My beloved boy,
If you've set your hands on this journal, than I am dead and I never said goodbye. I could prattle on for ages about the things that I should have told you before the end, fill these pages with a mother's advice and sorrows, but that's not what you need right now. Right now you need to run. Do not read the rest of this journal until you are safe. Perhaps I have already put you in danger by saying so much. But run, please. Live. Sovengard has no need of a hero so young as you.
The blood in his veins thrummed with life, terror spiking his adrenalin until his hands shook and the journal threatened to tumble from his hands. Bright green eyes stood open, his shocked expression engraved into his face like a statue. When his mother had said to read the book when the dawn peeked above the horizon, he had never even begun to fathom that inside the pages would be her final farewell.
Outside thunder cracked, shaking the wooden walls of the house he had lived in all his life, snapping him back to reality. Outside the wind was howling like a hundred wolves crying for blood, rain pelting the shutters and rattling them, straining against the latches and threatening to knock them inwards with the force of the gale outside. Over the racket of the impending storm he could never have heard the cell of Justicars heading towards the lone farm just outside of the city walls. He couldn't hear their conversation of how they planned to surround the house before blowing down the door to keep anyone inside from escaping. All he could hear was the rapid rush of his own heart and the clattering as he knocked over a candle in his haste to stuff the journal in a bag full of supplies that had been packed with just such an escape in mind by a mother with the gift of foresight.
The boy left through the back door, the upset candle kindling a small fire on the corner sheet of a bed that quickly began to spread. But there was no time to think about that. He would never be coming back here again.
The storm welcomed him into its embrace, fairly sucking him out of the house with a powerful gale that cracked a nearby tree, sending a huge branch toppling to the ground in a whirl of splinters and leaves. Overhead the thunder roared, an arm of lightning striking the ground so close that for a moment the boy was blinded, shielding his eyes behind an upraised arm and a curtain of thick brown hair that had plastered itself to his face almost the second he stepped out into the tempest. But he couldn't stay. His fear nipped at his heels, forcing him to pick up his feet and head out into the night.
A bolt of lightning sizzled the air and sent a shock wave through the ground right in front of him, kicking up a clod of sodden muddy dirt. The boy whipped around to see a tall figure cloaked in gold-trimmed black robes building another lightning bolt in his hand and immediately the boy dove for cover, the next shock of mage lightning missing him by only a hair's breadth. But he didn't stop, rolling to his feet and kept on into the night, fleeing desperately as the mud slid under his feet, propelling him down the slick hill that their house rested on. Behind him the mage yelled something indistinguishable over the noise of the storm and sent another handful of bolts after the boy.
The chase was on, two of the Justicars skidding after the boy in the rain and the mud, egging him on, corralling him as they came in on either side, their longer legs allowing them to catch up faster even though they slipped and slid worse in the mud than the boy did. Just ahead an old tree creaked in the gale, its wide leafless branches spreading out like clawed hands whose form was only defined whenever the lightning speared the sky and made the earth tremble. The boy's foot caught, sending him flying face-first into the mud and he slid under the shadow of that great tree. The Justicars, sensing an end to the chase called out in victory, charging their spells with harsh words on their lips. The boy looked up with fearful eyes, trying desperately to scramble to his feet as the elves advanced on him.
Lightning struck again, this time on the ancient leafless tree. The blinding light numbed all of their senses, the following crash of noise so loud that it was as if the earth itself had split in half to devour them all whole, making a sound as if some ancient beast had opened its maw and let out a terrifying bellow. The tree cracked, rent in half by the lightning, and half of the ancient clawed thing began to fall as if in slow motion. The boy held on to some of his senses, moving sideways from the tons of falling wood and avoided the severed trunk that tried its best to crush him. The Justicars were not so lucky, and their screams as they were impaled and squished beneath the tree pierced even the violent gale of the storm.
He did not wait. His feet carried him away from the grizzly scene of blood mixing with the blood in rivulets as the rain poured down on unseeing eyes. The boy ran until the storm blew itself out and he was in the foothills of the mountains, shivering and miserable in a tiny cave that would only fit a child and his pack.
The daylight broke, and even though the ordeal had tired him, the boy could not sleep. He was haunted by the screams of the dying elves and the fear that they would find him hidden here. Light streamed into the small indent in the rock that the boy had taken shelter in, illuminating his shivering form. With fingers stiff from cold and fear, the boy undressed himself, wringing out the sopping clothes he wore and pulled a long thin shirt that was more dry than damp from his pack and put it on in place of his clothes which he left to dry in the sunlight. Hesitantly, he took out the journal, holding it in his hand and simply staring at the worn pages for a long time before flipping open to the first page, reading over again the single paragraph on the page, the rest left intentionally blank.
He read over the words again, the shock of them lessening now that the house was long behind him and two of his pursuers dead. He was too numb to be bothered about the death of his mother, too afraid to cry, though the choking sensation in his throat told him he dearly wanted to sob until no more tears would come.
My dear son... I never wanted it to end this way. I wanted to watch you reach manhood, to help you shape your life until you no longer needed me. I wanted to be there when you found a wife and held your first child in your arms. I wanted to tell you when I was old and grey on my death bed how much I loved you and that all I ever wanted was your happiness. That was the ending this mother wanted for her son. But that is not the ending that I have brought upon myself.
Do not seek revenge. This is beyond you my beloved boy, and I would not see you waste your life on a corpse. My spirit is in Sovngarde and from there I will watch you all the days of your life until you are called to be here with the great heroes. You have the same wildness as your father; the same hearty blood of the Nords that coursed through his veins is also in you. I hope you grow to be a strong and noble man like him and not like the silly milk-drinking mother that could only watch him be taken away from the both of us. I regret every day that you never knew him, and it seems unfair that now I too have been taken from you.
It will be hard, but do not dwell in the past. You are alive, and you should stay that way. Forge your own path through the days to come. Be honorable, courageous and brave. Never settle for second best. Push yourself and grab whatever destiny lies before you. Tame that destiny and make it your own. Be your own master. Show loyalty to those who are loyal to you, serve only those who are worthy of service, and show kindness to those who follow you in turn. You have the makings of greatness my son, and I love you more than simple ink on a page could ever tell. Be strong, and know that I was always proud of you.
The journal fell from his hands, landing page-down on the hard surface of the cave floor. The knot that had been restricting his breathing loosened, unleashing a well of tears that fell silently as the boy fell asleep, the last of his strength spent on finishing the page.