“About an hour out now, I’d say.”
Brynjolf had been staring blankly, quietly, out at the leaden sea and sky, vaguely aware of the increasing fog marking the far-off shoreline. Captain Wulf’s comment startled him into a more immediate awareness. He didn’t turn around, though. Staring into the distance was all he could bring himself to do at the moment.
“Children still below?”
Wulf’s hearty laugh seemed much louder than it probably was, given the relative quiet. They’d been fortunate to have sailed with a gentle breeze behind them and seas that were much calmer than anyone had the right to expect. The occasional flap of canvas and the gentle lapping of waves against the hull were about the loudest sounds they’d heard, really.
“Children, are they? That big man doesn’t look much like a child to me, and the girl – well, she’s seen things. Just on Falskaar, she’s seen things that I know of, but she’s seen things, if you catch my drift.“
Brynjolf chuckled. “I suppose you’re right. They are my children, though. The ‘big man’ is all of eighteen, maybe nineteen winters. They’re a lot younger than their da.” He had a quick mental image of snow-white hair and tsk’d. “Just like I’m a lot younger than my da. A whole lot younger.”
He’d been thinking about it ever since he and his offspring had gathered to make their farewells. The image of Gulmist smiling up at him from her seat before the fire would probably stay with him for the rest of his life.
“Thank you for coming to visit, Brynny. I can rest easy now, knowing that you’re alive, and hearty, and that you’re such a good man after all.”
He’d wanted to laugh at her for that, but held back. Of all people to call a good man. It’s ridiculous. But I can’t blame her for wanting to believe the best of her son, just as I think the best of my children. Instead of laughing, he’d just smiled back. “Thanks, Ma. I’m glad Qara nagged me until I agreed to come. I feel easier about things now, too.”
He’d been surprised to realize that was the case. It wasn’t as though he had sudden close feelings of family for Gulmist and Brunulvr – particularly not for the old man. But as they’d talked for those long hours after learning of Brunulvr’s secrets he’d felt knots in his soul relaxing – knots like the netting on this ship, so tightly tied for so many decades that he’d nearly forgotten what it felt like to be without them.
“Travel safely, all of you,” Gulmist had told them. “I’m sending Brunulvr with you to the docks. Between him and Chip I can’t imagine much of anything will bother you.”
“Don’t underestimate Qara, Grandma. She could probably protect all of us on her own,” Chip said, grinning at his sister. “But yeah, I’m glad Grandda is coming with us.”
Brynjolf had given his mother a final smile and had seen hers in return. Beautiful, serene, and loving – those were the words to describe her at that moment. It had reminded him of Sayma, cradling Qaralana on the porch in their secluded home in the Rift. And that reminder had been like a knife to his gut. While there were old knots that had eased there were others yet left behind, just as stubborn and uncomfortable as ever.
He looked out over the ocean again, idly noting that they were indeed closing in on the familiar shores of northern Skyrim if the occasional far-off cry of a gull meant anything. Brunulvr had wished them fair winds and following seas, and those had been their lot for the entire voyage.
That had been a strange leave-taking, to be sure. The old white bear had looked him in the eye, his face as usual betraying no particular emotion but his gaze full of regret and something else, besides. Hope, perhaps.
“A’m glad ye cam tae visit us, laddie. It meant sae muckle tae yer ma.” He drew a deep breath and paused, following up with a nod. “‘N’ tae me if a’m bein’ honest. If ye ever need me ye ken whaur ah will be.”
Brynjolf noted how his father had put that observation. You know where I’ll be. I, not ‘we.’ I’ll probably never see her again; and he’ll be left alone, perhaps to live another whole lifetime, based on what they were both saying. It was a sobering thought, a sad thought, and Brynjolf realized in that moment that this was a thing he now shared with his father: the memories of great love and the knowledge of great loss. Maybe some day he would need to come back. Maybe some day he would even want to. But for now, all he could bring himself to do was to give his father one small, insignificant token of understanding.
“Aye, Da. I ken.”
Brunulvr’s eyes had widened at that. It was the first time he’d called the old man ‘Da’ since he’d fled Falskaar as a child. Brunulvr had waved goodbye to them, turned without another word or another look, and trotted back up the trail toward home.
Brynjolf had listened to Chip and Qara’s good-natured bantering as they sailed. He was glad they could occupy each other, because he was far too deep in his own thoughts to engage in conversation.
“Well you have to go check in, Chip.”
“Are you kidding? Can you picture what it’s going to look like, big old shaggy me trotting up the steps to Jorrvaskr?”
“Now that you have some answers, yeah I can. You’ve got nothing to be ashamed of. You said Farkas and Vilkas know about this. And others?”
Chip snorted. “Yeah. Aela – the others are dead now. But they’re not who I’m worried about. It’s the rest of the people outside. Plus…”
“Plus what?”
“I just don’t want to be around a bunch of people, Qara. I’m happier on my own.”
“Bah. There are plenty of shaggy-looking men of all kinds running around Skyrim. The people in town aren’t going to look twice. It’s not like you’re going into the Palace.”
“No, that’s your job.”
“Mine? What are you talking about?”
Brynjolf heard Chip chuckle. “The heir? Harald? You remember him, right?”
It was Qara’s turn to snort. “I’m mad at Harald.”
“Yeah, and? You know he worships the ground you walk on, Qara.”
“I think that’s only in your mind, big brother.”
“Well, we can check on the way back. We’ll need to stop in Windhelm anyway.”
Qara tsk’d. “You need to go to Whiterun. First.”
“And I’m not planning on running there from Dawnstar. Call me lazy, I don’t care. I’ll go with you guys to Windhelm and grab the carriage to Whiterun from there.”
“Procrastination, thy name is Chip. Besides, how are you ever going to meet a girl if you never go where people are?”
“Pffft. I met a girl I liked. She didn’t like me back. I’m not worried about it.”
“Ooooh, really? You never told me about a girl. Who was it? Where?”
“Solstheim, and I never told you because it wasn’t important!”
The siblings’ voices had blurred into a sea of good-natured bickering somewhere behind Brynjolf. He chuckled to himself until his thoughts brought him to a new conclusion. They’d be coming ashore in Dawnstar, where the ship they were on docked not far from the Black Door. His good humor dissolved into gloom once again, and he could do nothing other than frown.
Another regret I’ll never be free of. Two, really. Finally finding the lass at the Sanctuary – and being led there by Vitus. How was I to know what he was thinking of doing at that moment? If I had, I’d never have let him wait outside with me. I’d have made him run. Something.
Anything.
But I didn’t. And now I’m without both of them, still. Again.
He’d stood there like that for most of the voyage. Even when he took the occasional break to sit and rest his legs his mind was a million leagues away, working on who knew what. He half expected to hear one of the two souls he’d left behind in the Twilight Sepulcher, nagging him from beyond death, telling him he needed to shake himself out of his melancholy and get on with the business of…business. He’d heard Vitus’ voice often, probably because their union had been most recent. Only rarely did he feel the touch of joyful mischief that he recognized as Dynjyl, and that was usually when there was some particularly enticing job to be done for the Guild.
He had felt that presence once more as the calls of sea birds grew closer and more insistent, and the beacon of Dawnstar’s lighthouse cut through the fog. Go home and talk to Delvin, the voice told him. Get busy. For instance, my widow needs some attention.
He’d risen to his feet once again, a tiny smirk taking his mouth as Chip and Qara clunked up the ladder to the deck. I know it’s just me imagining them. By the Eight they’d lock me away if they could hear me pretending I can actually hear their voices. But I know just what they’d say, both of them. And he’s right, Dynny is. I’ve been ignoring the Guild, and that woman and her fortune have been a thorn in my side and the scar on my face for far too long. I need to make sure people remember who we are. Who I am.
“So what exactly are you laughing at, Daddy?” Qara asked once they disembarked.
“Not much, lass,” he said. “I’m just doing some planning. There are things I need to take care of back home, once we get there.”
“Home as in…” Chip said, his words trailing off into a question.
“No, not the house you grew up in. The place is way too big for just an old thief like me now that your mother is gone. I moved into a little place up over the Snow-Shod manor. It used to belong to Gallus, the old Guildmaster from when I first joined.”
“Uh-huh,” Chip said. “OK, as long as you’re going to take care of yourself.”
“I’m not very far away,” Qara said. “I’ll make sure he does. And you,” she said, turning to Chip. “Do I need to escort you to Whiterun in person? Or will you go on your own?”
The flash in Chip’s eyes and his inhalation said he was about to give argument, and Qara’s foot stomped down, squelching into the mud. Their momentary, very adult seriousness devolved into sibling bickering before Brynjolf’s eyes. He smiled. He was a fortunate man, still, in spite of his grief. Somehow, in spite of everything he’d done wrong, he’d managed to father these two inarguably fine people.
“Let’s go, you two,” he said, heading for the ferryman’s campfire.
Ondale Perdeti trudged slowly along Coldhaven’s main thoroughfare. Yes, he could have taken the portal from just below the home he’d gifted Agryn Gernic and Vyctyna Tardif, and transported all the way up to the entrance above Ivarstead. Yes, he could have used one of the nodes in Dalaran’s portal room to travel. But he wanted time to think. He needed time to think. He’d used Dalaran’s ring to pop in and speak to them on his way back from Riften, and now he fully appreciated the weight of the situation in which he found himself. So he walked, and he pondered.
He’d been chosen as Listener, much to his surprise, and thus foisted upon not only the Dawnstar Sanctuary but also the Sanctuary of the Crimson Scar, here in Coldhaven. He glanced up at the tower, quickly, but then averted his gaze. He wasn’t ready to visit them again. He wasn’t ready to assert his leadership over Camryn and the other vampire assassins. He wasn’t ready for anyone else to know.
He had told Agryn and Vyctyna as much as he could about the city’s layout and the purpose of its various structures. He’d shown them where the former Sovrena, Sicara, lived and had identified the various noble houses sharing space with them on the upper plateau. He hadn’t, however, told them there was a Sanctuary here. He hadn’t told them he was its new leader. He hadn’t told them about the ancient Dwemer lab far beneath the city, or how he was suddenly far stronger than he’d ever been, as a result of investigating that lab for Tamara, the Sovrena.
And he hadn’t told them that the Sovrena they were eager to influence or supplant was already dead, and by his hand. He had actually expected them to tell him that she was gone, and to ask him what he knew, but somehow, impossibly, it seemed that Tamara’s absence had gone unnoticed.
I suppose it is actually possible, though. These people are all too self-absorbed. Nobody searched for Dalaran, either, until I brought up the matter.
He would surely be ended, immediately, if either of them learned that he’d purposefully withheld information he’d been tasked with gathering, or that he’d taken such an irreversible action without their prior approval. As strong as he was, now, he still couldn’t imagine being able to stand up to as ancient a vampire as Agryn Gernic. All he could do was hope, fervently, that when the Sovrena’s death was discovered – and it would have to be, soon, when she failed to show up in her own court for days on end – Agryn would not remember his admission that he didn’t trust Tamara.
Or maybe he’ll remember it but assume it was just my instincts at work again, that I suspected someone here was angry enough at Tamara to kill her. It’s not as though I left the political situation here a mystery. As far as they know it could have been Sicara.
And for all those reasons, Dale walked slowly toward Coldhaven’s exit, mentally sifting through the myriad events and hints and suggestions and possibilities he’d encountered since following Balric down the endless spiral staircase from Ivarstead to Coldhaven. For all those reasons, he flinched and nearly drew his weapon when he saw the fuzzy-cheeked form dashing down the road toward him. Then he managed to steady himself. Someone coming to accuse him of murder would be coming from behind him, from the area around the Sovrena’s tower. An attack like that wouldn’t be coming from the city entrance.
The man slowed to a stop, panting, and looked around uncomfortably. Then he turned to Dale. “I’ve been looking for you,” he said quietly, “and I don’t really like being here at all. I have something for you, your hands only. Please take it so I can get out of this place. I don’t want to be around vampires.”
Dale blinked. “I wasn’t aware that couriers made deliveries down here,” he said, reaching for the man’s outstretched hand.
“We don’t! I had to be told how to get here. And, uh,” he looked around again, nervously, “I was also told I’m a dead man if I even hint that this place exists. So please, just let me go. I promise to you and everyone else down here that your secret’s safe with me!”
“Of course,” Dale murmured. He watched the courier turn tail and sprint for the exit. The poor man is dead anyway. There’s no way anyone who knew to find me here was planning on letting him live, and there’s no use worrying about it.
What he’d been given was a folded note. It suggested that his particular skills might help in investigating what the writer called bizarre vampire rumors. “I need a third party to handle matters which I cannot be seen to be involved in,” the note read, directing him to visit an abandoned den in the mountains south of Knifepoint Ridge. “What you discover there will be worth the journey, I assure you.”
Dale turned the note over, looking for any kind of signature or other marking, but there was nothing. All he knew from this surprising development was that someone knew who he was. Presumably they knew what he could do. And who knew what might be in that “abandoned” den?
I don’t like it at all. It’s yet another unwelcome surprise.
That thought made him glance back toward the Sovrena’s tower. He saw shapes scurrying about in the area. It seemed to him, through the dark and the deep haze, that there were many more shapes than there had been when he’d passed by only a few minutes earlier. From this far down the cavern he wouldn’t have expected to hear voices, but sounds suggested the people rushing about were calling to each other.
Someone must have discovered the Sovrena’s body. The farther away from Coldhaven he could get in the short term, the better off he would be. He looked down at the note again and nodded to himself. Then he drew the shadows in around himself and sprinted for the exit.
Dale shifted the shoulder straps of his bag once again. While the large chunks of human flesh he’d taken from the three werewolves just north of Cracked Tusk Keep would make plenty of blood potions, they were heavy and awkward to carry. Every few steps, he heard them squelching together, and frowned, hoping they weren’t going to ooze blood out onto his new armor. The moons were full on this night, and Masser shone a dull red in the sky. It was no wonder the werewolves had been out, but they were dead now and he had no desire to attract more. Maybe he would find some way to render the meat down in his explorations; otherwise, he would need to wait until he got home to deal with it.
He passed a mound that seemed to have, at one time or another, been a carriage. The disintegrating remnants of a burned wheel held together only by its rusting metal cladding rose out of the soil, dark and lumpy and still smelling faintly of charred wood. Before him was Knife Point Ridge. He turned left, uphill and through a small gap in the mountains’ knees; and there, beside a small, flat grassy area, was a deep gap in the rock face.
Looks like a cave opening to me. Alright then. I may as well go see what I can see.
The entrance, rough and narrow, opened to a small alcove holding bones, some of them old but others quite new and freshly chewed-on to Dale’s eyes. Through a crack in the far wall he could see a brazier, and light to his left told of another. This was as well-lit a cave as he’d explored in some time; he was grateful for the light, especially when two skeevers well inside the larger room of the cavern leapt out to attack. Skeevers were of no consequence whatsoever to a vampire, but they were small, annoying, and sometimes difficult to find in the dark. Once they were dealt with, he took a moment to examine the room.
“This is a ‘den’? A skeever den, maybe. Someone has a vivid imagination.” The space held a small table and one rickety-looking chair, a stool, a couple of barrels and an empty chest. Several disintegrating banners moved listlessly in the small air current of his passing. Curiously, there was also an oil drum tucked in a corner.
Odd thing for a vampire to have stored away, but I’m sure I’m missing something.
Aside from those details, the most prominent feature of the cave was a tall wardrobe set into the wall, the gaps on either side packed solid with dark brown brick. Neither persuasion nor lockpicking skills would open the wardrobe’s stubbornly shut doors, and Dale had run across too many unpleasant surprises to try brute force. There was something beyond that door, and there had to be another way in.
He made his way around the periphery of the room, searching and listening and feeling the walls for any kind of latch or lever hidden in an out-of-the-way corner. Behind one of the banners, he thought he felt a slight draft. When he moved the banner aside, he found a wall panel that, when pushed against, could be slid sideways. He opened the cavity behind the banner and stepped in.
“Oh! The master bedroom, I see.” There was a single, upright, plain wooden coffin leaning against the rock wall, and not really enough room for anything else. There was barely space to turn around, outside the coffin. He frowned, once again feeling all the chamber’s surfaces, crouching down to examine the floor. As far as he could tell, there wasn’t anything here that could have warranted a stranger sending him nearly to the Hammerfell border to investigate.
“Unless it’s an elaborate trap… Oh, wait!” On the floor in the tiny space beside the coffin’s base and blending in with the stones around it was a small strongbox. To his relief, it wasn’t locked; he didn’t think much of his chances to pick a lock in these cramped confines. Inside was one small item: a key.
“Here we go,” he murmured, rising again and backing out of the coffin alcove. The only locked thing in this cave was the wardrobe and, as expected, the key made a satisfying click when he tried it.
Behind the now-compliant wardrobe doors was a panel, but set so close to the doors themselves that it could only be a false wardrobe back. Dale tapped on it and heard a muffled sound from beyond. Wrestling the panel aside, he looked down and gasped.
Beyond the many layers of security, a short flight of stairs led down to a pointed arch, much like the structures of his own home. Beyond the portcullis gate blocking the arch was a polished stone floor, light gray with darker insets. Dale started down toward a wall-mounted button that he assumed would raise the gate, but stopped when something in his peripheral vision caught his attention. Looking down, he saw that his foot had been a whisper away from triggering a trip wire.
“So it really is a trap, and I’m damned lucky I stopped in time,” he muttered, backing up to a safe distance before reaching forward with one of his short swords to tap the wire. Startled, he jumped backward as the wardrobe doors slammed tightly shut, and the distinct sound of flames came from behind them.
By all the gods. If I hadn’t jumped back I’d have been trapped between those doors and the gate below, standing in fire. I might have survived, but somehow I doubt it. At least now I know what the oil barrel is for.
When the sound ceased the doors opened to his touch again, revealing scorch marks on either side of the stone walls, all the way down. Only a moment of freak luck had kept him from becoming a pile of ash on those stairs; the hand that rose to press the portcullis’ button was a bit shaky. Technically speaking, he was already dead. Emotionally speaking, he wanted to stay the way he was for a very long time.
Aside from having only one exit, the room below was a perfect hideout. On one wall, long tables and shelves overflowed with books, soul gems, weapons and alchemy ingredients. A box of valuable metal ingots was tucked under one end of one table, and next to it a large blood basin with a shallow coating of dried blood inside. On the opposite wall was a tall shelf holding blood potions, bits of armor, coin purses, and a few more books. Most of the floor space, though, was taken up by a metal cage in which a man stood unsteadily, weaving back and forth with a blank stare. Dale searched shelves and containers until he found the key to the cage, and then unlocked its door.
“There you go,” he said. It didn’t seem right to keep the thrall there. There was no way to know how long the man had been held prisoner, and the food placed nearest the cage was stale.
I don’t know whether vampire cattle ever regain their wits enough for him to leave the place, but at least he is free to do so. I won’t feed on him.
He poked through the library of books, picking one up here and there to scan a page or two before returning it to the shelf. One particular volume finally caught his interest when, after opening it to find handwritten text, he realized it was a journal. It wasn’t clear who was writing, but it was clear that the author was a vampire, searching for a way to mitigate the negative effects of Dawnguard silver weapons and sunlight on vampires. That seemed straightforward enough. But then the author started, for lack of a better term, whining. “I have been called foolish by those I once considered allies. I have been shunned, barred entrance into many of our dens throughout Skyrim, and forbidden to approach any of our leaders.” The person was convinced they – and only they – knew, better than anyone else, the sole way to prevent vampires’ extinction. Dale turned the page and gasped.
The person… was Tamara.
I’d forgotten. The journal in the Sovrena’s tower said she’d originally been working in a lab in the mountains. This must be it.
Her journal continued, with arcane drawings that looked as though they might have been in a different hand. Then Tamara continued. “I have finally made a breakthrough!” She’d somehow combined basic enchanting with blood magic to create a magical aura, which she had then placed on a mace – presumably the one here before him on the table.
“Well that explains all the blood flasks and the soul gem shards. And these,” he added, reaching up to a high-mounted shelf covered in potions for smithing and enchanting. Those, he added to his pack, along with some of the more valuable ingots below. He then reached for the mace and frowned, feeling its aura. It wasn’t just an ordinary enchantment. It felt wrong, somehow. Malign.
Tamara had written that it would disarm opponents wielding Dawnguard or silver weapons, but that it wasn’t perfect. She wanted to use more powerful black soul gems to experiment with. “I must find more subjects near my crypt lab – the last of the guards from that town is no longer of any use to me.” She finished by saying she’d return for Silverbane.
Hmm. Well I guess she won’t mind if I take it, then, given her current situation. But where is this ‘crypt lab’ she mentions? I wonder if there’s a map, or a note, or something.
He turned to reexamine the tall shelves, holding items that he now knew were evidence of Tamara’s experimentation. The human blood he took, slipping it into his pack. The other large flasks were Falmer blood; those, he happily left behind.
On the bottom shelf was a full set of Dawnguard gear. They were nothing if not persistent, the Dawnguard. In spite of having been mostly wiped out a decade or two ago they’d survived, and there was never a shortage of fanatics and would-be heroes to fill their ranks again. This particular Dawnguard had met a bloody end, judging by the state of the armor. But there was still nothing to indicate where Tamara might have gone. He pushed the armor to one side. Something on the floor, tucked beneath the lowest shelf, caught his eye.
What’s this?
It was a Falkreath Hold guard’s armor – just the cuirass, but with the distinctive markings of Falkreath making it unmistakable for anything else. Dale looked up at the cattle, still swaying unsteadily back and forth in his open cage. “So was this you?” he asked, not expecting an answer. “Are you the ‘last of the guards’ she mentioned? And what does this have to do with…” He opened the journal once again, carefully considering the wording of that sentence. Tamara had written ‘the last of the guards from that town’ immediately after mentioning her crypt lab. If the grammar could be understood as written – not a sure thing with as many local variations of language as there were – this former guard came from Falkreath, and that’s where the ‘crypt lab’ might be found.
Not a big surprise, I suppose, given that Falkreath’s claim to fame is a huge graveyard. Of course there’s a crypt there. Now all I need to do is find it.
He rose to his feet again with a groan, and scanned this den once more to be certain he’d found everything important. Then he addressed the captive once more. “I’m sorry this happened to you,” he said, thinking regretfully of how nonchalantly he had followed Agryn into Castle Volkihar’s cattle den to refresh himself. “You’re free to go. There’s food here.”
“What… happened?” the man moaned, clearly not possessed of his mind.
Dale sighed, and headed for the exit. It made no sense to him.
I’m a vampire. I like being a vampire. I live on blood and I use soul gems to enchant my gear. Why does this all bother me so much?
As he stepped back out into the gathering dawn he heard the echoes of spectral voices in his mind.
“I’m sorry! I don’t want to do this! I don’t have any choice!”
They were cries of souls forced into service against their wills, long after they should have been at rest. He snarled, breaking into a trot. It wouldn’t take him long to get to Falkreath.