The sun peeked out from behind a flurry of gently coasting clouds in the afternoon sky, warmimg Mara's skin as her wagon rolled down the path cut into the woodland. They'd been traveling since the break of dawn, and already had she started to tire of her tail. The two had come in handy the previous night, but she could've handled the pair of careless thieves on her own. She continued to question her father's decision to hire an armed escort ever time she had to make a simple delivery. It was, in Mara's opinion, a waste of money.
She looked back at the two black-clad mercenaries aoclosely following her wagon. Ansen kept a close watch on their surroundings, his eyes seeming to take in all that they could instead of focusing on a si gle point of interest. . The other mercenary, Sindell, casually and calmly read The Wolf Queen as his mighty mount trotted steadily, the Dunmer jostling with the animals movements. He only glanced up for a brief moment after feeling Mara's gaze on him. He soon returned his own vision to the pages of the book in his hands. Mara rolled her eyes, and brought them back to the road. She noticed out of her periphery Ansen come to her side.
Sighing, the young Imperial woman asked, "What do you want?"
"A two man armed escort isn't necessarily standard procedure for a simple transport of ore..."
"It is when you have a father like mine."
"What exactly are you hauling back there?" Ansen asked, glancing back at the wagon.
"Ebony ore, and a lot of it. Our company bought a mine in the Jerral Mountains, and struck an unexpected vein."
Ansen nodded slowly. "How lucky... Ebony ore always seems to be in high demand, no wonder your father hired us..."
"My father hired you because he's a paranoid old man. I told the two of you that I don't need your protection," she repeated what she'd said before.
Looking her up and down, Ansen grunted and cracked a small smile. He pulled back on his horse's reins, falling back from beside the wagon, leaving the well-off woman be. Looking back to Sindell, who'd been watching the exchange, Ansen remarked, "She's a charmer."
"The sooner we get her to the city, the sooner we're done with her."
The pair weren't completely out of earshot, and they knew it, but were ignored by the young merchant's daughter. She kept her hands on the reins of her horses and her eyes on the road ahead. That's when she noticed it, a merchant's wagon much like her own lying on its side in the middle of their path... Beside it lay two Bosmer and a mare. The wagon, barely holding together, appeared to have been ransacked.
Slowly bringing her wagon to a halt, she whispered, "Gods, what happened here...?"
Sindell noticed her slowing, and, looking past her vehicle, noticed the wreckage before them. His mind began to work, and he quickly scanned their surroundings. "Mara, we shouldn't stop," he warned.
Continuing to ignore the Dunmer, she dismounted her wagon and slowly approached the devasted scene, trying to get a closer look at the transport... the insignia painted onto the side was familair. Drawing closer, she recognized the two elves as employees of her father's company, doing a simple delivery much like herself. Kneeling beside the bodies, she looked them over, grazing the hand of Tarim, a mer she'd known for many years, a man she'd seen just a few days ago, alive, well and laughing. Seeing him lying dead, broken, was a little too real for the young woman...
Ansen stopped at the wreck and dismounted as well, passing the bodies by, he took a look at the wagon. "All they were carrying was food, and some it is still here..." He walked over to the dead horse and inspected it to see what kind of damage had been done to it. It appeared as if the creature had been battered so badly, it'd died from the internal bleeding caused by whatever damage it sustained.
"What on Nirn happened to them?" Mara asked, still shaken from seeing two people so familiar lying dead.
"Let us leave before we find out, or worse, join them..." Sindell suggeseted, still eyeing their surroundings, beginning to grow concerned.
All was too quiet. The woodland didn't speak, the bird's didn't chirp, no wildlife could be seen or heard rustling through the brush, all that met Sindell's acute hearing was the sound of the wind. He then picked up on it, the sounds of slow, heavy foot steps, imprinting the underbrush and fallen leaves. Swiveling his head around to meet the disturbance, he saw the beast. A tall, lumbering creature, gripping it its right hand the severed limb of a deer, dripping with blood, riddling with teeth marks. Its belly distended out, and blood dripped from its chin, the monstrosity's pale blueish body wrapped in a leather harness. It slowly trudged towards the travelers, dragging an enormous stone club behind.
"Ogre!" Sindell announced, quickly dismounting his steed as well. Becoming aware of the immediate danger they were in, Ansen drew his bow just in time to see a second ogre emerge from the treeline just off to their left. It had a long jagged scar adorned its front, running from its right shoulder, down to its left hip.
Turning to meet this new threat, Ansen tried to place himself in between the still kneeling Mara and it, with just a few yards of distance between the ogre and himself. Not enough, in his opinion.
Yet another Ogre appeared at their backs, barreling up the road towards them. They were trapped.
It was too late now to try and run from the trio, since the mercenaries and their charge were now surrounded, meaning a confrontation was the only option. Sindell snapped his fingers and his hand sparked and erupted in fire. Ansen could feel the intense heat radiating from the Dunmer's hands more than five feet away. Targeting the Ogre coming from the forest, the battle-mage took a defensive stance, planting his left foot forward and putting his body weight on his back leg, waiting for the creature to get closer...
Ansen grabbed hold of the hunting bow he carved himself, snatched an arrow from the quiver that was strapped to his horse's saddle as he jumped back onto the saddle and strung it. He sunk the arrow into the belly of the first ogre to appear. The creature just ignored the nuisance and continued to eat the deer leg as it trudged forward.
"Their hides are thick!" Sindell warned him.
"Obviously!" said Ansen, drilling another arrow into the creature's abdomen, which was also seemingly ignored as it gorged itself.
SIndell let a river of flame run forward from his hands, covering the ogre before him in orange fire. The beast howled in pain, but his approach didn't slow, and the Dunmer spellcaster had to roll out of its path just to keep from being trampled. Gritting his teeth, Sindell increased the flow of magicka to his hands, and turned to meet the ogre as it attempted to slow and face him again. Another stream of magical flames erupted from his palms, burning blue and white, this time producing an even louder bellow from the monstrosity, and causing it to come to a halt.
Although it was quite the spectacle, the show of magical prowess, Ansen couldn't take his eyes off of the ogre before him, whom he'd given up on trying to bring down with normal means. He had to be clever. Stringing another arrow, he aimed at the creature's head, intent on blinding him. Unfortunately, he'd forgotten about the third ogre...
"Behind you!" Mara shouted as she mounted her wagon once again.
The young mercenary didn't even have time to try and turn to face the threat. It grabbed Ansen's horse and picked it up with ease. He fell from the steed to the dirt and watched as the Ogre slammed the horse to the ground a half-dozen times. Thinking quickly, Ansen drew his iron sword, and while the ogre was preoccupied with pummeling the horse, drove the blade upward, though its mouth and skull, misting his face with the creature's blood. He shuddered at the warm, unsettling feeling of it on his skin and pulled his blade from the base of the ogre's skull.
After charring the second ogre a solid black, Sindell took a step back from its body, exhaustion from the extreme use of magicka catching up with him.
The final Ogre was slowly coming up on Sindell's flank so Ansen moved to intercept it. He pounced on it and dug his sword into its back, twisting the blade right and left. The Ogre reached back, grabbed Ansen by the arm and pulled him off of its body. It started to squeeze his arm, with definite intention to break it, but before it snapped, Sindell unleashed a frost spell into its face.
When the monster dropped Ansen, Sindell took a step back, and concentrated his magicka. Once it was at its peak, he cocked his arm back and punched the Ogre's chest. Electricity snaked through its body, destroying every vital organ within until the Ogre was left a lifeless corpse.
As it collapsed to the dirt, Ansen rose, holding his left arm. The damage wasn't severe, at least not in comparison to what it could've been, just extremely sore. Mara wore a stunned expression on her face as Ansen and Sindell walked back over to her. She stepped down off of her carriage, glanced over at the dead traveler and his wrecked carriage and realized just how dead she would've been if these two mercenaries were not with her.
Mara walked up to the body of one of the Ogres, trying to get a closer look at it. She was so intrigued by the creature that she didn't even notice the stomping of hooves in the distance drawing near. Sindell looked down the road at the rider whose horse was sprinting right towards them.
"Mara!"
"Huh?"
The rider didn't even stop as it ran by them, snatching Mara up in the process.
"N'wah!" Sindell spat. "That woman...!"
Quickly, the Dunmer hopped onto the wagon's couch and grabbed a hold of the reins of the horses pulling. With no horse to ride, Ansen joined him, setting an arrow in his bow and steadying himself in the seat. Sindell knew that something was going to go wrong on this job sooner or later. It was only a matter of time…
Mara's kidnapper carried her underneath his arm as his horse raced down the road. The Khajiit could clearly hear the wheels of the carriage behind him booming like thunder. The girl's protector's were right on his tail. He only had a little farther to go, though...
Sindell snapped the reins of the two horses pulling the carriage yet again, to no avail. They were already going as fast as they possibly could and the Khajiit was still out of reach, no doubt because of the large, ore filled carriage they were leading. Sindell couldn't believe he didn't react quickly enough. He was more smarter than this...
Ansen readied his bow and said, "I'm gonna' take him out."
"You think you can do it without hitting Mara?" Sindell asked.
"Maybe..." he shrugged.
The Khajiit turned halfway around on his horse, released its reins briefly and hurled a weak fire spell at them. Sindell shot the ball out of the air with a frost spell and grit his teeth. "He's stalling," Ansen said.
"Exactly what I was thinking..." Sindell said.
four strangers on mounts appeared from the forest and two rode up to either side of the carriage. "I guess they were waiting for us," Sindell said. he turned to Ansen and said, "Take the reins."
The young merc obeyed and took the leather from his Dunmer companion. As soon as the reins were out of his hands, Sindell grabbed his mace, and jumped from the carriage to the left. He knocked one of the two riders off of his horse and landed gracefully on the steed's saddle. One of the other three, a Redguard woman, came to ride beside Sindell and drew her sword. The Elf blocked the woman's swing with the armor on his left forearm and deflected the attack. He ducked, hugging his horses back as the woman ran right into a low hanging branch that whipped her off of her mount. She fell from her horse and landed right on her neck. Two down, three to go.
"Ba'l, take the girl to the drop off point!" one of the assailants shouted to the Khajiit that held Mara. "We'll hold these two back!"
"You can try!" Ansen replied as if they had been addressing him. He unsheathed his knife and looked over to his right, where the other two strangers were. The dagger soared through the air, cutting right through the throat of one of them and spilling blood all over the road as he toppled.
Sindell took that as his cue to get Mara back. He snapped the reins of the horse he rode and caught up to the Khajiit. Hefting his mace, he swung at the back of the man's head as he came upon him. Ba'l saw it coming, ducked the attack and growled at Sindell. The Dark Elf swung a second time, but Ba'l's quickness saved him yet again and he sped up his horse's sprint, attempting to get away from Sindell.
"Don't run away you damned cat!" Ansen commanded.
He took up his bow, strung an arrow and let it fly. Just as he'd hoped, the arrow flew its coarse and struck the Khajiit in the back. The black furred man-beast whimperd and his grip on Mara lessened. Sindell quickly got to her and caught the woman before she fell from the horse.
"Let's fall back!" the only other remaining attacker said to Ba'l. The duo broke off and lead the steed's into the thick of the forest.
Ansen and Sindell stopped and watched them leave. The Imperial-Nord was fairly satisfied with their temporary victory, but Sindell's mind was burdened. Now there was no doubt in his mind that there was much more to this mission than Varris had told them, and his daughter was right in the middle, it appeared.
"Who were they?" Sindell asked as he let Mara off of the horse.
"I-I don't know! I thought you two knew!" she proclaimed.
"Those five weren't after the ore like the thieves from last night, they were after you," Sindell said.
"And they used those ogres..."
"Yeah, and they were pretty determined to get a hold of you too," Ansen added. "What'd your father get us into, Mara?"
"My father doesn't tell me everything regarding the business, so it could be that they were hired by a rival merchant or something," she said, shrugging loosely.
"Whoever they were, they were professional," Sindell said.
"What makes you think that?"
"When I was fighting one of them, I noticed a tattoo on her left forearm. It was a hand weilding a broken sword, the symbol of the Copper Company mercenary organization," he explained. "They're The Silver Sparrows' biggest competition right now."
"You think they'll be back for round two?" Ansen asked.
"There's no telling, but it's a possibility." The elf turned to Mara and thought for a moment. "We were lucky today, the mercs that came after us we fairly weak, probably grunts. If they come back, they'll be coming back with some of their best, and that'll be a problem."
"So, we should hurry to the Imperial City, is what you're saying," Ansen said.
Sindell mounted one of the dead mercenary's horses. "Yep."