Chapter 13 – Boom Town
The four met up with Chancellor Ocato in the courtyard of the Arcane University, where they still believed Ariel and Halisman were being kept. The grave look on Ocato's face made Camri feel distinctly uneasy as he approached him.
"I have bad news and good news, Camri" Ocato said.
"Hit me with the bad news first, Chancellor"
"For some reason, the Emperor believed that the safest place for Ariel and Marlus would be the Imperial Prison. And it's very heavily guarded"
Camri's heart skipped a beat. "And the good news?"
"If you get them out, Jauffre will pull some strings and make it officially someone else's fault – you technically have legal immunity in this case. And if you want more good news, I've got some extra help for you"
Ocato beckoned over a Battlemage who was standing at the base of the Arcane University's great tower – a Breton of about sixty years of age with long, flowing grey hair and a huge bushy beard, a thick blue hood pulled over his head.
"Captain Larand Pasqual of the Imperial Battlemages" the Breton said, offering his hand to Camri.
"The Battlemages are the only division of the Imperial Legion who are under my command, not the Emperor's," Ocato explained. "Pasqual and his men will be accompanying you to Skyrim"
"Nice to meet you, Captain," Camri said to Pasqual. "I'm sure you will be invaluable to us"
Camri introduced Pasqual to Assurrani, Latta and Staada.
"One more question, Ocato" Camri asked. "Who incarcerated Ariel and Halisman?"
"Kanvius" Ocato said under his breath. "Be prepared for the worst"
Camri swore to himself.
"Captain, do you know where the sewer entrance that leads into the prison is?" Camri asked Pasqual. The Breton nodded.
"Take Latta and Assurrani there. You two, go into the prison the back way. It's an obvious path. Wait until you can hear me and Staada in there before you attack"
"You're planning an assault on the Imperial Prison?" Assurrani asked.
"What else did you expect from me?" Camri replied. "One last thing – do not kill any guards unless they attack you. I don't like killing men who are just trying to do their job"
Camri and Staada ran across the short bridge that linked the Market District to the fortified Imperial Prison structure. Two guards stood at the great gate leading into the prison – one made to stop the pair, but the other, recognising Camri and knowing that he was on an official quest for the Emperor, stopped his comrade. The pair kept on running, bursting through the door into the Imperial Prison.
--
Before any more guards could stop them, the pair sprinted across the courtyard and into the prison itself.
The warden, seated at his desk, looked up from his logbook and saw Camri aiming his bow straight at his forehead.
"Where's Ariel's cell?" Camri demanded. The warden, too frightened to speak, indicated down a gently-sloping corridor which ended at a rigid wood and iron door.
"Is that door unlocked?"
The warden nodded. Not missing a beat, the pair raced for the door. Once on the other side, Camri barricaded it shut with a discarded cell door, held in place with several loose stone bricks.
"Ariel!" Camri called.
"Down here!" came a weak reply, followed by the sound of a hand hitting flesh.
"Cover me" Camri said to Staada, who readied herself to cast a spell. Camri bolted down into the cellblock – it didn't take him long to locate Ariel's cell.
Kanvius and two other guards were inside it. Ariel was cowered in one corner, trying to fend off a Legion man who had been beating her wearing a pair of steel gauntlets. The other was restraining Halisman.
"Let them go!" Camri shouted at Kanvius.
"I will not go against the Emperor's orders" Kanvius said coolly, standing in front of the cell's door. "I would advise you to do the same"
Camri fired his bow, the arrow passing past Kanvius' head, missing by millimetres.
"A rare miss on your part, Camri" Kanvius said wickedly. But then, he turned around and realised that Camri hadn't been aiming for him. The Legionnaire who had been restraining Halisman was thrown back, dead, into the stone wall, Camri's arrow jutting from his eye. Halisman broke free and punched the man attacking Ariel in the temple, knocking him unconscious, then helping Ariel to her feet. At the same time, Camri knocked down the cell door with a powerful kick to its locking mechanism, sending the door, and Kanvius, tumbling into the cell.
"Camri!" Staada shouted as Camri heard the sickening sound of his barricade giving way.
"I've got you covered!" Camri called back as he ran back out into the corridor, loading another arrow into his bow and firing, nailing an approaching guard in the forehead as Staada crouch-ran down into the cellblock. Reaching Camri, she turned around and cast a bolt of lightning, taking down another guard.
Then, Staada was thrown to the ground by a tremendous impact from the side – a very pissed-off Kanvius. But then, Kanvius was thrown off her, as he was hit in the throat by an arrow.
Assurrani.
The Dunmer emerged from the cell containing the escape tunnel, motioning Camri and Staada to duck as he fired again, hitting a guard who was about to fire an arrow of his own.
"Go! The exit's clear!" Assurrani ordered as Latta ran out of the tunnel wielding her glass Claymore. Staada ran for the tunnel whilst Camri hustled Ariel and Halisman out of the cell. He took one last look at Kanvius, who was alive, but only just.
"Leave Kanvius to die" Camri said to Assurrani. "He does not deserve his end to come quickly"
Assurrani nodded and reached for another arrow from his quiver, but his hand clasped around thin air. Shit.
"I'm dry!" Assurrani shouted.
"Don't worry" Latta said, measured, as she stepped past Assurrani. A guard charged at her but she swung her sword horizontally as hard as she could, the glass blade cutting straight through the sword and shield that the guard had held up to defend himself.
"I would suggest not following us," Latta said to the guard as she turned around and made for the exit.
--
"Déjà vu" Camri said to himself as he emerged from the sewers, overlooking the ruins of Vilverin. After he had helped everyone out of the tunnel, he turned to Ariel.
"Are you alright?"
Ariel nodded shakily. She was in shock, and Halisman didn't seem to be in a much better shape.
"I'm sorry. If I had known sooner I would have come for you straight away" Camri said as he took a potion from his bag and let the pair drink it.
"I don't understand why we were treated like that," Halisman said. "If we're working for the Emperor, why did he let Kanvius treat us like that?"
"The Emperor probably knew nothing about it" Camri said. As he spoke, Latta and Assurrani emerged from the tunnel, unscathed. "Welcome to the world of Emperor Namiah Carius. He's not in control – his court is. He's just a figurehead – he's got no idea how to run the Empire. He got elected because he said the right things – things that his advisors told him to say which would get him favour with the people. The Emperor probably didn't even know that you two were in the jail, to be honest. The Chief Guard Captain handles things like that"
"Pontis? No, I know him. He's a good man"
"He is, but he's in Kvatch overseeing the retraining of the City Guard and rebuilding of the fortifications at the moment. His deputy is in charge at the moment… or was, until Assurrani fired an arrow into his throat"
"Kanvius was the deputy Chief?" Assurrani asked about the man he had killed without hesitation.
"Don't worry, no-one will miss him," Camri replied. "I'm hoping his job will be given to someone good like Itius Hayn. When all this is finished, I'm going to do something about the Emperor situation"
"Don't kill the Emperor, Cam" Assurrani said flatly.
"I'm not going to kill him. I'm either going to expose him as a useless fool or replace his little gang with people who know what they're doing. I know plenty of factors of the Septim dynasty"
Camri had loathed Emperor Carius ever since he had come into power. When a corrupt Imperial Legion General had begun a campaign to secure resource-rich lands in Black Marsh and Elsweyr, Camri was not surprised – before he learnt of the corruption, he merely thought of it as something that the Emperor would sanction. Whilst the Septim dynasty represented people and old money – riches tied up in land and ancestry – the Carius dynasty had to start over after most of the Septim dynasty's wealth was divided among its factors after Martin Septim's death. Part of the reason that Camri thought an overthrow of Carius was possible was that he knew many of the factors – owners of land and minor kingships from the Septim dynasty who now owned vast amounts of money but had nothing to do with it apart from have an early retirement.
"Anyway, back to more pressing matters" Camri continued. "It's time to launch the attack on the Throat of the World or whatever it's called. I'm going to go to the Cartography to see if they've got any maps of the area we can use. Falas, you should come with me to help me carry all the scrolls out. Latta, can you go to the Arcane University and tell Captain Pasqual to assemble his men at Weye at noon tomorrow?"
Latta nodded.
"Camri…" Ariel said quietly, holding her wrists up. They were still bound by the magicka-sapping wristbands. Camri produced the Skeleton Key and quickly picked the lock, causing the bands to spring open and fall to the ground. Camri cast them into the sea.
"Thanks" Ariel said, smiling. "Not just for this, but for getting us out…"
"Anytime" Camri replied, placing his hand on Ariel's shoulder.
"What do you want us to do, Camri?" Ariel asked. Camri handed Ariel the smaller of the two sacks of gold he had taken from his stash.
"Market District. Buy anything you think we might possibly need"
--
The six all went their separate ways – Camri and Assurrani towards White Gold Tower, Latta towards the Arcane University Island and Ariel, Halisman and Staada into the Market District.
As Camri and Assurrani walked through Green Emperor Way, Assurrani spoke.
"So, you and Staada…"
"How did you know about that?" Camri replied, slightly taken aback.
"Latta pointed it out to me," Assurrani said. "She told me that Staada has that look of a satisfied woman!"
Camri laughed. "She was amazing. I don't want to get too involved with her, though"
"Why not? It wouldn't do you any harm to settle down one day, you know"
"Well, when we were back in the Shivering Isles, Staada told me that the portal is only going to remain open until Sheogorath's affairs in the mortal world are finished. So, as soon as Staada takes the stone back to the Shivering Isles and Latta runs Mannimarco through with her sword, that'll be it – the portal will close and I'll never see her again"
"Same with Latta. I'll miss her when this is finished. For the daughter of a wayward mystical sorceress and a barking mad Nord she's quite a character – the sort of person you'd want around all the time"
"If she becomes a Daedra she'll never be far away," Camri said, before he turned to Assurrani and flashed a wicked grin at him. "Just don't go running off to some plane of Oblivion to try and sleep with her!"
Assurrani's face went slightly red. "I'm not going anywhere without you, Camri"
Camri was momentarily taken aback by Assurrani's words, and their sincerity – despite meeting under circumstances where they had been trying to kill each other, Assurrani and Camri had become inseparable friends.
"Good," Camri said. "Because I've been having doubts about whether this is what we were brought together for…"
"What do you mean?"
"I don't see why we were needed in this quest. Everything we've done, Latta could have done on her own. And the Emperor knew that she was going to be involved. I think he might have told us another lie"
"It does seem a little convenient, actually" Assurrani said. "Perhaps the Emperor just wants to keep us occupied for the time being until he knew what we were up against"
"Or maybe he wanted to keep us in training. Your marksmanship has improved tenfold since the days of the Marsh Spirit"
"Thank you, Camri," Assurrani said genuinely. "So, if this isn't what we were brought together for, what's going to happen next?"
"Whatever Ariel saw is going to come true" Camri said quietly. "And from what she's told me it's going to be a lot more serious than the Oblivion crisis or some wizard doing a Dagoth Ur and binding himself to a magical stone. She saw the end of the world. It's going to be the big one. And the fact that Ariel saw it gives me the horrible feeling that we're going to play a part in stopping it"
--
Whiterun, Skyrim, two days later
After a long and arduous journey, two large horse-drawn caravans pulled into the small mountain town of Whiterun. One contained Camri, Ariel, Assurrani, Halisman, Staada and Latta, and the other Captain Pasqual and six other Imperial Battlemages.
Camri gazed out of the window of the caravan, which offered a stunning view over central Skyrim, a part of the world that Camri had never seen before. Spectacular snow-capped mountains and dense pine forests surrounded the small plateau that Whiterun was built upon, a homely-looking town made up of ornately decorated wooden buildings similar to those found in Bruma. And looming over everything else, to the south-west, was the imposing presence of Snow-Throat Mountain, which was simply the biggest natural formation Camri had ever seen in his life – significantly taller than any of the other mountains in the area, and possessed of sheer rocky flanks, too steep even for snow to permanently settle upon.
It was early in the morning, and an uncharacteristically clear day – through a gap in the mountains to the south, the summit of White Gold Tower could just about be seen on the horizon. The perfect time to attack.
"We should continue on foot from here," Camri said to the assembled party as he paid the two caravaners. "It's a few miles due west to the river – once we get there, the assault begins"