"Damn your eyes, Balefire, I ask you one more time," she snarled, jaws clenched like her fists, forcing the words out , "why the sword?"  

"You are, as I have told you many times before, beautiful when you are angry, Twilight. And for all that it is an unoriginal line, I mean it in all sincerity. Loosen the tourniquet a bit, would you? I have my doubts about whether my Allheal Bracer would be able to deal with gangrene, to be honest." I spoke mildly but with effort, for the gash in my thigh was a deep one, and I must hold it together while my spell worked, or it would scar badly.  

Arrow nocked and pose vigilant, she stood guard at the mouth of the cavern grotto while I ministered to my wounds. She bent to loosen the rawhide tourniquet, then swiftly resumed her watch. As always, though, she could talk while watching, more's the pity.  

"That's the Sword of Midnight you have strapped to your back, or I'm a barmaid. I want to know why you are carrying it again, after all these years. It fairly reeks of death. One more time, or by the gods I'll finish the job those Orcs began…*why the sword*? I thought you'd sworn them off, in any case."  

The wound was healing well, knitting before my eyes, a tribute to my spellcrafting skill, especially in these cold, damp, slime-covered granite warrens deep beneath a half-ruined, nameless stronghold. I activated a Mark of Stamina and felt nearly my old self again. The draft was steady and cool, and I could hear water dripping not far off.  

"You over dramatize, Twilight. The blade does indeed reek of enchantments,  

I'll grant you. If the mage we seek…"  

"My *father*", she thrust between my words.  

"Aye," I replied, but could not bring myself to say it,"if…the mage…is as powerful as you say, he must know we are here. All of my armor is enchanted with one spell or another, as is most of yours and nine of ten parts o four other gear. To an alert wizard, we must stand out like veritable beacons of magicka. An enchanted sword more or less can hardly make any difference, after all."  

"You do not deceive me, Lord Balefire. You are carrying one of the two mightiest weapons you or anyone else owns. You have not used it since we left Dwynnen. You have promised to spare my father's life. Damn you, *why the sword?* Do not play the fool with me, lest it go badly for you. I require an answer. A *real* answer." Her arrow wasn't pointed at me. Not quite.  

Something skittered and scampered in the darkness. A scavenger, no doubt, bound for the sumptuous feast we had laid for its kind, back along two days' worth of enemy-filled passages and tunnels. Giants. Dragonlings. Fire Daedra. Assassins. Rogueknights. Battlemages. Spellswords. Ominously, as we'd delved deeper into the ancient caverns below the dungeon, several Daedra Seducers and a small army of Orc Shamans. Mostrecently, the Daedra Lord who'd pounced, laughing madly, from a secret door behind us,with a squad of knights behind him.  

The Daedra Lord's laughter was stilled by the blast of reflected magic that felled him, Twilight's arrows killed two knights and her sword another. The Staff of the Dawn filled me with the life energy of the two other knights, but one managed to strike with his Orcish blade at a part of my thigh from which the greaves had come loose.I hoped that this last memory gave him some solace in whatever pit of Oblivion he now occupied.  

"Very well", I said at last, "I shall be as forth coming with you as you have been with me. I have not sworn off the use of the blade. Merely as another way of commanding higher fees, since I started operating out of Wayrest I have been using staff and dagger only. Some of the nobility and merchants are young enough not to recall my deeds of yore. Oh, they have heard the songs, I suppose, as who hasn't, but rightly believe them to be embellished. Some are skeptical of the tales told about me. The Sword of Midnight and the Sword of the Dawn are becoming legends, though. Thus, it is easyfor some prospective employers to give credit to the blades rather than to the man. Toimpress such as these skeptics, I put my blades in storage and augment my reputation byusing only a staff. It has been working well. That is, of course, the true test of any tactic."  

"But you carry it now," she persisted.  

"Aye, for if the Staff should break, its three soulbound Ancient Vampires will be released, and in the midst of a fray, with no other weapon than a dagger,the outcome could be…unpredictable. Fear not, Twilight, this ebony claymore shall notdrink the life of the mad mage if it can be avoided."  

Mayhap I only fancied it, but it seemed some tension went out of her muscles as I said this. Seeing an opportunity I might seize, I resettled myself more comfortably on the cold, uneven granite floor, half-leaning against an outcrop of rock, and caught Twilight's eyes with my gaze.  

"I had thought both of your parents dead, Twilight. How is it that this mage we hunt can be your father?"  

For just an instant, the space of two heartbeats perhaps, her full lips quivered, but then she mastered herself and answered.  

"My mother was a Wood Elf from Valenwood, as you have known of old, and my father a High Elf, a Prince in fact, from Sumerset isle. She might have been apowerful Battlemage…," she smiled a little, and continued, "…like yourfriend Myrallin from Daggerfall, but although she studied the Art most diligently, shesold her talents as a scout to employers in some of the brushwars back when she was young. An excellent archer and a master of stealth as well as magic and woodcraft, she was at the peak of her career when she met Father.  

"He was much like you, Balefire, in some ways. A puissant Archmage,learned in the Art, he'd spent his youth in mercenary bands, being a younger son who would not inherit the crown. He grew powerful in warcraft and in spellcraft, and his talentswere much in demand. Na'theless, after they married and I was born, he tried to see as much of me as his work allowed. Between the two of them, my parents saw to it that I was trained as well as they could manage and afford. And they could afford quite a lot. He was a grim man, Balefire, but he cared for me and for Mother, more than he could show. And, in his own way, he could be a very kind man, too, for all that he was a famous deathdealer. It was his kindness that brought his doom, actually."  

She paused, and her eyes looked at something beyond the dripping walls of this foreboding cavern, something back in time, in some shrine of special memories. Wordlessly, I handed her a skin of wine. Her eyes regained their focus and she squared her shoulders. Taking a tighter hold on her longbow and facing back out into the dimness of the cavern, she continued.  

"I had word of their deaths after I had joined my first mercenary band, while on my first campaign, in fact. It was not so very long before I met you, Balefire; a year or so, mayhap. We were living in Dwynnen by then; my parents werehalf-retired. Though still young enough for campaigning, there was more money in servingas advisors and trainers, and most mercenaries come through Dwynnen, eventually. It was, and is, as you know, a crossroads for warriors, and my parents could let their clientscome to them.  

They had a large house near the city walls, with guards and servants,and trophies from their campaigns, and…and…beautiful…many beautiful…things…and…"  

Her shoulders shook, as memory overcame her. I rose, recovered fully now, and went to her.  

"All right. That's enough for now, Twilight. Rest, and I will keep watch. Here, take the rest of the wine."  

She wiped her eyes with the edge of her cloak's hood, and took a long pull from the wineskin. She bent her bow against the floor and unstrung it, then looked back up at me.  

"No, let me finish. There is little left. That was a bit more than ten years ago. One night, raiders came over the wall and attacked our home. Theys laughtered everyone and fired the house, and got away. They were never identified, muchless caught. There was nothing left to bury separately; the Mages' Guild razed the wholestructure…burned it right down to ashes. The Court of Dwynnen sent me a letter of condolence, and I inherited a fortune, but what good does it do me? I threw myself into the mercenary life; later I met you. After we…parted…I ended up back in Dwynnen and decided to study the Art some more. A few days before I called for you, one of the patrols came back with a message to me, on a map that had been left on the body of a slains entry. Father's handwriting, and his signet seal. 'Join me here', it said, over his signature: 'Garthaniel Brightblade'. I am pledged to protect Dwynnen, Balefire. I don't know how my father could have escaped, or where he might have been all this time, but I cannot just slay him, nor allow you to. I have to talk to him. I have to know…"  

I could feel the deeply incised runes on my staff, indeed I could feel the very grain of the wood, so tightly did I grip it. I looked into her pleading eyes, once again a-brim with tears, and I knew I could not refuse, however unwise it might be. We had once had a fine time, days of laughter and nights of fire and lightning. We had snatched much that was matchlessly beautiful out of the flame and noise and smoke of war. We had each saved one another's lives so many times that counting was impossible, even had we tried. And we had parted in a way that left me bitter for years, and untrusting, and unwilling to bare my soul again to anyone. I owed her nothing, for memories fond or dire do not admit of accounting, but I could not refuse her.  

It is easier to slay than to save, and none knows it better than I, whoam a professional slayer. The moment of hesitation, the staying of the hand, the checked spell…these can be the death of you in battle, and well I knew it. But I could not refuse her.  

"Very well," I said, my voice heavy with a resignation and overtones of doom which echoed like those of a stranger in my own ears, "I shall spare him, if at all possible. You shall have your chance to speak with him. I hope we do not perish of an excess of mercy, M'Lady."  

It was then that we heard the grunts and snarls of many Orcs, coming closer, and the clanking and ringing of many weapons and armor. And evil, insane laughter. The sound of death, as our foes came nearer…but whose?  

Ah, comrades…companions by the fireside…I grow thirsty and tired. Ho, innkeeper! Another ale here, make it two, nay, bring a keg…I must refresh myself before continuing my tale.