Baldar was the first to wake up in the morning and left him to do the morning duties. He walked through the forest with the large bundle of sticks on his shoulder. He was planning to make a large fire start the morning and hope it would be enough to keep them well after the weather from the previous night. The ground itself now covered in a good foot of snow and the morning held a calm silence as if the rest of the world had not woken up yet.

The walk was good for him, helping to make some sense of what he knew. The first thing he knew was that his name was Baldar… Or maybe it was K'Vash? The next thing he knew was that there was a lot in his bag, though he didn't really know how much. The third thing was that he was good at surviving. His sense of direction was spot on, and at least for this morning, he didn't eat anything poisonous.

The problem was really that he couldn't really remember much else beyond that. It was like a wall had been resurrected in his mind and cut him off from knowing anything about himself. He couldn't recall where he was from or how he had fallen the previous night. Friends and family were completely gone as well. The feeling left him with a strange feeling of relief and yet, a yearning for something.

The Khajiit arrived at the camp and saw that the tent was not open and there weren't any footprints leading away from the tent beside his own. He found it safe to assume that she was still there and proceeded to reconstruct the fire from the previous night. Placing the firewood into a similar pattern from the previous night, he used the remaining coals to start the fire back up and took his seat by it.

The blaze warmed him gradually, and in his waiting, he pulled his bag over and began looking through it for anything that might give him a clue to something. From the bag, he pulled out a short ebony dagger with gold trim on it. The trim took the appearance of tree limbs moving up from the handle to a cat's eye. The eye started back at him as if an old friend who was happy to see him again.

With a sigh, he put it back in his bag and fished around inside for another few seconds before pulling out a long white bow with a quiver attached to it. For a moment, he thought it had been made of some elven metal but was wrong in his assumption. It was a white oak bow with a steel reinforcement within it to keep it flexible and strong. By sheer muscle memory, he notched an arrow and pulled back with the world slowing down around him. There was a familiarity in this state that made him hyper-aware of his surroundings.

There were some shuffling noises from the tent as the flap was drawn back as Magna tucked it behind the clip to allow the tent to stay open. The woman looked tired, dead tired almost if he had anything to go by from the dark bags under her eyes. Blinking ever so slowly the Nord watched him silently before going around the campfire to sit down watching him silently.

Baldar looked at her and untensed the string to let it all go slack. "Well, how did you sleep? I assume better than you would have outside."

"I don't want to talk about it." Magna curtly spoke in a gruff voice turning her head away from him to look off somewhere in the forest while her hands fiddled with the burned and tattered clothes she had on her back. Now in the early morning light, Magna pale Nordic skin was dirty, covered in soot like her clothes as if she had just rolled around in an oven. The shoulder blade length slightly curly blond hair laid limp on top of Magna's head, dirt, mud, leaves and even a stick made up the rat's nest of hair. Overall the cat would notice his charge looked like something ate her then spat her back up, in a more or less metaphorical sense.

"Well, then would you like to talk about your current… attire? It hardly seems fitting for a lady to carry herself in a manner like you do now. Surely, we can stop by Riverwood and retrieve you something nice." He suggested, trying to keep a cheery smile since this girl seemed to be under great stress at the moment. The bow was then set down beside him, and he placed his hands on his lap.

"And why do you care what I wear or don't? You can keep that lady bullshit to yourself, cat." Magna grumbled lowly before standing up turning on her heels to walk away from him. "Besides its hard to get stuff when you have no money to buy stuff with, and I'm not going to start asking for you to help with that. Now if you don't mind, I'm going to find something to eat." Magna shot back over her shoulder giving him a glare before stalking off into the woods.

"With what? A stick? I hardly think a young girl such as yourself could handle that task alone." He observed, reaching into his sack and pulling out a hand full of dried meat. Taking one, he shoved it into his mouth before holding the strips out to Magna. "It's hardly fitting for me to sit and eat when you appear to be starving."

"..." Magna only glared at Baldar before reaching down towards the log pile and tossed the one she grabbed at his head. "No like a big old club, and for your information, I can handle it myself thank you very mu…" Magna stopped midway through her little spill looking like the girl was turning a bit paler by the second. The annoyed Nord woman wavered on her feet for a moment before slowly sitting down on the ground with a soft groan as she reached up to hold onto her head in what might have been a bit of dizziness. "Don't, say a goddamn word." Magna hissed snatching the meat out of his hand shoving half of it into her mouth, chewing in what he could only assume was bitter frustration.

Baldar took a bite of his jerky and sat back on his other hand to relax. The fire was warm and relaxing for him to soak in. All in all, it had been a good morning along with looking like this day would be a lot better than the previous. Lost in thought with everything that had happened over the few hours he could remember so far. "So, where are we headed today then?"

"..." Across from him, the girl was silent like she was pondering how to answer his question, finishing up the last bit of her jerky. "Helgen, I need to get to Helgen." Magna finally answered standing up to stretch out, her voice sounding more like hardening steel keeping whatever she was currently feeling away from Baldar unlike the other times before.

Baldar nodded to her words and pulled over his bag to look inside. After some fishing, he pulled out a leather map and opened it, revealing the entirety of Skyrim. It took a bit of thinking and figuring, but from the surrounding area, he was able to determine that they were just northeast of Helgen. "Alright, well, it looks like it's just on the other side of the mountain here."

Magna paused for a moment looking into the fire looking like she might have been thinking before she nodded her head again. "Okay let's go." Magna went back into the tent before coming back out a few seconds later with her bag over her shoulder ready to go.

"Slow down there, Magna. There is a mountain in our way, and we cannot just get up and walk around it. Especially after last night." Baldar informed, reaching into his sack and exploring it some more.

Manga crossed her arms and tapped a barefoot on the ground. "I need to get back today. Once we get to the road, it won't be that bad." Manga pointed out to Baldar with a long sigh her shoulder slumping down a little bit. "If you won't help me get back then I will just have to get there myself."

"I never said that I wouldn't help you, only which neither of us is in any condition to make the journey right now. Let's relax a bit and wait for our strength to rejoin us." He suggested, pulling out a strange leather bound book that Magna would recognize. All it received was a shrug from him before getting set off to the side.

"I DON'T CARE ABOUT THAT!" Manga stopped her foot again, the loud yelling making the few winter birds in the trees scatter in fright. "I need to get back today, now, I don't have much time to waste. I can worry about 'getting my strength back' whenever I'm back in Helgen, we can't be that far from the town, you… You a-are just being a lazy Khajiit! Why would I ever expect anything else from you." Manga spat out turning her back to Baldar and went to the nearest tree and started to climb its trunk with what seem a little effort to him.

Baldar sat his sack down and walked over to the tree with his arms crossed. Something told him that he wished to observe her attempt to gain a vantage point. Immediately, he noticed her legs and arms shaking as they scaled and she was using her upper body more than her lower. At that rate, she'd come tumbling down out of the tree from exhaustion soon.

"Are you sure you can handle this? You don't look well Magna." He told, keeping a worried tone.

Magna paused, even from his spot on the ground he would see her knuckles were white from trying to grip onto the bark and stay on the tree. But the girl only shook her head and kept climbing the tree until she reached just high enough to see above the tree line, not climbing any further than that as she vanished among the pine needles and leaves.

"I-I see it, to the west! The road should be to the south not that far from us then!" Magna voice wavered a bit as she called down to Baldar.

"Yes, and we will head there when we have the strength." He reiterated, putting his hands behind his head as he waited for her to descend.

"I told you I don't have time for that. You are just trying to find an excuse to laze around all day. I'm sorry, but that is not the Nord way of doing things." The leaves started to rustle while the girl above him started to climb down, hugging the tree in a death grip while she inched her way down. Once Magna's feet were back on the ground, she kept her back turned away from him, adjusting her shirt before turning back around to face him. "Now I'm going now, whether you like it or not." Magna pushed past Baldar, shoving her shoulder into his side for good measure as she walked away from the camp.

Baldar turned and watched her walking away; his gut told him that he shouldn't let her go, but he didn't feel it was necessary at the moment. He'd been around the area, picking up sticks and not run into any trouble so he doubted there was anything around that would hurt her. With a cleared mind, he chose to let her walk and blow off steam while he remained at camp. The state she was in wouldn't allow her to get too far in her tantrum without him catching up.

The cat went back over to his bag and the fire, taking up the journal in hand and looking it over. Inside, the pages were written in a language he managed to recognize somehow. His mind searched for the answer, but none came to him. Instead, he was forced to look at it and read it. There was the talk of traveling and how he hoped for a big score of some sort. Something with enough money to set him up for life but he never gave an explanation of what it was.

Then, he looked at the note on the front, and it made his heart flutter for some strange reason. He couldn't remember who K was at all, but there was a special place in his soul for her. That feeling scared him immensely as he felt a sort of anger at it. The sense he belonged to someone just frustrated his very core.

This sudden upheaval in his thoughts made him stand up and start violently packing the tent and his belongings back into his bag. There was this urge to move and leave the area so that nobody could track him or find him. A weight of chains on his wrists made it even worse as he felt something drag behind him in his movements. Slowing him down and pulling him back toward something in the west.

Within a short period, he had all of his belongings together and hit the road toward Magna. Whatever was dragging behind him slowly lost his its grip as he pushed forward. Soon, he finds the girl, standing just on a hilltop watching smoke rise in the distance.

Baldar reached into his bag and pulled out his bow and quiver. "Magna was Helgen attack by bandits."

The girl spun on her heels with a squeak to face him, the orange-brown eyes going wide with surprise to see him standing there. "N-no… it's just fine nothing is wrong with it, but you should stay away… They hate your kind. Yeah, that is it." Magna sputtered out quickly, but her words fell flat, her body stiffening up noticeably.

"Oh well, I'm bound to follow you until I've saved your life. It's my way out of the debt I owe." He assured, giving her a pat on the shoulder and then looking back at the smoke. It was too dark to be a bonfire since the clouds were a thick black. No, there was something bad going on there.

"That smoke, though, I do not believe it is just from your village."

"I said don't worry about it!" Magna snapped slapping away his paw from her shoulder her face contorting into a scowl. "It's nothing for you to worry about, now leave me alone!" Magna pushed him away a little bit with a grunt.

Baldar quickly caught onto Magna's mood and crossed his arms with her statement. Then, he caught a whiff of something vile, and his mind immediately knew what it was. "No, we can't go there Magna. I think your village was attacked… I can smell the burning flesh."

Magna took a step away from Baldar a flash of grief crossing her face before the scowl quickly returned. "I don't care what you smell; I told you before I don't trust you! Whatever is going on, It's not of your business I already told you to leave me alone!" Magna shouted again turning to leave.

Sighing with her statement, he walked forward and grabbed her by the wrist. "No, Magna, life debt aside, I'm not letting you go into that fray. A child such as yourself should not be subject to this kind of carnage that lies ahead."

"I SAID LET ME GO!" Magna screeched in frustration twisting her body around trying to get away, but Baldar grip remained true trapping her there. Turning around to face him Magna eyes narrowed with clear resentment, but there was something else that flashed over her face too quick for him to pick out what emotion it was.

"I'm sorry." That was all the girl said with a burning heat, which seared at his skin spread across his chest and the hand that held her, followed by a gut-wrenching blow to his manhood.

The cat doubled over and grabbed his groin, eyes about to pop out of his head from pain. He couldn't recover quickly from this and just sat there cursing until finally a torrent of vomit shot from his mouth. "Why… why would you do that?!"

There was no explanation to his question as she pulled her arm out of his grasp and the sounds of footsteps walking away were all he is given. But there was a pause before the sound of something shuffling around in a bag came close by and the flat clink of something hitting the stone road quickly followed the sound of footsteps running away. Then there was only silence as Magna ran away rushing into Helgen by herself.

Baldar sat there, holding his groin while the pain started to come to the forefront if his mind. There was another sensation as he felt his skin start to bubble and bubble with heat. His fur singed and turned to dust before making him fall down on the ground. He then began to roll on the ground with the heat to try and stop off from burning him anymore, but the pain was so much.

Once the fire was out, Baldar laid there on the ground in pain and suffering from everything he had been through. It had sapped him of his strength and ability before leaving him half covered and in such pain. A simple movement made it feel like his skin was breaking or falling off onto the ground.

Something inside him wouldn't let him just let go, though, and he managed to roll over from his back to his belly. One unburned arm reached forward and grabbed the rocks to drag him toward the way Magna went. Some inner sense of duty is forcing himself to follow her to this extreme degree. It was like something in him was coaxing him on and telling him to keep going to her because she needed a hero right now.

With every gasp and drag, an image of some dark, sickly dark elf woman shot through his mind for a moment before disappearing. Never giving him an exact image of what it was but also showing him something that gave him strength. This wasn't the strength of love or happiness though and instead formed a pit in his stomach. The girl told him that this was his failure and soon another just like she would come.

That pain only got him so far, and soon he arrived back to where she had stood before running off down the path. In that spot, he faltered and curled up into a ball of pain and anguish. He wasn't going to get to be the hero anymore with the pain he had not. There was no way he could get up from this and keep going.

His hands moved on their own and brought something to his lips to drink. His eyes only opened a little to see what it was and the ends of his mouth bent up. It was the potion that Magna had left him before running off toward Helgen.

The potion brought up something though from within his mind. It was a younger elf girl from the flashes in his mind to a sitting position within an alleyway. Her knees were in her chest, and she was looking up at him with her large red eyes. They were sad and crying for some reason beyond him at that moment.

"Will you take me away from here?" she asked before the image faded away from his vision.

Baldar reached back and tried to clutch at his burnt flesh before the skin itself peeled off, and the new, healthier skin started to grow in. Sadly, the side effect of the health tonics was that they didn't stop the pain. Thus, every scab felt the excruciating pain of being formed and then slowly peaking off. Each boil started to pop and peel from his body.

It had taken a good while before his body had healed enough for his body to move and even then the aches and pains didn't go away. His pants had burned away almost completely except for the upper thigh and connecting piece. Besides that, his shirt is gone now, and his fur was in patches. If he had another healing potion, he could have grown some of it back, but he never found any in his bag.

The poor cat lets out a sigh and leaned on his bow, hobbling after Magna down the path. At this point, she could have already been in the town and taken hostage by whatever attack is. He'd have to go about this very carefully if he wanted to be safe. It'd help neither of them if he spooked Magna into fireballing him again or any bandits into acting.

It wasn't long before he arrived at the town to see the sorry state it was in. Pieces of the towers looked like they'd been ripped off by some powerful claws. The ground was melted all around the place and to the point that a thin layer of glass sealed it in. The sight made him pick his bow up and hold it at the ready with an arrow notched.

Baldar took a deep breath before walking down the road and made it to the front gate. The door closed shut so he carefully opened it to look inside. Inside the door, he saw bodies strewn about in strange places like they were thrown. Others were leaning into the rubble and looked like had looted through since the ground around them was covered in personal belongings.

The Khajiit's ears laid back while his eyes narrowed down the path with suspicion. His ears searching for any telling sounds that could tell if there were enemies nearby. There were signs of bandits being here, but currently, he knew they could have already moved on. That's when he decided just to press on forward and into the town with his senses on high alert.

Inside the town, the smell of burnt flesh and something more seemed to fill the air as he walked. Almost a smell of brimstone, like the demons of Molag Bal, had been there recently to destroy everything they deemed unfit. A disgusting scent to say the least but also a scent to be wary of too.

Before he got too far into the village, there was the sound of casual talk along with footsteps. Baldar hunkered down behind the fallen wall of a house from these sounds and watched as a group of men came around the corner with iron weapons in hand. They looked too happy to be in a place like this making the can insinuate that they must have been bandits.

"Alright, she was right over here." The leader said, pointing at a house with a door and one side completely burned away.

"You're sure that she was some sort of half breed?" Another man asked, pulling a knife from his belt. "Last time you said you found a half-breed it just turned out to be a Breton."

"A Breton prince!" He corrected.

"He was a Breton, everyone god damn one of them claims to hail from royalty." The other had retorted before the entire group laughed.

There was a part of Baldar that told him just to shoot now and take them out, but another told him not to cause unnecessary bloodshed. If they were coming up on someone and it wasn't Magna then there would be no reason to kill them if it wasn't. At least, that's what he kept telling himself when in reality he was probably going to have to kill these people no matter who was behind the door.

He watched though as one of them moved up the house's steps and got prepared. Two of them took their positions at each of the corners of the house while the other two moved a bit farther out to stop them whoever was inside tried to run. Their positions were a sign that these bandits had done this sort of thing before. Luckily for Baldar, it also made them great targets since there was no cover besides in the house.

Taking aim, he pulled his first arrow back and aimed for the one on the left side since he seemed to be the biggest one of them all. The one heading inside moved in, and a couple of seconds later there was a very feminine screech that rang out. That's when Baldar's arrow loosed and sailed through the air. The steel tipped arrow pierced the man's head and out the other side with still enough momentum to strike into the wall. Stapling the man in place though his eyes rolled up into his head.

The whole instance happened so fast that the remaining bandits only had enough time to witness their compatriots death before another arrow released. This one slammed into The closest flanker and lodged itself deep in his chest. From the blood that began to spurt from the wound, Baldar had hit the man's heart or one of the central channels to it.

The three that remained outside got a good idea of where the arrows were coming from but that just made Baldar act quicker. The next closest one took an arrow through his eyes before calling on top of it. The force was enough that it sent the arrow busting out of the back of his skull. The other two died in similar fashions in their charge toward him, trying to give themselves some chance of surviving since there was no cover.

There was none left outside after that, and it came down to the one that had moved into the house. Since the bandits that Baldar had attacked made sure to hell an extensive amount of noise, the man inside was aware of him. Before moving any closer, the cat looked into his belongings and found the black dagger from before.

With a knife in hand, he moved to the door and pushed it open slowly to make sure that he had the advantage of stealth. His stealth broke as soon as he saw Magna laying on the ground across from him, struggling to pick herself up. The sudden visage made him step forward to her without being able to stop himself out of worry for her sake.

"Mag-" Baldar was stopped before he could say her name with a dagger piercing his guts. It was dragged to the side, splitting him open and letting a gallon of blood drain onto the ground. The cat righted himself though and grabbed the bandit on his left. A raw determination is keeping him from reaching down and holding his stomach from falling out of his body.

"What the fu-" Was all the bandit was allowed to say before the cat's hand covered his mouth.

Black tendrils leaked out from his fingers and forearm and latched onto the man beside him. The rage inside of Baldar became far too insurmountable then, and he looked into the man's eyes while the tendrils latched onto his face and body. Slowly, he dried out while Baldar started to feel better from the draining of the man's life force.

"You've brought this on yourself, my friend. With a profession of banditry, you should have expected an early death." Baldar said, showing no joy in what he was doing.

The cat then took the dried body and tossed it into a few smoldering flames to hide any evidence of what he did before going over to Magna. "Magna, are you alright?"

Magna whimpered weakly reaching up to touch the back of her head, the blood lock soiled not only with dirt and ash but now with blood as well from where it would have seemed that the man had hit her over the head. The girl looked up from the floor and turned away from Baldar, almost like she didn't hear him or noticed that he was there next to her, struggling over to some of the smoldering rubble of the home Baldar watched as Magna reached out to the rubble. With his keen eyes, Baldar realized that a burned and charred black hand stuck out limply from the mess, the rest of the body having been buried under the pile of rubble.

Baldar let out a sigh of regret and took hold of her hand to stop her from taking the one of the dead. It was someone she must have cared about, but he did not know who. The cat then used that to roll her over and pick her up at the shoulders and knees. It was the time that they leave this place and head off to safety.

"C'mon Magna, Falkreath is not far from here." He said, standing up and leaving the house. Magna didn't protest being moved around or stopped from touching the dead but only returned his statement with an another whimper as she reached up to touch her head again with one hand while the other limply wrapped around his neck so she would not fall.

Now that Baldar had Magna safe once again the exhaustion of the day so far set in well over his body. He didn't know how beat up he was and why he went as far as he did for the girl but he did. There was a life debt he owed to her before, but now he had repaid it with his recent deed. He couldn't drop her now, though; she was scared and wounded from the attack. A small sigh escaped him as he thought about it now, he didn't have the courage to leave the only person he knew in this world even if that person didn't trust him. With that Baldar readjusted her weight on his back, so it was more comfortable, quickly retracing his steps to leave the ruined town and start down the correct road to Falkreath.

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