The Out-takes

I call these out-takes because they are either ideas I never developed while I was writing the fan fic, scenes which sprang out at me after I had finished the fic and had no place to insert them prior to publication, or just little notions and ideas which popped out and I thought would be fun to read. I'm posting these for two reasons, first to give young writers more examples of where ideas come from and second, because they are hopefully humorous.


A Marital Duet

Viarmo sat down next to Lisette while Inge and Giraud were leaning against the wall. Aia was sipping her glass of wine in the corner. Jordis had just taken our three children out for a stroll in the spring afternoon that was Solitude. Ostensibly they were going to look for flowers to decorate the table for tomorrow's gala. Jarl Elisif was having a little celebration to announce that she would accept Falk's proposal for marriage. But for this evening, the Bardic college was gathering in Proudspire for a few drinks and brief discussion on what this year's Burning of King Olaf Festival should have. We had done some preliminary business but I had decided we needed a break from the serious discussions and I was in a mood to be a little silly.

"So Valentine, you say you came up with this a few nights ago?" began Viarmo.

"Pretty much," I said. "It's not for the poetic edda by a long shot, but the boys in the taverns will get a kick out of it."

"And the wives especially," added Sofia grinning while her fingers gently taped the skin of the drum in a rapid cadence.

"It's not often we see the two of you sing a duet," observed Lisette. "What brought this on?"

"An argument," suggested Sofia.

"Just a little one," I suggested. "Only three plates, two cups, and a chair were broken."

The bardic college gave each other glances. Some of our knock down drag outs were rumored to drift through the open windows of the house on hot summer's evenings and everyone in the college could hear the insults and shouts and accusations and occasional thumps of bodies colliding across the plaza. Of course I exaggerate. The thumps of bodies colliding usually happens when we are making up with a playful wrestle.

I note the skepticism in your faces. You'll just have to accept that no further elaboration is forthcoming.

I began to play the accompaniment on the lute while Sofia paddled the rhythm on the drum. And I sang the first stanza while she responded on the second line. And the song went something like this . . .

Me : I don't take no crap from anybody else,
Sophia: But me.
Me: I wear the pants around here!
Sofia: When you're finished with the laundry.
'Cause I'm a guy you don't want to fight!
When he says "jump" I say "yeah, right".
I'm the man of this house!
Until I get home.

What I say goes around here!
Right out the window.
And I don't want to hear a lot of whining!
So you'll shut up.
The sooner you learn who's boss around here!
The sooner I can give you your orders, dear.
'Cause I am the head honcho!
But it's all in his head.

And I can have sex anytime!
That I want.
'Cause I'm a man who has needs!
But they're not that important.
And don't expect any flowers from me!
Because you've learned by now I prefer jewelry.
I'm the king of my castle!
When I'm not around.

And I'll bet on the racing pools whenever I want!
To get into trouble.
And I'll come home when I'm good and ready!
To sleep on the couch.
Because a man's got to do what a man's got to do!
And you're going to do what I tell you to.
Because I'm top dog around here!
But he's been neutered!

Sean Morey is a comedian who wrote this silly little song a few years ago which I encountered when a Muppet sang it on a You Tube. Suffice to say The Man Song struck me as the sort of song Valentine would write when in a whimsical mood as a duet between him and Sofia. So this is a little short written to illustrate how Valentine and Sofia would perform such a piece. The playful thumping noises idea came from the newlywed couple who lived in the apartment above the shop last year. And yes, it was wrestling, there's a difference. *grins*


Sofia's Attack Horse

"So Sofia, how are you feeling right now?" I asked as we walked across the tundra towards Whiterun. Off in the distance the Jarl's Palace stood like a giant against the sky. The sun was just about set and it was looking like it would be a nice evening, that is if you liked just the weather. The fact that I still had not figured out how to get her affectionate towards me put a damper on what would have promised to be a really nice night. I sighed to myself. How do you get a girl to fall in love with you?

"Bored," she replied to my query. "Can't we do something a little more exciting like insulting a jarl or punching a sleeping dragon?" She paused. "Actually that's probably going a bit too far even for me."

I noticed something ahead and an idea presented itself. "You hungry?" I asked.

"Yes!" she said. "I'm so hungry I could even eat you . . . um . . . I mean in a non-perverted way of course."

"How about we make some Venison Stew?" I suggested. I had been tempted to say something else, but what? I have no intention of letting you know.

"You mean with the potatoes and carrots and salt pile?" Her faced lighted up a bit. Like most young girls she was more than capable of packing away the food, but when it came to cooking, if she thought I was expecting her to do it for the two of us, then I could expect a raw carrot and apple. I didn't know how to cook the good things, like Venison Stew, but she did. So how do you get a girl who won't cook Venison Stew if she thinks she's doing it for you to cook it? Simple, you insist on being the one to cook it and ask her how and she sits on the tree stump and tells you while taking quaffs of ale from a bottle or two you stashed away when she wasn't looking. You get the Venison Stew and she thinks she's the one in charge. I know how to be a deceitful little bastard and I'm proud of it too.
"Of course!"

"Val," she continued. "How are we going to get the venison?"

"See that deer on the hill?"

"Val," she replied. "You can't sneak. And you couldn't hit the broad side of a barn with that Hunter's Bow you have."

"I'd be doing it a lot better if you didn't keep adding commentary. How am I supposed to be sneaking up on something when you keep muttering things like . . ."

"Oh so you're going to tell me to wait here while you go and get it?" she accused me. "Oh don't worry, I'll just sit here like a good doggie unless I find someone better to stalk."

"I'm not leaving you, Sofia," I said as gently as I could in spite of my very prominent desire to just snark back. Her gaze softened for a moment. "I'm going to show you a trick with Illusion Magic."

"Oh?"

I turned with a grin and called up two spells. With my left hand I summoned up the Fury Spell. It was a useful spell. Have too many trouble makers down the hallway who will attack in masse the moment they see you? Cast a little fury spell and suddenly one of them thinks his companions really need to be killed right now. On a deer? It throws out every single herbivore survival trick lovingly given to it by Kynnareth and charges right at you thinking it's the Long Fanged Sabre Cat of the TUNNNNNdra. Then when it's good and charging you unleash with your right hand the fireball spell you just learned an hour ago, thanks to that now dead brigand adept in the fort you just cleared out.

And both spells went off with the skill that my magic had reached, that is, perfectly. This was my chance to shine. She would see where I really could adventure. I knew it was going to be perfect. Then she would say something like "Oh Valentine I didn't know you were so clever. Please take me now and be my lover forever." Yeah yeah over the top as usual, but these are the sorts of feelings that were going through my head in those early days. I really wanted to impress her and she was deucedly hard to impress since she was already convinced she was The Perfected One.

I watched that fireball sail from my hand like a loving child dashing from his father for the first time and head right for the charging deer. It would have been a beautiful blast . . . problem was that in the middle of this brief instant a creme colored nordic horse with battle neighs sung out charged right at that deer. The fireball hit and went off and there they were, a dead deer and dead horse.

"You JERK!" screamed Sofia. "You killed my horse!"

Sofia's Horse always attacks creatures in the game so if you don't want yet another person or thing getting in the way of your spell or bow shots, you walk everywhere.


Mehrune's Cat

"Have you ever thought that our lives are just one big game?" began Sofia. We were laying in our sleeping furs under the stars. The late summer nights were still bright and warm enough that a tent was not necessary and besides, we were up on a set of rocks so that nothing of the normal predator type would be able to climb to get us. I really looked forward to these little camps we sometimes had to do and I will confess that sometimes I worked things so that we would not get back to an inn but would have to sleep out on the landscape. She would get a bottle or two of wine or mead from me which I had stashed in my backpack but she would not be able to get drunk, or get troublesome. And so we would settle down and then, just maybe, she would start to talk about what she was really thinking about. Granted it was mostly about herself but even so, I really liked these moments. We could just . . . talk. There would be no booze, no playing the guards off, no losing of clothing, no staggering about, no brawls. I kept thinking, if I could only get her to know me better, I would have a chance. I mean, it was times like this that I could on occasion make her laugh.

"How do you mean?" I asked.

"Like someone is sitting there playing with us like some adult play thing. And no I don't mean that kind of adult. It makes you think though."

"I don't see the Gods as doing that sort of thing," I reflected.

"I wasn't thinking of the Gods, or Daedra," clarified Sofia. "I was thinking of . . . Oh I don't know . . . Just that our lives and our world were not really . . . real."

I kind of chuckled.

"Don't laugh at me!" she snapped.

"I'm not laughing at you Sofia," I replied. "I am thinking that it's interesting that you said that because of the dream I had last night."

"Oh?" she asked. "What sort of dream?" She rolled on her side to better face me. The moons weren't full but the whole night was illumined by the faint glow and she just looked so enchanting under them.

"Promise you won't laugh?"

"No."

I sighed but pressed forward. "I dreamed," I began. "That I was looking at someone who was looking at me. He was a middle aged guy, in clothing that seemed to be way more colorful than anything I had seen save on the Jarls. It was kind of worn, especially around the knees, but it was clean. Really clean. Like it was brand new clean. He had grey hair and grey eyes and was clean shaven. He was in a wood paneled room with this strange white fur upon the floor, or moss. The consistency of it was a cross between a loose weave like you get on those thick woolen blankets and a bed of moss under a tree. The lights were clearly magical since they seemed to glow with no flickering you would find with candles, oil lamps, or torches. He was seated in a green leather covered chair . . ."

"Green leather? White fur floor? He was either rich or must have a lot of slaves to keep that stuff clean," mused Sofia.

"Yeah," I added. "He was wearing black leather shoes too, but they were cut like peasant shoes, not the high boots of the Jarls and Thanes in the courts. So I wasn't sure how wealthy he was. And the desk he was seated on was a cheap wood and had big gouges on the sides of it like things had been rubbed and had splintered the edges. But what was on it was . . . Well that's what was really magical or strange."

"Yes?" continued Sofia. There was a lilt in her voice which suggested she was intrigued. I was encouraged so I pressed on trying to remember as much of the dream as I could so that I could weave it into a story.

There was a big silver covered box on one side of the table. It wasn't silver, just silver colored and there was a red symbol on it and then a little line on it which . . . Well I did not recognize the runes but I got the impression that this was the box's name."

"He had a box with a name?"

"Yes, he had named that box."

"What?"

"I don't know, I couldn't read the runes," I sighed.

"What did he do with the box?"

"I don't know that either, but it was making a low windy noise. Like a breeze was blowing through it. But he was doing things, three things."

"Three?"

"Yes; first, he had his left hand on a board which had all these little black buttons on it. He kept pressing those buttons, particularly on the left side. Then he had his right hand on an oval bar which he would just slightly shift on a blue mat. And he was looking through this window and that, Sofia, was where the dream really got strange."

"Yes?" She was literally leaning forward now, almost to where I could have reached over and put my hand that that divine face of hers. I so wanted to do that too. There were days when I almost ached to make her mine.

He was looking through a window that was not on the wall, but just mounted on a base. But Sofia? That window opened up on Skyrim. I could see me walking down the trail that is on the north side of the Throat of the World. And while I could not see you, I was able to hear you talking."

"What was I saying," she asked.

"You were talking about how you found the phrase milk-drinker confusing. You were recounting on how you drink milk, but also mead and reminded me you were as tough as any nord. Or something like that."

"Well yeah. I drink both so what does that make me?"

"It makes you Sofia," I replied. "Unique and pretty among Nords."

She paused. "That didn't sound like an insult. Did you just compliment me?"

"Yeah I did," I said.

"Okay," she replied. No thank you's no you're sweets no nothings. I mean really, what's the point of telling a girl she's pretty or clever or unique if she simply takes it as her due and shows no appreciation? I still am amazed at how utterly in love I was with her at this time. My only excuse was that she was there every morning, showering me with abuse for the most part but still, she was there. "So what about this guy who's watching you through the window and listening to me."

"That was when his cat came in."

"His cat?"

"Yes his cat. Who hopped up on his lap and settled down and he began to rub the cat's head."

"Val if this gets sappy and sentimental I'm going to roll over and try to get to sleep."

"No No, Sofia, this wasn't any ordinary cat, this was Mehrune's Cat."

"What?"

"Yes, clearly Mehrune's Cat for just as he was relaxing and not worrying about things that cat jumped out of his lap and landed on that flat board with all the buttons."

"So? What does that do?"

"Well that's where it gets freaky Sofia," I said. "I saw myself suddenly turn to the right and charge off that cliff with a flying leap and I fell three hundred feet, slamming against the sides of the cliffs and I knew I was dead. I just knew it. I could hear my death grunts as the pressure of the impact blew the breath out of my lungs." I paused for a moment. "Then I woke up this morning and I could swear I had woken up already before, but I couldn't remember why. Just the same, I decided I didn't want to be anywhere near the Throat of the World today."

"You dreamed that," she said quietly. "And you thought you had already woken up before."

"Yeah," I replied. "I dreamed that someone was watching me and a black cat came in and did something that killed me. And I had lived this day before. Or part of it anyway . . . until I had died." I turned to her and just looked at her. And she looked at me, her eyes were getting as big as saucers. Then she tried to steal a quick glance at the sky. And then she turned back to me.

"Would you think me forward if I suddenly confessed that I needed to be held right now?" she asked.

"I'd be the perfect gentleman," I suggested. Inside of me however that little voice was screaming "YES!"

She slipped out her sleeping furs and slipped into mine and the next thing I knew she was holding on to me like she was convinced she would fall up and into the sky if she let go. I leaned back on my back and she rested her head on my shoulder and put her right hand over my heart.

"Don't get any ideas," she warned.

I was sorely tempted to say, "I've already implemented them and they worked," but that wouldn't be true. But of course, I was almost in Sovngarde with delight. Having her like this next to me was more than I could have ever imagined before. I was sure we'd be kissing in the morning. We weren't of course, she got out of the furs later and crawled back into her own after spending a couple of hours with me. But I'd never even been able to do that with a woman before.

Needless to say I tried to come up with equally freaky dreams to provoke her into wanting me to hold her again over the next week or so. But apparently, the real dream was the only one that ever worked.

I never was able to figure out why I had that one. Nor why I kept thinking I had lived that day over once before.

The cat we have is very fond of sitting in my lap while I play games and then gets up and walks all over the desk frequently during very tense moments of game play. Sitting on the keyboard or mousepad is pretty routine for him. He has not only triggered events in computer games by the keys he presses, but has been known to knock over drinks onto the keyboard. I refer to him as The Gamer Cat. He's entirely black save for some stray white hairs. He is the runt of the litter of my daughter's cat Peanut who likes to claw my knees when she wants to be let out - once again during boss monster fights - and he is known as Inky.


Bumper-horses

I reined in my horse and looked ahead. There he was, a Black Hand assassin on the other side of the bridge crouched down in his attack mode. I pulled out my bow and dribbled a bit of paralysis poison on the tip and waited for him to make his first move. Within a few seconds he was moving across that bridge towards me, swift and certain, orc's sword in one hand and dagger in the other. He had a furry tail so he clearly was Khajit. I lifted my bow and aimed, and the arrow flew perfectly. And it would have hit too, instead of burying itself in the tree nearly entirely on my right. For just as I had let the arrow fly, my horse had decided it didn't want to be facing the road, but rather the woods.

"Damn it," I screamed as I heeled the horse to send it forward for the Assassin was almost on me. "Learn to rein in that horse of yours before it slams into my horse's backside Sofi!"

Again, Sofia's horse does not stop and slams into the back of your horse knocking it almost ninety degrees to the right or left, usually as you are getting ready to shoot a grizzly bear charging you.


Val and Sofia's New Matching Armor Set

"So what's this armor design again?" queried Serana, looking at me as I wiped the sweat off my brow finishing up the last of the leather lacings on my set.

"The designer's name was Tera," I replied. "I made two sets of the same pattern. One is for Sofia and one is for me. She's in Jordis's room with Jordis putting on her set right now. And if you like how it looks on her I'll make a set for you. I can even dye it in your favorite colors too."

"You're such a sweetie," she mused.

"Nothing sentimental about it," I replied with a grin working myself into it. "Better armor means you are less likely to end up a pile of dust on the ground."

I slipped the last of the pieces on over my torso and pulled the gauntlets on. I stepped back.

"How do I look?" I asked.

"I like the golden sheen," she admitted. "And it really frames your chest nicely. You're looking good enough to eat right about now." And she smiled just enough to show the tips of her fangs. "Not that I would be able to do that with your entire body encased so well."

"I guess that's the best compliment I can hope for from a vampire girl," I replied with a bit of nervous chuckle.

"I'm ready," came a rather mischievous sing song pronouncement from Sofia.

"Let's see how it looks on you Sofi!" said Serana. She once again looked at my set and seemed to appreciate the lines of the design. I suspected she wanted to try the style on herself.

Sofia sauntered, yes I literally mean sauntered, out of Jordis's bedroom and leaned against the door frame with a 'here I am boys' expression of purest vanity. Behind her was Jordis with a very annoyed look upon her face. Serana on the other hand, had eyes wide as muffins and was holding both her hands over a hanging jaw open mouthed gasp.

"My thane!" stated Jordis with an ultimatum tone in the voice. "If you ever try to make me wear something like THAT I shall walk out of this house and straight up to the Jarl's palace and tender my resignation!"

"Iyah . . . Iyah . . . Iyah . . ." I began. I mean I liked what I was seeing but I had not anticipated that view at all. "How did THIS!" I exclaimed, slapping my own armored chest. "Turn into that!" And here I gestured with both hands at the armor (if you can call it that) she was attired (if you can call it that) in.

"You don't like it?" queried Sofia, somewhat genuinely surprised.

"I LOVE it!" I insisted. And I did to, I mean she was looking so damned desirable I was having a hard time not breathing like some old pervert looking through the window of a girl's dormatory at bed time. "You know I think your physic is practically flawless already. I just wasn't expecting such a view in a set of armor."

"No doubt about it," mused Serana. "You do look good in dweemer gold plated pasties and g-string. But I don't see the protective value at all. Nor do I think I want to wear such an outfit."

"Well of course, I do look better in it that you would," agreed Sofia.

It is not an uncommon thing that an armor mod looks perfectly reasonable and rational on a guy but transforms into a burlesque costume when worn by a woman. One of the more popular of these are the Tera mods (hence the name of the designer) So naturally Valentine, being the naive sort he is, not to mention the violation of common sense these armor mods suggest, makes two sets of what he thinks are normal armor only to have Sofia's set transform into something extremely skimpy when she puts it on.