[h3]Checkmate, Part 2[/h3]
[I]14th Midyear 4E208, Governor’s Palace, 10:47am…[/I]


Lone footsteps came down the hallway in a hurry, without much care for caution, and given the disruption of the attack it stood to reason the owner was a messenger being sent to relay information from section to section. What the Dwemer didn’t see was Daro’Vasora waiting around the corner with a table leg in hand. As the guardsman went to run past, the broken piece of furniture was swung like her mace into the mer’s face, stopping his forward momentum and knocking him out from the traumatic blow to his head that recoiled his head backwards as he fell, his feet kicking out as his helmeted head smashed into the hard tile floor. The Khajiit bent over, picking up the sword that had scattered across the ground and tossed it to Shakti, arming the Redguard girl. 

Shakti gratefully picked up the sword and got to her feet. She looked apologetically at Calen and offered him a hand as well. “Sorry, I suppose I am not ready for this sneaky business yet.” 

“I’m still not ready for this fighting business,” Calen remarked, “so you can call us even.”

“You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting to do that.” Daro’Vasora said, checking over her improvised weapon for damage. It was going to hold up, at least for a few more heavy blows. Hardwood was sturdy, if nothing else.

The plan, as far as it went, was to regroup with one of the other teams who were at the palace as a part of the operation, and after the near-fatal run in with the Ministry agent that had been sent to execute Daro’Vasora rather than risk her liberation, the Khajiit was decidedly on board with any sort of lethal force against her captors that might be required. Latro, Calen, Shakti, and the large strange Redguard man she still hadn’t quite learned the name of on account of him barely uttering words at any given time, were largely following the Khajiit’s lead towards where the passages around were; she knew a separate lift than the one they’d come up before, since they knew there was likely more Ministry guards that direction. They found the second one unguarded, and quickly and efficiently boarded it, Daro’Vasora tilting the lever down just so to reach the ground floor. 

“There’s somewhere we need to stop before we leave,” she said suddenly, looking at her companions since they had a few moments of quiet. “There’s a medical wing that has a lot of invaluable potions that I think we shouldn’t pass up.” she paused, flexing her hand in and out of a fist. “I had my arm broken by Zaveed, and two days later, it was healed with the medicine they had. No aches, no pain. The attendant was very keen to share her insights with me, and she said there might be a way to fix Judena’s short-term memory and Gregor’s… well, his future deterioration. It’s a slim chance, and a risk going there, but you all are risking your lives for me. I would like to return the favour and give those two their lives back, and if someone gets shot again, we might not be able to heal them if we’re in the wilderness unless we had something that acted fast.” 

The Khajiit sighed, taking Latro’s hand, looking him in the eyes with a steady gaze before turning back to the others. “Please. I know I’m asking a lot, but this could save lives and give two of our friends a second chance at life.”

“It might be worth it.” Calen mused.

Latro chewed his lip, thinking over the prospect of making a detour. They were already outnumbered as it was and they couldn’t waste anytime lest they all get trapped and killed in the Palace. Although, a way to save Jude and... [i]Gregor?[/i] Well, it would be invaluable to everyone, those two in particular. It would be a weight off of their shoulders, and his own in turn. “Fine.” Latro said, quickly, “But we can not dally, Sora. Wasting too much time for Jude and Gregor could get all of us killed, Jude included.”

Just as he stopped talking the lift screeched in protest, the grinding of gears coming to a forceful stop shaking in Latro’s feet and knees, hissing steam vents working to stop their descent. Fate would have it that they were in the Ministry Offices, a cadre of Ministry Agents gearing up, interrupted to stare confused at the five people on the lift, who returned a stare of confusion of their own.

“What the-“

Latro wasted no time in raising the pistol he’d stolen off of the dead Agent that had leveled it at Sora’s face, the sharp crack of a discharge catching the Agent on the receiving end through the eye and interrupting him.

And then it was bloody chaos.

[i]Finally, some action[/i]. Zhaib sprung to it, pulling the dagger from its hiding place, a smirk playing upon his lips - alighting his eyes with some kind of menacing glee. “Stay behind me Daro’Vasora, I promised I would let no harm come to you.” With that, he sidestepped in front of the Khajiit, and with an almost businesslike flick of his wrist he drew the dagger across the bare throat of a Dwemer guard that had foolishly stepped up to challenge the Redguard. 

Following Zhaib’s lead, Shakti leapt into the heart of the group of agents, her sword twirling like the branch of a tree in a gale. “I’ll cut you to pieces for making me wear this you [i]tobr’a ra[/i]!” The Redguard girl shouted as she cut neat ribbons of red into a few of the agent’s bodies. 

Latro wasted no time in joining the others, though in their quickness to jump into the fray he hung back. With Sora at his back, he moved behind them, using them as a shield. He recalled Francis’ words of advice at fighting a room full of opponents on your own- don’t. But he also remembered that he badgered him on looking for some other answer.

Move quick, waste no time in putting yourself in the right stance or worrying about angles of attack to your opponent. Jump in among them, use each as a shield to the next, slicing and tearing along the way. Such is the brutality of a wolf alone against its rivals. So, when he saw the Ministry Agents pulling back and quickly rallying together at the other end of the room, he gave Sora’s hand a reassuring squeeze. Then jumped in among them.

Calen, on the other hand, quietly stepped behind Daro’Vasora, shut his eyes and kissed his amulet as he muttered a few words under his breath while trying to regulate his breathing.

Latro’s knife and his fist was all he had, though he was a blur against them. They weren’t expecting one of their enemies to act with such recklessness and bloody abandon. The first few he came against stepped back from him panicked and defenseless. They were easy, he caught one in the throat with his knife, turning to the other and lashing out with a kick, he broke the Agent’s knee and forced his leg to bend backwards.

A stone-skin hand came down in a chop hard enough to hear the Agent’s head break. The next came at him with his axe only to have his terrible swing side-stepped. Latro caught his wrist before he could backswing and drove his knife through his forearm. As the man screamed, Latro snatched his axe away and cut it off by burying the man’s handaxe in his own forehead, his eyes bulging out and tongue lolling as Latro pulled the axe free with a wet sucking sound and letting him fall.

With knife and axe, he continued on, the others surely joining him and taking advantage of the chaos he and Shakti had spread in their ranks.

Daro’Vasora was no stranger to violence, but something about the agent’s grizzly demise with his own axe caused her to involuntarily scrunch an eye and suppress a gag. She’d known how capable Latro was in a fight; she’d fought alongside him before against all odds with the Falmer, but this was like seeing something released he’d kept suppressed. 

[I]So this is Pale-Feather…[/I] she thought, feeling rather silly dwelling on such thoughts while holding a table leg and wearing a long dress while her friends and rescuers were fighting for her.

“Oh, fuck this.”  She said to herself, unsheathing a claw and making quick cuts down the legs of the dress and tearing the rest on either side to give her legs a full range of motion. She hurried to join the fray, not contented to be a meek bystander while others risked themselves on her behalf; an agent was busy fending off Zhaib’s flurry of slashes with a dagger, the Dwemer held back by his half-armoured form. The Khajiit brought her improvised weapon down into the back of the agent’s legs, stumbling him for a moment as the Redguard bodyguard drove his blade into the man’s throat. 

She didn’t have time to celebrate a victory as another swordsman came with a vicious overhead swing that she managed to catch with the wood; the blade couldn’t slide free, so the Dwemer pulled the sword back to readjust. Daro’Vasora didn’t let him. She drove the broken end into the face of the agent, causing him to shriek in agony as the sharp edge tore into his eye, causing a string of Dwemeri curses that she only understood every few words of. 

She leapt back to avoid the swings, and remembering her sparring lesson with Latro, she caught the sword with her table leg, causing enough of an opening that she was able to grab the Dwemer’s wrist and throw herself down and behind him, forcing the agent to stumble and lose his balance as he reached out to brace himself from having his face smash against the floor. He was quick, but not quick enough to avoid the claws that lashed out across his exposed jugular, a seep of crimson flooding out of four clean lines and a gurgling cough barely escaped his throat as he collapsed into the tile below, the Khajiit only standing then, holding aloft her bloodied hand. 

Calen watched from behind in an inconspicuous cranny between the leg of an archway jutting out from the wall and a display case as the other four were displaying their skills in battle against the Dwemer, his heart racing as he tried to think up a plan. What to do, [i]what to do?[/i] He heard a door open down the hallway followed by footsteps and the clanging of armor. His breathing became haggardly, and reflexively, he shook his hands and focused hard on them until they were alight with a washed-out yellow glow before taking in a deep breath. The veins in his neck were aglow with the same light for a brief moment as his throat relaxed. [i]Relax, Calen, Relax! You can’t lose it now! Think! Do something![/i]

But no ideas came to mind.

“Blasted brain!” Calen swore. He grabbed his amulet again and prayed, “Under her skirt and into the bum, watch out Nirn, here I come…” The bard kissed the amulet three times and jumped to his feet, not noticing the faint glow emanating from his necklace. One last soldier had just recovered from Shakti’s onslaught, and, Sora being the first enemy he saw, began lunging toward her from behind. Calen sprinted from his hiding place, surprisingly zippy when he wanted to be, and jumped onto the Dwemer soldier’s back from behind and causing him to stagger and miss his thrust on Sora. Calen pulled the helmet off of the dwemer’s head and, [i]Ping! Pang! Clang![/i], whacking it into the top of their skull three times until they collapsed onto the ground, dazed and concussed, causing the bard to tumble onto the ground after him.

“They’re over there!” A voice yelled from down the hallway, where Calen remembered the enemy reinforcements to be coming from. In a panic, he threw the helmet down the corridor, which ricocheted off the brick wall and under the foot of the soldier leading the charge. The soldier tripped, and trying to recover, failed miserably and began toppling over the men and women behind him. 

Calen simply blinked in confusion and pleasant surprise. “Huh.”

Shakti paused in her offence for a moment to gawk at what had just happened to Calen. “I guess I missed one.” She gave a shrug and smacked a swordblow aside and impaled the dwemer who had thrown it. He gurgled and flopped over as he died and the Alik’r Warrior spun on her heels and gave two lightning-quick slashes to an agent who had hoped to catch her unawares. It was a curious thing to watch someone die. The Agent stumbled a bit, blood seeping from the gashes across his chest, fingers missing from where the Redguard girl had caught them in her swings. At this point in her journey Shakti had killed countless men, but never before had she really thought about them. She felt a pang of sorrow in the pit of her stomach for a moment before she realised it was life or death. There were no other options at this point. They had started it, but Shakti planned to be the one to finish it. 

Latro stumbled back from his opponents, a long but superficial gash on his forearm as well as one that stung across his ribs with each breath. There were three of them left against him while the others were dealing with theirs. The four of them stood opposite each other, each of their chests heaving with breath. These were the best of them, whittled down to the strongest by Latro’s hands like nature to man.

A coldness ran through him, willing violence to bubble to the surface. It made him sick, almost, to see what he had wrought, but in the deepest corners of his mind, he felt something too sickening. Old and almost forgotten, a pleasure in watching his enemies die by his hand. Pale-Feather of the Crow-Wife clan had come again, and it made Latro’s skin crawl. But Sora didn’t need Latro right now, for things like this, one needed Finnen Pale-Feather.

“Alright,” Latro heard himself speak, though the voice didn’t even seem like his own, too grating and whisper-like in its cruelty, “Let’s get to work on you.”

The first one came at him, a burly Nord with an appropriately large axe. He swung, but like the salmon of the River Karth, Pale-Feather slipped under the blow. He tried to close the distance but was put off when he had to side-step a jab from the end of the Nord’s haft, the Nord wasting no time in trying to swing again, but it was still as fast as a glacier to Pale-Feather.

The effort was good, the Nord was skilled to use every part of the axe as a weapon, but Pale-Feather was quicker and meaner. Like the small wolf, he bared his fangs twice as fierce and gave twice the fight lest he lose his life to the larger in the pack. With a wolf’s growl he jabbed hard with the top of his axe and split the Nord’s mouth bloody, stumbling him back with closed eyes as Pale-Feather let go a hacking laugh at his pain as if it were some cruel joke. He brought the axe back to him, hooking the Nord’s haft with the beard of it and slicing deep into his forearm with his knife, relinquishing the big weapon from one Nordic hand. As the Nord stepped back, Pale-Feather’s axe chopped and nestled deep in his chest like the tree in the mountainside, roots deep and strong enough to split stone.

He pulled it free, following after the huge Nord and clambering over him to sit on his belly as he lay on the ground, wolf’s fangs smiling from Pale-Feather’s lips, yellow wolf’s eyes on another kill. Three quick stabs with the tempo like the hummingbird’s wings ended him, and he danced away just like it.

An animal roar whipped his head to the side and like a charging bull, the furious Orc barreled into him, knocking him sprawling and gasping to the ground. He felt himself picked up and again they were moving. The Orc and Pale-Feather both were roaring into each other’s faces as Pale-Feather made furious stabs into the Orc’s shoulder, but the shallow bites weren’t enough to stop the Orc’s charge. Like a battering ram, the Orc used Pale-Feather to bowl straight into Calen, the three now pressed up against a wall. “Help me kill this damn beast, Nord!” Pale-Feather roared over his shoulder at Calen.

“Nord?!” Calen cried out incredulously, though stifled as his chest was being crushed. “You know what my name is… damn it!”

Despite the infraction, Calen managed to pull one of his arms free from the crushing force of Latro sandwiching him against the wall by the massive Orsimer’s strength. Trying his best to concentrate, a dull and barely visible blue glow radiated from his hand and he pressed it firmly against the orc’s head in an attempt to calm them down and hopefully weaken their grip.

Zhaib did not understand what the cheerful Bard's magic was doing, he only saw at the centre of it a worthy opponent, and two of Raelynn's companions being squashed beneath him. A smirk flashed over his face, “finally…” he breathed before barreling toward the Orc with speed, he used a sidetable to springboard him closer… With the speed of his jump and the weight behind it, he landed both of his feet square against the Orc's head, sending him staggering to the side and freeing the cross dresser and the singer from his grasp. “I'm going to wear your guts as a necklace…” He growled before launching toward his new enemy, dagger in one hand and the other a balled fist. 

The remaining two guards decided this was their best chance to take advantage of the skewed numbers as Latro and Calen were still recovering from the Orsimer’s attack and they made a charge to finish the job. Daro’Vasora, now having recovered a mace from one of the fallen, raced to intercept, peeling one of the agents off as he turned to engage the new threat. 

“The Governor was a fool to keep you alive.” he snarled; it was an Imperial she recognized from when she was first detained. 

Daro’Vasora scoffed. “Make sure you file a complaint, asshole.” she said, waiting for him to make his first move.

He made a few testing thrusts with his sword that Daro’Vasora managed to deflect easily enough before the Imperial tried a feint, making a slash from an upper diagonal direction before swapping to a lower slash. The Khajiit put a heavier swing into the parry, her own weapon easily knocking the sword aside, and keeping the momentum going brought the weapon back into position and down towards the man’s chest, which, he sidestepped and went to thrust his sword into Daro’Vasora’s flank, which she managed to avoid by going into a low 3-point crouch, and in the same motion bringing the weapon into the man’s shins, a sickeningly loud crunch of bone filling the air. He didn’t have long to scream out in agony as the head of the mace was thrusted up into his lower jaw, breaking it and knocking him onto his back. Daro’Vasora stood again, spitting on the ground as she wasted no time bringing her weapon down into the Imperial’s chest over where his heart would have been.

She hoped the others could have managed the last one.

Pale-Feather stood opposite the last man. He stood strong enough, solid in every limb and seemingly proud, height reaching towards the ceiling like every other Nord Pale-Feather had put in the dirt. Yes, this man surely was a towering oak. But this oak stood against the tempest winds. Pale-Feather wasted no time, dashing forward and catching the Nord off guard. His startling the man wasn’t good enough though, as he raised his greatsword like a staff and hooked Pale-Feather’s axe, raising it up with his strength and pulling it free from his grasp.

Before the Nord could capitalize on disarming him, Pale-Feather ducked down to the right, knife slicing deep into the inside of his thigh, right where the big arteries were. Immediately, in big spurts his lifeblood left him, big leg buckling. The tree was close to being felled. Pale-Feather continued on, turning the duck into a full roll and snatching up his axe on the way. He skidded to a halt on one knee and put all his strength into his planted foot, springing forth like the jackrabbit and cracking the man’s nose flat against his face. The tree was felled, more fuel for the fire in him. The flame in his chest was burning cold now, a smile so wide it pained his cheeks, teeth threatening to crack under the pressure of his set jaw and hissing breaths throwing out spittle as he loomed over the great, big man that once loomed over him.

Such as it should be.

Chop. Chop. Chop. Chop. Five, six, seven. Grunting double-handed blows like a joiner’s hammer. And It was done. Pale-Feather didn’t turn to the others or mutter a word as he continued onwards. There was someone who needed telling they were dead...

“Latro?” A soft voice came from behind him.

Daro’Vasora looked to Latro, this crazed man who had slaughtered men like he was overcome by madness with her arms protectively across her waist, her posture diminutive, her ears pulled back. Despite the heat of the room, she was shaking; she didn’t know what had overcome her lover, and when he told her of his time as Pale-Feather, one of the Forsworn, she hadn’t expected it to be quite like this. He turned around, eyes on her as if she was not but meat and bone.

“I’m… I’m going to get the medicine.” she stammered, turning to leave the room suddenly, walking as fast as her legs would take her with her head down.

Shakti turned and saw Sora powerwalk out of the room, looking a bit uncomfortable (from what little she could read on the Khajiit’s face) and jogged after her. 

“I’ll come with you, Sora the Khajiit. I do not think you should be going around alone.” the Redguard girl explained as she caught up with Sora, slowing down to a walk and wiping her blade off on her gown. 

[hr]


They managed to meet with the eastern side, Janelle kept her word when she threw her fair share of illusion spells, creating confusion among the friendly fire in the ranks, even if she did spurn her offer of turning it into a contest.


In her element of pure chaos, Maj grinned wickedly, blood flowing down from her temple squinting with one eye shut. She hung off the side of her Furgur Blitzcloud, the storm atronach. She harassed a Dwemer guard, they took a direct hit of a chain lightning attack - the bolt landed square in their chest before bouncing off to zap a few others - narrowly missing Nanine and softening the Ministry Agent before her.

Maj snarled knocking her elbow against the rocky head of the Furgur, “Watch it you fucking pile of sparks! Aim for the Dwemer!”

She shouted over her shoulder to Nanine, “All yours!” She cackled, she was fine - a hit was a hit regardless of it being an accident.

The Ministry Agent seized in place, and Nanine took the opportunity to shove her sword through his neck. Pulling her blade out she looked over at Maj with a small frown, quietly giving thanks that she hadn’t been wearing her plate. The Storm Atronach was too uncontrolled with its attacks for her tastes, but another dead enemy was another dead enemy. The plan had mostly devolved into complete chaos, but they were all still moving forward. It was good enough. She scooped up the fallen Agent’s pistol, stuffing it quickly into her belt, and carried on, lightning crackling in her free hand. The stark light illuminated her focused face, eyes intensely going from person to person, place to place, as they moved through the Palace. 

While the chain lightning bounced passed Nanine to hit another of the dwemer, it bounced again and made a beeline toward Aries who had received plenty of warning from Maj’s yelling to see the bolt coming her away. Instead of attempting to dodge, she reached out and seemed to grab it, pulling it close to her and cupped her other hand around a dimming electrical orb. For a second, sparks crackled around her hands as she channeled her magicka into the electrical energy, apparently recharging it, before letting it fly off in a different direction towards incoming Dwemer troops. The bolt arced through their bodies and metal armor, their muscles seizing, before falling unconscious or dropping dead. Her cold eyes glanced over to land back on Maj, feeling a little resentful of the mage’s recklessness in the middle of the operation, even if she was making herself a bigger target than her.

“Can’t you control that thing?” Aries called out to her. Her usually cool disposition replaced by visibly stressed demeanor, even if she was trying her best to contain it and keep her head cool in the midst of the chaos. She had been sparing with her use of magicka when she could help it so that she could be more efficient, and for the most part, she had been relatively successful in that endeavor with chain lightning spells - but being in the thick of battle had a way with making a person exert more energy than was needed. Fortunately for her, her magicka had a penchant for recovering quickly. Sweat and dirt was smeared across her face even if no blood was splattered across her person. She was fighting this battle from two different fronts, one here, next to her allies, and the other in her head, anticipating their tactics and the evolution of which and their expectations of the raiding party. A few select men had stayed back in the storehouse in anticipation of reinforcements from the weapons depot arriving so that they could ambush them from behind.

She took two seconds to catch her breath before her hands began crackling with electricity once again.


Anifaire avoided the fray as much as she could, her heart pounding. She stuck as closely as possible to Judena, all but using the Argonian as a shield, as she used the skills they’d been practicing to cause confusion. She directed her magicka, lifting a dislodged chunk of stone, and swung it around with more hope than precision. It struck several Dwemer guards, bouncing between them, though Anifaire was afraid to hit them with force and the stone served only as a distraction and giver of minor bruises. Judena’s ironflesh spell glimmered over her body, the pair of alteration mages skirted through the fray, avoiding facing any guard completely on their own, where Anifaire’s stones distracted Judena’s spear pierced calves and shoulders. 


That distraction was the only opening Mazrah needed. The Orsimer had opted for her trusty spear over her bow now that they had entered the fray proper and she tore into the Dwemer guards with unchained ferocity. She disemboweled the first guard with a swift slash to the gut, sliding across the floor on her knees to get within range, before hopping to her feet and leaping over him with a somersault. The next guard was ready for her and parried her initial thrust with his sword. Annoyed, Mazrah smacked his weapon aside with her beastly strength and buried her spear deep within his chest, the orichalcum tip piercing through his light cuirass easily. She ripped the barbed spear out, spraying the dying elf’s blood all over herself, and swung it like a staff to knock him and another one of his allies to the ground. She grabbed her spear in a two-handed grip and slammed it down into the helmet’s visage of the second downed Dwemer. His body spasmed for a second or two before it caught up to the fact that he was now dead. Mazrah looked over her shoulder to give Anifaire a thumbs-up before flashing Maj, high atop her Atronach, a gore-splattered grin. 

The thumbs up surprised the Altmer so much that she nearly dropped the stone, which by happenstance thudded against a Dwemer guard’s helmet. He dropped to the ground stumbling, and Anifaire felt proud of her achievement. 

With so many dwemer enemies and her own friends in the fray, Meg opted in no longer using her bow, stashing it away on her back and instead pulling her sword from its scabbard. She was in much too close a proximity with the others and didn't want to shoot her allies in the back because of a miscalculated shot. She also found she had a newfound pride for her blade since Latro's admiration of it and was itching to use it once more. She didn't have to wait long either as she saw a dwemer guard approaching her. Her blade was instantly brought up to parry against the attack, a grimace on her face as she pushed against the dwemer guard, who was stronger than the average bandit. In a battle of strength, he would clearly beat her, but Meg wasn't going to allow that to happen. 

With a grunt, she snapped her knee forward, ramming it against his thigh. She didn't think it would hurt him, but it did have the guard stumble for a second, giving her enough time to send a hard kick to his stomach, which did more than cause him to stumble. Losing his footing, the guard fell back, and Meg wasted no time in slamming a boot against his head before thrusting her sword into his naked throat.

In all this distraction, she didn't realize she was being accosted by another guard. Luckily for Meg, Jaraleet took notice of the guard about to attack her and moved to intercept the Dwemer. Just as the mer was raising his sword to strike Meg’s back, the Argonian assassin intercepted the blow with his dagger; catching the sword’s edge on the serrated teeth of his smaller blade. Forcing the sword away from the Nord woman, Jaraleet took chance of the opening in the Mer’s guard to drive his knee into his opponents gut and causing him to double over in pain. Taking advantage of the opening, and ignoring the pain coming from his own knee, the Argonian wasted no time in driving his sword through the exposed neck of his enemy, turning to look at Meg once he was sure that the Dwemer was no longer a threat. “You should be more careful Meg, always be attentive of your surroundings.” He told her softly, a note of concern on his voice. 

However, once he was done speaking to Meg, Jaraleet’s demeanor turned to the usual cold, professional, behaviour that characterised the Argonian when he was on a mission. “Everyone!” He shouted over the chaos of the battle. “We can ill afford to waste our time, we need to push deeper into the building!” The assassin said, hoping that the others would listen to him and that, hopefully, others would join him in steering the group towards rendezvousing with the others further inside the palace. 

As much as the argonian’s wordiness in the middle of a heated battle was grating on Aries’ nerves - honestly, just be succinct and concise - he was right that they were spending far too much time in the courtyard trying to defend themselves against the waves of soldiers throwing themselves at Samara cell. Something was definitely wrong here; there shouldn’t be so many soldiers left in the palace after the attack on the weapons depot. If they weren’t anticipating an attack elsewhere and chose to sacrifice a rook in order to defend the king, then the depot was either mostly defunct or…

She barely had enough time in the midst of her thoughts to react to a war-crying dwemer charging at her with a sword. She quickly raised her hand against him, and in the adrenaline-fueled moment, didn’t hold back any magicka as a red mist began to envelop her hand and her eyes bore into her enemy’s with the casting of a fear spell. The dwemer dropped his sword and dread gripped his heart, and after he took a few steps backwards, his war cries turned to screams of terror as ran the other way… before the rocky club of Maj’s storm atronach’s arm silenced the mer by swatting him into the ground. That soldier was only one of possibly hundreds still inside the palace. They had to move up soon before enemy forces weathered them down too much.  She was hoping to save her magicka and lay low, but it seemed like this was one of those emergencies she was loathe to resort to.

“Stay close!” Aries shouted, her temperament finally catching up to her. Rage-filled eyes like fire took over her countenance as two huge and blazing fireballs erupted in her hands. Instead of throwing them, though, her hands fell to her sides and the fire seemed to spill out from her hands like napalm onto the ground. It ran like a raging river down the hallway behind them and blocking off the corridors beyond, guarding their flanks and providing a clear line towards the lift and the stairwell next to it. The dwemer who did not step out of the way in time would be engulfed within the blazing inferno, and as the flames burned, its height grew to ten feet, high above the heads of every fighter in the battle. It the first true display of her destruction magic, and it was befittingly dramatic and intense compared to the restrained shock spells she used earlier, but as far as her energy was concerned, there was little to show for it - she took a deep, calming breath after casting such a spell and that was that, reaping the benefits of being frugal with her magicka early on. The knowledge that the soldiers were cut off by the scorching flames, their vision also obscured, and those inside the walls would be quickly dispatched was enough for her and the others to begin catching their breath and letting everyone else’s magicka recover, too.

“The way is open! Let’s move!” Aries declared as she began the march towards the stairs, helping the others with the remaining hostiles that were preoccupying them as she went. One in particular was in combat with Jaraleet, and she snatched a spare dagger from their sheath on its belt and slashed the side of their neck open before continuing forth. The others finished their battles and followed after, and those more fleet of foot ran ahead to scout out the stairwell to confirm its clearance. Once everyone went through, she raised another wall of fire at the base of the stairs with a casual flick of her wrist to dissuade enemy forces from coming after their flank.

Rushing into the stairs as close as she could to Judena, Anifaire immediately pressed herself back to the wall inside as she caught her breath. Her chest heaved, panting, tired from running and fear more than her magicka was depleted. Despite not having the usual skill of other Altmer, she has the energy reserves of one. While the others scouted ahead, she took the moment to attempt to clear her head. Images of Dwemer skewered by blades or burnt to a crisp by spells intruded on her attempts to calm her mind and she fought against rising panic, the image of Aries slicing a guards throat several yards in front of her reoccurring. She closed her eyes and focused on returning her breathing back to normal. 

Furgur Blitzcloud dissipated back to the depths of Oblivion bringing Maj  to the ground, she brought up the rear of the party using the flames Aries created masking their exit with the illusion of fire engulfing the staircase. Next she quickly summoned Cinders, her flame atronach to stand guard empowered by the very same flames. Nodding she climbed the stairs behind everyone else, “Move, move, move, move!”

Mazrah, strong and quick to crest the steps of the stairwell three at a time, was among those in the vanguard. Her golden eyes burned bright in the blood-soaked Daedric mask that was her painted face and her tusks were bared. This was her element. 

Trinimac-consumed-turned-Malacath, the spurned spawn of Boethiah’s appetite, was the spirit that lit her rage and she could hear the battle-drums and war-cries of her people thunder in her ears. Aries’ flames and the fury of the dragon that she brought to the battlefield inspired Mazrah and she glanced behind her at the woman with a flash of admiration before her head snapped back ahead as she rounded the last twist of the stairwell and emerged onto the floor above. More enemies awaited. The Orsimer barely registered what they were -- Dwemer, foreigners, it mattered not. They were all prey. 

With explosive strength and speed, Mazrah uncoiled like a bolt from a crossbow and crossed the distance between herself and their opponents with feline agility. She avoided a salvo of close-range gunfire by swerving to the left and taking to the wall, the firm grip of her boots carrying her across the smooth surface like a legendary prince from an ancient tale, before she fell upon the gaggle of enemies with a scream. Her spear crushed the windpipe and severed the spine of one of them, too slow to even drop his rifle and reach for his shield, while Mazrah’s momentum allowed her to leap from the wall and drive her feet into the chest of another. Her weight and technique drove the Dwemer to the floor and his cuirass crumpled, breaking his ribs and cutting his skin in a hundred places. She pulled the spear free and whirled it around her with deadly precision, knocking weapons aside and leaving bloody gashes in exposed throats. The orichalcum speartip whistled as it cut through the air. Something, some primal intuition, told her that Daro’Vasora and the others were close. She hissed as she was forced to jump backwards to avoid being skewered by a Dwemeri blade. This was annoying. 

“Kill them!” She roared at her allies behind her as a Nord began closing the distance with an axe in hand.

Hearing the sounds of combat ahead of them, Aries took a deep breath and prepared herself. Deciding it was best to save her Destruction magic for when it was needed, she instead summoned wisps of energy to her hand, which then coalesced into an ethereal blade with an unprecedented elegance in its slight curve. Cresting the top of the staircase, a quick thrust caught the crook of the nord’s axe before it could find itself in Mazrah’s side. In her parry, Aries swung the axe wide, and a twirl of her blade later would find itself lunged into the torso of the Nord with a stylish riposte. Though as large and enduring as he was, the stabbing pain in his abdomen wasn’t enough to stifle his war cry and aim his rage down on Aries herself -- but as though it were a dance to her, she left the blade embedded in her enemy and spun around his side until she was behind him, two new ethereal blades in hand, which were then stabbed into the Nord’s back.

Another cry of pain and rage, the nord desperately swung around with his axe, causing Aries to leave the two swords behind as she stepped back on her hind foot before immediately springing forward again, summoning a fresh blade mid-thrust. The blade found his heart, and after his last few seconds of life, his bulky body fell forward and Aries stepped out of his way. Her enemy lay dead with four ethereal blades pin-cushioning his body, which disappeared after a few seconds as she summoned a new blade in her hand. She faced her remaining opponents with her other hand behind her back, poised in a classical dueling stance as she carefully studied their movements.


Nanine headed up the stairs, sword drawn. They needed to move quickly. The longer this took the faster the city guard could react and cut off any escape they could have. Dark oblivion magic coiled around her cupped hand and arm, and she threw it amongst the guards facing Mazrah. A Frost Atronach appeared among them, sending bodies flying with swings of its limbs. She gathered more energy into her hand and released a Spider Daedra on the walls behind the guards facing Janelle. Lightning bolts slammed into two of them as Nanine threw her own lightning magic into the fra. They couldn’t afford to be stopped, especially when there weren’t any mages among the Dwemer.  She paused next to Janelle, throwing another lightning bolt into a third as he tried to dodge her Daedra’s poison spit. “You kill people faster with your destruction magic. Do that. If you need it, I have magicka potions. We have to keep moving.”

“Mind yourself.” She calmly replied, noting the battlemage generous expense of magic with sharp, critical eyes. Two large daedra suddenly summoned, followed by more shock magic -- potions or not, and regardless of skill level, it wouldn’t be long until that one was out of commission. She felt little more than minor annoyance toward her new ally’s badgering, as if she thought she was so dense that Aries was not aware of her own abilities. It’s just as well then, in case of the event she’d turn her magic against her’s.


[hr]



There was work to do. Always more work. 

Pale-Feather scoured the floor they were on, sniffing at the air and growling as if he were an animal. Head whipped this way and that at every sound real or imagined, like a hook was through his nose. Finally, his shadow stretched across a door lined along the wall of others. He raised his fist, banged the pommel of his knife once. Twice. Three times, “Open up, Deep Elf.”

He heard a shuffling behind the door, then it whipped open and the barrel of a pistol was in his face. He leaned to one side, hooked the beard of his axe over the Elf’s wrist and yanked towards him, the Elf squawking as Pale-Feather grunted with the effort. The door pressed against his elbow as Pale-Feather pulled with all his might, hearing the sinews and tendons and joints giving protest until his arm gave with an almighty snap.

The Elf heaved in a long breath as he looked at his arm but was cut off from making his pitiful braying to no one when Pale-Feather hooked him around the neck and brought him into the hallway. He sheathed his knife and his axe. “You don’t get to touch me or mine without my blessing. This will be slow, Kerztar.” Pale-Feather said, hands slowly curling into fists that shook under their own tension and fury, knuckles popping like a fire, “Slow as slow.”

He stepped closer to the shaking Elf and he stammered out, “L-Latro?”

Pale-Feather stopped for a moment before a wicked smile crossed his bleeding lips, a voice cold as winter left him, “‘Fraid not.”

[hr]



“Please, leave me alone!” The attendant pleaded. Daro’Vasora raised her hand reassuringly. 

“Look, no one’s here to harm you, least of all me. I won’t forget your kindness to me, and part of me wanted to warn you to find somewhere safe to hide until this blows over. You’re a good person, the world needs more of that.” the Khajiit said softly, Shakti by her side, probably not doing much to alleviate the Dwemeri woman’s concerns.

“Then what do you want? Why are you here?” she asked, guardedly. 

“Remember what we talked about, that serum that could potentially help my friends’ damaged minds? I need that, and whatever else you can really spare.” Daro’Vasora replied.

The attendant stepped out from behind her cover cautiously, wringing her hands nervously. “There’s no guarantee any of it would work, and without the equipment to monitor it…”

“It’s a chance, and a choice, we need to take. Please, I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for a good cause. You’ve sworn an oath to preserve life, right? My friend hasn’t been living a life ever since I’ve known her; she has to write literally everything down or she won’t remember it. I know I’m not going to restore lost memories, but I’m hoping to give her a chance to form [I]new[/I] ones. The other guy has a family disorder where they start to hit the high end of middle-age and they start to lose their minds, some hereditary shit.” Daro’Vasora explained, reaching over to put a hand over the attendant’s. “Please.”

The Dwemer nodded, staring at the strange hand over her own. “Okay. Okay. Just, give me a few minutes, okay?” she said, hurrying around back. Daro’Vasora slumped down against a table, burying her face in her free hand. 

“Thank you, Shakti. You barely know me and you’re risking your life for me… I’m not sure how to process that.” she said quietly to her Redguard companion.

Shakti smiled warmly at Sora and twirled her sword, “It is the right thing to do.” She declared proudly. Just as easily as her smile had come it shifted to puzzlement. “There is one thing I am wondering.” She began, tapping her chin thoughtfully, “Who-“ She cut herself off and lowered her voice to a whisper. “-is losing their mind? No one told me anything about this.” 

“Shit.” Daro’Vasora muttered; she forgot it was something that was told in confidence, and her mind had certainly been elsewhere given what had transpired in the fight only moments before. There was no sense denying it, but she met Shakti’s eyes with her own. “This isn’t widely known, so please keep this between us. Gregor told me back in Anvil his family has a disorder that caused his father to lose his mind, become a babbling husk of the man he used to be and it was a painful stretch of time before death mercifully put the man out of his misery. 

“Gregor said that it afflicts everyone in his family and he discovered it way too late, and it’s what put him on the path he’s on now that made him leave his family behind to try and find a cure for them. I promised I’d help, if I could, and this might be my best chance to make good on that promise and maybe save a… friend? I don’t even know what our relationship is. I can’t imagine having access to another Dwemeri medical center like this again, so while the timing is horseshit given everything, I would hate myself knowing I didn’t at least try to take a risk for the same people who are risking everything for me.” the Khajiit explained, offering a morose smile.

Shakti blinked once. Sora had meant [i]literally[/i] losing their mind. It was… hard to grasp. Did they just become shells? The Redguard girl did not know what she would do in that situation, but there was no time to ponder hypothetical situations, not now at least. Instead she nodded, “I won’t tell anyone.” and hefted her temporary sword, keeping an eye on the entrances. 

“I know you won’t.” Daro’Vasora reassured her. 

An idea came to Shakti. She wasn’t much of an alchemist, but there were a few in her tribe. “Maybe we should save a bottle, perhaps someone can figure out how to duplicate the recipe, yes?” Shakti postulated quietly. 

The Khajiit nodded in agreement. “It was my intention to grab as much stuff as we can carry and try to figure out what it does on the road, even if it’s just a regular healing poultice, it’s still more than we had a few moments ago.” she said, heading towards a cabinet and browsing through its contents. “I’m sorry you had to go through all of this trouble for me, I never meant to make you all worry or do anything like this.”

Shakti grinned, “It wasn’t much trouble in the end, the worst part was having to dress like this.” She shook her free arm to indicate her distaste for the bloodstained gown. “They made me do my hair up and told me I couldn’t bring my sword in. My sword!” Shakti laughed at her own indignance. 

That prompted a grin; Daro’Vasora recalled exactly how the two of them had met. Now she mentioned it, it seemed strange to see Shakti without her beloved weapon, the two were practically one in the same. “Well, I thank you for your noble sacrifice. When we get out of here, I’ll be sure to buy you an outfit that’s more your style. Deal?”

Suddenly, the attendant returned carrying a pair of boxes, labeled in Dwemeri writing. Daro’Vasora had found a book on medicine she’d been skimming through while waiting, and to her pleasant surprise, the writing on the boxes matched what she’d expected. Shoving them in a bag with a few other things she’d managed to find around the medical wing, the Khajiit smiled at the attendant. 

“Thank you. This will come in handy.” She said, holding the book aloft. She looked over to Shakti, gesturing to the door. “Let’s go find the others, we wasted enough time.”

“What, it’s just like that? No questions, no skepticism?” the attendant asked.

Daro’Vasora looked over her shoulder at the Dwemer woman and shrugged. “Well, I’ve taken bigger risks. I’ll find the answers I’m looking for, one way or another.” she said, and the two of them were out of the door and headed back to the others.

[hr]

Things almost seemed too quiet, too easy. Daro’Vasora made her way down the stairwell she’d passed by a half dozen times during her captivity with Calen, Latro, Shakti and Zhaib, and after the encounter with the ministry agents, there had been no more resistance; either they’d been fortunate enough to avoid the enemy, or they were regrouping to cut them off. They couldn’t let their guard down.
 
Hurrying down the spiral stairwell, Daro’Vasora turned for a moment to make eye contact with Latro, or the crazed man that had once been him, when she ran into something built like a wall. Feeling like a fool for letting her guard down, Daro’Vasora yelled as she prepared to strike with her mace, and she found a familiar tattooed Orsimer face staring back at her with wide eyes.

“Maz?!” She exclaimed, taking in the woman as if for the first time before noticing that she wasn’t alone; most everyone in her group were here, in this palace, likely to rescue her. A flush of embarrassment throbbed in her temple and ran down her spine, and she felt her throat getting choked up. [I]This is no time to be emotional, we need to go.[/I]

“Baan Daar smiles on you lot, I never thought I’d see you all again.” she said with a grin, grabbing Mazrah by the arm affectionately before looking at the others. “I can’t believe this, thank you, all of you, but we need to leave [I]now.[/I] Do you have an escape route?”

Meg stepped forward, a relieved grin on her face at finally being able to see Daro'Vasora alive and well. "Thank Mara you're doin' a'right! Y'had us worried there for a bit." That was an understatement of course, and what she really wanted was to rush forward and hug the khajiit, whether the latter enjoyed one of not. Now wasn't the time for that though, as Sora clearly indicated. Looking to Maz and Jaraleet, Meg addressed the two. "What 'bout the tunnels we came from?"

Jaraleet regarded Daro’Vasora briefly, giving the Khajiit a nod before he turned to face Meg. “The tunnels could be an option, but….” The Argonian began, letting out a sigh and shaking his head slightly. “With how long the Dwemer have been here it wouldn’t surprise me if they know of the tunnels as well, most likely they know them even better than us, and they probably will connect the dots sooner rather than latter. It’d be risky, to say the least.” He finished, crossing his arms over his chest. “Truth be told, I don’t think we have too many options as it stands. As much as I’m loathe to say it, I think our best option would be try and break through the gate and whatever forces the Deep Elves have mustered then scatter through the city. We’d make a harder target if we split and then, hopefully, reconvene later on.” 

“With respect, you’ve also a history of unsound decisions.” Aries intervened, taking a step forward and casting a critical and distrustful glance toward Jaraleet as she adjusted her hand’s grip on the bound sword. Her eyes then scrolled over and landed on Sora, to whom she nodded curtly. “Daro’Vasora -- a pleasure. I hope we have time to properly introduce ourselves later.”

The Khajiit returned the nod, wondering who the Imperial woman was. Subconsciously, she straightened her posture; the Imperial woman looked like she carried herself so erect that bending over for anything would be an affront. Daro’Vasora reflected that her slouched posture was largely due to a lifetime of scrounging through ruins and tight spaces. At least she was flexible.

Looking back to others, specifically Latro, Aries felt a certain amount of incredulity at their eagerness to flee, though it didn’t show on her face. “I’ve helped you find Daro’Vasora like I said I would. You all may wish to extract her immediately and leave Gilane… but we are already in the palace. This may be the only chance we have left. If we wish to gain a foothold in Gilane, then we start by cutting the head off the snake. We still need to find Governor Rourken.”

"Wait." Meg frowned, looking over at Aries. "We didn' come here for that. We came t'get Sora, an' now she's here with us. We gotta leave 'fore all've this ends up for nothin' an’ we end up dead!"

“We [i]broke into the palace[/i] and [i]slaughtered[/i] their men and women.” She repeated, staring down the Nord woman. “That blood is on your hands too. You think they will simply let you go? If not the Dwemer, then it will be the insurgents who will see to us. They’ve risked their lives today as much as we have, and they didn’t do it so we would only rescue one woman.”

"I ain' stupid," Meg muttered, stepping back a little, feeling foolish despite her words. "I know all that... I'm jus' sayin', I don’ remember tha' bein' part of the plan, an' headin' further in an' searchin' for the gov'nor sounds like suicide t’me." Her eyes swerved back to Daro’Vasora- if there was anyone she should be listening to, it was their leader. If Sora thought it was necessary to go after Rourken, she would no longer make a fuss.

“Absolutely out of the question.” Daro’Vasora said, stepping forward. “Look, looking past me and all of your heroics today, we’re about to be up to our ass in Centurions that can sprint and climb walls and I’ve met the woman… she’s probably one of the few chances Tamriel has at finding peaceful coexistence with the Dwemer. She’s not like the ones who attacked Imperial City, the ones that killed my uncle and destroyed my home. She can be reasoned with; if she’s assassinated in her own home, it won’t be just us who suffer, it’s going to be everyone in Gilane, in Hammerfell. Right now, I’m all for taking a page out of the Renrijra Krin’s book and running away at a superior force. An Alfiq can force a Senche to move if they don’t get caught between bites.”

The Khajiit looked at her companions, her friends. [I]Friends.[/I] she affirmed to herself, looking at each of them with a new resolve, a new promise; she’d repay their courage. 

At this new information, Aries seemed somewhat perturbed and took a moment to reflect on what she was told. Sora was about to continue on with her speech before Aries halted her with a raise of her hand, “Slow down for a moment.” She said. Her eyes were now back on the Khajiit. “I appreciate what you’re trying to accomplish here, but I was in Sentinel when the Dwemer first arrived in Hammerfell. They didn’t hesitate to occupy the King’s palace with armed force then. You might think the governess is reasonable, but positions of power are always occupied by clever people. I don’t mean offense, but it sounds like Rourken had you wrapped around her finger.”

Then Aries took a deep breath and continued, “But this talk of centurions is troubling. If the enemy is about to receive expendable reinforcements, then we should regroup with Irranhu cell. They raided their arms depot, and we’ll need their numbers and firepower if the Dwemer are going to launch a counter-attack.” The woman looked back up to face Sora, and was grimly shaking her head. “If what you say is true, then that is just further proof against her supposed desire for peace.”

“Whatever gets us out of this palace, but you don’t spend over a week with someone you want to claw their throat out without understanding them a bit. Hammerfell might be worse off today for what we’ve done here, but you didn’t see what the Dwemer are capable of when they aren’t trying to coexist.” Daro’Vasora explained, her eyes narrowing. “But I think I know a way to stop this invasion for [I]all[/I] of Tamriel, and I can’t do that here. The rest of us are leaving town, you can come along if you want.” Daro’Vasora said definitively, turning to Jaraleet and Meg. “I’ll leave the path up to you; my preference would be the tunnel because I don’t fancy trying my luck across open ground, but getting trapped without options also isn’t particularly alluring.”

Mazrah had resisted the urge to pull Sora into a hug and settled for returning the affectionate arm-squeeze while listening to the others talking. She was not a fan of fleeing for anyone or anything but even the Orsimer had to admit that rescuing the Khajiit and getting the hell out of here had been the plan all along. “The tunnel works,” she said and nodded encouragingly at Meg -- it was a good suggestion. “The entrance is outside of the palace. It's only a short distance of open ground to cover and then we're underground.” 

She stopped and tilted her head. A faint sound was echoing through the corridor. It sounded like… thunder. “You hear that?” Mazrah hissed. By turning her head this way and that, she was able to determine that the sound was coming from deeper within the palace. “I'm not an expert but that sounds like magic to me. Something's not right. We have to get out, now.” 

“I agree, but I must once more say that using the tunnels isn’t a good idea.” Jaraleet spoke up, turning to look at Mazrah. “Normally I’d agree that the tunnels are the best idea but, look at us.” The Argonian said, motioning towards the gathered members of the group with one arm. “We are about a dozen in number and the tunnels through which we came aren’t all that big. Were the Dwemer to corral us down there we couldn’t defend ourselves properly in such confined spaces.” He said to the Orsimer woman. “I know what I propose isn’t ideal but, truth be told, none of our options are. If we stay together we paint a bigger target on our backs for the Dwemer to track us down, regardless of the route that we take to get out of here. That is why I propose that we split up and reconvene later on, so that the Dwemer will have a harder time tracking us through Gilane’s streets.” 

“I agree with Jaraleet. We punch through the way we came, then scatter and reconvene. I can create walls of lightning to help keep the path open, and my summons can aid in that as well. In as large of a group we have, we can quickly deal with any enemies that do get in our way and keep moving.” Nanine was relieved to see that Sora was alright, even more so when she quickly and succinctly shut down Janelle’s foolish plan to try to assassinate the governor. It was nice to see that someone else understood the consequences of actions. [i]Unlike some people.[/i] She cast a brief, disproving, glance at Mazrah’s lack of cover and silently thanked her brother for teaching her the value of being ready to move at an instant. Her armor and pack was ready to be picked up and taken at the [i]Three Crowns[/i] and she fully expected the Dwemer to find and follow Mazrah to them within the month.

Of course, Aries had her own disagreement with what Nanine was proposing, looking at the battlemage with her persona momentarily broken as an expression of incredulity came over her. She was about to shut her down herself before Calen stepped forward sheepishly. He has been quiet throughout most of this to let the tactically minded folk create the escape strategy, but then approached with a finger in the air as if to make a proposal of his own. He said, in a somewhat sardonic fashion, “Uh, yeah, hi -- non-combatant here -- I feel like you might be, I don’t know, underestimating them a little bit by running into courtyard like it’s nothing. Remember when we first started making this plan of ours? Courtyard was a killbox? What happened to that? Because I really, [i]really[/i] don’t want to get shot again.”

Validation had only felt good for a moment; Meg looked rather antsy after Maz's words. If something was troubling the Orsimer, then she very much doubted it was worth ignoring it. And as much as she hated to admit it, Jaraleet's words did make sense, though heading out through the gates caused her more nervousness than being in a tunnel. Attacks could come from anywhere without any proper cover keeping them safe. 

It also irked her that all this all this discussing was taking up precious moments they could have used to already escape, whichever way they decided to go. "We need a decision, an' now," she broke out bluntly. "'Else we'll be dead right here." She chewed on her lip for a second before hastily continuing, now wishing to lose her courage now that she'd found it again. "How 'bout we split up now? They'd havta split t'find us... one group can take the tunnels, the other goes through the gates?"

“That sounds like an agreeable enough compromise to me.” The Argonian finally conceded to Meg, letting out a soft sigh. “Maybe the group going out through the gates can draw some more attention for those who are heading into the tunnels.” Jaraleet mused before he shook his head. They had no time to waste to consider such things. “Alright, who will head to which exit? We need to decide that before we do anything else.”  

“I’ll go through the tunnels,” Mazrah said with a firm nod. “At least one of us three should because we’re the ones that know the way. Anyone that feels a little spent or anxious to face more Dwemer or their forces should come with me. We’ll try to escape unnoticed.” She glanced at Anifaire while she said that but didn’t necessarily expect the Altmer woman to take her up on the offer. 

“I agree the She-Elf bitch needs to die… but now is not the time to do it. We’ve got what we wanted, you don’t turn a raid into a war.” Pale-Feather’s voice came from over Sora’s shoulder. While the rest hashed out plans, Pale-Feather hung back. His breathing had gotten noticeably slower and more relaxed than earlier, his amber eyes less crazed, the pupils no longer pressed into pin-pricks or golden-ringed voids but there was a quiet violence in his fingers still. He had his arms at his sides, staring off until he perked up. A brow cocked at the wind, sounds of fighting on it. “Janelle…” he said, “Was Irranhu cell supposed to come back for us?”

He walked to a nearby window, eyes still a bit glassy, but consciousness struggling behind them still. What greeted him outside was a fight in the courtyard, the Dwemer steadily losing ground. Not that there was a sizable garrison, but whoever was attacking again quickly dealt with them.

“No…” Aries replied curiously, looking out the window with Latro. Then curiosity turned to trepidation -- she didn’t like things not going according to plan, and Irranhu acting on their own like this and storming the palace was very much not according to plan. She hoped it was a executive decision to provide backup, which would give them the edge they need to take out the Governor, but… she wondered if her and Sevari’s stunts with manipulating the Poncy Man and his forces were beginning to catch up with them. She was hoping for the best but expecting the worst.

Latro took his gaze away from the window and looked towards the door, the wolf’s eyes on the moving wood and metal. The loud creaking rung through the hall to reveal two Redguard in Dwemer armor, holding rifles. One of them spoke out, “Come with us. Hassan has questions.”

[hr]

It was bloody slaughter.

It fit, all things considered. What had been done to Al-Aqqiya would be repaid ten-fold upon the Dwemer. Hassan swore it when he looked upon the charred bones of his family home there. And just like there, he and the rest of Irranhu cell had plundered and murdered with impunity in Gilane’s weapons depot. His bloodthirst was not yet sated though. He walked among the garden of corpses rooted to the ground by Irranhu’s guns and swords and arrows, the courtyard still thick with smoke and the smell of powder. This was his wrath brought forth and he sighed like a farmer at the edges of his crop, a smile upon his nodding face.

“You enjoy this too much.” A voice said behind him, syllables slithering in his ears like serpents.

“So did they,” Hassan said, his smile dropping as he spoke, “when they burned my home. Irranhu’s home. You should smile, my sister in arms, we’ve done good today.”

“Not until I take my quarry.” She replied coldly, impartially gazing at the carnage around them.

“Ah,” Hassan smirked, pointing out to the door, “Speaking of.”

The men Hassan had sent in to retrieve them had come back far quicker than he had expected. He guessed he had to give them credit then, able to fight their way through the Palace so well that they were in the main lobby by the time he and Irranhu got there. He raised his hand in greeting, walking up with Nadeen in tow to stand before the trio at the head of their dozen. “Greetings!” He began good-naturedly, “I don’t suppose you know where the girl with the bosoms and her big, mean Ohmes are?”

His eyes scanned all their faces until they snagged on Aries, “Ah, there you are! The Poncy Man wants to chat with you. Where’s your friend?”

“You know how working men are.” Aries responded coyly. “Always busy, trying to bring home the bacon… could you let dear Poncy know that we’re all too busy with war for more pleasantries?”

“Oh, woman, if you knew,” Hassan chuckled, “Your fucking working man was at Al-Aqqiya. He was where Irranhu cell was birthed from, no? He burned it all. So, no, Janelle. This is about as far from pleasantries as we can get.”

“Step forward, Janelle. Tell us where your man is and we can all sit down and talk this out.” Nadeen said.


Aries, for once, felt like she was caught off guard, but she was able to keep it off her face. Instead, she gave them a more inquisitive look. Curious, but not entirely convinced.

“I wish I could tell you more,” she said, stepping forward, “but I’m sorry to say this all sounds very new to me. If he has done wrong by you like you say he has, then I would like to make it right -- but I don’t know where he is, he always worked alone… but this isn’t a discussion we should be having in the heart of Dwemer territory. Now that we’ve regrouped, though, we can take the fight directly to Rourken and take back Gilane. This city could be the first foothold Hammerfell sees in this war!”


Nadeen stepped forward to stand at Hassan’s shoulder. Hassan shook his head, “We aren’t here for Rourken, Janelle.” His eyes bore into hers, “Just step aside and come with us.”

Their eyes met in an intense stand-off, seconds of which Aries spent trying to figure out what they were here for then. Her eyes were glancing across the men and women of Irranhu cell, armed and armored to the teeth, and brandishing their weapons. They were on guard and cautious. Hassan and Nadeen sounded angry. They told her to step aside. From Samara? Her eyes widened and she looked over her shoulder toward the others as that haunting realization came over her. Among the group, Jaraleet stood out the most -- Nblec’s supposed murderer. That’s when everything started going wrong. [i]Shit.[/i] Maybe if word got back to Rourken that the insurgents started turning on each other, then maybe they would call off the centurions… but then she would be hard pressed to call herself a leader if she were too quick and willing to make that sacrifice. 

And what then of the would-be wasted effort she spent today? There wasn’t an easy answer, and she was stuck between a rock and a hard place -- two groups of people she sworn herself to support, and there didn’t look like there was going to be a clean way out of this desperate situation. She just… [i]the centurions.[/i] If Daro’Vasora wasn’t just lying to her so she could leave as soon as possible, then maybe she could stall Irranhu long enough until they arrived. It wasn’t ideal to wait for another enemy to enter the fray, but it’d either temporarily unite the two cells or give Samara enough time to escape. Both outcomes would keep her own integrity intact.

She met Hassan’s eyes again with a look of solemn understanding. She took a deep and calming breath, holding one hand behind her back in a classically regal pose. To those in the group behind her, they could see a faintly green, calming energy, but no more than that. It wasn’t directed toward anyone, but it was subtle and the pacifying sense of calmness radiated from her person. She could understand why Irranhu would suddenly resort to such an extreme course of action; they were uncertain and didn’t want to take risks, but that didn’t make it any easier for her. She knew that they were too resolved at this point to be talked down, but all she had to do was buy the others some time until she figured something out.

“Now isn’t the time for this.” Aries asserted. “We can resolve this situation later rationally. Trust me when I say I’ve no intention of letting any [i]mistakes[/i] go unpunished, either.”

“Now is the only time.” Nadeen replied firmly, stepping ahead of Hassan and cutting through the bullshit. “You’re lucky we’re even giving you this choice, and it’s only out of respect for your station.”

Aries’ eyes lit up for a moment before keenly settling  on them. So they already knew. Still, she pressed on. “Then you know the position I’m in. I am as devoted to the cause of the Redguard people as I am to my own. It is for that reason that I cannot choose between my support and allegiance to you and to those who rely on my protection, whom I have also sworn to aid. To do so would make me a poor shepherd of my flock, would it not? Such is the burden of leadership, I’m afraid.”

“Your diplomacy isn’t an option here. Not as long as you harbor a--”

The one Hassan knew as Latro and another large Redguard that stood a head taller than even himself stepped forward. “I don’t care what is going on between you. I am to protect Sora.” The big Redguard rumbled. “Are you hindering that?”

Hassan just shrugged, “Who are you?”

“I am Zhaib.” He said, grip ever so slightly tightening on the hilt of his pilfered sword. “Who are you?”

“No one to you. We were just looking for her.” He pointed to Aries. “And the other ones you’re hiding. Your little girl and her little fucking-“

Pale-Feather heard the sound before he even registered the movement. It was fast enough to have probably even given Francis pause at how quickly Zhaib had brought his sword down and in what little time Hassan had responded. Even as they were locked in the bind, Zhaib reached up under his shirt and yanked his pendant from his neck, leather thong still dangling from it. “Give it to her. Let her know that she’s worth protecting by me, by her father,” Zhaib struggled and pushed Hassan off of him, effortlessly but blindingly quick he parried another two equally fast blows, “By her man and you!”

“What are you doing?!” Aries shouted, her eyes going wide with disbelief at the redguard as he jumped into the squad of insurgents before him.

Zhaib caught Nadeen’s spear in a huge hand and wrenched it away from him, chopping through the haft with his sword and using it as a dagger as he threw himself at them. In the same moment, the report of Dwemer rifles came and Pale-Feather knew what to do.

Kill.

But even so, there was a little voice in his head, a niggling at his back like a finger poking into him. Sora. That Khajiit. Sora, his lover, the one reason he was here. Latro was here. Latro took Sora’s wrist in his hand and bellowed to the others, “To the tunnel!”

Daro’Vasora had the pendant in her grasp, and she looked on wide-eyed at Zhaib throwing himself at the other Redguards, the other cell… she’d seen the ill-intent in their eyes and after seeing Aries confront them, her hidden hand coalescing with a calming spell, she realized that the Imperial woman was likely the only reason that the other Redguards hadn’t taken aggressive action - yet. It was a few valuable seconds bought.

“Go, while we can.” She urged the others, and the group took off as one, stealing a glance at the weapons, tracking them but not quite raised; perplexed looks crossed the faces she could see, and it seemed like that Irranhu cell wasn’t quite sure of what they were supposed to be doing at that very moment. 

All the better.

Aries, though hesitant, realized Zhaib’s actions had already condemned any possibility of further talks and stalling, so she followed after Daro’Vasora. As the last of the group started to descend into the previously concealed tunnel, the first barks of gunfire came behind them, kicking up stone and sand where they had been moments before. While a detachment moved to give chase, Daro’Vasora glanced back and watched Zhaib, fighting like a man possessed, and her feet took her further into the darkness, following her companions.

[hr]

Arriving at the [I]Three Crowns[/I] wasn’t the reprieve they were hoping for; rooms were burning and bodies were scattered across the grounds, a battle had fallen upon the hotel while they had been raiding the palace, grimly explaining the lack of resistance for many of the party. Faces they’d seen for weeks laid staring at the sky, wide-eyed and unblinking as their bodies displayed what had caused their grizzly fates. 

“We need to gather our things, if they’re still there, and go, quickly.” Daro’Vasora said, leading the way into the building. Many of the servants and guests were visibly consoling each other, and most of the bodies that were scattered about were wielding weapons; they weren’t the only cell to have occupied the hotel either. 

Passing by the central courtyard, a grim sight was to be had; the Poncy Man, a pair of axe wounds deep between his collarbones was propped up like a ghastly scarecrow with a spear jutting up under his chin, his eyes gouged out. His wife knelt, sobbing hysterically at his feet. 

Alarmingly, pieces of mechanical equipment from Dwemer automata were scattered here and there, and the damage inflicted didn’t seem to have slowed the machines down any. A wide-eyed cleaner sat against the wall, holding her head. When the group started to pass by, the woman looked at them, her eyes looking like wells that had dried up. 

“The machines… they came like a pack. Foreigners, led by a massive Orc, they… they did this. It was like they had planned this for weeks… they knew exactly where to go.” she said, retreating into her arms once more.

“So that plan wasn’t going to work, after all…” Aries sighed, thinking back to her confrontation with Irranhu. “Even Poncy…”

“Fuck.” Daro’Vasora muttered, looking at her companions. “Okay, five minutes and we meet back here. Get your shit and get out.” 

Shakti raced through the halls of the [i]Three Crowns[/i], hurdling bodies and fallen stones and various other signs of the massacre. She couldn’t let it affect her, she wouldn’t. She was no stranger to death and all it did was bring her dislike of the dwemer down to hatred. The Redguard girl had been baffled when they’d arrived to find the hotel destroyed, its inhabitants killed to the man. Politics in the city were so byzantine. None of it made sense. 

Finally, she reached the linen closet that she called a room and gingerly opened the door. Shakti exhaled her breath in relief as she found her modest belongings untouched. She quickly kicked off the servant’s shoes she had been wearing and stripped off the bloody and torn gown, stuffing it into her pack and pulling out her normal tunic, cloak, and leather armour pieces. Shakti dressed as fast as she could, much happier to be out of the stifling and most degrading serving girl’s outfit and back into her tattered Alik’r garb. With bated breath she rolled her bedroll up and beheld up her father’s sword that had been lying underneath it, hidden. Her sword. She looked at the dwemer blade she had been carrying around and leaned it against the wall. Maybe someone else needed it. The young Redguard warrior smiled as she picked up her sword and tied the baldric around her waist and chest, where it belonged. She thanked all the spirits of the desert and Tall Papa and even Satakal that it was still here and that it was still hers. Picking up her pack and pulling it onto her back, she gave one last look at the small room before running back to rejoin the others. 

[hr] 

Brynja, Rhona, and Alim were nowhere to be found. 

After the five minutes had passed and the group had regrouped, it became apparent that those that had remained behind were nowhere to be seen; quickly checking the bodies with dread, no one found a familiar face staring back at them, which brought both relief and another horror. Had they been captured?

Witnesses claimed to have seen the Nord and Breton manage to escape out of the back while the roguish Redguard held them off, and though he put up a valiant fight, Alim apparently had been overwhelmed and knocked out cold from a pommel strike to the back of his head. He was one of several prisoners taken in the raid; apparently someone had decided he was valuable enough to spare. There was nothing that could have been done for them at this point, and the group decided to press forward.

Gregor and Raelynn managed to catch up with the others, wide-eyed at the destruction of the hotel, and lied that they had been out for supplies when everything happened. Gregor cleaned the blood off his claymore when nobody was looking at him and made sure that the soul gem that held Kerztar’s essence was safely hidden at the bottom of his backpack. Aside from a quick pat on Daro’Vasora’s shoulder and a smile there was no time for a proper reunion and after grabbing their remaining belongings, the two lovers were ready to leave.

Heading back into the streets, the saving grace was the crowds; other than being a bewildered group of foreigners, it wasn’t hard to disappear into the throngs of people in Gilane’s streets. It was a simple matter of holding to the same patterns the masses followed; when people ducked out of the streets and into alleys or behind cover, they followed suit. It was quickly apparent why.

Groups of six Centurions, around 8 feet in height, were sprinting through the streets, their loud footfalls echoing across buildings, and it was clear that except for exceptionally athletic individuals, the machines were faster than most could run. Their cold, expressionless faces scanned the crowds, and for a moment lingered on Daro’Vasora and the others, causing her heart to skip a beat. However, the moment passed quickly and the Centurions continued their run, disappearing from sight a few moments later.

“They must not have had time to fully program them…” the Khajiit observed under her own breath, recalling the threat she’d received from Governor Rourken; speak well of the Dwemer, or her machines would slaughter her friends and the rest of the insurgency. It became increasingly clear that they were indeed the ones responsible for what had happened at the [I]Three Crowns[/I].

[I]Rourken legitimately was going to spare us…[/I] Daro’Vasora realized, shaking her head as the group continued on. 

The city gate came up, and a small bickering argument of how to get past the checkpoint broke out when Aries stepped forward, approaching the guards with her hands behind her back; the calm spell was literally about to work its magic. The diplomat easily won over the Redguards at the checkpoint, and the group passed unmolested. For the first time in quite some time, most of the group stood outside of Gilane, the expanse of the Alik’r Desert very apparent to each and every one of them.

Latro felt like it should’ve meant freedom. To see no buildings for miles, no brick and mortar or sandstone. Where it would’ve meant that the future could be anything for them, it was pure nothingness and uncertainty to him. He had the polished stone between his fingers the entire way to the gates and he was still timidly fingering the stone as they all stood there, breathing in the open air that smelled of baking sand in the sun. A small bit of respite for the group while he made his way alone to the stables outside of Gilane, looking for the horse Sevari had given him for their ride to Al-Aqqiya that day. While there, Calen had also picked up his pony, Danish. It would be much harder for a northern-bred horse, but he wasn’t willing to leave the animal behind.

Latro was finally in the saddle again, patting his horse’s flank as the two of them ambled up to the group. “I’ll scout ahead. We’ll need an outrider to warn the rest of anything.” Latro looked to Calen, “You and Danish can ride between me and the rest, you’ll be the first to hear of anything and bring it back to the group behind us while I keep ahead.”

With a nod, Calen hopped onto Danish’s back. The pony would be hard pressed to travel in the sand, but he had enough muscle to climb up steep hills. This shouldn’t be so bad, right?

Daro’Vasora stepped forward, grabbing Latro by the arm. “Not without me, you’re not.” She said with an air of finality. “We…” [I]need to finish our discussion of what happened back there[/I] “Need to make sure no one’s left alone again. No more wandering off without a partner, for anyone.” she said, diplomatically, looking to the rest of the group.

“We won’t go far, I promise. The rest of you, see if you can arrange transportation, find supplies, whatever it takes.” she smiled to the group. “I won’t forget what you’ve done for me today… each of you, from the bottom of my heart, thank you. I owe you everything. I’m just asking you trust me for a bit longer.”

“Alright, then,” Latro said, the smile on his face was supposed to be an easy one, but it was anything but, “Let’s be off then.”

When Sora took his hand and he helped her into the saddle, it should’ve felt right. Should’ve. But nothing did. Even so, he sighed and looked back at her, a kiss planted on his lips and they were off at a quick canter with Calen riding after them.

Gregor took a moment to sit down against the city walls while Calen, Daro’Vasora and Latro hoisted themselves into the saddle. His assault on the governor had taken a lot out of him, but he looked at Raelynn and managed a small smile. He was going to be fine. He realized that Alim, Brynja and Rhona were missing and felt a pang of concern. Alim and Raelynn had been friends. He hoped the Redguard’s absence would not weigh too heavily on her. 

Nanine leaned against the wall of Gilane, cold emanating from her as she reached for magic to calm herself. She was nervous, confused, afraid. She needed to establish control, before those emotions took over. She needed to be in control of at least herself, no matter how bad they situation was. Though, to be fair, she couldn’t think of a worse situation she had been in than this one.

The new Centurions were even more powerful than the old ones, they were wanted by both the Redguard rebels and the Dwemer, and the only route left available to them was to flee the city across the Alik’r Desert with almost no supplies. She could easily recall her father’s stories of the Great War and his march across the desert. Without a plan, she didn’t have much faith in their odds of survival. She gave a quiet sigh. There was nothing left to do but trust in Sora, now that she was back. 

 Everything had gone completely out of control in a matter of seconds in the palace, and she had no idea why. Why had the Poncy Man turned on them in the palace of all places? Her mind returned to the accusation the woman with cold, yellow eyes and the snakeskin cloak had tried to make before the massive Redguard had interrupted her.

[i]What do they think we’re harbouring?[/i]

Shakti looked happily at the vast expanse of desert in front of them, her hands on her hips. The sun beat down and the wind tousled her already-messy hair as she took in the sight of the place of her birth again. Her home. She twirled back around to look at the group. “This is exciting isn’t it? I cannot wait to be back in the Alik’r! I’ve missed the stone and sand of my home.” She exclaimed, unable to keep her glee to herself. The group looked a bit less excited than her, but she still held out hope that they too would come to appreciate the beauty and power of the desert. “I’ll be able to lead us to an oasis in no time, trust me!” she said aloud, assuaging the fears of approximately no one.

“Gilane is as good as lost.” Aries replied, a note of bitterness in her voice. “And with it, the rest of Hammerfell. We should head north. Hopefully in either High Rock or Skyrim we can find at least one remaining bastion of men still resisting the Dwemer.”

Aries’ eyes landed on Mazrah and she continued, “If our journey does take us through the Dragontail mountains, whether you’re from Wrothgar or not, you might be our best bet for leading us through those mountains after the girl leads us through the desert.”