Chip stood looking east for a moment, considering what he would do next. The tops of the arches around the great circular temple were just visible over the icy ridge he’d crossed earlier, a testament to how massive it was. But investigating it further was going to have to wait for another day. In the meantime, he needed to see what could be found to the northeast.
He went due east first, back to where he’d found the first two Rieklings and the hunter who’d turned out to be a bandit. He turned to his left, up the hill, pausing to watch for any movements that might indicate more adversaries coming from above him. It was hard to tell; the walls of ice to either side were very tall, and very grey, and so were the tiny grey Rieklings. He turned his head to listen, and heard nothing more distinct than the movement of the wind through the passage. Lowering his hood over his hair, he started up the sharp slope.
As he climbed, the snow covering the dirt path beneath his feet grew deeper and less well-packed. It was more work to pull himself up through it. He was approaching what looked as though it might be the highest point of the pass when he looked up and ahead, and saw a pole atop a rocky mound, a set of narrow flags above it flapping out toward the west. He couldn’t tell what color the flags were with the bright, cold sky behind them. It didn’t really matter, though. Flags meant some sort of occupied place, and that meant he needed to exercise more caution.
He dropped into a crouch and moved one slow, deep footstep after another up to where he could peer over the crest of the passageway. With each step upward the roar of the wind grew louder, and its temperature a bit colder, until by the time he stepped out from behind a bare boulder at the top he was shivering. Not far beyond him was a set of structures, on the top of which were the flags he’d seen earlier. A kettle-shaped building atop inward-leaning piers had wooden ramps, steps, and nets leading to it; and there was a wooden deck or bridge across the pass leading from it, just above where any traveler would need to go. Chip thought he saw some movement and spotted one or two squat, grayish figures patrolling the bridge and peeking out from just beneath the building.
So. It’s a Riekling trap. I can’t very well go up there; they’ll swarm me and I’ll be a goner. Maybe I can make it over the top of this boulder and go around that way.
He turned back to the south, facing the boulder he’d just come past. It was a long, steep way down if he missed his footing and slipped off, but it looked to him as though there was just enough slope to it on his side that he might make the jump. He took a deep breath and leapt upwards, scrambling to grab hold of any surface he could with all four limbs.
The first leap had him clinging to his balance by a thread; but he managed to make it up onto the boulder. He swiveled left, back toward the crest of the mountain and pushed himself up; and as he did so, motion above him and to the left caught his eye. A Riekling just beneath the round structure had seen him. To his right – the direction he wanted to go – was a large ice outcropping.
Well, I guess it’s time to pray I don’t just slide right off that ice, because if I stay here I’m going to be a pincushion any second.
He held his breath and jumped again; once, onto the edge of the ice, and then again, pushing upward as hard as he could. To his surprise and huge relief he found that behind the shelter of the rocks that made up the pass, snow had accumulated atop the ice. He sank into it with both feet, and his momentum stopped.
He blew out a breath and pulled his bow around in front of him, just in case.
Alright. OK. Not dead yet. Let’s see what’s across the way.
It was simply too sharp a slope up to his left for him to even attempt going that way, so Chip turned slightly southeast again and moved slowly and carefully across the granular snow toward a ridge of stone. When he hopped up onto the rocky ridge and peered over the side, he gasped. There was a lovely pool of water well below him, terminating in a waterfall down toward the ocean. He moved carefully along the ridge, looked down, and gasped. There were stone steps leading up onto the far slope from a flat platform at the water’s edge, and a tall stone arch onto which, he realized, he might be able to drop. As he inched toward the edge, motion caught his attention.
It took him a moment to realize that there were three men there, wandering back and forth on the platform. That in and of itself was not unusual. What was, he thought, was the fact that they all appeared to be barefoot and were wearing nothing more than short, torn, raggedy pants with rope belts.
What the…
It turned out, as he got closer to the edge, that it was really too large a drop to make safely, so he began edging around to the right. He flattened himself against the cliff side and inched along, finding footholds and testing them before shifting his weight. He got past the outermost part of the outcropping he was on and looked down in surprise.
Just below him was a monument of some sort, an open-faced niche of the type likely to be holding a shrine, though he could not see into it from this angle. The flat platform on which the men were pacing wrapped around the edge of the pool, with the staircase he’d noticed on one end and the shrine on the other, just below his feet.
Well now. What have we here?
He was just about to descend when movement just beneath him stopped him. Two of the three men had spotted him and were shouting, and shaking their fists at him in obvious anger. Under normal circumstances he would have backed away and tried to let the situation resolve itself; but he had a nearly sheer rock face directly behind him. He had to descend. He had no real choice in the matter.
Chip backed up and climbed laterally across the rocks as far as he could, to a place where he might conceivably jump down without breaking a leg. One of the men ran away, beneath him, to the stairs leading up to the adjacent hill. He didn’t know what was going on, exactly, but something told him that he could not let the man get away; so he reluctantly drew an arrow from his quiver and took aim.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. The man stopped, and ducked behind a rock; but he wasn’t hidden from a genuinely talented archer perched well above him. Chip judged the distance between them and fired high, just high enough that the downward arc of gravity dropped the arrow just behind the boulder and into the man, who sagged out of sight. It was too far to tell whether he had died, and Chip heard nothing. He lined up another shot and dropped it into the same place; this time he heard a groan. There was movement, and a shape emerged from behind the boulder.
Chip gasped.
It was not the man he’d shot who rose up and turned to face him. It was a huge, dark brown, fur-covered form with a massive, blocky snout and thick arms ending in enormous paws.
“Werebear!” he cried out. “These are the werebears Hjordis was talking about! Of course!”
He was so flustered by this realization that his next two shots went wide of the mark. The werebear turned back toward him and came running down the hill, toward the stairs, roaring as it came; then, inexplicably, it turned to look back up the mountainside as though it couldn’t figure out where Chip was. He shot again as the beast turned away and struck it solidly. Still it didn’t fall. It turned toward him again and ran a few paces in his direction, then swiveled around, looking in all directions once more. Once again Chip let fly when the bear’s back was to him; once again the bear staggered, but didn’t fall.
It took a good half-dozen more arrows before the creature finally fell, sliding downhill toward the landing at the top of the stairwell. Chip blew out a sigh of relief but then turned to look directly below him again. There were two more men, and if that one was any indication they also were werebears. He couldn’t let them get near him.
I’m strong in my werewolf form, but I’m new to this, and young, and werebears are huge. They’d rip me to shreds. One of them would. Two? I’m dead meat. I have no choice; I have to kill them from the high ground.
He allowed himself to slide carefully down the rocks. There was a stone trough extending out in front of him, carrying water from somewhere – perhaps in the mountain itself – out to the pool, continually feeding it and the waterfall at the far side. If he was careful with his footing, he thought, perhaps he would be able to use the trough as another vantage point for archery. All he needed to do was not to slip on the wet stones. In an agonizingly slow descent, he eased down onto the slender outside edge of the trough and held his breath while settling his balance. Then he leaned out just enough to look around the icy platform beneath.
There were a series of short obelisks along the edge of the platform, each with a set of rings embedded in them. He was certain they must be ceremonial, but for what ceremony he did not know. Disturbingly, though, there was a bloody skull just in front of one of them. He wasn’t certain, but it looked human. A step or two forward revealed other bloody bones, but also nearly had him losing his balance. He jerked himself back onto the trough, his right foot landing squarely in the icy water, and grimaced. It was a very wet foot, now; but at least he wasn’t tumbling into the werebear’s paws.
Guess these guys have eaten recently. Maybe that’s a good thing for me.
He couldn’t see the men, and that bothered him. He knew they were still in the area. He could feel them still in the area; but they weren’t at the shrine, or on the stairs. It would have made sense that they were directly beneath him but he couldn’t hear anything over the splashing of water in the trough, the howling of the wind and the roar of the waterfall directly opposite him.
He was almost to the end of the trough when he heard a voice yelling. He couldn’t decipher what was being said, but the voice and splashing helped him pinpoint their source. One of the men was in the water, next to the rock wall.
How is he not freezing? Are werebears even more immune to cold than normal Nords?
Maybe I am too, and I just don’t know it. Ah, doesn’t matter.
He hated to shoot the man in his human form, but there was no help for it. His first arrow was an easy hit on the man; but a few seconds later the bobbing human form became a werebear, light brown whereas the other had been very dark. Chip lobbed a second arrow into it.
“You think you can take me?” the bear shouted as it swam around to take shelter behind the stones. Chip waited a few moments, but the werebear did not reappear.
“Yeah, I do,” Chip muttered. “Maybe not from here, though.”
He looked around carefully. There weren’t many options open to him. He could jump into the water, a choice he was decidedly against. He could wait, crouched there in the trough with one foot freezing. He wasn’t wild about that idea, either. Finally he sighed, moved to the innermost edge of the trough and dropped over the side.
To his simultaneous fascination and disgust, there were in fact many more bloody bones scattered along this platform. Ribcages, skulls, long bones: all of them had teeth marks and were fresh enough kills to carry the scent of blood still. Chip swiveled right and caught his breath for a moment, for in the back of the structure there was, in fact, a shrine. He recognized it instantly. Except for the lack of a banner, it was identical to the shrine to Hircine he’d found in Whiterun Hold.
He wanted to go to it, to throw himself on his knees before it and worship in happy gratitude; but there was no time. He had to get off the platform and out of the way of the two remaining werebears. At the end of the platform were boulders he could climb. He ran for them and leapt, barely making it high enough to be able to scramble the rest of the way up onto them, in a position that would keep him safe.
Always take the high ground if you can do it.
When he finally stood and looked across the pool he realized why the bear hadn’t reappeared. There was a small shelf of rock, just above the level of the water; it had retreated there and was glaring across the pool at him. Chip wasted no time, but instead shot another arrow into the beast’s shoulder. This time he saw the hit. To his complete surprise, though, the bear submerged. The final man, still in human form, had been just behind it, treading water.
“Ok then. You can have this one.” He fired at the human, reluctantly but accurately. As had happened before, the man submerged and a werebear took his place. He wasn’t surprised. It made perfect sense; a wound in the weak human form would be nothing at all to a lycanthrope in his full power.
Suddenly, both werebears made for the steps that led up out of the pool. Chip was nowhere near high enough above the platform to safely face both of them at the same time. If he could jump to this location then so could they, and easily.
Oh crap. I’ve got to move!
He jumped up onto the next-higher boulder. There wasn’t anywhere else for him to go aside from into the water; and while he would do that if he absolutely had to, he truly didn’t want to get everything he possessed at that moment wet. The two werebears emerged from the pool. He fully expected them both to attack him.
To his utter amazement, one of the bears ran up the stairs and turned to Chip’s right, fleeing along the pathway up the mountainside where his fellow lay dead. The second bear turned and dove back into the water, vanishing from view.
What in Oblivion?
Ok, then.
He waited until the werebear was fully into the open and then began emptying his quiver of steel arrows into it, one after another, just as quickly as he could fire them. This bear seemed to be not especially bright. Where the first had taken cover whenever it could, this one ran wildly around in the open, circling back to its dead brother’s side where it was completely vulnerable; and it only took a few minutes of work for Chip to bring it down.
“Now, then.”
He looked down into the pool and saw a number of his own arrows floating there. Those, he would retrieve if he could, as soon as it was safe to do so. First, there was the matter of the third werebear; and he spotted it in the deepest part of the pool, nearly camouflaged in the dark water by its dark fur.
It took him a bit of maneuvering to find the best spot from which to fire at the werebear but once he had, it was just a matter of shooting, and shooting, and shooting more. The creature seemed too dull-minded to realize that it could swim away and potentially escape, or perhaps climb out of the pool again and attack Chip. It just flailed about in the water in the same way the second werebear had run in circles out in the open. It was a tedious battle, more than anything else; and by the time it was finally over Chip’s arm and shoulders were on fire from fatigue.
He sighed loudly, and stowed his bow.
“Finally.”
After pulling the third werebear out of the water, he searched the three bodies. None of them had anything valuable aside from their pelts. When it came to the pelts, however, it was difficult to know the best approach to take.
Ordinarily I’d just skin them, no questions asked. But they are Hircine’s creations, too. Aren’t they?
He started to walk away, several times; but each time he returned to the carcasses and pondered them again. There was a great deal of fur there. He could sell it for a lot of money.
On the other hand, they’re like me. Aren’t they?
He thought of Hircine’s voice, telling him to rip the skin from Sinding and offer it up to him. Hircine reveled in the hunt. That was what he wanted, even when it was two of his own creations hunting each other. These three beasts had lost their fight with Chip. He nodded to himself.
“I will take these skins and offer them up to you, Lord Hircine. I believe that is what you would want me to do.”
It took some time for him to do what was, after all, a large job. When he was done he was tired, and messy, and ready to rest. First, though, he wanted to examine the shrine, and offer his thanks to Hircine. He’d come here to clear out the werebears on behalf of the Frostmoon pack – or at least their temporarily-adopted member – and he’d accomplished his goal. He was, indeed, very thankful for that.
The sun had moved low enough that it illuminated most of the interior of the shrine’s niche. As he approached, Chip saw that there had been other offerings left – whether by the werebears or Hjordis and her former pack members, he didn’t know. There was a snow wolf, several rabbits, pelts tied up in neat packages and, scattered on and around the base of the shrine, skulls. And there was something else, too, something atop the shrine that he couldn’t make out from a distance.
When he stepped up into the niche, Chip drew a quick breath in awe. There was a bow resting on the shrine. He hadn’t seen it before; and he frowned, for he should have seen it as he’d passed the spot the first time. He leaned over it and extended a hand, almost hesitantly, to pick it up.
It was a beautiful thing, to his eye. It was a sturdy, heavy-duty hunting bow, its central grip nicely wrapped and padded, the tips clad in steel. The wood of the bow’s elegant curves was not the rich, deep color of his own bow, but a lighter, almost bone-colored shade; and it had carved into it a vine-like pattern, as if it was one piece of wood that had grown together from three or more. The bow’s most distinctive feature, though, was a pair of identical deer skulls affixed to either side of the grip. The mandibles had been removed and the remaining pieces of skull somehow threaded onto the bow as if they, too, were organic parts of it, their antlers curving gracefully away toward the bow’s tips. At the back of each skull was a set of feathers, grey with reddish tips.
As he held the bow to test its balance and weight, Chip thought he felt energy running up his arm from it. Warmth spread through him. He smiled; the bow was as natural to hold as his own – perhaps even moreso – and there was something special about it. He turned back to the shrine and placed the offerings of pelts around it. Then he knelt, quietly raising his hands and silently thanking Hircine for the gift.
Take my bow, my hunter. Use it well. When you have sated its appetite with a sufficient number of animals, return here and I will have another gift for you. You will know when you have hunted enough and the time is right. Take these pelts that you have offered up to me. Use them to make arrows, here on my altar. They will serve you well.
“It will be done as you wish,” he said quietly.
Chip knelt before the altar for a time, meditating. It seemed almost beyond belief that his life could have changed so much, and so abruptly; but it had. He’d found a purpose, an explanation for why he’d been so driven to master bow hunting for his entire life. He’d found other people who were like him. And in spite of what he’d heard about Daedric princes – namely, that they were capricious and often cruel – he felt that Hircine was harsh but fair. He valued the skill and strength of the hunt. Sinding had known that; that had been obvious in his last words. Hircine had given the gift of lycanthropy to men; but if those men were foolish and unthinking, as the three werebears had been, he welcomed the hunt that would bring them down.
I just have to be the best. That’s all. And if I’m not the best, I don’t deserve any better a fate than they had.
Suddenly, he heard in his mind his father’s voice, saying “And that’s why I’m the best!” He laughed. It made sense now. He’d never watched his father doing… whatever it was that he did, as the leader of the Thieves Guild; but he was certain that the man was, absolutely, the best at what he did. He wouldn’t joke about it if it were not so. And, if he ever ceased being the best, he would cease being the leader.
I need to talk to Da. I can’t tell him what’s happened to me but somehow I need to explain that I understand him a little better.
He made his way down to the shoreline, taking his time, picking out a path down the rocks beside the waterfall. When he’d been fighting the werebears it had seemed too steep to get down, but he found that by easing south along the edge, there were places he could jump down. Halfway down the mountainside, a snow bear popped up from between two boulders and roared at him. He was able to deal with it quickly, and smiled at how much extra power he’d gotten from his simple steel arrows. It was a bittersweet moment, realizing that he was going to put away the bow he’d lovingly tended for so long, but it was clear that Hircine’s bow was going to serve him just as well – and probably better.
The sun was down by the time he reached the shoreline and started following it south. He intended to make his way back to Raven Rock and hire the boat to Skyrim again. His task was to hunt many things. There was a great deal more game in Skyrim than there was here on the half-frozen, half volcano-blasted island, to the best of his knowledge.
Suddenly, he felt very anxious. He looked around, listening closely to the sounds of the evening. From the south he heard the long, low call of the lone silt strider Dardeh had told him about and grinned, remembering what the imitation of its call had sounded like. Aside from that there was nothing unusual that he could hear, or smell; and yet his heart began beating faster and louder. He turned to look over his shoulder just as the moons slid out of the mountains’ shadow.
“Damn. Not tonight! I need to…”
The next thing he knew, he was opposite a partially-submerged structure, a long walkway leading from the shore to it. Several of the domed towers that made up the complex sat at absurd angles; large pieces of carved stone pillars lay across the oddly-tilted pathway.
Dwemer.
The werewolf didn’t care so much about the fact that it was a Dwemer ruin, or that it was partially collapsed. What he knew was that there was a distinctive scent on the breeze that drew him across the bridge as surely as though he’d been on a gods’ leash.
Dunmer.
He ran toward the curved stone ramp leading up toward the entrance and met a Dunmer on the way down toward him.
“There you are!” the mer shouted, drawing a mace to attack. The werewolf slashed at him with a paw: once, twice; and the mer slumped to the stones, dead. He looked down at the carcass, salivating.
No. Wait.
Chip knew he had the ring that would supposedly heal him in this form, but he had yet to see its effects for himself. He wasn’t hurt yet. If he waited, he could consume this body when he needed it.
He ran up the ramp, only to be greeted by an angry archer. “You’ll regret crossing me, outlander!” the man cried. Two more quick swipes of his claws brought the man down, and Chip lolled his tongue out of his mouth in a wolfish grin.
An arrow clattered to the stone surface just to his right. The werewolf swiveled around and located its next adversary, firing at him from an intact but leaning tower attached to this main structure by another ramp. He headed for the bandit, assuming that he would take this one down as easily as the others. He was wrong.
Just as he leapt across to the tower’s center, one of the archer’s arrows struck him in the abdomen. He roared in pain and swiped at the mer, only to find a second arrow lodging under his arm.
“Die, outlander!” the Dunmer shouted.
Outlander, ha. Werewolf.
He slashed again. This time he caught the mer squarely in the chest and tossed him, end over end, down the ramp and onto the central platform. He followed down the ramp and finished the archer with his claws. This time he didn’t hesitate; he devoured the mer, feeling himself heal and Hircine claim the soul of the dead.
There were two more adversaries on the far side of the platform, one of whom was a mage who he tore completely to ribbons. He devoured them, and found a way around to a ramp leading to the main structure.
A mer in chitin armor and brandishing a war axe roared out from his spot in the shadows next to the ruin’s entrance. He was a tough opponent on his own. The werewolf would have had him well in hand, probably, but for the lightning attack that suddenly struck him from the side. He howled in pain and finished the mer in chitin, the body skittering almost off the edge of the platform into the sea. The werewolf fed, quickly, because it was an absolute necessity to do so. Then he turned to the mage who had been damaging him so badly and leapt at him in blind rage. The mer fell to the floor, his skull making a resounding crack as it slammed into the hard surface. Chip made certain he was dead and then consumed him.
He scouted around the area, neither hearing nor smelling any other foes nearby. He reached the ramp to return to shore and stopped, tossing his head back and howling to the skies.
I am strong.
Chip, inside his werewolf form, smirked. You’re also a long damn way from Raven Rock, and who knows how long it is until dawn? Be a little more careful.
He made his way back to the shore and started south again, taking stock of his situation. He knew people like himself now. He had a ring to help him survive. And he had a bow, which was thirsty for the hunt. It had been a good day, and a good night.