Prologue

The smoke was thick and choking, stinging Leto's eyes and making them water as he staggered from his burning bedroom. His mind was still clouded with being shocked from a deep and half-drunken sleep by the sound of the door to his family home being kicked in and seeing the lit torch sailing through his bedroom door to land on his bed. Sounds of his family's home being ransacked barely made it through the sounds of wood crackling as it burned.

The flames had spread quickly, and within a few seconds he realised the whole house was alight. Screams echoed through the night, but he couldn't make sense of where they were coming from and his vision was further marred by the inferno that raged around him.

Leto grasped half-blind for a one-handed sword that his father had finished making that day and left sitting on a table to finish wrapping the hilt in the morning. A shape moved through the smoke and flames, huge and dark, and the young Nord knew immediately it wasn't someone from his village. With a scream of confusion and rage, he drove the sword into the lightly armoured gut, not even waiting around to check that the man wouldn't rise again. This man had set his house alight, not even caring that there were people inside, and while it burned had been grabbing at anything worth more than a few septims.

When Leto had woken and dragged himself from his burning bed, the first thing he'd done was check his sister's bed across the room, but it had been empty. Either she hadn't gone to sleep yet or she was outside for some other reason.

Staggering across broken furniture and debris, Leto made his way for the open door, the need for clean air becoming too strong for him to think of anything else. His bare feet sank into the melting snow and he sucked in a breath. The air was only mildly fresher, still tainted with thick smoke and the smell of blood.

He cast his eyes over the scene that was revealed to him. The entire village was in flames, the few inches of snow that was a permanent feature this deep into the Jerall Mountains melting under the heat to become muddy slush. Bodies littered the ground, their blood joining the mess of dirty snow to form murky puddles. The villagers who weren't already dead were screaming; some battle cries, others calling for their children or parents or spouses and others still in agony as flames consumed them and they flailed to try and find the river and douse themselves. All had been awoken in the dead of night by their doors being kicked in, and either dragged from their beds and thrown to the ground outside, demands of where they kept their valuables screamed into their ears, or the bandits had ignored them and held lit torches to rugs or anything else that would catch fire easily. There had been no warning, no explanation. There had just been fire and steel and death and pain.

Leto's own voice added to the chaos, calling for his parents and his sister. Now that his mind had come out from its sleep-haze, he realised just how bad a sign it was that his younger sister wasn't in her bed. He heard his name being called and he forced his legs to carry him in that direction. His blurred vision caught a snatch of his father battling a bandit, teeth bared in fury as his greatsword arced through the air. Before he could charge in to help, he sensed movement behind him and whipped around just in time to block an axe to his gut.

The bandit's eyes gleamed with blood-lust and his lips were peeled back to reveal half-rotted teeth in a grin. "Come on, little boy, show us what you're made of!"

Leto had never been called little in his entire life. Though the bandit was a tall and broad Redguard, he was still a head shorter than the young Nord he'd tried to gut. Rage overtook Leto and he slashed at the bandit's face with his sword. He was a blacksmith's son, and had been learning the art of metalcraft since he was old enough to hold a hammer, but the only swordsmanship he'd ever learned was when he was testing a new blade against a dummy. His swing went wild and the Redguard rammed the head of his axe into Leto's stomach, doubling him over and knocking the wind from him.

A cry of agony from his father had Leto spinning around, the sound wrenching at his heart and making him forget that he was about to be killed. He could only stare as his father, a gash across his gut that showed his insides, crumpled on the ground, eyes open wide in death.

Leto screamed wordlessly in pain and despair. His fist tightened around the hilt of his sword and he slashed out, catching the Redguard, who had been about to drive his axe down into the prone young Nord's back, off guard. His dark eyes widened in shock as the sword was driven up beneath his ribs and into his lung. The distraught Leto didn't even wait to see him fall to the ground. He tore his sword free and charged at the other bandit that had just taken his father from him, before his very eyes.

The bandit easily dodged the savage strike and laughed as Leto slipped in the mud and slammed into the ground right beside his dead father. His laughter failed when the young man scrabbled back to his feet with another shriek and charged at him again, sword held over his head like it was a greataxe. The bandit was also a Nord, his unshaven face scarred and smeared in black war-paint. He dodged the wild swings of Leto, taunting him as he lazily struck out and cut the boy's unarmoured flesh with his own sword. Rage and the agony of watching his father die made Leto not even notice the multiple slashes to his arms and chest, dripping blood onto the stained snow. All he could see was the man before him; a fellow Nord, who had no honour to be attacking a defenceless village in the dead of night and burning it. He had to die. Leto was going to avenge his father. He had to.

He was so focussed on making the image of the bandit choke on his own entrails a reality that he never noticed the other bandit coming up beside him. There was a flash of movement that made him snap his head around, but he didn't even have time to register the warhammer crashing into his skull.

The world tilted and his whole body went numb as it was spun around with the force of the blow. He lay limply on the cold, wet ground, the flames creating a garbled chaos of moving shadows to his swimming vision.

He vaguely heard the Nord he'd been fighting complain to his fellow bandit about ruining his fun, and the other respond that they had better things to be doing than toying with some brat in his bed-clothes. As their footsteps carried them away, the darkness closed in around Leto and he was powerless to struggle against it.

Leto didn't know how long he'd wandered aimlessly through the forest, covered in mud and blood that wasn't all his own. Everything since waking up in the ruins of his once peaceful home village was a blur. Everyone had been dead; the bodies of bandits and friend alike abandoned on the muddy ground while the homes of everyone he had known and held dear burned. Charred corpses were among them; there was no way to know who they once were. The smell of cooked meat and blood and smoke still lingered in Leto's nostrils and he didn't think he'd ever be able to get rid of it. He'd tried to put the fires out, burning his hands and feet in the futile effort. He'd tried to shake awake the people he'd stumbled over in his concussed confusion – including his own father, but all that had happened was his already blood- and mud-slicked hands had become even more covered. The bandits had even killed the dogs and livestock.

At some point during his aimless meandering, the pain of rocks and forest debris cutting into his bare feet and seeped through his shocked brain. He'd been forced to tear the sleeves from his tattered nightshirt and wrap them around his feet for some minor protection, just so he could keep moving. The cold of the snow didn't bother him. Even if it weren't for his Nordic blood protecting him, his mind was numb to all feelings but the ache of loss that what small part was still functioning was surprised he'd even noticed the damage to his feet.

Vague memories of pausing to drink from a river and eat wild berries, only to vomit them back up, flittered through his mind. But for the most part all he saw when his eyes closed to blink or he succumbed to exhaustion and collapsed to the snowy ground were the bodies of those he had grown up with, their blood and entrails spilling onto the melted snow, or their flesh still blistering and bubbling as the flames consuming them dwindled. He didn't have the sense to clean himself off, or even attempt to tend to the deep gashes he'd received from his brief battles with the bandits that had destroyed his world.

It was night-time – of what day, Leto had no idea – when he heard the first signs of life that weren't from the wild animals that made the mountains their home. The warm glow of a campfire filtered through the trees and acted like a beacon, drawing the young Nord toward it like a lunar moth. As he drew nearer he could make out voices, speaking of honour and glory, and another singing about Sovngarde.

His leaden limbs slowly took him closer, feet tripping on any small obstacle. Leto was too far in shock to consider that he could be stumbling into danger, that this could be another group of bandits or worse. All he could see was fire and life and help. He was half-starved and wounded. He needed aid. The people with the warm fire could give it to him.

He'd barely broken through the line of trees when several armoured Nords spotted him and leapt to their feet, all conversation ending to be replaced with orders for Leto to stop and announce himself and his purpose. He staggered forward, unaware that any not asleep in bedrolls or inside tents were looking at him suspiciously and had weapons drawn.

A tent flap was parted and a huge Nord in regal armour stepped out to investigate the ruckus. Whoever he was, even Leto's fogged mind could understand he was clearly in charge. The blue-clad warriors nearest him stepped aside to allow him through as he strode toward Leto, a frown creasing his heavy brow.

"Lower your weapons, he's just a boy and he's unarmed."

"But, my Jarl," one of the warriors protested, "how did he find us?"

Before anything more could be said, Leto's knees buckled. One of the blue-armoured warriors reached out and caught him, easing one of the young man's arms over his shoulders to take his weight.

"Talos, he's wounded!"

The 'jarl's' booming summons for a healer went unnoticed by Leto as another set of hands aided the first and started to move him through the camp.

"Please," Leto croaked, "my village…we were attacked…"

"Easy lad," one of the men holding him up murmured, "we've got you. You'll be alright."

"I need help," he insisted, "they're all –"

He never got the chance to finish his plea. With battle cries that shattered the silence of the night, a sea of crimson-clad warriors burst through the trees, weapons drawn. The strong arms that had been supporting Leto suddenly threw him to the ground and he felt a fur boot slam into his ribs.

"Damnit! It's an ambush and he's the distraction!"

Heavily armoured warriors poured into the camp and began to hack their way through the blue-armoured Nords, shouting out that they were under arrest. The two who had been walking Leto toward a healer turned and rushed into battle, ignoring the unarmed youth in exchange for the real threat.

As battle raged around him, the sounds of screaming and pain reawakening Leto's terror and sending him back to the massacre he'd just fled from, he scrambled to his feet. With wide eyes staring at the scene of crimson-armoured warriors hacking their way through the blue-armoured ones, filling the air with the scent of blood, Leto found himself stumbling back and away, shaking his head. He hadn't heard the heavy footfalls approaching behind him. What was taking place before him was a one-sided slaughter. Many of the blue-clad warriors had been sleeping when this had started, and all had been caught off guard. It was almost exactly the same as the bandit attack on Leto's village.

When a scuffle between a Nord in a horned helmet and an Imperial whose armour clanked like a blacksmith's workshop wound up kicking hot coals from the campfire into a nearby tent, Leto was lost in the memory. Flames immediately engulfed the tent and spread to the nearby ones.

When the heavily armoured hand of the one who had crept up behind him slammed down onto his shoulder, Leto whipped around and struck out. He couldn't see the face of a warrior, all he saw was the bandit that had killed his father.

He knew he was almost defenceless without armour or a sword – which he'd been too concussed to retrieve when he'd awoken in the middle of the road at his village – but he was too frenzied to care. His opponent was shorter than him, slighter of build, and despite his heavy armour, he staggered back with every blow Leto landed to his face.

Finally, the young Nord's wild thrashing left the Imperial a good enough opening to use. He swung the hilt of his sword at Leto's head, landing a blow near where his skull was already battered from the bandit's warhammer that had spared him death.

Leto slammed into the cold ground, head swimming and vision darkening. Once more he was left with the vision of flames, the smell of smoke and blood and the sounds of death as darkness consumed him.