A Ballistic Based Impediment

  A discordant roar followed by a clap of thunder roused Caprifexia from her comfortable slumber. She poked her head out from the saddlebag she had been napping in a moment later, scowl on her face.

  "Stupid SABIGSIMFs!" grumbled Caprifexia, rubbing her face with a forelimb. "Can't they be quiet? I'm trying to sleep!"

  "Yes, your disrupted sleep is clearly the issue here," said Einar, insolently. "It isn't like the world's ending or anything."

  They had been travelling southward for almost five days from the city of Solitude, along a road clogged with terrified mortals who, like her companions, seemed to believe that the end was nigh. Caprifexia had tried to explain to them that the giant Faceless that was apparently wreaking havoc on the Whiterun Plains would almost definitely run out of energy to sustain itself, and that everyone should just calm down, but they, predictably, hadn't listened to her. As usual.

  Although the journey hadn't been difficult for a mighty dragon such as herself, tbut he two mortals in the party had been struggling with the long days of travelling they were forcing upon themselves, and had been even more irritable and unreasonable than usual. And rather than deal with their hysteric mortal emotions they were taking them out on Caprifexia. As usual.

  They'd turned from the road the day beforehand and began ascending a ridge line to 'Half-Finger' peak, where the very foolish time-meddling mortals who had probably triggered this whole alleged calamity in the first place with their reckless magic had told them there was a Bow that was somehow very important.

  Caprifexia thought it was pretty absurd to think that a fancily tied ribbon was going to either save or damn the world, but no one had cared what she thought. As usual.

  Fools.

  "The world isn't ending," she shot back. "That's nothing but mortal delusion-"

  "A Divine has been fighting something over there for almost a week!" said Einar, pointing eastward to where the sky was fractured, great cracks splitting the horizon with lines of brilliant gold and pale silver. "And those mages said that Akatosh-"

  "-Amanosh-" corrected Caprifexia. Correctly.

  "-no, Akatosh! Akatosh!" said Einar, doubling down on his error in typically ape headed mortal fashion. "That he was going to die-"

  "Mortals who meddle in time can't be trusted," she said. "I've explained this-"

  "-and you also said that whatever that monster was it would be gone in a few hours, but it isn't," said Einar, growing hysterical. As usual. "It's still there-"

  "It's not my fault your reality is stupid-"

  "Enough," said the cat sharply, cutting off Caprifexia's detailed explanation as to exactly why Einar was wrong. "J'zargo hears something."

  Caprifexia turned her head and listened. "I don't hear anything," she said. "You're just imagining things-"

  "No, he's right," said Serana, rudely interrupting her and pointing to the nearby crest of the hill. "Voices, up ahead."

  Her mortal charges slowed to a stop and dismounted, tying the exhausted horses to an anaemic looking alpine tree and creeping up to the crest of the hill.

  "Thalmor," hissed Einar as soon as they peaked over the edge of the rise, catching sight of several dozen gold-clad elves sitting around some kind of crumbling entrance-way built into the side of the mountain. "How are they here already?"

  "They must have found another Scroll somehow," said Serana, her unsettling glowing eyes peering out from her deep cowl. "Figured out that the Bow of Auriel was here."

  "If they are still here, they are still looking," said J'zargo. "J'zargo and the others may be able to find it first."

  "There are a lot of them," said Einar, glancing over the three dozen or so armoured elves. "Too many to fight, even for you Serana."

  "Agreed," said the vampire. "A distraction?"

  "That'll just put them on edge," said Einar, scratching his scraggly beard and turning to look at Caprifexia, who was picking at her teeth boredly.

  "What?" said Caprifexia, feeling his gaze. "Did I miss some fish?"

  "Your 'clothes.' They aren't really 'real,'" he said. "In your elven form I mean. You could change them, right?"

  "Yes. So?" she said.

  "Think you can copy a Thalmor mage's robes?" he said.

  The nasty, villainous elves looked up as Caprifexia crested the hill, her most villainous smirk plastered on her face as black and gold robes flapped around her. Behind her Einar and J'zargo shambled after Serana, trying to look even more gormless than usual. A difficult task, to be sure.

  "Halt," said one of the elves, a woman dressed in slightly fancier armour than the others. "Who goes there."

  "I am Vicereeve Caprifexia," said Caprifexia, who had, after much discussion had eventually reluctantly acceded to Einar's insistent demand to use one of the villainous elves middle-ranked officers as a cover, rather than the top ranked 'Emissary.' Even though she was a dragon, and therefore would have outranked any mortal in any organisation she chose to join, even for the sake of manipulation.

  "Apologies, we weren't expecting you ma'am," said the elf, snapping to attention. "And the vampire?"

  "I am Serana, daughter of Lord Harkon," sneered Serana, doing a decent impression of a villain. Not as good as Caprifexia's of course, but if Caprifexia hadn't known better, and been told repeatedly that she wasn't allowed to incinerate the vampire, she would have thrown a fireball at her.

  "I see," said the elf, justifiably wrinkling her nose slightly at the undead abomination before turning her attention back to Caprifexia. "May I ask what are you doing here, ma'am?"

  "I fail to see why I should explain myself to an underling such as yourself," said Caprifexia imperiously. "I have business here, that is all you need to know. Now get out of my way."

  "I'm very sorry ma'am," said the elf, stepping in front of Caprifexia. "I am under orders to stop anyone from entering the tomb."

  "You dare to presume to order me!?" growled Caprifexia, advancing on the elf and jabbing them in the chest with a finger hard enough that they stumbled back. "I am a Vicereeve!"

  "I'm- I'm sorry ma'am," stammered the elf, sweat beading on her forehead. "The Lady was explicit: no one is to enter the tomb, not until she finds the bow."

  "And how pleased, do you think, will she be when learns that you hindered her search by preventing us from delivering this?" said Caprifexia, hefting the uncomfortable feeling Elder Scroll. It crackled in her grip, protesting touching the skin of a being from outside its tiny, silly little reality.

  The elf's eyes widened. "Is that- is that an-"

  "It is," said Caprifexia, poking the still crackling and protesting object towards the elf's face and making her flinch back. "Now stand aside, fool, before I have you executed, whipped, and then flogged for obstructing a superior officer!"

  The elf paled and quickly stepped aside. "Apologies Vicereeve!" she said in a high pitched voice as she gestured to the entrance. "I believe the Lady is searching the upper levels already. Do you require an escort?"

  "No. Now get out of my way," said Caprifexia, pushing passed the villain and entered the tomb without a backward glance, conjuring a warelight as she passed into a tunnel that sloped upward.

  "J'zargo cannot believe that worked," said the cat as they passed out of earshot. "He was sure that the small dragon was going to get J'zargo and his friends killed."

  "I suppose when you have her levels of arrogance, it isn't hard to fake being in-charge," said Serana.

  "It isn't arrogance if you're objectively superior. It's fact," sniffed Caprifexia. "You're both just jealous you don't have such natural authority and gravitas."

  "You did great Capri," said Einar, ruffling Caprifexia's hair and earning a mix between a deadly glower and a smile. "Now come on, let's find the bow before this 'Lady' does."

  The 'Tomb' itself was less confusingly built and twisting as most mortal constructions, and seemed to more or less have only a single path leading upward. Unlike the other dank places she had been forced to enter, however, the usual undead monsters and eight limbed horrors were strangely absent. There were webs, and the occasional sign of recent magical battle – a charred wall here, a shattered lance of frost there, and neatly cut, naked stone in a few places, but no sign of any bodies whatsoever.

  Whoever had been here clearly also despised spiders, which, although they were a villain, meant they at least had some taste.

  They pressed onward, and almost two hours after entering they emerged onto a raised mezzanine of a large, cathedral like-space filled with still whole stained glass windows depicting – badly – various pointy eared, blonde mortals.

  At the far end of the vaulted room was a large tunnel, from which came a soft white glow. Around the tunnel was a veritable platoon of Thalmor soldiers, and a handful of black and gold robed elven wizards who were standing around boredly. Unfortunately said boredom meant that they were looking every which way, and saw Caprifexia and the others immediately.

  "Who are you?" demanded one of the robed Thalmor Wizards. "The Captain was ordered to stop anyone from entering!"

  "I am Vicereeve Caprifexia," said Caprifexia, brushing some spider-web off her shoulder as she prepared for another dazzling display of guile. "I am here to-"

  "No you're not," snapped the Wizard, stamping his staff. There was a surge of magic, and lurching sound behind them, and Caprifexia turned to see a grate slam down behind them, locking them into the room. "There is no Vicereeve 'Caprifexia.' You're an impostor!"

  Caprifexia blinked in surprise as there was a scraping of steel as over thirty Thalmor soldiers drew their blades and began to advance across the room.

  "What!?" How dare you!" said Caprifexia. "Me an imposter? You're the imposter! Minions, arrest her!"

  The soldiers didn't even break stride.

  "Well shit," said Einar.

  "I'll have you all flayed for insubordination!" yelled Caprifexia. "I'll have you pen-sons revoked! I'll… put you all on no rations! For a month! No, three months!"

  The elves were unmoved by her dire threats.

  "J'zargo, get the door," said Serana as she drew her own sword and stepped forward to meet them where the stairs led up from the mezzanine. "I'll hold them off."

  Beside her J'zargo turned, raising his furry paws to the gate. He sent out an exploratory pulse of magic, only to immediately be hurled backward in a shower of sparks and sent sprawling onto the ground.

  "J'zargo, are you OK?" said Einar, rushing to the yowling melodramatic feline's aid.

  "It's warded," said Caprifexia, abandoning her brilliant attempt to convince the elves she really was a Vicereeve and casting her own, far, far less invasive scan. "As any real wizard could have guessed."

  "Can you break it?" asked Einar, helping the silly moggie to sit up.

  Caprifexia focused for a moment, before glancing back toward the advancing elves, who had slowed to a cautious walk as a result of some kind of fear spell Serana had cast. The gate was, surprisingly, quite well warded, and even for a hero as cunning, intelligent, and amazing as Caprifexia it would take her a while to unpick the nasty elf's magic.

  "Not in time," said Caprifexia, shaking her head and turning back to the oncoming elves, turning her attention to search for some kind of advantage. Although as a dragon, if push came to shove, she could of course defeat a bunch of mortal fools in a straight fight, even the greatest of heroes sometimes got hurt unexpectedly, especially when they had incompetent companions – like when J'zargo had gotten her crippled in their battle at Dimhollow – so it never hurt to abuse every possible advantage.

  "Hey kid, I could use some help!" said Serana, hurling a blast of ice at one of the elves, who caught it on their shield and kept advancing.

  Thirty odd elves, versus Caprifexia and the vampire.

  Thirty elves…

  Vampire…

  "Respirante," she said, pointing her finger at first Einar, and then J'zargo. "Respirante."

  "What are you doing?" asked Einar as a bubble of clean air formed around his head.

  "Nublias!" she shouted, ignoring him and thrusting her hands forward, conjuring a swirling plume of smoke that billowed out over the vampire and the advancing elves.

  "Nice!" yelled Serana, who just like the vampire Caprifexia had saved Einar from had no need to breathe. Unlike the Elves, who were now hacking and coughing and, at least one of them, screaming as Caprifexia presumed the vampire went on the attack.

  Caprifexia shifted her form, flapping up into the smoke and soaring through the air, she'd practised and refined the magical smoke a fair bit since she'd first brilliantly employed it against the first proto-drake she'd met, and grown far more powerful, and the cloud hung low to the group – just high enough to choke any mortal unfortunate enough to be inside, and to obscure any dragons who might be flying overhead and circling around to where the enemy wizards had been.

  She followed the sound of the coughing and opened her jaws, unleashing a torrent of dragonfire down onto the pathetic mortal villains. Unfortunately, while the elves were obviously inferior mages, several of them conjured spherical shields that were visible even though the smoke, and only a few of the more low ranking elves were consumed by her righteous dragonfire.

  She reached the end of the room and turned, intending to make another pass over the elves. But before she could reopen her jaws a conjured net of blue-black magic erupted from the smoke, wrapping itself around her and sending her crashing into the smoky depths.

  She hit something hard, metal, and smoking, which yelped in pain as Caprifexia rolled off it and across the floor, cursing in draconic as she struggled against the nasty, villainous, and totally dishonourable restraint.

  A pulse of wind raced through the room, and while it didn't clear the smoke, it did thin it enough for her to see a very burnt, very angry looking elven soldier looming over them, halberd raised.

  "Obstantus!" shouted Caprifexia, conjuring a swirling shield to turn aside the blade a moment before it hit her before casting another spell. "Fuerza!"

  The elf's neck made a disquieting snapping sound as Caprifexia's blast of raw force hit them underneath the chin, blasting their head back at an angle that mortal necks were not designed to support. Unlike dragon necks, which amongst their virtually infinite superiorities had a far greater degree of free movement. A tricky, and difficult shot that she had definitely absolutely intended to make.

  Caprifexia yelped as the now dead elf collapsed on top of them, and struggled with her magical restraints for a few moments more before finally dispelling them. She needed to transform to get out from underneath the heavy mortal, and was just picking herself up and dusting herself off when a screaming elf emerged from the smoke at high speed, clipping her on the shoulder and sending her sprawling back to the ground before disappearing in the other direction.

  "Run for it!" screamed an elf, emerging from the direction of their flying fellow and sprinting away from where it sounded like Serana was busy heroically murdering elves. Well, semi-heroically, they were a hideous vampire after all.

  As they passed, Caprifexia grabbed for their leg, and the elf, however, saw this, and tried to dodge, meaning that rather than the elegant trip Caprifexia had been going for, they fell onto her in a tangle of kicking limbs.

  "Get off me!" screamed the elf as Caprifexia used her greater strength got on top – where she belonged. The small dragon summoned a jagged piece of ice and rammed it down toward the prone mortal's face. The elf caught it in desperation with both hands, slowing, but not halting the descent of the razor sharp ice.

  "Prepare to die, villain!" grinned Caprifexia, her greater strength bit by bit overwhelming the elf. "Do not feel bad, you never had a chance-"

  The elf headbutted her, their golden helmet smashing into Caprifexia's nose.

  Her nose didn't break like a squishy mortals, but it still hurt, and Caprifexia reeled back, anger warring with disbelief at the sheer audacity of the mortal.

  "You- you insolent little mortal!" she growled, rubbing her sore nose with her free hand. "You'll pay for that!"

  "You're already trying to kill me!" said the elf hysterically, trying and failing to push the razor sharp ice away. "What else are you going to do!? Help! Help! She's going to kill me!"

  Before Caprifexia could heroically ram the ice through their eye, however, another elf emerged from the smoke at high speed – this one missing an arm – and smashed into her back, knocking her off the elf and to the ground for the third time.

  "Stop throwing people at me you stupid leech!" raged Caprifexia, picking herself up as the elf she had been about to mete out justice to fled toward the far tunnel.

  "It isn't my fault!" came Serana's. "I can't even see where you are!"

  "Well I'm over here you-" began Caprifexia, trailing off as her spell destabalised and the smoke vanished, revealing a scene of bloody carnage.

  Unable to see the vampire, and unable to properly dispel Caprifexia's brilliant magic, it seemed that the undead abomination had proved quite effective against the nasty elves. The lamprey was soaked in blood, and all around her lay bits and pieces of elves in a circle of death and destruction.

  "Well then, that went well," said Serana, picking up one of the more intact elven bodies with one hand and opening her mouth.

  "Ugh," said Caprifexia. "That's disgusting."

  "What?" said Serana through a mouthful of blood. "You can't talk. Your face is covered in blood too."

  "What?" said Caprifexia, putting a hand to her nose to find it was bleeding. "Oh, err… yes, this isn't mine. Definitely elf blood. Not dragon blood at all."

  A drop of the hot, bright red liquid hissed as a fell to the floor.

  "And I'm not drinking it, like you, you disgusting monstrosity!" said Caprifexia, wiping at the mess on her face, and quickly moving back to check on Einar and the cat. "How is the cat?" she asked.

  "J'zargo is not a cat, but will be fine," said the cat, glancing over the destruction as he pushed himself back to his feet. "And the small dragon? Is she well?"

  "Of course," she sniffed, surreptitiously rubbing her aching nose.

  "So, I think they know we're here," said Serana, joining them, licking her disgusting lips disgustingly. "That smoke spell wasn't bad kid. You'll have to teach me it."

  "I doubt you could manage such a complex enchantment," sniffed Caprifexia, tweaking her collar as her ugly Thalmor robes flowed up and back into her usual coat, modelled after the one her mother Sinestra had worn in her elven guise. "You're not a dragon, after all."

  "Uh huh," said Serana. "Clearly I'm the less experienced mage here."

  "Clearly," agreed Caprifexia, glad that although the vampire was revolting, at least she had a companion capable of acknowledging her immense superiority.

  Although it had been a bit messy, she was rather pleased with how well the fight had gone. After J'zargo's error that had been blamed on her against the vampires, and the unfortunate… 'Lich incident' with the Vigilants, and her totally justified, but still perhaps unfortunate, although impressively effortless dispatching of the villainous Imperial Legion at Solitude, some small, tiny, ridiculous, part of her had begun to doubt her own unmitigated brilliance. It was nice to receive the reassurance that she was still a perfect being capable of wreaking righteous destruction upon lesser creatures.

  Strictly heroically, of course. Yes, things were going very well…

  The sound of footsteps pulled her from revelling in her righteous victory, and she turned toward the far tunnel, narrowing her eyes as several figures emerged from the gloom.

  The first figure was the tallest. At first glance she appeared to be a large feathery cloak, but after a moment's examination revealed itself to be a set of folded alabaster wings. The ape-like, winged woman was dressed in a simple white dress and sensible travelling boots, and in her hand carried a golden bow that even from across the room Caprifexia could feel was deeply magical.

  Behind the winged woman were the villainous Thalmor, those who had run, including the noisy elf who was bleeding from the neck, but also another, unscathed elf who Caprifexia recognised with a snarl.

  "Arakno!" she yelled. "There you are, villain!"

  "What the…?" said Arakno, his eyes flicking to Einar and J'zargo, and then to the destruction that Caprifexia had wrought. "What is…?"

  "You may have somehow tricked me the last time we crossed paths," said Caprifexia, calling lightning to her fists. "But this time I know the villainy that lays in your heart, and I will put you in the ground, Arakno!"

  "My name- my name isn't Arakno!" said Arakno in an exasperated, and wrong, voice. "I have no idea how you survived, Caprifexia, or what you are doing here-"

  "Wait," said the winged woman, who had been looking bored, now suddenly interested. "What did you call her?"

  "Caprifexia, my lady," said Arakno. "She was present when I retrieved the eye of Magnus, an altmer student from the Winterhold College-"

  "Caprifexia is not an altmer name," said the winged woman, cocking her head to one side. "My, my, my. You're a long way from home, aren't you? Dragon."

  Caprifexia started in surprise as it took even her brilliant mind a few moments to process the fact that she was being addressed in her native tongue: Draconic.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Azerothian Draconic.

  Addressed in a language that no one else on Nirn should have known, by a winged woman on a plane that, as far as she knew, didn't have winged women. That made her a…

  Caprifexia took a step back as several things snapped together in her mind. Before that moment each point had been seperate. Disparate. But in that instant they clicked together like pieces of a puzzle, forming a single, unified whole.

  The rip in Windhelm. The giant Faceless that somehow, impossibly was staying manifested long after it should have shrivelled up and faded back into the Void. The fact that there had, allegedly, been two – strictly equal – 'Fractures' that the stupid time-meddling mortals had mentioned present on Nirn. The Plane of Zarrak. The Temple to the 'Goddess of the Void…' who had strangely not been a reptile like the local mortals, but an ape-like winged woman…

  This woman wasn't just another trivial villain. This was a woman who had murdered a world. Murdered a world, and seemingly wanted to do the same to this one. Somehow, against all conceivable odds, those time-meddling mortals had actually been right. Nirn was in danger. Terrible danger. And not from those probably paradox causing fools, but from a being –almost– as majestic as Caprifexia herself.

  Another Planeswalker.

  "I know who you are. I know what you did – to Zarrak, to Windhelm," snarled Caprifexia, replying in her first tongue. "You're Mirael!"

  The winged woman smiled widely. "You've heard of me?" said Mirael, clapping her hands. "I do love a fan!"

  "I am no fan of you, villain! I won't let you destroy this world," said Caprifexia, switching back to Nirnian as she channelled more power into the lightning around her fists. "J'zargo, Serana – be careful, this woman is a Planeswalker. She posed as a Goddess on Zarrak – she's the one who destroyed it! Einar, run, you're useless, you'll just get in the way."

  "Oh, so they know what you are?" said Mirael, following her effortlessly back into Nirnian Imperial. "Odd – I normally never bother telling my pawns what I really am, it just tends to cause confusion. Bless them, such limited creatures."

  "J'zargo is no one's pawn," said the cat, before turning his attention to Arakno. "Does Arcano know what this woman is attempting to do?"

  "She is going to return the Altmer to their rightful place as Gods," said the elf, summoning fire to his fist. "Not that you'll be around to see it, cat."

  "She is going to destroy this world!" said J'zargo, who for some reason was OK with Arakno pointing out his feline nature, but got snooty whenever Caprifexia did it. Totally unfair, and likely rooted in dragonism. "She is going to kill Akatosh!"

  Arcano paused, and several of the other surviving Thalmor looked at each other with confusion. "What?"

  "J'zargo has stood in a world stripped of all life," continued the cat, jabbing a claw toward the winged woman. "Stripped by her."

  "You lie-" began Arakno.

  "You're also a Planeswalker?" said Mirael, cutting off her minion and holding a hand delicately to her mouth. "Oh no. How embarrassing! I'm terribly sorry, I wouldn't have picked this world had I known –don't tread on one's neighbours and all that– but I'm rather too far along to stop now, so again, terribly sorry, but you're going to have to find a new home. Don't worry, I can recommend some good ones if you like!"

  "Why are you doing this?" said Einar, who had defied Caprifexia's orders to run, and had remained insolently where he was. "Why are you destroying entire Planes?"

  "Why?" said Mirael with a smile. "Why else? Power. That's all anything comes down to in the end."

  "Power?" said Einar. "What power is there in a dead, twisted world? There was… there was nothing left of Zarrak. Not even bacteria in the water."

  "Another Planeswalker…? Very odd," said Mirael. "You didn't put together a party just for little old me, did you? I'm touched!"

  "He's not a Planeswalker," sniffed Caprifexia. "I am simply more powerful than you can imagine – they just stumble along in the wake of my awe-inspiring majesty!"

  "Really?" said Mirael, her eyes lighting up. "Now that is interesting. Surely then you felt it? You're a Black Dragon. You were born steeped in the power of the Eternities. Zarrak was no barren waste, it was merely… stripped of its impurities. Refined. Turned into a source of the most powerful energy in all creation."

  Caprifexia frowned, trying to make sense of the villains words. She was talking about Void Magic, that much was clear, but how could a barren waste give her that…?

  The books Caprifexia had borrowed from Sorbet Melon surfaced from the depths of her crystalline mind. Books she had been reading and rereading in an attempt to learn how to bond and draw power from places, from the 'land,' or rather, more exactly, from the fabric of reality…

  "You're- you're creating Void Bonds," said Caprifexia aghast. "You destroy entire planes just- just so you can bond with the land?"

  "Ah ha! Now you've got it!" said Mirael, clapping her hands. "We really should compare notes, I'd love to hear about how you're able to transport others with you. It would make things so much easier if I didn't have to spend so long recruiting new servants wherever I go. I'd be happy to teach you the basics of bonding with the Void in exchange!"

  "You think I would- you think I would work with you?" said Caprifexia. "You're a villain! A mass murderer! A monster!"

  "Oh don't be boring, you're an Azerothian Black Dragon and a Planeswalker," said Mirael, rolling her eyes. "The Multiverse is your oyster, our oyster; to do with as we please. Surely you, who weren't raised with the tedious trappings of a nauseating slave morality, can see that? We are strong, they are weak; what more justification do we need?"

  "Just because mortals are weak and stupid and pathetic and terrible at absolutely everything they do and ugly and pathetic doesn't mean they deserve to die!" said Caprifexia, her hands shaking in anger. "The strong should- the strong should help the weak! Or at least not hurt them! Not genocide them!"

  "They are ephemeral," said Mirael, waving a hand airily. "Mere fleeting moments. Even the longest lived immortal is doomed to die when the last embers of their Plane splutter out. Even Gods and Goddesses are but temporary bursts of activity. But us? We Planeswalkers are true Eternals – we swim in an endless sea of possibility. We and we alone can dance between never ending pyres. What is a single world, a handful of worlds, to us? Nothing. Nothing at all. My dear, you only hurt yourself by allowing yourself to be shackled by silly little notions of 'Good' and 'Evil.'"

  "I used to think like you," said Caprifexia. "I thought that just because mortals were stupid and short lived that their lives were meaningless. But they're not! They might be inferior to dragons in every way, but they have friends, loved ones, and even if their efforts in art and theory will never measure up to draconic standards, some of it isn't totally mediocre! You call it 'slave morality,' but I am slave to no one: you're the slave, just like I was before I broke free. A slave to an insatiable lust for power!"

  Beside her Einar beamed, but Mirael looked at her boredly. "Oh dear, you've really internalised this whole 'hero complex' haven't you? A shame, I was hoping that we could be friends – it would be so much easier to scour this plane clean with a partner."

  "My… Lady?" said Arakno, who had, along with his fellows, been growing increasingly concerned as the conversation had gone on.

  "Oh, Arcano – you're still here!" said Mirael, putting her hand to her mouth again, as if she'd just committed some kind of vulgar faux-pa, rather than admitted to planning to annihilate his entire universe. "That was clumsy of me, wasn't it? It seems I got rather too swept up with meeting my new peer! Ah, annoying, you've been rather useful. Still, I suppose I don't really need you anymore now that I have the Bow. Goodbye."

  "What-" began Arcano, before Mirael swiped a hand around and behind her, releasing a crescent of pure void energy that cut straight through the villainous elf's torso, neatly bisecting him, before moving through the other elves and doing the same thing before they could so much as blink.

  Arakno's eyes bulged in surprise for a moment, before his lifeless body crumpled apart along with his fellows. Caprifexia's boiling blood seemed to run close, her mind reeling as the reality of what the winged Planeswalker had just done hit her.

  Wielding the power of the Void was one thing. Caprifexia could do it, of course, because she was so amazing, but it was possible for others to do it as well. Most mortals were driven mad by the Whispers of the Old Ones, but not only was this Mirael not really a mortal, she was protected by the same kind of Spark that had freed Caprifexia from her servitude.

  Still, even with that knowledge, the sheer casual way that the winged woman had wielded the most deadly force in the multiverse was, even for a dragon as incredible as herself, absolutely terrifying. She doubted even her father at his peak could have managed such an effortless and delicately controlled application of Void magic.

  "Monster," said Serana. "They were your allies."

  "They were tools," said Mirael lightly. "And you're one to talk. Serana, isn't it? Harkon's girl? Did you know your father still has your portrait above his desk? Oh, heavens, the smell of that castle…"

  Mirael shuddered.

  "Ghastly."

  "Give us the Bow," said Serana, conjuring ice around her fists.

  Mirael tittered with laughter. "You really think you're a match for me, little leech?"

  The Vampire yelled and hurled a blast of ice straight at the winged woman's heart, but before the magic could strike home there was a pulse of golden light and the ice, Caprifexia, Serana, J'zargo, Einar, the bodies of the elves, and just about everything else not bolted down was hurled away from Mirael.

  The wind rushed from her lungs as Caprifexia hit and then slid down the wall, J'zargo on one side, Serana on the other. Her vision swam, and she took a deep gasping breath, trying to push herself up as the winged woman sauntered forward.

  "Now, Caprifexia," said Mirael seriously, flexing her fingers and summoning more Void magic, aiming it straight at Caprifeixa's chest. "I want you to know this isn't personal. I hate to have to put down another of my kind, to waste a Spark, but if you're not going to play nice then I can't just have you running about and ruining years of work. You understand?"

  "Wait!" wheezed Caprifeixa, raising her hands as her mind raced for some kind of ploy to use against the woman, some way they might escape. "Don't- don't you want to know how I can take other people with me when I Planeswalk?"

  The winged woman paused and cocked her head to one side. "I'd be lying if I said no," she said after a moment. "Alright, explain your power and I'll let you leave. How do you do it?"

  Caprifexia gulped as she continued to search for a way out of the situation: it was possible to shield against Void Magic, but it was extremely difficult and exhausting, and not something she really wanted to test herself with in the heat of battle; she could blink behind the woman, but that would only delay the inevitable, and leave her friends open to attack; she could attack, but she doubted that even her mighty magic would have any more affect than the vampire's had. What was more, this close to an Elder Scroll, she couldn't even open a portal to the Void…

  Caprifeixia turned her head to the vampire, who was grimacing and pushing themselves upright, eyes zeroing in on the Scroll on her back. The annoying, para-causal, time-bending 'fundamental part of Nirn' scroll that complained whenever it came into contact with anything from 'outside' its little universe.

  No, she might not be able to block a pulse of void magic, but she was fairly certain that something so steeped in reality as an Elder Scroll could at least blunt the worst of the power.

  "I actually learnt it from- from an Elder Scroll," said Caprifexia slowly, her voice trembling.

  "How?" said Mirael with a frown. "They are blank for us – we're not part of this world's silly little 'Cycle.'"

  "I used a spell," said Caprifexia, reaching out and grabbing it off Serana's back.

  Lightning crackled and reality protested as Caprifexia's hand closed on the Elder Scroll, and the vampire immediately grabbed it back. They struggled for a few moments, vampiric might warring with draconic strength.

  "Give me that-"

  "-get your grubby hands off it-"

  "-you stupid bloodsucker I'm trying to save you-"

  "-I will not- OW!" said Serana, releasing the scroll and nursing her hand. "You- you bit me! You bit me!"

  Caprifexia ignored them, taking a deep breath and holding up the scroll. "I-I can show you."

  Mirael regarded her skeptically. "Go on then," said the woman.

  "Well first, you need to-" began Caprifexia, before raising the object and then hurling it straight at the winged woman and immediately summoning a shield over herself and her 'friends.' Snooty, unreasonable vampire included.

  The Elder Scroll struck Mirael's outstretched hand, and there was a keening noise as the Void magic coating it reacted very, very, very badly with the 'a-temporal, fundamental piece of Nirn.'

  Caprifexia's swirling shield shuddered as the two opposing forces clashed and a blast of force radiated outward, sending not only the winged woman and the Elder Scroll hurtling away from one another, but also smashing apart the vaulted room itself in an explosion of ancient glass and masonry, coating the rocky mountainside in debris for hundreds of meters.

  "Quickly!" said Caprifexia, summoning up her Spark. For a moment she worried that the Elder Scroll, which was somewhere dozens or hundreds of meters behind them, might still be too close, but then reality flexed and a tear into the Void appeared.

  "Through, now!" she said.

  "The Bow!" said Einar as there was a scream of rage from across the room. "Capri, we need-"

  "We can't save your ridiculous world if we're dead!" screamed Caprifexia, grabbing her foolish moral friend roughly and shoving him through the portal, glancing over to where the winged woman was flapping up from where she had come to a stop, some two hundred meters away, before doing the same with the cat and then the protesting vampire.

  She felt a pulse of Void magic from behind her as she hurled herself after her companions, and the deadly magic passed over her head as she landed on the squishy, disgusting tendrils and eyes that covered Nirn's entrance-way, the aperture snapping shut behind her a moment later.

  "Where are we?" began Serana, before there was a pulse of gold and an enraged looking Mirael appeared behind them, her entire body glowing like Caprifexia's. Caprifexia gave a totally fearless and controlled roar, lowered her centre of gravity, strategically, and scrambled, tactically, away from the world-destroying monster. She needn't have bothered, however, as Mirael's unfocused eyes slid over them unseeingly, and the villainess broke into a sprint toward another platform.

  "What the… fuck?" said Einar.

  Caprifexia frowned as Mirael reached the next Plane over and vanished as she touched the orb, only to appear a moment later and sprint toward another platform – seemingly at random.

  "She can't comprehend the Void," said Caprifexia as she remembered something that Sorbet had said to her months earlier. "She's searching for us, but she can't see us. She doesn't see things when she Planeswalks, it's unconscious for her…"

  "Where are we?" said Serana sharply, cutting off Caprifexia. "It doesn't look very safe."

  "The space between worlds, and no, it isn't," said Einar. "We need to find somewhere to 'set down' before the monsters that live here find us."

  "What we need is to find a way to stop her," said Serana, shaking her head. "Ambush her maybe as she comes out of… this place? We need that bow-"

  "You saw how powerful she was, you stupid Vampire!" snapped Caprifexia.

  "She was strong sure," said Serana. "And that creepy magic looked nasty-"

  "It was Void Magic, you undead cretin!" said Caprifexia. "And not even my father had the precision she does!"

  "Well maybe your father wasn't-"

  "He was a fifty thousand year old! Empowered by beings that ordered the cosmos to watch over an entire planet! He was closer to Godhood than your stupid 'Divines!'" yelled Caprifexia, tears beginning to prickle at her eyes. "You don't know anything! You're too stupid to realise just how strong she is! She'll kill us! She'll kill us!"

  "Hey, hey, easy," said Einar, hugging her in his typical melodramatic mortal fashion. "We're OK. We're OK."

  Caprifexia contemplated telling him to get his filthy mortal paws off her, but ultimately decided she could tolerate his insipid behaviour, for a while at least, and buried her face into his shoulder as her body trembled for totally unrelated reasons. It was… cold. Yes, that was it. People trembled in the cold, didn't they? Cold.

  "Alright, if you know so much about her, how do we fight her?" said Serana.

  "We can't!" said Caprifexia. "She'll kill us!"

  "Capri, take it easy OK," said Einar, rubbing her back.

  Caprifexia took a deep breath and attempted to get her slight discomfort under control. He was right. It wasn't seemly for a dragon to show weakness in front of mortals, even if they had just come face to face with a world-destroying monster. Einar was one thing, but the cat would never shut up about it if she showed weakness in front of him, and the vampire was probably liable to attack her. Not that she was scared of Serana or her admittedly at least mediocre magical and martial might, of course.

  "We… We need to regroup," said Caprifexia, forcing herself to focus on making a plan. She was a dragon. The mortals couldn't be relied upon to stop someone like Mirael. As usual, it was up to her. "Find some cannon-fodder-"

  "-allies-" said Einar.

  "-whatever you want to call them," said Caprifexia, scratching her horn and trying very hard not to think about what Mirael had done to those villainous elves. "Assuming those mortals were right, we know where she is going to be when she kills Amanosh-"

  "-Akatosh-"

  "-no, it's definitely Amanosh," said Caprifexia, a flicker of irritation breaking through her tiny, insignificant, not really worth mentioning feeling of disquiet. "You're remembering wrong. I'm a dragon, I don't make mistakes like that."

  "You are absolutely and totally wrong," said Einar. Wrongly.

  "The small dragon is right – somehow – no, not about the name," said J'zargo. "J'zargo has seen the destruction that even the small dragon can cause with 'Void Magic.' We are not powerful enough to face a competent practitioner alone."

  Serana rubbed her temples and made a growling sound.

  "Who?" said Serana in an exasperated voice. "Capri killed the entire command structure of the Imperial Legion in Skyrim! Remember?"

  "That was- that was self-defence! Heroic, totally justified and righteous self-defence!" objected Caprifexia, wiping her sore, and treacherously running nose. "I should- I should be getting a medal! I saved the city!"

  "You're a damned menace, you know that? You just gave an Elder Scroll to someone trying to destroy the world! Why did we even take you with us!?" said Serana, jabbing a finger at her. "And don't think I've forgotten that you just bit me you wretched little lizard!"

  "You deserved it, you- you- you mean, bloated corpse!" said Caprifexia. Justly.

  "How would you like it if I bit you?" said Serana, taking a step toward Caprifexia and flashing her fangs.

  "Serana!" said Einar sharply. "She's a kid, and she's scared. Have a heart, yeah? And she saved us, we couldn't have taken Mirael alone and you know it."

  "I'm not scared," sniffed Caprifexia. "Dragon's don't get scared."

  Serana glared for a few moments more, before deflating.

  "Ugh. Sorry," grumbled Serana, rubbing her forehead and turning away. "Just, we were this close to stopping all this! Stopping my father…"

  "Capri and J'zargo are right," said Einar. "We can't fight someone like that alone. We need allies."

  "Who? Who is left?" said Serana, raising a hand and counting off digits. "You told me that the only other army in Skyrim, the 'Stormcloaks,' was destroyed; Whiterun has apparently been eaten by that 'Old God;' little miss megalomaniac over there managed to exterminate the Order of Stendarr, who might have helped us-"

  "That was an accident!" protested Caprifexia, tears prickling in her eyes as feeling a familiar ache in her chest at the memory of the 'Friendly Lich Incident.'

  Mortals were so unfair! She'd said she was sorry, why did they have to keep on bringing up the one time, fine, few times, she'd messed up? They never focused on all the good things she did. It was always 'why did you incinerate that person Caprifexia,' 'why did you put that nasty villainous ape in their place Caprifexia, 'stop biting me Caprifexia, even though I'm horrible and deserve it and you're trying to save me Caprifexia.'

  "-and then she blew up the entire Imperial Legion in Skyrim," continued Serana, ignoring Caprifexia's eloquent clarification of the situation. "Who's left? That might actually help us, I mean?"

  "The College," said J'zargo after a moment's thought. "The College can help us."

  "Let's just hope there aren't anymore accidents there," said the mean and horrible and nasty vampire sarcastically.

  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!).