Caution! (decries voryn, throwing an arm out as though he were tearing the very thought from his mind. there is no caution to take now that he has already been caught in the snare of nerevar's reflection.
voryn leads them again down the block back to nerevar. it is not the city's streets they wind through any longer but a long, tapestried hall. kogoruhn, the sixth house clanstead, is dressed in reds, blacks, and golds, and paper lanterns hang to illuminate dark corridors. there are no windows, and beyond the sharp and spiced scent of herbs and incense, the smell of soil and ash can be picked up from the walls, floors, and ceilings. they are deep underground but the stagnant air is not humid nor cool but oppressively hot, and they soon stand before the reason why. their bottleneck opens up into a vast chamber whose ground is constructed of flat metamorphic rock and whose walls are raw, solid earth. lava churns, viscous, from inlets that channel its runoff into draining pools.
on approaching a low stone stage where the mirror once was, nerevar stands before six great bells. voryn does not spare a thought for liem's comfort for liem has ceased to exist with their current company.)
Lordβ
Voryn, (nerevar interrupts, reluctant to. nerevar knows that the name itself is both a command and an invitation that voryn cannot disobey. he watches his advisor slow at the steps leading up to him.) ... The Mother Soul has cursed you as She has cursed the Tribunal for their trespass. I had not expected to see you like this, my friend; I believed that the dead were spared it.
(they stand on different tiers which separate them from seeing eye to eye. voryn's head feels heavy but he defies his natural inclination to bow, angry.)
Friend? (nerevar does not flinch even as he watches voryn struggle to spit venomous thoughts at him. perhaps they are deserved. if they are, however, they should both be buffeted by them. narrow blue eyes say this, his mouth unneeded to convey his point.) Prince Azura cursed us our eyes red and our skin grey, but you... you... you inspired her. Your distrust in me, in your most faithful servant. Your betrayal of my confidence in you. And what was it all for?
(stricken, voryn is unable to move. nerevar, who has always been stronger, takes one step down.)
If you had only believed in me and heard my advice... What would have become of us?
We would have arrived at the same conclusion, (nerevar counters. it becomes readily apparent why this person was able to become ruler. his expression is held in neutral understanding, unwavering. his charisma cloaks him, an invisible and intangible barrier. it is evocative when wielded, able to shape one word in all who listen to him speak: hero.
he is someone who raises a sword for others, who ascended from humble beginnings to become a powerful uniter of beliefs and causes. he is daedric prince azura's chosen one, symbolized on his finger by the great ring of the ancestors, one-clan-under-moon-and-star. he is saint nerevar the captain. he is lord nerevar the chimer king of resdayn.
he again steps down to speak more intimately. it is clear even through his invulnerable calm that he still possesses great affection for voryn.)
I will not play this child's game with you, Voryn. That you would still cling to pretence when we have both lost our lives is not like you. I accept the role I played in our shared fate... I was blind to the deceit of my general, my wife, and my teacher. And while I rest in death, prophesied to be born again millennia from now, I shall wait for you all to accept your own.
But right now, you are changed. I do not know with whom I speak.
(with liem at voryn's back, he is unable to see the widening of his eyes.
the taint of discord, however, is able to easily be sensed, and its buildup occurs rapidly in this time pocket. if there were anything that could cause corruption in him so great as to force voryn to absorb kenos' energies, it is contained within this moment. vivec, almalexia, and sotha silβtheir very mention compounds with nerevar's dismissal of him.
something within him splinters.)
You do not know? (his voice rings out over a tremor in the earth that makes the bells behind nerevar toll.)
You speak with the Lord High Councillor of the Sixth House, Lord Voryn Dagoth, Dagoth Ur. And the oath that I swore to you, Moon-and-Star, is one I still uphold. If you do not like the bitter thing that I have become in your absence, my friend, brother, and companion, know that it is by your hand that I have changed!
no subject
voryn leads them again down the block back to nerevar. it is not the city's streets they wind through any longer but a long, tapestried hall. kogoruhn, the sixth house clanstead, is dressed in reds, blacks, and golds, and paper lanterns hang to illuminate dark corridors. there are no windows, and beyond the sharp and spiced scent of herbs and incense, the smell of soil and ash can be picked up from the walls, floors, and ceilings. they are deep underground but the stagnant air is not humid nor cool but oppressively hot, and they soon stand before the reason why. their bottleneck opens up into a vast chamber whose ground is constructed of flat metamorphic rock and whose walls are raw, solid earth. lava churns, viscous, from inlets that channel its runoff into draining pools.
on approaching a low stone stage where the mirror once was, nerevar stands before six great bells. voryn does not spare a thought for liem's comfort for liem has ceased to exist with their current company.)
Lordβ
Voryn, (nerevar interrupts, reluctant to. nerevar knows that the name itself is both a command and an invitation that voryn cannot disobey. he watches his advisor slow at the steps leading up to him.) ... The Mother Soul has cursed you as She has cursed the Tribunal for their trespass. I had not expected to see you like this, my friend; I believed that the dead were spared it.
(they stand on different tiers which separate them from seeing eye to eye. voryn's head feels heavy but he defies his natural inclination to bow, angry.)
Friend? (nerevar does not flinch even as he watches voryn struggle to spit venomous thoughts at him. perhaps they are deserved. if they are, however, they should both be buffeted by them. narrow blue eyes say this, his mouth unneeded to convey his point.) Prince Azura cursed us our eyes red and our skin grey, but you... you... you inspired her. Your distrust in me, in your most faithful servant. Your betrayal of my confidence in you. And what was it all for?
(stricken, voryn is unable to move. nerevar, who has always been stronger, takes one step down.)
If you had only believed in me and heard my advice... What would have become of us?
We would have arrived at the same conclusion, (nerevar counters. it becomes readily apparent why this person was able to become ruler. his expression is held in neutral understanding, unwavering. his charisma cloaks him, an invisible and intangible barrier. it is evocative when wielded, able to shape one word in all who listen to him speak: hero.
he is someone who raises a sword for others, who ascended from humble beginnings to become a powerful uniter of beliefs and causes. he is daedric prince azura's chosen one, symbolized on his finger by the great ring of the ancestors, one-clan-under-moon-and-star. he is saint nerevar the captain. he is lord nerevar the chimer king of resdayn.
he again steps down to speak more intimately. it is clear even through his invulnerable calm that he still possesses great affection for voryn.)
I will not play this child's game with you, Voryn. That you would still cling to pretence when we have both lost our lives is not like you. I accept the role I played in our shared fate... I was blind to the deceit of my general, my wife, and my teacher. And while I rest in death, prophesied to be born again millennia from now, I shall wait for you all to accept your own.
But right now, you are changed. I do not know with whom I speak.
(with liem at voryn's back, he is unable to see the widening of his eyes.
the taint of discord, however, is able to easily be sensed, and its buildup occurs rapidly in this time pocket. if there were anything that could cause corruption in him so great as to force voryn to absorb kenos' energies, it is contained within this moment. vivec, almalexia, and sotha silβtheir very mention compounds with nerevar's dismissal of him.
something within him splinters.)
You do not know? (his voice rings out over a tremor in the earth that makes the bells behind nerevar toll.)
You speak with the Lord High Councillor of the Sixth House, Lord Voryn Dagoth, Dagoth Ur. And the oath that I swore to you, Moon-and-Star, is one I still uphold. If you do not like the bitter thing that I have become in your absence, my friend, brother, and companion, know that it is by your hand that I have changed!