"You must be Leola?"
The young blonde turned as she heard the words from behind her, hesitating slightly as she saw the young Breton woman. She was a brunette, clad in brown trousers, boots, studded gloves, and a white blouse with a black vest on top. She had eyes that were a light blue-grey colour and full lips that gave the blonde a smile.
"My name is Erith," continued the brunette, flashing Leola a wink. Leola could feel her cheeks heating up. "I knew your mother."
"Seems everyone knew her but me," Leola said in a soft voice. "It's nice to meet you."
Erith nodded towards a nearby table before moving towards it to sit down. Leola followed, seating herself across from Erith.
"So," said the brunette with a grin, clearly appraising Leola's appearance as her eyes wandered, causing Leola to feel even more warmth rushing to her cheeks. "My friends and I, we're travelling merchants, kind of like the khajiit caravan. They had this crazy idea – mind you, I didn't support this idea at all, but it was two against one – that we should come to you and see if you have anything interesting that you might be willing to sell to us. You know…things that belonged to your mother."
Leola's mouth fell open in surprise, before turning downwards into a frown. "Don't your friends think they're being a bit…insensitive?" she asked softly, and Erith gave a nod.
"I know, and I tried telling them that, but they really only care about the money. They were orphans, so travelling around and selling stuff is just the only way they've ever known how to get by. They wanted me to talk to you, though, and see if you'd be willing to consider." Erith offered Leola an apologetic smile, and the blonde sighed softly.
"Maybe another time," she said, shaking her head. "I'm still going through a lot of her stuff. Trying to figure out what it is, how she got it, things like that."
"You mean like the mace?" Erith asked, and before Leola could speak, she cut in, "I bumped into Aventus on my way into town and he mentioned it. And for the record, he also said this was a bad idea. He didn't want me to ask you, but I didn't have much choice."
Leola sighed softly, nodding. "Yes, like the mace," she mumbled. "There are…so many daedric artifacts in there. It's terrifying. I don't know where they came from or how she got them, or what to do with them now that she's gone."
Leola paused slightly as she spoke, realizing that she was spilling everything out to this Erith girl. She wasn't sure, however, why she was doing this. She had only just met the other girl, and the whole reason Erith wanted to talk to her was to see if she had anything interesting or valuable to sell. She probably didn't care to hear about all the stress and confusion that her mother's death was causing in the young Nord.
"I'm sorry," Leola said quickly, shaking her head. "You don't want to hear about all this. Now's just not a good-"
"No, go ahead," Erith cut in quickly, before Leola could finish. "My friends may be all about the money, but I was raised with more decency than that. If you need to talk, I'm all ears."
Leola smiled a bit at the other girl, giving a light shrug of her shoulders. "I don't know," she said softly. "There's just so much. My life was so easy before, eat and sleep and clean and read and laugh with my mother. She would sing to me and tell me stories, but the stories she told were nothing like the ones I've been hearing since I came here. So first off there's me having to find out about all this warrior, adventurer type stuff from other people and trying to process it, and then there's all the weird stuff in her house that doesn't make sense with all the things that Ulfric has said…"
"Is there stuff other than just the daedric things?" asked Erith.
"Nothing else that Aventus was able to identify, but there was a lot of weird stuff," Leola replied softly.
"If you want, I could come in and take a look. I happen to know about a lot of stuff regarding magical and mysterious items," Erith offered with a grin. Seeing the hesitation on Leola's face, she quickly added, "No buying offers. I won't price anything, just try to help figure out what it is."
Leola gave a small nod. "Okay," she said softly, smiling. "I suppose we could do that."
Erith grinned at Leola, nodding. "When do you want to do that, then? We could go right now, I'm not busy, or if you have anything you need to do we could meet up another time."
Leola smiled, shaking her head slightly. "I don't have anything else I need to do," she said. "Let's go now."
Erith nodded and stood from the table, with Leola quickly doing the same so as to follow her out. The brunette stopped as they passed by the counter, pulling out some gold from her pocket and quickly grabbing an apple and a chunk of bread from Elda. Taking a bite out of the apple, she nodded towards the door, motioning for Leola to lead the way.
Leola opened the door, pausing to hold it for Erith. "Thanks," said the brunette as she passed through before taking another bite out of the apple. Leola let go of the door and began down the path that ran alongside the wall, in the direction of the market. Erith followed, happily munching on her apple.
"So, um, you said that you knew my mother?" Leola asked softly, and Erith gave a nod.
"Yeah. Not well, but I met her a handful of times. My mother worked at a mine outside Markarth, and your mother came by sometimes, usually because she needed iron or something like that," Erith replied, punctuating the end of her sentence with a large bite of bread.
"What did she need iron for?" asked Leola, frowning a bit as they made their way past the forge.
Erith nodded towards the blacksmiths, hard at work smelting and smithing away. "Making weapons, improving weapons, all sorts of stuff," she replied. "Lots of the merchants around Skyrim remember her making fantastic weapons. She would craft them herself and then enchant them, and then she would sell them all over Skyrim."
Leola wanted to sigh. Yet another thing she hadn't known about her mother. It seemed like it would never end. She was a talented smith, and she could enchant weapons and armour? "I never knew that," Leola said softly.
"Well, no, making weapons isn't exactly a priority when you're a family woman," said Erith with a light laugh, grinning over at Leola. "But yeah, I mostly just chatted briefly with her whenever I saw her. I was the only kid there, it was pretty lonely with just me and my dog."
"How did you end up with the two friends you mentioned?" Leola asked.
"They swung by to do some business when we were teenagers and I jumped on the opportunity to join them and see the world. I think they just wanted to get with me, but I don't swing that way," Erith said, winking at Leola. The blonde, again, felt her cheeks heating up slightly.
"And you've been a travelling merchant ever since?" asked the Nord as they reached the gate of Hjerim.
"I go where I want, I sleep wherever I can rest my head, and I'm free as a bird," replied the brunette with a laugh, watching as the blonde made her way up to the front door and unlocked it with the little key. Leola opened the door and stepped inside, Erith following quickly.
"Most of the stuff is upstairs," Leola said softly. "There's not really anything down here."
"It's still worth taking a look," Erith said with a grin as she began to walk around the edge of the main room, examining the shelves and everything on them. Simple things – elegant pottery, a lute, and a few bottles of Nord mead that were collecting dust.
"Let's just go upstairs," Leola said quickly as Erith headed towards the archway in the back, and Erith shot the blonde a curious look before heading in. Leola headed quickly after Erith, following her into the room with the two small childrens' beds.
"It looks like your mother was planning on being a mother after all," Erith said in a soft voice as she picked up the blonde doll on the shelf. "I believe this should have been yours?"
"I don't want it," said Leola, shaking her head as Erith put the doll back. "If she wanted me to have it I'm sure she would have taken it with her."
"I suppose that is true," said Erith as she moved to open the wardrobe. She frowned as she looked inside. It was empty, but there was some scuffing on the back panel. "I think this comes out," said the brunette, beginning to fumble with the back panel.
"I don't think so," said Leola with a shake of her head. "That would be weird."
"No, seriously," said Erith, knocking gently on the panel. "I just need to figure out how."
Leola watched for a moment, until Erith finally dislodged the panel and it swung open. Both girls exchanged a wide-eyed look before the brunette stepped in, followed closely by the blonde.
"An alchemy lab and an arcane enchanter," murmured Erith, moving curiously towards the enchanting table. "This must be where your mother enchanted the armour and weapons that she made before selling them."
"Yes, it must be," Leola said softly, shaking her head. "Let's just…let's just head upstairs and get to work."