Note: This will be the final chapter of Soleiya's backstory. If I decide to create a travelogue of her exploits in-game, it would likely pick up somewhere around where this tale leaves off. On the other hand, it's very likely that I'll get too caught up in playing the game to want to stop and write about it, so this may be the last you hear from her for a while. ;)
Freedom was even better than she expected.
At first, Soleiya was elated merely to be able to move about as she pleased, hunt without restriction (other than those imposed by the Green Pact, which she did respect), and love whom she chose. After a few days, however, she learned of smaller, less obvious liberties. The freedom to wake, sleep, and eat when she wanted, rather than being chained to the chime of a clock. The freedom to indulge her curiosity about everything around her without making a stern guardian impatient. The freedom to spend a day lazily not getting up at all.
Sakirra was a constant delight. Not only in intimate matters, but in her own blossoming understanding of what it meant to be a free Khajiit. Her spine straightened, she held her ears more erect, and her tread became more confident. She began displaying the feline stalking skills that all Khajiit seem incapable of forgetting. Soleiya began to forget how it felt to drift to sleep without stiff whiskers gently scraping her cheek or neck.
The pair wandered first to the east--to Elsweyr, as Soleiya had promised. They spent several happy months wandering the veldts and open forests of Sakirra's homeland, so different from the dense, tropical jungles of Valenwood that they both remembered. Sakirra even managed to track down some distant relatives, who welcomed their prodigal cousin with open paws. Soleiya was made welcome, too, but received more than a few askance looks. Her smooth, fair skin and unruly red hair made her stand out as much or more in Elsweyr than Sakirra had in the leafy halls of Falinesti.
As the months wore on, the two women finally bid farewell to the land of the Khajiit and roved further afield. They avoided Black Marsh and Morrowind, both still seething with unrest left over from the cataclysm and subsequent invasion. Making swift tracks across Cyrodiil--a province recently much more militant and well-guarded than in previous centuries--they found reasons to linger in Hammerfell, for both found that they enjoyed the change of desert and savannah. The teeming port cities of the province were where Sakirra first taught Soleiya the dangerous art of purse-snatching and robbery, which Soleiya gradually found that she enjoyed almost as much as hunting. As her skill grew, so did their standard of living, to the point that they were finally able to ship out of Gilane on a sleek ship, rather than, as Sakirra put it, "wearing the pads off of their feet all the way to High Rock."
It was in High Rock that they first became aware of their pursuers. On a week-long excursion into the strange vales of Orsinium, Soleiya was flabbergasted to catch a quick glance of Erradan, one of her mother's personal guardsmen. She rushed back to the wayhouse where Sakirra waited, white-faced and shaking, but her companion was unharmed. Neither woman would have guessed that anyone in Soleiya's family would value her enough to actually pursue her across Tamriel, and the knowledge that their every move could be watched was unsettling, to say the least. The pair agreed to leave High Rock much sooner than they had planned, and trekked as swiftly as they could manage across the northeastern expanse of Hammerfell, back into the Imperial province. They reasoned that if they doubled back, their route would be less predictable than if they proceeded on into Skyrim, as they had originally intended.
It was in northern Cyrodiil, finally, that they had to flee in earnest. Soleiya caught another glimpse of Erradan, this time leading a force of Bosmer archers and swordsmen, marching through one of the gates of Chorrol. The girls fled northeast, through the wilderness toward Bruma. Soleiya used every trick she knew to try to mislead pursuers in the wilds, blurring their trail, deliberately taking circuitous trails, and traveling through shallow water whenever possible. Every day when they awoke, they were certain they would see the glint of sunlight on chainmail, or hear the cries of soldiers on the chase.
Soleiya began to increasingly chafe against the idea of losing the freedom that had so quickly become so precious to her. Her anger grew until she was even snapping at Sakirra as they continued to move across country with all speed. Her Khajiiti companion grew silent, the better to avoid provoking Soleiya's increasingly sharp tongue and unforgiving humor.
They passed north of Bruma into the high mountains, avoiding the city, but the snowy landscape turned against them, as it became nearly impossible to obscure their tracks through the fresh powder of late autumn. One day, as they climbed into a narrow pass heading north into Skyrim, they heard a shout, and turned back to see a ragtag band of soldiers a mile or so behind. Soleiya and Sakirra looked each other in the eye, then turned and ran.
They were able to evade the pursuit for another half day, and made it over the Pale Pass into the land of the Nords before they were surrounded by eight or ten armed men. Erradan removed his helmet to reveal a sneering face stained with sweat from their long chase. "M'lady Soleiya, I am under orders to remove you back to your noble home by any means necessary," he pronounced, clearly enjoying her impotent wrath. "Should it become necessary--"
A steel-fletched arrow sprouted from his eye socket as if by magic. Another appeared a moment later....standing out from Sakirra's shoulder blade. Soleiya caught the Khajiit as she fell. She knew at a glance that a lung was pierced, and without strong healing magic....no herb would save her life.
Sakirra turned wide eyes on her lover, the breath already bubbling in her throat. "I see your face, my Soleiya..." she rasped, and her throat hitched. "...And I die free..."
Sakirra died there, in Soleiya's arms, as a pitched battle raged around them. Soleiya felt her heart icing over; her hate was the only warmth left. When a gauntleted hand fell heavily on her shoulder, she reacted almost without thought. She cared not who attacked her, or why. She acted merely to assuage her own rage and pain. Grabbing a broken arrow from the ground beside her, Soleiya spun and buried the shaft in the throat of the man behind her.
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