My head ached, and so did my throat. I found myself in bed, lying down in a comfortable position and with clean sheets over me, protecting from the cold. I got up and smelled a scent of liquor and tobacco coming from outside. I opened the doors and found myself at a balcony, overlooking a lake that mirrored the nearby landscape in its waters. In the balcony there was a table and two chairs, one of them was empty, and in the other one sat Shade, smoking his pipe and drinking a cup of brandy.
-Feeling comfortable? – He asked, creating a puff of smoke from his mouth as he spoke
When he said that it clicked, I started to remember the day before. The fight, the vampire, me fainting… That was embarrassing. Then I also noticed that I was not wearing my regular clothes, but instead a tight, but comfortable, silk nightgown. As I put the pieces together I blushed and slapped him across the face.
-You bastard! How dare you change a lady without her permission – I said while trying to hide my embarrassment
He passed his hand on his cheek and let out a small smile. Picking up the bottle he poured the liquid on the cup across the table and refilled his own. I sat down after he signaled me to do so, then he started speaking.
-I’m sorry, well not really, you are a very beautiful woman – he said with a slight chuckle, making me blush again. – Anyways, I hope you had a full night’s sleep we need to talk –
I took a drink from the cup and was a bit surprised, that was some strong stuff! I coughed a bit and started to remember the day before. Edward. That was that vampire’s name, he was strong, and if Shade were not there I would have died. The thought discussed me, I need to be stronger.
-Sure, I have some questions to you myself Shade; you seemed to have be awfully close to that vampire, if I didn’t know better I’d say you know him personally – I stated with a tone of malice
-It is unfortunate that after so much time we have such a violent reunion – said Shade
-And I’m guessing that is all you are going to tell me about him? – I asked
-Not really, what I can tell you is that you are too weak at the moment, and that he is not the only unsavory character we will come across, if I am right, there are much bigger fish to fry than just Edward – he said with a slightly tired expression
I began to worry, if Edward was only a pawn as Shade was saying, then I would be in a fairly desperate situation. I need to train, I need more power, I need more souls… I shook my head slightly. Those voices again, scanning the room behind the porch I could see my equipment in a neat little pile, and of course, the mace, sitting right above it. I got up and closed the doors, letting out a small sigh of relief I got back to my chair. Shade said nothing, he just waited for me to sit down and speak to him.
-I need to know. I have heard about shadow magic, but I have never seen someone use it, not before I met you. I am curious, while I don’t usually show interest in this kind of stuff; I have sensed a remarkable essence coming from you, I have never sensed this before. From you’re titles, the things you told me, the names you used. I have heard stories of you, champion of Kvatch. But this is impossible; you are too young to be that man. The oblivion crisis, Martin Septim, that was about 200 years ago. You are not a vampire, that much I am sure. And you’re shades, they split from you, not like a caster summons a deadra, but as if you’re very soul was split at that moment – I said
-And so you are young one, I am aware that my condition maybe very confusing for one such as yourself. The means for this form were, unorthodox, I had the help of an old friend, and, well, this… destroyed him – he said, seeming almost broken, depressed beyond meaning.
He drank and took a huff from his pipe, staying in silence for what seemed like ages. Eventually he decided to speak again and I eagerly awaited whatever explanation he would provide.
-Shadow magic works in a certain curious ways; it requires conflict to be cast, whether it is a simple light hitting an object and casting a shadow, or even a fight between two people, casting the conflict itself as a shadow. The objective of every shadow mage is eventually one, to unite himself with his own shadows. You see, when a shadow is cast, you will be looking at a projection of the object itself. This projection however, possesses a certain, memory, if you will. Memory of the object itself and all of the other instances of this object, all of the possibilities. What a shadow mage yearns is to use his own shadow to fuse himself with all of the other instances of himself. This however is tricky, the only one who ever was able to do this was the great Azra Nightwielder himself, and even he made quite a mess of things when his objective was eventually achieved –
-Yeah, this is all fine and good, but how does it tie in to you? Even if you managed to achieve a perfect existence with your own shadow, this does not give you immortality, nor does it split your soul, in fact it does the exact opposite – I said, starting to get a bit puzzled with this new information
-What you say is true, even if I did manage to fuse myself I would not receive the longevity that I needed, nor would my essence be split. This “fusing”, if you will, has enormous risk. Even if the ritual is successful, you still have all your different instances to compete with, as you will have multiple “yous” in a single body. After studying the principles of this school of magic, I devised a plan to circumvent this requirement, and to preserve not only my safety, but of those around me, as anything that goes wrong with this ritual may endanger those around me in a multitude of ways. My idea was the following, what if I did the exact opposite? This is not a well-known fact, but we do not use our full potential. Either being our own minds, emotions, physical or magical powers, we only use a small part of this – he said before taking a pause for his drink
-But how does this tie into you? What did you do? –
-It is simple really, instead of risking myself with my other selves I decided to explore my own self, my own mind. This was all possible because of one friend, an elf, now broken, one that I owe everything I had done to this day. I will not go into details right now, but my eyes are unnatural, you already saw the illusions that are possible if one even lays eyes on mine for even a second. These eyes also helped me see the shadows in a way that normal people don’t, because of this the possibility of shadow magic opened up to me. And so I looked into myself, and unlocked the possibilities of my own hidden powers. There was a side effect though; my emotions unlocked themselves to their full potential, separating themselves from my central consciousness and gaining personality, a mind of their own. Essentially, my worries with using the regular methods of shadow magic resurfaced, and the voices began. I felt my head tear apart as the newfound entities living inside me fought for control. Eventually, after much struggle and training I was able to subjugate the capital sins and even learned how to use their abilities and powers. Even developing various techniques that allowed me to use these shades to my advantage –
-So what about now? Are these things still able to take over? – I asked, not wanting to stay around a madman with multiple personalities
-Essentially no, but the possibility is there. But now I am rambling, what I told you now is very privileged information, and I do this in a gesture of trust. The rest of my story and peculiarities will have to wait though. Now comes something of utmost importance, get dressed, then meet me at the gates of the city, we are heading out –
When he said that he got up and left, leaving me alone in the porch. I got up and closed the doors of the porch behind me, the bedroom was quaint, and my clothes were on a neat little pile on a chair, along with my dark weapon. When I finished getting dressed I picked up the house key that Shade left me and got out, locking the door behind me.
When I arrived at the gates I saw Shade talking to a man in a hood and dark leather armor, he signaled me to wait while he finished his conversation. When the man did leave Shade told me to follow and we got out of the city and into the stables. We got up on our horses and started riding down the road.
-So, what were you saying to that man? Where are we headed? – I asked
-That man was the leader of the thieves’ guild: Brynjolf. I spoke to him because of the little problem we had yesterday, that Khajiit presented himself as a member of the guild and I needed information as to why he had the documents and info on our agent. Apparently, the actual guild contact went missing, at Dimhollow Crypt…
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