Sevena blushed at yet another description of the mating customs of the Falmer. She was right, it was a very interesting chapter, but it was also very descriptive, which embarrassed her to no end. It had started out okay, just talking about anatomy and the requirements that a male needed to get a mate, but it had just gotten into sexual... Stuff.
She closed the book, stepping over to her alchemy station. Now was not the time to be reading that. Maybe after she calmed down her libido. She began mixing paralysis potions, something that might be useful, if she ever wanted to investigate a live Falmer. She placed the poison in her potion belt. That was four poisons that were useful, and two potions.
She placed the belt on its hangar, moving to her bed and collapsing on it. She didn't have anything to do. She could try and capture one of the Falmer, but there was no reason to... And that book...
She sighed. It was time to open one of the other books. She grabbed the one that looked like a journal first, its leather binding creaking as she opened it. She scanned the first page of writing, then set it down again. No language she knew. She took the other book, this one thankfully written in the imperial script. Something easy to read. She flopped back down on her bed, turning the page.
"A history of the Dwemer, what they did to the Falmer." Everything was about the Falmer, it seemed. Well, at least she would know more about what she was going to be hunting.
The Dwemer, as she already knew, were a form of bearded elves, that vanished long ago. No one knew why, they just did. Again, common knowledge. But, as she read further, the book talked about the way the Dwemer had been especially good at conjuration, and it was conjectured that they were in Oblivion somewhere. It was an unknown theory, but it was plausible.
A scrape outside her door made her close the book, listening. The sound of the doors levers turning alarmed her, and she snatched her elven dagger up, a Ice Bolt spell on her lips, the glowing blue orb in her palm pulsating
A Falmer walked in, a bow over its shoulder, its eyeless face turning, sniffing to catch her scent. It growled low, pulling out a blade at its side. A dwarven blade, obviously plundered. It scratched out a few words of a strange language, but stayed where it was, in front of the door. Right in the way of her sneaking out.
Her ice bolt flashed out, but was parried by the creature, who immediately charged her. She called another spell to hand, casting it over the creature
The pale skinned, former elf stopped, looked around, then stalked towards her again. Okay, Calm didn't work, and it had too good of reflexes to fight it... Hopefully, she could manage to scratch it with the paralysis on her dagger.
Before she managed to move, the creature tackled her, keeping her pressed to the ground, still snarling, speaking in its language.
"I don't know... I don't know..." She was frightened out of her right mind, trying to get the twisted elf off of her. Her struggling was useless. In fact, worse than useless, as the Falmer bit her, savagely, with its sharp teeth, to get her to stop moving.
"Kahk-ghuta, Likikmeran." It growled at her, its fearsome face contorted in anger. It stood, growling, sniffing around the room, stepping to her skinning table, smelling the dead Falmer recently killed. It hissed, touching its fingers to the blood and bringing it to its mouth. It turned back to Sevena. "Likikmer. Ahg-ganni. Ahg-gagallikinmer"
She stood, leaning on the wall, surprised she wasn't dead yet. The creature was trying to communicate to her, that was obvious, but it's language was much different from her own. She tossed her dagger to it. If it wanted to kill her, it would have already.
"Ahk-ihg-" it grabbed the dagger, sniffing it and running its hands over it. "Likikmeran kavu. Likinmeril kati." It tossed the dagger back to her.
It sniffed one more time, then sat down in her chair. She cautiously moved to her study desk, opening the large book and turning to the contents section. "Falmer language... There."
The section began with the old Falmer lettering, which she skipped, moving straight to the language itself. It talked about the similarities, then got to the word structure. Each word was composed of multiple sections. She looked through the words to find what she wanted to say.
"Likikmeril lissta-ich." This other elf doesn't want to kill. That was what she thought she said, at least. The Falmer referred to themselves strangely. They had no personal pronouns, but they separated themselves from other elves in their speech.
"Likikmeran shak-ezkata?" The creature lowered its weapon slightly, but still kept it ready. "Likikmeran ahg-garignak?"
She again turned to the book for how to say she didn't know how to speak its language. "Eh- Likikmeril kechich-ich." That should work.
The creature stepped closer to her, taking a deep breath of her scent, nodding. "Likikmeran ahki." Again, she had no idea what it said, other than "you other elf-", then something she couldn't understand. The creature stepped away from her, sniffing around the room. It took on last sniff of her, then nodded to itself, walking away, out the door.
She collapsed on her bed, terrified and confused. She should have died to the creature, food for an ever hungry species. But she didn't.
She took her paste out, swallowing some of the gruesome mixture, the taste becoming more and more appealing to her. She wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. She knew the blinding mushroom was probably in their blood, but it also was something that she needed to survive, and she wasn't going to chance eating any fungi in this cave.
She also knew, that someday, if she ever got out, she would be more open to the dark idea of cannibalism, which scared her to no end. Cannibals were monsters in the land of Skyrim. In all of Tamriel. They were feared, and their practices were revolting. But the flesh still wasn't all that bad, taste-wise. She would have to hide it.
She laid down, slowly letting herself sleep, confused and frightened at her intruder.
Authors note: if any of you find any of my stories to be even remotely good, say something. I don't know. I've always considered myself mediocre at best.