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JASH
Another scream was ripped from my throat as Scouts-Many-Marshes slowly skinned me alive. He had taken delight in slowly ripping off my scales one by one in a way that made unspeakable pain course through my body like some perverse storm sent by Molag Bal himself. Now Scouts was using a dull knife to carefully and methodically skin me alive.
The real Scouts-Many-Marshes would have vomited if he saw a version of himself doing this. That made this torture all the more terrifying and degrading.
While this was a level of cruelty and perversion that rivaled what torments I had inflicted on others, this was like a hatchling’s first prank and not the psychological forms of torture Scratch had used before.
My husband and egg-friends were still alive. They were still hunting and that made up for the fact that I could not join them.
Yet even when Scratch could not dedicate time for me, he still knew how to inflict the most unimaginable pain even for someone like me. He still could use my love for Scouts like a weapon instead of a salve.
“I never should have married you.” Scouts hissed as he shoved his claws into my muscles. “So now I am doing what I should have long ago. You will face justice for all those you killed because of nothing more than being offered a few Septims. Kodlak Whitemane saw good in you and you repaid him by turning to Daedra worship.”
At that Scouts ripped off a muscle and threw it to the ground and I couldn’t help but cry out. Not only because of the pain but because he was simply repeating what I told myself. Things I had created the By My Soul Shout for.
“Our culture.” Scouts said in Jel in such a way that I could only describe it as heretical. “You worshiped a Daedric Prince that you are now married to. No other Saxhleel will be called Kysnier and the name will never be spoken again by our people’s lips.”
I managed to let the words, feelings, and pain wash over me. I had endured worse before and I must survive the worst yet again. That was the path I had chosen in life. This pain was only temporary as my egg-friends would rescue me from this plane of Oblivion.
In the face of eternity my suffering would only last the blink of an eye.
My eyes opened as the world around me quaked as if from a massive earthquake. Something was happening! My friends had made a strike against Scratch that tore into him like this illusion of Scouts-Many-Marshes was digging into me.
I focused on healing myself and my body quickly looked as if nothing had happened to me. My body reacted before I realized that my husband was turning into dust. His expression was blank and he had become unusually wooden. At first it merely seemed like dust was being blown off of him from an unseen wind.
Then he burst into dust that settled to the ground once the world had become more stable. I blinked my eyes in the dim light of night.
Hircine’s howl made me feel more at peace as if my mind didn’t still harbor trauma from my time as a slave. If Scratch didn’t currently have possession of my body, I would have run towards my love and given him a tight embrace.
He was finely mine as I had always been his.
The world Scratch had created hadn’t been defined. Or, at least, my mind had been unable to concentrate on anything but Scouts-Many-Marshes. Now, though, the landscape was clearly that of Argonia.
The home that I could never go back to. A people that would never again accept me.
“I would have come sooner if I had been able.” Hircine said as he approached me, his form now that of a giant wolf. “Sorry, my husband, but I could only track you to this moment.”
Before I could reply, we turned as one to the Taken and werebeasts running towards us. I hissed at the obscene scene of the Taken, the Dark Presence’s puppets, in my home. This was only an illusion but even the mere idea of Scratch and his ilk invading my home made my scales start to turn a sickly color of green.
I hissed and grinned as it would be good to rip these abominations apart.
“How dare this thing insult me so.” Hircine grinned with bloodlust in his voice.
“It is ours to punish such an atrocity.” I said.
“Shall I join you in this hunt?”
Those were the words I had wanted to hear ever since the Companions had given me Hircine’s blessing. It was one thing to embrace his blessing, it was an entirely different thing to hunt with him.
“It would be my honor.” I said and focused on my hybrid form.
The first thing to change was my size. It was ours to be unusually tall for a Saxhleel and my hybrid form was larger still. I looked down as my claws became that of a werewolf. I watched as fur appeared to consume my scales as my body twisted and turned to accommodate my larger form. A fierce roar escaped my throat as vampire wings burst out of my back and fangs tore themselves from my maw.
Hircine looked at me as if there had been no more beautiful creature. He tilted his head and we ran towards the onslaught. At least I did for a moment before taking to the skies. My husband rained bloodshed from below as I attacked from above.
I got lost in the excitement of diving down and tearing Scratch’s illusions apart. Hircine seemed to get lost in the joy of forcing Taken and werebeasts where I could cast fire spells to burn them alive.
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