

As the name implies the Speakers speak for the Dark Brotherhood and protect the Listener with their lives if need be as the Brotherhood's sole line to the Night Mother's spirit.

In honor of the Night Mother's five sons there are four colleagues that confer with the Listener, each is titled 'Speaker'. Whether the story of the Night Mother birthing and killing Sithis's children is myth or not the Night Mother her self is quite real, although long since dead, her ghost speaks to one member of the Dark Brotherhood only, this person is titled the 'Listener'.

There is much ambiguity as to whether or not this actually happened as the Night Mother was originally a supplicant to the Daedric Prince Mephela, arch-fiend of secrets and plots, and the Dark Brotherhood only became an organized group after she left the cult But regardless of validity, the story of the Night Mother becoming the Dark Brotherhood's unholy Messiah after sacrificing her own sons to the void, is the Brotherhood's standard belief. In return for the tribute Sithis granted the Night Mother his voice and spoke to her from that day forth allowing her to act as his parley to the ears of mortals. These five children are said to be the first Dark Brotherhood and where the term originated. Sithis then demanded tribute for the Night Mother to kill her children, a demand she quickly complied with. Legend goes that The Night Mother bore five sons immaculately conceived in her through Sithis. The Dark Brotherhood was founded by the Night Mother, whose true name has been lost to history. 1.2 The Black Hand and Dark Sanctuaries.
