“Wait a moment,” Matthew the priest called out. “I have a question for our mage.”
Kalaman turned back, one eyebrow raised. “Yes?”
“I am trying to determine what may be atop this mount,” the man said quietly, “and something you told me about finding Lord Mortifayne’s amulet has stayed with me ever since. In the ruins, was the air oddly fresh?”
Kalaman frowned. “Gods, no. It was like this place. Decaying flesh, ruined stonework, disembodied wailing and an overwhelming stench.”
“How bizarre. That’s not characteristic of the Direnni at all. Wait… not Direnni, then, but Ayleid: the Ayleid embassy, built by the Direnni millennia ago. You’ve heard of the Alessian slave revolt against the Ayleids of old Cyrodiil? Once that revolt turned its attention to the Direnni Hegemony the Direnni, panicked, gathered what remained of the Ayleid including their so-called “Last King,” Laloriaran Dynar. Working with one or more Daedric princes he turned the Reach into an Oblivionscape of terror. When the Alessians reached the inner sanctum here in the Reach, scholars say, they found a patchwork of human bodies, stitched together from one end of the giant hall to the other.”
Harald shook his head at the torrent of words. “I seem to have failed in my understanding.”
Kalaman tsk’d. “I don’t think I have, however. We’ve seen the echoes of the patchwork of flesh everywhere, especially here. Are you suggesting that this place is where the Last King went?”
Matthew nodded. “I fear that Namira may have brought Dynar here, to this plane of Oblivion.”
“Along with the remnants of all the souls he and his minions flayed in the process. And now they act in concert to return to our world. A disembodied voice said as much to me, when I was retrieving that amulet – but at that time I wasn’t certain what it meant.”
Harald blinked. “Oh! That’s also what that thing we met in Subject Realm 137 meant! It talked about returning to the world, something about a ‘corpse king rotting atop his spire’ and that royalty was emerging from that place. Just before it left it told me we would meet again. The worm will conquer the mountain, it said. I think I’m the worm.”
Matthew frowned. “Then we may well face some intermediate form of a resurrected King Dynar. And if so, that being will be unspeakably powerful. Please be careful. And bring us back as many survivors as you can find.”
Harald cast a tiny spurt of flame. That was the extent of his Destruction magic knowledge, and it wasn’t good enough to fight with; the gigantic roots, though, recoiled at a tiny bit of flame as vigorously as they had Kalaman’s much more expert magic. He grinned, pleased with himself.
“I would have been happy to perform that duty, Harald,” Kalaman said, coming up behind him.
Harald grinned at him. “Yeah, but it’s so satisfying. I’m absolutely not a mage. This much, though, I can do.”
They passed beneath the opened roots. Harald had half expected Kalaman to laugh, to agree that Harald was far more suitable as a warrior, but instead he shook his head.
“I don’t know about that. You have the Voice, Harald, and from what little I’ve seen you’re quite good with it. The Thu’um is an ancient form of magic after all, drawn up from the very bones of the world and channeled through the Tongue who uses it.”
Harald looked down at the surface on which they trod. It was neither stone nor soil here, but rather a thick bed of crushed bones that might have been there forever. He made a face. “Marvellous. I’m happy to ponder the thought that I’ve somehow drawn power from this.”
Kalaman did laugh, then. “Bleak though this may be, remember that it is Oblivion through which we travel. But do not sell yourself short. Your father is said to be quite accomplished with the old magic and it’s clear that you are as well. One can only imagine what some future child of yours might be.”
Harald felt himself flushing, suddenly, and was glad he was facing away from Kalaman as they headed uphill through the gnarled trees and packed bone.
Some future child?
He stopped for a moment and looked around for survivors. His mind, though, was racing, and so was his heart – and he didn’t know why.
“Is everything alright?” Kalaman asked.
The sounds of battle up ahead interrupted them. Two shapes, small and red – flachets – hovered about a third: a familiar, huge man in black armor.
“Sek!” Kalaman cried, casting an armor spell on himself. Harald sprinted ahead, drawing his weapon as he went.
“Come on, keep up!” Sek shouted, slamming his warhammer down on the skull of one of the beasts with a brutal crunch. Harald heard a sound just behind him and whirled to find the other flachet coming straight at him. Startled, he barely managed to fend it off with his shield. In the next moment, though, his enormous downward slice hit the creature just as a fireball from Kalaman struck it. The bones disintegrated into a slick pile on the ground.
Harald removed one gauntlet and wiped his brow. It wasn’t that the flachets were that difficult to defeat, but they were uncanny and gruesome, and flitted about like ice wraiths, and he’d been caught by surprise. As he replaced his gauntlet he approached Sek. He still didn’t trust the man, but Sek was still a warrior and a huge one at that. They needed him in this weird place.
“Come with us, Sek. We’re heading for the tower. Jackos and the Priest are going to meet us there.”
“Aye. Let’s get out of this shithole before it really gets bad. But if I see you turning into one of them, don’t be surprised if you find my hammer up your ass.”
“Delightful,” Kalaman said, patting his robes in a futile attempt to shed some of the gore that had accumulated on them. Harald chuckled, not sure whether the Archmage was referring to the gore, or Sek’s observations. Or both.
Harald led them, uneasily, upward around and under huge vines and rock formations. It was getting darker, and they needed to find the others before light faded completely; there were far too many places here to fall to one’s death.
As they passed beneath a natural bridge, an explosion above them produced a red sphere of energy and waving tendrils. Harald sprinted uphill, looking for the nearest place to reach whatever was happening above him. Someone yelled “I see you, scum!” but he couldn’t tell whether it was Sek or another person atop the bridge. Then came a sound that made his blood run cold.
“The tears end here! Submit, and let rot consume you!” The malevolent croaking meant that whoever else was up there was in real danger. Harald heard cries of pain, but he also heard defiant taunts and the clash of weapons.
The darkness finally revealed at least three spiders on the narrow bridge, trapping the several men in guard attire. Harald Shouted – “IIZ!” – freezing the spider nearest him long enough to do it substantial damage with his shield and sword. Even though the ice didn’t last, the spider was disoriented; Harald finished it before it could respond.
Beyond its carcass were four Arniman guards, two spiders, and a hagraven. The Witchman he’d heard was already down, though there were pools of green poison nearby. As the guards finished off the hagraven one groaned “my gods the stench!” Below the bridge, Kalaman ended a spider that had either come up behind them or fallen from above. There was nothing left for Harald to do but to gather the guards, Sek, Rados and Kalaman, and lead on.
“I found everyone I could,” Harald told Jackos. “No sign of Mek, though.” Or Ulkarin. Gods, I hope he’s alright.
Jackos nodded. “Right. Follow me. We’re ascending this mountain.”
They ran uphill along the pathways of ancient bones, crossing a blood-red waterway by means of a narrow stone bridge, arriving at a collapsed structure fronted by stone stairs and several weeping, poison-spewing, zombie-like beings. Harald’s group was the larger, though; it was quick work to end the zombies, so long as they avoided the poison. A second, steeper, much longer stair ended at the wooden door into a fortress, ruined or perhaps simply corrupted by the Scuttling Void.
Jackos pushed the door. Then he grabbed its hardware, rattled it, and pulled hard. The door stubbornly remained shut.
“Damn,” he growled. “Seems to be locked.” He looked over at Harald. “I heard wind issuing from that cave down there at the foot of the stairs. Must be coming from its other end. Haven’t many options, so we’ll have to take risks. See if you can find another path through this dump.”
Harald prickled at being ordered around again and drew a breath, but Kalaman grabbed him by the arm and interrupted. “I heard it, too,” the mage said. “Let’s go, Harald.”
They were halfway down the stairs before Kalaman whispered to him. “Many pardons. I sensed that you were getting angry and thought it might be best to expedite our departure.”
Harald blew out an impatient breath. “This place is making me crazy, Kalaman. I don’t know how a thing can make no sense and perfect sense at the same time, but it does.”
Kalaman pointed to their right, where thin tendrils of mist blew out through a darkened crack in the meaty surface of the hillside. “I think this is our destination. And for whatever it is worth, I understand your confusion. The people in Arnima and Evermore seem determined to work against their own best interests. That usually means there is someone or something very powerful at work, just out of sight.” He grinned at Harald. “As to your increasing displeasure with being treated like the common rabble, I understand altogether too well. Trust me when I say that no mage of lesser rank calls me anything but Archmage for a very good reason.”
Harald laughed. “Should I address you as Archmage, then?”
“You’re not a mage of lesser rank, so no.” Harald saw a wry grin on the Archmage’s face, not quite hidden by his voluminous hood.
Inside the crack was a passage much like a mine, with support walls at intervals and boardwalks covering partially-flooded areas. That’s where the resemblance ended. The walls were the same slick, reddish, meaty material that comprised the mountain outside, with skeletons adorning every surface. The boardwalks crossed the same dubious liquid as that in the stream outside. The passage ended in a large, round, cistern-like space full of that same “water.”
Harald peered upward. It was too dark to see very far, but thick, intertwined vines hugged the walls in a spiral. He turned to Kalaman and pointed toward them; Kalaman nodded silently. The slippery climb up was, thankfully, brief, and ended at a board-lined, normal-looking dirt and stone tunnel leading to a confusing space next to operating, but red-tainted Dwemer pistons. Red light streamed in ahead of them, its rays ending just short of an empty cage. There were things around the periphery to entice them forward: pages fluttered in one place, a glowing orb floated in another.
“Well,” Kalaman whispered as he came up behind Harald. “You’re right. This makes no sense. Each part on its own is reasonable, but combined? It’s nonsensical.”
But Harald saw what he hoped was the reason they’d come through the slimy tunnels: a door to their left, blocked by a lattice of roots through partial, grisly skeletons. Harald grimaced and brought his sword down several times until the blockage fell to the floor. As he’d hoped, the door took them out onto the landing where Jackos and the others waited.
“We found the way through,” Harald said. “It’s as interesting in there as it is out here.”
“Thanks for putting your neck on the line for us. We should get going, before our luck runs dry.”
To say that the next while was strange would be a vast understatement. Jackos led them back into and up through the fortress. On each level was an Ayleid zombie, glistening red like the mountain itself, each possessed of impressive magic and each seemingly guarding something: tables holding partially-dissected and dismembered human bodies on one level, cages full of zombies on another. The fortress’ exit opened onto another substantial staircase and more of the weird spiders – one of them the most gigantic creature of its type Harald had ever seen.
Jackos approached Harald and pointed up the hill toward an ominous structure wreathed in black mists. “You and Rados must reach the top of that tower. The rest of us will buy you time. The fate of the Reach is on you. I hope to see you on the other side. Now go!”
Kalaman fired the vines blocking their way through a stone underpass, and then he, Harald, and Rados ran toward the tower. Kalaman drew in a sharp breath once they were in full view of the place.
“This looks like the Daedric towers that once dotted the landscape of Vvardenfell!” he said. “No wonder there were pistons in the building below.”
Harald shuddered. “Is this what we saw back in Arnima? The shape is the same…”
Kalaman frowned. “Likely so. The liminal barrier between our world and Oblivion has never been quite the same since the Oblivion Crisis. Perhaps it is especially thin here.”
“Do you boys want to get this done, or what?” Rados snorted. “It’s not exactly the time for a history lesson.”
“You’re right,” Harald said. “I merely needed to catch my breath. Let’s go.”
As with the fortress below, this tower held a fresh horror at each level. Flesh mimics, Kalaman called them, and their appearances could mask their powerful magical attacks. Still, there were three from Tamriel fighting each mimic. With each success, an explosion of magic would open the path forward and up. The final chamber held two mimics – one appearing as a headless mage and the other in the guise of a storm atronach. Harald rushed forward – into a powerful shock spell. His muscles spasmed, his head swam, his heart threatened to stop, and he was forced to fall back in favor of Rados in his enchanted armor and Kalaman, who seemed to be at home attacking these creatures, proclaiming his own superior magic powers.
Harald’s body returned to normal too slowly to help finish the battle. The last Mimic dropped, there was an explosion of magic behind Harald, and he turned to find a chamber encased in a magical barrier like the one outside Evermore, empty of everything but a single pedestal with a red ball of magical energies just above it.
“Portal,” Kalaman whispered. “I don’t know where it leads but I’m certain we need to go through.”
Harald nodded. “If I don’t survive this, Kalaman, please make yourself known to my parents. Let them know I died trying.”
“Nonsense,” Kalaman said. “We’re all making it back home.” Then he gave Harald a sad smile. “But yes. If the worst happens I shall make every effort to comply with your wishes. You’ve more than earned that.”
“Let’s go, then.” Harald activated the portal, and the world went dark.
Before his vision returned, Harald heard a voice, deep and guttural, again reminding him of the mad Witchman he’d encountered first here in the Reach.
“So the married messengers assail us. Neither despair nor decay could halt the march of destiny. Will the story of your flesh end in tragedy or triumph?”
Harald frowned. “You make very little sense. But tell me. Who are you?” He thought he knew the answer. In the next moment, the creature confirmed what they’d all thought.
The creature, a glistening red mer floating up and down like some vile lich, chuckled. “The corporeal was The King, reigning over flesh and mud all the same. In those mortal years my aid was sought after from Mer in the west.”
It spoke slowly; so slowly, in fact, that Harald was able to listen closely even while taking stock of their surroundings. It hovered before a circular platform covered by a transparent dome emitting magic so powerful that even Harald could feel it. Beneath the dome, above the center of the platform, floated a sphere: dark, rotating, with power swirling within.
That’s it: the Sigil Stone Priest Matthew told us we must obtain. It has to be. But how to get it out of that dome?
“Brothers of same flesh, same wants. We combined for the race,” the Last King continued. “Superficial, yet penetrating so deeply.”
“Speak clearly,” Harald snapped. “I haven’t the time for your vague metaphors.” Even as he spoke and awaited its ponderous response, he glanced behind the Last King and saw a sweeping double staircase up to a small, covered platform. Beneath it was a shrine, at which crouched a body – a praying body, but painfully red, flayed alive no doubt.
“Harald!” Kalaman hissed in a whisper just behind Harald’s ear. “That’s a shrine to Namira! and I’d be willing to bet that body is…” The Last King interrupted him.
“Mortals are locked behind the eyes, forever beholden by the spectacle provided. Carnality flows down from these organs – libido, hunger, dominance. I hope the patchwork below has given insight: art etched into the very edifice of this red land. Convention betrayed, the civilized devoured by the subaltern.”
Harald heard Kalaman snort derisively behind him. “Art?” the mage said in the withering tones only an Altmer could generate. “Flayed and terrorized beings, sewn or skewered together? That’s not art. It’s madness. And you have no place in the civilized world!”
“Just the civilized part?” Rados snorted. “I say it has no place anywhere anymore.”
The Last King seemed unperturbed. “Want eating want – a tale you’ve come to know, cattle as you are,” it continued. “Here lies all that’s aberrant, all of nature’s most hated.”
Harald grimaced. “What about Lord Mortifayne? What’s happened to him?”
“Your little lord promised his walls as tribute, an amulet to seal our proposal. As is common with weak fleshed men, he betrayed us. Reconciliation at the last moment has guaranteed an eternity for him within Namira’s embrace. She will rend his soul until the sum of this reality.”
That body… is Mortifayne?
“I knew it!” Kalaman cried. “That amulet was a foul construct. You invaded Arnima and not only took those of us in the courtyard, but pulled the Lord of the city from his very throne!”
Harald had felt his anger building throughout the creature’s pontification, but with this it burst into a full flame. Mortifayne had been pompous, cruel, and corrupt, but even he did not deserve the fate his patron deity had served up for him.
“Enough!” he shouted, a part of his mind wondering where the authority in his voice had come from. “We are taking that stone, like it or not!”
The Last King’s expression did not change. Maybe it could not, given his incomplete, interim state. But Harald could have sworn he heard amusement in its voice when it replied.
“Brash and impulsive the fickle beast becomes. The Dragon and his mistress should have sent more suitable heralds. A waste of flesh.”
“Ha!” Rados snorted. “We’ve got your more suitable Harald right here! Bring it, prick!” The runes of his armor and the swirling sphere of magical energy erupted just as the Last King manifested his own, red, sickly-looking energy. The huge Breton rushed forward to engage the Ayleid king.
Harald was about to follow, but Kalaman grabbed him by the shoulder and pointed toward the top of the stairs. “The hand! Go after that hand! We’ll keep him busy down here!”
Confused, but trusting in Kalaman’s knowledge, Harald nodded and dashed across the space, up the stairs and under the canopy above them. A disembodied, clawed hand hovered in midair, glowing moist and red and surrounded by black smoke like that around the tower. He raised his sword and began pounding the thing as fast and as hard as he could.
Kalaman was right. This feels right. That thing we met – Ambition – it said it was being pulled toward its wants, toward the corpse king rotting atop its mountain. And here he is, the King and his desires and his complete confidence in his own power. This hand is open, extended toward what it wants. Waiting for its prize. Waiting for the King to come into his power and return to Nirn.
He heard the others yelling. “On your ass!” Rados shouted; “I’ll see you burn!” was Kalaman’s response. The King flitted about the place, too quick for even Kalaman’s powerful fire spells to land. Suddenly, painful bolts of red and white lightning streamed from somewhere to Harald’s left, shocking him even as he hammered away at the grisly appendage in front of him.
“Get away from me!” Rados shrieked. Harald wanted to spare him a glance, but he didn’t dare take his attention from the thing before him.
“Futility,” the King croaked.
When the next strike landed, it felt different. Something was different. The King shouted “Get back!” and Harald turned his gaze in that direction. From some reach of time and space – whether his own mind or some other being’s – a voice spoke to him.
The King doubts.
“Now, Harald!” Kalaman roared, while he and his flame atronach continued a barrage of attacks.
Harald located Rados, his bright sphere of righteous magic closing in on the Last King, and he sprinted toward them, shield raised. There was no magic around the Ayleid. The King had doubted, and his shield had dissipated. He could be slain. But just before Harald reached them Rados swung his greatsword round in a huge arc, catching the creature in the leg. Harald watched the blood spray and knew Rados had done damage, but as he raised his own sword there was an explosion followed by a mass of writhing tentacles where the King had been. Rados yelped in surprise; Harald, though, was standing close enough to see that the Ayleid had simply teleported behind Rados.
“Watch out!” he yelled, throwing himself forward and landing his own blow on the creature. Once again there was an explosion of tentacles. It was Harald’s turn to be confused; that is, until yet another loud spell sounded from atop the platform. The King was there, wreathed in magic, standing before the hand of Want.
“Damn it!” Harald yelled. “He’s regenerated it!” He wasn’t sure how he knew that, but he did. It felt different. It felt bad.
Both Harald and Rados ran up the steps again; again, as soon as they attacked, it teleported away. Rados gave chase; Harald turned to the hand and began his attack. It was as though he hadn’t nearly conquered the thing just moments before.
And so it continued, over and over again. He could see that they were damaging the Ayleid, but as soon as they made progress it would teleport back to the hand and regenerate. Harald’s body screamed with fatigue. He saw the sheen of sweat on Kalaman’s brow, even from across the space. He had no idea how Rados, with his full ebony armor, was still moving as briskly as he was. And every time they neared the beast it sprayed them with its corrupted lightning, slowing their progress with painful muscle spasms and, he knew, draining Kalaman’s all-important magicka.
He’d attacked the hand once again. Felt the energy shift. Exhausted, he dashed down the stairs and saw Kalaman, his atronach, and Rados all converging on the Ayleid near the archway closest to Harald. He turned and raised his arm, meaning to attack, feeling the muscles in his arm shuddering. For just a moment he closed his eyes and thought of home.
Shor have mercy on me.
He felt a fireball explode next to him. That was Kalaman.
He heard the whoosh of a blade passing perilously close to his head. That was Rados.
He opened his eyes and struck the slick, red torso before him just as hard as he could.
“NOW, Harald!” Kalaman screamed. “The stone!”
Dazed, Harald turned his head and saw that somehow the dome over the circle had disappeared. The sigil stone had dropped, but the convex outer surface of the platform had kept it near the center. Harald forced himself into motion, ran forward ignoring the shrieks nearby, and scooped the heavy stone up into his arms.
There was an enormous explosion, and the world went red and dark. Harald could hear Kalaman on one side and Rados on the other – and from somewhere near the center a guttural, rasping voice called out.
“Fallen from the womb, crawl, strive. You shall survive. Forward unto the fissure – away from this crushing red. This cord will mark your journey home, this cord will tie us together. Live!”
I know this voice, he thought as his world went dark once again. This is the voice of the thing we met in Subject Area 137, the thing that called me the Liberator. What did it tell me? Oh yes. “We will meet again, liberator, and I will be pleased to see you. The worm will conquer the mountain, as they say!”
He came back to himself inside Mortifayne’s palace, and frowned in confusion. He knew where he was, but couldn’t believe the destruction that had taken place. Vines covered most surfaces, giant green pods like those they’d seen outside pushed up through the floor; blood spatters told of the violence that had wrenched Mortifayne from his own world to a fate Harald could all too easily imagine.
Maybe Mek is dead. We didn’t find him. Maybe…
No. I can’t allow myself to imagine that Ulkarin is gone.
The vines blocked any egress from the building aside from the one directly ahead, so that was where he went: through the door and out into what was left of Arnima.
The sun was out. Whereas there had been a cacophony of noise before they’d entered Oblivion, the place was now eerily quiet. As Harald moved forward, dazed, one of the grotesque spiders dropped from the skies above to land, lifeless, below him. He slowly descended from the palace.
“You made it!” It was Horustair, King Sigmayne’s personal knight, standing with Matthew and Rados, who had both, somehow, come back intact. “By the gods I didn’t believe you’d conquer that evil. Those creatures just collapsed as soon as you came through, how did you do it?”
“I…” Harald tried to formulate an answer, but nothing would come as his gaze snapped from side to side, looking for the others. Sek ran up from the lower landing; so that was good, at least one other had made it. But where is Jackos? And Kalaman? And Ulkarin? “I’m not entirely sure,” he finished lamely.
“How many are left? What’s the damage?” Matthew asked quietly, his voice quavering. “Forgive me; the body still trembles. It wasn’t I who sealed that rift, it was our friends here. Their selflessness for such a hopeless people is more than any words of mine can describe.”
“Of course!” Horustair exclaimed. “I can’t… We can’t thank you enough for the perils you’ve been through. I’ll make sure that you two will be knighted for this triumph.”
Rados heaved a sigh. “Not sure any title could make up for the things I saw in that terrible realm. Before any celebrations… let me have a rest.”
“A rest well earned!” Horustair proclaimed. “But your friend here may still have energy.” He turned to Harald, beaming from ear to ear, looking every inch a knight.
A knight who has never needed to fight his way through rivers of blood and mountains made of rotting flesh and pulverized bone. Gods, I’m tired.
“Head into the King’s Hall, and your knighthood will be immediately awarded!” And with that, the gleaming knight started toward the gates of the tainted city of Arnima, to return to Evermore. As he did, another familiar figure ran past and down the stairs.
So Jackos made it out, too. Good. They’ll need him here.
Matthew faced him. “Becoming a knight is a great honor for anyone, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone attain such a privilege without being conscripted. But it is the least you should be compensated for: the toll on all our minds was great. I’m sure the nine were watching over us there. Farewell.” With that, the Priest descended the lower stair, returning to his church.
The Nine? No. Well, maybe they were; Father would surely tell me it was Talos who guarded me. And maybe he did, on Father’s behalf. But as to my own, it was Shor. I know it.
“Let’s go settle at the inn for a bit,” came a familiar voice behind Harald. “My legs are begging for a rest.”
Harald whirled. “Tiny!” He ran to his friend, clapping him on the shoulders in joy. “Shor’s sacred bones, I thought you were… well, I didn’t know what to think. I feared the worst.”
“Nah,” the big man said. “Well, ok, I’ll admit I thought the same of you. Couldn’t believe you all headed for that Oblivion gate like you were going sightseeing.” He grinned. “Not that we didn’t have plenty to keep us busy on this side. But I’m glad you’re back. At least you got a title out of it, right?”
“That’s the last thing on my mind. I’m worried about Kalaman. Have you seen him? If he somehow got left behind I’ll…”
“I don’t know whether to be grateful for your concern or offended that you didn’t see me here,” the cultured mage interrupted. “Although I am seated, and there were a great many very large Bretons between us.” The Archmage heaved himself slowly up from a chair beyond where Horustair and Rados had stood.
Harald’s legs nearly gave out. “Kalaman. Thank the gods.”
The Archmage grinned. “I am in complete and utter agreement with Rados, and with our tiny friend Ulkarin. I could go for a pint right about now. Shall we?”
Harald smiled. The mer had carried as much, if not more of the heavy load as he had himself.
“We shall.”