Chapter 1

the escape

All night he dreamed horrid dreams. A dream of a world, whose very sky was ablaze with fire, whose oceans boiled red and searing to the flesh. All around was death, decay, destruction. He stood before a large burning gate, as an army of twisted beings in strange looking armor moved towards him. They clustered around a grand mechanical beast which was resemblant of an arachnid, as it moved closer he began to hear a voice speaking to him. It was a males voice, speaking of his past and his lack of control over his destiny. Just as the mechanical spider reached him...

His eyes flew open. He wasn't really standing in a burning hell he was... in prison. Which is just as bad a hell as any kind of volcanic world could be. He brushed his long white hair back out of his face, he was an odd child having white hair and bright Grey eyes. His name is Fortuna Lupus, a name that up till a month ago when he was thrown into a dingy morrowind prison for defending his friend, of whom was getting raped, from a guard no less, was a badge of honor, the lucky wolf. But as it turns out, the bastard guard had friends in high places. So Fortuna ended up in jail, whilst the guard got a heroes funeral. Joy.

Although initially imprisoned in morrowind, this was a new cell. He was now in the imperial city prison, smack in the middle of the Cyrodilic empire, hell, he wouldn't be surprised if he was smack in the center of the whole fucking continent. About a week ago, he got packed up and moved out of the fort near his home town of Balmora, and boarded on a Seyda Neen boat, for... no real reason, tho looking around his cell with the chains hanging from the ceiling and the random bones laying on the floor he wondered what was going to become of him. Sitting up in his bed-roll, he looked around more, spotting a rickety old table and stool, on the table sat a loaf of bread and some water.

"ugh, I'm so sick of bread," he groaned.

Suddenly there was movement in the shadows beyond his cells door, his hand flew to his hip, expectant of a sword, but of course, there was none.

"wh-who's there" came a slow voice.

A fellow prisoner, his muscles relaxed.

"I'm new," he sighed

He peered into the other cell, his cold grey eyes were met with a mocking red.

Oh great. He thought to himself a fucking dunmer

"oh! Whats this? An imperial in the imperial prison?"the dark elf laughed

"yeah? So what?" Fortuna's eyes narrowed, the dunmer's voice was full of nothing but mockery.

"i guess they really don't play favorites, huh" he continued "your own kinsmen think your a pile of human trash!"

Fortuna's eyes narrowed further, this elf really was asking for it, he bent down and picked up one of the bones lining his cell.

"how sad, I bet the guards give you some 'special' treatment before the end! Thats right! Your going to die in here imperial! Your going to die"

Fortuna let out a growl and threw the bone, it whistled through the air and stabbed into the dunmeri's eye, squirting blood, the dunmeri screeched as he grabbed for the eye.

"IMPERIAL SCUM LIKE YOU GIVE THE EMPIRE A BAD NAME! BEST IF YOU JUST DISSAPEARED!" he roared, pulling out the bone with a sickening pop... which made Fortuna guess the eye came out too.

"yea? Well you talk to much" he sneered at the one red eye still glinting at him, but only for a second as the dunmeri's retort was cut off by the scream of an ancient rusty iron door creaking alive and open

"hear that? There coming for you" he hissed. "you in'wa"

footsteps began descending the stares, along with voices.

"my sons... they're dead aren't they" an familiar voice said sadly.

"we don't know that sire," a female quickly responded. "the messenger only said that they were attacked!"

"no... they're dead. I know it to be true"

"my job right now is to get you to safety." she said as the group came into view, it consisted of the warden, whom Fortuna only met once last night when he arrived, two male Redguards and a woman all dressed in strange armor he had never seen before... and a man, who was dressed in the most regal and noble looking robes he had ever seen.

"Whats this prisoner doing here?" she snapped to the warden

"u-usual mix up with the watch i..." he sputtered

"never mind, get the gate open," she cut him off sharply

the warden obeyed and despite his nervously fumbling with the gate, it soon swung open faster than Fortuna thought that door had ever been opened... who are these people that they instill fear so readily into the heart of such a cruel man?

"stand back prisoner, we wont hesitate to kill you if you get in our way," she said taking him in, and for the first time, he noticed the curved blades the people in the still foreign, tho he searched his memory for any armor that looked like it, armor.

The warden opted to make now a good time to show his dominance of the jail "you, prisoner, over by the window and you wont get hurt"

smirking at the sweat running down the Warden's neck, Fortuna complied and moved over by the window, next to his bed-roll.

The group of four, the three in strange armor and the regal old man, moved into his cell, and over to a slight indent in his wall, while the warden closed and locked the cell door. An action that made Fortuna's eyebrow raise into his shaggy bangs.

"no sign of pursuit sir," one of the redguards said to the woman, apparently she was the leader, the other redguard walked over and pointed at Fortuna "stay put."

a rumbling off to the side made him disobey the heavily armed stranger and move, he turned to see the wall moving aside and was able to soon see a tunnel as torches sprang to life one by one leading down into the earth. The woman nodded to herself, then turned to her group "good lets go, we're not out of this yet"

"wait," the old man held up a hand "I've seen you..." he said, taking a step towards Fortuna "let me see your face..."

"erm..." Fortuna blinked, as the old man stared into his face.

The old man turned pale as ash "you are the one from my dreams, then the stars were right... then this is the day. Gods give me strength..."

"wh-whats going on?" he spluttered, that was the voice from his dream last night! "who are you?"

"i am your emperor, Uriel Septim VII" he explained "these are my blades, Renault, he pointed to the woman, Baurus, one of the red guards, and Glenroy, the other. Assassins attacked my sons, and I am next. My blades, are leading me out of the city along a secret escape route, which happens to be through your cell. By the grace of the gods, I serve Tamriel as her emperor, now you too will serve her in your own way."

Fortuna scowled "i go my own way."

Uriel laughed "don't we all? But what path can be avoided, whose end is set by the gods?"

"sir, we must get moving..." Renault cut in, eyes darting towards the tunnel and back. The old man nods, and with one last look he joins the others as they start to climb through the opening "better not close this one, there's no way to open It from the other side."

"looks like its your lucky day prisoner, just make sure not to get in our way." Baurus scowled