Skyrim: Band of Thieves

While Capper was dealing with Gulum-Ei, and whatever that entailed, Azure and the others decided to get a few hours sleep in the inn, which was needed after the long carriage ride and everything he had done for the Companions before coming this way, especially since he knew they didn't have to worry about Capper or Tri Ki asking for assistance. That was the benefit of the skills that their friend had, because he knew that Rarity's friend was a skilled thief, something he had confirmed many times since they arrived in Skyrim, meaning none of them had to worry about him having to ask for aid. Of course that wasn't considering the fact that Capper was a Daedric Prince now, a being that was far stronger than a mortal, but what he found to be interesting was how the cat didn't seem to use his powers for mortal pleasures, but that might be due to Capper still learning about his abilities. That made sense to him, that his companion would want to learn everything about what he was capable of, and he was learning from someone who apparently knew about Daedric Princes, which he was still slightly interested in since Ithelia seemed to be more than she had said so far.

When early morning arrived, however, Azure and the others got up, got some breakfast, and walked outside, though when they departed from the city itself he found that Capper was waiting by the gate that was a fair distance away from the main gate that they were leaving through, with Tri Ki sleeping next to him.

"I take it you were successful?" Azure asked, though as he said that Capper gently woke the kobold up and carried her down to the carriage, where they could tell that his new position as a Daedric Prince must have allowed him to stay awake while they were sleeping, and it seemed like he had been busy during the night, since he and his companion didn't return until this very moment.

"Yes, and Mercer is going to be annoyed when we get back." Capper replied, but he made no move to reveal anything more than that, he figured the information would be revealed once they were on the road again, not that he suspected that the guards would be able to do anything if they listened in on their conversation.

Rarity and the others shared a glance before they made their way back to the stables, where they climbed onto the carriage and made their way out of the area without delay, where La'nari took them in the direction of Dragon Bridge, though this time around she told Capper that they would be heading up a path to the right for a time. It was due to the fact that Azure had found where Wolfskull Cave was located and wanted to clear it before they left the area, which was understandable since he wanted to impress the Companions, to which he nodded and let her direct the carriage to their next destination, a temporary one. Such a thing allowed them to pass by an interesting stone temple, which had a statue that Capper was sure was connected to one of the other Daedric Princes, it held a bit of power that seemed to suggest such a thing, but he made no move to speak about it, since he was sure they would have a problem with him stepping on their territory. Following that they were able to reach a fork in the road that happened to be where Azure's directions had brought them, which was when he found a cave ahead of them and discovered some bones outside it, especially a wolf's skull, which meant they had to be in the right area.

As usual Rarity, Midnight, and La'nari remained outside for the time being, as to not get in the way, while Azure was joined by Tuk Ur and Capper, where they found that there wasn't much inside the cave, in fact it was just an opening, a path down, and a path down to a small camp, where three bandits were camping. Of course Azure knew that Midnight and the others might attack them in their sleep, for an easy kill, but he tapped the stone wall and forced the bandits to wake up, where he charged the leader as soon as he understood that they were under attack. Such a thing allowed him to hack his way through his foe's defenses, while at the same time Tuk Ur used his smaller size to his advantage as he slashed into the pair that was behind the leader, cutting them down before they had much of a chance to fight back. The battle was over in a flash, where Capper collected the golden soul gems as Azure looted the nearby large chest, finding the ring, the heirloom he had been tasked with acquiring, was definitely inside it and claimed it without delay, while he let Capper take the gold and jewels that were inside it.

Based on what he had seen these bandits had been quite successful, no doubt having robbed many people despite being such a small crew, and the treasure would be better in the hands of Capper, instead of someone who might use the small wealth to harm others, so the moment it was back in the Opulent Lands they returned to the carriage.

"So... back to Whiterun? Or are we heading somewhere else?" La'nari asked, though as she did that she made sure the rest of the group was aboard the carriage, after Capper made sure to loot the bandits of their goods, where her question was to see which direction they had to head in and if she needed to change her course.

"I know the Companions aren't expecting Azure to return for some time, just like the Guild isn't expecting Capper back for a day or two more, so I was thinking of visiting Winterhold." Rarity answered, though her reason was twofold, because she did want to visit the College and see if there were any new spells she could add to her arsenal, so she could be of better use to the rest of her group, and she could see that everyone, even her own kobold companion, was interested by the idea, "We can stop by Morthal and Dawnstar, since both of them are on the way to Winterhold, and find an area to put a portal in for the future... and on our way back we can stop in Windhelm for a moment to do the same. That's four new locations for us to move to in the future, once the nine portals are completely set up... should only leave Falkreath, which we have no reason to go near right now."

Capper thought it was a good idea, because it would allow them to explore more of Skyrim and set up more of their portals, and decided that following Rarity's suggestion was what they should do, especially with the fact that the end goal of reaching Whiterun was another good one. As they departed Capper had to agree with Rarity's unspoken comment, she wanted to join the College so she could learn more about magic and her powers, since there was no telling what she might learn from the mages that called that area home. Following that decision they headed back down the hill and traveled in the direction of Dragon Bridge once more, though this time around La'nari directed them to the area that Morthal was resting in, where she told them it was a small swamp town and likely wouldn't have anything of interest in it. Dawnstar, on the other hand, was a port town that might be interesting for them, since recent rumors suggested that the people were having trouble sleeping, a fact that made Capper wonder if there was another Daedric Prince at work in the area, since there were many others and he was getting used to feeling their energies.

What was interesting was that this time around the ride to their next destination was quiet, there were no enemies on the road for them to worry about, though there were a few areas of interest, like an area off to the left that happened to be an old battleground, or a fort overrun by necromancers. Capper made sure to collect the golden soul gems that dropped, as a few more died in the battle they passed by and he had Tri Ki collect them without drawing attention to herself, and once the items were in hand they continued down the path. The necromancer fort, however, didn't seem to care about them at all, in fact the undead just watched the carriage move by their domain and didn't even try to bother them, which meant they had to be guards and were waiting for intruders to get closer to the structure. Since they weren't interested in the fort La'nari just focused on the road as she moved away from the fort, allowing everyone else to see that there was a short bridge in front of them as they moved into the snowy portion of Skyrim once more.

Morthal, as it turned out, was right after the hill that the carriage moved up, off to the left, and it was as La'nari described, a small swamp town that had a Jarl's building, an inn, an alchemy shop, and a few other normal houses, plus a mill that was out of place, before Capper put the portal behind what appeared to be a house to the right of the guard house.

Once that was done, and he was sure that there was nothing else for him to worry about, Capper returned to the carriage and they continued to the east, where he and the others found that there were a few enemies on the road, spiders and the occasional saber cat, but the soldiers continued to clear the way. Capper was fine with this, as it meant they could use the soldiers to their benefit since they were clearing the roads to their various camps, though he was disappointed in them, as all of the camps were far too easy to see and it made him wonder why the war was ongoing if both sides were making such stupid decisions like this. There was also a carriage with a dead horse off on the left at one point, and a small mining area off on the right, but what was more interesting was the large dwarven ruin that was on the right after they around a bend in the path, where Capper paused for a moment as he checked it out, finding a fairly large bandit group in the outside area, which meant there was likely more of them inside the ruin. Other than that there really wasn't much else for them to worry about on the road, which was actually quite the disappointment when Capper and the others thought about it, as he was honestly expecting more ruins or something in this portion of Skyrim.

In the end it did take them a few hours to reach Dawnstar, where they found that it was a small port town built around what appeared to be a natural inlet, with two mines, a good number of houses, an inn, and the Jarl's domain, though again Capper saw no reason to stop and placed the portal on the backside of the guard house.

Following that they entered the inn for a moment, finding a priest of Mara that was talking to some of the local girls, though he was focused on talking about dreams and how they would pass with time, before they purchased some food and quickly returned to the carriage so they could eat while making their way towards Winterhold. Capper knew that half of the ride was going to be spent in peace, due to the fact that they had wiped out the bandit clan that had been in the area near the fork in the road between Winterhold, Windhelm, and the path back to Whiterun. He didn't know about the rest of the path, since there was no telling what else was on the road right now, but he suspected that there would be more bandits and maybe a few groups of soldiers to avoid, since those were common in Skyrim these days. As they moved away from Dawnstar it was easy to see some bandits getting beaten to death by a giant, where Tri Ki carefully scouted the area and returned with four more golden soul gems, but other than that Capper didn't feel like bothering the giant, so La'nari kept moving.

What was interesting was that when they approached a fort that was on the main path, in fact it was built on one side with an inn on the left side, though it appeared that it was under bandit control and those very bandits were dead, based on the amount of Thalmor that were in the area, and one of the black robed ones approached them, a male this time.

"You there. What business to you have in this dreadful place?" the Thalmor agent asked, where Capper noted a key fact as the carriage stopped, the slain individuals were actually Stormcloaks, meaning they must have stopped the elves, since the Stormcloaks were racists towards everyone that wasn't a nord, and the elves rapidly destroyed them.

"We are on our way to Winterhold, and we departed from Solitude earlier this morning." La'nari stated, because the time it took for both routes to reach the same location was nearly the same, so to the agent it seemed like they were trying to cut down on the journey and not waste time, before she glanced at all of the other Thalmor and found that none of them cared about them, "Two of our friends wish to visit the College and see if they can enroll, or at least be permitted inside so they can purchase new spells to learn, and after that we'll be making our way to Riften... we're only passing by this place since it is in the way."

"You don't say? Might I trouble you for a ride, since I have a missive that needs to be delivered to an associate of mine that's visiting the College?" the agent asked, in fact he offered a small bag of gold, at least seventy-five coins, which was more than what an actual carriage driver would make in a single ride, meaning he saw her as a carriage driver, though since he didn't seem ready to take up arms against them La'nari decided to let him sit with the others, before he laid eyes on the kobolds as he climbed into the back, "What... in Oblivion are these things?"

"We're not 'things', we're daedra... sort of. We are kobolds, and we hail from the Opulent Lands, the realm of Midas, who is the Daedric Prince of Greed." Mah Oh replied, because they knew that their Lord didn't want people that were out of the loop to know who he was, so they and their Lord had come up with a way to avoid telling people the truth, they were going to act like Capper and Midas were two different people entirely, before she glanced at the other two kobolds, "You know, I never stopped to think about where we sit in comparison to the beings that call the other Realms of Oblivion home... it might be worth looking into later."

"Right... and how did you get to this realm? The barriers between Nirn and Oblivion have been sealed to prevent this sort of thing from happening... you can only come here by being summoned." the agent pointed out, which was a fair fact as Capper thought about it, as it was one of the few things they had learned before the demise of their clan by Maven's command, but it wasn't something they were worried about since his powers seemed to just go beyond the norm, "And say I believed you about there being another Daedric Prince... where have they been all this time?"

"Maybe they didn't want to be involved with everything their brothers and sisters were doing? I really don't know, since one cannot understand a Daedric Prince." Capper stated, which was another fact they had learned so far, that people were often driven mad when they tried to understand a Daedric Prince, especially the Prince of Madness, before he carefully removed the Sword of Jyggalag from his bag while the agent wasn't looking, "We also found the artifact of the Prince of Order, who seems to have lost it when he last clashed with Sheogorath... I imagine if Jyggalag is out there, not communicating with us, whose to say there aren't other Princes we aren't aware of yet? And besides, we know that Midas is more than the Prince of Greed, he's also the Prince of New Beginnings, as these three used to be bandits before they were transformed... and we've also found golden soul gems, which means the person was marked by Midas in some manner."

Despite the fact that the agent was caught off guard by that statement, which was understandable considering that there was a set amount of Princes and here they were revealing to him that two more existed, one that had been known at one point in the past and one who was only now surfacing. The presence of the Sword of Jyggalag made the figure conflicted, as if he wasn't supposed to be doing anything with the daedra, but here he was jotting down notes and writing things down as the kobolds told him about the Opulent Lands, painting the picture of a rich and vibrant realm that was full of wealth, just like Capper wanted. Such a thing made him think back to what Ithelia said, about 'one Prince to another', and that made him wonder if there was a third Prince out there that would really mess up the Thalmor and the rest of Nirn, since they were so used to the established number that everyone seemed to be worshiping these days. All of this made it hard to tell if the elf thought they were liars or not, but he seemed to actually believe that there was another Prince out there and that he, one of the Thalmor, had learned of him first, meaning they could hold this over the Empire's head.

In fact the agent asked about what sort of artifacts this new Prince had, where Mah Oh told him that while they didn't know what Midas' relics were called they knew there were two right now, the first being the special ring he wore and the second being his golden greatsword.

"There must be an artifact somewhere in his realm that harbors a connection to his other title, the 'Lord of New Beginnings'," the agent commented, which would have explained the sudden arrival of the golden soul gems, as Capper found a chance to make one with a skeever that decided to attack the carriage, so the Thalmor agent could study it up close, and they found that he was just absorbing all of this with a lot of interest, "Once you three find your way back to the Opulent Lands I want you to ask your superiors a number of questions... like 'what is Midas' Summoning Day', what are his artifacts called and what do each of them do, and a few others that I'll leave with you. When I'm done in Winterhold I'll be returning to my post at the Embassy, so if you have a chance to return to the Opulent Lands, and I do hope you do, send them there and make sure they're addressed to 'Alerion', which is my name."

Despite being a Thalmor agent Capper found that the high elf was actually rather chill and open minded, which was nice to see since some of the others in his order seemed like they would tear their heads off for even mentioning the fact that they were traveling with beings from a Plane of Oblivion and had an artifact from a Daedric Prince. Alerion proved to be a more interesting person to travel with, in fact he seemed to pull his hood back and just relax with them, chatting and learning a bit about them, even though he did seem to ignore the fact that some of them were thieves, one was a vampire, and that the others were focused on their own path. If he did notice those facts he sure didn't make a comment on them while La'nari directed the carriage towards Winterhold, eventually passing by the areas that the Seducer Clan had been in, which was now fully cleared out of items, which was due to Capper's insistence with the collector kobolds, to make sure no one collected all of the Saint or Seducer items. Such a thing reminded him that he had tasked a couple of them to head into the area that the Sword of Jyggalag was contained in, to make absolutely sure every golden and dark piece of gear was acquired so none of it could be used against the people of Skyrim.

Eventually, however, they passed by another necromancer fort, which again ignored them, before reaching the tiny domain of the College, as Winterhold was literally a house, the inn, a trader, the Jarl's place, a few burned down buildings, and the stone bridge that went to the College, a bridge that looked like it was slowly crumbling away on the lower side.

Alerion wished them well and disembarked from the carriage, walking up to the lady that was on the start of the bridge, like a sentinel of some kind, where he talked with her for a few seconds before being admitted into the College, though while he walked along the bridge Azure, Midnight, and La'nari, plus two of the three kobolds, remained at the wagon. Capper simply followed Rarity and Mah Oh as they approached the lady, who was wearing what appeared to be master robes, destruction maybe, and seemed to be stopping people before they bothered the mages of the College, no doubt to see what they were up to or something. Sure enough she wanted to test the pair of mages, where she had Rarity use a fireball on the sigil that was behind her and tasked the kobold with using frostbite, though she didn't seem to care much for Mah Oh being a kobold, maybe something she would ask about later. Fortunately both figures were able to use their spells with ease, striking their target with ease, thus allowing them to follow the figure across the bridge and enter the College, all while Capper followed from a distance as everyone else headed into the inn, as he wanted to check out the place.

As it turned out the Master Wizard, the second under the Arch-Mage, gave the pair a short tour after arguing with a Thalmor agent who looked like he was utterly miserable, while Alerion seemed to be leaving with a smile on his face, since he had been able to deliver his missive, before the pair were able to join three other apprentices, a khajiit with a dark elf and a nord, who were listening to an older nord talk.

"Welcome, welcome! We were just beginning a new lesson, so please, stay and listen." the elderly mage said, welcoming the pair to the lesson without delay, even though he did seem interested in the fact that a new creature was among them, but for the time being he was focused on his lesson for the other apprentices, "As I told your fellow apprentices earlier, my name is Tolfdir, the master of Alteration Magic, and I am in charge of overseeing new apprentices, such as J'zargo, Brelyna, and Onmund, but you'll have to introduce yourselves after the lesson is over. Now, as I was saying before your new classmates joined us, the first thing I want all of you to understand is that magic is, by its very nature, volatile and dangerous... unless you can control it, it can, and will, destroy you in an instant."

Capper found that the female dark elf, Brelyna, seemed to point out that none of them would be here if they had no grasp of that concept, as if suggesting that they would have blown themselves up if they didn't understand the principle of magic that their mentor was trying to teach them. Tolfdir told her that he understood that each of them had the ability to control magic, but what he meant by his words was that he was talking about true control, a mastery that came from years of practice and study, and that he meant this to be a warning before something terrible happened to them. The male khajiit, who had to be J'zargo, was an impatient one and seemed eager to get started, something that really annoyed their teacher as he told them that their eagerness had to be tempered by caution, otherwise they would rush right into disaster. Even Onmund, the male nord, seemed offended by the fact that they weren't being taken seriously, despite the fact that they had only arrives a few hours ahead of Rarity and Mah Oh, so since this was their first lesson there was no way Tolfdir knew what their previous education was like and they were lashing out at him for wanting to start with safety as their first lesson.

Tolfdir sighed as he continued with the lesson, which seemed to be based on ward magic, which he told them was from the Restoration School and was an invaluable tool in a mage's arsenal, as it allowed them to block incoming magic, a barrier of sorts, and since none of them knew how to use that spell he taught them the most basic of wards. Following that he had the group take turns practicing with their new spell, which involved standing across from him, as he stood on one of the circular floor symbols and had the apprentices stand on another one, and calling forth the ward that he showed them all how to use. Once all of them knew how to call forth the lesser ward, and he approved of how they maintained their spells, he told each of them to hold the spell up as he hurled a few small fireballs at each of them, allowing the others to watch before taking their turn with their mentor. The only one that required a change of approach was Mah Oh, since he had to shift where his fireballs were going due to her being a kobold, a target that was shorter than everyone else he had taught so far, but Capper did have to smile as the man told them that he was pleased with them.

As the lesson came to a close, however, Tolfdir informed them that the College was actually excavating the nearby ruins of Saarthal and that it would be an excellent learning opportunity for all of them, so he was going to continue the lesson over there and beckoned for them to follow, causing Capper to smile as he wondered what Rarity and Mah Oh would learn next from their mentor.