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There was no one in sight as I collapsed into the hay, my anguish at what I had become forcing me to hunch over with fists pressed to my temples, crying and dry heaving until sleep finally took me.
While relatively short, the journey back to Cloud Ruler passed without incident and we found ourselves glad to be within the towering walls once more. The entire fortress was bustling with activity now and everywhere we looked, dozens of Blades practiced, manned the walls or went about the tasks required to keep such a place maintained. There was easily a hundred of them filling the halls of the fortress, and nearly all were armoured in some form. Members of every race were present and were a considerable fighting force who were not willing to let the last heir to the throne die like his father and half-brothers.
A handful of familiar faces met us as we led our horses through the gates and up the rising staircase to the fortress’s upper level. Belisarius was there, lightly sweating from his latest training session despite the increasingly frigid temperatures that left the breath fuming into the air. I could see his unease at the mottled bruising that was visible under my armour and the handful of light furs I had managed to procure for myself and Viconia to ward off the cold. They must have heard of what happened to us over the previous month but our appearances spoke more than what rumours ever could.
I slid out of the saddle with my usual infantryman’s grace and felt my spine crunch as I leaned back and straightened it out. Viconia was saddle-sore and weary, her wounds taking a toll despite how well they had healed so far. With a handful of greetings to a few of the Blades that I recognised I walked over to her, holding out a hand in assistance as she stiffy tried to climb out of the saddle. For a moment she glared at my offered hand like it was a venomous reptile, before visibly swallowing her pride and allowing me to help her clamber down.
"We had heard of what happened." Belisarius said simply after he greeted us properly. There was concern and grief written in his features not only at our appearances but at the loss of several of the Order. "It is good to see you both."
His friendly pat on the shoulder spoke volumes of how he felt, but he didn’t let his emotions stand in the way of his duty. Carefully he and some of the others led us into the warmth of the great hall while our horses were led away and cared for in the stable.
Feeling the sudden bloom of heat wash across our flesh was a pleasant sensation as our shivering from exposure began to lessen. The enchanted fire was roaring somewhat larger than the last time we were in the hall due to the grip of winter beginning to tighten on the region. We busied ourselves with warming up in its glow, shedding some of our access equipment and armour even as the doors to the living quarters opened and Jauffre appeared. He was dressed almost as though he was within the comfortable walls of the priory, a billowing set of brown robes that flowed around him as he moved and a lit pipe full of tobacco puffing with every breath. It was obvious that his sleeping patterns hadn’t changed since our departure but he genuinely appeared pleased to see the both of us.
"Viconia, Kaius, it is good to see you both again."
"Likewise." My own unease of not knowing how to exactly address this elderly spy was blindingly obvious to anyone watching.
"You look like you have both been into Oblivion again." the concern on his face appeared honest as he glanced over us, noting the extensive bruising and the way we carried ourselves with obvious pain.
"Oblivion could’ve been a vacation compared to that." Viconia’s own voice was tinged with bitterness and I grimaced inwardly at the tone.
"I can imagine." For a moment he glanced between the both of us, taking a deep puff of his pipe before motioning towards the living quarters. "If you wish, we can wait until tomorrow after you have had a chance to rest from the journey."
The snap of irritation in Viconia’s voice was sharp and barbed like an arrow. "We’ll be fine. We can rest later."
The sound of a door opening and the sudden draft of mountain air sent shivers up my spine. Martin’s exclamation and call of greeting however was more than welcome. With a mild clap of welcome over the shoulder he and the rest of us walked over to the fire and the seats arrayed before it, placing ourselves in them with pleasure at the first real comfort in days.
"So," Jauffre said softly as we settled into the chairs. "what happened?"
Carefully, and precisely Viconia and I told Jauffre, Martin and two of the senior commanders of the Blades what had occurred. We spoke of the ambush, the way they had meant to capture the two of us alive as sacrifices and the disappearance of the Blades who were meant to meet us there. I told a variation of the truth of how I had managed to survive the fall over the cliff and how I had managed to infiltrate the caverns, as admitting the truth was not something that I could bring myself to do even if it didn’t result in death. To them they simply believed that I had silently killed my way through their ranks with stealth and surprise and when I did finally have to fight I was faced with an array of unarmed cultists ill prepared to face a fully armoured and experienced fighter.
"If I hadn’t had known that you two had managed to step inside Oblivion I would have never had believed you could kill an entire cult on your own." Martin finally said once we had finished describing how we had spent the past fortnight with the Fighters Guild recovering. He glanced at Jauffre. "What was the total?"
"The report I received of took into account that some of them were in pieces..." there was the tiniest hint of suspicion in Jauffre’s eyes as he gazed at me. "but Jena said that there was at least forty-two dead."
The moment of silence seemed to stretch into eternity as one of the Blades seated near us choked at the number, and they were all staring at us with renewed respect.
"But Mankar Camoran escaped." Martin said simply, and the sense of failure was almost too much to bear.
I nodded. "Yes. And he took the Amulet with him."
"How did he manage to escape in the first place? I can’t fault your efficiency but I don’t think he simply slipped by you and ran in the chaos."
"No, he didn’t." they all watched as I rummaged in my pack, feeling the horrid weight in the bottom wrapped in its layers of torn cloth and leather. "He used this and some form of conjuration to create a brief-lived oblivion portal."
Both the Blade Commanders and Jauffre involuntarily twitched and pulled away slightly as I uncovered the rune-encrusted book. The sheer malevolency of the bound leather tome was a sickening force in the stomach and staring at it for any more than a glance was enough to start inducing a headache.
Martin swore with such potent and violent force that we all turned to look at him, shocked at the softly spoken priest and the words that no man of the cloth had ever uttered. "The Mysterium Xarxes... You have been carrying around one of a handful of daedric artefacts; the most powerful and evil objects in existence in your backpack? Like it was a change of clothes?!"
"Well I didn’t have much else of an option, and it’s not like this is something you can send by messenger." I replied a little too bluntly, seeing his hardening but haunted expression soften at my rudeness.
"I’m sorry." There was pain in his eyes as he struggled not to look at the loathsome thing sitting before us. "You were right in bringing this to us my friend, but this book is of such great evil that even being in its presence is a danger beyond comprehending."
"You seem to know a lot about these sort of things." There was a steel like edge to Jauffre’s voice now, and I suddenly felt a memory drag itself to the surface of my mind of when Viconia and I had first met him at Kvatch.
"You’ve had experience with Daedra before." I said softly, seeing the look of horror cross his face and knowing that I was right.
"I haven’t always been a priest..." he closed his eyes for a moment and there was sorrow and self-loathing in them when they reopened. "In my youth I had followed a much darker path."
"No wonder you looked so terrified at the thought of the Blades coming for you." Viconia’s own voice had a hard edge to it as she looked him over.
Lightly with a hand to the shoulder Jauffre reassured him and took a few more puffs of his pipe. "Maybe that was by design of the Nine, maybe it wasn’t. I don’t think any of us are in the position to judge."
Martin laughed, but there was no humour in it. It was a laugh at one who believed himself the target for some kind of sick joke. "It doesn’t matter though. What does matter is that somehow in this situation we have found the best and possibly only way of finding that insane bastard and retrieving the amulet. On top of this I just happen to be the only one with the experience to use this thing."
"How do you mean?"
He looked over to me, grimacing at the challenge that laid before him. "Baurus returned a little over a week ago and brought his copies of the Commentaries with him. I have read enough of Camoran’s writings to know that has his own little home-away-from-home jammed into the depths of Oblivion. It seems that is where he has most likely escaped to and unless we can find a way to kick in the front door, he’s effectively out of our reach."
"How long will it take to find a way in?"
For several moments he tried to estimate it in his head, before giving up and shrugging. "I... I don’t know. Weeks? Months even? I’ll have to come up with a way to protect not only myself but everyone here from the mere act of opening it. I’d then have to read it, translate or decipher whatever is inside and use what little we know to come up with a method of breaching oblivion."
Viconia looked distinctly uneasy as she tore her eyes from the writhing symbols and runes that swirled impossibly on the surface of the book. "There’s bound to be some form of ritual which will require ingredients and other collected items. Which doesn’t include the considerable amount of preparation required before anything can commence.
She shrugged as we all looked at her, yet again reminded that she had considerable experience with the darker side of magicka.
"So in the meantime we are stuck waiting and hoping."
Martin nodded, unhappy at the prospect. "I guess so. The hourglass is draining and sooner or later the barriers will break and we will have lost no matter what."
"You will not be doing this alone." Jauffre said quietly, looking at Martin and gesturing to the rest of us with his pipe. "You have the full support of the Blades and these two here are proving to be extremely capable. Whatever you need we will get."
For the coming days Viconia and I found ourselves in our all-too-familiar routines as we settled back into the comfortable schedule of the Blades. We would rise with the dawn, having breakfasts and gradually easing into training for most hours of the day. Our armour and equipment, while patched by the Fighters Guild still required several repairs and the fortress’s collection of smiths began the arduous process of repairing chainmail and battered plate. Sunchild and Dragonbane however remained by our sides or in our hands as we trained against the members of the Blades, or on occasion against each other. Viconia was determined to regain her lost strength and health and pushed herself to breaking point every day until the last remnants of her weakness were removed from her flesh.
I returned to my sparring sessions and teaching under Belisarius, using his peerless skill with a sword to constantly learn and strive for my own improvement and understanding of my own abilities. It was obvious that I was improving and learning with every day and every session we sparred but I had a long time and an enormous amount of practice and learning ahead of me to match his skill.
After three days an increase of messages and supplies arriving was noticed by us all, especially the one occurrence of a wagon being brought up to the gates. A small number of Blades unloaded it, carrying the cargo carefully into the depths of the fortress with no hint of their contents to any of the curious onlookers. The fortress was slowly growing into a hub of activity and I barely had time to spend with Martin as I had the previous stay. He busied himself in reading dozens of tomes regarding the arcane and mystical, poring through the collected writings of the Empire in the search of the answers we all sought.
My time with Viconia however was increasing and as she healed we found ourselves in each other’s company more regularly. Sometimes we would simply sit or eat near each other, not talking or conversing but merely staying in each other’s presence. Other times we would spar or train among the Blades, versing each other in the art of swordplay and on one occasion pitting our bodies against each other in a brief bout of unarmed practice. Even unarmed and without the use of magic she was a deadly foe, one that I could only briefly hold my own against with what legion skills I had been taught and without the use of my vampiric strength and abilities.
For the evenings we seemed to either spend time together, walking the walls or spending time in the great hall. A large amount of time we would sit for hours discussing everything that came to mind. I did find myself spending more and more time within the Fortress’ library, pulling specific tomes and scrolls from their shelves and reading through them one after another. For the most part my table would have a dozen or more books piled about it as I delved into ancient writings but except for the most prying of eyes no one noticed that I was only reading from those regarding vampires.
One such evening I was reading my way through a book that was somewhat thinner than those surrounding it. The hour was late and almost all the Blades had retired for the evening but I still found myself reading through the book’s contents. Lit by nothing more than the handful of torches scattered above the walls and heated by drafts from the fireplace of the great hall the Library was surprisingly comfortable even with the deepening chill of mid-autumn making itself felt. For the moment I was alone, all others heading to their beds or to their various guard duties and even Martin had vanished from behind the ever-increasing stack of research materials.
Viconia entered the room, dressed in little more than the set of robes no different from the others worn by the Blades. Even the cheap fabric did little to hide the feminine curves and elegant beauty underneath.
"Did you find something interesting abbil?"
"In a way." She seemed to glide over the stonework tiles with a lithe ease that few could ever replicate. Most times I knew that she only made a sound when she chose to.
An eyebrow arched and she slid into a seat adjacent to me, lifting up the book from where it lay opened on the table in front of me and glancing at the cover. "A treatise on Porphyic Hemophillia, Sanguinare Vampiris and the Undead." Her quizzical expression didn’t change. "Sounds interesting..."
Involuntarily I glanced around the room, looking not just with my eyes but with my enhanced senses to ensure we were alone. "I’m trying to learn more about myself."
Leaning back in her chair she placed her feet up on the table, not even sparing a glance to the couple of books she knocked off in the process. "And are you succeeding?"
"Not really."
She plucked the book from the table and ignored any complaint that I might have made while glancing over the pages. Looking confused, her eyes furrowed as she tried to read the script. "What is this?"
"Ancient Cyrodillic." Her expression didn’t change as she stared at me with her cold yellow eyes that so reminded me of a wolf. "Dominari in homines non timent. Loosely translates to: Do not fear the pawns of the dominator."
"And you can read this?"
"Some. This particular book is so old I can only understand one in every three words but it’s proving to be enough."
Her face was impassive and for a moment I could feel the strange clenching in my stomach as I stared at her beauty. "So, tell me some."
My mind failed to hold a thought for a few moments as she sat further back in her chair, flicking some hair over a shoulder and giving me a rare smile that always seemed to make me feel breathless.
"Well, very roughly translated this book goes into details of how to face and defeat vampires. Their weaknesses, ways to kill them and so forth. Most is baseless superstition, such as having to cut off a vampire’s head, stuff its mouth with rose petals and nightshade and bury them face down at a crossroads."
"Sounds specific and effective."
"It is but it is totally useless and impossible to do in reality."
I shrugged and motioned to the small pile of other books. "All these other books on the subject, along with the fact that I killed the one that bit me proves that when a vampire dies there is little more than ash and bone left afterwards. Whether it be by exposure to the sun or death in combat a vampire’s corpse rapidly combusts and burns from within."
There was a moment of silence between us as I remembered the way that when the fiend who had fed on me had burned after he finally died in the shadows of the cave. Its flesh seemed to smoulder before flaring into a consuming conflagration that left nothing more than blackened bones and white-grey ash behind. The unpleasant memory of the smell and taste caught in the back of my throat and I felt strangely nauseous.
"Anyone or anything that you killed that didn’t burn immediately means that they weren’t a vampire. In fact, it used to be an old test to determine whether a person was infected or not. If they burned after they died then they were a vampire, if they didn’t then they were free of infection and their souls would go on to reside in Atherius."
Viconia’s smile didn’t change but the expression somehow turned darker. "There seems to be a lot of times that the surface is not so dissimilar from the Underdark."
"I’m not so sure that is a good thing." My tone was light but my expression wasn’t. "The nature of vampires is fascinating but there are so many questions left unanswered."
I pulled a coin from a pouch and held it out for her to see. The gleaming silver piece caught the light as I flicked it into the air before catching it in a fist. For a moment I sat there, keeping my face passive and neutral before opening my hand and showing her the livid red burn where the coin had imprinted itself into my palm.
"Silver is a weakness to vampires, and other forms of unholy creatures and the undead." I said simply, seeing her eyes study the way the burn seemed to fade into nothingness in the seconds after I returned the coin to its pouch. "Other weaknesses described are garlic, holy places and sunlight but there are some that are little more than flights of fancy or straws for the desperate to grasp onto."
"Sunlight doesn’t affect you."
"Obviously, but I don’t think that it’s because legends and stories are untrue. My first feeding was of a dremora and there are no writings describing such a situation before. The first feeding is the most important as it is when the infected being becomes a true vampire and it has to be against another humanoid creature. Whether it’s man, mer or beastfolk it doesn’t matter but feeding on animals doesn’t trigger the change."
"And so you think that because you drank the blood of a daedra it has changed you somehow?"
"I know that it has. I believe that it is the reason why I’m able to walk in sunlight and the differences in how I look and act when I lose control. I might feel uneasy and strangely weary when I enter a temple but the strength that it provides is far greater than anything that is written in anything I have read so far. Most vampires are two or three times stronger than a mortal, but I’m several degrees stronger again. That’s not to mention the other abilities that I used against the cultists."
Viconia went quiet for a moment as she looked at me, thinking over what I had already told her about what had happened. "Creatures that are able to change form are known within the Underdark, but usually from one form into another, and not into multiple forms."
"These abilities are akin to Lycanthropy but it is not the same as that disease. There are stories of vampires becoming one with the darkness but none that I can find is of them being able to transform into bats or mist or physically growing stronger and their face changing when they turn. There are also no stories where anything more than their canines lengthen into fangs, where the more the vampire takes over the more my face changes and the more teeth that change shape."
"So what do you think is the cause?" her question was honest and she leaned further back in her chair, moving some further strands of hair out of her eyes.
"I think that feeding on the daedra has turned me into a form of vampire that either has never been encountered before or is so exceedingly rare that it’s never been recorded. To have simply gotten to this point in the past would have required a concentrated effort on the part of not only an infected individual and a highly experienced conjurer. The amount of time and resources it would have needed to summon a daedra at just the right time for someone infected with vampirism and then manage to drink its blood would have been near impossible to complete before this. That’s not including the fact that I’m not sure if anyone would have considered undertaking something so drastic and incredibly dangerous before."
Once again she smiled, standing up from her chair and moving around to my side of the table. "So you are unique." She murmured, and I felt a shiver of pleasure as she gently patted me on the shoulder. "I doubt that any of the answers that you seek are going to be found trapped on paper abbil."
"I’m suspecting as much myself."
"Then discover it for yourself the more interesting way." My nervousness at not only her proximity but her light touch was building rapidly by the second, sending fire flooding through my veins. "Rather than wasting your hours reading you should be testing yourself. I am going to retire for the evening, but come the morning I’m going to learn more about you..."
There was a wicked pause from the beautiful Drow and she was fully aware of the effects of her proximity to me. "On the training square." She finished, smiling and showing her teeth in such a way that left my mouth dry and lightheaded. "I suggest that you get your own rest while you can."
She strode away, revelling in the control she knowingly held over my emotions. "You wouldn’t want to disappoint me..."
I stayed up only long enough to gain some semblance of control over my desires. For a few minutes I strode the battlements to let the cold mountain winds to reduce my ardour, before crawling under the layers of furs and cloth in my bunk.
The routine of the fortress became second nature to us once more, training our bodies during the day and my mind of the night. Viconia and I became regular training partners to the amusement of the others who would watch our sessions. Viconia was quicker and more precise that what I was but I had a slight edge in strength and power that only barely made us an even match. If we ever found ourselves fighting unrestrained it would still be an even battle as my vampiric nature would be met with her magical abilities.
Every night as dinner would be served, Jauffre had taken the opportunity to brief the assembled Blades in occurrences throughout the empire and the campaign against the cult. Almost a full week after our return to the fortress Jauffre stood, framed by the fireplace and looking over the sea of faces arrayed at the tables in the hall. His expression was grim and he looked every day of his true age.
"The war has begun."
As the silence deepened he motioned with a single sheet of parchment in his hand. "Oblivion gates have opened throughout Tamriel, and while each have been comparatively small compared to what happened to Kvatch there have already been losses."
"How bad is it?" one of the Blades asked softy, her voice barely above a whisper.
Jauffre paused, seemingly to try to not believe the reports that he had been receiving over the previous days. "Villages been razed, hundreds slaughtered and if the reports I have received are accurate then some cities have been destroyed. Ald’Ruhn is apparently nothing more than a smoking ruin."
Those of us familiar with the Dunmer city openly gaped at the news. The seat of House Redoran was one of the more defensible cities in Vvardenfell and for it to fall did not bode well for the rest of the Empire.
"How?" the question echoed through the room, the speaker unseen among the tables. "The Mythic Dawn has been smashed. We control their shrine. How are these portals being created?"
Martin stood up from his chair and moved towards the centre of the hall, nervous at speaking but confident in his knowledge. "Those who Kaius and Viconia killed in the Lake Arrius Caverns represented only a tiny fraction of the whole. There are possibly dozens of cultists still hidden in every city throughout Tamriel and while the loss of their shrine is crippling it isn’t fatal."
Carefully he opened a lid of the crate sitting near his chair and rummaged through its contents for a moment. I could see it was one of the dozens that I had last seen within the cult’s storerooms, and as he turned around he held a pair of the perfectly formed spheres of obsidian in his hands.
"These are Sigil Stones." He explained, holding them up for all of us to see. "They are the key and the way that the cult is summoning the portals. They don’t look like much but these represent the ultimate level of knowledge of the arts of Conjuration and Alteration. With these, even the most unskilled of mages can create a portal to Oblivion."
"So how do we stop them?" I asked carefully, seeing nods of agreement in the crowd of Blades around us.
"The most preferred option is to stop them from creating the gates in the first place." He held up the stone in his right hand, showing it to us all and showing that it was black and perfectly smooth with no discerning features. "The stockpile of these stones that we have acquired from their shrine is a considerable setback to the cult and all that are being found are being brought here for safekeeping."
Carefully, he raised his other hand and the stone contained within. It was no simple sphere of polished stone, but seemed to be writhing and pulsating with foul energies. Ethereal flames swirled inside like oil spreading through water, and a symbol had been carved into the surface that hurt the eyes to look at. "However, when the stones activate they are pulled into oblivion, creating a portal with the stone acting as an anchor within that foul realm. This activation, when done correctly and through the correct rituals can be performed anywhere and is perfectly safe other than creating an entrance for Daedra to enter Mundus. But as you all can expect, the Mythic Dawn don’t care about safety so every time a stone has been activated you can guarantee that the one performing the ritual is killed and their soul sent screaming into Oblivion."
With a nod of his head Martin motioned to Viconia and myself. "Once a portal is opened the only way that it can be closed is by someone removing the stone from where it anchors and channels the energies. This particular stone is the one that Viconia removed from the portal outside of Kvatch so in essence every portal that opens needs to be closed by someone physically entering Oblivion."

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