Keljarn
Take Up Arms
City of Whiterun
The innkeeper at the Bannered Mare, Whiterun’s seemingly only inn, hadn’t been difficult when he asked for a room in the dead of night. Some innkeepers were fussy or angry when woken up for a room booking during the night, but Keljarn never cared. It was part of the job.
The sun shone in through the cracks between the shutters, painting lines of pale yellow light on the sheets and the floor. Keljarn’s sleep had been short but refreshing, and first order of business for him was to find this Jorrvaskr place the four hunters had spoken of.
Or maybe that wasn’t really the very first thing to do. He’d look a fool if he walked in there with just a stupid woodcutter’s hatchet on his back. He’d always figured that those fancy weapons were for showmen and pretentious want-to-look-tough types, but this would probably be a good time to buy an actual weapon instead of the old hatchet with its notched head and leather-wrapped grip.
He’d passed a shop on the way to the Bannered Mare, a small smithy, from the looks of the sign outside. They’d have to be pretty stupid to hang out a sign with an anvil if it wasn’t a smithy. Or maybe an anvil shop.
A woman stood outside the shop, holding a strip of iron between a pair of tongs and inspecting it carefully. When she noticed him, she gave him a nod and said, “Welcome to Warmaiden’s. If you’re here to buy stuff, head right on in. If you want something repaired… Well, I’ve got back orders for an entire week, so it’ll take a while.”
“Nope,” Keljarn said to the tanned Imperial woman. “No repairs, I need a replacement for this old thing.” He pointed his thumb at the hatchet on his back.
“Daresay you do,” she said. “No offence. Well, my husband will help you inside.”
“Alright, thanks.”
The man tending the counter in the shop was a bear of a man, even by Nord standards. His arms were as thick as most people’s thighs. Despite his impressive physique though, he looked friendly and cheerful. “Welcome to Warmaiden’s,” he greeted in a deep and gravelly, yet somehow strangely pleasant voice. “Got blades, helmets, pretty much anything to suit your needs.” Cocking his head at the old rusty woodcutter on Keljarn’s back, he added, “And looks like you’ve already got one need right there.”
“You’ve got that right,” Keljarn admitted. “Got anything I can replace this old thing with?”
He let out a hoarse chuckle. “Adriana forges just about anything, and everything she forges is top quality. Including the axes.” He walked over to a weapon rack. All kinds of sharpened weaponry hung from the rack, including several axes. Most of Keljarn’s friends in High Rock swore by the sword, but Keljarn had tried them both, and decided nothing could replace the feel of a weighted axe head lending power to a blow. Swords were just… too damn light.
“You’ve got your basic garden-variety wood-and-iron axe right here,” the huge smith explained, slapping the head of a very plain-looking, but excellently forged axe. “It’s cheap, efficient, and does the job.”
“M-hm.”
“Full metal axe forged in one piece costs double,” he went on. “But it lasts much longer.”
“How much for one of those?”
He slapped the wood and iron axe again. “A hundred for the regular, two for the full metal.”
Keljarn kept a mental count of the gold in his pouch and the expenses he still expected. “I think I can afford a bit more.”
The bearded man’s grin widened. “What I like to hear. This thing,” he picked up an axe with a faint yellow sheen to the metal, “has a corundum-iron alloy head. Edge is keener and lasts much longer. Most iron axes dull after a bit of use, but not this. Regular’s a hundred and fifty, full metal’s three hundred.” After looking at the weapon rack more closely, he added, “But seems I don’t have any regulars in stock anymore, and Adriana’s struggling to keep up with all the demand, so there’s either a full metal available right now, or a regular in… say, a week or so?”
That didn’t matter, he had enough. “Full metal will be fine.”
“One-handed, right?”
Keljarn nodded. He preferred to have a hand free for other uses, including what few spells he knew. Still grinning, the weaponsmith took the last full metal corundum alloy axe from the rack. “Wise buy, my friend. Go see Adriana if you’d like some extras.”
“Extras?”
He shrugged, “Yeah, etchings, or a leather grip, things like that. It’s all free with the purchase except etchings. They cost extra unless it’s a simple bit of text, like initials or a name.”
Something wasn’t clear though. “Wait… your wife does the smithing? Not you?”
The man laughed. “That’s right. People’s jaws drop every time they realize. My wife’s the smith, I just sell the things. And mark my words, her weapons are almost as good as Eorlund’s, and his only have the edge because he’s working the Skyforge.”
Who, the what? “Eorlund? Skyforge?”
He chuckled again. “Adriana can explain it better than I can, and she loves to chat during work. Might as well ask her to talk your ear off about the Skyforge.”
“Thanks, I’ll do that.”
The lady in question was nowhere near the constant yakker her husband had described her as, but she proved quite sociable, offering to wrap the axe in leather bands for a better grip and less blisters, and while she did so, she asked if he was new to Whiterun.
“Does it show?” Keljarn asked with a grin.
“Mm… yes and no,” the smith said, carefully wrapping long leather strips around the axe handle. “Everyone looks new here, in a way.”
“Your husband said I should ask you about something called the Skyforge?”
She grinned as she took a metal strip and bent it around the axe handle so it would stop the leather from coming undone at the top. “Well, I’m not the best smith in Skyrim. Eorlund Gray-Mane holds that honour. He works the Skyforge over at Jorrvaskr. All I can do is do the best I can and hope I come as close to him as possible.”
Well, she was certainly gracious about not being the best. “I was told to meet some people at this Jorrvaskr place. Can you tell me where it is exactly?”
“Oh, sure, looking to join the Companions, huh?”
He shrugged. “Looking to learn more about them, at least. See if they’re worth joining.”
She took a small round metal plate and heated it. “Oh they’re a good lot. A bit too uppity, some of them, but the world would be worse off without them, that’s for sure.” She placed the glowing plate against the bottom of the axe and gave it a few gentle taps, then cooled the haft to make the iron bond together. “There you go, all done.”
“Thank you, uh… Adriana?”
She let out a clear and pleasant laugh. “Usually I prefer ‘mistress Avenicci’, but for you I’ll make the exception.”
Keljarn took the axe she held out at him and grinned. “You are most gracious. My name’s Keljarn, and it’s been a pleasure doing business with you and your husband.”
“Likewise, stay safe out there.”
He fully intended to. Strolling down the streets of Whiterun in the pale winter sun, he treated himself to a fresh handful of snowberries, sold at a market stand, and thought to himself that it was damn good to be here, in Skyrim, the country he’d always considered his true homeland, not High Rock. Two children ran past him, one girl with long blonde braids and a boy with fair hair in a bowl cut. As they ran, he heard the girl squeal, “Tag! You’re it!”
A rather skittish-looking Redguard woman, who looked like she had something to hide, pointed him to Jorrvaskr, a large mead hall at the top of a hill, at the very edge of town. He passed an old man preaching full of passion about Talos, and full of contempt for the Empire, who had “sold Skyrim to the Aldmeri Dominion”. Right, the Empire had all the trouble in the world quashing the rebellion of the so-called Stormcloaks, radical Nord nationalists who were bent on driving out the Imperials and their Altmer leash-holders. Even though Keljarn felt a true Nord, he knew it wasn’t his fight.
As he ascended the stairs, he heard the sounds of sparring: the thudding of metal on wood, the thwacking of arrows into targets, the grunts and growls of exertion and competition. All he had to do was follow his ears. Going higher up the stairs, he came to a large oval hall, made up of broad wooden beams supporting a sort of turtle shell made of heavy wooden boards. It almost looked like an inverted boat. The shield motifs carved into the walls made it clear that this was the place he needed to be.
He didn’t have to take a breath or close his eyes to compose himself. He simply pushed the door open and walked in.
A young woman with a sharp face and two stripes of red war paint on each cheek raised her head from the shield she was polishing. “Just because a door’s unlocked doesn’t mean you can just walk on in.” Her tone was nothing short of confrontational. “I don’t remember this being the church of Mara.”
She was the only person in the hall, even though there were plenty of chairs at the tables, which were set into a U-pattern for maximum enjoyment during mead binges, with in the middle the smouldering charcoal remains of what looked to be a huge fire. Keljarn was somewhat dubious as to whether or not it was a good idea to build such a needlessly oversized fire in a wooden mead hall, but he supposed the inhabitants knew best. He certainly hoped they weren’t all as unfriendly as this one, though. “I’m not here for worship,” he replied curtly.
The woman went back to polishing her shield. “Let me guess, another farm boy thinking fighting’s the same as chopping wood ‘round back?”
Keljarn knew her type. People who acted all belittling to hide their own insecurity. It was usually the new cubs in groups such as these who had the most attitude. The more experienced members were usually calmer, they didn’t feel like they constantly had to prove themselves, and these wet-ears usually did. He was far too smart to let such people get him riled up, so he simply said, “Some of your people should be expecting me. Woman called Aela, and uh... two brothers. One mer with an elfhawk haircut.” Figured that he only managed to remember the woman’s name. Ah well, he wasn’t made of stone and had never claimed to be.
At least dropping her name had some effect, because the woman with the sharp face raised her head again. “That so? So what’ll you be doing then? Fetching the mead?”
Keljarn always wondered about those people. Did they actually think this kind of thing made an impression? All it did was draw attention to their own insecurities. “I’m sure I’ll be told what my job is by people with bigger responsibilities than shield polishing.” Just because he didn’t want to be provoked, didn’t mean he couldn’t gently bump this big-mouth off of her imaginary pedestal.
The woman seemed to get the message, glaring at him and then devoting her attention to the shield again. “Aela’s out back with Farkas and Vilkas.”
He couldn’t resist adding a snide little “Thanks” before crossing the hall and opening the door on the other side. She was out back alright, the first thing his eyes fell on as he blinked against the sunlight, which reflected on the sweat matting her tanned skin, her muscles taut as she held the bowstring drawn, her eyes focused on the target and nothing else. Then she released the bowstring and the arrow found its way to the target, striking it in the third-most central ring. It was an impressive shot, to be sure. There were probably even more precise bowmen and –women in the world of archery tournaments, but Keljarn doubted if those people could also skin a boar, find their way in a dense forest, or take a few punches and have a mug of ale afterwards.
On the other side of the practice field, which was hemmed in by a wooden palisade, the two brothers he’d fought the giant with were sparring, the brother with the longer beard wielding a two-handed sword, attacking with broad swings, the other holding a one-handed blade and limiting himself to dodging his brother’s blows. Keljarn thought to himself how much nerve they must have, because the wide sweeps of the two-handed sword looked like its wielder wasn’t holding back, and one miscalculation could lead to serious injuries, even in a practice match. As he saw them in the daylight, he was surprised at how hairy these men were, even for Nords. Their forearms were covered with dark hairs and the stubble of their beards went all the way up to just below their eyes, which they’d blackened with soot. They had a certain animalistic appearance to them, and it wasn’t just their Nord blood.
A young woman sat on one of the benches ringing the sparring field, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees, and watching intently as the two brothers went at it, her eyes shifting as she followed every move, studied every feint and noticed every shift. For some reason, her war-paint was made up of nothing more than a thin line going down from her bottom lip over her chin. She didn’t look Nord, more Breton or Imperial. Whatever she was though, she was clearly in deep concentration.
“Huh, was wondering when you’d show up.”
Aela’s voice pulled him from his thoughts. She still stood where she had been, but her head was turned to him as she nocked another arrow.
“Yeah, figured I’d come see what this whole Companions thing is about.”
The two brothers had noticed him too, and they broke off their training to come meet him.
“Care for a round of mead?” the huntress asked him. “We’ll answer all your questions inside. Come on.”
“All this sparring is making me thirsty, so good idea,” the larger of the two brothers agreed. “Ria, get some mead for our guest, would you?”
The young woman who’d been concentrating so hard on the training promptly gave a short bow of her head and answered, “Of course, Companion.” With that, she scooted off to the hall and disappeared inside. That ornery woman inside hadn’t been kidding about fetching the mead.
The smaller (well, less huge) brother put his hand on Keljarn’s shoulder. “Come inside, friend. You’ve done us a great service, and you’re welcome at our table.”
They didn’t need to ask him twice. When they came back inside, all the Companions took their places, which were apparently fixed, and motioned for him to take an empty chair between Aela and the woman with the sharp face and the snarky attitude. She seemed none too happy to have him at her side, but that wasn’t Keljarn’s problem. He’d just have to devote his attention to Aela then.
The woman they’d called Ria arrived with one large ceramic bottle of mead, set it on the table and immediately ran back off to get more. The larger brother immediately reached for the bottle and poured his cup full.
“Farkas,” his brother said with a weary sigh. “What kind of hospitality is that? Guests first, remember?”
Farkas chuckled sheepishly. “Right, forgot.” He held the bottle out to Keljarn. “Honoured guest?” There was no sarcasm in the addressing, unlike as was usually the case when people used an honorific these days.
Had his Breton blood been more dominant, Keljarn would have begun a series of polite refusals and insistences that they should partake first, and had the Companions been Breton, they would have countered with insistences of their own until the whole interaction consisted of nothing but apologies and after-yous and I-insists, but they were all Nords, and when a Nord offers you a drink, you don’t beat around the bush and start babbling pleasantries, you take it and drink to his health. So he held out the cup set in front of him at the table and allowed Farkas to fill it, though the man didn’t do so without spilling on the table and not caring a bit that he did.
“To your health,” Keljarn said, raising his cup and taking a swill that was sizeable enough not to look effeminate, but also not so greedy he seemed like a septimless beggar gulping down his drink because the price was right.
“So,” Aela asked him as Farkas filled her cup, spilling even more of the mead on the wooden table. “What do you know about the Companions?”
Keljarn took another drink of mead (it was of decent quality but clearly a mass-produced batch to be drunk quickly and without too much discerning) and said, “Well, I know you take on dangerous work for good coin. I know you’re a close-knit group of fighter-hunters.” And to flatter them ever so slightly, he added, “And I know people respect you, but they know not to mess with you.”
Aela smiled, looking satisfied. “That’s mostly it, I suppose.” She brought her cup to her lips and drank, not with a dignified, feminine sip, but with two greedy gulps. She wiped her mouth with her wristband. Maybe it was Keljarn’s Breton lineage, but seeing a woman drink like this was amusingly surprising.
Then again, it’s not like he had expected a company of dignified mead samplers with uplifted pinkies and pencil-thin moustaches.
Farkas filled his brother’s cup, then his own again, and then finally the one of the unpleasant sharp-faced woman, which Keljarn had to pass to him and then back to the woman.
Lastly, the cup of the focused girl was filled. She’d brought two more flasks of mead and then had taken her seat next to the unpleasant woman. From the way these people treated each other, Keljarn could make up a rough idea of the pecking order. His cup had been filled first, because he was a guest of course, but then the order hadn’t really mattered for the next three. If it had, Aela’s cup would have been filled before or after both brothers’, who were clearly around equal in standing, which meant Aela ranked more or less the same. Then had come the more junior members, first the snippy one and then the mead-fetcher herself. It was a bit of a risk, but it’d make a good impression if he made it known he already understood the dynamics in the group, so he asked, “So isn’t it difficult to make decisions without singular leadership?”
“What makes you think we don’t have singular leadership?” the less-bearded brother asked, looking amused.
“Well,” Keljarn explained, “You wouldn’t be a disciplined and efficient companionship if you didn’t have at least a vague hierarchy. Seems to me like you three are the people with the most, and around the same, level of authority. So there must be the occasional difference in opinion, right?”
Both brothers laughed, and Aela joined in with a chuckle. From his other side, he heard the woman snort in derision.
“You seem to think we’re the only Companions,” the less huge brother pointed out. Ah, of course, he’d been making assumptions in his haste to show off his perceptive abilities. “We have a leader, but he leaves most of the day-to-day affairs to us.”
“Kodlak doesn’t get out much anymore,” his brother added.
“And he’s not a leader as such,” Aela said. “But we hold him in the highest respect and follow his guidance.”
“Ria,” one of the brothers said. “Why don’t you go check on Athis, see if he needs anything?”
Both Keljarn and the young woman sensed that she was being sent out of the hall for a reason, he saw it in her eyes, but she didn’t question the veiled order and rose. “Right away, Companion.”
“You too, Njada,” Farkas told the unpleasant woman at Keljarn’s side. “Ria may need help.”
Her reaction was considerably less deferent. With a snort, she got to her feet and said, “Yeah, right,” stomping off after Ria.
When they had both left, Aela said, “Ria and Njada are young and inexperienced, and from the way you fought that giant, we’re guessing you no longer need to learn the basics. Here’s our offer. If you agree to join the Companions, we’ll skip the whole initiation period. You’ll be able to join us to assist on missions as apprentice right away instead. When we’re confident in your abilities, you’ll be able to undertake missions alone, or even ask one of the apprentices to accompany you.”
Keljarn blinked, somewhat surprised by the offer. “But you don’t know the first thing about me?”
Farkas chuckled. “Let’s just say all three of us are really in touch with our instincts. Right Vilkas?”
“What my brother means, is that we’re good at sensing people.” And somewhat reluctantly, he added, “And that we feel this is suitable recompense for saving the life of a Companion. Or more than one.”
Aela seemed a bit less embarrassed by the matter, saying it right out. “If you hadn’t arrived, there’s no telling how that battle with the giant had turned out.”
“This is a one-time deal,” Vilkas said. “It’s... a bit unusual, that’s why we’ve sent Njada and Ria out, but if you accept, you’ll be set to the same status as Njada and Athis. And Ria, pretty soon.”
“Which means,” Farkas grunted, “We’ll be needing some new blood soon. That mead doesn’t fetch itself.”
Keljarn found the offer almost too good to be true, but there was one thing he was worried about. “Won’t they be jealous? I mean, they’ve been here for a while already...”
Vilkas shrugged, refilling his cup and leaning back in his chair. “There will be some... resentment, mostly from Njada, but it’s up to you to prove you were worth our trust, isn’t it?”
They had a point. “And your leader?”
“He knows, and he trusts us when we say your arm is strong enough. Skjor might have reservations, so he’ll probably be the first to take you out on a job when he gets back.”
He’d heard good things about the Companions. They’d struck him as dedicated and welcoming, and if they weren’t the epitome of Nordic fighting spirit and comradeship, Keljarn didn’t know what was. “I have to say, when I decided to return to Skyrim, I did it to fill... a hole in my heart, I think. Not just to come home, but to be part of something. To find purpose. And – ”
“I think he means he’s in,” Farkas interrupted, laughing boisterously.
Vilkas grinned along with him and clinked his cup against Keljarn’s. “Welcome, Companion.”
Aela said nothing, but reached for the second bottle of mead.
“I think this warrants a drink or two, Aela?” Farkas said, emptying the bottle into her cup.
“I swear,” Aela said, grinning and opening the second bottle. “When it comes to not training and pouring yourselves full of mead, any excuse is good for you two, isn’t it?”