19th of Heartfire, 4E201
When I woke up this morning, Marcurio was gone. I got worried at first, then heard whistling nearby. I looked over the wall, and saw him walking around outside of the fort gathering birds' eggs. I thought it was strange, but to each his own I guess. He came back to the camp not long after that, while I was polishing my armor. Then he asked if I was hungry. I said that I was, and he asked me to find us some plates and silverware while he cooked breakfast. I found some, and took them down to the river nearby to wash the bandit off. After I managed to get them clean, he called down to me and told me that breakfast was ready. When I got back up to the camp, he had a little table set up, with food on it. He explained that he'd noticed the food in the bandits' kitchen in the fort last night, and hated the thought of it going to waste. So, he'd gotten up early to go and get it, then planned what to cook. We had some salmon, and ale, and some things he called omelets. They were eggs cooked with vegetables and meat and cheese in them. I didn't care what they were called, they were delicious! After breakfast, we put out the fire and he packed up some of the food and cookware into his bag in case we needed it again. As we left the fort, I wondered if Jenassa had ever eaten an omelet before. If she hadn't, it seemed sad that she never got the chance to. I thought about her often, and tried not to cry when I did. Marcurio seemed nice enough, but I didn't want him thinking that I was weak or anything. I didn't know if I could trust him or not, but for now I was thankful for his company. And his breakfast ideas.

We made it to Ivarstead that afternoon. We would have been there sooner, but we had taken a shortcut through the forest. The shortcut had ended up taking longer due to bandits and spiders and wolves, but I did manage to find an enchanted circlet. And we found some treasure near part of an outside Dwemer ruin. In town, Klimmek was happy to see me again, and gave me a thousand septims for the delivery. Perhaps it had been worth it visiting the Greybeards after all. While we had lunch, Marcurio asked what I'd done to get all those septims, and I told him about the climb up the seven thousand steps. After my story, he asked who Jenassa was, and I told him all about her, and about our time together. I tried to keep my emotions in check, but I ended up crying anyways. I didn't tell him about Aventus though, or killing Grelod. I didn't want him turning on me and reporting me to the guards. While I'd been talking about Jenassa, and crying, he kept looking like he wanted to comfort me, but stopped himself. He did give me a hankerchief though. He told me about himself, and about leaving Cyrodiil behind after a falling out with his family. He also confessed that although he supported the Empire, since he was an Imperial, he didn't agree with what the Thalmor were doing. He'd heard stories about people losing family members to them, and their family had never seen them again. I told him about my mission to free the roads of Skyrim from them, and he thought that it was a good idea, and promised to help me. We talked for hours, and didn't realize how late it was until some of the villagers in town started coming to the inn for dinner. It seemed that we weren't going to be doing much travelling for the rest of the day, so I went ahead and rented us a room for the night. Wilhelm, the innkeeper, told us a story about the barrow near the town, saying that it was haunted. The only person who had tried exploring it was a treasure hunter about a year ago, but the night he left they heard screams from the barrow and he was never seen again.

During dinner Marcurio asked if we could explore the barrow. He seemed to think that it might be full of treasure, and that the ghost story was a fabrication of the locals to get people to come gawk at the barrow and stay at the inn. Since we'd been relaxing around the inn all day, I said that we could explore it. I warned him that barrows tended to be full of draugr though, at least in my experience. He assured me that he wasn't afraid of a few dead ancient Nords.He also told me that one of his hobbies was studying the ancient Nords, and their ruins and barrows. I added exploring the barrow to my list, and he laughed a bit. It seemed that he was started to understand how I ended up with so many things to do.

We explored the first section of the barrow, and found the ghost that everyone had been talking about. It was the treasure hunter, and he'd made some sort of potion to make himself look like a ghost. After reading his journal, it seemed that he had eventually gone insane. We couldn't get any  farther into the barrow than we did for the same reason that he was stuck: we didn't have the claw that unlocked the puzzle door. I took the journal, and some of the potion to study, and we went back to the inn to tell Wilhelm about what we had discovered.

Wilhelm was angry that the treasure hunter, a Dunmer man named Wyndelius, had been tricking them all for a year now. He thanked me for taking care of him, and gave me a sapphire dragon claw as payment. It was ironic that Wyndelius had been tricking the one person whose help he needed to get the treasure in the barrow. It was starting to get late, so I decided to finish exploring the barrow tomorrow. Marcurio seemed like he wanted to go back tonight, but he understood that we needed to be well rested to avoid having traps or draugr kill us. Thankfully the room at the inn had two beds, so we wouldn't have to argue over who got to sleep on the floor.

18th of Heartfire, 4E201
I left the inn around the middle of the night in my regular clothes, with my robes and dagger hidden in a bag I was carrying. When I made it to the orphanage, I hid behind a tree and changed quickly, then left my bag buried under some leaves. I made sure that no guards were patrolling nearby and crept inside, amazed when I discovered that the door had been left unlocked. When I got inside, I saw Grelod and Constance still awake and sitting in the dining room. It was the middle of the night, why weren't they asleep? I sighed mentally and hid in the shadows, watching them to wait for them to go to bed. I didn't have to wait long, thankfully. I waited to make sure that Constance had fallen asleep in her room, then I quietly crept through the room of sleeping children to Grelod's room. I slowly and carefully shut the doors behind me, looking at the bed often to make sure she didn't wake up. I went around her bed quietly and looked down at her, my dagger in hand. Even in sleep, she looked wicked, her teeth bared in a cruel grin. Most likely she was dreaming about hurting the children again. I was about to cut her throat, then remembered that if I did, her blood would get all over me and it would be obvious that I had killed her. I crept back around the bed and carefully climbed onto it, then quickly slit her throat from behind. She screamed and gurgled, then died. Suddenly, I heard the children in the other room, and I quickly hid in the shadows near her wardrobe so they wouldn't see me. They ran into the room and stared at Grelod, and I got as close to the wall as I could, afraid that they would see me. When they realized that she was dead, they started cheering. Cheering! They danced around in excitement, and said "We love you Dark Brotherhood!" and "Aventus really did it!" I could hear Constance in the other room also, running around and screaming in fear. I waited until everyone went back to bed, then placed a nightshade flower on her pillow before sneaking back out into the night. Outside, I changed  back into my regular clothes, then went back to the inn to have another nap.

I studied my dagger as I got ready for bed in my room. It had managed to kill her so easily, so effortlessly. I didn't even realize that it had cut her until she screamed and gurgled. I polished it with a scrap of rag, amazed that it had only gotten a few small drops off blood on it. I wrapped it up in some leather, and placed it under my pillow for safekeeping, then laid down to have a nap. Hopefully I wouldn't be woken up in the early morning hours by a guard intent on arresting me.

Marcurio was still on his bench when  I went downstairs for breakfast, snoring a little loudly. I walked over and gently kicked the bench with my boot, causing  him to wake up in sudden confusion and he nearly fell off of the bench. I held out a coinpurse with five-hundred septims in it, and asked him if he wanted some breakfast. He took the gold, and counted it as we waited on our food at the table. Satisfied that it was the full amount, he smiled and said that he would come with me. I would see how long it would take him to regret his decision.

After breakfast, we went down to the alchemy shop so that I could make him some healing and magicka potions. I also made a few potions and poisons to sell for profit. I stopped by the general store, and got Marcurio some enchanted jewelry: a necklace to fortify his magicka, and a ring to help his magicka recharge faster. He thanked me, and put them on. I also gave him a few of the potions I had made.I also got myself a necklace that would help improve my smithing.  I was nearly out of septims again now, but I knew that I could make more. I stopped in the market to check my list of things to do. Near Riften, we could go and take Avrusa her jazbay grapes, go and get the moon amulet for Kharjo, or go to the Dwemer ruin and put the lexicon back. I didn't want to go into the Dwemer ruin, so I decided to deliver the grapes. Marcurio saw my list and asked me what it was. I told him that it was a list of all of the things I'd been asked to do since I came to Skyrim. I had started writing them in my journal to keep track of them all. He then asked how long I had been in Skyrim, and seemed surprised when I told him I'd been here a little over a month. He shook his head, and said that maybe I should start telling people that I was busy. When I told him that most of the things I had done so far paid rather well, he changed his mind. We left Riften and headed for the Sarethi farm. From there, we could go and get Kharjo's amulet, since it wasn't far.

I didn't talk much on the way to the Sarethi farm, and Marcurio only asked me a few questions. I did tell him about being the Dragonborn though , to warn him about having to fight dragons. He didn't seem too impressed though, but I suspected that was because he thought I was lying. Oh well, he would find out soon enough, based on my luck.

Avrusa was very happy when I brought her the grapes, and gave me a few potions in return for my help. She also invited us inside for lunch. When we left a little while later, she said that I could come back and visit anytime. I checked her off of my list, and we headed down the road towards Treva's Watch, and the stolen moon amulet.

On the way to Treva's Watch, another assassin came after me. I hadn't even seen her coming, since I had been stopped to pick some flowers for my potions. Thankfully Marcurio had seen her, and fried her with a powerful lightning spell. I found the contract in a pocket, only a little burnt from the lightning. It said the same thing that the others had. I remembered Aventus then, and told Marcurio that we'd need to go to Windhelm soon. He asked why an assassin from the Dark Brotherhood had wanted to kill me, and seemed surprised when I told him that she wasn't the first one to try. I also thanked him for saving me, and gave him a ruby that  I had found in her pocket.

We made it to Treva's Watch not long after that, and found three people camped a ways from the fort. One, a man named Stalleo, asked me if I was there to help. I asked him what he was talking about, and he seemed to think that Marcurio and I were reinforcements, and said that he hoped we were good. I sarcastically said that we were the best, and he seemed pleased, and said that they had lost some good men trying to take the fort earlier in the day. Apparently sarcasm was something he didn't catch onto. He went on to say that he suspected someone named Brurid of taking over the fort, since they had had bad blood between them since the High King's death. His family had been kidnapped, and his home had been taken away while he and his guards were off fighting somewhere. Marcurio asked what we would get in return for our help, and Stalleo said that in addition to the posted reward, we could take whatever we wanted. Since we had no idea what the posted reward was since we weren't really mercenaries, I had no idea what to expect. We were going to take a secret entrance and sneak in, but one of the bandits spotted us from the walls and started shooting arrows at us. Stalleo and his guards helped, but one of the guards was killed. I summoned an atronach through the locked front gate, and Marcurio used his lightning to blast them from the walls. After all of the ones outside were dead, Marcurio gave me a boost up the side of one of the walls, and  I went in to find a way to unlock the gate and let him in. I found a lever in  a small gatehouse outside, and pulled it. It opened the gate, and Marcurio ran in with his spells ready. I told Stalleo and his remaining guard to wait back at their camp, and we went inside to take care of the rest of the bandits.

We managed to find Kharjo's amulet not far into the fort, in a chest guarded by a bandit chief and a few bandits. They didn't last long at all. I admit, I had been skeptical about Marcurio being a "master of the arcane", but he did do quite a bit of damage with his spells. And, thankfully, he didn't hit me with any of them. I put the amulet around my neck so I wouldn't lose it, and let Marcurio take what he wanted from the room. Then we stopped and had a quick meal before going to rid the rest of the fort of bandits.

Marcurio and I got separated in a fight against at least twenty bandits. I'm hiding in a room I found, and sending atronachs after them. I ran away from the fight to get some of them to follow me so we'd have a better chance of survival. I don't know if he's still alive or not, but I hope he is. I finally managed to kill all of the bandits that had followed me, and went to find Marcurio.

I found him alive, and rifling through the pockets of the bandits he had killed. I didn't know how he had managed it, since he was wearing only mage robes. Nearby, I found the body of what seemed to be another bandit chief, and took his steel plate armor. I cleaned it up a bit, then took it to Marcurio. He looked like he didn't want to wear it, but I insisted. I had to help him put it on though, since he'd never worn armor before.

A few hours and many fights later, Treva's Watch was at last free of bandits. I went to tell Stalleo the good news, and told him that I hadn't seen him family while we were in there. He thanked me, and said that they would go and find them after they got more supplies. Hopefully they had left before the bandits came. As a reward, he gave me something I valued: a spell book that I didn't have yet. Marcurio didn't ask for a reward for himself, I suspect  since his pockets were already lined with gold and trinkets that he'd gotten from the bandits. It was late, so we found a couple of bedrolls outside and shook them to get some of the bandit smell out. One of  the bandits' camp fires was still burning, so we moved the bedrolls and their little wooden lean to's that had been over them closer to the fire. Marcurio thanked me for bringing him here, since he'd gotten so much treasure. I went over my notes again, and noticed that I'd never gone back to tell Klimmek that I'd taken the food to the Greybeards. They may have been rude, but he seemed like a nice enough man. We were near Ivarstead, so I decided that we'd stop by and tell him tomorrow. But, for now, it was time to sleep.

17th of Heartfire, 4E201
I got up early and had some breakfast, then bought more preserved food since mine was getting a bit stale. I left the inn and wandered around town, stopping near a building whose name seemed familiar. It was called Honorhall Orphanage. I wondered why since I'd never been here, then remembered the boy in Windhelm. He's asked me to kill the orphanage's headmistress. I decided to go inside and see if she was really as horrible as he claimed that she was. I crept inside, and overheard her telling the children that they would get extra beatings if they didn't so as they were told, and told them that they were never going to get adopted since no one wanted them. So, she was mean and horrible, but was is enough to deserve death? I decided to talk to the children there, to find out more about her. One told me that she was the meanest person in Skyrim, and that she sometimes locked them somewhere she just called "the room". Another begged me to take them out of there, and said that Grelod had been meaner since Aventus left, and he was worried that she was going to kill one of them. He said that the other woman in the orphanage, a woman named Constance, was nice to them, and would even sneak food to them when Grelod wasn't looking. Apparently, Grelod only let them eat one meal during the day. Another suspected that she must be part Hagraven, since she was so mean. I talked to Constance, and asked if Grelod was always mean, and she said that she was. The townsfolk had started calling her "Grelod the Kind" as a joke. I explored the orphanage, and found  a room with what looked like prison shackles on the walls. Was this the room she put children in? So she beat them, half starved them, and had them afraid that she was going to kill them. I had my answer. I would go to Shor's Stone for that ore sample, bring it back, and then figure out how to save those children from that horrible woman.

On the way to Shor's Stone, I decided to stop and get rid of a few of the bandits. They probably robbed travelers that were too foolish to go around the fort. I had to rely on my atronachs for help, but managed to defeat all of the ones outside. In Shor's Stone, Filnjar was happy to see me again, and I told him that I was there for the ore sample. He was glad, since he's sent a letter to them about it weeks ago. He handed it over, and said that they could chip off whatever they thought was a fair payment for their time. I sat on his steps and had some lunch, then made my way back to Riften. Hafjorg was happy to see me again, and gave me a few potions in return for getting the ore for them.

I spent the rest of the day wandering around Riften. I picked some flowers growing around town, and found some nightshade in the cemetery. I went outside to the docks and met two Argonian women. One, named Wujeeta,  begged me to help her by giving her a healing potion. She had tried some skooma a few months ago, and had been addicted ever since. Her boss, a man named Bolli, had threatened to fire her from her job at the Riften Fishery if she came to work on skooma again. The potion  would help her cleanse the poison from her body so that she could start over. I had plenty of potions, so I gave her one. She thanked me, and gave me a gold ring with a diamond in it for my help. I remembered that skooma was illegal, so out of curiosity I asked her where she got it. She didn't want to tell me at first, since she was afraid that they would kill her. I persuaded her to tell me, and she told me that she'd gotten it from a man named Sarthis Idren. He was apparently hiding out in the warehouse on the docks, but no one could get inside. She said that he had always met her outside the door with a bodyguard. I asked if anyone had the key, and she mentioned that she had overheard Bolli telling someone that only the Jarl had the key. When I turned to go back into town, another Argonian came up to me and begged me to take something called a lexicon from her. Her name  was From-Deepest-Fathoms. She was dressed like an adventurer. She seemed very troubled and begged me to take the lexicon away from her. It burdened her terribly, and she said that she couldn't take the memories haunting her. I had no idea what she was talking about, but I decided to help her anyways. She handed it over and said that I must return it to Avanchnzel in the west. She insisted that it must be returned to them. I told her that it would be and she walked away. It was wrapped in cloth, and felt like a square box. I carried it back into town, to look at in the light of my room at the inn, since it was starting to get dark.

When I got to my room, I closed the door and sat down on the bed. I carefully unwrapped the lexicon, and gasped when I saw it. It was unlike anything I had ever seen. It was black and dull bronze, and made of metal. On its surface, strange red runes and symbols glowed. As I sat there studying it, I realized that I had never asked where Avanchnzel was. All I knew is that it was west of here. But, most of Skyrim is west of Riften, so that didn't give me much to go on. I decided to go back out to the docks to see if she was still there, so she could show me where it was on my map. When I found her, she kept saying "Its yours now, I won't take it back, I won't!" I calmed her down, and asked her where Avanchnzel was. She said that she wasn't going back there, and I took out my map and asked her to show me where it was so that I could go there. That calmed her down a little. It was near the mountains not far from Riften. I thanked her, and asked what sort of place it was, and she told me that it was a Dwemer ruin. I sighed and thanked her, then went back to the inn for dinner.

I sat down at one of the tables in the inn, and set the lexicon on the tabletop, wondering what I was going to do. Talen-Jei came over and asked me if I needed anything, and I asked him to get me some salmon steaks with bread and cheese. And a few bottles of ale. As I waited for him to get back with my food, a man in robes sat down in the chair across from me. I didn't notice him at first, since I was starting at the lexicon. He cleared his throat to get my attention. I told him hello, and he asked if I was an adventurer. I told him I was, and he smiled. Then, he asked if I needed someone to guard my back. I asked what he meant, and he explained that he was a mercenary for hire. Then he apologized, and introduced himself as Marcurio. He further explained that for a mere five hundred septims, I could have a master of the arcane at my side. I couldn't tell if he was serious, or if he was trying to flirt with me in some way. I told him that I would think about it and get back to him, and he thanked me and went back to the bench he'd been sitting on near the door. Talen-Jei came with my food not long after that, and I thanked him and paid him for it, then enjoyed my dinner.

After dinner, I went back to my room to store my gear and plan my attack on Grelod. I couldn't wear my armor, it was too noticeable. None of the clothes I had would blend in the shadows, so I went to see if I could get any that would from the general store. I bought some black robes and soft shoes from the store owner, and went back to the inn to get ready. It was still early in the evening, so most people were still awake. I decided to wait until the middle of the night to go to the orphanage. The only weapon I had to use that didn't shine in the light of my room was my black dagger. Only the edge of the blade reflected the light, though it was faint. It would be perfect. In a few hours, those poor children would be free of that horrible woman. I only hoped that I wouldn't get caught and arrested. As I waited for the middle of the night, I went over all of the things Jenassa had told me during our travels. She would often tell me to strike my enemies from the shadows, in order to take them by surprise. She had also told me to be careful in places when we were sneaking, and to watch where I stepped, lest I trip over something and make a sound to give myself away. I wished that she was here now, since she'd know exactly the best way to kill Grelod. She probably would have even killed her for me, if I asked her. I decided to take a quick nap to rest some, so that I would be more alert later.

16th of Heartfire, 4E201
I made myself eat something when I woke up. It wouldn't do any good to have made it this far only to collapse from hunger. When I had first opened my eyes, I sat up and looked around for Jenassa, then remembered what had happened and started crying again. It took a while, but I managed to pull myself together enough to eat and get my armor back on. I got my gear together and took my runes off of the floor, then headed back to the locked door.

I found Jenassa's shield on the floor near the stairs up to the door, and I picked it up. It was still in fair enough shape, so I decided to keep it. I still had a few ingots of  moonstone, but I'd need some blacksmith equipment to get my armor and her shield back in full working order. The key opened the door with ease, and I started down the long hallway towards wherever it led to.

I found another dead creature at the end of the hallway in front of a closed door. It was locked, but a voice came from the other side when it heard me, asking if I was someone named Gavros. I remained quiet and readied my weapon, just in case it was some sort of trap. He wasn't happy to see me, and demanded to know who I was. I didn't tell him my name, just that I had come here looking for the Synod. He congratulated me and told me that I had found them, since it seemed that he was the last one alive. He made a halfhearted joke about being surrounded by angry machines and angrier Falmer. I asked him what a Falmer was, and he gestured to the dead creature outside of the door. So that's what those damned things were! He went on and said that all hope was lost though, and that they had come there for nothing, since Gavros was lost. He'd had some sort of crystal with him that they needed. I asked him about it, and he told me about a focusing crystal, and said that the cold had broken it. Gavros had left to go back to Cyrodiil to get another, and had left everyone to fend off the Falmer. I got the thing with the crystals in it that I had found out of my bag, and asked him if it was anything like what he needed. He became excited then, and said that whoever I was, I may have saved their project. He asked who I was, and I told him that I was from the College of Winterhold. He was a bit hesitant to trust me, since our arch mage hadn't even wanted to give them an audience when they visited the College, but he decided that he would look past that, since I had found the crystal thing for him. He told me that his name was Paratus, and bid me to follow him. He explained that they were there to use some sort of machine that the Dwemer had made to harness starlight and use to figure something out. He wasn't sure what, and it just seemed strange to me. The machine was very large though.As we walked up to the top, I made up my mind not to tell this man the real reason that I was here: to look for the Staff of Magnus. When we got to the top, he had me put the focusing crystal into the machine, and then we had to get it focused. I asked him how we would do that, and he said that I would have use heat and cold to further calibrate the crystal. Without his help, since he was just standing there, I managed to figure out that the three beams of light coming from the crystal would need to line up with three glass circles around the room. There were three buttons on a platform nearby, and each one moved one of the rings that the glass circles were in. The rings were part of the domed ceiling above us, and it amazed me that all of this still worked. It took a while, but at last I managed to get it to work. One of the beams of light illuminated a wall nearby, and it showed what looked like a map of Tamriel. Paratus was excited at first, then said something about the results not being what they should be. He said that the entire map should have been lit up,but that something was interfering with it. Something from Winterhold. He got angry at me then, and accused me of trying to stall his work. I told him that I had no idea what he was talking about. He yelled more, then realized that I really didn't know what he was talking about. Then he said that there must be something very powerful at my College, and asked me what it was. I told him that I wasn't going to tell him unless he told me a few things first. He guessed that we did have something there, and said that it was causing some interesting results. He told me that they had gotten the idea to use this place from the Orrery in the Imperial City, and that they were using it to project a map of Tamriel, and it would show them sources of great magical power. The only places that showed up though were Winterhold, and some place that he claimed could only be Labyrinthian. He then mocked me, and said that he'd beaten my game, and that the Synod now knew that we had something at the College. He told me to go off and get my Staff from Labyrinthian, and that that we could have it since he know knew that there was something even more powerful at the College. He then said that he was going to go back to Cyrodiil and tell the Synod there all about it. I decided not to let that happen. We fought until I defeated him, using Jenassa's shield to crack his skull. I dragged him out to where the dead Falmer was so it would seem that they had killed each other, and messed up the machine so that no one else could use it. I was tired of this place, and hurried to find a way out.

In front of a door, one of the Psijics appeared  and told me that I needed to get back to the College at once and tell the Arch Mage what I had learned. He looked like the one from Saarthal. He assured me that I was on the right path, and that I had  the ability to prevail in the end. Then he vanished. I went through the door he had been in front of, and it led down a small hallway and to the world outside. I ended up on the side of a mountain, but I didn't care. I was outside! The sun was hidden by clouds, but it was enough that its light filtered through them. I carefully climbed down the mountain, and made my way onto the top of some of the ruins. In a chest there  I found a dagger. It was black and deadly looking, with golden scrollwork all over the blade and handle. I strapped it to my belt, and climbed down the rest of the ruins to the ground below.

When I got to the ground, the sun had broken through the clouds. I sat down in the grass and had some food, then decided what to do next. Jenassa still had her map, and I didn't want to have to go back into that place to get it. I had scribbled a few notes and sketches into my journal, but they were mostly of the area around Whiterun. I remembered that I had been close to Darkwater Crossing, so I decided to head there, at first anyways. Then the more I thought about, the more I realized that I would only get sad again when Hrefna asked where Jenassa was. I made it to a fork in the road. One way led to Darkwater Crossing, and the other I had never been on. I took the unknown road, hoping that it would lead me to a town where no one knew me.

I came across a small settlement called Shor's Stone. The blacksmith there, a man named Filnjar, welcomed me, but told me that he hoped I hadn't come looking for work in the mine. I asked him why not, and he told me that it was full of spiders. They'd almost killed him and one of the miners when they showed up. He was worried that soon they'd come out of the mine soon to look for food. I asked him why the I'd seen around hadn't helped him, and he scoffed and said that they gave him some nonsense about looking out for enemy soldiers. I offered to kill the spiders for him, if he'd help me fix my armor in return. He made an even better offer, and said that if I kept my word, that he would not only gladly help me, but he'd line my pockets with as much gold as he could scrape up. I agreed, and went to the mine to kill the spiders. The spiders weren't much of a challenge, and I found some ore veins in the mine.I was going to leave them, but noticed that the ore looked like my new dagger. I dug out some of it, then went back to tell Filnjar that the spiders were dead now. He was very happy, and gave me one thousand septims for my help. He hadn't been kidding about lining my pockets. We went to work on my armor and weapons, and in a few hours we had them all looking like new again. I asked him if he knew where I could get some supplies and a map, and he told me to head down the road to Riften. I thanked him for his help and set off, waving goodbye to him from the road.

There was a fort over the road not far from Shor's Stone, but it looked like it was full of bandits. I crept around it, since I didn't want to deal with any fighting right now. I made it to Riften not long after that, and one of the guards at the gate tried to get me to pay some "visitor's tax" for the privilege of entering the city. I told him that this was obviously a shakedown of some sort, and he gave up and let me into the town. It amazed me that the neither Filnjar or the guards here commented on my appearance. I hadn't bathed or anything since getting covered in Falmer blood. I probably smelled horrid too. I decided to go to the general store in town to get some soap as soon as possible. Jenassa had been carrying mine.

In the market, a man stopped me, and tried to tell me that I'd never done an honest day's work for all of the coin I was carrying. I ignored him, and he said that he could take a hint, and told me to come and find him if I wanted to make some money. He then went back to his stall and started trying to sell people something called "Genuine Falmerblood Elixer" I fought the urge to flake off some actual dried Falmer blood and throw it at him. I went over to the blacksmith nearby, to see if he had any better armor that I could wear. I'd gotten some boots from Filnjar, but I needed better gauntlets. The smith, Balimund, asked me if I'd come to see him perform miracles with steel. I smiled and told him that he seemed proud of his work and he gave credit to his forefathers, and their recipe for flame. Apparently, his forge used fire salts, and it allowed him to forge superior weapons. I was impressed, but he seemed sad. I asked him what was wrong, and he said that he'd used the last of the fire salt that he had, and his forge was dying. I happened to have some in my bag. I handed them over, and he thanked me and told me that I'd "warmed an old smith's heart". He then rewarded me with one thousand septims. He didn't have the gauntlets I needed, but at least I had managed to help him, and make some coin in the process. He told me that I could come back and use his forge anytime, and thanked me again for my help. I managed to find the general store, and bought myself some soap, a map and fresh clothes. I also sold him a few things, and asked if there was an alchemy shop in town. He told me that there was, and that it was down on the lower level near the canal. I managed to find it, and I was greeted warmly by a woman inside. She introduced herself as Hafjorg, and told me that this was her husband Elgrim's shop. I sold her a few potions, and she asked if I would mind doing her a favor. I said that I would, and she asked if I could go to Shor's Stone and pick up an ore sample from Filnjar. I wondered why he hadn't mentioned it while I'd been there, but I supposed that he'd been to happy about the spiders and it had slipped his mind. It was starting to get dark when I left the alchemy shop, so I decided to head to the inn to get some food and a room.

When I got to the inn, a priest was there yelling at everyone, and saying that dragons had returned because Mara was angry at everyone's constant drunkenness. The innkeeper, an Argonian named Keerava, got onto him, and the barman talked to the priest and asked him to stop using the dragons as an excuse to harass their customers. He then asked him to keep the sermons at the temple, and to let everyone sin in peace. Keerava wasn't  very friendly, but the barman Talen-Jei was. He offered to make me one of their special drinks if I wanted one. He also asked if I was an adventurer. I told him that I was, and he asked if I could do a favor for him. He explained that he and Keerava were in love, and he wanted to marry her. But, according to Argonian tradition, he needed three flawless amethysts to finish an engagement ring for her. I had gotten a few of them in Mzulft, so I handed three over to him. He thanked me, and gave me some sort of poison as a reward. I thought it was strange, but put it in my bag to sell later. I rented a room from Keerava, and asked her to bring up a kettle of warm water. She did, but it was cold, so I just heated it up with a flame spell. I bathed myself as best I could, and got all of the blood off of me. Then I put on some of my new clothes and got into bed to write. Riften wasn't the best town, but I had seen a few other Dunmer here, and they didn't seem to be racist against us here. And a few of the people I had met were nice. I looked over my map and made a few notes on it, then tucked it away in my bag. I'd forgotten to buy dinner, so I ate some of my food stores, and decided to get something fresher for breakfast.

15th of Heartfire, 4E201
I don't know how long we slept, only that I was still tired when we woke up. I was tempted to go back to sleep, but my desire to get out of this place stopped me. I got  out some of our food for breakfast as Jenassa looked out the room's barred window. There were no signs of anything out there at the moment, and thankfully nothing had tried to get in. We ate in silence, afraid that something would hear us talking and come after us. We washed our breakfast down with a few stamina potions to keep us going, then got our armor and gear back on. I pocketed the room's key, just in case it opened any other doors. A key was much faster than a lockpick, and lockpicks couldn't lock doors behind you. At least not that I knew of. I removed my floor runes and opened the door as quietly as I could. Nothing out there, thankfully. We set out further into the unknown, our weapons ready for the inevitable things that would surely try to kill us.

Not far from the room we stayed in, I found more moonstone ore. I managed to mine it without anything coming to attack us. In a nearby hallway, we found another of the Altmer like monsters, dead. There weren't any machines around though, except the ones attached to the walls, just pipes and gears. We weren't sure what killed him, but we didn't stay around long enough for it to come kill us too. Down the hall, we found a locked room. I tried the key and it opened it. Inside was another of the insect monsters, but my frost atronach took care of him. It was a bedroom. The bed was on a raised, what was it called, dais I think? It was larger than the other room, and also had a table with a chair and a chest sitting on it. In the chest was a beautiful amethyst, a gold and amethyst necklace, and a silver one with an emerald in it, that seemed to be enchanted. There were dishes everywhere, and various metal components from something. I also found a helmet on the desk. It seemed to cover your whole head, and a likeness similar to some of the metal decorations we'd seen on the wall was made onto it. I wondered if they just liked that face, or if perhaps they all looked like that. I left it sitting on the desk, and we continued further into the ruin.

In the next room two more of the creatures were skulking about, and one of them even summoned a bound sword like I used! I explored the room after we killed them, and we found what seemed to be a water reservoir. Amazingly, the water was still clear and seemed to be drinkable. We refilled our water jugs, and had some to drink. I was glad that the creatures hadn't spoiled it. We found another bedroom near the reservoir, and it had one of those large insects in it. I had to summon  two frost atronachs to kill it. In the room, there was a large chest on a desk. It seemed that the bedrooms were getting nicer and nicer. It worried me though, that these bugs had somehow managed to get into them though. I found an amulet to one of the divines in the chest, as well as another amethyst. The Dwemer seemed to like them. I also found the main piece of a set of armor, which Jenassa said looked Orcish. How had this gotten here? She picked it up and managed to fit it into her bag after throwing out a few other things. I asked her why she wanted it, and she said that it was worth quite a bit of money. That seemed to be a fair reason. If we got out of here alive, we were going to be able to afford to buy a feast fit for a Jarl, or even a king.

I'm never going to make it out of this place. Those creatures, those horrible horrible creatures, managed to kill Jenassa. I flew into a rage and shouted at them, knocked them backwards and cutting them until they fell, and even after. I was covered in blood and had gotten it everywhere. I held her for hours it seemed, begging her to come back. I could have raised her from the dead, but it wouldn't really be her, just a soulless zombie that looked like her. I cried and cried until I was empty. Then, hate started to fill me. Hate for this place, those creatures, and for the gods for letting her die. There was no dirt to bury her in, everything was stone. I knew that she hated it underground, but I hoped that she would forgive me. I managed to carry her back to one of the bedrooms, and laid her on the bed. I made a bouquet of nightshade and lavender for her, and left it clutched in her hands on her chest. I also left a note with her, letting anyone that found her know that she had fought bravely, and had fallen to the horrible creatures of this accursed place. I left her there, and locked the door behind me. Now it was time for me to make some of her art in her honor. My brushes would be my sword, my bow, my spells, and my hands if they had to be. The paint would be the blood and insides of those creatures. The canvas would be the walls and floors of this place, and any of their fellow creatures who got too close while I was killing them.

I went back to the room where the creatures had been, and tripped over something in the dark.I picked it up and carried it over to some light to see what it was It was a metal sphere, with a metal ring around it. Part of the sphere was missing, and there were crystals inside. I assumed that this had been the crystal thing that the dying mage had been talking about. It was broken, likely thanks to those damned things. I put it in my bag anyways, in case I managed to find one of those Synod mages alive here. Along the side of the room, I found another dead one. I kicked her body out of spite, for coming to this place. If they hadn't come here, I wouldn't have been sent here, and Jenassa would still be alive.Part of me knew that it wasn't their fault, but I still blamed them anyway in my anger and despair. I tried all of the doors in the room. One, I couldn't pick open, and my key didn't open it. Another, I managed to pick open, and it had a small chest and some moonstone inside. I left it where it was. The third door led down a hallway,and seemed to be my only option.

I  found two more of the creatures, already dead. I stabbed them anyways out  of hate. There were more dead in a room nearby, and one of the sphere machines was there, curled up and waiting.  I summoned a frost atronach and shut the door behind them. My atronach didn't last long. Thankfully it didn't come out of the door after me, and I kept to the shadows. I did it again and again, each atronach being sent back to Oblivion faster than I liked. It was my only option, since I knew I'd never survive if I fought it. For a brief moment, I considered letting it kill me, but quickly dismissed the thought. If I did that, Jenassa would never forgive me. Soon it did come out though, and I had to fight it. I kept summoning atronachs to distract it, and hacked at it until it finally fell to the ground in pieces. It had cut me up pretty badly, and I downed a few healing potions to heal my wounds. I limped back to the room it had been in, and kicked and stabbed at the dead creatures in the room. It was a bedroom, larger than any of the others I'd seen so far. I searched the dead creatures to see if any had any healing potions, and ironically one of them had a nightshade flower in his pocket. I took it of course, and kicked him for defiling it by touching it. A chest in the room also held another key, probably the one I needed. I was exhausted, so I dragged the creatures' bodies out of the room, tossing them into the hallway. Then I shut the door and places a few runes just inside of it. I used some of the scrap metal in the room to patch up my armor as best as I could. It was still in terrible shape. Luckily I knew a couple of mage armor spells that I could use if I needed to. I crawled into the bed, not even bothering to eat anything.

14th of Heartfire, 4E201
This morning, we had a nice breakfast with Roggi. He talked more about mead, and said that he missed travelling to Riften, where the best mead in Skyrim, Black-Briar mead, came from. He hadn't been there in years. When we left, I stopped to tell him goodbye and gave him a bottle of Black-Briar mead that I had been carrying around to sell someday. He stood up and gave me a hug, then ran around the inn celebrating. I  laughed and told him goodbye, and to enjoy his mead. Jenassa just shook her head, but I could see a small smile in the corner of her mouth.

We continued south from Kynesgrove, and I found a lot of alchemy ingredients growing along the way. I even found some of the "rare" jazbay grapes for Avrusa Sarethi. I found the twenty bunches that she had wanted with relative ease, and grabbed a few more to experiment with myself. I guess they were only rare if you didn't know where to look. We kept hearing a dragon roaring in the distance, and we finally saw him further south. He was west of the road, and circling around his roost. I was going to ignore him, but then I spotted the falls near Darkwater Crossing in the distance, and remembered my friends there. I couldn't leave that dragon alive and have them in danger. We took off across the volcanic tundra, weapons in hand, to defeat the dragon.

He flew to us and spewed fire down on us. Jenassa shot him with arrows until he landed, then I finished him off with my sword and my frost atronach. He set me on fire, and I jumped on top of his head, slicing at his eyes and face until he finally collapsed in death. I healed our wounds and burns, and we made our way to his roost to see if he'd had any treasure. There was another chanting wall, and a large chest.I didn't know why such a large dragon needed a chest that would have been too small for him, but I doubted that I would ever find out. In the chest was a coinpurse of septims, a scroll, an Imperial helmet, and an elven greatsword. It was too heavy for either of us to carry without difficulty, so we left it there for an adventurer to find. I left the helmet too, it was dirty and grimy, and you could buy an Imperial helmet in almost every town in Skyrim. We climbed back down from the dragon's roost, and hurried back to the road.

At last, we made it. We'd seen what looked like Dwemer stonework from the road, so we followed a footpath up the hill and found the ruins.  According to where we were and the mark on Jenassa's map, this seemed to be the right place. We readied our weapons just in case and went inside. Just inside the door we found a wounded mage mumbling something about a crystal being gone. Jenassa looked around for trouble and I sheathed my sword and hurried over to him to help him. He bled to death before I could help him. Before he died, he said something about finding someone in something called an Oculory. He was clutching a book in his hand, so I gently closed his eyes and took it to figure out what had happened. Apparently the Council of the Synod had sent them here with a crystal of some sort  to do something, but something had gone wrong. I kept his book, and tried to open the door near him, but it was locked. I apologized to him and searched through his pockets for a key. Thankfully he had one. I used it to open the door and pocketed it in case we'd need it later. We walked quietly, heading further inside with our weapons ready in case of trouble.
Not too far from the door we spotted a dead mage in a hallway, and were nearly killed ourselves when spikes suddenly came down from the ceiling. There hadn't been a tripwire or anything. Thankfully they didn't go far enough to kill us if we flattened our bodies against the floor. We waited on them to stop trying to impale us,then got up and hurried over near the mage and out of the way. There was blood everywhere. He didn't have any sort of journal or research log with him, but he did have a magicka potion. He wouldn't be needed it anymore, so I carefully put it into my bag. Not far from the dead mage, we were attacked by metal spiders! How were these machines still working? The halls were filled with gears and pipes, all making noise and turning away. The Dwemer had vanished ages ago, yet all of this still worked without them. It was enough to nearly make my head spin. The spiders had soul gems in them also. One had fallen out when Jenassa broke it nearly in half attacking it. If we made it out of here alive, we'd have plenty of septims after we sold these gems.

We also found some moonstone ore veins. I remembered moonstone being expensive at the blacksmith shops, so I mined as much as I could. Jenassa was getting a little nervous as I mined, because we kept hearing an odd clicking sound. We soon found out what it was. It was a giant insect of some sort, and it was nearly the size of a small pony! I summoned a frost atronach to block it from getting closer to us, and we aimed around it to shoot at the creature. We found two more mages in the area that it was in, dead with their faces splattered with some sort of greenish liquid. They'd been torn up and partially eaten as well. Near one of them, we found two bedrolls. There was also a table near the platform that the bedrolls were on, as well as some food that was beginning to spoil. Another moonstone ore vein was near the table, so I quickly mined  the ore before any more of those things came. Further along, we found two more of them, but they were thankfully smaller and a little easier to kill. They spit some sort of poison at us, but thankfully missed. It smelled foul as it flew past my head. More machines attacked us in the next area. They were about our size, and seemed to be half man and half sphere. They also moved very fast. I wished that we could find a lever somewhere that would turn them all off. I didn't like things coming out of walls to attack me. We were both getting hungry, so we found some shadows to hide in and quickly healed our scrapes and bruises and had something to eat. I summoned an atronach to guard us. Further into the ruin, we found more traps and machines trying to kill us. I discovered that my frost atronach seemed to last longer against the metal beasts, so I decided to summon him from now on.

Through a door and down a hallway, we found a few dead machines and a dead creature that I'd never seen before. It looked like an elf, but it was eyeless and nearly nose less, and had sharp teeth and claws. It was wearing rags, and had weapons and armor plates, made from a material that looked like the shells of the insects we'd seen. We found another dead one and more dead machines further down the hall. They looked like Altmer that had been cursed to become monsters. I hoped that we would only find dead ones.

In the next area, we found more dead machines, but I saw one of the cursed Altmer creatures skulking around between the shadows. We crept closer and stayed still in the shadows, and he walked right past us, wheezing heavily. I summoned my bound bow and killed him from the darkness. We also found another
dead mage, seemingly throttled to death by the creature.

Hours later, after trekking through miles and miles of creature and bug infested tunnels, we finally made it back into what seemed to be the Dwemer ruin again. We'd found a few more mages in the tunnels, probably dragged there by the creatures. Just inside the ruin, we found a locked room that the creatures hadn't managed to get into. I picked the lock, and we shut the door behind us and looked for something to block the door with. All of the furniture was carved stone, but I did find a key on a table that fit the lock in the door. We locked ourselves in. It was a small room, with a table, a chair, and a stone bed with a long dead skeleton on it. There was also a chest on the table with a beautiful emerald ring in it. We pushed the skeleton off of the bed and made a mattress of sorts with some of our clothes. We ate some dinner and studied the room. Most of the room was chilly, but it was warm near the bed thanks to some steam coming out of a few spinning gears in the floor. I put some fire runes near the door in case anything managed to get in, and we huddled together in the small bed. We'd been through the closest thing to hell that we could imagine, and we were nowhere near out of it yet. I wondered if we'd ever get to see the sun again.

13th of Heartfire 4E201
I woke up fairly early, and found Jenassa already up and having breakfast. I sat down to join her, and we made small talk about how we slept, and all the crazy stuff happening at the College. Mirabelle walked by the dining room and told us good morning as she passed the doorway. I got up and went after her, stopping her to ask about the Staff of Magnus. She thought it was a strange question, and asked why I wanted to know about it. I told her about the possibility of it being connected to the Eye of Magnus. She dismissed the orb as not being legendary enough to be called that, and told me to not jump to conclusions. I told her that the Augur had called it that, not me. She gave  me a look and chided me about getting into something over my head, and warned me to be very careful. I reminded her that I had asked about the Staff, and she told me that it was supposedly very powerful, but it had been missing for ages and was likely nothing but a myth. She added that the last she'd heard anything about it had been a few months ago, from the Synods, the mages from Cyrodiil. She told me about them, and about how she suspected that they weren't true mages like us at the College, but used more smoke and mirror style magic and were all talk. It seemed that they were asking about the Staff since they were trying to hoard magickal artifacts in an attempt to appear more powerful. They had seemed to think that the Staff was somewhere in Skyrim, in a dwarven ruin called Mzulft. She suspected that the Synod would be there, but warned me that they likely wouldn't want to help me.

Jenassa and I went to our rooms and got our gear together, then went to town for supplies before starting down the road to the south. We got interrupted during our shopping  trip by a dragon. It breathed ice at us, and kept landing on rooftops out of our reach. It finally landed after we enough fire and arrows into its hide, and I summoned a sword to attack it with. The guards and some of the townspeople helped, and we finally killed it. I thanked everyone for their help, and we went to the store at last. We got some supplies and sold her a few things, and I bought a ring from her that was enchanted to help your magicka recharge faster. Then, at last, we left town, walking around the dragon skeleton on our way down the road.

I wasn't looking forward to our trip, since the gods no longer made the animals stop attacking us. I was reminded of this when a bear near the road tried to tear us to shreds. This was going to be a long trip.

Another assassin tried to kill me!! I had almost forgotten about the Dark Brotherhood, and an Argonian woman came out of nowhere and attacked me! Thankfully Jenassa helped me kill them. Their note said the same thing as the other one had. They never said anything to me but yelled insults and taunts. I stood there by the road holding the note and shaking. Jenassa grabbed what she could from their body, then kicked it a few times for good measure. She managed to get me calmed down some finally and we continued down the road.

According to Jenassa's map, Windhelm was the next city between us and Mzulft. I didn't like it there, but I wasn't sure what choice we had. It was still barely past the middle of the day, so Jenassa suggested that we get as close to Mzulft as we could, and we could perhaps find a camp or inn along the road to stay at. I readily agreed, since  I didn't want to deal with the Nords in Windhelm.

We found a town! It was a small mining town south of Windhelm, called Kynesgrove.  We met a Dunmer woman in town named Dravynea, and she asked us to get her some frost salts. She used them to make a potion to keep herself cool in the mines. Without here there, the tunnels might collapse on the miners. I happened to have some frost salt in my bag, and I gladly gave it to her. She seemed surprised that I had helped her, and taught me about Alteration spells in return for my help. I also met the mine's owner, Kjeld, and he told us that he paid a fair price for any ore we managed to dig up. We still had a few hours left before dark, so I decided to help them out and make a few septims. Jenassa didn't like mines, so she said that she'd take our things to the inn and go ahead and get us a room for the night. I met a nice man in the mine named Roggi. He talked more about mead than mining though. He said that he'd even tried to make his own, but he'd been terrible at it. He also told me about the ore in the mine, and said that it was used to make glass weapons and armor. I saved a few to smelt into ingots in to work on Jenassa's glass mace with, and I sold the rest of the ore to Kjeld. He gave me four-hundred and twenty septims for only fourteen pieces of ore. I went to the inn to tell Jenassa the news.

I ran into Kjeld's son in the inn. His name was Kjeld the Younger, and he was very rude. He kept asking why I was there, and saying that I didn't look tough and he could best me with no problem. I sighed and ignored him and joined Jenassa at a table across the room for some dinner. At least his father was nice.

I told Jenassa all about the mine, and about the people there. She seemed impressed with how many septims that I had made, and thanked me for saving some of the ore to use on her weapon. After dinner, I went out to the smelter near the mine and made  the ore into ingots, then used some basic smithing equipment that I found near the inn to work on her mace. It took a while, but at last I finished. When I gave it back to her, she thanked me and said that it was even deadlier now than it had been. She told me that her art would be a little more beautiful now thanks to me. I was confused, but took it as a compliment.

There weren't any rivers or lakes close enough to the town for comfort, so I asked the innkeeper for a kettle of water and bathed off the best I could. My soap was starting to get low though, so I'd have to get more in the next large town that we came to.I washed my clothes as best I could, then Jenassa helped me and we managed to get all of our armor and weapons polished and cleaned. As I got ready for bed, I remembered Jenassa's compliment, and then it dawned on me. When I'd met her, she'd compared vanquishing her foes to making art. She was strange, and a bit morbid at times, but I was still thankful to have her here with me. Hiring her was the best thing I had ever done with five-hundred septims.