Kyra pulls the bedroom doors closed behind her as she walks out into the main foyer. Neloth and Frea rise from the benches surrounding the small stone reflecting pool set into the middle of the spoke wheeled design of the underground second floor of her manor.

"Kyra, please. Miraak's rising is-well it's not good. You're the only one who-" Kyra holds up her hand.

"I'll help, ok?" Neloth exhales in relief as he looks at Kyra, she nods her head over her shoulder and they walk down one of the hallways to the left and into the armory, Kyra pausing to unlock the double doors with a key.

"I do not understand if you're the Dragonborn, who must ask you to help us?" Frea asks as she looks around at the racks and racks of weaponry of all manner and origin.

Armor from Imperial standard issue to, what Frea recognized, as an ancient suit of Dwemer armor hangs on mannequins lining the far wall, bows resting on hooks, and the equipment required to work and tool them.

In the center of the room, lit by the glow of the fireplace, was a lone mannequin on a pedestal. A suit of hand made black armor sat upon it, a long black leather cape spilling down the back with a hood that hid the mannequins feature-less face. A simple steel and wooden shield clutched in its hand bore the emblazoned symbol of a dragon breathing fire, with arrows clutched in its talons.

"Oh, Frea um-Kyra, she is Dragonborn but see Kyra is well.." Kyra opens a cabinet and retrieves several faded yellow rolls of paper.

"Retired." Kyra finishes for him setting the rolls on the table as Frea looks at her.

"Retired?"

"Yes, as in this is not who I am anymore." Kyra presses her finger into Neloth's chest.

"And when this is done, I'm done for good understand? I told you seven years ago and I will tell you again. You people are on your own." She spreads the rolls of parchment out flat weighing them down with a bottle of mead from one end of the long table and an iron dagger from a box of them on the shelf beside it.

"Yes, yes of course I promise." Kyra sets two candles on the table and looks up at Neloth.

"All right Wizard, where do we start?"

Neloth leans over the table in thought for a long moment before he taps his finger on a point a little ways north of his tower, Tel Mithryn.

"We need to find out where Miraak has been. Where's your library?" Kyra points out of the door.

"Go back to the main foyer look to your right, second door to the left of my bedroom doors, end of the hall." Neloth disappears as Kyra looks at the mark on the hand made map, Nchardak.

She looks at the symbol beside the name, a Dwemer ruin. Kyra pops the top off the bottle of mead she was using for a paper weight and takes a pull from it offering some to Frea, leaning back down over the map of the island resting on her forearms.

"So how exactly do Dragonborn retire?" Frea asks before she tilts up the bottle and takes several large gulps.

"Everything you ever loved is dead or is in danger of ending up that way. You make some gold, you kill a few people then you run... and you never look back." Kyra states simply as she looks up from the map at Frea, her blue eyes flickering in the candlelight.

She takes the mead bottle back from Frea as Frea looks at her without a word. She turns up the bottle taking a long swig before slapping the bottle back down onto the table.

"Your collection is simply exquisite." Neloth looks up from the book he was flipping through as he sets three more down on the table. Kyra looks up at him her head resting in her hand, her elbow propped on the work table.

"You're going to be in there all the time now aren't you?"

"Hmm? Oh right yes how clever of you, if only you had this kind of taste in literature. I assume your lovely wife bought them?" Neloth flips through several more pages as Kyra rolls her eyes and looks at Frea, raising the bottle of mead.

"He's right though, she did." Kyra tips the bottle to her lips and takes another pull from it. Neloth slaps the book closed in his hand and looks up.

"Ok." He takes a swig from the bottle of mead that Kyra offers him and looks at her.

"When Miraak began to explore the teachings of Hermaeus Mora, another Dragon Priest named Vohlak-"

"The Jailor." Frea adds as she takes the bottle from him.

"Yes, yes, now Vohlak was still loyal to the dragons so upon learning of Miraak's treachery he sought to defeat him."

"It is said that this was how the island of Solstheim came to be, the battle between Miraak and Vohlak was so powerful that it ripped the land from Skyrim itself."

"So the Skaal say, either way just as Vohlak was about to defeat Miraak Hermaeus Mora took him from this realm and into Apocrypha, where he has believed to have been ever since."

"Ok so what does all this have to do with Nchardak?" Kyra asks pointing to the spot he indicated on the map.

"That, my dear, is where I found a Black Book that I believe should contain the answers we need, but it is locked with a complex steam lock that no longer functions."

"Well that I can probably help with but what's in this Black Book that will help us?"

"Knowledge."

"Knowledge? Come on Neloth, is it a spell, a how to guide I mean what's in it?"

"No, child, Knowledge. The Black Books are artifacts of Daedra magicks, they are tomes of sacred knowledge that only the God of Fate and Knowledge could possess."

"And one of these things is locked away in Nchardak."

"Yes." Kyra furrows her brow for a moment in thought then blows the air from her lungs.

"All right, give me five minutes." Kyra looks at them as they look back at her.

"Get out." She adds pointing to the door, they both turn and exit the room as Kyra crosses the floor and closes the doors behind them, turning and leaning back against them she looks at the armor on the lone pedestal. She exhales as she slowly crosses the floor approaching it.

"Hello again." The armor never replies but it shimmers at her touch a web of eerie grey energy flickers to life for a moment then fades. Kyra steps back a step and pulls her shirt over her head.

Kyra shuts the doors behind her as she hikes the leather knapsack, her shield lashed to it, higher up her armored shoulder turning and locking the armory behind her.

Her boots make a familiar muffled clicking sound as she walks down the hallway. She hadn't heard it in so long it almost annoys her, all the years she'd worn these boots she'd forgotten they even made a sound.

As she walks into the foyer Selena stands by the reflecting pool watching her walk to her, holding her sword belt.

"I've never actually seen you wear this." She runs her hand down the tight and hardened black leather, she smiles looking up into Kyra's blue eyes before their lips meet.

"Hopefully I won't have to wear it for long, I'm only going just beyond Tel Mithryn so I'll be back by nightfall ok?" Kyra kisses her again and takes her sword belting it around her waist.

"Hey." Selena says grabbing Kyra's arm as she walks by her.

"I love you." Kyra smiles and hugs Selena again kissing the top of her head.

'I love you too. Neloth, lead the way."

The snow was just beginning to fall as they come over the hill in sight of the ruin.

"Whoa girl. Neloth, hold up." She says as she swings herself out of the saddle. She takes a knee in the snow as she looks down at the ruin.

"What is it?" Neloth asks as he comes to her side, Kyra extends her arm pointing at an archer atop a higher point of the ruins beyond the bridge across.

"Your ruin is occupied."

"Bandits?" Kyra doesn't acknowledge him as she walks back to her horse and pulls her bow from its place secured to the saddle.

"How badly do you need to get in there Neloth?" She returns to her place on the ridge slinging the quiver over her neck.

"Badly, Kyra, our answer is in that Black Book I am certain of it." Kyra exhales her breath wafting in the cold air.

"All right wait here." Kyra moves around a rock and out of sight moving towards the ruin.