XIII - Honningbrew Meadery

The Bee and the Barb was as rowdy as it had been when Merill had first come to Riften, and she noticed a number of Guild thieves in the bar dressed in street clothes. They didn’t seem to be talking to one another, though, and when Merill caught Niruin’s eye he shook his head just slightly, insinuating that they shouldn’t talk outside the Flagon. Nalimir had been relieved to learn of her mostly-safe flight from Goldenglow, though he had apologetically left for Falkreath earlier in the afternoon to do a job with Etienne, wishing her luck in her meeting.

Merill had heard much talk of Maven Black-Briar, the matriarch of the family that practically ran the Rift and the Black-Briar Meadery, but she wasn’t sure who to look for as she scanned the bar. She headed to the upper part of the inn, only occupied by a few tired-looking guards and a familiar black-haired woman that sat in a corner, reading a letter and running her finger around the rim of a tankard of mead beside her.

“Maven Black-Briar?” Merill asked, approaching the woman, and the woman looked up, her dark eyes scathing under heavy black brows. Merill recognized her in an instant – the severe-looking woman that had saved her from Armion’s scrutiny at the Thalmor party and harshly threatened her seconds later. The woman surveyed Merill for a moment, then kicked out the chair across from her and folded the letter with one finger.

“So it’s you,” she said, her voice dripping with malice. “You didn’t look so impressive at that party, and you still don’t.” Merill returned her sour gaze, ignoring the chair across from Maven.

“Why don’t we skip the conversation, then?” she growled, and Maven looked pleasantly surprised.

“My, you’re a firebrand, aren’t you? Suppose I could tell from the way you nearly took Armion’s balls off up at the Embassy,” she replied, setting the letter facedown on the table. “It’s about time Brynjolf sent me someone with business sense. I was beginning to think he was running some sort of beggar’s guild over there.” She nodded to the chair again, and Merill sat.

“You don’t have faith in the Guild?” she asked, helping herself to the wine beside the table.

“Faith?” Maven repeated with a humourless laugh. “I don’t have faith in anyone. All I care about is cause and effect. Did the job get done, and was it done correctly? There’s no grey area.”

“What do you want me to do, then?” Merill asked.

“Head to the Bannered Mare in Whiterun,” Maven told her. “Look for Mallus Macius. He’ll fill you in on all the details.”

“Details on what, exactly?” Merill pushed. “I like to know what I’m doing before I get sent on errands.” Maven’s eyes narrowed.

“I requested you because I’d heard you were talented. If I wanted someone to run errands for me I’d hire an errand-boy, wouldn’t I? There’s a meadery near Whiterun that’s being run by some insufferable fool that wants to put me out of business. I’d like that to stop. So you and Mallus are going to stop it. Now, as I told you, Mallus will give you the details. Be quick about it, he’s waiting on you.”

It was a dark, chill day in Whiterun when she arrived the following afternoon, fresh cold providing a whisper of the winter to come. Merill lingered a bit on the plains outside the city, gluing the bent fletching on a few of her arrows back into place, then returned to the Bannered Mare to meet Maven’s contact as a chilly evening settled on the plains. The barkeep directed her to the back room, which seemed to be mostly a storage area. A man with long, greasy black hair sat at the back table, breaking cheese with hands and muttering to himself.

“Mallus?” Merill asked, coming over to the table, and he looked up, giving her a view of his pallid skin and hollow eyes.

“What do you want?” he snapped.

“Maven said you’re expecting me,” Merill replied, taking the seat across from him. Mallus took a long drink from his cup.

“I’m going to keep this short ‘cause we’ve got a lot to do,” he said, wiping his chin with his sleeve. “Honningbrew’s owner, Sabjorn, is going to hold a tasting for Whiterun’s captain of the guard tomorrow. And we’re going to poison the mead.”

“Fine,” Merill said, leaning back in the chair. “You’ve got the poison?”

“No, no,” Mallus said, shaking his head doggedly. “That’s the beauty of the whole plan. We’re going to get Sabjorn to give it to us. The meadery has quite a pest problem and the whole city knows about it.” He leaned forward, his shadowed eyes glimmering. “Pest poison and mead don’t mix well, you know what I mean?” he asked, and Merill nodded.

“So what do you want me to do?”

“You’re going to happen by and lend poor old Sabjorn a helping hand,” Mallus said, almost giggling with delight at the plan. “He’s going to give you the poison to use on the pests, but you’re also going to dump it into the brewing vat.”

“Clever.”

“Maven and I spent weeks planning this. All we need is someone like you to get in there and get it done. Now get going before Sabjorn grows a brain and hires someone else to do his dirty work.”

“How do I get into the vats?” Merill asked him as he took another long drink.

“Both the buildings are connected by tunnels made by the pests infesting the meadery,” he told her. There’s an entrance in the basement storeroom of the warehouse that used to be boarded over. I’ve already removed the boards so the meadery would get infested. That’s where you should start. And make it look good.”

The following morning dawned grey and frigid, and Merill pulled her cloak tightly around her shoulders as she trotted down the road toward the meadery outside town. It was nearing the end of Frostfall, and the Skyrim’s air was growing sharp and biting. Merill had passed the Honningbrew Meadery a number of times, though she’d never actually been inside. The first thing she noticed upon stepping into the wide main room was the smell – a nauseating stench choked the air, forming a sickening combination of rotting flesh, acid, and the acrid odor of animal urine.

Merill’s crooked nose wrinkled as she stepped over the skeever corpse sprawled out by the door, its dead eyes cloudy. Like mine, she thought, amused in spite of herself.

“Gods!” she exclaimed, unable to help herself as she saw the other corpses accompanied by bloodstains on the carpets.

“What are you gawking at?” someone snapped, and a glossy bald head appeared from behind the bar. “Can’t you see I have problems here?”

“What the hell happened?” Merill asked, stepping up to the bar as she stared around. In addition to their indecency of rotting on the carpets, the skeevers had caused all manner of chaos before they’d died – bottles were shattered on the flagstones, casks of mean lay broken and leaking, and puddles of skeever piss darkened the carpets and stones alike.

“I’m supposed to be holding a tasting of the new Honningbrew Reserve for the Captain of the Guard,” the man, whom Merill assumed was Sabjorn, muttered frantically, wiping his glistening forehead with a dirty cloth. “If he sees the meadery in this state, I’ll be ruined.”

“If he smells it I’d say you’d be in prison for life,” Merill murmured, and Sabjorn gave her a sharp look.

“What are you doing here, anyway? The meadery’s not open this early. I only unlocked the door to –”

“I was just passing by,” Merill cut in. “I’d heard some rumors and thought I could help.”

“And I don’t suppose you’d do it out of the kindness of your heart, would you?” Sabjorn snarled, pulling out a large burlap sack from under the counter and pulling on a pair of thick hide gloves.

“No, not really.”

“I hope you’re not expecting to get paid until the job’s done,” he told her waspishly, coming out from behind the counter and slowly picking up a stiff skeever corpse, his face twisted in disgust.

“Just tell me what needs to be done,” Merill replied shortly, biting back a sharp comment as Sabjorn dropped the body into the sack and shuddered before moving onto the next one.

“My only demand is that these vermin are permanently eliminated before my reputation is completely destroyed,” he told her. He handed her the neck of the sack, which she took reluctantly as he ducked behind the counter again, fiddling with a lockbox. “I bought some – ah, here it is – some poison. I was going to have my lazy, good-for-nothing assistant Mallus handle it, but he seems to have vanished.” He held out the small bottle to her, and she traded him for the sack. “If you plant that in the vermin’s nest, it should stop them from ever coming back.”

“Fair enough,” Merill told him, tucking the bottle into her belt as Sabjorn passed her a key and pointed her toward the cellar door.

“Don’t come back until every one of those things are dead,” he commanded, and Merill gave him a mocking salute as he turned his back.

It was easy to find the once-boarded up hole Mallus had widened, and from there the caves beneath the meadery were filled with skeevers. Merill was able to take most of them down with a few well-placed shots, and when she reached the wide cavern that housed the skeevers’ nest, she tipped a few drops of the poison into the rancid straw.

From there, it was only a short climb up to the basement of the meadery’s brewhouse. The sickening stench of the dead skeevers was mercifully gone from the brewhouse – it was a simple, two-story square building, with the great vats on a large platform in the centre surrounded by a plank mezzanine. High windows let wintry light filter in, and the brewhouse’s air was thick with the scent of honey and carmelized sugar. Merill put away her bow and climbed up to where the great iron vats were shaking and humming with the effort of churning honey and wine into mead.

She climbed up to the mezzanine, popping the stopper out of the bottle, and walked around to where there was no railing, right at the top of the main vat. Merill pulled the top of the vat open with a heavy grating sound, revealing the churning mead inside. She knew the mead in this vat was piped straight through to the casks in the main building of the meadery, meaning that whatever ended up in this vat would be drunk very soon. She emptied the remainder of the bottle into the spinning golden liquid, dropping in the bottle and the cork for good measure.

She found herself remembering the sour-faced Dunmer that had hung around with them in Markarth, the night Merill had kept watch while the girl dumped poison into Markarth’s rivers for fun and the way she had laughed cruelly to see the dogs and horses in the stables lying dead the next morning after drinking it. A pang of guilt struck her at this memory, surprising her. Merill shook the guilt away before taking a key from inside the door and heading back into the thin, chill air.

“It’s about time,” Sabjorn hissed as Merill reentered the main building of the meadery. The place looked much better – the corpses were all gone, and the carpets and floor had been scrubbed of their respective messes, though a faint odor of rot lingered in the air. A tired-looking man in Whiterun armour and two guards stood near the door, watching her curiously. “I had to stall the captain until you were finished,” he murmured.

“Sabjorn,” the captain said, rubbing the back of his neck exhaustedly, and Sabjorn looked up, sweat glistening on his brow. “I’ve a lot to do today. How about I get a taste of some of your mead? That is, assuming you’ve taken care of your little pest problem.”

“Why – Why yes, of course, Captain,” Sabjorn stammered, hastily drawing a silver goblet from beneath the counter and going over to one of the flasks. “It’s my finest brew yet. I call it ‘Honningbrew Reserve.’ I think you’ll find it quite pleasing to your palate.”

“Yes, yes,” the captain said impatiently as Sabjorn resealed the casket and handed the goblet over to him.

“You really ought to let the drink breathe first –” Sabjorn started, but the captain had already taken a hearty swig from the goblet, which he spat out, sputtering, almost at once.

“By the Eight!” he gasped, throwing the goblet away and coughing as it struck the flagstones with a clang. Sabjorn looked horrified, hovering over the cask as if he wasn’t sure what to do. “What the hell is in that, Sabjorn?”

“I – I don’t –”

“You assured me this place was clean!” the captain snarled, pausing several times to spit. “I’ll see to it that you remain in irons for the rest of your days for this!”

“No, no, I didn’t –” Sabjorn said frantically, casting a look in her direction. Merill realized Mallus had entered and stood behind her, leaning on a bookshelf and eating an apple, watching the whole scene with eyes full of amusement. When he saw her looking, he lightly plucked another apple from the bowl on the shelf and tossed it over to her.

“Silence!” the captain shouted, jerking his thumb to the guards with him. “I should have known better to trust this place after it’s been riddled with filth. Mallus,” he said, turning as Sabjorn stammered hopelessly. “You’re in charge here until I can sort this all out.”

“It’ll be my pleasure,” Mallus said with a cordial nod as he carved off a chunk of apple with a paring knife and took a bite. Merill hopped up on the edge of the bar, rubbing her own off on her cloak.

“You’re coming with me to Dragonsreach,” the captain told Sabjorn as Mallus joined her at the bar.

“Nicely done,” he said as the guards pulled Sabjorn out into the chill air.

“I need to get a look at Sabjorn’s books,” Merill told him, setting her half-eaten apple down on the bar and hopping down.

“So, Maven wants to hunt down Sabjorn’s private partner, eh?” Merill shrugged.

“I suppose so.”

“You’re welcome to take a look around Sabjorn’s office,” he told her, jerking his head toward the room beyond. “He keeps most of his papers stashed in his desk.”

Merill climbed up to the second story of the meadery, where Sabjorn’s spacious bedroom stood. Merill slipped a few valuable-looking things into her bag her and there before going over to the dresser. She’d learned fairly quickly that people didn’t often store their expensive things in their dressers, but it never hurt to look. She pulled out a stack of dirty white shirts and, sure enough, found a folded bit of paper beneath them, addressed to Sabjorn in a spidery hand with the dark purple seal broken.

Merill flipped open the letter and found its top was marked with the same symbol from Goldenglow, the dagger in front of a black circle. Sabjorn, it read:

Within the enclosed crate, you’ll find the final payment. As we discussed, Honningbrew Meadery should now being brewing mead at full production. In regards to your concerns about interference from Maven Black-Briar, I can assure you that I’ll do everything in my power to keep her assets and her cronies at bay. This is the beginning of a long and successful future for both of us.

Maven’s not going to be pleased about this, Merill thought as she returned downstairs, tucking the note into her bag.

The matriarch, though, took it more calmly than Merill had expected.

“This doesn’t tell me much,” she muttered, reading through the note as they sat in the upper story of The Bee and Barb late in the evening, the jollity from the bar downstairs leaking up through the floorboards. “The only thing that could identify Sabjorn’s partner is this odd little symbol.”

“That was on the bill of sale for Goldenglow,” Merill offered, leaning back in her chair. Despite Maven’s sharp manner, Merill had taken quite a liking to the fierce old woman.

“Well, whoever this mysterious marking represents, they’ll regret starting a war with me,” Maven said darkly, closing the letter, and Merill smiled. Maven paid her, and Merill slipped quietly back through the dark streets to the Ratway, where nearly everyone seemed to be gathered at the bar, drinking and laughing while Dirge made a poor attempt at playing a Breton jig. Nalimir and Etienne were back, sitting a table near the bar, and Merill gestured to Nalimir that she’d be over in a moment. She found Brynjolf at a table over the water in the Flagon, drinking with Delvin Mallory.

“Word is that Sabjorn’s found himself in prison,” Brynjolf said cheerfully as Merill approached, sliding a tankard over to her. “How unfortunate for him.”

“But very fortunate for Maven,” Merill said, sitting down and taking a long drink. Brynjolf grinned and Mallory made a sound of approval.

“You’re beginning to see how our little system works, lass,” Brynjolf told her. “Now, Maven sent word that you discovered something else while you were out there. Something important to the Guild?”

“Aye,” Merill told him, taking another swig of mead. “The same symbol from Goldenglow was involved.”

“This ain’t a coincidence no more, Bryn,” Mallory said from across the table. “First Aringoth and now Sabjorn.”

“Someone’s trying to take us down by driving a wedge between Maven and the Guild,” Brynjolf agreed.

“Is there anything we can do?” Merill asked, and Brynjolf scratched his beard thoughtfully.

“Mercer’s been thinking on it. I’ve no doubt he’ll come up with something soon. For now, though, do a few odd jobs. I’ll let you know when something comes up.”