The storm raged above me, and I could feel the eyes of the Madgod bore through me from the heavens. The thought made my stomach turn and the voices in my head grow louder. Some were shouting, some were laughing, and some were screaming. The cacophony was a chorus of chaos, or a chaos of chorus? No, no, a chaotic chorus. I grabbed both sides of my head and gritted my teeth. It was these thoughts that were driving me mad! "Shut up!" I screamed.

Like the snap of a tree branch, reality whipped me in the face. It was a grey day, rain was falling from the sky, and pattering on the cobblestones. Around me, citizens of the Imperial city were staring at me with surprise, maybe even fear. I lowered my head and kept walking, letting the rain soak my clothes. I had four feet, no, no it was only two. But it looked like four, it was all blurry. I needed to calm down.

I looked at my feet and wandered forwards, hearing the people around me murmur. I ran smack into an iron wall, and felt the chains start to bind me.

No, not chains. They were hands, with iron gauntlets, which had grabbed my wrists. "Ma'am, can you come with us?" The iron man said.

"No, no!" I gasped. I had felt the vile chains of capture around me before, I couldn't survive it again. "Please I'm fine!" I was being dragged, dragged away. The people thought I was crazy, that I was going to harm them. "I never hurt anyone!"

"Perhaps a night in a cell will calm you down, dark elf." Said the iron man. I still struggled.

"NOO!" I was screaming now. I was wrenching my arms back and forth will all my strength. Let me go, let me go, let me go...

I felt more hands take me, and I knew with a demented blackening of my heart that I was not getting free of them. I let myself sag, my feet dragging along the cold, cobbled ground. Throwing my head up, I looked up at the sky. The clouds were gray, and the specks of light fell from them, dropping in my eyes and glossing them over. Suddenly, a crash of violent thunder split the air. No one else noticed but me that the lighting came a split second after its resonance, a blinding white light that, for an instant, painted everything a violent shade of pure color.

Why? I asked him. Why do you always follow me?

The cell was dark, and cold, and small. It was the kind of place that penned in my thoughts and twisted me up into knots. The storm could still be heard outside, raging and howling. Every once and awhile, a flash of lighting would crash upon the foundations of the prison, echoing one word over and over again. Madness.

I reached under my sack cloth shirt and clasped my amulet. They hadn't taken that away, curiously. I suppose they thought a plain amulet of Akatosh would't hurt anyone, and they were right.

Akatosh had never done anything for me. All those times I had prayed to him for strength, he hadn't done as much as lift one of his dragon claws to my aid. Before my flight from the Shrine I had chosen Akatosh purposefully, as the one I would beseech.

Mara was the goddess of love, I had thought at first that she would be the best to pray to, that she would heal me. However, she was also the goddess of family and parentage. I had no family, my parentage was a vile mistake. Stendarr was the god of mercy, but also the god of justice. If any creature deserved the justice of the Aedra, it was me. I had also considered Julianos, whom governed wisdom. Perhaps his steady thought could counterbalance my disorder? No, my disorder was a foil to his mind, I was not worthy. With every Aedra, I found a cause for them to hate me.

But Akatosh...He was the god of time, strength, endurance. He was the closest thing to order that the Aedra had. So I had clutched onto the hope that Akatosh would save me. I knew he wouldn't, but I also knew that holding onto this amulet gave me calm, so I chose not to care.

For hours a dark mumbling had been going on in the cell across from mine, but suddenly I heard it grow louder. "You, you there! Come here, let me see you..."

I froze, hearing the madness in his voice. I thought for a moment that it disturbed me, but realized that it didn't. It should have frightened me, but I knew that it had the opposite effect. I stood up, wincing at the ache of my frozen bones. I hobbled over to the bars.

It was a Dunmer who stared back at me, my own kin. He looked me over, a deranged smile creeping across his face. "I must surely be dead, and in the halls of Azura to look upon such a vision. You are so beautiful, my dear Dunmer maiden..." I knew he was lying, the crazy fool. Somehow his madness calmed me, like it brought me home. "One of the guards owes me a favor, you know. I could get us put in the same cell. Would you like that? You should have some fun before the end. Yeah, you heard me. No matter what the law says. No matter what they told you. You're going to die in here! You're going to die!" His taunts of death did not reach my ears. I was too busy feeling the creeping revulsion cloud my thoughts.

Suddenly there was a bang down the hall. "Hey, you hear that? The guards are coming...for you! He he he he he..."

Indeed the clinking of armor was getting closer and closer. A panic drove through my chest. My vision swam, and strangely, I realized that my panic was not stemming from fear of death. No, it was something that was approaching me which was affecting me so greatly. A light was coming from down the hall. I could feel it as well as see it, just like I could feel the amulet of Akatosh grow warm against my chest. My heartbeat quickened, and the voices in my mind started yelling, shouting. I stumbled backwards, tripping over the latrine bucket and onto the ground. Faintly I thought, Good thing I haven't used it.

Voices were coming closer. I couldn't tell what they were saying, so loud was the chorus inside my head. Suddenly, a woman appeared at the gate of my cell. She spoke so loudly this time I could make out her words.

"What's this prisoner doing here? This cell is supposed to be empty!" Anger flowed from her like sparks, but it wasn't because she was angry...curios...it was because she was frightened. Fear and anger, so much fun, such best friends! I gritted my teeth.

"Usual mix up with the watch, I-" Another guard sputtered.

"Nevermind, get that gate open." The woman interrupted.

The door to my cell swung open, and a Redgaurd walked in. His armor was not iron, it was shiny, a shiny silver and gold. "You there, prisoner, stand up against the wall."

I shuffled back along the ground, pushed myself up, and squished my back against the wall. The guard advanced, blocking me from the other people entering the cell. There were three others, two guards and a well dressed man.

When I looked upon him, the voices in my mind screamed and my amulet seared. I gasped and pressed myself even further against the wall, screwing my eyes shut. "You...I've seen you..." A voice like the deep rumble of the ocean pulled at me, and it was terrifying. I would never have looked at him if it wasn't for the fact that his voice cut through the ramblings in my mind. Suddenly, they were silent. I felt dizzy and nauseated, and I had to grasp the wall to keep from falling. "Let me see your face..." He advanced, and the guard blocking me had to move to the side to let the Emperor come closer.

His eyes were blue. Quick, sharp, icy blue. I flinched as I looked into them, expecting some sort of pain to breach me. Nothing happened. His gaze continued to fight away the voices in my head. He reached up a hand to my face, and I was frozen to the spot. His wrinkled hand brushed the veil of stringy black hair away from my appearance. "Yes, you are the one from my dreams...Then the stars are right, and this is the day...gods give me strength..."

His words were simply stated. They were order, they were calm. They were the opposite of me.

"Who are you?" I asked. My voice was a breathy tone that indicated my need to know what he was, not just who.

"I am your Emperor, Uriel Septim. By the grace of the gods I serve Tamriel as her ruler." He looked at me oddly, and I thought I saw him smile. "Though you may not believe it, you too are a citizen of Tamriel." A citizen of Tamriel...no, I didn't believe it. "You too will serve her in your own way." he went on.

Serve Tamriel? I was not in any position to serve this plane of existence! And who was I to have the ability to help anyone? In my experience, I had never even been able to help myself.

"Serve Tamriel?" I echoed.

"Perhaps the gods have placed you here so that we may meet." He said sagely, smiling at me in an almost fatherly way. "Your destiny may not be what you think it is."

"Sire! We need to keep moving!" Said the woman, her eyes shining with urgency.

The Emperor looked at me for one last moment. "We will meet again soon." He turned away and followed the guards out. Only one guard was in the cell with me still. He looked from me to the door, and then shrugged, smiling a little.

"Looks like it's your lucky day, prisoner. Just stay out of our way." He too, disappeared into the darkness.

I stood there for many moments before I grasped my amulet and brought it out from underneath my shirt. The lightning from outside pierced the cell like hellfire and the amulet shined in defiance. I looked up at the window, smirking at the Madgod. "Not today." I followed into the darkness.

I was a mage. Virtually the only thing I could handle safely was magic. I had alteration spells to defend myself, a few destruction spells, and one Restoration spell I had gotten the hang of. But what I was really good at was conjuring. Daedra, to be specific. As soon as I looked upon the locked gate to the dark hole in the wall, I had lifted my hand and summoned a daedra. My daedroth lumbered through the hole and cleared a path for me, for which I was very grateful.

It was nice, leaving the killing up to the daedroth. Only once and awhile did a creature get past it, and I held them off well enough with a conjured mace.

What really bothered me was the dark. I never liked the dark. It was full of voices and thoughts. Some people thought it was empty, but really, it was thick. The voices on the edge of my consciousness were beginning to edge back inwards, whispers of dissention. Beside me I could hear the soft hissing of my daedroth, and focused on it and it alone.

After some winding goblin tunnels and the sewers, I made it to a room with a small slit in the wall. I looked back to the daedroth and whispered an apology before I loosened the binding magic and sent it back to oblivion.

I squeezed through the hole sideways, tumbling out of it and onto the ground. It had been a short fall, but at an awkward angle, and my hip protested angrily to getting up. The sound of metal on metal greeted me, and I summoned a smaller creature to aid me. A Hunger appeared at my side, and together we approached the sound. Just ahead I saw the guards kill the last of the red-robed people. Taking a breath, I dismissed my daedra, and entered the pool of light in the room.

One of the guards saw me, an angry looking man. "It's that prisoner again...we should kill her, she could be working with the assassins!" He advanced, pulling out his sword.

I backed up, holding out my hands. Death! A voice suddenly shouted. Entrails...

"No. She is not one of them." It was the Emperor's voice. The angry man looked very much like he would have loved to end my existence right then and there. However, he sheathed his weapon stiffly and glared, walking away. The Emperor looked at me, smiling, like he had before. "Come closer, I'd prefer not to have to shout." My feet carried me over to the man. "They cannot understand why I trust you. They have not seen what I have seen...How can I explain..." He looked ahead, eyes unfocused, like he was looking at something that was in his mind only. "Listen. You know the Nine? How they guide our fates with an invisible hand?" He was looking at me with those blue, blue eyes. I wanted to tell him, then, what I was. I merely shook my head and looked to the floor. "Child." he said, suddenly, his voice holding a softness. I felt a hand on my shoulder. "The Nine do not desert anyone, not even you." I looked back up into his face. A chill fell all the way down my spine. Not even you.

"I have served the Nine all my days and I chart my course by the cycle of the heavens. I wonder...what stars you were born under?"

The stars I were born under bore little importance to me in light of the circumstances of my birth; however, the usefulness of my deep magika reserves had helped me on more than one occasion. "The Atronach." I told him.

He nodded. "Then perhaps the Atronach will guide your steps..."

I blinked and looked around the room. "Where is it that you're trying to go?" I asked.

"My Blades are trying to safely deliver me out of these sewers. However, that is not where I will go."

I furrowed my brow. I had the feeling that he was saying he wasn't going to make it out. But how much more dangerous could these tunnels be? He had two strong guards. "Where are you going?" I asked for clarification.

"I am going to my grave. A tongue shriller than all the music calls me. You shall follow me yet for awhile, then we must part. I shall face my apportioned fate, then fall."

His words fell from his lips like prophecy. I furrowed my brow. He seemed so calm... "Aren't you afraid to die?" I whispered softly.

"No trophies of my triumphs proceed me, but I have lived well, and my ghost shall rest easy." He seemed to register the shock on my face. "Child, In your face I behold the sun's companion. The dawn of Akatosh's bright glory may banish the coming darkness. With such hope, and the promise of your aid, my heart is satisfied."

I blinked. He needed my help to bring Akatosh's 'bright glory' to Tamriel...Akatosh...an Aedra. "My aid?" I stuttered out.

The angry man stepped forward. "All right, we should keep moving." He headed off into the tunnel, and the Emperor followed.

"Here, if you're going to be following us, you might as well make yourself useful." The other guard, the one that had blocked my view, was addressing me. He handed me a torch. I nodded numbly.

"I can conjure too, if that would help."

He shook his head. "That would just get in the way. Come on, we can't fall too far behind." I fell in step behind the Blade, my burning torch sending twisting shadows across the walls. They made pictures, dancing pictures.

The sewers were cold and dank, never changing as we marched along. Once or twice, red conjurers accosted us, and the Emperor and I stood at the back of the group, waiting for the Blades to kill them all. We seemed to be reaching the end when the man up front, the angry one, shouted something about a locked door. A locked door? it must be a trap. Hehehehehehehhehehe trapped in a cage! Raucous laughter filled my skull. I growled under my breath.

"Back there, there's another passage!" Cried the nice Blade.

"Worth a try, let's go!" Said the angry one. We filed into the room, which was a dead end. "Dammit, a trap!" Suddenly the sounds of approaching enemies hit all of us. The blades ran to hold them off, the nice one yelling at me to protect the Emperor with my life before he disappeared into the darkness. I could hear the clangings, the cries, and the screams. The gurgles and the splashing blood. I pressed against the wall in fear. Suddenly, the Emperor turned to me, grabbing my shoulders and looking into my face with urgency.

"I can go no further. You alone can stand against the Prince of Destruction and his mortal servants. He must not have the Amulet of Kings!" He removed the glowing jewel from his neck, and the vibrant red grew dull. He placed it in one of my hands, bringing the other down on top of it. He held my hands in his, his eyes intense. "Take the Amulet, give it to Jauffre. He alone knows where to find my last son. Find him, and close shut the jaws of Oblivion."

I blinked, my mind rushing to take all of this in. The voices were screaming, the Amulet was burning my hands, my mind was thinking of some kind of excuse to utter to get me out of all this...when all of a sudden, a flash of red burned in my vision. The Emperor was cut down by a conjured mace, his blood flying across the wall and my tattered clothes. I screamed, dropped the amulet, and unleashed from my hands all the fire that I could. In seconds the assassin was a crisp corpse on the ground. My arms were shaking and I could barely see, but a tugging on my mind reminded me of the Amulet. I picked it up, again aware of how hot it was on my skin.

The Blade rushed in, and immediately he fell to his knees in front of the Emperor's body. There was a moment of thick silence. "We've failed...I've failed." He choked out. He reached over the slain Emperor, hands looking for something, when he cried, "The Amulet! Where is the Amulet of Kings!" He stood up, looking around with wide eyes. Trying to speak, I shoved the Amulet forward towards him, stuttering "H-He gave it to me."

The man calmed. "It's strange...he saw something in you...trusted you. They say it's the Dragon Blood that flows through every Septim's veins. They see more than lesser men." He looked downwards onto his former ruler with sorrow. "He must have given it to you for a reason, did he say why?"

I nodded. "He said...to give it to Jauffre...that there was another heir."

The Blade shrugged. He looked so defeated now, and it made me sad for him. "Nothing that I ever knew about. But if anyone would know, it would be Jauffre. He's the head of our Order, though you wouldn't know it to see him. He lives quietly as a monk at Wenyon Priory. Here's the key to the Sewers."

I blinked. "Wait...wait you want me to deliver this...this extremely important artifact...by myself?!"

He nodded. "I have to stay and guard the Emperor's body."

I shook my head. "No, no. I was locked in here for being crazy, you can't expect a crazy person to do something like this!"

He chuckled dryly at me. "Kid, the whole Empire's going crazy. Look, you handled yourself well, I know you'll be able to get that where it needs to go. From the looks of it, you're a mage?"

I shrugged, "Conjurer."

"Hmmm, close enough. Anyway, you should make your way out of the sewers and give that to Jauffre."

I looked down at the stone and sighed. Despite myself, I nodded.

"The name's Baurus by the way. Thanks for all your help down here."

I looked to him with resignation. "The name's Absinthe."

I descended into the sewers.

I summoned more daedroths to help me on my way through the sewers. I was numb all over. What had I done, what had I gotten myself into? This whole thing was mad, terribly terribly mad. I disregarded the giggling in my mind. Who was I to do any of this? Certainly not a champion of Akatosh. The metal of both the Amulet of Kings and the religious trinket around my neck had not stopped their burning since my meeting with the Emperor. They said the Septim line held the blood of Akatosh inside of them, and the Amulet held that blood too. Perhaps the Amulet was supposed to be warm. However, that did not explain how my own Akatosh Amulet was so hot now too. Another theory began creeping into my mind.

Akatosh was a divine, an Aedra. His power was light and good and just, the opposite of Daedra. The blood in my veins could be crying out against the holy metals touching my skin.

Shaking my head I continued on. When the light of the outside met my skin I felt free. I smiled and pushed open the grate and burst out into the air. I laid down on the grass and took a deep breath. What was I to do now? I placed the Amulet on my stomach, where its heat was not as intense through my clothes.

I blinked and held my hands up above my face. They were a light blue, soft and unused to hard toil. Magic and fear had kept me out of physical danger for much of my life. I had never fought for a cause before, preferring my only cause to be myself. Now though, it was harder to tell myself to just run away. The least I could do was give Jauffre the Amulet. I couldn't keep it forever anyways.

So I made my decision.

Fighting for the cause of the Septims...fighting for the mortal plane of existence...why...that was just madness. I grinned.