Chapter 7
Although my conversation with the Arch-Mage had given me the illusion of clarity, it quickly wore of as soon as I sat down to really think about what she'd said. In all honesty, she'd posed more questions than she'd answered; I'd started off wanting to know more about Brendr's death, and ended up with incredibly vague knowledge of some kind of conspiracy, a conspiracy that I was somehow embroiled in.
I leaned back in the studded leather chair and rubbed my temples frustrated, almost as if I could coax the answers from my skull with a mere touch. Unfortunately my small room on the ground floor of the Hall of Attainment wasn't exactly the best thinking spot around; mages could, and would, just wander in for a chat anytime they liked, and my location near the entrance to the hall made me a prime target for masters looking for an apprentice to run errands for them. It wasn't like I had any other choice though, with the lower ranking mages confined to the college grounds there wasn't anywhere else I could go that had even a small claim to privacy.
I needed to get my head straight if I wanted to figure this out; the past few weeks had been stressful, and I'd barely had the time to breathe. Now that lectures where temporarily suspended, I'd be a fool not to capitalise on the opportunity to really think things through.
I stood up and walked over the bookshelf in the corner of the room. In the short time I'd been living in this room, the bookshelf had managed to accumulate a mountain of junk, including everything from half completed spell scrolls to all eight volumes of 'The Wolf Queen' (which I'd never gotten round to reading). After a bit of rummaging and the accidental triggering of several small paper avalanches, I finally found what I was looking for; my old Flames spell tome.
I flipped to the back and tore out a blank page and laid it flat on a small crate next to the chair which was currently serving as a desk. I grabbed a bottle of ink and ratty brow quill and began to write down everything that I did know.
Known Facts:
-Brendr's death was part of a larger conspiracy
-The Arch-Mage, Nalimi, and myself are all somehow involved, along with Ruptga knows how many others.
I stopped writing for a second, the list was depressingly short, so just to cheer myself up a bit I added one more thing.
-Whatever's going on is clearly very dangerous, and I am in over my head.
I was wrong, that wasn't very cheerful at all. I sighed and leant my head on my folded arms, taking care not to accidently dip the sleeves of my robes in the not-yet-dried ink. My father had always claimed that by writing down everything you knew you could figure out what your problems actually were, and that when you knew what the problem you had to solve was, you were better equipped to handle it. It had obviously worked for him, even on the nights before he had to go to battle, he would stay up until all hours of the morning writing lists, but it clearly wasn't working for me. I decided to try list writing again, but I took a different tack
Unanswered Questions
-Who was Brendr really, and how did someone so nice get involved in something so bad?
-What part does the Arch-Mage play in this?
-What part does Nalimi play?
-And what about me? How am I involved?
-Why was there a Scimitar sticking out of Brendr's chest, the only people I know to use that type of sword
I stopped writing, a realisation suddenly hit me. I pulled the piece of paper with the first list, the list with all the things I knew for sure written on it, towards me and added another note.
-I don't know who, and I don't know why, but somebody is trying very hard to make it look like I killed Brendr.
I put down the quill shakily; the last dredges of ink dripped slowly of the nib and stained the wooden surface of the crate was trying to frame me, but why? It's not like I was important to anyone here, I'd only been in Skyrim for two weeks!
I was interrupted by the sound of someone knocking very lightly on the stone entryway to my room. I turned round, expecting it to be one of the masters, trying to get me to fetch them some deadly nightshade or giant's toes from the store-room, but to my surprise I found the shy Breton from class.
"Hello, did you want something?" I asked, trying to keep the irritation out of my tone.
"Err; Nalimi wanted me to check if you were okay…" She said so quietly it was almost inaudible. "Are you okay?"
"Yes, I'm err, fine, thank you…" I said awkwardly.
"That's good…" Whilst she spoke, she refused to look me in the eye. In fact, she looked everywhere else except at me directly.
"How come Nalimi sent you instead of coming himself?" I asked.
"I think he said he was busy, but I'm not sure…" she said uncertainly, her eyes now firmly fixed upon her feet.
"Busy with what? There are no lectures and we're on lockdown!" I replied angrily, immediately feeling guilty for taking out my frustration on this person who I didn't know.
"He said he was working on a project or something… I don't know, there was lots of paper." She explained whilst simultaneously trying to back out into the main hall.
"What kind of project?" I pressed, certain that there was something she was leaving out. Nalimi was the least academically orientated individual I had ever met, so it clearly wasn't something for the college, and now that I knew he was involved in whatever was going on, I was incredibly curious about what he was up to.
"Something to do with… err… magic." I could tell immediately that she was lying, and that pointed to one of two things; she was either a creepy stalker using Nalimi's name as an excuse to talk to me, or she was somehow involved in whatever mess had got Brendr killed. Either way, I wanted to know more.
"I know your lying to me; tell me what Nalimi's really doing."
"I… I can't. He's doing something really important for the Arch-Mage, he asked me not to tell you anything else, he said it might put your life in danger." She said, "Look, I'm sorry for interrupting you, but I really have to go now."
"Okay then, err, bye!" I said giving her a small wave.
"And I'm really sorry about what happened to Brendr, he was my friend too." She said quietly, before turning round to walk out.
"Wait, why don't you stay and chat for a bit?" I offered, mostly because she looked so small and lonely. "I don't know anything about you; it'd be nice to get acquainted." I said with a smile.
"Okay." She looked somewhat apprehensive as she turned back to face me.
"Right, let's start with the basics. What's your name?"
(-)(-)(-)
Her name, as it turned out, was Estette, and she was half Breton, half Imperial.
"My mother was a mage in the Synod, and my father was a court wizard back in High Rock. He stole what she thought was an important document and she ended up chasing him halfway across Tamriel before she realised it was just a copy of 'The Yellow Book of Riddles'" She explained with a smile, although it didn't really feel like she was talking to me, her mind was elsewhere, back home probably.
"So how did you end up in Skyrim?" I asked with genuine curiosity, up until now her life story had sounded like something out of a story as opposed to something that had actually happened. Apparently she'd spent her entire life on the run from both The Synod, and an important family her father had annoyed in Hammerfell. She'd lived in virtually every province in Tamriel, and met more people than she could remember.
"My mother decided that I needed a formal education in magic, something I couldn't get whilst we were on the run. So they sent me here because it's so out-of-the-way no one would think to look for me. What about you, how did you end up over here?"
"It's kind of a long story…" I trailed off, I'd managed to avoid thinking about the events (or rather the people) that had driven me from my homeland so far, and it wasn't really something I wanted to discuss. Luckily, Estette seemed to understand what I was getting.
"Don't want to talk about it? That's okay." She smiled like she didn't have a care in the world, a total contrast from the shy girl I'd been seeing all week. I suppose she was just one of those people who take a while to get comfortable around new people, and I suppose that kind of made sense, if you spend your whole life on the run trust probably isn't something that comes easily.
"Thank you." I said, relieved.
"If you ever need someone to confide in, don't hesitate to come and talk to me. I tend to find that if I tell people about my problems, they don't seem as scary anymore." She said warmly, idly twizzling the end of her long, golden braid between her thumb and forefinger.
"Your hair's so pretty…" I said after a moment of watching her. And it was; it was smooth, and golden, and reached all the way down her back. I had no idea how she managed to keep it so nice and still keep up with her work for school.
"You think so?" She said, seemingly delighted that someone had finally noticed what was evidently her pride and joy. "I've had a lot of hairstyles over the years, but this one's definitely my favourite. It was really hard to pull off too, I had to use a special potion from Cyrodil every night to make it grow quickly, and I had to keep it tucked in a hat all the time to make sure our pursuers didn't know what my new appearance was going to look like. And that's not even mentioning what I had to do to get it to go this colour." She shuddered at the memory "Definitely worth it though, this is so much better than that time I went bald for a month…"
"I can't imagine you bald." I said with a chuckle.
"It was a dare from my father, my mother was understandably horrified when she saw it; she said I looked like an Argonian!"
"Don't Argonians have scales?" I queried.
"That is exactly what I said." She replied. "You know, if you wanted I could fix your hair up for you, it doesn't look like it's been properly cut for months!"
"Your right it's not." I shifted awkwardly "Haircuts have never really been at the top of my to-do list, I'd love it if you could cut it though!" I said the last part with a smile; it'd be nice to feel like a girl instead of a runaway again, and Estette clearly knew what she was doing.
"Great!" She said excitedly, "I'll go get my scissors!" And with that she bounded away to her room upstairs.
I was about to turn back to my lists, when I noticed someone else standing by the door.
"It's nice to see you two getting on." Nalimi said, stepping into my room.
"Where have you been?" I said angrily, standing up to face him directly. I was annoyed; he'd just left me on my own, and sent someone else to check if I was okay.
"I had to do something important." He said and looked down guiltily at his feet, as if he was following the same line of thinking I was.
"That's no excuse, I'm your friend, you could have at least popped round to say hi!" I exclaimed.
"What do you think I'm doing now?" he said.
"Oh… well…"
"I told Estette to go and check on you because I thought you could help each other, more than I can." He explained calmly. "Brendr and Estette where incredibly close, they were a lot more than just friends. Estette thought she was responsible for his death because she didn't keep a close enough eye on him, you were feeling guilty too, so I thought you could relate to each other." His expression looked down cast, especially as he talked about Brendr.
"That was incredibly manipulative." I smiled, then pulled him into a hug. He tensed for a second, then relaxed and put his arms uncertainly around me. "Thank you." I uttered under my breath, just as Estette appeared in the doorway, brandishing a scary looking pair of scissors.
A/N: Thank you for reading! And sorry it took so long, I've been really busy recently (unfortunately a place exists called 'The Real World' *sigh*) I know this chapter feels a bit filler-y, but I think Sharli needed a chapter just to wind down after all the revelation-y type stuff that's been going on, also, Estette's a fairly important character later on, and I didn't want to rush her introduction too much. =)
