A Holiday in Morrowind, OR: How Eilidh got her mojo back Options

[PhonAntiPhon]

"You should go to Morrowind." Said her friend Callius. "I have some friends in Ald'ruhn, I can give you a letter of introduction if you like."

Eilidh, who'd had a difficult year what with a failed relationship, a fifty thousand septim loss on a business deal with a meadery in Skyrim which had subsequently failed; not to mention a slow and creeping sense of boredom and general malaise, gave the idea some brief consideration and agreed.
She'd never visited the area, indeed since arriving at Anvil some three years previously she had not left Cyrodiil, she knew little about the region; Callius had told her something of it but that was all. It would make a pleasant get away and also maybe reignite a little of the expeditionary spirit that she'd always enjoyed and which had formed such a big part of her previous military career back in her homeland across the sea.

It turned out that Callius' hometown was not on the Morrowind mainland but was instead located in Vvardenfell, a large island in the Inner Sea. After the briefest of searches - (it helped if one was a monied Princess, even a foreign one) - Eilidh was able to charter a cabin aboard a scheduled Imperial brigantine bound for Seyda Neen, a small Imperial settlement to the southwest of the island.
The Captain, one Marcus Lucillius, was the perfect gentleman as indeed were the officers and ratings, at least up on deck and in his presence. Eilidh was not naive enough however to assume they would be the same were she to venture into the dimness of their world below the deck, and so limited herself to her cabin, the captain's, and the aft, by the wheel.

The journey took some two days or thereabouts, and Eilidh spent the time either playing cards with Captain Marcus, writing in her journal, or hanging over the side of the boat and breathing in the salty air whilst staring out over the calm and deep waters of the Inner Sea; the wood creaking and the rigging and sails slapping as they came ever closer to Seyda Neen.
For the first time in a long while she felt a growing excitement and anticipation in her breast.

-X-

[PhonAntiPhon]

20 Last Seed. 12pm
Balmora.

Tendrils of grey fog fingered their way into the Eight Plates as the door was pushed open and a figure walked in.
Dulnea Ralaal, the publican, looked up as the new arrival entered the large common room and stood for a moment looking about herself.

"Just another traveller..." She thought but then, taking a second look, she put down the silver tumbler she had been polishing and studied the young woman.
She was an elf certainly, and a young one at that, maybe thirty seasons. At first Dulnea thought she was Bosmeri for she was small and neat, not so much "petite" as "compact", she felt.

As if realising she was being studied, the new arrival turned to look directly at the publican.
" Definitely not a Bosmer." Amended Dulnea quickly.
Indeed, the other elf's gaze and bearing were very direct. Dulnea thought to herself that there was a confidence and sophistication in the way the other held herself. The visitor approached the counter, nodded and smiled cheerfully.

"Can I help?" Asked Dulnea. She was used to travellers passing through Balmora, of all types, but there was something intriguingly exotic and, well, foreign about this particular one.
"G'aftanuin, hae ye go' a ruim, b'annee chanss?"
Dulnea blinked. The traveller was was admittedly a pretty little thing, her long black hair expertly coiled at the back of her head and held with a butterfly clasp. Her face, the publican noted, had just the faintest tint of pale blue to it, around the eyes and the small, freckled nose.
Her voice was light, with a curious musical lilt to it, and obviously cultured. There was one small problem though.
Dulnea had absolutely no idea what her new visitor had just said.

"Pardon?"
"A sed, hae ye go'a ruim, pliz?" She spoke more slowly this time, again with a friendly smile.
"Um, I don't..."
A gulf of awkward silence opened between the two women. The smaller elf's cheerful expression slipped somewhat and took on a more exasperated air.
"Och, wye eva'tiyme? Yoo peepul, a'swere..." She rolled her eyes, then looking back at Dulnea raised one delicate, long-fingered hand and made a writing gesture with it.
Dulnea, slightly amused by the situation and by the other's reaction to it, fetched her some paper and a quill with some ink. The other elf nodded in acknowledgement and taking the quill in hand, bent to write a short note:

~My name is Eilidh MacAuley. Im a travaller inne these parts. Do you hav a bed for the night?
Please.~

Having finished, Eilidh put down the quill and handed the note to Dulnea, brushing a strand of hair from her face as she did so.
"Thair y'ar..."
Dulnea read it and smiled.
"Yes," she said, "we do have a room. It's ten gold a night."
Eilidh nodded her head.
"Ryte y'ar. Ah'll tek itte, pliz." She reached into a pouch at her waist and after some rummaging produced the required funds.

The exchange completed, Eilidh followed the directions provided and proceeded to her room.
Dulnea watched her go, a thoughtful look in her eyes, and a smile playing about her lips. Eilidh seemed on the surface a rather delicate and pretty little elf - (but from where?) - and yet she had a sort of almost regal bearing to her; evidently there was more to her than met the eye, a fact given credence by the sword at her side and the quiver and bow at her back. Dulnea had no doubts in her mind that she knew how to use them.
The publican shook her head and picked up the tumbler.
"What a curious creature..."
-X-

This post has been edited by PhonAntiPhon: Aug 22 2014, 02:27 PM