I approach Solitude, excited to see what it's like. So far, three out of the four cities I've visited have been pretty drab--Riften, Windhelm, and Dawnstar. Rat-infested warrens, snow-blasted stone hovels, and a sleepy pile of shacks on the edge of a glacier. Whiterun was okay. If the pattern holds, the more sympathetic a city is to the Imperials, the prettier they are.
So I guess Solitude should be amazing.
And it certainly is. I walk in during the middle of an execution of some guy. I'm wary at first, since I don't mix well with the super-judicial types, but then I find out what this guy did. Turns out he let my king, Ulfric Stormcloak, escape Solitude after he assassinated the real High King. So this guard here is partly responsible for the Nose-itocracy back home?
I'm going to enjoy this.
I love this city.
It gets better, too. While I'm inside the local alchemist's, randomly mashing everything in my pack together in the hopes it makes something worth selling, another Argonian tells me to have a word with him. I find him outside and we talk.
He tells me about a heist going down soon with some buddies of his. They're going to ground a ship by putting out the lighthouse, then take the spoils. Now, that sounds like piracy to me, and I have a history with pirates, but I consider both sides of the issue.
Working with a marshfriend to steal shiny things from Noses? Pro.
Actually, there's no cons--I think working with a marshfriend to steal shiny things from Noses pretty much trumps anything. I agree to his job, but first attend to my original reason for coming to the city.
I meet with Legate Rikke, who tells me I'm free to join the Legion provided I can do something for them. To my dismay, it doesn't involve killing Stormcloaks--just bandits. A fortress full of them. Alone.
I'm sensing a pattern here.
But it's nothing I haven't done before, so I check in with a few more shops and head out to the fortress.
It then occurs to me that I don't know where it is.
Nope, this isn't it. And the elves inside don't answer when I ask for directions. I consider casing the estate briefly--maybe there's something nice inside--but decide against it. I'm working for the Legion now, and their deadlines are probably tighter than those of my other employees.
But as I keep heading west, wondering where to find Fort Hraggstad, I see something very distracting.
As I approach the shiny light--or geyser?--a sonorous voice suddenly rips into my head. The voice introduces itself as someone called "Meridia", and tells me I have something of hers, some round stone thing I picked up a while back. I forget where. I offer to return it--no one would buy it anyways--but she's interested in something completely different.
They always are. As I stand in front of Meridia's statue, I'm lifted into the air by an unseen force. I nearly lose it completely, but I calm myself and take stock of the situation.
Hey, I can see Fort Hraggstad from here!
I completely miss what Meridia says--this is first chance I've had to actually see my place in the world, albeit in a blander, more literal, certainly scarier sense. But I do thank Meridia profusely when she finally lets me go.
On the way to Hraggstad, I meet another marsh...well, enemy.
He's psychotic, apparently, and sets upon me with all manner of catastrophic magical power. I kill him with some difficulty, but am very interested to learn that lizards can be magical. I'm not aware of any magical ability in myself, but I take the magical lizard's staff. Maybe I can use this instead.
My bow more than suffices at Hraggstad though. I'm an ace with the bow, and take out most of the fort's guards before they even realize what's happening.
When they finally do discover me, I give the staff a whirl.
It's fun, and I feel very powerful, but it's not any more effective than my knife and arrows. Less, even. I figure if I want to get all magical like my marshenemy, I'll have to do some serious training to see if I've really got an aptitude for this.
I head to the top of the Hraggstad tower and clean up the last sentry.
Only one guard remains outside, now. As usual, it's an orc. A seriously tough brute who resists mightily, despite the arrows I pour into him. But the arrows sure help.
I head inside the fort, eager for a second chance to be all stealthy again. Having found some fancy arrows on the body of one of the sentries, I try them out inside. They're wickedly effective, and I wonder where I'll be able to find some more. It's a shame I'm unable to get them out of the bodies without damaging them, but at least they do the trick.
It's creepy, actually.
So maybe I'm a bad thief, but I sure make a heck of an infiltrator. I wonder who could have more of this kind of work for me. Maybe after I help my pirate-marshfriend with his boat heist, I'll go pay a visit to Pajama-Girl.
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