The next morning, I ate a soul husk with breakfast- it was dry and crunchy, a bit like bread crust- and we set out. Following Valerica's directions, we came to a square stone building that turned out to have a small maze inside. Picking our way past piles of bones and fighting black skeletons, we eventually found ourselves at another portal. It was similar to the one that transported us higher onto the tower that had housed the final Keeper.
When my vision cleared, I found myself on the roof of the building. To my right, a small set of stairs led up to a platform. A stone chest was situated beneath one of the gigantic purple crystals that floated over other structures on the landscape.
Gulping nervously, I climbed the stairs. The crystal flared; purple flames blazed up around me, making my skin tingle unpleasantly. I flinched, expecting pain, but the wicked purple energies merely danced around me with a faint crackling noise.
Letting my breath out in a whoosh, I did a quick search and found a stone chest directly beneath the crystal. With a grunt of effort that set my weakened muscles screaming, I shoved the heavy lid off. Thankfully, there was only one object inside the chest, and I grabbed it before bolting back down the stairs.
The object felt warm and comforting in my palm, and as soon as the purple flames winked out, I felt warmth and energy suffuse me.
I caught my breath, and the fatigue that had plagued me in this damnable place was washed away as the fragment of my soul returned.
I looked down at the black soul gem in my hand, a relieved smile growing as the missing part of me poured out of the gem. The gem trembled in my hand, then disintegrated into dust as the last of my soul returned to me.
Feeling whole again, we turned back to the portal that brought us to the Soul Cairn and made our way back to our world. Traveling back through the castle and back to the mainland was a long trek. Despite my returned stamina, we both agreed to stop in Solitude for the night once she had fed.
By the time we hiked through the wilderness and up to the city, it was well into the evening. Most of the shops were closed for the night, but the citizens were all out in the streets. The city was decked in streamers, and the sounds of laughter and cheer seemed to come from every street corner. The streets were well lit with lanterns placed anywhere there happened to be room. Tables gathered near clusters of lights, and the smells of baking and grilled food filled the entire city with mouth-watering smells.
A few men were standing outside the tavern, shaking their tankards in a rather merry way. A few were even attempting to drunkenly dance to the beat of a drummer and the lilting tune from a flute player.
"Hail friends!" called a rather tipsy fellow in a voice that was slightly louder than necessary. "You two - hic- missed the Burning Of King Olaf, but you didn't miss the revelry!" He half swayed, half gestured to tables nearby, "Help yourself m'friends. -Hic- If you two go to bed hungry tonight, it's your own fault!"
"Well," I murmured with a smile to Serana, "Far be it for me to miss the foods that come with a city-wide celebration."
The man who had greeted us had spoken truly; all manner of foods spread out to be sampled. We found grilled meat and vegetables on skewers near the inn. Someone had butchered an entire cow and the meats were arrayed on massive platters: cooked, seasoned, and presented according to local recipes. At another table, we found candies and sweets glistening with sugar, competing for space with palm-sized fruit pies. Drinks ranged from bubbly cordials, to mead, to rare, mixed creations that burned stronger than my favorite rum, and impressed me with their alcoholic content.
Serana was a child again, meeting and greeting and chatting with the various local cooks, and I couldn't begrudge her enjoying some normalcy. During our wanderings, Serana pointed out a clothing store called the Radiant Raiment. It was closed now, both because it was past business hours, and because the festival likely drew the shopkeepers out to join the revelries. Perhaps we would have to return sometime a little less hectic and just do some shopping.
We eventually returned to the inn and paused to watch some citizens dancing to a lively, bouncy tune. The song wound its way to its conclusion a few minutes later, to the clapping and hurrahs of the tipsy crowd.
That was when a figure caught my eye; a man in a black hooded mage's robe was slinking closer to the crowd.
The hood was pulled low over his head, hiding his eyes. He was keeping to the shadows. His pace was silent and he seemed to be trying to make himself a smaller target in the shadows. Thieves were better at stealth than this, and they knew how to blend into crowds rather than skulk near them. This man was moving with predatory purpose, aiming for the front door to the Winking Skeever. His efforts to be unnoticed were almost exaggerated, to the point that he was drawing my attention, rather than avoiding it. Even Serana stood straight and tall within her hooded cloak, and didn't skulk about in the shadows.
A few steps nearer, and I was just able to spot how the corners of his mouth looked withered and wrinkled.
Beards of my ancestors… Are they really so brazen? I scowled and flicked my gaze to a nearby guard before nodding to the man. The guard frowned, followed my gaze, and his expression twisted with suspicion at the not-so-subtle movement of the man. He signaled to three other guards, and they all moved on a cautious path to intercept.
The hooded man suddenly spotted me. His gaze focused on my armor, and he lost all pretense of subtlety. Throwing back his hood to reveal glowing yellow eyes, the man snarled, "Die, Dawnguard!"
Serana was no fool, and whipped around like lightning, an ice spike crystallizing in her hand. Dawnbreaker blazed brilliantly in my hand as the vampire charged up his own spell to drain me.
"Vampire!" roared a guard, and the cheery atmosphere vanished faster than fog before the sun.
Perhaps it was because he was too focused on wanting me dead. Or perhaps his stupidity and superiority complex ran deep. Whichever the case, the vampire didn't notice that his situation had abruptly become dire until it was too late. He aimed his draining spell at me, and lost his arm at the elbow. The vampire screamed in surprised agony and whipped around, only to find himself face to face with three guards and a smattering of grim-faced, armed Nords.
He managed a weak, "By the blood... I slapped the bear on the nose," and then the crowd was upon him.
I didn't even have to act; Nords have an extreme hatred of anyone or anything that threatens their homes and safety. The rallying yell of 'vampire' had promptly united every reveler into a somewhat intoxicated army of carnage. I had once seen a school of slaughterfish turn a cow into a slick of blood and bone in less than five minutes. It didn't take the half dozen civilians and guards more than a single minute to cut down the vampire and then behead him.
A guard eyeballed the two of us as we stood in surprised befuddlement. "What was that he said?" The guard inquired, "Something about the Dawnguard?"
"Er, yes," I hastily sheathed my weapon to look less threatening, and gestured to Serana, who let the spike of ice drop harmlessly to the cobblestones. "We're members of a guild of vampire hunters. My apologies. Our open recruiting seems to have earned us the ire of the undead."
To my relief, the guard smiled warmly, "Apologies are not needed, shield-maiden. It's good to hear that someone's making an effort to deal with these foul creatures beyond the city gates." A wry grin split his face, "Though we seem to have made it clear that we are not as helpless as those bloodsuckers would think."
He turned to Serana, still partially concealed by her hood, and frowned. "We're not overly fond of mages here in Skyrim, but as long as you don't go around burning down houses, we'll be fine."
"An easy promise to make," Serana reassured him with a small bow.
He nodded curtly, "Good. Go on inside, both of you. I'm sure you both could use a warm bed. We'll take care of the… hmm... mess."
"Thank you, sir," I said, over my vampire friend's relieved 'whew.'
We both hustled inside as a few guards closed in on the body, preparing to take it away and dispose of it.
"That was closer than I would have liked," Serana murmured as we took our meals to the room we rented.
"I agree. We'll only rest for the night though." I settled onto the bed as Serana spread her sleep roll before sitting down with her food.
"I was wondering…" Serana started, then paused.
"Yes?" I invited her, before savoring a thin slice of spiced beef with a muffled groan of relief. Traveling supplies had kept us fed for days, but eating a home-cooked meal was a slice of bliss I had been missing. We needed to restock before we left town. One of the marketplace merchants was a meat seller, and I wanted to see if we could get some spiced beef for travel.
"How did you come by Dawnbreaker?" she nodded to my sword with curiosity, "I've never heard of a sword that does what your blade can do."
I laughed and rubbed my hand over my face, "Oh Divines… what a story… Okay, so the short of it was I had just crossed the border. No one gave me trouble, thanks to my papers verifying me as a traveler and a person of good repute. Well, on my first day in Skyrim, I took shelter in an uninhabited cave. To the best of my knowledge, it was a hideaway for smugglers, since the only contents were three chests full of loot. I opened the first one out of curiosity and found a giant, faceted crystal sitting right on top. Of course, the instant I pick it up, some woman's voice suddenly bellows at top volume, 'A NEW HAND TOUCHES THE BEACON!' I screamed like a twelve-year-old girl, and nearly chucked the thing into the nearest river."
Serana laughed, wiping tears from her eyes as I mimicked Meridia's commanding voice and my not-exactly-a-stoic-warrior scream.
"I was about to, but her voice kept ranting on about how I needed to vanquish a foul darkness in her temple. And… well… I swore about vampires, but I've never walked away from other jobs that involved danger to people. Her temple was across the country from where I had come in. I had to climb to the roof and put the crystal into the hands of a statue of a woman with massive bird wings."
I blew out a breath and sat back with a small smile, "Next thing I know, I'm lifted high into the air. When the trees looked like matchsticks and I could see the entirety of Skyrim, a ball of light approached me and introduced herself as Meridia, Daedric Prince of Life. She told me that a necromancer had taken over her temple of light. She needed me to cleanse her place of worship. I agreed, and she set me back down safely. I soon discovered that the necromancer had slaughtered an entire platoon of Imperial soldiers and corrupted their souls into shades. I cleared out the temple, releasing the trapped souls and slaying the necromancer. My reward was Dawnbreaker. Meridia found herself in a bit of a quandary; she wanted me to wield the sword in her name, to spread her influence, but I was already sworn to a Divine."
"Oh dear," Serana looked both amused and dismayed, "That couldn't have gone over well."
I gave a small chuckle, "It didn't. There was an entire week where I could occasionally hear snippets of an argument between the two before they finally hashed out an agreement. Honestly, it would have been solved a lot sooner if they had stopped arguing long enough to realize that their goals were almost identical." I sighed, a somewhat indulgent smile on my face, "They were almost like quarreling children. Sometimes, the Aedra and the Daedra are as silly and petty as their mortal worshippers."
Serana blinked at me, "You sound almost fond of her."
"Perhaps a little. Don't get me wrong, Meridia is not human and never has been. But she is one of the few Daedric Princes who is not viewed as evil." I gave Serana a small smirk. "Meridia and Stendarr have an overlap in their thoughts and views, which is where I usually do my work. The vampires I had to put down, well, all of them had committed atrocities, and bringing them to justice satisfies them both."
"What do they say about me?" Worry clouded Serana's amber gaze.
"You mean about you being a vampire or me not... well, not killing you outright?" I asked.
Serana nodded pensively.
"They haven't said anything, actually," I gave a small shrug. "Not directly, anyway. Stendarr has done a little bit of nudging, but that has always been about helping you. I've sent thoughts and prayers to both, and they haven't seen fit to contradict me on them. To be honest? I think that's the biggest vote in your favor. Of the two, Meridia is the most vocal. I think she would have had something to say by now if she had a real problem."
She seemed to relax a little, and went to bed contentedly.