A/N: Once again, thanks to my beta. I've changed the transport system slightly so that there are horses and carts. It just seems to make sense that horse and carts would be used for trade etc, even if the player character is mysteriously barred from using any.
Cyrodil, Heartfire 3E 432
At the meeting the night following the heist, Dovyn had announced he planned to travel to Anvil to sell the goods. Travelling to another city directly after a heist was both prudent, as it let the guards calm down before returning, and also necessary, as the only guild fence in the city was Fathis Ules, a rich Dunmer, and not even Dovyn was up to his standards of customer. It was said that only those who have had direct correspondence with the Gray Fox did.
Lettie had never been to Anvil; the furthest from the city she'd been since she was five was Cheydinhal. It had been a nice enough place, except for the count's idiot son wandering around trying to be heroic. But since there was no regular thieves' guild fence in the town, she'd never been back. But Anvil was a docking town; surely it would be full of exciting people and exotic merchandise.
Her discovery of the ever-valuable skooma during the heist meant that Dovyn was in good spirits in regard to her, so she had little trouble convincing him to bring her along. He didn't seem to realise that to bring Lettie meant to bring Erica, though. There'd been many jokes about the two being 'joined in magicka' and one being powerless without the other. In many respects it was true.
So now the two of them were sat at the front of an old horse and cart that Dovyn had managed to hire, Lettie on Erica's knee and Florrie beside them with the reigns. For a clumsy teenager, Florrie was remarkably un-clumsy when it came to steering horses, which inevitably meant that he spent the entire journey with the job. Dovyn and Marc were in the back, speaking in alternately loud then hushed voices.
They were moving along the Gold Road, which stretched all the way from the city to the coast. Lettie, who had never been to this part of Cyrodil before was astounded at the sheer volume of plant-life she could see from her perch. The West Weald was definitely something for Imperials to brag about. If you wanted to boast about architecture and trade, you'd speak of the Imperial City. If you wanted to talk about multiculturalism, Bruma, with its Nord population, or Morrowind-proximate Cheydinhal would be prime examples. Or if you wished to brag about the history of the province, then you'd cite the various forts and Ayleid ruins dotted about the place.
But when it came to hugely varied plant life, with soil perfect for both the humble tomato and the fairly illusive nightshade to grow in abundance, the West Weald stole the limelight from even the agriculturally driven Nibenay Basin. The group had stopped off at Skingrad about an hour previously, and both Lettie and Erica now had a lapful of grapes and tomatoes, much more than the money they had should have been able to buy. Well, Tamika and Surile and Undena wouldn't miss them, with the amount of crops the Skingrad soil yielded.
As the cart made its bumpy way towards Kvatch, Lettie was inspired by the sight of the many different plants by the road to show off by explaining in great detail the other alchemical facts she'd picked up from mages and shop owners about the city.
"Did you know," she said through a mouthful of grapes, "that everything what can be made into a potion has tons of effects, loads more than most people can actually use? You have to be really good at alchemy, so you know what amounts to use and what to mix it with and how to cook it, that way you can get those secret effects out of them. Like grapes," she held one up as if to demonstrate, "I heard grapes can make it so you can walk on water. I mean, you can get it from eating them, but it'd go away after like a squillionth of a second. It'd wear off so quick, you'd be drowning before you noticed it!"
This was followed by a bemused silence on the others' part while Lettie had her mouth too full to speak without spraying. Then Erica, who'd been watching the West Weald go by, said: "Hey Lettie, this'll be the furthest you've ever been from the city, right?" She bounced her on her knees like one would a small child, but surprisingly Lettie didn't mind this in the slightest.
"Yeah, s'pose. Never been out of Cyrodil though. Not you, though. You've been to Skyrim before."
Erica shifted on her seat and grimaced, "Yeah, well I'm never gonna go back there. You'd have to tied me up and gag me. And tie my legs together so's I couldn't kick you. And strap my head down so's I couldn't nut you." By the end of the sentence she was laughing at the absurdity of it, the brief moment of unease forgotten. Lettie laughed with her.
"Still," she said more thoughtfully, "At least you come from somewhere. I ain't never been to High Rock."
"Yeah, we just come from Bravil, and that's a dump!" Florrie remarked from his driver's seat.
"Yeah, but you don't come from there, jus' like I don't come from Skyrim. That's just where we was. Where we are now is what's 'portant." Erica rested her head on Lettie's shoulder, face turned towards the world rushing past, and added almost to herself, "We don't need to come from anywhere but the Waterfront."
This was quite deep by all of their standards, and it struck Lettie that Erica could be quite wise when she wanted to, it was just because she said 'portant' instead of 'important' that it wasn't always obvious. She probably had a lot more wise things in her head than Lettie herself did, she just didn't always find the words. Lettie had just learned to echo people like the two blue-clad mages.
She opened her mouth to somehow try and convey this line of thought, but was interrupted by a jolt as the cart went over a stone. Florrie jumped in his seat and pulled on the reigns to stop the horses from panicking, and Erica's head snapped up from its place on her shoulder and she gripped Lettie tighter with her strong arms to stop her from falling the short distance between them and the road. The moment of ruminating was broken fully by the appearance of Marc from the back of the cart.
"What happened just then?" he queried, resting one hand on his brother's shoulder to steady himself while stood on the moving cart.
"Drove over a stone, it's fine," came the immediate answer, Florrie's eyes fixed on the road. His mop of greasy red hair was ruffled carelessly by Marc's spare hand. With the brief moment of fury the other night still firmly lodged in her mind, Lettie slid off Erica's lap and crawled into the canvas-covered area where Dovyn was still sat. Erica followed suit, and Marc took it as a sign he could have the seat.
Dovyn was sat with padlocks of varying difficulty, practicing his lock-picking spells. The two girls watched him, Lettie sat cross legged and Erica with long legs out-stretched. The aging Dunmer didn't seem to be in any hurry to look up from his work, so Erica spoke first.
"D'you think I could learn to crack locks like that?"
"Depends," said the Dunmer, pausing to reseal the lock he had been working on, "Can you do any other spells of alteration?"
She nodded: "I can protect myself with this spell I got from Calindil."
"Yeah, works like a shield, 'cept there's nothing there. I can too."
"Oh she's great at magic! She had tons of power in her."
Dovyn seemed doubtful. "Well, you can have the biggest magicka in the world, but you have to know how to use it to your advantage, especially with locks."
"But we can!" Lettie insisted.
Ganged up on by the two eager girls, Dovyn finally said, "Well why not?" He set the lock to one side and then carefully picked out two more. "I think these are the easiest. Tell you what, let's make it a competition: first to open their lock gets…hmm, gets this." Dovyn fished out an amulet from one of his many pockets, assumedly one from the heist. It was silver, and the chinks of light peeping through the tears in the canvas bounced off it and gave it an air of value. However, both girls knew that all that glittered was not gold and all that stunk was not dung, so the thing that really caught their attention was the engraving of a unicorn on one side.
"Unicorn…that's luck, right?" said Lettie.
Dovyn nodded. "Don't get carried away, mind, I reckon this can't be more than a base amulet. Might get you a couple wins at the arena, if you can sneak it past the bookmaker."
"Cool!"
---
There was considerable debate over who got their lock open first. While Lettie, after several tries, managed to manipulate the flow of magicka until heard the gentle click of tumblers sliding into place, Erica had only moments ago managed to crack open hers in a powerful surge of sheer frustration. However, Dovyn said it didn't count.
"But why didn't it count?" Erica demanded, worked up over the apparent unfairness, "I got the lock open, didn't I?"
"Yes, but I told you, that was easy. The springs were not as tightly wound, and there were fewer tumblers. A better lock would never have given in so easy. Oblivion, it wouldn't have given in at all. Besides," he said before she could protest, "Didn't you hear the cracking sound it made? You'd wake up a whole house!"
Erica didn't take kindly to the dig at her noisiness, so she grabbed the newly sealed lock and went to sit at the back of the cart. Lettie, who would always take the side of her friend, said sternly "You shouldn't've said that. She doesn't like people finking she's not a good thief."
Dovyn, who found being told off by an eleven year old more amusing than intimidating, said "You should learn to respect your elders."
Lettie knew the answer to this. "I'm a Waterfront girl. I'm gonna say what I fink." She eyed the amulet still held in Dovyn's wrinkled hand.
Dovyn laughed, a far realer laugh than Lettie had ever heard from him. "You keep thinking like that, girl."
He handed her the amulet, and Lettie ducked to avoid getting her hair ruffled. Why did people keep doing that?
Leaving Dovyn to his locks, she crawled over to where Erica was still sat. She was scowling and rigid, yet she still had the lock in her hands and was trying to open it again. Lettie suddenly found herself strangely inarticulate.
"You ok?"
"Mm-hmm."
"He's jus' a grumpy Dunmer." the words felt wrong as soon as she said them. Judging by her expression, Erica thought so too. "Ok, no he's not. He's Dovyn, and he's brilliant. But that's the point: everyone who's good at something finks everyone else is rubbish at it."
Erica smiled, as she had smiled while they were talking with Florrie before, and put one arm around Lettie, pulling her into a hug. "Thanks." she said simply, meaning 'thanks for trying to cheer me up, even if it's obvious that you're trying'.
Feeling on firmer ground again, Lettie held up the amulet and said "Look, we pract-tic-cally drew. I fink we should share it."
She dropped it in Erica's lap. "Besides, I'm a thiefborn, right? I've got enough luck already."