Chapter Four: The Torpor's Shade
Darkness crashed over her like a wave. The torrent bellowed, tore at her cloak, trying to whip the thing about in every direction at once. The wind, thick with sand, slashed at her with its infinite tiny daggers, abrading every inch of exposed flesh. Within minutes her forearms grew slick and warm with her own blood, but she gripped the her hunting horn in a white knuckled fist. Surely some must have heard, and were smart enough to make towards the ruins. Time stretched out and began to lose all meaning in the howling void. If not for the rhythmic sway of the senche's gallop, Syl would not have sense movement at all.
Suddenly, Kabal skid to an unsteady halt, and Syl collapsed to the sandy ground in equal parts relief and confusion. The fortress loomed with a presence of sheer enormity that hadn't existed when she had seen it from a distance. Twisting spires leaned in odd directions, uncomfortable for the eye to follow. She tore her eyes away from it with some effort. The architecture was strange to her, as if made to please some other creature's eye, not Mer or Man. What manner of place was this? Syl found it did not matter so much as long as it offered shelter.
It took a moment to realize the sandstorm was gone. The torrential wind was little more than a tickling breeze, carrying a warmth that her body soaked up readily. A heady, floral scent wafted from a ruined colonnade with half of the columns collapsed. Kabal followed after, lifting his muzzle to breathe the air in heavy gulps. A curtain of black clouds roiled angrily overhead. Her vision slid across it unseeing, unknowing, uncaring.
Just a little farther. That smell, hyacinths in her mother's spring garden, of so, so long ago. It tickled the edge of her memory. A doorless arch led them further into the building.
"This… It is good enough." Her fingers fumbled at Kabal's girth strap. She let the saddle fall where it did. Now that she was no longer fleeing for her life, the exhaustion of the flight and the fatigue of her muscles set in. Her entire body pulsed with a throbbing ache. "We can rest here for just awhile. Then... we will look for the others."
As she lay on the warm stone, the sweet aroma tickled her nostrils again. Warm, soothing. Yes. Rest here for just awhile, and then… I'll... just rest... here… A deep sleep washed over her.
"Wake up, fool girl!" A soft soled boot nudged her side.
Syl yawned and stretched. She blinked blearily into the new dawn's slanting rays. It took longer than usual to recover her senses. Strange images of dark, roiling clouds and the jagged tops of twisting spires still clung to the edges of her mind. What a horrible dream it had been.
"Wha- Master Aelan?" Syl sputtered anxiously. She scrambled out of her bedroll, and jumped to attention.
"And who else did you think it would be, girl? How many times do you expect me to call you?" Her mentor followed her around the campsite, berating her as she navigated the practiced ritual of breaking camp. Master Aelan might have the temper of a badger with a toothache, but he was something of a legend in the Valenwood. No mer could shoot better than he, and it was said he once bested Arnlorn Strongbow in a competition of knives. However, his best skill was tracking, and Syl soaked up every shred of knowledge he would impart. Even after all their time together, she was still in awe of his abilities. "You are no easy charge, that is for sure. Being your master is a thankless task. Thankless, I say! If not for your skill with the bow I would have left you in that…that… Well, let's just say I would have left you!"
His eyes became brown pools of sympathy. She avoided his gaze, pretending to be intent on lacing her boots. Master Aelan was from the Bramblebreach, and he held a great disdain for what he called city-folks. But he would dare not insult her home. Not now. Even he had the sense to tread softly. She favored him with a small smile. It was not his fault. Things were as things were. Nothing could change it. She had to live in the Now.
"Of course, Master," she said after his tirade concluded. She inclined her head, and slung her bow over her shoulder.
"Do you know what today is, girl?" Her master's voice softened.
Syl gave him a tight nod. "We go to meet the Silvenar."
Not she, exactly, but Master Aelan had been called. The summons came not two days prior, while they were on a hunt. Some of her mentor's hunts were known to last months. During those times, sight of other mer was rare, and news of the outside was unheard of. An even greater impossibility was a stranger coming to the tents, seeking her mentor by name, and sequestering him inside for hours. It was not until after the stranger left that Master Aelan filled her in on the news.
Gil-Var-Delle was gone. A Daedric horde, seemingly summoned from air, slaughtered the entire city and set the oakgraht ablaze. Nothing was left alive. She had been too stunned to really comprehend it. The smiling, proud faces of her brother, mother, and father as they sent her off to her apprenticeship with Master Aelan, not even a year gone. Gil-Var-Delle had been such a beautiful place, a place so full of life and warmth, a place that was no more. It still barely registered as true.
The newly raised Silvenar, little more than her age or so the rumors said, had called a moot to discuss the threat. Two days at the same ground covering pace, but not much longer now. Little more than a morning's march left. She did not have to examine the moss on the trees to know they headed North. She could feel every step that separated her from the city of Silvenar. No longer just a vague tickling sensation in her mind, as it had appeared some few weeks before. She could point to it blindfolded now. Her destiny lay there as surely the sun would rise the next day. There was no way Syl could deny it. The threads of fate had tangled her up, and pulled her along this path.
She looked up from the dirt footpath and blinked. In a densely wooded thicket to the left, an arch of polished black stone peeked from behind the trunk of wizened oak. A skittering noise rustled further in the wood, the soft whisk of carapace on carapace. Without thinking, she slid her bow off her shoulder, nocking an arrow. Master Aelan walked on without her, somehow failing to notice she no longer kept pace beside him. The arch called her gaze to it again. She stepped closer, carefully, without any sound. Inside the arch, a murky, purple gloom rippled. She wrinkled her nose in distrust as she gently probed the rippling surface with her hand. Her fingers slipped through the quagmire, Syl found no other word for it, and felt as if she had touched a tepid pond. She jerked her hand back, wonderingly. She glanced over her shoulder as Master Aelan turned a curve in the path, out of sight. Silvenar pulled at her, Master Aelan did too, but there was something, something that tickled the edge of her memory, something she needed to do. She steeled herself with a breath and stepped through.
Diaphanous, red towers climbed towards the sun, twisting and twining like rays. It was the sun itself, rising from the loamy earth, so absolute was the splendor of the Silvenar's palace.
"Glory to you, First Ranger. Have you returned to Silvenar, First Ranger? The bows are eager to follow you again into battle." A guard in an antlered helm greeted, thrusting a fist to his shoulder in salute. Syl wondered at the title. There was so much she did not know about her mentor. The guard spoke to him with a familiarity beyond the hero-worship of Master Aelan's skill.
"Do you anticipate battle, boy?" her mentor asked. His brows furrowed thoughtfully.
"Just so, First Ranger. The Silvenar, the Green favor him always, has sent a call to the rangers, summoning them in defense of the city." The guard shook his head. "For what cause I do not know, but the bows stand ready in defense."
"Thank you. I will stand with the guard if the call is sounded. Be steadfast, and Y'ffre guide your steps."
The guard nodded, awe painting his cheeks pink. "And you, First Ranger."
Syl followed Master Aelan over the wide bridge, seemingly made from the petal of flower so large that gigantic couldn't fit for a description. The strange sap-wrought palace towered overhead. The pull in the back of her mind tugged more forcefully than ever. So intensely Syl barely noticed the multitudes of courtiers as they scuttled like insects in showy gowns and jackets, silks of every hue. The beauty and grandeur of the people and the palace blinded Syl towards the people themselves. She only noticed their garments, not the tight eyes behind their forced smiles. Had she seen, she would have sensed a tension so palpable it was nigh on the edge of breaking.
"What has happened here…" Master Aelan muttered beneath his breath. With a shake of the head, he stalked through carpeted wide hallways, and Syl lengthened her stride near to a jog in order to keep pace. He deliberately turned through a nondescript set of doors into a private quarters. He walked straight to a hidden staircase that led into the kitchens. Syl dodged cooks and scullery maids, as she followed Master Aelan through rooms of the palace more random than the last. It was absolute madness, but Master Aelan picked their path with the surety of deeply ingrained knowledge. He knew where they were going. Deeper and deeper they went into the palace, Syl thoroughly losing all sense of direction on that strange rabbit-trail of a journey.
Master Aelan paused at a relief carving on a wall, along another wide corridor identical in every way to the several they had traversed already. He pressed the center of a glass daisy, and a piece of wall shuddered open to reveal a domed room. The walls slanted upwards towards a small hole in the center of the ceiling. Light filtered down, centering on a round, flat mushroom in the center of the room. At least thirty chairs were pulled up around it like a table. Each chair but one was filled with merchants, aristocrats, and rangers. Syl thought she saw the King himself in among them. Rangers who brought apprentices with them had the youths kneel beside their chairs, all with eyes fixed on the floor with blank expressions. Syl's gaze swept a quick circuit around the room, until it slammed to a halt. For a time, all they did was look at each other. She with a wild-eyed, almost fearful expression, and He, The Silvenar, with eyes like tranquil forest pools filled with a strange knowing that made Syl quiver with a sudden chill. The pulling feeling pulsed. Her destiny was somehow caught up with this mer. The Silvenar, she could barely believe it. She tore her eyes away and knelt beside her mentor. Her heart thundered in her throat.
"Now that we are all here, let us begin," a soft, mellifluous voice instructed. The Silvenar's voice was like a cool spring bubbling between two stones or a warbler crying on a brush oak, a melodious trill.
"Refugees from the north come in droves at the border. My guards are nearly overwhelmed processing all of them," a plaintive voice whined.
"Turn them aside. They abandoned their race when they abandoned the Green Pact!" a harsh voice answered.
"All who seek refuge are welcome to the Green," the Silvenar said.
"And when they begin to cut down our trees to make their cities? What then, Silvenar?"
"An understandable concern, Baerlorn," the Silvenar said consideringly. "Shelter them on the plains, and instruct them in our ways. All should be welcomed back to the fold, to the Pact. Paitr, kindly provide the materials for tent making until the Spinners can grow their lodgings."
"The cost would be tremendous, Silvenar," a squeak to her left said.
"And what is the price of some leather scraps against the cost of their lives?" It was not said sharply, but the squeaking voice blathered obsequiously. And so it was with every murmur of dissent, he parried them aside like a blademaster turns an opponent's thrust. Even the most brusque Bosmer was eventually converted to his way of thinking, and it was then the planning began in earnest.
A tolling gong cut off the din of conversation, replacing it with worried murmurs. Syl heard the scuffling of feet and whisking of silk as the dignitaries rose. Syl waited for what seemed an eternity for her master's signal. Her eyes bored holes in the sap-wrought floor. Muted shouts echoed from somewhere in the palace. Sweat sprouted from every pore and still she waited. What could be happening out there?
The door opened, but no one came. Syl rose, deciding Master Aelan had forgotten her in the ensuing chaos. He had not, his indignant expression showed. Syl ignored him, studiously fixing her gaze on the empty door. The shouts grew louder, and the clang of steel filled the uneasy silence. Why did they stand and do nothing?
Syl snuck a glance at the Silvenar who merely stared at her with that same curiously knowing expression.
"I'm going, Master Aelan. We cannot afford to stand and wonder," Syl said quietly. She hated the very idea of incurring his disappointment.
"Know your place, girl!" her mentor snapped.
"Let her go, Aelan" was all the Silvenar said, in a quiet, thoughtful tone.
Master Aelan shook his head in anger, but waved her away with his hand. It was all Syl needed and she bolted to the door, her ivory-hewn bow in her hand, an arrow already nocked.
Glancing both ways, she found who opened the door and why he had not entered. Bent over the corpse of an antler-helmed guard stood a clanfear. It's beak glistened red as it jerked free the guard's intestines. Occupied as it was, it did not notice her until it fell, feathered in arrows. She ghosted towards it, beginning to reclaim her arrows. Who knew how precious a commodity they would become before the fight was done. Sounds of battle reached her from a nearby room, but as she rose to lope in that direction, she saw it.
The black arch was slick as if wet. She had seen the thing before, seen the runes carved along its edges, crude markings. A strong sense of something yet undone filled her. She glanced back with a grimace and walked through the rippling miasma.
The Daedra shrieked in its death throes and collapsed to the dull, black floor with a sickening thud. Syl grabbed her dagger from the gaping wound in its throat. She had to keep moving. Another might appear at any moment.
The smell of sulphur choked the air, and the wind blew with the heat of forge fire. Only Mehrunes Dagon could create a place such as this. Nothing lived except the Daedra she killed. She sprinted along the hallways.
Up, up. She had to go up. It was at the top of this tower somewhere, the sigil stone the hooked-nosed scholar had told her about. Syl ducked close to the wall, striated and pockmarked like melted stone flash frozen. It radiated heat. The hallway curved sharply both to the left and right. Through the open arch, she could see the sigil stone, a blazing eye of fire floating on the pedestal.
She darted crouched across the threshold. Arrogant fools to have left so important a thing unguarded.
The room was round, roughly hewn from the same black stone as the entire tower had been, as the ground of this place. And to the left an arch of slick black stone stood, the purple quagmire shivering. She did not even pause now before she ran through it.
Memories flickered in images one after another, blending together in a maddening cacophony. She knew them now as memories, although she could barely piece them together. She ran through black arches again and again. They came quicker with each one she entered. Until…
A circle of black stone, fifty paces wide stood before her. Its edge bordered by those black doors, her memories, encased in each arch. She spun around, dizzying herself with the constantly shifting windows into her past.
"Your will is strong," a hissing voice whispered. "Better for you had you not fought me. You would have died peacefully in your sleep. Now I will consume you whole. Either way, my Lady will get what she is after."
Syl spun on her heel to face the creature, and her stomach lurched. A spider daedra, cruel fangs exposed in her wide smile, moved closer. It's many legs clicked against the stone with each step. Syl nocked an arrow, and the daedra's smile deepened in wicked delight.
"What do you think to do with that, pet? You are in Vaermina's realm. Nothing can save you now," the daedra hissed.
Syl loosed her arrow, and it glanced the daedra's abdomen. Purple blood oozed from the gash, but it did little to slow the creature. It advanced swiftly, striking at Syl with pointed forelegs, like bristled spears. It was all she could to evade the blows. Deflecting what she could with a small leather buckler, Syl was driven back again and again. She loosed arrow after arrow, but with little time to fully extend the bow, they deflected off the creatures thick carapace and clattered to the ground ineffectively.
Syl threw the bow down, drawing the thin daggers from her boot in desperation. She knew she was losing, that it was only a matter of time before the creature ran her through with its cruel spears. She whirled the daggers, parrying the forelegs, closing the distance between them. If she would die, she would make the creature work for it. Pay for her life in its blood. She darted in, slashing quickly, and retreated in the span of a breath. She repeated the dance again and again, slash, parry, retreat. Slash, parry, retreat. Each strike left a ribbon of purple blood in its wake. Surface wounds, but the daedra was weakening. She too was flagging with fatigue. It was a race for who would tire first. Syl pressed forward with the last of her strength, thrusting the dagger hard at the creature's chest. Her blade bit into the daedra's white fleshed and it shrieked in pain.
Syl's screams joined it, white pain blinding her. She staggered back, clutching her thigh. Red bubbled between her fingers. She grit her teeth, and rose to an unsteady crouch. The daedra collapsed to the ground in a slumped pile of limbs. With its final gurgle, Syl's vision wavered. Blackness surrounded her, swallowed her. It was a welcome escape from the throbbing heat that wracked her body.