The Saga of Laprima Donnaugh Options

[Renee]

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Clavicus Vile

When the dream began, she found herself lying in a cart, lying in hay, lying still, half-hiding from the others. Part of her wanted to be out there with them, while another part felt quietly content to stay right there. Right in that haypile. Staying still, and keeping quiet. It's this latter, secondary part which attained.

The scene was heavily pastoral. Lots of trees, green with foliage. Sunlight and blue skies. A few puffy clouds, a perfect sort of day. The sounds of others around her. The cart she was in had been drawn off to the side, placed in shadow. The horse which had brought it here must have been tethered somewhere else. As she lay in the cart, she began to feel rather lonely. Sad, and lonely, despite the others cavorting nearby.

They were there for her. All of them, gaily awaiting her presence. Dressed in finery. The women wearing whites, pinks, and light blues. Maids and maidens. The men, dressed more somberly, but the sounds from their revelries were no less delighted and cheerful.

Where is she? Where is Laprima?

Someone was calling. A man, sounding a bit tipsy with wine, perhaps. Yet his voice contained an edge of concern. And then, the voice of one of the ladies...

We should go find her! She's probably near! She's going to miss out!

She sank lower, hiding within hay. She could hear them coming, getting nearer, occasionally calling out to her. She cowered. Not with fear, but with some sort of distress. Lonely she was, and part of her did want to join the others.

She scrunched within the hay as footsteps approached and circled the cart. She held her breath. Eventually, the footsteps moved on. Small relief; she exhaled. They hadn't discovered her. So she took a chance. Got situated upon her arms, and raised her head about a foot, attempting to peer over the cart's side. As she did so, she noticed there was a knot in its wooden planking. For no reason at all (other than, this is a dream, and in dreams we sometimes do strange things) she pushed upon this knot, and the knot fell out, leaving a hole. She squinted her left eye, viewing outside of the cart, only to see vague shapes of the departing couple, heading off into a cabin. Still calling out, still calling her name.

...And that's when she noticed the man with the dog.
...He stood off to the side of the meadow, nearer to the woods.
...He stood in shadow. He wore a jerkin of white and black. He beckoned to her.

You there! I can see you, he said quietly. Despite using a soft tone, she could hear his voice clearly, in the surreal way which dreams can magnify. I can see you, and I mean no harm. Why do not you approach me?

She felt a stab of fear. How can he view me, hiding within this cart? But then, she relaxed. For the man was merely a boy. A boy she recognized from her youth. And this boy was her brother.

Laprima! he called. Come hither, posthaste!

And so she did.

She rose from the cart, took a moment to brush stray strands of hay from her clothings, and then ran swiftly toward her brother, skirts ruffling below. She noticed that the dog which had been there a moment ago had vacated, or vanished. She looked to her brother as she drew nearer. And her brother smiled up at her in his typically mischievous way. A smile she hadn't seen since they were, in fact, both children. Her previous feelings of loneliness were gone.

You should depart! her brother said to her, dancing around her with gaited elan. Head on! Depart hence toward Solitude! And do as they say! ... These folks you see in their fabled costumes, all of them here, are of nothing to you! ... To us! .. They mean nothing! ... A wretched lot! ... So onwards must you go! ... Your man, he awaits your presence! And you shall be in high company! Just dandy! Just peachy!

She felt elation at his words. Her brother, right there before her. 'Whatever is to come, would be fine,' he was telling her, seemingly tapping within her thoughts, her hopes, her fears.

Elija, she said to him.

Yes, sister!

She was weeping by now.

Her hands raised to embrace him. But just then, a flash of emotion overcame her. A mixture of revolting sickness, and sweet delight. She recoiled, stumbled backwards in disgust...

Laprima Donnaugh awoke, bolt upright, her eyes teary. Her bed quarters around her, her 8 year-old feline dozing by her side. She'd just had a dream. Her thoughts were racing, so she consciously made an effort to remember all she could. ... Her brother .... A cart ... Some people walking by in gay costume ... A dog by the side of the forest ... Slowly, she pieced it all together. After a minute or so, she sat up in bed, inked her quill and began to scribble words quickly in her journal.

After she had recalled all she could, she realized she was in agreement with her brother. She would head to Solitude.

This post has been edited by Renee: Jan 24 2022, 02:42 PM

[Renee]

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The Past and the Present

Laprima and Elisif left the Blue Palace mid-afternoon, Elisif cheerful and elated, Laprima curious yet cautious. Their soles and heels clicked and clacked over Solitude's cobblestone streets. "Such a merry day!" Elisif called to the sky, while her niece inwardly groaned.

At this point in the story, let us take some time to glance into Laprima's upbringing.

Elisif's sister was named Alicia. In the Fourth Era's Year 179, Alicia married a land baron whose name Reiley Donnaugh. Due to some luck and some clever acumen with acreage deals, Reiley by then had made a small fortune. As Cyrodiil's wilder areas became rid of their vermin and monsters, more land was sold. The countryside's goblins and monsters in some locations were pushed away by men and by mer, which meant Reiley's funds only increased. Within another year Laprima was born. Within three, they had a son named Elija. Elija Donnaugh would be in their lives another five years, until he disappeared in the Year 190. By now Laprima was ten years of age, her younger brother was nearly eight.

At the time of his disappearance, Elija and Laprima had been playing a game they, and other neighborhood children, called 'Dare'. The idea of Dare was similar to the popular kid's game hide 'n' seek. One player (or several) would hide somewhere, while others would try to find them.

The game was initially played indoors when they were young, and not in school. But over the course of a year or two, they'd begun to hide from one another outdoors, in the streets of the city's Talos Plaza District. When some of the pack were nearing teenage years, the game had broadened to include the entire Imperial City. Hence, they were daring each other to keep pushing for new boundaries. New places they could try to hide from each other. The day Laprima had gone hiding into White Gold Tower's crypts, she'd merely been looking for a new place to dare the other kids, even though she, herself, was just nine.

As they continued daring one another into new territories, they were also facing a series of fears. Fear of getting caught by adults, but also fear of things irrational. Fear of the dark, fear of confined spaces, fear of spiders, rats, and other vermin. In this way, the game was not just a game. The 'hide' part of hide 'n' seek had become much more, as the phrase "I dare us to go..." had taken over their childhood.

It was on the day they broadened Dare to the Waterfront District that things had gone horribly wrong. The Waterfront, where thieves, vagrants, and killers were rumored to dwell. Elija, at just seven years of age, had chosen to brave the area with a hide, but had never been found. He'd not been found from the others who'd been playing, nor later as guards and adults took up th search. The boy simply vanished. His disappearance was investigated of course, but not a mere trace of him had ever been located. People on the Waterfront were not exactly known for loose lips. Even after a reward was promised, those who did speak to officials were unable to tell them exactly what happened.

And that was it. Laprima was despondent from the age of ten and deep into teenhood. Depressed, forlorn, her best friend for a long time was her cat. She was mostly uninterested in anything other than her studies, to which she pored lots of attention, and mostly excelled at. She 'grew up fast', as the saying goes. She was now unable to see the games of young children as anything other than entertainment which could horribly go wrong.

But her schooling went well. She attended classes in the city's Aristocratic District, earning good marks in the subjects of Philosophy, Social Issues, and most of all, Architecture.

"...Because any good court where aristocratic topics are discussed becomes an even better court with a series of variegated echoes..."

Despite having grown up as a 'rich girl', Laprima became interested in visceral designs. Housing and buildings which would be inhabited by peasants and commoners. Laprima had an eye, a talent, for blending some of the layouts and compositions she had grown up with, and streamlining the materials needed to create interesting constructions, at least during her classes this was so. She spent hours building models on her own time, attracting attention from superiors. Cyrodiil's population was likely to expand over the next decade or so, and there were words about a brand-new town being built to accommodate, southwest of the city itself. A new town meant new houses, and new buildings. Laprima Anne Donnaugh, barely eighteen years old, applied to be considered a position within the new town's Faction of Architecture.

But no student who's had such severe tragedy in her life can continue toward excellence without consequence.

On the surface it seemed Laprima had become a dutiful student. But to the wary, one might've noticed her brooding. Flashes of anger, followed by days of remand and silence. But most of all, her walks about the city. Starting from the age of twelve she began strolling the Imperial City's streets, unattended. Sure, the guards by now knew who she was, what she had suffered, and therefore they'd keep an eye on her. But as time progressed and she got older, she became adept at avoiding them, and other adults as well.

Day after day she began retracing their steps, until she finally felt ready to approach the Waterfront itself. As she did so, young Laprima made sure to carry a knife. In essence, she was playing the game of Dare all over again, daring herself though, rather than daring others.

As a member of a class whose goal it was to design buildings, Laprima also became interested in locks. How they worked, and why one lock held better than another. She then became obsessed with locks. As she spent time building her little models in class, she also began inquiring, then studying, lock mechanisms. Their tumblers, their barrels, their key designs.

Eventually, her appearance also changed. Laprima, along with a few classmates who'd been present on the day her brother had vanished, began to embrace what they called their 'darkness'. The world was a sad and violent place, and it seemed all the adults in their lives could not see how or why this should matter. They'd spend long hours discussing their lives, and how they lived in a city which was not as pleasant and safe as they'd been brought up to believe. Laprima and her group began powdering their faces white, while painting their lips, brows, and eyelashes black. Some of them would blush themselves gray instead of white. Some of them would even dye their hair black, though Laprima herself was already blessed with a coif the color of a raven's feathers.

It was Laprima's classmate Siouxsie who coined the term for their new look. She considered them all to be gothics, partially due to the fact that half of them were also studying the gothic-styled architecture which had been so popular during the Third Era. Laprima and her classmates appreciated this term, 'gothic'. And as gothics, they'd live and rule forever.

Laprima and Siouxsie became fast friends. Siouxsie extolled Laprima for her smarts, while Laprima admired Siouxsie for her ideals and bravery. Both of them began engaging in deviant behavior, as a way to alleviate their darkness. They started pilfering items from shops during daylight hours: clothes, gems, whatever they desired. Together, they also wondered if their hauls could increase at night. With Laprima's newfound knowlege of lock designs, it was only a matter of time before one idea followed another, and nothing but trouble was to follow.

In the month of Frost Fall, Year 199, Laprima Donnaugh and a group of gothics were caught by guards in the city's Market District, just after Laprima managed to pick the lock to the long-established Red Diamond Jewelry shop. Laprima's apprehension caused consternation within her family, of course. Despite her arrest it was only a matter of time before Laprima tried again, and was caught again.

This time she was jailed for five days, yet denied it all. Hence the lies and the ruckus mentioned by Laprima's aunt did indeed occur. And for awhile, it looked as though poor Laprima would lose her place in society, as her family debated ousting her from their cozy Talos Plaza home.

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Now in Solitude, walking along with her aunt the queen, Laprima wondered for the thousandth time if she'd made all the right decisions. What would have happened if she's merely stayed back home, and finished her studies? Had it been wise to come to Skyrim instead? Would she ever be able to go back into Cyrodiil, the past forgotten, old pages turned?

"This is going to be such fun!" Elisif gushed as the pair headed toward Solitude's shops. "Are you not glad to be here?"

Laprima smiled her soft little grin. "I am, yes I am," she said to her aunt, while inwardly groaning again.
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