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I was interested that evening to learn that Anuriel, the Bosmer steward of Riften, was the local East Empire Company's representative.
"It's an open secret that Anuriel's on The Company's payroll. It's how she came to be here: She was a buyer for the mead the city makes. People in power noticed her talents and placed her hands on the Jarl's leash. It's not a hard job, Jarl Law-Giver couldn't govern her way out of a brown burlap sack," Aerin explained to me while we ate an early dinner at a canal-side tavern. "All the real affairs of the Hold are handled by Anuriel or dictated by Maven. It wouldn't surprise me if they coordinated their efforts to exploit Laila's ineptitude."
An idea began to form in the back of my head, "Would proof exist of that kind of corruption?" I wondered aloud while looking up at the ceiling.
Aerin shrugged while wiping his mouth, "If there is, it's in Anuriel's possession. They don't talk to each other directly so far as I can tell."
"So it's not worth hitting up Maven?"
He snorted, "A waste of effort. That old bitch keeps her hands cleaner than a surgeon's."
I set my bottle of mead down and looked at him, "Does anything get by you?"
He shrugged, "Knowing who the untrustworthy people are is a survival skill. Hell, I didn't tag along on Mjoll's 'patrols' for the moral support. I did it to keep her from getting shanked."
"And she has no idea?" I asked with disbelief.
He shrugged, "She does now."
I sighed and traced shapes in the spilled mead on the bar, "For what it's worth Aerin, I'm sorry she found out this way."
"That makes three of us," He said glumly.
Two black figures catted over the closely packed roves of Riften's market district after night fell. Once the four of us were sure we were going to different buildings, we parted ways.
Mistveil Keep utterly lacked the scale of Dragonsreach, the grandeur of the Blue Palace, the weight of the Palace of the Kings, or the invulnerability of Understone Keep. It was a small hall better suited to a town like Morthal or Dawnstar than a major city like Riften. The stone palace—hardly worth the label 'palace'—was a cheap, mean building full of cheap, mean people.
Aerin and I dropped down to Laila's balcony and pulled scarves over our faces. It took me a few careful minutes to force the lock on the door. Aerin led the way through the darkened chambers and into the hallways of the palace. A handful of guards patrolled at regular intervals, but Aerin's easy intuition led us around them without trouble.
The two of us padded into Anuriel's room. It was an austere chamber; featuring little more than her bed, a wardrobe, and a desk. With delicate movements, Aerin closed the door behind us and placed a wedge. In the meantime I crept over to the desk to begin reading.
The papers left on the desktop were of no consequence: just the day-to-day accounts and scribbles that are required to run a city for an indolent noble. Nothing in the lower cabinets she left unlocked were any different. There was a small drawer that Anuriel kept locked, however. I forced it with a gentle pop that I thought would certainly wake the Bosmer. Aerin ghosted over to her bedside, ready to pin her down if necessary. Thankfully, she just grunted and rolled over onto her back.
I grabbed the fistful of letters inside and opened them beneath a candle. The first two were love notes from Laila's personal housecarl. The man's use of language and imagery could make a sailor blush. The third, shorter letter was far more useful to me:
Dearest Anuriel,
It pains me that it's been so long since we last spoke. If I didn't know better, I'd think you were avoiding me!
It has come to my attention that deliveries from Honningbrew have escaped your vigilance. Further, I would remind you of your pledge to send a detachment of guards to escort my merchandise.
I understand that navigating your mistress's delicate sensibilities can take time, but the delays have gone on long enough! If my concerns aren't addressed and soon, you will find the line of credit you use in your arms-dealing scheme with the Summerset Mercantile Combine drying up.
Your cunning, tact, and grace make you well suited to your singular position and avail you to a tremendous profit. Provided you continue to serve my interests, I will look after yours.
I trust we will not need to communicate on this again.
-Maven
Aerin was poised over Anuriel as I crept up to her sleeping form. I decided to wake her with a line from a popular drinking song.
"Beware, beware, the Dragonborn comes," I sang softly into her ear.
She moved fast to sit up, but Aerin's hands were clamped tight over her mouth. Once we forced her back down, I shook off the cloth covering my face. I brought my antique elven dagger into her view.
"Are you going to be good?" I threatened her.
She stopped struggling at once. Aerin lifted his hands away. The Steward of Riften sat up slowly this time, clutching the bed sheets to her diminutive frame. She looked up on me with two large amber brown eyes filled with innocence.
She didn't fool me for a second.
"My spies thought you might be in town. You're not as short as I thought you would be," she taunted.
I kept a shallow smirk on my face. Secretly, I was getting tired of the Stormcloaks' 'Imperial Dwarf" jokes. Yes, most Nords have an inch or two on me; a very few have a head on me. That's not saying much.
"Using the Jarl's militia to interdict a private citizen's goods? Manipulating the Jarl's policies for personal gain? Profiteering on the sale of weapons from The Company's competitor? You've been a poor servant Anuriel," I said with casual contempt. I fanned myself with Maven's letter for affect.
"Don't tell me you went through all this trouble just to admonish me, Dragonborn," Anuriel replied with an impatient tone.
I let my face brighten, "Oh no Steward! I'm not here to censure you at all. If you want to undermine the authority of one of Ulfric's liege-lords, by all means go ahead!" I let my voice darken, "This is extortion."
The dim light and her sharp elven features served to emphasize the baleful look she gave me, "Name your price Imperial."
I waved the letter casually, "Just some information, Steward. Where do the moonstone weapons you buy come from?"
Anuriel rolled her eyes at me, "Would you believe the Summerset Isles?"
I frowned at her and flicked the incriminating letter in my hand.
"We warehouse them at The Company's offices in Windhelm," she clarified quickly.
I liked were this was going, "And are you the one actually buying the weapons or do you just pass the orders and money along?"
"Erikur handles the purchasing of course," She said as if I just asked a particularly uneducated question, "He makes the final orders with the SMC agents in Solitude and the weapons are run from their warehouses down the coast into Windhelm. The Company never touches the weapons until they arrive in Stormcloak territory. Really Dragonborn, smuggling isn't terribly hard."
I shrugged in reply, "Neither is blackmail. Where does the cartel drop off deliveries to the Rift?"
She smiled, happy to have even a small edge on me, "That I don't know. I let my distributors arrange that with the teamsters out of Windhelm."
I stood to leave, "You've been very helpful Steward. I'm going to keep this letter until I'm sure you aren't lying to me. If you're being honest, I won't expose you to your masters."
Aerin and I scarcely shut Anuriel's door before she screeched out the alarm. Every door in the castle opened to release a gauntlet of furious, partially dressed guards.
Aerin's forearm slammed into the neck of the closest guard. The man dropped like a rock as the two of us began to run back to the Jarl's chambers. I twisted around another guard, still struggling to pull on his trousers while holding a sword in one hand.
Running full speed, I ducked my shoulder and rammed it into the waist of one of the fully armed night guards. I could hear him suck air back in as I drove him hard against a wall where he collapsed. I grabbed the top of his helmet and smashed it against the wall for good measure.
In an eye blink Aerin and I were in Laila's chambers again. Her housecarl and sons were standing at the foot of her bead with swords drawn and shields high, preferring to stay between us and their Jarl. My friend and I bolted for the balcony door where we came in. Retracing our rooftop climb, the two of us didn't stop until we were sheltering on the orphanage's roof.
"You should get out to your boat as soon as you can," Aerin said while shrugging off his blacks and pulling out a set of street clothes from his pack. He opened a bottle of beer and splashed some of it on his clothes before taking several gulps and swirling it around his mouth.
I nodded my agreement, "Are you going to be alright Aerin? We just kicked a beehive!" The hue and cry was echoing through the canals and streets below.
He swallowed his mouthful actually laughed, "Really? Mjoll's henpecked husband, getting wrecked after she threw him out, broke into Mistveil Keep and assaulted the steward?" He held out his arm to me, "Ieago, this was the most fun I've had in years. Gods go with you."
I clasped his arm in return, "You're a clever son of a bitch Aerin. I hope you and Mjoll find every happiness."
With that I dropped down to the docks on the lake side of the wall. I ran hard while guards shouted at me, throwing off pieces of clothing as I went. Arrows clattered on the wooden planks around my feet or buzzed past my ears. At the end of the longest pier, I angled to the small island where Farkas was camped and dove.
The chilly water thundered around my ears as I held my pose. Weeds growing on the muddy bottom began to brush my face. I stretched out and began to swim, holding myself deep beneath the surface as long as I could.
I broke the surface with a gasp. Treading for just a second, I spotted the glow of a fire in what I figured was the correct direction. I swam over the inky blue-black water of Lake Honrich.
The far end of Lake Honrich came insensibly closer. My hands dug into gravel and I stood in the thigh-deep water. Adjacent to a nearby fire, Farkas's familiar silhouette grinned at me.
"You're going to smell like pond scum for days," he mocked with his gravelly voice.
"Laugh it up, brother. At least one of us can swim," I shot back as I crouched next to the grateful warmth of his campfire. "What have you been up to the last two days?" I asked before accepting a flask and a bag of dried beef from my friend.
"I've been stalking those Snow-Shod guys," He said happily.
The contents of the flask restored some of the warmth to my face. "Well?" I asked after the strong liquor's burning reached my stomach.
"They go around to five places. One of them had crates of weapons stashed there with a few guards in Windhelm colors. They loaded them up on their wagons and drove for the road west."
I tossed the half empty flask back and downed the remaining booze without a wink, "Between this and what I found in town, maybe Tullius will let me back into Haafingar."
On why Mjoll is angry at the end of chapter 13.
1: First and foremost, being a hostage is humiliating. Especially for someone like Mjoll who is accustomed to empowerment. The icing on the cake is that she gets to be the damsel in distress in front of the same man twice now.
2: I get the idea that while the signs were always there, and Mjoll probably knew in the back of her mind, she was never willing to put all the pieces together concerning Aerin's criminal past. And now she's been confronted with blatant evidence that he was once one of the people she looks on as her enemies.