Disclaimer: I don't own Skyrim.

Her wrists were burning.

Grunting under the pounding of her headache, Kendrick felt her muscles ache and tremble and she grimaced.

Attempting to lift her heavy lids, the girl hissed as a brightness seared into her eyes and made her flinch so hard her whole body moved. Jerking back, she threw her hands over her face and let out a little bleat when instead of flat palms cradling her head, she ended up smacking herself a good one with her balled up fists.

Groaning in half pain and half self-pity, it came as a surprise when she heard someone else speak.

"Are you okay lass?" A heavily accented voice asked and Kendrick snapped her neck up and blinked hard to dispel the bleariness in her sight.

And then she blinked some more - because there was no way in hell she was sitting across from a Viking wannabe.

Scrambling back into her seat with a half startled half frightened noise that clawed itself way out of her throat, Kendrick pushed herself as far away from the man as she possibly could before her back hit something hard and she let her eyes pinball in every possible direction.

Yelping a bit as she was sent a few inches up into the air by a sharp bump, Kendrick threw a look over the side of the cart - a fucking cart! - and felt the overwhelming need to throw up as she spied the cobblestone road underneath them. Bending over she placed her head between her knees and breathed - hardly paying any mind to the attempts at comfort that the Viking lookalike was trying to force on her.

"Where am I?" She squeaked out from her prone position as she tried not to shiver and shake so much. "Where did you bring me?"

There was a loaded pause where the only thing she could hear was the sound of the horse clopping about and she could feel her shoulders hunch defensively.

Hesitation belayed guilt her mind hissed, and the guilty can't be trusted.

Fuck she was terrified.

"We are nearing Helgen." The man said after his brief - and potentially incriminating - silence and Kendrick shook her head as her grip tightened painfully in the curls of her hair.

"And where the fuck is that?" She snapped, brow furrowed angrily and mouth twisted down into a frown that was hidden by her knees. "Norway? Sweden? How far are we from the U.S?"

He paused and it didn't reassure her.

Guilty! Guilty! Her mind jeered and Kendrick shivered.

"I'm afraid I don't get your meaning." He said, confusion thick in his voice and she twitched. Violently. "Helgen is Northeast of Falkreath, as it has always been."

Kendrick gave a harsh sigh that beat against the side of her inner calf and she started to tap her foot in time to the rapid beat of her heart.

"Fine. Okay." She growled, annoyance thick in her tone. "But which country is Hellen-"

"Helgen."

"-Hellen, in?" She hissed out as she ignored his attempt at correcting her. If he really thought she gave a fuck about the pronunciation of the place where she would - more than likely - be sold off as a sex slave, then he was sadly mistaken.

"Well?" She gritted and after a beat, there was a shifting.

"Helgen is in Skyrim." The man said and Kendrick snorted so hard it hurt.

"Don't play with me." She muttered as the hot feeling of irritation bubbling up in her stomach turned to anger and she lifted her head from between her legs to pin him with a red-eyed glare. "That's not funny."

The man - with blond hair and blue eyes - looked baffled.

"I had not meant my words as a jest." He said as his brow furrowed in - seemingly - genuine confusion. "I have spoken nothing but the truth to you, young one."

Kendrick gave him a blank wide-eyed stare for perhaps a few moments more before it slid into skepticism and she dismissed him with a glance.

"Yeah fucking right, Skyrim my ass." She muttered to herself, making sure to speak quietly enough that only she would pick up on her words but sadly enough, the insane man across from her had exceptionally good hearing.

It was probably the perks of being a goddamn psychopath.

"I am telling you the truth." He urged to Kendrick but when he saw that she was ignoring him in favor of observing her bindings with a look of extreme discomfort, he switched tracks.

"If you do not believe me, then why don't you tell me where it is you think you are?" He said and with the narrowing of her eyes, Kendrick pursed her lips with the intent to be mulishly quiet but the stranger leaned closer with a cajoling stare.

"You might as well share," The man with the startlingly familiar accent said. "you might never get the chance to do so again."

Hunching her shoulders against the vague warning in his words - was that a fucking threat? - she wrung her fingers together as best as she could.

Fuck it.

"I already said it before," She spat out, fear treading on her every syllable. "we're either in Norway or Sweden but you keeping lying to me and I don't know why since you're a goddamn captive too."

He nodded, eyes intent on her face and Kendrick had to resist the urge to claw out his eyes.

"Aye, I am indeed a prisoner same as you - but," He paused and Kendrick felt an oncoming sense of dread. "these places you speak of are entirely unfamiliar to me."

He leaned forward with apologies shining in his gaze and she almost spit on him.

"I'm sorry." He told her with his mooning cow eyes and she twitched angrily.

This lying ass motherfucker was trying to play her!

"Yeah. Okay, sure." She spat out hurriedly as she looked away and Kendrick felt more than heard the man move closer.

"Why don't you try again lass?" He coaxed and Kendrick set her jaw before she cut her glare at him.

"Why?" She answered scathingly as her dark eyes narrowed and flashed like flames. "So you can lie to my face again?"

The man shook his head.

"Perhaps I am not as well versed in my homeland's layout as I once thought." He said placatingly as if she was the once acting crazy and she visibly bristled. "Mayhaps I'll know the next one?"

Fixing him with a judging glare, she carefully weighed the pros and cons of saying anything before she figured she had nothing to lose and Kendrick sighed.

If he was gonna hurt her, it wouldn't matter what she told him - and that thought shouldn't have been as comforting as it was in that moment.

"Finland?" Kendrick asked after some deliberation and the Viking shook his head.

"I'm unfamiliar."

Biting her lips, she tried again despite the slow tightening she could feel in her chest.

"Iceland?"

"The coldest region we have are the ones that are high in the mountains - and we don't call it that."

"Greenland?"

"Nothing comes to mind - sorry lass."

"Denmark?" She practically growled out as her frustration mounted and when she was met with a blank stare, she dug her nails into the skin of her wrists.

"Perhaps that is some city on Solstheim or Cryodiil?" He said softly as he moved even closer. "I myself am less knowledge of those parts of Nirn but I'm sure if you just-"

Kendrick gave a snarl.

Jumping at the man, she wound her bound hands into the front of his shirt and hefted him up.

"Don't play games with me!" She shrieked as her eyes burned with tears. "Stop acting like you don't underst - ah!"

Flinching as she was cut off by a vicious yank on the collar of her sweater, she fell back into her seat with a harsh thump. Feeling fear replace her anger yet again, the young girl stared into the hard face of the soldier riding in the head of the cart and she shrank back.

"Enough." Was all the man said, but that was all the threat he needed to cow her into submission.

Positively rigid with terror, Kendrick clasped her hands together and gritted her teeth, lest she start sobbing and once that started she knew she wouldn't be able to stop.

"It's obvious she isn't even meant to be here," A new voice snapped but Kendrick refused to budge her eyes away from the tips of her Doc Martens. "and neither am I! This is the fault of you Stormcloaks! Skyrim was fine until you came along, the empire was nice and lazy. If they hadn't been looking for you, I could've stolen that horse and been halfway to Hammerfell!"

She could feel the owner of the new voice staring at her.

"You there - you and me, we shouldn't be here." He said angrily. "It's these Stormcloaks the Empire wants."

"We're all brothers and sisters in binds now, thief." The Viking wannabe said and the supposed 'thief' scoffed.

"Shut up back there!" Another man from the front of the cart shouted and Kendrick jumped, inching away minutely from the barely concealed violence in the tone - and despite her being properly cowed, the thief wasn't seeing as how he kept talking.

"And what's wrong with him, huh?" He sneered and across from her, the Viking man bristled in the corners of her eyes.

"Watch your tongue." He snapped and Kendrick started at the acid in his voice. "You're speaking to Ulfric Stormcloak, the true High King."

And at those words, Kendrick jerkily looked over to her right and quickly faced forward. She didn't know what was going on but quite frankly, she didn't want to.

But that being said, this was either all a big joke or a dream from hell.

"Ulfric? The Jarl of Windhelm?" The thief gasped. "You're the leader of the rebellion! But if they've captured you - Oh gods, where are they taking us?"

"I don't know where we're going," The Viking answered. "but Sovngarde awaits."

Wilting in on herself, Kendrick ducked her head back between her legs as she tried to fight through her hyperventilation. She wished she could place this all on a dream, she really did. It was just that the pain in her body wasn't going to let that happen.

This was real, the only question was - how much of it?

She supposed it could be a prank, she hadn't been hurt by anyone so far besides the ache in her wrists and all of her friends knew she liked the Elder Scrolls - which meant everything that had happened up till now made perfect sense. Now if her guess was right, she only needed to play along long enough for someone to jump out and yell the fabled 'gotcha'.

And that she could do.

Huffing out noisily from her folded place, it wasn't long before the carts stopped moving and with a quiet sniffle she stood and exited the wagon.

Kendrick knew this part like the back of her hand, all she had to do was act like nothing was wrong and it would be over before she knew it.

It had to end soon, her friends wouldn't torture her like this.

They wouldn't.

And with that thought in mind, she was patiently waiting to be called when the thief - Lokir - jumped forward with fear swirling in his eyes.

"No!" He sobbed as he broke out into a run and Kendrick nearly smiled - the man's acting as superb. "I'm not a rebel. You can't do this!"

"Halt!" The Imperial captain called but Lokir kept going.

"You're not going to kill me!" He shouted back and Kendrick had to admit, the man was booking it but when she heard the captain call for the archers she gave a confused lift of her lips.

"Haha, what are you doing?" She asked the woman dressed up as the Imperial captain from a goddamn video game because surely, the other actors weren't actually going to fire on him?

She had heard of going the extra mile for a role - hell she had done so before - but those bows were real - as in could do serious damage real and just as she was about to step forward to ask again (because what were they doing? They didn't need to go so far for a prank), she heard the familiar twang of an arrow being released and Lokir fell.

Kendrick's eyes were wide as she stared at the limp body on the ground, waiting for the man to get up and call it a joke. Waiting for him to roll over and bow or hell, something! And she kept waiting even as red spread out from under his body and the coppery tang of blood filled her nostrils.

"Oh my god," She whispered as she cupped her hands to her mouth. "I - I think you killed him!"

The captain turned to glare at her and she stumbled back a step.

"He was a thief and a coward to run from his earned execution." She said without a hint of remorse for the actor she had definitely ordered to death and Kendrick whimpered "He deserved what he got."

The woman gave her one last look before she switched her needling stare toward the others.

"Anyone else feel like running?" She asked with a growl in her voice and there was only silence to answer her. "Good, that's what I thought."

Kendrick stayed silent and stock-still, even as the guard - Hadvar - urged her towards him.

A harsh push at the shoulder rocketed her forward and she ripped her horrified gaze away from the lax body of Lokir to stare at the Imperial soldier in front of her.

"Who are you?" He asked and she licked her lips.

"Ken - Kendrick Stark." She stuttered out as she shifted from foot to foot. "I don't belong here - I-I've done nothing I swear it and if you tell me how much you're being paid I'll double - wait fuck - I'll - I'll triple it."

She didn't bother to suppress the begging in her voice.

"I'll do anything so for the love of god," She damn near sobbed. "please help me."

If the actor who was playing the captain would kill her co-stars then she would sure as hell would kill her. She needed an out and she needed it now.

"What are you? An Imperial?" He asked as he narrowed his eyes at her after giving a pause. "Well, either way, you aren't on the list. Captain, what should we do?"

Kendrick tensed as the woman turned to face her because there was nothing soft in the look she was being given.

"Forget the list," She told him and the way Kendrick's heart slammed into her ribcage at her next words was painful. "they all go to the block."

Kendrick barely paid any mind to Hadvar's sympathetic glance - how could she when it meant that he was going to let her be murdered?

She ignored Tullius speaking as her mind raced because she had more important things to do than to listen to some pillard call Ulfric out.

If Kendrick was to go after the first victim then she would be on the block when Alduin was supposed to attack and that's where this joke had to end. Her friends didn't have the money or resources to fake a fucking dragon attack! Or even a beheading! And perhaps the actor playing Lokir wasn't even really dead! A shot wound could be faked, Kendrick had done it tons of times in theater! Not to mention, surely they had scared her enough for today and once they jumped out of the bushes screaming about how gullible Kendrick was, she would laugh and smile with them.

This was all gonna work out, all she had to do was play along.

And as she heard the distant rumbling of a dragon's growl, Kendrick gave a hysterical giggle as she thought of how much money her friends had dropped on sound effects.

How wild.

Watching as the Stormcloak soldier went to kneel at the chopping block, Kendrick smiled as she glanced around in wait for her friends to shout out at her.

And she waited.

And waited.

And waited until a sick sound of metal on stone met her ears and she gave a muffled scream of terror because - oh god oh god that man was missing his fucking head!

"Next, the Imperial!" The captain shouted and with a belated shock, Kendrick realized that was supposed to be her.

Play along Ken, she thought to herself as she almost choked on her sob, play along and it'll be over soon!

Her friends won! This was a good joke but now she only wanted to go home!

Forced to kneel even as she struggled and shouted, she gagged on a scream as the feeling of the sticky red fluid covering the neck rest rubbed against her throat.

And as tears burned a path down her cheeks, Kendrick realized two very important things.

The first being that this was not a joke that was cleverly devised by her friends in order to get one over on her because some things couldn't be faked and this situation was one of them.

And the second being that there was a giant black dragon sitting atop the tower to her left and it was very, very angry.

Which was why Kendrick had to scream because holy fucking shit she was in Skyrim and soon, she'd be in a goddamn coffin as well.

Here's my new SI-OC into Elder Scrolls. Kendrick is 17 and is actually based off of my own personality for once. Please review and enjoy.

Edit: 6/17/17