You know how in Far Cry 4 black eagles were absolutely terrifying and could attack any time or place?
Chapter 10: To see the Past
Mohamara held in his hands a great treasure. A grand soul gem, filled with the spirit of Olaf's Draugr.
"You didn't tell me that your ax snares souls," the Khajiit said in awe as he looked at the forked crystal from many angles. The Draugr's soul was ensnared inside, tormented by the way light from the campfire passed through his prison.
"You didn't ask. But it's good to have for going into a Draugr crypt. Because they're not people anymore you can harvest their souls guilt-free." Yagraz adjusted the salmon Mohamara had caught them out of the Hjaal River for their supper as they cooked near the fire.
No one could out-fish a cat, after all.
"I've been selling the filled gems to Farengar up in Dragonsreach for a nice little profit since I don't have enchanting skills to make any of my gear magic. Got the ax done as a favor from some guy up in Winterhold, he had a deadbeat who wouldn't pay what they owed him."
Mohamara's eyes were full of glittering facets from watching how the light played with the grand soul gem. If he stared too long, he'd fall into the Khajiit trap of shiny things, so he set the gem down and pushed it toward Yagraz.
"Well, I can whip you up something pretty sweet. Just tell me what you want, and I'll make it happen." Mohamara's share of the loot from Dead Man's respite had been the soul gems he'd found, a handful of garnets, and a Nordic dagger they'd found in a chest. Even though he could call up a bound dagger whenever, he didn't have the conjuration skill to enchant it yet, so a physical blade would be necessary.
"Here." She handed him a gold ring set with an almost perfectly rounded ruby and pushed the grand soul gem back over to him. "Make me a ring of regeneration, short-stuff."
"No problem." Mohamara took the items and went into a meditative state. Anyone from the Fourth Era likely would need a designated workstation laden with enchantments of its own to enchant an item.
But with an Enchanting Plus Certification, Mohamara was trained to do on-site enchanting, anticipating a need to fix broken components on the job. Still, it wasn't a quick process.
Once properly centered, he pinched the top of the forked grand soul gem and pulled away. The soul gem began to unravel into hair-thin filaments, too light to be brought down by gravity. When there was a small cloud of the soul gem in the air, Mohamara picked up the ring and began to guide the filaments into it forming Nordic knots to complete the magical array.
Mohamara's light tugging as he fused the gem into the ring pulled more filaments free of the gem, in turn, ensuring that he never had to touch the gem's complete form again during the entire process.
Strictly speaking, what he was doing was illegal. He was only cleared to work on souls up to the greater size category. But there were no cops around, and Yagraz's presence gave Mohamara the confidence not worry about some mystical detection method once he was back home.
The only reason he wasn't cleared for grand soul gems was that it would make him able to work with black soul gems. The only people legally allowed to use grand souls were military enchanters, and certain authorized corporations, such as Telvanni.
When it was done, the ring's whole surface was coated in densely interlinked Nordic knots that shone with the light of Olaf's Draugr's soul. After a moment to let it cool down, the filaments sank into the ring and the gem, where they would settle at the middle and radiate the regeneration effect outward.
Proud of his work, the cat handed the ring back with a wide smile. Yagraz examined the ring with an appraising eye and tested it by quickly putting it on. The few scratches she'd gotten from the trek through Dead Man's Respite sealed right before Mohamara's eyes, sealing closed with faint trails of smoke with nary a scar left in their wake.
To his surprise, she took the ring off, however. "That's a really strong regeneration effect you got on this thing. Great work, short-stuff." Then she offered the ring back to him.
Mohamara's ears and whiskers drooped, as he tried to parse what was going on. Didn't she like it? Had he missed something in her request? Was it healing incorrectly?
"Oh don't make that sad face, fuzzbutt. It's exactly what I wanted. I just want you to have it, for now at least. Think I didn't notice how you're missing most of your tail? Aw come on, short-stuff, don't cry-ack!" Yagraz was unprepared for how much kinetic energy an emotional tojay Khajiit could convey when one wanted to tackle-hug someone. "Jeeze, how bad have you had it that something as basic as this gets you weepy?"
As if to answer her, an eagle swooped down, snagged Mohamara by the back of his robes, and attempted to fly away with the emotional cat. Attempted being the key word, as Mohamara snagged a rocky outcropping from the top of the hill Dead Man's Respite was carved into and kept it in place long enough for Yagraz to throwing-ax the bird out of the air.
"Okay, ask a stupid question get a stupid answer, I guess." When she ascended the hill to retrieve her ax, she also grabbed the eagle to carry back down to the campsite with her. "C'mon, I know how to make this taste like chicken. Not really good chicken, but still."
When Mohamara woke up, after spending the night with the ring of regeneration on, it was to having his fully regenerated tail brush up against his nose. After so long of not seeing it, natural cat instincts took over as the limb seemed to move on its own.
He tried to catch it and continued to miss. This would go on until Yagraz woke up and found the tojay actively chasing his tail around. Whereupon she would do as friends were required to do: Record the scene for future blackmailing purposes.
The trip back to Solitude was uneventful, but things became interesting when the dynamic duo arrived at the bard's college and presented King Olaf's verse to Viarmo. It was a thing of terrible beauty to watch him go from neutral, to hopeful and energized and then bitterly defeated as he was handed the verse.
"With so much of the verse unreadable, I don't think this will be enough to convince Elisif to overturn the ban," Viarmo informed the two after examining the book's pages. One of them actually fell away as he was reading it. "I'm sorry to have wasted your time, one moment I will go and fetch your pay, Companion."
"Hold up," Mohamara caught Viarmo's sleeve as the High Elf turned away. Something in how it looked like the headmaster had fully given into despair-like he would never be happy again-motivated the cat into action. "I know of some magical ways that might be able to tell us what those verses were about. And-even if we don't get it right we can still bring the story of the bard who wrote the verse to Elisif."
"The guy wrote that stuff to criticize Olaf, and Olaf had him buried alive for it." Yagraz seamlessly backed Mohamara up on his stance. "Elisif is many things, but if she wants to keep her title of 'Fair' perhaps she could stand to be better about criticism?"
The High Elf looked at the two of them, considering, and as he did a bit of his old energy came back. "A good point. So! This magical method you mentioned, would it involve restoring the book?"
"Sorta." Mohamara released Viarmo and went hunting for a round table, and three chairs. "We're going to need Giraud for this."
Yagraz gave Mohamara a questioning look after Viarmo went off to fetch the dean of history. "You doing some of that freaky magic-trip stuff?"
"Yep." Mohamara went around the room and grabbed copies of the Poetic Edda from Giraud's shelves, and arranged them on the table he'd picked. The chairs were arranged to be positioned at the one-third marks around the table. When Giraud and Viarmo were back, Mohamara snatched the verse out of the headmaster's hands and placed it dead center on the table with his slate on top of it. "Alright, take a seat you two. The more I explain about this the harder it'll be to do since your minds will resist the spell-so ask your questions carefully."
"Alright," Giraud started, his tone intrigued. "Why am I needed?"
"Because you know the history of Skyrim better than anyone else here-you know the information around what we're looking for, and I can follow that to find what we're missing."
"That explained less than nothing-I've somehow forgotten things I didn't even know I knew."
"Good, that means it'll work better." Mohamara looked away from the dean of history who was still visibly confused by the Khajiit's words. With the dean's question done, it was Viarmo's turn.
"Will it help convince Elisif?" The High Elf had a faint but noticeable note of hope in his voice that Mohamara feared. It spoke of the possibility of disappointment.
"To be honest, you could have just changed the festival's name to the burning of Ulfric Stormcloak and she'd have been fine with it," Yagraz cut in as she took a seat against the far wall. "She's not exactly stubborn."
"Yes, I know. But the political angle on the burning of King Olaf was worn off hundreds of years ago. Now it's just a way for the people of Solitude to relax, and be happy." A bit of his energy drained from him as he spoke. "There are so few reasons to be happy in Solitude anymore."
Mohamara took the empty seat and closed his eyes. A Mysticism master who could see the sympathetic bonds would have been able to set up this little ritual in seconds, but for him, it took a bit of time to first find them and then guide them to where he needed them. "Alright, it should work now." Mohamara activated his slate and set it back down on the verse, enabling the projector set to cast a white light on the ceiling. "Now headmaster-you remember the parts of the verse that's legible? Good, you'll read it off. Giraud, I need you to think about the history of what he's saying-leap to conclusions if you can. What I'm able to find will show up in the projection."
Ataf, Illdi, and Aia had heard the talking going on and came to watch the ritual, seated alongside Yagraz as the cat's eyes went white from the magic.
"O, Olaf, our subjugator, the one-eyed betrayer;
Death-dealing demon, and dragon-killing King.
Your legend is lies, lurid, and false;
Your cunning capture of Numinex, a con for the ages."
Mohamara saw a pictograph of Olaf, stylized and regal, then the mountain palace of Dragonsreach with its armored Jar. The two grew closer together until they were one in the same. The hybrid figure was shown, younger-a boy, Shouting at rocks alongside others with a dragon perched overhead.
"King Olaf was Olaf One-Eye," Giraud spoke, amazed as he looked up at the projection. "Numinex was supposed to be a vicious, mass-murdering beast. But look!"
"He's teaching them how to Shout," Viarmo finished. "He was their tutor. But… why capture him then?"
The sympathetic bonds raced between images-Olaf stood in front of a moving background, growing older until his hair was salt and pepper, and his face heavy with lines. This aged Olaf grew angrier and angrier until his face was a twisted mask of vitriol. Olaf faded, and the scene changed to a blurred image-there were so many sympathetic bonds here that Mohamara struggled to piece them together into one cohesive whole.
When it became clearer, it was a grinning and happy Olaf who stood on the balcony of Dragonsreach, a table heavy with food near the doors to the palace, while Numinex advanced inward. Bonds from Numinex himself began to override the image-the dragon's very nature was important.
NU - MI - NEX, the text appeared.
"I don't speak the dragon language, what does this-"
"Now, faith, trial," Yagraz cut in. "Mi is the root word for 'loyal' and 'loyalty', so it would translate into test of faith or test of loyalty."
"Numinex put to his student a test of faith that he'd failed, perhaps?" Viarmo was guessing wildly, stroking his beard while the students looked on with wonder. "This just raises more questions."
The feast and the dragon were clear again, and as Numinex stepped forward a great yolk slammed down upon his neck. Olaf's one eye glittered with malevolent glee.
"This was in the time when the practice of sacred hospitality was still common," Giraud observed. "So Olaf would have violated custom in a hideous way by doing this."
"Hmm, I think I can figure out what those damaged lines refer to with this information." Viarmo watched as the scene faded from the projection, then looked at the audience, Giraud, and the inert Mohamara. "Should I start on the next part, or-"
"Yes." Mohamara's body spoke, growling in an otherworldly voice both Mohamara's and not at the same time.
"By the Eight is that disturbing," Ataf commented while chewing on some snowberries that Illdi had passed him.
"Olaf grabbed power, by promise and threat;
From Falkreath to Winterhold, they fell to their knees;
But Solitude stood strong, Skyrim's truest protectors.
Olaf's vengeance was instant, inspired and wicked."
"But Solitude attacked Winterhold, not the reverse." Giraud's face grew agitated while he considered the verse itself. This, in turn, gave bonds for Mohamara to run down and bring to the projection.
Olaf, older still, gathered before a table of heavily armored Nord men and women. Before him a mockup of Solitude's archway, with a fleet of ancient Nord ships in the waters around it. The projection of Olaf knocked the pillar under which the Blue Palace rested away, hissing a faint 'fus ro dah' as he did. The mockup of Solitude fell onto the table, unable to support its own weight without the completed arch.
"Oh. That's… yeah, that's pretty inspired and wicked."
"By the gods," Aia breathed more than spoke. "He would have destroyed the whole city."
Illdi's grip on the snowberry bowl went slack and it hit the floor, spilling red fruit everywhere. She furiously blinked at the scene of the destroyed Solitude mockup, unable to comprehend how it would look if it had happened that way.
The scene of the projection shifted to a man standing in the room with Olaf and the armored Nords. The same bard that would go on to write the verse and be entombed alive looked upon this scene, turned and ran away, A series of stilled images showed the bard running, climbing, and riding horseback from Winterhold city to the gates of the Blue Palace. The bard pleaded with the Jarl of Solitude, begging on his knees for something that the sympathetic bonds could not find.
The Jarl of Solitude stood and suddenly was in his armor, standing before his army, attacking Winterhold's once mighty walls.
"Olaf was going to destroy Solitude entirely-and that man told this to the Jarl of Solitude, who then attacked Winterhold preemptively," Viarmo spoke, with venom in his voice and a hateful look in his eyes as he watched the Olaf escape Winterhold. "I don't think I'll have any trouble convincing Elisif of the festival's importance now." The projected image began to fade, and the High Elf stood from his seat. "That's the last damaged part of the verse-now I have the task of reconstructing what was written there in accurate verse."
"Please, there's so much more we could learn from this," Giraud started as the sympathetic bonds between them began to fray and break apart. "So much history we could recover. Just a little while longer?"
"How do we even know that what you were seeing was what really happened?" Illdi spoke up, voice shaky as she picked up spilled snowberries.
"Well… I guess it was the feel of it." Viarmo crossed his arms and watched the Khajiit fall face-first onto the table, passed out. "When the spell was going on, even though we were watching it happen on Mohamara's slate it felt like… like we were there."
"I could feel what Numinex felt when that yolk slammed down on him. And the desperation that man felt when he ran away to tell Solitude of Olaf's plans." Giraud backed up the headmaster and looked forlornly at the passed out Khajiit. "Oh well, perhaps an occasion will come again where we can do this."
"The actual fuck you will," Yagraz cut in as she scooped up Mohamara and his slate. "Short-stuff didn't tell you because I guess he wanted to help you real bad, but this ritual he did? It's like reading an Elder Scroll-draining and damaging if done too often." Though unconscious, the Khajiit moved his arms to better hang onto his friend's neck while she carried him around. "Just doing the ritual at all is probably going to leave him blind for… I dunno. A week? Two tops."
Ataf was taking a drink of water when Yagraz dropped that information and spat his mouthful of water out onto Aia from the shock of it. Aia then slapped him as hard as she possibly could.
Viarmo pinched the bridge of his nose. "But it won't be permanent? Good, I'll see that he's suitably compensated for what he's done. And if he's able to walk tomorrow, I'll have him with me to present the lost verse at court." He looked up and glanced at Yagraz before slapping his forehead. "I forgot your payment, terribly sorry, Companion. I'll go grab that and you can be on your way."
"Oh every single kind of no, string bean," Yagraz adjusted her grip on the unconscious Khajiit, using his spear to help hold him up, and thrust her chin out in defiance. "Me and short-stuff go way back, I'm staying here as long as he does. You tell me where his room is, I'll set him down there and go get a room at the Skeever."
Aia stood, wiping Ataf's spit-take off her face in visceral disgust and walked away. "I'll show you the way, I have to change anyway."
Yagraz had taken one look at the corner of the cold stone room where the students slept, turned on her heels and walked out. No friend of hers was going to be sleeping on the ground while she had the gold to pay for a bed.
After getting her pay off the headmaster, she marched down to the Winking Skeever and booked two rooms. The one with the larger bed she had to take by necessity, so she just set the Khajiit to sleep in his room and rested in hers.
Five years. She'd overshot Mohamara's kidnapping by five years. Apparently, she'd aged well, the tojay hadn't even noticed how much older she was. But still, she almost regretted all that wasted time looking for him when he wasn't even around yet.
But the thoughts of her shield-siblings in Jorvaskr, of the friends she had made in Whiterun and beyond, and the little girl she'd taken in made her remember regret was worthless. Her life had been good, and she was stronger for having been in the Fourth Era so long.
Mohamara… was not. He was wiser, more experienced, but had not grown any stronger from his time in ancient Skyrim. Perhaps he could entreat his Daedra for help as she had done, or perhaps she could cajole him into joining up with the Companions. If she could teach him to put his quick movements and elegant jumps into killing potential, he might have a good chance of surviving when she couldn't rescue him.
The most obvious path to ensuring his survival was to impart… the gift. But that would seal his fate after death-Hircine's hunting grounds for eternity. And his Daedra might abandon him immediately if he became a werewolf.
...Hadn't she already abandoned him, though? Meridia hadn't saved Mohamara from Sheogorath, no matter how enraged she'd been that the Mad God had stolen him. She hadn't sent any help to him.
Yagraz stopped the train of thought short-Mohamara would never forgive her for turning his Lady against him, even unintentionally. If he did that to Yagraz, and Malacath abandoned her, she would have the same reaction. A third option would have to be found or made.
Her brooding was cut short by the bed she sat on creaking under her weight, then breaking apart. Dread and fear were replaced by rage as she stormed down to the tavernkeeper to shout about how he had guaranteed a bed that wouldn't break under her.
It hadn't even happened in the fun way.
Yagraz, a waif, is not.