Assignment Skyrim Borders: Fear and Loathing in the City of Stone

  • Music (for Bilal): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nivjYuX4C7s&feature=related  For best results, start this music playing around the fourth paragraph.

    Let me tell you what I imagined would happen in Markarth:  I would find the famous scholar Calcelmo, and show him my collection of Dwemer artifacts.  He would be so impressed he would invite me to visit his famous Dwemer museum, and perhaps even tour his dig site under the city.  Finally, he would invite me up to the famous Wizard’s Balcony overlooking Markarth, where I would find Markarth 001, the primary benchmark for this valley.  Maybe he would even help me with the surveying.  After taking a couple of shots at the surrounding ridgelines, I would finish up my stimulating conversation with Calcelmo, and then repair to the inn for my cups and a comfortable bed.  The following day would be nothing but R&R.

    I’ve already told you about my first hour in Markarth, in which I was almost arrested and my entire collection of Forsworn war gear was confiscated.  Believe it or not, it was all downhill from there.

    My fantasy started breaking down when I met Calcelmo: “I’m a busy man.  I have no time to look at your knick-knacks.  Why does every pothunter in three countries think I can examine their junk?  Sell it to the smith.  I tell you what, there’s a giant frostbite spider that’s preventing our work from going forward.  You take care of my pest problem, and you can have the keys to the museum.  And you can wander around in the dig as long as you want.”

    My face reddening, I clamped my mouth shut and recalibrated the situation.  If I couldn’t make friends with Calcelmo, then I required the keys to the museum to reach to the Wizard’s Balcony.  Guess I’d better kill a spider.

    I did manage to purchase some spell books from him in exchange for my novice hood and a couple of books I’d picked up along my way.  My mother would be happy with that trade. She wanted me to study magic at Old Imperium—said I should have at least one useful skill to fall back on.  When I told her surveying was an honest trade, she just got that look. 

    Anyway, I went on into the ruins—which were astounding—and killed a spider. Calcelmo neglected to mention there was more than one.  I was picking at a mineral deposit in the floor with a rock hammer and a brush when a second spider was attracted by the noise.  Turns out the ruins were lousy with them, and the mother of them all—the one with the name and reputation—was the size of a small house.  I only survived because she was too big to squeeze down the corridor.

    Having killed the spiders, I thought I might get a chance to look at the ruins, but I stepped through a door and turned a corner, and ran smack into this shambling, hideous, eyeless elf-like thing, and I decided the seeing the ruins wasn’t worth it.

    Calcelmo gave up the key, and I headed over to the famous Dwemer museum.  I took my time in the museum, enjoying the displays before using Calcelmo’s key to let myself into his lab.  I was pretty sure I wouldn’t be welcome there, and there was a guard making rounds, so I tried not to be noticed.  Yet there were all these intriguing steamworks around, and I just couldn’t stop myself from turning a dial to see what would happen.

    A series of propellers popped up out of the floor and chopped the guard up into four separate pieces.  Sweet Stendarr! I thought, What do I do? I am so screwed! 

    I couldn’t think through my panic, so I tried the door I believed led to the Wizard’s Balcony.  It was locked and Calcelmo’s key wouldn’t work.  I bolted back out the way I came, and quick-walked my way out of the dwemer museum, and then straight past Calcelmo’s workstation and keep walking.

    The lane dead-ended at the door to the local catacombs.  The priest of Arkay stopped me and told me the “Hall of the Dead” was closed because something had been gnawing on the remains.  The small hairs went up at the nape of my neck, and I started to turn back, but then I told myself it was probably just rats, and I promised him I’d investigate if he let me cut through the Hall.

    Into the catacombs I went, and I was more than halfway across when I heard a voice echoing from everywhere saying something about the “smell of fear.”  A woman appeared from the shadows and asked me the first time I had tasted human flesh.  I fled out the nearest exit, screaming.  I slammed the door behind me, and covered my heart with my hand, gasping for breaths. 

    I found myself on a narrow alley perched on the cliff face, overlooking the city, the sound of a waterfall roaring in my ears, night air fresh in my lungs, the lights of Markarth spread out before me.  My heart rate began to slow.

    All at once, another door on the alley behind me burst open. I turned to see a mob in Forsworn leathers and feathers flooding out, ululating war cries and weapons raised over their heads.  I was backed up empty handed against a steep drop off, and my life flashed before me.

    The howling Forsworn ignored me, racing down the steep steps and fanning out to attack and slaughter the guardsmen that converged from every quarter.  As I stared in stunned silence at the carnage unfolding below me, a figure appeared at my shoulder. I jumped a little, but she ignored me, dispassionately watching the battle. She was a young orc, petite—almost pretty—but with an expression of intense disgust disfiguring her features. “This city be cursed,” she muttered. “Nothing good is left in this place.” Below us, the Forsworn forced their way out the main gates, leaving blood and screaming in their wake.  The orc girl sighed and walked away without another word.  I don’t think she ever realized I was there.

    This day was terrifying and exhausting, so I checked myself into the Silver Blood Inn, looking forward to a soft, comfortable bed for the first time in two weeks.  That’s when I found out that the beds in Markarth are made of stone, and the Silver Blood Inn is infested with gigantic rats.  

Comments

3 Comments
  • Piper Jo
    Piper Jo   ·  April 19, 2012
    You are right, and I shall have to add a theme song in to this post!
  • Kynareth
    Kynareth   ·  April 18, 2012
    Oh, and Durz and Lucy were so close!!  I love the extra arc in these past few episodes, playing against Forrest's mission focused mind.   I liked reading about Lucy from a different perspective, as we really had everything first hand from her.  
  • ricardo maia
    ricardo maia   ·  April 18, 2012
    Great storyline, killer ending. The story of Forrest`s frustrated expectations about... really everything is always enjoyable, and his meeting with his soulmate Cacelmo could bring nothing but hilarious trouble. And that great jest about stone beds was th...  more