Apathetic (Project Nemesis)

{3}

Middas, 1st day of Sun's Dusk, 4E 200

***

At first, no one knows what's happening. The air whistled on Vex's ears. Paralyzed from the shock and sudden rush of adrenaline, she let herself fall until they hit the snowy and pillowy ground. She turned, blinking uncontrollably as blood spilled from the woman's chest, tainting the pure white snow with dark blood. Feeling as though her life just flashed before her eyes while struggling to catch her breath.

"Are you alright? A sabre cat took us by surprise, but it won't be able to follow us here." Was the first thing that comes out of the woman's mouth. Clutching at her chest with pained grunt, her eyes ran a quick check on Vex and pulled her on her feet. This shocks the thief. Like, look at her. She is the one who's bleeding to death!

"Wh, look at you! You're the one who's bleeding. To death!" Vex blurts, hands moving quickly, moving frantically and pressing her coat over the claw wound to reduce blood spilling. Being a thief for so long and no-kill rule, Vex never thought she will actually be nauseous, seeing blood.

"I'm fine. It'll heal quickly." The woman chuckles, clearly amused from her overreaction. Vex's gray eyes gave her a questioning glare and sure enough, the wounds closed swiftly. Followed by the armor stitching itself together. She backs away, standing two feet apart, mouth gaping and pointing to her chest with terrified expression.

"Witch." Vex exclaimed, earning a soft chuckle from the woman. The cold persona left of the mysterious woman's facade for a moment. The woman poked her damaged armor and acted like nothing had happened moments ago. She became stoic and quiet again, and so Vex's chance to get to know this stranger was lost.

"We need to get back to the cave. I have some energy left to teleport us both there." The woman hums, grabbing Vex's freezing hand and murmured something before a portal appeared underneath them. Trying to ignore the cold hand that is gripping her tightly, Vex sighed. Yelping as she fell unwillingly into a dark pit and stumbled upon her feet. Once again, the woman's piercing gaze examined her with such interest.

"Wait, where's Brynjolf?" Vex grumbles as they saw the cave is empty. The woman blinked, pointing towards town. Vex rushes quickly, taking the advantage of getting away from her and the confusing tension around her.

- - - - - -

~~~

As Vex's figure gets smaller from her sight, she snapped her fingers. The stone and any traces of a camp evaporated into a mist and disappeared into thin air. She checks her map, glancing at the sky and cursed as the sun ray blinded her momentarily. With a frustrated stomp, she walks towards the cliff.

As she walked slowly, her brain screamed in agony. From the hunger and overthinking these past few days, her ability of thinking straight is wrecked. All she knows is that she have to get them to safety from the Lich, for Riften's fate is upon their hands.

- - - - -

...

"Enthir. So good to see you again." Brynjolf smiled and hugs the bosmer tightly. Enthir laughed and returned the embrace warmly.

"Sit sit, have some mead. Is on me, don't worry. How's the guild? Good? Never saw you outside Riften, Brynjolf. Took you good few years to finally visit this sad mage, huh?"

"I'm sorry I never visited you here, Enthir. And.. no. The guild is not alright." He frowns, staring into his mead with disinterest. The bubbling yellow liquid suddenly makes him feel nauseated. Enthir barely noticed as he pushed the drink away.

"It's... Mercer. Last month we brought this altmer lad into the guild. Everything was fine. Good, even, perhaps. But for these past few weeks he became angrier than he usually is. And.." the bosmer raised an eyebrow, waiting as Brynjolf paused. Brynjolf shook his head and continued, relieved the sickness slowly fading.

"We're here because some mysterious lass carried us." He lowers his voice, barely a soft whisper. Enthir frowns, concern clear on his face.

"Are you okay? And what do you mean 'carry'?"

"I mean, she's carrying us. Using teleport magic or something. You're the wizard here, is that even possible?" Brynjolf tensed as he saw Enthir's face completely covered in shock.

"Well, I- I think it's possible. But Riften to Winterhold, a single trip? I don't think even Archmage Savos could do it."

They both exhaled, anxious of this stranger. Letting a tired sigh escape his mouth, Brynjolf asked again. Rubbing his lips uncomfortably.

"Is, is that a good thing?"

"Well, yeah and no. She's powerful, can tell. But also disturbing. Reminding you of the fact that she's powerful and she gonna took you somewhere, we don't know." The elf closed his eyes, finishing the rest of his own drink and stood, waving strangely. Small, pale blue dots slowly hummed on the air. They grew until the size of a thumbnail. Enthir took one of the buzzing orbs.

"This is a Pearl. Not that kind of pearl. They can be used for long range communication, very useful. All you need is a drop of your blood to bind it. They will appear on your call, well, not call. When you willed them to appear, they will send a message to someone you wanted to speak with. You get it. I invented it with the college students for fun. Wanna try it?"

Brynjolf squinted his eyes, not really trusting chaotic college kids to invent a new spell. But he will need an instant call when he is in trouble. And he is far from trusting the mysterious woman.

Grabbing the elven dagger that's resting on his waist, he carefully pricked his own thumb. When the red drop slowly emerges from the wound, the other Pearls started buzzing loudly. The one on Enthir's fingers flew steadily towards the cut. It sat on it, icy cold on Brynjolf's finger. When it rise from his finger, the graze was gone.

"Well, I love watching Pearls transform." Enthir chuckled and created a barrier around the fed orb. Other Pearls was buzzing uncontrollably loud, but no one in the inn seem to pay him any attention, just sighing in annoyance and back to their own business.

"Wait, what? Transf- what are you saying?" The thief growled, a bit scared of the shaking orb.

"Ngggggggg..." It buzzed angrier, shining even brighter and almost looking like it's going to... explode?

Pleeft!!

"Holy mother of Mara! Enthir, that's on you." Dagur yelled, coughing and waving fairy dust off his face. Other patrons too, grumbled and shook dust off themselves.

Wait, fairy?

"En, Enthir. What the heck is that?" Brynjolf hit Enthir's chest repeatedly, terrified of what evil being he had summoned.

A small, palm sized fairy yawned. Uncurling herself from the small barrier, she stretches and grins.

"Hi! I'm your Pearl!! Nice to meet you, Brynjolf!" The fairy jumps excitedly on the table and flew in front of Brynjolf's face, hand outstretched.

"How, why did it knew my name?"

"Rude." She mumbles.

"Well, I said bind, did I? I mean she's like bonded with you. For life."

"Wh-"

"But on the bright side, you will never be lonely!" Enthir grins, patting the Pearl's head, who's sitting on his shoulder. "Name her!"

"What?" Clearly, Brynjolf is still shook. No word passed to his mind, only staring blankly at the supposed-to-be-besties of his.

"Well? Name her!" The elf urged, laughing as the newborn Pearl flew around, testing her wings and had a little emergency landing on the bread.

"Oh, uhm. Well.. she's.. green. I'm gonna name her.." Her small head perks up. With a huge grin on her pretty elven face, she flew to his shoulder and pats his cheek.

"Clover, I name you Clover. Maybe you bring good fairy luck with you, I don't know." Enthir laughs as Clover did a little happy dance and blew fairy dust everywhere.

"And oh, she's not a fairy. She's a Pearl. There's difference. She's a daedra." Enthir smiled, walking them to the door.

"Oh, well th-"

The door slammed open, revealing an upset breton. And an even upsetter imperial.

"You. You're dead."