Chapter 22: Rock Bottom

Vigurl was still dead.

No matter how many days I laid in bed, staring at the ceiling, that immutable fact did not change. Vigurl Deep-Water was dead, and I had killed him. I had come to him in friendship, and I had killed him. He had been innocent, and I had killed him.

I squeezed my eyes shut to try and drive away the litany, but it kept echoing in my mind, over and over again. I wondered if this is what it felt like to be Cicero—if this is what it felt like to be mad. Could madmen know that they were mad?

"How are his wounds?" I could hear Hecate asking from the hallway outside. I had been given a private room in which to recuperate, not unlike when Grelod the Kind had beaten me almost to death. "Has he spoken yet?"

"I've treated his wounds as much as he will allow," Babette responded. All of my senses were keyed up way past normal. They almost sounded like I was standing next to them. I could feel every individual bead of sweat on my skin. "I think he has an internal injury. It's likely only a sprained back, but it could be internal bleeding too. I have no way of knowing, since he doesn't respond to any of the usual methods."

"What in Mara's name happened to him?" Hecate asked, her voice worried and desperate.

"I don't know, Listener," Babette said formally. Her voice seemed smaller than usual. Could she be worried about me? Why would she worry about someone who had hurt her so badly? I would ask her, but I couldn't seem to find my voice. "He won't speak to any of us. He let me bring him inside and put him to bed. He'll eat if we put food in his mouth, and he'll walk if we lead him. But he hasn't said a word in three days."

Three days. That's how long it had been. Time seemed to be slipping away from me.

"Gods dammit," Hecate hissed. "I would never have let him go on a contract if I thought he would get hurt like this."

"With all due respect, Listener," Babette said firmly, "with that attitude, he would never go on contract. Getting hurt, even killed, is a risk we all face in service to the Night Mother."

"I know, I know," she said. I could imagine her fluttering her hands nervously in front of her. I almost smiled, but my face didn't seem to want to move. "He's just… so young."

"He is," Babette replied. "But then again, all of you seem young to me."

"I suppose so," Hecate allowed. "Will he recover?"

"His body," the child-like vampire mused, "almost certainly. He's young and strong, and he has one of the best alchemists in Tamriel looking out for him. But his spirit is wounded too. I'm not sure any of us can do anything about that. He has to decide to come back to us."

"He'll be fine then," Hecate said confidently. "Aventus has the best heart of anyone I know."

"Hecate," Babette said sadly, finally calling the Listener by name, "I worry that he won't be fine, precisely because of that. A good heart isn't a benefit when you are an assassin. It's a hindrance."

"We'll see," was all the Listener could say in response.

Babette had said the choice to come back was mine. I didn't feel like I could make choices. And even then, even if I could put together the strength to do it, why would I come back if they were just going to send me away again?

No, better to just lay in bed and stare at the ceiling.

After all, Vigurl was still dead.

I had killed him.

"Dammit, boy," Garnag grumbled. "I know you can hear me."

The old orc leaned over me, his grizzled and weathered face looming across my view of the ceiling like a great green moon. He came close enough that I could smell his breath, heavy and warm on my face. Then he sighed and leaned away again, settling into the chair next to my bed with a groan. His bones popped and the chair creaked; I wasn't sure which sounded older.

"You've got to be in there somewhere," Garnag muttered. He sounded less sure this time, though.

I couldn't blame him. I wasn't sure that I was in here anymore myself.

"Any change?" came a lilting voice from out of my field of view.

"Like you care," Garnag growled.

"This one cares," came the voice again. It had been so low, so careful, that I hadn't recognized Meena at first. She usually spoke in a higher register, a voice that demanded to be heard from all around her. "This one is… fond of the kitten. He amuses Meena."

"Uh-huh," Garnag replied doubtfully. "Well, he's my friend, and I cared about him before he got hurt." Garnag paused. "He reminds me of how Chickpea used to be, actually."

"Really?" Meena asked, sounding surprised. I heard her pull a chair up. "Now this one is especially interested."

"Chickpea was always so serious," Garnag mused. "Aventus is a lot like that—focused, dedicated to the job, reverent to the Night Mother. I'm just worried that this… breakdown, or whatever it is… that it's some kind of warning that he's too much like Chickpea."

"You mean the moon-blessing?" the Khajiit said.

"What's that mean?" Garnag asked.

"The Keeper is blessed by the moons," she said as though it were self-evident. "Any cat worth her fur can tell someone touched by holy madness. It is one of the things that made the Keeper so attractive to this one." She snorted dismissively. "The kitten is not mad. He is simply weak."

"He's not weak," the old orc snarled. One of my hands twitched ever so slightly, but I couldn't make it move any further.

"Oh, his body is strong enough," Meena purred. "I have trained with him enough to know that. It is his spirit that is weak—his heart. He lacks…" She paused and made a noise back in her throat. "I don't know the word for it in human talk."

"Willpower?" Garnag asked.

"Something like that," she responded. "It is a word that means 'the ability to go against your own nature and still survive.'"

"Ahhh," Garnag sighed. "You mean conviction."

"Are you sure that is the word?" Meena asked. "I have only ever heard it at sentencing hearings."

"It's a homophone," Garnag explained.

"Like you?" she asked, sounding even more confused.

Garnag only growled in frustration. I could hear his heavy bootsteps as he stomped out of the room. Meena tittered to herself once he was gone. She took far too much delight in winding up the people around her. I didn't hear her stand again, not even with my hyperactive senses, but she was suddenly looming over me, her calico face and mismatched eyes looking down into my staring ones.

"Get better soon, kitten," she murmured. Then, as though embarrassed, she turned and walked quickly away.

"Why does this feel like a wake?" Vedave asked in hushed tones. On a normal day, at the same distance, I probably wouldn't have been able to hear him. Now, with my senses turned all the way up and my body nearly immobile, I could have heard a pin drop on the other side of Sanctuary.

"Shush," Anaril cautioned him. "Everything social feels like a wake to you. It's what you get for having an inherently morbid nature."

"I thought that was what you found attractive about me," Vedave returned. I could imagine the Dark Elf smiling his devilish grin as Anaril looked away and coughed into his fist. Sure enough, the cough came right on cue.

"That's enough of that," the prim High Elf insisted. "We're here to pay our respects."

"Now that sounds downright funereal," Vedave said morosely, his good humor vanishing as quickly as it had arrived. "Five days of lying there like a corpse. Now I hear he's not even eating or drinking."

"Gossiping within earshot of a sick brother is hardly becoming," came Elbent's gruff voice. I heard both of the elves gasp in shock; the rangy Breton was surprisingly silent when he wanted to be. "He can probably hear you."

"Please," Anaril said. It wasn't quite a sneer, but most things high elves said came off sounding slightly pretentious. "I doubt Aventus can hear us from this far away. He's not an elf, after all."

"I could hear you from that far," Elbent said, his voice sounding slightly offended.

"Well, it's to be expected," Anaril allowed graciously. "Bretons have elven blood going back centuries. It's also one of the reasons you people are so much longer-lived than other men."

"What do you mean 'you people'?" Elbent growled.

"No offense intended," Vedave quickly said. "We're just all on edge because of Aventus being..." The Dunmer paused for a moment, looking for the right word.

"He's dying," Elbent said brusquely. "We all know it. No need to be coy."

"Babette says he's recovering physically," Anaril insisted. "There was some internal bleeding, but she managed to make a clotting potion. With my help," he added. "It's just catatonia."

"If he doesn't eat or drink anything," Elbent replied, "he's still going to die."

"Babette has a plan for that," Anaril said, more quietly.

"She came to us about mystical possibilities," Vedave explained. "Magic isn't very good about subtle alterations to the mind, so we can't risk using illusions to change his emotional state. It could drive him permanently crazy or actually kill him outright."

"But if he doesn't recover on his own soon," Anaril continued, "she's going to have us try anyway."

"She would have asked Garnag," Vedave picked back up, "since his specialty is in illusions. She just thought that he might refuse because of sentimentality."

"Or tell the Listener," Anaril muttered.

"Just let the boy die in peace," the Breton hissed. "Have you considered that the reason he's wasting away is that maybe he doesn't want to live anymore?"

"He's our brother," Vedave hissed. "Would you have us give up on him?"

"Of course not," Elbent said immediately. "Look, I'm just saying…" He paused, apparently trying to decide what to say next. "I had a son once." His voice was so quiet that even I could barely hear him. "He got sick, and eventually he died. In between those things, I tried everything I could to keep him alive. I hired healers, surgeons, and wizards to try fixing him. None of them did anything but prolong his pain. He just kept getting worse and worse, until I finally realized that he was never going to get better—that only pain remained for him in this world."

"What happened then?" Vedave asked, his voice full of sympathy.

"How do you think the Brotherhood found me?" Elbent finally said, his voice thick and pained.

The three of them were quiet for a long time after that, until I finally heard them separate and leave without saying another word.

Geldii and Deesei had come and gone without saying a word in my presence. Both of them had come close enough that I could see them out of the corner of my eye. Deesei had held my hand for a few minutes, her scaly hand surprisingly warm against mine. Geldii had looked angry, though at what I wasn't sure. Maybe she was mad at me. Thinking had been difficult enough days ago when Hecate and Babette had been talking; now, everything was a fuzzy blur.

I think I was dying.

Light and darkness came and went. Sometimes I thought I could hear Babette stalking around, just out of sight. Other times, I was convinced that it was Rolff Stone-Fist, back from the grave and taunting me with his silence. Most of the time, I was just numb. After a while, I couldn't even remember why I was in my bed, or really where I was. There was just a gaping wound in my heart that ached—a little less every time I opened my eyes.

I welcomed the end of the pain.

It was almost totally dark when I woke up with Cicero looming over me. A single candle was lit on my nightstand, casting harsh shadows across the planes of the jester's angular face. His eyes were lambent in the reflected candlelight, the burning yellow of a jack-o'-lantern's eyes. His face was turned down in a scowl that threatened to tear the corners of his mouth right off of his face, and his breathing was heavy and erratic. He was perched on the edge of a chair that had been pulled up to my bed, leaning over me from it like a vulture on a branch.

"Finally awake, are we?" he rasped. I wasn't sure either way. Had I been asleep? Had I slept?

The jester's scowl only deepened when I didn't respond. He leaned forward enough that I could see myself reflected in his eyes.

"Why won't the boy answer?" he demanded. "Why so silent? Speak!" He shook all over, his flesh visibly rippling in loathing and disgust. Tears welled up at the corners of his eyes as he rocked back and forth, clutching at his knees with hands clenched so tightly that his knuckles were bone-white.

"The boy must talk!" he demanded in a high, wailing voice. "Silence, terrible silence! The boy may die, but at least do not go quietly! Scream! Weep! Beg! Anything! Anything! Speak, worm!" He was standing now, his hands balled up into fists and spittle flying from his lips. His voice seemed to deepen and become gravelly, almost like a different man talking out of Cicero's mouth. "So quiet. Like Mother. She never speaks to poor, loyal Cicero, no matter how long he waits. Only to the Listener, but there is no Listener…" He trailed off, as though confused.

"Yes, yes, there is a Listener now," he muttered like a man unsure of his own memories. "Sweet Hecate is the Listener. And Cicero is still the Keeper." He ran his hands through his long red hair, pulling his jester's cap free and throwing it on the ground. "But Garnag is here. How can Garnag be here? Garnag is dead! He went away and never came back! Is poor Cicero's mind playing tricks on him again?" He looked down into my eyes, his face twisted and pained.

"Please…" he begged in a quavering voice, the weakest in which I had ever heard him speak. "Please say something. Cicero… I… I don't know what's real. Sometimes I think I'm dead, suffering in the Void for my failures." He sat down, putting his face into his hands. "Sometimes I think I might still be in Cheydinhal—that I've gone mad and dreamed it all." He cocked his head back and laughed maniacally. "Cicero? Insane? That's madness!"

Finally, Cicero composed himself and stood up, kneeling briefly to pick up his cap. He dusted it off and set it back on his head, tucking his hair neatly behind his ears. He paused a moment to tug his gloves tighter. His face was set and grim as he leaned forward, tentatively reaching for me. He put his gloved hands to my neck, letting them settle there on either side of my throat like gentle falling leaves.

He kept them there for a long moment, as though trying to remember what he had intended to do. Then, with another shudder, he drifted his hands down to my blankets and brought them up under my chin. He tucked them in as carefully as he might have wrapped the Night Mother in her shrouds, then ran a gloved hand over the top of my head to brush my hair out of my eyes.

"Loyal Cicero will stay here until you fall asleep again," he said gently. "No one should be alone." Then he sat back on the chair next to the bed and folded his hands together in his lap.

And as far as I know, he stayed until I fell asleep again.

When I woke again, it was as dark as the Void. For a time, I wasn't even sure that I was conscious at all. I wasn't dreaming anymore when I slept; I was barely aware of the world around me when I was awake. My body was cold and dry, like a frozen desert.

I was empty.

The pain had gone. My guilt had gone. My memories had gone. I was alone.

At least, I thought I was alone until someone drew my blankets back and crawled into bed with me. In the dark, I couldn't see who it was, but I could tell that it was a woman. Her skin was warm against my chilled flesh. Someone had stripped me naked at some point, probably to clean my wounds. She was naked too, soft and smooth. Her hands snaked over my bare chest and under my back to hold me close to her. She rested her cheek against my shoulder, and drew up her knees slightly to wrap her legs around mine.

Her breath tickled my ear, the first real sensation I had registered in days. She brought her mouth close enough for her full lips to skim my earlobe. She stayed like that for long moments, her breathing filling my world. Her hand moved from my chest to caress my stomach in slow circles, a casually intimate gesture. She moved her lips to brush against mine, feather-light. They moved in such a way that it seemed like she was speaking to me, but no sound emerged.

Bit by bit, I felt my warmth returning. I started to become more aware of her presence, her body. More than that, her body started to make me more aware of my own.

She leaned away from me for a moment, and the sudden loss of warmth actually made me shiver. I could hear her take a sip of water from a glass on my nightstand. When she resumed her place next to me, she leaned over to kiss me again, more fully this time. She used her lips to part mine, then slowly released the water from her mouth into mine. I involuntarily swallowed, taking my first sips of water in what must have been a day or two. My throat burned suddenly, as though the sensation of water running down it had reminded my body that it was dying.

She repeated the gesture three or four more times, each time bringing me a little more fully back to myself. I still couldn't move, still couldn't think clearly—but I was completely conscious again. The pain was coming back too, and I was aware enough now to fear its return. It had a name, I knew that much. If I were to remember that name, I feared that I might go mad.

The woman's hands moved against my stomach and back, an insistent pressure that forced my breathing to deepen. Her warmth seeped into my bones, making my circulation improve. A piece at a time, I was returning to life. I was in pain, physical and mental alike. My back and gut ached where I had been injured, and my ribs throbbed.

The memory of being attacked by a werewolf flooded back to me all at once, and I shook all over with the recollection. I could feel the memories following it coming back too, rushing into me like a flood. I didn't want them. As I started to fall back into myself, I was begging for the silence again, for the end of pain. Dying was preferable to living if being alive felt like this.

Just as everything fell back into place and the screams started to well up in my throat again, the woman rolled on top of me and put all her weight on my chest with her hands, forcing the air out of my lungs. My wounds groaned with the pressure, and the scream died in my throat. I thrashed back and forth for a few moments, unable to draw enough breath to scream. Now that I was aware of being alive again, my lungs burned for air—against my will, my body was fighting for life.

She leaned up again, putting most of her weight on my lower body. Her hips ground against mine, and my body rebelled again, tensing with her motions against me. She rocked back and forth, a teasing movement that didn't quite deliver on its promises. I was gasping for breath again, but the screams had gone. Part of me wanted to give in to what she offered, to live again fully and accept the pleasures along with the pains. Tears trickled from the corners of my eyes, and not all of them were from my wounds.

The woman leaned down, her hands on either side of my chest to keep her weight off of my injured torso. Now that my screams were gone, she moved more gently, her breasts brushing against my chest as she brought her lips to my ear. My hands fluttered like ships on a storm-tossed sea, wanting to reach for her but unable to quite remember how.

When her lips moved again, she spoke the three words that I had been waiting to hear since my mother died.

Like a broken spell, my hands jerked away from the bed, reaching up to rest on her hips. I tilted back my head to look at her—really look at her. She leaned away from my ear and brought her head around so that we were eye-to-eye, our foreheads just touching. There was dim light leaking in from under the door now, just enough that I could see the shadowy outlines of her face. Her full lips brushed against mine, a promise of more if I could only claim it.

"You're not alone," Eiruki had assured me. Everyone I knew and cared for left me eventually—some by chance, and one at my own hands. Could I take an innocent life and still be myself? Could honor be compatible with the path of an assassin? Nazir, Cicero, Meena, Babette, Hecate—they had all told me that I would cut pieces of myself away by believing the way I did. What was left once all those pieces were gone?

As my thoughts started to retreat into paralysis, Eiruki leaned in again and bit my lip, hard enough to draw blood. The sharp pain was replaced by warm pleasure as she ran her hands along my sides. Those both came along with being alive.

I was alive. My mother was dead. Vigurl was dead. But I was alive. I had killed Vigurl Deep-Water. I hadn't meant to… but I would have done it anyway, even if I had known. My life as an assassin meant more to me than someone I used to know. He had seen my face, seen me kill his compatriots. His life was forfeit. I could have avoided it if I'd been more careful, less arrogant or less desperate. Dying now wouldn't bring him back. Giving up on my family—on myself—wouldn't bring him back.

Dying alone might be my fate someday—but not as long as I could fight. I was injured, dehydrated, hungry, and soul-sick. But I was alive. And I wasn't alone. It was time to start acting like it.

I leaned up off the bed, ignoring the pain of my wounds as they pulled and twisted. I crushed my lips against hers, breathing in her breath like a drowning man gasping for air. Her hips moved against mine, fulfilling the unspoken promise of her hands and lips. She gasped and bit my lip again as we joined our bodies together. I welcomed the pain, the sweet agony. I sat all the way up to wrap my arms around her; she pressed closer to me, her arms locked behind my back. We moved like the rolling waves of the sea, anchoring one another.

A long time later, when she had rolled off of me and curled up at my side once more, she brought her lips up to my ear and again whispered the three words I had needed most.

"You're not alone."

Her soft body and soft words followed me down into sleep.

I woke up with a fresh set of clothes folded on the chair next to my bed and new bandages wrapped around my ribs, tight enough to support the cracked one. I tried to sit up, but the pain in my lower back made me collapse back onto my pillows. I laid there for a few moments until the pain receded into a dull ache, then sat up again more slowly.

The door to my private room was open, and the smell of cooking food from somewhere in Sanctuary wafted to me, making my stomach rumble in emptiness. I rotated my legs off the bed and reached for my clothes. I was weak enough that even picking up a set of clothes made my arms shake and sweat bead on my brow. I took a few sips of water from the glass sitting on the nightstand, noting how my lower lip stung when I drank. I touched it and found a newer wound than my others—what felt like a bite mark.

My face twitched and it took me a moment to realize that I was smiling. It felt like it had been forever since the last time I smiled. I somehow managed to get into my clothes and stagger to my feet. I leaned heavily on the chair, then on the wall as I stumbled to the door. I was hungry and I wanted to see my family.

I staggered through the upper gallery of Sanctuary, distantly hearing the Dark Brotherhood gathering for breakfast. The usual cacophony of conversation was a dim shadow of its usual self, as though they were still in mourning. I didn't want to keep them long. Their happiness at seeing me alive—and I knew now that they would be happy—would be a better painkiller than anything Babette could brew in her laboratory. More than that, though, I just wanted to be with them again.

But first I had to see the one member of my family who definitely wouldn't be coming to breakfast.

The Night Mother's coffin was open when I arrived at her shrine. A few wildflowers were on the floor about three feet from the coffin. I shook my head at the sight, still grinning. Eiruki was eventually going to go too far with this sort of thing, and I wouldn't always be around to placate Cicero. Still, it was just something cute and fond at the moment. I shakily knelt down in front of the coffin, pocketing the flowers to keep the peace for another day, before I started praying.

"Sweet Mother, sweet Mother," I whispered, my throat still raw.

"Aventus?" I heard from behind me before I could go any further. I turned and looked over my shoulder to see Cicero standing in the doorway, a bundle of healthy-looking wildflowers in his hands. He sat them down on one of the stands next to the door, then stumbled toward me, looking like a lost child more than an assassin almost three decades my senior. "Are you real?" he asked.

I stood up shakily, almost falling. Cicero was there in an instant to catch me. I leaned heavily on him, squeezing his upper arm to reassure him.

"I'm real," I rasped. "I'm alive."

Cicero's face lit up, and his broad smile was infectious. He let go of me and spun in a circle, jumping up to click his heels before taking my arm again. He tilted his head back and laughed, and I found myself holding onto him and laughing too. After a few moments, he turned to look at the Night Mother, a sheepish expression on his face.

"You came to see Mother first?" he asked. I nodded, and his smile became a sober, serious one. He embraced me again, a gesture of pride so personal that it made my heart ache. "What can I do?" he finally asked after breaking the embrace.

"You could let Nazir know to set an extra plate," I said with a wan smile. I was hungrier than I could remember being since… Well, since Windhelm. Cicero nodded enthusiastically and ran off, hooting with laughter.

"Aventus is awake!" I could hear him shouting as he bounded out into the hallway. "The boy is awake!"

Once he was gone, I turned back to the Night Mother. I bowed formally before saying the only words I could think of that summed up all I wanted to say.

"Thank you, Mother," I said. She didn't respond, but I hadn't expected her to.

By the time I made my way out to the main room, the Brotherhood had all gathered together. Even the ones who didn't habitually take breakfast were there. Babette was standing at the top of the stairs in her sleeping gown, obviously having been rousted out of bed by Cicero's shouting. I walked up to her and smiled. She reached out and took my hands, looking delightfully awkward as I pulled her in for a hug. The Brotherhood cheered and applauded as I finally broke our embrace.

As one, they rushed to the bottom of the stairs, waiting for me with smiles and pats on the back and warm embraces. I was still hungry, but it could wait for a few minutes more. Their words were overlapping babble and well-wishes, to the point that I could barely make out anything, but that was okay. Garnag clapped me on the back hard enough that my rib flared in pain, and Nazir grabbed my upper arms in greeting hard enough to make my muscles groan. Hecate pushed through the crowd and threw her arms around me, crushing me deeply enough that my wounds ached—but I didn't mind at all.

Eiruki was the last of the Brotherhood to approach me, her shy smile and downcast eyes giving no hint of what had passed between us the night before. She clasped her hands together in front of her, making it my responsibility to reach out to her. As I wrapped her in my arms, she brought her lips up to my ear. Softer than anyone could have heard, she whispered to me again.

"It didn't mean anything," she insisted.

"Yes, it did," I replied, just as quietly. "It meant everything."

I leaned away from her and smiled. Her shy smile became something broader and warmer as we both acknowledged that we didn't owe one another anything. It was what it was—everything and nothing all at once. She unclasped her hands and threw her arms around me, to the cheers and applause of the others. Even Babette was smiling when I let Eiruki go and walked away. I staggered to the table, sitting down at my usual spot.

"Who do I have to kill around here to get something to eat?" I asked.

My family came streaming back to the table as Cicero came rushing back with plates full of food. Nazir didn't even scold him for being in the kitchen without supervision. They all demanded some of my attention, wanting to know what had happened to me. I let them stew for a little while as I enjoyed my breakfast, relishing the flavors and textures of Nazir's cooking as much as I enjoyed the babble and noise of my family's happy voices.

It was good to be alive.

…to be concluded…