Well. I don't know what to say! Thank you so much everyone for your comments on the last chapter. It means a great deal to me. Thank you, also, to everyone who voted for me in the End Of Year thread. I was chuffed to bits!
Peleus said it best, I think. "I feel envy and gratitude at the same time".
Rumple, you once told me I wrote prose as poetry. May I return the compliment to you? And if I am not mistaken, has your prose style changed more and more towards the lyric mode in the last seven chapters or so?
Thank you for writing, and for being yourself.
Thank you so much, Foxy. I may be becoming more lyrical - that is probably because we are now entering the parts of this story that I wrote many years ago, and my style was slightly different then. More quirky - pseudointellectual, you might say! I was doing my philosophy degree at the time, so that explains it :hehe: Also, as the events of the story become increasingly serious, I felt the lighthearted banter I toyed with near the beginning - like the stuff with Crassius - was no longer appropriate. In fact there are only a few of those moments left in the remaining chapters as the story comes to a climix.
When I grow up (as a writer- I plan to never grow up as a person), I want to write like Rumple.
There is so much power, so much vivid descriptive imagery in this chapter, that I feel myself lying twisted on that snowy moor, surrounded by those who would as soon sacrifice me as aid me...
:lol: When I grow up,
I want to write like Treydog! But thank you, very much.
As before, I like the "Daggerfall atmosphere" you provide for something as momentous as summoning a Daedra prince. That was a bit of the "architecture" of TES that was lost in MW and Oblivion. Through the power of your imagination, we understand that treating with Daedra is a perilous undertaking, and that one must possess sufficient will and mental strength to survive.
And, like all demons, the Daedra are slippery, and will demand such a price as a mortal fears to pay.
An finally, such an encounter will mark a person- physically and/or emotionally-
"Knowledge you seek, and knowledge I will give you. But you will not be happier for it."
A very wise quote indeed. And you have certainly hit the nail on the head. Of course for the Player Character, daedric encounters are not particularly special. But for an actual gameworld NPC? I'm certain it would be a lifechanging experience, and not necessarily in a good way. Be careful what you wish for.
For readers NOT from the UK, let me explain the similarity here
A Delia book is a tome of immense power, wielded by a powerful sorceror(ess) (damn, the wine has made me forget how to spell that...). Written by, in TES terms, a master alchemist, the ancient and mystical recipes within have the power to make men and mer cry, drool and do other things that should never be seen in public.
:lol: Could Delia be Dibella herself? The letters fit! Sierra, it is a conspiracy!!
Damn. I mean damn! - "A voice that rasped like the turning of brittle ancient pages, a voice wet with years of ink and thought." That is just so evocative, so clear. The recent updates have been chocka with elements like this. But the "DAMN" moments are quite frequent this time. I'm not going to quote, simply because of the length the quote would take. Like THE ENTIRE Mannimarco birth. My jaw dropped, not in the cliched sense, but in the actual, physical "holy crap" sense. I've always been fairly upfront about my admiration for your plotting. Maybe I've not given the sheer technical quality in the writing enough credit. Consider this that time - it's awe inspiring.
Merry Christmas Rumple, this might be the best Christmas gift of all.
Merry Christmas to you too, and happy new year. And thank you very, very much!
The King And I
Chapter Twenty-Nine – The Frame And The FaceMorgiah sat at her dressing table, slowly dragging a brush through her hair.
It was Mourndas, 28th First Seed. The sun was setting through the window; it was ten past eight. According to the King’s letter, he would be arriving at nine o clock. She had designed the gem to manifest in her study; it was out of the way, a place visited by others only at her explicit invitation. Behind her, Kippet the maid was taking a dress from the wardrobe and smoothing the skirt.
She selected a jewelled comb from the drawer and slid it into the mass of curls.
Kippet began to lace her corset, threading the ribbons cross by cross, loop by loop. Morgiah took a sip of kanet-flower tea, feeling a strange enjoyment in the domesticity of the scene. The boning tightened in a series of gentle tugs. Kippet was always careful not to pull at her; she appreciated that.
She had just stepped into the overdress when a series of rapid footsteps sounded in the corridor outside, joined quickly by voices raised in anger and indignation. She barely had time to exchange a quizzical look with Kippet before the door flew open, banging against the wall and causing the maid to shriek in alarm.
“Your Majesty, we have not yet ascertained the sender of this information,” someone was saying, a harassed-looking mer Morgiah recognised as Helseth’s steward. Her brother himself pushed his way into the room, eyes like molten lava.
“Peace, Vilerys!” he snapped. “I want it checked
now. Then we shall see what follows. Sister,” he said with a smile that could have halted a rampaging kagouti, “how do you fare? I should like to take a look at the contents of your bureau, if you please.”
“Do come in,” said Morgiah, looking very pointedly at her brother’s position in the middle of the room.
“Vilerys,” Helseth repeated, keeping his eyes on his sister.
The steward crossed the room, opening a drawer in Morgiah’s bureau and sorting through the beribboned contents with noticeable discomfort.
Morgiah adjusted her skirts, motioning for Kippet to fasten the back of her dress. “Might I inquire as to the nature of this unexpected sortie?”
Before Helseth could answer, the steward gave a faint gasp, withdrawing a linen lavender-bag from the back of the drawer and straightening up with a look of incredulity. His Majesty held a hand out for it, eyes still locked on hers, and sniffed imperceptibly at the contents.
“Raw bittergreen,” he pronounced.
There was a silence as Morgiah’s brain ticked.
“Your steward mentioned a “sender of information”, she said calmly. “Do you mean to tell me some obliging benefactor informed you I was keeping poison among my corsets?”
“Do not spin this out; you are in danger enough already,” Helseth replied, his voice tight and strained. His expression was blank with suppressed shock, but the eyes rang true, seething pits of disbelieving betrayal.
“I have been framed,” Morgiah answered with that same superb calm. She marvelled idly at the steadiness of her voice, because this was bad. This was very, very bad. Who in Malacath’s name was the orchestrator of this damnable charade? As if her relationship with Helseth didn’t have enough problems
already! “Even if you believed for a moment that I would seek to poison my own brother, do you really have such little regard for my intelligence to think I would nestle the evidence conveniently among my smallclothes?”
She thought she saw a flicker of hesitation cross Helseth’s face, and scented victory. Was it actually possible she could worm her way out of this?
“May I examine your… information?” she asked, keeping her tone as light as possible.
Helseth narrowed his eyes, but to her profound relief looked away and signalled to the steward with a flick of his hand. The mer reluctantly brought a slip of parchment out from his sleeve and passed it over.
Morgiah examined it hungrily, raking her gaze over the innocuous missive for a hint of anything familiar.
Regarding the tragic death of his manservant Othrell, his Majesty will learn something to his advantage in her Highness the Royal Princess’s dressing-table, said the scrawled note. She did not recognise the hand. It was simply signed,
A friend.“A
friend?” she snorted. “How very droll. And you
believed this?”
Helseth’s eyes became dangerous once more. “It is less easy to doubt when the evidence is present as instructed, madam.”
Careful. It wouldn’t do to offend him, not with the axe so well and truly over her neck. “Yes, of course. But again, I ask: do you really think me so simple-minded as to conceal my heinous treason in an unlocked drawer? In my
own bedchamber?”There was a moment of silence.
“Then we must look for an alternative solution,” Helseth said, surprising her with his tranquillity. Funny; she’d expected a screaming match akin to the first assassination attempt in the dining room – not, of course, that this wasn’t infinitely preferable. “Who has access to this room? Who could pass unnoticed, that might have the opportunity to plant such damning evidence?”
There was a small noise of muted terror from the corner by the wardrobe. As one, the three of them turned to bear on Kippet, the little Bosmer maid, who was shaking from head to toe.
*
The crowd in the Silk Market was as dense as ever. Merchants hawked, customers argued, drunks sang, who
res laughed. Almalexia seethed.
For the first time ever, Solon seethed with it.
A fire had been lit in him since Dren’s death. He was out of his depth, confused – spikes of reaction jolted through him like a shock spell gone wrong. Anger. Sorrow. Resentment. And… something else? Anticipation, excitement?
The anger was easy; the person he was angry at was himself. No, not angry; he was
livid. How could he have been so stupid? He had treated it like an experiment, like a
game. He’d never misjudged so badly in his life.
The worst thing was, he had begun to look
forward to seeing Dren. No matter how uncomfortable the lack of control had made him feel, he had still been ready to relinquish the power for a moment. To see where the situation would take him. That it would ultimately reveal Dren to be a violent, jealous, manipulative bas
tard was such a bitter disappointment. It could have been so much
better.And then the sorrow, and resentment… he thought of Felara Ules defending a man she barely knew, a man who had actually been lying through his teeth during the entirety of their brief acquaintance, and felt a deep pit of guilt in his stomach. She had probably died for him. Dren hadn’t clarified, but it didn’t take a genius to connect the dots.
And the anticipation… of what?
The Cammona Tong was in chaos; it was all over the province. He’d heard more panic in taverns this past week than in a whole decade. Where would the syndicate go from here? Was there anyone who could pick up the threads? The Cammona Tong had been Orvas Dren’s precious pet; he’d built up his contacts through over two hundred and fifty years of business ingenuity, Hlaalu contacts, social climbing, dealing, bullying, threatening and one-upmanship. It was one of the reasons Solon had thought he might make an interesting friend, before he’d panicked and turned tail. The Cammona Tong was a cardhouse – a cardhouse made of explosive glass, balanced so precariously that one nudge would cause the kind of catastrophe where people are still cleaning their brains off the wall ten years later.
Well, the nudge had happened, and it would take someone of extraordinary skill to repair the shattered remains. Someone who had the intelligence to do so quickly before it was too late. Someone who had the right contacts, and the charisma to enchant them with the idea of a successor. Someone…
Ah. So
that was what the anticipation was for.
Solon smiled a wolfish smile, just another face lost in Almalexia’s stewing anonymity.
*
At precisely two minutes to nine, Morgiah entered her study and locked the door. Frowning distantly, she went to the glass-fronted cabinet in the corner and removed the bottle of 409 Karnver Falls vintage she’d had the cellarmaster bring up earlier, along with two crystal goblets.
The business with Kippet had left her scant time to keep this appointment. Helseth had staunchly advocated the use of thumbscrews and racks, but Morgiah overruled him. Kippet was
her maid, after all. The girl was plainly terrified. She had simply brought the linen up from the washrooms, she said. A lavender-bag among the pile would be no cause for remark; they often went up and down with the washing. She had given it no more thought than any pile of linen she had carried up to her mistress’ chambers in her life.
Morgiah believed her. Kippet was a young mer whose family lived exclusively in Valenwood; she was too juvenile and inexperienced to have any foothold in Dunmer politics herself, and too tremblingly na?ve (not to mention generously paid) to do anyone else’s dirty work for them. The culprit was more likely to have posed as one of the washerstaff. Helseth had stormed immediately to the sculleries, but Morgiah saw little point. The perpetrator would be long gone.
She had been granted a respite, at least for the moment – but she knew Helseth was not fully convinced of her innocence. There were too many coincidences. A flare of anger erupted within her once more; what traitorous piece of filth was messing with their lives? Who thought they could get away with manipulating the relationship between her and Helseth?
She had just finished placing the glasses on the table when the lights momentarily winked out, and with a slight pressure of magicka in the room, a red-cloaked figure materialised by the fireplace.
“Well,” said the King of Worms, putting the still-glowing tourmaline gem on the table next to the wine, “this makes for a novel change, does it not?”
Morgiah’s lips curved into a smile, the woes of the past hour slipping away like sand through an hourglass.
She had not seen him for nearly three years. Reman’s death, her move to Mournhold and the recent business with Helseth had driven much else from her mind. The long separation renewed her age-old astonishment at his ordinariness; the confusion of it, the disarmament.
But she, of course, was equal to that.
“It’s rather refreshing, wouldn’t you agree?” she said airily, filling his glass. “I almost feel embarrassed; after three decades, this is the first time
I’ve entertained
you.”He settled into the green leather chair by the fire. “Princess, you have been entertaining me for years.”
“Evidently,” she said dryly, filling her own glass and taking a sip. The wine superseded even her standards, much to her pleasure. Pulling up a velvet-cushioned divan to the other side of the fire, she stirred the coals into a momentary blaze. “I trust you found my couriers effective?”
“I took great delight in seeing our nation’s saviour once more after all these years, although I must say she has poor taste where Totems are concerned. It would have looked so much nicer on my mantelpiece than in the Underking’s desiccated grip.” He sighed. “Alas, one cannot win every battle.”
“How magnanimous of you to forgive her.”
She sensed his amusemant. “I must confess our little artefact foray shortly afterwards took the edge off my disappointment.”
“That makes two of us. You may have wheedled my First out of me, but I must say, my Second proved more interesting in any case.”
“Ah, yes,” the King murmured, sitting back with the goblet held lightly in his gloved hand. “You always were infuriatingly cagey on the subject of your
Second. Did the Infinium live up to your expectations?”
“It surpassed them.” For a moment she was lost in time, remembering the swathe of images that had crowded in on her at the Glenumbra coven, and the uncomfortably intimate familiarity it had yielded of the being that now sat on the other side of the fire.
The King could not fail to notice her sudden change of mood; he paused, catching something of the atmosphere that flowed between them, obviously mystified by its nature.
Morgiah gathered herself. “Speaking of arcane knowledge, I have occasion to petition yours. Things have been escalating here in Morrowind. No doubt Bomba ‘Lurrina and Nenya gave you some indication as to the details?”
To her relief, the King did not press the issue. “Briefly. I understand you’re having something of a family tiff.”
Instantly Helseth’s betrayed face flooded before Morgiah’s eyes; with effort, she pushed it away.
“Tiff is an interesting way to put it,” she said wryly. “I’d call it more a tempest. My brother is embroiled in some kind of covert operation, and the more I discover of it, the more I mislike. Bomba ‘Lurrina has confided a most disturbing theory to me; I am eager to get to the bottom of it as soon as possible.”
“Hm,” said the King slowly. “And what, exactly, have you discovered?”
She had already decided this evening’s mess was not worth discussing; it was personal, a family affair. “Bomba ‘Lurrina and Nenya are convinced he is doing something clandestine with golems, although their suspicions seem logistically impossible. I am sure, however, that he is involved in several major recent deaths and disappearances – among those no less than Divyath Fyr and even Vivec.” A small frown appeared between her brows, as if pressed by a knife. “Sire, a
god has disappeared. I cannot possibly fathom what his reasons could be, but his ambition and recklessness have escalated alarmingly since our days in Wayrest. I fear for him, and for what may come of this madness.”
The King was silent for several long moments, a flurry of unspoken activity going on behind the pinpoints in his hood. Then his posture relaxed, and he leaned his head back.
“Ah,” he breathed, like a man who has just quenched a deep thirst. “Divyath Fyr, you say? Yes, that fits – it fits perfectly.”
“Sire?” Morgiah was momentarily thrown off-track.
She felt as if he was smiling again. “For some months now I have been aware of a most intriguingly ferocious presence in the planes of Oblivion. I could not approach close enough to discover its nature, but now I am all but certain. No other mage in Tamriel has the strength of will to achieve such a thing. Divyath Fyr would not give in to murder without a fight, after all, and his aptitude for the arcane rivals even my own.”
Morgiah felt her heart skip a beat. “Ser Fyr is
alive?”“I would say rather in a state of suspension. Your charming brother may have found some way to slip under his guard – Aedra knows how, he must have discovered some truly formidable weapon – but a sorcerer such as Divyath Fyr is not someone you can dispatch with mere blade or poison. He is clinging to the gate of Oblivion with all the strength his aeons have given him, until he finds a way to force himself back through.”
A wild excitement shot through Morgiah. “But this is just what I wanted to ask! Your art, Sire – can you bring him back?”
The King gave a sudden laugh. “It
would be rather fascinating to hear what he has to say, would it not? If Helseth really is behind this bizarre occurrence, Fyr will have all the information you could possibly want. His motives, his means… I must admit, Princess, the intrigue of the situation is not lost on me.”
“When could such a ceremony be performed?”
“Theoretically, in the next few days. I assume you wish to be present?”
“If you would permit it.”
The King steepled his fingers. “It would of course be preferential to undertake the ritual in Scourg Barrow, but I understand from your renewed use of couriers that your usual method of transportation has let you down.”
Morgiah produced the beryl-gem, frowning. “A most inconvenient time for the enchantment to fade. Though I must say, given how much it is used, I find it remarkable the effect lasted so long.”
The King reached out; she placed it in his gloved palm. “I will renew it as soon as possible. In the meantime, it is no great trouble to execute the rite from your end. It will be simple; his spirit is, as I say, at the very threshold of Oblivion. I give my word you will not end up with a ruin of an office. Scourg Barrow is still standing, after all.”
Morgiah smirked. “You mean you
don’t blow it up on a regular basis? One would never think so, judging by the state of the d?cor in the Great Hall.”
The King sighed. “Princess, I am a busy man. Regrettably the perusal of curtain-fabrics is not part of my schedule. If this state of affairs distresses you, you are more than welcome to oversee the refurbishment yourself.”
“Perhaps,” she said airily. “It’s probably my due. After all, were it not for my timely intervention, Scourg Barrow might long ago have been overrun by the Order of Arkay.”
“Ah yes,” he said pensively. “A favour you never asked returned, as I remember.”
Morgiah didn’t answer, but she looked at him, suddenly serious.
“I want you to return it now,” said she.
There was a pause.
“After so long?” said the King slowly, sensing the change in the room. She had looked like this once before: thirty years ago, when she told him her real name in the interview-room at Scourg Barrow.
“Very well,” he said, rising and pacing along the bookcase. “What would you have me do? Name your desire and you shall have it. Are there enemies of yours you wish removed? Should I reveal to you the truths of Necromancy? Or do you want to see outside the mortal plane, where the sun and moons are alive and close enough to touch?”
“No,” said Morgiah. “I want to see you.”
For the second time in all their years of acquaintance, she had said something to which the King of Worms had no reply.
Morgiah didn’t dare move, didn’t dare speak. Were it anyone but she voicing this request, certainly such insolence would mean death on the spot. He had frozen with his back to her, and for a long time neither of them moved; Morgiah’s heart beat so hard against her ribs she felt sure he would hear it. Then she heard another noise that almost made the beat stop altogether – she heard breath.
For a moment she thought it was her own. She had never heard breath from him before. In an instant, she realised that the same glamour that filled his hood with shadow must also have masked the sound of everything but his voice, and in the next moment it hit her: he had done this because breath sounds
alive.He turned around, and her whole body tingled with delirious excitement. The shadow under his hood was no longer black and impenetrable, but a normal shade in which she could just make out the line of a jaw.
Slowly, very slowly, she approached. Her mind was reeling: What would she see? A man? A lich? A daedra? Another being entirely, a body so changed by the immortal planes that it was no longer recognisable as something that had once walked the earth? She was so close now that she could see the shades of candlelight playing across the
something that was under the red cloak.
She stopped, near enough to hear the impossible breathing. She reached up and touched the cloak at either side; he did not stop her. Then she closed her fingers around the cloth, and lowered the hood.
One of the lamps ran short of oil and died out. She didn’t even notice. Time was still, as if the gods were holding their breath.
After what seemed like hours, they moved. She let him leave without a look or a word, as she knew he wanted to.
*
*
A/N: Well, Sierra, you picked up on the "Divyath's hanging on in Oblivion" clue way back in Chapter 21, so here is your acknowledgement... and there will be more to come of it, I can promise you that. 
» Fri Feb 18, 2011 6:42 pm 
I've been waiting a very looong time to finally read that moment. 
