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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
4-202-05-12 05:17
Proudspire Manor, Solitud, Haafingar, Skyrim
There aren't many people on the streets this early:
In the slowly emerging morning light, the city looks like fairytale and I feel highly energized. Jordis, however, doesn't seem quite as happy as I would have thought she'd be. But I naturally don't want to ask her anything with Ghorbash hearing. So we just bathe, have breakfast and head for the harbor.
We exit the city proper by the sidegate, the door leading to which you can just barely see on the right under the arch.
That's the shortest way to the northern part of the harbor.
That's the shortest way to the northern part of the harbor.
We take a boat to the eastern shore. During our journey across the marshland, we kill a chaurus. This somewhat forbidding landscape looks particularly wonderful on this cold morning:
[series of 4 pictures you can click through; click on the first picture to make it big, then click again to see the next picture etc.; press Esc to return to the text]
Headed for Windward Ruins southwest of Dånstar, we make a slight detour to visit the Pale Imperial Camp.
I succeed in leaving Ghorbash talking to the blacksmith and ask Jordis about last night. She tells us Ghorbash was excited all right, but when she wanted to suck on his penis, he seemed repulsed.
Oh... I'm so sorry. Lydia and I already knew from Borgakh that Orcs don't do oral or anal, ever. It simply makes no sense to them. I had forgotten to warn Jordis.
"He actually seemed, like, afraid," says Jordis. "He even lost his erection."
"I'm not surprised. Have you noticed what kind of teeth Orcs have, women too?"
"What happened then?" enquires Lydia.
Well, Jordis was very gentle and patient with Ghorbash and got him hard again and when she squeezed him with her vaginal muscles, he turned into a real beast. He fucked her fast and hard and came soon. But he was kind of confused. Jordis thinks that maybe she wasn't as loud as I had been last night (I cast my eyes down, but I can still notice Lydia grinning; I must have been really loud), so maybe he thought something was wrong but he couldn't know why. After all, I and Jordis are the only sex partners he's ever had.
All in all, the situation was somewhat awkward and neither of them didn't really know what to talk about afterwards, and so they went to sleep without even waiting for Ghorbash to get hard again. But she did have a loud orgasm in the morning, so it was not a complete disaster.
We fetch Ghorbash and run southeast, to Windward Ruins. Just like Faralda has told me, there's a pedestal inside that snowy ruin of I've-no-idea-what. After we've killed a couple of skeevers, I put the book onto the pedestal and cast the Flames spell at it as instructed.
When I open the book again, it has one more page of text, just as cryptic as the previous ones. I must find a mage or a priest who could explain what it means. I mean, I can understand that I'll have to cast a frost spell the next time, but me and my followers have no chance of finding out the correct location by the undescription in the book.
Since Lydia has no reason for going to Dånstar today, we run south.
The snowy spruce forests in this region are always a delight. I never grow tired of looking at them.
In the mountains southwest of Fort Dunstad should be a very ancient site called The Dunpar Wall. Like every Nord in Skyrim, Lydia and Jordis know it's incredibly old, but don't really have an idea what exactly it is. Most importantly, they don't know what dangers (or possibly excitements) we might encounter there. We'll check the place out today. As I've already mentioned to you, we're not going to Winterhold to fetch Jenassa just yet, because we want to be in Hviterun tomorrow – as well as do what we had planned on doing with Ghorbash two days later.
Halfway between Windward Ruins and the supposed location of The Dunpar Wall is the Hall of the Vigilant, the headquarters of the virrs where we have already been once.
We stop only for a moment to say hello to a man in front of the house. He doesn't seem as fervent as they usually are, so I take a chance showing him Faralda's book and asking him if he can make any sense of the description of the next location. He says he can't, but maybe someone in the town can.
The town?
Yeah, there's a town called Dunparwall around that ancient site.
I smile and ask if he possibly knows a road there, and he tries hard not to smile back and shows on my map where the path is.
I thank him cordially and then he smiles after all. I refrain from hugging him, because another virr has just come out of the house.
On our way up the mountain, we discover a vein of a material called Stone Quarry (I've no idea what it may be good for) and admire spectacular views of Fort Dunstad in the midst of a snowy forest.
Soon we indeed discover a town.
The massive wooden grating-gate is opened and we enter.
The people here are on the unsophisticated side, leading a simple life in a harsh climate.
There are quite a few streets and buildings. With most of them squeezed into narrow spaces between mountains, nice views are rare. But I succeed in stealing a glance at a letter that is not addressed to me:
We walk around for a couple of hours, but then I realize we're having good daylight and a nice weather, so we'd better check out that thalmor fortress that is supposed to be east of here. It's not far, but we don't know if it's possible to ascend the mountains from this side. So let's find out.
The climb is moderately challenging, but there are paths between mountains most of the way. North-northwest of our destination, we stumble upon a citadel with a few bandits.
A big but low square-shaped castle which is presumably Fort Snowshield is visible from here.
We approach it cautiously, but I can't detect anybody on the outside. Most of the structure seems to be inside the mountain. We climb onto the roof of the visible part. There is absolutely nothing to be found there. So we'll have to go in through the front door.
It opens into a small lobby, beyond which is a hall with several thalmors. We are promptly noticed and find ourselves fighting a messy battle with new groups of enemies turning up from various directions.
The hall has thick columns in the middle and a lot of furniture, so it's very difficult to maneuver, and I'm in fact very worried about my followers because we are outnumbered rather badly. But the girls' reflexes are still perfect and even Ghorbash survives the ordeal.
Before exploring the rest of the stronghold, I use the Ritual Stone power and succeed in awakening almost a dozen killed thalmors. I hadn't used it for such a long time I had already forgotten how horribly zombies groan. Well, I shouldn't have even bothered, because there are few enemies left.
I can only hit this leg from this angle, but I don't dare sneak any closer. This will hopefully be enough to disable him.
The place is very clean, has a large dormitory, dining rooms, books and a large map of Skyrim, but unfortunately no secret documents. The most intriguing thing we find are the notes of someone who was evidently translating a book from the Dwemer language. But at least we destroyed a thalmor base.
Unlike in bandit fortresses, we found the dormitory empty. No one was sleeping while their comrades fought the intruders (us).
One of these days, when we happen to be near Solitud, I'll tell Velvus about this – after I've told Tullius. And, come to think of it, I ought to tell Yrsarald first. Tullius has truly made me suspicious about that defeatist legate.
The sun is setting. (Outside, I mean.) The view from the mountain is very beautiful. The direct way back to Dunparwall where I intend to spend the night passes by Fort Dunstad pretty close and I'm not in the mood of fighting bandits, so we head southwest instead and end up so close to Laintar Dale that we can see it at some distance. We turn back towards the mountains in the northwest and return to Dunparwall where we walk around, talk to people and shop.
This is the Dunparwall Inn:
It has long narrow corridors on three storeys and quite a few small rooms. We get one each. The only roomy place apart from the taproom is a nice lounge of sorts on the second floor:
next awakening
