It takes three days of Mayenor mixing her own, admittedly stronger, healing potions before Vilkas agrees that she's strong enough to travel. They leave the cave at dawn, both eager to escape the dank darkness of the underground. As they pass through the bandit camp on the horses Vilkas had retrieved shortly after Mayenor's injury, they can see the toll of the past week: the corpses scattered across the ground are bloated, and many show signs of wild animals snacking on them. The pair hardly pays them any attention as they steer their mounts toward Falkreath.
"How are you feeling?" Vilkas asks for the umpteenth time as the sun rises higher in the sky. She's traded her ruined cuirass for a bulky studded one she'd taken off one of the corpses. It's too big for her tiny frame and shifts uncomfortably with her every move, but she'd insisted she wear it.
"I'm fine," comes her irritated reply, just like every other time he'd asked. He doesn't say anything else, then, sinking into his own thoughts. After their encounter three nights ago, things had more or less gone back to the way they'd been before, if a little less unpleasant, and he's been trying to figure out her intentions ever since. For his own sanity, he's decided to put it down to a type of damsel-in-distress reaction: she'd been grateful to him for saving her life, and she'd tried to repay him the best way she knew possible. He's looking forward now to getting back to Jorrvaskr and putting the whole ordeal behind them. She'll stick around just long enough to get her portion of the bounty, then disappear for who knows how long, and he'll be left to savor the memory of her lips.
The majority of their journey is undergone in silence. Even when they stop to rest at Lakeview Manor, they eat without a word to one another. Instead, Mayenor disappears into another room with Rayya, leaving Vilkas alone with his thoughts until she returns and grunts that it's time to head out. They get back on their horses and don't stop until the silhouette of Dragonsreach looms on the horizon.
After leaving their steeds with the stablehands, they begin the trek up the hill to the city gates. He watches her in the sinking daylight: though they hadn't let up their pace since dawn, she looks remarkably healthy and only a little travel-weary. As they pass through the marketplace and climb the steps to Jorrvaskr, the afternoon sun catches on the gold of her dirty, blood-splattered hair, and he quickly looks away from her, scowling.
How close he had been to making that Angel of War his lover.
The familiar creak of the heavy mead hall doors sends a wave of relaxation across his tight shoulders: after a week of confusion and terror and just a little bit of bliss, he's finally home.
"Well, well. Looks like I owe you a drink, Athis." Their entrance is met with Torvar's drawling voice and Athis' look of amused surprise.
"You're both alive?" He asks lightly, standing from the long table to circle the pair. "All limbs and fingers accounted for, too." He tsks and grins at Mayenor. "I'm disappointed in you. I thought for sure you'd leave him for bandit bait." He tosses Vilkas a teasing smile, then moves to clap Mayenor on the shoulder. Before his hand can make contact, Vilkas catches his wrist, and Mayenor twists away from him, cradling her injured arm warily. Athis' red eyes widen with surprise.
"She's injured," Vilkas grunts, releasing his Shield-Brother and pushing past him to take up his usual seat at the table. A glance back results in him catching Mayenor's gaze, and she nods almost imperceptibly in thanks. He ignores her, and in an instant, Ria takes the spotlight.
"You're hurt?" The girl coos, brows furrowed in worry. Mayenor's jaw tightens in instant annoyance.
"Hardly, Ria. It's nearly healed already. Just a scratch, anyway. Now, do you know where Aela is?" Mayenor's voice carries the overly-patient tone that frequents her conversations with Ria.
"Right here." Mayenor and Vilkas both turn to see Aela emerging from Skjor's bedroom; she nods at them both. "Let's get you two debriefed and paid. This job's already dragged on longer than I anticipated."
Even Ria doesn't argue as Mayenor moves away from her to follow Aela toward the stairs; after pouring himself a tankard of mead and giving his brother a friendly clap on the back, Vilkas follows suit. They gather in Aela's study, shutting the door behind them, and Vilkas settles against the wall to allow the women to take the room's two chairs.
"Well?" Aela prompts, looking between the pair. "You're alive, so I assume the bandits are dead?"
"Quite," Mayenor replies, a familiarly savage glint in her eyes.
"Good. Any particular reason a three-day job lasted almost two weeks?" She narrows her eyes at the pair knowingly. "Could you not even cooperate long enough to finish the job?"
"There were complications," Vilkas retorts, nursing his tankard.
"They weren't just bandits," Mayenor adds, quickly seeing that he's not in a talkative mood. "The bandit camp was just protection for a necromancer, probably a rogue from the College. We dealt with him, but I was injured. It took a while before I was well enough to travel." Immediately, Aela's brows knit together in concern.
"Injured? How badly?"
"It's nothing to be concerned with, really," Mayenor assures her, and Vilkas snorts.
"Nearly cut her arm off," he corrects, and Aela gives Mayenor a sharp look.
"He's exaggerating—"
"Let me see."
"It's really not a big deal—"
"Let me see."
Sighing and grumbling, Mayenor fumbles with the fastenings of her unfamiliar armor, then lifts it over her head with a wince. Aela swoops in to examine her shoulder, and even Vilkas glances at it out of habit. He watches as Aela runs her fingers along the wound and has Mayenor move her arm in all sorts of ways; when she's done, she returns to her chair with pursed lips.
"What's that look?" Mayenor asks distrustfully, replacing her armor.
"It's healed up fine," Aela assures her quickly. "It'll leave a hell of a scar, but you'll be fine. It's your sword arm, right?" Mayenor nods in suspicious affirmative. "You're going to have to re-train it a bit to get it back up to strength. The muscle was cut in an odd way, and you'll have to teach it to stretch and support the weight of a sword again."
"Well how long will that take?"
"A few weeks, minimum. Njada had a similar injury once; if you stick around, I'm sure she'll be happy to help you whip it back into shape. If you decide to run off on your adventures, though… Well, just don't go fighting any dragons with that arm any time soon."
While Mayenor grumbles in her seat, Aela turns to the strongbox that sits atop her desk.
"Jarl Siddgeir hasn't sent his payment yet, but it should be here shortly. Here's your cuts." She tosses two bags of coin into the air; Mayenor and Vilkas catch them deftly, simultaneously weighing their rewards in-hand. Mayenor grins and stands.
"Right, well. I'm off to spend this. Ta!" With a cheery wave and a flash of teeth, she's gone. In her absence, Aela turns to Vilkas.
"Anything else to report?"
Vilkas considers for a long moment, thinking of all the things he could tell Aela: that Mayenor had risked her life with a foolhardy plan, that he had spent almost a week of sleepless nights questioning the point of a life without the hard-headed girl in it, that he had come so close to fulfilling his every fantasy but had turned her away because of some romantic notion of how their first time should be. Instead, he shakes his head.
"Alright, then. You're dismissed. Get some rest—and for the Divines' sakes, clean yourself up. You both look like death." Though Aela's voice carries a teasing tone, Vilkas scowls as he turns toward the door. Halfway out, he pauses and looks back.
"Aela?"
"Hmm?"
"If you ever put me on a job with her again," he looks over his shoulder to stare Aela dead in the eye, "I'll kill her myself." With that, he slams the door shut behind him and heads for his quarters.
After he cleans up and decides against shaving—somehow the jungle of scruff across his chin feels almost like a souvenir from his night of bliss—he returns to the mead hall's main room. As he'd expected, most everyone has disappeared to their own enjoyment by now: Torvar is, he's sure, at the Bannered Mare pestering the local women; Ria, on the other hand, is likely in the training yard with her bow drawn in shaky hands, trying to improve her hopeless aim. And Farkas, always reliable as the cycles of the moon, is resting in a chair away from the main table and the fire.
Vilkas drops into a chair across from his brother, snatching up the tankard of ale that had been waiting for him.
"Rough mission?" Farkas asks while Vilkas takes a moment to relax. He looks around the mead hall, eyes lingering on weapons mounted on the walls, the never ending supply of food on the table, the burning chandelier of candles hanging from the ceiling, and, finally, his twin "Something like that," he grunts in return, downing his tankard and refilling it.
"Well, you're home now." Farkas nudges his brother with his foot. "And she's already gone, out of your hair." Vilkas's head snaps up.
"Gone?"
"Yeah. To wherever the hell she goes." Farkas chuckles and raises his tankard in a toast. "To a few months of peace without that whelp!" Dumbly, Vilkas touches glasses and drinks.
If Mayenor was gone—if she had really left—then that was it. He had blown his only chance to feel her heartbeat race beneath his hands, and now she was on her way back to that damned redhead in Riften. Vilkas imagines her arriving in Riften under the cover of dawn and slipping into Brynjolf's bedroom just as the sun made its appearance in the sky. He imagines the thief blinking awake as her hands trail down his chest; he can almost see that infuriating grin spreading across his lying lips.
He gulps down the rest of his mead.