Ghosts of the Past
Martin Septim stood back, looking over the little house. To say he was admiring his handiwork was to give him a bit too much credit: the house was more a shack than anything else. It was unsettlingly lopsided, and the roof hung at an odd angle. Someone behind him tut-tutted disapprovingly.
"You're gonna have to tear it down and start over. Again."
Martin sighed, hanging his head. "I know... but it's going to have to do for now," he said. "I need to report back to the Temple of Mara and meet up with Desmond, it will be fine while I'm gone."
"Has it even got locks on the doors?" Jean Christophe asked, giving the door a surprisingly solid knock. Martin scowled at the ghost of his comrade before turning to pick up his bag from where it sat by the drafting bench.
"I did read about proper lock design. It will be fine," he insisted. "Come on."
The door swung open. Jean looked pointedly at Martin. "Really? Proper lock design?"
Martin glowered at him. "Close the door and let's go. No one is going to think anything of value is in there, anyway."
"Yeah, fair enough." Jean shut the door and followed Martin to the south, towards Whiteurn. "Let's just hope it doesn't cave in on everything you hold dear."
"Do not tempt fate. Fate has creative ways of answering," Martin pointed out.
As they traveled, they gave the city of Whiterun a wide berth. Ghosts tended to make the people of Skyrim a bit uncomfortable, if the unfavorable reception of Ivarstead was any indication. But when out and about, Martin frequently traveled with at least one of the long-dead heroes of his past, even more so now that he and Desmond had gone separate ways. It had been a mutual agreement after a few more months of companionship, fighting off bandit raids and the occasional dragon attack. While he and Desmond still met up and occasionally ran into each other, and while the toll of Alduin's fall still stung beneath his skin, Martin had to admit that he missed the adventurous life. He enjoyed his work for the Temples well enough, but there was something to be said for getting up in the morning and simply taking on whatever the day had to offer.
"How are the girls?" Martin asked offhandedly.
"Hm?" Jean looked surprised. "Fine. Anna's having a blast in Sovngarde and Amelie Rose is still catching up with Lex and her daughter."
"Oh. Good."
"I mean, we're dead. What can go wrong now?"
This was true. Especially with Alduin gone, the afterlife had to be one of the safest places in creation. "How about Aleius?" Martin asked.
"Alenvar?" Jean nodded. "He's good. He and Amelie Rose are getting along famously, let me tell you. Sometimes I think they're fighting, but then I get close enough to hear them spouting restoration theory and black arts arguments at each other for days on end... I don't understand a word of it."
"That's excellent. I had hoped they would get along," Martin said as Jean fell behind.
"Where to?" asked the carriage driver outisde the Whiterun stables.
"Riften," Martin said, looking back. Jean bowed his head and vanished in a small puff of blue fog.
"All right. Climb in back and we'll be off."
"You shall not evade me forever. Your free will is an illusion. Whether you acknowledge me or not is your own business. But I will be in your mind."
He had learned long ago never to Shout inside the house, even for a companion. The Voice was not something to be quietly used.
"ZOOR!"
A bluish cloud of smoke came to the ground from the starry skies above, Amelie's ghost rising from it. She held a staff in her hand, a handful of lightning in the other. They always came expecting battle—better paranoid than blindsided.
"What do you need?" she asked evenly, hanging her staff on her back with a muted glare in his direction. At least she was no longer angry with him.
"I need to speak with you," he said.
Amelie shook her head, sighing deeply. "I'm not getting into this again."
"Not that. Something different," Martin added quickly. "Please, it's important."
He led the way into the little house, sitting down on a chair that tipped dangerously on uneven legs. She refused to sit in the other chair, probably for that very reason. Instead, she stayed standing, her arms tightly crossed and her eyes still narrowed in a glare.
"What now?" she asked.
"I've just come from Winterhold." Martin pulled the Oghma Infinium out of his bag and laid it on the table. He watched her expression go from quietly upset to horrified. "Septimus got the box open."
"And that was inside?"
"Yes."
"You're not...?" Amelie sank into her chair, leaning forward to keep it from tipping. "You aren't going to read it, are you?"
"No. It's going to stay in the trunk with all the rest," Martin said firmly.
"What all do you have?" she asked.
"Oghma Infinium," he said, ticking them off on his fingers. "A ring of Hircine's, mace of Molag Bal, Sanguine Rose—"
"How did you—"
"Long story," Martin said dismissively. "And a beacon of Meridia's. I should probably deal with that at some point, she keeps talking to me through it."
Amelie crossed her arms on the table, frowning. "I worry for you with all this Daedric influence."
"At least here, I can safely ignore them," Martin pointed out, unlocking a chest in the corner of the single-room shack. All the artifacts he had collected in the past few months were piled unceremoniously inside. He dropped the Oghma Infinium on top and shut the chest again, locking it. "And the rest of Tamriel can ignore them, too."
"How can anyone ignore it if Meridia's constantly yelling at you?" Amelie pointed out.
"It's not that loud inside the chest, and she doesn't yell—"
"What now?"
Martin shrugged. "Stay the night here, at least. The Temple of Mara has nothing else for me to do, so."
"Then what?" Amelie prompted.
"I don't know." Admitting it out loud made him feel more restless than he had felt in a long while. "I don't know what's left to be done."
A knowing smile crept onto her face. "I know this feeling."
"What feeling?"
"Purposelessness." She rested her chin in her hand, looking at him. "The battle is over, the war is won, and the hero is left without anything to do. It happened to me."
"And how did you get past it?"
She laughed. "I got married. Had children. Faked my death and became a madgod."
Martin scoffed. "I aspire not to do any of that."
"Well, then ignore me." Amelie clasped her hands together on the table, twisting her wedding ring on her finger. "Surely there is something left for you to do. Remember the plan."
"The plan was just to do good, and I should like to think I have done that," Martin pointed out. "A few times over, by now."
"So do you feel forgiven?"
"No!" He shook his head, sighing. "No. I feel better, but not..."
They were quiet. Amelie rose from her chair and gently pushed it back in to the table, picking up a book from a small, slanted bookshelf. "Then perhaps you aren't done," she suggested.
"Perhaps I am trying to find forgiveness in the wrong places," he said dully.
"Listen." She leaned down to look him in the eyes. "Stay the night here, all right? In the morning we can talk more about what to do. Maybe something will pop up and need dealing with."
Martin sighed. "Right. All right, sure."
Amelie turned to leave the house. She never stayed inside the house overnight, none of them did. Whenever he stayed at Heljarchen Hall, they watched the door from the little garden outside. "Get some rest," she said, flipping open the book she'd surely read a hundred times over weeks of nights spent keeping the house safe.
"Amelie?"
"Hm?" She looked up, a little ball of light in her hand.
Martin paused, the ghost of an idea occurring to him. He'd sleep on it, but just maybe... why hadn't he thought of it sooner? "Desmond loved his ring," he said finally.
Amelie beamed brightly at him. "Good. I'm glad."
"Good night."
"Good night," she said, closing the door behind her.
Her little ball of light shone faintly from outside as he drifted off to sleep.
The captain of the Northern Maiden brought the ship to the dock, the deck pitching and rocking as it made port. It had been a turbulent ride from the docks of Windhelm. So this was Morrowind.
"Well, here we are. This is Raven Rock," said Captain Gjalund. "Can't say I'm all that glad to see it again. Good luck. Maybe you can figure out what's going on around here."
"Thank you." Martin stepped off the boat, looking around. Raven Rock was entirely foreign to him, and looked nothing at all like the cities of Skyrim he'd grown used to. The air was dry and dusty, even over the water. What was it that he expected to find here? With any luck, something to do. If that something happened to lead him towards whoever wanted him dead, such the better.
A professional-looking Dark Elf approached him as he walked on the dock, still taking in the surroundings.
"I don't recognize you, so I'll assume this is your first visit to Raven Rock, outlander," said the elf. "State your intentions."
"Hm?" Brought back to earth, Martin searched for words. "I'm looking for Miraak. Do you know where I can find him?"
The elf looked faintly confused. "Miraak. I... I'm not sure that I do."
"So..." Martin crossed his arms, suspicious. "Do you know who he is?"
"I, I'm unsure. I swear I know the name, but I cannot place it." The elf frowned, his gaze a thousand leagues away.
"Can you tell me anything about him?"
"I don't think so. I'm not..." The elf broke off. This was becoming more and more strange by the moment. "The name has something to do with the Earth Stone, I think. But I'm not sure what."
Martin nodded, still suspicious. "Thank you."
"Just remember, Raven Rock is sovereign ground of House Redoran. This is Morrowind, not Skyrim. While you're here, you will be expected to abide by our laws."
"Of course."
"Remember, we're watching you." The elf turned to the captin of the Maiden. "Gjalund! I was beginning to wonder what happened to you."
"We, ah. We were delayed by bad weather. Before you even ask, yes, I have the supplies you requested. But..."
Martin took off, looking around the city and wondering how bad an idea it would be to call for a companion here. He thought better of it—at least in parts of Skyrim, he could explain the ghosts away as a Shout. He wasn't sure what kind of clout the term "Dragonborn" held in Morrowind. Hopefully, the next time he spoke with Amelie, she would have some information for him.
"Excuse me," he said, stopping someone at random on the road. "Do you know of someone called Miraak?"
"Do I?" asked the elf, sounding lost. "I was going to say no, but something makes me feel like I do. Does that make sense?"
"...No," Martin admitted. "Is he someone here in Raven Rock?"
"No, I'm sure of that," said the elf, shaking his head with such vigor that his hat fell askew. "And yet, I think I had a dream of a temple, and he was there."
"Thank you."
"Pleasant journey, serjo."
Martin wandered around Raven Rock, asking a few more elves he saw if they knew anything of Miraak and receiving much the same response. How could it be that someone had sent a pack of soldiers to kill him, and somehow not exist? He reached what he hoped to be the outskirts of town, among what looked to be ruins.
"ZOOR!"
Amelie descended from the clouds, quickly putting away her staff.
"All right, here's what I know," she said immediately, walking alongside him. "Solstheim was given to Morrowind in the early Fourth Era, I vaguely remember this happening a few years after Ocato was assassinated. Lore has it that Solstheim used to be a contingent area of Skyrim until some Dragon Priests in the Merethic Era tore it from the mainland."
"That doesn't help me."
"Sorry," she said, frowning. "I'm not sure what will be relevant, that was a pretty cryptic note."
"How did Morrowind come to claim it?"
"Red Mountain turned half the island into ashlands. The High King of Skyrim turned over rulership to Morrowind as a goodwill gesture," Amelie reeled off. "The elves here were probably displaced by the destruction and escaped here."
"Probably to the Gray Quarter of Windhelm, too." Martin crossed his arms, frowning. "I don't suppose any of this has anything to with Miraak."
"Alen and I came up empty," Amelie admitted.
"He's helping?" Martin asked, shocked.
Amelie cringed a bit. "I... had to be creative about how I asked."
Martin's shoulders drooped a bit. "Ah."
"He'll come around," Amelie said comfortingly. "Just give him some time."
"Here at his shrine."
"Here do we toil."
"That we might remember."
The ruins were not so deserted, after all. None of them seemed to pay them any mind, going about their work carrying stones and praying to a tall stone structure in the middle of a pool of water. They recited snippets of some sort of mantra as they worked, their eyes glazed over and unfocused.
"By night we reclaim."
"By day what was stolen."
"Far from ourselves."
"What in the world...?" Martin tried to get the attention of a man walking rigidly towards the work site. The man did not stop, moving right past them towards the tall stone. "I don't suppose you have an explanation for this?" he asked Amelie.
"Hardly." She was standing on her toes, trying to look one of the hyper-focused workers in the eye. "I cannot imagine what's gotten into them, I can hardly assume this is normal."
"You there."
Martin turned around, coming face to face with a Dunmer man who looked decidedly more in possession of his faculties than the rest of the men and elves working around the stone. Amelie backed away nervously.
"No no, stay," the elf said quickly, frowning at her in what appeared to be curiosity. "You're quite interesting."
"Thank you?" she said uncertainly, casting an anxious look at Martin as the elf peered closely at her, mumbling something to himself.
Martin cleared his throat, attracting the strange man's attention again. "Can I help you?" he asked.
"You don't seem to be in quite the same state as the others," said the elf, turning to peer at Martin with an unsettlingly clinical stare. "Very interesting. May I ask what it is you're doing here?"
"I'm looking for someone named Miraak," Martin said carefully. Something about this stranger struck him as odd, even though he wasn't entranced as the rest of the group was. "Do you know him?"
"Miraak... Miraak..." The stranger stood up straight, arms crossed. "It sounds familiar, and yet I can't quite place..."
"You and the rest of this town," Martin sighed. "No one seems to know who he is."
"Oh wait! I recall!" The stranger's face lit up for a moment, almost immediately falling back into its frown. "But that makes very little sense. Miraak's been dead for thousands of years."
"What does that mean?" Martin asked the stranger.
"I'm not sure. But it is fascinating, isn't it? Perhaps it has some relation to what's going on here." The stranger turned to the stone and those working on it. "Quite unexpected."
"What are they doing?" Amelie asked.
"Building something. Clearly," the stranger said matter-of-factly. "And yet, they don't seem to have much to say about it. I'm very interested to find out what happens when they finish."
"Have you tried to stop this?" Martin asked, approaching the stone proper. It was tall and solid, but appeared not to be extraordinary in any way he could tell.
"Certainly not! Doing so would interfere with whatever is going on, and I would be unable to see how this all turns out," said the stranger.
"What is this stone for?" he asked.
"Don't—DON'T, that seems inadvisable!" the stranger said quickly as Martin touched it.
His vision blurred for a moment, voices blending together around him.
"Fascinating..."
"...what are you doing..."
"...whatever influence is affecting..."
"...MARTIN!"
He shook his head, clearing the fog from his mind. He was among the other workers, holding a heavy stone in his hands. "What...?"
"Ah! So you appear to be able to resist the effect by exerting your will," the stranger said, again peering closely at him. "Fascinating."
"Are you all right?" Amelie asked.
"Fine... what happened?"
"You started working with them." She fidgeted nervously, watching as he dropped the stone on a pile of others. "Perhaps you have a stronger mind than they."
"Perhaps."
"I would advise not touching the stone again," the stranger said knowingly. "The effects of repeated contact could be... well, unless of course you'd like to contribute to my investigation. It could be very enlightening to observe you."
"I'd rather not," Martin said, running a hand through his hair. "Is there anything else you can tell me about Miraak?"
The stranger grumbled noncomittally. "I'm afraid I can't give you any answers, but there are ruins of an ancient temple of Miraak's toward the center of the island. If I were you, I'd look there."
Martin turned to Amelie, who shrugged. "That's more information than I was able to find."
"It's as good a place to start as any. Thank you—"
The stranger was already off, observing another of the unfortunate workers on the stone.
Jean was still scowling at him as they approached the construction around the shrine. "I can't believe you."
"What?"
"A thousand gold?" Jean demanded. "That had to be the most thinly veiled excuse I've ever heard!"
"That was a lot of money," Anna Marie agreed.
"I have nothing else to spend it on!" Martin pointed out.
"More books?" Amelie suggested lightly. "It's what I'd do—"
"What about fixing your damn house?" Jean snapped.
"I just wanted to help the poor fellow!" Martin said defensively. "Stuck digging an entire barrow out of the dust, I don't envy him the job. Besides, what happened to doing good?"
"There's a difference between doing good and bleeding gold!" Jean scolded.
Martin blew out a breath, refusing to entertain anything further. While none of them agreed that the investment had been wise, the three ghosts had been a great help when strange bugs and reavers launched themselves at him on the way from Ralis's newly financed dig site.
"That world will cease to be."
"Here in his temple."
A dragon skeleton lay buried in the ash. Martin led the way up into the construction, Amelie waving the other two ghosts on.
"They seem not to care," she explained. "Something's taken hold of them, they won't notice us."
"That they have forgotten."
"Here do we toil."
"That we might remember..."
"They're all reciting that mantra, too," Martin said. "Do you think Miraak is controlling them?"
"All of them?" Amelie asked. "From beyond the grave, apparently?"
"...please! You must listen to me!"
As they neared the center of the shrine, they heard shouting. A woman was yelling at one of the workers, begging her to leave. She was a tall and heavily armored Nord woman who spoke with an unfamiliar accent.
"You there. What brings you to this place? Why are you here?" she asked.
"Who are you?" Martin asked. The ghosts made themselves scarce, ducking behind columns and watching from a safe distance as Martin spoke with her.
"I am Frea of the Skaal. I am here to either save my people or avenge them."
"Save them? From what?"
"I am unsure." Frea crossed her arms, shifting uneasily. "Something has taken control of most of the people of Solstheim. It makes them forget themselves, and work on these horrible creations that corrupt the Stones, and the land itself. My father Storn, our shaman, says Miraak has returned to Solstheim, but that is impossible."
Martin nodded. "That's what we know, too. Miraak tried to have me killed."
"Then you and I both have reason to see what lies beneath us. Let us go, there is nothing more I can do here." Frea cast a glance back at the workers, still reciting in low voices as they worked. They showed no signs of slowing or stopping, even as the sun sank lower on the horizon. "The Tree Stone and my friends are beyond my help for now. We need to find out way into the temple below."