#dark elf

paint purple skin is so funny :)

Your dark elf wife kisses you a lot before bed. Her kisses help you get to sleep. Why? Because- *snicker* because they- *snicker* they make you drowsy. *laughs over your groans*

Handsome has been tracking this particular mark for a year now. Her reputation depends on it: this argonian nearly killed the Queen of Wayrest, and under her watch. So through the East Wrothgarians she’s chased her, hunting from sighting to sighting, always one step behind. She’s a tricky one, this assassin, former sister of the Dark Brotherhood.

Handsome pulls her cloak tighter against the frigid air of this altitude. What a waste of time, she thinks, to be an assassin. It’s not much better than being a bandit, albeit a little more civilized. There’s a proper profession for people like her, like Handsome: bounty hunting, or at least other mercenary work. That way you can make money killing people legally. They had something like that in Morrowind, before it blew up: the Morag Tong. This assassin, an old member of the Wayrest chapter of the Dark Brotherhood, idealizes herself as one of those old state-sanctioned assassins. But there’s not much room for virtue in this kind of work in the 4th era.

Handsome’s last clue was a sighting climbing this path up Mt. Martag, spotted by a group of orc teens playing banditry in the valley. Not the best lead, but the trail is running dry. Handsome needs a little bit of luck on her side. The kids told her a story of a cave near the peak of the mountain, of an infamous marauder who hid his loot there before being caught by the Empire centuries ago. Many youngsters tried to climb to this cave to find his riches, but all either turned back halfway or were never seen again. There was a rumor that a vicious dire troll lived in that cave, but the adults knew the much simpler truth: the path was treacherous, and it was nearly impossible to reach it in the first place. Most never bothered to try to reclaim the bodies of the lost, and instead tried to instil the danger of trolls and dragons into the children to keep them away.

Handsome was experienced enough that she felt her odds were better. So she set out to climb the mountain, following the often narrow and icy path upwards. As she approached, she heard ominous sounds, almost like the roaring of a troll, but she convinced herself it was the wind. Now, as she nears the cave, she’s not so sure. Even if her target isn’t here, maybe she can make enough money killing the troll for the locals that she can run far away from Wayrest and start again somewhere else. 

-

Handsome stares into the dark, narrow opening of the cave and sniffs at the frigid mountain air, the cold stinging the lining of her nostrils. No smell of troll dung, which she takes as a good sign. But she does smell something: the faintest whisper of smoke, an even better sign. The brief roar of her torch igniting breaks the howling winds for a moment, and she draws her axe. Then she begins to descend into the cave.

The air in here is hazy, smelling more strongly of smoke. She follows that odor as she keeps careful footing on the damp stone. No signs of habitation anywhere in these early corridors, so she commits to delving deeper.

The smoke leads her to a larger chamber in the bowels of the cave. She waves her torch around to get a better look. The smoke clears a bit and she can see a bedroll, a doused fire, and a handful of small barrels. Lying near the bedroll is a pack, lounging open on the stone floor. Whoever lived here, they left in a hurry, and recently.

Handsome lays her torch on one of the barrels to give the room light as she investigates. Halfway tucked into the pack is a small book, a journal by the looks of it. She picks it up and leafs through it with one hand, her other still firmly on her axehandle. It’s written in daedric script, which Handsome can read, but the language is entirely unfamiliar. She studies the cryptic handwriting for a moment, trying to decipher the text, but to no avail. Her best guess is that it might be written in the strange language of the argonians, seeing as her target is one herself. But to Handsome’s knowledge, that language is completely oral, with no written equivalent. Puzzling. She sticks it in her back-pocket to study more later.

“Hello.”

Handsome nearly jumps out of her skin. She swings around instinctively, her axe-arm outstretched in an offensive arc to catch her attacker. But all it finds is air, as the speaker is at the entrance to the chamber, leaning against the wall, arms crossed.

“Who are you?” Handsome asks, trying to gauge who she’s dealing with through the smoke and darkness. Looks like a dark elf, so not her target.

“Who are you, snooping around in my things?” The stranger draws a sword, but her arm is shaking. Clearly untrained. “I know how to use this.” No, you don’t, thinks Handsome.

“You live here?” Handsome waves her hand around, but keeps her axe leveled the stranger’s way.

“For the time being, yes. Why are you here?”

Handsome grunts. “I’m looking for someone.”

“Unless that person is Sivennis Dirale, I think you should leave.” She waggles her sword in what is surely meant to be an intimidating gesture.

Handsome grins. “Going to call the guards on me? The legion, perhaps? Or an ordinator?”

Sivennis drops her sword in a pleading gesture. “Please just leave me be. I’m just a hermit. I live here by myself.”

Handsome strokes her chin. “That may be so,” she says. “Tell me, have you seen an argonian around these parts? Possibly accompanied by an orc?”

“An argonian? Why are you looking for an argonian?”

Handsome decides to trust this poor woman. “I’m a bounty hunter. She’s wanted in connection to…an attempted murder. The orc’s her accomplice.”

“Oh! How awful!”

“I’ll leave you alone, if only you answer my question. Have you seen any suspicious argonians lately?”

“Well, no, why would any argonian come this far…” The woman bites her lip. “Oh Azura save me. I can’t tell you now that I know she’s a murderer. What if she comes after me next?”

“Attempted murderer. That means she’s not good enough to finish the job. Tell me what you know and I’ll make sure you’re protected.” 

“Well…she came to me one night, with her orc man, asking for directions. I think they were heading south, towards Cyrodiil. Something about meeting with a friend in Skingrad, I think. That’s all I know, really.”

“That’s good enough. Thank-”

“I’m home!”

The words bellowed and echoed throughout the cave, causing Sivennis to cringe and whisper, “Dammit,” under her breath.

Handsome’s eyes dilate. “I thought you said you lived here by yourself.”

“I did, didn’t I? Sithis damn his loud mouth.”

There was a space of time between the sword being on the floor and then appearing in the elf’s hand again. In that brief moment Handsome saw through the dark haze clearly enough to make out some of the finer details of “Sivennis’s” face; notably, dark grooves on the sides of her neck, and the faintly reflective scales on her cheeks. After that brief moment was another, briefer, when Handsome’s axe-arm instinctively drew upwards to defend against the incoming strike.

“I told you I knew how to use this,” Hla-eix the assassin said, pulling back from the parried blow. 

“You did, didn’t you,” quipped Handsome, readying her axe for a strike of her own. It came at the same time as one of Hla-eix’s, forcing her to quickly step to the side to avoid it. She certainly was a far cry from the quivering mess Sivennis had been, striking decisively like a viper, with a well-trained grace. 

The two slowly circled one another, blocking and parrying each attack. Handsome needed to finish her, and quick, because she could hear the orc coming, his steps heavy down the stone halls - she certainly couldn’t take them both on, if he’s anything like her. When they had completely switched positions from the start of their duel, Hla-eix made a mistake that Handsome jumped on: she catches Hla-eix’s wrist under the beard of her axe, disarming her, her sword clattering away. 

So much for the “alive” bonus, she thinks as she readies a finishing blow. She raises her arm over her head -

- but it won’t come down. She feels a weight on her wrist that holds her back. She elbows behind her and wrests her hand free, swinging it around to hit her attacker. She finds that the elbow connected with his throat, and her axe finds his side, but doesn’t manage to find much depth. 

But something manages to find depth in Handsome’s back, sucking the air from her lungs. She falls forward, knocking the wounded orc over but catches herself on the wall of the cave. 

Now, Handsome thinks, is the time to run.

She gropes her way through the dark cave, away from the light behind her, running as fast as her breath will allow. She realizes too late that she left her axe in the orc’s tough flesh but keeps pushing forward. Finally she finds the light of the moons and stars outside and follows it until she escapes the cave. She turns her head briefly behind her to see the orc hot on her heels, bleeding, holding her axe, eyes glowing red. No one escapes an orc’s rage, she remembers just as she realizes there’s nowhere else to run. She can’t manage the descent wounded like this, and all that remains is a nearly vertical cliffside. 

She runs to the edge then stops, turning around. Hla-eix and the orc are both there, and Handsome is out of options. Hopefully there’s a soft snowdrift down there.

This is going to hurt, she thinks. She steps backwards.

-

Everything hurts, she thinks as she wakes up. Handsome tries to sit up but starts coughing so harshly that she has to lay back down. A little orc girl in the room notices and gasps before running away. She returns a moment later with an older orc woman, a shaman by her garb.

“You’re finally awake,” the woman says. “Was beginning to wonder if you would wake at all.”

“What happened? Where am I?”

“You’re in the village of Orsinium ag Martag, in friendly hands. You fell off a mountain. With a knife in your back. Which was poisoned. You also broke some bones. From falling off the mountain. I’m in the process of fixing you.”

Handsome raises a shaky hand to try to rub away a headache. “Is that all,” she whispers.

“It’s a miracle you survived,” the shaman says. “You should be thankful.”

“Yes, thank Malacath, I thought I was done for.”

“No, stupid girl,” the shaman shouts, slapping her on her unbroken leg. “Thank me. Malacath had nothing to do with it.”

“…sorry. Thank you.” Handsome slowly sits up, wincing all the while. “How can I repay you? I have gold. Drakes.”

“We don’t deal with Imperial gold in Orsinium,” the shaman says. “Tell me who you are and I call us square.”

“Okay. I’m Handsome. A bounty hunter. Just got my ass kicked by my current mark. Is that good enough?”

“I know you’re handsome,” the shaman says, “but what’s your name?” The little girl giggles.

“Handsome. It’s my name. Professionally.”

The shaman laughs deeply too. “Oh, I’m just playing with you. You outlanders are so fun to tease.”

“How do you know I’m an outlander?”

“People from here don’t climb mountains just to jump off them. Got more sense than that.”

“…Fair.”

The woman drags a sack over by the bed. Handsome looks through it, finding most of her things intact. She sees Hla-eix’s journal and pulls it out, puzzling over it again.

“We had to dig around where you fell to find a lot of this, so we may have missed some stuff,” says the shaman. “And you may be missing a few healing potions. We used them on you.”

Handsome acknowledges with a grunt, but is still poring over the pages. “You read daedric?” she asks.

“It’s all we write in,” says the shaman. “No cyrodiilic letters in Orsinium.”

“Can you tell what this says?” Handsome turns the journal out for the shaman to read.

The woman squints as she focuses on the words, but shakes her head. “Gobbledygook. Is it code or something?”

“I think it might be argonian talk,” Handsome replies, closing the book. “Know anyone who might know it?”

“Not out here. Maybe in the city.”

“How long until I can leave?”

If drow evil… why hot? Hm?

My partner has such a way with designing characters that they can be as irredeemable, evil, cruel and self serving as they wanna be and yet I will fall in love, make art and then continue to think about them for months on end. As far as I know, this all started with them reading War of The Spiderqueen… :::) <- thats an eight-eyed emoji!

:::)

villains are just extra kissable

reblogs are love, click for better quality

ALT

Another dnd party birthday piece, featuring the lovely Orla, our sorcerer/monk.

[image description: a digital illustration of an elven woman, Orla, who has dark grey skin and long, silver hair. She is stood in an active stance, as though mid-combat, and looking up with mild apprehension. She is holding a wooden quarterstaff in front of her, while the other hand readies a spell represented by a skeletal hand. She is wearing a carved metal chest plate over a white blouse and heavily layered skirts. Her right lower leg is formed of a rough, wooden prosthetic claw.]

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