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Severed Destiny, pt. 10

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Author's Note: tw, Sadara doesn't want to be 'alive' anymore and considers taking steps to not be alive.

Lots of medical talk from the Divath Fyr section. You can't tell me that this man can clone himself and not also invent a shitload of things.

This is long, almost 6k words

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Below the sound of constant ashy gusts of the blight winds, the Ghostfence hummed.

She had been staring at it, waiting, for what she knew not. Perhaps for the bravery to carry through with the idea that had brought her here.

There had hardly been a moment of respite outside of Mausur Caverns. It seemed that whenever she approached a corprus beast or ash zombie, they would almost instantly turn, necks giving a too-loud crack, before fixing her with either a steady gaze or bolting at the spot where she'd last made a sound.

And she might have thought he did not have ill intent, had they not been so intent to lay hands on her. She could toss a bolt of ice at the lesser ones and run, but the ash ghouls (poets, his voice still corrected her somewhere in the back of her mind) and ascended sleepers...they were another story.

She'd thought herself well hidden enough, behind a scattering of rocks. The blight winds had slowed a bit, but were still strong enough she'd been certain it couldn't see or sense her movement.

She had been wrong.

The sleeper had spotted her, and as she'd moved back to flee - hurled a bolt of magic at her. It struck, but seemingly did nothing, and for a moment she could not figure out why - not that there was time for much thought. Moving away there was another bolt of the same, and another, yet neither of the two did anything.

It was not until she had gotten safely back to Mausur that she realized they were paralysis spells. They'd done nothing because wispmothers weren't affected by such things. It was almost a relief.

Almost.

But the fact that she was being attacked at all confirmed what Azura had been telling her: that he wanted her gone, and likely enough, wanted to handle it himself. Why else would the sleepers be hurling spells at her?

Then there had been a similar encounter a week later, with an ash poet, and then another, a few days after that.

It made her wonder if Gilvoth had finally spoken up. Stay gone, he'd said, and I will keep your secret. Stay gone, and I won't tell him you didn't leave to retrieve Wraithguard. Perhaps after she'd been caught through the eyes of that dying man, he'd started trying to find her. Maybe it had not been entirely angry, she couldn't know. But he WOULD be angry if Gilvoth spoke up...yes. Yes, that would explain the sudden surge of spells the ash poets and ascended sleepers directed at her. That would explain everything.

The small joy she had been able to take from this world of shit had been eliminated, and Azura had had much fun mocking her for it.

The Sharmat wants to destroy she who most betrayed him! Do you think he would want to leave it to his underlings? Do you think he would let you expire peacefully? Dead as you are, the demon has ways of making you pray for the true end! There is no escape!

She was alone again, but she couldn't simply stay in Mausur - that was the surest way to madness, to hole up there to wait for the end, in whatever way it came.

So now here she stood, an arm's length from the Ghostfence, contemplating what, she wasn't sure.

No, she knew what it was.

She extended a spectral hand, lifted it to the shimmering, shifting surface of the Ghostfence, and winced. Putting a hand near it produced a repelling force, and pushing it forward anyway made her feel as though her hand would split painlessly apart.

But actually touching it?

Pain shot up her arm, and she cringed from the agony. She felt weak - weaker than usual, even more than she had when she had first awakened behind that cursed glow.

Yet it hurt not nearly so much as feeling nothing at all.

Had she still been living there might have come then a deep breath. There was still a steeling of nerves, a moment of silence in her mind, a desperate attempt to keep her course steady.

Fifteen years.

For certain she knew it, for Azura had been sure to tell her each time a year passed. Her daughter was nearly a woman now, and she had seen none of it, had barely been able to hold her as a babe before expiring. What would she look like now? Would she still resemble--him? Would her little girl be able to see her at all? How had the argonians raised her, what had she learned? What hopes and dreams did she have?

What would have been, had she been able to convince him of the wrongness of his actions? It was a sword, that imagining, a sword that cut her a thousand agonies with every attempt to approach it. She had once tried thinking how joyful a father he might have been, how eager he might have been to teach a young mind, the first new one of his family in well over three thousand years. The smile on his face when a small voice called him father.

She would gladly have cast off her own and worn the name Nerevar, forget all that she had been if she could have even a taste of that life.

How wonderful things might have been, had I only been able to make him see?

So many questions I will never know the answer to.

There had been light, laughter, and love once, a lifetime ago. But now? Now there was only darkness and the constant red fog of the blight storms, and even this was going to come to an end. And she would know - for Azura said as much - when he had been defeated, for it would all stop, and then would come her true doom.

Even the corprus monsters she had once sung to, her only real company, would cease to exist and she would be lost, truly lost, in a never-ending stretch of ash and ruin.

A silent moment passed then. She steeled her nerves, kept her ghostly hands clenched into fists, and began to float forward--

No. STOP.

The voice was distinctly male, and stern in a way that reminded her of the ordinators. It came--from where, she wasn't sure. There was no one around her, that she could see, anyway. Perhaps she had finally lost it.

This isn't the answer.

"This is the only option I have left," she said in reply, "The last mote of happiness I had has been stolen. He has his followers dogging my every step, ready to end me if I'm not vigilant enough. I will never be able to pass the Ghostfence...what is left for me? What other answer is there?"

All is not as it appears. Listen to me. Let me help you. Just don't end yourself.

"Please don't make me hope," she whispered, "I would rather go now, than...than find you aren't real, or..."

I am real. I am HERE, the voice said. Strong as an ox, sure as the sun, he believed what he was saying, she could understand that much.

"But who are you?"

-----------------------------------

Yagrum was so eager to speak that Haj-deek couldn't help but sit there with him. She had the blood drawing tools in hand, but hesitated to go back up to Divath Fyr just yet.

"Your father - he was always brilliant, always knew exactly what he wanted - but perhaps not always how to get it. Else you would likely bear two names instead of only the one."

She looked away for a moment. "My mother's journals tell me she tried to change his mind, but...but was unsuccessful."

"Even for a lover's touch Lord Dagoth would not change his mind, that was always his way. Stubborn as any lord of a Great House might be."

"If my mother couldn't do it, then..." Haj-deek shook her head. Whatever Vivec had done, given her - she felt it kicking around in her head, boiling beneath her skin. He'd said she would know when the time had come to use it. Maybe whatever it was could be used.

She tried to explain what had lead to the situation wherein Vivec had given her this supposed power, whatever it was. Yagrum latched onto the topic eagerly.

"Much as Azura likes to consider herself a loving and benevolent deity, she has proven many times to be quite the opposite. And Vivec - him I am more and yet less sure of. He is eager to correct his mistakes, you say?"

"He claims to have seen the future," she said, "He showed me Baar Dau falling and striking the city...the disaster that followed. He was--very precise."

She knew she'd said too much, but Yagrum wasn't in a position to tell anyone else but those of Tel Fyr, and none of the people here seemed like the sort to go running to tell what she'd said.

"He didn't seem to dislike the idea of doing something to help my father," Haj-deek went on, "I wanted to know him, I said, and...he went along with it. He knows a lot of things I don't, this is probably one of them."

"Or he could be leading you on, to direct you to a most bloody fate. That is the whim of gods and those who consider themselves gods. Disobey them and their façades fade away in an instant." There was a moment of thought. "If you are quite serious in the attempt...I suppose there is something I could lend you. I would if possible want it back if you are able to escape this plan with your life."

Yagrum turned, and the spiderlike legs beneath him went tk tk tk as he moved over towards the wardrobe. He opened it, humming briefly to himself, and then lifted something from its bottom. "I've got something your father once gave to me...and when trying to appeal to one's humanity, it helps to have reminders from the past."

When he returned he held out a tiny, inert dwemer spider. It looked clumsily made - its sides were a little lumpy, and its legs felt brittle. Too thin. The metal had not been worked right, she could see that even not knowing how exactly smithing of such metals worked.

But the joints seemed to be holding together well, even while the rest of it didn't seem so well off.

"What is this?" she finally asked.

"A dwemer spider," Yagrum said, "House Dagoth mingled its blood with that of the Dwemer at some point in the past, and your father was interested in learning something of our skills, saying it could be of benefit to learn more of his heritage. And I, being--well, one of--his closest friends at the time, seemed the obvious first place to look for guidance on the matter. He tried a little of everything - and presented me with this spider."

Haj-deek smiled briefly. "Was he proud of it?"

"Yes and no. He was pleased to have made something, but he was well aware its quality was not...ideal. 'I have created, if not beautifully,' he said, 'And I would give it to you, but it would be an insult to provide you with something of such poor quality.' I cared not. I told him it was a shaky first attempt, but that he did not have the benefit that I did. I studied under Kagrenac himself - he had contented himself with notes I gave him. Seeing is better than reading, which is itself secondary to doing. I told him he should keep trying. I kept the spider, though, as a token of our friendship. Even in my wanderings, it's been at my side. Even when my mind deserted me, I knew it was important, even if I did not know why."

"I--thank you, for trusting me with it. Any help I can get, I'll take...do you think it will help remind him of--before?"

"It could, or it could not. But when you encounter your father, be sure to show him this little spider. Remind him that there was a time he did not make perfect the enemy of good, that there was a time he did not..."

Yagrum seemed to stop short at that.

"I'm sorry, I...lost track of my thoughts. Ah. You did not come here to only speak to me. You'd best take the blood-drawing tool up to Lord Fyr, I await eagerly the news of what you might help him discover."

"I don't mind speaking to you, though. Um...before I go..."

"What?"

"Did you ever meet my mother? Divath Fyr says he did, and..."

"Your mother...the previous Nerevarine." Yagrum paused, squinted, and shook his head. "Very little. Her smile, I remember that...she had a smile that brightened even this dark room. Ah - something else, she played that guarskin drum you might've seen Uupse using. I don't remember why."

Haj-deek thanked Yagrum once again, and finally left.

-------------------------------------

The blood-drawing tool in question was a strange looking needle attached to a colorful...tube of some kind? It was made of something that seemed to give a little, but not much, and on either side of the bright part were two strange little things almost like wings. Behind that the small tubing extended into something that looked like it was made to be put into something else.

The needle was...rather large, and that made her skin crawl just a bit. But she went on back to Divath Fyr anyway, with Sunchaser following close behind.

"Ah, good, you're back. You were gone longer than I expected."

"Yagrum was eager to talk to someone new," Haj-deek said, "And he'd met my mother, so...I wondered if he'd have anything to say about her. Now...uh...this thing, what is it? How are you supposed to draw blood with it? What's it even made of?"

"A new material derived from certain trees in Black Marsh, they're calling it 'rubber,'" Divath Fyr said, "And I've taken to calling it a butterfly needle. My patients seem to prefer these to the metallic sort. It was actually Vistha-Kai who suggested using the rubber in place of them."

"Where's the blood supposed to go?"

He gestured to her to follow, and so she did. He lead her to what was clearly some sort of alchemy lab, as crowded as the desk there was. Vials, ingredients, lined the shelves behind it, and he plucked a small vial from a lower shelf. The end of the tubing seemed to slot neatly into the vial's open top.

"Your blood flows at a certain speed as it moves through your body, and as such all I need do is give a little prick into a vein and let your body do all the work."

"And then?"

"Then I begin my work. Your blood could be invaluable in my struggle against the...more negative effects of corprus. Provided, of course, your blood is...of the right type." Divath Fyr took to cleaning the point end of the butterfly needle as he spoke.

"Type? Blood has types?" Haj-deek was frankly astonished, and even though the idea of being stuck with the needle was a bit gross, she was curious to hear more.

"Oh, yes. I noticed that when studying the blood of some of my patients, a curious reaction happened when I combined some of it under another of my inventions. It allows for amplified viewing of small--"

"Go on," she gestured, when he stopped.

"--of things too small for the naked eye to see itself. I noticed certain differences between the samples, yet similarities from the corprus."

"The blood was different from one patient to the next?""

When he gestured for her arm, Haj-deek decided to cooperate. It was fascinating, listening to this, despite...everything. Listen, Vivec had said, listen when the masters speak. You may learn something even if you do not understand it.

"There were four types, as Uupse later discovered, and two...subtypes of those types. To keep things simple, I named them after two of my daughters...and for oblivion itself."

The needle pricked a vein in her elbow, and despite the sudden nausea Haj-deek watched the blood flow out and into the vial. It didn't take long to fill the thing; the needle was pulled away and the small wound healed.

"That's a little weird. Not your daughters, but oblivion...?"

"A thing a man discovers is his to name, after all," Divath Fyr went on with a laugh, "Alfe, or A, Beyte, or B, and AB. The fourth, O for oblivion, was chosen because it did not seem to fight A, B, or AB as they would with one another. Hence the name. All of my patients had one of these four types, in either the positive or negative..."

She nodded, and momentarily looked down at the tiny wound in her arm. It was still gross to think about, him taking her blood, but it hadn't be as bad as she was expecting. And at least he looked like he was doing something useful with it.

He went on to explain some further things she didn't understand as he turned away to examine her blood. He took drops of it and put them under glass with some other drops of other blood, and then looked into the strangest thing she had seen yet.

"What is that?" she asked as he bent over the thing.

"A device Yagrum Bagarn helped me with. I have a spell for magnifying my eyesight, but it leads to troublesome headaches and other...strange side effects. This thing merely requires lenses, such as you might find in an old man's glasses."

There was a pause, and then he spoke again.

"This may take me a few minutes, go and see about getting yourself something to eat. And for my sake, don't do it up here around my specimens."

----------------------------------------------

When Haj-deek returned, Divath Fyr who had been still over whatever that little device was, looked quickly up.

"Anything?" she asked.

"Well, you're as immune as you say you are. And also what I've come to call O-, so that's an advantage to my work."

"How so?"

"It means that anyone can receive your blood, without it attacking or being attacked. With the little you've given me I've already seen some reduction of corprus in the other samples."

Haj-deek was momentarily puzzled. "How--how does that work when I have it myself? I mean...I don't feel any of the bad effects, but..."

Further explanation was soon given, and most of it went over her head. Something about "hereditary immunity" and "bodily defenses" and a whole host of other things she didn't really understand. But what was clear was that her blood was doing something to that of his patients. The blood of the others were responding in some way,

Still, after years of trying and so much failure in finding a cure, it was something - and much less fatal than that potion he had fed her mother.

"I may even be able to formulate a treatment from it...assuming there are no ill effects."

"I imagine you Telvanni wizards can do anything with magic."

"Of course we can," Divath's head raised proudly, "This could take magic of a different sort...if you wouldn't mind staying here for a week, perhaps two...and give me a little time to study your blood, perhaps provide me with a few more vials of it. If you're as eager to learn as you've been so far, it would be no chore instructing you."

He held a vial like that which he'd collected her blood in.

"As long as you only take my blood with that...that...what do you call that thing, anyway? Leeches?"

"I hadn't named them, actually...leeches, yes. I'll go with that."

And with that he was back to looking at her blood through that strange little device. She resolved to ask about it later, when he seemed more amenable to talking again.

------------------------------------

For the next week she spent the bulk of her time with Uupse and Yagrum, helping the former with the corprus victims and their various treatments, and speaking of her father and the past with the latter. Uupse applauded her for her interest one morning as she was helping dish out saltrice porridge for the patients' breakfast.

Sunchaser was having her own little meal from fish that Haj-deek had caught earlier - but outside. She seemed to adjust well enough to it, seeing as how there weren't any other cliffracers nearby...though she still preferred to stick close to the tower.

"He never gets visitors...Tel Fyr gets new people now and then, but they're usually not in good shape by the time we receive them, and not in a mood to talk. I think your presence has benefitted him greatly."

Haj-deek gave a slight smile. Yagrum had had many things to say, as the more he talked of her father and the past, the more linked memories seemed to appear. Not too many - sometimes they were only snippets, half-thought conversations, but he remembered, and that was the important part.

And more importantly, it gave her the chance to learn about her father. The moment Uupse was gone, she sought Yagrum out. He appeared to be studying her mother's journal--she'd given it to him, half wondering if there was something he could see that she didn't. Something to actually help.

"Your mother was quite the hopeful woman," he said, rubbing his eyes, "Nerevar...I don't remember him very well. I don't know if he was a hoper. He was...a man of action, though, I do remember that."

"I like doing things too," Haj-deek said, "And seeing things change because of me, but...I don't know if you'd call me someone of action just yet. Most of my life has been other people guiding me. The argonians that raised me...Vivec, for a while."

"Well, you're at that age where you start learning to make choices," Yagrum said, "So it's not your fault that you haven't made any yet. One thing I will say - don't be too much like your father. Stick to a decision if you feel it to be right, but be willing to change what you think if you're shown evidence it's not good for you. The man was stubborn, to an irritating degree, so unchangeable, unshakeable, he could not fathom being wrong most of the time."

"What worked with you?"

"Time," he said, "And multiple reminders that such behavior wasn't going to win him any favors with the people who cared for him."

"Could it really be that simple?" she asked. "He's been like this for...centuries."

"It's what worked before, who's to say it won't work now? Form a hypothesis and test it based on prior evidence. Granted, my evidence is...anecdotal..."

"Anecdotal?"

"Means it's my experience only, and not documented under studied conditions," Yagrum replied. "Now, I'm going to get to my breakfast before it goes cold. You should do the same."

Haj-deek's stomach growled in agreement, and she headed off to find Uupse again to get her own serving of the saltrice porridge.

"You've got a letter," Uupse said, after the bowl was filled, "It doesn't have a name on it."

"That's...strange." Haj-deek glanced over the envelope. "If it was anybody I knew they wouldn't...huh."

The envelope looked fairly nice, so she sat down in an alcove, near what had probably been some sort of campfire, and opened the letter. As she ate she read:

To the Nerevarine, Haj-deek

Be not afraid on receipt of this letter, if you should happen to have first ready my signature. I assure you that my actions shall not be those that you might already have heard from the dissident priests or other such unfaithful folk.

Though I have watched others come and go, my belief is that you are the child of prophecy. The time has come for you to reclaim your station. Together we can unite Morrowind once again, free from the Imperial yoke.

You are but a child, though nearly a woman you be. Allow me to guide you, for the title you carry is a heavy one. One, I am sure, you have already a deep awareness of, if your stay in Vivec City has been as long as I have heard it was. Let it not be said that Mother Morrowind, the font of mercy herself, cannot set a course ahead of the youth and help them to see the way they must go. You could be a beacon of hope, if only you will heed my words. Let the moon-and-star that adorns your hand and marks your destiny symbolize also your return to my side, though in a far different role than before.

But I must present you two warnings: there are those who seek to sway you to their own sides, away from the path of righteousness which you will soon walk. Lord Vivec, a revered god among mer as he is, has designs that are shrouded in complexity and ambiguity, as is his nature. You must be wary of seeking his counsel, lest it lead to your confusion in his wisdom at the worst possible time.

And as you no doubt have heard - you must at all costs guard your heart and mind against the evil whisperings of Dagoth Ur, the devil that plagues all of Morrowind. His influence is pure malevolence, a creeping necrosis that rots and kills all that it touches. You will be promised power and glory, but the path he would lead you down goes only one way: to ruin and despair. Do not trust him, even once, even for a moment, for the inch will be taken and the mile with it, as the saying goes. You should not have trusted him in the First Era, and you should not trust him now.

I would ask that you visit me in Mournhold. Seek out my wisdom, stand at my side, and fulfill your destiny. There are things only you can accomplish, and through me you will find all the strength you need and more to set the world right. Only you can now do what is needed - so it was with you when your name was Nerevar and you united Chimer and Dwemer, and so it shall be again.

Perhaps this time I may convince you to be less reckless, the better to preserve your life.

Signed, Almalexia, Mother of Morrowind, the Lady of Mercy

Haj-deek had for a moment an inkling of a feeling to show Almalexia the same mercy as she was planning to show to others. Something in the back of her mind stirred, weaker and yet there, a distrust of (Ayem) that would not be held back. It was Vivec, memory and the man's own mouth had said, to spear me through, but it was Ayem who I trusted most and thus who most betrayed me.

Still, perhaps she could see if these were only words, or if there was an inkling of a chance for her to change.

And if not...Vivec had once said something about Trueflame, and how Almalexia had it. Getting that sword would help...how would Vivec put it?...legitimize her as the Nerevarine nearly as much as the ring did.

The presence of a bloated corprus monster stirred Haj-deek's attention from musing on the letter. She looked up, and found the bloated thing staring at her. It sat down and seemed to inch closer.

She readied fire in her fist, which he seemed to notice. He looked at the embers, then back up, and shook his head.

They were so strange, these things. They'd never attacked her--grabbed at her, yes, but never hurt her. Most of the time they simply stared, and if she talked to them, would listen.

What were they looking for? What were they getting from this?

It reached for the letter clumsily, with a shaking hand.

"No, no, that's mine," she said, pulling it away, "Seems I'm very important these days...it's from Almalexia."

The corprus victim made an outburst--not quite a scream, but clearly an expression of pained panic.

"Oh, it's nothing to worry about. She's down in Mournhold, and I'm all the way up here. Still...if she's as eager to make up as she sounds, maybe she's sincere. It's worth checking--"

There was a groan, and a grab at her arm with its own bloated one. A clenched grip that wouldn't release, however much she pulled away. Still no attacks - but she wasn't sure he wouldn't.

"Uupse!" she called out, before looking back at the victim.

"Nnnn...nnn..." He was trying to make a sound, trying hard, she could almost feel the desperation, see the struggle, until finally a single strangled word escaped his lips, "No!"

"No?"

A painful motion, almost like he'd vomit and then two words, in a softer tone, "No...go..."

"No go...don't go? Don't go whe--what, you mean to Almalexia?"

The patient nodded eagerly.

It was then that Uupse appeared, and she was able to cast a calm spell and ease the corprus victim's hand off Haj-deek's arm.

"They aren't usually like that," she said, "What was this about?"

"I got a letter from--from Almalexia, and I said I was considering seeing her and he just--he just--" she stammered, rubbing at the sore spot on her arm where the victim had grabbed her, "He said, and I quote, 'no go.'"

"Well, you're a Nerevarine, and the Temple doesn't like Nerevarines..." Uupse shrugged, "But...this one is so far gone, I didn't think he could..."

There was a pause.

"Well, it's a good sign...in a way. Do you know a calm spell? It might be helpful if you intend to stay here much longer...it'll be good practice for those fits you keep seeing them have. And for situations like this."

Another groan from the corprus victim, as Haj-deek stood; he stood with her and stayed close. There was a sickly groan, and then both his hands moved to her shoulders.

"Oh, he must think he knows you," Uupse said, "That happens rarely with them at this stage, but the early stage infections will...get like this. It's the rotting of their mind, it causes them to think that people around them are their friends, or family...it can cause them to be familiar with those they've never met."

Haj-deek looked up at the yellowed eyes of the corprus victim, and he stared back down at her own red ones.

She expected almost anything except what came next.

This corprus-addled man, so sickly looking she could not even tell whether he was man or mer, wrapped both his arms around her and pulled her into the tightest hug she'd ever been a part of.

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