Shades of Ending, set after the oblivion MQ Options

[Olen]

Well it’s been a while, a long while, since I posted anything. I have been writing, some stuff which was non-TES, a false start which I spent too long fighting… There’s also another ~80k piece which I’ve left on a hard drive in Scotland so I’m taking a hiatus. Anyway I decided I fancied posting something.

This is unplanned and unfinished. I prefer to write all of something with a lot of planning and then post, but this time I thought I’d just let it flow and see what comes. Hopefully it won’t be too unpolished and I intend to make it more episodic so if I do lose interest for a bit it shouldn’t matter so much. The plan is to post one section while I write another, that way any criticisms can be addressed as I go.

Anyway without any more waffle a short intro.

Shades of Ending

1.1 Questioning

The prisoner met Verus’s eye across the scarred table. The watchman swallowed. “It does not look good for you,” his voice was quiet. He knew he should feel disgust, hatred even for what the man had done. But it was tempered. Perhaps it was because the man had more brain than most of the scum they dragged into the Cheydinhal prison. Or perhaps it was because he understood why, though he’d never admit it. Or it could just have been the passing resemblance to his son. Same dark hair and eyes, and not so different features.

Damn he hated this place, the sooner the investigation was over the sooner he could go and see the real thing back in the Imperial City. Not that distraction like this helped.

The prisoner looked back, “I’m fetched aren’t I?”

Verus winced at the tone and nodded. “Ferir,” he said the man’s name, gave him that much respect, “double murder of Imperial guards only leads to the gallows.”

“And it doesn’t matter that it was self defence, that they were trying to kill me? Had already killed my friends. We didn’t attack them.”

“It doesn’t matter. And even if it did you’re guilty of enough else to string you up. Possession with intent to supply – don’t tell me that much skooma was for personal use, our mage says you’re clean anyway. Bootlegging. Smuggling. As little as I like it you had it coming.”

Ferir nodded.

Verus could hardly believe it, they were always full of guar apples. Fake bravado to start with which slowly decayed into pleading. There was fear there certainly, he reeked of it, it was in the way he sat and moved. There was pain too, but mainly Verus thought it was resignation in the prisoner’s voice when he spoke. “Can you at least tell me who you killed?”

“I’m not meant to.” The gaze from the dark eyes flashed fierce like glowdust on a fire. It was the same spark which had cost the lives of two of the Imperial Legionaries who had raided the smugglers cavern, and it caught Verus off guard.

“You have a family.” It was a statement. “The people in that cave were as close to family as I’d found. You come and kill them, and within the next couple of days…” His gaze dipped to the scored boards of the table in the interrogation room. It slid uneasily round the manacles which held him. “I just want to know if any of them lived.”

“The patrol killed five. A two humans, a man and a woman, two khajit and a dunmer male.” If you had better luck you’d have been in that list. Verus didn’t add the thought, its truth was too bitter.

The eyes screwed closed. “The dunmer, what colour was his hair?”

“Red.” Verus watched Ferir deflate. His eyes shut and he thumped his wrists against the table, the chain which held them didn’t allow space for it to make more than a dull thud. He muttered something Verus didn’t catch, and decided not to press.

When Ferir finally opened his eyes again they were bloodshot. “Have you got what you want now?” There was anger in his voice, but also sadness, enough to suppress the flames, if not entirely quench them. “You know someone got away, you’ve got our contacts. I’m in pain, several of my closest friends are dead. Have you done enough?”

Verus frowned, it wasn’t something he was used to. Lines about choosing this fate when he chose crime seemed flimsy, paper props for the tragicomedy which passed as justice in this town. Ferir hadn’t lied about the pain either, the man was a mass of bruises. The legionaries had worked him over, and who could blame them? He wasn’t the only one to lose friends. Occasionally his hands would sneak towards the lower ribs on one side only to be rudely stopped by the chain.

Not that they’d waste healing on a condemned prisoner. You should have died in that cave. Verus shook his head, trying to dislodge the malaise which had built. He stood, this was too discomfiting. For a moment he struggled for words, then gave up and offered Ferir a single nod before leaving.

[Olen]

Seeing as the last part was rather short, and got quite a few comments.

Haute - I suspect the seedier side of Cyrodiil will be involved, there really is very little plan, a few things I think I'll steer it towards, if nothing else comes up. Essentially I've just made a few characters and set them loose...

Subrosa - believe it or not the last piece was initially a comedy... but I agree, if I wrote about happy people it would end up boring and flat. I'm glad you find Ferir an interesting character, you'll be seeing a lot more of him.

Acadian - thanks, I hope some of the what and where is explained, and more added...

Destri - A comment from the legendary Melarg himself. If my posting makes things normal in your world it must be a mighty strange place. I'm glad using the different pov worked well, it's something I want to play with, indeed my main issue with first person is that you're stuck in one head. Does normal include an update in Interegnum?

1.2 Mirror to the past

Ferir went quietly when the two jailers came for him. They managed a few insults on the way back to his cell but he wasn’t paying attention. Even the stabs of pain from his ribs with every rough movement seemed distant, news from elsewhere. They were dead, all but three of the inhabitants of Sundew Cave. Two really because he didn’t count. He knew they hadn’t got Teemva, the argonian had been away cutting a deal down Leyawin way with a nord captain called Hulgar. It appeared Torvas had escaped, there were a few possibilities but Ferir couldn’t be sure how.

Arvyn hadn’t. They were dumping him onto the mouldy straw in the cell before he even thought it. He hardly noticed. The door clanged shut and he gazed at the wall without seeing. Neither did he hear the muttered conversation behind him. He didn’t care. He’d heard a dunmer shout in the cave, but not seen anything before a mace to the head put him out. But not hard enough. The thought was viciously grim, it hung from the ruins of the hope he’d half sheltered.

Even through the pain another thought lurked in the depths. It was ever present, waiting to bite. What now? It came with a peculiar edge of excitement, of meeting things unknown. He was cut free. It curdled in the pain like cream in vinegar. In that moment he hated that anticipation. He’d lost everything. Sundew Cave was his home, his family. Had been. What now?

Chains, pain and then death. He killed the curdled hope with savage satisfaction. There was no chancing from this one, no last ditch gamble. He couldn’t even run as he had before. He looked round the cell, seeing it now. The dirty secondhand light which filtered down from the high barred windows. The ingrained filth on the floor. It smelt of urine and worse. The next cell was separated by bars. Its occupant, a bear of a man, sat on a stool talking to one of the jailors and another guard in hushed tones. Ferir turned his glance away, their bearing suggested that overhearing would prove painful.

The remnants of the pallet chewed on his bruised back. The irony didn’t escape him; after a life which he’d lived every moment the last day would have no final crescendo. It was outshone by the past’s reflection, there was nothing even to rival the chance that he might dream. He felt the tug of religion, that some god might come and save him, lift him from this pit. He threw the thought aside with disgust, the gods were dead, or wantonly evil. Striking people at their weakest, infecting and spreading. He’d seen enough of the world not to want to have anything to do with any higher power. Certainly none that might save him. There at least he was under no illusion. He was guilty.

It had been easy to assume it wouldn’t be them who were caught. The guard only caught idiots, or those suffering form massive bad luck. It would be fine, a bit of bootlegging lead on to smuggling. And then the realisation that he was a good ‘cook’. Then they were hitting the big stuff. Hell it had been fun, and bad stuff happened to other people right?

So did that make him unlucky or an idiot he wondered.

Both. He thought of Arvyn and rolled to face the wall and shut his eyes.

Sleep took a while to come, but slowly he drifted away from the hushed voices by the next cell and, in spirit at least, escaped the gathering dark.


It was late afternoon, the sun washed red light over the hazy Jerall mountains. The blue peaks marched away to the west climbing towards Skyrim. One day Ferir would go there, but for just now Sundew Cave was home. He sat on a broken log and looked at the old track which away though the stunted birches. A little out of sight it dipped into the valley and past several villages towards Cheydinhal, and beyond that was the world. In the other direction it rapidly diminished, no one passed this way now. Whatever it had once served, drovers perhaps, or the scattered ruins which dotted the mountains, had passed into obscurity.

Ferir looked at the rising slope of the glen behind the cave and smiled. For all he knew it had always been a smugglers trail taking contraband over the obscure passes in better days. Days long gone now, but the birds still sang in the trees’ edge where they gave in to rock and grass. Cyrodiil was tucked away there, and beyond it Nirn, there was more beyond that if it came to it. This was his corner though, away from the law and the rent and the bills which caged society. Here he could up and leave anytime, go cut a deal in some backwater inn, or take a shipment of kitty oil to Kragenmoor. He was free to run.

And because of that he didn’t have to.

The smell of Hrissa’s skooma pipe drifted to his nose. He smiled, even now Ja’lar would be complaining, most likely with a moon cake in hand. She had a cat on her shoulder though, well two including Ja’lar. But supply was no issue with them so where was the problem? He always felt the loss of novelty would be disappointing though and stayed off the stuff in the main. It made it more fun when he did partake, and without care cooking it up all day was a recipe for a massive addiction.

The current batch would need the reflux turned down soon. He glanced out over the hills again and heard the door behind him. Only one person opened the door quite that way, not that he could have described it if asked. Perhaps the skooma could wait, he always said the trick was a long reflux, and he was one of he best ‘cooks’ in the business. Arvyn walked up behind him and put a hand on his shoulder.

“How’s things?”

Ferir smiled, “Yea, good.”

“You’re not planning on leaving are you?” His rough voice held jest, but there was more there.

“Nah, I like it up here.”

“Good.” Ferir knew the elf would be smiling. “Your batch smells ready.” Arvyn turned to head back inside, Ferir shot one last glance down the track and then followed him in.

The dream wavered, somehow, like a drop of ink landed in its mirror surface. Darkness leached in from the corners, breathing like a monster in the shadow.

He was dreaming, good dreams just before waking on a good day. The first crash wove seamlessly into his reverie, but it became confused. There came another. Shouting. The reverie cracked. A scream.

It shattered. He woke disoriented. What? Another scream, harsh, a dunmer? It was cut off.

“Guards,” a shout. Ja’lar probably. Ferir reached for his axe.

An instant later the curtain to his chamber was torn aside. He rolled up out of bed as an armoured behemoth crashed in. Ferir saw the blood spattered on its blade and armour with terrible clarity. The cold helmet regarded him with a cyclopean slit, the line as dark as death. It bellowed something. Ferir didn’t hear, his heart was pounding, the last webs of sleep burned away.

He threw out a hand and fire leapt from his fingers. It was instinctual, and it was powerful. The invader staggered back. Another scream rang through the halls. Ferir threw himself forward. The blow was wild, driven by surprise and panic, but it was powerful and the fire had done its work. The mail split under the long axe-head and this time he could see the screamer. The axe head pulled free in a torrent of blood and the guard fell. He rose it for a killing blow. Another shout echoed, closer this time. It was Ja’lar and maybe just outside his room.

The axe returned itself to guard without him thinking and he leapt the writhing legionary. Suddenly he was acutely aware that he wore only his bedclothes. There was no time, the fight was now.

The khajit was being pressed hard, he had his ridiculous oversized sword in hand but was otherwise naked. His opponent was taking full advantage, a lightning blow added another cut before the heavy sword could block it. Ferir brought his axe back sideways, it left him open, but he had the guard’s back and needed to break through the imperial armour.

His feet slapped the stone floor. The guard must have heard as he tried to circle round Ja’lar. The khajit took the opportunity to press his attack but it was the wrong move at the wrong time. The guard took it on his shield and turned the momentum driving his own sword through Ja’lar’s unprotected throat.

It was too late for the guard. Ferir realised he was screaming as he brought his axe round. A desperate attempt to block knocked it low so it bit into the armour over the stomach rather than higher on the side. But it was enough, the steel bent and split under the impact which knocked the man from his feet. Blood erupted round the wound and a moment later from his mouth and nostrils.

Then Ferir realised what had prompted Ja’lar’s desperate last move. The shape of another guard was advancing down a side corridor.

The axe was stuck. Ferir glanced at it, but it was no help. When he looked back the guard was running, the mace in his hands held ready. Too late. It was in swing, maybe if he dodged right. He tensed and at the last instant moved with all the explosive force he could muster. Maybe it would miss and then-

Darkness.

This post has been edited by Olen: Aug 6 2011, 11:08 AM