C.O.T.W Chapter 36: Lycanthropic Alchemy

  • Rakel, a now sober Inigo in control of his mental faculties, and Kodlak stepped outside of the bannered mare, Kodlak bade farewell

    to the two as he walked toward the mead hall. Rakel and Inigo heard the slowly fading footsteps of his boots. Both the nord and

    khajiit turned to go to the alchemy. They looked over their shoulder to see Koldak disappear into the mead hall. They approached the

    wooden door of the shop and Inigo opened the door and gestured the nord female inside; he went in after her. 

     

    Inigo gazed in amazement as he beheld the shop for the first time. He could smell the rich pine scent of the finely carved support

    pillars holding the shop together. He could also 'see' with his nose as well just as a blind person can strengthen one sense to replace

    what as lost; so too can Inigo. However, Inigo is not entirely blind as he can see perfectly fine; however, an arrow to the left eye

    diminshed his sight a bit in that eye. His nose, however, works fine, albeit a little too well as he not only can distinguish smell with

    his nose but he can also distinguish scents of colors.

     

    He sniffed the air again and scents of colors both new and foreign went up his nostrils like a salmon swimming upstream to mate. He

    sighed in relief as he took in the rather odorous smells of the shop. Rakel called to him from over by where Arcadia stood, hands

    folded upon a wooden counter. Inigo's reverie fell apart at the seams as he begrudingly trudged over to where Rakel stood. She

    reminded him of the reason they were hear: to help Hasir recover, not to take in the ambrosial smells of the shop. Inigo shook his

    head to rid his nose of the odors which mingled with the shop's air once again.

     

    Inigo frowned at Rakel and sighed,

    "I am sorry Rakel, but this is also a first for me, being in an alchemy shop I mean." He said, rubbing his neck in embarrassment. "I

    will try to keep my mind on a tight leash next time so it does not run away." He said smiling at her.

     

    Rakel smiled at him, stiffling a giggle. He turned back to the shop keeper, pulled out a bit of parchment, unrolled it and handed it to

    Arcadia. She looked at it and frowned,

    "What do you want me to do with this?" She asked him, her face a mask of confusion

    Iniigo told her that that is a list of ingredients that they will need if they want to save their friend who suffered a terrible accident.

    She became even more confused. She glanced over at Rakel and asked her what on tamriel he is talking about. The female nord told

    Arcadia that Hasir has blood poisoning brought on by a silver blade, she also added that they need to hurry as she fears Hasir does

    not have much time before he succumbs to the poison. She left out the bits about him being a werewolf and about how intolerable

    silver can be to werewolves as she thought this would make the imperial even more uneasy.

     

    Arcadia glanced down at the piece of parchment, screwing up her face as she read the ingredients list,

    "Hmm...let's see, I sell charcoal and void salts here; bonemeal and vampire dust may be a bit harder to come by." She lent forward

    and placed her head on her folded arms and thought for a bit.

     

    After fifteen minutes of thinking, she came up with where they would procure vampire dust and bonemeal,

    "As I said, I have two ingredients here. The other two ingredients can be found at White River Watch, a cave full of vampires and

    skeletons."  She wrote down the name of the cave on the pachment and handed it back to Inigo.

     

    Ingio asked where this cave was and she told him that it is outside the city, near Honningbre meaderyHe thanked her, He looked

    around her shop to see if she indeed had any void salts or charcoal. He used his super powered nose to sniff out the location of the

    ingredients. He sniffed the air and caught a faint scent of gravel in the southwestern corner of the shop. He strode over there to find

    four sticks of charcoal laying on the shelf. He grabbed them and put them into his leather bag. He took out the ingredients list,

    crossed off charcoal and went to place the list in his bag. He thought better of it and held on to the list. he glanced at the list and

    saw he needed to find void salts next.

     

    He utilized all his senses for this one; his ears twitched madly as his tried listening for if the void salts emitted a certain sound the

    way nirnroots do so he would know if he was getting near them. He used his sight, well, what he could see because of the spotty

    vision in his left eye and he also used his most dominant sense of all: smell to find the void salts. After a lengthy process, Inigo

    found the void salts or rather thought he did.

     

    He turned to Rakel and asked jokingly, gesturing to the 'void' salts,

    "I might need night vision too because, well what if void salts are hard to see with the naked eye. They are salts of the void for a

    reason you know."

     

    Rakel roared with laughter, walking up behind Inigo and clipping him on the back of his head,

    "Inigo you are a moron, that is a blank wall. The void salts are over there." She said, still giggling. She gestured to a shelf near the

    counter.

     

    Inigo held up his hands; surrendering to his fate,

    "Do not call me a moron, my friend, I am just a bit slow due to my skooma addiction back in the day."

     

    He walked over to the shelf, found a mall bowl with void salts in it and placed it into his leather bag. Rakel apologized for insulting

    Inigo. He turned towards her, smiled and shook his head, silently telling her not to think on it for another minute. She nodded and

    asked where they would get the two remaining ingredients.

     

    inigo turned to her, patting her on the shoulder,

    "Do not worry, Arcadia told me where we need to go."

     

    Rakel opened her mouth to asked where they were headed but shut it as she knew Inigo would know where to go. His nose was

    good at sensing direction. They thanked Arcadia for the help and left the shop. Inigo groaned because it was he and not Rakel who

    had received her help. inigo ann Rakel exited the main gates and walked down the cobblestone path and out to the plains

    surrounding the city. They could see the meadery past the farms. They croosed the stone bridge as they heard the calmy running

    stream below. They could smell the   sweet honey-based liquid on the air. The scent made Rakel's stomach leap for joy. She

    remembered back to the first timed she tried mead was in Elysium Estate when Hasir was awake and communicating about the anti

    Lycanthrope rule the Adrian made because he had lost his sister to that 'dreadful disease.' Rakel shed a tear as her mind kept

    reminding her of Hasir's 'fate'.

     

    Ingio looked over and saw Rakel shedding tears, to him they smelled of sadness. He snorted to push the two conflicting smells-

    sweet and bitter-from his nose and sped up to catch up to Rakel. He went to comfort her but her felt thick brown fur as his hand

    descended upon her shoulder. The sadness must've overwhelmed her, causing her to transform. He thought.

     

    Accalia sniffed the evening air and was off running to Hircine knows where. Inigo had to full out sprint to catch up with her. As he

    ran alongside her, he could here her hurried, excited breaths as she ran. She stopped, ears rotating as if the were a sattiliite dish;

    her tail stood at attention. She picked up some kind of scent. Inigo was just about to as what it was when a grey wolf padded out

    from cover. Accalia's tail relaxed and tilting her head whined at grey wolf. He barked in response and sped of towards the cave.

    Accalia and Inigo ran after him. They ran through groves of thick oak trees, twigs crunching underfoot until they came to a rocky

    mountain with a pathing winding up the side of it. They chased the wolf as it ran along the serpentine path to the top.

     

    once at the top Inigo, Acallia and the gry wolf stopped short of anothe bend in the path leading to stone steps. The grey wolf turned,

    barked again, its tail wagging, and retreated down the way it had come.

    Inigo watched as the wolf ran across the fields chaising a rabbit it had spotted, he watched it for a bit more before turning to Accalia.

    He asked her if they should get on with the ingredient hunting without that 'lunatic' bothering them. Accalia barked and then

    immediately settle into growl, her tail and hackles in the aIR. Inigo apologized to her saying that he was in the wrong for saying

    that. Accalia thought on this for a short while and her tail began moving from side to side while her tongue hung out of her mouth.

     

    Inigo looked at her confused,

    "Do not do what I think you are thinking of doing, I do not want to be covered in wolf slobber." 

     

    His cries of preotest did not work, however, as Acallia jumped on him knocking him to the ground and licking him nonstop. Inigo

    laughed and tried to control the wild she-wolf. 

    "Stop, get off me you fleabag! What, do you want me to throw a stick or something?" He asked her, bewildered

     

    Accalia got off of him as Hircine had told her that every minute they was is one minute that Hasir gets closer to death. She did as

    the wolflord ordered, giving Inigo room to scramble to his feet. He approached the cavern with Accalia at his side like a master with

    his faithful hound. They entered the cavern together. Upon entry, Inigo found the vampires and skeletons were fighting each othe

    instead of fighting him and the she wolf. Inigo's face screwed upp, he pointed to the bizarre scene and looked at Accalia. the rather

    exhubeant werewolf shook her head as if she thought it was weird as well

    Accalia bent low to the ground and let out a low howl as she had a plan in mind. She slunk into the darkness of the cavern, leaving

    Inigo to question her odd decision. Before he could voice his decision, she growled to him and jerked her head to the left of the

    cavern signaling that she wanted Inigo to deal with the skeletons while she dealt with the skeletons. Inigo let out a small wimper, He

    took a few deep breaths and told himself to everyone has to face their fears sometime in life. He snuck towards a skeleton who was

    patroling the caverns. He made sure to sticks to the shadows so no one would see him, came up behind the skeleton and shoved his

    ebony sword through the skeleton's ribcage. The skeleton fell apart as bones fell to the cavern floor like snow flakes on a calm

    winter day. 

     

    Inigo saw a bowl of bonemeal laying on the cavern floor where he had felled the skeleton. He ran over to it and pocketed it. He

    looked down at the list and crossed off bonemeal and went over to see what Accalia was up to. She was busy holding her own

    against a group of vampire who had gathered around her failed stealth attempt. Inigo roared out at the vampires and they

    concentrated on him instead of the female wolf. As the last vampire retreated from Accalia, she flung herself at the throng of

    vampire, batting at them with her massive paws like a cat would a mouse or bird that he or she has trapped, proceeding to play

    with it before killing it. Accalia had no intent to 'play' with the vampires, she had pure hatred in her eyes.

     

    She did not know why she hated vampires so much, it was not just her but her kind hated vampire for some reason, no one really

    knows the REAL reason why vampires and werewolves have a blood fued against each other, they just hate each other. They have

    been doing it for millenia. The exact reason may, in fact, be because they both have the same food supply: Humans, Elf and Mer. No

    one knows for sure though. There was no denying she had the fires of Oblivion burning in her eyes. She threw herself at them,

    biting necks and ripping throats out and she pinballed between the undead monstrosities. The vampires, now devoid of throats,

    slowly shriveled to nothing but ash piles.

     

    Accalia barked in delight as she rubbed up against Inigo, who had to keep her at arms distance while he searched the ash pile, got

    what he needed, which was vampire dust, and then went to cross it off the list. Inigo beamed widely as he realized that they had

    gotten everything for the potion that they were making. Accalia too barked with joy, Unseen by the pair of them the sun rose.

    transformed back into her nord form and accompanied him out of the cavern and back to Whiterun. 

    When they got back to the walls sorrounding the city, Rakel took point. She and Inigo walked past the stables, Sulvar was tending to

    the hay when he saw them, smilled and waved. Both Rakel and Inigo returned the gesture. They walked up the cobblestone path,

    they were about to cross to the whiterun doors when Inigo bumped into something wooden. He yelped in pain as he collided with the

    closed drawbridge, which he bounced off and landed several inches from the opposite wall.

     

    Inigo got up and rubbed his nose to see if it was still attached,

    "Owww! Stupid drawbridge, did they not know we would be coming back?" He asked, confused

     

    Rakel roared with laughed at the poor Khajiit. Inigo frowned at her while giving her a stern look,

    "How would you feel if you were struggling and I laughed at you? Not well, I'd imagine." Inigo waggled a finger at her, "Don't be

    rude please." Rakel quickly apologized. Inigo marched over to the area with the close drawbridge and started climbing the stones

    next to it. He had to scrambled up the wall on the north end because it was too far to simply jump onto. Inigo saw a guard patrolling

    the walkway above and pressed his back against the near wall and sidled along it until he could jump down to safety.

     

    Rakel took a different approach, she approached the drawbridge and asked the guard nicely to lower it so she could pass, the guard

    told her that strange creatures have been seen abroad and that the Jarl ordered them to raise the drawbridge, to block the

    creatures from entering the city. Rakel asked what kind of creatures. The guard, named said that there have been reports of

     

    vampires roaming the plains, though she did not know the reason. 

    Rakel begged for her to let her in saying that she was not a vampire. Lydia lowered the drawbridge, Rakel thanked her and stepped

    through, all the while grinning madly at Inigo.She stuck her tongue out a Inigo, who promptly called her a 'show off' and they both

    entered the city. The streets were packed with life. Addriane was outside, attending to the forge and the food and produce stand

    were stocks with fresh supplies. Rakel could smell charred meat and the earthy smell of cabbage on the air. Inigo tried, but all he got

    was a nose-full of ash from Warmaiden's forge.

     

    He coughed and snorted to try to clear the disgusting smell from his nose,

    "UGH! Smells like burnt feet." 

     

    Rakel laughed and asked him how he knew what burnt feet smelled like and Inigo just shook his head,

    "My friend, you do not want to know."

     

    The nord and khajiit ventured onward until they came to the door of the alchemy shop. This time, Rakel opened the door for Inigo,

    he blew a kiss to her and chuckled as he walked passed her into the shop. She went in and closed the door behind them. Inigo

    gestured to the alchemy table and said he would mix the potions and told Rakel to go over to Arcadia and inform her that they

    procured all the ingredients for the potion. They split up, setting to their assigned tasks.

    Inigo set his unopened leather bag on a chair that sat next to the alchemy table from which he extracted the list of ingredients as

    well as the required ingredients of the potion. He placed the ingredients on the smooth wooden surface and began pouring over the

    list.

     

    He muttered to himself as he went down the list,

    "Okay, so I need four sticks of charcoal, okay, next I need four handfuls of vampire dust, geez, I hope I am not allergic to ground up

    vampire, hehe. Let's see, ermm, the third thing I need is one handful of bonemeal. The last thing I need is...two handfuls of void

    salts." As he said the last ingredient, he silently chuckled to himself. He went over to the alchemy station, grabbed a mortar and

    pestle and went about grinding the charcoal into little pieces, he found an empty vial in his leather bag, removed the stopper and

    sprinkled the charcoal into the vial. He repeated the process for the vampire dust, the bonemeal and finally the void salts. 

     

    He took a wooden spoon from the alchemy table and started stirring, he failed to noticed the spoon was too big for the vial and he

    saw tiny crack spiderweb there way across the glass tube. It shattered sending bits of glass flying to the four winds and some

    cascading to the floor, the contents fell on the floor as well.

     

    Inigo stomped his foot in frustration,

    "Dammit, now I will have to repeat the process again."

     

    Rakel and Arcadia heard this and rushed over to him. Arcadia told the khajiit to hold out his hands. Inigo questioned this. The

    imperial said she just needed to make sure there were no cuts on his hands. Satisfied she let go of his hands, glaced downward and

    tutted at the mess on the floor. She instructed Rakel to retrieve the trash can in the corner near her desk and the dust pan and

    broom behind her desk. Rakel return soon after with the items and helped Arcadia clean up the now dirty alchemical ingredients.

    Once they were disposed of she and Rakel helped Inigo with the second batch which Inigo made over the table so if the vial did fall;

    it would not travel far.

     

    Inigo reached for another vial and finding none he turned to Rakel who reached into her pack and extracted one which she handed

    to Inigo. He thanked her and placed the ingredients into the long, thin glass tube and brought it over to the alchemy station and

    placed it into the mortal and mixed it together with the pestle. Once he was satisfied that they were mixed up well enough he

    poured the now dark grey liquid in the vial and replaced the stopper and placed the potion into his bag. 

     

    He thanked Arcadia for all her help to which she replied if they ever need alchemical reagants, alchemy training or just need a

    question about a potion or ingredint that her door will always be opens. She smiled and waved as the two exited her shop. She

    cursed under her breath for the clumsy blue cat so carelessly wasting such costly ingredients. 

     Inigo made sure he had everything in his bag plus the potion he had made earlier'he did. Rakel asked him if they should set off for

    Elsyium Estate, he nodded. They passed by the general store and Warmaidens as they exited the city. They walked down the

    winding path to the stables where they found ebony and starlight. Rakel was shocked, Inigo chuckled as he knew what was going

    on. Rakel turned to him with her hands on her hips along with a furiously tapping foot signalling that she wanted an answer...now.

     

    Inigo cleared his throat and told Rakel what was so funny,

    "You see, they," He said, motioning the the horses, "Retunr to this stable after being left unattended for a while."

     

    This did nothing to abate Rakel's confusion, so Inigo clarified that Ebony and Midnight are kin to the mighty Shadowmere. That being

    said, after some time not being ridden or looked after they would return to Whiterun stables; just like Shadowmere would to

    Farragut when she was owned by the dark brotherhood all those years ago. Rakel nodded but was still confused, nonetheless she

    took the smart blue cat's word as truth.

     

    That was getting a little off topic. Inigo forced his mind to focus on the task at hand and he and Rakel continued down to the

    stables. Once there, they found Jervar tending to the horses. He was feeding them, making sure they were well hydrated, saddling

    them and making sure their shoes where in tiptop condition as he did not want any horse going with a rusty or broken horseshoe.

    Jervar greeted them and requested five gold if they were taking the horses out plus five more gold piece for every hour the horses

    were away. Inigo took out a coin purse and handed Jervaforty five gold. He paid the rquired gold and he and Rakel mounted their

    horses. They waved goodbye to Jervar and headed toward Elysium Estate.

    Both Midnight and Ebony passed over cobblestone, hooves clattering on the stone as the nord and khajiit rode hard toward the

    estate on their respective steeds. Groves of sgraggly trees,, fields of unkempt grass rushed past them as they lent over their horses

    to get the potion to where it needed to go. The could see the estate looming in the distance. A bunny hopped in the middle of the

    road and spooked the horses. Rakel quickly got hers under control and calmed down,

     

    Inigo had a much harder time trying to get his to calm down,

    "Woaah, horsie, easy, it's just a harmless bunny nothing to be scared off." He reached his hand out for the bunny to sniff to prove it

    was frinendly, but the horse huffed and bucked him off. He went flying head over heads until he landed head first into a stone wall

    that served as the start of the turn into the manor.

     

    'THUD'

     

    Inigo lazily slid down the wall, laying dazed on the grass while Rakel looked on from her steed, roaring with laughter,

    "Wow, Inigo I didn't know you were such a wall magnet," She folded her arms across her chest, "I guess you are not the best with

    animals or horses." Inigo growled something under his breath. 

     

    Rakel cupped her hand around her ear,

    "Sorry, what was that?

     

    Inigo spoke louder so she could hear,

    "I said mind your manners, you vicious she-wolf." 

    He got up and dusted himself off. He looked over to Rakel who stopped laughing. He got back onto his horse and  they entered the

    stable and garden area. Inigo told Rakel he would be in in a minute. He just had to tie the horses up at the stable and made sure

    they had water. When he had them tied up and water was poured for the two horses. He saw a tall wodden crate that was 

    seventeen hands tall and fifteen hands long, Inigo stared at it suspiciously, it winnied, spooking Inigo a bit as he jump a few inches.

    He giggled a little as he walked back to it; inquiring as to who sent it. After inspecting every inch of the box he found it odd that

    there would be no note. He walked past the crate that was situated neext to the door and went inside the estate.