Title: Fools' Ebony, Part the Oneth
Author: Frincheps
IsNaughty: True
Price: 317
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Content:


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[/center]Fools' Ebony,

[/center]Part the

[/center]Oneth



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[/center] Dramatis Personae

 Prologue The Adventurer, A Dark Elf Rascal Komon, A Priest
of Akatosh Lheban, Another Priest of Akatosh Epilogue Stete, A
Priest of Julianos Raic, Another Priest of Julianos Shub, A
Mage Shub, A Different Mage of the Same Name Nephron, A
Somewhat Sleazy Merchant 5 Armorers Ortho Crunn, Husband of
Millie A Lusty Contessa Millie, Innkeep and Philosopher
Gurnsey, Bovine Wench Assorted Wenches and Cads of the
Taverns Soldiers Dwarves Giants



 Daggerfall and Environs in the Doldrums of the 3rd Era

 Part The Oneth - Concerning Priests and Nackles       As
related at length by two Priests of       Akatosh to the
Adventurer, who at the        time was not having an
adventure, and       had nothing better to do. In which some     
 (probably unwanted) light is shed upon       the Priesthood
and its members, and upon       an old peasant myth of some
significance,       especially common in High Rock. And in      
which the mysterious Fools' Ebony       appears, that strange
material that       could bring either drastic cultural
change       for the many, or just great profit for a       few,
or death for a bunch, or have no       result whatsoever.

 Early in the month of Frostfall. The Dead Daedra Inn. Enter
Prologue

      Prologue: Our poor players will try and remember their
lines and not trip over our meager set. I beg you, the
audience, not to heckle, badger, or throw rotten
foodstuffs. You will only make this short play last longer.
The Guild of Playwrites, Actors, and Dramatists wish any of
you who are sensitive or allergic to rambling dialogue,
wooden acting, incomprehensible exposition, or
unsatisfying endings that leave one confused and unhappy to
exit the theatre immediately. Your gold will, alas, not be
refunded. As a saving grace, this series of vignettes
contains gratuitous references to all pleasures of the
flesh. You may enjoy it. Ah, here comes our hero, the roguish
Dark Elf called the Adventurer. It is time for Prologue to
trip merrily away.


     Exit Prologue Enter the Adventurer

       Adventurer:  What an odd conversation I just heard
between those two mages. It is best not to speak of such
matters next to privy hedges.

 Enter 2 Priests of Akatosh (Lheban, Komon)

       Lheban: Mind if we join you, fellow? ... Good, need some
company ourselves. I am named Lheban, my fellow priest
here is Komon. We both serve Akatosh, all in our own ways,
of course ...

       Adventurer: Make yourselves at home, it's not my bench.
But I thought that priests ... didn't go to ... er ...
places like this, Inns. I mean ... unless on duty?

       Lheban: Oh, we're not on duty. Got to regenerate our
internal vital energies, so we can go on blessing and curing
...

       Komon: We often come here, hike up our robes, kick up our
heels, as it were. Fill up with some bottled energy ...

 (Komon snickers)

       Lheban: Looking for those in need of comfort and
blessing, of course ...

       Komon: Oh, yes, Oh yes ... like that young girl outside the
other evening ...

 (Lheban kicks Komon)

       Komon: ... and anyway our High Priest told us to get
lost...

       Lheban: He means told us to get some air. We've been
having visions, you see ...

       Komon: Yes, sort of weird, really ... and we hadn't even
been taking any of that ...

 (Lheban kicks Komon)

       Lheban: Both of us been having the same visions -- real
odd.

       Adventurer: Do tell, I'm not going anywhere in a hurry.

       Lheban: Well, we've both been hearing sort of ... words
... for a start. Like 'Sir Nich' or 'Sain Nack' ...

       Adventurer: You said 'Nick' or 'Nack'? Just a minute ...
let me have a swig from your bottle, Brother ... Ah! That's
better - high-class stuff you fellows drink! Yes, I recall -
some story or old legend about an elf, name of Nuckle, I
think -- from Morrowind?

       Lheban: You know, maybe you're on to something there --
there is a old legend around these parts, comes from deep in
High Rock I think ... hmmmm ... Nackles, that's it!

       Adventurer: Nackles, eh! Seems that several Dark Elves
use that name ... particularly the ... more peculiar
ones...

       Komon: Yes, I guess that the bad ones are into all that
weapons magicka stuff ... very nasty fellows ...

       Lheban:     (to Komon) Komon! This fellow's got pointy
ears and red eyes ...

       Komon: Pardon me, friend ... it's sort of dark, and I
didn't ... uh ...          Adventurer: Oh, that's fine. These are
strange times. You know, live and let live -- or die -- as the
case may be.  Now ... suppose you tell me about this Nackles
myth? Here, let me help you with that bottle ... Ah! Thanks.     
    Lheban: Er ... sure, if you want to put it that way ...
Here, have another swig! Sure, we've got the time, and I
recall it clearly now.                Komon: Yes, we've a couple
hours 'til that little blonde shows up at her lamp ...

 (Lheban kicks Komon)

      Lheban:      (to Komon) Quiet! Remember, we had to tell the
High Priest her address, so she won't be around for a while!    
 (to all) Very well, here's the story, best as I can recall
it. This is a tale the peasants up in High Rock tell their kids
to scare them into being good for a while, I guess. They tell
it, let me see ... either on Tales and Tallows, or is it
Witches' Festival? -- just before the kids are sent out to the
barn or pigsty to sleep. 

       Komon: Nasty cruel peasants!  But then, I'd send them
all out to the midden ...

       Lheban: Really, Komon! Remember, those poor souls need
our compassion and blessing, we are their salvation!

       Komon: Now who's in Old High Mucky-Mucks' study?

       Lheban: Er ... anyway. It goes a bit like this.  If the kids
have been real good during the  year -- filched enough in the
market, mucked out the stables every day, not gone playing
with goblins, left the sheep alone, and so on. If they have
been real good, they've nothing to worry about. But if they
haven't been real good then there is this nasty, horrid Dark
Elf spirit called Nackles. Doesn't look like your typical
Dark Elf -- thinner, taller. Pasty white face, long as your
arm. Walks like his knees and elbows bend the wrong way.
Snickers like when you drag your fingernails across slate.
Wears a tight black suit (not Khajiit, more like a formal
suit with buttons) but too tight and small. He visits the bad
girls and --

       Komon: Why are you talking about Old High Mucky again,
Lheban?

 (Komon hiccoughs) (Lheban kicks Komon)

       Lheban: You really must excuse Komon here: overwork, you
know. Too many curings and conversions ... Anyway, Old
Nasty Nackles is supposed to wander under our Tamriel, in
dirty deep dark dwarven tunnels. Everywhere under the
lands, if you can believe that! Rides in a rusty squeaky old
mine cart, on old mine tracks ...

       Adventurer: I saw some of those in Fang Lair once, down
in Hammerfell a long long while ago ...

       Komon:       (to Lheban) What the Sheogorath was he doing in
Fang Lair!?             Lheban:       (to Komon) Hush! If he's who I
think he is, you do not want to know!       (to all) Um, yes.
Well, Nackles gets pulled all around these deep tunnels by
goblins -- not your usual dirty yellow ones, but nasty
black things. Anyway, they pull Nackles round and through
these dark tunnels, and then, late at night, he stops below
each and every bad child's hovel or house or castle -- makes
no difference. Then he slides up the drainage pipes ...

       Komon: Creeps up cracks ... crawls through holes ...

       Lheban: Oozes up oubliettes ...

       Komon: Climbs giggling up garderobes ...

       Lheban: Right into the kid's place! Then, if the kid's only
been sort of bad, Nackles will just mess things up in
general, so the kid gets blamed. Make greasy dirty marks
everywhere (more than usual, anyway), break some things,
steal some things, so on and so forth. Maybe take the sugar
sweets, leave some lumps of fools' ebony instead ...

       Adventurer: Fools' Ebony - what's that?  Heard mention of
that, oh, a few hours ago ... Some Mages ...

       Lheban: You did now? Interesting ... Very ... Well,
lets talk of that in a bit ... just let me finish this Nackles
thing. Where was I -- Oh yes ... Now, if the little brat has
been real bad --  then all the little brat's toys get taken.
The copper dagger, the wooden sword, the little whip, and
so on. All the usual favorite kids things.

       Komon: Whips? I like those.

 (Komon hiccoughs) (Lheban kicks Komon)

       Lheban: Now if that little brat has been very, very bad
then Nackles grabs the brat. Pops him or her in his dirty
great sack. Hauls the sack off down the holes and cracks, down
to his rusty old mine cart!  And away they go!         Komon: Hope
he leaves some bad little girls behind.

 (Lheban kicks Komon)

       Lheban: Er ... so we can save them, of course, friend ...
Well. Sometimes, so I've heard tell, the brat never comes
back. No great loss, I guess, peasants just breed another.

       Komon: Know 'bout that, I do, I do ...

 (Lheban pinches Komon's nose)

       Lheban: But, as the story goes round here anyway, often
the brat is just put to work, digging out lumps of Fools'
Ebony, shoveling dirt, bagging it. Extending the tunnels of
the Nackles. After a while, Brat is pushed back up to where it
came from. Seems that Brat might think it's spent a year down
there, but only a day has passed up top ... Brat comes back
real thin and dirty though, covered in black mess ... You
know, come to think of it -- on the day past Witches'
Festival, I've often seen some little brats, scrawny, real
dirty black mess on them, looking terrified, too. Parents
drag them into Temples to get blessed and cured, if they have
the gold. By the Beard of Sheogorath, the wailing and noise!
Enough to drive a priest to ... er ... well,  never mind ...
that's our problem ...

       Komon: Nah ... it's a problem with our suppliers, I tell
you ...

 (Lheben throws Komon through a screen)

       Lheban: Anyway, that's the short of it, this Nackles
legend up around here. I recall now, it's widespread all
over Tamriel ...  and knowing the place, probably more
than a grain of truth in the tale, much, much more ...        
Adventurer: So, I guess some of the ... er, darker Dark Elves
sort of identify with this Nackles. Take on the persona, so to
say ...

       Lheban: Yeah, that sort of sums it up, I guess ... though
we don't see those types hauling off brats in sacks, now do
we?

       Komon: Nah, that's wot we does, girly brats anyway,
isn't it not?

 (Komon hiccoughs) (Lheben breaks a bottle over Komon's head)
(Komon falls unconscious)

       Adventurer: Thats a very interesting tale, gentlemen.
Say, let me repay you with another bottle -- what's that
you're drinking? Ah, thought so - Innkeep!  More holy wine for
these holy men!

       Lheban: A blessing on you for that kind gesture, friend.   
       Adventurer: I thank you, I sure could use one or three ...
Anyway, this 'Fools' Ebony', I've heard mutters and murmurs
about that of late -- mostly eavesdropping ... pardon me
... listening ... to Mages and the like. What's with this
stuff?  Here, have another swig ... good!

       Lheban: Well, we're not supposed to tell outsiders ...
but then, you seem to know something already. And if you have
been hearing Mage gossip ... Why, maybe we can do some
business. Profit all round! Well ... for the Akatosh
Chantry, of course, and your fee, good Sir.

       Adventurer: More and more interesting -- tell on, I pray
you.

 (Komon staggers to feet) (Komon hiccoughs)

       Komon: Time for me to go convert that little lamppost
girl ... no, no, no - not last nights one, but the blonde
...

 (Exit Komon) (Female squeals from offstage)

       Lheban: Friend, you'll have to excuse Komon. He's a bit
... you know strange ... Got these ...

       Adventurer: Oh, that's all right, we've all got our own
...

 (Exeunt Lheben and the Adventurer) (Enter Epilogue)

       Epilogue: Our apologies for the quality of this drama so
far. If those of you still present will wait for a few
minutes while our bard plays "Silence Implies Consent," we
will change the set for the next act, Part the Twoth. Please
don't forget to tip your wench. Do you believe there's such a
thing as Fools' Ebony? Maybe we'll find out in Part the
Twoth. Or maybe not.

 (Flourish) (Exit Epilogue)

 End of Part the Oneth, Being Mostly Concerned with The
Legend of Nackles. 
