Ryaela Mavariin

~ Part of my Skyrim character series ~

Ryaela Mavariin paused for a moment as she began to press against the heavy , etched door of the tomb, taking one last deep breath of cool, fresh Skyrim air before venturing into yet another bone-filled hell.
As the Breton expected, a rush of stagnant air greeted her nostrils the second the door swung open, rife with the thick scent of death and decay. The door slammed shut behind her, drolling echoes ringing through the passages for what seemed like an eternity – She had a long walk ahead of her. Tugging at the strap that secured Shatterfire, her enchanted greatsword, to her back, she soldiered forward into the darkness.
After a few minutes of making her way through the ancient maze of dimly lit passages, Ryaela stepped into a much larger, much brighter room. Several mounted torches threw the details of the room into sharp relief; Ryaela picked out the usual masses of glory-mongering Nord inscriptions on various stone surfaces, as well as scattered offerings and burial urns – typical Nord formalities and obsession with tradition. She also instantly noticed that the walls were lined with rows upon rows of corpses. No surprise there. She unslung Shatterfire and drew it over her shoulder, letting its considerable weight slam the blade into the ground, her right arm gripping it loosely. The only thing to do now was get their attention, as draugr tend to be light sleepers.
“Rise and shine, you decrepit bunch of rags,” she shouted, her Breton accent causing for thick R’s and lengthened vowels. There were times even she wasn’t used to the sound of her own voice, as she so often traveled alone. As it were, her present company wasn’t used to the sound either. Throngs of ancient Nord warriors began creakily rising from the stones on which they lay, snarling and slurring at her in dragon tongue, drawing rusty swords and axes. Ryaela wasted no time as they began converging on her; she hefted Shatterfire and swung it sideways at the nearest draugr – as she swung, a trail of flame began to spout from the etchings in the blade, and upon impact the draugr’s ribcage shattered in a blaze of sparks. She executed several more in a similar fashion, their frail bodies no match for her trained arm and enchanted sword. As their numbers seemed to be thinning, Ryaela suddenly felt a searing pain in her left shoulder; she had scarcely caught sight of the draugr in her peripheral vision when she instinctively kicked backward. There was a grotesque crack as her boot snapped the walking corpse’s knee and the draugr toppled forward, and Ryaela spun around to stab her blade downward into her foe’s spine. Damn draugr, she mused; just when I thought Nords couldn’t get any more stupid and violent, I had to go and make a habit of wandering into their tombs and meeting their ancestors.
Her thoughts were interrupted as a nearby coffin’s lid was viciously kicked off from the inside, and a draugr Deathlord crawled from his resting place, staring the Breton down with a breed of malice only the dead can muster. The Deathlord charged forward, but Ryaela confidently stood her ground, readying her blade. She was just about to bring Shatterfire down on the reckless moonster’s head, when it spat “zun haal viik,” the thu’um tearing the weapon from her hands and sending it skidding to a far wall. Ryaela dodged the draugr’s battleaxe at the last second and rolled to a nearby pillar. Then, out of the corner of her eye, she spotted a miracle: Protruding from the nearest wall was a partially visible studded metal framework, obscured by dirt and dust. Ryaela smirked. Perfect.
She waited until the Deathlord was practically on top of her, then rolled just past him, leaping to her feet and conjuring a sphere of flame which exploded in the draugr’s face, sending it staggering backward – onto a peculiar circular floor panel. The metal framework swung free of the its hiding place, swatting the Deathlord off its feet and scattering dust and rubble across the room as it slammed against the wall, crushing its unfortunate victim. Without a word, Ryaela trudged back to retrieve Shatterfire and moved on through the tomb as though nothing had happened.
These lonely walks through tombs and mountains gave Ryaela a lot of time to ponder things, and these ponderings weren’t typically the most pleasant. She truly couldn’t believe she’d found herself wrapped up in the damned political struggle in Skyrim, much less the fabled return of the World-Eater himself. She often asked the Divines what she had done to deserve the burdens that had fallen upon her shoulders; all she had ever wanted was to find someplace she could call home, far away from petty wars. She’d had no such luck.
She wasn’t always alone, either. She’d had one friend in her entire life, since she was a girl growing up in High Rock: Sorelon, her family’s servant, was the only person she had ever met with such a spirit as hers; all their lives, they had tended the farm together, studied the arcane arts together, fought together, lived together – and when she finally made the decision to leave High Rock and find her own destiny elsewhere in Tamriel, there was no question that he would come with her – not that there was any way they could have possibly convinced him otherwise, as he was the most loyal of companions and dreaded leaving Ryaela’s side.
Together, they had ventured into Hammerfell and spent the next several seasons travelling all over the province, and by the end of their last season there, no one could have convinced them they would ever part ways; their fates were simply too intertwined.
But they were wrong. After a brief venture into Cyrodiil, and only a day after they first set foot into the province of Skyrim, they were beset by a band of thugs bearing blue armor and shields emblazoned with the visage of a bear, demanding to know if the pair swore fealty to Empire. Not knowing what else to say, they had confirmed this notion. The strange soldiers were attempting to force them into custody, calling them “possible Imperial spies,” when the entire group was, in a bout of cruel irony, discovered by a division of the Imperial Legion. The blue-clad men instantly accused the travelers of having led the Imperials right to them and instantly attacked. In the confusion, Ryaela heard the term “Stormcloak” shouted out by one of the soldiers, giving a name to the band of violent men – but she was given little time to ponder this as, to her horror, Sorelon shoved her out of the way of an oncoming attack and was struck down by an axe blow to the shoulder. Ryaela cried out his name, and he desperately reached out to her as a Stormcloak delivered a final blow to his skull and ended his life.
She stared, aghast and unfeeling, as she was forced to her knees, bound, and shoved onto a cart with the very Stormcloaks that had murdered her companion. She remained silent as they made their way into a small town, she did not bother to look at anyone around her as the Imperials led them toward the execution block, and she didn’t bother panicking when a titanic black dragon tore the town to pieces around her. She simply ran. She ran from the Stormcloaks that had taken away her only friend and the Imperials that had attempted to end her life.
But as she ran, she began to ponder. This was the first of what was to be many decidedly unpleasant ponderings. Then and there, making her way from the burning town, she decided she would wipe them both out. She would destroy the lives of everyone that destroyed hers, and take away all that they loved. She vowed to become stronger than anyone she would ever face, strong enough to destroy the Empire and scatter the Stormcloaks.
And so she found herself here, in this tomb, searching for the very powers she had discovered she had the ability to possess: The power of the Dov, the thu’um that she would use to drive the Empire out of Skyrim, take away their precious Emperor, and murder the “High King” Ulfric in the same way he had done his predecessor, Torygg. It was what they all deserved, and she would bring it to them.
Her ponderings were suddenly cut short by a strange sound: The sound of a voice – a living voice, and not that of a draugr, shouting threateningly. As she swung wide the door into the next chamber, she saw that someone had gotten here before her… And he was standing right in front of her.
He was an Argonian with an extremely muscular build, black skin, and curved horns, carrying a greatsword of Nord make, a sphere of light floating above his head, several mangled draugr bodies littering the floor at his feet. As Ryaela entered the chamber, she caught his attention; he turned and let his blade fall.
“Hail, Breton,” he said, bowing his head slightly, his voice gravelly, his dialect that of a Nord. Ryaela scoffed.
“Spare me the pleasantries. What are you doing here? I have no time for dealing with overblown bandits like yourself,” she snapped, raising her fists slightly, flame beginning to curl around her fingers. The Argonian smirked, seemingly unimpressed by her vigour.
“Name’s Rikkun, and it’s nice to meet you, too. To answer your question, I’m here for that;” he nodded his head toward a large wall at the far end of the chamber, covered in ancient Dov inscriptions, “but at the moment, I’m a bit preoccupied with him, as you should be, too.”
Ryaela then saw what he had been looking at before: Rising slowly from a large, decorated coffin at the other end of the room was, unmistakably, a Dragon Priest, dark magic swirling around him as he began to regain consciousness. Ryaela hastily drew Shatterfire and glared accusingly at Rikkun.
“Look, Argonian, I don’t know what business you could possibly have with that wall, as I am the first Dragonborn seen in Tamriel in an age, but I honestly don’t care; I’m going to kill that Priest, and if you don’t get out of my way, I’m going to kill you shortly afterward.”
Chuckling sardonically, Rikkun raised his blade. “Looks like we’ve got some personal issues to sort out. I accept your challenge, Breton, though if we’re going to have a bloody free-for-all in this cozy little tomb, I think I have to right to a name.” The battlemage raised an eyebrow, not used to being spoken back to, and almost smiled.
“Ryaela. Ryaela Mavariin.”