Come, my lad, let us speak
Come, fair maid, let us talk
Scale to scale
Tip to tail
Fair maiden
Hist-maiden
And sap-drenched lad

Gold exchanged hands, marking the deal complete. Makes-Many-Waves belonged to a new master.

Sendrasa Llarys watched as her newest acquisition joined the group she’d already purchased. She stared so long at Makes-Many-Waves that she drew the Argonian’s eyes to hers. They both looked away quickly, almost instantly. Eye contact between master and slave would be punished by ten lashes.

The distance between market and house was no more than seven miles, but it seemed an eternity to Sendrasa. She’d counted the years impatiently until she could set up her own household and bring Makes-Many-Waves home.

"Send the rest to the field house," Sendrasa said. Her footman assisted her from her horse. "I want that one," she waved a hand towards Makes-Many-Waves, "brought to my sitting room. She’ll be my personal assistant."

"As you wish, madam."

Pulling her gloves off as she strode into her home, Sendrasa laughed. "Finally, yes! It will be exactly as I wish."

How long since she’d felt her lover’s lips pressed against hers? Shared in desperate, guilty caresses whenever they could steal away together? How she’d suffered once their intimacy became known! As though, Sendrasa thought bitterly, seeing her beloved sold through the Archeins hadn’t been punishment enough.

Time passed with deadly slowness from that moment until Sendrasa finally located Makes-Many-Waves and bought her back. This time, no one could separate them. They belonged together.

The door opened, and Makes-Many-Waves stepped forward, eyes downcast becomingly. Sendrasa walked past her, shut and locked the door, then turned.

"I’ve missed you," she said softly.

In a moment, they locked in a passionate embrace, Sendrasa touching Makes-Many-Waves’s scales gently, searchingly.

"Did they torture you, darling? I swear they’ll pay!"

Makes-Many-Waves shook her head, her frilled spine fluttering. "Seeing you heals me, my love. But the Archeins …."

"You’re safe. Those traitors won’t touch you again," Sendrasa said.

"Listen, my love," Makes-Many-Waves said. "Your parents paid the Archeins very, very well. Their eyes are everywhere. They’ll know you bought me, and they’ll come for me."

"I’ll free you," Sendrasa replied. "You’ll be safe!"

"It’s not like that," the Argonian whispered. "The Archeins don’t care whether Argonians they sell are free or not. To live together safely, we must leave Morrowind. "

"I see. Now kiss me."

As darkness approached, Sendrasa and Makes-Many-Waves began their journey, heading northwest toward the border with Skyrim.

"Is Riften safe?" Makes-Many-Waves whispered. They’d traveled several days out of their way to shake off any possible followers.

Before Sendrasa could speak, an arrow pierced her throat. She clutched at it with one hand, her eyes widened in surprise. More arrows followed swiftly, killing the Dark Elf long before she slid to the ground.

"You’re free now," said an Argonian archer, stepping from the shadows.

Makes-Many-Waves stared at him, unable to speak or move.

"Did she hurt you?" he asked, coming closer. "You can return to Black Marsh now. You’re no longer a slave."

Collapsing across Sendrasa’s body, Makes-Many-Waves sobbed.

A tunnel. A cave? Dark, damp, and warm. Scale-Song ran toward the hazy light, hearing his footsteps echo in the narrow passage, sinking deeper into the mud.

"How can I sink in this?" he asked aloud. "I am of parents born in Black Marsh."

When he could no longer move, Scale-Song bowed his head, listening to the moisture dripping from the roots twisted above him. Soon, it would be over. He would return to the Hist. How embarrassing, though, for an Argonian to suffocate in mud.

His eyes opened suddenly. He’d had the same dream every night for weeks. Each night, he felt he was nearly at the cave’s exit. Everything would be made clear once he reached it. And each morning, Scale-Song awoke, no closer to understanding the meaning of the imagery.

"Clearly, the Hist speaks to you," said his egg-brother Gash-Tail. "Tonight, ask what it wants. Talk to it."

"I’ll try," said Scale-Song, "but I never remember it’s a dream until I’m awake."

Gash-Tail reached into an earthenware jar on the shelf beside him. He handed Scale-Song a thick roll of leaves tied with twine.

"Burn this," he said. "The incense may clear your mind. If the Hist wants you, you must listen."

Scale-Song nodded. Advice like this was precisely why he sought Gash-Tail’s help. For the first time in a long while, he couldn’t wait for night to fall.

The burnt incense filled his hut with thick gray smoke that coiled heavily along the ground like fog. Scale-Song hadn’t expected it to smell so horribly. Still, he watched the smoke spread slowly throughout the room, his eyelids growing heavier and heavier.

A cave. A tunnel? Smoke drifted along the muddy floor. Scale-Song stopped running and reached out a hand toward the smoke. Talk. Ask. Speak.

"Are you trying to tell me something?" he asked aloud.

"I am dead."

"Dead? Who are you?"

The smoke coalesced into a shimmering figure, hooded and cloaked. Its tail twitched. "I am dead," the figure said. "Without it, all that I am will be lost forever. Find it. Remember."

"It? What is it?"

Scale-Song followed the figure through the dark passage. His feet no longer sank into the mire, as in all the other dreams. They walked in silence. Scale-Song was alert, but untroubled.

It seemed like hours before the pair reached the tunnel’s exit. The shimmering figure sighed deeply, pointing toward a shriveled tree.

"A Hist," said Scale-Song, surprised. "Is this it? Dead … but how?"

"Remember," said the figure, unfurling into the wind, but not before it pressed a Mnemic Egg into Scale-Song’s hands.

They said the work would be hard, but Huusmaheem did not expect it to be so backbreaking. To be paid, Huusmaheem needed to fill eight baskets a day, but his tools were crude. Small mattocks are not made for clawed hands, not when they formed from the only tools available.

Rust-colored liquid seeped from the piles of slag, staining everyone’s scales a dusky orange. Huusmaheem crawled forward a few feet, dragging his baskets behind him, so he could pull apart a new section of earth and rock. The miners tapped apart rocks and sifted through the mud for the rich variety of reagents found in those oozing mounds.

The miner beside him said, "Finished my eighth basket. You?"

"Almost done with seven," Huusmaheem replied. "You’re always done first, Split-Tail. What’s your secret?"

"Hard work," said Split-Tail with a grin. "Also, I made enough to buy a bigger mattock."

"Cheater!" said Huusmaheem with a good-natured chuckle.

"I’m heading out now."

A cascade of dry earth slid down the terraced wall toward them. The miners, used to these collapses, grabbed their work loads and quickly moved away.

"There!" someone yelled. Huusmaheem and Split-Tail, still beside each other, looked at the slope above them. Though dust rose from the slithering scree, they could see shapes hurtling toward them, leaning back on their heels, arms outstretched for balance.

"Ogres! Tell th-"

A blow silenced Split-Tail, knocking him to the ground.

A dozen ogres attacked the unarmed miners, wielding nothing more powerful than their beefy fists. Huusmaheem ducked a right hook, still clutching a basket to his chest. He had to get to the village and warn people. Ogres hadn’t been seen near the mines in at least twelve months.

He scrambled forward. Realizing he still held a basket, he flung it away, so he could use both hands. A brute stronger than Huusmaheem grabbed his tail and pulled him backwards. And then it let out a scream of rage and pain as Split-Tail swung his proper-sized mattock into the ogre’s hand.

"Run!" Split-Tail cried.

Hefting another bale into the loft, Maakul felt the pain shoot through his shoulder once more. He rotated his shoulder, shrugging to release tension.

"Thanks for your help," the Argonian trader said. He nodded at the Kothringi and lumbered away with his cart.

For several months, the same trader came to Zuuk bearing loads of hay for the horses. Maakul’s brother Huug, before he died, had handled the transactions. He arranged deliveries, unloaded the bales, and made payments. Then the illness struck Huug: a rash that stood out as bright spots against his skin together with a high fever. Within a week, he was gone.

And now, Maakul dealt with the trader. If only his muscles didn’t hurt so much. Clearly, he lacked the strength of his late brother. He’d need to try harder, though he preferred studying and reading to any physical labor.

"I need to check the ledgers anyway," Maakul said to himself as he headed into his hut. He’d let the books go during his brother’s illness, and the latest delivery should be entered.

As he opened the payment register, a slip of paper fluttered to the floor. He recognized his brother’s handwriting and picked it up.

"Beware the ruby necklace."

Maakul frowned. They couldn’t afford necklaces, much less rubies. What did his brother mean? Shrugging, Maakul threw the crumpled note into the brazier beside his desk, draped a cloak over his legs, and settled down to bring their accounts up to date. He felt so cold.

That night, Maakul saw his reflection in his wife’s concerned face. She’d found him, coughing and shivering at his desk. She half-carried him to bed. A line of red welts, the tell-tale rash, encircled his throat.

"Rubies," he mumbled, clawing at his skin as the Knahaten Flu claimed its latest victim.

By the Silver-Haired Shadow

You don’t need to know my real name—not sure I remember it anymore, anyhow. My auntie left me a shack on a hill south of the border. Never thought about it much, until I lifted Hrol’s Golden Girdle from the Temple of the One. Suddenly life got real complicated, and I decided it was time to go claim my inheritance.

Auntie—let’s call her Auntie Alias, no point in telling you too much—was an Imperial Border Scout, part of the cohort stationed at Fort Sphinxmoth, in the hills between Elsweyr and northern Valenwood. In the late days of the Second Empire the job of the Border Scouts was to keep the quarrelsome locals in line so as not to interfere with trade. "Free trade, by Aless," auntie would say, opening another bottle of Surilie Farms and winking. "Lifeblood of the Empire!"

Now the Scouts couldn’t stop every little cross-border vendetta, but they did prevent the Cats and the Runty Elves from engaging in wholesale slaughter, and kept the bandits off the road from Dune to Arenthia. Auntie liked the climate, so when she retired she bought this little plot, came down and put up her hut. It’s bigger than it looks, by the way—goes way back into the hill, and you can bet auntie dug out a back door, just in case.

By the time I got here, one dark night in Sun’s Dusk, with the wound in my thigh leaking blood again after that wild ride on the stolen horse, the Border Scouts were long gone, and the Dawnmead Marches had returned to their natural state: just one law shy of anarchy. And that one law was the Law of Revenge.

It was the Vinedusk Wood Elf tribe versus the Dakarn Khajiiti clan, and it was a near-continual war of cross-border raids and midnight murders. They took turns occupying the ruins of Fort Sphinxmoth, sending out bands to waylay merchant caravans, raid villages and towns, and pay off old scores. Neither side noticed me hiding in the old shack during daylight, and slipping from shadow to shadow around the Marches after dark. The place was a killing ground—I could hardly go five hundred paces without encountering a dead warrior, a half-empty cart, or a slain merchant.

It was a looter’s paradise.

Ah, those were the good times. Too good to last, I suppose—eventually the Vinedusk bandits overreached and staged a raid on Arenthia itself, right about the time the Dakarn Cats tried to take over organized crime in Dune and the Thizzrini Arena. The respectable citizens on both sides of the border formed militias or hired mercenaries, swept the hills clean, and that was the end of brigandry in the Marches. The Vinedusk tribe actually reformed as a Bosmeri irregular unit, the "Vinedusk Rangers" (Ha!), while the surviving Dakarns became the nucleus of the Duneguard Outwalkers. The border settled back down, and the Lifeblood of the Empire resumed its flow.

Fortunately, I was there to recognize opportunity when I saw it coming down the road from Dune, laden with trade goods. By the next Fredas I was in Bravil, looking up a few of my old contacts. Half a season later it was me and the newly-dubbed Murkwater Gang who were occupying good old Fort Sphinxmoth, digging out the barracks, sharpening our blades, and repairing the old traps.

The good times are back.

By Centurion Iunius Ocella

This unit will begin occupation of Arenthia within a fortnight. To ensure our success in the operation, every soldier needs some knowledge of the city and its civilians. Go in unprepared, and you’ll end up robbed blind or stuck full of Wood Elf arrows without knowing how or why. Having spent some years guarding caravans in transit from Arenthia to Skingrad, I can provide the information you need to avoid personal harm and unnecessary provocation of the citizenry.

Don’t be lulled into complacency by the familiar buildings; this city is nothing like home. Though some Colovian traders from north of the River Strid have settled here, they’re outnumbered by the Wood Elves from the south and the Khajiit who roam in from the eastern savannas. In the past, the city’s allegiance has changed as often as the wind, but the flimsy Khajiiti hovels and the Elves’ temporary tree-shaping don’t endure like the good Colovian stone from which most of the lasting structures are built.

You’ll encounter plenty of Wood Elves and Khajiit, so a general awareness of their customs and practices will prove useful. Wood Elves become unreasonably aggressive if they believe a plant or tree is in danger. If any trees need to be cleared, obtain permission from your superior and assemble an armed squad. Also, be aware that Wood Elves are fond of indulging in drink, and their normally irreverent tongues become even worse when soaked. A word of advice: do not engage in drinking contests with these Elves, no matter how they taunt you.

Khajiit make up a sizable portion of the population, though few hold permanent residence here (or anywhere). These moon-worshipers drift in and out in bands, bringing their sugary liquors and garish fabrics to market. Exercise caution if you are approached by one of the pleasure-partners that often travel with these caravans. They are invariably thieves, and by the time you realize you’ve been picked clean, they’ll be halfway back to Dune.

On a related note, we’ve caught wind that a ring of skooma smugglers may be operating out of the city’s shamefully disused Temple of the Divines. This is an affront to the Divines and will be investigated once our hold is established. We will clear out the scum if the rumors prove true, but there is to be absolutely no looting of the Temple. In time, we will restore it to its rightful glory.

Your job is to make certain that our grip on Arenthia is ironclad. Enforce martial law and keep the peace as much as possible, but be swift to quell any potential disturbance. Remember, no culture can claim "traditional" ownership of this city; it belongs to the banner with the most troops on the ground, and that’s going to be ours.

By Zwinthodurr Roun-dar

Spies walk among us. Across Elsweyr, in every street, in every village, around every campfire—we are watched.

"But of course!" you say. "Our tribal elders and clan mothers watch over us always, in the name of Alkosh, Mara, and Azurah!"

And that is true. So they do.

But there are Others.

Others who watch our every move, who suspect us of "disloyalty," who can report us as unfaithful and treasonous.

Report us? To who? To the officers of the Mane?

Oh, no. Not to Cat-Folk at all.

These watchers report only to the Elves.

Admit it: you have heard their name. But only in whispers. And you dare not repeat it.

They are … the Eyes of the Queen.

The Eyes, who are beholden to no one but the tall and terrible Queen Ayrenn.

Her Eyes see everything, they say. But how, since Elves cannot go everywhere? Because, Khajiit, Elven gold can—and does.

Hush. You know it to be true.

And because you are watched, your tail-dance droops ever-so-slightly, your ears stand a little less proud, and you look over your shoulder a little too often.

Because who can say who has been bought, and who has not? Who might be sending reports about you—and what might they be saying?

Where did that neighbor of yours go last Middas? Was it to receive new orders from the Eyes? Or was she taken away, perhaps to Alinor itself, and the dungeons beneath the Crystal Tower?

Beware, Khajiit. Keep your whiskers alert.

This one is watched. And this one may not be permitted to warn you again.

By Moon-Bishop Hunal

NEW:
To speak of the dark gambol of the dro-m’Athra.

WAX:
When true cats die, their souls are lifted by Khenarthi and flown to the Sands Behind the Stars, to play and prey until the Next Pounce.

When bent cats die, their souls are dragged down by Namiira into the Dark Behind the World, to serve the Heart of Lorkhaj until their tails are straight.

FULL:
These, then, become the Dancers in the Darks, where they whirl to no music but the beating of the Heart. Sometimes these dancers seep up through the cracks in Nirni to the moonlit world, and walk among us as if made of moonless night. Then we call them dro-m’Athra. And this is a name of fear.

For a true cat to see a dro-m’Athra do the Bent Dance is to feel his tail twitch in time, and feel the pull of the Darks. As each twitch pulls the true cat further from the moons-light, the cat’s shadow grows longer and more bent. And if the tide of the Darks grows greater than the tide of the Lights, the true cat is lost, and becomes a bent cat.

Then comes the true peril, for a dro-m’Athra can twist out a bent cat’s soul, and send it through the cracks to the Darks. Once it hears the beating of the Heart it, too, will dance bent.

It is hard to stop. One night all the villagers of Lohrn were found dancing the Bent Dance. Now we do not go there.

WANE:
To banish the dro-m’Athra, there are two ways: the Way of Jone and the Way of Jode.

Warriors use the Way of Jone, which is to unsheathe the claws and strike the darkness until it is no more. And this way is a good way, for everyone who is strong of heart and claw can use it.

Priests use the Way of Jode, which is to bathe the moonless dark in bright lunar light. And this way is a better way, for bent spirits thus banished do not return.

by Gi’Nanth

The Temple of Two-Moons Dance in Torval has for many hundreds of years been the finest training ground in all Tamriel for warriors of foot and fist. The masters teach students of all ages from all parts of Tamriel the most ancient techniques and the most modern variations, and many a former pupil has graduated to great fame. I myself trained there, and as a young child I remember asking my first master, Zoaraym, which former student he felt had best learned the lessons of the Temple.

"I was not a teacher when I met this man, but a student myself," he said, smiling in reminiscence, his great wrinkled face becoming even more like the withered fruit of the bathrum tree. "This was long ago, before your parents were born. For many years I had trained at the Temple, rising to study in more difficult and demanding classes taught by the wisest and most learned Masters of the Two-Moons Dance.

"Gi’Nanth, you will come to understand that the tempering of your body must attend the tempering of your mind, and there is a prescribed order of training we at the Temple have designed over the years in concordance with the way of Riddle’Thar. I had reached the highest level, where my power and skill were such that even by supernatural, magical means, few could ever best me in weaponless combat.

"There was a servant at the Temple at the time, a Dunmer a few years older than myself and those in my class. We had never noticed him but in passing over the years, for he would enter the training chambers quietly, clean for a few minutes’ time, and leave without saying a word. Not that we would have listened if he spoke, so enwrapped were we in our exercises and lessons.

"When our last Master told some of us, myself included, that the time had come for us to leave the Temple or become teachers, there was a great festival of celebration. The Mane himself deigned to visit and observe our ceremony. As we were and are a temple of philosophy and combat, there were contests of debate and competitions in the Temple’s war arena, not only among the elite few, but open to all students.

"On the first day of the festival, I was examining the gladiatorial roster to see who I would fight with first, when I heard a conversation behind me: the servants speaking to the archpriest of the Temple. It was the first time I heard the Dunmer’s voice, and the first time I heard his name.

"’I understand you wish to rejoin your people’s struggle in Morrowind, Taren,’ the archpriest was saying. ‘I am sorry to hear it. You have been an institution here for many, many years, and you will be missed. If there’s anything I can do for you, please name it.’

"’Thank you for your kindness,’ the Dunmer replied. ‘I do have a request, but I fear you would be loath to grant it. Ever since I first came to the Temple, I have been watching the students learn, and practiced myself when my duties allowed for it. I know I am but a servant here, but I would be honored if you would allow me to compete in the war arena.’

"I stifled my gasp at the Mer’s impertinence, to even suggest that he would be worthy to fight with those of us who had trained so hard. To my surprise, the archpriest agreed, adding the name Taren Omathan to the roster at the beginners’ level. I was eager to whisper the news to my fellow elite students, but my first bout was scheduled to begin in a few minutes’ time."