Applying Exotic Metaphysics (Alien, 21.3)

AN: I wrote this while crying to Young Scrolls’ newest song, Amulet of Kings.

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The street was quiet. I could feel a web of magic, carefully layered into the stones. Illusion magic, warding people away. Everyone except for me, Goranthir, and the red-and-golden robes the masked elves wore.

I smiled.

It wasn’t a nice one.

I looked at him again. Really looked at him, felt out the magic. The colors of his robes and mask.

After a moment… I pulled the magicka back out of destructive blast I had been about to unleash.

“... You’re not Thalmor.” I said, finally.

Goranthir tensed, as he seemed to realize something.

“The Beautiful.” He said- and drew his blade. “You’re here for me, aren’t you? After what you did in Shimmerene…”

“Your companion has already clarified: We are not here for you. There is no harm meant for you, Prince.” The one in the lead said. “Our first question is directed elsewhere: Why does an outsider wear the skin of our kin?”

Goranthir suddenly glanced at me.

Well.. They knew the trick, I guessed. I let my form melt away, revealing my true one.

The elves weren’t surprised, except for the prince. His blade wavered toward me.

“You are known to us, Maria Manatsoni. Confirmation was more important than Hypothesis.” His mask seemed to shine, and he tilted his head a fraction. “Mannimarco’s absence from our culture has left gaps in his doctrine. He is more Psijic than he was ever Aldmeri. He has left both identities behind. What he imparted upon you was flawed.”

“Yeah? Was it the way I was lording it around, or the way I dressed?”

“If you were informed, you would correct it, and more completely elude us in the future.” The figure responds. Which, you know. Fair enough. “You will accompany us. Time, as always, proves expensive. Our compatriots cannot maintain the field for long.”

“Yeah? And how are you going to make me?” I asked.

“Please?” Is all he says.

Somehow, that threw me. I wasn’t expecting him to say something like that. Goranthir’s eyebrows met.

“... I’ll need something more than that,” I said. “But it is a good start.”

“This is the land of the first diviners. We know your history, and so we have an approximation of your goals. You wish to find the Thalmor.”

“I do.” You said, finally.

“Your approach would not have worked for many years. Beyond that, their presence in Firsthold is weak. This is our doing.”

One of the masked figures, who was just sort of standing there, seemed to focus. I could feel magicka drain from the air, slightly. He was meditating to regain it. 

“So is a murdered princess, I hear.” I snapped.

“This action was not our doing,” He says, finally. “We repeat our statement: Time is expensive. Our master would like to speak with you. We must go.”

Goranthir glanced between me and the masked figures. Four of them stepped together, and muttered to one another. Numbers. Coordinates. Eventually, their hands sparked, and a shiftgate opened between us.

I did the math, based on the coordinates I heard. The spell was angled upward, and that meant it had to correspond with a building. Firsthold’s central tower. The palace?

“... Yeah. I’ll go.” I said.

“Prince, your presence is not required, but nor is it unwanted.” The elf said.

“The shiftgate leads into the palace.” I explained.

“... My mother’s been hosting you, hasn’t she?” He sighed.

The Beautiful agent nodded, and stepped through the portal. I shrugged and followed him.

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Goranthir casually sat  in one of the half-sofas that decorated the lavish room. He lounged only like royalty could, with a kind of casual arrogance that even the Lady hadn’t seen, even in emperors or daedric princes. But I could tell it was an act. He tried to look like he was relaxed, like everything was going to plan… But his sword leaned on the sofa next to him, and there was a tenseness in his eyes.

I, on the other hand, sat politely in one of the other chairs. Everything was gold and red, and it was starting to mess with my eyes a little bit. The Beautiful, whoever he was, had said that we could make ourselves comfortable while we waited for our guest to arrive.

Light shined in through the window. It wasn’t real sunlight- the wrong angle for that- but it felt like it. The magicka felt real, but… patterned.

As the light danced against the wall, a high elf stepped out from the wall like it was a doorway. He was old. The oldest altmer I’d ever seen… outside of Mannimcaro, who didn’t count.

“You’re our guest?” I asked. “Or, well, we’re your guest?”

“The answer to both of your questions is no. What you see is a projection, and cannot be considered to be hosting or guesting.” He said. “I am the First.”

“The first what?”

“Mirror-Logician.” Goranthir said. He frowned. “I’ve never met any that weren’t in at least the double digits.”

“The smaller, the more important, I would assume.” I drawled. Knowing the High Elves… “And the primes, of course.”

The First simply nodded. “Yes. Your assumption is correct. I am the primary caretaker of Crystal-Like-Law. For reasons of secrecy, we will now proceed to call me by my birth-given name. It is Lovilian Silmane.”

“... Silmane?” I asked. That caught my attention. 

“You know of my name because you know of Ria Silmane.” Lovilian said. “But you do not see me with distrust, as you think of her name as more than that of her status as Jagar Tharn’s apprentice.”

“Yeah.”

“You know of her and Jsashe’s quest in more detail than most.” He said. “Interesting. May I know how?”

“Maybe if you tell me about the Thalmor, first.” I responded.

“The Third, Fifth, and Seventh Mirror-Logicians have allied with them. Even as our multiplicities redirect the anger of the Septim Anathema, they attempt to wield it like their own weapon.”

I wracked my mind for a second. Septim Anathema?

“They always talk like that.” Goranthir said. “Being a Mirror Logician messes with their heads.”

“If you understood, you would be one as well.” Lovilian responded. “‘Go Then, There are Other Worlds Than These’.” He said. It sounded like a quote, one that scratched not just at my memories, but the ones from Earth.

But I thought about it, what an elf would call an Anathema connected to Septim... and I got it.

“Numindium.”

“You know of it. I witnessed you construct a facsimile of what it was not, hadn’t you?”

“Technically,” I responded- then I realized what they’d been saying. “You’re fighting Numindium? The original?”

“The first World-Refusal was against time.” He said, carefully and calmly- then burst into a staccato. Quick, almost spitting words. “The Second Aldmeri Dominion loses its war against Tiber Septim as we speak. It screams refusal hence, and in the present, and finally hitherto. The fate of my fellows is to have been destroyed.”

I froze.

“But that day is not today.” He says, going calm again. “We were speaking of the Thalmor.”

“Right. Sorry.” I said. “So. Three, Five, and seven are, uh, working with the Thalmor?”

“Yes.” He said. “... Once, it was known that Crystal Like Law would fall to Ambition. But you have made the known into a lie, and the tower that stands has given the Thalmor power. I am countermanding them, but my ability is not ”

“I mean, they would have gained power anyway.”

“Not like this.” He says.

“What do you mean?”

He told me, and my blood went cold.

I knew those words. But I didn't. I remembered it, but I didn't. Somewhere, elsewhere, Shor was paying attention. She and I were watching.

Goranthir looked between the two of us.

"I don't get it. What is Landfall?" He asked.