Chapter 64: Strange spiders
[18th – 19th of Evening Star 4E 201]
After my companions and I had returned from the catacombs below the Solitude temple, where we had fought Potema՚s ghost and claimed her skull, Jarl Elisif had declared me Thane of Haafingar, and Jordis had been assigned as my housecarl. Legate Rikke at Castle Dour had asked to see us, and when we had also met General Tullius there, he had intended to arrest Fiona and me right away – Fiona and I had been declared outlaws by the general, who apparently still considered us to be escaped prisoners. Only the intervention by Breya, one of the senior hold guards, who insisted that Jarl Elisif would not appreciate it at all if two of her special guests, one of them even a newly appointed Thane, should be thrown into prison without trial, prevented us from being apprehended right away.
In the early afternoon we met our housecarls again, now with Lydia, who had fully recovered from the injuries she had received in the fight against the Thalmor a few days earlier, and we found a quiet spot near the docks to discuss the situation. We also used the opportunity to introduce Jordis to Antonius, Rayya and Lydia, but I had hoped that this could have been under nicer circumstances. Jordis was quite excited specifically about getting introduced to my saber cat cubs, but spending more time with them would have to wait, considering the circumstances. All of our housecarls were shocked when they learned about the general's attitude, but they promised that they would of course defend us and stand on our side. Except for Jordis, they had all been told about the events at Helgen in Last Seed, and Jordis got a quick summary right now.
"I do appreciate your bravery," I told them, "but this will not work in our favor if we encounter a large detachment of Imperial soldiers. Even with our skills and Fiona's shouts, we'd get either killed or arrested if we met a larger detachment of Imperial troops. I believe that we need to get back to Whiterun as quickly and safely as possible, but the direct way may be risky; surely General Tullius will expect us to take the main road via Dragon Bridge and Rorikstead. So, what about being sneaky instead?"
"Like what?" Jordis wanted to know. I got my map out and explained:
"Breya stated that we should be safe in the hold, so that we can travel to Dragon Bridge as expected. From there, everybody will assume that we will cross the bridge and follow the road south to get into Whiterun hold as quickly a possible. We would have to travel through Hjaalmarch for a day or so, and this will be the chance for the Imperials to catch us. I bet that a courier is already on the road to warn the troops there, and I would not even want to rely on the general keeping the 24 hour truce period."
"True" Lydia admitted, "but what else can we do? If we go east, towards Morthal, this is still Hjaalmarch and thus Imperial territory, and we may not be able to pass through and get into The Pale quickly enough. We might be quick enough to divert south to Labyrinthian before we reach Stonehills, but honestly, this is not a safe road; I'd prefer not to go there if I have a choice; frost trolls and other dangerous creatures are said to lurk there, and there have been some reports about strange ghosts as well."
"Agreed, Lydia, and adding to that, the Imperials might get the idea to block the road there just in case. But maybe we could ask Safia and Sabine from the Red Wave if they could sail us to Dawnstar?"
"Antonius, this is certainly an option, but if Tullius learns about that, and he only needs to recount the ships in the harbor to find out, they will never be able to come back here, and their business will be gone."
"True, my Thane. Though, if this was our only chance, they might still be willing to do it."
"Yes, and I appreciate that. However, I was thinking about something else; what about we go west or southwest from Dragon Bridge?"
"There is no road west from Dragon Bridge."
"Exactly, and that's my point. We could try to get through the wilderness, follow the river, and get to somewhere near Karthwasten, maybe, to enter Whiterun Hold somewhere west or northwest of Rorikstead."
"But The Reach is also under Imperial control!"
"Yes, it is, but this is not where they will expect us to go, and they will have a harder time finding us off the roads."
"Maybe, but the general could send many troops to search there nonetheless."
"With the Civil War going on, can he really afford to spend the effort and redirect so many soldiers just to get a hold of us? Can he afford to spread his troops over a large territory just to search for us? Jordis, the area southwest of Dragon Bridge is not like totally flat, right?"
My new housecarl promptly replied:
"No, it is not, my Thane. If we go there, troops should have quite a hard time finding us there, indeed. I like your idea, and you have a good point. General Tullius can certainly alert his troops in Hjaalmarch to block the road east of the bridge, but it is very unlikely that he even has enough soldiers around here to do much about the area between Dragon Bridge and Markarth. Most soldiers are in the holds closer to the Stormcloaks, and the few here are mostly training and such. No, going in this direction sounds good to me, and it might even be some kind of adventure. We sure don't need to stay on roads."
"My Thane, you have been quiet all of the time" Rayya now chimed in, addressing Fiona. "What is your opinion?"
"I do not know much about military options, and I don't know much about any of those roads and the potential dangers on and around them either. So, if the others agree on a proper solution, I will just go along."
Lydia nodded and agreed: "As much as I have learned to not trust the Khajiit՚s plans, this seems to be a reasonable one for a change, and Jordis knows the area well, I assume. We don't have much of a choice, and staying on the main roads is too risky."
"Well, than this seems to be decided. At least there are enough of us to allow us proper watches at night. And do not forget: We tell everybody who asks that we are going to Whiterun via the shortest road, as we are in a hurry. Also, although we have told the general that we'd leave Solitude tomorrow morning, it might be better to hurry to Dragon Bridge today, just in case."
There was agreement on that, and thus we got all of our belongings, which was not too much, as the housecarls had sold almost all of the collected loot in the city's market area, and headed off towards Dragon Bridge. Breya actually went with us; as she told us, the Jarl insisted to make sure that no harm came to us while we were in her hold. We arrived just after dusk, got rooms at the inn there, and while we enjoyed our evening meal in the taproom, we told everybody who talked to us that we were in a hurry and hoped to get to Rorikstead on the next day. To add to the confusion, I pretended to have a confidential chat with the innkeeper, telling him that this was a ruse and we'd need to obscure our route of travel; rather than going towards Rorikstead, we'd head in the direction of Dawnstar, and I even hinted that we might leave early in the next morning; I made sure that he got fully paid and added some extra money for breakfast already to save time for the next day. I could not be sure if this worked, but hopefully nobody would expect us to go southwest instead, and any Imperial soldiers searching for us would hopefully focus on the wrong direction. Naturally, as we did indeed want to leave early, we did not linger much after eating and headed towards our rooms; I shared with Janina again.
I managed to wake up about a couple of hours past midnight, and I sneaked out of the house together with Hanni and Nanni. Nobody was outside except for the hold guards, and I woke the others when I had made sure. We had been forced to trust Breya, and she had promised to make sure that the guard post at the southwestern town entrance was going to be deserted for a few minutes when we needed to pass there. When we approached, she stepped ahead and gave a signal to the guards, who decided that they all needed to empty their bladders behind the bushes at the same time. After a very quick good bye to Breya we passed the gate and were gone in the darkness; the guards would be able to confirm truthfully later on, if somebody asked them, that they had not seen anybody get out during the night.
A night walk in Skyrim! How many times had I done that while playing, and with standard settings it was not so very much challenging, as the darkness was not so very dark. As a matter of fact, one of the moons was out, the larger one – I still failed to remember if this was Masser or Secunda – and even without my night eye sight, we were doing fine. Fiona was a little bit scared, but we had four capable housecarls with us; this should be more than good enough if we encountered bandits or dangerous animals. Lydia walked right next to her, and Rayya and Janina covered our flanks; Antonius was our rearguard, and I was leading with Jordis at my side; she knew the area best. Hanni and Nanni were also very excited to be out at night, and they would sure provide an early warning if anybody showed up anywhere close to us.
For some time we kept close to the narrow river, and I was not sure if we should stay on this side or cross to the other one. Jordis had been in the area before, and she suggested to stay here for the time being; on this side, there were fewer hills potential enemies could hide behind, and this was better for our safety. Despite the low temperature and the uneven ground I enjoyed the nature hike, and for the first few hours we had no encounters whatsoever; just before dawn a pack of wolves approached. They were apparently undecided on a course of action; the pack was a large one, about a dozen or so, but there were seven of us. I shouted 'KAAN', and the wolves let us pass in peace.
It was quite entertaining to see Jordis' face when I had shouted. She had not known that I could do that, and I quickly explained about it. I guessed that I had now grown in her respect. From now on we needed be more careful, as she sun started to rise, and we could easily be seen by anybody who might be around. On the other hand, we should also be able to see potentially approaching enemies early enough. And indeed, we actually did meet somebody soon; a group of three people approached from the other direction, and we had no easy way to avoid them. All three of them wore robes, and soon I recognized cultists, but was unable to see if they were Miraak cultists or Dragon Cult cultists. When they saw us, they got closer, and one of them spoke:
"Dragonborn, you have been warned before, and you refused to listen and to obey. Now, suffer the consequences!"
I had already assumed violence coming up, and I had been hiding behind a rock for a few moments to get my crossbow ready. As soon as the first cultist prepared a spell in both of his hands, with the obvious intention to dual cast some kind of destruction spell right into our group, I released my first bolt and hit him right in the chest. The other two cultists were shocked for a moment, but reacted quickly, jumped to the side just in case, and released a quickly prepared lightning spell of their own almost simultaneously; the shock jumped to several of my companions at once, so it was probably some kind of chain lightning. Fortunately, the two of them had not had a chance to fully charge the spell, so while Antonius, Rayya and Lydia got down to the ground, they did not seem to be severely injured. Fiona was apparently getting angry now, and when the first cultist got up from the ground, despite the bolt in his chest, and stood next to his colleague for a moment, she shouted 'FUS RO' right against the three robed men. This was nothing they could withstand, and the injured cultist died instantly, while the other two found themselves on the ground ten meters further back. In a few seconds Janina was over there and killed them as well.
"Wow, what was that?" Jordis asked.
Before answering her question, we checked the injuries the three housecarls who had been targeted by the chain lightning had suffered, and fortunately a little bit of magic could heal them fully in short time. I shuddered, though, when I thought about the damage a fully charged chain lightning spell might be able to deal when cast by an expert mage.
Once the healing of our housecarls was taken care of, we sat down for a quick break to rest and eat something, and Lydia explained how we had met cultists on the way back from Valtheim Towers some time ago and what they had claimed.
"So, they really say that the Dragon Cult has risen again?"
"So it seems, yes. We have not encountered Dragon Priests yet, but it appears that some people at least support Alduin the World-Eater and don't like the idea of a Dragonborn opposing him. Rather than just threatening her, they also warn and fight all who support her, but we do not know if they have the resources to actively fight us. If they have capable mages, like the ones we just encountered, we need to be prepared, though."
"Indeed, that spell one of the cultists cast was quite a powerful one!"
"It would have been a very powerful one if he had had the chance to fully charge it. Our quick reaction prevented that, fortunately."
Thinking about the cultists, I recalled that we had encountered Dragon Priest cultists a few times, but no Miraak cultists yet; did that imply that Solstheim was still quiet and Miraak would start to annoy the Dragonborn at some later time only, had she been lucky and they had not found her yet, or something else? I did not know, but maybe it was a good thing that not all of the potential issues, threats and tasks showed up at the same time.
While we walked onward, I had a chance to observe Jordis from time to time. Since she had been assigned to me, events had been happening quickly, and this hike into the morning was a good opportunity to take my time looking at her and finding out what and how I felt about her. She was clearly a strong and pretty blond lady, but while I had assumed earlier that such a blond and athletic lady might trigger some affection in me, that did not really happen. Sure, I found her attractive, but that was about it. My own feelings, or rather the lack thereof, confused me a little bit; after all, I had been looking forward to meeting Jordis for some time, and I had expected some more feelings from myself. On the other hand this might not be the best time for romantic entanglements; maybe when I was back in Whiterun safely I could take more time thinking about that aspect of my life. She might have noticed that I looked at her a few times, but she misinterpreted my thoughts and said:
"I guess that you are as confused as I am while General Tullius reacted like he did, right?"
"Yes, this worries me, indeed" I admitted; fortunately she had not caught me ogling her too much, and I appreciated the opportunity to direct my thoughts in a different direction. "He should at least have acknowledged the Dragonborn and her importance for the province and all Tamriel. On the other hand, he was either unable or unwilling to state specific accusations against us."
"I may be wrong, but this smells like Thalmor involvement" Lydia replied. Antonius agreed, and I wondered if we'd ever learn about that; time might tell.
About one hour later we met something which resembled an old road, and we started to follow it. When we passed a small hill to our right, though, a shout was sounding from the side, and Lydia, who was guarding our left flank, barely had the time to get her sword out before she was attacked by a warrior woman. Rayya and Janina quickly helped her, and right when I started to look around to see if more enemies were coming, an arrow embedded itself in my arm. With my improved armor it only managed to nick my skin, fortunately, and I saw an archer on a rock raising a bow and preparing to send more arrows our way. Hanni and Nanni were racing off, I ducked and conjured Spirit, and Antonius also climbed on a rock to see how many more enemies might be approaching. Janina followed the saber cats, and when she came back after helping them to defeat the archer, she reported that there was a small cave entrance behind the hill. Jordis explained that the two enemies who had attacked us were Forsworn, and this was, as much as I could recall, my first encounter with them.
The warrior lady who had attacked Lydia was sparsely clad in parts which I was not sure were more clothes or armor, but considerable parts of the body were left uncovered anyway. I did not know if they were related to Nords or some other race, but they obviously also had at least some resistance to cold. Naturally we had to assume that more Forsworn might be hiding in the cave Janina had seen, and that gave us options. Rayya suggested:
"We could enter the cave, conquer the inhabitants, and hide in there for the day, to travel on during the next night."
"Yes, but this would delay our progress" I objected.
"And there could be a Forsworn Briarheart or Shaman in there. In a narrow cave we might not be able to fight them in a group and risk serious injuries."
We discussed options for a few minutes and agreed to move on, ignoring the cave. Following the rough path further downhill, we were led to an area where two small rivers met and merged into one. The road itself continued southwest of us and turned further west and even northwest, which was not the direction we wanted to go. Thus, we crossed the river and got to the western bank of the south branch for now; from there, we cautiously proceeded south. So far, except for the cultists and the Forsworn, we had not seen a single human being, and specifically no Imperial soldiers. However, just when we had passed the start of a road which led uphill and in westerly direction, my eyes spotted movement further south on the river bank, and when I looked again, it looked like a group of at least twenty people, with military looking armor. Instantly I told my companions, and we quickly hid behind rocks. The suspected Imperials moved north; they might not specifically look for us, but we had to assume that they at least knew about us, and rather thank risking a fight, we decided to circumvent them and follow the road which we had just passed. As we did not know if the Imperials would come here, we looked for a place to hide in, but rather than finding a small cave or so, we noticed the entrance to something like a small fort.
"What is this place?" Fiona asked.
"I am not sure, but I don't think it's an Imperial fort" Jordis replied. "Look, there are no signs of Imperial occupation anywhere."
"Shall we look inside then?" I asked.
"Probably better than waiting out here and risking to be seen by the soldiers" Fiona nodded.
Most of the others agreed as well, and we quickly opened the large wooden door and stepped inside. While we had expected some courtyard or so, the entrance area turned out to be a short passage with natural rock walls, which soon opened up into a larger cave like room. As soon as we got there, we heard fighting noise, and we stopped before proceeding. When the noise ended, we slowly moved on, with weapons drawn, and in the light of some braziers and candles we saw a warrior examining the body of a dead frostbite spider. We had not made an attempt to be stealthy or so, and the man noticed us and addressed us right away, without showing any fear:
"Hello there, good to see you. I am not fighting humans, but spiders here. Look at that one, and it actually seems that this place is full of them."
"Spiders? More than one? But that's just normal frostbite spiders, right?"
"Ha! That's what I thought, too, but every one I've encountered has been enchanted or the like; can you imagine that?"
"Enchanted? Wait, you can enchant spiders? Really?"
"No, I did not think that one can, but there must be somebody who managed to do it anyway. Look, I'm getting out of here. Normally, spiders just make my skin crawl, but magic spiders? Blech. Have fun with the others!"
He waved and was gone soon. Enchanted spiders? That had raised my curiosity, and I could not recall that area from my game times. As we did not dare to leave again so soon – the soldiers might be right in the vicinity outside – almost all of us were in favor to investigate, and as the spider the adventurer had been examining was already looted, we looked for a way to proceed. The only way forward appeared to be a passage at one end of the cave, barely wide enough for two people side by side, and we cautiously followed it. After the expected turns we had to step down some stairs, and then we passed a few shelves and barrels. A few turns later the passage was blocked by a set of metal spears, but Rayya found a lever to lower the obstacle in a corner. A large table in a corner had another one of those dead spiders, and when I tried to loot it, it generated a small flame cloak around it, hurting my hands; I needed to apply healing to myself. The now open passage led us to another narrow corridor, which soon opened up into a large cavern. There were some mushrooms growing in the corners, and the way forward was blocked by metal spears again, but this time not just a single set, but several sets crossing the opening in various directions. In the center of the room there was a group of four large levers, with all of them pointing away from us, and braziers on both sides illuminated the setup.
"Is this going to be like in Bleak Falls Barrow, and when you get the combination wrong there are poison arrows going to hit you?" Fiona asked.
"I don't know" I replied. "Has anybody seen that kind of setup before?"
It looked like nobody had, and I searched the entire cavern to see if there were any hints around. I had not seen such a puzzle before, and I did not know if we were supposed to find a hint first or just experiment. Alas, no hint, like pillars to turn, was found anywhere around, so that experimenting was apparently required. I could not even recall that fort, the enchanted spiders and this specific puzzle from my many hours playing the game; either I had never been here or my memory failed me once again. What to do?
[Author's Notes: Apparently Balu had not visited this place when playing the game.]