Over the following week, busy investigating holds and harrowstorms with Svana, Anora managed to keep her mind off Fennorian. The princess had showed some real backbone after the loss of her mother, then her father’s refusal to acknowledge her concerns regarding what was happening in Skyrim. Despite the tragic loss of the Jarl and most of the town of Karthald, Svana had remained focussed on the task at hand rather than give in to her grief. She would indeed make a fine ruler one day, if given the opportunity, as Lyris had remarked.

At Svana’s request, Anora had now returned to the Blue Palace. She nodded at the guards and knocked on Svana’s door. Without offering a greeting, the princess held up a note. “It’s from Fenn,” she explained. “He says he’s made an important discovery in Dusktown – in the Blackreach Caverns. You and Lyris should go see what he found.”

It seemed to take forever to find Lyris and prepare for their descent to Dusktown – probably no longer than usual, but Anora’s longing for Fenn had resurfaced, constant and unrelenting. When at last they reached his door, Lyris’s knock went unanswered. She pushed into his room. Anora was horrified to see the state of it – furniture overturned; his alchemical flasks smashed; his notes spread over the floor. The bed furs were ripped off the straw mattress. No blood, but no Fenn either.

“He’s been taken.” Anora tried, and failed, to keep her voice even. “Look – his flask. He wouldn’t have left that behind.” She picked it up and levered out the stopper. It smelt of herbs and alcohol, with the overwhelming tang of blood. Not pleasant. Best bring that along, she thought. Worry for him ate at her. Was his disappearance connected to the Gray Host or had the villagers discovered him, the vampire in their midst? She followed Lyris outside, and they soon found the trail that led to Edjar, a werewolf. He knew something about Fennorian, but he wouldn’t tell unless they rescued his pack. Of course. No alternative but to deliver on Fenn’s promise of aid.

It was a simple matter for Anora to find and free Edjar’s packmates, but then she was well used to such work. Fenn, Edjar revealed, was being held in a Dwemer ruin. When he mentioned the experiments being conducted on vampires and werewolves, it was all Anora could do not to run off alone. She needed Lyris as backup; they didn’t know what they would be facing in there.

Inside the ruin they came to a halt: the door to the next chamber was sealed by dwarven locks. Anora was trembling, so it took a few tries to activate each gear, but at last the door swung open and they were able to move forward. A laboratory. And notes, confirming Anora’s worst fears. The Gray Host were torturing their victims. Frantic, she ran ahead of Lyris. Please, please, let Fenn be alright.

The next room was a strange garden, with a horrible red mist coming from valves in the ceiling. Simple enough to disengage them, and even simpler to sneak past the strange, moving stone husk, and into the passage beyond. There they found and despatched more of the Host’s minions.

And then Fenn screamed.

Anora would have run straight in, heedless of the need for stealth, if Lyris hadn’t caught her arm in a death grip.
The woman’s voice was like iron. “Wait, Anora. I know you want to save Fenn, and we will, I promise, but let’s see if his captors give anything away first.” She didn’t let go as they crept into the chamber where Fennorian hung limp within a dwarven apparatus powered by strange red lightning. Two men, one an aristocratic Redguard, and the other they recognised as Exarch Tzinghalis, were conversing while Fenn writhed and moaned in his restraints. Anora couldn’t concentrate on what they were saying. Lyris gave her arm a shake. “We kill them first,” she grated, “then rescue Fenn. Got it? It’s too risky to do it the other way around.” Anora nodded weakly. Rage competed with anxiety. She watched him, her hand pressed to her mouth to keep herself silent. Although, as a vampire, Fenn couldn’t die, he could still feel pain, but letting Lyris despatch their foes alone wasn’t worth Titanborn’s bad mood afterward.

The Redguard vanished. No sooner did Lyris relinquish her grip than Anora shot off like an arrow. It wasn’t a difficult fight; as soon as the Exarch fell Anora dashed over to turn off the valve powering Fenn’s torture device, then watched dismayed as he dropped heavily to the floor. She tried to pull him to his feet, but in his debilitated state all he could do was huddle with his arms around his knees. He looked terrible, and not just because he was barefoot and dressed in rags.

“Don’t touch me, please.” He glanced up at her, his reddish eyes filled with pain. “I feel like… when I was a child, I was stung by a bee. It’s like that, but all over. Like a thousand bee stings.”

“Oh, Fenn…” Anora knelt beside him. “I want… is there anything I can do to help?”

“No, unless you have my flask.” Gratitude lit his haggard face as she produced it. “Perhaps you could find my leathers?

Anora found them in a chest. She took them back, wondering if she dared kiss him.

She did not.



After a couple long hours’ anxious wait back at the Blue Palace, Anora was relieved to see Fenn hobble into Svana’s chamber behind Lyris. From his brief smile – more of a grimace, really – it was clear he was still in pain. He sat off by himself as the others pored over the map they’d found after his rescue, only rousing when asked a direct question.

“I need rest,” he responded to Anora’s soft enquiry. “I can’t see myself getting any, though. The Gray Host poses an ever-larger threat, and we still don’t know what exactly they’re planning.”

“Not even an hour’s recuperation?” she pressed, hoping she didn’t sound too eager. “I’ll help you back to the Inn; you can have my room.”

“Thank you, but no.” He took a long pull from his flask. “I can rest when this is all over.” When Svana suggested he go to the Gray Host’s coastal camp to see if he could discover anything, he readily agreed.

“Meet him there,” the princess said to Anora, tipping her a wink. “Anora, you’ll then go to meet Lyris. Once you have the netherroot brew, come meet me in Blackreach. After we’ve investigated there, let’s regroup at the Blue Palace to confront my father with our findings.”

Fenn struggled to his feet. “See you at the coastal camp, Anora. Wear something warmer, yes? It’ll be much colder on the coast, for you.”

Anora nodded and trudged off alone toward the Lonely Troll, despondent. He didn’t want her company, until it was absolutely necessary. Forget him, she told herself.

She could not.

They found Skreg at his broken tower. Barrels oozing a noxious greenish substance that could only be poison dotted his arena; this truly was a dishonourable Orc.

The fight went without a hitch until Skreg let out a battlecry, at which a dozen or so archers and swordsmen poured out of the broken tower to join in. While dodging away from a bowman Anora fell backward over a barrel, which ruptured. Skreg threw a poison bomb at her. It shattered in her face and she began coughing and vomiting. And blacked out.



When she regained consciousness, everything hurt. Her eyes wouldn’t open. Unable to move, she lay there in agony beneath a pile of furs that were almost too heavy for her to breathe. From the cold blasts of air, scent of woodsmoke and the calls of night birds, it was clear they were in a camp somewhere. She heard the river, and the rustle of leaves.

A thin moan escaped as an icy hand touched her, then withdrew. Fenn spoke softly. “Anora? You need water, but I daren’t move you. I’ll drip some water in your mouth.”

She heard a swish of cloth in a filled basin, gently squeezed, then a few merciful drops hit her tongue. It was difficult to swallow. Once done he draped the cloth over her forehead and with the creak of his leathers, rose and walked away.

“She’s getting weaker,” Anora heard him say. “The bomb held a paralysis poison. The other… it soaked her through. Her skin must have absorbed some of it.”

“We can’t lose her,” growled Lyris. “And we can’t afford this delay either –“

“What would you have me do? I’ve tried everything but she’s not responding. And I will not leave her like this.”

“Then I will go find Svana in Blackreach,” Lyris told him. “Better than waiting around for…” Heavy footfalls faded, and Anora knew what Lyris had been loath to say: better than waiting around for her to die.

Darkness fell once more.



When she awoke again, little remained of her world. A cold hand held hers, and she gave it as much of a squeeze as she could.

“Anora…” Fenn drew her name out in a sad sigh. “Can you hear me? Squeeze for yes.”

She did.

“I fear you’re dying,” he said. “This poison… it’s beyond my skill as a healer. I’m sorry. Really, I am.” He stroked her hair with his other hand. “We… we don’t want to lose you. I don’t want to lose you. But you’re fading. There’s only one way to save you. If you’re willing.”

Wishing she could speak, Anora squeezed his hand again.

Fenn took a deep breath. “Your choice is this… either I do nothing and you pass away… or I can turn you. I must warn you, though… the change from mortal into vampire is… not pleasant.” He paused a moment to drop a kiss on her hand, smoothing it with his thumb. “If you want me to save you… tell me now, before it’s too late. Squeeze. Or not.”

She did.

“Understand that this is of your own free will and without coercion.”

She squeezed.

“Understand that this will cause you to die before you change, and that the change will be the worst pain you ever experience.”

She squeezed.

“Understand that I do not do this lightly, Anora… and that I would not have offered it under any other circumstance whatsoever. But, as I said… as Lyris said, we don’t want to lose you.”

She squeezed.

“Shall we begin?”

She squeezed.

His strength returning, Fenn lowered Anora to the ground and stroked her long, dark hair. He lifted her head and pillowed it on her folded cape, so she wouldn’t injure herself during her convulsions, then tied a rag bandage around his neck. That done, he rose and built up the fire again before fetching the shovel to start digging a depression in the half-frozen ground next to her. This was the unpleasant part: the purging. Her body would expel all waste as it changed, including the toxins that would have otherwise taken her life.

No help for it. This what what Verandis had done for him, during his change.

Digging completed, he manoeuvred her over the depression. She was naked, since her clothes were still covered with whatever foul substance Skreg had had in the ruptured barrel. Fenn covered Anora with a fur, fetched more rags and refilled the basin from the nearby river, then settled upwind beside her to keep vigil, whispering encouragement.

Long stretches of unconsciousness were punctuated by periods of thrashing, tormented moans and, a few times, shrieks that split the night. Fenn was glad they weren’t at the Lonely Troll; a mob would have broken the door down after her first scream. The poison still roiled about inside him, making him queasy. What remained in the flask would have helped, but he was saving that for Anora.

And, once this was over… what then? They would go on to meet the Gray Host; of that he was certain, but what of Anora? She had made her choice, yes, but after this night’s harrowing, would she hate him for it?

He was more than fond of her. Much more than he’d admitted to, only hours before when they’d parted near the graveyard. He’d known she was interested, of course, but had ignored it until she’d forced his hand, so to speak. He could not have watched her grow old and die – it would have been too much, just as if she’d rejected his offer this night. Parting would not have been sweet sorrow, it would likely have meant he couldn’t go on. He didn’t have Svana’s fortitude.

As the first glimmer of dawn lightened the eastern sky, Anora opened her eyes. They were now reddish, like his, rather than her familiar hazel.

“Fenn?” she croaked. “Is this over now, or is there more? And if there is –“

“I believe it’s done,” he told her, letting her hand go at last. “You’ve not had any convulsions for a while.” Wrinkling his nose, he helped her sit upright then handed over his opened flask. “You should clean up and dress before Lyris and Svana return.” He passed his flask and his spare leathers, the only available clothing that would more or less fit her, as well as the rags and the basin of water he’d had warming by the fire. She wouldn’t feel warmth any more, but it was better for ablutions than cold water. Then he went to gather more firewood.

When he came back with an armful of fallen branches, Anora was sitting by the fire, reclothed, arms around her knees, staring into the flames. Fenn threw some wood into the blaze, then sat nearby. Close enough to be companionable; not so close as to impose. He glanced at her a couple times but she didn’t look at him.

So be it, he thought. She didn’t want him, and he couldn’t blame her. He stared at his feet, trying to will away his disappointment.

“Fenn?”

He looked up.

“Thank you. I think.” A wan smile ghosted across Anora’s now-pale face. “I wouldn’t wish it on anyone except my worst enemy.” Her gaze dropped away. “I think I dreamed that Lyris –“

“She came close to ending me,” Fenn interrupted, “which, at least… would have spared you the night’s torment.”
Anora held a hand to him and he took it, moving closer when she tugged his arm.

“I’ll never do anything to cause you pain again, I promise,” he told her.

Anora said nothing, only let go of his hand and pushed him flat. In a flash she was on him, kissing him breathlessly.
“No,” she said, at last. “No, you won’t.”

And they stayed that way, each recovering their strength, until Svana and Lyris appeared out of the rising sun.

AcadianPaladin wrote: »

A touching story. And well-written.

Thank you!
First writing I've done in ages and it was really enjoyable to write.