The At-Tura Estate is the home to the Redguard leader of the Midnight Union, Count Hosni at-Tura, and his wife, the Lady Adima.  The Union are an ill-famed band of smugglers and petty criminals tolerated by the Wayrest authorities; Indeed, the noble houses of Stormhaven are believed to make frequent use of their services.  All that changed recently however when members of the Union brutally attacked the Spirit Wardens of Pariah Abbey and stole a Dream Shard which has potentially left the whole of Stormhaven vulnerable to the growing iniquitous insurrection of Vaermina’s cult of the Supernal Dreamers.

Every good Guar tamer in Morrowind will warn that the longer the rein you allow a Guar, the more likely they are to buck their rider; and the richer the food you feed them, the more likely they are to bite the feeder.  This is as true of bandits as it is of beasts.

One need only look at the history of the noble houses of High Rock to learn that this is a land whose Kingdoms are bargained for between bed sheets and bloody bodkins, and its outlaws are rewarded, not with stocks and chains as in other civilized cultures, but with coronets and crowns.

There are no nobles left in all High Rock, just those with greed and gold.

S.K

The story of the Soulshriven Tower as related by the Priestess Pietine is that this area was once the site of a beautiful gardens belonging to Princess Violetta, a daughter of the house of Gardner.  The Gardner’s were once the ruling family of Wayrest prior to the rule of the present King Emeric Cumberland.  It was the last King Gardner who, along with several other Breton Kingdoms, signed the first Daggerfall Covenant, uniting High Rock to repel the Reachman invasion back in 541.  The family’s legacy was destined not to endure long after however as the King and his entire family fell victim to the Knahaten Flu, bringing an end to their auspicious dynasty almost 20 years ago.

The flower gardens of the Birdsong Tower, as these crumbling ruins were once known, were said to be a place of such pure beauty, tranquillity, and enchantment that it was whispered that the Mother Goddess Mara herself tended to every bloom.  When the Daedric prince Molag Bal, the lord of brutality, discovered a landmark of such purity and grace subsisting unsullied despite the tumult and disorder of the world about, it enraged him.  And in an act born of pure malice and spite, he sent his necromancers against the tower, to raise a legion of Undead that would corrupt the utopian gardens forever more.

It is an intriguing story, and one worthy of a bards supper; but perhaps what is more salient to note is that the tower offers an excellent outlook over Southern Wayrest and, more importantly, her docks.  One who has control over such a vantage point might gain vital strategic intelligence of ship movements to and from the capitol of the Daggerfall Covenant.

Or perhaps on a more base level, in a land where the drudges of Vaermina hold sway, claiming such a prized landmark for Oblivion may be little more than a notch in a perverse Daedric game of one-upmanship.

Whatever the true story behind the corruption of Birdsong tower, there is but one fact about this legion of undead of which I am certain…

They stand in my way.

S.K

On the southern coast of Stormhaven, hidden amongst rock and sand bank is the entrance to an excavation whose original purpose is lost to history.  For many a generation however it has been used by the smugglers and pirates of Iliac bay to move goods to and from High Rock’s docks without attracting the attentions of Breton authorities.

Although recently closed down by the Lion Guard, it did not take the Midnight Union long to move in.  I discover neglected correspondence further suggesting at links between the Union and the cult of Supernal Dreamers, and that is all the reason I need to clear this delve of rat and skeever once and for all.

S.K

Farangel’s Landing is a large estate and dock just outside the southwest gates of Wayrest.  Whilst passing through I am approached by a troubled Breton of noble appearance.  Serge Arcole claims that the Midnight Union have taken his estate and kidnapped his wife for ransom.

When you live life on the edge of a blade, sometimes despite the best of intentions, you will be the villain.  It is the millstone of the mercenary that inevitably you will make wrong judgments, and sometimes you will be outwitted and used as a tool by others of dishonourable intent.

A mercenary’s life is all about balancing; the weight of your conscious against the weight of your purse, the weight of a deed against the weight of a consequence, and the weight of your vengeance against the weight of their ‘dishonourable intent’.

S.K