Karliah and I, our business with the Guild finally over--well, for her, anyways; I'm a bar owner now--head out from the tomby temple place together.
But, seeing a nearby bandit hideout and feeling ready to test out my newfound powers from Nocturnal, we part ways. I watch her go, a bit fondly, now that her mask is covering her dog-awful face.
After clearing the hideout and heading north into the valley west of Whiterun, I realize, to my alarm, my vampirism had progressed--a passing hunter attacks me on sight, probably to extract my teeth and sell them on the black market. My black market!
The ignominy is sickening.
I suppose as long as I'm making the long walk north to kill my remaining Brotherhood target, some bard in Morthal, I ought to make it lucrative. I find a pair of giants and disabuse them of their souls, which are, unsurprisingly, bigger than everyone else's.
And then I kill their cattle. Because they also have souls. Also bigger. Unsurprisingly.
While harvesting the souls of the local wildlife, I find the cave that Kematu, the Redguard bounty hunter I met back in Whiterun, is hiding out in. I remember that Saadia promised to outpay him if I killed him, so I figure I'll make good on the deal. It's been several weeks, though...I hope Saadia is still okay.
I rip through the bandits inside the cave, scarcely stopping except to pull my arrows from my enemies' bodies.Â
The purity of my attack is interrupted, unfortunately, when some mage overhears the commotion and unleashes a flurry of fireballs into the passage in which I'm hiding, scorching my face and setting my robes alight.
It's hard to hide when on fire.
But Nocturnal comes in handy, again--I simply become invisible. And then it's business as usual.
Sadly, Kematu really throws a wrench into things when I find him at the back of the cave--he's gotten word I'm coming and there's no way I can ambush him. We talk about something but it basically just ends with a huge fight. I hold my own.
I'm not terribly used to being surrounded, though; I take down two of the Alik'r and am forced to retreat backwards, retracing my steps through the cave, trying to funnel Kematu's army through the narrower clefts in the rock.
Soon, only Kematu is left, and in a one-on-one, the vampire usually wins.
My work done in the cave, I continue my hike northward, picking up even more souls as I go. With the twilight at my back and an arrow in my bow, there is little I can't kill with one shot, and nothing I can't get the jump on enough to loose a second.
But after some time, it seems, I attract the attention of something infinitely greater than myself.
Or at least that's what I'm inclined to call the ghost of a dragon.
But if it looks like a dragon, fights like a dragon, and quacks like a dragon...it probably dies like one.
So, by the time I get to Morthal, I'm pretty tired and am ready to kill the bard and go to bed. To make matters worse, the sun's coming up in an hour and it looks like Morthal already has a vampire problem of its own.
As I skulk around the perimeter of the town, trying to spot the bard from afar so I can snipe him with my bow, the local miller is unfortunate enough to see me. And it doesn't bode well for his wife, either. The only permission I need to come inside is the door key.
So it's a sad night for the Miller family, but a halfway decent night for me. The sun's nearly up, but with my vampirism wrestled back under control, entering the inn is no problem.
And the bard is inside. Sleep tight.
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