A/N: Hey everybody, thank you all for your reviews! It hadn't occurred to me before your comments that this could work as a one-shot, and it does. But I'd planned a little more. Still keeping it short, more like a three-or-four-shot, depending on... things. So anyway, here we go.

Madness
2. The Dam Breaks Open

She didn't believe it, not at first. She consulted her map, wandered around on the water for an hour or five, dove beneath the surface to see if it had sunk maybe -- before coming to the realization that it had, in fact, disappeared. Bewildered, she headed for shore.

She sat down on the sand and thought. It wasn't just the Door. The entire island was gone. No mushroom trees, no Khajiit bones, not even a speck of dirt. As if none of it had ever existed.

But it had existed. She'd been there, spent half a year of her life on the other side of the Door, in the Isles, her Isles. She was Sheogorath, Daedric Prince of Madness...

Had it all been a dream?

It didn't make sense. More importantly, she didn't understand; things didn't have to make sense to be understood. In any case, it was wrong. The ring on her finger -- it was Hirrus's ring, from Crucible, the one she'd found in his room in after pushing him to his death. Certainly it still worked, and hadn't disappeared; it was how she'd been walking all over the bay for the past few hours.

No, the Door couldn't be gone. If the ring existed, then the Isles existed, her Isles existed, and she'd been there to get the ring. That meant her memory was right, and she was Lord of the Isles, and who but the Madgod could close the gate -- let alone make the whole sodding island disappear? It couldn't be gone. She refused to believe it. All she could think was that it must have been moved, somehow. But moved where? Who knew?

She tried to summon a Saint. When it appeared, she smiled. See, she could still do that, too. But when she tried asking it where was the Door, it stared at her blankly, sword and shield at the ready, before gradually fading back into Oblivion.

She tried again, and again, then tried summoning Seducers, but to no avail. Not a one would speak when commanded to. She fell back on the shore, groaning in frustration. The Door had moved. Who knew? Who knew?

Haskill. Haskill would know. Haskill knew everything, and if he didn't he could ask Dyus, who did. But she couldn't summon him outside the Isles, and she couldn't get to the Isles to summon him. So how to talk to him? How?

An idea struck her. A mad idea, of course, but mad ideas were always the best kind. She rose from the shore and headed off southwest.

It was barely dawn by the time she reached her shrine, but a flock of mad followers already milled around her statue. "Good madfolk," she said, "might I trouble you for a head of lettuce, a skein of yarn, and a lesser soul gem?" She'd been here long ago; she knew what she liked; she didn't have to be told.

The Dunmer glanced up. "What've you got to trade?"

"An apple, a fork, a dagger, some cheese."

The Dunmer's eyes lit up. "I'll have the fork," he said. He took it and stuck it in his hair, and then he gave her what she asked for. She took the offerings and placed them on the altar, praying to herself that this would work.

It did not. Frustrated, she prayed again. And again.

The Dunmer appeared over her shoulder. "Are you sure you're doing it right?" he said. "I don't think it will work. It isn't even raining."

"Of course it will work," she said. "It has to work. I don't care if it isn't raining."

"Oh, but He does."

"I am He. I am the Madgod. I'm Lord Sheogorath. And I don't care if it isn't raining."

The Dunmer giggled. "Oh, that's good!" he said. "You know something?" He leaned in conspiratorially. "I'm Lord Sheogorath, too."

"No! You didn't hear me properly," she said, taking a step back. "I rule Madness. I am the Madgod!"

"Of course you are. And so am I. I'm the Madgod, too."

The others caught on and began to join in. She couldn't understand. These were her subjects, her worshipers. If she had her staff, her princely raiment, then they would realize. Then they would believe. But she didn't have them, and she couldn't get them, and Haskill would not speak to her, and they all thought this was some sort of game, a mad joke.

As the madfolk laughed and reveled around her, she sat down on the bench and wept. She was lost. She didn't know what to do. There was no way she, the Madgod, could go back to live amongst the mortals. It wouldn't be right, and besides, her life as a mortal was over, the story closed. Her manor was abandoned; her Imperial Dragon armor lay at the bottom of Lake Rumare. She'd staged her own suicide, for the Isles' sake. There was no way she could go back. No way. And even if she could, she didn't want to. Tamriel was no longer her home.

Home was the Shivering Isles now. It was her place, her right. Anything that had ever mattered to her had happened there. She had taken the greenmote, bathed in the blood of her enemies, and had known ecstasy. She had seen the ruined city of Passwall, the forces of Order polluting the realm, and had known despair. She had seen the Gatekeeper born again, had sat on her throne and watched over her children, had walked the winding paths of her Isles under tangerine trees and marmalade skies -- and had known love. It was too much to leave, too much to have simply disappeared. The Isles were her, and she was them, and she had to find them, to get back and set things right.

And then, drying her eyes, she decided. If no one would direct her to them, she would search the Isles out herself. No matter how long it took, no matter how much it cost or how far she had to travel, she would find her Isles again. And she would start now.

She left her children to their games, and with such thoughts walked off into the morning sunlight.