A changeling's visit to Skyrim

Fenora had decided to take a break from studying up on the dragons, and since Stross and the others still weren’t back from their little dungeon delving excursion, she thought she might as well head in to Winterhold and get something to eat. Perhaps Stross and his new friends would even meet her in the Frozen Hearth and they could all swap stories about their boring adventures in academics.

“Heh, I wonder what that little guy is doing right now.” Fenora chuckled to herself at the thought of Stross discovering ancient artifacts in old buried ruins; it actually reminded her of quite a bit of her friend in Elsweyr.

“Hopefully he won’t get himself killed doing that kind of stuff.” She said, remembering how many times her friend had nearly lost her life, and the lives of her crew as well.

It was then that she noticed Brelyna running down the main street of Winterhold, nearly tripping over her own feet as she made it past the Jarl’s longhouse.

“Fenora!” she called as she got closer “Fenora get the others, we need help!”

“What’s going on, are you okay?” Fenora slowed her down enough to talk with, though Brelyna wouldn’t stop fidgeting in place “You look terrible, what happened in-“

“It’s Stross!” Brelyna interrupted her and broke out in tears again “He’s dying!”

At those words Fenora’s world seemed to shatter and crumble away, leaving only her inner thoughts. She tuned out the Brelyna’s frantic sobbing, and she ignored the people of Winterhold gathering around them to watch the spectacle.

Fenora grabbed Brelyna’s arm, turned on her heel and dragged her back to the college. Though she would have easily rushed back to Sarthaal to aid her changeling, she knew that she’d be next to useless unprepared. She’d need to know what she was dealing with and equip herself to help.

“I told you them no good mages would do something stupid again!” one villager pointed and yelled, only to get punched out of the way a second later.

“Faralda!” Fenora called as she approached the gate to the bridge “Get the other teachers, something has gone wrong in Sarthaal!”

“Oh for fuck sake, not again.” Faralda heaved a pained groan. She then raised her hand skyward and shot a burst of red sparks into the air. The magic wellsprings that lined the bridge changed from blue to red as well, and the whole college was put on alert.

Continuing across the bridge, Fenora turned to question Brelyna. “Okay, tell me what happened.”

“It’s all my fault. I was paralyzed with fear; I just stood there and did nothing and now he's-“

There was a resounding smack as Fenora’s hand impacted her face.

“I don’t care how or why!” Fenora shook the sobbing girl and looked her in the eyes “Just tell me what happened, from the beginning if you have to.”

Though tears still ran down Brelyna’s cheeks, she did her best to be calm. “Okay. Okay… I guess it all started when I was born. My mom was a bit of a drinker…”

Fenora face-palmed with a groan and continued through the courtyard into the hall of Attainment as Brelyna recounted her painful childhood.

“… and then Stross just closed his eyes and went limp and I thought he was dead! Onmund and I were the only ones that could still walk, so he told me to go for help while he made sure the others were alright.” Brelyna finished as they approached the back entrance to Sarthaal.

“You could have just said ‘bring a ton of potions’ you know.” Fenora told her as she kicked open the secret door, careful not to damage the crate full of flasks she was holding.

On the way in they passed one of the word walls that contained knowledge of the thu’ums. Fenora made a mental note of it and promptly shoved it into the back of her mind, right now there were more important things to deal with.

Winding down the passageway a bit further, they found themselves in the room with the glowing orb.

Onmund ran up to them from where Tolfdir and J’zargo were sitting, nursing their wounds and broken bones. “Thank gods you’re back! I thought we were all gonners and- wait a minute. Is it just you Fenora? Brelyna, I thought you’d at least bring some of the teachers.”

“You mean they haven’t arrived yet? We told all of them where we were.” she nervously defended.

It was then that they hear muffled shouts echoing from further within the catacombs.

“Drat it all, the gate is jammed!”

“But we solved the puzzle, and killed the draugr.”

“What do we do now?”

“Gaaz dilon, baragul!”

“Gahh, we missed one! Get it off before it rearranges my face!”

“Oh great… they took the long way ‘round.” Onmund deflated “I’ll go tell them about the secret entrance, I moved Stross over there.” he pointed to an alcove on one of the higher ledges that had some better lighting “Please know that I did everything I could for him, but he was in really bad shape and I’m no priest… I think that even moving him made it worse.”

With that he ran to get the other mages, sparing a quick glance over his shoulder as he did.

Fenora prepared herself for the worst as she and Brelyna climbed the stairs, but even so, what she saw made her feel sick. Stross was laying atop a table normally used for embalming the dead, practically in a pool of his own blood despite the bandages and appropriated linen wraps used in a futile effort to staunch the bleeding.

“Brelyna, help me out here.” she said as she placed the wooden case on the floor and grabbed a few bottles within.

Fenora placed an ear to Stross’s chest, a mixture of relief and dismay flooding her when she heard his breathing and how ragged and shallow it was. Setting the rest of the bottles on the table, she pulled back the linen wraps and the soaked remains of Stross’s mage robes.

The stench of the ichor nearly made her gag, but even worse was the sight of the horrendous wound causing it to spill out of the changeling. She quickly uncorked the first bottle of healing potion and immediately poured it into the wound, instructing Brelyna to pour a second into his mouth. The liquid gurgled down Stross’s throat and into the trench in his torso, but it all had little effect and most of it spilled out onto the table, mixing with his own blood.

Fenora silently cursed herself for not finding out how changeling bodies worked, and cursed changeling bodies for not healing like everyone else’s did. “Magika potions, now.” She ordered, and Brelyna handed her one.

The two of them poured the potions into Stross in much the same way as the ones before, with much the same effect.

“Why isn’t it working?” Fenora pounded her fist on the table, causing a few ripples in the ever growing puddle of black liquid.

Suddenly there was an explosion behind them, bits of rock sprayed from the entrance from the catacombs along with a heavily disfigured metal gate. Out from the wreckage stepped a familiar company of mages and one absolutely massive hulking rock golem.

“Thank you Herb.” Phinis said to the construct and gave it a careful high five before sending it back to its own realm.

“Out of my way!” Colette yelled and shoved her way over to Stross. She hummed thoughtfully as she examined him “This looks dire.” She concluded. “Excellent!”

While the others gave her a few odd glances, Colette couldn’t have been more pleased with the circumstances.

“Finally… my time to shine. Let’s see you all disprove my field of study after this!” she gathered a positively huge amount of magika between her hands, forming a great glowing ball of healing energy. “The power of restoration COMPELS YOU!” she yelled and brought the sphere of restoration down onto Stross.

Colette fell to her knees and panted for breath as the orange glow slowly subsided. “There, you see. Restoration magic is totally a valid-“

“It didn’t work.”

“What?” Colette’s eyes shot open and she hastily looked over Stross again, finding that he was still as butchered and bleeding out as ever. So like any reasonable scholar, Colette began to think of why her magic had no effect, and find another way to heal this unfortunate, dying-

“You son of a whore!” Colette screamed as she grabbed Stross by the scruff of his neck and punched him in the mouth “I don’t care if you’re unconscious and dying; how dare you reject my healing?! Stupid bug, you made me look bad!”

*Smash*

Colette released her hold on Stross as her eyes rolled back into her skull and she stood ramrod stiff before comically falling over like a timbering tree.

“Well that’s one problem dealt with. Anyone else have any ideas?” Faralda asked, casually discarding the remains of the burial urn she smashed over her collegue’s head.

“I don’t get it. Stross always heals so fast even without potions, something about his changeling healing factor using energy he’s stored up to replace damaged body parts.” Fenora remembered “So why isn’t it healing him now? We literally just pumped him full of magic and potions.”

“It’s because it isn’t magic that heals him.” Brelyna chimed in “Magic does nearly nothing for him if it doesn’t come from someone’s heart and soul, if it’s empty. Potions are even worse, they only stimulate his body’s healing by drawing more energy from his own stores rather than actually giving anything to him.”

“Right, that makes sense.” Fenora nodded “Wait… how did you know that?”

“Stross told me. We stayed up all night talking... and I took notes.” Brelyna said shyly “Sorry, I probably should have told you this sooner, huh?”

Fenora was already gone.

“Sergius, do you have any souls gems? Full ones preferably.”

“Yes.” the enchanter grunted as he rummaged around in his pockets “You know, I’ve been going through quite a lot of these lately. I expect you’ll reimburse me somehow-“

“Yeah. Cool. Don’t care right now.” Fenora snipped as she snatched the pink gems from his hand and headed back to Stross. “Here Stross, these will help you.” she placed the soul gems in his mouth, just under his tongue. “… I hope.”

Not three seconds after the gems were in his mouth, Stross’s body began to heal itself. It was quite something to see really; the lung that had ruptured began melting into a gelatinous slime as a new one slowly started growing into the empty space to replace it, the shattered and broken latticework of many tiny bones crumbled away and started reconstructing themselves where they once were. Even with as much fluid that Stross had lost, a new batch of the ichor began flowing through his veins, albeit still spilling out of the still gaping wound.

All too soon though, it all stopped, leaving the changeling with a partially constructed lung and quite a few missing bones.

“Sergius, I need another.” Fenora held out her hand.

Sergius stared back.

Fenora fixed a hard glare on him and twitched her fingers expectantly, to which he simply raised an eyebrow and held his hand out as well, preforming the same motion.

Fenora stood up, knelt down, picked him up by his ankles and shook him upside-down until several large soul gems fell out. She roughly dropped him on the ground to his continued displeasure, picked up the gems and then dropped a bag of septims heavily on him stomach with a thwump.

She returned to where Stross lay, carefully picked the used soul gems from his mouth and replaced them with the newer, larger ones. His changeling body seemed to like the greater amounts of energy produced by the larger souls, as it quickly began mending again, and at a much faster rate.

Soon the entire wound had closed up, the bones pieced together, the damaged organ replaced, and the sub-dermal skeleton was scabbing over. Fenora had to hold the nearly severed arm and shoulder in place to make sure they healed in… about the right spot, but once that was done, the only trace Stross had ever have been injured at all was a thin line in his outer shell that was quickly fading as the imperfect bits of scale chipped and crumbled away to allow better ones to grow in.

His breathing returned to normal shortly after, though there was a soft gurgling as lingering blood sloshed around inside his newly formed lung. To Fenora’s dismay however, he did not wake, she even shook him slightly but he stayed comatose.

“Is… he going to be okay now?” Brelyna asked softly.

“Yeah…” Fenora said slowly remembering the last time Stross had fallen “Yeah, it always takes a while for him to wake up. He’s been through worse than this. He’ll be fine.” she spoke in a distant and hollow tone “He’ll be okay. He’s lived through worse. He’ll be okay. I’m… I’m just going to stay here with him for a while.”

Brelyna nodded and turned away, only to return a moment later with the crates of potions. She offered one to Fenora and sat atop the other. “Then I’ll stay here with you.” she said and scooted closer, resting her arms on the table near Stross’s head while Fenora gripped his hand in hers.

And so they sat there in silence, both of them prying that their changeling would be okay.

Meanwhile, the collection of mages consisting of Faralda, Mirabelle Ervine, Sergius Turrianus, Phinis Gestor were quite preoccupied by the giant glowing ball of runed stone that adorned the center of the chamber.

Tolfdir was especially sure that his injuries wouldn’t stand between him and such a momentous discovery, even as he broke his still healing leg three more times while hobbling over to the artifact.

“Just what is all the fuss about down here?” came a grumpy voice as they were joined by Arneil Gane, and Steve the recently glued together statue of unmentionability. “I thought I made it clear that we were to keep these ruins intact as much as possible, and yet you’ve ransacked the halls, broken down doors and… and… Steve, would you look at that.”

Like moths to a bug-zapper, the company of mages was drawn to the mysterious orb, their minds wandering at what it was and what it was used for.

“We should take this back with us.” Colette said as she tentatively placed a hand on the stone’s cool smooth surface.

“Indeed,” Faralda nodded “it’ll be much easier to study in the Hall of Elements.”

Tolfdir agreed as well and continued licking the sphere.

“Sure. Sure.” Mirabelle said sarcastically “And just how do you intend to move this thing? It must weigh, oh I don’t know… a metric butt-ton, maybe two.”

Phinis snapped his fingers and summoned the rock golem from before. “Get your friends Herb, I know what we’re gonna do today.”