I was a little disappointed that Laurenna wasn't back from her relatives yet, so I had to head back to Mournhold the fastest way I knew how.

Using Recall, I ended up in Caldera, and from there, the Mage's Guild offices gladly teleported me to the city of Vivec. I headed out the door and headed to the edge of the walkway, three floors up. The sun was just beginning to set.     

Rather than take a slow boat or walk, I changed into a cliffracer, and flew as fast as I could to Ebonheart, and the castle of the Duke.

Once back in the castle, the ever-present Ascine Rane, always wandering around the castle these days, gladly agreed to teleport me back to the palace greeting room in Mournhold.

I headed back to the Museum with my unique items, hoping this would be enough to obtain the last missing piece I was after.

She was quite impressed with the items I had brought with me.

"Oh my." she exclaimed, "The Staff of Hasedoki. I wonder whether or not the stories are true. Is the soul of Hasedoki really contained in this staff?" Either way, are you prepared to part with it? I can offer you 30,000 gold for it."

"I am donating it." I replied, "And as to your first question, I leave it up to you and your staff to attempt to ask him yourself." I smiled, and she smiled back, instructing one of her staff to place this item in a special place of honor in the Museum.

"I have one more item for you." I said.

I produced the Shield.

"Oh, my." she said, "Is that truly Eleidon's Ward"

"The very same." I said.

"What a wonderful shield that is!" she continued, marveling at it's smooth texture and beautiful color, gleaming violet and silver at the same time. "Are you interested in selling it? I could offer you 30,000 gold for it."

"No," I replied, "I am also donating this item as well."

She took the shield and handed it to another of her staff, promising to place this in a place of honor as well, considering its history.

"You've been quite a friend to the Museum." she said. "I'll give you the piece of the blade I have. I'm classifying it has a Dwemer Battle Shield. I'm not sure what to make of it. The spike attached to the front of the shield seems to be loose, but a competent smith can probably take care of that for you."

She had one of her people bring the artifact to me. I thanked her for her kindness, and she replied in kind. "Good luck to you," she said, as I was leaving, "and if you're able to recreate the Blade of Nerevar, I'd love to see the finished product."

I turned, smiled, and said, "I'll certainly do that, thank you."     

Inside the Smith's shops, I stopped and put the shield down on a bench to get a closer look at it.

It certainly looked like an ordinary Dwemer shield, but there was one thing odd about it.

Upon closer inspection, I noted the loose item that had been mentioned: It looked very much like the first part of the blade that Almalexia had given to me earlier.

I wondered: Nerevar had been in battle with King Dumac at Red Mountain. The blade had been shattered. Could this have been Dumac's own shield? There was no way to tell for sure, but my next step was to get this third piece out of the shield.

Bols Indalen, chief Smith, had a quick look at the shield. He looked it over, squinting at the poor condition the item was in.

"Hmmm, an odd construction to be sure." he mumbled. "Let me see...As I thought. These two pieces aren't supposed to be attached."

He wandered over to his tools, picking up a pair of tongs and a hammer.

"Looks like a regular Dwemer shield with this other piece attacked." he continued, starting to work on the loose piece. "Hope you didn't pay too much for that shield, friend. It's nothing special as far as I can see. The other piece is interesting, though. Dwemer in origin, but unlike anything I've seen before."

Using the tongs to hold on to the loose piece, he gave the shield a good hit with his hammer, and the two items came apart. He gave them both back to me.

I found it very nice of him not to bother charging me for the repair.

"Is there a master smith here that could reforge these three pieces into one blade?" I asked.

"Of course." he said, pointing to the huge Ork right next to me. "He's standing right there."

Yagak gro-Gluk turned from the blade he was bashing away on, looked at me, snorted like an animal, and asked what I wanted with him.

"These three pieces." I said, showing him the items. "They used to be one entire blade. A very special blade. I was hoping you could put them all back together for me."

Yagak took the pieces, held each one of them up to the light, glaring at each one, as if each was a challenge to his expertise as a smith.

It's impossible to see if a Ork is smiling or not, but he seemed pleased with such a challenge, especially considering where the pieces had originated from.

"You got interesting pieces there." he snorted. "Yagak can work with this. Make best blade you ever see...not that you'd know a daikatana from a butter knife."

I didn't want to go into my whole history of who I was, and so on, so I decided to leave that last comment drop.

"That's fine." I said. "How long will......"

"Humf." he snorted, "You come back in two days time, and Yagak have your blade. Now, leave me alone."

Orks are not the most friendly of folk, but if he got the job done, I'd be happy.

I turned and headed back out the door, checking my Dwemer pocketwatch: 20th day of Heartfire. I had until the 22nd (or more correctly, the morning of the 23rd) to wait until this quest was completed. It was pretty late, just after 8 PM.