This is the end of part 2 of this story, so thank you again to everyone who's supporting it! There will be a part 3 but I think it will be shorter!
Chapter Twenty Nine
Endless Night
"I'm curious," Frederick started as they rode on their way back to Windhelm, their horses slowed to a walk and the sun flickering through the trees covering the path they were on. "How did you deceive us all those years ago? I mean, Brynjolf can be pretty blindsided by a pretty woman, but the rest of us should have been able to pick out an assassin."
"Hiding in plain site," Phaeril offered softly. "It works better than you might think."
"People don't see what's right under their noses, right?" Frederick chuckled and it touched his eyes and made them brighten warmly, even in spite of how frail he looked.
"There were a lot of clues that you all missed," she added.
"Such as?"
"I was the one that set off the trap on the door to Gallus' room, I didn't get burnt because I was wearing the gloves I'd used when I robbed that dunmer pyromaniac earlier on." Phaeril glanced at him and pointed at the scar on her cheek. "Mercer gave me this as punishment for screwing up."
"I figured out that Brynjolf had the key to Gallus' private quarters when Tove was taunting him in the flagon one night," she continued, her hand brushing over the black mane of her horse affectionately as she spoke. "So I set the trap in that cave to try and get the key off him, but I realised nothing short of killing him would get my hands on his key because he kept it so damn close to his body."
"Or seducing him," Frederick added. She nodded slowly. "Why didn't you just kill him, then?"
"I almost did." Phaeril's brow creased and she fixed her gaze on her hands. "But I couldn't. He was the first person since I came to Skyrim who ever genuinely cared to get to know me."
Frederick gave her an empathetic look. "That's a shame."
"The Dark Brotherhood was different then, we only looked out for ourselves and we climbed to the top by stepping on our brothers and sisters." Phaeril sighed. "Cynric almost blew my cover, he recognised me as an assassin because we worked together in the Brotherhood a long time ago. He was convinced I was there to kill him for deserting us, but I managed to convince Brynjolf that Cynric and I used to be lovers and that was the reason for his hostility to me."
"Were you?"
"No, never." She narrowed her eyes with a frown as she continued. "Eventually Mercer got frustrated with how long I was taking and gave me an ultimatum. I took Brynjolf to bed and stole his key while he slept, by then I was committed to killing Gallus and I didn't think I had any other choice."
She pursed her lips and glanced at Frederick almost pleadingly. "And somewhere along the way I was stupid enough to fall in love with him."
"I wouldn't say stupid," Frederick chided gently. "Tragically, perhaps, but not stupid."
"No, it was stupid," Phaeril said with a shake of her head. "But I can't regret it, not now."
Frederick smiled. "You're a better person because you know him."
"I know." Phaeril glanced at him and there was an openness in her eyes that she'd never shown before, not even with Brynjolf. "So much of me is made of what I learnt from him."
"Like a handprint on your heart, huh?"
She smiled ever so slightly. "Something like that."
o0o
"My son." It came as a pleading, wretched and desperate noise. "My son!"
He knew he had to edge closer, there wasn't any other way forward, but the voice floating towards him was making him hesitant. It was almost like a song, but not the kind you would enjoy listening to. Perhaps closer to a banshee's drone would describe it better.
"Gone to rot in the sun, the sun!" It was a female ghost, Brynjolf realised as he approached her as quietly as he could. Somehow startling this ghost didn't seem like a good idea. "Please, come back... my son, my son..."
The ghost had stood up and flipped around to face Brynjolf with a manic expression in seconds. Perhaps she'd always known he was there, he couldn't tell.
"Kill them all!" she screeched and threw a knife at him that he thankfully managed to doge, if barely. "One, by one, by one!"
She was at his throat faster than he knew it and it was all he could do to dodge her and try to fend her off. She was surprisingly skilled, and it didn't help that he couldn't even retaliate her attacks because she was a ghost and every slice of his daggers passed through her otherwordly frame like a knife through smoke.
After a while he escaped from their dual and clambered away. She span around, desperately trying to locate him but he put a hand forth and shouted at her with as much authority as he could summon.
"Stop!"
"My son," she chimed brokenly again.
"Please, no more singing," he grumbled to himself.
"My son!" she repeated again and she'd swept closer to him in one lithe movement. But instead of attacking him like he'd thought, she grasped his face in her cold, whispy hands and pressed her forehead to his.
It was then that he noticed that the glistening, translucent hair draped around her shoulders was the brightest of red. The kind of ridiculous colour he'd only ever seen before once in his life. The kind of colour his own hair was.
He stared into his mothers eyes in disbelief, even if he knew that in all likelihood he stood a very good chance of meeting his parents in this place, it still caught him by surprise.
"By the Eight," was the only thing that he could say.
She smiled at him, her eyes glittering with affection and love even if they were cold and ethereal. "My Brynjolf."
He couldn't stop the tears that pricked at his eyes. Maybe it made him weak, but he'd never really known her. And if he was true to himself, half his promiscuity and inability to form a solid relationship before he met Phaeril had stemmed from the fact he'd never really dealt with losing his mother so early on.
But it didn't last and just as his mother had gained her sanity, she disappeared in a flash of smoke moments later. And it left him standing in shock, desperately wishing he could bring her back and wondering if even seeing the ghost of his mother was the best thing for his mental state. It was short lived, because another ghost materialised behind him after a few moments and Brynjolf turned around to find himself staring into a face he recognised all too well, even if it had been decades.
"She struggled more than most retaining her sanity in this place," his father started with the hard, penetrating stare he remembered as a boy when he'd been disobedient "She's been here longer than me, but it's more than that. She was always... closer to Nocturnal, and tenuous with her grasp on reality."
The ghost of his father cocked his head and crossed his arms over his transparent chest. "A bit like your fleeting opinion of relationships, always jumping from one woman to another like she would with her lucidity."
"How would you even-"
"Oh, I've been watching you over the years," his father interrupted with a smirk. "I'll give you credit for that elf, though."
"Thanks," Brynjolf replied dryly.
The ghost smiled genuinely at him and took a step closer to place his hand on the redhead's shoulder. "I am proud of how you've turned out."
Brynjolf couldn't stop the tug at his lips no matter how much he wished he could. "Well, you've got a strange way of showing it sometimes."
There was a sharp pain on the back of his head from where his father cuffed him and the redhead glowered at the ghost as he started sauntering off.
"Hey!" Brynjolf protested.
"What?" His father glanced at him and gestured ahead. "You just going to stand there gawking or you actually going to return that damn key in your pocket?"
"Eh, um," Brynjolf stammered a little dumbly. "Right."
His father rolled his eyes and chuckled to himself as he lead the redhead further into the Sepulcher. Surprisingly, with his father leading him, his journey was far easier, although the further they went the more his father became visibly distressed and seemed to be less and less able to keep his mind sane. Perhaps the fact he'd managed not to try and kill Brynjolf like every other damn ghost in this place had was a testament to his father's strength of will, or sheer stubbornness.
After a while his father stopped in front of a whole in the ground, turned to the redhead and inclined his head toward hole. "Well, go on then."
"What?" Brynjolf frowned at him. "Down there?"
"Yes, you daft boy." When the redhead hesitated (because it was kind of a dumb suggestion in his opinion), his father rolled his eyes and pushed him into the hole. Thankfully it wasn't particularly deep and he landed easily, but it didn't stop him being royally annoyed with his father.
"What are you doing?" Brynjolf snapped and craned his neck to look up at the ghost.
His father chuckled and walked off, his voice floating down to him tauntingly. "Dust the cobwebs off and use your brain for once, I'm sure you can manage."
Brynjolf sulked for a good few minutes in that hole, noticed there was skeleton sharing it with him (which wasn't particularly encouraging), before it occurred to him that perhaps the key he'd been holding on to this entire time might be the, well, key to the reason he was sitting in the hole at all. So he pulled the artefact out and peered at it carefully, before his eyes widened as it began to shine and seemed to pull itself magnetically into a small whole in the centre of the floor beneath him.
So he pushed the key into the socket and clenched his eyes shut as the light that shot out around him seemed to try it's damn hardest to blind him.
o0o
Brynjolf decided that, after meeting her for a second time, Nocturnal was a rather frustrating and mysterious being who rather liked using annoying cryptic phrases that made his head hurt and teasing her mortal servants. Regardless, with the Skeleton Key returned she did seem particularly grateful. There was some obligatory ceremonial thing in which he was invited to became a Nightingale Sentinel, and then, just like the flash of magic in which she had arrived, Nocturnal disappeared again.
Which left Brynjolf pursing his lips and glancing around the room he'd somehow found himself in after returning the key and wondering where the hell he was. Then, his eyes landed on Karliah, who had probably been there the entire time and moved to approach her, before noticing her gaze was fixated on something behind him. So he turned around to find Gallus approaching again.
Karilah froze up like the permafrost that persisted mercilessly in the most northern parts of Skyrim. Brynjolf sighed, grabbed her arm, and dragged her towards the ghost of her dead lover because so help him, if he'd been forced to confront his dead parents and closest friend today, then she would be forced to confront her dead lover too.
Gallus' name slipped from her lips in barely more than a whisper and it was all Brynjolf could do to step away and smile softly as she collapsed into the ghost's arms. He wouldn't even hold it against her later that he could hear her crying.
And then it occurred to him that someone was singing, a soft, lilting tune that he distantly remembered hearing as a baby. Brynjolf glanced up to see his parents, now restored completely with the return of the Skeleton Key, standing nearby. They were smiling at him, but it couldn't last and after a few minutes the three ghosts in the room slowly disappeared. Yet, it was enough for him, and as he glanced at Karliah and saw the small smile tugging at her lips, he knew it was enough for her as well.
o0o
When the Thieves Guild celebrated, they did not do it in half measures or with only part of their hearts committed to what they were doing. Some might even say they were too committed to what they were doing, given the way Vipir had loudly started blabbering about his various (most likely not true) sexual escapades. Brynjolf could only laugh as he strode through the flagon with Phaeril at his side. He wasn't particularly sure when they had all started celebrating, but he highly suspected it might have been from the moment that Frederick had told them Mercer was dead several days earlier. He and Karliah had only just arrived back themselves.
Phaeril stopped in her tracks and he glanced at her questioningly, before realising she was staring at Delvin. The old man took a few moments to realise someone was looking at him, and when he looked up at the elf he paled and swallowed thickly.
"Er," he started awkwardly.
"Delvin." Phaeril crossed her arms over her chest and cocked her head at the old man. "Why am I not surprised to find you here?"
"I swear, I didn't tell Astrid nuffing," Delvin protested a little too loudly. "Once I realised Bryn was sweet on ya I kept my bloody mouth shut!"
"I'm sure." When Delvin opened his mouth to retort something else, she shook her head and interrupted him with a smirk. "You're going to do me a favour, Delvin."
"Am I?" the old man asked somewhat dumbly.
"Yes." Phaeril's features turned into a sneer. "Tell Astrid I'm dead... that way she won't see me coming when I go for her throat."
"Aye, yes, will do, miss!"
"All this time you were still nurturing your ties with the Dark Brotherhood," Brynjolf murmured with a glower at the old man. "Even after I explicitly told you that if you wanted to stay in this guild you'd need to have nothing to do with them?"
"At least I'm not bedding one of their bleeding assassins," Delvin pointed out bluntly. "You damn hypocrite."
"That's not the same and you know it!" Brynjolf snapped.
"Just sayin'," Delvin continued with a grin and weighed both his hands up in the air metaphorically, "screwing an assassin or doing some innocent business deals with them-"
"You wouldn't know innocent if somebody tied you up and spanked you with it," Brynjolf retorted hotly.
There was a snicker nearby from Vex and the redhead sighed, rolled his eyes and excuse himself from the conversation. He couldn't really be furious with Delvin, he knew the old sod would never truly betray the guild but he felt like he needed to make Delvin at least think that he was pissed for a bit, otherwise people might think he was getting soft.
He sat himself down at a table by himself and Phaeril joined him silently. After a few moments of sulking, she chuckled quietly to herself and he glanced at her. "You know Delvin, then?"
"He's... acquired things for the Brotherhood over the years and been our main fence," she said. "But I never worked with him directly, it was always through Astrid."
Brynjolf stared at her. "Why?"
"Because I think I didn't want to be reminded of you," she replied with a frown.
"That's probably the reason I forbade us having any ties to your guild either," Brynjolf admitted. Then, he frowned and added, "and also because at the time I wanted nothing more than your heart on a platter."
"I'm glad we're past that point," Phaeril muttered. There was a seconds silence, and then they both laughed.
The thieves continued to celebrate well into the early hours of the morning, with Brynjolf observing multiple unsuccessful attempts by various members of the guild to get into Vex's pants. It was rather amusing at first, and then it started to irritate him, until he almost stood up and said something, had Delvin not beaten him too it. Granted, Delvin was particularly drunk, so his attempt at standing up for Vex was sloppy at best. But the little spitfire seemed to appreciate his gesture, or was just equally inebriated, because she grabbed the old man roughly by the collar and smashed a messy kiss to his lips. Which made Brynjolf feel rather awkward and uncomfortable. After all, she would always be like his little baby sister, and seeing her intimate with another man, even if she was an adult woman now, made him somewhat queasy.
Phaeril laughed and touched his arm, snapping him out of his thoughts and pulling his attention towards her. She inclined her head towards the cistern and the silent idea she was proposing to him, he realised, was a rather welcome one.
He was exhausted, and perhaps it was because he was getting old, but he couldn't face staying up drinking until the sun rose like his guildmates seemed intent on doing. So he followed her out of the flagon and hoped that the loud, off tune singing of Niruin and Cynric would be drowned out by the thick brick walls.
