After discovering that the Elves were only pretending to have been poisoned and had actually been replaced by daedric lookalikes, Skavild is determined to follow them and find out what they are up to.
"Halthir," said Skavild, later that day. "I've made a decision. I'm a proud Nord and I shouldn't be sitting around looking after Thalmor who got 'emselves poisoned after being too rude to people. I'm going to run away and start a new life. Good-bye."
Skavild had been expecting Halthir to say something. But he didn't.
"Now, don't look at me like that. I like you just fine, 'specially for an Elf, and you know me, Halthir, I'm probably just in a bad temper and I'll change my mind and come back in a few days, anyway. But I'm got to make a break for the desert when the Redguards aren't looking. Just tell 'em you never seen me."
"I understand." said Archivist Halthir. "But don't you think it would be easier if I just summoned a Daedra to impersonate you, as well?"
Although he had been expecting Halthir to say something, as I said, Skavild had not been expecting him to say exactly that.
"You knew about the Daedra?"
"Oh, yes. It was fairly evident. I have spent a great deal of time on planes of Oblivion, thanks to the Second Archivist's insistence on my taking regular research holidays. Daedra have a very particular air about them. A scent, or perhaps a feeling. It is hard to explain. I am sorry to be so imprecise."
"Oh... Oh, that's all right." said Skavild. "Well done for working it out. Why didn't you tell me?"
"I was worried that the Second Archivist would send me on another research holiday if I did."
"But you seem to have worked it out for yourself, with the help of the lady Xivilai upstairs, and I probably cannot dissuade you from setting off in pursuit. Only, if you catch up with them, please do not "put the Second Archivist over your knee", at least in front of the others, as they would consider this inappropriate."
"Oh, no." said Skavild. "They're all going over my knee, all four of 'em, for making me feel sorry for 'em when they're gallivanting around the desert. Now, find me a Daedra from Oblivion, and you'd better make sure he's just as handsome as me."
"I have been observing the guards' patrol patterns." said Halthir. "I recommend that you leave in two hours, when Tierva generally leaves her post to ask Cyrus if he needs anything. You will have a window of five minutes while he explains everything that is wrong with the Aqueninan Geography shelves, which I have carefully spent the morning reordering. Good luck, Skavild."
"Do not worry, Second Archivist Eldaline." said Aralina. "Nobody will have recognised us even as Altmer when we went to buy supplies."
"Thorstad Place is a very isolated village, and we were wearing our disguises. Ondolemar and I went to two very good shops called the Practical Supply Store and the Basic Sundries, and Aranwen went to gather local rumours at a tavern called the Black Jug."
"And what local rumours did she find there?" said Eldaline.
"I am afraid she cannot remember, yet, Second Archivist, but I believe if we give her time her memories will return."
"Why is the desert so hot?" said Ondolemar.
Agent Aralina concluded: "Anyway, I am quite sure that we were not observed."
"Good." said Second Archivist Eldaline. "In which case, you did well. Only, let us not succumb to overconfidence."
"Though, after the other day's expedition into the western tomb, I feel silly to have wasted more money on torches."
"I told you, the dead fear the dark." said the soldier called Aranwen. "That is why they get up to light all those candles along the corridors."
"It is more likely to be a kind of ancient ritual, than a fear of the dark." said Eldaline, remembering the rows of candles. "As the draugr of Skyrim get up in the night to light the lamps."
"It was terribly funny. With those skeletons guarding the entrance." Aranwen said, in the present time, under the half-shade of a desert tree.
"Thinking themselves so clever, running towards the entrance to waylay us."
"Little did they know we had already been in the corridor for ten minutes."
"I blame them not having any ears to speak of, Second Archivist." Aranwen added to her own story, suddenly.
"Because with respect, Second Archivist, you don't move nearly as quietly as you think you do."
Aralina said, "As you were, Aranwen! The Second Archivist's silence is an example to lesser Altmer, and I cannot believe you have forgotten it!"
Aranwen did not listen, but nobody was surprised by this. "Because the first one did a bad job of noticing you."
"Until your sword was through its spine, of course."
"Second Archivist," said Ondolemar. "Why is it so hot in the desert? Is there any way to make it colder?"
"It was lovely and cool in the western tomb."
"I know." Eldaline said. "And I am sorry for your poor complexion. You look almost flushed with the heat. But I want to clear a little more of the distance between here and the eastern tomb. If we miss the moon, we will have to wait an additional week, and I really do not want to give our esteemed Redguards a chance to catch up with us."
"Skavild will be beside himself, Second Archivist Eldaline." said Aranwen.
Eldaline said, "Skavild will be taking advantage of our convalescence to enjoy himself quietly with some mead and books. You saw for yourself how his pride usurped every other sentiment."
Aralina was also dazzled by the heat and ferocity of the sun, but fortunately nothing more than a pleasant glaze ever appeared over her skin. "But was it not a risk, Madam, that the human Skavild would accept your offer of wine in the bathing house, and stay?"
"If you call it a risk, Flopsy." said Eldaline. "Had he accepted, I would have been very surprised."
"Second Archivist Eldaline," said Aranwen. "with all the respect in the world, where are we going?"
This question would have to remain unanswered, at least to us, for in the vicinity of Lainlyn, Skavild was also discovering that the desert was hot, and the sun was certainly taking a long time over its descent into the sand.
Skavild had seen snow, and glaciers, and tundra, and crags, and swamps, and, unusually for most Nords, he had seen more Planes of Oblivion than he could shake a stick at, but, in his mind, sand was for the seaside, not to blight his existence as it currently was in the northern Alik'r desert.
He met a pointy green thing with arms.
"Err. Hello." he said.
"What are you?" said Skavild. The green thing did not reply. "Pardon the strange question." Skavild went on. "It's just, I'm not from round here and I really haven't a clue if you're a person or a tree or an animal or a thing."
"Well, it doesn't speak Tamrielic, so perhaps it's a tree. I wonder if it's as pointy as it looks." Skavild carefully reached for a spiky spine, but not carefully enough.
"Argh! Damn your stupid spiky spiney arms to Oblivion and back, you wicked green abomination, you and your mother's father and his grandda and the whole extended family, look what you've done, now my arm hurts, you bastard plant." Shouted Skavild.
"And don't you dare look at me like that, Talos smite you and your smug six arms, you have no idea of the day I've had, and you're about to have a worse one."
"Just for that I'll chop your self-satisfied head off, you vegetable terror, you see if I don't, now which one's your head, don't worry, I'll find it myself."
"You don't like the look of my axe, do you, now what do you mean by poking a man in the arm in the middle of the desert, I was just walking along and minding my own business, you reproachful shrub."
"Ah, you know what, you're not worth it."
"You're just a tree."
Skavild continued on his way. The tree, in case you wondered, was quite content.
continues