A/N: Just so we're all on the same page, if you are a big Elder Scrolls fan and know a lot about the lore, you probably won't enjoy this story. I know very little beyond what I remember from playing Skyrim, and frankly, I don't have the time or desire to do loads of research. The lore is very complicated and weird and a lot of it doesn't really work with my intentions for this fic, so I will just be picking and choosing the bits that I want to use. This whole thing came from a Tumblr post (from imaginexhobbit) and it shows. Feel free to read it anyway, but if you're expecting canon accuracy, fair warning: you're going to be very disappointed. Maybe go read something else and save yourself the headache.
For those of you who are just here for a silly little story about an overly sarcastic Elf who enjoys tormenting Thorin Oakenshield and also happens to absorb the occasional dragon soul, welcome. Hope you enjoy it.
Also posted on ao3, but I had to post here as well for old times' sake.
Disclaimer: This story will follow along with the plot of the three Hobbit movies plus some bits from the book, which belong to Peter Jackson and J. R. R. Tolkien respectively. Sif is my creation, although obviously she is based on the Dragonborn from the Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and thus I guess kinda belongs to Bethesda. Basically, I don't own anything that looks familiar. You guys know the drill.
Listener, your next contract will take you far from Skyrim. There is a ship waiting in Solitude, and it will transport you to the Grey Havens in a land called Middle-earth. Find the inn in the town called Bree. Your target will be there in forty-five days. Hail Sithis!
When I step off the ship, my knees buckle. I land in a crouch, my palms smacking the spray-slick dock. A month is the longest time I've ever spent at sea, and my balance is shot. Thankfully, there's no one around to see my less than impressive entrance. Not that I'm self-conscious, I just prefer not to have people gawking at me everywhere I go. There was a time when I couldn't avoid unwanted attention; being a prophesied dragon-slayer made me somewhat of a novelty in Skyrim. The only other things going on are a civil war, crippling poverty, and occasional dragon attacks. I had hoped my arrival in Middle-earth would be free of ogling, and I could look around without having to ignore it. So far, so good.
The small port is clean, well-maintained, and empty besides a couple of fishing boats and the ship that brought me from Solitude. The mid-morning sun warms my shoulders and sparkles off the dark grey water. A cool breeze swirls my hair around my face, carrying the stink of brine and fish through the harbour—an improvement on the lungfuls of ash I'm accustomed to breathing in Skyrim.
I rise from my crouch, shaking out my stiff legs and reaching my arms above my head. The day is blessedly calm after a month of constant storms throughout the crossing. I've never been one for prayers, but there were nights when I came close—when I was convinced the next wave would smash the ship to smithereens and drag us down into the freezing depths. It almost made me regret my desire to leave Skyrim's grey shores behind. Almost.
My heartbeat quickens. This is a brand new place where no one knows me. Here, I am no longer the Dragonborn. No longer a thief, a misfit, or an oddity. Tucking the short, pale strands of my hair behind my ears, I turn to retrieve my pack from the dock. As I straighten, my spine stiffens.
The harbour isn't as unoccupied as I thought. A couple of children stroll along the boards towards me, wrapped up in conversation. My scalp prickles, and I turn away from them, ducking my head. Besides a few brief interactions with the ship's crew, I haven't spoken to another living soul in weeks. Most of them made a point of giving me a wide berth, and the bosun mouthed frantic prayers each time our paths crossed. Though I rolled my eyes at their superstition, it still stung. Trapped inside that floating wooden box, I couldn't escape their hostility. It permeated the air, the walls, the boards beneath my feet. Whispers filtered through the cracks in the boards as I lay curled on the narrow cot in my cabin. Strange. Quiet. Intense.
From Dragonborn to thief to assassin, my career has never called for people skills. At some point, things like small talk and common interests fell by the wayside in favour of more violent exchanges. The company I keep these days is undead, extremely dead, or just plain obnoxious. A change of scenery is long overdue-if only to get a break from Cicero. His grating laugh and constant babbling to himself in the third person makes me doubt my decision to spare his pathetic life.
Something nudges my shoulder. I whirl to find Shadowmere beside me and frown as the adrenaline dissipates. "How many times have I asked you not to do that?"
Shadowmere snorts, tossing his head in an equine display of amusement. His coat gleams a deep brown in the sun, his mane and tail a few shades darker. Though unusual, his colouring doesn't suggest he is anything other than a common horse. The only thing unnatural about him is his eyes; they glow like hellfire, red and demonic, no matter what form he takes.
I sigh and reach up to rub the spot between his ears. "I missed you."
When we first met, he wasn't shy about revealing his true form straight away: a devil-horse made of black mist and nightmares. If it weren't for Astrid's assurance that he was a good friend, I would have refused to go near him. I'm certain that was his intention, and I annoyed him by not taking the hint. We eventually got over our mutual dislike and have travelled together for over a year now. There's no one I would rather have as a companion, but I envy his ability to travel across oceans without the need of draughty, dubiously watertight vessels.
He nudges me again, half playful, half grudgingly affectionate, his breath cool on my face. I resist the urge to wrap my arms around his neck—he will only tolerate so much attention. He turns his head to stare down the dock.
The two children have stopped a few feet away from us. One of them points at the ship, massive and hulking in the small harbour. "Where did that come from?"
The other stares at Shadowmere, eyes huge. "Look there! Have you ever seen such a beast?" "Is that an Elf? Why is she covered in scars?"
Unnerved by the way they stare at my pointed ears, I pull my hood over my head. I already miss the assassin's garb I left back in Dawnstar; the cowl covered my head and most of my face, cloaking me in comfortable anonymity. These new clothes were waiting on my bed the night before I was due to leave for Solitude: a simple linen shirt and trousers, itchy but neatly stitched and sturdy, and a heavy travelling cloak. I kept my favourite pair of boots, made of supple leather that has moulded to my feet. This outfit certainly draws less attention than the Dark Brotherhood uniform.
The ship departs soon after depositing me on the dock. Pressing my lips together, I watch it shrink to a tiny dark smudge on the horizon, then vanish altogether. A strange mix of sensations battle for dominance behind my ribcage.
Though it holds many painful memories and experiences I would rather forget, Skyrim is the only home I have ever known. I know its roads as well as the veins spidering across the backs of my hands. Its caves and forests sheltered me through wintry nights and summer days. Everyone I've ever loved and lost is buried in the shadow of those mountains.
Standing on this dock, I feel like I have left those ghosts behind. The weight on my chest is lighter, and I can almost breathe without effort.
But I won't be here long. As soon as this task is complete, I will continue to answer the calls of desperate souls who pray to the Night Mother. The weight of my duties as Listener anchors me to the Night Mother, the Dark Brotherhood, and Skyrim, but the miles of ocean have eased the burden a little.
Darkness rises when silence dies.
I shudder, pushing away the memory of the Night Mother's voice scraping the inside of my skull, of her corpse's rictus grin inches from my face, and set my jaw. My target will arrive at the inn in less than two weeks. There's no time to waste feeling sorry for myself.
A crowd of children has gathered on the dock behind me. Murmurs permeate the air, and one or two fingers jab in my direction. Their presence hovers at the edge of my awareness like a persistent insect as I hoist my pack onto my shoulders and sling my bow and quiver across my back. I touch the dagger at my hip, and their buzzing intensifies. Hooking my fingers through Shadowmere's bridle, I lead him away from the water. There are so many people that I can't track a wide enough circle around them. Their eyes follow my every step, searing into my back.
"'Ere!" one of them calls. "Who are you? What's your business?"
I stop, accidentally jerking Shadowmere's head. He glares at me, but I barely register his annoyance and turn to face my audience.
They aren't children at all. Their curly heads are about level with my waist, but crow's feet line their eyes and streaks of grey hair gleam in the sun. Their curiosity morphs into reproach as we stare at each other for several heartbeats. Shifting my gaze to the dock, I choke on a gasp. Every one of them is barefoot.
I debate ignoring the question and walking away. These creatures appear harmless, and not one of them has taken a step towards me. A couple of them try to slot themselves behind their neighbours to avoid my stare. My mouth twitches up.
"My name is Sif." My voice is scratchy from disuse, but that seems to add to the effect. The creatures shuffle their large, hairy feet, desperately trying to avoid looking at me. "I'm here to fulfil a contract, and I'm running late."
The one who spoke looks as though he's about to argue, his cheeks flushing red. I lift my head, and his mouth clamps shut. He makes a choked sound, distracting the others enough for me to slip past. I try not to smile as I continue walking. They mentioned Elves, but judging from their wide eyes, they've never seen one like me before. I've been told I'm quite a formidable sight when I want to be. The cat-like green eyes and jagged, angry scars on my forehead and cheek combine etherealness and menace in a way that most people don't know what to do with.
This coming from someone who decided the way I look was a reason to make me his wife.
A sliver of ice pierces my chest as his face surfaces in my mind. His kind brown eyes sparkle with mischief, his lips forming my favourite crooked smile that always meant trouble. I grit my teeth, shoving the image down before the tide can rise and drag me down.
That's another ghost I'll gladly leave behind for a while.
Though the strange creatures in the harbour were intriguing, the sea-voyage ate up thirty-two of my forty-three days, and I still have to make it to Bree. I can almost feel the Night Mother's unseeing stare on my back as Shadowmere and I make our way out of the harbour and join the road leading east.
Some days it's easier to think that becoming the Listener was my decision, but I can't ignore the truth. The Night Mother named me, and that was the end.
After Alduin was dead and the prophecy fulfilled, the world mostly forgot me again. I was reduced to searching for odd jobs, wandering until I found the Thieves' Guild. The work was exciting. For the first time in months, my heart pounded and my blood sang. I was no longer just existing. I was alive. The Dragonborn was in my past, but I'd finally found something that could compare with the thrill and people I could share it with. A family.
But it wasn't to last. My peace with the world shattered like an expensive vase over my head in the space of a single afternoon. What started as a thrill ended with a body cradled in my arms, his blood soaking through the front of my shirt as I screamed.
These memories hang around me like black fog, growing denser and darker the longer I have to sit and wallow. During the month-long sea voyage, I had a lot of time to think and nothing to keep the nightmares away. They were demons with claws and teeth, impossible to bear or ignore. I sat with them for days or weeks or a lifetime before the sun finally broke through the thunderclouds, and by then it was too late.
As we continue along the road at a steady pace, the spring day balms my frayed nerves. The watery sun warms my skin and showcases the sprawling grasslands and pine forests. Though the landscape is reminiscent of Skyrim, the colours are more vivid, the air cleaner. I give up counting the shades of green and instead breathe in the sweet-scented air. It chases away the fog in my head as I inhale, and my body grows lighter with every exhale.
Around noon, we stop at a stream to drink. The water sparkles in my hands, clear as glass. Cool freshness lingers on my tongue in place of the usual grit and metal. I splash another handful on my face, closing my eyes as droplets trickle down my neck. Shadowmere wades through the shallows, ears pricked, tail swishing. The sight of him warms my chest further. He lifts his head to look at me, needing no words to make his question clear.
What are you looking at?
The laugh feels foreign and pleasant in my throat as I kick off my boots to dip my toes in the water. Leaning back on my hands, I watch the clouds amble across the sky like sheep in a pale blue field. For the first time in weeks, I push away the thoughts that nip and scratch at the inside of my skull. I can pretend my problems belong to someone else, someone far away in a land across the sea.
Shadowmere wanders up the bank to stand over me, always alert. I reach up to pat his shoulder, inhaling the vague scent of sulfur. "I think I'm going to like it here."
Despite the peace and the fact I have yet to see a single sabre-tooth, I don't dare risk camping in the open, even with Shadowmere standing watch at the entrance of the shallow cave, a horse-shaped demon with eyes like glowing embers. Unable to sleep, I instead spend the darkest hours of the night studying the map that came with my instructions and clothes. My fingers linger over the names inked on the yellowed parchment: Gondor, Rohan, Mordor—all much further south than the little dot labelled Bree. My tasks never leave time for sightseeing.
As I gaze out from the cave entrance at the hills and trees outlined in silver moonlight, a pang goes through my chest. The whole reason I accepted this contract instead of giving it to a recruit was to get away from Skyrim. Now, an entire world lies before me, begging for me to explore, but the shackles tying me to the Dark Brotherhood won't let me wander. It seems stupid now to accept a task like this only to have freedom dangled in front of my nose, maddeningly out of reach.
Sighing, I roll up the map and draw my favourite dagger, the Blade of Woe. It glints in the moonlight, the same way as on the night it came into my possession four months ago. The night everything fell apart.
When I returned to the Sanctuary, soldiers were already swarming over it like termites. Reeling from the failed mission, I was too slow to process what I saw. One man spotted me, and as he charged, his uniform caught the glow of the spreading flames. Penitus Oculatus. I swept an arrow from my quiver and halted his advance, my heart thudding in my throat.
Please. Not them.
I found Festus Krex pinned to a tree by a dozen arrows. He and I never saw eye to eye, but he didn't deserve to die like that, as though they had used him for target practice.
I lurched through the burning Sanctuary, choking on smoke and struggling to fend off the men emerging from the flames. I tripped on something lying in my path and looked down. Veezara's yellow lizard eyes stared unseeingly at the ceiling, blue blood leaking from a hole in his chest. A few steps further, and there was Gabriella, a broken marionette silhouetted against devouring flames.
Arnbjorn was still alive. His grief and rage echoed off the stone walls as he lunged at three of the soldiers in wolf-form, claws swiping, jaw snapping. I reached him just as the first blade sliced across his flank, and a second drove into his belly. His dying roar broke through the haze of shock, and it became an inferno. A moment later, the soldiers lay dead at my feet.
By the time I found Nazir, the smoke was so thick I could barely see. Tears blurred my vision, and my nose and throat burned with every breath. There was no time left.
Listener, I am your only salvation. Come. Embrace me.
Her voice tugged on something inside my abdomen. I battled my way through the flames and soldiers, tripping and stumbling into the room that housed the Night Mother's coffin.
Crash. Flames billowed at my back, scorching the skin through my clothes. The roaring fire drowned Nazir's panicked voice as it devoured the wreckage, creating a flaming barrier between me and my way out. The Night Mother grinned at me through the smoke. Her coffin door stood open, inviting me in. It slammed shut behind me, sealing me inside with the dusty corpse.
Another crash. Something shattered beside the coffin, the sound splintering my ears.
The Night Mother's hollow eyes stared through the darkness as the Sanctuary collapsed around us.
Sleep.
I fought against her, but the Night Mother's will was too strong. She dragged me under, and everything went dark.
I came to as the coffin lurched, bumping over rough ground. It took a moment for the fog to clear, and I realised my lungs were no longer filled with smoke. Cool air filtered in, permeating the staleness inside the coffin. I shook my head, blinking to clear the last of the daze, and reached for the door. Sealed tight.
"Hurry, Nazir! I'm telling you, she's in there!"
Babette. Alive. Her girlish voice untainted by smoke.
"I'm going as fast as I can, you stupid she-devil." Each word punctuated by a grunt as Nazir dragged the coffin a little further. "I don't see you helping."
"I'm not exactly built for manual labour."
Their bickering made me want to sob in relief. I shoved against the door with my shoulder, but it wouldn't budge. I glanced at the Night Mother. The silence stretched taut between us like a bowstring just before it snaps.
The coffin ground to a halt. "There!"
"Can you get it open?"
As Nazir scrabbled at the lock, the Night Mother's dry voice echoed inside my skull.
You must speak with Astrid. Here, in the Dark Brotherhood Sanctuary.
Astrid. Astrid was alive. I didn't stop to think about what that meant or why it sounded like an order. I just had to get to her.
Nazir and Babette jumped as I staggered out of the iron tomb. Nazir put his hands out as if to catch me, but I remained upright on shaky legs, the news about Astrid tumbling out in a rush. The two of them jogged after me as I ran blindly back into the smouldering remnants of the Sanctuary.
Astrid lay on the floor surrounded by candles and the ruins of everything she had built, reduced to a hunk of raw flesh. The enchanted dagger lay an inch from her blackened fingers.
The stink of charred meat filled my nose as I dropped to my knees. "Astrid…"
She shushed me, her voice a brittle whisper. "I'm sorry. So very sorry. The Penitus Oculatus... Maro… He said that by giving you to them, he would leave the Dark Brotherhood alone. Forever. By Sithis, I was such a fool. All of this is my fault. You are the best of us, and I nearly killed you. As I've killed everyone else."
Smoke and tears clogged my throat. I couldn't speak or reach for her. Everything in me rebelled against what I was seeing. It couldn't be real.
"I deserve whatever fate the Dread Lord has in store. I betrayed you, and now Maro has betrayed me." She closed her eyes, coughing as her lungs fought to expel the smoke. "I just wanted things to stay the way they were. Before Cicero, before the Night Mother… before you. I thought I could save us. I was wrong." She opened her eyes again, and I focused on the familiar blue irises rather than her ruined face. "But you're alive! So there's a chance to start over, rebuild. That's why I did… this." Her eyes flicked towards the candles, at her own scorched body. "Don't you see? I prayed to the Night Mother! I am the Black Sacrament."
My nails cut into my palms. The pieces slotted together in my head, and I realised why the Night Mother had sent me back to get her. But I didn't want to believe it. I couldn't. "What are you saying?"
"I'm saying you were right." Her voice was stronger now. "And to prove my sincerity, I have prayed for a contract. You lead this Family now. I give you the Blade of Woe, so that you can see it through. You must kill me."
The way she said it, so direct and matter-of-fact, ignited a flame that burned away the grief. "How can you ask that of me?"
I glanced at the Blade. Its soft red glow beckoned to me, but I forced myself to look back at Astrid. She tried to have me killed. That would have been more than enough reason to leave her festering in the dirt.
But I couldn't hate her. Not after everything she had done for me and everything she had suffered. Neither could I leave Nazir and Babette to a miserable fate. As the Listener, I had to lead the Dark Brotherhood. Astrid had fought against that with everything she had, and she had lost.
With tears running down my face, I picked up the Blade of Woe and used it to cut her throat.
"Thank you."
I study the dagger in my hand, tracing the veins of glowing red spidering along the curved blade. My throat burns as I force myself to swallow. The stars stare down at me, cold and unfamiliar.
"You were right," I say, not because I think she can hear me, but because I need to say it out loud. "This is all your fault. You gave me no choice."
Astrid took me in when I had nothing left. She gave me a new purpose and a family that, while it would never replace the one I lost, made the hole in my heart ache a little less. And maybe that makes what she did unforgivable, but it's also the reason I have to keep my promise.
I have to keep the Dark Brotherhood alive. For her and myself. The Night Mother promised an eternity of suffering at Sithis's hand if I abandoned my duty. At least this way, my misery might bring someone else peace.
Though part of me blames Astrid, a bitter voice in my head reminds me of the truth: I chose this life. I cut that vile Khajiit's throat the night I met Astrid. The monster scratched at my door, and I let it in.
However intrigued I am by this land, my presence here can mean only one thing.
Soon, someone will feel the Blade's metal kiss at their throat, and it will be the last sensation they ever experience.