Resh POV
Kayci glared at him for a few moments but decided not to do anything. She had already done a good deal of fighting in the last 10 minutes. Any more and she might try too hard from adrenaline and snap his arm off.
Both Brelyna and Lydia seemed confused at his last statement, judging as it had not actually made any sense. But they summarised that if Kayci wasn't going to speak up against him then it would be best if neither of them did either.
"Anyway," Resh started, noticing no one was speaking. "I've been tasked with finding so antique horn. it seems kind of unnecessary to me but we might as well go. It's in some Nordic burial barrow a while from here. So if we set off now we can probably get there in a week or two."
"So we trekked up this frozen mountain just to be told to right back down it? Couldn't they have just sent you a courier to tell you what to do?" Lydia asked, as their journey had been seemingly unnecessary.
Resh's eyes narrowed when he remembered what he had learnt about the aforementioned courier and the false information being spread by him. "No, they probably knew I'd rip his head off on sight," he muttered so the others could not hear.
"Why don't we just take a carriage there from Whiterun?" Brelyna suggested. "It would be slightly faster than walking and it would be considerably easier than going from place to place on foot. Especially for you, Resh, as you seem to be carrying all the supplies."
"I don't think that would be the best idea," Kayci started, the two other women noticed a look of amusement begin to grow across Resh's face as he started to remember something.
"Why not?" the Dunmer questioned, perplexed.
Resh was practically shaking with laughter as he watched his superior shift uncomfortably, "Because… I… uh…"
He decided to put her out of her misery when she started to stumble over her words, it was mostly for his enjoyment than to help her. "The mighty Kayce over here has a fear of horses. So when the cart is being pulled along by them, she will be running the other way," he smirked. "Of all the things that exist, it's horses which she hates."
The man's declaration caused the Tamrielic women to open their jaws in amazement and turn to the now red Kayci. He couldn't figure out if Kayci was so embarrassed she would start to run or instead knock him out. He decided to ready himself for an attack, as it could go either way.
A few seconds later, the group, minus Kayci, burst into a fit of laughter at her expense, thinking about the woman who seemed to be scared of nothing, and was frankly a little bit psychotic, being scared of an animal that was a herbivore, and probably wouldn't even try to hurt someone.
Brelyna was the first to speak again as the other woman glared at the three of them, "How can you be scared of the domesticated horses? They're practically born and bred to be ridden, and they're ridden pretty much every day of their life," Brelyna asked, still slightly chuckling and wiping away small tears as she spoke. The Elf couldn't imagine how something bred for men, mer or beastfolk use could possibly be scary.
Kayci didn't have a chance to reply before Resh howled in laughter at her words. "Born to be ridden every day of their life? Sounds like someone I know…" Resh laughed nudging a fuming Kayci. It looked like she was going to kill him for his joke.
Her dignity was not helped by the resulting reactions from the two others who were sent into another wave of mirth at the man's words. Grabbing Resh's hair she wrenched him down close and whispered in his ear, "You're going to regret that." Despite being friends and knowing nothing very bad was going to happen Resh visibly straightened and immediately stopped laughing. He had no doubts he would be made to pay for his mistake.
Releasing his hair, Kayci turned to Lydia and Brelyna who too were still slightly chuckling. Resh quickly stepped out of her arm range in case she tried to reprimand him for their continued amusement.
"If it's any consolation," Lydia started feeling bad for the clearly pissed off female in front of her. "You're not the only one terrified of silly things like that. I for one can't stand spiders. Only the small ones which aren't the frostbite species. I can handle the big ones fine."
"How do you feel about the other creatures people are usually scared of?" the woman asked, the colour of red draining from her features, "Like… snakes for example."
"I've only ever seen one when some Alik'r trader came to Whiterun with it as a pet. I wasn't scared."
"Well isn't that lucky?" Kayci smirked. Winking at Resh whose previous smile had been wiped away.
"In fact, I thought it was quite cool. It was really friendly towards me, more so than anyone else. Maybe I have some strange gift where snakes really like me," Lydia wondered, remembering back when it had happened. She was actually half tempted to buy it from him she liked it so much.
Kayci was grinning like crazy now, strangely delighted at her words for an unknown reason. "You hear that Resh? That would definitely make a lot a sense, wouldn't it?" she replied, smiling at Resh, whose eyes were almost popping out of his head at her words.
"How so?" Lydia asked in confusion, having no idea as to the reason Kayci seemed so overjoyed and why Resh looked like he wanted to end his own life.
"You'll see soon enough," she answered cryptically before speaking to Resh in Tsaescian. *Can you believe that Resh? You're in luck. She likes you already. Maybe she would have a Tsaesci fetish!* Her crude words earned a growl of annoyance and disgust from the other Tsaesci as he winced away from her meaning.
I hope you all enjoyed this chapter, I thought it would be interesting to have someone like Kayci be scared of something, and horses seemed like a fun option as it's so outlandish for her character, the slutty, cannibalistic, torturer fist fighting snake.
Resh POV
*Can you please, please, please, just let go of whatever ridiculous fantasies you have of me degrading myself to your lows? I have no interest in her,* Resh groaned, straining because of his hatred when it came to begging Kayci for things. It almost never ended well for him.
*Still deluding yourself, huh?* she smirked in reply as they started to travel back down the mountain after having gathered all their stuff while talking. *Am I going to have to lock you and Lydia in a room and wait until you either kill each other, die of starvation or at long last start fuc-*
"Did I just hear my name?! What are you saying about me?" Lydia snapped, not liking them talking about her behind her back.
Resh was both very thankful for her interruption and being incredibly pissed off. On the one hand, whatever Kayci was going to say had been interrupted. But on the other, he had forgotten that names were still exactly the same regardless of the language spoken in, so now things had to be explained again.
"I was just wondering how long it would take you two to shag if locked in a room," the Tsaesci woman drawled, before turning to Resh who had now completely frozen and stood rigid at what she had said.
The silence that filled the environment for a few moments was devastatingly awkward. Practically everyone, bar Kayci who was trying not to laugh at their reactions, had completely stopped moving and were trying to think of a way to ease the tension.
At last it was Brelyna who spoke up to alleviate the atmosphere. Unfortunately, it was not in the way in which Resh had hoped. "Why?" she asked.
Thankfully Kayci had a small amount of mercy left for her old friend and dodged the question, "If I were to say everything now it would ruin the surprise. And I won't be able to drag this out for longer."
"Drag what out?"
"It doesn't matter," Resh ground out. "Let's just go. We can get back to Ivarstead with the next hour or two if we speed up. And I swear Kayci, if you don't stop talking I'll make you regret it."
"Awfully protective aren't you Resh?" Kayci laughed, nodding over to Lydia who he was seemingly being defensive over.
Resh growled but maintained his composure, "How long do you reckon it would take a horse to finish eating you?" he hissed, the sole purpose being to scare her.
"Fine, fine. I'll stop," she replied carelessly, holding her hand up in mock surrender.
When he was satisfied, the group started to walk again. After a few moments Kayci ran over to Resh and tugged at his arm to get his attention. "They don't really eat people do they?" she whispered fearfully.
1 Hour Later
"-And then when your headless carcass is there on the ground charred and rotting… That's when they lay their eggs in the wounds, which will one day hatch into larvae which preserve the body forever!" Resh shouted, finishing his story to a now uncharacteristically quaking Kayci.
"Why would anyone ride them?" she whimpered, much to the amusement of the three others who could barely contain their mirth. "It's bad enough they breaths fire, but that? That's horrific, I don't think I'll ever sleep again!"
"They're fast, that's why they're ridden. They probably get it from all that flesh they eat. They don't go for virgins though. They actually prioritise their hunger on people that have more 'intimate relations' than any others," Resh said with the sternest voice he could muster.
At that Kayci's eyes widened to almost unreal proportions as she fidgeted and shifted manically. Lydia and Brelyna almost couldn't believe how she could be so gullible considering she was meant to be some form of military authority figure.
Another thing the girls noted was how close she and Resh must be for it to be okay for him to pull tricks like this on his superior. But then again, so far they hadn't shown the most orthodox practice of the scouting combat cell they supposedly were.
"In that case, I'm not going anywhere near them!" Kayci shouted, completely terrified at the prospect that practically every one of these 'horses' would probably be tracking her down from a 50 league radius because of her exploits.
"Just remember when to keep one eye open when you sleep. It would be terrible if someone was to accidentally leave the door open and one of them was to get through…" Resh teased, causing her to have another small tremble of fear.
"If you try anything like that I will kill you. I'm not even joking. I will not let you let something that dangerous anywhere near me, especially when I'm sleeping," Kayci hissed, the sheer ridiculousness of her statement causing the three others to burst into bouts of laughter.
Kayci seethed in anger while blinking in confusion at their reaction, "What…?"
Resh POV
It turned out that running down the mountain was considerably harder than walking. It was far easier to slip, much as Resh had learnt on his mad dash away from an angry Kayci. Thankfully it had only been down a few stairs instead off the edge of the rocks where he could have broken some bones or died.
Unfortunately, the slip itself was enough for Kayci to catch up with him. And before he had a chance to get up, she collided with him causing them both to roll and slide down the edge while in a small death grip.
Although neither actually wanted to kill the other, the current scenario of falling off the edge of a mountain might do it instead. Resh could feel bruises start to form and injuries appear as every few seconds a different part of his body would collide and skitter against the harsh surface of the stone.
He was just thankful that he was a Tsaesci. If he were anything else, he probably would have died, or at the very least broken a few bones. It was still very painful though. And having Kayci land on top of him didn't help either.
All of Kayci's anger at him and the others mocking her dissipated as she giggled at the fall. *Bet the other two are going to be running down here soon, all worried,* she said, speaking in Tsaescian, as it was easier for her.
*You really need to start speaking other languages all the time if you want to be a good scout,* Resh told her, still very much dazed from the fall. His head was still spinning.
Kayci got up first due to her lack of injuries, as she'd used Resh's body to avoid hitting the rocks. *And you really need to stop making fun of me if you want to stop falling off the edge of mountains.*
*Well it is you who makes us fall, so I can hardly be blamed for that. And what makes you think I'm mocking you? For all you know I could be telling the truth,* Resh joked, only to be reward with a slap by Kayci who was still slightly pissed now he was doing it again.
*Okay fine, I'll stop,* Resh surrendered, holding his arms up and trying to ignore the stinging pain dancing across his face. Luckily, if you could call it luck, his other injuries being worse made it easier for him.
*Damn right you will. I'd hate for throwing you off the 7000 steps to be the nicest thing I do to you all day.*
*Then I will have to try hard not to piss you off further, lest you ruin even more memories of Tamriel,* he laughed in answer.
*So Resh,* Kayci started, reminded because of his mention of Continents. *Forgive me for asking, despite me actually being in charge. When are we actually going back to Akavir? I believe our quest is pretty much over considering everyone being dead and all the countries having been visited,* Kayci asked.
*Kayce, let's be honest here. Even though you are technically my leader, you always took my advice for everything, so I was making most of the decisions. And I was thinking we could stay here for a while longer. Our people aren't even expecting us back for a good 50 years or so,* he replied. Not only was Resh scared about going to his kind and having to explain his curse, but Resh couldn't help but admit, in his head, that he was enjoying it so far in Skyrim. The people were nice, especially the new friends he had met recently, despite them not being Tsaesci like himself.
*Fair enough. Akavir can be a real shit-hole sometimes. For all we know the Ta'agra have taken over by now,* Kayci pointed out. It wouldn't be nearly as bad for her as it would be for Resh if the last statement was true. She was raised by them.
*That would be pretty awful…* Resh murmured, only now realising that could probably be true. It's not like he could talk with them. They were all the way on the other side of Nirn. A couple of centuries was a long time and a lot could happen he wasn't aware of. And if any of it were serious, that would be horrible.
*Don't go all 'sad' on me Resh. You know just as well as I do that we're probably still hanging onto our control even after all these years,* Kayci told him trying to cheer him up after unintentional making him sad. *I would be just as sad to see our fall as you would.*
*How so? You've never seemed overly 'loyal' to our doctrine in general, and-* Resh started before getting cut off.
*In fairness, our doctrines pretty shit. 'Fight for the sake of fighting' and all that nonsense. I would have thought you of all people, being 'so much smarter than Kayce' as you put it, would realise it's not all that great. Especially the idea that just because something is able to fight it should.*
*I admit it may be quite harsh in some respects. But its honour binding, so it's irrelevant. Technically I should be killing you right now for not following it. Of course I'm not going to because you're like family to me. My point I was saying though was 'why would you be sad to see our empire go?'* Resh asked seriously. From what he had seen, his friend had seemed to enjoy life in Tamriel more so than that in Akavir. In her words, it was because when it came to sex she was 'spoiled for choice'.
*You couldn't kill me even if you tried. As for why going back would be good, for one your sister said when I get back she wou-* Kayci stopped upon seeing the deathly glare coming from her friend who looked about ready to kill with his mind alone, *On second thought, staying here would be a-okay.*
Resh sighed and decided to not get himself caught up in petty anger again, *Speaking of inappropriate relationships, how close are you to finishing this pointless endeavour with the Elf? It's quite obvious what you're doing with your ridiculously revealing armour, and the way you act around her.*
*It's not like I'm trying to be subtle is it?* Kayci drawled sarcastically. *I'm just waiting for her to snap.*
*Classy as always. You're in luck, too. From what I've gathered from her previous bed-mate, she should be interested.*
*You're oblivious to everything you know that? Of course she was interested. Didn't you see her staring? That's more than enough to go on. She was far more interested than Lydia was,* Kayci chuckled.
Resh couldn't understand why but he suddenly felt protective of Lydia. He shouldn't care but for some reason he didn't want Kayci getting her teeth into her. *You tried to come onto Lydia?*
*Yeah. You afraid of a little competition?* Kayci laughed, earning a scowl from the man. *If it's any consolation she's definitely straight. I only really asked her to make Brelyna jealous. You of all people still have way more of a chance than anyone else.*
*What do you mean by that?* Resh asked, taking note on her focus on the word 'you'.
Cryptically she just looked into the distance to see Lydia spot them and run over to see if they were okay. *You'll see eventually.*