A/N: Clodia, thank you! The ending section in Oblivion is less cryptic than you might think - it relates directly to the events earlier in the chapter.

I should also say that this chapter mentions some events concerned with the in-game literature; in particular, the book The Firsthold Revolt. I can't link from this site (annoying rule), but you can find it by googling "Imperial Library Firsthold Revolt". It's short, and will give some insight into what has been happening in Firsthold while Helseth fled to Morrowind.

Chapter Thirty-Four

Interlude Thirteen; The Penultimate Reflection

Firsthold, Summurset Isle, Frostfall 3E 427. It is eighteen months before the present day. Morgiah is fifty-one.

It was dusk. The sky was like a bowl, indigoes and violets draining out of the west as if through some cosmic sinkhole. It laid an unreal light over the architecture of Firsthold, an illumination with no point of origin; the sun had already disappeared and the moon had not yet risen. There was only the dusk, steady and soft.

Of course, Firsthold had never really seemed real to Morgiah, not even after all these years. She counted them sometimes when she forgot. Twenty? Twenty-one? Could it really have been so long? The years shimmered like soap bubbles, separate, remote. It was as if she had been living in a trance.

Over time in Firsthold she had achieved a measure of respect from the city's people, though their love had always eluded her. It was an acceptable substitute nonetheless. The Revolt had been the turning point, she could see with the benefit of hindsight. It had all been the fault of that simpering royal concubine, Gialene – that the girl thought she actually had a chance of enticing Reman away said all Morgiah needed to know about her intelligence. Her plan to manipulate the commons' mistrust of their "Black Queen" to instigate a revolution was a good base, she had to admit – it had the scent of Elysana about it – but in the end, it lacked the finesse to produce results. She had often wondered in amusement what the outcome of locking Gialene and Elysana in a room together would be. As much as she was loath to admit it, Elysana could probably rip out the Altmer woman's entrails without displacing a single golden ringlet.

And of course, negotiating tricky situations like the looming Revolt had been so much easier since her fateful trip to the Glenumbra Moors…

When she thought back on reading the Infinium her memories were like a paradise flower, each layer revealing a different colour and texture. To her, every page seemed deeper and more enduring than the last, though if questioned she could not have articulated the nature of their contents. One might think the conscientious reader would endeavour to reread each page carefully before progressing to the next, but the magic of the Infinium was such that this notion never crossed Morgiah's mind. You kept turning pages until the end, and when you finished the book it disappeared. That was the way it worked. Reaching the last page was like waking from a dream; closing the cover was like seeing the harsh morning light pouring through the window of your mind.

She had been right. Everything was different.

Her sight had sharpened. Not explicitly, but when she looked at people there was the quality of being able to look through them, to the thoughts and desires and memories that lay beyond. It was much harder with those she had a particular attachment to; she suspected her own emotional involvement with such individuals obscured the clarity of her vision. Nevertheless, in the following years she would become ever more accustomed to reactions of uneasiness and discomfort from her peers. "Piercing" and "intuitive" were the more polite terms the Firsthold court applied; less flattering were the whispered descriptions of "unnatural", "witch-like," and on one memorable occasion "eyes of a damned snake".

She took it all in her stride. It had been worth it, for her newfound insight was incomparably valuable. The Gialene fiasco proved that, if nothing else; Morgiah had looked through her and read her like a book. It had been so easy.

She was standing by the window of the private chamber she shared with Reman, overlooking the ornamental gardens. This area of the palace had always been her favourite. The lawns and borders had been raised by some enterprising architect onto a series of glass walkways, spiralling around the residential wing of the castle until its highest feature, a sculpted crystal fountain, stood more than a hundred feet from the ground. A stream of pure water flowed artfully from its tip into a pool far below.

As she watched the fountain glowing faintly in the violet dusk, she experienced an unsettling yet now familiar sensation. It was as if the air had been drawn out of the world, leaving it a vacuum, hushed and expectant. Her head jerked, her hand flailing for the window frame as Hermaeus Mora gripped hard. Flick flick flick – a dark room, candlelight, Reman at his desk with head drooping from tiredness, sliding off his chair and falling to the floor… a servant running from the room, crying for help…

She came slowly back to herself. The window frame dug into her hand.

She looked around. Reman was behind her, asleep in the four-poster bed. He looked uncharacteristically small. He had been sleeping more these days; getting slower, wearier.

She turned back to the window, inevitability settling over her like a blanket of snow. She could not be certain, of course, but the vision left her with a quiet bleakness that made her think it would not be long now. A year. Maybe less.

And what would she do then?

Stay? Not an enormously appealing option. With Reman gone and her quest for the Tome fulfilled, her ties to Firsthold would be nonexistent. The citizens tolerated her as a trophy queen, but she would have a revolt on her hands – a real one this time – if she announced a desire to succeed the throne in her own name. No, they would put Reman's remaining son in power, and she would be relegated to Dowager Queen. Dowager, at her age? The title made her think of Daggerfall's Mynisera, all thin lips and colourless hair and bitter memories. No, better anything than that.

Go, then. But where, and to whom?

Her prospects were limited. It was conceivable she could arrange herself another marriage – her status as Firsthold Queen would open more doors than merely Wayrest Princess. But she was tired of depending on others for her status and power; if she married again, it would be on her terms. And she could be waiting a long time for that.

Wayrest was closed to her forever. Eadwyre was dead, her family long gone, and Elysana would rather offer houseroom to a man-eating nixhound than Morgiah. Besides, she was too proud. No, Wayrest was not a possibility.

And Morrowind…?

She rolled the idea around her mind like a jeweller appraising a new specimen of gem. When she thought of joining her family in Mournhold, a strange feeling possessed her – whether anxiety or excitement, she wasn't sure. Of course, it would be pleasurable to see Barenziah. Her mother visited once every year or so, but these journeys were far from hazardless and had become less frequent of late.

Then there was Helseth…

They had not seen each other now for twelve years. This coincided exactly with her last trip to Wayrest; Helseth and Elysana had been at daggers drawn, and in her six-week stay she had spoken to her brother all but twice. They had grown into strangers. She'd left feeling as if someone had died, and in the following years even his infrequent letters had stopped. It was as if he had simply forgotten she existed.

If she went to Morrowind, what would it do to their relationship? Would it heal or kill it? There was only one way to find out.

She padded softly towards the bed. The sky was darkening, but the last remains of daylight reflected from the glass towers and shed a soft illumination over the walls. As she sat on the coverlet and looked at her sleeping husband, an observer might have noted that her expression was very different to the icy shrewdness she had become so infamous for among the court. She looked tender, and a little sad.

Morgiah drew the drapes and shut out the light.

A/N: And this is pretty much the last we will see of Morgiah's previous life. We've gone all the way from Wayrest to the end of Firsthold, and now things in the present are going to be hotting up.