Best Laid Plans
A D Gray-Man and Skyrim Crossover

Lavi groaned, his throbbing temple resting against the ground as he stirred back to consciousness.

Should he hope he was alive, or dead?

Blinking his single eye open and glancing up, perhaps it would have been better to be the latter over the former. His gaze was met with darkness only pierced by the poor flicker of a torch and he could make out the silhouette of cage metal bars. Since he was primarily doing his job on the Legion's side of things, he either had to be in a Stormcloak jail, or someone else's prisoner.

Gods I hope they aren't Necromancers. Or vampires. Vampires were simply the worst. At least the Necromancers might kill him somewhat humanely. They didn't like to damage their goods too much, after all.

In either case, he'd really prefer not to die today.

He pushed himself up, only to stop as he hissed, angry fire springing to life in his shoulder. He reached a hand back from the opposite arm to finger a feathered arrow-end. Oh, right. Maybe that meant he hadn't been here very long though, if someone hadn't already removed it.

Or maybe they just don't care if you get an infection and die. Somehow that was probably the more likely possibility. Unfortunately, the only thing he could do about it was leave it in. He just didn't have the right angle to pull it out even half-properly, and there was no telling what it might have hit. Arrow wounds were notorious for making one bleed to death after they were removed, unless they could be treated properly. Not something the wounded could usually do on their own. It took too much precision.

Getting to his feet and trying to be careful not to jar the wound too much, he staggered to the bars and peered through them toward the side, trying to get an idea for his circumstances, extending all of his senses.

The heavy reek of saltwater and ice... and bloated wood panels. The sound of waves crashing and ice creaking. The structure he was on, though, wasn't bobbing or moving like a ship out on water. Must be a wrecked boat. The ground was slightly slanted, not flat, and a faint glimmer on the far side cornering the wall confirmed that it was probably a grounded ship. Plus, a cold breeze was still managing to tickle by, so there was an opening somewhere. He was aware of a bed roll on the other side of the room, and the ratting of cloth, that he now realized was making up one of the 'walls' of the room, trying to keep the snow and the wind out. It must still be a blizzard outside.

He tensed as he heard footsteps overhead and light illuminated a wood stairway, several figures appearing, all dressed in leathers and furs, some with armor atop the under-layer of clothing. He watched them carefully, trying to judge their intent, but knew full well that he might not get his answer before he got a blade through his gut. And if he did get his answer, he probably wasn't going to like it.

The faces of the bandits, familiarly grizzled and unfriendly, marred by scars, some others by war-paint, sized him up and down as they approached with a torch in-hand. Were they going to kill him, or did they have something else in mind?

"Unlock the cell," one of them muttered to another, receiving a nod as the other one stepped forward. Lavi instinctively stepped back without needing to be told, knowing the proper 'etiquette' of prisoner behavior, if one could call it that, to keep from instigating any unnecessary violence or put the jailors on edge, trying to look as non-threatening as possible, but still keeping his guard up.

When the door creaked open, the man with the torch nodded to his other men.

"Subdue him."

Lavi withheld a curse as two of them rushed in and grabbed hold of him, not really having anywhere to go, and being aware that backing himself to the wall and resisting would prove impossible without lodging the arrow in his back deeper. Shoes scuffed over wood and after a few moments of struggle, Lavi was thrown down and pinned, biting the inside of his cheek as his face hit the floor and making him wince at the slight taste of blood. He tried to push himself back up but with three men keeping him flush face-first against the floor and pinning his wrists, knees pressing down on the back of his thighs, it was nearly impossible.

"Going to kill me?" he managed to grind out through a tight jaw, single eye peering up towards the one who seemed to be in charge.

"Not for me to decide," the torch-holder grumped, before nodding towards the stairs. Lavi's eye wandered to two shapes moving in the dim lighting, coming down the stairs now. One was dressed the same as all the others. The second he thought he recognized, but he had to think to recall from where, then he remembered the solid white thing that had pounced on him and knocked him into the snow. He had assumed that it had been a snow sabre before, but apparently he was wrong about that. It was a person dressed in bright white, much more easily giving him away in the shadows, making a poor attempt at staying hidden in the darkness of the ship.

Out in the open snow and ice of the northern coast though, it would make him absolutely invisible, especially in white-out conditions that so frequently hit the area.

He had been so distracted by the white-clad figure that he only now noticed the scent of heated metal and the glaring tip of hot iron, squirming apprehension under several pairs of hands keeping him from either fighting back or escaping.

It didn't take a genius to figure out what that was for, even before one of the men grabbed the shaft of the arrow still lodged in his shoulder. The only plus side was, at least if they cared whether he bled to death or not, it meant that they weren't going to outright kill him.

There was no further warning before the arrow was worked out of his flesh, the red-haired male having to bite his lip to stifle any noises of pain that rang in the back of his throat, but he knew that wasn't the worst of it. It was never the worst of it.

He was less capable or willing to hold back a shout of pain and several loud expletives as the searing metal was pressed to his wound and he almost managed to throw off all three or four men that were holding him down, putting up a valiant struggle that had a few almost sweating with strain, before the small burst of adrenaline seeped out and he collapsed again, breathing hard through the pain.

Would have been nice if they'd put some snow or cold water on his wound too, to numb the burning, but they weren't quite that generous with his well-being. And since they weren't going to give him that much, he highly doubted they would spare any sort of potion to quell it either.

"What do you want, exactly?"

The figure flicked their head to him, and he was only now just noticing things he hadn't before.

The one that had ambushed him was younger than he was, and certainly a lot younger than the rest of this lot of bandits. Not only that, but he was everything opposite of the ruggedness one expected of his kind. His features were angled, but soft, not a single hair covering his chin or lip against the cold as one might expect. What Lavi had thought was a part of the fur-lined cowl he wore was actually his own hair, locks as white as the freshly fallen snow outside. Even the scar that marked one eye, pink against pale skin, did nothing to detract from his good looks. If anything, it just added something to them.

This wasn't someone who should be some brutal blood-spilling highwayman. This was a young man who should have been sitting on the throne of a Hold amongst aristocracy, or the son of the Emperor in the White-Gold Tower of Cyrodiil, catered to day and night by people with far less physical blessings.

"You're not a soldier for the Legion, but you must be important for them to waste resources guarding you," the kid spoke, eyeing Lavi and his fine clothing with a wise intensity beyond his years, having a quick knack for spotting something of value when he saw it. "I'm sure someone would pay better gold than the coin we found between your entire traveling party to get you back."

Oh, he was a sharp one alright.

"So you're going to ransom me back to the Legion?"

The young man smiled with far too much fake innocence, sending inward shivers down the redhead's spine. "I could do that," he hummed speculatively. "I guess it all depends on who wants to pay more for you. The Legion, or the Stormcloaks."

Oh fuck, was he screwed now.

"And why would the Stormcloaks have any interest in me?" he questioned, playing stupid. Hopefully this young man had no idea as to his true significance.

"I guess we'll just have to find out, now won't we?"

So he didn't know.

Then again, he didn't have to. All he had to go off of was an educated hunch, and let things play out and reveal themselves naturally. This kid was good. He probably had more brains than all the other men here combined. Probably more than all the stuffy, overinflated codgers in the Imperial City that thought they could run an entire continent just swimmingly too, despite a track record that spoke otherwise.

And right now, that was looking very bad for him.

"And what if it turns out I'm not worth buying?"

The smile thinned, giving him all the warning he needed. "Let's hope it doesn't come to that." He spun around and motioned to his men to take their leave and lock up again. "Let him up."

The men stood, allowing him to sit up, and they exited the cage, locking it up again with an audible crick. He watched them all shuffle out, pitching him almost entirely back into darkness, but at least he had the assurance that they wouldn't be outright killing him. And this ship wasn't going anywhere.

They would have to make some travel arrangements that wouldn't end in him being able to escape, which meant he had time to plan to do just that. First thing was first, he needed to get out of this cell. And as it just so happened, he had at least one lock-pick still stashed on his persons that they hadn't managed to catch and take away from him.