Aw, that was a sweet piece; I enjoyed the look into Niamh and Luciana's relationship, and it's quite warming to see a couple as different and unusual as they are still being close together. The accent was maybe laid on a bit thick for me, at points, and I kept having to pause to work out what Niamh was saying, but apart from that the piece actually worked very wel and if you hadn't said that it was a spur of ht emoment thing that you'd just put together, I'd have never have thought it.

Oooh...They were excellent...

That armours well funky!!... ...

Loved the stories...Loved the whole description of the loveliness around Anvil and then the frying of the vampire... ...

That with the stone and the head in the second one was a wee bit ouchie... ...

And the third one was lovely...

Though I can see Mustard's point, I will also say that I didnae ha' a problem wi' it either...Ya ken?... ...

Brilliant writing, as ever...Always a bloody good read...In so many ways... ...

Oh, one question though...Niamh's always been Oirish as far as I can tell...Yet this in this last one, her accent seemed ta heed up north ta Alba a wee while...Not a complaint at all, I'm just wondering where she's at from your point of view?...

Brilliant...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

Heh, you know what, I know what you mean! Thing is she is oirish but when it's transcribed its more generally gaelic/celtic. Its just the way it comes across really...

(This is the revelatory section of Niamh's story, where we find that she really is not what she seems, as much of a surprise to her, mark you.
Note that the Old Tongue is analogous to Irish in our world, the translation for the "Old" sections can be found in the bracketed italicised sections).

PART II: Niamh.

She was floating, suspended in the chill, clear waters of the lake, her body submerged. She had been under the water for some minutes now and her lungs felt swollen, fit to burst.
She would not surface, though, rather she would stay here in this non-space; her body slowly becoming numb, her mind fleeing from the reality in which she found herself, fleeing from a truth she could not process.
And so she hung there, arms and legs outstretched, back arched; at peace.

Presently a final stream of bubbles exploded upwards from her nose and, strange slit-eyes still open, her lithe body drifted limply upwards to float upon the surface of the water...

----

ONE DAY EARLIER:
"Beldanne, chomaoin agat dom roinnt eolais."
(Beldanne, you owe me some information)
"Chomain mé tú rud ar bith, Niamh, nach bhfuil mé a dúirt tú roimh."
(I owe you nothing, Niamh, that I have not told you before)
"Ach níl a fhios agam cad a dúirt tú dom!"
(But I do not know what you told me!)
The tall woman with the moonlight skin laughed, "Ah, ach go bhfuil toisc nach raibh tú ag éisteacht..."
(Ah, but that is because you did not listen)

How she had ended up at the house, high up in the Valus Mountains, was as much a mystery to Niamh as pretty much anything else that had happened to her over the past few days, certainly she had not set out for it, she'd set out for a different destination entirely.
The problem had been that hitherto clear paths had grown confusing, maze-like, eventually it had dawned on her that the more she tried to get away, the further into the paths she was drawn, and so eventually she followed them until, some undefined time later, she had arrived at the door to the house; a simple two-storey affair it seemed, stone construction, small windows to minimise the chill from the brisk mountain air.
It had seemed that way from the outside anyway.

There being nothing else to do, she had placed a gloved hand on the door handle, as she had done so, a name flashed into her mind; a memory from long ago.
"Beldanne."
Simultaneously a voice from inside, youthful-sounding and strong had said; "Tar isteach, Niamh."
(Come in, Niamh)
And so she had.

Across the room from the door at which she stood, a room considerably larger than the outside appeared to be, stood a woman of maybe forty seasons, provocatively clothed in a plunging black silk dress. Her skin was pale, paler even than Niamh's and her long, lustrous black hair fell about her shoulders and down to her waist in delicate ringlets. Long bladelike ears, be-ringed like the Bosmer's stood out from the side of her head, angled backwards.
To her right was another female, shorter and darker in complexion, younger, her hair cut boyishly short, dressed like a doll and with the vacant stare of the heavily drugged.

They regarded each other for a moment, Niamh and Beldanne, and as the latter turned her chiseled, angular face with it's yellow eyes upon her, Niamh knew that she knew her, or had known her, once.
The air was heavy with the scent of unseen flowers and full of the sound of birds and insects, none of which Niamh could catch sight of, the walls disappeared into blackness above her. The room appeared strangely unfinished to her eyes, although it shifted in a strangely pulsing light as if it were being newly created with each moment so that new details came and went in the corners of her vision.

"Bheadh beannacht a beith deas." Husked Beldanne, a smile flickering over her lusciously plump lips.
(A greeting would be nice.)
"Beldanne, ní dóigh liom go bhfuil am chun é seo!" Niamh slashed her hand downwards across her chest, looked at her meaningfully, although inside she was increasingly perplexed at the feeling of "Knowing", of ...familiarity.
(Beldanne, I do not have time for this!)
"Ansin a dhéanamh am, Niamh." Beldanne chuckled throatily; her companion moved closer to her, a strange halfsmile on her perfect face. "Tá tú difriúil; ooh do shúile, " Beldanne looked more intently at niamh's face, raising an eyebrow. "ach tá rud éigin nios mó..." Her voice tailed off for a moment then, head cocked on one side; "Aah, tuigim anois..."
(Then make time, Niamh.)(You are different; ooh your eyes,)(but there is something more... Aah, now I understand...)

Niamh looked at her, eyes narrowed in distrustful puzzlement. "Cad, cad a dhéanann tú a thuiscint? Cén chaoi a bhfuil a fhios agat dom?"
(What, what do you understand? How do you know me?)
Beldanne grinned infuriatingly at her and waved a hand casually in her direction, there was the wafted scent of lillies. "Nach bhfuil tú cad a bhí tú mar sin le déanaí anuas, ach níl a fhios agat cad tá tú..." She breathed softly, ignoring Niamh's second question.
(That you are not what you were so recently past, yet you know not what you are...)
The Bosmer clenched her fists, looked at the marbled floor, back up to the other; "Ná labhair liom i tomhaiseanna, Beldanne!"
(Do not talk to me in riddles, Beldanne!)

Beldanne regarded her intently for moment, then a single shake of her head; "Beidh muid ag labhairt sa teanga coitianta, nach bhfuil tú ag dul ar an óráid d'aois" She held her hand out palm downwards, slashed across her body.
(We will talk in the common tongue, you do not deserve the old speech.)
Niamh shook her head; motioned with it towards the other female, currently staring vacantly in the general direction of the two women.
There was a faint tinkling sound and the scent of almonds and cinnamon wafted past the Wood Elf, the light had dimmed to a lambent rainbow glow seemingly coming from the walls themselves.
"Cad ni mor duinn a labhairt de nach bhfuil an leithead di." She jerked a finger at Beldanne's companion, then, standing straight and sticking her chin out she said "Agus níos mó, beidh mé a chinneadh cé acu a úsáid mé an sean urlabhra agat - a bhfuil tú a insint dom seo?"
(What we must speak of is not for her.)(And more, I will decide whether I use the old speech not you - who are you to tell me this?)
Beldanne shrugged. "Is féidir linn a labhairt os a comhair, tá mé aon rúin ó mo... comhpháirtíochta: Keleveth." She grinned wickedly, once again ignoring Niamh's question.
(We can speak before her, I have no secrets from my... partner: Keleveth)

Niamh shook her head, turned to look at Beldanne's partner. Keleveth gazed blankly back at her with eyes so glassy they may as well have been cut from diamonds.
"Cé chomh fada agus beidh tú a choinneail ar an bréagán beag do?" Even as she said it, she had no clear idea why she was even having the conversation in the first place, though she knew Beldanne was merely amusing herself.
(How long will you keep this little toy for?)
Beldanne shrugged, motioned to Niamh to follow her, she walked on silent feet towards the now curved backwall of the house.
"Go dti go bhfuil mé ag leamh." She said lightly over her shoulder.
(Until I am bored.)
Niamh, following her at a wary distance, said with a sneer; "Tá tú i gcónaí grá do pheataí."
(You always did love your pets)

Beldanne rounded on her then, seeming to grow and fill the space before the Bosmer. Niamh took a step back as Beldanne pointed a perfectly manicured finger at her; "Dhá caighdeain!" She shrank again, cocked her long head to one side. "...Cén chaoi a bhfuil an maid teach osta ag an mbealach?"
(Hypocrite!)(...how is the barmaid by the way?)
Niamh could feel her patience wearing thin, adding to the confusion and frustration that was building within her; anger rose in her at the thought of this woman's knowledge of Luciana.
"Fhágann tú í amach as seo." She growled.
(You leave her out of this.)

There was a pause, then; "Heh, go leor comhrá." Beldanne pursed her lips in an expression of smug amusement, as if a point had been scored. "Arís, beidh mé ag labhairt gan níos mó a thabhairt duit ar an teanga d'aois, agus sa bhreis ar..."
(Heh, enough conversation.)(Again, I will speak no more to you in the old tongue, and besides...)
Niamh felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up, had the temperature dropped?
"Besides, wut?" She asked, unable to keep a quaver from her voice.

Beldanne looked away for a moment, her yellow eyes staring into space, as if thinking of what to say, finally she sighed; turned back to Niamh.
"Ni ba chóir duit tar éis teacht anseo; ba chóir an fhirinne de tú tar éis fanacht faoi thalamh, agus ba chóir duit a bheith curtha leis, Niamh."
(You should never have come here; the truth of you should have stayed buried, and you should have been buried with it, Niamh.)
Niamh shook her head as if to clear it, her eyebrows beetling in a frown. "Cad é?"
(What?)
A bench cushioned with black velvet had appeared, Beldanne sat down on it, her dress splitting open to reveal her perfect legs as she crossed them; enveloped in delicate mesh, their white skin revealed in diamonds between dark threads; she motioned to Keleveth. "Fetch us wine, an' be quick, eh?"
Turning her attention back to Niamh, she looked up at her, an expression of resignation on her face. "Ach, tá mé ag súil agat. Luaithe nó níos déanaí a fhios agam go mbeadh tú ag teacht; cé nach raibh a fhios agam an whys agus wherefores. Táim ag obair amach go leor cé go. Mar sin..."
(But, I have expected you. Sooner or later I knew you would come; though I knew not the whys and wherefores. I have worked out enough though. So...)
She turned to Niamh then, directed her gaze upon her, long years - longer ever than Niamh would see even in her lifetime - radiated from those eyes. Niamh shuddered; so familiar she was - they had met before.
"...now." Said Beldanne, her common tongue a rich brogue. "Ye hae questions...?"

----

There was nothing for the Bosmer to do but sit down with Beldanne. The two women regarded each other for a moment, then; "Why do ah know ye so wull, an' what d'ye know o' me, an' how?"
Gods how she hated her, and yet the question again; how did she even know her?
She had just had a conversation with a woman who appeared to exist like a beacon in her memory, whom she knew that she knew, but yet she knew not how she knew her nor what had passed, hitherto, between them.
Confusion held its fists tightly against the door of Niamh's understanding.

Beldanne regarded her for a moment. "Yeh drank the bluid, di'nt yeh, Niamh?" She chuckled, "that's how ye know ye're not jes' a waif 'n' stray fro' the slave markets, eh?"
Again there was a pause, Niamh shifted impatiently.

Keleveth brought the wine, Niamh refused. "I'll tek nuthin' from ye." She said quietly.
"'Ceptin' what ah know." Beldanne took a sip of wine, sat forward. "What ah know o' ye is as poisonous as any thing that mayhap be in this wine, Niamh Esher..." She whispered, her lips pert and oh so full.
Niamh set her own lips in a thin line. "Tell meh, an' be done wi' this gamin'."

Beldanne regarded her a moment, then; "Here's the truth o' it, Niamh, here's yer birthright."

And she told her.

----

"Alls ye know is a lie, ye are a Bosmer right enough, but only in part - you were born there, an' ye father, he was, in part.
"Ye are the child o' many parents, Niamh, formed from a conjunction of an Elven priestess and the bluid of many fathers, only one of whom, the Wood Elf, proved worthy enough to come through, to rise above, to be a part o' ye - the part ye recognise as ye're ancestry.

Niamh gaped at her. "How...?"

Beldanne's mouth twisted up in a parody of a lopsided grin. "Ah wus there; No," she said, holding up a hand, "Ye're no from me, Niamhy mah sweet - although ye hae met wuth me many times in yer dreams an' sumtimes also in yer wakin' life, though o' that ye hae only vague recall." Beldanne laughed once, harshly; "Nay, ye're from a rite, a rite te create a being o' power and strength, formed fro' bluid and the substance o' the body o' the priestess who submitted hersel' to the rite, teh Mah Rite." Beldanne tapped the point of a long finger at her chest, between her breasts. She looked balefully at the Bosmer. "She gave ever'thin' fer me - fer suthin' Amazin'... An' ah got ye."
There was a sneer then.
"A pale spindly thing o' shadows an' porcelain. A thing with nay grace nor any power, none that she cuild use, nor I." She pointed at Niamh. "You."

Niamh was speechless, she slumped in her chair, her mouth agape, eyes staring blankly at the now marbled floor of the room. She felt as if all the air had been sucked from her lungs, as if all the substance had been drawn from her; her heart pounded in her chest but no blood seemed to flow in her veins nor any life exist in her. A dry husk she was, bereft of all feeling and any sensation.
Slowly, with immense effort, she turned her face to the other woman.
"Tá mé rud ar bith, botún?" She gasped, her voice papery.
(I am nothing? A mistake?)
"Aye, Niamhy." Beldanne looked at her, her voice soft. "Ye shuild nay be. I hae watched ye grow an' ye hae done so well, in the end 'gainst all a mah expectations; Buit Niamh, ye are not..." she cupped her hands, one atop the other, as if holding something, "...ye dinnae belong here, ye are no' o' thus world, Niamh."

The Bosmer took in a deep, trembling breath. vaguely she realised that tears were streaming down her face, her mouth was full of the salt taste of them. She sniffed.
"But the bluid, ah drank it an' it made meh strong..." Her voice was thick with emotion, her eyes, strange now in her head and no longer the deep chestnut they once were, felt sore and aching. "Suthin' is in mah heart! Ah can feel it there." She turned her pale face with it's strange eyes upon the other. "Cad tá mé?"
(What am I?)

Beldanne laughed.
"Aye, the bluid, it awakened suthin' in ye fer sure, 'tis also why ye hae a thing about Wampyres, they are o' the bluid, same as ye, d'ye no remember yon Patriarch, huh? He knew ye fer wut ye were; aye he did." her voice softened again. "Told me he did, ye came back fer more that time, he said," she waggled a finger at the Wood Elf, "buit he bested ye twice coz ye were no as strong as ye thought." She sat back in the seat, cocked her head; "Naow? Who knows..."

There was a pause, Beldanne watched Niamh, her expression now one of pity. Niamh snuffled, looked at her. Beldanne shook her head and smiled ruefully.
"As fer wut ye are..." she struggled to find the right word for a moment, "ye are a Spiorad, an Aos Sí. A creature o' great power in her proppa place, aye, but not of thus world, nay." She shook her head, looked at the stricken creature in front of her. "'Twer better that ye were finished when first ye were made, but ah couldnae bring mesel' tae do it, so ah took ye an' ah hid ye, an' ah disguised wut ye were wuth glamours an' spells an ah put ye out tae folks who would take ye on."
She paused then, took a sip of wine.
"Ach beidh fola amach, they say; so 'twas with you Niamh, ye cannae hide wut ye are, an' so tis - ye hae got suthin' yet dinnae ken the use fer it, an' thus world hasnae use fer ye - ye're groundless wutevva ye try teh dae, ye'll nevva be right an' ye'll allus be nuthin' more than some strange thing wuth strange dreams, an' a drifter an' death wul follow ye." She leant forward then, pointing a finger at the Bosmer; "E'en the Daedra wul hunt fer ye, e'en so they wul fear ye and hate ye cuz ye are no' e'en like they are - fiú i measc na n-filth tá tú rud brocach. Cuz Ye Were Nevva. Meant. Teh. Be."
(But blood will out)(Even amongst their filth you are a filthy thing)

There was a silence, but for Niamh sobbing quietly.
"An' that's it." Said Beldanne. "Ye shuildnae exist but fer me; a mistake, now, perhaps. An yet ah dae pity ye - an eternity awaits ye, empty and silent. Ah cannae kill ye now ah see ye, jes' like ah cuildnae then, though 'twould be a mercy fer sure..."

The air smelt faintly of cinnamon, Niamh brushed a butterfly away from her tear-stained face, wiped her eyes, swallowed hard.
She turned her changed gaze upon the other woman then, and in doing so sensed there was no life force there in her, nothing. Beldanne was as empty a vessel as a drained bottle of wine.
Niamh knew then that whatever she was, herself, she was at least Alive; Lifeforce flowed in her, Through Her; heated her skin, gave her meaning and passion. Beldanne was a dead shell, had always been; a glamour only, overlaying a husk, as frail as a dandelion clock, or butterfly wings.
No wonder Keleveth was drugged.

The revelation gave her strength, bore her up from the black depths of a dark ocean of thick meaningless despair.
Taking a deep breath, Niamh sat up straight.
"I'll not go intae the dark, fer all ye're sayin'. Ah hae tae much tae to do, naow, Ah hae a Life - it ain't much but it's suthin'; a start." She bared her teeth at the other, "Ah hae got ye pegged, Beldanne."

The other sat back and laughed at that. "Oh ye have have ye? Heh, well mebbe, but wut life? Heh." She leant forward, arms resting on her thighs, "Wut life? Ye lie an' cheat and kill. Ye'll ne'er be anythin' else than wut ye are."
Niamh stood up, took a step towards the woman, suddenly filled with strength and righteous anger. Beldanne sat back, regarding her through hooded eyes, like some cornered thing unsure of the turn of events.
"Beidh mé cad tá mé agus beidh mé a bheith bródúil agus láidir!"
(I will be what I am and I will be Proud and Strong!)

Beldanne stared at her for a moment, her eyes wide, then she sucked at her teeth, said; "Aye, mebbe you will be at that, but ye'll ne'er prosper Niamh - ye are no' o' thus world, so ye cannae evva be a part o' it, proper."
Niamh clenched her fists, glared balefully at the other woman, "Ba chóir dom a deireadh tú, beidh mé deireadh tú..."
(I should end you, I will end you)
"Mebbe ye shuild, mebbe ye cuild, an' mebbe ah deserve it, but ye wull no do fer me." Beldanne stood up, looked down at Niamh, her yellow eyes bright. "Ah hae seen mah death, an it ain't fro' ye."

Niamh nodded her head towards Keleveth.
"Tá go leor bealaí a thabhairt iseal duine éigin," she grinned nastily, her canines glinting in the now-green light, "b'fheidir go mbeidh do madra beag a fhoglaim chun eagla,roim dheireadh..."
(There are many ways to bring someone low,)(maybe your little puppy will learn to fear before the end.)
Beldanne, facing her, hissed; "Bain triail as agus a fheiceáil conas tú cothrom, créatúr beag, is féidir liom a dhéanamh dom i gcónaí ceann eile."
(Try it and see how you fair, little creature, I can always make me another one.)

Niamh laughed then, short and sharp. "We'll see."

----

But that was a lifetime ago, here in the lake.

Her body twitched, briefly.

-END-

Fair dues...Wow...That's some proper origins right there... ...

So if another race had had stronger genes, she could have been a Nord...Wow...

Fantastic idea...Loved all the Old Speech stuff...(The translation was welcome... ...)...

That was a proper epic tale...And yet, very sad...After her defiant speech to Beldane, she'd gone and offed herself anyways...

You like killing her off then?... ...

Anyways, excellent stuff...

Loved it...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

Thank you

-SEARCHING-

It had been too long, too long by far....

...In the darkness, a figure crept quietly along the wooden planking until it reached Niamh's empty, locked house. Producing a set of lockpicks it fumbled in the lock with them for a period of time until it heard a faint click. Looking around for a moment to ensure it was unseen, the figure crept inside and moved to the closet where Niamh kept the locked chest containing all that was most valuable to her.
--
The door opened, and the thief crept out, shutting the door quietly. Crouching, it made as if to move away.
"Oh no you don't." said a gruff voice quietly. Another figure stepped out of the shadows and held up a dim lantern.
Eyes saucer-wide in fright, Luciana looked up at Bogrum Gro-Galash.
"What...?" She whispered, standing up.
"Keep it down!" Hissed the Orc, shading the lantern.
"I'm going to find her... I... just needed funds. For a horse, and... things..." She stared at him in the dim light, eyes shining; face set in a mask of determination.
"Luciana..." Began Gro-Galash.
"Don't try and stop me!" She hissed.

Bogrum shook his head, "I weren't gonna." He said. "I'm comin' with ya, to help."
Luciana looked at him, perplexed. "Why...?"
"I may just be landlord o' that Lodge yonder, " he said, indicating The Lonely Suitor, "but I ain't blind. I've seen how much you've suffered, and her too - before she ever met you. I dunno." He shrugged. "I feel like I must do this, for both of ya."
he looked at her with a faintly embarrassed expression. Despite everything, Luciana had to smile.
"So be it." She said. "But we better hurry, something bad has happened, I can feel it..."

----

It was some days later.
Luciana and Bogrum had journeyed north, following Niamh's trail as far as was possible, asking at inns and scattered farms along the way; resorting to guesswork when they had no answers, which was unfortunately all too often.
Luciana had an idea of where her partner was headed, but only insofar as it was somewhere to the north of Cheydinhal.

Few people, it seemed, had seen her and she certainly had not stopped at any of the inns or rest stops along the way; at least not anywhere where anyone would have noticed...

Luciana and the Orc had crossed the Niben at the causeway bridge, to the north of which sat the Imperial City upon its island in the midst of Lake Rumare, its White Gold Tower gleaming in the light of the westering sun.

Though a breton, Luciana had been born and raised in Bravil and had spent much of her life both as a child and as an adult around that town and it's immediate environs, aside from the (very) occasional trip south to Leyawiin, she was now as far away from Bravil - her home - as she had ever been; indeed this was the first time she had ever seen the seat of the Emperor, though as with anyone in Cyrodiil, she had heard much about it in tales and stories.

Bogrum had visited however, he had a brother who was a bodyguard there, plying his trade in the Merchants' Quarter.
"It's still a grand place, " he husked through a mouthful of teeth, "but old now, feels... like old glories, fading away."
Luciana had to agree with him, to her it did indeed look as though it possessed a kind of faded grandeur, a slightly melancholy air; but maybe that was just her mood.

They paused for a little, in the centre of the bridge, and looked to the City, each lost in his or her own thoughts, whilst far beneath them the river flowed noisily and unceasingly around the massive stone piers that supported the causeway, on past Bravil, and down to the ocean in the south and from thence to who knew where.

Finally she turned her face away and looked to the east along the bridge to the path, their path, winding east into the trees.
It was long past noon, and although the sun was still shining brightly from a clear sky, within her heart there was a cloud and a shadow that even it, with all it's promise, could not drive away.
"We'll find 'er." Rumbled her companion, watching her and speaking as if reading her thoughts.
She didn't look at him, but only said; "We'd best be getting on, the day is drawing away."

----

Now they were at Cheydinhal. By a stroke of luck they had found Niamh's horse, it had been stabled there.
"Jes' turned up couple of days back." Said Mivryna the stable girl. "If'n ye wanna claim him ye can - but the boss'll be needing some coin from ya."
As far as could be ascertained, the horse had found it's way down from the highlands to the north of the city. The fact that it had arrived riderless had however only served to fuel Looch's abiding sense of unease, where it lay leaden and heavy in the pit of her belly.

Bogrum had insisted on their staying in the town for the night even if they left early the following morning, it would give him time to make enquiries, he said; but in reality he could see that Luciana needed both rest and food.
She had, he knew, barely slept or eaten during their journey thus far and often he had awakened from his slumber to find her staring pensively northwards, eyes bright and moist, chewing upon her lower lip in unconscious imitation of the Bosmer whom she sought.

Despite her remonstrances on the subject of them staying, Luciana eventually had to admit that if nothing else she did indeed need her sleep, and in the end went - more or less graciously - up to the room that Bogrum had rented for her in Newlands Lodge; a more frugal alternative for the cash-strapped traveller to the rather more upperclass Cheydinhal Bridge Inn.
"Thank you for everything, " she said, looking up at Bogrum, "you have been a good friend, when I needed one the most."
"Eh." He said gruffly, and not without a little embarrassment. "We're not through yet, Luciana, thank me at the end. For now, get some sleep; I'll see what there is to see."
Luciana watched him leave, then took herself to the room, undressed, and gratefully climbed into the bed. Soon, despite all her expectatins to the contrary, she was fast asleep.

----

When Bogrum knocked on her door early the next morning she was already up and dressed and rinsing her face in a bowl of cold water on the washstand. She bade the Orc come in and tell her what he had managed to find out.

It was not much.
He had been unable to make his enquiries too overt due to not wanting to attract the attention of the city watch. What he had managed to confirm however was that the Orc tradesman who had told his tale in Bravil had been right, and the events had happened much as he had described them.
"At least we know we've been headin' right." Said Bogrum, looking to extract at least a crumb of comfort from the news, as frustratingly sparse as it was.
"I suppose, " said Luciana, "there's that at least."

Before setting off that morning, Luciana visited Mach-Na's bookstore and purchased a map of the local area. After some searching, she managed to locate Walker Camp.
It was up in the Valus Mountains, above the city; somewhat to the north. A little more searching and the two of them were able to trace roughly at least some of the route that Luciana's lover had taken.

With a shaking finger the breton traced a path; Lord Rugdumph's estate then; "That other place the trader mentioned might have been here." She said, pointing out another campsite marked a ways to the north and east of the estate.
"We know, " she continued, "that those Camona Tong were here." She placed the tip of a finger over Walker Camp, not far to the north of Fanacas, the Ayleid ruins that gloomed in the hills above Cheydinhal.

"At least they marked the camps." She said, folding the map so that the locations they had discovered were visible.
"True, " replied Bogrum, "they do it so ye know where the bandits are, but these are only the ones that the Watch know about, mind."

Twenty minutes later they set off, taking the path that wound up from the town into the hills, becoming a rutted and unmarked track as it climbed higher; they had decided to start their search at the last place they thought that Niamh might have been at - Walker Camp.
The sky was a crystal clear blue, the sun beaming down upon them.

As they climbed, the air became progressively crisper, though the sun was still hot. Vegetation, aside from the ever-present pines, was low and scrubby, clinging to the hard and rocky earth.

They travelled silently, Luciana was too preoccupied with what they might find to engage in conversation and Bogrum respected that, and besides out of his comfort zone of the Suitor back in Bravil, with a woman searching for her lost love in the mountains far to the north, he knew that any conversation would be awkward at best.

----

It was mid-afternoon when they reached the camp. They had bypassed the ruins of Fanacas, bearing away to the west of them, although even from a distance they could still hear the faint tinkling of the mysterious well that sat, shining in the sun, next to the ancient settlement.

At Bogrum's suggestion they left the horses out of sight below the rise upon which the camp was situated. Creeping up the hard-packed rock and soil slope they lay down and peered over the top.
The camp was silent, the fire cold.
"Seems deserted." Whispered Luciana.

After a final check, they picked themselves up and walked across the small area of scrubby earth to the two tents, situated opposite each other, the long-extinguished cooking fire between them.

The campsite was indeed truly deserted, even the corpses of the Camona gang members appeared to have been removed, although evidence of their prescence lay strewn about - weapons, some armour, a few clothes.
Luciana elected to look around the camp whilst Bogrum headed a little north, over another ridge at the camp's rear.

"There's a lake over 'ere!" He called over his shoulder, his words coming sharply in the clear mountain air.
Luciana, who had headed towards the larger of the two tents, stopped dead in her tracks.
"Niamh!" She cried out, and turning, ran to and past the startled Orc, who followed after her, a puzzled look on his face.

"What's the matter?" He asked her when he had caught up. Luciana was standing at the water's edge, staring into the lake's crystal clear depths.
She shook her head, turned to him. "Nothing." A half-smile played on her face. "I just... I just half expected to find her floating face down in the water..."
Bogrum looked down at her. "Do ya think...?"
Luciana shrugged, looking hopeless. "I don't know, Bogrum." She said quietly. "She was never exactly stable on her good days; who knows what she might have done."
Her face seemed to collapse in upon itself then, and she started to cry, holding a hand over her mouth. She looked up at Bogrum, tears streaming down her face from red eyes.
"I miss her. I miss her So Much. I just, I just don't know what has happened to her... I hope for something, " she coughed, a sob caught in her throat, "for anything."
She swallowed, took a deep, shivering breath; "I am sorry, Bogrum." She snuffled, wiping her nose on the back of her sleeve.
The Orc placed a large meaty hand upon her shoulder, squeezed it awkwardly.
They stood in silence for a moment, the water lapping at their feet.

Presently they made their way back to the camp. Luciana began to pick through the scattered debris and the contents of the two tents, more to give herself something to do than because she thought that she might find something.

After some moments, she heard the Orc's gruff voice calling her name. She turned and walked across to him on legs suddenly wooden and uncooperative.
"I was thinkin', " Said her companion as she approached. "she's been goin' south, now she could've gone to them ruins down there a ways, Fanacas. Maybe."
Hardly daring to hope, Luciana said "Let's go and look..."

The shadows were lengthening and the evening was becoming chill as they made their way carefully down the slope to the ancient settlement, now tumbled and decayed. Looch had a feeling they were headed in the right direction, but this was tempered by a growing dread that she was not going to like what she found.
Her heart was pounding against her ribs as they reached the marbled entryway to the underground ruins.

As she rounded the dusk-shadowed corner of the sidewall, she stopped so suddenly that Bogrum, who had been listening to the musical tinkling of the nearby well, almost walked into her.
"These are her things." Said Looch, her voice flat but underlaid with a trembling quaver. She pointed at the ground.

Strewn around on the grassy soil outside the door were various items, undoubtedly her partner's; the stealth suit and gloves, a skeleton key, potions; all thrown away as it seemed with uncaring abandon, almost as if...
Looch raised a trembling hand to her face, touching her cheek with shaking fingertips. "Something terrible has happened, " she breathed, "it's as if..."

"Now now..." Said Bogrum. "You don't know that much, but we DO know she is in trouble." He gestured at the forbidding stone door. "I reckon that she has gone into there, quickly now - but be careful, " he warned, looking at Luciana earnestly, "there's all sorts of things in these places, they say."
He realised the inappropriateness of the comment even as he said it. "Sorry." He said, looking at Luciana, but she had that same determined expression he had seen on her face when he had stopped her all those days ago outside Niamh's house, at the start of their search.
"Let's go in." Was all that she said.

----

The atrium beyond the door was lit with a strange fluctuating light, silvery-blue; lambent and soft in itself, it showed up the ancient marble walls, floor, and ceiling in sharp relief.
The atmosphere was moist and there was a smell of damp stonework. From somewhere below them came the sound of water lapping; faint splashes.

From the atrium there descended a short flight of shadowed steps, down to what appeared to be another level, lit by the same ambient glow.
The walls, centuries old, were pocked and stained; around the two of them came the quiet scurrying of small creatures.

None of this made much of an impression on either of the pair however, for all of their attention was fixed upon the very bottom of the steps, and what could be seen in the light that pooled there.

It was a pale, skinny arm with a long fingered hand at the end of it lying, palm up, upon the cold stone floor.

-END-

-RESCUE: PART I-

"Niamh!" Luciana, uncaring of any danger, ran down the steps; her only desire in that one moment was to get to the figure at the bottom.

She arrived two steps in front of Bogrum who, caught unawares by her sudden move had to bound after her, drawing his shortsword as he did so,
"Careful Luciana! You dunno know what else is here!"
The other's attention was fixed on the naked figure slumped awkwardly on the floor, half-propped against a corner of the wall and the shadowy bottom of the steps they had just come down.
"If she's still here, then nothing else is, Bogrum, believe me..." She didn't look round; "Have you anything shiny?"
After a brief hesitation, Bogrum sheathed his sword and drew his dagger and handed it to her, handle first.

Very gently, Luciana cupped her hand around Niamh's chin. She was completely unresponsive and she had to resist the temptation to assume the worst had happened. Holding the blade before the Bosmer's nose and mouth she waited, aware of Bogrum peering over her shoulder, he seemed to be holding his breath.

Finally, the faintest clouding on the blade.
Luciana wasn't sure at first but, yes, yes; moisture had formed on the cold steel.
"She's alive." She turned to the Orc. "She's alive!"

She turned back to Niamh, still supporting her head. The Elf's eyes were closed, her body limp. Luciana could feel that although her skin was clammy with sweat, where she touched her she felt icy cold.
In the strange glow that filled the passageway Luciana could see scuffs and scrapes on the Bosmer's skin, they looked recent.
Had she tried to get out, and in trying fallen back down the steps?
"What happened to you...?" Luciana whispered to her.

---

Aside from the all-encompassing stealth suit, Niamh had never exactly been modest about her clothing and thus Bogrum had seen a fair amount of her, one way or another; nevertheless his proximity to her naked form, in extremis, coupled with Luciana's obvious distress was making him feel very uncomfortable.
In a bid to give himself something to do, and because it was clear that something needed doing, as Luciana was far too preoccupied with Niamh to be able to think practically, he said; "I'll go an' fetch a blanket from yer pack on the 'orse, we can wrap 'er in that."
Luciana did not respond, she had changed position, gently moving moving behind her partner and taking her into her arms, curling her own body protectively around the other's, holding her tightly.

When the Orc had disappeared back up the steps and she'd heard the grinding of the heavy stone door to the outside she looked down at the Bosmer, ran a hand through her hair, kissed the top of her head.
"Oh Niamhy, " she said to her softly, "you do get yourself into some scrapes." She sighed, brushed some dirt from niamh's muscular belly.
"What happened to you?"
She looked up to the shadowed ceiling, into the darkness beyond the range of the light, and shook her head.
"You do get yourself entangled..."

---

A few minutes later Bogrum returned with the blanket and a small pack which he had slung over one shoulder. He stopped when he reached the bottom of the stairs and looked down at them both.
Dropping the pack, he knelt and wrapped the blanket about the two women.
"Thank you." Said Luciana, looking up at him as he stood.
"I've brung down the food and water, the weather is closin' in." He scratched the end of his broad flat nose. "I'm gonna go and get some wood, for a fire."
The air moving through the passage was fresh and chill, coming as it did from unkown depths, moistened by the water they could hear lapping somewhere below them.

Bogrum went to head back up the steps again, but paused with one booted foot on the first one. He looked around uncertainly, his wide green face wearing a worried frown.
"Ye sure 'tis safe 'ere?" He asked Luciana.
She smiled wanly, tore her gaze away from Niamh. "Yes. It's the only thing I am sure of." Looking back down at her paramour she said; "If's she's been anywhere near the place there'll be nothing here but corpses..."
Bogrum grunted, and turned to go. "I won't be long." He rumbled over his shoulder.
Luciana nodded, though he could not see.

Then they were alone again, the two of them, and the ancient marble city gloomed over them. Luciana sat cradling the Bosmer, gazing at her face.
Now that she had her under the blanket, she could feel the faintest of movements of Niamh's body, the telltale signs that life was still, somewhere deep within her, smouldering.

Aside from the faint lapping of water, the only other sound was a low-pitched hum that seemed to come from all about; gently thrumming it was, now louder, now softer and quieter.
In the softly flickering light, with the ruin's voice singing, she simply sat and held Niamh for a while.

After a little time, she shifted position, touched her lips to Niamh's head and moved her hands on her body under the blanket. The Wood Elf felt warmer now, if only a little, though the clamminess was still there.
"When we met, " Luciana whispered softly, "I knew that my life would never be the same." Again she turned her face up to the darkness, pausing for a moment. "And I was right, too."
She smiled briefly.
"I know we have had our ups and downs Niamhy but I always felt, in my heart, that we could make it; and I know that you do as well, somewhere in that tricksy brain of yours..."
She kissed Niamh's head again.
"You're so different from me, and so strange, sometimes I wonder why you choose to be with me."
A pause, then; "But I am glad that you are." Under the blanket she gently stroked Niamh's limp body. "I want to help you, Niamhy - you're so troubled, you seem so..." She took a trembling breath, feeling her eyes starting to sting. "I just wish I understood, then maybe I... Maybe I could..." Her voice trailed off and she was silent for a moment.
"Come back to me Niamhy." She said quietly, her head bowed low over Niamh's.
She closed herself more tightly around her partner.
"I Love You."

---

Not long after, Bogrum came back. He was carrying an armful of firewood; it and he were both slightly damp.
"Rainin'." He said gruffly as he dropped the wood on the marble floor. Squatting down he began to arrange the wood for burning.
"How is she?" he asked Luciana, nodding at Niamh.
"She's still the same, still just the same."

After a few moments, the Orc had got the fire lit and going, he looked across at Luciana who was staring at the flames, her eyes reflecting their dancing yellow light.
"Ye should eat sumthin'." he suggested. "Ye'll need yer strength tomorrer t'get this one off'n this mountain." He shook his head and tutted, regarding Niamh with concerned eyes. "Poor thing, she never seems to get a break. Always troubled that one."
Luciana nodded.
"Yes, " she said softly, "she is."

Silence hung between them for a time and they kept to their own thoughts, Bogrum fished out his small knife and, finding a suitable stick in the bundle he had brought in from outside, he began to idly whittle it.
"Bogrum, why are you helping us?"
The unexpectedness of the question and it's directness startled him, he stopped what he was doing and looked up.
"I mean, " continued Luciana, "you did not have to, at all."
Bogrum smiled toothily, shrugged.
"Me 'an you 've been friends quite a time, Lucy." He said. "You're a sweet girl and well, I wouldn't wanna see ye hurt..." He stopped.
She could see he was ill at ease with the conversation, and nodded encouragingly for him to continue.
"Well." He put down his knife. "When Niamh arrived in Bravil she was the strangest thing I 'ad ever set eyes on, never met a woman like 'er." He laughed. "Remember? She jus' turned up one evenin' in The Suitor, half nekkid. She got drunk an' started a fight."
Luciana smiled, looked down at Niamh affectionately. "That's her alright."
"I was forever banning 'er and she'd keep comin' right back evry time. So full o' vim an' life. I dunno Lucy, " he struggled for words, "She's so dark an' fascinatin' - like lookin' into a deep sea or sumthin', always changin'.
His expression changed to one of sheepishness.
"I would not be 'ere but fer you though."
"What do you mean?" She asked, absently brushing a stray hair from Niamh's face. The Bosmer had not even so much as stirred in all the time she had been holding her.

"Well, " The Orc went on, his gruff voice ripe with awkwardness, "When you two... got... t'gether, I thought she would break yer heart if you was lucky, an' sure enough it looked that way at first." he shrugged again, toying with the stick he had been whittling earlier. "But, well, ye made me see that there was more to 'er than what I thought. She's an angry one, an' everything else right enough fer sure but she's not jus' that, there's more there an'... an' what she is she is fer a reason. An' she makes ye smile..." He grinned helplessly. "I can't put it any better."
Luciana smiled at him. "I think you've said what you mean quite well enough."
"So anyway, " He continued, "I'm 'ere fer the both o' ye - you an' 'er. You coz I seen 'ow much she means to you an' Niamh there coz she jus' needs a break." He looked earnestly into Luciana's face. "She needs you more'n she knows. She needs your 'appiness."

Luciana cocked her head to one side, she'd never heard him speak like that before.
"Thank you Bogrum, from the bottom of my heart, thank you."
She leant her head back against the wall. "She is a bit of a force of nature isn't she?"
"That she is." Agreed Bogrum. "That she is."

They lapsed into silence again, keeping watch; for Niamh, for the dawn; for a change, anything.
Bogrum kept the little fire stoked, the sooty yellow flames driving back the weird glow that pulsed all around them.

---

Though Luciana refused food, she took some water and with Bogrum's help managed to pour a little of it into Niamh's mouth and moisten her dry and cracked lips.
But there was still no response, nothing at all, save for the faint slow beat of her heart and her shallow breathing.

Presently Luciana fell asleep and Bogrum, watching them together and seeing the unconditional love that Luciana showed, the unquenchable desire to hold on and never - not ever - give up or let go, was humbled and yet filled with a curious lightness of being there, in that ancient and dead place.

--End Of Part I--

Fair dues...I do always love the extended tales of yours...

*CoughongoingCough*... ...

Loved the description of the journey...The scenery stood out so damned well in this...So beautifully written...*Sighs*...

Luciana was brilliantly written...Her desperation to find Niamh was so well written...Fantastic stuff there...

Loved the Orc...That he was so willing to come along and help was excellent...And that he was uncomfortable with the talking and all that...Brilliant touch that...Just made the character funnier almost... ...

So much to love in these two posts...It was a joy reading them...

Fair dues...Proper exceptional stuff matey...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

Thank you very much McB, it's sizing up to be quite an intensive tale...

I'm glad you're enjoying it.

- RESCUE: PART II -

The next morning, Bogrum came back down the steps and returned to their campsite to find Luciana awake, her head bent close to Niamh's. She was whispering softly to her.
He stood quietly for a moment, and then discretely cleared his throat. Luciana looked up and smiled weakly.
Bogrum thought that she looked exhausted, black circles ringed her eyes and her skin had a grey tint to it. He himself had been awake much of the night and knew she had slept only fitfully.

"I was just talking to her." Luciana offered by way of explanation.
Bogrum nodded. "How is she?"
Luciana yawned. "Still much the same really..." She stroked Niamh's hair gently. "She made it through the night at least."
"Well that's something." Said Bogrum. He walked over to the now cold fire, kicked at it a moment, then turned to her; "Weather's cleared, an' the 'orses are safe. We need to figure out how t'get Niamh home."
Luciana nodded, "And soon." She said.
"Aye." Replied Bogrum. "But 'fore that, you need t'eat sumthin'." He gave her a meaningful look.

She stared at him, then; "How can you? We have to get her home, Bogrum, there's no time..."
He stamped one booted foot on the marble floor, pointed a finger at her. "No, Lucy, there IS time. There is time for you to eat, and to drink." He slashed his arms across his body. "You will be of no use to Niamh, or me, or you, if you are weak and ill coz ye 'ave not eaten owt, nor slept neither." His voice softened. "You know it, Lucy. You know this to be true. Have some food."

Eventually she acquiesced, and Bogrum, having left her with some bread, cheese, and beer, took his leave.
"I will be back shortly." He grumbled, as he set his feet upon the stairs. "She ain't goin' to make it on 'orseback, so I will 'ave ta see if'n a can't get a cart for us."
Luciana just nodded, it turned out she had been starving after all and she was filling her mouth with the soft rich goat's cheese and thick white bread that they had purchased a couple of days earlier before they left Cheydinhal. The bread was in truth a little hard, but Gods it tasted like nectar as it passed down inside her to her starving, empty belly.
"Don't be long." She said between mouthfulls of food and beer.
He shook his head; "I won't, I'll get a cart from Cheydinhal and then we'll see." He turned to walk up the steps, then stopped, looked at Luciana. "Take care Lucy. Take care of her."

Then he was gone.
The silence, punctuated only by the lapping of water from somewhere far below, closed in upon Luciana, pressing at her temples. She finished her meal and, casting a glance in Niamh's direction, moved off down the corridor. Dropping her trousers she did her business and, conscious that she'd need a bath later, pulled them back up again.

Walking back, she sat down next to her lover and placing her hands under her neck, lifted her head onto her lap. Stroking her hair, she whispered; "I know that you are in there somewhere, Niamhy. I wish I could know what you are thinking." She ran her fingers tenderly over the other's face. "Please."

----

There were lights, flashing in strange patterns off to her left. Moving through air that felt like treacle she pushed towards them, a beacon in the darkness that enveloped her; had enveloped her forever.
For years uncounted she had lain in the deep shadows at the foot of the mountain and now she saw the lights dancing above her at the peak, beyond it's peak - in the spaces between it and the stars far above there were dancing energies and sizzling, fleeting sprites composed of dreams and lore long gone.
She remembered though, remembered the tongue of her people, heard it from far away muffled, as though through a great thickness of linen;
"Niamh , ní mór duit a glacadh do oidhreacht breithe . Tá tú ar leith i measc na linn . Tá muid in éineacht leat agus tá a fhios againn ar do cinniúint ; ach tá a fhios seo - nach bhfuil mise lasair a bheidh a mhúchadh go héasca , fiú ag bás féin ."
(Niamh, you must embrace your birth legacy. You are unique amongst us. We are with you and we know of your fate; but know this - yours is not a flame that will easily be extinquished, even by death itself.)

The words surrounded her; now to her left, now to her right. Always they seemed in her mind.She had no answer; her mouth opened but from it came no sound, only a blank silent scream.
The voices continued: "Tóg fógra i dtaobh an Luciana bhean . Beidh sí tú a threorú chun sláinte agus go dtí an pointe de do ardú . Beidh tú a fháil neart as a ghrá duit agus beidh tú a bheith réidh le haghaidh na chéad chéimeanna eile ."
(Take notice of the woman Luciana. She will guide you to health and to the point of your rise - [ascendancy]. You will gain strength from her love and you will be ready for the next steps.)

Again she resisted, her body arching in the air, her muscles straining against the resistance they felt from the pressure of the voices around her. Eyes wild and staring, she shouted into the night, her voice shrill and full of fear and doubt.
"Uimh ! Tá mé ar an saol léi ! Le do thoil , is gá mé seo beo . Lig dom beo , ag na déithe , tá gach a fhios agat go bhfuil mé ag siúl i gcónaí le mo chroí , lig dom beo - raibh mé in ann a bheith sásta anseo . Raibh mé in ann a bheith sásta ..."
(No! I have a life with her! Please, I must live this, let me live, by the Gods, by all that you know that I have always held to my heart, let me live - I could be happy here. I could be happy...)

There was a silence, then, as if minds vastly beyond hers considered her fate. She cowered, naked, before them; hunched in upon herself, her strange eyes staring up into the darkness, now punctuated by sparks and folding drift of luminous colour, strange and nebulous; wisps of cloud and vapour - lit by a lambent glow.
"Níl sé do cinniúint go deireanach thar pointe áirithe leis an sonas go bhfuil tú ag fáil duit féin . Tá sé do cinniúint a fhágáil saol seo agus tús le saol nua thar agus os cionn an ceann ; bheith ina lucht siúil i measc go leor shaol . Beidh grá i bhfad agus caillteanais i bhfad a mise taithí a fháil agus tú , Niamh , beidh tú a bheith ar feadh na mblianta fada thar comhaireamh lucht siúil i measc go leor sa todhchaí is
féidir. Tá sé cad é agus má tá tú i ndán don cosán ."
(It is not your fate to last beyond a certain point with this happiness that you have found for yourself. It is your fate to leave this world and start a new life above and beyond this one; to be a traveller amongst many worlds. Much love and much loss will be yours to experience and you, Niamh, you will be for long years beyond counting a traveller amongst many possible futures. It is what it is and you are destined for this path.)

She lay in bright water now, it filled her lungs - filled her body - she floated, numbly aware of it's slow movements about her. The tears flowed from her eyes, drifted away into the dappled brightness of the water surrounding her.
The voices returned, softer than before.
"Oh Niamh , nach bhfuil tú ar an domhain . Tá tú thuas agus thar an áit seo agus ní féidir leat a mbaineann anseo . Ní mór am tagtha nuair a bhíonn tú ag aistriú fro an shackled de Nirn agus a chuirtear amach sna flaithis agus tugadh cosán nua , a tugadh le cinniúint nua . Caithfidh tú a thuiscint , Niamh , tá tú aisteach amonst fiú dúinn an bhiotáille , an Sidhe . Ní mór duit glacadh le do oidhreacht agus glacadh leis. Tá Spiorad cad tá tú agus is Spiorad cad a bheidh tú a bheith; fiáin agus saor in dúlra agus nach bhfuil aon bhannaí . BE A NÍ MÓR DUIT BHEITH ."
(Oh Niamh, you are not of this earth. You are above and beyond this place and you cannot belong here. A time must come when you are removed from the shackles of Nirn and are sent out into the the heavens and given a new path, given a new destiny. You must understand, Niamh, you are strange even amongst us spirits, the Sidhe. You must accept your legacy and embrace it. Spirit is what you are and spirit is what you shall be; wild and free of nature raw and with no bonds. BE WHO YOU MUST BE.)

And she knew it was true, even as the voices spoke, even as they dopplered away into faint, dancing echoes.
She would end, such as she was. She would end here and a vast, dark future sat brooding and pregnant before her...
...But there was much to do before that, before the end of everything she had known and the beginning of a journey down dark and strange roads.

A light flickered deep in her eyes, a spark ignited in her mind; far back in the darkness, something came forward, travelled into the flickering jagged light of that spark and smiled.
It was not a pleasant smile.
--END--

Oooooh, more gaelic!!...

Um...Is it actually Google Translate level gaelic or are you doing a Tolkien?... ...Either way, it's amazing... ...

Going a bit meta with the various lives in various universes...I love the idea though, fantastic stuff...

Is this how you're getting the separation between Oblivion and Skyrim Niamh?...Or is it simply that she outlives Luciana to go to Skyrim?...

Anyways...Both halves of the story were excellent...Loved both...

Brilliantly amazing, dark, gritty and fun...Helluva combination!!...

Love it!!...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

-PART VII - Rescue III-

Nothing moves in these ruins, barring the constant breeze blowing from the depths of the ancient structure bringing with it the sounds of water; but here in the entrance level, just down from the door, no, nothing moves here.
I have sat here for what seems like days now. I've not seen the sun, nor the sky, nor heard a bird or seen the horses or looked out over Cheydinhal. Bogrum must come back soon with the cart or I shall be as incapable as my Niamh is now, still.

But for the slow beat of her heart and the barest flutter of breath from between her lips there has been nothing from her.
Not a stir, nor a sign of any sort that there is any longer a light behind those hooded eyelids or a thought within that skull.

She's so thin and scuffed and scarred and hurt and I don't know why or how and I can't help her beyond holding her and telling her to Hold On Niamh, Hold On Please.
I take her limp body in my arms and I gather her close and maybe I hope that the life that burns in me will by Dibella's grace ignite hers once more and she will come back to me again.

But will she even be the same? I don't know, she seems even in this way different and maybe she will be a stranger.
No.
I will not, I cannot believe that she has gone from me - in any way. I will hold onto her, I have enough strength left for both of us.

But I am so tired.
So tired.

Come back Niamh, please.

----

Luciana stoked the fire once again and boiled a little water. She dipped some cloth in it and wiped Niamh's face, and some of the messier parts of her body; it was only superficial though and Luciana knew that her actions were more for her own sake than for the Bosmer's.
She undoubtedly felt better for having eaten something, but she was nevertheless tired, beyond anything she had imagined that she could be. Sitting cross-legged beside her partner she fought to stay awake, although sleep crept up over her shoulder and slipped into her mind at every moment, invading her senses and seeking to bring down her defences.
She would not give in though, and during the hours of Bogrum's absence she sang softly, told stories from her childhood, talked to Niamh about her plans for their future.

Maybe three hours or so after the Orc had left she was retelling an old tale about Daedra that her father had related to her once, holding onto Niamh's hand and gently squeezing and releasing it.
Suddenly, just from the corner of her eye she saw a movement.
She stopped her story and turned to look at Niamh's face - had it been her? Yes, there it was again. In the flickering light of the hallway, and given her tiredness, it was difficult to tell for sure but she would have laid septims on Niamh having moved her head and opened her mouth.

She sat, silent and watching.
There, again. Niamh stirred, her mouth opened and she spoke, her voice merely a breath of air.
"Ceann de Linn . A bheith ar cheann de Linn ..."
Luciana leant closer, the words she'd heard seemed to be in a language she'd heard Niamh speak once, but she could not understand, maybe she hadn't caught...

"Ceann de Linn. "
Suddenly Niamh's eyes sprung open, black slits in silver pupils glared at Luciana.
"Ceann de Linn!"
Luciana was fully alert now, her eyes wide.
"Niamh, what? Niamh!"
The Bosmer's mouth opened, and in the flickering, yellow-tinged blue light of the passageway Luciana caught the glint of sharp white teeth.
"Ceann de Linn . A bheith ar cheann de Linn!"
"What? Niamh I..."

But then she realised, the Bosmer wasn't "her", she was something "else" or rather, in that moment something looked out at Luciana through Niamh's eyes.
Something that was not Niamh.
"Bí mar aon ní amháin..."
The Bosmer's eyes were fixed upon Luciana, unblinking.

Luciana leant forward and reached out a hand to Niamh, but the other pulled back, away from her under the blanket.
"What...?" Asked Luciana, feeling increasingly worried and not a little scared.
"Bí mar aon ní amháin." Said niamh again, although Luciana could not tell if she was talking to her or not.

Suddenly the Wood Elf sat up, the blanket falling away from her. Luciana gasped, her hand pressed to her chest, feeling the thudding of her heart.
Niamh's eyes, still unblinking, never left Luciana's face.
"Bí mar aon ní amháin."

The voice was Niamh's and yet not Niamh's, it seemed to have strange dynamics, as if another was talking through her.
"I can't understand you..." Said Luciana, feeling increasingly helpless, her voice a croaking whisper.
So much here was strange, fear clenched it's fist around her stomach, chilled her blood.

Niamh's eyes narrowed momentarily, then, twisting her upper body, her head turning to keep her eyes fixed upon Luciana, she tensed her arms, pressed her hands against the floor, and tried to rise.
"Bí mar aon ní amháin."
The pulsating light around them seemed to dim, the fire died a little; shadows closed about them.
Hair prickling on her arms and neck, Luciana could only sit and watch, paralysed, as her partner struggled to her feet, half standing on trembling legs.

"N..."
For a moment, time stalled.

A silent tableaux unfolded before her.
The Wood Elf, trying to stand, tensed her spindly arms and pressed her long-fingered hands flat against the marbled wall.
Pallid skin, running with sweat.
Her lips were pulled back from her teeth with the effort of holding herself upright, her strange eyes glinted, sunk deeply within black sockets.
Still they glared at Luciana.
"Bí mar aon ní amháin."

Then it was over.
It may have been a second, or an hour.
Sound rushed in upon her; the fire, the constant breeze, Niamh's breath rasping from her mouth.
The light brightened around her, the yellow flicker of the fire against the pulsing ambience of the ruins.

For maybe a second longer Niamh remained upright against the wall, still staring at her, her face a rictus of strain and effort.
Then she collapsed, her body going limp like a boned fish, her head lolling backwards on her neck.

Luciana was across the space between them even before Niamh hit the floor, grasping hold of her clammy body and laying her down on the blanket.
Stillness returned, Niamh's eyes were closed once more, her expression relaxed; the tension in her body gone.

Luciana took a deep shaking breath, waiting for her heart to slow down. Folding the blanket back over niamh's body she reached for the damp cloth once again and placed it over the Bosmer's forehead.
Then, sitting back against the wall, feeling it's coolness against her through her shirt she brought her knees up to her chest and rested her forearms upon them.

"What did it mean?" She whispered to the brooding stones around her. "I don't understand any of this. Is she her, my Niamh?" She shook her head. "What just happened..."
The image, burned now into her mind of the "other Niamh" looking out of the eyes of her Niamh, the one she knew, came back to her once again; and yet even those eyes, those eyes were not the ones she once knew - deep chestnut, rich with passion and life - all gone now and replaced with what? A portal, a gate to something - to somewhere - else, through which she had seen another, looking through those eyes at her and into her and through her, and that voice.
"Bí mar aon ní amháin."
She shook her head again, closed her eyes.
"I don't know."

...But she did, deep down, she did know and the thought of it chilled her; left a heavy feeling deep within her belly...

---

A short while later Bogrum arrived, and she found that she welcomed the sound of his heavy feet on the steps as his boots clumped down from the massive stone door. There was something reassuringly earthy about him, after the otherwordly strangeness that she had just been a part of.
She stood as he emerged into the passage.

"Got a cart." He said.
"Good." She replied. "We should be going."
He nodded. "'Ow is she?"
"Oh," she said, perhaps a little too blithely, "no change." She found herself reticent to tell him what had transpired in his absence.

Bogrum looked at her for a long moment, then said; "Right, awright." He turned to their belongings.
"I'll get this lot up an' packed. You stay wiv Niamh, an' I'll 'elp you when I'm done."
She nodded and sat back down.

---

Some thirty minutes later they had carried Niamh to the cart and laid her in the back, on a thick bed of fresh straw.
Luciana sat with her in the back of the cart whilst Bogrum gingerly navigated back down the rough trail. The day was edging towards early afternoon and the air, even as they moved slowly downslope towards Cheydinhal, was chill with the first hints of the northern winter season.
The sky was a patchwork of clouds fleeing westwards, driven by strong winds, though there was barely a rustle in the trees around them.

Bumping in the back of the wagon, Luciana mulled over the events that had overtaken her. She had so many questions but also she was afraid, not just of what she did not know, but of what she thought that she did; Niamh was different now of that there was no doubt, but beyond the how and the why was the more pressing question of What.
What was she, if not Niamh?
In her heart she knew the woman she loved was still there, but equally when she looked at and studied the once again catatonic form under the blanket before her, regarded the now peaceful face that she thought that she knew, had once known so well; she realised that Niamh was now Something Else, something Strange and "Other".

She longed to find out what had happened to Niamh during the time she had been missing, but was afraid to know the truth of it; but more, she was terribly worried that Niamh had gone somewhere where she could not follow, had become something that she could not relate to.
It scared her more than anything, beyond any other fear.

So many questions, so many doubts.
She sighed quietly, chewing at her lower lip, alone for the moment with her thoughts.

---

Bogrum guided the cart to the town, and from there took them back south, skirting east around the shore of Lake Rumare, travelling until way past sunset and keeping a distance from settlements. Neither of them knew who might be looking for the Bosmer, what she might have done, and Bogrum was determined not to take any chances.

They camped out in the wilds, sharing the cooking and watch duties; always though Luciana would minister to Niamh's needs however minimal, before looking after herself.
Each night, when not on watch, she would climb into the back of the cart and lie under the blanket with her, pressed close and holding her, whispering softly to her or singing quietly songs from her childhood until she fell finally succumbed to the soft wings of sleep.
Bogrum would often keep watch all night rather than awaken Luciana, so close could he see that the bond between her and Niamh was. It made him smile, it was something he had never known.

Conversation between Luciana and Bogrum had been sparse on the journey back to their home. A sombre mood had been upon the two of them since leaving fanacas.
Bogrum was well aware that Luciana was keeping something from him, that something had happened in the ruins that day he had gone to get the cart.
Whilst he realised that Luciana had her reasons, and that clearly there was more going on here at a personal level to which he was not, and never could be, a party; still it affected their relationship to an extent, he could see that Luciana was worried, very much so, but his practical Orc brain could not find a way to broach the subject.

Therefore, barring desultory conversation and the addressing of day-to-day matters, there was a dour silence between them.
All that was to change, however...

---

Bogrum had brought the cart to a halt just off the south road, on a spot close to the Niben. They had crossed at the causeway and were making their way down the west side of the great river.

Their increasing proximity to their home had done much to lighten their respective moods and so it was that when Bogrum climbed down from the wagon to stretch his legs she got down too and walked over the soft green grass to him.
He was standing at the river's edge and looking away downstream; his bulky body solid, clad in leather tunic and breaches, thick, iron-studded boots half in and half out of the cool water.
It was warm still down here in the south of Cyrodiil and the air was full of the buzz of insects and the calling of birds away in the trees bordering the western edge of the road behind them.

"Bogrum, " she said as she caught up with him, "I need to tell you something."
He turned to face her, looking down at her, his flat greenish face full of concern. "I've bin worried." He said.
"I know." She put her hand on his thick forearm, squeezed it. "Something did happen that day." She said.
"Thought as much." He nodded.

She sighed; "It isn't that I wanted to keep a secret, I just did not feel that I could tell you, then; there was too much I had - have - to think of."
Bogrum looked out across the river, then back at her. "I understand Lucy, 'tis personal and all..."
"No." She said, holding her hand up for him to stop. "You have been ill-used by me, Bogrum; and besides I..." She swallowed. "...It's not just that, I owe you an explanation for sure but I need, I must speak of what happened." She looked up at him. "Maybe if I tell you, then I'll understand a little better, too..."

And so she told him, and when she had finished, he stood awhile in thought, looking down into the clear waters of the Niben, it's surface sparkling in the sunshine.
Presently he said; "Lucy, I am a simple man. All this? 'Tis beyond my ken, but I can see what worries ye and and why ye kept it to y'self - 'tis personal and... difficult to deal with, or understand." He looked sideways at her. "I would thank ye for telling me Lucy, I know t'was difficult, I do."
He looked down at his boots for a moment, fiddled with the buttons of his tunic. "I will watch her though, when you can't and when I can; to make sure she's safe." He looked up at her. "And you."

She felt more than a little humbled by his attitude. "Thank you Bogrum." She said. "If nothing else it was good just to be able to tell someone, I..."
Suddenly she turned to look at the cart.
"Gods!"

Bogrum, startled, turned to follow her gaze.
Looking over the side of the wagon was a familiar face, pale skinned with eyes hidden deep in dark sockets, though now there was a silvery glimmer within them that she had not yet become used to.
Black, red-streaked hair framed that face, no longer tied back it hung loosely, covering the large ears so that only the very points at their tops showed on either side.

"Niamh!" Shouted Luciana, and the joy and relief in her voice was plain to hear. The two of them ran back over the short distance to the wagon, though Luciana outdistanced her companion and was already climbing into the cart's bed by the time the Orc arrived.
Bogrum got to the cart in time to see that Niamh had turned around and was sitting against the side of the cart, her long legs out straight, with the blanket draped across her lap.
Bogrum coughed, "I'll er, l'll go an' er, I'll go an' look to the 'orse." He mumbled, and clumped off around to the front of the cart.

Luciana squatted beside the Bosmer, one hand on Niamh's shoulder.
"How are you?" She asked quietly, brushing a stray hair from Niamh's face.
Niamh looked at her; "Ai dunno..." She said, her voice dry and croaky. "Ai feel... numb."

"Don't worry Niamhy," Said Luciana softly, "there will be time enough for us to work it out."
She put her arms around the Wood Elf and held her close, pressing her face against the other's grubby neck. Niamh's body felt frail and twig-like, as if she might break if Luciana squeezed her too hard. Her skin was greasy, sticky with dirt and sweat.
"It's good to have you back, Niamhy, I've missed you so."
There was a brief hesitation, and then Niamh shifted position and slid her arms around the other woman.
"Ah missed ye, Looch." Said Niamh softly. "Ah'm glad that ye foun' meh, fer sure."

Full of gladness, and of hope that Niamh might fully recover; putting aside for the moment her doubts and questions, Looch held her partner close. She could feel her heart beat, stronger now; her breath warm on her shoulder, the pressure of her arms around her.
For the first time in what seemed an age Luciana allowed herself to relax, and closed her eyes.

Niamh stared ahead over her partner's shoulder, her strange eyes shadowed. Altered as they were, the bright southern sunlight bored into them, the colours around her seemed hyperreal.
Her head ached and something, behind those eyes, turned away from the brightness and fled into the darkness of her mind.
It could bide it's time there in the dark, growing strong and gaining power and then when the time was right, well, then there would be the Old Ways and the Wilding Ways and the mask beneath which it had concealed itself for too long would be cast aside.
So it slunk away, for the time being, but as it did so it turned and whispered softly into her mind; "Go gairid..."

---

They stayed by the river for the rest of that afternoon. Luciana took Niamh down to the water to bathe, and then once she had had a chance to dry off in the warm sunshine, and take a little fruit and bread, Luciana fetched her some clothes.
"They aren't what you're used to, I know." She smiled as Niamh wordlessly took the plain homespun tunic and trousers and slipped them on.

Bogrum had made himself scarce, busying himself with the cart before walking the horse down to the water and taking a meal, sitting on the lush green grass.
Later, when Niamh was napping, curled up next to the gently lapping water, Luciana took the opportunity to walk along the shore to him.
"You didn't need to stay." She said as she reached him. She squatted down beside him.
"Well I figgered ye'd wanna bit of privacy, ya know?" He replied. "'Ow is she?"
"She seems fine, or ok at least..."
The Orc looked at her, raising his eyebrow. She met his gaze for a moment, then; "Truth?"
He nodded almost imperceptibly.
"The truth is, " she sighed, "the truth is I don't know, Bogrum. I did not expect much yet in truth but she seems..." She shook her head, looked back at the sleeping form of the Bosmer briefly. "...not like I would expect."
"P'raps she's still shocked." Said Bogrum softly.
"Maybe, but Bogrum it's more than that." She clenched a fist in frustration. "I wish I could explain better! I know that she's only just come back but I know Her, and I know, " she placed a hand on her breast, pressed it against her heart, "I Feel in my heart that she is Not Niamh, Bogrum." She gave him a helpless look. "Or at least not My Niamh."

They stood in silence for a moment, Bogrum looking perplexed.
"I still don' see Lucy. I mean she's only just come round an' all." He placed two ham-sized hands on her shoulders. "Give 'er time, she just needs a little time I'm sure."
Luciana turned and look back at her lover again, still asleep on the grass. She sucked air in through her teeth.
"...Perhaps..."

---

Once Niamh had awoken Luciana helped her back into the cart and Bogrum, flicking the reins and clicking at the horse with his tongue, set off once again for Bravil. They were not in fact all that far from the town and they reached the stables on the landward side of the bridge to the gate a little before nine of the clock that evening.

Getting back in through the gate proved a little problematic, much as Luciana had feared. They were loathe to expose Niamh's presence to the watch, in part because of the troubles around Cheydinhal but also because they had no real idea as to whether Niamh had committed any other crimes for which she may have been wanted; Niamh herself was unable or unwilling to tell them. Indeed, for much of the journey from their rest stop by the river she had been slumped against the side of the wagon, her head on Luciana's shoulder, her eyes closed.

When they were not far from the guarded bridge they had Niamh lie down in the back of the wagon, under a tarpaulin. It would not save any of them if the wagon was searched, but it would at least hide her from casual observation.
Bogrum nodded to the guard at the bridge as he drew up the wagon.
"Late delivery." Commented the guard.
"Yeah, " replied Bogrum, "Mead from up north, the 'Onningbrew stuff."
The rather bored guard, his face lit by the lantern hung from one of the bridge supports, brightened up at this; "Nice. I'll be round fer a mug when I come off duty!"
Bogrum laughed, "I'll save ya some!"
He urged the horse on down the roadway.

A few minutes later they arrived at the water-gate, where deliveries for the inns and businesses were traditionally brought through.The practicalities of guarding the gate itself meant that it was seldom manned, and indeed on this night their luck appeared to be holding.
Bogrum kept a small boat for the purposes of ferrying barrels and other provisions from the mainland to the island upon which Bravil sat, and it was to this that he and Luciana helped Niamh, who was still a little unsteady on her feet. The Orc loaded a couple of barrels he had brought along in the cart into the boat whilst Luciana once again secreted Niam under a tarp.
"Well." he whispered to Luciana. "With luck, we should be 'ome an' dry very soon."
Sitting down, he picked up the oars and rowed the short distance across the channel to the large iron-shod gates.

Three members of the town watch met them as they moored up the small jetty that stood out in the noisome waterway that effectively bisected the centre of Bravil. Luciana felt her spirits sink; she should not have been surprised, she supposed, but it would have been nice if once, just once, they had caught a break.

"Ho there Bogrum." Said the watch sergeant with an amiability that largely failed to conceal an unpleasant edge.
Luciana knew this man, Flintus was his name, he drank in the Suitor on occasion. He was large and barrel-chested, with a ruddy slack-jawed face, and he thoroughly enjoyed making the most of other peoples' misfortune.
Bogrum busied himself in tying up the boat, largely to conceal any awkwardness from the sergeant.
"Evenin' Sergeant." He said.
"Very late delivery, this is." Continued the soldier, Luciana detected that the edge in his voice was more pronounced and that to it was added a fair degree of suspicion.
Bogrum stood up and moved to stand next to Luciana in the boat, both of them making very sure to not look at the tarp under which Niamh was hidden.
"Mead, come in from Skyrim." Rumbled the Orc, his gruff voice calm and even.

One of the other guards, a corporal, sidled over and made a show of looking into the boat.
"Why'd you go?" Asked Flintus. "Bit strange, innit?"
Luciana replied; "The usual delivery wasn't available, so we went instead."
The sergeant nodded thoughtfully. "Izzat so?"
"'Sides that, " elaborated Bogrum,"got a bruvver in the City don't I, figgered I could fit in a visit." He shrugged, don' get there much..." He pointed a thumb at Luciana. "Took Lucy along fer the comp'ny."

"Well that's lovely is that." Said Flintus, he motioned for the other guard to come over and stand with the corporal.
They know. Thought Luciana.
It's over.

The old sergeant turned his hard eyes to Luciana. "'Ave a nice time then, did ya Missy? Bit of an 'oliday fer you then, bein' wiv a fella." He grinned nastily.
"Look Harald." Interjected Bogrum to save Luciana's blushes. "We've known each other fer years, what's this all about? Ya can see I got barrels. We've 'ad a long trip an' I wanna get this lot sorted and in ta me bed,and Lucy here to 'ers." He held his hands out to the side. "Whaddaya say?"
Sergeant Flintus rubbed at his stubbly chin. It irked him that the innkeeper was being chummy, and besides he had a definite feeling that, even if the Orc wasn't hiding anything, the barmaid clearly must be, she had an uncomfortable look about her and besides; "I fink she knows what this is about." He pointed a thick finger at Luciana.
"It's about yer girlfriend missy."

Luciana took a deep breath and strove to keep the trembling out of her voice. "Oh? What about her?"
Flintus grinned mirthlessly, tucked his thumbs into his belt. "Seems she went wild up near Cheydinhal, did some stuff they want 'er for. He leant forward a little. "Bad stuff."
Luciana opened her mouth to speak but the sergeant raised a hand to silence her.
"Nah, what wiv you an' 'er being' so... Close an' all..." He leered obscenely at her as he said it. "An' what wiv you two being' up that way, I figure that's a bot too much of a co-win-see-dense, don't you?
He paused, evidently pleased with himself.
"Thought I might take a punt on what you 'ad brung back wiv you, when you got back." He concluded.
Luciana found herself wishing the podgy watchman was as stupid as he looked. there was an iron ball of fear in her belly, cold and heavy; she found she desperately needed to pee.

"Anyways, " Said Flintus, "We 'ave come to search your boat Bogrum, so if you an' the little lady would be so kind as to step out of it and come up 'ere wiv me..." He gestured with mock politeness at the jetty where he and the other two soldiers were stood.
Bogrum, with only the barest hesitation, stepped out of the boat and held out a hand to Looch. As she took it and let him help her out and onto the jetty she caught his eye.
The look in it spoke of defeat, and of frustrated disappointment. They were beaten, but they had been so close. She felt her lower lip starting to tremble and had to blink to clear her eyes.
Oh Niamhy, we were so close...

The sergeant ordered the two guards into the boat. It did not take them long, but they were thorough, even pulling the seal off of one of the barrels to check it really did have mead in it.
One of the guards got out whilst the corporal turned his attention to the tarpaulin, bending down to lift up the corner. Flintus turned to look at Luciana, keeping his gimlet eyes on her as the searcher pulled the tarp aside. In the sergeant's gaze was a look of triumph.
Don't react. She repeated to herself over and over. Don't give him the satisfaction.

"Nuthin' sarge." Said the corporal, letting the tarpaulin fall back into position again.
Luciana's breath caught in her throat and it took every ounce of her willpower to remain neutral.
"I could 'ave told ye that." Said Bogrum, with admirable self-control.
The disappointment was clear in the sergeant's voice. "Awright, but don't go finkin' yer got one over on me."
He pointed a finger at Bogrum and Luciana.
"I will be keepin' an eye on you two. Especially you, Missy." He nodded at Luciana. "Especially You."

---

Bogrum and Luciana watched the watchmen leave.
"Where'd she go?" Asked Bogrum. "I thought we was done for."
Luciana looked at him, her face a picture of bewilderment. "I don't know." She said. "I'm becoming less sure of everything by the minute, it seems."
"Maybe she's got one of them funny rings..." Offered the Orc by way of explanation.
Luciana shook her head. "No. Well, she has, but it wasn't with her stuff or on her." She shrugged. "All she has is what I have given her to wear."
She shook her head again.
"I don't know, Bogrum."

There was silence between them for a moment, then Bogrum, looking round and seeing one of the watchmen looking at them said, "Well whatever is going on we 'ave to carry on at least lookin' normal." he walked to the boat. "So let's get this sorted."
Stepping into the boat he lit the lantern that hung from a pole in the bow. The light pooled around him, deepening the shadows beyond it.
After a moment Luciana stepped into the boat and joined him.

She lifted the tarp and threw it to one side, Bogrum was manhandling a mead barrel up onto the jetty.
Act normal.
Luciana stared at the place in the boat where Niamh should have been.
"I can't un..." She froze. Bogrum looked over at her.
"What?" He hissed.

Luciana very slowly looked down.
There was clearly nothing there but empty decking and yet for all that, a long-fingered hand had closed around her ankle with a vice-like grip.
Very quietly, almost on the limits of hearing, a voice said; "Dinnae look down, Looch. Ye hae gotta crack on wi' yer job, an' ah wull come back wi' ye when ye're done."
The voice was so quiet that Bogrum, only a few feet away from her, had heard nothing. He was looking at her quizzically. She looked up at him, her eyes saucer-wide in her face. As subtly as she could, she pointed at the deck.
It took a moment for the Orc to catch up with what was happening but when he did, he merely moved his head very slightly in acknowledgement.

"Ye might as well get yerself back to yer 'ome." He said loudly. "I can finish up 'ere."
"Are you sure?" She asked, more for show than anything else. It barely seemed possible but a thrill of excitement was washing through her.
"Yeah." Said Bogrum, he glanced at her, his greenish face expressionless in the lamplight.

On legs suddenly wooden Luciana climbed out the boat and headed, not looking back, across the jetty to the ladder leading up to the town. Though she could not see her, some sense told her that Niamh was right behind her.
She turned to the left and walked to the bridge that crossed over the channel, on the other side she could see her home, in the second storey of the building that Niamh had her dwelling in, the two places were now pretty much shared between them, although in truth Niamh's was rather too messy to live in, so the two women tended to reside in Luciana's.
Looking at her house now, she was sure of one thing; never had her home, and the thought of it, seemed so sweet.

A hand rested on her shoulder, Luciana looked round but could see no one there.
"Jes' ye keep walkin' Loochy, let's us jes' get us home"
"Can you make it alright?" Luciana spoke without looking, they were nearly across the bridge now.
Just a few feet more...
"Aye, ahm awreet fer naow. Buit this disappearin' teks it owt o'me so it does." There was a pause, then. "Nearly there..."

Turn left, past the shop, up the steps, to the door, unlock.
Open.
Through.

Luciana closed the door behind her and turned the key in the lock.
She turned round letting out a long shuddering breath as she did so. Her whole body was shaking.
Niamh reappeared in front of her. It was strange seeing it happen, one moment she was not there, the next she just... was.

She leant against the wall, panting. She looked drawn and tired. Smiling wanly she said; "Ah'm glad we got back wun we did. Ah dinnae know jes' how long ah could'a carried on wi'it..."
"Niamhy." Said Luciana. "Niamhy, you're back."
She crossed the floor from the door to where her partner leant against the wall and took her tightly in her arms.
"You're back."
Niamh wrapped her arms around Looch, the two women clung to each other in the darkness of the house for a moment; and for that moment nothing - nothing - existed in all of the world but them and what was between them. Luciana felt the tears stinging her eyes and wetting her cheeks.
Never in all of her life before had ever felt the way she felt now about Niamh.
"I love you." She whispered to her.

Niamh let go of her, placed a hand on Luciana's wet cheek.
"Let's go teh bed, Looch, ah'm so tired..."
Luciana watched her undress and climb into the bed they shared, and then she did likewise, curling up against the Bosmer's too skinny body and folding her arms around her.
There would be time to understand what had happened, and to work through the still-present feeling that Niamh was "different" in some strange way, but just for now...
"Sleep well." She whispered to her.

And if only for that night, Niamh did...

--end--

*Applauds*...

Fair dues...That was brilliant...Amazing...

From the somewhat scary bit when she's all marionette to the sweet bit at the end, this was utterly awesome!...

So much to love through all this...Proper impossible for me to quote it all...

Absolutely loving this story, and your writing of it...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

Well thank you McB
Your appreciation is very gratifying, I shall make sure that the next instalments are up to expectations!

-Interlude; A Farewell of Sorts-

4.
Over the next few days Niamh seemed to recover somewhat, she slept often and lengthily for sure, but when she was awake she was alert, she ate and drank more and indeed more often as the days went by.
Within the week some of her former vigour had returned, which was a pleasant surprise, if Luciana were honest.

This was not to say that there were not issues that bothered the Breton though; her partner seldom spoke at all anymore for one thing, to her or anyone. Niamh had never exactly been voluble when she had been at her best but now, well now she was if anything verging on the completely silent.
More than the lack of any form of explanation or dialogue about what had happened so recently, Luciana was increasingly bothered by the absence of what she thought of as comfortable, day-to-day conversation.
There were times as well though when Luciana had walked into their abode to find Niamh staring blankly at a wall or out of a window, her lips moving silently and with a strange and far away expression on her face...

Of more immediate concern however was her partner's notoriety and the potential for disaster and the uncertain future that came with it.
Luciana had been to see S'krivva who had told her in no uncertain terms, though with some degree of sympathy, that no amount of bribery at any level would mitigate the damage Niamh had caused.
It appeared that as far as the authorities in the northeast of Cyrodiil were concerned her paramour was very much Public Enemy Number One. Clearly the Watch Sergeant, Flintus, whose suspicions were if anything more acute than they had been prior to his unsuccessful search of Bogrum's boat, had made it his business to find Niamh.
On more than one occasion since their return Luciana had seen guards, albeit fairly amateurishly, prying on her as she went about her business. What with that and the constant threat of a visit to their home from the authorities, well her nerves were more than a little frayed.

The situation as it stood was not helped at all by Niamh herself who appeared increasingly to be blithely unconcerned by both the trouble she was in and by the possibility of disaster that hung threateningly over their heads.
It had only been a week or so, Luciana would have been the first to admit, and maybe she should have tempered her expectations but something constantly jarred with her when she looked at Niamh and her behaviour; the feeling that the woman in her bed was emphatically not the same as the woman she had been with only a few short weeks before was growing in her mind.
It wasn't simply the obvious - (still no explanations, nothing said of the sudden invisibility, nor of what led to her being in the state in which they found her) - but subtler things too, on more than one occasion she had seen something else looking out from behind Niamh's eyes and it was something that felt animalistic and wild, out of control and inherently "chaotic".

That she loved her was a given, but she no longer understood her and nor could she seem to connect with her. A distance had come between them, a distance that seemed to be too great for her to make it up.
She was not going to give her up though, not by any means. Somewhere within the Bosmer was the Real Niamh.
And yet in some ways that was what scared her the most, she was no longer sure just who, or what, the real Niamh was.

All she could do was hold on, and hope.

3.
Light, flat and bright; darker shapes move within it. Hard glare stings her eyes and throbs against the back of her skull. Movements flow across her sightline in a blur of drifting smoke.
From the windows of the house, her sight extends through and beyond the walls of the town that bounds her and into far vistas outside of her experience. Strange places and distant lands, all just shapes, fogged by the constant flat glare of shifting colours.
Touch and taste, smell and hearing - these too are slowly fading into a melange of sensations that wash over her, leaving her with the feeling that she is drifting in some infinite ocean composed purely of input, flowing into her and through her.

Luciana stands out, if only as a brighter shape against the light in her mind, against the darker shapes of their surroundings; her voice calms her, the scent of lavender strong about her. Her touch, her taste; these things form the one nexus of definition.
Yet latterly, even she seems to be fading away, merging into the constant, hyperreal noise and glow that has become Niamh's world now.

And yet she is not alone, here in her mind, some Other is in here with her; another her but not Her - a stronger, wilder, feral Niamh. This creature she now realises is draining her, feeding off her emotions and her senses.
Her world is blurring and fading because the Other Niamh is taking all her input for herself, leaving her with only shadows and flat light; ghosts.

Soon now, she will disappear completely.

2.
And so the days passed, and whilst outwardly Niamh seemed better in some sense, Luciana knew that her lover, though she had initially grasped the rope that had been thrown to her, was now slipping back and away into who knew what unplumbed depths.

It was late on the eighth day following Niamh's rescue. Luciana propped herself up on an elbow and looked at the Bosmer as she lay, eyes closed, next to her in their bed.
Her breathing was slow and deep and her face relaxed and calm. For all the world it appeared as though she were merely sleeping, sunk in the luxuriant fuzziness that overcame the two of them afterwards.
Luciana wished she could believe it were true, but she she knew that some conflict was going on behind those eyes, she had seen it there in the heat of passion and it had scared her.
"I wish I understood Niamhy." She whispered to her sadly. "Tell me how I can help you." She reached out and put a hand gently, palm down, on the Wood Elf's muscular belly.

To her surprise, Niamh opened her eyes and turned her head to look at her. Luciana gasped and pulled her hand quickly away.
"Loochy," Said Niamh, "ye cannae halp meh."
Still surprised at the sudden reaction, Luciana opened her mouth and then closed it again.
Niamh sat up in the bed and turned her body to Luciana. Luciana followed suit and the two women looked at each other in the semi-darkness for moment, then Niamh placed her hand on the other's arm, closed her long thin fingers around it.

"No, Luciana." She said softly, with a shake of her head. "Ye cannae."
Luciana stared in the darkness at her, it was her; it was Her. Her Niamh was there, no sign of The Other, the eyes that stared so intently into hers were a dark, rich chestnut brown and the face was free from the care and the struggle which had been written upon it since her rescue.

As if sensing what Luciana was thinking Niamh laughed, not unkindly.
"No, petal, Ai am here fer a little while only. In here, " she pointed a finger at the side of her head, "in here there is a war, in ma heid, ye ken?" She tilted her head questioningly at Luciana.
"I don't..." Began the other, shaking her head. "I've been so confused..." Her voice hiccupped and trailed off.

Niamh gently stroked the side of Luciana's face.
"Ai know, Loochy, an' ah wish ai cuild ixplane it t'ye." A little shake of the head, she brushed her hair from her eyes. "Buit ah cannae, coz ai dunno rilly masel'. There... There is suthin' in here, it isnae the Me that ye knows." She placed her hand upon Luciana's chest and then on her own.
"Buit it's still Me." She paused, thought for a moment. "It is mai Troo sel', wit ai wus te start wuth."
She took both of Luciana's hands in her own.
"An' it is getting' Stronger, an' ai, the Me ye ken, ai am gettin' Weaker."

Luciana could feel her eyes stinging, her mouth seemed suddenly too wet.
"No." She shook her head. "I want You, This Niamh." She whispered in a pleading voice, squeezing the Bosmer's hands in the darkness of the room.
Sadly, her partner replied; "Ai wush it cuild be so, petal, Buit ye will hae neither mai not The Other. Ai do not belong here, Loochy. It wus a dream, a guid one fer a time, Buit a dream ye shared wi'me."

"No." Was all Luciana could say, as if repeating the word would somehow give it power, but she was no mage and even if she were, there were some things even mages could not fix.
Niamh drew her close and the two women embraced in silence for a moment, then Niamh, her breath hot against Luciana's neck said; "Ai havenae got much time ah think. Ai feel... Stretched an' see-through somehow. All the cullers in ma werld are bleedin' intae one big culler, an' e'en ye too are fadin' intae it naow."

It was all Luciana could do to hold onto the other, her fingers digging into her skin.
"Ai need ye t'know Loochy, that ai hae nevva in mai life before ye known luv like ye hae shown me an' warmth an' jes'... Peace." Again silence, Luciana felt too lost in the moment and the news to even sob or make a sound.
"Ai Luv Ye Loochy." Said Niamh. "With all mai heart, the heart tha's mine."
She pulled away from Luciana then, said; "Know this Loochy, wutevva happens tai me." She put a hand on her heart. "thas Me, the one ye ken. Wutevva happens tai Me, Ai will Always Luv Ye an' sumwear, sumwear ai wull be an' we wull Find Us aggen."
She touched a forefinger to her nose and then to Luciana's.
"Ye an' Me."

Luciana felt drained.
There was nothing that could be said. Obviously she had known that something strange was indeed playing itself out, but with Niamh's return and her apparent recovery she had hoped So Much that her fears would remain unrealised, even as she knew she was fooling herself.
But the moment had finally come and she was, as she had known she would be, powerless before the inevitable.

So it was that, for want of any further talk or action, in the knowledge that this was in all likelihood a Goodbye; at the very least to the Niamh she knew, Luciana pulled the Bosmer close to her.
The two women embraced, sunk to the mattress.
They held onto each other tightly, as if they found themselves adrift upon a roiling sea, powerless to resist it's currents, and all there was was them, just the two of them against the dark ocean.

Finally, incredibly, Luciana slept.

1.
In the grey light of the early morning Luciana awoke and found that she was alone.
Getting up she dressed and went out of her home. She walked down the steps and turning right, headed to niamh's front door.

It was ajar.
Keeping her thoughts carefully in check, she pushed the door open and walked in, stopping when she got to the main living area. Turning around in a slow circle, the wooden floor cold under her bare feet, she surveyed the scene.

Those unfamiliar with the Wood Elf would have detected little difference between the mess that confronted Luciana and the state of Niamh's home normally.
Luciana knew though, someone or something had quite literally turned the place upside down.

What little furniture there was was smashed, the pile of staffs that formed part of the rather eclectic junk collection that Niamh had amassed over the years lay scattered with it's constituent parts broken almost into matchsticks.
Everywhere that she looked in the little space was the same, but of Niamh there was no sign.

Luciana could only assume that her lack of awareness of any disturbance overnight was something to do with her partner, or whoever she was; some glamour placed upon her, maybe.
Despite what she was seeing, and the events she had so recently been a part of, and especially taking into account the night that had just passed, she felt strangely fine; slightly detached even.
She suspected that this too had something to do with Niamh, maybe she had indeed woven some magic over her as she slept, to numb her...

Uncertain now of what to do, and feeling more than a little disconnected, she headed back to the open front door and stepped outside.

And that was when, finally, everything went Mad.

----

...Oh...Oh my...

*Blinks*...Damned early mornings making my eyes blur...Yes, that's it... ...

Fair dues matey...That was incredible...Really was amazingly moving...So sad...

That you managed to get so much emotion into the phonetics was a proper testament to your skill...Yes, I could absolutely hear the voice saying all that...I loved it, I tell ya!!!...

I loved hugely the description of the "Otherness" that Niamh was experiencing...Fantastic stuff...

So...Mad in Bravil...Wonder if that means...Island hopping ahoy?... ...



As if there was any doubt... ...

Oh, and with Niamh, I never know what to expect, so... ...

Proper brilliant matey...

Loved it!!...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

[NOTE: The following episode has been edited slightly for content to tone down some of the descriptions, those of you wanting the full flavour can head over to the blog and read the unexpurgated version there if you wish. To be honest there is not that much difference; so for this version here, reader discretion is still advised to an extent.]

-Descent-

They led her down to a sub-cellar, below the level of the dungeon proper. The air was noisome and musty, the humid atmosphere sticky and cloying.
Her way lit only by the sooty, flickering torches of the jailor and their guard escort, Luciana wrinkled her nose and stepped gingerly over a stream of stagnant water as the jailor led them down the gloomy corridor.

Finally, in front of them, loomed a heavy wooden door banded with iron strips, rusty now in the moist air. It was fastened tightly shut with a large and new-looking iron padlock.
There was a small hatch in the door at roughly eye-level, it was covered with a flap, hinged at the bottom and bolted at the top.
The jailor flipped open this cover and peered gingerly into the darkness beyond.
From the open hatchway came a fetid sewer-smell, rank and raw.

Grunting as if satisfied, the jailor moved to fetch his keys from the thick leather belt buckled around his waist; as he did so the guard behind Luciana said; "You ain't got any silver on ya, 'ave ya?"
His voice sounded flat in the confines of the corridor; too loud in the oppressive silence, punctuated as it was by nothing more than the rattle of the jailor's keys as he fumbled to find the right one in the sooty light from the torches.

Looch, nervous and more than a little worried at the turn of events that appeared to have led to this situation, not to mention the unpleasant environment in which she found herself, could only shake her head mutely.
"Good, " said the guard, "she'll try an' 'ave it off ye, an' we don't like t'get 'er excited..."
The jailor, having by now unlocked the door said; "We'll stay 'ere miss, if 'tis all the same t'ye..." He thrust his torch into her hand and standing to one side, pushed open the door.

---

Upon the opening of the door there issued from the room beyond a stench so rank and foul that Luciana gagged, holding her hand over her mouth and nose, her stomach somersaulting.
An acrid ammonia-taint made her eyes water fiercely and the over-powering smell of rancid waste and filth seemed to smother her like some hideous blanket woven from dense strands of effulgent ordure.

Swallowing down the bile rising in her throat she forced herself to move into the room.
The space in which she found herself seemed to her to be reasonably large, at least as far as she could tell, it felt damp and from various points about it beyond the limits of the flickering yellow light of the torch there came the drip of water and the scurrying of what she presumed were rats, moving through the soggy, rotting straw that covered the stone flags that made up the floor beneath her feet.

With a growing feeling of dread, she walked across the centre of the space, through a darkness that was, beyond the torchlight, so complete that it seemed to her as though she were wading through some stagnant, night-bound ocean; it oppressed her to the point that even without the fetor that assaulted her nostrils, she would have found it hard to breathe.

For all of that, it was the smell though that guided her finally to her goal.

---

From the far wall, on the opposing side of the room from the doorway, hung a figure. It depended limply from a pair of iron manacles that were set so far up the wall that it's feet barely touched the floor.
As she approached it, and brought it into the penumbra that ringed the dancing circle of yellow light thrown by her torch, the smell that gloomed about her took on a new character, a musty animal scent underlying the stink of excreta that still knotted her stomach.
Closer still, and now the figure came into view, lit fully by her torch.

She froze.

Rooted to the spot she stood, one hand over her open mouth; saucer eyes goggling in disbelief and revulsion at the thing before her dangling from the cuffs.
The starving, skeletal, stinking vision of degraded horror in front of her could not, absolutely and indubitably could not, be Niamh.

And yet, despite everything that her mind tried to tell her, it was her - or at least a version of her.
The Wood Elf's head lolled down over her chest so Luciana could not see her face, but yes, she knew it was outwardly her; this... thing, this creature chained to the wall in the sub-cellar of Bravil prison was indeed, apparently, the same Niamh in whose arms she had fallen asleep not a half a day before.

---

Niamh's hair, still incongruously tied in a ponytail with a red-embroidered ribbon, was matted with dirt and greasy with sweat. It hung limply over one bony shoulder.
Even when she had been relatively healthy Niamh had always been a skinny thing but now she was quite literally skin and bone; her chest, never exactly ample, had all but completely disappeared, now nothing more than papery skin stretched tightly over her ribs.
She was covered in filth and grime, and where the manacles had bitten into her wrists streams of dark blood, now dried and crusted, streaked her stick-thin arms.

Beneath the filth though her skin, always pale, had taken on a dead and bloodless hue, not unlike that of a corpse, sheened with an oily sweat that threw back the light of Luciana's torch with a sickly glow.
Luciana noticed that Niamh had more tattoos than when she had last seen her, some few hours previously. A good deal of the right side of her body was now covered in a multitude of darkly-inked stars of varying sizes, from her chest down to her nethers and round to her back, up under her arm.
Appearing crudely done, Luciana had the distinct impression that at least some of them had been put there by their owner.

It was obvious that the Bosmer was really very sick indeed and this was made all the clearer by the mess that coated the straw beneath her hanging form.
Unable to contain herself any longer Luciana bent over, clutched at her belly with her free hand, and was violently and copiously sick.

When she had mastered herself once more, Luciana looked back up, wiping her mouth and chin with the back of her hand.
Niamh had raised her head and was regarding her, her head cocked slightly to one side.

Shock upon shock.
Niamh's face was a skin mask drawn taut over the skull beneath, the cheeks sunken, blackened lips pulled back from broken yellow teeth.
A thin line of spittle glistened wetly on her chin.

It was her eyes though that were the worst, where before they had been shadowed they had now sunk deep into their sockets, which were themselves black and bruised.
From somewhere within those pits, she could see the glitter of the Bosmer's altered eyes and she knew, then, that the Elf really did not need light to see by.

What scared her most though was that even though she could barely see them, she knew that there was no warmth, no shred of love in those eyes.
Niamh's gaze now was one of unreasoning animal hate and dark instinct from which all vestiges of her former self and any sense of comprehension and of sanity had been driven out.

Those eyes regarded her unblinkingly and for a moment the silence, but for the crackling of Luciana's torch and the rattling sound of Niamh's laboured breathing as she painfully dragged the humid, heavy air of the cell down into her chest, still held sway.
Then she spoke.

The Wood Elf's mouth opened and from between the dry and cracked lips and the yellowed ruined teeth came a breathy whisper, like as to dead leaves blowing in some desolate wintry wind, a nebulous papery rustle.
"Aaaaaah, Lew-chee-yar-naaaaaahhhhh..."
The word, Looch's name, faded away into the silence and Niamh's mouth hung open, spittle dribbling from her lower lip.
The eyes still gazed unblinking at her.

It was like the Niamh-thing in Fanacas, only much, much worse.
Luciana could only stand and gape, speechless, her heart faltering in her chest, her limbs wooden.

Then she heard a sound, coming from the Bosmer. Unsure what it what could be, and thinking that maybe she was trying to say something further, Luciana swallowed her fear and leant a little closer to Niamh, even though the stench radiating from the Bosmer left her breathless.

It took a few more seconds, but then she realised what the sound was that Niamh was making.
It was laughter.
Dry as dust, the creature that had once been her partner was laughing at her; a cracked, insane cackle.

---

Luciana fled then, back to the watchers at the doorway and she did not look back as the jailor, a look of sympathy upon his old and lined face, closed and re-locked the heavy door.
In the room beyond, with the darkness now once again wrapping everything in thick velvet, the Niamh-thing laughed madly.

-END-

...I rest my case m'lud!... ...

Wow...that was unnerving!...

Nicely done...

Looking forward to seeing how this all pans out...

Excellent stuff...Loved it!!..

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

Thank you.

-CONSEQUENCES-

A short while later Luciana, having recovered a little and been furnished with some food and a mug of beer, sat before Bravil's Commander of The Watch in his ornate office on the ground floor of the castle.
The windows were open and the sun was shining from a sky blue and cloud-free. A gentle breeze wafted fragrant geranium-scented air into the room.

"We found her by the Island Door." Said the commander, a large man of about 50 summers, stocky if not actually turning yet to fat, with a still rugged face and short greying hair."She had killed the guard and that Khajiit which was always hanging around." He was referring to the strange gateway about which the citizens of Bravil had been warned, it having opened on an island in the lake some time ago now.
Sitting back in his chair, he watched Luciana closely, as if expecting a response of some kind from her.

But she had none to give him.
Presently he grunted and scratched the side of his stubbly face.
"She was found by two of my men." He continued, his voice deep, Official, and impersonal. "They had gone over to the island to investigate flashes of light in the early hours of this morning. They took a Guild mage with them, as a precaution." He sat forward. "Luckily for them."

She watched him as he picked up a mug of ale and took a swig from it, placing it back on the dark wood desk with one hand whilst wiping his mouth with the back of the other. From outside the castle came the sound of birdsong and distant voices.

"Your input, madame Galena, would be helpful at this point." His voice was flat but his eyes were hard and with a clear suggestion that cooperation on her part would be very sensible, indeed necessary.
She shook her head, there was no point lying, he must already know anyway.
"All..." She began, stopped and took a breath, then; "All I know is that she was... with me last night. She talked, said something about... well she seemed to be saying goodbye and when I awoke this morning she was gone." She looked helplessly at the commander. "I am as confused about all this as you, Sir!"

He looked hard at her.
"I am inclined to believe you." He said. "Despite yours and that inn keeper's deceipt." He shot her a glance.
He shuffled through some papers on his desk for a moment until her found what he sought.
"It would seem," He began again, glancing down at the parchment, "that she was returning through the Door from the Other Side. We aren't quite sure of the events as they stand but we believe that the flashes of light that were witnessed occured as she passed through the gate originally, earlier." He looked up at her. "That was when she killed - Murdered - the Kat and one of my guards."
She could tell he was keeping his voice neutral but beneath it, and not far down either was anger, this was a man who felt very strongly about his men that much was clear.
A cold feeling began to gather in the pit of her belly, but something bothered her about what he had said.

Evidently the commander had noticed this.
"Madame Galena?" He prompted.
"I don't understand how she managed to get into the condition that she is in now when she's not been gone that long..." She said. It was not entirely true she knew, What was chained in the dark under their feet bore now only a passing resemblance to her Niamh, and for all that she knew the creature she had seen earlier might look like that anyway.
But no, more had gone on than either she or the Commander knew of that she was sure; the Other Niamh - (as she thought of her) - was suffering it was clear, it - she - was ravaged and clearly hurt and the part of Luciana that still hoped, Hoped, and Prayed that there was even some small piece of Her Niamh still left somewhere within could not stand to see her like that.
However much of a foolish hope it was, she had to cling to it, what else did she have?

She was snapped back into the room and out of her thoughts by the voice of the Commander; "I could not say, I do know that His Lordship has been advised by the Head of the Mages' Guild that time beyond the Door may work differently somehow." He made a face. "Apparently that means she may have been gone for days, over there." He shook his head, looked back down at his papers for a moment, as if finding some certainty within their physical reality. He was clearly a man for whom magic and it's associated oddities were something he would sooner have avoided and that, Luciana suspcted, included Niamh.
"She spotted my men and the mage, " he continued then, "whilst they were still in their boat and apparently wiped one of them out - all but incinerated him - almost before they knew what was happening." Again that anger in his voice, barely concealed. "They had to push his body off of the boat." He looked into her eyes. "Into the water." A pause, then; "Fortunately, the mage proved her worth and was able to place a ward upon herself and the remaining guard and then subdue... her."

"How...?" Luciana asked, concerned even now that Niamh had not been hurt.
The captain looked at the parchment again.
"Paralysed her, it says here." He said. "Additionally it seems that the manacles keep her weak, the mage advises me that the iron they are made from causes her pain if she tries to use her power." He looked at her then, his mouth slightly open, his grey eyes hooded beneath his eyebrows. "They hurt her."
Luciana swallowed hard and looked away from him.
Maybe it was her shackles that were making her sick. She did not know and she felt conflicted by her feelings. On the one had it was clearly wrong, the murder of the Kat and the watchmen but on the other, could they not see?
Could they not see what she could see?

The feeling in her belly grew heavy, a cold lead weight. She forced herself to look back at the Commander once again.
There was a question she had to ask, even though she knew the answer.
"What will happen to her?"

The commander's eyes narrowed slightly, he almost seemed a little surprised she shoud even ask.
"She will hang, and soon." He paused for a moment. "That is if she does not starve to death first, she's taken neither food nor water and no one wants to get close enough to her to force her. We may well need to hurry if justice is to be served." His fingers rubbed the parchment he was holding. "I have spoken to His Lordship already."

Luciana could bear it no longer.
"But she's sick!" She cried out. "Surely you can see she is not normal, she's not herself and she doesn't know what she's..."
The Commander slapped his hand, palm first, down onto the table so hard his mug of ale jumped into the air, spilling beer onto the desk. Luciana, stunned into silence, sat back in her chair and stared at him.
"You, Madame, are no position to make any comment!" Her pointed a finger at her. "You and that inn keeper of yours are lucky that you are not joining her in the cells, harbouring a known criminal especially a murderer is a hanging offence!" His hand slashed from left to right across his face. "She's wanted over half of Cyrodiil and because of your misguided attentions she's killed again! Two watchmen, and the Kat."
He took a deep breath, steadied himself, though the anger burnt brightly in his eyes, still.
"One of those men had a family, two young children." He took another breath. "Would you let her go, if you were me?"

She very nearly asked what he would have if he was her, or if it was his wife, or son and not her Niamh or at least what she hoped might be her Niamh, still. But instead she just said; "I could take her away Sir, we could leave and go far away. I know what she has done is wrong, Sir, but you must believe me she is not right in her mind..." She looked at him, her eyes moist, her fingers knitted together. "Please."
The commander looked away for a moment, then looked back at her again. When he spoke his voice was softer.
"Your loyalty is admirable, Madame Galena, but justice must be served and must be seen to be served. Bravil will tolerate nothing less." He held up a hand to silence her protests. "That is the decision. If you were me, " he said quietly, "you would do the same."

The truth hit her then, as if the man she was facing had walked around the desk and sunk his fist hard into her midriff.
It obvious on her face to anyone who looked.

The Commander was not a cruel man, despite his anger at the loss of his men, but he was a staunch believer in justice and its rightful application. Even so, he would have been heartless indeed had he not been able to see the distress and helplessness written all over the attractive woman sitting opposite him.
"You were her..." He coughed. "...lover, were you not?"
Luciana could only nod at him, speechless as she was.
"I am aware of your actions with regards to her." Went on the commander, a more sympathetic tone in his voice. "Who is to say that I would not be doing the same now, as you are, were the boot not on the other foot." For the first time he looked a little uncomfortable. "I know of her, and I know that rogue as she was, she was not a mindless lunatic killer. She has been before me in the past and I am not blind, Madame Galena, and though I may not see through your eyes I can see well enough to know that what is in my dungeon is not the woman who stood before me."

From outside the door to the Commander's office there was the sound of a bell being rung, footsteps in the hall; borne on the air through the windows children's voices - the sounds of a normal world.
He spread his arms out on either side of the chair.
"But what can I do?" He shook his head. "There is nothing I can do other than what I have done, madame, that is all. She cannot be allowed to live."

Outside, the sun continued to shine brightly down from a clear blue sky.

-END-

-From Darkness-

Even this, too, must end.

And so it had come to it finally, as she knew it must.
The morning dawned grey and chill, with the promise of rain in the air. The wind blew sullenly through the wooden struts of the scaffold that had been erected in the courtyard of Bravil Castle.

Luciana had awoken and dressed in her best clothes, washed her face and hands in the chill water from the bowl on the washstand. She had eaten a little, all the while managing to maintain the dream in which she had existed for the last couple of days, since her meeting with the Watch Commander and her first and only visit to that room deep under the castle.
It was a good dream, a fine dream, her partner was away exploring and would be home anytime soon, bringing a gift or two like she always did and smiling at her in that mischievous way that she had.

With this in mind she walked across the creaking bridge over the waterway, then past the Mage's Guild and on to Mara's Chapel, steadfastly ignoring the sideways glances directed at her by other folk as they drifted slowly towards the castle courtyard.
In the chapel she found the shrine of Dibella, Niamh's patron Goddess. Kneeling, closed her eyes and said a few quiet words.

There were some thirty minutes to go, at the suitor she found Bogrum, they looked at each other for a moment or two; there were no words to be said anymore, nothing to be done but simply to make it through the next half an hour or so, and after that...
Bogrum pushed a small mug of spirit across the scarred counter to her, poured one for himself. They both drank, glasses first raised in a silent toast, Luciana feeling the burn of the greasy liquid as it slid down her throat.

Fifteen minutes to go and they were amongst the crowd at the scaffold. Niamh had caused quite a stir during her time in Bravil though few there had ever really met her, for all that though much of the town was present in the large courtyard.
The three who had come to know Niamh the best now gathered together: S'krivva, Luciana, and Bogrum; keeping close to each other, the burly innkeeper casting a protective eye over his barmaid and friend.

There were ten minutes to go; Luciana stood between the other two and stared fixedly at the gallows. The first officials had arrived on the platform, the Watch Commander, the Priestess of Mara - Bravil's patron Goddess, a couple of watchmen, and the magistrate.
She noticed the commander look up at a window set high in the wall of the castle, he seemed to be awaiting a signal. She saw him nod, and then turn to a watchman. The guard saluted smartly and headed off back into the castle.

There were five minutes to go, the sound of the crowd washed over Luciana, snatches of conversation impinged upon her.
"...always come to a bad end..."
"...strange one that..."
"...knew she wasn't right..."
"That one there, that's her... lover..."
She could feel heads turning to look at her, eyes regarding her, a thousand unasked questions prickling the back of her neck. S'krivva's clawed hand gripped her shoulder and squeezed it.
She could feel the Kat looking at her, but was unable to tear her attention away from the scaffold.

There were two minutes to go, it had begun to rain now and distantly Luciana could feel she was becoming wet. Somebody put a cloak about her shoulders.
Increasingly it seemed to her as if she were watching events unfold from a vantage point some distance above the crowd, somewhere beyond the hubbub and away from the constant, and now increasing, sense of something once so good finally coming to an end. Detached and gently drifting.

There was one minute to go, in her mind's eye she saw the door from the dungeons opened and Niamh being led out between two guards; she was shuffling unsteadily, manacled at ankles and wrists.
From her position above the crowd she watched the trio ascend the steps at the back of the scaffold and arrive on the wooden platform.
Distantly she noted the noise from the assembled crowd quieten and die away, saw their attention focus as one upon the gallows.
Calmly, almost languidly, her attention moved there also, focused on... her.

Time slowed down.
Niamh was dressed in a single piece of cloth sacking, with rough holes cut for her arms and head. It was far too big for her, she looked lost in it, her spindly body adrift in a sea of coarse brown material.
She was staring, unblinking, into the distance. Her strange eyes glimmered even in the dim grey light of the morning, the black-slitted pupils wide. Her face was sunken and thin, her mouth hanging open.
Someone had roughly chopped her hair short and removed the piercings from her ears and face. There was a large bruise on her left cheek, livid against the white skin.
She was barefoot, and Luciana found herself hoping that Niamh's feet weren't too cold, what with the rain and all.

Vaguely she heard the magistrate begin to list the Wood Elf's crimes and it occurred to her that actually her Niamhy was already gone; she had known for a while really, but perhaps finally she accepted it now and understood that what was there on the scaffold staring blankly into space, shackled and dressed in rags, was just a shell, empty now of the life force that had once burnt so brightly within it.
She smiled then for she knew that Niamh, her Niamh, was Free; free from her bonds and from the pain and the past that haunted and hunted her, dragging at her with clutching fingers.

In the realisation of this Luciana herself found peace, and falling back into her body she wept, and her tears were as much for the joy of Niamh's liberation and for their time together as they were for the sorrow of her passing and the end of that time.
Through misted eyes she watched with the others.

Snapshots.

"...commend unto Mara..."
"Spirit"
"...crimes..."
"Have..."
"...mercy..."

The noose went over Niamh's head, was tightened around her neck.

"...last words..."

Silence.

Anticipation rippled through the crowd.

"...commend your..."

There was a thunk, the clatter of a trapdoor.
The rope went taut.

One final tear, the last drop in the ocean she had shed, coursed down Luciana's cheek.
"Goodbye Niamhy."

A whispered voice, an ending.

-X-

EPILOGUE

In the sum of all possible worlds, another.
A planet, a continent, a city...

In the bedroom of a third floor apartment in a building in the less well off side of the city, a woman - Lucinda Galner - awakes from a dream and sits up, staring for a moment into the soft darkness clinging about the bed. She holds the sheet up to her chest.
As her eyes focus and become used to the night, she turns to look down at the sleeping form next to her.

It is a woman, a little younger than her, maybe thirty. Her name is Niamh E. and she's the singer in a band that works the seedier bars in the waterfront district of the metropolis.
Lucy had met her earlier that night, she'd felt drawn to her; tall and slender with pale skin, dark chestnut eyes and long red-streaked black hair. She had an air of mystery about her, a dark and hidden past that Lucy found - finds - irresistibly fascinating.
She smiles in the dark and shakes her head. Lying down once again she presses close to the other woman and lays an arm gently over her.

She has no idea if the road that she's on is the right one or even where it is headed, but she has a suspicion that the ride, as long as it lasts, will be a wild one.

And you can't say fairer than that.

-The End-

Wow...That was epic!!...

That was one hell of a tale...I absolutely loved it!!...Thrilling and wonderful from start to finish...I mean, yeah...Sad end and all...But still...

Soooo, this the end of the Niamh story?...Hmmmm...

Fantastic stuff...

Loved it!!...

Amazing writing matey...

Nice one!!...

*Applauds heartily*...

I just got to enjoy this whole arc in one sitting and it was very, very interesting indeed. Somewhat confusing, though I suspect that that was the intention, but tense, moving and ultimately rather sad

That little ending snippet, though, was great; I'd assumed by (what I gather) Niamh's reincarnation was limited to Nirn, allowing her to move between games (Skyrim, Oblivion and possibly Dragon Age from what I've read on yer blog), but that final bit was a really cool little surprise.

I enjoyed it very much, and it kind of reminded me of something that Neil Gaiman would write; I'm intrigued to see what'll be happening next.

Thank you Colonel, that's really nice of you to say and thank you for reading.
As it happens Neil Gaiman is my Very Favourite Author, I have pretty much everything he has written as it goes!

It might well be, that you'll find out...

Will.... Will Niamh be resurrected!??

Sort of, I'm working on a few ideas.

I miss that girl!

She had such cute butt comments on stuff

I actually do miss her as well, as it happens, and despite my best efforts - her character got under my skin...
And so I found myself wondering if there was any further I could take her story, without trivialising it or just becoming repetitious. I made a lot of false starts, not least because I dont actually play Oblivion anymore, certainly not at the moment.

I do still write though, and I do write about her from time to time, and it kind of feels like I have an idea now as to how things might pan out, so if you are interested, watch this space!

See the new thread...

See the new thread...