Nine: Do Not Collect 200 Septims
"She's crazy," Delphine said, shaking her head as she read the letter. "Rushing off on her own like that – she'll get herself killed."
"What she lacks in wisdom, she makes up for in courage," Jenassa said, "and you had no doubts about her competence when you persuaded her to infiltrate the Thalmor Embassy."
"That was just for one short operation," Delphine said, "and I made sure she was as well prepared as possible. But setting off on her own to Markarth… she has no wilderness survival skills at all. She can't butcher a carcass, or even skin a rabbit, and she doesn't know which wild plants are safe to eat. And, really, she's barely adequate with a bow and only fair with a sword. She's fast, and good at parrying, but her repertoire of attacks is limited and there are holes in her defenses that a skilled opponent would find and exploit. I've been concentrating on building up her confidence. Perhaps I should have been teaching her to know her limitations."
"I must go to her aid, if she may be in peril," Jenassa declared. "It matters not if she is less than perfect with a sword, if I am there to be her sword and her shield."
Delphine shook her head. "She gives specific instructions that you are to stay with me," she said. "Apparently Meridia told her your presence would make it harder to deal with the Forsworn on a peaceful basis. I wouldn't have thought it possible to deal peacefully with them, personally, but Meridia seems to think Rhiannon can."
"Even so, we should go at once to watch her back," Jenassa said.
"By the time we could get there, it would be too late," Delphine pointed out. "She has too big a start on us. Indeed, she may even have reached Markarth already. I think we have no option but to leave her to her own devices, at least for the time being, as she requests. Here, read the letter for yourself. It is odd," she mused, as she passed the letter over, "Rhiannon speaks after the manner of one who is well educated, if one disregards her odd accent, but her writing is that of a child."
"As is mine," admitted Jenassa. "My hands are far more accustomed to wielding a sword than holding a pen." She took the letter and began to read, her lips moving as she followed the words.
Delphine had picked up the first of the dossiers, the one marked as being about dragons, and glanced through it. "As Rhiannon says in her letter, the Thalmor know little of the dragons," she said. "They mention a lead, but it would appear they mean the thief Rhiannon says she rescued, and he didn't seem to know anything." She moved on to the remaining documents. "Let's see what they know about me."
"I like this not," said Jenassa, still concentrating on the letter, "but Rhiannon's orders are, as you say, specific. I will obey her and refrain from going to Markarth to join her."
"Well, they know I'm still alive, and they want me dead," Delphine said, "but I knew that anyway. At least they don't know where I am. I should have adopted an alias, though; they'll find out that there's a Delphine who runs an inn in Riverwood eventually." She set her own dossier aside and picked up the next.
"Ulfric Stormcloak… not surprising they'd have a file on him. Interesting, but not relevant. I'll read it later. The last one will be Elisif, I'd guess, let's… what? Esbern? Esbern's alive!"
"Who is Esbern?" Jenassa asked.
"An old colleague of mine from the Blades," Delphine informed her. "My mentor, you could say. He was the undisputed expert on dragonlore. A little… obsessive on the subject, in fact, and the rest of us mocked him about it. Obsolete knowledge, that would never be any use, or so we thought. Well, we were wrong, and he was right."
"And his knowledge could be helpful to Rhiannon," said Jenassa.
"Indeed so," Delphine agreed, as she read on. "And the Thalmor think it could be useful to them and they don't ask nicely. I have to find him before they do. They believe he's hiding out in Riften so that's where I'll be going. At once. I daren't wait for Rhiannon to return."
"So we go to Riften? I hate that city," Jenassa said.
"You don't have to come," Delphine said, "although if you're offering I won't say no."
"Rhiannon's orders are for me to stay with you, until she returns," Jenassa said, "and so, if you go to Riften, so must I. And the chance of action will help me not to fret about what might be happening to Rhiannon when I am not at her side."
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The Temple of Talos smelt like a public toilet. The light was dim, coming only from a single lantern, and Rhiannon was wary as she approached the shrine. A figure moved ahead of her, and she tensed, but it was only the man who had slipped her the note requesting the meeting. He was smaller than her, bore no visible weapons, and was dressed like a common laborer. His face was decorated with a spider-web pattern of black lines, either tattoos or war-paint, that might have seemed intimidating to some people. Rhiannon was used to hanging out with Samoans, and face-painted ring-warriors, and wasn't in the least disconcerted. She was fairly confident that the man posed little threat to her but she didn't let down her guard.
"So," she said, "I'm here. What do you want?"
"I'm sorry to drag you into Markarth's problems," he replied, "but after that attack in the market-place I'm running out of time. You're an outsider, you're dangerous-looking. You'll do."
"I'll do, is it? Do what? And who are you?"
"My name's Eltrys, and I'm a smelter worker," the man said. "I want to find out what's going on. A man goes crazy in the market-place. Everyone knows he was a Forsworn agent but the guards do nothing but clean up the mess. There have been murders like that for years and no-one does anything. I've never been able to work out what's behind it all. Maybe an outsider like you can get to the bottom of it. Find out why that woman was attacked, who's behind Weylin and the Forsworn, and I'll pay you for any information you bring me."
"How come you're so interested?" Rhiannon asked. She wouldn't have expected a common smelter worker to be looking into crimes, unless he thought he might be a future victim.
"My father was killed, when I was a boy," Eltrys explained. "He owned a small mine. Rare for anyone who isn't a Nord. The guards said it was just a madman but everyone knew the murderer was one of the Forsworn. The Silver-Bloods ended up taking over the mine for not much more than a pittance. I was too young to oppose them and my mother was too broken up with grief. I've been trying to find out what was behind it ever since but gotten nowhere. I'm married now, and we have a child on the way, and I can't go poking my own nose into things any longer. But maybe a fresh mind, an outsider, might find out what I couldn't."
Rhiannon considered. She wasn't interested in the payment, and the murders weren't a priority to her, but she did need to make contact with the Forsworn. Maybe this was the opportunity to which Meridia had referred. "All right," she agreed. "First, tell me what you know."
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Rhiannon emerged from the Warrens, after searching Weylin's room, and found herself face to face with a leather-clad warrior. Six feet or so in height, broad of shoulder, and with his hair shaved into a Mohawk top-knot.
"You've been digging around where you don't belong," the man growled. "It's time you learned a lesson."
"Can't we… talk about this?" Rhiannon said, sounding nervous despite herself. She didn't feel confident about fighting this man; his hairstyle made him look like Sheamus and she knew she could never have beaten the Irish wrestler in a real fight, or even made a scripted victory look convincing, as he was just too strong and experienced. Luckily the Markarth version was three or four inches shorter than Sheamus, and probably forty or fifty pounds lighter, although that still made him some fifty pounds heavier than Rhiannon and most of it looked to be muscle. This would not be easy.
"Nothing to talk about," the thug answered. "The boss says to beat you up, I beat you up. Defend yourself… not that it will do you any good." He advanced with fists raised.
Rhiannon assessed her surroundings. Behind her was the door to the Warrens, the poor quarter carved out of the stone under Markarth, a cramped area of tunnels and cubicles with uneven floors littered with rubble and garbage; not a good place in which to fight a stronger opponent. To her sides were stone walls, pinning her in. But ahead of her, past the advancing thug, there was more space.
A stream ran past the entrance to the Warrens, crossed by a wooden walkway, and on the far side was a wide flat area with the city's smelters on one side. On the other side there stood a raised wooden platform, about half the size of a wrestling ring, on which were two sets of pillories. Actual medieval pillories, a few feet apart and at right angles to each other, in what seemed to Rhiannon to be an odd location as there would be nowhere for a crowd to stand and pelt captive miscreants with rotten eggs. But she could see a way of using them…
Before the Mohawk-wearing thug could get close enough to trap her in the doorway she rushed forward and threw herself into a rolling dive that took her under the swinging punch he aimed at her. He turned and lashed out with a kick, aimed at where he expected her to be, but the roll had brought her smoothly back up to her feet and she was well clear. She raced for the walkway and ran across it, over the stream, and headed for the pillories.
"Come back here, you cowardly bitch!" the heavy roared, pounding after her. As Rhiannon went up the ramp to the pillories she glanced behind her, saw that he had lowered his guard to run faster, and mule-kicked him in the face. It stopped him in his tracks, only for a moment, but when he recovered himself and resumed his pursuit he was bleeding from a split lip.
Rhiannon reached the pillories and ducked behind one of the wooden structures. They were quite close to the edge of the platform, giving about as much standing room behind them as there was on the apron of a wrestling ring, and she felt at home there. As Sheamus-lite closed on her she kicked out, under the pillory, and hit him solidly on the knee. He grunted in pain and began to throw punches over the top bar of the pillory. Rhiannon dodged them all with ease and kicked him again. He tried to follow her onto the outer part of the platform but was awkward on the narrow rim. Rhiannon retreated, faster than he could follow, and then seized an opportunity and hit him on the side of his jaw with the heel of her hand. He stumbled and fell over the edge.
"This is my house!" Rhiannon yelled, stealing Paige's catch-phrase, as Sheamus-lite picked himself up. She moved away quickly, before he could grab for her legs, and waited for him in the center of the platform. He charged up the ramp and she slipped behind the other pillory, evading his charge, and again dodged his punches.
He swung with a right hook and was slow to pull back. Rhiannon seized his arm with both hands, swayed back out of the way as he threw a left, and then stepped off the edge of the platform and let herself fall. Her full weight slammed his arm down onto the top bar of the pillory and she heard him yell in pain.
Rhiannon's fall stopped with her feet mere inches above the ground. She straightened her legs, stood up, and released her grip on the thug's arm from sheer force of habit. As he pulled his arm back it occurred to her that she shouldn't have let go; there was no referee here to enforce a break and it would have given her an unassailable advantage, with Sheamus-lite unable to reach her, and helpless to stop her continuing to work on his arm. She'd have to remember not to make the same mistake in the future and, for now, hope she'd weakened his arm enough to give her an edge for the rest of the fight. She vaulted back up onto the pillory platform and raised her hands ready to resume the combat.
It didn't look as if it would be necessary. Sheamus-lite had staggered back, away from the pillory, and was clutching at a right arm that looked decidedly mangled. Blood was dripping from a gouge in the upper arm, where it must have scraped along the rough edge of the wood, and the elbow joint was bent in the wrong direction. Assuming he wasn't double-jointed, like Alexa Bliss, it was a hyper-extension injury and the arm would be virtually useless.
"Who told you to beat me up?" Rhiannon asked. She felt a little guilty; she hadn't expected to do quite that much damage, being used to slamming an opponent's limbs onto the more forgiving material of a ring rope.
"You haven't won yet, you mangy piece of pit-bait," Sheamus-lite snarled defiantly. He let go of his injured arm, advanced, and threw a left-hand punch. With his balance destroyed by his right arm hanging limply the punch was awkward and easy for Rhiannon to catch. She twisted the arm around and down, swung a leg over it, and forced him downward until she could put him into the Dis-Arm-Her.
"You've lost," she told him, as she applied pressure. "Give up and tell me who sent you."
He struggled, futilely, for a few seconds and then gave up as he realized that he was helpless. "Nepos," he revealed. "Nepos the Nose. The old man gives out the orders. He told me to rough you up and make sure you didn't get in the way. That's all I know."
"There's tidy," said Rhiannon. "That wasn't so hard, was it?" She stood up, released his arm, and moved away. "I could try to heal your arm," she said, "but I don't know how a spell would work on that kind of injury, is it?" Back on Earth it would have needed RICE treatment and, probably, weeks of physiotherapy. Possibly surgery. "You'd best get a proper healer to take a look at it."
"I'll go to Bothela," Sheamus-lite said, and he staggered away supporting his right arm with his left.
Rhiannon leant against the pillory and stared out over the mill-stream as she considered what he had said. She had heard Nepos the Nose mentioned before and always he'd been spoken of with respect and, indeed, admiration. A Reachman who had managed to become a successful businessman in a city dominated by the Nords. Somewhat less admirable an achievement if he had done it by having people beaten up, or killed, of course, but that wasn't the most important thing to Rhiannon. What was important to her was that Nepos would seem to have links to, and perhaps authority over, the Forsworn. He might be her best chance of finding her parents.
Or he might have her killed. She'd have to take precautions against that. A letter to Delphine and Jenassa, listing everything she'd discovered so far, so that if he asked the standard villain's question 'Does anyone else know?' she could answer, truthfully, 'Yes.' And finding out a bit more about him, so that she could make her approach in the best way, would be a good idea.
Bothela, the elderly proprietor of the Hag's Cure apothecary, was the only person she'd come across in Markarth who seemed willing to talk freely and had been outspoken in giving her opinion of the local mining magnates the Silver-Blood family. Talking to her seemed like a good starting point for information about Nepos. It would have to wait, as Sheamus-lite had headed off to the Hag's Cure to get his injured arm tended to, and so Rhiannon set off for the Silver-Blood Inn. She'd write out the letter to Delphine over lunch, get it sent off by courier, and then go to see Bothela. It might not be a perfect insurance strategy but keeping a pair of professional killers, both of whom regarded her well-being as of major importance, informed of her actions was the best she could do in a world without the Internet or newspapers. And, if anything were to happen to her, she was sure Delphine and Jenassa would make those responsible regret it.
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"Hold there!" ordered one of the two guards at the city gate. "Before I let you into Riften you have to pay the visitor tax."
"Visitor tax?" Delphine echoed. "Somehow I don't think Jarl Laila knows anything about this tax. Tell you what. You let us in, without paying any so-called tax, and I won't cut your balls off and Jenassa won't make you eat them."
"Perhaps those Khajiit traders would let us use their cooking pot," Jenassa suggested, "if he would prefer them boiled rather than raw."
"All right, calm down, no need for that," the guard said. His helmet hid his face but, judging by the tremor in his voice, it was likely that he had gone pale behind the visor. "I'll let you in right away."
"A pity," said Jenassa, as the guard unlocked the gate. "The other way would have been more entertaining."
"We're not here for entertainment," Delphine reminded her. "We find… the person we're looking for," she said, withholding Esbern's name as the guards were within hearing range, "and we get out. That's all."
"Good," said Jenassa. "The less time we spend in this city, the happier I will be."
"I take it you're familiar with Riften," Delphine commented drily.
"I spent some years here as a child," Jenassa told her. "It was… not a time I remember with fondness."
"Not many people think of Riften with fondness," Delphine said, "except the Thieves' Guild, and even they seem to have fallen on hard times lately. Of course, one of them being an agent of the Thalmor might have something to do with that." She led the way through Riften's residential district, over the bridge that crossed its disused and stinking canal, and into the market square.
"Make love like a sabre cat, or crush your enemies to dust like a giant!" called out one of the market vendors. "Learn a whole library's worth of knowledge in moments, or grow back that missing limb, with my genuine Falmer Blood Elixir at a mere twenty septims for a bottle."
"Ah, Brynjolf is at his stall," Delphine remarked. "I'll have a word with him first. He might be able to point us in the right direction and save us a lot of wandering around the Ratway."
"Quite possibly," said Jenassa, and then she lowered her voice. "We are being followed, sera."
"By a Khajiit," Delphine confirmed, without looking around. "She may be naught but a cutpurse… but it is possible she is a Thalmor agent. I'll ask Bryn if she's a Guild member. If she's not, and she follows us into the Ratway… we kill her."
"A wise precaution," Jenassa agreed. "Dead spies pass on no secrets."
Brynjolf was a tall Nord, red-haired and with a neatly-trimmed beard, who wore the garb of a moderately prosperous merchant or noble. Twin swords rode at his hips. "Delphine. Good to see you, lass," he greeted her. "And… Jenassa. It's been a long time since we last saw each other. You look to be doing well."
"As do you," Jenassa replied, giving a slight nod of her head and allowing herself just a trace of a smile.
"Appearances can be deceptive, lass," Brynjolf said. "The stall doesn't make enough to pay for its rental and my… other interests are going through a bad patch. Hopefully Delphine's going to put some profitable business my way."
"I'm afraid not," Delphine said, "at least for the time being. It turned out to be more urgent than I had thought and our patron had to do the job herself. Don't worry, I'm sure we'll have other things for you to do in the future."
"Well-paying things, I hope," Brynjolf said. His eyes narrowed. "You're being watched."
"The Khajiit? I take it she's not one of yours, then. I was going to ask you about her," said Delphine. She nodded to Jenassa. "Right, first chance we get, we do it."
"Sounds… ominous," said Brynjolf. "Well, anyone idiot enough to spy on you two deserves whatever they get. Try not to leave the body anywhere the guards will trip over it."
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When Rhiannon entered the Hag's Cure she saw that Bothela was busy, attending to a woman with a crying baby, her assistant Muiri was dealing with a male customer, and another woman and a teenage girl were standing in line waiting their turn. Rhiannon went over to the shop's alchemy bench, which Bothela had given her permission to use, to pass the time in a productive manner. She knew only a handful of potion recipes, and what she made couldn't match the quality of what she could buy, but making them herself saved money; could even make money, if the apothecary would buy them, and Rhiannon knew one recipe that would be very saleable.
Rhiannon didn't gather many ingredients for potions because it was too much hassle. Butterfly wings, for instance, could be used in some useful potions but chasing down the flying insects without a butterfly net was frustrating and time-consuming. She collected ingredients only when she happened upon them without going out of her way. With one exception; Hanging Moss. That was the material used in the stuffing of this world's version of sanitary towels and she had made a point of picking up as much of it as she could. Mixed with the blue flowers of a fairly common local plant it could produce Poisons of Damage Magicka Regeneration, or Potions of Fortify Health, and – importantly – Delphine had told her that for the poison effect it didn't matter if the moss already had been used for sanitary purposes. 'Eww', in Buffy-speak, but she supposed it was an efficient method of waste disposal. And the money made it worth putting up with the 'eww' factor.
The alchemy workbenches of Skyrim were designed to make the process of potion creation as easy as possible. The students at Hogwarts would have loved them. Rhiannon hadn't shown any particular aptitude for chemistry at school, and hadn't been taught by Severus Snape, but she managed to turn out a few Healing and Stamina potions, and three Poisons of Damage Magicka Regeneration, by the time Bothela had finished with her customers and was free to talk.
"Nepos the Nose? A wise man," Bothela said, after she'd agreed a price and purchased Rhiannon's poisons. Her face was tattooed, her nose was hooked, and she looked like the stereotypical fairy-tale wicked witch. No doubt that was why her shop was called 'The Hag's Cure'. "He doesn't waste his talents trying to bring back a past that vanished long ago, and that few of us can remember," Bothela continued, "but deals with the world as it is now. That is how he is perhaps the only Reachman in Markarth who has become wealthy and influential."
They were speaking Welsh; or, at least, Rhiannon thought they were speaking Welsh. She had to consider the possibility that she'd been somehow re-educated, on her transportation to Skyrim, so that the local languages replaced those she spoke already. It seemed a more likely explanation than the people of a different planet just happening to speak English and Welsh.
"Do you think he might have a way of getting in touch with the Forsworn?" she asked. Muiri was a Breton but not from the Reach, and didn't speak Welsh, and Rhiannon felt secure enough to talk freely.
Bothela's eyebrows rose. "Now why would a nice girl like you want to get mixed up with the Forsworn?" she asked.
"I've been told my parents are being held prisoner in a Forsworn camp," Rhiannon answered. "I want them back. If I can arrange a meeting perhaps I can negotiate their release."
Bothela's eyebrows rose again. "That won't be easy," she warned. "The Forsworn aren't known for their willingness to talk. Still, they're not known for taking prisoners, either, and if they've made one exception they might make another. You speak the Old Tongue and that should count in your favor. I take it that your parents speak it as well?"
"They do," Rhiannon confirmed. "My father doesn't speak it as fluently as my mother and I do, but he does speak it."
"He would be the Nord, then," said Bothela, nodding. "I had a feeling you were half Nord, half Breton."
"Quarter Nord, actually," Rhiannon corrected her. Her father's mother had been English and that, she supposed, counted as Nord. She didn't want to go into the details, it would only confuse Bothela, and she went back to the original subject. "So, how would I get to see Nepos?"
"Just go to his house and ask," Bothela said. She gave Rhiannon directions. "I used to see him quite often," she added, "but I haven't visited for a long time and he hardly ever goes out these days. Tell him I was asking after him."
"I will," Rhiannon said, just as a new customer entered the shop.
Or perhaps not a customer. She recognized the powerfully-built man who came in; Yngvar the Singer. A brute who spent a lot of his time drinking at the Silver-Blood Inn and the rest of the time, according to Bothela, beating people up for the Silver-Bloods. They'd call him a leg-breaker in America, if she had the idiom right, and he looked strong enough to do exactly that. With his bare hands.
Yngvar halted and his eyes swept the room. They fastened on Rhiannon. "Out!" he growled.
Rhiannon looked at Bothela and raised an eyebrow.
"You'd better do as he says," the old woman said, still speaking in Welsh. "It's safest that way. Don't worry, he won't do me any harm, and I can afford the payments."
"I understand," Rhiannon said. "Farewell, and thank you." She turned and headed for the door. As she passed Yngvar she saw him look at her, frown, and then direct his gaze at Muiri. The apothecary's young assistant did have a distinct facial similarity to Rhiannon, almost close enough to pass as a sister, but in other respects they weren't very alike. Muiri was a good six inches shorter, her hair was light brown without any reddish tint, and she lacked Rhiannon's muscle. Yngvar looked at Muiri for a few seconds, frowned again, and then looked back at Rhiannon. She met his gaze, giving him the kind of intimidating glare she would have given an opponent during a pre-match promo, and walked on out of the shop.
She paused, once outside, and considered her next actions. The thought of doing something to put a stop to this protection racket, starting off by going back into the shop and breaking Yngvar's arms, was extremely tempting. Realistically, though, she had to accept that she wasn't equipped to take on organized crime. Even assuming she could beat Yngvar, by no means a given, and even if she had had Jenassa and Delphine to back her up, it would have been difficult to achieve anything; without them it would be impossible. She sighed, gave up the idea, and set off for the house of Nepos the Nose.
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The Ragged Flagon tavern was a sewer. Literally. The underground chamber was part of Riften's ancient sewer network and at the center was a large, stagnant, pool. The walkways around the pool, and the raised area that formed the tavern's bar, were clear of the water and dry. A barman stood behind the bar polishing a tankard, several Thieves' Guild members sat at tables, and a burly thug in leather armor guarded the walkway that led to the bar.
"Stay out of trouble," he growled as Delphine and Jenassa approached.
Neither of them bothered to reply. They walked past him, ignoring his glares, and made their way to the bar.
"Vekel," Delphine greeted the barman. "Two meads and some information."
"Ten septims for the mead, Delphine," Vekel replied. "Information… that's more expensive."
"We're looking for an old friend of mine," Delphine said. She laid some coins on the bar top. "We know he's living somewhere in the Ratway but that's a lot of ground to cover. Can you pin it down any closer?"
"Maybe," Vekel said. "There are a lot of old derelicts holed up in the Ratway. Most of them are crazier than a Khajiit on a Skooma bender. What's this one's name?"
"Esbern," Delphine told him.
"Can't say I know the name," Vekel said, "but the odds are he'll be living in the Ratway Vaults."
A shabbily-dressed man, sitting alone at a nearby table, glanced across at Delphine and then stood up. He set off for the walkway that led toward the outside but the lurking thug blocked his path.
"Here, where do you think you're going, Gissur?" the heavily-built Guild member growled, resting a hand on his Elven war axe. "The boss said you wasn't to go outside the Flagon."
"Gissur?" Jenassa hissed, her hand going to a sword hilt.
Delphine caught her by the shoulder. "Wait," she urged. "Don't do anything yet."
"Come on, Dirge, you can let me through," Gissur pleaded. "I just need to see Romlyn Dreth. He says he's got a job for me that will pay a lot of coin. If I don't do it soon he'll find someone else and I'll lose out."
"Don't care," Dirge said. "Boss says you stay here, you stay here. Get back to where you were or get your face smashed in."
Gissur quailed and backed away. Once he had returned to his seat Delphine relaxed her grip on Jenassa's shoulder.
"Now," Delphine said, "we can act. You cut off his retreat."
"As you wish, sera," Jenassa said. She moved off, in the direction of the walkway, but stopped once she had gone past Gissur's seat.
Delphine turned back to Vekel. "How come Gissur isn't dead?" she asked, keeping her voice down. "Didn't Etienne Rarnis make it back here?"
The barman frowned. "How do you know about that?" he asked, equally quietly.
"My patron wrote a letter," Delphine explained, "telling us what she'd seen and heard in the Thalmor Embassy. Gissur getting paid off by Interrogator Rulindil. Etienne in the interrogation chamber. I expected to find Gissur floating face down in the canal once Etienne got back and told his story."
"Mercer wasn't going to have Gissur killed just on Etienne's say-so," Vekel explained. "We're keeping them apart, and keeping an eye on both of them, until we get some confirmation."
"He tried to leave as soon as he heard me mention Esbern," Delphine said. "That's all the confirmation I need. Don't try to stop me."
"Wouldn't dream of it," Vekel said. "I'd have cut his throat before now, if it was up to me. Etienne's a good lad and Gissur… isn't."
Gissur must have been able to hear at least a little of what they were saying. He kept glancing over his shoulder, in the direction of the bar, and his forehead was damp with sweat. As Delphine walked toward him droplets of sweat began to trickle down into his eyebrows.
"Gissur," Delphine said, in a conversational tone. "Who's your Thalmor contact?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," Gissur claimed. His right hand disappeared from view under the table.
"Not that it matters," Delphine went on. "I'm pretty sure I know already. And I can't risk you getting to her with what you've overheard here. Make your peace with the Divines." She put her left thumb behind the guard of her katana and eased it forward in the scabbard as her right hand moved to the hilt.
"No, wait!" Gissur protested. "I'm innocent! I can prove it! Look!" His hand came out from under the table, holding a dagger, and he aimed a thrust at Delphine's stomach.
Delphine's katana came out in a blur of speed and sliced across Gissur's throat. Simultaneously the point of Jenassa's sword burst out through his chest as she stabbed him in the back. The dagger clattered on the ground as Gissur's body toppled from his chair.
Two of the Guild members, a shaven-headed Breton man and a lithely-built blonde Imperial woman, stood up and moved toward Delphine. Both of them wore black leather armor that looked to be of very high quality.
"You got proof he was a traitor?" the woman asked.
"Search the body," Delphine suggested. "I'll bet you'll find something. And why would I have killed him if he wasn't? I've never met him before. He wasn't around last time I came. Which is lucky for me, thinking about it, as he would have ratted me out to the Thalmor and I'd be dead or on the run."
"And it would have imperiled our patron," Jenassa put in. "That is something I do not permit." She bent down and cleaned off her sword blade on a section of Gissur's tunic that wasn't soaked in blood.
"I'll take note of that," the male thief said. Once Jenassa had finished, and stood up and moved away, he took her place and, avoiding the blood as much as possible, went through Gissur's pouches and pockets. "More coin than he should have had," he remarked, "and gems a bit too valuable. Either he was skimming from us, or doing unsanctioned heists, or getting paid off by someone outside the Guild. What's this?" He came up with a potion bottle. "This ain't no healing potion."
"Let's see, Delvin," said the woman, extending her hand. After the bottle was handed over she examined it. "Poison," she said, "and vicious stuff too. Not anything the Guild would allow." She pointed at the dagger that lay on the floor. "Some of it's been used," she said. "Pass me that dagger… and carefully."
Delvin picked up the weapon, making sure his fingers went nowhere near the blade, and handed it equally carefully to the woman.
"As I thought," she said. "The blade is envenomed. You're lucky he didn't cut you."
Luck had nothing to do with it, Delphine thought, but she refrained from saying so aloud.
"Here, what's this?" Delvin said. He pulled a folded sheet of paper from a slim pouch, concealed behind Gissur's belt, and opened it out. "Well, that settles that," he said. "You were right, Delphine."
"What does it say?" the blonde woman asked, echoed by Vekel asking the same question.
"Description of target," Delvin read out. "Breton woman, tall, red hair, believed to go by 'Countess Hanna of Narnia' (may be an alias). Likely to be enquiring about 'Esbern' and the Ratway. Do not approach. Inform your assigned contact immediately if spotted."
Delphine frowned. "That means there were written references to Esbern in the Embassy that… Countess Hanna… did not find," she said. "We'd better move on at once. The Thalmor might be not far behind us."
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Rhiannon could see at a glance how Nepos the Nose came by his name. He had a bigger nose than Adrien Brody. He was an elderly man, bald-headed, with a short grey beard on a prominent chin. His chair was positioned directly in front of the fireplace, so that he could get the most benefit out of the blazing fire, and he didn't rise as Rhiannon approached. He did lay down the book he was reading, however, and he raised his head to look her in the eyes.
"I'm sorry about my housekeeper," he said, referring to the servant who had been reluctant to allow Rhiannon admission. "She's a little protective of me. Now, what is it you want?"
"Thank you for agreeing to see me," Rhiannon said, in Welsh. "I seek… I suppose you would have to call it a favor."
Nepos raised his eyebrows. "You're not what I expected," he said. "Do you mind if we speak Cyrodiilic? I so rarely speak the Old Tongue, these days, that I am no longer fluent."
"That is a shame," Rhiannon said, switching back to what she thought of as English, "but Cyrodiilic is fine. I'm bilingual."
"Good," said Nepos. "Hmm. Bring a chair over here, girl, and sit down. I'm getting a crick in my neck looking up at you." Once Rhiannon had taken a chair from beside a dining table, and brought it over to join him, Nepos looked at her intently.
"Which of the camps are you from, girl?" he asked. "The Karthspire? Hag Rock?"
"None of them," Rhiannon said, guessing that by 'camps' he meant 'Forsworn camps'. "I'm not a member of the Forsworn. But I need to talk to them and I hope you can arrange it."
"You're not?" His eyebrows climbed again. "Where are you from, then? The Western Reach?"
Rhiannon hesitated. If she remembered Delphine's briefing correctly the Western Reach was part of High Rock, where Narnia was supposed to be, but she'd dropped the 'Countess Hanna' identity as soon as she was away from the Thalmor Embassy and didn't want there to be any connections that might enable the Thalmor to link Hanna with Rhiannon. Even so, perhaps claiming to be from High Rock might be better, certainly more believable, than the truth. She compromised and gave a slight nod.
"A little town called Bethesda," she said, hoping that he would take it that she meant a town in the Western Reach. "Most of us there speak the Old Tongue."
"And why do you want to talk to the Forsworn?" Nepos asked. "Wanting to join them, are you?"
"Not as such," Rhiannon replied. "I have some sympathy for their aims but it's not my fight, is it? The thing is, I've heard that my parents are prisoners in a Forsworn camp. I want to negotiate their release."
"Oh? Do you know which camp?"
"No," Rhiannon said. "All I know is that I was told to come to Markarth and that I'd find out more here."
"An odd way of informing you," Nepos said. "Who was it who told you?"
Once again Rhiannon hesitated before deciding that the Forsworn might not be as anti-Daedra as the Nords and, anyway, sticking to the truth as much as possible usually worked out for the best. "Merida," she said, and then corrected her slip of the tongue. "Meridia, I mean. I got rid of a Necromancer for her and afterwards she told me about my parents."
"Meridia the Daedric Prince?"
"That's right," Rhiannon said. "I wasn't going to press her for more details. I just said 'Thank you very much' and got moving."
"Probably a wise decision," Nepos agreed. "The Daedric Princes are perilous. Meridia may well be the best of them but still not to be taken lightly."
'She's not a tame lion,' Rhiannon thought, suppressing a grin.
"I have no direct contacts with the Forsworn in the camps," Nepos went on, "but I know people who know people. I should be able to pass on a message and get a reply before too long." He leaned forward in his chair. "I would like to know why, if you were only interested in finding your parents, you have been going around the town asking questions about that regrettable incident in which a young woman was tragically slain in the market-place?"
"It was the only lead to the Forsworn I had," Rhiannon explained. "It was either that or go wandering around the Reach at random, hoping I could find some of the Forsworn and get them talking before they shot me full of arrows, and Meridia told me to start in Markarth anyway. I hope I didn't hurt your man too badly."
"Dryston has made a full recovery, I am told," Nepos said. "Don't worry, there will be no repetition. Give me your parents' names, and describe them, and call on me again in, say, two days. I should have some news for you by then."
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Yngvar hustled Muiri off the path, into the rarely-used courtyard in front of the side entrance to the Hall of the Dead, and slammed her up against a wall.
"Who was that girl who was talking to Bothela?" he growled. "What were they talking about?"
"I don't know," Muiri said, almost in a whimper. "Her name is Rhiannon. She did a delivery for Bothela and after that we let her use the alchemy bench. That's all I know."
"Don't lie to me, you little slut," Yngvar said. "She looks enough like you to be a sister. You must know her."
"I don't, I don't," Muiri insisted. "We look alike but it must be just coincidence. I don't have any sisters. And she's a Reachwoman and I'm from Windhelm. You know that."
"What was she talking to Bothela about?" Yngvar repeated. He seized hold of Muiri's right breast and squeezed just hard enough to hurt. "Answer me!"
"I don't know!" Muiri wailed. "They were talking in some Reach language I don't speak. I heard them mention Nepos but that's the only word I understood. Please. If I knew I would tell you. Don't hurt me!"
Yngvar released his grip on her breast but only to take hold of her by the throat and press her hard against the wall. "I won't… as long as you don't say a word about this. Not to that Rhiannon woman, not to Bothela, not to anyone. If you do… we'll pick this conversation up again somewhere more private. And I won't be this gentle."
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"Muiri didn't know what they talked about," Yngvar reported. "She says she doesn't speak the language they used. I believe her. She was too scared to lie. Want me to wring it out of Bothela?"
Thonar Silver-Blood shook his head. "Leave Bothela alone," he said. "There's a limit to how far we can push her. Raerek's one of her customers, and he's already suspicious of us. If she goes to him with a complaint he'll push Igmund into acting on it. I get potions from her myself, for that matter, and I'd rather they weren't lethal."
"She won't do anything as long as you have her nephew locked up in Cidhna Mine," Thongvor Silver-Blood, the elder of the two brothers, put in.
"Perhaps not," Thonar said, "but I doubt if she knows anything of importance anyway. What worries me is that the girl went to see Nepos after that… and left his house alive. Every other time someone's started asking awkward questions Nepos has had them killed. Not this time."
"Did she fight her way out?" Thongvor asked.
"She walked out, smiling, and that vicious little so-called housekeeper of his said goodbye to her at the door," Thonar said. "The likeliest explanation is that this girl Rhiannon is a Forsworn agent, from one of the Redoubts, come to find out why all the killings by the Forsworn in the city benefit only… us. And if she does, and reports back to those filthy Hagravens, our position becomes precarious. How much would our leverage over Madanach be worth if the Forsworn stop obeying him?"
"If that happens then we execute him," Thongvor said. "We should have done that way back when we first captured the bloodthirsty savage."
"If we had, then we'd have had to do our own killing all these years," Thonar said. "Traceable back to us. It's easy to pull the wool over Jarl Igmund's eyes if we can blame the Forsworn for everything. Without them, what happens if he starts asking 'Who benefits?' Even Igmund, who isn't the brightest of men by a long way, will find the answer staring him in the face. The Silver-Blood family."
"Yes, you're right," Thongvor said. "Keeping things as they are is greatly preferable. So, what do we do about this Forsworn agent Rhiannon? How much does she know?"
"A lot, I would guess," said Thonar. "She was seen with Eltrys. We should have had him killed ages ago. She's been in Margaret's room at the inn. I slipped up there. I should have had Yngvar clean the room out and I didn't think of it. If she left anything on paper… Rhiannon has seen it. She was in the Warrens, poking around where that smelter worker who killed Margaret lived, and then she crippled the thug Nepos sent to discourage her. And now she's talked to Nepos and must have come to some sort of agreement. We have a big problem."
"So, have her killed," his wife Betrid said. She was very good-looking, if you overlooked the hardness in her eyes and the set of her mouth, and her jewelry cost more than a smelter worker would earn in a year. "Problem solved."
"Have her killed by who?" said Thonar. "Order Madanach to set the Forsworn on her? When she's one herself? We don't know how they identify themselves to each other. If the one sent to kill her finds out who she is that could destroy Madanach's credibility. And our tame assassination network would collapse."
"I'll do it," Yngvar volunteered.
"And then the next Forsworn agent who comes to the city would start off by stabbing you in the back," Thonar said. "I suppose I could bring in Atar and his men..."
"We can kill two birds with one stone," Thongvor suggested. "You said you should have killed Eltrys, whoever he is, before now. Kill him, blame her, and have her thrown into the mine. Madanach will probably kill her there but, even if he doesn't, at least she's out of our hair. We'll have a breathing space in which to think up something to lull the suspicions of the wild Forsworn. Something we can order Madanach to do that will benefit the Forsworn and not us. It would have to be something that doesn't harm us either, of course, but that shouldn't be too hard to arrange."
"Why not kill three birds with one stone?" Betrid said. "Frame her for a Forsworn attack that looks as if it's aimed at us… but really serves our purposes?"
"That would be ideal," said Thonar. "You have someone specific in mind?"
"I certainly have, dear husband," Betrid said. "Your receptionist."
"Rhiada?" Thonar's eyes widened and his mouth dropped open. "But… why? She's an excellent worker."
"And she's married to Eltrys," Betrid said. "I don't care how careful you are to keep our… less legal activities separate from the Treasury House business, sooner or later you'll slip up and she'll see something she shouldn't. If she passes the information on to him he'll use it against us."
"Is that right?" Thongvor asked. "You have the wife of one of our enemies working right in the Treasury House?"
"They weren't married when I hired her," Thonar said, sounding distinctly defensive. "And I didn't connect the worker who started courting her with the boy whose father we… removed, ten years ago, until he started getting nosy recently."
"Then you should have gotten rid of her there and then," Thongvor said. "Betrid is right. Kill Rhiada, and Eltrys, and blame Rhiannon."
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Esbern opened the last of the multitude of locks on his fortress-like door and pulled it open. He swept Delphine into an embrace as she stepped in. She reciprocated, despite the old man's tunic being decidedly grubby, and then followed him deeper into the room once he released her. Jenassa stayed at the door, keeping watch, with her bow poised for action.
"Delphine! Still keeping up the fight after all these years, I see," Esbern said. "It's good to see you, even if it is just to say goodbye before the end."
"Before the end?" Delphine echoed. "What do you mean?"
"The end of days," Esbern said. "I warned everyone, of course, but no-one would listen. Certainly not you. And now it's plain as day and still no-one can see it. Alduin has returned, just like the prophecy said, the Dragon from the dawn of time who devours the souls of the dead. No-one can escape his hunger, not here, not in the afterlife. Alduin will devour all things and the world will end."
"Alduin thuri," Delphine quoted, remembering the dragon at Kynesgrove. "The big black dragon who is raising the others is Alduin?"
"Yes!" Esbern snatched up a book from one of his tables. "You see, you know, but you don't understand the implications. Nothing can stop him. All we can do is watch our doom approach."
"I don't accept that," Delphine said. "We've killed dragons. They're tough, but by no means invincible."
"Killing them achieves nothing more than a temporary respite," Esbern said. "Without a Dragonborn Alduin can just bring them back, again and again, until they overrun first Skyrim and then the whole world. And there has been no Dragonborn for centuries."
"Until now," Jenassa put in from the doorway. "We have Rhiannon. We have seen her take the souls of dead dragons and destroy them utterly."
"You have a Dragonborn? Truly?" Esbern's face lit up with a smile that seemed almost manic. "The gods have not abandoned us. There is hope after all. Where is this Dragonborn?"
"Markarth, at the moment," Delphine said, "but we're not going there. Not until we hear from her again, anyway. We'll go to Riverwood first. Grab everything you need and let's go. We don't have much time. The Thalmor know you're here. We've killed three of them, since we left the Flagon, but there'll be more coming."
"Thalmor, eh? I'll have to make sure I don't leave any secrets behind for them," Esbern said, and went to his bookcase and began rummaging through the shelves of tomes. "Let's see. My Annotated Anuad, I'll need that. Fire and Darkness, much too valuable to leave. Junk, junk, The Dragon War, yes, Children of the Sky, yes… that should do. Very well, let us be off. You can tell me about your Dragonborn as we go."
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"For the darkness has passed, and the legend yet grows
You'll know, you'll know, the Dragonborn comes."
Ogmund the Skald finished his song and, as several of the patrons applauded, headed toward the bar.
"Another song!" called Cosnach, a laborer who seemed to spend far more of his time drinking in the inn than he did working. "Give us another, Ogmund."
The bard, a tall Nord with an impressive but greying beard, shook his head. "I've sung enough for one evening," he said. "I am going to dine now, and then go home. Maybe someone else might care to perform." He looked at Rhiannon. "How about you, lady? Your speech is melodious. Can you sing?"
Back on Earth Rhiannon would have answered that with "I'm Welsh. Of course I can sing." Here, where no-one had heard of Wales, she said "I have been known to sing. The people of Falkreath seemed to like it."
"Then give us a song, girl," said Ogmund. "It will make a nice change for me to listen to someone else. Yngvar isn't bad, but he hardly ever sings these days. Give me a mead, Kleppr, and let us hear this girl sing."
Rhiannon stood up. She was feeling good, as she thought she'd made progress toward finding her parents, and in the mood to sing. "I can't play the lute," she admitted, "and I don't have the instrument that I do play." She had done the optional Music and Performance module, as part of her Performing Arts degree, but the instrument she had learned was a Yamaha electronic keyboard; nothing she had seen in Skyrim bore any resemblance to it. "I'll have to sing unaccompanied."
"As do I," said Ogmund. "Go on, lass, sing for us."
In Falkreath she had sung Let It Go but she decided against it this time. Another Disney song seemed more appropriate for the warmer, less snowy, environment of the Reach. Her slip of the tongue when telling Nepos about Meridia, when she had said 'Merida' instead, had brought Brave to mind. She took a deep breath, gathered herself, and then began to sing.
"When cold wind is a-calling
And the sky is clear and bright
Misty mountains sing and beckon
Lead me out into the light
I will ride, I will fly
Chase the wind and touch the sky…"
The song went down very well. Her rendition received more applause than Ogmund's performance had done, even though he was regarded as one of the best bards in Skyrim, probably because everyone must have heard The Dragonborn Comes many times and they had never heard Touch the Sky before.
"Very interesting, and well sung," Ogmund praised. "Are you a graduate of the Bards' College?"
"Not the one in Solitude, no," Rhiannon said. "I went to one outside Skyrim."
"You should go," Ogmund said. "I expect they would accept you as a full bard right away, with innovative songs like that. As long as it's not the only one you know, that is."
"Yeah, sing us another," called Cosnach.
"That was lovely, and I want to hear more," the innkeeper's daughter Hroki said. She was pretty, extremely curvaceous for someone who couldn't have been much more than sixteen, and always courteous and friendly to the customers – unlike her sarcastic and quarrelsome parents. "I think she deserves a tankard of mead as a payment, don't you, father?"
"Oh, very well," Kleppr the innkeeper said, with a sigh. "Provided she entertains our customers with another song, that is."
"I'll do two if you throw in a baked potato with seared slaughterfish," Rhiannon proposed. That was acceptable to Kleppr and Rhiannon paid for her supper with renditions of Learn Me Right, also from the Brave soundtrack, and then abandoned Disney for her favorite song; Closing Time, by Semisonic. After that she excused herself from singing any more songs, ate her meal, went to bed and read The Madmen of the Reach before going to sleep.
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Delphine went through the corpse's pouches and pockets until she found a folded note. She unfolded it and read.
I have good reason to believe the target will be coming to Riften in the next few days. Discretion is preferred, but elimination of the target is of the highest priority. The usual restrictions on exposure are lifted – you will be reassigned outside Skyrim if necessary, without penalty.
Do not fail me.
E
"Exactly as we suspected," Delphine said. "Well, Brynjolf asked us not to leave the body anywhere the guards would trip over it. The bottom of the canal would fit that perfectly."
"Indeed so, sera," Jenassa said. She had left her sword in the fatal wound, to prevent a gush of blood from making too much of a mess, and now she pulled it free and cleaned it. She tucked two Elven maces, whose original Thalmor owners lay dead in the Ratway, into the Khajiit spy's dress and shoved the body off the edge of the walkway and into the murky water. It sank out of sight almost immediately.
"Efficiently done, lady Dunmer," Esbern praised. "Let us make the most of this opportunity and depart before more of the Thalmor, or their agents, locate us."
"I had hoped to spend the night here," Delphine said, "but that is no longer feasible. We'd be too vulnerable in the inn. Let's get out of Riften as fast as possible."
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Rhiannon was woken by her door bursting open and several men rushing into her room. Before she was fully awake hands had seized her and dragged her from the bed. She screamed, and struggled madly, and managed to catch the hand of one of her attackers and wrench it around until something snapped, but it was hopeless. She couldn't get free, her arms were pinned, and someone punched her in the stomach. She rode the blow by reflex, even in her disorientated state, but it still hurt and drove some of the breath from her lungs. The men hustled her out of the room and into the common room of the inn. Only then did she realize that her captors were members of the Markarth city guard.
The inn's customers and residents were absent, of course, as it was the middle of the night. Kleppr, the innkeeper, was the only one there at first but then his wife Frabbi emerged from their room. Her hair was disheveled and her feet were bare.
"What's going on, Kleppr?" Frabbi queried. "What are the guard doing here… and manhandling one of our guests?"
"They're arresting a wicked Forsworn murderess, my darling wife," Kleppr told her. Rhiannon had heard the two bickering enough to be well aware that the endearment was meant sarcastically. "Nothing for you to be concerned about."
Rhiannon continued to struggle. "Let me go!" she demanded. "What am I supposed to have done?"
"Shut up, you murderous bitch," one of the guards ordered, and punched her in the stomach again.
This time Rhiannon saw it coming and tensed her muscles against the impact, as well as riding the punch, and it had almost no effect upon her. Despite that she reacted as if it had been a devastating blow, doubling up and gasping, so that the guards would believe her to be incapacitated. She could sell a punch well enough to make an entire arena of forty thousand people believe she'd been winded, even if the punch had been delivered by Eva Marie, but her captors didn't relax their holds. Even if they had, and she had broken free, would it have achieved anything? How could she escape the city barefoot, unarmed, and wearing nothing but bra and pants? She would have to go along with her captors and try to sort out what could only be a mistake.
"What was that about murder?" a new voice asked. Hroki, the innkeeper's daughter, wearing a tunic far too small for her and drawing the eyes of all the guards. "Is that Rhiannon you're arresting?"
"She's a Forsworn," one of the guards replied, "and she's killed two people in cold blood."
"I haven't killed anyone in Markarth," Rhiannon protested, to no avail.
"What? Who did she kill? And when?" Hroki asked.
"Don't get involved, daughter," Kleppr urged.
"Rhiada, the receptionist at the Treasury House," the guard answered Hroki's question, "and her husband. Just before it closed for the night. Young Eltrys had called to see his wife home. This savage walked in behind him, cut both of their throats, shouted 'The Reach belongs to the Forsworn!' and ran away. Betrid Silver-Blood saw the whole thing."
"Just before it closed? Closing time?" Hroki's brow furrowed deeply. "Are you saying she knifed two people and then came in here, sang those lovely songs, and then went to bed? That doesn't make sense. And I didn't see any blood on her. You're making a mistake."
"Don't get involved," Kleppr hissed, more urgently.
"He's right, for once," his wife agreed. "Let the guards do their job or you'll get into trouble."
Hroki's intervention had made Rhiannon feel a little better. She would have at least one witness to testify on her behalf at her trial, unless Hroki's parents pressurized her into backing off, and there were others, such as Ogmund, who could testify that Rhiannon had been free of blood splatters, calm, and cheerful when she was alleged to be fresh from committing bloody murder. She relaxed and, other than making a rejected appeal to be allowed to dress, didn't resist being hustled out of the inn and frog-marched away.
And then she realized that they weren't taking her to Understone Keep, where the Jarl resided and held his court, but directly to the convict-labor mine that served as the city's prison.
"What are we doing here? Why aren't we going to the Jarl? Aren't I getting a trial?"
The guard who had done most of the talking slapped her across the back of the head. "Why would we bother with that? You were seen in the act, red-handed, by one of the most influential citizens in the Reach. The Jarl's agreed you don't need a trial. You're going straight to Cidhna Mine and staying there. For life."
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English meanings of Dovahzul (Dragon language) phrases:
Alduin thuri = Alduin my lord