The Outlawed Hero- Chapter 2

• Posted by Riggzon September 5, 2014 - 1,123 views

  Chapter 2

  "You there, step forward." called an Imperial soldier, who held a worn leather tome in his hands. He was obviously a Nord, despite his allegiance to the Empire. I stepped forward, to await judgement from the Imperial captain. After looking at me and glancing back at his book, the soldier, with a puzzled look on his face, turned towards the captain.

  "Captain, what should we do? He's not on the list." He asked. 

  "Forget the list, he goes to the block." the captain said, not so much as giving me a glance as she walked to where the rest of the stormcloaks were gathered. The horse thief, Lokir, I heard him called, was not there. His body lay on the road we'd come in on, feathered with arrows after he tried to run. Determined not to make the same mistake, despite the rest of my senses telling me to make a break for it, I steeled myself for the end and followed the Imperial to the block.

  General Tullius, the military governor who had ambushed us, was in the middle of saying something to Jarl Ulfric as I walked over.

  "... some here in Helgen call you a hero. But a hero doesn't use a power like the voice to murder his king and usurp his throne." The Voice? I'd never heard of a person's voice killing a man, but Tullius didn't seem to be referring to some regular mortal voice. Too bad I'll never find out what it is. I could use something like that in this situation. Tullius was still speaking.

  "... now the Empire's going to put you down, and restore the peace!" The General declared, before a roar that made my fur bristle and chilled me to the bone silenced him. 

  "What was that?" A guard asked, just as unsettled as me. The other Imperials were passing nervous glances to each other, and I thought I saw a look of uncertainty flash across Tullius' face, before it rapidly disappeared.

  "It was nothing, carry on." he commanded, after letting the murmur of voices die down. A priestess garbed in flowing brown and yellow robes began to chant our last rites, but they meant nothing to me. My gods were not Akatosh or Zenithar, they were Jode and Jone, Baan Dar and Rhajin and so many others. But I had the feeling none of them had the time to watch over one little khajiit who was about to die. As the priestess was talking, the Stormcloak who would perish first seemed to get impatient.

  "For the love of Talos, shut up, and let's get this over with." He fumed. The priestess seemed taken aback, but silenced herself anyway. The prisoner, a well built man with dark red hair, walked up to the block. I envied him. It seemed as if death didn't scare him, as he almost casually strolled up to where the headsman waited with his axe. It was a quick death, at least. The captain pushed him down so he was kneeling with his head on the block, and the executioner cleaved the man's head off in one clean swing. As he lifted the axe, the newly drawn blood glistened ominously on the blade, and sent a chill through my body.

  "Next up, the cat." The captain said. Another roar echoed off the snow-capped mountains, but I didn't notice it this time.

  So this is it. After all my journeys, all my victories, it seemed even I was not worthy enough to avoid a headsman's axe. My heart pumping furiously in my chest, threatening to burst before I even got to the block, I allowed my legs to carry me to it. As I stood over the block, the captain pushed me down, allowing me to glimpse the severed head of the Nord before me. Even now, I wished I could be as brave as he. My head rested on the worn, wooden block, now slick with blood, and I was forced to look straight into the face of my killer as he raised his axe. But the blow never came. Suddenly, an unbelievably large, winged creature crested the mountains, roaring defiance.

  "What in Oblivion is that!" shouted General Tullius, as the creature landed on top of the stone watchtower facing me. It was huge, bigger than any creature I'd ever seen, and covered in black scales. Its head was crowned with two long, bony horns, but it's eyes were the worst. They were blood red, and evil seemed to radiate out of them to everything their gaze touched. The beast roared one last time, sending the executioner tumbling like the Nord's head, and turning the sky a cloudy red. Pieces of flaming rock came falling out of the sky, smashing into buildings and people alike.

  "Dragon!" A woman screamed, as a hundred voices shouted out, pulling swords and bows from scabbards and off of backs. I stumbled to my feet, as I heard Ralof shouting to me to follow him. We rushed into another stone tower, to discover Ulfric Stormcloak inside, unbound, along with the other Stormcloaks. I ran up the stairs to reach the top of the tower, but discovered it blocked by debris that another Stormcloak was trying to move. As he began calling to me, he was thrown out of the way as the wall exploded. The dragon, if that's what it was, opened it's maw to spew flame, hotter than anything I'd felt, through the gap, but by luck, I was just out of the way, however the same couldn't be said for the charred soldier among the debris. As the dragon flew off to terrorise the other parts of the village, I noticed the roof of an inn just within jumping distance. Praying to the gods, I leapt the gap, to land roughly on my knees, my bound hands not helping at all. I hurried downstairs, and sprinted through a group of burned houses, to come into a blackened, flame covered clearing, with Helgen's keep looming to my right. As I entered the courtyard, Ralof and the Imperial soldier who'd called me forward for inspection rushed in as well. Seeing Ralof head for the main door to the keep, the soldier shouting curses as he ran, I followed Ralof blindly into the keep, not knowing any other choice.

  "Here, let me get those bindings off." Ralof said, as he sawed at my ropes with a knife. Other than us, the room was empty, save for the corpse of another Stormcloak resting against a table. After reciting a quick prayer to the man, Gunjar, I was told, Ralof directed me to his weapons and armour. It felt wrong, stripping this man for his goods, but he was dead, and I wasn't, and I intended to stay that way. As I pulled on his cuirass, which felt a bit too light and flimsy for my more heavily armoured tastes, Ralof confessed to me.

  "I'd only heard of the dragons in myths and legends. The harbingers of the end times." The way he said it sent further chills through me. If that truly was a dragon, was our time in Tamriel coming to an end? I grabbed Gunjar's iron axe, well used it seemed, but heavy compared to the lighter option of a sword. While Ralof searched the room, testing the gates, I quietly summoned a ball of flame into my left hand. There was a reason I was called a spellsword.

  "Sssh!," Ralof silenced my thoughts, as he pulled out his own axe and indicated towards an iron door to our right. The Imperial captain and one of her soldiers was running up the hallway. She hung a chain of keys on her swordbelt, I observed, as my Stormcloak ally and I slipped into the shadows. The captain pulled out the chain, and fumbled with the keys until she discovered the right one to open the door. Not even giving her a chance, we sprung out of the dark corners of the room, as I launched a ball of fire at her companion. His jerkin burst into flame, and he began to scream before I silenced him with a cut from my axe. I turned to join Ralof, but found his battle already won. The captain was sprawled on the floor, a pool of blood slowly forming around a wound in her neck. Nothing needed to be said. I quickly threw off my cuirass in return for some steel armour and a helm, and we moved on into the tower. You may live yet Na'jar, I thought to myself, a grim smile forming on my face.

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