Eye of the Wind - Prologue

• Posted by Kyrielle Atrinati August 14, 2012 - 409 views

  The last time I saw the trees of Valenwood, my father was able to carry me around on his shoulders and horses were still giants.  When the whispers of the Aldmeri Dominion became loud enough to hear in the streets, my family left our homeland.  We made our way north along the Niben until we took up residence in Chorrol.  There, with the large forest masquerading as our homeland, we lived quietly.  Without the soft shade of Valenwood, however, my mother’s health declined.   My father heard of some kind of elixir that could cure her malady somewhere in Skyrim, so we left for Falkreath that spring.

  We never made it.  We were in the midst of negotiating for transport in a small village just south of the Skyrim border when a fight broke out.  A drunken, bearded young man vomited on an Imperial guard's boots.  The guard proceeded to beat the young man until he was crying and bleeding in the street, coercing the boy into licking his boots clean.  My father, always one to pity the broken, tried to stop the Imperial from humiliating the boy.  The guard saw it differently.  We were accused of, how did he phrase it?  “Abiding and aiding a known rebel.”  I tried to explain that he wasn't abiding or aiding anyone, he just didn't think the boy needed to suffer so. 

  It made no difference.  We were bound and marched with a passing squad of soldiers up into the mountains.  The boy was taken, but died of his injuries soon after we passed the border.  Up in the frigid cold, we were unprepared.  Father became ill very quickly.  He coughed so hard he brought up blood, and the constant racket compelled the guards to kick him at every chance.  It wasn’t long after we passed the border that he, too, perished.  I tried to cry, but the tears just froze to my cheeks and made blinking painful. 

  

  The Imperials were no help either.  One of them sneered at me, and pushed his dead body towards me.  “What’s the matter, flesh-eater?  Aren’t you hungry?” 

  Another laughed heartily, “Maybe if we starve her long enough, she’ll do it!”

  “That’d be a sight to see.  Nothing like watching a mer debase herself.” 

  “And if that doesn’t please her, I’ve got somethin’ else she can eat…”  

  I scrambled away in revulsion.  They only laughed at me.  No matter how hungry I was, or how much I observed the Green Pact, I refused to do it.  This was not how the Bosmer commemorated their fallen.  Yes, sometimes they were eaten, but it was always with great ceremony and respect.  Not while crawling on the ground like a beast.  And whatever else they would try to “feed” me, I’d be sure to bite it off. 

  

  With their hourly taunts resulting in no sick amusement, the soldiers eventually tossed my father’s body out into the snow.  He landed next to a bush of snowberries, many of which tumbled from the branches onto his frozen chest like drops of bright blood.

  We set up camp for the night after meeting up with a second squad of soldiers and other prisoners.  I overheard that we were to meet up with several carts down the road and be taken to Helgen.   

  

  As we ate our meager repast, one of the other prisoners threw his maggot-filled bread at a soldier.  "I want real food!  Not this excuse for bread!  Let me have some of that!"  He got up and groped across several dining Imperials for their meals.  They swatted him away, pushing him to the ground.  He got up and swung at one of the soldiers.  The rest of us sat very, very still.

  

  A melee broke out and while the crazed gentleman was being subdued, the rest of us ran into the surrounding woods, our bare feet crunching softly through the snow and slapping on the stone.  Around me I saw men and women crumple to the ground, bodies sporting arrows or oozing blood.  The Imperials pursued us for sometime after we split up.

  I ran until the cold air froze my lungs.  Until I could no longer hear the cries of prisoners and soldiers.  With the night deepening around me, still I ran on into the dark.