Swordfighting was not Mairon's forte. Any kind of fighting that involved swinging pounds of metal over her head, also not so great. What she was good at though, was spellcraft and alchemy. In fact, the very reason she'd been caught in that Imperial ambush was because she was headed to the only place in Skyrim (and possibly all of Tamriel) that had a specific alchemical ingredient she wanted.
Mairon had been poor for most of her life. Seeking new opportunities in Skyrim, her parents had left Daggerfall before she'd been born, and died not long after. Her features betrayed her ancestry though; her mother had been a Breton lady-in-waiting, and her father had been an Altmer attaché at the embassy. Following a brief courtship and a minor scandal, they fled to Skyrim where they married and had her in Markarth.
Her father had been the one to teach her alchemy. With Calcelmo's alchemy table, she'd watched with wide eyes as he ground up the petals from a blue mountain flower and some wheat. The concoction had sizzled as he put it into the alchemical catalyst, turning a bright red. Asking her to watch closely, he took a dwarven dagger off of one of the workbenches and cut his thumb right down the middle. Quickly, he downed the potion and she watched, fascinated, as golden sparks and threads in the air stitched the bleeding cut back together.
From that moment on, she'd been hooked, though, thanks to her lack of understanding none of her experimental concoctions actually produced an effect other than slight nausea. She'd only seen the petals and the wheat, and had thought the key component, the catalyst, was simply water. After her parents died, she lived on her own, keeping out of trouble. Not long after, Calcelmo did his best to teach her alchemy, granting her her own set of phials and flasks, along with a decent supply of catalyst and the recipe for it.
Since alchemy and spellcraft so often went hand-in-hand, she'd decided to apply to the Mage's College in Winterhold, and had even gotten accepted before everything went to pot. She'd nearly reached Rorikstead on her way when she heard the news that Jarl Ulfric had challenged High King Torygg, sparking the civil war. She did her best to keep her head down, keeping her hood up to hide her pointed, Altmer ears when she was in eastern Skyrim.
Of course, everything was different now. She'd stumbled directly into that Imperial ambush, right alongside Ulfric, Ralof, and poor Lokir. It didn't matter that she wasn't even acting suspicious, no matter how much she protested, they had tried to execute her. The rest was history. Alduin had (unintentionally) saved her, she'd headed to Whiterun to warn Jarl Balgruuf, and she had helped kill the dragon at the Western Watchtower, revealing her status as Dragonborn.
Some days it was a lot to take in. With adventuring money she'd gotten from ransacking Nordic tombs, she'd been able to buy a homestead in the Pale with her own alchemy set and everything.
She'd been riding her horse from Winterhold to Dawnstar when the thought had struck her: Potions could improve enchanting! Not only that, but there was a specific potion that affected the potency of enchantments!
She'd spurred her horse on, breaking south towards Heljarchen Hall to collect her things. As soon as she tied her faithful steed up, she burst through the doors and began searching high and low for ingredients and soul gems.
Nearly a dozen grand soul gems, three black soul gems, and one white and aquamarine Azura's Star later, she collected her things at the enchanting table. Muttering incantations and precisely carving runes, she now had a Copper and Onyx circlet, silver necklace, silver ring, and a pair of gloves all enchanted with the highest level of alchemical fortification she could muster, with one silver pendant and ring waiting to be enchanted.
Catching her breath, hands shaking with nervous excitement, she began mixing ingredients. Ironically enough, the very ingredient she was using - yellow mountain flowers - had been the ingredient she'd been searching for when she'd been captured. Thanks to her tendency to buy out all the alchemical ingredients she could afford, she had on hand enough piles of salt to season a feast.
Carefully mixing quantities, she made the first potion. It was more potent than normal, thanks to her enchanted gear, but it was the first. She downed it in one gulp, feeling the liquid fire of magic rush down through her veins. Shivering, she quickly mixed the next potion. When she drank the next, the bitterness alone told her that her idea had worked; the potency had increased just enough. Repeating this over and over again, Mairon had eventually created and drank nearly three dozen restoration potions and felt the searing fire of magic.
"Okay," she told herself, "Let's make this one count."
She mixed the final potions - Snowberries and Spriggan Sap, nearly spilling it all over herself in the excitement.
Cursing multiple times, she made sure she had four on hand before she rushed back to the enchanter. Gulping down the first potion, she scratched out the necessary runes onto the pendant and transferred the Star's power to the trinket. When the process was complete, she could almost feel the pendant humming with magical power, but she had no time to lose. Downing the next potion, she repeated the process with the ring. She donned the new ring and necklace. Unlike with the potions, she didn't feel that much different. Deciding to take a different avenue, she went back to the alchemy lab, this time a lot more relaxed, trusting in her own work. Still, the excitement was there as she mixed another half-dozen muddy brown enchanting potions and returned to the enchanter with a bag full of soul gems and half of her unenchanted wardrobe.
The very first thing she did was take her nice leather boots (her feet felt cold on the wooden floor even with the fire roaring) and enchant them with stamina fortification. As soon as she slipped them on, all tiredness was gone. She felt she could run for leagues! With this newfound energy, she enchanted the next ones - a circlet that expanded her mana pool so large that the Arch-Mage seemed like a drop in the ocean, and a ring that opened her up to Aetherius enough that even if she tried to empty her mana pool it would regenerate faster than anything.
In quick succession, she enchanted her bracers with smithing (she wasn't great in hand-to-hand combat, but she wasn't useless and that requires a good weapon), a pendant, which improved her light armor (somehow), and finally, her simple black robes, she enchanted with a health fortification.
The moment the black cloth touched her shoulders, she felt invincible. Cinching the waist tight. She strode over to her armory and picked up an ebony dagger she'd made. This did cause her some hesitation, but she gritted her teeth and plunged the blade into her own stomach.
Gasping for air, she realized that she felt the pain, but distantly, as if it were almost happening to someone else. Slowly, she pulled the black metal from her stomach and watched in confounded amazement as the wound simply stitched itself back together, not even leaving a scratch. She started laughing in amazement, and then glee as she realized she was unstoppable. She could cast the costliest of spells without breaking a sweat, run for days without stopping, and even if something managed to hit her before she blasted it to Oblivion, she would heal from anything.
"Look out world," she chuckled, more than a little madly, "The Dragonborn Comes."