"Mother speaks! Yes, Mother speaks! Ooh, she spoke to you! I wish she'd spoken to me…"
Cicero danced from one foot to the other, slapping his hands together as his voice relentlessly increased in pitch. He'd charged into the dining room, loudly spouting the same wild declarations as Lucien until everyone had forgone rest and work to see why he was making such a fuss. Once more, everyone was standing around the dining room, the majority of them looking a lot like they didn't want to be.
"Quiet, Cicero!" Astrid rubbed her temples with her fingers. "So… You're the Listener?"
Kedi gave a small nod. "Apparently so…"
Astrid folded her arms and eyed Kedi warily. "And how are we supposed to know this for sure?"
The Breton frowned. Astrid had been like a mother to her, but now she questioned everything Kedi did. It seemed her paranoia was getting out of hand.
She held her hands out, almost in defeat. "How can I prove it to you? I heard a whispering in my head." Kedi shrugged. "It grew louder, demanding I listen to my mother and embrace her... You know my own mother is dead." Her tone had more than a hint of accusation with that last sentence.
Astrid's eyes narrowed. "Perhaps then, it is a message from Sithis regarding your parents. We need proof."
"Cicero, how do you know the Night Mother spoke?" Babette asked; her sweet childish voice a drastic change from the bitterness that now leaked from Astrid and Kedi.
"Ooooh! Mother glowed, she did! She did! Perhaps I can… show you?"
Babette looked to Astrid, who nodded. "I suppose that would have to suffice. Can the Night Mother speak to the Listener anywhere?"
"Ooh, no! No, no, no! The Listener must listen! A Listener cannot listen if a Listener cannot hear! The Listener must be near!"
Astrid sighed and rubbed her head again. "So it must be someone within the Brotherhood, and if no one else heard anything…" She glanced at Kedi. "… We shall test it, to be sure. But that can be taken care of later; we still have an Emperor to kill. Have you gotten anywhere with that poison?"
Gabriella nodded. "Nock helped us retrieve some rarer ingredients and instructed us on their uses. Babette found some recipes that will be helpful in putting yesterday's bounty into use. We should have something perfected by tomorrow; tasteless, invisible, but very deadly."
"Good. Nazir? Festus? Any luck on finding this cook?"
"It seems he's been hiding out at the Nightgate inn for many months now." Nazir's deep baritone bounced off the walls, making Festus' old voice seem even frailer in comparison.
"He appears to be an orc, of all things." The old wizard cackled. "An orc cooking for the Emperor! It's ludicrous."
Astrid frowned at Festus. "You're sure your contacts can be trusted?"
"Oh, yes, yes, most definitely. It may be hard to believe, but most things are, these days, wouldn't you say?" Festus grinned. Kedi swore he was getting madder by the day. Perhaps he was spending too much time with the jester… All the same, she remained silent; she no longer seemed to hold Astrid's trust.
"Where is this inn?" Astrid asked.
"I believe it's located within the Pale hold, near Dawnstar. It's an old building, passed down through generations, situated on the precipice of a fairly deep lake." Babette explained. "I stayed there once, a few decades ago. I may have been responsible for the inn being passed down… earlier than expected." She grinned, her teeth gleaming in the orange light of the torches burning on the walls.
"Then you should remain here." Astrid folded her arms as she began to think. "The Pale… The weather will be bad, which makes that lake a death trap. It does, however, provide us with an excellent place to hide the cook's body." She turned to Kedi once more. "You'll go. Take this… Lucien with you, just in case, and return here to report once the orc is dead. Remember, you must take his possessions, but remain unseen above all."
Kedi bowed her head. "Understood." The Breton met Nock's alien gaze. "You should remain here, and assist Babette and Gabriella with the poison."
The Bosmer frowned, but nodded after a moment of contemplation. However, when Kedi left the room to prepare, Lucien wasn't the only one following her.
