CHAPTER 1: Murderous moon sugar.
Powerful, bone chilling gusts of freezing cold wind shot through the streets of the city of Solitude. The townsfolk scuttled to hurry back inside their homes clutching onto their wares with what little energy they had left in them, while the children, could do nothing but curl up into the mold-ridden corners and murky, dusty alleys hoping and praying to every deity that the fruit and flowers they hoped to sell froze before they did.
Yet outside the city, perched atop the highest hill lay the Thalmor Embassy. And inside the entrance hall it was bright and warm with soul soothing music playing for the high elves who were feasting on the many rich delicacies that sat before then on polished silverware. Over in the Kitchen stood Tsavani; a worrisome Khajiit, stirring a ladle around the stew pot, trying to calm her nerves with the aroma of her handiwork. Yet suddenly from out of no-where, in walked Malborn, a wood elf who she had become rather acquainted with over the months she had worked here. A smile was about to cross her cheeks, when she noticed someone unfamiliar to her walk in behind Malborn.
She walked towards the duo and exclaimed in her raspily voice: "Who intrudes Malborn? You know I don't like strange smells in my kitchen."
"A Guest felling ill. Leave the poor wretch be." Malborn responded in an assuring tone.
"A guest? In the kitchens? You know this is against the rules."
"Rules is it Tsavani? I didn't realize that eating moon sugar was permitted."
Tsavani stepped back from Malborn as she heard this comment as she believed she had kept her addiction well hidden from everyone in the Thalmor Embassy.
"Perhaps I should ask the Ambassador-" Malborn began to say, before Tsavani hissed:
"Tss! Get out of here; I saw nothing." at them, and returned to her cooking as the other two walked off through the back door. As unnerved as she was by this encounter with this mysterious stranger, she thought it best to ignore this minor event and get back to her cooking pot. Yet she imagined if it was her food that made the guest feel unwell, and so strode over to her pantry to see what ingredient she could add to the concoction.
A pinch of chopped garlic would add more flavour to the dish, yet may not provide enough nutritional value. Perhaps some thinly sliced leek stems would freshen up the meal, but she knew she had to save those up for the soup festival coming up later in the month of Frostfall. She should had averted her gaze to the carrots, which would be a nice addition, yet her nose wafted over to that sweet scent of her moon sugar stash she had hidden away in behind the pantry. Entranced by the intoxicating smell of the ingredient. she reached for it, but suddenly heard a loud crash coming from the back door snapping her senses back into place.
She hadn't even noticed that Malborn had returned to the bench right outside the front kitchen door. She tiptoed out the back to see what ruckus caused that sound, but the door was locked. She looked through the lock hole of the door, and to her shock, saw a Thalmor guard laying there, seemingly unconscious. Tsavani rushed back through the front door and up to Elenwen, the Thalmor Ambassador.
"Ambassador! Ambassador! I need to speak with you urgently."
"Oh what is it, cat? Lose your ball of yarn? Leave me to talk to my guests and stir that toy kettle of yours." Elenwen responded in a patronizing, joking tone.
"No ma'am, I have seen a guard laying unconscious outside the back of the kitchen. They may be hurt!"
"Excuse me? what caused this-" Elenwen responded more seriously to Tsavani, before Malborn butted in on the conversation.
"Please excuse her mad ramblings Ambassador, she's digested one too many pinches of moon sugar tonight."
"No I haven't! And you! You let that guest through the kitchen and locked the door behind them! You're in on this you snake!" Tsavani lashed back raising her voice alerting the crowd.
The folk conversed among themselves about an assassin in the embassy and the Thalmor harboring stocks of skooma in the kitchens. This made Elenwen furious. She beckoned some guards to follow her and into the kitchen while shoving Malborn and Tsavani in with them. She then turned back and asked another guard to try and calm down the guests.
"Guards, take this traitorous scamp through the back door and see what this disturbance is about."
"Yes Ambassador!" The guards said forcing Malborn to unlock the door. They all stepped through and checked on the fallen elf to see that he wasn't unconscious, but deceased. The Guards walked off to check the other bodies.
"Now, you have ten seconds to tell me where you've hidden your stash of that cursed sugar." Elenwen demanded to the trembling khajiit.
"I-I promise Ambassador, I would never let my nose come within a mile of that daedric drug!" She pleaded back.
"Funny. Oh so funny indeed. Because one special little fact about moon sugar is that it reacts to electricity. Once voltage enters it general are, it jumps and jitters about like mad hares. So all I would have to do is send a tiny electrical current about this room until I hear the sound of shaking, shifting sands. Let's see if you have consumed any this evening."
And with that, Elenwen extended her arm and shot a tremendously poweful bolt of lightning through the head of Tsavani, causing her to stumble back, hit her waist on the table, then fall forward, couching out wet grains of moon sugar.
"Should have know better than to hire a skooma sniffing feral beast into my embassy such as yourself. Guard! Drag this rat out of here and toss her into the blizzard!"
Tsavani could barely catch her breath, let alone stand on her feet, letting herself being quite literally dragged out of the embassy and thrown out into the ice-ridden gravel path and the freezing winds. Her fur was matted and her bones almost broken, yet she knew she had to spend what little energy remaining to crawl her way back down the mountain to the city below, or even just a a cave, or a tree, or anything she could find to shelter her from the storm. She couldn't even take the time to cry, for her tears would freeze over her face. Her fur might keep her warm enough but for how long?
And so she crawled into the blizzard, coughing up moon sugar.