CHAPTER 17: THE DAEDRIC PRINCES
In which our hero is a total CHEATER!
Previous: Chapter 16, Lovely Party, Pity I Wasn't Invited

So this is Dawnstar. There's not much I can say about it. Two mines, a boat, a Jarl whose time has most definitely come and gone, and a madman who wants to get his hands on an evil Daedric artifact. This dude is apparently obsessed with the Mythic Dawn cult, which, as anyone who has ever played the last ES game read any history knows, was a cult that assassinated the emperor and tried to take over and/or destroy the world. And if you don't know about it, Silus will be sure to tell you about it. At length.

As I walk into his house, he stands expectantly in the corner, obviously waiting for me to ask him some questions about his Mythic Dawn stuff. He's wearing a big grin, wide-eyed, the sort of face that you'd expect to see on an overeager mongoose confronted with a snake buffet. Just waiting for someone to make a move. Any move. In my case, getting just a little too close to one of his display cases containing robes, where he took it upon himself to tell me exactly what was in the display case. Which was robes. As any idiot could see it. But Silus is the type of guy who likes to explain things about his hobby, ad nauseam, and the only way to get him to shut up is to run, screaming, from the room. There's no way to do it politely. Affect disinterest, yawn dramatically, look at your watch (or, since this is a fantasy game world, examine your wrist-mounted sundial), shift from foot to foot... this kind of guy doesn't take a hint. Gods forbid you actually ask him a question about anything, you'll be there for the next nine hours.

Which... is what I did. And we were. He tells me that the robes were colored with a dye made from blood, which seems kind of like a lot of work to go to for a bunch of canvas-grade cloth. I get the sneaky suspicion that the Mythic Dawn just used regular cheap red dye, then told their members it was dyed in blood, to give it that authentic evil-cult feel. Trust me, I've washed enough blood out of clothing to know it makes for a shitty dye, the robes would be a pale brownish-pink after only a few washings. But whatever. After hour six of the lecture, I managed to get him onto the topic of what he wanted out of me, and it was a fairly straightforward fetch quest. I have to go hunt down three pieces of Mehrunes Razor, a dagger with an apparently awe-inspiring enchantment. After promising profusely to go get his pieces, I managed to skedaddle. Outside, I channeled my magical energies and put several lightning runes on the door in case he ever has the notion to emerge from his sanctum. He'll get a nasty shock, hur hur hur.

Moving on. The town is being plagued by nightmares, which is nothing strange to me. I've been plagued by nightmares since I arrived in this stupid province, but nobody's rushing to help me out. The local priest wants me to deal with their nightmare problem. Well, actually, he says he just wants help, but I know how this sort of thing goes. He'll have me follow him for a while, killing his enemies while he stumbles around in a Nordic ruin hitting trap after trap, and then he'll either turn on me and try to kill me or give me a 500 gold reward for my "help." But I'm gonna do it anyway, because of my oath.

After following him for a while, up a snowy path while he walked very SLOWLY (this guy could give lessons to Ralof), it turns out that he was actually a priest of a Daedric Prince Vaermina, and so I backed out of that relationship too. What is it with people wanting me to do their demonic work for them? To date, I've been accosted by a big white rock in a chest, a berserk Dunmer wielding a book, a critically ill fellow fleeing to High Rock from Peryite's faithful or something, an idiot Vigilant who wants to face off with some daedra or other in Markarth, some dude who wants to resurrect an evil daedra-worshipping cult, another wandering Dunmer who was heading to the shrine of Azura, and now a reformed daedra priest who wants to do something with Vaermina, I don't know what, and I don't really care. Fuck these guys, I want nothing to do with meddling daedra, aedra, divines, old ghosts, or what-have-you.

In fact, I'm going to hunt down every last one of these fuckers, mark them in my journal, and then carefully avoid them for the rest of my life. I focus my powers and use the WIKI shout once more, and learn that in addition to those previously mentioned, there is a dog I have to avoid somewhere outside Falkreath, a dude in Falkreath jail, an orcish tribe somewhere in Riften, a possessed child in Whiterun, and my old buddy Sam is a daedric prince in disguise. I've already been cursed to carry a bunch of their junk, why would I want to burden myself with their "artifacts" which are undoubtedly more junk?

You know what? That WIKI shout has also given me enough information to be able to competently spell "Jarl of Falkreath" now. I'm kind of leery heading there after learning that I have not one but two daedric princes to avoid, but I figure one guy's in jail anyway, and another one is something like trapped in a dog's body, so it should actually be pretty easy. I'm headed to Falkreath.

Next: Chapter 18, It Was An Accident!
Start at Chapter 1
Pic: He's not getting out of there alive.