IV.

You're going to drown.

In front, behind, left and right, there's nothing but inky darkness.

As you stretch your hands out in front of you, they disappear in the suffocating murkiness. As for Vilkas, perhaps even the Nine don't even know where he is.

You've tried to find the surface, but your head has already hit rock, and now up might be down. Left might be right. You might even be swimming back the way you came.

Several electrical currents of panic puncture your brain. If you could just find the way you had come. If you could just find a pocket of air.

Sand and pebbles and weed brush your fingertips. You've gone too far down and now your lungs feel like they are full of fire and are about to explode. Your eyes bulge in their sockets.

Swimming stops being swimming and becomes flailing. You brandish your arms around, your actions made sluggish by the water. You imagine Hircine standing at the edge, his wolf companions lapping at the water. They wait for you to die.

Then one of the Nine, or some other Daedric Prince, reaches out for you.

Their hand latches around your wrist, and they drag you through the tunnels of shallow water, until your bedraggled carcass is on land.

Cold air floods your lungs. They squeeze together and you cough and gasp and wretch forwards to bring up water.

'By the Nine,' Vilkas says, panting. He runs a hand through his air and brushes water from the fur around his chest plate. 'Didn't think we were ever going to surface.'

His other hand is still around your wrist.

Vilkas clears his throat.

You flex your fingers.

Droplets of water hang off his nose and chin and rest on his eyelashes. His hair, sodden and dripping, sticks to his skin.

At first your words become stuck in your throat, but when you manage to get them out you thank the Nord for his assistance.

'Get lost, wolf pup?' There's no malice in his voice. He shakes his head like a canine and sends droplets of water into the air. 'Me too,' he says. 'Hope there aren't many more passageways like that. '

You point out to Vilkas that once the mission is complete you might have to come back this way.

He juts out his chin, says, 'We'll deal with that matter when we come to it.'

There's the sound of constant running water, and the splashes your feet make as you walk upstream.

The wind moans.

The weight of your amour and your wet clothes cause you to walk hunched. Clumps of hair stick to your face. Your muscles tremble uncontrollable. Tremors rock your body, cause your teeth to chatter. You clench your teeth, hug yourself. It feels like you have been buried alive in the snow.

Vilkas pats your shoulder.

The cave walls glow blue and green like an apothecary bottle illuminated by a potion. Now and then you come across a hole in the roof that allows light to flood the corridor.

Shale and gravel crunch beneath your feet.

Spiders aren't the only creatures who inhabit Chillwind Depths.

You've read about them in books, but this is the first time you've seen one.

You hold your breath, peer around a corner.

'Falmer,' Vilkas breathes as one stalks past.

Their sun starved skin is like bleached bone. Their noses have collapsed into their faces and replaced by two slits giving them a slight reptilian face.

There's no hint of their Mer heritage. It's been drowned out of them from their time underground. Beaten out of them by the Dwemer who betrayed them.

One stops, sniffs the air.

Vilkas' draws close to you, his mouth inches from your ear. His warm breath causes your wet skin to prickle.

'They're blind,' he whispers. 'But only a fool would underestimate them. Take heed Harbinger. They're formidable opponents. '

The Falmer's head twitches from side to side. It grinds its teeth, then turns and heads back up the way it came.

'We should creep up on them,' Vilkas says. 'Take each one out without fuss.' You nod. It's impossible to tell how many Falmer may lurk ahead. Taking each one out in secret will ensure no alarm is raised.

Vilkas replaces his sword with the bow off his back. He pulls an arrow from the quiver, and sets it against the string. Then, back and knees bent, little by little he places one foot in front of the other. Taking hold of you dagger, you mimic him, and follow.

It's how you proceed through the tunnels of Chillwind Depths. A hunting party who bides their time, knowing that to be hasty would could bring death. You watch the back, and Vilkas leads at the front.

Your heart quakes. You try to steady your breathing. Spiders you can deal with. They're ugly to look at but they're not subtle. You can read their moves before they enact them. But you've never fought Falmer. You're curious and wary to see how they manage with no sight.

A bubbling spring, froths to the left of you.

You walk into Vilkas' back.

'Careful.' he says, steadying you. 'Do not want to walk into that.'

Up ahead is an entrance. It is accompanied by a fence either side, made from tree bark woven tightly together. Axes are propped up against it.

The Nord points, and you see, in between the fences there's a pressure pad for a trap.

'We'll have to deactivate it before we go through,' Vilkas says. 'Be ready, the noise from the trap will probably bring them to us.'

He brings up his bow, narrows his eyes.

Why waste an arrow and alert them when you can use your power? You grab hold of his arm. Tell him to wait. Tell him to watch.

With your eyes closed you submerge yourself in the darkness inside your head. You can hear the crackle of fire from a torch up ahead. You drown out the noise by listening to the drumbeat inside you, your thudding heart.

It's a word the Greybeards gave you. Therefore it's one you treasure.

You drag the letters into your mind. You arrange them in the darkness, and when all is in order you speak the word and you become the wind.

The word smudges together.

Your body jolts forwards. It's like taking one giant step, though in reality you're taking many but at increased speed.

The air roars in your ears.

In one blink, you are the other side of the trap.

A smile crosses your face. Your stomach summersaults. You want, need to see Vilkas' reaction. If setting fire to the spiders impressed him, what will his reaction be to this?

The Nord isn't the easiest to impress. Any compliments off him feels like receiving a set of armour made of Ebony.

You find yourself clinging to his words and recalling them on cold evenings. Thinking about his voice causes warmth to flow through your body, though you aren't sure why.

There's one wooden lever in the wall. Presuming it controls the trap, you pull it.

The trap deactivates with a clunk. You turn, are about to call Vilkas through, but come face to face with a Falmer.

It stares at you through its milky and useless eyes.

It sniffs the air.

It sneers.

Threads of lightning run up the staff it's holding.

Adrenaline gushes through your body. You reach out for the Falmer. You wrap your hands around the Falmer's neck, and smash its head against the wall.

'I am beginning to think there is nothing you cannot do,' Vilkas says, his gaze resting on the limp body you clutch.

Vilkas holds his wounded arm.

You smirk, tell him you can do most things, apart from breathe under water.

The Falmer smells musty, like how the dirt smells after a storm. The twang of blood fills your nostrils and you look down at the dead Falmer's face.

Its blind eyes are still open.

You wonder if they ever think about their ancestors'. Are they intelligent enough to recall their history? Do their ancestors dead memories resonate through their minds?

The Falmer's body slips from your fingers, collides with a decorative pot. It shatters into pieces.

You hear hurried footfalls in the corridors beyond the room.

Vilkas puts his bow away and unsheathes his sword. He gives you a level gaze.

'That's done it,' he says.

No point in hiding.

They'll find you.

They're blind.

But they'll find you.

You snatch the mage's staff from the dead Falmer's hands.

With both hands holding his broad sword, Vilkas nudges you with his arm. 'Don't worry,' he says, 'I have your back.'

There's confidence in his voice. It flows into you.

You both charge out of the room.

You slay whatever Falmer you find in the corridors. Vilkas alternates between his sword and his bow. Sometimes you see him use an arrow as a makeshift dagger.

One Falmer comes at you. The torchlight glints off the axe blade. The light in the caves make them look like wraiths.

You dodge sideways, the Falmir's axe blade drives into the wall, snagging a few strands of your hair.

For a second you think you're going to die. Then you think, if you're going to die you don't want it to be here. Not buried underground with the Betrayed.

The comforting weight in your hand reminds you what you're holding, and you pull back the mage's staff, push it up with such a force under the Falmer's chin that it snaps his head backwards.

An arrow whizzes by you, nicking the armour on your arm. You're about to send a bolt of lightning at the archer, when Vilkas' retaliates and takes the archer out with an arrow of his own.

There's blood on the Nord's face. He grins at you, and you reply by blasting the Falmer creeping up on him with a bolt of lightning that crackles through the air.

The main chamber of Chillwind Depths is bigger than the one you found the Frostbite spiders in.

But before you can look around fully, more Falmer descend upon you.

They're accompanied by large insects with black and purple casing.

'Charus!' Vilkas shouts above the clatter of blade meeting blade and the plink of arrows hitting armour or the rocky ground. 'Watch out for their pincers.'

You stick your sword through one. Then when it's on the ground you pin it down by treading on it and pull your weapon free.

'Stick together,' Vilkas says, his breathing laboured. You're about to ask if he is okay when you hear it.

'Help!'

A call for help.

Vilkas' shoots you a look. 'Engar,' he pants.

You nod, turn away from Vilkas, trying to pinpoint where the voice came from.

'Stick close to me,' Vilkas says.

'Help me!'

You can't help yourself. You are driven forwards by that cry for help, and like following a shaft of light in the dark, you trail after the echoes of the voice.

Instinct drives you.

'Stay close!'

You hear the drumbeats in your head. Automatically, your arm swings your sword and you fell any Falmer that get in the way.

Two Falmer drag the farmer through the water and force him onto his knees. His hands and feet are bound.

You know it's too late, that you'll never get to them in time.

An arrow pierces the chest of the Falmer on the right.

The Falmer on the left pulls out a dagger.

Engar's eyes roll back into his head. He falls face first into the water. A raw bloody cut, like a crooked smile, slashed across his throat.