Elanniren gasps awake, clutching her chest. She should be dead, shouldn't she? Yet after feeling around for a wound, her hands come away clean. Had it been a dream? She remembers the shackles biting into her wrists and ankles, the cold of the obsidian altar beneath her when the knife came down and pierced her heart. It's foggy, yes—she suspects she had been drugged, magically or alchemically—but it had still felt so real. But it can't be. You don't wake up after being stabbed in the heart.
She looks around. She seems to be in a cell, and there's someone else with her, just sitting there. She wears the same rags that Elanniren realizes that she herself is wearing, and her brown hair is matted as if it hasn't been combed in ages.
"Hello?" Elanniren calls to her. No response; she just stares straight ahead. Perhaps she can't hear her? Or maybe she doesn't speak Cyrodilic. Elanniren shifts into her view. She looks to be Imperial, so there aren't any other languages that Elanniren can think to try, and so she decides to try a friendly wave. Still nothing. It's like she doesn't even see her. "Ma'am?" she tries again, this time gently touching her on the shoulder.
Finally the woman blinks, focusing on her. She opens her mouth hesitantly and seems to try to say something that Elanniren can't quite make out but decides to take as acknowledgment of her greeting, if nothing else.
"I'm Elanniren," she says. "Do you know where we are? Or how we got here?"
Her cellmate's brow furrows, as if she doesn't understand the question. "Dead," she says in a slightly clearer voice. "Where else?"
Dead. The word washes over her like ice water. So she was right the first time, assuming the woman is to be believed. But this is...decidedly not Aetherius. It's cold and dark and the longer she's here, the more sure she is that she hears wailing in the distance. The realization sinks into her gut like a rock. Those necromancers—they're servants of Molag Bal. She's in Coldharbour.
"Oh, gods..." She begins mumbling a prayer to Arkay. Surely the Divines can rescue their followers from the grasp of the daedra...can't they?
"It doesn't work," her cellmate says. "I tried it all the time when I first got here."
Elanniren looks up. For someone who barely noticed her a few minutes ago, she seems like an entirely different person now.
"I'm Vellaise, by the way. You're surprisingly lucid."
"So are you," Elanniren says before she can think better of it.
Vellaise smiles sheepishly. "I, uh, tend to let my...husk run on its own these days. Makes things easier. I haven't actually spoken to another person in...Anyway, how did you get here?"
Elanniren recounts her story of the contract that turned out to be a trap, and Vellaise in turn tells of how she was an Arcane University student who was caught studying the prophecies of a moth priest known only as the Prophet.
"How long have you been here?" Elanniren asks carefully. It's obvious the place has done a number on her.
Vellaise seems to think about this for a while, and then shrugs with a grimace. "Is it still 580? No...it must be 81 by now."
"It's 582."
Her eyes go wide. "Over a year, then," she says quietly.
The dread creeps further into Elanniren's bones. This is really it, then. This is how she'll spend eternity. She feels panic building but catches herself and decides to keep talking before she can lose her composure.
"You said you hadn't talked to anyone in a while?"
Vellaise shakes her head. "Most people are...well, they're not really people anymore. And anyway, they don't let me out much. I think they think I'm dangerous. Yours is the first kind face I've seen since I got here. I'd almost forgotten other conscious people exist."
Elanniren places a hand on hers, almost on instinct. "You're not alone anymore."
Their eyes meet, and Vellaise truly smiles for the first time, even if it's tinged with fear. She tries her best to return the smile. As much as she doesn't exactly feel brave, maybe putting on a brave face for her new friend will keep them both grounded. If they can keep talking, she might be able to keep the dread at bay for just a little longer.
"So, tell me about the Arcane University."
---
They're still talking what must be over an hour later, sharing tales of their lives and trying to ignore the fact that they're over, when they are interrupted by a bright bluish-white projection of a haggard man in rags not unlike theirs.
"There you are," the projection says.
They both stop talking and look at the projection, and then at each other. Given that Vellaise looks just as baffled as Elanniren feels, it's probably not some morbid onboarding ritual that every new prisoner gets. The speaker doesn't look like a daedra, and, really, how dangerous can a projection be?
"Greetings," she says tentatively, rising to face him. "Can we help you?"
"Like you, I am a prisoner in this place," he says. "You must rescue me, and I, in turn, must rescue you."
"Rescue?" she asks, casting her cellmate another confused glance. "I'm...sorry, but I was under the impression that we were dead."
"In a sense, you are, and yet your story has only just begun. You must escape your cell and take up arms."
"Hold on," Elanniren says. This is all going so fast. "Who are you?"
"Forgive my rudeness," he says. "I am called the Prophet, for my true name has been lost to time. But our time is short."
Vellaise jumps up. A little wobbly on her feet, she quickly grasps Elanniren's arm to keep from falling.
"The Prophet?" she asks in a stronger voice than Elanniren has heard from her yet. "The Moth Priest who spread word of the prophecies of the end of the Planemeld crisis?"
There is a brief pause. Then, the Prophet says, "Two of you. Curious. Indeed, I was once a Moth Priest, but those days were cut short by my imprisonment here." His projection begins to flicker. "I must go; I shall await your rescue. Fate has put you in that cell together, and together you must escape. Find Lyris Titanborn—"
The projection vanishes. Elanniren turns to look at Vellaise, whose eyes burn with renewed purpose.
"You're a spellsword, right?" Vellaise asks. "Magic works differently here, but if we pool our magicka, we might be able to unlock the door."
Letting go of Elanniren, she rushes to the door and begins channeling magicka; Elanniren joins her after a moment. It's a difficult lock, and Vellaise was right—it is hard to channel magicka. But so far from the light of Magnus, she supposes it makes sense. They've barely made any headway when a large shadow falls over them. They both start, bracing for whatever trouble they may have brought on themselves, but they're greeted by a woman who looks every bit as out of place as they do.
---
They enter a chamber where a man is restrained in some sort of magical bubble. It's hard to see inside, but he looks to be the same man who spoke to them earlier.
"All right. The good news is, we made it here in one piece and the Prophet looks unharmed." Lyris scratches the back of her neck uncomfortably. "Now the bad news. It's going to be up to you to keep him safe and get him back to Tamriel. I'm not going with you."
Concern creeping in to burn away the anticipation to get out of here, Elanniren turns to face her. "What do you mean?"
"There's a trick to opening the cell," Lyris says. "The only way for a prisoner to leave is for another living soul to take their place. I need to swap places with the Prophet."
"What?" Vellaise is the first to object. "N-no, that can't be the only way. What do you mean by 'living?' If my soul is tied here, which I assume it is, could I take his place instead? I already know how to—to turn it all off."
Elanniren instinctively takes Vellaise's hand, as if shielding her from the very idea. She thinks she feels a light squeeze back, but it's hard to tell with the way Vellaise is trembling.
"Believe me, I appreciate the offer," Lyris says. "But I'm the only one here with a beating heart. If Molag Bal isn't stopped he'll destroy everyone and everything we've ever loved."
Vellaise looks like she has more to say, but she exhales and shakes her head. "You're right. I'm ready when you are."
