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SPOILER INFO
This fanfic novel is largely based on the events that occurred in an actual game of Skyrim I played. Therefore, it's inevitably a spoiler.
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previous day
4-202-02-09 11:01
Elisdriel, Hjaalmarch, Skyrim
Lydia is already awake. She has been waiting for me to wake up. We kiss and cuddle a little and then go downstairs. Jenassa and Jordis have already eaten and are outside taking in the sights.
With beautiful weather, we travel to Dunstad Grove and from there to the northeast.
Having reached the highway near The Naked Dragon Morthal, we turn west towards Dragonbridge.
Dragonbridge is a delight, as it's always been (or, well, almost).
I ask Eydis how it's going with Etienne. She says he left. He didn't enjoy it here and urged Eydis to move to Bitchen with him. In fact, when I was in Dragonbridge a couple of weeks ago, they were visiting Bitchen, all three of them. Eydis didn't like it there at all. She says it was a complete madhouse of a city. Besides, she is so well established here, and her daughter Sveina was very reluctant to leave all her friends behind, even though she found Bitchen quite interesting too. Eydis couldn't understand why Etienne would be so eager to return to a place like Bitchen. Well, he ended up leaving without her. It's very sad.
That's Ygfa and one of the neighborhood children.
Eydis lives on the main street, a little farther to our left.
Eydis lives on the main street, a little farther to our left.
Eydis feels much safer with her daughter here in a village near Solitud, as well as comfortably away from all the urban vices and dangers. I can't really blame her. I tell her I'm sorry I brought this upon her, but she says it's all right; it was wonderful while it lasted.
The fox had just come down the road. Upon reaching the guard, it decided to turn around and run away. :-)
I suggest Eydis come with us to say hello to Jordis's parents. After a little hesitation, she agrees.
Then she goes back to work. Jordis who evidently guessed my intentions tells me her brothers (who weren't there this time) wouldn't want a woman with a child anyway. I shrug and reply someone may know someone who would. It never hurts to get to know people.
After an hour and a half of talking to people and shopping and such, me and my followers travel to the Haafingar Stormcloak Camp and then Solitud.
This time, the crowds of Solitud feel oppressive to me. I'm not enjoying myself. There are uncomfortably many people around me all the time. Maybe I'm just feeling under the weather. Speaking of weather, it's still sunny and nice as we walk around shopping and socializing.
I pick up a delivery for Sergius of Winterhold from a man Aquillius who, strangely enough, lives in the house of Vittoria Vici who is preparing to get married. Don't tell me he's sleeping with her! Curious to the extreme, I find an excuse to cast a glance at the (or a?) big bedroom upstairs. It's neat and clean and doesn't contain any clues as to who might sleep or not sleep there. So I leave the house none the wiser.
In the palace, I inform Elisif I have an Ancient Falmer Crown for her which was meant to be a goodwill gift to her late husband from the Aldmeri Dominion but got stolen on the way and I recovered it from the criminals. Elisif says she doesn't want it, and if I don't have a use for it, I can just as well sell it to the Khajiits. Upon a little reflection, she remembers her position and realizes she probably shouldn't so openly refuse a gift from her deadly friend the Dominion, and orders Falk to take the Crown and store it away somewhere.
Then I tell Elisif that a criminal named Jaree-Ra intends to send someone to put out the fire in the Solitude Lighthouse secretly, in order to make a ship carrying extremely valuable cargo run aground. "Not the Icerunner !" exclaims Elisif. I reply that I have no idea and the name means nothing to me.
Elisif tells me all about the ship, but all those technical details will hardly interest you. The point is, she'll send word to the lighthouse to be especially alert and check the fire more often than usually. She will also send a few soldiers there for extra assurance.
Elisif says the Icerunner ought to be reasonably safe now, because not even Jaree-Ra wouldn't dare actually attack the lighthouse. What does she mean, "not even" Jaree-Ra, I ask. With great reluctance, Elisif finally reveals that Jaree-Ra is protected by Vittoria Vici. She beseeches me not to antagonize her. A boycott by the East Empire Company would be disastrous for Haafingar. Elisif informs me Vittoria likes me and even admires me for my courage standing up for Evette, but there are certain boundaries even I have to respect.
I decide to drop the matter for the time being. To change the subject, I ask Elisif why is Vittoria Vici's wedding being delayed so long, and learn it's because her fiancé has to graduate from the military academy first. That is about to happen in five months from now. Very high-ranking dignitaries (although not the emperor himself) will arrive from Cyrodiil for the wedding ceremony, and Elisif thinks that's why the event is going to take place at the warmest time of the year.
Aquillius, Elisif tells me, is a distant relative of Vittoria's husband-to-be, and that's all she knows. If I want to know exactly what he was sent to Solitud for, I'll have to ask Falk.
Well, thanks, I don't think it's that important. Besides, it's now time for me to make my last and most unpleasant call today – to go to the fortress and tell that pig General Tullius that he's needed at the peace conference in High Hrothgar. I have been fantasizing about how I have him tied up when this is all over, and kneel before him, look him in the eye and gently stroke his cheek with my fingers during those last horrible seconds when he waits for Valdimar to chop his head off. But the arrogant way he talks to me this evening makes me change my plans. I'll need to give some serious thought to what to do with him, but he is not going to die so quickly and painlessly.
As to the factual contents of our conversation: Tullius blankly refuses to attend any peace talks. I try to argue with him. About to run out of arguments, I mention that Ulfric has promised to attend. Now Tullius's attitude changes completely:
He says he's going to attend the peace negotiations after all.
This is beyond crazy. Please follow Tullius's logic with me. First he insisted that Ulfric is no better than a common bandit, a lowlife who's had the impudence to rise up against his emperor ("his emperor" – that's exactly how Tullius put it). There can be no negotiations with Ulfric whatsoever, Tullius said, because the law doesn't negotiate with the criminals. Ulfric is simply to be caught, tried and punished. Greybeards or not, there's nothing he would ever discuss with Ulfric. Yet, as soon as I said Ulfric is willing to negotiate, Tullius said so is he.
The important thing is, my goal has been reached. I thank Tullius and leave before he would change his mind. My followers who wait for me outside ask me eagerly how it went. Yes, I reply, he'll attend the peace talks all right, but his reasoning... I tell them everything I just told you. "He's like my grandmother's dog who wouldn't begin to eat until you threatened to take his food away," I sum it up.
"So you remember your grandmother's dog?" says Lydia.
Merciful heaven... Yes, I remember my grandmother's dog. My eyes fill with tears. I lean on Lydia and try to compose myself. We'll need to go to the temple. It's right here. No, I'll go alone. I have to talk to the priest, following Danica's recommendation.
The priest is not there. His assistant Silana listens to me most compassionately. She's always been kind to me, but she doesn't have any special knowledge about memory recovery. So I'll have to come back another time. All I can do today is to pray to Dibella.
I remember only now I ought to go and say hello to Hadvar. Reluctant to enter the fortress again, I ask one of the soldiers and he says Hadvar is out on patrol.
Then me and my followers take a stroll in the southwestern suburb. Astonishingly, we meet Jarl Elisif who is getting some fresh air accompanied by Legate Rikke. I'm too absent-minded to really pay attention. I have my grandmother's house in my mind's eye, and the dog (the cutest dog ever!), and the two of us standing in front of a mirror, me a child barely taller than him, but I can't remember the grandmother herself.
It's past 9 in the evening already. The girls and I walk back to our house unhurriedly and go to sleep. This has been a strange day.
next awakening
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