THE FARAWAY LANDS OF OZ - Book One

Part Four, Chapter Twenty: Tamriel

Based on the Elder's Scrolls© game-series by Bethesda Inc.© 

EVANORA

Something was rattling beside me. I must have dozed off while or after traveling. When I opened my eyes, everything was black. The mask had no holes or slits for the eyes and all I was staring at was the wooden backside of the carved artifact.
I realized just how sore my body was when I reached upwards to remove the headpiece. Every muscle involved ached and sent waves of pain through my nerves.
When the mask was removed, it was almost as dark as it had been before. Only a small dot of white sunshine at the far end of this cave-like place illuminated it a bit. The rattling grew louder with each second that I spent contemplating my whereabouts and when I turned to the source of it, I saw death.
It was a crowned mummy of sorts, draped in crimson-ish brown cloths with bony-looking golden armor covering its chest, shoulders and arms. I was faced by nothing other than a Draugr and one particularly fearsome one.
I had faced those before but back then, I had my sisters with me when we tried to rid the tree of life from their infestation. Right now, I was alone and more afraid because of what happened last time when I faced a Draugr on my own.
In its one hand, the creature held a dragon-shaped staff that was breathing an icy mist and a curved dagger in the other. Both these items hummed with the same energy as the mask, and I was highly confident that it belonged to the creature that must be a Dragon Priest. Or used to be while it had been alive.
It actually makes perfect sense for it to be one deriving from the shape of the staff and the dagger that looked like a dragon's claw. I tried to charge up my magic so that the priest is dealt with but there was one minor setback in this idea. I had no magic to charge.
For whatever reason, I was empty. Now, the only option I had was to run or to somehow outsmart the being in the darkness, through which it may or may not be able to see.
Currently, the former option seems a little more advisable. I slowly tried to stand up, which proved harder than I can remember. All my limbs, muscles, and bones were hurting but I managed to pull myself up soundlessly.
I was afraid though of beginning to walk towards the light. The cave appeared to me like it would echo my steps against the walls and thus reveal my location to the priest. As far as I could see, it was still staring at the spot that I had just been laying on.
Thankfully, I managed to pull off moving soundlessly as well. At least, until I passed one of the walls. It wasn't quite like an ordinary wall though. It was more of an ornate slab, leaned against it with carvings written all over it.
I assumed that it was some kind of language that I didn't understand. When I passed said slab, I saw a light pulse from it from the corner of my eyes. When I turned, one of the carvings began to glow in a pale silvery light, pulsing faster and faster until an orange stream of energy connected the word with my chest.
Immediately, I understood what was written on the slab. As if the knowledge had been poured into me by this strange energy.
Unfortunately, it had awoken the priest's attention as well. His rattling breathing moved closer, and I could see by the way it moved that the creature was ready to kill. I did what came to me instinctively; I shouted the word that I had just learned on top of my lungs. I had not been ready for what happened because of shouting "ice" in a strange language.
"IIZ!" As if I had just taken a mint, I felt my mouth cool down and thus the breath that exited it as I said the word. Yet, it had all cooled down in such a way that it made the water and air particles around me freeze into solid form, hitting the priest right in the chest. The creature was petrified and frozen to the bone.
Since it had been floating in the air, the bones draped in leathery skin and rotten clothes fell to the ground and shattered. Only the dagger and staff remained from this so-called Dragon Priest.
I picked them up and made for the light that soon proved to be the exit to the maze-like, wet and creepy cave. The brightness of daylight moved closer and closer, and no other weird monsters crossed my path out of the cave.
I had not realized how stale the air inside had been until I finally breathed the freshness of the forest as I exited the cave from a slit in a mountain. The birds were singing and I could hear the waters of a calm river splash against rocks and muddy shore.
There was neither the pungent smell of decay from the cave, nor the heaviness of human pollution in the air anymore. I had, after all, landed in Tamriel.
Although it was quite sunny and the sound palette around me made me think of summer, it was actually quite cold. I bet the river's water was freezing. The thing I had to do for now was find some shelter or house or even settlement and someone to answer my questions.
Walking around the mountain proved to be the best idea. Crossing the river would be suicide and if I don't manage to find civilization, I would probably freeze to death or die of whooping cough. Undoubtedly, there was no modern medicine around here and if yes, I would have no chance of finding it.
Walking around the mountain and through the forest at the foot proved to be actually quite calming. It cleared my mind brilliantly and I was relieved of stress that I hadn't known I was experiencing. The sound of nature made me come at peace with my emotions and the current situation.
I was thinking about my family and whether they had arrived in Oz safely. My mind wandered to mother and the reception she would get. Her eldest and grandchild, gone. I imagined her reaction to the news, and it forced my chest to contract.
I also thought about Noa and the Government and Soleil and how he would ever manage to restore peace to Phoenix on his own. But he was cognitio after all and had his books to guide him. And all the rebels and Soleil soldiers to help him.
Anyways, I was drifting off.
On the bright side, if Tamriel had all the magic that I had met already, there must be an explanation for my sudden loss of powers and the way the mask worked. THE MASK! I forgot it in the cave! The entire dealing with the Dragon Priest had totally distracted me from retrieving it.
There was nothing I could do about it now; I was not in the mood to return the fifteen minutes to get it because it was beginning to get dark already. Some adventurers would find it and know what to do with it for sure.
Anyway, what I was thinking is that if this is truly a land of magic then there will also be a way for me to return home. Even if I would have to search through the entire continent, I was confident of finding a way in the end.
After I don't know how many more minutes of walking through thick forest of yew and fir with slightly browned leaves, the trees began to become scarcer until I reached a small hut at the end of it.