A/N: Hey hey! Writing challenge with SkullKing223; so here we go! Short one, probably the first multichapter I'll finish. Huzzah! Enjoy, and review my lovelies! You know you need to… This is the update version with the prologue.

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Fanfiction

Disclaimer:

I do not own Skyrim or any of the NPCs, Quests or game dialog. The rest of the characters are mine. Enjoy and please review!

Prologue: The Speed of Pain

Elenwen sighed, closing her eyes and pinching the bridge of her nose. She was seated at a large table with her most trusted Thalmor agents, Ondelomar and Ancano on either side of her in the Thalmor Embassy, just outside of Solitude. The Emperor, Titus Mede II, and a few of his Council members were also there, with recent documents of alarming events lying open in front of each of them. How had this happened? "This… is a problem," Elenwen said softly, looking up again.
Titus frowned. "Are the Blades not behind this?"
Ondelomar smirked from under his hood. "We have long ago destroyed those glorified sellswords."
"But a mage is behind this," Ancano added, his nasal voice ringing out. Elenwen clenched her jaw: yes, a mage from the College of Winterhold, where he had been stationed. Ancano had failed her; he had been stationed there for this very reason, and he had had contact with this mage for at least eight or nine years, and Ancano had failed to see the signs. That, or whoever this was had greater skill than anticipated. It was worrying. "Is that not why you are at the College?" the Emperor pressed.
"I have done everything I can under pretense of 'advisor'! Even more when opportunity arose! More obvious matters would put my position at risk and the entire ruin of a College is up in arms!"
Titus opened his mouth to argue. Elenwen fell him in. "Enough. Arguing over what has already happened will not change it," Elenwen paged through the document again, more for something to do. "Since both Imperial-favoring and Stormcloak-favoring jarls have been killed I can only assume that another group or order is at work.:
"Why not an individual?" a Breton man asked, looking up from the documents for the first time.
Everyone gathered stared at him. Elenwen and Ondelomar started laughing at the same time. "A lone mage? Killing all these jarls, Imperial soldiers and –"
Elenwen cut him short with a glare. This mortal emperor didn't need to know this rogue organization had gotten to the Thalmor as well. He leaned back in his chair, folding his arms across his chest. "A lone mage isn't capable of this. Not even an Altmer. It's too well-planned for an individual," he finished somewhat lamely. Ondelomar's eyes focused on an Imperial soldier who shifted uneasily, sweat running down his face. "What ails you so, Imperial?" Ondelomar quizzed, nodding his head at the man.
The soldier flinched, blinking and wiping his brow before vigorously shaking his head. "N-nothing at all, Altmer," he stuttered, looking down.
Elenwen glanced between the two. Her elf was onto something. "If you know something, you should speak. Unless you're aiding these mages, in which case you will become very well-acquainted with a special friend of mine…."
The soldier shook his head again. "I know nothing," he spoke a little more convincingly.
Titus narrowed his eyes at Elenwen, preparing to stand. "Very well. If this is all that is necessary, and it clearly isn't useful, I'd like to put troops out and start looking for suspicious activity."
Elenwen looked down her nose at the emperor. "Of course," she waved a hand to let her soldiers show the emperor and his host out. Once they were gone, Elenwen asked, "What are we going to do? How can we stop this?"

A young Imperial woman sat on her bed in the College of Winterhold, pouring over books and finishing a few notes of her own. Not an inch of her room was free of some kind of intellectual clutter – maps, borrowed and bought books, old scrolls, as well as journals of her own. She stowed her current project away, sitting cross-legged on her bed, then closed her eyes. This was one of the few spells she had difficulty with, and she practiced it as often as she could. She murmured a few words, letting her magicka loose to let the spell happen. She felt the air shimmer slightly, holding onto the image she conjured in her head. The air settled, and she padded to a mirror. She smiled at her reflection. She was getting better at changing her appearance. The woman wondered briefly if she could use the spell to make her look like a man… she let the spell go, thinking of the Thalmor agent who resided in the College. If she could get him right, then there was nowhere she couldn't go. She closed her eyes, concentrating on his face, every detail she had seen. She opened her eyes to a close rendition of the Altmer. The Imperial smiled. Soon she would leave this place behind, soon she would start her mission, and no-one would know she had been the one to do it.