My Mage was walking through the forest by riverwood and stumbled upon a cottage with an old woman (anise) sitting by and telling me not to trouble myself with her. I walk through her shack and find alchemy stuff and a locked cellar door, curious I picked it and went down to find an alchemy stand, skulls, an enchanting station, and a note trying to convince a girl in riverwood to come and join her coven. I leave the cellar and anise is waiting for me outside and says no one can know her secret and starts attacking me, so I kill her. Is that justified? Or should I have not gone into her locked cellar in the first place? Lol I'm trying to add to my mage's backstory as to why he would invade her place being a good guy and then kill her, he's is a Breton and a full on Mage. Maybe he can feel magical disturbances or he roots out rogue mages? Suggestions would be awesome

Funny with as many times as I've gone through there (and stolen her books) I never saw a cellar... gonna have to check it out.

but maybe your mage was warned about her from the girl in riverwood and checked it out?

Oh so Riverwood has a necromancy hiding in the vicinity that the guards don't know about.

Or even I knew about for that matter. Thanks for the heads up.


I shall kill her.

"My, you have a very nice house.

...

Finders keepers, old lady! *stab*"

I pretended that the door wasn't locked, and my witch just was curious. She really didn't mean to kill Anise - actually she was going to ask her more about her coven - but when the old woman attacked, Faendel killed her before my character had a chance to stop him.

They agreed to hide the body and never mention it to anyone. "We elves gotta stick together here in Skyrim. Even a Dunmer and a Bosmer."

Necromancy is pretty much legal in Skyrim. People just don't practice it openly. They tell you that at the Mage's College. It's not like in Cyrodiil, where the Mage's guild persecuted all the necromancers lol.

Now, your mage could have known Anise maybe through other mages and you have been tracking her for years. In order to establish her identity, you have to rummage through her basemant... I mean you can make up 100 different stories, really! LOL

Lol the cellar is in the far left corner of her house, right by her bed, you can't miss it. Yeah I was thinking about that as my excuse, but my guy was returning from bleak falls barrow so im just gonna say that I needed a place to rest for the night before returning to whiterun and stumbled on her cellar

no because she is just minding her own business...although one could argue yes (because of the coven thing)

but overall there is no sign of necromancy / violence / gruesome stuff in or around her area - or indeed of ansie herself

when she attacks you no wonder she is angry at you , you've just nosed around in her private stuff without even asking... wouldn't you be?

wow...how could people not know about ansie and her infamous cabin?

It's justifiable to defend yourself once she attacks you, but not justifable to search her cabin because she wasn't hurting anybody and you had no business in her cellar. Not that I haven't done it on certain characters.

It took me a very long time to find out. I would probably still think she was just some random old woman in the woods, possibly related to some quest I didn't know about, if I hadn't read something here on the board about her having a secret. Then I went to investigate.

Btw, I've tested the spawning time of the cabin, since I've read so many different things about how secure different places are. Here goes:

- The garden, the barrel next to the cupboard on the ground floor and the dried frost mirriam and the rabbit respawns in 10 days.

- Every thing else I left - including in all the sacks, the satchels and the barrel in the basemant - was still there after more than 30 days. I would recommend being careful about what you place in the basemant barrel and the sacks, though.

- I did NOT test to put items on open surfaces (I forgot...) but I likely will, later.

I'm on PS3, btw, if that matters.

I knew of her cabin, just usually left her alone.

until now. I think my nord will have to pay her a visit...

"You know you've played too much Oblivion when.."

The wiki says that even if you're walking past, minding your own business, and a wolf of dragon or something comes, and she goes hostile and attacks it, she then attacks you as well, claiming that you've seen something you shouldn't have. So, she's not really a nice person no.. To quote a certain alien plant:

If you wanna be profound...
If you really gotta justify...
Take a breath and look around...
A lot of folks deserve to die...

I've had the opposite experience. My character was jumped (at low level - below 10) by the bandits who pose as Imperial soldiers. She ran back towards Anise's cabin and Anise came out and frosted two of the three bandits down including the orc leader. After the fight, she was as friendly as ever. Because of this, my later characters stay on her good side.

I think this was a missed opportunity in the game scripting - she would make a heck of a follower for those playing witches or neutral casters. Heck, maybe she could've been head of a witches guild since she was recruiting.

great ideas

Waitaminutewaitaminute! That's not a very nice thing to say!

On topic, I visit her sometimes and give her alchemy reagents and other supplies, but I don't go into her locked cellar. I figure it's locked for a reason.

I had not noticed her cellar either so I will tell Mjoll to wait in Riverwood, I'll check out her cellar and if she attacks me I'll run away. Now if she were to attack me unprovoked that will end quite differently.

Is "witch" synonymous with "necromancer" in TES series?

Witches are a type of evil or hostile Destruction caster in Skyrim. I don't think they do much in the way of Conjuration, but I might be wrong.

Edit: Checked, and Conjuration was in their skill set for both Oblivion and Morrowind, but I cannot recall them reanimating anything.

I figured that she attacked me after I read the letter in the basemant about starting a coven with her sister...She said something about me knowing her secret and attacked...my frost atronach wasted her in a few seconds!

OK, thanks - no need for me to burn them on sight, then.

And, in the future, could you check these things before you post so we don't have all the extra "Edited by..." text? Let's try to keep this area clean, m'kay? Thanks.

Went there and it seems I killed her long time ago.

Geez, it's 6am and my PA is not even here yet. I'll make sure she gets your message when she gets in.

I snooped in Anise's cellar and then cast a calm spell on her and ran away. Her secret's safe with me.