"There he is! Shoot him!" The Justiciar ordered his archers to open fire immediately. After months of wearily following leads, tracking clues and finding nothing but mutilated Altmer corpses, they finally found him. They found the wood elf Marudil, and they weren't going to let him escape with his life.
Speedily Marudil ran through the brush and the trees, veering left and right in the hopes that, somehow, he might manage to outrun his pursuers. If they hadn't taken him by surprise in the woods, he might very well have been able to face all three on his own... but these were no ordinary Thalmor agents. Their moonstone armor was thicker than what they usually wore, and their weapons were better-forged... no doubt they had forged their weapons and armor for the sole purpose of hunting and killing him. However, there was still a Bosmer's agile frame and advantage in the wilds to be concerned... but the agents' arrows were many, and in spite of his incredible speed, Marudil could not dodge their deadly tips forever. Sure enough, as Marudil leaped nimbly over a rocky crag, an arrow plunged itself deeply into his left shoulder. His balance was thrown clean from his feet, and he tumbled down the rest of the hill.
The pain was great, but he could not afford to stop running. Not yet. Not until the Justiciars had lost sight of him. Clutching his shoulder and trying to keep the wound off his mind, Marudil looked every which way for an escape route. And he found it: just to his left was a rocky slope, leading to a river below. If he could climb just right... if he could follow the river to a cavern to hide in... yes. That'd be his escape plan. Hearing his pursuers behind him, Marudil made a mad dash for the cliff, jumped for the first rock and...
"Got you!" The Justiciar mage shouted proudly, as a streak of lightning shot from his fist and into Marudil's back. The force of impact pushed the wood elf clean over the cliff side and sent him careening down into the river. The Justiciars watched from above as Marudil hit the rocks as he fell, then lost consciousness as his head met the bottom of the lake. His helpless body floated limply to the surface, as the water carried him away...
"We did it..." One Thalmor archer said in disbelief. "We actually did it... Lady Elenwen said it was impossible!"
"I never thought I'd see the day when that savage was finally punished for his crimes... yet it has come."
"Perhaps now we can continue our operations in Skyrim without fear of finding a tomahawk in our backs. Did you read Lady Elenwen's dossier on this barbarian?"
"I did. The descriptions of his operations against the Aldmeri Dominion for the past 200 years were... shocking."
"I'm just in awe of this... he really is dead, then? Has the nightmare come to an end?"
"It has. And when we give our full report to Herself, we shall be rewarded most handsomely for our victory this day! Let it be known across the Isles: the savage Bosmer known to Tamriel as Marudil is dead!"
*****
The pain... the dizziness... what happened? At the shoreline, Marudil's eyes creaked wearily open and beheld the sun rising above his head... his head! What happened to his head that would make it hurt so terribly? In fact, where was he? This land was unfamiliar to him... he stood before the water's edge and gazed upon the face staring back at him... the face of a stranger without a name.
"Why... don't I recognize this face?" He said in a quiet panic. "Why can't I remember my name? Who am I?!"
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