Chapter Thirteen: Life at stake
Merlac had been arrogant. He had let his anger flow and it had now sealed his fate. The hatred had clouded his mind and he had paid a terrible price for that mistake. Corpus…the one and only disease in whole Morrowind which could not be cured.
Merlac looked at the mirror again. Bloody blisters covered his face and his back was starting to go deformed. What would it be like to change into a monster, a ruthless creature? Merlac was about to find out… but when? He had no idea how fast the disease would spread.
He sat on the cold, wet, stone floor. The effect of the friend's soul spell started to wear off, desperation returned. Merlac thought Milo…imagined her alone in a cold, stone prison, hoping for Merlac to rescue him. But Merlac had failed. Nobody would rescue Milo, nobody would be the one who rescues Morrowind….
"But…", Merlac said to himself. "But if I die, then I cannot be the one… so either I am not the Nerevar reborn, or I will not die!"
At first, Merlac didn't know what to think. If he really was the incarnation, he could not die, not just yet. There had to be a cure, there just had to be!
"Caius! He will know what to do!", Merlac yelled alone in the cave. As he partly walked, partly ran through the stone tunnels, he wondered how he hadn't though of this before. He had come this far, it was wrong time to give up.
Finally, Merlac stumbled out of the dark cave into dim sunlight that tried to get its way through the thick fog. The rather cold air felt wonderful on the blisters on Merlac's face, as they had started to become painful. Merlac took a deep breathe and suddenly everything cleared out. It was those incenses in the cave which had caused the hatred in Merlac's mind. Those incenses had made him too self-confident and arrogant.
Merlac regretted his violent acts few minutes, but then he remembered that he didn't have any time to loose; he had to find Caius!
Luckily, Balmora was only few hours walk away from Gnaar Mok, as no human would have dared to come within 50 feet of him. The darkness of the night had already started to descend, as Merlac arrived to the walls of Balmora. He had left all his items, except the longsword and his clothes, to the swamp to lighten his burden.
While covering his face and hands with his clothes, Merlac knocked at Caius' door. Few guards were already glancing suspiciously at him. If they would notice what was matter with him, the city would probably go to complete panic. Luckily, Caius opened the door rather quickly.
"Who are you and what do you want?", Caius asked with impatient and tired voice.
"It's me, Merlac, please let me in!"
"Merlac, what… where is your armour? What has happened? Did you finish the sixth house -mission already?"
"I don't have time! Please, just let me in and I will explain!", Merlac moaned in worry.
Caius stepped aside and let Merlac come in. Merlac sat on Caius' bed and waited for his master to close the door.
"So what happe…", started Caius, but froze as he saw Merlac taking off the pieces of clothes covering his face. "Oh my god! What the hell has happened to you?", he groaned.
"Well master… I have some good news and some bad news. The good news are that I killed sixth house cultists inside the cave, including the Dagoth -family member who claimed to be an ash vampire."
"Ash vampire! What the hell? There hasn't been any ash vampires outside the ghostfence since the great war between the dwemer and the chimer, how could he…", Caius began, but Merlac interrupted him again.
"Please master, I don't have the time. The bad news is that the ash vampire had cursed himself somehow, and when I killed him, I caught the corpus disease…"
At this point Caius' face went extremely pale. He looked like he was about to say something, but he didn't know what, so he just opened and closed his mouth quietly, lookin horrified. Then he stood up from his chair and looked like he was about to look at Merlac closer, but then he just sat down, looking like he would like to leave the room as soon as possible.
"Oh my god…oh my god!", Caius repeated.
"Master, please. I have hard time enough without you looking at me like I were the ugliest thing you have seen before."
"Well… actually, you are. I'm sorry."
"Look, Caius… I know there is no cure to corpus, but… I was kind of hoping… there has to be a way! Can there be something that slows the disease down so that I can wait for a cure being found?"
Caius sighed and buried his face to his hands.
"Merlac, my dear apprentice Merlac… the leading wizards in Morrowind have tried to find a cure for corpus for over five hundred years, it is very unlikely they could find one in a matter of days!"
"But… I can't just give up! There has to be somebody who could help me!", Merlac moaned. "They can experiment on me and try to find the cure. Please, master… anything?"
Caius leant over his knees and stared at the wooden floor. After short time, he spoke again.
"Well… there is one person in Morrowind who might be able to help you… and I put the pressure on the word might."
"So tell me where can I find him! Hurry, I don't have any time to loose!", Merlac yelled.
"There is just one problem…", Caius sighed.
"And what is that, master?"
"He happens to be a Telvanni wizard."
"Oh… no, no, no… you mean…?"
"Yes, and that's not half of it. He is one of the oldest members of the Telvanni house and he hates Mage's guild's wizards more than anything."
"Great. Anything else I should know about?"
"Yes. He is one of those wizards who got their asses kicked in the South Wall Corner club some time ago, and I bet he remembers you, so I have a strong feeling he will throw you out of his house as soon as he sees you."
"Well, I believe I have no other choice, do I?"
"I'm afraid not. But… there is one thing that just might make him help you."
Caius walked to his desk of drawers, opened the bottom drawer and took out a small, black goblet.
"What is that?", asked Merlac.
"It's a very old dwemer goblet. The wizard who you must find is called Divayth Fyr and he is a famous collector of old dwemer artefacts. If you give this to him, and he does not have it already, he just might be willing to help you."
"But… master, this cup has to be worth of hundreds of septims! I can't take this."
"It's worth of over 50 000 septims, my friend, but I would be ready to spend a whole bag of those if it would save your life."
"Oh… master, thank you, thank you so much!", Merlac walked towards Caius and were just about to hug him, but Caius took a step backwards.
"I'm sorry Merlac, but I don't know how easily corpus infects, so just in case…"
"Oh, of course…"
"You should leave now. Travel only during night and don't let anyone see you like that."
"All right, master. But… how do I find this… who was he again?"
"Divayth Fyr, and you will find him in his own tower city of Tel Fyr, on a small island of Sadrith Mora. You have been in Sadrith Mora, haven't you?"
"Yes, master. The Telvanni tower is actually visible from Sadrith Mora during clear weather. So is there a bridge or something that leads to the island?"
"No, I'm afraid Telvanni wizards don't use bridges or boats. Their towers don't even have stairs. They just levitate all the time, so make sure you are rested when you levitate to the island, it's a long way to go."
"Yes, master, I will. I will go now, I hope to see you soon."
"Good luck, Merlac!", Caius yelled after him, but Merlac had already taken the goblet and ran to the dark streets of Balmora.
"Good luck, my friend… you're going to need it…", said Caius to himself and stared at the night sky, where the two moons of Tamriel slowly climbed up from the horizon.
***
Sadrith Mora was located on an island in the opposite coast of Vvardenfell, and because Merlac couldn't use any public transportation, it took him almost a week to get there, as he only travelled during night time, and hid himself during daylight.
On the night of sixth day, Merlac arrived to the eastern coast of Vvardenfell. It was very dark and he was only barely able to see the Wolverine hall, a great stone tower of Sadrith Mora far away in the sea. As he moved his sight to right, he saw it; a weird-looking, high Telvanni tower pointing out from the fog.
Merlac closed his eyes, relaxed his mind, - as much as it was possible despite the growing pain in the blisters - and rose slowly from the ground. He opened his eyes again and started levitating slowly towards the tower island.
A bit before the halfway, Merlac landed on a small stone to rest. The distance was much longer and energy-consuming than he had first though. There was no way he could levitate to the tower, and there were no more resting-stones between him and the island. There had to be another way.
Merlac stood up again and decided to try another spell instead. He remembered the time when he was training with Ranis in the rived, but he hadn't practised water walking much since then.
He carefully touched the water surface with the tip of his shoe. It went all wet. Merlac looked back where he had come from, the coast was too far away, he could never levitate back there without having a good night sleep, which was impossible in that small stone.
Merlac decided to stare at the distant tower instead, and without thinking it much, he just started walking towards it. He heard the water squelching in his shoes, Merlac knew that if he would look down, he would fall and drown.
After a time that felt like an eternity, Merlac finally reached the tower island and as tired as dead, he collapsed on the beach. Merlac didn't know how long he had been lain there on the sand, but finally he stood up, still tired as hell, and started slowly walking towards the tower.
The Telvanni tower was like a gigantic tree, or a plant of some kind, whose leaves and branches surrounded it like walls. As Merlac reached the root of the tower, he realised there were no doors or windows on any side of the building. How could he get in? A password perhaps? Or a spell of some kind? Then, Merlac happened to look up, and then he saw it. Near the top of the tower, was a small wooden door, built on the middle of the tower and without any kind of stairs around it. He would have to levitate again.
Pain tore his body apart as Merlac used his last powers to reach the door, and finally literally just crashed through it. First he thought he had lost his consciousness, but then he heard a female voice speaking.
"Are you all right?", the kind voice asked. Merlac opened his eyes and saw a young, dunmer woman kneeled next to him. Another young woman behind them swung his hand and the broken door became solid again and filled the open hole in the wall.
"Yes…thanks… well, no… I'm not ok.", Merlac stuttered in exhaustion. "I need to talk with Divayth Fyr, please."
"We are two of Mr. Fyr's seven wives. I'm sorry, mister, but I'm afraid he won't be very willing to help anyone, especially an outlander at this time of night. Is there anything we can do for you?"
"Well… no, I really must see Divayth, or I will most likely die…please, I beg you.", Merlac moaned.
The two wives looked each other and then one of them spoke to a third woman who was standing a bit farther away from Merlac.
"Daiah, quickly, go and wake Mr. Fyr, we will bring this poor man upstairs, hurry!"
The third woman touched her ring and vanished. The two other grabbed Merlac gently from his hands and started partly leading, partly dragging him towards a corridor.
"Now hang tight, mister, we must levitate now a bit. If you can, it would be nice if you helped us a bit.", said the other woman to Merlac.
Next to the wall, there was a large hole in the roof of the room. Gently, the two woman began to levitate and lifted Merlac with them through the hole to next room. The room was much smaller than the previous one and the numerous shelves in there were filled with colourful potions and herbs.
Few seconds later, two people landed down from a hole in the roof next to Merlac and the two women. One of them was the third wife Merlac had seen, and the other was Divayth Fyr himself.
"YOU!", Divayth spat as soon as he saw Merlac. "Get out of my house, you worthless outlander, mage's guild's lousy scum!"
"Please, Divayth, please listen to me, you're my only hope!", Merlac moaned.
"I don't care whether you were the last person upon this island, I wouldn't help you!"
"But… please, I caught corpus, and I heard you might be able to help me…"
"Corpus?", said Fyr with a bit calmer voice but his face still as red as a boiled crab. "How the hell did you get corpus? And why, why in the name of Almsivi, do you presume ME, a great Telvanni wizard to help you, you filthy outlander?"
"All I can offer is my thanks…", Merlac started.
"Then I will throw you the hell out of here!"
"…and this.", Merlac continued, and took the dwemer goblet from his pocket and gave it to Fyr.
Fyr took the goblet from Merlac's hand with a bit surprised look on his face and examined the goblet carefully.
"But… oh my… this is… is it really? Well…", Fyr tried to hide his joy, but Merlac saw that the Telvanni wizard had something very unique in his hands.
"So… tell again, what do you ask in return for this…. this little cup of yours?"
"I ask you kindly to cure my corpus dis…disease.", Merlac stuttered. He knew he wouldn't live much longer, his hands were already almost numb and strange bumbs had started growing into his chest.
"Well, I believe you understand that I can't promise you anything, I do have a good potion to fight the corpus disease, but it has been tested with hundreds of corpus patients, and not one of them has survived, unless the potion was drank immediately after catching the disease, and you are already in very bad shape I'm afraid…"
"Please…", said Merlac with his last strength, as the blisters in his face had started bleeding badly.
The Telvanni wizard hesitated few seconds, but then started working.
"Daiah, give me that black bottle from the second shelf!", he yelled and carefully put the goblet to his table.
One of the wives ran to the shelf and took a small, black bottle which was filled with smoke-like liquid, and brought it to Divayth. Divayth kneeled next to Merlac.
"Now listen to me, Merlac, it is most likely that this will not work, and I won't lie to you if I say I will not be the one who is sorry if you die, but let's give it a try anyway, shall we?"
The wizard opened Merlac's mouth and carefully forced him to drink the bottle empty. Merlac coughed twice, and then fell unconscious. The women in the room stared in horror as Merlac threw up several times, and then his body felt motionless to the floor. Divayth touched his throat with his fingers.
"There is no hearth beat.", he said and lowered his ear near Merlac's mouth. "And he doesn't breathe."
The wizard waited for few more seconds and then stood up.
"He's dead. What a mess around here…", he said and glanced at Merlac, who was laying in his own puke.
Merlac knew he was dead. He wasn't able to breathe, his heart did not beat and his thoughts started fading away. Voices from the room had went silent long time ago and all he was able to hear was silence. But then there was a faint voice, like a whisper… a woman voice…
"Merlac…", the voice said. "Merlac…it is not yet your time to go… you must survive…. you must live… you have the strength… breather….BREATHE!", the voice echoed.
The wives of Divayth Fyr were about to carry Merlac's body away, as suddenly from thin air a lightning struck Merlac in his chest. The women stepped backwards in horror and Divayth turned around to see what had exploded.
Merlac's body started to wriggle and sparkle. A lightning struck him again, and again, and even a third more time. The whole room bathed in bright light as Merlac's body rose high above the floor and continued wriggling in the air, sparkling faster and faster. Suddenly, Merlac fell back to the floor and screamed as loud as he his lungs could. The same female voice spoke again, this time not inside Merlac's head, but somewhere in the room, but nobody saw anything.
"By the grace of Azura, the life of this mortal is spared, it is not yet his time to go. Breathe Merlac, breathe!"
Bolts of lightning struck again, but this time they came from Merlac itself. Divayth's wives ran screaming away from the room and Fyr himself threw himself behind a large desk of drawers. The strokes of lightning struck faster and faster and the bottles started flying around the room like a hurricane. An enormous flash stuck the wall and ripped off entire wall from the room, revealing the sea and night sky outside the tower.
Finally, as fast as it had started, the storm ended hand the room became quiet again, except from the sound of sea outside. Merlac lied quiet on the floor, and finally opened his eyes. The blisters were gone and his hands looked normal again. Then, like if he had held his breathing for over a year, Merlac breathed and coughed.
Merlac rose sitting on the floor and Divayth carefully peeped behind the half-burnt desk, stuttering something like "my tower…my beautiful potion collection!"
Merlac stood up and ran to Divayth.
"It worked, it worked!!", screamed Merlac in joy and hugged Divayth, who was still staring at the enormous hole in the wall. "I'm alive, and all the blisters are gone! Oh I love you Divayth, I love you, I love Telvanni, how can I ever pay you?", Merlac said, but before Divayth was able to say anything about repairing the tower, Merlac had already jumped out from the hole and was running above the water, screaming and jumping.
"I'm alive, I'm alivee!", he yelled and ran towards the main island of Vvardenfell, as morning sun began to rise slowly above the horizon, bringing its orange glow around the still smoking Telvanni tower and the confused face of Divayth Fyr…