Gyromancing the Stones

Adventures in Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the whole story here!

Calder and I continued the hunt for the stones, looking through the Markarth and Falkreath areas with no luck. At the Pinewatch bandit place where Dex was previously arrowed to death, Calder also died after being hacked, stabbed, and taking two arrows to the face. Unfortunately the stone there was already gone too so he died for nothing. It was around this point that I noticed Shadowmere was no longer following me, probably due to its old master turning into dust before its eyes.

No matter, next stop was Whiterun where I knew the guards wanted my head. Nice of them to still ask if I'd like to surrender though, and one of them was even so nice as to ask me to stop all the yelling as it was frightening people (i agreed) - just before trying to kill me. Got into the local pub which was quickly being emptied of inhabitants but found Rayna an ex-imperial soldier willing to follow me into battle. She probably was impressed by my Stormcloak killing ability.

After clearing the streets we checked the crypts where we didn't find a stone but instead found fresh coffins for a whole group of familiar names. Always wondered what happened to Uthgerd - turns out she was moved down here awhile ago. Next stop was Dragonsreach itself, so after fighting through more guards we made our way past the slain Jarl Vignar (from my last visit) to his quarters and there waiting for us is Jarl Bossman! He had returned from his exile in Solitude and seemed to now be running the show again, and he was still pissed off from our last meeting. Fought our way past him (a few times) but alas, there was no stone to be found up here either.

A true nord never backs down. Just like Aerys Targaryen?
(art by GoranGligovic)

Luckily the next spot, a keep full of necromancers did have one. Decided to dismiss Rayna back to Whiterun since she was a handy asset to have in that location when I picked up the mage Ralan. Unfortunately he was a complete loser who wouldn't want to go past the entry points of the next few places I explored (including a charrus infested lighthouse) and soon met his end (via friendly fire arrow) against some conjurers in a cave where again - there was no stone.

Replaced him with a barbarian lady named Sunni who showed off her skills by slaying a brash redguard right in the tavern I found her in. With her I found the last two remaining stones and was tasked to retrieve the crown they sat on from a falmer infested cave. The crown was retrieved but Sunni was left floating face down in a pool of water after getting eviscerated by the falmer bastards. Having completed the "end game" for the thieves guild I figured it was time to go get the person who most wanted them dead - Mjoll the Lioness who now resided at Skyhaven Temple.

They know what I did last Blogger

Adventures in Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the whole story here!

Picked up Raven, a pretty blades archer (because she had their armor) near Windhelm to clear the nearby lowlands and she was put to work early with a blood dragon and a Shadow Nightingale coming out of nowhere to attack us! The Nightingale was damned tough and when we finally killed her she vanished into a puff of black smoke. I'm beginning to think the thieves guild is on to me if they're sending assassins now, so I went directly to them while playing "dumb" to see if anything was amiss and sure enough there were strange things afoot. Brynjolf was too busy to talk to me, Delvin began talking about a contract at Solitude mentioning the name "Erikur" as the contact but the quest never generated, nor did he ever speak of it again, and the task I did get was to chase a khajit caravan far away. Sure felt like they didn't want me around.

I let it slide for now and decided to clear out another cave full of conjurers I stumbled across. Seemed like the whole conclave came at us at once, and a master wizard zapped Raven to death in the battle. Decided to pick up my Windhelm housecarl Calder who was getting bored of sitting at home and growing his enormous sideburns. First stop was a dwemer ruin high in the Eastern mountains. The initial, empty hall turned out to be an elaborate pit trap that nearly killed Calder in the fall. Couldn't help but wonder if the nightingales were behind it as we fought our way out of the falmer infested caves back up.

Hoofed it across the map and finally cought up with the khajit caravan I was tasked to deliver drugs to. Seems that for a small amount of catnip these furry traders were willing to smuggle stuff for the guild, and not just this caravan - all of them! Damnit, I like the khajits - but criminals do not deserve jail; they deserve death. And that is exactly what I gave him and his friends.

Obey or die.

After fighting a giant we stopped by Morthal since I was in the area and the entire guard contigent decided to fight me for killing their previous leader. Idiots. The ancient dragon that showed up midway through actually helped me out quite a bit. When the streets were littered with the dead and dragon bones we pushed on to Solitude where I found out from Njada and Jordis that "Erikur" was a thane of the local court. They had also been doing research on a bunch of stones Vex was looking for and gave me a list of where I could possibly find them. The only catch was I had most of them already (missing only 4) and I had forgotten where I got them.

This meant I simply had to visit each and every spot on the list, the first being the Blue Palace itself, so we marched straight back in there and slaughtered this Erikur person. No upstanding citizen would contact the thieves guild anyway, and the guy was a bit of a douche. Nice to see all the dead bodies still in the basement where I left them too - but the stone here was already gone (in my pack). More disturbing, Jarl Bossman who was one of the survivors from my previous rampage here, was nowhere to be found.