Brande, Cysleister Brand

A James Bondian playthrough of Skyrim for #CharacterCrusade Unbound, using a mostly random start from the Unbound mod.

Brande. Cyleister Brande. I'm a Breton agent in His Imperial Majesty's espionage service, newly assigned as an attache to Commander Maro of the Skyrim Penitus Oculatus. I'm a patriot, a jack-of-all-trades, a man of action; but also a ladies' man, suave, debonair, deadly.

My tale begins on a mountainside south of Morthal. I'm embedded with one of the local hunters and we're "working off the adrenaline" from having just slain a frost troll that charged our camp. The walking stick that doubles as a flame-thrower that Q gave me came in handy!

We've been surreptitiously observing Forsworn movements, but things have calmed down. So we need to bring this shipment of 10,000 arrows to the Imperial headquarters in Solitude - they've depleted their stock in skirmishes against the Stormcloak forces pushing West.

From there my orders are to report back to Dragon Bridge to debrief Commander Maro. But for the rest of the night I'll enjoy the warmth of this huntress in this tiny tent

Next morning we picked our way down the mountain, and trudged through the frosty marshlands westwards. We came across a nest of frostbite spiders who had killed a legionnaire, and the lovely huntress showed me how to avoid their venom and dispatch them with a dagger thrust.

Saw some interesting ruins, and some uptight Thalmor who we made fun from a distance but didn't engage. Couldn't afford any more delays, those soldiers needed these arrows!

Homework: story "value pairs." Think about how events cause the character to change from one state to another. Start out as a thrill-seeker, only feels alive when living dangerously. Avoiding dealing with something internal by being superficial.

Just past a little camp in the lowlands, we heard shouting up ahead... investigating we came across a few imperials cleaning up a battle site. Many dead Stormcloaks and Imperials but the Imperials prevailed.

We revealed our mission and asked directions to the city to deliver our shipment of arrows. They obviously needed them desperately with Stormcloak squads of this size getting bold around here! We hurried on over the next few miles and found Solitude. We marched past a public execution going on in the public square, to Castle Dour, and delivered the arrows to the Imperial Quartermaster. Mission accomplished!

While there, Legate Caesinneas mentioned there might be an assassination plot against the Jarl Elisif the Fair, the potential new Empire-friendly High Queen of Skyrim. I resolved to keep an eye out.
With a kiss, I sent the huntress back to her mountain perch to continue observations, and set off towards Dragon Bridge.

GHOSTS OF YORE 1:
That night, I made a small fire at my temporary campsite. A haggard and hunched stranger approached wearily from the darkness, laden with ornaments and talismans; I put a hand to my dagger but let him approach.

He sat and warmed himself by the fire. I gave him some of my rations. He smiled darkly and began creepily telling a tale of being cursed long ago, and seemed hopeful that I could help him. Some dark mystical forces were afoot, for as he smiled wider I could feel his curse subsuming my being as well! What foul sorcery was this??

It seems Hevnoraak, or Vokun (he couldn't say because of the curse) wanted to imprison him the "soul cairn" and now would be after me as will since I offered hospitality to their victim. I began to have a vision...

I made to the quaint village of (x) just a storm began brewing. An old woman advised that I get inside soon. The sky darkened and lightning flashed ominously as I thought I saw a figure approaching down the road. I entered the village inn, The Old Holdran, where a jolly scene played out with drinking and music.

I shrugged off the ominous feeling, and relaxed with drinks and games with the patrons. As I drank more, the ominous feeling returned, and I was gradually enveloped in a gray haze as the faces of the villagers seemed to morph into grotesque and diabolical visages. I felt like I was supposed to be somewhere, with someone... befuddled and anxious, I blacked out.

I awoke again to the clang of heavy iron door closing. Someone told me "Quiet Hjalti, there could be Reachmen out here... now come on." I crept along behind my companion. Where was I now? Who was I? Who was this sworn brother of mine?

We crept of out a cave mouth, squinting to see a host of armed warriors looking at us. They were the Reachmen we had come to rid land of. We killed them. We killed them all.

That night, as a lamented my sworn brother's Tolvdir's death, I had a nightmarish vision of a skeletal figure wreathed in lightning, in an expressionless iron mask, hissing "You have forsaken us!" Very unnerving.

Then I awoke in my campsite, under a clear sunny sky. There was no sign of the mysterious stranger. I took a long drag of Colovian brandy and splashed my face with cold water, then packed up and continued on towards Dragon Bridge.

Gave Maro my report. Received new orders, head back to Solitude, take a boat to Windhelm, meet with a contact, initials A.A., with knowledge of a plotter against Elisif.

But somehow I felt inexplicably called to travel by land South instead. I hiked the winding roads into the rocky Reach for 2 days before an overturned cart
with a slaughtered horse got my attention. Two merchants lay riddled with arrows, which also peppered the cart itself and horse... they were a strange, primitive kind of arrow, yet not of Forsworn make. My curiosity was piqued and I went on high alert, scanning the surrounding mountainside.

As I cautiously moved ahead, about a half mile down the stream I saw a small campsite on the opposite bank. I thought I would ask whoever was there if they had seen or head anything untoward lately. I waded across, but the camp was deserted but for some gear and a small journal - I snooped a little, and discovered that the camp apparently belonged to a pair of adventurers who indeed HAD seen what happened to the cart! They described some kind of abhorrent, twisted mer-like creatures, who they apparently tracked to a cave further up the mountainside, and it looked like the adventurers had just recently set out in pursuit of the murderous monsters.

I thought they could use my help, so I set out after them. I found the cave easily enough from their description, and crept in. A number of frostbite spiders lay dead, webbing everywhere. A few more scuttled at me but were easily dispatched thanks to my training from the huntress. Delving further into the depths, there was a chill wind, and in the eerie glow of the fungus I beheld one of the foul creatures from the journal's description - a Falmer!

It didn't seem to spot me before I caught it full in the throat with an arrow. More of the beasties lurked further in, and they all seemed to have poor eyesight, often not noticing me until I was upon them. There were also some massive insectoid creatures they seemed to keep as livestock, who spit venom and hissed angrily when I sprayed them down with flames from my secret staff.

In the furthest reaches, I found my adventuring predecessors - but they had perished in combat with the falmer. There were also lots of human remains, it looked like these creatures had been capturing prisoners along this road for a long time, and either eating them, or sacrificing them in some kind of abominable ritual? Hard to parse what I was seeing in there, but one man's corpse was splayed out on some kind of altar stone, and he had a note in his pocket, lamenting that he would never escape and make it back to his love, Eydis...

So I find myself drawn to the Old Hroldan Inn, where the inkeeper is Eydis! I giver her the note (exposition) and decide to spend the night. She put's me in what she calls Tiber Septim's room...
That night a ghost appears... it's Tolvdir, from my vision. He thinkgs I'm Tiber Septim... now I realize the first of the line of rulers of the Third Era was formerly known as Hjalti... was the ancestral emperor trying to communicate with me somehow? Was a part of his spirit in me? Was he just somehow guiding my fate? Maybe I had a deeper purpose in my clandestine activities supporting the Empire than just lining my pockets and putting notches on my bedpost.

So I felt called to help deliver my (Tiber Septim's?) sword to this appartion, as felt a kind of deja vu feeling about this Hroldan fellow and felt he deserved the promised sword.  So I headed out to find it, trekking all over the surrounding countryside to seek it.

Eventually signs pointed to an ancient Nord ruin, acting as temporary redoubt for a small group of Forsworn savages.  I approached them calmly, to parlay and explain that I just needed to take a sword off their hands, and was willing to pay or come to some other arrangment.  But they turned me away, and when I insisted and wouldn't leave, they became hostile.  I subdued a pair of their warriors before they could mount a defense, then charged in and made an example of their shaman, right in front of some strange and blasphemous moose-dragon altar they had set up. That seemed to break their morale, like their god was obviously not going to stop me from doing anything, and the rest of the heathens fled off into the woods. Now to search the ruins.

In the ruins were more Forsworn a few gave me trouble but I killed them or scared them off with my flame staff.  I had to carefully pick my way past several lethal traps, but eventually came to a little central camp they had down below the surface, where I found one of their missives - apparently to another tribe indicating this tribe of the Matriarch was not going to help the other to pester Markarth with cowardly guerilla terror tactics, but rather was going to grow and expand, building it's strength until it could pose a direct challenge to the city with a full-on invasion.  They also had some texts, including a tome on the legend of Red Eagle (a story of an ancient sword imbued with the spirit of untamed savagery with which the early Reachmen had resisted the yoke of the Empire) with notations about where the artifact was, and about which they believed the finding of would portend that the much-anticipated time of expansion and conquest was nigh.

Then Eureka!  I found the first sword that had been calling to me... Hjalti's sword, the original sword of the man who would unite the Empire and found a dynasty, Tiber Septim himself.  As I took it from a dias, a foul hagraven descended from up in the rock walls and shrieked as other Forsworn cried out and took up the charge with their Matriarch, coming out of the woodwork.  I abruptly turned around and bolted, narrowly escaping their furious pursuit up and out of the tomb... I cleverly led them to their demise as in the pursuit I led them directly into the spike and swinging blade traps I had earlier navigated around!  They perished at the hands of their own defenses and I made off with the acquired artifact.  (How do I feel about holding it?  Resolve my relationship to Tiber Septim?  Was it a vision, hallucination, flashback, deja vu, omen, Cloud Atlas reincarnation thing, or what?)

I cautiously traveled back south the Old Hroldan inn.  Got back and the apparition was there to greet me.  To Eyedis's delight, I presented it with the sword, and it entered into some kind of communion with me, and now armed, it expressed an eagerness to help me also track down the other sword, an icon of power for the Reachmen now calling themselves the Forsworn, in order to help protect the new Empire from the same old enemies by preventing them from acquiring this symbol which might unite the untamed savages once again.  Eyedis flirted with me in her gratitude and I set off with my spirit guide seeking the Red Eagle blade.

I went up into the mountains, and stalked another band of Forsworn, taking them down one by one with Tolvdir's guidance, until we found their chief, a Briarheart who carried the ancient blade!  He put up a fierce resistance, but my flame staff made all the difference, and I claimed Red Eagle's Fury.

I would keep this potent symbol away from the Forsworn. I thanked Tolvdir and he faded away as I picked my way back down the mountain, and began the trek back northwards to continue on my mission for Cmdr Maro.

The Odyssey of Xenophon pt.1

Biography

Xenophon is a Breton, who signed on with the Empire's intelligence service in Cyrodil.  He made a name for himself in undercover operations, partly due to his natural facility with various illusion and alteration tricks.  Eventually he was deployed to Skyrim to infiltrate the Stormcloak rebels. It was as though assignment in a harsh climate but he sent back a couple briefs and was instrumental in luring the leader Ulfric into a trap.

Character Profile (based on Militant Wizard kit in AD&D wizard's handbook)

Loyalty: high to the Empire, likes Redguard and Orcs (Daggerfall Covenant), likes the Forsworn, dislikes Nords who oppress the Forsworn Bretons.

Piety: high to Julianos (magic) medium to Dibella (healing/beauty) low to other divines

Passion: magic, spycraft/intrigue, highborn ladies

Selfishness: medium, willing to work for the good of the Empire but expects to be rewarded

Cruelty: medium/low, but sometimes must interrogate or betray in the line of spy duties

Sanity: high, believes in a code like Sun Tzu

Journal

Today Ulfric was to be executed, along with the rest of our Stormcloak commandos and a couple of unlucky bandits, in the Imperial village of Helgen.  I had led us into an ambush in the pass to Ivarstead, having set up said trap with a covert missive to the Whiterun Battleborns.  I continued to play my part as a doomed fellow prisoner right up to the end, in case Ulfric were to let go any word of secret contingency plans that could be triggered upon his death.

But Ulfric smiled at me just as his turn on the headsman's block was to come, and a nirn-shaking roar issued from the sky!  Fire rained down as a dragon descended upon the keep and attacked.  Several guards, prisoners, and townsfolk were incinerated and the rest of us scattered around the town square.  Ulfric dragged me away from danger, but I had had enough of his boorish company and in the chaos I slipped his grip and found my way to a guardsman rounding up civilians and ushering them into an armory.  He released my hands from bondage and introduced himself as Hadvar.  As the dragon raged overhead smashing down the guard tower and burning the houses and shops, he lead me down through the jaol to a subterranean tunnel that would take us out of town to safety.

We emerged some distance West, and began running for Riverwood, leaving the smoking charnel house of Helgen behind, knowing that the neighboring peoples must be warned of this draconic menace.  Dragons hadn't been seen in Skyrim for generations.  What did it mean that Ulfric was not surprised by his last-minute salvation?  Was he somehow in league with the terrifying monster?  We jogged the rocky trail for hours, finally arrived in the quaint logging village where we paused to rest at the home of Hadvar's uncle, the village blacksmith.  We told him our harrowing tale, gasping for breath, and then he had his wife prepare us a meal as he headed off to the tavern to spread the word.

Upon refueling our bodies and taking some supplies for the road, we then continued our rapid hike down the foothills and into the tundra, to bring word to the local jarl in the hold capitol of Whiterun.  We reached the city gates long after nightfall, hurried through the darkened streets, and Hadvar convinced the guards at Dragonsreach to admit me.  As an Imperial Envoy, I gained an audience with the bleary-eyed Balgruuf and explained what had transpired.  He sent for his court wizard to be awoken, an interesting fellow called Farengar Secret-Fire, and after some consultation he directed me to retrieve a stone fragment with a map of ancient dragon burial sites from a tomb near Riverwood, with hopes that he could discern from whence this dragon had appeared.  Then we feasted, planned my excursion, and I slept.

Shouts in the great hall woke me just before dawn.  The dragon had been sighted at the Western Watchtower!  The jarl gestured me over as he spoke in clipped tones to his court wizard and guard captain.  I volunteered to join a detachment of soldiers led by the guard captain to go fight it off.  We grabbed bows and spears, then ran down the grey city streets, out the gate, and marched Westward.  There it was!  The guard tower was in shambles, fires burning and a few screaming guardsmen left alive.  The dragon circled overhead and dove when it saw us approach!  After a pitched battle we slew it with arrows and magical fire.  Then something odd happened... as I approached its fallen corpse, it's skin kind of split open and some kind of spiritual energy leaped out of it an into me!  The guards were astonished and began murmuring that I was Dragonborn, some strange superstition in this land.  Anyways, we then returned to the jarl to report on what happened.

As I entered the great hall, a surreal shout echoed across the city, "Dovakiin."  The guards began gossiping again, and when I had explained all that had transpired to the jarl, he also looked astonished.  He named me Thane of the Realm for my heroism in slaying the dragon, awarded me a small parcel of land with a log cabin out near Riverwood, appointed a beautiful and stoic housecarl named Lydia to my service, and suggested I make my way to the Throat of the World to confer with the Greybeards who had probably been the ones to issue the surreal shout as a way to summon me.  The wizard Farengar then interjected with a request to retrieve and ancient artifact he had uncovered word of in his texts, called the Dragonstone.  It was rumored to be located in (barrow) and to contain a map of the ancient dragon burial sites, which Farengar believed would reveal some clue as to why and from whence the dragon had come.

So then, new housecarl in tow, I decided to head back to Riverwood to reassure them that a hold garrison was on it's way, and from there seek Farengar's artifact.  On our way out of town we stopped at Warmaiden's to get Lydia some solid adventuring gear.  Adrianne the blacksmith didn't have anything in her size, but after a little hushed girl talk, she offered to craft her some custom armor if we would procure some corundrum and help her out with a little marital problem she'd been having - her husband just wasn't that into her.

We hiked back up into the foothills, and man was it nice to have someone to carry my burdens!  Stopping for a bite in Riverwood at the Sleeping Giant, we bumped into the proprietor of the Riverwood Trader and his sister, Lucan and Camilla Valerius, discussing the theft of their prized possession - a golden claw - and their speculation that a bandit had taken it and might be camped out near (barrow).  Since I was headed there anyway, I suggested that I might be willing to retrieve it if they would pay a bounty, and they were interested.  Lucan was desperate to get it back, and his sister seemed to take a shine to me... was Lydia jealous?  So far she resolutely ignored my charms, all business.  Anyway, we headed out across the river and became to climb towards the (barrow)

(get claw, dragon stone, fight drauger leader, find word of power) (then return claw to the Valerius's head up past helgen, to Ivarstead, reveal the sneaky illusionist, climb the mountain, train with the greybeards, climb back down, head down in to the valley of the hot springs on the way to Darkwater Crossing, through the pass to rescue an Anrgonian from the Falmer, get to the Crossing and meet the friendly ex-adventurer miner lady who also has a chat with Lydia, who now seems more open to me)

We stumbled across the beautiful Eldergleam Santuary and spent some time there, talking.  We decided to stop and check out my new home on the way back to Whiterun, and began our hike.
We find it on the western riverbank, and wow was it a thane's manor.  More like a compound.  We spent a couple days opening it up setting up a household, then continued on to Whiterun, which could be seen off in the distance from my new scenic deck.

We hiked all morning and reached the gates in the afternoon, finding Adrienne the blacksmith at her shop.  I gave her the corundrum and she set about crafting Lydia a new set of armor while we waited at the Inn, taking a vacation and visiting her by night to check her progress and counsel her and her husband.  Finally she completed it, and Lydia was now more formidable as a result.

From there we hired a carriage ride to Solitude, and I finally was able to debrief the Imperial General about the Stormcloak plans, and events I had witnessed in Helgen.  I also agreed to assist on a quick sortie to a nearby fort that had been plagued with bandits.  I requisitioned some funds and headed to the Winking Skeever, a nearby saloon at which mercenaries were rumored to hang out.  I hired one such strapping fellow and we set out for the fort!

We scared off the bandits, and cleared out some ragged necromancers from Wolf Skull Cave on the way, and returned to Solitude as Imperial heroes.  I finally obtained an audience with Jarl Elisif the Fair, and she seemed to have eyes for me when hearing of my exploits, and was impressed by my title in Whiterun, but I would have to shake off the boorish Erikur from her court before she would see a potential tryst with me as feasible... the court sorceress Sybille seemed to be of one mind with me there and might prove an ally.

Then we stopped by the Bard's College and offered some advice on how to get their effigy ceremony started, and took a carriage back home to Riverside Lodge.  Spent a few more days there, got a guard dog, and I decided it was time to head back to Cyrodil to check in with my superiors there.  Lydia and I began hiking through the pass south of Helgen, into Bruma Hold.

In the Pale Pass fort, we came across some Imperials having a bit of a problem with a Stormcloak captive.  I agreed to help interrogate him with my Penitus Oculatus training, and once again posing as a fellow rebel, I gleaned that a terror cell was plotting an attack on the Imperial City itself!  It was a good thing I came by.