Thank God Mikael could take a break from being a bard for a few minutes and give me some leisure from my prison.

He pretty much had a bro day with me and we ended up selling some of my stuff. Eating Carlotta's food. And finally, he bought me a silver garnet necklace from Olfidia Grey-Mane. I gasped when he procured it from Olfidia's grasp. "You're gonna buy that? Your girl is that special?"

His face grew redder than the garnet encased in the silver. "You're my girl," he said, and placed it around my neck from behind me. He finished biting his lip and after glancing at how I looked in the necklace, walked away. Towards Dragonsreach. And if you know the stairs it takes to get up there, he was up them in a second.

"Wait, Mikael!" I called, catching a glance at Ysvolda's grin, and sighing. I got up to him and snatched him by the back of his bard suit, pulling him back a distance, and walked directly in front of him. "You don't just give girls this. I mean you've had many. You should know better."

"I'd give them just a silver necklace actually," his blushed face studied the ground. "It's a gift. Keep it."

"I ain't keeping this thing unless it'll protect me in battle," I said, massaging the design of the crystals. "Don't worry. I've got enchantment powers."

He grinned with a little scoff. "That's not the least I'm worried about."

I looked at his face, a little heartstricken. "Miakel, I really appreciate it; if it makes you feel any better, you're my second choice." I cupped his face in one of my hands, before he lifted his face up, and my hand dropped.

"Really?"

His shock value was immensely hilarious. I really said nothing to compliment my statement but leaned in closer and closed my eyes as the bridge of our mouths met. I wanted him to know, and I wanted him to feel safe in that knowledge. I retracted, and his mouth surprisingly never closed back until I took his fingers and pinched them closed with them. I really wanted to be with him, but knew that it was wrong to be with more than one person - it was infidelity, really. He just needed to believe in someone as much as he believed in me. I was sure that someone would come along. As long as - I took a book out of the small, virtually weightless, sack on my shoulder - that someone didn't read this book. I'd smuggled it from my other belongings to talk to Mikael about it, as I was a fan. "So this book is very interesting..."

He snatched it from me - "Give me that!" - and cradled it in one arm. "I - I mean nothing that I wrote in this book," he said, looking down at the cobbled earth and then back at me.

I laughed a rich laugh that I'd never done in so long - and the repercussions was the sorest feedback I ever felt. "I don't care about your previous  relationships. In fact, I think it makes you a little more experienced, and I like that."

He blushed. "Oh, well. It was personal project. I don't suspect anyone that I'm ever going to love in the future to read it."

I grinned crooked. "Sorry."

He touched my face, as he was slightly shorter than me and so he didn't have to crook it up or anything. "I hope your words are true and that I can be yours one day."

"Write me a book on bigamy and maybe I can reconsider," I said, grinning as I took his hand in mine and walked back down to the merchants' shops. I hummed satisfactorily at the familiar sound of the grinding stone at Adrienne's shop. "Mikael," I said in a whiny voice, "can you make me knife, please? I need someone that's gonna have just a nick for smithing stuff as I do."

He crashed his fingers together nervously, and stared hard at the ground, as if searching for something. "Just kidding," I added, then sighed afterwards. "I miss you," I honored the grindstone with my words before heading back to the Bannered Mare Inn, because the stress was killing me.

I'd went to sleep the night before, and we were out for a few hours. It was almost midday, though, I noticed by the sky. Almost sleeptime, again. I didn't like to sleep. I only did it because I would heal, faster. I thought of ways to torture Mikael, the bard (in other words, musician) I loved so much, while we were walking to the Mare but really he went through a tough time with me telling him to acquire another project just to become mine. It was hard when someone neglected you, but worse when someone didn't accept you to begin with. But I wonder how Mikael believed all those girls felt when he did the same to them. Acquire, rehire...

Well, not the same person did he rehire of course, but you get the drift. I grinned a little harder until my naturally overprolonged canine cut into my lip. maybe I was doing a good thing by teaching him a lessons on relationships.

The Inn was normal, but no Battleborns seemed to be in existence today. Weird. It was kindof like that, yesterday. I didn't know what was up with the Battleborns, but maybe they knew I'd rough 'em up, too, I mused. Or they were trying to keep from roughing me up from injuring Uthgerd. Or...I don't have any idea.

The aley scent was okay for me to smell, as well the baking bread that Hulda put on at least an hour before we came in, I noticed by the smell. But I really wanted to eat that bread now that I was horsing down the smells.

Mikael's look garnered me some kind of pity, so I began taking off the necklace, not being able to take his face any longer. He noticed, and then blushed right before he began to help me put it back on. Sinmir walked past us by the door to leave, and Mikael blurted, "Just helping a lady with her necklace." I could stifle my laugh that came from that, at least.

"There. Never take it off. I don't care what enchantment you put on it, I will protect you when you go to battle. If you need anything, call me."

"Yes, indeed. Sharpen my tools when I wake up."

He looked down again, and I patted his shoulder. "It's okay. You don't have to do any of that. I'm just messing with ya. I'm enough Warmaiden for both of us."

"You've really taken to that word."

"Yeah, Adrienne's father's portmanteau is impressive." He laughed, some of the shyness gone. The name of Warmaiden's is a name inspired by Adrienne's father to describe her and chosen for her shop, the smithy Mikael and I just left.

"Well I'll remember your words, and your dedication to your significant other. Maybe if I were more like you, I'd have someone to love."

Isn't that what I just said folks. "Sure. Now I'm Dr. Love."

"A man of many hats," he said, chuckling toward his position by the table in the back, near where he sings. But he wasn't about to sing, just sit and enjoy some hard Nord bread made earlier and having sat on the table for God knows how long, and some mead.

I went to a barstool and checked out the place. A strange man in dark garments happened to be sitting right near the stools, and never said a word. He was in a chair, instead, that was docked near a table of food that he must've had a strange appetite to gorge down (because it was a lot of stuff).  I simply stared at him after my fleeting looks gave him no notice of my presence. "Hey. Weirdo over there." 

The man simply smiled and took off his long hood. He was a Nord, a brunnette one, and so not a perfect Nord for that...or maybe I'm racially unaware of other lighter-skinned ethnicities. But one thing is certain; he approached me phonetically with the utmost Nordiest of phrases. "You and me, a few drinks, a few laughs, and a contest. What could be better?"

Maybe not having followed through with this could've been better.

But can I say that; the day did turn out to be a marvelous night, remember? Yes, A Night To Remember. A wonderful title for the rest of the day...

So I could've been wrong about me having been satisfied nearly any other way; besides maybe Mikael's smooch. But it was quite weird:

Flaw number one, he (not Mikael of course) had a hood and was dressed in the darkest robe I've seen in Whiterun, even darker than Farengar's. I'm sure the old guy'd be jealous.

Flaw two, I never have seen him in my life.

Flaw three, where in the world did I just end up with this guy??? Drinking contests lead to some serious frivolousness.