Authors Note:
The story focuses on a reluctant Nerevarine, and is interspersed with references to The Seven Curses, The Seven Trials, The Stranger and 36 Sermons of Vivec: Sermon 16. Hope you enjoy, feedback is always welcomed. :)
When earth is sundered, and skies choked black,
And sleepers serve the seven curses,
To the hearth there comes a stranger,
Journeyed far 'neath moon and star.
Though stark-born to sire uncertain,
His aspect marks his certain fate.
Wicked stalk him, righteous curse him.
Prophets speak, but all deny.
Many trials make manifest
The stranger's fate, the curses' bane.
Many touchstones try the stranger.
Many fall, but one remains.
- The Stranger, Ashlander text
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.
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It's pretty, he thinks.
Orange, purple, muted blues splash across the sky like vivid colours on some phantasmagorical canvas. It's the same sun he's languished under in the Imperial City for the first two decades of his life. He's lost count how many times he'd done precisely this, waiting for the cover of night for another larcenous venture. Yet somehow, here in this foreign land, the sight of that great ball of fire sinking into the horizon captures his imagination like nothing else has.
He pops another cornberry into his mouth, which isn't too bad once you grow accustomed to the bitterness. Inevitably, his eyes stray towards the mountain range far in the east, the peaks and troughs almost calling to him.
Finally, dusk settles like a heavy cloak around him, with no trumpets or fanfare. He approaches the rock face with trepidation, frowning as the symbol of Azura begins to glimmer on the worn stone door. There it is. Time and elements have worn down some of the intricate carving on the door, but given the months he'd spent in Vvardenfell, there is no mistaking Azura's sign. The same sign from those blasted Ashlander riddles. His hand hovers a breath away from the ancient stone to unlock the cavern. A strange feeling prickles deep within his chest. Wariness, yes. Fear, most certainly so. A moment passes. Then two. And he drops his hand, turning away, back towards the Valley of the Winds.
Nerevarine.
That's what the wise woman of Urshilaku called him. He tries not to remember her ruby eyes, how they lit up with pale fire as she recounted the prophecy handed down from her ancestors. And of how her recital of the Seven Trials slots perfectly into the gaps in his findings from the Dissident Priests and Caius' skooma-fuelled suspicions.
Even so, why does it all feel like a waking nightmare, or worse, a bad joke? Who would possibly conceive that a Breton man with no ties to Morrowind could be the reincarnation of Lord Indoril Nerevar, the greatest Dunmer hero in history? A soft chuckle escapes him, as bitter as the berries he chews on. Ah, the irony is not lost on him. The Dunmer hate outlanders with the same passion one would loathe a lingering mosquito in the bedroom. To have their gleaming, golden Nerevar return in the form of a scrawny Breton would make for an interesting confrontation.
He tucks away his bag of berries and leans back against his trusty rock perch in the plains of the Ascadian Isles. Venturing into the Cavern of the Incarnate is only the Third Trial of the Nerevarine. Given that the second trial gave him corprus, that wasting disease that destroys both mind and body, he isn't sure if he wants to stick around until the seventh. To Oblivion with Caius' none-too-subtle parting shot, he still has a chance at getting out of this mess. He just needs to reach Vivec and figure out the fastest way to get off Vvardenfell without tipping off the Blades. Maybe Mournhold to start with, then off to the Black Marshes after. The people of Morrowind need to find themselves a real hero, not some washed up crook from Cyrodiil.
The distant sound of a male voice pricks his ears without warning, derailing his ruminations. He goes still to listen. Silence. For a taut moment, he thinks he's imagined it. Then...
"Rollie!"
His hand strays to the sword at his belt, the other grabbing his chitin helmet. The Ascadian region is far safer than the Ashlands (unless you're khajiit or argonian), but it pays to be on one's toes. Wildlife in Morrowind has considerably more teeth and claws compared to those in Cyrodiil. Not to mention the odd Dunmer one sometimes encounters sleepwalking to the old Dagoth fortresses in the north. And how they turn murderous if you so much as tap them on the shoulder to ask for directions. Oh, how could he forget those. Yet he remains still as a statue at his cosy roost near an ancestral tomb, moving only his eyes lest he alert an unseen enemy.
"Rollie, come here, my boy!"
A man approaches from the north. Dunmer. Medium build. He wears the trappings of a merchant, unarmed except for a sheath strapped to his belt. The Breton's grip on his helmet loosens. He looks around, searching for others, a bodyguard or pack animal, but no. There is only him and the Dunmer for as far as the eye could see. Well, until a hungry alit or kagouti catches wind of the man's hissing and yelling and comes to investigate.
"Oh, Rollie, where are you?"
The Dunmer is almost sobbing by then. In his distraught state, it's likely he will walk right past the ancestral tomb in ignorance. Minus points for situational awareness. He looks somewhat aged as well. The Breton cranes his neck to scan the horizon again. What in Oblivion is this mer doing out here on his own, anyway? Night is falling. If he keeps wandering the area announcing his presence like this, he's going to be food for something before the sun's first rays tomorrow.
The Breton scratches at his day-old stubble. Oh, he really shouldn't. But his curiosity is piqued now.
"Who's Rollie?" he asks.
The Dunmer just about jumps out of his skin at his sudden intrusion. He pivots on his heel, frantically turning this way and that until his sharp elven eyes pick him out in the shadows. "By Azura! Ye Gods, man, you scared me half to death!"
"Sorry." He knows he sounds anything but.
Taking a deep breath, the Dunmer straightens the front of his shirt. A nervous tic of a man struggling to compose himself. "I…what are you doing, sitting out here like that?"
"Nice weather for it, I suppose. And you?"
For a moment, the Dunmer says nothing. The Breton endures his scrutiny without comment. He recognises how disconcerting his appearance can be to locals – a fair-haired Breton clad neck-to-toe in unrefined chitin like an Ashlander. Most locals don't know what to make of him at first, especially when he starts speaking Dunmeris like he's always known the language, as he just did. One of the unexpected perks of fast-tracked Blade training was the language lessons. Which this Dunmer obviously doesn't need to know about. To his credit, though, his unexpected guest chooses not to make it a point of contention. Instead, once he's satisfied that he is not up against a bandit or other similar low life form, he sketches a short bow.
"My name is Teris Raledran, I'm a merchant from Suran. I'm meant to deliver a few bolts of cloth and some clothes to Vivec, but my guar Rollie and I were attacked by a kagouti about a mile from here. We scattered for our lives and the beast chased me for a good stretch. Thank Azura I managed to give the creature the slip." His features crumple in despair, accentuating the lines near his eyes and mouth. "But now I can't find my guar!"
"It's dangerous to wander the Isles after nightfall, sera," the Breton points out. "Best you give up your cargo and head straight on to Vivec. It's not worth your life."
Teris sputters in indination. "You think I'm concerned for the cloth? I can thread newer, even better ones in days. No, I need to find Rollie. He's been with me since he was a pup, you see. I can't leave him out here in the wilds to die. That kagouti is still out there!"
The Breton cocks his head with interest. "You're…risking yourself for a guar?"
"Not just any guar, he's the best guar in the world! Wouldn't trade him for anything. Look, sera. If you…if you're not otherwise indisposed," hope shone through his exhausted features, "Could you…could you help me find him? He really is the sweetest boy. Would never harm a fly. I just need to get both of us safely to Vivec and I'll hire a guard for the trip back. I should have known better than to skimp on safety in these hard times."
Oh, he really shouldn't.
Sighing, the Breton looks to the darkening horizon. Somewhere across the foyada, high up in the mountains, Azura's magical door is glimmering, waiting for him. He's supposed to spend the night brooding about cowardice and bad decisions. But really, what kind of man would he be to let poor, precious Rollie get eaten by kagouti?
"Alright then. Lead on."
Teris' answering smile almost makes him feel better about the whole situation. The Breton ducks his head, deftly slipping on his full-face helmet to hide his discomfort. That's something that takes getting used to, being on the receiving end of honest-to-Aedra gratitude from others. Caius could have blathered on about duty and honour for days on end and none of it ever appealed to him. Not since he's been getting those smiles from the people he'd helped since arriving in Vvardenfell. Maybe age is making him soft.
Despite his words, he has no intention of letting Teris lead the search. All that caterwauling is bound to attract unwanted attention. Knowing his luck, such attention can come from anything ranging from a rabid horde of cliff racers to Nord brigands with more muscle than sense. He's had quite enough of unwanted encounters in the wild, thank you very much. So, once Teris pointed out the general direction he expects to find Rollie, the Breton walks slightly ahead with a hand on his sword hilt and his ears alert for the tell-tale scratching of guar noises.
"I didn't catch your name, sera," Teris asks after a while.
He pauses. "You can call me Jacques."
Not his real name, but Teris doesn't need to know that either. Honestly, he's not too fussed what people call him these days. Anything would be an improvement on Outlander, s'wit or n'wah at this point.
"So, what were you doing near that tomb?" Teris prods.
His sigh is genuinely pained. "It's a long story."
"It's not something…illegal, is it?"
Honestly, look at the cheek on this mer.
"Sera, do you want to find your guar or not?"
Teris throws his hand up in surrender. "I'm only asking. You have to admit, it does look funny, young man like you lurking in the middle of the Ascadian like that."
"I wasn't lurking."
"Of course not." The Dunmer sniffs. "But you do seem a good sort. It's important for youth to find employment, else you seek trouble in idleness." He waves a hand. "Take my nephew twice removed…"
Jacques starts to grind his teeth. Oblivion take him. Of all the rotten luck, he's apparently chosen to aid a nervous talker. Worse, a nervous nag. Maybe Rollie the Sweet Boy made a break for it to escape Teris more than anything else.
"…he's causing all kinds of trouble telling people he's the Nerevarine reincarnated." Jacques nearly trips on a stray rock. Swept up in sudden fervour, Teris doesn't notice his stumble, continuing, "He loiters all day near that seedy little brothel reciting insane prophecies to any who would listen. I warned him before I left, if he keeps this up, the Temple is going to have words with him and then who will take care of his poor mother?"
He speaks the law for Veloth's people. He speaks for their land, and names them great.
"Is he?" Jacques asks.
"Beg your pardon?"
"Is he the Incarnate?"
Teris turns to stare at him like he's grown another head. "Surely you jest. The boy can't lift a blade to save his own life. How can he liken himself to the greatest warrior to have ever graced Morrowind?"
Jacques tries not to reflect on his own paltry fighting skills. Sure, he knows his way around the sword and bow. Practicing on mudcrabs and cliff racers has certainly helped. But from the sound of it, he's a long way from the shining yardstick held up by the Dunmer. "By your reasoning, can anyone claim to do so?"
His question is shrugged off. "'Well, I think the point is moot. The Nerevarine Prophecy is heresy. Ashlander superstition. No one really believes Lord Nerevar will return and give us salvation. We have the Tribunal to keep us safe."
Yes, the Tribunal and their near-unintelligible scriptures. Or the False Gods, as the Urshilaku call them. Preening in their gilded palaces while their zealous agents persecute innocents like Mehra Milo and her exiled brethren. He understands now that the Tribunal's powers are protected by the Temple's illusions and bolstered by the faith of people like Teris. Which makes him wonder: how will the land recover from the knowledge that despite their belief, the Gods they hold up as all-mighty are in fact powerless against the evil awakening in the deep?
Lord Voryn Dagoth, Dagoth Ur! Steadfast liegeman, faithful friend, bids you come and climb Red Mountain!
"Tell me about Rollie," he says instead.
"Oh, he's the finest guar I'd ever met...kind, compassionate, funny, loving," Teris gushes affectionately. "Sure, he and I have our arguments, and he sometimes can be a little bit stubborn, but we always seem to be able to work things out. I remember there was this one time..."
After that, it's easy to let Teris' voice wash over him like background ambiance. The mer loves to talk. So, Jacques lets him talk, keeping to safe topics. After days of solitude on the road, it's almost pleasant to half-listen to. All the while, he follows noticeable scuffs on the ground and trampled grass, the tell-tale tracks of a large two-legged creature. It doesn't take long for the trail to converge with another set of tracks, this one smaller and with deeper indentation on the earth. As if whatever had made it had been running for dear life.
"Teris, stay here," Jacques says, cutting him off mid-story.
He doesn't wait for a response. Off he goes, bolting full tilt across the flatlands. After months of criss-crossing Vvardenfell, this is his terrain now. Survival necessitates learning the lay of the land, the beasts that inhabit it, the flora that can be both boon and bane. It's becoming second nature for him to pick out the best path across the sloping plains as he hunts. Thus, the sight of a laden guar facing off against a kagouti doesn't surprise him when he crests a steep knoll and pauses to take stock. The guar is already wounded based on its awkward stance, but it stands its ground against a much larger beast, armed with long claws and sharp tusks made for gouging prey.
No time to waste. He draws his sword and barrels down the knoll, hoping he doesn't fall over and impale himself in his haste. Now wouldn't that be an ignominious end. Turns out that fortune favours him. His speed and momentum give the kagouti very little time to react as he ploughs into it from behind with ten pounds of steel. Before the beast could turn around and give him what for, he pulls the sword out and with a quick whirl, swings it with all his might into the beast's neck. There! Dark blood sprays across his face. His lips thin on reflex to avoid getting the stuff in his mouth. Arterial spray. A quick, clean kill.
Except no one told the kagouti that. Even bleeding profusely from a fatal wound, it charges into him as if possessed by an unholy spark. Chitin armour is all well and good for speed and reflexes, but it's terrible for actual protection. He grunts as a few hundred pounds of angry meat slams into him, twisting to avoid the tusks on either side of the beast's mouth. That's going to bruise tomorrow. How is this thing still fighting? Then he notices its beady eyes. Glazed, red, and rheumy. The unmistakeable sickly-sweet odour of rotten fruit. Up close, the reddish tint to its scales and the sores also become obvious, the crazed frenzy driven by more than simple hunger.
The creature is blighted.
Cursing, he careens away from it, drawing another sword as he does. Blighted creatures fight to the bitter end, gnashing and biting even after you've dismembered every other appendage that could hurt you. The next few minutes pass in a haze, as he sets out executing the grisly deed, until the kagouti is nothing more than a growling red mess on the ground. A clinical sword strike to the head is what finally puts it down in the end.
Dark blood pools beneath the twitching carcass. Silence hangs heavy in the air. He shudders as he rubs absently at his bruised chest, though the clime remains as temperate and balmy as it was the day he arrived.
What's a blighted animal doing in the Ascadian Isles? This place is miles away from the Ghostfence.
How deeply has the rot set in the land?
"Rollie! I'm so glad you're alright!"
He turns around just in time to see Teris throw his arms around his beloved guar. Rollie makes an unusual chirping sound he's never heard before, and he can't help but wonder what it's like to be so loved by one's own pack animal. His lips twitch under the chitin helmet as he quickly wipes and sheathes his blades. No wonder Teris was so hell-bent on this crazy search and rescue mission, if this is the kind of reunion he gets. It's enough to give him respite from creeping trepidation.
Jacques clears his throat. "Should I leave you two alone?"
Rollie glances at him askew. For a moment, it seems about to speak, but then thinks better of it. Clearly this benign-looking creature is the brains of the operation.
"See, Rollie, I told you there are still some good folks in these lands!" Teris pats the guar on the back like the proud owner he is, then directs his grateful smile to Jacques. It looks as though years have fallen off him in the blink of an eye. "He's become such a pessimist in his old age, but even he has to admit you're a real hero."
The Dunmer's sincere warmth gives Jacques pause. He glances at the kagouti carcass again, but in his mind, he sees a cavern bathed in ominous red glow, deformed mer ambling within with holes where their faces should be. Deranged puppets of the Sixth House spreading a waking nightmare across Morrowind. Suddenly he knows with certainty that the Ghostfence will not hold. Not even the Temple can stop this plague when it grows from within the earth itself. A poison that spreads slowly, inevitably…
…from the halls of the oath-breaking house, rings seven curses of gods blasphemed.
"He's wounded." Jacques ignores the dread pooling in his gut and points to the guar's right leg, choosing to focus on more practical matters. "I can heal it, but you'll need someone to take a closer look at that, in case he's caught the blight."
It takes him far too many seconds to realise he's just referred to a guar as 'he'.
Teris goggles at him, then at the dead kagouti. "Blight? Wha- how?"
He half-shrugs. "I don't know where that thing came from, but it's diseased."
"Oh, no no no. This won't do." Teris clutches at his head. "We must head to Vivec immediately. Without delay! Jacques, my good man, you would be doing me a world of favour if you could accompany us. I'll tell you what, when we get there, I'll reward you. I think 100 septims seems fair, isn't that right, Rollie?"
Rollie huffs a loud breath, as if in affirmative.
"There, he agrees. What say you, sera?"
Oh, he really shouldn't.
Jacques' gaze flickers between the mer and the guar for a moment. Then again, he was heading to Vivec to begin with, even if it is well past nightfall. They would simply need to stretch themselves a bit to make it there in an hour or so. Plus, reward or no, he admits it's hard to say no to Teris' beaming face, which seems to be cracking with uncertainty given that he can't see Jacques' expression underneath the chitin helmet. Instead of replying, though, the Breton approaches Rollie and lays a hand on its wound to heal it. With that bit of magic, it should be able to keep up since the city is not too far away. Rollie gives him a knowing look as he steps back. Somehow, he has a feeling it will bounce back from this ordeal just fine.
"I will come," he says at last.
"Wonderful! Now then, how about the three of us get going?"
Teris claps him on the back with gusto and sets off south with a bounce in his step. For a few seconds, Rollie tests its footing on the newly healed leg before moving to follow. Jacques stands back, watching the mer and guar ahead of him. Then he smiles at the sight. This hero-ing business – it's not awful, he thinks. Even as his imagination conjures up a soft, comfortable bed in Vivec, he feels in his bones the shift slowly taking place within, potent and irresistible like the dreams plaguing him from the second he arrived on this rock.
He thinks of Mehra Milo, the thankless labour of the Dissident Priests in Holamayan, their on-going sacrifice over years and decades and centuries of conspiracy. Of the wise Urshilaku tribesmen who have waited so long for their Lord to return.
He thinks of the Sleepers and the horrors of the Sixth House Cult. The unholy statues of Sharmat scattered across homes and towns meant to corrupt unwitting mer into becoming tools of evil. Sometimes he can still see that red glow flickering behind his eyelids when he lays his head down to rest.
And lastly, he thinks of Vvardenfell and the long shadow cast by the great Indoril Nerevar's legacy. Ruler, Hortator, Saviour. How the children of Azura will never truly know if the great mer was killed fighting his loyal friend Dagoth Ur or murdered within the circle of his closest confidantes. What would Nerevar think of all this if he still lived? Would he weep at the sight of the Dunmer too divided to rise and combat a great evil intent on devouring them all?
A chill runs through Jacques. Like someone has walked over his grave.
Nerevar said, "I am afraid to become slipshod in my thinking."
Vivec said, "Reach heaven by violence then."
Glancing over his shoulder, he gazes across the plains again, up towards the foreboding mountains of the eastern range. The moon and stars shine overhead. Gooseflesh prickles his skin; he feels it even under layers of armour and clothing. He doesn't feel special in his all-too-mortal flesh. The question from the harrowing weeks past gnaws at him again: could he truly be Nerevar reborn? He savours the stillness of the Ascadian Isles, the beautiful landscape yet untouched by the foulness of the Sharmat. But at the end of the day…what does it matter if the land is dying and people like Teris and guars like Rollie die with it? Should he not at least try to raise his sword and fight for the sake of this land he begins to feel like his own?
He breathes deep and feels resolve bloom in his chest. Then he turns back to the road ahead and walks after Teris and Rollie. Once they are safely in Vivec…perhaps he will give this whole Incarnate thing another try.