Chapter 52: King Olaf's Verses

[7th – 10th of Evening Star 4E 201]

Antonius, my housecarl, Athis, my Shield-Brother, and I had started to travel from Whiterun towards Solitude, and on the way we had been asked to retrieve a special book from a place called 'Dead Men's Respite', which the headmaster of the Bards College was looking for. We had spent one night in Granite Hill, another one in Rorikstead, and yet another one close to a place called 'Crabber's Shanty', where he had killed a dragon. We had been invited to eat from the fisher's plentiful supply of mudcrab meat, and eventually we had made it inside the Nordic ruin. To my surprise, a ghost had led the way and we had been able to find the book we had been looking for, but on the way back the ghost guided us towards a door with a magical aura around it. The spectral image had somehow managed to unlock it and had beckoned us to the other side, where we had soon encountered a sturdy stone door which could be unlocked and opened with the Ruby Claw I had picked up from the table in the entrance room earlier.

Right after the big stone door, following a very short passage, another door opened into a larger room. Both sides were lined with double rows of high backed stone chairs, occupied with a skeleton or draugr each; there was some kind of big table or altar close to the center, and a sarcophagus on a platform accessible via stairs at the far end. The large room was dimly illuminated by some lights hanging from the high ceiling and a number of more braziers resting on the heads of stone pillars leaning into the room from both sides. All lights and flames in this room were blue rather than orange, though; this was quite strange, and it kind of enhanced the eerie ambiance and mood in here, at least for me and my senses.

Our ghost guide did not hesitate to enter the room, and as soon as he passed the center, a number of draugr and skeletons on their chairs became alive again and stood up; some of them confronted the ghost – Svaknir, apparently – and some of them turned towards us. The undead were not very fast, and that gave me plenty of time to make my crossbow ready. While I started to release bolts – fortunately I had found some more bolts earlier in a chest – my two saber cubs worked as a team to attack and distract individual draugr, and Athis and Antonius defended us against those coming close to us. Svaknir, though, worked alone, and he seemed very determined to defeat many enemies on his own. The first group of draugr were barely down when the next group got involved, and we had to fight hard for a few minutes, specifically once a number of skeletons joined the fight as well. Those skeletons, on the other hand, provided a good opportunity for me to get my axe out, and I found that my glass battleaxe with fire enchantment, the very one I had received from Jarl Balgruuf, was quite powerful, and it allowed me to kill a skeleton with a single swing, and once, when two of them got close to me, I managed to bring both down with the same swing of the weapon. The draugr and skeletons weren't that tough, but there were quite a few of them, and we would not have easily managed without the ghost taking many of them on his own. As it was, we coped with the challenge and survived with hardly a scratch, and I found that fighting in a team with Antonius and Athis and the two saber cat cubs worked quite well.

We were about to take some hard earned time to rest, when Svaknir turned away from us, approached the sarcophagus which was located on a raised platform at the other end of the room and called out:

"Olaf! It is time!"

Olaf? The one who the book with verses was about? Really?

There was no response, and a few seconds later the ghost called again: "Arise, Olaf! My vengeance is at hand!"

With a loud and reverberant noise the sarcophagus opened, the lid crashed to the side, and a ghostly figure, almost like a dragon priest, arose from it, responding:

"Insolent bard – die!"

Well, at least this time there was only one enemy; all of the draugr and skeletons had already been defeated. Svaknir and Olaf fought hand to hand, and I supported 'our' ghost with bolts from my crossbow, while Spirit and my two girls attacked from the side. I had to admit that my part was quite easy, as the ghost prevented the strong adversary from getting close to us, so that Antonius could now also switch to his bow. Many bolts and arrows later Olaf sank down to one knee, and Svaknir quickly finished him off with his sword. I looked around to see if any more enemies showed up, but we seemed to have conquered this room at least.

'Our' ghost seemed to be happy about the achievement, and he suddenly had a lute in his hands; he played it for a few moments before he nodded to us and disappeared with a short burst of light; his job and mission was apparently done now.

While my companions searched the draugr remains, I examined what was left of King Olaf, and I found a key. Behind the sarcophagus was a rounded wall I identified as a word wall immediately, but it would only be useful for the Dragonborn, and I had no way to find out which shout it might teach her, unless I could somehow learn to decipher the words on it. The key opened a door to a small side room, and this one had some treasure at least, namely a considerable amount of septims plus a few weapons and potions. In addition, there was also a book, and to my surprise it was titled 'King Olaf's Verse', exactly like the other book before. I did not understand why there were two different books with the same title, but that was going to be something for the college headmaster to worry about, not me. Further, same as in many other locations in this place before, there were a number of ruined books. I wondered if they had any purpose and if there was anything which could be done with them; as I was not aware of such an option, I did not pick them up.

Once we had treated our various minor injuries and had looked around to make sure that we had not missed anything important, I also spent a few minutes to retrieve as many of my crossbow bolts as I could. Many of the bolts had penetrated the draugr and skeletons and were now stuck in the stone chairs, but for some reason they had still caused damage to the undead. When I was done, I turned around to find the way back to daylight, via the way we had come in, but Athis stopped me:

"B'lushona, wait; when we came in, we jumped down into the water once, and we may not be able to get out there again. Don't you think that there might be a back exit somewhere around here?"

"Oh, yes, you may be right about that, Shield-Brother!"

I had indeed still been distracted by the fight against King Olaf, and the Dunmer found a lever in a corner to the right of one of the chests in the side room where he had found the last treasure. He made sure that we paid attention and pushed it, and after a few seconds a section of the wall on the other side slid into the ground, with the usual ominous rumbling. Like probably in many such places, this was a shortcut to the entrance area, and we were back in daylight only several minutes later, just in time to see the sun sinking below the horizon. While we rested for a few moments, Athis asked:

"You have used the axe a lot today. What about the charge?"

"What? Which charge?"

"It does have a fire enchantment, but you must have almost exhausted the charge today, right?"

Oh, of course he was right; I had used the axe a lot today, mostly against draugr and spiders, and I had not thought about that aspect. Enchantments on armor and clothes were permanent, but effects on weapons needed to be recharged from time to time, with filled soul gems if I remembered correctly. I got the axe out and looked at it, but did not know how to check, and thus I asked back:

"Do you know how to find out about the charge?"

"I think one needs to be a trained mage to see that, but if you hold a filled soul gem close to the weapon, you will find out if the charge is absorbed or not."

I did not have a filled soul gem with me, so that this topic would have to wait for later.

We decided to make camp just inside of the ruin, and on the next morning we continued our journey to Solitude. Rather than bothering with the bandits who likely occupied 'Robber's Gorge' I opted to go around and meet the road from Morthal to Dragon Bridge; according to my map, that should not be too much of a detour. Just before we actually got to that road, we saw a small herd of goats grassing close to the hills on our left, and they did not appear to be bothered by us. My girls seemed to be interested to hunting something larger than rabbit for a change, and I allowed them to proceed. They needed a few attempts, but finally one of them managed to jump on one of the smaller goats; however, her jaw was not strong enough yet to bite through the throat for a clean kill. I quickly got to her and helped by cutting off the poor animal's head with my sword, and before my cubs were allowed to feed, my companions and I cut off the best pieces of meat, to be roasted for lunch later on.

We passed Fort Snowhawk around noon, made sure to keep our distance from the place as we could see some skeletons roaming around, and found a nice spot for a lunch campfire not far from the road, about half an hour to the west from the fort. We indulged in eating the goat meat, and once we had properly eaten and rested, continued our trip. Another hour or so later we approached a small settlement with a few houses, a farm and a sawmill. Strangely, both the mill and the farm were operated by soldiers in legion armor, that was unusual as far as I could tell, and I asked my companions when we passed:

"Say, isn't it strange that soldiers work here? Where are the farmers?"

Athis was silent, but Antoninus replied with a subdued voice:

"My Thane, I have heard some reports that the Legion plans to make a stronger effort to end the war next year, and they may have been unhappy with the deliveries from the farm and the sawmill. Honestly, I doubt that the soldiers can do better, but they probably have their orders."

"And what happened to those who were here before?"

"Well, it is possible that they were just asked to leave. It is also possible that they were taken prisoners, using some lame excuse. I hope that they were not put into a dungeon or worse; I used to know Iddli and Signar Iron-Blood, the farmers; they are good people."

"That does not sound fair."

"No, it does not, but not everything the Legion does is fair, I guess. Skyrim is far from Cyrodiil, and General Tullius is the military governor with lots of authority."

What we saw here and what Antonius had just told me gave me much to think about, and my opinion on the Legion did not exactly benefit from it. Moving on, we managed to reach Dragon Bridge before nightfall, with a couple of hours or so to spare.

In the last few minutes before we arrived in town, I had already seen clouds forming on the sky, and it looked like some rain was going to come down around dusk or so. From the big and impressive stone bridge we could already watch farmers in a hurry, and it looked like they wanted to get some harvest in before the rain came. Just before we came to the local inn, we saw four people sweating on a big field to load a carriage and push it into the barn. Without asking I lent a hand and made the vehicle move faster, and that got me a warm glance. I helped pushing it out onto the field again after it had been unloaded, and we found an easy rhythm with three people loading the cart and the fourth and I pushing the cart. Hanni and Nanni saw this as a game and tried to push as well, replicating what I did; with their front paws on the cart and their hind paws on the ground they made for an amusing view, and not only I had to smile when watching that. Athis and Antoninus had gone ahead to the inn, and they had told me that they'd get rooms and order dinner. We worked for an hour or so, and just before the rain started, we were done. I did what I should have done earlier and introduced myself:

"My name is B'lushona, by the way."

The male Redguard in the group replied:

"Thank you very much for your assistance, B'lushona. Without your help we would not have got all of the wheat in. My name is Azzada Lylvieve, and I run this farm with my wife, son and daughter."

"May I ask what kind of wheat you are harvesting this time of the year?"

The Redguard smiled and responded:

"Yes, that's a question I am getting a lot. The harvest time is unusual, but we can extend the growth period by heating the fields. You see, my wife is a Breton, and she is quite gifted in magic. She came up with the idea to heat the fields with a low level fire spell, and that makes the wheat grow even at this time of the year; once some of the big stones in the field are properly heated, they keep and radiate the heat for many hours. 'It's no easy thing to make a living in the wilds of Skyrim' my wife frequently says, 'so we have to use what we got'. Well, a big heart and lots of magic she has, and we are using it, for this one big field at least. Keeps the mills busy for a week or two, and fresh flour at this time of the year is worth a lot, so we can make a decent living here."

That was a good point. As the rain started to drop now, I took my leave and hurried to the inn, where I met my two mates. The 'Four Shields Tavern' had a cozy fireplace going, and I found some rest and a good meal after the work of the last hour. My two cubs of course got their share as well, including a large bowl filled with milk.

On the next day we finally started our final leg towards Solitude, and the walk between Dragon Bridge and Solitude was not very eventful. We passed an increasing amount of people coming out of Solitude, which made sense as it was the Capital of Skyrim after all. The day had started with rain just like the previous day had ended, but the sun was out now, and so we opted for camping out and asked for permission to stay for the night on a grass area close to Katla's Farm, and only on the next day we planned to enter the city of Solitude.

From the area around the farm we had a wonderful view both on Solitude itself, with the impressive stone arch, and the wider river and harbor with docks and ships. There were three larger and apparently oceangoing ships, maybe for trading along the coast, and there were about half a dozen of smaller boats, likely for fishing. This was one of the opportunities I wished I could be something like an ordinary tourist for some time, just looking around and taking in the new and unknown sights. To a certain extent I was almost a tourist here, wasn't I? At least I was not under severe time pressure. Kodlak has explicitly mentioned that I could take a few extra days if I wanted, and at least I did not have a quest log like the player practically almost had in any of the Elder Scrolls games.

While the sun started to set behind the city in the west, I allowed myself to relay and get lost in thoughts, and when it was almost fully dark, the three of use slowly walked to the area where we had our bedrolls; Antonius got a small campfire going, and we talked for some time before we got to sleep.

Solitude – capital of Skyrim. At the city gate I almost expected to be stopped, but while the guards looked at me with some suspicion in their eyes, they actually allowed me to enter, though not without a warning to not cause any trouble. When I entered the city together with Athis, my Shield-Brother, Antonius, my housecarl and my saber cat cubs, I was almost expecting the execution – the one which seemed to be mandatory when you entered the city for the first time in the game – to be on, but it wasn't. The morning sun warmed the air nicely, and once we had passed the first few buildings, we came upon the market area; most merchants were just about to open up their stands for business. I noticed quite a few children going in the same direction, and I wondered if they were on their way to school, like in Whiterun. Probably they were; basic reading and writing needed to be taught after all.

While I looked around and enjoyed the scenery, my housecarl asked:

"So, my Thane, where are we going first?"

"Good question", I replied, "maybe we start at the Bards College and see what they say about the book we got for them."

"That appears to make sense" Athis agreed. "But, don't you want to get a soul gem to recharge your axe first?"

"Of course – thank you for reminding me."

We were just starting to get to the city's shop and market area, conveniently located close to the city gate, and I looked around. The first shop I noticed was called 'Bits and Pieces', and I entered this one. The friendly proprietor, a Redguard lady who introduced herself as Sayma, told me:

"Oh, no, we usually do not have soul gems. You can try to find some at one the market stalls outside, but I think that your best chance would be one the newer stores in the northeastern city district. I have heard about some kind of wizard who sells spell tomes and soul gems and such, and of course you can also try to talk to the court wizard, if she is willing to talk to you, that is."

That was quite helpful, and I thanked the lady, saying that I'd certainly be back when I needed more supplies. Once outside again I decided to search for that vendor, and thus we turned east rather than south, entering what was most likely that newer district she had mentioned. The environment there was slightly different, and I noticed that the houses were built from a different kind of stone. Maybe somebody had decided that the dark grey was no longer in fashion, and houses were built from lighter colored stones, and they also had more decorations.

We had to search for some time, but eventually Athis found an entrance in a corner, and it had a sign with a spell tome on it. We entered, stepped down into a basement, and were met by an old man in a black robe. He did not talk much, but when I asked for a soul gem, he showed a black board with the types he had, different sizes both unfilled and filled, and his prices, and I selected a medium size, filled. Thinking about it, I told him I'd buy three of those, to have some supply when I needed to recharge again, and while that was not cheap and took a significant part out of my savings, I considered the enchantment benefit on my axe worth the expense. In addition, I purchased a spell tome for shock damage from the vendor.

Once we had left, we stayed in the corner for a moment, and Athis showed me how to use the soul gem to recharge my weapon. It was not very difficult; one basically touched the weapon with the filled soul gem, had one's magicka flow into both, and somehow the connection was made and the soul's energy flowed into the weapon. The so used soul gem was, unfortunately, getting destroyed by the process.

"So, what is the process to get an empty soul gem and fill it?"

"Empty soul gems are provided by various sources, and I have heard about special veins, so called geode veins, which can produce them a lot. I have not seen any of those, but there have been some isolated reports from travelers who claim that some can find in special underground locations. For filling an empty soul gem, people use soul trapping."

"Soul trapping? Really?"

"Indeed. That's what some people do. As a matter of fact, there are some who made it a profession to take empty soul gems from wizards, fill them from various animals, and return them to said wizards, who don't have time for those profane tasks."

That made sense, I though. Some wizards needed filled soul gems for their experiments, and weren't they needed also to create weapon and armor enchantments? I had not done a lot of that while playing, and I had mostly used filled soul gems I had either found as loot or purchased from those who sold them. But I still had another question:

"But, does that imply that some people are running around killing animals just to get soul gems filled?"

"Some are, yes. However, the smart ones team up with hunters, or they are soul gem collectors and hunters in one person. When they kill an animal, say a goat or a deer, they gain a filled soul gem and they can also sell meat and pelt. That's not a bad business, actually, although the smaller animals cannot fill the larger soul gems adequately."

"So, how are those filled?"

"That's challenging. For a grand soul gem, you need something like a mammoth or a draugr deathlord, and trying to kill one of those is really dangerous. For the mammoth, they are usually guarded by giants, and for the draugr deathlord, they usually have lesser draugr around them, are found deep in ruins, and can shout."

I understood, and my curiosity in that direction was satisfied for now. When I had played the game, I had been content with the filled soul gems I had found as random loot, and I would have to find out if that also applied here.

[Author's Notes: I recently re-played the quest in Dead Men's Respite, using the mod 'Eternal Flames' which turns the lights blue; I liked it.

Balu should have remembered how soul gems work from playing, but not only does his memory have gaps, he also wants to make sure that things are like in the game. He has already seen some discrepancies here and there...]