When she came to, the first thing she registered was the pain in her head. It was threatening to make her sick to her stomach—and the rocking and swaying wasn't helping anything.

Then she thought to question the rocking and the swaying. She focused her ears over the pounding between them, and other noises started to come in. The creaking of wood. The trundling of wheels on stone. The nickering of horses and the clip-clop of hooves.

She was confused for several moments, the pieces refusing to fall into place. And then she remembered how she'd come to be unconscious at all, and all at once, she realized it.

She was in the back of a carriage.

She could feel daylight trying to stab through her lids and into her throbbing eyes; they must have driven straight through the night. She needed to find out where she was.

Reluctantly she opened her eyes to the harsh light of day, immediately letting out a vicious oath as the pain in her head struck her like a hammer. She tried to block the sun's rays with her hands, but they were tied behind her now. And she'd opened her eyes for nothing—all she could see was trees passing by. She let her lids close again.

Suddenly, she heard a sharp intake of breath, and then a male voice.

'Hey...you there, kinsman.'

So she wasn't alone in the wagon? She groaned, not daring to open her eyes again. Whoever was talking to her could wait.

'Hey! Sell-sword!'

Her eyes snapped open again after all.

'You're finally awake!'

When she turned her head, she came face to face with the picturesque definition of what most people thought of when they heard the word 'Nord'. A man sat across from her on the other side of the cart with his hands bound in front of him, staring at her intently. He was tall and muscled, with thick and partially braided blonde hair falling loose on either side of a chiseled face, and the eyes that met hers were a deep, dark blue. He was wearing a tattered Stormcloak cuirass—so he must've been part of the group in the forest.

When she was silent, he spoke again.

'I was starting to think those bastards hit you too hard.'

She grimaced then, eyes flashing angrily. 'I'm starting to think they did, too.'

He grinned. 'We Nords are heartier than Imperials give us credit for.' Then his smile faded, and he looked curious again. 'You're the one that was on your way to Riften, right?'

She nodded, and then winced as her head gave another ugly throb.

He let loose a frustrated sigh and shook his head. 'You were a sitting duck, same as us. We didn't notice those damn soldiers until they were right on top of us.'

'They didn't seem to care much when I told them I wasn't with you.' She couldn't keep all of the hostility out of her voice, but instead of offended, he looked sympathetic.

'It's a gods damned shame, to be certain. But that's the Empire for you.' He lifted his bound hands then, and pointed to the space ahead of them. 'That poncy little Breton you were travelling with is in one of the wagons up ahead. He cried for hours...a real lion, that one.' The sarcasm laced heavily through his voice, and at the thought of the noble, she made a sound of disgust.

And then he sobered up significantly, eyes searching hers again. 'Did you know what he was up to, when you agreed to bring him here? Carrying all that dark elf trash?'

She winced. So they knew about the Skooma. If even a fellow prisoner was asking her about it, there was no doubt in her mind that her captors knew it too.

'Not at all,' she growled. 'That little pissant lied to me. I had no idea what he was up to. I'd only just found out when we ran into your group. That was why I was being so harsh with him.' She thought for a second about what an asshole her client had been, and shook her head. 'One reason why, anyway.'

He nodded, as if he'd had his suspicions confirmed. 'I figured as much. You didn't seem the type, you know? Shifty.' Then he shrugged. 'Of course, they say that the best ones don't look shifty, even when they are. Maybe that's why they suspected you as soon as they looked in his bags.' He scowled. 'But there was still no honor in them taking all your gear. Damned thieves.'

Taking all her—? Oh, for the love of the gods! It was only then that she noticed that her armor, weapons, and rucksack were all gone, everything she'd had, taken. She was wearing nothing but the cotton underclothes that protected her skin from her armor, so thin it was a wonder—or an embarrassment—that she hadn't noticed them earlier. She wasn't even wearing shoes.

Another wave of white hot anger went coursing through her then, and she let loose a string of expletives so loud that it caught the attention of the Imperial driving the carriage.

'Shut up back there!'

If her hands were free, she would've ripped the driver's head off. Instead she bit her lip until she nearly drew blood, and breathed through her nose until she felt a semblance of calm. The Nord man sat there staring at her. Her things being taken was obviously news to her, and his sympathetic look had grown noticeably more intense. Finally, she spoke again.

'My things...do you know where...?' Perhaps she could take her gear back by force, as soon as her hands were untied.

He nodded. 'You know the Empire. Bloody pack-rats. They took most of your things and stored them in one of the carts up ahead. Can't be sure which, though.'

Hope and excitement were burning in her gut, but his next words dashed them both.

'But I don't think you'll have much luck getting it back. They threw it in a chest, with a heavy lock. I don't see how you'd get it open without the key.'

So that was it, then. As his words sank in, she slumped in defeat, her eyes clicking shut as they burned with bitter anger.

Neither of them spoke for several moments, and then she heard him clear his throat.

'Hey...I'm sorry about your things getting taken. My name is Ralof. I hail from Riverwood. What do they call you by?'

She sighed. What was the point in being guarded now? She opened her eyes to look at him.

'My name is Merrin.'

'Oho!' He smiled again, despite their obviously grim situation. 'Finally, someone friendly to talk to on this endless ride. You've been out all night. They had this horse-thief in the wagon when they nabbed us.' He jerked his head to his left. 'And I tried to ask him his name, but he wouldn't give it to me. Now him, he's a shifty one.'

Cursing herself thoroughly for not being more observant, she turned to look down the length of the carriage, and saw not one but two other people inside.

Immediately to her right sat a hulking Nord, with a mane of honey colored hair. He was dressed in finery, with a cloak of raven's feathers on his broad and muscled back. As if he felt her stare, he turned his head to meet her eyes, and she saw that his were a clear and daunting grey. She also saw that he was gagged with linen wraps, and incapable of speaking at all. Their eyes held for several moments, and there was a proud spirit in his steely gaze that would've made her suspect he was of high birth, even if he'd been wearing rags.

The other man in the cart was less formidable. He was dressed in rags, but they seemed to actually belong to him. He sat on Ralof's side of the carriage, several feet away from him. He had a much slighter build than the other two, and roughly chopped brown hair that fell to his chin. He was staring angrily at Ralof, and he did look decidedly shifty to her. So this was the horse-thief, then.

Up until then, the man had been sitting in the cart so quietly that she hadn't noticed he was there. But Ralof's comment seemed to have angered him, and he twisted on the bench to face them.

'Damn you Stormcloaks.' His dark eyes narrowed to slits. 'Skyrim was fine until you came along. Empire was nice and lazy. If they hadn't been looking for you, I could've stolen that horse and been halfway to Hammerfell.'

Then he shifted his gaze over to her before Ralof could say anything. 'You there! Merrin, you said? You and me, we shouldn't be here! It's these Stormcloaks the Empire wants.'

He was trying to seem angry, but when she looked into his eyes, she saw fear at their core. Across from her, Ralof scoffed.

'We're all brothers and sisters in binds now, thief.'

'Hey!' The carriage driver again, sounding irked this time. 'I said shut up back there!'

Both men looked like they had more to say, but reluctantly feel into silence. For a few minutes they only sat as they were carried steadily down the road; even though she spent the time trying her best to discern where they were, the jagged rockfaces and coniferous trees didn't give her any clues.

The thief was the first one to break the silence.

'What's wrong with him, huh?' With his bound hands, he was gesturing to the gagged man beside her.

Ralof's eyes lit up in anger. 'Watch your tongue,' he barked. 'You're speaking to Ulfric Stormcloak—the true High King!'

Her stomach lurched. Ulfric Stormcloak, Jarl of Windhelm? Leader of the rebellion in Skyrim?

She turned her head again to look at him with new eyes, and saw that he held his head high. He regarded the people in the wagon around him now with his back stiff and eyes burning. Embracing recognition.

Looked like she'd been right about him being high-born. But what on earth was he doing here? Worry had started to churn in her gut as a realization hit her. A second later, as if he'd read her mind, the horse-thief spoke her concerns aloud.

'Ulfric? The Jarl of Windhelm? But you're the leader of the rebellion! If they've captured you...Oh gods.' His anger had vanished like smoke on the wind, and now he only sounded horrified. 'Oh gods, where are they taking us?!'

For the first time since she'd woken up, Ralof sounded nothing but haggard, and his exhaustion showed through. 'I don't know where we're going. But Sovngarde awaits.'

'No.' The thief railed back as if Ralof had slapped him, eyes alight with growing terror. 'This can't be happening. This isn't happening!' He bent forward suddenly, curling in on himself as he brought his bound hands to his face, and started rocking back and forth.

Merrin looked at him with pity, but didn't know what to say. Worry gnawed at her stomach like a rat; if what Ralof said was true, then they all had serious problems. She had no intention of dying, that much was a fact. But how would she prevent it? She had to find a way to escape.

Silence had fallen over the cart again, aside from the thief's rapid breathing, and as they rode, Merrin looked around. It turned out that their wagon was the last in the line; about ten feet behind them, a Nord Imperial brought up the rear on horseback—probably to take care of anybody who thought to throw themselves off of a wagon.

Her hands had gone numb a long time ago behind her, and she doubted she could use them for anything. Even if she could use them, there was nothing to use them for; the cart was devoid of anything that might help her.

She'd really gotten herself into it this time.

The sun had risen steadily higher into the sky as they'd driven, and now it was past it's zenith. How much farther did they have to go? If she had to sit here much longer completely powerless, she thought she'd lose her mind.

It had been silent for a very long time when suddenly, Ralof spoke.

'Hey. What village are you from, horse-thief?'

The dark haired man had fallen silent long ago, but he'd never sat back up. At Ralof's words he turned his head, and his dark eyes were full of anger.

'Why do you care?' he hissed.

Ralof shrugged his shoulders and looked sorrowful. 'A Nord's last thoughts should be of home.'

The thief had clearly been expecting some other response, and the one he actually got seemed to hit him hard. His shoulders sagged and his expression was pitiful, and it wrenched at something in Merrin's heart.

'...Rorikstead,' he whispered at last. 'I'm from Rorikstead.'

'And what of you, Merrin?' Ralof looked over at her. 'From where do you hail?'

She only shook her head at him, her chest feeling tight. No matter what his sensibilities were, home was one thing she refused to think about. She couldn't afford to, now.

He seemed to understand, though, because he didn't press her further.

Another melancholy wave of silence overtook them, but she refused to be dragged down into its depths. She ignored the pain in her head and kept her eyes sharp for any thing, any distraction that would give her a moment's upper hand. Any chance of escape.

After another few minutes, the road sloped decisively downhill, and shortly after that, they rounded a bend in the road. All of a sudden, the front gates of a village loomed not far ahead, and the carriages were all being driven inside. As their carriage finally passed through the gates, she heard yet another Imperial guard call down from a watch-tower above.

'General Tullius, sir! The headsman is waiting!'

Her stomach lurched violently all over again at hearing Ralof's suspicions confirmed, and a voice who's owner she couldn't see called back from somewhere to her right.

'Good. Let's get this over with.'

On the other side of the cart, the horse-thief's eyes were blown wide with panic, and he dove head-first into a feverish, muttered prayer. 'Shor. Mara. Dibella. Kynareth. Akatosh! Divines, please help me...'

Desperation wanted to flicker to life inside of her, but she mercilessly tamped it down. What good would it do her here?

The carriage was being steered down the main road, and none of it was familiar to her. This wasn't a village she'd ever been to before. Suddenly Ralof straightened in his seat, eyes blazing as he looked to their right.

'Look at him. General Tullius, the military governor.' He spat the words out as if they were poison.

'And it looks like the Thalmor are with him. Damn elves,' he snarled. 'I bet they have something to do with this!'

It was then that Merrin got her first chance to look at Tullius. She saw a grey-haired Imperial man of average height in gleaming armor, with a flowing cape of crimson at his back. He stood talking to a member of the Aldmeri Dominion, a female on horseback in black satin robes. Before she could take in anything else, the wall of a building cut off her view.

'This is Helgen,' Ralof offered, regaining her attention. 'I used to be sweet on a girl from here. Wonder if Vilod is still making that mead with juniper berries mixed in...' His eyes were far away and full of sorrow, and something about them made her tremble. It was as if he'd given up on living, and was only reflecting before the inevitability of death.

'It's funny,' he continued in a mirthless voice. 'When I was a boy, Imperial walls and towers used to make me feel so safe.'

She opened her mouth to say something—anything—when the voice of a child hit her ears.

'Who are they, daddy? Where are they going?'

She whipped her head around.

A young boy in a red tunic sat cross-legged on the porch of what appeared to be an inn, and his eyes followed the carts with interest. He wasn't alone; a man and woman, presumably his parents, stood on either side of him, and they leaned against the porch railing as they watched the procession go by.

For a moment, she met the father's eyes, and then a shadow passed over his features. He turned to look down at his son and frowned.

'Go inside, little cub.'

Internally, Merrin approved of this man, a stranger she'd never met. No child should see what was going to happen here.

The boy's voice was plaintive. 'But why? I wanna watch the soldiers!'

'Inside the house, now.' Their voices were fading as the carriage drew further away, but she could hear that his tone brooked no argument, and soon the boy conceded defeat. 'Yes, pa.'

She craned her head to look behind them, and could just make out the boy as he closed the door to the inn behind him.

A moment later, the carriage slowed significantly, and then lurched to a halt.

'Why are we stopping?' the horse-thief asked, his voice high and full of fear.

Ralof sighed. 'Why do you think? End of the line.'

'Move it!' A harsh female voice rang out to their left, and when Merrin looked she saw that it was the first Imperial woman she'd seen since this whole thing started, and she was ushering prisoners out of the carts that'd already settled. Ragged Stormcloak men and woman jumped miserably from the backs of the carriages in single file, hands bound in front of them, faces streaked with mud.

Soon it was their turn to get shuffled along.

'Let's go,' Ralof said bitterly. 'Shouldn't keep the gods waiting for us.'

Merrin was the last to leave the cart, and when she stood, she almost toppled over again; it had been ages since she'd sat for so long without moving, and her knees screamed in tandem with her head as she hopped down to the ground. Ralof moved to steady her, but she shook her head at him.

'No, wait! We're not rebels!' The horse-thief yelled at the Commander as she passed in front of them.

'We weren't even with them! Ask them, they'll tell you!' But his desperate pleas were coldly ignored.

Ralof nudged him from behind. 'Face your death with some courage, thief. The Empire's made it's decision.'

'He isn't wrong to say it, though,' she hissed, as anger bubbled fresh inside her.

The Commander stood in front of the group, about twenty five people in all, and addressed them as a whole.

'Step to the block when we call your name from the list. One at a time!'

'Empire loves their damn lists,' Ralof muttered.

A Nord Imperial stepped up to meet them then, and she recognized him as the man who'd been bringing up the procession's rear. He was holding a quill and a sheaf of parchment, and he looked at it before he started calling out names. Evidently, he'd started with the final cart.

'Ulfric Stormcloak, Jarl of Windhelm.'

Every Stormcloak there stood up straight with pride as Ulfric stepped forward and out of their midst. Many of them cheered, and Ralof shouted after him. 'It has been an honor, Jarl Ulfric!'

'Ralof of Riverwood.'

Ralof turned to her and nodded, blue eyes flashing, before he walked over to join his Jarl. She only stared after him for a moment before her eyes glued themselves back to the man holding the list.

'Lokir of Rorikstead.'

So that's what his name is, she thought. But when Lokir heard his name called, he broke.

'No, I'm not a rebel,' he cried frantically. 'You can't do this!' And with that, he shoved his way past the people in front of him and broke off at a run down the road. She'd been thinking of doing the exact same thing if she saw an opportune moment present itself, and for a wild second she considered veering off in the opposite direction while he caused a distraction. But he wasn't a distraction for long.

When he didn't listen to the Commander yelling for him to halt, she called for her archers to fire on him, and they cut him down with half a dozen arrows to the back. He fell to the cobbled road in a heap, and was immediately still.

The Commander whipped her head back to face the group, savage triumph shining in her eyes.

'Anybody else feel like running?'

A nervous silence descended over the crowd, and her heart picked up in her chest. The reality of her situation was slamming into her like a boulder.

Suddenly, the man with the list looked at her, confused. 'Wait,' he called. 'You, step forward.'

Staring at him sullenly, keenly aware of the Commander and her archers watching every step she took, Merrin did as she was told.

He looked her over. 'Who...are you?'

'I'm innocent,' she deadpanned. 'I'm not a rebel.'

'That wasn't the question,' the Commander snapped. 'We already have your charge written up. Tell the soldier your name!'

She glared at him, and noted that he seemed put out.

'Your name?' he asked, more gently than before.

'Merrin.'

'And your surname?'

She gritted her teeth, and spoke angrily through them. 'Hakonsdotter.'

He used the quill to scratch down what she'd given him, and then looked up at her again.

'And from where do you hail?'

'None of your gods damned business.' And she spit at him, watching in satisfaction as it hit him in the face.

The Commander stormed forward then, and boxed her in the ear, making it boom and then ring, dazing her and causing her head to throb nauseatingly. She fell to her knees, and the woman grabbed her by her undershirt and dragged her to her feet again.

'Tell the man from where you hail!'

Merrin was about to spit at the Commander too when the man with the list interrupted.

'Captain, what should we do? She wasn't on the list. Neither of them.'

'Forget the list.' The Imperial woman's face twisted in disgust, and she roughly let Merrin go, nearly toppling her again. 'She goes to the block.'

Her eyes met with the man's as he wiped her spit from his face, and rather than seeming vindictive, his face held plain regret and unease.

'You picked a terrible time to come home to Skyrim, kinsman. I'm sorry. At least you'll die here, in your homeland.'

She was all out of words to spare for him, and she stared at him coldly in silence.

One by one, he named the rest of the prisoners standing there, and they shuffled forward to wait by the chopping block. When the man was finished with the list, he handed it to the Commander.

General Tullius came striding up to them then, and she finally got a good look at his tan, weathered face. The Commander handed him the lists she'd just been given, and he gave them the barest of glances before he procured a list of his own. From this, he rattled off the charges.

For twenty one Stormcloak soldiers, the charge of treason against the Empire by participating in the Stormcloak rebellion. For the now-deceased Lokir of Rorikstead, the charge of horse theft. For herself, and one Dalan Dufont of Morrowind, the charge of possession of illicit substances with the intent to sell, and racketeering profit for the rebel war effort.

She didn't have to say a word about how the charge was horseshit—Dufont started gibbering all over again after the charge was laid about how it was all a big mistake, all a misunderstanding, if they would only hold him and contact his parents...

The Commander yelled for silence after a few seconds of his groveling, and apparently he was sufficiently cowed by the woman, because he fell sniffling but silent.

Tullius cleared his throat and continued. 'And finally...' he walked directly up to where Ulfric Stormcloak stood, and tipped his chin up to look the hulking Nord in the eye.

'Ulfric Stormcloak. Some here in Helgen call you a hero. But a hero doesn't use a power like the Voice to murder his king and usurp his throne.'

Ulfric obviously attempted then to make some reply, but it came out as nothing more than a growling behind the linen gags.

'You started this war,' Tullius continued. 'Plunged Skyrim into chaos. And now the Empire is going to put you down, and restore the peace! As ambassador of Cyrodiil and Military Governor to Jarl Elisif, I hereby charge you with murder and high treason!'

Spectators had long since gathered to watch the trial and executions; at Tullius' words, some of them booed and jeered, and others screamed their approval.

Suddenly, a strange and chilling sound came ringing out from the mountains in front of the town, causing all who'd been making a racket to fall silent. It rolled in strange, metallic waves towards them, and townsfolk and soldiers alike stared at one another dumb-founded—no one present had ever heard such a noise.

The hairs on the back of Merrin's neck were standing on end as the man who'd collected their names looked at the mountain, and the forest. 'What was that?' he asked, sounding nervous.

But Tullius was obviously unconcerned. 'It was nothing,' he said tersely. 'Carry on with it.'

'Yes, General Tullius,' the Commander replied enthusiastically. She turned to the priestess of Arkay, standing in sunset-colored robes beside the headsman. 'Give them their last rites.'

The priestess stepped obediently forward, and raised her hands up to the sky. At the same moment, the Commander shoved one of the Stormcloaks ahead of the group, and he started walking to the block.

'As we commend your souls to Aetherius,' she began in a dreamy voice, 'blessings of the Eight Divines be upon you—'

'For the love of Talos,' he cut in sharply. 'Shut up. Let's get this over with.'

It didn't come as a surprise to many that a Stormcloak soldier would scorn last rites in which his patron god had been deliberately excluded, but the priestess herself seemed terribly offended. She faltered, hands falling jerkily back down to her sides, and she scrunched up her face to peer down her nose at him.

'As you wish,' she huffed.

'Come on,' he shouted at the Commander. 'I haven't got all morning!'

The Commander shoved the Stormcloak soldier down onto his knees at the block, and then put a foot in his back so that he had no choice but to kneel.

He had a shock of red hair, and for a split second, her mind conjured up a picture of her father at the wooden block. And then she shoved back against the thought with all her strength, and the man's face turned back into a stranger's.

She didn't want to see what came next; what was happening wasn't right. It was one thing to die fighting for what you believed in—it was another thing entirely to be executed for it.

Mercifully, he turned his face from the crowd, but Merrin closed her eyes anyway.

'My ancestors are smiling at me, Imperials,' she heard him say. 'Can you say the same?'

A second later she heard the axe come down with a sickening thud, and the collective gasp as the crowd drew in breath. Somebody burst into tears.

'You Imperial bastards!' A woman cried.

'Justice!'

'Death to the Stormcloaks!'

Then Ralof spoke softly. 'As fearless in death as he was in life.'

She forced herself to open her eyes. Imperial soldiers were dragging away the body. The head was still sitting in the block's catching basket.

For the first time since she'd been captured, she couldn't push down her fear or desperation.

When the Commander levelled a finger at her, her heart started thundering against her ribs.

'This one next!'

Before anybody could make another move, however, the same strange and horrible sound came rolling down the mountains again—this time at a much closer range. People in the crowd shuffled uncomfortably and muttered to one another; what in the world was that noise?

'There it is again,' said the list maker, sounding earnestly worried now. 'Did you hear that?'

'I said, next prisoner,' the Commander snapped.

'It was good to know you, Hakonsdotter.' From behind her, Ralof's voice entered her ear in a whisper, and she nodded to him without turning around. She lurched forward then on watery legs. It occurred to her that she should pray, but she couldn't figure which gods to pray to. She had the feeling that they weren't listening, anyway.

No weapons at her disposal. No way to free her hands. No escape route. No way to evade the archers. Surrounded on all sides by people who wanted her dead.

It sank in for the first time for Merrin that she might not be escaping Helgen alive, and as it did, as she arrived at the block, her surroundings disappeared. She stopped seeing the glint of the headsman's axe, the grimy faces of the other prisoners, the glittering eyes of the townspeople, and the terrified fascination of Dalan Dufont.

As the Commander shoved her to her knees, she was staring not at the stone tower in front of her or the blue sky above, but inward, at the faces of her parents.

Her father, so dear to her, with his fiery red hair and his twinkling blue eyes, hammer in hand as he smiled and beckoned to her. And her mother, much hazier, looking much more like she did; olive skin and a broad smile, long dark hair falling over her shoulders as her brown eyes danced and she reached for her.

She barely felt the booted foot in her back, pushing her down. Didn't react to her face connecting with the hot, irony puddle of the Stormcloak's blood.

Soon she'd be with people she'd been missing for a very long time, and she could think of worse fates than that.

She closed her eyes for what she figured would be the last time.

It was then that they heard the booming roar.