Azuyia had been amused at the cultural shift from the more jaded urban quarters of Cyrodiil to the farmlands and wild areas of Skyrim. Seems to her there had been a bar somewhere in a small town not far from Falkreath. She had probably heard a quip from a saucy server about her fancy getup or a soused patron making a pass, and sat trying not to look like she was taking mental notes, this burned into the wall next to the knife-throwing target and a display of antique riding harness pieces, underneath one of those purpose built heraldic letters the capital likes to issue in sentimental tour guides, an R about the size of an Imperial shield splashed with the entire color wheel :
Ride your horse well, come tell us your tale
Leave your horse brass, we'll fill up your ale
Toss your meat pie, we might kick your tail.
Skyrim for Nords who ride and who draw
Fletchersgate welcomes you to live our law
Come to the 'R if dragons you saw.
Tell us your tale and leave us your tiding
Tell only the deeds you should be abiding
Or horse your bull and just keep on riding.
Some towns even had minor ordinances about inflating war stories. These bylaws seemed more crowd control to relieve the municipal burden of hearing out the two sides of a drunken brawl, those ones where one type of swagger tells another it's out of line, and tended to involve a small fine and elocution from a small panel of veterans in the town hall room devoted to eagles and memorabilia. Petty courts simply had no time to separate the two legionnaires who busted up someone's brand new cedar over the one who had not actually, personally, taken the Thalmor emplacement singlehandedly, nor did the Kynareths place much priority on the resulting broken jaws over the ailments people suffered through the natural aging process.
Blizzards, droughts, livestock epidemics, raids came and all needed every neighbor. Essentially, part of the fiber of Nord harmony was a sense of the value each product or service every citizen provided, however inglorious or commonplace. Azuyia had seen a prudhomme in rich overseas cloth stop to help an embarassed vendor right a barrel of aged cabbage after his mule had kicked it, before it completely turned over and lost its top to dump all over the ground, and guess what? That barrel of fermented cabbage is one more item in the area food supply. Hmmm, she had thought on witnessing this, a Thalmor in even the muddiest outpost might have had that vendor's head dunked in the spilled barrel if a drop of vinegar had splashed too close.
Not that Nords were always courteous or cheerfully glad to meet chipper young Bosmer novices out to discover the world. Well? Who are you? And why are you out on the moors trying to get yourself killed?
Azuyia wandered out of Deolli's house for a walk later in the morning. She took the wolf pelt that had been drying over the table and chair ever since she had arrived in Fletchersgate. Stopping a little ways down the street, she felt why Deolli had given her that smirky look just as she started out away from the front yard. This pelt was difficult to carry in an armful out in front, and couldn't really be bundled well on one shoulder (and she hadn't thought to find a cord of some kind to wrap it up somehow). Sigh, yep, didn't learn this one in college either. She pulled the pelt up behind her in a cape and held it across her shoulders with both hands closed, feeling a little warmth reach her cheeks as a few more villagers pointed and tapped each other on the arm. It was only down the first street and a right, then a walk on the raised boardwalk in front of the open cartwright's workshop and the milliner's storefront that she reached the gate to the spread out forge grounds. She needed the one hand to open the gate, so she threw the pelt over one shoulder and held it tightly underneath, pushed the latch, and walked in to the baked clay and gravel surface of the outdoor part of the smithy.
She walked over to Temur at one of the workbenches and let the pelt slump down her arm and held it draped over the crook of her elbow.
"Hey there," she began with a smile.
Temur was hitting a plate of silver with a cross peen hammer. "Hello," he said, looking up with the hammer paused on the metal surface. "More sightseeing?"
"No," she beamed, "actually, I wanted to talk to you about tanning."
"Not today. I've got work to do."
"Oh I know," she said, happy to be out talking to people for once since her sickness, in the fresh air just out and about, "maybe when you get a chance you could teach me about how to use this? I'd love to know how to use wolf pelts."
Temur smiled as he hit the silver. "Plan on doing the lone wolf thing again, I see," chuckling. "Don't count on Deolli standing over you for three more days if you do. She has five children, three about your ... well, three married and two getting on that way. And her husband," he looked at her askance, "died serving in a ranger battalion east of Markarth."
Azuyia let her head drop and looked at the ground a moment, then looked back up at Temur. "Okay, okay. You too? Do I have to listen to ... "
"I am making," he interrupted, placing the hammer on the bench next to the silver plate and pulling a dirty cloth from his front apron pocket, wiping his hands, "a fruit plate for the jarl's daughter on commission for her wedding in a little less than three weeks. This," he said, lifting the piece of silver and holding it vertically, then placing it back on the bench, "is to hold frozen Argonian cherries. And it will pay me enough to put a down payment on a house."
"Temur, I just want to learn."
The Breton wiped his hands again, and placed them in the front pocket of his apron. "Tell me, wild one, why I should waste time teaching you my stock in trade when I could be making money for my wife?"
"Well, I could help you around the shop?"
Temur snorted and smiled. "Oh ... that's rich."
"Hey, really!"
"And what do you plan on doing around here, hmm hmm? Demonstrating your exalted craft on some unsuspecting fork? Embedding an automatic tie on the latest fashion in scabbards?" He laughed and walked past Azuyia to a door in the smaller of two sheds near the smelter, opened it, and disappeared inside.
She threw the wolf pelt down on the ground and followed him in. Temur had a couple of terracotta jars open and was sorting through them.
"Alright. I get it," she said, annoyed, "you and everyone in this village is going to tell me what a softhanded little dork I am for collecting nirnroot without a tank bodyguard. Just get it over with!"
Temur had his back to her and did not turn around. He did, though, place his hands on the table. "How you choose to die is your business, Bos, but this is my business and my time, every minute of every day at that table out there, is valuable. I— "
"I understand that," Azuyia interrupted.
"No ... you don't," he said, turning around and leaning against the table. "See, the closest I, my wife, our friends, everyone I know here get to rolled pieces of vellum and bound pieces of paper with all that glorious stuff is a few vacation trips in our entire lives. If the gods grant us the peace and time aside for a carriage to Falkreath where we can stay at some house for a week and sleep till nine, stuff our faces with sweets and roll in afternoon delight we might care a quarter-septim to see a buncha frilly paper under glass cases, and hear some ponce talk about them. Then we take our commemorative wooden medallion for the next thane on the back, happy that we have been kulchured, and get on our way."
"Man ... "
"What? Expecting me to perk up at the possibility of helping you get your smithing ribbon?"
"I am not expecting advanced metallurgical ... "
Temur snorted and laughed some more. "Advanced metallurgical," he mimicked.
Azuyia stopped. "I know ... I will only ... be a complete ... beginner."
"Damn straight, pointy," he laughed.
"No need to be rude."
Temur's smile subsided. "You are not the only Bosmer here," he said, "but we work for a living. You don't."
"Is that so? And you don't think college mages do anything at all to help in the war effort?"
The Breton's forehead wrinkled and his face pinched. "Name ... one."
"We," and at this Azuyia tried to find words. They stood there in silence long enough to notice the sound of someone else's voice.
"Hello? Hello? Shop open?"
"Be right there!"
"I ... I don't know how to explain it," Azuyia tried, "but—"
"Let me know when I'm smart enough to understand it," he said, pushing past her with his shoulder roughly brushing hers.
She stood there in the shed wondering what to do.
