AN: here's some of that 'irregular upload schedule' i was talking about. nothing really to pin it on, just stuff tbh lol. anyway he's 7k words to make up for it c:
He'd taken a nap of suitable length and recovered Lanfael, which had been sharpened and smoothed out by blacksmith whom he didn't know the name of. It's edge was in much better shape now, finer and better for cutting and blade-to-blade contact. Apparently, the blade was of Elvish make, which explains both its age and its quality. The blacksmith couldn't get rid of every nick and scratch without completely reforging the blade, but Valios thought that the marks added character. Perhaps some younger part of him thought of it as adding to the 'dashing rogue' he'd once wanted to be, but regardless, he now had a weapon befitting his station and skill, and a few hundred extra gold to go towards supplies.
Shopping was a simple affair, as he only truly needed food for himself. Much as Serana had complained, he knew that regular food to a vampire would always be lackluster when compared to blood. He couldn't bring a horse, however, so he was forced to buy only enough food to conceivably last him until Solitude. He could hunt, but he didn't have a bow, and that and arrows would be both another expense and another thing to carry.
He'd also gotten a haircut from one of the women in the village who apparently provided such a service for many in the village who didn't do it themselves. He'd been initially tense, an unfamiliar woman with a blade near his neck, but he'd gradually relaxed as she began casually talking about her son's who'd gone off to join the war. She was clearly lonely, so he'd obliged with small-talk until she was finished.
He had to admit, he looked much cleaner. His hair, instead of cascading about his shoulders, was now neatly swept back. It was still long enough to reach past his jaw, but it was no longer a veritable mop of hair. His beard, too, was much smaller; no longer that of a wild hermit, but instead a kempt adventurer. It had the added effect of revealing more of his facial scars, but he'd made peace with the marks long ago and didn't care about them.
When he went to fetch Serana, he found her already awake, securing the Elder Scroll to it's harness. She turned to look at him and he detected a flash of surprise at the change in his appearance before it turned to scrutiny. He raised a questioning brow.
"You look younger." She said, turning back to her things.
"Oh? As opposed to looking old beforehand?" He challenged, surprised she'd commented at all.
"Obviously. The long hair, big beard, and the way you talk - all you were missing was the grey hair." She snarked, not looking at him.
"Oh, please. We are both aware who the old man here is - or, rather, the old woman. You've got me beat by a few millennia."
"Maybe, but I don't look it. I'm forever young. You're forever cranky." He rolled his eyes, not trusting his response to be something that wouldn't prove her point.
"The illusion held, yes?" He said. Rather than carrying the Scroll about into battle, unwieldy as it was, Serana had elected to put an illusion over it and hide it under the bed. He'd been skeptical, because an Elder Scroll was the definition of priceless, but she'd waved off his concern citing that she wouldn't take the risk if she didn't think it'd work.
"No, I'm actually holding a paper-mache replica someone made of an Elder Scroll." She said with a tone to rival his own dryness. At that, he levelled her a Look to outdo any of his previous Looks, and she couldn't withhold a snort. "Yes, it held. Even if someone looked around, no one would have found it. I'll keep it up once while we leave town. And, it gave me an idea."
"Enlighten me." She turned to look at him, and it took him a moment to realise. Her eyes were green. He blinked away his surprise, taking in the sight of her without her amber gaze.
"With this, I won't have to have my hood up all the time." She said proudly.
"Wasn't the hood to hide the sun?" He tilted his head.
"Well, yes, but also no." He frowned. "Partially, but I'm a higher vampire. The sun doesn't affect us like others - they can burn and even turn to ash, but it's more just an uncomfortable tingling for us. I won't seek it out, but the main issue was people questioning my eyes. They're rather distinctive."
He couldn't help but agree. Serana's eyes didn't glow, per se, nor were they the distinctive color of burning coals, like others; they were a much more neutral honeyed-yellow, still remarkable and clearly unnatural in their own right. With green eyes, though… she looked startlingly human. The light in the room was dim so her paler skin was more difficult to pick out, and the shadows more clearly accentuated the lines of her face. He grunted, looking past her to examine the room, because looking at her made him uncomfortable in a not-unpleasant way (which was, in turn, unpleasant. because of the implication).
"That will be useful when we reach Solitude, I suppose," he agrees with a nod. "You're ready to go, then?"
"Ready if you are." She stood, Scroll strapped to her back and dagger at her hip, and little else. He frowned at her lack of equipment, but then supposed there was little to do about it. They'd not be traveling for much longer anyway.
"Come along, then." He turned to leave and she followed.
He tossed a coin to the innkeep with a small smile and nod of thanks as he left then continued outside. Wordlessly he turned to his left and started on the trail outside of town. He didn't quite know what it was that made him stop and frown, turning to see if Serana was still behind him. To his mild surprise, she wasn't; she was, instead, staring up at the sky with an expression akin to awe on her face.
"Serana?" He queried.
"The sky," she said simply, and he turned to look.
The night sky was awash with vibrancy. Broad strokes, as though from an artist's brush, of teal and blue painted the scene above. Masser, the larger of the two moons, was in full view, with Secunda just below it. The full moon had been yesterday, but a single night had done nothing to dim their respective majesties. Beyond them, white pinpricks of light dotted the sky.
His father had adored the night sky, particularly on nights like this, and he had always said the view was best in Skyrim, for whatever reason. He found that he agreed; though Cyrodiil was gorgeous, the blue light of the aurora blended well with the snowy landscape, creating a mood that seemed to calm you just by looking at it.
He had walked past it. He hadn't meant to, per se, but it had just happened. He was focused on getting a start on their journey, knowing it would be a long walk, and he had spent many a nights under the night sky in years past. He had… gotten used to it? No, that wasn't right. He felt a sense of wonder come across him - not something one does when 'used to' something.
He couldn't remember the last time he'd simply stopped and looked. It wasn't even that he didn't have time to, but always when on the road he'd thought about other things, the mission or destination ahead, his next objective, or maybe thoughts of a warm bed and hearth. Sometimes, he'd journal, a habit leftover from when he'd first been taught to write.
He felt the urge to grab the journal he carried with him, sitting in his pack. He had used to draw a fair bit, too, before he'd simply stopped - sometime after Varondo, he thought.
"I haven't seen the sky like this in a long time." He heard Serana whisper behind him. He didn't look at her, but took advantage of the moment for what it was: a small period of peace, truer than when he'd had a bed to sleep in.
"My father used to take me outside some nights. He'd sit me on his lap and tell me stories. Of how the Et-Ada had followed Magnus into Aetherius, creating the Magna-Ge - the Children of Magnus. Stars." He spoke, surprising himself. He hadn't spoken of his father to anyone in years, even casually.
"...my mother had a garden," Serana spoke a few moments later. "Sometimes I'd stay to help her, and the sky looked a lot like this. It was… nice."
"Simpler times." He said.
"Yeah." She responded.
He felt the spark of empathy in that moment. Of someone he could relate to, even briefly, however miniscule. He had no idea what had happened to Serana, but it was beyond obvious that it wasn't something nice. From the way she spoke, her family was still alive, but what family sticks their daughter into a coffin for four-thousand years?
He'd lost his mother when he was born, and his father when he was eighteen. The Vigilant Order was his saving grace, gave him purpose in dark times, but it had led him down some very dark roads. He had suffered, he thought, more than he probably would have had he tried to lead a normal life. He didn't know if it was for better or for worse.
He wondered how it was they both had ended up here, in the middle of Skyrim in the dead of night, staring up at the night sky and thinking of happier times when things weren't so complicated or… lonely. The vampire and the vampire-hunter. How ironic. Surely some God or Prince had a sense of humor.
He sighed into the night air. With some effort, he lowered his eyes from the beautiful night sky.
"We should get moving. We've a walk ahead of us." He said.
He might have expected a remark about how vampires could go longer without exhaustion than mortals, or perhaps a comment about his 'age'. Instead, Serana sighed too, likely a habit left over from when she was alive since she didn't need to breathe.
"Lead the way," she said quietly. The same wistful melancholy that so often buried itself in his thoughts had descended upon her, too. He led the way in silence, and for once, it wasn't uncomfortable. Not companionable, but… not bad. They were both too absorbed by their own thoughts for it to be anything more or less.
Given their two personalities, the silence wasn't bound to last forever. Surprisingly though, it wasn't words that broke it, but rather a sound -
"Achoo!" He blinked, tensing then relaxing at the lack of threat. A frown followed, and he turned to look over his shoulder.
"Was that a sneeze?" He asked Serana, who appeared a little miffed, rubbing her nose.
"Yes, I think so." She didn't elaborate.
"...but you don't breathe. How did you sneeze?" He had never heard of a vampire sneezing in his life - it seemed impossible. What was she going to do next, yawn?
"I have no clue. I still breathe sometimes, it's a hard habit to break when you were born a mortal." She responded.
"But - that doesn't make sense, with your physiology." Or, lack thereof, kind of. He didn't know the exact process of sneezing, but he was fairly certain it required regularly functioning lungs, or something.
"What do I look like, an expert on physiology?" He shot her another confused look.
"You… are. You're the only expert on vampire physiology here. I only know what parts to stab and shoot with arrows."
"I'm sure you'd like to find out all about my physiology," she said, almost muttered, and he stopped.
"What." This conversation hadn't made sense from the beginning, he didn't know why he'd bothered speaking, but had she just flirted with him? He could feel a flush rising on the back of his neck. In the time he stopped, she'd walked just past him before she stopped and looked.
Presumably at the expression on his face, she laughed, and swivelled to continue walking ahead. "Prude." She threw over her shoulder, and he let out a disgruntled sigh.
He was more annoyed at the fact that he didn't have any suitable name to throw back at her, so he chose to remain silent, and came up with a bunch of insults in his hand as he followed. Would it be rude to offer the Dawnguard's sword to her, if only to watch her get stung trying to hold the silver? Probably. He very much disliked being flustered.
They were in a section of open plains offset from Morthal at the base of Hjaalmarch's mountains. At this time of night, few travelers were about, which meant it was altogether rather quiet in the area. Occasionally, wolves would howl and he would spot an elk or two scatter in the distance, but on the whole, it was not a terrible time to walk. If it weren't for the fact that he knew he'd have to walk for several more hours, he might even take time to enjoy it. As it was, he was just thinking.
"What's that?" Serana spoke up from ahead of him, pointing towards the mountain. It took a moment to spot what she was referring to, narrowing his eyes at the landscape. It may have been lit by the aurora and the moons, but it was still dark, and stone tended to look all the same.
"Ah. A Nordic ruin." Further up the slope of the mountain, a structure was built into it, with chiseled stone forming a large arch and spire up the middle of the arch. Up close, it was probably more dilapidated, the elements and time wearing away at the stone. He could spot some steps built into the mountain that lead up to it, too.
"A what now?" She peered at him and back to the ruin, brows furrowed.
"Well, maybe back in your time they were simply the strongholds of local lords and Jarls, but as people migrated to the main holds, or wars happened, they were abandoned. They're only full of draugr now." He didn't actually know the exact reasoning for the abandonment of the ruins, but he could extrapolate.
"Draugr?" She frowned.
"Do you remember the undead creatures back in the crypt? The dead ones beside the vampires."
"Oh. Those? I thought those were some form of minions that the vampires had raised through necromancy."
"Not quite. They're the last denizens of the ruins, withered away, but forever cursed to protect the strongholds they probably defended in life." Serana pulled a face.
"That sounds morbid." He exhaled sharply through his nose.
"It is. Nordic ruins are dangerous places. Few adventurers consider the risk worth the treasure they might find, and fewer still actually make it out alive." They were something of a bogeyman in the hills for villages, as he understood it - 'don't misbehave or something will come from the ruins' for the kids, things like that. That never happened, of course, or there would've been mass purges to rid the danger, but it hadn't stopped them from being creepy.
"Have you ever been in any?"
"One. I haven't been in Skyrim for very long. I did a favor for the Jarl of Whiterun, went into a ruin near Riverwood. Bleak Falls Barrow." She frowned at the name of 'Riverwood', so he amended, "It's a small village in the valley next to the Throat of the World."
"Oh? They must not be very dangerous, if you made it through alone." She sounded almost as if she was attempting to tease him, but he waved it off with a casual shrug.
"I'm actually quite dangerous myself, you know. Draugr have nothing on me." It was a nonchalant boast that he didn't fully mean, although with his skillset, draugr genuinely weren't much of a challenge. He'd heard of the more ancient, powerful draugr, who could Shout like the old Kings. He didn't fancy a run-in with them.
Serana was probably about to form some insult against his professional pride, but instead she stopped moving, frowned, and tilted her head, eyes unfocused. He stopped, too, immediately alert.
"What do you hear?" Though he could make up for some of his deficiencies in combat with magic, he'd never be able to match the enhanced senses of a vampire.
"Wind." She said, sounding confused. "But not natural. In a rhythm, like… like wings." He stilled. It couldn't be.
"Wings?" He said, voice tight.
"From over the mountain. But there's nothing that big that could sound like -" A roar, great and terrible, a roar that had haunted his dreams for the past few weeks, broke the silence of the night. The sound rolled over the land like a wave, echoing in the distance. He snapped to look over the mountain. "Valios? What is that?"
"Dragon." He said, tension curling into every part of his being.
"Drag - what? That's not possible, dragons are extinct, even in my time." She argued, but he could hear her shift next to him.
"Dragon. We need to -" He couldn't finish his sentence because the dragon crested the top of the mountain, great wings unfurled. It swept through the air like a snake, body undulating in rhythm to grant it speed. For a moment he couldn't move, could only think about Helgen, about the beast that had destroyed it, about red eyes older than the world -
"Valios." Serana said, snapping him out of his reverie. He compartmentalized, shoving memories down into the depths of his mind. "What do we do?" He didn't know why she was looking to him for command, but he couldn't be bothered to question it.
"We need to run. In an open field, a dragon will decimate us. The - the ruins," he started towards them… except that that was the same direction the dragon was now flying in.
"The ruins? What happened to danger -" She started to snark.
"Run!" He shouted, knowing that she would be much faster than he. "Make the thing choose!" It roared again, much louder now that it wasn't blocked by the mountain, and it was really moving far too fast for Valios' own good. He ran, trying to take an indirect path but knowing that it would do little if the beast landed near him.
It was the smallest of solaces that he could tell upon further inspection that this dragon was not the same dragon that had destroyed Helgen. Whereas the other was the largest thing he had ever seen, this one was not quite so big. In addition, the other was covered in gnarled spikes like the branches of an unnatural tree; this one had only horns and hard scales each the color of the same mountain he'd just flown over.
This was, of course, followed by panic as this meant there was not just one but two dragons in Skyrim. He tried to focus on running.
Serana had indeed blurred off to the other side of the plain using her superhuman speed (and that bore thinking about when he wasn't in mortal peril). Rather than choose either of them, the dragon decided to make a spectacle of it.
The night was suddenly awash with orange and crimson as the dragon flew down the middle of the open field, breathing dragonfire upon the ground and creating a great plume of destruction. He winced at its brightness, so stark compared to the tranquility of the aurora, and could only imagine how Serana felt; maybe she wasn't that sensitive to light but it had to be uncomfortable.
He didn't dedicate much more time to observing the wall of fire and instead diverted more of his energy to sprinting. He flexed his magicka to grant some extra strength to his limbs as he reached the staircase built into the mountain - stairs that might as well have not been there, for all that he leapt over them three or four at a time.
The dragon was certainly coming back around and would probably divest him of his life with a well-aimed breath of fire. Serana was already there, near the large carved door to the ruin but behind a pillar.
"Valios!" She called.
"We need to get inside!" he shouted, nearing the door. "Open it!"
"You mean we're not going to fight it!?" She exclaimed back, moving to the door despite her protest.
"Fight it? Serana, it's a dragon - the last time it burnt down an entire village! Unless you can fly…" He was now reaching for handholds on the door to pull it open, but not before he caught her expression, which was a hesitant, 'Well, actually…' kind of deal.
"Seriously!? I thought you said you couldn't turn into a bat!"
"I didn't say anything! And - well, not exactly!" She was not allowed to elaborate, as the door was thrust open and both ducked inside, slamming it shut behind them. He was breathing heavily, she was not, predictably, but they were both still incredibly on edge.
"Let's get deeper inside." Valios said, turning to get away from the door. A dragon couldn't fit through it certainly, but that did little to quell the phantom sight of endless smoke in his periphery.
The small entrance chamber directed one through an arched doorway which lead into a larger chamber of sorts. Parts of the roof were caved in, throwing rubble and dirt into the room and, thusly, allowing small plantlife to erupt. As opposed to stone, the ground was more fertile soil than anything with grass and thistle growing about. At the far end of the chamber was another door. The roar of a dragon could be heard, muted, through the front door and through the cracks in the ceiling. Valios winced.
"...what do you mean 'last time'?" Serana said, turning to look at him. He tried to remain still.
"What?" He said, knowing precisely what she was talking about.
"You said 'last time it burnt down a village'. What did you mean? Dragons have been extinct for centuries. Millennia, at this point." He resisted the urge to flinch. She has no idea, he told himself. She cannot possibly know how much he does not want to answer that question. But he knows that she will not relent.
"Helgen." He said, the word strange on his lips. He'd never voiced the word aloud, he realised; only ever in his thoughts. "There was going to be an execution." My execution. Ulfric Stormcloak's execution. "A dragon appeared." His mouth twitched. A dragon, as great and terrible as the night. "Burned everything to the ground. Only a few people escaped." Short and simple. No room for elaboration, for thoughts of the creature that wanted to swallow him whole, even as dragonfire burned outside.
"You were there," Serana deduced.
"I was going to be executed." He found himself saying. Better to think on that than the alternative. Serana blinked, brows rising towards her hairline.
"You? Executed? For what?" Ah, yes. A Paladin of Stendarr sentenced to execution.
"Wrong place, wrong time. An Imperial ambush as I was trying to cross the border. They caught me near the leader of the Rebellion, didn't give me a chance to explain myself."
"'They'?" she queried, gaze focused on him. He, conversely, was looking about the room, itching to do… something. Fight, perhaps - not the dragon.
"The Imperials. An overzealous bunch, atimes." He said quietly, stepping into the room.
"...Is this the same dragon?"
"Don't." He snapped at her, surprising her into taking a step back with his vehemence. He looked away, trying to focus his breathing. He was better than this, damn it. "No. If it was the same, we'd -" already be dead. He couldn't finish. Fuck's sake, you'd think he was a fresh Novitiate again, buckling at the knees with fear.
"Are you okay?" She said, far too softly. She is a vampire, he reminded himself.
She was human once, another voice said.
"No." he said honestly, but his tone was grave enough to hopefully deter further questions. "I… I need to think. The beast is outside, yes?"
"...yes." She said after a beat. He could tell she was still looking at him.
"We will wait. Maybe explore the ruin if we must. I need to think." He repeated, and moved away to one side of the room. He needed to meditate, to pray and clear his thoughts. He shouldn't be this much of a mess.
"Alright," Serana said softly, watching him walk away. She was concerned. About the dragon, sure, even her father would be concerned when faced with such a foe, but more so about Valios.
She had only known him for two days, but she'd already seen him delirious and unconscious, had healed him in that state, had travelled alongside and spoken with him, and had saved his life in a fight. She had not seen him afraid.
It didn't suit him at all. She had always been good at reading people, since her days at court, and Valios had always appeared to her like a fixture of personal strength. He had not been afraid when he had expected her to kill him before he fell unconscious, and he had not been afraid when going into a master vampire's lair to fight him single-handedly, leading a contingent of guards. For someone belonging to a group who hunted daedra and daedra-worshippers, she figured they had to have seen some thing. She knew very well the kinds of horrors a Daedric Prince could conjure.
This was… he practically shut down. Sure, he'd always appeared aloof and disinterested, but he'd never actually hesitated to answer at length her questions, nor had he ever struck her as a particularly succinct person. Not to mention, the way he'd snapped at her…
Was it Helgen? A dragon attack, an entire village destroyed - terrible things. But… Valios said himself he hadn't been in Skyrim long. What attachment had he to a single village? Maybe Serana didn't have the full picture, but - well. He had held a funeral for over two dozen of his fellows in his Order and he had been… solemn. Quiet. Not this.
She wanted to help. In the same fashion as when she'd healed him after he'd passed out in front of her, though, she had no idea why. Moreover, she had no idea how. And - and, well, it was probably not the time. She didn't have space to dwell on it.
"I'm going to go further in." She spoke aloud, the first words in a few minutes. She could hear the dragon outside, the occasional beat of its wings and the occasional rumble when it would land near the front.
Valios, from his crossed-legged position against the wall, opened his eyes and looked to her. She felt like his blue eyes were glowing in much the same way hers might, but it was probably just the natural intensity he carried with it.
"I will come." He says, rising. Well, that was better than she expected. She nods, and walks towards the door leading further into the ruin. Maybe they'd get lucky and it would be inhabited by nice refugees who needed shelter from the elements.
She almost scoffed. She wasn't actually that naïve.
This door opened inward with considerably less effort than the front one, revealing a similarly sized chamber. Two pillars arose in the middle of the room, and shafts of moonlight provided the only source of light, the torch sconces unlit. The natural focus of the room directed one's attention to its center, the far end, where an alcove was cut into the stone. On a small raised platform was a conspicuous wooden chest reinforced with iron bars.
"I didn't think the 'treasure' part would be that easy." She said aloud, looking through the room.
"It isn't. The torches have been recently lit. And -" Valios responded, but was interrupted by a faint groan. A spectral figure rounded one of the corners, taking the form of a Nord and not at all like the 'draugr' she presumed she'd seen back in the crypt.
"Please…" The ghost said, voice echoing and ethereal. "Leave. Or I'll be forced to attack you." It genuinely seemed to be pleading with them, and she tensed as the ghost-man withdrew a greatsword from his back. Valios drew his sword in a single practiced motion.
"They're not here of their own volition." Valios said quietly, as though she couldn't have guessed. Then, louder, "Who has trapped you? Tell me and I can release you." The ghost-man gained a stronger form, finer features becoming visible, but still mostly transparent.
"Turn back. I don't want to kill you." The man said instead of answering, sounding desperate. Nonetheless, he stepped forward, greatsword in hand. Valios tensed, probably meaning to meet him, but before he could, Serana formed an ice spike in her hand and shot it forward. The ghost couldn't react and, fortunately, it sunk into his chest rather than passing through. Shocked, the man stumbled backward, before he faded into nothingness.
"What was it you were saying about these ruins being incredibly dangerous?" Serana spoke, raising a brow at Valios. He looked unimpressed.
"Binding spirits like that takes some skill. There's probably more - I wager that chest is empty, too." She wondered if how angry he'd be if he knew of her particular expertise with necromancy. Nonetheless, they headed deeper into the room, Valios with his sword out and Serana with her magicka ready to be formed into more ice.
She saw a door to the right of the room, but before she could remark on it, it opened and out poured several of the other spirits. Literally; they were running. She'd never been attacked by spirits who were telling her they "didn't want to do this" and "I'm so sorry" but it was a distinctly unpleasant experience. They closed the distance so quickly that she couldn't dispose of enough of them quickly enough; she tried to back up in order to let Valios, clearly the close-quarters specialist of the two, take care of them, but -
The ground suddenly have way beneath her and she shouted as she began to fall. She landed on something metal, which then fell open once more. She landed again only to fall, and she noticed as she did that they were doors in the ground. Of course, the last one was not another door but instead the ground - and not just any ground, but ground covered in a layer of water, and below that, hard stone. She grunted as she landed, trying to catch her bearings and lamenting her now soaked pants.
"Ah, yes… greed makes a fantastic lure," came an unfamiliar voice from behind her. "Odd you didn't die in the fall. But I won't question my good fortune." If she hadn't been a vampire, the fall might've been debilitating. Or… would have been, judging by the dead bodies surrounding the cage she was now in. Their blood was old, they'd clearly been dead for some time.
"Oh, and don't mind my assistant here. He may be dead but he sure is more useful than he was alive," the man, a Redguard in dark blue robes, cackled like he'd just made a fantastic joke. She grunted to a standing position, noting that the man's 'assistant' was in fact just a dead body standing beside him. "Now, let's see what we've got…" he walked over to an alchemy bench with all manner of ingredients.
"Not even going to introduce yourself? Bit rude." She said, more to get him talking than anything. Valios would surely be along shortly. They might have had their disagreements, but he still needed her to get to Volkihar. Well, to get there without dying.
"Oh, it speaks, does it? Maybe we'll have to fix that…" the man mused, and she decided she didn't like him at all. "I've got something that'll end this quickly. It'll be relatively painless. Relatively." She rolled her eyes, and stepped forward to discreetly test the iron bars of the door to her cage. Locked, predictably, but not very strong. Or at least, not to someone with her strength.
"I presume by 'this' you mean my life? Can I at least know why you're trying to kill me?" She didn't have to try hard to sound bored, because she was aware that this man posed no real threat to her if she wanted to turn the tables.
The man - a mage, she presumed, - was muttering to himself, searching through bookshelves, before he grunted to himself.
"Guessed it already, did you? Hrm. You have to be dead for the spell to take hold, and no one volunteers to be dead!" He sounded distressed by this fact. "No matter. I don't need willing subjects; just ones that can't run away. Now, where did I put it…" he continued muttering to himself and searching before sighing. He was clearly insane. Joy.
"No matter. I can do it the old fashioned way." He turned towards her, and spells appeared in his hands: in one, flames, and in the other, the teal-blue glow of Alteration magic. She took a step back, and prepared a ward in one hand. Before spells could be thrown, the door at the other end of the… lab, she supposed, burst open, and in stepped Valios, sword in hand. The mage instantly forgot her, turning to face him.
"Oh, another subject, hm? The more the merrier!" He started forward to face Valios. She was sure Valios could've easily handled him, but she saw her chance. She summoned her strength and planted her foot against the lock of the doors, kicking. With a loud snap of wrenched metal, they slammed open.
The mage began to turn, but Serana was always going to be faster. She closed the distance in the blink of an eye and grabbed the arm with the flame spell to splay it to the side. With her other hand she grabbed his jaw and bent his head to the side, exposing his neck. With practiced ease she sunks her fangs into his jugular and began to drink.
Drinking blood was… vampires had been around long enough for them to be romanticized by those ignorant of their true origins. All the metaphors and sappy descriptions were true; to vampires, blood was the nectar of the gods, like water to those dying of thirst, food to the starving, the most beautiful taste to ever experience. But those couldn't quite do it justice. How does one describe what it is to imbibe life, the energy that exists in blood? It's invigorating in a way she doesn't think any mortal can understand.
She doesn't like killing people - that is, killing innocents. But then, this man had planned to kill her and was responsible for the needless deaths of many others, so she didn't feel all that terrible. And after several thousand years in a stone tomb, she was very hungry indeed. Animal's blood would do in a pinch, but that of sapient beings, man or mer, was something else entirely.
It felt like minutes but it was probably only several seconds before she relinquished her hold on the man with a gasp, dropping his limp body as she stumbled backward, overcome with the intensity of finally feeding after so long. Her strength felt ten times more potent, her senses enhanced beyond even their already considerable norm. She felt some of the blood dribble down her chin and she wiped it away with a delicate finger.
Valios was standing where he'd entered, sword in hand and watching her with a mix of alarm and something akin to fear. She couldn't say she blamed him, but she also didn't appreciate the suspicion; she'd not fed or tried to kill him once before, and she wasn't about to start now. Besides, she'd just completely drained a man, she wasn't exactly hungry.
"What? You said, 'don't feed on anyone not trying to kill us', and he was clearly about to try to do just that." She was perfectly justified. "I needed to feed, and now I won't need to for a while."
"You'll forgive me if seeing it is still discomfiting." He said stiffly, and she crossed her arms. She wasn't about to apologise for feeding off of someone who was clearly better off dead, and Valios would have killed him if she hadn't. "I suppose you've no need of 'rescue', then." She raised a brow.
"Did I ruin your dreams of being a knight in shining armor? So terribly sorry." she said, faux-serious. She even put a hand over her still heart.
"I'm not the one who fell into the most obvious trap anyone has ever conceived of." He said, rolling his eyes. "It was a door in the ground. I don't know how you missed it."
She cursed her luck. She'd just fed, so there was an excess of blood running through her veins - enough, in fact, to rush to her cheeks and give a slight blush, obvious against her pale skin. Judging by the sparkle in his eye, he noticed.
"Shush. We've still got a dragon to fight." She said, making for the door past him. He scowled at mention of the dragon, turning to lead the way.
"Ghosts and a necromancer are one thing, but a dragon is quite another. How does one fight what can simply fly dozens of meters above you then incinerate you from a distance?"
"I don't know. But I know that we can't stay in this crypt forever, and we'll have to get past it eventually. Aren't you supposed to be an important Paladin, or something? Coming up with plans, and such?" She was using a low-level Destruction spell to heat her clothes and dry them since she'd fallen into the water earlier.
"I'm a swordsman who can use a bit of magic. A dragon isn't undead, so my magic's out, and while I'm sure if one held a sword I could perform a very nice riposte, they don't, and their claws will instead cut through whatever sword I try to parry with." She pulled a face, but didn't respond. Anything she had to say would just be another remark, because truth be told she didn't have much of a solution either, she just knew they had to get out eventually. They were silent as they went through the halls back to the entrance, before -
"Wait. This door. I hadn't noticed it before." He said, stopping near an iron reinforced door to their left.
"There's a draft," she noted, referring to the minute breeze her hearing picked up from under the door.
"There's also a lock." Valios responded, trying the door and having no success in opening it.
"I have a key." She said, and he stepped aside with a frown.
"You do? Picked it up off his bo-" She kicked it really hard. It nearly fell off its hinges, but swung open, lock system snapped in half. "Ah. That kind of key." She snickered. "You'd make a terrible thief. No finesse." He sniffed as though this offended him, and a part of her was relieved to see that dry humor was coming back instead of distrust or the strange fear that had accosted him earlier.
"Implying you would? The virtuous servant of Stendarr?" She scoffed, heading through the doorway into a tunnel. She could tell that this headed outside, probably a backdoor. Conspicuously located, though.
"I've picked a lock or two in my time." She could've gasped in faux-scandal, but she was trying to strain to hear for the dragon.
"Sure, sure." She waved a hand behind her dismissively, cautiously creeping forward. The light at the end of the tunnel was entirely non-figurative, and the wind of Skyrim's plains was clear to hear.
"Anything?" He said quietly, having guessed the reason for her concentration.
She sniffed - although smell had never been a Volkihar trait, that of vampires was still fairly good - and shook her head. "I think it's flown away. Gotten tired of waiting, probably." She heard him nod.
"Good. Let's hurry, then. I'd like to be in Solitude as soon as possible."
"I can carry you, if you'd like. I can run a lot faster than you." It was entirely true; she might get tired before too long, but they'd make it a fair distance.
"I think I'd rather face the dragon," he said, disdain easy to hear - she almost laughed at the sight. They were outside then, the tunnel having led to a small lip near the base of the mountain. There were no stairs as such, but the natural formations made it easy to climb down onto the ground.
They had reached the plains and started a brisk pace towards their destination, but it felt all too exposed. She was easily keeping pace with Valios and honestly itching to go faster, but she wouldn't feel comfortable leaving him behind and he would probably stab her if she picked him up (and she was, thus far, doing very good at avoiding being stabbed, by him and everyone else). It was sudden, then, when the hair on the back of her nape stood up, and she halted in her running. Valios too stopped a moment later, turning to look at her with the question written clear on his face.
"Wings." She said, and they both turned in time to see and hear the dragon launch itself from around the mountain. She looked around; clear plains for a few hundred meters more, then the tree line of the forests off the main trail, and even picking Valios up and running would present too clear of a target. "Valios?" She said simply - because he'd always been capable thus far, he was the warrior and she was the princess who was sometimes a little too snippy for her own good, but she had absolutely no faith in her ability to sass a dragon to death.
"We fight," he said grimly, and she heard him draw Lanfael. She looked to him and he to her, and there was a strange sort of determination mixed with resignation in his blue eyes. A protest was on the tip of her tongue, but in the end she nodded and readied an ice bolt spell. "Never fought a dragon before, only ran from them," he said, voice tight, "might be fun. When we can, we make for the tree line."
"What was it you said about 'you'd rather face the dragon'?" She questioned dryly, spreading out from him and preparing to run to dodge dragonfire.
"If I'd known the gods would take my words that literally, I'd have wished for a teleportation circle," he retorted. She couldn't bring herself to laugh. Instead, she watched as the dragon grew closer, and as a Paladin of Stendarr and a Volkihar Princess prepared to fight it alone.
AN: woo, cliffhanger.
the ruin they went into was Rannveig's Fast, and i took a few liberties with its layout. and by that i mean i forgot what the actual place looked like and was too lazy to alter it for accuracy bc they stayed in there so short a time anyway. it's also in a different place on the map than it is in-game, because i'm the author and i can do that for plot purposes.
a curious note that isn't entirely relevant now but will become more so when they reach Solitude, and a lot more so when we get back to Whiterun: these cities are real damn small, aren't they? like, Morthal has no right being a Hold on its own, truthfully, tiny lil fishing village that it is (you'll notice i added a blacksmith when in-game there is none), but Whiterun is the crossroads in the center of all of Skyrim. it's a hub of trade, probably the jewel of the province in all truthfulness even if it isn't the capitol. idk, i've been reading some other skyrim fics recently for inspiration and because they're interesting and some people have done really well with world-building wherever Bethesda dropped the ball.
but yeah! more interesting stuff to come. solitude, i think, might be neat, though i don't know how far i'll go with it yet. i'm finding the path as i walk it, but it's been very fun so far.
let me know if you like som'n, if there's something you want to see, something you don't want to see, any of that stuff.
cheers!
~ylri