The Green Lady is waiting for us at the entrance to the Orc village of Dra’bul. Maybe not waiting for us specifically, but whatever she came here for hasn’t been accomplished yet and we’ll doubtless be able to help in some way. I’m not sure whether this particular mission is likely to wind up becoming ‘talk at them until they capitulate’ or ‘kill them all’ but it’s probably going to require knocking together a few hard Orc skulls either way.
She’s already heard about us rescuing her sister and is thankful for it. Somebody must have run up the road to tell her about it in the time we were busy killing Daedra and dealing drugs, because it’s not like we ever sleep or anything, and definitely didn’t have any moon sugar naps with Khajiit by the wayshrine leading the Dunmer guild trader there to get annoyed at us.
So. Right. Yeah. The Green Lady wants to talk to the chief (or chieftain? What’s the difference?) and has some plan involving disguising us as Orcs, which she can do with a lock of hair, which makes me wonder if that guy who disguised me as Queen Ayrenn that one time had been given some of her hair in order to do it.
“Well, I’ve always wondered what I’d look like with green skin and tusks,” I say. “Ilara-daro, would you be so kind as to sneak in and do the snip-snip?”
Ilara’s whiskers twitch as she grins. “It would be this one’s pleasure.”
Since it would probably be too conspicuous if too many of us were to suddenly turn into strangely-behaving clan members, we decide to only disguise me and Eran. Gelur and Ilara are sneaky enough and Merry takes up a position in a high location where he can get a good view of most of the village without being noticed. People always forget to look up. (Including me sometimes.)
Once the glamor has been cast, Ilara lets me borrow a (rather fancy and definitely stolen) mirror to get a good look at myself. It would be so convenient if I could do this more often. If I ever have to travel outside of Dominion territory (like that’s really an ‘if’) I’ll need to consider doing it under a disguise that makes me look like an Orc or Dunmer. (Not that I’m hugely eager to actually go into Morrowind, but if I need to travel to Black Marsh or Skyrim for some reason, it would still probably be better to blend in a little more and I have no hope of pretending to be an Argonian or a Nord.)
A careful investigation of the village reveals that their food and drink is delicious and more importantly, that they’re getting orders from some wolf-thing they’re contacting with glowing red candles on top of skulls. I’m going to assume this thing is evil because, well, glowing red and skulls. The wolf-thing (probably connected to the werewolves and Hircine worshippers, I’m betting) gave them Velyn Harbor as a ‘gift’ because gifts totally involve you going in and taking it for yourself, and wants them to detain the Green Lady while he does something in Silvenar. The place, not Calm Indy.
While I’m having a chat with the wolf-thing who I’ve convinced I’m just a particularly dim-witted Orc that needs everything explained to him, the shaman’s lovely daughter, Roku, has come up behind me.
“I know you’re not one of our clan,” Roku says. “That’s just a disguise, even if it was enough to fool the Hound. You’re a friend of the Green Lady, like me. We’ve got to help her, before it’s too late.” She explains briefly a bit about what’s going on here and pleads with me to plead with her father to stop helping the chieftain.
The shaman’s hut has a copy of The Cantatas of Vivec on his desk, of all things. Very… strange reading material for a Wood Orc in Malabal Tor, but who am I to judge? Maybe his reading tastes are as eclectic as mine. He also has a very impressive mask of black and red face paint. He’s not willing to act directly against the chieftain, but he still wants to help in some circumspect manner.
We get to the arena where the trap for the Green Lady was supposed to have been sprung, only to find mostly just a bunch of Orc statues and my companions looking smug.
“Their whole trap thing was a lot less subtle than they thought it was,” Gelur says.
“What happened here?” Roku says, running up and gaping at the statues. “What did you do to them?”
“Do not fret,” Merry says. “They’re fine. I will revert them to flesh once again when they can be convinced that going against us is a foolhardy affair.”
“I applaud your quick thinking,” the Green Lady says. “Neralion, did you find out anything?”
“Well, someone called the Hound wanted to capture you, but I think you already figured that part out,” I say. “I think that was the same guy who wanted to capture your sister, too.”
As if on cue, a translucent image of the large wolf-thing in question appears and snarls something about Silvenar or the Silvenar and commands the chieftain to kill us before disappearing again. The chieftain launches himself at Roku. I push her aside and step into his path and take a knife to the gut for my trouble. The Green Lady’s glamor isn’t strong enough to hold up to stabbings, and I’m abruptly no longer green.
“What the fuck are you doing?” I demand, headbutting him and shoving him away as Gelur starts healing me.
“She chose to go against her people!” the chieftain blusters.
“Go against them?” I say. “The way I’m seeing it here, what you’re doing is getting a lot of your people killed! And do you seriously think you’re going to kill us all by yourself? You wouldn’t even be able to kill me by yourself even without my friends.”
“Are you challenging me to a duel?” the chieftain growls.
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“You know what? Fine. I, Neri, hereby challenge you, chieftain whatever, to a duel to the fucking death for command of your tribe. Because I’m really tired of you and you tried to stab an unarmed girl like a coward. I’ll even have Merry de-stone your clanmates so they can watch me wipe the floor with your sorry ass.”
“I accept!” the soon-to-be ex-chieftain snarls, unable to say anything without a bluster, growl, or snarl.
While we’re preparing for the duel (such as it is, neither of us is really in much need of ‘preparation’) Merry goes through and restores all the stoned Orcs and my friends inform them of what’s going on. Approaching them like I would Ashlanders has been working well enough so far. With respect, directness, and occasional face-smashing as necessary.
Normally, I go in for killing things in the most expedient way possible even if it’s not the most ‘honorable’ or pleasant to watch. Even Ilara no longer even bats an eye at severed limbs and heads flying about. I debate between giving the Orcs a show and going all out. Ultimately, I decide on the latter, but with no fancy light powers. Just me, an axe, and an Orc. I can’t help but grin madly at the prospect as I grip Wobbly. I’m pretty sure I overhear whispered speculation that I must be part Orc because obviously no pure-blooded Altmer would look quite so eager to hit something with a battle axe.
Several Orcs start making inaccurate reassessments about Altmer upon seeing the way I move. It’s an epic fight and everyone watching is highly impressed.
Once the asshole Orc is dead, the shaman doesn’t hesitate to declare me the new chieftain and what have I just gotten myself into here? I swear, if these people start calling me ‘Elf-Orc’, Dumac is never going to let me live it down if I ever wind up wherever he wound up. Especially considering Orcs are mer. Anyway, they do figure out pretty quickly that we’re the ones who killed their wayward cousins who attacked Velyn Harbor, but being Orcs, they don’t hold it against us too much.
Fortunately, Orc society seems to function by the sacred principle of ‘Asskicking Equals Authority’ and are happy to give me authority following my asskicking. I’m sure it didn’t escape them that we absolutely could have just killed them all and been done with it.
The shaman tells me that the former chieftain ordered some warriors to go to someplace named Jathsogur, which upon looking at a map I discover is way at the far side of Malabal Tor near the border to Grahtwood. The Green Lady’s afraid that the Hound (she seems to know exactly who this guy is) has done something with her Silvenar and needs to go kick some ass herself.
“Alright then,” I say, looking to the gathered Orcs. “I’m going to need to defuse the shit your former chieftain made a mess of. Roku’s in charge while I’m gone.”
“You want me to be your hearth-wife?” Roku asks, eyes widening.
I blink in surprise. “Would you want to be? I’m not really a fan of forcing people to get married against their will.”
“You saved my life, and fought my uncle to protect me,” Roku says. “Why wouldn’t I want to marry you? I would be honored to be your hearth-wife and bear you many children.”
“Iiiii think we’re getting ahead of ourselves here,” I say quickly and look to my friends for help.
“Don’t look at me,” Eran says. “You walked into this one yourself.”
“But I understand if you don’t want to marry an Orc,” Roku says. “I don’t imagine most Altmer would find me attractive.”
I sigh. “Roku, no. Don’t get me wrong. You’re the most beautiful Orc I’ve ever met. And I mean that. But there’s some things you need to know.”
Roku beams at the compliment, and asks, “Like what?”
“First off,” I say, pointing toward the shaman. “Let me ask you a question. Why were you reading The Cantatas of Vivec?”
“It’s important to learn about other cultures and to understand different points of view,” the shaman replies, and I almost regret forgetting to learn his name.
“You wouldn’t… of course you wouldn’t,” I say with a sigh. “I don’t know what I was afraid of. Let’s go inside and take a seat and get something to drink. This is going to be a long story.”
“You’re going to tell these Orcs everything?” Merry whispers to me as we’re relocating.
“I’m going to tell my Orcs everything,” I say quietly.
“You know they were just trying to kill us a moment ago,” Merry points out.
“So?” I say. “D’you know exactly how I became Great Ashkhan of the clans of the Ashlands?”
Merry sighs. “I am imagining that it involved violence.”
One might say that I’m being too trusting, but there’s no way in fuck that I’m not going to tell someone who apparently wants to be my wife about the ex who murdered me and might just do terrible things to her as well as me if she finds out about this. We wind up back in the longhouse with my friends, Roku, and the shaman. The Green Lady has run ahead again leaving us behind for the moment but I’m sure we’ll catch up soon enough. It’ll be fine. Calm Indy’s a tough fetcher and he’s not going to die just because I stopped to have a drink and tell my life story to an Orc I just met. Probably.
So I tell them everything. Well, not everything everything. We’d be here the rest of the month. But I give a detailed summary of the key points.
Once I’m done, Roku hugs me. I look at her in surprise.
“You’ve been through a lot of shit,” Roku says. “You definitely need a hearth-wife.”
“You know all that and you still want to marry me?” I ask incredulously.
“Yes. I won’t claim to understand half of what you’ve seen and done,” Roku goes on. “All the gods and weird magic is beyond me, but war and battle? That I understand, and you’re hurting deeper than you can heal with potions and spells. Let me help.”
I don’t deserve this girl. I close my eyes, take a deep breath, and decide not to argue about it any further. “Alright.”
…
I sleep. I dream. I dream of the Shivering Isles, but that realm is often as much a dreamscape of a warped mind as anything else.
“Forget Shalidor,” I find myself saying. “He can get his own damned books. I wish to make my own request.”
“Ooooh, feeling cheeky today, are you?” Sheogorath says.
“I wish for you to bless my ring to hide me from the other gods.”
Sheogorath grins widely, more widely than a human face should be capable of. “Now that’s a very interesting request. Oh, and such delicious paranoia, too!” He leans close and rasps, “You’re terrified of him. Much more than you ever would be of me.”
I just give a short nod.
“What would you do for it?” Sheogorath whispers.
“I’ll do anything.”
Most of the people who make deals with Daedra don’t really know what they’re getting into. I do. I, painfully, achingly, madly, desperately… do. And the Madgod seems to find that all the more delightful.
“An-y-thiiing?” Sheogorath drawls, extending each syllables. “Really? Would you even kill your pretty Queen if I demanded that of you?”
I close my eyes and sigh. “If what I fear were to come to pass, she would not be safe from me regardless.”
He lowers his voice to a harsh whisper, “What about Roku?”
Only then does my sleepy, sluggish mind even remember her, and I feel ashamed for it.
I snap open my eyes again and stare at him. “No. Not her. I will not hurt Roku, not even for you, not even for this.”
Amid the Madgod’s laughter, I jolt awake.
Tense, my heart racing, but I don’t move. I feel arms around me and I sense no danger, so I close my eyes again and let myself fall into deep sleep.