Bishop took out the lone sentry, an arrow piercing the man's head without as much as a sound.
They continued along the way, reaching a larger room.
Seven men were sitting at the table, counting coin and packaging moon sugar.
There were three others nearby on the ground, unarmed, lying motionlessly, groaning in their delirium.
Bishop took out one of the men at the table, managing to shoot another one before they realized what happened. Aeyrin charged forward bashing her shield and swinging her mace at anyone in sight while Bishop covered her back. Karnwyr joined the fight alongside them, lunging at the remaining men swarming Aeyrin, biting down into their legs or even throats when he got to them.
The three men on the ground didn't even move, they groaned or blubbered some nonsense every so often, not minding the heated battle taking place a stone's throw away.
All three of them got out of the battle with barely a scratch. Bishop pointed his bow at the three delirious men on the ground but Aeyrin shook her head at him, touching his arm lightly to make him lower his bow.
"You know they're in on the operation too," he smirked.
"They're sick," she said sadly, looking over the men, lost in their own minds, oblivious to everything happening around them. She saw that one too many times before.
"They're not sick, princess, they're weak-willed idiots. A child knows what that shit does to you. It's their own damn fault," he pulled his bow up again determinedly, but he still didn't shoot, as if waiting for her consent.
"That doesn't mean they deserve to die for that mistake,"
"We'd be doing them a favor," he snorted derisively, looking at the men in disgust.
"Please don't," she said quietly.
Bishop paused at the increasingly sad tone of her voice. She was looking down at her feet woefully, either trying to hide her expression from him or trying to avoid looking at the three men.
"Princess," he sighed, "what do you think will happen to them out here? They're either gonna overdose from all the sugar here, or if you destroy everything again, they'll starve or die out in the wilderness. There's no way this ends well. It will be long and painful in any case."
"We can tell someone in Riften that they're here, they might have families or…"
Bishop shook his head in frustration.
"People like that don't have families," he snorted again, but looking over her expression, he just sighed and motioned for her to move on further into the cavern. What did he care about those lowlifes anyways?
They continued on, leaving the three men behind, Aeyrin vowing to herself that she will destroy the drugs in that room on their way back.
They reached an even larger room, but it looked like the last one. There were no other entry points outright visible.
Bishop looked over the room carefully, hidden in the shadows. There were at least twenty men, all up and about. Some of them were eating at a table, some were moving things in and out of crates, the others walked around, talking, laughing and drinking. All armed and armored, ready for any attacks.
He scoured the place with his eyes, there was no way he could get to a vantage point from where he was and there were so many enemies around.
This would get ugly.
There was no way to attack any of them without alerting all, so they needed to use every weapon in their arsenal.
"Princess," he whispered, "we need to catch them off guard. A lot."
Aeyrin cringed at the thought. She didn't want to use that power… especially after, what happened last time. If there was even a slight chance she would hurt Bishop again, or Karnwyr… the strange force was too unpredictable, but then again, there were so many people in that room…
"You might as well use it. You sure suffer for it enough," he shrugged. He knew she was apprehensive, but what harm could it do if he and Karnwyr stayed out of the way… unless it could cause a cave-in or something… he probably shouldn't mention that to her.
Aeyrin sighed but she nodded in agreement. These men needed to be stopped and if this was what it took, so be it. Bishop was right, they needed to surprise them, otherwise they would never stand a chance against such numbers.
She told Bishop and Karnwyr to stay back until it was done and charged as fast as she could towards the largest crowd of their enemies.
"FUS!"
The Shout rumbled through the chamber as all the men in front of her flew all over the cavern. It was a rather terrifying sight, but it wasn't as if these people didn't deserve everything they got.
Karnwyr ran towards her immediately and Bishop didn't wait either, thinning the ranks of the scum charging her with madness in their eyes.
One of the men managed to hit Karnwyr with his mace pinning him to the ground, eliciting a painful whine from him.
An arrow flew through the man's his head immediately in retaliation, but the wolf did not get up again. Bishop focused his eyes, breathing out a bit in relief when he noticed his friend breathing, but he was likely too wounded to fight on.
Aeyrin turned quickly to check on Karnwyr after she heard the low whine he let out when he got hit, but she got immediately snatched back into battle by a Khajiit whose claws scratched maliciously across her face and neck, only barely missing her eye.
She swung her mace towards the man's torso, denting his plate armor with the blow.
Two other attackers managed to swarm her in the meantime, a Redguard woman, sneaking up on her and grabbing her in a chokehold and a large Orc, preparing to impale the exposed woman on his sword. The Orc didn't quite know how to thrust his large weapon into her without killing his compatriot while Aeyrin was struggling with all her might to escape her grasp.
As the Khajiit fell with an arrow through his neck, the Orc decided for a different approach, turning over his sword-wielding hand and hitting the side of Aeyrin's head with the pommel of his weapon.
The Redguard let go of her and Aeyrin fell to the ground hard, the whole world spinning around her, her vision blurry and doubled.
The Orc finally had a clear shot at her as she was pulling herself on all fours, trying to get her bearings.
The Orc heaved, raising his weapon, but was hit with an arrow right through his eye just in time. The Redguard woman barely yelped out in shock before another arrow swished from the darkness right in her chest.
Bishop checked the room with his eyes hastily.
Everyone was down. They needed to check if they were dead soon.
He ran over to Karnwyr and Aeyrin, both on the ground and both breathing heavily. He fished out a healing potion for Aeyrin first, sitting her upright and helping to hold it up to her lips, as her coordination seemed completely off. She almost fell over, but he managed to hold her up with one hand while making her drink with the other. After a few seconds the color started to return to her, her face still scratched deeply and stained with blood, but the effects of her concussion hopefully subsiding at least a little.
She crawled over to Karnwyr quickly, running her healing hands over his back. She had to start over several times as her concentration was fought by her wooziness, but eventually Karnwyr managed to stand up shakily. He moved all too slowly, but the worst was over.
"Now, now. Don't move a muscle, dears," a voice sounded through the cavern as a man approached from the shadows. He was very tall and lean and wore long robes. As he made his way closer to them, they spotted his long platinum hair and chiseled gaunt face with golden skin. The Altmer's hands lit up – one with fiery ball in his palm, the other with a crackling lightning above it.
"You attack us, you die," Bishop's eyes narrowed at him dangerously.
"Really?" the elf smirked. "Because I'm thinking: I attack you first and your whore and your mongrel won't be able to do shit about it, with the state they're in."
"You attack, I Shout!" Aeyrin growled at him, her head still spinning. She was wondering if her mind was playing tricks on her. She never before met an Altmer talking in such an unrefined manner. The condescension was still palpable though.
"Possibly," the elf snorted. "So, I attack, one of you attacks, or one of you attacks and I attack. Either way, it doesn't end well for either, huh? Or do you want to sacrifice one?" he smirked at Bishop. "I suggest the mongrel, whores are more useful."
"Just get on with it!" Bishop barked at him. His bow wasn't even ready and the second he would reach for it, he would risk that the elf would attack Aeyrin or Karnwyr.
"Here's what we do then: I leave. You can enjoy my merchandise in peace if that's why you're here. Or do whatever the fuck you came here to do, I don't care," the Altmer said, moving sideways towards the exit subtly.
"No! We're here to kill you!" Aeyrin yelled at him, she had to close her eyes for a second as blood was running from her head into them.
The elf chuckled slightly: "How flattering. You should really weigh your options though, girl. You might just be the first to go down."
"It's not worth it," Bishop grumbled at her quietly, not willing to let one man take either of them away from him.
Aeyrin didn't answer. All too aware of their limited options, she was trying hard not to think on what kind of man they were letting out in the world.
"Go!" Bishop barked at the elf.
He continued to move sideways, slowly, his hands still lit with magic.
Only after he disappeared in the room exit they heard the fast footsteps of a running man, echoing through the now empty caverns.
Aeyrin tried to heal the scratches on her head and neck but her head was still spinning too much.
Bishop ran off for a while, checking the rest of the cavern for any signs of the elf. He didn't want him to catch them off guard while they recuperated. And if he was still lurking around, he could just kill him.
He noticed the three delirious men in the other room were now a pile of burning corpses, likely the elf's attempt to kill any unnecessary witnesses.
The elf was nowhere to be seen though, not even outside the cavern.
He returned to the main chamber, systematically checking all the attackers scattered on the ground, slitting the throats of those that he had even the slightest doubt about being dead.
Aeyrin and Karnwyr stayed where he left them, both still trying to get their bearings.
…
It took some time and one more potion before Aeyrin started to feel better, even managing to heal the scratches on her face.
It was still covered in blood, but at least the stinging was finally gone. Hopefully the Khajiit didn't carry any nasty diseases.
She sat at the table nearby and Bishop picked Karnwyr up and laid him next to her on the bench so that she could reach him and try to heal him some more. She didn't stop trying but the wolf needed more powerful magic than she had.
Bishop scoured the room for anything valuable while she looked over the large number of crates. She couldn't even imagine how to get rid of all that.
After a while, Bishop came back, sitting across from her, his pack loaded with new loot.
He noticed the direction of her stare immediately.
"You know… there's a lot of oil lamps on the ceiling. We could just burn the whole place for good." he shrugged.
Aeyrin seemed to like that idea. Her expression got a bit less morose at the very least. She nodded thoughtfully as Bishop fished around his pack for two bottles of Honningbrew, passing one to Aeyrin.
"Shouldn't we leave? That elf might call for reinforcements," Aeyrin looked at him, surprised.
"There's nothing around here for quite some time. We can relax for a bit. Besides, I saw you stagger to the table, you still need to keep calm."
They were silent for a while, sipping the mead in the corpse infested room.
"So…" Bishop tried to broach the subject again, "are you gonna finally tell me what's with you and all this skooma business? You didn't seem as pissed at the addicts themselves."
"Gods, the men! We should get them out before…" Aeyrin remembered but Bishop interrupted her: "They're dead, sweetness. The mage burned them on his way out."
She looked down at the table sadly, playing with the label on the mead bottle. Bishop didn't push her further, hoping the silence would spur her to talk instead.
"My father… he was an addict," she said into the silence after a while.
Bishop stayed silent for a while, but when she seemed reluctant to go on, he tried to nudge her more: "He gave you to the temple?" She did say she was there voluntarily, besides she would hardly hold such grudge against the stuff if her father gave her away when she was still a baby. But why would an addict keep a child he had to feed? He knew that people like that were incapable of caring about anything besides their own poisons.
She shook her head. "Father… well he earned his money by begging… but people recognize an addict. He figured it would be nice to have someone more… capable earning money for him," she sighed, looking anywhere but at him.
"He barely managed to keep me alive when I was a baby. As soon as I could walk and talk he sent me to the streets. I begged, stole, broke into homes and I had to bring him all the money so he could spend it on skooma," her eyes started to glitter with tears. The callous disregard of her father still stung, but the most painful part still remained unsaid.
"I had to steal something for myself from the amounts I brought so that I could at least get something to eat, but… that often meant he didn't get enough for his habit…" she shook her head. "It was… worse when he didn't have any." tears dropped from her eyes slowly, she still didn't look at him. She never talked to anyone about it. Master Therien and some other people in the temple knew, but she never actually had to tell anyone.
"There was a… seller. A Khajiit. He always came over, giving him new and new ideas on how to use me to make money when he didn't have enough. At times father protested, that his ideas were too dangerous or that I was too young, but… he… had a way of convincing him..." she tore parts of the label of the mead bottle bit by bit absentmindedly. "He was an awful man. He knew well what he was doing, how many lives he was destroying," she took a deep breath and shook her head again, running her hand over her left thigh subconsciously. She snatched her hand away from there in a second, not wanting to think about him anymore.
"When I got a little older, he suggested to father that I had… different uses he could get a lot of money for. So my father took me to a dark alley and waited for the first man to walk by so he could offer him… some time with me," she shivered, still staring at the table.
"How old were you?" Bishop scowled, it was nothing new really, his own parents encouraged his sisters to do that themselves. It was pathetic of them, he always thought so, but hearing that the same happened to her made him… more furious than he would have expected.
"Eleven," she scoffed, then she finally looked up at him, her eyes, troubled by her memories turned a little lighter.
"The man paid father, but he took me straight to the chapel," she smiled sadly, "he told me that if I wanted it could be my home. That I would get food and a bed. That they would educate me and take care of me… that I would never have to see father or anyone else from that life again…"
She stayed silent for a while after that again, looking down at the table, playing with the bottle of mead. The thought of making that choice still made her feel… guilty. She knew she shouldn't be but couldn't help herself. She was so angry at him… and yet… she still couldn't stop wishing for things to turn out differently. Wishing she'd have another chance to have a family.
Bishop observed her for a while. He knew well how shitty a life with a callous parent could be. "Did you? See him again?" he asked after some time.
"At times. He was still in Chorrol of course, wandering the streets, begging. He came to the temple a few times, demanding they give me back, got aggressive. But he was weak and delirious, no match for the priests. They never let him near me..." she shook her head sadly.
"The Khajiit was worse. He didn't risk angering the church outright, but he pulled a lot of schemes trying to get me back. Probably lost a lot of business without me supporting father…" she scoffed in disgust.
"What did he do?"
She only shrugged in response "It doesn't matter, he stopped… eventually," she closed her eyes, trying hard not to think about her last encounter with the man. He got away in the end… same as the Altmer just now.
Bishop couldn't really fathom how she could have so much sympathy for the delirious addicts after all that shit she went through with her father, but he decided not to ask further. She was upset enough already. He hesitated a while then covered one of her hands with his with a slight squeeze.
"We should get out of here," he said after a while, hoping that taking her away from the place would make her feel better.
"There's still…" she motioned towards the crates with an uncertain expression.
Bishop nodded, climbing up on the table and untangling one of the poorly fastened oil lamps from the ceiling. He repeated the process for any he could reach, then started to spill the oil inside and over the crates.
They made a trail leading back towards the smaller room, taking down the lamps there too and spilling the contents over the packages of moon sugar.
Aeyrin looked over at burnt corpses of the three men on the ground with regret, but didn't say anything on the subject anymore.
They led the trail all the way to the entrance. Bishop threw the remaining lamp back inside and rushed Aeyrin and Karnwyr to step back. He bent down, pulling out a flint and a small metal rod from his pack, striking the sparks out of them.
The flames went up in a matter of seconds, the whole visible entryway lighting up with wild blaze.
Bishop was careful enough not to lead the oil trail too far out, so that the shrubbery wouldn't get caught in the midst of the heat and a forest fire wouldn't start – that way only a malevolent red glare could be seen coming out of the cavern.
They watched for a while in silence, the flames slowly dying down by the entrance and moving further into the den.
After the red haze was no longer visible, Bishop draped his arm over Aeyrin's shoulder, ushering her away from the scene gently.
She nuzzled her head into his arm with a slight smile as they headed westward.