Tes4Mod:Order of the Dragon/Hinrich the Lion, Book VIII

The country was hostile to life; no river flowed at these heights. The rocks were steep and stony paths mind. Hinrich was from one moment to the other in this sky near wasteland again and did not know what had happened, but at the first whisper of the wind, he remembered his mission. Because even here, many days ride away from his tormentor, the magician Mogan, Hinrich was nothing more than his slave. Still the thought sat in his mind that struck him as so wrong and yet pushed back everything right, as a dam prevents the water from flowing.

Immediately he arose to bring his master the desired stone which he coveted so much. With hammer in hand, he walked through the door. The caves that hid behind it, did not tolerate magical beings and especially no intruders. Yet he walked through and noticed a cold shiver ran down his spine. But the voice in his head demanded the stone and he had no choice but to move on. He did - days, weeks, nothing more than to move forward, always forward, further into the mountain. Fortunately, he was neither hungry nor thirsty, because the magical guar-leather armor gave miraculous power. Surely he would have long since died, if he had not worn this protective skin. In all the time he dragged himself there, down, forward, he encountered no living being; nothing moved at this depth, nothing demanded air. Eternally it was dark, the day went astray not down there.

Hinrich was reminded in that mine, which had been nothing more than the living hell in his thoughts of his past. The everlasting darkness, the smell of wet rock, the stuffy air called awake long-forgotten experiences in him and he shuddered as he wondered if he would find the way back. But the falsehood in his head drove him ceaselessly. Meanwhile, the air began to get noticeably warmer. More than that, it was unbearably hot and just as he believed he would not be able to go on, he heard a strange sound.

It was the pounding of a forge hammer against an anvil. Hinrich pricked up his ears. Yes, he was sure. Earlier, he had often been in the Order of Akatash's forge in Blacklight. He had watched the blacksmith at his work and even tried from time to time to forge a sword. This sound was unmistakably burned into his memory. He groped his way cautiously forward, and finally saw a man whose golden skin shone so much that even the most fleeting glimmer of light caught it. He swung his hammer in a high arc against the recalcitrant metal and the sparks flew in all directions. Abruptly he stopped and looked Hinrich with a glare in his eyes. With a wave, he asked him to come. He gave him the hammer and motioned for him to work the metal, which lay on the anvil. Hinrich's thoughts vanished; he moved like an empty shell to the anvil, taut from the guar leather armor and dropped the heavy hammer, which he had received from Mogan. Instead, he took the gold-skin's sledgehammer and began to work the metal. The smith stood beside him and smiled, like a god, observing, as he has already done it countless times. Hinrich needed a hundred blows until the metal began to deform.

So he stood there in the divine forge and beat the metal without a single break. Each time with all the strength and every time without a single thought. He just did it. He stood there for many years. But one day he looked up and lay down the forging hammer. It was done. On his shoulders rested the metal which he had so worked for so long and now it was like a shod armor that shone like the sun, and was golden, like the skin of the stranger, who still had not said a word, but steadily eyed Hinrich's work. On the armor shone a dragon, symbol of Akatosh's blessing.

Suddenly complete silence had occurred; the forge fire was extinguished and the stranger pointed Hinrich to the outside with a slight movement of the hand. It took a moment before he stood under the open sky. His thoughts had returned and the wrong thing in his head was gone. His armor cast back the sun's rays as bright as they hit on it and any who had saw him from afar, had to cover his eyes, or think that the sun fallen from the heaven. In his hands, Hinrich the Lion held a moon blade that sang of the vastness of the sky and he had been handed it by the gold-skinned foreigner.

Thus equipped, Hinrich the Lion suddenly cried out "MOGAN, MOGAN!" And without delay the magician appeared before him, looked Hinrich in the eyes and and without another word, turned his snake-twined staff on him. Hinrich threw his sword with all his strength against mage's the chest. It pierced his heart with the force of a falling tree. His body fell to the ground and did not breath anymore.