*Vaengr means wing in old Norse. The ae is pronounced as ee, thus you say the name as Veengr.

She could still hear the drums turning in her ears, the thrumming of ancient machines, water rushing through pipes. Always in Vaengr's ears the scratching sounds of Chaurus and the Dwemer spiders, following, always surrounding, no matter how far she ran from the Blackreach.

Under her bare feet the snow crunched, icy daggers in her feet. Vaengr's raw wrists had long since been removed from their slave bindings, an effort that'd taken days of chafing the thick ropes back and forth until her hands were slippery enough with her own blood to slide free. Her climb to the surface world had been long and taxing on both her body and mind. The greedy and blood lusting hands of the Falmer who had chased her left bruises and cuts and the effort to remain silent though it all (as not to alert them of her escape), atop the suspense of not knowing what was around the next bend in those cursed ruins, had cost Vaengr dearly.

Malnourished and blinded by the storm she had escaped into, Vaengr took one misstep, and the world spun as she slipped down the mountainside. She did not have the time to scream before her head collided with a blunt rock.

She was out only momentarily, or so she suspected, for little snow had accumulated on her body by the time she awoke. Foolhardily, she tried to move. There was little outwards damage, but her head throbbed, and one of her eyes had swollen shut. Her body shook with cold, and there was a wrenching pain in her gut. The cold became her strength at that moment, for it had numbed her pains.

The fall had taken her quite some feet from the mountain pass, just under the vale of the storm clouds to see the landscape below her. It was a view she had not seen for years, and barely recognized - - barely hoped to be real, least the disappointment kill her. Dreamlike, the expanse of Skyrim unfolded outwards, mountains upon more mountains, and the plains beyond them under the dusk's sunlight.

And then the storm took away her view once again, back into the harsh tunnel vision of snow and the gray haze below her platform - - what she realized now as a precarious perch.

Vaengr gave a mockery of a laugh, and the pain of doing just that caused her tears as she gripped the rock below her.

Once she found her feet, her arms did little to block the strengthening wind. She was fatigued and loosing on hope fast. She should have stayed put… a prisoner to the Falmer. Perhaps then this incessant drumming would end. That drumming in the deep.

When Vaengr collapsed she did not know, only that her memories had blurred into one jumbled mess. She only became aware of the collapse when the strong arms pulled her up from the snow. She thought the Gloomlurker had tracked her across the peaks, just to bring her back to that hell, perhaps to kill her. Let him, Vaengr decided. This is freedom enough.

But the hands that cradled her were gentle, oh so gentle, for such large hands.

At some point, she was no longer bearing the full brunt force of the wind in her bones, as the thick furs of a tent did that for her. The inside was a mere warm glow under the one lit lamp within and the darkness of outside. Those hands laid her upon a bedroll, and finally away from the armor of his chest, Vaengr's one usable eye cracked open to gander at the man who'd plucked her from the snow as he turned to fasten the tent flap. Alas the glow was not enough to reveal him, only outline a warriors form…

The man unclasped his armors, shedding everything until there was nothing. The sight made her vaguely sick, not understanding why he did so. When he reached for her damp clothing, to remove it, Vaengr finally let out a strangled cry, but could muster nothing but weak struggles.

"Shh," the man said, his baritone voice thick, "I must do this or you'll die."

Vaengr could not prevent this had she wanted. Her modesty was stripped away and the broad, naked, body of the man joined her beneath the furs. Those great hands took hers, engulfing them and pulling until her numb fingers were burried between his arms and sides. Her small frame was covered by his until his breath mingled with hers and had they been any tighter together, may have fused like a soul gem and its component part.

The most masculine part of him, what made him a man, pressed against the apex of her thighs, although soft. It was an uncomfortable feeling, to be so intimately close to someone she'd never known personally, never met. And between the haze of sleep and panic, she understood why it must be so.

His breaths were slow, each forcing more of his heated flesh against her waxy skin. Her body shook uncontrollably to warm itself, and she found it difficult to breathe against his chest. His scent was musky and strong, a combination of traveling and steel. Vaengr's senses had sharpened in the dark abyss of the Blackreach, and there was an underlying stench she could not place. It made her nervous, sick, her skin crawled - - or was that only the onset of frostbite?

The next few days were hazy to Vaengr; the tent flap opening and closing, the howling of distant wolves and the wind. The constant warmth of her savior. Vaengr's body was in pain. Her extremities suffered frostbite, blackening and waxing - - like the dead. Soon the damage areas blistered and boiled with a horrible pain she'd never known before. But the warrior saw her agony and forbade her from popping the sores.

"If you do, the pain will be worse, and you'll get fever." His large hands took hers and dabbed a cooling cream from a red bottle over the sores, and Vaengr fought the urge to pull back as he anointed her wrists. He moved to dab the salve on her blackened toes, his steel armors creaking with each movement. His hazel hair was long and spilled over his back, and a light stubble had started to grow on his face. He had rugged features, but his eyes were pale blue - - and strangely gentle.

"You're quiet person," he noted, once he realized Vaengr wasn't going to fall asleep again. "My name's Farkas."

Vaengr's lips parted as if to speak before she clamped her mouth firmly shut again. She was swathed in animal skins, and during her weakness, she'd been dressed in a rough brown homespun tunic. It provided much more than her rags provided by the Falmer.

There was little room for both of them inside the tent, as it was made to fit one comfortably. Two pushed the idea, especially for Vaengr, who was not used to the close proximity of others. The Falmer barely let their human servants socialize.

She flinched at the too common memory of a pale hand, striking her. Animal-like yowls echoed in her ears. The humming seemed louder now, the thrumming of the wind against the tent might as well have been the thrumming of stone and pipe.

Vaengr realized shortly she'd held her cheek in remembrance of the brutality, and in that, she noticed Farkas had stopped applying the salve. His blue eyes stared into her, but her mind was numb and faraway - - not so far. She imagined her prison lay right below her feet. Farkas's calloused hand was warm on her ankle.

Farkas turned and unclasped the tent once again to go into the blizzard that still raged. "I'm going hunting," his voice was thick. "I'll be back before nightfall."

She hadn't realized it was day.

Alone, Vaengr's skin crawled, imagining every sound as the Falmer. The snow made hollow sounds, like some of the pipes in the underground. Alone, one's fears tend to fester. Her skin was tight and scratchy, her swollen eye burned, her gut still made the wrenching ache.

I'd rather die than not know my death, the woman thought, but unable to move. Without the man's heat to fill the tent, it soon became cold, and Vaengr burrowed further into the pelts to keep warm. Let it be a quick death.

Knocked to the hall floor, Vaengr earned a scrape on her chin. A fist curled into her long hair, pulling her hair back as a child screamed. The Falmer holding her down snarled, a blithe and meaningless sound. She could not see her attackers well in the Blackreach, but knew them well.

A sudden flare of light blinded her eyes to the dark space, flame from a pipe. The child's screaming stopped abruptly as the other large Falmer swept the boy up by the throat. He was the one called "Gloomlurker" by the servants, never seen, but always there. He doled out punishment as he saw fit, reveled in his power over the hapless and helpless slaves. In the torchlight, Vaengr saw his nostrils flare, and his toothy mouth twist into a mockery of a smile between the pointed edges of the opaque chitin helmet.

Vaengr knew what was about to happen as the boys face grew purple. This moment had been etched into her eyelids by fate. The boy was fair, his hair hay colored but dirty from digging tunnels in the black. His eyes were hazel, sunken, and fearful; his skin gaunt. The limbs were frail but tried to pull the choking hand away all the same. The child was known as Fornjot.

Gloomlurker turned towards her, and snorted thickly of the air. 'It's your fault,' his expression told her, 'I'm doing this to punish you. Because you disobeyed.'

A terrible scream broke forth over the thumping machinery, and it was followed closely by Vaengr's own. The beast crushed the child's head into the wall in one swift movement, ending with a sickening crunch and smear of blood along the golden metal. Fornjot crumpled to the ground and Vaengr wailed where he could not. Released, the woman crawled to the child's body and brought it to her chest. She rocked back and forth clutching Fornjot and spilling hot tears into his once hay colored hair, now dyed red with blood.

Gloomlurker hunched before her, cackling in their nonsensical language. His claws reached out and ripped the boy from her arms, backhanding Vaengr as he did so. Her cheek smarted and the woman fell into a dead silence. In the dark, she could hear the scales of the Chaurus, scenting out the new death and preparing to feast.

The crunching- she couldn't stand that sound-

Vaengr jolted awake. She tossed and kicked and struggled in vain. Nails dug into her skin and an unbreakable grip on her hands kept her from pummeling the body beneath the covers with her. She proved no match for the brute strength as he rolled and pinned her beneath him, arms crushed at her sides. He was just a dark looming figure in the lightless tent. Each of his deep breaths were loud, his musk was overpowering. Fresh from the memory Vaengr broke and cried.

"Fornjot," she managed between each lungful, "My Fornjot." That's shat she had named the boy. "Fornjot."

The warrior, Farkas, released her. His oddly gentle hands arranged them as they had been before, although he was tense, unsure of her crying and the name on her lips.

His eyes were gentle, but within them Vaengr sensed something dark. The eyes of a beast.

The end of the prelog! Sorry for the rough start (haven't wrote much for a while), but I hope you enjoyed it! Reviews are much appreciated, and make me work harder! Questions are appreciated as well!