Chapter XX: Abyss Walkers

Serana slowed her pace down, noticing that Azrael was taking shorter steps and looking around. He turned in her direction, looking down the passageway they were coming from, and then cast a glance to his left before bringing his gaze somewhere else still. Straight ahead this time. He's not looking, he's trying to hear something. She listened intently as well, trying to pick up anything. Noises, but very confused. Screeches, squeaking, nothing precise. This place has been sitting here empty for a very long time. 'Nothing around here,' she said. 'Unsurprisingly. I wonder if the rats found anything at all around here.'

'Careful with your assumptions,' Azrael whispered. He slowly raised his right arm and loosened the grip on the longsword's handle, bringing it above his head. He let the blade slide down his back, attaching it to the hooks. 'There are no rats here, true. But why is that?' he asked, rubbing his armored hands as if to clean them.

If he has called me out on them not finding anything to eat, then that must be wrong. She looked around, remembering all those times when the answer was something so obvious she hadn't even paid attention to. There was nothing of interest around. There are the plants… Deathbell and Nightshade blossoms were scattered all over the place, almost all of them completely exsiccated and lacking any smell. That wasn't a viable solution. The rodents would just ignore the petals and search for something else. She tried to remember when the mice had stopped trying to bite her ankles. Some time ago, which means they avoid this whole area. That would mean an aura of some kind…

A strange feeling of euphoria filled her from the inside. Yes, of course… It was so obvious. Animals dislike the presence of any kind of conjuration magic, especially necromancy. Still, there would need to be something very powerful to emit this kind of an aura. That was only the first part of the existing problems with that assumption. The second was that Azrael had an idea, but he should not have known that her mother was dabbling with necromancy. Well… Dabbling is not the word. She was an expert. She raised her head, and met the black void beneath the hood. 'And how do you know that my mother was a necromancer? How?'

Azrael held her gaze for a moment before answering. He bent his head slightly to the right. 'I had an intuition. Thank you for confirming it,' he said, his tone quicker than normal and carrying an ironic note. He turned around and looked up, further on into the sloping tunnel. 'I was thinking of something else.'

Serana stepped forward and quickened her pace. Something else? What? He had guessed her mother was into necromancy, but that wasn't the solution to the problem. Indeed, there was nothing that suggested the presence of an active spell nearby. Of course; no spells. There is technically nothing suggesting the presence of magic at work here. But then… What else could be so powerful that animals didn't dare go near it? 'Enlighten me,' she said, chortling softly, 'what is driving the rodents away if not the magic?'

He glanced behind his own shoulders briefly, meeting her eyes for a moment. 'Do you really not know?' he asked, disappearing behind the corner.

'I don't,' she said, climbing two steps at a time to keep up. Now you have intrigued me, she thought, peaking around the turn and spotting a closed wooden door at the end of it. 'My mother was into necromancy, it wasn't a secret. I mean, she taught me everything I know. That you might have understood by now. However, I really have no idea of what else could be driving away the animals. Ingredients? Some poison she made that still emits odors to this day?'

The Dunmer stopped in front of the wooden door. He looked at it, bending his head first to the left and then to the right. He brought a hand forward, following the points in which the wooden beams connected together with the sharp tip of the gauntlet's fingers. 'I carry a Daedric artifact with me. Azura's Star, we call it. It's vibrating slightly, as if something is interfering with it.' He glanced back her way once more. 'Your mother either experimented with the substance of Oblivion, or has struck a deal with a Daedric Prince directly. It doesn't really matter. Something that gives testimony to that pact is in the next room. That scares away more rats than a simple necromancy hex ever will.'

Oblivion… The initial hope was that her mother had told her and she had forgotten about it, however that had happened. When we were out in the garden… Maybe sometime I was distracted and she told me… But no, she was rarely distracted when they went to the garden together. She was either watching her very closely or was completely lost in her own thoughts. Not that her mother talked a lot while she was among her plants. Judging by the amount of care Valerica had for them, Serana could have considered them her little sisters. No… She never, ever mentioned having directly struck any pact with any Daedric entities. She just… Spoke to them. Oh mother… what have you done?

'Serana.'

She shook her head, touching her temples with her fingertips and shutting her eyes for a moment. 'I'm coming,' she answered, and slowly made her way up the stairs. The door at the end was open, and Azrael had already stepped into the room that came immediately after the corridor. She put a hand on the doorknob, more out of need to have something to put her hand on than to keep the door open. She stepped in the room and looked up. As she did, she felt strong shivers shaking her limbs.

She looked for a moment at the huge mammoth skull on the right side, with still the tusks intact. Her eyes moved down to the bookshelves, and then darted elsewhere. Her gaze moved frantically around, not even looking at the room in general but running from specific objects to others, as if magnetized by her memories. Souls gems, a lot. Shelves full of ingredients, and many more things. The room had an elevated portion; she could see an arcane enchanter on the extreme left and a small alchemy workshop on the extreme right. There was also a piece of the elevation that stuck out onto the lower level, and there was something resembling a small brazier near the end.

Well, and of course… She looked down, at the circle in the center of the hall. You couldn't walk in here and not notice it. A large circle surrounded by candles, all unlit and with the wick drowned in the wax. The only word that popped into her mind for it was circle, but in truth it was a sequence of concentric rings, each one a little higher than the previous, if analyzing it from the center and outwards. No necromancy device I have ever seen. Azrael is right again. It looks like a very advanced summoning circle.

'Look at this place,' she whispered, unable to keep her surprise inside for longer. 'It has to be it.' She stole a glance at Azrael, who looked extremely focused on his observations. I wonder if he even heard me. His head was moving in characteristic way, in very small but lightning-fast bursts of movement. He's thinking. 'We should take a look around; there has got to be something that will tell us where she's gone.'

'She kept records, I assume.'

Of curse, he's got that one figured out as well. She caught herself smiling. 'Yes, she did. She was meticulous abut her research. If we can find her notes, we might also find some hints of where she's gone. She was planning something bigger than I thought.' She looked at the shelves, and images emerged from her memories. 'I remember her spending years to gather some of those components. Then there's this… Summoning circle. Maybe there's some notes on this.'

'It's not a summoning circle.'

Serana was looking on the elevation, searching for other rare ingredients that she could remember, but she turned towards Azrael immediately. But those shapes… No, probably not. She stole one last glance at the candles. 'What is it then?'

'It's a portal.'

So that is where she's gone… she thought, looking at the stone rings. They looked dead, completely inactive. Yet there was some kind of energy seeping from it, or so Azrael claimed. I should trust him on that one. We may be creatures of Molag Bal, but I don't know a lot about Oblivion. She looked at Azrael. He knows. I don't know how, but he knows. He knows everything, or it looks like it. In remembering how intently he had looked at the room and at how utterly unmoved he had been at the mention of the records, she could only guess he knew something already.

'Have you found anything?' she asked.

Azrael looked briefly her way, as if showing that he had understood the subtext. 'She's been away for a long time, four millennia isn't out of the question, but it wasn't meant to be this way. Look at the candles,' he said, pointing at the circle surrounding the stone rings. 'Slow burning, imbued with magic. The plan was to enter the portal and have the candles lit for long enough to come out, but something went wrong. She couldn't come back. It seems more likely that she fled into the portal rather than walked through it unhurriedly. She left a lot behind.'

'And where has she gone?'

Azrael turned around, towards the shelves on the side of the room opposite to the door. 'Purified Void Salts, cleansed with very special magic treatment.' He moved his head to the other end of the room, on the extreme left of the elevation. 'An entire bowl of soul gems fragments; black soul gem fragments. There are some more scattered around the room. That pillar,' he continued, pointing at the object that Serana had mistaken for a small brazier on the part of the elevation that stuck out. 'It's a vessel. Some more ingredients will be required to re-open the portal. I would guess she thought she had found a way to keep it open indefinitely, but miscalculated.'

How he does that… She pursed her lips and looked around, wondering what other things she had failed to notice. Well, let's not forget that I'm the one who's missed four millennia of change. Some things had definitely changed, but if Azrael was right, then her mother might have shared her same plight. If she remained stuck for however long in the place where she went, the two of us are on the same boat. She recollected her thoughts. She had better look for her mother's records and leave Azrael to his own scrutiny.

'Serana,' he said slowly and absently. 'Has your mother ever mentioned the Ideal Masters?'

The same kind of euphoria as before arose in her, but this time it was mixed with a hint of fear. She did indeed… Yes, of course. She had meddled with them, and had talked about them. Possibly to them, even. It hadn't occurred to her because she always associated it more with necromancy itself than with Oblivion, but the link was obvious. 'Yes, she did. Several times, near our departure. Is that what she has tried to do?'

'Look at this place. Everything here hints at Necromancy. Very advanced necromancy. I know very little of the Ideal Masters, but enough to know that's their area of expertise. Besides, what could such a workshop be used for?'

'Certainly not longevity. Not that useful for a vampire,' she replied, turning to her right. She had noticed a piece of the room that was rather secluded from the rest, as if built in a corner. There were many books there, with tattered and ruined covers. If there's anything to be found, it will be there. 'The Ideal Masters. And that makes you think it's the Soul Cairn she went to?'

'Soul Cairn,' he repeated after her, diving each letter from the other. His tone was pensive, absent.

Serana slowed down involuntarily. He never is so distracted that he repeats my words, and that wasn't a question. 'Yes, the Soul Cairn, of course,' she said. She kept thinking what was going on through his mind. Some tangential thoughts of there being fumes or vapors that could numb his mind even passed through her consciousness briefly. 'The home of the Ideal Masters.'

'I've never heard of it.'

She turned behind abruptly, and once again involuntarily. Her legs seemed to have moved of their own accord, and her eyes had widened. 'What? Really? How can you…' She bit her lip. How can you not know something? was the questions she wanted to really ask, but she stopped herself in time. Aside from her surprise, there was a childish joy of having won a difficult game dwelling inside of her. I know something that he doesn't. I should mark down the day. 'I only know what my mother told me about it. She had a theory on soul gems. She claimed that the souls used in enchanting and necromancy don't just vanish when they're used. They end up in the Soul Cairn. According to her, powerful necromancers even send souls directly to the Ideal Masters and receive power of their own in return. My mother spent some time trying to contact them, and it would seem she tried to get there herself.' She stopped, laughing under he breath, so faintly that Azrael surely couldn't hear her. 'Did you really not know?'

'I didn't,' he answered. His tone was cold and even as always, as if it didn't much matter. He was inspecting something at the bottom of the protruding elevation, a pile of dust that Serana had immediately discarded as being a simple heap of rubble.

She turned towards the bookshelves again, busy noticing how part of her mind was irrationally defending him for not knowing something. Consider that, said the voice, if it hadn't been for him, you wouldn't have guessed the Soul Cairn was involved in the first place. She had a depiction of him that was far more vulnerable than he appeared on the outside, and whether it was an accurate representation of his inner world, she couldn't know, but she had her serious doubts about it. The amount of time I spent thinking about him should make me worry more than anything, she thought, scolding herself. We're trying to find someone, my mother, who could possibly be dead, and I'm thinking about someone who's safe, right here. She remembered what she had thought earlier that night. That her attention was always directed inward. Azrael is probably thinking about the mission, about my mother. It had changed her viewpoint. But don't get too concerned with it, alright girl? she told herself. I'm still the altruist, between the two of us.

She looked at the shelves, trying to send away the thoughts. The wood was very old and dry; after that much time someone would have expected it to have rotten, but the air was so arid that there was no possible way anything could rot. The pages of the books ran the risk of pulverizing, rather than decaying. That was her fear. That she would be unable to read anything. Let's see… A diary… A diary, or a journal.

Old tomes of alchemy, one with a sketch still visible on the cover. It was green, but the color had completely dried and pulverized. What else? It was dark, but it wasn't a problem for her. There has to be something. A book, far too big to be a journal. Another big volume, and then a thin book with a blue cover. This is it, probably. She grabbed the small manuscript, but as she did she heard a cracking sound in between the two leather protections. She slowly released the grip, and the minced pages fell to the floor in a cascade of little shards of paper. No, no… She looked at them, and would have sighed a breath of relief if she could breathe. There wasn't any writing on the shards. I was lucky. I need to be more careful.

She swept her eyes over more tomes and books, none of which were the ones she was looking for. Come on, mother, you can't have left your biggest achievement unwritten. Her eyes fell on a small book with a reddish cover, thin enough to be a report. Trying to contain her excitement, she grabbed it slowly with two fingers, focusing on her hearing to avoid any unpleasant noise of papers breaking down into small pieces. This is it, she thought, looking at the cover. She slowly opened it and looked at it.

Her mother's handwriting was very recognizable. She was not the most feminine person she had ever met, and it reflected in the simple and practical calligraphy. She felt something in the area of her eyes, but wasn't sure what exactly was happening. All right, it's her notes. She was looking at notes from Last Seed of the year they had fled. We fled on the fifth of Hearthfire. The very last note in the book dated to the third of that month. Let's see… Lists. Could be useful.

I've done it! After wasting thousands of gold coins on components,
I've discovered how to sustain the portal.
I'm listing the components below
without the proper amounts for my own protection.
As a secondary precaution, I am combining
my own blood into the formula
which should prevent anyone from being able
to duplicate it and following me into the Soul Cairn.

The formula consists of:
Finely ground bone meal,
Purified void salt,
Soul gem shards

Using the proper measurements, place the above
in the silver-lined portal vessel and add blood as a reactive agent.
I will make my way into the Soul Cairn tomorrow
after I gather my things and prepare for a potentially lengthy exile.
More importantly, I must enact my plans with Serana,
and get her to Dimhollow Crypt as soon as possible.

Serana closed the book with a snap movement and pursed her lips. 'Damn it,' she groaned, grinding her teeth against one another. She heard the sound of the journal's leaves mincing, but she didn't care.

'What is it?'

She felt a faint heat, an irritating one, at the collected and focused sound of his voice. 'My mother distorted the formula so that it would only work if we add her own blood. How was she so sure that she would be the only one getting in? We wouldn't even be here if we were in the position to have a sample of her blood.'

'How much similarity does this kind of blood magic allow?'

What does he mean? She looked at the books in front of her absently, trying to understand what that could have implied. Well, some, she thought. 'It tolerates similarities, yes, but I don't know how much.' She turned around, still clutching the journal. 'Were you planning to recreate her blood or something mental of the kind?'

Azrael was inspecting the shelves, holding in his hand a sample of a Blisterwort's cell wall. 'I was considering using yours,' he said. He grazed the surface of the fungus with his finger. 'This sub-specimen of Blisterwort has been considered extinct for at least three thousand years by some alchemists. She has definitely not been here for a long time.'

Serana didn't listen to the rest of the phrase. Stealing a glance his way, she noticed that he had recognized her lack of interest and had stopped talking. I do hope it could work, but mistakes with those kind of magic can be very, very unpleasant. 'Do you have any idea of whether our lifeblood will be similar enough not to blow us both up?'

Azrael put down the mushroom and looked down at the stone rings. More precisely, his gaze followed the outer circle of unlit candles. He didn't speak, he just looked at the candles. They probably remind him of something, or have reminded him in the recent past. She turned towards him wholly, not just with her head, and waited. She couldn't help but try to understand in what way candles could remind him of something related to blood. Her blood and her mother's of all things.

'You and Valerica,' he said slowly. 'You're both pureblooded. This means you've not been infected, and that you've been given vampirism through a ritual, a common—'

'Azrael, enough,' Serana groaned, turning to the other side. She felt her flesh burning from the inside and the side of her field of view flashing red. Do not remind me. She brought her head around. 'Not a word more about rituals, please.'

'You share the vampiric side of your blood and you are her daughter,' he continued, completely unfazed. 'It shouldn't disrupt the magic.'

He's right, she thought, pulling herself up and standing straight. She was still holding the journal in her hands. The reddish cover was thin and fragile, and it was cracked in the spots when she had pressed the hardest. If she wasn't able to come back, I wonder what might await us there. She raised her hand and slid the diary back where it was. Look, she thought observing her hand, I'm shaking. She lowered her arm and turned around, casting a last glance at the whole corner filled with shelves and books.

'Take the bone meal,' Azrael said from above.

Serana looked at him, her mouth half-open. She was searching for words, but could hardly found any. 'How in Oblivion did you know we needed that, too? You read the journal through my very eyes, by chance?' She looked around, but she didn't see anything that might have been the fine meal her mother had mentioned in the report. 'Where is it, even?'

'On the table to your right.'

She brought her eyes to the table, and in fact there was a bowl full of finely ground bone dust. It was just under the mammoth skull. Yeah, he… She halted for a moment and refocused her senses. She clearly saw the bone meal in front of her, but while walking towards it would have been completely oblivious of anything that was what she was supposed to take. Try it. Look at the whole table. She swept it with a glance, picking up on everything she could. It's too much information, she thought, realizing she had to look at each item one at the time to really comprehend what it was.

Grabbing the bowl of bone meal, she turned around and paced towards the stairs. Maybe it's just training, she considered. If I look at every item in this room, it would take me ages. He's faster, so he can do it. She tried to structure the thought more coherently, and the best way to frame it was that she, since her attention was inwards, saw the world using her own state as a filter. Azrael seemed to have no such filter. He didn't see the world through anything, and he let the world itself guide his scrutiny of what lied around him. It's one way of looking at it. What's more, there's what he said to me before. I'm constantly trying to decrease the burden on my shoulders, and I try to see less things to accomplish it. He works in the opposite direction.

She walked up the stairs, with the residues of that reasoning with her. Azrael waited for her at the end of the parapet built on the sides of the protruding part of the room's upper level. Now that she knew a little more of him, she often wondered how differently they saw the same thing. We might look at an object, and it could be a completely different things for the two of us. She didn't really know. She could only guess and try to imagine it. In spite of the very few things he revealed to me in the last hours, he's still a mystery. He just feels more familiar.

The Dunmer extended his arm and opened his palm. 'Give me the bowl.'

She grabbed it with both hands on the rim and deposited in in his hand. 'Here,' she said, 'although, really, how did you guess this was the last ingredient?'

He balanced the container in his hands for a moment, and then turned around, taking two careful steps towards the rim of the protrusion where the vessel stood. 'It was the only other ingredient here that had been treated with magic,' he said. 'I knew that void salts and soul gem fragments were required, and when you explained me about the Soul Cairn, it became quite apparent that another ingredient would have to do with the dead.'

'All right,' she said, smiling ironically.

Azrael had already deposited the soul gem fragments at the bottom of the vessel, covering all the surface, and had spread a layer of void salts over it. He emptied the bone meal bowl on top of it, and the white dust almost covered the salts completely. He put the bowl on the parapet and looked down, towards the rings. What is he… She wondered what he was expecting to happen, but she had barely given a form to her wonder when he jumped down the protrusion.

'What…' She stepped forward, looking at him on the lower level. 'Azrael?'

'Add your blood,' he said. 'I need to light the candles.'

She approached the vessel, looking at Azrael with the corner of her eye. She felt the veil between reality and Aetherius breaking, and a very small quantity of magic bled through the crack. Flames crackled in the Dunmer's palm, overflowing on the candles and melting the wax that was choking the wicks. Effective, she thought, averting her eyes. She looked inside the vessel. I'm anxious, she realized, feeling the need to check again the content to make sure they were correct. She almost doubted the things she had read in the journal. It's all fine. Just…

She closed her eyes for a moment, trying to focus. She slowly brought her wrist to her mouth, opened it and sank her canine fangs into the skin. I thought it would have hurt less, she thought, sensing that the pain wasn't exactly nothing. She ripped the skin away, opening a wound large enough so that some blood could get through. It's been a week since I last fed. The drops were a viscous mix of her dark blood and the strange transparent life lymph that made it so dense.

Nonetheless, three drops fell in the vessel. The first didn't make it past the layer of bone meal, but the second landed where the first had already moved away some of the mixture of salts and dust. The entire content of the vessel shook at once and crackled strangely. When the third touched the mix, all the ingredients seemed to melt together. The souls gems themselves cracked and broke off in a dozen smaller shards, making a sound similar to the one of glass breaking. The mixture smoldered and a faint heat irradiated from it for a moment.

A sound coming from slightly under her brought her attention elsewhere. She saw Azrael standing beside the circle of candles, and inside them the rings making up the floor were distancing from each other. Violet hues shone in the thin spaces between them. Are they… rising in the air? Some of the pieces were shaking and some were moving in a way that made it seem like they were about to levitate above the floor. When they lost their equilibrium, some did detach from the ground entirely, leaving spaces through which glowed a blinding, purple light.

I cannot believe it… Serana brought a hand in front of her eyes to protect them from the flash of light, but left a small space in between her fingers so that she could see what was happening. She actually managed to reach the Soul Cairn. The small circle of stone in the center of the rings had collapsed down, but there was no such thing as a floor keeping it suspected anymore. As more and more piece of stone took flight, she saw what lied below. It looked like a pit, welling energy all over the room. The magic was overflowing, it even reached her and her own flesh, making her feel slightly weak. 'By the blood of my ancestors…' she whispered, realizing her eyes were open wide in an attempt to take in the whole scene.

'Now that I've seen this, I'm not that surprised,' Azrael said, with a focused frostiness in his voice. 'Violet and purple hues, defying the existence of physical objects and erratic behavior. This is the same magic you were sealed away with, Serana.'

He's trying to tell me something, but what? She could understand herself that it had implications, but she didn't understand which kinds of implications. 'So what? What does that suggest?'

'That she knew a lot about this kind of magic. However, this makes it more probable that she had dealings with the Ideal Masters herself. They would be a valid enough reason for her failure to return.'

It would make sense, she thought. Valerica was prudent, nobody could deny it, but she had also a strange tendency. She believed there wasn't a limit to anything. If she found it, she pushed past and broke it. However, if she started dealing with very dangerous things such as the Ideal Masters, she might have pursued in spite of everything. Her belief, something that had been invaluable to the court for many years, and probably why Harkon had chosen her as his wife, might have cost her dearly, much more than she was prepared to sacrifice. 'Azrael,' she asked, hesitating for a moment. 'If she is… stuck, in there,' and she pointed and the purple, seething well of forbidden energy, 'how can we know we will be safe? I mean, she had way more experience than the two of us combined.'

Azrael kept his eyes fixed on the center of the purplish well. He took a step forward, and the next would have landed in the stones that lied inside the portal. 'Make your choice,' he said glacially. 'I'm curious. I'm going in. I want to see this through to the end.' He moved again, raising his foot and stepping inside the circle.

'Azrael!'

His shape shimmered and was enveloped in a violet haze before dissolving into vapor. You're insane, she thought, leaning on the side of the parapet to keep herself on her feet as she rushed past the vessel, marching down the stairs. You're not even brave. You're just insane. She put her feet into the portal and felt herself losing her weight, and she knew she was about to be carried somewhere else. Although, I didn't even consider for one moment leaving him alone. She had been courageous. And she was almost proud of herself for that.

Everything that lied outside of her eyes was spinning around uncontrollably, but the only thing she felt was a complete lack of motion. The world around her slowed down, moving more clearly but less regularly in front of her eyes. Violet hues, she remembered; it was the way Azrael had described them. Now they were all around here, in all the possible shades of purple she could name. They blurred and sharpened at intervals, irregularly.

The image stabilized gradually, but only so much. There wasn't a lot to look at. Her head was reclined backwards, and she was looking at whatever had taken the place of the ceiling. There was a strong tingling sensation permeating her body. Nothing that a real stimulus could give. This has to me magic-induced. In the end, they were only partially dead in a place where only the truly dead could enter. Her mother had made her way through the portal and she must have known of that caveat, so she hadn't worried about it. It doesn't change the fact that we shouldn't be here.

She lowered her eyes. Azrael was in front of her, and he was looking ahead. Serana too tried to take in the view, but she was overcome with surprise and disbelief. I never thought it would be this bad… Not even Coldharbour was as barren as that place, and that was saying a lot. The one thing that was probably the most alienating about that place, more than the view itself, was the complete and unnatural lack of smells. There were no normal odors and equally there weren't any traces of fresh blood lingering. Nothing. It makes everything look more a hallucination than anything.

Despite the strangeness, it wasn't very far from what she had imagined. She could freely admit that she had never thought about the smell such a place would have, and likewise she had never pictured it clearly, but it was what it was supposed to do. A sepulcher for the cursed. 'Well,' she said, 'I never expected I'd see this place for myself.'

She shifted her eyes on Azrael, but he didn't even attempt at making his attention overt. Serana had noticed that he never really ignored something she said, but there were moments when he didn't seem to have any mental space left to formulate any kind of response to it. He was looking at the landscape, keeping his head perfectly still. Moving his pupils, Serana thought. He does that when he's not looking for details. That in turn meant he was still taking in the big picture. He's probably already trying to mentally map what he can see on the horizon. She followed his gaze, and the only relevant thing that was in front of him was a whiter, slim track on the terrain.

She looked at it herself. The ground was dense and solid, more like rock or compacted dirt, and of light colors. Most of it reflected the purple colors of the sky. Her eyes moved away from the terrain, drawn to the hole in the center of the Cairn's sky. Or whatever it is. The energies seemed to converge there, flowing towards it in circles and falling inside it. It would be less strange if that thing was upside-down. It was unsettling at best and frightening at worst. The constant flow was a reminder that none of the things that were familiar applied to that place.

'You're tense.'

Azrael's word brought her back, and she shifted her eyes from the sky. It took her a few moments to feel the sense of confusion that the sentenced evoked in her. 'Of course I'm tense, how could I not be? We're in a daedric realm with its entities possibly watching our every move. We don't even know where to go.'

She saw him turning his head slightly behind and glancing at her for a brief moment. 'No,' he said, calmly, 'we do know that. It's the only thing we know, in fact.'

Serana gave him a mocking look, but he had already turned around. 'Do we?'

'Look.' He pointed at the strip of terrain that had the brighter color. 'That's a pathway, it's quite clear. The portal always transports the user to the same location, so your mother also found herself here where we are. She probably followed it, and I would wager she tried to reach that fortress over in the distance,' he said, shifting his index finger from the pathway to two distant towers, the top of which was coated with spiraling coils of purple haze.

'Why should she be there? I mean, this place must be immense.'

Azrael remained silent for a moment. He waved the fingers of his left hand; whether consciously or otherwise, Serana could not tell. 'When I said you were tense, I really meant that you didn't seem very focused.' He brought his right hand to his chest and tugged the leather band that held the bandoliers firmly before stepping down the long, winding stairs which floated in the air. 'Look around and find the answer yourself.'

His words managed to bring some degree of awareness on her state. She had not noticed the strong stiffness that had a hold on her. In some ways, she felt that if she had ever let go of that tightness, she would simply dissolve into the air as if she was vapor. Fear, very strong. I feel weak. The strength with which her mind was working on the background was completely below her level of consciousness, but it was doubtlessly making it harder for her to focus. She felt distracted, as if the purple haze was also penetrating her mind and numbing it. I might have even considered it true, at some point.

On the other hand, however, she felt the Dunmer's words as unnecessarily impertinent. He treated me like a child. Yes, I am tense, and yes, I didn't take in my surroundings very well, so what? He had his own ways of judging a person's efficacy. My mother's life might be on the line and we have just set foot in a plane of Oblivion. It seems natural to be scared. She gazed at him for a moment. He was stepping down the stairs, glancing around. I am a bit fragile, though, am I not? she thought. Looking his way had made her feel some of that exhilaration she had felt earlier that night, and that made her change her perspective on the matter a little. Still, my dear Dunmer, you're insane. I don't care how focused you are and how useful it is, if you're not afraid right now then you're out of your mind.

She began the descent herself, walking down one step at a time. She didn't really fear falling down from that height, but the idea that the floating staircase could betray her at any time and collapse to the ground made her shake. Her eyes were still turned towards the Dunmer, who was pacing down without any worries. While slightly envious of his reliance on the safety of the staircase, the mere sight gave her some courage. Absurd, she said to herself. Someone like me, who didn't even trust her own parents, has chosen to trust Azrael of all people. But then again, she distrusted normal. Whatever looked unassuming, she assumed there was something dangerous about it. Azrael wasn't unassuming. She could distrust him without being ambivalent. Or maybe he's just the first person I've seen after having been locked away for millennia, she thought with a mirthless smile.

With that train of thought going away, she felt like she could finally focus on the outside. So… I said that this place is immense, and he contradicted me. That meant there had to be something that he considered apparent that made that statement false. She looked at the horizon, and saw giant towers and various other landmarks, but nothing remarkable. There are those wells and those cracks in the ground… she observed, saying every word inside her mind as a way to concentrate. There's the towers where he said mother would be… Those towers are build in between those high walls…

The walls. That was probably what she had missed. From those towers in the distance the walls continued along the borders of the land as far as her eye could see. And since it was the eye of a vampire, it could see quite far. She followed the fortifications on both sides of the fortress in the distance, noticing that they never stopped and there wasn't any visible opening or gate in them. As a last proof… she thought, turning her head sharply around, what's behind me? Walls, she realized, seeing that the black rampant continued even behind them. Walls everywhere. This place is closed shut. There's nowhere else we can go. The central spot of that enclosed space was the fortress in the distance. Now it all makes sense, she thought, content with herself. She quickened her steps, trying to close the distance with Azrael.

'I got it,' she said, smiling and with a playful tone in her voice. Why do I wonder why he treats me as a child when I behave like one? She ate back some of her enthusiasm before continuing. 'The walls surround us. There's not way out.'

'Precisely.' His tone was deep, and there was something else that transpired from it. It seemed to reflect the gloom around them, which made it a little sinister.

Serana returned to her senses at hearing him speak in that way, because she too became aware of how eerie and frightening it was to simply be there. They were at the bottom of the stairs, on the level of the ground. If seeing the landscape from the top of the stairs had been very strange and alienating, standing at the bottom was terrifying. The violet fumes were flowing around them and curling around their frames, and there was something menacing in the way they moved. The light cast down from the giant pit in the sky made them glow in unsettling ways.

There were subtle noises in the air, which alternately sounded like something sizzling and the hisses of a snake. Serana looked around, not only trying to find the source, but also trying to understand why they were so irregular. They're unchanging now, she thought, listening intently and waiting for them to become stronger. At once point, the whistle turned into the stronger sizzle. There. What's causing it? She looked around multiple times, and upon looking in front of her the answer passed her by. Or more precisely, floated her by. 'What are those things?' she asked aloud, almost too caught up in her own surprise to keenly look at anything about them.

Azrael shifted his head in the creature's direction. 'Souls, I'd say,' he answered. The being which was making that noise had a strange shape, that Serana could only think of as a falling star. It had a compact, round head area and then a shimmering tail of white matter that waned gradually behind him as it moved around. 'Only black souls are relinquished to the Soul Cairn,' Azrael continued. 'maybe this are some very old ones.'

'Doesn't the absence of smells… unsettle you?'

'It feels odd, I agree.'

The creature drifted past them. There was no way of telling if it was conscious, and if it was, where his attention was, but it acted as if it hadn't noticed them in the slightest. She noticed Azrael moving his right hand, bringing it down again by his side. He raised it to be closer to the longsword, she guessed, recognizing the movement he had made. He did consider that thing being dangerous. She looked at the shimmering tail disappearing behind a small mound in the compacted, colorless terrain. There was a deep crack in its highest point, from which seeped out a thick haze, darker than the one that lingered in the air around them.

'Estormo.'

Serana turned towards Azrael. His voice had taken on a scornful tone like she had never heard from him. He was facing a low brick wall that bordered the path they were taking. Leaning on it, there was a shape. What in blazes is… Serana stopped for a moment, but then realized it was just a shadow. A phantom. It was similar in color to the creature that had floated by, but this one had the clear shape of a humanoid. An Elf, actually, she thought, noticing the long robes he was wearing. A hood was lowered on his face, but the outlines were so incredibly thin that she couldn't see much either way. As all the information began to make sense, a storm of questions peaked out into her mind. Why is this one still in his normal shape? And how in Oblivion does Azrael know him?

The phantom held his hands at the height of his chest, the elbows bent and the palms half-opened. His head was moving around, languidly but at the same time quite frantically. 'Where is he…?' it muttered, the voice echoing but still recognizably the one of someone out of breath. 'Where is he…?' The accent was that of an Altmer, a bit different from what she remembered them speaking but close enough. Vingalmo's accent, for instance, was different. If Azrael recognized him, it means he has died recently… If recently deceased ones do retain their original shape, it could make sense for the creature to be a very old soul. How exactly Azrael had thought of that was unclear, but she stored that for later. There was a more pressing question she wanted to ask. 'Azrael,' she said. 'How do you know this Altmer?'

The Dunmer was looking at the Elf's phantom like someone would look at an animal in a cage. 'I'm the reason he's here,' he said, unemotionally.

He didn't… Serana caught up to what he had said, realizing that he had not answered her question but rather the one she would have asked immediately after. Clever you, she thought. 'You were the one who killed him? Or the one who used his soul gem?'

'Both.' Azrael averted his gaze from the Elf's phantom and brought it in front of him, on the road. 'He tried to stop me, a few months ago. As all the people who had tried to thus far, he died. I cast a soul-ensnaring hex to weaken him and then slit his throat.' He brought his right hand to the hilt of the dagger and curled his fingers around it. He tugged a little, making a small portion of the blade come out. 'This dagger had a very powerful enchantment on it, something I designed for myself with the help of a expert in the field. That Altmer's soul was the fuel for the magical infusing.'

Serana couldn't help but laugh under her breath. 'You don't seem to be very remorseful about what you've done.'

'He was a conceited idiot.' He remained silent, afterwards, but Serana knew that silence. The thing he had just said had linked to another thought, and one that he had the intention to share as soon as he was done formulating it. 'I could have enchanted the circlet I gave you, now that I think of it.'

Serana hands move a lot father than any of her thoughts and touched the spot of her belt where she kept the jewel wrapped up in the leather folds. He hasn't mentioned it for a very long time. I almost believed he had forgotten about it. Too many things at once were surfacing. Calm down, she told herself, batting her eyelids to aid her in clearing her head. Nothing's happened, he just remembered about it. Azrael had always had a tendency of placing very little value on things that everyone else would consider immensely meaningful. That diadem was the perfect example. It was an item worthy of a queen, and he had given it to her in a matter that was terse on most standards and nothing more than normal on his own standards. A present for his dear Elisif, that much I would understand, she thought. She's almost a queen, after all. But for me? It had always seemed strange, as if there was something more behind that gift.

It was also surprising how inconsequential his line of thinking seemed to be from the outside. Serana could easily picture it, from the things she knew about him. He values practicality and usefulness among anything. He clearly thought back about the circlet and, in light of some new events or insights he'd had since then, he deemed it useless. For what was the point of enchanting that piece of jewelry, if not to make it more useful? If he was someone else, anyone else, I would think he'd be bringing this up to remind me that I don't wear it. But he isn't like that. He was centered and egocentric. He saw the world rotating around himself, in a way. He had done his part and had given her the diadem. What she did with it probably didn't concern him all that much.

Should I… She removed the thought, but another one arose. It was similar almost to the point of being identical. Should I ask him what it meant? While living around him, one inevitably learns the importance of utilitarianism. She knew there were little moments when he was in the disposition of answering questions, and right then was the most prolonged and relaxed moment there had been between them ever since they had met. I really shouldn't think about it like this, she told herself. It made him look childish and capricious, where instead the moments when he was open were clear. The only reason why she could just as well consider them based on chance was that she didn't feel one of the factors that contributed to it. It was the thing they were doing and how much he was interested in it that changed his outer temper. Well, whatever it is, maybe it's a good time to ask.

'Azrael—'

'Not now.'

She halted. She had been so preoccupied with her own thoughts that she had neglected her surroundings for a few moments. Again… She quickly tried to orient herself, and above all trying to guess what Azrael had silenced her for. Something he has seen… she guessed, looking at him and following his gaze. He was looking slightly upwards, between the horizon and the sky, or whatever the ceiling of the Soul Cairn could be called, but there wasn't anything there. He's completely still, so he's looking… But then again, there wasn't anything of importance there. A tower and little else… A noise, perhaps, but what noise would make him look to the sky? Besides, there weren't any suspicious sounds. Not even the hiss of those floating beings. She cast another glance his way.

She noticed his hand. His right hand. It was bent just beside his head, but the palm was more open then if he meant to grab the longsword. It's stiff, so it hasn't opened. And he never fails to grab the handle of his blade. On the other hand, there was a weapon on his back that she had yet to see him use: the bow. The longbow with that strange emblem on it. It was a bird, but not a bird of prey. A robin, maybe a nightingale. Nevertheless, it was bow with thick limbs that not everyone had the strength to draw. His hand now hovered near the upper limb, no doubt ready to move quickly down at the grip. He's looking at the sky and about to grab a bow. He had silenced her, which might mean that he had heard a noise and that he was waiting to hear it again. Something that comes from the sky. It was expensive in terms of focus for her to piece together the context of what he did, but there was no other way.

She brought a hand closer to her side, already preparing to call magic to it. She felt tension beginning to gather in her body, the limbs tensing and her senses enhancing their precision. He's not moving, she thought, looking at Azrael. When she had emerged from her thoughts, she had found him completely still. His feet were firmly planted on the ground, and he was in a position where he could be stable. He's not doing anything. He's just ready for a fight. The tension crept up to her jaws, making them stiff. She realized how dry her mouth was. The sensory information had reached her consciousness but her saliva glands were unable to produce anything. The cold feeling of fear gripping had already frozen her chest. We could be attacked any moment, and I don't even know by what. She kept her gaze on the sky. It was her best bet, if Azrael wouldn't be more specific.

She turned around, knowing that Azrael would be watching her back. How did I not hear anything? A noise seems the only likely thing to have put him on this level of alert, but I didn't hear anything. She focused on her hearing, but it was even more unsettling. There wasn't a single noise in the air beside the low rustle of the fissures all around emitting the thick purple haze. Nothing there… she thought, once again reminding herself that whatever Azrael had heard, it had come from above. She turned once again in his direction. Come on, it's impossible that I haven't heard anything. The high tension was making her anxious, and that in turn was making her frustrated. What did you hear? She looked at him more carefully, repeating the cycle. First his gaze. He's looking up… But, wait… He wasn't really looking at the sky. The tower…

All her limbs and muscles locked themselves into place. She couldn't move anything, and even staying on her feet proved difficult for a short moment. It was as if she had been hit by a paralyzing spell, but she hadn't. What in Oblivion… She looked at the dark shape perched on top of the tower, where Azrael had been looking all along and where she hadn't seen anything when she had looked for the first time. It was black on black. 'Azrael…' Her voice quavered. She was shaking, and not entirely of fear. 'What is that?'

'It's a Dragon.'

No. It's impossible. How can a Dragon be here? She went over the shape once again, trying to find another solution that could explain the strange shape of the tower's top. Stop, she told herself, stop doing this. There's a Dragon there, and that is all too real to be a vision. Not much could be seen of it. A crystal shaped like a lozenge floated on the tower just behind, emitting a faint light that completely obscured what could otherwise be seen of the monster. Even her enhanced sight could not deal with the strong contrast. 'How did it manage to come here?' she asked, whispering.

'Good question,' he answered. 'I can't imagine a portal that would allow something of his size to get through. The only possible solution is that he was summoned here by the Ideal Masters themselves.'

The frost grip seemed to grasp her throat for a moment. 'But if that's true, then it's here to stop us, isn't it?'

'It's a he,' he corrected her impassively. 'And yes, he is.' Azrael had bent his back and partially hid behind the low brick wall that bordered the pathway, but now he rose and stood straight. He stepped back from the bulwark, bringing his hand away from the grip of the bow and leaving the palms open and exposed in the Dragon's direction. He didn't speak, but he gestured her with his hand, pointing the base of the wall.

Serana complied and crouched under the small hedge, lowering her shoulders as much as he could and only leaving her head peaking out of the cover. She brought the palm closer to her chest and weakened the barrier with Aetherius a little more. I don't know what he means to do, but that Dragon won't be happy to see us here. She went over everything once again and reviewed what information they had, and the shock just wouldn't go away. A Dragon, here? She wasn't that surprised because she still didn't fully believe it. She wasn't able to do so that quickly. She looked towards the Dunmer, who had spread his legs a little and had took on a majestic stance, with his hidden chin raised and the hands open.

'Drem Yol Lok, Zeymah!'

Serana was surprised at first to hear how much his voice had changed, but then she remembered Dimhollow. When he had spoken to the Draugr, he had used that same voice. It because even deeper and sonorous. It wasn't really his voice that changed, it was the language itself. It had to be uttered in a stronger tone, but its sound alone was more powerful. This once, it rang across the empty air, without producing an echo. I wonder what he has said to him. Because he's communicating with the Dragon, isn't he?

'Wo Los Hi?' Azrael screamed again, and from the tone it was clear he was asking something.

'Bo Nah Gut!'

That had been the voice of the Dragon. It was different from Azrael's, very different. He was a monster, while he was an Elf. I quivered, she realized, not finding her own balance as easily after she had gained a new hold on her senses. She brought her gaze towards the Dunmer, because she wanted confirmation; those words had sounded incredibly aggressive to her ears, but there was no way of knowing if she was right. She could just listen to her gut and little else. Azrael was completely still, not moving once muscle. The game is still on, probably. But she didn't feel it would be on for a long time. After that, there would be another game where there were no rules applied and where the stronger and smarter one would win.

'Nis,' Azrael replied. 'Zu'u Tovit Gein.'

'Kren Sosaal!'

Azrael's head turned tersely and abruptly in Serana's direction. The movement had been quick and firm. 'Run.' He kept looking towards her, but he brought his legs closer together and the hands back by his side with swift and measured movements, shifting his chest towards the continuation of the pathway.

We're not escaping, Serana understood from the direction he had turned towards. We're going further away from the portal. Likewise, she knew when his motions became that precise and fast. He's ready for a fight. There had been too little time to think about it, but the last thing the Dragon had said had sounded even more hostile than the last one. The mere sound of it was dreadful. He's going to attack us. She rose to her feet and hurried to Azrael's side.

She caught up with him while he wasn't already speeding up, but when she did he dashed forward into a running pace that she had never seen him take. He normally walked with long strides. He had long legs and walked a lot, so it was only natural to have grown accustomed to making the most out of each step, but he retained that even while he ran. He's fast, she thought, understanding that she wouldn't have managed to stay behind him if she hadn't given that her all. Well? Go! she said to herself, accelerating. 'What did he say?' she cried at him.

'Paraphrasing, that we're not welcome,' he answered, turning his head to the side and seeing how she was keeping up.

I so hate being a burden, she thought with a sting of frustration. However, there was very little space for every emotion right then. The sudden movement, even if unmotivated by any threats, had made it clear to both her body and her vampiric core that she was at risk of dying. The sense of touch was spreading along her body like it often did, all the way to her canine teeth. The sensation of overflowing strength in her limbs was what allowed her to ran at such breakneck speed. She looked at her side how fast the wall and the landscape passed them by, and it was really fast. We could outrun a horse, running this fast. There was an interior sense of enjoyment of the danger, a need for intensity that only arose at such times, when she felt her life was on the line.

Her ears filled with a strong noise, so strong that her whole body shook and all sounds died out for a moment. When they came back, the only thing she could hear was a strong and continuous whistle. Damn, she thought, shaking her head and trying to make the shrill go away. She focused on her eyes for a moment because she felt like she was losing her balance. She bent to the left and almost slipped, but she quickly returned to a stable position and kept running. A roar, she understood. No other sound could have been so strong to deafen her and shake the air with enough strength to make her lose her balance. She stole a quick glance at Azrael, who was a few feet ahead of her and on her right, and he too had his hands distant from the body and the palms towards the terrain. He had been destabilized too.

If he roared, though… She waited for the whistle to wane, and the more it did the more she heard more sounds. Prolonged sounds, deep and unfamiliar. However, she could easily guess what they were. They were the sounds of the Dragon beating his wings. She felt the tension rising as well as her senses sharpening. Where is he coming from? Her hearing soon took over much of her conscious attention in the attempt to locate the sound. Behind us, she decided, based on what she could hear. The flapping was shifting, moving from the left to the backs. If he attacks us from behind, there might be problems ahead.

They kept running. It was the only thing to do, it seemed. Azrael is the one they call Dragonborn. If he doesn't know what to do with a Dragon, I don't think I ever will. Most of them weren't aggressive towards mankind when she was born. Well, they weren't until you stepped in their territory. That was both a useless piece of information and a possible hypothesis as to why that Dragon had attacked them. But what is a Dragon doing in the Soul Cairn, of all places? Azrael's right, there is no portal large enough to bring him here. And what have the Ideal Masters brought him here for? She listened to the sound of waving wings one last time before letting it slip into the background.

They were sprinting past things that were as much bizarre as they were intimidating. From the solid, pale terrain of the Cairn emerged old structures, dilapidated towers and blocks of stone slabs. The place was full of those strange creatures they had seen before, all floating around and apparently oblivious of the two intruders. The fissures emitting the thick purple haze were everywhere, and now they were encountering even stranger landmarks. One of them was something that looked akin to a spout, which propelled white currents into the air. They were also nearing a very high archway ahead, which looked like part of the wall the place was enclosed within.

'Duck!'

She turned her head towards Azrael and followed his gaze, but also obeyed his order and lowered her whole body to the height of her abdomen. Her eyes pinpointed an arrow flying through the air, which whistled above her head. That would have ripped through my shoulder, she thought, trying to guess what that would have done if not for the warning, I would have probably been able to dodge, but it wasn't guaranteed. She brought her shoulders at their normal height again and found Azrael again, trying to stay by his side. Hold on, she thought after the spike of energy of the dodge had subsided. An arrow? Who shot it?

She tried to reconstruct the trajectory and adjust based on the distance they had covered, and then tried to identify anything that moved. She found it behind a small archway embedded more than halfway into the ground. Behind there was a skeletal figure with bones black as coal, who resembled a reanimated skeleton but only in regards to the upper portion. He's levitating, she realized after trying to understand the lack of legs. There was a purplish mist around its abdomen, and that was keeping it suspended in the air. He had both hands free to hold a bow, which had another arrow knocked in.

Azrael's didn't warn her this time, but she did just as they had done before and dipped. The projectile flew above their heads, but this time it was closer than before. Rudimentary intelligence, it seems, she thought. I wonder if they are daedric in nature or if they are yet another form of the poor sods who ended up in here after their souls had been used. She paid close attention once again to the sounds around her, once more hearing the Dragon waving his wings. He's closer, she thought, feeling a claw grasping her throat, still quite far away though, it would seem. She stole another glance at Azrael. He was now running exactly by her side, on her right, and the sound of his cloak flapping wildly was the strongest sound by far.

'Diil Qoth Zaam!'

Serana lost her balance once more. She stretched her arms and regained it after a brief moment, but when she came to she found herself with her mouth still open in surprise and vaguely unaware of what was going on. That magic again. It was the same as when Azrael had breathed either fire or ice against their enemies and the one the Draugr had used to propel her to the ground. The fabric of reality was torn and something new was sewn in to replace it.

'Undead…' she heard Azrael whisper. His voice was deep and absent. 'Tomb.' She looked his way, incapable of understand what he was on about. Maybe he's translating. He had read the wall written in Dragon Tongue with relative ease. This one seemed to require some more concentration. He never thought out loud. 'Zaam…' he said, whispering. 'Unwilling servant… Slave.' As he said that last word, his eyes moved all of a sudden towards the horizon. They darted around a couple more times. 'By the Three,' he growled. 'Watch out. He beckoned more.'

Serana looked around. Another few moments and they would have reached the big archway. He probably anticipated that. Once beyond, every ground enemy will not manage to keep up. She could imagine him being able to calculate exactly how much time they would spend reaching the building itself, but she couldn't. Half a minute probably, but she knew she could have been wrong. The dim light distorted all perceptions, especially spatial awareness. He beckoned more, he said. Undead Tomb Slave. More of the little ones. She looked over her shoulders, trying to look in the same direction as Azrael had done. Against the endless expanse of the Cairn, some more small figures had appeared. The Dragon summoned them, then.

Her eyes instinctually moved on to something else. Two… Three archers with the previous one. There was one more in the distance, a figure with the skull covered by a rugged hood. A mage. There were others, but they were further away. Those, however, were firing what they had. She saw clearly two arrows coming their way and two ice shards fired from the hooded one. The physical projectiles were dense enough to make it impossible to dodge them all at once. 'Azrael!' she screamed.

'On the ground!' he shouted back.

She complied once again. She let her feet slide against the ground and her weight bring her forward. She was still in the air when the first arrow hissed above her head. The fletching grazed a lock of her hair, sending them flying. The impact with the ground was more felt than heard, as Azrael had landed roughly in the same moment and had covered her softer sound. It also covered the whistle of one more arrow and the two ice shards wheezing above their heads. You can feel that he's been in so many of these situations, she thought, looking at Azrael while he put his palms on the ground to bounce on his feet again. He calculates and executes to perfection. She imitated the movement, placing the palms at the height of the shoulders and recollecting her legs, sending them past the line of her head and giving the little boost required to accelerate again.

They were halfway closer to the archway then they were when she had tried to understand how long it would take. I don't even know how much time actually passed between now and then. The only thing she was keeping track of for herself were the timing of the projectiles coming their way. However… There was also another disturbance, a strong sound. She felt herself freezing from them inside. The Dragon… 'The Dragon is right behind us!' she yelled.

'I know!' he screamed. 'Focus!'

She knew why he had said that. He had kept the timing on the wave of projectiles too. She sharpened her hearing one more and heard at the arrows coming in. She softer whistle of the missiles and the screeching one of the ice shards. She first dodged to the left, then ducked and then kept on the left still. The first arrow passed her by and struck Azrael's pauldron. The tip snapped and the shaft bounced back, all without causing barely any damage. The thing she had ducked under were the two ice missiles, which flew above her and shattered against the archway up ahead. The third was an arrow, which she dodged and lost sight of. All right, now some more time to…

She felt a strong impact at the height of her waist. On the left. Her field of vision changed, twisting diagonally, and everything blurred for a moment. What…? She didn't feel anything in particular except for a very unpleasant feeling on the impact zone, but she was stumbling to the side. She was falling to the ground. No. She pulled herself up straight, but she was dragged sideways again. No. Her hand darted to the spot in the waist that had been hit, and when she reached it she found something sticking out of it. By the blood… It's an arrow. She looked at the archway. It was barely a few yards away, but she felt she wouldn't have made it.

'Azrael,' she called out, feeling her voice breaking. 'They've hit me!' He was a few steps in front of her, probably because she had slowed down and he had assumed it was completely normal.

Even before she had finished speaking, probably already guessing something was wrong judging by her tone, he had turned around tersely. The impenetrable blackness that hid the face was more mysterious than ever. How much we rely on the reactions of others… Serana said to herself, dragging herself forward but feeling that it was become more and more difficult with every motion.

She saw a flash, Azrael reaching for her with a hand. The cold grasp closed around her shoulder, and then he tugged very strongly. She almost lost contact with the ground and completely lost her balance, tumbling to the side. She was completely airborne for a moment, without any contact whatsoever with the terrain, and then she landed on her shoulder, on the opposite side of the wound. She felt a dull pain coming from the inside of her body rather than from the injury itself. I wouldn't feel that much pain for a normal wound. There was one, unpleasant explanation. Height of the waist. The arrow had snapped some ribs.

She threw her head over her shoulder as much as she could and she looked at Azrael. They'll be firing again, she thought. Some of the projectiles were already in flight. He had drawn the longsword after having tugged her behind him. That's what he did, she realized, he threw me behind him. A single thought surged past her consciousness, but it was able to bring more warmth and conform than anything else in that moment. He has put himself in harm's way to protect me. The arrows were approaching and so were the shards of ice. She saw his left hand closed firmly on the grip of the longsword.

The first arrow reached him, and just before it did the blade of the longsword seemed to vanish. There was a snapping sound, and then the blade reappeared in front of Azrael's frame, while the shaft of the arrow fell on the ground a few feet away. He then bent his head left, and two other arrows hissed past the side of his head. He raised his right vambrace, the one holding the sword, and kept it still for long enough for the ice shard to shatter against it, making his arm quake. Serana froze when she saw the last ice missile coming his way, but she saw that the spike was dissolving in a flash of light. There was a stream of flame coming from Azrael's left hand which completely melted it.

'Yol… Toor Shul!'

Serana looked at the source of the noise. The Dragon… she thought. She was motionless, incapable of moving even if she would have had to. She didn't see anything that resembled a Dragon beyond Azrael's black frame, but only a sudden blaze. The air around her heated up. Her skin hurt, starting to sizzle and burn as if it was being touched by a burning iron. On the sides of the blaze, she could see two black, enormous shapes against the sky. They were tattered and ruined in some places, with holes that allowed her to see the sky beyond. The light came closer and closer and the heat became more unbearable with every passing moment.

'Joor Zah Frul!'

Pain. Pain everywhere, but she recognized Azrael's voice speaking those last three words. The blaze disappeared abruptly, and after a new and eerie flash of blue light there was nothing more. She saw only black. A prolonged sound beat against her ears, but the pain was too strong. She still felt as if she was burning to cinders in that very moment. She caught her hands rubbing her legs uncontrollably, trying to put out the fires. There is no fire… Her skin was still scorching, she could hardly think of anything that wasn't the pain. She snapped her jaws, looking for something to bite. There was nothing, only the thick air of the Soul Cairn, which lacked any smell.

Her hand stopped its frantic motion when a new sound filled the air. More sounds, in fact. There was a more vicious one, a roar, shredding the air. It was grim, it carried the feeling of pain and desperation. Then, there was a different one, one that grew with each passing second. A sharper sound, less alive. Time distorted, bent by her sensations, and both noises ended in a louder mix of the two that deafened her once more, leaving an ear-splitting hiss in their stead.

'Serana.'

She batted her eyelids and saw a black, black void staring right at her. 'Fire…' she murmured, but her voice broke after that. Even the pain of the wound had become unbearable. Her skin was still sizzling. She felt her limbs shaking, but she was afraid to move them any further.

'Let go. Faint.'

She could not think clearly, but she felt the answer. She remembered it. 'Too long…' She snapped her jaws again, baring her teeth. 'Too long since I fed.'

She heard a soft sound, and then a warm and pleasant sensation filled her mouth. Blood… she thought, feeling alive. Her vision cleared a little, but the pain was still there. It burns… She heard no more sounds, nothing al all. Is… Oh, no. She felt herself losing consciousness, her vision darkening and her senses shutting down. One last coil of the ice stopped her. You're fainting, and you have no idea what he could do while you sleep. She cast away the thought. He risked his life for me. I can trust him.

'The Dragon…'

'He crashed against the archway and demolished it.' His voice, although always cold and unemotional, had taken on a soothing note. She was unable to decide if she was imagining it or if it was true. 'His slaves disappeared when he did, and I shot the last one. You're safe. Now let go.'

Let go. She felt that he was holding her from underneath. His right gauntlet was against her shoulders, the left on her lower back. She reclined her head backwards and her eyes closed. The sense of touch receded and the pain went away, her hearing dulled to the point of disappearing and everything became black. She felt her heart beating slowly.

A/N: In watching the candles and thinking about blood, Azrael is course reminded of the Black Sacrament.