Waking Nightmares
Teldryn kicked a rock viciously out of his path and took a petty satisfaction in the sound it made clattering over the wind swept cobbles and cracking into one of the dragon skulls. It knocked the skull loose to settle lower in the weeds, canted at a forlorn angle. The empty sockets stared at him accusingly.
He stopped and looked back at the spires of the temple behind him. It was just his imagination, he was sure.
Guilt made his stomach ache. He never knew gold could weigh so heavily.
What kind of reputation was he going to have? The mercenary who bailed out whenever things got too dangerous. The bodyguard who outlived all his patrons. Once that rumor got around, he'd never get hired again.
He and Ceirin had been working well together. The altmer was a talented fighter, a quick thinker, and he had a great eye for treasure. Valuables in general, really. He had been thinking that a longer term contract might have been in order.
He knew Ceirin wasn't suicidal. A risk taker, to be sure, but a good sort overall.
And all these people. Geldis, Glover, Bralsa, the people he'd lived and worked and drank alongside for years, all turned into mindless slaves for this Miraak's purpose. Himself, too, though he did his best to block that out. If that thing could get into his head , how far could he really run? What would happen when they were no longer needed?
He pictured Raven Rock, dust and dark buildings, full of skeletons, ash drifting in to bury them all. No less devastating than the worst that Red Mountain could dish out. Dunmer knew how to survive dark times. It was what they excelled at. This was different. No one could fight against a volcano or any other force of nature, but here there was a mind at work, a being who could be fought.
No. Ceirin and Frea were right. Stopping this Miraak, before he took over the whole island, was the only option.
Snarling obscenities, he tightened his pack and tore full speed back up the road.
By the time he descended into the cool silent innards of the temple, there was a rather extensive trail of bodies to follow. Open doors, open chests, disarmed traps; all pointed the way for him. Clearly, he had been wrong about those ten minutes.
He noticed some of the draugr wore heavier armor. Weapons lay scattered about, discarded, useless…ebony?!
There were ebony blades, just left behind. A fortunes worth. His fingers twitched to feel what the balance of a blade like that would be like in his hands. No, no time. He couldn't risk getting weighed down. If they survived this, they could come back to get them.
He continued through the temple, checking corners just in case and jumping at shadows. The place was a labyrinth. He remembered Ceirin's comment about keeping the powerful undead inside their tombs, and broke into a sweat as a fresh wave of anxiety swept over him. He quickened his pace.
He caught up to them just as they were finishing up with an all too familiar series of blade traps.
Frea jumped, startled by his appearance.
"He just…." She gestured to the end of the room, visible in patches through the line of now still blades. Judging by the expression on Frea's face, Ceirin had pulled the same stunt on her that Teldryn had witnessed back in the mine.
"Yeah. He does that." Sudden awkward silence made him aware that Ceirin, who had been busy securing the lever on the far side, had yet to notice his arrival.
He took a deep breath, walked over to the altmer, and clearing his throat for attention, held out the coin purse to him. Ceirin looked briefly shocked to see him, but he covered it quickly.
"You needn't look so surprised." He glanced away from the altmer's wide and somewhat wary gaze.
"I may not be the first to volunteer whenever a hero or a martyr is needed, but I'm no coward, either. If you still want to cancel our contract, we can talk about it afterward." He shrugged. Ceirin didn't move.
Amber eyes studied him for a long moment, a faint spark of something glinting there. The silence stretched by until it was just getting Teldryn to the point of needing to fidget from nerves when Ceirin reached a hand up and took the coins back, a small smile tugging at one corner of his mouth.
"Glad to have you back." It was spoken so quietly that Teldryn knew he was the only one who heard it. Frea had been keeping a polite distance away to avoid overhearing them. When Ceirin inclined his head towards the door, she rejoined them. The three of them then proceeded down the tunnel and deeper into the complex.
"Let us hope that is the last of those traps." The Skaal woman spoke a little too loudly, her low voice echoing off the halls around them.
They made it through the next series of hidden passages to a large open section where a cultist stood waiting for them across the way. As they ran toward the stairs a dart trap activated and sent them diving to the floor until the clicking sound told them it was empty. Three ramps dropped down and they separated without a word, each heading up one and working together to back the cultist up against the door he had been guarding. As he died, a draugr stepped out of the shadows. The same deafening noise sounded that he had heard in the mine.
Trying to get in close enough to cut at it without ending up in its line of fire proved difficult, but as Frea dropped to her knees under guard to shelter from its shout, Teldryn managed to step around and stabbed it. They took a few minutes to make sure no one was injured, check the bodies, and haul the cultist away from the door.
When they were ready to continue, Ceirin motioned for Frea to go ahead, but held Teldryn back a minute.
"That draugr had this on him. I figured you would put it to better use." He handed Teldryn the sword he had looted. The ebony sword. Teldryn held the blade carefully, not knowing what to say. At a 'get on with it' sort of gesture from Ceirin he walked through a series of cuts with it. It felt brilliant. Light and quick and like it wanted to cut.
"Now we have a chance." He grinned.
"Well, if I knew you were going to be an ass about it…" Ceirin's sarcasm didn't echoed as badly as Frea's nervous energy had. The altmer rolled his eyes and they headed after her.
They found her standing at the foot of a covered walkway. Covered in the bound skeletal remains of torture victims. Cages hung from the ceiling on either side.
"All these poor souls…" She murmured.
"I had been told that the dragon cults were some of the most vicious in history. That was the main reason people rebelled, but seeing this... is…." Ceirin shook his head, at a loss for words.
They hurried across and did their best not to touch anything until they got to the other side. By silent mutual agreement, the sooner they got out of this place, the better they would all feel.
They appeared to have left the footprint of the old temple and passed under the earth into a completely separate and even more ancient ruin. Stairs and catacombs hewn roughly from the bedrock around them fell away into darkness below.
As they approached, the undead rose to meet them. With three it was much easier to set up their defense. Frea met the advance with her axe. Ceirin kept his sword and dagger whirling in quick parries and repelled any that got past her one woman war zone. Teldryn hit the back ranks with flame and ice spells and sent them tumbling. By the time the room had been cleared, they were gasping for breath, the stairs littered with draugr and bits of bone, as the last of the ice spike spells began to melt away.
At the bottom of a steep narrow stair they stumbled through the doorway and then into each other at the sight of a dragon skeleton hanging from the ceiling over a platform lined with sarcophagi.
"All Maker, protect us." Frea's soft prayer pretty well summed it up in Teldryn's opinion. Something felt odd about the place, an undercurrent of energy he couldn't place. He wondered if the skeleton would come to the defense of this place like the rest of the undead.
Ceirin looked back at both of them.
"Whatever you do, stay behind me." He waited until they each nodded. Then he stepped into the room, not to the sarcophagi, or towards the skeleton, but to their left. To another of those curved walls with symbols carved on them. This time, Teldryn knew he wasn't imagining it. Ceirin approached the wall, the energy surged, and then…it was pulled? Into Ceirin.
"Boss, what did you …..?"
"Something feels wrong. Brace yourselves!" Frea's warning coincided with the sudden tremor that shook the whole room. Rocks and dust crashed down. The skeleton swayed and creaked. All the sarcophagi crashed open.
Teldryn lost track of what happened after that. The thunderous sounds of shouts, the crackling rush of the atronach, blades striking other blades or into flesh. He got tossed about in the concussive wave of one draugrs shout and took a wicked cut to his shoulder, the blade finding its way under his pauldron and slicing through the leather gambeson beneath.
As he pulled his blade up through a parry, he caught sight of a massive gout of flame striking several of the draugr and spinning them to the floor to gutter out. His atronach hadn't done that…He returned a cut and made sure the draugr wasn't getting up again.
Frea 's axe finished the last one and they both turned to Ceirin.
"What was the…"
"You said you couldn't cast…"
Ceirin took a breath to answer and immediately doubled over coughing. He turned away, his eyes watering, an arm up over his mouth.
But not before Teldryn saw the smoke. What in Oblivion…?
"You can shout! That was a shout, like what they did, only you did it with fire!" Frea sounded almost giddy. "I did not know anyone but the Nords studied such things."
As soon as Ceirin could breathe again, he managed a nod.
"I.. try… to avoid it." His voice was horrible. A hoarse whisper that sounded like it hurt. It sent him into another coughing fit.
"You are dragonborn! That must be why Miraak considers you a threat." She looked proud of herself.
"He's what? Don't be ridiculous." Teldryn had no idea what the explanation was, but he wasn't about to turn to ancient Nord legends. He had had quite enough of those already and they weren't out of the ruins yet. Except…Except Ceirin wasn't denying it.
"How did you know?" His employers tone was resigned.
"We Skaal have legends older than those of the Nords in Skyrim. In our stories, Miraak was a dragon priest who turned against them. He must have found secrets to use against them, to become powerful enough to do this. It makes sense that one who could challenge him now when the dragons are no more would have to be a dragonborn." Frea made her pronouncement as calmly as if she were discussing a favorite hunting technique.
Ceirin looked thoughtful. He blew out a long slow breath, this time without coughing or any more smoke, and nodded.
"I am." Those two quiet words shook Teldryn almost as badly as the tremor had.
The spellsword couldn't wrap his head around it. He had spent time in Skyrim working for one of the most traditional death and glory types he had ever come across, he had heard all kinds of legends and tales Nords considered heroic during that time. Shouting only figured in the oldest of them. Tales of dragonborn were even rarer. And now he was working with an altmer, of all things, who somehow embodied both?
"We can talk about it later." Said altmer gestured at them to get moving again.
They found the key, and opened the next door forward. The dragon skeleton did not come to life. Teldryn supposed that in a place such as this, he should be grateful for the little details. They worked their way through the temple-within-a –temple's living quarters, dining hall, kitchens, and security posts, through hidden doors, and silent hallways. The heavy Nordic influence of the outer catacombs fell away and was replaced by a sinister dragon theme with odd almost deformed looking shapes.
Spiral staircases led them deeper into the earth. It had gotten so cold this far down that Teldryn's fingers ached, even inside his gauntlets. He had no idea how Ceirin could stand it with his fingers bare. Everything became a choke point as they wound their way down and through a series of antechambers.
They continued into a larger tomb, back to the Nordic design except for the arrangements of dragon bones, the traps, and the bizarre effigy carved and placed at the back of the chamber. Something lumpy with eyes all over it and a flaking patina of black paint. It looked totally out of place against the traditional, if crumbling, Nord stonework. About the only reassuring thing about any of it was that they seemed to be climbing upwards again.
Beyond the statue, the hall narrowed until it had them crawling through a rough, twisting mine shaft excavated from the bedrock itself. Just when Teldryn was about to call a suggestion to turn back, the shaft came to an abrupt end, dumping them through an ornate oval doorway and into the most out of place room Teldryn had seen yet.
Dark iron fretwork scrolled and twisted over the floors, the walls, and every surface. Arches stood at regular intervals and swept up to a point in the vaulted ceiling. The room had an almost obscene aura to it, like realizing there was a dead animal crawling with maggots nearby; even if it was out of sight, the smell would still be there. Dead center in the room, a pedestal supported another creepy black book, as if presenting it to them as their sole reason for being there.
Afterward, Teldryn would never be sure how it happened. One moment Ceirin was lifting the book carefully to put in his pack, Frea was saying something about dark magic, and he was checking the exit. But as Ceirin was turning away from the pedestal, there were more tremors, and he tripped. The book flew open in his hands as he tried to catch his balance and then…
Frea shouted in alarm and Teldryn spun to look at Ceirin, through Ceirin. Tentacles as transparent as he was had grown out from the pages to anchor him in place. His eyes had gone solid black.
There was nothing either of them could do.
A moment later he snapped back, the book tumbling from nerveless fingers. He fell to his hands and knees to vomit weakly across the floor. Both companions where at his side in an instant.
"What happened to you? " Frea's voice was hushed with concern. "You read the book and then…"
"He's there, Miraak is there." Ceirin washed his mouth out with the water Teldryn handed him, settling back against the wall with his knees up, a shaking hand up over his eyes, thumb rubbing over his temple.
"How? Where?" Frea demanded, "Can we get to him, kill him?"
"No, he's… in some other ….realm, the book pulled me in there." Ceirin flinched away from the meager torch light as Frea moved around to get a better look at him. He ducked his head and kept his hands up to keep out the glare.
"Headache, boss? " Teldryn asked, keeping his voice down. He and Frea gently began to lift Ceirin to his feet. He swayed and nearly collapsed again.
"Migraine…I'm going to be sick again.." The altmer shoved away suddenly to retch himself empty.
"We must take him to my father." Frea said. " He will know what to do."
Watching the slow sick shivers that wracked Ceirin's frame, Teldryn was grateful for the Skaal woman's confidence. He had no idea what to do about an evil book that could kidnapped people and made them sick, other than to stay away from it. Frea, on the other hand, bundled up the book and shoved it into her pack, insisting that Storn would need to see it.
Together they hauled the altmer to his feet and staggered for the exit.
