Fire On The Mountain (A Skyrim Quest)

Departure

Do'azda feels like an Al'fiq put in a bag and tossed down a hill. She groans, and rubs her eyes sitting up. The good news is she is young, young enough that she can just push through it after a very, very long groan.

She gets up from the bed she's not going to be able to return to for some time. At least she's not waking up in a gutter. She's never done that before, and today would be a poor day to start. The good news is that she's packed already. It hadn't been because she'd known that she's going to be hungover in the morning, but just because it is too easy to forget things when traveling.

She'd forgotten a number of little things when she started the journey up north: tinderboxes, spare rope, a second knife… and now she's going to journey north once more.

She hauls up her pack, getting dressed in her robes. Hopefully they'll be warm enough for the day. She rolls up the bedroll again, to make sure it's well-ensconced on her back, and then she steps out.

Breakfast is on the table, and quite a lot of it; more than Do'azda imagines she can handle in such a delicate state, but she sits without complaint - it could be weeks before she can enjoy a home cooked meal again, and she ought to savor it.

Sha'ki paces around the kitchen as Do'azda eats, a wax paper packet clutched in her hands.

"Do'azda!" She steps forwards when Do'azda pushes away the remains of her breakfast, holding out the packet. "This one prepared some food for you, for the trip? Some bread from the baker, a little cheese… She is sorry to see you go."

Do'azda takes the packet and Sha'ki smiles tremulously.

"This one will be back soon," she promises. "She thanks you for all your hospitality. You have shown yourself to be a true cat."

Sha'ki pulls her into a rough embrace. "Be safe, shaman."

And then Do'azda is gone, out into the early morning chill.



She has had to eat faster than she would like, both because she wants to leave before enough morning passes that questions are asked, and because she suspects she's being waited for. At the edge of Little Elsweyr, Bathes-In-Steel is indeed waiting for her, patiently standing there as if she has all the days of the world to wait.

Bathes-In-Steel looks up when she sees Do'azda, but lets Do'azda come to her, walking in her direction.

"Ah, Shaman," Bathes-In-Steel says. She is dressed as if ready for battle, burnished steel armor that she moves around easily in. She grins, and it is a toothy, vicious thing, "I hope you are ready for the journey. If you are not, we may have some minutes left for last goodbyes."

"Do'azda should be," she says, looking Bathes-In-Steel up and down, eye going to the sword. A glass sword is a truly deadly thing, especially against the kinds of bandits they're most likely to face, for now. "You look ready for battle."

"I decided that what you would want in such a moment," she says, gesturing to the far wall, where there are more soldiers than usual and it seems as if all of them are looking at her. "Is a Battle-Mage. Or something like that."

She knows about Imperial Battle Mages, whose training is some of the most intense within the Empire. They are a knife honed to a single fine point, and this point is not good for skinning, or cutting food, or spreading butter. It is a knife that is only good for finding the heart of the enemies of the Empire. But as a way of… being… Battle Mages inspire imitation, people who even though not officially a graduate, fight with sword and steel and powerful Destruction magic.

She suspects the jarl's huscarl is a battlemage. It is a sort of deadliness which people recoil from instinctually, a person forging themself into an implement of death.

"Do'azda hopes there is not such a need," she protests, "But she fears it will be a dangerous road ahead."

"More so than it would be normally?" Bathes-In-Steel asks, a quick, casual gesture to the world as if to say 'have you seen that Skyrim is in a civil war?'

"Yes," Doa'zda says.

"Then best hurry to the danger, rather than have it catch us at night," Bathes-In-Steel says.


The weather could certainly be worse, and Bathes keeps up easily with her without ranging ahead. She looks over at Bathes-In-Steel and decides to ask a question, "When was the last time you traveled?"

"For more than a few hours? Far too long," Bathes says, not looking over to Do'azda but instead watching for any sign of ambush.

She thinks about what she knows of the Hist, and Black Marsh, and what Bathes-In-Steel said last night. She can't go home, and the thought of her never being able to return to Elsweyr makes Do'azda's tail stiffen in fear and worry greater than if she were told that a Dragon is waiting just around the next bend.

It is too cold in Skyrim, and though she has not been here for that long, she cannot imagine she could ever get used to it. There are Khajiit who are essentially and fundamentally Skyrim: a few recipes, a few words--and it'd be even less if they were accepted rather than forced to live separately.

But Bathes, she doesn't seem like someone who would leave behind Blackmarsh… but she also doesn't know the other woman that well, truly.

"The Shaman is thinking," Bathes says after a long moment's pause.

"Too much thinking," Do'azda confesses.

"Care to share what you were thinking about?"

"Home," Do'azda admits.

Bathes-In-Steel considers this and nods. "In an hour, would you like to stop for a quick break? You seem tired."

"Do'azda said goodbye too hard and too loudly," she confesses.

Bathes-In-Steel laughs and rummages in her pack before pulling out yet another sweetroll. "It sounds like you need this now, and not in an hour."

Do'azda considers saying no, but she instead pulls out a cloth to pass it over and eats it, trying to just slow down rather than stop as they ramble through the not-truly-wilderness.


Not too long later, they begin seeing hives in the distance.

"Ah, this is the meadery, Honningbrew," Bathes-In-Steel said. "Did you drink any of this? I'm not much of one for mead, but they do not have 'Marsh Water' this far north, and if they did it would send the Nords slipping under the table? Do you like mead?"

Bathes-In-Steel could be quiet, politely respectful of distance, but she has in her something a little like some enthusiastic friend, the sort who is always excited to hear and be heard.

"Do'azda likes mead well enough, though she would not say it is her favorite," she says, thinking of the taste of berry mash, and of all the drinks from home. "She did have some of it, but she cannot remember its tastes now."

"Ah, you must have truly made many friends. My party was… smaller. I did not drink, and so perhaps that is some of it," Bathes-In-Steel says, stretching a little as they begin to cross the bridge, the meadery already fading from view. "But still, to have been so liked--"

"Do'azda's celebration meant many in the bar could drink for free. They would have tasted anyone," she says, trying to keep her ears from perking. She wants to be casual, even humble, but a part of her does hope that for all her failures and limitations, she's done enough good that she will be missed.

She also hopes she will be back in a more permanent manner.

All she has to do is somehow defeat Alkhan.

Not much of a problem to even mention. Probably an afternoon's work, perhaps two.

No pressure that anyone could notice.

"Yet while a drunk will drink to anyone… it's more than that. You did a lot, Do'azda," Bathes-In-Steel declares.

Do'azda's tail flicks a little in embarrassment, and she considers saying something back. But what can she say against such aggressive, easy kindness?


It is not that much more than an hour later that this easy kindness is tested when they hear a desperate shout in the distance. They are traveling along the path set out for them, and Do'azda is trying to figure out how well both of them will do with hard terrain, and how they will divide their watches if they do not come upon a settlement, or one willing to host two members of species hardly tolerated in Skyrim.

She is also not talking about Shouts, about what it is like. She's only done it once, and she wants to do it again, remembers the feeling of power and control, of reaching her hand out and at last seeming to take charge of her destiny. She can understand now how he did it, why Ulfric is so eager to use the very power of the universe, a power that feels sacred and profane to Do'azda even from her first use, as a tool.

And she did not have to deal with a ruined throat for her trouble.

She didn't even know what the limitations truly are for Shouts.

Then, amidst all of it, she hears a very different shout. "No, please! Help! Stop, I didn't--"

Do'azda freezes, legs tensed before she realizes it could be a trap. It is a common enough bandit trick, to have someone wounded or crying out for help.

"We should see who it is," Bathes-In-Steel insists, seeing the hesitation on Do'azda's face.

She's not used to violence, and hopes that it is simply a hurt traveler off the path and not someone being attacked, though their voice is filled with panic. It's a man's voice, she thinks, and a Nord accent if she has to guess.

It's not much of a guess, and they turn right on the path and make their way into the underbrush, across a slight rocky dip down towards--

Ah.

There is a man in dirty, stained leather armor, bleeding from a cut on his face, an axe discarded some distance away. A woman is crouching over him, holding daggers. She's dressed in more substantial, if rather rusty looking, armor, and she has a helmet which almost hides her face, the snarl as she says, "Quiet, you've drawn attention. Damnable fool."

Do'azda draws her weapon, and so does Bathes-In-Steel, and the woman looks up at them and considers. It's clear where she's looking, the way that she's trying to find any hole to slip out of. Wherever she and the other bandits--and that's what this has to be, a bandit trying to give up the life and now at risk of dying for it--are staying, she needs to get back to them to warn that someone might have noticed.

Or, she could--

The woman roars, "Skyrim for the Nords!" because of course she does, aiming at Do'azda as the weaker party.

Do'azda hefts her axe, and lashes out. The woman dodges partially. But a partial dodge still means her axe slams into the woman's side, even though it doesn't make it through the armor. She lets out a huff of breath as Bathes-In-Steel steps forward in a single, fluid motion, grinning and suddenly come to life in an eerie way as the glass sword slides right through the woman's throat.

In a single clean motion she gasps, reaches for her throat, and then collapses as the sword is pulled out of her throat.

Blood almost gushes, pouring out of a fatal wound as she croaks in desperation and fear. Do'azda steps back, and Bathes… watches.

"Sovngarde for the Nords," Bathes-In-Steel says, in as pleasant a voice as just a little while ago when she is offering sweetrolls out of the goodness of her heart. She turns to look at the man. "We will not hurt you. You are fleeing from a life of crime. It is an understandable impulse." Her smile is no doubt meant to be friendly, but the man actually goes even paler than his already wan Nord face at the sight of her teeth. "I too understand what it is like, to have done things I regret," says the Argonian with the lifeblood of a bandit all over her arm. "We can help you."

He talks.

No, that is not the case. He all but begs Do'azda to save him with her eyes and babbles anything and everything to her as if she is his only hope of salvation. "I, I, my name is Vigrod, and I don't want to be a bandit anymore. Not after he killed them who wanted to quit. I'll leave I promise, and never take up a sword again. I'll devote myself to religion, to peace, to--"

"It is a very good thing, to live for peace," Bathes-In-Steel says pleasantly, and he becomes entirely incomprehensible for a good five minutes at that entirely innocuous statement.

But what they finally hear is disturbing enough. A major bandit camp, not far from there, and not that far from the city.

"Hajvarr Iron-Hand," Vigrod says, "As foul a bastard as you'll find. Swings that greatsword around like its nothing, but he's going funny, erratic. He thinks he can fight the whole city watch, but every day he gets more paranoid, and Ulfr and Rodolf don't help, dripping poison into his ear whenever they get the chance. I just- I just wanted to leave, but he said anyone who leaves is betraying the gang. Gods."

Bathes-in-Steel frowns, considering.

"It is not kind," She says, "For a man to stop others from turning away from their life of crime. He had perhaps no cause for paranoia before." She laughs, as though remembering a well told joke. "But now…"

Do'azda cannot even disagree. A part of her does want to leave this alone. Another part of her is slightly unnerved with Bathes-In-Steel's words, especially since she herself spent years as, presumably, a ruthless Argonian gang leader. It is not a position given to those unwilling to do sudden and terrible violence, as the last fight has shown.

But at the same time, it doesn't mean she's wrong.

Tactics!

Overall Strategy (Choose 1)
[] Move fast - they'll be expecting the woman back from killing their deserter. Move quickly, try to outrun their ability to raise the alarm.
[] Be thorough - move carefully, without alerting anyone, and then explode into violence, killing all the bandits in a specific part of the hideout before moving on.
[] Let Bathes-in-Steel take the lead - she is tremendously lethal. If Do'azda hangs back, no doubt Bathes-in-Steel can carve through the bandits.


Magic Strategy (Choose 1)
[] Hold back on casting any spells for now.
[] Conjure Animal - A wolf would be a useful companion for such a mission, reducing the numerical imbalance.
[] Bound Dagger - In such confined space, a dagger could be indispensable, especially one as light and deadly as the conjuration.
[] Courage - Perhaps Bathes-in-Steel could use the boon to their strength of will? It seems unlikely.

Shout Strategy (Choose 1)
[] Shout early and often. Perhaps Do'azda has a limit to her shouting, but before she reaches it, all shall taste of her voice and fear.
[] Shout for most effect. A dragon does not shout at a single wolf, she breaks the whole pack. Do'azda will not shout until she encounters a large clump of the bandits.
[] Do not Shout yet. She will Shout when she encounters a worthier foe.

VM AN: And now we've left Whiterun.

TL AN: Bathes-In-Steel, what a moral woman! How kindly! How sweet!