Shadowmere's hooves pounded hard and fast against the reliable Imperial roads. Her master set a breakneck pace, one that would have had any normal horse frothing at the mouth and stumbling off the road in a short time. This was no ordinary horse, however, as any could see by looking at her. Dark as the Void, eyes the color of blood, and a saddle emblazoned with the Black Hand. Above all this she carried an intelligence that far surpassed her fellow equines. No, the speed was nothing for this timeless creature.
This overly clever horse could sense her master's distress. More appropriately, she could smell the anger rolling off of him like so many waves against a ruined shore. A need for vengeance that could not be sated. Perhaps his contract in the Imperial City had not gone well? But then, she'd not heard of her master being unable to perform before, so there was no reason to start now.
Whatever the reason, whatever the rage, Shadowmere obeyed without resistance, carrying Lucien ever closer to Fort Farragut. Her rider himself was lost in thought.
He remembered her as she had been, his Elisif, and their last days together.
She hurried to greet him as soon as he'd darkened the doorstep, the same as always. She was soft and fair, still so innocent and naive despite her association with him. Everything about her was soft, from the arms that encircled him to the lips that sought out his with a slight bashfulness. Despite his desire to appear detached and cold blooded, he could never keep up the facade around her. Perhaps because they'd been companions since childhood, or maybe because there was no one there for him to intimidate. If ever he had seemed imposing or frightful to her, that time had long passed.
"Welcome home, Lucien." Elisif whispered against his dirty, cloth-clad chest, and as much as he wanted to scoff, he knew it was true.
The pound of hooves lulled Lucien into a state of terminal calm, the constant swirl of thoughts churning on and on until they were interrupted by the faintest trail of smoke in the moonlight, which he followed to the source. A camp of bandits slept around a dying fire, only one keeping watch in the still night. Shadowmere was left to graze beneath a hemlock tree as the many-blooded assassin crept in the shadows.
Several shabby tents were pitched around a cheery fire, the watchman, a Redguard in fur armor, warming his hands without a thought to the dangers that lurked beyond the ring of light. He breathed his last exactly twelve seconds later, blood gushing in lovely rivulets against rocky soil.
His first victim dead, the usual peace did not fall upon the Speaker. Instead a deeper, more persistent rage settled in his chest, a lust for violence that was damn near unquenchable. The sound of her laughter, the feel of her hands and lips, the warmth of her- it all flashed through his mind in an endless torment. With a growl, Lachance threw the redguard corpse into the flames, setting the fire to sparking and popping, starting the bandits into consciousness.
The bandits were quick to their feet, panicked and flooded with adrenaline. Their hands gripped weapons tightly, but by the time they were fully alert, Lucien had vanished. Surely he could have killed them outright, but all deaths were not equal. He favored killing up close, so intimate a position to see the light fade from his victims' eyes, to breathe in their final gasp of air. The pulse of arterial bleeds fading away into a faint ooze as the heart gave out was a particular favorite of his. Feeling the soft skin of throats being sliced through like silk, it was invigorating. The best part, however, was watching the person accept the Void. Yes, one was never quite as honest as when they were about to die, and in that way Lucien had met and learned of countless personalities, hundreds of faces offered to his beloved Father and Mother.
This night was hardly different. He had a need to fulfill, and through the blood and fear of these miscreants he gained said fulfillment, stalking the men as they pulled blades from their belts. There were only three left after the initial kill, and the lot of them started to pit against one another immediately. Most of the time Lucien would have sat back and enjoyed the show, but not this night. This night all souls were his to claim.
The first two were given brilliant red smiles as soon as they wandered away from the light of the fire, leaving the final one, a tall, youthful Breton, alone and terrified. The Breton braced himself against a nearby tree, determined not to be taken unawares like his companions. He would face death as an equal, or so it seemed. Lucien grinned at that thought, for he knew the truth: Death has no equal.
"Come out then, coward." the Breton yelled, barely managing to keep the tremor from his voice. He fingered the handle of his ax nervously, his palms slick with sweat. "Fight like a man."
Suddenly Lucien appeared before the Breton, a smile more pure than any the boy had ever seen gracing his killer's face. His chest was pressed against the youth's, his hands gripping the pitiful rusty ax and tossing it aside. It was his blade that pierced the young man's belly, and later it was that same blade that stabbed him in the chest, when the wait had become too much to handle. Stomach wounds had always been too tedious a thing for the Speaker, who always preferred clean kills.
The pulse of that doomed heart was a song that lulled Lucien to peace as he walked bloodstained and content back to Shadowmere, greeting her with a kind word before mounting and departing at a much more reasonable pace.
Once back at Fort Farragut, disrobed and soaking in a steaming bath, his thoughts overtook him. Memories of things that he thought he'd long since forced out, of laughter and tenderness, of pale eyes and smiling lips, gentle hands and kind words. Childhood games and comforting embraces. Of the hearth and home they'd kept together. Of passionate kisses and long nights learning and savoring each other's bodies. Of- but no, it didn't matter. All of it was barely more than a distraction, and it all came from the desire to know one thing.
Why, after all these years, did she keep that damned blade?