Out of Cyrodiil

An Autobiography of Dahlia Deavius

---

"What the hell happened here?"

We walked up to the camp as a Altmer man came running down at us.

"Get out while you still can!" he screamed as he ran up to us.

Wes grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him to calm him down. The fact that Wesley Madison was a large, bulky man did not help the frantic Altmer's nerves.

"Oblivion gate opened! Daedra swarmed the city! All hope is lost!"

Shocked, my companion loosened his grip on the man, who took this as a chance to get away quickly. I was completely dumbstruck. Wes frowned slightly, shook it off, and without a second thought, started to continue down the road toward the city. Regaining feeling in my body, I rushed to him.

"WESLEY!" I squeaked. Running as fast as I could, I lunged at him, landing on his back and knocking us both to the ground. With a slight blush, I got off of him as he spat the dirt out of his mouth and began to stand back up. Wesley was now staring at me like I had just told him I gave up gambling for good.

"Dahl?" he gaped slowly, "What the hell?"

My face turned bright red as the surviving citizens of Kvatch turned to stare at us. He tilted his head and his jaw was hanging as I tried to explain in a high-voice, "Well, you were dimly heading to the most deadly of places, and This One felt a need to save her friend from a certain destruction."

"You're lucky you're cute," he grumbled, "Between tackling people when a simple 'wait' would do and your incomprehensible speaking, it's a wonder how anybody puts up with you. Any way, we've gotta find this Emperor guy or whoever you were babbling on about."

A blank look came to my face as I registered what he said. Then with a slick smile, I batted my eyelashes, "Do you think Dahlia's pretty?"

My companion's cheeks flushed a violent red and he stammered, "No-I just-let's go."

Turning his back at me, he trudged up the path. Sauntering behind him, I teased him, chanting, "Snowman thinks I'm pretty. Snowman thinks I'm pretty."

As we neared the top of the hill, he finally swerved around and grabbed me by the shoulders. "Will you shut up?" he barked.

All the color drained from my face as he yelled this. Yet again, I had lost all feeling in my body, but not because of Wesley. Thinking he had scared me, he brought his palm to his forehead and apologized in a sigh, "Dahl, I'm sorry for yelling at you. I lost my temper and I shouldn't have taken it out so harshly. Now, can we get going?"

I didn't reply verbally. Instead my whole body began to shake uncontrollably. Confused, Wesley tilted his head and asked, "Hey, Kitty, what's wrong?"

"D-da-dae-d-dr-ra" was all I could manage to stammer out as I raised my hand slowly to point behind him. Swirling around he let out an audible gasp at what I had seen. Only a few feet in front of us there were guards struggling to keep the daedra from going any farther. Even more frightening was the giant, fiery Oblivion gate that the daedra kept coming out of. A high scream escaped my lips as a fearsome clannfear lunged at one of the guards, who just in the nick of time, swirled around and speared it with his sword. I couldn't help but look to my tiny dagger and wonder if it would be enough to fend off these monsters. Even worse, I hadn't thought of changing into the armor Jauffre had lent me before I left so I would have to be killing daedra, in a dress. No good could come out of this situation.

Of course while I was imagining the many ways I could be ripped apart by clannfears, a large smile came to Wesley's face as he ran empty-handed toward the battle.

"What in Oblivion does Snowman think he's doing?" I growled to myself and sprung after my fearless fool of a friend. Grabbing a sword out of a fallen scamp, he swung his newfound blade at a Dremora, slicing it in two. Grimacing at his natural ability in battle, I let out a reluctant war cry began to change into the chaos myself. My yells caught the attention of a very frightening looking Dremora, who smiled to itself and raised its blade to attack me. Gripping Sufferthorn, I waited anxiously as it lunged toward me. It was inches from me when in one fluid motion, I pulled out my and stabbed its neck.

What I had not expected was my blade's enchantment to send it flying backward. Stunned, I stood gaping as my foe flew back and knocked over another Dremora that was about to finish off a beaten soldier. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted a smirk come to Wesley's lips as he pulled his blade out of a clannfear. One of the guards finished off a final scamp and hurried over to where I was standing.

"I'm Salvian Matius and what in the name of Akatosh are you doing here?" he asked me in a growl, keeping his eyes on the Oblivion gate right behind me, in case more Daedra came running out.

"L-looking for Brother Martin," I replied, still shaken from all that had happened. In my defense, this was my first experience with Daedra.

"The priest?" he snapped, "Oh yeah, I think he's still in the city. I hope he got to the chapel with the rest of them."

As we were talking, Wesley, with a proud smirk still on his face, shook some of the blood off his sword and sheathed it, before sauntering back over to us.

"Well if he's in there, we better get going into the-Watch out!"

To be cliche, the series of events that followed his shouting happened in sort of a blur. I remember him suddenly lunging at me, pushing me out of the way of a clannfear that had been charging behind me. The next thing that I remember was losing my balance and falling backwards through what must have been the Oblivion gate, taking Wesley through with me.

-o.b.l.i.v.i.o.n-

"Ooomf!" Wesley grumbled as we teleported into this fiery hell. I clutched to his shirt trying to keep myself from falling. Instead, I just ended up dragging him down with me. I groaned as the large man landed on me. If I lived through the night, I was definitely going to feel this in the morning. A strange smirk came to Wesley's lips.

"Well Miss Deavius," he grinned, "I never knew you felt so strongly for me."

I would have stuck out my tongue if it wouldn't have meant licking his face. Instead, I grumbled and attempted to push him off me. In one movement he did a push-up and jumped back to his feet. I hated how strong and coordinated he was compared to my ditzy bumbling. He stuck out a hand to help me up and I managed to get back on my feet. Looking around I realized exactly what kind of mess I had, literally, just dragged us into.

In the distance there were two similar sized and equally intimidating towers. They were framing the larger, even more frightening tower between them. In order to get to these large frightening towers we were going to have to go over a big stone bridge over a lake of boiling lava. The only way this could've gotten possibly worse was if the bridge had been a rickety wooden one with planks already missing. While I was apprehensively getting acquainted with my surroundings and trying to figure out how I was going to get past the large war gates in order to get to the big tower where the shutter-offer to this eerie hell was most likely going to be, something else had caught Wesley's eye. Unsheathing his sword and letting out a loud war-cry, he ran off to the left where two clannfears were clawing at a guard.

Not even bothering to run to help him this time, I slowly made my way over to where Wesley had just slaughtered the daedra.

"Thank you," the guard exclaimed, "I thought these things would be the death of me."

"No problem," Wesley flashed an award-winning smile. "Wesley Madison," he told the man. Then pointed to me and said, "and this is Dahlia Deavius."

I nodded and looked back at the war gates. There had to be some way to get past them and get to the big, gargantuan tower. I had a feeling that was our ticket out of here.

"Ilend Vonius," the guard replied, "there any way I can help you?"

Wesley opened his mouth to answer, but I cut in before he could say anything. "Can the Dutiful Guard help us get to the Big Scary Tower?"

A small crooked grin came to Ilend's face. "Actually I can."

-o.b.l.i.v.i.o.n-

By the time Wesley and I got to the Sigillum Sanguis we were soaked from head to foot in daedric blood. Ilend had tragically fallen off of the tower into the pit of lava below. We had been told that in order to close the gate we needed to steal a Sigil Stone. There was a large pillar of fire in the middle of the room that shot up to a platform a few yards above us.

"I bet that's where the Sigfred Stone is," Wesley stated.

I glanced over at Captain Obvious, glaring at him. My blonde hair was dripping in my face. My nice dress that Emelin had given me was probably ruined. I had just gone through complete hell to find some stupid heir to some stupid throne. My day could not be any worse as my dear mother's words of warning rang in my ears. No good could come out of Cyrodiil. I was starting to wonder if I would ever have the chance to leave this gods-damned place.

"Ya think?" I growled.

We started up the red stairs and got to the platform to see a glowing stone that the pillar of fire seemed to be leading up to. I swear if Wesley had said 'that must be it' I would have killed him right then and there. Wesley started toward the stone as I hung back and looked around. No daedra seemed to be in this room. Funny, you'd think something would be in here to guard the Sigil Stone. Wesley was about to grab it when suddenly there was a loud growl and he fell back to the ground with a Dremora's sword in his shoulder. Before the thing could pull the sword out of him, I screamed and charged at the creature. Enough was enough. I have had it with these motherfetching daedra in this motherfetching plane.(1) Afraid for Wesley, I didn't even bother to pull out Sufferthorn. I just pushed the thing off the platform onto the pillar of fire and grabbed the damned stone.

The tower shook with a loud creak. I stumbled to the ground and knelt next to my wounded friend, who had broken most of the sword off and now had a large piece of daedric metal coming out of his shoulder. Once I realized that durable bastard wasn't dying anytime soon, I noticed something very bad: everything around us was beginning to tumble down.

"Wait, Wesley what is happening?" I exclaimed.

"Apparently this Sigil Stone was a self-destruct button," he stated rather plainly.

I stared at him and cried, "Nobody told us about this part! S'rendarr save us, we're going to die in this infernal hell!"

A small frown came to his lips and he shook his head, "Just hold onto that stone."

There seemed to be no other option. I grabbed the sleeve of his good arm, clinging to him and the stone for dear life. I closed my eyes awaiting to either be squished by falling rocks or the floor to crumble below us and send us falling to our dooms.

And then suddenly, the sound of the destruction around us stopped and cold rain began to pour down on me. I opened my eyes to see where we were. My mouth fell open and an ecstatic smile came to my lips. We were back in the Nirn! I stood up and twirled in the rain, letting it wash off all the blood on me. I felt like dancing in jubilation that I was alive!

Wesley grinned slightly at my antics before groaning in pain because of his shoulder. Salvian Matius ran up to us.

"You did it! You are truly the Hero of Kvatch" he exclaimed, tightly hugging me. My face was a lovely shade of blue when he let go of me. Quickly catching my breath, I smiled at that new title: Dahlia Deavius, Hero of Kvatch. Well, Wesley helped too. He could be Wesley Madison, Helper to the Hero of Kvatch. As I drifted off into my ego-inflated thoughts, Salvian grinned, "Now we can beat these bastards!"

The joy slowly faded from my face. "This one hates to break The Captain's jubilation, but she must ask this one question. What does he mean? Have we not won yet?" I asked cautiously.

Salvian shook his head and stared at me, "Of course not. The city is still overrun with Daedra. You are going to help save the city, aren't you?"

I couldn't say no. This man was looking for a hero to save his people. Then Wesley chimed in, "Uh, actually. I'm going to stay and help fight. Dahlia here would gladly stay and help, but she is on a special mission. She must get to the chapel and find Brother Martin immediately."

I almost sighed in relief at this, but then a pang of worry set in.

"Can we have one second?" I asked Salvian, who glady turned back to the other guards standing by. Once he was out of earshot, I swirled back around to Wesley who stood up and brushed the dirt off of his knees. In a hushed voice, I snapped at him, "What does Wesley think he's doing? He'll get his Nord-ass killed if he stays here and fights."

"No I won't," Wesley defended in a childish manner, "and I'm an Imperial, thank you very much, Kitty Kitty."

I shuddered. "Snowman! You have a piece of metal in your burly shoulder!"

"Dahlia, I'll be fine! I've had worse."

"No, you won't!" I stomped my foot in defiance.

"Did you seriously just stomp your foot? I thought girls only did that in plays," Wesley grinned.

I scowled and spat at him, "Fine, Snowman can go and get himself killed! See if This One cares!"

Wesley flashed a crooked smile. His brown eyes twinkled with a mischievous look. "Me thinks the lady doth protest too much."

"What is that supposed to mean?" I glared.

"Nothing," he grinned and waved over Salvian. "I do believe this is good-bye."

I glowered and sighed, "Good-bye Wesley."

Salvian walked up to us and asked "Are you two ready to go?"

I looked at Wesley and we both nodded slowly. Salvian clapped his hands together, "Capital! Now let's go slaughter some daedra."

-o.b.l.i.v.i.o.n-

I burst through the doors of the church. The guards waiting in there gave me a strange look.

"Uh yeah, This One needs to find the priest called Brother Martin." I told them rather loudly in hopes Martin would hear.

"Yeah, he's over there sleeping, I think," the guard informed me cautiously.

"Thank you," I smiled and began to search the church for the sleeping heir. I couldn't find anybody who seemed to fit the profile of a priest of Aka-whatever. I was about to tap on this one sleeping man's shoulder who looked the right age when from behind me came a low voice.

"I am Brother Martin," he announced in a voice strong enough that I knew he must be the Fallen Emperor's son. I swirled around to face a shadow of a man standing in a dark corner of the church. I tried to get a good look at him, but the shadows were too dark for me to make out more than his figure. "I was a priest of Akatosh, but I'm not sure how any god could let this happen."

Talk about brooding. I was wondering how Brave and Valiant Emperor Uriel could have such an angsty teenager of a son. He stepped out of the darkness and into the torchlight. My heart skipped a beat. For an angsty teenager of a son, Martin Septim was pretty damn hot. I couldn't help but stare at him with my mouth slightly opened. He tilted his head to the side and asked, "Are you okay ma'am?"

"Oh yeah!" I remembered a little too loudly. The people in the chapel turned to stare at me, and I giggled a bit too loudly, blushing a violent red.

"What is going on?" Martin asked.

"Okay, see The Brooding Brother, you, are the lost son of the great and noble Emperor Septim," I began in a hurried sputter, "Dahlia, I, was in prison when the Most Admirable of Nobles, your father, came through my lowly cell and then he died, as the Brooding but Beautiful Brother Martin probably heard about. Now the Easily Irritated Monk sent me to find you, and it was a long and perilous journey, but I did because-well here you are!"

There was a second of silence as I finished. Martin's eye twitched as his mouth dropped and hung agape in astonishment at my words. I slowly realized how crazy I must've looked. Feeling blood rushed to my cheeks I stammered out, "Please, The Brooding Brother must believe what This One says to be true! She knows it sounds much, but she's being honest!"

"Who are you?" he gaped.

"I am Dahlia Deavius, Hero of Kvatch!" I announced proudly.

The darkness drifted from Martin's face. I could tell he was repressing a smile as he asked in a small curious voice, "What do you mean by that?"

"We're winning!" I exclaimed, "I and the Adominable Snowman closed the Gate to the Most Evil of Hells. Now all the guards have to do is drive back the rest of the forces of evil, and the battle will be done by daybreak!"

After hearing this, the smile Martin was hiding shone through. It stretched from ear to ear as his voice cracked in celebration, "You mean it's over? All the madness gone! Thank the Gods!" In complete euphoria, he grabbed me into a tight hug and laughed. In that moment I thought I myself might die of happiness. I thought he was cute when he was all angsty, he was gorgeous when he smiled! I felt my knees weaken as he squeezed me and it wasn't until he pulled away that I realized he was the only thing holding me up.

The last thing I remember thinking was: I'm about to faint in front of the most beautiful man in the Nirn.

---

(1) I would like my readers to forgive me for that cheesy overused line. I was watching my little brother play Oblivion and he said "I've had it with these Motherf'n Daedra in this place" and I thought about how that reminded me of the line from Snakes on a Plane. Then I remember that it was a plane of Oblivion. So yeah. I had to do it. I'm sorry