Dear Alzena,

You are correct. The daedra do work together, but only to seek their own advantage. Never forget.

Remain inquisitive. Keep your eyes and ears open. Do not rely only on what I have said.

Oblivion never lies, but it rarely tells the whole truth.

Signed,

Master Joneleth

"You're insane," I told Muiri.

Her perfectly manicured nails caressed the berry tart she set before me.

"You hired me to kill one man," I reminded her. "One man. Not all the thieves at Raldbthar. There must be at least twenty men there."

I knew. I'd spent the better part of a day perched above the ruins, counting.

"Alain's friends are just cutthroats," she sniffed. "I don't care what you to do them. I just want that son of a horker to pay."

She dabbed the smudged charcoal from her eyes with an embroidered handkerchief. Pink. Flowered. "Don't you care what he did to me?"

"I…." Nazir hadn't warned me about this part of the job. I was going to throttle him, when I got home.

Her elegant fists clenched. "He told me I was the beautiful tulip he'd waited his whole life for. Beautiful tulip! Can you believe I fell for that?"

I shifted in my chair, coughed a few times.

"And then he…used me – to get close to my friend – to rob her blind!" She rubbed her eyes with the pink flowers.

"Never trust what you can't control."

She gasped. "That's horrid! What kind of heartless …." Her voice hardened. "You don't care, do you? You're just in this for the money." She threw down the kerchief. "Fine. You can have all my wages until I die, if you give that bastard what he deserves."

"Muiri." This job had gone all wrong. "Be reasonable. Even the guards won't take those bandits on."

That, I also knew. I'd offered them all my gold.

Her heavily lined eyes narrowed. "You're nothing like Frabbi said. The fearless Dark Brotherhood, rushing in where soldiers fear to tread. What a joke."

With a knife, I stabbed at the berry tart.

"Please." She clasped my hand. "Do it for me. Woman to woman. Maybe you know what it feels like, to be betrayed by the man you love."

By now, the tart was as mangled as the priest of Boethiah's head. "A contract's a contract," I told her, and stalked out.

Kicking aside pebbles from the road, I made for the stables and climbed into a carriage. The horses' hooves clopped. Across from me hunched a brawny man, a sign of Talos hanging brazenly from his neck.

"War's hit this land hard." He cracked his back. "Talos would have never wanted this in his name. By the divines, when will the Empire learn? You can't outlaw a god."

We rode past a burnt-out stable, a blackened field.

"No." The chain hung heavily around my neck. "You can't."

He kissed the sign of Talos, brought it to his forehead. "Fleeing the war?"

My face was chapped, my robes were stained, and I couldn't remember last time I'd eaten. I'd have thought I was a refugee too. "No."

He squinted. "No?"

A mountain cat loped by.

There are powerful spells, which can bind creatures more permanently and stronger to your will.

If he had to do this job, what would the Master do?

"No," I told him. "I'm on my way home."

"A man's last thoughts should be of his home," he said.

It was near midnight when I staggered back into the sanctuary and cast myself onto my blankets. At first light, I headed out to the forest with my staff and scroll.

My robes flapped in the breeze as I paced the runes.

"Morio oiobala." Lighting tingled at my hands, eager to strike. "Pelinan racuvar…."

Sheogorath's staff burst to life, a thousand unintelligible tongues jabbering as one.

"Shanta ehlno." Winds whipped around me. I thrust the staff against the forest floor. "Ehlnaya moridor…."

Ancient voices slithered through me, screeching above the wind. My hair stood, and the world crashed down around me. I wandered through an endless, sorrowful expanse of lava and screams, ice and darkness, a spiked pendulum rushing towards me….

And then the mists parted, and I saw the beast.

His flawless sable hide shone in the wan sunlight. Orange eyes gleamed like amber. Ivory horns budded into curls. Ashen scales lined up like soldiers. He smelled of fire - a campfire smoldering through the night, promising warmth and cheer.

He was beautiful.

And he was mine.

He shook out his ebon mane. "Mortal."

He wasn't struggling. He wasn't fighting. He wasn't even complaining. "Do you…do you have a name?"

Head held high, he said, "I am a kynval."

I frowned. "Is that your name?"

"No." Long black lashes framed his eyes. "All kynval are called kynval. Only our lords have names." He chuffed. "I will earn my name by slaying my enemies, and serving my lord."

I wanted to reach out and touch this creature that I had brought into the world. "What lord?"

"The great archlord Mehrunes Dagon."

My muscles tightened.

"Mortal, I assure you," he said, "kynval is a respectable rank."

"It's not that," I said. "It's just…."

"Just what?"

"The great archlord…." I couldn't bring myself to say his name.

His muscles rippled proudly from his arms to his talons. "All my kyn serve the great archlord Mehrunes Dagon." He spat. "Except the traitors."

"Your kyn?"

"My clan."

He scooped up a handful of mud and twigs, dangled a worm in his claws, tasted it and spat it out. "The mortal is not what I was expecting."

Dremora had expectations? "How so?"

He snapped the twigs in two and tossed them aside. "The mortal is weak. The mortal is afraid. The mortal is female."

I bit my lip to keep from laughing. "You don't have females?"

"We have," he said, very seriously. "But few. My kyn-brother has one. I am not allowed to touch her."

"Oh."

Flames crackled from his horns, casting a deep ruby glow over his eyes. "Does the mortal have a mate?"

"Me? No." That sort of thing didn't occur to you when you lived in a tower full of books.

The Master had never said anything about wanting a family, either. He never even seemed to want friends. He seemed to go out of his way to avoid people.

The dremora cocked his head. His face was sculpted in sharp, even lines. "My kyn-brother says that mortals are for killing. It is good you didn't bring him here, or he would have torn your heart out."

I did laugh at that, remembering, and then shuddered. The dremora perked up his ears.

My heart quickened. "Do you fight?"

"Yes. Kynval fight."

I drew in a breath. "If I bring you to Raldbthar, will you fight for me?"

He stretched languidly, like a panther in the sun. "The mortal doesn't control me?"

"I do." Remembering the Master, I added, "You will submit."

His flames crackled.

Soon, so blessedly soon, we stood atop the rocks overlooking the ruins. Crisp mountain air blew by. "Raldbthar," I told him. The last remains of a people who had delved too deep, disappeared with barely a trace.

What had Raldbthar been? A keep? A temple? Its solid marble was barely worn. Jagged, ancient calligraphy hinted at mysteries untold. Fearsome gears and clocklike hands still spun, and steam puffed from its innards. A door wrought of gold beckoned towards greater wonders – or, I hoped, Alain.

"Raldbthar." The dremora surveyed the ruins. "Yes. That is not what they called it then."

My jaw dropped. "What? But…."

"Time has no meaning in Oblivion," he said. "Although, I was but a caitiff when they built it. It is hard to explain to mortals."

The gears clanked and whooshed. "What happened to them?" I whispered.

His eyes flashed. "They were proud. They rejected the gods. They profaned the great archlord. They thought their tools and tricks would save them."

"Did the gods destroy them?"

"No." The mountain itself seemed to clink and jangle. "The gods let them destroy themselves."

Now, scraggly men with swords and bows paced the marble stairs. Burlap sacks teetered towards a makeshift cooking pit. Onion peels and broken bottles littered the last traces of a forgotten world. One of the men scratched his armpit.

Raldbthar had fallen.

The dremora's muscles quivered, like a horse spoiling for battle.

"Kill as many of them as you want," I told him. "Except their leader. He's my kill."

The dremora sloshed off through the mud. Birds scattered. He kicked the marble. It cracked, and he hauled up the slab and threw it against a pillar.

Silence fell over the forest. Only the pine needles rustled in the breeze.

And then, a man screamed – a scream that chilled my bones. Footsteps pounded through the foliage. Someone fell, rose, fell again.

Rock tumbled down. Bone snapped. Stone crashed, crushed into a thousand pieces.

Ash stung my eyes, and a warm wind hit me. Metal rattled. "Alain! Alain! We're-" There was a sickening crunch, and the screech of claws against gold. The twisted door plunged down the mountain.

Men were yelling, running. The dremora hauled a burly man out, his muscles bulging under his ripped shirt. Black bile oozed from a gash in the dremora's side.

I clambered over a broken dais. Soot coated the pristine marble of Raldbthar. A severed arm dangled from a statue. Burning apples and cabbages mingled with the scent of blood. A charred shoe sat on the stairs. I crunched over a chiselled inscription, next to half a man.

This was Oblivion.

This was what Dagon had tried to do to our world.

This was why I had been bound to the Master – so this would never happen again.

"She sent you, didn't she?" Alain wrestled against the dremora. "She's crazy. She'd do anything for revenge."

The dremora growled.

Alain's voice rose to a fever pitch. "She'd call demons down into our world!"

I curled into a fetal position, buried my face in my robes.

"Get it off me," pleaded Alain. "We can do it. We can fight. We can send it back to the hell it came from."

"I have a job to do." My voice was muffled, quaking.

"Are you an idiot?" A warm liquid flowed underneath me. "It's a godsforsaken demon. It'll rip your head off next!"

My eyes squeezed shut, I felt around my pack for the rough haft of Molag's mace. I embraced it, inhaled its familiar scent.

"Divines, hear our call," Alain whispered. I had heard that quiet certainty once before. Solitude. Rogvirr. "Deliver us from your enemies, the destroyers of your world…."

I no longer smelled ash. I only smelled blood.

"Hold him down," I commanded the dremora. The dremora thrust Alain's face into the dust. Alain thrashed and grunted. The mace beat down.

Slowly, so very slowly, he yielded to Sithis.

It had been far too long.

I sank down onto the blood-stained marble, next to a fallen engraving of a wildflower. Blood and flesh clung to my robes.

"The mortal is not weak," the dremora said.

I huddled up against his warm scales, willing the wasteland around me to disappear.

With his arched talons, the dremora brushed the ash off of my face. "You wish to peer into Oblivion," he said. "That is the real reason you called me here."

From inside the mountain, the gears still whirled – but now limping, weak.

"Yes." My voice sounded tiny against the desolation around us.

His stroked my hand. "If you call me back, I will bring you more of the knowledge you seek."

Sand blew against the cracks in the ancient marble. The dremora's eyes shone like brilliant stars in the darkest of nights. I traced my fingers along his smooth obsidian face, his fur, his horns. He trembled, and a rush of power flowed through me.

"I will," I told him. "You are my dremora."

Author notes:

tirechanclas: One thing's for sure...the Mother seems to have an agenda.

Please forgive me if I misspelled "Ralbdthar". It's even more difficult to type than it is to say!