~ Chapter Eleven ~
I Slew an Undead Abomination
Luz stood a while on the edge of the Northward Road, watching the caravan wobble up the hill and over the crest, vanishing a minute or two later.
"You will see them again," Irileth said, standing. "Come. I have dallied enough, and you are wasting daylight."
"I will," murmured Luz, more to herself than anything. She shook herself out of her melancholy and jogged to catch up with Irileth.
"You didn't have to wait for me," she said, catching up to the Housecarl. "But I appreciate the company."
"I needed to check in with the Northern Gatehouse. It's not much of a gate, nor a house, but it is stationed far away that I only check in once in a while." Irileth shrugged. "They are due for an inspection."
"Two birds with one stone then."
"Indeed."
They traveled in silence for a while, the winding road to themselves, save for a cart passing them by, an odd pair arguing atop it - a man with raven hair, hooded against the sun, his skin ghastly pale in the mid-morning light, and a motley looking jester, his bells jingling.
"Shut it, Cicero! I'm not interested in excuses."
"Cicero is sorry, Mordryd. He did not mean to become lost."
"How did you miss Falkreath Hold entirely? I have better things to be doing right now than hauling your sorry ass all over Skyrim."
"Cicero is new to Skyrim! You mustn't be mad at poor Cicero-"
"Shush."
The cart rumbled by, Irileth peering at the man and the jester, her senses piqued.
The man merely nodded to her. "Fine day."
"It is," she said. "Are you lost, I heard?"
"No," the one called Mordryd said, waving casually at Luz. "Just helping a friend get his dear mother to her old home in Falkreath." He patted a massive crate in the back of the wagon.
"Yes, yes, dear mother," the jester said, his face drooping in a concerningly malleable way. "Poor, sweet, mother. She did so enjoy the fog."
"Are you sure you're alright?" Irileth asked as the cart continued on.
"Yes, positive!" The hooded man waved. "Good day - sit down, Cicero! I swear, I'll blind you for the day if you don't quit that."
Irileth watched the cart rumbling away, Luz matching her gaze.
"You should probably follow them," Luz said.
Irileth grunted and nodded. "Are you alright from here?"
Luz shrugged her small pack, making it rustle with various goods, and caused the staff and mace to clack from their straps on the side. "I'll be fine. Think it's best if I avoid conflict right now, anyway. And Farengar said that there were three students of the college here just before all that business with the dragon? They left a day or so ago, something about Shrouded Grove. He pointed it out on a map. I can get there - hopefully, catch them - before sundown."
Irileth hummed. "Not a word to the guardsmen at the Northern Gatehouse. I want to test their response to a sneaking foe. I doubt it's any good."
Luz laughed and nodded, waving goodbye as Irileth stormed after the cart.
The road was quiet and barren for a long while until Luz came upon the ruins of the old gatehouse. Stopping long enough to get a stone out of her boot, she waved to the guards before moving on.
The crisp air kept her cool as she ventured further north, careful to keep an eye on the sun. She'd left later than they'd planned - she found it hard to say goodbye to Eda and Martin, and then Eda had given Luz her staff - 'temporary loan; do not lose or damage it' - and then had to extract herself from Luz's hug.
But with something familiar so close to hand, Luz felt a little better about parting ways.
It was strange to have such a quiet walk, across the golden plains and through farmland. It reminded her a little of home, of the small village of Cropsford.
Of Mami, and the life she left behind.
Luz didn't want to think about it.
She'd sent a letter with a courier, trying to not lie to her, but also not reveal just how much danger she'd been in recently. She didn't want to worry Mami, she told herself. It was better if she thought Luz had gotten to the temple only to learn that she had no magical talents and had taken a job at the Jarl's house in Whiterun. Safe, neutral, technically not a lie.
Luz groaned to herself, making a seat of a rock on the side of the road. It was midday, but she hadn't seen the Hold marker yet. The next safe place was Nightgate Inn, well inside the Pale Hold of Dawnstar. She needed to make it by nightfall - Farengar had warned of a storm in the mountains, working northward.
She could even see the dark clouds crowding around the Throat of the World - the mountain where the few friends she had were going.
Sighing, and grabbing an apple from her bag, Luz trudged on, trying to distract herself with a game of counting only the circular stones in the road.
Luz had just passed one hundred stones and the Pale Hold Marker when it started to snow.
She pulled her hood up and looked around.
There was nothing for miles. A giant's bonfire far off the road to the right, but definitely not something she wanted to chance, and the treeline began to thicken further down the road. There was already some snow left on the ground from the last storm, who knew how many days or weeks ago, and Luz tried to remember some other landmarks that meant she was near the Shrouded Grove.
She couldn't be too far off. It was supposed to be down a short road, near another barrow, and across the ways from an ancient shrine site.
Of course, with the light fading, Luz couldn't be sure what any of those distances meant. She took a few deep breaths, pushing her nerves down. She had a few torches, her staff, and her mace.
"And," she said to herself, smiling. "You."
Grabbing her journal - recently converted into a Daedric sigil practice book - Luz took her staff, and spent a minute carefully copying down the 'magelight mote' rune Irileth had shown her.
Double checking her scratch, Luz tapped the encircled rune with the staff and whispered - barely audible to herself - "Light."
The rune blazed, releasing a series of magelights, which made Luz's heart bubble and couldn't stop herself from dancing in place for a minute before remembering to grab a small lantern off her bag and catching one of the motes as it drifted up and away, the rune growing dark.
Armed with a small blaze of white light, Luz made her way along the road, more confidence blooming with every step.
It didn't take long before she realized, that with the snow coming down, she would have missed the turn-off towards the Shrouded Grove if it hadn't been for the small campsite on the side of the road.
Three packs and tents sat at the edge of the campfire, neatly covered, with only a few embers stirring in the ash as the wind gusted now and then.
"Not here," Luz murmured. "But here recently. Footprints…"
She held her lantern high just in time for the light to fade. Groaning, Luz grabbed her journal and staff and, after a few errors, captured another mote in her lantern.
With her fresh light, Luz scanned the snow, holding her hood tight as another long howl of wind rushed by her. The storm was getting worse, quickly.
Thankfully, not so bad as to have erased the footprints in the snow, heading off into the woods.
Luz gripped the knife that Irileth had given her and carved a small light rune into a tree trunk as she followed the prints, glad that the thick pine tree branches caught the released motes, and also that there was no difference in the use between channeling her intent via staff or dagger.
It occurred to Luz, as she crested a small hill, that she never dreamed to be carrying an enchanted item, like the hero in her books, let alone three. She wondered idly if any of them would become legends, like the Champion's bow, Whisper, or his blade, Witchbane.
She paused. It had been so long since she thought of the hero's weapons - each having a legendary story of their own- that she'd missed it.
Witchbane. An enchanted blade that stole magic from each cut it made, said to burn without fire, used to slay hundreds of dremora during the Crisis.
She humphed. "Seems like 'demonbane' would have been more appropriate. Or maybe he was a witch like Eda? A Witch's Bane? Huh…"
Luz half skidded, half tripped down the slope into the hollow below. It could only be the Shrouded Grove - a freezing mist filled the indent in the ground, and a great ruined stone head rested along one edge. She listened for a moment.
Nothing.
Everything was so still in the snow, the silence was oppressive.
"Hello?" Luz called, quietly. Her neck felt very tight, and her heartbeat was quickening. She'd lost the footprints now - the snow had given way to mostly frozen mud here, but she could pick out a bear print her and there, as well as the odd boot.
"Hello?" she called again, a little louder, uncomfortable with how echoey it had become.
Nothing still.
Examining the edges of the clearing - mace now a comforting weight in her hand - Luz found the opening to a cave behind some trees and scrub brush.
A burned-out torch sat on a level slab next to the entrance.
"Oh, boy," Luz said, rolling her shoulders and starting inside.
The cave quickly dove down, then leveled out, clearly having been worked at some point in the past. Ferns and other ground plants grew unfettered in the mist.
When she heard voices - one snide, another two or three defiant - she slipped off her bag and carefully placed it on a felled log, taking her mace and staff with her, as she snuck closer.
"You need to stop, Peryn. Archmage Aren tasked me with retrieving that book, one way or another." Luz rolled her eyes. She recognized that voice. Prim, proper, and demanding with an Imperial City accent, tinged by Bretony. The angry, green-haired one.
"Miss Blightward, you of all people should recognize the importance of this experiment." Also a Breton, but his voice was pitched, almost as if he was barely containing his exuberance. "A discovery - a re-discovery! - like this will change what we know of Conjuration itself."
"This is barbaric!" A higher voice, panicky. "Leave that poor thing alone. This is foul!"
"I'd have thought a wood elf would appreciate the reuse of fresh meat."
"That is a gross misunderstanding of the Green Pact, Peryn."
"Thank you, Amity." Willow sounded surprised.
"He has a point though. About not letting it go to waste."
Willow groaned.
Luz had managed to get closer to the voices, now able to see the scene before her.
In the heart of the cave, a clearing was marked out by a black stone barrow coffin, sealed, but with various alchemical and magical tools laying on its surface. Next to it was a crudely constructed wooden table, with a mass of muscle and fur on it, something that looked like half-troll and half-man.
Off to the side, bound by ropes to a strangely vibrant tree, here in the heart of a cave, were the three mages Luz had met almost a week ago. Two staves and a bow were tossed into a heap nearby.
In the center of the clearing, stood a short, balding man, though his mousy brown hair was long down his back. His eyes were ringed with dark circles, and he seemed the kind of thin from not eating well - somehow portly around the middle and skinny everywhere else. He was clad in similar robes as the rest of them, but his were soaked with new and old blood, as well as white-ish green stains that Luz couldn't figure out.
"It doesn't matter," Peryn said, stroking his chinless face. "It is time to move from theory to trial." He turned from them, raising his arms wide. "You've woken up just in time. The binding will soon be complete, and I shall bring forth the fifth element to Mundus once more." He looked over his shoulder, singling out Amity with a leering smile. "Feel like Aren's star apprentice can put a true flesh atronach to the test?"
Amity looked down at her hands as the ropes around her wrists gave way. She stood, head high, back arched, and looked down her nose at Peryn. "You've made a grave error, Conjurer."
"Well?" Luz whispered to herself, watching from under a bush. "Get him!"
But Amity waited for Peryn to make his way over to the table and place his hand on the thing's chest.
"Amity," Luz heard Augustus hiss, but Amity shushed him.
"I've got this," Amity hissed. "Peryn. When I turn your monster inside out, you will give us the book. Deal?"
"When my creation rips your arrogant elven blood from your spine," Peryn snapped out. "I'll let your friends run for their lives. A few seconds headstart should do the trick."
Willow and Augustus looked at each other, but Luz rolled her eyes and started to move around the edge of the grove, trying to get closer.
"Rise, my hideous creation," Peryn crowed. "Rise and show little miss perfect the true nature of atronmancy."
There was a terrible moan, as the air was forced into deflated lungs, and Luz swore she heard a faint screaming and what sounded like hateful curses within it before the thing on the table grunted and began to move.
It was like a horrid puppet on strings, made worse by the haphazard stitchwork and blood-red runes carved into shaved skin. It was like Peryn had stuffed a man into a troll suit, leaving holes for humanoid arms to stick through from under the troll's ribs, which flexed grotesquely, like insect mandibles.
It was top-heavy and fell forward as it rose, using its troll arms to knuckle walk, while the two human arms flexed useless fingers around blades of metal that had been tied to them.
It turned its head toward Amity, troll jaw lolling open, the humanoid jaw under and inside it, chattering. Putrid green slime leaked from its mouth and down its arms, dripping down the metal scythes to hiss against the dirt and stone of the grove.
"Huh," Amity said, gathering blazes of purple energy into her palms. "Your stitchwork is very sloppy."
She released the spell as the troll-man hurled itself forward with an unnerving skittering sound, only to crash straight into the rising tower of groaning ice as the frost atronach stepped from the portal, a club of ice already raising to attack.
Luz took her chance and bolted for Willow and Augustus, sliding into the foliage behind them and pulling Irileth's knife from the sheath at the small of her back.
"Where did you come from?" Augustus asked, rubbing his wrists.
"Don't worry about that right now," Luz said, slicing through Willow's bonds next. "We need to help."
"Don't!" Amity drew a ward into place as Peryn hurled a stream of fire at her, boiling against the shield. The atronach and the troll-man had moved off to the side in a brutal crash of ice, slime, and bone.
"I've got this."
Luz ignored her, sheathing the dagger and unhooking her mace from her belt. "You two help her atronach bring that thing down."
"What about you?" Willow asked, grabbing the bow and arrows before tossing the staff to Augustus.
"I've heard," Luz said, grinning. "That rendering a mage unconscious breaks their spells. I intend to find out."
That sounded so much better in my head, she thought, turning away to run up behind Amity.
"Stay out of this," Amity said, using both hands to maintain the ward. A bolt of lightning crashed against it and she gasped.
"Take this," Luz said, holding out Eda's staff.
"I don't need it. I have him."
"Yeah, we do."
"No, don't get in the way-"
But Luz had already dropped the staff and dashed out toward a tree on the near side of Peryn.
"Interloper!" The mage's eyes were wide and mad. "Cheat! You're ruining the experiment!"
"This is all kinds of gross," Luz yelled back at him. Her heart was thundering, which was apparently nothing compared to the ear-splitting crack of wood as Peryn hurled a bolt of ice the size of her arm through the side of the tree.
"Hey," she yelled, rushing to new cover, now almost fully behind him. "That almost hit me!"
"I was trying to," Peryn snarled, throwing another pair of ice shards at Amity, overwhelming her shield and sending her tumbling to the ground. "You're ruining everything!"
Luz took her chance, not really letting herself think of the actions and consequences.
She ran for him, mace held back and up, her other hand reaching for his arm.
He turned, eyes red, wide, and filled with terrible, blind malice. He tried to bring a spell to bear, but she grabbed his forearm, directing a shower of ice and snow down her leg and across the floor, followed by a spray of frozen blood as her mace cracked against his temple.
Peryn crumbled to the floor, unconscious.
Luz didn't have a chance to contemplate what she had just done, as the troll-man-thing crushed the frost atronach's chest, smashing and tearing, turning one of its own arms to jelly as it thundered against it.
"Why won't it stop?" she asked, moving towards Amity, who slapped Luz's offered hand away.
"Because it's a flesh golem, you slackwit," Amity said. "Without its master to harness its energy, the daedra bound to the body will tear itself apart - and us with it."
Luz looked over to see the beast advancing on Augustus, who was backing up quickly.
"Uh, a little help here," he called over his shoulder. "I don't know how to make an unliving brain not beleive in me."
"What?"
"He's an Illusionist," Amity snapped, grabbing Eda's staff. "His magic cannot affect something like this." She swirled it in the air, conjuring a blaze of fire that arched out, igniting the thing's chest and stomach with a scream.
"This is beyond you."
"No," Luz said. "I can help. Just tell me what to do."
Amity growled, her lip curling. "Fine. I need to unbind it. It's not complicated, but I need some time."
"Got it." Luz skipped back, waving her arms and whistling. "Hey, big and ugly! Over here."
The troll-man - still alfame - roared at her and charged.
Luz's face fell. "Oh-no."
"Get over here," Willow called, gesturing for Luz to run around the far edge of the circular grove, before she nocked an arrow and let it fly. It took one of the troll skull's jaw mandibles off, sending it flying over Amity's head.
"Sorry!"
"Look, I could just not unbind it," Amity said, still making gestures with her hands, with each pass the purple-black mist around her growing and fading. "And let it kill us all."
"No thank you," Augustus said from behind a rock.
"Get out here!"
"And do what?"
"The magic-less girl with a mace is making you look bad, Augustus!"
"I think she's doing a great job!"
"Thanks!" Luz called back.
Augustus gave her a thumbs-up and made a gesture with his free hand. "You got this!"
Luz felt her skin prickle and yelped as she dove out of the way of the troll-man as it slammed its bloody fists into the ground where she had been.
"Augustus," Amity snapped, straining with her spell. "Get your staff… and freeze it."
"I can hold it down," Willow called out, slinging her bow around her neck and running to one of the trees. "Give me a second."
"No, Willow! Just-" Amity stopped herself as the troll-man turned to her now. "Oh Gods…"
"Hey!" Luz grabbed a rock and threw it at the thing's head. "Over here!"
"Oh my Gods," Augustus said, casting a frost spell from his staff that went wide. "I am not suited for this."
"Stop complaining." Amity planted her feet, sweat beading on her forehead as she clasped a roiling ball of misty oil to her chest. "I need a good shot. Someone slow it down!"
There was a rumbling, and the earth erupted in a mass of roots and brambles. At the same time, there was a humming, buzzing song that seemed to emanate from the trees themselves, and the very stones.
Two spriggans - Luz knew they could be nothing else, with their wooden faces and hollowed bodies - emerged from the trees, melting right out of the bark, long, spiny fingers reaching for the troll-man.
The roots and ferns wrapped around the flesh golem, thorns raking across its dead skin, tearing up the runes, causing them to sputter like a dying flame.
Amity released her spell with a cry. "Release! Unsew thy sinew and begone!"
There was a screaming rush of air, a flicker of magic, and a crack like a bone in the fire, then the runes faded and the creature fell into the embrace of the roiling roots, pulled down into the earth until there was no hint of it.
Luz raised her arms over her head. "Woo! That was amazing-"
"That was a disaster," Amity said, pushing herself to her feet. "Least because of your actions. Why did you interfere with a wizard's duel?"
Luz looked at her, confused. "Because you needed help. Should I have just stood by and let you get killed?"
"I had him where I wanted him." Amity began to approach Peryn's still body when Willow intercepted her.
"We should leave," she said, looking over her shoulder at the spriggans, who were now stalking closer to the body. "They said they would help clear the den of the undead, but then we needed to leave."
"I need that book," Amity said, shoving past Willow. "I'm not afraid of your woodwyrds."
"Amity-"
The spriggans closed ranks, the smaller of the two, her heart and eyes alight with a poisonous green fire, her gentle hum becoming a threatening buzz, interposing herself between Amity and the body of Peryn.
"I'm not leaving without the book," Amity growled, flames dancing along her fingers.
Luz stepped in, putting a hand on her arm. "Hey, wow, maybe don't threaten the tree spirits who just pulled a four-hundred-pound troll-thing into the dirt, huh?"
"I don't need your help."
"But maybe you need hers?" Luz gestured to Willow, who was quietly, nervously, fishing a small leather-bound book out of her bag. "That is the book right?"
"Oh." Amity quenched the flames with a fist and took the book. "Yes. Good job. Ah," she turned to look at the spriggans. "And… thank you. As well."
"They just want us to leave," Willow said, tugging on Amity's sleeve. "So… let's do that."
"Yes. Of course." Amity turned and stalked off, back out of the cave, Augustus close behind and Willow hanging back behind Luz.
Luz looked behind her, at the tree spirits. One kept watching them, and the other dragged the body of Peryn into the underbrush.
The four of them sat around the campfire as the snow alighted on the dome of magic, melting on contact.
Augustus was snoring lightly, having passed out almost at once, while Amity had conjured the dome and then folded herself into her tent, back to the fire, book in her lap.
Luz slowly and carefully cleaned off her mace, feeling nagging thoughts slowly bubble to the surface with every dried stain she wiped away with fresh snow.
"First one?"
Luz glanced up at Willow, who was tending to a small kettle on the fire. "Huh?"
Willow nodded politely at the mace. "Dead guy."
Luz laughed shortly. "Ah… kind of. Does it count if they were already dead?"
Willow shrugged. "Depends. Fresh dead or old dead?"
"Old."
Willow nodded. "No, I don't think so."
"Oh."
"Tea?"
"Ah… sure."
Willow smiled and handed Luz an extra cup. "Listen. Not going to lie. I've killed about six people. Plenty more animals and monsters."
"Is that supposed to be comforting?"
Willow paused. "Nope. Just… you're not the only one. Did you mean to kill him?"
"No. Yes?" Luz sighed, staring at the mace, leaning against the rock. "I just… wanted him to stop. Hurting all of you."
"If you aren't prepared to kill someone," Amity said, not looking up from the book. "Then you should have stayed out of it."
"What is your problem?" Luz felt her face get red. "Are you always like this?"
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Arrogant."
"Hey," Willow said, standing up and placing her hands between them. "It's been a long day and a difficult journey. That wasn't an easy fight, Amity. Give her some credit."
Amity huffed, burying herself in the book again.
"Thanks," Luz said.
"And you need to be more careful," Willow admonished. "Do you really not know any magic, and thought tackling a wizard with a mace was a good idea?"
Luz chuckled. "Ah, well funny thing about that…"
She picked up the mace and with the tip of it, traced the magelight rune, tapping it.
Amity turned around when Willow gasped. "What?" Her eyes widened, taking in the rune, the mace, and Luz's shy grin. "How did you do that?"
"It's just channeling the magic in the item," Luz said. "Eda - she's my teacher - showed me how to do it."
"Hm," Amity said, scowling. "Stealing the charge from an item to power a rune. You can't use your own magicka?"
"Yeah," Luz said. "Something like that. I don't know exactly how it works -"
"Then you shouldn't be messing with it." She turned back to her book.
Luz fixed her smile, glaring at Amity's back. "You know… not everyone just gets the best education in the Imperial City to go off and become a mage. Some of us started later, learn differently."
"Ignore her," Willow said, putting a hand on Luz's arm. "You won't win an argument with Amity Blightward. Too many books up there." She tapped her temple and poured some tea into Luz's cup.
They lapsed into silence for a while, Luz sipping at her tea - which was surprisingly good - and eventually Amity snapped her books shut, rolled over in a fur blanket, and waved out of her tent.
"If you want the dome,Willow, better upkeep it now. We set off in the morning."
"Can you show me how you do that?" Luz asked, seeing Willow roll her eyes but stand.
"If you do," Amity muttered from her tent. "Do it quietly."
Willow just shook her head. "Would if I could. But I learned most of what I know very young. Grew up with magic and my fathers. Best I can tell you, they called this a 'sun dome' - just a shield of magical warmth. I think it falls under Mysticism? Oh, well, that's what my dad called it. Though maybe it's Alteration, or Restoration now? Probably, Alteration."
"If I knew a Silence spell," Amity threatened from her tent.
Luz stuck out her tongue at the tent and Willow chuckled. "Maybe another time then."
Willow nodded and wove her hands around the edges of the dome, before releasing another, more vibrant dance of energy.
Luz lay down with her blanket on her sleeping roll. "Let me know if you need me to… keep… watch."
Within minutes Luz was snoring herself, and Willow sat down by the fire, like usual, making another cup of tea.