They rode into Falkreath, the capital of Falkreath hold, about one in the afternoon, pushing the horses. To find that the wagon hadn't arrived. That was frustrating, and Nora wasn't sure what she should do. Well, she couldn't take the search to the air without the suit.

 

“Should we start the search without if?” asked Annekke, trying to calm Nora down.

 

“No, dammit. Without the sensors it won't do any good.”

 

“Well,” said Valdimar, looking down at Nora from horseback. “We can either wait until it comes, or we can go in search of it.”

 

Valdimar didn't know what it was, though Nora had done her best to describe it to him, and he had watched her presentation to Elisif.

 

“We might as well wait in that tavern over there,” she said to the cheers of her people, who were tired and thirsty, having been up before the dawn to take on the last leg of the journey here.

 

The Dead Man's Drink was in the center of the small town. Falkreath reminded Nora of Morthal in some ways, without the swamp. Seventy or eighty buildings, all of wood, which made sense since they had basically ridden through a dense forest through the day. A smithy, an alchemist and a trader, along with the Jarl's longhouse, were the centers of attraction, along with the inn. A bed of hot coals sat in the center of the great room, while a bard played to the almost full room. Soon after the party entered the inn people started filing out, and Nora discovered that they had hit the tail end of the lunch rush. A few people stuck around, sipping on drinks. Nora didn't think that any of them had the look of assassins, but then what did a hired killer under cover look like. One had looked like a priest in robes, another in the leathers of their guild.

 

She sauntered over to the bar and ran her eyes up and down the inn keeper. He looked normal enough, not a man to be leading a gang of people looking for the Dragonborn's head.

 

“Would you like a drink?” asked the man, nodding at her friends. “Maybe some food?”

 

“What do you have to eat?”

 

“Venison steaks, freshly taken this very morning,” said the man proudly. “Or some lake fish, if you prefer that.”

 

Since the man hadn't sung the praises of the fish, Nora thought it must not be fresh. So she ordered the venison, with sides of vegetables and a couple of loaves of bread with butter. And, of course, whatever her friends wanted to drink. And so they spent most of the afternoon eating and drinking, Nora fretting over her missing power armor

 

Night came and still no wagon, so she got them rooms for the night. Setting guard shifts in the common room, something she felt strange about doing, she retired with Eldawyn to her room, taking the last shift herself with the elf.

 

Elda and her made love, for which Nora was grateful. She was too wound up to sleep, and was sure she would be having nightmares about assassins coming out of the woodwork. After the end of an hour she felt relaxed, her tension drained, her skin tingling with pleasure.

 

“Thank you,” she told her lover.

 

“You're welcome. But to tell you the truth, I doubt I would get any sleep if I didn't calm you down and chase away the nightmares.”

 

“Well, you seemed to enjoy it, but thanks for making the sacrifice.” They both laughed, and Nora turned over and fell into a deep sleep. To wake up to the sound of movement in the common room. She was out of bed in an instant, drawing her sword and creeping silently to the door. She flung it open and leapt out, to find that the inn keep and staff were preparing the inn for the day's business. With an embarrassed smile she slunk back into her room, going ahead and getting dressed.

 

“Nora,” called out Annekke from the common room. “I'm coming in, so don't strike me down.”

 

Annekke was already dressed and in her armor. Elesia was as well, along with Eldawyn.

 

“You didn't wake me for my shift,” she said to the people, cross that they had let her sleep in.

 

“You needed it,” said Eldawyn, smiling. “So come on, let's get some breakfast and we'll go looking for the wagon.”

 

“It hasn't arrived yet?” asked Nora in a panic, wondering if maybe it had been waylaid along the way. Well, anyone who got it wouldn't be able to do anything with it, but she really didn't like the idea of primitives poking around her high-tech hardware.

 

Nora ate her fill at breakfast, eggs, bacon and bread, taking it with plenty of tea. She walked outside just in time to see a wagon, sitting low on its springs, pulled along by a pair of horses, Farkas and Vilkas sitting in the drovers positions.

 

“Nora,” yelled Vilkas, waving. “We had some trouble yesterday with a broken spring, but here we are.”

 

Nora ran to the wagon, jumping up onto the forward area and wrapping Vilkas in a tight hug, then doing the same with his brother. “I am very glad to see you, but I didn't think you would be doing such work.”

 

“Jarl Balgruuf wanted this, thing, safeguarded,” said Vilkas, smiling as Nora hugged him again, “and so contacted Kodlak to hire some muscle.”

 

“And we were curious to see this thing in action,” said Farkas. “And to lend a hand if you need one. I, for one, have been looking forward to seeing the Dark Brotherhood taken down for good. The cowards.”

 

The Hold guards had been gathering around, talking and pointing at the wagon. The armor stood on the back, held in place by ropes and protected from the eyes of the curious with several blankets which had come askew, revealing parts of the machine.

 

“Here now. What is this dwemer contraption? And what are you doing with it?”

 

“I'll show you,” said Nora, pulling the blankets away, then starting on the ropes. The armor looked to be in very good shape, only the paint scratches she had gotten fighting a dragon showing any sign of wear.

 

“Come to life,” she said as she shrugged out of her hauberk, setting it on the wagon bed and laying her helmet on top. While she might have preferred to have the armor ready for when she dismounted, she thought it might be a tight fit in the suit that had been form fitted to her.

 

“Eject,” she ordered.

 

“Welcome pilot,” came the machine voice of the armor, and Nora climbed aboard.

 

“Heh. Get out of that,” yelled one of the guards as she settled in.

 

“Turning controls over to pilot,” said the computer,

 

Nora pulled up the diagnostics, happy to see that she had two almost full fusion cores aboard. She still had two in the storage compartment, so she was good to go. Initiating her sensors, then warming up the jetpack, she felt she was ready.

 

“Everyone step back,” she said over her speakers. “And someone gather up my armor.”

 

She bent down and picked up the sheathed Dawnbreaker, securing it to the clamp on the armor's side. While not sure she would need it, she wanted it near just in case. Squatting down, she leapt into the air, then engaged the jet pack, soaring into the sky.

 

There was a lot of forest below, but she had heard from a hunter who had stumbled across the sanctuary door that it was in the woods about a mile of the western road around the hold capital.

 

That was still a lot of area to cover, and with the thick woods they might go past it several times and never see it.

 

“Prepare scan for metals,” she told the computer.

 

“Scanners set,” said the computer. “Full pulse ready on command.”

 

“Pulse.”

 

The computer sent out a strong radar pulse and the return came back, projected onto the HUD. A lot of trees, some small hills, even a dip in the ground that had to be a pond. A stream flowing close to the road. She pulsed a couple of more times when an interesting return came back. Something hard and dense, but without the texture of stone.

 

“Concentrated pulse on that object.”

 

The radar pulsed again, and the return showed that the object, set against a hill side, was rectangular, looking like a door. The Dragonborn maneuvered her armor to come in overhead of the door, lowering itself through the woods. She checked her power and cursed as she saw that one of her cores was just about dead. The jet pack drank energy like the town drunk, but it was handy when needed.

 

It was dark in the small glade before the door, and Nora engaged her headlamps, seeing a black portal with a death's head on it. An advertisement for the Brotherhood, and the woman thought they would have been wiser to make it less conspicuous from close on. She walked up and rapped on the door with one hard knuckle, then stepped back.

 

“Deep radar on the door.”

 

“Scanning.” The return came back, indicating the metal was at least seven inches thick. Well, she thought that the rocket launcher would penetrate it, no matter what it was made of. She dropped a beacon near the door and soared back into the sky, looking for her people, the brothers mounted on some horses riding along with them.

 

“Over here,” she called over the speakers, watching as they came her way and rode into the woods. Nora landed again and pulled the missile launcher off her back, checking its status and seeing that everything was in the green.

 

“How are you planning to get through that thing?” asked Vilkas, looking at the square device with four openings that Nora was cradling.

 

“I'll show you. But everyone needs to step back. A couple of you take the horses into the woods. I'm afraid they're not going to like this. And make sure none of you are standing behind me. Maybe over there, to the side.”

 

“What?” asked Farkas, confused.

 

“She said over here, you idiot,” yelled Vilkas, pulling his brother along. “From what she's saying, behind her is a bad place to stand.”

 

Nora extended the launcher, making sure once again that no one was near the back-blast zone. She set the launcher for single shot, then aimed in on the center of the door. The suit sent the signal into the rocket, which roared out and struck the door on a stream of flame. The door rang as the rocket hit, and a five-inch hole appeared in the metal. Nora ran forward and shone a light in the hole, grunting in satisfaction as she saw that her rocket had penetrated entirely through, and that a chamber of some kind was on the other side. But the door was still sealed tight, the rocket not having unseated it.

 

“I'm going to send more rockets into it and see what I can do,” she told her people, setting her feet, checking behind one again, and sending a rocket in to strike a foot to the left of the center hole. She followed up with one to the right at the same distance, then collapsed the launcher and let it snap back into place across her back.

 

If Farengar had done what he said, the suit would have enchantments against cold and fire, and it was already well insulated against electricity. She placed a pair of fingers through each hole, got a grip, set her feet and started to pull. The door creaked but did not come free. Well, just have to keep at it, she thought. The suit had the strength of ten men, and it could continue pulling as long as it had power.

 

One minutes, two, three, and finally the door started creaking. With a sound of ripping metal it pulled away from its mount, hanging on in one place while the rest came free. A couple of arrows came flying out of nowhere and struck the suit to bounce off, followed by a ball of fire. The air conditioning units of the armor engaged fully, and Nora felt little of the heat of the spell.

 

Her people and the brothers were yelling at her to get out of the way, but Nora intended to send a message to anyone who might come across this hideout in the future, including any Dark Brotherhood operatives that might not be in the sanctuary. Reaching back she pulled her Gauss rifle, noting that there were only twenty-three of the small rounds that were both projectile and power source. After that the weapon would be useless, but again, she wanted to make an impression. And the first target popped into sight on her HUD under her infrared vision equipment, invisible to normal sight but clear as day to the heat sensors. Nora ordered her own suit to go invisible, fighting fire with fire.

 

She took aim at the woman, who was still bravely standing in place, sending arrow after arrow into the armor. She triggered the rifle, feeling the heavy recoil, which could have broken an unprotected shoulder, buck into her suit. And the woman's head turn into an exploding mass of bone and brains as the projectile transferred its energy into her.

 

A pair of assassins came out of the shadows, launching more arrows, and Nora took them down with quick shots. The Gauss killed quickly, and there were no survivors to her single shots. She took down a large orc with an ax, then a huge Redguard with a two-handed sword. A couple of women with swords, she shot all of them down without mercy. Next she came across a man in a jester's outfit, cackling madly as he came at her with a pair of knives. He reminded her of the Raiders that had charged her armored suit, yelling and swinging a baseball bat, and she treated him the same as she had those wasteland animals, sending him to the afterlife. Nora wasn't sure what kind of afterlife assassins went to, but she hoped it was horrible.

 

They went into room after room, corridor after corridor. Some came out of the shadows behind her, and the yells of her companions as they killed the sneaks let Nora know they had been taken care of. Finally, they entered a room with a spider and a little girl. At first Nora thought the spider was menacing some captive child, and she splattered it against the wall. The child started screaming, and Annekke came around the power armor to comfort the child. Then Nora noticed that the child had no body heat, cold on her HUD. So she sent another Gauss round into the undead body and ended the child vampire assassin.

 

“Why?” shouted Annekke, turning in anger toward Nora, who had disengaged her invisibility field.

 

“She was a vampire, Annekke,” said Nora through her speakers. “No body heat. She must have been turned as a child and has used that form to sucker people in ever since.”

 

The child's body disintegrated quickly, and Nora had to guess that she had been at least a couple of centuries old. Well, she's at peace now, her demon slain, thought Nora, looking down at the small form of bones and ash with a tear in her eye.

 

And then she heard it. The singing, barely audible through her audio pickups.

 

“Eject.” she ordered.

 

“Ejecting pilot,” said the suit as it unfolded, giving her access to the outside world.

 

“Nora,” shouted Eldawyn, almost panicked. “We haven't cleared everything out yet.”

 

Nora didn't hear her. All she could hear was the singing of a word wall, just a room away. She walked in that direction, and would have been an easy target, except for the friends that formed a protective bubble around her.

 

“You two,” shouted Sofia to the brothers. “Make yourself useful and clear this place.”

 

Nora found the word wall in another room, the symbol it conveyed glowing as she approached. It burned into her mind, Krii, a word that would drain the health and soften the armor of her enemies. She thought that seem useful, and since she had a pair of souls she went ahead and unlocked it, eager to try it out. But not today, not in this place.

 

“We made sure the place is clear,” said Vilkas as the brothers came into the room. “We poked swords into nooks and crannies, so if any of the bastards were hiding in invisibility, they now have new holes in their bodies.”

 

“Let the looting begin,” called out an enthusiastic Elesia, waving her swords in the air.

 

“Remind me to not get on your bad side, Dragonborn,” said Farkas, coming to the side of his brother. “That was amazing.”

 

“Oh, I could never get mad at you, or any of the Companions,” squealed Nora, enfolding Farkas in a hug, then doing the same with Vilkas. “And I so appreciate you bringing my armor to me.”

 

“So what now? Are you going to fly it back to Whiterun?”

 

“I don't have enough power to do that?” said Nora. “It will fly for a limited time, and suck up all the power in a fusion core. It's what, forty miles from here?”

 

“Closer to fifty,” said Vilkas, his brow furrowed. “We'll take it back in the wagon, if you promise to ride alongside and regale us with tales of your adventures. And maybe meals and some mead along the way.”

 

“You've got it, big fella,” said Nora, wondering what he would be like in bed. What either of them would be like, or both together?

 

“We've hit the jackpot,” said Annekke, using a term she had heard from Nora. “Gold, gems, so many potions we may have to make two trips. Magical weapons, armor, you name it. And this,” she said in a quiet voice, handing a small booklet forward.

 

Nora snatched the booklet from Annekke's hands, quickly thumbing through it, looking the names of many a poor soul who had been struck down by knives from the shadows, the amount of the contract written in next to them. Normally tens of thousands, in one case over fifty thousand septims, with a notation that it had been paid in gems. Along with the name of the person who had put out the contract. She stared in sorrow and disbelief at all the lives the Brotherhood had snuffed out. And then, on the final page with writing, was her name. Thane Nora Jane Adams, a sum of forty thousand septims, and Thane Erikur of Solitude at the end of the line.

 

No, thought Nora in alarm. She had known the man was a jerk, and a rich one, but that he would hire someone to murder her, paying such an extravagant sum to have her killed. And he was with Elisif, who knew nothing of his murderous intent. And she smiled for a moment as she realized she had the third largest bounty in the book. I hope it was worth it, she thought, looking around the cavern, her eyes landing on what looked like a sarcophagus.

 

“What in the hell is that?” she asked, walking toward the sarcophagus.

 

“Be careful, Thane,” yelled Valdimar, running toward her, trying to get ahead of her. “It might be trapped.”

 

Nora stopped in her tracks, realizing that her friend might be correct, It would be the height of irony to take out the Dark Brotherhood, only to be felled by something left to kill the unwary. She looked it over, trying to make out projections, switches, anything that might trigger a trap. Nothing she could see, and she pried open the lid with her sword, unwilling to touch anything. The lid fell open, and revealed a visage of horror. A desiccated corpse, her mouth held open in a silent scream.

 

“By the Gods,” cried Eldawyn. “The Night Mother.”

 

“The who?” asked Nora.

 

“The Night Mother. I've heard her mentioned in regards to the Brotherhood,” said the elf, her face twisted in disgust. “The god the damned assassins’ worship.”

 

Now that Nora was paying attention she could feel the concentrated evil arising from the corpse. Along with a searing hatred directed at her. Nora called up fire to her hand and sent it with a scream into the body.

 

At first nothing happened, the body encased in some kind of magical protection. Nora kept pouring in the flames, soon joined by Eldawyn and Sofia, and whatever was resisting her flames fell before the onslaught of the trio. The corpse caught on fire, just a few tongues of flame at first. Then it burst into a conflagration, soon reduced to oily ashes.

 

“I don't feel that good,” said Nora, suddenly sick to her stomach.

 

“Me neither,” said Sofia. Eldawyn said nothing, but the look on her face said she felt much the same. But no one else was complaining, only the three that desecrated the corpse.

 

“You are cursed,” said Vilkas, putting an arm around Nora and helping her to a seat. “The damned thing fought back in the only way it could. We need to get you to a shrine so you can accept a blessing.”

 

“There's a priest of Arkay in the town,” said Annekke, helping Eldawyn take a seat, while Valdimar aided Sofia, who seemed not to mind the touch of the man at all. She mouthed a silent thank you as she leaned onto the table.

 

“Take them to it,” said Elesia to Annekke. “We'll clean out this place for her.”

 

Valdimar and the two brothers helped the mages onto horses, which Annekke led away, holding their reins as she rode her own. Nora wasn't sure how she made it into the town, through a nightmare ride that saw her throw up along the way. She had never really believed curses were real. Why not, in a land of magic, and she had just destroyed the material form of a dark god.

 

“Lead them to the Shrine of Arkay,” said the priest, an old Altmer who tended the huge cemetery from which Falkreath drew its fame.

 

Nora touched the shrine and said a prayer to the God, and felt a wave of healing magic roll over her. She felt healthy almost immediately, and something else. A rush of energy that flowed through her body and would not go away.

 

“I feel, much better,” she said, seeing her two friends rising to her feet with smiles.

 

“The blessing of Arkay,” said the priest. “It will stay with you for some time.”

 

Nora resolved to pray at shrines whenever she was near one if this was the result. They rode back to the sanctuary, to find items stacked outside, waiting to be loaded up. There were bags of gems, enough to make the party wealthy once again. She let Eldawyn look over the potions and magic items, sifting out those which only an assassin would use. And she drew the line on the quivers of black arrows that Valdimar was stacking by a tree.

 

“We will not be taking those,” said Nora, feeling herself growing ill again, so much was the evil radiating from the arrows.

 

“But..”

 

“Leave them, I said,” screamed Nora, a shadow of her power in the yell. “I want nothing to do with those damned things.”

 

“As you wish, my Thane,” said the big warrior, shuffling away with his head down.

 

I need to apologize to him, thought Nora. The man had only been gathering what he thought would please her. He didn't know. But she would let herself cool down before she tried to apologize.

 

“Where's Eldawyn?” she asked as the party was busy loading up their booty, noting that the elf had disappeared as soon as they returned to the sanctuary.

 

“She said something about leaving some surprises for returning assassins.”

 

“What now,” mumbled Nora, heading back inside. To find her friend in the entry, casting, a glowing fire rune appearing on the floor of the entry hall.

 

“Booby traps?”

 

“Yes,” said a smiling Elda. “This one here, along with a pair each of shock and cold further in. I figure that as long as we don't tell anyone where this place actually is, only returning assassins will trigger them.”

 

“Good idea,” said Nora, who wanted this organization gone, root and stem, but was unwilling to wait for assassins that might not exist, and who could return at any time.

 

“I need to get the armor back to the wagon so you can take it back to Whiterun,” she told the brothers.

 

“Why not just fly in back to Whiterun?” asked Vilkas, not seeming to remember what she had told him before the incident with the Night Mother. “Be a lot easier on everyone.”

 

“It takes up too much power,” said Nora, launching into an explanation of fusion cores and the energy consumption of the suit, almost laughing as she saw the blank look on Farkas' face, and the understanding on the visage of his smarter brother. “So there you have it. I need to land back on the wagon and let you take it from there.”

 

“What?” stammered Farkas.

 

“Never mind brother. Let me do the thinking on this one,” said Vilkas.

 

Nora stopped herself from laughing. Farkas really wasn't very bright, but he was a great warrior and quite handsome, despite the warpaint on his face. Vilkas was handsome as well, which made sense since the two were twins.

 

“Meet me back at Falkreath,” she told her people before climbing back in the armor. She jumped into the air and engaged the pack, the horses rearing and screaming in fear at the noise. The Dragonborn circled over the sanctuary for a moment, feeling good about getting rid of that evil, and getting the monkey off her back as well. There might have been some assassins out on missions. The book, after all, had two more names that hadn't been checked, but Nora had no way of knowing where those people were, and thus no way to warn them.

 

Nora set down gently on the wagon, to the sight of almost all the guards in town converging on her, and a man in fine clothes with the circlet of a Jarl on his brow, hurrying from the longhouse, an Altmer woman in his wake. She made sure the armor was sitting level on a good perch, then ordered the suit to open.

 

“Ejecting Pilot,” said the suit just before she climbed out. She decided to leave it open for now, just in case she needed to jump back inside in a hurry.

 

“What witchcraft is this,” yelled the young man who must have been the Jarl.

 

Nora had heard many tales about Siddgeir of Falkreath, none of them good. The man was said to traffic with bandits, and had deposed his wiser uncle, Dengeir. She thought it might help the region to kill him, or at least threaten him into leaving his throne to someone else. However, the man was in the pockets of the Imperials, and she still wanted to avoid antagonizing them, despite all they had done to discomfit her.

 

“Not witchcraft,” said Nora, looking down on the assembled guards and the gathering townspeople. “Technology.”

 

From the expressions on the faces around her she might as well have said witchcraft. She didn't really want to launch into a long explanation that would most probably sail right over the heads of most of these people. “A type of magic unknown to you people.”

 

“Daedric?” asked one of the guards, hand on his sword hilt. “From Oblivion?”

 

“Neither,” shouted Nora, wondering if she was going to have an incident on her hands. She could shout one section of the guard down, then send magic into more of them. But that would be a hostile act against one of Balgruuf's neighbors, and though she thought Whiterun could crush this pissant little Hold, she didn't think the other Jarl would appreciate one of his Thanes getting him into a war.

 

The mood of the crowd was starting to turn ugly, and the Jarl was shouting questions and commands at her, when her team, along with the twins, rode into town.

 

“What's going in here?” yelled Farkas in a roar. The crowd turned toward him, recognition on many faces.

 

“What do the Companions have to do with this, spectacle?” demanded the Jarl, pulling himself up to his full height and storming over to the dismounting twins. It was not a sight to intimidate one. Unlike Balgruuf, Siddgeir, though attractive enough, in a slimy sort of way, had the thin arms of a man who sat around and let others wait on him hand and foot.

 

“Thane Nora is our friend,” said Vilkas, looking down at the Jarl. “She's an honorary Companion as well, and a friend to all of Skyrim. And she just wiped out the Dark Brotherhood.”

 

That brought forth excited conversation among all and sundry. The guards clapped her on the back after she climbed down from the wagon. Townspeople shouted her name in celebration. Only the Jarl looked like he wasn't liking what he heard, and Nora wondered if the man had been in bed with the Brotherhood. Well, if so, he would have to find another cash cow.

 

“I have a proposition for you, Thane,” said the Jarl, taking her aside. “There are some bandits inhabiting a small fortification one the way to Helgen,” said the Jarl. “About an hour from here. I have had dealings with them in the past, but they have grown inconvenient of late. Take them down and you will be well rewarded.”

 

Nora stared at the man for a moment, who had all but admitted that he was a bandit himself. Again, there was nothing she could do to him that wouldn't have adverse consequences for her mission.

 

“I'll take them down,” she said, looking down her nose at the Jarl. “But I'm on my way to Whiterun, so the reward will have to wait.”

 

“And so it shall,” said the Jarl with a wide smile, realizing that he would not be out any gold this day.

 

“We have a mission on the way back,” she told her people, the twins close and listening. “Some bandits on the road to Helgen. About an hour's ride.”

 

“How many?” asked Annekke, obviously not liking the idea of more fighting this day.

 

“I don't know, but the Jarl said it was a small group. So what do you say?”

“We're with you,” said Vilkas, receiving a nod from his brother. “Kodlak can probably use our involvement to bill Siddgeir.”

 

“Will that work?” asked Nora.

 

“If the Jarl wants further dealings with us in the future he will pay up,” said Vilkas.

 

Nora liked that idea, and nodded toward Vilkas before jumping up on the wagon and securing the suit, then draping furs over it. They rolled, going the slightly more than a mile before spotting the bandits. They were fortified on both sides of the road, log towers, a walkway over the path. There were rockfalls rigged to both sides to catch anything that decided to not stop. A few wrecked wagon, one burned, sat on the side of the road, proof that they had been taking people out. And the only reason she could think for them operating so close to the hold capital was the complicity of the Jarl.

 

“Annekke and I will sneak up and take them out,” said Nora, looking over her people. “You be ready to come in if we need you.”

 

“Save some for us,” said Farkas. Nora flashed him a smile, though she had no intention of saving anything if she could help it.

 

Nora and Annekke cat footed it into the woods, sneaking up on the bandits who had their full attention of the strong party of riders with a wagon down the road. The women took out the ground sentries with knives, then went to the bow to take out the others two at a time. The bandits were easy prey, and soon they had all nine of the bandits down.

 

“You didn't save anything for us,” complained Vilkas.

 

Nora flashed the man a coy smile. She had other things saved for them if they were amenable.

They took a small crossroad over to the lake road, setting up camp with an hour of sunlight left. While some of the party made a fire, others erected the tents, including the one that Farkas and Vilkas had brought along. All bathed, then sat around the fire drying and warming, while Nora went through a practice routine on her own, going through the motions of flinging spells and catching arrows, then finishing with a half an hour of martial arts. In the nude, showing everything, aware that the brothers were staring at her and becoming aroused. She had already apologized to Valdimar, letting the man know that he could service one of the other women tonight, leaving who up to him.

 

An hour after everyone had retired she was at the flap to the tent of the twins, a smile on her face. She had not bothered to dress, and if everything went right she would have been stripping anyway.

 

“Can I come in?” she asked.

 

“Of course, Thane Nora,” answered Vilkas, a bit of nervousness in his voice.

 

Nora crawled through the entrance, to see the faces of the twins in the candlelight, mouths hanging open.

 

“What is this?” asked Farkas, his voice rising to a near squeak.

 

“I would think it would be obvious. I find you attractive, I think you feel the same, and I mean to take advantage of our time together.”

 

Nora needed the sex. The day’s events, especially the episode with the Night Mother, was sure to send her into a series of horrific nightmares this night, and she meant to diffuse that.

 

“But, you're a Thane,” said Farkas, still nervous, while Vilkas smiled as he ran his eyes up and down her body.

 

“And she's a woman,” said Vilkas in a voice that dripped with lust. “A very beautiful woman. I know she's not a man, Farkas, but you need to be with a woman every once in a while was well.”

 

So it's true, she thought with a twinge of disappointment. Farkas was gay. But his brother had said something about having a woman every once in a while, which meant he was bisexual, didn't it?

 

“I am a Thane by the declaration of Balgruuf,” she said, sitting cross legged on the floor and hoping to kick this threeway off. “I was born a woman, and this woman wants both of you, now.”

 

“But..”

“Oh, wake up Farkas. She's offering herself, willingly, and I for one am not about to pass up on someone like Nora.”

 

Vilkas crawled forward, locking his lips on Nora's while a hand cupped her breast. Nora sighed and let her tongue explore the mouth of Vilkas. She felt another hand on her posterior, then a finger searching for the opening of her vagina. They're cooperating, she thought as a thrill ran through her.

 

The twins took her in every way possible. Her vagina, her mouth, even her anus. Nora had never really been into anal, but having a penis in both openings at once thrilled her like few other things. They fucked for hours, Nora losing track of the orgasms she had, the flares of pleasure growing stronger with each event. The twins came so many times she was worried that they might hollow themselves out. Their stamina was awesome, and they thrust into her like lustful beasts. Like nothing Nora had ever experienced, and she loved it.

 

Finally, all spent, the trio fell asleep in a tangle on the furs. Nora let her hands roam over the bodies of the brothers as they fell into a deep sleep, soon joining them herself. Morning came, and she found Vilkas entering her vagina while Farkas continued to sleep.

 

“You feel amazing,” whispered Vilkas as he thrust slowly into her.

 

“You don't feel so bad yourself,” replied Nora, riding the sex into yet another orgasm, then clamping down to give Vilkas all the slick friction he could handle. He exploded inside her with a grunt, then rolled off.

 

“That's all I can do, my Lady,” said Vilkas, lying on his back and smiling.

 

“You both did good,” she said. “I have no complaints. In fact, I would like to arrange a return engagement in the future.”

 

“Whenever you want, my beautiful Thane.”

 

Nora decided that these men were like her, living on the edge with no promise of a tomorrow, taking their pleasure when they could. She was happy she had teased them the day before, building up the arousal that had exploded from them and into her.

 

Nora crawled out of the tent to the cold air of morning. The sun was starting to rise over the mountains to the East. The rest of the party was sitting around the rebuilt fire, in their traveling clothes and armor.

 

“Where's Valdimar?” she asked, taking a seat at the fire, not concerned with her nudity around these people. “Where's Sofia?”

 

Eldawyn laughed. “I guess you didn't hear them over the noise you and your twin paramours were making,” she said, looking over at one of the tents.

 

Nora heard it then. A woman panting in passion while a man grunted. The panting turned into cries, and Nora knew where her Housecarl and her follower had gotten off to.

 

“Oh, Valdimar,” cried out Sofia. “You're making me cum. Again.”

 

“You're so beautiful, my lovely spellsword,” cried out the man, then grunted as he came, his cries blending in with that of the woman.

 

All's right with the world, thought Nora, grinning from ear to ear. Sofia might not be totally over being raped in Solitude, but she was a Nord, as the people said as solid as stone. And she had gotten back on the horse.