~]} SHADOWS AND LIGHT {[~
Prologue : Waiting
The cold felt like needles. It stung the cuts on my arms and bristled my fingers where the sores were open to the air. I looked around to the driver and noted the olive-skinned youth. He looked cold too. In fact, there was just something about the whole image that didn't seem right – the imperial uniform, the Cyrodiilian weapons, the green officers who looked as if they wanted to be just about anywhere else. I shifted slightly so that I could lean over the side of the cart. There. Stamped on the hubcaps. The Imperial Seal: a dragon, its wings bent into a rhombus as they spread out from its body. A symbol of strength and stability for more than two ages, now a sham as its represented empire crumbled.
I remembered reading about the rise and fall of the humans back ho –
No.
Not home.
Not anymore.
Everything I'd left behind – my family, that life, and even that blasted library my father valued so much – everything was gone. Home? I had no home. I had no family. No name. They had taken it from me.
Admittedly letting it happen had been my choice, but that didn't make it better. And the choice had been between surrendering everything I'd ever believed to be right and being exiled from everything I'd ever known. A choice indeed.
Well…that was how I saw it anyway. There are two things about that I doubt the Thalmor would have agreed with, the first being that there was anything ethically wrong with what they were doing. Having met them, I knew better than anyone outside Alinor what their secret was; why they'd had so much success, both politically and martially. Simply put, it was because they believed. Absolutely. That what they did was right. Every action was passionately dedicated to their cause and the whole concept of a second Aldmeri Dominion was founded by blind belief and unquestioned loyalty.
If it were not so frighteningly efficient, it might have passed for irony.
The truth was that they were nothing more than oppressors of everything that did not fit to their doctrine and they went to great lengths to enforce it. That system of control extended to every part of life from education to estate ownership, the Thalmor's installation of themselves as the ruling body just the end act. Myself – I once worshiped their ideology along with everyone else. A naïve child. Because that was the truth of living in the new Alinor state: we believed. Believed what we were taught; believed in the men who taught it.
Believed in the righteous 'greater good'.
Believed in the intrinsic superiority of the Aldmeri over the lesser, barbaric humans.
In fact, I might have continued to believe had it not been for my unfortunate penchant for asking questions.
Oh.
My asking questions.
That was where all this started. Not in an imperial prison convoy, though it was as odder place as any for it to end. Yes, here was where it would end. The cold gnawed at my flesh like the famed beasts of the Northern Wastes and I stared down the track as it wended between the firs, knowing exactly what was waiting. So I was to die at the hand of the Imperials, in Skyrim, and for nothing so noteworthy as being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Fate certainly has a way of laughing.
What amazed me, though, was that I'd actually managed to get this far. Which brings me to the second point that the Thalmor wouldn't have agreed with: the alternative of exile. I saw it as exile because it meant I could never go back, at least without being killed. But I don't think they ever really intended to let me live long enough to leave the isle. It was by sheer luck, some nerve, and my sister's love that found me on a boat under the name of a business associate of hers. When I left, she spoke of slitting her own throat rather than letting the Thalmor torture the information from her. The thought made my blood seize. It was the last time I'd ever see her. I knew it rationally. I knew it in my heart. My beautiful sister…
And still they'd hunted me. Even if I hadn't been one of the Official Record Keepers or part of the Underground, they would never rest until they'd recaptured the 'one that escaped'. It galled them, one of their own slipping through their fingers. Perhaps dying now would be a mercy.
It'd certainly be cleaner.
Something dripped onto my hand. It was whipped away by the wind. I twisted my bound wrists up to touch my face and noted dimly that it was awash with water. How strange.
I had thought all the tears dried up.
The pain echoing in my chest hadn't stopped since…since I left her. Since I knew I would have to leave Aeroniel to the mercy of those bastards. If I was rational (and being rational wasn't high on my list of current priorities) I hoped she was already dead. Because if she wasn't…it was unthinkable. I couldn't think of it. Not now. She had offered her life to ensure mine. And I selfishly agreed.
My beautiful, beautiful big sister…
I crumpled under a fresh wave of weariness and grief, slumping down where I sat. I wasn't built for this. This pain. It never eased, just stuck there like a knife. Ever since the boat landed on the continent, I'd done my best to vanish, using every skill I'd ever picked up in stealth and guile, yet I couldn't hide from the pain. This agony of mine. Or the fear, for that matter. It ate at me; gnawed me. This never sleeping, never resting, always moving; never staying long enough for someone to notice.
Oh, what woe had I become?
I'd been privileged. My life was lived in the Glass City, jewel bright as the midsummer sun fell softly from high in the sky.
A wondrous sight I would never see again.
But there always had been shadows in Alinor. That city, filled with people and well-tended gardens, each melding onto the next like a well-oiled machine. It shocked me, when I set upon the roads in Hammerfell, for it was the first time I'd ever been somewhere truly chaotic. Everything in my life thus previous had been perfectly orchestrated and forcibly serene, yet this was a wonder all of its own. Somehow...more.
Yet I hardly noticed, moving from place to place. Across the desert by night; lost in the crowds the next day. It felt like a lifetime: from Hammerfell to Cyrodiil, hugging only the very edge of the country, not daring to set foot in the cities. I'd almost believed...
Then, shortly before closing on the northern border, my guide – Hamlin – disappeared in the middle of the night. I didn't sleep. I hadn't slept since. I ran.
I reached the line, crossed it, and fell right into the trap.
For someone else.
Irony at its very best.
And for all the Thalmor's enlisting the empire's help in pursuing their affairs, they yet seemed to have no idea who I was. Where I was going in such a hurry: they barely looked twice at me. They bungled me off, stripped me of anything valuable like good soldiers, and put me on the cart with the rest of the prisoners.
Where they were going, I didn't know.
It probably didn't matter in the end.
I let gravity take its hold and leant heavily on the edge of the cart.
I was going to die. All that running and fighting and hiding and trying…
Here, at the end of it all - after all the battles had been fought and all the words said - I couldn't, honestly, bring myself to care.
A.N: started this about a year ago and sort of umed and ared about it. You would not believe the research I had to do to make this cannon - information into the cultural evolution of the Admer and the militarial history of the Dominion is long and complex. Still, I think I have it reasonably correct.
I debated with myself whether or not to put this up now. I keep chipping away at it - I like it, personally. You know how you get an idea and end up writing good stuff for it? Unlike some others where I like bits and cringe at other bits. Still, now's as good a time as any. Edited this fist one thoroughly after posting it - after editing it the last time - and now I think I'm mostly happy with it.
Third long fic. The first one was Perihelion, which I really should take up again - Harry Potter (SHUT UP, EVERYONE HAS ONE!) the second being Senga (The Hobbit, which I have had some runnaway success with, for which I have to thank the fanbase!) but this is the first time I'm attacking this genre with 1st person. Rather find I enjoy it, however, so I'll see how it goes.
Reviews? (she tentatively askes with fluttering lashes) Oh, come now my pretties, give us a review? (love it/hate it/indifferent/bored) and thank you to the two I've recieved!
Disclaimer: I'll say this once - no, I don't own Skyrim, and yes, I did find the cover image on Google Images. A great piece of fanart to whomever out there owns it, I must say, and perfect once I found it (took a bloody age ;)