1 - For All Things, an Appointed Time...

    3rd of Second Seed (May), 4E 175

    It was an easy thing, and happened often - losing track of time.  Forced wakefulness from racked limbs, or burned and cut flesh would eventually slip into restless and dreamless sleep, and then back again until it was impossible to know for sure whether it was even day or night anymore.  Why had they thrown her back down here again after all this time?  The Nord woman moaned and shifted against the cold wall, heavy iron shackles biting into her wrists and swollen, bruised ankles. Her black hair stuck to her face, the humidity of the season having seeped into the dungeons and layered everything slick with moisture.

It was oppressively quiet in the Skingrad Prison where she was still being held - was she the last one left now? No way to tell really.  It had been two days, maybe even three, since a goodly portion of the garrison had been sent off towards the Imperial City, and the first hurriedly whispered rumors passing from guard to guard had reached her ears. Soft, tired blue eyes closed as her lips offered up a silent prayer.  The Emperor was leading an assault to recapture the Capitol? Praise the Old Gods and the Nine if it were true!

Her brow furrowed.  Had he gone with the rest to aid the Dominion forces?  Was he gone, and that was why she was here?  How long had it been? Her thoughts were interrupted as she heard the clanking footsteps of guards coming closer to her door. She barely had time to take in the face of the Robe - the Interrogator that had come for her.  His was an unfamiliar face, and it was full of seething distaste, even hate.  It struck fear in her heart. Their usual cold indifference defined most of them. Yet now...

I’m going to die tonight...

A brace of armored hands yanked from her cell with unusual hurry and an urgency bordering on panic.  Strapped on the rack, the Interrogator was frenzied and relentless, barely giving her any chance to answer his questions before barking orders to the pair of footsloggers - ever brilliant and shining in their golden armor.

"Tighter! Tighter!"

The wheels and rope creaked and groaned as her arms and legs were pulled taut. She squealed and cried. She didn't know! Legions coming down from the Highlands? Decianus was in Hammerfell! She'd been a captive of the Aldmeri Dominion since the fall of the Imperial City, how was she supposed to know anything about where Jonna's Nord Legions were?

Next came the lightning sparks. Her own screams left her ears ringing as the convulsions induced by the Thalmor's magic wrenched her left shoulder out of joint with a sickening wet pop, ripping and reducing the ligaments to threadbare strings.   

"The sewer tunnels, you wretched cow!" the strange, older Mer bellowed. "You fought with the Eighth Legion, you know the routes through them."  Pausing, he looked over to the soldier arming the wheel. With a flick of his wrist he signaled them to take her down, as he walked over to a table often referred to jokingly by Mer soldiers as a Butcher's Stall. "You are going to tell me..." he began, his speech punctuated by the swipes of his cutting instrument against leather. "How the southern sewers are laid, and where they exit the city."

A taller, more lithe figure, dressed in the black, leather robes of an officer of the Thalmor Justiciars approached him from behind. Droplets of rain still clung to the edges of his cowl, and wet his outer robes.  He’d ridden through a storm it seemed. The angular, stately features of his face were completely blank and emotionless - save for a tiny twitch in his brow and a slight frown as the dark haired Nord woman cried and gurgled, shaking uncontrollably as the armored Dominion soldiers took her down from the rack, and tossed her onto the hard slab and began to chain her hands and feet.  Her reply, if it could be called that, incomprehensible.

"Might I have a word, Interrogator Felindral?" he whispered softly, not asking before stepping forward to take hold of the woman’s more badly injured arm. A series of smoothed, practiced movements very quickly and loudly popped the offending joint back in place.  His face flinched and his frown became more pronounced as his actions elicited an ear-piercing shriek of pain from the woman laid out in front of him. He released her arm and a soft magical glow began to emanate from his palms.

His eyes met hers, and for a brief moment her pale blue eyes seemed almost...relieved.  He laid one hand gingerly on her shoulder with a healing spell. It was not his most proficient school of magic, but his skills were sufficient in his current station. His eyes were a rich emerald green - they bored into her's as he laid his other hand across her forehead,  murmuring a strong Calming spell.  Her eyelids began to droop, the cool dampness of his wet gloves soothing to her flushed skin.

The Interrogator he had called Felindral was more than irritated.  "I demand to know the meaning of this interruption!"  The Justiciar's eyes snapped away from his charge and narrowed. "You failed to notify me before beginning to question my assigned asset, Interrogator." he said, with a low, flat tone - the emphasis meant to remind the other who held rank.

Felindral arched a brow and twitched the corners of his mouth into a frown. “You weren’t exactly readily available, Justiciar.” he snipped in return. Still, he stepped away from the table, knife still in hand, and moved to a further corner of the room to wait. Another handful of minutes and the Justiciar finished with their captive, having induced a dreamless, comatose sleep. A lazy flick of the wrist as he approached his colleague dismissed the guards.

A silent, pointed stare asked the obvious questions.

"If those lowbrowed Nord dogs cross the river, Lord Naarifin will be surrounded. You're aware of our current reinforcement efforts..."

The Justiciar nodded dismissively, "Get to the point."

The other mer sneered. "And Commander Aelthor ordered me to investigate any and all additional means of getting into... or out of the City."

The younger male grimaced. Crossing his arms tightly, he tapped his fingers anxiously on his forearms. Bullying down an older agent of lower rank was one thing, the commander of the Skingrad garrison was another matter entirely.  Still, he was quite put out that the most brutish torturer in their ranks had chosen to lay hands on what was his.

"Then I will question her.," he said after a moment. He raised a quick hand to cut off Felindral’s immediate protests.  “Who exactly is it you believe lies over there on that table?” he asked with a deft nod of his head over in the unconscious woman’s direction.

A huff and thick condescension saturated his reply.  “Some Nord bitch, like every other mangy human dog we have here. Freya’s her name, isn’t it? ”

The Justiciar pulled a bound dossier from the outer fold of his robes and thrust it roughly in the other mer’s face. He did not wait for any response before turning away and removing his gloves.  As he approached the still unconscious figure on the table, he began rolling up his sleeves a bit, glancing up for a moment to see Felindral’s face.  It was a combination of disbelief and reluctant anxiety.

“Descended...from Lysa Silver-Hawk? ‘Champion of Cyrodiil’ and all that Imperialist blather?” he said in a more strained voice than he intended.  After another moment of thought, he looked up and blinked with a slight gulp. “That wasn’t the one there was gossip about having married the Septim bastard?”

The tall mer smirked slightly with a smug sort of satisfaction at the discomfort in Felindral’s voice.  His expression was hidden from view of course, as his head was bent, eyes focused on her face.  “Not gossip.” he said without looking up. “Supporting documents were recently found in what was shipped back to Alinor after the fall of the White Gold Tower.”

“They were hidden?”

“Hm.” he affirmed with a nod, “It would seem… that forces contending for the succession after the... unfortunately timed demise of Chancellor Ocato wanted such information… repressed.”

His words paused and trailed off as he continued to run the best healing spell he could muster in the rather compressed amount of time the situation required.  It wasn’t much truthfully, and once he woke her, she would still be in a considerable amount of pain. Cradling her head in his hands, he turned her face up towards his and began to draw her out of the stupor he had put her in.  

“Does she know?” he asked the Justiciar, jutting his chin out to gesture to Freya.

A soft chuckle answered him.  “How do you think we knew what to look for?  Freya, my dear… Wake up Freya.” he whispered in her ear.  His voice was soft, almost cooing.  

Felindral frowned, but said nothing as he observed with his arms crossed.  Cutting, burning, racking… that was torture he understood and appreciated.  These types of manipulative mind-games, however?  Psychological torment and manipulation, particularly along sexual lines was quite effective, he couldn’t dispute that.  Still, even if the actual acts were left to those tree-jumping beasts who called themselves Bosmer, the idea of getting so intimately involved with one of those lesser-made wretches left him feeling dirtied.

A shudder ran through Freya’s body.  Her eyes and her face scrunched in an unpleasant expression, as if she were a resentful child being woken from a nap.  Icey colored eyes fluttered open and blinked once, twice, refocusing.  She opened her mouth and closed it again, seeming to smile.

“Ondo...Ondolemar?”

The word had barely left her mouth before her eyes slammed shut again and she made a strangled cry.  Her body tensed, and tried to thrash against the chains that still held her ankles and other arm.

“Shhh… shhh, my pet, I know it hurts.” Ondolemar said, redirecting her attention to his face. “Look at me Freya.” he said with a more forceful tone.

She looked up, eyes wide with pain and fear...anguish, even. “You left… you were gone… they threw me back down here...” her ragged little voice began to ramble.

Ondolemar’s lips thinned, and his green eyes narrowed. “And here you’ll stay if you don’t do as I say, and focus…Think about the sewers in the Imperial City Freya.  What do you know about them?”

She blinked and looked confused for a moment.  She closed her eyes, muttering and mumbling for a moment, before taking a large, shuddering sigh.  “Blades used them more…Big circles, the Districts, the Palace, they’re all connected. You… You can get anywhere from everywhere.”

Felindral’s eyes rolled, and he clicked his tongue.  As if this was useful.

Ondolemar did not break his gaze away from Freya’s. This was a good start, considering the state the other had reduced her to. Slowly, and softly, he began to stroke her hair, brushing it back away from her face. When she turned her cheek into his palm slightly, even Felindral had to admit that this one appeared well broken.  Between her blood-curdling screams, all he’d been able to pry from her were curses, damnations, and all manner of foul epithets.

“Good my dear, very good, but how do you get out?  How many ways are there outside the City?” he continued, speaking very evenly and simply.

Another deep breath, hitching with pain on the exhale. “Two.  North and s...Southeast.”

The Justiciar took a moment to glance over to his associate when she closed her eyes briefly.  Felindrel’s attention was quite focused, and he stepped forward a pace or two in order to better hear.

“Tell me about the Southeast, Freya.  Where do I go to get there?”

Freya bit her bottom lip, hesitating willfully for the first time since she’d woken.  Ondolemar frowned and gave her a stern look.  His other palm pressed against her cheek, it began to hum and crackle, ever so slowly charging with a lightning spell.  Her eyes were glassy, but shed no tears. “The Arboretum…” she said finally. “Inside the city, go to the Arboretum. It will empty into the water, south and east of the Arcane University.”

“And have you ever walked this path yourself?”

She shook her head and mouthed a ‘No’.  With reluctance, she looked away from him, and would not meet his eyes.  Letting out a most pitiful moan, her body began to shake more intensely as she started to sob.

Ondolemar’s fingers twitched and he huffed in frustration.  He knew her tells thoroughly, and she was exhibiting them all flagrantly.  Not about to say so out loud however, he straightened up and looked over to the Interrogator.

“Go. Now.  And send Arelya to finish cleaning up this mess you’ve made.” he snarled, gesturing to Freya. Not wasting any time, Felindral nodded curtly and turned on his heels to leave.

No sooner had the door to the chamber shut than Ondolemar swiped a ring of keys off its peg in the wall and set about unshackling Freya. Tossing them aside, he quickly reached his arms around her shoulders to catch her before she rolled off the table.  Cradling her gently, he nuzzled her hair as her next heaving cry was buried into his chest.

Vivid images and urges of what he wanted to do to Felindral were pounding inside his head almost as hard and uncomfortably as what he knew his superiors would do to him, if anyone returned and chanced upon them in such an embrace.

Freya’s right hand clung to his forearm, while the other sat idly in her lap, the shoulder still too painful to move anything. Her words were nearly incoherent and babbling as she pleaded softly for him to not leave her here.

“Hush my dearest.  Hush now.” he murmured, lifting her chin and pressing a kiss to her lips. 

“I’m not going to leave you ever again.”