To Kill a Nightingale

The Only Path

"Bashnag."

Bashnag braced himself. He had already grown used to the silence, which had blessedly reigned between him and the Nightingale ever since their encounter with Jagar until now, having just passed the farm located by the outer bailey of Solitude. The music of the songbirds and the gentle melody of the spring breeze in the young foliage had made him feel almost good, comforting as nature was in its predicable simplicity. Now he felt his gut tightening again.

"Yes, sir?"

"Have I, perchance, ever expounded to you the account of how the Dunmer managed to finally chase out the Argonian invaders from Morrowind?"

No, and can we please keep it that way. "No, sir."

"Excellent! Now, that gives us something to talk about it, then, lest the silence of our journey grow tiresome."

Wouldn't want that now would we. Bashnag grunted.

"And, I will add, there is a pertinent lesson within the account as well; one elucidating rather well, I believe, the reasons for my mistrust of young master Jagar."

Just get on with it, please!

"It was through learning from their enemy, first and foremost, that the Dunmer finally gained the upper hand." As always, the man launched directly into lecture mode. People of books, Bashnag had found, were often like that. "Well, at first, of course, they needed to unite the great houses, to pool their resources; and in order to do that, hatchets needed burying. But necessity and desperation, as so often, proved the greatest teachers. Though obviously that wasn't enough. They also needed to modify their way of warfare. Wisely, they decided to take a page from the Argonians' book. The military force they put together, detached from any one house, was one relying heavily on guerilla warfare, a decidedly Argonian approach. Through many clever tactics, one of the cleverest ones being the magical poisoning the waters of the southern region—an essential element for their enemy—they slowly but surely ate away the Argonian resolve. As simple as that may sound, over time, that was all it took to regain their lands."

Bashnag grunted. A short but uninspiring stor—

"That's not the lesson, however."

Dang. "No sir?"

"Not by a long shot. See, as smart as the Dunmer had been thus far, here is where they stopped being so. That military force that they used to win their freedom again? Disbanded, effective immediately. And just like that, it was as if the truce and alliance that had bound the houses together had never been, and they were right back to their old rivalry—even worse than before! And it's no surprise that everyone did their best to forget all about the one thing that they had shared—the guerilla army.

"And so what did that leave them with? Adrift, traumatized soldiers, suddenly abandoned and left to their own devices, denied any of the glory which they had thought was waiting for them. People who for a long time had known nothing but killing, now on their own, betrayed, embittered. They soon became a social detriment all across the land. Drug and alcohol abuse, rampant delinquency, demented cults, explosive growth in organized crime—you name it. And just recently, I have heard, a new radical cult promising its adherents power beyond measure, glorifying death and violence, has been rapidly growing— built in some sense on the smoldering ruins of that abandoned army, but now drawing in even those who had little to nothing to do with the war. All this because the Dunmer wanted to sweep some inconvenient problems under the rug. Well, sometimes, under the rug, the problems just grow." He chuckled.

Bashnag dared hope the man was done.

"And so what is the lesson? Perhaps that in addition to turning your back on your enemy, you should doubly not turn it on your allies? Well, sure, ideally. But more importantly: if you are going to turn you back on them, make sure that they are not able to get you back for that later on."