Dardeh pushed open the door to the Bannered Mare and stepped inside. There were only a few people there this early in the morning, so it was easy to spot Saadia standing in the side room, stirring in a cooking pot. She looked up, smiled, and beckoned to him.
“Any news of the Alik’r?”
Dardeh tried not to visibly grit his teeth. The only way this was going to work was if he could lie through them, convincingly, and he was neither a very good liar nor a fan of doing so.
“I couldn’t get them all. I had to hide to get away with my skin.” That much is true enough. There would have needed to be three of me to get them all. “I overheard them say that they’re coming for you.”
“But I thought they weren’t allowed within the city!” She reached out to grab Dardeh’s arm as if for support.
“They aren’t. The guards were pretty clear about it when I heard them talking to the two at the gates a few days back. But they’ve found another way in. We need to get you out of here.”
“But where will I go? I can’t keep running forever!”
“There’s a horse waiting for you, down at the stables. I’ll make sure you’re safe until you’re out of sight, but you have to go now, while it’s still early.”
She looked truly distressed. I can’t stand this. What am I doing? It had better work or she’s going to be justified in cutting a finger off like she threatened.
“After all this I have to just pick up and leave again?” She shook her head, looking around as though she was saying a quick goodbye. “Well if you really think it’s the only way, I’ll trust you. Let’s not waste any time.”
Dardeh nodded and followed Saadia out the door. She jogged through the marketplace, down the street and out the gates, her gait telling him that she was no stranger to the need to move quickly.
Dardeh felt for the grips of his swords, making sure they were exactly where they needed to be for a quick draw. I’m only going to get one shot at this, he thought, and I need to make sure I can do it right. It was bad enough that he was wearing his plain steel armor; he’d given the plate over to the smith for repairs. All the more reason to take Kematu down as quickly as possible.
Kematu and his band had been hiding out in Swindler’s Den, a deep cave about halfway between Whiterun and the town of Rorikstead, out on Whiterun Hold’s western edges. Dardeh had crept into the cave’s entrance, overhearing the bandits there. They’d been paid to guard these outer rooms; Kematu and his Alik’r warriors were deeper in. He’d worked his way toward the back by picking off the guards one at a time; but all of the Alik’r had come running together when he’d tried to draw them out. There were just too many of them for him to take on. One of them dropped with an arrow through his eye; Dardeh had used him, and the obstruction he created in the tunnel, as his chance to retreat and bolt for cover outside the cave’s entrance.
Then he had come up with another plan. He made his way to Rorikstead and found the two men who had been in Whiterun, sitting in the inn. “She’s at the Bannered Mare,” he had told them. They’d been pleased. “Get her out of the city. Down by the stables should do nicely. Just get her out there and Kematu will take care of the rest.” They’d thanked him, paid him some gold, and left to tell Kematu their news. Dardeh had run back to Whiterun as quickly as he could.
It was going to be just short of cold-blooded murder.
It’s not right, but I have to do it.
He jogged along behind Saadia, hoping that there wouldn’t be too many of the Alik’r waiting for them. If he was lucky, Kematu would be alone. If not, well, Saadia was quick on her feet and had a knife, they were within shouting distance of Whiterun guards, and maybe one would even be walking his rounds nearby.
Saadia ran forward toward the front of the stables. Dardeh held back, then cut left around the back side of it, creeping as quietly as he could to the back corner of the building. Saadia was facing a lone Alik’r.
“What is this, Kematu? Why are you here?” she hissed.
“You can’t run from us any longer, ‘Saadia,’ if that’s the name you’re using these days,” the man called Kematu murmured. “Come along quietly. There are people who are … anxious to see you.”
Now. Go! Go! Go!
He threw himself forward, attacking Kematu from behind, roaring his battle cry as he slashed. He managed to land a single deep cut on Kematu’s left shoulder; but Kematu was wearing the armor favored by the Alik’r warriors, made of a finely woven, reinforced material that repelled a great deal of damage. Dardeh’s scimitar bit into Kematu but not deeply enough to stop him.
Dardeh dropped back a step and blocked with his left sword as Kematu drew his own and turned to attack, slashing over and over with his right hand while using the left, damaged though it was, to block and thrust forward. Kematu was seasoned, experienced, and his every move efficient and dangerous. Dardeh was strong, but not nearly as experienced; he moved to block an attack from Kematu’s right side and failed to see the left sword slashing toward him. It raked across his bicep, leaving a deep slash.
Dardeh hissed with the pain, felt the warmth of his own blood running down the exposed skin of his arm, and staggered backwards several steps. Damn, he’s good. He’s better than I am. Well, there’s no help for it.
He gathered his energy and Shouted.
“FUS-RO!”
Kematu flew backwards, across the road leading to Whiterun, a good fifteen or twenty paces, and landed on his back, all the wind having been knocked out of him. As he gasped for air, Dardeh barreled into him with all the strength he had left, hacking as hard as he could, and finished him off with a deep slash to the throat.
He wasted no time beginning to heal his arm.
“Damn, that hurt,” he muttered, then looked up as he heard Saadia approaching. She was glaring at him. I’d be toast right now if she could cast flames with those eyes, he thought.
She snapped at him.
“You could have warned me that you were going to set me up like that, Dardeh!”
“If I had told you, you wouldn’t have come. Well you’re safe now, aren’t you,” he grumbled. It would be nice to be appreciated once in awhile. But I suppose she’s still reeling from finding out they were so close to catching her. “They won’t bother you again.”
Saadia sighed and relaxed.
“I’m sorry. Yes, you’re right. Here. I suppose you should have this.“ She handed him a coin purse.
I didn’t really expect to be paid, Dardeh thought, but I could really use the money. I’ll give some more coins to Lucia and, well, maybe I’ll rent a room for myself once I get to Riverwood.
He looked around as he continued working on his arm. Aside from himself and Saadia, he saw only two figures, crouching near the corner of the stable, and neither of them in Whiterun guard uniforms. Darned good thing that wasn’t a real emergency, he thought. I would have thought I’d have brought all the guards running, using a Shout like that.
Saadia nodded, almost as if to herself more than to anyone else.
“Well, I thank you. Now I can go back to my life in Whiterun. You’ll always be welcome at the Bannered Mare, Dardeh.”
She turned and jogged up the path toward the city gates.
I would hope so, he thought. My coin is as good as anyone else’s.
He was looking down at his arm, testing it to make sure it was well enough healed, when the sound of feet crunching on dirt caught his attention. In his peripheral vision he saw a Redguard woman, and wondered what Saadia had forgotten to tell him. Turning, he found not Saadia but one of the people he’d seen crouching by the stable.
“Um, we didn’t mean to be intruding on that,” she told him. “Whatever it was. But… is everything ok? Your arm?”
This woman had longer hair than Saadia but was roughly the same size and was dressed in leather armor covered with pockets and pouches. She was carrying two steel swords and looked ready for travel. Dardeh took a step closer to her and his heart started accelerating. She had black hair. She had green eyes. And she had a long, pale scar reaching down the side of her face.
By the Nine. Could this be her? After all the searching?
Sorry to stare,” he said. “It’s just that I wasn’t expecting to see another Redguard woman with a scar in the same city.”
The blonde man had come up beside them; and when Dardeh spoke, he tensed, radiating alarm.
Dardeh glanced at him and his world shifted, as completely as it had when the Graybeards summoned him, but without the slightest whisper of a sound. He stared, hearing and feeling his heart pounding in his ears, as overwhelmed as he was when a dragon’s soul rushed in to merge with his own.
He was a Nord, a big, pale man who could be nothing other than a Nord. Tall, taller than Dardeh and probably ten years older, and he had the bluest eyes. Not an ethereal, icy blue, like those of the Nord he’d followed into Whiterun after the dragon attack, but a deep blue, the blue of a Skyrim sky on a sunny, clear, cold day; the blue of a lake in summer, the blue a man could drown in. He had long hair, very blonde, pulled back into a tail, and a long blonde beard pulled into a knot. He was in leather armor that showed off his solid build and well-muscled arms, built to swing the greatsword strapped to his back. He had high cheekbones and a face that, while it wore a wary expression at the moment, had laugh lines and crinkles around the eyes that spoke of humor and a good disposition. Not the best-looking man Dardeh had ever admired, certainly not the worst; but something about him grabbed at Dardeh in a way he couldn’t define.
Stop everything. Just make it all stop while I figure out how to know this man.
He didn’t know why he’d never felt such a thing before, or why it was that this particular person made him feel it. He couldn’t stop staring.
I don’t know what this is, but I do know that I’m in such trouble right now.
It’s not like a dragon soul. But I want it to be.
He blinked and took several deep breaths, forced himself to return his attention to the Redguard. Stop trembling, he told himself. Pay attention, he told himself. Redguard woman with scar? Maybe your sister? That’s why we’re in this part of Skyrim, remember?
She shook her head and reached out to touch the Nord’s arm. “It’s ok,” she told him.
Dardeh watched him flinch, just the tiniest bit, as she touched him.
She’s the one in charge. All right, now that’s clear.
She’s really comfortable with him, too. And he … is not. But he wants to be.
She looked at Dardeh, and waved her hand toward her scar, grinning. “It is odd, to be sure. I wasn’t exactly expecting it, either. Can I ask why you were looking for… one of us?”
He chuckled. One of us, indeed. She’s sharp and she has a sense of humor. He found his gaze drifting back to the blonde Nord, and forced himself to look away, look back at her. Her eyes were green, the same green as the single one of his, and they were both cautious but curious at the moment.
“Well,” he said, picking his words carefully, “Saadia there was being pursued by those bounty hunters for reasons that aren’t mine to share. Let’s just say that I couldn’t just leave a kinsman in trouble like that. There were too many of them to take out as a group, so I picked off a few here and there and then figured out a way to lure the ringleader out here.”
He pointed at Kematu’s body, then groaned internally. And here am I, he thought, calling Saadia my kinsman when most of the time I’m trying to convince everyone that I’m a Nord. I’ve lost my mind here.
Gods, I’m sore after that. He shifted and rotated his shoulders, willing them to loosen up. Something about me needs to relax because gods know my heart rate isn’t. Or my mind. Or the rest of me.
“Wasn’t expecting him to be quite that tough,” he told her. I should have, but I didn’t. Eventually I’ll learn to not underestimate my opponents. “But yeah, I’m fine. Thanks for asking.”
They were just looking at him. He was superbly, excruciatingly aware of the man’s eyes on him. He’s wondering about the Shout, I’ll bet. That has to be it, right? And why am I so self-conscious all of a sudden? Damn. Now the neck. My neck is stiff. Every damn thing about me is stiff right now and it’s ridiculous. Come on, Dar, don’t think about it. Think about something else, think about…
He popped his neck. It made a vivid, resounding crack. By the Nine.
“That sounded awful, didn’t it? As for me, I’m looking for my sister.” Then he laughed and waved his hand up at his own bright blonde hair. “Well, half-sister. Same father, different mother. My mother was a Nord.”
“Good,” the blonde man said. Dardeh’s head swam. His voice was deep; not as deep as Dardeh’s by any stretch but a good, mellow sound like the warmth of mead at the end of a long day; and Dardeh felt a shiver trying to emerge from the very depths of him, butterflies dancing around in his stomach. Not just good to look at but good to listen to as well. This is bad. I’m just…lost.
Dardeh couldn’t help himself; he started smiling at the man and couldn’t stop.
“I’m a Nord,” the man said, just as though there had been any doubt whatsoever about that fact.
Ordinarily, Dardeh thought, I might say something extremely sarcastic right about now but… but…
“I guessed as much.” He couldn’t stop smiling. The man nodded at him and smiled back, and the butterflies in Dardeh’s stomach danced a little faster.
Dardeh forced himself to return his attention to the Redguard. She was rolling her eyes at her companion. She’s thinking what I was thinking. Heh.
Pay attention, already, he scolded himself, trying to quiet the tumult of his mind and senses. She could be the person I’ve been looking for all this time.
“Anyway,” he said, “it probably seems a strange thing to do. I’ve never actually met my father, but just before my ma passed she told me about this girl. If she really exists, she’s the only family I’ve got. I was told that she has green eyes and a scar, and you…”
“…have green eyes and a scar,” she nodded. “But my family has been gone for a very long time now, since I was not much more than able to hold a sword. I was the only child, unless ma and da were hiding one somewhere. Sorry about that. I guess I’m not the only one who was prone to scratches from sharp blades,” she laughed.
Dardeh’s heart fell. No? But what were the chances that there would be two Redguard women with scars in the same city at the same time, and one of them with green eyes? And this one… he wasn’t sure why, but there was something about her that spoke to him.
Dardeh looked at the plain swords she was carrying. They were good enough swords, as such things went, but…
“Speaking of which,” he asked her, trying not to chuckle, “what in Oblivion are those things you’re hauling around? Don’t you have some proper weapons?”
He grinned to himself as she flushed. Yes, a temper here, he thought. Maybe she really is my sister, because that’s exactly the kind of thing that would make me start fuming. And I would tease her, like that, if she was my sister.
“Well I’m sorry they don’t meet with your approval. They were the best I could come up with after mine got liberated by some bandits. I wasn’t exactly in a position to head back home to replace them.” She looked disgusted.
“Wait a moment.” He walked over to Kematu and wrestled the Alik’r scimitars out of his stiffening fingers. Kematu had been his kill; anything on his corpse was Dardeh’s by right. “Take these,” he said, handing them to Dag. “I already have mine, he doesn’t need them any longer, and I’d hate to see some… someone who isn’t Redguard have them.”
Damn, I almost said ‘some Nord.’ What am I thinking. I am a Nord, and so is he. And she’s not a Redguard man. Still, I’d rather have them go to a Redguard woman than one of those sleazy shopkeepers behind the gates. Especially not that Belethor guy. He makes me cringe. ‘If I had a sister, I’d sell her in a minute!’ Good for you, buddy, but I’m looking for mine and even though this isn’t her, I want her to have some decent Redguard swords.
The Redguard woman took them and tried them for balance. She looked almost emotional about it, he thought. She hadn’t just had some random swords stolen, she’d had a set of these swords, important ones, that were stolen from her.
“Thank you,” she said quietly, her voice catching. “You have no idea how much this means to me.” She cleared her throat and smiled at Dardeh, handing him her old swords. “Here, at least take these off my hands, would you? Run them up to the smithy and sell them off for as much as you can get. Please. Maybe they’ll buy you a couple of nights in a soft bed.”
Ok, he thought, I will. It’ll give me a little extra for Lucia. I’ll be gone from Whiterun for awhile and I don’t want her to go hungry again.
“Well,” he said, wishing he could think of another excuse to stand there and admire the blonde Nord some more, “I suppose I need to go start searching for yet another girl with a scar.”
The woman stopped him with a hand on his arm.
“Wait a moment. I really need to know. What that was? The thing you did?”
Her companion sighed and shook his head, shooting Dardeh a slightly awe-struck look. “I told you already. It was a Shout. He Shouted. Listen to me sometimes, woman.” He frowned at her and she glared back.
Dardeh laughed, but his heart sank again. Well, he thought, I can see that these two are a couple. Not that I should be surprised. Damn. I don’t know why I should have expected anything else.
“Yeah. I just learned that I could do that not long ago. A dragon… well, never mind.” He shook his head. “It sounds ridiculous even to me and I’m the one that was there. That shout is translated from the dragon tongue as Unrelenting Force, for obvious reasons. I have a few of them now. It’s a strange thing, but it’s pretty handy in a tight spot. It’s a relief to talk to someone who knows what I mean.”
“Wait,” the Nord said, staring at him. “Are you saying that dragons are real?”
Dardeh grimaced, remembering the overwhelming size and power of the black dragon at Helgen, its head having rammed a hole in the side of the keep’s tower wall.
“Oh very real. Big and nasty, and they don’t like people. Some speak with fire and some with frost, and you can’t get too close to the front end of them, for all the teeth. I’d hate to tell you what the first one did to some of these Whiterun guards.” He remembered the dying guard’s screams, and shuddered. “I’ve had to kill several of them now. I wouldn’t recommend it for a leisure activity. Learning their language is useful for that, though.”
The woman shook her head, looking incredulous. “Dragon… language.”
Yep, Dardeh thought, running his hands up over his braids. I don’t blame you. It does sound absurd.
“I know, it’s bizarre. That’s how they explained it to me, though. You have to, well at least almost everyone has to, study the words for a long time before they can make them work in that way. Unless you have the gift. I just more or less knew how to use the words when I heard them.” More or less, close enough without trying to explain that I absorb them somehow, a thing that still sounds ridiculous to me and I’m the one who does it.
The Nord’s brow furrowed. “Who is ‘they’?”
“The Greybeards. Well, Master Arngeir, I should say. The others don’t exactly talk.”
The man looked at him, his eyes round, mouth open. The only other place Dardeh had ever seen that look was on the face of the Whiterun guard who had called him…
“Dragonborn?” the man gasped. “Can it be? Are you … Dragonborn?”
“Um,” Dardeh said, embarrassed and yet pleased that he knew what it meant. “So it would seem. Whether I like it or not.”
“Would you boys please tell me what in the name of Stendarr you are talking about?” the Redguard girl snapped. “I am lost.”
The Nord told her.
Dardeh stood, watching the man talk, just drinking in the sound of his voice as he explained what a Dragonborn was, and who the Greybeards were, and that he’d thought it was just a legend. All of it. The man knew about all of it, and it was wonderful, and Dardeh wanted to hear him explain it for the rest of the day. I know that I can’t have him but at least I can listen to him. And now he’s staring at me. Probably thinks I’m some sort of freak but I’ll take it, he’s looking at me.
What in the name of Talos is wrong with me right now?
“Thanks,” he said once the lesson was done. “You explained it better than I could. I’m still trying to figure it all out myself. The only thing I know for sure is that I can do, well, what I did. I’m pretty sure I’m not related to any dragons, but then again I’m kind of half and half anyway, so who knows.” He laughed and smiled at the man again.
Cut it out, Dar, you’re smiling at him too much. He’s going to think you’re a creep.
“Anyway,” the woman said, looking down at her new scimitars, “we have a long way to go to get back to Riften. If you’re ever there … Well I was going to say look me up, but who knows whether I’ll even be there. I hope we’ll see each other again someday, though. It was good to meet you.”
“Likewise,” Dardeh said. Then he sighed. “It’s too bad, really. I would have enjoyed having a sister like you, someone tough. And a brother-in-law like you,” he added, smiling at the Nord. No, he thought, I’d rather not have you as a brother-in-law but I would settle for that, I truly would.
“Oh no, no, it’s not like that,” the man stammered, looking uncomfortable.
His companion laughed. “We’re not married, Dardeh,” she said. “I needed a friend to travel with me on a job, and lucky for me that he is, too. He keeps saving my hide.”
That got a smile from the man as he gazed at her and, just as Dardeh had expected, it was a glorious smile. Genuine, one that went all the way up to his eyes and back. Beautiful.
And he’s in love with her. Oh well. A fellow could dream.
“I see. Ok then,” Dardeh said, grinning at them. “Be safe out there. And keep an eye on the sky. You’ll probably hear one of those bastards before you see him. And if you do, find some good solid shelter.”
He waved and walked up the path toward Whiterun. He hadn’t gotten too far up the path when one of the city guards barreled toward him. “We heard a Shout. What is it, dragons?”
He laughed. I shouted fifteen minutes ago and you’re just thinking about checking it out at this late date? Well done, my man. Well done indeed.
“Everything’s fine. Don’t worry about it.” He turned for another look. The Redguard woman and the Nord man were walking along at a good pace, obviously chatting away, and Dardeh looked at the man’s body language and sighed. Yep. He’s in love with her, alright. She’s pretty taken with him, too, but I’m not sure she realizes it.
Dardeh went back into the city. Adrienne bought the standard swords; not for much, but there were more than enough coins in his pocket that once he found Lucia he gave her a good-sized handful of them. She grinned and ran into the Bannered Mare to buy herself a warm meal. Brenuin, the beggar and town drunk who at least tried to give her advice if nothing else, asked him for a coin. He knew that Brenuin would take it and head straight for the bar, but he shrugged, told himself “why not,” and handed the man a couple of gold septims. Then he went to the Bannered Mare himself, to get something to eat before heading off to Riverwood.
He was sitting at his table, eating, trying to think forward to what might happen when he met the person who had left him the note in Ustengrav. Trying, and failing; because he kept thinking about the tough Redguard girl with the green eyes and the scar. But failing even more so because the image of the tall, blonde Nord with the blue, blue eyes wouldn’t leave his mind. Maybe, he thought, I should just stop being an idiot about it and go find them again, travel with them for awhile, something. At least I could be around him.
Suddenly he stopped short, in the middle of a mouthful of food, and slapped himself on the forehead.
He hadn’t even gotten their names.
Saadia had given them his name by virtue of talking to him just as they’d approached. So they knew who he was.
But their names? He hadn’t gotten them. He hadn’t even done the obvious. He should have asked the woman where she was from, true; that would have told him for sure whether she was his sister. Her name would have, as well. But he’d been too preoccupied, too distracted, to do the single simplest thing he could have done.
He wanted to look at that man forever, and he hadn’t even gotten his name.