Give and Take: Riften part 4

Arn sat on his bedroll, staring out on the calm, moonlit waters of Lake Honnrich's western shores.

A day of rest and two days of travelling since the incident with Mercer Frey and they still weren't close to the entrance to this Pilgrim's Path that Karliah was referencing.

Sleep would not come to him. He was trying to decide if the collective number of people looking to him expectantly was beginning to weigh too much, or if his unease was due to one woman in particular.

"Maybe you should kiss me. So they know I'm spoken for..."

Arn sighed and hung his head as Lydia's words, but maybe more the tone and look on her face when she said them replayed in his mind again.

She had looked...happy, content, even though following him around had nearly killed her.

It was as if as long as it was just the two of them, nothing bothered her. By now, she and Freyya would both be in Riften looking for him.

He hoped the message he'd left with the surly innkeeper at the Bee and Barb would be enough to keep them from worrying.

A slight rippling sound from the Lake caused Arn to raise his head.

He was surprised to see someone walking up out of the Lake toward him.

The moonlight silhouetted dark, voluptuous curves as a woman slowly strode toward him.

Arn gulped as she got nearer and felt his cock beginning to harden, realizing she was naked, the gently bouncing breasts and sway of her hips holding his gaze, even though he knew he should not be staring at a stranger bathing.

But as she walked directly closer and closer toward Arn, he forced himself to tear his eyes away from her body and look up at her face long enough to gasp in surprise.

"L-L-Lydia!"

At the sound of her name, she giggled and ran to him, knocking him back onto his bedroll and straddling him with a shapely leg kneeling on either side of him.

"You can't be...How did you-?" Arn sputtered as Lydia wasted no time in beginning to grind herself against his hips and now painfully erect cock that needed to get released from the confines of his leather breaches.

"I finally tracked you down" she sighed breathily, smiling at him "Don't you think we've waited long enough"

After seeing her come up out of the lake like a vision and feeling her rubbing her womanhood against his abdomen and his cock straining to be let free from his leathers as she grinded on him, Arn quickly lost control.

But Lydia was atop him and he was still in his leathers.

Sitting up, he quickly shirked his top off before Lydia slid down his legs to his feet, pulling his pants and smallclothes with her, her bountiful breasts glancing off his freed lower extremities, driving him mad with desire.

He looked down to see her smiling happily as she crawled back up toward him on her hands and knees, large slightly tanned breasts swaying hypnotically.

Right as their lips were about to meet, he felt her hand on his chest as she pushed him back down with more force than he was expecting.

He was about to remark about it, but lost the ability to when he felt a soft lick on the tip of his cock, further hardening him beyond what he thought was possible.

He looked down to see Lydia perched over his crotch on her hands and knees, looking at him deviously before opening her mouth and gently engulfing the head of his cock.

Arn couldn't help groaning and throwing his head back in ecstasy as the soft warmth of her lips and mouth slowly slid over the head of his cock and continued down, soon engulfing all she could as he hit the back of her throat.

Arn's legs spasmed and he heard sounds come from him he didn't recognize as Lydia began to go up and down on his cock, sucking and swirling her tongue around it as she went.

Just when he thought it couldn't get any better, with the moist warmth of her mouth plowing up and down on him, he felt the plump softness of her breasts pressed and fondled against his sacks as she continued.

"OH...Mmfh...Gods...Lydia...I ...won't...last" Arn managed to get out as he felt his loins beginning to tighten up further in prelude to exploding.

Lydia sat up for a moment with a slurpy pop as she released him.

Just as he reached for her, her smile suddenly vanished.

"You should have kissed me" she muttered sadly.

Arn woke up suddenly, springing up out of his bedroll, and panting wildly as though he'd just run for miles, looking all around for the bewitching woman of his dreams.

As he looked out across the early moonlit morning on Lake Honnrich's western shores, he sighed and lashed out at the air angrily, realizing it had all been a fantasy.

It wasn't the first time he'd had such a dream about her. Most went further than that.

He angrily slumped back down on his bedroll.

Why couldn't he get her out of his head? Why did he even think about her to begin with. While he'd thought about his time with Elisif for awhile before dismissing any future as a fantasy, he'd never really dwelt on Aela, Rikke, Ingrid, or any of the other women who'd flirted or slept with him.

What was it about Lydia that vexed him so?

Even as he angrily tried to force those thoughts from his head, he looked up when he heard water rippling again.

He put his face back in his hands as he saw a woman's silhouette rising from the smooth waters.

NOT again. Wake up fool!

As he dragged his hands down his face, stretching his features and shaking his head in frustration, he realized he must be awake already.

Looking back up, he realized as she got closer to the shore, she didn't have the same physique Lydia did.

Slimmer with smaller, but still perky breasts and slim, tight hips, the near-white blonde hair dripping wet and sticking curled around the left side of her neck was the final piece of the puzzle.

Vex surprisingly said nothing nor bothered to cover herself at all as she sauntered up naked from the water and rummaged through her bag as Arn sat stupefied for a second whether to look away or pretend this was normal.

Adventuring in the wilds meant seeing your fellow travelers in a state of undress from time to time, but Arn knew from experience women did not parade themselves completely naked in camp...unless they had other things in mind.

Arn noted she didn't look flirty or amused, more matter of fact than anything else. Of course, he hadn't seen her be very expressive about anything since meeting her.

He did note a nasty jagged scar of a cut extending from the right side above her hip down to a hands breadth above the juncture of her womanhood.

"How'd you get the scar?" Arn muttered as a means of breaking the awkward silence.

"Didn't make a clean escape from somewhere" she replied nonchalantly.

"But you did escape?"

"Of course"

"Must've been quite a feat with a gash like that"

"You know what's ironic?" Vex replied as she slipped her smallpants on and stood up to tie her breast strap on.

"What?" Arn tried to keep focus on her face as she talked, but he felt like there was something odd about her movements.

"If I hadn't been struggling with the guard, the slice would've been cleaner and it wouldn't have been as bad" She murmured, tracing a finger over the jagged scar tissue.

"You know, you don't strike me as a person that would believe in all these stories about the Skeleton Key and Nocturnal's blessing" Arn ventured, both wanting something to talk about to get his mind off her flesh on display and genuinely curious as to her real feelings about their journey.

"Maybe if I hadn't seen you do what you've done, I would be a lot less...receptive...to the idea, but in the end, it doesn't matter if I believe it" Vex replied cynically.

"Why not?"

"Because the others do. Karliah's not the first person I've heard to mention such tales. And if there's a chance that this place will provide proof of what she's saying, then I'm willing to chance it...that and maybe the opportunity to get some spoils back that Mercer absconded with" she muttered with a slight smirk, though Arn couldn't fail to notice she'd stopped dressing and simply leaned against one of the large stones in just her smallpants and breast strap, eyeing him with an expression he couldn't distinguish in the darkness.

"Of course, it would come down to gold" Arn replied with a sigh.

"And why not?" she retorted.

"Why would you choose a life like this? taking from others to supply whatever you want or need" Arn mused, wondering if his assessment had been too harsh.

"You speak as if the world were some vast place full of happiness and possibility" she scoffed "The reality is no one gets what they want or deserve, either good or bad. Best advice I heard from a young man a long time ago, get what you can, while you can because it will all be over a lot sooner than you think."

"Tamriel's already too full of people taking whatever they can" retorted Arn more harshly than he meant.

"And why aren't you one of them?" Vex asked him, surprising him for a moment.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, with what I've seen you can do, with the power you have as this...Dragonborn, why aren't you taking what you want?"

"Is it so hard to believe someone would have ideals?"

"It's not hard to believe when it's some peasant or priest who'd never see more than a few septims even if he decided to ditch his morals somewhere, but for someone with power...yes, it is strange...or is it that you just don't know what you want?" she cocked her head slightly as she spoke.

"The thing I want most is answers" Arn murmured as he looked away, frustrated with how little he actually knew about the power pulsing in his veins "Answers no one seems to have...or want to give" he sneered.

"It's not the..only thing" Vex replied, continuing to smirk.

Arn looked up and followed her gaze back down to his crotch where his cock was still tenting his breaches and blanket enough to be noticeable even though it'd receded from where it had been when he woke.

"Agh" Arn sighed in aggravation, turning away and closing his eyes in frustration, just wanting the night to be over with.

They were both silent for awhile before Vex spoke up again.

"You know, I saw it as soon as I returned from bathing in the Lake. I figured as corked up as you were that you'd have been all over me. I figured a man with your power takes what he wants. So I had this stashed out of sight in case you tried to force me" she remarked as Arn looked back up to see her holding a dagger in her hand "but you never did..."

"I don't force women" Arn replied bluntly, looking back to his lap and feeling more aggravated the more she insisted speaking about the subject.

"But if I wanted a quick rutting in the bedroll..." she replied, suggestively swaying her hip out and running her hand up the side of her hip as Arn's head bolted up to look at her again, feeling his cock beginning to harden again.

"Are you offering...?" he mumbled

"Do I have to spell it out for you or do I just have to wonder loudly enough if daggers are the only thing you can snatch?" Vex huffed before licking her lips in anticipation, her eyes locking on Arn's hardening crotch as he got to his feet.

Arn paced determinedly over to Vex and stopped before her, his eyes clouding with lust as the frustration of the sleepless nights and thoughts of his housecarl gave vent to a blaze of passion.

In a few blinks of an eye, Vex found both her breaststrap and smallpants had vanished and Arn stood naked in front of her, his cock now engorged and sticking out in a slight curve forward.

"I see you can snatch other thing-" Vex had begun to remark, but Arn burst forward, bringing a muscular arm up between her legs, both lifting and spreading them wide while the other hand steadied her upper back enough to guide her to lean against the rock she'd been leaning on while he used his mouth to latch onto her left breast with a powerful suction as she couldn't hold back a screech of surprise and pleasure.

"Oh...Ahn...Gods...I" Vex could only gasp as Arn's mouth worked over her left breast before switching to the right one, licking, kissing and sucking on the perky mounds before lavishing attention on her nipples.

She arced her back and Arn kissed up to the side of her neck before nipping at her earlobe and stroked the wet mass of white blond hair while Vex felt his other hand leave holding her up, his torso pinning hers to the rock while his other hand adventured further, caressing over her left buttock down the cleft between them before coming back up her spine, around her ribs, cupping a breast before sliding down to the slit of her womanhood, now swelling and beginning to moisten.

"Ahn...Ouh..." she moaned as Arn slid a finger inside her womanhood and carefully traced its inner outline before exiting and sliding around the outside, coming to rest atop it, carefully circling the bud and pinching it delicately, causing her body to collectively try to get closer to him, her arms and legs jumbling, trying to latch onto him and bring him closer, insider her, but she was denied.

Arn was surprised to hear her whimper as he eluded her grasp as he reached under her inner thighs with both hands and pulled her hips up to him, leaving her top half leaning back on the rock.

"Mphf...I...Ahn" she continued to gasp as Arn brought his lips to her lower lips and immediately slithered his tongue in, causing her hips to buck up toward him as he continued his exploration of her womanhood with his mouth.

He continued to kiss, lick and explore her womanhood with is mouth as he allowed his hands to wander her hips, thighs and buttocks.

She began to shudder and Arn knew she was close. Withdrawing his mouth from her lower lips, she opened her mouth to complain, then was silenced as Arn slipped two fingers in her womanhood and thrust upward.

Vex's body spasmed uncontrollably and her seed splurted onto his fingers inside as she threw her head back and wailed in ecstasy.

Arn only waited briefly, giving her a moment to get her bearings back and steady enough to stand before he picked her up by the inside of the thighs again and stretched her legs wide as he lined his now dripping cock with her dripping womanhood.

Then he slowly allowed her to sink down onto it, stretching wide the moist lips of her womanhood and allowing both of them to sigh with great pleasure as he felt her moist warmth envelop him.

Slowly at first, he began picking her up and then letting her fall back down on the hard cock that filled her, making them both groan and moan in excitement as Arn picked up speed.

Just as he really began pistoning up into her as she bounced on his cock, he felt her body begin to tighten as did his cock.

Then she did something unexpected. She'd been gripping his shoulders with one hand and alternately playing with her breasts until she got close to exploding again. Then she grabbed him by the back of his head and locked him in a passionate kiss, her pert nipples poking his muscular chest.

"You should kiss me. So they know I'm spoken for..."

The act brought up everything he'd been thinking about for the last few days and suddenly he felt like it was all wrong.

He wanted it to be Lydia here, bouncing on his cock, moaning his name, sharing the perils of the wilds, not...this thief.

Suddenly, he realized he had slowed to a near stop, though that hadn't stopped Vex from picking up the pace on her side as she bounced up and down, pushing off his hips with her legs coiled around him.

Angry with himself again at the prospect failing to please a woman he'd consented to rut with and failing to relieve himself for his own good, Arn picked Vex up off his cock before setting her down.

She opened her mouth to wonder aloud at his actions before he spun her around so she was facing the rock.

He snaked an arm around her waist before nudging her legs wider. Vex knew what was coming and braced both hands on the rock.

Arn latched on with his other hand as he leaned over her slightly and slowly slid his still engorged cock into the moist sheath of her womanhood from behind.

Vex had been vocal before, but it paled in comparison to the cry of joy she made as his hips finally smacked the soft skin of her buttocks as he fully shoved himself inside her.

There would be no kissing, no sweet nothings whispered, nothing tender.

Arn closed his eyes and imagined it was the voluptuous form of Lydia that he was pounding away into, beginning to moan himself as he picked up speed.

"Ahk...Mmf...Gods...Oh...Ahn...Yes..." Vex moaned out as Arn picked up speed, rutting her from behind with greater pace, the slap of his hips against her buttocks beginning to be louder.

He squeezed his eyes shut harder, pounding her harder as she squealed and moaned.

Arn opened his eyes briefly and realized he had been rutting her so hard that she was no longer bent over, but pressed up against the rock with her hands splayed out, her breasts rolling up and down against the mossy surface, feet flailing off the ground as he was pounding straight up into her.

Closing his eyes and envisioning Lydia pinned to a wall before him, Arn crouched over her back closer and reached an arm around to squeeze and caress her breasts as he pounded up into her faster and faster, feeling his loins tightening up.

Then Arn felt himself shut everything else out as he thrust up into her deeply, squishing her buttocks and exploding inside her, vaguely aware she was spasming and exploding over his cock as well.

As Arn breathed and gasped for air, slowly becoming more aware of things again, his mind latched onto the fact Vex had been moaning a name when she came.

"Oh...Bryn...Bryn" she cooed with closed eyes as Arn set her down on shaky feet and slowly withdrew his deflating cock.

Once Arn was sure she could stand unassisted, he slowly moved away and walked out into the lake to wash the smell and seed from their activities off.

What a pair they were, he mused sadly.

The Dragonborn of legend and here he was pining for a woman he was almost old enough to be the father of. He couldn't even get a good casual lay without the woman calling someone else's name out...figures.

Dipping his hands into the cool water and drenching it over his face, he hoped the shock of the cool liquid would help clear his mind now that his body was fairly "uncorked".

He felt a soft touch on his arm and turned to see Vex standing in the waist deep water next to him.

By the worried look on her face, Arn figured she must've realized what she did.

"I...uh...wanted to thank you for that" she mumbled, looking unnerved and distraught for the first time that Arn had met her.

"We both enjoyed it" Arn evaded, pretending to continue washing, wondering if she would actually acknowledge it or not.

"Uh...did...was I...too...erm...loud?" she stuttered.

"Yes, I heard you screaming Brynjolf's name" Arn sighed, not feeling like waiting for her to finally come around to it.

"Oh um...I mean..." she started before they both fell quiet for awhile, the splashes of water as they both pretended to continue washing the only sounds that filled the now blue darkness of the dawning morning.

"I'm sorry. I...didn't mean for that to happen" she muttered after a long pause.

Arn turned to leave the Lake when Vex latched onto his elbow with surprising force.

"Please, not a word of it to anyone. I'll make it up to you, I promise"

Arn wondered for a moment if he should just admit to her that they'd both used each other and that it was no big deal, but he wasn't sure if telling her he'd fantasized he was with another woman might do more harm than good at this point.

Vex interpreted his silence for indecision and immediately leaped unbidden onto him, wrapping her arms about his heck and locking her legs around his waist as she slowly started to grind against him, feeling to see if his cock was responding.

"What are you doing?" Arn sputtered in surprise, doing his best just to keep from falling over when she jumped on him.

"Making it up to you" she whispered.

Arn was about to protest, but his loins were beginning to respond, and dumping her off him and trying to backtrack the conversation to explain seemed pointless.

Suddenly, she arced her back and jerked against him.

Arn was surprised she would've come when he hadn't even done anything yet, then froze when he saw the look in her eye.

It wasn't pleasured bliss. It was shock.

Looking down between them, he saw an ugly black arrowhead sticking out of her abdomen just as he felt one whip by where his head had been.

"TIID KLO UL!"

Time slowed to a crawl as Arn grabbed Vex and twisted, plunging them under the water as Arn saw several arrows just behind her on a path to hit them if they hadn't moved.

Releasing Vex under the water, Arn came up standing in the cool water of the Lake, furious that even here, he was once again hunted.

His blood began to boil with rage. He'd had enough of being hunted, enough ambushes.

Now, he would do the hunting.

With a bellow of rage, he raised both fists in the air and pounded them down into the water.

"FO KRAH DIIN!" The new word of power he'd learned burst from his lips and a frosty blast of wind shot forth, freezing the wave he'd just created and freezing the water in front of him for about six feet, causing the dark cloaked attackers on the bank and wading toward them to pause.

Reaching down, he pulled Vex back up and knelt with her behind the frozen wave of water.

"This will give you cover long enough for me to deal with them. Get out as soon as you can before the slaughter fish pick up the blood scent" he muttered before submerging into the water and swimming out in an arc.

Finding a nice sharp, sizable stone on the bottom, Arn gauged his location before ambushing his would be ambushers.

"WULD NA KEST!"

Arn exploded out of the water, plowing sprays of water to both sides of him as he came to a stop, connecting the sharp rock into the unguarded face of one assailant, the gratifying crunch of bone signaling his attack had accomplished its purpose.

Arn stepped behind the dying assailant and grabbed him over his shoulder under the neck, pulling him over Arn's shoulder and draping his spasming body over his own as he charged the next group of attackers.

He felt several arrows hit his human shield before he reached the next group.

Flipping the man off him, the corpse landed atop one of the attackers as Arn snatched his short sword from his hand.

"ZUN HAAL VIIK" Arn bellowed, sending the next attacker's longsword flying out of his hand far out into the lake before Arn slashed across the now defenseless man's neck.

"TIID KLO UL" Arn spun, crouched and pivoted as arrows from the second group were fired at him.

As time slowed, he crouched, grabbed one out of the air, and let the others go by, two of them hitting the lone other hapless attacker at Arn's back.

As time sped back up again, Arn stood to his full height and walked menacingly toward the remaining attackers.

Four of them in dark cloaks with cloth pulled over everything but their eyes stood in the lake where they'd been wading toward him, but the display of power followed by the sudden deaths of the other group of comrades had made them hold their attack momentarily.

Arn had felt a brief wooziness after the last word of power, but his continued rage, combined with a brief respite to walk a few steps toward the other group had allowed it to subside.

One of the four started backing out of the water.

"That's right. You should run!" growled Arn angrily.

The other three aimed their bows to fire as Arn burst sprinting forward.

"FO KRAH DIIN!"

The blast of icy wind burst forward more powerfully than the first time he'd used it, freezing the water, leaving the assassins' feet frozen in place as the arrows they'd released were frozen and flung backwards, cracking in pieces against the rocks behind them.

One of them even had his arm frozen solid, screaming out in pain.

Stepping up onto the uneven ice, Arn grabbed the frozen arm and ripped it off with a crunch, wrenching a blood curling scream from the now stub-armed assailant.

Pivoting, Arn used the frozen arm to block the longsword swing from the second assassin before stepping inside his swing and latching onto his neck before driving him backward, bending him over until he heard the sickening snap of the man's back giving way before Arn let go.

Standing to full height after picking up the dead man's bow and an arrow, Arn stared at the terrified assailant still left frozen in place a few paces away, desperately trying to wrench his feet free.

Slowly, he brought the bow up with the arrow nocked and ready, aimed right between the wide eyes of the frightened assassin.

"Please! Please! It was Frey! He wants you dead! We were to track and kill you if he didn't tell us otherwise within two days of his departure from Riften. It's him you want! I could probably even help find him. Surely that's worth something!" stammered the Nordic assassin staring at Arn's nocked arrow.

"No, it isn't" muttered Arn as he released the arrow, thudding through the man's skull with a loud THWACK as he pitched backwards.

Arn looked back to see Karliah had appeared, her armor spattered with blood, as she helped Vex out of the water.

Still stark naked, Arn picked up a sheath of arrows before sprinting into the woods toward the lone assassin that had run off.

A few words of power helped Arn easily catch up to the sprinting man.

Taking aim, Arn let an arrow fly, impaling the fleeing man's left thigh.

"Augh!" he exclaimed, trying to get back up on both feet as Arn advanced on his downed form.

As Arn neared, the smaller man tried to draw his longsword and slice at him, but Arn kicked his elbow before he could draw it, sending him sprawling on his back with a yelp of pain as the arrow in his thigh shifted.

He tried to crawl backwards before Arn nocked an arrow and he stopped moving.

"How many more of you are left?" sneered Arn.

The wide eyed man seemed to look around for a moment as if considering his options, but the THUD of Arn's arrow into the ground next to his head made him jump.

"How many?!" Arn bellowed, advancing slowly as he nocked another arrow.

"I..I..I don't know. I don't know who's left from the group that was supposed to deal with the sentry" the downed assassin stammered.

"How many of you made the journey?"

"Twelve of us"

"Is that all of you, or are there more of you back in Riften?"

"There's always more men in Riften willing to do what Mercer Frey asks"

"How does he pay you?"

"If I tell you about it, will you spare me?"

"Maybe..."

Ten minutes later, Arn left the lifeless body of the assassin with several arrows pining it down as he ran back towards camp.

Circling around to find Karliah's sentry spot, he found four dead assassins, one of them, an older looking Bosmer hadn't bothered to wear a covering over his face like the others.

Once he'd removed anything of value from them, Arn carried the small bags of items back to camp.

Bright rays of sunlight shone through the trees as Arn made his way back out to the camp on the shoreline.

He found Karliah had already removed the arrow from Vex and administered healing potions, carefully wrapping the wound and drawing a cloak over her.

Both Vex and Karliah looked up as Arn stepped into the shoreline area and he was reminded of his nakedness again as both sets of eyes grew wide with surprise for a moment as they took in his blood spattered form before looking away.

Arn unceremoniously dumped the bag of stuff from the assailants on the ground before turning to go bathe the gore off of him, but as he looked out on the lake waters, all the ice had melted, and all the blood and bodies had attracted a vast amount of slaughter fish, making the water writhe and move with their sinuous movements as they fed on the bodies.

"I'll find a stream" Arn simply muttered before grabbing his leathers and walking off into the woods.

After awhile, he found a stream and washed the blood and gore off as he thought over what the last assassin had coughed up before Arn killed him.

Arn had wondered from time to time if he was putting too much faith in the word of thieves that they would make good on the deal he kept having to do more for, but knowing where Mercer Frey had been hiding most of the goods he'd stolen was an unquestionable guarantee in getting the Guild's help when the time came, both now and in the future.

This trip had turned out more useful than he thought it would be.

Arn sighed as he looked around, cautiously dressing in his leathers.

There was still the matter of dealing with Nocturnal, which he honestly was not looking forward to.