Smith From Another Land

Chapter Five

The house was small. Smaller even then her home in Whiterun which was saying something. There was a fireplace, a table, a chair, a bed but not much else other then some crates and a chest next to the bed. The entire place was made of wood and she just thought about how easy this place would be to burn.

She was content to lie in the bed but no sleep came to her. She had already rested outside even if there had been a rude awakening by the Imperials that called her names again. At least Solas had seemed to be on her side even if he made her come to this wooden box.

Hopefully it doesn't get to the point where I have to beg to be outside.

She thought over the events of the day. From going free to her dream. It was a strange thought, to think of the wolf she had encountered in her dreamscape. She had instinctively known that it was not something her mind had thought up and he had smelled different.

Perhaps it's Hircine and whatever claim he thinks he has on me.

She mused over it but eventually shook her head. There was no way that the wolf was the daedric lord Hircine as she was certain he would have come to her as a full werewolf instead of a wolf. He had been large, certainly, and possessed an unnatural amount of eyes but she was the person who was a dragon in her dreams. He also didn't smell like a daedra.

Not that there really was a smell in her dreams but whatever sense passed as smell had told her it was not the same. The few times she had encountered the daedra, they all had the same basic smell. They had other things marking their scent like Sanguine smelling of booze and sex while Hircine smelled of the woods and earth but beneath it all, they had an almost ash like smell.

The wolf smelled like wolf with a little mix of electricity. There was no almost ash smell at all.

Not a daedra then.

That still wasn't much help in her mind so she turned from that to thinking about how to get a map. Of course, she wasn't sure how much help a map would be as she wouldn't even be able to read the damn thing. It would at least give her an idea of where she was, provided they had a distinct 'you are here' marked on the board in a way she could understand. She had the feeling that she wouldn't be that lucky.

Eventually, she grew tired of thinking about the wolf and how to escape this place, and she started counting how many boards of wood made up the ceiling. Until that too became boring.

She spent the next few hours rearranging the furniture in the house. Table from one side of the place to the other. It felt flimsy in her hands but then she guessed it was someone's second hand table that they had shoved in here for keeping. The bed was not much better but at least it was sturdy enough to hold her weight. She eventually decided to put it away from the window so the sun wouldn't shine on her face if she did manage to fall asleep.

Rearranging things got boring too.

The sun was just beginning to peek in through the windows when she was balancing everything on top of each other. Bed in the middle of the floor, the table on top of that and then the chairs. She was just adding a crate to the top of it when she heard the knock at the door.

She may have stumbled a little at the noise, knocking over the leaning tower of furniture to send it all crashing to the floor, she landed in a heap amongst the broken crates. At least the flimsy table had broken her fall, although it looked like she was going to need a new table.

The door swung open with a bang as Solas rushed into the room. Ara could practically feel his eyes on her, with a look somewhere between concern and irritation. A look reserved for children doing something potentially dangerous.