For weeks Veria carried that vial. She fingered it in her pocket, turned it over in her hands, and sometimes sat it on the table in front of her as she prepared to eat a meal. Twice she uncorked it, but closed it back up every time.
It was cheap poison, purchased the day of her departure from Markarth. It wasn't something she thought about much. It just seemed right, buying it. Something in her wanted to drink it, and something else didn't. Maybe it was a desire to live, or maybe it was her humanity desperately trying to preserve itself. Whatever it was had almost failed twice. A third time would surely be the last.
From Markarth she traveled west, eventually running into a small mining settlement. There was work there, enough to distract her and feed her for a few nights. She went north, killed a thief trying to rob her and three bandits. Just for fun she tracked down their encampment and relieved it of its tenants.
She used the gold and minor trinkets looted from the bandits' cave to purchase a night in Solitude, but couldn't bear to stay past morning. She crossed the marshes to Morthal where she spent weeks on a fishing boat. Often she had to fend off the advances of one of the crewmen but it proved amusing enough. She kept moving, never staying long in one place. Veria found occupation wherever she could to keep herself busy. She'd work herself into exhaustion and fall into dreamless sleep wherever she could rest her head.
It was on Veria's journey from Morthal to Dawnstar that she was met by an unwelcome party. A Khajiit caravan had made camp near the road. They tried to call to her and draw her to what they were selling, but she pulled her cloak tight against her body and quickly moved on. She didn't like Khajiit, having had a bad experience with one a few years back. It was Tulian who had saved her from him, and as thought of the incident came to mind her fingers danced across the glass vial in her pocket.
When she arrived in Dawnstar she immediately downed two bottles of wine at the inn, all the while turning the vial over in her hand. It was almost a comfort to have it in her hand. Suddenly she stood and left the inn. Night had fallen, and the light of the moons glimmered on the water of the bay. There was a mine in this town, she knew. Tomorrow she'd get work. The next day she'd work again. The next day she'd move on. Then work again, then move on again. Work, then move. Work, move, work move.
Slowly Veria sunk to her knees. She sat in the snow and let the cold seep into her. She felt far away, and was barely thinking as she uncorked the vial. In one unrestrained motion, she downed the contents of the vial she had carried for almost two months.
The liquid slid down her throat and into her stomach. Veria sat there a moment and let the reality of what she had just done sink in.
Suddenly she felt dread and fear in her chest, then something like a kick in her stomach. Her midsection collapsed, and she emptied the contents of her stomach onto the ground. She spit and cleaned out her mouth with snow. Cheap poison, she thought.
Stumbling out of the snowbank where she sat, Veria's head suddenly began to spin. Dizzying sparks danced across her vision and her stomach purged itself once again. She crawled on her hands and knees to where a bush grew beside the road. There she curled into a ball and waited for the dizziness to pass.
How long she lay there she didn't know, but after a long while, she felt a hand gently tug at her arm. She let it help her to her feet, but violently shook free when she saw it belonged to a Khajiit. "Don't touch me," she said. The poison still afflicted her, and she struggled to keep balance.
She lurched again, and her empty stomach contracted painfully. Her mind spun, and she suddenly became entirely unsure about where she was, or how time was passing around her. Her vision blurred and black shadows danced across her eyelids.
When she finally shook her head free of the specters, she found herself somewhere else entirely.
A canvas tent stretched above her, and below she lay on a woven mat of dried grasses. She smelled cooking meat and the faint scent of some unfamiliar incense. There was only one place she could be, at this realization she shot up to her feet and nearly knocked the tent askew with her head.
"Woah, now! My child, please rest a little longer."
A female Khajiit, fur as dark as wet ash, rested her hands on Veria's shoulders. Veria felt so weak she let the Khajiit push her back down the mat. She sat and clenched her fists against the ground.
"Where am I?" Veria asked.
"Not far from Dawnstar," the Khajiit said. Her tone was polite enough. "My brother brought you here after you collapsed."
Veria drew a palm over her face. "That poison was supposed to kill me. That's what I get for two septims..."
"You drink poison for yourself?" the Khajiit said. "We have fine poisons here. Ten septims. Very effective."
Veria slid her fingers through her hair and shook her head. "No...No I shouldn't have it."
"My brother and I run the finest caravan in Skyrim. Even we carry moonsugar and skooma." Veria looked up and scowled at the Khajiit. From out of her sleeve the cat drew a small pink bottle. "Very good price, just for you! Twenty septims. You be hard on gold, yes? Twenty septims-"
Veria was already pushing her way out of the tent. The Khajiit insisted she stay and rest, sample moon sugar, and share in cooked meats hunted by fresh by her brother. But Veria had had enough of her pandering, and she had no interest in being exploited by merchants of moon sugar.
As she exited the tent, she suddenly collided with the Khajiit she met in Dawnstar.
She pushed him away and tried to continue but he stopped her.
"Are you leaving so soon, my lady?"
Veria was sick of listening to their sandy, grinding voices. She wrenched her arm away from the Khajiit. "I'm done with you, Khajiit," she spat. She headed towards the town, and the Khajiit did not follow.
She continued into the inn, purchased a room, and shut the door. As she was settling into bed she felt something hard in her pocket. The empty poison vial, she thought. But when she pulled the object from her pocket it wasn't an empty vial. It was a small, glimmering, pink bottle that was brimming with skooma.
Veria cursed inwardly. Damned cat must have put it in her pocket when she bumped into him, she thought.
She should have dumped it out the window, or buried it under the floorboards, and she considered doing so. But in the end, she put it back in her pocket. There it remained during the weeks she spent working the mines in Dawnstar. The woman who drove the workers was relentless, and the work was hard. It gave her mind little time to wander, but the pink bottle in her pocket felt heavier and heavier with each passing day.
It was on the road to Winterhold where she finally gave in. When the liquid hit her stomach, it was if the weight of her bones became that of clouds. Her heart became light, and all the sadness and grief and pain that had plagued her for so long seemed to melt like snow on the hearth. All the love she had ever felt in flesh and soul seemed to flood into her tenfold.
And all to soon it dampened and faded. All was back as it was. Gray, heavy, and painful as the shackles of those damned to Oblivion. Feeling even heavier than before, she passed through Winterhold and continued down the road. She came to a crossroads. Windhelm lay only an hour's walk from where she stood, and there would be warm with food and beds and perhaps even pleasurable company.
But she was born in Windhelm. She spent her childhood there, and had life she had no desire to return to. It was there she was stolen away by a band of mercenaries years ago, and where she first met Tulian. So, despite her freezing feet and heavy soul, she continued on.
Veria traveled the western road of Skyrim and wished so dearly she had bought better poison. Outside Kynesgrove, a small settlement just south of Windhelm, Veria spotted a small, familiar tent. She never thought she'd be so happy to see a pack of Khajiit in her life.