~ Encore ~

Awake

It began in the waning years of the third era, when, in a boarding house within a great stone wheel of a city, you lay down to sleep with blood still on your hands. And when you woke, you were not alone.

"You sleep rather soundly, for a murderer."

The words are more approving than accusatory, delivered in a resonant voice with the slightest hint of an accent not of Cyrodiil. And the speaker, dressed entirely in black, has not come to you by chance. His purpose dawns on you only by degrees, the compelling quality of his voice and eyes making his proposal seem at first reasonable and then enticing.

He speaks of blood and death, but he also speaks of love and of family, something you have never known.

So when he offers a matte black blade, refusal seems all but impossible. You reach out, unthinkingly, to take it; his fingertips brush yours -

-and the jolting of the carriage awakens you to the bitter chill of another era, another part of the world.

"Hey, you. You're finally awake."

They had taken you almost the moment you crossed the border, your path suddenly blocked by grim-faced Legionnaires. Your Imperial captors haven't told you where you're headed, but given the kind of men who are sharing the cart with you, it's not hard to guess.

A Nord's last thoughts should be of home, the blond one says. It's been a long time since you had anywhere to call home, but if you think back far enough, it's the black-and-white timbers of Cheydinhal that form in your mind's eye - and the crumbling fort rising from the hillside above it.

You're not likely to see them again.

Standing motionless, hands bound before you, you watch with practised indifference as the first one's head tumbles from his shoulders. And when the executioner readies his axe over your own neck, it's almost a relief. At least it's a conclusion - surely preferable to the listless drag of this existence, which hasn't been the same since the day you opened the door to that lonely farmhouse in the Jeralls and saw-

And at least, unlike his ending, it'll be quick and clean.

That was two hundred years ago, and even had he survived Mathieu Bellamont's treachery, he'd be long dead. Not you, though - your elven lifespan meant there were centuries ahead of you, centuries in which to mourn him. So you offer little resistance as they push you to your knees before the block. Perhaps you'll be going to join him soon, in the eternal shadow.

Lucien, you think longingly - your final thought, almost a prayer. And as if in answer, something as black and wicked as the Void itself comes, and you are spared. This may or may not be a good thing; but when the cries and the flames have died down, when you have washed the smoke and grit from your eyes in a bubbling ice-cold spring, you lift your head and look anew at the land laid out before you. The first thing you see clearly is a spray of snowberries, gleaming scarlet against the pristine blanket of white.

They are, you muse, the exact colour of freshly-spilt blood.

Freed, and with little interest in the rivalries of Stormcloak and Empire, you leave ruined Helgen and find your own path.

Hi everyone. It's great to be writing again after a long gap. If you haven't already, I strongly recommend reading my earlier story 'Lucien's Luck' - 'Encore' is a follow-up/companion piece.

For my Tomb Raider readers: I hope to update Reborn in Shadow soon...it hasn't been abandoned!