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ACRUS

Under Saarthal

College Excavation Site

"J'Zargo," the Dunmer student said to the Khajiit, pointing at the other student's lower half. "What on Nirn is that?"

The Khajiit chuckled. "J'Zargo is trying some new things. Tight things. These pants will make J'Zargo stand out. Going to get myself a woman." And with another chuckle, he nudged his chin at the Nord apprentice. "This one cannot help but stare."

"Excuse me, brother," the Nord said. "But you've got a real nice lump down there."

"Say what?" Acrus interrupted, disgusted.

"I said, a real nice lump down there."

"Hey!" Acrus snapped. What kind of perverts were these? Were these his fellow apprentices? "Get a damn room!"

"For three?" the Dunmer woman asked with a lopsided sneer. "Would you like to taste for yourself?"

"I – what – no!" Acrus shouted. What in blazes was going on here? It wasn't that the Dunmer apprentice was good-looking or anything, but he still didn't want to be made out to be a deviant in front of a woman.

"Now, now," the Nord apprentice said with a laugh. "Let's not take the piss out of new guy too much."

Oh, so that was what it was. Some newbie hazing. Acrus knew he had to cut that shit short as soon as it started. Nip it in the bud. "Yeah, I suggest you leave that be in the future, unless you want to be wearing your ass as a hat."

The Nord's laugh was instantly gone. Good, he'd made himself clear. "Oh, you're one of those guys."

"Don't worry, your majesty," the Khajiit added. "J'Zargo and his fellow students will look elsewhere for humour."

"You do that," Acrus grunted. There. They knew there was no messing with him. Taking him for some sod that could be made fun of whenever they liked, unacceptable. You had to react quickly and decisively to that kind of behaviour, or they mocked you for the rest of your carreer.

Looking away, he resumed hugging himself and stomping his feet against the cold. Acrus and the three apprentices were standing at the edge of a hole in the earth, easily twenty metres across, in the evening twilight, freezing their toes off, the snow ankle-deep and more falling every second. Tolfdir, the man who'd blasted the unexpected fireball at Acrus, had told them to wait for him there.

His fellow students. One Nord, who looked like just about every Nord in Tamriel, rugged and square-chinned, pale-skinned and dim of intellect. A Khajiit who looked like every Khajiit in Tamriel except with longer whiskers, furry and feline, oozing untrustworthiness and deceit, and a Dunmer woman who looked like every Dunmer in Tamriel, a narrow, ashen face with perpetually angled eyebrows and a face that radiated a mixture of boredom and arrogance. He'd shared the bed with a Dunmer woman once. The woman had lain there like a dead horse. Never again.

"There's Tolfdir," the Dunmer woman remarked. "He's late."

The old man shuffled towards them through the snow, his beard swaying in the lazy breeze. "A wizard is never late," he said. "Now then, are we all accounted for?"

"Yes," Acrus said. "All four of us." What a dumb question that had been.

Tolfdir shot him an irritated look, then said, "When we head into the ruins, stay close to me. This place is not free from danger, and apprentices have the unfortunate habit of being eaten by monsters or falling down chasms in the dark."

As if a little danger scared Acrus. The wild dog that had attacked his village could testify to that. The beast had run back to its cave whining, with half its fur singed off. Acrus was sure he'd be able to manage not falling down chasms or not soiling his britches from the occasional rat of unusual size.

A ramp led into the dig site, a rickety wooden construction mounted on stilts and hammered into the edge of the excavation, making two straight turns until it reached the bottom. It wobbled as the group of five went down, but Tolfdir didn't seem alarmed, and so, neither was Acrus. The man had probably descended that ramp many times, so he probably knew what it could take.

"J'Zargo thinks Nords and Imperials are too heavy for rickety old ramps."

Their instructor laughed wheezily. "It'll be fine, don't worry. Our footing might not be as light as yours, but if this ramp can take a cart full of stones, it can carry a few lightweight students as well."

Acrus wondered if he meant anything by the word 'lightweight'.

"Now then," Tolfdir said. "We're heading into the excavation site of Saarthal, an old Nordic ruin. Before we go, is there anything I should know?"

"Such as?" the Dunmer woman asked.

"Oh, claustrophobia, achluophobia, agrizoophobia, bathophobia, things like that."

Acrus wasn't afraid of small spaces, the dark, wild animals, or depths, and he hoped none of his fellow students were either. He didn't feel like getting stuck with a whimpering, paralytic sack of flesh in the throes of some phobia or other. Thankfully, all the students replied in the negative, and they reached the bottom of the dig without problems.

Tolfdir took hold of the knob of the hastily-put-together door that sealed off what looked like a cave. "Now then, we're entering the ruins of Saarthal now. I must again ask that you stay close to me. Even you, J'Zargo. I know you're Khajiit, but I don't want to take the risk of having to look for your body at the bottom of a ravine."

"J'Zargo will not stray far, promised," the Khajiit said, in his peculiar accent. A promise from a Khajiit. Almost as valuable as a cow meat groin protector when fighting a daedroth.

"Very well, let's go inside."

Tolfdir opened the door, leading them into the darkness. They could see nothing apart from what was right in front of them and catching the light of the doorway leading outside. The gentle dripping of moisture from the cave walls was the only sound apart from the shuffling of the four people now inside the cave. "Brelyna", Tolfdir said, almost invisible even at a distance of a mere two metres, "I hope you've done your homework?"

"I have, Master Alterer Tolfdir," the Dunmer woman said proudly. Acrus felt the pinpricks on his skin from the magicka weave being manipulated, but where the feeling was subtle and consistent when master mages did it, the sensation on his skin was jarring and erratic when this apprentice tried. The next moment, a tiny little light rose from the Dunmer's hands, flitting up a few centimetres before extinguishing in a feeble flicker. Acrus resisted the urge to sneer, even though no one could see him in the darkness. If this was all these students were capable of, he'd have a promising career here. Not that that wasn't already the case.

"I... Forgive me, Master Alterer," the woman called Brelyna stammered. "I practiced this so... uh, so many times, but..."

"It's alright," their instructor said gently, his voice disembodied in the darkness. "As long as you're with me, you can make so many mistakes it makes the rocks crack. What matters is that you've mastered your craft when you go out there, into that great big world. Now. Take a breath and try again."

"Yes, Master Alterer." Acrus could actually hear the woman taking a deep breath to steady herself.

"Now, gently but firmly weave the threads of magicka. Take your time. Speed comes with experience."

There was a moment of silence and again Acrus felt the weave being manipulated, this time more slowly and with less jerky movements. It lasted for a second or three, and then an unsteadily-flickering globe of light emerged from the Dunmer's hand, rising up with determination despite its small size and inconsistent strength. Still, it was enough to illuminate the area a few metres around them, and Acrus supposed it would do. The Illusion school had never been his area of expertise, but he figured it was decent enough for an apprentice to be able to keep a globe of light suspended in the air, even one as puny as this.

"Yes, well done," Tolfdir praised. "Needs some more practice, but it's a promising start."

Pft. How was this a promising start? If Acrus had practiced the Light spell, he was certain he could do better with only a few hours of work. Of course, Illusion wasn't his field, but still. Light was the cantrip of all cantrips.

"Shall we move on, Master Alterer?" the Nord asked. First smart thing he'd said all day.

"Yes, let's see what these ruins hold in store for us." As if he didn't already know. This was an exercise, he'd hardly send them into unknown territory.

They proceeded through the dark tunnels, only slightly illuminated by Brelyna's poor excuse for a Light spell. The walls were slick and wet, and more than once, Acrus had to wipe his hands on his robe, cursing under his breath. The robe was good for washing anyway, after the slog through the snow and slush.

"Now then," Tolfdir said with a contented sigh. "Here we are."

They stood in an open room where three smaller caves crossed paths. "Brelyna, since you possess the Light spell, I'll need you to go into the east cave. The farthest we've gone is to a fork where the ceiling lowers. You'll have to crawl for a bit. I need you to take this little trinket and look for anything magickal. It's set to start vibrating when it detects magickal resonance."

"Yes, Master Alterer," the woman acknowledged. In the faint light of her feeble little globe, Acrus could see the apprehension. Looked like the ashface wasn't so keen on crawling through narrow shafts.

"J'Zargo, Onmund," Tolfdir said, "You're coming with me. There's a barrier I'd like you both to try your Destruction skills on."

Both apprentices nodded.

"As for you," Tolfdir told Acrus, "you'll assist Arniel Gane, one of our master Conjurers, in locating magickal items. He's in the west hallway somewhere." He chuckled. "Hope you're not afraid of the dark."

"Wait, wait," Acrus protested. "I have to find my way in the dark?"

"What did you expect, apprentice?" the Alteration master asked. Acrus could hear him smirk. "A torch? A mage has no need for something as dangerous as fire when he can just make light by using the weave. Now then, off you go."

"You can't be serious," Acrus blurted out. Exploring a cave in the dark was dangerous. You could slip and fall, breaking a bone or five, or bang your head on the ceiling, or any other kind of potentially deadly accident could happen.

"Oh you big crybaby," Tolfdir laughed, digging in his robes and fishing out a short rod with a gem on the end. He frowned at it, almost unnoticeably, and the big gem lit up with a pale blue light. "There you go, this should be sufficient."

Setting his jaw, Acrus muttered a thank you. He took the rod and set off, indignant at being so talked down to. Who did this old coot think he was? Just because he'd had years and years and years to study magick didn't mean he had licence to just humiliate him.

He navigated through the dark caves, not looking back and just grunting to himself in discontentment. Still, he resolved not to get angry, but to show everyone, both the disrespectful fellow students and the condescending teachers, that their dismissal of him was ill-placed. And he'd do it, not by shouting at them, but by studying diligently and proving them wrong. Revenge is a dish served cold, and making everyone look at their own boots in embarrassment was the best revenge he could have.

So let them kick him around. He who laughs last, laughs hardest.

Further down the corridor, he saw a faint red light illuminating the area around ten metres further. "Hello?" he carefully called out.

"Ah yes, hello," the man who'd conjured the light called back. He sat with his back to Acrus, kneeling over something. "You must be the new apprentice. Arcus, was it?"

"Acrus. Yes, that's me."

"Come closer, I'll explain what needs to be done."

Acrus did as he was told, almost slipping on the wet cave floor when it suddenly sloped unexpectedly. "Damn this rathole," he growled. As he did so, his foot again slipped out from under him as he put his weight on loose stones that rolled out from beneath his soles. Seemed this particular cave had just been opened.

"Quite. Now then," the man said, standing upright. He held up a hand, showing a small circle of metal, glinting in the red light of his conjuration. "We've just opened this path," he explained, "and this shows we're on the right track." Acrus looked closer and saw, in the faint red light, that the man was holding a ring.

"I take it that's enchanted?" Acrus said. Of course it was. The College wouldn't care about some stupid band of copper.

"So it is." Arniel Gane was an old Breton, bald as a marble save for the wreath of gray hair at the back of his skull. "And where there's one, there's usually more. You can assist me in the search."

A scavenger hunt? Really? That was what they needed the apprentices for? Worst of all, he'd be baby-sit by this old geezer while the two male students could let themselves go against some kind of barrier, and that dark elf could search on her own. Great.

"What's wrong, apprentice? Do you find this task beneath you?" The old wrinkled Breton was frowning at him.

"No, no, of course not," Acrus said quickly, hiding his disgruntlement with ease. "I was... just thinking." He had to come up with a good excuse for his frown real quick, and did so, "about how difficult it'll be to find these items with what little light we have."

"Ah," the Conjurer said, all suspicion gone from his face. "Well, I suppose we'll just have to keep our eyes open, no?"

"You wouldn't happen to have any amulets that detect magickal resonance, would you?" Acrus asked hopefully.

"No, I fear Tolfdir has taken them all." He stood thinking for a moment, his hands in his sides. For a few seconds only the drip of water from the stalactites could be heard. Then, far off, there was a distant whooshing sound, almost inaudible. Seemed like J'Zargo and Onmund were trying their best at the barrier. Why the old coot hadn't asked Acrus with him was a mystery. Destruction was his specialty.

The red light floating around the Conjurer disappeared, and promptly appeared again as the old man renewed the spell. It took him even less effort than Tolfdir, and the light itself seemed to be more than just an illusion. Acrus could swear the glowing orb moved with determination rather than in a set pattern, or not moving at all, as light illusions often did.

"I see you're taking an interest in my magick?"

"Uh, yes," Acrus said. "It doesn't move like a regular Light spell."

"Of course not," the man said proudly. "That's because it's not a spell from the school of Illusion. This is, in fact, a Conjuration. A creature summoned to provide assistance."

"Huh. That makes sense."

"It's from the plane of Oblivion, but I'm not sure what it is exactly. It's friendly enough at any rate."

Acrus looked closely at the lazily cavorting globe of light and saw what looked to be a kind of glowing moth, only this one didn't flap its wings. "Amazing."

The Conjurer grinned. "Glad you think so. Now then, to work."

"Right. I suppose we're looking and feeling around in the dark?"

"Aye," the Conjurer answered. "We should get to it. You start looking on the far side of the chamber. Notify me when you've found anything abnormal, no matter how slight."

"Understood." Hmph. When people wanted to be notified of every little thing, it meant they didn't have much faith in the other's decision making capabilities. Another insult. Holding the staff low to the ground, Acrus began searching, meticulously covering every inch both with his eyes and with his hands. It would not do to miss an item.

He kept feeling and looking around, in the dim white light of the staff, running his hands over the light beige rock.

Wait, he'd touched something. "Master Conjurer?"

"Yes?"

"I think I've got something." He held the staff closer to the spot and saw a shining, multifaceted stone sticking out. "Over here." Yep, that was definitely something.

The Conjurer came closer and sat on his knees next to him, inspecting the shiny bit. After a few seconds, he chuckled. "Sorry, son. That's a piece of good old geode."

"Geode?"

"Yes. You don't know how to recognize different stones?"

Acrus felt his face get warm. "Well..."

The Conjurer chuckled and rose. "There's a good bock on minerals in Urag gro-Shub's library. If you have some free time after lectures, it makes for some fascinating reading."

"I'll keep that in mind, Master Conjurer," he said meekly, inwardly irritated at the man's smugness.

"Still, good that you notified me."

Condescending jackass.

Redoubling his efforts, he resumed searching. As he did, his concentration gradually waned until he found himself daydreaming of home, and the one thing that had kept him there: Anorra, his golden-haired miracle. He'd been happy then. Not the brief elation one felt when achieving something, not the contentment one had when lazing in the sun on a warm afternoon, no, true happiness, the constant and heart-filling kind. He almost couldn't remember what it was like, not wanting other women, not seeing them as fleeting conquests to either suavely woo into bed, or to get them there with a combination of a lot of wine and a little physical coercion. He'd been happy then. And his happiness had only grown when she'd accepted his marriage proposal.

A proposal for which he now cursed himself, every day. Because if there had been no proposal, there wouldn't have been a pre-nuptial ladies' drinking night, and Anorra wouldn't have drunk herself into complete besottedness, and Anorra wouldn't have drunkenly walked out into the afternoon streets of Cyrodiil, right in front of a rambling cart. She'd been dragged along by the wheels a few metres before the cart had stopped, and her drinking night had ended before the night had even fallen, her body reduced to a twisted and wrenched sack of broken bones and ruptured organs, a trail of blood and puke and shit behind her on the cobblestones.

Every time he treated a girl less well than he should, he simply told himself that if what happened to Anorra was meant to happen, then so was what he did to them. Gods weren't the only ones who could play that game.

He became aware of a tickling sensation on his cheek and wiped the tear away. As he replaced his hand, a metal object pricked into it, driving the leaden thoughts from his head. Before calling out, he brought the staff closer, making sure it wasn't just another geode. He had no intention of being seen as a moron twice in one hour.

The thing that stuck out was a blue and gold object, partially sunken into the stone. This was worth calling to the Conjurer for.

"Master Conjurer! Not a geode this time."

The man shuffled over to him, and his red moth-like light illuminated the object even better. "Oh dear me," he said quietly. "Not a geode indeed." He took a closer look.

"It looks like... an amulet?" Acrus dared to venture.

"Yes. Yes indeed. Stay here, I'll go get Tolfdir. Don't touch that thing, you never know what kind of accidents can happen."

"Of course, I'll sit tight," Acrus said. He had, of course, no intention of doing so. As the Conjurer shuffled off to find his fellow old coot, Acrus extended his hand toward the item again. Its edges looked pretty sharp, but not sharp enough to cause injuries, and when he held his fingertips closer, the barely perceptible feeling of magickal energy brushed his skin, like the wispy threads of a spider's web carried on the wind.

He brought his fingertips even closer, and now he clearly felt the resonance, the threads of energy undulating out of it. He concentrated on the patterns made by the wildly emanating threads and with pure focus and mental willpower, made them align, twist around each other, and become a bundled cord of pure energy, the cord tightening and strengthening until –

A flash of white blasted through Acrus, knocking him flat on his behind. Everything, including thought, became a blur as he flailed around for a handhold, drunkenly snatching at the air. His hearing was gone, and his sight only registered the blurry and doubled light of the staff he'd dropped.

"Hey! Are you alright?"

Acrus tried to speak, but his mouth only produced unintelligible, slack-jawed babble.

"Some sort of backlash. Hey! Can you hear me?"

The voices came from far away, and when Acrus slowly and drunkenly turned his head, he saw the red moth-like light fly through a crack in the wall, circle around his head a few times, then fly back.

Clarity slowly came back to him, and the ringing in his ears and spinning of his vision lessened. What in Oblivion had happened?

"Can you hear me, boy?"

Tolfdir's voice. A mixture of concerned and annoyed. Heh, probably because he'd succeeded in manipulating that amulet and stolen the old man's moment of grandstanding. "I c... an hear you," Acrus slurred.

"I thought I told you to leave it alone?" the Conjurer's voice came from the same direction.

"We would... still be living in a world without... magick if we all listened to the people... telling us to be careful," Acrus said, paraphrasing his old mentor. It only got him a disapproving grunt in return.

"Can you stand?" Tolfdir asked.

Acrus tried, fell back down on his ass, and tried again, with more success this time. The disorientation was mostly gone now, and he felt himself more able to think and act straight. "What's... did the walls cave in?"

"So they did," Tolfdir said. Acrus only now realized the old coot couple were speaking through a small crack between the fallen boulders. Oh no, was he trapped in here? It would take hours, if not days, to dig him out.

"Wait, I'm not... trapped, am I?"

"From the looks of it, you are."

Acrus felt warmth rush to his head and his heartbeat quickened. Oh no, no, no. Don't let him be trapped.

"Calm down, boy," Tolfdir admonished him. "You've freed the amulet from the stone. If it can move walls once, it can do it again. Go on, put it on."

Still rattled from the blast, Acrus gingerly let the amulet's chain go over his head and around his neck.

"Good, now reach out to it."

Acrus did so, trying to identify the currents of magicka emanating from the amulet, and direct them into a powerful and focused force. The threads whipped and writhed and he had the greatest difficulty to keep them under control, but he didn't give up, and eventually, the energies bent to his will, again coiling around each other to form a focused and directed energy.

Without thinking, operating purely on feeling, Acrus directed the amulet's magick towards a nearby wall.

With a blinding flash of light, the wall blew apart, debris flying away from the blast. One sharp fragment of rock went only a hair length past his head.

"Yes, well done!" Tolfdir cheered. "I believe that explosion just uncovered a previously inaccessible section of the ruins."

The hole made by the amulet was big enough to both open the way back to the others, and to reveal a previously unexplored section of the ruins.

Tolfdir laboriously squeezed in between the fallen rubble. "Come, let's go further in. This is fascinating."

The students followed, but Arniel Gane remained behind. "Master Alterer, I'll return to the College, send word of what's going on. It might be dangerous and the College needs to know where we are. I'll return as quickly as possible."

"Very well Arniel. Be careful."

"I believe that advice is best extended towards you rather than me," the bald man said with a grin. With that, he turned and walked back to the entrance, his red moth-light dancing around his head.

Tolfdir seemed inclined to let Acrus lead, and Acrus knew better than to let such a chance go to waste. He stepped towards the newly-created opening, and as his foot first set down on the floor of a newly-revealed cave, an apparition appeared, just forming out of thin air!

"You have set in motion a chain of events that cannot be stopped," the apparition intoned. It looked like an Altmer wizard of some sort, but Acrus couldn't make it out, nailed to the ground as he was. The apparition was looking straight at him. "Judgment will be passed based on your actions to come and how you fare against the dangers ahead. We pass this warning onto you because the Psijic order believes in you, and because you alone have the potential to prevent disaster." With that, the ghost winked out of existence.

"Son, are you alright?" Tolfdir's hoarse voice brought him back to reality.

"Did you... did you see that?" Acrus breathed. "The... the ghost, or manifestation or... whatever it was?"

"No," Tolfdir said. "I haven't seen anything." He looked back at the students, who all shook their heads.

"It... spoke to me. Told me about some kind of danger ahead, and the Psijic order believing in me..."

"That's... odd," Tolfdir said. "There's no known connections between the Psijic order and these ruins. No one has even seen them in ages."

The old coot didn't believe him! "Well it was there and it spoke to me!" Acrus snapped.

"Settle down, son," Tolfdir quickly backed down. "I didn't say I doubted you. Just that it was odd. Perhaps we should look for answers deeper in the ruins?"

"Maybe."

The corridor went on, twisting and winding its way underground. This looked like a natural cave, used as part of the complex because it had already been there when the place was hewn out of the stone.

"Look, Master Alterer," the Dunmer woman said, pointing forward. "Over there."

Acrus could make it out too, it was a throne of some sort, and someone was sitting on it. Surely whoever was still here would be long dead?

They carefully came closer, and as they did, Acrus saw he was right. The body sitting on the throne was a desiccated, lifeless corpse, decayed to the point of being nothing more than wires of mummified flesh stretched over a skeleton.

"Intriguing," Brelyna remarked, "yet highly disturbing."

"Well," Tolfdir remarked. "It seems we've found Jyrik Gauldurson."

"Jyrik who?" the Khajiit asked.

"Gauldurson," the Nord apprentice clarified. "You're a student in the College and you've never heard the name Gauldurson?"

"I... eh... should I have?" the Khajiit asked. Apparently he should have, yes.

"Jyrik Gauldurson was one of the three sons of Lord Gauldur, the erstwhile Archmage of the College of Winterhold," Onmund explained, then stopped himself. "Ah, but... of course Master Alterer Tolfdir can tell the story better than I can?" Slimy toad.

"No, no," the old man said. "Go ahead, you're doing fine."

"Oh, thank you, Master Alterer." The Nord cleared his throat and went on. "Jyrik Gauldurson was the first to discover his father's power, a mysterious amulet, and he and his two brothers fought each other, coveting – "

"Master Alterer!" the Dunmer exclaimed, "Look! By the Nine!"

All heads whipped in the direction Brelyna had pointed and all of them felt their breaths stall in their throats. The mummified husk of a man, that had once been Jyrik Gauldurson, slowly gripped the arms of the throne and pulled itself to its feet.

"No time for history, my boy," Tolfdir commanded, bringing his staff up. "I doubt this thing is friendly."

"But, but..." Acrus stammered. "Surely he's dead? How does he even move?"

"It's a draugr," Onmund breathed.

"A what?"

"A draugr," Tolfdir repeated. "Restless dead of Nord myth. It would seem they're more than a myth after all, now get ready to take it down!"

"Take it down? How did you kill someone who was already dead?" The thing stood fully erect now, and its head turned towards them.

"You set it on fire until there's nothing left but ash," Tolfdir shouted, and with that, raised his staff. A searing bolt of fire shot out, catching the walking corpse right in the chest... but to no effect.

"This thing is invulnerable," Acrus heard the Khajiit exclaim behind him. "We should run!"

"Stand ground!" Tolfdir ordered. "We're mages of the College. This foe is a test and you are about to pass or fail!"

"Look out!" Brelyna shouted, throwing herself against Acrus and Onmund, her meagre weight striking with enough force to knock them out of the way of the murderously sharp ice shard the draugr had just sent towards them. Tolfdir, too, jerked his head out of the way in time, and the shard cracked apart on the cave wall. "Hit it!" the old man shouted. "Direct your magicka toward it!"

Easier said than done. Acrus, from his position on the floor, attempted to direct the energies around him into a firebolt spell, but as he concentrated on the weave, a blast of icy cold air struck him and he had to grit his teeth to bite the cold and pain, his muscles contracting and cramping in pain. The next moment, he heard the thing's voice, a dry, rattling croak. It shouted something, and the next moment, the Khajiit was lifted off his feet and propelled several metres back, smacking into the stone wall behind him.

Brelyna and Onmund did get their spells off, Onmund zapping the thing in the chest with a bolt of electricity and Brelyna erecting a shoddy and flimsy ward, that immediately fell apart when another shard of ice shattered itself against it.

Acrus again tried to channel the magickal energies, bundling them in his mind's eye to make for an acidic spray, but as he did so, he saw the threads of magicka, blackened and bleeding dark energy, flailing out of the corpse, toward a green orb on a pedestal a few feet behind him.

"The orb!" he shouted. "The orb's powering it!"

Tolfdir wasted no time and telekinetically lifted a large chunk of stone, sending it flying towards the green orb. The stone struck true, shattering the green crystal, and Acrus saw the blackened tendrils of magicka being severed, and wrapping themselves around the draugr like twisting, spasming snakes.

"Hit it with everything you've got!" Tolfdir shouted.

Acrus again bundled the threads of magicka around him, his and his fellows' vibrant and alive unlike the draugr's black, oozing tentacles, and with his willpower, made them turn acidic and sent them lashing out at the enemy. A green spray of acid hit the draugr in the face and it howled, staggering backward. It recovered and shouted again, "FUS... RO DAH!" and now Acrus felt himself being buffeted by a tremendous force, lifted off his feet and thrown several metres further. He felt his ribs crack as his body smacked hard into the cave wall, and pain exploded in his chest. Numbed by the blow, he could only look on as Onmund blew a large chunk out of the creature's chest with another flash of electricity, and finally Tolfdir set it ablaze with a jet of roaring fire, turning the thing into a roaring, flailing pillar of flame that staggered a few steps, then fell over on the cave floor, burning as it went.

They all fell silent for a moment, concentrated on the pile of carbonized, smouldering draugr, to be sure it wouldn't rise again.

"I think that's the last we'll see of Jyrik Gauldurson," the young Nord remarked.

"Let us hope so," Tolfdir agreed. "Is anyone injured?"

"J'Zargo got a little shaken and rattled, but no bones broken," the Khajiit groaned, rising from the floor.

"You seem like you weren't so lucky," the Dunmer said, coming to stand over Acrus with a grin. Acrus looked up at her and didn't find it all that much to grin about. Every breath he took sent excruciating pain through his ribcage.

She kneeled beside him and asked, "trouble breathing?"

Acrus couldn't help but nod.

"Broken ribs, most likely." She cocked her head at him. "I know a few simple Restoration spells. Nothing impressive but it might take the worst of the pain away?"

"By all means," Acrus grunted. It wasn't a time to be proud or refuse help. He was hurting, quite a lot.

The Dunmer nodded and put her hands on his chest. White light dimly faded in and out of existence, and he could feel his pain lessen. The ribs weren't healed, nowhere near it, but the pain was less, and that was a lot already.

"We should get him to Master Restorer Marence as soon as possible," Brelyna said to Tolfdir, who was busily sifting through the ashes of what was once Jyrik Gauldurson. He held up a shiny object, inspecting it, and then said, "Yes, we should. Is he badly injured?"

"Not fatal, I think," Brelyna said back, "but certainly serious."

"Very well, let's go then. I think we can all use a cup of mead."

"Master Alterer?" the Nord asked, pointing at the wall. "What's this?"

The wall was polished to a flat surface, and etched with all kinds of markings, always in groups of two or three. One group seemed to have threads of magickal energy contained in it, but even in his injured state, Acrus could see that whatever the energy was, it wasn't like the magick they commanded, and it was probably useless to them. It required a different conduit than a mage.

Tolfdir had established the same. "This, Onmund, is something we will never understand or be able to use. It's an ancient power, and it waits for someone other than us."

"Huh," was all Onmund had to say.

"Master Alterer," Brelyna insisted. "We should get him to the Master Restorer. My spell won't hold for very long."

"Yes," Tolfdir said. "We should go. I'll return later, but I think we've already found the most important thing." He held up the amulet, then looked at Acrus. "And I think this belongs with you."