WARNING: This story contains Arson, Drowning, PTSD, Depression, Death, Hints at Starvation, Derogatory Language Aimed At Mentally Disabled, and lots of feels and tears from the author. None of this is intended to be glamorized. This story is not meant to glorify any of it. This story is about the most human side of painful things, from an inside perspective. This story will hurt to read, perhaps almost as much as it hurt to write so much of it. Some things will be written in extreme detail, and these things may be triggering, and for this I apologize in advance. No one deserves to go through the torture that I put this character through but some of you do experience it. I wish that it didn't happen at all but it does. And I hope that for those of you who see themselves reflected in this story, I hope that you might find light and love. You fight a war every day. You deserve better.
Please don't be afraid to comment on anything with this story. Tell me things you like, you dislike, things you find inaccurate, accurate, sickening, helpful, and please please please tell me why. It's the only way I can improve as an author.
All my love to each and every one of you.
Sincerely,
The Author
(PS. Beginning Warning of each chapter will be updated as additional warning tags pop up so you will have a heads up at the beginning of each chapter of what is to come)
His teeth hurt after the first mugging had left him promptly worked over, jacket torn and clothing rumpled from the rummaging of the thief who was left in disappointment but equally left him with his life. The second attempted robbery was slightly more gentle, a person dressed as a dirty beggar brandishing a knife in his face who resorted only to shoving him into the gutter and flee after he blankly told the individual, "do you really think the last guy left me with anything?"
If this was what petty thieves were like here in Tamriel, they didn't stand a chance compared to how it had been in Skywatch before the Shadows took over organized crime.
They'd be dog meat, and so would their prey.
That had been before he even set foot outside of Daggerfell.
As darkness crossed the sky with the moons looming overhead, he didn't dare stop, walking in view of the road but never directly on it in case of watchful eyes, shifting further out of view every time he heard voices or steps or horses, there was no need to draw attention to himself.
Eventually though he was forced to stop out of sheer exhaustion and he curled up as tightly as he could between a tree and a boulder that could block him from the road, eyes weary as they watched until they could no longer remain open. And in the morning, he continued.
At first, travel had been easy, stealing vegetables from farms and palmfuls of grain straight from the stalks as he could, but civilization grew farther and further in between the further he grew from the city and the forest began to close in around him. With his clumsy city-reared steps, animals fled away from him and birds fell silent often, but only in the moments where he stilled did life show itself around him.
To see a true deer for the first time in his life was awe inspiring.
Wolves less so.
He was starving as much as they were as they circled around the base of the tree he had clambered up, clutching a sturdy branch just feet above their snapping jaws, and there he lingered for what felt like hours until they slunk away.
Yakov didn't dare descend until the next day when he had become certain they had truly left.
Wolves were terrifying, and huge. He was grateful to have not seen a bear, he had read in books that they were even larger and could climb trees too. If he met one of those, he was going to truly become another creature's meal.
The next day was somehow worse though, not due to fear but mortifying embarrassment.
Whatever he had managed to find to eat did the exact opposite of agree with his stomach and he spent the better part of the afternoon looking for a river just to wash himself, his pants, and smallclothes.
The further he wandered, the denser the morning mists and the more rocks, boulders, and caves he discovered, and just in time it seemed when one morning it decided to rain.
That rain eventually turned into a downpour so heavy and hard it felt like he was getting hit with shards of ice until he finally was forced to retreat into one such caves, a shallow thing that was large enough for him to lay down in completely stretched out, but barely tall enough to sit. It was enough though, but being cold and wet, he was shivering hard by the time that he drowsily crowded himself into the farthest corner and took off the heavy-soaked jacket in hopes that it would be dry by the time he woke.
Sleep was shallow though.
Every time thunder boomed, he would jolt awake with a cry of panic, and on more than one occasion he smashed his head against the ceiling of the cavern.
He stopped trying to sleep after a while.
And his jacket was still wet by the time the rain stopped.
It restarted later that afternoon, and this time Yakov took the initiative to gather fallen branches before he hurried into another small cave, deeper, darker, and under the glow of a magelight he arranged his kindling with clumsy fingers.
And there, crouched by his damp little efforts, the Altmer boy closed his eyes with his hands reached out and breathed.
Slow and deep.
Using magicka was like touching the tide, feeling the gentle push and pull as it flowed through his fingers, slow and comforting as it wrapped not only around him but through him.
The heat that gathered between his palms was growing and with the promise of the hovering flame, his eyes opened and he introduced it slowly to his kindling that sputtered and smoked and eventually caught alight.
And then as heat began to fill the cave, he settled back feeling satisfied with himself.
It had been months since he had last cast magic like this. Useful, in a different way from invisibility.
And with his clothes spread out on the ground near the fire, he walked around for a little while, inspecting an oddly shaped rock or two in the light out of boredom before settling close to the fire again to warm himself.
Then he wrapped himself in his dry clothes and slept.
And dreamed of fire.
Everywhere it burned there were screams as shelves full of precious pages sparked and collapsed.
Then someone shoved him from behind, right into the flames.
He woke up screaming and kicking, and the sight of the dying fire in front of him made him scurry back against a wall, shirt soaked through with cold sweat until finally rationality settled in.
Yakov was thousands of miles away from the burning Archives, safe and alone somewhere in High Rock with a lonely little fire on its last legs of life with rain pouring outside.
The facts were comforting but he did not move from his little space of wall until all that was left of the fire was the dim glow of embers.
And refused to sleep until at last the rain wandered away. Then he returned to running.
Day after day, he roamed with sleep far and few in between, riddled with nightmares of drowning in fire, smoke, and oceans when his eyes closed, and eventually he stopped trying to sleep, even when the breath in his chest began to rattle and he had to clear his throat often to keep the burning sensation of coughing from rising. Scuffed knees and aching teeth and crawling skin, he couldn't bring himself to stop.
He just kept going.
Running when he could.
Wandering when he couldn't do that.
Walking when he couldn't do that.
The world was alive around him with noise, birds and insects, even the deer paused like curious neighbors to watch as he roamed by.
His head drooped down and jolted back up endlessly with his every drunkenly staggering step down the road and just enough clumsiness to send him face first into the dirt where he stayed and breathed, hazy eyes blinking through blades of grass and he murmured at himself to get up, get up, "get up," dragging his useless boneless body onto his elbows, and then knees, crawling until he could push himself onto his feet.
He couldn't have been surprised even if he tried when the bought of coughs sent him back to the ground.
The burning in his lungs and throat was bad but it was the shivering and itching that felt more awful than anything despite the sun beating down on him. Shoulders, elbows, wrists, spine, knees, jaw, ankles, every fucking bone and joint in his body aching with shooting pain that sometimes made him bare his teeth down on every little sound that might dare scramble up his throat like spiders in a chimney.
He stayed on the ground until the pain steadied itself and then pushed on.
Yakov didn't remember when he had collapsed again.
It was hard to breathe and he felt so cold.
The ground scraped against his face and he absently marveled at the sting, the pull, the jerk, then there was the shift and teeth pressed against the flesh of his shoulder, biting into the bony spot and dragging him a few more inches before releasing.
Snapping of teeth and snarls, clawed feet stamping down upon him without regard before shouting, yelling.
A breeze and he almost felt a scattering of earth against the back of his neck.
Pressure.
And then sunlight dazzled across his vision, blinding white and lovely, the weight of his head too much for his neck as he was pulled upwards enough that he could feel blood rushing back towards his feet and golden brown hair and wind-chafed skin and green eyes.
How pretty he thought deliriously.
The fight to try to get back up, to walk again was one that he couldn't bring himself to even bother attempting as bleary eyes closed and opened to sky and sun and a figure, two, boneless as he was lifted from the ground as though he weighed nothing. Trees and birds, the sound so sweet and peaceful, even darkness and the crackle of a fire soothed him so.
The pain came and went, and his chest ached, worse when he choked on what was pressed to his lips so he would drank.
Some things were soothed though.
Even the way his head was lifted up with the touch of fingertips, scalp touched and scratched to relieve the itch that infurated him for he didn't remember how long, soothed with gentle scrapes and again everything was so light, like all the soot and salt and earth had been pulled away from his soul so he could sleep for longer than a few breaths at a time.
The world floated around him, or perhaps it was the other way around.
Blissful peace.
With the taste of copper in his mouth.
Darkness interrupted with hearth-light and a bitterness on his tongue, when did he even get on his feet to investigate the noise, hands blindly reaching out and he almost fell right through the door when it opened under his hands, caught somehow before he could fall.
And then he looked up.
Above him was the biggest man he had ever seen, wearing leathers and furs, two yellowing points jutting up from his lower lip, skin green as olives and eyes yellow as squash, gripping him by the back of his shirt as he dangled from his hold like he was nothing more than a kitten caught by the scruff, lifted up off his feet so that the two could be eye to eye.
An Orc.
The two regarded each other, the Orc with disinterest and Yakov in awe, before the man turned his attention away and gave a great shout, "Hearth-Mother, it's awake."
The Orc then looked back at him and put him down, but kept hold of his shirt so he wouldn't wander off, a growl in his throat and a scowl on his mouth.
The boy could only stare.
He wasn't even aware of the approach of a woman until long thin calloused fingers turned his chin and dragged his eyes to her, nearly as tall as this man and twice as old, her face weathered with wisdom and her face fierce, each tusk capped with gold and her greying hair bound back from her face with skillfully made pins—they had to be bone, he was sure of it.
"You wake quickly, child. Are you in a hurry to leave us already?"
He was too stunned to respond, managing to swallow, her fingers feeling the movement and she only shook her head, "come. You've been dead to the world for too long. How you can even stand is a wonder."
If the Orcish man hadn't been holding him up, Yakov was certain he actually wouldn't be standing at all.
It was the man who got his feet to move properly, dragging him back inside after the woman, the Hearth-Mother, he called her, and forced him to sit down by the fire, the man dropping down into a chair while the woman gathered a bowl and filled it before giving it to him, the bowl itself warm to the touch and heavy with the contents of a hearty stew of earthy brown with every ingredient diced finely so that it was hard to tell what was what from the lumps, but it smelled…
Absolutely divine.
And the boy tucked his head down to sup right from the bowl before they even found him a spoon to eat with, swallowing hungrily what he had been given, more than grateful even as hiccups jolted him.
"Slow, child. It isn't going to run away from you."
How could he slow down? It was so good? How was it so good?
He felt fit to burst, he was so full after that one bowl, breathing slow and heavy as his hiccups continued to jar him. But he didn't care as he looked to the Hearth-Mother and swallowed hard before croaking, "Thank you. So much."
Perhaps they didn't expect his gratitude, judging by the looks on their faces, man and woman both, but they deserved every word and more.
She gave him the courtesy of waiting for his hiccups to die down before she checked him over, listening to his breathing and his heart with her clipped ear against his back, his pulse, the color of his tongue and how his eyes reacted to light before telling him he had fully recovered from all ailments he had suffered that lead to him being given to them.
That made him wonder though.
"I… don't remember how…"
And so the Hearth-Mother told him.
He had a been found by a farmer and his daughter while wild dogs were fighting over his not yet dead body, and they had brought him into their home to try to save him. Instead, he developed fever in addition to his cough, and when fever turned to seizures, they knew they would not be able to help him and in turn had a hunter of their little village bring him to the local Orc stronghold that they knew could.
That had been a few weeks back.
It did not explain why his hair had been sheered down, every strand prickling against his hand from the strangely short length that couldn't have been longer than his own fingernail, but he didn't dare ask out of worry he might come across as vain.
He thanked the Hearth-Mother again and she waved off his gratitude.
"Rest. Now that you are among the living again, you need to gather your strength. Strange gods hold strange signs around you, child. Whatever their intentions of you, you must live for them," she told him as she had him settle into a bedroll, and made him close his eyes. She promised him more would occur in the morning.
Yakov lingered there, the little hearthfire warming the entire stronghold longhouse, and even with his eyes closed, he could hear someone move in the darkness to prode it and offer more fuel to keep the blaze going through the night.
No one asked him his name, and he only knew members of the stronghold by their titles, Hearth-Mother, Hearth-Wife, Forge-Wife, the Chief as well Yakov met but only long enough to know to stay out of his way if he came around, and there were children there too, all ranging from green to brown in skin with two white tusks poking from their lower lips, some who were eager to peer at him and tease whim while others ran and hid.
It was the children as well who gave him a new name after a week or two of being part of the group, watching him crouch by the fence with a small bit of bread from his lunch, murmuring quietly at the mouse that was carefully coming to trust him enough to take the bread from his fingers. Their yelling scared the mouse away, his yelling scared the cowards of their pack away, another child nearly as tall as him started yelling back, and the squabbling children were silenced when an adult yelled at them to either shut the fuck up or be beaten.
And so the nameless Altmer boy became Mouse in the stronghold.
It was weeks longer before Mouse finally set foot outside of the stronghold, bound up in coarsely woven clothing in hues of grey and green and earth, alongside perhaps one of the least important but certainly the grumbliest of Orc men who could be spared on this important errand: to escort Mouse to the temple of foundlings in a nearby city.
There, at least, Mouse could have a chance at a normal upbringing the Hearth-Mother had concluded. A stronghold was no place for an Altmer child that strange gods had plans for.
And while Mouse was as quite as his name, his warden complained loudly, and often, cussing and blasphemying without fear of even his own god for being put on this task, but even when he turned his anger towards the boy, he never raised hand against him.
All bark and no bite.
It suited Mouse just fine, he was used to that kind of people as he remained dutifully behind the Orc for long days up through the rocky hills that clearly had began to transform into mountains, and he had no worries at all. The Orc chased away wolves and would-be bandits and every morning and every night they would sit and eat rations that had been packed for them. Conversation was poor, one was in no mood to do anything but complain and the other would rather be silent. It was easier for them both to just be silent.
Mouse's steps hesitated though as he finally saw the outskirts of the city.
Through the flinty crags and hills, scattered houses began to grow denser until towers and walls raised up, the city itself as grey as the mountains around it despite the banners that were raised, and he hugged his belongings a little tighter to his chest, ducking his head as he followed the Orc a little closer.
The cold of their travels deeper into the mountains hadn't bothered him until they had stepped past the gates and into the inner city, and his entire body trembled as they passed great buildings with greater statues, the crowds dwindling before he ran right into the Orc's spine with a grunt. He was only glared at and jerked his arm at the building right in front of them. "Where you belong," he grumbled at Mouse, and then, with a hand gripping the back of his jacket, he hauled the boy up through the door.
The Hearth-Mother called it a temple of foundlings.
Mouse didn't expect it to be an actual temple.
Beautifully designed statues where evenly placed everywhere throughout the vast space, all featuring a beautiful woman in some fashion but the largest of all was the nude figure of her holding a great trumpeting flower above her head, cloth gathered about her waist so it pooled down to her feet, offerings of candles, money, flowers ,food, even cloth and musical instruments at the base of her great marble form.
Mouse's eyes were drawn to a white cat though that quietly pattered by, distracted immediately even as his escort continued to haul him through the temple.
"Such aggression is unnecessary in this house," someone said and the Altmer's eyes jerked up and around towards the speeker, a robed woman old enough to be his own mother, bright eyes steady and calm and somehow warm too despite her frown at the Orc.
"Making a drop off."
"Rude."
Another woman dressed in the same garb approached, younger, prettier, even less amused with the orc.
"It's unusual for one of your people to bring anyone to us."
"Found things belong at temples of foundlings," he grumbled, and let go of the boy's shirt roughly and turned to leave, not wanting any further interaction with these people, and both women, a third even joined, scowled at his back, the youth standing there, hugging his rough sack of meager belongings (a single change of clothes and a bowl) tightly.
And as the door slammed shut, the eldest shook her head and approached him.
"What is your name, child?"
Her voice was warm and kind, her expression even matching.
He swallowed nervously and tucked his chin a little more, mumbling his answer.
"I couldn't hear you, could you repeat yourself?"
And he nodded, took a deeper breath and said, "Mouse."
The women glanced to each other and then back to him, "is that what you'd like to be called?"
He nodded again, without hesitation.
"Very well, Mouse. Welcome to the Temple of Dibella. This will be your new home. Have you eaten yet?"
"Not since the morn," he answered, looking up to the one who had asked.
She nodded and patted him on the shoulder before drawing her hand away, "let's get you settled in. Supper will be soon. I don't know what they've been feeding you but it simply isn't enough for someone still growing."
Her smile was sweet although he could almost feel a sense of distance just looking at her before she turned and lead him past the vast space of the temple where worshipers gave their prayers and offerengs and into an area that felt more like a great house carved from stone.
As the priestess, Amelia was her name, walked, she told him all he needed to know at the moment: as a foundling of the temple, he would be given a bed to lay his head and there was no shortage of children close to his age who could keep him company. He would be expected to manage daily chores and food was at easy access to everyone. Clothing would be provided, and he would receive a weekly allowance so he could buy things that he wanted if he wanted to. If he had any questions, he could ask anyone. If he felt bullied for any reason, he could tell any of the priestesses (or the priests, there were a couple of them too) and they would handle it. Stealing from the temple, and others, was something frowned upon and would result in strict punishment, but she didn't think she needed to worry about that with him. She'd never known an Altmer to be a thief.
She clearly didn't know the crowd Mouse used to run with.
"This is where you'll be sleeping with the rest of the boys," Amelia stated as she entered a room filled with bunk beds, several loitering youths looking up with looks of feigned innocence as they shifted to hide whatever it was they were holding when she called out to one, "Sam, be a dear and fetch some blankets for the new boy."
"Yes'm," the boy answered before turning back to his friends and saying a few more words before he left his post to go get them.
Amelia wandered through the rows before pointing to a bottom bunk with crisp sheets that looked like it had been disturbed by the impression of someone sitting on it at some point, at the foot of the mattress a trunk—it looked like the bunk beds were purposely built long just so storage could be that much closer to the owner, "this will be yours," she told him, "after supper we'll find you a couple changes of clothes and let you wash up. I imagine the other children will want to bombard you with questions at some point but for now, you should focus on making yourself feel at home and familiarizing yourself with the temple."
The boy, Sam, came back with his armful of blankets that he dumped on the bed before turning to the pair with his hands on his hips and a wild grin, older than Mouse but not taller, "well if he's supposed to feel at home and get familiar, shouldn't he be shown around instead of standing here talking to you?" he teased Amelia, Mouse's ears turning red in astonishment that anyone would casually speak to their elder so rudely.
But she didn't seem to find it that way and she sneered back at him, mirroring his posturing and sticking out her tongue, "kicking me out already, are you?"
"No girls allowed! That means you too, miss Amelia!" one of the boys shouted.
She scoffed, feigning offence, "I'm not ignorant to your game of poker, Donel. Do you want to drag in the new boy when he's barely been here twenty minutes?"
"It's not like we're betting booze this time! Just chores!"
Mouse could have died from embarrassment. Did he really just say that?
"At least wait until he has assigned chores before you try to swindle him into taking over yours too, you little slacker," her voice too warm to be scolding before turning to him and rolling her eyes with a smile, "this bunch of troublemakers are good, when they want to be. Just don't let them drag you into their schemes, they've been dragged back to the temple by their ears by the city guards a couple times already," she faux-whispered, spurring indignant squawks from the boys that made her throw her head back with laughter. "Alright, alright, I'll leave you boys to introduce yourselves to Mouse and show him around. Don't make him late for dinner though or I'll come find you."
And with that, Amelia left him to the troop and Sam threw an arm around his shoulders, dragging him down a couple inches, "don't listen to her, we're lots of fun. Come on, sit down with us. You don't have to join the game if you don't want. Be funner if you did but like she said: You should get your chores first before you gamble them," Sam commented and dragged him over, the boys shifting to take their hands of cards out from their hiding spots: under butts and folds of clothes, one even had his cards hidden in his cap, all of which scattered on the floor with a panicked squawk as the boy scrambled to pick them back up before they were seen.
"Your name is Mouse? That's a weird name. And you're an Alty too. Double weird," a redheaded Imperial said, arranging his cards.
"Shut it, Hilio, or Mother Eola will tan your hide if she thinks you're making fun of the mers again," another commented before turning to Mouse, "I'm Perth. Dickhead over there is Hilio. That's my brother Pryner over there," the boy in question raised his hand in acknowledgement, "and that's Vund, and that's Jeri."
Jeri in question, a half-Redguard judging by appearances, rolled his eyes, "its Jerissean, if you aren't lazy."
Mouse sat down beside Sam awkwardly, smoothing his palms against his pants, "it's good to meet you all," he told them.
"You're dressed in Orc clothes. What were you doing with them?" Perth asked.
"I was really sick. They took me in and healed me up before sending me here."
"Huh. Kinda like Lob."
"Lob's da was a Legionaire, dummy, he was orphaned not abandoned," Jerissean grouched, flicking a card at Vund before looking at Mouse, "so what's your story? Orphaned or abandoned?"
"I…" Mouse didn't really know what to say, chewing on his words before he drew a breath and let it out, "I guess neither. I ran away."
"You ran away? Why? I thought Alties had it good."
"Shut up, Hilio. He doesn't have to tell your stupid ass jackshit."
Mouse's eyes only lowered down to his lap, rubbing his palms along his thighs again.
Sam scoffed and swatted him on the shoulder in what Mouse assumed was a friendly manner, "well, it doesn't matter. You're here now, that's what counts. Damn good place too when the uppers aren't being sticks."
"That's cuz your stupid ideas keep getting us in trouble. It's fun when others are the ones getting sniped at."
"Then maybe you guys should stick to the plan and stop getting caught when you decide to do your own thing!"
The boys completely forgot about their game as they began to argue, tempers and voices raised and Mouse took advantage of the moment to glance at cards in tipped hands. When things calmed down and they went back to the game, he tapped Sam's thigh while the others were talking and glanced at Hilio before tapping again.
And smiled.
It took a moment before Sam realized what he was doing and winked. Then, when his next turn came, he ruined the rude Imperial.
Hilio's outrage was even more satisfying to Mouse before a ringing bell could be heard.
"Supper time," Sam told him, putting his hand out to collect the cards and put them away in his trunk, "come on, before Ammy decides we're keeping you from your dinner and comes after us with the spoon."
"The spoon?" Mouse repeated, voice calm despite the feeling anxiety raise in his gut. He remembered one of the sailors talking about how his mum would tan his hide with a large wooden spoon growing up. Noone in the Isle was punished like that. That he knew of.
His arms ached where phantom hands once gripped him.
"Tiniest spoon you'd ever see," Jerissean told him, hips bumping as they passed through the door, "It's for babies really, but you have to use that to fill your bowl and only your bowl for supper if your being punished at meal. By the time you got your bowl full, the food's gone cold. It's a shame to let good food go cold."
Okay, more tedious than traumatizing.
His shoulders untensed as they made their way down the hall with more and more youths filtering in, although Jerissean squawked and pulled Mouse back by his shirt to prevent him from being ran into by a portly figure carrying a pair of heaping bowls filled with still steaming bread rolls in both strong arms.
"Careful, Rosie!" the Redguard huffed.
And then Mouse saw her face.
Rosie's broad round face was mismatched with unusually small features, her eyes almond shaped and nose short, almost flat. There was something so strange about her, but so wonderful. Everything about her just extruded childishness. Warmth. Joy.
Never in his life had he seen anyone like her.
Her smile was so bright as she faced them proper and apologized in her thick voice, like her tongue was too big for her mouth, eyes moving to Mouse and Rosie giggled, "new. Glad you're here!"
"Yes, Rosie, he's new. Go on ahead, Rosie, we're going to dinner too," Jerissean told her, ushering her on when he realized Mouse had barely managed to get rid of the dumbstruck look on his face, and he frowned when she finally scurried on ahead. "Never seen a retard before, have you?"
That made Mouse flinch. "Excuse me?"
"Rosie, the temple idiot. She's sweet but stupid and has been here longer than anyone because she's Mother Eola's niece so everyone has to be nice to her. She stays out of the way most of the time though so you don't have to worry about having to be around her too much," Sam explained as they began moving.
His heart was seized in his throat as he followed after, anxious and nerves rising even more as they stepped into a vast room that was so loud with the chatter of so many children, a few dozen at least, most of them younger, some of them older. He wasn't even the tallest there, one beaky looking lad who was all limbs stood at least as tall as the Nord man who was speaking to Mother Eola. Mouse counted at least three Orcs among the vast pallet of flesh tones, a few Dunmer, a couple handfuls of Bosmer, and the rest were humans. He was truly the only gold skin in the room.
Between the smatherings of people standing about as well as sitting were several large long tables, the centers rowed with several different jugs and bowls full of fruit and breads alike, sweet Rosie with arms finally empty standing off to the side of the room where heat and light and smells alike bloomed from the kitchen that was very much a part of the area.
Sam tugged on his sleeve to get him to stop gawking so he could get in line for plates and cutlery, and as the row moved closer to the heat separated by trays full of food, adults depositing portions onto plates, Mouse could only squeak out his thanks as an astonishingly heafty slice of what must have been meat pie was placed on him and he trailed after his lead to sit.
A girl among the vast squabble of children gave the person next to her a pinch and told them to scoot over, "sit by me," she told Mouse, making Sam laugh.
"Oh come on, Yurta, stealing my new best friend already?"
"Your mother, Sam," she snarled and the boy cheerfully stuck his tongue out at her and patting Mouse before sitting several spots away so that the Altmer could be subjected to the girl's sharp attention instead of him to her wrath.
Awkwardly, Mouse settled himself down beside her and she stuck her hand out, "Yurta. You're Mouse, aren't you? Everyone's been talking."
He couldn't help but think of Romana but sharper, her rambling cutting through the talk around them, and he nodded, someone putting down empty cups in front of every seated individual as they passed behind Mouse and Sam leaned over to poke him in the shoulder, "Yurta, quit gabbing," he cut in, ignoring her grouch of fuck you below earshot of the keepers of the hall to tell Mouse, "that squat pitcher's milk. Tall thin one's juice, and the clay one's water. She's too busy talking to tell you the important stuff."
Mouse's ears had been red from the first snarl Yurta made at Sam and had only grown worse with time, the casualness of every insult and bicker familiar as his own brothers but so strange. It was so normal to be rude apparently? He only nodded and said thanks before a loud voice cut through the noise and all fell silent as attention turned to the head of the hall.
Grey, strong, and lovely, Mother Eola, matron and senior priestess of the Temple of Dibella stood tall and graceful, age wearing like good wine on her skin as she gazed over every foundling with patience, robed arms clasped behind her back before all whispers ceased and she spoke.
"Come to us, Dibella, for without you, our words must lie dull and leaden without the gilding of grace and sagacity to enchant the eyes and ear. For you we open our hearts to the noble secrets of art and love. For you we treasure the gift of friendship. For you we seek joy and insipriation in the mysteries of love. For you, we come together to have this meal. Blessed Dibella, thank you," her voice carried.
"Blessed Dibella, thank you," every voice quietly murmured, some sounding bored, but there were some who sounded like they believed it with their whole heart.
That was not the end of it though. "Our Lady Dibella has gifted us with the presence of a new brother. Please welcome Mouse and treat him fairly."
Mouse's entire face burned from the acknowledgement that put him on the spot of so much attention so suddenly that he wished he could sink through the floor and disappear as chatter rose when Mother Eola took her seat.
His saving grace however was sitting beside the personification of an angry cat as Yurta hissed at everyone to stop gawking and eat, there'd be lots of time to pester him later, and many heads turned away, only sneaking glances before conversations turned elsewhere.
"You can stop shrinking, Mouse. Eat," she nudged him after long moments.
"Thank you, Yurta," Mouse murmured.
She only smirked and shook her head before tucking into her pie.
Mouse couldn't help wetting his lips.
Turning his gaze to the rest of the hall, he picked out Jerissean and Hilio, Perth, Pryner, Vund, Amelia, even joyful Rosie among the faces in the crowd.
So many people.
One day he'd learn them all, wouldn't he?
With that gentle reassurance to himself, Mouse reached out and took the pitcher of milk to pour some into his cup, the quality rich with the taste tender and gently sweet on his tongue, good and soothing in so many ways even as he allowed himself to pour a full cup before turning his attention to the singular massive portion of pot pie he heard others call it.
Flecks of goodly white chicken meat, carrots and peas steamed among flaky crust in his first forkful with a crisp crunch of something else, maybe even waterchestnuts on his tongue, wholesome and so wonderful with flavor so unimaginably good.
He swallowed past his tight throat, eager for more, and so he gave himself more.
Others had pieces as big as his, and so many ate much faster than him. A couple were already rising to take their plate for seconds.
Seconds!
He could have seconds too?
He could, he realized, as Yurta grinned at him and filled his cup again before getting up to grab another helping.
He'd never been allowed so much food before.
A sensation against his knee though made him pause and he leaned back to look down, a handsome white furred face peeking up with clever blue eyes from the floor with a singular paw on his knee. One low meow, and the bold feline claimed his lap for itself.
Stunned, Mouse sat frozen as others who saw the display laughed, watching as the cat sniffed the end of his nose like it was the most curious thing in the world.
Perhaps he was.
This entire moment, the last hour, two even, was truly the most curious thing in the world, one thing after another as in awe hesitating fingers stroked over downy soft fur, a purr rattling through the body of the creature in such a way he couldn't believe the gift he had been given just to breathe.
This entire moment, the last hour, two even, were so many things he never would have been able to experience before.
Never would he have, so far away in the place he had been born.
Children with unbridled energy with mouths just as forward as the adults around them, affection and annoyance in equal measure so bright across all ages. Not one child was expected to sit there and do nothing, say nothing, just be a fixture as much as the furniture, something decorative and vaguely useful.
There was food aplenty without shortage or hesitation, not one person scolded for taking too much, and so many of them with more meat to them than bone. Hunger was a thing totally absent in this place.
There were people with something wrong with them, people who were as young as the smallest child he could see and old as Rosie who would have been abandoned as soon as society, as soon as their parents realized they were mentally disabled. Visibly disabled, and they were alive, and thriving, and all of them looked so so so happy he could barely breathe. Some of them may have been thrown away but yet here they all were. Here!
And the cats.
He couldn't believe it when he first saw it, those beautiful creatures roaming the place freely, loitering about like they owned the place, not one of them scared of a single person and each one of them healthy and without trouble.
Here, in so many moments, months maybe, fear was so far away.
Danger, not of the unknown but something so intimate and domestic, was entirely absent.
The uncomfortable numbness in his chest was nothing, it was gone and replaced by something so unfamiliar he couldn't believe the name for it at all.
How could he, when all he had known, all he had experienced before had been needles one after another after another in his flesh, all the agony far away as Mouse broke.
The murmurs around him were nothing compared to the high keening in his throat with eyes burning, a hiccup quivering in his chest before the sobs crashed through his reserves all at once, uncontrollable.
There was nothing like this.
He had never felt anything like this.
This was one moment of so many things new and great.
And he would never forget such a feeling for the rest of his life, he swore he wouldn't.
So this was what it felt like to be safe.
Safe.