A Concise Biography of High King Torygg, Volume II

By Hroldar Hearty-Beard, True Skald of Haafingar.

Volume I of this series described in brief the early years of the late High King Torygg.

In the 193rd year of the Fourth Era, Torygg, along with a detachment of fifteen soldiers tasked by Skald to keep the Nord safe, travelled from the snowy fields of the Pale to the city of Markarth in the Reach.

The Nord entered Jarl Igmund's bastion, Understone Keep, and requested an audience with a man held prisoner in the mines. Igmund told him that he had no control over the mines, and directed him to Thonar Silver-Blood, the head of the Silver-Blood Clan.

Torygg was granted permisson from the Silver-Bloods and he entered the mines. It was when he was a few miles down where he lay eyes on the Nord he had set out to find. His hair had a dirty, blonde shade to it, an unkept beard and the physique of a man who had worked in the silver mines for the past seventeen years.

He revealed himself to Torygg as Ulfric, the son of Jarl Hajfnar of Windhelm. He gathered the other miners round and told Torygg his life story, of how at a young age he was chosen to be taught by the Greybeards of High Hrothgar the Way of the Voice and how he would be inducted into the order when he had gained the knowlege of the thu'um.

He told how he had heard in a letter sent to him that the Thalmor of Summerset had slain all of the Blades in the Isles and Valenwood, and presented their heads to the Emperor, Titus Mede II.

He told of how he had abandoned his training at Hrothgar to signed up for the Legion. He told of the battles he had fought in the name of Talos against the Dominion in Cyrodiil and how he used the power of Old to tear them into pieces.

He told of how the Thalmor had captured a small battalion of men including himself and was tortured for weeks on end with abhorrent magic.

He told of how the Legion crushed the elves at the Battle of the Red Ring, and how the Emperor had betrayed the Empire by banning the worship of Holy Talos.

He told of how on his return to Skyrim, he was employed by Jarl Hrolfdir of Markarth to eradicate the Reachmen that had invaded and taken control of the city, in exchange for the free worship of Talos, in spite of the White-Gold Concordat.

He angrily told of how he was betrayed by the Jarl, and was thrown into the mines to appease the scum of Alinor.

He told of how he missed his father and how he would like to see him one more time before he died.

Ulfric broke down into a sea of tears, and Torygg saw a broken man before him. The heir to the seat of Solitude said he would see to it that he would be released a free Nord.

The Silver-Blood's pockets were filled with enough gold to persuade them to set Ulfric free, and Torygg escorted him to Windhelm, and began plans to rid Skyrim of Imperial control.