[h3]The Dagger Falls[/h3] [sub]ft. [@Lemons] and [@LadyTabris][/sub] Joy and Henry tended to Janus and that freed up Solomon’s hands and his mind for other matters. He got up from the bed and stepped back out of the hut, into the cold and deathly night. He didn’t look up, even though he could feel the Serpent staring daggers into the back of his neck. It was a deeply uncomfortable sensation and he took a deep breath before sighing hard and closing his eyes, wishing so very hard that daybreak would come soon. He stood there, rubbing his temples, and weighed his options. It was his duty, explicitly outlined in a warrant signed by the Emperor himself, to gather any and all information pertinent to the survival of the Empire. This definitely counted as an existential threat. He could only be sure about Daggerfall, but something told him that this wasn’t just happening here. The sky, the Serpent… if they couldn’t see the stars, then surely nobody could. Perhaps all of Tamriel was under attack. But he couldn’t do anything about the rest of Tamriel. He could only do something about High Rock. And right now, that meant going to Daggerfall and finding out who was sacking the city. Sirius had joined him outside and Solomon sank down on his haunches next to the dog, still wide-eyed and panting hard, whining softly at his master’s soft touch. “It’s going to be okay, boy,” Solomon murmured and ran his hand through Sirius’ plentiful black coat. “Stay here with Bozo and the others. Okay? Stay.” His tone was commanding, but not unkind, and the dog settled down on his rear and licked his chops as if to say that he understood. Solomon nodded and straightened back up, though it was a while before he moved again. He stood still, eyes staring blindly into the gloom, while he processed what had happened. “I’m going to the city,” Solomon announced a while later to the people inside as he stuck his head in through the door. Bruno and Joy were busy with Janus, so Solomon looked towards the others instead. “I have to find out what’s going on.” He hesitated for a moment. How much about his motivations should he explain? They’d probably already guessed that he wasn’t just an innkeeper, and if Breton society [i]had[/i] collapsed there was no point in keeping secrets. But still… “Anyone coming?” Kneeling in the corner, Sihava opened her eyes for the first time since she’d entered Bruno’s cabin. Praying to Nocturnal had yielded...predictable results. No response. Of course, the Daedric prince had never actually spoken to her, not really. She’d only ever communicated in the subtlest of ways. Often, Sihava hadn’t noticed them until they’d made themselves obvious. So she needed to make her own way, now. And she [i]desperately[/i] wanted to know what was happening. An undead uprising and the sacking of Daggerfall, all in one night. The Serpent’s sign burning above. All of it was connected somehow. Sihava had spent her life in search of power. And knowledge was power. [i]Not to mention[/i], she added to herself, [i]I don’t much like Bruno, and as far as I can tell, he doesn’t like me. The less time I spend in his house--indebted to him--the better for everyone. Especially me.[/i] She sent some thoughts to Solomon, then: an image of herself, an image of Daggerfall, a nebulous feeling of readiness. Nodding once, more to reassure herself of her decision than anything else, she rose to her feet smoothly, cracking her knuckles with a series of satisfying pops. Then she felt an odd sensation on her chest, and realized: there was a faint warmth emanating from her amulet. Not enough to be comfortable or uncomfortable, but more than enough to be noticeable. A ghost of a smile flitted across her face for half a moment at the acknowledgement. Sinalare was leaning against the wall, some distance away from the rest of the group. Her hand twitched irritatedly, tapping against her thigh. She was aggravated by what was going on. She truly thought she had seen enough city-destroying level disasters when the Great War ended, and yet here one was, directly in front of her, and she stood doing nothing, safe in a shack. Irritation pricked at her the longer she stood still, anxiety about her companions and the events of the night only growing as long as she didn’t distract herself. Solomon’s announcement was welcome. The innkeep was, clearly, more than that, but Sinalare hardly cared, so long as he continued to be as capable as seemed. She pushed off from the wall, her unsteady hand coming to rest calmly on her sword-belt. Her nerves relaxed once she knew she’d be outside again, doing something -- sitting still never agreed with her. “I’ll come,” she announced. “I’ll be of more use out there than in here.” He was still not used to Sihava’s arcane method of communicating but he refrained from flinching this time and merely nodded in acknowledgement. It had been a chaotic fight at the inn but Solomon hadn’t failed to notice her skills in stealth and misdirection. The Illusion magic, in particular, was impressive. Given that they were walking into a presumably hostile city, her abilities would be invaluable. His eyes fell on Sinalare after that and he didn’t say anything for a moment. She had been antsy and restless until he had called on her and Solomon recognized that for what it was immediately. He was the same, and he felt a strange kinship with the Bosmer despite their obvious differences. The question of whether he could trust her was still alive in his mind and the idea of having someone that was once an enemy watching his back made him uncomfortable. After seeing her fight, and now seeing her fidget, he was sure that she was ex-Dominion. But if there was one thing that old soldiers hated the most, it was waiting. He couldn’t stand it and neither could she, and now she had seized the opportunity to do something useful. Solomon couldn’t deny her that. They were all on the same team now. “Alright,” he said eventually and unsheathed his falchion. “Let’s do this.” Leaving Sirius to rejoin Bozo and the others inside, the three of them set off towards Daggerfall, keeping a low profile and hugging the lay of the land to stay out of sight from any potential sentinels outside the walls. The once-wooded areas outside the city had made way for farmland and they moved silently through the stalks and rows of corn and grain, staying off the roads to avoid any unwelcome encounters. After half an hour they began to approach the killing fields outside of the gates and Solomon sank down in a ditch by the side of the road that led up to the walls, surveying the field in front of them. The bodies of those slain in the slaughter they had first witnessed on their arrival remained where they had fallen, but the laughing killers had disappeared. The columns of smoke that rose over the city had thinned and diminished and less flamelight illuminated them. Most important, however, was that the bells had ceased ringing, and a strange silence had descended over the city. Solomon surmised that the people that had sacked Daggerfall had started fighting the fires, which meant that the fighting -- if there had been any -- was over. It was still and quiet outside the gates, which remained wide open, probably shattered off their hinges, and Solomon could just barely make out that the streets beyond the high arch of stone were devoid of people. Staying low in the ditch, they followed the length of the road, shrouded by the intense darkness and the shadows cast by the crops that whispered over their heads. Solomon’s anxiety disappeared with every step they took, replaced with a reassuring, iron resolve. The closer he was to danger, the less agitated he felt. It was a strange paradox that he had never been able to adequately explain, but it sure came in handy now. After waiting in the ditch for ten more minutes to make sure that the field outside was well and truly abandoned, Solomon and the others broke cover and sped across the frozen ground -- their breaths steaming in the inexplicably cold air -- in order to kneel down by one of the corpses that had been left in the dirt. Solomon rolled it over to reveal that it was a middle-aged man, clearly in good health and garbed in fine clothes, who had been stuck through the neck with something viciously sharp before bleeding out in the mud. A merchant or an aristocrat, Solomon thought, and he mumbled something to that effect before he left the dead man to inspect another corpse. They were all like that. Rich men and women, dressed in their evening finest, who had been run down and killed like game. An uncomfortable sensation crept up on Solomon as memories came back of his work, before the Emperor had been assassinated and he was reduced to gathering intelligence at a wayside inn, his field privileges removed -- certain groups he had investigated, festering in High Rock’s dark underbelly, who had whispered of overthrowing the rich and seizing control for themselves. With black foreboding, Solomon turned towards the city gates. His gaze lingered there for a moment. Was the gate left undefended because the unknown belligerents did not expect anyone to come from outside the city? Were they aware of the dead rising to drench the countryside in blood? Had they been [i]counting on it?[/i] Solomon beckoned for his allies to follow him as he crossed the remaining distance to the towering city walls and huddled up close against them, the vast shadow cast by the stone monolith shrouding them from sight, the sundered gate two dozen yards to their right. “Alright,” he whispered and looked Sihava and Sinalare in the eye as best he could in the near impenetrable gloom. “We can either chance it and go in through the gate, or we stay out here and keep moving along the wall until we find another point of entry -- a sewer grate or something. The gate appears to be undefended and I have a feeling that whoever has taken control of the city isn’t expecting anyone to come in from the [i]outside.[/i]. That’s why I say we take the gate, but you never know. Maybe we should play it safe. Thoughts?” A jolt of nerves hit Sinalare as the idea of crawling through a sewer was mentioned. Going underground was the last thing she’d like to do. She leaned over a little to throw a glance at the gates. It would probably be fine, right? She hesitated to voice an opinion, fearing a wrong choice. Sihava held up her hand, the deep blue glint of an invisibility spell dancing along her fingers, and gave a little smile. Holding up her other index finger in a ‘hold on’ motion, she breathed deeply a few times to slow herself down, or to calm herself--a strategy she’d used countless times to stop herself from doing something reckless--and let the spell creep over her, fading her from sight. She stalked down the road towards the gate, making sure to remain as quiet as she could. After all, no matter how invisible you were, you could still make just as much noise. Her breaths faded to quick, light, and silent as she passed through the gate. Sinalare pressed back against the wall, hoping Sihava would have success at the gate. “That’s effective,” she mumbled. The streets beyond the gate that greeted her were still dimly lit by the smoldering structures of the houses that stoo I Ud there, many having gone up in flames during the night’s chaos, now reduced to standing half-structures aglow with embers, sending the occasional shower of sparks into the sky. Not every house was burnt; whether randomly or by the hand of some unknown methodology, some were spared while others had suffered. Vortices of heat swirled through the streets, mercifully banishing the freezing air that wafted into the city through the open gate, sending flurries of ash and debris scattering with every gust. Visibility was limited, as smoke still hung cloying and blue between the buildings, not thick enough to snatch one’s breath away but close to it. Five men unexpectedly stepped out of one of the unburnt houses, oblivious to Sihava’s invisible presence. All were dressed in grey robes and they wielded weapons -- a mace, an axe, a hammer, and so on -- that were clearly coated with fresh blood. “Was that the last of them?” one, a dark-skinned Redguard, asked the others. “Yes, brother,” a morbidly pale Breton replied and raised a hand to point, his finger extended in the direction of the heart of the city. “We should go. The High Priest will speak soon.” “A glorious day,” the Redguard said, a beatific smile on his face, wildly at odds with the near apocalyptic scene around them. The group of men turned around and began to walk away deeper into the city, leaving the gate still undefended and the streets empty once more. Sihava had remained unnoticed. She grit her teeth, barely resisting the driving urge to throw them against each other with a quick rune of Frenzy at their feet. There was something more important here to worry about. She should go back. Show the image of the men to Sinalare and Solomon, recollect with them, make a plan, figure out how to do this more intelligently. They seemed smart. Probably smarter than she was at this kind of thing, at any rate. If she was back there, then they would probably grab her by the shoulders and pin her to the ground until she agreed to settle down and wait for an opportunity. But this was a perfect opportunity, right here! Sure, she could try to slow herself down with measured breathing, like she’d done so often in the past. But...what kind of raiders wore gray robes and called each other ‘Brother?’ What kind of bandit leader was called the High Priest? What ‘glorious day’ were they talking about? Her curiosity was fatally piqued by this point, and she was inescapably in its grip. They’d said it was the last; who knew when there would be another way to find where the leader was? With a quick glance backwards--[i]they can handle themselves, right?[/i]--she slid behind a wall and let her invisibility drop. Better to save the magicka, and she could tail idiots like these with her eyes closed. She threw out a thought over the wall, hoping that it might reach the two outside, but unsure whether or not it would: they gray-robed men, their conversation, and then, of course, Sihava behind them as they walked. Then she followed with silent feet, trailing them into the ruined husk of Daggerfall. When it remained suspiciously silent and Sihava did not return, Solomon crept up to the side of the gate and dared to take a peek -- only to find the streets empty and the Dunmer woman gone. “Son of a bitch,” Solomon muttered under his breath and looked over his shoulder at Sinalare. “Looks like we’ll have to make our way through the city.” He had caught a snippet of what he thought must have been communication from Sihava, but the only thing he had been able to make out was a vague impression of a group of armed men. The fact that these men were now gone, and Sihava too, meant that she was either discovered and taken by force, or that they left and she followed them. Solomon knew dark elves as headstrong and independent people, so he didn’t put it beyond her to leave them in the ash like that. Fortunately, the ash gave them a trail to follow. Even with the fire-fueled gale that swept through the city, the footprints of the passage of such a large group could not be erased from the street fast enough to be hidden from Solomon’s experienced gaze. The Imperial and the Bosmer stuck to the shadows as well they could, but they had to kneel down in the middle of the road every so often to check the trail to make sure they were still going the right way. It was during one of these moments that they were suddenly interrupted. “There!” came an excited voice from an alley, and Solomon looked up sharply as he leapt back to his feet. Another group of armed insurgents -- they swept out of the alley and fanned out in a circular formation immediately, trapping him and Sinalare by surrounding them. There were six in total, four men and two women. They were outnumbered three-to-one. “Wait!” one of the women called out before Solomon could say anything. “I know his face. From the inn outside the city. [i]The Trusty Dog,[/i] was it?” That prompted Solomon, who still held onto his falchion tightly, to look at her more closely. He didn’t recognize her, but it looked like she had recently cut off most of her hair and her face was marked with red paint in a strange symbol… or was it blood? “[i]The Loyal Hound,[/i] actually,” he said tersely. She scoffed. “What are you doing here, innkeep? You’re supposed to be dead. You, and all the other sinners out there.” He shrugged, thunder on his brow. “Didn’t take.” Another voice behind him spoke up. “You’re surrounded. Drop your weapons.” Solomon’s scowl deepened. “All I am surrounded by is [i]dead men.”[/i] He elbowed Sinalare with one arm to spur her into action and raised the other in a bright flash of lightning that struck one of the gray-robed women square in the chest, throwing her off her feet. Sinalare spun to face the opposite direction as Solomon, her left hand flying out in front of her, sending a blast of flame at the two nearest robed men. The flames blew them back, one dropping his sword so that he could block his face from the heat. Her right hand flew to her sword, and she moved to engage a gray-robed woman. The strange woman blocked Sinalare’s blows, once, twice, three times - the Bosmer stepped closer still, and launched her leg out in a low attack. Her shin struck the woman’s thigh, disorienting her, and Sinalare knocked her sword aside, slicing into her unguarded neck. The woman’s blood spattered and her spasming body thumped to the ground, writhing as her blood flowed onto the street. The gray-robed figures were unprepared for the vicious onslaught of the two Great War veterans, and Solomon could see the fear in their eyes as the street lit up with flashes of lightning and bursts of flame, the blood of their comrades splattered across the cobblestones. But they found their resolve -- they were fanatics of some kind, Solomon assumed -- and put up a brave effort. He had killed the woman in front of him with his lightning bolt, its power fueled by his anger but also draining so much magicka that Solomon relied on his sword for the others. His skill and experience outmatched theirs put together and he dismantled their offense in a clinical fashion, falchion singing with the thrill of blood purchased with honest steel, his face set into a grim sneer. He parried the Redguard expertly, used his free hand to slap his weapon away and pivoted on the spot, a roar escaping his throat as he extended his blade horizontally in his spin and decapitated the man with a single, clean stroke. Another fell to a series of brutal slashes and stabs, a page from a swordsmanship instruction manual come to life, that the Breton was far too slow to stop. Between him and Sinalare, only two of the six gray-robes remained just a few seconds after combat had erupted. They backpedaled and turned to run, cries of alarm already rising in their throats, but Solomon lifted a piece of charred debris with telekinesis and flung the projectile after them, knocking one down and sending him tumbling onto the ashen street. The other, however, was fleet of foot and Solomon cursed. “Sinalare! After him! I’ll finish this one!” he yelled and bore down on the man he had knocked down with ill intent. Sinalare wrenched her sword out of the recently-made corpse below her. The man’s blood pooled under her feet. At Solomon’s words, the bosmer’s attention flew up to the fleeing man and she set out after him, smears of blood left where her quick feet landed on the cobblestones. She took three long bounds, raising her free hand to cast a bolt of lightning. The electric projectile launched at the zealot. A cry of pain was torn from his throat as the magic struck his right leg and he went down, wailing the whole way, his weapon abandoned. Prostrate on the ground, the last fanatic’s face filled with horror as he watched Sinalare’s last bloody steps towards him. Her foot caught his shoulder and she stepped down, hard, thrusting her sword into his chest. She pulled back her sword, which was dripping with fresh blood. She turned to Solomon, from several paces away, and with a smile, she called, “Got him!” With the assailants slain, an eerie, soot-filled silence descended over the streets once more. Solomon nodded at Sinalare to convey his respect and gratitude. She was his blood-sister now, a comrade-in-arms. Whatever their past differences, he felt that he could trust her. It was a weight off his shoulders. [hr] Up ahead, the streets opened up into a wide city square. A large crowd had gathered there, beneath the wafting smoke and the swarms of sparks that soared on the air, staring up at a makeshift podium where three dignitaries appeared to await their execution. Those that thronged at the front were almost exclusively dressed in the same gray robes as the group that Sihava had followed to get there, but there were plenty of seemingly ordinary people further back, most of whom looked frightened and confused. More gray-robes patrolled the edges of the crowd, wielding maces and batons, and applied them liberally to keep the corralled city masses in line. Someone, a bearded man in a white robe, wielding a massive hammer, was speaking, but his voice did not carry far enough to reach beyond the edges of his audience. Fortunately for Sihava, nobody seemed to be paying really close attention to the streets that emptied into the square -- clearly, whoever these people were, they believed they had done a thorough job at securing the city. The wind changed, and snippets of the bearded man’s voice carried far enough for Sihava to hear. “... ever the outcast, now the brightest… as foretold by our prophet, the Lord of… on this blessed day.” She would have to get closer if she wanted to hear the rest. Giving a quiet “tch,” she ducked behind the burned-out shell of a building. As good as she was at sneaking about, she was in the nerve center of their entire operation now, as far as she could tell. No point putting herself at risk. She steadied her breathing, calming her racing pulse. [i]Come on, Siha. This is no different from that time in Solitude. You can do this in your sleep.[/i] She let the shimmer of invisibility cloud her over again, then slunk about the edges of the crowd, being careful to avoid any pools of ash that could leave her footprints, or the roaming grey-robed men. If she bumped into one, she knew, she was NOT going to have a good time. [i]Come on, big guy,[/i] she thought grimly as she slowly edged her way closer to the white-robed man, [i]what are you saying?[/i] She was so close now to figuring out what was going on, she could almost taste it. Her expertise paid off and the voice of the white-robed man grew in power until she could hear his words clearly. “Stendarr’s might has guided our victory here today,” he said and lifted the hammer over his head, eliciting a roar of approval from those at the front of the crowd and a demure murmur of forced assent from the rest of the citizenry. “Just as the machinations of Akatosh, Arkay, Kynareth and the other Divines have guided the victory of our brothers and sisters across the cities of High Rock. We will restore balance. The wealth and prosperity that has been hoarded by the so-called elite, the kings and lords in their castles and mansions, their lives full of avarice and degeneracy, will be redistributed among the people. Rejoice, my fellow citizens! You have been spared -- you have been deemed worthy. Weep not for the nobility that we hunted down like the dogs they are, or for those that succumbed to their sin and tried to resist the cleansing. Weep not for those outside the safety of the walls of our great city, for they shall be judged by the Serpent, and those that are pure will have nothing to fear from the servants of the great constellation.” He took a few steps closer to the people on the platform with him, bowed and shackled, awaiting their fate. “As High Priest of Stendarr, it is my pleasure to tell you that this is merely the beginning of a new era. The gods have ordained it, and the Lord of Moths has enlightened us to this truth. How can anyone question his word now? Everything he has prophesied has come to pass. Recognize now the authority of the High Priest of Akatosh and his humble servants, or perish. Because once dawn breaks and the sun rises on Tamriel once more, on Dawn’s Beauty herself, it will be a new world. The land outside these gates will be cleansed, ripe for the taking, to feed and clothe us. A new world indeed… one that we will build together.” Looking towards his prisoners, the High Priest raised hammer again and scowled. “But without [i]them.[/i] No more leeches, my children. No more parasites like the so-called King and his family, or anyone that stands with them. Their unjust and sinful rule ends today.” The High Priest’s robe stained red and the sound of the hammer being dropped, crushing heads beneath its inexorable weight, was drowned out by the bloodthirsty cheers and horrified gasps of the crowd. The invisible thief brought her hand up to her mouth reflexively. She had no love for kings, but murder was murder, whoever the victim. She fought past the nausea, holding grimly on to her mission. [I]Come on, Siha, focus. What did he say? The Lord of Moths?[/i] She searched her memory for anything like that--[i]King of Worms, Wolf Queen[/i]--but nothing was forthcoming. She'd never put much stock in the divine, at least not recently, but somehow, she doubted that Stendarr--the god of Protection--would have been alright with the slaughter of last night, or that Arkay would have ordained the undead. Still. This 'High Priest of Stendarr' did bring one comfort to her. This was happening across High Rock. Not Skyrim, not Cyrodiil, not Morrowind. Just High Rock. Lips set in a grim white line, she carefully backed away from the blood-soaked stage. Her invisibility didn't have long left. It was past time to go. [hr] The triple-threat trio of Solomon, Sinalare and Sihava met up again as the Dunmer retreated from the packed executioner’s square and they abandoned the city as quick as they had entered, leaving only the six corpses of the cultists behind in the smoking corpse-hull of Daggerfall. The benefits of Sihava’s unique method of communication became evident when she was able to soundlessly relay what she had seen by projecting the memories into Solomon’s mind, who did not recoil from her arcane touch this time -- he devoured the images and the sound of the High Priest’s voice greedily as they hurried through the shadow-shroud beneath the stalks of corn outside the city walls. It was terrible news. If all of the cities of High Rock had indeed fallen to this murderous doomsday cult, then there were precious little safe havens left in the province. But Solomon could still think of one -- a place deep in the mountains where they could rest, resupply and regroup. “Ken Muhyr,” he whispered to himself. “I hope your walls still stand.”