mutilated into an unrecognizable clump of flesh and iron. Her eyes turned to the corpse in frosted armor, still lying lifeless at the top of the hill. Her mind, to the smell of fresh blood that had drawn her here. And her feet, of course, to carrying her to the unthinkable before her. Sure enough, as she pulled what she could up out of the snow, the body was headless. She touched his neck; warm.
But more, even. She could feel the faintest… the faintest thum, thum, thum…
He had a heartbeat. What in arkay’s asshole.
Curiosity and resolve fueling her, she stuffed the orc’s head into her bag and began trying to coax the body downhill. It was a struggle freeing it from the snow, but once she had, gravity quickly carried the heavy lug down the hill. Sheer force of will and unbridled dark fascination did the rest in pulling him to the fire. This was a bad, idea, and she knew it fully, but she couldn’t stop herself in the name of knowledge.
She’d have made an excellent mage.
As the frost began to thaw into a shiny coat of water droplets over his breast plate, she pressed her ear to the stinging cold metal, not realizing she was smiling. Thum, thum, thum. It was barely there, but there it was. This was exciting. And that was her problem. The thrill of danger in doing something she shouldn’t.
She’d have made a very excellent mage.
Naturally, she had her healing kit on her. Stitches, to hold the head in place. Bandages in case bleeding increased. And advanced healing potions to fuse the two–if he was, in fact, still actually alive.
She readied them all, but doubted she’d need any, as she aligned the orc’s head on his shoulders.
This was absolutely some eerie daedric tomfoolery.
The dry and frigid mountain air may as well have been poison burning down his throat, hitting his lungs with the force of an avalanche. The Orsimer gasped, no, rasped for every precious breath despite the discomfort. Of all the places he expected to wake up, freezing to death on top of a mountain hadn’t been one of them.
That stench. Oddly familiar. Burnt bodies. He knew that scent, and as overpowering as it was, he found that it didn’t bother him. Should it have? There were other scents familiar to him as well, carried on the wind. Prey. Food. He remembered that he was not alone in this body. Had it been another hunt gone awry that had put him out here?
No, that wasn’t possible. He was still wearing his gambeson. The black fabric kept him just insulated enough that he wasn’t freezing his arse off. Still, it was odd. If he’d somehow passed out, the boar should have taken over for him, and that should have meant no clothes.
This was certainly a horker-sized mess he’d gotten himself into. Now, if only he could remember what exactly the mess was. He wracked his brain, searching for names, faces, anything to jog his memory on why in Malacath’s accursed name he’d come here.
Oh... Oh shit.
There was nothing there. Nothing, nobody. Just blank, shadowy lapses where he could sense vague impressions the people and places he’d once known. It was all just gone, erased in an instant. The Orc realized with a jolt of fear that he had not the slightest idea who or what he was.
The chain of sudden revelations was lightning-fast, occurring all in the split seconds while his vision cleared from darkness into hazy light. He was not alone. He caught the scent long before his eye was able to focus in on her. The pungent, saturated aroma told him that the woman could only be one of those ardent denizens of the wilds. Had some hag witch taken him hostage? Erased his memory?
Whatever the case, she was currently stabbing a needle into his neck.
He reached instinctively for a weapon, fingers sinking into naught but icy earth. It was another fraction of an instant before his vision cleared enough for him to make out the details of the figure before him. Elven, Bosmer, exactly as wild-looking as she smelled. But she was small. He could chase her off without a weapon if need be, or snap her in half if it came to it.
But for now, she was the only one who could give him any answers. A powerful hand reached up and clamped around her wrist, accomplishing very little apart from pushing the needle further into his thick skin. Stitches, he realized. His throat struggled against him as he croaked out a question. He didn’t release his grip. “Who the fuck are you?”
Broken-Spear Keep now lies a desolate ruin in the mountains of Hjaalmarch, its foundation obliterated by an unknown force as a legion of knights under Imperial banners stormed the fortress to bring justice to the Black Iron Bandit. Rumor has it the primarily Bretic army used their battlemagi to set off a chain explosion from within the castle walls, but given the severe casualties dealt to both sides in the ensuing chaos, the claim remains uncertain. The Legion has remained silent on the matter.
Precious few survivors managed to escape before the keep collapsed in on itself, but those who did claim that before it was all over, the Black Iron Fist had fallen into complete disarray. Most mutinied as soon as the walls were breached, others simply went berserk and cut down anything in their path to escape. Some hushed reports state that several dozen raiders managed to escape by rushing naked into the advancing legion ranks and shifting into a pack of werebeasts, cutting straight through enemy lines to make their break for freedom. Most assume such stories to be fanciful exaggeration at best.
There have been no retaliation efforts from the Black Iron Fist as of yet, and most of the former raiders seem to have broken back up into their own disorganized clans, scrabbling for dominance among themselves. The Black Iron Bandit has not been seen or heard from, and among the few spoils recovered from the battle was his notorious troll-skull helm. The body itself has not been seen, but for most, the symbol is enough: The king is no more.
Fire and smoke. Everything collapsing down, down around him, only this time his pulse thundered with apprehension alongside the exhilarating waves of chaos. The heat seemed to be boiling him alive in his own suit of iron. The smoke tasted of charred flesh and hair. Even the air itself crackled and singed the inside of his throat, as if with every gasping breath he was drinking down the flames. His every sense screamed of danger, danger…
Blood and sweat. His, others’, it didn’t matter; he was drenched in it. His helm had been knocked loose. When? The bitter, viscous mixture stung at his eyes as it dripped down his face, blurring his vision along with the noxious smoke and the dancing mirages that rose like spirits from the sheer heat. He could feel hair clinging in wet clumps to his forehead, to the back of his neck. He could smell the terror hanging thick and pungent like an oversaturated stormcloud, and at once realized that his own fear mingled in the air with those of his own men and the enemy alike.
A wolf was howling.
Was this how Gervais Bossuet felt, he wondered, when revolt had brought fire and sword to his noble seat? No, the waddle-necked old vulture had thought himself untouchable. Up to the very last moment, Dakog heard him barking orders at the guards even as they turned against him. The Black Iron Bandit had always known that this was how it would end, with everything crashing down a storm of fire and steel. This was the destiny he had claimed for himself ever since the day he burned Raukrahuan-Gothob to the ground, perhaps before even that. He had been barreling towards this moment, a juggernaut after his own destruction. Now, finally, he had arrived.
The fear drained away, and he felt himself again. He laughed like a wild dog as he watched his own raiders fall, laughed as the armored fools surrounded him, fell in on him like flies on the corpse of a lion. He grinned bloody and wide into the face of every man and woman he slew, until he couldn’t count the faces anymore. One after another they crashed against him and fell, and one to the next he roared his laughter as their funeral dirge.
He cackled like a mad beast until steel kissed his neck, and sunk her icy teeth into sinew and spine, and he watched from the burnt and bloodied ground as his headless body crumpled and fell.
“An antiquated relic, boasting a surprising amount of resistance despite its apparent brittleness. Old magic permeates the iron.
“The Nords of Skyrim are known for adorning themselves with aspects of various wild beasts when charging into battle, a tradition apparent even in their earliest historical artifacts. Perhaps the bearer of this helm thought that jutting horns and woolly pelts would bring him strength in battle, though he was evidently mistaken.”
“A small, but ornate piece of jewelry, possibly an heirloom passed down for generations. Faded lettering is etched along its edge, now worn beyond any recognition.
“Wedding bands of this sort are not commonplace in Skyrim. Whoever the ring’s previous owner was must have come to this land from afar. Whatever they were in search of, it seems their journey ended in failure, as this symbol of love and loyalty ultimately fell into the hands of vicious bandits.”
“M’lord Dragonling’d best be careful he don’t get too greedy, aye? Already sent him back his big brother, and in one piece too. Awful kind of little old me, if I say so m’self. Now, I gotta wonder, what else could he possibly want?”
“And why in the name of Azura’s perky purple tits would I fuckin’ know what that old priest would want? The fuck are you tryin’ to say, anyway? Fuck you.”
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