Redemption, part 2 Options

[jack cloudy]

Click here for Redemption Part 1


Alright, part 2. Still not much redeeming going on but whatever. Now instead of continuing the story, I figured I'd use this post for all the miscellaneous stuff. Things like a character list and the recap for part 1. So be warned that this post CONTAINS SPOILERS. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK!


RECAP FOR PART 1 Again SPOILERS!

One night, the palace is breached by unknown assailants. Following standard protocol for such events, the Emperor is secretly transported to the prison by his Blades. The Imperial Battlemage, Ocato, declines to join him, claiming that the situation is under control and that his services aren't needed.

Despite having reached the prison safely, the Emperor soon finds that he is still in danger. It is then that Uriel receives help from an unexpected ally. Angoril Bobardi reveals that the very cell he has inhabited for decades, contains a secret escape route that was built during the simulacrum at the order of Jagar Tharn. With this passage and the considerable magical prowess of Angoril, the Emperor manages to flee the deadly trap.

Also freed from the prison by Angoril is Maorlatta Orgnum, a young (by elf-standards) and somewhat naive girl who was arrested for the crime of sleeping in the park. Once free, she quickly makes herself scarce and eventually finds herself in the shack of an old fisherman who lives on an island in Lake Rumare. The fisherman seeks the help of the thieves guild to rid her of the manacles and prison outfit that would have every Legionnaire arrest her on sight. Unfortunately, the one assigned to pick the locks on the manacles informs Vicente Valtieri instead, who takes a personal interest in the girl’s talent for camouflage. Maorlatta is saved by the Redguard Sorian, a young and rather strange lad who keeps going on and on about something he calls an Ansei. The two team up to go treasure hunting in a nearby Ayleid ruin.

Meanwhile, Angoril returns to the prison. Pretending to be from the palace, he gets a vital clue from the Argonian private investigator Grey-Tongue. The Argonian sends him to Chorrol to find the source of the assassins distinctive red robes. To get to Chorrol, he summons a shiftgate, circumventing days travelling. From Chorrol the trail leads to Kvatch, a city whose precise location he does not know. Unable to summon another shiftgate with reasonable accuracy, Angoril seeks more mundane passage to Kvatch.

While Angoril is travelling, Maorlatta and Sorian hit the Ayleid ruin. After some trouble with a zombie, they strike gold and find an abandoned office with some intact artefacts. They attempt to sell the artefacts in the Imperial city, where they are intercepted by Grey-Tongue and then Vicente Valtieri. Sorian again makes the vampire flee. The next morning Maorlatta wakes up in the Imperial palace with no recollection on how she got there or what happened during her stay at Grey-Tongue’s house. Jauffre interrogates her in the garden at the top of the tower.







Redemption's persons of questionable importance

Main characters:
Angoril Bobardi: An Altmeri sorcerer who inhabited a cell in the Imperial prison, fully aware of the secret escape route. After leaving the prison, he makes it his task to track down the leaders behind the red-robed assassins.

Maorlatta Orgnum: A Maormer from Pyandonea, sent to Tamriel at the command of king Orgnum. Circumstances land her in the same prison as the Altmer. After escaping, she returns to the pursuit of her own goals, one of which is to become filthy rich.

Side characters:
Grey-Tongue: An Argonian private investigator. He is a friend of Hieronymous Lex and has been hired by the guard-captain in the past. Grey-Tongue is hired now as well by the city-guard to investigate the events at the prison and find Uriel’s corpse.
Guard-Captain Hieronymous Lex: Hieronymous Lex is the man put in charge of investigating the massacre at the Imperial Prison. Upon finding that Uriel Septim was seen entering the prison that night, he hires Grey-Tongue to help him uncover the truth.
Sorian: A Redguard who saves Maorlatta from Vicente Valtieri. A simple wandering swordsman with a slight Ansei-obsession.
Rajn Geydar: A Wood Elf who lives in Kvatch. At one point possessed a piece of the Balac-Thurm.

Others:
Guard-Captain Argelius: A colleague of Hieronymous Lex who describes him as the man to call when you need subtlety.
Bannon: A merchant who travelled with Angoril from Chorrol to Kvatch
Baleni: Daughter of Rajn Geydar
Doruk: The Bouncer who worked at Rajn Geydar's restaurant. Deceased.
Penald Baurus: Blade and bodyguard of Uriel Septim.
Berius: Lord Protector and Head of the palaceguard in the Imperial City.
Valen Dreth: A Dunmeri prisoner. Not the most pleasant sort.
Jennifer Renault: Blade, recently promoted to captain.
Glenroy: Blade and bodyguard of Uriel Septim.

Fenasim: A member of the emperor's Palace guard.
Mankar Camoran: The father of both Raven and Ruma. He is the leader of the Mythic Dawn and its prophet.
Raven Camoran: The ‘Hand’ of the Mythic Dawn, an organization with an unknown purpose. What is certain however, is that the Dawn wants Uriel Septim dead.
Ruma Camoran: The sister of Raven, she serves the Mythic Dawn as Priestess. In the same night that the attempt on the emperor’s life is made, she infiltrates the vaults beneath the Imperial palace to steal two artefacts.
Harrow: A member of the Dawn, Harrow used to be an Armiger stationed in Vvardenfell.

Ludius Bester: Member of Bester and Bester, the Kvatch Hall of Mercantile Interests. He runs the office in lower Kvatch.
Aelwin Merowald: An old fisherman who lost most of his leg to Slaughterfish. Friend of Delmar Tunius.
Rajn Geydar: Owner of the Eight Provinces, a restaurant in Kvatch.
Ra’Jezhr: A Khajiiti lockpicker in the employ of the Thieves Guild, Ra’Jezhr is also coerced into serving the Dark Brotherhood’s interests.
Simanuel Rosendorf IV: The owner of a silk-plantation near Chorrol

Umbacano: An Altmer who lives in the capital city. A well-known collector of Ayleid artefacts.
Uriel Septim VII: The Emperor of Tamriel.
Brother Tanner: A priest who serves in the Kvatch-temple. Looks like a Septim.
Delmar Tunius: An old fisherman who lives on a small island in lake Nibenay.
Vicente Valtieri: A member of the Dark Brotherhood, he takes interest in Maorlatta’s talents at stealth, and desires to make her an assassin, with or without her cooperation.

Latta’s evergrowing list of people only she knows:
Levvelyn of Glashorn: The hero of a popular series who spends most of his books saving the world, slaying vicious monsters, duelling devious Altmeri warlords and chasing the girl.
Irrillys: A fictional princess of Pyandonea, she is Levvelyn’s love interest. Posesses an unfortunate talent for being kidnapped by devious Altmeri warlords.
Mettildi: The Maormer that taught Maorlatta how to fight, though his methods traumatized her to the point where she is mentally incapable of defending herself.
Master Zelthir: Another Maormer put in charge of educating Maorlatta. Master Zelthir is a well-known and highly respected healer.

This post has been edited by jack cloudy: Sep 22 2013, 07:36 PM

[jack cloudy]

I know this is rather late and short for that matter, but I'm having big trouble wrapping my head around how I want to deal with Kvatch. I still need to hammer out a few things to find a natural flow for it.


That said I am happy that everyone liked the part with Doruk. I wondered if I should have written out the fight-scene but in my opinion the tension of the scene would be better if I left it up to the reader's imagination. That, and I don't know how I could top an Orc dual-wielding bound swords while berserking while on fire.

Oh, and the bound swords were Doruk's magic though it may have been easier to cast with the intrusion of Oblivion into Tamriel. So without further ado we pick things up about a day later (wow, time flies) when the main actors arrive on the scene.





Lower Kvatch


The city was gone. I knew that, intelectually, when we left Skingrad. I knew when we joined up with the hundred strong force of chainclad men with spears, bows and axes that had been sent by Skingrad to its neighbour. I knew from the loud rumourmongering of the mercenaries, as varied in race and motive as in their gear, that went to Kvatch as well. I knew the city was gone, but I didn't feel it. Not until we arrived at the foot of the mountain.


A city is characterised not only by its towers and its streets, the boats grazing in the harbour and the gulls pecking at scraps. It is also characterised by its people. And it is the people that characterise its loss. First were the merchants, the farmers that lived around the mountain and a scant few refugees with naught but the clothes on their back, who all flowed out away from the city like ripples in a pond. The Skingrad man in charge of our group stopped a few to ask questions, then sent them on to his city for protection and shelter. They were not what made me feel. Certainly, each of them were frightened to some extent, but there was still a drive to go forward. To make things better.


It was the refugee camp that showed me the true horror. And not just me, but my companions and shields as well.
"Is this war?" Sorian asked himself and for what was possibly the first time since I met him, his confidence was truly shaken. Was this war? I asked the question myself as I looked around. I had read about it, of course. About the raids the Altmer performed on my people for slaves and sport. Of the retaliation fleets grandfather led. The ones aimed at the Altmeri shipyards. I'd read about war, but I'd never seen one. It was all before my time.


Master Zelthir had seen war. He'd been a master healer for four centuries and counting. He had to have gone on one of the punitive expeditions, or dealt with the aftermath of a badmer attack. So I'd asked him once, out of curiosity. I never got a straight answer out of him though. He said the subject was unladylike. Which was an odd moment of gender-awareness from him. Often I was led to wonder if master Zelthir even knew there were men and women, apart from the anatomical distinction.





So whatever war was like, I had no basis to compare what had happened at Kvatch to it. I looked around the camp, but there were no weapons that I saw, none of the guardsmen that were so common everywhere else. And didn't war imply armies? I couldn't see any at the camp, or up on the mountain, though my eyes weren't good enough to make out much detail from down here.


The people I did see at the camp were not like the ones we'd seen on the road. They were lifeless, sitting or laying and staring at nothing with blank eyes. Others wailed and screamed their loss at the skies. It was only a few, though still at the brink of physical and mental exhaustion, that had kept their wits about them. They tried to care for all those who could not, feeding them and giving them foul but necessary water. Some had even set up a large tent from which came the smell of open wounds and infection. Finally towering above the camp was the city itself. Even though the refugees tried to keep their eyes away from it, it was impossible to forget its presence. Dark walls cloaked in darker clouds that roared with an everlasting storm.
"See that? " Baurus said to us. "The skies anywhere but over Kvatch are clear and those black clouds don' t follow the wind. Whatever it is, it's unnatural."


This place rattled my bones. It wasn't just a war that had happened here. Something had emerged here, something that didn't belong. I could feel it, in my teeth and bones and above all, in my head. It was like the ache of spellsong. The pain that came with changing a world that didn't want to be changed. But I wasn't doing anything. It wasn't me. I just wanted to get away from here right now and how anyone could possibly choose to stay here was beyond me. At least for any good reason, that was. I had my own duty to the House Septim which for me at least was enough to stay. I shook away the worst of the shivers and focussed on our mission. The chainclad Skingrad leader and a second, unarmoured, man had accosted one of the active refugees and asked him who was in charge at the camp. They were directed to a path that snaked up the mountain to the city.


"Sorian." I said. "Follow those two and find out what happened."
"Of course, your highness." The young Redguard snapped a salute at me and then casually wandered after the Skingrad officers. Did he not feel the evil in the air?
"You know, you will have to explain to him sometime that calling you that isn't safe." The older of the two Redguards said with a shake of his head. He was right of course, but for now I was just happy that Sorian had begun to follow my instructions without constantly complaining about them. I'd promised myself to have a talk with him. As soon as we had a day where I wasn't sore from horseriding or rushing to a disaster-area. For now I contended myself with pursuing the emperor's will. That was the other reason I'd sent Sorian away. I would have to explain to him why we were taking two children to Cloud Ruler, but until then Baurus and I had chosen to remain silent on the subject unless he was asleep and even then we talked by scribbling and burning notes.


Ironically, as careful and subtle as we'd been around him, so blunt were we about to be now. There was no other way to do it. I'd been throwing Blades recognition signs all over the moment we got here, but so far there had been no response. While the signs looked like nervous jittering to the uninformed and were unnoticeably small unless specifically looked out for, I had expected someone to contact me. I checked my vest-pockets for any random notes that had found their way in, but there was nothing I hadn't possessed already. The stealthy approach didn't work. Either there were no Blades in the refugee-camp, or they were lying in the tent with the injured. In both cases my title of Agent would be of little use to us. I pointed to the surgery tent and Baurus nodded. It was time to go to work. I just hoped that the boy and the girl had made it here. There weren't enough people down here to populate even a tenth of Kvatch. Was this war?

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OOC: It never made sense to me how nobody seemed to care beyond what happened to their own city and even then their response was apathetic at best. I mean, even if Count Skingrad would love to see Kvatch ruined (and I don't think he does), it is in his best interests to find out what's going on and how to prevent it from leaping over to his city. Hence the hundred-strong light infantry and assorted mercenaries he's sent to Kvatch.


Another thing that didn't make sense to me is for the survivors to camp right beneath its walls in easy striking range of the Daedra. That element of wrongness is still in my version, but I plan to wrangle out an explanation for it.