On the road at the edge of a frozen cliff, a man walks along the stone path. He is unable to see five feet in front of him due to the thick blizzard. The man wore a black, hooded cloak that was turning white from the falling snow. As he walked his footprints were covered seconds after he lifted his feet.
He looked up and shouted, "Lok Vah Koor!" It was loud and in a tongue that only those who have devoted their lives to its words could understand. A role of thunder cracked and the clouds parted, showing the bright sun in the sky. With no blizzard to cloud his sight, he saw the end of his journey, the mages college of Winterhold.
He entered the rebuilt city and made his way to the bridge, the reconstruction officially began five years ago, and to the man, it was quite impressive. As he was passing what was once the jarl's longhouse, then his eyes fell upon the mead hall. The city had a radius of half a mile and in the center, the college stood, a large stone tower, and on the roof were three circular buildings that connected to the surrounding wall. The stone bridge that lead up to it touched the edge of the roof and met with a metal gate. Two of the towers matched each other and were on the opposite sides, the last one was the largest with a wide, round window at the top. It was at least twice the size of the others. The man had been to the college before and noticed a small change to the larger tower. Another wing was added onto it.
When he arrived at the bridge, he walked up the first steps, towards the first, small joint of the bridge. A robed woman appeared in front of him and spoke, "Stop where you are, unless you want me to melt your skin off?" The man recognized the robes she wore. It was of the college, robes of an expert level of destruction. She was obviously a teacher.
The man looked up, he was wearing a mask that was as pale as bone. It had two tusks coming down from the cheek and two round eyes with a narrow slit so the man could see. The name of the mask was Krosis. "Why such hostility towards a friend?" his voice was muffled by the mask, "And a friend of the arch mage at that." The man sounded sincere with a sarcastic tone.
"What is your name, traveler." The woman was committed to her guard. Hand still raised, she prepared to cast a spell of destruction.
The man paused for a moment. "Surely you arch mage has told you of me? No?" He sighed, removed his mask and spoke again, "My name is Troy." He was a nord, long blond hair that was starting to grey, a beard and blue eyes. A few scars showed on his cheek along with spots of dirt.
The woman's eyes widened, "Forgive me," she pulled of her hood and showed that she was a high elf, "come right this way." She straightened up and waved her arm in the direction of the bridge.
As they began to walk, Troy spoke again. "You still didn't answer my question."
"And what question is that?"
"Why are you so hostile toward a guest?"
The high elf paused again and looked at him, "A guest belongs in an inn, and the rest of Winterhold still blames us for the great collapse. We still get angry mobs and with the town growing in population, the nords have been getting more support. So we have to be a bit more hostile towards them." She turned away and held her hand up, it started to glow and then a bright light burst from her palm and shot toward a small fountain on the bridge.
Troy continued the conversation, "But you helped rebuild the town, didn't you?"
"Of course we did, but the nords of Skyrim are a stubborn people, they remember every fault, no matter how many times the debt is repaid. Besides, we like being outcasts, if we are left alone, we have much more time for our study, the attacks only happen about once a month and our arch mage uses a master spell of illusion to calm the mobs. It wears off a couple days later but it takes them longer to organize another attack."
"I know what you mean. It took me a while to get Ulfric to fix the grey quarter for the dark elves back in Windhelm."
"I think that one of our students would appreciate that, she had been complaining about it until word of its resolve reached us." She cast the spell on another pool and turned back for a response.
"How do you think your students will react seeing a nord walk through the front gate with no explanation?"
"I think they will be to concentrated on their research to notice." They had arrived at the front gate that was made of tall metal poles and an image of an eye with columns of energy shooting out from it, through the bars Troy could see a statue of the first arch mage of the college. The high elf cast a spell on another pool right outside the gate and the metal doors swung open. The woman turned to him again, "The arch mage will be in his quarters." She turned around and cast a spell on the pool again and the gate creaked shut. As he walked across the courtyard a kajiit made a quick glance his way and returned to casting enchantments on a pile of scrolls. The statue in the center of the courtyard had a pool in the front, much like the ones on the bridge, but this one was about three times as large as the others and had a large column of blue light emitting from the glowing liquid. He passed it and noticed the garden to the left and right of him, the path leading to the large building was stone and despite the cold weather it was warmer than the air. Most likely a series of spells to keep it that way. He opened the large iron door and stepped inside.
The room inside the large building was circular, except for the entrance with two columns of spiraling staircases on both sides. In front of Troy was another door with a sign on the side that read "Keep door closed when teaching, experimenting, testing, practicing, and harnessing any type of magic." On the other side he could hear a series of explosions and the crack under the door kept flashing as each explosion occurred. He turned to his right and walked up the staircase, one rotation he passed a wooden door that read "The Arcanaeum" with a small note etched under the title, "Please Remember to Return Books in the Condition They Were Taken." Continuing up the stairs he read another door, "Arch Mages Quarters." He knocked twice and heard a familiar voice.
"Come in!" The voice was young but came from the throat of an old man, a bretton. When Troy entered the man was sitting down at a table, eating a sweet role and reading a book. Without looking up he swallowed and a wide grin appeared on his wrinkled face. "Troy! How have you been?"