This was not how she had planned on spending her afternoon.
Not in this stink-trap, covered in filth and grime from the sewage they waded though. It was going to take weeks to get this junk out of her hair and clothing, and even longer for the smell to finally dissipate. If it ever did. And apart from that, there'd been the rats. Creepy little rodents, staring at them with their beady little eyes in the darkness, occasionally being stupid enough to actually attack them. During those little spells, Nhiilaa tended to mysteriously fall behind, leaving the majority of the extermination to Baurus.
To be truthful, it was getting a little annoying.
"Ugh. What kind of self-respecting villain hides in a sewer, of all the damned places?" she asked again. Baurus rolled his eyes in frustration.
"Seems to me you said the exact same thing about the nice paper and calligraphy. First, whoever they are, they're far too feminine. Now you're not happy because they dwell in a sewer. Can there be nothing done to please you?" he replied, tired of her incessant whining.
"No," she stated simply. He sighed and held the torch higher to avoid the rising water level. "Just where are you taking us? You said you knew the place that was discussed in the note. Seems to me that we've been going in circles for a frightfully long time."
"It's just up ahead. If you can't stop whining like a child, you can always go back to Cloud Ruler and tell Jauffre yourself why you couldn't complete such a simple task as collecting a book, be my guest and go ahead. It'll get you out of my hair at least--"
"Hush." She stopped.
"Oh what now? You can't take the criticism? Well-" Nhiilaa shook her head.
"It's not that. There's a light over there and you just passed it," she said, pointing to the side.
"Oh. Well, that's it, then." A snide smirk crossed her face as they stepped out of the disgusting filth and onto the stonework. "Now, the note said to come alone. I think it would be best if I handled the Sponsor. There's a vantage point up the stairs and--"
"No," she interrupted. "I'll talk to the Sponsor."
"No offense, but you don't exactly have the best people skills from what I've seen, Nhiilaa," he said, skeptical of her motives. She opened her mouth to protest, but he quickly intercepted. "And we can't kill the Sponsor just yet. They may be able to lead us to the main hive of the Mythic Dawn, and we'll be able to nip this in the bud. If we kill him, we won't be able to do that."
"So you expect me to just sit up there and watch the Sponsor..."
"And cover my ass if I need it. He may try to kill me. I don't know what's going to happen in there, and we need as good a plan as we can get right now, one that doesn't involve rushing in and cracking skulls. Understand?" Something changed in her face; she looked somewhat older as she straightened up and focused.
"Understood." Baurus opened the door and entered, leaving Nhiilaa to scale the stone staircase up to the vantage point that he'd spoken of.
It wasn't much of one; a stone bridge leading to the next gate which in turn connected to some other passageway. It was a little too... convenient. Almost as if this whole thing was planned from the beginning. She suddenly got the feeling that she was not supposed to be here.
Before she could warn Baurus of this, the gates below her opened with a sickening metallic sound. As quietly as she could, she slipped Arpenalatta from its sheath, hiding the glimmering blade in the shadows, along with herself. All she could see was the Sponsor as he entered the room, but as soon as he sat, he fell from her sight.
She could hear the voices below her, but could not quite make out what they were saying. By the tone of the voice, and the snide tone, she supposed it was an Altmer. That tone was one that she was all too familiar with; it was the very same one that Carahil, Caranya, and even that damned Suurootan had taken with her every single time she'd been subjugated to listen to their rants and raves when she made the mistake of being in a ten mile radius of them.
At least Baurus was still alive.
A shiver ran down her spine as two other voices joined the din, not from below, as expected, but from directly in front of her. She tilted her head up to see the torchlight reflecting off of the walls, illuminating the next passage. Although she could still hear Baurus and the Sponsor below, and knew that he was still alive, there was no way for her to communicate to him the oncoming danger without putting him in jeopardy.
"... Shit," she whispered as the gate opened. The two figures, both clad in the red garb worn by the assassins that killed the emperor, looked straight at her. For a moment, she thought that they were smiling, almost as if they were expecting her, that they knew that she was there the entire time.
Suddenly, they both let out a cry and armed themselves with the same puff of yellow mist. Time stood still as the assassins rushed toward her, maces raised above their head in preparation of the strike.
"Nhiilaa!" Baurus yelled from below. She looked down to see the Sponsor upturn the table and summon his own daedric armor. Baurus drew his own blade and lunged...
She spun away from the battle unfurling below her and turned her attention to her own attackers. Her lack of armor unnerved her, for while it allowed for more free range of motion, it also allowed her to be open to attacks that would have been normally deflected by her heavy raiment. That, and she had to find openings in their armor before they actually got to attack her, placing her at an extreme disadvantage.
With any luck, they would have no idea who they were fighting. They would have no idea that they now faced the Dragonheart, and while the Arena breed of sword play was far from elegant, it was rather useful when faced with a matter of self preservation. After all, that is what it was used for; survival.
Fortunately, the two assailants were poorly trained in the arts of the mace. Their flailing movements gave way for a multitude of attacks. But while their haphazard swings gave her some sense of advantage, it also put her in a very risky position; for every way she dodged an advance, there were hundreds of more ways to misplace a step and fall to the level below, most likely to be dismembered by this so-called Sponsor.
A thought struck her, and in a moment of desperation, she maneuvered slightly to catch her nearest opponent square in the chest with the hilt of her sword. The resulting impact knocked him backwards fell down to the ground below, landing with a horrible metallic clang. Now she just hoped that the armor didn't protect her assailant enough to allow him to live.
The other attacker ignored his fallen comrade and advanced hastily toward Nhiilaa. The Nord glared at her and walked toward her, an evil sort of look in her eyes. She raised her sword, hilt facing the agent, and with a loud yell, brought it down on his helmet, knocking him backwards. In his moments of disorientation, Nhiilaa grasped him by the helm, ignoring the sharp corners ripping into her hand. In a blur of motion, she sheathed Arpenalatta and placed her free hand on the other side of her attacker's head. With one twist, it was finished. The armor melted away, leaving the corpse to fall to the ground. The sound of breaking bones reverberated throughout the cavern.
"Hey!" Baurus' voice broke the quiet. "You alright up there?" Nhiilaa looked down at him; the Sponsor lay dead at his feet. She was right. He was an Altmer.
"A little cut up, but nothing major. You?"
"Took a blade to the shoulder. It'll probably leave a scar, but at least I'm alive, right?"
"I'll be down in a minute," she said and opened the door. Her leather boots made muffled sounds on the stone-work as she descended the staircase. Baurus wiped the last remnants of blood from his sword with the hem of his shirt and returned it to its sheath as she reentered the chamber. Blood, mainly the Sponsor's, she assumed, decorated the walls in a macabre manner, a trail leading up to Baurus' feet. He looked at her and shrugged, immediately wincing in pain from his injury.
"Here, let me help," she said and placed her hands on his wound. A blue glow emanated from her hands as she focused her energy on repairing the flesh. "You're in luck, it's not that bad of an injury. Just a minor gash. I've seen worse in the Are--- I've seen worse."
"What happened up there? I saw you up there, then some people, and before I knew it, that Altmer flips over the table and that strange armor materializes and--"
"It's conjured daedric armor," Nhiilaa said absentmindedly. "It disappears when the caster dies..." Something caught her attention. There was a corpse underneath the bridge: the agent she'd thrown off in the midst of the battle. There was something not quite right about it.
Perhaps it was the fact that they were breathing, or maybe because they were still dressed in the daedric armor they'd conjured.
"This makes it a good indicator of judging whether an opponent is either dead," she said, walking towards it, "or merely faking." Nhiilaa looked down at the assassin, his face hidden by his devilish helmet. "While daedric armor is amazingly strong and flexible at the same time, it has one fatal commonality with mortal-made armor." Deftly, Arpenalatta was removed from its sheath, the blade glimmering in the soft torchlight. "And that is, of course, that there is a gap between the helm and the cuirass." And the armor disappeared in that tell-tale yellow smoke...
"... Fascinating. I've got the book, in case you care," Baurus said, more than a little disturbed by the scene that had just unfolded in front of him.
"Good. Let's get out of here, though. I can't stand this stink any longer." But instead of walking forward, she took a moment to look at her bloodied palms. Large rents had been torn into them, but she lacked the energy to heal the wounds.
–
"Sweet, sweet freedom!" Nhiilaa exclaimed as she hauled herself out of the sewer grate. Her companion let out a small laugh and offered her a hand to help her up, which she took.
"Now you've got all the books. I'm going to return to Cloud Ruler and see if Jauffre needs my help doing something else," he commented, hoping she'd ignore the last part.
"You can't leave me all alone to figure this out on my own. You--"
"Nhiilaa, I can't stay. I have other duties that I need to attend to. I'm sure you can find the Amulet on your own. Besides, you're probably going to have to infiltrate their headquarters, and that's easier to do when you're by yourself. The two of us'd look odd, and they'd get suspicious. Think about it." She opened her mouth to protest, but closed it almost as quickly. He was right, of course. Blowing their cover was the last thing that they needed now, and they needed to get the Amulet back before the main body realized that the Sponsor and his lackeys had been killed.
"Alright," she grumbled begrudgingly. She remembered Martin, and how she'd treated him. "... Tell Martin I'm sorry. He'll know what it means." In avoidance of answering any questions, she placed her hand on Arpenalatta and quickly headed for Luther Broad's. Baurus shrugged, and headed out toward the city gates.
–
Back at the relative comfort of the tavern, Nhiilaa stared at the books in front of her on the table. The bath she'd taken had removed most of the stink of the sewers, but still had not cleared her mind on the day's events. Worse yet, she could feel the pain returning, and she was running dangerously thin on that blessed potion that she'd come to love. She sighed, unable to concentrate on the tomes' hidden secrets, or on the Mythic Dawn, or whatever impending crisis was on the horizon.
The door creaked in protest as she opened it and walked down the stairs. The din of the bar was irritating, and several drunks attempted to block her passage, but she set them down gently and left, stepping out into the coolness of the City night.
At night, no stares lingered on her face as she passed, mainly because everyone that would recognize her were presumably either too drunk to notice her or busily sleeping their lives away. That was just the way she wanted it right now: to be nothing more than a shadow passing through. Her boots made sounds that reverberated in the empty streets, drawing attention to her by the guards. Whatever they thought that she was up to they must of ignored, because they left her alone for the most part, only speaking to her to bid her a fair night.
When she got to her destination, the loud noises stopped. She was no longer plagued by the too loud noises of her shoes, but was comforted slightly by the soft, earthen sounds they now made. Despite all the poverty, she'd always thought that the Waterfront had looked rather serene at night, how the twin moons reflected off the Rumare. You didn't get this lovely scenery inside the walls of the City, and in that respect, the poor were far richer than all the nobles of the City.
Nhiilaa was surprised to see that the house was still uninhabited. It wasn't in terribly good shape, for there were a few more patches missing in the thatched roof than the last time she'd been here. It seemed a lifetime ago, when in reality it hadn't been. Sadly, it was growing faster and faster into a memory, old wounds healing and scars forming over where there'd been clean skin.
She stepped inside the rubble, the scent of blood that'd been so pungent was now long faded, though the pools of blood had dried to the earth in dark splotches. A glimmer in the moonlight caught her attention. The urn...
With the uttermost carefulness, she picked it up. There were still slight remnants of Perinea's ashes inside. A tear rolled down Nhiilaa's cheek as she thought of her friend's smiling face, and how it'd been cut short far before her time.
"Well, I'm here," she said to the urn. "You would be surprised at me, Peri. I got arrested, for assault none the less. It's led to some things that I suppose I can't control. Agronak's dead, so hopefully you'll be able to rest easy now... Sorry, but I had to do it... I had to. You understand, hopefully." More tears fell from her eyes. "Anyway, you'll like this. I met someone... His name's Martin. It's not like that, you know. He's much too whiny, and far too priestly anyway. I could never stand them, honestly. He's different than the other ones, somehow. Lost his faith, it seems. You'd like him though. He's nice enough, I suppose, and you always went for that type."
Nhiilaa set the urn on the table and stood. "I... I have to go now... Things to do. It's actually important though. There's this... I suppose you could call it a code... in this set of books. I'm supposed to figure it out somehow, but I haven't the damnedest about how to go about doing it. You were always better at that sort of thing than me, anyway. Made me sort of jealous, really. I-- I really miss you, Peri. I guess it's a little late for this sort of thing, anyway."
And that was that.
Nhiilaa left, rushed at first, running toward the one place she thought she'd be welcome. But... something felt odd. She stopped.
The Bloodworks was not where she needed to go. Somewhere inside, she knew this. To return there would be what she always did. She would just be running away, away from responsibility, away from everything she needed to do.
Running away was no longer an option. It was cowardly. Thinking of Perinea reminded her of this, because Perinea wouldn't have run. She'd fought until the end.
Nhiilaa knew what she had to do. She changed her direction and headed back to the boarding house. Her gaze fixed on the Commentaries as soon as she entered the room. It was time to accept her duty, and to finally fight back.
Suddenly, the world didn't seem so large and daunting anymore.