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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
4-202-05-05 08:23
Thoromhel's House, Sunhold, Summerset, Aldmeri Dominion
While cuddling with Thoromhel, I ask him about the political situation and me and my girls' safety here. I want to get several people's opinions to have a better idea of the general picture.
Thoromhel says in Sunhold we are heroes. Should a thalmor army approach to apprehend us, someone is bound to come and warn us even in the middle of the night. However, do I know Glenview?
The small military outpost west of here?
Yes. We'd better keep away from it, he says.
All right, we will.
Thoromhel gives me a sign to turn my back on him. I had already begun to wonder if he doesn't want sex at all. Guess the elves have more patience than humans or Khajiits. :-)
When I meet up with my followers, we run north and then east. That is because I figure that between the road along the coast and the road along the southern shore of the big lake, there should be another road or path eastwards. It probably won't go all the way to Dusk, so we'll turn left at some point before the big mountains and run to Shimmerene, and to Dusk from there. I'm reluctant to approach Dusk from the west along the coastal road, because I don't want to have to kill the mage-bandits who reside in the Cliffs of Dusk village. (And, quite frankly, they are so strong I'm not even entirely sure we can defeat them.)
Right now, we're still on the Sunhold–Riverfield highway, though. We turn away from it and proceed east, spend some time admiring my favorite adorable little pond northwest of Aro Pass, and then continue eastwards. It's more a path than a road, but it's comfortable to travel along, and there are bridges over bodies of water. I get a nice picture of a rockbug:
And of a swamphound:
Approaching the high mountains, we notice a strange mist to our right. Walking towards it, we end up on the shore of a lake.
There's a number of most curious rocks that look exactly like old men sitting and thinking. They are covered with patterns that look too elaborate to be natural. So these rocks seem very much like statues or even slumbering creatures. But they are showing no sign of an intention to come to life.
There are remains of a wooden pier at the southeastern end of the lake, but nothing like caves or ruins.
We can already see a tower high up the mountains. It must be Dusk. Let's see if we can somehow reach it from this direction after all.
No we can't. We end up at a scenic narrow lake or possibly the beginning of a river where we are attacked by a group of skeletons.
It's impossible to climb up the steep rocky mountains. Yet we are so near Dusk already that I don't want to run to Shimmerene and then come back all the way along the east coast. We'll go south and try to sneak past the bandits, should there be any.
Indeed, with the help of Invisibility potions, we succeed in getting past them. The Invisibility potions are notoriously unreliable, but our Sneaking skill is so high that we succeed in running past right under their noses. We hear bits of obscene conversation and in fact by the time we have reached the winding walkway up to the gate of Dusk, there are confused shouts somewhere behind us. We're not going to find out what it's about. We just run up as fast as we can and enter through the gate. No one is pursuing us. I hurry to Bradwin's place.
We talk and make love and such. When I realize it's quarter past six already, I wonder if I should stay the night. Bradwin reminds me I wanted to come here for a couple of weeks someday, so right now I'd better proceed to where I was headed and return when I don't have anywhere important to go to.
He's right. A few more hours with Bradwin wouldn't give me what I really need, and would only keep me from my goals, the achieving of which would bring closer the time when I could come back and be really properly with him. I know, I tend to get a little philosophical around here. :-)
I go to the inn (naturally, I'm curious to see what the girls are up to; nothing special this time) and then we exit by the main gate. The sunset has painted the sky in most beautiful shades of orange. I jump right off the top of the walkway onto the ground and land between three bandits. I had completely forgotten there might be some on this side too!
We don't have much difficulties with just three of them, but they gave me a mighty scare. (Or rather I caused it all myself, jumping into unknown like that.)
The road to Shimmerene and the sights from it look truly like fairytale at this hour.
We run past Mana Grove, Fort Nettle and Silverwood and over the bridge across the river without being bothered by anybody.
When we arrive on the Shimmerene marketplace, the traders are just going home. We are eight minutes late!!
Now, what should we do next? We could, of course, go to the nearby Coruscate Mine, but our Spriggan Soap has worn off, which means the swamphounds would attack us, and I'm reluctant to kill them just for a little coruscate. What bothers me more is I don't have the slightest desire to have sex with Dulizar right now, but I can't think of an excuse to turn him down other than lie once again that I'm having my period.
We can travel to Winterhold and spend the night there, Jenassa suggests. Of course. Why didn't I think of it myself? We don't really have any more business in Summerset and no matter how safe Quillinda says Shimmerene Mages' Guild is, it might be wiser not to tempt our fate and spend more time here than is absolutely necessary. And much as I'd love to chat with Berenice, Noemie and Heloise, I feel I'd better not, because someday they may end up being questioned about when they last saw me and what we talked about.
So we run to the Mages' Guild, outside of which we stop for a moment to admire a running hare. When it disappears into the long grass, I cast the spell and we return to Skyrim.
Just recalling longingly how beautiful it was in Summerset.
We go to the library, chat with Ertzebet and watch amusedly how Renna and Brelyna sit at one of the tables with Master Tolfdir between them. We can't hear what they're talking about, but the girls look at each other, I'd say, not entirely without hostility. I ask Ertzebet if she knows what's going on. She shrugs and says Master Tolfdir has something mysterious about him and she's sure those two are not the only ones fascinated with him. I quickly change the subject.
Eventually, I retire with Lydia and Jordis to the Arch-Mage's Quarters for the night.
I've been feeling strange about Lydia these past few days. Now I ask her what's wrong. The way she replies "Nothing is wrong," convinces me ultimately. I sit onto her, look her in the eye and demand she tell me what's bothering her.
"I don't want us to fall out over this, Laura," she replies with almost the same words I used that evening five months ago when I was laying on this bed and she was sitting on me.
"Cut the crap, Lydia. What is it?"
"How could you be so heartless about Fastred's parents?"
"What do you mean? They're monsters. Just like that woman in Skaal. Just like..." I shake my head and climb off Lydia. "All right. My childhood friend Petrille – I've told you about her, haven't I."
"Yes."
"I now remember her home. Her parents." I look pensively at the ceiling. "The awful things she told me they said to her. I remember how she dreaded going home, how she tried to stay away from her parents... Fastred is not like that, but the way her parents treat her, it's basically the same. They're destroying her, they want to keep her helpless, kill every bit of belief in herself she has, but she just accepts it. She doesn't have a character like Petrille's."
"Petrille should have been grateful that she at least had parents."
"What?" I'm shocked. I opened my soul to my closest friend and she spat into it! "Do you have any idea how it broke my heart when her mother told me that I should go because she needed to talk to her daughter, and how Petrille looked at me, her eyes pleading "Don't leave me alone here!" But what could I do when I was ordered to leave someone else's home?"
"I would switch places with her this instant," Lydia says with blood-chilling determination.
Now I'm angry. "You don't know what you're talking about!"
For a moment, I wonder if it was too loud and if Jordis could hear it in her room. Then I realize I don't care.
Lydia's face is icy and she stares somewhere far away. It slowly starts to dawn to me that having no parents can be devastating too, in a different way.
I sigh. "Well, I don't know what I'm talking about either. I'm sorry."
Lydia closes her eyes and doesn't answer.
Whatever. I lie down and close my eyes too.
Half a minute later, I sit up, riddled with guilt. Lydia has turned away from me.
I kiss her shoulder and say: "We'll be friends again in the morning, agreed?"
"Agreed."
next awakening
