We made surprisingly good time, travelling quickly, and I soon found myself surprised at how easily Viconia kept up with the pace I set. Most people would’ve struggled to match the marching pace of any member of the legion, especially over the broken ground as we made our way south west and purposely shied away from the main roads and tracks. But she strode ever onwards, her long legs effortlessly lengthening in stride until she was almost outpacing me. Moving with a liquid grace I found myself distracted on several occasions as I watched her move through the thickening vegetation. It reminded me all too well how long I had been away from civilisation, women and overall general companionship.

  Not that Viconia was a pleasant travelling companion. The rare times that she chose to speak were acidically sarcastic, overflowing with disdain or outright hostile. Most of the time she simply marched alongside me, keeping a respectable distance between the two of us and ensuring that her back was never turned to me. There was obviously no trust between us, which at that time suited me perfectly but for the most part we both seemed to be content travelling together.

  We made camp that night several hours travel from Bruma, the light of Masser lighting our way across the darkened landscape until midnight was upon us. Making camp in a tiny cleft in some hills we settled down for the night, not even lighting a fire to ward off the chill in the air. We slept lightly until dawn, both wary of the others presence and figuratively and almost literally sleeping with one eye open.

  Rising with the first rays of light from the dawn sun, we briefly ate, and drank from the waterskins before once again making our way further towards Chorrol. For the first day we barely even spoke to each other, Viconia especially treating my presence with a mild contempt, choosing to outright ignore me for most of the waking hours but never complaining or showing any form of weakness. She was tough, and extremely fit and for however long she had been stuck inside of Bruma’s dungeon it had obviously not unduly affected her.

  The rolling hills soon shifted into wooded forests, punctuated by clearings both natural and made at the hands of men and mer. County Chorrol, containing almost the entirety of the Great Forest was sparsely populated, containing little to no villages of substantial size but was still home to several scattered tracts of farmland and numerous logging and foresting hamlets barely large enough to qualify as such. Keeping mostly away from the Orange road and the merchant caravans and Legion patrols, we instead made our way cross-country, weaving through the gradually increasing Redwoods and Aspen trees and the knee deep ferns and bushes.

  Hunting was plentiful, and before long I had managed to strike down a pair of healthy rabbits in the late afternoon, hanging them from my belt as we travelled for the evening meal. Between them and the small collection of summer bolete mushrooms we had more than enough for a proper meal.

  As dusk approached, and several dozen kilometres of travel behind us we found ourselves a quiet portion of forest to make camp for the night. Deadwood was piled inside a circle of stones, both my new hatchet and collection of flints proving themselves invaluable as time savers and as the sun set low amongst the towering redwoods the crackle of an open fire broke the silence between us.

  I sat close to the fire, using my skinning dagger to turn over the sizzling corpses of the rabbits. Their entrails carefully buried a short distance away to stop any opportunistic scavengers from getting too close to us while we made camp. Viconia sat on the opposite side of the fire, still fully dressed and cloak and hood covering as much of her features as possible. A handful of strands of hair hung down but I could see little of her face other than the glint of her eyes under the darkness of her cowl.

  Stabbing the first of the rabbits I pulled it from the fire, stepping up and around it and holding the dagger to her hilt first. She barely seemed to register my presence to begin with, before finally reaching up with a fine, almost delicate hand to take the dagger and the hot meal from me.

  There were no words of thanks or gratitude that I was to receive, barely even a nod so I turned back, unclasping the buckles of my gambeson and pulling it and my tunic underneath off to leave me completely barechested. Viconia for her part didn’t even seem to notice, not that I was doing it for her benefit and while I too began to pull strips of hot rabbit flesh off its bones with my teeth I idly turned my shortsword over, twisting it deeper into the burning coals.

  I had several concerns, most of all was the nature of my new travelling companion, who I only trusted when she was in front of me and with a healthy distance between us. But of all my concerns the one that was consistently playing on my mind other than my concerning desire for blood was the markings on my right arm. One of the first things that my original captors did upon my imprisonment at Balmora was to press a burning brand across the mark of the Imperial Dragon that all legionaries received upon joining. While crude, the simple X mark showed enough of the Dragon to be instantly recognisable and while it was still recognisable there was the considerable danger that I could find myself back inside the Imperial Prison. This time however there would be no Emperor and his bodyguards to inadvertently provide me a means of escape.

  It didn’t make the coming level of pain any easier to bear.

  My thoughts of imprisonment and impending self-mutilation were broken when Viconia properly spoke for the first time since we left Bruma.

  “So am I to be your ssindossa then?” She asked, her eyes glowing strangely red in the darkness as she stared at me unceasingly.

  I looked up, ceasing my fidgeting with my sword buried in the coals and returning her gaze. “Ssindossa?”

  With an audible sigh she leaned back slightly, muttering under her breath. “Whore,” she eventually replied. “Or slave if you prefer to quibble over words.”

  The moment of silence stretched between us, and I struggled to come up with something to say. “Is that what Burd said that you were to be when we left Bruma?”

  She shrugged. “No, but for what other reason would he pass me off onto you unless I was to be a plaything? That appears to be the only thing you surface dwellers wish of me.”

  If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

  “Surface dwellers?” I replied, feeling more and more confused as the conversation continued.

  “Ugh, how can you all be so stupid?” She looked away briefly to flick the remains of her meal into the darkness beyond the light’s edge. “I am not of this roofless existence. I am Drow, born in the darkness in the depths of the world. Now, cursed it seems to be stuck with the likes of you.”

  She shook her head angrily. “Shar guide me…”

  “I am not your master, and you are certainly not my whore.” I retorted, glancing down at the metal as it steadily began to glow a dull red. “In fact, you are free to continue on your way if you so desire. I’ll go halves with everything I have and bid you good luck without even a backwards glance.”

  This seemed to confuse her even more, but her gaze hardened. “I doubt that you have no desire for me. It is the one thing that all jaluk desire, especially here in this hell.”

  I snorted, loudly enough that her face darkened with anger and her scowl grew deeper. “It may have been long time since I have experienced a woman, but I would prefer to keep everything where it’s supposed to be.”

  With a scrape of metal, I pulled the sword from the coals, seeing the tip glowing a bright red-orange and grimacing at the heat and the future pain that it represented. Viconia’s sudden flash of apprehension didn’t go unnoticed, and I smiled grimly at her.

  “I’m not a threat to you.” I said simply, placing the sword back into the coals temporarily while I quickly began unbuckling one of the leather straps around my gambeson.

  “Then what is that for?” she snapped, pointing to the glowing sword.

  Folding the strap over itself I turned it into a somewhat thick gag, feeling my chest tighten and heart start to race faster.

  “It’s for me.” She looked shocked for a moment as I pointed to the legion brand. “I need to cover this so I’m not going to be recognisable as a deserter. I’m not keen on finding myself in a prison again, especially if that path leads to the gallows or a beating.”

  Her look of astonishment seemed to be more about the purpose of the dragon brand rather than the fact I was preparing to stick myself with a red-hot piece of metal. She didn’t even cringe or change expression as she saw me jam the folded belt between my teeth, pull the glowing sword from the flames and go to press it to my flesh with a great deal of trepidation.

  “Stop.” The word snapped through my concentration, and I glanced at her as she rose to her feet. “I’ll be surprised if you don’t manage to cut your own throat.”

  With careful steps she moved over to me, holding out her hand for the sword. I hesitated for a moment, suddenly more concerned with giving her a weapon than her offer to burn away the marks of desertion. After a few moments I relented, handing her the blade hilt first as I had done with the knife and feeling my heart hammering into my throat with the expectation.

  “You’ll need this more than once if you don’t just want to look as though you are hiding that mark.” Her words were cold and her voice never wavered, holding the sword steady with one hand on the hilt and the other flat on the lower part of the blade.

  My entire universe erupted into waves of pain and I smelt the strangely familiar pork-stench of burning flesh. Screaming through the makeshift gag I struggled not to writhe and twist from the agony as Viconia impassively pressed it diagonally across the brand, obscuring the mark almost entirely and making it look as though I had a slashing sword cut cauterised.

  Two more times she pressed the blade against my flesh, heating the tip between each time as I sat involuntarily weeping between each self-inflicted torment. By the time she was finished my entire right arm was numb from the pain, my heart threatening to burst in my chest and three fresh burns across my bicep and forearm weeping burnt blood and fluids. The gag falling from between my nerveless lips, I stared down at the ruin of my arm, seeing the burns etched deep into my arm, but if treated properly and promptly the likelihood of permanent muscle damage was low. As she had suggested however it no longer looked as though I was purposely hiding my Legion mark but rather having to perform field aid to overcome injuries sustained in a fight instead.

  “Thank you.” I said once I had regained some semblance of control over my body. She had returned to her spot and had watched with an impassive mask for a face while I had writhed in pain.

  “You are a strange individual.” There was no hint of emotion on her features, seemingly regarding me with as much interest as a spider would an insect caught in her web.

  I didn’t reply, concentrating fiercely as I hovered my left hand over the first of the fresh burns and felt the cold tingling of magicka flow through my palm. Slowly, carefully I ran my hand over the burns, using nothing more than my pain-focussed willpower to control the restoration magicka long enough to stop the bleeding, and advance the healing by a couple of days at least.

  “So you are a student of the arcane as well as an archer?”

  With a grimace I turned slightly and looked over the burns. They were sealed and had stopped weeping blood, congealing into solid scabs that would tear and split with every motion of my arm. I had a couple of restless nights of sleep ahead of me. “I only know enough restoration Magicka to keep myself out of trouble. Healing bruises, sealing minor cuts and abrasions. That sort of thing.”

  “Maybe you aren’t as simple-minded as you appear. But it is doubtful.”

  “You don’t do humour at all, do you?”

  Her scowl returned with shocking force. “Drow do not joke. We kill.”

  Looking at her I didn’t doubt it in the slightest and we didn’t speak any further that evening, instead choosing to retire for the night in our own ways. She simply rugged up further under her hood and cloak, wrapping it around her clothes and leather armour and leaning against a tree. I similarly followed suit, but due to the agony of the fresh burns chose instead to rest with little more than a cloak to shield me from the elements, leaving my arm exposed to the cool night air and allowing the magicka a chance to assist speeding the healing process.

  I slept uneasily, dreaming of the intensity of her eyes and the growing urge and desire that was building from deep within my soul. It was no lust or anything of the sort, but a thirst far more foul and unquenchable. The fire had stared to dim by the time I finally fell into a light slumber, finding myself dreaming of rivers of blood.

  Once more we rose with the sun, eating and drinking lightly as I dressed myself back into my tattered gambeson after making a few crucial adjustments. Using another modicum of restoration magicka I managed to heal the burns enough to be able to slide my arm within the sleeve, choosing to ignore the sensation of the wounds splitting and adhering to the inside as I picked up my pack.

  Moving further into the Great Forest and out of County Bruma we were able to travel on the roads once again, making good progress for the entirety of the day and camping through the evening. Our conversations were just as stilted as before, spending most of our journey in silence. As we made camp and now that it was obvious that she had consciously chosen to tag along with me I told her of my goal to reach Weynon Priory and delivery the Amulet of Kings. The most emotion that she had shown the entire time we had been together was when I had withdrawn the Amulet from the depths of my pack and showed it to her. Her eyes glowed with an unusual golden intensity as she carefully held the gleaming jewelled amulet and golden chain, staring at it intently for several minutes before handing it back.

  “There is a powerful magic with that.” She had said simply, pointing to the amulet. “An old magic, but still potent.”

  “You seem experienced in these things.” I had replied, and as usual her distain for me was almost a physical force.

  “I have some.”

  She failed to elaborate any further.