Book's and Reading pg 11

Atub called us to the alter the next morning, as we were heading out. A different Warhammer was sitting on the altar and Atub said that she thought we should take it. I took it down but then handed it to Shiamar, she got a huge smile on her face and she took off her harness and adjusted it so that the new one would fit.

She and Navitas walked out of the Stronghold admiring the workmanship on her new weapon. I thanked Atub and Gularzob for their hospitality and walked out to where Marcurio was holding Shyla, both women already in the saddle.

"Navitas, how are our funds? Do we need to work on a bounty or treasure hunt?" I had let her keep track of our gold, as she seemed to be better with the merchants than I was. She laughed.

"That's depending on how fast you want to buy your land. We have about half the money, the Chiss carry some very valuable items."  I caught the "we", as far as I was concerned that was fine.

"Half the money huh? Well, then we need to get a bit more. How many more chiefs do I need to talk to?"

"Three more, but I also had an idea, we should talk to the Librarian at the College, he's an Orc and knows our history better than anyone." Navitas looked over at me with a happy look, but just beyond her shoulder, Shiamar looked a bit confused.

"An Orc... Librarian? Books, you mean he can read? On Orc?!" Shiamar sounded very surprised, Navitas looked at me and narrowed her eyes in warning, and I wisely stayed quiet.

" Kurdan and I both can read, I can read  Nord and Imperial, Kurdan reads Nord and Orcish...."  Navitas had not even finished her sentence when Shiamar started speaking over her.

"My father had always said that books were useless, that there was nothing in them that I could not learn by listening to our Wise Woman, and that anything she did not know, I did not need to know."  Navitas started off with Shiamar right beside her the two of them had their head's as close as it was possible while on horseback.  I looked at Marcurio and shrugged, he shook his head and we rode in silence.

Later that evening we sat at the entrance of a Dwemer ruin only it didn't look much like it was in ruins, just disused. We debated on camping inside or outside but ultimately decided that it would be safer for us and the horses if we camped outside. The ladies were off to the side, talking quietly to each other. I pulled out the Chiss letter and opened it, then the ring and put it on, the ink on the paper was still a jumbled mess I could not read, so I handed it to Marcurio.  He opened the letter but shook his head, then I handed him the ring and told him what it was.

He read the letter and I could follow along because he mouthed the words as he read. He looked startled when he finished.

"How many times have you been attacked?"

"Because of the bounty on Navitas? That is hard to say, we have been attacked four or five times in the past couple of months, but twice by what we could term assassins or bounty hunters. Here, this is the first letter I pulled off of those that attacked us. I didn't give it to the Dunmer that read that letter to us, but if you're going to be part of us, you need to know." I handed the letter across to him and he opened it up. He read through the letter quietly and then looked up grimly.

" This one says that Navitas is to be brought in alive, for questioning if possible, dead if not."   It was as much as I figured, but did not make me any happier. Marcurio went to hand me back the ring and I told him to keep it, it didn't do me any good and he could read all the letters and journal's that we found.

We gathered a lot of Dwemer metal from the ruin, all of it loose or pieces of automated creatures, that had attacked us. Weapons, gems, and other things that Marcurio and Navitas said were worth money to someone. After two trips back to the surface to bring up our loot and to sleep, the last room had nothing in it of note, but a couple of the rooms right before that had much in the way of dinnerware, which Marcurio and Navitas both said we could sell for a very good price. I liked the look of it and maybe not these, but I would like to get a set for my table.

We headed to Windhelm to sell all our loot, the horses loaded down, so that we walked into town, stopping in a small town to camp. I said nothing when Navitas took Shaimar off to the side each night with a book and the two of them talked in hushed tones. It was good that Shaimar wanted to learn to read. Navitas told me that one of the Orc Strongholds was just up the path from the inn we stopped at, but that we should wait and go up after we had visited Windhelm.

A Different kind of Tribe pg 10

We spent the day in Windhelm at the Candle Hearth Inn, Navitas needed some time to heal and rest, the horses needed new shoes and I used the time to mend and upgrade our armor. I also worked on some new Armor for Navitas, it would not be done by the time we left here, but I crafted all the pieces that I could and the links to piece them together. I went and inquired about hiring the carriage to Riften, that would be easier on Navitas and I could work more on her armor.

The end of the week saw us at the Riften Gate, as it was early evening, we decided to spend the night at the Inn instead of heading straight to Fort Dawnguard. Navitas talked to the Innkeeper and rented us rooms and a meal and asked if I was still interested in hiring a mage. I nodded yes and told her that I thought the old Dunmer's idea of fighting magic with magic was not a bad Idea. She got up from the table and walked over to an imperial in fancy robes, they chatted for a moment and then walked over to our table and sat down.

"Kurdan, this is Marcurio, he's a wizard. Mercenary by trade" Navitas looked at the Imperial and nodded toward me.

"With the Chiss around, I won't contract on as a single guard, it's just too hazardous. A great many of the merc bands have either left or been absorbed into a city guard, they don't want more than one wizard right now. Navitas says that you want to start your own Stronghold, very admirable and something that I would not mind helping with." he paused for a moment, looked me with an odd look, and then finished with " If you are willing to allow a Human as a full member of your tribe, I would be willing to use my skills both now and in defense of that Stronghold."  Before I could answer Navitas started talking again.

"Kurdan, I never outright said that I would join your Stronghold, mostly because I won't be a part of a "traditional" one. My Heart-Sisters are a Bosmer and an Imperial, I could never be a part of something they were not.  You seem to have some ideas that are not traditional, does that extend to non-Orc's being part of the Stronghold, not just tolerated as "blood-siblings" but as full members?."

I looked down at the table for a moment and thought quickly, I knew I did not want "traditional", but allowing non-Orcs as full members of my Tribe. I looked back up at Navitas and realized, that was exactly what I wanted and more to the point, needed. I needed the diversity that many different peoples would bring.

" Marcurio, you have yourself a new home, when it's built of course. Welcome to the Tribe. Navitas, you and your Heart-Sisters are more than welcome, even if Azul does not manage to cure her Vampirism, of course making snacks out of her family would not be nice. You may marry or not as you wish, I can only ask that you bring in a male that will contribute to the good of the Tribe."

The trip to Fort Dawnguard and back to Riften was quiet and mostly uneventful. Marcurio was ready to go with us by then, having found and bought a horse. We headed to Largashbur, as Navitas had heard that they were having some difficulty and that the Chief was not inclined to listen, had in fact told all the Tribe on threat of exile that they could not leave the stronghold.

We met with Atub and she said that she needed some supplies to perform a ceremony to find out why Malacath was angry with them. Navitas had already informed me of what she would need, because the Chief would not allow us back in once we had those things, better to bring them in the first place.

We ended up agreeing to help the Chief clean some giants from Malacath's shrine, which I would have done anyway, but it seemed a test of the Chief's honor, but we agreed to meet him at the cave entrance. We camped for the night but noticed that the Yamarz and another Orc left in the middle of the night.

When we got to the cave entrance, Chief Yamarz was already there and my eyes almost fell out of my head, when I saw the female standing next to him. The bits of metal she was wearing could not really be called armor and barely covered her considerable assets. I must have been staring more obviously than I thought because Navitas came up from behind me and thumped me on the shoulder and said I was going to end up in a fight over a female with the Chief if I didn't quit drooling. Marcurio coughed as Navitas went by us both and said, " If ever there was a female Orc to drool over, she would be it."

We made it to the chief who put his arm around the girl and gave me a look that said "Mine".   I shrugged my shoulders, the girl had the right to be with whoever she chose and obviously, she was with him at the moment.  I had the feral urge to knock the smug look off his face as they turned around and walked into the cave.  I could not help but notice, the lack of... of... well anything but a couple leather straps, that held the bits of metal to the front, as she walked away.

"That is one fine ass". Marcurio whispered to me. I grunted and silently cursed the part of my anatomy that noticed how the leather disappeared between the muscled curves of that very fine ass. He had not whispered low enough, Navitas came up between us and smacked us both on the back of our heads.

"Hey, I didn't say anything!" She looked at me in disgust.

"It's not what you didn't say, it's what you were thinking! Males.. that girl is barely old enough to be out hunting, but her father gave her to Chief Yamarz like a prized heifer!.

"Fine, he comes out of this alive and I'll kill him for you and you can invite her into our tribe as another Heart-Sister, to come and go as she pleases." Marcurio was snickering.

The look she cast over her shoulder, had it been a fire spell, would have left me one crispy Orc. We followed her into the Cave and killed a couple Giants in the first area. The girl was standing on a ledge, looking deeper into the cave, and we could see Chief Yamarz nowhere. At our footsteps, she turned and looked at us.

" He left me, He drank some kind of potion and was gone.. he left me to fight that giant all by myself. I am glad you came in when you did, it was more than I could handle by myself." Navitas walked over and gave the girl a hug.

"You can come with us, we promised to help him clear the shrine, but the promise was more to Malacath than to the Chief.  Why are you here with him? I know your father sent you to Chief Yamarz, but you don't look like a trained warrior." She looked down and her shoulders drooped.

" I know, I look like a Chief's favorite wife, his young play toy, the one every other wife hates. I can not help the way my body is formed." she plucked at the armor, " Chief Yamarz said he would allow me time to learn a warrior or guard's profession if I would wear the armor he brought and watch his back this day."

Naviatas dug into her pack and pulled out her hunting armor and handed it to the girl. " It isn't as protective as full armor, but it will probably be warmer than what you are wearing. You can use that hammer yes? Oh, and we can't just call you girl, what is your name?"

"Thank you, yes I can and my name is Shaimar."

"Well Shaimar, I am Navitas and this is Kurdan and Marcurio."

Shaimar proved that she could use her Warhammer, in fact, she was very good with it. The Armor Navitas had given her, did not hide all of her umm charms, but they did cover them much better. We killed four or five giants with no sign of Chief Yamarz, Marcurio said he must have taken an invisibility potion. When we finally saw him, he was standing on what looked to be the final trail down to Malacath's Shrine.

He wanted us to kill the last Giant, but I refused, not for any amount of gold, this was his challenge from Malacath himself, not ours. We stood on a ledge overlooking the pocket valley the Shrine was in. Shaimar had her hand fisted and against her mouth, I looked at Navitas and then at the girl and she walked over and put her arm around her. I edged Marcurio and I a small distance from the women and heard Navitas start talking to Shaimar in a low tone.

The Chief failed, we did not, but all of us let the girl get the last blow in. Malacath started talking to us and said that we should take Shagrol's Warhammer back to Largashbur. I told Shaimar that she could carry the hammer back, she was happy to do so, but upon giving it to Atub, who rewarded us well. Atub said that Shaimar could stay as a warrior or first wife to the next chief if she choose to. She shook her head and said no.

" No, I think I will travel with my new Heart-Sister and become a member of Kurdan's new Stronghold."  I smiled at the girl when she turned and looked at me.

"Welcome to the tribe Sister."  She gave me a coy look through her lashes.

" I would not go that far...Chief".  It seemed I had at least eight members of my new stronghold and it wasn't even built yet.

A bump in the Road pg 9

We were not even a half a day out of Dawnstar when  the snow started falling, it wasn't a blizzard, but decreased our visability, we were in the tree's when they hit, three of the Chiss. The mage was the biggest problem, throwing spells at us faster than we could dodge, the sharp coldness of ice spikes slowed me down as I went after the mage. The other two disappeared into what looked like a cloud of black birds and reappeared one on either side of Navitas.

I had to turn my concentration to the mage as he hit me with another powerful spell, I had a thought and ducked behind a tree for a moment and felt in my pouch for one of the rings that I had looted and that the Priest of Mara said was an amulet of magic resistance and then I dug down deep inside and called all the rage energy an Orc has and ran at the mag as fast as I could.

The Nordic Greatsword I had taken off of one of the Bandit's lopped off the mages head in one slice. I then ran back to Navitas, who was on the ground, both Chiss closing in. I placed myself between them and her, it was hard to keep my eye's on them, as they used some kind of magic to cloud themselves. I ignored where they went and concentrated on where they wanted to go, I stayed by Navitas.

Luck held as a patrol came across us, two members of the Dawnguard and a Vigilant of Stendar. When the Chiss attackers were dead, the Vigilant went over to Navitas and offered her a potion and used a healing spell and she soon looked a little less pale.

I and the two Dawnguard members rummaged through the dead Chiss and then went back to where Navitas and the Vigilant were sitting. The Vigilant laid out a cloak and we dumped everything except the bloody armor and weapons, those we placed beside the cloak.

One of the Dawnguard, a Dunmer that looked old enough to be a contemporary of my Father, which meant old enough to have known my Great-great Grandfather, picked up all the letters and upon opening one grimaced and then pulled a ring out of his pouch. At the same time the Vigilant waved a hand over the small items, which included a lot of jewelry, she gasped then started sorting things out in different piles.

When the Dunmer was finished reading he asked if I would like to read the letters myself or just wanted him to give us a brief summary. I told him he could read the letters, he laughed and said just as well, he wasn't sure the Translation ring would work on someone with little magic.

"Well ...hmmm. " He looked at Navitas and asked if that was her name, when she replied yes, he went on. " It seems your traveling companion really made the Chiss Admiral  angry and angry may be to mild a word. He has put out a "death on sight" bounty to all Chiss, but only to his own people so far. Young Lady you need to tell Isran about this, I know you have been put on special projects, but he still needs to know. They have already attacked some of the Dawnguard and Vigilants, but from what I have heard anyone is fair game to these people. "

The Vigilant explained which jewelry was enchanted and with what, their was a translation enchant on one of the rings, so I kept that one, even if it didn't work for me, I could get someone else to use it. We split the value of the items between us, though because of the horses, Navitas and I took the weapons and armor.

The third Dawnguard member had been setting up camp, the tent they had plus ours, was big enough that we could share and had a partition so that the ladies could have a bit of privacy.  Around the fire that night we talked about these invaders and where they might have come from. Navitas told the story of how she had helped a young Chiss girl get away from the Admiral, she had been a spy posing as a servant girl.

The Stendar Vigilant gave us some of her observations about them, that they always traveled in groups three or larger and almost always had a mage or spellsword type with them.  Her advice was to hire a mage, because it was often the case of the best way to fight fire, was with ice.

We helped with cleaning up the camp the next morning and then left, making it to Windhelm just before nightfall.

Nightmares Chapter 8

Navitas made the suggestion after we had taken care of the house to travel to Dawnstar and talk to the Jarl that owned the land in the area I wanted to put the Strong hold in. I figured we could find a bounty or two in that Hold maybe another kind of job. It was short trip up the mountain to get to the house, it sat on a trail that was near Iverstead, so that might be a good town to do some trading in, order supplies from the local hunter.

Two days saw the house to rights, Navitas said that we had it as clean as we could, we draped the furniture in dust cloths again and left. The trip to Dawnstar took two weeks, bandit's  attacking slowed us down, but assured we entered town with enough loot to add coin to our purses. We traded that off and bought some better furs than we had come north with, the thinner ones we had selling right away to a group that was heading to Solitude for a wedding.

The Jarl would not speak with us, the steward saying that all business other than the Civil War was to be put on hold until such a time as someone did something about the Nightmares everyone was having. So we went to the Inn and rented a room, with two beds, then went out and listened to some of the local women complain about their nightmares to a Priest.

We watched them walk away, not happy with the answers he was able to give. I picked up my dinner and walked to our room and ate at the table in there, I wanted to think without the local Bard caterwauling in my ear..

From what the women had said, the nightmares just started, they had not mentioned anything that would cause people to have bad dreams, so. The Priest was giving them the run around, not really answering their questions, just reassuring them. He knew something, but what? Not a Divine... huh, a Deadric Prince? Yeah, that sounded about right, which meant he had a solution or something that he wanted to try, but maybe needed a strong sword arm for. I would ask him in the morning.

I found out the next morning and wished I had not asked, because this Priest of Mara not only wanted my help, but as we stood in front of the place he called Night Caller Temple, he told me all of the truth he had hidden the day before and also said that Navitas could not come with us.

Two hours later I was even more unhappy with him, he was not a warrior at all, the mace he carried was more for show. The Bandit's that had been gassed to sleep along with the worshipers of Namira, were none to happy to see either of us. The Worshipers and Priests were as inept as Eurander and easy to deal with. The Orc Bandit's, they on the other hand were warriors and much harder to deal with.

He destroyed a Staff that had been used as a Locus for the Deadric Prince to spread nightmares and then said he would be more than happy to help me in any way he could. I thanked him and then headed out of the Temple, where Navitas was waiting.

"Well Kurdan, I love your new armor, it's all spiky, you could always run into any enemies and impale them on it." I grunted as I dug into Shyla's pack for a healing potion. " Of course you could have your old armor back if you want it, a bandit ran out of the Temple with a sack of loot, including your armor and sword. I'm not sure I even want to ask." I guzzled down the potion and grimaced at the foul taste, but I could already feel the small cuts knitting together.

"That Priest was no kind of warrior and it's Mara's own Luck that neither of us were killed." I looked over and grabbed the bag that Navitas was holding out and then rummaged through my gear for some underclothing. Damn only one set left and I know I had blood smeared neck to toe.  I stuffed my cloths in the bag with my armor and tied it to Shayla's saddle. " Navitas, I think a bath in Dawnstar before I put on my armor." with that I sung onto Shayla and headed to town.

"Sounds good to me" I could hear the laughter in her voice, It wasn't bad armor, the craftsmanship was excellent, but it was heavy and I had no where near the flexibility of my own armor. I would clean it then sell it.

We sat in one of the tubs, hot water to the neck, warm mead in tankards with food ordered for when we got out. The other tub's dirty water was draining, the Innkeeper had said to wash in one tub and soak in the other. While I was at it and after Navitas had finished cleaning and was soaking, I had washed myself and my underclothes. I would wear soft breech's and a loose shirt til the morning.

"Navitas, once we talk to the Jarl in the Morning and if he is agreeable to sell the land, I think it is time to start talking to the Stronghold chiefs. While I don't need their approval, I do need their good will so that I can draw in some good warriors." I heard her sigh and the water splash just a bit.

"Sound's like a plan, we can sell the thing's you looted and then get a good days rest while we re-provision and then head out the next day, barring bad weather.