Author's Note: I am extremely unhappy with this chapter, as it was really difficult for me to find the time to write it between all of my classes. I'm very sorry for having such a long haitus... again. This chapter probably doesn't make any sense whatsoever and is more filler than anything else, to be completely honest. Filler that I'm really really unhappy with. D:

EXTRA NOTE: Okay, why the HELL is there Chinese in my chapter? I don't remember writing in Chinese! Uh. Just hang tight until I get this fixed, I suppose. Sorry about this D:

Extraextra note: So I fixed the Chinese problem. Huzzah for that!

Early morning was Martin's favorite time to awaken, he decided. The Temple was always its most quiet at that time. Everyone was still asleep, including Jauffre, thank the Divines, and the only people who were awake were the few Blades put on patrol, and even they seemed to almost sleep at their posts. That was a foolish idea, but they were definitely more relaxed in the morning.

He opened the door to the Great Hall, Baurus at his heels. The Redguard had taken over from Steffan as Martin's personal bodyguard. Not that Martin minded; Baurus was good company to keep and, despite the seriousness of everything, was always more light-hearted than his peers amongst the Blades. On top of that, he was decently educated, and was quite useful to bounce ideas off of as to the translation of the Xarxes, unlike James' poor brother. The conjurer knew his daedra and his daedric, to be sure, but he was always so easily distracted that any ideas coming from him were difficult to discern amidst the rest of the babble. It was like he knew too much for his own good.

This morning, Martin did not pick up the Xarxes as he customarily did the moment he awoke. He would have, but found that he couldn't, because a Nord was currently using his makeshift desk as a pillow, the unholy book trapped underneath a copy of A Warp in the West, which was supporting the girl's head. Tangles of blonde hair covered in both dirt and blood, presumably someone else's, obscured the girl's face, but there was no mistaking her. Gingerly, Martin tugged slightly at her long braid. She didn't budge an inch.

He let her be for the moment, and moved past her to the dining hall. Caroline and Belisarius chatted quietly in one corner, though they immediately stood to salute Martin as he entered. He still was not used to that, and doubted that he ever would be. They sat and resumed their conversation, leaving him to prepare his own food in peace, as he liked it. He returned then to the Great Hall and placed a bowl of whatever concoction he had created by Nhiilaa's sleeping face, causing her to stir slightly.

She looked up at him and blinked for a moment, not realizing quite just where she was. She then sat up, found the bowl on the table, and promptly began to inhale the contents of the bowl indiscriminately. The priest laughed slightly, and Baurus just shook his head, smiling.

Martin found an extra chair from some corner of the room and sat down at the opposite side of the table, waiting for Nhiilaa to finish as he ate his own portion at a much slower rate. It didn't take her long at all, and she set the bowl back down where it had originally been placed.

She was still in her armor, Martin noted, and that was in disrepair and bloodied. It was apparent that she had returned to Cloud Ruler without pause after whatever debacle had occurred while she was gone, and then promptly fell asleep. He felt a pang of guilt, but then she smiled broadly and it was erased.

"G'morning," she said as she let out an unladylike yawn. Martin smiled briefly.

"Good morning," he replied. "How long have you been back?"

Nhiilaa paused and thought for a moment. "Erm... about three hours I suppose? You wouldn't believe the time I had trying to gather aid for Bruma. It was absolutely mad. Apparently Gates have been cropping up all over the place, especially around the cities, and so none of the Counts or Countesses would allow any guards to be sent until they were gone. Guess who was stuck with that?"

"You?"

She rolled her eyes. "Oh of course." The Nord rocked back in her chair and stretched. "It wasn't terribly difficult, as far as closing Gates goes. Well, except for Cheydinhal. Let me tell you, Farwil Indarys is a s'wit. Count Indarys should hope he never kicks off, otherwise that city would fall before nightfall with his son on the throne."

Baurus coughed, attempting to cover up his laughter.

"That reminds me... You want a sword? Count Indarys gave me this 'heirloom' for saving his idiotic son's life and not killing him myself. It's nice, but it's too heavy and frilly for my taste." She pulled out the Thornblade and unsheathed it, pointing to the serrations on the blade. "See, it'd just get stuck in a corpse and make it hard to pull back out. Fine for slashing, but not stabbing."

Everything she had just said bounced off Martin and fell to the ground like a ton of weights. It was clear that he had no idea as to what she meant, and he blinked for a moment. "Erm. No thank you. I er... can't use swords very well..."

"Ah... well. You can have it anyway. Put it on your mantle or something, I suppose. I don't want it at all. It's supposed to be enchanted, and I figure it'll be in better hands with the Emperor than mine." She handed him the sword, which fell into his lap heavily. He winced from the pain, and Baurus took the sword from him quickly, garnering the future Emperor's thanks.

Nhiilaa yawned and scratched at the blood in her hair. She frowned at it and rose, bidding both Baurus and Martin farewell and walking off towards the West Wing of the temple. She greeted James as she left, and the Imperial just stared at her, startled at her appearance. He looked back at Martin, who shrugged, but said nothing before picking up the Xarxes and dedicating the rest of the day towards its translation.

James remained at his post at the door and watched the priest in silence, and time seemed to pass at a crawling pace in the Temple.

A few hours later and the Nord emerged, the carnage of travel cleansed from her skin, her hair combed and bound tightly in her traditional plait. She sat at the table that was being occupied by Martin and sighed. After a few minutes, she began to poke at the armor of Tiber Septim absent-mindedly. James sucked in his breath in horror.

"Don't touch it! Jauffre will murder us all if he catches you," he snapped, flicking her hand away. Nhiilaa crinkled her nose in irritation, sat back, and crossed her arms over her chest.

"Why? It's just armor," said the girl as she leaned.

James rolled his eyes. "It's Tiber Septim's armor. It's a holy relic. I did not just almost die for anything less than holy, damnit, so don't touch it." Nhiilaa sighed again, but stopped prodding at the ancient metal and rocked back in her chair. The armor just sat there, mocking her, begging to be poked, especially now that it was forbidden from doing so. She bit her lip in mild irritation and stared back at the metal, returning its glare match for match. Minutes passed with no sign of détente from either party.

"What are you--" came James' voice, but was cut off by the Nord shushing him and waving him away with her hand. By now, she leaned forward, pressed against the table and partially hiding behind both her hands and the edge of the wood. It was like she was stalking the relic, waiting for a crack in its defensive armor and the lapse of notice by its guard. That was when she would strike.

It was also by this time that Martin noticed what she was doing and looked down at her from behind the Xarxes. "Oh by Talos," grumbled the priest. He sighed and touched the object of her current obsession lightly with a single finger. "Are you happy now?"

Apparently not, because all she did was glare back at him and sit back in her chair, clearly pouting. Like a child, in fact.

–

"Nhiilaa, will you please stop that?" Hjotra hissed at her daughter after taking yet another artifact from the child's hands and placing it back on the cart where it belonged. There were few relics in her possession, and the ones that she did have she would have liked to kept intact. The girl sat in the snow in protest of the whole thing.

Packing up an entire life was not the woman's favorite activity, to be sure, but it had been her idea to leave their native land of Skyrim. After all, Alyeid artifacts and ruins did not exactly grow in the massive forests of the mountains. Ijorta was not at all pleased with this decision, and she thought her father was quite the traitor for supporting it. The girl was in love with the snow, the mountains, and especially the forests. But, Hjotra thought it was the best thing to do, and Ingar agreed. Business was booming in the south and was growing stagnant in the north.

It wasn't to be permanent either, she rationalized. They would be back. And Bruma wasn't all that different from their village near Falkreath. Or so she heard. She hoped with all her heart that it wasn't.

Newheim placed another crate of their belongings into the cart and picked up the six-year-old from her nest in the snow. She kicked at the portly man violently and clawed at his arms with her tiny hands, but the thick fur mittens on them prevented her from being in any way, shape, or form, damaging to the oiled leather. Hjotra clambered onto a makeshift seat at the back of the cart amidst all of her life's work and belongings, and took the child from Newheim's hands, holding the squirming thing in her lap.

There was a lump in her throat as she watched her relatives poured from their houses to say their goodbyes. None of them understood Ingar's supposed choice to pack up his wife and child and leave the safety of home, and none approved of it, for that matter. But still, they were family.

The cart shook with motion, prompting the child to double her efforts to pry herself from her mother's grasp, and nearly did. Their home shrank in the distance, and finally faded out of view, and the snow turned to slush as the group traveled further and further south.

–

The snow of Cyrodiil was deceiving. It looked the part, but was never quite cold enough for Nhiilaa's taste. It was too wet, too warm, too... like water. Like rain, even. It melted upon impact with the flesh of her exposed hands, and yet it still did not chill her, and while the other Blades shivered and huddled amongst themselves in the Great Hall and around the fire, she stood outside, keeping watch with a somewhat-vigilant eye.

Fresh powder dotted the land as far as she could see in the darkness of dusk, but Bruma lay south glowing from innumerable torches and flames. It would have been idyllic if not for the construction of the buildings, the walls, the city on a whole. Bruma was Cyrodiil's pretender to the throne, at least to her. A cheap imitation of the simplicity of Skyrim, it would—no, could—never be the same as her home, no matter how hard it tried.

Slosh had matted her hair to her scalp annoyingly by the time when Baragon, in his perpetual wonderful mood, came to relieve her from her post so that she too could join her fellow Blades—though they didn't seem very fellow to her—in the Hall and listen to stories and laughter that she'd rather not hear. Still, she went anyway. It was something to do, at the very least.

–

Isaan had absolutely no idea why he had been sent to Cloud Ruler Temple. No bloody idea whatsoever. Traven had been so abrupt with his dismissal as his assistant; though he hadn't gone and said that he was fired explicitly, he'd called it a "temporary reassignment." Now it was two years of his bloody life dedicated to the whims of that crotchety old geezer wasted in a blink of the eye, and he was freezing his bloody ass off in this forsaken, frosty hell-hole. It was hard for him to understand how the Nords endured this sort of ice year after year after year.

He pouted. It was the only thing that he could do at the moment, because quite frankly, Isaan was useless. He was a good conjurer, though he liked to think that he was a better researcher and instructor on arcane theory and history, but what use was that here? Ooh, the mage can summon daedra at whim and can ramble on and on about the effects of the ruin of Alyeid society on the development of magick! Fascinating. That will be so useful in assisting the translation of the Xarxes. Surely he would be an integral part of this adventure and his name would go down in the history books as a hero.

Snow was cold, and he disliked it very much. Even around the fire, there was snow everywhere! Except inside, it was melted and wet and greased the wood panels, causing him no end of aches and pains when he inevitably slipped and fell. He seemed to be the only one with this problem, he noted.

Why, oh why did Traven send him here? Had he botched a project, some notes, a spell somehow? He couldn't remember something of that sort of ilk. He was so careful in everything that he did, documenting his procedures and daily movements down to the bitter minutia to be reviewed by the Arch-Mage at a later date.

Maybe that was it? Perhaps it was all that useless documentation and red-tape that he'd been so insistent upon. Maybe, just maybe, Traven disliked his thoroughness, because magick was anything but thorough and it certainly wasn't careful?

That was preposterous, he decided. You could never be too careful.

Whatever the reason, it was James' fault, and Isaan resigned to being cross with his elder twin. He folded his arms over and glared at the swordsman from across the room. Of course it was his fault, Mother had always liked him better. James' swordplay always took precedent over Isaan's mystical education, and Mother had no time for the poor boy's love of the arcane. Magick gave her a headache, he thought. Traven had probably found that his twin was a Blade and thought to send Isaan to him in order to get the pest out of his hair.

That was ridiculous. Isaan wasn't a pest. He was a good mage, and a better assistant. Whatever Traven's reasoning, it was most likely for Isaan's benefit. He should trust his mentor, believe that he had Isaan's best interests at heart when he sent him away.

This was all James' fault. Prat.