The Dominion's Bane

Chapter Three: Plot Revealed

Ma'dran awoke groggily, but this time he was in a medical ward, laying in a nice comfy bed with white sheets. After recovering from the shock of finding himself being cared for and not being left to rot in a dungeon, he pushed back the sheets, propped his head onto his knees, and looked around the room he was in through a crack in the curtains. The place was painted entirely white, as can be expected from any medical establishment. Oak double doors stood tall and firm on each side of the room. Healers streamed in from all four of them, bustling about and checking on patients, creating potions, and bringing the mentally ill to special therapy wards. Ma'dran quietly slipped out of the bed and crouched down, beginning to cast an illusion spell.

Iya neht vehk iya seht iya bedt iya lyr iya tayem yakhem, he chanted under his breath.

Seht hekem ayem doht oht web hekem iya doht ekem meht ekem! He muttered as his body slowly began to dissolve into the light, seemingly melting into its surroundings.

Just then a healer walked over. "What are you doing out of bed?" She asked Ma'dran, yanking him up by his armpits and lowering him slowly back into the bed. "You're supposed to be resting."

I have no interest in staying here any longer, I'm completely fine, thought Ma'dran, staring daggers at the healer's back as she wrinkled her nose as if she had smelled something distasteful and strutted off.

Then Ma'dran realized that he was sweating like a pig. That spell must have taken a lot of effort. He also noted that his magicka reserves had vanished into the Void. With all the healers around, simply walking out wouldn't cut it. And since he now couldn't cast spells, the only logical choice was to sleep. He laid his head back onto the bed and closed his cumbersome eyelids, slowly dozing off as the hustle and bustle of the world outside the ward continued.

-exactly 5 hours later, at noon-

Ma'dran opened his refreshed eyes  to discover Cassius, dressed in his full legion gear; M'draza, with an emotionless expression on his face, as always—how had he forgotten who M'draza was?; Thazara, who looked genuinely concerned; and a tall Redguard chained to M'draza's wrist, obviously a prisoner. All were standing at the foot of his bed. The prisoner inspected J'harr with a cool and piercing gaze. Without ceremony, he said, "So it's really you, 'old friend.' Where is he?"

"There is only one."

"You've already told me that."

"But you didn't listen."

"Because it doesn't make sense."

They gazed at each other in cold silence. This battle of wills was cut short when Cassius motioned for M'draza to yank on the chains, pulling the prisoner away from J'harr. He eyed Ma'dran quizzically, as if mentally questioning the cryptic conversation.

The prisoner spat viciously at J'harr, who snatched it up in mid-air with lightning quick reflexes and sent it boomeranging right back. The spittle smacked right into the prisoner's lower lip.

"You'll never tell me the truth, will you?" hissed the prisoner.

"I am telling you the truth, you merely refuse to believe it, Kastor," replied Ma'dran calmly.

The prisoner, Kastor, threw Ma'dran one last dirty look and then sat down in the middle of the floor, closing his eyes peacefully. He was sitting in a pose often used for meditation, the Hala Su. Ma'dran noticed that after a few moments Kastor was no longer touching the floor, and was hovering a few feet above it. He started to rise towards the ceiling but Ma'dran threw aside his covers and launched himself through the air towards the escaping Kastor. He landed directly on Kastor's lap, breaking the Redguard's concentration and causing him to fall towards the floor like an anvil. Ma'dran vaulted off at the last second, did a backflip, and gracefully landed on his bed in a Rawlith Khaj pose. Kastor had crashed into several chairs and the curtains separating the ward from the rest of the room. Buried in the wreckage, he began swearing his head off.

"N'wahs," "S'wits," and "Renrijs" were some of the nicer things he called them.

Cassius snickered and mumbled something to M'draza about picking Kastor up and burying him deeper in the wreckage.

After a few moments of enjoying his struggle, Thazara carefully walked over and dug Kastor out of the debris, making sure they didn't engage in eye contact. Everyone else in the room was still standing there in shock and staring at the people within the ward, wondering what had happened. Ma'dran muttered something under his breath that shifted the shade of his eyes to temporarily blue, and everyone stopped gazing at the group and went back to what they were doing. It had been a simple spell to cast then, as he was merely instructing the room to do what they already wanted to: get back to their work and forget that the chaos had ever happened.

A small whiskery man with a missing finger hurried into the ward and handed Cassius a note, before scurrying out of the room and seemingly turned smaller and smaller as he hastened to get out. At the end, he almost resembled a rat.

Cassius carefully unfolded the note while Thazara and Ma'dran attached new chains to Kastor, as his original ones had been shattered by magical release when he was flying up. Cassius cleared his throat and read the note out loud to everyone in the ward:

To whom it may concern; we are watching. Our glinting armor stands ready to defend us, and our shining swords ready to be used to kill anyone who violates the terms of the White Gold Concordat. We are watching, and we are ready.

At the bottom of the note was a crudely drawn image of a broken tower and a large scroll.

Kastor spoke up. "Could it really be them? I thought they disbanded?" asked Kastor, who was listening intently. Everyone ignored him.

"It has to be them," concluded Ma'dran. "They must've poisoned the mess hall wine. Which explains why I did those things! I was poisoned!"

"Then why wasn't the rest of the mess hall hard wired to kill, if everyone took in the same poison?" Cassius challenged. "You're right, of course, Cassius. I don't have an answer to that question."
"Perhaps you were given an extra poison to go with the one already in the wine?" Thazara put in.
"No, I don't think so... I don't think the assassin could have—no, nevermind, you might be right. The assassin that attacked me was dressed as a serving girl. She or he could have slipped something in my drink before they gave it to me!"

Kastor sighed heavily, and the other turned to listen.

"It's true then. The Thalmor... They've returned."