Aurelia (again)
Isobel got another letter from Knight-Commander Jourvel, asking us to meet her in Gonfalon Bay, at the Ancient Anchor. Izzie's sure it has something to do with Aurelia.
Dame Jourvel showed us a letter she received from Aurelia. She was still in Rivenspire, trying to track down the gold that had gone missing from Veloise Mecantile's account. It said that she and Marso were getting close to solving the case.
"That means she's about to get into more trouble," was Isobel's opinion, and I was inclined to agree. "We'd better go there and find out."
The letter said she was staying at the Run Inn in Fell's Run, so that's where we went first. We found Aurelia in conversation with a man in mage's robes, but there was no sign of Captain Marso.
And that was because he'd been kidnapped by the brigands, who were holding him hostage in the nearby Obsidian Scar ruins, theatening to kill him if Aurelia didn't put an end to her investigations. Of course, that made her even more convinced they were on the right track, and close to a resolution. Marso needed to be rescued, so the investigation could continue.
"I can't fault her logic, even if her judgement is a bit lacking," Isobel remarked. "Now we're here, that might actually be the best course of action, but Aurelia would probably have tried to go it alone. It's a good thing her mother sent us."
"There's no guarantee we'll succeed, but there's also none that they'll let him go if Aurelia backs off," I added.
We headed for Obsidian Scar.
Things started to make more sense, and at the same time got more complicated, when we entered the ruin. Not far in, we met an Orc named Lashgikh, who had also been kidnapped, along with her Redguard husband, Esmaeel. It seemed that the Orc cultists who lived here, the Oathbound, did kidnapping for hire, and Marso wasn't their only prisoner. Lashgikh had escaped, but she hadn't been kept with Esmaeel, and didn't know where he was. Perhaps he and Marso were being held together? So Izzie and I agreed to help her, as it would be the same search anyway. And naturally Dame Isobel Veloise would feel that she had to do so, being a Knight.
We soon found Esmaeel dead in a cell off of one of the corridors. There was no sign of Marso, and the cell was small enough to suggest it would only hold one prisoner at a time. I didn't like finding out that the Oathbound were prepared to kill their prisoners, but Lashgikh's story hinted at extra prejudice against Esmaeel, for taking an Orc bride. Osgrikh, the chief of the clan she left when she married, had sent the Oathbound after them, and he was definitely the kind who'd want Esmaeel dead.
The rest of the cells along that stretch of corridor were empty of prisoners, but we found an Ogrim in another. The door to that was open, so I assume it just wandered in. It wasn't the first Ogrim we'd encountered. The Orcs seemed to like summoning daedra, and there were dremora, scamps, banekin, and flame atronachs as well. So many, I started to wonder if they were allies, not summons. They were all hostile to us, so it didn't really matter.
Lashgikh asked us to help gather the heads of Thrug and Larzgug, the siblings of Osgrikh, so she could use them in a ritual to swear a blood oath to Malacath for revenge on Osgrikh himself. She'd seen them here after they helped bring her and her husband in.
Even after doing that, we still hadn't found Marso. Wherever they were holding him was even deeper into this maze of a ruin. There were cells and cages in a lot of places, but all empty so far.
Finally Lashgikh led us to a corner that held an altar to Malacath, and there were spikes for the heads on either side. She knelt and swore an oath to Malacath, and someone, whether the Daedric Prince himself, or an avatar, appeared and answered her. When he disappeared again, a portal opened and disgorged Osgrikh, who promptly attacked Laskgikh, so we defended her, and together we killed him. So that was Lashgikh's quest settled, what about ours?
Back up the stairs, and off to one side, we spotted a cage we hadn't searched, with an Orc berserker on guard. There was someone in the cage, altough we couldn't yet tell if it was Marso.
The Orc was at least as tough as either of Osgrikh's siblings, and didn't go down easily. But we got the key to the cage, and it was indeed Marso in it. We quickly made our way back to the entrance, before more of the Oathbound turned up.
"I can make it back to the inn from here," Marso told us, "but I don't want to slow you down. Ride ahead, and make sure Aurelia's safe."
The way he said that had me worried, so we did just that, and with good reason. When we got to the inn, the mage we'd seen with Aurelia earlier was waiting outside with the news that she'd now been kidnapped. Not by Orcs, this time, but by a Breton woman. Aurelia seemed to know who she was, and called her Vetitia. The children of the village had seen them headed north, towards Orc's Finger, the old Ayleid ruin. "And they can't have got far; Aurelia was giving her a hard time."
We headed off north. Sure enough, we found a camp-site just outside the ruin, with a Breton woman standing guard over a rather undressed Aurelia, who was tied to a post.
The woman, Vetitia, wasn't in a mood to negotiate, and we ended up killing her.
Aurelia had been bound using strips of her own dress, which is why she wasn't wearing much of it any more. It seemed that Vetitia had no rope, so she improvised.
Marso arrived just as we were setting her free. "Tied up \i again?"\i0 he inquired. "We always seem to be undoing knots when we find you."
"Well, at least this time I didn't get comprehensively manhandled," Aurelia replied. "It was three guys last time, not a solo woman."
Vetitia had a change of clothing in a backpack at her camp, but she was a bit smaller than Aurelia, who looked like she'd burst out it before long.
"Get your butt back to the inn, and put on some of your own," Isobel commanded.
"She's right, Marso," Aurelia replied. "And then let's go home, back to High Isle."
She turned to us. "Meet us at the Ancient Anchor in Gonfalon Bay. I want to tell you the whole story, but first I want to go home ... with Marso."
"Those two have got very close, haven't they?" I remarked to Isobel after they'd left.
"Yes they have. Did you notice how Marso wasn't seeing anything unfamilar, even with her being almost naked?" She paused. "And that remark about being tied up ... When we were playing Knights and Princesses, I was always playing the Knight coming to the rescue, and she was always the Princess, of course. She insisted on being tied up, as part of the game, she said. Do you think Aurelia has a bit of a thing for bondage?"
A few days later, in the Ancient Anchor, we met up with the couple again. Dame Jourvel was there, too, and Marso told us they'd got approval from his employers for the new arrangement.
"You mean my parents?" Isobel asked. "And what arrangement?"
"Marso and I will be sailing together," Aurelia replied. "Mother wanted me to travel, and we don't want to settle down until we have to."
"So that's why I needed permission to take a permanent passenger," Marso explained. "We'll have time to see the sights at each port of call, while the ship gets unloaded and re-loaded, but I won't be attending to that myself, like I had before. They needed to know that, too."
Isobel wished them both luck. "Stendarr keep you safe, Aurelia."
"If she's going to be a sailor, Marso," I added, "make sure you teach her all about knots."
I ran into Gabrielle about a week after that. I asked when she was going on her mission to Coldharbour, and she told me she'd already done that and come back. Darien hadn't come back, though. She was sure he was all right, as she'd seen him alive just before Meridia transported the rest of them back to the Hollow City. I must have looked blank, because she had to explain where the Hollow City was before it made any sense. And about Meridia, and her involvement, too.
"Look out for Darien, will you?" she asked as we parted. "I think Meridia may have sent him somewhere else to do a job for her."
Since this had nothing to do with what Clark or I were doing, I decided to talk to him about it, next time he came home. And Azura didn't say anything to contradict me.
"Darien ... Gautier?" Clark asked me.
"Yes, do you know him?"
"Not yet, but when I was in the Clockwork City, Nocturnal mentioned his name, and told me I might see him in Summerset. Something about him working for Meridia."
"So Gabrielle was right about Meridia being involved," I said, feeling rather relieved.
Clark suspected that Darien couldn't tell Gabrielle what he was doing in Summerset, for much the same reasons that were preventing me being informed. We were safer that way.
"But I get to see you whenever you're not actually busy there. Gabrielle hasn't seen Darien since she got back from Coldharbour."
"Meridia isn't Azura," Clark reminded me. "You and Azura sorted things out before I even went to the Clockwork City."
"Just let me know if he turns up, and if it's safe to let Gabrielle know, too," I begged.
}