"...and that's the last I saw of her."
Eydis's mother wiped a tear from her cheek with a finger, the motion quick and almost angry, like she was annoyed at herself for still crying after all this time. Her hands were rough—not heavily calloused, not like someone who worked with stone or steel, but worn in a different way.
There were tiny scars all over her palms, little puncture marks that had healed into pale, pinprick dots.
The tips of her fingers were slightly discolored, stained a faint bluish-grey that no amount of washing would ever remove.
Seamstress's hands. No doubt about it. The kind of hands that pushed needles through leather and canvas, that tied off threads with quick, precise movements, that had probably made half the clothes in this house, including the dress Eydis had been buried in.
She was a simple woman living a simple life. Her home was small but clean, the furniture rough-hewn but sturdy, the hearth warm despite the fog pressing against the windows.
A spinning wheel sat in the corner, a half-finished bolt of cloth draped over it. On the mantel, there was a wooden carving of a horse, crudely made but somehow alive, the kind of thing a child might give a parent and the parent might keep forever.
Torin sat across from her, his hands resting on his knees, his voice gentle.
"Once again, I'm sorry for your loss." He paused, letting the words settle. "And for what it's worth... you should know that I'm steadily getting closer to finding the bastard who did this."
The woman nodded, her eyes distant. "Thank you," she said, but there wasn't much weight behind it. The words were automatic, a reflex, the kind of thing you said because saying nothing would be rude and you didn't have the energy for anything else.
Her daughter was gone. There was no getting her back. And some stranger's promise of justice, however sincere, didn't change that.
Torin understood. He didn't push. He just let the silence sit between them for a moment, then turned his attention to the man in the chair by the fire.
Eydis's father.
He hadn't said a word since Torin arrived. Hadn't offered greetings, hadn't asked questions, hadn't even looked up from the armrest he was tapping with his fingers.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
It was an impatient rhythm, the kind that came from a man who wanted to be somewhere else, doing something else, but couldn't because custom demanded he sit here and listen to a stranger ask questions about his dead daughter.
Torin studied him.
His hands were heavily calloused—the kind of callouses that came from years of gripping an axe, of swinging it against wood day after day, of working in the cold until your skin cracked and bled and healed and cracked again.
They were permanently stained with resin, the same bluish-grey as his wife's fingers but darker, deeper, worked into the creases and lines of his palms.
Woodcutter's hands. Undoubtedly.
But.
Torin's eyes narrowed slightly.
The scarring and callouses on his fingers were twice as thick as the rest of his hands. Thicker even than the callouses on his palms. The skin around his knuckles was raised and rough, worn smooth in some places and cracked in others, like he'd been gripping something small and hard for years, something that required constant pressure from his fingertips.
And the way his fingers moved as they tapped—the dexterity, the precision, the almost musical quality to the rhythm—that wasn't the kind of movement you expected from a man who spent his days swinging an axe.
Woodcutters had strong hands. Strong grip. But their fingers were rigid, their joints stiffened by years of wear and tear from vibrations. They didn't tap out complex rhythms on chair arms. They didn't have fingers that moved with the fluid grace of a musician or a—
A mage... possibly a surgoen, or even a swordsman.
"So," Torin said, his voice casual, almost conversational. "Hrogar. May I ask what you did before you came to Falkreath?"
The father frowned, and Torin gave him an apologetic look, the kind you give when you're about to ask something intrusive but want the other person to know you don't enjoy it.
"We've already established that this is likely the work of a Daedric fanatic," he continued. "And the question might seem inconsequential. But I still need to know. To completely eliminate the possibility that this was an act of revenge by someone from your past."
He spread his hands, a gesture of helplessness. "Someone who held a grudge and finally found a way to hurt you."
The room went very quiet.
The mother's hands, which had been twisting in her lap, went still. Her eyes darted to her husband, then back to Torin, then to her husband again. Her lips pressed together in a thin line.
Hrogar's fingers stopped tapping.
He turned to look at his wife. Something passed between them—a question, an answer, a decision being made in silence. The mother hesitated, her jaw working, her eyes glistening.
Then, slowly, she nodded.
Hrogar let out a long, heavy sigh. The kind of sigh that carried years with it.
"I suppose I can't hide it forever." He shook his head, his gaze dropping to the floor. "Yes. I wasn't always a woodcutter." He paused, and when he spoke again, his voice was quieter.
"I don't know how you found out. I've been careful. But..." He shrugged, a tired, defeated gesture. "In truth, I was a mercenary. With a well-known company. The Crimson Shields."
Torin's eyebrow rose a fraction. He'd heard of the Crimson Shields. Anyone who's in the mercenary workline would have.
They'd been one of the most famous mercenary companies, back in the day—before the war ended... then they fell into obscurity.
When they were active, they'd taken all manner of jobs. Fighting on behalf of squabbling Breton nobles in Wayrest, Daggerfall, and even participating in the conflict between the Crowns and Forebears in Hammerfell.
They were mostly wartime mercenaries. However, they also exterminated bandit dens in the Wrothgarian Mountains and hunted beasts that preyed on village herds in times of peace.
Theirs was the kind of work that paid well but left marks on the soul.
"I traveled all over," Hrogar continued. "High Rock. Hammerfell. Even Cyrodiil, once or twice. We fought where we were paid to fight, and we didn't ask too many questions about who was right and who was wrong."
His jaw tightened. "Until I got tired of it and decided to leave, and that's when I met her during my travels." He glanced at his wife, and something softened in his face. "She was... different. She made me want to be different. So settled here. Started over."
Torin let out a low hum, considering.
"I know mercenary work isn't exactly black and white," he said carefully. "Did you do anything that might have earned someone's hatred? Something that might have followed you here?"
Hrogar shook his head firmly.
"My hands aren't clean." His voice was rough, defensive. "I've done things I'm not proud of. Killed men who probably didn't deserve it. Took coin from people who needed it more than I did. But I've never..."
He paused, his expression shifting—anger, grief, something else that Torin couldn't quite name. "I've never done anything to warrant... this."
He took a deep breath, his chest heaving. His hands, those calloused, dexterous hands, curled into fists on the arms of his chair.
"Either way." His voice was steadier now, controlled. "Our captain was a clever man. Paranoid, maybe, but clever. He made sure we all covered our faces and used false names. We hid our identities. Wore masks, hoods, helmets—whatever it took to make sure no one could recognize us afterward."
He met Torin's eyes. "He said it was for our protection. That if no one knew who we were, no one could come looking for revenge."
Torin nodded slowly, filing away every detail.
"You said your captain made you hide your faces," Torin said slowly. "But you must have seen each other. The other members of the company. Did any of them leave around the same time you did? Settle somewhere nearby?"
Hrogar's jaw set in a firm line, his eyes hard.
"I wouldn't know," he said, his voice flat. "The Shields remained active for a few years after I left. Then the news stopped coming—I heard rumors, but nothing certain."
He shook his head slowly, his gaze drifting to the fire. "However, I can say this for certain; only the captain knew that I came to Falkreath. I made sure of that. Told no one else. Not even the men I served beside for years."
He looked back at Torin, his expression defensive.
"And before you ask—he's not someone who would do this. The captain, I mean. He was ruthless when he needed to be, but not cruel. Not like this." His voice dropped. "He had lines he wouldn't cross. We all did."
Torin raised an eyebrow and just stared at Hrogar in silence.
The fire crackled between them. The mother had retreated to the corner, her hands busy with a piece of mending, her eyes downcast. The tapping of Hrogar's fingers had stopped, replaced by a stillness that felt almost fragile, like the wrong word might shatter it.
Finally, Torin nodded.
"You seem very confident," he said, "so I'll take your word for it." He rose slowly from his chair, his knees popping slightly. "But I must take my leave now. Thank you for your time. Both of you."
He inclined his head toward the mother, who offered a small, tight nod in return, her eyes still fixed on her stitching.
Torin turned and walked toward the door. Hrogar followed, his heavy footsteps echoing on the wooden floor. The latch lifted, the door swung open, and cold air rushed in, carrying the smell of fog and wet earth.
"One more thing," Torin said, pausing on the threshold. He didn't turn around. "If you remember anything else, send word to Runil. He'll know how to find me."
Hrogar was silent for a moment. Then: "I will."
The door closed behind Torin with a soft thud.
He stood on the stoop for a moment, breathing the cold air, letting the fog settle on his skin. Then he began to walk, his boots crunching on the frost-covered path.
His mind was already working, laying out the puzzle pieces he'd gathered, turning them over, trying to see how they fit.
Hrogar was a mercenary. That much was clear. And not just any mercenary—one who'd spent years fighting in the shadows, taking jobs that paid well and asked few questions.
He'd undoubtedly committed acts that would look ugly in the light—killed men who probably didn't deserve it, burned villages even, done things that left marks on his soul that no amount of woodcutting would ever erase.
But that didn't make him someone capable of killing his own daughter.
The mercenary band he'd been part of—the Crimson Shields—had hidden their identities. Masks. Hoods. Code names. They'd gone to great lengths to make sure no one could track them, no one could hold them accountable, no one could come looking for revenge.
And according to Hrogar, only the captain knew he'd settled in Falkreath. That meant the list of people who could have known where to find Hrogar's family was very, very short.
Hrogar seemed very sure the captain wouldn't do this. And Torin was inclined to believe him—not because he trusted Hrogar's judgment, necessarily, but because the logic didn't hold.
If the captain had a grudge against Hrogar—if he'd wanted to hurt him, to make him suffer—there were easier ways. Cleaner ways. Set him up on a suicide mission. Sell him out to enemies who'd been looking for him. Or simply accuse him of embezzling from the band and watch the other mercenaries tear him to pieces...
Mercenaries were a ruthless and efficient bunch, as a rule. They didn't leave much room for emotion, for messy personal vendettas that took years to plan and involved torturing innocent children.
If the captain wanted Hrogar dead, Hrogar would be dead. Simple as that. He would have acted much sooner. Not waited years, not tracked down a daughter who wasn't even born when her father left that life behind.
The timing was wrong. The method was wrong. The captain—whoever he was, wherever he was—probably wasn't the culprit. Not directly, anyway. But that didn't absolve him completely.
The captain could have been bribed. Could have been threatened. Mercenaries were a self-serving bunch, after all. They fought for coin, not for loyalty. If the price was right, some would sell their own mothers.
Torin gritted his teeth.
And just like that, the puzzle pieces were blown apart. Scattered. Useless. He was back to square one—maybe worse than square one. Now he wasn't even sure this was purely a Daedric ritual.
Now there was a possibility—a real possibility—that this was a personal act of revenge. Someone from Hrogar's past. A former comrade who'd held a grudge. A victim who'd survived and wanted payback.
The possibilities multiplied, each one less helpful than the last.
Torin walked until he reached the graveyard, his feet carrying him up the hill, past the rows of headstones, toward the place where Camilla lay. His mind was still churning, still trying to make sense of the fragments he'd gathered, still trying to fit them into a shape that made sense.
The fog was thinner here, closer to the edge of town. The moon, hidden behind clouds, cast a faint, milky glow over the frost-covered ground. The trees creaked in the wind, their branches bare and skeletal.
He stopped at the base of a large oak, its trunk split by lightning years ago, its roots clawing at the earth. He leaned against it, letting the rough bark press against his back, and closed his eyes.
Think, he told himself. Think. There's something you're missing, but what? What could—
"This one is disappointed."
Torin's eyes snapped open.
K'hila sat on a low branch of the oak, her grey dress blending with the fog, her black fur making her almost invisible against the bark.
Her arms were crossed over her chest, her tail curled around the branch behind her, and her yellow eyes were fixed on his face with an expression that was equal parts disappointment and reproach.
"You lied to this one," she said.
Torin blinked slowly, his mind shifting gears, pulling itself away from the labyrinth of theories and suspicions.
"Oh?" He smiled lightly, keeping his voice casual. "When?"
K'hila turned her nose up at him, the gesture so absurdly adult on such a small, furry face that Torin almost laughed.
"You said you would slay the monster." Her voice was sharp, accusing. "And this one believed you." She huffed, a sound that was half sigh and half growl. "And yet you let it go."
Torin's smile faltered.
"The monster was too dull-witted to realize," K'hila continued, her eyes narrowing. "But this one isn't. This one saw and understood. You let it go. On purpose."
Torin stared at her.
This little Khajiit child had seen through him. She'd watched him fight, watched him drive the harvester off, watched him stand there as it slithered into the fog—and she'd understood what even the creature itself hadn't realized.
He'd let it go. Not because he had to. Because he'd chosen to.
The fog swirled between them. The wind moaned through the trees. And Torin, for the first time in a long time, found himself at a loss for words.
...
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