"Wait! Stop! Stop her!" cried a stern voice as we darted out the door. Outside, the two soldiers looked at us suspiciously, and in hearing their comrade's shout, drew their weapons. I shuffled my feet, trying to look confused and bewildered, but they were advancing on us threateningly. The bandage around my head slipped down to my neck, and I hastily pushed it back into place.
One of the soldiers looked at my face and his eyes ignited in recognition. "It's her! The Bosmer with the clan tattoo! The one with the bounty!"
I snatched at Derkeethus' hand. "RUN!" I roared, fear pushing energy into his body. He barked something unintelligible, and we were pushed through the air some feet away from the men, who had been closing in on us. Stumbling, I picked up the pace, irritably ripping the bandage from my head and casting it into a nearby brazier as we ran.
Heavy footsteps thumped and jangled after us. Down the stairs we scrambled, Derk's armor making an awful racket, especially when the plated skirt brushed the stone railing in a terrible screech of metal. The discordant sound garnered the attention of the merchants setting up their wares, and all in the marketplace below us stared balefully at our progress down the bluff.
Once at street level, I cast about wildly for a place to hide.
"Stop criminal scum!"
"We have you now!" one of the soldiers panted somewhere at the top of the stairs. A city guard passing by turned and made for us, his face tense.
"What's going on here," he demanded, readying a short-hafted axe. Panicked, I felt trapped with no place to climb or hide and no weapon with which to defend myself.
"This way!" my friend exclaimed, pulling me into a stumbling jog behind him. We headed to the right, back towards the main gate.
"There's no way we can leave that way! They'll catch us in the bottleneck down the hill!" I cried, managing to find my rhythm and follow him down the street. Shops flanked us on either side, their whitewashed walls and clay tile roofs glowing in the early morning sun. People began to trickle out of the inn, the drunkards squinting and swearing lowly in the light. The commotion began to draw their attention towards the running guards, then towards us.
With an rude yank on my arm, Derkeethus flung me into a hay stall situated behind a small tree. He scrambled in after me, cursing his bulky armor. Together we hid in the shade, covered head to toe in bits of straw and panting heavily. For a few tense moments we crouched, peering through the hay bales we saw the soldiers and the guard run past, then stop.
"Where'd they go?" They began to search the area, and finding nothing, they strayed over to the hay stall. Experimentally, one of the soldiers stabbed into a bale. The point of his blade appeared a finger's breadth from the side of my head. Clapping my hands over my mouth, I stifled a gasp of surprise. They continued to probe the hay, and every moment fear and panic set deeper into my mind. My friend wasn't helping either as he shook in his armor, sharing the same fear.
It's over. We're going to be caught. They're going to kill us. We should stand up now. Stand up NOW. Beg for a pardon. Something... his thoughts crowded into my head, circling about like a swarm of angry bees. I heard him rustle in the hay, moving to get up.
No! Don't! I thought fiercely back at him, and in my hurry to stop him, I upended my will into his as power burned in my chest and rode up my spine in a line of liquid fire. Derk's mouth opened to speak, but what came out was nothing more than a whisper of a whisper.
"Please! Please don't hurt us! We'll do whatever you say. J-just don't kill us..." said my friend's voice, but it originated from beyond the city wall where the front gate was just started to close. The soldiers and guard stumped by, storming out the gate to the city and down the hill. When the door shut with a clang, we dared to heave a sigh of relief.
We need a better hiding place, I thought, looking out from our spot. There was a shop across the street with a large awning. Its sign depicted a needle and thread. And a new disguise.
Townsfolk milled about as their morning routines picked up their paces. A priest sat on a nearby bench and munched on a loaf of bread. A tradesman strode down the street, a mission on his mind. Leaning against the pillar of another building relaxed a man in tattered clothing. He looked right at us. For a moment I thought he might have been staring off into space, then held up the tip of one finger. Wait. It suggested.
I tapped Derk on the arm and nodded towards the man. Together we watched him keenly. He broke our eye contact and glanced about. "A septim for an old war veteran?" he asked the tradesman, who, seeing his disheveled appearance veered away from him and headed towards the market. When the man was gone, he held up another finger. The priest on the bench shifted to speak with a passerby who stopped to ask for directions. Then, the beggar quickly jerked his head minutely towards the shop.
This is it, Derkeethus thought. And we bolted across the street as quietly as we could, flattening ourselves in the doorway of the awning. I nodded to the raggedly dressed man, meaning to thank him later. Cracking open the door as much as we dared, we slipped inside.
"Can I help you?" sneered an Altmer woman behind the counter. Her expression deepened from mild disgust into outright revulsion the longer she looked at us. Beside me, I felt Derkeethus tense as rage rumbled through his body, and it only increased when the Altmer's eyes drifted coolly over my figure. "If you are looking for clothing, forget it. I do not clothe such filthy...people in my fine garments. Unless you'd like to use the downspout in the back, then I might consider accepting your patronage."
"Listen. We've been chased, hauled through the dirt, harried, accused, and almost arrested. I don't give a damn if you think we're too dirty to wear your clothing. You'll take our gold and we'll take our wares," he snapped, and I goggled at him.
You'll surrender to a bunch of soldiers, but stand here and intimidate a shopkeeper? Very gentlemanly, Derk. I thought scathingly, fixing him with a cold glare. He sighed heavily. The Altmer only regarded us with the same disconnected, chilly dislike.
"We'll be back in a moment," he grumbled. Behind the store was a spout that ran rain water off the roofs and into a half-rotted barrel. We cleaned as much of the pig's blood and muck from our faces and bodies as we could. The water was freezing, and we didn't make much progress.
"This is probably for the best, Derk. We have to get into the Blue Palace, and whatever disguise we use won't work if we look like we're a bunch of shabby beggars," I said softly, trying to redirect his anger. However, my own irritation at the woman's treatment did little to mislay his reaction.
Slipping back inside, I leaned on the counter and gazed steadily at the shopkeeper. "Whatever you may think of us, we need something other than these uniforms."
"Clearly," she replied with a smirk. I managed a half-smile in return, though my top lip threatened to twitch into a snarl. Must she be so rude?
"We're heading to the Blue Palace, but not as members of the court. What do you recommend?"
Stepping back from the counter, she examined us, circling about like a vulture before coming to rest at the counter once more. "Nothing. There is nothing that would be suitable for such an esteemed palace," she said at last.
"Nothing? There has to be something," the Argonian hissed, clearly displeased.
"Unless..." Without explaining further, she retreated to the back room where I heard her rummaging through crates and drawers for several minutes. When she returned, she placed two sets of clothing in front of me. "Odar, the chef in the palace, has been looking for an apprentice. However, for one reason or another, no one has been good enough to satisfy him. He was expecting another hapless fool along last week, but they never showed." She pushed the white and grey dress towards me.
"Me? But, I don't know how to cook," I protested.
"Yes, well we can't have an Argonian slumping around a palatial kitchen, now can we," she smirked, eyeing my friend sardonically.
"And why not?" he groused.
"Regardless of your standing in the world, sir, Argonians are seen as little more than indentured servants in this land. Or thieves just waiting to be convicted. Seeing as you're already in trouble, an indentured servant is all you'll ever be." Derkeethus clicked his teeth in fury, but the Altmer didn't respond to his silent threats or his intimidating stature. Instead, she shoved the reddish, brown clothing into his arms and pointed him towards the back room.
We both marched down the hall, turning our backs to each other as we changed. The Imperial armor was disposed of in a crate and tied shut with twine. I returned to the shop first, smoothing the dress and adjusting the ridiculous hat that felt like a deflated sheep's bladder on my head. Out of my peripheral vision, the red clan tattoo on my cheek glared brightly. "Is there anything to cover this up?" I asked.
"Bosmer. Wouldn't know cosmetics if it bit them in the rear," she sighed, clicking her tongue. She passed me a small jar of some foul-smelling salve flecked with iridescent flecks of insectile chitin. "It will hide the mark for a few hours." When I made to hand the jar back to her, she shook her head and pushed it back towards me. "Oh, no. You have to purchase the entire jar."
With a swear, I put it into the front pocket of the dress as Derkeethus appeared from the back. He was adorned in a strange garb I had only seen worn by Redguard travellers. His head was covered by a white cloth. I could sense he was still unhappy. "At least you'll be my indentured servant," I smiled, trying to lighten his mood. It's only for a little while, Derk. We'll be out of here before the day is out, I'm sure of it.
"At your service, milady," he replied with a mock-bow, though I could feel the tension radiating from him. After haggling for several minutes more, we paid for the new disguises and left as the soldiers and guard came bursting in. They glanced at us, then resorted to arguing with the shopkeeper about searching her place for fugitives. We hustled out the door before they could get a second look at us.
"Three hundred and twenty-two septims for a couple of uniforms. What a waste. It's just flat-out extortion!" my friend cried as we headed down the street.
"She was going to charge us more, you know. To dispose of the armor," I reminded him. "We're lucky we got what we did." I didn't have the heart to tell him I picked up something else to change into once being a chef no longer functioned. Passing the beggar from before, I slipped dried food and a few septims into his pocket, much to the Argonian's dismay. "Thank you," I murmured as we passed.
"Mara bless you," he said. We continued on our way, Derkeethus gloomily considering how little money we had left.
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