21st of Hearthfire, 4E 201
Alopexin circled the walls of Whiterun like a vulture scouting out prey. She crept forward in a leaning crouch, with her fingers digging into the mossy ground. Her hair hung down to her waist in thick greasy hanks, sodden with blood and dirt, laying flaccid against her pale skin. So pale that her skin glowed in the bold, bright moonlight, slick with sweat and smear, deep shadows purpling her eyes. Her sour, foxy smell rankled in her nostrils, and a coarse linen shirt hung from her almost emaciated frame.
She had been running wild for 3 weeks now, foraging berries and raw fish from the plains and tundra. It suited her to live like a fox, steering clear of the cities and roads. She preferred solitude, her voice had been silent for so long now that words sounded jagged, jumbled and too loud.
The wilderness was full of joy for the Breton. She had felt like her heart would burst with pleasure, running through long-swaying grasses and leaping from rocky crags with her blood pounding in her ears like a tightly skinned drum and panting in the pure, hard air. The smell of the salty ocean fading into gentle pine and the sweet cloying nectar of the mountain flowers as she moved North. But the frozen ground and streams of the far North yielded little, and she was weak from wilderness living. The natural bounty was hard-won and it had been days since she had eaten her fill. A ragged claw wound in her side ached, at times burning like a spark and at others freezing her into torpor.
Easing gently towards the city Alopexin panted, each breath boiling in her throat before wheezing out of her cracked lips, and sweat oozing from her in salty rivulets that snaked down her grimy skin. The metal beads that her mother had threaded into her fox-red hair before she left home clanked in her ears like the death-knells from distant temples. Her bow hung like a broken arm at her back, the string grinding into her tired spine. Each step was a labour, her bare feet were blistered even through the horn-like soles that had formed over the past tennight. Her boots had long since been shed as excessive weight to allow her to run and jump through the land. She was so light it was almost like flying. The chinking of her hair beads called painful memories of home.
Her mother's soft, white, gentle hands raking through her scalp, pushing the beads gently into her shimmering mane of fiery hair in the dark, decrepit temple, while shedding warm wet tears that studded her skin. The hushed voice of the village priest counselling her mother.
"Our children must follow their own paths Anesi. You named Alopexin for the white fox, and like the fox she is a wanderer. The little fox runs alone with the wind at her back, and so must Alopexin. It is in her bones, blood and name. It is her gift from you."
The air had been thick with the scent of burning pine and fizzled with emotion, Alopexin could almost feel it on her skin now, could almost taste the charred wood and the electric emotion of her mother. The image flickered in her eyes as she dragged her feet onwards towards the Whiterun gate. Slipping in and out of a past dream with her eyes rolling wildly as she stumbled forward.
The priest had moved Anesi's hand from Alopexin's hair into his mittened grip.
"Do not forget Anesi, the white fox makes barren lands her home, she thrives in bleak surroundings changing her appearance with the seasons. She is a trickster, a natural survivor. Alopexin will do the same. Desolation will bring her into the bloom of womanhood."
"But she can never return. Those are the rules the village council have set Would a fox still blossom on being cast out from his den, or is he forever doomed to wander with nowhere to call his home?" Anesi sighed out the words, her face already marked with the pain of defeat.
The gate shimmed into view as Alopexin pulled her tired bones forward. She could feel the swell of fever grating in her blood and an empty nausea swam in her belly. She could see the gate, she was so close now. Her feet were betraying her, dragging thick grooves in the mud like lifeless animals trailing in a wolves mouth.
As she moved nearer, straightening from a crouch to a hunchbacked shamble, she could see the guards exchanging cautious expressions. Their mouths were gaping and moving like a caught fish. But their words sounded like a savage wind, too loud and jumbled, roaring in her ears with the strength of a dragon.
Alopexin quivered with fever and fear as the guards began their approach to her, but like a rabbit she remained glued to the spot, facing down her fears with blind stubbornness. With a rumbling sound, like the swell of the sea pounding in her ears, and the world see-sawing in her eyes Alopexin stumbled backwards, fumbling at her waist to find the cold buckle of her belt.
And the guards were closing in, their arms outstretched, mouths still flapping wordlessly.
Her fingers found the cold, steely grip of her dagger just as her legs gave in. The earth was spinning too fast, and it was hot, searingly hot. She collapsed to the ground, with her last view of the world in blurred faces, outstretched hands and the glassy shimmer of the Aurora in the dark, dark sky.