Chapter Three: A Wizard and a Letter

Maximillian laid back in his chair, and placed his feet on his well built, but very messy, desk. He took a deep breath, and exhaled even more deeply. He got up and skulked over to the main window of the office. Once there, he looked down from his tower to the newly established town of Uvirith s Grave surrounding his tower of Tel Uvirith. Far below the tower the town s citizens moved around in their own lives, doing their own activities, all of which had one purpose: the support of Maximillian s tower, the only safe refuge in the Molag Amur region for any traveler.

From the endless lava rivers, to the strange, contorted, lifeless landscape of the decimated region, only Maximillian s tower stood firm. It is ironic therefore to think that he was one of the leaders of the group, the Great House Telvanni, that had sent him there. It all had to do with politics. Maximillian was not from Morrowind; he was instead from the distant realm of the Summerest Isles, far off on the other side of the continent.

The xenophobic Telvanni almost turned down his offer to join the house, and it was only due to choice assassinations that he had gotten to where he was today. Therefore he was incredibly worried about where he stood, he never knew when a fellow Master may try to take him out.

Truly, there had already been several attempts. This could be seen when you looked at the ragged condition of the armor of any of the Tower s guards, or when you looked at Maximillian s left eye, which had been slit during the last attack.

Delam, Maximillian s apprentice, slowly opened the door to his master s office, quickly casting a silence spell when he heard it creaking. He was terrified of his master, not only because of his ruthless history, but also because he was a high elf, and therefore nearly eight feet tall, dwarfing his rather stocky frame.
Suddenly, to his horror, Delam coughed due to his developing asthma.

Maximillian turned around to face this intruder to his home, and he smiled as he saw his apprentice s terrified face as it was twisted into a comical grimace of anxiety.

From his face, blackened not only by the fact that he was a dark elf, but also due to the endless ash-storms that raced throughout this horrid place, to his scrawny body wrapped up in a robe several sizes too large, Delam seemed to be a perfect example of the Telvanni ideal. While he might be a weakling, too weak to fight in the Warrior s House Redoran, so impersonal that he could never serve in the commercial Great House Hlaalu, and too questioning to serve in the Imperial Temple, he fit right into the Telvanni where the weak, but intelligent, ruled even the strongest warrior.

Delam, it seemed though, had never really left his mother before coming to Tel Uvirith.

What is it? Groachily asked the sorcerer as he turned his attention back towards the window.

Well, Master, your representative at the Telvanni Council sent you a message, it seems that there is another problem with Mistress Therana, Delam s voice shifted to a quieter tone as he ran to his master s side, she has announced that she is seceding from the Telvanni due to your recent promotion to house Arch magistrate. Please don't do anything unnatural to me, you wouldn't want to have to explain it to my mother, would you?

Maximillian took another deep breath, although he knew that Therena was nothing if not insane, he could not afford to ignore this threat for the same reason, he could never predict her. Living for over a thousand years could do that to a person though, and Maximillian had to give her credit, she had kept her position as Telvanni Master for longer than any other person in history.

Don t worry, my apprentice, just go back downstairs and clean out the Calcinator and Retort in the Alchemy Lab, I may need to use them later in the day. Delam ran out the door and levitated down the central column to the main hall.

Still, this was too much for him to handle at the moment. The head of the tower guard was in prison due to his frequent inebriation caused by his recent divorce and the cook had just been executed for poisoning his food as another master bribed her.

He turned around, and walked towards the central column, and he moved down through it smoothly with his levitation spell, until he reached the very bottom, or what seemed like it. Once there, he pushed on a jutting piece of fungus growing from the rest of the fungal tower, and suddenly the bottom dropped out, revealing another level of the tower.

He slowly levitated down, and then he closed the entrance behind him. Before him was a door, he entered it.

He was now in a massive lab filled with alchemy supplies, soul gems filled to the brim with all the ingredients for enchanting, and in the very center, a large stagnant pool of what appeared to be water.

It was this pool that he approached, and when he reached it, he knelt down at it, and he whispered something beneath his breath.