The Vianto Diaries - Volume 2, Entry 2. Rorikstead

• Posted by Andrew Shepherd January 4, 2016 - 1,216 views

  Sundas 22rd, First Seed, 4E 204

  TOC

  Bloody Rorikstead. The place where my real misfortunes began. Well, they haven't eased up any, the past few days have been terrible.

   

  We started off really well on the Fredas. The sun was shining, Cyrus was happy (although I think the Nightquill might still have been working) and Gograb appeared to be in a good mood. I had Cyrus in my back pack and Sanguine Rose in hand and the village saw us off.

   

  "Don't show your whitemeat face here again, you scrawny Breton fetcher!" yelled the chief at me. Prick. 

   

  We made pretty good time down through the reachlands and on to the main road with only a few travelers and merchants abroad. Not a sign of the Forsworn, although I must admit I had my heart in my mouth the whole way. Then Gograb suggests a short cut. We could walk down to the river, stay at Old Hroldan for the night and then up through this gorge he knew about which would take us directly up the escarpment and into Rorikstead.

   

  So I said, ok fine, whatever gets us out of the reach quickly. Straight away, it starts off badly. There was no real track down from the road to the river at the bottom of the valley. Just dirt, and shale and slippery rocks. So I am clambering down on all fours, jiggling Cyrus up and down, which he thinks is really funny and so he starts giggling at the top of his voice.

   "Shut up, Cyrus!" I say to him. "The big bad Hagravens will come and get you!"

  "NOOOOOOOO!" he screeches.

  "Here, here take this, just shut up, please!" and I hand him a bone and wood rattle one of the Orc women made for him. And then he starts hitting me over the f***ing head with it and yelling "BOING, BOING, BOING!"

   

  Then Go-grabUrNutz turns around to tell us both to shut up and he catches his foot and goes cartwheeling down the scree and into the mud at the bottom of the ravine. Where he knocks into a bunch of mudcrabs. 

  I got to the riverside still being beaten over the head by Cyrus to find Gograb wheeling two war axes at the mud crabs yelling 

  "You wanna piece of me? You wanna piece of me, is that what you want huh, huh?" and then while he's raving a mudcrab scuttles up from behind and takes a big nip out of his ass. 

   

  Well, I know I have a bit of a potty mouth at times but some of the swear-words I heard come out of this Orc's mouth would have shocked a drunken Nord sailor. He didn't even land one axe blow! The crabs just ran off! He was so mad that he couldn't even run after the mud crab that had pinched his bottom. He just stood there frothing and swearing and swinging his axes like crazy. Took him ten minutes to calm down. I was in the company of two tantrum throwing brats!

   

  When we finally reached Old Hrolgan it was almost nightfall because Gograb's arse was so sore he almost had to hop up the slopes. Cyrus had stopped hitting me, but his lunch didn't agree with him and I ended up wearing it down the back of my neck. 

  So, cold, tired, sore and stinky we get to the tavern. As soon as we come in through the door, the inkeeper takes one look at Gograb and yells:

  "Don't bring that goblin in here!" Gograb thinks there is an actual goblin behind him and whips out his axes and starts waving his arms around without even looking. I just grabbed a fistful of coins and threw them at the woman, whisper-screaming "Shut up! He's an orc not a goblin and he's very sensitive about his size!" Thank Arkay, the minature orc was still looking for the goblin and didn't overhear.

   

  I desperately wanted a drink but I try to be a responsible parent so I had to settle for some elf ear tea. Except the bloody inkeeper didn't have a teapot, so I had to boil hot water over her stove and brew it in a pan. Idiot! Gograb settled for some three day old goat's haunch and then had a small mug of ale and fell over in a drunken stupor. I took Cryus off to our room, helped him with the potty (the stupid inkeeper didn't have a chamber pot so I had to use the pan again!) and then settled him for sleep.

   

  Sometime in the early morning, I heard Cyrus giggling in the main room of the tavern. Then the inkeeper started screaming. I jumped out of bed and raced into the room with the innkeeper pointing in shock to where Cyrus was standing. Next to a table. With a ghost sitting at it. Cyrus looked at me and then pointed to the ghost:

  "Shiny man, shiny man." he said and giggled again. The ghost looked at me and said:

  "Hratli, is that you?" but I was in so much shock and fear for Cyrus that I summoned a daedric sword. Except, of course, it wasn't a daedric sword was it? I was a friggen daedric teapot!

   

  I didn't care. I ran at the ghost yelling "Get away from my son, you bastard!" and clocked the ghost over his horned helmet head. He fell off his chair, smacked his head on the ground and then whooshed in a blue cloud of smoke down into the teapot, which started whistling and then vanished.

  The innkeeper fainted on top of Gograb and I just left her there and took Cyrus back to bed. Didn't get another wink of sleep though...

  The next day Gograb was in a foul mood from his hangover. Grumbling and cursing. I had another cup of elf ear tea (which tasted like shit) and then the inkeeper gave me my money back and told us not to come back ever and we set off to find his secret gorge. After about three hours of searching for it up and down the road, Cyrus going boing boing boing on my head with his rattle, he finds this bramble thicket winding its way up a narrow gorge in the escarpment. Here it is! he yells, must have grown over since I was last here!

   

  So we go thrashing though this thicket, with me holding my arms out to protect Cyrus from the thorns whilst getting cut to pieces myself. Gograb was up ahead cursing and smashing his axes through the stuff and this went on for about two hours until he saw a small clearing and we stopped for a break.

   

  And realized the clearing was part of a perfectly cut path that ran up the escarpment RIGHT NEXT TO THE F***ING BRAMBLE THICKET!!

   

  I was so mad. We'd been thrashing our way through this damned bush with the proper path beside us all along. All Gograb says is "Oh." I could have killed him. We finally reached the top of the steep path by dusk, tired and sweaty and bleeding and Cyrus crying and right into a Forsworn camp. With a Hagraven.

  Well, I simply soiled myself. Cyrus starts laughing and pointing at the thing and yelling "Birdy! Birdy!" and all the savages jump up and the Hargraven starts screeching:

  "The chosen one! The world screamer!" Even in my paroxysms of terror, I knew she was referring to Cyrus. GograbUrNutz had axes in hands and flew into an immediate beserker fury, windmilling his arms and cursing, spittle flying from his stubby fangs. The Forsworn didn't rush in like they usually do due to the orc whirlwind in front of them so one of them grabbed a long branch and just clonked him over the head and he went down in a heap. Not knowing what else to do I pointed Sanguine's Rose at the ground in front of the charging barbarians and the raging dremora known as Narhaz came shrieking into existence.

  "KILL, KILL KI..." he was in the middle of screaming when Cyrus started saying:

  "Uncle Narhaz, uncle Narhaz. Go to uncle Narhaz!" Narhaz suddenly just whirled away from the cowering Forsworn and looked at Cyrus.

  "Cyrus!" he said in that grating metallic voice of his. Then he looks at me with a snarl and says: "When was the last time you changed his diaper, scum?!" 

   

  Me: Narhaz, this is not the time.

  Narhaz: You don't take good enough care of him. You are the father from Oblivion.

  Me: We are about to be captured by the Forsworn.

  Narhaz: Hand him to me. You're useless!

  Me: Fight the bloody savages Narhaz! That's why I summoned you!"

  Cyrus: Go to uncle NARRRRHAAAAZZZZZ! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

  The forsworn and the hagraven all hit the deck holding their ears.

  Narhaz: How long has he been doing that?

  Me: Since he turned two.

  Narhaz: BLOODSACK! I missed his second birthday!

  This went on for several more seconds until I couldn't take it any longer and I handed Cyrus over, no longer screaming and giggling as Narhaz tickled his belly with a long talon and walked off crooning to him. Suddenly all the Forsworn jump up and come at me again!

   

  So I cast a spell that I had been practicing for months, well away from the stronghold. It was supposed to be "Wall of Flames". I ended up having to re-name it "Wall of Stench."

   

  Imagine all the garbage heaps, latrines, road kill and smelly socks in the world. That's Wall of Stench. A brown miasma 15 feet tall and 50 feet wide erupted in front of the charging Forsworn and the lot of them dropped and started puking. Even the Hagraven was dry reaching. I picked up Gograb and slung him into my backpack and made after Narhaz.

   

  So now we are sitting in the Frostfuit inn. I'm trying my best to look inconspicuous, Gograb is in bed with a headache and Cyrus has just poured a cold bowl of rabbit stew that I have been trying to get him to eat for the past hour and which I spiked with Nightquill over his head.

   

  I could say things couldn't get any worse, but they could. They really could...