Swindler's Den (Cave)

Swindler's Den is a cave east of Rorikstead and southwest of Morthal. It is infested with several leveled bandits. Swindler's Den serves as the base of the Alik'r in the quest "In My Time of Need."
==Quests==
*In My Time of Need
*Stealing Plans
*Rare Gifts
*Possible location for Ancient Technology.
==Notable items==
*In the fourth large room, the Pickpocket skill book Thief is on a bedroll on the ground. Also in said room, two Refined Malachite and one Gold Ingot can be found inside a small wooden box on a rock formation.
*In the next room, or ledge overlooking the third room, is a copy of Night Falls on Sentinel on a crate next to a deer hide. This book is needed for the quest "Rare Gifts" given by Rustleif in Dawnstar.
==Trivia==
*A skeleton found in a haystack reaching for a bottle of mead can be found in an alcove.
*To the right of the first hall, there are a couple of boulders, the Dragonborn can climb up with spamming the jump button. With that, it is recommended to follow the path into the final hall; this spares the Dragonborn almost every battle with local bandits.
*Upon entering the first hall, there is a practice dummy with a red apple perched atop its head. This is a reference to the story of William Tell, who had to shoot an apple off of his son's head. Amusingly, the dummy has two iron arrows in it, being nowhere close to the head. The Dragonborn can play a mini-game of trying to shoot the apple with the long bow and iron arrows provided on the opposite ledge after clearing the dungeon.
*Outside of Swindler's Den there are three unmarked locations, each containing a skill book:
**South of the fast travel point, two torches can be seen in the distance. They are at a Shrine of Stendarr containing a strongbox (which contains random gems and/or jewelry) and the Enchanting skill book Twin Secrets. From here look west to see some ruins. When at the ruins there's a Shrine of Zenithar, satchel, two silver ingots, and the skill book 2920, vol 05 - Second Seed. From there, to the north is a depression. In the depression there is a mammoth skeleton, slaughterfish egg, nirnroot, and a dead bandit. On the dead bandit is the skill book Beggar. Be aware the depression is guarded by a sabre cat. At higher levels, there may be two sabre cats guarding the location.
==Bugs==
* If the cave is reentered after finishing the quest "In My Time of Need" and choosing the ending by helping Kematu, the Alik'r Warriors and Kematu are still in Swindler's Den, without Saadia. The warriors can be attacked and killed.
**Upon entering the den under this scenario, the Alik'r spawn with a Bandit Chief and a couple of regular bandits who immediately become hostile to the Alik'r. Whoever is left alive can now be finished off and looted (the Alik'r will also have no conversation options and are not needed for any further quests).
* If the cave is reentered after finishing In My Time of Need, there is the possibility that the game will get stuck on the loading screen and never load the cave. The problem may arise as soon as the Dragonborn accepts the "Stealing Plans" quest from Aela the Huntress after clearing Gallows Rock in the Companions questline.
* Sometimes, after completing In My Time of Need, all subsequent reentries into Swindler's Den will cause the game to crash. This can make completing the Companions quest line impossible.
* During In My Time of Need, once the Dragonborn enters Swindler's Den, upon trying to exit, the screen will turn dark, but will not teleport the Dragonborn. Certain features will also be locked up, such as saving. This bug is related to an error during the decompression of the teleport script of this specific area. Reloading to an earlier save will not fix this. The only way outside is through the use of a command code that teleports the Dragonborn outside.
* The "Night Falls On Sentinel" book can fall into the crate and become inaccessible.
* Killing Kematu and his men by skipping the dialogue, via hopping up the wall in the first room, will cause two A'likr warriors to permanently appear inside Whiterun at the gates. This can be beneficial as vampire protection if is installed.
==Appearances==
*
de:Schwindlernest
es:Antro de los Timadores
pl:Nora Szulera
ru:Логово плута
Category:Skyrim: Whiterun Hold Locations