A/N: As promised in the previous chapter, this one will see some sort of bonding between Ria, Ram-Ku and Lucia. It will also involve Braith, Torvar, and Moira.

It was a week since my parents had arrived, and subsequently returned to Bruma, and in that time, Torvar had returned to Whiterun, spouting nonsense about the temple of Dibella and a goat, before being collared by an irate Ysolda, who had started going on about an engagement ring he had bought and now needed to pay for. The drunken warrior had promised to go and retrieve the ring, seeing as how he had no memory of a fiancée in the first place. Ysolda had told him that he had better retrieve the ring, or she'd bring the matter to Kodlak, completely oblivious that Kodlak, along with the rest of the circle, was watching the proceedings with some amusement.

Also during that week, I had resolved to spend time with Lucia, getting to know her, as well as making sure that she was settling in alright. I needn't have worried, she was quite happy to spend time endlessly braiding Falin's hair, something that Falin wasn't especially happy about admittedly. She also helped Tilma cleaning up after the Companions, easing the old woman's workload considerably. The highlight of the week though, had to be when she was playing at being dragonborn with Ram-Ku.

I had woken up late one morning after clearing out a particularly large bandit camp with Falin the previous day, and upon entering the training yard had been greeted by the sight of Ram-Ku, with a curtain spread across his back to mimic wings, being beaten over the head by a wooden sword-wielding Lucia, who was shouting "Die, dragon, die." Much to the amusement of Athis and Vilkas, who had taken it upon themselves to cheer Lucia on. Ram-Ku on the other hand, did not look at all amused.

"Lucia. Ow! That hurts. Ow! Could you please. Ow! Stop hitting me with that sword? Ow!"

Lucia grinned down at him evilly, a grin that I swear she got from Falin, "If the dragon submits, then I will stop hitting him." She giggled. Ram-Ku groaned.

"Fine, I submit."

Lucia's fans cheered, "Hooray dragonborn, you showed that scary-looking lizard."

Ram-Ku growled at the reference to Lucia's insistence on calling him scary-looking lizard man, but was quickly distracted by Lucia wrapping her arms around his shoulders, and giving him orders.

"Well dragon, now you've submitted to me, I command that you give me a ride around Whiterun. Get to it."

Athis and Vilkas burst out in renewed laughter as Ram-Ku attempted to protest. Lucia, however was prepared for this. She brandished her wooden sword at him, "Perhaps the dragon wants a go at round two?"

I swear to all the divines that I have never seen Ram-Ku move as quickly as he did then, running around Whiterun with Lucia on his back, shrieking happily. Guards and passers-by alike looking extremely confused, although that might have been because he'd forgotten to take the curtain off, and still looked vaguely like a dragon.

By the end of the week, Lucia had gone on from playing ridiculous dragon based games with Ram-Ku to playing tag with Carlotta Valentia's daughter Mila, and Lars Battle-Born. Then she had introduced Mila to Falin's hair, which resulted in two ten year olds sitting around Falin singing random songs and braiding flowers into her hair. Falin was quite definitely not enjoying this, and was almost glad when Aela gave her a contract to remove a wild beast lair that was a bit too close to Rorikstead for comfort. You could see the smoke from clear across the plain by the time she was done with it.

I had been teaching Lucia how to read and write, seeing as how none of the others were mature enough, or had the patience to do so. Ram-Ku had turned up during the middle of one of the lessons and attempted to copy Lucia, but had given up when she started gently ribbing him for being worse than his daughter at something, but as I pointed out, Lucia was quite clearly a better fighter than he was, how else would she have been able to defeat him with a wooden sword? Needless to say, Lucia had found that to be immensely funny, Ram-Ku, not so much, he left muttering about how everyone was ganging up on him at the moment. I then spent the next half an hour playing some sort of intricate game with Lucia and Mila that seemed to involve vast quantities of string and a rhyming song that made absolutely no sense whatsoever. I was fairly sure that I had never played games like that when I was younger, but then I remembered that my father had been of the opinion that playing games in the street as a child was entirely undesirable behaviour in a young lady, so had forbidden me from doing so.

I then watched the two of them run off and join up with Lars Battle-Born, to play a game of tag on the streets of Whiterun. I turned to the practice dummy that had been designated as mine, and aimed a few warm up swings at it with my blade. I quickly lost myself in the training, and seeing as how the only other Companions who knew how to use one handed weapons with any proficiency were Athis, Liedan and perhaps Njada, and most of them were out killing bandits or something, I was left completely undisturbed for several hours, practising repetitive strikes and slashes until the dummy was rent in numerous places. The thing that drew me out of the training was Lucia returning to Jorrvaskr just as the sun was setting, her face and clothes stained with mud. I immediately wanted to know what had happened.

"It was nothing mama, just some games that got a bit out of hand."

I may not have been the most intuitive person on the planet, but part of Carlotta's parenting crash course had been how to tell when your children didn't want to tell you something, combining that with dealing with Liedan and Ram-Ku so often meant that I considered myself reasonably adept at telling when someone was lying to me. As Lucia turned to enter Jorrvaskr, I noticed a splash of red amongst the brown. Grabbing my daughter by the shoulder, I turned her to face me.

"Lucia, is that, blood on your face?"

She raised her hand to her face, pulling it away quickly when she felt the blood. Looking up at me, her face creased as she burst into tears, explanations pouring out of her. It appeared that the Redguard girl, Braith, had been bullying Lars Battle-Born for quite some time, and had recently decided to expand into bullying Lucia and Mila as well. Today, Lucia had tried to stand up for herself, but had been knocked onto the floor by Braith, cutting her cheek on an outcrop of rock.

Internally, I was furious, but I let no sign of this show on my face as I instructed Lucia to go and see Falin about getting the cut healed, and to go and see Tilma about getting cleaned up. Meanwhile, I set off to find Ram-Ku and to see with we could get anything done about Braith's bullying. I found him sitting in the main hall, drinking mead and laughing at Liedan's impersonations of Torvar, whilst the subject of said impersonations attempted to drink himself oblivious. It would appear that Torvar's erstwhile fiancée had been a hagraven, and that 'Uncle Sam' had been Sanguine, daedric prince of drunkenness and debauchery, which explained the strength of the alcohol, and the nature of some of the consequences.

I grabbed Ram-Ku by one of the horns, dragging him, protesting, to his feet.

"Ria, what the hell are you doing? That hurts."

"Shut up Ram-Ku. We need to talk about Lucia."

"What, are you regretting adopting her? We can't just abandon her Ria."

I was furious that that was the first thing he thought of, I in no way wanted to abandon Lucia.

"Don't be ridiculous," I hissed, "This is far more serious. Lucia came back from playing with Mila and Lars earlier,"

"Yeah, I know, she was covered in mud." He interrupted.

"And blood." I said, getting his full attention. "I questioned her some, and she told me that Braith's been bullying her, I want you to come with me and speak to Braith's parents. See if we can put a stop to this before it gets out of hand."

Ram-Ku grinned humourlessly, it was a grin that was all teeth and nothing else, it was the grin that he had used on my father, and having seen how effective that was, I didn't doubt that it would work now.

"So," He said, "Where does the little bitch live?"

A small part of my mind realised that bringing the 'scary-looking lizard man' who was also very hot-tempered, with me on a dispute of this level might be a very bad idea indeed. Unfortunately this small part of my mind was overruled by the majority that was just as angry as Ram-Ku was.

"They live in the Wind district," I told him, "Just past the temple of Kynareth."

"Well, what are we waiting for? Let's do this."

When we arrived at Braith's house, Ram-Ku pounded his steel-clad fist against the door with such force that some of the wood cracked and splintered beneath him. I heard people moving around inside the house, until eventually, the door cracked open, and a Redguard man peered out.

"Who is it?" He asked, tersely, "What do you want at this Divines-forsaken hour? Can this not wait until morning?"

I smiled at him, "No, Amren, it cannot. This is very important to me, and also to Ram-Ku." I gestured to the massive Argonian, that Amren had somehow managed to miss up until now. Now he had noticed him however, he did not seem to be able to take his eyes off him.

"Who is it Amren?" a voice called from inside. Amren turned his head to answer.

"Two of the Companions, Saffir, they say they've got something they need to talk to us about."

"Well tell them to go away, it's late, and they might wake Braith up."

At this Ram-Ku grinned happily, "That would not be a problem for us, in fact, that would be majorly beneficial, seeing as how Braith's the reason we're here."

Amren's usually dark skin paled, "You want to talk about Braith? What's she done?" Turning back into the house again, he shouted up the stairs, "Braith! Wake up! We've got some people here who need to talk to you." Then turning back to me and Ram-Ku, "I suppose you'd better come in."

The door opened up and we entered the small building, Ram-Ku having to stoop to fit his bulk in. A middle-aged Redguard woman sat at a small table, reading a book titled 'Feyfolken', then below in smaller lettering 'Book II'. A small girl, who I assumed to be Braith was walking sleepily down the stairs, rubbing at her eyes.

"What is it father, I was sleeping."

The response did not come from Amren, but rather, Ram-Ku, "Hello child," he hissed, showing off far too many of his teeth for either my liking, or Amren's.

"Hey, Argonian, stop that, you said you were here to talk, so talk."

Ram-Ku shrugged, "It's better than 'walking boot', I suppose. Fine, we will talk."

He attempted to sit down, but stood up quickly when the chair began creaking beneath his weight.

"So," Saffir stood up, hands on her hips, "For what reason have you disturbed our evening, Companions?"

I decided to take control of the conversation, rather than allowing Ram-Ku to offend Amren again. "I suppose you know Lucia?" I started.

"The little beggar girl always sitting around the Gildergreen?" Saffir interrupted, "Yes, I know her."

"Well, she is our daughter," I said, gesturing to Ram-Ku, an expression of confusion crossed Saffir's face before she realised what I meant. Ram-Ku didn't notice, as he was focussed on the expression on Braith's face, an expression that indicated she knew exactly why we were here. As I opened my mouth to continue, Ram-Ku beat me to it.

"She came home today, covered in mud and bleeding."

"That's awful, but I don't see what-'

"She said it was because Braith knocked her to the ground. She also said that Braith has been bullying her."

From the look on Amren's face, this was not surprising to him, "Are you sure, I mean, we knew there were some problems with the Battle-Born boy, but your daughter as well?"

"Oh yes," I said, "Apparently Mila Valentia as well, but neither of them have been knocked to the ground and bloodied. We just want you to be aware of it."

"And that next time, Lucia will be armed."

I turned to my friend and punched him, "Don't be stupid Ram-Ku, we are not giving a ten year old weapons."

He rubbed his shoulder, "No weapons? Fine, I'll get Falin to teach her magic, that should do the trick."

"Ram-Ku, we are not starting a war over this."

Amren coughed, "If you two could leave the domestic issues until you have left our house. What do you want to do about Braith?"

Ram-Ku grinned again, showing off his teeth, "Simple, keep her away from Lucia, if I hear of your daughter bullying mine again, Ria will take it up with the Jarl."
I was about to ask 'why me?', when I remembered what had happened last time Ram-Ku had spoken to the current Jarl of Whiterun. Then he turned to Braith.

"You hear that child? Touch my daughter again, and the Oblivion crisis will seem like a minor scuffle compared to what I'll do."

Braith looked absolutely terrified by his sharp teeth, and looked like she was about to soil herself. I punched the Argonian again. "Ram-Ku, that is not what is going to happen, and that is not an appropriate way to talk to a ten year old." Then to Amren. "I am very sorry for my friend's behaviour, I assure you that he will not be doing what he said he would, or I will be telling Kodlak about him." This last bit directed at Ram-Ku.

Amren nodded nervously, clearly eager to get the dangerous Argonian out of his house, "Thank you for telling us this, and thank you for the warning. If you don't mind, I would like to have a private word with my daughter."

We both nodded, and left the family to sort out their problems.

Upon returning to Jorrvaskr, I don't really know what we were expecting to see, but it definitely did not involve Falin sitting on Aela's lap, happily cuddling and kissing the red-haired Nord. Ram- Ku apparently was not expecting it either.

"What in Oblivion is going on?"

Falin broke off from kissing Aela long enough to flash a single sign in Ram-Ku's direction. You did not need to be a genius to recognise it as 'fuck off'.

Athis came over to us, "What does it look like, friend? I believe that they are both slightly drunk, but let them have some fun alright?"

Ram-Ku sat down heavily, "Fine, but I'm going to be talking to Aela in the morning." He looked back up, "Wait, where have they gone?"

I looked over towards the sleeping quarters, just in time to see Falin disappearing after Aela. "It would appear that they are going to bed together." Then looking at Ram-Ku, "Don't get any ideas, they might happy together, but you and me was strictly a one-off."
He held up his hand defensively, "Hey, whoa, I already explained that you're not my type, I have no intention of sleeping with you again. I just don't want Falin to get hurt, that's all."

"I'm sure Aela won't hurt her, and if it bothers you that much, you can sit outside their room, ready to burst in at a moment's notice." I immediately burst into giggles at the expression on Ram-Ku's face.

"Women, I'll never understand you."

"Don't try brother," Athis said, resting a hand on his shoulder, "Come on, let's get drunk and try to forget our troubles, eh?"

A/N: The author would like to point out that he does not condone drinking to try to forget troubles, and that is not how to talk to ten year old bullies. Seriously, don't do that.

As another note though, reviews really can affect the story. Falin and Aela was supposed to be one-off mistake, but thanks to a review from TheGreatJabberyJamie, that has now changed and they have an entire subplot devoted to them. So please, leave reviews and they may well end up affecting the story.

Also, I haven't quite finished with the effects of Sanguine yet, there are still a couple more to go, including one that I'm very proud of. I hope that you will enjoy them.