The next morning Legate Rikke shakes me awake and tells me,"You and I will ride ahead of the soldiers to Dragon Bridge, to warn the guards that over two hundred soldiers will be marching through in less than an hour. One of my trusted advisers will lead the troops over the Dragon Bridge and a few miles away from the town. We'll stay in the village for the night to speak with the captain of the guard about reinforcements. Now come on, we can't waste time."
When Legate Rikke told me we'd be riding ahead I almost sighed in relief, I didn't want to wait around for an hour while everyone packs up and prepares to ride. We pack, mount our horses, and ride as quick as we can. What would take the soldiers an hour or two takes Rikke and me less than five minutes, we even have time to eat breakfast at the inn. When we tell the guards the soldiers will pass through town they all groan, but go ahead and prepare for the march. 'Preparing' apparently means warning the citizens and hiding all the animals from sight, apparently there have been some problems with soldiers in the past.
Legate Rikke leads me back over to the local inn, apparently the captain of the guard doesn't have any other place to house his soldiers. "Should I be part of the conversation, o-or do you want me to go do something?" I ask Rikke as she sits down. She gives me a confused look and tells me, "You act as if you're a housecarl instead of a future Legate. Sit down, and try to learn something." We have to wait a few minutes before the captain sits down, but the conversation starts immediately.
"I already know what you want, and the answer is no." The captain says before Rikke can even ask. After letting out a sigh Rikke tells him, "We need soldiers, Rorikstead is our next stop and they're currently neutral so they can't lend us any help. You have fifty soldiers under your command, I want thirty to accompany us. I also want two hundred pounds of your food rations, your ten finest horses, and five of your famous hunting hounds.
The captain's eyes widen and he exclaims, "You're mad! We only have three hundred pounds of food stored away, twenty horses in total, and seven hounds. I can give you seven men, two horses, twenty pounds of food, and one hound." Rikke considers the offer before saying, "Two hundred and fifty pounds of food, forty men, fifteen horses, and all of your hounds." When he begins arguing Rikke calmly lays her blade on the table and tells him, "You brought this on yourself, if you'd accepted my first offer you wouldn't need to give so much away. I'll pay you twice what the supplies are worth, leave you in peace, and I promise we won't touch a single of your pigs." As an afterthought she says, "Or your women."
The man is forced to watch as Rikke lays a sack of gold on the table, sheathes her sword, gets up, and walks away without a second look. When I remain sitting she turns and says, "Follow." I obediently rise and follow her into the nearest room, all the while the captain stares after us with his mouth open in shock. "Why did you demand so much from your own people?" I ask her as we sit down at the small table in our room, a meal already prepared for us. "First, they aren't my people. The citizens and soldiers of Dragon Bridge consider themselves neutral, although if it wasn't for the Empire they'd be burned down to the ground. Second, I demand so much because we need twice as much as they have. And, Rorikstead and Whiterun are unlikely to offer us any assistance. There's also a good change troops from Windhelm will attack our flank while we travel to the Rift."
"Now, I believe it's time for your lesson." Once again she pulls the map of Skyrim out. "Before we start, run and get me a pitcher or ale." By the time I get back Rikke is in her nightwear and her meal is eaten, as I hand her the ale I smile when I see my bread has a chunk cut out of it. Rikke takes a large gulp of her drink before saying, "I taught you about our path, now I'm going to teach you how long it'll take us. It'll take us two to three days to reach Rorikstead, five or six before our tail end passes through. From there to Whiterun it'll take us three weeks, but we won't have to march in such a long formation. Passing through the mountains and past Windhelm will be tricky, but won't take more than a week. Then we enter the Rift, which will hopefully be ours in less than a month."
"Of course, there's always the change that bandit attacks, weather, or starvation could halt our progress. Now, I'm sleepy and wish to rest. Do what you please, just don't bring them back into my room." As she climbs into bed I make my way over to my own room to sleep. My rest is deep and uneventful, for which I'm thankful.
I'm awoken by the howling of a raging storm outside, and Rikke smacking me in the face with a pillow. "Uh? What's going on?" I mumble as Rikke yanks me to my feet. "The storm of the century is outside, the troops are hunkered down against a cliff for protection. So a courier tells me. We'll have to stay here until the storm dies down, which the locals say will be in three days."I feel anger rise up in me. "So, why did you wake me up in the middle of the night?! This could have-" I'm cut off by a light smack, while not enough to hurt it gets me to stop talking."This news was worth waking you up, it'll effect our plans. It's also a perfect example of what I said last night. Now, go to sleep." She pats me on the head mockingly and leaves my room.
I snarl as I slam my head back on my pillow, attempting to go to sleep. After an hour of rolling around I realize it's fruitless, and I push myself up to go get a drink. I sit beside Rikke and yell, "Serving wench, a pitcher of water!" Rikke lightly elbows me and yells, "Ignore my companion, three pitchers of your finest drink!" I turn to face Rikke and yell, "Bring Rikke whatever she wants, but bring me a pitcher of water." I can't help the smile that crosses my face when I realize that I haven't stuttered yet. "Bring Legate Rikke and her companion three pitchers of drink, if I see a drop of water I'll cut out your tongue and feed it to a goat." Not surprisingly, Legate Rikke's offer wins over the girl. Give her some beer and you get to keep your tongue, a fair deal.
Sure enough, the wench puts down three pitchers of beer, two glasses, and a slab of ham. "Why did you stop me from ordering water?" I ask as she forces a full cup into my hand. "We're going to be here a while, so we may as well have a little fun. The villagers will crowd in here when the morrow comes, so I ordered extra beer. Tomorrow when we've sobered up we'll fight our way down to the bath house, until then we can be drunk off our asses. Now," She pulls out a bag of coins and drops it between us. "I'm going to try to flip a coin in your cup, if I make it you have to drink a mouthful of beer and tell me a secret. If I miss I'm the one that drinks, then you go and so on and so forth."
I consider it before asking, "And, why would I play this?" She laughs and says, "You're bored, can't sleep, and wouldn't dare disobey your commander." I let out a deep sigh, push my cup forward, and tell her, "Go ahead." She gets up, moves to sit across from me, and flicks the coin. It smacks the table, flies in the air, and lands in my cup with a blob. I roll my eyes and raise the cup to my lips, I almost retch when the sour beer passes my lips. Chocking it down, I ask Rikke, "What kind of secret do I tell?" She shrugs and says, "I couldn't care less." I think about it and says, "I once got into a drinking contest, I won, but got sick as a dog."
She gives me a disappointed look and says, "A good secret, come up with a better one." I think for a minute and tell her, "On my eighteenth name day I went out to a bawdy tavern with some friends, easy to say we all got drunk as skunks. On the way home I had to piss like a horse, so I just went behind a bush to pee. I didn't notice there were kids on the other side of the bush, they all got a wonderful view of a drunk pissing. I was suppose to go to jail, but the village counsel was kind in my case. They just made me put my name on a list of rapers and child molesters, so the guards knew who committed any sexual crimes."
Suddenly she's laughing like I just told her the funniest joke in the world, after she's done she tells me, "You're the only woman I know who could get on a list of rapers, just for peeing! Bravo!" After she's done mock clapping I roll my eyes and pick up a coin. When it lands in her cup with a blob she says, "I once punched a soldier in the face for snoring. He thought his tent mate did it and they both got into a huge fight, it even came to physical blows. In the end I just sat back and watched them hack each other to pieces." After I'm done laughing we continue the game.
"When I was little I stole fish from my local market." I tell her.
"Beer is better than wine, in my opinion."
"I was a skooma addict for ten years."
"When I was little I never wanted to be a Legate."
The more beer we drink the deeper our secrets get, it's obvious to both of us.
"I don't mind the taste of human flesh, especially holy men."
"When I found out a spy was among our ranks I killed him by slipping poison in his mead."
She misses my cup and is forced to tell the next secret.
"I used to have a crush on Tullius, but I got over him years ago."
I don't know why but I tell her the next secret on instinct, probably because of the beer.
"I prefer the touch of a woman over a man."
As once she chokes on her mead and stares at me with wide eyes. Before she can say anything, ten villagers push their way into the tavern. Pulling me up she says, "Come on the bath houses are probably abandoned by now." As she drags me away I can't help but think, 'Does she still want me as her squire?'.