Chapter Text
For all Teldyrn’s gripes about Riften, the natural sights were a sight for sore eyes.
After living decades upon decades in ashfilled wastelands, craggy cliffsides, or snow covered plains it was nice to settle down somewhere with an abundance of green. Not to mention the lakeside home with a personal dock.
It was about sunset, and the sun was sparkling perfectly off Lake Honrich. All around the area were birch trees with their beautiful stark white trunks and glittering orange leaves waving in the wind. The last of the fishing boats were coming to shore, muffled and distant cries of orders as people rushed to get back home. Teldryn throught the nearby fishery would cast this place in a terrible stench but the wind was blowing just right and blowing it far away from this perfect sight.
He couldn’t say that this was his own piece of Aetherius unfortunately. No, that belonged to his patron that was just coming out of the house with a towel over her head.
Freshly bathed and finally dressed in something casual, Yera plopped down on the chair next to him and scrubbed at her hair to get the last of the water out.
“You’ve got a nice place here, boss,” he commented to her. “Can see why you were rushing us to get back here.”
“Mostly that, yeah,” she responded under the towel. “The other half of it is if I don’t come back home every so often, Brynjolf sends every padfoot in the country looking for me begging me to come back. Like a mother hen that one but the sentiment is nice.”
That was another part of his boss he wasn’t expecting. Being Dragonborn was shocking enough, but also being head of a guild of thieves threw a wrench in his image of her. Teldryn didn’t have the highest opinions on thieves and cheats; compared to his life as a mercenary and living a particularly bloody lifestyle it seemed tame and cowardly to sneak away and steal your living.
He still didn’t understand it completely, but what he did understand was that these were her people and they had her back. Just the same that Yera made the effort to come back to homebase and take care of home before being whisked away onto another adventure. They seemed like… ‘nice’ enough people. Teldyrn walked away with all his armor and gold intact after the first meet-and-greet.
These were thoughts for another time. What was more important was he was going to bunk up with his boss in her fancy lakeside house for free. And his own furnished room with a feather mattress! Luxury of the highest order in his opinion.
“What are the next plans, if any?” he asked her.
“I’ve got Guild business to work on, but otherwise I feel like we deserve a break after all that nonsense on Solstheim,” Yera answered. “You’re welcome to anything in the house, within reason, and to any plans you’d like to make. I think you especially deserve it after what I dragged you through.”
“If you ever need help saving another island from an ancient dragon priest bent on taking over Nirn and steal your own soul for power, I need a bigger pay bonus to do it again.”
Yera scoffed at him and threw the towel resting on her head in his general direction. He swatted it out of the air with a laugh that caught halfway in his throat when he looked at her.
Caught in the tangled locks of her hair was the sun. Light caught in her white hair, reflecting it like spun gold.
Teldryn had seen Yera in many different forms; ranging from a wandering stranger into the Retching Netch, to a towering warrior over a freshly burning dragon, to a frightening stillness while recovering in a tent after her final fight.
Never had he seen her quite as relaxed and calm as she was now.
It was a phenomenal sight.
One he had to shake himself out of neigh immediately after that thought.
They fell into a silent lull after, appreciating the ambient sound of the lake and nature around them. The songbirds singing their evening calls, beckoning flockmates to their roosts to sleep the evening away. An occasional fish leaping out of the water, splashing water into liquid gold in the fading sun’s light.
Teldryn dreamed of retiring to a place like this. Away from the ash and trauma of his homeland to somewhere free of such scars. Somewhere fresh and alive at every turn. The idea of one day finally hanging up his sword and never needing to pull it down again was a goal somewhere in the far, far, far future.
And as he dreamed of how much gold he needed to live that dream, his eyes kept drifting toward his companion. In the final rays of light, the sky was cast in a myriad of pinks and oranges and reds. The birch trees with their orange leaves made for a brilliant background as he gazed once more at the golden visage of his friend, catching the sun with her very being.
For a single moment, he wanted to reach out and run his fingers through her hair. To touch that glimmering gold just once.
Then the moment was lost, the sound of a door opening and closing in the house.
“That must be Lydia back from the market,” Yera said, standing up from the chair. “I’ll head inside and get started on dinner. You’re welcome to stay out here as long as you want.”
“I’ll… stay out here a bit longer,” Teldryn answered back. “I won’t be long.”
With a nod, Yera turned and re-entered her home, calling out to Lydia before the door shut behind her.
Alone on the porch once more, Teldryn finally took the moment to hunch over and cradle his face in his hands.
‘You’re a professional,’ he thought to himself. ‘You can’t be thinking about your boss like this.’
But he couldn’t get the image out of his head of a relaxed Yera. Sitting quietly on a porch in her home, the wind fluttering her hair, and gold in her eyes.