Einar and the cat coughed as they emerged from the Void into a thick cloud of caustic smoke.

  Caprifexia, on the other hand, took a deep breath, closing her eyes and taking in a calming lungful the heady wood-scented vapour. In the distance she heard a scream, and overhead the faint thud of a large creature's wings.

  It reminded her a bit of home.

  "Capri!" coughed Einar from somewhere in the smoke. "Help!"

  "You're such a whinger, it's just a little smoke – Respirante," she said, pointing a finger in the direction her friend's voice and conjuring a ball of clear air.

  The ambient mana felt a bit odd, like it had been stretched too thin, but nonetheless a moment later she felt the spell connect and her friend stopped spluttering quite so badly. Well, it stopped him choking, his mortal splutterings would doubtless continue indefinitely.

  J'zargo managed his own much less elegant spell a moment later, and she saw his outline straighten as she made her way to Einar, who had a hand on a stone wall.

  "This is not Saarthal," she said, peering at the stonework before looking upward. Although it was hard to see through the smoke, even for a dragon, she could tell that they were outside. There had been some ruins on the surface, and they had been decrepit – even by moral standards – but there had been snow, not mud on the ground.

  "Soren-" began Einar.

  "Who?"

  "-Sorbet teleported us after saving us from the other vampires," said Einar. "Damn, I hadn't considered that – we could be anywhere."

  Overhead there was a roar, and they all paused for a moment.

  "J'zargo thinks there may be a dragon," said the khajiite.

  "Of course I'm here-"

  "He means a proto-drake," said Einar, flattening himself against a wall. "Capri, maybe we should leave?"

  "If I cannot see in this smoke, it certainly can't," she said, rolling her eyes and placing one hand on the wall to orient herself before heading down what seemed to be a street they had arrived on. "We should at least see where we are before indulging your mortal cowardice."

  Her hand ran over the reasonably smooth stonework for a few moments before coming to a far harsher and angular cut.

  "Typical shoddy craftsmortalship…" she began, trailing off as she turned to look at what she had felt, seeing that rather than just a badly cut block the wall had instead been warped into familiar sharp geometric angles from one point to the next.

  She cast a wide spectrum diagnostic spell, hissing as it confirmed what she had suspected.

  Void Magic.

  Lots and lots and lots of Void Magic.

  She should have picked up on it, noticed the ridiculously high level of entropic mana all around her. Titans, there had barely been a drop in the ambient level of the energy between the Void itself and whatever this place was.

  It was probably why the energy around her had felt so thin. And maybe, just maybe, Einar had been right that the rent he had noticed in the entrance-way to the Plane hadn't been there when last they'd passed by; the tear that had been leaking the energy of this world out into the Void.

  "Why has the small dragon stopped?" asked J'zargo from behind her.

  "Someone has opened a Void aperture here!" she said. "Can't you feel how the mana is all warped?"

  "Err yeah," said Einar. "You just did that Capri-"

  "No, not me you insufferable-" she said, freezing as she heard a faint stomping sound. Something began to itch in the back of her mind, and beside her Einar rubbed his temple.

  "Ugh, my head-"

  "Hide!" she hissed, grabbing Einar and pulling him across into an archway partially blocked by the detritus of a smashed wagon. A moment later the cat followed them, hunching down and peering into the gloom.

  As the stomping grew closer the itch in her mind grew more pronounced, and Caprifexia bit her lip as her skin began to glow golden, and what she had suspected was confirmed. It wasn't an Old God, they couldn't have manifested from such a relatively trivial wound in the skein of reality, but it was definitely one of their servants.

  "My mind hurts," whimpered Einar, closing his eyes and gripping his forehead.

  On an impulse, which she had probably picked from spending to much time around sappy mortals, she grabbed his hand in some kind of insipid attempt to reassure him. Rather than just prop up his fragile emotions, however, there was an actual effect, and the golden glow spread from her hand and moved up and over his body, visibly relaxing him.

  "What did you-"

  "Shush!" she hissed, grabbing the cat's paw and extending her Spark's field of protection over the khajiite as well.

  Not because she was especially concerned for his welfare, but because if the thing she could hear coming was what she thought it was, then she didn't want it to have a telepathic foothold in the mind of anyone anywhere near her.

  A moment later an enormous figure appeared in the smoke, from the direction of where they had arrived, or rather, the two fleshy legs and two tentacles dragging through the mud belonging to it did.

  There hadn't been many of the creatures in Blackwing Lair, since their presence alone tended to have a deleterious effect on the productivity of the mortal slaves, and the first affects of which had been felt by Einar, but there had been enough of them around for her to recognise one when she saw it.

  A Faceless One.

  Walking upright like an horrific caricature of a mortal, its body disappeared up into the smoke. In the place of arms and it had writhing purplish red fleshy tentacles that trailed along the ground, and rather than a face there was a hideous crown of more tentacles, several fang-filled mouths, and lolling tongues. Wherever it trod reality twisted and warped, and even as Caprifexia watched the cart they were hiding behind began to subtly shift and change, the wood taking on a kind of rough hexagonal pattern.

  Like the wall she had just examined.

  Like the buildings on bare, desertous world of Zarrack.

  Caprifexia's breath caught in her throat as the monster came to a stop, it's tentacles twisting too and fro as it made a kind of snuffling sound as it searched the area. Searched for them. For her.

  Of course, she thought, a being of the Void would have been able to sense her transit to and from it's native realm. For an abomination like that her portal would have been the thaumic equivalent of summoning a thunderstorm – obvious, flashy, and impossible to ignore.

  The fact that it hadn't already found her, sensed her, however, seemed to confirm her brilliantly deduced theories about her Spark's ability to ward off the powers of the Void. It was almost certainly the reason that the Old One's hold on her had been broken in the first place, and why her incredible mind was even more resistant to their Whispers than a normal dragon.

  Although, amazing as Caprifexia was, it didn't seem her protection was full-proof, and slowly but surely the tentacles crept closer, padding and pawing at the ground, leaving behind twisted geometry and a slimy residue wherever they touched.

  Carefully, taking care not to disturb the surrounding flow of mana too much, Caprifexia wove an illusion. It took a while, since she couldn't use a mnemonic in case it heard, and she hadn't practised extensively with the discipline, but she managed, keeping her focus even as the creature closed in on them, taking another earth shaking step and extending a tentacle toward the cart.

  Crash.

  The tentacles swivelled as the sound of something heavy and metal falling echoed from further down the road, followed by a high pitched Einar-like scream and the exaggerated sound of running footfalls.

  The creature took the bait, it's tentacles moving off in the direction of the noise as it's tree-trunk like legs lumbered off.

  "What the fuck was that?" hissed Einar as Caprifexia began to drag him and the cat off in the opposite direction. "Capri-"

  "A Faceless One," she said, the glow of her skin beginning to recede as the stomping faded into the distance. "A servant of the Old Ones."

  "What was it doing here?" asked J'zargo "And why did the small dragon not open a portal?"

  "That was a creature of the Void," she said. "They might not be able to easily cross into reality, but they can definitely move the other way. If I had Planeswalked it would have followed us – it almost certainly felt me when I arrived."

  "J'zargo asks again – what was it doing here?" said J'zargo. "J'zargo has never heard of these… 'Void' creatures before, and he is very wise and well read. And handsome."

  "I don't know," she said as another roar shook the sky. "But we need to get away from here. Even I can't fight a Faceless that big, so you wouldn't stand a chance."

  "J'zargo is a mighty wizard-"

  "No," she said firmly. "You don't know what you're talking about, you foolish mortal. You will die if you attempt to fight them, and then Einar will never shut up about it. No. I forbid it."

  "J'zargo does not follow your orders-"

  "-Einar, make the cat behave-"

  "-he isn't a cat-"

  "-J'zargo is not a cat-"

  "-whatever-"

  "-J'zargo, she does have a point," said Einar. "Capri does know a lot about the Void – her people used to be pretty much slaves to it."

  "J'zargo still thinks he would triumph."

  There was a bloodcurdling roar in the distance that cut off halfway through, followed by the sound of a ground-shaking implosion.

  "Or… maybe he would not," speculated the feline.

  The smoke began to thin as they rushed down the road. Alongside them more and more buildings that had been twisted by the effects of whatever had brought the Faceless to the town, and in places a piece of particularly twisted and geometrified wood or stone had floated entirely free of the rest of the structure.

  Then they turned a corner and emerged into open air, revealing a skyline of densely packed squat stone buildings aflame within tall curtain walls. Beyond the fortifications were towering jagged mountain peaks, their sides pure-white with heavy snow.

  It took a few moments for Caprifexia to place where she had seen their shapes before, but then she recognised them as mountains and ridge-lines she had passed to the east and then south as Einar had been following her to the college after his little tantrum, which meant, thankfully, that they were still in Skyrim.

  Within the town itself several clumps of mortals doing what could generously be termed 'fighting' against perhaps half a dozen Faceless giants and myriad lesser voidspawn, and overhead, in smoggy sky several proto-drakes wheeled above the city – probably responsible for all the pleasant fire and smoke.

  The single most eye-catching element, however, was the towering beam of colourless energy erupting near the centre of the city that shot into the sky and had utterly warped the surrounding buildings beyond recognition. It seemed to drink in the light around it, and even as Caprifexia watched she saw twisted masses of fleshy voidspawn emerge, ranging from creatures as large as her whelpling form to those the size of those horses the mortals loved so much.

  "This is… this is Windhelm!" gasped the cat, apparently recognising the city.

  "What in Oblivion is that?" said Einar, pointing at the beam of void light.

  "That is the tear I saw on the entrance-way to Nirn when we were in the void," said Caprifexia. "Obviously."

  "Did the dragons make it?" asked Einar.

  "J'zargo does not think so," said J'zargo, gesturing to a proto-drake as it strafed a Faceless one, it's fire consuming the towering giant entirely for a moment, before the flames faded, revealing an entirely unharmed monster. "They do not seem pleased by the presence of these 'Faceless.'"

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  "Einar, you've been here before?" said Caprifexia. "Where is an exit? We need to leave – now."

  "What? We can't just abandon this place," said Einar. "We need to help, you're suppose to be a hero-"

  "What part of 'I cannot defeat Faceless' did you not understand you rock-brained mortal!?"

  "But won't this just spread? That rift I mean."

  "Unless a given existence's metaphysical defences are utterly shattered, or there are extremely unusual circumstances, then the energy required to keep a void-tear open is equal to the factor of the size of the initial aperture and whatever that world's specific void integrity quotient is to the power of the number of seconds since the aperture was opened," she explained clearly. "In the absence of any directed energy keeping the tear open, the diameter of the aperture will shrink at a rate equal to the factor of 0.033 times the inverse of the void integrity quotient to the power of the time since it stopped receiving energy, plus the initial size of the aperture."

  There was a moment of silence.

  "… what?" said Einar in an exasperated voice.

  "E=ai?vt? and da?=0.033(-vt?) + ai?, respectively," she said, rolling her eyes.

  "What does that even mean!?"

  "They're exponential functions you ignorant ape."

  "I don't know what those are!" said Einar.

  "J'zargo believes the small dragon is saying, in her typically confusing manner, that the 'tear' will close by itself eventually, no matter how much energy is being used to maintain it," said J'zargo, apparently eventually able to wrap his tiny mind around her perfectly clear explanation and rather simple mathematics.

  Honestly. It was a wonder that mortals had ever learnt to make fire.

  "Oh, that's much clearer," said Einar.

  "It's precisely what I said!"

  "Sure it was Capri," conceded Einar, rolling his eyes in shame at his own ignorance. "But for those who can't do horrific mathematics in their head, how long is 'eventually?' Those things seem virtually indestructible. Even the 'proto-drakes' aren't so much as denting them."

  "I'd need to know this world's VIQ to answer that, and I would need to do some experiments to work that out."

  "Guess."

  "Well Azeroth's VIQ was 1.0001, but I suspect that this world's might be higher, since you don't seem to have an Old God infestation," she said. "But if that tear was on Azeroth, without any energy being added to it… thirty three hours."

  "So those things will keep on pouring out of that portal for more than a whole day? Capri, they'll overrun Nirn."

  "Oh don't be so melodramatic, no they wont," she said, rolling her eyes. "Faceless are incredibly powerful when able to draw directly on Void energy, but they are fundamentally inimical to reality and without a constant supply of power they and the lesser spawn will wither and diminish. This is a self-solving problem."

  "Dammit Capri, what about all the people who are going to get hurt before it 'solves itself?' Hero's care about that."

  "As I have said multiple times you deaf mortal: I cannot fight Faceless. My sentiments are irrelevant. We have no option but to flee – preferably before you ask me any more inane questions."

  Overhead a proto-drake soared overhead, unleashing a shard of ice at a one of the monstrosities. It had more effect than the fire, and the creature stumbled from the force of the blow. But the ice didn't piece it's fleshy body, and instead a tentacle whipped up, snaring the fake-dragon out of the air and dragging it down to the ground. The two-legged reptile thrashed and roared, trying to escape, but the creature tightened it's grip and the proto-drake's movements became more and more feeble.

  "OK, I can see what you mean," gulped Einar as the proto-drake's neck snapped with an audible crack. "There's, err, a gate this way."

  "Why is the Dragon's Thu'um not affecting the creatures?" asked J'zargo as they ran down the warped street, watching as to their right a Faceless, taller than the three story houses shrugged off another blast of fire effortlessly, responding with a torrent of void magic that narrowly missed the circling reptile.

  "Einar said the 'Voice' is some ridiculous magic specific to this world," she theorised. "The 'language of the SABIGISMFs-'"

  "The what?" asked J'zargo.

  "Sufficiently Advanced Beings that are Indistinguishable from Gods to Idiotic and Superstitious Mortal Fools," explained Caprifexia.

  "What?"

  "She means the Divines," said Einar. "Capri is an atheist."

  "An… atheist?" said the small minded feline, as if this somehow was an incomprehensible position, instead of self-evidently the most logical and reasonable one. "But the Divines exist. There is documented proof of their interventions and manifestations, J'zargo has read many accounts. Restoration magic comes directly from Mara. On what possibly grounds could they be denied?"

  "I have explained all this," said Einar. "But, as you've probably realised, you can't really convince Capri of anything if she thinks she's right and you're wrong."

  "J'zargo has noticed this," said the cat, nodding and stroking his chin.

  "Are you done being ignorant mortal fools?" she snapped. "Good. As I was saying, if the 'magic' of this 'Voice' is just commanding the ridiculous artificial laws of this reality to bend to accomplish something, then it will have very little affect on a being outside those laws."

  "That… actually sort of makes sense," said Einar as they rounded another corner, coming into sight of the gate.

  Ahead of them was a crowd of mainly civilians, cowering behind a line of blue-clad Nord men and women, who were struggling to push past a line of voidspawn to the gate itself.

  Had she been alone, she would have just flapped over their heads, but Einar was with her, and she couldn't abandon him. Oh, and she was a hero. She should probably help the civilians escape the death-trap of a city. That was heroic, wasn't it?

  "Out of the way mortals," she said, shoving a small child to the side who was taking up far too much of the road. They fell over and started crying, but that seemed very much like a them problem.

  The others swiftly parted, learning the small one's lesson as fire blossomed around her fist, blasting forward a moment later and smashing into one of the lesser abominations. A blonde soldier yelped as the searing column lightly singed her hair and clothes, but as usual, it was nothing but mortal melodrama.

  "Ahh!" screamed the woman, batting at her hair as the flame-wreathed voidspawn she had been fighting convulsed and died. Well, not died, it wasn't really alive to begin with – it just sort of lost cohesion and sank down into the ground in a puddle of noxious bubbling fluid.

  Caprifexia ignored the ungrateful and flammable mortal's over-the-top wailing, skewering another of the voidspawn with a viciously sharp spike of rock.

  "Capri!" whinged Einar as she obliterated a third spawn.

  "What?"

  "That thing – the 'Faceless' – that we saw in the smoke, it's coming! I can feel it in my head again."

  Caprifexia turned, her eyes widening as the twenty meter high monstrosity rounded the corner. Although Caprifexia couldn't be sure, since it wasn't called a 'Faceless' for nothing, she got the distinct impression it was looking at her.

  The mob of mortal civilians also saw it, and probably felt it in their small, feeble minds. They surged forward toward the gate, screaming as they jostled past her and the mortal guards, ignoring the still living voidspawn even as the smaller monstrosities cut dozens of them down. The soldiers broke a moment later, adding even more chaos to the terrified stampede.

  "Cat, protect Einar!" she said, her hands shaking as she moved towards the creature, transforming and flapping above the throng. Her scales began to glow as the creature neared, although it didn't block out the entirety of the creature's telepathic aura.

  "J'zargo is not a cat!" said the cat angrily, but nonetheless obeying and grabbing Einar, pushing him towards the gate and blasting apart a voidspawn that lunged at him.

  Content that her friend was as safe as could be managed given the circumstances, Caprifexia bared her fangs at the approaching Faceless. Her normal magic would have more of an affect than the silly fake dragon's 'Thu'um,' but there was no way that even an immensely powerful whelpling like her could conjure a firestorm large enough to harm such a huge Faceless, let alone while it was being strengthened so much by it's close proximity to the rift.

  That didn't, however, mean she was without options to slow it down. She was a dragon. Dragons always had options.

  She reached for the sickly, cloying power of the Void, and immediately whispers far louder than anything the Faceless could manage pressed down on her, threatening to overwhelm her focus as she began to shape her spell.

  W?????????????????????????e???????????????????????????? ??????????????????w????????????????i??????????????????????l??????????????l??????????????????? ?????????????????????????????c??????????????????????????o???????????????n??????????s????????????????????????u????????????????????????m??????????????????e??????????????????????????????? ?????????????????????y????????????????????o???????????????????????u???????????????????????????r???????????????????? ????????????????????????????s???????????????????o???????????????????u????????????????????????l?????????????????.?????????.?????????????.?????????????????????????

  The magic built, colourless light dancing over her claws as she gradually forged it into a lance. The creature drew closer, it's thudding steps shaking the buildings around her as the golden light from under her scales grew and grew and grew. Her head began to throb as the whispers began to cut into her mind, digging in like a dagger behind her right eye.

  Y???????????????o?????????????????u???????????????? ?????c???????????????a??????????????????n????????????????n?????????????????????????o?????????????t????????????? ??????????????????????????e???????????????????s?????????????????????c???????a??????????p???????????????e??????????????????.???????????.?????????????????.??????????? ????????????????????????

  "Nulius!" she shouted, and a lance of void light shot from her claws, streaking down the road and striking the charging creature in the leg.

  The silly 'Thu'um' might have not worked against the Faceless, and normal, proper magic would also have had a reduced effectiveness on a creature soaked in the energy of unreality. But Caprifexia had not used normal magic, she had fashioned a bolt of razor sharp energy from the same force that animated the creature, so rather than bouncing off, or leaving a small wound, her bolt of void energy cut straight through the creature's left leg in a shower of purple blood and gore.

  The creature screamed telepathically, and Caprifexia grinned ferally as it slowly and ponderously began to fall, crashing face-less first into the filthy mortal street with enough force that a nearby, half-burnt house collapsed.

  It wasn't dead, she knew, but she hadn't been trying for that. Even a whelp as unusually powerful, magnificent, clever, and generally amazing as herself wasn't up to that kind of magic. It would heal, and probably quite quickly, but the attack had been enough to slow it down.

  And if the creature was foolish enough to stray far from the Void-soaked ambient energy of the tear? Well then it would begin to wither, and then she – with perhaps some moral support from the cat – would have no trouble ripping it to shreds.

  She allowed herself a few moments to bask in her victory before she turned, flapping after Einar and roasting one of the straggling voidspawn with a blast of dragonfire as she soared under the twisted stonework of the gatehouse and out into the churned snow, streaking after the fleeing mortals.

  A.N. If you like my writing, you might be interested in my fantasy adventure novel – – which is entirely pre-written and with chapters released every Friday!

  Mishka the Great and Powerful that isn't up on Royal Road yet!). However, I don't monetise or time-gate my fanfiction though (plz no sue!).