A Dreamer in a Dream (chapter 20)

Windhelm continued the whole Lord of the Rings vibe that Whiterun had, just more Minas Tirith than Edoras, a sprawling thing of rock and stone that meshed with the mountain next to it. Though unlike the White City it also sat right on a massive river that emptied out into the sea to the north. Which meant ships.

One of those ships was bound for Winterhold.

I did think about taking the opportunity to fuck with Ulfric’s head, but yeah, no. Not my mess to deal with. I was perfectly happy providing moral (and magical) support to my wife, who could just shout them down if they got out of line.

Lydia hadn’t let me sell the horses for a pretty penny either. She was stubborn and the textbook definition of a horse girl.

At least we had plenty septims to find passage on a ship anyway.

Amur had also found us the previous day, having presumably completed her fetch quest.

It was Big Red that had been telling her where to find me, as she had easily admitted to. There wasn’t much I could do about that.

Still, it did mean I could go back to nagging her about magic. Which meant having to listen to her complain again and again about how ugly the way I ‘weaved the colors of Aetherius’ was, sure, but that was fine. I was perfectly fine being a cheating cheater that cheated.

I was looking out at the Sea of Ghosts one night when she found me again. “Shouldn’t you be pretending to sleep, Abomination?”

I glanced at her red eyes. “Russ,” I corrected for the umpteenth time.

“A false name,” she accused. And she was right on the money here, but…

“Right back at you. You don’t hear me calling you Mehrunes Dagon’s number one fangirl either, do you?” At least not out loud.

I didn’t have to worry about being overheard. It might have taken me a bit, but I’d eventually noticed there was some kind of perception filter that she always had around her.

“You are free to call me what you like, Abomination.” My eye twitched. This meant war.

“Yeah, well, I guess it’s a bit of a mouthful anyway. Now Cultist-chan, that’s catchy.”

One of her neon red eyebrows rose. No doubt she knew she was beat.

I looked back out at sea, watching the twin moons dancing on the waves in a cool way. It’s easy to sleep when seven feet of woman rides you to exhaustion every night. Or maybe Cultist-chan was right and I’d just been forcing my Lovecraftian body to sleep because I didn’t want to spill the beans.

“Mehrunes Dagon has foreseen the pandemonium you will unleash at our destination,” she suddenly commented like she was talking about the weather. “I am to ensure you are successful.”

I tried not to look too curious. I knew the Daedric Princes were limited in what they could do on Mundus, but they were still Daedric Princes.

“The more the merrier.” It was starting to feel like the peanut gallery had found a third member.

Mephala also seemed to have found that funny, a husky chuckle echoing in my ear. It only made me appreciate Namira more for not being too nosy. Maybe I should get her a gift basket.

“They will suspect you are not what you say you are,” she continued. “The best of them will not be fooled for longer than it takes for you to cast a spell, if not sooner.”

I could see what she was angling at. “I suppose it would be easier if they didn’t.”

Honestly, my plan wasn’t even to really fool them? I was just going to let Ancano do his thing and then play myself up as the lesser evil.

I wasn’t such a narcissist as to miss that what I wanted was selfish. Like come on, I had fucking Mehrunes Dagon cheerleading me on. I just didn’t want to be thrown back into that lonely place, and this world? It was a murderhobo’s paradise. You didn’t get shit handed to you. You had to take it.

My calculus was simple. Whether the Eye of Magnus was actually Magnus’s eye or his left nut or fucking KINMUNE, it was still an engine of magicka, and I ate magicka.

“Then they shan’t,” I heard her serenely reply.

I turned to face her again, leaning on the railing. “I’m not the only one that needs hiding.” It would be something of a pickle playing the lesser evil with Mehrunes ‘I tried to eat the world’ Dagon on my shoulder.

Her lips slowly stretched into a smile so wide it turned uncanny. That all changed as soon as I blinked, the domineering sorceress replaced by a nervous wreck of a schoolgirl. Her eyes had turned as blue as a summer sky while her mane of neon red hair had tied itself into a messy braid, and she even looked younger, her sharply golden features losing their edge.

“M-Mother was teaching me magic, but t-t-there was an accident, and…” Her fingers sparked dangerously as she wrung them nervously. “ Please, I need to learn how to control it.”

Yeah, I had to give credit where credit was due. That was some masterclass acting.

“Point made.” And there was always Plans B through F, just in case. Not my best work, maybe, but beggars, choosers, you know the line.

It would have been hard not to notice the College of Winterhold on our approach the next day, a massive spiral of a mountain jutting out of the ocean. Upon it stood the college itself, a monstrosity of snow-covered stone and stained glass that shimmered under the sun.

The only thing that connected it to the outside world was an uncomfortably narrow bridge.

Winterhold itself was a sad sight in comparison, and even in comparison to Whiterun or Windhelm, it just seemed tiny. Which, yeah, that kind of thing would happen if half your city just up and fell into the sea one day.

The ramshackle docks also slowed us down, but I contented myself with my imminent freedom from life on a ship that never stopped rocking. Bright-Like-Dawn, go-getter that she was, had already jumped overboard as soon as there was a speck of coast on the horizon. 

We found her sunbathing on a rock later. I let the goofball be until we had to ascend to Winterhold. I still had a letter to give a paranoid wreck of a jarl.

“Dragons. As if we didn’t have enough troubles.” He gave me an impressively miserable look. “You still have my thanks, whatever that is worth to you.”

We were quickly shooed away after thanks to a certain someone selling her new alter ego a bit too well. The guy understandably didn’t want his house to go the way of half of Winterhold.

There was only one thing left to do after that. Cross the bridge.

We were already most of the way across when an older woman approached us, her very silver robes shimmering under the sun.

Her equally silver eyes looked us over curiously. “It’s not very often we see four prospective students arrive together.”

“Three and one housecarl,” I amended. Lydia was trying to look like she was cut from stone, but she only managed to look even more constipated somehow, and it wasn’t because the woman’s eyes had went to her.

I did get it, and I didn’t blame her. Like most Nords she had probably grown up on stories of the Oblivion Crisis, and now she had to pretend the nervous wreck of an elf on my other side wasn’t Mehrunes Dagon’s number one fangirl.

The two horses trailing behind her were at least on their best behavior.

“It isn’t often we receive a thane either. Mirabelle Ervine,” she introduced herself. “Master Wizard here at the College of Winterhold.”

Her MILF energy was much stronger in the flesh, I decided. That my thoughts went there I blamed solely on not having a dragon to get them out of me.

We introduced ourselves in kind, and what a trio we made. The sob story Amur told her even seemed to be pulling on her heartstrings some.

“I assume you already have a grasp on the fundamentals?” she continued with a motherly eye on Amur. “I am afraid we do not teach those here.”

I put some fire in my right hand and some ice in my left. If I had a song to go with it, I could have made a joke.

Bright-Like-Dawn copied me to a tee. It was only the second time I had seen her do any magic.

“Then allow me to welcome you to the College of Winterhold. We carry on Shalidor’s legacy, as we hope you will in time.”

As we followed her into the courtyard rather than being thrown out or asked certain pointed questions, I could only assume that Amur was successful. I also tried not to stare at all the magicka in the air and in the stones. Even in Mirabelle and the others milling around. Other students, presumably. They were speaking in hushed tones as they gave our party some funny looks.

It was like I was in a candy store without being able to have any.

The center even had what looked like a beam of pure magicka shooting up from a well and into the sky, the same shade of blue as my magicka potions.

“The Hall of Elements ahead is where the majority of our lectures are conducted. Above it lies the Arcaneum, which you will want to acquaint yourselves with as soon as you are able.”

Yeah, I wanted to acquaint myself with it, alright. That was the library.

“On either side of you are the Hall of Attainment and the Hall of Countenance. You would normally be staying in the former as a student, but as a thane—”

“I’ll be right at home with the other students,” I soothed. I didn’t want to make a bad first impression.

Mirabelle nodded gracefully. “You are nevertheless free to make use of the small stables in the Hall of Countenance.”

Lydia didn’t waste any time as the MILF continued.

“I’m not happy to say it, but you will find no shortage of empty rooms in the Hall of Attainment, so choose as you like. There is also a lecture this evening in the Hall of Elements if you wish to attend.” She paused a moment to take a breath. “Now, if you will excuse me, there’s always something to do…”

She left after a smile at Amur.

“That went well,” I commented.

“I hope I d-don’t ruin everything,” she mumbled. With more hand-wringing and everything.

Bright-Like-Dawn meanwhile was sticking her head into the beam of magicka shooting into the sky. Yeah, so much for that first impression…

There was another well of magicka inside the Hall of Attainment, and I was starting to see why. I could already feel myself drinking in the ambient magicka in the air, and presumably I wasn’t the only one. It didn’t work as quickly as a potion, but it was free, and I liked free.

We ended up picking our rooms on the same floor, the third floor. If I closed my eyes as I laid back on the bed, I could even pretend I was back in college. Now I just had to wait for Ancano to make a mess of things. Maybe make a few books mysteriously go missing while I was at it.

Some unhappy sounds from Bright-Like-Dawn’s room after an hour had me taking a look, and I quickly sighed, seeing as she was fighting the enchanted robes the rooms came with, and losing. I had left mine alone for obvious reasons.

“They obviously don’t fit you.”

The pitiful sounds she made had me helping her. Which wasn’t easy when I was trying not to eat them.

That’s how Lydia found us. I didn’t mind her snickering at the sight, which I much preferred to whatever she was rocking earlier.

The tiny Argonian gave the robes the stink eye when I finally saved her from a most ignoble fate. Then she got her revenge. It looked like she was going to do to them what she did to everything not bolted down, but instead she just shortened them some with her black piranha-like teeth.

Then she put them on with a triumphant smile like a shark’s. That only had Lydia snickering louder.

I wanted to take advantage of the moment to say something, but I didn’t want to smother her good mood like always happened when I did anything to remind her who (or maybe what) she swore an oath of fealty to.

I distracted myself with my new dormmates instead. A few of them were familiar to me, like Brelyna who Amur swiftly befriended. But the other thirty or fifty of them? Yeah, just trying to remember all their names was already proving to be a pain.

Maybe that should have clued me, because it wasn’t Tolfdir who showed up for the evening lecture, but the bald motherfucker in a love triangle that also happened to teach enchanting. I knew it was game over as soon as he opened his mouth to tell us all about meridians and morpholiths. You know, real edge-of-your-seat stuff.

No Tolfdir meant no Saarthal. No Saarthal meant I was stuck here, pretending I wasn’t the world’s biggest fraud.

Bright-Like-Dawn was also staring out into space, but that was cold comfort. Everyone else there found no issue with the guy droning on about Aetherial patterning now, and that wasn’t even the worst part.

That would be the fucking practical after. Yeah, a few problems with that. Namely that I ate enchanted things.

“Go on.” The guy clasped his hands behind his back as the others spread around the room. “And do mind the soul gems. You’ll find they aren’t so easy to come by when you leave Winterhold behind.”

I had almost succeeded in escaping anyway when I heard a high voice on my heels. “You’re new here, aren’t you?”

I turned around to find a girl staring at me intently. There was a slight point to her ears and the shape of her eyes reminded me of Amur’s. Breton? “You got me.”

She crossed her arms with a heck of a frown. “You think you’re already better than the rest of us, don’t you? I saw how bored you were.”

“Terribly.” I already made a terrible impression here, so… “After all, there’s so many other things—”

My eyes quickly followed the sudden and overwhelming pressure of magicka that just entered the room. The Thalmor robes were a dead giveaway. Ancano.

The only one that even came close to the ungodly amount of magicka I felt from him was Amur.

“Don’t mind me.” His eyes like molten gold caught on me for a moment, but then he dismissed me just as quickly. Phew. “I am only here only as an observer, Sergius, as the Arch-Mage has already made you aware. At most I might lend a helping hand had anyone a question worth answering, unlikely as that would be.”

The sheer smarm in his lilting voice was impressive.

“What a pleasant character,” I commented. “I’m guessing he’s not a student?”

“I don’t trouble myself with what doesn’t concern me,” I heard from her.

I snorted. “But I fit the bill?”

“I will be Arch-Mage one day, and I will not countenance arrogance as yours among my competition.”

I looked at her again. “This isn’t just a convoluted way of telling me you have a crush on me, right? Because I’m a married man.”

I’d always wanted to say that line.

She went a very ugly shade of red as it registered. “No, you foul rogue! And it is the lady that is meant to be courted!” I was surprised she didn’t stomp her foot for good measure. “Indeed, I challenge you! I will show you exactly why I am the superior enchanter between us.”

I nodded absently. “What’s your name?”

“Vivonna, of the family Veloise. Remember that name, knave.”

“Then that’s a no, Vi. Sorry.”

The ugly shade of red came back with a vengeance. “How dare you be so familiar with me! And a coward as well!”

If only Lydia were here right now. She would set her straight. “Look, Vi, unless you’re also the hall monitor, I’m going to go. Toodle loo.”

I left her pouting at me like a little girl.

I looked up at the stars as soon as I left the Hall of Elements behind, another sigh leaving my lips. Honestly, even if I devoured a thousand books on Enchanting, it still wouldn’t stop me making a snack of any soul gem I got too close to. I found that out the hard way with Farengar.

And as I stared up at Oblivion and Aetherius, it fucking hit me. It annoyed me that it had even taken this long to click.

The me here might not have all the answers, but the me in that lonely place? He put me here, put all of this into motion.

I didn’t even have the patience to wait. It was just me and Shalidor out here anyway, and he was a statue.

The next moment I saw my tower. At my prodding it began to rise again. Slowly. Very slowly.

I heard it again the moment the top of my tower pierced into the rainbow of Aetherius again. Static. Like on an old radio.

The further I went, the more I heard behind all that static. But I also didn’t want to go too far. The me here would just get swallowed up again.

And then I found it. The sweet spot.

“It took you long enough.”

It was my voice. But it wasn’t me me.

“Buckle up, Buttercup. This is where things get fun.”

AN: This has been a long time coming. When solipsism is a circle and we have finally come full circle.