Prompt 202-Compliment

What is the best compliment you have ever received?

Elraenia danced through the shadows of Riften, giggling as she hefted her spoils in the burlap bag. It may have been foolish to pilfer the coffers at Black-Briar Manor, but Maven had been especially irksome in their earlier meeting that day. The young Bosmer had never liked the Nord woman. Now that Raen was Guild Master, there would be changes. She scoffed at the “Protected” Shadowmark on the door of the manor. As far as she was concerned, it just marked the lavish home as her own private playground.

Maven had her fingers in many sweetrolls throughout Riften, but she was too much allied with the Empire for Raen’s tastes. The guild may have barely remained afloat thanks to the Black-Briar family, but with Elraenia as Guild Master and Nightingale, they had no more need of Maven or her kin. Let the woman throw her tantrums and reach out to the Dark Brotherhood. Raen was already highly placed there as well. How entertaining it would be to hear a contract for her own head from the Night Mother.

Raen slipped into the graveyard to access the secret entrance to the Cistern. She frowned as she watched the fake stone coffin slide away to reveal the stairs to the sewer. No, it was still too soon to oust Maven. Her time would come. In the meantime, Raen would inconvenience the woman as often as she could.

She slid down the ladder into the Cistern and greeted her guild mates enthusiastically. She tossed the satchel to Brynjolf. “Add that to the guild safe. Special donation from our honey-natured patron.”

Brynjolf’s face contorted in a grimace. “You shouldn’t antagonize her, lass. She still has too much pull around here.”

Elraenia considered reminding him of her Voice. Mul Qah Diiv would certainly implant the image of her as a dragon firmly in his mind. However, the dragon aspect was a power she could only use once a day, and it was wasted as a mere intimidation tactic, even if it did look awesome. Instead she dropped onto her bed with a bounce and began filing her nails with an ebony dagger. “For now,” was all she said.

Rune joined them to congratulate her on a job well done. “Don’t be too hard on the guild master now, Brynjolf. With her success and our rise back to the top, it’s as if Nocturnal were here in the flesh.”

Raen quirked an eyebrow and smirked at Brynjolf. The two had met the Daedric Prince when they embarked on their quest to stop Mercer Fray and restore the guild to its former glory. They had made the same pact to protect the Twilight Sepulcher in this life and the next. “Why thank you Rune, I can’t imagine a higher compliment.”

The thief saluted her as he went off to practice his throwing skills. Brynjolf shook his head and left her to rest from her adventures.

Notes: Yeah ok this is kind of dumb but I’m bad with compliments and tend to brush them off/ignore them so I couldn’t really think of any good ones to use for this prompt. I went around in circles trying to come up with other kinds of compliments that I could use in a brief scene and boiled it down to a bit of dialogue like “That was the most impressive display of [insert skill here] I’ve ever seen!” I was drawn to stealth/subterfuge/thieving and remembered my character in Skyrim was a master thief, as well as the de facto leader of every group she infiltrated. The Thieves Guild had her heart though, and becoming a Nightingale was the best thing to happen to her since discovering she was Dragonborn.

I love the Thieves Guild quests but almighty Talos do I hate Maven Black-Briar. I’m still salty that I couldn’t kill her once I completed the main questline for the guild. There are so many ways I could kill her and she dares to speak to me like I’m some petty criminal. She is the only character I ever actually wished I could kill. So I wrote a fic where I fantasized about ridding Riften of its briar bushes while managing to finagle a compliment my character would appreciate in there.

How about you? Do you like compliments? What is the best one you ever received? Best you ever heard someone else receive? Best you gave? It’s your turn to write now! Have a great night! See you tomorrow!

PS-Like these prompts? Like the short stories I write based on these prompts? Want to show your support? Give the blog a follow! Leave a comment! Buy me a coffee! I put a lot of time and effort into these posts and your support means the world to me! Ok, now go out there and write!