Thanks guys! Peleus, I'm glad I didn't scare you off
I was aware the Solon/Dren interaction might not go down well with everyone, so it's nice to see positive responses.
Onwards!
The King And I
Chapter Twenty-Four – The Gathering DarkThe fire at the Dren Estate raged on and on. The water-chain from the docks had been abandoned; the workers fled, slaves slipping through the chaos to freedom. There was no hope now. There could be no-one living in that hideous inferno.
In the gathering dark, the gods play dice. They play dice with people’s lives, and this time, two deaths become two narrow misses. This time, someone wins.
Caius found himself hanging in mid-air, blinded with pain but alive. He’d fallen with the floor – a piece of it was sticking into his leg – and the rest of him was caught on a broken length of banister and on Solon respectively, both of whom were clinging to the only remaining portion of the corridor. With the floor gone, the full force of the fire leapt up around them at once, and Caius’ legs and back were scorched and smarting. His clothes would catch at any moment.
Solon was a better off, although he was currently the only thing between Caius and certain death, and he was dizzy from shock and smoke inhalation. But Dunmer have lived for centuries in the ash storms of Red Mountain, so with his free hand he wrapped his cloak around his mouth, and with his other he began to pull hand over hand, shoulders cracking and legs weak, dragging Caius to safety. The remaining floorboards groaned and protested, but they held. Caius clung to them and inched himself up, splinters driving themselves into the palms of his hands.
After a minute that seemed like an hour, they were both crouched on the ledge. The Imperial was fighting to stay conscious – neither him nor the ledge would last long. Solon looked around swiftly and saw something behind them that made his heart leap.
He grabbed Caius’ shoulder. “There’s a way out!” he gasped hoarsely. “The floor’s taken part of the wall with it – I can see the ground. But we’ll have to jump.”
Caius nodded grimly, too spent to answer. Slowly, they shuffled into the place closest to the wall.
“Ready?” Solon rasped. Before they lost their nerve, he grasped his companion’s arm and tugged. They jumped.
Caius’ knee finally gave way with a sickening crack; Solon landed on a piece of fallen masonry and took most of the skin off the side of his shoulder. Together, they managed to crawl, limp and drag themselves away from the wreckage. At all costs they mustn’t be found, or the fire suspected to be anything other than a terrible accident.
It seemed to take years, but drawing on reserves of strength they hadn’t known they possessed, the orange glow from the manor finally dwindled and disappeared behind the hill. Caius fell to the ground and passed out.
Solon stumbled next to him, not even noticing their chosen resting-place was half in the edge of the lake, and followed suit.
*
Gwynabyth cried out in alarm and dropped her ounce-measure as Dralasa barrelled into the disused living-room of Tel Fyr’s Corprusarium.
“Pack up,” the spy hissed. “Empty the stills; you’ll have to leave the equipment. Throw the dust-sheet over them. Be ready to leave in ten minutes, do you hear?”
“What’s going on?” demanded Eadwyrd, shaken by her urgency.
“We’re going back to Mournhold,” Dralasa ordered. “I’ve finally heard the Master talking, and if I’m not mistaken, Fyr is
dead. This is worse than I’d ever dreamt. Fyr didn’t move the Corprus victims, the
black robes did; they’re following with King’s order’s – and to top it off, they’re Dreamers. Sixth House cultists.”
The alchemists were gaping, silent, unable to process this shocking barrage of information.
“They’re sealing the entire estate and moving to Red Mountain,” Dralasa said, already throwing random belongings of Gwynabyth’s into a satchel. “I’m going for a last check round the building, then we’ll use Morgiah’s scrolls. I don’t need to tell you how important this is, so
get a move on.”She tossed the now-bulging satchel to Gwynabyth, who fumbled and nearly dropped it. “I’ll be back in less than quarter of an hour. Get your stuff and meet me near the Corprusarium entrance, understand?”
She threw the remaining satchel at an astonished Eadwyrd, and was gone before they even had time to speak.
*
Bomba ‘Lurrina was feeling strange.
Almalexia was coming into view, the great fortified wall of the city encroached by sepia-coloured slums that clung, limpet-like, to the outer fa?ade. These mini-provinces of poverty stretched near five miles into the surrounding countryside, lining the roadways with shabby stalls and mazte-sinks. The poor had refuge here; Almalexia was the mother-goddess, the merciful one. While in Blacklight or Necrom the hovels might be razed to the ground when the squalor began to offend the nobles, no home, however fetid, would be destroyed here.
As she walked, Bomba ‘Lurrina’s vision seemed to blur until she was not only approaching the gates of Almalexia, but of Orsinium, Daggerfall, Wayrest, Sentinel, the Imperial City… the many journeys of her life swam before her eyes like the hazy visions of a skooma-dream. She had arrived at a hundred and one city gates in her life, but had she had not once felt as if she were coming home.
Why did she have this gnawing emptiness in the pit of her stomach?
It was not as if she minded being a nomad; she had been born in the Noquin-Al desert of Elsweyr, where migration was a way of life. She had not returned to her homeland for many years now, of course, but the wanderlust was in her blood. So what could it be?
Nenya had disembarked at Old Ebonheart, citing a desire to return to Balmora. The Nord girl had been quiet for the remainder of their voyage from Omayni; uncharacteristically pensive, Bomba ‘Lurrina thought. She hadn’t stated her reasons for this sudden desire to return to Vvardenfell, but the Khajiit could make a good enough guess. She suspected Nenya would make a beeline for a certain Spymaster’s dilapidated house.
It had been odd to watch her leave. Having spent the better part of three weeks entirely in eachothers’ company, Bomba ‘Lurrina had not noticed how quickly she had become used to the girl’s presence. She had always been a loner; it was part of the reason the Emperor had chosen her as his agent. Secrecy demands isolation. But Nenya had got under her skin, creeping in without her noticing… and now she had gone, there was an uncomfortable empty space left that Bomba had never realised existed.
The gates of Almalexia loomed above. She passed under them along with the usual crush of merchants, tourists, pilgrims and homecomers, musing on how one could be surrounded by people and still feel so totally alone.
*
The mood in the Corprusarium had taken a distinct turn for the worse.
Gwynabyth and Eadwyrd were huddled under an alcove of rock in the tunnel leading to the main house, waiting for Dralasa. It was wetter here, and colder. A pool of dark water filled the hollow in the floor of the cave.
“Do you think…” Gwynabyth began, her voice cracked and strained. “…Do you think Dralasa could be right? Divyath Fyr,
dead?”“I don’t know,” Eadwyrd whispered. His face was pale in the darkness. “It seems mad… they say he’s nearly four thousand years old. How
could he die?”
They were silent for a long time, with only the drip-drip-drip of water to keep them company. There was no sign of Dralasa yet.
“But these black-robes,” Eadwyrd continued. “Surely Fyr would never have let this happen if he could prevent it? Dreamers? Relict Sixth House cultists? And they took the Corprus victims to Red Mountain… what can they be
doing?”“I want to get out of here,” Gwynabyth shivered miserably, pulling her hands into the sleeves of her robe. “This is too big, Eadwyrd. We’re don’t belong here. We haven’t seen the sun in more than a fortnight; I feel like I’m forgetting what it looks like. I want to get
out.” Her voice broke.
Eadwyrd couldn’t say where he suddenly got the courage from. He wound his arms around her, his heart thumping at her closeness, hand buried in her hair.
“We’ll go,” he said softly. “As soon as we get out of here, we’ll go back to Glenumbra. We’ve done enough. We can work on the tonic again. Your cottage, and the kitchen-garden…”
He felt a thrill as she sank into him. “I’d like that,” she whispered. “I’d like that more than anything.”
You have to do it now, he thought.
You have to tell her. Do it now, do it now.“Gwyn,” he began hoarsely. He had to stop and swallow, his throat was so dry. “Gwyn, I…”
She took his hand shyly and wound their fingers together, and he thought his heart might burst. “Gw–”
There was a splash from the other side of the pool.
“Dralasa,” Gwynabyth breathed, turning away and looking out into the tunnel. “At last! Is it safe?” She called across. Throwing an excited smile at Eadwyrd, she grabbed her satchel and stepped into the light.
So did the figure on the other side of the pool. And with a jolt of horror that struck him like a kick in the chest, Eadwyrd saw what was wrong in one terrible moment of clarity. The newcomer had red hair. Dralasa’s was black.
A Cultist.
Before he knew what he was doing, he was out of the alcove and splashing across the shallows of the pool, the whole world shrinking until it was nothing but the knife that had appeared in the newcomer’s hand. A moment later, he slammed into the woman’s body and they were on the ground.
Then it was all teeth and eyes and hair and the knife, the black-robed Dunmer squirming in his grasp like a demonic snake. Something seared across his forearm; in desperation he tried to hold her wrists, but she was kicking and biting, and his hands were slippery – with water? Blood? He couldn’t tell. He thought he heard someone scream his name – Gwynabyth?
With an unnatural burst of strength, the attacker threw him sideways and he lost balance, stumbling over the lip of the pool. A second later he felt the water close over him. The sudden silence pounded in his ears, and fear washed over him, so thick and awful that he thought it might rip him in two: Gwynabyth was up there, alone.
He surfaced with a scream bubbling up in his throat, staggering back through the shallows in time to see the two women grappling like cats in the flickering light of the tunnel.
The knife had skittered away across the other side of the pool. Gwynabyth had had the presence of mind to rake up a loose stone from the floor; the attacker’s temple was bloody. But the newcomer was stronger, and Gwynabyth was weak with fear and shock… Eadwyrd lunged towards them, his heart in his mouth…
It happened so quickly he didn’t even have time to move. The Dunmer knocked Gwyn’s arm aside with savage strength, wrapped a hand around her throat, lifted her clean into the air and shook her like a ragdoll. There was an awful snapping noise.
The next moment, her own knife punched into her back – the knife that Dralasa, now running full pelt down the tunnel, had picked up and thrown with deadly accuracy. And then everything was still: the Dunmer choked out her last breath, and Gwynabyth was sprawled awkwardly on the floor, her neck twisted at an angle that he knew was very wrong.
He couldn’t seem to find air in his lungs; silver pricked the edge of his vision, an icy hand was clamped around his chest, there was a distant roaring in his ears…
In the gathering dark, the gods play dice. They play dice with people’s lives, and this time, someone loses.
Hardly aware, he stumbled across the tunnel and was clumsily dragging her away from the pool, her body so deadweight and different to the time he had laughingly picked her up in the apothecary. Her face was covered by her hair, but he didn’t brush it away. If he didn’t see, it might not be true.
Dralasa kicked the attacker’s body out of the way and knelt over Gwynabyth, fingers searching her neck. There was no need for the compassionate look she gave a moment later, the unfamiliar pity in her eyes.
“The scrolls,” she whispered in disbelief. “Why didn’t you use the
scrolls?”Eadwyrd only looked at her dumbly. His face was a blank sea of horror.
“Please,” he said. “Please.”
The words were detached and meaningless. He didn’t seem aware he had spoken. She cringed.
“Use them now,” she said quietly. “Take her back to the Palace. I’ll get rid of this.” She indicated the Dreamer.
Afterwards, Eadwyrd found he could never remember returning to Mournhold, or the weight of the nightmare thing in his arms. The images were a blur – a haze of dark and cold; a terrible cocoon of pain, kept only inches away by shocked denial.
*
*
» Wed Feb 02, 2011 12:33 am 
Again, everyone, thank you a thousand thousand times! xx 
