Morrowind Day 118 - In the Unlikeliest of Places

10 Evening Star

~~~

Today a solemn oath to never set foot in another sewer system after leaving Mournhold. I spent nearly the entire day in the filthy depths of the city and have little to show for it.

The day started promising. Fedris was very pleased that the goblins' war-chiefs and trainers were dead and rewarded me with a staggering fifteen thousand Septims in the form of fifteen small gold ingots. He had nothing for me to do and suggested I see Gavis Drin, the Archcanon of the Temple. Fedris said that the Archcanon had been in consultation with Almalexia, so I anticipated a much more grueling task than I received.

The Archcanon did not bother himself with anything approaching politeness. Upon receiving me in his office he commented that I smelled like I was familiar with the sewer system, but that it was a good sign, for he required that I go deep into the ruins of Old Mournhold once again.

I should have walked out.

He explained that there was an ancient shrine known as the 'Shrine of the Dead' within Old Mournhold that used to allow the Dunmer to speak with their ancestors in order to receive counsel and grow wise. With much of Almalexia's attention drawn to the difficulties on  Vvardenfell the shrine grew corrupted and drew powerful undead to it that neither Almalexia nor King Helseth wanted to dedicate warriors to eliminate. The elimination was now up to me to accomplish.

But I was not alone! Assigned to me was an acolyte named Urvel who would perform the ritual required to 'cleanse' the shrine of its affliction. Once we both left the Archcanon's office he stammered that he was completely unsuited to combat and doubted his ability to survive the city's sewers. I readily agreed and offered to clear the way to the shrine if he would wait in the temple's basement where the entrance to the relevant sewer was located. Relieved, he wished me luck as I descended, once again, in to the city's sewers. 

Rather than Helseth's brutish goblins, I had only to contend with Bonewalkers, ghosts, and skeletons, all of whom I could have bested with my eyes closed. The ruins in this part of the sewers were much more interesting than under Godsreach and better preserved too. It must have been quite a place before it was destroyed.

The shrine's undead were in the form of clothed skeletons that had some very powerful magicka at their command. Fortunately they were unarmed aside from their spells and were content to remain at a distance while I answered their spells with arrows. The silvered arrows cracked and shattered their bones, eventually loosening the energies that held their bodies together. Once the three undead shrine guardians were dead I turned around and walked all the way back to the Temple's basement to fetch Urvel.

Despite there being no opposition against our trip back to the Shrine, Urvel insisted on halting at every corner and doorway so that I could go far ahead to make sure the way was clear. This being a sewer built upon the ruins of a city, we cam in frequent contact with corners and doors, making the unopposed walk take twice as long as the initial one I had to fight to complete.

At least he was able to perform his duty at the shrine quickly. It seemed all he did was wave his hands over the shrine, mutter some incantation, and walk back down the platform.

If I had any hope that Urvel would be more interested in leaving the sewers than imagining enemies around every corner it would have been quickly dashed. The man was just as terrified about absolutely nothing going back to the Temple as he was going away from it. By the time we were safely back in the Temple's basement it was well into the evening and Urvel simply stumbled off back to what I assume were his quarters with not a word of thanks to me. Nice guy.

The Archcanon was a bit more appreciative, though not to the tune of thousands of Septims. Rather my reward was a valuable Ebony spear that had been "blessed" by Almalexia, though if it was I could not tell. It was strongly enchanted, but I cannot tell with what. A good enough reason to visit Balmora, if I can get away from this city for a few days.

He also said he had nothing more for me to do, but that Fedris had more tasks for anyone looking to make some coin. I suspect Fedris had those tasks this morning, but I was diverted to the Archcanon for some sort of evaluation.

Unsurprisingly, Fedris's latest task is for me to go back into the sewers after an artifact called 'Barilzar's Mazed Band', an ancient ring that Fedris said has lost all of its power. He said that Almalexia had a personal interest in recovering the ring, but that he did not know why. Her personal interest did not, of course, extend to sending her own guards into the sewers, so once again I am to go into the sewers.

I am thinking it may be better to simply live in the sewers and have a messenger run to the surface now and then to collect more work.

Thanks to Urvel, the relatively simple task of cleansing the 'Shrine of the Dead' took nearly the entire day. The Band will have to wait until tomorrow. 

Morrowind Day 117 - Backtracking and Sidetracking

9 Evening Star

~~~

Too much of my time at Mournhold has been spent running errands that seem increasingly petty even if the person I am doing them for thinks otherwise. This morning I woke up with a part of yesterday still pending completion: the "apprehension" of the Nord known as 'Hloggar the Bloody'.

Inquiries among the Royal Guards patrolling the city pointed me downwards into the city sewers once again, specifically an area known as the 'West Sewers' off of the main Godsreach sewage system. Adventuring in Mournhold is apparently never a dignified affair.

Nor a lucrative one. The ladder in Godsreach leading into the sewers deposited me among a large pile of crates and barrels, but all of them were rotten and empty. Goblins, my dear old foes from Cyrodiil, were plodding about aimlessly just ahead, but had not noticed my arrival. After two of them dropped with arrows in their necks a short, but fierce, melee with the survivors was ensured. The long reach of Hircine's pike gave their stubby blades no chance of landing a blow. It was the first time I had fought against anything I had encountered in Cyrodiil, making me feel oddly wistful for my simpler days as I wiped blood off of my spear and armor.

Some of the goblins were accompanied by what could be best described as the Nix-Hounds' stronger, larger cousin. Whatever they were, they moved fast and hit hard, and were a much greater danger than their handlers, though fortunately far fewer in number.

My quarry was in an unfinished, or perhaps recently excavated, part of the sewer system, hiding in a small cave of his own. He was just as brash as I expected him to be, boldly asking me what I was going to do about him being a part of the conspiracy I had uncovered. I simply told him I had been sent to kill him, but would rather not if he would like to make some sort of escape.

He appeared confused for a moment, that laughed and called me one of the "good guys", as if such a thing actually existed. With a cheery wave, he activated an amulet of Recall he must have hidden on his body and disappeared from Mournhold, hopefully for a long time.

With all three of the conspirators "executed" I returned to Tienius to bring him the unfortunate news that all three of them had already made their escape, leading me to suspect a leak of information from within his guards. I received no reward, but then I had also failed to do what he asked, so I suppose that is fair.

Naturally he had yet another thing for me to deal with, this time to track down the author of the 'Common Tongue' pamphlet so that I could 'peacefully' force them to stop printing such obvious lies about their glorious King. I fear I am growing ever more cynical by the hour so long as I stay in this city.

The guards were of no help this time other than to suggest I stop wasting their time and start wasting the time of someone who knows about books and letters. The bookstore in the Bazaar was the obvious next step. In turn, the bookseller pointed me towards the pawnbroker, disdainfully stating that a person of 'shady reputation' such as he would be more helpful.

Shady reputation or not, the pawnbroker, an Argonian amusingly named 'Ten-Tongues Meerhat', was very helpful. Ten-Tongues makes it a point to personally know everyone in Mournhold, if such a thing is possible, but the name connected to the 'Common Tongue', Trels Varis, is not known to him nor to anyone else he asked. He first heard the name within the Craftsmen's Hall, so that was my next stop in this increasingly exasperating job.

I discreetly searched the Hall while pretending to view the wall tapestries and a particular door caught my notice as being very conspicuous owning to the large sign hanging on it that simply said "KEEP OUT". When I asked blacksmith about it he said that behind the door was a closet where he kept his more valuable supplies. He could not look me in the eyes as he said this, so I suspected there was more behind the door than ingots and hammers and a locked door is more an invitation to a Khajiit than a hindrance.

He was not lying, the door did open to a closet with a shelf of raw Ebony, but he failed to mention the trapdoor. The hinges were well-oiled and the door opened with barely a sound. The ladder descended only about eight feet and the sound of papers and whispers floated upwards. Confident of what I would find, I quickly climbed down the ladder and was confronted by four very surprised Dunmer, all of which comically looked away, pretending not to see me, save for Trels himself.

Trels asked me why I was in his well-kept secret office and threatened that my death was an acceptable way to keep it a secret. I revealed that I was there to get him to stop printing lies about the King, but he stated that he only printed the truth and there was nothing I could do to prevent him from continuing to print it.

My suggestion that three thousand Septims would stop him was met with disbelief, then suspicion, but I had not come unprepared: three sacks of coins, each holding one thousand Septims, was withdrawn from my pack and dropped on to one of his tables. I then announced that any further publications of the 'Common Tongue' would be met with a blade instead of coins. Trels assured me that he and his co-workers would move out of Mournhold immediately and I climbed back up the ladder, promising to return to the hidden office in two days.

Tienius was pleased that I had avoided bloodshed and awarded me my money back, plus an extremely valuable (and as always: heavy) two-handed Daedric sword he called "King's Oath". It is a nice gesture, but I am at a loss to decide how to dispose of it.

He had also finally run out of things for me to do, but my work had caught the attention of Queen Barenziah and I was asked to speak with her for further work in the name of the monarchy of Morrowind.

I knew the woman to be of high renown and have paged through her biography once, but other than that she was a complete mystery to me. I was allowed in her chambers and she welcomed me with the poise and grace I suppose a Queen would have to have. Her request was not to work for the monarchy, but for me to work for the Temple so that she would better know what they were up to. I doubted they would allow someone who has already worked for the Royal Guard's Captain, but I agreed to try. The Queen warned me that Almalexia's steward, Fedris Hler, was more than he appeared to be and was rumored to have been an assassin before coming to the Temple.

Assassin or not, Fedris either had not heard of my work for the Palace or he did not care, for he agreed to employ me in completing odd jobs for the Temple. I was picturing sweeping the steps or something equally mundane, but I was once again sent down into the sewers, this time to verify the rumors of an army of goblins being trained by King Helseth. Once I located their camp, I was also to eliminate the two goblin war-chiefs leading the tribes, as well as the two Altmer trainers, if I could find them.

This I had much less of a problem with compared to eliminating the King's conspirators. Goblins were an ever-present threat in Cyrodiil and their presence in large numbers always made for a rather bad day. Whatever his motives, I cannot see the King training an army of the creatures to lead towards anything good for Mournhold.

Asking around I was finally given the suggestion to look within the sewers of Godsreach, where the city's less reputable citizens reported seeing one or two of the nasty little monsters. It did not take me long to find a small camp of three goblins in the Godsreach sewers. They were surprisingly well-equipped, for goblins, each of them carrying a weak health restoration potion, but none of them were any more difficult than I expected.

The sewers ended at a section of wall that looked very different from the rest of the sewers. It was made up of very large stone blocks instead of the small, uneven bricks of the sewer. The thick metal door set into the stone screeched horribly as I forced it open and beyond lay the ruined city of Old Mournhold.

Old Mournhold could be called the 'original' copy of the city. I remember reading that long ago during the First Era, Mehrunes Dagon opened up portals to his plane of Oblivion, allowing his hordes of Daedra to quickly overwhelm the defenders of Mournhold. Two of the Tribunal, Almalexia and Sotha Sil, traveled to the besieged city and drove off the invaders, but not before the city lay in ruins. In time a new city was built atop the ruins of the old and the sewer wall may have been part of the original battlements from eras past. Now it was just a wet, leaky wall with a creaky door.

Beyond the wall lay the skeletons of adventurers long since dead, many of them crushed beneath rocks that had come loose from the ceiling above.

The door may have been a sally port, for the corpse-strewn corridor opened up to a giant plaza, just like the city above. Whatever it used to be, there were a dozen goblins using it as a campsite, eating hall, and toilet, all within a few feet of the other. Truly disgusting. The mouth of the corridor lay above the plaza, giving me a great vantage point to rain arrows upon them. The few that survived my barrage found themselves scrambling uphill into my spear. 

None of the goblins fit what I figured the war-chiefs would look like, so I proceeded through a door on the far side of the bloodied plaza. The door led me into a rough-hewn rock chamber with a waterfall that disappeared into the rock beneath me. Just beyond I found the first war-chief, a hulking brute of a goblin that surprised me by flinging a fireball at me. Fortunately the creature was relying on a weakly enchanted ring and the fire did little more than singe my fur. 

The second of them was further along the way and I dodged his fireball before spitting him on my spear. With both war-chiefs dead the goblin army was effectively leaderless and I had little doubt that a great battle would erupt among the goblins as they fought to decide upon their next chief. 

The two Altmer mercenaries were my next targets, but proved much easier to find. I slew the second war-chief in a small plaza with some half-ruined buildings on the far side and both trainers were staying in the same house. They well well-armed with Ebony weapons, but evidently neither had anything to be wary of and I was able to sneak up to them. The first Altmer died with a gurgling rasp as my simple steel dagger sliced across his throat and the second succumbed to close-range shot from my bow.

That was minutes ago. I have no idea how late in the evening it is, but it certainly feels like it has been a long day. I am bedding down in what might have been a room for one of the Altmers, but I think I will only take a short nap before making my way back up to the surface. It occurs to me that one of the scrolls that transports its user to the nearest Dunmer temple might have gotten me back to Mournhold, but I have no such thing. Something to keep in mind for tomorrow after I report back to Fedris.

Morrowind Day 116 - New City, Same Mundane Tasks

8 Evening Star

~~~

Mournhold, the city of Light and Magic! Prior to my assignment to Vvardenfell I had never seen a city outside of Cyrodiil, so I was excited yesterday to be visiting Morrowind's capital. Today's adventures have dispelled that excitement entirely.

The first indication of what the day was going to bring was an Imperial named Geon Auline. The man was standing in front of his home beseeching people to help him with a simple task and they were all shying away from him. I do not know what possessed me, but I walked up to him and asked how simple a task his was.

He was overjoyed that someone had stopped to talk to him and assured me that the task really was as simple as walking a few houses over. Geon is a collector of some sort and had a series of daggers in his possession that required only one more to be complete, something he called a 'Droth' dagger, whatever that was. This dagger was in the possession of a recently widowed neighbor of his, but she refused to sell him her husband's dagger. My task was to acquire this dagger and bring it to him.

As it turned out, the task was easier done than said. The widow's husband had been a Legionnaire and I told her I had come to pay my respects, even though I never knew the man personally. She was suspicious of me until I told her about my time in the Auxiliaries, after which she was rather hospitable towards me. She showed me her late husband's Legionnaire equipment, including a silvered dagger she herself called a 'Droth' dagger. I offered to buy it from her and we settled on a price of six hundred Septims. A very simple task.

My Khajiit instinct for bargaining served me well, for Geon paid me eight hundred Septims for the silver dagger. He laid it alongside three other identical-looking daggers arrayed together on his table and was immensely satisfied by the arrangement. I still have no idea what a 'Droth' dagger even is, but I have made myself two hundred Septims richer for it anyway.

As I left Geon's house I heard another hopeful soul asking for assistance. The coins clinking in my pack lent me a charitable sort of curiosity, so I approached the Breton myself and asked if I could be of any assistance.

The Breton introduced himself as 'Ignatius', a very Breton sort of name, and his request was fairly simple as well: he needed scrap metal from the Dwemer ruins underneath Mournhold to repair his Dwemer golems. I was rather taken aback that anyone would have such a thing, but he only had the small spider-like ones and he used them against one another in an arena that was quite a popular spectacle. Unfortunately, the latest arena match disabled many of his little automatons and he lacked the parts to fix them. His request was that I bring him any scrap metal I come across and I readily agreed should I find any.

I thought to stop in the local armory to have my equipment repaired and even the blacksmith had a complaint for me, but not one that I can do anything about. His newest apprentice has apparently deserted his post for the life of an adventurer and I was asked to refer anyone looking for work to his shop. Simple enough and my equipment was quickly repaired.

And that was not all. When I left the armorer's a man was walking around Godsreach, also asking for help. I cannot recall any of my time on Vvardenfell or Solstheim when so many people in such a small area needed something from someone. It certainly does not speak well of the province if the capital city has so many troubled citizens.

Alvan Llarys was his name and he asked that I go to the Sadri family manor with him to discuss his issue. It sounded a little odd, but I agreed, rationalizing that I could easily kill the man if this was his idea of a clever ambush. The mood inside the manor was that of a family mourning their dead and Alvan quietly pointed me towards a woman muttering and pacing at the far end of the room. Nothing she said made any sense to me, but Alvan said that she had been acting normally until she spoke with an enchanter named 'Elbert Nermane' at the Craftsmen's Hall here in Godsreach.

Elbert nearly had a fit when I asked him about the strange woman, but calmed down when I assured him I did not want him to visit her. No longer panicking, he shed some light on the poor woman's condition, explaining that she had found some Dwemer objects that she had wanted him to teach her to enchant. 

Eventually she asked him to visit her to continue helping with the objects and when he arrived at the manor he found the things were everywhere. On her urging he stepped closer to examine one, but it suddenly gave him a very bad shock and he ran out of the manor, the woman laughing behind him the whole time. That was the last he saw of her, for he admitted something about her scared him.

Alvan stopped me just outside the manor, very worried. He had stepped outside for some fresh air when he suddenly heard a scream from inside. An Ordinator had arrived on the family's request to guard the woman against herself while I was speaking with Elbert, but Alvan found that the door had been locked and no one was answering his knocking.

A simple Opening spell unlocked the door, but no one was home. The body of the Ordinator lay in the room, but no one else was present. Alvan rushed back outside to summon the guards while I examined the room for the exit the group had obviously taken.

I found a trapdoor emitting a foul smell in a small closet and opened it to reveal the city's sewer, explaining the particular odor I was smelling. Just inside the sewer lay the body of a woman that had been present the first time I visited the manor, but there were no indications as to why someone felt she had to die.

Further inside the sewers I found another trapdoor leading deeper into the complex, but a crate was resting on top of it and was too heavy for me to move. I found that turning a wheel in the room let water into the depression in the floor where the trapdoor lay, so I let enough water inside to float the crate off the trapdoor. After casting my water breathing spell I dove into the frigid pool and swam deeper into the city's sewer system.

The trapdoor led to a small chamber with another wheel-valve and trapdoor. The wheel thankfully drained the room of water, leaving me very cold and wet, but the second trapdoor opened up to a dry cavern.

Surrounded by cold, indifferent earth, I crept down the cavern and found the first of the devices Elbert warned me about. Mindful of his description of receiving a shock, I sneaked around it, but there were many more ahead of me to deal with.

I managed to avoid the enchanted Dwemer pots or whatever they were, but then I came to a long corridor in which the things were stuck into the walls, making it impossible to avoid triggering their hostile enchantments. 

Very careful experimentation revealed that they shot fireballs at anything nearby, so I simply ran as fast as I could down the dirt hall, fire exploding behind me. I am sure it made for a very adventurous sort of scene, but I was only wondering why I had bothered helping Alvan to begin with.

The lady that everyone had been troubled by was waiting for me in a large room at the end of my fiery gauntlet. She screamed that she had rid herself of the others and would rid herself of me too, so that nobody but her would have "it"...whatever that was. 

We were a fair distance apart and she picked up a Daedric bow and a sheaf of arrows I had not noticed laying on the ground next to her. Before I could react I was dodging surprisingly expensive Ebony-tipped arrows inexpertly shot in my direction. Poor of a shot though she was, even a glancing hit from such a powerful weapon would cause me grievous harm, so I dispensed with my usual strategy of creeping into melee range.

I was confident that my skill with a bow was greater than hers, even if I had a simple Bonemold bow and steel arrows against her Daedric war-bow and Ebony arrows. Her full suit of volcanic glass and steel armor made my task even more difficult, but eventually I managed a lucky shot right into her throat, ending the poor lady's madness forever. I left her weapons and armor with her and dashed back through the corridor of fire traps.

When I finally stepped outside the manor into Godsreach I found Alvan nervously waiting for me. He said that the guards had come and removed the Ordinator's body, but refused to descend into the sewers, not that I can blame them. I told him of my dangerous trek through the sewers, ending with the unfortunate death of his friend. He took the news well, only commenting that she was likely too far gone to save. I never learned her name, nor what "it" was, but this sad story is over.

One of the larger buildings in Godsreach is a nearly empty museum that the curator tells me is the 'Museum of Artifacts'. The goal is a lofty one and there are many pedestals to display artifacts upon, but right now there is only a single artifact: a largely useless weapon called 'Stendarr's Hammer'. The hammer was massive, larger even than the Sixth House's massive bell hammers and I was told it took four men to lift it on to the display pedestal. I am promised a decent price for any artifacts I sell to the museum and I was given a list of ones the curator is interested in. I believe I have two already: the Fang of Haynekhtnamet, which I found in a Sixth House base and the Boots of Blinding Speed, which were given to me by someone with a unique sense of humor. But I do not have them with me and their sale will have to wait.

My last order of business was to find out who the "H" was who contracted with the Dark Brotherhood to kill me. I suspect it is King Helseth himself, but only because there is no one else whose name begins with an 'H' that would have any reason to want to see me dead. Why the King would is a mystery, but one I am intent on solving.

Naturally the King himself is unavailable to be spoken with by just anybody, but his Captain of the Royal Guard, Tienius Delitian, is. I chose to approach him with the contract I found on the body of the Dark Brotherhood assassin and the Captain did more to confirm my suspicions than any amount of searching I could have done.

He outright admitted that the King, for some reason, saw me as a threat and issued the contract against me. Tienius then rushed to tell me that the best way to solve this little misunderstanding was to prove my "loyalty" to the throne. I suspected he merely saw an easy way to take care of some of his own problems and I was absolutely right.

In order to prove my loyalty to King Helseth I first had to speak to the people of Mournhold to determine how they felt about King Llethan's death. Most of the people I spoke with were hesitant to talk ill of the new King, but several spoke more openly about their belief that King Llethan's death was not a natural one. I was given a pamphlet called 'The Common Tongue' that described several suspicious deaths of Helseth's rivals in the West and accused him of being responsible for the deaths of over a hundred people.

Tienius was pleased to receive the pamphlet, though I cannot say how he has failed to find one until now, they are all over the Great Bazaar. His next task was for me to find someone in the Temple that could act as an informant. Tension between the Court and the Temple has been rising recently and Tienius lacks someone to give him inside information, as it were. I thought it unlikely that anyone would trust me enough, but I agreed to give it a try.

As it turned out, I did not need someone to trust me, I just needed to be someone that looked like they would listen. I was allowed to speak with everyone at the Temple and as I was talking with a Dunmer who I shall not name here, I noticed that she seemed sad. When I asked her if there was anything I could do for her, words suddenly rushed out of her. She was doubtful of Almalexia's benevolence now, whereas before she celebrated the return of the Tribunal among mortals, she now felt that there was a cloud over Almalexia's head. She described the demi-god's words as "dark and bitter" and feared what the future held for the Temple.

She also stated that King Helseth was not and would never be accepted by the Temple and that a violent confrontation between the Court and Temple was inevitable. I thanked her for speaking openly with me and she agreed to contact me should anything important occur.

I was hoping that was the end of Tienius little loyalty tests, but he had another job for me. After thanking me and frowning a lot over my news from the Temple, he confessed that he had doubts regarding the loyalty of some of his Royal Guards. The new King does not seem to be an inspiration kind of person. 

As before, I was asked to bring people into my confidence so that I could determine where the disloyalty among the Guards lay. It was suggested that I pretend to be from House Hlaalu and looking to join the Guards, laughable as that was to me. But Tienius felt that would be enough of an opening for a fool to reveal himself to me, so that is what I pretended to be.

One guard, Ivulen Irano, suggested that I speak with Aleri Aren about my Hlaalu connections, but not to mention either himself or Aleri to Tienius. Not very subtle. When I spoke to Aleri she denied any knowledge of why my being Hlaalu would mean anything to her and promised to have a word with Ivulen about it. Even more suspicious! Following a hunch, I went to the guards' quarters and looked around a bit. Sure enough, there was a note penned by Aleri which specified when she, Ivulen, and another guard named Milvela were stationed together in the throne room. I decided this was incriminating enough to give to Tienius.

And that was still not enough! Yet another task was waiting for me when I returned! It is a wonder the city has not already collapsed upon itself with no Khajiit rushing to and fro solving all of these stupid problems. But if this is what I have to do in order to confront Helseth, then I will put up with Tienius's petty jobs.

Again another similar job to the last, this time to uncover disloyalty among the Hlaalu nobles residing in Mournhold.  Tienius asked me to visit the late King's widow's home in Godsreach, Llethan Manor, to see if I could uncover some evidence of a conspiracy to overthrow Helseth. Given what I had been learning of the man I thought this entirely possible.

The manor was unguarded and the object of my quest in plain sight. This too was a letter, penned by a person named 'Bedal Alen' to a 'Forven Berano'. It explicitly stated that the Dunmer assassins, the Morag Tong, would be contracted for an attempt on King Helseth's life and that if they failed, Forven himself would have to become the assassin. And this letter was not hidden at all! I am glad people seem to be a great deal stupider in Mournhold. 

Tienius wrote three official writs of execution for Forven, Bedal, and a Nord called 'Hloggar the Bloody'. To make a long, boring story much shorter I tracked the first two of the three down and told them to leave Mournhold forever, lest death stalk them. The pair nearly wept with relief and left the city immediately. I do not mind helping Tienius prop up his crooked King, it is of no great concern of mine either way, but I will not murder for him. He wanted these people gone and so they are. Should I be questioned, I shall only say that someone must have warned them prior to my coming, for they had already fled. I need only find Hloggar now, but the night was already old when I started on this venture, so he will have to wait until tomorrow.