» Wed Feb 20, 2013 4:58 pm -17 Frostfall, 2E 579-
Everything seemed bleak and cold that day in the unpaved streets of Bravil, and a fine mist had settled over the town. The indigenous folk, almost entirely Nibenese, were not used to the chilly weather. Few braved the streets in the midst of the masses of sickly pouring in from the south, which increased daily. The perimeter of the city was filled with the unmarked mass graves of the dead. The city watch had locked down the city to keep the huddled, diseased masses from sharing their curse with the rest of the town, but no precaution ever appeared as if it was going to be enough. Every day, more and more went to the chapel in the center of town, the only place with healers, to heal the never-ending influx of the dying.
It was here that he had brought Perrif, under the pretense that she too had the flu. Her unusually pale complexion gave nothing away in the damned city, and the kind priest, by the name of Erlick, had wasted no time in giving them a small room in the chapel undercroft. It appeared to the priests that she would not survive the night.
The dunmer who laid her body to rest however, knew otherwise. Though dunmer were not very highly regarded here, his dai-katana and the Akaviri dragon motif on his flowing, moth silk uniform was all that was required to show him that he was responsible for ensuring the safety of a wealthy Niben family. His well-kept honey-colored beard gave the impression that he was someone of repute. His tidiness would have been bizarre if the mer had been a bandit and so the thought never crossed Erlick’s mind that he could be an imposter. Though his moth silk tunic was tattered in many places, he had the grim look of someone who had known battle. The eye patch he wore over his right eye and the scars on his face demonstrated that he was either very experienced, or very clumsy. Erlick did not wish to caution a guess. Though he had heard that dark elves had eyes as red as Dagon's Deadlands, the one that had stood before him had a single purple one. Like all dunmer, he had skin the color of ash. Erlick knew right away that he did not really like the dark elf all that much. Still, he felt it would be against Mara's teachings to turn away someone in need, so long as he wasn't a daedra worshipper. Erlick felt relieved when he left them to perform his evening ministrations. He last saw the golden-haired dunmer sitting cross-legged, hands in his lap, chanting in a heathen tongue. Candles surrounded the dying girl.
After the priests had begun their evening prayer, and began to turn in for the night, the dark elf began to remove chains from his satchel and wrapped them around the stone dais she lay upon. He gave them a long, hard tug, before sitting back down, staring intently at her, waiting. Every heartbeat felt like an eternity to him.
After about half an hour, her eyes opened, only to find his deep purple one glowering down over her. With a sudden jolt, she tried to sit up, but the chains held her securely in place.
"I'm afraid that you will not feed tonight my darling."
Perrif glared back at him sullenly, the ghostly pallor of the grave on her face. Her eyes widened as the dunmer reached into the satchel on his belt, already knowing what it held in store for her. How many nights had it been already? It had been so long since she had last had a meal and if she didn’t feed soon, she knew her sanity would be endangered.
"Please, I'm so hungry," she moaned. "In this place, so much death...at least let me feed on the corpses, I'll do anything you ask, I'm begging you!" she struggled again, and tried to get her long ragged black hair out of her face. Begging felt beneath her, but the strange dark elf had not decided to harm her for the year they had been together. The first time she had met him, she had just awoken to find that she had been draining blood out of his arm, with his single eye gazing upon her, with a kind of madness. His blood always left her feeling sour though, and whether she fed or didn't feed, she felt like she was only getting weaker. Slowly, the dunmer stood up, and tenderly brushed her hair out of her face. Whatever she once was, she must have been beautiful, for even under her grotesque vampiric appearance, one could see the fine arches of a cyrodilic nose, and smooth red lips, now red like blood. Thin, delicate eyebrows adorned her brow, but her eyes were dark and full of madness. Her skin was wrinkled and worn and cold to the touch.
She began to shiver with fear at his approach. In one hand, he carried a scalpel, and in the other a vial containing a milky white solution in the other. Everytime he applied one of his foul concoctions, she felt her strength vanish. Slowly he opened her robes, and opened up a series of long thin stitches between her briasts. Perrif felt intense pain, but it soon vanished as he applied the foul smelling solution on the inside of her flesh. All the while, she knew that to stay alive, she must avoid screaming. She was too weak to hunt even a house cat, much less anyone seeking to exterminate a vampire. Perrif weakly looked up at the man, a face that seemed so familiar, yet distant, like a long forgotten dream.
It felt like hours passed, and whatever he was looking for, he did not find it. Perrif felt that she had seen this man before. But like every night, her memory escaped her, every impulse surrendering to her blood-urge. His scowl deepened, a face she knew by now did not bode well for her. She tried to brace herself for the blows that would soon follow, for failing in some way unknown to her. Even lifting a finger proved excruciating for the pale woman however. Her insides burned as though her organs were being melted, and all the pain that had vanished returned and intensified until it was too much for her to bear. Slowly, she felt her life begin to dim. The dunmer watched over her as she slipped into some kind of fevered dream.
“Do you remember that time when we first met,” he whispered. “It was in the temple district. You were traveling to court, and had stopped to pray in the Temple of the One, when assassins hired by the Tharns made attempts on your life. I was a terrible fighter, so I took you through a hidden passageway in the underground sewers.”
“Of course,” he continued. “You didn’t really trust me, but you saw no other options. Even still, it was the first time anyone in my life had even needed me. In Morrowind, I was someone to be taken care of, but in Paravania, in the center of the world, I was able to be of use to someone.”
He takes out a sheathe of paper, wrapped around a fine, white powder, and suspends it from his lip. Quickly, he lights it with a little jet of flame from his index finger. As he inhales the sugary vapors, he relaxes a little bit, embracing sorrow and ecstasy with every breath.
“And now you are no more, a monster, a husk of the beauty that I loved. It is probably best that you don't remember anything after that night. After that thing....did this to you.” He felt her shivering flesh, the curves of her body under her clothing, and then firmly clutched her hand in his. Slowly, he began to weep uncontrollably.
“I couldn't protect you after all. Forgive me,” he rasped out.
As he begins to wail and lament loudly, he utters in dunmeri “Lord Boethiah, please give me strength.”
He then began to wail louder still. The very spirits of the undercroft seemed to dance with the energy of every exasperation. When he was finished, he unsheathed a dagger that hung on his belt, and raised his arm over the daughter of Coldharbour. For moments on end, he wrestled with himself, dwelling painfully on the present. Every breath became a difficult ordeal. After awhile of this, he reached down within the dark recesses of his heart, and gathered up all of his will. In a bitter, vengeful voice he cries out. Then again, and finally he utters,
“BOETHIAH, GUIDE ME!”
With all his might, he plunges the blade into into her chest. Her face gave a shudder, and then looked peaceful. The ash-skinned mer then grew silent, and it seemed for hours he did not move. His lingering gaze would not leave her eyes. Finally though, he lifted his scalpel off the dais, and began to cut into her chest, carefully removing her heart. The stagnant blood and viscera that flowed out darkened his hands as he removed the organ. It seemed smooth, and beautiful, unlike the rest of her diseased flesh. It reminded him of everything she once was.
"I promised that I would take you with me," he stated as he devoured the heart "but all I can do is carry part of you with me." The sobbing started again, and he kissed her face repeatedly, each time apologizing in in a raspy Velothi accent.
The room was clean when the priest returned in the morning. The weathered soldier had not left even a trace of his being there. The girl was wrapped in linen. Her eyes were closed, and flowers of nightshade had been scattered over her body. From a small ashy bowl came the scent of the purest sugar, relaxing the senses. A strange smelling tree bark was in her hands, and moths swarmed out around it. She seemed less pale than before, which seemed strange, but Erlick simply had her added to the daily corpse pile with the rest of those who had succumbed to the dreaded Knahaten flu. The corpses were burned together after he had performed the last rites of Arkay over the bodies. Erlick prayed to Mara that he would not have to make another one. For now though, the cold spell had past, and a warm south wind carried its way into the Niben river. With it came new hopes, and new fears.
The dunmer was not seen again in that area, and months later in Morrowind, he was standing in a shrine of Molag Bal, the blood of his worshipers splattered on his altar.
"Lord of [censored], I promise that one day I will do to you as I did to these."
And I will, he thought to himself, for language without exertion is dead witness.
Far to the west, in Cyrodil, an evil wind blew. And with its flow came ambition and the promise of conflict. But for the somber elf, the war had already begun.
----
Cheers.
