The twin moons, Jode and Jone, have already taken their place in the night sky when Taalie slips through the back doors of the Cloud Ruler Temple.
She'd run out of healing potions while exploring a cave and had paid the price for it. Blood seeps red-hot through a hastily tied bandage on their side and the high elf grimaces as she limps towards the east wing.
The memory of her father's voice rings through her head, lecturing her about proper wound protocol "A potion is only really helpful in the first five hours, after that one needs a poultice for proper healing and to prevent infection, cinda."
Unfortunately, Taalie wasn't as alone as she hoped. Martin Septim sat in the corner of the room, reading one of the temple's many ancient and very dull tomes.
She makes an attempt to perhaps sneak by him, but as soon as she drops into a crouch her vision blurs white with agony and she falls to her knees in an involuntary effort to stop it.
"Oh you're back!," exclaims Martin, jumping to his feet in surprise, although the sight of Taalie kneeling on the ground and clutching her side quickly changes surprise to concern "Are you alright?"
Gripping the edge of the table, Taalie tries unsuccessfully to pull herself to her feet, "Just peachy," she hisses, falling back to the ground with a groan.
Martin kneels beside her "Do you want me to fetch a healer?"
"There's nothing hurt I can't take care of by myself," Taalie explains, slipping into the clipped Altmeri accent of her childhood "And at this stage restoration magic does more harm than good, please leave me and go get some rest,"
"You can't even stand, Mistaalie!" Martin says sternly, before his voice softens back to his usual even gentle cadence "At least let me help."
Taalie opens her mouth and closes it several times in an aborted attempt to argue before sighing "Alright."
She moves to stand again and this time Martin supports her, lifting her as carefully as he can onto the table in front of them. Taalie had already taken off her cuirass, leaving the high elf in just her mail shirt and tabard.
The wound keeps her from having the full reach of her arms and so Martin helps her undress. His hands are soft, marked with the little calluses and scars of a quieter life. Taalie's are rough and bony, but they were like his once.
He hesitates for a moment and Taalie soon realizes why, a thin cotton undershirt is the only thing between her bare skin and the cold night air. Men are more sensitive than mer when it comes to these sorts of things, male men even more so. His embarrassment bleeds down to her and she has to forcefully override her protesting mind to lift the shirt up over her head.
Dried blood has glued the shirt to her skin and the shirt peels a thin scab of skin along with it. Watery blood trickles slowly down her side and the gouge is hot and inflamed to the touch, Taalie quickly recognizes that it's in the first stages of infection.
Martin swallows thickly at the sight, any embarrassment at her naked form lost in horror "Are you sure I shouldn't fetch a healer?"
"Yes," Taalie repeats, "If you magicka an infected wound shut without cleaning and treating it first, it can trap the poison inside the body and lead to all sorts of pleasantly deadly complications, now would you please pass me some dragon's tongue?"
The two carry on like this for a while. Taalie asking for different ingredients and Martin fetching them from around the room, occasionally asking a question or offering a suggestion for an ingredient.
"Where did you learn all this?" Martin asks, "You never told me you had knowledge of the alchemical arts,"
"My father worked as a healer when I was a child," Taalie explains as she scrapes an herbal mixture into a retort to refine it, "Taught me all I know about magic and medicine."
"Was he a good father?"
"He tried his best, Altmer aren't as soft on their young as you Imperials are."
Martin nods in response "My father -that is the one who raised me- tried with me as well, I paid him back by abandoning the Mage's Guild he was so proud of me for getting accepted into and running off to waste my youth worshipping Sanguine," He says the Daedric Prince's name with a bitter edge, absentmindedly tapping at the table.
Taalie has only ever heard Martin speak a couple of times about his time with the cult of Sanguine, it's almost hard to reconcile the image of this quiet and intelligent priest with a wild youth dedicated to hedonism and debauchery.
She realizes she's a similar contradiction, turning from a prim little girl who'd sob for hours if she messed up her dress, to an Oblivion gate-closing, thieving, assassin who despite her messed up morality, can't find it within herself to abandon the silly foolish people of this world to destruction.
"Why Sanguine?" Taalie asks, taking the refined herbal mixture and pouring it into a bowl of beeswax and oil.
"My friends and I sought the hidden knowledge offered by the Daedric lords and Sanguine seemed like the most pleasant to serve. I learned ancient lore from the lips of a whore, sought daedric truth while half-blind from drugs and wine. By the time I'd realized what I'd done, my friends were all dead and I no better."
Martin clutches his arms to his chest, these are bitter memories and Taalie has a sudden understanding that she's one of the few people to ever hear them.
"A brother of Akatosh saved me, he gave me a place to stay and sat with me while I suffered out the fits of withdrawal,"
Martin is shaking by the time he finishes and Taalie waits until he's composed himself to respond.
"will you help me apply this? I can't reach far enough to dress the wound evenly," Taalie says, offering up the bowl of salve like some pale imitation of a temple maiden.
The cool salve feels like heaven against her fevered skin and Taalie leans into it. When was the last time she'd been touched like this? Tenderly and patiently with nothing asked of her in return?
"I think you are the best man I've ever known." They fall naturally from her lips as if they have always been waiting beneath her tongue. "I am not a kind or good person because the world has been cruel to me, it is far easier to be cruel in return than to be kind in spite of it. You are despite the things you've experienced and that takes a strength I don't think I'll ever know,"
Taalie spits out the last sentence and then falls silent, like the quiet hour that follows a storm. Martin looks at her with unshielded emotion and there is a sudden awareness of how physically close the two are to each other.
She kisses him and he kisses back.
In the morning they will speak of the gravity of this moment and discuss what needs to be done, but the night is far from over, and worry seems far away. Taalie pulls back eventually and bandages her side, wrapping it tight and secure with a practiced hand.
"I don't think you are quite as terrible as you think you are," Martin brushing his thumb along the line of her cheekbone.
"oh, darling you don't know the half of it."