(AN: I was reading back through some of my earlier chapters to get some reference for what is going to happen in this chapter, and learned that i made a mistake. I listed two different people as the Jarl of Riften. Thankfully, i made both stories technically true [horay for retroactive continuity!]. I've also been thoroughly engrossed in the weirder aspects of Elder Scrolls lore, which explains some of the really weird stuff happening in this chapter. You'll never guess what it entails.)
(I say 'weird', but I might have to give further warning. What happens in this chapter may be too disturbing for some audiences. You have been warned.)
Strife
The darkness began to dissipate. In the east the sun began to rise, and the grassy waves of Whiterun were crested with gold. Sigrun breathed deeply the cool morning air; it was invigorating and brought a smile to her face. She looked north, where the snows rested upon the high mountains all year long, and then west, towards the dwindling darkness of the Reach. Her father had never told many stories about the Reach. Maybe she would go there and do battle with the fierce Reachmen, the savage Forsworn. The sound of clanking armor and footsteps in the deep turf behind and to her right told her that she was not alone. Looking over her shoulder, she saw a sight that stung her heart.
Jonna. She was there with her, a smile on her face. Or was it Jonna? Perhaps it was her heart playing tricks on her mind while she slept, or a trick of the new morning's light, but the small frame of Jonna Jordisdottir changed into that of a strange man, one whom she had neither met nor knew. He was tall, about a hand's width taller than her, with broad shoulders beneath his iron armor, and long was his crimson hair. Though Sigrun knew him not, there was something about him that made her feel content.
A blast of icy cold water smote her in the face, and she awoke coughing, sputtering and shivering. She was inside a dimly lit cavern, surrounded by six figures hooded and wearing masks. All of them were armed with various weapons: bows and arrows, swords, axes, clubs, maces, and spears. Sigrun looked about at the hidden faces, but they did not speak to her.
"Who are you?" she asked. "What do you want?"
There was no answer. One of the masked ones turned to another and nodded at another one. The second one nodded and left the cavern. Sigrun tried to move but found that her hands and feet were bound: she struggled to break free, but found that the restraints were tightly secured, beyond her strength to break them. A few minutes passed and another hooded figure appeared. This seemed to be one the others respected, for as the figure appeared, they parted to give it a clear path to their prisoner.
"Leave us," the new one spoke. The voice was female, and Sigrun seemed to recognize the voice.
"You sure, Number One?" another of the hooded and masked figures asked. Also a female.
"Don't worry," the one identified as 'Number One' replied. "She won't give us any trouble."
One by one the others left the cave. Once they were out of sight, Number One slowly approached her. At first she said nothing, merely looking at Sigrun from beneath her hood, though no face could be seen.
"Who are you?" Sigrun asked. "Why am I here?"
"I had to make sure," Number One said.
"Sure of what?"
"That you were the right Sigrun," said Number One.
"What does my name matter?" Sigrun asked.
"Haven't you guessed yet?" Number One asked. At this, Number One removed first her hood and then her mask. Beneath was a woman in her late twenties, with dark hair, fair skin, and blue eyes. She had dark hair, which was long at the back but had been shaved from the sides of her head. Sigrun gasped as she recognized the face.
"Hello, sis," she said.
"Lucia?" Sigrun muttered.
"It's been too long," Lucia said, a smile on her face. "I'm sorry I couldn't find you sooner. You don't know how hard it was, looking for you."
"Where have you been?" Sigrun asked. "All of these years you were missing, we couldn't find you anywhere in Skyrim. And why am I tied up?"
"Oh, don't worry about that," Lucia dismissed. "I'll have your bonds removed in a minute. We have so much to talk about, you and I, so much catching up to do!" With that, she removed a key from her bosom and unlocked Sigrun's bonds. Sigrun's first instinct was to make for the exit, but Lucia placed her hands on Sigrun's shoulders. A shiver ran through her body: it had been so long since she felt her adopted older sister's arms around her shoulders in a friendly embrace.
"It's okay, you're safe here," Lucia assured her.
"Why did you kidnap me?" Sigrun asked.
"It wasn't a kidnapping," Lucia returned. "It was a rescue."
"Rescue?"
"Mhmm," Lucia nodded. "You'll know everything soon enough." She sighed. "I'm happy to see you again, little sis. You've grown up so much."
Sigrun smiled. "I've missed you so much, Lu."
"It's almost time for supper, Sig," Lucia replied. "You'll have plenty to eat and get to meet the other sisters."
Lucia stepped back and gestured with her left hand towards the tunnel that left the cavern. Sigrun arose and walked forward, with Lucia following closely behind her. The tunnel turned about leftward and continued on for several paces, then forked forward and right. The tunnel was dry, well-lit, and tall enough to stand up in, though Sigrud still hunched. Lucia told her to go straight and then turn left at the next fork. As they came to the second fork, Sigrun thought she heard a voice echoing from farther down the right-hand path: she thought it sounded like singing.
In a little while, they came to another room that was larger than the one in which Sigrun had awoken. There were several crates and barrels in the room, which were being opened and from which food was being drawn and prepared. There was no table, but a fancy but thread-bare rug lay on the floor to which Lucia gestured. There were no chairs, so Sigrun and Lucia sat on the floor and partook of the food. The food was tasty and there was some good beer, but there was nothing hot or even warm.
"So what have you been up doing?" Lucia asked. "What brought you to Whiterun?"
"It was only a temporary stay," Sigrun replied. "I was on my way north for a job."
"A job?" Lucia asked. "What kind of job?"
"Delivery," Sigrun said.
"Aww, you're much better than that," Lucia replied, through a mouthful of mead. "You should be doing something much better, something that suited your talents as a woman."
"Well, it was certainly an adventurous job," Sigrun chuckled, trying not to think about the groping hands and leering smiles of the Dunmer slavers. "But I'm almost done."
"That's interesting," Lucia nodded.
"So, what about you?" asked Sigrun. "Have you been living here for twelve years?"
"Not here, specifically," Lucia answered. "I've been living in several places around Skyrim." She took a sip of her mug. "When I was twelve, I met my best friend Anita Black-Lock. She was practically a second mother to me; a beloved aunt, an older sister, an inspiration, a mentor, an idol to me. You probably don't remember her very much, you were young at the time."
Sigrun nodded, but her mind was busy. She distinctly remembered some furtive words exchanged between her mother, father, and Lucia years ago; something about a friend of hers about whom they were not happy. She did not say anything, but she marked the difference of reaction between what their parents and Lucia had said about her.
"Go on," Sigrun said.
"Well," Lucia continued. "When I was fifteen, Anita took me in and we began living on the run. We had help from several silent partners, but we were able to live free and unmolested for years. But it wasn't enough. Anita told me that it wasn't enough to just be free on our own; we had to find others, convince them to live free and unbound. So we built this group."
"So what is this, like a commune?" Sigrun asked.
"One might call us that," Lucia replied. "A commune of free sisters living on our own, free of the bonds and shackles of men and their laws."
"So there's no men here, at all?" asked Sigrun.
"None at all," Lucia shook her head.
"Why?" Sigrun asked.
"Because they're shit," Lucia returned. "Anita told me the truth. Throughout the whole history of Tamriel, men have done nothing but oppress and enslave women. Think about it: how many stories do you hear about women doing anything but being mothers? And whenever a woman becomes stronger than men, she is slandered as evil. Remember Potema?"
Sigrun chuckled. "That doesn't make any sense. What about the Hero of Kvatch? I've heard she was a woman."
"I'd like to believe she was one too," Lucia said. "But we'll never know for sure. That's what makes things worse: she might have been a woman, but because people can't stand a strong, independent woman doing things without the shackles of men, they erased her sex."
"What about the Divines?" Sigrun asked.
"Less than half are women," Lucia stated. "Even if people call Talos a god, which I don't, that still makes for fewer goddesses than gods. And what attributes do they have? Mara is the mother, Dibella is the whore, and Kynareth? Fucking wind! Absolutely useless. None of them strong or independent or anything useful or worthy of aspiration!"
"Mama used to talk about her adventures," Sigrun stated. "She said the people in Morrowind worshiped three gods they said were actually living among them in the flesh. Wasn't there a woman among them too?"
"One woman!" Lucia retorted, holding up one finger to punctuate her point. "But even Almalexia was given weak attributes: the Healing Mother, Lady of Mercy, and Mother Morrowind."
"I don't think motherhood is weak," Sigrun replied. "Mama raised all four of us, and that surely couldn't have been easy for her."
"Motherhood is a punishment!" Lucia insisted. "An invasive mongrel takes over our bodies for nine months, weakening us, turning us into piteous wrecks; we're basically imprisoned in our own bodies! All because some man wanted to use our bodies with no thought for what it would do to us, and no consideration, since they don't suffer anything for it!"
"But Mama went through that for us," Sigrun said. "And yes, I know that you and Jonna had different mothers, but they still went through the same thing for both of you."
"It wasn't their choice!" Lucia retorted. "Someone forced it upon them; a man. It's just one part of a bigger scheme, as Anita told me. They keep us down because they know that we can rule them, and we should rule them!"
"Is that what Black-Lock told you?" Sigrun asked. "Because Mama and Papa never said anything like that."
"Mjoll was a strong woman," Lucia said. "Who was enslaved by that man who was your father."
"How can you say that about Papa?!" Sigrun exclaimed. "He took you in when you were literally thrown into his lap!"
"And I never asked for his self-righteous pity," Lucia returned. "Whatever he might have been to you, he is still a man, and driven by only one thing. You'll see it in due time; Anita opened my eyes to this truth before I was ever enslaved."
Sigrun was not happy with what Lucia had said about her father. But she did not press the matter, for the food was still good and she was still buzzed with euphoria over finding her sister again.
"So what happened with Anita?" Sigrun asked.
Lucia's countenance fell. "She died. She took sick when I turned eighteen and just wasted away. I sought out every physician and healer from the seven holds and beyond; they weren't able to help her. But I never forgot what she told me: that I should make a safe space for women to be free from the shackles of men and their laws. So I made this commune of free women, and we've remained free and outside of the law for years ever since."
"So what do you do, here?" Sigrun asked. "Do you just live by yourselves?"
"More or less," Lucia answered. "Several scores of women stay here, more coming day by day. We do not sow or reap or build anything for ourselves: those things are the work of servants. We take what we want from men and the holds."
"You're bandits..." Sigrun muttered, but it was loud enough to be heard.
"That's what men call us," Lucia said, with venom in her voice. "But we wear the word like a badge of pride. We live to turn their perfect little society upside down, to give men chaos and strife in return for what they've done to us."
"Strife..." Sigrun returned. "You...you're the Sisters of Strife?"
"That's one name we've been called," Lucia stated. "Others include Boethiah's B*tches, the Cunts of Chaos, among other things. But we wear them all with pride."
"You're outlaws!" Sigrun retorted. "We've faced some of your followers before. They tried to rob us."
"That's not true," Lucia shook her head. "The sisters would never have assaulted women. And if we're outlaws, it is because we oppose the oppressive laws of men."
"What do you have against laws?" Sigrun asked. "Aren't laws supposed to protect people?"
"Laws are made to keep people in line, especially women," Lucia returned. "You know this to be true, don't you, especially if you've been to Whiterun? You must have seen the bodies hanging from the walls of the city, bodies of women! Who are being protected by the laws that are being passed by the Emperor, the worst of men? If the weapons ban weren't in affect, women could be armed against their male oppressors: but instead, the Emperor punishes the people of Skyrim because of some pathetic grudge he has against the Nords!"
Sigrun nodded. Lucia's words made sense, especially considering that she had seen the bodies as Lucia had said. Still, she was not entirely convinced of her older sister's focusing on hating men.
"So what do you do instead?" asked Sigrun.
"We have agents in all of the seven holds," Lucia said. "Hiding in plain sight, play-acting as weak, passive women. They inform us about the injustices in society, and we act upon them. We rescue women from their lives of slavery and set them free as sisters. They're so grateful, they elect to join us in our struggle."
"Your struggle?" Sigrun asked.
"The ultimate eradication and enslavement of all men in Skyrim," Lucia stated. "Our first strike is Riften. Just a month ago, a coup was quietly carried out. Runa Fair-Shield was deposed and a man was set up in her place! The Rift is weak: there's bound to be chaos from the transition, the so-called 'Sons of Skyrim' are over-extended and can do nothing, the Imperial Legion doesn't go there, and the northern border is under threat from the Dunmer slavers. We're perfectly set to take it over and claim it in the name of the sisters of strife."
"And what will you do when you're done with this?" Sigrun asked. "Kill all the men in the city?"
"No, of course not!" Lucia returned.
"But you just said your goal is to eradicate and enslave all men!" Sigrun reasoned.
"We want peace and safety in Skyrim," Lucia said, her voice calm and sweet. "And the only way that's going to happen is if men are reigned in from the evil they carry out on all people, not just women."
"But you said..."
Lucia sighed. "I see you've believed the lies that you've been told. Well, maybe if you spend a few days among the sisters, you will see what we truly are and how we are truly what's best for Skyrim."
"Am I...a prisoner here?" Sigrun muttered.
"What? No!" laughed Lucia. "No, you're free to come and go as you please. I'd like you to stay, of course. After all, you're my sister, right? And I love you! This is only the beginning."
Lucia smiled, but there was something off about it. Sigrun did not want to believe it, but that smile seemed false: as though Lucia was forcing herself to smile against her natural desire.
After they had finished, Lucia led Sigrun back to the room where she had arisen. Here she found her blanket and most of her supplies, but no sword or shield. Lucia kissed her on the cheek and bid her goodnight, then went to go to her own room. Sigrun wrapped herself in her blanket and snuggled up against the rock and sand wall of the cave, pondering the irony of why her weapons were not returned. Slowly she slipped into a restless sleep and knew no more.
Her eyes were blinking in the rising sun. Sigrun realized that she was standing once again on the plains of Whiterun. North the mountains were covered in snow, and there was a second light shining in the east that was not the sun. The sound of clanking armor and footsteps in the deep turf behind and to her right told her that she was not alone. She turned about, expecting to see Jonna or the red-haired man. What she saw instead was something that perplexed her greatly.
It was a woman with dark hair, but it was not Lucia. Instead, the woman had a full head of hair and seemed a good deal older; almost the same age as her mother. She was clad in steel armor, with a shield upon her back and a sword on her belt. Perhaps it was a trick of the light, or something else, but the woman seemed to shimmer for a moment: she seemed to appear younger, and blond-haired. But the vision passed almost as soon as it had appeared and the older woman spoke.
"What do you think Sigrun..." she asked.
The dream ended with Sigrun awaking with more questions than answers. Soon enough, one of the other "sisters" appeared in the cave where Sigrun slept. She was uncovered and her head was completely shaven. Her face, however, was covered in ritualistic scarring that left her looking harsh and unlovely. Sigrun was taken aback by the ghastly visage, and wondered what horrible thing had happened to her, and if it had been Lucia who had rescued her from some terrible fate and brought her to live in peace and safety? Surely she wanted to believe this, her heart still loyal toward her sister.
"You've been called to dinner," the scarred woman said to Sigrun.
Sigrun nodded, then rose to her feet. She had been given no water to wash her face or hair, as was the wont of all Nords, despite what the folk of Cyrodiil and Alinor and Morrowind may say. But she did not protest: it had been a while since she had a good meal and the last night's meal had only whetted her appetite. She followed the scarred woman through the tunnels to the same room where she had eaten supper. There were other women here, standing about or seated around Lucia, eating food already. When Lucia saw Sigrun approach, she rose from her place, embraced her, and planted a kiss on her cheek. Sigrun was surprised at this, but made no protest. Upon Lucia's face was a more genuine smile than had been seen last night.
They ate their morning meal together, which was also cold as had been the meal of the night before. There were no words spoken between Sigrun and Lucia, but some idle chatter passed between the other women gathered here. Sigrun felt particularly out of place: these women seemed to have known each other for years, and here she was, a stranger, made to feel especially cast out from among them. As she looked upon their faces, she noticed that they were all so scarred as the other woman had been. Yea, with the exception of Lucia, they were all ritualistically scarred. Their hair, also, was in various differences: some had only a side shaved, some both sides, some had the forward half shaved, other the back half, some were completely bald, and some had a full head of hair but cut so short that they could easily have passed for a veteran of the Imperial Legions.
After a while, Sigrun spoke up at last. "Lucia? What happened to your, um, sisters?"
"What do you mean?" Lucia asked.
"Well," Sigrun said with a hint of discomfort. "Their faces, they've been..."
"The scarring?" Lucia returned. "Oh, they choose that for themselves."
"Choose?" Sigrun exclaimed.
"Yes," Lucia nodded. "Those of our sisters who have proven themselves in battle, or in their devotion to the cause, have their faces ritualistically scarred. This shows their total devotion to the sisterhood, that they have turned their backs on men for good. They choose it of their own free will."
"Is that so?" Sigrun asked.
As they were eating, there was a sound heard again echoing from somewhere deeper within the caves. Only now Sigrun knew that it was not the sound of laughter: it was a cry of pain. She noticed that none of the others seemed to be taking any heed of the sound: indeed, they did not so much as stir in their seats or turn their heads towards the noise. Even Lucia continued eating without a single sign of care.
"What was that?" Sigrun asked. No one gave her so much as a glance in answer. "Sounds like someone's in pain. Do you know where that's coming from?" Their response was the same. The cries came again, this time with added shouts of "No! Please, don't!", repeated over and over again, until they were lost in a high-pitched, agonizing wail of despair.
"Are you really just going to sit there and do nothing while somebody suffers?"
There was once again no answer. Sigrun arose from her seat, but the others around her rose up with her, facing her as though they would bar her way.
"Let me pass," Sigrun said.
"I'm afraid I can't let you do that, sis," Lucia said. "Terribly sorry."
"But there's someone in pain!" Sigrun retorted. "Don't you want to help them?"
"Tell me, sister Hecate," Lucia said to a bald Breton woman. "Do you hear anything?"
"Nothing, Number One," Hecate replied.
"Anyone else?" Lucia asked. "Does anyone hear any noises? Any cries of alarm?" Her querries were met with silence. She then turned to Sigrun, a smile on her face. "There, you see? Nothing. Now, then, I have some things to attend to, so you'll pardon me if I leave you in the middle of breakfast. Eat up, there's plenty for everyone. I will speak with you later today, when I have more time." She then rose from her place and, walking over to Sigrun with a pained smile on her face, placed her arm around her shoulder, and whispered into her ear:
"I don't think I need to tell you how dangerous it is to claim to be hearing voices that aren't there. One would think you've been among men too long, and it's starting to affect your mind." She playfully slapped Sigrun's shoulder, then went on her way.
Sigrun returned to her meal and ate quietly. The other sisters remained with her, eating in silence or engaging in small-talk among themselves. None of them spoke to Sigrun, or gave her any regard, unless she tried to leave to investigate the screams. These carried on for a while, then faded out altogether. After they had finished, Sigrun was ushered out of the room, despite her offers to clean up after herself.
"Such work," sister Hecate told her. "Is beneath a woman."
For the rest of that morning, Sigrun remained in her room. She had a feeling that, having found Lucia again, she should be on her way back home to tell her family where she could be found: if she even knew where here was, that is. Also she was separated from Jonna, and despite their falling out, she was determined to find her again and make amends. Therefore she spent the rest of her morning going through her supplies: everything seemed to be there except for the food that Roggi had given them. She could have sworn that he gave out equal portions to her and to Jonna, but couldn't remember eating or discarding all of them between leaving Mara's Eye Pond and here.
At noon, another sister had appeared and summoned her for the luncheon. She followed her to the same room, where there was food prepared for the afternoon meal. The remnants of breakfast were nowhere to be found; which was remarkable, considering the number of sisters who had partaken and how much of a mess they had made. The food was good, but the company was no better than it had been at breakfast.
One of the sisters seated across from Sigrun was eating a roast chicken and throwing the bones behind her back. Sigrun caught, out of the corner of her eye, what appeared to be a small hand reaching out from behind some barrels towards one of the bones. Her curiosity got the best of her, but instead of making a scene of getting up and investigating, she instead cleared her throat and said: "I need to...uh, relieve myself. Where do you do your business?"
"The one to the left," one of the sisters replied, pointing towards the end of the room, where there were two tunnels leading away, with one going left and another going right.
Sigrun thanked her, then took her leave of them to go down the left-ward tunnel. It wound around a corner into a room with some large, foul-smelling chamber pots. Once she was sure that she was out of sight, she carefully crept back into the room. None of the other sisters seemed to notice her. With this, she softly made her way over to the stack of barrels. There, to her surprise and sorrow, she found a small boy hiding behind the barrels, huddled up with his knees underneath his chin. He was dressed in rags and was gnawing on discarded chicken bones, trying to find any morsel that had been forgotten.
Suddenly one of the sisters shouted: "You're not supposed to be here!" Sigrun was startled by the sound, but the boy wept and hid himself. One of the sister left the table and walked over to the barrels. Then, taking him by the hair on his head, she dragged him up to his feet; then she struck him across the face with her fist and, seizing him by the neck, led him out of the room before Sigrun could protest.
"What the hell was that?" she finally asked, once the boy had been removed. There was no response. "Who was that boy? Why was he being treated so roughly?" Again there was only silence. "Wait, wh..." Sigrun stammered. "Why was he not supposed to be here? What is it that you don't want me to see?" There was again nothing. Sigrun looked down at her plate, but did not feel hungry at the moment. Instead she rose up and turned to go back to her room.
"Maybe Number One is right," one of the sisters spoke up. "Maybe you have been around men too long."
Sigrun dismissed this, and went her way.
Back in her cave, Sigrun was more than anxious to be up and about. Despite what she had been told by her sister, she felt truly and deeply imprisoned. She wanted to know where that boy had gone, why he was not supposed to be here, and why he had been treated so poorly. The scream also hadn't left her mind entirely. She made a last second inventory of what she carried, placed it in a crevice of the cave that put it out of sight, then began exploring the tunnels.
The one that she had first found led back to where they had supped. She went back and tried one of the forks from that tunnel. It went to a large supply room where many blankets were stowed in rolled bundles; this she assumed must be where the others slept. It seemed cozier than her cave, for there were also unlit candles sitting on tables or in niches carved from the rock. There was also a hole in the roof that led up to the sky, and at the bottom of that hole were the scorched remains of small camp-fires. This must be their hearth, where they would keep warm, she thought to herself. There were several tunnels, she saw, that had doors barring the rooms beyond. These doors were all secured by locks, to which she had neither the key nor the skill to pick without one.
As she was going her way, she thought she could hear voices echoing in the tunnels. Some voices talking, others laughing, but there were some that were not so innocent and jovial: there were some whimpers of sorrow, or tears in between fearful mutterings. One of those sorrowful voices sounded near at hand. Sigrun made her way towards the voice, following it down a rather long, dark, and dreary tunnel. There were other tunnels branching off into the darkness, but there was no light in them to illuminate what they held. With one hand feeling along the walls, Sigrun followed the tunnel, through each of its tributaries, until at last her hand passed out into emptiness and there was no tunnel beyond. Here she could hear the sound of moaning and crying from somewhere before her.
"Hello?" she asked.
"I know you're there," a voice responded. It was a woman's voice, but the voice was racked with sorrow, dread, and despair.
"Where are you?" Sigrun asked.
"Stay away!" the voice cried, and a sound of shuffling was heard.
"I'm not going to hurt you!" Sigrun replied.
"What more can you possibly take from me?" the voice asked, her voice breaking in tears. "What more can you possibly do to me that you haven't done?"
"What are you talking about?" Sigrun asked.
"You fucking brigands!" the woman screamed. "All the things you did to me."
"Did..." Sigrun muttered. "Wait, you...you were the one screaming? What did they do to you?"
"Like you don't know!"
"I don't, I really don't."
"I had a family!" wept the woman. "I had a husband who loves me, despite the lies you b*tches spoon-fed into my ears. And you killed them in front of my eyes! And then you..." She wimpered. "...you tortured me!"
"What?" gasped Sigrun.
The woman was about to speak, but a distant sound silenced her. Sigrun heard it as well; the sound of boots upon the dry earthen floor. Then came the orange flicker of a lit torch being held aloft. Turning around, Sigrun saw Lucia standing behind her, flanked by two bald sisters with torches in hand.
"Lucia," Sigrun asked. "What the hell is this?"
"An unfortunate event," Lucia replied, her voice cold and uncaring. "She had lived too long among men, and as a result had become deluded by their lies, thinking to incur their favor by hating and abusing herself: it's sickening."
"Oh, that's sick?" the woman wimpered. "You groped me, you sick, twisted b*tch!"
"Oh, listen to you, sister-to-be!" Lucia said, rolling her eyes. "Parroting the lies of men. They made those rules of decency and propriety to keep us in line. The pain will cease once you accept the truth, you know that."
"Pain?" Sigrun gasped. "Sis, what did you..."
"No no no, that's nothing," Lucia dismissed, with a wave of her hand. "It's all for the cause. Come now, sister of mine. All will be answered."
Lucia put her hand upon Sigrun's shoulder, but now the grip was icy cold and without any feeling of sorority or warmth. She then led Sigrun before her, with the two other sisters taking up the rear. They walked back down the dark tunnel and came into the more hospitable tunnels. At one branch, there was a locked door. Lucia removed the key and opened the door. She then gently pushed Sigrun inside and whispered instructions to the other sisters before turning around to her.
The room itself was a spacious cavern, with a hole in the ceiling for light, and many candles burning brightly in carven alcoves. In the middle of the room was an exquisite bed, with a long wooden box lying next to it. The cave looked like the room of someone very important, for there was no shortage of fine wooden furniture, or books, or things of gold and silver, or of gorgeous tapestries hanging upon the walls, or rich rugs upon the floor.
"What's that box, sis?" Sigrun asked. "Are you going to kill me and bury me?"
"Oblivion, no!" Lucia returned. "I just wanted to explain everything to you."
"What," asked Sigrun. "About the woman in your dungeon who said that you killed her family and molested her?"
"We saved her, sis," Lucia said. "She was being oppressed and abused by her so-called family, and we liberated her."
"She said you tortured her!" Sigrun retorted.
"Oh, sis," Lucia rolled her eyes. "Spare me this ridiculous charade of self-righteous sympathy. What is torture to one person is perfectly acceptable to another. That's just the way life is; embracing all the little paradoxes equally with open arms."
"But she said you groped her!" Sigrun stated. "Did...oh, gods, did you rape her?"
Lucia threw her head back and laughed. "Oh, sis, you really are naive. Women can't rape, only men can do that."
"Then what did you do to her?"
"Relax, it was just a little fun," Lucia replied dismissively.
"Fun? For whom was it fun?"
"Does it matter?"
"You hurt her!"
"If it makes her recognize," Lucia replied, stone-faced and serious. "That men are the monsters, that she has been living her life in an abusive state of mind, and will help her on the path to liberation, it is worth it."
"That's terrible!" Sigrun exclaimed.
"Says who?"
"Says me!" Sigrun firmly stated. "What you're doing, torturing a woman, killing her family and husband before her eyes, that's just evil!"
"Good, evil?" chuckled Lucia. "It's all the same. Just words, ideas, meaningless things made by the male sex to keep us in line and protect their fragile egos. Rather than embracing the truth, they make up words that they can use to justify their insecurities and keep us under their thumbs."
"Gods above, Lu! What madness has done this to you?"
"It is not madness!" Lucia sternly stated. Sigrun made a start, and Lucia backed down, composing herself before continuing. "It's not madness, it's the truth. My dear, beloved Anita opened this to me when we first made acquaintance all those years ago. And ever since then, I've been happy and free."
"You speak of freedom, of happiness?" Sigrun asked. "But what about the happiness and freedom of the woman in your dungeons?"
"Oh, please," Lucia groaned, rolling her eyes.
"What about the little boy in the dining hall?"
Lucia turned to her step-sister. "What little boy?"
"Today at lunch," Sigrun replied. "There was a little boy in the dining hall. He was practically beaten out of there once your sisters saw him."
"You weren't supposed to see that," Lucia vaguely replied.
"Sis, are you...is he being kept here as a slave?"
"He's a male, it's what he deserves."
"He's a child!"
"A child who will grow into a man!" Lucia retorted. "But even youth is no excuse for his culpability. If we hadn't taken him in, we would have had to kill him eventually. We're doing a profound favor to him."
"By keeping him as a slave?" Sigrun asked, disgust growing in her heart like a cancer.
"By teaching him his rightful place in the world that is to come," Lucia stated. "This way, he will grow to be a useful subject, doing all those things that are beneath women. He will survive, which is more than I could say if he was 'free' to rape and abuse women, as he certainly would do."
"How many more boys have you ripped from their families and made as your slaves?"
"Not enough." Without warning, Sigrun lashed out and punched Lucia in the face. Perhaps it was her absence from Jonna, which made her more aggressive and decisive, or the fact that her beloved older sister was standing here, proud of her monstrous actions. But something within her snapped.
"I'll let that one slide," Lucia said, wiping blood away from her lips. "Because I've decided that it's time for you to have your mind opened. Isn't that right, Anita?" With that, and much to Sigrun's surprise, Lucia walked away from her sister and over to the long wooden box. From the chain that hung upon her neck and into her bosom, Lucia pulled out a key with which she opened the box. From out of it issued the most foul odor Sigrun had ever smelt. So odious was it that she instinctively held her hands over her nose. Then, to Sigrun's dismay and disgust, Lucia reached into the box and propped up something that was clearly the source of the foul smell.
Within the wooden box were the remains of what had once been a human. It had rotted so badly that little remained of what it had originally been, save for dried skin stretched over ancient bones and rotting hair. The eyes had long ago sunken in and the mouth was left hanging open in a jarrish, torn gash.
"What is that?" Sigrun asked.
"This is Anita," Lucia replied, undisturbed by the body or, apparently, by the smell.
"You...you kept her in a box?" Sigrun asked.
"In my room!" Lucia added with a smile that turned Sigrun's stomach.
"Why?" Sigrun exclaimed in shock.
"I told you before," Lucia answered. "Anita was my world, my light, my goddess. I couldn't bear to hide her away in the cold, hard ground. So, with the help of some...connections of mine who were alchemists, I had the body embalmed and preserved here in my bedchamber for all time. That way Anita will always be with me, won't you, love?" With that, Lucia placed her arm around the decrepit shoulders of the skeleton and kissed the rotten flesh around the ragged mouth of the skeleton. A shudder of disgust and revulsion flowed through Sigrun's body as she remembered Lucia's hand upon her shoulder when they were reunited, and the kiss she had planted on her cheek the night before.
"Is there something wrong?" Lucia asked, noticing Sigrun's disgust.
"Wrong?" Sigrun asked, her voice rising in wrath. "Wrong? What you're doing here is far beyond simply wrong! Gods, if you loved Anita so much, why would you not rather respect her rotting bones and leave them at peace? What you're doing is no better than the work of a necromancer!"
"Oh, there you go again, with your rules and laws of propriety," Lucia sighed, placing the body back into the box and sealing the lid. "So you have been taught to say by the man you call father. Bah!" She rose to her feet, taking a step closer to Sigrun. Having witnessed what she had just seen, Sigrun took a step back.
"There's nothing to be afraid of, sis," Lucia said, a smile on her face. "I won't hurt you."
"You have hurt me," Sigrun returned. "Your words against our father have hurt me."
"'Our father,'" mocked Lucia. "He was not my father! My father died before you were born!" Her eyes seemed to be welling with tears at these words.
"He took you in, dammit!" Sigrun replied. "He treated you like family!"
"Family," scoffed Lucia. "Let me tell you about 'family.' When my real mother died, my aunt and uncle kicked my ass to the curb; they said that I was a useless good-for-nothing! Your precious father and mother, the ones you think so highly about? They gave me an ultimatum! They demanded that I cut all ties with Anita or they would kick me out as well!"
"That's not true!" Sigrun returned.
"You know what?" Lucia continued, without acknowledging Sigrun's reply. "I'll let you in on a little secret, one that has been kept from you your whole life. When you were nothing but a parasite, draining the life from your mother's body, there was another man. One who offered to be to me as a father, and to her as a husband. When he learned about you, he tried to have you killed before you were born. Now if your mother and father were as good as you say they are, why wouldn't they tell you this? Why would they hide the truth from you, their precious first-born daughter?"
With that, Lucia leaped forward and pushed Sigrun up against the wall, with one hand upon her right wrist and the other seizing her neck. She leaned in for a kiss, but Sigrun's left hand grabbed Lucia by her long black hair and pulled her face away from hers. The right hand left Sigrun's neck, as it sought for the hand that seized her hair, and with that Sigrun's knee made contact with Lucia's stomach. Doubling over in pain, she loosened her grip on Sigrun's right wrist. Now free, Sigrun stepped back away from her step-sister and tried to find herself a fast way to the door. Unfortunately, Lucia was far too close to the door to make flight an option, and the door was shut.
"What the hell are you doing?" Sigrun asked.
"Oh!" Lucia returned, a little bemused. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to come on so strong."
"Come on so strong?" Sigrun returned. "Lu, you're my sister!"
"So?"
"So?!" Sigrun exclaimed. "It's wrong for kin to do that together."
"Oh, again with the rules of men!" Lucia sighed. "Besides, the Imperials in Cyrodiil already think you Nords sleep with your own 'kin', as you say it. Who's to say they're wrong?"
"You're my sister!" Sigrun shouted, slower, feeling in her wrath that Lucia hadn't heard her the first time.
"Not by blood," Lucia replied, as though that were to make it better.
"Still, you're a woman!" Sigrun said.
"And proud of it," Lucia returned with a smile.
"You don't understand," Sigrun continued. "I don't do that with women."
"So?"
"What do you mean, 'so?'" Sigrun asked, sounding more and more disgusted.
"What, are you going to tell me," Lucia asked. "That you like men? You're sixteen, how many men have you fucked?"
"That's not any of your business," Sigrun returned.
"How many?" Lucia insisted.
"None," Sigrun replied.
"There, you see?" Lucia asked. "How do you know that you like men when you haven't even fucked one? You don't know the humiliation, the pain, the shame, the degradation, and outright horror that a woman goes through, in mind and body, when she is fucked by a man!" She then held out her hands and softened her voice. "Now come here, sis. It's alright, it's perfectly harmless."
"You had me pinned up against the wall with your hand on my throat!" Sigrun retorted. "That's not harmless!"
"I was just a little overzealous, that's all," Lucia returned. "Come on, it's alright. I won't hurt you, I couldn't even if I tried. Women know what other women want, and can please them in a powerful and dignified way that a man simply can't."
"Is that what Anita told you?" Sigrun asked, not buying any of what Lucia had said.
"Sis..."
"No, don't you 'sis' me anymore!" Sigrun shouted angrily. "You fucking tried to rape me! And don't say you didn't, because I know you did. I've seen the very actions you did to me in this room carried out by the Dunmer slavers in Eastmarch. Because we're sisters and I value family much higher than you, I have not defended myself against you as I should. But now you will release me from this room and let me go my way, or by Talos, if you try any of that shit on me again, I will break your hands and bite off your tongue, that you may never molest anyone ever again!"
Lucia seemed to get the message now. Now she seemed to become sad, almost grim.
"It's sad, you know," she said, "I had expected to win you over peaceably. But, seeing as you're so indoctrinated, you leave me no choice."
"No choice but what?" Sigrun asked, gasping from her loud warning.
"Sisters, to me! At once!" Lucia shouted.
The door was opened and the two sisters who had stood guard outside this whole time now entered the room. They seized Sigrun by the arms and pinned her against the wall. Fearful of what was about to happen, Sigrun kept kicking with her legs, to dissuade Lucia from closing in on her.
"Lies!" Sigrun shouted. "Your whole sisterhood is a lie!"
"Such a shame he didn't kill you when he had the chance," Lucia tutted. "You know what, Sigrun, I'm going to let you in on another little secret? This is something I never told anyone else except Anita." She walked over to Sigrun and looked down upon her with resentment in her eyes.
"I hate you," she said. "I've always hated you. I hated you from the moment I held you in my arms, all those years ago, as a little screaming, crying brat. I hated you because you stole Mjoll away from me. After you were born, I was nothing; just a charity case, something your mother and father showed affection to because they felt sorry for me, because it made them feel good about themselves. Then they brought that little b*tch Jonna to live with us, and she stole your affection from me. Then that little shit Bjorn was born and your father had a son to carry on his name, and I was even less than nothing."
"That's a lie and you know it!" Sigrun retorted. "I never loved Jonna more than you, I loved you both equally. I even left home just to look for you."
"And now you've found me," Lucia returned. "And I've found you; and now I must break you. It may take minutes, if you are weak and wise, or days if you're foolish and hungry for pain. But in the end, I've broken them all. When I have broken you, you will see things as I do. You will come to hate men as I hate them. You will serve the sisters without question. You will have affection for only me, and when that happens..." She smiled.
"When that happens, you will be free." She gave the order and the two sisters carried Sigrun out of her room.
(AN: I'm still here, just trying to juggle time between looking for work, recording my next album, playing World of Warcraft Burning Crusade 2 [aka. Legion], and writing this. I'm definitely in the mood to write some for Warcraft, as my story about my Priest alt showed. Though getting started with an interesting story is still a challenge. And I'd rather do a lot of smaller stories and not just jump right into the stuff that would be happening now in Legion, since it works better with the story that way in the long run.)
("Omg, stop hogging the word count with an unrelated author's note!" you say. Well, I'm specifically being a bit tight-lipped about what I share story-wise. Both because, though I have a rough outline of what I want to have done in this story, I'm mostly flying by the seat of my pants, and because I don't want to give away things that will be revealed in time in the story [which I do plan on completing before this year is out])