So this took about four months to get out and the only excuse I have was my will to write giving me a big fat NO. Writers block of the worst kind has prevented me from sticking to my plans of updating this story frequently and for that I apologize. After this I may or may not post an epilogue of some sort, but either way I'll call this story completed! Thanks to those of you that stuck with it on my pathetic little hiatus.
He was sitting at a table, surrounded by fine wine and baked goods, writing a letter and looking for all intense purposes like... a king. It was a little surreal, seeing as the cell he was in was such a dump. She approached him cautiously, hand resting firmly on the pickaxe at her side, just in case.
"So, my fellow beast, what do you want?" He asked with barely a glance in her direction, so casually you'd think he didn't even know he was locked up. "Answers about the Forsworn? Revenge for trying to have you killed?"
Tess glared at the back of his head. "You have a lot to answer for."
"Do I? And what about you? What right did you have to meddle in my affairs? Kill my people? Was it worth it? Your truth?" Madanach fired the questions at her one by one, yet leaving her no time to answer any of them. "You're one of us now, you see. A slave. The boot of your kinsmen stepping on your throat. Maybe if you understood that, I could help you."
"I don't need, or want, your help." She growled, her fingers itching for her bow.
She wasn't proud of killing all those people. If it were up to her, no lives would have been lost. But it wasn't, and if she hadn't defended herself then she'd be the one dead in the ground and Markarth would be even tighter in the Forsworn's grasp. It may not have been her responsibility to 'cleanse' the city, or whatever Eltrys had in mind, but after getting the Breton and his wife killed it sure was starting to feel like it. That was good enough for her.
Maybe offing the King in Rags himself would help her feel better about the needless deaths. She couldn't have turned back when it was still possible because, selfish as it was, she needed to do this for herself too.
"So many say that, at first, until they realize the truth." He spat, still not bothering to look at her, instead he put his quill down and folded up the letter before setting it off to the side as he spoke. "If you change your mind, speak to Braig. Tell him I sent you. I want you to know just how widespread the injustice of Markarth is."
Before she even considered that, she would at least get some of the answers she had been looking for. "I had questions about the Forsworn."
"This was our land. We were here first." Madanach explained, poison and resentment dripping from his words. He spoke like it was such a valid reason, but to Tess it just seemed childish and petty. She hated politics. "Then the Nords came and put chains on us. Forbid us from worshiping our gods. Some of us refused to bow. We knew the old ways would lead us back to having a kingdom of our own. That is who we are. The Forsworn. Criminals in our own lands. And we will cut a bloody hole in the Reach, until we are free."
His words were full of passion and confidence – not like he was being cocky, but that he just knew that they would take the hold back. She aimed to stop that from happening.
"I want to know about Thornar." Tess said, still standing behind him with every muscle in her body ready to defend herself if it was needed. She was on edge and making it obvious, she knew that, but there was something about this Breton that screamed dangerous. He was old and she could most certainly take him in a fight if the situation called for it, which she was sure it would, but that only meant he had life experience. Dark and twisted as it was.
"I had Markarth. My men and I drove the Nords out. We had won, or so we thought. Retribution was swift. I was captured, quickly tried, and sentenced to death. But my execution never came." Madanach finally turned towards her, slowly. He looked tired and bitter. "Thornar Silver-blood stopped it. He wanted the Forsworn at his call, that I would point their rage at his enemies and spare his allies. And I have. Humiliating at first, but I knew he would let his guard down eventually. That he would come to trust I was under control."
There was so much she wanted to say. To tell him that he was a sick and guiltless son of a bitch, that he deserved to die and then to swing her pickax into his smug face. But all of that would have only fed the troll.
Except for maybe the ax thing.
So instead she stormed back into the main mining area and asked Borkul for where she could find this Braig. Her curiosity always got the better of her, but she doubted whatever the prisoner had to say would sway her.
A taunting remark from Madanach was all she got in response to her turning away so suddenly. "Do you remember the sun? Because you'll forget. Soon."
That was just one more person to prove wrong.
Tess stood a little ways away from Braig, giving him space as he mined the ore vein viciously. There was pent-up aggression in his actions, and she guessed she'd be finding out why soon enough. "What do you want? I have digging to do."
"Madanach asked me to hear your story." She informed him simply, arms crossed tightly as she waited.
"My story, huh?" He scoffed miserably. "Everyone in Cidhna Mine has a tale. Let's hear yours first. When was the first time you felt chains around your wrists?"
What she wanted to do was flatten him to the ground and demand an answer, but that probably wouldn't end well. Instead she decided on a half truth, seeing as her less than upstanding childhood wasn't any of his business. Her teenage years in Cyrodiil weren't exactly full of epic thievery, but she had gotten into enough trouble to get arrested, if only to childishly rebel against her mother.
"It was Helgen, just a few weeks ago. I was being sent to the executioner."
"So you know what its like to have your life in someone else's hands. Why should they get to decide? Isn't judgement for the gods?" He had stopped mining by now, opting to wring his hands together in aggravation as he spoke to her. "Do you have any family? Anyone waiting for you on the outside?"
No. No one knows if I'm even still alive.
"Yes, but they're far from Skyrim."
"I had a daughter, once. She'd be twenty-three this year. Married to some hotheaded silver worker or maybe on her own learning the herb trade." Braig informed her wistfully, staring somewhere over her shoulder, his voice brimming with pain. "The Nords didn't care who was and who wasn't involved in the Forsworn Uprising. I had spoken to Madanach once, that was enough. But my little Aethra didn't want to see her papa leave her. She pleaded to the Jarl to take her instead. And after they made me watch as her head rolled off the block, they threw me in here anyway, to dig up their silver."
All she could do was gape at the Breton. She didn't think anyone could be that cruel, not even her racist and short minded kinsman.
"How long have you been in here?" She asked in a whisper.
"Long enough." Was the only answer he gave her as he leaned against the wall, tired and hurting, with his arms crossed in what looked like an effort to hold himself together.
Tess swallowed thickly and bowed her head. "I'm sorry to hear what happened to you."
"My daughter is the one who needs your pity." He shook his head suddenly as more of the anger she had witnessed before leaked into his voice. "I'm just a poor Forsworn whose only regret is not killing more Nords before he was locked up."
And then she was angry as well. He lost his daughter and was thrown in jail all in the same breath, but that gave him no right to want to kill people who had done nothing but share the race of the men that wronged him. "You think your story justifies the murders the Forsworn have committed?"
"I'm not Madanach. I was never a leader of the Forsworn. The only anger I can justify is my own." Braig growled, pushing off the wall and glaring at her. "But every family in the Reach has a story like mine. There are no innocent onlookers in this struggle. Just the guilty, and the dead."
Tess didn't even know why she bothered listening to this. These men were insane and they couldn't even look past their own tragedies long enough to hear the other side of the story. No one had the right to murder a child just for wanting her father to stay home with her, it was wrong and inexcusable but that didn't mean the father had anymore of a valid reason to declare war against every single Nord, guilty or not.
Innocent people existed until the things they kept precious were unfairly ripped away from them. She was a prime example of that herself, but the difference between those people and the Forsworn was what they decided to do with the loss – cope with it, mourn, move on with your loved ones in your heart and memories, always, or seek vengeance for something that you can't change no matter how many lives you take as recompense.
And maybe she was being a hypocrite. She had planned on killing Madanach, and she was still going to go through with that, all because she had a guilty conscience. Maybe she needed to kill him not for herself, but to end the Forsworn conspiracy and to stop them from taking back the Reach.
Did that make the murder any more justified? It wasn't her place to say.
All she knew was that she was going to put the King in Rags' rein of terror to an end before the nervous subjects of Markarth even realized he had ever been in control.
"You're back." Madanach noted, still seated at his table and staring blankly at the wall. "Have you done what I asked?"
"I talked to Braig." She confirmed indifferently.
"Imagine hearing a story like that, over and over. Each time a different family. Each time a different injustice." His tone was dripping with a sort of sympathetic anger he must have had to use often in order to perfect it. Honestly, she didn't think he felt any kind of remorse for the victims, only satisfaction at knowing there were more people angry enough to join his cause. "Your meddling above ground reminded me of how removed I've been from the struggle. My men and I should be in the hills, fighting."
Tess folded her arms in front of her, fingers lightly grazing the pickax at her side. If she were lucky she could strike him hard enough for the blow to be fatal, and no other prisoners would hear the sounds of a fight and come looking. "Spare me from your speeches." She said distractedly, her mind still working out all the details of her attack. It would be hard to act casual around the others, but without an escape plan that's what she'd have to do.
Unless, of course, he was getting at what she thought he was. Then he'd be doing all the work for her.
"You know, I'm almost beginning to like you, but you haven't earned your place out of here yet." Madanach chuckled hoarsely and her lip curled in disgust. " Have you met Grisvar the Unlucky? He's rightly named, and he's also a thief and a snitch. He's outlived his minor usefulness. Take care of him, and then we can leave Cidhna Mine for good."
Quietly she unsheathed her pickax. "Not gonna happen, your Highness."
She could practically sense his eye roll, but before he could open his mouth to demand her cooperation or whatever he planned to do, she swung. Fortunately for her the prisoner by the fire was wrong. He didn't see it coming at all.
The tip of the ax embedded itself into the side Madanach's skull and a squirt of blood poured out from the wound, coating the hilt of the tool and her hands. It was sticky and warm but she paid it no mind as she tugged, throwing the old man off of his chair and then pushing the blade further into his head. He let out a few cries of agony and surprise, obviously not expecting her take him out so forcefully – or at all – but he was dead soon enough.
Borkul the Beast no doubt heard that, so as quickly as she could Tess snatched the letter Madanach had been writing earlier off the desk along with a key. She opened the letter, praying for something useful and smudging the page with thick blood.
I promised you all we would escape Cidhna Mine together, and I have found a way. If I die before I can show it to you, then search the cells near my room. Use my key. There is a tunnel that leads into the city that you can use.
-Madanach
She fled the room and found the tunnel leading out of this place easily and re-locking the cell once she got in. It wasn't enough to stop the Orc if he really wanted to get through, the rock wall surrounding the door was weak and a strong kick could probably dislodge it, but it would have to stall him for now. It lead to some sort of old Dwemer ruin, but she was in such a hurry to get out of there that she didn't even think it through before entering.
Tess rushed through the ruin for only a few steps before noticing an old stone pillar that looked ready to crumble. If she gave it a push, it would send the entire ceiling on one side crashing to the ground and effectively blocking any of prisoners from following her or escaping themselves. So with a relieved sigh, she did just that.
The sound of collapsing rocks would most likely draw their attention – along with the attention of any living machines around the place – if Madanach's painful shouts hadn't already, but she wasn't worried. They wouldn't be able to find her anyways.
She coughed loudly to clear the dust from her throat and continued on out of the mine.
Of course the Dwemer were clever little bastards, and of course their machinery was still working like the day it was made. She was attacked by a multitude of Frostbite spiders and Dwarven Centurions and her only weapon was lodged into his majesty's brain. Tess did her best to out run them, and apparently that was enough as she eventually made it to a large metal door and got out of that terrible place.
For some reason, Thornar Silver-blood was waiting for her on the outside. By the Divine's, if I get tossed back in there, I'll be out for blood...
"My eyes inside Cidhna Mine tell me that Madanach is dead."
So he had informants that couldn't help her out with the whole escaping thing? Nice.
"You've done a great service to the Silver-blood family." He informed her appreciatively. "I've had the Jarl officially pardon you, and take care of a few other loose ends."
Tess stared at him incredulously. "You and your thugs had me arrested in the first place!"
"And you've proven that was the best move I could have made." That did nothing to pacify her, instead she only continued to glare at him. "Don't give me that look. You're free to go. Here, how about a little token for your efforts? My family's ring and all the things my guards confiscated from you when you were jailed."
Grumbling, she gingerly took her things back from him while trying not get the dried blood on anything important. After sorting her things back into her reacquired bag, she inspected the ring. It was solid silver, naturally, and definitely not her style. Most likely sell for a lot though, so she'd accept it gracefully.
"Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to figure out how we're going to fill our recently emptied mine." Assuming the rest of the Forsworn locked away would finally be executed, he had a lot of work to do.
Her, though... not so much. She had absolutely nothing expected of her besides a good cleaning a long sleep. Finally.
End
