I stop by Anvil to take a look at the bounty board before we make our way to Kvatch, in case there’s anything we can get paid to kill along the way. There’s a bounty posted for the assassination of a troll in a nearby Ayleid ruin by the name of Garlas Agea. The shifty High Elf who hires us also wants some ledgers for shifty reasons that I don’t feel like prying too hard into just yet. I’m sure answers will be forthcoming as soon as I see said ledgers and their owners.


    The Ayleid ruin isn’t too far from the Sanctuary. There’s a minotaur or two outside, and a door leading to the interior that we slip inside.


    Down the stairs at the start of the ruin, a very familiar Khajiit is interrogating a Redguard. Ilara draws in a sharp breath upon seeing the red hair ridge that matches the one she’s currently hiding under her headwear.


    Razum-dar does not recognize us on sight under our disguises, and warns us away, telling us that the ruins are dangerous and he doesn’t want us in his way.


    “Can we step outside for a moment?” I ask, quietly making a small gesture the Eyes of the Queen use as an identification signal. (I did technically join, after all, and they did tell me a few things before I wound up accidentally becoming a king.)


    “Very well,” Raz says, tail shifting and one ear flicking curiously. “This shave-skin isn’t going anywhere.”


    We head out of the ruin interior, and I take a glance around to make sure there’s no one liable to be eavesdropping in the immediate vicinity. Ilara takes off her hat first, grinning.


    “Ilara?” Razum-dar says. “What are you doing here?”


    “This one is Kisha,” Ilara says with a twitch of her whiskers. “Certainly not your dear sister, sleek and skilled Ilara-daro.”


    Raz snorts softly. “But if you’re here, then who is this?”


    I pull my cat mask off. “Hi.”


    “Neri?” Raz says. “Raz thought you were leading a war campaign in Cyrodiil.”


    I grin wildly and put my cat mask back on before someone sees me. “That’s the idea,” I say, slipping back into my imitation Khajiit accent. “Neri gro-Drublog isn’t here. Just Vara-do, a mighty Khajiit sellsword and sometime pirate.”


    Raz gives me a look-over appraisingly. “Your tail needs practice but your disguise is quite clever. You change identities like Canonreeve Estre changes gods. Dare I ask what brings you to the Gold Coast?”


    “Stuff,” I say with a shrug.


    “We joined the Dark Brotherhood,” Ilara says.


    Raz blinks. “Seriously? And you tell me this?”


    “This one would not keep secrets from her brother,” Ilara says. “At any rate, Kisha joined the Dark Brotherhood. Sweet Ilara-daro is totally innocent.”


    “But the Dark Brotherhood…” Raz sighs and runs a paw across his red hair ridge. “Why?”


    Ilara is quiet for a moment. “This is where the path took us. And when we are done here, we will walk on.”


    Raz looks at me a touch accusingly. “Did you drag her into this?”


    I hold up my hands. “I don’t drag Ilara-daro anywhere. Good luck in getting her to do anything she doesn’t want to do. In any case, they recruited her, not Vara-do.”


    “So you joined as well to keep an eye on her and keep her safe?” Raz asks.


    “Ilara-daro does not need people to keep her safe, Raz,” Ilara says vehemently. “She prefers to work in a team, though. If people are paying attention to someone else, they aren’t paying attention to her. Ilara-daro can take care of herself, but she’s not stupid.”


    Raz sighs in resignation. “Be careful, sister. Raz does not want to see you hurt. And not every hurt is one you can see. The work of an assassin is messy business. Killing can take its toll on a person. And should they ever ask you to kill someone you do not wish to…”


    “Then Kisha will vanish, and Ilara-daro will walk on.”


    “Very well,” Raz says. “Raz could tell you to be careful until he runs out of breath. What brings you to this ruin specifically? Or is Neri–pardon me, Vara-do--simply poking his nose into every hole in the ground like he usually does?”


    “There was a bounty on a large troll that’s supposed to be inside,” I say.


    “Of course you’re coming here to fight a troll,” Raz says with a feline smirk. “So long as you are here, perhaps you can assist in slaying a war criminal Raz has tracked to this ruin. Her name is Captain Jena Apinia, and she is known as the Butcher of Bravil.”


    “I assume she got that title from killing civilians and not from selling meat,” I say.


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    It’s easy to forget sometimes that in between the cloak-and-dagger, Raz is still an adventurer, albeit one who works for a queen.


    “You would be correct,” Raz says. “Raz is also here to retrieve some official trinkets stolen from there. A seal, a signet ring, a tax ledger, that sort of thing. Raz knows it might take a while to search all the crates for Bravil’s missing trinkets,” Raz says.


    I hold up a hand to interrupt him. “Raz, there’s some friends you need to meet.” I pull out my communication orb. “Rocky, get the loot crew ready to move in once I clear this ruin.”


    “Acknowledged,” Merry’s voice replies.


    “You have a special looting crew?” Raz says, then chuckles and shakes his head. “Of course you do.”


    “Yep!” I say. “They’re good folks. Maybe I need a good name for them like the Eyes of the Queen. Maybe the Pockets of the King.”


    “Maybe not,” Ilara says with an amused smirk.


    “Let’s hit this ruin,” I say. “Or at least the people in it. My support team are not as skilled of warriors as us so I’d rather they not have to deal with anything too dangerous or too many hostiles.”


    I drop back into character and we make our way through the ruins. I’ve adjusted my sleep poison and need to test the latest mixture, after all, and fortunately, these mercenaries have decided to volunteer! They perhaps should have reconsidered harboring war criminals. Still doesn’t mean I’m just going to slaughter them, though. You never know when you might need perfectly good mercenaries who will take your coin without asking too many prying questions.


    There’s a Skyshard in one of the crates, which I absorb on the way by once everyone in the room is down, but otherwise I ignore the various containers for the moment to focus on hitting things. Not shoving everything into my bag as I go does streamline the ruin-clearing process a bit.


    We locate the troll. The mercenaries are not doing a very good job of keeping it contained, and our distraction isn’t helping matters any. It completely breaks free of its chains when we approach, knocking several mercenaries aside and scattering them across the ground.


    Once we’ve killed the big troll, the surviving mercenaries in the immediate vicinity immediately surrender. Smart of them for not wanting to mess with anyone who could kill that troll. I reward them by healing them and letting them run away.


    Along with the troll, there’s a number of other caged animals. I leave them be for the moment. I’ll let Grishka figure out what to do with them. They’ve even got a guar! Maybe I can finally have a pet guar.


    Some of the poor hirelings here got trapped by traps. While I might consider the swinging blades to be fun, I’m sure most people would find them hair-raising. Or rapidly hair-lowering.


    “Stay put!” I call to them. “Khajiit will get you out of there in a moment. First he must murder your boss!”


    “Good luck!” yells back one of the mercenaries loyally.


    The “Butcher of Bravil” is in the final room of the ruin, in which she has set up a sort of bedroom and office. She’s gotten entirely too comfortable in here. Turns out she’s not such hot stuff when pitted against people who aren’t unarmed civilians.


    Once we’ve ensured no one in here is liable to be fighting back, I call in my support team to loot the place and help locate the ledgers and trinkets amid the mess of crates and barrels the Gold Coast Trading Company is storing here for some reason. (I suppose a random ruin that no one else is using is free storage and relatively safe if there aren’t undead, Daedra, or whatever in it.)


    “Be sure to avoid that hallway–” I point. “–unless you enjoy swinging blade traps. Ayleids sure did like their traps. Vara-do is going to go rescue some fools.”


    Raz and Ilara inform them what we’re looking for while I go back over to the trapped hallway. The fools in question have been stuck here for some time and are dehydrated, hungry, and tired. They were about ready to try their luck at timing the swings when they heard fighting in the distance and decided to wait and see what was going on.


    “Hmm,” I hmm. “Usually there’s a lever or switch that controls the traps. Kisha, do you see anything?”


    “Kisha isn’t spotting anything.”


    “Maybe it’s broken or buried,” I say.


    “We didn’t see anything like that,” says one of the mercenaries. “We were trying to hold the traps back with wooden scaffolding. That… didn’t work out terribly well.”


    “Give me a moment,” I say, watching the blades swing back and forth for a minute. “Alright. When Vara-do says go, run this way like you’re fleeing from a troll.” I pause. “The troll is dead, by the way. But still. Ready?”


    “Got it.” The mercenaries nervously take a position near the traps and wait for my signal.


    Swing-swing. Swing-swing. Swing-swing. “Go!”


    The woman makes a break for it and sprints past me. The man is just a tiny bit slower to get moving and stumbles. The closest blade to me is about to come down. I step into its path and put up a Blinky Barrier. The swinging blade slams into the shield of light, staggering me for a moment but leaving me and the hapless mercenary unharmed. He makes it to safety, panting heavily and looking like he was about to have a heart attack there.


    I meant to limit the use of my light powers, but it’s not like healing and barrier spells are rare and it was the only way I could be sure the blade would actually stop.


    “I’m alive?” the man says. “Oh, praise the Divines, I’m alive. I thought I was never going to get out of there in one piece.”


    “We owe you our lives, Khajiit,” the woman says. “And if you were here to kill our boss, then I’m doubly grateful since you didn’t have to stop to help us. Unrelatedly, are you hiring?” She looks over at the ‘pirates’ currently confiscating the Gold Coast Trading Company’s goods.


    “You’ll need to talk to my first mate, the Orc lady over there,” I say. “She handles the crew. This one just picks targets and hits things.”


    Raz gets his trinkets and bids us good day. I get the ledgers, and return to Anvil with Ilara to bring them to the mer who hired us.


    The shifty High Elf gets even shiftier when we return with the ledgers he wanted. After some prodding, he confesses that he’s with a competing company and was tired of the Gold Coast Trading Company buying off his mercenaries.


    “Mm, a good thing for you then that we saw your notice first, yes?” Ilara says.


    “And that it was their goods that were being stored in a ruin for some reason that got stolen and not yours,” I say. “And simply providence that they were harboring a war criminal who deserved to die as well.”


    “A war criminal?” the mer says nervously. “Oh dear. That part I didn’t expect.”


    “Fortunately for you, many of those mercenaries are now seeking new employment,” I say.


    The High Elf is also in the business of monster transport, and is afraid his own measures aren’t secure enough. It’s easy to make something secure enough for a nix-hound. Less so for a giant troll.


    “This one heard that the Thizzrini Arena had trolls transported while turned to stone,” I say.


    “Oh, that would be much safer, but sadly mages capable of doing such a thing are not cheap.”


    I wonder what I’m paying Merry. I mean, the answer here is probably “anything he wants”, but still.