Chapter 62: On and off the road
[19th of Sun's Height 4E 202]
Tolan, Agmaer, Inigo, Jordis and I – not to forget Hanni and Nanni, my wonderful saber cat 'pets' – had left Fort Dawnguard to start an expedition towards Dimhollow Crypt, a target which was quite familiar to me from the game. The distance from the southeastern part of the Rift and the Crypt was significant, though, and we'd sure need several days to get there. After all, the distances here in real Skyrim were quite a bit larger than in the game.
About half way to Riften, we had been attacked by bandits, from a small fortified structure right of the road, not far after the side road to the Black-Briar lodge branching off, and while we had had to kill most of them, we now had two prisoners with us. We were going to deliver them to the guards in Riften when we got there.
The female prisoner had taunted Agmaer, the junior Dawnguard member, a lot before and during the fight, and she was now gagged, as she wasn't willing to stop spitting insults and such. I was now curious enough about that to ask the Nord about it:
"Say, Agmaer, that bandit woman and you, do you have some kind of history?"
He looked a little bit embarrassed and responded:
"I have met some of those bandits before, true, and they pestered our patrols for some time. For some reason, the young woman seemed to target me specifically, although I never gave her any reason to do so."
"Do many bandits behave like that?"
Agmaer just shrugged his shoulder; maybe he was too young and inexperienced to know. Jordis had a reply for me, though:
"No, they don't, according to my experience. I have encountered a few like this one, but only very few, among the females. It seems to be more common for male bandits to 'acquire' young female people as slaves, for household chores and more. Disgusting, but unfortunately reality."
I did not have a proper answer for that and just nodded. Right at this time, we encountered a couple of Nords with a mule heading east, and when they saw the two captives we had with us, the male Nord told us:
"You managed to get her? I'm glad to see this!"
"You encountered her before?"
"Oh yes, we did. She's got a habit to tease us with … with vile remarks, like she could be a better mate for me than my wife. We already discussed moving our trade route somewhere else, but we've got good regular customers just across the border of Morrowind."
"Well, she won't bother you any longer" Agmaer replied, with some obvious satisfaction; "we'll let her rot for some time in Riften jail."
"Well done; our thanks!"
So, Agmaer had not been the only one she had targeted. I did not really want to ponder this for much longer, and for the remainder of our trip to Riften I focused once again on enjoying nature and practicing my magic.
We arrived at the Riften southeastern gate without any further interruption, and when we explained the presence of our two prisoners to the guards there, one of them told us:
"Good that somebody finally managed to put a stop to that. Some travelers have already complained, but with the Civil War and all, we haven't had a chance to do something about it. Can you please head directly to the guard barracks with them?"
"Sure, we can do that. The guard barracks is where exactly?"
"Go up the stairs to Mistveil Keep and turn left before you enter the Keep."
"All right, we will do that."
When we got there, we met the Guard Captain, I forgot the name, and he said about the same the guard at the gate had mentioned. He was grateful for our service, had his fellow guards take over the two bandits, and we were free to go again.
"Now, where do we go next?"Agmaer asked.
"We need to march on!" Tolan insisted.
"But we can at least grab lunch in the city" I suggested; "after all, it seems to be about the right time for that."
As it turned out, I was able to talk my companions into eating lunch next to the fish market outside at the docks, and while not everybody was fully happy with the offered food there, I was; I even got some smoked fish for the road. A Nord who called herself Klara was happy to see how much I liked her fish, and she claimed:
"All caught locally here in the lake! Fresh catch, too. Come again, will you?"
For now, we did not linger for much longer, and thus we quickly proceeded towards the road north. However, when we had just left the market and were still on the wooden footbridges, I suddenly saw a familiar face further south, when I looked around, maybe fifty meters away. She looked out to the water and not in our direction and thus probably had not noticed our group, but unless I was very mistaken, this was Ferwen, the very athletic and very pretty young Bosmer lady. I had already wondered why we had not met her a few days ago here in the city, but had been distracted by other issues and not thought about it too much. Now a chance to talk to her offered itself, but right before I could turn around to my companions and tell them that I'd need a few minutes, a man with reddish hair, likely a Nord, stepped next to her and put on of his hands on her shoulder. Due to the distance and the noise around us, I could not understand what they were talking about, but that male Nord looked suspiciously like Brynjolf, although I could of course not be sure about that. The two of them seemed to be comfortable with each other, and although I did not observe anything like PDA, I suddenly was not eager at all to initiate conversation. As usual in such situations, my shyness and social clumsiness came through and made me turn around and follow my companions; I might regret that later, but for now I caved in. Inigo had somehow noticed what and how I had looked at and asked me:
"My friend, do you have a problem with Brynjolf?"
"What? No, not really, but that was indeed Brynjolf, right?"
"Aye, that was him for sure. I saw him in the prison frequently enough when he bribed a guard to get someone free or, which also sometimes happened, extend jail time for someone he disliked. Brynjolf shows up in public much more than the mysterious leader of the guild, Mercer Frey. However, I have to admit that I have not seen the young Bosmer lady before."
I was certainly not willing to tell him details about Ferwen, but at least I could admit that I knew her:
"Oh yes, the Bosmer lady is Ferwen. We already met in Whiterun, but there have been a few… misunderstandings between us, and I'm not so eager to talk to her right now."
He looked like he guessed that I did not tell him the full story, but he did not inquire further. I also asked the fellow Khajiit:
"So, Mercer Frey is the boss of the Thieves Guild?"
"He sure is, and everybody knows that he's in bed with Maven Black-Briar. Well, probably not literally, but it is not a secret that the two of them do a lot of scheming together, and Maven likely gets a percentage of the guild's income."
"How do you know all of that, Inigo?"
"This is not really a secret, and besides, one hears a lot when spending months in the local jail. Both guards and prisoners talk a lot."
All right, yes, that was an excellent point. The information did not really surprise me, but once more I was amazed about the many parallel events between the game and the real Skyrim. I had learned abut the burning beehives at Goldenglow Estate, I had partially witnessed certain events around Honningbrew Meadery, and with Mercer still being alive, I could assume that the Thieves Guild quest line was ongoing, but far from complete. That was, however, not really my concern, although I was of course curious. For now, Inigo and I followed the others, and we passed the stables north of the city. A young male Redguard saw us and called out:
"If it's horses you want, you'll want to speak to Hofgrir inside!"
Inigo replied politely:
"Much obliged, but most horses do not get along well with Khajiit, my friend. You work at the stables?"
"Yes. Hofgrir took me in when I arrived in Riften about a year ago. He's been teaching me everything he knows. Horses are my whole life. Back in Hammerfell, I helped my family raise horses at our farm. I hope to open my own stables one day, but I think it's going to take a lot longer than I expected."
"You will eventually achieve your goal, I'm sure. But we need to be going now."
Indeed, the others were already ahead and getting close to the watchtower; we hurried to catch up with them.
Some time later we reached the road branch where a smaller dirt road led northeast and branched off the main road north. We did not have a local guide with us, but the map showed that the side road should also get us to our target for today, Shor's Stone, and I felt brave enough to use it; so I asked:
"Does anybody have an objection against using the side road?"
Agmaer replied:
"No, and actually I prefer walking on the smaller dirt roads over the hard cobbled roads. This might change when it's raining, but it does not look like rain today."
"My sentiment as well, Agmaer" I told him.
"I'm not surprised" he responded, "with you never wearing boots."
This was very true, and my feet, which more resembled big cat paws than human feet, indeed preferred softer ground whenever possible; that had also applied in my first life, with shoes, when I had always preferred unpaved trails in forests and between meadows to paved side roads; they were, in my opinion, more comfortable to walk on. I was glad that nobody objected, although it was obvious that Tolan would have preferred the main road.
The next few hours were reasonably quiet, and except for an encounter with a single bear and the ubiquitous wolves, not much happened. While we walked, I thought about the game concept of 'fast travel', and I was almost glad that this did not exist in real life. Yes, I could understand why the game designers had introduced it, but traveling in the game was by far not as immersive as it was here. I would not want to miss enjoying the sights, noises and smells of nature when walking, and even if I could do something like fast travel, I'd likely use it only on rare occasions. Even when playing the game, I had eventually used one of the survival mods, and I had found one which allowed fast travel only when you were next to a road sign or close to a carriage; that had turned out to be a good compromise for me. I had also read a few fan fiction stories where some of the main characters could fast travel, and it had felt to me like they were racing from one adventure to the next with barely a break in between; for me, taking my time to travel was not wasted time, but part of the goal; fortunately, I was not in a particular hurry. Tolan would sure have preferred to fast travel to Dimhollow Crypt, if he could; but even with the game mechanics, this would have required a previous visit to the target location, as far as I recalled.
We stopped for a quick break at a small pond, and while we drank and ate a little bit, I watched the ducks swimming in the water. Butterflies were buzzing around the mountain flowers all around, and some faint rustling in the distance indicated a few small animals under the bushes, maybe foxes or rabbits. The scenery looked quite peaceful, but I knew too well that this wouldn't last; Skyrim was harsh and sometimes cruel; did it have to be like that?
Soon the break was over, and Tolan in particular pushed for us to get moving again. While we walked, I recalled my magic practice, and I continued to cast 'Oakflesh' on myself while mumbling the word 'Eiche'. Just for variation I also conjured Spirit a few times; this was a spell I always wanted to be able to cast quickly, in case of an emergency. So far, I was able to cast three spells without really thinking about it – the spell to conjure my familiar (Conjuration), the 'Flames' spell (Destruction), and a simple healing spell (Restoration). Curiously, the spell to heal myself and to heal others seemed to be the same here, contrary to the game, which was totally all right for me. While thinking about magic, I also noticed that many spells did not show as kind of magical balls in my hands while casting them. Healing, for instance, just made one of my paws glow on the surface, and that glow extended to the body part I was getting close to, doing its work either on myself or somebody else.
Some of my companions did not know and understand what I was doing, and I explained. Agmaer admitted that his knowledge of magic was basically zero, and his interest to learn also wasn't really there; however, he did not mind if others knew their magic and were, for instance, able and willing to heal him after a fight. Inigo was more interested, and he claimed that he was willing to learn some magic, as soon as there was a good opportunity. I did not recall if the Inigo in the game knew many spells, but my real friend did not have to mimic his game counterpart in all aspects.
The trail was easy on the feet, and it was apparent that it was not very much in use. East of us, the mountains loomed, and I imagined to see a couple of cave entrances on the slopes. While looking there repeatedly, I tried to remember which special places were in that region, but except for that Dawnguard related excavation where one could eventually find Florentius, I did not recall any. When I asked Jordis about that, she had an answer for me:
"Indeed, a group of people have started an excavation somewhere over there not so long ago."
"How do you know that?"
"Oh, when Fiona had her audience with Jarl Laila Law-Giver the other day, Iona had a chance to exchange information with her steward and her housecarl. Besides, many guards know Iona well, and she learned a lot from them as well. Before we separated, Iona shared a lot of information with me, too. Actually, one of the guards mentioned that the excavation is led by some Vigilants of Stendarr."
"This is correct" Tolan chimed in. "A group of Vigilants left the Hall a few months ago, prior to the vampire attack there, to pursue what some believe to be valid information. Like Brother Adalvald believes that a valuable artifact is located in Dimhollow Crypt, Moric Sidrey and a few other Vigilants believe that something valuable can be found in a place called Ruunvald. There is, according to the information I have received, no obvious entrance, and they need to do some digging. I don't know if that digging has got them anywhere, and I haven't heard anything about their progress recently."
"Is it possible that there is something valuable in both places? Dimhollow Crypt and Ruunvald?"
"In theory, yes, I guess. For my part, I believe that Brother Adalvald has our best lead; he's been doing that kind of work for much longer than Moric."
"I see. Maybe at some later time it would be interesting to check their progress, too."
"As long as we explore Dimhollow Crypt first; fine."
Was this a sign of competition within the Vigilants, or had both activities been started in parallel on purpose? When I had played the game, I had not cared about such details at all, but just enjoyed the scenery and done the required fights, preferably with a few followers aiding me in both – the fighting, as my reflexes with computer combat were mediocre, and the scenery, as pretty females contributed to that in my opinion. For instance, a waterfall by itself was nice, but the same waterfall with a scantily clad blond and smiling Vilja under it was even nicer. One of the reasons I had liked the Vilja mod was that there had been an option to have her change clothes when she was in the water, although I had never really been able to decide what the appropriate and lore friendly Tamrielic equivalent to a bikini was. Besides, I had come to love her slight Swedish accent.
Despite not keeping to the main road, there wasn't a lot happening while we traveled north. Naturally, no surprise here, there was the occasional wolf pack, but with the early warning Hanni and Nanni gave us, I was always able to be prepared and not have a wolf bite into my arm or so. Besides, I kept practicing my magic; I could not really feel much improvement yet for invoking the 'Oakskin' spell, but I had been told that this might need quite some time. At the very least the frequent use of that spell helped to extend my pool of magicka, slowly but steadily, although I had no way to directly measure that.
Getting close to Shor's Stone, we encountered a couple of bears, and this time I allowed us to pass without being attacked by shouting 'KAAN DREM' – 'Kyne's Peace', as Master Arngeir had told me – with two words now. Agmaer and Inigo saw and heard that for the first time, and once we had passed, I needed to explain why I could shout like that. While Agmaer just nodded, Inigo had a comment, of course:
"Traveling with you, my friend, is getting more fascinating again. I'm glad that you bothered to find me in Riften, and I will work hard to be worthy of your friendship."
A few minutes later I saw him taking a deep breath and look around, and when he noticed me looking at him, he smiled and stated:
"I can smell adventure everywhere – this land is full of it!"
He had a point, and I did not hesitate to agree with him:
"So true, Inigo, indeed."
[Author's Notes: I heard that Emma, the Swedish modder who had created Vilja both for TES IV and TES V, stopped being active in the modding community years ago because she had been mobbed, mostly for the Swedish accent. Not sure if this is true, but if it is, it is very sad. Balu also speaks for me in saying 'I had come to love her slight Swedish accent'. In TES IV, I had already loved the Vilja mod and also a few house mods from Emma, in particular 'Red Rose Manor'. I can't help myself, but I consider Vilja's Swedish accent cute.]