Chapter 577 Kill Steal

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This morning, Falkreath woke up on the news of a murder. Someone under the light of day while the Jarl was touring the town and that one was none other than the Jarl's own guard, Helvard.

Almost the whole town witnessed what happened. Almost everything went in the bloodiest of ways. One moment Halvard was following the Jarl, the next he was facing an angry woman who dug her fangs into his neck and made his blood splatter covering every inch of Jarl Seddgeir.

To the calm and quiet Falkreath, this was terror incarnate, for the kill is the Jarl's strongest arm and the killer is a Vampire.

With such an incident about a Vampire targeting a Jarl, every corner in Skyrim was alerted to the existence of those vampires attacks as it would that those beasts have finally grown bold enough to go after the better men and the blue blood.

Jarl Seddgeir survived the attack with three of his men falling victims to the claws of the vampire and while all that happened, the monster still escaped. Who would blame the Jarl for cashing out every favor he has to alert every hold in Skyrim and put a bounty on the Vampire?

The thing that everyone failed to notice was the fine details of the incident itself. Surely anyone who is killing the people of the Jarl is after the Jarl himself but that logic is flawed since Helvard was the Jarl closest man in both rank and action. He would always follow Jarl Seddgeir like his shadow and be alert from every hostile aura targeting his Lord yet a Certain Woman saw this from a whole different perspective.

As she walked in Falkreath carrying a basket of vegetables and dressed like a farmer, she smiled at the townsfolk who recognized her as the woman who sells fruits every Fredas at Falkreath's market. She has a farm outside the town somewhere in a nearby village but no one really cares for a mere villager with dirty clothes.

She walked on the muddy street avoiding the coming and going horses, bowed to a Thane patrolling the streets and took the long turn around the Jarl's Longhouse to avoid the security checkpoint around the area.

Falkreath was locked tight.

She found the Alchemist Shop of Falkreath in the innermost corner of town where the buildings meet the mountain and she put the fruit basket on the ground then sat on the wooden sidewalk with her back against the stonewall of the shop. She looked like a simpleton from a village with her old looking dress stained with five inches of mud around the hem of her dress.

"Fresh vegetables! This morning's pick! Fresh vegetables."

As she shouted the same as any villager who sells their fruits in the local street, people started looking at her with annoyance as she was totally out of place. Whoever wants to sell their products go to the market in the middle of town, not in this secluded quiet place. However, the person who got annoyed the most about this noisy villager was none other than Zaria, the owner of Grave Concoctions alchemy store.

Zaria was just brewing some minor healing potions for the morning and had a lot in mind lately so the voice of a villager selling their veggies outside her door was clearly an unwelcome interference. She grabbed a mop and with heavy steps towards the outside of her shop, she went on with her hot-headed Redguard temperament.

"Who in the name of Bal would come to…"

As she raised her mop to shoo off the villager woman, Zaria's feet froze and the muscles of her body stiffened with an instinctive reaction to the stare she received. If stares can kill then the villager's stare was one that snaps necks and slits throats.

"Zari, dear. Been a while." The woman spoke in a tone so clear and yet so faint only Zaria could hear.

The accent changed, the attitude switched, the temperament wasn't that of a rough villager but rather a silent hunter, a deadly trapper, a beast waiting.

Zaria recognized whom she's up against and lowered the mop she raised with cold shivers running on her dark skin.

"Astrid."

"Dear! You look unwell. Is it so dark in there with all the potions and… other things."

Zaria, a mere owner of an alchemy shop or so she seems, met with Astrid, a power-hungry woman who happens to be the leader of the Sanctuary of the Dark Brotherhood.

Of course, the two of them have had prior knowledge of each other. It may even extend to be called History.

"Come on in." Zaria felt strange meeting Astrid this way thus she cleared the way for her inside the shop but Astrid seemed rather… uncaring.

"To be fully honest with you, dear Zari, we are having a situation here. A situation where trust is an issue at the moment. Excuse my caution, of course. Never walk into the den of an alchemist not knowing their intentions, they say." Astrid said with a faint smile on her mud-stained face.

Zaria could see the air of caution looming around Astrid and towards none other than her. This complicates things.

"Astrid, how long have we known each other?"

"You tell me, Zari."

"Then believe me when I tell you it has nothing to do with me."

"Oh! I didn't even begin to ask anything." Astrid laughed, "You are a dear, Zari. I wouldn't suspect you would have any other means other than us to deal with poor Helvard. Still, your revenge against him may have driven you… impatient."

"Impatient?" Zaria dropped all mannerisms of Astrid and glared at her, "You know what this did to me and my sister. Impatient is the word that fits me best while you were stalling for more time and money."

"Hold on! Hold on! Hold on!" Astrid acted a little bit on the retreat, "I haven't done anything about it just because the man was the Jarl's dog. Believe me, killing r@pists is a thing we do for free if possible."

"And I upheld my end of the bargain." Zaria said, "Wherever that vampire witch came from, it has nothing to do with me."

"But to kill Helvard, of all people, and while the Jarl is parading? And in the daylight of all things? This vampire surely has a style." Astrid said, "Yet she stole my contract, my kill… this is something I can't just let pass by."

"As I said, I have nothing to do…"

"Well, I don't even care." Astrid said as she got up, "But given your history, dear Zari, you know a thing or two about Vampires, Undead and all that tones. I have a vampire close friend but I wouldn't ask her to track another fellow vampire before I know what I am dealing with so I have come to you. You have some of those tracking scrolls and spells from the old coven that used to operate in the graveyard, don't you?"

Zaria kept staring at Astrid before confirming the question with a nod.

"Alright. I hope to get some… on the house." Astrid said.

"What track do you have?" Zaria asked.

"A few fabrics in the forest, footprints, a faint scent… the usual stuff."

"I'll find you something."

"Do give me some Poison for Apples, dear. I haven't had fun with those nasty things in years."

"You people still use that? Don't people already suspect it to be your doing ever since the past Era?"

"Sometimes the old methods are the best ones." Astrid replied, "Sometimes what is old only needs to be purged."

Zaria shivered faintly and retreated to her shop then after a minute, she came with two potion vials and a scroll.

"Here's the apple poison. This scroll makes the undead unwary of you. It should keep slumbering vampires unconscious." She said.

"And the other vial?"

"If you have a hunting dog or a trained wolf, you can feed this concoction to it. It helps heighten their senses but gives them an upset stomach the next day, hunters use them all the time. You have a hunting beast, don't you?"

"I have the best." Astrid confirmed with a smile that only she understood what it meant.

"That's all then. Don't find me again."

"It's a pleasure, dear Zari."

Zaria walked back to her shop suspiciously watching Astrid who kept on with her disguise as she went on and sold her veggies until the guard chased her away.

***

Outside Falkreath near a river, Astrid emerged from the lake with her upper body naked and a man behind her back. She was drying her wet blonde hair from the water she just took a plunge in and asked for the man to help her with a towel.

"So, we are letting Zaria off the hook?" Arnbjorn asked.

"Husband, things won't be fun if we keep on killing whoever crosses us. Let them think of us what they want to think. We are not the Thieves Guild, are we? We don't need to go around making ourselves the top dogs wherever we go." Astrid spoke as she got closer to her hot-headed husband.

"Grrr! I still think it is a bad idea leaving loose ends."

"Who said we are leaving loose ends. Everyone wants someone dead eventually and once the other alchemists in town are tired with Zaria, someone will pay us to twist her neck and make it look like an accident."

"Hehehe! I like this. Fine."

As Arnbjorn finished helping his wife bathe, she put on her armor and presented him with the items she received.

"Any of these would be of use?" She asked.

"You'd have to ask Festus about the scroll but this potion looks authentic. I smell no poison in it." He replied.

"Good." Astrid returned the items to her bag and complained, "Every time I get into some old ladies disguise, I feel like my skin is crawling."

"We've aged well, wife. All this killing doesn't just twist your mind but gives your soul a… certain vigor and youth." He said.

"Don't start speaking like Festus for everyone's sake. The old ways this, the old ways that." She seemed rather annoyed with the mystic way of things.

"Don't be like that, I don't feel good about the old ways either but the Brotherhood has roots and with time they shall link to us. You know that, don't you?" Arnbjorn warned her.

"We are one of the last standing sanctuaries, husband. It was us who kept the others safe, not the tenets… not the old ways and certainly not Sithis. We would have been purged by the Last Listener if things were to go south."

"I get you… but…"

"No buts… it is all us now… all those who are left. I don't want to tread down that path ever again."

Astrid and Arnbjorn seemed to have been distressed lately. Actually, the last twelve years were nothing but distress to the Sanctuary of Falkreath. Being the last in Skyrim with the contact cut from the Sanctuaries of Cheydinhal of Cyrodiil and Wayrest while being pushed out of business in Morrowind and Black Marsh by the Morag Tong. Things looked grim for what is likely to be the last surviving Assassins.

If they were to follow the old ways of the Dark Brotherhood, it would have been the end of them all or so Astrid believed. So if they were to survive, they would need a new way. No Tenets, no Night Mother, no Listener and certainly no Black Hand. Just Astrid and her little gang of killers using the name of the Dark Brotherhood to act like hired hitmen.

The Sanctuary of Falkreath has strayed from the path of Sithis, the Dread Father, for over a decade by far. A wrong that had to be corrected for the balance to find itself back to the world.

Yet ironically, Astrid and Arnbjorn sat out to find the one who stole a contract from them as according to tradition, those who take a kill away from the Brotherhood are indebted with one and one they shall return. This is the only way for them to increase their numbers and keep the blood flowing.

A vampire it is or a werewolf, it never made a difference who they recruit. They have many children of the night in their ranks and always prided themselves to be a family of those with tendencies that transcend the normal takers of lives and harvesters of souls.

But with the Dark Brotherhood being a shadow from its former self, another was lying in waiting and ready to rise from its ash. But for something to rise, it must reach ruin and that's where Astrid and Arnbjorn were heading.

To their Ruin.

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