The screaming had long since stopped but all Trinbjol could think about was the horrible sounds Sibil made as she was slowly killed and devoured. He wasn't sure which was worse, the agonized wailing as she was cut apart or the horrible, wet gurgling noises she made just before she finally faded. What he was certain of was that the sounds remained and it was all he could do not to slam his head against the stone floor to shake the noises out.

Another group of twisted, pale monsters came to the gate, this time grabbing up one of the other guards. This time Trinbjol refused to look up, even as the screaming started. He simply fell on his knees and squeezed his hands against his ears, trying to crush the sound. It was no use. He could still hear the man screaming.

When the sickening, bubbling gurgles came, Trinbjol snickered for a second. He wasn't sure why but something about the dismal situation had suddenly turned humerous. Perhaps it was the irony that he'd fought against Imperials, then against a brass army lead by a man who'd stolen the powers of a god. And in surviving all of that to the extent of becoming allied with former enemies, he was going to die, down in a hole in the ground in agony while frail, mishapen monsters ate him alive.

His snickering became a chuckle, and then eventually a full, boisterous laugh.

Naspia stepped into the main hall of Fort Snowhawk and looked around curiously. Back before the end of the war this place had been home to necromancers and their abominations. Since then it had be taken and garrisoned by Stormcloaks. And there should have been a lot of them, too. All she found was an overturned table, some broken bottles and a greeting of pure silence.

"A battle was fought here." Akonus whispered as he stepped further in.

"You can see that?" Naspia asked as she focused her eyes inside. There was absolutely nothing but Akonus' grey form.

"No, I can smell blood, though." Akonus told her and pointed to the stairwell leading into the dungeons. "It's coming from down there."

"So your nose is enchanted, too?" The Dragonborn asked as she followed the Akaviri into the stairs.

"I don't imagine you linger on battlefields too often." Akonus stated. "You don't notice it when you're fighting. You're too busy. but in the aftermath of the battle the smell is almost overpowering."

Naspia decided not to continue the line of conversation and followed Akonus quietly as they wound down into the dungeons. The floor was dark and sticky, like someone had spilled mead all over it, except the smell, as Akonus described, wsa blood, not mead. Naspia looked all around the room, seeing fallen weapons and shields scattered everywhere, most of thme stuck to the congealed blood on the ground. Naspia lifted a hand up and conjured a blade from Oblivion, seeing as she'd not carried Dawnbreaker since the Battle of Windhelm. Akonus seemed content to use his hands if a fight occured. No sooner had the spell been cast then a small, throaty bark was heard coming from a distant corner.

"What was that?" Akonus asked curiously.

"Falmer..." Naspia replied, a twinge of nervousness in her voice.

Trinbjol watched as many of the gnarled little creatures ran off past the gorey dining hall. Two of the things in the room left, leaving only the last one. Drawing a small dagger, it opened the cage door and began approaching Trinbjol. The Nord simply stared at him and laughed. When the creature seemed to be riled up by his outburst, it made to grab his wrist. Tribjol grabbed its wrist instead, threw it to the ground and snapped its elbow backward, causing it to growl.

"Oh there once was a hero named Raggnar the Red..." He cooed as he ripped the dagger from the creatures hands and began stabbing it in the back, over and over again. "Something...something... flopped on the floor!"

Trinbjol laughed as the foul creatures blood squirted him in the face and stood up, away from the limp corpse. He walked to where the last of the guards had been taken and picked apart and set hand on the dead man's head.

"If you didn't like the song you could have just said so." He told the dead body and picked up a blade that one of the monsters had left behind. "I suppose I'll have to go find a more appreciative audience."

Trinbjol left the gruesome scene, humming a tuneless song to himself as he dragged the tip of the sword along the walls.

"Care to elaborate?" Akonus asked, hearing the sounds of footsteps approaching. There certianly were a lot of them.

"Falmer used to be called Snow Elves." Naspia replied as she heard the growling get closer. "Think of them like goblins. Only meaner."

"Goblins?" Akonus asked.

"You'll see them in half a second!" She replied just as one of them lunged out of the hole Napsia just learned was in the wall across from her. She'd forgotten to unfocus her eyes as the falmer, highlighted in red ran at her with three more close behind it. As the thing shifted from red to black, Naspia's attention was on the weapon as it came down at her. Swinging the enchanted blade upward, she carved right through its wrist and then kicked the wounded beast back.

"Well, don't they look wretched." Akonus remarked as a pair of the came at him. He grabbed the shaft of an axe as it came down on him and wrenched it from the falmer's grasp. Swinging his arm back he struck the twisted little creature in the chest so hard the handle of the axe became inbedded inside of it. The other swung in at him from the side but Akonus twisted out of the way and struck the falmer in the throat with the side of his hand, crushing its windpipe.

"They're horrible little terrors." Naspia muttered as she hacked down the last one attacking her. More shuffling could be heard coming from the tunnel and she prepared to counter-charge but Akonus grabbed her shoulder. "What are you doing?"

"Don't you think we should break away and let the Stormcloaks know they lost an entire fort to monsters in the dirt?" He asked as he pointed his palm toward the hole in the wall. Akous had never touched her while casting a spell before, not that it ever really seemed necessary, but with his hand on her shoulder Naspia could actually feel something shift through Akonus as it reverberated off his hand against her. All within the span of a second or two the feeling came, went and then a cone of bright blue fire speared into the hole. "Come on, killing these things isn't going to mean anything if the Stormcloaks don't retake this place and prevent it from happening again."

"Right." Naspia replied as she peered into the smouldering tunnel. Charred bones and scorched stone was her only greeting, at first. Then a smell caught her and almost made her gag. "Yeah, let's get out of here."

Trinbjol had found his way back to the cavernous opening where he'd first been rendered unconscious. The half closest to him looked as it had before, albeit with a lot less blood. The path closest to the exit, however, was blackened with little embers sizzling and cracking the stones. One falmer was still moving, its lower half nearly burnt away but whatever had attacked it. Trinbjol stepped up to the creature and knelt beside it.

"What happened, my friend?" He asked in a soothing voice. The falmer swiped at him, scratching his face with its filthy claws. Trinbjol laughed and grabbed its hand, breaking each finger individually. "You always were the clever one!"

The madness that was overcoming Trinbjol had not been subtle, but he still hadn't ever noticed it until it had fully taken ahold of him. As the falmer tried to get away, the mind shattered Nord grabbed it by the throat and pressed its face against the smouldering ground. The falmer shrieked and reached up, digging its nails into Trinbjol's leg which scored more cackling laughter from the Nord as he lifted that leg up and drove it down on to the falmer's head.

Trinbjol marched past the corpse, swinging the chitinous blade to and fro as he whisteled to himself. He could feel the heat of the burning stone beneath his boots but paid it little mind as he came out into the dungeons of For Snowhawk and looked at the burnt, pooled blood that had since dried on the ground. Striding over to a steel blade, he jammed the bone sword into the coagulated blood and pried his late commander's weapon from the ground and gave it a few swings.

"With this lute I shall play songs that will force greatness upon the masses!" He shouted, cackling as he headed toward the stairs. The sound of heavy doors closing caught his ear and he sprinted up the stairs, taking the first few steps uneasily as the congealed blood caused his boots to stick ever so slightly. Making it to the top and into the main hall, he went to push the doors open but found that they were barred shut from hte other side. With a roar of frustration, the mind shattered Nord turned and headed for the ladder leading to the ramparts above.

Once he was topside he looked out, catching sight of two figures, a tiny red headed woman and a small raven haired man walking away from the fort. Trinbjol looked around and took notice of a a way to climb down from the side of the tower and slowly mad ehis descent to the ground. Five feet from the bottom he hit a patch of ice and slipped, landing hard enough on his back to knock the wind out of him and cause his ears to ring. As he stood up, the ringing still very present, he pulled his plundered blade out of its sheath and began swiping the tower, dulling the blade horribly before sheathing it again.

"I think you've learned your lesson." He said with a nod and turned to follow the two who had attempted to lock him away. "Now we play with new friends!"

Just as Trinbjol was about to chase off after the pair he watched walk off, he caught sight of a battleaxe being used to hold the main doors shut. As Trinbjol looked at it the image of Sibil popped into his mind, standing triumphantly with axe in hand. The image was fleeting, however, and was soon replaced by dark sillouhettes in fiery backdrop, one being torn apart and screaming. Trinbjol fell to his knees and clutched the side of his head as what felt like an eternity of nightmarish visions flooded into his head. He was broken from his traumatizing recent memory as the snow beneath him melted and soaked through his pants to his knees. The biting cold snapped him back into reality, but his mind continued to stay lost.

Forgetting what direction the pair he'd seen walking away had gone in Trinbjol decided to simply follow the road. As he made his trek down the winding, icy dirt path a voice caught his attention. It wasn't one he recognized and he could barely hear it, let alone understand it. Whatever the voice belonged to, though, it sounded rather excited. Trinbjol's mind immediately changed as he turned east. He wasn't exactly sure where the voice was leading him, but he figured there wasn't much of a reason not to check it out.

Not really sure why but I'm running head first into some serious writer's block. Ah well, got the point across that things are being set in motion. :/