Author's Note: Here goes nothing... except... well, chapter 1, of course...
"General Tullius, sir!" an Imperial scout perched on the gatehouse parapets met them at the gates of Helgen, which were already opened, and beckoned them in. "The headsman is waiting." he announced.
"Good," the aging general's voice thundered, too young, too loud for someone of his years. He was that who led their carriage from atop his bulky destrier barded in the scarlet colours of the Imperial Legion. His short hair was grey as the sky at the coming of a storm, and his wrinkled, liver-spotted skin was the vibrant olive hue of the Cyrodilian southerners. Pressed against his chest was no standard Legion leather; his was the commander's wear: tanned hide tougher than nails even without hardening, with a golden dragon of his order emblazoned across the breast. By his belt was a broadsword also bearing the dragon emblem, polished and sharpened that it flashed brightly at the slightest beam of light that made it through the canopy of leaves. "Let's get this over with."
As they crossed under the gatehouse, the man in rags began saying his prayers to every god he knew. "Mara, Shor, Dibella, Kynareth, Divines, please help me!" he said their names, pressing his callused hands together tightly, and cold sweat ran from his brow. He could only name so many, and before long he was pleading to the same names again, but stuttering and jittering more frequently with each repetition.
That morning in Helgen was idyllic and sweetly serene; likely to be hardly any different than most days the village sees. Most of it had gone up and bustling when they got there, but as their lot crossed by their houses, a townsman had yet to notice and remark on their arrival. It was as if the capture of the rebel leader had mere trivial meaning for them. Mothers still went to and from market stands with baskets of bread and greens, occasionally tending to their frollicking children as they played in the dawning sunlight, while their husbands work the mills and smithies, and old crones sat in their rocking chairs, knitting quilts for their grandchildren for the winters to come. A pair of early drunkards raised their bottles to them as they passed by in their carriage, ignoring the warning glares of nearby legionnaires as they sung, "All hail to Ulfric, you are the High King! In your great honour we drink and we sing!" The Imperials would have taken with the other on account of treachery if they had not sung it like the mere jest it was for them.
"This is Helgen," sighed the gold-haired man, deep in reminiscence. "I used to be sweet on a girl from here, until the Thalmor took them away." In a glance, the unfaltering cheeriness went out of his eyes, leaving an emptiness filled only by tears that he fought to hold back. "They dragged her off in the middle of the night. She was a novice, you see, on the path to become a priestess… of Talos. Her father had paid the dowry, and we were to be wed on the morn, but the elves… the damn elves thought different." by the time he had told his tale, he was no longer verging on tears. His sadness was but a flash, a brief window into the less explored spaces of his psyche, now hidden again by the placid mask of serenity that clung like skin to his broad face.
As they came upon a building excessively adorned with Imperial banners, General Tullius parted from them to go beside a woman in black robes astride a slender-limbed mare taller than he on his destrier, with the company of two men in pale gold armour standing guard for her. "Look at him, General Tullius the military governor." his face was beaming with emotion once more, this time with anger that shaped it into a snarl full of burning hate. "And it looks like the Thalmor are with him! Damn elves, I bet they have something to do with this." he ground his teeth.
Taking the chance as the street curved into a bend that edged close to the general and his elven consorts, the blond man stood squat on his boots and went between the prisoner and the Jarl to lean far enough out of their side of the carriage for his spit to fall short of the horsed elf's skirt. "Talos curse you, elf!" his shout — not the presence of spit on her slipper — was what turned the elf's gaze to him, and when she saw the putrid wad of spittle on the tip of her slipper, she merely flicked it off, letting it land upon the earth. And then, turning towards them while their carriage was still near, she raised her long, pointy chin to the sky and she looked down on them with such great scorn which left the prisoner feel unclothed and alone, before moving her ravishing eyes back to the general, resuming their conversation.
He was certain he'd heard of the Thalmor before, and he found the way their name rolled off his tongue greatly familiar. Were they not the ones who chased him to the border on their Summerset steeds, after burning the village from whence he came for its steadfast worship of Talos that the Thalmor loathe undyingly? He remembered that he was not the only one who ran up the Jeralls on bare scabbed feet, but he had yet seen any of them on this side of the border, and despaired by the notion of him being the sole survivor. He had wanted to inquire more about the Thalmor in hopes of confirming his previous experience with them, but he was not given the chance nor time when the carriage came to a sudden halt at the centre of an immense paved yard. The prisoner had been deep in his thoughts that he never noticed their carriage passing through the raised portcullis into the walled courtyard of Helgen Keep, where waiting for them in the middle of the yard was a man in a black mask that covered all but his eyes and mouth, who stood by filthy stone block next to a small wooden crate that held its open mouth to the air. He held in his muscular arms a battleaxe, large and polished, its sharp edges glinting in the sunlight. He thought he saw a hint of a smile play about his thin lips, and looking again, his axe had a happy look about it, too.
"What's happening? Why are we stopping?" the ragged man asked, his voice a wavering song about the craven in him.
"Why do you think? End of the line." the blond man answered him with a smile, ever so calm and stagnant. He did not appear to be frightened by the slightest at the sight of the headsman's toothy axe like the ragged man was.
And there came shortly a stout woman lugging around on her small but stocky frame a heavy Imperial regalia that denoted her position as a captain of the Legion, while a clean-shaven Nord skittered by her side. The Nord had brought a ragged, leatherbound book and quill, to write and read by the captain's beck and call. "Step towards the block when we call your name, one at a time! Move it!" she snapped, as fierce a wolf could never be.
"The Imperials love their damn lists." the blond man drawled.
When the man in rags finally came to realise what was to become of them soon, he strained his dry throat to sound his plea. "No! No, this is a mistake. Tell them we weren't with you. This is a mistake!" he sputtered.
To which the blond man replied, "Face your death with some courage, thief." to no effect. The ragged man still shivered and wept, whimpering again and again that he wasn't with the Stormcloaks and that he shouldn't be there in the courtyard to be executed with the rest.
The first off the carriage was Jarl Ulfric. When he sat, he was easily two heads taller than any of them, but when he stood, everyone was a half-man and a dwarf. A truer Nord than most, the gold-haired man would say, and a half-giant to those who've never seen true giants or Nords. The prisoner noted the Jarl hadn't spoken at all on their carriage ride, owing to the cloth around his mouth, which seemed to be useless concerning that anything he said wouldn't be of consequence to anyone. There were noises from beyond the keep walls; the voices of the previously silent villagers crying for the death of Jarl Ulfric, whom they most likely know only as a rebel leader and nothing else.
After the Jarl came the man in rags, the prisoner, and lastly the blond man. The prisoner looked around and saw that they were not the only captives there that day. Two other carriages were there in the courtyard, the men and women in blue that were on them already assembled in two neat columns by the execution grounds, awaiting their moment under the executioner's axe as they were. "They die for their homeland," the blond man said quietly, when he noticed the prisoner eyeing the others. "for the honour of their ancestors, for the blood of those spilt, for themselves and their freedom." The prisoner kept in mind that they were rebels, but for people so willing let themselves be shunned and demonised by most for joining a rebellion, they were fighting for their freedoms, and that was enough to earn them his respect.
It was uplifting that he would die by the side of people so noble. From up close, they scarcely looked like the savage barbarians many had painted them as, but more like people of farmlands and fisheries who had risen up in arms to free themselves from whatever it was they were fighting against. "The Imperials," the blond man reminded. "They want us to follow their laws and forsake Talos by the command of the Thalmor, but the sons and daughters of Skyrim are not meant to serve."
"Ulfric Stormcloak, Jarl of Windhelm." the Nord with drew with the quill upon his book a check as Jarl Ulfric stepped forward and walked towards the execution block, forming a new line next to the other Stormcloaks who had been gathered there. "Ralof of Riverwood." and the blond man went. "Lokir of Rorikstead."
"Wait!" the man in rags yelped, raising his leather-bound wrists into the air. "Hear me out: I'm not a rebel! This is a mistake and I shouldn't be here! I'm innocent!"
"To the block, prisoner, nice and easy," the Nord said coolly, ignoring his pathetic pleading.
The man's face was awash in shock. His eyes widened for his pupils to leap here and there, searching for a way out, and when he saw the unguarded, open portcullis, he made a run for it. "You'll never catch me!" he laughed madly.
The Imperials, well-equipped with men who could catch him and bring him back again, let him run for a while instead, until he went near enough to the portcullis. At that point the Imperial captain issued "Fire!" to the archers on the parapets, and they followed her orders accordingly, loosing their arrows on the escapee in an instant, the first shot piercing his calf, stunning him, the second his neck, and the third his head. He lied down in the moist earth, watering it with blood that flowed from the wounds at his back, still crawling towards the portcullis, before stopping halfway through as the final breaths of air went out of him in the form of a mad cackle. At least he got there, the prisoner sighed. Little did he know that it would've been better for him not to have reached the portcullis, as its iron spikes shortly fell by the orders of the Imperial captain, impaling his lifeless body.
The Imperials were efficient, and most of all, punctual. That did not mean they would not go over norms to exercise their power. They were making sure everyone in that list would be dead by the end of the day, even those that weren't. "You," the Nord pointed the feathery end of his quill at the prisoner, his eyes observing his every feature. "Who are you?"
Author's Note: Apologies if this chapter isn't frankly as good as the prologue. I've been having difficulties writing this chapter, but I promise the next one will come swiftly, and hopefully of a better quality than this one…