Chapter 2
"You worthless little brat, I should have ripped you from my stomach the second I knew you were there."
"You're mother's right girl, there's no room for freaks like you here."
"You have ten minutes to leave this place before I tell my men to rip you limb from limb"
"Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna-"
The voices swirled with their lyrical clarity, all around me. They were chanting, over and over and over again. They were never going to stop, there were too many of them to stop!
"Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it,"
I recognised the voice of my childhood friend, Thedon, killed by a necromancy cult before he'd seen six years. I heard my sister, Gircin, whose heart gave out the day before she turned ten. I felt the oppressive silence of my cousin, Isled, born sleeping.
"Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's go-"
I saw their faces too, ghostly and pale, surrounding me, dragging me further, deeper, down into the black void. A thousand faces belonging to a thousand dead children.
"Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna-"
Their pale dead fingers tugged at my clothing, poked at my skin, pulled at my hair. They clawed their way inside of me with their blunt childlike nails, their ethereal voices bored into me like a drill, round and round and round with same perfect clarity, the same ghostly truth. I stumbled, knocked over by a particularly strong tug. I fell to my knees; to weak too get back up again, too tired, too worn down to care. And all the while they stared at me, with their dead, black, accusatory stares.
"Please, leave me alone!" I sobbed quietly, salty tears liberally rolled down my face, carving shiny trails over my dark flesh.
A single figure stepped forward, her features closely matched mine but her appearance had been ravaged by age and blood.
"You brought this upon yourself, you condemned your own soul to the wrath of Tall Papa, and whatever judgement you receive is fully deserved. I wash my hands of you, daughter." She spoke with so much conviction I couldn't doubt that she believed what she was saying, but that didn't mean I had to accept it. I grit my teeth and pulled myself shakily to my feet, I couldn't bring myself to speak up against the hordes of dead children, but I wasn't prepared to take any crap from the woman who kicked me out of my own home for pursuing my own interests.
"Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna get it, Sharli's gonna g-"
"Please, be quiet spirits. I must speak with this woman about something very important." I said.
"What would this important something be, brat?" my mother spat, her lower lip curled in disgust.
"You betrayed me. You had a responsibility as parent, you shouldn't ha-"
"I did no such thing!" She cried angrily, her chocolate eyes darkening. "You were the one who did the betraying! You practiced dangerous magic in our home! You could have gotten your brothers and sisters killed! You took everything we struggled so hard for and tried to throw it all away on a petty whim! I hate you, you should hate you too." Her voice broke on the last sentence, tears began to pool in her eyes and every hardship, and every battle she'd fought in the name of protecting our family was instantly visible.
"I'm sorry." I said quietly, the realisation that I had endangered my brothers and sisters slowly dawning on me. I might as well have killed them. I didn't deserve to flee to the safety of another province; I should have just waited around to be killed.
"Sharli nearly killed us, Sharli nearly killed us, Sharli nearly killed us, Sharli nearly killed us, Sharli nearly killed us, Sharli nearly killed us, Sharli nearly kille-"
"Sharli, it's time to wake up now."
The spirits were pulled back all of a sudden, their agonized screams filled my head. It was intense, loud, but also satisfying, like the pain of pulling out a splinter or cracking a twisted joint back into place.
"Sharli, wake up."
"Shar-"
'''
The bed I woke up in was soft, and the room was far warmer than anything I'd experienced all week. I felt as if I could lie there forever, basking in the peace and quiet of this unexplored place. For a moment I struggled to remember how I got there, before realising that I was too relaxed to care.
"She looks like she's waking up." A disembodied voice noted.
"It remains to be seen what damage was done, at the moment we don't even know if she remembers how to tie her own shoelaces." I recognised the distinctive accent of a high elf, but it wasn't anyone I knew.
"I'll have you know that restoration can heal any sort of damage suffered by a living thing, I once knew a mage who re-grew a child's arm!" Said the first voice in a strange accent I couldn't quite place.
"I'm not doubting the power of a well done healing spell, what I'm saying is that it isn't necromancy, it cannot bring brain cells killed by oxygen deprivation back to life." The high elf argued.
"It can speed up the healing process though, help create new ones."
"The brain is the most mysterious and complex of all organs; even now we still don't fully understand how it stores information. We won't know how much damage was done until she wakes up."
"I don't feel brain-damaged." I said quietly, opening my eyes slowly so as not to be blinded by the light of the room.
"Finally, you're awake." The high elf said. I noticed she was shorter than most altmer, so short I could've mistaken her for a bosmer if it weren't for her regal air and thalmor robe.
"You're with the thalmor." I noted, from what I'd heard of them, they weren't a nice group to be dealing with.
"Yes I am. My name is Aryenne and I'm a high-ranking wizard within the Aldmeri Dominion, I'm here to try and re-establish diplomatic relations with your college following the unfortunate actions of my predecessor, Ancano." She explained. To be honest, I didn't think she sounded evil, or even that stuck up. But who am I to judge? When I was a child my mother had a friend who killed his wife and children and buried their bodies in a sand dune, he seemed like perfectly nice man until the king's soldiers discovered the decomposing corpses; it's very hard to spot evil at first, or even second, glance.
"What did Ancano do that was so terrible?" I asked curiously.
"He only killed the arch-mage!" the room's other occupant spoke up suddenly, her eyes narrowed at Aryenne, "I think you should leave now, elf. You've done what you came to do; I have no more need of your assistance!"
"As you wish, if you have further need of my services do not be afraid to ask." Aryenne replied in an even tone. She bowed her head to the other mage, and then to me, before leaving the room.
"Thank the eight, she's finally gone! The thalmor has a lot of nerve, sending someone like her here after what happened with Ancano!" The mage said.
"She didn't seem all that bad to me." I countered, and it was true, I hadn't met many high elves, but she was the nicest one I had. "Why was she here anyway?" I asked.
"She was helping me heal your injuries with some special potions from the Summerset Isles. How are your injuries by the way? You're not in any pain are you?"
"No, I feel fine…" I paused for a second, I couldn't remember even getting injured, "I'm sorry, but I can't really remember, how did I get hurt? In fact, scratch that, how did I even get here?"
"Are you sure you don't remember?" She asked, "Do you not know who I am?"
"Not really, no." I was becoming increasingly confused.
"My name's Colette Marance, I'm the college's resident restoration specialist. I've been looking after you whilst you recovered over the past few days." She explained.
"Thank you for that, but I still don't understand how I got here, last I remember I was talking to a bard in a tavern!" I exclaimed, wishing that she would just tell me what happened.
"I suppose it makes sense for your brain to be a bit scrambled, by all rights that fall should have killed you! It was only thanks to the intervention of my prized student that it didn't!"
That fall… that rung a bell but I still wasn't getting any specifics, I could vaguely remember ice and fear, but that was it. "Please, would you explain what happened? I'm really disorientated at the moment and I don't have a clue what you're talking about!" I asked.
"Oh I do apologise, I have a tendency to get a bit carried away when I'm talking to new people, I suppose it's because nobody that already know takes me seriously. They simply refuse to believe that restoration is a valid school of magic, especially Tolfdir! He doesn't even believe there should be a need for restorati-"
"Please, can you just tell me how I got here?" I pleaded.
"Sorry dear. From what Faralda told me, you were crossing the bridge over from Winterhold when you slipped and fell. Luckily for you, one of our newest apprentices has a passion for hiking, he cast a healing spell on you as you hit the ground to negate any fatal damage, then continued to heal to the best of his ability. Whilst that was happening, Faralda summoned Tolfdir and myself to the bridge. Tolfdir used a powerful telekinesis spell to pull you up from the ground, and then I cast a series of more advanced restoration spells to heal the rest of the damage." As she spoke, Colette pulled a bundle of cloth and a pair of boots from one of the crates that filled the room. "Tolfdir, our current Master Wizard, brought these over for you earlier. Your old robes were destroyed when you fell, we had to get rid of them because they were beyond the help of even our most skilled seamstress."
"Thank you, for everything. Will I get to see Tolfdir so I can thank him as well?" I asked. I could still remember very little from the accident, but it sounded like I was lucky to be alive.
"He should be around later, he likes to show all the new apprentices around and deliver a few words of warning." She said.
"And what about the apprentice that saved me as I hit the ground…" I racked my brain for a name, or even a species, "a wood elf if I recall correctly?"
"Yes, he is a wood elf. Nalimi, he's one of the few apprentices that willingly studies restoration magic, he's incredibly good at it as well. You should have the opportunity to thank him when you have your first lecture in the hall of the elements, you'll be in the same group together." She replied proudly, her eyes took on an excited light as she spoke of her favourite pupil. To be honest I pitied the guy, he obviously got a lot of attention from Colette, but as far as I could tell she was totally nuts.
"That's good." I smiled.
"Well, I should probably leave you to get changed in peace. Tolfdir should be here in about an hour, if you need anything my room's next door, there are also plenty of other people wandering around." Colette said.
"Thank you again, I'm incredibly grateful for everything you've done for me." I said as she walked out of the room. "So far, so good." I muttered quietly to myself, fumbling gracelessly into the apprentice robes she'd left me. I'd successfully made it into the college (albeit with a few hiccups), now all I had to do was survive.
A/N: Thank you everyone who's reading this, and thank you to kat, Swi7, and ElderSkie for the reviews, it's greatly appreciated =)
On another note, I'm really sorry if this chapter felt a bit like filler, it felt like the only logical progression from the last chapter because I didn't want to brush over the near-death-experience thing too quickly. It wasn't a total waste of a chapter though, there were some hints for future plots and you could probably figure out some pretty awesome twists I have planned if you really looked at it (and made a lucky guess =P), thanks again for reading!