It was cold.

Starting awake, I found myself in a snowbank. A growl bubbled and sleep stung my eyes.

I flailed my way out of the snow, finding my horse plodding down the path without me. I raced after it, nearly tripping over myself. It quickened its pace as I approached; I swear this thing knew what I was, but I caught it and hoisted myself back into the saddle in one swift motion.

Drawing the horse to a stop, I took the time to survey my surroundings. I probably hadn't been asleep for long. The road was still visible, but there were few distinguishing landmarks around. I dug out my map and cursed at the horse as it stamped its feet and bellowed.

I was somewhere past Nightgate Inn. The Vigilant's hall could not have been far, I thought.

I looked up, squinting against the blinding morning light. A scowl curved my lips. The outline of a fort lay some distance ahead, and I urged the horse onward.

No sign of life emerged from the fort, even as I drew closer. I searched around as the horse continued on. The fort was in a state of disrepair, clearly out of use for some time. Arrows were still stuck in wooden beams, siege weapons dilapidated and covered in snow.

The smell of smoke caught my attention and I snapped my head around. Ahead, to the northwest, a plume of smoke rose into the sky. I kicked the horse into a canter, raising up in the saddle and craning to see. There was a bend ahead, and if I had read my map correctly, the smoke was likely coming from the Vigilant's Hall.

I turned the horse off the main trail, bounding it through the snow. When I got around the bend, I found what I expected; a building in absolute ruin, charred nearly to the foundation on the eastern end. Ash and soot was everywhere. The stench of death lingered. The smell burned my nose enough that I pulled my mask above my face, though it helped little.

I dismounted some ways off, tying the horse to a tree, before proceeding up the short slope to the building. Heraldry denoting Stendarr littered the path, as did several corpses with various stages of burning. Some were nigh unrecognizable as human.

A strange mound caught my eye as I passed it and it bade me stop. I nudged it with my boot, then cleared the snow from it. Some hellhound of a creature, whose skin was black as pitch and had knives for teeth, lay sprawled atop the body of a Vigilant. The ground beneath them was frozen with a mix of red and black.

I got up and continued to the Hall. Several more corpses lay beyond the threshold. I stepped lightly across the charred boards. I was fingering the hilt of my sword, trying to distract myself from the smell of death and burning, and to assuage the thought that whatever caused this was still close by.

Many books were scattered about the floor. Documents, or parts of documents, scrolls and some other pieces of writing, too, lay in ashes. I stooped and picked one up. The page disintegrated at my touch.

I turned my attention to the opposite end of the building, which inexplicably was left mostly untouched. A pair of legs extended from a doorway, the body face down. I stood, walking over, my skin crawling at the crackling beneath my boots. I stepped across the corpse; it was a woman, but she was dressed in garb differing from the Vigilants. I bent enough to lift her upper lip. Fangs. Vampire.

Continuing on, another corpse lay sprawled atop a table. This one a male, undressed from the waist up, his arms stretched out into a cruciform position. As I approached, it became evident that something, a sword as I quickly discovered, was staked through the center of his chest. An amulet of Stendarr was entangled around it.

His ribs and torso were marred by deep reds and purples; whatever left him in this state had crushed him, badly. But upon closer inspection, I found no other major injury on his body. No bite or puncture marks, as I would have expected.

I grumbled. This wasn't at all like the vampires that I had fought before. Whatever the Vigilants had done, perhaps especially this poor sod, inspired something truly terrible.

There was still the matter of Dimhollow, and the supposed relic it contained. The reason I'd been sent out here in the first place. I took a final look at the wreckage as I left the ruins of the building. I was starting to get the nagging feeling that whatever the ruins held wasn't worth half a Septim to a thief. Especially so if an organized pack of vampires were after it.

Whatever it was, it was dangerous. There would be a bigger headache to deal with if these vampires got their hands on it, that much I was sure of.

A trail of blood splintered off from the path, dotting the snow up a mountainside trail. Lumbering footsteps, alongside drag marks, accompanied the blood. I followed the trail. As I ascended the mountain path, the scent of death and decay picked up on the wind until, finally, I came to the mouth of a cave. There were two bodies outside, one face down, the other laid across the other. They were Vigilants, by the look of their armor.

I took one last look off the mountainside before descending into the cave. Far below, just barely visible, the remainder of the Hall of the Vigilants smoldered. I grimaced before turning back and beginning the descent.

I started to hear voices part way down, and the stink of fresh blood accompanied it. Torchlight glow was just ahead. I drew my bow and readied an arrow, crouching low as I continued on.

"He killed her right in front of me," a voice lamented. It was shrill and somehow gravely at once. Choked with emotion. "First Bastien goes missing, then Yvett gets blown into fucking stardust!" There was a guttural roar, a loud, solid thump, then rumbling as rock gave way.

Finally I reached the end of the descent. The cavern was clearly the opening to an ancient Nordic ruin. A gate blocked the path further in. A crumbling tower, dimly lit, sat lower and deeper in the cavern.

There were three individuals; one face down, probably dead or dying. Another next to them, by the gate, arms crossed. The third had their back turned away, fist to the wall, wailing.

"You were always too soft for this, Lisbet." This elicited a choked sob. "They died serving Lord Harkon's orders. They knew what was at stake."

In a sudden movement, the other vampire careened across the cave and into the other. The fiend barely moved, only stumbling back a step or two.

"Yvett was mine!" screeched Lisbet. Her voice grew deep and monstrous. I crept forward another step, footfalls feather light. I lifted the bow. "And I was made for Bastien! He wouldn't just leave me! They were all I had, and then Harkon wanted his fucking scrolls back!"

There was a laugh, dry and cruel. "Bastien would have traded you for a common bar whore's blood. You were nothing to him."

A bellow; I loosed the arrow. The vampire howled and fell sideways, falling to the cavern floor. Her companion stood motionless for a moment, but he quickly whipped his head around, then to his kin, calling her name to little avail. I walked toward the pair, drawing another arrow, firing it. It found its mark in the other vampire's back. He fell forward with a groan.

I went over and nudged both of them with my boot. Then there came a visceral groan and my skin crawled. It didn't appear to be coming from either of the vampires. Quickly drawing my sword instead, I turned, frantically scanning the space, straining my senses to find anything.

The body I had spotted earlier moved, hands pressing flat to the earth, to push itself up enough to look at me. His face was badly beaten, bloodied and scratched, but he looked familiar.

"You," he said, his voice thick with fluid and death. "You aren't one of them. Stendarr's mercy. You were at‒" He choked a breath. I sheathed my weapons and approached him. "At the fort."

I crouched in front of the man, squinting in the dim light. "Tolan? Vigilant Tolan?"

He weakly nodded his head. "Aye."

"What are you doing here?"

"I came for‒ for Adalvald. To get him to Isran. He discovered this place before the‒" He hacked and wheezed with a pained sob. "Would you tell me something?"

I didn't answer.

"Are you‒are you truly the Dragonborn?"

I recoiled a little, leaning back upon my heels. I considered lying.

"Yes."

He sighed, a pleasant, relieved sigh. "Dragonborn," he said, "whatever evil lies in here, rid Tamriel of it. It would surely doom us all. Please, as a fool man's wish." He collapsed back to the cavern floor, a final, wispy breath escaping his lungs.

I grit my teeth.

Well, shit.

"Stendarr have mercy on you," I said under my breath.