Night-walkers
An Elder Scrolls: Skyrim Fanfiction
Disclaimer: the author claims no ownership for Skyrim, The Elder Scrolls, and pretty much anything you might recognize
Chapter Five: Prophet: the prophecy
As they closed to the dragon's bridge, they could understand why someone would put the name on a village. There was a bridge, made of dragon's bones, that connected the village (and solitude, if one had to be precise) to the rest of the Skyrim.
Unlike the bridge, though, the town in front of them was by no means impressive. Only a few houses on the two sides of a road connecting it to Solitude, and a large building with the imperial Dragon banner on it.
"well, I for one can't see a priest" said Serana, Eradil Frowned, "maybe someone around has seen him." He looked around, target found, "maybe a guard"
"apologies, sir. Have you seen a moth priest around here?"
The guard halted mid-patrol. "so he was a moth priest?" he asked himself, "man in grey robes, an old imperial. With five or more legionnaires as his bodyguards? That the man you lookin' for?"
Eradil hadn't seen a priest before, but he could presume, and also the guard wasn't looking for an answer. "he was travelling south. hired one of the Legion Carriages a few hours ago. If you go after him, you might catch him in the way."
As he was talking, the door to the imperial keep broke, a man in red and black armor bolted out of it. a guard from the keep, wearing an armor almost like Heavy Legion armor yelled "stop! THIEF!"
His warning caught the attention of every guard in the town, including the guard near them. He murmured "thief! Gotta stop him!" before joining the party of guards chasing the man towards solitude.
"wonder what that was all about" said Serana, but Eradil scoffed, "nothing that concerns us, I bet. Let us hurry. The moth priest isn't going to wait for us"
He was, of course, wrong. Backtracking the path, and moving across the bridge again, they saw no priest. But a few miles past the bridge, they found a broken carriage. a few dead men in the armor of Legionnaires were scattered near the carriage. One or two had the armor of a vampire.
"dammit! We weren't fast enough!" said Eradil, "all this search, and we still come second to a filthy-" Serana interrupted, "do you know a vampire named Malcus?" "-little- WHAT? No, sounds like an orc. I think I would know if I had seen an orc vampire"
Serana showed him a note, "found it on one of the vampires."
He read it.
I Have New orders for you. Prepare an ambush just south of the Dragon's Bridge. Take the quarry to the Forebears holdout for safekeeping, until I can break his will
Malcus
He said "where the hell is forebear's holdout? We have no idea where they've taken the priest. Even if the priest is their quarry. We can't possibly manage to find him!"
Serana said "well, a mortal can't. but even they have methods on finding prey. As a vampire, we have quite a method for tracking others" he asked "what's that?"
"your new lesson. We call it 'blood tracking'. Short version: we find people by smelling their blood"
They looked around, there was a lot of blood here, "how do we know the moth priest even fought?" "please. Look around. See that scratch?" she pointed at a scratch over the carriage, "no double-edged weapon can create that. That's the mark of a Tsaesci sword. From Akavir. Do you think any of the vampires here look like they could find an akaviri blade?"
She was right. and he began smelling the puddles of blood. After ten failures, he finally tracked the moth priest.
The forebear's holdout turned out to be an underground fort. This one wasn't filled with vampires, a fact that put Eradil on his guard.
Then, he heard the bark. A hound had noticed him over the bridge, the beast attacked Eradil, but a well-placed bolt of lightning put it down. fortunately, the Dawnguard and the vampires were very incompetent, for the booming sound of Shock magic didn't alert anyone is the fort,
Passing over the bridge, and into a sort of courtyard, just as he was entering, Serana halted, raised a hand and pointed at two in Dawnguard armor on the said "wow, those vampires put up one helluva fight"
His comrade wasn't as amazed, "I just hope we aren't too late. I'm not sure what these beasts did to the poor priest, but he doesn't look right"
"you think they turned him? "don't know. Maybe. We can't tell, until we get him outta there" "but how do we do that?" the other said "I'm working on it. give me some silence, I need to think"
The Dawnguard turned around, just to notice the two in vampire armor. "VAMPIRE!" he bellowed, making three more vampires notice them.
Serana sighed, "I take it, this is the civilized bunch you'd joined?" Eradil sighed, "I'm not proud of some of my past actions. But yeah, pretty much"
Before attacking the mortals, he was fed his own bitter medicine. A bolt hit him in the shoulder, throwing him down, and making him cry in pain. This hurts! He thought, before summoning the aura of Vampiric Drain. If only he could access his night powers while in mortal form.
Casting it upon the first Dawnguard as he pulled out the bolt, the orc's life force began healing him. The decayed form of his enemy fell like a ragdoll. The other met the same fate, and the third, a nord not older that seventeen, began showing signs of fear. He was lucky, for his superiors, the two who were trying to get the priest out of something, decided to show up, and with bolts of crossbows, they distracted the vampires long enough for the boy to do something.
The boy, alas, proved foolish, for he drew a measly dagger and attacked, swinging it with all his might at Eradil's unarmed arm. Apparently, the Dawnguard wasn't that good at educating the whelps on the enemy they were facing, the piece of metal shattered at collision with the vampire's skin.
The boy gasped in shock, and then stuttered in pain, as Vampire claws tore his throat. Eradil pulled the boy to the air, before throwing him towards the other two Dawnguard soldiers.
He hit one of them, making him fall down and break his back. The other vampire yelled "VANIK! No!" before drawing a Warhammer and climbing down the stairs.
The Redguard proved quite brave, and even more of a fool. By the time he was down, seven spears of Ice had pierced his body, and no matter how well-trained, a human needs all his inner organs intact.
Walking past the dead Dawnguard and the dead vampires who'd been slain by them, they reached the highest floor. On the highest level, the man the guard had described was trapped inside a blue barrier.
"he's trapped. Any ideas on removing the barrier?" Serana asked, Eradil looked around, "huh. Something has caused the barrier. Can you sense anyone?" "no heart beating, no magicka visible. Aside from the priest here, there's no one but us." She replied, "maybe a mechanism or something?"
A waystone Focus was all that was needed for the barrier to fade. Unfortunately, that also removed the priest's magically-enforced coma.
"I must serve my master's will" he said, then continued "but my master's dead. I will make his enemies Pay!"
And attacked.
It didn't take long for Eradil to learn how hard it could be to fight an enemy with the intent of not killing them.
The priest had no such intents, and unleashed his unlimited wrath upon them. Unfortunately, he did so in the form of fire.
Fire hurts. It hurts a vampire a thousand times worse than sunlight ever can. The moth priest had a fire cloak on, and was unleashing two walls of fire, one upon each enemy.
He proved a worthy foe. For one, he didn't fall by just one hit. And proved a mightier enemy than the Dawnguard, even with their chainmail armor.
Eradil swiped his sword, but the monk blocked it with his own sword, a long sword with only one edge, a fabled akaviri sword. The strength behind the parry was more than Eradil's, and he was forced to duck before the sword could cut him. It wasn't made of steel, and Eradil couldn't risk it hitting him if he didn't know the material it was made from.
blocking the wall of fire with an impressive ward, he swiped his off hand at the man, shocking him mildly with a basic sparks spell.
"I can't hold it any longer" he said, "he's got more magicka!" as his magicka ran out. He jumped to the left side, and threw an ice spike between the man's feet. It didn't hit him, as was Eradil's intention, but the explosion of the spike threw the Priest off his guard.
Serana said "there it is, a clear shot! Take cover!" she said, and threw a jet of green light at the priest.
As soon as it hit him, the old imperial hit the ground, not capable of moving. Paralyze.
Serana said "we don't have much time! calm him!"
This was something he knew. Vampiric Seduction. A power all thirsty vampires had. To calm one person for a day, so that the vampire could feed, if they weren't near a sleeping target.
Another effect of the spell, though, was that it was the first level for enthralling someone. As soon as the vampire fed on a calmed foe, the foe would become his thrall. And would pretty much do whatever his master told him.
Right before the paralyzing effect wore off, Eradil used the Seduction power, calming the priest.
"Feed on him. Make him your thrall, or others will, as soon as we're in the castle"
This time, Eradil was careful not to feed for more than five heartbeats. When the priest rose again, he looked really calm.
"By the divines! It's as if my eyes have been opened! I am blinded by the light of your majesty. I…I must obey you. What would you have of me, master?" asked the monk.
"for one, tell me who you are. I don't want to call you 'moth priest' all the time" asked the elf. The monk answered, "I am Dexion Evicus, master. A Moth priest. I travelled to Skyrim because of the-" "rumors of Elder scrolls. We know. Those are just that. Rumors"
Dexion seemed disappointed, "is my master telling me there is no scroll?"
Eradil laughed, "oh no. there is an elder scroll waiting you at your new home. And you are going to read it. you, my mortal friend, are the first Priest in the entire era to get his hands on an elder scroll"
Then, he said "now, we travel to the Volkihar keep."
Three days later, Eradil was the last volkihar to arrive at the Castle. But unlike the others, he was successful. As soon as they were near the castle, Serana said "don't mention me, okay? If Father want to gift us, let him just gift you whatever rewards he has in mind. I don't need the attention of the court on me"
When inside, the courtiers were feasting, as they usually did at that time of the night. Harkon rose as he saw him, "so, our last Vampire returns. What news do you have for us? Another vampire failed?"
Eradil said "on the contrary, My lord. I have enthralled a Moth priest"
The vampire raised one of his eyebrows, "well. You are indeed successful. You are rewarded, you have a seat at my high table now, on the far end of the main table"
he said "Menasur, give our priest his scroll." when the imperial had his scroll, he turned to Eradil again, "your thrall awaits, command him to read the scroll. Let us hear the words of the prophecy together!"
Dexion was quite pleased to have a scroll in his hands, he opened the scroll, and after a few moments of silence, he said "I see a vision before me. An image of a great bow. I know this weapon! It is Auriel's Bow!"
Another pause, "Now a voice whispers, saying 'among the night's children, a dreadlord shall rise! In an age of Strife, when Dragons return to the realm of men, darkness will mingle with light, and night and day will be as one!'"
He paused again, "the voice faders, words begin to shimmer and distort…but wait! There is more here! The secret of the bow's power is written elsewhere. I think there is more to this prophecy, recorded in other scrolls!"
He paused for about a minute, just as they were going to give up, he said "yes, I see them now. One contains ancient secrets of the dragons, the other speaks of the potency of ancient blood."
He paused, and said "my vision darkens, I see no more"
With a disappointed voice, he closed the scroll, and looked at the court, "to know the complete prophecy, we must have the other two scrolls"
He put the scroll down, and bowed. Harkon wasn't looking that pleased. "dismiss your thrall, Eradil."
Two hours later, when most vampires had gone to sleep, the main body of Harkon's Court was having a council session.
Garan, Vingalmo, Orthjolf, Eradil and Harkon himself had retreated to Harkon's Study, and there, Harkon had a truth to admit.
"the truth is, gentlemen, we are in trouble" Harkon said, "as you might've noticed, the prophecy, or the parts we heard, is not as straight as we like."
Vingalmo said "indeed, especially the part 'night and day will be as one'. That can be dangerous"
Three nodded, Orthjolf asked "Why? I don't understand"
Vingalmo said "please put on your idiot act for the court, Orthjolf. You are smarter than that. The sentence can mean eternal night" he paused, "or eternal day"
Eradil said "well, then it's up to us to make sure it's eternal night, isn't it?"
Harkon said "indeed. Garan, start tracking the old artefacts. We might need all firepower we can have. If there is going to be an all-out war, the Mortals may not be all we have to face."
End of Prophet arc.
Next up, amulets of ancient blood.
A.N:
Notes:
You might've noticed this (if you actually read the story at all). There are not any fight scenes here. I have a reason for that. You see, Vampires are mostly spellswords, proficient on Ice Magic and Drain spells. I'm pretty sure if a spikeof ice had run through you, you wouldn't really survive it. not only it can tear off flesh and vital organs, but also coldis bad for body. An icy spear in the head cannot be survived. Not by a vampire, not by an elf, not by a Frost giant. The only creature in the entire Skyrim that I could see surviving that would be a dragon (and we'll face one of those soon enough.
In my opinion, many of the things we see in the game are basically good acting skills. One of them is Vingalmo/Orthjolf feud in Volkihar castle. The two have probably been co-advisors to an ancient vampire for almost four eras. I'm pretty sure no feud between two people can exist for that long (now, if they were families, it could be explained). Another is Heimskr's 'preaching'. He's probably a Thalmor agent, trying to eradicate Talos worship in a trickier way. I'm pretty sure I would stop worshipping Talos (were I in Skyrim) if I had to hear Heimskr yell about him all the time.
The first cameo of Dark brotherhood. Another thing I'll have to work on later.
That's all for now,
Davoid, signing off