I meet up with Vanus again, who opens a portal to Stirk for me and my friends. Everyone’s ready for the conference, and we’re as ready as we’ll ever be.

  Stirk is covered by old elven ruins and palm trees. Quite a lot of people are already here, so I head in and start greeting people I recognize and meeting ones I don’t while trying very hard not to mistake the two just because I forgot to write down someone’s name.

  Telenger is here, and whatever Merry or I might feel about him, he’s still a powerful mage who will be a valuable ally in the fight to come. Vanus refers to Telenger as “Telly”. I’m starting to like this mer. Even I don’t do that.

  Sees-All-Colors is here too, managing the Fighters Guild personnel. She greets me warmly but briefly, and nobody mentions murder or Daedra worship. (Not that I’m terribly sure why worshipping Malacath is okay for Orcs but people seem to have a problem with Meridia. Neither of them are exactly Daedra.)

  There’s a surprising number of Goblins in the guilds. Some of them even recognize me, although I’m not sure how seeing as I wasn’t dressed like an Orc when I was in Auridon. I would imagine that they’ve heard rumors and that they’re more observant than most people give them credit for.

  “I heard Coldharbour is cold,” says Togga, the Goblin woman with the Mages Guild. “I will burn it all down!”

  “Everything between us and our goal should be sufficient,” says one of the other mages.

  Across the way is a snobbish Breton noblewoman turning up her nose at the Goblins. “I simply can’t believe they let those filthy creatures into the guilds. I suppose they’re good at setting things on fire if nothing else.”

  The three alliance leaders arrive by portal, and Vanus introduces them. Queen Ayrenn is the only one who sounds reasonable. The two humans? They’re still being posturing fools who think if they invade Coldharbour, one of the other alliances will just take the Imperial City. Contact with one another very nearly undoes the convincing I’d done. They storm off to their camps. For fuck’s sake, am I the only one here capable of diplomacy?

  “They’re so frustrating!” Ayrenn laments when I speak with her in the Dominion camp. “How did you ever convince them to come?”

  “I didn’t just convince them to come,” I say. “I already convinced them to send troops! Jorunn might be actually angry at nothing here, but I’m betting Emeric’s just trying to negotiate himself into a better position. They’d have portalled away if they were completely unwilling to work with us.”

  “Maybe if you speak to them again, you can convince them to return to the conference,” Ayrenn says.

  “If they don’t, I’m going to go conquer Cyrodiil, kick their asses, and then say ‘see what you made me waste time on?’” I grumble.

  “Perhaps if they are reluctant to commit troops, we can suggest the guilds spearhead the invasion,” Vanus puts in.

  “That’s fine,” I say. “We don’t need an army there so much as scouts and a strike team, and I’m bringing the strike team. Coldharbour is a big place and I just need to know where to strike and how to get there.”

  I go to speak with each of them to try to reason with them. I’ll probably have a much easier job of this without the other two to start an argument. How did these people become kings? Probably just birthright. Happenstance of birth isn’t always as strong a claim to leadership as some seem to think it is.

  Since I’m pretty sure Emeric is just pretending to be annoyed to make us wait and come to him (as an Altmer or Chimer might do), I decide to go speak with Jorunn first, leaving my friends to protect Ayrenn just in case.

  “Bah,” Jorunn is muttering very loudly when I approach, clearly talking to me while not directly talking to me. “I don’t know why I bothered to come. I knew it would be impossible to work with Emeric and that High Elf girl.”

  “It doesn’t matter what you think of them,” I say. “This has to be done, regardless of what sort of force may be brought to bear. I’d do this myself, but the guilds have pledged to back me up even if we don’t get further support.”

  “What chance do bookworms and sellswords have against the Daedra?” Jorunn says.

  “The guilds have been the only ones holding the line against the Daedra while the alliances have been free to bicker amongst themselves. In any case, it’s not like I’m asking for a squad of Tongues.”

  Jorunn snorts. “I wish I had a squad of Tongues. Or even one. The Greybeards won’t even come down off their mountain to defend Skyrim.”

  The Nords have no Tongues? No wonder they’ve been failing at conquering anything lately.

  “This isn’t the first time you’ve mentioned the Thu’um,” Jorunn goes on. “How do you even know about the Tongues?”

  “I read a lot of books?” I say with a shrug.

  “No, really,” Jorunn says with a smirk, folding his arms across his chest.

  “I was trapped in Coldharbour for thousands of years,” I say. “I’ve fought Tongues. And won, mind you, but they certainly broke a lot of shit.”

  Jorunn’s eyes widen. “You’ve fought them? That would be quite the honor to have seen them in action. I can’t imagine what it must have been like, in Coldharbour. No wonder you’re so confident in this invasion plan if you know what to expect, though. Why didn’t you say so in the first place?”

  I’d love to be able to just tell him everything and get him on my side here. I have no doubt that I could. But there are too many people in earshot who might be loyal to my betrayers, to my ex, and I may have already said too much. (Hopefully they still think I’m an Orc. It’s kind of a badly kept secret, though.)

  “Long story. Maybe I’ll even tell you before this is all done with. Can’t say I’m actually looking forward to going back to Coldharbour, but I’m definitely ready to kick some Daedra ass.” I pause and look at him thoughtfully. “Skald-King, how do you deal with the Tribunal? Have you ever spoken with one of them?”

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  “I have no business with gods,” Jorunn replies. “Leave that to the priests.”

  “They’re not gods, though,” I say. “They’re just powerful mages who stole Shor’s power in order to pretend to be gods. And one of them once made a deal with several Daedric Princes, including Molag Bal, to prevent them from invading Tamriel just as he’s doing now. Has Sotha Sil said anything about Molag Bal’s apparent violation of the Coldharbour Compact?”

  “No, I haven’t spoken with them,” Jorunn says. “What are you getting at?”

  “Sotha Sil is either compromised or incapacitated,” I say. “Or a full-scale invasion of Tamriel doesn’t count as a violation, in which case what the fuck was the Compact for?”

  Jorunn frowns. “What is this… Coldharbour Compact?”

  “That’s an excellent question and one I wish I knew the answer to,” I say. “Supposedly, Sotha Sil convinced several of the Daedric Princes to stop messing with Nirn. No idea what he threatened them with or offered them. No idea what the exact terms might have been.”

  Whatever gears might be turning in Jorunn’s head, our conversation is interrupted by a silver-haired Dunmer woman striding onto the scene as if she casually walks up to kings for a chat every day. Possibly half-Dunmer if her not-red eyes are any indication.

  “Ah, Theryn,” Jorunn says. “Glad you could make it.”

  “Am I late?” Theryn says.

  “Just on time,” Jorunn says.

  “Theryn… Teldras?” I ask.

  “That’s right,” Theryn says. “You’ve heard of me?”

  “Hah!” Jorunn says. “You’re a hero of the Pact, you know!”

  “Theryn, have you ever gotten the feeling that you always arrive at a new village just in time for weird shit to start happening?” I wonder. “Do complete strangers ask you for help in recovering lost belongings, loved ones, and pets?”

  “While waving their arms and yelling ‘Traveler, you have to help me!’? Yes, from time to time.” Theryn chuckles. “I overheard you mention the Tribunal.”

  “Your thoughts on the matter?” Jorunn asks.

  “I’ve never met Sotha Sil,” Theryn says. “But Almalexia didn’t say anything about a Coldharbour Compact. Or the Dark Anchors, for that matter. Admittedly, she doesn’t really chat much with mortals. The conversations I had with her mostly involved dealing with an unrelated Daedric threat in Deshaan.”

  Great. It at least sounds like she’s not about to go have chit-chat about the weird Orc who remembers fighting Tongues. I just need to not say anything else. I’ve been letting down my guard since being the Orc King comes so naturally to me.

  “Well, it’s up to us to take care of this mess,” I say. “I suppose I should go talk to Emeric. Or we could just wait until he starts feeling sheepish and comes back on his own so he isn’t left out.”

  Jorunn laughs heartily. “That would be fine to see.”

  “Could you do me a small favor?” I ask. “Just… be nice to Ayrenn? She’s young, yes, but open-minded and trying to do something good.”

  “Ah, fine, fine,” Jorunn says. “I suppose bullying girls isn’t befitting of a warrior. I still don’t understand why you follow that little waif of an Elf.”

  “I believe in her dream,” I say.

  I head over to the Daggerfall Covenant camp. High King Emeric is in conversation with a dark-haired Breton man in a blue robe, and referring to him as “Tom”. This must be the reputed “Hero of the Covenant”.

  When Sheogorath mentioned Tom Gautier to me, I was expecting someone… well, younger. Tom can’t be less than five hundred years old. No, wait, Bretons age more like Orcs than Altmer, I think. Fifty? Sixty? Let’s call it sixty. Also, I’m pretty sure he’s a necromancer. I just get that vibe from him. Maybe it’s the fact that he looks like skin and bones under that robe and seems halfway to being undead himself.

  Tom openly sneers at me and backs away to let me speak with Emeric.

  “So, did you have a rousing talk with the barbarian king?” Emeric asks. “I hope you convinced him to work with us and stop blustering.”

  “He’ll work with us,” I say. “You can always trust a Nord not to back down from a fight if it would make him look ridiculous to do so.”

  “I don’t see why any of this is even necessary,” Tom grumbles. “This isn’t the first Daedric Prince I’ve dealt with. I can take care of this myself.”

  I don’t know enough about Tom Gautier’s capabilities to know whether he’s just being overconfident, but I’m pretty sure he’s just being overconfident.

  “So you’re saying you want to be first through the portal?” I ask.

  Tom grunts. “Just don’t get in my way. I don’t need to babysit clueless warriors who think they can solve problems just by hitting them repeatedly. This is going to require magical finesse you couldn’t hope to match.”

  I chuckle. “Oh, but there are so many problems that can be solved just by hitting them repeatedly. Sometimes you’ve got to find the right thing to hit, though.”

  “You can’t do this by yourself and you know it, Tom,” Emeric says.

  “Whatever other commitments people are willing to make, the guilds will be spearheading the expedition,” I say. “As will I.”

  With agreement from everyone on hand, Vanus and I head back to the middle of the island to meet up with Sees-All-Colors to make preparations.

  Vanus pauses and frowns. “Does anyone else feel that?”

  I nod. “Yep. Feels like a Dark Anchor is about to drop on our heads.”

  “Xuth!” Colors utters.

  “How are you so calm about that?” Vanus asks me.

  I shrug. “Honestly, at this point, I’ve come to expect it.”

  An Altmer mage runs up to us yelling frantically and struggling with something within himself. He was being controlled in some way and unwittingly betrayed us.

  An image of Molag Bal appears, and he taunts us predictably. “Blah blah, pathetic, blah blah, crush you like insects, blah blah blah, Nirn will be mine!” Something like that.

  Oblivion rifts start opening all over the island, and Daedra pour out to invade Stirk. Trusting my friends to be able to hold the line at the Dominion camp, I run over to start at the Covenant camp.

  A huge Storm Atronach has come out of a rift into the middle of the camp, and Tom is barely holding his own with… a single skeleton. Okay, so he’s a necromancer, and a terrible one at that. What kind of a self-respecting necromancer fights with one skeleton?

  Emeric is covered in blood and his hair is all standing on end. I hit him with a Blinky heal and charge past with Shiny to tackle the Atronach head on. Tom takes the opportunity to cast a spell that gets the downed Covenant defenders back on their feet. I hope he didn’t just turn the High King’s bodyguards into zombies in front of him.

  We kill the Daedra and close the rift before I run on to the next camp. A huge four-armed snake-like Harvester is attacking the Dominion camp.

  “We got this,” Ilara says amid shooting at the thing. “Check on the others!”

  “On it!” I say with a grin. The Covenant and Pact might have their own heroes… but we’ve got five.

  Jorunn and Theryn are facing off against a huge black Daedric Titan. By which I mean Jorunn is facing off against it, and Theryn is trying to stab it from behind while dodging its spiky tail.

  “Neri!” Jorunn exclaims upon seeing me and my axe. “Glad you could join us!”

  “Couldn’t let you have all the fun!”

  We kill all the Daedra and get the rift cleared, and I make another sweep of the island to make sure there’s no more hostiles. Or at least, nothing more hostile than Nords who are not specifically angry at me.

  Once the situation is settled and most of the people capable of healing are busy doing so, I speak with the leaders again. There’s not exactly any doubt as to what needs to be done at this point and nobody important died tragically here.

  Vanus brings the invasion force to the Ayleid well at the center of the island. Since I have the most experience with Coldharbour, I give a briefing on what to expect, most of which is “expect them to fuck with you and trust nothing you see and no one you meet because everything wants either your life or your soul or both.” It’s absolutely not just paranoia.

  Once everyone who’s coming is here, Vanus opens a portal to Coldharbour. I’d meant to be the first one through, but despite myself, I still hesitate and people more starry-eyed and foolish than me are the ones to rush in ahead. How many of these idiots are just going to get themselves killed? The Fighters Guild at least know how to fight Daedra, but they’ve been fighting from the relative safety of Nirn. Now, we’ll be on the Daedra’s own turf.

  “You won’t be alone, Neri,” Ilara says to me quietly.

  I give a nod and take a deep breath. I should be able to leave anytime I want. There’s nothing to fear anymore. The gates of hell cannot hold me, and I will reclaim my soul and build a safer world for my friends and family. I step into the portal.