Madgod Options

[Colonel Mustard]

Hey everyone.

This has been rattling around my head for a while now, and I figure I might as well get it started with and continued while I've got the drive to write it. As you might have guessed, the following is based off the Shivering Isles, but I'm doing my own thing with it somewhat, so I should probably say now that, while there are bits of this that you'll recognise, there are a lot of parts that you won't; I'm bringing in a lot of new character ideas and so forth, and there will be interesting things done.

Anyway, I'm not very good at this whole introduction business, so I'll just let you get on and read it. Do enjoy!

Madgod

Chapter 1-The Champion

Sing deep, sing low, sing the song
pay the piper to play it on
to his tune you must dance
and slumber in eternal trance
for deep within its secret dreams
madness desperate plots and schemes
the gauntlet breaks the chain of snakes
and its bloody bounty it finally takes
the starving serpent eats the tail
consuming slowly as a snail
but patient, hungry, it awaits
the cyclic feast it anticipates
will we be free or forever slave
hear the siren call of ‘obey’
or will Madgod rise and strike down
mercury tide that would Isles drown?

Do not be here when it will come. It is hungry. It is angry. It has plans. Your nice little world which you’re reading this in won’t be all that nice if they come to fruition. Oh no. You lucky, lucky things. You honestly have no idea. Must I explain?

Very well. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I shall begin.

Let’s step back. Right now, we are at the end. To begin at the end is impossible. Not impossible, no, not here, nothing is impossible here, but to begin at the end here is implausible. Is that the word I want? No. Unnecessary. It is doing it wrong. Sometimes it works, but here it does not. So let’s take a step back from here.



His fished crashed down, crunching bone. A scream rang out.

“Mercy! Please, mercy!”

“Mercy?” he asked, gauntlet raised above his head, his scarred, battered face contorted with rage. “You want mercy? That’s just too good.”



No, not far enough, further back we go. We need to get to before that. No context. That’s too close to the end for what we want.



He and Her Ladyship turned around on the glass platter as it rose above the city, stepping around one another’s feet as they danced.

“See,” she said. “I told you you’d be good at this; it’s all about the rhythm.”

He nodded, glancing down at their feet self-consciously as they moved.

“Relax,” she said, steering a hand gently down his back, guiding him along. “You’re learning fast, my dear.”

The world spun below them as they danced on their rotating glass platform, hovering in midair.



No, further back still. Is this it? Is this the place?



He pulled himself up the top of the ladder, through the trapdoor, into the great glass globe at the tower’s very top. He stared at the figure sitting cross-legged a few feet from him on a cushion, and the eyes of the man stared back at him.

In a voice as thick and rich as Felldew, Sentinel said; “Ah, you’re here. I saw you coming, you know.”



Not here, no. No, no, where is it? Where do I start?



The Angel of Rage slammed down before him in a landing that sent a cloud of ash blossoming around her. Wings of flame and lightning pinned themselves to her back, and a mace of fire materialised in her hand. Her ruined face twisted into a grimacing snarl as she beheld the intruder.

“Why are you here, mortal?” she demanded. “Why should I not destroy you?”



Not yet. She comes partway through. This is all too late, nobody will understand it, you fool!



They opened with a creak, and he saw it spread before him. A twisted landscape of gnarled roots, growing upwards into the air whilst leafy branches clawed at the ground. Rock formations of shimmering, rainbow stone formed bizarre shapes, ones that seemed to gain form as you looked at them, moved, grew, reached towards you. Faces grew from the scenery, hungry mouths and gasping maws, clawing talons.

He blinked and glanced away, setting off for the city in the distance.



No, not quite. Nearly there, nearly there. Here we are. Here, we begin.



He was drinking to the death of his best friend.

He getting slapped on the back, cheered, toasted, hailed as a hero, bought drinks, and all for the simple reason that he had just killed his best friend.

The night was a blur of tankards, one swallowed after another. There were yells of encouragement, the crowd urging him on once more, their favourite, their hero, their champion. He could only remember them being quiet from earlier, when they had all fallen silent right after that moment.

The taste of ale, the smell of smoke, the offensive eye-watering blur of flaming torches. He couldn’t focus his gaze properly, he noticed, and his tongue felt numb. He was getting drunk. Good.

“’nother drink!” he slurred out, swaying as he did so. Behind and beside him, the rest of the Blue Team cheered their approval and assent, ordering another round. He wasn’t paying tonight. He didn’t know who was paying tonight, and he didn’t care. What he wanted right now was noise. What he wanted right now was cheering. What he wanted right now was distraction.

His head was numb, spinning, buoyant. He managed to grin as complete strangers approached him, shook his hand, and grinning was good. Grinning meant he was happy, and he knew that it was important that he felt happy, that everyone expected him to be happy. He thought he was happy, so he was. He had the ale down the hatch, and that was good. That was a good way to get happy, get happy quickly.

“That’s our Carnius. Ain’t that something? Our Carnius, of all the people.”

That was one of the boasts. One of the favourites

“Waterfront boy, he is. Knew him since he were a kid.”

And there, another. He could pick the threads of conversation out as the Waterfront locals boasted about him, their Carnius, who had grown up around here. A real local hero. Something to boast about. Something to be proud of. Just went to show.

He stood, the sudden movement sending him swaying. There was a chorus of questions about what he was doing, where he was going and he answered them with; “Goin’ out back. Be back in a minute.”

He stumbled outside, moving through the inn, the crowd of blurry faces parting before him. He caught snippets of detail, a grin from an admirer, an alluring look from a hopeful wench, a torch burning in a bracket, a knot in the wooden surface of a table. The din of the tavern muted as he entered the back alley. It was a good tavern, that one. Good stories there. That time he and Agronak had nearly got arrested for brawling, only for the Watch to recognise who they were and haul everyone else off but leave them be, shaking their hands as they did so. That was one of the good ones. One of the favourites.

He urinated down the back wall, in the quiet, concentration taken up by the task at hand, before he finished relieving himself. And then, for a moment, in the quiet that followed, he was drawn back to earlier that day, in the hush that had come. The hush that had come when the battered, broken corpse had slumped to the floor of the arena, armour clattering, as Carnius had stepped back from the body of Agronak Gro-Malog, the Grey Prince. The hush that had come as he had limped away, down to the bloodworks. The hush that had come as he had done so without acknowledging the silent crowd, with the cheering only rumbling into his range of hearing as he had splashed chilly water from the Basin of Restoration onto his face.

And for a moment, the clarity and the harsh reality he had been avoiding since then hit him like the blow from a warhammer. Agronak was dead. He had killed him.

Carnius Hackelt, new Grand Champion of the arena, leant forwards against the wall and quietly wept for what he had just done.

[Colonel Mustard]

Chapter 10-The Bard

“Murderer!”

The word scraped from a throat that was hoarse and ragged with rage and grief, half-choked with tears. Relmyna Verenim, crouched as she was over the desiccated corpse of the Gatekeeper, looked up at Carnius through enraged eyes, features contorting into a snarl of untold fury.

“Monster!” she snarled. “You monster! Look what you’ve done! You killed my child! You killed my only child!!”

She stood, hands held wide as magical power danced at her fingertips, gaze fixed with murderous intent on Carnius. Dredhwen and an Imperial Carnius didn’t know grabbed her arms before she could rush forwards, and she struggled for a few moments before dropping to her knees once more. They released and she let out a low moan of grief, slumped and sobbing over the body of the Gatekeeper.

Carnius watched the scene without much in the way of sympathy for her; he found it difficult to empathise with somebody who had brought that creature into the world and who had remarked on how he would make a good sculpture.

“So Sentinel was right,” a familiar voice remarked from behind Carnius. He turned to see the butler type who had greeted him, Haskill, standing not far away. It seemed he had just appeared from thin air, in the same way he had faded out of view the night before. “You did kill the Gatekeeper. Most impressive.”

He glanced at the two keys that Carnius still held in his hand.

“Just use those keys to open the gates whenever you so feel like it,” he added. “I suppose you were probably wondering what to do with them, after all. And after that, Lord Sheogorath himself wishes to hold an audience with you.”

“So I should head for New Sheoth?” Carnius asked. A momentary look of surprise flickered across Haskill’s face, but the chamberlain quashed it in an instant.

“How did you work that out, I must ask,” he said.

“Looked like the only big city around, so I figured it would be the capital,” Carnius replied. “Like how the Imperial Council are based in the Imperial City and the Emperors were based there before them. Rulers always stay in the biggest towns, after all.”

“Well, make your way there and present yourself to His Lordship at the palace, as soon as you can,” Haskill said.

“Haskill!” Relmyna called from where she was slumped by the Gatekeeper’s body. “This man murdered my child! He is a murderer! Have him locked up! Have him executed!”

“My apologies, Lady Verenim, but Lord Sheogorath’s decree was quite clear; whoever succeeds in killing the Gatekeeper and unlocking the Gates of Madness is to have an audience with him as soon as possible,” Haskill said, with a curt, slight bow in Relmyna’s direction.

“What?” Relmyna asked, eyes filling with rage. “He…he planned on somebody killing my child?”

“Those were his orders,” Haskill replied.

“How dare he?” the Dunmer seethed. “First he ignores my letters, and now it turns out he has invited people into Isles as part of his plan to kill my darling?”

She stood, a look of terrible wrath in her eyes, and said to Haskill; “Tell him that I have had enough; he has made an enemy of Relmyna Verenim, and I will stop at nothing, nothing until my child is avenged!” Her gaze fell upon Carnius. “And you, Imperial, will suffer in equal measure! You and your master will pay!”

She stormed away down the hill, Haskill and Carnius watching her go.

“Well, that’s a rather concerning development,” Haskill remarked. “I’ll have to inform Lord Sheogorath of this when I return.”

He glanced around.

“Sentinel said you were fighting the Gatekeeper with a Nord,” he added. “Where is he?”

“Jayred?” Carnius asked. “He’s down fetching his Swattle herd. Do you need him to speak to Sheogorath too?”

“No, not particularly,” Haskill said with a shake of his head. “According to Sentinel you were the one who takes the Haratak’s share of the credit for killing it, and you were the one who made his way through the gateway in the bay. You are the sort of person Sheogorath was calling for, after all.”

“Right,” Carnius said. “Anything else I need to know?”

“I simply recommend that you stick the roads for now, and perhaps try and keep a wary eye on Relmyna when you can,” Haskill replied. “She is quite good at holding a grudge.”

“I’ll bear that in mind,” Carnius said. “See you in New Sheoth, Haskill.”

“I look forward to it,” Haskill said in a tone that suggested he would rather be in the most chill and benighted depths of Coldharbour than seeing Carnius in New Sheoth. He stepped back, and faded from view, and Carnius turned his gaze towards the imposing Gates of Madness. There were two doors, one decorated with a manic grin carved into its surface, the other a grimace or a snarl. Carnius unrolled the map and glanced down at it; there were two road leading from Passwall, it seemed, one through the southern province of the Isles, Dementia, and another taking a more scenic route along the northern half, through the realm named Mania. The choice was an easy one, the Dementia road being a far more direct one, and Carnius rolled the map up in time to see Jayred approaching, his herd of Swattle slithering up the path before him.

“You haven’t it opened it yet, friend?” he asked as he ordered his herd to a halt with a click of his tongue.

“Just wrapping up a little business with somebody I know,” Carnius replied. He tapped his belt-purse, which was now bulging with coin from the bet he had made on himself with the mayor of Passwall. “I’m all ready now, though.”

He made his way up the steps that lead to both of the gates, the two keys in either hand. The two implements, one carved a golden metal and the other cut from a purple crystal of some kind, hummed in his hands. He approached one of the gates, the left hand one and raised the golden key to its lock; with a discordant whine it jumped in his hand, somehow jerking away from the hold in the massive portal. Carnius frowned, raised the other key and inserted it; it was almost eager with the ease that it clicked home. A twist sent a great clank echoing from the gate, the noise somehow sounding like a moan of pain or despair, the key spinning in the lock and, once that was done, fading from view. After a moment’s consideration, he did the same with the second gate and key. With that one, there was the distinct impression of laughter within the echo.

Jayred had already pushed the gate open, and he and his herd of Swattle were making their way along the Dementia road. He was just fifty paces ahead, and Carnius stepped through the threshold to catch up with them.

Moment of broken balance scales tip paradigm shifts gauntlet shatters snake-chain. That moment? Yes. No. One of the many. A weight on the scales. That is what it was. An influence, when the snake’s tail first began to slip from its jaw.

I can still hear that scratching, you know. I think it’s getting louder. Please help. I’m sorry for what I did, I truly am. Please. I’m afraid, now.

They came to the village just an hour or two before darkness was about to set.

The place reminded Carnius of Passwall, if on somewhat of a larger scale. The two of them had spent the better part of three hours skirting the borders of a lake that the road ran alongside, and the village occupied a silted peninsula that jutted into its waters. Each of the houses were raised up on stilts, rising out of swampy soil, and beyond its borders the lake split into hundreds of miniature rivulets, mushroom trees raised above them on the pillaring of hundreds of roots.

“Mushroom mangroves,” Jayred remarked as they approached. “This place will be perfect for my herd.”

“Looks like as a good a place to stay as any, if there’s an inn,” Carnius said. “Would certainly beat camping.”

There were more than a few people out on the central square the village was based around, and the gladiator was quietly pleased when the Nord and his herd of Swattle drew more attention than he did. While Jayred managed to gather a small crowd of around a dozen of the village’s residents, Carnius slipped away to the largest building there, one which he guessed to be an inn; if Jayred decided to stay, he would bid the Nord farewell in the morning.

The inn itself was of the same sort of construction that he would have found in any place around Cyrodiil; the bottom floor was a single large, high-ceilinged room with tables spanning its length, a fireplace at one end and a bar running along a wall. There were a few patrons, and Carnius spared them only a cursory glance, and his gaze lingered on the young woman playing what looked to be harp made from fused together bones. The tune she was playing was a complex, quiet melody, fingers dancing over the strings.

There were words in her tune, and Carnius lingered for a moment as he tried to pick them out. After a few moments, he gave up; whatever tongue they were in, it was one he couldn’t understand, but he took a few moments more to listen before he headed to the bar.

“A stranger, I see,” the Argonian behind it remarked. “Somebody who I’ve never seen before. Which is, of course a stranger. If you were familiar, after all, you would not be strange.”

He harrumphed, and added with an accusing glare; “You unfamiliar strangers are not very helpful, you know. How am I supposed to know you if I do not know anything about you, eh?”

“I…I was just hoping to get a meal and a bed for the night,” Carnius said after a moment. “That’s all.”

“Then you are a stranger who is also a customer,” the Argonian nodded. “I can tolerate customer strangers. What do you want for food, strange one who engages in custom?”

“What’s cooking?” Carnius asked.

“Swattle stew with vegetables,” the bartender replied. “Will that be a good meal for the customer stranger? Or perhaps, in your strange ways, it will not be. I do not know.”

“That sounds fine,” Carnius said. “And a tankard of mead to wash it down.”

“Then that will be three of the customer stranger’s coins, then,” the Argonian said. Carnius placed them down on the counter, and the lizard-man bit one to check if it was genuine. Satisfied, he nodded and called into the kitchen; “Raddaz, a bowl of stew!”

“This one hears,” a hoarse replied, and Carnius glanced through the doorway that it came through to see a Khajiit with ragged, patchy fur ladle a thick liquid into a pewter bowl while the bartender poured out Carnius’ drink.

His meal and drink in hand, Carnius found a seat near the bard. He glanced at her occasionally as he ate, watching her play and simply enjoying the music. She was good looking in a boyish way, short-cut blonde hair turned orange in the light of the fire she played besides, leading Carnius to guess she was from Imperial or Nordic stock. Her voice was husky, low-pitched for a woman’s, but pleasing to the ear nonetheless. There was a pack by her feet, not unlike Carnius’ own, and she was wearing armour of hardened and padded leather. She looked like somebody who travelled a lot, and knew how to fight, but he couldn’t see a weapon anywhere near her person and judging by the fact that an Orsimer a few tables away had a pair of fearsome handaxes mounted on his back, that wasn’t due to the inn having a no-weapon policy either. She probably knew some magic or fought with her fists like he did, he guessed.

He was nearing the end of his meal when the door to the tavern swung open. Carnius glanced over at it, half expecting to see Jayred enter, but instead it was an Imperial dressed in steel warplate with a broad-headed battleaxe across his back. He surveyed the inn with a look of disapproval, one that turned to outright rage as his gaze fell upon the bard.

“What is that?” he asked, the question directed at the bartender.

“She is playing for the entertainment of the customers,” the Argonian replied. “Is there a problem?”

“Entertainment?” the man asked. “Entertainment? Entertainment, my dear Argonian, is a vile abomination more akin to the realm of Mania than it is to that of Dementia. Entertainment brings happiness, and happiness brings blindness, decadence and corruption! It leaves us open to the deceptions of the false Madgod!”

The bartender sighed as the bard’s music petered out. She turned on the stool she was sitting on to face the new arrival, fingers poised over the strings of her instrument.

“You have been hanging around with those Heretics too much, Lucius,” the Argonian said. “Go home and stop pestering my customers.”

“Blind fool,” Lucius snarled, stepping towards the bard. “You, girl, what do you think you are doing?”

“Playing music,” was her reply.

“Then I order you to halt your decadent act of sin, immediately,” the Imperial replied with a growl.

“I just have,” she pointed out. “Otherwise I’d still be singing, not talking to you.”

“Do not be smart with me, girl,” the Imperial said, stalking towards her. Carnius pushed his bowl to one side and swung both legs out from under the table, freeing him to rise. “If you have any decency you would take that implement of debauchery you have there and smash it at once.”

“I’m not doing that,” the bard replied. “Now please leave me be.”

“You won’t?” the Imperial said taking a few more steps towards her. Carnius prepared to move. “Then perhaps I should do it for you.”

Her response was to pluck a string and to say…something. The noise seemed to be confused to Carnius’ ears, chopped and warped despite the perfectly serviceable acoustics of the room. Whatever it was, the Imperial was flung back from her as if he had been struck in the chest by a giant’s club, sailing through the air to clatter on the floor.

“You sane little strumpet!” he cursed, he cursed, scrambling to his feet and loosing his axe. “I’ll smash your damn head for that!”

He managed a step forwards before the bard plucked another string and loosed another one of those half-words. The Imperial stumbled, swaying on the spot and blinking in sudden confusion.

“Why don’t you go home like Eats-His-Claws suggested?” the bard said, plucking the strings of her instrument as she spoke. Carnius was no mage, but even he could sense the arcane power contained within that order crackle through the air. “You look tired; some rest could do you good.”

The Imperial looked dazed for a few moments, before he nodded.

“Yes,” he said, tone dazed. “Perhaps a nap will sort me out.”

He looked at the axe in his hand with a look of bafflement, as if confused as to why he was holding it, and placed it in its harness on his back. After a moment, he stumbled back out of the door, and the Argonian shook his head.

“Damn Heretics,” he muttered.

The bard glanced over at Carnius, and she smiled at him.

“I noticed you just there, friend,” she said. “I might not have needed the help, but thanks for the thought in any case.”

“No problem,” Carnius said. “Never been a fan of his sort of person.”

“Not many people are keen on the Heretics,” the bard replied. She extended a hand. “Salyan Irrenius, by the way, bard.”

“Carnius Hackelt,” Carnius replied as he shook it. He glanced at the doorway which the Imperial had stumbled through. “I’m curious, by the way; what was that you just used on that Imperial, just there? Some kind of magic.”

“That’s right,” Salyan said. “Audiomancy; I use my lyre here to help me focus and cast my spells. It’s not the widest-known kind of magic, and it isn’t the easiest to use, but it works for me.”

Carnius nodded. That would explain the lack of weapons; she was a spellcaster, as he had guessed.

She sat down on the bench next to her, and called to the bartender; “Eats, have I earned my meal yet?”

“I suppose so,” the Argonian said. “Raddaz, get the instrument girl something to eat!”

“So what brings you to this part of the Isles?” Salyan asked.

“I’m on my way to New Sheoth,” Carnius replied.

“Really? You came from Passwall, then?” Salyan said. She looked him up and down. “That would mean you were blessed, but you don’t look blessed. How did you get past the Gatekeeper?”

“Killed it,” Carnius said.

“You killed it?” Salyan said, raising an eyebrow. “Really? I’m the one who tells tall tales here, Carnius, not you.”
“I’m not joking,” Carnius said. “I killed it. There’s a Nord outside with a herd of Swattle you can ask if you don’t believe me. But I’m heading to New Sheoth now to meet with Sheogorath.”

“So that call for champions he sent out wasn’t completely useless,” Salyan murmured, half to herself. “I’m heading to New Sheoth myself; I was around this part of the Isles to try and get some scrolls from some old ruins, but now I’ve picked those up I’m heading back there.”

Carnius glanced back at the small crowd in the tavern, before he said; “Might be a good idea to do a bi to adventuring on the side; this crowd doesn’t look all that interested in any songs, if I’m honest.”

“Most Demented taverns don’t have all that much time for bards and minstrels,” Salyan said with a shrug. “If this was a Manic crowd they’d be calling for an encore right now.”

Before Carnius could question what any of that meant, the Argonian appeared with the bard’s meal in hand. He set it down on the table along with a fork and spoon, and glanced at Carnius.

“Does the customer stranger wish for anything else?” he asked.

“I’m fine, thanks,” Carnius said.

Salyan was about to tuck into her meal, but paused and glanced up at the Argonian.

“Hey, Eats,” she said. “What was that you were saying about Heretics just a minute ago? Have they been giving you trouble?”

“They moved in a couple of months ago, started camping out at some old ruin about half a mile east of here,” Eats replied. “They haven’t actually gone and attacked anybody yet, but they’re causing trouble in any case. Merchants have started steering clear of here now, because of them; worried about being attacked and so forth. Plus they’re getting some of the folks in the village all stirred up, like Lucius, and they’ve started making a scene.”

“Carnius and I could sort them out for you, if you want,” Salyan suggested. “Just point us in the right direction and we’ll deal with them tomorrow morning.”

“Hold on,” Carnius said. “Since when did I agree to this?”

“You look like you can look after yourself in a fight, you’ll be fine,” Salyan replied. “Besides, it’ll be fun. And if you thought that Lucius person was bad, believe me, the actual Heretics he looks up to are even worse. And afterwards I’ll head to New Sheoth with you; there’s safety in numbers, after all.”

“I suppose so,” Carnius conceded.

“Great,” Salyan said. She took a spoonful of her meal and started chewing. Through the mouthful, she smiled and added; “This is going to be good!”