All-Flag Rangers: Part XVII, Into Valenwood
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Valenwood, 4E 97
“I don’t like this.”
“You don’t have to like this," Furioso said in a calming tone, "As a legionnaire I would assume most of your job consists of doing things you’d rather not be doing.”
“Certainly, but this is something else. This isn’t Argonia or Elsweyr, independent but neutral nations we can just waltz around in," Aurelius kept glancing from side to side, as if expecting a bunch of high elf soldiers to apparate all around them, "This is Valenwood we’re heading into, it’s Dominion territory and they’ve had closed borders for almost seventy years. Just going in is illegal, especially as Imperial agents.”
“It’ll be fine Captain, where we’re heading the Dominion presense is fine, very fine. It’s wild, even for Valenwood," the moth priest stretched and yawned, "Plus we have one of the world's oldest and most skilled assassins, a monk that looks like a housecat, and a sword-singer who can move as quiet as the wind, not to mention whatever skills Dagot-Ei elects to download from his trees. I think we'll be quite fine at going unnoticed."
"We also have a minotaur and a nord tongue. Silence isn't gonna be a strongsuit, and Dagoti-Ei needs time to digest his new skill before he can use it."
"Aurelius, we are the All-Flag Rangers, not the Imperial Rangers. Empire, Argonia, Elsweyr, and Dominion, all the nations of Tamriel united."
"Not that the Dominion will know about it."
"Surely not."
The two continued arguing, Iszir on Furioso's other side grimacing with every mention of the southwestern empire. The group grew nearer the border.
Meanwhile Alessandros walked a few steps behind the rest of the rangers, head hanging low. He was still thinking about the dream he’d had, or what he remembered of it. The minotaur shook his shaggy head, dragging a hand over his face. He was letting Michala and her cult get to him. He was not the son of a demigod and a saint, he was nobody, he was an abomination, a runt of a minotaur that even the other bull-men hated. There was no room in his head for illusions of grandeur - he couldn't even speak properly.
Alessandros jerked when he felt four points of light pressure on his back, then a shape slid over his neck. He turned his head and came face to face with S’basa, who was settling onto his shoulder with her tail wrapped around the back of his neck. She mewed and rubbed her cheek against his in a comforting, motherly embrace. Alessandros closed his eyes before the drops fell.
Up ahead Lagerta scooted close to Dram and whispered,
“What did the cat say to the bull?”
“Is this a joke?” Dram’s smile fell away at the nords hard stare, “Er, she said something along the lines of ‘don’t cry M’Alesh, the motherless son can share his sorrow with the sonless mother’, or something. I wasn’t really listenin’.”
“Why does it matter to you Lagerta?” Dagot-Ei said as he passed her a cup of tea. She accepted it gratefully,
“To make sure it is not mean. Little Kar has had enough meanness in his life.”
“I wouldn’ta expected you to be so caring El,” said Dram, “I thought you’d be more, put ‘em to the fire! trial by blood and sweat! no coddling the youth! ration the sweetrolls! and all that.”
Lagerta harrumphed, "I was born in a thunderstorm, and raised beneath sheets of ice. Some people do not need all that to be strong."
The rangers continued their seperate conversations as they left Elsweyr and walked into the shadows of the canopies of Valenwood.
~ ~ ~
"We do not need to ask again."
"Lagerta be reasonable. This isn't Falkreath. This place is massive, no one will think less of you for asking direc-"
"We already asked directions, there is no need to again," Lagerta kept walking as she spoke, a determined set to her shoulders, "the elf said to go north, if there is one thing I know how to do it is to go north."
"Lagerta that makes no sense at all," Aurelius continued, "you were born in Winterhold, the most northern part of Tamriel. You been going south your whole life."
Dram rolled his eyes, "This conversation is going south..."
Lagerta shook her head. "It does not matter if you are too stupid to know which way to go, there is nobody around to ask anyways."
"Y'ello." came a noise from somewhere above them.
"By the trees!" Lagerta yelled as she whipped out her handaxe, "An ambush!"
"By the trees?!" Aurelius said in frustration, "We're in a jungle woman, it's all trees!"
"That was a curse not directions you idiot."
"You guys look lost."
"Ah she is up there," Dagot-Ei pointed directly above them at a branch jutting out of a tree. There was a short wood elf with skin the color of peanuts crouched barefoot on the branch like a monkey. She was wearing what could only be described as a fur and leather bikini clasped with bones, and her brown-gold hair hung down her back, dreads tied into a ponytail by one of the locks. Hey eyes were completely black and there was a tiny bump on the tip of her pointy nose, like a rhino's horn. And she was beautiful.
"We are," said Aurelius and Dram together.
"We are not." Lagerta countered at the same moment.
"Where are you going?"
"It does not concern you." Lagerta snapped.
"Adamor," said Aurelius in the same breath.
The wood elf woman was quiet for a moment, her bare leg hanging off the branch swinging lightly in the breeze. Then she asked in a curious voice,
"Are you stupid?"
"What, no" said Aurelius.
"Yes, without doubt they are," said Lagerta.
"No one goes to Adamor, and you're going the wrong way anyways," the wood elf stood on the thin branch as confidently as if it were solid ground, "I expect whoever told you to go this way was trying to save your stupid skins."
"We don't need you barbarians to save our stupid skins," Aurelius said testily. He was getting tired of crazy wild women calling him stupid, "We just need to get to Adamor. Now."
"You look like a soldier, you got the same bearing. I seen a lot of soldiers since the Dominion came in, and you look like them. But you aren't altmer," her eyes, like liquid darkness, stared through the nibenaen. She tilted her head, "Are you an imperial soldier?"
"No," Aurelius lied, glad he'd left his armor at the khajiit hold. The leathers they'd given him to wear weren't great, and there was an awkward breeze through the tail slit in the rear, but at least they wouldn't cause a diplomatic incident if they were caught by Dominion operatives.
"You're lying," the bosmer grinned then, and it took Aurelius' breath away, "There are two things I'm really good at, and one of them is lying. You, on the other hand, are shit." She bent at the waist, hands on her knees, to look closely down at them,
"Give me one good reason to lead you to Adamor."
Aurelius coughed in Furioso's direction. The moth priest shrugged, then nodded.
The captain sighed again, "We're... looking for someone. There's someone, in Adamor, that we need to speak with."
The wood elf stared at him for a good long minute. Then said, very quietly,
"Speak?"
"Yes, speak, like civilized people." Aurelius said through clenched teeth.
The wood elf stared at them for another minute. Lagerta thought about cracking the elf's head open with her axe and checking if there were any brains actually in there, when the mer finally spoke. She straightened up and said,
"Fine. I'll take you to the outskirts of Adamor," then she grinned, "if you can keep up."
And she was off, leaping from branch to branch, using the unstrung bow in her hand to hook onto too-high branches, grabbing the other side when she reached it and then swinging to the next tree. The rangers were stunned for a moment, then broke into a run.
"Chase her!" Aurelius shouted, and all besides besides Iszir and Alessandros did, the former helping Furioso onto the latter's back before they began the long lope to catch the bosmer woman running deeper into the woods.
Faylin grinned as she leapt from tree to tree. She always loved being chased.
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