Three Years Later

It's been three years since I left to join up with the Craftsmen Guild. I've been working for Adrianne since and have worked my way up to working with steel. I've learned that I have a knack for leather working, but I do whatever orders we get. I haven't heard anything from Calvin in awhile, but I trust that he is ok. I've made some friends here in Whiterun. My best friend is a guy named Lorvak and, through him, I met his twelve year old kid brother, Selvyn, who looks up to me. After about two weeks of meeting me, he took to calling me uncle Varis. I still don't know why he calls me that, but there's no harm in letting him do it. I start work at the forge early today, but first I want to get Adrianne something. 

I walk to the Arcadia's Cauldron to buy a potion of youth. Adrianne mentioned recently that she wishes she could have time to pick up her monthly potion, but hasn't been able to. She is starting to feel sick, so I decided to get her one. It costs five hundred gold, which is fine. I've saved up quite a bit over the last three years. I go in and pick it up and take it to work. 

"Hey Adrianne, I have something for you. I know you've been feeling down and I wanted to help out." I said. 

"What do you mean? You, just by working here, help me out so much already! Speaking of which we have a load of orders today. We need twenty Medium Iron Armors and ten Leather Jackets." She said.

"I'll get to those in a minute. First I want to give you this." I say as I hold out the youth potion. She looks at it and sees the label. She reads it and smiles starting to tear up.

"You got this for me? Thank you so much! This is an expensive potion. I can't possibly accept this." She says. 

"Please take it. I could afford it, please don't worry about the price. I know you haven't been feeling well and I wanted to help. Take it. You did mention, just last week, how you wanted time to get one and now you don't have to." I say. She takes it and thanks me. 

We spend the next ten hours making all the orders and sell them to the customers as they come in. At the end of the day, she gives me my pay and I sit on the bench, out of breathe. 

"Here you go. I want you to go give this to Seraphine. I told her I'd give her the next hunts meat and you collected quite a bit this past week, from all the elk and wolves you've killed." Adrianne said as she gives me two baskets worth of meat. After about a year working here at the forge, I started hunting, for myself, to get the materials for leather working so I don't use up all of her materials. I craft from my own supply. I had to go to the Hunter's Guild to learn the legal hunting grounds here in Whiterun, but that wasn't very difficult. The Hunter's Guild is south of Riverwood at Orphans Rock and the land surrounding it. When I arrived and asked for the locations, in which I could hunt, they handed me a map. The map showed red areas, for where it was off limits, and the other locations were free and public hunting grounds.

"Of course I will. Is there anything else I can do for you?" I ask as I reach for the baskets. 

"Yes, you can take this letter to the Craftsmen Guild and get yourself a rank up." She says smiling. 

"You think I'm ready? I mean I just got to Rank F last year." I ask surprised since it usually takes a few years for one rank up. 

"Yes. You have been doing excellent work and have gathered yourself a lot of Credit points, or CP if you'd prefer, with the guilds. You've earned it." She explains. 

I smile and thank her. I take the baskets to Seraphina. "Hello there, these are for you from Adrianne. She said she promised you meat from the next hunt. How is business today?" I ask. 

She smiles at me and looks away for a moment. "Thank you. Here is the payment. Business is good today. I'm actually about to close up shop for the day. I was wondering... Nevermind. Thanks for the meat." She says. 

This confuses me a bit. She is normally really outspoken. It's weird to see her so unsure. "Adrianne didn't say anything about the price, but I'm the one who collected the meat, so I'm going to say there's no charge. What did you want to ask me?" I ask. 

She accepts the baskets and looks me in the eyes. "Are you doing anything today? You have stopped by here every day for the past three years, but we don't really get a chance to talk. You've been busy at the forge and I've been busy at my stall." She asks and explains. 

This caught me off guard. I am a customer because she makes meat exactly how I like it. She doesn't know why I always want meat almost raw, but she makes it for me anyway. She even puts some kind of seasoning on it which makes it ten times better and, because of that, I keep coming back. I am not opposed to spending time together though. 

"Actually I am going to the Adventurer's Guild by Ivarstead today. I will be gone for a five days. I know you're busy with your stall, but... Would you like to accompany me on my journey?" I ask nervously. I expect her to say no because she is the only one who runs her stall, but I figured I'd offer anyway. 

She smiles and puts the closed sign out on her stall. "Actually yes! I can afford to close the stall for a few days." She says as she walks around the stall to me. 

"Actually, it's going to be about two weeks. It's five days there and five back." I explain sheepishly. 

"That's fine. I can get my mom to run my stall for me." She says smiling. "I just have to run home to get a change of clothes and food for the road." She explains. 

I've seen her everyday for the past three years and I've never heard of her mom. "Who is your mom?" I ask. 

"Her name is Ysolda. She used to run a stall of her own when she was younger. She is retired now, but I took over and now I'm the merchant. I can get her to help me out though. Come on, walk with me to my house for a moment." She says. 

We walk to her house and I wait outside waiting on her to get ready. I'm not used to having a companion, so this will be interesting. We walked out of the city and headed down the roads. When it became night fall, I built us up a camp and we laid down our bedrolls. "So, how has life been for you?" I ask. 

She laughs a bit and looks at me. "Life has been good. Thank you for inviting me out. I've been looking for an excuse to get out of the city." She explains. 

At this moment I hear leaves rustling. I listen close to hear what sounds like footsteps, but I hear four of them. "Watch out!" I yell and turn around drawing my sword. A saber tooth tiger pounces down on top of me from the shadows. It was targeting Seraphina but I jumped in the way. It knocked my sword to the side and Seraphina jumped back. I wrestle with the tiger for a few minutes and it bites down on my shoulder. I yell out in pain and without thinking, I start to shift to gain strength. I grow claws, my ears grow pointy, my eyes glow amber gold, and my canines grow sharp. I pin the tiger down on the ground and bite its neck as hard as I can. I rip open the flesh and claw at it's face one swipe after another. I then rip off the tiger's head and shove my hands into the body, lifting it up above my head and tearing it in half. Now covered in blood I calm down and shift back to a normal looking Breton. I notice Seraphina and realize what I just did. 

"Oh shit." I say with wide eyes. 

"You... You're a werewolf?!" She yells out in shock. She then proceeds to smile a tad. "This is why you always eat your meat bloody. I figured you just liked it that way, but I did think it was weird that you kept asking me to pour extra blood on it." She explains. She inches towards me and I step backwards. "Please, don't. I'm not afraid. You lost control a little bit, but you pulled back the moment it was over. You have enough control to not hurt me." She says. 

We spend the next few days getting to know one another. She saw me at my worst and didn't run away. She also suggests that I go talk to the current Harbinger at Jorrvaskr to learn how to fully control the wolf. I show her how good I am at hunting and we get enough food to last a week. Throughout her telling me to go to Jorrvaskr, she mentions how Lycanthropes, like Vampires, are able to live among us, as long as they don't break the Lycanthrope treaty. 

"Wait wait wait, I've spent these last few years living in secret and I didn't have to? Lycanthropes live amongst people peacefully? That would have been good to know before. I've been going off into the woods on my hunting trips and shifting in secret, since I have to shift every so often to keep it under somewhat of control." I ask and explain in shock.

"Yes. You don't have to live in secret at all; you just have to obey the laws and be responsible." She explains. This explains why she wasn't afraid of me when she saw me shift. This woman truly is amazing. "The only downside is that you have to register your 'Power', as the treaty clarifies for us to call it, to the Adventurer's Guild." she adds to her previous statement. We continue talking for a little while.

"You know, have you thought about joining up with the Hunter's Guild? You're good enough to join." She says.

"I have, actually. That is what I want to do with my life. I want to be an official hunter, but you have to be rank D to join up with them. I am about to become Rank E." I explain. 

"Oh. Well good news is you only have one more rank to go! I am jealous though. You already know what you want to do for a living. I thought you'd become a blacksmith." She says. 

I shake my head. "I wanted to learn a trade and get credit for learning one as important as blacksmithing and leather working. That skill could help me out a lot for hunting if you think about it. You're out in the wild and you break your tools or dull your blade. Learning the trade is good, so you know how to fix them on the fly, or better prepare yourself. And I thought you wanted to be a merchant?" I ask. 

"No, I'm just doing this because there's a demand for it and so I can save up the money I need, to do something else. I may go to school at the Bards College or maybe even the College of Winterhold. I haven't decided yet, but I want to learn something practical." She explains. 

We talk some more and before we know it, it's been five days and we reach the guild. I walk in and give them the sealed letter. "I was told to bring you this letter from Adrianne in Whiterun." I say as I hand the clerk the letter. 

He takes it and unseals it. He looks at me, then back at the letter. "I see. Give me your License." He says. 

I hand him my License and wait for him to do whatever he needs to do. "You are now Rank D. You have collected enough credits from working the forge, hunting, and skinning the animals that you have managed to rank up twice. Good work. Keep it up and you may just be able to make a name for yourself." He says. 

This surprises me and I look at Seraphina with a wide smile. "Did you just say Rank D?" I ask to make sure I heard correctly. 

"Yes sir." He says with a nod. 

"In that case. I would like to join the Hunters Guild." I say with confidence. 

"Good. I was wondering if you would ask. This is a letter of recommendation from Adrianne for you to join us." He explains. 

This hit me to the core. I only mentioned to her once that I want to become a hunter. That was two years ago. She remembered and helped me out in a huge way. I don't know how to thank her, but I have to do something. 

The man takes out his stamp and stamps my License. When he hands it to me, I look at it to see Rank D and over to the side where there is a small space there is now a symbol for the Hunter's Guild. Up on the top however is a new symbol. One I've never seen before, in the shape of a recurve bow drawn back with a dagger replacing the arrow. Above the blade of the dagger, there was a bear pawprint and below the blade, there was an oak leaf. On the wood of the bow, there were feathers hanging.

"Sir, what does this symbol mean?" I ask. 

"You'll find out. This is how you will make the real money. Come back here in a few days and I'll have your first mission. You'll have the chance to prove to me you are as good as this letter says you are." He explains with a sly smile. 

"I also need to register as a Lycanthrope." I say nervously.

He looks surprised, but pleased which confused me further, but I brush it off. "What type are you?" The man asks.

"I am a werewolf. What other types are there?" I ask.

"There are a lot of types. We get a lot of wererats and werebears. We get some werewolves, but the list goes on." He explains. He jots it down in his notebook and creates another card for me then stamps it. "This is your Lycanthrope permit and here is your copy of, A Lycanthrope's Guide to Citizenship." He says. I thank him and walk out. Seraphina and I get a room with two beds at the Inn to stay the night.