black_sluggard | (Fic) Vasa Jijri ("Under the Skin")

Title: Vasa Jijri ("Under the Skin")
Fandoms: Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Fantasy, Family, Angst
Warnings: Racism, threats of racially motivated violence, mildly violent bullying, religious drug use, non-consensual drug-use, under-aged drug use, accidental poisoning, harm to children.
Details: Gen, pre-canon, prequel, fantasy, magic, demons, Faustian deals, tragic love, family, cultural differences, distant fathers, questionable parenting decisions, anthropomorphic animals, fantasy racism, angst, lies and deception, stealth crossover, unbetad.
Characters/Pairings: OCs, Frida, Fruki, Skald the Elder, Dro'marash, Bulfrek, mentions of others.
Wordcount: 5,060
Summary: The father he had never met had left him with a Breton name. Growing up in Dawnstar, his mother's people had bestowed the ignoble kenning of "Honeymilk". His mother's friends among the Khajiit caravans outside the city called him ja'ahn kriniit, which in Ta'agra meant "laughing boy". But the caravan leader, Ri'yaan, had always called him ahzi' ja'ahn—"my boy"—and when he was young, it was this name he had loved best.
(The story of a half-Nord boy growing up in Dawnstar, and his friendship with the Khajiit of the caravans.)

Chapter One - Chapter Two - Chapter Three - Chapter Four

"Divines, child, what have you been up to since you left?" Frida managed after a blank beat of surprise when she opened her door to him. "You're supposed to be at home with your mother."

Kevin would have answered her more promptly, but his teeth had started chattering, and so with an exasperated sound she quickly ushered him inside. She left him standing in front of the fire in the shop and went upstairs to fetch a blanket. She draped it around his shoulders and he sat down on the floor before the fire, huddled beneath it. Frida waited as he warmed enough for his shaking limbs to settle before asking him once again.

"What's happened, boy?" she asked him. "What brings you back here tonight?"

And Kevin didn't know at first what to say—how to address any of the questions buzzing frantically in his mind. She must have read his confusion, even without knowing its cause, for still she waited, patiently.

"I– I wanted to ask about Fruki," Kevin finally said.

For it was as good a place as any for him to start.

"What happened to her?" he asked. "Was...was there really moon sugar in the sweets I gave her?"

"There was, I'm afraid," Frida said, nodding solemnly.

"How did you know?" Kevin asked her. "And why did it make her sick?"

Frida seemed to weigh his question carefully, moving to bring her stool near the fire so that she could sit beside him.

"I could tell by the effects it had on her...and you," Frida said, slowly. "There are many substances which have effects on the body, and my craft as an alchemist is based in knowing them. Between her symptoms, and yours, and the circumstances, there were few other things it was likely to be."

Kevin didn't know what symptoms he might have shown that she could have noticed. He tried not to think about it.

"Is she really going to be alright?" Kevin asked instead.

"I'm certain she will," Frida reassured him. "In time she will be as well as ever, have no fear of that."

"But my mother says there's a sickness..." Kevin said. "One that doesn't go away."

Frida seemed confused for a moment, though understanding soon came to her and she shook her head.

"Addiction, you mean," she said. "It can happen, but in a single incident such as this it is unlikely. You needn't worry...not for Fruki's sake, at least."

There was half a question in her words, and Kevin pulled the blanket tighter around him. Yet it seemed she may have gleaned some piece of an answer, for Frida watched him a moment in silence, her expression thoughtful as she seemed to dissect his.

"Moon sugar is a rather potent drug," Frida said finally, breaking her silence, "though it pales beside the scourge which is made from it. Skooma is a deadly danger to all the races, poisoning both mind and body of any who touch it, but moon sugar carries barely half the risk..."

"Though," said Frida, "I've also been told that it doesn't effect the Khajiit quite the way it effects elves or Men."

And the words were said easily enough that they might have been simple trivia, but she watched his reaction sharply.

"That's why, isn't it?" Kevin asked her finally, his voice small. "That's why Fruki got sick and I never did. Because I'm—"

But he could not say it, for he could not understand how it was possible. Yet Frida confirmed it, first with a nod and then her words.

"Because you are Ri'yaan's son," she said.

"I– I don't understand..." Kevin managed weakly.

Because none of it made any sense. He was human—

Wasn't he?

The confusion and hurt of his mother's and Ri'yaan's betrayal—of his parents' betrayal—was finally catching up to him. Frightened and uncertain, he found himself fighting tears. And Frida wasn't the most motherly of women despite having been a mother years ago, but still her arm found its way around him, drawing him close.

"Come, child," she said softly. "You enjoy stories, yes? Hush a moment, for I have one to tell you."

Looking up into the old healer's face, Kevin saw her offer a faint but reassuring smile.

"A long time ago," Frida began, "it must have been, I think, fifteen years ago at least—a caravan of Khajiit came to our town. Back then, before the war, that wasn't as a rare thing as it is these days, but though the Khajiit hadn't yet been barred from the cities, neither were they quite welcomed or trusted. So when they arrived with one of their number badly in need of healing, there were many in Dawnstar who wanted them to continue on their way. "

Frida smiled a thin smile at the memory.

"It was the beginning of winter, you see—for in the days before the safety of the cities was shut to them the Khajiit came and went during all times of the year—and the townsfolk worried that if the caravan lingered they might be trapped in Dawnstar by the coming snows. Indeed, I was urged by many to sell them the potions they would need and hurry them on their way. But the wound was on the verge of spoiling, and I knew that without proper care the young Khajiit would lose his leg, if not his life..."

"And though I was quite leery of the cat-folk in those days," Frida said, "unnecessary suffering was something I never could abide. So, leaving the well-being of the townsfolk in the hands of my husband, I agreed to accompany the caravan to Solitude, where they hoped to find a ship that might carry them home. But though I was haler and stronger in those days, I still was no young woman, and so, Divines bless her, my neighbors' young daughter volunteered to go with me—"

When Frida paused then, looking at him, it was to smile a genuine smile.

"That was your mother, of course," she said. "Sigun has always honored all of the Divines—including Talos, as a good Nord should—but never was there a better example of Mara's love and her compassion than your mother. I believe she was only sixteen at the time. But while our travels were difficult, as travels always are in winter, though she had yet to earn her kenning she was steadfast even then. And what a boon she was...for the injured one, J'yaan, wasn't much older than she. Indeed, her kindness might have done as much for him as my care ever did."

And Kevin drew himself up slightly, paying close attention, for he knew that J'yaan would have been Ri'yaan's name as a young Khajiit, before he had earned his current standing.

"After the Khajiit found their passage back to Pelletine," Frida continued, "Sigun and I spent the winter in Solitude, then stayed in Morthal for the start of spring until the ice could melt and the roads back home become safe again. And Sigun loved the capital—the warmth and the color and the activity of its people—but though it was a pleasant adventure she was glad to come home to her family. And that was the end of it, as far as we all knew, and for most the incident was soon forgotten."

Frida paused for a moment, and when she spoke again her voice had shifted slightly. Where before her words had been distant, almost soft with remembering, they became stronger, more direct, and she turned to look at him once more.

"Now this part of the story I'm sure you know well," she said, "for it is your story. Indeed, there likely isn't a nosy soul living in Dawnstar that doesn't know it. Three years after that winter ended, a young trader came by ship from the southern parts of the Empire—a Breton by blood, whose name was Ian Peltienne."

Kevin recognized the name, of course—it belong to the man who, for all his life, he had believed to be his father.

"Ian stayed here for several months arranging contracts with the owner of the quicksilver mine," Frida told him, "but once his dealings were finished he stayed, for he had become so enchanted with Sigun that he simply could not leave. And Ian...was a very strange young man, but he was a kind one, clever and handsome, and soon your mother felt the very same way about him."

"They were married at the end of that year," Frida said, "and for the next two years they lived together as happily as any man and woman ever did... But the part which most do not know begins—for myself and for Sigun, at least—the night that you were born."

The lines on her brow knotted briefly, as if even now the memory of that night were still too much for her to believe.

"Your mother's pregnancy was a difficult one, especially in the beginning," Frida told him, "and there was fear that you would not survive. And expecting fathers always worry, so no one questioned Ian's nervousness as the time for your arrival grew near..."

Frida paused then, frowning for a moment as she looked at him, seeming to weigh her words very carefully.

"I have delivered many children to the mothers of Dawnstar," Frida said at last, "and it's treated me to more unexpected surprises than you might imagine. But none will ever equal the shock I felt upon delivering a human woman of a furred and squalling cub. Nor, I imagine, could anything match Sigun's alarm or her horror. For neither of us could understand how what we were seeing was possible, and above all else your mother feared what Ian might think of her..."

Seeing Kevin's distress, Frida gave his shoulders a gentle squeeze.

"But your father, Kevin..." Frida said, very softly. "Your father loved you from the moment he laid eyes on you, because to him you were perfect. He loved you so very much, and he was happy...even though he knew that his perfect son had cost him the woman he loved."

"What your father confessed to us that night," continued Frida, "was that he was J'yaan—that Ian Peltienne and the young Khajiit your mother had befriended were one and the same. And he told us how, years ago, he had been so moved by your mother's kind heart that, in spite of her strangeness, he had fallen deeply in love with her. Yet even though he knew that his courtship would never be welcomed, nor his love ever returned as he wanted it, even once he had returned home to Torval it would not let him be. And it had burned within him with a strength that had driven him toward madness and despair..."

"But," Frida said slowly, "it was not Sheogorath who was drawn by the call of his hopeless desires, but another Daedric Prince entirely."

Then Frida shook him slightly to rouse his attention.

"In the stories he's told you," Frida asked him, "has Ri'yaan ever said anything about Clavicus Vile?"

Still absorbed in the enormity of all she had told him, at first Kevin could not speak.

"He...he grants wishes," Kevin finally said, his thoughts slow coming together. "Only...they're cruel tricks to snare the foolish, and always turn against them in the end."

Frida gave an unhappy, though satisfied nod.

"And that is the truth," she said, "for your father wanted the chance to make your mother his own so badly that he sought out the Prince of Trickery, and he struck a dangerous bargain. He was charged with completing some task in our mortal world on the Daedra's behalf—and I have never asked what that was, for it is not my place to ask—and in return your father was granted the Ornament of Clavicus Vile."

And Kevin did not draw it out or look at it, for he could not bring himself to touch it, but he knew for certain that she spoke of the very same amulet which hung around his neck.

"The Ornament," Frida told him, "grants its wearer the command of a powerful alteration which can fool all of the senses, but which is only skin-deep. And J'yaan finally had his chance to win your mother's heart, for with its power he was able to pose as a Man. But in spite of the transformation granted by the Ornament, he knew he would never convincingly pass as a Nord in Skyrim, and so he chose to present himself as a Breton instead."

"J'yaan sold every possession he had in Torval," Frida said solemnly, "collected upon every favor he was owed, and finally returned to Dawnstar as Ian Peltienne. And for the two years he and Sigun lived as man and wife he believed he had escaped the fate of so many of Vile's followers, and that his story might end happily. But it is no secret that Clavicus Vile delights in making his followers suffer for the gifts he grants them, and that he enjoys drawing out the cruel consequences of his bargains to last for as long as possible. And I have no doubt that prideful self-deception such as your father knew only makes it that much sweeter for the Daedra once the catch is finally revealed..."

"And it sounds cruel to say that you were that catch, Kevin," Frida told him gently, "but it would seem to be the case. Though the disguise granted by the Ornament is nearly foolproof, it could never truly change what your father was. And though elves can bear or father children to Men, and either one can do so with Orc-kind, however rare, a half-breed of Khajiit stock is something which, to my knowledge, the world has never seen."

"Your father had believed it impossible," she said gravely, "and that part of the price he had paid for his love was that he and Sigun would never have children of their own. That failing was one of the few things about which he had been honest, and so when she conceived it had seemed like a miracle. But your father always suspected that your birth was a result of Vile's trickery, for it was your arrival that ultimately exposed his deceptions, and which drove him to make the hardest choice he had ever had to make..."

"I think you understand already—and more than most—how ignorant and cruel people can be," Frida said sadly. "Your father knew this as well. And he understood that to continue to hide what he was from the townsfolk would be to ruin your mother's reputation—she would have been labeled an adulteress, and worse. Yet even revealing the truth to the people of Dawnstar would mean dooming both her and you to even greater ridicule than you now suffer. And either way, Sigun would likely have been forced to flee her home, leaving her parents, who were still living then, and everything else she knew behind. He knew there was only one chance for you—for any of you—to live in peace. And that was for him to give up the Ornament to you, so that your mother could raise you here...as a human boy."

"And so it was that on the very night his son was born, Ian Peltienne left Dawnstar forever, and when the morning came and Sigun showed you off to her parents you were her perfect son at last. And with the next summer it was J'yaan who returned to us, delivering tidings..."

"And so it has been ever since," Frida finished, sadly.

Kevin had long ago lost his silent battle, so that the tears which had lurked so long unshed finally escaped his eyes. Released from the spell of Frida's account, he began to cry in earnest. For a while she simply let him, and in her silence lent the simple kind of strength he needed. And when finally he began to regain his ragged breath Frida took the corner of the blanket and dried the tears from his cheeks.

"Your family's story is a sad one, Kevin," Frida told him, "full of betrayal and sorrow, and the lies that have resulted have caused all of you a great deal of pain. But now that you know the truth, the one thing that you must remember above all else is how much both of your parents love you. For they always have, and they always will."

And Kevin didn't know if it had been during Frida's tale or while he was crying that he had missed the sound of the door—but he must have, for when a soft sound caught his attention behind him he turned and saw his mother there. There were tears in her own eyes as well, and when they met his she softly spoke his name.

"Kevin...I'm so sorry."

In spite of all the shocks the day had brought him and in spite of his earlier hurt, at that moment Kevin needed her arms around him more than he had needed anything in his life. Leaving the blanket behind on the floor by the hearth he went to her, burying his face against her, and let out a sob as she held him tight. Though his mother and Frida likely exchanged a glance out of his sight, neither of them spoke, nor he. Finally his mother lifted him up, and with a wordless murmur of apology kissed his cheek.

Kevin's mother took him home, and things were silent between them as he changed out of his muddied clothes while she prepared a quick supper. She had brought his things back with her from the caravan—his clothes and bedroll, his books and his daggers, though naturally nothing else. One of those books still held his father's letters pressed inside. His throat stung as he thought about it—the lie of it—for his whole life Kevin had believed in and loved the man who had sent him those letters. A man, he now knew, that did not exist. Ri'yaan must have written them himself, Kevin now realized. He must have been doing so from the very beginning—

Which, in spite of all the lies, meant that they were the truth, in a way.

But Kevin was not ready to think about that just now. He shut the letters and the gifts away in the chest beside his bed, and did his best to forget they were there. And when his mother called him to the table he went quietly. He did not feel like eating, but he knew it would only make his mother worry if he didn't, for under normal circumstances Kevin was almost always hungry...

Of course, once he sat down his stomach rumbled eagerly as if to remind him of that very fact.

Kevin did not speak until after, when his mother was clearing the table. She stilled at the sound of his voice, though only briefly. Kevin thought she had been waiting, but from her faint surprise he didn't think the question he asked was among those she had been expecting. He didn't ask her whether it was all true, for he believed Frida and though her tale sounded impossible it explained far too much for it to simply be another lie. Nor did he ask her why—had he not already, the Jarl's words today had been more than enough for him understand why—or why they had not told him sooner. What he asked was far more personal, and—he thought—impossibly more urgent.

"Do...do you still love him?" Kevin asked her, very quietly.

And Kevin deeply, painfully needed to know—because if he could understand that, if she could explain it, then perhaps he would know how he was supposed to feel. Because he was angry at them for their lies, and it hurt more than anything he had ever felt, but there were no two people in his life more important to him than his mother and Ri'yaan. He was angry, but they were all he had, and he loved them, and Kevin didn't know what he should do.

Sigun set the bowls down and drew her chair beside him at the table. She placed her hand over his where he was picking anxiously at a splinter in the table and offered him a sad smile.

"I do," his mother answered softly. "Though there were many times that I wished I didn't—times when I tried not to. And there were even times when I hated him. But while he was away from us, often all I could think about was how much I wished he was still by my side. The Ornament only changes the surface of things, Kevin, and though he lied to me about what he was, and who he had been, all the reasons I had for falling in love with him were still true. And they always will be true, every one of them that mattered, so that I love him still. And I always have, even when I hated him..."

"How did you forgive him?" Kevin asked her. "And why? When you found out he lied...how did you forgive him for that?"

Sigun looked him over slowly, and gently squeezed his hand.

"It took a very long time," his mother admitted, "and sometimes it's still hard. I was so angry with him, and anger is a very difficult thing to forget—and, honestly, I don't feel I should. But I've also had time to weigh the lies he told me against the things that were true, and the mistakes he made against the things he did right. Because he does try to do what's right, Kevin, but sometimes the differences between us make it difficult for it turn out that way."

His mother took a slow breath, her smile turning somewhat brittle though still true.

"You know that Khajiit do not view secrets the way Men do," Sigun said. "So you might understand that your father never knew until his own were revealed how deeply his betrayal would hurt me. It was a harsh lesson for both of us. But though he wronged me, Kevin—and he broke my heart, there is no mistaking that—I know he has suffered more deeply as a result of his lies than I ever have. Because my hurts have had the chance to heal, and as old hurts do sometimes they pain me still, but in all the years that he and I have lived apart I've had you to soothe the ache."

And Kevin had to look away, for he had thought himself long done with crying, but at her words he felt his throat begin to tighten.

"I never tried to punish Ri'yaan for what he did to me," his mother said, "but there really is no punishment I can imagine crueler than what he has endured. Even in my anger I never went so far as to ask him not to return, but there were times I almost wished he would stay away—for his own sake. Leaving us behind broke his heart as well, and though he lives for the joy of seeing us again, each time he is forced to leave it breaks anew. And even when he is with us, there is pain—for every season he has but a short time to have us close, and to know the young man you are becoming. And he could never tell you as your father how much he loved you, and how proud he was of you, and he knew no number of letters would ever be the same to you as hearing those things said."

His mother fell silent a moment, and when he looked up, Kevin saw her staring at the fire.

"You never should have had to learn the way you did," his mother told him with a sigh, "and for that I am to blame. If I had listened to Ri'yaan, we would have told you the truth years ago. He believed you were old enough to understand—old enough to keep a secret. I never did..."

She shook her head, her expression turning a bit wry. A bit pained.

"I don't think I wanted to," Sigun admitted wearily. "Frida tells me all mothers feel pangs of sadness watching their children grow up, but those I feel bite sharper than most. Khajiit live lives comparable to the lives of Men, but their childhoods are much shorter. Because of who your father is—because of what he is—I've had to watch you grow up faster than most human mothers would. It hurts knowing that—sometimes it hurts too much to let myself see it—and so I didn't want to believe that you were ready to know the truth. I didn't want to admit I was that much closer to seeing you leave me."

It was alarming for him to hear her words confirm—subtly, but certainly—just how fundamentally different he was from those around him. Though he supposed he had always sensed it in a vague, nameless sort of way. He was vulnerable to the cold in a way the other children were not. He tired more quickly, was hungry more often, and was nowhere near as strong. Though taller than his age would usually see, he was thin to the point of worry, and it beggared his mother's energy at times to keep him hale, and clothed, and fed. And though he had understood his mixed blood to be the reason, it was hard not to feel defective and wanting when the standards of Nords were all he had to measure himself against. At least as far as humans were concerned...

Yet now it appeared he never should have been measuring himself by human standards at all.

"You have every right to be angry, Kevin," his mother said, then. "It is your right to be angry at both of us for what we've kept from you. But to answer the question you asked..."

Sigun released a faint sigh.

"I forgave your father because I loved him," she said, "and when you love someone you often do forgive them, sometimes even when you probably shouldn't. And I forgave him because he loved you, and he always tried to do right by you in his way. And I forgave him because he loved me enough to honor my wishes whenever I made them clear... Or so I had always thought, until now."

She turned quiet a moment, no doubt thinking of the secrets she had uncovered this day.

"Only time will tell whether I find it in me to forgive him again," she said softly. And, turning to look Kevin in the eye she brushed his cheek with her hand. "But he was right about one thing... You are old enough, now. I should have trusted you with the truth."

She dropped her hand with a weary sigh.

"And as angry as I am at the way your father deceived you," she said, still gently though her voice turned rather sharp, "it is no one's place but yours to decide whether you forgive either one of us."

Sleep did not find him easily that night though he tried, wishing as he lay awake in his bed that his thoughts would settle and at last give him rest. His hurt and his anger still gnawed at him, yet in spite of his parents' lies he knew he could not hate them for it. In his heart he hoped to forgive them, and he offered a prayer to Mara, asking for the strength to find that forgiveness within himself.

And he offered a prayer to Stendarr as well, asking him for courage and resolve...

Because now that he knew the truth about the Ornament the chill weight of it felt more oppressive than it ever had. It was a heavy reminder—both of his father's lies, and of the cruelty and power of the being that had forged it—and it sat upon his chest like a stone. He hated it, and thinking about the pain and suffering it had caused his family made Kevin feel almost ill. He wanted nothing so much as to tear the amulet from his neck and throw it as far away from himself as he could...

And yet he did not dare.

His mother had told him long ago that without the amulet both of their lives would change, and now Kevin understood why. To reject the Ornament would be to reject the face and form he had known all his life, and the stable, comfortable life that went with it. For he was well aware that the disregard and petty cruelty he faced at times from the people of Dawnstar paled in comparison to the challenges the Khajiit faced in this land. The cat-folk of Elsweyr were almost universally unwelcome in Skyrim, and without the amulet so was he.

Kevin wondered whether that knowledge ought to frighten him more than it did.

In the dim light thrown by the dying fire, Kev shuffled free of his blankets to stare at his hands. Looking at them, Kevin tried to imagine what they should have looked like. He hadn't thought to ask his mother if she knew. Ri'yaan's hands Kevin knew well—the long, clever fingers which harbored sharp claws, and the soft, rosy flesh padding his palms and fingertips—and the other Khajiit he had known were much the same. Yet the hands of an Ohmes or an Ohmes-raht would probably not be very different from those of an elf or a Man—

Or had he even been meant to have hands at all?

Kevin loved his mother very much. He loved the life and the home he shared with her, and he wanted to see her happy. Yet that home and that life and their happiness together were all balanced precariously on a lie, and Kevin's role in that lie—that of Sigun's human son—was a part he had been filling with indifferent success all his life, without his ever knowing it. It was a role that had always fit him poorly—and one which, now that he knew the truth, pinched uncomfortably, like the old clothes he had so quickly outgrown. And now that he did know the truth, Kevin wasn't sure that he could stand trying to pass himself off as something and someone he was not...

And yet—having learned of his father's betrayal on the same night he learned who his real father was—Kevin knew so little about what embracing the truth would mean.

Though Kevin had always listened intently when Ri'yaan spoke of his faith, it had baffled him how one might pray to the Moons. They had always seemed too silent, too alien and inscrutable to understand or approach. Yet the questions in Kevin's mind demanded one last prayer before it would finally grant him sleep, and it was a prayer that only the Moons could answer...

For whose place was it but the Moons' themselves to teach a Khajiit his proper shape?

Chapter One - Chapter Two - Chapter Three - Chapter Four