Click here for Redemption Part 1


Alright, part 2. Still not much redeeming going on but whatever. Now instead of continuing the story, I figured I'd use this post for all the miscellaneous stuff. Things like a character list and the recap for part 1. So be warned that this post CONTAINS SPOILERS. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK!


RECAP FOR PART 1 Again SPOILERS!

One night, the palace is breached by unknown assailants. Following standard protocol for such events, the Emperor is secretly transported to the prison by his Blades. The Imperial Battlemage, Ocato, declines to join him, claiming that the situation is under control and that his services aren't needed.

Despite having reached the prison safely, the Emperor soon finds that he is still in danger. It is then that Uriel receives help from an unexpected ally. Angoril Bobardi reveals that the very cell he has inhabited for decades, contains a secret escape route that was built during the simulacrum at the order of Jagar Tharn. With this passage and the considerable magical prowess of Angoril, the Emperor manages to flee the deadly trap.

Also freed from the prison by Angoril is Maorlatta Orgnum, a young (by elf-standards) and somewhat naive girl who was arrested for the crime of sleeping in the park. Once free, she quickly makes herself scarce and eventually finds herself in the shack of an old fisherman who lives on an island in Lake Rumare. The fisherman seeks the help of the thieves guild to rid her of the manacles and prison outfit that would have every Legionnaire arrest her on sight. Unfortunately, the one assigned to pick the locks on the manacles informs Vicente Valtieri instead, who takes a personal interest in the girl’s talent for camouflage. Maorlatta is saved by the Redguard Sorian, a young and rather strange lad who keeps going on and on about something he calls an Ansei. The two team up to go treasure hunting in a nearby Ayleid ruin.

Meanwhile, Angoril returns to the prison. Pretending to be from the palace, he gets a vital clue from the Argonian private investigator Grey-Tongue. The Argonian sends him to Chorrol to find the source of the assassins distinctive red robes. To get to Chorrol, he summons a shiftgate, circumventing days travelling. From Chorrol the trail leads to Kvatch, a city whose precise location he does not know. Unable to summon another shiftgate with reasonable accuracy, Angoril seeks more mundane passage to Kvatch.

While Angoril is travelling, Maorlatta and Sorian hit the Ayleid ruin. After some trouble with a zombie, they strike gold and find an abandoned office with some intact artefacts. They attempt to sell the artefacts in the Imperial city, where they are intercepted by Grey-Tongue and then Vicente Valtieri. Sorian again makes the vampire flee. The next morning Maorlatta wakes up in the Imperial palace with no recollection on how she got there or what happened during her stay at Grey-Tongue’s house. Jauffre interrogates her in the garden at the top of the tower.







Redemption's persons of questionable importance

Main characters:
Angoril Bobardi: An Altmeri sorcerer who inhabited a cell in the Imperial prison, fully aware of the secret escape route. After leaving the prison, he makes it his task to track down the leaders behind the red-robed assassins.

Maorlatta Orgnum: A Maormer from Pyandonea, sent to Tamriel at the command of king Orgnum. Circumstances land her in the same prison as the Altmer. After escaping, she returns to the pursuit of her own goals, one of which is to become filthy rich.

Side characters:
Grey-Tongue: An Argonian private investigator. He is a friend of Hieronymous Lex and has been hired by the guard-captain in the past. Grey-Tongue is hired now as well by the city-guard to investigate the events at the prison and find Uriel’s corpse.
Guard-Captain Hieronymous Lex: Hieronymous Lex is the man put in charge of investigating the massacre at the Imperial Prison. Upon finding that Uriel Septim was seen entering the prison that night, he hires Grey-Tongue to help him uncover the truth.
Sorian: A Redguard who saves Maorlatta from Vicente Valtieri. A simple wandering swordsman with a slight Ansei-obsession.
Rajn Geydar: A Wood Elf who lives in Kvatch. At one point possessed a piece of the Balac-Thurm.

Others:
Guard-Captain Argelius: A colleague of Hieronymous Lex who describes him as the man to call when you need subtlety.
Bannon: A merchant who travelled with Angoril from Chorrol to Kvatch
Baleni: Daughter of Rajn Geydar
Doruk: The Bouncer who worked at Rajn Geydar's restaurant. Deceased.
Penald Baurus: Blade and bodyguard of Uriel Septim.
Berius: Lord Protector and Head of the palaceguard in the Imperial City.
Valen Dreth: A Dunmeri prisoner. Not the most pleasant sort.
Jennifer Renault: Blade, recently promoted to captain.
Glenroy: Blade and bodyguard of Uriel Septim.

Fenasim: A member of the emperor's Palace guard.
Mankar Camoran: The father of both Raven and Ruma. He is the leader of the Mythic Dawn and its prophet.
Raven Camoran: The ‘Hand’ of the Mythic Dawn, an organization with an unknown purpose. What is certain however, is that the Dawn wants Uriel Septim dead.
Ruma Camoran: The sister of Raven, she serves the Mythic Dawn as Priestess. In the same night that the attempt on the emperor’s life is made, she infiltrates the vaults beneath the Imperial palace to steal two artefacts.
Harrow: A member of the Dawn, Harrow used to be an Armiger stationed in Vvardenfell.

Ludius Bester: Member of Bester and Bester, the Kvatch Hall of Mercantile Interests. He runs the office in lower Kvatch.
Aelwin Merowald: An old fisherman who lost most of his leg to Slaughterfish. Friend of Delmar Tunius.
Rajn Geydar: Owner of the Eight Provinces, a restaurant in Kvatch.
Ra’Jezhr: A Khajiiti lockpicker in the employ of the Thieves Guild, Ra’Jezhr is also coerced into serving the Dark Brotherhood’s interests.
Simanuel Rosendorf IV: The owner of a silk-plantation near Chorrol

Umbacano: An Altmer who lives in the capital city. A well-known collector of Ayleid artefacts.
Uriel Septim VII: The Emperor of Tamriel.
Brother Tanner: A priest who serves in the Kvatch-temple. Looks like a Septim.
Delmar Tunius: An old fisherman who lives on a small island in lake Nibenay.
Vicente Valtieri: A member of the Dark Brotherhood, he takes interest in Maorlatta’s talents at stealth, and desires to make her an assassin, with or without her cooperation.

Latta’s evergrowing list of people only she knows:
Levvelyn of Glashorn: The hero of a popular series who spends most of his books saving the world, slaying vicious monsters, duelling devious Altmeri warlords and chasing the girl.
Irrillys: A fictional princess of Pyandonea, she is Levvelyn’s love interest. Posesses an unfortunate talent for being kidnapped by devious Altmeri warlords.
Mettildi: The Maormer that taught Maorlatta how to fight, though his methods traumatized her to the point where she is mentally incapable of defending herself.
Master Zelthir: Another Maormer put in charge of educating Maorlatta. Master Zelthir is a well-known and highly respected healer.

I love the recap, and the list of characters - that may help me a lot to keep up with what is going on. I have had too little free time lately to catch up on your story, and every time I get some and try to start I've had to go back and refresh my mind about what was going on.

@ EVERYONE - whether you read the recap or not - the story itself is well worth reading anyway. I have had trouble finding it at times because it is archived, but when found it is an Awesome read !!!

So glad you are posting down here again, where your story will be easier to find, lol.

Yeah, why was it never down here?... ...

*Makes note to go read it once he's done the others*...

Sounds cool though...

If vol 2 is here, then here I will be also...*Nods*...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds in admiration*... ...

Good, a recap. Now I can read the entire tale from start to finish as it goes along!

Yuss! Those are a lot of characters by the way. The main ones look very interesting so far.

I just buried my father this morning. I was hoping to do some proper planning, but that idea got left behind due to circumstances. I've got an idea for scenes much later in the story, but none for right now. So instead I'll be continuing on with simple improvisation. I'm sorry for the delay and my general lack of activity.

As for the character recap, most of them are either one-scene characters, or characters who only exist as part of Latta's background.


Chapter 7: North and South

Kvatch, Angoril Bobardi

Finding a caravan to travel with had been surprisingly easy. All he had to do was go to the wagon camp before Chorrol’s main gates and read the notices pinned to the wall of the nearby inn. There was no notification of caravans, but rather the time and day when Chorrol’s roadwatch set out and their destination. A quick askaround confirmed his suspicions that travellers were simply expected to travel with the patrol. It was almost identical to a plan he had once proposed in which each city would be allowed their own private force for securing their cities and roads. Their expenses would be regained through the increased trade revenue. His emperor had vetoed the plan, preferring to keep all military force in his own legions. But now the plan had been implemented. So the next day he simply showed up at the gates and followed the horsemen . A few uneventful days later he arrived at the village of low Kvatch.

He took in the settlement as he waited in line. There was no gate, just a simple barricade on the road that forced any passing wagons to zigzag. The place looked at once temporary and old. The buildings were simple squares made of wood, often with visible sections that had been replaced or expanded over the years. The only stone structure was a manhigh wall to the south but that one was still under construction. All things taken into consideration, low Kvatch was exactly what he had expected, an unofficial district placed solidly on the road between Anvil and Skingrad, primarily to extract toll from the many merchants travelling along this road. Kvatch itself was actually situated on the mountain to the north and its only access was via a winding path up the steep slope. Too steep for the heavier wagons and still a good two or three hours climb for everyone else. This permitted low Kvatch its second function and source of income as a waystation and market for weary travellers unable or unwilling to visit upper Kvatch.

“You’ve never actually told me why you’re going to Kvatch. The place is a bloody leech on us honest traders. No good products worth exporting, and a lot of taxes.” Bannon, the portly old Breton who had offered Angoril a ride on his wagon, remarked.
Angoril knew three reasons for visiting Kvatch. First was naturally the trail of the assassins, followed by an inspection of the temple. The list of regular donations he’d discovered in Ocato’s office had caught his eye and like most things that drew his attention once, he kept thinking about it. He knew from experience that Uriel liked funding temples of Tamriels prime faith, but rarely this much. Furthermore, discreet inquiries had revealed that none of his fellow travellers remembered any large-scale construction projects, which made the regular payments all the stranger. He doubted it was anything important but it wouldn’t take too much time and one never knew.

Finally there was the investigation in Rajn Treesap that he’d found in the same book. He had made use of the service of a young woman by that very name. Long ago, when he needed a good guide to Valenwood’s oldest trees. She had been good, cheap, and useful for his plans. If this was the same one, he would have to look into her and reassess if she still held value to him. The book mentioned she had been in Kvatch back in 3E 403 which had earned her a place on his to-do list. Perhaps people would still remember her or she was still here.

Those were his three reasons for visiting Kvatch and none of them he could tell Bannon.
“Kvatch was originally meant as a stronghold. Trade revenue or any source of livelihood for its occupants was not needed. If anyone, say the Camoran Usurper, invaded from Valenwood or Elsweyr, they would either be locked up in siege for months or leave themselves open for a rear assault by Kvatch’s garrison. It lies away from the main roads to improve its defensibility, but not so far that its army can’t strike out against nearby targets.” He explained and noticed with amusement that the lecture had come without thinking.
“Ease it, it has been many years since you last stood before a class. Just answer the man’s question instead of hoisting random trivia upon him.”
“An old friend of the family moved to Kvatch a while back. If figured I should look him up at least once before returning to Summerset.” Angoril answered after a short pause and the wagon moved ahead a few metres. Neither man said another word as they slowly drew closer to the barricade and the officials manning it. It was only when they passed the gate that Bannon talked again.



“There’s my next gain.” He said, waving at the wall.
“You wish to become a masoner?” Angoril asked and chuckled. Bannon grinned, shaking his head.
“If I were twenty years younger. No, I want to be a supplier. They take the bricks from old forts nobody but bandits use these days, then take them here. And Stendarr knows those poor sods need it. Leaches they may be, but I wouldn’t wish death by troll stampede on my worst enemies. So I figured I’d make some money hauling rocks. That, or maybe selling enchanted arrows to the foresters here. It depends on the price I can get at Skingrad for those.” The merchant’s voice drifted away at the last few words as he weighed his options.
“You would be cheapest if you went into Valenwood. They practically marry their bows there. You would get high quality and low prices. Back here you could double or even triple the price.” The Altmer suggested but Bannon shuddered at the thought.
“Valenwood? That’s where the trolls came from! I didn’t get this old by being suicidal.”

The wagon rolled up to the barricade and an official stepped up to inform them of the current going fare. Both men paid, a one-piece for Angoril and a five-piece for Bannon and his wagon. The portly merchant steered the wagon through the sharp bend and into the open area beyond. Once through, Angoril decided it was time to leave.
“It was a fool’s advice I gave you then. Fare thee well, Bannon. Perhaps we shall see each other again.” He said and was about to leap from the wagon when a hand on his shoulder made him pause.

“Tell you what, Tennil. If it doesn’t work out for you here in Kvatch, you can come along with me. The building folk would pay quite generously for your feather spells.” Bannon whispered. Somewhat confused at the sudden conspirational tone their conversation had taken, the Altmer lowered his voice as well.
“I’ll think about it. I can’t make any promises though.” He muttered. Bannon cast a quick glance around, either looking for a place to park his wagon or checking for any eavesdroppers. Angoril suspected the latter. No one was near them but the wagon behind them, whose owner only gave enough attention to prevent ramming them. Soon he slipped off to the left to a space under the shade of a tree. Bannon nodded to himself and whispered one more thing before lightly shoving the Altmer off the wagon.
“And one more thing. Keep your talents on the low. This ain’t Summerset. The mages guild down here doesn’t like independents, especially skilled ones. And they’re very good at getting rid of thorns in their side, if you get my drift.”
Angoril nodded in silent acknowledgement. No independent mages, another aspect of the more ordened and safer Empire he had envisioned. Unfortunately, he qualified as one at the moment.

He watched Bannon park his wagon near the southern wall and walked towards the center of the village. The merchant had told him that Kvatchians often hawked their own wares at the market here instead of the one in upper Kvatch, which made this the place to start.

Condolences on the loss of your father.

I found this episode to be absorbing, entertaining and full of subtly presented plot thickening goodness.

“You would be cheapest if you went into Valenwood. They practically marry their bows there.”
I very much liked this!

Oh Jack, I am so very sorry for your loss. Even with his extreme illness toward the end, there is no way to prepare yourself for the loss of a parent. My very deepest condolences go out to you and your family.

So sorry about yer father... ...

That you produced this excellence after that speaks much about you...

Nicely done...

Looking forward to more...

Terribly sorry about your father, my condolensces. I hope you feel better. Chin up, alright? I know it can be tough at times.

Thanks, everyone. Thank you.


Chapter 7.2


The market consisted of three different types of stalls. There were the simple tents erected by passing merchants such as Bannon, or more often local farmers coming to sell their harvest. Second were the slightly more durable stalls with a wooden or straw awning. Last were the vendors operating out of an actual building. It were these that held his interest. Only a large clothier could have provided the robes. Not so much because of the number but because of the material. Silk was expensive and not something given to any random peasant trying to make extra coin during winter. The robe had also possessed a certain feature he had only discovered when it literally turned to sand in seconds. Or more accurately, the sand which had been turned into a robe returned to its proper state. It was a magecopy which gave further weight to Rosendorf’s implications. There had never been robes. There had only been one, devoid of frills to cheapen its cost, then multiplied by a mage.

The magic holding his copy together had grown so weak by the time he got his hands on the cloth he hadn’t noticed it was there till it was too late. The mage in him derided the spell-use and his own failure to detect it as sloppy while the politician realized that it was exactly what he would have given his assassins to wear. Though the magic matrix would have made them stand out like a lighthouse, their plan had not involved much stealth during its critical phase. It was likely that the assassins had timed their attack to take place when the robes were near their limit, using them as a way to hide their appearance rather than their presence. And what better disguise than one that would cease to exist after its purpose had been served?
“If I hadn’t been there to provide some free samples, they might never have been found at all.”

He went into the only clothier he could find and looked around. Boxes with folded pants, shirts, vests, dresses and skirts were placed throughout the sole room in an efficient manner while a rather more disordened pile lay atop the counter. No red robes however.
“Of course not. That would have been too easy.” Angoril thought.
“Just a moment!” A voice called out from the back of the store. A young Breton came and added a pair of shirts to the pile. Angoril appraised the man with a single glance and concluded that he would find no helpful information here. The storeclerk was more a boy than a man and too untidy to have inherited the store. More likely he was a hired help, here to run the place for a day. But it was too late to run out now and he wasn’t going to gamble on being right. So when the boy asked how he could help, the Altmer retrieved a small scrap of red silk and held it up.
“Would you happen to sell anything like this? I bought it not too long ago but I require a replacement now.” He said, remembering that the robe had looked brand-new when he got it.
“Ah, you mean in that material?” The wipnosed Breton asked after the scarcest of inspections. Angoril nodded and decided to keep things simple.
“For starters. It used to be a robe I’d bought for our wedding’s anniversary. But the dog got to it before I could give it to my wife. Stupid mutt.” He grumbled.
“This was all I could save.”

To the part-time clerk’s credit, he did help Angoril sift through the boxes but neither found another robe matching his recollections or even colour. Further inquiries in who owned the place didn’t help much either, as the store was apparently ran by half the clothiers in Kvatch as a communal place to offload surplus stock.
“You could try Bester and Bester. Go out the door and turn left. Their place is built into the left wing of the barracks. If anyone knows the shops out here, its them.” The Breton finally offered. Seeing no other solution other than heading for upper Kvatch, Angoril decided to follow the advice. Once there, he knocked on the door and entered. A luxuriously moustached Imperial greeted him at the door.
“Hello there, sir Altmer. Welcome to the Kvatch Hall of Mercantile Interests. I’m Ludius Bester and that young lad minding the books over there is my son Antonius.” The words came out with the ease of something he’d said daily for years, but they had not been dulled to mindnumbing routine. Ludius Bester led him into a smaller office while Antonius excused himself.
“Hopefully he’ll join in a year or two and then we can rename ourselves into Bester, Bester and Bester. Try not to repeat it, you might bite your tongue. But have a seat! Thea?”

Angoril repeated the story about the dog and his irate wife. Bester asked a few questions but became quiter and less excited with each answer. Though Angoril did wonder if he’d made an error in his story, he pressed on. Correcting earlier details was the quickest way to make a bluff fail. At the end Bester sighed and held up a hand to cut off the description of the robe’s weave. The other hand plucked at his moustache.
“I know the guy you want, but there is a problem.” He admitted and elaborated when Angoril frowned.
“There was an accident not too long ago. He’s dead.”

The Altmer let the news sink in. The man who possibly sold the robes, or at least the original, to the assassins was recently killed in an accident. He didn’t buy it. It would be too much of an coincidence. There was another option which he believed more likely, but he needed more information to make sure.
“My condolences. What happened?” He asked.
“He had a flying loom, know what that is?” Bester responded, now plucking the other end of his facial hair. He stopped only after a sudden wince and pang of pain told him he’d pulled too hard. Angoril shook his head. He'd never heard of such a thing.
“It’s a fancy contraption some guy in High Rock invented a decade or two ago, lets a single man weave more than five. Lovely thing, but gives an unfair advantage over the competition so we removed a few key components. Not to mention the accidents we had when untrained personell used it. Lost fingers mostly, but bad enough to outlaw it. Father has the parts in his vault at upper. Guess poor Belgoth forgot and took his chances. He was found, strangled.”
Bester couldn’t give anymore details and Angoril wasn’t going to ask. His interest would be too suspicious for simple Tennil. But it seemed likely that this Belgoth did not have an accident at all.
“If I had to get a costume made for my intrepid band of kingslayers, I would make sure to silence the source. And that loom would be an awfully convenient excuse. Legion investigators wouldn’t know how it worked and after Bester explained to them its purpose and the removal of vital items, they would rule it out as an accident. Though if I needed a costume, I would have gone for something that could implicate my enemies, not something that stands apart. Their choice of garb didn’t seem so much pragmatism but rather a religious statement of some sort.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t help you.” Bester apologized after they left the office.
“That’s alright. Have a nice day.” Angoril muttered with a smile, his thoughts already elsewhere. He decided to head for upper Kvatch and see if he could break into Belgoth’s store for further clues.
“I’ll ask Bester about the other stores. Knowing their locations would allow me to indirectly narrow down the place of Belgoth’s.” He told himself and turned to ask but the Imperial had been thinking as well and come up with a plan of his own.
“Wait, I got an idea. We’re holding an open sale at Belgoth’s place to get rid of any leftover stock. If you return here tomorrow, I’ll take you to upper and show you in. Perhaps you’ll find something that suits your wife’s tastes. Junior can mind the office for a day. It would be good practice for him.” He suggested, brightening up again. To Angoril this seemed perfect. It would save him a lot of trouble and allow him legal entry instead of being forced to sneak in during the night.
“I’ll do that, thank you. Till tomorrow then.”



OOC: Added Bannon and Ludius Bester to the character list.

I like how well you describe the market, Jack--I feel like I'm walking through it.

So some other scenes before I take Angoril to Kvatch. I don't think there are any useful pictures or descriptions of Kvatch from before the Daedra came calling. In-game it only serves as the place to show this crisis is serious. (at which it fails because it is the only one, but whatever.) The ruins don't tell me much really, apart from it having a church and a castle with a moat. I wonder how they get the water up there anyhow? Perhaps with an Archimedean screw?

So anyway, first you get a tiny bit of Sorian. It took me a while to figure out what I wanted to do with it and how not to turn the drat thing into two thousand words of him talking about nothing. Also, Rosendorf and Umbacano added to the character-list.


Chapter 7.3


Bruma county, Sorian

It had been a week since we tried to hawk our Ayleid junk. One week since Maorlatta got kidnapped. I had to give it to her. The girl had a greater talent for finding trouble than Tiber Septim. That and some very stubborn enemies. I’d gone through a third confrontation with the vampire and this time it had gone badly. The damned thing just busted through the open window, scooped up the elf and ran off again before I could even blink.

Of course the first thing I’d done was to go to the nearest guard and demand help. They just laughed me away the moment I mentioned the Dark Brotherhood. I was better off finding her last will or writing my own. The fighter’s guild made the same lousy joke, even after I’d offered all the money we’d made. That had been the end of it. I had no one left to run to and wasn’t eager to go after the Dark Brotherhood on my own, even moreso since I had no idea on where to go. I knew the stories. No, it was best and safest to just forget about her.

It had been a week since then. And three days since Guard-Captain Lex hired me on as a Special Service Officer, his last act before his forced leave of duty. It had a nice ring to it and paid well. My first task was to escort Grey-Tongue as he followed two thieves. I hadn’t known the Argonian did those things but the thieves must have taken something important. Maybe even something that belonged to the Emperor. So naturally I accepted the responsibility of keeping his friend safe.

It had been three days since we left. First we used horses, but had to abandon them when the trail went off the road and onto an unmarked wildtrail. I had to admit the thieves were good. They kept splitting up, vanishing into thin air and then somehow reuniting. But my client persistently dogged their every step like a bloodhound with scales. We’d followed them along the Niben, up north through the Heartlands and now onto the bare slopes of the Jerall.

“It appears to be a cabin. I believe our trail leads right to them.” Grey-Tongue muttered. I clambered over a rock and stopped beside him. In the distance I did make out something that could be a cabin. If so, it could be the end of our chase. There was nowhere else to go beyond it but straight up. I gave the sword at my waist a little tug. The weight was reassuring. If those thieves weren’t going to come without a fight, I’d give them one they’d remember.
“What is that over there? A wall of ice?” I asked and pointed at the white mass that bridged the gap between two mountain-peaks. The cabin was built an arrowshot away from it.

The Argonian growled and nodded.
“It is more like a frozen river, called Ysmir’s tongue. It originates from Skyrim and runs up to here before melting. Supposedly there is a path leading through the ice to Skyrim.” He hissed, then growled once more. I could understand his frustration. If there was a path, then it meant we weren’t done running. But a path running through a frozen river was hard to imagine.
“So you think the thieves have gone through there? What did they steal anyway?” I asked him.
“Something very valuable, Sorian. Something very valuable. Pray they didn’t brave the gletsjer, for that would mean they’ve taken the guide living in that cabin. I would ill advice chasing them on foot by ourselves. The ice may look solid, but it is weak and treacherous.”

Excellent stuff... ...

I can picture it perfectly!...Covers much ground quickly and efficiently...

Brilliantly done...

Love it!...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

LOVED this line!

As always, your writing/story are spectacular. I'm still not caught up with the back chapters - just haven't had enough free time to do a lot of reading. Excellent Write!

Chapter 7.4


Maorlatta

A wave of pure cold hit me at the same time as one of darkness. I wanted to hug myself and light a flare for light and warmth, but the damned chain stopped me from doing that. So I had to be satisfied with shivering uncontrollably and the muttering of a few words unbecoming a lady. This whole ‘forced recall’ thing was something I could do without. It was humiliating, uncomfortable and oppressing. The worst part? I was actually getting used to it.

Running away till I took one step too far and ended up right back where I started. I wasn’t even sure if I had to flee. So far I hadn’t been harmed in a physical way, just generally mistreated and dragged around like a pet. It was more a matter of principals and general uncertainty that made me oppose the nasty old man. Jauffre could claim he was Lord Emperor Uriel Septim’s best friend as much as he liked, he still hadn’t given me any proof. Perhaps most importantly was the fact he simply rubbed me the wrong way. I wasn’t going to deny that my behaviour was influenced by my personal feelings in the matter.

“How do you feel?” That man now asked from somewhere in the darkness. How did I feel? I’d tell him how I felt!
“A purple bunny is snorting granite and using my ribs as harpstrings. Thank you for asking. I'd feel a lot better if you removed that magical chain around my neck.” I grumbled back at him as I pulled myself up from the ground.
“Good enough. Kort, you can head back now.” The fake priest declared and behind me something harrumphed, then shuffled away. I turned to look but saw of course nothing.
“Who is Kort?” I wondered out loud. Jauffre ignored the question like he ignored all of them. I could hear him shuffling away as well, in the opposite direction. Turning around again, I tried to make a flare but the sound wouldn’t come and I developed a splitting headache instantly.
“Bogbreath.” I hissed at my invisible tormentor as I followed him with one hand on a numbingly cold wall and my feet sliding across the slippery ground.



Onwards we went, turning left and right, up and down, the only sounds the shuffling of our feet and the chattering of our teeth. How I wished for a fire to warm myself with, to light the way and reveal what kind of place we were in now. It was too cold in here. Not even winternights were this cold. And then there was the smell. I could smell nothing at all. Just water. Very clean water.

“I know it’s cold, but we’re almost there. Stop complaining.” Jauffre said when I asked him, for the twentieth time, to remove my leash and let me make a flare. It was the last drop. I refused to take another step.
“And do you care to tell me where ‘there’ is? Of course you don’t. Just like you haven’t told me why we’re going and why I have to wear this thing around my neck. No, I think I’d rather stay here. Or better yet, I’ll turn around and go back the other way. It couldn't be any worse than sticking to your heels!” I snapped at him and turned to do just that.
“Follow me.” Without asking, my feet turned back 180 degrees and went after the old man. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t budge from the course he’d set me. At first I didn’t know what was going on, then I screamed in helpless rage.
“Falseblooded son of a falseblooded son! Get Bonewither, you dungshoveler! I’m not your dog!”

Jauffre shook his head, not even looking at me.
“By Talos, I am so fortunate that your elvish split off from Aldmeris millenniae ago. I don’t even want to know what you said this time.”



It became brighter, though the new light revealed nothing but dark rock, slick as if worn down by an ancient river. Finally we turned one last corner and found ourselves at a door flanked by two tiny lanterns. The door was featureless, except for a thin slit from behind which more light gleamed. The light was obscured for a second, then the door was thrown open and a man stepped through, weapon in hand. Naturally I stopped instead of getting closer but Jauffre kept moving. I noticed that he held his hands out, showing the man his empty palms. Then I felt the queasiness of a purple bunny emerging and I scrambled after him.

“Master Jauffre! We expected you days ago!” The doorkeeper exclaimed once we were within arm’s reach of him. I noticed that despite the warmth of his greeting, he still had a hand firmly on the hilt of the now sheathed sword and for a moment, a very big finger twitched. It was all I could see. Jauffre however didn’t notice, or didn’t mind. He stepped into the door and grabbed the stranger’s shoulder.
“I suffered a few delays, Captain Steffan. But I am here now.” He said and then pulled me in as well.
“And this is?” Steffan asked. I could feel his eyes on me, but mine were still on his sword. It was such a frail looking thing, thin like a blade of grass. But a sword was a sword. It was still designed with murder in mind. I took a deep breath, trying to find the right words to say. Before I could answer, Jauffre’s hand went from the man’s shoulder to my mouth.
“A pain in the back end. I assume that he is here? I wish to see him at once.” He muttered dryly. The urge to bite those stinking fingers of his was overwhelming but I exercised restraint. I’d better wait till there weren’t any sharp murder instruments in the vicinity. Then I'd give him a pain in the back end to complain about.

Steffan closed the door and gave us one last discomforting warning before returning to his post.
“Of course, master. You know where to look. There is however one thing you should know. At the moment, we trust no one. Not even you. But Renault and her team can explain things better than I can.”



Jauffre took off down an empty corridor till he stopped before one particular door. It was as featureless than the others, but I knew it was different. It was the smell, like an alchemy-lab. No, not that. Like a pharmacy, selling only the refined products and none of the ingredients. Also perfumes, of the kind spread by scented candles.
“You stay in the corner and keep your mouth shut.” The bald tyrant told me.
I mimicked his words silently, then added: “The magic word is please, oh great exalted master of refined wordchoice.”
Jauffre opened the door, letting out a welcome wave of heat, and stepped through. I followed and did as he asked, find the nearest corner from where I could see everything and everyone, then sulk there. The fact that it was near the burning fireplace was a complete coincidence.

There were four others in the room. Three men or women in the same steel shell as the doorkeeper’s, sitting by the bed of the most ancient elder I’d ever met. All the armoured ones began talking at once.
“Master Jauffre! You made it!”
“Sir, good to see you.”
“You’re looking healthy, master.”
“You’ve come.”

I got a good look at their armour as they swarmed around Jauffre like kids around the candywoman. The armour was…strange. Not the simple singlepiece of the cityguard, but a series of overlapping belts. It looked more sophisticated and oddly familiar.
“Yes, it is truly a blessing to see you all in fine health. But are you…everyone? I learned much at the palace I didn’t ask for and little I did. No one had actually seen what happened.”
They kept rattling on, Jauffre now as well though I didn’t pay any real attention to who was speaking or what they were saying.
“There is Fenasim down in the training hall. But yes, master. We are the only ones left.”



No, my eyes had drifted back to the elder in his bed who stared back at me. He was so frail it made my heart hurt. There was no flesh on his bones, just pale skin and two deep-sunken eyes. With each breath I could hear his lungs struggle and smell the sickly scent of someone whose insides are liquifing. His mouth opened and closed, but I could actually hear him talk. He closed his eyes, licked his lips and tried again. This time I heard him, barely.
“Come closer. Let me see your face.”

I stepped closer, close enough to count every single vein standing out against the skin.
“Yes, I’ve seen you before. You were at the prison, weren’t you?” The dying man whispered. I froze, shocked. The prison? Then this man was Uriel Septim! The man I’d been looking for! He looked even weaker and frailer than back then but yes, I now recognized that nose. The slope of his brow, the heavy jewel resting on his heart. The same jewel his statue in the palace had borne. If this was the Emperor, then those three were the same guards from that night.

I bowed as deep as I could, my nose almost brushing my knee. I stammered incoherently before I refound my voice.
“I was, Lord-Emperor Uriel Septim the Seventh, ruler of Tamriel. It is with great regret that I failed to follow formal etiquette that time. Please forgive my failings.” I said slowly and with the most dignity I could muster, hoping I didn’t mutilate the words somehow. The Emperor grimaced. Had I said something wrong? Then he spasmed as he coughed madly with all the force his flesh could muster.

I leapt to his side, forgetting all I’d learned about court protocol in that moment. My hand already moved in to remove that heavy stone that had to be torturing him. I stopped when I realized the epic blunder I’d made. Not only had I thrown aside diplomatic respect in favour of care for his health and comfort, I’d also earned the tips of three terrifyingly sharp things prodding my throat.
“Are you alright…Lord-Emperor Uriel Septim the Seventh, ruler of Tamriel?” I giggled nervously, though I wanted to scream. That I was just trying to help, that I didn’t want to get killed over something as stupid as this. What was a sick man doing in a cold place like this in the first place?! What kind of idiots where they to take him here?! And why wasn’t there a shorter form of address I was permitted to use?!

A silent gesture from the ancient ruler made the killers withdraw their arms and step back. Again he tried to talk, so soft it was more lipreading than listening that I did.
“It matters not. No, more important is you. The gloom did you no justice. Now that I see you clearly, I know why you’re here. Orgnum Maorlatta, I should have known you would come.”

If the sudden deathtreaths hadn’t knocked away what remained of my composure, then this did. How did the Emperor know my name? Jauffre hadn’t told him and there was no other way he could have found out. More than that! He didn’t just know my name, he even used it in the proper context! Familial bond first, then my personal name. What sorcery had he used to learn this much?
“That’s…quite…” I stammered but the Lord Emperor was plagued by more coughing. I waited till the attack ceased, terrified for his health and terrified for my own if I tried to help.

One of the guards cleared her throat when the last attack ceased. It was a woman, the only one other than me in the room.
“Master Jauffre, I think I should explain to you what transpired that night. The part before we entered the Imperial prison. The important part.”


OOC: The next update will be all flashback I believe. Because I don't think it is ever explained quite why or how the Emperor get's to the player's prison cell.

Excellent stuff!!!...

Loving the whole attitude thing whilst following Jauffre... ...Made I laugh that did... ...

Definately a cool chapter, and then the rest of the Blades turned up...And...Right...And Uriel Septim!!...EXCELLENT!!... ...

Most brilliant chapter...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

I just couldn't decide how I wanted to write the next chapter. Should I do a quick summary, have captain Renault tell it in first person or third person. Or should I use the omnipresent narrator I use for the Angoril portions? I decided on the latter.

After that, the big question was basically how I could get the Emperor out of his home without making everybody involved look like incompetent idiots. And how could I make Ocato brush the whole thing off as 'doesn't need my help'? Heck, I'd never really thought about it much myself and I've got the feeling that the writers didn't at all. The Oblivion script probably started with "Emperor get's murdered, player is a prisoner, find a way to put those two together."

It would have made more sense I think if the game had started with the player in court, right when Uriel is about to give his verdict (no need to explain the crime that way.) Then BOOM! In come the Mythic Dawn! That way there is no need for an old man to run through half the city, across a bridge, into a prison and down a supposedly secret passage...while leaving the door open for pursuers.

But we didn't get that and I started my story in the stock prison, passage and everything. I think I have it now though.

So anyway, here's the start I'm going with. Next up will be a fight-scene, something I haven't done properly in ages.



Chapter 8: Night of disaster

Berius was a tall man and built like an ogre, though he only counted Imperials among his ancestors. Medals covered his broad chest like the glittering scales of a dragon. There was the crowned dragonhead that marked him as a member of the Emperor’s elite bodyguards. Other marks linked him to the Blades, the first Legion and the mage’s guild. There were medals of valor from campaigns in Skyrim and High Rock. There was the crossed sword and sceptre of the battlemage. One emblem he gave more care than all the others, always wearing it prominently at the center.
It was a small and shattered mask, a reward that had been given to less than a dozen men and women in all Tamriel and only issued once. Though Uriel Septim himself had given each of the masks, there had been no grand ceremony. Instead it had been conducted in a small room away from the public eye. If asked, he would not be able to reveal who else had received that same reward. But he could speak of why he had received it and so he often did with pride.

He had been there, wielding the sword, that day when the traitor Tharn and his demonic horde was defeated by the Eternal Champion.



Now older, balding and head of the palace-guard, he had lain aside his armour and sword. The fighting was something he left to his younger subordinates, such as the two that flanked the door leading to the Emperor’s suite. Berius stopped before them and silently appraised the two silverclad guardsmen. Being equals in length and weight, the two could have passed for identical twins or statues. Only the slow synchronized rising and falling of their chest revealed the life within the armour. Berius judged their stance, the condition of the ceremonial halberd in their hands and the more functional katana at their waists. He paid exceptional attention to the condition of their armour, noticing that no errant scratch, dent or speck of dust marred the polished facets. Finally when he was satisfied, he spoke.

“Wulfharth, you’re a bit jittery tonight. Nervous you’re going to emberass yourself in front of your new colleagues?” He laughed. One guard tipped his head and shrugged.
“No sir. I’m nervous that they will emberass us. Have you seen how young they are? That Redguard isn’t even close to hitting thirty!”
Berius shook his head. He understood the Nord’s problem. The palace guard were the elite of the elite, handpicked from the Blades like the Blades recruited among those with years of proven ability in war. Yet the only grand conflict in the last two decades had been a single battle in Morrowind.
“We recruit for skill, not age. Reserve your opinions till after observing their response to the mock intrusion I have planned. We’ll start shortly after they’ve arrived. For now I shall go in and prepare our lord.” He said.


He pressed his fingers against the bronze door and chanted the spell of release. With a soft click, the internal mechanism unlocked and the door sank downwards. He passed through the opening into a short corridor that hummed and warped under the influence of countless wards placed upon it. Wards that sapped his magicka, wards that held off the undead, that revealed the invisible, prevented conjurations and spells of destruction. A second door lay at the other side, sealed with the same mechanism as before though requiring a different chant to unlock. Berius opened it and entered the first room of the Imperial residence. There, seated amongst the furs of mammoths and the fragrance of Argonian incense, was Uriel Septim.

The man was asleep as he often was these days. Tired from the day’s politics and hard to wake. Berius shook the emperor gently till he stirred and began to rouse from his slumber. He knew from experience that it would take time for Uriel to fully awaken and that he was swift to drift away again. To help the former and counteract the latter, he moved to the bar that was nestled in one corner of the room.
“I shall pour you something hot, lord.” He muttered and reached out for a bottle of mead. His hand stopped in midair as he stared intently at the glass. The liquid inside sloshed around gently and he became aware of a vibration in the air, just beyond the edge of his hearing.
“What is going on?” Berius asked himself and turned towards the door he’d entered from.

The door clicked and sank beneath the carpet.

I'm going with the tunnel running straight from the palace to the prison, under the city... ...

Love the chapter...Always like a good Blade section...And this was one!...

The magic door was excellently done...With all the magic wards...Brilliant!...

Loved the sound of Berius...Very cool character...

An excellent chapter indeed...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

I'm not using a direct passage, but there will be a reason for why he goes to the prison instead of any of the two dozen safehouses the Blades keep in the IC. Or ya know, the Legion barracks.




Chapter 8.2


Through came one of the guards, all the wards rolling off his armour like water. He didn’t stop at the door or utter a single word regarding his reason for entry. He kept moving on a straight line for Uriel, red-tainted sword drawn and raised. Berius noted for himself that this was not the script he had prepared for the exercise, nor were the young Blades here to see it. Then all thought ceased and instinct took control. Honed by many years of service and more than one confrontation with a would-be assassin, it made him throw the glass in his hand at the running man. He did not expect an empty snifter to injure the intruder, even when aimed straight at the eyeslits of his helmet. But it made the palaceguard duck and slow for just half a step. In that half a step Berius began his own sprint to intercept the man before he could reach the Emperor.
Berius’ instinct held no illusions regarding his odds against a member of the palace-guard in full armour. The other man was younger, stronger, far better equipped and just as skilled. Berius had no sword, no armour, only the slimmest sliver of magicka in his veins and most importantly, a person to protect. No, a protracted engagement would only end badly for him and his charge. He knew he had to strike fast and decisively.

There was but one advantage he possessed. If the other was a traitor, then he was as aware of the situation as Berius himself was. Though constantly drilled not to, overconfidence would cloud his judgement. If the man was merely disguised as a palace-guard, then he would be even more ready to underestimate an older man whose muscles were making way for fat.
The two men crashed together at the center of the room like mountains. Ducking inside, Berius managed to avoid injury from the first swordswing by making the assassin’s arm hit him, rather than the weapon it wielded. He hooked a foot around an ankle where the other couldn’t see and used the residual momentum to throw the man to the ground.

On the floor they fought, both trying to gain even the slightest advantage. Berius worked his fists across the sides and joints, seeking nonexistent openings in the armour. If he’d had the stamina for it, he would have cursed how even the chain underlayer was guarded with a shielding spell. The blade’s blunt edge struck him across the back repeatedly, Failing to cut the vest but sending a lance of pain up his spine with each blow. Berius changed tactics and pinned the swordarm with a knee. Now the two men were at a temporary impasse and stared each other in the eyes. Suddenly the guard threw out his free hand which burned with a hungry flame and Berius reared back. Too late.



Berius threw himself forward, smashing his head against the helmet and then, with his foe momentarily disorientated, he struck the fatal blow. His hand thrust through the narrow gap exposing the traitor’s eyes. Then he called upon all the magicka he could muster, manifesting it as a torrent of lightning. It wouldn’t draw the envy of even the least proficient apprentice but it was enough. Passed the protective wards permeating the helmet and sunken into vulnerable tissue, the electricity pouring from his fingers burned out the man’s brain almost instantly.
Too tired to speak, Berius crawled off the corpse. The armour began to shudder and the old man forced himself back into a combative stance. Surely the other could not have survived his spell? Steel shrieked, bolts flung themselves across the room, richochetting off the walls and shattering an expensive vase. The chestpiece split in two as the body occupying it began to change. Muscles coiled like living snakes, bones creaked and twisted. A fur, not of hair but of bronzed barbs, burst from the skin. The face, recognizable for a single second as it burst through the helmet, distorted. Distorted into a terrifying maw filled with fleshtearing teeth. It began to sizzle and smoke, then burst into flames.

Berius shook his head, stunned by the sight. He knew that face, both of them.
“Wulfharth, you….By Talos I thought we got all of you bastards. What’s next, Tharn walks in and apologizes for not going to our meetings in the last thirty years?” He growled to himself and a chilling realization came upon him. If one guard had been a monster in disguise, then how many others were there? Did he even have a palaceguard, or were they all inhuman beasts? The thought drove the rising fear back beneath the surface.
“No time to complain about fate. I’ve got to get ready for the next one. No goblin raids alone.” He told himself and carefully edged towards the burning corpse to pick up the katana with his right hand. Exposed bone glistened where the flesh had been stripped away from his fingers. With a mental shrug, he picked up the glass sword with his left hand.



“What was it?” The elderly man behind him asked. Adrenaline at the sudden threat had expediated his awakening. He now stood before his chair leaning heavily on his walking stick. Uriel’s favourite carpet burned away before his feet and a vile smog destroyed the painting on the ceiling but he paid it no heed. His eyes, untouched by fear, were fixated solely on the door as he repeated his question.
“That was a simulacrum. We’d better get out of sight of the door.” Berius sighed, his own eyes also watching the door. It had not rose back up on its own as it should.
The attack had not unnerved Uriel Septim, not even when the assassin burst out of the armour and burned away. But the mention of a single word was enough to make him tremble and speak a prayer.
“Simulacrum? As in the Imperial Simulacrum?” He whispered, referring to that infamous period when, betrayed by his most trusted advisor, he had been imprisoned in another realm and the throne taken by a copy. He held no memories of the event, as he had more then once sworn. But there were the dreams, always haunting him in the night since that day.

Berius gently led him to the cover of a few potted trees before he answered.
“Yes, and no. If that had been Tharn, we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now. But that thing was one of his tools. Replaced most of the palaceguard with its ilk during the nineties when you were…you know. Course, there wasn’t a palaceguard left by the time we rescued you.” He shook his head at the end. To this day he still wondered if some of the men he killed that day had simply been unaware of the truth and tried to protect the palace from what they believed to be an out of control riot. But it had been necessary.
“It seems to me that you missed some.” Uriel pointed out. He kept his voice low as not to draw attention from anyone who might come investigate the opened door, or the dead man he suspected to lie just outside. Again Berius shook his head.

“Could be, but I doubt it. I remember asking the wood elf and she said we got them all. I’m inclined to believe her on that one. Only some general staff were spared and they were reassigned to less essential positions as a precaution. No, this wasn’t a survivor of that day. But Tharn could have deployed simulacra all across Tamriel without us knowing. Wulfharth, or the monster that took his form, must have been one of them.” He said. With the adrenaline of the fight fading, he became aware of his injuries. The harsh burning of his hand, the stiff ache of his bruised back. It wasn’t anything fatal or debilitating, but he definitely would need medical attention if he survived the night. For now, a simple spell to stop the bleeding would have to suffice.


“Didn’t Jauffre install a system to ferret out any infiltrants?” The emperor asked him after a short period of silence. From time to time the tower still trembled, but the cause of those vibrations seemed to go further and further away. Neither man knew what was going on, but both were convinced it could be nothing good.
“If Wulfharth had been replaced recently, we would know. You can claim the flesh, but you can’t just walk the walk and talk the talk. No, I think Wulfharth was already a simulacrum by the time he first entered our sights.” Berius replied and Uriel finished the thought.
“In other words, the simulacrum played the long game. Join the legion, show valor and prowess in battle. Become a Blade, show some more, be appointed here. It would take patience, skill and display of all the desired morals and values both in public and private.”

Uriel sighed. It was regrettable, but he had to admit that Wulfharth had been very thorough in eluding all the loyalty investigations that one received in a Legion and Blade career. It was even more regrettable that the tremors suggested he was not working alone.
“To the matter at hand, Berius. What do we do now?” He asked then and received a grim answer of his bodyguard.
“Now? Now we wait for the only ones we can still trust. The recruits. Pray they’re good, because if simulacra are involved, this will be far more dangerous than any test I could have come up with.”





OOC: Ok, maybe he switched a bit too fast from 'Hey dude, what's up?' to 'Kill Rage Murder". Meh, instinctive handwaves. Also, how come it's always two and a half pages in word but such a short piece of text on the forum?

That was just brilliant... ...

Fair dues...

From this...



To the lightning to the eyeballs end was brilliantly done...

Not familiar with the ealrier story as in the Jargar Tharn thing, but nicely done bringing the earler story into Oblivion...*Applauds*...Loved the way the armour shot the rivets out as the body changed back to its original form... ...

Fantastic stuff Jack...

More!!...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

My idea of how Blades and by extension, their even more dangerous elite, fight is simply to kill as quickly and efficient as possible. Also, I was rereading the first chapter and noticed three things. One, my style back then was different, with a better way of getting the feel for the environment down. Two, the characters were different back then. Things like proto-Maorlatta actually threatening someone with violence like it's no big deal and showing none of her Altmer-issues.

The third is that the Emperor mentions sending a messenger to Ocato. Obviously my idea back then was of Mythic Dawn elite assaulting the palace instead of my current idea involving traitors. Anyway, let's get some commanding done.



-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Chapter 8.3


The young Blades, all five of them, arrived at the exact moment of their meeting. Berius watched them spread through the room, efficiently covering every angle simultaneously, leaving no place to hide or sneak up on them. Even the door they’d come through was kept under close watch. It was therefore no great surprise when Berius and the emperor were discovered.
“Keep your hands, Sir! My lord Emperor!” The Redguard man who had first seen them shouted then sprang to attention as he recognized them. Having cleared her side of the sweep, a woman put a hand on his shoulder and whispered urgently.
“Keep your voice down, Baurus. Can you tell us what is going on, Lord Protector?”

Berius motioned for Uriel to remain knelt and stepped out from among the plants. He examined the two Blades in turn, then his gaze drifted to another man who had just declared the bathroom to be safe. He nodded to himself and looked the woman that had questioned him in the eye.
“In a moment, Sister Renault. This morning when we met in the Tiber Septim hotel you seemed rather amused. Please tell me why.” He asked her and almost shook his head at the surprise he read on her face.
“Because Glenroy nearly jumped out the window when he heard the fly buzzing around the ceiling.” Jennifer Renault answered, pointing at the man who’d walked from the bathroom to one of the windows.
“I told you, I served a tour in face-eating Argonia. The flies are worse than the crocodiles there. You High Rock pampered boys and girls could never understand what that place does to a man.” Glenroy called back, rolling his eyes.
“Good answer on both accounts. It will have to do for now.” Berius decided. If they still had the memories of this morning, then they hadn´t been replaced. There was still the chance that they´d been simulacra for years like Wulfharth but he doubted it. If that had been the case, it would have been far easier for them to have the assassination be performed by the new blades rather than the old guard.
“Six against one would have been a foregone conclusion.”

The Redguard who’d first found them caught on the hidden meaning behind his superior’s question when no one else did.
“You don’t trust us, sir.” He muttered then nearly flinched when Berius drilled him with his stare.
“Brother Baurus, right now I’m debating whether I can trust myself. Now, before entering you came across a dead member of the guard, correct?” He told the young man. Prompted, Baurus shot straight up, as if he was singled out by his Legionnaire captain during inspection.
“Yes, Lord Protector. Slain by a blade that penetrated the lungs and heart via the armpit. The melting of the chain suggest that the weapon was enchanted with armor-eater.” He barked, chin raised. The older man nodded to himself and looked at the pommel of his sword. Like Baurus had claimed, the exchangeable pommel was indeed the armor-eater.
“Quite perceptive of you. I want you and Glenroy to drag him in here. Meanwhile…” He ordered and looked at each Blade individually once more. His next decision was a painful one, but it had to be done. The Lord Protector recalled all the reports as he walked to a window, then picked the two Blades who had least impressed him.
“Brother Merric and Sister Eaglewood. You will go to respectively the coordination centers on the tenth and the twentieth floor. Tell the staff present to announce and execute protocol 4G. Follow their orders once you’ve done that.”
“Yes, Lord Protector! At once!” Merric and Eaglewood snapped and jogged out of the room. Berius watched them go with a heavy heart.


“Sir. 4G is not listed among today’s potential protocols.” Renault’s words pleased him. He’d read about that perfectionist streak of hers in most of the reports that had been written during her career. It was good to see that she’d already gone through and memorized the protocols his staff used.
“Captain Renault, let me tell you that the guidebook you were given was scrambled. 4G is possible today. Still, you are correct in the assumption that 4G will not be used.”
He paused to think over what protocol they should use. In the end, he had to assume that the enemy knew all of the manoeuvres he’d drilled over the years as well as who was on station today and where. Which meant all the usual safehouses were compromised. He came to the conclusion they’d have to use a plan which didn’t exist.
“I want you to take Lord Uriel Septim to the Imperial prison isle instead.” He said slowly as he knelt beside the window and pulled out a pair of bricks. Behind them, lay a small dustcovered pouch.
“The prison? But there’s no plan that includes that location. Besides, it seems…illogical.” Renault objected. The sound of footsteps made her turn to the door and raise her sword but she relaxed upon seeing it was merely Baurus and Glenroy, carrying the armoured form of Wulfharth’s partner between them.
“I know. I scratched it from the books when I became head of the guard here. Call it insurance. Most important is the fact that the only records of that plan now reside in my head. The enemy won’t know of or expect it because as you said, that would be madness. And the guards there get rotated frequently. So go to the isle and hide.”


Berius took the pouch from its resting place but made a point of not putting the bricks back.
“Good. And you won’t be using the stairs. I want you to leave through this window, circumventing the palace interior entirely.”
“You want us to jump, sir? But that’s impossible. We’re not birds. We’d die the moment we hit the ground. Or well, I could do it, but I doubt Baurus here could. And what about the Emperor?” Glenroy objected with a handwave towards the old man that still sat among the plants.
“That’s what these are for.” Lord Protector Berius replied and opened the dirty pouch.
“These rings are enchanted with slowfall. With them, dropping down is no problem.” He explained. Glenroy and Baurus nodded, but Renault was not yet convinced.
“Wouldn’t the Ayleid barrier around the fifth floor destroy them?” She wondered out loud.
“Again you impress me with your knowledge, captain. The barrier can be beaten. An assassin of the Dark Brotherhood managed it first. He had two rings of levitation. The barrier drained the first, but the second ring was sealed in a dampened pouch and survived. He simply had to switch rings in midair. Simple yet effective.” Berius elaborated and gave her one of the dusty copper bands.

“Now these are a new thing from Morrowind. Same trick basically, but no need to switch rings in midair. They’re one use only, but that use will get you through the old field and to the ground.” He finished with a shrug. At that moment Uriel grunted as he pushed himself off the floor, cursing his creaking joints and the frailty of his breath.
“Berius, you never told me of this. Are you certain it will work?” He asked his friend and loyal defender, who handed out the rest of the rings.
“The math is sound. And I’ve tested it on bricks, cats and even a mannequin. Just keep your feet down and you’ll be fine, emperor.”

Jennifer Renault fingered the ring in her hand. Though her Breton blood pulsed in reaction to the magic in the copper band, she had never received the kind of education that would let her tell what kind of magic it was. And Berius had implied he couldn’t trust himself. It hadn’t seemed like a joke to her. Renault realized that she needed to see it work rather than be told it would. She pocketed the ring and turned to the others. Then with a deep breath, she took charge for the first time as the captain she’d informally been promoted to.
“Glenroy, you are experienced at Alteration, yes?” She inquired of the Imperial. The man scratched his chin, not sure why she wanted to know.
“In Argonia, you need at least a basic expertise in…” He began but she cut him off with a simple wave of a hand.
“Yes or no would suffice. Can you slow your own fall without these rings?” She asked him next and Glenroy nodded.
“Yes, captain.”
“Good, then you get the honour to test them. You will jump and try the ring. If it doesn’t work beyond the barrier, stabilize your fall yourself. Afterwards…” Captain Renault leaned over and whispered her last order into his ear.
“See you on the ground, captain.”

They watched Glenroy vault over the windowsill and plummet to the plaza below. The air visibly distorted in a series of small sparks as he crashed through the barrier. But the Blade survived the erupting magic and drifted to the white cobblestones light as a feather. He waved up to the window once, then rushed for cover. Up in the Emperor’s suite, captain Renault let out a breath she didn’t knew she’d been holding. Then she straightened herself and led Uriel and her remaining subordinate out of the room.
“Follow me, milord. We’ll use a different window in case this one was being observed. I don’t like the lightshow Glenroy made on his way down.” She said and shivered as the corridor’s wards washed over her. Behind her, Berius gave her a grim warning.
“Don’t forget to remove the barrierbrick first, captain. And remember this above all. We will not meet again. We won’t. If you see me, your orders are to stab me, then stab me again just to make sure I’m really dead. Don’t even think about asking questions first.”

Neither the Blades or the Emperor gave a sign they’d heard him, but he knew they’d take his words to heart. He knelt down beside the dead guard and carefully began to remove his armour.
“Now then. Berius old boy, time to make some chaos. It’s your last day on Tamriel, make it a good one.”

Fantastic stuff!!... ...

Love it...

Poor old Berius...Gotta love him...Improvising the saving of the Emperor and not being part of it!...

Nice way of getting Uriel to the prison though...Nice one!!...

You made Renault well hot...Simply with the name Jennifer... ...Wow...

Brilliant stuff Jack...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

Over two months. I really am losing it, ain't I? The good news I guess is that I have half a blade piece ready as well. The bad news is that I'm not sure if I should use it or skip ahead and do it more gradually in another flashback.

Going back to the last part. Giving Renault a first name, as well as having her not be a captain already, was a simple and barebones attempt at giving her more characterization than 'woman that dies first'. It also explains a bit more on how the Blades could be blindsided like they were in the game.
But for now, let's change perspectives again. Oh, and a small rant at the end.

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Chapter 8.4

Imperial City

With a hard pat! the brewing storm announced its arrival over Cyrodiil. A man watched from a balcony as the last patch of crimson twilight was devoured by the clouds and his robes became soaked with cold water. It was good weather, he decided. The harsh downpour drowned out the voices of men and drove the regular patrols to any cover they could find. That left the streets open for others. He winced as lightning blinded his eyes for a moment and the roar of thunder overwhelmed even the clatter of rain on stone and metal. Then his lips curled upwards in a smile. Yes, it was excellent weather, better than any he could have wished for.

More lightning tore the sky asunder. They were silent bolts, of the wrong colour and too short to connect with either cloud or ground. The man recognized that what he looked at was no lightning but just as that realization had dawned upon him, his sight was blocked by the arms and bodies of his comrades. They jostled for a place at the balcony, all dressed in robes identical to his own, the red darkening as it soaked to a rusty brown. The man scowled at the sudden crowding and raised his voice over the storm.
“Compose yourselves! Are you heralds of the Dawn, or mere children?!”

With a chorus of “Forgive us, master Camoran!”, the men stepped back and fell to a knee, leaving the balcony once more to him alone. Camoran squinted into the rain and hoped to find the eerie lights again but the glimmer had already vanished.
“It’s gone.” He muttered to himself.
“It came from the palace, master.” One of his companions shouted.
“I know, acolyte! Be silent!” The master bellowed back at the men, not knowing who had spoken and not caring.

The building they’d occupied, a large mansion within a walled-off garden, provided a perfect view of the Imperial residence. Tonight however, that visibility was all but gone. Even moreso than the encroaching darkness, the rain’s haze reduced the Imperial spire into a vague shadow. Only at the crack of lightning, did it stand out. But after days of observation in better weather, he knew exactly where to look. So he mentally retraced the unnatural light and swore under his breath. It had occurred directly beneath the Emperor’s suite.
“Pah, it’s just a little riot over there. I don’t see what it’s got you all riled up for.” An acolyte declared. This time he turned to see who had spoken. Even over the hammering rain he had heard the lack of reverence and the arrogance. His eyes sparked fire and his followers shrinked back, drifted aside from his gaze. All but one.

He settled his sight on the lone Dunmer that dared face his wrath. As he recognized the weathered face before him, he could barely hide his disgust.
“Just a little riot, you say. Your stupidity astounds me, Initiate. Since when do you declare yourself learned in the arts of the arcane? A riot you believe? It may be the right time for one, but why would a riot occur in midair outside the palace? Care to answer that?” He said and stepped closer to the man, carefully swerving around the books stacked in disorderly piles on the floor. He approached till the Dunmer was forced to look up, using his Altmeri stature to his advantage. The smaller man said nothing, but neither did he flinch under the angry stare.
“So silence is your answer. Fine then, I shall answer for you. Every year at coronation-day, rose petals are thrown from White-Gold Tower and light the air aglow.”
“It’s not coronation-day, Camoran.” The Altmer’s eyes narrowed further at the casual response.
“Indeed it isn’t, Harrow. But flowers are not the only thing that stir the Ayleid wonder. Someone just jumped. From Uriel’s room.” He whispered slowly, his words almost lost to the storm raging outside.

Harrow cheered, throwing his fist towards the ceiling.
“Hah! Then we are done here! Let us go now and celebrate our victory!”
Some of the other robed men, mostly Bosmer, raised their own fists. But all, even Harrow, lowered them when they saw the growing displeasure on Camoran’s face. Then, his fury exploded.
“You fool! Is your head only there for bragging?! Do you truly believe that such a fall would kill him? You were an Armiger, you must have encountered more than a few that could survive such in your homeland. Or did you spend your time in taverns playing with the women instead of performing your duty?” Though his words were harsh, they had the opposite result from what he’d intended. Now angered himself by the insult, Harrow snapped back at him.
“This is not Morrowind, Raven. Levitation is outlawed here. You should use your own head before critiscizing others.”
“Cease your tongue lest I cut it out and force it down your throat! This is the Septim we are speaking about. A law he made himself would not stop him when it came to preserving his life!” The Altmer shouted in anger. He saw Harrow’s hands fall to the slit that hid the knife beneath his robe. Though he held no fear for the Dunmer and relished the excuse to burn him to ashes, he remembered that Harrow was a murderer and his father would be displeased to hear that his son had disposed of the fetcher. It was far better to keep him around to take blame for any unpopular but necessary acts than to waste him on a mere whim.

The scent of charred flesh spread through the room and a mad cackling could be heard coming from no distinct direction. With forced calm, Camoran spoke. With each word, he drew his portal open further.
“The Prophet is not here, Harrow. And neither is the Priestess. If it is your desire to lay a hand on the son and brother of those who protect your miserable life, remember this. For whether you would succeed or fail, you will meet our lord. As the defecation of his beasts.”
An inhuman eye blinked and a toothfilled maw large enough to swallow a man whole strained to push through the tear between worlds Camoran had created.
“My apologies…master. I meant no disrespect.”

Raven scoffed at the apology. He doubted the sincerity of it but also knew that pressing further would cause him to lose face before his group. He couldn’t keep his portal open for much longer either, though he hid the strain it placed upon him. Already the corpsegod squirmed and fought his intrusion. So he dropped both the issue and the portal without a further word.
“Leave me. All of you.”
“One of these days, I really will kill the honoured user. And neither father nor Ruma will be able to stop me.”
Turning his back on them, Raven shook his head, angry both at the Dunmer’s insolence and his own failure to control his anger.

He realized that he’d wasted too much time dealing with Harrow. Knowing that he had to move quickly if the Emperor had managed to escape, he reached within the folds of his robe and drew out an eyepatch. He settled it before one eye, closed the other and looked again. To his covered eye, the rain, the stone walls and even the very land seemed to have vanished. What was left on the other hand, shone with a light of its own. The tower rose up towards infinity before him. Its walls were sheathed in dancing rainbows, so bright it hurt. He slipped his gaze down to the streets and scanned the buildings near the palace. Nothing. The only light that was not cast by the tower came from the few magical knickknacks collected by the various noblemen and other wealthy folk that lived nearby. He knew them all and nothing was where it shouldn’t be.
“The Septim would never abandon the symbols of his power. He knows the political ramifications if he did. So that means it was not the Emperor who fell. Good.”

If it hadn’t been the emperor then there was only one answer left. The assassination plan had been defeated. If so, an alarm would be raised.
“Which means that our main operation is at risk as well. Should I be frustrated, or happy?” He thought to himself and for a moment a sharp self-loathing took hold of him. He had hoped the intervention of him and his men wasn’t necessary, but he also knew he hated to stand idly while others performed acts of glory. He struggled with this inner dilemma for a long breath, then he sighed and again dug a hand into the folds of his robe. This time, he retrieved a small ebony rod. It was irregular in both shape and texture, smooth and damp like glass in one place and sharp like tiny knives in another.

Gripping it as if he was holding a dagger, he called upon the powers hidden within the artefact, envisioned a place and thrust at the air before him. Upon drawing back, the punctured air was not the cold of the stormy outdoors, but hot like a furnace and reeking of old wax and burnished copper. He placed his eye before the tiny portal and peered through. Like always, he compared it to peering through a keyhole. The resemblance was there, though keyholes wouldn’t cause bodily harm if its edge was carelessly touched while a portal would. He saw an empty corridor that spiralled downwards out of sight. It wasn’t what he desired. Camoran calculated where the corridor led and stabbed again. And again.

Pure blackness, a gate of diamonds woven like string. A hand, lying amidst bloodsoaked silk, its owner crushed beneath a housesized block of white stone. He flinched and sweat burst from his skin despite the chilling rain. His heart pounded against his ribs and his own hand trembled. With effort, and subconsciously grateful he had sent his troops away, he forced his thought back to reason and studied the hand closer. It was an ugly hand, thick and calloused like a miner’s, one finger missing from an earlier accident. His hand stopped trembling and his heart relaxed as he knew that this bloodied appendage wasn’t hers. It was a sacrifice to the Dawn, not a loss.
“If I’d sent Harrow into the vaults, that might have been him. Hah, only if everyone else had fallen before him. This is no time to daydream, Raven. Now then, where are you, sister dear?”

The dead follower was practically forgotten already as he moved his portal again. Snakes of clicking blades writhe and crawl all over the walls and floor of a long hall. A bridge of clouds cast over a bottomless pit. Eight women in red gathered before a blank wall. One of them is working a spell, muttering in the arcane tongues. Raven changes the angle so he can see her face and smiles. The woman possesses a face much like his own, though finer and lacking the harshness of his brow. He doesn’t speak till she finishes the spell and the wall flows aside like water.
“How fare thee, Priestess?”

The woman in red halted her followers with a gesture. She looked about till she saw the pinprick of rain in the otherwise dry corridor. Then she spoke, slowly and deliberate as each word was chosen with care.
“Several persons of valor have sacrificed their flesh to the Dawn and their names shall forever be remembered in the Prophet’s scrolls. The Septim’s traps are cunning, but they will not hold us in our quest. The first object is already ours and soon we shall come upon the second.”
She raised something and showed it to him, but the portal was too small to give him a good view. All he could make was that the item scattered the light as if made from glass and silver.
“So that is the famed coffer. Its shell is priceless, but the true treasure lies within. It is smaller than I expected though.” He thought to himself.

“I have come upon you with grim tidings. The servants of our Lord, who have waited so many years in the Dragon’s den for the Prophet, have fallen to treachery and betrayal. Pure were their souls, but their flesh has been corrupted.”
Raven picked his words with just as much care. Had it been a more informal setting, had they been alone, he would have called names. But he could not when others were listening. Even if they professed their faith in the Dawn, the men and women of the robes had been born and bred in an empire that reviled the allies his father once had and whose minions they now used. The Dawn would fall apart as minds corrupted by the Septim’s words and teachings would instinctively move away from their betters. So he hid his words and thoughts behind symbolism.
“Priestess and those who were chosen worthy to bring the new Dawn, know this. They are tainted through their proximity with the Septim. Their flesh has grown weak and their masks frozen. Even now the Septim guards his throne and sends his demons among us. Be on guard.”

The Priestess’ blinked, then scowled, then she lost herself to anger and shouted.
“Failed?! How dare they betray father’s trust! They said we could rely on them! That we wouldn’t have to lift a finger! What do you mean, failed?!” Raven cringed at the outburst. As the Dawn’s Priestess, she was not supposed to let her emotions rule her. Especially when they would make her imply that the Camoran’s were fallible. He knew he had to calm her down before she said too much but did not know how to begin. So he answered her question instead and buyed himself time to think.
“Berius. It must be him.”

“That lardfaced relic? Impossible! He’s still trapped in the fourth century.” Despite the seriousness of her continuing indiscretion and the nervous fidgeting of her followers, Raven let out a soft chuckle. She had just given him the key to dealing with the situation.
“That word is not to be used lightly, blessed Priestess. Do not forget that it was this ‘relic’ who defeated the Usurper. His bones may be old, his swordarm sluggish, but his mind is yet sharp. We would do well to remember that. We shall remember, and through remembrance the Dawn shall prevail. None shall speak words of weakness for we shall triumph!”

The woman’s features smoothed as his voice struck home. His words had sounded like a declaration of confidence to her followers but she knew what he’d really said. He saw her let go of her fury and grasp the calculation their father had fostered. She would make sure that those who had witnessed her momentary lapse would be silent, one way or another. None would speak of weakness.
“As always, the wisdom of your words cannot be denied. I shall double my rear guard. Do you require our aid? We can’t let the Septim escape.”
The offer was tempting. If she sent two or three of her followers, then he could find ways to silence them. Place them in the path of a guardsman, or perhaps even a Blade and claim their own incompetence and lack of faith as the cause. But he could not accept it. The Dawn’s hands were few, and growing fewer tonight. The vaults the Priestess had assaulted were murderous and there was no telling how many more sacrifices she would have to make to obtain the most important relic. They could deal with the survivors later.
“Your commitment to the cause is without equal, but we follow our Prophet’s will. The Priestess shall present the gifts, the Hand shall take the blood. Stay with your task as I shall stay with mine.”

She bowed to him and turned back to the opened wall.
“Of course. Your words are as ever true. I shall finish my task and gather the fallen. Once I am done, know that whoever I can spare will be yours to command. Good hunting, Hand.” She said before stepping into the darkness, her acolytes following like rubies on a chain.
“And to you, Priestess.” Raven replied and let the portal cease to be.

He went downstairs to the dining room where his own followers were waiting. They had closed the curtains and were gathered around a large map that had been spread out on the table. Coins were scattered on it. Tenth-pieces for guard-posts, half-pieces for their own observation-posts and a full septim marked each safe-house the Blades maintained in the city. He was glad to see they had not been wasting their time and had been going over the details of the various plans one last time, even though none of those plans would see use. Harrow stood in a corner away from the others. He had no ear for the murmurings and his eyes were focussed on the sharpening of his knife, not the map. But he looked up when he heard Raven Camoran step into the room and stepped forward with an eagerness to please that disgusted the Altmer.
“What is your desire, master?” He crooned with a voice dripping of poisonous honey.
“For you to die, treacherous snake. If you believe a little toelicking will make me trust you, you will find I am wiser than that.”

Raven said nothing and walked over to the bookshelves that lined a wall. From there he picked an old book and leafed through it. Behind him Harrow grit his teeth angrily and eventually went back to his corner and his knife. Raven read the pertinent sections quickly and then addressed the men.
“Unseal the armory. We’re moving out now.”
“You are right, sister. Berius is stuck in the fourth century and knows he can’t trust in the present. So I shall counter him in the same way. With fourth century information, not fifth.”

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OOC random words of randomness follow. Also, spoilers to the game.

So yeah, the Mythic Dawn. They're the bad guys of Oblivion and generally exist to be evil and get stabbed, burned and pincushioned by the heroic deliveryman. Now it's been a few years since I actually last played Oblivion beyond Kvatch and I only ever finished the game once, so I could be missing a lot of characterization that is actually in the game. The problem is, I don't know of that characterization so I'm basically improvising here.

To me, the Dawn never made much sense. They worship the lord of Destruction, while at the same time believing in a happy funtime paradise. The paradise of course turns out to be false because seriously, you're worshipping the lord of Destruction, not the lord of pleasant picnics amidst flowers and cute little bunnies of the non-vorpal kind. What did you expect?

They also don't do much onscreen outside the tutorial, recruit every hobbyist willing to buy their books regardless of the moral requirements they have and have a hideout whose presence is glowingly pointed out on a old monument. Which implies that this hideout has been around for a while (making you wonder why it is still a barebones cave instead of something more comfortable), or the Camoran's don't know the meaning of the words 'secret organization'. Oh, and when they do something, it is in the frontal attack by cannon-fodder way while loudly proclaiming your affiliation.

Back to the recruiting. They have one moral test that I am aware of. This is fine in itself since if the participant fails they get murdered and problem solved. But the test takes place in the secret hideout! What if said recruit decided to tell his families, neighbours and the 'Intelectual society of Daedric studies' where he went beforehand?


The same problems basically exist with the Blades. (watch Baurus' detectiveskills that basically amount to telling everyone he is a Blade then see who attacks him.) I guess in their case it can be summed up however as the requirement to keep the player relevant and front seats for the hero-role. That and I'm not supposed to think about it so much.




So, what do I plan to do with my version of the Mythic Dawn? That's a good question and one I'm not ready to answer. For starters however, I decided to raise up the religious part, give each Camoran a role in the pyramid and make them not be responsible for everything bad. I also want to adress the lord of Destruction and lovely my-little-pony paradise dilemma, but that must wait till later.

Other things include ditching the summonable armour. In the game it served no other role but to point out that this person is an evil Dawn loony and you could totally kill them without remorse. But for indentification purposes, I think the robes were good enough. The armour is redundant and I don't like it myself. It makes them too survivable (even though in-game I think it had as much armour-value as wet paper). The elite can have their bound armour (generic bound armour), but the grunts will have to do with simply not getting stabbed. The way a secret cult without infinite resources and who recruits from criminals and sociopaths might work.

Ooooh, that was good!!... ...

Liked that...Falling short of moustache twiddling and BWAHAHAA, but obvioulsy they's in the anti-Septim line of things... ...

I really did enjoy that...

Loved the Ebony wand thing...Brilliant idea...There was loads of brilliant imagination going on there...

Well done that man!!...

Oh, and on yer rant...Go for it!!...I can't remember the characterisation meself...And really, what does it matter?...There is flaws in both the writing and the voice acting, which means that any fan could rewrite what was done before...In fact, I think it's almost mandatory to rewrite the damned thing!...

As I've mentioned several times...We're all multiversing here...What happened in the game is just one universe...mALX's is happening waaay differently...Mine was somewhat different...Your universe is yours...No one can tell you that it's wrong...It's fiction...

Whatever you do with the various agencies (good or bad), I'm sure it will be brilliant, you seem to have a knack for improvement so far...I look forward to each episode...Every time...Brilliant stuff...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds most heartily*...


Oh, two teenie nits that I noticed...You fell foul of the censor with b@stard at one point (One of these days, I really will kill the honoured user. And neither...)

and

...imply that the Camoran’s were fallible...Don't think it needs an apostrophe...Pretty sure anyways...

Brilliant stuff Jack...

Actually, my story is depicting the last year of Uriel Septim's life before he was killed in that tunnel system escaping at the beginning of the Oblivion game.

I totally agree with what both you and McB said. The game is just the palette, what you paint is what makes the story exciting.

Stories like SubRosa's take place in Cyrodiil and have the familiar names and characters from the game, but the story is totally her own imagination and creativity. It is exciting to read because we can't anticipate where the story will go next. It develops a few new characters into the game that grew out of her own inspiration. Acadian's story is the same way. They take place in the familiar setting, but the story is their own.

I'd rather read what you dream up in the TES realm than just read a replay of the game itself anytime.

Your imagination and the changes you made in your earlier stories kept me on my toes reading, intrigued and interested. The early chapters of your last story, guessing the characters before you revealed who it was - that was genius, huge fun for the reader.

You have a very creative mind and imagination that comes across in anything you write, that is what makes your stories great.

I really like how you're developing Camaron's character. He wasn't exactly memorable in Oblivion, but you're making him more-and-more interesting.

Curse you, autocensor! Curse you!

And just after I went around it the last time I tried to use the word honoured user. (This get's censored again.) It was when Latta was throwing insults at Jauffre. I first considered just the word itself, or bastarde (I think Taillus or Agent Griff used that to get around the censor), but then I figured that the average reader would interpret it as 'generic curse'. In reality, she was literally claiming that Jauffre was an illegitimate child and his father likewise. So I switched to falseblooded son. Think of it as calling someone's mother a mother of mine (curse you, censor! ), only more serious.

As for Raven, I didn't even remember him till I'd read about him in the UESP. Turns out that he's the one who tries to recruit the player or Baurus ingame. Funny, I guess the guy died so fast he never registered with me. And I'd just like to say that we haven't actually seen Mankar himself yet. I don't know how to make his personality, but I do have a barebones plan prepared as well as an excuse for why he isn't around right now.


And I like the multiverse idea. It's a good way to look at things. Anyway, back to the Blades and I'll get to updating the character list in a bit. But first, the recap! Cause it has been a few months.


In the same night that Raven Camoran is watching the tower but a bit earlier, the Lord Protector Berius (head of the palace-guard) went to Uriel Septim to prepare him for a meeting with the new Blades. In turn that meeting was to be preparation for an official knighting ceremony but I digress. Before the Blades could arrive, a member of the palace-guard tried to kill Uriel. Berius fought the man off and discovered that the guard had been a shapeshifting monster. To be more specific, the same kind of monster he believed he'd personally wiped out the same day that Jagar Tharn was slain by the Eternal Champion.

When the Blades arrive on the scene, Berius instructs them to escape with the emperor by jumping out the window and also promotes one of them to captain. He tells them to take Uriel to the prison and hide there. We rejoin our Blades as they make their way to a suitable window.

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Chapter 8.5


Imperial Palace

There was a small storeroom, not quite on the spire’s opposite side. Unremarkable in both place and name, it would seem to be an odd place to go. But Uriel was resolute in his choice and the two Blades followed his command unquestioningly. After all, as Jennifer Renault reasoned with herself, if she couldn’t trust the man she was sworn to protect, then what was she doing here in the first place?

She led the way in silence, Uriel following behind her and Baurus bringing up the rear. Despite her best efforts, her mind kept following random thoughts and more than once she realized she’d lost awareness of her surroundings entirely.
She shook her head and chastised herself for lacking discipline. But the thoughts would soon return.

They were questions and doubts. What was happening? What did the Lord Protector plan to do after he’d sent them off? Would Glenroy make it safely to the rendezvous, or would he fall to an ambush by their mystery assailants? Just what had burned Uriel’s suite? And above all, could she rise to the task? The Lord Protector had promoted her, a necessity for establishing a chain of command. But while she thought of herself as competent, she could not consider herself a fighting Blade. That was Glenroy’s place, who had learned to survive where the very land tried to kill all that approached. Or Baurus, who even now walked backwards with unnatural fluidity, never stumbling, always aware of the distance between them, though he never turned his head to look her way.

The late hour combined with Uriel’s preference for solitude was a blessing in disguise. There was no staff at this level to ask questions or….She shuddered though the thought wouldn’t form clear words. Just what had the Lord Protector so worried? He’d looked as if he’d found himself in a living nightmare.
“He wasn’t supposed to be like that. He should have been confident, dignified, strong. Like he was in the stories. Or even this morning. He was all I’d expected him to be back then.”

“This is the one.” Uriel said and gestured at the simple door which some painter had made to resemble the white walls. Renault shook herself once more to the here and now. She made to open the door but stopped her hand before it could touch the handle. Following the others into the emperor’s suite had been easy, but she felt in no condition to lead an entry-and-clearing procedure herself. The Divines knew she had trouble enough getting around her lab at times. A dark and unfamiliar storeroom was definitely beyond her expertise.

She raised a finger to her mouth in the universal sign for silence, then drew out a message with the same hand.
[Check it out]
Before she’d even finished the first word, Baurus had already stepped passed her and placed his hand on the doorhandle.
“You already knew, didn’t you? Or did you just assume you were the best man for the job?” Renault thought and shook her head. Of course he was the best, she told herself. The man had at first come across as easygoing to her, but his perception had been simply frightening from the moment they’d come across the dead guard. It had been Baurus who noted the tiny entry-wound, it had been Baurus who found the Emperor and the Lord Protector. Baurus, who seemed to have the eyes and ears of five men.

The Redguard repeated the silence sign, loosened a trio of thin throwing knifes from its sheath with one hand and counted down from three with the other, then kicked the door open. The knives followed in an instant, whistling through the shadows left right and straight ahead, the places where an unsubtle assassin was most likely to be positioned. They clattered on stone and thunked into wood. Baurus listened closely but could not hear any response to his actions. After a moment he peered into the room and willed his eyes to acclimatize to the darkness faster.

Rapidly, the dark blotches resolved themselves into crates, rolled up carpets and various other decorations or pieces of furniture that filled the room till there was barely enough room to stand or move between them. At the far end he could make out a small part of the tower’s bare outer wall. There was no window, but the Blade easily pushed the questions it raised from his mind while holding on to the thoughts that mattered. He noticed plenty of hiding spaces for the small and limber assassin but no one foolish enough to stand or crouch in the open. The Redguard would have to step inside to make certain it was truly safe. So silently he laid both sword and shield beside the doorway before entering and drew the curved knife kept on his hip. Within these cramped confines, he reasoned it would serve him better than the more cumbersome weapon.

He moved slowly, holding his breath and straining his ears after each step. He quickly but effectively inspected every nook and cranny, first by sweeping through with his knife, then his eye. No one challenged him and he made it to the bare wall without incident. Again the question came to his mind and again he pushed it aside.
“Clear.” He spoke softly as he worked his way backwards to the door.

Uriel entered the room, leaning heavily on his stick and breathing as if he’d ran a marathon. Renault looked at him with troubled eyes. Even just circumnavigating one floor of the spire was enough to push the emperor to his limits. She did not see how he could walk to the city prison. Not without aid.
“Sit on that crate and rest, my liege. Brother, seal the door behind us. We’re not going back that way.” She said. While the other Blade began to shift the furniture, she took her time to look at the room. The outside wall was completely bare safe for the knife sticking into it. There was no window or anything that suggested there had been one. Renault paused and took a second look.
“That knife shouldn’t stick into the wall like that. It’s stone bricks and Baurus didn’t hit a crack.”

She pulled the knife free and shook her head with an amused smile.
“It’s wood. They’ve boarded up the window and then painted it to look like stone.” The Breton muttered to herself, not knowing whether it had been done for the sake of paranoia or aesthetics. In any case, she could see that it would increase their chances of surprising any observers on the ground. No one ever expected someone to jump from a window that didn’t exist.
She felt for the ensorcelled brick beneath the planks and pulled it out. Behind it she found another pouch of rings which she pocketed.

“My liege, it is my professional opinion that you are in no shape to make it to the prison, especially in this weather. Is there any other place you know to go?” She asked over her shoulder as she continued to free up the window. Behind her the old man sighed and clutched the jewel that hung from his chest. He could feel his spine complain from having keep his back straight and his lungs burned with an intensity that nearly robbed him of his voice.
“None, we go to the prison. Captain, you studied under…the former court healer. I assume you are capable of fortifying.” He wheezed. The woman ceased her activities to walk up to the emperor and watch the symptons that were written in his posture clear as day. Baurus didn’t wait for the order and continued where she’d left off.
“I could.” Renault decided after a moment. “But the kick afterwards will be too much. I estimate that you would be bedridden for days, and that’s the best case scenario. Worst case, you will die. It’s not worth it.”

Uriel coughed and whipped the dribble of saliva that had freed itself from his throat.
“But it is, captain. I can’t…explain. Staying here is…death.” He coughed again and forced himself to breathe slowly and deeply. It was hard to keep his body from spasming and gasping uncontrollably, but he managed. In return, he regained his voice.
“If you will not do it on your authority as a healer, then I shall order you as a Blade.” He spoke and looked her in the eye.

She couldn’t withstand the gaze that had united a continent and forced countless would-be kings and queens to their knees. The Blade saluted and looked away.
“Understood, my emperor. I shall cast a spell the moment we hit streetlevel.”
“Good, then I won’t be needing my cane.”

It was then that Baurus interrupted them and waved for their attention.
“Sister, emperor. If I may? Someone is emptying baskets below us. The whole sky is lit up.” He said and indeed his face was lit by an unnatural glow coming from beyond the opening he’d made. Renault observed that the gap was wide enough for them all to pass through easily now and decided that now was their best chance to leave.
“That must be the Lord Protector rallying the staff. No telling how long he can keep it up. Brother! Jump now and secure our landing. We’ll be right behind you.” She ordered briskly and lifted Uriel onto her shoulder.
“Hold on tight, sir. It’s a long way down. Try not to blink. We can’t have you stumble on landing and breaking a leg.” She said.

They jumped.

Autocensor - I just subtitute characters...B@stard, $hit, b!tch...etc... ...My personal faves are where it changes a$s to boat and ar$e to British boat...Oh, and the Thermos one... ...

Raven - I don't remember Raven in the game at all ...Is he the one in Luthor Broad's place?...So anyways, I found his character as you portrayed him as excellent as all your others...

Recap - I'd remembered all that...See, I'm good me... ...

Aaaamywho...

Loved this chapter muchly...Renault and Baurus work well together...Loved the way that Baurus just put himself in front...Absolutely brilliant characterisation...I also loved that Renault felt she was way too inexperienced for the task...Yet was determined to do it properly and all that...

Uriel was brilliant...Loved his appearance here hugely....

Amazing chapter Jack...

Loved it!...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds most heartily*...

You are doing an amazing job with Uriel Septim in this, and I am absolutely Loving that you are giving us this glimpse of him before that dreaded day! Awesome Write!

The guy at the tavern who attacks Baurus? Nah, I think that was just a random Dawnie. Raven is the interviewer in the sewers, the one that carries the last book you need to figure out where the Mythic Dawn's base is.

For today's bit, we're going to do a little jumping back and forth. I don't tell which viewpoint is which as I think they explain themselves well enough. Besides, the breaks are indicated by the dotted line. Can't miss them.


Chapter 8.6


Outside

He didn’t like it, didn’t like it at all. For the past two minutes or so the barrier that spanned the city had been lighting up in all directions, its glow spreading till it reached the far walls. It had made magicka-enhanced sight mostly useless and even the mundane eyes were discomforted by the light. People pushed their heads out of windows and craned their necks to see while Raven led his troops by them in the hope that no one would have the wit to report his heavily armed group.
“It is a small blessing that everyone is watching the skies instead of the streets. But I wished there had been no reason for them to look beyond their windows in the first place.”

Worse perhaps was that he’d been forced to put away the eyepatch. While bright enough on its own, the light he now saw was merely a fraction of the blinding radiance on the Arcane plane. As such, he could not keep the palace under observation as they jogged towards it. He did risk the patch once, to scan the streets on groundlevel. There were a great number of signatures scurrying about. Far too many for any day and too many to track them all down, even if he did split up his group into lone individuals.
And that was something he would not do. Apart from himself, he doubted that anyone on his team could subdue even a single guard. And guardsmen never worked alone.
“I know the man’s got doubles, but he can’t have that many. Perhaps they are trained animals, small birds and cats.”



They stopped before the gates to the palace district. Raven thought that he’d rather avoid going up to the front door as the guards would never shirk their duty this close to the Septim’s eye, weather or no weather.
“Where would he flee to? Well, I doubt the man would be stupid enough to leave by the front door, or anywhere on the same side of the building for that matter. The Imperial Suites are too obvious as well. So…that leaves east or north?”
He looked both ways. Circling right through the arena would be the shorter path. However, a sizable portion of the city’s watch was stationed in that district to keep an eye on the gladiators. Or anyone else going that way. He did not want to lose his acolytes to a fight which he could just as easily avoid by going left instead.
“The man is old, we are on an island and I already have the bridge and the waterfront under watch. Really, I think we can afford to waste some time.”

“We go clockwise. Keep an eye out!”

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Though for Raven the possibility of a citizen noticing his group was merely a grave concern, for Uriel Septim it was a reality. The simplicity of the matter was that he stood out with the shining jewel on his chest that pulsed in rhytm with the waves overhead. To that the official escort and his awfully out of place sleeping-gown were merely an afterthough. Oh, the citizenry’s attention was initially focused on the barrier, but no one watching at street-level could ignore him.

“Look mum! It’s the Emperor!” One young child yelled into the night and the man held back a sigh.
“Everyone will know where I am.” He thought and when Renault steered him to the cover of an awning, he resisted her gentle hand.
“No. No rest till we get there.” He whispered. His voice was lost in the storm but the meaning was not.
“Baurus! Double-time!”


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


“I warned you not to look up!” Raven snarled when an agonized cry disturbed his thoughts. The group came to a halt as he wheeled to face the Bosmer that had shouted. The mer was clutching his eye with one hand, and a smoking patch in the other.
“Forgive me, master Camoran.” He squealed inbetween his sobs. “Something came from…I think it was the Battlemage’s mansion. It went straight up. Like an arrow.”
At once Raven Camoran’s anger was gone. This was a new development and his mind set to work on how to exploit it.
“So Ocato sent a whisp. Did you see where it landed?” He asked the smaller man who shook his head.
“I didn’t, master Camoran. My will wasn’t strong enough. Please forgive my weakness.”

The Altmer waved for everyone to continue moving.
“Save those words. Your perception is to be praised, not shamed.”
“Whisps are patterns of semi-intelligent magicka. With the barrier agitated like this, it is effectively trapped within the city. So the recipient of the message must be close.”
As they ran, he looked around with enhanced sight himself. Though his skull itched and his eye watered, he stuck with it. Even as his own eyepatch began to burn away and singed his flesh, he still looked.
“Now who would be important enough for Ocato to send a whisp at this hour? They’re too rare and valuable to be expended in frivolity. Given the night, it can only be one man.”



The Altmer nearly missed it. Moving so fast it’s body appeared as a thin line, the whisp came down again next to a cluster of spell-signatures. There it reshaped its nonphysical form to draw a message in the air before promptly vanishing back up towards the rainbow umbrella.
“We got him.” Raven said as he stepped into an alcove and threw aside the now useless eyepatch. Out of the rain, he took out the book he’d taken earlier and opened it.
“The Septim and two of his shields are north-east of us, about three blocks away and moving slowly. Given their current location and heading, I think they are headed…for the prison.” He frowned and reread the paragraph again. The prison had not been in their plans for interception, though they had hidden their boats at an old pier nearby for the evacuation. If the Emperor was headed the same way, he wouldn’t let the opportunity slip him by. And then there was a loose scrap of paper which he just now found had been slipped into the book.
“Listen closely. There is a tunnel leading from the prison to the undercity. And from there they have a straight path to the dock we left our boats.” He held up a hand to hold off the questions. Like his compatriots, this was the first he’d heard of a tunnel leading from the prison. One would suspect the Thieves guild to be very interested in it if such a thing did exist. But their contacts in the guild had never spoken a word of it. Even his father had never spoken of it, though he evidently knew given the small piece of paper. That he’d not informed either of his children was testament to how unlikely he’d expected the information to be of use.
“So does the emperor even know of it? He is heading that way though. Damn that Berius. Damn us for underestimating him.” He thought and then wondered about the exit.

The pier they used wasn’t a secret, though this time of the year it was deserted. Come harvest-season, farmers who could not afford the Waterfront’s exorbitant fees would land their boats there. Such being as it was, he was surprised no one had discovered that exit. There was a barred entry to the sewersystem, but the undercity lay further below.

He remembered the steep hill that rose up from that pier to the prison itself. Never before had Raven given the overgrown dirt and the rough path any thought, but now he realized that the hill was the end-result of centuries of mud sloughing down from the top, fixed by the roots of trees and smaller plants.
“Hah! Of course that’s the answer. The exit has been buried for ages. That makes our job easier, but let’s see if we can’t get it done before we have to resort to dirtying our hands.”



“Harrow! Take the parallel road and block the entry to Justice-street. Under no circumstance are you to engage! You are only to seal off the Septim’s escape while I destroy his allies. You, you and you. Go with him. The rest comes with me.”


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------



He was the first who noticed. A singular purpose moving to obstruct their path. Exactly what had given him the first clue, he didn’t know. It could have been a misty shadow up ahead, the obscuring of a lantern’s reflection in the windows or the tremor of running feet being carried up through the cobbles.

Baurus grimaced. The unknown assailants had appeared before them instead of chasing from behind.
“They know exactly where we’re going.” He noted and ran in front of the Captain and their charge.
“Hold up! They’re in front of us.” The Redguard called out with a nod towards the still unseen nemace.
“Front? How many?” Uriel asked him.

“I don’t know. Three…five. No more.” He replied as he tried to determine what exactly had set off his instinct. For a moment he held hope he’d merely seen shadows, but that hope was dashed by a voice calling for them through the rain.
“Cease running Septim, and you may not die tired! The days of you and your empire are at an end!”
“Definitely hostile.” Renault muttered even as her eyes searched for potential escape routes. There weren’t many. The alleys here were thin and looped back to the main street right before the gates of Justice district. For a moment she inspected the building walls and nearby clutter for a way up to the rooftops, but then she realized that neither her armour or the Emperor would permit a climb.
“Think we could take them?” She asked.

Baurus looked at her for a moment and saw how she was practically carrying the old man by plain strength now. Though he lacked the training to tell, it was clear to him that her spell was running out.
“Forgive me for being frank, captain. I’ve run escorts before and believe me, you do not keep your charge near a battle if you can help it. They’re packed tight though. If we could keep them that way…”
He did not say what was more obvious to her than it was to him. With a gentle push, Baurus sent her and the emperor to a nearby alley that his instinct told him was still safe.
Renault carried the emperor down the alley as fast as she could, which was unfortunately about the pace of a standard march.
“Keep going.” The Redguard muttered at their receding backs and turned around. He drew his sword and waited.





Baurus observed the figures as they appeared trough the thick mist. There were four of them, all wearing the same rusty brown robes. They came at him unhurried with three hatchets kept loosely in their hand and one short sword, still sheathed. Even more evident of their confidence were the hoods drawn deep over their face. They seemed to consider the weather a greater adversary than a man bearing steel.
“Four to one, the numbers alone would justify their confidence.”

The strangers stopped barely within his sight. For a moment they looked around as if they expected the Emperor to be hiding behind a window. But all that showed were the faces of confused and curious citizens. The one with the sword, far taller than the other three, was the first to give up the search and the first to speak.
“Look, the Septim leaves a little dog to play with us. You picked the wrong street to patrol, lawslave. I dearly hope you weren’t planning on ever collecting that retirement fund.”
Taking the hint, heads were hurriedly pulled back and windows were shut tight.



The Blade’s eyes narrowed. In a way, it was good to finally put a face to the nebulous threat the Lord Protector and Uriel Septim had hinted at. But he didn’t see how a trio of Bosmer and one of other descendance could constitute such a threat. Their hatchets looked like they’d been stolen from a forestry camp, not the kind of weapon he’d gamble on against solid plate.
“Then you must be the one who was shouting just then. I take it you have an issue with our emperor. Who are you anyway?” The Redguard responded.
The robed swordsman barked a laugh and swung his arms wide dramatically.
“I have no name to give to you. Call me, Death. It is a name that fits me well.”
“Quite the ego on that one.”

Again the tall one barked his laugh, but one of his companions seemed less confident.
“Is he really a guardsman? He looks kind of different.” He wondered to himself out loud. The swordsman called Death barked his laugh again.
“Well, he’s dressed too pretty to be a mercenary, isn’t he? And I do not care what he’s wearing. There is four of us, one of him. Surely you have enough fingers to count that far.”

They all began to yell at him now.
“Get out of our way or bleed in the gutter. It’s not a hard choice!”
“I’d love to run. And come back with reinforcements. But I swore an oath.” Baurus thought and began to whisper. His words were blown away by the thunder, the howling winds and the pattering rain. But his soul heard. And that was enough.

“I am Penald Baurus. Shehai Shen She Ru. The sword is the master, the man is the tool. Shehai Shen She Ru. We are Ra Gada. The wave that drowns the land, that cuts rock. Shehai Shen She Ru.”


While the robed men lost their tongues in taunts and threats, Baurus lost himself. Where once had stood a Redguard from the halls of Skaven, now stood two. One was the poet, always attentive to the words of men, both spoken and those kept in silence. The other was the warrior, silent and stoic. A wiseman in the lore of flesh and murder. Both shared the same form, though it was only the warrior that could move its bones and the poet that moved its tongue.
The two stood in silence as the robed strangers threw insults. The words rolled off the warrior’s skin as easily as the rain and passed through the poet’s ears like whispers. The warrior felt the weight of the ill-fitted armour and the slick water coating the street beneath his feet. He made an inventory of the weapons in his possession and those of his enemies. The warrior considered the likely motions the actors in the upcoming conflict were to take, drawing heavily on similar encounters in the past.

Meanwhile, the poet had been forced to listen to a story about a future meeting between the thugs and any females sharing his blood. Unlikely, he considered, since those women were either dead or likely to cut them down as well as the warrior planned to do right now. In fact, their mannerisms revealed a barely constrained anxiety. In other words, they were trying their best not to be afraid. When the warrior and the poet took one step forwards, their demeanor changed entirely.
“Stay back! Didn’t you hear us?! We’ll gut you, we really will!” They cried, waving their hatchets wildly at the air that separated them. The tall one with the sword was the only one who seemed filled with confidence to the point of arrogance.
“Shut up! Did the dummies make you into cowards? Cut and run!” He spat in anger.



They ran, and cut. The poet filtered out the disbelief that the warrior felt at the tactic being used. He’d expected something more elaborate, something better. The first two came in shoulder to shoulder and swung their axe straight down where he’d stood. They were good swings, basic but efficient. It was everything else which was wrong.
They did not accommodate for the shift in posture the warrior performed, nor the placement of his shield or the area threatened by his sword. Yes, they were both so focussed on that strike they were even unaware of their partner’s position. As one, their arms jerked back again as they stumbled into each other’s path and the warrior merely had to lean aside to dodge the attack and destroy their balance.

Left swung the shield, crushing ribs. Right went the sword to cut across the other’s arm then up the assassin’s chest, parting the robe like water, splitting flesh and following the curve of bone to the throat. Before either man had the chance to fall or even scream he stepped between them and cracked the rim of his shield on the left-side man’s skull.
“Two down.” The warrior thought and the existence of the two left him as they crumbled. Only the awareness of two low obstacles remained, for in the event he had to move backwards.
“Two to go.” Thought the poet.



The third cried as he slipped to a halt on the wet cobbles, just beyond the reach of the advancing warrior’s sword. Rather than moving in recklessly, the warrior slipped one of his knives into his shieldhand and prepared to throw it. As the clatter of a falling hatchet joined the clatter of the rain, the third turned and fled back passed the last of the robed assassins.
“Stand your ground, damn you.” The tall one growled but the frightened man paid him no heed. He kept running and vanished within the fog.
“Uriel isn’t that way. Let him go.”

“Tsk, when you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.”
The last said, pulled back his hood and drew his blade. Both actions gave the split entity that used to be Baurus valuable clues. The ashbitten face was Dunmeri, the sword like a hewn piece of stone, black and glossy as only Ebony could be. On their own they would have only given a general hint to the mer’s background but together it wasn’t so much a hint as a blazing sign. The poet put his conclusions into words.
“A Dunmer. Let me guess. Vvardenfell, ashlands? You must have been an Armiger, stationed at Ghostgate. A high ranking one at that.”

The Dunmer was stunned, just as the poet had planned. People that thrived on mystery were often unnerved when that mystery was dismissed. He regathered himself in moments however.
“False Incarnate!” He yelled, his features twisted in fury. He gestured, thumb and ringfnger touched, drew a jagged line in the rain. Then he charged. The black sword cut the air where the Blade had just been, its tip gouging a deep groove in the shield. The warrior retaliated, but the mer was already gone. With unnaturally powerful strides, he circled around to keep the shield between them. Again the sword claimed a piece from the steel disc and again the Dunmer dashed away before the counterblow.



The warrior began to retreat, zigging and sagging with the Dunmer. As if by coincidence, he stepped between the dead and the dying. This broke up the relentless assault. Fast as he was, the Armiger could not step onto the two bodies and he couldn’t reach across. As long as the Blade stayed where he was, he could only be attacked directly from the front or rear.
He could easily turn either way in the time it took the Dunmer to get around his beaten compatriots.

It was an impasse, one that suited the warrior well. With every breath Renault was carrying the emperor closer to safety. All he needed to do now was to keep his enemies attention.
“Ebony weapons are unparalleled in mass and their ability to keep an edge. Unfortunately, a weapon is only as good as the mind that wields it. And your perception is lacking.” The poet laughed, raising the ire of the Armiger once more.
“Ancestors take you!” The dark elf cursed but did not attack.

It happened a heartbeat later. A cold pierced the warrior’s guts, an ethereal hand closed around his spine. He swung his shield at the ghost that had appeared behind him. His arm was gripped by the killing chill and fell lifeless to his side. In that instant, the Dunmer attacked


“N’wah…” He croaked.


He looked down.


The ghost was no more, its incorporeal flesh cut.


His blood washed away in the rain.


The Redguard’s katana was buried deep in his gut.


Something whizzed by them.

The Blade pulled back his sword and ran.
“Damn I feel weak.” Baurus thought.


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Raven Camoran had only seen the aftermath. One fighter had swiped his shield behind him while simultaneously thrusting his sword forward where the other fighter obligingly impaled himself upon it.
“Archers, fire!” Raven had ordered. One fighter had ran off, the other fell down next to two lumps.

They had drawn closer where Raven saw one of the worst situations he could think off. The fallen fighter was Harrow, the lumps were two of the men he’d sent with him.


“My commands to you were clear. You were not to engage!” The Altmer growled to the wounded Dunmer, who gasped a reply between gritted teeth.
“Shut it Raven. I’m dying.” Harrow said.
Raven threw his head back and laughed loudly. It was a haunting laugh, one that made those around him shiver. He looked down again at the Dunmer.
“Yes. It is a mortal wound. To think that faith smiles upon me so. It has taken the leech from my sister. This is glorious!” He thought to himself. Then another thought came to him and he smiled.

He could let Harrow die, but it would be better if he saved his life. He pulled both of his hands from their sleeves and began to draw the arcane signs of healing over the mer.
“You won’t die, Harrow.” He said as he casted spells that mended the flesh and revitalized the blood. He was not concerned with removing the pain however, or sealing the wound in a way that would get the man back on his feet. Harrow cried out as his guts bent, as torn muscle flexed.
“Oh no. I am going to give you your greatest desire. The continuation of your worthless life. You think that is a mercy?"
"I shall do more for you.I won’t tell the prophet of what you’ve done. I won’t tell him how you charged ahead like a fool, got two of the faitful killed and stole the heart of a third."
"I won’t tell the Prophet of your phenomenal failure.”
The healing was complete now, as far as Raven cared. His smile grew wider, like the hungry grin of a predatorial beast.
“You get to do that yourself.”

He liked the terror he saw in Harrow’s eyes. That alone made it worth it.



A glint on the street, between the two dead Bosmer, caught his attention. Raven knelt down to see it was some sort of knife. It wasn’t like any kind he’d seen before, very thin, flat on one side and rounded on the other. The metal was like layer upon layer of steel and silver. Instead of a leatherwrapped grip, the blade simply narrowed down into a narrow strip. He picked it up and turned it in his hands but could not find a craftman’s signature. What he could tell was that this knife was not a guardman’s weapon. Neither was it part of the palace guard’s toolset. Which left only one answer.
”We picked today because we saw the inauguration of the Blades as a weakening of security. But it seems that the new hands of the Septim were skilled enough to compensate. Well played, Berius.”

He rose and waved his arm at the two martyrs laying side by side.
“Look around you! This is a Blade! When in the future you come upon one, remember this scene! Perhaps it will temper your lust for glory and let wisdom have its tongue.”
He shouted. He looked at Harrow and spat upon the ground.
“Take that cretin, that heretic, to the boats! You can all go guard that passage I told you about. I’ll chase down the Septim myself!”

Just a quickie.



Chapter 8.7



Blades hideout


The story had wandered on, taking up life and going places. I heard how the young Lord Emperor’s statue had been thrown out of the highest window of the highest tower by his protectors. It had landed in the deepest basin of the splintered sea where he’d sunk to its depths, to the study that was mine. I followed on the wings of a little bird, the tail of a fish.

On and on the statue ran, passed all the places I knew. Passed the lighthouse, the marketplace. Passed the singing galleon stuck on the reef. It danced upon the floors of Orgnum’s palace and presented a broken head to the throne.
“Fear not, child. This is a regret I must take. You shall be the king’s now. So it was promised.” The head whispered and smiled at the empty throne. Shadows leaped at the statue, with spears and malevolent spellsong.
“Foullness! This land isn’t yours!” The statue yelled at them as it jumped around to dodge the deadly assaults. knocking over a lantern, setting fire to the sea. It took me in its arms, spun me around in its wild dance. Then Kelth was there, all radiant like the sun, calling out to the statue.
“You do not belong here, marble man. Why do you take my beloved, steal her in fargone lands?” He said.

Master Zelthir was there as well, tutting about my failings in that brusque yet gentle manner of his.
“Healer third grade, have you forgotten your vows? Why do you stand there? Look, an old man requires your talents. Have you not given your oath?” He asked me, pointing at the Lord Emperor. The statue burned, the elegantly curling beard crackled and laughed.
“Help me. Give me flesh. Give, me, time!” The marble face wailed. It was shriveled now, like a dried corpse ready for the sealing.
I drew back, told it that I was only a second grade, that I didn’t know what to do. It grabbed me, melted, turned to ash.
“HELP ME!”
“No!”

The study burned down, Kelth and Zelthir went away till nothing was left. Just me floating amidst coral and an inky cloud near my hand.
“Child.” The cloud whispered.
“Child.” The inky face whispered. I watched it, couldn’t tell who it was. It changed colour, into the sun like Kelth. But it wasn’t the Kelth I knew. Wrinkles carved his smooth brow, blood colour his eyes red.
“Who are you?” I asked.
“A ghost. Wake up, child.”

My eyes opened.




I was surprised to find I’d nodded off into sleep. I was less surprised that my dreams had been the stuff of nightmares. They’d been that way the last few days, though I rarely remembered them so vividly. At least this one had ended mildly unnerving rather than horrifying.

I rubbed my eyes and tried to remedy the soreness in my back. Around me, the candles were now far shorted and the fire burned less hot.
“Wake up. I need to put some more wood in the furnace.” One of the armoured ones said to me. It was the older guy, the one….I couldn’t help but stare.
“Yeah, looks pretty nasty. Anyway, the emperor needs to rest now. Follow captain Renault. She’ll take you to a room where you can stay.” He answered of his own, making me feel embarrassed for being too curious. I dragged myself onto my feet and walked to the door while trying not to think. How did someone breathe without a nose? The steel woman was waiting for me. Ugly old Jauffre too, looked like he was readying himself to leave. He pushed the both of us through the doorway and then followed.


“Wait!” The emperor hissed, his voice stronger than I’d ever heard it before. We stopped and turned.
“You haven’t heard…the most important thing.” Jauffre shoved us into the hall and closed the door behind us.
“So this isn’t meant for Pyandonean ears. Oh, now I simply have to know!” I muttered to myself. Curiosity had always been one of my vices and I lingered at the door even as the armourlady stomped off.
Before she noticed and came back to drag me along, I managed to pick up two words.



“Tharn…lives.”

It was about time we checked up on how the other protagonist is doing. Last time we saw the Altmeri sorcerer, Angoril Bobardi, he was trying to find the assassins in the red robes. His search took him to Chorrol and then Kvatch. While in Low Kvatch, which is a 'temporary' and unofficial district located on the road between the cities of Anvil and Skingrad, he found his next clue. Ludius Bester, of the Kvatch Hall of Mercantile Interests, told him which Bosmer could have made the robe. Unfortunately, said mer got caught in a fatal accident not too long ago. Angoril still wants to inspect the store however and uses a coverstory to get in.

In his cover identity he is Tennil, a much simpler Altmer who is frantically looking for a dress for his wife after the last one got devoured by their dog.





Chapter 9: Ghosts of the Past

Low Kvatch

Ludius Bester had come to collect him long before sunrise.
“Best eat hearty.” He’d said. “The climb to Upper isn’t to be done on an empty stomach.”

It was no exaggeration. Like a stairway made for giants, the road to upper Kvatch looped its way up the mountain. Though the sun had not yet risen when they stepped upon the first tile, a good score of carts were ascending already. Each cart was pulled along the sideramps by as many as eight of the muscled beasts and carried food, lumber, stone, luxuries and a wide variety of other goods that had been brought to Low Kvatch by the caravans. Up above, Angoril Bobardi saw a trail of ants making their way downhill. More carts, this time with goods to be sold and taken to Skingrad or Anvil.
When Magnus rose in the east, it baked the path in its light and the temperature rose exponentially. To the Altmer the heat was a forgettable discomfort but to Bester it was a formidable foe that sapped him of his strength and breath. He had to rest often on benches that stood in the shade of a few lonely trees. It was therefore more due to the physique of his companion than the length of the climb that Angoril arrived at Kvatch proper several hours later.

He looked upon the massive walls, higher than ten men and thicker than Valenwood’s oldest trees. They were dark, pitted and scorched with the scars of many sieges long ago. Within the shadow of those walls, Kvatch was laid out like a maze of tiny alleyways and hovels as more and more people had to make use of the limited living space behind the stone ring. Only along the main streets did there seem to be any room to breathe or build spacious dwellings. Even that space however, was limited. The inner keep claimed Kvatch’s heart and the Divines mandated grand gardens around their temples. There was little doubt in the Altmer’s mind that the landprizes were as massive as the citywalls.



The portly Imperial brought him to a medium-sized building, two floors high, just off the main street. Its owner looked to be well-off, where it not for the fact that he was dead. There was a sign mounted above the front door.
‘Belgoth’s on demand fabrics’ it said in golden lettering. Bester produced a large keychain with a flourish and with almost excessive delicacy selected one of the barbed rods which he inserted into the door’s lock.
“I thought he sold clothing. Why does the sign not mention this?” Angoril mentioned when the door came unlocked. Bester shrugged in response.
“Belgoth sold both. Fabrics were his main product but if you wanted them stitched into something, he was always willing to set some local lasses on the job. Course, that cost extra.” He pushed open the gilded door and waved the Altmer in.
“We’re still looking for any heirs he may have had, but until someone steps forward who can make his or her claims stick, Mercantile Interests is going to sell off everything that isn’t nailed down.”


The Altmer looked around and let the first impressions wash over him. Belgoth’s store was a single room, quite spacious. On the right side, he saw a counter and racks filled with rolls of fabrics in all colours, including the elusive red. On his left, was a bizarre contraption of crisscrossing treads, levers, copper tubes and wooden frames.
“Was that, the loom?” He asked the heavy-set man he was with.
“Aye, that’s the cursed thing.” Bester answered. “Strung him right up, like a moth in the spider’s web. Feet reached for the ceiling, his eyes studied the floor. It was a dreadful sight, sir Tennil. Very dreadful.” He crossed his hands to ward off evil and then shook his head. Angoril also shook his head in what Bester took to be pity and empatic sorrow for the dead Bosmer. In reality, it was sceptiscism the Altmer felt. The machine looked like a fragile thing to him and he doubted it could have taken the weight of a man, even one as light as most wood folk were, and continue to function long enough to wrap up the poor soul.
“There are a few articles of clothing upstairs. Call me when you find anything of interest. I’ll be in the office. I just can’t stand being in this room, you see.” The merchant said as he walked away.

As soon as the Imperial’s shoes vanished up the stairs, Angoril began to investigate. He ignored the fabrics for now. Instead he focused his attention on the machine, or the flying loom as Bester had called it. The Altmer knew little of mechanical devices and the spinningmachine’s complexity was far beyond him. He didn’t dare guess at what each part did and the device wasn’t even complete.
“But would this Belgoth really forget that the Besters had stripped out some ‘vital components’? And say he had, then what of it? Given this store’s expense, I’d take him for a manager, not someone who gets his hands dirty on the workfloor.”
He told himself and let a finger run across one of the madly twirling pipes. When he pulled his hand back, the tip was covered in a fine layer of dust.
“It hasn’t been used in a while…wait.” Again he reached out to touch a section of the machine but this time, his finger was clean when he pulled it back.

He looked over his shoulder and listened for any noise coming from above. After some time, he made out the sound of paper rustling. Concluding that Ludius Bester was busy with paperwork of some sort and wouldn’t interupt, he returned to his investigation. A closer look of the clean section revealed ragged screw holes in the wood, as if whatever had been attached to it had been crudely torn free rather than unscrewed first. He found more screw holes when he looked further, most old and clean but some fresh and damaged.
“So assuming for the moment that the old holes are from when the Hall of Mercantile Interests removed the key parts, then someone has taken more components at a later date. And he was in a hurry.”
He listened for more activity from the Imperial upstairs before lowering himself to the floor and looking at the thick dust that covered the floor beneath the device. Spying a squarish bit of metal, he drew it towards him and turned it over in his hands. Two bent screws were sticking to it, and one side of the plate bore stenciled writing. It was a set of instructions for the use of the flying loom. The plate only contained a subset, but it was enough to reveal to him that the contraption could not work without constant activity of its operator. Every single movement required the handling of one or more levers and wheels. Even if Belgoth had fallen into the strings and gotten himself tangled up, the machine would have stopped instantly.
“That does it. Belgoth was definitely murdered. The perpetrator must have taken the instructions to keep the guards from realizing how impossible the accident was.”


He pocketed the plate and turned to the rolls of fabric that were lined up on the other side of the room. He was content to leave Kvatch in its misconception regarding this incident. It was far better than letting them know and in doing so, reopen the investigation. The red-robed men might learn of this and go underground. That was something he didn’t want to happen.
“They came too close to killing Uriel last time, even with me there. I’m not going to give them the chance to prepare a second strike. Anyway, I won’t find anything else down here. The weave is right, but there’s no silk.”

Angoril took a random roll of linen and tucked it under his arm before going upstairs. The second floor of Belgoth’s fabrics was smaller than the first. The area dedicated to the store was only the size of a small walk-in closet and held only three shirts. All the other rooms Angoril surmised to be the general living facilities. Bedroom, kitchen and the like.
“Sir Bester?” The Altmer called and heard the Imperial reply from behind one of the doors. He found the man sitting in a luxurious office, reading a document with one hand and plucking his dark moustache with the other.
“Sir Tennil. Did you find anything?” The man asked him. Angoril let his eyes casually wander across the room, seemingly without focusing on anything in particular. In that casual look however, he read the titles of several volumes, discovered the corner of a wallsafe peeking from behind a deershead, and noticed the deskdrawer from which Bester had taken the document.
“I found some linen. My wife would like a colour and I’ll look into a place to have it sewn up.” He answered while still looking. The other man put the file back in the drawer which he locked with a key. He then lead the Altmer out of the building while they discussed his other plans for the day.

“I was thinking of visiting the temple. It has been some while since I gave the Divines their proper due. The roads aren’t a place for worship.” Angoril told the man.
“You do that. Me, I’m going to visit my pop for lunch while I’m here in Upper. By the time I got back down, it would be far passed noon. Good day to you then, sir Tennil.”

He took one last look at the building as they parted and he turned for the spire of Kvatch’s temple.
“I’ll come back after nightfall. If Belgoth kept a copy of his accounting, it will be in that safe.”

I’ve just spent a very enjoyable rainy evening catching up with your story. This is outstanding! I love the originality, and the way you have portrayed game characters brings them to new life. Jennifer! Who knew that Renault was a hottie? (She must be with that name! )

I must mention how much I enjoyed Baurus’ badassery against ‘Call Me Death’ Harrow and the three Bosmer ex-woodcutters. That whole part was a beautiful thing to read.

I love this, cloudy!

Just stopping by to say I will catch up to this! I thought you abandoned it and left the forums!

Nah, I'm just slower than the drat gletsjer that swallowed Cloud Ruler Temple. (Is that even possible? Meh, I guess the Akaviri built things tough.)


Chapter 9.2


Mythic Dawn Temple

After the fiasco at the Imperial City, Raven Camoran and two others had travelled as fast as they could to the Dawn’s hideout. Carved out of stone and dirt by scamps, it was a temple to the glory of Mehrunes Dagon, Daedric Prince of Destruction, and his foremost servants, the Camorans. What Raven didn’t like about the place was how far removed from civilization it was. He hated how it sat in a northeastern corner of the province like the hiding hole of a common bandit. He hated how the nearest city was Cheydinhall, infested with too many Dunmer. He hated how the secrecy of the place had made it impossible to bring decent furniture. All they had was roughly hewn from local wood and a few small luxuries they’d sneaked in over the years.

He had made his own room, actually a large alcove walled off with timbers and a spell of silence to ensure some measure of privacy, in the deepest part of the tunnel-complex. There he simmered and stewed all day, angry at just about anything. At having to sacrifice his comfort here, at his worthless underlings, at his own failure and that stranger who had so easily thwarted his plans. He hoped that Ruma had done better, yet he feared having to explain to his father why he had failed what was supposed to be the easier task.
“This almost makes me believe in the existence of Talos. Who else but an apeothisized Septim could have so skillfully outmanipulated me?”




“Raven! I know you’re in here!” A familiar voice called at the same time the door was thrown open. In came the sister he’d just been thinking about, dressed up like an Imperial Forester in leathers and a chain undershirt. She held a small jewelry box made of misted glass which she slammed down on the table before him with enough force that he feared it would crack.
“When I speak to father, he,” She continued but he jumped up from his seat and cut her off.
“Father has been delayed!” He said.
The Altmeri woman blinked while she processed the new information. By the original plan, Raven and she would perform their respective tasks in the Imperial City, at the same time that other arms of the Dawn would strike at the Septims throughout the province. Their father meanwhile, would personally undertake another vital operation in the land of the Dunmer. He’d left a month or two ago but did promise to return for the fateful day. Yet he had neither visited or contacted her.
“What did he say?” She asked her brother.
“Nothing. We can only assume that something of import had him extent his stay in that land. Now that I have your attention. From the beginning please.”


“It is about Harrow. I want him out of that cell! The Dunmer you put on guard-duty actually had the guts to ignore my commands! I would have burned him to a cinder, were it not for our need to display unity.” He didn’t doubt for a moment she would. She had often demanded the right to cast capital punishment upon the unworthy. But their father had possessed the wisdom to deny her wishes in that, for their grip on their followers was tenuous as it was. If their acolytes would ever fear their masters would kill them, they might make foolish plots to escape or murder the Camorans first. So their father had decreed to his children that all the unworthy were to be cast off through accidents and ‘plots of the Septim’.

With a sigh Raven picked up the box she’d brought in. It was of a simple design, with rounded edges and light as a feather. He focused his eyes upon the patterns that were cast into its smooth shell, like milk that had been frozen in mid-stir. It was the focus he needed to keep his calm and not yell back at her.
“Speak to me not of him. I’ve had it with that sickening psychopath. Do you have any idea how many lives he spilled that night just for his amusement? Do you? I left this blasted cave with a dozen men. I returned with only two.” He spoke softly, yet unable to entirely hide the hatred he felt for the Dunmer.
“He did what he had to. Sacrifice the lesser for the Dawn. You are being a hypocrite, brother. I sacrifice, you sacrifice, father sacrifices. We all spend the lives of our followers like precious coin. What makes his so much worse?”

Raven let out a sigh again and placed the coffer upon the soft pillow he usually rested his head upon in the night. As for Ruma’s question, he knew the answer.
“The way he’s wrapped you around his finger. The way he will kill you, father, me, all of us the moment he believed he could and would gain from it.” He’d said those words or a variation upon them a hundred times, and she’d never once believed them. So he gave her another answer, just as true but not quite as important.
“We sacrifice because we must, not because we can. He claimed three for no other reason than because he thought it amusing to watch them fight a Blade. A Blade!” His self-control was slipping and he gripped the edge of the table till his knuckles turned white. But Ruma dismissed his argument with a dainty wave of her hand. There were no callouses on that hand or even the lightest speck of dust under her nails, Raven suddenly realized. It quite ruined the disguise.

The woman talked, unaware of her brother’s untimely distraction.
“And? He told me it was a mistake. He thought it was a man of the city watch. Anyone could have made that error. Also, you miscounted. One still lives though I do not know if he has returned.” She said. Raven tried to remember the Bosmer that fled. Neither his name or face came to him, though he was certain he’d written down both on some paper. He searched in his pockets, then remembered that he’d gave the scrap away.
“He hasn’t, and won’t have the chance to beg my forgiveness. The Brotherhood does not ask questions.” He finally said as he shook his head to himself. If the mer from Valenwood had rejoined that night, at the boats perhaps, he would have been in the mind to forgive him. After all, it was that mer alone who remembered his orders or had the wisdom to know when he was outmatched. But it was too late for any of that now. The Camoran’s were not generous with second chances.
“As for Harrow, my dear sister. You know this as well as I do. Better even, for no doubt he has regaled you with endless tales of his valour during the long nights. You know how he spent decades fighting the ashen hordes at Red Mountain. He knows the difference that training and proper weapons make. He knows that despite whatever faults the Septim may have, foregoing the training and arming of his men in his city is not one of them. Faith does not save the amateur from the professional. Even if it was just a man of the watch, the outcome would have been the same. Yes, Harrow probably would have slain the man in that case, but the three Bosmer would be just as dead.”


For a while they locked eyes, Raven somehow trying to will his sister to see things his ways through sheer force of will. At the end the woman threw her arms up in defeat.
“Alright, enough! I admit your point holds merit. Some. But you can’t blame him for drowning the men in the undercity. That was entirely beyond our expectations.” She said exasperated. Though savoring his small victory, Raven found himself forced to admit that her argument held some merit of its own. Harrow was not the only one at fault, much as he’d like to think that way.
“True, the blame for that is not his alone. I blame them just as much for following the orders of a man I’d deemed unfit to lead.” He admitted. One of his fingers began to idly play with the latch of the jewelrybox as he continued.
“What’s done, is done.The bigger issue with that incident is the stranger that caused the flooding in the first place. We were unaware that a sorcerer of noteworthy skill was imprisoned there, with his magicka unbound.”

It was the first Ruma had heard of it. All she’d known up to this point was Harrow’s view of affairs, which had focused on her brother’s failure to catch and kill the Septim, as well as his irritable mood on the long journey back to their sanctuary. If he’d mentioned an encounter between Raven and some sorcerer, it had slipped her mind.
“A sorcerer that can give him pause? I can’t think of many. Archmage Traven perhaps, but he never leaves the university these days. A troublesome matter.” She thought and decided to inquire directly.
“Who was he?”



“We never met face to face. I took some time to finish off the prison-guards while my Daedroth ventured down below. I figured that a beast like that should even give the mighty Blades a worthy challenge.” Raven muttered with his eyes on the ceiling as his thoughts returned to his one-man assault on the prison. It had begun easy enough. The weather had driven the outside guards inside and the locked gate could not resist his magics. A clerk had been in the entry-hall, one whose face and throat he’d burned away with an almost dismissive gesture. Still simple.


It had been afterwards that things became mildly difficult. Uriel Septim had warned the prison guards and every single one of them had been in the following room, swords drawn and facing the door from which he entered. The first one had nearly managed to strike a blow at him before he’d managed to draw the Daedroth from its outerworldly realm. Things became easy again as the beast torn the Imperials apart in that brutal way only an animal could. Oh, they’d shown courage resisting the great beast, he admitted that. Their swords had bent on its hide and they’d never yielded, never allowed access to the cells until the last had been tossed aside like a broken doll.
He’d sent the Daedroth ahead and taken a generous amount of time to finish off the mangled survivors. There were none whose wounds weren’t fatal, but the close encounter had retaught him to be ever careful and never allow even the slightest chance for his plans to be defeated.

But when he carefully descended the steps, he didn’t find the Emperor, or his Blades. He found his Daedroth standing in the corridor, immobilized by magic he’d never seen before or heard of. Bands of coloured light that tightened around each joint like a leash. And the cell, with the secret escape route, was wide open.
“I followed immediately, of course. But the undercity was flooded even as I crawled through the narrow tunnel that led to it. I nearly drowned myself.”
He’d been forced to turn back, with his confidence shaken. Coming back, he found that the cells were not as empty as he’d first believed. There was a prisoner on the opposite side of the corridor. He’d been quiet up to this point and Raven had entirely missed him on his way in. The beast naturally tried to eat the grimy mer the moment it managed to free itself from its bonds, but Raven had called it back. He needed answers.
“He told me that the sorcerer was an Altmer like us, and had been in that cell already at the time of his imprisonment. That’s all I know, actually. They did not exchange their autobiographies. But I do believe we may find more if we look into the guild’s records. A mage of that caliber doesn’t operate alone, nor does his education come from a vacuum.”

The prisoner had told him more, but none which he felt like telling Ruma. He definitely wasn’t going to tell her how he’d brought the filthy animal with him. That mer, what was his name? Dreth, was now his very own Harrow. A man who he owned completely, who could take the blame for him if he needed. Besides, he had been somewhat impressed at the mer’s tale of how he bested a Blade and held the emperor hostage, even if just for a minute. It sounded like bragging, but the Dunmer vowed it was the truth.
“Like I’d believe a natural liar. But there is a kernel of truth to his tales. There must be.”
They changed topics to lighter subjects, mostly about what Ruma had done and idle wondering about what could have detained their father. Finally, the woman stood up and walked to the door.
“I must prepare for the service. What will be done with Harrow?” She asked with her hand on the doorbolt. Raven covered his eyes and wished she’d forgotten about that. He knew she would not accept what he really wanted to be done. And the Camorans could never appear disunited.
“You may ensure he does not suffer discomfort. But that is all. He stays there till father says otherwise.”



She left Raven alone in his room. The man looked again at the little box she’d left behind. Finally he flipped the lid to see what was inside. Coins, each a full septim minted in some far corner of the empire, were stacked densely to the point of spilling, and the weight of this fortune pressed the coffer deeply into its pillow. He took one and turned it in his hand before flicking it contemptuously back onto the pile and closing the lid.
“Why is it that the moment one of our problems is solved, two more rear their head?”

Chapter 9.3

Blades’ Hideout


That short little nap I took next to the fireplace wound up being just about the only sleep I caught that night. The ‘room’ I was given turned out not to be very conductive towards revitalizing one’s body, mostly due to the lack of a fire. Granted, I was not familiar with the logistics of ones fueled by wood, or large-scale flames in general, but I couldn’t see why it was so hard to have one in the guest room. Just cut up a tree, right?
I say guest room, but even that was subject to a rather generous interpretation of the word. By using guest, one would expect to receive a certain form of hospitality. I certainly did, after the Lord Emperor had officially noticed and accepted my presence. He was the most important and powerful man on the continent, so I assumed that everyone lower on the rankings would follow his word. And yet they still threw me in a cell cold enough to store meats with no light or any furniture beyond a pile of dusty furs lying in a corner. I had a lot left to learn about Tamrielic court policy it seemed.

By the time morning came, or what passed for morning in a place with no windows and good clean sunlight, I was just about ready to be hung and boiled in a pot. I heard the door open, but it took me some time to free myself from the furs I’d curled up in.
“Skin is slick, white with no visible veins. Zero bodyhair. Flat toes, barbs between fingers of two to three millimeters in length.” My reply to that is not worthy of mention. Let it be known that my brain was as chilled as my toes and my nose felt like someone had jammed a piece of stonewater into it. I got out of the pile just in time to see the torchbearing figure toss something at me and almost smacking me in the face with it. It was a tome, heavy leather plated with goldleaf lettering and some artist’s impression of the world. Mostly out of habit, I flipped it open to a random page. I landed on a detailed treatise on the differences between meric and mannish development during pregnancies. Fascinating, though the drawing held some serious errors. Our ears don’t become pointy because they’re stretched out in the womb by bony hooks.
“Lexicum Sapiens Tamrielis, the most accurate and comprehensive list of all thinking beings in the world.” The figure continued. “I suppose you’re not hairy, but that’s hardly a distinctive trait and nothing else matches. Hell, you’ve got enough of a tan to claim Redguard ancestry. Uriel may believe he has recognized you but I need a very good explanation for why you don’t match the description.”

Slowly, my thoughts began to resemble those of the living again and I felt an anger taking hold. Put simply, this woman had decided that court policy didn’t apply because she read something in a book and real life didn’t agree with it. And there were all things wrong with it. It had Tamriel butchered into the title and I wasn’t even from there. And where did they get the bright idea to describe us by starting with our colour? The rest wasn’t too far off, but the colour? That’s the last thing one would bother to mention about a healthy Maormer. I mentally kicked myself in the head. There was the answer, all too obvious.
“I’m not dead.” I told her. She cocked her head to one side and chewed on it for a long, long time before giving a wonderfully intelligent reply. It was truly the magnificent display of which only a well-educated mind could conceive.
“Oh.”


She waved me on into the corridor and bade me to follow as she stomped off.
“Now tell me why you’re here. Somehow, I doubt you’re just a tourist.” She said, still suspicious for no reason. I wondered if this was the same woman who had thrown me in that cell last night. These roundears all looked the same, especially when they’re wearing helmets.
“That, is none of your concern. I am Maorlatta Orgnum, princess-heir and designated representative to lord Thras Orgnum, Lord Eternal of Pyandonea. My reasons are mine, to be shared solely with the Lord Emperor Uriel Septim the seventh, ruler of Tamriel.” Now be quiet and take me somewhere warm.
“And I’m, Jennifer Renault, his shield. His concerns are my concerns.” Which was a polite way of saying that it would really be in my best interests to tell her, lest I might receive hands-on instruction in the use and advantages of a metal sword. I giggled nervously for a bit and then let out a long drawn-out sigh. The day it was me bullying harmless kitchenmaidens again simply couldn’t come soon enough.
“The Imperial dynasty of Tamriel entered into a covenant with the house of Orgnum, in the year…” I paused. What year was it in Tamriel reckoning again?
“Now seventy-eight years ago. I remember it like it was yesterday.” That was actually quite a while ago now that I thought about it. I don’t think I’d even lost my babyteeth then.


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My aunt had woken me up around midnight, then unleashed her maidens on me. By the time the sun rose and we’d boarded her yacht, I’d been bathed, perfumed, dressed, polished, bejeweled and instructed till my ears bled. The summary of those lessons were shut up and don’t stare too much. I managed the first one pretty well, though that was mostly because I was struggling not to fall asleep on my feet again. The other, not so much.

Orgnum Thras, the ageless king of Pyandonea, did not reside in one place. Or rather he did, but that place swam freely among the countless islands of our realm. His palace happened to be near today and my dear aunt had decided it was time she presented me to grandfather and the other immortals. His estate, if it could be called such, was of the species commonly referred to as the king’s beetle. No doubt because of its oldest, greatest specimen. And huge it was, larger than anything I’d seen, including auntie’s island. On its back rose towers of spellspun glass,banners of all colours, shapes and sizes. A flock of firebirds weaved among the flying gardens and above it all the living island’s manycoloured wings waved to carry a soft breeze over the palace and its grounds. Beneath, a hundred legs walked across the seabed and a second pair of wings sweeped water into its cavernous mouth. Auntie had to tell me to pick up my chin.

I could go on for hours on everything and everyone I saw, but most of it was unimportant in the grand scheme of things. What was important happened in the night. A stranger came into the palace, despite the best efforts of the king’s men to remove him. I remember being scared of him. He was too tall, dressed in black like some demon, with eyes the colour of blood. He strode in there as if he was greater than the immortals around him. Perhaps he was, he didn’t seem to be having any trouble with the best duelists in Pyandonea. I don’t know what the man said once he’d reached the throne, but the king removed his mask for him. Well, nobody left standing was going to try and hurt the stranger after that. Not after receiving the greatest honour a Maormer could get.

It was five years ago that I finally learned who that man was and why he’d come. So now I was here, as one of the main actors in the second part of this play.


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In the time I’d spent reminiscing, Renault had brought us to a kitchen. There a pot was bubbling and steaming away over a set of glowing rocks, big cleavers, ladles and spoons hung on one wall and racks filled with urns lined the others. There was also a spiraling staircase going down in the center and some doors leading to other places. Best of all, it was deliciously warm in here so naturally I flowed to the source of it next to the pot.
The woman took the biggest cleaver and opened one of the doors. A wave of new cold came from the other chamber which seemed to be made entirely of stonewater, and contained a single piece of hung meat. Well, so much for the heat. She started hacking away at the carcass while grunting words inbetween swings.
“Pelagius Septim the fourth held the throne back then. Treaties by tradition fall upon the passing of the ruling emperor. If you’re here to renew it, you’re rather late.”

I hadn’t heard about that, but I could see them coming up with this. I remembered the long row of portraits that had lined my room in the Cyrodiil palace. If Tiber was the first emperor, and only four centuries (Aha, so I did remember the year!) had passed, then that line was far too long. Uriel must have been his son, or his grandson if the Tamrielics are sickly and old before their time. To have this many emperors between them, the only answer could be violent upheaval. Murder of the last Lord Emperor by the next and so on. I could see why some usurper didn’t like the idea of upholding the agreements with the allies of his enemy. But that had nothing to do with me.
“The covenant was sealed and done by the envoy of the Lord Emperor…then prince Uriel Septim, specifically in the name of the Septim house. As long as the bloodline remains intact so will the agreement. Moreover, the original signatories still live so I disagree with your assessment.”

I could see on her face she didn’t buy it, but she kept quiet till she’d finished chopping off a large piece of meat and carried it out to the kitchentable. I was happy to close the door behind her.
“I’m no politician so I’ll take your word for it. For now. And, what is this agreement?” She asked me in the end.
“That is,” I began automatically but caught myself. It really was none of her concern. This was between the Houses Orgnum and Septim, not Orgnum and an overzealous guard-and-cook. Then I noticed that she was still holding the cleaver. I let out a long sigh. I really wanted to get home and away from all these metalbearing murderers.
“It was a loan.”

She laughed, a loud and thoroughly unpleasant guffawing that made my head hurt. She actually had to put down the cleaver before she hurt herself, so funny was apparently my joke.
“A loan?” She spurted, gasping for breath. Then she began to laugh uncontrollably again.
“Centuries of no contact, your whole people reduced to some fairy tale I never even heard of, and now you swing by to ask for money? That’s ridiculous!”
I shook my head and let out another sigh. Of course it was ridiculous. That’s the thing I said, five years ago.


“Pyandonea was approached by Tamriel. You swung by to ask us for money.”

Chapter 9.4

Upper Kvatch, Temple gardens


He approached the question of Uriel’s regular ‘gifts’ as methodically as he could. Angoril began from the outside of the temple grounds and would gradually work his way in as he sought some material eveidence of large-scale spending. First was the park that marked the temple-grounds. He saw tiny hump-trees that normally grew within the canopies of their far larger Valenwood cousins. Each had been groomed into the representation of a person, animal, structure or some part of a mythical scene. There were also flowers of many kinds and marble statues of the temple’s long succession of head-priests. While impressive, the Altmer had to conclude that there was nothing to warrant a yearly donation from the emperor. The statues were commissioned only rarely, the flowers were standard and as for the hump-trees – well, he could see Valenwood’s border the moment he stepped outside the main gates. They were not imported from some far away place.

He walked on paths of crisping gravel and circled the gardens twice before shifting his attention to the main temple itself. Like all Cyrodiilic temples built in the early third era, back when Reman Septim possessed the throne and his conquering armies swept the continent, the Kvatch temple did not fit in any clear architectural style. It was crafted from heavy stone, smooth bricks greater than a man assembled into a square groundplan and thick foundations as found in the High Rock style. It reached for the skies and was built to look light in spite of the gray bricks, with coloured glass spanning the vacuous gaps. This he knew to be an attempt at emulating the glass cities of Summerset, though there were no spells infused into its walls which limited the height that could be reached. To support the high ceiling there was both an internal and external framework of arcs and beams, patterned after the skeletal interiors of the Vvardenfell crab-shells. Finally there were figurines of beasts and saints that walked across the frame in an endless parade, reminding one of Skyrim from which the first Septim hailed.

His first thought had been that the temple was undertaking some grand renovation-project, since that was how Uriel’s annual gift had been listed in the book. But no one whom he’d asked had mentioned such a thing. Still, his questions had by necessity been rather roundabound and secretive. He had not asked them directly as much as he had tried to steer them towards the subject. So he’d still held out hopes.
But though there were all the discolorations that indicated newer sections and recent repair-work, it all looked like it had been done piecemeal. A piece of a flying wing here, a new arm on St. Pelinal there. Expensive, but still far from the 5000 septims Uriel donated each year.

The Altmer shook his head and walked up to the double-doors that were opened wide to permit entry for the believers. Once through, he knew that his movements would be more restricted by the unwritten laws of behavior and pietous humility. It was somewhat of an irony that the temples prided themselves on the lavish decorations of their interiors, the whiteness of their altars, yet at the same time considered it to be rude for anyone to actually look up and see. His best option would be to keep his head respectfully lowered. It was a good thing that one of the demands the Divines made was for their floors to be clean and as reflective as a mirror.



He moved slowly yet deliberate, both to maximize his opportunity to study the floor and to avoid suspicion. Through the reflections he noted that the ceiling revealed no new clues. That left but three reasons for Uriel’s anomalous donations. The first was that the emperor had nothing to do with the monetary gifts. There were more than a few persons who enjoyed the Imperial privilege to use money in the emperor’s name. While it was considered good grace to inform their liege of the spending, this was not necessary. The Imperial Battlemage, Ocato, was one of them and Angoril could name a dozen others. Or rather, he could name the positions these individuals kept. His knowledge of who kept the stations was embarrassingly out of date and he had not yet found the time or means to rectify this weakness.
“Add one more thing to do to my list then. Ah, things are never as simple as the chroniclers would have you believe.”

The second hypothesis could go hand in hand with the first, but was not bound by it. This one was simply that someone somewhere was skimming from the temple’s income. Perhaps a priest with a gambling-addiction, or a desire for more luxury than Divine doctrine allowed. Unlikely though, especially over a timeframe as large as the one he was working with. The donations had begun almost immediately after Jagar Tharn’s death and the return of the true emperor to his throne. Someone should have noticed by now.

The third and last hypothesis turned around the idea of donations. Ocato had written them down as such, but politicians lived in a world of metaphors, hyperboles and half-truths. It was possible for the annual gift to not be aimed at the temple, but at a person or persons instead who held connections to this place. Blackmail was one answer that fit this idea, though again the long years it had been continued made this unlikely. The other was a form of gratitude for some service rendered to the Uriel Septim or one of his subjects, a service the man considered valuable enough for this neverending gift.
“In any case, I am unlikely to see it by just walking around in the public areas. Ah well, it was an unimportant goose-chase anyway.”



With the matter closed as far as the Altmer was concerned and since he was here anyway, he wondered if he should take the opportunity to pray for real instead of merely pretending. It wasn’t a habit of his, but it had been more than thirty years. Now would be as good a time as any. But to which entity should he direct his prayers? He did not know who the patron deity of Kvatch was, though he doubted it mattered much. Should he pray to Akatosh, ask the dragon to rewind time on his account?
“I’ve asked the lizard to merely slow it down and it never answered. I doubt it would be willing to go through the extra effort.”
Julianos, for wisdom and insight to help him along? Or to Arkay, for the sake of all those whose lives he’d brought to an early end. Angoril scoffed at the last idea. Arkay would care not for his actions, even if he felt it had been for the good of Tamriel. In fact, most of the Divines would refuse to hear him for that reason. If they ever listened in the first place.
“May I help you?”
He turned ready to politely yet resolutely brush off the eager priest. Any such thoughts he entertained were blown away when he found himself looking right in the eyes of Geldall Septim, first prince of Tamriel.



It all whirled through his head. Why was Geldall here? Did he recognize the sorcerer? Wasn’t he supposed to be dead? He looked younger than he should.
It was that last thought that let Angoril grip the reins on his mind once more. Time had always been kind to the Septims, but Geldall Septim was pushing sixty by now. The white-robed man before him looked like he was still in his mid-twenties. Too young to be the prince. Besides, with the synchronized wave of assassinations, the last thing Geldall would do was to publically serve as a priest. Especially not in a bustling temple as this one. He had to be a mere lookalike.
“I was just wondering who the patron deity of this temple was, brother.” Angoril said and bowed lightly. The man who looked like a Septim nodded.
“Our patron would be Talos, though all the divines are praised in equal measure here. You may speak to whomever you wish, I am certain your prayers shall be heard.” He said and chuckled.
“I do look like him, don’t I?”

Ever since the first shock, Angoril had kept the tightest control of his expression and posture. As such, looking down on the priest was the befuddled and apologetic Tennil. Inside, Angoril again reviewed the man that stood before him. He was cunning. Was it a mind meant for intrigue, or simply the people-skills all good priests would learn sooner or later?
“Was I that obvious? Forgive me, I did not mean to stare.” He babbled. The man shook his head and chuckled softly.
“You and half Cyrodiil, my friend. And why not? That’s my father over there.” He said and waved at a buste located to the left of the main altar. URIEL SEPTIM VII, 3E 412, the plaque said. With the marble head to compare against, the Altmer realized that this priest really looked like a son of Uriel. They carried the same hard chin and aggressive forward thrust of their brow.
“When the count commissioned a buste of the emperor, he couldn’t arrange to have the emperor model so he went to my old man. Folk have always said that we Tanner men have a pinch of the dragon in us. My father used to joke, that if the stories about Tharn replacing the emperor’s sons were true, I should become the new prince. Of course, it’s only a story.” The young priest continued, oblivious to Angoril’s eyes and mind who thought differently.
“With you, it is more than a pinch.” Everything, the payments, the timing, it all fell into place.
He decided to take a gamble. He had to know where the man stood and what he was willing to do.
“But the Septims are all dead now. It said so in the courier. What is going to happen to us next?... Perhaps you should take the throne. The council does its best surely, but we need a face to look up to.”

Tanner’s generous smile froze on his face. For a split-second, he looked angry, though not at Angoril.
“Oh no. Not me, not ever.” He whispered, “This temple is big enough for me. I’m not the man you or anyone should want as their emperor. Besides, you shouldn’t believe everything the courier says. They’re still searching the rubble and Septims don’t die easily. And lord Uriel has been emperor since before I was born. That is a long time to rule a continent. He’s done well, never complaining and never faltering in his duty. When the Divines finally grant him the rest he must desire, it will come to him through peace, not an assassin’s blade.” The words weren’t special, they lacked the elegance of a prepared speech. But the conviction with which the man spoke was contagious. The Altmeri sorcerer realized that the emperor’s voice, that almost supernatural charisma all Septims possessed, was strong with him. He tried to match that conviction in his answer, though he felt he came far short of it.
“You are right, brother. We mustn’t give up hope. The Divines will guide us.” He just wished he believed it.

Brother Tanner guided him in a prayer for the well-being of Uriel Septim. They whispered the old phrases, clasped their hands and lit the candle. Angoril even added two full golden septims to the offerings on the altar. When afterwards the young Imperial bid him farewell and turned to seek for others that would need his aid and guidance, Angoril begged his attention.
“Ah, permit me to ask you one more thing, brother Tanner.” He said and continued after the priest nodded.
“Would there be a Rajn Treesap among your flock? She’s a Bosmeri woman and related to an old friend of mine.” He was somewhat startled by his own admission, and realized that he’d spoken the truth. He did once have a friend who shared family-ties with the woman.
The priest scratched his chin as he thought.
“Treesap…Treesap. I don’t think I’ve heard the name. Rajn Treesap - Oh, but I do know a Rajn Geydar. Bosmeri through and through. She owns an eatery not too far from here. The Eight Provinces, it’s near the south gate.” Angoril made the connection in an instant.



Aran Geydar and Rajn Treesap. Both had been mentioned in Ocato’s book. The Emperor had ordered an investigation into them in 403, for a considerable but not overwhelming sum of 531 septims. The same year there was an investigation costing over ten times as much into a ‘Cluson Alkad’, and the year after that was the first mention of a ‘Luper Alkad’. Over the years the Alkad-case had snowballed into a minor economic and political crisis it seemed, though he was unsure of how this was connected with Treesap and Geydar, if at all. The price-points were too dissimilar, hinting at a difference in priorities. In any case, he wasn’t too surprised to find that the two had stepped into marriage. It had been thirty years and few people remained single for that time.
“Thank you, brother. I will head there then. I am becoming rather hungry.” Angoril said and bowed.
For a moment, the humor Tanner had displayed when he first approached the Altmer returned.
“One last word of advice, my friend. Don’t ask what’s in the ‘Argonian surprise’.” He said with a wink and a smile.

Reet, I'm so nearly caught up...I'm starting the last part next...

This is simply an amazing story, and I'm absolutely loving it...

That bit with Pydonea was fantastic...Simply amazing...

I'm loving so much the way this is different to the game, and how you're weaving other parts of the "Lore" (*Shudders*) into it...Absolutely brilliant...

I also admire your persistance...I'm sorry I wasn't around to encourage more...

But hey, I'm back now... ...

Well done, I shall finish this very soon...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...


EDIT!!!...Oooh!! Oooh!! Should I read Brother Tanner with a particularly Sheffield-ish accent?... ...(Sean Bean is from Sheffield btw... )...

Excellent stuff matey!!...

Nice one!!...

Well, the lore of Pyandonea I am aware of is rather limited. I'll have a rant on that and something else later. As for Sean Bean/Brother Tanner, you can use any accent you like. Heavens know I can't tell one accent from the other anyway.



Chapter 9.5


Blades’ hideout



I was back in the Lord Emperor’s quarters. The venerable elder did look better than last night, if not choking on one’s own lungs could be considered an improvement. Speaking as a healer and using Maormeri anatomy as a guide, I wasn’t going to give him more than another week or two in here. The air was too stuffy, it was either too hot or cold and the scented candles while a nice touch, only worsened the air problem. There was nothing I could do about that however and given his womanguard’s beliefs, it would be best for me to finish my duties and get out before then. It was a horrible thing to contemplate, but I told myself that my loyalty to Pyandonea had to weigh heavier than the respect due to one man in his final days. Besides, I didn’t want to be here when all the prospective candidates began to fight for who got to sit on the throne next. If they hadn’t already started. It did seem to be the tradition here. Sure, he had sons and daughters, but how much would that deter the other hopefuls?

“The covenant stated that we, House Orgnum, would provide the House Septim, with the possession and free use of an object.” Renault didn’t know how fast she could finish cooking and hurry me through all the paperwork and formalities that were necessary before one could have an audience with the Lord Emperor. Jauffre had not filled out any of the two dozen forms she sped me through, but I was wise enough not to mention that. I did however make a mental note that the Tamrielics didn’t seem to care much for diplomacy unless a great deal of wealth was involved. At that point you could just see them reshuffle the priorities in their thoughts.
“Object. You will tell me what that is.”
The man himself. He and two of the guards had insisted on remaining when I tried to send them away. The guards I was willing to tolerate, not in the least because they were armed and I wasn’t. Bald Jauffre however, him I’d rather thrown out beyond the outer reefs. Like the guards, I couldn’t get him out of the room, but I could ignore him.
“In return, the house Septim, or any person granted authority to act in its name, would give a payment of blood.”

Faces of confusion and even disgust all around. Even without the aid of colours I could tell. I wondered how much of what I was telling here was unneeded. Surely the Lord Emperor had to remember the articles of the treaty? Wouldn’t it just be easier and quicker to skip to the relevant part and ask for him to uphold his end? Wasn’t I implying that the Tamrielics couldn’t remember their promises and were untrustworthy as a result? That was how I thought about it, but my mentor had explained that I was thinking in reverse. The idea was not that the other party couldn’t be trusted to know what they’d signed, but that one’s own party remembered and wasn’t trying to sneak in new articles that had never been agreed upon.
“Blood is family, mother to child to grandchild.” I explained. What did they think I’d meant?
“The head of House Septim or any appointed representative of such that meets the House Orgnum’s needs, would father a male child with a woman of Pyandonea. This son would then be wed to a woman of House Orgnum.” Where the blood could be kept nicely on a leash.

More disgust. Why? Weren’t marriages and bloodlines a known and well-spread political tool? I’d been told that it was as true for the Tamrielics as it was for us. Renault shook her head.
“And you’re the one they sent for that. My liege, I must remind you that you are in no condition to sire any heirs. I know it is of the utmost importance right now, but it simply won’t happen.” She said. Important? I had to think about that for a moment before I remembered that the Lord Emperor had fled here despite his health. What happened to his sons and daughters? Perhaps they hadn’t been so lucky. I then realized what else she’d said. Did she think I was here to collect a son? The thought made me wish I’d been wearing a mask. I had a nice one, but they took it before tossing me into the dungeon. It would have made it so much easier to hide the colours of my face.
“Come on, captain. Let’s be honest here. This is a matter of age more than health.” The other guard, the mudman, said. Jauffre and the Emperor said nothing however. The fake monk looked as if he was chewing a sour flatworm while the old man in the bed merely seemed too tired to let anything show.
“Brother! Please, remember your manners.” Renault admonished and the mudman shrugged.
“It’s true though.” He muttered. His attempt at humor was ill-timed, but at least it showed he wasn’t stressed out and likely to put his iron at my throat.



I cleared my throat to draw the attention back to where it belonged and continued.
“The son was sown the night after the covenant was sealed. It’s done.” I said as lightly as I could. I did wonder however. What if the Lord Emperor had offered that alternate arrangement? His age and status would make him a desirable father. But it would also mean breaking my own oaths and voiding the covenant I was here for. Which was the greater accomplishment? Sealing the foreign blood that had already been obtained, or trying to bring in some more? It didn’t matter I suppose. I wasn’t going to get any from the Lord Emperor and he really was the only eligible individual I knew of. Besides, my lack of expertise would just lead to embarrassment and a taint on my House.
“I hope to get back on him later, but for now let us discuss the last article of the covenant.”
“No, no! We’re getting back on this now. Who is this heir and where is he? There is no way I’m going to let any Septim marry some backwoods fish-eating mother of mine when I need him on the throne right here!” Jauffre barked. I couldn’t ignore that. Acting in general like a self-obsessed jerk? Fine, I’m used to it. But I would not accept anyone insulting my House or my personal honour. I faced him and though my heart was beating madly and my face blazing, I kept my voice cool and level.
“For starters, I take offence at being called both backwoods and unable to observe my familial duties. Secondly, I do not care for the opinion of a liar and an oathbreaker. This treaty was made only seventy-eight years ago between the Houses Septim and Orgnum. One so young does not get broken at mere convenience, especially when someone who is not of either House calls for it. Now I demand for all interruptions to be withheld until I have said my words.”

The bald monster opened his mouth to scream again but three whispered words made him clam shut as if he’d been punched in the face.
“Jauffre, back down.” It was the Emperor, the first time he’d spoken since his greeting when I was brought in.
“Thank you, your Grace.” I added a another thank you, a silent one, to lady Renault. The form of address she’d suggested was much easier than saying ‘Lord Emperor Uriel Septim the Seventh, ruler of Tamriel’ all the time. And that had been about the shortest form I’d been given before I left home. I took a deep breath to both calm me down and prepare for the next mouthful in my rehearsed and probably still rather simple speech.
“When a full hundred has gone, measured in years from the moment of signing, the object shall be returned to house Orgnum. The head of House Septim, whomever he may be, shall personally deliver it from his hands to the hands of House Orgnum’s representative. I am aware that time has not yet passed, but my father the king requests an earlier return. In exchange, we brought many riches…”
My voice faltered. Many riches, our ship’s belly had been filled to the limit with them. The handlers had to process and inject nutrition directly into its bloodstream since it couldn’t eat for itself. And now I had nothing to give but the clothes I was wearing and even they were borrowed. I swallowed. What I had to say next was the stuff of nightmares but it had to be done. House Orgnum always upheld their end of a promise, no matter the cost.



I spread my arms and bend forward till my nose brushed my knees. I kept that pose and bit back the tears.
“Those riches have been lost.” To betrayal of my own people no less. “As is customary in these situations, considering the inability of House Orgnum to repay the House Septim through material wealth, as the nearest Maormer able to represent House Orgnum in financial matters, I hereby place myself at the service of House Septim till the debt of my House has been repaid, or till the original time as mandated by the covenant has come to pass.” If only I could be air and fly.





Rant time:

Ok, let's get started on Pyandonea. Using solely my recollections for the moment, here's what I know. Pyandonea is an island kingdom surrounded by fog and also the home of big snakes and water spirits. They've had wars with Summerset Isle. Their king, Orgnum Thras is described as ageless and possibly immortal. The Maormer themselves are described as having skin that is white like pallid jelly (I'm not sure what to imagine here so I just think of it as white pudding). I've also come across a reference of chameleon-powers. Their ships are described as membraneous in the wolf-queen books I think.

Now let's extrapolate that a bit. The islands, the fog and even the wars with Summerset where easy enough. There was no real need to add anything to that right away. But the skin and chameleon ability where a bigger issue. If the Maormer had been in a game, their chameleon would have probably been turned into a greater power for game balancing reasons. But I don't like that. I can understand the need to balance the races so one isn't objectively superior (too much) to another, but the games are compressed as well. Days go by in a matter of minutes so even if you can turn invisible only once a day, the cooldown isn't too bad.

But what if we kept it like that in the lore? Things become all kinds of messed up then. Redguards can go into murder-mode once a day. Orcs can get angry once a day. Bosmer can talk to a single animal once a day, Imperials can charm your shoes off once a day, Khajiit can look crazy once a day etc.

It doesn't make much sense to me so I had to look at the choice of making it a skill that could be toggled at will. And at first that was just what I did. I turned the chameleon from what was probably intended to be magic into a feature of their skin. Latta could go invisible when she was scared with an instinctive shift of her hues (which incidentally makes the clothes she wears a bit of a hazard when the threat is real but let's skip over that). Later on I pushed it even further. If the Maormer could change their skin-tone on instinct, what if they learned to control it? What would they use this ability for? Hunting perhaps, or even communication. Like the peacock spreads its feathers, different colours and marks could mean different things in Pyandonean society.



Moving on to the king, Orgnum Thras. You may have noticed that I called him king Orgnum up till now. That is how he's most commonly referred as when I did my first research and the name stuck. When I found out it was his first name and so he should have been of House Thras, not House Orgnum, well I felt a bit silly. I blame the habit of the naration to use first names too much. Uriel is way too often referred to as Uriel instead of lord Septim. It's too informal. Fortunately, there was an easy way out. Just have the Maormer value the House over the individual to the point the House is mentioned first and we're done. So in Tamrielic it would be 'Thras of House Orgnum', and in Pyandonean it is 'of House Orgnum, Thras'.

One other thing often mentioned about Orgnum is how he is immortal. Again extrapolating from that, I decided that the Maormer put great value on one's age and by extention see immortality as a great achievement. All the greatest Maormer are immortal. There are easier ways to immortality than the one enjoyed by the king and his inner circle, but those are silently mocked and seen as less pure. The mask-thing that was mentioned in Latta's flashback and again here, is another random idea related to this. With the mask, there remains some doubt over whether or not there really are immortals. And well, if your face is likely to broadcast your inner feelings to anyone with eyes, it might help to put on something to cover it when you're playing at politics. The upper class all tend to wear concealing clothing and elaborate masks for that purpose. To have someone remove his or her mask is by extension then, a sign of honesty and great trust.


With the Maormer out of the way, let's go to Brother Tanner. People who have played Oblivion for more than an hour probably know who I'm talking about. Angoril let slip that he's figured it out as well but for those who haven't, I won't spoil it any further. We'll hear plenty about him and maybe I'll have another rant when his place in the story has become clear. For now, let me just say two things.

One, I think that having Jauffre literally explain the entire plot to the player five minutes after the tutorial dungeon was a huge mistake. As a Morrowindophile, I still have to admit that the third Tes game was too slow to get its plot going, but Oblivion went too far into the other extreme. We get to learn just who the bad guy is, who his minions are, why they are a threat now and not before and what we need to do to stop them. And this is coming from a guy who literally didn't know the bad guy could possibly be a threat before you marched in and repeated Uriel's vague one-liner to him.

Two, that scene with Angoril and Brother Tanner was solely there for Tanner's sake.

Um...I hope that rant wasn't aimed at me... ...

Aaaamywho, I know what you mean...And I really thought the whole Pydonea thing was brilliant...I do genuinely love what you're doing with it...

As for the name thing with House Thras thing...I did much the same with the Knights thing...I know that it's the first name that comes after the Sir, so Sir Areldur, Sir Thedret, their names are Areldur and Thedret, but they felt more like Surnames to me, so I changed them...It's all down to what you want to do I think...

As for the Jauffre thing, I do agree with you...If he knows so much, why the hell didn't he guard better, and why hide himself out there if he's head of the order?...Bit far away from the action no?...

Aaaamywho...

As ever...Absolutely brilliant stuff...Love the idea of the living ship thing being so full they have to feed it I.V. style...

I also love the idea that she's confused by the briefness of the human span of life...That's brilliantly done...

Absolutely well done Jack...Keep it up!!...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

Re-reading all to get re-oriented to the story, then catching up the chapters I've missed in Part 2:

Part 2 - Chapter 7 - This chapter is huge in detail! This glimpse into the workings of Angoril Bobardi's mind is very revealing - would not want to be this man's enemy, his mind is like a steel trap!

Absolutely love this chapter, from his plan being turned down and then implemented (one of those details I loved so much in this chapter) - to the descriptions/workings of Kvatch/lower Kvatch!

My favorite line in this chapter that tells so much in one sentence is this one:




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Absolutely loved the explanation for the disappearing mages robes - Awesome world building!

***



ROFL!!!

Latta and the Emperor - Loved this whole chapter, but the section where she is surprised he knew her name and said it properly - a wonderful detail! (I was comparing it to (Example: Dagoth Ur).

Sorian's personality shined through this whole chapter - his descriptive phrases were perfect! (and funny!)

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Loved the lore and history of Berius brought in here, the reminders of Tharn and the Imperial Simulacrum! This scene between Berius and Wulfharth was absolutely perfect, easily visualized. GAAAH! A cliffhanger!

***
The delay to act instantly by Berius was a sensational touch of realism - I am in awe of what you did with this entire scene from the cliffhanger end of that last chapter till the end of this one - that split second of hesitation in Berius manipulated the tension of that scene to the NTH power - Huge Write on this sequence, HUGE! This was stunning, I am in awe after reading this!

Not sure if you've ever read Alexander's "Cyrodiil" (the Administrator of this site) - but you just matched him in his ability to throw a curve to the reader and knock them off their feet - LOVED this chapter!

And then Holy Crap, what a fight - then what a result! That was freaky! Awesome creativity on this, I absolutely love what you are doing with this story! It just keeps getting better!

You can't say you haven't done a fight scene properly in ages now, every bit of it had me at the edge of my seat, you had the tension ratcheted up hugely before the assassin even entered - and that killing move was brilliant! I need the "I'm not worthy" emoticon on this whole chapter!

***



Oh, please don't change from what you are doing now - this is coming to life and inspired, that is felt powerfully in the read!

OMG, another cliffhanger! Since you introduced Berius, this story has picked up momentum like a juggernaut, relentless force pushing the story and reader along to what we think may happen but aren't sure because you are a master of throwing curves where least expected! This is hugely immersive!

***
"I'll be back..." (said in Arnold's voice)

Sorry, had a busy few days. Adding this:


Your portrayal of Camoran is perfection, you have captured his arrogance and personality traits well! The scene with his initiates had me rolling! This line in particular sums Camoran up:



Then enter Harrow's statement and I completely lost it!





Amazing detail in this whole paragraph, the rod itself and casting of the portal - huge detail!

Part 1 made the reader love the characters, and stay interested in the story - but Part 2 brings the story to a life of its own. The momentum has picked up and the pieces beginning to come together - this is a huge write, Jack! I am loving it!

Back to reading!

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Your censor woes: ROFL !!! I have seriously thought about writing myself a PM with every curse word imaginable on it just to see how it would be altered - can never think of any but the basics when I get the blank page in front of me, lol.

As far as not getting Mankar's personality down, I had erroneously thought you were getting him down to a T (everyone was even calling the Camoran in your story "Master") - Then someone mentioned his name, and I realized it was Raven being portrayed, lol. Oops, sorry. Still, the personality was fitting of Raven as well.

The inner dialogue of Renault is outstandingly done here, fine time to realize she isn't fit when Uriel's life is in her hands! Loved that, and her perceptions of Baurus.

Oh crap, what a cliffhanger ending to this chapter! AWESOME Write !!! Loved this chapter!


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HA! LOVED this whole section!



This whole section gave me chills! I have been riveted to this page from the time the chapter opened!



This is AWESOME! Baurus is a Sword-singer! What a huge surprise you tucked in here! AWESOME! I got goose-bumps on my arm from this!


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McBadgere: Heh, maybe just a little. To be honest, I like to just vent about random things from time to time. The only problem is that my rants end up competing with the actual update in length.

And perhaps it is about time that someone tells Latta their age. I did some math and (if the emperor didn't age those ten years he was banished by Tharn), she stands a good chance of actually being older than Uriel Septim. Which is kind of ironic, given how she measures the respect someone is due by how much older than her they are.

mALX: I'll stop using excuses. Glad you like it at least. And you're not the only one who at first thought that Raven was Mankar. I admit that I aimed for that by not giving his name right of the bat.


The hardest part of the flash-back chapter was probably figuring out how to play the Blades and the Dawn against each other. Both had to look competent, but I couldn't have them guess each other's plans so perfectly you'd think they're reading the story. Also hard were the fight....OK, no excuses! I just want to say that writing a fight between 'normal' people is different than writing one with vastly 'superhuman' combatants. For one, any real injury turns into an instant fight-stopper and movement is restricted much more by obstacles, the relative placement of the fighters and even plain old gravity.

Anyway, back to more Latta.




Chapter 9.6


The proceedings entered the proverbial rapids at that point. As the Tamrielics were obviously unaware of all the intricacies of Pyandonean customs regarding debt bondage and there was no real point in teaching them, we agreed to leave the matter for now and have Jauffre draw up a contract later. I didn’t argue, but I was planning to read it very carefully and not miss even the smallest accidental blotch of ink. To be honest, I just wanted it to be over and done quickly. Not just because of the mental anguish I’d put myself in, but also because the bow I was supposed to maintain throughout the ceremony was far from comfortable. Held too loose, and I’d be insulting the man in the bed. Held too tight, and I would be tearing my muscles. Of the two, ruining my legs was the preferable option. And sometimes, my own thoughts scared me.

“Lady Princess Orgnum, heir to the throne of Pyandonea, are you willing to travel the land on behalf of the Tamriel crown?” The elder asked me. It was a stupid question, even if he couldn’t know. I belonged to him now, in mind and body. If he bade me to walk to Summerset, I would do so. Even if it killed me. My throat squeezed shut and I tried not to think too hard on the knots I’d just pulled.
“If that is Your Grace’s desire, I shall follow all four winds. Though I would request the removal of this leash first.” I said and tapped the cursed band that was strapped to my neck. Still bent over, I craned my head back to look at him. That was permitted, though it only made my stance even more trying.
“It is my desire.” The Septim king answered to me. I was surprised at the strength of his voice. Others might not have noticed, but my eyes shifted across the signs on his body by habit. All of last night’s convulsions were still there, but he forced them down with a self-control I could do nothing but respect. What he was doing wasn’t healthy, but ten lesser men and women couldn’t have done it.
“There are many deeds that must be done and only you, the promised envoy of Pyandonea, can accomplish them.” He continued. More tears tried to break free but I blinked till they went away.
“Don’t think it, Latta. Not now.” I told myself.

“Your Grace, would you permit me knowledge of these deeds?” If I was going to do his bidding, it would be best if I knew exactly what he wanted of me. His House was now my House. I would not bring dishonor to its name.
“In due time.” He said with a slight tremble in his voice. A hand shook beneath the bedcover. That was not a good sign. Yes, it would definitely be for the best if this session was ended as soon as possible.
“I grant you the title of Agent. My Blades will hear my words through your voice. Their ears and eyes are yours, their hands move at your command. You will have need of them.” I couldn’t hide my confusion. What was an agent, and why would I need weapons? Or a private army, if I got the context right. Whatever it was, for the moment I forgot the strain the man was putting himself under.

“Baurus!” The Emperor called. His voice was weakening, but still strong. Beside me, the mudman straightened his back abruptly. I couldn’t help but think I’d already failed him. Did I not bow deeply enough? I tried to make my nose touch my knees again, despite my body’s protests. Little gasps entered his words, but what drew my attention more was the change in tone. It was still recognizably Tamriellic, but different as if it borrowed the intonation of another language.
“My Agent’s journey shall be a dangerous one. Will you be a shield that stands between her and spell and sword?”
“Unto my last breath and beyond I do swear I shall.”
“I have heard your vow, Penald Baurus. May the Divines bear witness and grant you strength and honour in equal measure.”
The back and forth had been quick, obviously rehearsed, and hard to follow, not in the least because the Lord Emperor’s voice broke more and more now. What I did get I didn’t like. I knew I needed a bodyguard and it seemed like I got one. But the open talk about danger made me flush. It had to be a figure of speech, I told myself. Part of this traditional bodyguard ceremony they just performed.

Next up was some business between Uriel and Jauffre about teaching me the symbols of something. But we were at the end now and in the span of a hundred heartbeats the man whispered the words we’d both been waiting for.
“Rise, my hand and voice. Go now and prepare.” Every muscle in my body trembled with relief and I heard the elder sigh as he sank back in his bed.



“We’ll eat first.” My new bodyguard muttered. I’d sneaked in a few bites of half-raw meats and vegetables while cooking, but was still hungry myself. Renault had put me on finishing breakfast so she could go do the paperwork. It had been a lot though, enough for a dozen or more men. The man took me to a large hall I hadn’t seen yet. A fire blazed on both ends of a long table and swords were hung up on the wall like some obscene decoration. I tried to count the curved pieces of metal and estimate their value, but gave up after I lost count a few times.

The meal I’d prepared was mostly gone already. All that remained of the juicy meatstrips and boiled red and green plantstuff were dirty plates. The dark man spread what was left on two clean plates and had us sit down close to one of the fires. He also poured from a karaff a golden liquid. It was like that mead-drink Sorian bought me. Sweet and lightly alcoholic.
“I’m not sure what exactly I was given, but I take it was something important? The false priest didn’t look happy about it.” I said while we ate. No matter how much I thought on it, I still had no idea just what it meant to be an agent. Only that Jauffre didn’t like it.
“Jauffre? Umm, what should I call you?” He was chewing even while talking. Disgusting.
“Lady Princess Orgnum….No, you may use lady Orgnum instead. From what I was taught that is a neutral form acceptable to most stations and situations.” I said. Lady Princess felt rather short and informal to me, but I knew better than letting him proclaim who I was to everyone on the street. So like I allowed Sorian, I would let my new bodyguard simply address me as lady. Maybe I should change my name as well. Didn’t Levvelyn do that when he infiltrated the staff of maester Braxxin, in ‘Levvelyn and the Iron Mines of Yokuda’?”
“Lady Orgnum it is then. I’m Penald Baurus, just call me Penald or call me Baurus. Whatever you like.” He told me. I still had to tell myself that they did things backwards. So I would have to use Baurus. Using Penald would be far too intimate.

He still had his mouth full while explaining. I looked away cause it made me feel sick.
“And of course the Grandmaster was upset. He’s not used to being overruled, even by the emperor. And as Agent, well you basically just got given carte blanche over all the spies.” Spies? I didn’t know that word either. If I had been taught, I couldn’t remember it right now. So I simply asked him.
“Pardon me, but what is a spies? Are you one?”

“A spy is a…well how to explain. The Blades are made up of two branches. There is the arms-bearing one of which I’m a member. We protect the emperor and his chosen dignitaries, such as you, from any that would wish them harm. The other branch sits in the shadows. They serve as emperor Uriel’s eyes and ears, and sometimes his poison. Jauffre is their grandmaster and Lord Protector Berius is mine. Was that clear?” He mumbled amidst bits of roasted meat. His explanation could have been clearer, but I thought I understood the core of it.
“The spies learn what the Lord Emperor must know, but Jauffre decides what he hears. Am I right?” Which would make him arguably the most powerful man on the continent. And of course he didn’t like me.
“You got it in one. Now as Agent, you are a special kind of spy. Jauffre holds no authority over either your actions or your goals. You are completely free to pursue your mission in any way you see fit. Blackmail, trespassing, thievery and even murder are the tools which you are permitted to use.” Four tools I did not want to use, ever. Actually, I was relieved and quite sure I didn’t have to. Who would trust me, a stranger from far away lands, with such powers? It was really just a ploy to get me out of Jauffre’s grasp. And for that, I was grateful.

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Cyrodiil

Since the departure of Grey-Tongue, the investigation in the Imperial city had ground to a halt. The lost of the Argonian’s razorsharp mind wasn’t the only cause. Another was active opposition from his superiors. They didn’t admit it of course, but Heironymous Lex saw the words of the Elder Council echoed in them. And he bet the Council was parroting the wishes of the Blades who had refused to tell him what had happened at the vaults. Which reminded him of what his friend had said. Something had been stolen from the vaults and the Blades were now torn between the need to apprehend the suspects and retrieve whatever they’d taken, and the desire to not let anyone know they’d failed in their duties.

The investigation was further crippled when the guard-captain himself was attacked. The healer’s guild sent inquiry after inquiry and demand after demand his way. The law obligated him to admit that he’d allowed an unregistered healer to practice on him and law obligated him to help apprehend this rogue healer. An unregistered healer was an uneducated one and therefore a direct threat to anyone he or she chose to administer, so said the guild. To Hieronymous it was just another unneeded distraction. He’d argued that his injuries had been treated to satisfaction, and that the healer had been educated outside Tamriel. Impossible, the guild claimed. Only the education and certificates given by the guild were suitable proof of expertise. Anything given by an outsider was by definition inferior. Hieronymous had given up at that point. Hearing about the very real of family-trained and effective healers found in every small settlement was the last thing the guild wanted.

Their complaints were so severe and forceful that he saw the hand of the Blades in it again. No, the Guard-Captain decided it would be an exercize in futility to further fight the demands. He went through the motions of searching for the hedgehealer in his district, despite already knowing that she was nowhere near the city. After a few days of that and ever further setbacks and obstructions to his real mission, he’d had enough. He formally requested leave for an undetermined period, using his knee as an excuse. As quick as the guild of healers had been to protest when he continued his duties, so quick was it now to suggest to his superiors that leave and fresh air were indeed what he needed.




He’d begun to pack for his wagon-ride the next day. Now clothing, a few books and personal effects were strewn across his office. His sword also lay ready to be packed, though he opted to leave his armour behind. If he did have to perform his duties as an officer of the guard, he would use the brocaded desk-uniform instead. It was far more comfortable to travel in.
The door behind him opened and someone spoke.
“This place is a mess. You definitely need a woman.”
Hieronymous sighed but did not turn around. “Julius, you shouldn’t be here.” He said.
“I am a grown man now. It is my right to choose who to see.” Julius protested.
“And what profession to follow. I know. Ah, I would be a poor father and a liar if I said I wasn’t happy to see you, my son.” Hieronymous said and embraced the younger man. They didn’t look much alike. Julius took more after Martha, sharing her brown locks and wide ears. But he was like his father in other ways, more than his mother liked.

“I heard you were injured, but my mentors wouldn’t let me leave before week’s end. I even took it up with Hannibal.” His son explained. He was still wearing the smudged apprentice-robes students at the Arcane University wore, showing that he’d come the minute he’d finished his lessons. Hieronymous shook his head at that. Yes, Julius was like him in some ways. He had that same stubborn streak to do what he felt was right, though the talent in magic could not be attributed to either parent.
“And darn right he was. The profession of a mage isn’t an easy one. If the students could go out whoring whenever they pleased, not that I accuse you of that, it would take attention away from their studies. You may resent them now, but nobody likes a sloppy mage.” He scolded his son, only half-serious. Julius laughed. The day he’d visit the Dibellans would be the day he gave up on his future as a battlemage in the legions and from there slip into the city-watch. And a Lex never gave up.
“So I’ve been told a thousand times.”

For a short moment both men were silent. Hieronymous picked up stray pair of pants and tried to fit them in a trunk while his son watched, unsuccessfully. Julius tried not to laugh, and broke the silence before he could.
“But enough about me. I heard rumors, the next worse than the last. But if I see you now, you look to be in perfect health.” He observed with a wry grin. The pants were balled up and tossed into a corner.
“Which is just what I’ve had to say to the damn healers a thousand times. But no, all they care for is that someone threatened their monopoly. Do you want to hear all about the troubles of a lawman?” The older Lex said and chuckled despite his earlier frustrations. Looking at it from an outsider’s point of view, it was sort of funny. Julius did not answer, but the look in his eyes said enough.
“Alright, I’ll tell you. It’s better that you know before you sneak yourself into the footsteps of your old man, thinking its all glory and grateful maidens. But under one condition. You help me pack all this junk.”
“Deal.”

My laptop is making strange noises and I've had a few blue-screens this week. Maybe it's time to look for a replacement.

However, that is not the reason for my continued slowness. No, the reason is the repeated rewriting of the chapter, the cutting out of bits and the re-adding of them. That, and plain old laziness.

In other news, I came across an image of Pyandonea. There were two things of interest to me. First was its location, which placed it to the south of Summerset. Secondly there was its nature as one big solid continent, with placenames that didn't make any sense to me and looked rather static. Maormer-landing? The whole continent is solely populated by Maormer, so why refer to your race in a place? If its the location where they first arrived, it might work. But in that case, I would personally prefer to attach it to an individual.

Fortunately for me, I discovered that image was from a mod for Oblivion, which also looks a bit dead. So I get to keep my Pyandonea, composed of lots of tiny islands, its silly moving palace and its location North-west of Summerset! Yay!

Ok, enough rambling. Back to business.



Chapter 9.7



“Pour me a drink, Brother. Gods, I need one.” I recognized that voice. It was the man who had been guarding the entrance to this place. While Baurus refilled his mug and slid it over to the doorkeeper, I studied his face. He’d left his helmet somewhere though he still wore the rest of his armour. What was his name again? Captain Stef something. The respect he received marked him as a high-ranking Blade. His face though, I felt for him. He was older than Baurus going by what was left of it. But mostly his features were a crisscrossing of scartissue from all kinds of sources. Cuts, broken bone, burns and some injuries whose cause I couldn’t determine. He’d seen war firsthand and paid for it dearly. Whether all the scarring meant he was a lousy swordsman or a good one, I couldn’t tell.
“ It’s been one thing after another since you showed up.” The man sighed after throwing back the mug in one huge gulp. “First the emperor comes to hide, then his sons die. Now Jauffre brought a w…ahem, elven dignitary. And this morning? First Sim flies off the handle, then Kort comes running carrying big news. Sealed envelope and everything. I passed it on to Jauffre and boy, he looked even more pissed than he usually does.” This Kort again. Was he some kind of messenger?

Baurus walked down the length of the table to get the karaff on the other end.
“What happened to Brother Fenasim?” He asked along the way, leading to another sigh from the devastated man. There were just so many scars on him. I had to look away in order to stop thinking of ways to fix the damage. Master Zelthir had demonstrated more than one method to heal such severe wounds but none of them were available to me even if I had all my tools at hand. It was just too depressing. So instead of following the lines and pits of ruined flesh my eyes followed the direction of his own.

He’d been looking at a particular set of swords ever since coming into the room. To me they looked unremarkable beyond the materials used, just one more shattered blade mounted on the wall. I blinked. Most of the swords were damaged in some way or another. They were warped or fragmented, most of them still tainted with old blood and some even looked like half-melted butter. Unremarkable had been the wrong word to describe them. Worn-down was a better word.
“Fenasim, what didn’t happen to him? It turns out that he…Ah forget it, there’s no way to say this nicely. The moment he learned the lady here was a mama.” My mind was only half there as I was now gripped by a morbid curiosity in the murdertools. So I corrected him without really knowing what he’d been saying.
“Maormer.” There seemed to be an order in which the blades were hung. On the one side the grips had rotten away to a few strips of leather but on the other they looked fresh from the workshop, apart from the damage. There was also a small blank space on the walls on this end. A place reserved for more swords?
“Maormer, thank you. Well, he was very eager to cause an intercontinental incident, if you get my drift. I had to talk him down, even though it would likely end with me on his sword.” That brought my intention back in a hurry. If this Fenasim had a personal interest in me, then what did he want? Raise his own social standing through close affiliation with House Orgnum? It wouldn’t be the first time. The name sounded elvish, so was he a Maormer? But there weren’t supposed to be any. Other than warslaves the Altmer caught in their raids, and those wouldn’t be walking around here. Baurus was as dismissive as I was, given his response.
“compassion.”
Captain Stef looked at his empty mug.
“Indeed. That’s the problem with duty, sometimes it makes you do things you just know are stupid.” He muttered.
“I think I need another drink.”




The man excused himself a little while later and went back to his post. Baurus decided that we would go to the armory next and when I asked him what would happen to the filthy tableware, he shrugged. Someone would clean up eventually. I didn’t like what that told me about the priorities here.
“Why did you bring that searat here?!”

I’d ducked behind Baurus at that first outburst and tried to become as small and unnoticeable as possible.
“Hands off, Fenasim. She’s under Uriel’s guard. And mine.” The man spoke with a hand on his sword. After that, silence. Eventually I gained the courage to peek beyond his back only to duck away again with a new panic. It was an Altmer, a real one!
“So I’ve been told.” The badmer spat. “Well I assure you that this is one matter I intend to take up with him. You mainlanders have no idea what you let into your backyard. These mist-elves are treacherous. They can’t be trusted!” He was going to kill me! That’s what the doorkeeper meant! Then why did Baurus move away from me? He was supposed to protect me!
“Save your arguments for the man, not me. I’m here on orders and until told otherwise, I aim to carry them out.” His actions didn’t match his words. The Altmer was right there in front of me! I couldn’t back away through a wall. I was stuck!

He turned away. Thoughts that had been frozen now resumed with the immediate threat gone. I knew I should just vanish and edge to the door.
“What do you need from me?” Good, keep looking at Baurus. Just a few more steps.
“First of all, the princess here has a slave-collar that needs to be removed.” No! Don’t point at me!

I froze again and tried to blend in with the stones. But the Altmer just kept looking right at me and in my frightened state, I couldn’t figure out how he did it.
“You’re not joking. The little witch is actual royalty. We should use her as a hostage to buy off the damn navy.” He said and turned away again, this time to rummage through his desk. Thoughts came back. I continued to move ever so slowly to the door, and safety.
“As I said, save it for him.” Baurus rumbled. Good, keep talking.
The mer tossed something and the man catched.
“Here’s the key. Believe me that it would be best for all of us if you do it yourself. My hand might slip. What else do you need?”
“I’m gearing up. The emperor has sent us on a mission.”
“Us?” The mer repeated and looked at me again. Why?! Though I trembled with fear again, I did manage to squeek out an answer. Barely.
“I..swore a-an oath. Of service.” If the words did anything to persuade him, they failed. But they did provide a foothold to my mind. I did swear an oath. And Altmer or not, I would not run from seeing it fulfilled.
“An oath, riiiight.” The tall one sneered but miraculously, he turned his attention back towards Baurus. “What level of gearing up are we looking at?” I swear, his words were almost business-like.

Baurus looked left and right and answered.
“Hope peace, assume war. Discreet, but not stealthy.”
“Fighter’s guild it is then. Weapons, armour, papers, all of it should be where you left it. Ask Renault for general supplies. She got dismissed from duty earlier.” The golden one said and I wondered. Fighter’s guild?
“Thanks.”
“See if you still feel like thanking me later.”
They both ignored me then. For a bit longer I kept watching the Altmer but even that didn’t last. Stupid as it was, my fear made way for an entirely different kind of emotion. Boredom.

At first still hesitating, I began to walk around myself. The Altmer’s eyes swept to me whenever my feet brought me close to a sword, an axe or a spear. But if I avoided any of those, he focused on a forge instead, on which he was hammering a piece of metal. Well, if that was the case, it was fine by me. I wasn’t that interested in deathdealing tools anyway. There were plenty of other items that did interest me. Armours for example. Unlike weapons, these aimed to preserve life, not end it. It was only a pity one was often used to help do the other.

I saw animal skins, treated, dried and thickened layer upon layer. These I knew. There were armours made from chains upon chains of iron. I knew the form, but not the material. Most common were the bands of steel like what Baurus wore. And finally there was the armour of the Altmer himself. It was a mirror melded to his form like water. And there were gaps in it, ugly ones like a turtle’s shell that had been pried open by a crab.

There were helmets that followed the same pattern. Skins, chains and steel. Most were plain, made to serve their purpose and nothing more. But others were more ornate, like the seashell mask with embedded pearls tracing out the symbols of Yokuda-watch, head of the tower. I blinked and did a double-take. It did say Yokuda-watch. That was my mask!
“Your papers were already brought to an associate” Jauffre had said that at the top of the Imperial palace. Evidently they’d taken more than just my papers. Now that I knew what to look for, I saw more of my own possessions. The traditional riding crop made from a firebird’s tailfeathers. My sandals with the springy soles of thrice-folded leaves and foam. The silverthread belt and attached to it my storing pouch, both things I quickly took and put on. There was my dress, its limbs frozen in rigor and wings torn to shreds. I picked it up, brushed away some of the dirt. Poor thing, it had been so well-trained too. Then it was snatched from my hands.
“Hey! That’s mine!” I said and wheeled around to grab it back. My hands never reached higher than my chest. It was the Altmer who’d taken the garment and looked at it with keen interest. He mumbled something in Altmeri, too quick for me to catch it. Then he rudely shoved something else into my arms.
“This, is yours.” He said and walked back to his forge while shaking his head. I looked at what he’d given me and mumbled something of my own. It was a staff as weathered as the swords in the main hall. Its shaft of golden wood was cracked, warped and blackened and capped with a small sphere of polished glass. A large crack had nearly split the ball in two.

The thing was broken and probably seen as junk by the mer, but I could still feel the magic in the glass. It buzzed and ached in my skull like my own spellsong, but fortunately not as bad. I wondered what it did? Was it crafted to burn people, or cut them from afar? Did it soften walls, shatter arms? I swallowed and summoned my courage.
“Ah, what does it do?” I asked him even though I didn’t expect an answer. His hammer rose and fell heavily on the steel armourpiece he was working.
“It glows.”

I looked at the staff, then at the mer and then at the staff again.
“Maormer. I will be giving your goods a very thorough inspection. I will find the evil you are planning. And how you bypassed our patrols.” What little was left of my fear for him was driven aside by anger over his words. I was not evil nor did I plan it! Almost I’d blurted out exactly how easy it had been for the ship to go around the wooden vessels of Tamriel. Almost. It was a convenient shred of common sense, bolstered by the knowledge that telling would leave Pyandonea open to a new invasion from the Altmer, that made me keep my mouth.

Baurus came and tapped my shoulder, gestured at the door.
“I don’t trust him.” I grumbled once we were back in one of the corridors and out of earshot. Baurus laughed which made me angry. I had not forgotten how he’d basically left me at the mercy of the badmer.
“Well now there’s a big surprise. But let me tell you one thing. If there is a single person here who can be absolutely trusted, it is Brother Fenasim.” He said. It was ridiculous of him, and I told him.
“But he tried to kill me!”
“And yet he didn’t. Love or hate, they don’t guide his sword.”




My next meeting with Renault was less heartstopping than the armory-visit, but no less important. The woman turned out to be a healer, one with a cluttered lab that gave me an instant bout of homesickness. Oh, Master Zelthir would have things to say on her workplace, but this was one of the few things were I disagreed with him. A disorderly lab, as long as the tools were kept clean and functional, the ingredients unsoiled, just meant its owner used it as more than a bragging-tool. I admit that Baurus’ surprise and subsequent confusion over our conversation amused me. He stepped outside in the end. It was only too soon that the woman handed us two parcels of restoratives and sent us on our way again.

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“There are four tasks I need you to perform. The first two are absolutely necessary, the other two are pursued at your discretion.” The Lord Emperor’s voice was strong and he sat near the fire in a comfortable seat rather than lying in bed. If I knew better, I would have called it a miracle and be glad he seemed to be the healthiest I’d ever seen him. But I did know. The antidote in my hand made sure of that.
“The vital information is on this note. Memorize and burn it before you leave the room.” He continued and eagerly shoved a piece of paper in my free hand. His grip was firm and stable, but the skin felt feverish to the touch.
“Oh Jennifer, I know now how you feel. How do you protect a man like that from himself?” I thought to myself as I took the paper and asked him politely to sit down again.

Uriel Septim began to explain to us and I looked at the letter he’d written. Why he couldn’t tell us everything was beyond me. He certainly didn’t seem to be in too much of a rush to end his current, well, rush.
“The first and second task share a goal. Under no circumstance are you to return with task one unless you also deliver task two.” I looked at the first line that was written on it. It had been jotted down with a shaky hand and a script that was as ligible as it was short. It seemed to me that the venerated elder had chosen to write it down himself instead of asking someone else to do it.
Martin Tanner Kvatch temple Imperial male 180cm 30yrs
First thing that caught me was the age. Thirty years would make this Martin Tanner Kvatch a child. The first question in my mind was how were we supposed to take him away from his parents,but then I idly did the math to translate his height into something more familiar. My estimates made him about a hand taller than me, if my math was right and I was pretty sure I didn’t miss a finger. Just what did they feed their sons here?
Rajn Geydar Kvatch Eight Provinces wood elf female 146cm 57yrs
I did the math again. This one had a more reasonable height. A tad too short actually considering her age, but nothing that made me question her health and dietary background. But again, a child? At least she was at the age were you could motivate them through reason. For a few days.
“I brag about my well-rounded education, but I haven’t been tutored on motherhood yet.” How was I supposed to placate a thirtier? That was right at the point they get rebellious. Too old for sweets and toys, too young for logic. Maybe I could use the older sister to control the young man.

I’d been given a moment to think about it, and memorize what it had said before His Grace babbled on again.
“The third task, I doubt you will succeed. But if you do come across a way to achieve it, do so. I suggest you start by buying a biography in any bookstore.” Biographies? I read the third line and it only brought more answers.
Nerevarine
That was it, just one word. Was it a name, a title? It was hard to say, but the word contained the aspects of birth and child. I hoped this wouldn’t be a youngster. But I’d been adviced to look in at a bookstore. Biographies weren’t written on children, usually. I would ask Baurus about it later.
“Finally, the fourth task. The attempt on my life was not the only incident that night. There was another. See the note.” Uriel Septim said and I read.
The item, you know what it looks like.
My head ran aground. He couldn’t. No, no!
“The ones that posess the fourth task are the same who attacked me. Be careful and avoid taking risks. Use your Blades for this.”

“That sniveling discarded skin of a worm! All this time I’d been worried sick about breaking the covenenant and how to explain it, when he had gone and done it first! By losing the cursed thing! I attached myself to his House for nothing!”

“Permit me a question, your grace. Why send me? I am ignorant of both your people and your maps.” I didn’t keep the poison from my words. To be honest, I didn’t try very hard.
“Because Pyandonea has nothing to gain or lose.” The Lord Emperor answered and looked at me not with anger as I’d expected for my breach of etiquette, but sadness.
“Your isolation goes both ways. You cannot attack Tamriel in force, and no faction has the means to strike at Pyandonea. It is in Pyandonea’s interests to maintain the current state. Furthermore, from what I have been told, and seen, the Maormer greatly value and act to preserve their honorable conduct, a rare thing nowadays.My envoy believed that the static nature and absolute might of its ruler is the cause. Noone has been able to dethrone your king for so long that the political maneouvering has all but ceased.”

“Your assessment is based on few observations.” I said and this time I did control my voice even though I was still furious. He’d lost it! And insinuating that anyone would plan of dishonoring lord Orgnum? It was unthinkable!
“True, but look at yourself. You know now that I broke the treaty but won’t let it affect your actions. “Even if he breaks his word, I will not break mine.” Those are your thoughts. You may hate me now, but you will not willingly see me come to harm.”

That was it. I had to admit he knew me better than I did myself. I hadn’t actually thought it yet, but I could see the truth in his words. From the moment I’d learned my subjugation was based on betrayal and error, I’d thought of all the things I was justified to do. I could have demanded reparations, or simply left at the earliest convenience. The conditions upon which I’d given my vow did not exist and so it was null and void. I’d thought that, but the Lord Emperor had spoken the truth. Even if I could prove breaking my word had been just to others, to me it would still feel like a lie and betrayal.
“I belong to my House. I will not shame its name for my own convenience, nor will I give excuses or justifications. The honour of my House wills me to voice my displeasure with your inability to safeguard that what was lent to you in good faith. The honour of myself wills me to protect your House as if it were my own.”

“Thank you and though it makes no difference, I truly regret placing you in this position. If there was anyone else I could trust, I would send him.”

There was nothing left to say. Baurus read the note for himself, shredded it, sprinkled it into the fire and then added more wood to the leaping flames. In the meantime I let the Lord Emperor breather the antidote and settled him in his bed. Then we were done and left.

Man, this story is awesome! You paint a good picture of what happened during the Oblivion Crisis and some new places, too!

Just a thing, I think seperating the sentences would be better and have a good space between dialogue. The paragraphs all seem close together and it can be a bit distracting

Still not caught up. I'm still in Florida spending time with my mom, and trying to read while she naps. I should be back mid week (this) and will try to be totally caught up by this weekend. This year has been hell-hectic, but December should be a time to relax and catch up reading (if nothing else goes wrong, lol). - Cindy.

Best wishes to you and your mum, Malx.

And I'll have to think about my spacing a bit more. While it looks neat and tidy all packed together, it can be a pain to keep track on where you were reading.

In other news:
Got my new lappy. I'm currently in the process of moving things and finding out where Word went on Windows 8, so no update yet. Still, I did finish up the main thrust of the next bit so it shouldn't take too long to get it done once I've got everything set up.

Also, there is this

I believe the observer said something along the lines of the following.
"Oh, not again! Can't this world go ten years without me having to save its sorry hide? Get lost ratface, before I put my foot up your flying Scrib-butt and boot you back to Vvardenfell!"


(No, I'm not going to write a story on it. I've got three that still need to be finished already. One at a time.)

This actually has been a problem for me too (as a reader). With no numeration or title to the chapters I have found myself having to reread chapters searching out where I left off each time I restart reading - hinders catching up when free time is limited. (Although I do love rereading many of the chapters, and on at least two occasions have come across scenes I didn't get the full effect of on the first read - usually due to the zoo of noise and distractions in the background here while I read).