Brother Jauffre was not having a good day.
First, that Khajiit this morning, tearing into the courtyard like the hordes of Oblivion themselves were after him.
The poor bay had barely clattered to a halt before it's rider practically flung themselves from the saddle and then, before Jauffre could even call out a greeting, he'd crossed the courtyard in seemingly the blink of an eye, and saddled Prior Mabel's old nag. His shout of alarm and protest fell on deaf ears- no sooner was the saddle secured than the broad shouldered Cathay swung up onto the old horse's back and spurred it into movement, kicking up clouds of dust and leaving both his former mount and Jauffre standing in the courtyard.
The poor animal was in a right sorry state, heaving and near frothing at the mouth, eyes practically rolling in terror. Judging from the familiar armor he wore, the tack his steed bore, and the frantic urgency at which he moved, Jauffre could only guess that he was likely some greenhorn the Legion employed as a messenger who'd somehow mistaken the Priory for a wayrest.
Either that, or a highwayman who got lucky and was looking to make a quick getaway.
If he'd been a younger man, he'd have torn off after the fool.
And now… this.
"You- I don't-" he pinched the bridge of his nose and rubbed at his temples, reigning in the urge to sigh. "I don't understand. You were supposed to be in Kvatch. What in Talos' name are you doing here?"
Martin gave him a strange look, still smiling that same almost feral, wild smile, and rocked backwards on his heels.
"Jauffre," he said as he tilted his head, tone serious though the smile still lingered, one hand still pinning the door firmly in place despite Jauffre's best efforts. "I've never been to Kvatch in my entire life."
The last thing he needed was another Septim who had discovered their surprising knack for throwing wrenches in plans.
"Why would you think I was in Kvatch, Jauffre?"
The man stepped closer, putting one foot on the threshold, and Jauffre came to the uncomfortable realization that if Martin decided to go through the doorway then he very well could not likely stop him.
"Who told you that?"
"Well, I-" Jauffre floundered for a moment, realizing that he could not very well tell the man he'd had agents following him nearly from the moment he'd been born—not now, not with the Emperor and his sons; his legitimate sons—sitting less than three feet away.
"Well, I had some-" Martin leaned forward, one eyebrow quirking upwards, and Jauffre almost gave in to the impulse to reach for the sword hanging at his side.
"I had some... some friends in Kvatch, and—you know your father asked me to look after you-" The smile twitched ever so slightly upwards-and Jauffre fought to keep his alarm from showing on his face. "Before he ...passed, and I asked them to look after you for me. 'Tis ...strange that they should tell me otherwise."
Strange was putting it mildly. Jauffre was tempted to have them discharged immediately, if not outright arrested. Interfering with a direct order from the Emperor himself was grounds for being charged with treason.
"... If what you say is true and you truly never went to Kvatch." He added pointedly after a moment, half-hoping that the young man would then laugh and declare it all a grand joke. When a heartbeat passed, and he did not, he narrowed his eyes and said—with what he hoped was passable as an air of fatherly concern rather than the alarmed suspicion that it was; "Where have you been, then?"
Martin's head tilts minutely in a bird-like fashion, and the grin returns. "Oh, you know, here and there." He answers noncommittally, and then steps forward again, clapping Jauffre's shoulder warmly. The non-answer only further raises his alarm.
"A word of advice?" He says, and then continues on before Jauffre can get a word in edgewise. "Find better friends." he says with a laugh and a knowing grin, in a tone that Jauffre supposes is meant to be a light-hearted jab, but in the light of the man's alarming behavior instead comes off as vaguely ominous and threatening instead.
Martin's gaze flickers from his face to the princes huddled in a weary cluster, and Jauffre feels a stab of cold fear at the sheer intensity of the way he stares at them—he has no idea why or how Martin came to be in a position to do as he'd implied, even temporarily or by chance, but he knows that even that time, brief as it was, had the potential to be dangerous. Martin's whole life has been carefully structured—or so he had thought, Jauffre admits to himself, thinking back to the troubling revelation only moments before—and it would take only the slightest misstep, the merest... chance for the metaphorical house of cards that made up the boy's life—and the lies and half-truths it had been so delicately constructed from—to come crashing down.
Even if the young man survived it, Jauffre wasn't sure he'd even be permitted to pick up the pieces, such as they were.
His duty was first and foremost to the Emperor and his heirs, after all.
Jauffre grimaces. He knows that look, that cunning, knowing smile that Martin gives as he watches them- and he ill-likes seeing it on young Martin's face, even less than he had in seeing it on the man's sire in their younger years. It is a look that is uniquely, utterly Uriel, and until this moment it has never been more plain and obvious just exactly who Martin's father was—a fact that Jauffre is sure he is not alone in seeing.
It is a miracle that the princes have not yet noticed it as well.
No, he thinks, at last recognizing the background tingling buzz of illusion magic for what it is, more than a miracle. He stares at Martin's face, squinting, unsure of what he is searching for, and then freezes in silent alarm as he realizes abruptly that he's no longer looking at Martin, but instead slightly to the side. He checks again, just to be sure, and sure enough, his eyes slide away from the man's face the moment he tries to make any closer inspections.
A glamor. Martin is wearing a glamor.
Nothing anywhere near the strength of a full glamor a spy or assassin would wear as a disguise—the man's face was still clearly very much his own, of course. There was simply just enough illusion magic there to suggest to the mind of an unwitting onlooker that there was nothing interesting there. Just enough to discourage close investigation. But who…?
And how? And why?
The fact that he was wearing one at all was highly troubling in and of itself.
Martin lingers there for a moment, and then to Jauffre's dismay, makes to step forward into the Priory. Jauffre, already moving to block the doorway in front of him, is so unnerved by his prior realization, frantically scrambling for an excuse to justify turning him away from the main hall of the Priory, that he doesn't quite realize that he is being bodily moved out of the way until Martin is already stepping past him into the Priory, the hand on his shoulder gently but firmly steering him to the side and then holding him there for a moment.
Martin casts a judgmental gaze about the building, frowns, and then, with a grunt, nods, patting Jauffre's shoulder as he steps further into the main hall. "There are …too many windows, and a..." he winces. " A lot of corners to hide in—but it is…. defensible—not the best, granted, but we'll just have to make do, considering the present lack of alternatives."
He sighs, and then turns to fix Jauffre with another of his intense looks that have seemed to become the new normal while he was… whenever the young Septim had gotten off to after apparently giving his agents the slip. "We'll have to bring the herdsman in, I'm afraid, can't leave the poor man out there alone—is anyone else outside the main hall right now?"
"I- no, but Prior Maborel was going to trim the candles and pray in the chapel in an hour or so, why?" and then, he blinked, and tacked on. " 'Lack of alternatives—it's defensible?' What on earth are you talking about, my boy? Why would we need to defend the Priory-"
"...Alright." Martin said, turning instead to fix the Prior with a steady stare in lieu of answering Jauffre's questions. "Prior Maborel, was it? Don't. Don't go outside. In fact, none of you do. Not safe."
"Not safe?!" Jauffre interrupted, irate at being ignored.
Martin paused in the middle of undoing his cloak clasp, swiveling around to stare blankly at him. "Jauffre. There were coordinated attacks—assassination attempts, just carried out against the Emperor of Tamriel and all of his known heirs,"- and, oh, Jauffre does not like the way Martin's face twists as he says this, nor the slight emphasis he places on 'known', not at all. "-that failed, by the way, thanks to the lucky intervention of yours truly and a few loyal friends—less than half a day ago, and you're asking me why we would possibly need to defend this place?"
"Four separate attacks, carried out by armed individuals all wearing the same standardized armor and weapons—this was organized, Jauffre, and you cannot tell me it wasn't, I was there, I saw them. An organized effort for premediated murder of the highest ranking, most powerful men in all of Cyrodiil, on a scope and scale that goes far beyond the lazy half-assed attempts of a few disgruntled nobles or so, and-" he trailed off with a shake of his head as he shrugged off the cloak, folding it over one arm, and Jauffre blinked in surprise.
Armor. Martin was wearing armor—and not just hastily looted from the corpse of an enemy, no, this was clearly tailored to fit the man, well-kept but scuffed and worn in a way that indicated the armor saw frequent use, and the casual, steady way he moved about in it spoke to a man well acquainted with battle.
"I don't know, Jauffre, you tell me—Do you honestly think they won't try again? We are in danger, old friend. All of us are. This wasn't just a coup, or a failed, short lived rebellion by petty nobles—no, mark my words, this is a war, a war whose horrors are only just now beginning to unfold."
Martin has spent an inordinate amount of time near the door, naked sword in hand, slumped in a position that looks as uncomfortable as it is impractical. He appears to be, for all intents and purposes, asleep.
Jauffre is just considering whether it is worth the risk of a soldier's greeting to wake the young man and direct him to a bed when Martin solves the dilemma for him, jerking upright and stumbling to his feet.
"We've got company." is all he says, and scowls at the princes' incredulous clamor, holding up a hand to forestall any questioning chatter.
And then Jauffre hears it. The clatter of hooves on cobblestone, a horse's nicker, the jingle of armor and tack. The room quiets instantly.
Just one? Martin mouths at him. Jauffre nodded in confirmation, and then Martin frowns, and abandons his place at the door to edge towards one of the windows. He cautiously pulls the heavy curtain aside a fraction, trying to get a look at the new arrival—to no avail, as moments later, there is a purposeful, heavy knock at the door.
Martin is somehow, improbably, there in front of him, already unlatching the locks on the door. He'd moved so fast that Jauffre wouldn't be at all surprised if the man had used a recall spell of some sort.
"Jauffre!" a vaguely familiar voice cries from the other side of the door, muffled by the heavy oak. Martin's face blooms into a bright grin. "Open u—Open the thrice damned door!"
"Shut up!" Martin bellows back, voice tinged with badly-hidden laughter. "I'm doing the best I can!"
The voice mutters something that sounds vaguely like "You're not Jauffre." and then, as Martin throws open the fourth lock, there is an indignant scoff. "How long is this going to take?"
"Oh, just five more or so." Martin says cheerily, leaning against the door with that wicked, knowing smirk that makes him look so much like a younger Uriel that Jauffre's heart feels near to stopping. His hands linger on the last lock.
"FIVE?!" The other all but roars, evidently incensed by that sentence, and Martin's unrepentant grin widens. "BLOODY BLADES AND THEIR THOUSAND-FOLD LOCKS—YOU'RE JUST AS BAD AS ESBERN-" Martin hurriedly flings the door open, stepping aside and smartly avoiding the figure that crashes to the floor.
"Hello again, my friend." he says, leaning over to inspect the dark mass of armor and fur that lies crumpled on the floor.
With a grunt, they roll over and sit up, the armored figure resolving itself into the broad-shouldered form of the Khajiit from earlier that morning.
He swipes locks of hair out of his face, bright green eyes narrowing, and then, with a half-grin, half-grimacing snarl that is all teeth, climbs to his feet.
"Martin." he rumbles in acknowledgement.
The strange expression cools into something like amusement as the dark-furred Cathay flicks one ear in faux irritation. "You were supposed to be in Kvatch."
"As I just told our friend Jauffre here; I've never been to Kvatch in my entire life." The door was slammed shut, and the Cathay turned to watch with one skeptical eyebrow raised as Martin redid the locks. "Don't know where you're all getting that idea from."
Notes:
Been a while. Found some more stuff I had written and thought I'd post it. There's more written for this loop sooooo ...potential special multi-chapter loop?
Battle Ready!Martin and Sheo!champ troll jauffre and co.
Champ and Martin have both gone through some. unusual loops. [if you saw me vaguely imply that they did a 4E skyrim loop with martin asthe LDB at some point, no you didn't because. yes.]