EARLY CHILDHOOT
Katya was born in Jehanna, a city in northern High Rock, near the border to Skyrim. She was ill-tempered and hotblooded brat, causing troubles to her parents and neighborhood kids.
FROM HIGH ROCK TO SKYRIM
At the time of Katya's teenage years, the Great War and its consequences shocked people in distant Jehanna, too. Battles between Aldmeri Dominion and Empire, ending to a White-Gold Concordat, and the arrival of Thalmor agents, the uprisings, resistance and rebels in the neighbor areas of Hammerfell, Markarth and Skyrim splitted the people of Jehanna.
Bretons have not forgotten that even that they are mixed blooded Manmer, half descendants of elves, Altmers have had no hesitation to keep them as low-class citizens and even slaves in history, and thus many of them are worried about the rise of Altmer power in Tamriel mainland. Although Bretons have always been supporters of the Empire, the late events has made many people to question if Empire needs to be rebuilt - including Katya's parents. Fearing of possible forthcoming slavery or even a genocide of human race, they were loudly demanding quick and strong acts to stop Aldmeri Dominion, as time is at elves' side.
This split of local people ended up to a violent riot, and Katya with her mother and younger siblings had to flee High Rock. Without having anything else than the clothes they were wearing, crossing the mountains to Skyrim was hard. In a heavy snow storm, the refugees were attacked by wolves, and Katya lost the others. Alone in the snowy mountains, freezing and starving, she swore that some day she would come back, find out what happened to her family and take her revenge on the people who drove them off.
THE ROUGH ROAD TO HELGEN
The ongoing civil war in Skyrim has given good opportunities for many bandit groups, and it was no surprise that Katya encountered one when entering Skyrim near Deep Folk Crossing. Having brawled her whole life and being desperate, furious and sturdier than a regular Breton woman, bandits finally changed their minds and accepted her to join them. The group was moving all the time, heading south, towards Falkreath. During this time Katya got her first experiences in shield and sword fight, wearing armor and using bow. Being handier than Orcs, Redguards and Nords forming the rest of the group, it was usually her responsibility to open the locked boxes and chests.
The life with the group was tough, but simple. Katya had some food and a bedroll to sleep, but at the same time she knew that she was moving farther from her real goal, getting back to Jehanna. Katya had had no interest in politics of Skyrim - "it's Nords' business, not mine" - but she started to think that if Stormcloaks would take Skyrim, it could lead to changes in High Rock, and she could return to her homeland.
That's why Katya decided to leave the bandits and join rebellions. That decision proved to be a mistake right from the beginning. Not far from Helgen she found herself in a middle of ambush, being captured and taken to be executed, before having even one fight for the rebellions. Cursing her bad luck when taken to a block, the things got even worse - a dragon attacked the town. But eventually the attack saved her life. In the chaos she was able to escape with the aid of Ralof and other Stormcloaks.
A FRUSTRATED REBELLION
When coming to Riverwood with Ralof, his sister Gerdur asked Katya to deliver message of dragons to the Jarl of Whiterun. As the city was along the way to Windhelm, Katya accepted the request. When restocking her equipment, local shopkeeper asked Katya to bring back an item stolen by some bandits. Shopkeeper and his sister pressed so hard, that finally Katya said, that she does what she can, even thought she had no interest to go to Bleak Falls Barrow in near future.
The situation was the same in the Dragonsreach. Katya thought that she could just simply deliver the message, but both Jarl Balgruuf and his court wizard Farengar asked her to find some ancient piece of stone from the same nordic ruins claimed to have the shopkeeper's stolen claw, no matter what she said. "Sorry, I'm hurrying to Windhelm, I really have no time, find someone else!"
When Katya left the city to continue her trip to Windhelm, she thought that she would never come back to Whiterun. How wrong she was - her first orders as a Stormcloak soldier was to deliver an axe to Jarl Balgruuf, and take back his response. But Jarl had no interest to answer to Ulfric's question as long as the dragon issue was unsolved, and Ulfric was not going to give her another tasks: "As a Stormcloak soldier, you do what you are told to do, and you are told to bring back Jarl Balgruuf's answer. Period. Now, go back to Whiterun, and stay there."
FROM THE CENTER OF SKYRIM TO EVERYWHERE
The time Katya was waiting in Whiterun for Jarl Balgruuf to answer initiated many changes in her life. In Whiterun, there lives an ill-tempered Redguard girl named Braith, who usually greeted Katya by saying "boys, girls, dogs, elders - there's nobody I won't fight!", reminding Katya for her own childhood. It was her father, Amren, who then asked Katya:
"Have you tried mercenary work? It might suit you."
Katya was never considered that, at least seriously, but now when said it sounded very reasonable. She was running out of money, she had some fighting skills, and as the mercenaries called Companions had their headquarters in Whiterun, she decided to go to ask if she could make some work while waiting Jarl's answer. The harbringer of Companions, Kodlak, accepted her to join them, although Nords and Redguards usually pour scorn on the fighting skills of Bretons.
The other person having a great influence to Katya's life was Adrianne Avenicci, a blacksmith living in Whiterun near the main gates. Katya has had no interest in smithing, but Adrianne first showed that it is not that hard to make an iron dagger or leather helmet, and then convinced Katya that the best swords and armors are the ones made by oneself: "Just think about it, how all the races known as best warriors in Tamriel, are also known as best blacksmiths in Tamriel: Nords, Redguards and Orcs, especially Orcs." Katya had to admit that Adrianne had a point. "But steel, only steel", Katya swore, "I'll never touch that fancy elven stuff, nor the clumpsy dwarven stuff." She was able to keep her promise only partly, as she later found out that elves really got the secret of making light and strong bows, and that learning the secrets of elven blacksmithing helped her to make better steel armors.
THE BLOODY THIEF
The work as a Companion took Katya all over Skyrim. Once she was going to kill a beast invaded a house in Riften, a man called Brynjolf made her an offer to get some easy money. Although the offer sounded quite suspicious, having constant lack of money and no big loyalty for Skyrim's inhabitants - she was still aiming to return to her homeland - she finally couldn't resist to have an opportunity to earn some extra coins. Well, for Katya it was not hard to open a strongbox, but trying to place the ring in to one's pocket proved to be nearly impossible to her skills. She gave up, but Brynjolf was willing to give her another chance, and this time it was something she really was good at. For a hotblooded troublemaker it was just pure excitement to bunch local innkeeper and trader down to floor when collecting money, and it was a disappointment when the third one handed the money willingly, without giving excuse to beat her down to floor.
Katya found herself to have joined to a pack of thieves, and started to receive tasks from them. When Brynjolf was sending her to her first task, he repeated many times, that Katya should not use needless violence. "We are thieves, not bandits, guerrilla warriors nor assassins!" he engraved.
"Yes, yes, I understand, just trust me, I can handle this and I am not that bad person after all", Katya convinced and headed to a bee farm nearby. It should be said that Katya was anything but a natural thief. When looking for an entrance to the farm, she then frustrated and decided to take off the guards watching the main gates with a bow. That leaded to a long-lasting and fiercy bloodshed, after what all the mercenaries both outside and inside were lying dead. "Oh, damned, what was I thinking", Katya thought and realized that she was not thinking anything, and prepared herself to be hauled over the coals for what she had done. But before heading back to hear it, she decided first to fulfill the given task. Walking over the dead bodies she burnt some bee hives, resisting the temptation to burn them all, and then entered back to the building to search for the safe. While searching the master bedroom upstairs, Katya had a strange feeling being watched. She was just scared to death when bumping into a man hiding in a corner in a dark bedroom. She made an attempt to try to solve the situation peacefully, without success, and had no other choices than to slay down the unlucky owner of the estate.
Surprisingly, Brynjolf just praised Katya's actions, saying nothing about the carnage in the farm. Katya never found out if Brynjolf knew or not how she fulfilled the contracts, but her career as a thief was filled with blood stains, dead bodies and mourning widows. What else could she do, being taught to the art of robbery by a bandit group?
ASKING FOR TROUBLE AND GETTING PAID FOR IT
Once, being in Windhelm and looking for some extra coins, Katya broke in a house she had heard to be empty. And it was empty, except that there was a strange boy chanting in a middle of some body parts and flowers. The boy greeted her as an assassin he was summoning, and didn't just believe that Katya was not the one he was expecting.
The boy wanted Katya to kill the headmistress of Riften orphanage. Being involved to Thieves Guild keeping their headquarters at Riften, Katya had heard the rumors of the cruelty of the old woman, used to threaten badly behaving kids: "If you just don't stop that right now, we will ask Grelod to come and take you!" So, when coming back to Riften to sell some stolen goods to a fence, Katya decided to take a visit in the orphanage. She walked in, and slashed Grelod down in the middle of her speech, in the front of the children, and walked out leaving them to celebrate the death of a cruel tyrant.
That might be one of the few real services to society Katya had ever made to people of Skyrim, but it also involved her to the affairs of assassins. It was something Katya didn't exactly welcome, as she thought that assassins are all cowards lurking in the shadows and avoiding real, fair and brave fights. But at the same time she had to admit that she was not been that valiant by herself, killing defenseless people in her past. One of the members, Nazir, managed to convince Katya that there is no problems: "You have no hesitation to kill people, right? These contracts are easy, and we pay some gold for you to do them. You really cannot refuse this kind of offer, can't you?"
No, in the end Katya was not able to resist an opportunity to fill her pockets with some gold, to buy steel to sharpen her sword and temper her armor, and it turned out that Nazir was right. It was just as easy as to intimidate the poor victim to start a fight, and then kill them without any other consequences but getting paid. Were those people just mindless fools, having too strong sense of honour and proud, but attacking a heavily armored warrior while wearing clothes and dagger by themselves is just purely stupid.
ARCANE SECRETS
Once, coming back to Whiterun, Katya had got some silver and gold ignots in her possession. She thought to sell them to Adrianne, who made an interesting suggestion: "Of course I can buy them, but you have also some gem stones, so why don't you smith some jewelry?" All her life, Katya had denied her girlish side. But it was still there: every time her contracts took her to Solitude, instead of heading to The Winking Skeever, she always visited Radiant Raiment on the other side of the road first. Still hesitating, Adrianne unknowingly gave her an excellent excuse: "Just think about it, chainmails and necklaces share the same kind of construct."
It took really long time until Katya finally admitted that she likes nice clothing and jewelry deep in her heart. Meantime she explained to the curious people that she was only making jewelry to learn to make better armors.
But Adrianne didn't want to buy the jewelry Katya made. "You can sell them to Belethor, if you like, but you may also ask if the court wizard wants to buy them", she said. Farengar, the court wizard, was not a person Katya counted as a friend, but as it was late evening, Belethor has already closed his shop. It could be possible to wait to tomorrow, but there were contracts to do, so Katya decided to see the wizard. When entering to Dragonsreach, Farengar greeted Katya with his usual complainment.
"I thought you were already on your way to Bleak Falls Barrow", he said, "the Jarl is not a patient man and neither am I."
"So pick someone willing", Katya answered. "Besides, I have been waiting Jarl's answer to Ulfric for one eternity! Do you have any idea what kind of dirty work I have had to do to earn my living while waiting?!"
They had a quick argue about the subject, but after a while they changed subject to jewelry. "Yes, I could buy these", Farengar said after taking a look, "but have you considered to enchant them? I can tell you how it is done, if you like? Even to uneducated warrior like you, it can give endless possibilities to use. Just look at your fancy sword. Haven't anyone told you that it has no use against ghostlike creatures, if you don't put some magic on it?"
The point was taken. Katya has always overlooked magic, in fact she had developed a deep hatred against all sorts of spellcasters, but Farengar was right: as real warriors trusted only to weapons and armors they made themselves, they trusted only to enchants they placed to their equipment by themselves. Katya had always wanted to be taken as a warrior, and she had made everything to deny and diminish her Breton inheritance involved with magic. In her childhood, her parents taught her some novice spells like conjuring a familiar, and she had used both ghostlike dog and flame atronach to aid her in her battles. Taking a step forward was much easier than she had ever thought.
When leaving, Farengar said: "If you have the aptitude, you should join to mages guild in Winterhold." And later, one day, Katya found herself at the entrance of College of Winterhold.
WRITING HER NAME IN THE HISTORY
Later, Jarl Balgruuf finally made an offer to Katya. If she brings back an ancient stone from Bleak Falls Barrow, he would make her a Thane of Whiterun. "Think about it", Jarl said, "you have spent so much time in this city, and as a Thane you could buy a house here. You just can't miss that opportunity. And I promise, that once this dragon thing is dealt, I give you my answer to Ulfric, what you have been waiting so long."
When approaching the ruins, Katya wondered if the bandits who stole the shopkeeper's claw were her old friends. No, they were not, and that trip eventually turned a whole new page in her life.
Much, much later, Katya was standing on the road leading over the mountains to High Rock, at the same place near Deep Folk Crossing where she once entered Skyrim freezing and starving. The life was tearing her apart; she would never call Skyrim home, but she had almost lost the hope to ever go back to her homeland, and find out what happened to her family. After defeating Alduin, messing her life with the affairs of gods and daedric princes, she has started to regret all the bad things she have done in her life. She still has responsibilities for guilds, but after that, she has promised to spent rest of her life to help the society, to atone all the grief and sorrow she have caused people in her past.
