Chapter 63: Violence in the Temple

"Here Mehrunes Dagon held this rock high above the Dunmer. Vivec taunted Mehrunes Dagon so that Dagon threw the rock at Vivec instead of the people." This was the inscription on the 'Magic Rock of Maar Gan'. The monk Tuls Valen had sent me to the rock on a pilgrimage; I was supposed to read the inscription and then mimic Vivec's actions.

Another riddle, then: it seemed the Tribunal Temple was fond of them. Looking about the main chamber of the Maar Gan shrine, I hoped that the solution to this one was not as cruel as that of the Puzzle Canal.

Despite its name, the 'Magic Rock' was an unremarkable boulder, as far as I could tell. I looked elsewhere. Really, the only other interesting thing in the room was Anhaedra the Dremora. I had learnt his - or its - name on my previous visit to the shrine, but nothing else. One of the priests had merely said: "Watch yourself around Anhaedra."

I thought it through carefully. I had to imitate the actions of Vivec as described in the inscription: right there in the shrine, presumably. In the inscription Vivec had taunted Mehrunes Dagon... Mehrunes was of the Daedra... and there was a Daedra right there in the room: Anhaedra.

I had to taunt and provoke the Dremora, it seemed: to violence, probably. It felt somewhat contrived ... well, I suppose it was contrived, being a recreation of a mythic (or famous, perhaps) event - but sauntering up to a stranger who was minding their own business and insulting them seemed strange to me. I wasn't sure how to go about it. Provoking a Dremora wasn't something to be taken lightly, either. I was still wearing my armour, of course - my shield I had slid up my arm, to leave both hands free. As I approached Anhaedra I let it fall down into the ready position.

"So, you're here to scare the tourists, then?" I stared into the Dremora's eyes (or rather, the glowing lights behind the eye-holes in its helmet) in what I hoped was an antagonistic manner. "Just for show, though, I suspect. Is that dust?" There was actually dust on the Daedra spirit's armoured shoulders; and though it felt like putting my hand in the mouth of a vicious guard dog, I reached out and roughly brushed some of the dust off.

"Do you want something, mortal?" Anhaedra's voice sounded, hissing out of the cracks in the Daedric armour. "You can't possibly be here to mimic Vivec. Your taunts are weak. Like your flesh."

I felt that things became a little juvenile at this point, but I couldn't think of anything better to say than:

"Weak? I'm stronger than you, I'm sure. I've killed many of your kind. In fact," I said, drawing my Daedric longsword and holding it up as if to examine it, "I cut down two Dremora to get this sword." (I was, of course, pretending to be ignorant of the fact that Dremora apparently could not be killed, only banished to Oblivion).

It had the desired effect, anyway. Upon spotting my Daedra blade, Anhaedra's eyes flared, and he bellowed:

"Unworthy!"

The Dremora twisted about and caught up a silver sword he had cunningly concealed in his shadow. Dremora are all mostly slow-moving creatures - Daedric armour is extraordinarily heavy, after all - but Anhaedra was the slowest I had seen. As I easily deflected his first blow with my shield, I wondered how long he had been standing there in that shrine. The joints in his armour seemed to be caked with dust. As I had the time to perfectly line up and execute my swings, I only had to strike him twice before the shriek and crack of breaking metal signified I had beaten him. A priest came up behind me as I watched the animated suit of armour crumble into dust.

"Good, good. Well done," he said. It was the same priest I had spoken to on my last visit to the shrine. He nudged the pile of dust with his toe. "Sometimes I almost feel sorry for Anhaedra. Being summoned and killed periodically would be enough to make anyone irritable, I imagine. Still, it seems to make him more prone to provocation, which is quite suitable to his purpose here, really." He paused, then, as if remembering himself, added: "In any case, you've completed the Maar Gan pilgrimage, so congratulations are in order."

I mumbled some vague words of thanks and excused myself. I was not comfortable there; the whole thing had felt like executing a caged animal to me. In a strange way, the thought that Anhaedra was not really dead was actually comforting.

I paid Valen a quick visit at the Ald'ruhn Temple the next morning, to tell him about the pilgrimage. He was polite about it, but it was obvious that he didn't care much for the whole business either. He gifted me with a book for completing the pilgrimage, the 'Death Blow of Abernanit', hinting as he did that I would learn much more from reading it than I would by cutting down a summoned and bound Dremora. The monk said he had nothing else for me to do right then, and suggested I try Uvoo Llaren at the Ghostgate or Endryn Llethan in Vivec if I was impatient to perform another service for the Temple.

"You do good work though, Sera Frost." Valen clapped me on the shoulder. "I'll be sure to send word through the Temples, should I have something for you."

I was glad of the reprieve, to tell the truth. During the interminable silt strider trip of the previous day, I had decided to focus on retrieving the remaining propylon indices for Folms, so he could make good on his promise to construct a 'Master Index' for me. Now I had the opportunity to do just that. I certainly wasn't beholden to the Temple to perform their will at a moment's notice - or anything like that - but I wanted to cultivate good relations there, and if no-one was waiting on me, I was free to take my time on other endeavours.

My newfound resolve was due mostly to the frightening time limit hanging over my head: if Master Healer Synnolian was right, and I was dying, I didn't have time to sit around in silt striders or hike across rough terrain. I had given up on somehow stumbling across something in the wilds that would lead to a cure. I needed help. For that I needed to curry favour with powerful organisations; which meant scurrying about on various errands, like as not. If Folm's plan worked, a Master Index would allow me to teleport in an instant to any one of the ten ancient Velothi strongholds scattered around the island - as long as the enchanter was available to send me on my way - he would have the actual indices in his possession, after all.

Through a combination of my magic, the services of the guild guides, and the teleportation properties of the Wolfen ring and the Master Index, I could at almost any time travel to a vast range of locations across Vvardenfell in a matter of minutes. That was my plan, and my theory, at any rate.

I had expected my visit to Divayth Fyr, a Dunmer wizard who was allegedly thousands of years old, to be ... interesting - to say the least - but as it turned out, the tale of our meeting is hardly worth the telling.

I found his tower easily enough: one of the curious, hollowed-out giant fungi of the type used in nearby Sadrith Mora. I was directed by a Dunmer woman to his study at the top of the tower: accessible only by a sheer central shaft - without a ladder. A wizard's house, sure enough. I jumped up the shaft with my Tinur's Hoptoad spell, and found the ancient Dunmer seated at a small, cluttered table.

At first I thought I was looking at a Dremora - though I had never seen one of the Daedra spirits scribbling in a notebook; Divayth was wearing full Daedric armour. I realised my mistake when he straightened up, revealing his bare head. He looked old - there was no doubting that - but thousands of years walking the land? I just couldn't say.


In any case, as I said before, our meeting was uneventful. So much so, in fact, that I barely felt as if I met him at all. Our conversation went something like this:


Me: "Uh - hello; nice to meet you, Sera Fyr." (Awkward pause). "Ahem - I was told you have a certain propylon index in your collection. I was wondering..."

Fyr: "Oh - that thing. You want it?" (Rummages through clutter on the table, and tosses index to me). "Here."

Me: "Th-thankyou! That's -"

Fyr: "Yes, yes. Very generous of me, of course. But I don't want it. So." (Stands and adjusts armour). "Now, I'm heading out directly, so if you don't mind?"


And that was it. As I said...

Retrieving the next three indices proved to be just as easy. The Berandas index, interestingly enough, was also in the hands of a reclusive Dunmer wizard. Baladas Demnevanni lived in an ancient Velothi dome on the outskirts of Gnisis. The most interesting thing about Baladas was that he kept a Daedroth as a pet. Like Divayth Fyr, he was polite enough, but fairly dismissive:

"You want that old rock? You're welcome to it - it's of little use to me... just gathering dust here somewhere." After handing it over, the mildly unkempt-looking wizard stood and gazed steadily at me, making it fairly obvious he wished for me to leave. I was not about to risk the anger of a man who let a crocodilian Daedroth wander about his study and bedchambers untethered, so I followed his hint.

The next two indices also shared similar fates - curious, really. According to Folms they were both in the hands of "dangerous outlaws: the Andasreth index at the Hlormaren stronghold west of Balmora, and the Rotheran index (appropriately) at the Rotheran stronghold. The Andasreth was among the easiest of the indices to collect: I levitated over the range of hills west of Balmora, found the dome atop Hlormaren that Folms had told me to look for, and found the index on a shelf inside. There was no sign of the outlaw Folms had warned me about.

The Rotheran stronghold was some way south of Dagon Fel, and the long, protracted boat trip from Sadrith Mora to Vvardenfell's northernmost settlement was a further reminder as to why I was going to so much trouble to collect all the indices. After a few hours' hike through the steep and rocky Sheogorad region I found the Rotheran stronghold, and the index: in the coat pocket of an overly aggressive bandit (he did not survive our meeting).

With those four indices safely in Folms' hands, the enchanter told me the location of the final one on his list: the Telasero index. He gave quite a dire warning of the place:

"The index is in a trough with some other objects, in a dark place - that's all I can see. Listen, I've heard nothing but bad things about Telasero: it's all dark there, really. A very, very bad place."

He was right, too. I have never forgotten the depths of Telasero.