Carmine blood upon the bedsheets. A black blade, fading in and out of sight due to the pale beam of moonlight striking, ends up streaking across the face of the panic-stricken victim. Casting a fairly complex spell, the murderer vanishes from sight, leaving behind the scenes of a mass murder, and scraps of detail depicting the killer's habits.
The guardsmen come across the smoldering building the next morning. Looking toward each other briefly, they then rush inside - only to find a sadistically macabre scene:
One body decapitated, the head of the Bosmer lying several feet of it's previous owner; the second crucified upon the wall, hands and feet pinned to it with arrows, before having their throat slit; the third, dismembered, only a bloody stump of a body is found lying in a position originally face-forward upon the table. The fourth, poisoned by use of a strange apple, blood clotting and foaming at their mouth as the brain didn't recognise the body's death. The fifth, from blood-loss caused by multiple stabs with different daggers, all of which were left inside the victim. Worst though - the sixth and final victim, their head sliced apart, with a hacking into the brain until it reached about halfway, before the victim, only just alive, had their heart ripped out of their chest.
How did they know? A note from the murderer, with a list explaining the causes of their deaths next to it. It read:
"This was my test to join the clansmen of murder. All these victims were innocent men and women, but they all needed to die. Next to this note you shall find a list of how the victims died, at what time, and where an item of importance held by them is now hidden. My identity cannot be found out unless you are either killed by me or you hire me. You do not wish to get any further when you find the sixth victim...
Sincerely,
A Dark Soul"
Ignoring the message, all three guards ran towards the victim, who was being kept alive by an evil necromantic enchantment. Immediately, the sixth died, before a toxic gas was released by his deacyed body, killing the guards instantly.
At this point, due to a detection spell cast upon the vacinity, in an area far away, the Sanguine Ritual began, celebrating the welcoming of the newest acolyte of Sithis...
This is written a while back, noting some distaste at some of the quests in the DB storyline. I mean, killing Rufio? That is so easy! Why should something that simple be the initiation? If I were Lucien, I'd give the recruit a difficult test of skill and cunning, such as the killing of Baenlin. That should be the initial joining quest.