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The fire was lit, the tent made, and the bedrolls laid out ready to be slept on. I sighed and flopped down on my bedroll, the scroll in my left hand rolling back up a little bit. I rolled onto my side and started toying with one of the beads in my dreads, closing my eyes and wishing on the stars that I would be able to sleep tonight. I had been up for three days and showed no signs of being able to sleep any time soon, which was starting to wear on me. I couldn't quite put his finger on what was keeping me up, but I had an idea.

The group of mercenaries I was traveling with had been hired to hunt down a specific lich, one I had dealt with in the past and knew would be hard to take down. Every single time they thought they had found his hide-out they found that he had left not too long before they had arrived, almost like he had an idea they were after him. After a while I started feeling like they were being watched and had managed to get a glimpse of an undead head peeking out of the bushes. They were being followed, which means the thing was somehow reporting back to its master.

Once the creature had been killed the party continued on their way but after a while I got this nagging feeling in the back of my mind that we were still being watched so I suggested setting up camp for the night and keeping an eye on their surroundings. Whatever it was now, it felt familiar to me. It felt like something I should remember was watching them, and it was driving me crazy. I wracked my brain trying to figure out where the feeling was coming from.

~~~~~~~~~~

Thirty years before I had dealt with the same lich we were hunting, it was back when I lived in Helgen, where I had been married to an orc named Ge'Shak and we had been raising a daughter together. One night, while I was out hunting, a dark and foul-smelling mist rolled into the village and surrounded it in a shroud of darkness and decay. The entire village was empty when I returned, the only signs of anyone ever being there strewn across the landscape. There were torches, spooked horses and markings of people being dragged off into the forest nearby.

I ran home, busting the door nearly off its hinges, to find my husband and daughter gone as if they just disappeared. Ge'Shak had been cooking and Z'Aria had been working on one of her little flower crowns again. Their tasks were left sitting there as if they had just walked off and would come back, but I knew better. I felt the darkness that was slowly leaving, smelled the stench of rotting corpses, and when I strained my ears hard enough, I could hear the screams of people slowly growing fainter. Before I could run off to follow the noises I heard a deep, guttural noise behind me and turned around, blades drawn and crackling as their enchantments came to life. My eyes fell upon a friend, Taggard, stumbling forth with his hands outstretched.

My eyes widened in terror as he realized that whoever had attacked the village had turned one of my best friends into some sort of zombie within a matter of minutes and the undead sod was now shambling towards me. I don't know how long I stood there motionless, trying to wrap my brain around what I saw, but eventually I took a step forward and, with tears in my eyes, severed Taggard's head from the rest of him before darting back out of the house and facing the sound of the screaming I had heard earlier. I stood there, straining my ears in an attempt to pick up any unusual noises but couldn't pick up anything. I cursed under my breath and started growling softly, trying to stop myself from crying. I started to rage and stomp around, furious that I hadn't been in the village to defend my friends, neighbors and family. After my tantrum was over, some things broken and some fireballs thrown around in blind rage, I found himself crying himself to sleep in a ball with my daughter's favorite stuffed bear clutched tightly in my arms.

~~~~~~~~~~

I woke up with a start from some noise my brain was still trying to comprehend, my ears twitching a bit to try and catch the sound. Sometimes when I was just waking up I could catch myself showing some rare cat-like tendencies. As I strained to listen I heard one of the mercenaries curse about tripping over something, putting my mind at ease but before I could put his head back down I smelled a familiar stench and found myself upright in a heartbeat and reaching for my belt with my swords on it. I walked out of my tent and drew his swords slowly, attempting to make as little noise as possible and softly shushing the mercs who were awake and on watch.

The smell in the air was that of rot, decay and death mixed with the familiar stench of the lich I had just missed thirty years ago. My lips curled back in anger as the memories and emotions flooded back to my, only this time I hoped I was strong enough to stand my ground and not fly into a blind tear-filled rage. I heard a low gurgling sound and slowly started walking towards it, swords at the ready and one aimed towards the noise. One of the mercenaries, the healing mage that had tagged along, did her best to disperse the black mist that was rolling in and offered to send a light with me. I nodded and waited until the ball had traveled near me before stepping forward again, noticing that the light was causing the mist to back off. I strained my ears again, hoping to hear the gurgling sound again and grinned, lunging forward and being rewarded with the sound of his blade sinking into something fleshy. As I stood to face the thing I had stabbed, my eyes widened and I found myself frozen in place.

I looked up to see the face of Ge'Shak, the husband that had been taken from me thirty years before, staring down at the blade in his chest quizzically. The orc had blood dripping from his mouth, which he wiped away on his sleeve before stepping back and letting the blade slide out. I still felt frozen to the spot, my eyes as big as a baby's and slowly filling with tears. I wanted to run forward and hug Ge'Shak, but I knew something wasn't right; the gurgling sound of a zombie had come from the orc in front of me and as I took a better look I noticed the glazed-over eyes and blank stare. What I didn't notice was Ge'Shak walking towards me, his mouth slack and his voice trying to articulate words.

"Z'Raa..." Ge'Shak stood there, his mouth hanging open as he tried to force words out, staring at the furred orc that just stared back in sadness and rage. He slid towards the furred orc and reached a hand out, touching his check softly. "You...kill...me...please..."

I could only stare at first, but after what felt like hours I finally managed to feel my body again but all I could do was continue to stare. The touch of my dead lover, even as cold and lifeless as it was, forced my tears to the surface. Years of never truly knowing what happened, years of wondering if Ge'Shak was out there alive somewhere, and now I knew. I saw what looked like an opening in Ge'Shak's chest and noticed a small vial of blood held within; the lich's phylactery, pulsing and churning within the orc's chest cavity. It was close enough to touch, I could just reach out and crush it....

Suddenly I woke up in my tent, my head throbbing and feeling like I'd taken an entire mountain to the temple. I looked around, confused and upset, my face still wet from crying. After a while I sat up, gripping my head as it pulsed in protest, and crawled out of the tent to see who was around. Everyone in the mercenary group was awake and sitting around the fire, whispering to each other, all talking stopping when I left his tent. I plopped down next to the healer girl and sighed. "Ok, someone want to tell me when and how I passed out?"

"First we want to know who the hell that was and why he seemed to be here for you." The bald dunmer guy glared at me, the others looking concerned and a bit scared.

I sighed and told them the story of how I met Ge'Shak, our relationship in minor detail, and the incident in Helgen. Afterwards I rested my head in my hands and took a deep breath. "I don't know why he was here, but now I think I know what happened to him and how to defeat this lich...."

The dunmer scowled and kept his icy glare. "How do we know you're not working for the lich yourself?"

The healer stood up with a huff. "Do you really think Z'Raashaq would have started crying if he already knew the guy was coming? And if he was the lich like you seem to think there would be far more signs already. You just want to get rid of him because you're racist against Khajiit. Sorry, Z'Raa, I don't mean to call you that."

I let out a deep growl. "I know, I still hate it...."

The dunmer scoffed and drew his blade. "I say we kill the damned necro cat before he turns us too."

I stood in a flash and turned to the dunmer. "I'm not a cat you fuckin' asshole, we've gone over this! And if you really want to kill me so badly, just go ahead and try! That's more money for the rest of us, you racist, greedy piece of shit! I can take you even without my swords!"

The dunmer stepped forward and in a flash it was over, his head turned all the way around and me growling with each breath, a strange mist escaping my lips and an even more painful pulsing in my head like something was trying to sprout out of my forehead. I spat on the ground before storming off into the forest, my head still pulsing. I didn't care, I just wanted to get the damned contract over with, and especially now that I knew for a fact it was the same lich that took his family away....