Dear Diary,
We left Riften and headed north. I had traveled this way before but it had been quite some time. This time I was after Gunmar, a man Isran insisted on recruiting to the Dawnguard.
Other than a few wild animals the first half of the trip was fairly uneventful. Lots of reagent picking and watching a dragon circle to the west carefully. At one point we came to a ridge, and laughing back at Belrand I slid down the side of the craggy slope. To my surprise I landed on the top of some very old battlements of some forgotten ruin. Right in front of me on the round tower was a hatch to go lower, and to my right tucked into the mountain wall was a door that looked to go further up into the ruins and mountain.
I peeked over the edge of the tower and saw nothing and heard no one around, so I tried the door. It was locked, so I opted to go down into the tower.
I snuck quietly down the ladder and around the corner. There was a open gate with a dead farmer woman inside, I searched around but saw no evidence other than a note mentioning she had put up a fight. Through the darkness only lit by a campfire, I could hear a bit of rustling around the curve of the tower. I carefully crept forward and hard a rustling, some shouts, and then the clang of battle. The unmistakable call of Stendarr and a familiar's wolfish howl made me realize I had forgotten all about Belrand and he had tromped his way through the front door. I whispered to myself for him to hold on and drew Void. Coming around the bend I spotted my first target, a bandit with bow drawn. I quickly loosed an arrow, shocking him and dropping him to the ground.
I pushed forward just as the two other men got the upper hand on Belrand and pushed him down the stairs. I saw an open opportunity and as they turned to investigate this figure that just stood their eyes went wide. I shouted them not only down the stairs, but their bodies went airborne and flew to the other side of Belrand. As the meaner one landed I put an electric crackling arrow into him. Belrand rose, and with a massive clang of magical energy, steeled his conjured armor and charged with his ebony axe. The man reached up for forgiveness and out of fear, but Belrand was angry.
His conjured wolf disappeared, and he sheathed his weapon muttering something about foul bandits. We pressed on and found another door. This one went outside and to more ramparts and another tower-top hatch leading lower. I peeked over the edge again and saw a man leaning against a battlement half-wall. I knocked an arrow and let loose. It his it's mark and he cursed - drawing his own bow and looking for us. The three of us traded arrows for a few minutes, all missing, until Belrand's wolf almost knocked me off the edge, and I thought to forget it and meet this man outside. So we waved a white flag and went down into the tower.
Coming from a hallway to the side of the hall - an unusual break in the architecture from the rest of this building, we saw some lantern light and I peeked around the corner. There was a man sat huddled there. He seemed rather wimpy and in despair so I snuck up and talked to him. Turns out the bandits here had kidnapped his wife and were holding her here. I worried that the woman in the prison cell before was her, and was about to say something when he handed me a key he had stolen. I figured I was going to check on that top door anyway, so I would wait and report on the way back down. I mentioned the bandits outside and told him to hide.
We ran back up to the very top and entered the door I could not before. A woman was sitting there indeed, but she was clearly a bandit. She saw us instantly and spoke - turns out she was the wife of the man, and she had seen him creeping around outside. She wanted nothing to do with him, gave me her wedding ring and told me to tell the man whatever I liked.
As I turned I considered killing the woman, since if I had to tell the man she was dead it might as well have been the truth, and she was a bandit after all. However I decided against it while he was still around, and went back down to him. I told him we found her but she was dead, and there was her ring. He was saddened, but at least he had closure. I would rather have told him the truth, but I just couldn't find the words. We left ahead of him and saw the bandit out front was dead. The wolf must have made it all the way down and taken care of him without me knowing.
We camped out in some bedrolls, as it was late. I lamented for a second wasting almost a full day here, but quickly realized this man was safe and had closure, and that was worth it. But time to steel my focus. The next day we headed north to find Grunmar. He was where Isran said he would be, hunting for some bear. A bear I could certainly take care of, and did. Grunmar was thankful and agreed to head south.
Seeing the next mark on the map being somewhere between Solitude and Markarth, I headed to Windhelm to catch a carriage. We did so, doing a bit of shopping, catching up with friends and just enjoying the city before dusk. The next day we took a carriage to Solitude and stopped at home for a bit.
Tomorrow - south to find this other person for Isran.
Until next time,
- ST
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