Interlude 3 – Bloodline
A crumbling fortress rises from the lonely expanse of a colorless sea, shrouded in impenetrable layers of mist. Three multistory towers soar skywards from its walls, barely visible through the cloudy veil. One of them is partially collapsed and ruinous.
The barren islet hosting this dilapidated edifice is surrounded by roiling waves and clusters of ice floes, a hazardous sea that mariners of all stripes would doubtlessly hesitate to traverse. The sky is eternally grey, and what little sunlight filters through the billowing clouds is watery and weak, providing no warmth whatsoever to the world below.
This place isn't far from Solitude as the eagle flies, but the climate is substantially different. The Haafingar Mountains guard the Karth River Estuary from the frigid gales of the Sea of Ghosts – but in contrast, these isolated islands benefit from no such geographic security. They're inhabited only by hardy fisher-folk of Nord and Breton stock, those few who are stubborn and bold enough to eke out a living in the treacherous deeps.
However, this particular islet is one they've learned to stay away from. They dare not trough its haunted waters for fear of vanishing into the mists and never being seen again. That fate has befallen many of their number over the years, though none know the reason behind it. Those who do are never able to live long enough to spread word of the horrors they've witnessed.
This coastal bastion is exceedingly old even by the standards of Skyrim, but despite its derelict appearance, it's still called home by teeming multitudes. Torches burn at several locations atop the sagging walls, flickering uncertainly in the harsh wind, and sentries patrol the crenelations at regular intervals.
Flights of birds soar overhead, wheeling lazily across the dreary horizon in the manner common to most feathered creatures. When seen from the ground, one would assume they're mundane hawks and crows, identical to their brethren found elsewhere in Skyrim's frozen north. The casual observer might likewise assume this place to be one of the handful of secluded outposts scattered across the coastlands of Haafingar, garrisoned by the men of Solitude to guard against Breton piracy. In any other circumstance, these assumptions might be correct.
But they would be wrong in this instance. There's more to this castle than meets the unwary eye.
Upon closer inspection, one would find that the sputtering flames of the torches provide no heat at all, and rather than a mundane orange-red instead burn with a faint bluish hue. The sentries' limbs, torsos, and heads are concealed beneath layers of chainmail and leather lamellar, but were the armor to be removed, they would be easily identifiable as undead revenants, their nightmarish forms composed of rotten flesh and exposed bone. If one of the islet's avian denizens were to descend to the earth, their skeletal bodies would reveal them to be yet more necromantic constructs, corrupted facsimiles of Kyne's servants.
This islet is not a place for mortals. Indeed, those who inhabit the castle's antechambers and halls of cold stone are for the most part distinctly immortal.
There are exceptions, of course. They maintain a large staff of servants and thralls to perform lesser tasks and keep a large stock of chattel for feeding. But to ones such as they, these are mere insects hardly worthy of consideration as intelligent beings. When a master of undeath has walked Nirn for centuries or even millennia, then unsurprisingly their perceptions and priorities are changed dramatically. That is certainly the case with the inhabitants of this forlorn isle.
The castle's interior is nightmarish, a dark and musty maze of blind corners and low-ceiling vaults, permeated throughout by the scent of lingering death. For the enthralled men and women unlucky enough to be ensconced within, it is their own little sliver of Oblivion on Nirn.
Deep inside the fortress, a man lounges upon a plain obsidian throne in a dimly-lit hall, scarcely brightened by a meager handful of candles suspended from wrought iron chandeliers high above. That's a bit of a misnomer, though – the word 'man' could only be used very loosely to describe this person. Many centuries have passed since the day he flung aside the vexing shackles that bound him to such a term, among them the professed virtues of mortalkind.
He rests an elbow upon the armrest of his throne and settles his chin atop his knuckles, eyes closed in silent contemplation. He has spent a long time pondering his current predicament, longer than multiple lifetimes of lesser men, but he still hasn't drawn any closer to a satisfactory conclusion.
Not for the first time, he vehemently curses the name of his faithless wife who so utterly duped him, who squirreled away his daughter – the sole true heir to his demon-blessed bloodline – to a hiding place sequestered so far and so deep that he, even he, has yet to uncover so much as a rumor.
This is his domain over which he presides as an all-powerful lord, where his commands are followed without question. He has ruled over this ruinous castle for hundreds of years. In this place, nothing changes unless he has expressly willed it to do so. But outside these walls, beyond these rocky shores, his authority is severely limited. And therein lies his conundrum.
He is the dread lord of these snowy coastlands now deathless, but was once a man of flesh and blood. He was a king who desired above all else to cheat death itself. Even now he can still recall those days with clarity.
He long feared his own mortality, and he could never bring himself to accept that the cold embrace of death would mark the end of his existence. He would not allow it. The treasures and influence he'd accumulated during his earthly kingship on Nirn were not to be given up so easily.
So it was that many lifetimes ago, when he was yet a mortal man, he began searching for a solution to the greatest difficulty of mankind. He explored the secrets of life and magic, and soon found himself delving into the black arts of Oblivion in a drastic bid to discover a method of evading his inevitable demise. And after many long years, he finally achieved his goal – by submitting himself to Molag Bal, the Daedric Prince of Domination, and contracting the eternal servitude of his soul in exchange for his ascendance as a vampire lord.
Not just a vampire, but a lord. One of the precious few who have been chosen by Molag Bal to receive the full breadth of his attentions, and thus exempted from many of the frailties with which common vampires are cursed. He was reshaped into something no longer human, retaining the trappings of his previous life only through his outward appearance – and that too was not unaffected. He became something greater, a godlike being to mortals as the mortals are to livestock. And as blood flowed unabated upon the dread altar he erected in the name of Molag Bal, his powers only continued to grow.
But even so, he soon grew frustrated with the lofty yet insurmountable limitations of his newfound immortality. He could no longer walk beneath the light of day without fearing the sun's enfeebling rays. Any manner of flames, whether they be mundane or magical, now had the capacity to inflict disproportionate harm upon him. If he allowed too much time to pass between blood-feasts, then his rationality slowly began to slip away, threatening to render him a mindless animal starved for sustenance. His pride as a king could not allow him to endure these contemptible weaknesses.
He became deathless, but in exchange he sacrificed his ability to maintain authority as a ruler of men and was forced into a life of seclusion from the broader world, shrouded in mist beyond the shores of his barren isle.
These things simply could not be. Though he had cheated death, he hadn't yet attained the solution to his original dilemma – to live forever, and more importantly to live according to his whims.
And so he spent decades trawling through ancient lore, no longer hard-pressed by the count of mortal years as he once had been. He learned much of the Mundus and its intricacies through diligent scholarship and an unfailing willingness to trade the lives of expendable mortals for daedric knowledge.
But as he delved deeper into the spiraling cavern of Nirn's hidden wisdom, he and his wife became increasingly estranged. Though she too had consented to being taken by Molag Bal and raised upon the sublime pedestal of a Daughter of Coldharbour, she never once shared his feelings of inadequacy. Both her and their daughter – herself also taken by Bal to be made one of his Daughters – were contented with their blood-feasts and their ensorcelled thralls, and with the eternal life they now possessed to pursue the furthest and deepest mysteries of magic.
He was not so easily engulfed by the rose-scented waters of base gratification. He continued along his self-appointed path to greatness without looking back. Sentimentality had no hold on him then and still does not now. The same couldn't be said for his fool of a wife.
When their disagreements as to the true nature of power became insurmountable, she took their daughter by the hand and fled, feeding her lies all the while to poison her against him. Centuries have elapsed since that time, and yet still today they remain hidden by way of his wife's peerless talent with the necromantic arts.
Even now, so long after, he still wonders how they could not understand his explanations and desperate entreaties. How could they not see? There is one single thing of value in this world, and that is power. It is strength. It is will. Those who stubbornly refuse to recognize these immutable truths of the Mundus, who are content to writhe like worms in the dust… he can only conclude that they are unworthy of even a hint of his consideration. And yet here he is, more than half a millennium later, still searching for them relentlessly.
For now he can only continue to wait in the depths of his shadowy abode, seething with impatience as his minions scour the neighboring districts for a hint of his esoteric quarry. Long have they fruitlessly sought atop every mountain and beneath every upturned stone, and that seems unlikely to change anytime soon. Still, there is always a chance, however slim, that they'll find something. And until such a time finally arrives, he must continue to…
Something stirs.
He lethargically open his eyes, revealing irises colored an entirely unnatural shade of vibrant gold bordering on orange. They gleam with an inner light that betrays the true depth of his power to those who might know the signs.
He feels it before he hears it. An earthquake, the bones of Nirn grinding together far below the surface.
…No. No, not quite. That isn't it.
Sonorous tremors resound through the earth, spoken words that shatter the mundane tranquility of the world. Seconds later, a chorus of voices boom across the sky.
"DOV-AH-KIIN!"
Like thunder, the words fade into the distance with a descending rumble that drowns out the crashing waves beyond the walls of his abode. Uneasy silence is left in their wake.
For the first time in recent memory, his colorless features subtly shift.
His lips tighten into a terrifying approximation of a smile.
Sensing the imperceptible change in the atmosphere surrounding their master, the dozens of thralls lingering within this ostentatious hall discreetly hide themselves behind arched columns and in the black shadows along the walls. Any manner of expressivity from their lord is always an ill omen.
He shifts his weight and sits up straighter, humming inquisitively. "How… interesting." His voice is rich and robust, laced with an otherworldly aspect like the vibrancy of foreign spices in a dish.
As he speaks, a pair of brass-bound double doors on the opposite end of the hall creak open upon disused hinges. A figure hurries inside, a man who shares the same pale skin and eyes of molten gold, though his clothing isn't quite as grandiose. "My lord!" he cries. "There is something amiss! Mere moments ago, a deafening-!"
The lord of the castle waves languidly as one might shoo away a fly. The newcomer immediately falls silent.
"I am aware," he says mildly. "I have ears." His words drip with sarcastic mirth, leaving the newcomer shaking in his luxuriant leather boots.
The man settles back onto his throne and glares upward, embroiled in tempestuous thought. More figures gather in the open doorway, peering at him from across the hall with palpable trepidation. They know better than to disturb him any further.
It has been an extremely long time since something like this last occurred in Skyrim. For most men, not even their forefathers of a dozen generations past would have been alive to see that day.
This man remembers like it was yesterday. A call echoing through the heavens just like this one, with precisely the same syllables contained therein.
His smile morphs into a full-fledged grin, displaying long canines that terminate into razor-sharp points, more animal than human. His aureate eyes flash.
The newcomer and his compatriots fall to the carpeted floor and grovel before their master. He ignores them, failing to even registering their presence. His mind is far afield.
"I am curious to see what this development will bring. Hmph. Another Dragonborn. Their kind typically make for quality… entertainment, shall we say. The last one certainly did. None can deny that his was a singularly momentous existence."
He grips the armrests of his throne and rises with refined elegance, without the smallest of movements wasted. The cowering of his subordinates redoubles. Still he does not notice. He is an ascendant being, the tyrant-elect of his great lord Molag Bal, and there are few in this world who could hope to merit his attention.
As of this moment, the Greybeards are among those worthy few, and so too is this newest Dragonborn. Wherever they might be, whatever they might look like, his mind already whirrs with the possibilities of the unknowable future. It would seem that Nirn's dearth of heroes is finally drawing to a close. Whether that will be a boon to his designs, a hindrance, or utterly irrelevant has yet to be determined.
Whichever the case may be, he cannot help but wonder.
"It seems that the doom-driven walk among us once more, Prisoners in their own skin and yet enslaved to no one. Some say that the fates of all creatures above and below are written immutably into the Scrolls, but there is a living proof that these are lies peddled by they who would call themselves gods."
His sniveling subordinates dare to raise their eyes, enraptured by his unanticipated sermon.
"Heroes do as they please, and the fabric of Nirn bows low at their passing – but invariably they vanish from history, their inescapable punishment for great and terrible deeds. They rise and fall and rise again, even unto the ending of the world. And so the Wheel turns…"
