It’s a beautiful day for our journey back to Falkreath, which turns out to be so thoroughly uneventful that even Nona’s a little starved for action. I’ve been going back and forth along this road so frequently that there’s nothing to gather—no plants or mushrooms of any interest at all—and we meet no-one along the way, save for a few hunters and a very rude orc who tries to pick a fight with me by calling me a milk-drinker. Even if I cared about some random idiot’s opinion, I couldn’t effectively prove myself not a milk-drinker by taking the bait and then watching Vorstag beat her to death, so I leave her be. We arrive in Falkreath in the middle of the afternoon, and I go immediately to see the Jarl. (I’m hoping he won’t notice that I’m wearing the same Radiant Raiment outfit I had on the first time we met; it’s still the only nice set of clothes I own.) Siddgeir is delighted to hear of the Embershard bandits’ demise. “Teach them to stop paying me,” he says with an air of grim pleasure. Then he adopts a confiding, friendly tone that sets my teeth on edge. “I like you,” he says. “You’re not afraid to get your hands dirty.” And he decides then and there to grant me permission to purchase property in Falkreath Hold. Here I was, enjoying a little glow of pleasure, even pride, at having accomplished something worthwhile—I mean, bandits are bandits, even if you’re going after them for the wrong reasons—and two minutes with Siddgeir has made me feel as though I’ve just finished wading through a river of slop and that he will be calling upon my vaunted slop-wading talents the next time he wants a priest blackmailed or an orphanage burned. I end the interview before he can ask me to do anything else. Well, I knew I was going against my principles when I agreed to kill those bandits in the first place: no sense in crying about it now. It takes me a while to find the steward—actually, it takes a stupidly long time: I walk all over the Jarl’s longhouse, and then I suddenly wonder whether she might have stepped over to the tavern for a drink, so I walk over there, and then I walk back to the longhouse and search the place from top to bottom again, before she suddenly steps out of a shadow and introduces herself. She’s an Altmer named Nenya, and she’s surprisingly agreeable for someone who has to deal with Siddgeir’s vagaries on a daily basis. This is most likely because she enjoys being the real power in Falkreath: she tells me that Siddgeir is wholly uninterested in actually running his hold, and so leaves everything to her and Helvard, his housecarl. She offers to sell me a plot of land for five thousand septims, and shows no surprise when I hand over the entire sum without hesitation. I now have the deed to a property called Lakeview, just off the road that runs east out of town. With all my expenses—including Vortag’s fee, the cost of materials for his arms and armor, the expensive scroll I bought from Calcelmo—Lakeview has cost me around seven thousand septims, and I don’t even have a house yet. But I am a landowner! I ride out eagerly to see my new property, but I’m delayed by those trapped watchtowers on the road—two more bandits have moved in, and these new ones aren’t quite stupid enough to kill themselves with their own falling rocks. Fortunately some Imperial soldiers just happen to be wandering by, and the bandits don’t last long against a hail of arrows. As Nenya directed, I turn off the road near a house called Pinewatch—my new neighbors, apparently. I stop by the door in the hopes of getting acquainted with them, but it’s locked and there’s nobody about. The path to the side—it’s not really a path, just an area open enough to ride through—is full of angry mudcrabs and wolves. The inhabitants of Pinewatch, if there are any, must not come out much. It’s getting dark by the time I reach Lakeview; a thorough inspection will have to wait until morning. Vorstag and I spend our first night on my new property camped near the spot where my house will likely be. The morning light reveals everything I could have wished for: the view of Lake Ilinalta is spectacular, and I have all the resources I need at the site to begin building—plenty of clay and stone, as well as a pile of sawn logs. In alarmingly short order I have built an unfurnished cottage that will serve as the entryway for a great hall. The size of the finished building will far exceed my former expectations; indeed Nona would have been perfectly content with a very small house, but Vorstag is staying over, so I need somewhere for him to sleep, and the cottage isn’t large enough for a second bed. I head back to town to buy more logs, passing along the way an extremely unpleasant Khajiit warrior named S’vashni, who can’t seem to open her mouth without saying something viciously insulting, and whose only topic of interest is swordsmanship. When I try to bring the conversation to a more civilized level, she tells me that talk is for cowards whose blades say nothing. I wish I could tell her that the message I’m getting from both her words and her blades is “I am a nasty, violent wanker with a dangerous sword fetish,” but I would most likely be both too polite and too interested in self-preservation to say that, even if the option were there. I leave her, then, to whatever senseless murders and/or diplomatic incidents she has planned for the day, and continue into Falkreath, where I find that I must purchase my lumber from that idiot Bolund who can’t believe that “provincials” like me are allowed to wander Skyrim. I also buy iron and corundum from Lod to make nails and fittings and locks, and, upon returning to the building site, use it all to put my main hall together. More wolves attack us while I’m working, so it’s fortunate that Vorstag is standing around wearing all of his armor with nothing to do. Once again, I’ve used up all of my materials in a burst of uncannily speedy construction, but I haven’t built any furniture yet. Another trip to town is in order, and there’s no way I’m handing any more money to Bolund, so I head down the slope towards Riverwood. Near the bottom of the hill I find a curious tableau: four skeletons stand unsupported and motionless, facing a large stone table with a haphazard collection of bones and soul gem fragments arrayed atop and around it. Leaning thoughtfully over the arrangement is a robed woman named Carmella, who asks me whether I have come to watch the dance of bones, to pay homage, or to learn the craft. I answer very cautiously that I’m not sure what she’s teaching, and learn, to my relief, that she isn’t taking on new students anyway. She introduces herself as a master of the necromantic arts—not a practitioner of necromancy, she is careful to explain, but a necromantic artist creating works that serve to illuminate the human condition. I can’t honestly say that I like this particular piece, but that is almost certainly not the point, and I find Carmella friendly enough, if a bit pretentious. The sun is setting as I get back from Riverwood. Carmella has gone elsewhere, leaving her artistic creation to whatever fate that hungry wolves and the elements might have in store. The skeletons stand as before, their eye-sockets eerily aglow, but they make no move to attack, and I decide that, on the whole, I rather like them. They seem lost and naked and vulnerable in the fading light, and—oh dear Gods, I’m actually standing here admiring the monstrous installation that this woman has left sitting practically on my doorstep. What will the neighbors think? Do the neighbors exist? Will they ever emerge from Pinewatch? I do a bit more work before going to bed—“a bit” meaning that I build a fireplace for the main hall, a washbasin, and two beds—and then fuss around at my property for a couple more days, riding to Riverwood now and again to mix potions and buy materials. (I want to have an alchemy table in my home, but it requires quicksilver and I haven’t any left.) I fish in the lake; I make soup; I put in a little garden and plant vegetables and flowers; and I build more furniture—a bench for the entryway, sconces, barrels to store food and water, shelves, endtables near the beds, a dining table. I build a wardrobe for my room, and inside it I place the Radiant Raiment clothes that I wore for my audiences with Siddgeir. I don’t think I’ll ever wear them again. Then it occurs to me that Vorstag has nowhere to put his things, so I build a dresser for Vorstag’s room. Vorstag’s room. How odd it is that I’ve constructed my house as though he lives here already! (That’s what happens, I suppose, when a single individual working alone is able to build and furnish a large house from scratch in two days with no prior planning.) And is it more peculiar that I have unthinkingly arranged things so that he can live here, or that I have unthinkingly arranged for him to live in a separate room? His interest hasn’t faltered: he still tells me from time to time that he’s surprised that I’m not spoken for. So why am I not spoken for? Now that I have no need to marry for property, Vorstag is everything I could want: he’s human and male, and, if I’m going to be especially picky, also strong and brave; he’s a decent enough fellow who hasn’t killed any of my pets, and he’s quite good-looking if you like a man with facial tattoos and a jaw that can crack walnuts. In fact he’s pretty much out of my league, and the only reason I can think of for his liking me so well is that he has entirely mistaken my character. And who could blame him for getting the wrong idea about a woman who makes him a complete new set of armor and weapons before hauling him off to a bandit-infested mine to slaughter all the bandits so as to collect a reward from the Jarl of Falkreath himself? I hate to admit this, but Vorstag may be under the impression that I’m some sort of hero, someone held in high regard, and not merely a timid, all-too-ordinary woman who needs someone to protect her from bears while she picks mushrooms. There’s only one way to resolve this: well, there’s several, but instead of taking the sensible route of thanking Vorstag for his help and sending him back to Markarth so that I can settle into a peaceful but solitary life of gardening, fishing, and alchemy in my new home at Lakeview, I’m going back on the road. With Vorstag. I’ll need him for protection, and once he’s spent enough time with me to disabuse himself of any silly ideas he might have about my courage or social prominence, I’ll know whether he truly likes me for myself. Maybe we’ll go back to Dawnstar; I’ll need some quicksilver if I’m going to make that alchemy table, and none of the nearby smiths are selling it.
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Middas, 1st of Frostfall. Falkreath Hold. 7:30 am. Started secret mission diary. Best to keep this entire proceeding under wraps—wouldn’t want word to get around that I, Nona Plaia, might actually be able to solve the stupid problems people are always bothering me with. Took special care with clothes today: chose new Hammerfell-style outfit—loose trousers and shirt, turban, matching boots. Feel suddenly strange and different—like a character, a woman of mystery! Also, like a perfect fool. Suspect this to be the ideal state of mind for starting an adventure. Also possible side benefit: uncharacteristic behavior may be ascribed to mental derangement rather than foolish, misguided attempt at heroics. Goat cheese: not the breakfast of champions, but will have to do. Feel I should be eating proper adventurer food like iron rations or lembas, but can’t find any for sale and am not entirely sure what either of those things are. 8:01 am. Bought all blisterwort, rock warbler eggs, swamp fungal pods, and wheat for sale at Grave Concoctions. Made 22 restore health potions and several combination fortify-and-retore-health potions, using up everything. Actually starting to run low on blue mountain flowers. Horror! 9:08 am. Starting out towards Markarth on horseback. Marcurio has been silent all morning. Still can’t stand the sight of him. 10:31 am. Attacked by sabre cat. Marcurio too far behind to help. Tried to gallop away on horse, but cat is faster. Dismounted and shot it with poisoned arrow, then managed to finish it off with sword and shield. Gained level. Still feeling shaky; lucky to have so many healing potions on hand. 10:47 am. Still riding far ahead of Marcurio. Would rather take life in my hands than spend time anywhere near him, apparently. Weather awful. 1:19 pm. Arrived in Markarth after pushing Snowberry very hard all morning. Had lunch in Silver-Blood Inn. Much relieved to find Vorstag still there: told me straight out that he’ll join me but first I have to let my comrade go. Could hardly kick Marcurio out the door fast enough. Marcurio brought up Amulet of Mara again while I was telling him to take a hike. Suppose I should be grateful to him for being so disagreeable—might otherwise feel guilty for abandoning him so suddenly, so far from Riften. 2:29 pm. Paid Vorstag his 500 septims and conducted brief, candid inquiry into his strengths and weaknesses as a fighter. Learned that he has no training with the armor he’s wearing: only knows how to use heavy armor. Can’t blame him, I guess—that goat-pauldron thing is pretty stylish—but a little frustrated, as equipping him properly will add greatly to the expense. Must also replace low-quality iron axe and shield he’s carrying. Vorstag responding to examination with insinuating comments about Amulet of Mara. Very pleased to discover that he has such fine powers of observation: Amulet is entirely hidden by current outfit. Wish I could get him to talk about something else, though; may be far less offensive coming from him than from Marcurio, but still inappropriate and distracting and not relevant to subject at hand. Unable to think of correct response to Amulet question owing to sudden attack of giddiness; am therefore ending conversation abruptly while giggling like schoolgirl. 4:39 pm. At smithy, putting final touches on shiny new panoply. Had to buy 22 steel ingots and 6 iron ingots from Ghorza; hope result is worth it. Superior-quality steel armor, full suit, complete with sword and shield. Would have liked to make Elven sword, but Ghorza has no quicksilver in stock. Now spending a few minutes checking handiwork for flaws, which requires minute examination of Vorstag. Can’t be too careful. 4:53 pm. Visited Hag’s Cure. Not much in the way of useful ingredients to be had, but mixed a few random things anyway. Force of habit—too easy to fall back into usual activities. So difficult to stay focused on the mission! Wish I could just get it over with; would love to begin the journey back towards Riverwood, but already too late to start. Waiting around starting to make me nervous. Must be something I can do to improve my chances. 6:34 pm. Talked to Calcelmo in Understone Keep. Suddenly occurred to me to bring magical forces to bear on the problem—not forces contributed by idiot Marcurio, of course; but enchanted items could be very useful. Sadly nothing to be had in the way of a Staff Of Hideous Fiery Death From A Safe Distance, but scroll of Conjure Storm Atronach has intriguing possibilities. Not cheap—634 septims for just one scroll. Bought it anyway after taking a moment to remember who and what I am: for the true hero is one who relies ever on superior skill, clever improvisation, and personal grit; but the NPC prefers to throw money at the problem. 7:43 pm. Silver-Blood Inn. Nothing to do but stare at Vorstag and listen to Frabbi and Kleppr snipe at each other. Could be worse. Fellow named Sam Guevenne wants to have a drinking contest with me. Sounds like fun, but mustn’t get distracted. 9:13 pm. Very bored, antsy. Nobody new in here to talk to. Going to bed early. Turdas, 2nd of Frostfall. The Reach. 5:21 am. Still dark, but am setting out anyway. Have a long way to walk—and I am walking; no more riding ahead. Need to look for ingredients, and will be safer close to Vorstag. Also wouldn’t hurt to get to know him a little better. 11:59 am. Ran into party of Forsworn fighting Imperial soldiers. Arrived too late to help the Imperials—all dead. Forsworn came for us immediately. Vorstag acquitted himself very well—kept them all away from me, plus showed good grace when I accidentally shot him. Have been gathering ingredients, but cannot find a single blue mountain flower growing anywhere. Somebody has already picked them all. 6:15 pm. Arrived at Embershard Mine—the front entrance. Vaguely recall finding a back entrance once with Jade, but can’t remember exactly where it was. Will be dark soon; don’t want to spend a lot of time looking. Front entrance will have to do. Final preparations: Vorstag fully armed and armored? Check. Vorstag ludicrously oversupplied with restore health potions? Check. (Am retaining combination restore-and-fortify-health potions for own use on assumption that Vorstag, like Jade, won’t drink them.) Nona armed and armored, with plenty of arrows? Check. Poisons ready? Check. Scroll of Conjure Storm Atronach ready and within easy reach? Check. Snowberry safely out of the way? Check. Voice of the Emperor ready in case of emergency? Perhaps a little drink of water, just to be safe. Check. That’s it. That’s everything I can think of. Do I feel ready? Not really. In we go! 6:48 pm. Interior very dark—torches in sconces barely adequate. Already starting to feel poorly prepared—need better light but must use both hands for bow. Vorstag says he doesn’t like the look of this. Hoped he would say something reassuring; now feeling even worse. Am scrutinizing tunnel very carefully but can’t see anything dangerous yet—just a very obvious tripwire, easy to avoid. Might make fleeing difficult, though. 7:10 pm. Reached a large chamber with a waterfall and what looks to be an underground lake. Found two bandits here. Wooden walkway passes over their campsite—angle is awkward, and with the poor lighting, was unable to get a good shot at them. Told Vorstag to move to other end of walkway; that got their attention. Killed them easily, although fight was a bit noisy. Doesn’t seem to have attracted any other bandits, though. Several clumps of mushrooms growing here; couldn’t hurt to harvest a few. Can’t get further into the mine without lowering a bridge—have to figure out how. 7:41 pm. Found side passage leading to little room with lever. Don’t like the look of this: lever room is better-lit than the tunnels, and noise of bridge coming down is bound to attract attention. Don’t want to get trapped in this tiny room with bandits coming. Decided to pull lever and immediately jump into water below. Ended up being a pointless maneuver, as nobody noticed the bridge coming down after all. Bandits very inattentive indeed. All to the good, I suppose. Looked very foolish clambering out of water, but Vorstag nice enough to forbear comment. Didn’t expect interior of mine to look like this; would be sort of pretty if I could see it better. Vorstag wonders whether it would be altogether foolish to stop for a bit and build a fire, bless him. 8:42 pm. Was spotted by a bandit while getting in position to shoot, but Vorstag killed him before he could hurt me. Dead man was carrying a key that unlocks the door to what appears to be the bandits’ treasure room. Not that much here, actually; perhaps the bandits stopped paying Siddgeir because they weren’t doing so well themselves. Leaving it all here, in any case; no way to know who it actually belongs to. 9:37 pm. Reached a very large chamber with another waterfall. Quite an impressive sight. Could see only two bandits, but in such a space, with visibility so poor, no telling how many more might be lurking out of sight. Determined this situation to be ideal for releasing storm atronach: a large open area containing an unknown number of foes. Retrieved ordnance from scroll casing without further delay; deployed atronach at bottom of chamber, below entrance walkway. Results were well beyond expectations—received quest update reporting bandit leader’s demise within seconds. Atronach has cleared the chamber of bandits. With leader dead, quest is technically complete: could back out now and leave the way we came. Will continue and secure the entire complex, though: Jarl Siddgeir expressly asked that all the bandits be eliminated. Must not give him any reason to be dissatisfied with my performance. 10:41 pm. Reached back entrance without further incident. All bandits dead—and Vorstag still has entire stock of healing potions! Will retrieve Snowberry and head to Riverwood—very close by; can spend the night there. 11:43 pm. Sleeping Giant Inn, Riverwood. So relieved to be able at last to get a drink and climb into bed. Success! Need to contain my elation—remember that the Jarl made no promises; may have to reconcile myself to having done his dirty work for him while gaining nothing to show for it. If so, must not be despondent. Will head to Falkreath in the morning, and, whether Siddgeir chooses to be generous or not, get back to normal life as soon as possible. Tomorrow will tell.
Having looked through Elgrim’s inventory, dully inattentive to the possibilities, I’m now staring listlessly at his alchemy table. I feel as though my chosen profession is losing its luster; I can’t seem to focus. Elgrim’s irritable, vaguely mean-spirited chatter isn’t helping. Was he always this annoying? Did I really come here every day to practice, back when I first stayed in Riften, and not notice? Somehow I thought there’d be more to do here, but in my alchemy funk, there’s really very little. Jade and I visit the Bee and Barb, of course, but apart from an odd little colloquy taking place between Sapphire and Wander-Lust, everything is just as I remember it--Vulwulf Snow-Shod and the Black-Briars are as unpleasant as ever. I ask Keerava for news, and she hands me a note that she’s been passing out to travelers: I put the thing away. I don’t need yet another notice of derring-do to be done poisoning my mood. It’s not difficult to figure out the reason for my aimlessness, of course: it’s been a hard journey, a journey that I barely survived, and now, having done nothing but work toward its completion for several days, I am faced with the fulfillment of its purpose--to see Jade safely home, and say goodbye, and let her remain here within the relative safety of Riften’s walls when I finally depart. I’m trying, I suppose, to postpone that moment for as long as possible, but its imminence hangs over everything I do. But Jade seems cheerful, and her chatter keeps me smiling despite these sad reflections. “What about Peragorn and Valindor?” she asks as we amble around the marketplace, and I spend a few moments in bewildered incomprehension before realizing that she has turned to matchmaking again. “What, you don’t think they like each other? Or you think they don’t like other males?” As I’m pondering this dilemma, never having considered the romantic preferences of either of them before, a courier comes running up and, to my dismay, delivers another note: This is quite simply the weirdest missive I have seen yet. The Jarl of Falkreath wants to see me--because of the “fame of my exploits across Skyrim”? What could he possibly mean? Have I become known for gathering more armloads of purple mountain flowers than any one alchemist or interior decorator could possibly make use of within a normal lifetime? For occasionally delivering small packages to nearby recipients and being grossly overpaid for that service? For strutting back and forth in front of Jarl Elisif the Fair like a costumed chicken? Wait--is this a standard form letter that Jarl Siddgeir sends to anyone he wants see, for whatever reason? But it wouldn’t do to ignore such a message, would it? It’s from a Jarl, and there’s that tantalizing mention of a “choice parcel of land”--doubtless I would have to do something adventurous to earn it, but you never know; after all, I can’t possibly be famous for doing such things, so maybe I’m wanted for some purpose better suited to my limited capacities--perhaps the Jarl intends that I should dress up like a Penitus Oculatus agent and follow Dengeir around while scribbling meaningless notes and surreptitiously handing them to passers-by. At dusk we head to Haelga’s Bunkhouse to visit Kjoli and Inari, the lovers we met in Shor’s Stone. As fate would have it, we find them in the middle of an argument--Inari, it seems, is not pleased to learn of Kjoli’s intention to adopt a child. She runs up the stairs in a temper, and Kjoli, clearly confused by her vehemence, asks me to talk to her. I do, and at first her objections seem natural enough--she and Kjoli aren’t actually married, it turns out, and she wonders how he could possibly have thought it appropriate for an unmarried couple to adopt. But then she goes on to relate a surpassingly weird tale of meeting him at a temple where she had gone with the intention of committing suicide. He was praying, and as she plunged her dagger into her heart, he tried to save her. Something passed between them, and she has somehow, despite being dead, continued to exist on love alone. Kjoli overhears this, and tells her that she isn’t dead--a healer told him that the dagger missed her heart and she made a full recovery--and that he would gladly marry her in any case: the only reason that he never asked is that his own parents were unmarried and perfectly happy, so it never struck him as being terribly important. Inari is so moved by his words that she agrees to marry him immediately, and they ask me to help with the arrangements. Jade has been silent during the entire exchange. As we enter the temple of Mara, I decide to ask her to perform the ceremony. She tries earnestly to persuade me to ask Maramal instead, for the couple’s own good. I don’t know--I think it’s silly for her to be so worried about this curse; I would hope that she sees that any weirdness in Inari and Kjoli’s relationship was there long before she met them and has nothing to do with her. So I tell her to go ahead with it, and it actually goes off rather well. (You can watch the entire scene on YouTube.) I’m not sure I understand this stuff about Inari’s being dead or not being dead, but she’s happy, and Kjoli is happy, and that’s what counts, not some trivial detail about whether one is married to a corpse. The following morning, I say goodbye to Jade. Delaying the inevitable is just making me feel worse, and I don’t want to keep the Jarl of Falkreath waiting. It’s impossible for us to say anything adequate to the occasion--our hearts are too full, and the dialog options too limited. To protect me on my journey, I hire an arrogant young wizard named Marcurio. He promises to be a tedious companion, full of his own importance, but he’s eager to take my money and confident that he can blow my enemies to smithereens. Outside the tavern, I meet someone new--her name is Caylene, and she is either a beggar who does street performances or a very low-paid bard, depending on your perspective. For the price of a single septim, she performs a one-woman play for me called “The Jarl and the Jarless.” It’s truly dreadful; I feel thoroughly guilty for being so vastly entertained by it. I turn to Marcurio to learn his opinion, but he only observes slyly that I’m wearing an Amulet of Mara, and wonders that someone like me isn’t taken. I am grossly offended--someone like me, indeed! Someone who paid him five hundred septims not ten minutes ago and clearly has more where that came from--is that it? Does he really have no better sense than to propose to a woman he has just started working for? Is this his idea of professionalism? I tell him flatly that I’m not interested, and he says he’s sorry he brought it up. I should hope so! We depart Riften in mutual dissatisfaction, start heading north, and soon hear the tiresome noise of a bear up ahead. Then I notice another bear off to the side. I jump on my horse and gallop away in vexation, leaving Marcurio to deal with the angry wildlife as he chooses. He catches up with me at around lunchtime, as I’m devouring an experimental new dish that I think I’ll call Nona’s Rabbity Reagent Salad (I’ve recently picked up the Experimenter perk, which allows me to figure out two properties of any alchemy ingredient I swallow instead of just one, and I have a lot of ingredients to get through, as well as a nice bit of rabbit). Once my vision has cleared and I’m well enough to walk again, we go on with our journey, and I’m just starting to think that it might not be so bad traveling with Marcurio after all--he’s annoying, but that and the fact that he’s a hired mercenary combine refreshingly to remove any sense of responsibility I might otherwise feel for his welfare--when disaster strikes. It starts with a couple of wolves--nothing to worry about, as Vigilance and I are perfectly capable of killing such beasts as these without assistance. But Marcurio insists on showing off his skills, and his dodging this way and that while projecting bolts of flame from his fingers would make for a fine display if his aim weren’t so terrible. He fails to hit any appropriate target, and an errant blast finally catches Vigilance, whose fur bursts into flame. Vigilance turns on his attacker, Marcurio hits him with yet another firebolt, and I watch helplessly as my two companions, the animal understandably panicked by being set on fire, and the man who ought to know better than to torment such an animal, have at each other relentlessly, ignoring my attempts to calm them, until Vigilance, thoroughly outmatched, burns to death. I’m horrified--utterly dumbstruck. I can’t believe what I’m seeing. I almost dismiss Marcurio on the spot, a mere four hours or so after paying his fee up front. And yet I know I can’t do without him--the roads are simply too dangerous, now, for me to travel alone. I’m trapped. I need protection, and being forced to receive it from the odious man who killed my dog makes me want to weep. Poor Vigilance! I hate leaving him here like this, his sad, furry corpse stretched out on the road, but I can’t pick him up and carry him, I can’t bury him--so here he will have to stay. I move on, numbly, with Marcurio following and at least having the decency to keep his ugly stupid mouth shut. The sun goes down, and although I was hoping to pass Valtheim Towers before making camp--the road leading up to them is so steep that I can’t find a clear, flat camping spot of any size--I tire of walking through the dark and set up my fire and my tent in the limited space available, leaving Marcurio to shift for himself. He knows where I keep the camping gear. Let him put up his own damn tent. The following morning, we pass the Towers and the turnoff to Whitrerun, taking the road that runs through Riverwood and along Lake Ilinalta. This is one of the most beautiful travel routes I know, but it brings me no joy; I feel stupid and miserable without my loyal, brave, incessantly-barking dog and my timid, self-doubting friend. And it’s a shame, because Marcurio is an astonishingly effective bodyguard--hostile beings are frequently burned to a crisp before I’m fully aware of their presence. (At least, I hope they’re hostile beings, and not just innocent passers-by or their pets.) With the security he affords me, I can walk all day without ever having to stop brooding about how much I loathe him. We arrive in Falkreath before 6 pm--not a bad time to present myself to the Jarl. I step behind a cart and change into my best clothes, the outfit that Taarie gave me to show to Jarl Elisif. We pass the general store and I can’t resist buying a couple of those scrumptious wheels of cheese. (Perhaps it is not the best idea to see Jarl Siddgeir while smelling strongly of cheese, but that thought only occurs to me after I’ve handed over my money.) Siddgeir turns out to be a pampered, self-satisfied young man, little more than a youth; any hope I might have entertained of his having a task for me that accords with my inclinations and competencies is quickly blown. “We’ll see if the stories about you are true,” he says, before describing his problem: there’s a group of bandits in his hold that he wants killed--not because of their crimes, but because they’re no longer paying him a cut of their proceeds. I don’t have any good way to respond. I can accept, I can flatly refuse, or I can turn away without answering. The latter options strike me not only as rude but as potentially risky: Siddgeir may be too great a coxcomb to think anything of telling a stranger about his chummy relationships with bandits, but there might be others looking out for his interests who have a grain of sense. I tell him I’ll do it. And not, I’m sorry to say, with the intention of appeasing him so that I can quietly leave Falkreath and forget the whole thing--I actually want to do it. I know how bad that is; I’ve willingly accepted a quest that goes against the basic principle under which I live my life: I am not a hero. I don’t kill bandits. (Well, I do, but only if they insist on attacking me as I’m going about my non-adventuring-related business.) But I want that land--that parcel of land that I can receive only through service to this silly young man. I thought I could marry my way into homeownership, but I’m too picky--I simply cannot find the house I want attached to the spouse I want. I would never have predicted that my dreams of domesticity would lead me down the slippery slope of adventure, but there it is; Nona Plaia will be a fallen woman. Best not to dwell on it--there will be plenty of time for self-recrimination when I’m done, if I survive. I need to focus on planning. I’m going to want some help, and not from Marcurio: the bandits are based in Embershard Mine, and narrow mine tunnels will make it difficult for a wizard to get clear shots at the enemy; plus there’s the more pressing fact that I absolutely detest the smug, soul-patch-sporting little creep. I want someone who will take the lead--someone with armor and weapons and courage and bulk. Someone like--just to pick an entirely random example that has nothing to do with my personal inclinations--that big, handsome fellow in Markarth with the goat on his shoulder. Vorstag? This needs to happen soon, before I can talk myself out of it. First thing tomorrow, I start breaking the rules.
I get up the next morning no less determined to leave the Reach than when I went to bed. I march straight over to Bothela’s shop, buy most of her ingredients, sell some mixtures; my Speech skill advances from all of the buying and selling, and I am suddenly level 10. Level 10! If I were a hero, I would feel a sense of arrival, of personal significance. But seeing that nice round number is actually a little unsettling--once again, the world has gotten more dangerous, and I have not. Not much, anyway. At the Markarth stables, I buy a dog from Banning. “A war dog is good company and good protection,” he says, and I believe him. Yes, I know that dogs are a pain; they’re stupidly aggressive, they bark incessantly--but I can’t resist: I feel that I need more protection, that my friend Jade deserves more protection, and 500 septims is a pittance for something that will make us feel even a little bit safer. And Vigilance, the dog I’ve just bought, doesn’t look like a war dog; he’s got the same shaggy fur in his eyes, the same grinning face, the same hopeful, dopey expression as every other dog in Skyrim. In short, he’s completely adorable. My general plan is to head to Solitude, the seat of Elisif the Fair (High King Torygg’s widow) and the base of Imperial power--such as it is--in Skyrim. But there’s more than one way to do that: before yesterday’s fight with the Forsworn, I might have taken the road north past the mining town of Karthwasten, then headed east and then north through Dragon Bridge. But this entails a substantial journey through Forsworn-occupied territory. The other option is to go east, back the way I came with Ri’saad, and turn north toward Rorikstead when I reach the lake. This would be a longer walk, but most likely less dangerous, and it is therefore this route that I choose. The weather is fine as we set off, and not having a party of Khajiit to keep track of allows me to admire the landscape, which is startlingly lovely. I stop to pray at a roadside Dibella shrine, fish in a pool while Vigilance paddles around happily, and then leap hastily out of the water when I see a sabre cat in the distance. Vigilance, belying his name, hasn’t noticed a thing, and I manage to get horse, dog, and companion safely away without alarming anyone. A little later I meet an orange-skinned gentleman who claims some sort of association with the Daedric Prince Peryite; naturally I don’t care to inquire too closely, and the journey continues uneventfully until the weather suddenly turns foul and a complete stranger runs up, hands me a pair of faintly glowing hide bracers, and tells me to hang on to them or else. He then crouches down and attempts to sneak away ... in the same direction I’m already headed, so I just walk along awkwardly pretending not to see him. A little bit later another fellow runs up and asks me whether I’ve seen the first one. I immediately hand him the bracers, saying boldly, “I presume this [sic] Hide Bracers of Major Lockpicking belongs to you?” (Even if I weren’t naturally inclined to return stolen goods, how could I resist the opportunity to say something like that?) Bracers received, the fellow thanks me and informs me that he is going to track down that thief and murder him. The tracking doesn’t take long, as the thief is still crouching near enough to be seen even in this horrible downpour, and I hurry away before I can get caught in the crossfire. We reach the lake without further incident and make camp for the night--it’s not actually night yet, but in this blinding rain it might as well be: even with a lantern lit I can hardly see well enough to find a flat spot on the ground large enough for my tent. (Thank you, Realisitic Lighting Overhaul weather beta!) The very first thing I see when I awake the next morning is another campsite not a dozen steps from my own: despite my fellow camper’s having lit her own fire, I entirely failed to spot it last night. As I pack up my own equipment, taking in the scene--tall trees, buzzing dragonflies, sunlight playing on the surface of the water--I realize that I’m not ready to rejoin civilization just yet; I’m starting to see camping in a new light. Before, it was the self-sufficiency that appealed to me, and having extra time to forage for ingredients--but these advantages turned out to be largely illusory. I have to carry a load of wood around order to light my cooking fires (owing to the limitations of the game, I can’t just collect it from fallen trees), and it’s usually too dark at night to search for ingredients, so in the end I am neither self-sufficient nor productive. But there’s a far greater benefit to camping, one that I hadn’t previously considered: the prospect of getting the hell away from the craziness of Skyrim’s settlements for a while. Now that’s worth a few armloads of firewood! So I turn south instead of north. I spend only a little time in Falkreath itself--enough to put together another tent and camping bed (Jade hasn’t complained about not having her own, but I really feel that she should), buy several bottles of mead (for cooking), and try a few new ingredient combinations. I think there may be some real value in the principle of cosmetic similarity that I applied when concocting my conjuring-enhancing magic-suppressant: I caught some luna moths last night, and I combine their faintly glowing wings with matching faintly glowing chaurus eggs to produce--an invisibility potion! It has an unfortunate side effect (it drains magicka), but I’m not going to cry over losing a little magicka when I’m trying to hide from bandits or necromancers or who knows what. Lod the blacksmith asks me to help him find a dog that’s been hanging around town--he wants it as a pet--and so I walk around near the city gates to look. Almost immediately, a strange dog runs up and tries to persuade me to go on an adventure. (Even Skyrim’s dogs are not to be trusted, I see.) I tell it that I’m busy, and it runs off, but not before asking me to meet it outside a place called Haemar’s Shame. (Not likely.) I tell Lod that the dog didn’t pan out, and he’s grateful for my efforts, despite the extreme vagueness of my explanation. The weather has turned really bad again--I almost get struck by lightning while I’m wandering around--but I nevertheless leave Falkreath and head boldly up into the mountains. I am determined to enjoy the wild outdoors for as many nights of huddling inside an open-ended rain-soaked tent as it takes to achieve my bliss, so help me Divines. Past the towers where, during my previous visit, the bandits ran afoul of their own falling rock trap, I find a winding path climbing steeply to the south. By late afternoon it has brought me face-to-face with another small group of bandits. Vigilance acquits himself well in this sudden, savage fight, keeping two of them occupied while I kill the third, and despite the poor visibility, we are never in serious danger. The bandits have made their camp near a spring that feeds a lovely little stream; the beauty of this spot is marred only by some gruesome evidence of the sort of treatment we could have expected at the bandits’ hands, had they defeated us--a dead woman lying stretched over a fallen tree. Despite this unpleasantness, I set up our own tents nearby--If we go any further, I’m likely to lose the path in this rain--and we spend a miserable evening crouched around a campfire that illuminates nothing beyond our faces, with lightning crashing all around us. The next day is clear, and I’m eager to see where this path leads. As we climb higher and higher, the views get more and more spectacular; my enjoyment of them is interrupted only when I step unexpectedly on a bear trap. More traps are plainly visible on the path--someone living here is not inclined to welcome visitors, or has a serious problem with bears, or both. I hesitate for a moment, but no arrows fly at us from the higher slopes, and I’ve neither seen nor heard any bears; so after carefully setting off the other traps, I decide to continue, and we eventually arrive at a tiny, lonely house, perched almost at the mountain’s peak. The house belongs to a Nord woman named Angi. She wears ordinary clothing but carries a bow, with which she assures me very seriously that she will shoot me if I try anything stupid. Her story is straightforward and brutal: her family was murdered by a pair of Imperials, and she took revenge; afterwards, she moved as far from civilization as she could to avoid repercussions. I express my sympathy for her loss, which only irritates her. Her mood changes, though, when the conversation turns to the subject of archery: she asks me whether I know how to shoot, and in response to my modest assessment of my own abilities, offers to let me use her archery range for practice. We walk down to the range together, and she gives me some practice arrows, telling me to try hitting each of her targets in turn. The task is oddly thrilling--I’m doing simple exercises, and in no danger, but each time I succeed at one of Angi’s tests my skill with Archery improves. It’s a non-adventurer’s dream! The first three targets are easy to hit; the fourth is problematic, because it’s much farther away--distant enough that I can’t see the impact of my arrows, can’t tell a hit from a miss. I do manage to hit it after a few tries--Angi can tell, even if I can’t, and so she gives me a more demanding test: I have to hit each of the three nearest targets in a matter of a few seconds. It takes a few attempts, but I eventually succeed at this, too. The next challenge is harder still: I have to hit all four targets in less than ten seconds. I try. Over and over again, going through one bundle of practice arrows after another, I aim and fire at each target in turn, always going for the farthest one last, unable to tell whether my arrow has flown too high or struck too low. I spend the entire day doing this. Angi doesn’t get impatient, exactly; archery is clearly a passion for her, and she seems dedicated as a teacher. But she clearly doesn’t like me very much: she refers to me as “Imperial,” pronouncing the word in in the same tone that she might use when describing an unpleasant fungal growth, and often responds to my presence with nothing more than a brief, inarticulate noise, like an exasperated sigh somehow combined with a snort of contempt. At last, the light begins to fail, and I can hardly see the distant target at all, let alone tell how near my last shot has come to hitting it. Angi has made a move to walk away after each of my failures, and this time I let her go. I set up our tents near her house and snoop around a little while she stirs her cooking pot. There isn’t much to see. I read a book, The Gold Ribbon of Merit, that I find near her bed. It adheres to a rather obvious formula--a pompous archery expert instructs a stolidly inattentive pupil, who turns out to have been getting the better of the teacher all along--but the ending makes me smile. I wander back down to the archery range, and, idly curious about the actual distance to the farthest target, walk out to examine it close up. It is only then that I see my practice arrows: the target is made of hard, smooth metal, but the post that supports it is wooden, and my arrows have stuck there in a tight line. I’ve been aiming consistently too low. I go to bed in renewed hope, and wake up the next morning impatient to try again. My first attempt is slightly too slow; on my second, I nail it. Angi congratulates me warmly. She tells me that she’s enjoyed my company, that it’s nice to meet someone who isn’t out to rob you. (Which is a pretty low bar for friendship, but I have to agree with her.) And she gives me her bow, called simply “Angi’s Bow,” which appears to be a perfectly ordinary hunting bow, but to me is a marvel, a treasure--a unique item that I didn’t have to kill for, didn’t have to remove from a tomb or a cave or a dead body. Exploration in Skyrim is a slippery slope, fraught with risk; for visiting new places means finding new discoveries, and new discoveries can lead inexorably to adventure. But today I feel vindicated: I’ve struck out into the unknown and found no mysteries, no quests, no heroic deeds to be done--nothing more or less than a good book, a good lesson, a good friend.
Falkreath has been a little disappointing: I’ve haven’t found any good camping spots or shot any elk, I’ve nearly gotten myself killed (again), and I haven’t received any marriage proposals. Much of this is entirely my own fault, of course, but that doesn’t make me feel any better about it. To top it all off, I have only just noticed the book that’s been lying next to my bed during my entire stay in Dead Man’s Drink: it is Nords Arise!, a frenzied call to all those “true to your blood” to join the Stormcloaks and fight for Skyrim in Ulfric’s name. I can’t say I’m pleased about it. It’s not that I hate the Stormcloaks--I don’t; the actual soldiers I’ve met have seemed like decent, courageous people, earnestly concerned for their future. And while I, true to my own Imperial blood, am inclined to trust that the Emperor is acting for the greater good, I can hardly blame those Nords who feel betrayed by an Empire that allows the Thalmor a free hand to persecute Talos worshipers in Skyrim. But I am neither a soldier nor an admirer of Ulfric, and the placement of this feverish bit of propaganda right by my bed--though it could have been a mere oversight, perhaps a failure to clean up after a previous guest--seems like a personal rebuke. So, despite the ready availability of delicious cheese wheels in this town, I’ve decided to move on again. My confidence in this decision is shaken slightly when I run into Isobel in the tavern, and, shortly after we start to converse, she quite unmistakeably begins flirting with me. “Here I was, trying to come up with the nerve to come and talk to you,” she says. Not entirely trusting my own instincts in this matter, I steer the conversation to the most neutral topic I can think of--her home city of Kvatch. She speaks affectionately of her childhood for a while before returning to her favorite idea, that of smithing arms for true warriors. I tell her that her notions seem very romantic, and she agrees, confessing that she used to dream of being the wife--and personal smith--of a great hero. “Maybe I’ll meet the next great legend right here in Falkreath,” she says. “Maybe that might be you.” I tell her that I prefer quiet times and chat; she seems surprised. But, to my immense relief, she ends the conversation cheerfully and without awkwardness--though also, as far as I can tell, without shedding her alarming notions about my heroism--and I am left free to depart Falkreath unencumbered by the affections of this amiable, talented young artisan. No-one has yet overestimated me quite as flatteringly as she has, and I should find it hard indeed to refuse an offer of marriage from her, if she were to make one, were I not certain of being a cruel disappointment to her as a spouse. Jade and I head north, stopping briefly at Half-Moon Mill to catch fish in the lake. We also find a little lodge named Hunter’s Rest perched on a small, steep hill, and admire the view for a few minutes before moving on. Turning west towards Markarth, we meet some Imperial soldiers--going in the opposite direction, unfortunately--and, further along, we find an overturned wagon. Its driver, a Khajiit merchant, lies face-down in the dirt nearby, and there are large, nasty-looking traps set in the middle of the road. I’ve done well, for once, by dawdling at my usual flower-picking pace: those traps might have done serious damage to my horse, had I been riding. I carefully spring the traps; the Khajiit, sadly, is beyond help. A fortress high on the cliff overlooks this road, and after staring up at it for a few moments, uncertain as to the disposition of the inhabitants, I decide to take the same approach that worked so well with Valtheim Towers--to get on Snowberry’s back, gallop past this fortress as fast as possible, and hope not to be struck by any stray arrows. I have just mounted up in order to put this plan into effect when I am overtaken by a group of Khajiit. Their leader, Ri’saad, is the same fellow I purchased a dress from near Whiterun, and after the usual greetings are exchanged, it seems very natural to dismount once again and walk along with this cheerful company. They are all delighted to see me (they keep telling me that it is an honor to have me with them--which might be nothing more than a buttering-up technique to induce me to buy things, but it’s very pleasant all the same) and awed by Skyrim in general--its high mountains, its spectacular views, its frigid air. Nothing untoward occurs as we pass below the fortress, and Ri’saad and his compatriots deal swiftly with subsequent threats (skeevers mostly) using swords and spells. The company’s easy camaraderie is intoxicating; I find myself weaving in among them, mimicking their movements, searching the landscape for the objects of their chatter. And I feel a strong desire to be useful, to contribute to the group’s safety--so much so that when a chaotic melee builds up around yet another vicious skeever, I ready my bow, take aim, and--to my utter mortification--shoot a Khajiit woman named Atahbah in the leg. She immediately turns around with a snarl and attacks Jade, who responds with a swipe of her own dagger. My sense of happy fellowship collapses almost instantaneously into despair: I put my own weapon away and stand passively, hoping vaguely to end the conflict even as I envision a more likely outcome, in which I am hacked and magicked to death by a justifiably furious merchant company--and all because of a skeever, a skeever, that would have been more easily dispatched without my intervention. But, miraculously, they respond to my gesture in kind: the Khajiit sheathe their weapons. Jade puts away her knife. Atahbah warns me that if provoked, she will use her claws--a pretty mild reaction, considering--but in the next moment all of her ill-feeling seems to vanish, and we continue on our journey. But something is missing, now--if not in the behavior of the Khajiit, which is unfailingly courteous, then in my own head, where my sense of shame will not allow me any peace. I keep pausing to look at the view or harvest the juniper berries that grow in these parts, and the Khajiit get further and further ahead. It’s a long way to Markarth, a much longer walk than I had anticipated, and by the time the light is starting to fail I’ve lost sight of Ri’saad entirely. I plod on through the darkness, lantern in hand, and a figure looms up before me, demanding that I hand over my money. I consider--briefly--giving it to him; it’s been a very long day, I’m still angry and ashamed--I just want this journey to be over and done with, and I really don’t fancy fighting this rude fellow in near-pitch darkness with a lamp in my hand. But being robbed allows me to focus my ire on a new object, and I only get angrier as I stare at his outfit: he’s wearing Imperial Legion armor. He’s robbing me, at swordpoint, in Imperial Legion armor. I feel insulted; I wonder whether this generally works--are the locals are so jaded as to believe that, when they encounter a thief dressed like this, they’re being robbed by an actual legionnaire? Yes, most likely, they are. And who knows, maybe he is a legionnaire. (He’s also a Khajiit; it’s like he’s bringing two sides down at once.) I’m too tired and angry to think about it any longer; I draw my sword and he goes down more quickly than I would have expected. I find Ri’saad’s group setting up camp outside the city, and it’s already so late that I decide to share their campsite. I buy a lot of stuff from Ri’saad--my clumsy attempt at an apology--including some tasty rabbit stew for dinner. But after I’ve set up my tent and camping bed I find myself quite unable to sleep. The reason for this, apparently, is that I can’t sleep while enemies are nearby. I have no idea where these enemies might be--perhaps there’s an irate mudcrab lurking near the river--and so, after issuing a few loud, self-pitying groans in the direction of the sky, I pack it all up again and walk the final stretch into Markarth itself. As I enter the gates, a man pulls out a dagger and stabs a woman in the marketplace, right in front of me. There is some shouting about the Forsworn; the guards draw their weapons and kill the murderer. It happens very quickly. Someone thrusts a note into my hand, saying that I must have dropped it. The nearest guard tells me to leave; the guards will handle everything from here. Whatever. I’m going to the inn.
The countryside of Falkreath Hold is lovely; it’s a shame the weather is so terrible--it’s almost always grey and thundery, threatening to rain if not actually raining, and with poor visibility owing to the mist. There’s also the problem of a general lack of cooking pots; I’m now equipped to make my own campfire to cook with--which is precisely what I do--but it seems a little uncivilized to do this in town, and it’s difficult to find a good spot outside the town, one that isn’t too far away, but is flat and clear enough that the campfire doesn’t look as though it is perched weirdly on a slope or about to catch on to some nearby trees. Another problem is the lack of streams in the area: there’s no shortage of water in Falkreath itself, of course, but finding water is a problem if I want to camp out (and I do! I will endure the tedium!), so I spend the next couple of days exploring the region until the early hours of the evening, and then, failing to find a good place to camp, I scurry back to a warm bed in Dead Man’s Drink as fast as Snowberry’s legs can carry me. I start my morning with a large slice of goat cheese (it’s tasty, filling stuff--an excellent meal to fuel a day of hiking in the mountains--and Solaf seems to stock cheese wheels regularly in his store; if I didn’t have to boil water I could give up on cooking entirely), and then Jade, Snowberry, and I set off to explore the paths in the highlands south of Falkreath. To the southwest of the city we find a cave not far from the road that I instinctively name Halldir’s Cairn. There is nobody about, but a couple of burial urns sit outside, mostly in pieces, which is not a good sign. The one intact urn contains a few coins and a gem that, having no desire to violate an old Nord burial ground, I leave as they are. But I can’t just walk away from the place; there are too many mushrooms growing there. After harvesting everything within reach, I’m even willing to venture inside. Jade and I enter very quietly and cautiously, and I am rewarded with the finest, most impressive crop of fungus I have ever seen--half a dozen different kinds growing in large clumps everywhere I look. The interior of the cave is otherwise not reassuring: the wide ledge we’re standing on overlooks a spacious chamber with a column of intensely blue light rising from some sort of rock formation--the cairn of the place’s title, no doubt--in the middle. I neither see nor hear any creatures moving about, but there are bedrolls on the floor, I don’t like the look of it at all, and Jade is clearly uncomfortable. She soon expresses her dissatisfaction in an outburst that uncannily echoes my own thoughts: “Did something just touch me?” she says, her voice rising sharply. “I think something just touched me! I really don’t like caves.” I collect as many mushrooms as I can without climbing down from that high ledge; there are even more below, but my daring will only take me so far. Leaving the cave and continuing west, we arrive at an arch that stretches over an otherwise unremarkable section of road. Jade and Snowberry refuse to follow me though it, and I realize that we are very near the Skyrim-Hammerfell-Cyrodiil border. For some reason, I find myself, like my friend and my horse, unable to go further: it is almost as though I am blocked by an invisible wall--but this sensation is surely the work of my own fancy. Might not this “wall” be an obstruction built up entirely in Nona’s mind? She lives in Skyrim now; she has no desire to venture into unknown Hammerfell or return to familiar Cyrodiil--in fact, she has objections to both. Her home is here--somewhere--and she is bound to find it eventually. An orc charges us, sword swinging, as we head back east, and despite my exaggerated caution (I am, as usual, reluctant to strike for fear of hitting Jade as she and our opponent circle each other), we manage to kill him. Another pointless death--what is it that drives these anonymous orcs and high elves and others to forsake their communities and friends and attack random strangers? What would it take to reduce someone like me to a state of such mindless aggression--catastrophic career failure? The tragic, accidental death of my dear friend Jade? The loss of my horse? I have a brief, terrifying vision of a future in which Nona, maddened by grief, clad in weirdly mismatched armor and now known only as “Imperial,” assaults some innocent stranger in a senseless explosion of violence. Southeast of Falkreath, a bridge hangs over the road, suspended between a pair of wooden watchtowers. Seeing no guards in attendance, I crouch suspiciously in a shadow nearby while I scan the area for bandits. Jade’s powers of observation prove superior to mine: she’s already running toward one of the towers by the time I’ve spotted the man that provoked her. He activates a device at one end of the bridge, causing a trapdoor to drop; large black boulders tumble down onto the road, missing both me and Jade--me because I am still a considerable distance away, and Jade because she is already well to the side. But the man who released them seems to lose his balance while aiming his bow; he topples off the bridge, falls to the road, and is crushed by one of his own boulders. Jade and I wait tensely for a few moments, but nobody else appears on the bridge or the towers. Approaching carefully, I find the reason why--directly beneath the bridge lies a second bandit crushed under a rock. Not only was the first fellow stupid enough to die in his own booby-trap, but he had very likely seen the same thing happen to the last guy. It’s getting late, though--having liberated these watchtowers without the ugly necessity of unsheathing our weapons, we’re left with little time to enjoy the view, and head back to town rather than camping out. It’s raining quite hard when I get up the next day, so I spend the morning divided between mushroom experiments at Grave Concoctions and smithing practice at Lod’s forge. But I soon get bored in town; I’m not finding anyone new to talk to, so I sell my potions, browse the general store, and then off I go exploring again, despite the weather. Jade and I find a dilapidated fortress to the west of Falkreath; turning north to avoid it, we discover a shack that my naming instinct tells me belongs to someone named Lorne. This Lorne, an alcoholic judging from the number of mead bottles piled on and near his bed, is nowhere about, and though his place appears to be otherwise well-kept, it is not sufficiently rainproof to tempt me to wait around hoping to meet him. As we leave the shack, a black-robed necromancer and a dead-eyed Imperial woman come running out of the woods to attack us. The battle gives us little trouble--this wizard, like the other spellcasters we have fought so far, favors frost magic, which Jade (being a Nord) is highly resistant to; she has no difficulty keeping him occupied while I dispatch the woman, who turns out to be a reanimated thrall. Her master goes down soon after, and I spend a mournful moment contemplating my nameless former countrywoman, who was wearing a ragged outfit similar to what I had on when I first arrived, and in death has become no more than a faintly-glowing pile of dust. Here, perhaps, is the worst possible fate that might befall someone like me, given sufficiently bad luck: even the mindlessly aggressive, exclusively-race-identified thugs that I’ve encountered near roadsides have more dignity than this poor soul. Not far from where the bodies fell, we find a rough stone bench; it’s covered in gruesome remains, but there’s also a book, 2920, Frostfall, v10, that I make the mistake of reading. In thoroughly uninspired prose, it tells part of the story of a man so bitterly embarrassed by his own failures that he tricks a coven of witches into participating in a (surely ill-advised) plot to kill his former lord, the living god Vivec, who was one of the rulers of Morrowind in the Third Era. (It also improves my Conjuring skill.) I don’t know what, exactly, makes this book dangerous, but its position on this altar tells me that it is, and for a moment I consider removing it as a sort of public service (Nona saves the world from lackluster reading material, one volume at a time!). In the end, though, I decide that I would rather not have the nasty tome in my possession. Further on from the altar is a large, raised mound, and as I am speculating as to its purpose I notice a green, glowing figure in the distance. I’m developing a truly annoying and dangerous habit of continuing to gawk at things even as Jade starts to panic: it turns out that there are two green, glowing figures, neither of them disposed to be friendly. One of them sends a stream of glowing motes toward me that, as I turn and flee, causes my health to drain at an alarming rate. I run as fast as I can, chugging healing potions as I go. Nona is no sprinter--all of her efforts at physical improvement go into bolstering her health, which seems only reasonable, given how many poisonous ingredients she eats experimentally--and in almost no time at all she is utterly exhausted and the spriggan(s) are still chasing her. She gets hit with another draining attack, chugs healing and stamina potions, keeps running. It feels as though I’ve been running forever as I arrive back in Falkreath; I must have consumed a good third of my supply of restoratives. Jade soon catches up, and we stand in the rain, catching our breath.
It’s only my first night camping out, and I’m already bored silly. Unless I can find something to occupy my evenings, I’m not sure how I’ll cope. I suppose I could just sleep for 12 hours at a stretch, but that seems like a waste, and there’s no piece of equipment I can make or buy--no pocket alchemy lab or portable anvil--that could help me fill this time productively. (I know I’m starting to sound like some sort of obnoxious workaholic here, and there’s not a lot to say in my defense, although I did consider bringing some books with me. But even that wouldn’t help, as time in the game freezes when you open one.) The man letting us share his fire--a fisherman I’ve come to know only as “Fisherman”--is friendly enough, but not the most stimulating conversationalist. (His years of fishing in these parts have apparently left him with nothing to say; perhaps he’s been alone for so long that he no longer knows how to entertain a pair of young ladies.) It’s too dark to swim or gather ingredients, and I’ve already heard Jade’s entire life story several times. Not that it’s all bad--it’s a lovely night. The stars are out, the weather is calm, and we’re camped on a little island in the lake west of Riverwood. I could hardly have asked for a more idyllic spot. Unfortunately, it’s hard to lie on the ground so as to stare wistfully up at all those tiny points of light in the infinite expanse of Oblivion when the camera insists on pointing down at me whenever I try it. It wasn’t my intention to go camping at all; Jade and I started out towards Falkreath this morning, and I was intending to stay on horseback at least until we reached Riverwood--I had already denuded the roadside plants growing between the two settlements of their blooms, after all. But the absence of flowers didn’t seem to have reduced the butterfly population, so naturally I climbed down from Snowberry’s back to catch some. As a result, our progress was exceedingly slow, and stymied by further delays--I stopped off at Embershard Mine to chop more wood (I’ll eventually need fuel, and it’s not possible to gather wood from fallen trees), and I also wanted to avoid the road that goes through Helgen (what with the rumors of a dragon in the area), which meant that we would be taking a somewhat longer route. Much to my regret, I made one further detour: I followed a side-path up a hill in search of a cottage that my instincts suggested lay in that direction, and found instead the scene of a horrific crime--four dead people, men and women, all apparently murdered in the act of worshiping at a shrine of Talos. The offerings placed about the statue’s feet seemed undisturbed, and some of the worshipers had coin in their purses--details that argued against the slaughter’s being the work of common bandits, and toward a conclusion that I didn’t much care to contemplate. As much as I’ve been hearing about the atrocities of the Thalmor, I might yet have believed that even they would have qualms about leaving their victims--however objectionable their beliefs--out to rot like this. But it does me little good to turn this appalling scene over and over in my mind; am I shocked? Certainly. Will I investigate this massacre and bring the perpetrator(s) to justice? Hardly. There is nothing that I, Nona, can do to end religious persecution in Skyrim; that is a task for someone made of sterner stuff. I can but content myself with the thought that should I ever meet such a person, I will inform them of these matters; I will, when I find this individual, do exactly as any conscientious, dyed-in-the-wool non-player character should. I will beg. I will plead. And, if necessary, I will hire a player character whom I have just met to handle everything. ... If the conversational option is there. It was clear by the time we had returned to the main road that we would not reach Falkreath before dark. We might have camped easily enough by roadside--I had enough supplies that a fire would not have been absolutely necessary--but a late-afternoon swim in the lake led me to Fisherman and his campfire, and we were able to rest in relative comfort. We don’t have a lot of ground to cover the next day, but the inhabitants of Skyrim do their best to make those last few miles as difficult as possible. Strictly speaking, our first assailants don’t qualify as inhabitants, as they are only animated skeletons: nevertheless they attack fiercely, and, as far as we can tell, independently--I see nobody who might have created or be directing them. One of the skeletons carries a well-made shield, and I pick it up (my first piece of, how you say, loot)--I don’t like to take people’s belongings, even dead people’s belongings, but a skeleton is more like a thing than a person. Even so, it was a person once, a person whose remains have been subjected to.... The shield falls from my hands. Hasn’t this body been violated enough already? The next person who wishes to express violent opposition to our reaching Falkreath is a high elf. He engulfs Jade in a cloud of magical frost while I shuffle from side to side with my bow drawn and Jade dodges back and forth blocking my shots. To my shame, she ends up killing him almost without assistance. (And here I thought we had an understanding that she was to be an even less capable fighter than I.) Perhaps I should make a better weapon for her. By mid-morning, a thick fog has settled over the region; we reach Falkreath around noon. The very first man I see who is not a guard asks me to deliver some ashes to Runil, the priest of Arkay; apparently, dealing with human remains is so much a part of daily life here that Thadgeir thinks nothing of asking a complete stranger to help. I stop briefly at the general store, where Solaf, an ex-Stormcloak, warns me about his brother, who hates everybody. Solaf’s inventory is practically overflowing with tempting articles: I buy a new pair of boots, some groceries, a tinderbox, and, most extravagantly, an enormous wheel of goat cheese. For some reason my pleasure in making this last purchase exceeds even my elation at obtaining a tinderbox without having to find troll fat. And then Solaf ruins it all by telling me that, if I steal anything from his store, I’ll regret it. (After I’ve bought over a hundred septims worth of stuff from him!) Stepping jauntily out the door in my new boots, I find my way down to the graveyard, where Runil is conducting a rite for a grieving couple’s 9-year-old child. I watch from a respectful distance until he is finished before offering my sympathies to the parents. The father, Mathies, tells me the gruesome details of his daughter’s murder with so little reserve as to provide sure indication that the end of his sorry tale holds a quest. I forbear asking who tore his little girl limb from limb, therefore; my errand gives me a convenient excuse to take my leave. I deliver the ashes to Runil at his home, accepting a generous cash reward and refusing to retrieve the journal he “left in a cave” (dare I ask? NO!), before having a chat with Melea Entius, a woman who has come to pray to Arkay. She is obviously very ill, and relates her sad history to me--how she became afflicted with an incurable and terminal disease, how she lost her husband. She is remarkably stoic, concerned only that her daughter Henrietta, whom Mathies and his wife Indara have agreed to care for when she passes, will forget her. I suggest that she write Henrietta a letter, and she thanks me profusely for this simple idea, asking me whether I wouldn’t mind checking in on the child once in a while. I can hardly refuse such a request. I meet Jerulith, a severely handsome Altmer woman dressed in Thalmor robes, whose coldly hostile manner would be more than enough to dissuade me from further conversation, were my memory of the scene at the Talos shrine not a scab demanding to be picked at. But she assumes, perhaps rightly, that my desire to talk must necessarily result from a wish to vent my hatred--and, her voice dripping with sarcasm, goes on to list so many possible crimes for which I might hold her responsible that I soon find myself hating her very earnestly indeed. I finish my tour of Falkreath at the mill, where Bolund, Salof’s unpleasant brother, declares that he can’t believe that provincials like me are allowed to wander Skyrim. I stare in disbelief. Provincials? Did he just--that I--I’ll give you “provincial,” you illiterate, backward, axe-faced northern goat-turd! Let the Thalmor have your snow-covered, bandit-ridden, pyscho-wolf-infested--aaaah. Deep breath, Nona. Tight smile, brisk nod, back away quietly. Smile, nod, back away.... I manage to calm myself at Grave Concoctions, the local alchemist’s shop, owned by a Redguard named Zaria. At her table I discover an interesting new property or two; I also discover that a single dose of troll fat costs more than my tinderbox. I discover no new formula as profitable as my conjuring-enhancing magic-suppressant (BUY NOW!), but selling my latest batch of mixtures does improve my Speech and get me to level 8. I have time for some smithing before dark, and I chat with Lod, the local smith, and his apprentice Isobel, a fellow Imperial who tells me that she’s on a sort of smithing pilgrimage--apparently her family is famous for its smiths, and her personal quest is to prove herself worthy to inherit the family forge, which is blessed with its own guardian spirit. She’s actually a little ambivalent about the whole thing: back home, she will be making fancy items for nobles, when she would rather make weapons for the use of warriors and heroes. I feel more than a touch of envy: how wonderful it would be if, having mastered the alchemist’s trade in Skyrim, I were able to return to a shop back home, a prestigious shop, complete with its own benevolent haunt. I shouldn’t at all mind working for the nobility; let them use my drugs to hide their disfigurements or poison their enemies or make their offspring fall in love with appropriate marriage candidates--a safe, lucrative business would fulfill all my fondest wishes. For a town in which death seems so close, Falkreath is certainly crowded with the living; the inn, Dead Man’s Drink, is packed. A woman named Narri says that I’m going to have the men here wrapped around my finger in no time. I’m concerned at first that her sight might be failing, but the little girl, Henrietta, tells me that Narri says something of this sort to everyone. A distinguished old man, Dengeir of Stuhn, is so wary of Imperial spies that he tries to get me to spy for him. (So--by complaining about Imperial spies he actually hopes to recruit one. Clever. Very clever.) Finally, knowing I shouldn’t, I talk to Jerulith again, to hear why she is no longer with the Thalmor: she explains that she had a disagreement with Ondolemar, her superior in Markarth, whom she found insufficiently ruthless. She had suggested that an entire Talos-worshiping family be put to death, including the children, though her colleagues thought that children, being malleable, ought to be spared. When the entire family was murdered--nobody knows by whom--Ondolemar decided to blame Jerulith, whose opinion on the matter was well-known, and paint her as a rogue agent. In this manner he disposed of her, appeased the Jarl, and stoked the general fear of the Thalmor, which from his point of view was all to the good. Worse and worse. Even we non-player characters should learn to keep our stupid mouths shut once in a while.
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201 And All That
Nona Plaia may well be the most boring person in Skyrim. Below are links to her "adventures" in chronological order.
A Life More Ordinary Mods An NPC is Born The Lady in the Lake Adrift in the Rift Opportunity Chops Studying Abroad Witches, Wolves Footwear is Not Enough A Modest Proposal Scales of Love Dances with Beers Five Rules to Live By Plain and Pusillanimous Watery Woes How Not to Stage a Murder Hot Heads and Cold Graves Run Nona Run Interlude A Fool Suffers Gladly The Markarth Discomfiture In Search of the Unknown It's Raining Bandits Down and Out No Holds Barred Beyond the Pale The Slippery Slope Mission Implausible The Nord in the Next Room The Only Living Girl Victory is a Gateway Drug Continuity Break Wherever You Go Archives
August 2014
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