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Since becoming an adventurer by trade, Vanha thinks both more and less often of her father. He comes up a lot in conversation, especially while she's visiting the Imperial City and other hubs of power, but in the day to day he's relegated to a shadow in the back of her mind. Even when she has to visit his shrines during the course of business, she's become used to being unbothered by him, and oddly enough the shrines to Clavicus Vile are where she feels safest.
Not that she'd ever tell anyone that. No, not even her own mother, who tried her best never to give away the secret of her parentage.
Not that she'd ever tell anyone that. Especially not her father, who she suspects may actually like her and her mother.
Pitching up in Bravil while waiting to be paid for a contract, Vanha takes a seat in a corner of the least wholesome tavern, one where she need not bother with the ornate mask she usually wears, placing the golden thing on her lap while she drinks some swill and pores over her maps. Exploring places, seeing sights, that's her quirk, Caper is her domain.
Of course, without her mask on the dilapidated drunks and skooma fiends that infest Bravil arrive to bother her, though they're not prone to the usual remarks.
“Hey, so…what are you? Those horns, are you a Bosmer?” asks a female Argonian in a classic hiss.
At this point in Vanha’s life, the question is not offensive, but it is still funny. She looks back at the lizard out of a face covered with scaled skin of a shimmering golden hue like that of certain sea snakes. But her skin is not as interesting as her yellow eyes and the pair of ebony horns jutting from her forehead. Curved and wicked sharp, large but not overlarge, they exactly match the horns of her mask.
“No, Maormer.” she says, in a soft, insinuating voice.
“Oh, yeah, that makes sense, yeah, yeah…” The Argonian dithers, shuffles back and forth, looks around furtively. “Hey, so, you don't happen to be, you know, him? I've got this problem, see-”
Vanha shakes her head, short and sharp. “I'm not him. I can't help you like that. But if you have a problem a sword or fireball can solve, we can talk.”
Sensing that these services require gold, the Argonian disappears. Peace descends upon Vanha in starts and stops, until someone interesting arrives.
A bottle of wine touches down on her peeling tabletop, too expensive a wine for this tavern.
“Evening, dear. Happy birthday.” A man, a golden skinned Maormer like her, with horns like her, but with a beard outlining his jaw, looks down upon her, a wry smile twisting his lips. He's young, but still old enough to be her father. He speaks with the sort of joviality that cuts, the sort of joviality which acts as a thin disguise for a deep vein of sadism.
Vanha sighs, but makes no move to rebut him. Smiling even more, he pulls out a chair, sitting next to her. Once he does, a huge dog with uncanny, intelligent eyes runs up to him, drops a dead chicken at his feet, and bounds off again.
“Of all the days you could have shown up. What do you want?” asks Vanha of the intruder.
“Aww, dear, why so hostile? This wine comes straight from the Emperor's private stash. I believe it's full of gold flecks. Shall we see?” The man opens the bottle and pours some into a couple glasses. Clean glasses which he pulls from within his sea green cloak. The dark crimson liquid is indeed flecked with gold. “Mmm, ah! That’s the stuff. Mortals, ey? The things they come up with to amuse themselves.” he smacks his lips, his grin like a gash.
Ignoring his hollow talk, Vanha sits back from the table. “I don't trust you.”
“Of course you don't, but really, aside from your mother, I'm the only one you can trust in Mundus, or outside it. We're not monsters, you know, teehehehe. Come on, someone sold their soul for this bottle.”
Using a tiny vial she keeps in a pouch at her waist, Vanha mixes a drop of potion in with the wine, watches it mix for a moment, then takes a sip. It's glorious, like liquid ecstasy.
The man watches her hungrily, his yellow eyes travelling all over her face. “Darling, I need to borrow the Masque. Some funny little man has completed one of my funny little tasks, and he requires a reward.”
Unimaginable disappointment falls on Vanha's shoulders, heavy, like a piece of the Numidium. “So that's why you're here. I should've known.”
Clavicus studies her for a moment longer, then snorts. “Dear, you know I can just manifest the thing into my possession, right?…” his smirk aligns itself before he takes another deep swig of his wine.
Yes, Vanha does know that.
Even when one is related to or loved by him, it is never a good idea to ask a wish of Clavicus Vile, and he knows that better than any, so instead he leaves her with a very special gift instead, a daedric puppy.