All right! Four chapters, four days! Again: I probably will not be able to keep this up. Consider yourself warned.


Serana stopped in her tracks as annoyance burst forth in her. Someone was sitting in her reading spot.

She had an armful of books in one hand and a piece of parchment to serve as a bookmark in the other, but despite the muscles in her arm complaining at the weight placed on them, she stared. Now was really not a good time for another one of the court vampires' antics.

Sometimes it would happen when a new vampire wanted to try and prove themselves. Other times it would occur when an older one wanted to try and advance their position. No matter who did it, someone ended up messing with her every so often. But right now she was not in the mood.

It had been a day since her return to the castle, and she had been in a whirlwind of indecision. Her mother was nowhere to be found. The courtyard was closed off. She had no one to talk to. What was she supposed to do?

Eventually, she had decided that she needed to take a moment and breathe, to relax. As she always did whenever she needed to take a breather, she grabbed as many books as she could find and headed for her customary reading spot, the small alcove overlooking the dining hall. The reading light there was perfect, and far enough removed that it wouldn't be easily noticeable to the average brown-nosing vampire.

Granted, it had been a really long time since she'd sat there, so they might have forgotten, but immortal vampires had surprisingly long memories. Since there hadn't been any new additions—yesterday excepted—whoever it was should have known better. She was not in a mood to be trifled with. Normally she could have been civilized, but she just didn't have the state of mind for it in that moment.

"Excuse me," she said, not caring if her tone was rude. If this was Vingalmo again…

The perpetrator jumped in surprise, and the book he was reading flopped closed as it hit the floor. He looked up at Serana in surprise, and she found the change in his eye color startling. Before, they'd been white with blindness. Now, they were as glowing and amber as her own. And they were seeing her.

As soon as Nathan looked up at Serana, he knew he was in big trouble. Before, he'd seen her as a mash of orange and blue lines and shapes, and he'd had to rely on her voice. Now he saw her face.

Serana seemed to be around his age—early twenties. Or at least, she'd been around his age when she'd been made a vampire. By the Divines, this was confusing! But Serana had dark black hair that framed her face. She also had high, sharp cheekbones, undoubtedly the kind that Nathan had heard the women in Riverwood wishing they had.

She was also quite possibly the most beautiful woman in Nirn.

Granted, Nathan had only met a few other women since gaining the ability to see. Not many vampires in Harkon's court were women, from what he could see, but there were a few. All of them were pretty (again, Nathan was surprised that he somehow had a standard of beauty), but none of them quite matched Serana.

Maybe he was exaggerating. Nonetheless, his hands started to sweat and he felt the tips of his pointed ears reddening. "Um," was the only thing that came out of his mouth when he saw her. He could already tell that this conversation was going to be extremely awkward on his end.

Meanwhile, Serana's arm was growing very tired. Was it a good idea to grab so many books? Probably not. She was starting to regret it. And the way that Nathan was staring at her was doing little to help.

"I…sorry," she said after a moment, realizing how mean she'd just sounded. Nathan had done nothing to deserve that. He'd been the kindest person to her in centuries, as it turned out. "I thought you were someone else."

"Uh," Nathan repeated, still staring at her with his new amber eyes. He coughed, and then he seemed to be back to his normal self. "No, it's fine. Is this your seat, or something?"

Serana started to shake her head, but then the muscle in her arm twinged, and she nodded. "Yes, but you don't have to—"

He was already standing up, and Serana noticed that he was not wearing the…traditional clothes of a Volkihar vampire. Rather than wearing expensive, silk clothes, Nathan wore a simple black cotton tunic and brown trousers, along with black leather boots. The clothes seemed to suit him. Not that Serana noticed.

"Uh, hold on," Nathan said, picking his book up off the floor and placing it on the small table next to the chair. He nodded at her and then rushed off, leaving her alone with her armful of books. Frowning in thought, she finally placed her stack of books next to the chair. She wondered what the hell Nathan was doing, then wondered why she cared. Out of curiosity, she picked up his book, only to find that it wasn't printed in normal ink. Instead, the pages were covered in strange bumps that she could feel as she ran her hand over the parchment. Strange. How was he reading this?

She heard footsteps behind her and hastily put the book back on the table. A moment later, Nathan appeared, carrying a heavy wooden chair as if it were nothing. One of the benefits of being a vampire was increased strength. He placed the other chair on the opposite side of the table, and there was just enough space in the alcove for both seats.

"There!" he exclaimed, his face red, presumably from exertion. "Problem solved!" He plopped down in the chair he'd just brought over and reached for his book on the table. He frowned when he realized that the book had moved from its original position, but other than that said nothing.

Serana sat down in the other chair, unsure what to say. She wasn't used to people here fixing a problem like that so easily. Usually, there was a lot of posturing, and Serana would have to use her position to get what she wanted—which she hated to do. But this half-elf showed a willingness to share, which seemed highly unusual; that is, until she remembered that he had only been turned yesterday. It was even stranger when she considered that fact that most people, once given Harkon's blood, became hungry for power immediately afterwards. Yet Nathan seemed just as chipper as before, if not more so. He did have his eyesight, now.

"What are you reading?" Nathan asked her, cracking open his own book but not looking at it.

"Everything," Serana replied. Then, when he raised a confused eyebrow, she said, "I just grabbed as many books as I could. Mainly history, to try and find out what I missed."

"They don't have anything recent," Nathan replied, still looking at her but running a finger over one of the pages of his strange book. "I already asked."

That was…surprising. For one, not many of the other vampires were interested in reading, so why was this one, even if he was fresh? For another, hadn't he been blind before? How would he know how to read?

He must have seen her confused look. He lifted the pages of his book for her, with all the strange bumps in the paper. "It's called 'Braille.' It allows me to read by just running my finger over the bumps. Each pattern is a different letter, see?" He gestured to a single dot. "This is A."

Fascinating, Serana thought. There hadn't been anything like that before.

"What are you reading?" she asked him.

He shrugged. "I asked around for books on the history of vampirism. I'm trying to learn." He snapped his fingers, and the book in his hands suddenly read just like any other book—with ink. He flipped it over and showed her the cover, which read Immortal Blood in golden stitching.

"That book is actually fairly inaccurate," Serana said, cocking her head at him as he turned it back to Braille. "It says that the Volkihar Clan is placed in Eastern Skyrim, but as you can see we are far from east. Also, our breath doesn't freeze anyone's blood. And obviously, we don't live beneath a lake."

Nathan nodded at that. "I gathered that much. But what about the Bonsamu?" He pointed to a portion of the book, realized that she couldn't read it, and turned it back to normal.

Serana leaned in to read it. The passage in question read, There were many tribes to cover, such as the Bonsamu, who were indistinguishable from Bosmer except when seen by candlelight. She frowned.

"I've never seen one of those," she said slowly, "and I've never heard of it either. Sounds like a myth to me."

"Hmm." Nathan seemed genuinely interested in learning about the vampires. Serana thought that was odd—then again, she was realizing that a lot of things about Nathan were odd, and that it wasn't necessarily a bad thing.

"Here," Serana said, digging into her own pile and grabbing a book from the bottom. Its cover read Manifesto Cyrodiil Vampyrum. She handed it to him, and he flipped through the pages curiously, once he translated it to Braille. "We Volkihar vampires are distantly related to the Cyrodiil vampires. This might help shed some light on things."

"Thank you," Nathan said, closing the book and looking up at her with a smile on his face. "I—"

"You!" a voice that Serana recognized as Vingalmo's suddenly exclaimed. "Half-breed!"

Nathan was on his feet in an instant, hand reaching for his ankle for a single moment before he stopped and turned to face the Altmer, fists clenched.

"Yes?" he asked, in a pleasant voice that Serana was positive was sardonic.

Serana stood as well, turning to face Vingalmo. His red eyes twitched as he sensed Nathan's underlying sarcasm.

"Why are you not carrying out Lord Harkon's task?" he demanded. "Surely you did not think you would be allowed to…mooch?"

Nathan's amber eyes flashed dangerously. Serana was surprised, as before his emotions had been hard to read. Now they were as clear as day. Or, well…night. It was obvious why he hadn't immediately performed whatever "task" that her father had asked of him. His body needed time to adjust to the new blood in his veins, and who knew how long it would take for him to get used to his sight. It would be suicide to send him out into the world now.

Yet Nathan's answer was different. "I was performing research for this task."

Vingalmo clearly hadn't expected Nathan to have a logical response. "I…" Then he seemed to recover his wits. "Perhaps you were afraid to perform the task? Afraid to perform your duty to the lord of this court?"

There was that dangerous glint in Nathan's eyes again. His fists were clenched so tightly that his knuckles had turned white, yet his face was as impassive as ever.

"Of course not," he said, voice frighteningly even.

"Then prove it, half-breed."

Serana wanted to say something to tell them both how foolish they were being, but something kept her silent. Maybe it was the confident bearing that Nathan held, or maybe it was the way that he was staring Vingalmo down. Either way, Serana realized that this half-elf may have been odd, but he was no fool.

"Very well," Nathan eventually said, though he finally sounded agitated. "If you want to see me prove it, I'll go right now."

"Excellent," Vingalmo retorted. "Garan Marethi is waiting for you downstairs."

As Serana watched Nathan gather his things and walk away, she wondered—not for the first time—if he was walking to his doom.


Yeah, so this chapter is sort of shorter, but the next one makes up for it! Please continue to review, guys! It seriously helps me to know that I'm doing things right, and it helps me stay motivated. Thanks!